Key Innovations: Further Remarks on the Importance of Morphology in Elucidating Systematic Relationships and Adaptive Radiations |
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Authors: | Leandro C S Assis Marcelo R de Carvalho |
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Institution: | 1.Departamento de Botanica,Instituto de Biociências, Universidade de S?o Paulo,S?o Paulo,Brazil;2.Departamento de Zoologia,Instituto de Biociências, Universidade de S?o Paulo,S?o Paulo,Brazil |
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Abstract: | The present paper is an argument in support of the continued importance of morphological systematics and a plea for improving
molecular phylogenetic analyses by addressing explicit character transformations. We use here the inference of key innovations
and adaptive radiations to demonstrate why morphological systematics is still relevant and necessary. After establishing that
theories of phylogenetic relationship offer robust explanatory bases for discussing evolutionary diversification, the following
topics are addressed: (1) the inference of key innovations grounded in phylogenetic analyses; (2) the epistemic distinction
between character ‘mapping’ and relevant evidence in systematic and evolutionary studies; and (3) key innovations in molecular
phylogenetics. We emphasize that the discovery of key innovations, in fossil or extant taxa, further strengthens the importance
of morphology in systematic and evolutionary inferences, as they reveal scenarios of character transformation that have led
to asymmetrical sister-group diversification. Our main conclusion is that understanding characters in and of themselves, when
properly contextualized systematically, is what evolutionary biologists should be concerned with, whereas the analysis of
tree topology alone, in which statistical nodal support measures are the sole indicators of phylogenetic affinity, does not
lead to a fuller understanding of key innovations. |
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