Darwin (was: Phylogenetic evidence)

[Richard Jensen]

SKÁLA Zdenìk wrote:

>
>
> I must disagree (despite I like most points that Pierre made). The clade definition does not exclude character-state reversals, so there can exist clades (and do exist - usually the large ones) whose members do not share any single character state in common. Consequently, the clades are not classes but objects defined by a distance/similarity measure like clusters in cluster analysis.
>

If I take this literally, then you are arguing that there can exist a clade in which the objects have absolutely nothing in common ("...members do not share any character state in common...").  If that's the case, then the "clade" does not exist - it cannot be supported by any evidence and, in my mind, consists of two mutually exclusive classes of unknown affinity.

Can you provide an example of such a clade?

Dick
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Richard J. Jensen              TEL: 574-284-4674
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