Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Tree of Life/Archive 10

Range maps

Range maps were accepted as an optional part of the taxobox, but so far we haven't considered how they should fit into the new template system. Pages like blue whale currently include an image thumbnail within the binomial name section. I think it would be better to use a second {{Taxobox_image ...}} tag for them, and have tentatively suggested it on Wikipedia:WikiProject Tree of Life/Taxobox Usage. However, this has the drawback that it's very awkward for thumbnails.

I am pretty certain that we are already doing the suggested method on some pages with range maps. I agree with should extend the practice. Pcb21| Pete 13:57, 16 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Where was it suggested? I don't remember it from the template discussions, and the new taxoboxes look different from the old ones, which had the binomial name and range maps were in separate cells. I like that better, since one isn't part of the other. What do you think of maybe adding a range header to the taxobox?

By the way, I also think it would be a good idea to link to that page from each of the template pages, so people know where to find information on how to use them. Should I go ahead? Also, why are we using <br\> when works fine? Josh 13:50, 16 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I presume you mean on the relevant Template_talk: pages. Sounds good to me! Pcb21| Pete 13:57, 16 Aug 2004 (UTC)

is well-formed XHTML and is okay for HTML, whereas is not acceptable XHTML. --Chinasaur

But, apparently are all translated to by MW, so now I see your point... --Chinasaur 11:38, 19 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Requests for comment

We really should decide what to do about viruses - whether to include them in our phylogenetic system, or not. Also, I'd appreciate comments on my proposed rewrite of our plant article, which I think focuses way to much on boundary cases and not enough on ordinary plants. And, should anyone happen to be interested in protists, it would be neat if anyone had any insight on how to treat the heterokont/stramenopile/chromist group.

Please comment on Talk:Virus, perhaps Talk:Plant, and if you're feeling generous Talk:water mould. Thanks, Josh 15:33, 17 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Categories again

Whoa! What's with this (Category:Animalia)? I thought we were:

Not in agreement on using categories and
Leaning towards using common name categories and not taxonomically named ones.

- UtherSRG 21:04, 19 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Only because Category:Animals was taken with more generic things than just taxa. I am happy to merge the categories, or move animalia to animals (taxa) as required - the category discussion appeared to peter out. Pcb21| Pete 21:10, 19 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Well, ya shoulda at least posted that you were gonna do this, so that I don't get all freaked out. *grins* - UtherSRG 21:55, 19 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Sorry, perhaps got carried away doing with the Mrs works late! Incidentally I tried to create only uncontroversial categories, with common names, in order to try to keep everyone who contributed to the prior discussion happy (subject to having categories at all!).

There exists Category:Cetaceans, Category:Pinnipeds, Category:Cats, Category:Reptiles, Category:Chordates , Category:Primates, Category:Mammals, Category:Carnivores (and many others now)

I later merged the animalia and animals categories to fit the guidelines. Pcb21| Pete 12:40, 31 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I've added Category:Protista and Category:Ciliates. Should we be keeping track of these someplace, in case we decide to adjust them all later? By the way, in addition to taxa and other groups, there are pages that are closely related to specific taxa, and there are images. We should consider including them in our general categories, or creating special categories for them.

So, I've added an experimental Category:Protist images. I think it will be useful, because not many protist have images associated with them yet; the same sort of approach could be useful for other small groups, helping people identify things they find. On the other hand, the current set-up isn't particularly designed for such categories, given that it places everything under I.

Btw, it may be noted the current templates break what links here for both articles and images. Presumably this has been reported? Josh 21:03, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Hi Josh - if you take the page [[Image:Common Name.jpg]] and add the category link like this: [[Category:Protist images|Name, Common]] then it'll index them correctly, listed as Image:Common Name.jpg under N. - MPF 00:23, 24 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Thanks! That's a much better system.

