User talk:WolfmanSF: Difference between revisions

Welcome

Welcome to Wikipedia! I see that you have already made many useful contributions to astrophysics-related articles. A couple of things that you may wish to consider:

• Checking out Wikipedia:WikiProject Physics. This is an informal association of editors who maintain physics-related articles. Articles at which problematic edits have occurred or which need improvement or vetting are usually listed on the project's talk page.
• Creating a user page. This will tell other editors something about yourself (as much or as little as you like), and will prevent your name from showing up as a broken link in edit histories.

Happy editing! --Christopher Thomas 06:57, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

Reactions

Quark matter

In the Quark matter article you added the statement that a star made mostly of quark matter is a quark star. I'm not entirely happy with the word "mostly" here: a hybrid star with 80% quark matter and 20% nuclear matter around it would still be a hybrid star, not a quark star. Many of the efforts to discover quark stars are based on their having a different kind or surface, not consisting of nuclear matter. I think it has to be 100% quark matter to be a quark star. Dark Formal 00:45, 5 November 2006 (UTC)

Re: Quark Matter

I see your point, but I have some problems with your argument. I don't know the equation of state for quark matter, but it is not clear to me that there is much likelihood that a star could be 100.00...% quark matter. By way of analogy, no one believes that the surface of a neutron star is composed of neutron-degenerate matter; the pressure does not rise high enough to eliminate normal nuclear degenerate matter until you get some distance below the surface. Even if "the efforts to discover quark stars are based on their having a different kind or surface, not consisting of nuclear matter", that might well be based on practical considerations (i.e. that being that easiest way to adduce evidence for the existence of quark stars) rather than the belief that this is the way quark stars must be. Also, I haven't seen any references to or discussion of hybrid quark-degenerate matter/neutron-degenerate matter stars as a separate class of object (please correct me if I've missed something). If quark stars were real objects of observational study, splitting the category of all stars containing quark-degenerate matter into pure quark stars and various types of hybrid stars might be a very useful thing to do. At present, however, with quark stars being purely theoretical, it is not clear to me that such subdividing has much utility. I would be happy to defer to anyone with expertise in this area.

There is plenty of literature on strange stars or quark stars. Take a look at nucl-th/0507055 for example, and some of the papers it cites. The definition of a quark star is a star that is quark matter from core to surface. This only occurs if strange matter is more stable than nuclear matter at all pressures, including zero pressure, i.e. at the surface. This may be unlikely, but that's what people mean, according to the scientific literature on this topic.

I'm happy to continue the discussion, but we should probably move to the talk page for quark matter. Dark Formal 23:52, 11 November 2006 (UTC)

Re: "The Strange Star Surface: A Crust With Nuggets"

Thanks for referring me to this article. Reading it, I find that the authors' model does indeed have strange quark matter going right to the very surface. However, they also cite a "conventional view" (ref. 10, which I don't have online access to) of a tiny nuclear crust at the surface of the star. I suppose it would be OK to say that the star is essentially 100% quark matter in either case, as long as the possibility of that tiny nuclear crust is mentioned. Alternatively, one could say that the nuclear crust is separate from the quark star (if that is indeed the convention in the astrophysics community). What I wanted was a definition of a quark star inclusive enough to cover different models such as these. If you want to re-edit my changes, please go ahead.

Re: Re: "The Strange Star Surface: A Crust With Nuggets"

OK, I have added a qualifying sentence after the offending revision. Please feel free to re-edit. WolfmanSF 17:33, 18 November 2006 (UTC)WolfmanSF

I agree with what you wrote. If I decide to add more content on this issue then I may re-edit it slightly. Dark Formal 23:25, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

Central dogma

That may have happened in the revert storm when we were dealing with about one vandal edit per minute. Your change is in the current version of the article. TimVickers 19:40, 13 February 2007 (UTC)

Sorry, I missed that edit and thought I'd reincorporated it. TimVickers 21:11, 13 February 2007 (UTC)

Capitalization

Please read the logic for the capitalization on WP:BIRD. I'm not asking you to agree with it, but to leave it be. - UtherSRG (talk) 02:45, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

Europa

Most of the material you removed was from this source, so I'd appreciate it if you read it to see if I misunderstood anything. Serendi^podous 06:44, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

I think you understood it perfectly, I just think it is so wildly speculative (and in particular, speculation of the hand-waving sort that glosses over all the difficult details) that it isn't worth citing. Europa has one very obvious and fairly well-understood energy source, tidal flexing, that provides an internal heat source that is clearly driving the geological activity there. It makes sense to speculate that it could also be an energy source for biology, since something somewhat similar happens on Earth (although in our case the heat isn't tidal in origin). It doesn't make sense to take this "anything is possible" attitude and apply it specifically to Europa, when no examples of organisms deriving their metabolic energy from these other energy sources are known. WolfmanSF (talk) 07:30, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

Image at Density wave theory

Hi WolfmanSF. I have long appreciated your efforts to add images to the articles concerning Saturn's rings. I wanted to point out, though, that the image you added here does not actually highlight the correct phenomenon. Those are "wakes" that arise from a single encounter between ring particles and Pan, not density waves that arise from a resonance condition. Density waves in Saturn's rings are so tightly wound that you can't actually see them as spirals (any image with good-enough resolution to see them has too narrow a field of view). Here are some good images that do feature density waves: [1][2][3][4]. I don't know if any of them are already uploaded to WP. The first one might be particularly good, as it includes a bending wave (vertical corrugation) as well as a density wave (basically a compression wave), but all are nice. --BlueMoonlet (t/c) 02:43, 25 February 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for your comments. Are you sure that the other prominent, more tightly-wound bands in the photo do not actually represent the resonance-induced spiral density waves you are referring to? And a question about semantics: are the Pan-induced wakes, as you call them, something other than density waves? If so, what kind of waves are they? I'll go ahead and edit the photo caption in the rings article and replace the image in the density waves article. Regarding the latter, I think a definition of "epicyclic frequency" would be helpful. WolfmanSF (talk) 03:26, 25 February 2008 (UTC)

Yes, those are spiral density waves, but as they're not the most prominent feature in the image, it's not the best for the density waves article. The one you chose to replace it is very nice. In the rings article, I edited the caption for a neighboring image, which has SDWs without other effects that might distract, but it would not be wrong to mention them in the wakes image also.

Wakes are a purely kinematic effect as different ring-particle streamlines are affected differently by Pan (due to their different distances), and the streamlines line up in a kind of Moiré pattern. That is, different parts of a wake do not affect each other. Spiral density waves, on the other hand, are traveling waves.

I see your point on epicyclic frequency. I have not edited the galactic part of the article, but I do know what is meant by the term, and will work on making that more clear. --BlueMoonlet (t/c) 13:59, 25 February 2008 (UTC)

Lineae

Hi, Serendipodous. I don't want to get into an edit war with you over the placement of the Europa images, but to be honest I disagree with both of your recent assertions. "Image:PIA01092 - Evidence of Internal Activity on Europa.jpg" actually shows a much more detailed view of lineae, and gives a much better idea of their structure and mechanism of formation than does "Image:europa g1 true.jpg". The latter shows lineae primarily as albedo features, whereas the former at full size reveals their 'triple-band' structure, and shows that their formation is often associated with transverse faulting. Thus, from my perspective, the latter is at least as appropriate as the former for an illustration in the "lineae" section. The reverse order also has the advantage I pointed out earlier of maintaining a sequence of images showing progressively greater resolution. The captions for some of these images are longer than normal, but there is no harm in this; the information in them is specific to the images, and if it was moved to the text the impact would be lost. Regards, WolfmanSF (talk) 16:44, 27 February 2008 (UTC)

I'm not assessing this article on scientific merit. It's already been assessed for that. I'm assessing this article on whether someone who has never heard of Europa, or lineae, or planetary science will gain anything from it. That grey picture doesn't explain what the lineae are. You'd have to already know what lineae are before you could discern anything from it. The other picture shows the lineae as they would appear to someone who was not familiar with Europa, as the moon's primary visible feature. My guiding principle as a Wikipedist is to be as clear and explanatory as possible, and I don't think that grey picture is either. Good for technical details, but someone seeing Europa for the first time may be confused. Serendi^podous 19:43, 27 February 2008 (UTC)

"The other picture shows the lineae as they would appear to someone who was not familiar with Europa, as the moon's primary visible feature." I agree; that's why I think it wouldn't hurt to put that one first. Whether its actually in the lineae section seems less important to me. However, its not really a big deal in the grand scheme of things. WolfmanSF (talk) 20:39, 27 February 2008 (UTC)

Rhean rings

Hi Wolfman,

Can you access the Science article to check if it's the source of the radii? Those were added anonymously.

Thanks, — kwami (talk) 02:55, 8 March 2008 (UTC)

(I responded by email - WolfmanSF)

Windsor, Ontario fire of 1871

Hello Wolfman - thanks for your contribution to Windsor, Ontario, but can you provide a reference for it? There should be a source, especially for the date and the number of buildings that were affected. I grew up in Windsor and don't recall hearing about such a big fire, but then again I wasn't heavily concerned about the city's history at the time! Cheers, PKT (talk) 13:30, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

I agree that references are desirable for this historical episode. Here's a few. None of them all that suitable for Wikipedia, which is why I didn't list them.

http://www.walkerville.com/postcards/postcard-sample.pdf see p. 24

http://209.202.75.197/digi/chi/timeline.asp?Lang=english

http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?_r=1&res=9803E2DF1439E43BBC4B52DFB667838A669FDE&oref=slogin (mentioned in the headline only; note that the Windsor fire occurred 4 days after the start of the fires in Chicago, Peshtigo, Wisconsin, Holland, Michigan, Manistee, Michigan, and Port Huron, Michigan.

http://www.uh.edu/engines/epi1524.htm (one sentence, paragraph 8)

http://www.windsorpubliclibrary.com/branches/museum/exhibits.php (I'll bet if you contact the museum they could give you a suitable reference.)

http://www.jewishwindsor.org/page.html?ArticleID=30899 (see 3rd paragraph)

http://travel.canoe.ca/Travel/Canada/Ontario/2005/09/11/1220389-sun.html (2nd paragraph) WolfmanSF (talk) 16:20, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

Below is a reply I got from the Windsor Museum regarding sources for the subject. WolfmanSF (talk) 08:54, 22 March 2008 (UTC)

Unfortunately, I am not aware of any sources in regards to the Great Fire of Windsor 1871 that are available on line. There are a few articles/references to the fire that have been written in local history texts that would be available at libraries (as well as here) and of course the best source is the original newspapers of the time. (Newspapers are on Microfilm at Windsor Public Library central branch.) We have done a small exhibit in the past on this subject and so have a record of what was displayed, that you are welcome to look at here.

If you wish to do research here at the museum, it is best to make an appointment to do so.

