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Archive 66

Category:Prehistoric X?

The amount of non-prehistoric species are negligible, as most if not all species of organisms originated far earlier than 3200 BC (the conventional end of Prehistory). It seems that these categories (e.g., Category:Prehistoric eukaryote genera and so on) were made with the intention of writing "Extinct" instead. We should correct it. — Snoteleks (talk) 18:26, 2 May 2025 (UTC)

This idea does sort of fall into the discussion linked to in the section above. In those recommended guidelines these categories would be deleted since they don't really serve an encyclopedic purpose. Relabelling them as "extinct" is a possibility, but are they really that useful? Eg. Category:Cambrian life is probably more useful to cover both extinct genera and groups or even living groups that evolved in the Cambrian (the latter use is uncertain per the discussion). IJReid ^{{{T - C - D - R}}} 18:57, 2 May 2025 (UTC)

Category:Extinct animals say that it "lists animals who are extinct according to Wikipedia's Conservation status categories" (and has done so since it was created in 2004). Articles aren't categorized 100% consistently, but the extinct categories are largely directly populated with recent extinctions, not prehistoric ones (although the prehistoric categories are often subcategories of extinct categories). Category:Prehistoric animals was created in 2005, with "Animals existing before recorded history". I don't think the prehistoric categories were "made with the intention of writing "Extinct" instead".

I think a distinction between recent extinctions and prehistoric ones is worth making (Wikipedia has both Wikipedia:WikiProject Extinction and Wikipedia:WikiProject Palaeontology). There is redundancy between the extinct categories, Category:IUCN Red List extinct species and Category:Extinctions since 1500. The IUCN category is populated automatically via taxoboxes parameters, and I don't think it would be possible to break it down by different kinds of organisms; the "since 1500" categories allow a break down by different kinds, but are underpopulated compared to the IUCN category. 1500 is the cutoff for what the IUCN considers extinct (it's a round number at the start of the Age of Discovery, when European naturalists would have had an opportunity to document organisms before they went extinct, 1500 also is near the end of "prehistory" globally if we're defining prehistory by there not being people present with a written language).

Maybe the solution is to make sure the "since 1500" categories are fully populated, and get rid of the prehistoric categories. But the original intent of the prehistoric vs. extinct categories seems clear to me, even if it hasn't been observed subsequently. It would be a lot of work to get rid of the prehistoric categories. There's also a Category:Fossil taxa to deal with, which isn't very populated aside from having Category:Fossil taxa by year of formal description and it's subcategories. Plantdrew (talk) 19:41, 2 May 2025 (UTC)

I agree that the original intention was clearly different, but that's definitely not the case anymore. I'll check the above section to see if the discussion includes this topic. — Snoteleks (talk) 18:46, 3 May 2025 (UTC)

I think a potential solution to this could be classifying by age as in Category:Dinosaurs by age as it would break down something like Category:Prehistoric birds into things like Maastrichtian, Paleogene etc all the way up to Pleistocene without issue, with a small area of potential conflict around "Holocene birds" where we would either have to chose to only apply that category to fossil/subfossil birds (with the IUCN categories for recently extinct birds) or some other compromise. IJReid ^{{{T - C - D - R}}} 05:17, 5 May 2025 (UTC)

New genera in Sepiidae, splitting Genus Sepia

Modified from Talk:Sepiidae#Reclassification:

A paper by Kubodera et. al. has proposed a new classification schema for this family, which has been accepted by WoRMS, its child project MolluscaBase, SeaLifeBase, and iNat. However i'm not aware if this is accepted as consensus by malacologists and therefore whether the pages and associated taxoboxes should be amended. Does anyone else have a better idea on this? Anthropophoca (talk) 05:12, 18 February 2025 (UTC)

The Gastropod Project follows WoRMS/MolluscaBase as its guideline taxonomy (i.e. for determining articles and taxobox classification), so I think updating the articles to reflect the new classification would get consensus.  —  Jts1882 | talk  07:19, 18 February 2025 (UTC)

I've added the new genera into the Sepiidae article along with their respective taxonomy templates. There are still dozens of unreviewed species though, which are still retained in Sepia as per WoRMS, and i'm pretty sure a number of them are synonyms, but i'm not great with reviewing taxonomic history. Anthropophoca (talk) 08:45, 12 March 2025 (UTC)

I've created the page Ascarosepion by moving the page Metasepia to there and moved all the species pages included, but there remains several dozen more species and the rest of the genus pages, many of which still redirect to Sepia. Help will be appreciated Anthropophoca (talk) 06:03, 5 May 2025 (UTC)