What about making KPCOFGS categories with stuff in parentheses like this: Category:Mammalia (class), Category:Primates (order), Category:Loridae (family) and so on? Fuelbottle | Talk 18:16, 29 Aug 2004 (UTC)

See the archived discussion. Ranks aren't always stable, but UtherSRG has already created Category:Primates (taxa) as a parallel to Category:Primates. However, I think that no other such categories have been added means it's not clear when we should use them and when they provide any additional benefit. At least, that's why I've been avoiding them. Josh 18:25, 29 Aug 2004 (UTC)

UtherSRG said to me on his talk page recently that he has now come round to the view that a parallel (taxa) system is an unnecessary complication - better to lump all article types into the one category, which is what I have been doing. Pcb21| Pete 18:31, 29 Aug 2004 (UTC)

It's just I think the categories that have been created now are kinda messy. Fuelbottle | Talk 19:08, 29 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I didn't know UtherSRG had changed his mind. In that case, do we have a rough agreement on how categories should be used? I agree with Fuel that the current system is messy, but I don't think the ranks help much. It looks like the general opinion is to use common names where possible. The idea seems to be to have one category at each major level, and include only the primary subdivisions. I don't think this works well with poorly developed groups - for instance Category:Ciliates is much better without a hierarchy. But if we only create subcategories when the originals are too large, I think we have a good system, and should maybe add guidelines to this page. Josh 19:46, 29 Aug 2004 (UTC)

The comments SRG made are at [[1]]. Pending Fuelbottle's further comments, I do think we should add these guidelines (use plural common names, use your judgement of when/where to categorize within each branch aiming for an approximate category size of 10-50 articles). However this is what I have been doing recently, so it would be good to have Fuelbottle tell us more about what he doesn't like about them. Pcb21| Pete 20:44, 29 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I guess if some guidelines are set up so we can get some consistency in naming the categories, they might work out ok. Fuelbottle | Talk 22:21, 29 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Josh has now written these guidelines. Pcb21| Pete 11:20, 30 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Should the stuff in Category:Primates (taxa) be moved to Category:Primates? Fuelbottle | Talk 21:18, 30 Aug 2004 (UTC)

It should be, but it is probably worth hanging on a while til SRG is around again, assuming he ever is! Pcb21| Pete 12:40, 31 Aug 2004 (UTC)

New style taxobox problem

What's gone wrong with the taxobox at Cashew? - it should be:
Anacardium occidentale L.
but is actually showing:
Anacardium occidentale
L.. {20 August 2004 (UTC)}
Can anyone solve it? - MPF 20:24, 20 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Quite simple. You used the footer with authority, but that one requires both the authority and the date. However you omitted the date, so instead the standard template {{date}} is instead used. I added the standard Linnaeus 1761. andy 20:29, 20 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Hi Andy - thanks; I didn't use the new taxobox, that was someone else put it in, I was just changing the citation of Linnaeus from spelled out to standard Botanical 'L.', and removing a question mark that had been there before. As botanical author citations (unlike zoological ones) don't cite dates, there should be no date there at all, just L. for Linnaeus. Can the relevant template be changed to one that doesn't require a date, please? - MPF 22:22, 20 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I made Template:Taxobox_section_binomial_botany which is like Template:Taxobox_section_binomial but doesn't have a date. If you don't like it, please change it, but don't put it in too many articles right away. It is currently in use at Garden Chervil. --Yath 06:40, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Thanks; I've copied across to Cashew. I've still not got round the new taxoboces yet, so won't be adding more, only editing any new-style that I run across MPF 09:46, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)

References - short names not unique between botanists and zoologists?

According to IPNI the abbreviation Gray belongs to Samuel Frederick Gray, while quite a lot of the animals described by his son John Edward Gray also have the short reference Gray. If those are correct than we have to make Gray (taxonomist) to be a disambiguation (there was only one taxobox pointing there anyway, which I fixed now), or have to change to use something like Gray (botanist) and Gray (zoologist) instead. BTW: is there anything comparable to IPNI for zoologists? andy 11:55, 24 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Hi Andy - I'd go for the Gray (botanist) and Gray (zoologist) option, or maybe for their full names (i.e., [[Samuel Frederick Gray|Gray]] and [[John Edward Gray|Gray]] respectively - MPF 14:19, 24 Aug 2004 (UTC)

