A zoologist asks: botanical names practice

[Barry Roth]

Implicit in Mary Barkworth's earlier reply is the fact that the latest revision may not be the best or the most intelligent one available.  Yet how is the manager of a large database, which includes a wide range of taxa, to judge which one is best?  She/he is not likely to have expertise in all the groups.  This argues for a query system that returns multiple taxonomic formulations, leaving it up to the end-user which one to choose.  If your average user -- equally lacking the expertise to evaulate a job of systematics -- chooses "most recent" by default, well, that's his/her responsibility.

Barry Roth

Paul van Rijckevorsel <dipteryx at FREELER.NL> wrote:
It seems to me that instead of adopting 'potential taxa', 'GUIDs', etc, many
of the objectives recently discussed here could be achieved by instituting,
as a good custom, the citation of the latest revision for every species
treated. [...]

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