nomina nuda

[Doug Yanega]

Chris wrote:

>Doug et alia:
>
>You are missing the point.

I think I see your point, but it does make a difference if the
assumption that one can safely ignore web "publications" when making
checklists, catalogs, and revisions is FALSE. That would create an
absurd burden on the reviser, to track down all those odd names
floating about on the web presently. 95% of those names would fall
into the "lapsus calami" category, but some are proposed as new
names, some even with full descriptions, diagnoses, and type
designations - but it was my belief these were all to be explicitly
ignored in any formal revisionary or catalog work. It'd be like
citing one of - to use two of the worst examples - Timberlake's or
Moure's "manuscript names" (of which there are dozens if not hundreds
apiece, very few of which actually do have a manuscript anywhere that
matches - they're simply ID label names). No one cites them.
        Your claim appears to be that it's up to the judgment of the
reviser/cataloguer as to whether to cite such names (i.e., the Code
neither *compels* one to cite them nor to exclude them), and I might
accept that - but I almost never see any citations that would qualify
in that category, so it appears that most people's judgment dictates
otherwise. In what way is a web-based name more citable than a
manuscript name?

Peace,
--

Doug Yanega        Dept. of Entomology         Entomology Research Museum
Univ. of California - Riverside, Riverside, CA 92521
phone: (909) 787-4315 (standard disclaimer: opinions are mine, not UCR's)
            http://entmuseum9.ucr.edu/staff/yanega.html
   "There are some enterprises in which a careful disorderliness
         is the true method" - Herman Melville, Moby Dick, Chap. 82