Re: birds and avians again

["Tim Williams" <twilliams_alpha@hotmail.com>]

Dinogeorge wrote:

> (But I don't like
> pinning a major group like Aves to a single genus such as Archaeopteryx: if
> we find a slightly pre-archaeopterygid fossil flying bird, why arbitrarily
> exclude it from Aves?)

But, to turn the question around, why arbitrarily *include* it in the Aves?

The point of phylogenies is to display the relationships between different 
taxa.  The names are just labels to help you get around.


> The vernacular, paraphyletic term "dinosaurs" would then denote the 
> non-avian
> ornithans.

"Ornithans"?


Tim

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