Taxacom: replacing un-sequenceable types (was Re: Minimalist revision of Mesochorus)

Fri Sep 1 11:27:45 CDT 2023

Wish upon a star - but I agree fully.

John Grehan

On Fri, Sep 1, 2023 at 12:14 PM Frank T. Krell via Taxacom <
taxacom at lists.ku.edu> wrote:

> One of the fundamental problems is that funders love to fund science
> without people, because people are expensive (see the decreasing number of
> museum scientists in most museums). Amateur entomologists and citizen
> scientists were seen as solutions for a while (and probably still), now AI
> could help us to avoid paying these pesky scientists and achieve better
> results. They are certainly better because when nobody is there to check AI
> results any more, how should we know otherwise.
> I hope it will never get to this extreme
> In an ideal world, we need more people engaged in taxonomy, more people
> educated, more people paid a decent salary, more people seeing it as a
> viable career choice, more people in administrations learning to appreciate
> the taxonomic endeavor. It is a people issue, and AI cannot and should not
> be more than a support tool.
>
> Frank
>
>
> Dr. Frank-Thorsten Krell
>
> Senior Curator of Entomology, Editor-in-Chief
> Commissioner and Councillor, International Commission on Zoological
> Nomenclature
> Department of Zoology
> Denver Museum of Nature & Science
> 2001 Colorado Blvd
> Denver, Colorado 80205-5798, U.S.A.
> Frank.krell at dmns.org
> Phone 303.370.8244
> Fax 303.331.6492
> https://nam10.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.dmns.org%2Fscience%2Fzoology%2Fstaff%2Ffrank-krell%2F&data=05%7C01%7Ctaxacom%40lists.ku.edu%7C9de36891dc1a4609287908dbab087641%7C3c176536afe643f5b96636feabbe3c1a%7C0%7C0%7C638291825071014307%7CUnknown%7CTWFpbGZsb3d8eyJWIjoiMC4wLjAwMDAiLCJQIjoiV2luMzIiLCJBTiI6Ik1haWwiLCJXVCI6Mn0%3D%7C3000%7C%7C%7C&sdata=wwUP5Dbylk5Azyn8el%2FCnv%2Fl8zKnlWh10q1rLthogBk%3D&reserved=0
>
> Infinity Theater: Jane Goodall’s Reasons for Hope, Flight of the
> Butterflies and Secrets of the Sea now playing on the giant screen!
>
> Teatro Infinity: Jane Goodall’s Reasons for Hope, Flight of the
> Butterflies y Secrets of the Sea ahora en pantalla gigante!
>
>
>
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Taxacom <taxacom-bounces at lists.ku.edu> On Behalf Of KD Dijkstra via
> Taxacom
> Sent: Friday, September 1, 2023 9:55 AM
> To: Peter Uetz <uetz at vcu.edu>
> Cc: taxacom at lists.ku.edu
> Subject: Re: Taxacom: replacing un-sequenceable types (was Re: Minimalist
> revision of Mesochorus)
>
> Hi all,
>
> This conversation reminds me of a joke a friend made, who works in exactly
> the field that Peter describes: "once we've taught the robots to identify
> species, we'll teach them to love nature for us."
>
> AI and genomics are wonderful tools. Maybe Peter is overselling their
> potential a bit, but that isn't the biggest problem. Nor is it perhaps a
> bit sad to hand over all the fun and experience to machines. The problem is
> that even if it's a fantasy that AI and genomics can do all the work for
> us, funders and institutes like to believe such fantasies and won't want to
> be left behind. So the resources will be skewed towards these techniques
> and the corresponding taxonomic expertise will continue to hobble behind.
> Just as it did with previous and equally wonderful (but maybe also
> oversold and over-embraced) innovations like DNA-barcoding, informatics,
> meta-barcoding etc. etc.
>
> I really appreciate all the excellent contributions that are being made to
> this important discussion, but the further we get into moving our
> discipline into sequencers and processors, the more we need to make clear
> that, ultimately, we're doing this for humans and so need to invest at
> least as much in humans...
>
> Feel free to ignore my philosophizing, just needed that off my chest!
>
> Cheers, KD
>
> _________________________________________
> *KD (Klaas-Douwe) B Dijkstra*
> dragonfly popularizer kddijkstra.nl
> my work <https://nam10.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fsites.google.com%2Fview%2Fkddijkstra%2Fhome&data=05%7C01%7Ctaxacom%40lists.ku.edu%7C9de36891dc1a4609287908dbab087641%7C3c176536afe643f5b96636feabbe3c1a%7C0%7C0%7C638291825071014307%7CUnknown%7CTWFpbGZsb3d8eyJWIjoiMC4wLjAwMDAiLCJQIjoiV2luMzIiLCJBTiI6Ik1haWwiLCJXVCI6Mn0%3D%7C3000%7C%7C%7C&sdata=08LNjkBYNyXKxHy%2BhV%2BP7qh4eAJ6tO%2F3GxmN1mO9ALo%3D&reserved=0> and my species <
> https://nam10.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fsites.google.com%2Fview%2Fkddijkstra%2Fmy-species%3Fauthuser%3D0&data=05%7C01%7Ctaxacom%40lists.ku.edu%7C9de36891dc1a4609287908dbab087641%7C3c176536afe643f5b96636feabbe3c1a%7C0%7C0%7C638291825071014307%7CUnknown%7CTWFpbGZsb3d8eyJWIjoiMC4wLjAwMDAiLCJQIjoiV2luMzIiLCJBTiI6Ik1haWwiLCJXVCI6Mn0%3D%7C3000%7C%7C%7C&sdata=rW3HBAHr7GH9XLcUh7K5se1ITvqZMVwauBXS81BFJ8E%3D&reserved=0>
