Pub Date : 2024-05-23DOI: 10.11646/megataxa.12.1.1
Peter Allsopp, P. Schoolmeesters
There are about 1500 genus-group names available in the scarab subfamilies Dynastinae, Rutelinae and Cetoniinae by the end of 2023. Of these, 997 refer to currently accepted genera, 227 in Dynastinae, 261 in Rutelinae and 509 in Cetoniinae. A further >650 genus-group names are given subgeneric rank or placed in synonymy. The chronology of descriptions of currently valid genera shows similar patterns in each of the three subfamilies with many described in the 1840s, a large group in the late 1800s (especially the Cetoniinae) and early 1900s (Dynastinae and Rutelinae) and a steady increase in numbers following World War 2. We predict that discovery of new genera, as well as the potential for further splitting of mega-genera with elevation of subgenera to full generic level, will continue the upward trend, albeit somewhat balanced by combining the numerous monobasic genera.
{"title":"All genera of the world: Subfamilies Dynastinae, Rutelinae and Cetoniinae (Animalia: Arthropoda: Insecta: Coleoptera: Scarabaeidae)","authors":"Peter Allsopp, P. Schoolmeesters","doi":"10.11646/megataxa.12.1.1","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.11646/megataxa.12.1.1","url":null,"abstract":"There are about 1500 genus-group names available in the scarab subfamilies Dynastinae, Rutelinae and Cetoniinae by the end of 2023. Of these, 997 refer to currently accepted genera, 227 in Dynastinae, 261 in Rutelinae and 509 in Cetoniinae. A further >650 genus-group names are given subgeneric rank or placed in synonymy. The chronology of descriptions of currently valid genera shows similar patterns in each of the three subfamilies with many described in the 1840s, a large group in the late 1800s (especially the Cetoniinae) and early 1900s (Dynastinae and Rutelinae) and a steady increase in numbers following World War 2. We predict that discovery of new genera, as well as the potential for further splitting of mega-genera with elevation of subgenera to full generic level, will continue the upward trend, albeit somewhat balanced by combining the numerous monobasic genera.\u0000 ","PeriodicalId":52569,"journal":{"name":"Megataxa","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2024-05-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141107027","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-04-15DOI: 10.11646/megataxa.11.1.1
Isaac A. R. Kerr, A. Camens, Jacob D. van Zoelen, T. Worthy, G. Prideaux
Species of the kangaroo genus Protemnodon were common members of late Cenozoic communities across Australia and New Guinea until their extinction in the late Pleistocene. However, since the genus was first raised 150 years ago, it has proven difficult to diagnose, as have the species allocated to it. This is due primarily to the incompleteness of the type material and a heavy reliance on cheek tooth size and slight variations in premolar form. Along with the rare association between cranial and postcranial material, this has hampered understanding of the palaeobiology of these large-bodied kangaroos. Here we review and re-diagnose Protemnodon, recognising a total of seven species and providing a hypothesis of species interrelationships. The following new synonymies are made: Protemnodon chinchillaensis is synonymised with P. otibandus and P. hopei with P. tumbuna. The following are considered nomina dubia: Protemnodon brehus, P. roechus, P. mimas, P. antaeus, and P. devisi. We reveal that the morphology of the cheek dentition is not as consistently useful for differentiating species of Protemnodon as features of the cranium and postcranial skeleton. As a whole, the species share anatomical features that reflect stability and power in the limb joints, yet they differ in body proportions, and axial and limb morphology. This we interpret as showing locomotory adaptations to different habitats. Of the three Pliocene species, Protemnodon snewini is interpreted as a medium- to high-geared hopper, suggesting proficiency in more open environments, whereas P. dawsonae sp. nov. we infer to have been a medium-geared inhabitant of eastern Australian forests and woodlands. Protemnodon otibandus, with a range extending through the woodlands and forests of eastern Australia into the rainforests of eastern New Guinea, displays adaptations to slower hopping. Its Pleistocene descendant, P. tumbuna, is convergent on the morphology of modern New Guinea forest wallabies, and was likely facultatively quadrupedal. Of the three Australian Pleistocene species, the long-necked P. anak is hypothesised to have been a large, medium-geared, eastern Australian species, and P. mamkurra sp. nov. a robust, low-geared resident of well-wooded southern Australia habitats. By contrast, P. viator sp. nov. was larger but more gracile, suggested to be a medium- to high-geared species convergent in some traits on large extant kangaroos. This and a wide inland distribution point to adeptness in open, arid environments. Protemnodon mamkurra sp. nov. and P. viator sp. nov. occupy the morphospace previously occupied by P. roechus and P. brehus. Overall, the species of Protemnodon exhibit a degree of ecomorphological variation suggestive of a broader array of ecological adaptations than hitherto envisioned.