Viroid And Viriform Taxonomy Templates

Template:Taxonomy/Viroid should be moved to Template:Taxonomy/Viroids and Template:Taxonomy/Viriform should be moved to Template:Taxonomy/Viriforms. Just like Template:Taxonomy/Subviral agents and Template:Taxonomy/Satellite nucleic acids. Jako96 (talk) 19:40, 4 May 2025 (UTC)

And they should be ranked as "informal groups" instead of "(unranked)". Jako96 (talk) 20:07, 4 May 2025 (UTC)

I don't often dwell on informal groups, but I don't think template page moves are necessary if all you want to do is change from singular to plural. You can just render the displayed name as plural. — Snoteleks (talk) 00:55, 5 May 2025 (UTC)

I know we can change the displayed name but there is no reason not to move. It would be weird if template names and displayed names were different. But they should be ranked as informal groups (not like the "Virus" case) because there is no source that proposes a "taxon" called "Viroid" of "Viriform". Jako96 (talk) 15:06, 5 May 2025 (UTC)

I've changed the "ranks" to informal group and the displayed names to the plural.  —  Jts1882 | talk  15:58, 5 May 2025 (UTC)

Nice. But why not move them instead? Jako96 (talk) 16:07, 5 May 2025 (UTC)

Categories named "Category:X unranked clades" are unecessary

I genuinely do not understand the necessity of these categories. All articles found in "Category:X unranked clades" (where X is the name of a taxon) can just as fine be transferred to "Category:X taxa", there is no need for an additional subcategory because all the ranked clades are already found neatly within subcategories. — Snoteleks (talk) 03:11, 5 May 2025 (UTC)

Another thing that I agree with and would be deleted per the category discussion at WT:PALEO. All "clades" are unranked, but note that a clade is mutually exclusive with ranked nomenclature (families, superfamilies etc) so there are cases where both are applicable. See for example Category:Dinosaur clades since clades are a common term in dinosaur taxonomy, but might not be as applicable in other groups like Category:Birds by classification where linneaen is still used. IJReid ^{{{T - C - D - R}}} 05:14, 5 May 2025 (UTC)

Good to know, I'm honestly all in favor with the proposals at WT:PALEO. — Snoteleks (talk) 23:33, 5 May 2025 (UTC)

Caftaric created most of these back in 2016/2017, including Category:Unranked clades itself. So this may be just another instance of a categorization system Caftaric created without any discussion. The remaining categories were likely created to build on this category tree, with the exception of Category:Mammal unranked clades which apparently has been around since 2009. Monster Iestyn (talk) 16:42, 5 May 2025 (UTC)

Interesting. Thanks for the info — Snoteleks (talk) 23:32, 5 May 2025 (UTC)

Does "mammaldiversity.org" count as a reliable source?

The article for the pangolin species Manis indoburmanica was moved recently to Manis aurita. There is evidently no published source, only this entry in the "mammaldiversity.org" website. Is this considered an acceptable source, or should the article be moved back until the synonymy is actually published? Dyanega (talk) 21:16, 3 May 2025 (UTC)

The Mammal Diversity Database is run by the American Society of Mammalogists and can generally be considered a reliable source. The guideline generally followed at WP:MAMMALS is to follow the taxonomy of Mammal Species of the World 3 or Mammal Diversity Database and the IUCN Red List (if the two are in agreement), but that doesn't really apply here: MSW3 is outdated in this area (my reading of it is that it recognises M. auritius, basionym of M. aurita, as a subspecies of Manis pentadactyla[1], though I believe aurita is correct per the genus gender?), and there is no Red List assessment for this taxon. My reading of this situation is that this move seems to be a purely nomenclatural issue, where the specific epithet aurita has priority over indoburmanica. MDD is likely the best and most recent source on this taxon, and I think it makes sense to follow its taxonomy here, but it would be best to discuss this at the WP:MAMMALS. Ethmostigmus 🌿 (talk | contribs) 02:06, 4 May 2025 (UTC)

Agree with Ethmostigmus. Definitely a reliable source and the only alternative for all mammals is the IUCN, which is much slower. The MDD name is consistent with MSW3 with a gender change. It might be worth checking why the authors came up with a new name rather than using the existing subspecies, but presumably the MDD editors checked this. The article creation might have been premature, but the move is appropriate.  —  Jts1882 | talk  07:08, 4 May 2025 (UTC)