And there is Asa Gray, George Robert Gray and there are a lot more. I suggest using the full name or the name plus all the initials, unless a link can be made to a biography, then you can use a link such as [[John Edward Gray|J.E. Gray]]. You can consult List of biologists, List of botanists or you can write a biography yourself, such as I have done a few times. JoJan 14:40, 24 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Maybe you misunderstood - the other botanists Gray's have their own abbreviation, e.g. Asa Gray is A. Gray, so those are not the problem here. The problem is that apparently the Gray for flowers is a different Gray than the one fort animals. And of course once we have a full article about an author it should be at the full name, and only use a disambiguation if that one isn't unique. However for taxoboxes it's handy to insert something like [[Gray (taxonomist)|Gray]] which then is a redirect to the plain author name, so not everyone who adds taxoboxes needs to know the translation table from short names to the full names. andy 15:21, 24 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Gray (taxonomist) is no solution, since all the other Grays were also taxonomists. The University of Wisconsin offers this solution : "Citations of botanical authors are standardized and abbreviated as per Brummitt and Powell (1992), with one exception. British naturalist Samuel Frederick Gray, abbreviated simply as Gray in Brummitt and Powell, is abbreviated in this Checklist as S.F.Gray to distinguish him from the American botanist Asa Gray (A.Gray). " See here [[2]]. I suggest we do the the same. JoJan 16:07, 24 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I think, indicating the full reference would solve the problem. See Nymphaeaceae - the first reference gives enough information for any purpose. Iorsh 16:48, 6 Sep 2004 (UTC)

"What links here", Clownfish and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Common_clownfish.jpg

The image at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Common_clownfish.jpg is used in the article Clownfish, yet the way it does so (using a taxobox expansion) somehow precludes discovering that fact via the usual automated "What links here" mechanisms. Apparently it is related to a known bug, see Bug #48. Is there a workaround? - [[User:Bevo|Bevo]] 08:27, 26 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I noticed the same thing on images I have uploaded and used on articles recently. Not really much of a workaround but I have been adding stuff like "This image is not an orphan. It is used on the article blah" to stop people from deleting it as an orphan. Pcb21| Pete 08:44, 26 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I created Clownfish/images as a workaround to this bug. - [[User:Bevo|Bevo]] 13:00, 26 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Clownfish/images does not appear to exist at the moment. nroose Talk 08:35, 1 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Another option is to repeat the pic on the page's talk page; I've done this with Image:Araucaria.columnaris1web.jpg which now shows up as being on Talk:Araucaria, even though its main appearance on Araucaria doesn't show - MPF 21:37, 4 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Another approach might be to put the images in categories, so that at least the category pages link to them. I think this could be useful even after the bug is fixed, since it lets people know what images are available for a group. Meanwhile, it looks like Image:Common clownfish.jpg found the best protection - getting featured. Josh

Apparently the bug is fixed now - pages which use an image via templates now show up on the image page. However it needs on edit to the article to get an update of the link table. Thus the workarounds to mark images an non-orphan are no longer needed. And together with it some other template bugs were finally fixed. Now we just need optional parameter in templates and ToL will be fully happy with templates. andy 15:08, 19 Sep 2004 (UTC)

How many layers of taxa?

The number of layers of taxa that are included in a taxobox varies a lot - Ascaphidae is an example of a completist, modern approach. Other places we are traditional KPCOFGS only. Is it worth standardizing these? Pcb21| Pete 10:15, 26 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Absolutely. Ascaphidae includes way too many ranks, and a number of them are non-standard. While it's nice to have a modern system, there's no need to promulgate it on every family and species page, which provides very little information about them and makes it harder to change when the system does (which they still do routinely). In general, KPCOFGS should be the rule, but some intermediate ranks may important depending on the group in question. This is already detailed on the taxobox use page. Josh 16:08, 26 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Amen. You need the in-betweens for a beetle family with 30,000 species in 2,000 genera, but "microphylum"? Pointless. Williamb seems to be the energetic adder, someone should have a talk with him. Stan 16:17, 26 Aug 2004 (UTC)

He hasn't been doing it recently. Josh

I would go from Vertebrata straight to Amphibia. Gnathostomata excludes just the lampreys, of which there aren't many, and non-cladists (traditionalists?) don't consider frogs to be fish. On beetles, I agree; likewise other big insect orders, such as wasps and moths. -phma 16:25, 26 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Gnathostomata also excludes the Pteraspidomorpha, not just Cephalaspidomorpha. By going straight from Vertebrata to Amphibia the encyclopaedia will be giving a very false and simplistic impression of the complexity and precision involved in determining the consituent groups of vertebrates. "Just split it up in amphibia and reptilia, etc., easy as one two three!" thinks the proverbial man in the street - and then he comes across the lamprey article (for example) and

1) it won't use the same taxa, or we will have Petromyzomidae sitting nakedly in Vertebrata! WIKIPEDIA MUST BE CONSISTENT!

