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OPINIONS AND DECLARATIONS RENDERED BY THE INTERNATIONAL COMMISSION ON ZOOLOGICAL NOMENCLATURE
Editor's Note: From the original 1962 manuscript
Admonitory note: Generic name changes may occasionally lead the experimentalist using this manual to give way to Frustration and Despair. Let him remember, however, that systematists are professional gentlemen who are doing the best they can, supported by such declarations as the following:
VOLUME I. Part 4. Pp. 23-30. 1943
DECLARATION 4
On the need for avoiding intemperate language in discussions on zoological nomenclature
DECLARATION - In the opinion of the Commission of the tendency to enter into public polemics over matters which educated and refined professional gentlemen might so easily settle in refined and diplomatic correspondence is distinctly unfavorable to a settlement of the nomenclatorial cases for which a solution is sought. It may be assumed that the vast majority of zoologists agree with the Commission in desiring results rather than polemics, and the Commission ventures to suggest that results may be obtained more easily by the utmost consideration for the usual rules of courtesy when discussing the views of others.
The dangers attending the use of sarcasm and intemperate language in discussions on zoological nomenclature were specially considered by the International Commission on Zoological Nomenclature at the Session held at Monaco in March 1913 during the Ninth International Congress of Zoology. The Commission considered that this question was sufficiently pressing to require special treatment in their report to the Congress. In framing that report the Commission accordingly devoted paragraphs (68) and (69) to this subject.
2. Paragraph (68) of that report reads as follows:
(68) Intemperate Language - Whether or not it be an actual fact, appearances to that effect exist that if one author changes or corrects the names used by another writer, the latter seems inclined to take the change as a personal offense. The explanation of this fact (or appearance, as the case may be) is not entirely clear. If one person corrects the grammar of another, this action seems to be interpreted as a criticism upon the good breeding or education of the latter person. Nomenclature has been called "the grammar of science" and possibly there is some inborn feeling that changes in nomenclature involve a reflection upon one's education, culture and breeding. Too frequently there follows a discussion in which one or the other author so far departs from the paths of diplomatic discussion, that he seems to give more of less foundation to the view that there is something in his culture subject to criticism. It is with distinct regret that the Commission notices the tendency to sarcasm and intemperate language so noticeable in discussions which should be not only of the most friendly nature, especially since a thorough mutual understanding is so valuable to an agreement, but which are complicated and rendered more difficult of results by every little departure from those methods adopted by professional gentlemen.
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