[Taxacom] Read... and believe...

[Richard Petit]

Thanks for posting this truly pathetic piece of verbiage.  It reinforces my oft stated observation that many modern workers prefer to accept a name as representing what someone has used it for whether or not it is correct.  This is a direct result of not going back to the original description which points one to the type specimen. Looking up and utilizing original introductions of names is evidently too much work for some and not doing so results in all sorts of taxonomic problems. 

I hope someone will post an explanation of: "If a specimen is named but the taxonomic classification used in the naming is not specified then it can’t be know which taxon (of the multiple possible taxon concepts for that name) it has been identified to."

In a recent post I expressed my fear that the IDs (based on photographs) by barcoders will become the de facto types of the taxa involved. That should suit (Mr.)(Dr.)(Rev.) Hyam. 

 dick p.

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Jim Croft" <jim.croft at gmail.com>
To: "TaxaCom" <taxacom at mailman.nhm.ku.edu>
Sent: Friday, September 04, 2009 1:23 PM
Subject: [Taxacom] Read... and believe...


you can weep if you like:

a blog post by Roger Hyam: http://www.hyam.net/blog/archives/598

For example:

" 1. Names are not reliable pointers to taxa. If a specimen is named
but the taxonomic classification used in the naming is not specified
then it can’t be know which taxon (of the multiple possible taxon
concepts for that name) it has been identified to. See Taxa, Taxon
Names and Globally Unique Identifiers in Perspective.
2. Descriptions require human interpretation. As described above, the
use of exemplar specimens combined with descriptions means that
identifications will vary between experts.
3. Relationships between descriptions are vague. The same name may be
used for several separately defined taxa. The descriptions of these
taxa may use the same or different morphological characteristics. Some
descriptions will omit characteristics used in other descriptions that
are ostensibly about of the same taxon. It is therefore not possible
to say whether the two description overlap, are equivalents or do not
intersect at all."

etc...

jim

-- 
_________________
Jim Croft ~ jim.croft at gmail.com ~ +61-2-62509499 ~
http://www.google.com/profiles/jim.croft
... in pursuit of the meaning of leaf ...
... 'All is leaf' ('Alles ist Blatt') - Goethe

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