Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Extinction

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Frustrated with the scope

Not expecting anyone to reply anyway but I have always felt a little frustrated with the ambiguity of recently extinct species such as the Great Auk etc. with creatures long extinct. I feel these two groups are somewhat disparate and placing them under one banner is weird. Not sure how others feel. Casliber (talk · contribs) 01:49, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Okay... this has been much harder to reply to than I originally thought it would be. Let me open by saying that I started writing in support of what Casliber was saying, but found myself sitting on the fence at the end. Sorry to state the obvious to a group that clearly understands the scope of this topic in depth, but when we talk about extinctions, the topic can be split many ways: big events vs. natural rate, current/on-going vs. ancient, human-induced vs. "naturally occurring," causes vs. victims, or extinction event causes vs. effects (adaptive radiation). Splitting along any of these lines is problematic. For example, how do we know which species were going to be lost anyway due to the natural rate of extinction during the middle of a large extinction event? (The natural rate doesn't pause during an extinction event.) Current extinctions and the on-going extinction event are tied to past extinctions by the natural extinction rate. (When exactly did an event start/end, and who was the first/last victim?) In the case of human-induced vs. "naturally occurring," consider that humans are just as much of a natural force, albeit biological, as volcanism, a meteor strike, climate change, etc. And splitting along the lines of causes vs. victims or extinction event causes and effects don't make much sense either. So, honestly, I don't know. I know what Casliber is saying, because it would also feel funny to me to see the WP:Extinction banner on the Tyrannosaurus talk page. There is always WP:Palaeontology to handle ancient extinct species. Maybe WP:Extinction's scope should just be the general topic of extinction (causes, natural rate, large events--past and present, etc.), detailed coverage of the on-going mass extinction (the Holocene extinction, which in my opinion is just a continuation of the Quaternary extinction event), and the species affected by the most recent event or lost recently via the natural rate. Does that make sense? –Visionholder (talk) 13:44, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Yeah, I agree with all that too. Funny eh? I guess it is somewhat academic as the wikiproject as such is inactive anyway. Not something I am thrilled about writing about...I find the stories of Great Auks and Dodos (and others) depressing :( Casliber (talk · contribs) 19:32, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Like all things in natural history, there is no clear line of division and so it does become an academic exercise. Visionholder has some great points - especially about the Holocene extinction being just an extension of the Quaternary extinction; remember also that the Holocene is an epoch and the Quaternary is a period. I'll try to give a bit of a review to see if something can be made of it. We now have multiple terms to contend with - Late Pleistocene extinction, Quaternary extinction, Holocene extinction, Anthropocene extinction:

"The first phase of the current extinction episode started ≈50,000–100,000 years ago, when modern humans began dispersing around the planet (Late Pleistocene-Quaternary extinction). The second phase started 10,000 years ago with further population increases and land-use changes associated with the invention of agriculture (Holocene extinction). A third phase of environmental alteration and bio diversity loss was ushered in by the industrial revolution (Anthropocene extinction)."[1] - emphasized parts added.

On a larger paleontological time scale - these three phases constitute the sixth major extinction event. Hence, I think that the division needs to be one of convention (such as a Global Stratigraphic Section and Point), but until this is done I think that the banner of extinction can only be organized through a time reference. For comparison,

• Hoplophoneus is listed as a fossil in the conservation status because it died out 23.8 million years ago;
• Smilodon is listed as extinct in the conservation status because it died out ~10,000 years ago;
• Dodo is listed as extinct with an IUCN conservation status bar in the conservation status because it died out ~1700 AD;
• Thylacine listed as extinct with an IUCN conservation status bar in the conservation status because it was last seen in 1936.

While some species that are currently going extinct may be part of the normal background extinction - it is impossible to separate the cause from all that is going on in the world. Hence, by virtue of association with humans as the causal factor[2] they (Smilodon, Dodo, Thylacine) are part of the sixth extinction, whereas Hoplophoneus is a fossil that has no affiliation with the sixth major extinction event. This pattern seems to be reflected in the conservation status bars. For some reason, however, Smilodon does not have an IUCN conservation status bar - perhaps it is conceptualized as a Holocene extinction, whereas the Dodo and Thylacine are conceptualized as Anthropocene extinctions? Some of the records become more confusing around the mid-Pleistocene, but for the most part - there is a relatively clear distinction between human and climatic impacts (e.g., [3], [4]). For another discussion on time boundaries in this context you might be interested in taking a look at the GSA article on the Anthropocene:[5] The GSA article does not give a time frame for when the Anthropocene started - but mentions 1800 as a possible/arbitrary time reference.Thompsma (talk) 19:52, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

late quaternary birds are normally listed as prehistoric (e.g. several Moa species), we should do the same with the late quaternary mammals (e.g. Dire Wolf, Wooly Mammoth, Smilodon). Extinct should be only used for extinctions after 1500 (an IUCN given year for Recent extinctions). --Melly42 (talk) 20:18, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Great post Melly42! I had forgotten about the 1500 AD time point used by the IUCN and as a generally agreed upon convention this kinda resolves the scope of the problem.

"Humans have played a significant role in the extinction of species prior to historic times (see Box 3.9) but the true extent of such anthropogenic impacts during the Holocene (the last 11,000 years) remains unclear. However, after 1500 AD it is clear that humans are responsible for most recorded extinctions."[6]Thompsma (talk) 04:04, 5 January 2010 (UTC)

Haven't read this entire discussion, but I assumed this project was restricted to animals that have become extinct within historic times (4th millennium BC)? Otherwise it is rather redundant, as we have the paleontology project. Maybe rename it "recent extinctions", or at least change the written scope, so it isn't so general. I do not agree that this should be restricted to the time after 1500, since animals such as Lapitiguana, the Insular Cave Rat, the Conquered Lorikeet and Coryphomys, to name a few, would then be excluded, and are not covered by the paleontology project either. And by the way, the image used in the logo is inappropriate, it is a copy of a copy of a Roelant Savery painting... FunkMonk (talk) 17:40, 14 January 2011 (UTC)

No, this project is not restricted to recent extinctions. And I don't agree that is redundant for that reason, because than other projects (like dinosaurs, pterosaurs, sea monsters, birds, mammals, etc.) can be considered redundant as well. But as discussed above, it is not easy to split "extinction" into one for just recent extinctions, because where do you start? What is considered recent (when not using the year 1500)? Start Polynesian expansion? Or when humans left Africa? Where did you get 4th millennium BC as a starting point? I'm curious! I don't have problems with overlap with other projects, as most have overlap. The Palaeontology project has for example an overlap with the biology, ecology, etc. And many project can be considered general. Extinction is extinction as palaeontology is palaeontology. The Palaeontology project can than be considered general as well as its scope contains palaeontologists and their work, extinct species (not all), and areas that overlap with geology, life science, botany, etc). However, although I don't agree with the reasons you mention, I'm not against creating a project for recent extinctions only. And is a copy of a copy of a Roelant Savery painting inappropriate? Not to me anyway, but feel free to create another logo. Peter Maas\^talk 16:38, 13 February 2011 (UTC)

Heh, completely forgot this discussion! Well, I still think the scope is too wide, I think a project can be more effective if it is more focused, and has its own unique niche. It will be much more enjoyable to work with, and we will have a much easier time working together, since there simply isn't such a huge bulk of articles. I think it will also attract more editors, since many people have a specific interest in recently extinct animals. If we limited it to recent extinctions, say within the last thousand years or similar, the project could also have a much larger significance, because we could work hard to make people aware of human induced extinction. We could do that by focusing on articles like dodo or passenger pigeon, and finally get them to featured status, and on the front page of Wikipedia. The only article about a recently extinct animal at featured status appears to be the great auk, which is too little! Maybe we should have a vote about this? I think it is better to change the scope of this one than to create a new project, since most people seem to think of this one as being about recent extinctions anyway.

