Sample size

[Kipling Will]

Sorry, I guess I should have said- Three living organisms that each
represent a set of kinds that, based on my perception of reality and
agreed convention, are alive and can be called beetle, cow and fish with
little or no ambiguity are used as my terminal taxa....

Anyway, I agree with John's response. One must know the group so that
meaningful questions can be asked.



John Noyes wrote:
>
> 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
>
> See info at - http://www.nhm.ac.uk/science/entom/project2/index.html

--
---------------------
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