[Taxacom] Molecules vs Morphology

[John Grehan]

From: taxacom-bounces at mailman.nhm.ku.edu
[mailto:taxacom-bounces at mailman.nhm.ku.edu] On Behalf Of Kenneth Kinman


Hi John,
>        I agree with Jason in that I don't see how you can justify
calling
>  it a propaganda statement.  The amount of molecular data is
increasing 
> FAR, FAR faster than any further additions to morphological data.  
> Therefore, molecular data is most likely to shed light on which
> morphological data is most reliable, not vice versa.     

That's the propaganda statement - the invocation of the law of large
numbers. It has no empirical foundation and is just a restatement of the
numerical taxonomy of morphology.

> Not that molecular data is infallible, but the odds are that some 
> percentage of that "quantity" will contain important information of
high
>  "quality" that will support some morphological data and cast doubt on
> other morphological data.   

Propaganda again

> Unfortunately, I believe your bias against
> molecular data could hinder you from balancing one against the other
in an
> even-handed manner. 

Your belief is acknowledged.

>      I truly doubt that you have many more putative morphological 
> characters to discover supporting an orangutan-Homo clade, 

So what? You don't accept them anyway.

> but I suspect whole genomes will provide a wealth of new information
that 
> could even more completely negate that grouping.  That is why I am so 
> looking forward to a whole genome analysis.

Your faith is strong.  

> You, on the other hand, seem to have discounted it even before it has 
> appeared, simply because previous molecular analyses have been
relatively
> limited in their scope.  

No. If you read our paper you would see that is not the primary
argument.

  Time will tell.

Maybe, maybe not. But if it's a theory driven issue new data may not
change anything. For example, what if a clearly orangutan-like fossil
precursor to bipedal hominids turns up in Africa? Will that force anyone
to change their belief? Of course not.

John Grehan


               ----------Ken Kinman
*********************************************
John Grehan's accusation of propaganda statement:     
        "Increasing availability of molecular data can help develop new
approaches (propaganda statement] by pinpointing characters that
reliability capture phylogenetic relationships versus those consistently
subject to homoplasy." 
John Grehan 


_______________________________________________

Taxacom Mailing List
Taxacom at mailman.nhm.ku.edu
http://mailman.nhm.ku.edu/mailman/listinfo/taxacom

The Taxacom archive going back to 1992 may be searched with either of
these methods:

(1) http://taxacom.markmail.org

Or (2) a Google search specified as:
site:mailman.nhm.ku.edu/pipermail/taxacom  your search terms here