2) He won't be able to understand how it is classified, because it won't use the childishly simplistic system he saw for amphibia - and what is the point of taxoboxes if not to let readers understand classification?

3) He won't be able to understand the relationship between Amphibia and cephalaspidomorpha because the former won't be shown as being in the Gnathostomata but the latter will have to be shown as being Agnathan - where has that extra taxon sprung from?, he will think. Systematics is supposed to systematic! Systematics is all about coherence, not simplification. This isn't a primary school textbook! He won't know that in one case taxa have been left out for "convenience" but in the other case such exclusion is impossible for a meaningful table. He will simple be confused and will not understand the incoherence.

There is a clear division between full, accepted taxa and not universally accepted taxa. Whilst I can understand that leaving out taxa that aren't really standard is reasonable, for factual correctness' sake, Gnathostomata is not one of them. I cannot see any reason whatsoever why Gnathostomata should be ommitted. It is lunacy! Why do you not want to see correct, thorough, factual information on wikipedia? 80.255 00:49, 29 Sep 2004 (UTC)

I disagree entirely. Gnathostomata is a standard clade, but that is not the same as it being standard within a ranked classification system. On the contrary, they are not always given a rank, and when they are it may vary. More importantly, corresponding groups for the other vertebrates are not well-defined, since many consider Agnatha obsolete. That gives an odd situation where some classes have a supergroup and others don't, and I don't think that's inherently more obvious. The idea that the division between fully accepted and controversial taxa is clear is simply false.

Anyone who understands how classification works should not have a problem with omitted levels, and other people won't get any benefit from including obscure microphyla everywhere. In fact, I don't think restricting intermediate ranks to those immediately relevant will confuse anyone. Either way, though, constantly presenting an enormous array of unfamiliar taxa would be far worse, especially since intermediate ranks are often inconsistent between sources, even when the groups are generally accepted. The current system is a simplified presentation, but I see no reason to believe it is over-simplifies things, except in that it presents a single taxonomy when there are usually several alternatives to choose from.

What exactly do you propose to do about the lampreys? Use Agnatha, although they are generally abandoned by modern systems, or something like superclass Hyperoartia, that won't correspond to almost any of the literature? The names won't convey any information about systematics to people who aren't familiar with them, and those who are will already know the relative positions of lampreys and amphibians. Detailed discussion of relationships should be available in the articles. So why are these options better than simply treating the lampreys without a supergroup, which far better reflects their current treatment?

I'm all for keeping our policy flexible, but I don't see why we should re-evaluate our position here. It's not like this is a new idea, or these points haven't already been discussed several times. Of course the current system isn't perfect, but if we have to re-open old arguments every time someone isn't entirely satisfied with the agreement, we may as well not have a standard. Josh 06:27, 29 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Titmouse

The current page titmouse is a family page coveing the whole of the Paridae (tits & chickadees in Parus, titmice recently split off as Baeolophus, and a few monotypic genera) - I'd like to suggest (1) re-naming the current titmouse as Paridae (currently a redirect to titmouse), (2) re-model titmouse as a genus page for Baeolophus, (3) make a new page for Parus, and (4) the remaining genera names as redirects to their current sole species. Only problem is that the AOU split Parus up into several smaller genera (not followed by any other authorities, as far as I know). Anyone any thoughts? - MPF 18:37, 27 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Sounds like a good plan. --Yath 21:53, 27 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Rat kings

Is there a mammal expert around here who is able to answer a question about rats and especially rat kings? The question is, if rat kings do really exist or if they are just a product of forgery. See Talk:Rat king. Thanks for any answers. -- Baldhur 21:12, 28 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Should we be using domains?

A number of biologists have objected to the three-domain system, including several big names like Mayr, Margulis, and Cavalier-Smith. Although this is treated lightly on relevant pages, some of their arguments are substantive. In particular, it is argued that the morphological differences alone don't justify the separation, and that the eubacteria are paraphyletic to the archaebacteria (and eukaryotes), removing the phylogenetic reason for separating them.

I would like to add some notes about this controversy, but I can't seem to find the other side. The only papers I could find arguing that the eubacteria were monophyletic were the originals by Woese, which are based upon his progenote hypothesis and rRNA studies. The former is not widely accepted, and the latter are no longer considered a reliable guide to phylogeny, at least among the eukaryotes where they contradict protein gene studies.

