Talk:arthrophyte

arthrophyte
Supposed to be a plant of the taxon Arthrophyta. This taxon is not in Wikispecies. My dictionary gives a totally different definition - an abnromal growth in the cavity of a joint. SemperBlotto 17:19, 18 December 2007 (UTC)
 * Arthrophyta is an obsolete descriptive name for Equisetophyta, which has been reduced to the rank of class as Equisetopsida under the Pteridophyta. It is a collective term for the plants known as horsetails and scouring rushes, as well as their fossil relatives.
 * 1987 - Harold C. Bold, C. J. Alexopoulos, & T. Delevoryas, Morphology of Plants and Fungi, 5th edition, page 514
 * Arthrophytes, like members of the Microphyllophyta, were important components of Carboniferous and Permian forests.
 * You won't find the taxon Arthrophyta on Wikispecies because that name is no longer used. --EncycloPetey 15:00, 19 December 2007 (UTC)
 * But as someone may well come across the term in a relatively modern text, it should be included, but with some sort of usage note, or an obsolete tag, wouldn't you say? - Algrif 20:39, 22 December 2007 (UTC)
 * If you're talking about arthrophyte:, then no it isn't obsolete. Just because the scientific name changes does not always mean the common term does.  The word arthrophyte: still used.  On the other hand, the problem with Arthrophyta is that it's the name applied to a scientific taxon, and not a word ever used as part of a living language.  While the taxon is obsolete, the name technically never goes away, and could be resurrected with the publication of a single paper on plant systematics.  Those usage categories generally do not apply to scientific names the way that we apply them to words in a language. --EncycloPetey 01:02, 25 December 2007 (UTC)