[Taxacom] Tuataras are REAL (the relativity of reality)

Mon Jun 4 12:48:39 CDT 2007

Pierre,

On the topic of semantics, all explanations are 
'historical,' so there is no need to refer to 
'historical explanations.' What we are talking about are just explanations.

There still is no need to invoke any notion of 
class in association with species. What you are 
really referring to when speaking of classes are 
the properties of organisms to which one has 
applied the same name, e.g., 'these specimens 
have red legs in contrast to blue legs.'

I agree with you completely that the emphasis 
needs to be shifted to the meaning of the term 
species, rather than what is a species. I 
attempted to do just that in my 2005 paper in 
Marine Biology. I have a manuscript in review 
where I give a revised definition of the term 
species: 'an explanatory account of the 
occurrences of the same character(s) among 
gonochoristic or cross-fertilizing hermaphroditic 
individuals by way of character origin and 
subsequent fixation during tokogeny.' I argue 
that species hypotheses cannot apply to obligate 
asexually reproducing and self-fertilizing 
hermaphroditic organisms - the only class of 
hypothesis applicable then are phylogenetic.

I also recommend David Stamos' (2003) book, 'The Species 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
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

At 02:45 AM 6/4/2007, you wrote:

>some agreement with Kirk seems possible to me:
>
>I have no problem with a clade (possibly qualified of "species-level" by
>any means) being considered as a historical explanation for a set of
>organisms,
>then what I consider a class (the corresponding "species") is the set of
>individuals sharing the property "being attributed to this clade" = fitting
>this explanation (= considered as being descendant from the exclusive
>common ancestor of this species-level clade)
>
>the common property shared by the clade as historical explanation and the
>corresponding class of historically explained individuals is that both are
>concepts, not self-consistent material "individuals", which was my point
>
>otherwise Ken is talking of "obvious gaps" allowing easy common agreement
>among scientists as for delineation of clades, ands he is using "real" as
>"obvious", still another matter
>
>and Richard (Aloah!) is somewhat using "real" as "true" in his reply to Ken
>
>it's all semantics OK, but the elementary caution of "defining our terms"
>is crucial for avoiding endless misconceived debates, which is occasionally
>reproachable to taxonomists
>
>the question turns to be, not "what IS a species", but "what do we mean by
>this word", and hopefully agreeing on a common vocabulary
>
>as a tentative exercise : "this species-level clade is the concept of
>historical explanation for the class of 'species-member' individuals
>according to that species-delineating criterion, and I hope this clade is
>true, i.e. fitting the real history"
>
>Pierre
>
>A 09:12 02/06/2007 -0700, Kirk Fitzhugh wrote:
>
> >Clades are neither
> >individuals nor classes. A clade simply summarizes the past
> >reproductive events that indicate the origins and fixation of derived
> >characters, and events of population splitting. Clades as such are
> >simply explanatory constructs that enable us to make sense of why
> >some tuataras have certain traits in contrast to what are observed of
> >other lizards.
> >
> >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
> >~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
> >
> >
> >-----Original Message-----
> >From: taxacom-bounces at mailman.nhm.ku.edu on behalf of Ken Kinman
> >Sent: Fri 6/1/2007 8:09 PM
> >To: taxacom at mailman.nhm.ku.edu
> >Subject: [Taxacom] Tuataras are REAL (the relativity of reality)
> >
> >Dear All,
> >        These endless arguments about whether species are real (or not) seem
> >largely to be semantic exercises which largely rest upon on which particular
> >species one is talking about.  The fuzzier they are, the more likely they
> >are to be branded a class of objects rather than a real entity.
> >
> >        The tuatara is an excellent example.  Admittedly, we could probably
> >argue endlessly about whether there are actually one or two species of
> >extant tuataras.  HOWEVER, tuataras are so distinctive that I cannot see how
> >anyone can argue against the reality that they constitute a REAL clade of
> >organisms which share descent from a common ancestral population of tuataras
> >(whether it is one or two distinct species just distracts from the reality
> >of the clade).  Such a clade seems to me to be BOTH a class AND an
> >individual.  It's like having your cake and eating it too, but some seem
> >intent on denying that we can have our cake and eat it too, even in such
> >clear-cut cases.
> >
> >        Why can't it be both, rather than only one or the other?  It is only
> >in a minority of cases that we can do this, so why not celebrate them rather
> >than insist that it has to ALWAYS be only one or the other just because many
> >cases are not so clear-cut?  In a Universe full of continuua, it seems such
> >a waste of time arguing over a term like "reality", when it is such a
> >relative term and dependent on a given context and perspective.
> >      ----Ken Kinman
> >
> >_________________________________________________________________
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>Pierre Deleporte
>CNRS UMR 6552 - Station Biologique de Paimpont
>F-35380 Paimpont   FRANCE
>Téléphone : 02 99 61 81 63
>Télécopie : 02 99 61 81 88
>
>
>
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