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Re: Enigmosauria Published (basically)


Mickey,
I think Sereno has rushed too quickly to name clades in the past, and if he has reservations about this one, that alone speaks volumes. Not to mention Norell and others at AMNH.
If your revised analysis still shows an enigmosaur clade, I will certainly take another close look at it. Of course, in my classifications, I would continue to recognize the same families, but simply recode them as a single "enigmosaur" clade, so enigmosaurs will remain an informal name either way (holophyletic or paraphyletic) as far as I am concerned.
----Take care,
Ken Kinman
P.S. BTW, even if enigmosaurs are paraphyletic, traditionalists would not regard it as an unnatural or unreal grouping. But I would personally see no reason to formally recognize a paraphyletic grouping that consisted of just two adjacent clades. In any case, I believe there has not been sufficient time given to testing this newly proposed "clade", and unpublished challenges appear to be in the works. The benefits vs. risks of rushing into formally naming this group now just doesn't seem worthwhile at the present, but I may change my mind when your revised analysis is completed.
****************************************** 
From: "Mickey Mortimer" <Mickey_Mortimer11@msn.com>
Reply-To: Mickey_Mortimer11@msn.com
To: <dinosaur@usc.edu>
Subject: Re: Enigmosauria Published (basically)
Date: Wed, 12 Sep 2001 20:10:33 -0700

Ken Kinman wrote-

> I think it is premature to assume that these groups form a true clade,
> much less giving it a formal name or cladistic definition.
> Therefore, why not just call them by the common name "enigmosaurs",
and
> if it turns out to be a paraphyletic assemblage, cladists will simply
> abandon that informal name. Why the rush to formalize?

Because no one thinks "Enigmosauria" isn't a real group besides- you, who
have yet to present good arguments; Sereno, who has flawed characters and
codings (http://www.cmnh.org/fun/dinosaur-archive/2001Jul/msg00242.html);
Norell, et al., who have not published their arguments yet.

Mickey Mortimer



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