post forwarded re names

[Grkovich, Alex]

As Alexander B. Klots wrote in his 1951 Field Guide: "...we use scientific
names every day without even giving it a thought: names like "nasturtium,
rhododendron, hippopotamus, rhinoceros...The learning of scientific names is
far easier than commonly believed..."

> -----Original Message-----
> From:	Ron Gatrelle [SMTP:gatrelle at tils-ttr.org]
> Sent:	Thursday, August 23, 2001 2:13 PM
> To:	Leps-l
> Subject:	post forwarded re names
> 
> I just have to pass this on.  It came in over the TAXACOM list serve.  The
> topic began with someone asking about _IF_ they should come up with a list
> of common names for nematodes and related organisms relative to
> communicating with farmers and pesticide people on product use etc. etc.
> The below post is from Dan Jansen at the University of Pennsylvania.  RG
> 
> Here tis.
> 
> 
> With respect to the anguish over common names, I would like to add that in
> training parataxonomists - rural residents carrying out massive inventory
> of species (plants, fungi, animals, microbes) in biocomplex tropical
> habitats in Costa Rica - we have found that simply teaching the scientific
> name (family, genus and species name) works beautifully.   In these
> species-rich ecosystems, there are extant common names for far less than
> 0.1% of the species, and it is commonplace for a genus to have 10-50
> species in it.
> 
> The parataxonomists (Spanish-speaking) have grade-school educations but
> are
> members of the adult workforce.  Whatever name is applied, it has to be
> learned by a combination of straight memorization and repeated use.
> "Schausiella santarosensis" is no more difficult to learn than is "schaus'
> guapinol eater", "guapinolgusano de santa rosa" or some other such
> invention.
> 
> By teaching scientific names in the first place - two clean words imbedded
> in an easily understood nomenclatorial construct - it is not necessary to
> learn a second parallel nomenclature in order to bring their knowledge
> into
> the global conversation.  The only drawback is that they do sometimes
> create their own imaginative spellings for a scientific name (especially
> when learned verbally initially), but as this name moves into databases
> (where spelling really matters), the errors are both easily corrected and
> become self-correcting as the parataxonomist communicates electronically
> with previous records and colleagues.
> 
> I should add that the imaginative mutation of spelling in scientific names
> in the field is NOTHING compared to the blizzard of geographically
> allopatric, parapatric and sympatric synonyms created by history,
> immigration and differential application throughout Latin America, all of
> which go through their own respective spelling mutations as well.   Even
> the sole source of New World amber is known by at least three different
> names throughout its range from Mexico to South America.
> 
> Having said this, let me also add from practical experience that the very
> large body of tropical peoples becoming users of the scientific names of
> tropical wild organisms is extremely frustrated by nomenclatorial changes
> generated by the scientific community when it shuffles species from genus
> to genus, changes family names, and changes species names due to
> synonomies
> (not so bad and can be accommodated) and grammar/gender arguments (very
> bad
> and generally ignored).  The sooner a stable nomenclature can be achieved
> for the (every day more computer-literate and web-literate) everyday user
> in the species-rich tropics, the better for them and the better for
> tropical conservation.
> 
> Dan Janzen
> University of Pennsylvania
> 
> 
> 
> >----- Original Message -----
> From: "Curtis Clark" <jcclark at CSUPOMONA.EDU>
> Subject: Re: Conventions for common names?
> 
> > At 02:36 PM 8/22/2001, Byron J. Adams wrote:
> >
> >Are there any guidelines or "rules of thumb" for establishing common
> names
> >for organisms that heretofore are known only by their scientific names?
> >
> >
> Don't.
> If nine-year-old boys can learn dinosaur names, growers can learn nematode
> names.
> Curtis Clark                 http://www.csupomona.edu/~jcclark/
> >
> >
> >MEGA double dittos on the don't and for the exact same reason.
> >
> >Ron Gatrelle, president
> >International Lepidoptera Survey
> 
> 
> 
> 
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