[Taxacom] double-peaked mountains (was: Wilkins on species, again)

[Richard Pyle]

Thanks, Bob.

I did glance at the Wilkins post that you linked, with the full intention of reading it in more detail.  For some reason, though, the immediacy of a Taxacom post drew me into the fray more effectively.  Perhaps it's displacement behavior on my part (I should be packing rebreathers and such -- not going to get much sleep tonight).

Is there a link to Craig's abstract online?  What you quoted is very interesting to me.  I know some of the genetic research on coral-reef fishes, but I was never sure whether the same patterns were evident in other groups.  I'm intrigued that we both converged on the "fractal" characterization.

Time to get packing....

Aloha,
Rich

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Bob Mesibov [mailto:mesibov at southcom.com.au]
> Sent: Thursday, November 28, 2013 11:12 PM
> To: Richard Pyle
> Cc: TAXACOM
> Subject: Re: [Taxacom] double-peaked mountains (was: Wilkins on species,
> again)
> 
> I hadn't intended to post again on this, after poor Wilkins got ignored,
> *again*, and his non-readers jumped straight into the confusion he was
> earnestly trying to sort out, namely the conflating of species reality, species
> concepts and species-as-hypotheses, but...
> 
> I would guess Rich's observations on reef fishes are just as apparent in most
> genetic analyses of individual species. At an upcoming conference, Australian
> specialist Craig Moritz has a keynote talk called 'Genomic perspectives on
> species discovery: the problem of fractal diversity', and in his abstract writes:
> 
> 'In some cases, evidence from smaller-scale multilocus analyses suggest an
> almost fractal structure of lineage diversity within currently recognized
> species. This raises anew the old question of where to stop in splitting taxa.
> While we have a deluge of data and increasingly sophisticated methods of
> inferring “evolutionary independence”, we have not entirely escaped the
> question of “how much is enough”.'
> --
> Dr Robert Mesibov
> Honorary Research Associate
> Queen Victoria Museum and Art Gallery, and School of Agricultural Science,
> University of Tasmania Home contact:
> PO Box 101, Penguin, Tasmania, Australia 7316
> (03) 64371195; 61 3 64371195