On Fri, 28 Dec 2007, Alberto Monteiro wrote:
> Charlie Bell wrote: >> >>> It's wrong, because they are not "whales". >> >> Yes they are. They're toothed whales. Baleen whales (humpbacks, >> blues, rights, minkes etc) and toothed whales (including killer >> whales, pilot whales, belugas, narwhals, and dolphins) are a clade, >> they're monophyletic. They have a common ancestor that was an early >> whale, and they're all in Order Cetacea. "Killer whale" may be a >> crap name, but it's not wrong on the grounds that orcas aren't >> whales, 'cause they are. >> > So the standard definition of "whales" include dolphins? > I thought that whales didn't include dolphins, like monkeys > don't include chimps [in Portuguese, BTW, there's a generic > word for all non-human primates: macaco]. Dolphins are a family of the suborder Odontoceti, or toothed whales. They are a kind of toothed whale. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cetacea#Taxonomic_listing Monkeys don't include chimps, because chimps are not monkeys, but both are primates. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Primate#Extant_primate_families Charlie may be able to further clarify anything he thinks needs clarification. Julia _______________________________________________ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
