Talk:Paraponera

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[edit] Previous Bullet Ant Picture

About the removal of the picture, see: [1] --Wynler | Talk 19:42, 25 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Nomenclature

What does "F. Smith, 1858" mean? RickK 04:16, 24 Oct 2003 (UTC)

The answer to this should really appear in the Binomial nomenclature article; I'll have to correct it at some point.

All Linnaean names must consist of a generic and specific name followed by the first author of the species, and the date of description - i.e. the person who first made a formal description of the species, and the date of its publication. In the case of particularly prolific or well known authors - Linnaeus, Fabricius, Latreille, etc. - this is often abbreiviated (to L., F., Latr., &ct.). However, in the case of someone named Smith, there's rather alot of room for confusion given the number of Smiths who have authored species in various different fields; Hence his initial is also provided. I'll write an article on Frederick Smith at some point - he was a contemporary of Saunders, and an important figure in the 19th century myrmecological world. Incidentally, if the original author assigned a species to a genus which has since been revised, then his name and date appears in parentheses; e.g. Lasius niger (L., 1758) - Linnaeus' original description was of Formica nigra, which was moved to the newly created genus Lasius by Fabricius in 1804.

The description of genera is no different from that of species - a genus must be formally described, and it is correctly listed with the same relevant authorship acknowledgements.

Does this answer your question? 80.255 04:37, 24 Oct 2003 (UTC)

No. If you want to explain it on this page, then please do so. If you don't then please delete it from this page. RickK 07:11, 25 Oct 2003 (UTC)

Which part have I failed to explain? F. Smith is Frederick Smith, the author of the genus, and 1858 was the year the genus' description was published. All taxa should have this information to avoid confusing homonymns (e.g. supposing Joe Soap, not knowing about Smith's description, decided to create a a genus Paraponera for a completely different set of species a year after Smith's. It would be invalid as a taxon, being a junior homonymn, but after this had been realised, a new genus would need to be allocated for this species - say, Soapia, described by A. Nother (all completely fictional, of course!). Paraponera Soap, 1859 would then become the type of the genus Soapia Nother, 1859, and it would also be a homonymnic genus of Soapia somespecies (Soap, 1859). It would be essential that Smith's Paraponera is not confused with the invalid but necessary type of Soapia. This procedure happened very many times with genuine species; Formica Picea Leach and F. picea Nylander spring to mind (the latter species is now F. candida)). 80.255 07:52, 25 Oct 2003 (UTC)

OK, this IS an explanation, although more than is necessary. If you're going to include arbitrary words in an article, you really need to tell us what they mean. RickK 07:55, 25 Oct 2003 (UTC)

It's all standard scientific notation - nothing original. You can't seriously be suggesting that the procedures of nomenclatural convention are explained in detail in every article mentioning a scientific name! I do think, however, that the explanation of this procedure should be woven into the current biological nomenclature article - perhaps a nomenclature link could then be judiciously added to the bottom of pages, as an "Also see:"? Personally, however, I don't see the problem with how it remains at the moment; encyclopaedias shouldn't explain every word - seperate articles are the places to do that. 80.255 08:06, 25 Oct 2003 (UTC)

You can't seriously be suggesting that the procedures of nomenclatural convention are explained in detail in every article mentioning a scientific name - no, I'm not. I AM suggesting that, since few other articles include this extraneous information, that, it is either unnecessary or needs to be explained. RickK 08:08, 25 Oct 2003 (UTC)

It certainly isn't unnecessary. Supposing, using my example above, I wrote an article on F. picea Nylander, but simply called it "Formica picea" - this could cause tremendous confusion since some people could well think it was refering to F. picea Leach. Apart from that it would be downright incorrect. Wikipedia follows correct protocols for naming - this case is no different. I'm certainly not against explaining fully in an article, but I really don't think encyclopaedic to put explainations in each an every article where the form occurs; a link at most. Articles aren't written for complete laymen who know nothing about anything, or we would need to explain english grammar at the top of every page! 80.255 08:16, 25 Oct 2003 (UTC)

[edit] Initation ritual

Are there any sources on this? I'm going to put a citations needed on it. --Easty 11:29, 6 May 2006 (UTC)

Here's something I found on google: [[2]]. Contains a link to a non-English paper on the subject and some photos of the ritual. --Jone 11:37, 4 July 2006 (UTC)