Sample size

[John Noyes]

So long as you know you have a beetle, a cow and a fish other wise you may
end up sampling three of a kind, eg. three beetles, and then where would you
classification be. It is just not possible to put a percentage figure on it.
If you know the group REALLY well then you may be able to get by on a
relatively small proportion of the taxa involved, but if you hardly know it
then you may have to sample virtually all the taxa to derive a meaningful
taxon! And that is assuming that you also sample the correct characters.
Nothing will substitute knowledge and experience.

John

At 21:19 18/07/99 -0700, you wrote:
>The minimum would be 3. I think we can all rely on set of relationships
>(Beetle(Cow + Fish)), for example.
>
>
>Joe & Alina wrote:
>>
>> Dear Taxacomers:
>>
>> Is there a minimum number of taxa from a group to be sampled for a
>> cladistic analysis before any classification can be made from the trees
>> obtained? How reliable would be the classification based on a cladistic
>> analysis that used 10% of the total number of species of a genus?
>>
>> Thank you for your help
>>
>> Alina
>>
>> **************************
>> Alina Freire-Fierro
>> Herbario Nacional del Ecuador QCNE
>> Museo Ecuatoriano de Ciencias Naturales
>> Avenida Rio Coca E5-116
>> Casilla Postal 17-21-1787
>> Tel/Fax (593-2) 441-592
>> Quito - ECUADOR
>>
>> *****
>> Domicilio:
>> Joe "the Juggler" Welling
>> Alina Freire Fierro
>> Calle de los Capulies E1046 y Joaquin Sumaita
>> Ciudadela Dammer
>> Casilla Postal 17-15-755C
>> Tel: (593-2) 412-405
>> Quito, ECUADOR
>> e-mail: joeali at pi.pro.ec
>> ****************************************************
>
>--
>---------------------
>Kipling Will
>2144 Comstock Hall
>Dept. of Entomology
>Cornell University
>Ithaca, NY 14853
>607-255-1351
>http://henry.ento.cornell.edu/CUIC/will.htm
>---------------------
>The grand fact of the natural subordination of organic beings in groups
>under groups, which, from its familiarity, does not always sufficiently
>strike us, is in my judgement thus explained.  -Darwin
>
>
John S. Noyes, Entomology Department, The Natural History Museum,
South Kensington, London, SW7 5BD, UK
Tel. (From July 5 1999): +44 (0)207-942-5594  Fax: +44 (0)207-942-5229]

INTERNET: jsn at NHM.ac.uk

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