cladistics & linguistics & PhyloCode

[Ken Kinman]

Barry and others,
      Most of this was written in response to Barry on Friday, but was not
sent then, so combining today's comments with it on several subjects.
      First let me say that there are not "too many names" in total, just
too many formal Latin names, especially at higher taxonomic levels.  I agree
that suffixes for PhyloCode names will not work, but if the Phylo- prefix
were applied to all PhyloCode names (as Tom suggested), that might be better
than the (P) marker, since it couldn't be omitted and would be more
explicit.  However, since either of these would increase formal Latin names,
non-Latin or informal names would be far more preferable in my opinion.  We
need to decrease formal Latin names at higher taxonomic ranks, not increase
them.
      The naming of newly discovered species (and the genera we group them
in) should continue as long as we keep finding them.  But the number of
potential hierarchical levels (needed to formally show all the
relationships) is enormous (whether you name them or not), and we should be
thankful the Linnean system has held the strict cladists back (somewhat)
from their natural tendency to formally name groups at more and more of
these levels.  The PhyloCode will probably cut them loose (perhaps even
encourage a premature priority race), and we will end up with so many higher
rank taxa that the utility of classifications will be severely compromised.
Sort of like having a business in which the numbers of managers begins to
approach the numbers of workers.  Hierarchies don't work well when they are
out of balance (top-heavy), whether we are talking about military
organization, business organization, classificatory organization, or any
other hierarchy.  I do not think these are bogus analogies, and are
appropriate if you don't try to carry them too far.  After all, it was human
brains that created all of these hierarchies (although biological
hierarchies are more "real" and less arbitrary than the others).  No great
harm if "informal" names greatly multiply, at least far less harm and
confusion than doing the same with formal Latin names (especially given the
hierarchical instability and rigidity of purely cladistic classifications).
     The Linnean system should have been modified decades ago to decouple
(as much as practical) nomenclature from classificatory information.
Classifications using something like the Kinman System are flexible enough
to grow and store increasing amounts of information, but in a way that keeps
the complex nomenclature from getting so out of control.  PhyloCode will go
the other way, sweeping away such checks and balances, and we'll really have
a mess.  Some cladists may actually enjoy the confusion, just as some
lawyers enjoy the confusion in the out-of-balance legal system.  But it's
not a healthy thing for the vast majority.  Nomenclature is already too much
of a legalistic, unproductive mess as it is.
     As for linguistics, I certainly didn't mean to imply that word origins
would always yield their present meaning (that would indeed be an
etymological fallacy).  But the evolution of language is certainly somewhat
analogous to the evolution of organisms (to a point), as Andrew's last post
on Friday pointed out (and Don's this morning).  To me the evolution of
whole languages is similar to that of bauplans (body plans/working
plans/ground plans), while the evolution of words and word-groups is more
like the evolution of individual genes and gene-groups (which can show a lot
more reticulation through borrowing/horizontal transfer).  In both
linguistics and biology, it is often extremely difficult to tease apart
horizontal and vertical evolutionary events and phylogenies.
     Some words can evolve so much that finding their origins and
relationships is very difficult, just as it is difficult to discern the
close relationship between tunicates and other chordates (at least based on
the adult forms).  And who would have ever guessed that pentastomid worms
might be related to crustaceans such as fish lice (but note that this idea
is still somewhat controversial and therefore I feel obliged to qualify that
statement with the phrase "might be").
     All in all, I prefer my own set of analogies to Barry's, but that is
obviously to be expected.  The "ostrakon-ostracism" word group is far
smaller and more recent than would be something like the baj-bas-bau-bao
word group I was hypothesizing about, so I didn't see the relevancy of that
example.  I am an admitted "lumper", emphasizing commonalities more than
differences.  Although the clade "eudicots" has some commonalities that
deserve to be recognized informally by that word (and a prominent node on
plant cladograms), I prefer to formally recognize (with class names) the
commonalities monocots share with each other and the commonalities dicots
share with one another (even though the latter may be symplesiomorphies lost
or modified in monocots).  Peter Stevens' list points to additional ways in
which they may be distinguished in the future.
      I would have no huge objection to a formal name for a "eudicot" clade
in particular (especially with the Phylo- prefix), but too many users of
PhyloCode (present and future) will probably go overboard naming clades in
the long term (if not in the short term).  They will still be supersplitting
hierarchies, but without having ranks to make it apparent.  As a cladist
(though not a strict cladist), I will have to deal with this daily, but I
will certainly do what I can to keep the PhyloZone from spilling confusion
over into general classifications.  I am obviously not very optimistic about
how this is going to turn out in the long run.  Most of the bickering will
be among various strict cladists, but the results will eventually affect
anyone with any interest in biological systematics (including children
interested in dinosaurs).
So it goes.  :-(
                       Sincerely,  Ken Kinman
*********************************************************
>From: Barry Roth <barry_roth at YAHOO.COM>
>Reply-To: Barry Roth <barry_roth at YAHOO.COM>
>To: TAXACOM at USOBI.ORG
>Subject: Re: bau-plans and cladistics
>Date: Fri, 20 Oct 2000 12:28:20 -0700
>
>Excuse me, but I think this premise is flawed.  Words
>undergo complex histories that often decouple them (to
>use a word that has become popular round here, with
>good reason) from their deep origins.  We can
>"ostracize" someone without any need to be conscious
>that votes to expel were once written on potsherds or
>tiles (ostracon), themselves named with metaphoric
>reference to seashells.  I believe linguists refer to
>the concept that by knowing the origins of a word you
>know its meaning as "the etymological fallacy."
>
>The attempt to analogize etymology with a taxonomic
>philosophy also seems flawed to me, and
>phenetically-driven as well.  The real bugbear in so
>much opposition to rank-free taxonomy seems to be "too
>many names," but I am not sure this is a problem -- at
>least for persons literally _using_, not just totting
>up, the taxa of a classification.  One's working
>vocabulary expands readily to accommodate nouns in
>active use.  (I estimate that, in my days as a
>collection manager in a large museum, I had a ready
>vocabulary of about 5,000 mollusk names -- entities I
>could recognize and manipulate without reference to a
>book or specimen.  It's one of those "use it or lose
>it" things, and I couldn't do the same right now.  But
>if sometime I needed to do it to keep my job ... who
>knows?)
>
>I've heard the "chain of command" argument too, told
>quite colorfully at a malacological meeting.  But
>there, as here, it was a bogus analogy.  And are
>things military really the best evidence for "how our
>brains organize information"? ;^)
>
>Barry Roth
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