And by the way, I just nominated great auk to be the featured article on the front page for July 3[7], since that's when the last confirmed pair was killed. And I also made a new logo for this project, with an actual Savery dodo, the most famous one. The previous image was a 19th century facsimile. FunkMonk (talk) 09:09, 25 May 2012 (UTC)

Automatic taxobox might require extinction dagger format rehaul

All,

The {{automatic taxobox}} template is being tested right now as fully as possible, and we've just realized the extinction dagger will no longer be able to be displayed in precisely the same way as before without doing some major recoding (although there are reasonable workarounds. However, we're offering two alternatives, and we'd like your opinion.

Here's the way it is displayed in {{taxobox}}:

Order:      †Glosselytrodea

The dagger can be included as part of the link's display text (which means you'll need to type the dagger):

Order:      †Glosselytrodea

Or a parameter such as "extinct=yes" could be used to automatically add a dagger next to the taxon level instead of next to the taxon name.

† Order:      Glosselytrodea

Order (†):      Glosselytrodea

Order:  †    Glosselytrodea

Post your thoughts; thanks! Bob the Wikipedian ^{(talk • contribs)} 07:32, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

In the absence of comment I will proceed to apply the † Order solution suggested above. Martin (Smith609 – Talk) 19:32, 11 October 2010 (UTC)

• The dagger should link to extinction, at least at the lowest taxon level of the infobox. It seems some readers don't know what it means. FunkMonk (talk) 07:41, 22 October 2014 (UTC)

Are these Panthera leo melanochaitus, Panthera leo leo, or both?

Cape lions, according to caption

Barbary lion, according to caption

Pictures of taxidermied specimens in Paris have recently been added to the respective artcles, but I noticed they depict the same specimens. The Commons description for each only mention one name, but in this page[8] (scroll down) it appears that there is one of each. Anymone have some better info on this? FunkMonk (talk) 00:14, 12 December 2010 (UTC)

I noticed that too, I will see if I can find the answer. Peter Maas\^talk 15:43, 13 February 2011 (UTC)

See that you got already an answer at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Mammals#Are_these_Panthera_leo_melanochaitus.2C_Panthera_leo_leo.2C_or_both.3F. I will change it on Commons. Peter Maas\^talk 16:56, 13 February 2011 (UTC)

Yep, and I didn't see this reply until now! It is still weird they would be captioned differently by separate photographers... FunkMonk (talk) 10:41, 25 May 2012 (UTC)

RfC

Please see Template talk:Geological range#RfC: Rewording of "fossil range" for a proposal to modify the fossil range template. Thanks! Bob the Wikipedian ^{(talk • contribs)} 03:08, 18 December 2010 (UTC)

Physical geologic driver

The section Extinction event#Physical geologic driver is in need of attention. Has WP:jargon and possible WP:SYN problems. Vsmith (talk) 15:50, 21 December 2010 (UTC)

Extinct turtles

{{Extinct turtles}} Hi, I'm from WikiProject Turtles and I don't know much about extinction but I thought it would be helpful to gather up the extinct turtles and make a navigation template {{Extinct turtles}}. I've made the above, please feel free to amend, correct etc. I would like to separate the Paleogene and Neogene period sections but there is not enough information to determine that. Regards, SunCreator ^(talk) 17:23, 14 January 2011 (UTC)

use of symbols

There is a discussion going on where people are unhappy with the biological use of the symbol † to denote extinction. Since this has the potential to affect quite a few articles it might be worth a look. Sabine's Sunbird talk 20:35, 25 August 2011 (UTC)

North African Elephant

See Talk:North African Elephant#No IUCN data about possible inconsistencies with references. -- Alan Liefting (talk) - 08:42, 24 September 2011 (UTC)

Transitional Fossil peer-review

• Wikipedia:Peer_review/Transitional_fossil/archive1
• Transitional fossil

It is a very important subject, and I wish to take it to GA/FA status in the future. Input from members of this wikiproject would be highly valued. --Harizotoh9 (talk) 00:53, 23 February 2012 (UTC)

Wikipedia:HighBeam

Wikipedia:HighBeam describes a limited opportunity for Wikipedia editors to have access to HighBeam Research.
—Wavelength (talk) 17:44, 5 April 2012 (UTC)

Caribemys

Could someone add a taxobox to this article. Regards, SunCreator ^(talk) 13:26, 21 May 2012 (UTC)

Time of existance

I want to rise awereness to this problem which has been itching me and that I see is kind of widespread on articles of prehistoric mammals; They have cited "The Paleobiology Database" and get from there the epoch from where the fossils of a species or genus are and then put the existance of them for the whole of said epoch. To explain I'll give you an example.

Mastodon

"were large, tusked, mammal species of the extinct genus Mammut, which inhabited Asia, Europe, North America and Central America from the Oligocene through Pleistocene, 33.9 mya to 11,000 years ago"

I quick look at the epochs articles tells us that Oligocene started at 33.9mya and that the pleistoce ended at 11,000 years ago. Moving further on the article we find this:

"The ancestors of Mammut diverged from the Elephantidae clade approximately 26.8 million years ago."

So the genus mammut is not even 27 million years old, this is supported by the species section where we find this (all the species paragraphs open the same way but this one is the one with the older dates):

"Mammut furlongi was endemic only to North America and from the Miocene, living from 23.03–5.33 mya, existing for about 17.7 million years"

Not only this tells us that the oldest mammut species is from the miocene and can't be older than 23 million years, completely rulling out the opening paragraph, it shows you another example of what I'm talking about, the source cited is not specific, sometimes it only mentions the epoch; others ealry, mid, late epoch and sometimes a period from other scales that is still several million years long, in this case it's only that the fossils are from the miocene, which lasted from 23mya to 5.3mya but that doesn't in any way mean that the genus lived during the whole of the epoch, they could be 5.5 million years old and it won't contradict the sources.

Doing it this way leads to very big margins of error; the opening paragraph on mammut is off by about 11 million years to 29 million years. Mike.BRZ (talk) 03:52, 13 June 2012 (UTC)

Raphinae FACs

I'm trying to get Dodo and Rodrigues Solitaire to FAC. Any comments or improvements are welcome. FunkMonk (talk) 09:32, 17 July 2012 (UTC)

I hope my question isn't stupid. But what is FAC? --Melly42 (talk) 18:12, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

Featured article candidate. And it isn't stupid, I made a similar question recently.[9] FunkMonk (talk) 18:16, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for the explanation because FAC is an abbreviation for many terms --Melly42 (talk)

Yikes, heheh, will be more careful before throwing around abbreviations next time! FunkMonk (talk) 19:52, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

Logo for userboxes, or something

Made this alternate logo[10] for fun, maybe it could be used for something... FunkMonk (talk) 15:10, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

Portal renaming

The portal:Extinction is now renamed into portal:Extinct and Endangered Species. I hope this makes the purpose more clearer --Melly42 (talk) 12:36, 1 September 2012 (UTC)

I for one thinks it's much better like this, the two subjects go very well together. Should this project be renamed as well? FunkMonk (talk) 03:24, 2 September 2012 (UTC)

agree. Casliber (talk · contribs) 05:17, 2 September 2012 (UTC)

I think this would be a good idea to rename the project too --Melly42 (talk) 08:37, 2 September 2012 (UTC)

Me too. How do we do this without creating a mess? HLHJ (talk) 15:04, 22 July 2015 (UTC)

WikiProject Extinct and endangered species does create the impression that we don't do the process, though. I've just clarified it on the main page for now. HLHJ (talk) 15:16, 22 July 2015 (UTC)

New article with red links

A new article, The World's 100 Most Threatened Species, has been created. There are a number of red links that need sorting out. Cheers. -- Alan Liefting (talk - contribs) 20:48, 25 September 2012 (UTC)

An excellent appearing new article, but I don't know what I'm talking about, so can someone here check?

