[Taxacom] Wikispecies is not a database

[Bob Mesibov]

Many thanks to Doug Yanega for reining in my over-the-top exaggerations.

And also for hinting at another cause of the molecular/morphological taxonomy divide. I can't get a decent set of sequences, let alone a whole genome, from a pinned bug in some museum or a dried leaf on a herbarium sheet, so I can't do revisionary taxonomy on them. The billions of specimens housed in natural history collections are only of interest to me for their labels. <humour>OK, it says here this interesting-looking species came from place X, so I'll apply for a big travel grant and all necessary permits, go to X, get fresh material, bring it back to my lab and spend lots more money getting out the sequences I want, while storing any residual material for future genetic work in the deep-freeze in my own private natural history collection. After all, I put the sequences in GenBank, what else would anyone want to know?</humour>
-- 
Dr Robert Mesibov
Honorary Research Associate
Queen Victoria Museum and Art Gallery, and
School of Zoology, University of Tasmania
Home contact: PO Box 101, Penguin, Tasmania, Australia 7316
(03) 64371195; 61 3 64371195
Website: http://www.qvmag.tas.gov.au/mesibov.html