The ReptileEvolution.com Project

Taxon exclusion is the number one problem currently vexing paleontology. The search for pterosaur, turtle, bat, snake, whale, reptile and tetrapod ancestors continues to unnecessarily befuddle paleontologists who continue to work from cherry-picked, textbook and traditional taxon lists that overlook and omit pertinent taxa. That’s why the large reptile tree (LRT), the nearly completely resolved cladogram at the heart of www.ReptileEvolution.com, includes 2212 taxa. Larger taxon numbers minimize taxon exclusion issues. Results indicate the simple act of adding taxa resolves all phylogenetic issues.

分类群排除（taxon exclusion）是当前困扰古生物学界的首要难题。针对翼龙、龟类、蝙蝠、蛇类、鲸类、爬行类及四足类的祖先溯源研究，至今仍在毫无必要地困扰着古生物学者：这些学者仍在沿用刻意筛选的、源自教科书与传统惯例的分类群名录，而此类名录往往会忽略并遗漏相关的分类群。这也正是作为www.ReptileEvolution.com核心的、近乎完全解析的分支图（cladogram）——大型爬行类系统树（Large Reptile Tree, LRT）——收录2212个分类群的原因。更多的分类群数量能够最大程度减少分类群排除问题带来的负面影响。研究结果表明，仅通过增加分类群这一简单操作，即可解决所有系统发育（phylogenetic）相关的问题。