Is the Neotropical Flora Ready for the PhyloCode?

Nomenclatural systems are structured around classification, and together they enable increasingly informed communication about biological diversity. Challengers of Linnaean classification and nomenclature have proposed the PhyloCode, a new set of rules that would govern the way systematists classify and name the diversity of life. Monographs and floras are two fundamental vehicles for communicating information about plant diversity. These works provide a comprehensive foundation of botanical research upon which other scientific studies are based. Information conveyed by monographs and floras is utilized directly or indirectly both within and outside the scientific arena by a wide range of consumers, such as educators, agronomists, ecologists, conservationists, amateur naturalists, and even lawmakers, to name a few. Both classification and nomenclature are essential to the process of synthesis that leads to monographic and floristic treatments and the communication that they facilitate. Conversion to a new system would have far-reaching consequences for the flow of information from systematics to other scientific disciplines, and to society. The purposes of this article are to address the proposed conversion from the perspective of monographic and floristic research focused on Neotropical plant diversity and to point out some difficulties in applying the PhyloCode to the Neotropical flora. Although we welcome improvements in the current nomenclatural system, we conclude that the PhyloCode is not prepared to replace the Linnaean system as a new way to communicate information about Neotropical plant diversity.