Re: Birds and pornography

["philidor11" <philidor11@snet.net>]

I mildly paraphrased:
<Would you really want to change the bird definition to:  'someone's current
best guess about which known fossils probably most resembled what the most
almost non-bird ancestor of a bird looked like.' ?>
Nick wanted to stick with the original:
<No, I'm reasonably happy with "the most recent common ancestor of [the type
specimen of *Archaeopteryx lithographica*] and [that *Passer domesticus* I
saw on the street this morning] and all of its descendants".>

Agreed, if you took out Archie and the mrca,  you'd have universal
acceptance.  Think of 'em as the cuckoos in the Passer's nest.
Taking out the references to specifics, you get '{The) mrca ...and all of
its descendants.' , or my paraphrase.