Fish named after US Politicians

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ThatFrogGuy
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Fish named after US Politicians

Post by ThatFrogGuy »

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gbin
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Re: Fish named after US Politicians

Post by gbin »

I think that, with the exception of Gore, none of the people for which these new species were named really showed all that much "environmental leadership and commitment" as supposedly earned them this honor. I also think that far too many species are named foolishly, and that going out of one's way to politicize the process is especially foolish. (Mind you, I'm not interested in offering any real criticism or praise of the politicians he chose to honor.)

Gerry
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ThatFrogGuy
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Re: Fish named after US Politicians

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I agree. It is a shame that such blatant partisan bias will be embedded in taxonomy.

Plus, what kind of a latin name is "Etheostoma jimmycarter?" :lol:
Matt Buckingham
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Re: Fish named after US Politicians

Post by Matt Buckingham »

If this is legit, I think it is pretty irresponsible of the parties involved. I think that the specific epithet of an organism should include something about it, such as a reference to a morphological characteristic or the range of the species. This helps to make the name universally relatable. These weird political tributes don't make any sense to me as a biologist.
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chris_mcmartin
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Re: Fish named after US Politicians

Post by chris_mcmartin »

Matt Buckingham wrote:If this is legit, I think it is pretty irresponsible of the parties involved. I think that the specific epithet of an organism should include something about it, such as a reference to a morphological characteristic or the range of the species. This helps to make the name universally relatable. These weird political tributes don't make any sense to me as a biologist.
Tantilla hobartsmithi, Gambelia copei, Crotalus willardi, "Elaphe" guttata meahllmorum, and many others are named after people...but at least those people were not "political" in the sense Presidents are.
Matt Buckingham
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Re: Fish named after US Politicians

Post by Matt Buckingham »

Yeah, the Latin nomenclature is full of tributes. Fortunately (in my opinion at least) this has become less and less common in recent years.
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gbin
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Re: Fish named after US Politicians

Post by gbin »

chris_mcmartin wrote:Tantilla hobartsmithi, Gambelia copei, Crotalus willardi, "Elaphe" guttata meahllmorum, and many others are named after people...but at least those people were not "political" in the sense Presidents are.
Yeah, I'm not especially thrilled with honorific nomenclature in general, but what really bothers me here is that it's political. Despite what Fox News et al. persuades the ill-informed to believe, one of the great things about science is that it's not political.

Gerry
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dery
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Re: Fish named after US Politicians

Post by dery »

well, darters dont deserve to be named after republicrats... whats next???ALEC or ACORN??
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