Paper concerning pros & cons changing bird names

[Robert Righter]

Hi

Interesting new paper in Bio Science about the pros and cons involved in changing bird names.

Bob Righter
Denver CO

[Eric DeFonso]

I didn't see much discussion of the pros, pretty much only the cons as perceived by the authors. That's one thing that troubles me about the resistance to the AOS efforts, the pretense of neutrality and objectivity as evinced by the 3rd sentence in the abstract, which implies that similar deep feelings are not possessed by those authoring this piece.

Eric

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Eric DeFonso
Boulder County, CO

[tom none]

I generally steer clear of politics, but would like to offer a couple of concepts that might be considered. First, in eliminating eponymous names en masse may be throwing the baby out with the bath-water. In some cases the eponymous names may be for patrons who legitimately supported exploration, scientific research, etc., who don't deserve vilification.  Second, the authors of the paper in question mention past colonialism as one one of the issues that would be addressed by the name changes. We must be careful that the imposition of new names doesn't reflect just another form of colonialism.  

That being said, I do support some of the name changes, such as oldsquaw to long-tailed duck, that reflect racial insensitivity, but not wholesale changes without well-founded rationales.

Have fun, 

Tom Curtis

[Marty W]

I concur, Eric... There's so much resistance to change and to acknowledging the errors of the past, which best need correcting for the greater good (including bird name accuracy/usefulness). History & scientific names can't be changed, but common names? --Yes, and it's an easy transition, again for the greater good. Keeps our brain synapses sparking & growing.

Marty Wolf

NW CO Spgs

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[Rachel Hopper]

Well, since we are on this topic again, I would urge you all to watch the YouTube video by Rohan Pethiyagoda (https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=tuD68dUAAAAJ&hl=en) to hear what a person of color living in a post colonial country has to say about the call to remove “harmful” eponymous names: https://youtu.be/kLMY-rw1yA0

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Rachel Hopper
Follow me on iNaturalist
https://www.rkhphotography.net
hopko...@gmail.com
Ft. Collins, CO

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[David Suddjian]

Thread closed as getting too hot to the touch and not really on the theme of Colorado birds and birding.  Take further discussion off list.

David Suddjian

Littleton, CO

list moderator

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[Ira Sanders]

You're cutting this off too soon. The guy on YouTube made a lot of valid points.  I'm against the changes because try as you might, you can't change history and I for one will not use the new names. 

Ira Sanders 

Golden,  CO

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