Science is CHANGING (was cladistic mubo-jumbo)

["Rob Gay" <rob_redwing@hotmail.com>]

> Since the only stable tree is the one which represents what actually
happened, rather than the -- necessarily imperfect, fragmentary, and forever 
missing critical data -- human understanding of what happened, having a 
classification system which will shift as a dynamic thing representing a 
dynamic understanding is a net gain<
I was going to reply to this thread myself, but I couldn't have said it 
better than this. I don't want stability in the name of a node (or Family), 
if the contents of it are wrong! It shouldn't be kept because of human 
preferences, it should change if evidence shows that aves is paraphyletic, 
or that _Coelophysis_ doesn't belong in a certain clade. Its part of the 
scientific process, to test a hypothesis. And if its wrong, than new ideas 
must be formulated to fit the data. To not accept change (of course after 
rigourous testing and review) is not in keeping with the spirit of science. 
Sorry about going off on a tangent here...
Peace,
Rob
Student of Geology
Northern Arizona University
P.O. Box 20840
Flagstaff, Az. 86011
AIM: TarryAGoat
http://www.geocities.com/elvisimposter/dinopics.html
http://www.cafepress.com/RobsDinos
"A _Coelophysis_ with feathers?"

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