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Do cladists understand that they are irrational or not?

Thursday, March 28, 2013 18:57

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(Before It's News)

Cladists claim that only clades are ”natural groups”. So, are they?

Clades is a kind of group that include ”an ancestor and all its descendants” in dichotomously branching processes. It means that a clade joins both a non-existing (ie, ancestor) and existing (ie, present descendants) entities, that is, both abstract and concrete entities. Distinguishing such groups is thus like distinguishing a group consisting of Donald Duck, Steve Farris and Gareth Nelson, or of Mona-Lisa as a painting and as a person. Much can be said about this kind of group, but “natural” is not the word that comes to my mind, rather that one of the members is out (ie, the ancestor).

The main problem with this kind of group is not, however, its mixture of abstract and real, but that it also include entities “between” the ancestor (ie, the abstract) and the presently existing descendants (ie, the concrete) which thus are either either or both abstract and concrete at the same time. The problem with this kind of entities is that they have paradoxically contradictory properties, meaning that they can be, for example, BOTH either white or black AND both white and black at the same time. The problem with this kind of entity is thus that it consists of impossible entities.

Clades are thus not “the only natural groups”, but rather a kind of group that is impossible (by joining impossible entities). The reason why cladists raise the claim that only they are “natural groups” thus ought to be studied by psychologists. The first question is: do cladists understand that this their claim is irrational or not? If not, the second question is: why? If yes, the second question is: why claim it?

Is there any psychologist out there that can explain this phenomenon? As far as I can see, cladists take the world historical record of being stupid by starting off on the wrong foot and claiming their thus totally wrong conclusion.