[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next][Date Index][Thread Index][Subject Index][Author Index]

Phylocode (was Pterosaur relationships)

The hope of strict cladists that paraphyletic groups (NOT wastebaskets) like Reptilia are going to be abandoned is probably a pipe dream. Vermes was a polyphyletic wastebasket, Reptilia is not (it's paraphyletic).
I have already expressed my opinion that the PhyloCode will ultimately fail, but Michael Benton's soon-to-be published criticism of the PhyloCode will hopefully help to prevent much of the confusion he also believes the PhyloCode will cause.
Therefore I encourage those who continue to recognize a traditional Reptilia, although one needs to now indicate whether you are using it in the traditional or cladistic sense. Perhaps someday we will all refer to a more traditional (but semi-paraphyletic) Reptilia once again, but in the intervening years (or decades), confusion will continue as long as the cladisto-eclectic war continues, now well into its fourth decade.
-------Ken Kinman
******************************************************** 
From: "David Marjanovic" <david.marjanovic@gmx.at>
Reply-To: "David Marjanovic" <david.marjanovic@gmx.at>
To: "The Dinosaur Mailing List" <dinosaur@usc.edu>
Subject: Re: Pterosaur relationships
Date: Fri, 29 Sep 2000 15:18:23 +0200

> Don't call birds reptiles either.
>
> eric l.

But I will call them sauropsids...

Please be so kind as to abandon the term Reptilia. Reptilia in the traditional sense is a wastebasket like Thecodontia, additionally affected with all kinds of prejudices. Sauropsida is a much less confusing word and was cladistically defined before Reptilia (currently synonymous in cladistics), and Eureptilia (seems to be node-based: it includes Anapsida/Parareptilia and Romeriida, but not Mesosauridae) is already enough...

Before PhyloCode is active, we probably can't avoid Eureptilia and Eupelycosauria (all but the basalmost synapsids/theropsids), but we can avoid Reptilia. 
_________________________________________________________________________
Get Your Private, Free E-mail from MSN Hotmail at http://www.hotmail.com.

Share information about yourself, create your own public profile at http://profiles.msn.com.