Heather Colautti

Registrar

Windsor's Community Museum

Email: hcolautti@city.windsor.on

Use of the Dagger

I am curious as the "enthusiastic" use of the Dagger symbol in taxoboxes. I would think that a Dagger at the taxon level which is extinct , be it Species, family, order, what have you, would be enough to show that all taxa below that level are extinct. It seems rather redundant to have daggers all the way down from an order to the species. Is there a wikipolicy I should refer to regarding the dagger use?--Kevmin (talk) 00:28, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

Logically, you are correct. I don't know of any wikipolicy - if you come across one, please let me know of it. My view is that "enthusiastic use" does no harm - if you feel differently, feel free to revert. I suppose the one advantage "enthusiastic use" could have is that if the dagger is used only once for a high-level taxon, it could be overlooked by casual readers.WolfmanSF (talk) 00:53, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

Hi, WolfmanSF. Noticing your recent additions of daggers, I was wondering if perhaps you would be better served requesting that a bot do it (given that I'm watching approximately 3000 articles at this time, almost all of which are fossil reptiles and would require at least one, to say nothing of all of the other fossil organisms). Perhaps a bot could be set up with a search string of certain high-order groups that are extinct, and once it finds them in a taxobox, it would add the dagger to all taxa below it? It wouldn't get everything, but it would clear out something like ammonites or mosasaurs, known extinct groups, quickly. J. Spencer (talk) 15:37, 26 April 2008 (UTC)

Hi, J. Spencer, thanks for you comments, and sorry for my delay in getting back to you. I'm not familiar with the capabilities of bots, and how one goes about requesting that one be set up. Where would I look to bone up on this? If it worked well, I would imagine it could be quite useful, but it seems to me that it would inevitably do a partial job in some situations, so one would want it to tag articles it has worked on to alert people to that fact (the tag could be removed from an article after someone checked the distribution of daggers and made corrections if necessary). WolfmanSF (talk) 06:30, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

I'm not a bot person either, but for the basics on bots, there's WP:BOT (for what they do) and WP:BOTREQ (for requesting one). I'd talk it over with people involved in biology wikiprojects first, since adding daggers to a number of pages would be a visible change on a lot of articles. My guess as to how a bot would work in this case would be that it would search out taxoboxes for known extinct groups (say, subclassis=Ammonoidea), and once it found them, it would add daggers to that element and every taxonomic level below. If this could be done, it would work quite well for large groups of known extinct organisms, but less well for groups with a mix, which would have to be done by hand at some point. Alternately, a bot could search for all articles with a |fossil_range or |status=fossil or extinct in the taxobox, and make a list, which could then be used. J. Spencer (talk) 17:27, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

Peshtigo Fire

I am curious -- why did you make several revisions to the Peshtigo Fire page, eliminating the comet references? Because -- the problem is that while it is true that small meteorites may be cold to the touch when they impact, the alternative hypothesis was about comet fragments. Now while it is probably the case that the fire was not caused by fragments from 3D/Biela, that was listed as an alternative hypothesis -- because it is considered (by a minority) as a hypothesis. As an encyclopedia article, referencing a minority hypothesis that has multiple references is valid, in fact it is necessary. You have deleted this -- but worse, you deleted the references to this alternate hypothesis. Please respond on my discussion page -- unfortunately it may be necessary to revert your changes. SunSw0rd (talk) 14:58, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

The references I eliminated had nothing to do with the Peshtigo Fire; they were related to a fringe theory that a comet impact was behind the Pleistocene extinctions in North America, something that took place roughly 12,000 years ago. This would have been a massive, catastrophic event (if it happened). I consider the comet theory of the origin of the Peshtigo and other simultaneous fires a "crackpot" explanation, something that only deserves to be cited for historical reasons. Small, grain-of-sand-size pieces of a comet produce what are commonly known as shooting stars when they enter the earth's atmosphere. They burn up completely high in the upper reaches of the atmosphere. If a larger, meteorite-size piece of a comet managed to reach the ground, it would act like a meteorite and lose any surface heat in its passage through the atmosphere. However, it is most unlikely that a piece of a comet a few feet across would ever reach the ground, because comets have a loose, ice/dust composition. Moreover, the passage of a significantly larger fragment of a comet through the atmosphere would produce a fireball that would be visible during the day, and thus could not have escaped notice. What makes the comet theory even more ridiculous is that fact that there were numerous fires already burning in the Peshtigo area, due to the land-clearing practices of the time, as a reference I added points out (http://news.minnesota.publicradio.org/features/200211/27_hemphills_peshtigofire/); did you read this? The point is, there is absolutely no need to explain the source of ignition of the Peshtigo Fire, which is already known. Given this, and the tinder-dry condition of the forests at that time, all that was needed to create the forest fire was a stiff wind, which a cold front provided. WolfmanSF (talk) 16:46, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

Right. But you are missing the point here. The point is not that the comet theory is, in your opinion, a "fringe theory." The point is that, as an encyclopedia article, the article should identify the fact that there are a number of sources that have asserted that the Peshtigo fire was in fact caused by a comet. It does not matter whether or not these sources are correct. What matters is that they exist. Deleting a reference to articles asserting that in the past comets have caused fires (whether or not in your opinion those references are themselves "fringe") -- is not OK. The simple fact is -- there are people that believe this and there are references to comets causing fires. The reference to meteorites is itself less valid than references to comets -- the theory, fringe or not, is that a comet, not a meteorite, caused the Peshtigo fire. Please understand -- it doesn't matter whether or not your scientific background leads you to believe that of course the comet theory is hokum. That is really not relevant. What is relevant is that people for more than 100 years have asserted 3D/Biela as the source. Deleting supporting references to "clean up the science" is in fact not OK -- regardless of the truth of that theory or not. SunSw0rd (talk) 17:25, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

It appears to me that one person suggested that the fire could have been started by a comet, and this fact is not being suppressed by me or anyone else. No one ever asserted that the fire actually was started by a comet - there was never any evidence for that. While the comet theory indeed deserves mention for historical reasons, its shortcomings also need to be pointed out. That is all I have done. Did you actually read and understand the references I deleted? They are not about comets starting fires - they are about a comet impact throwing dust up into the atmosphere that caused climatic cooling around the world. They are irrelevant to the Peshtigo Fire article. WolfmanSF (talk) 18:11, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

OK cool down. I didn't say anything about "suppressing" anything. But it is more than one person. (1) Ignatius Donnelly referenced this in 1883. (2) Mel Waskin in 1985 published "Mrs. O'Leary's Comet" suggesting this. (3) Robert Wood (retired physicist) had a piece on the Discovery Channel suggesting this.

As for the references you deleted -- they were in fact regarding the "Comet Wiped Out Early North American Culture" story. Which itself may be "fringe" BUT -- relevant in the sense that they assert that a comet can be hot. As the articles assert that this comet melted the North American ice cap. Really, I don't object to those references being deleted but -- then we should delete the references to meteorites being cold since -- they are not relevant.

It would probably be better to have an expanded section on the comet theory, providing background, discussion, and then the evidence debunking it. What do you think of that? SunSw0rd (talk) 19:13, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

Personally I'm not in favor of an expanded section on the "comet theory" because I don't think its credible. You and others can do as you see fit; I'll edit if I think it's appropriate. Now, about those references I deleted, which seems to be the main thing you are objecting to... I have rechecked both of them and neither says anything about comets starting fires. Even if they did mention something about comets starting fires, it would not be relevant because this is in the context of a major impact event, not a meteor shower of the sort proposed (without good evidence) to be associated with the 1871 fires. WolfmanSF (talk) 19:44, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for Mars Phoenix image

Much appreciated. Flex Flint (talk) 15:23, 27 May 2008 (UTC)

Mars Images

Why did you shift all of the pictures to the right of the page and re-align them? Some pictures were best left on the left, and others on the right. It looked better and flowed better with the article. Thanks, and maybe you could look into fixing that. Thanks.Ssmercedes18 (talk) 00:01, 30 May 2008 (UTC)

This was done by Wnt, not by me. I tend to agree with you. WolfmanSF (talk) 00:49, 30 May 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for correction regarding kinetic vs potential energy

When I made this edit including the word kinetic, I had indeed forgotten that it is the sum of potential and kinetic energy that are being converted into heat, not the kinetic energy alone. Good catch! CosineKitty (talk) 22:10, 7 June 2008 (UTC)

Thanks. There are definitely subtleties to this situation that take a while to appreciate. WolfmanSF (talk) 22:44, 7 June 2008 (UTC)

Scattered disc

Do you want to get this article up to FA? I'd be willing to help. Serendi^podous 10:42, 8 June 2008 (UTC)

(I responded by email - WolfmanSF)

I just responded back Serendi^podous 14:15, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

Rings of Uranus

Thanks for copy-edits. Do you think the article is ready for FAC? And do you want to be a conominator? Ruslik (talk) 10:03, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

I see the article is already a candidate. Does conomination help at this point? If so, how do I conominate? WolfmanSF (talk) 19:08, 2 July 2008 (UTC)

In that that definition τ means apparent (observable) optical depth, not normal optical depth. To obtain normal depth they multiplied it by sinB—the angle between the ring plane and the Uranus-Earth line. And than they multiplied it by the width of the ring. The better way is to integrate, because τ is not necessary constant. See refs 8, 15, 21. dePater article has other inaccuracies— their formular (4) (and procedure described there) is wrong. Ruslik (talk) 09:46, 3 July 2008 (UTC)

Edits to trogon

Thank you for your contributions to trogon. I've been working on it on and off for a while and another set of eyes is very welcome. I notice that you changed one of my citations to use the cite template. Could I draw your attention to WP:CITE's mention of citation templates, which suggests that "editors should not change an article with a distinctive citation format to another without gaining consensus." In bold no less. I personally abhor the cite templates and would prefer the article not to change, or to use both. If you think the article should be changed please start a discussion on the talk page rather than changing any more. You may find a number of editors willing to go along with it (I usually get outvoted in WP:BIRD colabs) but if I am going to be the only one working on it in the future I'd rather it stayed like it is. Thanks! Sabine's Sunbird talk 02:52, 22 July 2008 (UTC)

Please accept my apology for my failure to recognize that the article has a distinctive citation format. WolfmanSF (talk) 04:43, 22 July 2008 (UTC)

No need for apologises, and my continued thanks for your contributions. It was also nice to see the trogons mentioned on the Great American Interchange article and also see the interesting method used to separate citations and notes used on that page. It had never occurred to me to do it that way. I'll have to remember it. Sabine's Sunbird talk 04:56, 22 July 2008 (UTC)

Thank you for citing the interesting article on the role of the GAI on trogon biogeography. As for the separation of notes and citations, I simply copied that from the Rings of Uranus article. WolfmanSF (talk) 17:13, 22 July 2008 (UTC)

Rings of Saturn

Add them, if you think that they are necessary. In my opinion, however, it is better to expand the text first. Ruslik (talk) 05:21, 22 August 2008 (UTC)

Lowercase animal names

Thank you for converting the American crocodile article to all-lowercase common names. There is a lot of work to try and fix this common error, and it is great to see someone helping out in the name of grammar! StevePrutz (talk) 15:49, 27 September 2008 (UTC)

Central America

Hi Supaman89,

The reason that (in my view) Mexico should be included in the list of Central American countries is the fact that the Mexican states of Chiapas, Tabasco, Campeche, Yucatán, and Quintana Roo are by geographic definition in Central America. Of course this doesn't mean the whole country is Central American. But this listing is not just used for political purposes.