Is the three-domain system still the de facto standard in microbiology, and can someone refer me to a source justifying why? Otherwise, if it is obsolete, should we tone down our support for it and switch to a more neutral organization scheme? Josh 17:07, 29 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I never much liked the three domain system. :) But the 6 kingdom system is a nice working system even with its drawbacks. Since I do not work in a biology-related field and have not continued my biology education beyond my 2001 BS, I can't say just which system is most commonly used today. I would suspect that the 5/6 kingdom system is still the most commonly used system and would hope that we continued using it. --mav 02:28, 30 Aug 2004 (UTC)

When considing what to include in taxoboxes, it is a perfect moment to consider how to come to a universal taxobox. The de: taxobox only starts at subordo. When en: decides to use only up to regnum, that should be possible too.

One solution to this problem is to have a universal taxobox in WikiSpecies (or WikiCommons as the difference is technically immaterial) for all validly published names. For de: potentially en: there might be a parameter that defines the level where to start. By having taxoboxes for _all_ valid names, it will be possible to have a wikipedia on a particular revision and notify this when there is a later valid name.

Obviously having a box for all validly published names is only possible when there is enough intrest in creating the data. This is where the need for a big scientific intrest is needed for. GerardM 08:38, 30 Aug 2004 (UTC)

This particular problem isn't whether we want to show domains (we don't most of the time), but whether they're an appropriate system to use. That's something that has to be decided, regardless. Even invisible domains impact the division of the prokaryotes - for instance, they would prevent us from using Monera.

What I would like to do is generally reverse the decisions we made on Talk:Bacterium. I think treating the prokaryotes in two kingdoms is the best option, but the names Eubacteria and Archaebacteria should probably be used, since they are unambiguous. The two empire system isn't actually obsolete, since prokaryotes are assumed to be paraphyletic, and I would prefer it as a more neutral alternative to the three-domain system. However, I think it would likely face constant reversion attempts. It is nice to have a supergroup, domain or empire, for all eukaryotes, but not necessary. Josh 03:05, 31 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Wikispecies

As for the wikispecies idea, I think my initial reaction was too harsh, but I do have several concerns. Most notably I think it would end up requiring a full classification for all species, and so preventing us from being flexible in cases where the classification varies or is uncertain. For protists, which are my main interest, phylogenetic taxa are only recently emerging, and I don't think they could be used if the groups had been locked into the old morphological system, instead of being left as unclassified.

Also, I think it's very useful to have language-specific descriptions in the taxoboxes, as for instance on plant. Taking these away would hurt all the wikipediae, making them less accessible, in order to coordinate them. And the most important part, the information in the articles, still wouldn't be coordinated.

The things is, such matters are rarely considered by people interested only in the taxonomy and not the organisms in question. As such, I worry that a wikispecies project would end up dictating systems to the rest of us, without much regard for special considerations or the needs of the articles. It may be worth trying, but it would be nice if you could allay some of these concerns, and discuss some of the details of the proposal. Josh 03:05, 31 Aug 2004 (UTC)

When in wikispecies a taxobox will be included, there will be a link to the wikipedia. With this link is created with a syntax like [[taxobox:Homo sapiens|Human]] the passed parameter can be stored in WikiSpecies for a language. When for the higher taxons a vernaculkar name is known, the result can be a taxobox like with plant.

As to the "dictating" of wikispecies, at this moment considering the use of taxoboxes considering outside en:ToL has been little enough while there is a demonstrated need. With taxoboxes usable in all wikipedia, the basic information will be Latin, with more links to the Wikispecies more and more vernacular names will be available.

This may result in stubs like nl:Rode eekhoorn. This is perfectly reasonable when it coincedes with an interwiki to wikipedia that _has_ an article about the red squirel. GerardM 11:25, 31 Aug 2004 (UTC)

That covers the languages, but nothing else. The ability to coordinate taxoboxes quickly is only a small part of coordinating articles. Compare es:Protista, where someone had little difficulty copying our taxobox, and as a result we've gone from two systems in two wikipediae to two systems in one. That's not helpful.