Taxonomic databases are not a reliable source because they are not the scientific source to begin with. Ideally, a database should be well-maintained through the use of peer-reviewed sources, but it is never peer-reviewed itself. I feel like we should be really careful when claiming a specific database is reliable and another is not, because there will come a moment where editors refuse to make changes according to peer-reviewed articles due to the preferred database not yet being up-to-date. This is my point of view after much contact with databases that are both reliable and unreliable depending on the taxon group, such as WoRMS, IRMNG, AlgaeBase, and most recently EukMap. They will inevitably always be worse than peer-reviewed sources, because they are one degree of separation ahead at best and completely neglected at worst. — Snoteleks (talk) 11:53, 4 May 2025 (UTC)

In this particular M. aurita situation, the article clearly has no peer-reviewed source supporting its new title; all references refer to the species as M. indoburmanica except for the database reference. The explanation is that the name aurita Hodgson, 1836 has priority over indoburmica. The database itself provides this explanation as a 'taxonomy note': recently described under the name indoburmica as a new species based on populations previously attributed to M. pentadactyla, but based on the populations attributed to this species, the name aurita Hodgson, 1836 has priority over indoburmica and is used for the species here; the exact distributional limits between M. pentadactyla and M. aurita are currently uncertain and require further research. So sure, there's somewhere a (probably) taxonomist that made a well-meaning decision "based on the populations attributed to this species" and merged the two taxa in this database. But he did not publish that decision in a peer-reviewed journal supported by other taxonomists. These could be different species for all he knows, and for that matter, for all any reader knows. — Snoteleks (talk) 12:02, 4 May 2025 (UTC)

In conclusion, I disagree with the move and would consider it WP:OR if I was involved with mammal articles. If anything, I would simply state in the original article that "the Mammal Diversity Database considers this species to be a synonym of M. aurita based on its distribution" and cite that with the database until another, actually peer-reviewed source comes out claiming the same thing. — Snoteleks (talk) 12:10, 4 May 2025 (UTC)

I'm tempted to agree with Snoteleks here, in that the move/renaming is premature but it's absolutely fine to cite the MDD as treating aurita as a junior synonym. I'll note, for Ethmostigmus' benefit, that the nomenclatural gender of Manis does in fact appear to be feminine; it is an obscure feminine Greek noun meaning "wrath" - and this is an example of why I hate WP articles that make up etymologies where the author provided none. Even though that etymology doesn't really make sense, the ICZN insists that it be treated as feminine, and people shouldn't speculate about why Linnaeus chose it. We don't know, we'll never know, but I suspect it was NOT because pangolins are wrathful. ;-) Dyanega (talk) 18:20, 4 May 2025 (UTC)

Isn't MDD treating aurita as senior synonym (or whatever the correct term is for the name with precedence)? They aren't the first to use aurita over auritus (see Waterhouse, 1838; Ellerman & Morrison-Scott, 1951)

There was historical confusion over the gender, but the ICZN rules settle that dispute, so aurita is correct. Dyanega (talk) 16:03, 5 May 2025 (UTC)

While I have some sympathy for the view that the move was premature and the approach Snoteleks suggests, it definitely isn't WP:OR to use Manis aurita. We would be following MDD as a secondary source, which is considered reliable by the project. The question is do we follow the primary source describing the species (which on its own is insufficent for an article) or the secondary source that evaluates the species proposal. I find it a bit strange that the paper describing the new species didn't consider previous descriptions and names for pangolins from the area and just went for a new name without discussion.  —  Jts1882 | talk  08:31, 5 May 2025 (UTC)

There is no basis for synonymizing M. aurita and M. indoburmanica except for assuming that their distribution is the same, which is exactly what the MDD taxonomy note suggests. We editors should be critical of the sources we use, not just write them out as reliable just because of prior history. And, again, it is a scientific topic, which should require scientific standard. Not to mention, talking about other bibliography matters little when the Wikipedia article itself does not even cite those.

I cannot access the Wangmo et al. (2025) paper right now (I have asked for it at ResearchGate), but every news source talking about this paper ([2], [3], [4] for example) seems to suggest that M. indoburmanica is a cryptic species, meaning that it may look like the same species at first but is genetically distinct from others (particularly from M. pentadactyla). Moreover, they talk of this species as "proposed", "potential", etc. which makes sense due to it being very new. I even found an opinion article on the same journal where the author supports M. aurita instead. But MDD simply paints over all of that. So instead of having an article that goes:

• Manis indoburmanica is a proposed species of bla bla bla... one author has suggested that it could be equivalent to the species M. aurita, because bla bla bla... although M. aurita is generally considered a subspecies of M. pentadactyla bla bla bla...

