Re: FW: Philidor: No Class

["Jaime A. Headden" <qilongia@yahoo.com>]

Richard Forrest (richard@plesiosaur.com) wrote:

<How about soft tissue? How about genes? At a guess, about 95% of the
information we would need to sort out the problem is not preserved in the
fossil record.>

  Therefore we work with what we have. We determine the strength of
utilizing the data by using extant taxa and the same criteria and material
examined, and compare this to other analyses. Presently most of the
cladistic work done is genetic, not morphological, but for the analysis of
dinosaurs, we can utilize only bone, thus comaprison to extant forms can
only be osteological. Recent concensus between analyses are shaping up,
and provide us with a new trend in determining input as a criterion to
"value" of output.

<No - but someone who make a living by programming computers, and is well
aware of the potential hazard in trusting the output!>

  Never trust the output, but TEST, TEST, TEST! Er, in math, that means
cross-checking; in fossils, using different lines of evidence to produce a
result, comapre to others', and never, ever _beleive_ in the results. They
are _always_ preliminary.

<A cladogram is a way of presenting the output from an analysis of the
relationships found in a set of characaters chosen by the author. HOw can
it say anything about ontogeny, genetic or biomechanics?>

  This is where fellows like Hutchinson, Farlow, Horner, Currie, and
Carpenter etc. come into the fray, for here is their demesne.
Biomechanics, the form/function complex, ecological perspectives,
ontogeneitc studies, etc. are all as vitally important and can determine
_how_ a character analysis can be form, in which context to take it, and
how to utilize it within the analysis as a part. I think cladistic studies
are wonderful, but they are not the crème de la crème of the crop of the
world; no, instead, they are only _tools_, and as in any tool, it must be
perfected, as any program is upgraded, improved upon. But never, ever,
trusted. I think personally it a fallacy to _beleive_ anything a computer
puts out.

  Cheers,

=====
Jaime A. Headden

  Little steps are often the hardest to take.  We are too used to making leaps 
in the face of adversity, that a simple skip is so hard to do.  We should all 
learn to walk soft, walk small, see the world around us rather than zoom by it.

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