In article ,
"Des Higgins" writes:
|
| Taxonomists claim that nomenclature is important (which it is) to help
| organise knowledge but it becomes self defeating if it remains permanently
| unstable. Users (e.g. gardeners or field botanists) become cynical and
| start saying things like:
| "x belongs to the yaceae, for this week at any rate"
| or
| "anyone know what family z belongs to this week?"

It makes searching diabolically difficult, to be sure. You need to know
the complete history of the names to be able to unpick references, or
even to find all of the references you are looking for.

| As for cladists of different religious hues and their interminable wars, I
| am reminded of Swift and the war between the bigendians and littlendians.
| Making perfect compost is simple in comparison.

That comparison has been made by many people far more eminent than we
are :-)

Regards,
Nick Maclaren.