在更新世晚期灭绝之前，袋鼠属Protemnodon物种一直是澳大利亚和新几内亚晚新生代群落的常见成员。然而，自 150 年前首次提出该属以来，事实证明很难对其进行诊断，分配给该属的物种也是如此。这主要是由于模式材料的不完整性，以及对颊齿大小和前臼齿形态细微差别的严重依赖。再加上颅骨和颅后材料之间很少有关联，这阻碍了人们对这些大型袋鼠古生物学的了解。在此，我们对Protemnodon进行了回顾和重新诊断，共确认了7个物种，并提出了物种间相互关系的假说。以下是新的异名：otibandus 和 P. hopei 与 P. tumbuna 同名。以下被认为是 nomina dubia：mimas, P. antaeus, and P. devisi。我们发现颊齿的形态不像颅骨和颅后骨骼的特征那样始终有助于区分Protemnodon的物种。从整体上看，这些物种具有反映四肢关节稳定性和力量的共同解剖特征，但它们在身体比例、轴和四肢形态上却存在差异。我们认为这显示了对不同栖息地的运动适应性。在上新世的三个物种中，Protemnodon snewini被解释为中高齿跳鼠，表明其擅长在更开阔的环境中生活，而P. dawsonae sp.Protemnodon otibandus的分布范围从澳大利亚东部的林地和森林一直延伸到新几内亚东部的热带雨林，它的跳跃速度较慢。它的更新世后代 P. tumbuna 与现代新几内亚森林小袋鼠的形态趋同，很可能是四足动物。在澳大利亚的三个更新世物种中，长颈小袋鼠（P. anak）被认为是一种大型、中等体型的澳大利亚东部物种，而新种小袋鼠（P. mamkurra sp. nov.相比之下，P. viator sp. nov.体型更大，但更加婀娜多姿，被认为是一种中高齿的物种，在某些特征上与现存的大型袋鼠趋同。这种情况以及广泛的内陆分布表明，袋鼠善于在开阔、干旱的环境中生活。新种Protemnodon mamkurra和新种P. viator占据了以前由P. roechus和P. brehus占据的形态空间。总体而言，Protemnodon 的物种表现出一定程度的形态变异，表明其生态适应性比迄今设想的更为广泛。
{"title":"Systematics and palaeobiology of kangaroos of the late Cenozoic genus Protemnodon (Marsupialia, Macropodidae)","authors":"Isaac A. R. Kerr, A. Camens, Jacob D. van Zoelen, T. Worthy, G. Prideaux","doi":"10.11646/megataxa.11.1.1","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.11646/megataxa.11.1.1","url":null,"abstract":"Species of the kangaroo genus Protemnodon were common members of late Cenozoic communities across Australia and New Guinea until their extinction in the late Pleistocene. However, since the genus was first raised 150 years ago, it has proven difficult to diagnose, as have the species allocated to it. This is due primarily to the incompleteness of the type material and a heavy reliance on cheek tooth size and slight variations in premolar form. Along with the rare association between cranial and postcranial material, this has hampered understanding of the palaeobiology of these large-bodied kangaroos. Here we review and re-diagnose Protemnodon, recognising a total of seven species and providing a hypothesis of species interrelationships. The following new synonymies are made: Protemnodon chinchillaensis is synonymised with P. otibandus and P. hopei with P. tumbuna. The following are considered nomina dubia: Protemnodon brehus, P. roechus, P. mimas, P. antaeus, and P. devisi. We reveal that the morphology of the cheek dentition is not as consistently useful for differentiating species of Protemnodon as features of the cranium and postcranial skeleton. As a whole, the species share anatomical features that reflect stability and power in the limb joints, yet they differ in body proportions, and axial and limb morphology. This we interpret as showing locomotory adaptations to different habitats. Of the three Pliocene species, Protemnodon snewini is interpreted as a medium- to high-geared hopper, suggesting proficiency in more open environments, whereas P. dawsonae sp. nov. we infer to have been a medium-geared inhabitant of eastern Australian forests and woodlands. Protemnodon otibandus, with a range extending through the woodlands and forests of eastern Australia into the rainforests of eastern New Guinea, displays adaptations to slower hopping. Its Pleistocene descendant, P. tumbuna, is convergent on the morphology of modern New Guinea forest wallabies, and was likely facultatively quadrupedal. Of the three Australian Pleistocene species, the long-necked P. anak is hypothesised to have been a large, medium-geared, eastern Australian species, and P. mamkurra sp. nov. a robust, low-geared resident of well-wooded southern Australia habitats. By contrast, P. viator sp. nov. was larger but more gracile, suggested to be a medium- to high-geared species convergent in some traits on large extant kangaroos. This and a wide inland distribution point to adeptness in open, arid environments. Protemnodon mamkurra sp. nov. and P. viator sp. nov. occupy the morphospace previously occupied by P. roechus and P. brehus. Overall, the species of Protemnodon exhibit a degree of ecomorphological variation suggestive of a broader array of ecological adaptations than hitherto envisioned.","PeriodicalId":52569,"journal":{"name":"Megataxa","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2024-04-15","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140700367","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-12-29DOI: 10.11646/megataxa.10.2.1
