Abstract
Reconstruction of phylogenetic relationships can be an arduous and prolonged task. Large numbers of specimens must be examined to produce even larger numbers of potentially informative traits. These descriptive data are scored and fed into phylogenetic analysis routines to determine which of the myriad possible phylogenies are supported by the data. Often, these analyses are repeated several times, exploring various options, in the hope that one of them will produce a reasonably well resolved and strongly supported tree. Why do systematists go through so much effort to produce a single picture with a few dozen branching lines? One answer to this question is that the answers to many of the other questions in comparative biology depend on the arrangement of those branching lines. Several biologists have pointed out the tremendous potential for comparative analyses to reach erroneous conclusions when …
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