Re: DNA sequencing + Latin descriptions

dave evans (T442119@RUTADMIN.RUTGERS.EDU)
Fri, 06 Oct 95 20:16 EDT

> From: Fernando Rivadavia Lopes <ferndriv@USP.BR>
>
>
> Hey Jan, take it easy, we all misunderstand each other once in a
> while over these expresionless screens. Take the example of the people
> who understood I was against Latin nomenclatures (when it was really
> Latin descriptions).

I understand Jan's ire. I hate it when nonsense is taken for fact...
It used to really bother me when people had kept telling me that
S.leucophylla can't survive winter up here in the Northern states...
And they'd still tell me that after seeing the plants in person:
Ahhhhhhh! It is very important to put gather all the data within
your reach to make your conclusions as valuable as possible.

> I would say it another way: wouldn't both support each other?!?

Yeah, it would. Wouldn't it?. But what I was getting at is in
those cases where morphology isn't giving you the right pointers,
the DNA studies might given 'more weight' because we have already
seen that the results are postive for plants known to be related?
Have there been cases where the DNA studies have given data that
is flat out wrong? I know that is hard line to draw Jan and
Fernando, but do you see what I'm getting at. Or are we at the
point where the jury is still out and we must wait and see?

> And mine too, but doesn't it sound more likely that phylogeny
> based on the divergence of several genes would be better than phylogeny
> based on morphological characteristics which are just there to be
> observed and you don't really know which originated which nor how many
> times it could've happened over the course of evolution? Don't you
> agree that genes show and record these pathways better?
>
> 'Till the next round,

Please, just lets not fuel up the flame throwers. Last year was
enough for me. :)

Can we do that? Map out the course of evolution I mean. Or do
mean you beleive that this information is there and we might someday
make use of it? I can't really believe the whole record is there
but I'm no geneticist.

Dave Evans