Message 2000-10-0019: RE: Re: RE: RE: Nathan Wilson's question

Tue, 17 Oct 2000 12:53:35 -0400

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Date: Tue, 17 Oct 2000 12:53:35 -0400
From: "Moore, Gerry" <gerrymoore@bbg.org>
To: 'Kevin de Queiroz' <Dequeiroz.Kevin@NMNH.SI.EDU>
Cc: PhyloCode@ouvaxa.cats.ohiou.edu, cantino@ohiou.edu
Subject: RE: Re: RE: RE: Nathan Wilson's question

No I wasn't offended (it takes a lot more than that).  Upon re-reading the
message, I can see how one might come to such a conclusion. All I was trying
to do was stress the potential for dual interpretations (be they right,
wrong, correct, incorrect, real, imagined or otherwise) regarding the
problem at hand. Kind of funny that the message I wrote -- expressing
concern about the potential for more than one interpretation  regarding
certain phylogenetic definitions -- had more than one interpretation itself.
One of the reasons that I like the PhyloCode listserv is that the posts stay
on message (i.e., PhyloCode stuff with minimal venting). I apologize for
briefly getting us off message.   

I think all those involved in this discussion would agree that some may have
difficulty applying a clade name, given the current wording of the PhyloCode
and presented with a situation where a species of hybrid origin is used as
specifier.  I would say that that agreement represents progress.  The trick
now is to deal with this problem.  My current feeling is that the PhyloCode
should go with Kevin's interpretation (made explicit in a relevant Article
with accompanying examples), limit the conservation approach to those cases
where circumscriptional instability is a problem (this can occur when the
name was used as a specifier prior to knowledge that it was of hybrid
origin) or the application is ambiguous (I believe this can occur when more
than one of the specifiers used in a definition is of hybrid origin).  I am
working through several examples now for a later post. 

As Kevin pointed out in his earlier post, the fundamental problem here is
not that a species can be a member of two nonnested clades. And this is what
can cause the problems.

Cheers,
Gerry


  

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