We have an article that goes:

• Manis aurita is a species of bla bla bla... it was described this year as M. indoburmanica,^{[insert 1 peer-reviewed citation and a news article]} but it's definitely the same as this one.^{[a website that we like and is not peer-reviewed]}

It's just a matter of where the priorities lie. My priorities lie with reflecting peer-reviewed research and how scientists take time to reach a consensus, not with parroting whatever a specific website says, no matter how accurate it may be other times. — Snoteleks (talk) 12:28, 5 May 2025 (UTC)

@Snoteleks: the 2025 paper is available through WP:TWL - if you have access, that will likely be faster than waiting for the authors to approve your request on RG. I'm heading to bed now, but let me know if you can't access it through TWL and don't hear back from the authors and I can email it to you tomorrow.

From my reading, the paper concludes that this pangolin is a taxon split from M. pentadactyla and distributed in the westernmost distribution of the Chinese pangolin range with its possible presence from Eastern Nepal, North-East India, and North-West Myanmar, but did so without checking if other authors had previously identified this western population. The authors don't seem to have sought out existing specimens attributed to M. pentadactyla in the region, (rather, obtaining seven large seizures of pangolin scales i.e., five from northeastern India and two from western India and a holotype/paratype from Arunchal Pradesh) which is a very problematic oversight. Hodgson's M. auritus (treated as a subspecies of M. pentadactyla) is attributed here as a subspecies defined by its range, which encompasses that of M. indoburmanica. Ergo, if M. indoburmanica is a new name being attributed to the morphologically similar but geographically distinct westernmost populations of M. pentadactyla, the name Manis aurita takes priority. The 2025 paper may be peer reviewed, but the proposal of a novel species with no mention of the earlier literature is a big red flag, and brings the name Manis indoburmanica into doubt - certainly enough doubt that it should not be the title of a page on the taxon. I'm not sure of exactly what to do in this case, but the MDD editor appears correct to place this into synonymy with M. aurita in the absence of any proof that M. indoburmanica is distinct from it. Seems like a pretty classic case of newer authors creating a heterotypic synonym for an existing taxon based on genetic evidence, and given that the authors of the M. indoburmanica paper make no mention of, much less attempt to disprove synonymy with, M. aurita, it seems like we as editors should err on the side of caution and not adopt the name M. indoburmanica yet, at least not as an article title. Not sure if the best course of action here is to redirect back to M. pentadactyla or something else, but we shouldn't take the M. indoburmanica paper at face value. Nevermind, Zijlstra (2025) provides reasoning for this synonymy and its adoption at MDD. I am happy to leave this article at its current title until further analysis is published.

Apologies if I'm missing something obvious here, as I said I am about to hop into bed, and I'm certainly not a mammalogy expert so there may be some nuance I'm missing. Cheers, Ethmostigmus 🌿 (talk | contribs) 13:35, 5 May 2025 (UTC)

I hadn't known about WP:TWL until now, thanks for the info, I will definitely be trying it out — Snoteleks (talk) 16:46, 5 May 2025 (UTC)

We editors should be critical of the sources we use. Indeed, especially when we haven't even read the paper. As Ethmostigmus says, the paper has a clear flaw in not considering other pangolins found in the same area, which is standard in any taxonomic analysis. Wangpo et al even say the haplotype of their samples shares the same lineage as field collected samples from Nepal, where the type of aurita was located. They conclude it is a new species without considering the obvious alternative, that it's a previously described species/subspecies from the same area. We don't even have to make the decision ourselves, we just have to follow reliable secondary sources, which the MDD is considered to be by the project.  —  Jts1882 | talk  14:52, 5 May 2025 (UTC)

Our discussion right here provides far more information than the M. aurita article. My argument is not that we should blindly follow the peer-reviewed source (just as I refuse to blindly follow the database source), but that the Wikipedia article explained nothing in the first place, and it almost exclusively cited the sources it went against. There's also much more sensible information poured into this discussion than in the MDD taxonomy note, which grossly oversimplifies the situation that you and Ethnostigmus adequately just explained. — Snoteleks (talk) 16:22, 5 May 2025 (UTC)

Incidentally, Jelle Zijlstra, the author of the paper arguing that aurita is the correct name, which was published within the last couple of weeks, is the editor of the Hesperomys Project and has regular discussions with the MDD editors on their GitHub site. He may even be one of the editors now. So saying "MDD simply paints over all of that" is not entirely accurate. It is likely this paper is the result of the discussion that led to them favouring the older name.  —  Jts1882 | talk  15:09, 5 May 2025 (UTC)