A user recently created User:Lambertiana/Assisted Migration. It looks excellent, but I don't know much about the subject. I'm unsure if there's original research involved, but the bit I skimmed through reads a bit more like an academic paper than most Wikipedia articles. Can someone look through the article and see if it's ready, or if it's not ready, what changes need to be made to make it ready? If it is ready, a history merge will need to be done to place it over the existing text at assisted migration. In addition, are there any opinions as to whether the title should be Assisted migration or assisted colonization? I have no idea what the common name would be here. Ryan Vesey 03:26, 8 February 2013 (UTC)

WikiProject Prehistoric Mammals

People here may have comments to make at Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Mammals#WikiProject_Prehistoric_Mammals on the future of WPPM, which never really took off.Le Deluge (talk) 17:01, 24 February 2013 (UTC)

New scope

Since the scope has been widened to include endangered animals, doesn't the project page need an overhaul? It still only refers to extinct species. FunkMonk (talk) 00:01, 17 May 2013 (UTC)

yes surely, but it needs also more active members. --Melly42 (talk) 04:51, 17 May 2013 (UTC)

As I've mentioned before, I also think the scope should be restricted to recently extinct species, in addition to endangered ones. The bafflingly huge scope (all extinct species ever?) is the one thing that makes the project less attractive to me, and probably other people too. We already have the paleo project for prehistoric species. And the two fields do not necessarily attract the same editors. Articles bout recently extinct species go heavily into reasons for extinction, the animals are much bette r known, whereas paleo articles are much more hypothetical. FunkMonk (talk) 15:41, 18 May 2013 (UTC)

• I also think articles about prehistoric species such as Hyaenodon where their extinction isn't notable in itself should be removed from the scope. FunkMonk (talk) 13:56, 11 June 2013 (UTC)

But where should we drawn the line? We have pre 1500 AD extinctions and other Holocene extinctions (beginning at 10,000 BC). Should they also removed from the scope? There are several extinct species from Cuba, Bermuda, Madagascar, New Zealand, and other islands which are only known by bones but where there is a possibility that they have survived into historic times --Melly42 (talk) 18:07, 11 June 2013 (UTC)

Holocene is specific enough, and also used by others. As a example, the Extinct Birds book from 2012 also includes subfossil species, but nothing prior to the holocene. FunkMonk (talk) 18:23, 11 June 2013 (UTC)

Post 1900 extinctions category?

How much notability is there to create a category to catalogue post-1900 or later extinctions? Thanks. --Marianian^(talk) 20:54, 17 May 2013 (UTC)

I think such a category is arbitrary as the IUCN knows only one category for recent extinct species (beginning with 1500 AD until today) In addition we have Late quaternary extinctions which are ranging from the Late Pleistocene to the pre-Colombian time --Melly42 (talk) 21:56, 17 May 2013 (UTC)

New navbox: Template:Extinction

I just started it. The group names (Phenomena, Models, Processes, Theories and concepts) are a bit bizarre, but I didn't know how else to arrange it. Please feel free to bend it into the right shape.

I've posted this at a few other projects, so if there's anything to discuss, I'd suggest Template talk:Extinction.

Many thanks, Anna Frodesiak (talk) 09:30, 12 August 2013 (UTC)

• Looks nice! But is there a reason why the list of extinction events is not chronological? FunkMonk (talk) 13:04, 12 August 2013 (UTC)

Thanks. :) According to my original research using a homemade time machine, the events are chronological. The scientific community has been wrong the whole time. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 13:16, 12 August 2013 (UTC)

End-Silurian extinction event

Where is this coming from, Extinction_event#Lesser_extinctions? I searched and even wiki points to Lau_event. So is "End-Silurian extinction" and error and it is just Lau event? Thanks, Marasama (talk) 20:04, 20 August 2013 (UTC)

I wish to launch this article: List of species that possibly went extinct in the 16th century. Would anyone like to contribute?

Now, before anyone bashes me on this. Here is what I initially intend to do before I do this. See here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Keeby101#Timeline_of_extinctions

I intend to make the 16th century section of the Timeline of Extinctions so full to the point where it needs to break away and become its own article: List of species that possibly went extinct in the 16th century I will then put a link to the new article within the 16th century section of the current article. Sound good? Regards and Cheers! Keeby101 (talk) 14:22, 5 September 2013 (UTC)

Defining extinction

Do we need to define extinction?

Is extinction the death of all members of the species and absolute disappearance of DNA?

Or with global warming scenarios, it is possible that humans might face multiple decimation of population. So a future, possibly before the year 2100, would see bands of migratory tribes traveling with seasonal changes. And lucky humans could be struggling to survive for the few millennia necessary for CO2 levels to fall and cooling resume. ( The new IPCC report should be out soon, meanwhile http://localsteps.org/howbad.html We are locked in to 3 degrees of warming - and could easily reach 6 or 8 by the year 2100) Talk here is not to argue the event, it's to call for defining terms.

A global warming scenario is just to argue for re-defining human extinction as anything significantly below peak population. So if we have 7 Billion now - and some say that the optimal survival on earth is a few hundred million humans, then would that be an extinction of humans?

Or another question, if humans are reduced to a few dozen stragglers and some frozen DNA existing for centuries, then is that a definition of human extinction?

Since human extinction can never be finally verified, shouldn't we define it as a significant fall from peak population? Or perhaps should we use another term for the sudden insignificance of a species? Rpauli (talk) 04:04, 10 September 2013 (UTC) rpauli

• I think the term is already pretty well defined, in dictionaries etc around the world. We have to work with the definitions of terms that we have and not redefine them for our own benefit. If humans go through population crash as you describe (not arguing I think we will too) then I am doubtful that whatever stragglers survive will be concerned with the correctness of WP. Cheers, Faendalimas ^talk 12:20, 10 September 2013 (UTC)

AfC submission - 28/04

Wikipedia talk:Articles for creation/''Araripesuchus wegeneri''. FoCuSandLeArN (talk) 19:22, 28 April 2014 (UTC)

Notice of RfC at Talk:List of extinct animals

A discussion of interest to this WikiProject is underway at Talk:List of extinct mammals#RfC: Inclusion criteria. Ibadibam (talk) 23:06, 15 September 2014 (UTC)

Comment on the WikiProject X proposal

Hello there! As you may already know, most WikiProjects here on Wikipedia struggle to stay active after they've been founded. I believe there is a lot of potential for WikiProjects to facilitate collaboration across subject areas, so I have submitted a grant proposal with the Wikimedia Foundation for the "WikiProject X" project. WikiProject X will study what makes WikiProjects succeed in retaining editors and then design a prototype WikiProject system that will recruit contributors to WikiProjects and help them run effectively. Please review the proposal here and leave feedback. If you have any questions, you can ask on the proposal page or leave a message on my talk page. Thank you for your time! (Also, sorry about the posting mistake earlier. If someone already moved my message to the talk page, feel free to remove this posting.) Harej (talk) 22:47, 1 October 2014 (UTC)

Extinction daggers in taxoboxes

A discussion is under way on this topic at WikiProject Tree of Life --Epipelagic (talk) 06:56, 25 November 2014 (UTC)

Expert attention

This is a notice about Category:Extinction articles needing expert attention, which might be of interest to your WikiProject. It will take a while before the category is populated. Iceblock (talk) 18:08, 11 December 2014 (UTC)

Wroughton's free-tailed bat

Hello, the Wroughton's free-tailed bat is an highly endangered species. According to the Italian Wikipedia, Zoological Society of London lists it among the 100 mammals most threatened by extinction. That is why I came on this talk page, from Portal:Extinct and endangered species, but don't hesitate to redirect me toward a better talk page if suited.
In December, a paper has been published, reporting the observation of three new colonies in Meghalaya, reports doubling the known population size. I added this information, but there are still some sentences as "Since then, there is no record of sighting and/or collection of this species from that locality in Meghalaya in northeastern India" or "Pending further confirmation and authentication of the distribution of this species from Meghalaya in northeastern India, the distribution of Otomops wroughtoni in India should be restricted to a single locality record from Karnataka state" that I haven't removed. I think we still can keep these information but they need a context (since they are now outdated). As you may have noticed, I'm not at ease in English to make it properly, so I'm asking your help! :) Cheers, Totodu74 (talk) 10:17, 12 January 2015 (UTC)

It seems that this project deserves its noun :D Nobody's theeeeere? Totodu74 (talk) 02:39, 24 January 2015 (UTC)

Does this project cover extinct languages?

