[Taxacom] Hypothesis: How Nothofagus rafted to New Zealand

[John Grehan]

And different vicariance events is another alternative. But even so,
without knowledge of the spatial homology there is no biogeographic
connection between the sequences of biological relationship and the
sequences of spatial relationship.

John Grehan

-----Original Message-----
From: taxacom-bounces at mailman.nhm.ku.edu
[mailto:taxacom-bounces at mailman.nhm.ku.edu] On Behalf Of Curtis Clark
Sent: Sunday, December 24, 2006 5:37 PM
To: taxacom at mailman.nhm.ku.edu
Subject: Re: [Taxacom] Hypothesis: How Nothofagus rafted to New Zealand

On 2006-12-24 09:29, Ken Kinman wrote:
> Dispersal of some kind is indeed a testable hypothesis, and I'm glad 
> to see Fred Schueler understands what I am trying to do.

Dispersal is specifically not falsifiable, since there is no conceivable
evidence that would rule out dispersal. Vicariance *is* falsifiable, in
the sense that a vicariance event would be expected to affect many taxa,
and so one can develop an area cladogram from the congruence of multiple
organismal cladograms and areas. Any phylogeny that does not map to the
area cladogram is not likely to have resulted from the same vicariance
events. Dispersal is one alternative. (This is historical biogeography
in a nutshell, btw.)

-- 
Curtis Clark                  http://www.csupomona.edu/~jcclark/
Web Coordinator, Cal Poly Pomona                 +1 909 979 6371
Professor, Biological Sciences                   +1 909 869 4062

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