Taxacom: Single official lists of taxa (sensu Doug Yanega many proposals to this list)

[John Noyes]

You are right about that. However, I think give it a few years and everyone would accept the changes and even changing nearly 20% of the names would promote stability because once changed they would never change again. I have always been amazed at how quickly the general public accept name changes. People grumble about it for a few months and then accept the change. Just look at the bird people who accept vernacular name changes with hardly a twitch (and that seems to happen much more than changes in the scientific names). Most people I know use the vernacular names for bumblebees as well so that is possibly not a good example. It is usually only the specialists that use the scientific names.

Trichogramma is derived from hair line. So far as I remember gramma used in this sense is feminine. However,  I cannot argue against the code on this, but I think your example, and other similar examples, clearly illustrate how unnecessary this part of the code is. Drop gender agreement and you simplify the code at a stroke. The code should really only be there to determine availability and precedence, gender agreement should have nothing at all to do with it because it has nothing at all to do with taxonomy.

By dropping gender agreement no taxonomist would ever have to do a linguistic search again and they would also not have to consult a list of names. Your argument goes both ways.

All the best.

John

-----Original Message-----
From: Taxacom <taxacom-bounces at lists.ku.edu> On Behalf Of Douglas Yanega via Taxacom
Sent: Wednesday, July 5, 2023 11:18 PM
To: taxacom at lists.ku.edu
Subject: Re: Taxacom: Single official lists of taxa (sensu Doug Yanega many proposals to this list)

On 7/5/23 1:54 PM, John Noyes wrote:
> Hi Doug,
>
> Fair enough, but you cannot get away from the argument that gender
> agreement is just simply 100% unnecessary. Forget about it being a
> waste of time. If we all worked on the premise that all genera have no
> gender then it would make life a whole lot easier. Like many people I
> definitely prefer the original spelling.

And you work, by and large, with species names that rarely enter the non-taxonomic literature. In contrast, using a few other hymenopteran genera as examples, consider that many of the most common bumblebee species in the world, and many of the most common ants, and many of the most common paper wasps, would all suddenly have to change spellings because they have been in masculine genera for over 100 years, but their original Linnaean or Fabrician genera were feminine (e.g., Apis, Formica, and Vespa). The many people - including laypeople - who are familiar with common European species like Bombus lapidarius, Camponotus herculeanus, and Polistes gallicus wouldn't be happy *at all*.


The best estimate is that around 1/6th of the most well-known animal species in the world would have to change their spellings if we revert to original spellings (excluding butterflies). That would be the absolute biggest public relations nightmare we could ever ask for. If you think the furor over "offensive names" is bad, just imagine how much worse the public outcry would be if we told everyone that 1/6th of the animal species they know suddenly have different scientific names.


Maybe, if you worked on a group in the public awareness, you might feel a little differently about the matter.


> That way it would be completely objective and 100% stable.

Changing 1/6th of all well-known names is *not* promoting stability.

> However, if we had to determine the gender of every single genus it
> would probably take at least 3 weeks even using the system that you
> might be talking about because there is a good proportion of names
> that would have to be argued over (e.g. Trichogramma, one of the
> best-known genera in parasitic wasps which is currently used as neuter
> whereas it is actually of female gender; Tetramesa is another that
> springs to mind). Also, If we had to check the status (adjective, noun
> in apposition, etc.) of every species name it would take a good six
> months, even using the UCD. I think 6 months is minimum because very
> many names appear to be adjectival, but might just be nouns in
> apposition, e.g. flavus (a Roman general).
>
You seem to have missed the point I was making, that we don't want
anyone to "argue over" anything, ever again. Complying with gender
agreement can be trivially easy, and not involve any linguistic research
at all, *and no arguing*.


Case in point, under Article 30.1.2 of the Code, all names ending in
"-gramma" are neuter, because "γράμμα" (gramma) is a Greek neuter noun
transliterated directly into the Latin alphabet, and usage by the
coining author is explicitly not taken into consideration.


"30.1.2. a genus-group name that is or ends in a Greek word
transliterated into Latin without other changes takes the gender given
for that word in standard Greek dictionaries"


https://nam10.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fen.wiktionary.org%2Fwiki%2F%25CE%25B3%25CF%2581%25CE%25AC%25CE%25BC%25CE%25BC%25CE%25B1&data=05%7C01%7Ctaxacom%40lists.ku.edu%7Cfaadd7f803c7431fab8708db7e01bafa%7C3c176536afe643f5b96636feabbe3c1a%7C0%7C0%7C638242318121867321%7CUnknown%7CTWFpbGZsb3d8eyJWIjoiMC4wLjAwMDAiLCJQIjoiV2luMzIiLCJBTiI6Ik1haWwiLCJXVCI6Mn0%3D%7C3000%7C%7C%7C&sdata=MP4KTo89Yr8gZUAukDN%2B3GRPaAYhWMIDQyYWIAg%2BDrg%3D&reserved=0