In any case, this coordination is only one issue. I think it's more important to be able to maintain flexibilty and meet the needs of the specific groups in question, and I'm asking if we can figure out a way for wikispecies to addres these matters. It doesn't matter what benefit it has in coordination if it breaks what we're coordinating.

Remember taxonomy is a fluid and changing discipline, and there isn't a single system out there for all to follow. How do we decide what systems to use, and most importantly, how do we coordinate a change? This isn't such an issue when the taxoboxes are part of the articles, since they can be updated together, but your proposed separation leaves the prospect of major inconsistencies. This needs to be considered before we decide this is a good idea. Josh 18:47, 31 Aug 2004 (UTC)

A truly studly wikispecies would allow for multiple taxonomic entries, as in "Curculionidae is a family in Joe Blow's system", "Begoniaceae was in Violales in Cronquist", or whatever. A much-shifted taxon would have quite a few relationship/system entries. An advantage is that appropriate DB queries could reconstruct old systems in their entirety, and in theory, not necessarily useful, one could construct accurate historical taxoboxes as well as current ones. For the table of systems, one would then want a way to choose one as "current", and that would produce the usual taxoboxes for WP articles. Not an easy problem of database design, needs someone who really understands taxonomy deeply, but doable I think. Stan 19:32, 31 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Inline taxobox help

I feel like we probably want to find some way to point editors to Taxobox_Usage right from the main article or edit page. We can certainly make a template linking to the Taxobox_Usage page and add it to article talk pages, but I feel like for important help like this it's good to have something right on the article page too, in case notes on talk are overlooked. I have some preliminary suggestions that I've prototyped here:

We could just put a link to Taxobox_Usage in the main article. This is not optimal, since we'd like to keep these details hidden from non-editors, but it's not unprecedented. See the navigation box for Train. Compare to the small note at the bottom of the taxobox. The help message is in the table caption tag and I think pretty unobtrusive.
We could put a message for editors in HTML comments on the article page. To standardize this a bit, we could agree on an HTML message like , for example, and put it in a template. Using the {{subst:blah}} construction would put this message in the edit page where it might help some people.

I don't consider either solution optimal, but both are better than doing nothing, and maybe someone else will be inspired to a better idea. --Chinasaur 17:31, 30 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Maybe we could create a new page, explaining the taxoboxes to readers - referring them to how classification works, explaining the color code and bolding, and so forth. Something like that would be entirely appropriate to link to from the main page, and could send new editors to our taxobox use page for further information. Meanwhile, most of the templates have a link there on their talk page, on the hopes people might look there for explanations. Josh 19:14, 30 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Yeah, I remember you mentioning that you were adding that to the talk pages. I also like your suggestion; it's a good compromise to avoid exposing "readers" to too much nitty gritty but still give editors an avenue to find the template help straight from the article page. Ideally the link from the article page would use language that tempts both readers and editors to find out more... How about the HTML comment approach? I like this, but like UtherSRG, I'm a little more HTML friendly than some editors. Unfortunately there doesn't seem to be a way to use templates to make an HTML comment easily changeable and still appear on the edit page, but I thought it we standardized the comment it would at least be easily bot parseable if it ever came to that. (Despite my better judgement that encouraging bot parsing situations should be avoided, there doesn't seem to be a better way to implement a notice in the edit box.) --Chinasaur 19:56, 30 Aug 2004 (UTC)

New pictures for you guys to use

Iv'e added several new pics to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plants_and_animals_of_Belize and as always I'm takeing request. Belizian 17:58, 30 Aug 2004 (UTC)

yukkity yukkity yuk

This is what happens when people with no science background start writing about themselves. A fairly NPOV human article got hugely POVved. this is just a heads up, folks. Dunc_Harris|☺ 21:00, 30 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Ranks

Do we have a standard for how groups are ranked? There are at least thirteen well-known and reasonably stable groups between phylum Chordata and class Aves (Chordata — Craniata — Vertebrata — Gnathostomata — Teleostomi — Sarcopterygii — Tetrapoda — Amniota — Reptilia — Diapsida — Archosauria — Dinosauria — Saurischia — Theropoda — Aves). How are these to be ranked (if at all)? And what should taxoboxes look like in these articles? Gdr 18:37, 2004 Sep 1 (UTC)

See also "How many layers of taxa" a few sections above and the taxobox usage subpage of the project.