From the standpoint of biology, it is very useful to view Central America separately from the rest of North America. Central America is a tropical region that shows a strong South American influence; it is part of the Neotropic ecozone. The rest of North America is subtropical or temperate, and is only weakly influenced by South America; it is in the Nearctic ecozone. For example, in the United States only three mammals (the Virginia Opossum, the Nine-banded Armadillo and the North American Porcupine) originated in South America, while dozens of species of Central American monkeys, cavimorph rodents, anteaters, sloths, armadillos and opossums are descended from South American immigrants. Since the above-mentioned Mexican states are part of this tropical region, their species show similar patterns and they should be included in listings of Central American species. It makes no sense to me to leave them out.

Do you disagree with this reasoning?. If so, could you explain why? WolfmanSF (talk) 04:30, 20 October 2008 (UTC)

I can see how in your view Mexico is in Central America, after all a lot of people associate North America with English-speaking, fully-developed countries such as Canada and the States; but North America is barely a geographical region in which Mexico is indeed located (it's not like it can be moved, right?). Because of this differences with Canada and the U.S. some people try put Mexico in Central America even though it's not, going to extremes like taking that 12% as a fact (which was promoted by some geographers) and further more give it extra emphasis just to "achieve" it. I personally don't care about the location, Mexico could be in Asia, but what is a bit tiring is to see people constantly trying to put Mexico in a region where it just isn't located just because it is different from its 2 neighbours (people don't seem to realize that Anglo America and North America are not the same). I think it would be like saying that Egypt is located in Asia even though 95% of it is located in Africa just because it is different from Nigeria. I hope you understand my points and see that despites cultural differences, geographical location just isn’t something that can be chosen, cheers. Supaman89 (talk) 19:00, 20 October 2008 (UTC)

I think the situation is that you are viewing this issue from a political-cultural standpoint when from the perspective of myself and others it is just a question of geography. Actually, Egypt is listed as both an African country and an Asian country, because the Sinai is in Asia. Similarly, Turkey is listed as both an Asian country and a European country, because it includes part of Thrace which is in Europe. From my perspective, the fact that part of Mexico is in Central America makes it a more diverse and interesting country. It was not my intent to offend anyone by pointing that out. WolfmanSF (talk) 20:44, 20 October 2008 (UTC)

I'm glad to see that you edits weren't pretentious (cuz a lot of people are), and don't worry you're not offending anyone (why would you be?) is just it's a bit tiring (for a lot of us) that some people keep pushing Mexico into Central America even though it's not, just because if is different from Canada and the States. Anyways Mexico seems to bring much more attention that the other countries, and I think it is mostly motivated because of cultural reasons rather than geographical ones (I mean maps speak for themselves) but still some people just won't accept Mexico as "North American enough", so again, I'm glad you're not one of them. Supaman89 (talk) 22:29, 20 October 2008 (UTC)

Capitalization in mammal articles

Just an FYI in case you're wondering why your various otter edits were reverted: changing caps in mammal articles is a much argued debate and a huge can o' worms. It was headed to arbitration at one point but fizzled out. Just a head's up that you've walked into a hornet's nest. If you feel it is worthwhile to pursue, see Talk:List of bats#Taxonomy and the use of capital letters in common names for the latest background. Rgrds. --Tombstone (talk) 12:14, 24 October 2008 (UTC)

I'm well aware of that. I've participated in some of the debates, and encountered some of the opposing pro-upper case zealots before. Still, I think it would be nice to have Wikipedia articles that don't look like they've been written by schoolchildren who think they can capitalize anything they want, which is the current situation. One can always dream.

Part of the problem is actually the way Wikipedia is currently set up, with links to articles that have more than an initial cap in the title being redirected or in some cases broken unless the caps are reproduced. That has encouraged many to believe that it is appropriate to capitalize article titles throughout an article, and to capitalize links in general. WolfmanSF (talk)

Well, if you're willing to take the lead and initiate arbitration, maybe this can be put to rest once and for all! Rgrds. --Tombstone (talk) 11:55, 25 October 2008 (UTC)

It is WP:PRIM's directive to use capitals for species common names. - UtherSRG (talk) 02:37, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

Your FP

Hey,the image you uploaded has been nominated for FP status at Wikipedia:Featured picture candidates/Rhea Just thought you'd like to know!

--Fireaxe888 (talk) 16:34, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

Appreciation for "Great American Interchange" article

Hi WolfmanSF, just wanted to express my appreciation for your article on the Great American Interchange. It is very well-written, flows well and is very thorough and informative -- an exemplary Wikipedia article.

JamesHAndrews (talk) 03:54, 14 November 2008 (UTC)

Thanks. I find the subject fascinating. But it's an article which could still use a lot more work (mainly for non-mammalian taxa). WolfmanSF (talk) 04:09, 14 November 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for corrections to Dismals Canyon

WolfmanSF, thanks for correcting the mistake in the Dismals Canyon article. That went unnoticed for at least six months, and I'm glad somebody knowledgeable passed by and noticed it. There might still be errors in the Arachnocampa page, as it lists Orfelia as a species of Arachnocampa. Jo7hs2 (talk) 12:38, 27 November 2008 (UTC)

Yes, it did - good catch. WolfmanSF (talk) 17:01, 27 November 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the corrections at Nestoridae

Thank you for your copyediting at Nestoridae, very much appreciated. -- Kim van der Linde ^{at venus} 04:18, 3 January 2009 (UTC)

spokes

Don't know if it's displaying for you, but my browser (FF) says the img cannot be displayed because it contains errors. kwami (talk) 08:01, 5 January 2009 (UTC)

Thanks, the file is a bit large and loads too slowly anyway. It looked OK on Safari, though. WolfmanSF (talk) 08:03, 5 January 2009 (UTC)

It also doesn't work on Camino, but seems to work on Opera, iCab and OmniWeb. WolfmanSF (talk) 08:44, 5 January 2009 (UTC)

I just added a smaller, shorter version which seems to work on all the browsers. WolfmanSF (talk) 10:30, 5 January 2009 (UTC)

Media:Horseevolution.png

Shouldn't the caption read "modern horse" instead of "modern house"? Cheers, —Ruud 23:17, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

You just might have a point there. Thanks. WolfmanSF (talk) 01:54, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

Horse

Hi! Evolution of the horse and some other articles (Equidae, Equus (genus), etc.) are getting some much needed attention. Care to join us? --Una Smith (talk) 05:26, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

I'm happy to contribute to the limited extent that I have time for. WolfmanSF (talk) 07:55, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

Thanks. Every edit helps. --Una Smith (talk) 20:50, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

I like where you put the daggers on Equidae; could you do the same for Equus (genus)? --Una Smith (talk) 16:39, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

Ah, a clever ploy to get me to look at the article again. Well, I fell for it. WolfmanSF (talk) 01:32, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

That article is shaping up nicely. Thanks! --Una Smith (talk) 03:58, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

Younger Dryas impact event article

Thank you for the interesting ideas you put forward in the Younger Dryas impact, but I wonder if you could please add a citation from a suitable source to substantiate them. Thanks for your continuing contributions, I know you understand why it is important to stay on top of these things in 'scientific' articles. cheers Deconstructhis (talk) 05:38, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

I will add suitable references (which are available by following the links I provided). WolfmanSF (talk) 05:41, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

Thanks

Thanks for the fixing problems with commons:File:Neptunian_rings_scheme.png. I completely forgot about it. Ruslik (talk) 13:33, 12 February 2009 (UTC)

No problem. I see you've been busy lately. WolfmanSF (talk) 17:07, 12 February 2009 (UTC)

CA talk page

I'm sorry I was not able to post a response in the CA talk page, I was kinda busy. This "discussion" is just another one of the several that "anonymous" user has opened in the past. He is in fact not an anonymous user, but a sockpuppet of User:Corticopia, if you want more info just check my talk page. He is the only user in the whole Wikipedia and that through the years has tried to impose a false POV that Mexico is considered part of CA. The truth is that neither Mexicans, Latin Americans nor Central Americans consider Mexico a CA country.

However, that template is about CA topics, and Mexico is clearly not a CA country.

AlexCovarrubias ^{( Talk? )} 19:48, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

It is ironic that this commentator is commenting on your talk page, as the originator of the template who opted to add Mexico for legitimate reasons, and who also tries to continue to conflate their viewpoint by discrediting someone else instead of through persuasion. Clearly, I am not the only editor who supports including Mexico with qualification in the template, and the body of references and literature support that. Central America is little different than the concept of Central Europe or any other arbitrary region, and the commentator fails to grasp that it's not simply about how residents of a region self-identify but how they are identified by others. In addition, I dare the commentator to confirm that I am a sockpuppet of this 'Corticopia': I am not required to register a user name, nor will I do so given this. That is all. 69.158.150.169 (talk) 16:44, 11 March 2009 (UTC)

Blood Fall: For your information

File:Blood Falls 01 Medium Res photolibrary.usap.gov.jpg

The main photograph image of Blood Falls has been added on 16:44, 20 April 2009 (UTC) on the Wikipedia:Picture peer review page to be proposed as a candidate for Wikipedia:Featured Pictures. See Wikipedia:Picture peer review/BloodFalls to give a comment or to support the proposal. Thanks — Shinkolobwe (talk) 19:21, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

you can help!

yeah, this is random and stalkerish, but trust me when I have a reason for asking: where do you edit from? (City and country would be nice, but whatever you feel comfortable telling is fine.) You can just shoot me an email or reply here. It's for a project I have to do involving wikipedia articles and editing patterns, nothing special, but I'll let you see it when I'm finished :) --Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs ^(talk) 14:10, 27 April 2009 (UTC)

(I responded by email. WolfmanSF (talk) 16:09, 27 April 2009 (UTC))

Missing mammal species

Hey, thought you might be interested in the missing mammal species page as you have recently created quite a few of the missing species (if you didn't already know about it). It's not a guideline but generally mammal species common names are capitalised unless the word is following a hyphen, e.g. White-headed Capuchin. Some editors choose to ignore these rules and due to lack of consensus they are within their rights to do so. Another quick point, if you add the WP:MAM banner ({{Mammal|class=|importance=}}) to each of the pages you create it helps other editors find/assess/work on the newly created pages. Cheers, Jack (talk) 08:34, 29 May 2009 (UTC)

Thanks, I was unaware of the banner. I was aware of the missing mammal species page. I've been adding species to the lists of Central and South American mammals, which is a project that probably can never be completed, due to the constant changes in classification. It should be noted that there are a lot of missing mammal species that aren't listed on the page, but are listed on the pages of various mammal genera (particularly rodent and bat genera).

