Re: paleonet Dinosaur Genera List corrections #176

["Robert L. Fleisher" <forams@xxxxxxxxx>]

> As I perused the dissertation, I got to thinking about whether or not such
> dissertation names should be considered as published. The International Code
> of Zoological Nomenclature expressly excludes dissertations from their
> definition of a publication, so there is no question that the above taxa,
> despite their documentation in the dissertation and its subsequent
> distribution, are not available as scientific names. But the Dinosaur Genera
> List has a broader definition of what constitutes a published dinosaur name.
> Clearly, such documents as emails, Internet websites, interoffice memoranda,
> scientists' notebooks, private conference abstracts, manuscripts,
> limited-distribution preprints, and so forth are not publications. Neither
> are dissertations limited to a few personal and library copies. But when a
> dissertation becomes available to >anyone< with $31 through University
> Microfilms International, in endless multiple copies produced from a single
> master, this is publication. An essential part of the concept of publication
> is availability and distribution, and the Dinosaur Genera List deems printed
> documents available freely or by purchase to any interested readers, in
> multiple identical copies, to be publications. The method of printing is not
> relevant, as long as a more or less permanent paper copy is produced; the
> availability is.

I don't think so.  According to Article 8.1.3 of the current Code of Zoological
Nomenclature, one criterion of publication is that the work "must have been
produced in an edition containing simultaneously obtainable copies ...."  My
understanding is that University Microfilms generates copies of dissertations on
demand--you send them your payment, they make a copy--a condition which fails to
satisfy the "simultaneously obtainable copies" criterion.  It seems to me that the
Code is very clearly limiting "publication" to publications that produce in one
printing a batch of copies and then distribute them at one time, like a journal,
or gradually, like a monograph.  Either way, University Microfilms copies fail to
qualify as publications, and new names contained in them would not be available
and hence would be nomina nuda.  A "nomen dissertatio" would be a simple nomen
nudum as well. By the way, if you think University Microfilms qualifies as a
publication, I don't understand why you don't think the names would be available.

Bob Fleisher
Houston, TX

>
>
> Accordingly, I have set up a new category of dinosaur name, the nomen
> dissertatio, for dinosaur names appearing in dissertations that are made
> available to all through services such as University Microfilms
> International. Such names are not scientifically available, so they are a
> kind of nomen nudum, or vernacular name. If the name created in a
> dissertation is later formally published, then its listing would change from
> a nomen dissertatio to that of an available scientific name. Should the
> dissertation name change on publication, the name would remain in the List,
> but with a pointer to the correct scientific name. The year of publication is
> the year the dissertation was made available through the publication service,
> not necessarily the year the dissertation was completed.
>
> Incidentally, my Latin is not good enough to permit me to settle on the
> designation nomen dissertatio. If someone can suggest a better or more
> appropriate term, then I'll change it by all means. Also, what would the
> plural of nomen dissertatio be? Nomina --what?
>
> So names #926 and 927 of the Dinosaur Genera List become:
>
> Alashansaurus Chure, 2001 [nomen dissertatio]
> Szechuanoraptor Chure, 2001 [nomen dissertatio]
>
> Adding the new taxa to the forthcoming second printing of Mesozoic Meanderings
>  #3 will require some dismantling and rearranging of the listings for
> Allosaurus and Chilantaisaurus, as put forth in the dissertation. This I
> haven't yet finished, so I cannot present them here.
>
> If anybody knows of other dissertations that contain new dinosaur names >and<
> that are available as described above, I would like to hear from you. It is
> my aim to make the Dinosaur Genera List as complete as possible in this
> respect.