At 11:19 PM 5/18/99 -0700, Michael Price wrote:

>So trivial that the mere mention of the damn thing incites flames for days.

No, it was your insistence that the NGS was somehow obligated to pay
attention to the BC RBC that caused this little round. Your aggrieved
response to the little note to tweeters pointing out that Xantu's was
in it as a BC vagrant.

Has it dawned on you yet that the person who posted that little tidbit
was firing a barb in your direction?

At least, I suspect it was intentional.

The whole thing's pretty funny, isn't it?

There's a simple solution - if you're offended that you and the
others on the committee weren't consulted by NGS, don't buy the book.

>Well, rug-weavers the world around deliberately leave a small flaw in their
>carpets reasoning that only God is capable of perfection. And Heaven forfend
>that the mighty National Geographic Society would stop its presses for such
>a trivial purpose as ensuring accuracy--I'm properly chastised for having
>the thought.

Unproven assumption: RBC records are accurate.

They're conservative, and hopefully records accepted by the RBC have
a high degree of reliability, but given that only a subset of sightings
are ever reported to RBCs, it is clear that they CAN'T be accurate.

>>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.

>Well, this member of the committee may disagree on the bird's acceptability
>to the BC List, but certainly I can stipulate that whether it flew here as a
>vagrant or was carried here in someone's back pocket as a good-luck piece,
>it did reach BC. Somehow.

Then, where's the beef?

>
>>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.
>
>Or are very uncertain that it did so; ex officio, I'm uncertain about how it
>got here (as a Greek chorus might say, "He doesn't know! He doesn't know! He
>doesn't know!"), but personally, I allow myself to doubt it got here
>unassisted: fine-point difference, but I try to keep the two separate.

Totally subjective. If you were to rigorously apply the same standard
of doubt to past records, you'd be weeding out a few, I'm sure. There
must be other vagrant records where it has not been proven beyond a
reasonable doubt (your words) that the bird flew there on its own.

The records can not be accurate, in any objective sense of the word.

>
>>That kind of information has
>>no place in a field guide of continental scope.
>
>Sorry, but I have to dispute this remark

Then write and sell your own field guide.

>: the fact that this species was not
>accepted to the BC List is of utmost importance unless the National G is now
>in the business of telling Canada &/or its provinces their committees'
>decisions mean nothing if the G decides so.

Well, we Americans tend to think that of Canada anyway, don't we :)

It's a field guide. It doesn't purport to be a book of official
records.

Let's put the shoe on the other foot, Michael - when did the RBC get
into the business of telling NGS what it can, or can not, publish?

I think I'm going to buy ten copies of it, too. And I know damned
well that I'll never submit a record to the BC records committee.

>>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.

>Sorry, must have missed that meeting, Hal---too busy thinking about possible
>natural and artificial means of transport.

Yes, exactly as Hal describes, too - there was a total lack of empirical
evidence. Guessing isn't objective.

>I'm really baffled why the BC committee has been so singled
>out for such spitefully inane criticism for doing its job properly.

Perhaps because one member, at least, seems to feel he is the
sole judge of the definition of "properly"? And makes this clear
in repeated, condescending posts on the subject while making it
crystal clear that the decision was strictly subjective, with no
evidence to suggest anything other than arrival by natural means?

In other words, you voted no because its appearance astonished you.

> Sorry,
>but I---and, I hope, my fellow committee-members---won't rubberstamp for
>anyone, no matter how much he or she wants a species' tick on a checklist.

And I suspect NGS will continue to use a variety of sources when compiling
distribution data, no matter how much you wish them to supplicate themselves
on your front stoop.




- Don Baccus, Portland OR <dhogaza at pacifier.com>
Nature photos, on-line guides, and other goodies at
http://donb.photo.net