FWD>RE>FWD>True phylogenies

[Leonard Krishtalka]

On Mon, 31 Jul 1995, Curtis Clark wrote:

> Krishtalka wrote:
>  >        "Nature is parsimonious"
>
> I've never read William of Ockham's original works, so I don't know what
> he said.  But as I understand the principle of parsimony, it does not
> state that nature is parsimonious

        Urk.  You missed the context.  I wrote that the essential basis of
science is the assumption (hypothesis) that nature is parsimonious, which
is merely another way of saying what Sir William said, and what you wrote,
that "the most parsimonious solution is *most likely* to be correct" -- a
fine paraphrasing of Occam's Razor.

        Therefore, rather than my comments being "specious arguments against
parsimony in phylogenetic reconstruction", they were actually validation
(essential logic) of the necessary use of parsimony in the science of
phylogeny reconstruction.


        Krishtalka