Re: Gondwana Split Sorts Out Mammalian Evolution

["David Marjanovic" <david.marjanovic@gmx.at>]

> > Euarchontoglires
>
> Horrible, horrible name.  Why not just redefine Archonta?

Mammalogists use concept-based names. Archonta is applicable only within the
Archonta hypothesis, which says that bats, tree shrews, primates and
"flying" "lemurs" form an exclusive clade (supported by morphological
studies). When bats fall out, the rest gets the name Euarchonta. Same for
Eulipotyphla (Lipotyphla minus Afrosoricida), Cetartiodactyla (Artiodactyla
including Cetacea), Atlantogenata and so on. That's why every new phylogeny
comes with new names.

> Or, failing that, I suggest the following:
>
> Scansores ("climbers"; could be confusing because of the general terms
> "scansor" and "scansorial")
>
> Arboricolae ("inhabitants of trees"--not very applicable to modern
> lagomorphs, but it works for primates, flying lemurs, tree shrews, and
many
> rodent groups)

It would be really nice to name this clade after an apomorphy... is any
morphological one known? :-) The above 2 names imply its common ancestor was
arboreal, which can AFAIK hardly be hypothesized at the moment.

> > Boreoeutheria
>
> Yuck.  Why not just Boreotheria ("northern beasts")?

Analogy to Boreometatheria (which has of course meanwhile turned out to be
paraphyletic...). Of course this is the clade that should have been called
Laurasiatheria. Euarchontoglires has originated in Asia, according to all
early Paleocene fossils, and inclusion of Zalambdalestidae wouldn't
contradict that.