RE: Gaia theropod follow-up: a "new" phylogeny

["Matthew Bonnan" <mbonnan@hotmail.com>]

Tracy Ford Said:

> One thing I don't do (and which good systematists don't do) is recode and
> recode until I get a tree I like.  <<
> That's what I'm talking about. Say the person using Paup doesn't like the
> out come of the tree, THEY tweak it until it is something THEY like. Then 
> WE
> don't know if the person was right or the computer was right in the first
> place. If they always do that then how can we know (as George as said in 
> the
> past) which is right? It's like having a chocolate granola bar, it defeats
> it's purpose.

Since Ken Kinman and others have followed up on this response already, I 
will make mine brief.  The point is even if there were "bad apples" to quote 
Kinman, that is the point of peer-reviewed journals and meetings.  Science, 
and thus paleontology, are set up the way they are because we all realize 
that we are all biased.  By having others review our work (in this case, 
cladograms), we reduce the amount of subjectivity.  Also, because cladograms 
are defined hypotheses about systematic relationships, they can be tested 
repeatedly by other researchers.  Even if everyone from the original 
researcher to the peer-review board is in on a major scam, when the 
manuscript is published or when a public talk is given, others not in the 
circle of deceipt can determine whether or not someone is fibbing by testing 
those hypotheses.  Also, it may not happen overnight -- many things in 
science are discovered to be erroneous years after, but again, that's the 
point of publishing these things and exposing them to as many people as 
possible.

By the way, there is no such thing as right in science.  This rings of 
finding ultimate truth, which is not what science is about.  We never prove 
anything absolutely in science.  We only deal with probabilities.  But 
that's for other postings (and many previous ones from me on this list).

Mmmmm ... chocolate granola bar .... aaaah .....  what purpose is defeated 
here??? =) Just kidding, I get it!

Matt Bonnan
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