[Taxacom] Article 16.2 of the ICZN

[Stephen Thorpe]

>The Code is voluntary

That's an interesting assertion! Sure, nobody is pointing a gun at taxonomists heads and saying "follow the Code, or die!", but it is irresponsible of editors to accept manuscripts that clearly don't follow the Code. Besides, taxonomists naming new taxa generally want their names to be forever associated with the new name, but if I now go and publish a one line note citing a type species for Mahajangasuchidae, then it will be forever known as Mahajangasuchidae Thorpe! Also, not following the Code is going to make the bioinformaticians dream database a whole lot harder to create...

Stephen

________________________________________
From: Bob Mesibov [mesibov at southcom.com.au]
Sent: Wednesday, 25 November 2009 10:36 a.m.
To: Stephen Thorpe
Cc: TAXACOM
Subject: Re: [Taxacom] Article 16.2 of the ICZN

The Code is voluntary, and some taxonomists interpret that as 'relaxed'. There are so many instances of non-compliance that there is very little point in pursuing specific instances.

In 2007 I pointed out that a paper published in a well-known systematics journal contained invalid lectotype designations (see ICZN article 74.7). One of the authors, a taxonomist, wrote to me as follows:

'Yes, you are correct, we did not follow 74.7.3 (nor did the journal care). I expect more work will be done on the group and such technicalities can be dealt with.'

If you wanted to be unkind about the situation, you could say that there are two sorts of taxonomists: those who do things properly, and those who don't and expect the other sort to fix up the resulting mess. Such is life.
--
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
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