Re: Birds and pornography

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

>   What the Hell is a Class?>
>
> You're starting from the assumption that the most important thing a
> classification does is respond to and teach about a view of evolutionary
> change.
> What if the first goal is communication?

Let me state it that way: Whatever other classifications there may be (e.
g., we won't get rid of typologically more-or-less-defined words like fish
and worm), we want to have one classification that enables us to talk about
evolutionary change. Any poly- and paraphyletic groups hinder this.

> By the way, it is also possible to argue that cladistic naming approaches
> necessarily imply gradualism, as opposed to other evolutionary mechanisms.

Why?
OK, you _could_ claim that it's incompatible with the Hopeful Monster model.
But even if that idea would be correct, then it would still be possible to
name clades, even though discovering them would be quite a lot more
difficult sometimes.

> It is also possible to argue the contrary,

Again why?

> but my point is that a
> classification system used for anything other than communication opens up
a
> shelf of cans of worms.
> Let the worms stay on the ground to be trampled by the travelers on
> horseback.

1. Phylogenetic taxonomy is definitely used for communication. To
communicate the tree.
2. Ermm... just FYI, the polychaetes and nematodes I mentioned are all
marine :->
3. If it reveals a _diversity_ of worms, so that we can understand the
phylogeny of animals, then gimme, gimme! =8-)