There are more known arthropod species than species of all other creatures combined, an overwhelming one to ten million species. Many species may not yet be known. Fossils of arthropods preserve the shapes of many more. Insects, arachnids, myriapods, and crustaceans walk, swim, fly, slither, burrow, crawl, and climb. Are they more ancient? Have they been more successful? I ask to counterbalance fear more than ignorance. I admit it. I am squeamish. I wonder how any scientist could be dispassionate about arthropods. Their strangeness must not blind us to their beauty and significance.