Siphonaptera (poem) explained

"Siphonaptera" is a name used^[1] to refer to the following rhyme by Augustus De Morgan (Siphonaptera being the biological order to which fleas belong):

The rhyme appears in De Morgan's A Budget of Paradoxes (1872) along with a discussion of the possibilities that all particles may be made of clustered smaller particles, "and so down, for ever", and that planets and stars may be particles of some larger universe, "and so up, for ever".

The lines derive from part of Jonathan Swift's long satirical poem "On Poetry: A Rapsody" of 1733:

Lewis Fry Richardson adapted the poem to meteorology in 1922:

See also

• Self-similarity
• Turtles all the way down

Notes and References

1. For example: Snyed. JR. 2019. Who watches the watchmen and the problem of recursive flea bites. British Journal of Anaesthesia. Elsevier. 11 December 2018. 122. 4. 407–408. 10.1016/j.bja.2018.11.013. 6435839. 30857594.