Abstract
I DO not wish to be drawn into the whirlwind of controversy raised by Sir Archdall Reid; only from a respectful distance would I protest against his obiter dictum that “systematic zoology and botany are purely descriptive” as opposed to “interpretative science”. Every specific name is of itself an interpretation; “Equus asinus” is a statement that the creature is closely akin to “Equus caballus”. The classification of any group, and still more the classification of a whole kingdom, contains a long chain of interpretations. Modern systematic work—with which Sir Archdall Reid must surely be ill acquainted—deals at every step with “problems of heredity, evolution, development, and the like”. There may still be a few people who confine their energies to pure description of the objects in front of them; but why call them systematic zoologists or botanists?
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BATHER, F. Biological Terminology. Nature 107, 301 (1921). https://doi.org/10.1038/107301d0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/107301d0
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