Dimadick has tagged the talk pages of many extinct languages (e.g. Talk:Tangut language) as being of interest to this project, but I see nothing on the project page or this talk page to indicate that this project covers language extinction. In my opinion, extinction of languages is fundamentally different to extinction of animal or plant species, and should not go together just because the same term is used. BabelStone (talk) 09:41, 9 April 2015 (UTC)

This is the WikiProject about extinction in general. Dimadick (talk) 09:43, 9 April 2015 (UTC)

The project page states "This WikiProject aims primarily to create and improve articles on extinct animals, extinct plants and extinction in general". The article on Extinction does not mention languages at all, so I think that there should be consensus on whether languages are covered by this project before mass-tagging of dead languages. BabelStone (talk) 10:19, 9 April 2015 (UTC)

Extinction in Science does content the extinction of languages --Melly42 (talk) 10:52, 9 April 2015 (UTC)

Although extinct languages (like extinct volcanoes) are of course an instance of extinction in a broad sense, everything on this project page, and the extinction page to which it refers, seems to be focussed on extinction of organisms, and is not transferrable to the study of languages. So this seems to be overly broad tagging. Kanguole 12:32, 9 April 2015 (UTC)

Dimadick has a long history of over-tagging for wikiprojects, and does not seem to learn from the repeated concerns raised by other users, e.g. here, here, here, here, here, and here. BabelStone (talk) 13:39, 9 April 2015 (UTC)

This also seems to be the first time languages have been mentioned on this talk page. Kanguole 16:53, 9 April 2015 (UTC)

I support removal of languages from this. There is a fundamental difference and it is unhelpful to combine the two. Catfish Jim and the soapdish 16:59, 9 April 2015 (UTC)

Likewise, it should be redundant to tag every single dinosaur as a reptile or every prehistoric animal as extinct, when they are already in the dinosaur or palaeontology projects. FunkMonk (talk) 19:24, 9 April 2015 (UTC)

... like what Dimadick is doing right now, you mean? BabelStone (talk) 19:35, 9 April 2015 (UTC)

Yup. FunkMonk (talk) 19:39, 9 April 2015 (UTC)

I'm happy to consider that consensus. Catfish Jim and the soapdish 21:50, 9 April 2015 (UTC)

I think extinct languages are outside of the spirit and history of this project, (the Extinction article does not address linguistics) and languages would only be appropriate to include if enough users here are interested in them. In general, I would say this whole project would benefit from some clear consensus on what is and is not in its scope (or at least rough boundaries). I get the impression it was originally intended for recently extinct and endangered species, but then somewhere down the line various users started glomming on to dinosaurs, trilobites, and any old extinct group, which seems a bit redundant. As an example, a rule of thumb might narrow the scope to organisms that went extinct within the last 10,000 years, as well as processes and patterns of extinction in the past and present. I feel like WP:Paleontology adequately covers fossil organisms (which are generally but not necessarily extinct). Of course there will always be some grey areas and overlap- the End-Permian extinction event is certainly within scope, and perhaps also some well-studied fossil organisms that shed light on processes, but probably not every Late Permian species need be tagged. I would urge Dimadick and other users to at least temporarily halt tagging articles while this discussion is ongoing. I think the overriding question here is: is widespread tagging of articles with the Extinction banner likely to improve said articles? I don't have much interaction with this particular project so I don't yet know the answer, but I suspect perhaps not. --Animalparty-- (talk) 10:40, 10 April 2015 (UTC)

I would suggest to rename this project page into The Sixth Extinction which will include all Holocene extinctions as well as threatened species or into Quarternary extinction which will also include the Pleistocene and the Ice Age --Melly42 (talk) 11:11, 10 April 2015 (UTC)

The problem may also be that we have had problems in defining the scope of the project, as can be seen in the first section of this page.[11] FunkMonk (talk) 20:46, 10 April 2015 (UTC)

• I think that if the scope includes all things that can be said to go "extinct" such as languages, then this project seems to broad to make sense. Stick with organisms and their extinction.·maunus · snunɐɯ· 16:47, 11 April 2015 (UTC)

This project (established in 2006) predates Wikipedia:WikiProject Palaeontology (established in 2008). Because of this, there are a large number of articles tagged for Extinction that might have gotten tagged for Palaeontology, if it had existed when then tagging happened (and there are also a lot of palaeontology articles tagged for WikiProject Geology (established in 2007)). The Extinction project page doesn't even mention the Palaeontology project, which isn't helping matters.

I think the scope of this project should be narrowed or clarified to cover (mostly) recent extinctions. There is some overlap with palaeontology; previous extinction events and well-studied or very well-known fossils may be in scope. And there's certainly a grey area in picking a cut-off date for extinction vs. palaeontology. 1500 AD? ~10,000 BP? Maybe even older in the case of some Australian megafauna? Plantdrew (talk) 21:55, 12 April 2015 (UTC)

• Thinking about the scope again, we should maybe widen it to include all biology articles where something can actually be said about extinction. For example, the Cretaceous extinction event happened before 10.000 years ago, but wouldn't it be very illogical to not have it tagged as part of this project, as it is very central to the very concept of extinction? But for example the article about Stegosaurus, where little to nothing can be said about the extinction of the particular genus, doesn't make much sense as tagged here (I recently removed the tag). So in short, the scope could be narrowed to only cover articles that are relevant to the concept of extinction, excluding animals where we can say nothing other than "it is extinct". There needs to be information about why it went extinct in an included article. FunkMonk (talk) 04:41, 8 April 2016 (UTC)

Capitanian Extinction/Middle Permian Extinction

End-Capitanian extinction event might be profitably turned into an article, since it is about a Big-6 extinction level event, or deleted as a WP:REDLINK; per [12] elevating its status to one of the major extinction events. doi:10.1130/B31216.1 -- 65.94.43.89 (talk) 13:13, 16 April 2015 (UTC)

Agreed -- marked {{R with possibilities}}. - CRGreathouse (t | c) 19:00, 8 July 2019 (UTC)

ITN candidate Australopithecus deyiremeda

Hello. The article Australopithecus deyiremeda has been proposed on In the news candidates -- Aronzak (talk) 16:40, 28 May 2015 (UTC)

Are Dead Clade Walking and extinction debt two terms for the same thing?

Please comment on that question at Talk:Dead clade walking#Synonym for extinction debt Oiyarbepsy (talk) 05:05, 23 July 2015 (UTC)

Endangered-by categories

I recently made Category:Species endangered by the pet trade. I'm not entirely happy with the title; it's long and excludes, say, orchids endangered because people want them for similar reasons. It might be good to have analogous categories for habitat loss, food consumption, agricultural practices, magical and medicinal use, climate change, use in art, fashion, manufacture, religion, or sport, and anything else that threatens or has threatened many species. A species might of course be appropriately tagged with several of these. These are preliminary category suggestions; if you have suggestions, please comment. HLHJ (talk) 17:29, 2 August 2015 (UTC)

Psittacosaurus

I have nominated Psittacosaurus for a featured article review here. Please join the discussion on whether this article meets featured article criteria. Articles are typically reviewed for two weeks. If substantial concerns are not addressed during the review period, the article will be moved to the Featured Article Removal Candidates list for a further period, where editors may declare "Keep" or "Delist" the article's featured status. The instructions for the review process are here. DrKay (talk) 16:37, 6 December 2015 (UTC)

Rauvolfia nukuhivensis

Rauvolfia nukuhivensis is currently recorded as extinct on the IUCN Red list [13], however that is clearly not the case. There are at least two recent studies (from 2011 and 2015) that describe current populations, including photos; the 2015 one does some kind of phytochemistry analysis from fresh samples. As the IUCN entry is from 1998 and sports a nice "requires updating", it appears that no-one has gotten around to updating the listing yet. Accordingly, I have made a note to that effect in the stub (couldn't find much other WP-suitable material regarding this species) and set status in the taxobox to "see text". Not sure how this kind of thing is usually handled - someone might want to have a look and adapt if necessary?-- Elmidae 17:38, 19 December 2015 (UTC)

