[Taxacom] Animalia or Metazoa?

[Tony.Rees at csiro.au]

OK, mixed messages probably - I am saying that for a long time "Animalia" has excluded protozoa in most authoritative, high acceptance schemes (notably Whittaker, Margulis, and variants thereof, all the way back to Haeckel). Back in the 30s-50s one author (Copeland) used "Metazoa" for the same concept but that is in fact a different issue. If you (or someone's) argument against "Animalia" is the fact that it is ill defined, I would say that is not so. If you then wish to argue the toss for Animalia versus Metazoa, I would not venture an opinion except that Copeland used Metazoa, Whittaker and Margulis both preferred Animalia and it seems to me that this is the more widespread current usage (though as ever, I could be wrong).

Regards - Tony

-----Original Message-----
From: Stephen Thorpe [mailto:s.thorpe at auckland.ac.nz] 
Sent: Friday, 24 July 2009 4:51 PM
To: Rees, Tony (CMAR, Hobart); Taxacom at mailman.nhm.ku.edu
Subject: RE: [Taxacom] Animalia or Metazoa?

Tony: I don't understand the logical structure of your argument. Are  
you arguing for Animalia, for Metazoa, or saying that it doesn't  
matter? I don't really see the relevance in citing some historical  
publications - the fact remains that today, some taxonomists think we  
should all use Metazoa, and others think we should all use Animalia. I  
am trying to get a handle on the terms of this dispute...
Regards,
Stephen

Quoting Tony.Rees at csiro.au:

> Stephen, you write:
>
> "It just leaves open my initial question about
> whether Metazoa or Animalia is the best name for the clade left over
> when you remove the old "Protozoa" from the old "Animalia"."
>
> As I attempted to point out, in the three most influential systems  
> published over the last 100+ years (Haeckel, Whittaker, Margulis),  
> it is a non-issue: Animalia and Protozoa (or Protictista) are  
> already treated as distinct entities. In fact Copeland was also  
> doing so in his 4-kingdom scheme(s) too in the 1930s through 1950s  
> (refer the Leedale paper previously cited for details and reproduced  
> scheme), which I omitted to mention, although he uses the name  
> "Metazoa" (I should probably not have said that).
>
> Regards - Tony
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: taxacom-bounces at mailman.nhm.ku.edu  
> [mailto:taxacom-bounces at mailman.nhm.ku.edu] On Behalf Of Stephen  
> Thorpe
> Sent: Friday, 24 July 2009 4:31 PM
> To: kennethkinman at webtv.net; Taxacom at mailman.nhm.ku.edu
> Subject: Re: [Taxacom] Animalia or Metazoa?
>
> Thanks Ken - that clarifies for me current thinking on the
> phylogenetic relationships between sponges and the rest of the, er,
> Metazoa (?=Animalia). It just leaves open my initial question about
> whether Metazoa or Animalia is the best name for the clade left over
> when you remove the old "Protozoa" from the old "Animalia". Opinion
> seems to be divided. Names with typification go with the type, so you
> can use the same name for very different taxonomic concepts, provided
> only that the concept includes the type. Names without typification
> are trickier. If you prefer to use the name Metazoa, then you think
> that the name should change if the concept changes, but it doesn't
> have to be that way. There is good reason for arguing that since your
> Metazoa includes all the "typical" animals in the popular sense, we
> should still use the name Animalia for it, and so Protozoa were
> removed from Animalia when it was discovered that they [Protozoa]
> weren't in fact animals. It's a semantic issue, rather than a
> scientific one, but it does have implications for classification
> (which is a mixture of science and semantics)...
>
> By the way, imagine the uproar at a strictly cladistic
> reclassification of Animalia (or Metazoa) if it does turn out that the
> sister taxon to Eumetazoa is just some subclade of calcareous sponges!
>
> Stephen
>
> Quoting Kenneth Kinman <kennethkinman at webtv.net>:
>
>> Stephen,
>>       Kingdom Metazoa = Phylum Porifera (sponges) + Eumetazoa (all the
>> other phyla).  The only question these days is whether the sister group
>> of Eumetazoa is all of crown group Porifera or some subclade thereof.
>> Many researchers believe the latter, and that Eumetazoa evolved
>> specifically from the calcareous sponges, which would make the crown
>> group Porifera definitely paraphyletic (and even the crown group
>> calcareous sponges could easily be paraphyletic as well).
>>        The sponges themselves almost certainly evolved from
>> choanoflagellates, making the latter paraphyletic (as well as the
>> Protozoa as a whole).  The names are thus perfect reflections of what
>> they are evolutionarily.  Protozoa means "first animals", and their
>> descendants Metazoa ("higher animals").  Makes perfect sense to me.
>>      Animalia (in the sense of Protozoa + Metazoa; first animals +
>> higher animals) is also paraphyletic with respect to the photosynthetic
>> protists when they acquired plastids.  Metazoa on the other hand is a
>> clade, unless you believe those old theories that Porifera evolved from
>> choanoflagellates, and Eumetazoa evolved from some other group of
>> Protozoa.
>>        ----------Ken
>>
>>
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