The following is yet another excellent Youtube video from Erika aka
Gutsick Gibbon, where she discusses the current scientific debate
about which genera different hominins should be assigned:

<https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VWK0sjv5Qd8>

The controversy is due in part to the insensibly-graded distinctions
among multiple transitional hominin specimens. Similar to the debate
over whether some fossils were reptile-like mammals or mammal-like
reptiles, and to the debate over whether some fossils were birds or
dinosaurs, the current debate highlights once again that not only do
transistional forms exist, they exist in abundance, just as Darwin
predicted they would. Such abundance puts the lie to the Creationist
PRATT that transitional forms don't exist.

Another part of the controversy is due in part whether genera
assignments should follow cladistic rules or species adaptive
strategies or grades. According to Erika, the distinction involves
grouping on a suite of common characteristics, or grouping on inferred
common ecological niches. She cites several papers which discuss the
advantages/disadvantages of both, and expresses her preference for
sticking with cladistics, as grades tend to develop into paraphyletic
genera.

--
To know less than we don't know is the nature of most knowledge

I'm not addressing your topic directly, but I want
to say that I have a definite impression that let's say
when I was born, "marsupials" weren't considered
to be "mammals". Now, they are.

I was born before 1976, but I may be only describing
my own confusion and ignorance. I used to think
that dogs are male and cats are female - of course
that's before I received a version of an understanding
of why there are males and females, and it seems to
be a common mistake. I still misgender dogs and cats
sometimes. I don't often associate with them socially,
so it isn't a big problem for me.

The marsupial thing may be mine or intellectual
society's mistaken tendency to see evolution as
a teleology leading up to the appearance of ourselves.
We are placental mammals, and they come later,
and so we think that they, we, are better. But in fact
many mammals are not good citizens. Still, I think
some of us may regard marsupials as embarrassing
cousins that we prefer to overlook. I think I would
like to find that professional scientists did not
suffer from this bias and misunderstanding.

On 24/01/2024 13:08, Robert Carnegie wrote:
> I'm not addressing your topic directly, but I want
> to say that I have a definite impression that let's say
> when I was born, "marsupials" weren't considered
> to be "mammals". Now, they are.
>
> I was born before 1976, but I may be only describing
> my own confusion and ignorance. I used to think
> that dogs are male and cats are female - of course
> that's before I received a version of an understanding
> of why there are males and females, and it seems to
> be a common mistake. I still misgender dogs and cats
> sometimes. I don't often associate with them socially,
> so it isn't a big problem for me.
>
> The marsupial thing may be mine or intellectual
> society's mistaken tendency to see evolution as
> a teleology leading up to the appearance of ourselves.
> We are placental mammals, and they come later,
> and so we think that they, we, are better. But in fact
> many mammals are not good citizens. Still, I think
> some of us may regard marsupials as embarrassing
> cousins that we prefer to overlook. I think I would
> like to find that professional scientists did not
> suffer from this bias and misunderstanding.
>

Systema Naturae (1735 edn) has Didelphis (Linnaeus's only marsupial)
within Quadrupedia (= mammals) and Ferae (Carnivora, Insectivora and
Chiroptera). (In that edition whales and manatees are placed within fish.)

Cuvier (1816) places marsupials (including herbivores like kangarooos)
among Les Carnassiers (Chiroptera, Insectivores, Carnivores and Marsupials).

I thought that it might have been Huxley (1880) who was first to
recognise the distinction between marsupials and placentals, but I now
find "The threefold division of living mammals into monotremes,
marsupials and placentals was already well established when Thomas
Huxley proposed the names Metatheria and Eutheria to incorporate the two
latter groups in 1880" (Wikipedia - Prototheria).

I'd be surprised if any zoologist had narrowed Mammalia to exclude
marsupials, but I can't guarantee that none did.

--
alias Ernest Major

On 1/24/24 5:08 AM, Robert Carnegie wrote:
> I'm not addressing your topic directly, but I want to say that I have a
> definite impression that let's say when I was born, "marsupials" weren't
> considered to be "mammals". Now, they are. I was born before 1976, but I
> may be only describing my own confusion and ignorance.

You will be happy to know that your latter surmise is true. Marsupials
have always been considered mammals.

On Wednesday, January 24, 2024 at 1:12:49 PM UTC, Robert Carnegie wrote:
> I'm not addressing your topic directly, but I want
> to say that I have a definite impression that let's say
> when I was born, "marsupials" weren't considered
> to be "mammals". Now, they are.
>
> I was born before 1976, but I may be only describing
> my own confusion and ignorance. I used to think
> that dogs are male and cats are female - of course
> that's before I received a version of an understanding
> of why there are males and females, and it seems to
> be a common mistake. I still misgender dogs and cats
> sometimes.

