[Taxacom] "Bar Code" can track Nature's Inventory

[J. Kirk Fitzhugh]

At 02:35 PM 2/19/2007, you wrote:
>Determining what is and is not a species requires criteria OTHER than
>the sequence of the COI gene. No single character is ever going to
>tell us when things are or are not distinct species.

Worse yet, all this depends upon one's definition of the term 
'species.'  It makes no sense to claim a solution when we've not yet 
settled on the nature of the problem.

Kirk

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
J. Kirk Fitzhugh, Ph.D.
Curator of Polychaetes
Invertebrate Zoology Section
Research & Collections Branch
Los Angeles County Museum of Natural History
900 Exposition Blvd
Los Angeles CA 90007

Phone:   213-763-3233
FAX:       213-746-2999
e-mail:   kfitzhug at nhm.org
http://www.nhm.org/research/annelida/staff.html
http://www.nhm.org/research/annelida/index.html
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~