Talk:Crown group

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[edit] Diagram needed

This article would be substantially easier to understand if it included a diagram illustrating the relationships that it describes. Harold f 18:10, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

Added 6/&03/07Grahbudd 10:14, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

The diagram's a bit weird, though. I've never seen the term "scion" used like that, and the "zygotaxon" is just another (larger) crown group. Neither term is even in Wikipedia. 75.30.150.158 00:18, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

Just to express a degree of amusement that the lack of a Wikipedia page can be considered proof of the non-existence of a term!

The term zygotaxon, and indeed all 'crown group terminology', is relative to which crown group we're talking about. So if we're talking about the birds, it can be useful to consider Archaeopteryx as part of the zygotaxon, and other dinosaurs as part of the stem group - this provides an extra degree of discrimination. W

hilst the seemingly excessive terminology does seem to cloud the issue at first, it is logical (to a Greek speaker at least!) and makes it easier to visualise evolution in a meaningful framework, reducing the desire to pigeon-hole fossils into modern crown groups that has plagued pre-Ordovician palaeontology for so long!

Verisimilus T 18:19, 9 May 2007 (UTC)