The problem is that the IUCN needs sometimes extremely long for updating their accounts. E. g. It took 10 years to update Hadramphus tuberculatus from extinct to critically endangered. There are a lot of other "extinct" species which have been rediscovered in recent years but still don't have an update. BUT: The section in taxo box calls IUCN status. So you have to use the current IUCN status even when this status is outdated. So the question is: Why should we use the IUCN status in the taxo box? --Melly42 (talk) 18:05, 19 December 2015 (UTC)

Well, I suppose one could always just set a textual note (like I did - it doesn't actually refer to IUCN status in the box now). What procedure has been adopted in the cases you refer to?-- Elmidae 19:54, 19 December 2015 (UTC)

Passenger pigeon at FAC

Just a heads up to inform that passenger pigeon, a rather high importance article within this project, and Wikipedia in general (vital, CD selection), is now at FAC[14], and any comments are welcome. FunkMonk (talk) 3:26 am, 1 February 2016, Monday (23 days ago) (UTC+1)

List of recently extinct species

I just started List of recently extinct species. A few issues. Scope, in terms of defining "recently" could be discussed at talk. Also, when I check the articles, many say the species is not extinct. Not sure if they need to be updated or my sources are wrong. Another thing is that the table contains species and subspecies. Should the article name remain the same? Is the lead saying "also subspecies" enough? Many thanks if you could take a look. Please comment at article talk rather than here. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 23:46, 7 April 2016 (UTC)

Regarding recent, see some of the discussion above on project scope. "Recently extinct" to me implies non-palaeontological extinctions, which start at 1500 AD (by the IUCN's definition), or even much earlier than that. IUCN should probably be your go-to source as to whether or not a species is extinct; if there aren't any more recent sources than the IUCN evaluation, update the articles to reflect IUCN's status. Including subspecies seems OK to me. Plantdrew (talk) 00:22, 8 April 2016 (UTC)

This list is redundant. We have already lists with recently extinct birds and mammals --Melly42 (talk) 01:14, 8 April 2016 (UTC)

Or rather those are redundant. Actually, the article is intended to focus on the very recent and include any and all species. Plus, I thought it impractical to fill the gap by starting List of recently extinct flora and List of recently extinct fauna with the exception of mammals and birds. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 01:30, 8 April 2016 (UTC)

Thank you Plantdrew. Yes, IUCN is one of the two sources I used. I would like to define in the article name or lead that the focus is on the last, say, 20 years or something? I intended it as a sort of rolling list where new species could be added. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 01:30, 8 April 2016 (UTC)

List of species declared extinct in the 21st century? That gets you 16 years, but it won't really roll over another twenty years down. There's a fundamental problem with "declaring" species extinct and assigning a precise date. It's sad and nobody really wants to do that. The last known baiji died in 2002. It was declared extinct in 2006. There is a video from 2007 that might be a baiji. Even assuming the video is a baiji, there's no guarantee there's a viable population or any likelihood of future sightings. Extinct in 2002, 2006, or in another 50 years, when we're absolutely (probably) sure they are gone? Plantdrew (talk) 05:04, 8 April 2016 (UTC)

To include subspecies, I guess the title should say "taxa" instead of species, or (to be less esoteric) we could have separate lists for plants and animals, and just say "extinct animals/extinct plants"? "List of recently extinct species" is very unspecific, considering that you have some very specific criteria in mind. FunkMonk (talk) 05:46, 8 April 2016 (UTC)

I'll outdent this if that's okay, because this is sort of a response to everything above:

So...

First, where should this discussion be taking place?

Yes, List of species declared extinct in the 21st century is not a bad title. But, if we could keep it loose, that would be my preference. What the title lacks, the lead could make up for. I mean, we must have lots of such articles. Maybe something like Lakes in eastern XXXXX where eastern isn't clearly defined by the state but the lead says "...lakes which are east of the city of...and includes those lakes on the great island of...". That sort of thing. I can't find our guidelines on vague titles. Anyone?

A taxon

Taxa, eh? I am concerned about search engine searchability. Even with a bunch of redirects, wouldn't it get far fewer page visits that way? Also, walk up to a stranger and ask what a "taxa" is, and he'll point to a yellow car with a light on top.

And separate lists, well, would visitors want that? The focus of the article (to me) is the recentness. That is what visitors would expect. I don't think they would care if it is technically a subspecies or if flora and fauna are on the same table. It is about them seeing the latest extinctions in a table sortable by date. That is why I started this: because I went looking for exactly that. I found stuff split up and dating way, way back. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 06:23, 8 April 2016 (UTC)

If many consider "recently extinct" as non-palaeontological extinction as Plantdrew does, then maybe the article name is no good.

I'm just thinking from the visitors' point of view. If we, at article talk, hash out the scope and then make a good, solid lead, then would visitors arrive and see immediately what the article is about, and be super-delighted? Anna Frodesiak (talk) 06:23, 8 April 2016 (UTC)

As for the esotericness of the term taxon, that's why I suggested "animals" or some such (flora and fauna?) instead. Subspecies really isn't equivalent to species, though the boundary between the two can be very arbitrary. But recently extinct really does have a very specific meaning to zoologists and anyone interested in zoology, so I don't think there is reason to be misleadingly vague in the title. If we mean within this century, it should be specifically stated. Animals that became extinct 50 years ago are also "recently extinct", for example. FunkMonk (talk) 06:43, 8 April 2016 (UTC)

Good points. I would still love to see flora and fauna mixed. Sorting by date could really tell a tale there. As for "recently", I agree, it should be changed. Maybe "....since 2000" or in "...in the 21st century" is best. We should get a handle on the total number we're talking about. If we focus on that part of the scope then maybe all the other stuff will become apparent. How many new extinct species are declared each year? Should items listed have articles? Zillions of redlinks? And not sure how to solve the species/subspecies issue. This should really be at article talk, right? Anna Frodesiak (talk) 06:49, 8 April 2016 (UTC)

In light of the existence of Timeline of extinctions, which I saw back in 2015 but forgot about, I am thinking of deleting List of recently extinct species or maybe AfDing it. Thoughts? Anna Frodesiak (talk) 23:32, 8 April 2016 (UTC)

That timeline seems very incomplete, though? I guess if the list is ordered by phylogeny or geography, it would not be redundant in relation to the timeline (which is of course ordered chronologicaly). FunkMonk (talk) 02:07, 9 April 2016 (UTC)

I understand. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 23:04, 9 April 2016 (UTC)

So, what does the community think overall? What should happen? Anna Frodesiak (talk) 23:04, 9 April 2016 (UTC)

Thinking of deleting it

We are discussing getting rid of List of recently extinct species. Please comment at Talk:List of recently extinct species. Many thanks. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 04:31, 29 August 2016 (UTC)

Wikipedia to the Moon and extinction

Hi all. You may have heard that the wikimedia community has been invited to provide 20GB worth of data to be placed on a disk that will be transported to The Moon along with a LunarX rover. The information is here: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_to_the_Moon . Ideas are invited until June 10, when voting begins to determine how we will decide which articles and information to bring. The discussion is taking place here https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_to_the_Moon/Discussion . I've included a proposal ("Decoding with DNA"), which focuses on de-extinction, especially of humans. I'd encourage members of this wikiproject to consider joining the discussion. I think the focus of the discussion has been unfortunately narrowly focused and I think folks who are used to thinking in millions of years instead of mere centuries would be a welcome addition. Even at a timescale of centuries, there is a lot of potential for emphasizing articles pertaining to those taxa that are not likely to be around. --Aranae (talk) 02:30, 24 May 2016 (UTC)

I thought I would let you know that voting is underway. In addition to "Decoding with DNA", there is also a proposal called "Extinction" that looks to preserve articles about species, languages, and cultural aspects in danger of extinction in the next century or so. https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_to_the_Moon/Voting --Aranae (talk) 00:33, 14 June 2016 (UTC)

Project statistics

Is it just me and my crappy wi-fi, or is the Project Statistics page not loading?   User:Dunkleosteus77 |push to talk 

It's not just you. Project stats have been down for at least 40 hours. Plantdrew (talk) 19:04, 21 January 2017 (UTC)

Need help at Late Devonian extinction

The Late Devonian extinction article includes about 11 sources that consist of only author and year. They were added in 2010 by an editor whose IP address indicates University of Chicago, but they were never completed. A list of the incomplete sources is given on the talk page here. Could someone with greater knowledge of this subject try to fill these out?

