Re: New taxon (and taxonomy) from Sereno's Science paper

["Thomas R. Holtz, Jr." <th81@umail.umd.edu>]

At 08:32 PM 6/25/99 -0400, T. Mike Keesey wrote:
>On Fri, 25 Jun 1999, Thomas R. Holtz, Jr. wrote:
>
>> Sereno also provides new redefinitions for:
>> Ornithomimidae (all ornithomimosaurs closer to _Ornithomimus_ than to
>> _Shuvuuia_);
>AAAAAAAAH!!!

Yeah, I know...

>> Ornithomimoidea (_Shuvuuia_, _Ornithomimus_, their most recent common
>> ancestor, and all descendants);
>AAAAAAAAAAHHHH!!

Yeah, I know...

>> Alvarezsauridae (all ornithomimosaurs closer to _Shuvuuia_ than to
>> _Ornithomimus_);
>AAAAAAAHHHH!!!

Yeah, I know...

>> Therizinosauridae (all maniraptoriforms closer to _Erlikosaurus_ than to
>> _Ornithomimus_, _Oviraptor_, or Neornithes [not fond of more than two anchor
>> taxa, but this one kinda works for me, in that it covers most of the
bases...]);
>Did The Complete Dinosaur already define this as
>{_Therizinosaurus_ > _Alxasaurus_}?

Don't think so: they simply reiterate Russell & Dong's two families: the
monotypic Alxasauridae, and the everything else Therizinosauridae.  No
phylogenetic definitions for either.

>> and Oviraptoroidea (_Oviraptor_, _Caenagnathus_, their most recent common
>> ancestor, and all descendants).
>Ah, a good one at last! Except this is already Oviraptorosauria, isn't it?

Yeah.

>Are any of the AAAAAAAAH!!!! definitions preceded by another definition?
>I always thought of them as:
>Ornithomimidae: {_Ornithomimus_ > _Garudimimus_}
>Ornithomimoidea: {_Ornithomimus_ > _Harpymimus_, _Pelecanimimus_}
>Alvarezsauridae: {_Alvarezsaurus_ + _Parvicursor_ (or any other
>parvicursorine)}

Not bad definitions, but none were in the literature yet (to my knowledge).

                        Thomas R. Holtz, Jr.
                        Vertebrate Paleontologist
Deptartment of Geology                  Director, Earth, Life & Time Program
University of Maryland                  College Park Scholars
College Park, MD  20742       
Webpage: http://www.geol.umd.edu        Phone:301-405-4084
Email:tholtz@geol.umd.edu               Fax:  301-314-9661