# Unintended consequence of taxon change

**URL:** <https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/unintended-consequence-of-taxon-change/9725>\
**Category:** Curators\
**Created:** [January 25, 2020, 11:23pm UTC](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/unintended-consequence-of-taxon-change/9725 "2020-01-25T23:23:56Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![jwidness](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/9d8465/32.png) [@jwidness](https://forum.inaturalist.org/u/jwidness)\
**Post date:** [January 25, 2020, 11:23pm UTC](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/unintended-consequence-of-taxon-change/9725/1 "2020-01-25T23:23:56Z")

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Really not sure if this is a bug or what. Here’s what happened:

- iNat was recognizing the subspecies Ateles geoffroyi yucatanensis (following IUCN)
- Marcelo Aranda wanted to follow some other research that sunk A. g. yucatanensis into another subspecies, so he disagreed with the ssp ID
- I pointed out that the better way to fix it was to swap A. g. yucatanensis into another subspecies name (following the other research)
- after swapping A. g. yucatanensis into A. g. vellerosus, the disagreement changed from disagreeing with A. g. yucatanensis to disagreeing with A.g. vellerosus – which is NOT what he had intended to disagree with
- now there are observations back at the species level that should have the votes to go to subspecies

 ![image](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/uploads/inaturalist/original/2X/7/7d382e6ec95c6f18a914df1725e025e57e9b07d9.png)

(note: this is not blaming Marcelo Aranda, nor is it discussing whether subspecies matter, just simply pointing out that the current disagreement is not as expected)

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**Author:** ![jwidness](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/9d8465/32.png) [@jwidness](https://forum.inaturalist.org/u/jwidness)\
**Post date:** [January 27, 2020, 3:31am UTC](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/unintended-consequence-of-taxon-change/9725/2 "2020-01-27T03:31:42Z")

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@loarie any thoughts on how this might be fixable? I’m not really sure what the best solution is, but I don’t really feel comfortable changing disagreeing IDs like this – it kind of feels like putting words in their mouth.

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**Author:** ![mftasp](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/forum.inaturalist.org/mftasp/32/1428_2.png) [@mftasp](https://forum.inaturalist.org/u/mftasp)\
**Post date:** [January 27, 2020, 11:10pm UTC](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/unintended-consequence-of-taxon-change/9725/3 "2020-01-27T23:10:44Z")

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I’d have called this a bug, though one based on mistaken assumptions: that a disagreeing ID against a name continues to hold when the name changes. This only holds if the name change is the result of correcting a nomenclatural synonym, but not necessarily if it is done to correct a taxonomic synonym or a misapplication.