At 9:22 PM -0700 05/17/99, Michael Price wrote:

>Proof that even the National Geographic Society---which has become quite
>good at producing decent field guides---can stray outside its field of
>expertise (bird ID) and fall into one, some or all of the following errors
>of courtesy, process or judgement:
>
>A.)
>not paying the local rarities committee the elementary politeness of
>bothering to pick up the phone to find out what the committee's final
>decision was;
>
>B).
>making the mistake of counting chickens before they hatch, assuming that the
>assessment process on this species was merely perfunctory;
>
>C.)
>mistaking, as many twitchers clearly did, the wish for it to be countable as
>a BC/North American species for the reality (known in philosophy by the
>famous phrase, 'I want, therefore it is');
>
>D.)
>decide it knows best, and the local rarities committee can just piss off.


E.) [replaces A, B, C, and D]. The book was already 95% of the way through
the production process when the BC records committee reached its decision,
and there was no way NGS would stop the presses, at great cost, to
accommodate so trivial a change.

Anyway, the editors are absolutely correct in saying that a Xantus's
Hummingbird reached British Columbia. Even the BC records committee does
not dispute that. The only other "fact" we know for sure is that two
persons, who happen to be members of that committee, doubt that the bird
could have reached the province unassisted. That kind of information has
no place in a field guide of continental scope.

Think of it. First, a group of intelligent, skilled, knowledgeable, and
dedicated people carefully and conscienciously review the factual evidence
about the specific identity of such-and-such rare bird, and reach a
decision in the best traditions of the scientific method. Second, this
same group, putting on dark glasses and wizard hats, turns its attention to
pronouncing on how the bird may have got to where it was seen, this time in
the total absence of empirical evidence. What a transformation! The
committee in its second role reminds me of a bunch of theologians sitting
in a chapter-house somewhere in Europe in about the 12th century, solemnly
debating on the mechanics of the impregnation of the Virgin Mary.

I guess the message being sent by all such rarities committees is that
reason can only go so far, and after that, it's all a matter of faith.

Hal Opperman
Medina, Washington