[Taxacom] morphology and molecules again

[John Grehan]

The I was referring to the widespread kow-towing of morphologists to molecular phylogeny.

Yes the article tested congruence, but judged the congruence of one data set (morphology) against another (molecular). The converse was never considered - as usual. 

In general their may be congruence, but technically there is no congruence overall unless one quantifies and argues that there is a larger number of congruent than incongruent patterns and that somehow is more informative about the significance of that match than the incongruence. One might argue that 'overall' phenetic results 'mostly' match cladistic results and that phenetics is therefore fine to use instead of cladistics.

In the case of hominid evolution there is total incongruence - but no one in the field sees that as a problem (rather an anomaly resulting from the assumed falsity of the morphological evidence).

The paper seems to assume that the molecular data is the better data. This is an inference since the authors are not explicit.

John Grehan

-----Original Message-----
From: taxacom-bounces at mailman.nhm.ku.edu [mailto:taxacom-bounces at mailman.nhm.ku.edu] On Behalf Of Jason Mate
Sent: Wednesday, August 12, 2009 3:49 PM
To: Taxacom
Subject: Re: [Taxacom] morphology and molecules again




> So there you have it. Molecular systematics continues to be propagated 
> as the holy truth of phylogeny. What never ceases to amaze me is how 
> phylogenetic morphologists, whether dealing with living or fossil 
> taxa, are so keen to prostrate themselves before this supposed 
> molecular authority.

John, I don´t see the kow-towing. The question posed and tested was congruence between data types. In general there is congruence (this is more often the norm) and that is a relief, in particular if you are, like the authors, a paleontologist. If there is discrepancy then you have a problem, and you tend to put your faith on the "better" dataset. How you define "better"...... that is a different topic.



Best

Jason

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