Posted by:
CKing
at Thu Nov 13 15:19:26 2003 [ Email Message ] [ Show All Posts by CKing ]
Let me quote Herndon Dowling, who criticized Collins' proposal to use the so-called evolutionary species concept to elevate many subspecies to new species. WW's methodology is quite similar so Dowling's comments applies to him as well.
"In summary, Collins’s methodology is reminiscent of, and perhaps an attempt to return to, 'Taylor Taxonomy.' E. H. Taylor was a very active and long-lived herpetologist (in Collins’s same institution at Kansas) whom I admired in many respects. His working method, however, led to a plethora of species descriptions--many of which were later shown to be invalid. I was able to observe this methodology a number of times. Taylor would set out a number of museum specimens for study, and would methodically observe, measure, and record the various morphological features of each specimen. If he came upon one that appeared different or otherwise interesting, he would consult the original descriptions of appropriate, presumably similar taxa, and compare those descriptions with the specimen in hand. If the specimen differed (or was distinguishable) from the characteristics described by the previous authors, it was obviously a different taxon, and so he described it as new. Collins’s method is similar, but without the close examination of specimens."
Unlike Collins, WW do examine museum specimens. Like Collins, WW is trying to return to "Taylor taxonomy." For example, WW described "Drymarchon melanurus" as a new species (distinct from Drymarchon corais, because "D. melanurus" is morphologically different from D. corais. Like Edward Taylor, many of the species WW and his comrades (who subscribe to typological species concepts) recognize will almost certainly be shown to be invalid by later workers who re-examine the same material.
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