Fwd: Re: Raw's private collection note

[Neal Evenhuis]

At 2:45 PM -0600 9/25/02, Daniel Janzen wrote:
>This thread seems to have forgotten that a HUGE amount of very high quality
>collecting, inventory and taxonomy has been done by people doing what they
>really LIKE doing - collecting, organizing, understanding a large body of
>species and specimens, something that often results in a large personal
>collection.  This in turn very commonly ends up in a public repository once
>that individual moves on, and the public effort thereby gains a huge
>cost-free input.   A great part of the collective knowledge of the
>taxasphere rests on a base created by sweat-equity and "private" endeavors,
>in various kinds of synergistic combinations with formally funded and
>public endeavors.   Private collections are clearly a legitimate motor in
>the taxonomic enterprise, irrespective that they can be distorted (usually
>only temporarily) through normal human behavior - just as can institutional
>protocols and collections.     Dan Janzen

Am I missing something? I thought the original furor over "private"
personal collections was about primary types residing there. Are
people now dissing anyone having any personal collection at all?
That's rather silly. But I'm not laughing.

--Neal