The reference to Porsche in a dinosaur story succesfully caught my
attention, but the article is interesting for a very different reason....
>Welcome to this edition of DINOSAURNEWS.
SNIP>
>** Working On The 'Porsche Of Its Time'
>Using all of the information available, palaeontologists must confront the
>fossil world reality that the classification of a new fossil species is
>subjective and varies among taxonomists
>
Part of the article refered to reads:
******
Because the Rauisuchian fossil record is generally sparse, Novak instead
dove into the dinosaurian fossil record in attempts to quantify the
amount of skeletal difference historically regarded as valid to erect a
new species within the same
genera. She analyzed 28 genera containing 68 species from both the saurischian
(lizard-hipped) and ornithischian (bird-hipped) orders. Using the fact
that the skeleton
of a dinosaur generally contains approximately 338 different bones, she
catalogued the
number of differences as well as where the differences were found on the
skeleton.
Calculations indicated that, on average, two species of dinosaur that are
members of the same
genera varied from each other by just 2.2 percent. Translation of the
percentage into an
actual number results in an average of just three skeletal differences out
of the total 338 bones in
the body. Amazingly, 58 percent of these differences occurred in the skull
alone.
"This is a lot less variation than I'd expected," said Novak, whose
advisor is Josh Smith, Ph.D., Washington University assistant professor of
Earth and Planetary Sciences. "As a concept, this is not statistically
perfect. But I think it's something taxonomists can consider if they are
in doubt over classifying something. It's a kind of benchmark with
historical validity."
Novak was able to determine, using her Archosaurian Morphospecies Concept,
that the Ghost Ranch Postosuchus was indeed the same species, Postosuchus
kirkpatricki, as the two specimens from Texas.
******
Looks like Stephanie Novak is building the 'genericometer' that George is
after. Very interesting.
Does anyone know of the citations for Novak's work? Is she on this list (or
is Josh still on it?). I'd be keen to hear more about this work.
Cheers
Colin