[Taxacom] Biodiversity questions: Classifications

[Frank.Krell at dmns.org]

It only tells us about the successful biodiversity, not the failing part.
If we do not ground our categories on age, then we cannot even discuss this aspect.
Frank


Dr. Frank-T. Krell
Curator of Entomology 
Commissioner, International Commission on Zoological Nomenclature
Chair, ICZN ZooBank Committee
Department of Zoology 
Denver Museum of Nature & Science 
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-----Original Message-----
From: taxacom-bounces at mailman.nhm.ku.edu [mailto:taxacom-bounces at mailman.nhm.ku.edu] On Behalf Of Richard Jensen
Sent: Thursday, October 03, 2013 10:28 AM
To: Chris Thompson
Cc: TAXACOM
Subject: Re: [Taxacom] Biodiversity questions: Classifications

Could it be that the apparent discrepancy in biodiversity, as we perceive it, is that family Z has had just as many speciation events as family X, but has experienced extremely high rates of extinction?  If so, then knowing the age tells us nothing about biodiversity - the two clades, one with 999 surviving species, and one with 1 surviving species, could be the same age.

Dick J


On Thu, Oct 3, 2013 at 11:15 AM, Chris Thompson <xelaalex at cox.net> wrote:

> PAUL:
>
> The scientific question that we begin with was about biodiversity.
>
> And Hennig said to answer those kinds of questions, then groups based 
> on time are the best.
>
> So, under the Hennig system, one could say that family X which now 
> contains
> 999 species is more biodiversity, has more speciation, etc., than 
> family Z which now contains only 1 species. BECAUSE the contents 
> (species) of each family represents a clade that has evolved over the SAME time period.
>
> But as I indicated in my Diptera example, comparison of the number of 
> species in Limoniidae versus Inbiomyiidae does not tell you anything 
> about biodiversity, speciation, etc. because those groups are not 
> equivalent, not comparable, etc.
>
> Oh, well ...
>
> Sincerely,
>
> Chris
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: muscapaul
> Sent: Thursday, October 03, 2013 10:27 AM
> To: TAXACOM
> Subject: Re: [Taxacom] Biodiversity questions: Classifications
>
> Just out of interest: If actual age would (should?) be playing a role, 
> where do we then account for differences between taxa with highly 
> divergent generation time, like drosophilids with perhaps more than 10 
> generations per year under favourable conditions and panthophthalmids 
> which probably take multiple years to develop? And then I am just 
> considering taxa within the same order where one might give rise to 
> new taxa on a much shorter absolute time scale than the other.
>
> Paul
>
> On 3 October 2013 12:59, Chris Thompson <xelaalex at cox.net> wrote:
>
> > So, for example, in Diptera, we now recognize a family which is a 
> > clade
> of
> > some 10 thousand species and of some 200 million years old 
> > (Limoniidae) and another family of less than a dozen species and 
> > probably less than 5 million years old (Inbiomyiidae).
>
> ...
> >
> > So, if one wants to derived scientific hypotheses from classifications,
> > one
> > must go back to clades and their age.
> >
> > Sincerely,
> >
> > Chris
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-- 
Richard Jensen, Professor
Department of Biology
Saint Mary's College
Notre Dame, IN 46556
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Celebrating 26 years of Taxacom in 2013.