> key appearances and publications
> <https://nam10.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fsites.google.com%2Fview%2Fkddijkstra%2Flinks&data=05%7C01%7Ctaxacom%40lists.ku.edu%7C9de36891dc1a4609287908dbab087641%7C3c176536afe643f5b96636feabbe3c1a%7C0%7C0%7C638291825071014307%7CUnknown%7CTWFpbGZsb3d8eyJWIjoiMC4wLjAwMDAiLCJQIjoiV2luMzIiLCJBTiI6Ik1haWwiLCJXVCI6Mn0%3D%7C3000%7C%7C%7C&sdata=8Q%2BBiUphtUjIuL8iQJXwK5z4O%2FS68Z8aRIBl7Pwm%2FAI%3D&reserved=0>
> African Dragonflies and Damselflies Online <https://nam10.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=http%3A%2F%2Faddo.adu.org.za%2F&data=05%7C01%7Ctaxacom%40lists.ku.edu%7C9de36891dc1a4609287908dbab087641%7C3c176536afe643f5b96636feabbe3c1a%7C0%7C0%7C638291825071014307%7CUnknown%7CTWFpbGZsb3d8eyJWIjoiMC4wLjAwMDAiLCJQIjoiV2luMzIiLCJBTiI6Ik1haWwiLCJXVCI6Mn0%3D%7C3000%7C%7C%7C&sdata=%2FtZ2Q1s68ZY2cBSVAv2z6lL4M7zptgPkGx1LeDrcQnA%3D&reserved=0>
>
>
> On Fri, 1 Sept 2023 at 17:14, Peter Uetz via Taxacom <taxacom at lists.ku.edu
> >
> wrote:
>
> >
> > In the long run, AI will be able to take into account environmental
> > factors, age, etc.
> > Hence, it will be able to predict species too, including (potential)
> > gene flow etc.
> > It’s admittedly everyone’s guess when this will happen (but probably
> > sooner than many think).
> >
> > And yes, nature guides will be replaced by AI too, even without DNA.
> > It’s happening already (iNaturalist, Seek, etc.)
> >
> > You will need both DNA and images to predict phenotypes and species,
> > of course.
> >
> >
> >
> > > On Sep 1, 2023, at 10:44 AM, Lücking, Robert <R.Luecking at bo.berlin>
> > wrote:
> > >
> > > Dear all,
> > >
> > > do not forget that taxonomy has a lot of dimensions going far beyond
> > science. I don't think you can sell DNA-only-based taxonomy to
> > non-scientists, policy makers etc. Nature guides continue to be a
> > multi-billion dollar business and I do honestly not imagine these to
> > feature images of genome sequences in the future. So while it is
> > necessary to support taxon concepts with molecular data, the
> > morphological portion of taxonomy is equally required. Or can any of
> > you imagine a tour where you, as an expert, tell people:
> > "Unfortunately I cannot identify this critter unless I have a genome
> sequence..."
> > >
> > > We already have this problem: students start "taxonomy" through lab
> > > work
> > but have never seen the critters in situ, leading to statements such as:
> > "Oh, that's what I have been sequencing... I had no idea...".
> > >
> > > Also: many species are polymorphic, plus there are external
> > > influences,
> > plus ontogeny and age, meaning the phenotype cannot be predicted from
> > the genotype alone, not even with AI.
> > >
> > > Expert taxonomists can still identify (most of) their species and
> > > some
> > have predicted what we now see with molecular data many decades ago
> > based on morphology and anatomy and other data alone. The art of
> > taxonomy is not, and is not going to be, to predict phenotype from
> > genotype, but continues to be to predict species from phenotype,
> > taking into account all available information.
> > >
> > > Robert
> > >
> >
> >
> >
> > ————————————————————————————————————
> > Peter Uetz
> > Center for Biological Data Science
> > (formerly Center for the Study of Biological Complexity) Virginia
> > Commonwealth University Richmond, VA 23284 USA
> >
> > Reptile Database (https://nam10.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.reptile-database.org%2F&data=05%7C01%7Ctaxacom%40lists.ku.edu%7C9de36891dc1a4609287908dbab087641%7C3c176536afe643f5b96636feabbe3c1a%7C0%7C0%7C638291825071014307%7CUnknown%7CTWFpbGZsb3d8eyJWIjoiMC4wLjAwMDAiLCJQIjoiV2luMzIiLCJBTiI6Ik1haWwiLCJXVCI6Mn0%3D%7C3000%7C%7C%7C&sdata=efJyADKaEQFH9apkRUFxPIepTGjnaatT%2F0tiC1OaIYk%3D&reserved=0)
> > https://nam10.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=http%3A%2F%2Fuetz.info%2F&data=05%7C01%7Ctaxacom%40lists.ku.edu%7C9de36891dc1a4609287908dbab087641%7C3c176536afe643f5b96636feabbe3c1a%7C0%7C0%7C638291825071014307%7CUnknown%7CTWFpbGZsb3d8eyJWIjoiMC4wLjAwMDAiLCJQIjoiV2luMzIiLCJBTiI6Ik1haWwiLCJXVCI6Mn0%3D%7C3000%7C%7C%7C&sdata=MYliHLNhcjVn2FTC472xy6U%2B2wODv3YbHOD0BXc4cUg%3D&reserved=0
> >
> >
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> >
> > Nurturing nuance while assailing ambiguity and admiring alliteration
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> >
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> Nurturing nuance while assailing ambiguity and admiring alliteration for
> about 36 years, 1987-2023.
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> Nurturing nuance while assailing ambiguity and admiring alliteration for
> about 36 years, 1987-2023.
>

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