taxons and orthography

[Petersen, Mary Elizabeth (MSX)]

Re Thomas Lammer's suggestion:

Another way out of the "problem" with "The Medusozoa are the sister group of
the Anthozoa ..." is to circumvent it and write "The sister group of the
Anthozoa is the Medusozoa."

Here the meaning is not changed and there is no doubt that sister group is
singular, but the second formulation does not grate on the ears so much.

Mary

Mary E. Petersen
Zoological Museum, University of Copenhagen
E-mail: mepetersen at zmuc.ku.dk

>ooooooooo))))):>


        -----Original Message-----
        From:   Thomas Lammers [SMTP:lammers at VAXA.CIS.UWOSH.EDU]
        Sent:   08 March 2000 15:16
        To:     TAXACOM at USOBI.ORG
        Subject:        Re: taxons and orthography

        At 07:06 AM 3/8/00 -0700, Robin Leech wrote:

        > > The Medusozoa are the sister group of the Anthozoa ...
        > > Medusozoa is the sistergroup of Anthozoa ...
        > > The Medusozoa is the sister group of the Anthozoa ...
        > >     THE FIRST ONE IS GRAMMATICALLY INCORRECT.  "MEDUSOZOA" IS
BEING
        > USED AS A
        >COLLECTIVE NOUN, AND SINCE IT IS BEING TREATED AS A SINGLE ENTITY,
THE
        >VERB "IS" MUST BE USED.  MY PREFERENCE IS FOR THE SECOND ONE IF YOU
ARE
        >GIVING A LECTURE, AND THE THIRD ONE IF PUBLISHING.  THOUGH THE
THIRD ONE
        >READS OK, IT SOUNDS "STIFF" IF I READ IT ALOUD.

        I disagree.  A plural noun, as Medusozoa surely is grammatically,
takes a
        plural verb, irrespective of usage.  If you want a singular verb,
you have
        to put the name in apposition to the rank: "The class [?] Medusozoa
is ..."
        or "Medusozoa are ..."  It doesn't matter so much how it sounds;
there is
        so much bad grammar slipping by that all sorts of bad usage "sounds
good"
        to our ear.




        Thomas G. Lammers, Ph.D.

        Assistant Professor and Curator of the Herbarium (OSH)
        Department of Biology and Microbiology
        University of Wisconsin Oshkosh
        Oshkosh, Wisconsin 54901-8640 USA

        e-mail:                     lammers at uwosh.edu
        phone (office):         920-424-7085
        phone (herbarium):  920-424-1002
        fax:                         920-424-1101

        Plant systematics; classification, nomenclature, evolution, and
        biogeography of the Campanulaceae s. lat.
        -----------------------------------------------------------
        "Today's mighty oak is yesterday's nut that stood his ground."
                                                         -- Anonymous