[Taxacom] Picobiliphyta?

[Karl Magnacca]

On 13 Jan 2007 at 18:26, Thomas Lammers wrote:
> Y'know, it's JUST a name.  Just a handle by which to call it.  It
> doesn't have to MEAN anything.  As long as it conforms to the Code
> (which has pretty minimal requirements at this rank), it's a "good"
> name.  

The thing is, when it does mean something, one assumes that it means 
something relevant to the organism, or at least something that isn't 
outright wrong.  And of course, the codes explicitly say that that 
doesn't matter, so you're in kind of a bind.  With the upshot that I've 
got a bee from Hawaii that a European taxonomist who had probably never 
even seen it named "nilotica", and (I'm sure) thousands more examples 
like that.

Yes, I know there's not much to do about it, and ultimately most people 
won't know what the names mean anyway.  But it's still grating.

Karl
=====================
Karl Magnacca
UC-Berkeley, ESPM Dept.
137 Mulford Hall #3114
Berkeley, CA 94720
http://nature.berkeley.edu/~magnacca/