ABSTRACT
The development of phylogenetic analysis (Hennig, 1966; Wiley, 1981) and widespread adoption of quantitative methods to achieve those goals (see Brooks et al., 2007 for a review) catalysed a revolution in systematic biology. It also produced a travelling wave of advances and controversies permeating all of comparative evolutionary biology (Brooks and McLennan, 1991, 2002; Harvey and Pagel, 1991). Historical biogeography has not escaped this phenomenon. Since the early 1970s, historical biogeographers have found ample material for loud arguments over conceptual issues, methods, and results. The arguments almost always involve con™icts between simplicity and complexity, and have produced much heat but little light, and nothing approaching a synthesis. Rather, there is a ‘simplicity group’ (cladistic biogeography) and a ‘complexity group’ (phylogenetic biogeography; see Dowling et al., 2003; Ebach and Morrone, 2005; Van Veller et al., 2002). Both sides argue
2.1 Introduction .................................................................................................... 13 2.2 Biology as Complexity Science ...................................................................... 16 2.3 Historical Biogeography as Complexity Science............................................ 17
2.3.1 Phylogenetic Analysis for Comparing Trees, or PACT ...................... 18 2.3.2 An Example ........................................................................................26 2.3.3 Comparing What Is with What Ought to Be ......................................30