I'm not sure I would agree with your statement about use of upper case in mammal species common names. Most authoritative sources do not capitalize mammal species common names, and according to the formal rules regarding capitalization in English prose, they should not be capitalized (since they are not proper nouns). I would be willing to go along with breaking the rules if there was a major advantage to doing so, but I'm not aware of one. There is a widespread tendency towards erroneous use of upper case in Wikipedia generally, and I am of the opinion that this tendency should be resisted. Also, there is no Wikipedia policy that says capitalized mammal common names are preferred. I have no idea why there is a policy for primates that goes against the policy for mammals as whole, but there seems to be. My impression is that most of the more knowledgeable editors favor lower case common names. WolfmanSF (talk) 07:17, 2 June 2009 (UTC)

Yeah there does seem to be a large split. I generally work on primate-related articles so it just seems, from my perspective, that most are capitalised! Both WP:PRIM and WP:CETA follow the same capitalisation policy, though it would obviously be best to become consistent throughout the WP:MAM WikiProject. One of the reasons for the capitalisation is MSW3 which capitalises all the common names but not genera and above. IUCN also capitalises, but taxonomy-wise I'm not sure they're a great reference. Anyway, keep up the good work. Cheers, Jack (talk) 08:59, 2 June 2009 (UTC)

As far as I can see, IUCN does not capitalize within prose (see for example, the white-tailed deer article), and MSW3 does not use common names within prose. So, it appears that neither of the examples you cited actually supports your position. Also, it appears that the WP:CETA policy, and possibly also the WP:PRIM policy, were created by fiat and not as a result of discussion or reference to the literature. Thus I tend to question their legitimacy. WolfmanSF (talk) 19:45, 2 June 2009 (UTC)

Long-tailed rhipidomys

Hi, hasn't written Polish article on this rodent yet :) But this can spur me to do so - so please, keep interwiki. Lukasz Lukomski (talk) 00:08, 16 June 2009 (UTC)

Maybe you should check out the entire List of South American mammals. Cheers, —WolfmanSF (talk) 00:17, 16 June 2009 (UTC)

Cut and paste move

Hi Wolfman, I really appreciate your edits, but I wanted to point out that moving an article involves moving an article using the move tab at the top and not copying and pasting. Moving preserves the revision history. (Re: Anderson's rice rat). --Aranae (talk) 22:01, 17 June 2009 (UTC)

Thanks, I was unaware of that. WolfmanSF (talk) 00:04, 18 June 2009 (UTC)

You might also be interested in this: Wikipedia:WikiProject_Council/Proposals/Rodents --Aranae (talk) 02:21, 24 June 2009 (UTC)

WP:Rodents

Hi Wolfman. I have been watching your edits with much appreciation. WP:Rodents is now active. Right now, our numbers are a bit small and about half the participants are interested in rodents as pets. It would be great to have you join, neither Ucucha nor I are editing as frequently as we used to and it wold be nice if folks knew who to go to for expertise. If your knowledge is mostly Neotropical feel free to indicate that. --Aranae (talk) 22:50, 11 July 2009 (UTC)

I'm happy to participate, although I'm not a rodent expert by any stretch of the imagination. I do at least have a background in biology. WolfmanSF (talk) 02:46, 12 July 2009 (UTC)

Thanks

...for your help with the moles and relatives. Chrisrus (talk) 00:11, 4 September 2009 (UTC)

Your sandbox pages

Hi, I don't know if you have your various megafauna subpages pages watchlisted, but if you aren't aware, I'm having a minor edit war there about having categories on them. I'm assuming that the IP with whom I'm having the disagreement is not you, so I'm wondering if you could help me out here, either by talking to the IP or by helping keep the pages free of category tags. The person is using a dynamic IP, so I've left a note on as many pages as possible, but I don't know if s/he will see it. I'm making one last ditch effort to remove the categories, then I'll move on. I only became aware of the categories because the Indonesian IP added Chinook Salmon, which is on my watchlist, to the category Megafauna, and that didn't really seem right to me, so I checked Category:Megafauna and saw the inappropriately placed categories. I don't have much interest in continuing this, but at some point it's likely that other editors will also notice the inappropriately placed category tags and also remove them. Like I told the IP, the lists were userfied for a reason, and I have no opinion on that, but because they are supposed to be in user space, it is inappropriate for them to be listed in mainspace categories. Before I move on, I may try to alert the appropriate WikiProject so that they can give their opinion on the matter. Thanks for your help in this matter and good luck getting the lists back up to standard. Katr67 (talk) 18:09, 30 September 2009 (UTC)

Thanks, I was not aware of the situation. The pages look OK at the moment. I may add a note to them.

I'd like to get to this project eventually, but its not near the top of my priorities, so I don't know when that might happen. WolfmanSF (talk) 01:54, 1 October 2009 (UTC)

Adding the notes to those pages is a great idea. Thanks for helping out! Katr67 (talk) 03:54, 1 October 2009 (UTC)

Did you know you can disable the functionality of a category by placing a colon before the word "Category". Thus instead of [[Category:Foo]] you type [[:Category:Foo]]. You can also disable templates by using tl| before a template name - instead of {{Foo}} you type {{tl|Foo}}. Mjroots (talk) 22:00, 5 October 2009 (UTC)

Thanks. I wish it were as simple to convince everyone that a category tag should be disabled. WolfmanSF (talk) 01:35, 6 October 2009 (UTC)

Mammals

HI, could I tempt you to work through these? Himalayan 20:27, 7 November 2009 (UTC)

I've actually created about 133 articles for missing species already - primarily neotropic missing species, most of which have been removed from the list. The problem is that I've been spending more time on Wikipedia than I ought to, and need to cut back a bit. However, I will definitely keep the list in mind. WolfmanSF (talk) 20:35, 7 November 2009 (UTC)

Agree about lowercase "p" in President of the United States

I've run into the same issue, and think your approach is best, that most of the time, it should be lowercase "p" for presidents. Only when talking about a specific president, like "President Roosevelt", then we should capitalize. Good choice.--Tomwsulcer (talk) 02:33, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Thanks. From my perspective, excessive and inappropriate use of upper case seems to be a widespread problem in Wikipedia. One contributing factor seems to be that some Wikipedians don't realize that they don't need to use an initial capital when linking to an article. Other users don't seem to know the definition of a proper noun. WolfmanSF (talk) 03:46, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

upper vs. lower case in usage of "President"

All of the uses of "President" in question in Grover Cleveland are a part of a specific title -- that of President of the United States. If Cleveland had traveled to Mexico and met with Porfirio Diaz, I would have described it as a "meeting of presidents," since the word there would have been generic. If he had met with ex-President Hayes, I would have called it a "meeting of Presidents," since both held that specific office. This article made it through a rigorous featured article candidacy without anyone objecting to the capitalization, which suggests to me that those editors, meticulous as they were, agreed with me about the MOS. --Coemgenus 12:18, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

"President of the United States" may deserve to be upper case if it is viewed as a "standard or commonly used name of an office" as per the MOS. It is not a title, which is "a prefix or suffix added to a person's name"; in this case that means the word "President" followed immediately by the name of the individual in question. Please refer again to the MOS: "De Gaulle was a French president" is lower case, even though it refers to a specific president of France, while "President De Gaulle" would be upper case. A great many errors commonly make it through featured article candidacies, so I don't think these are as rigorous as they could be. It may be that some editors believe the issue of upper vs. lower case is too trivial to merit much attention. WolfmanSF (talk) 16:55, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

You may be right. It's certainly not worth an edit war, so I'll leave your changes. As to your other comment, I must disagree: there is nothing to trivial for the Featured Article process.  ;) Coemgenus 01:53, 24 November 2009 (UTC)

Megafauna

I like your megafauna lists. Given the vagaries of the definition of the term, though, I think you'll have a hard time convincing the community to keep them in the article space. I wish you luck. Abyssal (talk) 06:21, 24 December 2009 (UTC)

Are you referring to the ones in my name space? I haven't actually worked on those much yet; I just haven't had time. I asked to have them transferred to my name space after they were deleted. I think they can be salvaged, but it will take some effort. Listing the species by mass as is done for marsupials here may be the way to go. I have done a fair amount of editing of the list in Megafauna. Thanks, anyway. WolfmanSF (talk) 06:33, 24 December 2009 (UTC)

Oh, here we are, already a topic..Again, the definition of 'megafauna' is a scientific question just as the definition of species...and here is a good review with a consistent definition of Megafauna, appearing in a recent Science issue: 10.1126/science.1172393Amdurbin (talk) 16:44, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

Actually, that article doesn't offer a definition per se for megafauna, but just argues that the largest animals in insular environments should be considered megafauna because they play the same relative ecosystem function as the largest animals in continental environments...regardless the Megafauna page seems to lack any rigorous discussion of megafauna definitions, so that is another problem here.Amdurbin (talk) 16:59, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

Non-SI density units in Planetbox character template?

Hold it. This is a very bad idea! — Aldaron • T/C 05:00, 25 December 2009 (UTC)

Perhaps I should have waited for more discussion at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Astronomical objects. However, why is using non-SI density units a bigger problem than using units that many readers (as well as editors) can't grasp, and having a lot of values (as I have just found) that are off by a factor of 1000? WolfmanSF (talk) 05:06, 25 December 2009 (UTC)

That's why the correct approach is to add a new parameter with the new units and a name that indicates units (e.g. density_gcm), leaving the old parameter intact. Doing that would tip off editors that they should pay attention to the units when they enter values. The errors you cite happen for the simple reason that the parameter doesn't specify units and editors probably just assume some, without double-checking what gets displayed—not because they're thinking in g cm^-3. — Aldaron • T/C 05:17, 25 December 2009 (UTC)

RJH has already admitted he was thrown off because he was thinking in g cm^-3. I can guarantee you other editors will be also. And that many if not most nonspecialist readers will draw a blank when they see values in kg m^-3. At any rate, is this an issue you're interested in dealing with in the near future? WolfmanSF (talk) 05:27, 25 December 2009 (UTC)

All right, I'll revert the changes and continue discussing this subject for a while, and see where that leads. WolfmanSF (talk) 05:35, 25 December 2009 (UTC)

Thanks. I could be completely wrong, but I'd like to see what others say. Especially others who are big exoplanet contributors or in the field. — Aldaron • T/C 05:46, 25 December 2009 (UTC)

Reverted. Happy holidays. WolfmanSF (talk) 06:09, 25 December 2009 (UTC)

Ceres

I like this dif. Solid collaboration! Hiberniantears (talk) 04:21, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

Glad to hear that. Thanks, WolfmanSF (talk) 05:31, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

Noronha skink

Thanks for the corrections at the Noronha skink article. I thought I had struck the redundant "floating over" part, but as it turns out I didn't. I'm planning on getting the article to WP:FAC soon, with only a bit more work needed on the "Description" section; do you have any suggestions on how the article can be further improved? Ucucha 01:35, 28 January 2010 (UTC)

More and better images would be helpful. There are some nice images at Flickr (http://www.flickr.com/photos/jimsk/124238509/ and http://www.flickr.com/photos/jimsk/790092387/). It might not hurt to contact the photographer, let him know the reason for your interest and ask him if he would be willing to change the copyright to allow uploading into Wikimedia with attribution. Otherwise, the article looks pretty complete to me. It's an interesting story. WolfmanSF (talk) 02:02, 28 January 2010 (UTC)

Thanks. While writing the article, I found more interesting aspects all the time: its diet, its incredible abundance, the weird stuff going on with the helminths. The nomenclature is as messy as it can get (and there is even an additional point of confusion that I haven't covered yet).