ZHI-QIANG Zhang, Mark John Costello
Biotaxa.org is a non-profit international collaboration among professional societies, institutions, publishers, natural history museums and libraries for facilitating the publication, enhancing the access and enabling the preservation of journals in biological taxonomy. Since the start of Biotaxa.org in 2013, 58 journals by 46 publishers from 23 countries have joined this platform and 49 of these journals archived 10,076 issues covering a span of 98 years (1926 to 2023), Most of these journals (41) are for open access. Currently 13 journals are also using Biotaxa.org site for manuscript submission and review. Biotaxa.org has helped small publishers and journals—many of these lack sufficient funding—go online, reduce cost, become more sustainable, remain editorial independent, and/or be archived to fulfil the requirements of the International Code of Zoological Nomenclature.
{"title":"A decade of Biotaxa.org: community-supported online library for taxonomic journals enhanced their publication, access and preservation","authors":"ZHI-QIANG Zhang, Mark John Costello","doi":"10.11646/megataxa.10.2.1","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.11646/megataxa.10.2.1","url":null,"abstract":"Biotaxa.org is a non-profit international collaboration among professional societies, institutions, publishers, natural history museums and libraries for facilitating the publication, enhancing the access and enabling the preservation of journals in biological taxonomy. Since the start of Biotaxa.org in 2013, 58 journals by 46 publishers from 23 countries have joined this platform and 49 of these journals archived 10,076 issues covering a span of 98 years (1926 to 2023), Most of these journals (41) are for open access. Currently 13 journals are also using Biotaxa.org site for manuscript submission and review. Biotaxa.org has helped small publishers and journals—many of these lack sufficient funding—go online, reduce cost, become more sustainable, remain editorial independent, and/or be archived to fulfil the requirements of the International Code of Zoological Nomenclature.","PeriodicalId":52569,"journal":{"name":"Megataxa","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-12-29","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139144303","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-12-29DOI: 10.11646/megataxa.10.2.2
ZHI-QIANG Zhang
Megataxa was founded in January 2020 as a sister journal of the two most important journals in taxonomy, Zootaxa and Phytotaxa, with similar goals to accelerate the documentation of undescribed species and promote the development of global taxonomy, but aims to be a premium journal for most important works in taxonomy. Megataxa has grown steadily since January 2020 and has published 44 papers of various types in 3329 pages, 14 issues and 10 volumes, averaging 76 pages per paper and including six large monographs. These were contributed by 99 authors from 27 countries in six regions. Analysis of citation data in the Web of Science Core Collection showed that papers in Megataxa were cited three to nine times as often as those in Zootaxa published in the same year. The estimated (non-official) journal impact factor of 2023 for Megataxa is 6.8. These indicate that although Megataxa is still in its infancy, it has great promise to become a journal of high impact in taxonomy.
