Re: NANFA-L-- World's Smallest Fish?

Jerry Baker (nanfa-in-bakerweb.biz)
Fri, 27 Jan 2006 09:33:04 -0800

dlmcneely-in-lunet.edu wrote:
> Hmmmmmmmmmmm. So, smallest isn't smallest? You guys really have
> confused me. If the largest specimens of a population have to be
> smaller than the smallest specimens in all populations in order for
> that population to be considered to have the smallest, then there might
> be no smallest. You are setting up-in-the upper end of the spectrum
> the same conundrum-in-the lower end that you claim eliminates a
> population from consideration as including the smallest.

There is a confusion between terms here. The article seemed to imply
that this species was the world's smallest fish, not the species that
contains the world's smallest fish. There is a huge difference. One
suggests that individuals of the species as a whole are smaller than
individuals of any other species, and the other just says the smallest
fish ever recorded happened to be of this particular species.

I believe the objection is with classifying the entire species as "the
world's smallest fish."
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