Roughly speaking if you are describing a family or species within Aves then you probably want none of the intermediate groups. For the aves page itself? The only strong guideline is "use your own judgement". We've tended to stay basically KPCOFGS within the taxoboxes and be a bit more -phyletically descriptive within the article body. Pcb21| Pete 19:34, 1 Sep 2004 (UTC)

There are plenty of "sub-", "infra-", etc prefixes to cover all these, but although the names are well-known, it would be misleading to suggest that there's any consensus on how they would all be ranked. Cladistic types just finesse by calling them "clades" indiscrimately. Might be worth introducing a special type of taxobox that makes some links to containing groups, but discourages edit that try to hack it into the main hierarchy. (Unfortunately, our ToL is more rigid than specialists would prefer.) Stan 20:52, 1 Sep 2004 (UTC)

It should be noted that these groups aren't entirely stable. Sarcopterygii may exclude the amniotes, and everything from Reptilia to Theropoda may exclude the birds. Not everyone has agreed that paraphyletic groups are invalid; they are logical necessities for extinct groups. Those that avoid them have difficulty ranking vertebrates, since you have large groups like Aves and Amniota with tiny sisters like deinonychosaurs and lungfish.

I don't think we should include any of these groups in the taxoboxes until a more generally acceptable system that uses them emerges. We could add a more phylocode-like table, but outside of the vertebrates and perhaps the higher plant groups, the ranked systems seem to work fine. Josh 21:10, 1 Sep 2004 (UTC)

I think it's useful for a taxobox to mention the immediately containing clade, even if unranked. It makes it easier to browse in a deep hierarchy like this, without having to jump up to the top each time.

What system are we using to rank these groups? At the moment I see we have these ranks:

Chordata — phylum

Craniata — subphylum

Vertebrata — subphylum

Gnathostomata — infraphylum

Teleostomi — no article

Sarcopterygii — class

Tetrapoda — infraphylum

Amniota — microphylum

Reptilia — class (but Sauropsida is a nanophylum)

Diapsida — superclass

Archosauria — class

Dinosauria — superorder

Saurischia — order

Theropoda — suborder

Aves — class

Gdr 13:25, 2004 Sep 2 (UTC)

At the moment there isn't a system. People have been using the phylogenetic groups as formal taxa randomly, making up ranks as they go without worrying about inconsistencies. This is largely because there isn't an established system that uses them.

I tried discussing what classes we should use on Talk:Chordate, but it didn't attract much comment. However, most low-level groups are happy using the classes Actinopterygii, Amphibia, Mammalia, Aves, and Reptilia, with the last understood to be paraphyletic. We should probably stick with this and standardize other pages to it, although it means we can't use Reptilia through Theropoda as clades in the taxobox.

If you have ideas on better systems, I'd be happy to hear them. However, note that clade-only schemes simply don't work with extinct groups. For instance, whatever we rank Aves, we'd need to rank crocodylians, pterosaurs, ornithischians, coelophysids, ceratosaurs, spinosaurs, allosaurs, tyrannosaurs, ornithomimids, therizinosaurs, and deinonychosaurs at least as high. We could try a rankless system, but I don't think it would do too well for such common animals. Josh 16:38, 2 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Candidatus - a new naming code

Azhyd added an orphan page on an interesting proteobacterium, Pelagibacter ubique. However, strange to say, it looks like the formal name of the organism is actually Candidatus Pelagibacter ubique. There is some information on this type of name at LSBN. How do we want to handle it? A new binomial name template can be made easily, but how should it show up in the placement (or subdivision boxes), and should the article be moved or kept where it is? Josh 22:41, 4 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Candidatus isn't part of the name, it is a qualifier to indicate that the name has not (yet) been validly published. Since inclusion in wikipedia does not constitute formal publication, the page won't do any harm as it is, except possibly that it could alert others to the existence of this organism, who might then rush to print with their own formal valid publication and 'steal' the kudos of having described it. But I'd guess that anyone with the ability to do this will know about it from other sources anyway. The page needs a bit of cleaning (it's -> it is, etc). I'd also think the page might be better titled as the genus name only, not the full species binomial name (c.f. other monotypic genera). - MPF 23:13, 4 Sep 2004 (UTC)

In this case, it looks like Candidatus is used because the species hasn't met the qualifications for formal publication. If it is just a status, I guess the page doesn't need much changing, but the sudden inversion of whether the name is italicized when it is included makes me wonder if it can be validly excluded. At any rate, it should definitely be included along with the attribution, and I will make Template:Taxobox section binomial candidatus accordingly.