Thanks, Leschnei (talk) 13:00, 24 January 2017 (UTC)

Standardizing categories

The distiction between Category:Prehistoric animals and Category:Extinct animals seems inconsistently followed in categorization.The latter says "Please note that species which died out before 1500 should be listed in the relevant subcategory of Category:Prehistoric animals rather than in this category." Would anyone object to writing more category descriptions to that effect? That would include Category:Prehistoric reptiles, which currently says "Prehistoric reptiles are reptiles that went extinct before recorded history." Lophotrochozoa (talk) 17:08, 30 January 2017 (UTC)

This is related to the project scope-issue discussed above. We really need to define the scope properly for this project to be useful. FunkMonk (talk) 17:18, 30 January 2017 (UTC)

@Lophotrochozoa:, it would be helpful to add more category descriptions, please do so. @FunkMonk:, I added language to the project page in April 2015 restricting the scope to "recent"ish extinctions; in April 2016 I went through and removed the extinction banner from anything that had been extinct for more than a million years. I left the project banners on articles covering ancient extinction events (K-T, etc.) and late Pleistocene extinct taxa.Plantdrew (talk) 16:50, 31 January 2017 (UTC)

"Extinction in general" is also part of the scope, which would include all extinction events ever (which is logical, given the project's name). So I think there still needs to be some clarification. The problem is wording it so it covers the extinction events, but not necessarily the animals that went extinct in them. FunkMonk (talk) 09:02, 1 February 2017 (UTC)

Steller's sea cow FA

Steller's sea cow was nominated for FAC, and (so far) it looks like all it needs now is a source review. Anyone willing? Thanks   User:Dunkleosteus77 |push to talk  02:41, 27 February 2017 (UTC)

Categories for causes of endangerment?

I created [Category:Species endangered by the pet trade], and was thinking that some other categories (species endangered through logging, magical/medicinal use, food consumption, being worn, etc.) might be useful. IUCN does have some coarse database categories for threats. Any views? HLHJ (talk) 20:02, 21 April 2017 (UTC)

Steller's sea cow FA

I nominated Steller's sea cow for FAC (again). Feel free to start the review, thanks   User:Dunkleosteus77 |push to talk  22:41, 7 June 2017 (UTC)

Okay, so last time failed, but I renominated it last month, and (right now at least) it seems the biggest issue is that no one's done the usual spot check for accurate use of sources and avoidance of close paraphrasing (apparently last time was only a partial spot-check). So if you feel like it, please help. Thanks   User:Dunkleosteus77 |push to talk  05:21, 8 July 2017 (UTC)

Sea mink GA

I've nominated sea mink for GA. Feel free to start the review, thanks   User:Dunkleosteus77 |push to talk  03:48, 23 July 2017 (UTC)

Taxoboxes

If an image of a restoration of an animal is available for use, should that image be in the taxobox, or should it just be images of fossils and bones? I'm at sea mink and both the restoration and bones are illustrations, so I'm wondering what the standard is here   User:Dunkleosteus77 |push to talk  00:25, 23 August 2017 (UTC)

• (Copying my earlier response here) I think this should be determined on a case by case basis; I have personally advocated for showing good images of skeletons/taxidermy skins in the taxobox over speculative life restorations as a general rule, but sometimes, such images don't really exist. For example, at Massospondylus, there are not really any good photos of full skeletons available, so I personally wouldn't replace the current taxobox restoration. Likewise, at broad-billed parrot, there are no good modern restorations of the bird, or full skeletons to show, but the taxobox image is a pretty high quality drawing by someone who actually saw the bird, so it seems appropriate. At Steller's sea cow, the contemporary drawing seems a bit too crude to be taxobox material, though, so the good photo of a skeleton is probably more appropriate. As for this mink, I personally don't think the jaw drawing is informative enough to place in the infobox, but the restoration is probably very accurate, since it wouldn't have differed externally from its extant relative. FunkMonk (talk) 23:20, 22 August 2017 (UTC)

Sea mink FA

I just nominated sea mink for FA, say something if you're interested, thanks   User:Dunkleosteus77 |push to talk  03:41, 27 August 2017 (UTC)

Policy on "amateur" life restorations of extinct taxa?

I've asked this in WikiProject:Paleontology as well but I think you all might have thoughts/opinions as well.

I've noticed on several articles (recent ones I've seen are Paracamelus and Conquered lorikeet) that there are images about what the taxon in question might have looked like while it was alive. And for plenty of articles the images come from artists who've worked closely with experts who have transparent methodologies and outline their assumptions and everything's great and perfectly cited. But for a lot of articles it seems like the image has no such provenance; rather some editor on wikipedia or in commons drew an image and ex nihilo an "authoritative" image has been added to an encylopedia entry. It seems strange to me that for a platform like Wikipedia that's so big on No original research and Verifiability that these types of images would be fairly common.

Is there some policy I should defer to? Should I not be worrying about this? Thanks for any thoughts. Umimmak (talk) 08:36, 1 October 2017 (UTC)

This has been extensively discussed[15][16][17]], see WP:PALEOART for guidelines. In general, original imagery is not considered original research, per WP:OI and WP:pertinence. FunkMonk (talk) 08:52, 1 October 2017 (UTC)

Ah thanks. Sorry for not being able to find those discussions :( Umimmak (talk) 08:56, 1 October 2017 (UTC)

It can be hard to find, but at least the paleo project has a link to the art review on the main page. Also note that if user's weren't allowed to add restorations, 80% (or more) of our illustrated articles wouldn't have any. FunkMonk (talk) 08:58, 1 October 2017 (UTC)

Okay I've gone though some of the discussions and I guess I'm still confused by some of the arguments. I don't see how WP:pertinence is relevant to this discussion and WP:OI clearly says: Original images created by a Wikipedian are not considered original research, so long as they do not illustrate or introduce unpublished ideas or arguments, the core reason behind the NOR policy (emphasis in original). From this, I get the understanding that it would be fine if there is a clear verbal description in a reliable source and an editor produces an illustration citing that description as it's not the illustration introducing the ideas. But I don't see how this applies when an editor is synthesizing in order to create their own idea of what it looked like.

When you say Also note that if user's weren't allowed to add restorations, 80% (or more) of our illustrated articles wouldn't have any, I don't find that a convincing argument. First of all, I don't see an issue with editors creating illustrations if all the ideas in that image come from cited, reliable sources and the methodology/sources used to create them are explicitly given so others can verify the image is agrees with the known literature. Its when images don't do this that I have qualms, and just because other stuff exists doesn't mean it's right.

Lastly, I think the goals of WP:PALEOART are well-intentioned, and it's good to see some illustrators are citing sources in their discussions and that there's an attempt to get some sort of internal peer review. But a reader of a wikipedia article won't be able to easily see this "behinds the scenes" discussion easily.

I guess I don't mean to dead horse this if there's already a consensus, but hopefully there can be increased transparency in the future.