Since there is a paper saying that aurita is a valid species name, we do have something that can be cited; it's not simply an unpublished synonymy, as it had appeared initially. I'd be fine with citing this paper in both the Manis and Manis aurita articles, since synonymies are subjective and taxonomic, they do not have to fulfill the same criteria for publication as new species descriptions. Dyanega (talk) 16:03, 5 May 2025 (UTC)

MDD's taxonomy note is absolutely not sufficient, I still stand by that. Jelle Zijlstra's opinion (I feel like it's still necessary to point this out) paper is an entirely different thing and probably has very respectable conclusions, just like the ones we came to here. You can't just cite a database's comment and be done with that. Adding Zijlstra's paper adequately reflects at least a bit more scientific consensus, and Ethmostigmus' observations would be the ideal addition. We can't just go along with either M. aurita or M. indoburmanica unless we justify it properly. — Snoteleks (talk) 16:32, 5 May 2025 (UTC)

All taxonomy is opinion, but Zijlstra's taxonomic opinion is the most recent, most thorough and evidence based, and is the one that has been adopted by the ASM - adoption in MDD is the best reflection of consensus we have on the synonymy and valid name for taxon at this moment. Ethmostigmus 🌿 (talk | contribs) 05:58, 6 May 2025 (UTC)

I somehow entirely missed the section of Snoteleks' comment that mentioned Jelle Zijlstra's paper as I wrote my previous comment last night... Zijlstra does confirm my reading of the situation, and explains the MDD editors' decision to place these names into synonymy. I'll strike some of the more uncertain sections of my previous comment - until further developments, I'm of the opinion that the article should stay at M. aurita, given the evidence presented by Zijlstra and the MDD's adoption of M. aurita as the valid name for the taxon. Ethmostigmus 🌿 (talk | contribs) 05:39, 6 May 2025 (UTC)

References

Indented domain

Is it my imagination, or has the automatic taxobox formatting recently been adjusted so that the "domain" field is now indented to the left? Esculenta (talk) 16:27, 6 May 2025 (UTC)

I recently made some changes to the display that should only affect narrow screens in desktop view on non-mobile skins. I don't think they shouldn't be relevant here, but mistakes happen. Can you provide some more information? Example page, skin, etc.  —  Jts1882 | talk  17:42, 6 May 2025 (UTC)

It's indented for me too, both on my pc and my phone (when on desktop view). I'm using Firefox on both devices in case it matters. —Trilletrollet [ Talk | Contribs ] 18:27, 6 May 2025 (UTC)

But it looks like it only affects the new Vector (2022) skin, since it rendered fine when I switched to the old style (which feels surprisingly antiquated now). —Trilletrollet [ Talk | Contribs ] 18:31, 6 May 2025 (UTC)

It also appears in the monobook skin. I think the cause is the addition of class taxonrow in this edit by Peter coxhead. Iirc, I added the class in a test a while back but reverted it. It seems to have found it's way back, possibly due to a sandbox mismatch.  —  Jts1882 | talk  18:58, 6 May 2025 (UTC)

I've removed the offending CSS.  —  Jts1882 | talk  19:03, 6 May 2025 (UTC)

Yes, it was caused by not checking that the sandbox and live versions matched exactly before updating the sandbox. My error – thanks for the fix. Peter coxhead (talk) 21:40, 6 May 2025 (UTC)

Proposal: new category Nomina invalida

While working on lichen articles I have come across (and made articles for) several species—Lecanora perpruinosa among them—that were effectively published but invalid under the Codes (e.g. missing mandatory Latin/English diagnosis, no type designation, unregistered post-2013 names, etc.). These taxa are treated in the secondary literature, so their pages satisfy WP:N, but there is no precise category for them.

I suggest category:Nomina invalida, a sibling to category:Nomina nuda. The new category would house pages whose names:

• were effectively published (ICN Arts 29–30 / ICZN Art 8);
• fail one or more validity/availability requirements (ICN Arts 32–35, ICZN Art 11, registration, etc.);
• remain the subject of reliable secondary discussion.

Related categories already exist—Nomina nuda, category:Undescribed species, category:Taxa that may be invalid—but they serve different cases (naked names, yet-to-be-described material, or a broad "possibly invalid" catch-all). The proposed category would keep "invalidly published but discussed" names together without conflating them with these other situations. Comments? Esculenta (talk) 20:00, 8 May 2025 (UTC)

I support this. I also come across numerous nomen invalid taxa when researching protist taxonomy (e.g., Chrysoderma, Giraudyopsis, Ulva olivascens...). And Category:Undescribed species is definitely a different topic altogether. (Offtopic, thanks to this I found out about the hilariously named Dermophis donaldtrumpi). — Snoteleks (talk) 20:43, 8 May 2025 (UTC)