. etc, etc, etc,

mbpi at juno.com mbpi at juno.com
Tue Oct 22 21:15:02 EDT 2002


Naaaayy, naaayyy!!!!!!!  (That's a "horse" bleating her "pashionate"
response...) ;-)

Once again, the ugly reality of email and its propensity for
misinterpretation has reared its sociopathic head along the
"misinformation highway."

Now that I have calmed down (so to speak) since my previous posting, I
can at least find the humor in being misconstrued, if not down-right
insulted (!)

Let me just qualify that I was NOT making a statement against Lepidoptera
nomenclature:  having to categorize "micro-moth 1,2,3, etc.," to an Order
is pretty cut-and-dried, thanks to there being only ONE order to deal
with.  Things get a bit more messy when you are dealing with other
organisms...and I doubt anyone on "leps-talk" would be willing to tackle
some of the cryptic "sightings" of the various organisms that I am
working with...not to mention the misspelled nomenclature (as opposed to
"names").  And since I am working within a "short time frame," as opposed
to having a year to delve into all the "literature," I have to resort to
what is available online...

Who said anything about "common names?!"  I didn't...except in relation
to birds...which are pretty well established in the North American
vernacular.  I was just making a point...which I should know by now is
strictly "verboten" by those who go strictly by scientific nomenclature
and can't possibly concede that some groups find it "easier" to use
common names as opposed to scientific nomenclature in certain contexts...

You know, I sincerely believe that anyone who voices their perception of
reality on this listserv, is immediately categorized as "a lunatic," or
worse, a dumbo, if it doesn't corroborate with the prevailing mind set. 
Just because my experiences and perceptions don't jive with your biased
"take" on how it SHOULD be...the sad truth is...it just plain ISN'T.  And
THAT'S "reality.." 

If YOU know how to "filter out" Korean email, than please...let us ALL
"in" on it!

M.B. Prondzinski


On Tue, 22 Oct 2002 03:43:14 -0400 Ron Gatrelle <gatrelle at tils-ttr.org>
writes:
> 
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: <mbpi at juno.com>
> To: <LEPS-L at lists.yale.edu>
> Sent: Monday, October 21, 2002 11:24 PM
> Subject: Re: [leps-talk] vs. Glassberg's books vs. renegade 
> nomenclature,
> vs. etc, etc, etc,
> 
> 
> > Most recently, I have been wending my desultory way through the 
> vast
> > wasteland of scientific nomenclature and its omnipresent and 
> oppressive
> > "discrepancies" that strew the information highway like so much 
> toilet
> > paper shrouding the "adversaries" front yard...
> 
> These statements are meaningless.  Is this North American 
> scientific
> nomenclature you are talking about or somewhere else?   Popular 
> literature
> is not scientific literature.  Scientific nomenclature is not a set 
> of
> names one bestows on living things wily nilly.  They are technical 
> terms
> conveying systematic relationships.  They are to organisms what H2O 
> and Au
> are to elements.  When researchers discover that past systematic
> understanding of organic relationship has been in error they are 
> duty bound
> to adjust the terms to the proper taxonomic alignments.   
> Researchers at
> times differ on which alignments are correct.  Lay people have a 
> problem
> with these terms because they think they are names.  Yes, they are 
> commonly
> referred to as "names" even by scientists, but "name" is used here 
> as slang
> for what they really are - technical terms.
> 
> At the trinomial level all these scientific epithets are unchanged 
> over the
> centuries.   They _all_ apply to the exact same entity the 
> originally did.
> It has at times been found that someone else gave a different 
> epithet to
> the same biological entity at an earlier point in time, and in such 
> cases
> the earlier technical identifier takes "priority" over the latter - 
> but the
> ID attached to each entity remains exactly the same.   A synonomy 
> just
>  The most frequent realignment over the centuries is at the rank or
> level of Genus.   This is where taxa are actually shifted to 
> different
> organic associations.   There is nothing anyone can do about this 
> nor is
> there anything anyone should do about this. -  unless we want some 
> kind of
> systematic dark ages.  Which it seems some do want - enter dumbing 
> down.
> Anti-science.
> 
> Now to common names. These are actual names.   Have you visited the 
> SC-NABN
> list of common names?   It is the most complete list on the planet 
> of
> US/Canadian butterfly/skipper common names is any format.  The vast
> majority of these names have been around for a long time.  I think 
> the
> average lepster may be unaware that these taxa and their common 
> names
> exist.  A comparison of the SC-NABN, USGS & NABA common names lists 
> will
> show that they are probably 98% identical.  SC-NABN just lists 
> hundreds
> more of them as it lists hundreds more taxa.  Don't bitch about what 
> you
> refuse to utilize.
> 
> > I'm afraid "renegade nomenclature" exists throughout the ENTIRE
> > taxanomical heirarchy, if one wishes to point a finger at one 
> single
> > instigator.
> 
> The phrase "renegade nomenclature" has been introduced onto this 
> list serve
> as it was lifted by me as a quote from a recent review of J. 
> Glassberg's
> BTB books in the latest issue of the Journal of the Lepidopterists'
> Society - a society that has as its President the owner of THIS list 
> serve.
> One will have to read it in context to know how it was applied and 
> thus
> defined.
> 
> > And despite the fact that I don't even "pretend" to be a
> > know-it-all, I'll be damned if the self-proclaimed "know-it-alls" 
> are
> > WILLING to HELP me weed through the discrepancies (!)
> 
> Hey, you don't have to convince me you are not a know it all.  I 
> don't know
> about "know-it-alls" but there are a number of people at Leps-talk 
> who
> spend a lot of time helping folks answer nomenclatorial (and many 
> other)
> questions - but you wouldn't know anything about that as you have 
> refused
> to participate there.  Don't bitch about what you refuse to 
> utilize.
> 
>  So you all can wax
> > pedantic as much as you like, but when push-comes-to shove...show 
> me the
> > money!
> 
> I have tried.  I have at least three times over the months 
> personally
> invited you to join and check out leps-talk.  You can lead a horse 
> to
> water....  Well, I guess some times one can't even do that.
> 
> > That being said, in response to Ron's attesting to setting up his
> > leps-talk listserv in response to a need to get across his agenda 
> (and
> > there is nothing wrong with that)...
> 
> First of all that is a total falsehood.  The list sereve was the 
> idea of
> Harry Pavulaan - not me.  I ended up setting it up, thats all.   It 
> is not
> MY listserve.  What is my agenda?   Have I said?   Do you know?   I 
> am not
> to TILS what Glassberg is to NABA.
> 
> I, for one, can't even fathom the
> > extreme folly of subscribing to another listserv!  The thought of
> > receiving another 100 Korean emails for every 5 listserv-relevant
> > postings, stops me short of ever subscribing to anything again.  
> How many
> > pleas from Mr. Ugauaballo in Nigeria to transfer his monies into 
> my bank
> > account can a person stand?!
> snip more fictitious bla, bla, bla
> 
> Apparently you do not belong to any Yahoo group.  I never receive 
> any adds
> from any Yahoo emails and Leps-talk and Moth-rah are configured 
> (moderated)
> so that the spamers can't post anything.    There are some folks I 
> have
> heard of that get adds with their Yahoo groups emails - but that is 
> their
> own fault because they don't know how to set their own computer to 
> cut it
> off or set their Yahoo account to not send them any.  Unlike leps-l 
> one
> can't even get attachments through our Leps-talk Yahoo group - or 
> forwards
> from other groups..
> 
> Ron
> 
> 
> 
> 
>  
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> 
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> 
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>  
> 
> 
> 
> 

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