You're right about the images; I tend to forget about that with the rodents, which are extremely unlikely to get images. I've written to one of the people who contributed good Flickr images to ask him to release some. Ucucha 02:23, 28 January 2010 (UTC)

FWIW, this guy also has a gallery of images of the island (http://www.flickr.com/photos/jimsk/sets/25895/) WolfmanSF (talk) 03:16, 28 January 2010 (UTC)

Now look again. :) Ucucha 17:42, 28 January 2010 (UTC)

Much improved. Definite FAC material. WolfmanSF (talk) 19:09, 28 January 2010 (UTC)

Aye-aye acoustics

Won't echolocating shrews also fall under that? That would mean there are not "a few" species outside bats and cetaceans either. Ucucha 20:57, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

How many echolocating shrews are there? Perhaps further editing is needed. My original motivation for using the term "type" was to point out that the echolocators fall into just a few groups (even though the number of species is quite large). WolfmanSF (talk) 21:04, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

Basically all, I believe; compare this paper. Tenrecs apparently also echolocate [5]. I think it may be best to leave the specific other groups out and use something like "Aye-ayes use acoustic cues, a rare trait among vertebrates" or something (which the cited source explicitly supports) and throw in a link to animal echolocation. Ucucha 21:09, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

From my perspective, the fact that Malagasy mammals from two different non-flying non-marine groups use echolocation is interesting enough that it would be a shame not to mention it. However, I don't have time to do further editing now. Somehow, we have to avoid using "rare" in a species context where it doesn't make sense (given bat and cetacean diversity).WolfmanSF (talk) 21:19, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

What do you think of this edit? We're in a summary article about lemurs here, so I think details about exactly which other unrelated groups have the same trait are overkill. It's highly relevant to the Aye-aye article, however, as you say. I wouldn't be surprised, though, if other similar groups, like small opossums and dasyuromorphians or sengis would also be found to use echolocation. Ucucha 21:28, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

I think you're right, the list was getting a bit long. It's enough to indicate that it is unique among primates. WolfmanSF (talk) 23:28, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

References

I appreciate your help in working on the Lemur article, but your addition of animals that use self-generated acoustical cues is not supported by the reference I cited. You will either need to find a reference, or the list will have to be deleted. And if you do find a reference, you might want to add the information to the Striped Possum article, where nothing at all is said about this. – VisionHolder « talk » 21:00, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

I actually looked at the reference on Google Books, and it lists precisely these species. Ucucha 21:01, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

I agree that the Striped Possum article needs work, and better references. The reference listed in the Lemur article does not give enough details to be very useful for the Striped Possum article. WolfmanSF (talk) 21:08, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

There is a recent paper in Biological Journal of the Linnean Society 97:7–17 on "mammalian woodpeckers", including Daubentonia, Dactylopsila, and perhaps the extinct marsupial Yalkaparidon—an interesting parallel. It doesn't mention echolocation, though. Ucucha 21:13, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

My apologies. I did not recall that list. Thank you for the correction! – VisionHolder « talk » 21:48, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

Marsh rice rat

See Talk:Marsh rice rat#Sigmodontinae. Ucucha 17:30, 14 April 2010 (UTC)

Replaceable fair use File:Earthen Grave 1.jpg

Thanks for uploading File:Earthen Grave 1.jpg. I noticed the description page specifies that the media is being used under a claim of fair use, but its use in Wikipedia articles fails our first non-free content criterion in that it illustrates a subject for which a freely licensed media could reasonably be found or created that provides substantially the same information. If you believe this media is not replaceable, please:

1. Go to the media description page and edit it to add {{di-replaceable fair use disputed}}, without deleting the original replaceable fair use template.
2. On the image discussion page, write the reason why this image is not replaceable at all.

Alternatively, you can also choose to replace this non-free media by finding freely licensed media of the same subject, requesting that the copyright holder release this (or similar) media under a free license, or by taking a picture of it yourself.

If you have uploaded other non-free media, consider checking that you have specified how these images fully satisfy our non-free content criteria. You can find a list of description pages you have edited by clicking on this link. Note that even if you follow steps 1 and 2 above, non-free media which could be replaced by freely licensed alternatives will be deleted 2 days after this notification (7 days if uploaded before 13 July 2006), per our non-free content policy. If you have any questions please ask them at the Media copyright questions page. Thank you.  fetchcomms☛ 18:52, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

I know you wrote "I was unable to find a suitable free content alternative", but as they appear to still be together, it's still possible to obtain a free image of it.  fetchcomms☛ 18:58, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

You're correct, clearly someone could replace it (although I can't). WolfmanSF (talk) 19:42, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

It appears the image will have to go. The alternative is to obtain a suitable copyright license, which might be possible. WolfmanSF (talk) 21:34, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

Lists of Megafauna

Hi- I think your regional/continental lists of megafauna are excellent and they deserve to be standalone pages and improved by the Wikipedia community. For example, I think any Wikipedia discussion of eg African ecology should link to a list of megafauna, and I am surprised there isn't one (other biomes have faunal lists, etc.). I think this should include all megafauna from Pleistocene to recent. If you are an editor, perhaps you can get the ball rolling by linking from pages such as African ecology and African fauna. Also, as far as definition of megafauna, this recent review in Science makes a good argument for a consistent definition of megafauna: <10.1126/science.1172393>

In the meantime I will add a few to your African list.. Amdurbin (talk) 16:41, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

They aren't really my lists, they just got stashed in my name space when they were deleted from article space. I still think the idea of adding body mass values to as many of the entries on the lists as is practical is a good one. These articles can't be linked from other articles until they are accepted back into article space. WolfmanSF (talk) 23:21, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

MSW3 templates

Awesome job expanding/updating them! :) - UtherSRG (talk) 01:37, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

Thanks. My idea is to have a separate template available for each separately authored section, but that will take a little longer. WolfmanSF (talk) 01:41, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

Equus caballus in South America

Firstly I thank you for your diplomacy--you're the only person I've encountered on Wikipedia who hasn't screamed at me for disagreeing with you. I did believe that this was a mistake, as I frequently find animals on the La Brea Tar Pits page that most certainly do not belong there.

I still find myself doubtful as to the species in question however. I find it difficult to believe that the literal domestic horse, Equus ferus caballus was present in South America and not a related species such as Przewalskii's horse--doppelgangers of which are already known from Alaska. Is there an alternate approach to horse nomenclature at play here? 71.43.182.92 (talk) 16:04, 4 June 2010 (UTC)

(I saw this on my watchlist and was interested by the subject, so I looked around a ltitle.) I think the issue with your interpretation is that the specific name used in the Interchange article for the entire horse species (including domestic horses, Przewalski's, and tarpans) is Equus caballus. This is technically wrong (I believe), but often seen in the literature. That said, apparently Pleistocene American horses had some of the same DNA sequences that are still present in domestic horses. Ucucha 16:16, 4 June 2010 (UTC)

Thanks, I hadn't noticed that the authors' nomenclature was inconsistent with the Wikipedia Equus article. It does appear to be consistent with MSW3, however (where the variations in usage are discussed): http://www.bucknell.edu/msw3/browse.asp?id=14100015 I've adjusted the Great American Interchange article according. WolfmanSF (talk) 17:28, 4 June 2010 (UTC)

Reviewer rights

Hello. Your account has been granted the "reviewer" userright, allowing you to to review other users' edits on certain flagged pages. Pending changes, also known as flagged protection, will be commencing a a two-month trial at approximately 23:00, 2010 June 15 (UTC).

Reviewers can review edits made by users who are not autoconfirmed to articles placed under flagged protection. Flagged protection is applied to only a small number of articles, similarly to how semi-protection is applied but in a more controlled way for the trial.

When reviewing, edits should be accepted if they are not obvious vandalism or BLP violations, and not clearly problematic in light of the reason given for protection (see Wikipedia:Reviewing process). More detailed documentation and guidelines can be found here.

If you do not want this userright, you may ask any administrator to remove it for you at any time. Karanacs (talk) 15:59, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for letting me know. WolfmanSF (talk) 03:48, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

New MSW3 template

Just to let you know, I started a discussion of your new {{MSW3 Primates}} template on WT:PRIMATE. I wanted to make people aware that it exists, and it gives people a chance to address any concerns that might be shared by members of the WikiProject. Overall, it looks like a good reference template. Thanks. – VisionHolder « talk » 14:27, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for letting me know. There are new templates to every separately authored section of MSW3; see documentation for MSW3 templates. WolfmanSF (talk) 15:44, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

Dzungarian Gate

My thanks for your very helpful edits to the article, and I hope you like the picture of Zhang Qian you inspired me to add.μηδείς (talk) 23:37, 17 July 2010 (UTC)

Hi Medeis, thanks for your work in creating this interesting article. I certainly hope my edits were helpful, but it was actually PericlesofAthens (talk | contribs) who mentioned Zhang Qian. WolfmanSF (talk) 00:40, 18 July 2010 (UTC)

Oops! I swear I am going blind. I did notice and appreciate your edits as well, and was surprised to see the above comments when I came here to thank you. LOL. I do have to say I was quite surprised this article didn't already exist when I went to look for it.μηδείς (talk) 00:46, 18 July 2010 (UTC)

AfD nomination of List of battles by casualties

An article that you have been involved in editing, List of battles by casualties, has been listed for deletion. If you are interested in the deletion discussion, please participate by adding your comments at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of battles by casualties. Thank you.

