Re: Systematics and Paleontology

[Dinogeorge@xxxxxxx]

In a message dated 95-10-04 16:55:41 EDT, tey7004@geopsun.tamu.edu (Thomas E.
Yancey) writes:

>Systematics seems to have become subsumed within the theme of determining 
>phylogeny. In the process, descriptive systematic study is being lost in the

>welter of debate on how best to portray degrees of relatedness among taxa.
>This 
>philosophic quarrel inhibits workers from doing routine systematic work and 
>raises questions about the proper procedures for doing systematics. Is
>learning 
>the intricacies of cladistic methodologies more important than learning the 
>details of character state determination needed for completing a
>comprehensive 
>morphologic description of a taxon? Both require considerable skill in 
>application to obtain useful results. In most cases, the teaching of skills
>in 
>character state determination is the secondary step, especially since 
>relationships are evaluated on the basis of a selected set of characters,
not
>a 
>comprehensive set.

A friend recently relayed the following tidbit in this regard, from an
upcoming paleontology graduate student: "I don't do descriptions; I score
characters." The latest trend?