{"title":"Publication and impact: a bibliometric survey of Megataxa 1–10","authors":"ZHI-QIANG Zhang","doi":"10.11646/megataxa.10.2.2","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.11646/megataxa.10.2.2","url":null,"abstract":"Megataxa was founded in January 2020 as a sister journal of the two most important journals in taxonomy, Zootaxa and Phytotaxa, with similar goals to accelerate the documentation of undescribed species and promote the development of global taxonomy, but aims to be a premium journal for most important works in taxonomy. Megataxa has grown steadily since January 2020 and has published 44 papers of various types in 3329 pages, 14 issues and 10 volumes, averaging 76 pages per paper and including six large monographs. These were contributed by 99 authors from 27 countries in six regions. Analysis of citation data in the Web of Science Core Collection showed that papers in Megataxa were cited three to nine times as often as those in Zootaxa published in the same year. The estimated (non-official) journal impact factor of 2023 for Megataxa is 6.8. These indicate that although Megataxa is still in its infancy, it has great promise to become a journal of high impact in taxonomy.","PeriodicalId":52569,"journal":{"name":"Megataxa","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-12-29","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139145117","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-10-31DOI: 10.11646/megataxa.10.1.6
PETER UETZ, YAA ADARKWA DARKO, DUSTIN ZELIFF
Vertebrate databases have been slow to digitize species descriptions. One of them, the Reptile Database (http://www.reptile-database.org), has accumulated ~8,000 species descriptions for ~3,000 species of snakes, ~5,000 species of lizards, and ~150 species of turtles and crocodiles. Here we discuss how this data contributes to character analysis, species identification, but also to integration with other data sources such as citizen science observations (which depend on correct identifications). Importantly, the data described here may serve as training data for machine learning projects and we present examples of species comparisons using ChatGPT. While these AI-driven comparisons are still erroneous, we expect substantial improvements in the near future. We request the herpetological community to help complete our public collection of species descriptions and suggest that other species databases follow suit and provide similar data for their taxa.
{"title":"Towards digital descriptions of all extant reptile species","authors":"PETER UETZ, YAA ADARKWA DARKO, DUSTIN ZELIFF","doi":"10.11646/megataxa.10.1.6","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.11646/megataxa.10.1.6","url":null,"abstract":"Vertebrate databases have been slow to digitize species descriptions. One of them, the Reptile Database (http://www.reptile-database.org), has accumulated ~8,000 species descriptions for ~3,000 species of snakes, ~5,000 species of lizards, and ~150 species of turtles and crocodiles. Here we discuss how this data contributes to character analysis, species identification, but also to integration with other data sources such as citizen science observations (which depend on correct identifications). Importantly, the data described here may serve as training data for machine learning projects and we present examples of species comparisons using ChatGPT. While these AI-driven comparisons are still erroneous, we expect substantial improvements in the near future. We request the herpetological community to help complete our public collection of species descriptions and suggest that other species databases follow suit and provide similar data for their taxa.","PeriodicalId":52569,"journal":{"name":"Megataxa","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-10-31","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135927773","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-08-10DOI: 10.11646/megataxa.10.1.5
Gideon F. Smith, E. Figueiredo
It was recently stated in Megataxa that: “Of course, we have a duty to eliminate obviously hurtful and discriminatory words from the scientific lexicon” (Pethiyagoda (2023: 24). However, contrasting with this statement, Pethiyagoda (2023) broadly supports retention of the status quo regarding the present-day names and epithets in use in the biological sciences, and the terminology used in other sciences. With reference to a proposal to amend the International Code of Nomenclature for algae, fungi, and plants (Turland et al. 2018), adoption of which would eliminate epithets with the root ca[f]f[e]r- from the scientific nomenclature in use for algae, fungi, and plants (Smith & Figueiredo 2021), Pethiyagoda (2023: 21) further stated that: “They [Hammer & Thiele (2021)] cite, for example, a proposal by Smith & Figueiredo (2021)”. This statement is not correct. Both Hammer & Thiele (2021) and Smith & Figueiredo (2021) were published on “15 December 2021”, and Hammer & Thiele (2021) could not have cited Smith & Figueiredo (2021). To prevent any misconceptions that might result from Pethiyagoda’s statement, we here note that Hammer & Thiele (2021) and Smith & Figueiredo (2021) were not aware of each other’s work until it was published.