You appear instead to be looking at "γραμμή" (gramme), which is indeed
feminine, but does not transliterate as "gramma".


https://nam10.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fen.wiktionary.org%2Fwiki%2F%25CE%25B3%25CF%2581%25CE%25B1%25CE%25BC%25CE%25BC%25CE%25AE&data=05%7C01%7Ctaxacom%40lists.ku.edu%7Cfaadd7f803c7431fab8708db7e01bafa%7C3c176536afe643f5b96636feabbe3c1a%7C0%7C0%7C638242318121867321%7CUnknown%7CTWFpbGZsb3d8eyJWIjoiMC4wLjAwMDAiLCJQIjoiV2luMzIiLCJBTiI6Ik1haWwiLCJXVCI6Mn0%3D%7C3000%7C%7C%7C&sdata=7qBjo4lMNYuVislH9JsGxPWIdEhiknb8020PY6Y3Egc%3D&reserved=0


In fact, there is a natively Latin noun "gramma" already, and it is also
neuter.


https://nam10.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fen.wiktionary.org%2Fwiki%2Fgramma%23Latin&data=05%7C01%7Ctaxacom%40lists.ku.edu%7Cfaadd7f803c7431fab8708db7e01bafa%7C3c176536afe643f5b96636feabbe3c1a%7C0%7C0%7C638242318121867321%7CUnknown%7CTWFpbGZsb3d8eyJWIjoiMC4wLjAwMDAiLCJQIjoiV2luMzIiLCJBTiI6Ik1haWwiLCJXVCI6Mn0%3D%7C3000%7C%7C%7C&sdata=Z6ll8sBa20vyM6SyY13FBpZb92SK37jEidoHlisBDn8%3D&reserved=0


Accordingly, we appear to have an argument on our hands. However,
*arguing* is a waste of your time and my time. It would save everyone a
lot of annoyance if you were able to simply consult an official list of
genus names and suffixes, where it says "-gramma" is always neuter and
"-gramme" is always feminine. *Then there is no more argument*. Same for
declaring that names like "flavus" are always adjectival, even if
someone, somewhere, used them as a noun. If we try hard enough, can we
dig up obscure references that use nouns as adjectives, or adjectives as
nouns? Maybe we can, but linguistic research is *not our job*.


No taxonomist should *ever* have to do linguistic research again; we CAN
eliminate that, by having lists, and still keep gender agreement
completely intact as a practice. All of the alternatives to official
lists are much worse, including the status quo.


Sincerely,

--
Doug Yanega      Dept. of Entomology       Entomology Research Museum
Univ. of California, Riverside, CA 92521-0314     skype: dyanega
phone: (951) 827-4315 (disclaimer: opinions are mine, not UCR's)
              https://nam10.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Ffaculty.ucr.edu%2F~heraty%2Fyanega.html&data=05%7C01%7Ctaxacom%40lists.ku.edu%7Cfaadd7f803c7431fab8708db7e01bafa%7C3c176536afe643f5b96636feabbe3c1a%7C0%7C0%7C638242318121867321%7CUnknown%7CTWFpbGZsb3d8eyJWIjoiMC4wLjAwMDAiLCJQIjoiV2luMzIiLCJBTiI6Ik1haWwiLCJXVCI6Mn0%3D%7C3000%7C%7C%7C&sdata=ltz%2BMDs%2Fl1xp5aNx3bsiDpoPJJr5a7rGL3u62%2BnY1to%3D&reserved=0
   "There are some enterprises in which a careful disorderliness
         is the true method" - Herman Melville, Moby Dick, Chap. 82
_______________________________________________
Taxacom Mailing List

Send Taxacom mailing list submissions to: taxacom at lists.ku.edu
For list information; to subscribe or unsubscribe, visit: https://lists.ku.edu/listinfo/taxacom
You can reach the person managing the list at: taxacom-owner at lists.ku.edu
The Taxacom email archive back to 1992 can be searched at: https://nam10.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Ftaxacom.markmail.org%2F&data=05%7C01%7Ctaxacom%40lists.ku.edu%7Cfaadd7f803c7431fab8708db7e01bafa%7C3c176536afe643f5b96636feabbe3c1a%7C0%7C0%7C638242318121867321%7CUnknown%7CTWFpbGZsb3d8eyJWIjoiMC4wLjAwMDAiLCJQIjoiV2luMzIiLCJBTiI6Ik1haWwiLCJXVCI6Mn0%3D%7C3000%7C%7C%7C&sdata=A01yYGY5WpRzyOLs6yWt4pM9zt40t40Ze0Vad%2BXMOMo%3D&reserved=0

Nurturing nuance while assailing ambiguity and admiring alliteration for about 36 years, 1987-2023.