Please contact me if you're unsure why you received this message. Rubikonchik (talk) 11:17, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

Question

Hi Wolfman! I'm french contributor, I have a question for you. I translated the article Deep-sea gigantism in French and I would to know if you have found these few species, in this diff, in a book or you have found from your knowledge? Because I know a scientist french magazine has copied my article gigantisme abyssal, with the same list of species, in the same order. I would be sure no exists a book with the same list! Thanks! Best regards--Citron (talk) 19:21, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

Hi Citron, at this point I can tell you that the contribution was based neither on a book nor my previous knowledge, but on information from the web including Wikipedia. However, it is quite difficult to reconstruct exactly where I obtained the information because the web has changed so much in 2 years. Now, if you search for the list in the same order, you will locate mostly copies and derivations of the Wikipedia article. Hope that helps. WolfmanSF (talk) 21:34, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

If the magazine has used the same list in the same order, very likely they did copy your Wikipedia article. That is commonly done. WolfmanSF (talk) 22:14, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

Hi Wolfman, thank you for the information, I think that they really copy my article, I sent them a letter! Cordialy --Citron (talk) 12:34, 9 August 2010 (UTC)

Redirecting Jupiter Trojan

"Trojan" is a proper noun, like "Londoner" or "Parisian". It should be capitalised in any situation. Serendi^podous 23:49, 14 August 2010 (UTC)

And please never move articles by copy/pasting, this breaks the article history. Ask help or/and discuss at a talk page first. An article with a brown star at the top right corner (i.e. a featured article) has gone through extra scrutiny by at least several editors. Surely, it may contain blunders, but often those might only appear as blunders. A usual habit is to post proposed (if major) changes at its talk page first. Cheers. Materialscientist (talk) 00:05, 15 August 2010 (UTC)

"Trojan", as referring to a resident of Troy, is not actually a proper noun, because it refers to a class of people; proper nouns only refer to things that are unique. It is capitalized because it has the same spelling as the proper adjective, and can be viewed as shorthand for a term involving a proper adjective ("Trojan resident"). Likewise, "Londoner" is not a proper noun, but is capitalized because the word is a derivation of and reference to a proper noun, the name of the city. In the case of a "Trojan" asteroid, as referring to an asteroid named after a participant of the Trojan War, it can be viewed as a proper adjective (although I don't think this the only way it could be viewed). However, as a noun referring to a class of solar system objects that reside near a Lagrangian point of a more massive body, and which are not necessarily named after anything in particular, "trojan" is not a proper noun, any more than "planet" is a proper noun. The capitalization rule for a capitonym should then be applied, making it lower case. WolfmanSF (talk) 02:09, 15 August 2010 (UTC)

Sounds great, but this is still WP:OR. My Oxford dictionary specifically spells out "A Trojan asteroid" in its entry for Trojan. It is really difficult to prove that Trojan is a capitonym as I know no usage of this word which is not (indirectly) linked to Troy. Materialscientist (talk) 02:51, 15 August 2010 (UTC)

Pan wakes

Hi Wolfman. If you can get a hold of this book, which in general is excellent, section 13.2.2 describes the mechanism by which wavy edges and wakes form around the Encke Gap. --BlueMoonlet (t/c) 14:51, 3 September 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for the pointer. I've been looking around for some papers on the subject as well. By the way, the eccentricity of Pan's orbit, while small, appears to be nonzero. This has been modeled by M. Seiss et al. (http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.icarus.2010.06.013) and J. Weiss et al. (http://iopscience.iop.org/1538-3881/138/1/272). WolfmanSF (talk) 16:50, 3 September 2010 (UTC)

Yes, I did misspeak about that. Pan's eccentricity was indistinguishable from zero a few years ago, but now does have a detectable value. The papers you cite show that Pan's eccentricity can have a secondary effect on the shape of the wakes, but it does not cause them. --BlueMoonlet (t/c) 17:26, 3 September 2010 (UTC)

Book is on-line at http://books.google.com/?id=M56CHHxVMP4C&printsec=frontcover; the relevant section begins at page 381. WolfmanSF (talk) 00:09, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

DYK for HD 10180

-- Cirt (talk) 18:03, 4 September 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for letting me know. WolfmanSF (talk) 19:20, 4 September 2010 (UTC)

		The Space Barnstar
		Very nice work on HD 10180!! —hike395 (talk) 03:51, 15 September 2010 (UTC)

Re: Gliese 581 g

Hello, WolfmanSF. You have new messages at Viriditas's talk page.
You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{Talkback}} or {{Tb}} template.

Viriditas (talk) 01:50, 1 October 2010 (UTC)

Gliese 581 system tidal locking

Hi Gabriel, you added a statement to the Gliese 581 g article to the effect that there are planets between Gliese 581 g and the parent star that are not tidally locked, and then in support mentioned the eccentricity of Gliese 581 d, which is outward from Gliese 581 g. You also mentioned that eccentricities that could be up to 0.2, which to my way of thinking means that they might not be tidally locked, not that they are not tidally locked. The content of the Tidal locking article doesn't support the claim. I don't see any support for this idea in the other articles on the Gliese 581 system, either. Do you have any reference(s) or arguments to the effect that planets inward of Gliese 581 g are not tidally locked? Thanks, WolfmanSF (talk) 04:48, 1 October 2010 (UTC)

Did they change it yet again, maybe I didn't mean Gliese 581 d, perhaps it was Gliese 581 c, they keep changing their story, in any case the 0.2 maximum looked like confirmation to me that they still could have some eccentricity and if Gliese 581 c was up there, what was it 0.17 or something like that, that is still under 0.2 and that also doesn't seem likely to be fully tidally locked with such a high eccentricity, 10 times that of the Earth. I only added it back because it seems like a novelty to me, the example of the planet that is tidally locked because of it's size more than it's distance, while the larger close one is not, and that it can happen is unique. That's all.GabrielVelasquez (talk) 04:59, 1 October 2010 (UTC)

By the way don't take it personally that I don't leave anything on my talkpage, I'm just checking in on all the nonsense; my local newscast just today said this new planet was habitable for people and that shit has got to stop. After a balance is struck in this article I will re-retire.GabrielVelasquez (talk) 05:02, 1 October 2010 (UTC)

My impression is we don't know for sure about the inward planets being tidally locked or not, so perhaps we don't need to speculate about that. WolfmanSF (talk) 05:08, 1 October 2010 (UTC)

Ok, remove it, but there is one this you can't argue with me on: Habitability. When I tell you that my local news says this new planet is "habitable for people," what does that make you think?? It tells me that the use of the term habitable in the article has to be qualified with "extremophile forms of life." The associated press, quoted in my local paper, wrote a very good article that did just that qualifying it very well. If we can find that online I think it should be referenced in the article. GabrielVelasquez (talk) 05:15, 1 October 2010 (UTC)

I agree that given our limited knowledge, everything needs to be qualified, including over-enthuasiatic statements by the press and scientists. At the same time, there are reasons to suspect that the greenhouse effect there is stronger than here (due to the greater fraction of Gliese 581's radiation being in the infrared, and the likelihood of a more massive atmosphere), so it is still possible that life there would not be restricted to extremophiles. WolfmanSF (talk) 05:22, 1 October 2010 (UTC)

Get a grip man, Could be stronger and could be zero. It's nonsensical to allow this irresponsible speculation to run wild. If you have to go there include them both. GabrielVelasquez (talk) 05:39, 1 October 2010 (UTC)

"Life on other planets doesn't mean E.T. Even a simple single-cell bacteria or the equivalent of shower mold would shake perceptions about the uniqueness of life on Earth." <- Associated Press. - GabrielVelasquez (talk) 05:50, 1 October 2010 (UTC)

Yes, that story is currently reference #2. WolfmanSF (talk) 05:57, 1 October 2010 (UTC)

Yeah, I was the one who added it between commenting here and you noticing it, 8P - GabrielVelasquez (talk) 06:23, 1 October 2010 (UTC)

Glad you got around to re/reading the Gliese 581 c article and understand comparisons are a good thing. GabrielVelasquez (talk) 09:22, 1 October 2010 (UTC)

I should ask, since now I'm being badgered at Gliese 581 g, was your acceptance of the comparison to Mars (even if only in temperature) a concession or a conversion?? GabrielVelasquez (talk) 08:15, 2 October 2010 (UTC)

As originally written, the comparison to Mars was 4 sentences, and followed the section claiming that the published data was "less optimistic". It seemed to imply that the values for Mars were supporting the case that the habitability of Gliese 581 g was doubtful. That implication was what I objected to the most. Now that the Mars discussion has been condensed to 2 sentences and is being presented as a simple comparison, it's less objectionable from my standpoint. I'm closer to being neutral about it. It might be worth adding another sentence to improve it. WolfmanSF (talk) 09:53, 2 October 2010 (UTC)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gliese_581_g#Temperatures
I know this is more than a sentence, but what do you think? GabrielVelasquez (talk) 00:12, 3 October 2010 (UTC)

I think the table may be useful, but it needs a few edits (see my changes) WolfmanSF (talk) 00:29, 3 October 2010 (UTC)

Thank you. GabrielVelasquez (talk) 00:36, 3 October 2010 (UTC)

Lead section

Although the lead can be improved, I think the changes by several editors have made it more difficult for our readers. It is very important to remember that we are not writing for astro geeks nor for professionals, but for people we assume know nothing about the topic. For this reason a certain amount of redundancy is not only acceptable but encouraged, as a way to take the reader by the hand and immerse them in the subject while also maintaining their interest. As an example, I will show you the last version prior to your most recent edits:

Studies indicate that the planet is located in the habitable zone of its parent star, where the stability of liquid water is important to sustain life. In an environment where it is neither too hot nor too cold, Gliese 581 g is believed to be the first Goldilocks planet found outside the Solar System, and a candidate for the most Earth-like exoplanet with the greatest potential for harboring life found so far.

As a generalist encyclopedia, we first introduce the reader to several ideas, which while redundant to an expert, are stepping stones for an editor who doesn't know the topic. The introductory sentence is an overview, bringing the reader up to date with the latest findings from a new study. A term, HZ, is also given to the reader, with a concise definition attached. Now that the reader knows what we are talking about, we can explain a bit more in the second sentence, and indicate the importance of the finding. Notice also, the importance of linked items represents takeaway subjects: habitable zone, Goldilocks planet, Solar System, and most importantly, Earth-like exoplanet. So, while an expert like yourself might find this annoying, when we write for a general reader, we add redundancy to increase readability, and we carefully link to key topics that can help the reader understand what it is we are talking about. I feel that your latest revision to the lead did not take any of these things into account, and decreased the level of readability a general reader will require. Viriditas (talk) 02:51, 7 October 2010 (UTC)

Actually, I think I've improved the explanation of the "habitable zone" concept. "Habitable zone" does not imply liquid water is stable there, only that it could be. I tried not to remove any useful links. The addition of the mass estimate was needed. Almost any native English-speaker would know that "Goldilocks" implies neither "neither too hot nor too cold". I honestly don't think anything is gained by piling "most Earth-like" on top of "greatest potential for harboring life". In short, I think you may underestimate the readers a bit.

