[Taxacom] Race and taxonomy

[Thomas G. Lammers]

At 11:10 AM 10/7/2008, Richard Jensen wrote:
>Many physical anthropologists base their dismissal of the existence of 
>races on two observations: 1) genetic variation is clinal - the very 
>fuzziness that Pierre refers to; of course, if you ignore the middle of 
>the cline than the end points are clearly recognized as different; 2) the 
>lack of diagnostic markers - no phenotypic or genetic trait is unique to 
>any so-called race.

Hm.  That seems to describe an AWFUL lot of situations that confront us 
taxonomists when working at these levels of the hierarchy!
8-/



Thomas G. Lammers, Ph.D.

Associate Professor and Curator of the Herbarium (OSH)
Department of Biology and Microbiology
University of Wisconsin Oshkosh
Oshkosh, Wisconsin 54901-8640 USA

e-mail:       lammers at uwosh.edu
phone:      920-424-1002
fax:           920-424-1101

Plant systematics; classification, nomenclature, evolution, and 
biogeography of the Campanulaceae s. lat.

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