[Taxacom] People and databases

[Stephen Thorpe]

yes, and as for morphology vs molecules, I don't think I'm speaking  
out of turn in quoting Newton's (pers. comm.) view on the Hunt paper  
as being one of the results being so very "out of whack" with  
everything else, that they (Hunt et al.) must have made a mistake  
somewhere! So one person's surprising new discovery is another  
person's "well, clearly, you must have made a mistake somewhere!" One  
of the problems with large scope phylogenetic and/or molecular  
analyses is that you really just have to believe what pops out in  
terms of conclusions or not, there is no way of thinking it all  
through. I tend to side with Newton and value a thinking-it-through  
methodology over a "let's put data in and see what it spits out" one ...

Stephen


Quoting Bob Mesibov <mesibov at southcom.com.au>:

> Hi, Stephen.
>
> A remarkable example! The 2009 Grebennikov & Newton paper can be  
> downloaded free:
>
> http://www.eje.cz/pdfarticles/1451/eje_106_2_275_Grebennikov.pdf
>
> and is well worth reading. It involves morphology vs molecules, the  
> whole issue of 'how much support is needed to recognise a clade?'  
> and what to do about 'historic' paraphyly in classifications, and it  
> incidentally establishes Staphylinidae as the largest family in  
> Animalia.
>
> As a millipede person I always feel humbled reading about beetle  
> taxonomy. The 2009 report from the International Institute of  
> Species Exploration (http://species.asu.edu/files/IISE_SOS_2009.pdf)  
> says that of the 18516 new species of life described in calendar  
> year 2007, 3735 were beetles.
> --
> 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
>



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