Who is the postivist?

[sylvia hope]

You wrote:

>A synapomorphy does not support a hypothesis of homology; it IS the
>hypothesis, left standing after the test of congruence. Neither does
>it "support" the hypothesis of monophyly, for it IS the hypothesis of
>monophyly, left standing after the test of congruence.

          This is murky.  An hypothesis of homology is *arrived at* in
          the first place by comparison of characters
           in two or more taxa; it is *tested* or *validated* by
          congruence with other character evidence.

          A synapomorphy is not an hypothesis, it is an hypothetical
          construct which results from a successful attempt to
          validate an hypothesis of homology.


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