[Taxacom] Principles (was: early extant angiosperms)

[Kenneth Kinman]

        Okay, I guess we can agree on that (and thus basalmost xxxx is
clearly even worse than basal xxxx).   However, your statement  ("This
is not what you want to happen with a formal taxon name") sounded like a
criticism of recognizing formal paraphyletic taxa.  There are a number
of formal paraphyletic taxa that need to be recognized, which are
clearly more useful than a lot of the clade names being proposed (some
of which are redundant; others are probably polyphyletic in the rush to
be the first to name new clades).  
       In any case, I plan henceforth not to use the phrase "basal
dicots".  Instead I will say Class Magnoliopsida ("paleodicots").    
        ---------Ken
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Barry Roth wrote:
Dear Ken, 
My post had nothing to do with the practice of phylogenetic systematics,
strict or lax. It was about the mechanics of naming, and the goal of
nomenclatural stability. OF COURSE the scope/membership of taxa,
character-based, typologically based, or otherwise, changes with
evolving knowledge. My point was to reduce instability by not
christening something Basal that down the road may turn out to be
"penbasal" or (thanks, Fred S) "semi-basal." 
Barry