[tdwg-content] DwC taxonomic terms

[Richard Pyle]

Thanks!

> dwc:occurrenceID=BPBM-13492
> dwc:collectionCode=BPBM
> dwc:catalogNumber=13492
> dwc:scientificName=Centropyge flavicauda Fraser-Brunner 1933 
> dwc:acceptedTaxon=Centropyge fisheri (Snyder 1904)

Actually, according to the current definitions, you would need to split up
scientificName into:

dwc:scientificName=Centropyge flavicauda
dwc:scientificNameAuthorship=Fraser-Brunner 1933 

..which is a bit out of phase with:

dwc:acceptedTaxon=Centropyge fisheri (Snyder 1904)
[allowed by the current definitions]

One of my suggestions would be to treat these in a consistent fashion;
something like:

scientificName
scientificNameAuthorship
acceptedName
acceptedNameAuthorship

> if I understand you correct the orignal name is the one for 
> the accepted name.
> So I cannot state this in the above record, as it would mean 
> the original name of C. flavicauda

Right -- that's another one of the things I'm getting at.  Does originalName
apply to what it is identified as, or does it apply to the acceptedTaxon?
If they are different, then which one is implied by the originalName? I
gather from your statement above that they apply explicitly to the
scientificName (not acceptedTaxon), so that should probably be explicitly
indicated in the definitions.

> I would have to create another taxon record:
> 
> dwc:scientificName=Centropyge fisheri (Snyder 1904) 
> dwc:acceptedTaxon=Centropyge fisheri (Snyder 1904) 
> dwc:originalName= Holacanthus fisheri Snyder 1904

Right -- so presumably these would be returned by resolving scientificNameID
that is included on the specimen record, and would not themselves be
included within the resultset for the specimen record.  In other words, the
specimen record would give me scientificNameID, and resolving that ID would
give me the three pieces of information you list above -- correct?

> The problem here is that I dont think it is a good idea to 
> mix occurrence and taxon records in one dataset.

Agreed!!  That's actually the real point I was heading towards.  We need the
terms, and I think they all belong in dwc, but we need to be clear to people
in what context those terms should be used.  It's not clear to me how the
data providers will know which terms to populate for occurrence records, and
which are intended only for taxon name records.  Is there some sort of
specification within DwC that makes this distinction?  My apologies for
cluttering the list if it exists, and I simply missed it.

> But they could easily be separate datasets for specimen and taxa.
> 
> Also you could use ID terms instead of the verbatim one, 
> which is less error prone and cleaner to grasp:

Yes, exactly.

Aloha,
Rich

P.S. I am perfectly happy to do the work on writing the definitions, but I
don't want to do that if I misunderstand the intended purpose of these
terms.