species Look up species at Dictionary.com
1551, a classification in logic, from L. species "kind, sort," originally "appearance, sight, a seeing," related to specere "to look at, to see, behold," from PIE *spek- (see scope (1)). Biological sense is from 1608. Endangered species first attested 1964. Speciesism "discrimination against certain animals based on assumption of human superiority" first attested 1975 in Richard D. Ryder's "Victims of Science."