Phylogenies (evolutionary trees) are basic to thinking about and analyzing differences between species. Statistical, computational, and algorithmic work on them has been ongoing for four decades, with great advances in understanding. Yet no book has summarized this work until now. Inferring Phylogenies explains clearly the assumptions and logic of making inferences about phylogenies, and using them to make inferences about evolutionary processes. It is an essential text and reference for anyone who wants to understand how phylogenies are reconstructed and how they are used. As phylogenies are...

The NATO Advanced Study Institute on Numerical Taxonomy took place on the 4th - 16th of July, 1982, at the Kur- und Kongresshotel Residenz in Bad Windsheim, Federal Republic of Germany. This volume is the proceedings of that meeting, and contains papers by over two-thirds of the participants in the Institute. Numerical taxonomy has been attracting increased attention from systematists and evolutionary biologists. It is an area which has been marked by debate and conflict, sometimes bitter. Happily, this meeting took place in an atmosphere of "GemUtlichkeit", though scarcely of unanimity. I...