Taxacom: Taxacom Digest, Vol 219, Issue 17

[Leslie Watling]

I don't understand this comment about magic. Those old offensive words will
still be present in all the old literature unless and until someone has a
way to find all the hundreds of copies of those old monographs and
"magically" change the names. So, IMHO, the whole exercise is stupid.

Instead, a group, for example, maybe of Botanists, could prepare a list of
words they think are offensive to somebody and recommend that in the future
taxonomists not use them when naming new species. The past is the past but
the future can be controlled, should one want to. Or, when referring to
that old offensive name, a writer could add an asterisk indicating that
they feel the word is offensive but they acknowledge that they have to use
the word due to the rules of taxonomy. That way you can signal your own
virtue and not cause headaches for the broader taxonomic and databasing
communities.

I wonder how many more of these wacky things we as taxonomists are going to
have to endure. I mean, we have enough to do to try to get species
described and named before they go extinct, for crying out loud.

Les
Les Watling
Professor Emeritus
School of Life Sciences
University of Hawaii

Professor Emeritus
School of Marine Sciences
University of Maine



On Tue, Jul 23, 2024 at 1:00 PM <taxacom-request at lists.ku.edu> wrote:

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> Today's Topics:
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>    1. Re: botanical names with racist history (Stephen Thorpe)
>    2. Re: botanical names with racist history (Stephen Thorpe)
>    3. Re: botanical names with racist history (David Campbell)
>    4. Re: botanical names with racist history (Michael Heads)
>    5. Re: botanical names with racist history (Paul van Rijckevorsel)
>    6. Re: botanical names with racist history (Paul van Rijckevorsel)
>    7. Re: botanical names with racist history (Stephen Thorpe)
>    8. Re: botanical names with racist history (alberto ballerio)
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> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
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> ------------------------------
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> Message: 5
> Date: Tue, 23 Jul 2024 09:52:27 +0100
> From: Paul van Rijckevorsel <dipteryx at freeler.nl>
> To: taxacom at lists.ku.edu
> Subject: Re: Taxacom: botanical names with racist history
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> On 22/07/2024 20:44, Stephen Thorpe wrote:
>
> [?] The old name won?t just update by magic in the past literature.
> [...]
>
>
> Well, the original spelling (not the old name) already has been updated
> everywhere (or it will have been in the future, after the new Rule goes
> into effect).? Of course, the ?Any sufficiently advanced technology is
> indistinguishable from magic? will apply here.
>
> The ?botanical? /Code/has been working this way for decades. Just a
> matter ofappreciating the miracles of retroactivity.
>
> Paul
>
>
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> End of Taxacom Digest, Vol 219, Issue 17
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>