(062)-(063) Proposals to simplify author citation

For a long time, I have considered the authorship of the names of new taxa, new combinations and nomina nova published in books. These kinds of situations are different from each other. There may be many authors of editors of a book. Those authors may be the same as, partly the same as, or completely different from the authors of a subsection of that book (e.g., a family account in a flora). Similarly, the authorship ascribed to a name published in that book may have all, some, or no authors in common with the subsection of the book or the book as a whole. In such cases, it may be very difficult for subsequent researchers to determine the correct author citation for a name. Much time may be spent in reexamining the original publication, and confusion and mistakes may well occur. In my opinion, the best solution would be for all new taxa, new combinations and nomina nova to be published in journals before any use of such names in books. I also propose that new names must be attributed to the author(s) of the publication (i.e. paper in the journal) in which they appear. It will therefore no longer be necessary to re-examine the protologue to determine correct author citation. These new rules are to affect only those names published on or after 1 January 2007, and will be in no way retroactive. If these proposals are successful, I believe that many problematic aspects of author citation will be avoided and simplicity and stability will be furthered.