If you think it needs more work, have another go at it, but please don't revert all my edits. Thanks, WolfmanSF (talk) 03:08, 7 October 2010 (UTC)

I strongly disagree, and your linking of terrestrial planet is discouraged per WP:EGG for the same reasons I state above. We write for the general reader, not astro geeks. Lots of problems here, and the linking is neither correct or helpful. The reason that basic key words and topics were linked in the previous version is to help readers who do not know the topic. Those are the people we are writing for, and the lead is tailored in such a way that we draw the reader in slowly and deliberately. Try writing in a way that does this. Your removal of links to these basic concepts and ideas is not helpful. Honestly, I don't know who you are writing for, but we should be careful not to write for ourselves or our peers. I believe the previous version best reflected the secondary sources and the overall subject using simplicity, redundancy, and clarity. We should work from that starting point. Viriditas (talk) 03:19, 7 October 2010 (UTC)

I did not remove a single link. WolfmanSF (talk) 03:25, 7 October 2010 (UTC)

I explained the problem above. Read EGG. Viriditas (talk) 03:30, 7 October 2010 (UTC)

I've changed the piped link and expanded the explanations a bit to try to address your concerns. If it still falls short, you'll have to take over from here. I'm done for the night. WolfmanSF (talk) 03:58, 7 October 2010 (UTC)

The most common, primary terms are still not linked in the lead section, and this is not best practice. If you make a list of the most common terms used in the secondary sources, the reader should find these terms linked in the lead. That's what I did previously, and you removed it. The lead is supposed to standalone as a summary of the topic, and the reader should be able to scan it to get an easy to follow list of keywords that they can explore easily and without effort. It might help if you would review actual, published encyclopedia articles and other tertiary sources covering astronomy, written for the general reader. You'll find that instead of links, they use bolded or italicized index terms. This style might have escaped your attention. Basically, our reader should be able to understand the entire topic from just reading the lead section. Technical analysis and fine detail is welcome in the body, preferably in the "meatier" sections. This is why it helps to have at least two paragraphs in each section, with the first introducing the reader to the topic, and the second, explaining the technical details. Viriditas (talk) 08:09, 7 October 2010 (UTC)

What links are you talking about? I didn't remove any links. If any of the links you added are missing, they must have been removed by some other editor. Please recheck the article history. WolfmanSF (talk) 15:52, 7 October 2010 (UTC)

Lots of stuff was removed. For example, you removed a link to "Earth-like exoplanet", which has great currency in the literature, and you replaced it with "Earth-like Goldilocks planet", which is used approximately zero times. You also replaced "stability of liquid water" which is again, a term with wide currency in the astrobiological literature, with "the presence of liquid water", which does not. There are many other instances of non-standard wording that you have added for reasons I do not understand. I go from the literature, based on the literature, and try not to deviate from it. Viriditas (talk) 09:03, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

"Earth-like exoplanet" was part of the piped link to "Terrestrial planet#Most Earth-like exoplanets" which is still there. "Earth-like" and "Goldilocks planet" are two separate links. As I said before, I did not remove any links. I did change some phrases. "Stability of liquid water" and "presence of liquid water" mean the same thing, and the latter makes more sense in the context where it was used. WolfmanSF (talk) 11:39, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

One more thing, it was Styath who created the "most Earth-like Goldilocks planet" phrase; I'm not happy with that either. I would like to delete the term "Goldilocks planet" from the intro, as I don't think it adds anything, but no doubt others would complain. WolfmanSF (talk) 00:23, 9 October 2010 (UTC)

Edits by Drbogdan

User:Drbogdan has made an effort to discuss his proposed edits on the talk page. Could you join that discussion? He has been very civil and gracious, and I think we can accommodate his edits without deleting them. Thanks. Viriditas (talk) 08:55, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

In my view, the criterion for whether edits should be retained is whether they make a positive contribution to the article. Whether the editor is civil and gracious is really not the issue. WolfmanSF (talk) 10:26, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

No offense, but I think you've entirely missed the point. You reverted Drbogdan and deleted his edits without responding to the civil discussion about his edits on the talk page first. That's not how we do things here. I realize you are more on the content side of things, and I appreciate your expertise. We need more people like you that are on the content side, so for that I thank you. However, at the end of the day, Wikipedia is written by editors, not machines, and we have guidelines and policies to help us best interact with each other in a harmonious and collaborative environment. Reverting and deleting content contributed by an editor who has previously discussed said content in a civil and gracious manner without first responding to that discussion is not helpful. You may be interested in WP:BRD among other things. Viriditas (talk) 10:36, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

Sorry but it never occurred to me to look on the talk page for a discussion for that particular edit. I'm happy to join a discussion whose existence I've been alerted to, but you can't expect editors to check the talk page before every little edit they make. WolfmanSF (talk) 11:11, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

Do you use a watchlist? Recent changes? How do you keep on top of revisions? Viriditas (talk) 12:53, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

I tend not to add heavily edited articles to my watchlist. If I've been active in editing a given article, I do often scan its history. WolfmanSF (talk) 16:33, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

Templates

Hello Wolfman. I removed Mexico and the states from the Central America topic template because of the problems I already explained there. Don't worry I'm not an irrational person and for what I've seen you are not either.

That template is general and used for transclussion, which will lead to give the false idea that those states are always thought as a separate part of North America, which would be officially and unofficially false.

I think the best solution is to create separated templates for specific topics such as in mammals of Central America, in which the characteristics of the region make it very important to define the region in a physiographic way, which I totally understand and of course I'm not in denial of that.

My problem is to avoid to advance the false idea that Mexico is considered part of CA which is wrong and kinda insulting both to Mexicans and Central Americans, not to mention inaccurate. As we know this is not true, and the several sources I've pasted over this years clearly indicate CA as a 7 nations region, which doesn't include MX.

I volunteer to make this templates in the specific articles that might need it. I'll start right away in the Mammals of Central America tempalte. I hope you can see my point. Thanks. Muchas gracias. AlexCovarrubias ^{( Talk? )} 07:16, 18 October 2010 (UTC)

Look, I've successfully created Template:List of mammals in Central America. AlexCovarrubias ^{( Talk? )} 07:43, 18 October 2010 (UTC)

Why not just have 2 templates for Central America, Template:Central America topic and Template:Central America topic2, one that doesn't include the physiographic definition and one that does? That way, the use of the second one doesn't have to be restricted to just mammals. Is that OK? WolfmanSF (talk) 07:49, 18 October 2010 (UTC)

Hi Alex, I tried my plan, and it works in the List of Central American mammals article. You see, when you open the template and click on a country, say Panama, you should link to the list of mammals in Panama. But using your template, the link went to just the country Panama. So, is there any problem with 2 Central America templates? It should be quite easy to use the appropriate one in each circumstance. WolfmanSF (talk) 08:13, 18 October 2010 (UTC)

Ficus aurea

Thanks for shepherding that article through its day on the front page. Guettarda (talk) 02:54, 16 November 2010 (UTC)

GFAJ-1 at ITN

--Kslotte (talk) 12:33, 6 December 2010 (UTC)

Thank you

		The Original Barnstar
		Thank you for your excellent updates and additions to the Elk article! MONGO 02:58, 15 December 2010 (UTC)

You're welcome. WolfmanSF (talk) 10:33, 15 December 2010 (UTC)

Voyager 1

You are welcome to join the discussion here. Materialscientist (talk) 11:16, 15 December 2010 (UTC)

edit req

Please see User talk:WolfmanSF/List of prehistoric megafauna, thx,  Chzz  ►  22:26, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

Barnstar

	The Working Man's Barnstar
	For continually cleaning up and tweaking the lemur articles, I award you this barnstar. I greatly appreciate your help! – VisionHolder « talk » 16:07, 29 December 2010 (UTC)

Thanks. I'm happy to contribute at any level to this impressive set of articles. WolfmanSF (talk) 19:17, 29 December 2010 (UTC)

Thanks. :-) I just wish I had time to clean them all up. I hate having to tell people at the Duke Lemur Center that I can only vouch for the ones with stars on them. – VisionHolder « talk » 19:33, 29 December 2010 (UTC)

Question about MSW3 templates

I have a question about the citation templates you created, such as {{MSW3 Primates}}. Most citation formats I've see abbreviate the author's first name and only give the year of publication, not the full date. Is there a reason why you used the full first name and the full publication date? Part of the reason I ask is because it may come up during a FAC. – VisionHolder « talk » 01:09, 12 January 2011 (UTC)

Hi Visionholder, I believe you are correct as far as traditional printed references are concerned, where there is a stronger incentive to keep things short. In Wikipedia's citation templates page, however, there are a number of examples (starting with the first) in which an author's full first name is used, and also some where a month and year or full date of publication is used instead of or in addition to just the year. I agree the latter is superfluous for books, but since the space consideration is less important online, the main reason for keeping it short then becomes to reduce the amount of effort needed to create the citation. In view of the fairly elaborate templates involved, that did not concern me in this case.

At any rate, feel free to edit the template if you feel strongly enough about it. Regards, WolfmanSF (talk) 02:03, 12 January 2011 (UTC)

Only if it comes to it. Please note that I did add the parameter "ref=harv" to {{MSW3 Primates}} so that the template would generate a citation that works with {{sfn}} and {{harvnb}}. If you want, I'll add it to all of them. – VisionHolder « talk » 02:08, 12 January 2011 (UTC)

That's not a bad idea, so I've done it. WolfmanSF (talk) 03:14, 12 January 2011 (UTC)

List of eruptions

I saw that u r interested on volcanoes n u edited some lists. Timetable of major worldwide volcanic eruptions; List of potentially dangerous volcanic eruptions (now List of Quaternary volcanic eruptions); Large volume volcanic eruptions in the Basin and Range Province are three lists to keep it manageable and List of large volcanic eruptions is their sortable table summary and overview. List of largest volcanic eruptions is the featured list of it. It is assumed that more or less every Quaternary volcano is a dormant volcano...

My interest was awaken 'coz we r in a Pacific ring of fire earthquake cycle. San Andreas fault gets a big one every 101 years by simulation (1906 + 101 = 2007). And there are profecies of a Yellowstone eruption, even ten times Mount Saint Helens (1980) eruption would be a small Yellowstone eruption. --Chris.urs-o (talk) 07:51, 20 February 2011 (UTC)

In the San Francisco Bay area, the Hayward fault is viewed as being more dangerous in the near future than the San Andreas fault. WolfmanSF (talk) 18:36, 20 February 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the copyedit

As always, thanks for the thorough copyedit, this time on the article Evolutionary history of lemurs. Out of curiosity, do you come in a pocket-sized version so that I can pull you out and set you to work once I'm finished writing a full-length article? – VisionHolder « talk » 05:23, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

Only when the article is interesting and well-written. WolfmanSF (talk) 05:26, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Credo_accounts

Are you aware of this? Ruslik_Zero 13:51, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

No, thanks for bringing it to my attention. WolfmanSF (talk) 17:17, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

Eastern Sierra geology edits

WikiThanks

Thank you for the helpful edits on Mono-Inyo Craters and Long Valley Caldera! —hike395 (talk)

You're welcome. It's an interesting subject area (I have hiked the rim of Panum Crater a number of times). WolfmanSF (talk) 18:09, 29 May 2011 (UTC)

If you've never hiked to the center of Panum Crater (or Obsidian Dome), I highly recommend it. It's like Mordor! —hike395 (talk) 19:49, 29 May 2011 (UTC)

Actually, I've been all over Panum Crater, but never to Obsidian Dome. WolfmanSF (talk) 20:43, 29 May 2011 (UTC)

Diprotodon

Thanks for your edits with the Diprotodon article. I am personally in favor of the "early extinction" theory myself, it seems to be more coherent with what we know about global extinction patters of the era.