—Umimmak (talk) 21:01, 1 October 2017 (UTC)

The utter disrespect for the talents and efforts of our many paleoartists on display here is outrageous. The weasley demands for arbitrary, unmeetable standards is obvious concern trolling and I resolutely oppose placing obnoxious burdens on editors whose jobs are both difficult and -apparently- thankless enough as it is. Abyssal (talk) 02:22, 2 October 2017 (UTC)

I don't see how this is "completely ridiculous" (from the other discussion), "obnoxious", or an "unmeetable standard". The illustrators are using some sort of references when they make their reconstructions; I don't see how it's a burden to more explicit about what they used when they uploaded the images. But apparently I'm alone in this... Umimmak (talk) 03:59, 2 October 2017 (UTC)

P.S. Be civil; don't call me a "dipshit" just because I might disagree with you. Umimmak (talk) 04:34, 2 October 2017 (UTC)

Honestly, I keep wondering why people bring up that the reader needs to know the "behind the scenes". No normal reader gives a crap so long as there are interesting pictures! That's why theres an issue of using copyrighted works, because otherwise every article would have interesting images that break the law. IJReid ^discuss 03:10, 2 October 2017 (UTC)

An encyclopedia's content (text and images) should be more than just "interesting"; it should reflect current scholarship and be verifiable. There's no reason why images on Wikipedia can't be interesting, verifiable, and free. Umimmak (talk) 03:59, 2 October 2017 (UTC)

Let's use an example. Examples are fun. Let's use Vesperopterylus, an article which I have recently started.

You can start by observing that the article is without images. The paper is paywalled. Bugger.

Let's say you wanted to illustrate this poor stub. Obviously we want our articles to be illustrated.

You can't copy the life restoration in the paper, that's copyright infringement. How do you put the animal in a pose that doesn't violate copyright yet also doesn't infringe upon original research?

This is a case study, and it's incomplete - intentionally so. I'm curious to see how you would handle such a dilemma. Lythronaxargestes (talk | contribs) 05:20, 2 October 2017 (UTC)

I'm apparently in a minority position, but personally I'd just make a note in the article that Fig. 5 in Lü and colleague's paper was a restoration by well known Chinese dinosaur illustrator Zhao Chuang and briefly describe it. There's already an illustration, done by a professional dinosaur illustrator, approved by the scientists who described the species -- and it's in an open-access paper to boot. Perhaps one could use the External media template. Yes it would be ideal if it were licensed in a way that meant wikipedia could use it, but this seems like a very satisfactory alterantive.

But if you really wanted to create an image that could be used in a wikipedia article, I don't see why you can't just use the information about the species from Zhao and have different creative aspects. There wouldn't be original research or synthesis since things like colour, dimensions, perching behaviour comes from the paper itself or Zhao's interpretation. Explicitly cite Zhao and Lü and colleagues for the information about the species and then make different creative choices with respect to the actual illustration. Presumably any illustration would necessarily be based on this paper and that figure since it's the only species in its genus known so far and the species was literally described less than a week ago.Umimmak (talk) 06:21, 2 October 2017 (UTC)

Hi, what you describe in the lower paragraph is exactly what we already do; we base the restorations on published data and imagery, we don't "synthesise" anything. So I'm not exactly sure where the disagreement lies. As for linking images from journal articles in external links, that is redundant, when the given sources are already linked under the references. Also, it doesn't change the fact that the respective articles will still be needing illustrations. As for why WP:pertinence was brought up during the discussions, I'll quote WhatamIdoing from there: "does the image actually look like what it purports to be? If so, then it's okay. We do not require people to provide sources to prove the identity of the subject; we only require that images look like the subject."[18] FunkMonk (talk) 07:05, 2 October 2017 (UTC)

List of extinct rodents

• List of extinct rodents (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)

Would someone please check the recent edits at this article. I track {{convert}} errors and an IP has added a new entry (Castor, the first) with a broken convert. I don't want to fix it because the addition looks a bit dubious to me. Is it satisfactory that the first and second entries in the list are very similar (giant beavers)? I imagine there are hundreds of extinct rodent species that are currently unknown and perhaps there should not be two entries. Another problem is that the reference used for the second entry has been duplicated and used for the first. Johnuniq (talk) 09:12, 4 October 2017 (UTC)

• Let's ping the creator, Chiswick Chap, I'm pretty sure hundreds of extinct rodent species are known, so the list seems quite underdeveloped... FunkMonk (talk) 09:18, 4 October 2017 (UTC)

It's a total heap. I split it out of an article on rodents as inappropriate there so I was just tidying up, I'm afraid. Whether a list is justified vis-a-vis a category I wouldn't comment. There is certainly scope for a list article if anyone has the knowledge and inclination. Chiswick Chap (talk) 09:53, 4 October 2017 (UTC)

Rodrigues rail FA

The Rodrigues rail is currently at FAC, which was nominated by FunkMonk. Any comments? Adityavagarwal (talk) 17:54, 10 October 2017 (UTC)

Useful future bots

This project is not very active and no-one is keeping up with noting which species are endangered or invasive, not even as a taxobox or category. I've tried to fix by hand and the task is too big and tedious. We have good databases (from the IUCN, which explicitly allows reuse of its ratings) with adequate APIs, so we should be doing this automatically, to save volunteer time. It might have a major impact on the future of some of these species.

I suggested a bot that would automatically add IUCN Red List classifications to taxoboxes, properly referenced, but saw no response on Wikipedia:Bot_requests.

Ideally, we'd like categories for why it's endangered, but the IUCN terms probably won't license the database copyright on that information to us.

Separately, I think that a bot to include any article having a scientific name in the IUCN Global invasive species database in Category:invasive species would also be useful.

Opinions? HLHJ (talk) 03:03, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

Correction, I did get a response to the bot request, I just managed to miss it. Andy Mabbett sensibly suggests adding the data to Wikidata. Since Wikidata is CC-0, not copyleft, I'm not totally sure it would fly legally, but otherwise I think it's an excellent idea. I don't know much about this, and I can't seem to find the bit of the IUCN's terms which says that just giving the IUCN catagorization is under more liberal terms. If this is legal, I might have a go at making the bots.HLHJ (talk) 05:11, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

Endangerment reasons categories

(discussion moved from section on bots, above) HLHJ (talk) 16:12, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

...Ideally, we'd like categories for why it's endangered, but the IUCN terms probably won't license the database copyright on that information to us.... HLHJ (talk) 03:03, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

IMO, too many species articles are already subject to WP:Overcategorization. When will it stop? "Category:Species threatened by mining in Cambodia described in the 19th century with a middle-Eocene first appearance"?

I take your point, Animalparty, and as that's a separate topic I shouldn't have stuck it in here [edit:the section on useful bots] anyway, so I struck it. Let's stick to completing the taxoboxes. HLHJ (talk) 05:11, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

• I'm puzzled by the fact that many articles about completely extinct animals list them as "endangered by habitat loss" and similar. How can an extinct species be "endangered"? FunkMonk (talk) 09:53, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

@FunkMonk:, indiscriminate "endangered by habitat loss" seems to be a feature of articles that were created by PolBot. I was editing some PolBot articles on chimaeras yesterday, that had "endangered by habitat loss". This "threat" wasn't listed in the IUCN database entries, and it's pretty implausible "threat" for these deep-sea dwelling fishes. If there's one habitat on the planet that can't ever be lost, it's the deep sea (and absent fallout from a global nuclear war or run-away global warming, it's pretty implausible that deep-sea habitats could even be significantly degraded by humans). Plantdrew (talk) 15:45, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

I've moved this discussion to a new section, to separate it from the unrelated discussion of auto-populating IUCN status into taxoboxes using bots, above.

@FunkMonk:, Category:Endangered species by reason they are threatened says that the categories can be used for extinct species. It makes sense to say what drove a species to extinction, but in that case "endangered" should probably be read as being past tense (This extinct species was endangered by habitat loss...). It avoids recategorizing when a species is wrongly declared extinct and then rediscovered, too. HLHJ (talk) 16:12, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

@Plantdrew:, I'd heard that the global whale population crash caused by human hunting drastically reduced the number of whalefalls, thus changing an ecologically important component of the deep ocean. Changes in water chemistry eventually hit the deep ocean via the meridional overturning circulation, too. The changes in pH due to rising atmospheric CO2 is physiologically pretty drastic for some organisms. Not to mention the fixed nitrogen runoff from fertilizers (most of the fixed nitrogen kicking around the planet's surface is now fixed by humans), or the phosphorus runoff, or the increased iron input from human-caused desertification and wind changes due to changes in atmospheric heat patterns (iron mostly comes as wind-blown dust). Actually, though, I guess all of these would count as habitat degradation, not habitat loss, except maybe for species that live in whalefalls, so you're right. HLHJ (talk) 16:27, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

WikiProject collaboration notice from the Portals WikiProject

The reason I am contacting you is because there are one or more portals that fall under this subject, and the Portals WikiProject is currently undertaking a major drive to automate portals that may affect them.

