Wait a minute. There is a sequence of terms involved in botany: A name must be effectively published, then checked to see if it is valid, and then legitimate in breaking no rules, and them correct in that "Each taxonomic group with a particular circumscription, position, and rank can bear only one correct name, the earliest that is in accordance with the Rules, except in specified cases. (Principle IV).

So we are talking about one name per recognized taxon. What that name is can be approached nomenclaturally by seeing which homotypic or heterotypic synonym is earliest for the entity at that rank, plus legitimately published. Sometimes informatics questions can be solved with the Rules, which is nice.

In cases where the rules don't fix a problem, we can use the well-known philosophical idea that if you phrase the question right, an idea of the answer presents itself. Suppose two authorities have a different idea of what rank or in which genus a species should be. Since we are scientists, we should be able to check the methods the authorities used to analyze the situation. Maybe they didn't use any analytic methods, in which case the study is not replicable and it isn't science; well then that is when a user selects a name subjectively from silly taxonomy. Not good.

But most of the time taxonomists use some kind of method, or heuristics, or system, and so on, no matter how informal or perfunctory. So a user can ask, what was this system and are the studies replicable? Did different authors sample the same group? Were the samples big enough? If not big enough and analogy was used, what analogy? What heuristic or species concept or genus concept was used to sort groups? Surely if taxonomists are really scientists, their methods are amenable to formalization and replication from the same sampled data set. Such methods are not limited to only phenetics or only phylogenetics, but some combination of methods that works to cluster specimens into optimal groups that reflect both obvious similarity and less obvious evolution.

Again, I think, yes, many taxa are well known as distinct at some level and are generally agreed upon. But for a myriad taxa, we have little data, little access to well-sampled material, few funds or students or time to do the biosystematics needed to truly understand these taxa. Clear circumscriptions agreed upon by most are possible, in my opinion. Asking taxonomists for clear circumscriptions agreed upon most right now this instant is more like "Hurry up now, we are waiting, waiting, waiting."

* * * * * * * * * * * * Richard H. Zander Missouri Botanical Garden, PO Box 299, St. Louis, MO 63166-0299 USA Web sites: http://www.mobot.org/plantscience/resbot/ and http://www.mobot.org/plantscience/bfna/bfnamenu.htm Modern Evolutionary Systematics Web site: http://www.mobot.org/plantscience/resbot/21EvSy.htm

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