As for monotypic genera, are you proposing the page be moved to Pelagibacter, or simply that the title be changed? I'd be happy to do the former, but it would probably be better if the redirect was deleted first. We should probably draw up some standards for such pages. Josh 01:29, 5 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Wikimedia Newsletter

Hi all - Several of us have been working on creating a Wikimedia Newsletter on Meta. Since ToL is by far the largest WikiProect in Wikipedia we would like one (or more) of you to write a quick summary of where the project stands for the newsletter. We are especially interested in how the different language versions interact and the possible use of the Wikimedia Commons to store taxoboxes. Anything you can add will be appreciated. :) --mav 04:51, 6 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Category structure

To whom it may concern: Please feel free to visit Wikipedia:WikiProject Dog breeds/Categories because I think that structuring various animal articles and Dog articles could take a similar tack--would be nice to use same subcategories for consistency. I've left messages all over various Cat and Horse articles and topics to this same effect.

One thing I see (that someone else also just noticed) is a slight inconsistency of the listing for wild vs domesticated dogs & cats. Non-domesticated canines are listed in Category:Canines, while domesticated dogs & articles about them are in Category:Dogs, a subcategory thereof. Category:Cats, however, lists all--I'd think for consistency it should be Category:Felines for wild cats and Category:Cats similarly structured to Dogs; looks like Category:Equids follows this, but then there is no Category:Horse. Elf | Talk 04:28, 10 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Use of templates

Shark articles have picked up a Template:Sharks, which is incomplete, redundant with the category, and will be gigantic if all 368 shark species get included in it. Between taxoboxes and categories, I'm inclined to say that's plenty of navigational machinery, and the template on top of that is just extra noise. Any other opinions? Stan 15:31, 14 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Little job

Could someone identify the plants pictured here and add them to the appropriate article? →Raul654 03:22, Sep 21, 2004 (UTC)

I'd be impressed if anyone could do better than genus - need closeups of leaves, seeds, etc usually, as one sees in Pine for instance. Stan 03:44, 21 Sep 2004 (UTC)

General purpose placement template

With some non-classification entries, Bagworm moth has a few lines in there that don't fit with the current taxobox. I'm sure there's a separate debate as to whether those things actually belong in the taxobox, but for now, I think we need a Template:Taxobox_foo_entry for them (Taxobox_unranked_entry is not it). Unfortunately, I cannot think of a good name for it. Help would be appreciated :-) -- Yath 07:14, 21 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Taxobox Standard

I have a problem with the taxobox entry line called "Species" and I'm somewhat surprised no one else has caught it (maybe I'm just anaware of past discussion?). It is incorrect (see definition under Species) to call the second term in a binomial name a "species". The species is the binomial name. A correct listing would be (for example) Genus: Colocasia, Species: C. esculenta. It might be cleaner to simply eliminate the "Species" line and, following "Genus," have the next "box" called "Binomial" give the actual species name (w/o shortened genus and with authorship). The situation as it is now suffers from being both redundant and misleading. - Marshman 21:21, 22 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Apt remark. A species name consists of a binomen, the combination of the generic name and a specific name (International Code of Zoological Nomenclature ICZN). The specific name is the second name of a binomen (or trinomen). JoJan 21:46, 22 Sep 2004 (UTC)
There is discussion of this specific point in the (admittedly vast) archives. However a change might be more possible than in the past once all the taxoboxes use the templates. Pcb21| Pete 22:06, 22 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Prosimian vs Strepsirrhini

The current page is prosimian, but I think it would be best to split it into two articles. "Prosimian" is a polyphylogenic grouping that includes all strepsirrhines, plus the tarsiers and the extinct omomyids. Please follow up on talk:prosimian - UtherSRG 15:29, 27 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Templates for taxoboxes

We are planning to use taxoboxes in Finnish Wikipedia. However, there is a major obstacle: I have found nowhere a guide what templates are needed for a taxobox. Of course I can find some templates by looking at the page markup, but where is a thorough list? -Hapsiainen 23:29, Sep 28, 2004 (UTC)

Try Wikipedia:WikiProject Tree of Life/Taxobox Usage. --Yath 00:22, 29 Sep 2004 (UTC)