Preface. «Species and speciation». Analysis of new views and trends

The volume proposed is Supplement No. 1 to the periodical “Trudy Zoologicheskogo instituta Ross. Akad. Nauk” (Proceedings of the Zoological Institute of the Russian Academy of Sciences). The volume is conceived to present results of modern discussions on the topic “Species and Speciation”. Apart from historical articles dealing with the taxonomic concepts of plant and animal classification proposed by the founders Karl Linnaeus, Peter Artedi, Peter Simon Pallas and others (see articles by N. Bogutskaya, L. Borkin, A. Sytin, A. Ostrovsky), the volume includes estimates and interpretations of botanists, mycologists, and zoologists of orderliness of biological diversity and recognition or non-recognition of species and genera as natural categories. We deliberately present opposite views, so that the readers could form their own opinions of the problems.