[CPN] Discussion to incorporate elements of CMB proposal

Fri May 11 16:39:32 EDT 2012

It is indeed unfortunate that the authors of the proposal found out about the vote indirectly.   It would have been courteous to notify them of the results of the first vote even though there will be subsequent votes on portions of their proposal.  Unfortunately, none of us thought of this.  In my case (and perhaps all of us), it didn't occur to me because I view the decision-making process as unfinished.

I certainly agree with Dave that we should communicate directly with the proposal authors soon.  I think our communication should include an apology for not having informed them right away of the initial vote.  I also think that we should notify them directly of future votes, not just rely on postings on the ISPN website.  Here is a suggested revision of Dave's message to them:

Thank you for your thoughtful proposal for changes to the PhyloCode, with respect to species.  The CPN has voted to reject the proposal as an entire entity but also decided to continue discussion to determine if there are elements of your proposal that we would like to incorporate in the next revision of the draft code.  I apologize on behalf of the CPN for not having informed you promptly about the initial vote, an oversight that was related to the fact that we are still discussing elements of the proposal and thus view the decision-making process as still in progress.  At the conclusion of this discussion, we will inform you of the outcome as well as posting the CPN decision on the news section of the ISPN website.

How does this sound?
Phil

On May 11, 2012, at 3:30 PM, David Tank wrote:

Hi All,

It's been brought to my attention that the results of the vote on the CMB proposal have been made public:  http://3lbmonkeybrain.blogspot.com/2012/05/phylocode-will-not-be-amended.html

Clearly community discussion is what we wanted all along, but the unfortunate thing is that the authors of the proposal found out about the results of the vote not from us, but through the grapevine via this blog, and they are not too happy about it.

I feel that it is our responsibility to communicate directly with the authors to let them know where we are in this process and give them some idea of the discussion that took place.  Something along the lines of:

Thank you for your thoughtful proposal for changes to the PhyloCode, with respect to species.  The CPN has voted to reject this proposal, however, with that decision, the committee also decided to continue discussion of the proposal to identify if there are elements of the proposal we would like to consider as revisions of the current draft code.  That discussion is still ongoing, and we will make you and the rest of the society aware of these changes through the news section of the ISPN website.

Please feel free to edit - add, delete, etc. - I want this communication with the authors of the proposal to come from the CPN, not just me, so I appreciate your input.  Also, I wonder if we should post several of the responses and or snippets of the discussion for the authors and rest of the society to see?  For example, I feel that Dick Olmstead's review that he shared with the committee, David Hillis' comments, and Kevin's response do a very good job of articulating the position of the CPN, and it seems like the authors and the society should be aware of these.  Any thoughts?

Best,
Dave

_________________________________
David C. Tank
Assistant Professor & Director, Stillinger Herbarium
University of Idaho
208.885.7033
dtank at uidaho.edu<mailto:dtank at uidaho.edu>
http://www.phylodiversity.net/dtank/

On May 9, 2012, at 9:10 AM, Mike Keesey wrote:

On Thu, May 3, 2012 at 8:40 AM, Cantino, Philip <cantino at ohio.edu<mailto:cantino at ohio.edu>> wrote:
Here is a revised definition of "species" that I proposed for the glossary
in January, incorporating a change that Michel recommended on an earlier
draft I sent to the CPN:

species.  A taxonomic unit that is variably conceptualized as a kind of
biological entity that may or may not be different from a clade or simply as
a taxon of low rank in traditional nomenclature.  This code does not endorse
any species concept nor provide rules for defining species names, but it
uses species names governed by the rank-based codes to refer to taxa that
are used as specifiers in definitions of clade names.  Article 21 provides
guidelines for the use of species names governed by the rank-based codes in
conjunction with clade names governed by this code.

I like this definition. The first sentence is a bit difficult to read,
though. Perhaps: "A taxonomic unit that is variably conceptualized as
a kind of biological entity (which may or may not be different from a
clade) or as a taxon of low rank in traditional nomenclature."

While we're on the subject of updating the code, I note that some of
the other codes have changed their names since the last draft of the
PhyloCode was created. The International Code of Botanical
Nomenclature (or the Botanical Code) is now the International Code of
Nomenclature for algae, fungi, and plants (ICN) and the International
Code of Nomenclature of Bacteria (or the Bacteriological Code) is now
the International Code of Nomenclature of Prokaryotes (ICNP). These
are trivial updates that should be included in the next draft.

This was published yesterday by the International Committee on Bionomenclature:

David & al. (2012). Biological nomenclature terms for facilitating
communication in the naming of organisms. ZooKeys 192:67–72.
http://dx.doi.org/10.3897/zookeys.192.3347

It's basically an updated version of PhyloCode's Appendix C (itself
based on a BioCode appendix, IIRC). Happy to see it includes the
PhyloCode! I'd say the next draft should probably use it verbatim
(except with the PhyloCode column first, an additional row for
"converted" nomenclatural status, and perhaps any rows where
PhyloCode's entry is "[none]" omitted).
--
T. Michael Keesey
http://tmkeesey.net/

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