Thanks, Art, but I will claim that degree of "expertmanship" only for
invertebrate trace fossils and Upper Cretaceous bivalves from the U.S. Gulf
and Atlantic Coasts. And remember, never send specimens to an expert
without asking if it's all right first. He may be too busy, or at death's
door, and in both of these cases your specimens may be neither studied nor
returned.
Mistakes? Experts never make mistakes, do they? Here are some examples:
The author overlooks the latest edition of the ICZN and then has to publish
a correction of all of his new names because the rules have changed. In the
1930's, for instance, the rules were changed to require that new species
actually be described, not just figured. That caught an eminent Smithsonian
paleontologist, Ray Bassler, in mid-act.
The author has only fragments of shells, and publishes a drawing of the new
species based on pieces from different individuals. That not only makes for
a difficult choice of type specimens, but can lead to the creation of
species that never existed. Conrad used to do this. It used to be very
common in vertebrate paleontology, and has led to some rather spectacular
errors, as when the American Museum of Natural History's specimen of
Brontosaurus had to be given a new, correct head not long ago. Nowadays,
the author is careful to assign holotype status to only one fragment.
The author names a species early in his career, then forgets and uses the
same name for another new species later on. Timothy Abbott Conrad's
biographer claims that he did this too, but I don't have any specific
cases. (Yes, this is the same Abbott family as in "R. Tucker Abbott".)
The author has a poor library but lives in a remote region and simply
assumes that everything he sees is new, and publishes them all in a local
journal without review from outside the country. This guy is really
dangerous. I forget the name, but there was an Argentine paleontologist in
the early 20th century who did this, and he was hardly the only one.
The author names as much as he can, as fast as he can, with only brief,
inadequate descriptions, and without illustrations. In some cases, without
specimens. Can anyone say "Rafinesque"?
The author retains all the type specimens for his own collection, informs
his family that his collection is very valuable, and then dies. The family
tries unsuccessfully to convert the collection to cash and discards
anything that is unsold. What happens to the type specimens, which may not
even be labeled as such? Who knows? That's why a thoughtful editor will
reject a paper naming a new species whose type specimens are not given a
catalog number in a museum collection.
The author ambitiously revises all the members of a large group of
organisms, but his ideas are very individual and very wrong, and he
publishes it himself without review of any kind. This is unusual, but the
Australian herpetologists had this sort of crime perpetrated on them a few
years ago. They have the unpleasant choice of (a) ignoring the book (not
allowed by the ICZN), (b) correcting it (which would take the rest of their
lifetimes and achieve no useful work), or (c) having the book placed on the
list of books that are officially ignored by the ICZN (the zoological
equivalent of excommunication, and so far as I know never applied to a
living author). Wasn't Roding's catalog almost placed on this list? Does
anyone have the full story?
Andrew K. Rindsberg
Geological Survey of Alabama
P.S. Sorry, Ross and RoseSea, I got you switched in my last message. No
offense taken, I hope.
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