Theropod taxonomy

[jrw6f@faraday.clas.virginia.edu]

For all you theropod taxonomy nuts out ther, I just posted the result
of a week's hard procrastination to my homepage.  Yes, it's another
person's THEROPOD CLADOGRAM.  I've noticed that a lot of people have
been speculative cladograms around on the list and on their home
pages, and I decided to try my own.

This one has been done with Phylipp, using 86 derived characters in 44
terminal taxa and one outgroup (Marasuchus).  I'm not happy with it,
but I did convince it to accept the Arctometatarsali.  My page's URL
is http://faraday.clas.virgninia.edu/~jrw6f, and the paleo page is
/paleo.html (it has some (poor)art too!)

The cladogram is interesting, because it allies the Segnosauria with
the Oviraptors ( in a group I have (immodestly) dubbed
"Mongolosauria").  I doubt that this is a monophyletic group, but it
looks kinda cool.  The best run of the data set did not recognize the
Carnosauria,or the Ceratosauria+Abelisauria.  I attribute the latter
to poor data collection on my part (the data will not be presented, as
Tom Holtz would probably pummel me if he saw the characters I used).
It did tend to form several intermediate forms into groups.  Most
notably, it kept wedging Gasosaurus, Afrovenator, and Giganotosaurus
together as a sister to Sinraptoridae.

BLATANT SELF-AGGRANDIZEMENT:

The cladogram at my homepage is not a scientific animal.  I do not
have a higher degree, nor am I really that good at cladistics (yet on
both counts).  Any attempts to use it to argue points (by people other
than me) ought to be met with severe skepticism or derisive laughter.

So check it out!
Wagner
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Jonathan R. Wagner                                      
Graduate Student sans Portfolio
jrw6f@virginia.edu
        http://faraday.clas.virginia.edu/~jrw6f
        Check out the paleo sections!!!!!!
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