There was much debate in the early part of the twentieth century about whether the species name novaeguineae or gigas should be used to refer to the laughing kookaburra. The many disagreements and arguments that stemmed from this question arose because two separate naturalists, in 1783, gave this species a name according to Linnaean nomenclature, which had not been present until shortly before this time [5]. Hermann called this bird Alcedo novae Guineae and Boddaert named it Alcedo gigas [5]. Since Hermann's work was not rarer than Boddaert, the scientific community and eventually the general public around the middle of the ninteenth century began to use the name Dacelo gigas to reference the laughing kookaburra, the other name was forgotten at that time [5].
In 1900, however, a man named C.W. Richmond rediscovered a book written by Hermann that referenced the other name for the laughing kookaburra [5]. Another man named Streasmann, in 1920, used the material the at Richmond had uncovered to spark a debate about which name should be used [5]. He claimed that, according to Richmond, Hermann had priority for the use of the name he had created because the date that his paper was published was listed as 1783 and the date on Boddaert's paper was December 1, 1783, and since December is late in the year, it was likely that Hermann had published his paper before Boddaert [5].
It was discovered in 1926 by Mathews that these claims, though not supported by any concrete evidence when they were proposed, turned out to be true [5]. After an extensive review of Hermann's work, Mathews found that the paper in which the name novaeguineae first appeared was submitted for review on November 15, 1783, giving him priority in naming this bird [5]. There is still a large amount of arguement over this name because the name Dacelo novaeguineae implys that this bird is found in New Guinea, when in fact it is one of the only species in its not found in New Guinea. Both terms are found nearly in equal occurance in literature concerning the laughing kookaburra. Older publications tend to use gigas more often and newer publications tend to use novaeguineae.