[Taxacom] Why Taxonomy does NOT matter

[Stephen Thorpe]

below is an interesting insider look into the mentality of funders, as opposed 
to just scientists [this is meant to be a neutral remark, without any negative 
connotations]. Clearly, funding applications do need to be ranked somehow, given 
limited funds and (presumably) too many applications. However, looking at the 
output of, say, the journal, Molecular Phylogenetics & Evolution, I just don't 
see any evidence of prioritisation of projects which particularly 'illuminate 
evolutionary processes, assist in ecological studies, address societal issues, 
produce information resources needed by others, generate high-quality and 
accessible vouchers and databases, and have education value for students or the 
general public' ... no, I  just see projects on any old topic, the only common 
factor being methodological, i.e., they use the latest technology. So, I put it 
to you all that, in practice, the value of a project is largely determined by 
the methodology used ...

Stephen




________________________________
From: "Schindel, David" <schindeld at si.edu>
To: Fabian Haas <fhaas at icipe.org>; "taxacom at mailman.nhm.ku.edu" 
<taxacom at mailman.nhm.ku.edu>
Sent: Fri, 22 April, 2011 3:01:13 AM
Subject: Re: [Taxacom] Why Taxonomy does NOT matter

I went back to Fabian's original post.  There is an important distinction that 
wasn't made.  Taxonomy matters, but that doesn't mean that all taxonomic 
projects matter the same amount.  There were and still are plenty of taxonomic 
projects that get funded.  The others weren't denied funding because they were 
taxonomic projects.  They just weren't the best proposals for taxonomic 
projects.

I was an NSF Program Director in Systematic Biology for three years.  There were 
many more taxonomic (and other) proposals than could be funded so we always 
asked 'Why this study on this taxon and place rather than the other ones?  What 
value added does it offer beyond species description (which they all presumably 
did)?  Will it illuminate evolutionary processes, assist in ecological studies, 
address societal issues, produce information resources needed by others, 
generate high-quality and accessible vouchers and databases, and have education 
value for students or the general public?'  To get funded a proposal had to 
score well on most of these criteria, not just being good taxonomy.



-----Original Message-----
From: taxacom-bounces at mailman.nhm.ku.edu 
[mailto:taxacom-bounces at mailman.nhm.ku.edu] On Behalf Of Fabian Haas
Sent: Monday, April 18, 2011 4:48 AM
To: taxacom at mailman.nhm.ku.edu
Subject: [Taxacom] Why Taxonomy does NOT matter

Dear Colleagues,

my apologies for the subject of this email, but I thing I have your 
attention. I am a taxonomist myself, and working a lot to make taxonomy 
matter on various plat forms, so no need to convince me about the 
importance of taxonomy.

What I am trying to find out i , why we seemingly have not succeeded in 
gathering more support for taxonomy in the last 10 yrs or so? Although 
we have high political support for the CBD, a variety of interesting 
projects, like EOL and GBIF, and many other plat forms distributing 
taxonomic information. These success have little contributed -in my 
opinion- to improve funding for the production of taxonomic knowledge.

Instead of lamenting again, and preaching to the converted, I would like 
to find out, why the donors dont seem to react, what are their reasons 
not to fund taxonomic work, at all, or at a level would be useful. So I 
am looking for their reasons, why they dont seem to receive our message 
that we need to taxonomy. And also why taxonomic aspects are often 
deleted form projects when money becomes tight, more often than other 
section. Taxonomy seems expensible.

I do have some suspicions, like they dont know what it is, they simply 
dont like the topic, they think everything is known, they thing we dont 
need it anyways, its a public good and so available, taxonomy would be 
complete, etc.

I will certainly try to talk the donors informally to find out what they 
think, but what I would like to ask this community, if you have any 
first hand experience, first hand statements on that. I will treat all 
information confidential if wished, and keep informant and, more 
importantly donor, anonymously. It is not about blaming someone, but I 
would like to better understand their perspective, with the ultimate 
goal to improve our communication strategy, and better address them. We 
did work a lot on our/taxonomist communication and I believe all the 
necessary answers are ready, collected by BioNET etc, but this change of 
perspective -ask the listeners why they dont listen- seems worth wile to me.

So Why does Taxonomy NOT matter??

Best & Looking forward to hearing from you!

  Fabian

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