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Slack / Private Message Drop, p.471 [SLACK_000685] · slack_pm:msg:04890

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Germans and their neat little boxes - yes I believe it's a thing...

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2021-01-31 16:11 Andrew Rambaut open

My reply: ```The problem is that taxonomy doesn't really work for virus as far as I am concerned as there is essentially astructured continuum of diversity - i.e. completely artifactual notions of species. And with recombination that just makes thing completely arbitrary. I don't mind labelling bits of the phylogenetic tree for convenient discussion but Ithink we get too focused on trying to replicate a metazoan taxonomy on viruses. That said - to answer you final question - yes, SARS1 and SARS2 are completely distinct (not even sibling clades)with the diversity within each minuscule compared to the divergence between them. This paper gives an overview oftheir relative positions (and some of the complex recombinant history in the sarbecovirus clade):https://www.nature.com/articles/s41564-020-0771-4```
2021-01-31 16:12 Andrew Rambaut open

Glad I can't make the WHO nomenclature meeting this week - will be carnage.
2021-01-31 16:26 Kristian G. Andersen open

Lol. Jens was right about one thing though - that was indeed a dumb question. "What do you mean, we can't fit these little things into neat little boxes?! Nein!!"
2021-01-31 16:37 Edward C. Holmes open

The WHO nomenclature thing will be horrendous. Tulio and Jens is an interesting combination.
2021-01-31 16:43 Robert F. Garry

Germans and their neat little boxes - yes I believe it's a thing...