Portals are being redesigned.

The new design features are being applied to existing portals.

At present, we are gearing up for a maintenance pass of portals in which the introduction section will be upgraded to no longer need a subpage. In place of static copied and pasted excerpts will be self-updating excerpts displayed through selective transclusion, using the template {{Transclude lead excerpt}}.

The discussion about this can be found here.

Maintainers of specific portals are encouraged to sign up as project members here, noting the portals they maintain, so that those portals are skipped by the maintenance pass. Currently, we are interested in upgrading neglected and abandoned portals. There will be opportunity for maintained portals to opt-in later, or the portal maintainers can handle upgrading (the portals they maintain) personally at any time.

Background

On April 8th, 2018, an RfC ("Request for comment") proposal was made to eliminate all portals and the portal namespace. On April 17th, the Portals WikiProject was rebooted to handle the revitalization of the portal system. On May 12th, the RfC was closed with the result to keep portals, by a margin of about 2 to 1 in favor of keeping portals.

There's an article in the current edition of the Signpost interviewing project members about the RfC and the Portals WikiProject.

Since the reboot, the Portals WikiProject has been busy building tools and components to upgrade portals.

So far, 84 editors have joined.

If you would like to keep abreast of what is happening with portals, see the newsletter archive.

If you have any questions about what is happening with portals or the Portals WikiProject, please post them on the WikiProject's talk page.

Thank you.    — The Transhumanist   10:56, 31 May 2018 (UTC)

Category:Extinct animals and its subcategories

It states on the main category page that the category should only deal with recent extinctions (and so should most of the articles in most of the subcategories (with the exception of Category:Prehistoric animals)) yet people have been placing all kinds of animals that are extinct in them (including some palaeozoic animals in them). As such I suggest that we purge the categories and remove all animals that are not recent extinctions out of them categories. Due to the sheer amount of subcategories and pages within them it is almost impossible for one person to do them on their own, as such (One such discussion relating to this could be Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2018 May 3#Category:Fossils of Russia. (although that also talked about Category:Fossils of Russia 148.197.52.155 (talk) 15:58, 20 November 2018 (UTC)

I don’t understand. The category is just a parent for a bunch of other more focused categories (like Prehistoric animals and Animals extinct after 1500, the latter being composed of only recently extinct animals)   User:Dunkleosteus77 |push to talk  17:06, 20 November 2018 (UTC)

Sorry it has taken me so long to reply its just been a busy couple of weeks at uni. What I mean by the above is that the categories extinct animals of....(place) should only be used for recent extinctions (see the above linked Cfd for where I got this from). Sorry if the above didn't make any sense I have been known to explain stuff in a way that doesn't make sense to others in real life. 148.197.52.155 (talk) 10:27, 3 December 2018 (UTC)

So you wanna enforce the difference between Category:Prehistoric animals by continent and Category:Extinct animals by continent?   User:Dunkleosteus77 |push to talk  20:06, 3 December 2018 (UTC)

We should just have a "recently extinct animals" category then. FunkMonk (talk) 16:42, 12 January 2019 (UTC)

Nomination of Portal:Extinction for deletion

A discussion is taking place as to whether Portal:Extinction is suitable for inclusion in Wikipedia according to Wikipedia's policies and guidelines or whether it should be deleted.

The page will be discussed at Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Portal:Extinction until a consensus is reached, and anyone is welcome to contribute to the discussion. The nomination will explain the policies and guidelines which are of concern. The discussion focuses on high-quality evidence and our policies and guidelines. Users may edit the page during the discussion, including to improve the page to address concerns raised in the discussion. However, do not remove the deletion notice from the top of the page. --Nessie (talk) 14:48, 7 October 2019 (UTC)

Question about "importance"

I'm wondering how the level of "importance" is established to fit into one category or another. My particular interest is in the assignment of "top" importance to the TALK page of Holocene extinction, while the page itself isn't even listed. Is it possible someone is trying to artificially elevate the apparent importance of a topic by just slipping "importance=top" into an edit? Riventree (talk) 21:46, 5 January 2020 (UTC)

@Riventree: project importance is assigned on the talk page, through the WikiProject templates, and not on the main article. The article had 36,199 pageviews over the last 30 days, and is core to WikiProject Extinction, so I can see it being Top importance. --Nessie (talk) 23:03, 5 January 2020 (UTC)

The Extinct Barnstar

Introducing Template:The Extinct Barnstar. Jerm (talk) 04:39, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

Looks cool! You should probably state in the commons source field where the component images were taken from. FunkMonk (talk) 08:28, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

Potential merge

There's been a potential article merge languishing for several months. Klbrain suggested that the Norfolk and Lord Howe starling articles be merged into the Tasman starling article. (All three are about extinct taxa.) The first two articles are about the two subspecies of the latter. The proposer's comment is that "the two (extinct) subspecies share much in common, and hence are best discussed in one place where their similarities and differences can be discussed. There is enough content for one reasonable article, but not three." Anybody wishing to comment can do so here. MeegsC (talk) 23:46, 3 December 2020 (UTC)

Category:Extinction articles needing expert attention has been nominated for discussion

Category:Extinction articles needing expert attention has been nominated for possible deletion, merging, or renaming. A discussion is taking place to decide whether this proposal complies with the categorization guidelines. If you would like to participate in the discussion, you are invited to add your comments at the category's entry on the categories for discussion page. Thank you. Peaceray (talk) 18:06, 16 May 2021 (UTC)

Automatic taxobox

Is it time to make the taxobox example an automatic taxobox? The article from which the example originates uses this template. YorkshireExpat (talk) 19:42, 30 May 2021 (UTC)

FAR for Chicxulub crater

User:Hemiauchenia has nominated Chicxulub crater for a featured article review here. Please join the discussion on whether this article meets featured article criteria. Articles are typically reviewed for two weeks. If substantial concerns are not addressed during the review period, the article will be moved to the Featured Article Removal Candidates list for a further period, where editors may declare "Keep" or "Delist" the article's featured status. The instructions for the review process are here. Hemiauchenia (talk) 19:22, 29 January 2022 (UTC)

Featured Article Save Award for Chicxulub crater

There is a Featured Article Save Award nomination at Wikipedia talk:Featured article review/Chicxulub crater/archive1. Please join the discussion to recognize and celebrate editors who helped assure this article would retain its featured status. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 04:09, 30 July 2022 (UTC)

Project-independent quality assessments

Quality assessments by Wikipedia editors rate articles in terms of completeness, organization, prose quality, sourcing, etc. Most wikiprojects follow the general guidelines at Wikipedia:Content assessment, but some have specialized assessment guidelines. A recent Village pump proposal was approved and has been implemented to add a |class= parameter to {{WikiProject banner shell}}, which can display a general quality assessment for an article, and to let project banner templates "inherit" this assessment.

No action is required if your wikiproject follows the standard assessment approach. Over time, quality assessments will be migrated up to {{WikiProject banner shell}}, and your project banner will automatically "inherit" any changes to the general assessments for the purpose of assigning categories.

However, if your project has decided to "opt out" and follow a non-standard quality assessment approach, all you have to do is modify your wikiproject banner template to pass {{WPBannerMeta}} a new |QUALITY_CRITERIA=custom parameter. If this is done, changes to the general quality assessment will be ignored, and your project-level assessment will be displayed and used to create categories, as at present. Aymatth2 (talk) 20:03, 10 April 2023 (UTC)

B-checklist in project template

 You are invited to join the discussion at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Council § Determining the future of B-class checklists. This project is being notified since it is one of the 82 WikiProjects that opted-in to support B-checklists (B1-B6) in your project banner. DFlhb (talk) 11:41, 30 October 2023 (UTC)