O.K. I'll bite. What does it mean to "think cladistically"?

Jane Hadley
Seattle

On Mon, 5 Feb 1996, David Wright wrote:

> Hmm, I still think it is more likely to be resistance to change from an
> old, familiar way to a new, foreign way of thinking. That seems to be a
> fairly common trait among humans as well. Cladistic sytematists have made
> the shift to "tree-thinking," after all, and the last time I looked even
> traditional systematists (most of them, anyhow) still classify us as humans.
> And as to efficient classification, the cladistic system is *more*
> efficient than the classic Linnaean system, as the cladistic system is
> purely hierarchical, whereas the Linnaean system is a quasi-hierarchical
> system of "pigeonholes" (i.e., the categories). This pigeonholing
> distorts the way we see biodiversity. It does seem that resistance to
> thinking cladistically is greatest among those who already know the
> Linnaean system well, as one might predict.
>
> David Wright
> dwright at u.washington.edu
>
> On Mon, 5 Feb 1996, Eugene Hunn wrote:
>
> > David et al.,
> >
> > It's possible the persistence of "tradition" here is rooted more in human
> > psychology that resistance to "rational innovation." The human mind has
> > evolved to efficiently classified the elements of experience. Our minds
> > did not evolve to do "Science," with a capital S. The Linnean system is a
> > systematization of the contemporary European vernacular classifications &
> > nomenclatures and shares basic features with folk systems of most if not
> > all cultures and languages, including binomial names and a hierarchy of
> > ranks. You can program your computers to operate according to different
> > principles, but I suspect you will find it exceedingly difficult to
> > program the human mind to operate in ways foreign to its nature.
> >
> > Gene Hunn.
> >
> > On Fri, 2 Feb 1996, David Wright wrote:
> >
> > > Oops. My previous message on this topic went out inadvertantly before
> > > I had a chance to proofread it (someone walked into the office; I
> > > intended to postpone the message, but hit the wrong key on autopilot
> > > and mailed it instead). I hope the numerous typos and glitches are
> > > obvious as such.
> > >
> > > The last part of that message was about how a system of naming taxa
> > > without assigning them to ranked categories (family, genus, species, etc)
> > > would do away with the host of problems associated with our antiquated
> > > (literally pre-evolutionary) Linnaean system. Binomials are only part of
> > > the problem; the myriad comparative analyses published each year at the
> > > "generic" "familial," etc. "levels" -- when such "levels" do not exist --
> > > are another part; splitting and lumping of taxa are yet another artifact
> > > of having categories; and there's even more. But don't hold your breath.
> > > Moving to a saner system has been proposed, but people scream bloody murder
> > > about breaking with tradition (kind of like DOS living on). Looks like
> > > we'll be using 18th century classification and its attendant foibles well
> > > into the new millenium. It's important to maintain a sense of humor.
> > >
> > > David Wright
> > > dwright at u.washington.edu
> > >
> >
>