Shattered Glass as a Metaphor for Taxonomy
Let us suppose that we have laid on the table... [a] piece of glass... and let us homologize this glass to a whole order of plants or birds. Let us hit this glass a blow in such a manner as but to crack it up. The sectors circumscribed by cracks following the first blow may here be understood to represent families. Continuing, we may crack the glass into genera, species and subspecies to the point of finally having the upper right hand corner a piece about 4 inches square representing a sub-species.
Notes:
The smaller pieces you smash it into, the more specific the classification. TODO: I don't understand the "4 inches" part at the end concerning sub-species.
Folksonomies: metaphor taxonomy
Taxonomies:
/family and parenting (0.414398)
/food and drink/food/grains and pasta (0.270936)
/home and garden/home furnishings/sofas and chairs (0.254754)
Keywords:
upper right hand (0.921900 (neutral:0.000000)), smaller pieces (0.728470 (negative:-0.695880)), glass (0.688923 (negative:-0.695880)), sub-species (0.573152 (neutral:0.000000)), inches (0.538388 (neutral:0.000000)), blow (0.495148 (neutral:0.000000)), TODO (0.415688 (neutral:0.000000)), Metaphor (0.412624 (negative:-0.695880)), cracks (0.399580 (neutral:0.000000)), Taxonomy (0.394496 (negative:-0.695880)), subspecies (0.392080 (neutral:0.000000)), manner (0.390640 (neutral:0.000000)), genera (0.387845 (neutral:0.000000)), classification (0.384627 (negative:-0.353466)), table (0.382119 (negative:-0.553844)), end (0.379121 (neutral:0.000000)), sectors (0.378961 (neutral:0.000000)), order (0.374191 (neutral:0.000000)), plants (0.374074 (neutral:0.000000)), birds (0.373956 (neutral:0.000000)), species (0.371589 (neutral:0.000000))
Entities:
4 inches:Quantity (0.010000 (neutral:0.000000))
Concepts:
Species (0.973752): dbpedia | freebase | opencyc
Taxonomic rank (0.801046): dbpedia | freebase
Binomial nomenclature (0.540763): dbpedia | freebase
International Code of Zoological Nomenclature (0.532189): dbpedia | freebase
Order (0.521767): dbpedia | freebase
Zoological nomenclature (0.479646): dbpedia
Scientific classification (0.478981): dbpedia | yago
Debut albums (0.451221): dbpedia
Space, time, form
