Quite obviously Patrick is interested in my posts enough to "answer" several of them. It is also quite obvious that he has nothing to refute my arguments.



For those who are interested in Iguanian classification rather than to engage in childish antics, here is another quote from Kurt Schwenk:



"Although I disagree with most of Lazell’s (1992) particulars, I share with him a certain dissatisfaction with the iguanian taxonomy proposed by Frost and Etheridge (1989). I am not persuaded by the arguments against the metataxon convention that would have allowed traditional family names to stand until the weight of evidence showed otherwise. I am not convinced that use of formal family names for traditional "iguanid taxa, rather than informal names, helps us to understand better evolution within Iguania, so long as we are clear about their monophyletic status. However, these feelings are moot; Frost and Etheridge's (1989) taxonomy will stand or fall depending on usage. Its widespread acceptance in the comparative literature indicates that it is here to stay."



Schwenk is wrong again. The widespread acceptance of Frost and Etheridge's proposal is by the "starlings" sensu Galileo, and the "starlings" befoul the literature by accepting untenable taxonomic proposals such as that of Frost and Etheridge. The knowledgeable herpetologists, people like George Zug and James D. Lazell, who are Galileo's "eagles", fly alone. Knowledgeable herpetologists reject Frost and Etheridge's proposal in spite of the "starlings". Since Frost et al. have also adopted the separation of Agamidae and Chamaeleonidae in 2001, they too have rejected their own earlier proposal. Even Schwenk admits that the weight of the evidence is not enough to splinter the Iguanidae. Sure enough, new evidence shows that it is best to recognize the Iguanidae as a single family, instead of the destructive arrangement of eight different ones.

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