[Taxacom] Wikispecies is not a database: part 3 (after thinkingabout it!)

[Richard Pyle]

Thanks, Mike -- VERY well stated!  And I agree completely. 

These points stand out for me in particular:

> What is needed is a data model for taxonomic 
> information that can support all sorts of applications, 
> including wikis (as others including Jim Croft have said).

Yes!  I don't know if I said it in my post, but I certainly agree with Jim
and others (and you) on this point!  That is where I *hope* GNA and it's
various subcomponents (and the related, emerging CiteBank) are heading.

> All this may sound unnecessarily pedantic, but IT is no 
> different from systematics in that respect!  If one doesn't 
> use the terminology correctly one runs the risk of talking 
> from a dubious orifice... 

Being at arguably the most pedantic end of taxonomy (i.e., nomenclature and
associated rules relating thereto), *and* being fairly well immersed in the
IT world (more as a prentender, but at least as an astute observer), I must
say (again) that I agree completely!

> In my opinion (for what it's worth) I think many of the 
> sensible things that have been suggested in this and related 
> discussions (eg, inter alia - better flow of data between 
> grass-roots databases and large aggregators) are not 
> achievable until there are robust standards for storing and 
> manipulating taxonomic data.  

Amen, brother! Long live TDWG.

> I would totally sympathise with anyone who groans at my 
> mention of "standards" - but I don't see any getting away 
> from that in the end.  So rather than numerous competing 
> high-level money-sapping aggregation projects, it would be 
> better (if harder to fund) to put resources into developing 
> such standards.  

I agree, of course, but want to briefly intercept the inevitable (and
equally true) retort that more money needs to be put into basic taxonoxmic
research. Speaking as someone who just returned from 2.5 weeks in the field,
home for 2 days, and leaving in 1 hour for another 2 weeks in the field -- I
would say that the basic taxonomy stuff is in FAR more desperate need of
allocated dollars than either standards development or aggregation projects.
Having said this, I want to point out WHY I think that money spent on data
standards development (and such) is not well spent (at least in some cases).

1) I think in most cases it's naïve to think that a dollar spent on
biodiversity informatics is a dollar *not* spent on basic taxonomic
research.  From what I've seen, the "big" dollars spent on the former come
from pots that would/could *NOT* have otherwise been re-purposed for
taxonomic research.  In other words, for the most part, those dollars only
increased the size of the pie; they did not reduce the size of other slices.

2) I almost always agree with Bob Mesibov, but while it's true that the
narrow slice of humanity actually on the front lines of taxonomic research
generally operate in their context-senstive world (i.e., fish-nerds and
bug-nerds seldom overlap), we have to remember that this is, in fact, a
narrow slice of humanity.  The information-access initiatives being
discussed here, while certainly helpful to taxonomists, are not necessarily
directed primarily at them.  The *rest* of the world doesn't see the
divisions that we do in history & practice among workers in different
taxonomic groups. They want the 'OLs (COL, EOL, TOL, etc.) to find what
they're looking for -- no matter whether it's the fish they ate for dinner,
or the bug that bit their child on the foot.  These sort of data
"coordinators" (I see Google as an aggregator, but the 'OLs usually add more
structured value) help bring the importance of biodiversity into the minds
of the people who elect our leaders (in many funder countries, anyway).
Many people suggest (and I would agree) that this sort of coordination among
practitioners is a lot of the reason why physicists get funding on the scale
needed for building something like the LHC and ISS; while we scavenge for
relative pennies.

Crap.  I should have spent the past 20 minutes packing.....

("sometimes wonder how some of you manage to get anything else done!")

:-)

Aloha,
Rich