No more Neofinetia, now Vanda

[Shiva]

Get used to it. A recent study showed that just about everything we know has a half-life of truth of 40 years or so. The numbers may be different for every discipline of science. So 40 years from now, or 20 or 30, half of the orchid names we take for granted will be synonyms. :evil:

 

[KyushuCalanthe]

Ha ha! I can tell you one thing, I'm not going to be calling neos "Vanda falcata" on my website - nobody would think to search for it :rollhappy: Vanda what???

Somehow this makes me think of one of Jimi Hendrix's lyrics:

The traffic lights they turn up blue tomorrow
And shine their emptiness down on my bed

 

[bullsie]

Get used to it. A recent study showed that just about everything we know has a half-life of truth of 40 years or so. The numbers may be different for every discipline of science. So 40 years from now, or 20 or 30, half of the orchid names we take for granted will be synonyms. :evil:

I could get used to the change if they did a few over a 40 year period. I just can't get used to the hundreds of name changes in a few days and a week later they change again.oke:

If I changed my name tags, I'd definitely have to put a gross of yard sale blinds in stock. I couldn't recognize anyone, but I could update labels cheaply!

 

[Shiva]

Now that I keep mostly phrags and multifloral paphs, I don't worry as much for the nomenclature of other orchids. So my tags shouldn't change that much in the future.

 

[John Boy]

They'll actually both be Masdevallias as of next week. They found the proof in a lab at Hogwarts last week....

 

[NYEric]

And when it comes to Neos: They should just and simply stay away. If anything, it should be in japanese hands, to alter things..., and not up to some 23 year old kid who has no idea about what Neos involve.

This would not work as the Japanese assign an aesthetic to these plants that is not objective.

So if I'm a creationist I can ignore this 'memo'?

Oh no he didn't!

Actually when they recently, temporarily clumped Catts together I thought it would work but then they came out with all the non-identifying, inter-species names that just F'd everything up!

 

[bullsie]

They'll actually both be Masdevallias as of next week. They found the proof in a lab at Hogwarts last week....

:rollhappy::rollhappy::rollhappy::rollhappy:

 

[fbrem]

We also need to remember that taxonomic (evolutionary) relationships are just hypotheses and, thus, are always open to testing and revision. They are not proven (science can only disprove, never prove) and thus will never be set in stone. Hobby folks and breeders should be able to call them whatever they want. However, in order for evolutionary biologists to understand how all this diversity came to be, hypotheses must be tested time and time again, and if a hypothesis is disproven it needs to be modified in light of new data. BTW, I love this thread!!!

 

[cattmad]

what I dont think the taxonomists care about is the damage is being done to the orchid growing community by their constant changes, I have seen elderly growers who have grown and shown for years turn up to a show with a Blc. only to find it refused because it's not called that anymore, so they find out it is now an sc so they fix it, two years later same thing, it's now something else because sophronitis doesn't exist anymore, they dont understand because it has been a blc. for the last 40 years, they become discouraged and just stop showing

as pointed out in another thread societies find it almost impossible to attract newer growers and at the some time we are alienating many of the older ones

Science is fantastic, but at what point does it become pointless to the people who just want to enjoy growing orchids and not have to worry about what the latest crackpot taxonomist says. The cattleya debacle of the last ten years should resonate very clearly with alot of people.

my two cents worth

 

[Tom499]

Plant taxonomy is a very under funded, under appreciated area. Those who do commit the time and effort, do, more often than not do it purely for knowledge and insight. They don't clump and split just to annoy hobby growers.

 

[cnycharles]

(epiphany) I think that every time a taxonomist changes the name of something, there should be a five year grace period where it gets tossed around, and if it holds, then the name gets changed. by that time, the new name may be in circulation a little bit so not to be so much of a shock. just because someone can look at something and decide on their own that something needs to be changed, doesn't mean it should impact everyone right away.

even though genetic information is being used now to check out what an orchid might be, only very small bits of information are being used and looked at. also someone may be using 'not very good scientific methods' to come to their conclusions. if someone were to look at the 98% of chimp dna that is the same between humans, they would say that humans and chimps were the same species. ... look at the other 2%, and 'they're different'....

 

[KyushuCalanthe]

Plant taxonomy is a very under funded, under appreciated area.

To paraphrase Monty Python: "We need more plant taxonomists!"

The old cladistic models based on relating gross morphology of course were subject to revision. The fact that plant hobbyists are subject to those revisions is purely accidental, not premeditated :rollhappy:

In Japan they circumvent this whole thing by using the old Japanese names for everything - including the scientists BTW. As many of you know, Neofinetia falcata is known as fuuran in Japanese, and the special forms are called fuukiran. This is not a matter of being elitist either, it is just the system they use. So, no matter what genus this plant ultimately ends up in, it will always be fuuran/fuukiran in Japan.

 

[Shiva]

And in early spring, sometimes, I like to go up in the mountains and look at the Lady Slippers.

 

[John Boy]

They'll be Mormodes not before long!

 

[SlipperFan]

They'll be Mormodes not before long!

:rollhappy:

 

[Roy]

As a thought, with these name changes, the "old" name is still in fact a proper name but as a "Synonym". At present, the Victorian regional Judging panel is accepting whatever name is on the plant, Blc, Potinara, Slc, Neofinetia, Vanda, Ascda etc. The general member/exhibitor is the last to know of these changes "because" they are not broadly advertised to the world. These changes should be put into the orchid world for discussion & comment on how its to be handled. Once a general consensus is reached, then change or not change.
All this changing makes all species orchid books ever written invalid and put ALL new growers of orchids at a great disadvantage because they would be hard up to learn about an orchid as they won't easily be able to find it in a book.
They would have to get all the name changes, from & to, to refer back and where do you find that ??? You can't !!!!!!
All this does is create heated discussion between lumpers & splitters & confusion to all.

 

[Ozpaph]

burn the witch.............

 

[bullsie]

In truth, as they are changing names so frequently, each new person could be introduced to the same orchid under a different name. Somehow, that doesn't sound like progress or clarity in the orchid world-which I thought was important. Oh well, silly me......I just don't buy the ones I can't identify (which helps me know what I can grow and what I can't - but then again, who needs that information).

 

[NYEric]

burn the witch.............

:rollhappy:

 

[fbrem]

cattmod made a great point and made me think that RHS just needs to define a stop point and stick with the names they have at that point, taxonomy be damned. Why does taxonomic and horticultural nomenclature need to pair up? As long as we have names that both groups can work with to keep plants separate we should be good, right? Let taxonomists deal with all the synonyms and let the hobby growers and breeders just enjoy their plants.