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Posted by Byron Larkin on July 16, 2002 at 07:49:12:
In Reply to: I'm afraid you lost me, friend posted by David L. Martin on July 15, 2002 at 07:10:19:
: Let me try this one more time… In my opinion, you have unconsciously made the following assumptions or presuppositions throughout this discussion:
1. Atrox and adamanteus are essentially the same
species, with the same natural history.
2. Atrox and adamateus are capable of reaching
the same maximum length.
3. The frequency that maximum length is reached
is consistent among the species.
4. Population density is solely a function of habitat size.
5. Length is solely a function of age.
6. Age is solely a function of highway mortality.
While I’m sure that you would never consciously indorse any of these without a great deal of qualification, I think that they’ve been there all along, lurking subliminally in the background, and have biased your view on a number of issues. For example, your attempted comparison of how many atrox are sighted on a road at night in Texas versus Florida would only be meaningful, in a scientific sense, if the two species had the same nocturnal habits, the same life-cycle requirements at the same time of year, and above all, the bioenvironmental aspects of each study area in terms of climate, the availability of food, water, and so-on were essentially the same. If any of these were not the same, and they are obviously not, then I would submit that road-counts of this sort are not valid indicators of population size. That doesn’t mean, however, that your conclusion is wrong. It only means that your methodology is, and you just got lucky. Remember, I said “faulty assumptions almost always produce flawed conclusions”.
In any case, I believe that I can summarize your position as follows:
You postulate that the reason there appear to be more, large atrox in Texas than there are large adamanteus in Florida is that the population of atrox is greater than that of adamanteus, and highway mortality is less, therefore fewer adamanteus, as a percentage of the population, reach adulthood than do atrox. As such, there is a reduced probability of any adamanteus reaching the maximum size. Your conclusion is that there are more, large atrox than adamanteus.
Once again, you may be absolutely correct, but for all the wrong reasons. Essentially, my primary objection with your logic tree is the first limb. One cannot state, in any scientifically verifiable way, that these two species are capable of reaching the same maximum length, in the first place. Maybe they are, or maybe they aren’t. So far, what evidence there is over the last 65 years seems to indicate that atrox is the larger of the two species by almost a foot. By the same token, one cannot state, in any scientifically verifiable way, that the frequency of large specimens is consistent, in terms of a percentage of each population. In other words, one in 10,000 atrox may be predisposed to reach a length of 7 feet, whereas one in 10,000,000 adamanteus may be predisposed to reach a length of 7 feet. To put this another way, let me add to your “shopping list” of possible reasons why more large atrox are found than large adamanteus:
3. Atrox is the larger of the two species.
I’ll defend why I believe this to be a valid possibility in a future post, if we get that far.
