[Taxacom] Usefulness vs. convenience (Protista)

[Stephen Thorpe]

surely not the old "that's not science" argument!! Lots of things aren't science 
... in fact just about everything except science isn't science, like art, 
recreation, management, eating, ... Specifically, bioinformatics (=biodiversity 
information management) isn't science, but just like the other things that 
aren't science, that doesn't mean that it isn't worth doing ... So scientists 
can worry about the fact that the classification that bioinformaticians are 
using isn't science, but bioinformaticians and bioinformatic data users need not 
worry about that ...

Stephen




________________________________
From: Richard Zander <Richard.Zander at mobot.org>
To: Stephen Thorpe <stephen_thorpe at yahoo.co.nz>; Curtis Clark 
<lists at curtisclark.org>; taxacom at mailman.nhm.ku.edu
Sent: Tue, 21 December, 2010 11:48:35 AM
Subject: RE: [Taxacom] Usefulness vs. convenience (Protista)

Stephen:

If you try to mix classifications based on patterns of evidence (phylogenetics) 
and classifications based on theories of evolution of a group (evolutionary 
systematics) you will always get a mish-mash of apples and oranges. A 
paraphyletic group is a synchronic (one-dimensional present-day) view of a 
diachronic (through time) evolutionary process. The phylogenetic view is from 
well-supported evidence and the evolutionary view is theory. Only the last is 
science. The first is artificial.

R. 
* * * * * * * * * * * * 
Richard H. Zander 
Missouri Botanical Garden, PO Box 299, St. Louis, MO 63166-0299 USA 
Web sites: http://www.mobot.org/plantscience/resbot/ and 
http://www.mobot.org/plantscience/bfna/bfnamenu.htm
Modern Evolutionary Systematics Web site: 
http://www.mobot.org/plantscience/resbot/21EvSy.htm


-----Original Message-----
From: taxacom-bounces at mailman.nhm.ku.edu 
[mailto:taxacom-bounces at mailman.nhm.ku.edu] On Behalf Of Stephen Thorpe
Sent: Sunday, December 19, 2010 11:12 PM
To: Curtis Clark; taxacom at mailman.nhm.ku.edu
Subject: Re: [Taxacom] Usefulness vs. convenience (Protista)

>But name me an uncrackable paraphyletic group

basal Bilateria ... where do Acoela and Nematodermata fit in? Xenoturbellida?

>Certainly Reptilia seems well-cracked

then please point me to a fully-worked out published Linnean classification 
which is congruent with the phylogeny (i.e., with mammals and birds as 
subordinate to the class Reptilia, but still with Linnean ranks) ...

Stephen