{"title":"Eliminating slurs from the scientific names of algae, fungi, and plants will cause minimal nomenclatural change","authors":"Gideon F. Smith, E. Figueiredo","doi":"10.11646/megataxa.10.1.5","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.11646/megataxa.10.1.5","url":null,"abstract":"It was recently stated in Megataxa that: “Of course, we have a duty to eliminate obviously hurtful and discriminatory words from the scientific lexicon” (Pethiyagoda (2023: 24). However, contrasting with this statement, Pethiyagoda (2023) broadly supports retention of the status quo regarding the present-day names and epithets in use in the biological sciences, and the terminology used in other sciences. With reference to a proposal to amend the International Code of Nomenclature for algae, fungi, and plants (Turland et al. 2018), adoption of which would eliminate epithets with the root ca[f]f[e]r- from the scientific nomenclature in use for algae, fungi, and plants (Smith & Figueiredo 2021), Pethiyagoda (2023: 21) further stated that: “They [Hammer & Thiele (2021)] cite, for example, a proposal by Smith & Figueiredo (2021)”. This statement is not correct. Both Hammer & Thiele (2021) and Smith & Figueiredo (2021) were published on “15 December 2021”, and Hammer & Thiele (2021) could not have cited Smith & Figueiredo (2021). To prevent any misconceptions that might result from Pethiyagoda’s statement, we here note that Hammer & Thiele (2021) and Smith & Figueiredo (2021) were not aware of each other’s work until it was published.","PeriodicalId":52569,"journal":{"name":"Megataxa","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-08-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"79711763","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-06-13DOI: 10.11646/megataxa.10.1.4
R. Pethiyagoda
Several recent authors have called for the revision of the common and scientific names associated with taxa, as well as scientific terms, that may be construed as offensive (e.g., Hammer & Thiele, 2021; Cheng et al., 2023) or inappropriate (e.g., Gillman & Wright, 2020; Guedes et al., 2023). These proposals have been met with resistance, for example by Palma & Heath (2021—indigenous names), Mosyakin (2022—botany), Slabin (2023—philosophy of science) and all 26 commissioners of the International Commission for Zoological Nomenclature (Ceríaco et al., 2023).
最近几位作者呼吁修订与分类群相关的常见和科学名称，以及可能被解释为冒犯的科学术语(例如，Hammer & Thiele, 2021;Cheng et al.， 2023)或不合适(例如，Gillman & Wright, 2020;Guedes et al.， 2023)。这些建议遇到了阻力，例如Palma & Heath(2021 -土著名称)，Mosyakin(2022 -植物学)，Slabin(2023 -科学哲学)和国际动物命名委员会的所有26名委员(Ceríaco等人，2023)。
{"title":"Policing the scientific lexicon: The new colonialism?","authors":"R. Pethiyagoda","doi":"10.11646/megataxa.10.1.4","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.11646/megataxa.10.1.4","url":null,"abstract":"Several recent authors have called for the revision of the common and scientific names associated with taxa, as well as scientific terms, that may be construed as offensive (e.g., Hammer & Thiele, 2021; Cheng et al., 2023) or inappropriate (e.g., Gillman & Wright, 2020; Guedes et al., 2023). These proposals have been met with resistance, for example by Palma & Heath (2021—indigenous names), Mosyakin (2022—botany), Slabin (2023—philosophy of science) and all 26 commissioners of the International Commission for Zoological Nomenclature (Ceríaco et al., 2023).","PeriodicalId":52569,"journal":{"name":"Megataxa","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-06-13","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"88058996","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-04-27DOI: 10.11646/megataxa.10.1.2
Zhi-qiang Zhang
A new opinion piece published in Megataxa today (Conix et al. 2023) calls for preregistration in the field of taxonomy and discusses its potential benefits and objections. Preregistration is a practice for researchers to document their hypotheses, design and methods of their proposed studies in a public repository before they start the study and collect the data (Nosek et al. 2018). It is believed that preregistration can help reduce bias, increase transparency, and improve study design (especially replicability) of research (e.g. Nosek et al. 2018; Krypotos et al. 2022), including exploratory research such as some aspects of biodiversity discovery and taxonomy (Dirnagl et al. 2020). While preregistration has been already employed in other fields such as social sciences (e.g. Camerer et al. 2016, 2018) and ecology/evolution (e.g. Kelly 2019), it has yet been adopted in taxonomy. Conix et al. (2023) argue that preregistration could be beneficial for taxonomy, given the challenges it faces, such as subjectivity, disagreement, and credibility:
今天发表在Megataxa上的一篇新观点文章(Conix et al. 2023)呼吁在分类学领域进行预注册，并讨论了其潜在的好处和反对意见。预注册是研究人员在开始研究和收集数据之前在公共存储库中记录其假设、设计和拟议研究方法的一种做法(Nosek et al. 2018)。预注册可以帮助减少偏倚，增加透明度，改善研究设计(特别是可重复性)(例如Nosek et al. 2018;Krypotos et al. 2022)，包括探索性研究，如生物多样性发现和分类的某些方面(Dirnagl et al. 2020)。虽然预登记已经在社会科学(如Camerer等人，2016年，2018年)和生态/进化(如Kelly 2019年)等其他领域得到应用，但尚未在分类学中采用。Conix等人(2023)认为，考虑到分类学面临的挑战，如主观性、分歧和可信度，预注册可能对分类学有益:
{"title":"Researchers propose preregistration in taxonomy to enhance transparency and credibility and reduce subjectivity","authors":"Zhi-qiang Zhang","doi":"10.11646/megataxa.10.1.2","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.11646/megataxa.10.1.2","url":null,"abstract":"A new opinion piece published in Megataxa today (Conix et al. 2023) calls for preregistration in the field of taxonomy and discusses its potential benefits and objections. Preregistration is a practice for researchers to document their hypotheses, design and methods of their proposed studies in a public repository before they start the study and collect the data (Nosek et al. 2018). It is believed that preregistration can help reduce bias, increase transparency, and improve study design (especially replicability) of research (e.g. Nosek et al. 2018; Krypotos et al. 2022), including exploratory research such as some aspects of biodiversity discovery and taxonomy (Dirnagl et al. 2020). While preregistration has been already employed in other fields such as social sciences (e.g. Camerer et al. 2016, 2018) and ecology/evolution (e.g. Kelly 2019), it has yet been adopted in taxonomy. Conix et al. (2023) argue that preregistration could be beneficial for taxonomy, given the challenges it faces, such as subjectivity, disagreement, and credibility: \u0000 ","PeriodicalId":52569,"journal":{"name":"Megataxa","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-04-27","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"81468787","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-04-27DOI: 10.11646/megataxa.10.1.1
S. Conix, Vincent Cuypers, F. Zachos, T. Artois, Marlies Monnens
There are notoriously many different definitions of species and methods of species delimitation, forcing taxonomists to make a long range of methodological decisions in species delimitation. Because of this, there are sometimes multiple viable competing methodological paths, which could lead to different ranking (or even grouping) decisions. As a result, it is often unclear what it means for a group to be recognized as a species, the groups recognized as species are not always comparable, and some have even called ranking decisions ‘subjective’. To mitigate the problems this causes for users of taxonomy and taxonomists, we propose that taxonomists across the tree of life should start preregistering their research design and criteria for species delimitation in advance of their research. We argue that even if it were to require additional effort, preregistering taxonomic research would strongly benefit taxonomy in the long term, by increasing the transparency and usability of taxonomic outcomes and by reducing the need for ad hoc methodological decisions.
{"title":"A plea for preregistration in taxonomy","authors":"S. Conix, Vincent Cuypers, F. Zachos, T. Artois, Marlies Monnens","doi":"10.11646/megataxa.10.1.1","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.11646/megataxa.10.1.1","url":null,"abstract":"There are notoriously many different definitions of species and methods of species delimitation, forcing taxonomists to make a long range of methodological decisions in species delimitation. Because of this, there are sometimes multiple viable competing methodological paths, which could lead to different ranking (or even grouping) decisions. As a result, it is often unclear what it means for a group to be recognized as a species, the groups recognized as species are not always comparable, and some have even called ranking decisions ‘subjective’. To mitigate the problems this causes for users of taxonomy and taxonomists, we propose that taxonomists across the tree of life should start preregistering their research design and criteria for species delimitation in advance of their research. We argue that even if it were to require additional effort, preregistering taxonomic research would strongly benefit taxonomy in the long term, by increasing the transparency and usability of taxonomic outcomes and by reducing the need for ad hoc methodological decisions.","PeriodicalId":52569,"journal":{"name":"Megataxa","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-04-27","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"79379764","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
京公网安备 11010802042870号
京ICP备2023020795号-1
扫码关注我们
求助内容：
应助结果提醒方式：