[Taxacom] validation of taxon names

[Curtis Clark]

On 2/19/2012 12:36 AM, Paul van Rijckevorsel wrote:
> On another note, defining taxa by ennumerating the components is
> rather untraditional, and in fact has been explicitly disallowed in the
> botanical Code as a way to define new taxa.

I certainly wasn't saying taxa were or should be defined that way 
(diagnosis/description has always been the norm), but rather that 
botanists of my era often looked at taxa that way as an important part 
of arriving at a circumscription (and of course a diagnosis). I don't 
remember knowing of anyone who thought of characters first, and 
specimens later, although of course there is an iterative cycle, using 
specimens for a first cut at characters, and then using those characters 
for further evaluation of specimens.

-- 
Curtis Clark        http://www.csupomona.edu/~jcclark
Biological Sciences                   +1 909 869 4140
Cal Poly Pomona, Pomona CA 91768