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From: John Cowan <cowan@ccil.org>
Subject: Re: Horses
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Date: Fri, 15 Nov 1996 22:33:14 GMT
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Xref: glinda.oz.cs.cmu.edu sci.archaeology:55940 sci.lang:64289

Steve Whittet wrote:

[actually, my summary of his claim]
> >        3.  Horses evolved 22 new species to fill the niche

> 2.) Comment 3 above is a quote from a phone conversation with
> Bruce MacFadden. It isn't known if the "sub species" which
> evolved from, Equus Caballus between 12,000 and 10,000 years
> ago could have interbred, they might not have because of
> no other reason than geographical separation. A rapid
> rate of evolutionary change apparently was caused by the
> enviornmental stress of being hunted to extinction compounded
> with climatic change. The horses refered to apparently were
> found in and named for separate box canyons in Mexico.
> 
> Equus Caballus Laurentis for one, if I remember correctly.

Ah, now the claim is that 22 subspecies of (true) horses
evolved in the New World between 12KyBP and 10KyBP.  This
claim is actually moderately plausible, since subspecies
are very much in the eye of the beholder.  As you say, it
is hardly possible to determine from a bunch of slightly
different skeletons whether or not the subspecies could have
interbred: nevertheless, if a vertebrate paleontologist
goes on record with the term "subspecies", he implies that,
in his best judgment, they could have interbred.

> >>      Equus caballus, the true horse, which once had several subspecies.
> >
> >Subspecies aren't species.

You don't deal with this point at all (admittedly, I buried it
too deep).  It is fairly easy to get agreement (at least for
extant species) on species boundaries.  It is often very hard to
get agreement on the number of subspecies, or even on whether the
category is relevant at all.  Taxonomists can be "lumpers" or
"splitters" (just like linguistic taxonomists, no surprise).

-- 
John Cowan						cowan@ccil.org
			e'osai ko sarji la lojban