It's very common, and has been studied by cognitive
psychologists. Here a pop sci
version:

https://www.psychologytoday.com/intl/blog/canine-corner/202201/why-people-think-all-dogs-male-and-all-cats-female

In languages with grammatical genders,
"dog" is typically male, "cat" female - as e.g. Mark Twain
observed for German:

"Surely there is not another language that is so slipshod and
systemless, and so slippery and elusive to the grasp. [..] To
continue with the German genders: a tree is male, its buds are
female, its leaves are neuter; horses are sexless, dogs are male,
cats are female -- tomcats included, of course"

Twain is wrong though to think that German is unusual in this respect.
For dogs and cats, the same pattern is is found e.g. in Czech and Slovak.
Pes (dog) is male, and kocka/macka (cat) is female.

In Welsh, ci is masculine and cath is feminine. As
can be seen when an adjective is added - that then shows in
the feminine gender soft mutation of the first consonant:

Ci mawr = a big dog
Cath fawr = a big cat

In Scots Gaelic however, "cu" and "cat" are both
masculine (though piseag, kitten, is feminine, and
cuilean, puppy, is masculine) .

In romance languages, names for animals that live in close
proximity to humans often have two forms, so that biological
sex and grammatical gender align more - cattus/catta in Latin,
perro/perra and gatto, gatta in Spanish etc . "Canis" by contrast
IIRC in Latin is epicene, that is is used for both male and female
dogs (just as "felis" is female but used for male and female (wild)cats)
But the gender becoems visible again with the adjectives and
their gender agreement, so "canis laetus" and "canis laeta" for
male and female dogs respectively.

I don't often associate with them socially,
> so it isn't a big problem for me.
>
> The marsupial thing may be mine or intellectual
> society's mistaken tendency to see evolution as
> a teleology leading up to the appearance of ourselves.
> We are placental mammals, and they come later,
> and so we think that they, we, are better. But in fact
> many mammals are not good citizens. Still, I think
> some of us may regard marsupials as embarrassing
> cousins that we prefer to overlook. I think I would
> like to find that professional scientists did not
> suffer from this bias and misunderstanding.

On 24/01/2024 16:29, Burkhard wrote:
> In romance languages, names for animals that live in close
> proximity to humans often have two forms, so that biological
> sex and grammatical gender align more - cattus/catta in Latin,
> perro/perra and gatto, gatta in Spanish etc . "Canis" by contrast
> IIRC in Latin is epicene, that is is used for both male and female
> dogs (just as "felis" is female but used for male and female (wild)cats)
> But the gender becoems visible again with the adjectives and
> their gender agreement, so "canis laetus" and "canis laeta" for
> male and female dogs respectively.
>

In the past, I've seen people being amused by French soldiers changing
gender when injured - un poilu to une invalide (but invalide is epicene
in modern French), which leaves me wondering when if ever the oddness
existed.

--
alias Ernest Major

On Wed, 24 Jan 2024 05:08:12 -0800 (PST), Robert Carnegie
<rja.carnegie@excite.com> wrote:

>I'm not addressing your topic directly,

Not to worry, few posters do. It seems to be a tradition.

>but I want
>to say that I have a definite impression that let's say
>when I was born, "marsupials" weren't considered
>to be "mammals". Now, they are.
>
>I was born before 1976, but I may be only describing
>my own confusion and ignorance. I used to think
>that dogs are male and cats are female - of course
>that's before I received a version of an understanding
>of why there are males and females, and it seems to
>be a common mistake. I still misgender dogs and cats
>sometimes. I don't often associate with them socially,
>so it isn't a big problem for me.

Cats and dogs, living together, mass hysteria!

>The marsupial thing may be mine or intellectual
>society's mistaken tendency to see evolution as
>a teleology leading up to the appearance of ourselves.
>We are placental mammals, and they come later,
>and so we think that they, we, are better. But in fact
>many mammals are not good citizens. Still, I think
>some of us may regard marsupials as embarrassing
>cousins that we prefer to overlook. I think I would
>like to find that professional scientists did not
>suffer from this bias and misunderstanding.

I have occasionally considered how human civilization would have been
different if we had evolved from marsupials. At the very least, the
need for pair-bonds would have been greatly reduced.

--
To know less than we don't know is the nature of most knowledge