However, I think the "late extinction" theory deserves to be mentioned as well, as current radiocarbon dating technology is hardly a precise matter, which Roberts, Flannery & CO admitt. Interpreting "late extinction" artefacts as redeposition sounds credible to me, but it is after all simple speculation without any hard evidence to support it. Wether I believe it or not is irrevelant here - the fact is that this is based on speculation and we shouldn not omitt mentioning that and creating a false impression amongst non-professional readers (as Diprotodon may arguably be seen as one of the extinct marsupial topics that will draw more interest from laymen than for example the Lesser Bilby article).

Don't get me wrong, I don't want to ruin the article or force anything here. However until more evidence is collected, both the "late" and "early" extinction theories should be fairly mentioned with tangible arguments for and against each of them. Perhaps the wise thing to do would be to create a subsection called "Date of Extinction"?

I wanted to consult you here first before making any edits and making it seem like another "edit-war" of sorts (which could attract cryptozoologists into the fray) or causing other types of unnecessary editor tensions. Wikipedia should be about content, not inter-editor drama after all.

Last but not least: Phrases like "It is generally accepted" look like weasel words (Its also my fault, as I originally wrote "Commonly accepted" myself). Maybe we should just mention individual authors and scientists who favor the theory to avoid weasel wording?

Anyways, tell me what you think, or we could just simply take this to the "discussion" part of the article.

Wilhelm Klave (talk) 13:22, 14 September 2011 (UTC)

There's nothing wrong with expanding the section on extinction timing and discussing dating a bit more. However, if you want to do so I would suggest relying primarily on recent papers that are available online. What I objected to most in the previous version was giving equal weight to theories based on analysis of the entire data set, and theories based on one or a few anomalous data points.

I also don't think it is wrong to claim something is "generally accepted" if references can be used to back up the claim. Perhaps we need a few more here.

I disagree that the redeposition theory is simple speculation. The theory is based on the fact that the more recent dates are associated with disarticulated skeletal material (p. 1891, Roberts et al.); optical evidence for sediment mixing at sites like Cuddie Springs (p. 1891, Roberts et al.); the old radiocarbon dates (>= 40,000 years) that were actually obtained at Tambar Springs (Flannery p. 201) and considerations of the stratigraphy of some of the younger sites (Flannery p. 202-3). WolfmanSF (talk) 16:51, 14 September 2011 (UTC)

Well, disarticulation could have been caused by a wide variety of reasons - "Ethnographic observations of recent Aboriginal exploitation of macropods and analyses of faunal assemblages in middens show that disarticulation is almost exclusively complete at the end of food preparation" (M.Cupper&J.Duncan 2006). Optical evidence however remains an argument here, though its insufficient to disprove all the archeological sites. Still, this could explain only the Cuddie springs site, but not the Diprotodon remains at Trinkey, (also Lime Springs, but my info on the site is limited). Either way, I do agree with the necessity to stress the fact that the "early extinction" theories are more popular and accepted in modern science (trick is how to avoid weasel words here). I still think removing the "late extinction" theory out of the picture completely is not justified given the lack of decisive evidence and te fact that the theory was not sufficiently falsified (I do hope that the ongoing dating of the 2004 Lancefield Swamp bones will clear some of this up). Either way, I created a "date of extinction" section and I tried hard to give both theories justice with minimum changes to what we already wrote in our previous edits. (mostly avoiding controversy or weasel words). Wilhelm Klave (talk) 20:49, 14 September 2011 (UTC)

"The X family" vs. "the family X"

Hi, I don't like undoing people's edits without more comment. As I've often written things like "the Proteaceae family" I can't agree that it needs to be changed to "the family Proteaceae" as you did recently. While it's quite correct that Latin family names aren't adjectives, modern English allows phrases of the form "the <proper noun> <common noun>", as in "the Smith family", "the Johnson boys" or "the Hoover building", where the proper noun has no adjectival form. "The Xaceae family" falls into this category so far as I can see. Peter coxhead (talk) 10:53, 4 October 2011 (UTC)

An alternative viewpoint is that "Xaceae family" is a compound noun, but in that case I would argue that is an improperly formed example. There is a convention in English to use opposite word orders when referring to a taxon by its informal versus formal Latin name. We say the "animal kingdom" but the "kingdom Animalia", and never the opposite in either case. Similarly, we say the "squirrel family" but the "family Sciuridae", the "human genus" but the "genus Homo", etc. and so on for all other taxonomic levels. In these examples, "animal" and "human" are being used as adjectives, and one could argue that "squirrel" is being used as if it were an adjective. The point is, formal Latin names are generally not used in ways that make them look like adjectives (except perhaps in rare cases where there is no good alternative), and from my perspective violating this norm is a fairly egregious syntactical error. I think the situation is most confusing in the case of families because of conflation of the taxonomic and non-taxonomic uses of the term, and indeed your examples fall into this category. Wikipedia is full of examples of this mistake because a bot called "Polbot" set up stub articles for many of the species, and got the "family x-ceae" and "family x-dae" convention backwards in every case. As articles are expanded beyond stubs, this mistake is usually, but not consistently, being rectified. Unfortunately, Polbot may have contributed to a mistaken impression among many Wikipedians that "x-ceae family" and "x-dae family " are acceptable. WolfmanSF (talk) 16:23, 4 October 2011 (UTC)

You say that "There is a convention in English to use opposite word orders when referring to a taxon by its informal versus formal Latin name." What is your evidence for this? I've run a number of Google searches on different families and every time I find that "X-aceae family" is more common than "family X-aceae". You have to be careful with the latter search, because "common-name family (X-aceae)" shows up if you search for "family X-aceae" since Google ignores the parentheses. So to be fair I added -"common-name family X-aceae" to all the searches I tried. Just as an example a search for "Rosaceae family" -"rose family Rosaceae" yields about 114,000 results; a search for "family Rosaceae" -"rose family Rosaceae" yields less than half that at 47,800 results. I tried a number of Latin family names, all with the same pattern of results. The pattern "X-aceae family" is almost always about twice as common as the reverse order. Peter coxhead (talk) 18:03, 4 October 2011 (UTC)

Whoops, being a plant person, I had only tried plant families. I get different results with animal families. As an example, "Felidae family" -"cat family Felidae" gives 95,7000 results; "family Felidae" -"cat family Felidae" gives 103,000 results. For the animal families I tried, the numbers are about equal, with a slight bias towards the "family X-idae" pattern. Interesting difference! Peter coxhead (talk) 18:15, 4 October 2011 (UTC)

Well, I did some searches a little differently, and got different results. "Rosaceae family" (with the quotes included) gives me 130,000 hits; "family Rosaceae" gives me 641,000. Similarly, "Telopea genus" gives me 715 hits; "genus Telopea" gives me 3750; "Proteales order" gives me 2,300 hits; "order Proteales" gives me 177,000. Among animals, "Canidae family" gives me 152,000 hits; "family Canidae" gives me 401,000; "Homo genus" gives me 78,100 hits; "genus Homo" gives me 341,000; "Carnivora order" gives me 41,300 hits; "order Carnivora" gives me 737,000. All of which tends to support my position. However, at this point I haven't really checked to evaluate the quality of the search results. Also, Google keeps trying to add things to my searches, forcing me to click on an additional link to perform the search as I originally typed it in. At any rate, I think adding the common name to the searches as you did may obscure what is actually going on. WolfmanSF (talk) 21:30, 4 October 2011 (UTC)

One irritating thing about Google is that different users get different results; it seems to depend on the country you are in and also whatever history Google has on you... Anyway, it is essential to add -"rose family Rosaceae" to the search for "family Rosaceae". This is because Google treats "rose family (Rosaceae)" as if it contains the string "family Rosaceae". Similarly all pages with "dog family (Canidae)" come up if you just search for "family Canidae". These results, i.e. ones with the pattern "common name family (Latin name)" don't tell you anything about whether people prefer "Latin name family" or "family Latin name", so without this exclusion, your counts for "family Latin name" are much too large. Just now, seaching for "rose family Rosaceae" gave me 684,000 results, which when I look at the first few, are all "rose family (Rosaceae)".

I don't dispute that the order of the nouns varies by rank. I wouldn't normally write "Homo genus". I do claim that, at least for plant families, the order "Latin name family" is more common than "family Latin name", and that for animal families, it is almost as common (provided you exclude all occurrences in which Latin name is in parentheses immediately after "common name family"). Peter coxhead (talk) 22:12, 4 October 2011 (UTC)

In fact, I can reproduce all your results. But considering that ["rose family Rosaceae"] alone gives more hits than ["family Rosaceae"] alone, at this point I'm not sure how seriously the results of these searches can be taken. WolfmanSF (talk) 01:48, 5 October 2011 (UTC)

The results from Google Scholar make a bit more sense, and also show a stronger trend towards use of "family Latin name". I get 2810 hits for ["family Rosaceae" -"rose family Rosaceae"], 2220 for ["Rosaceae family " -"rose family Rosaceae"], 3250 for ["family Rosaceae"], 439 for ["rose family Rosaceae"] and 2240 for ["Rosaceae family"]. Similarly, I get 1770 hits for ["family Canidae" -"dog family Canidae"], 511 for ["Canidae family " -"dog family Canidae"], 1950 for ["family Canidae"], 189 for ["dog family Canidae"] and 518 for ["Canidae family"]. So, you may be correct that use of "Latin name family" is more common in botanical use than zoological use, but at least at the scholarly level there seems to be a preference for "family Latin name" in both fields.

I still think there is a general convention to use "taxon rank Latin name" in preference to "Latin name taxon rank" for all taxon ranks and that this is followed less consistently at the family level because of conflation of the taxonomic and non-taxonomic meanings of "family". I would expect that the usage of "Latin name taxon rank" to decline in higher quality and more professional prose, as appears to be the case. I regard usage of "Latin name family" as sloppiness. I guess it is a philosophical question as to at what point one should stop resisting "sloppiness" or defining it as such as it becomes increasingly common. WolfmanSF (talk) 02:49, 5 October 2011 (UTC)

Well, we can both agree on being against sloppiness and in favour of standards (which is why I started the discussion with you). The interesting question is what counts as "sloppiness". I'm strongly against sloppy language use which makes meaning less clear, and I spend quite a bit of time copy-editing to correct such sloppiness. I also agree that if there is a clear standard which has been adopted by a WikiProject, then it should be followed; thus I regularly correct italicization errors in writing scientific names. In this case, though, the meaning is quite clear whichever order of nouns is used and there doesn't seem to be a standard which has been adopted by a WikiProject (at least I can't find one). The issue of a standard order could be raised at WT:TOL to see if there is a consensus. If there is, I'll be happy to follow it (I wasn't aware that there is a much stronger preference for your preferred order in zoology). However, unless and until a standard is adopted by WP editors, I think that you shouldn't make such edit changes. Peter coxhead (talk) 08:14, 5 October 2011 (UTC)

I'll take that under advisement, at least concerning botanical articles, at least until I've explored the subject further. Lots of other experienced editors are correcting this situation in zoological articles, and I will likely continue to do that. I hope you don't object to me correcting the "Latin name genus" construction, which I also see occasionally. WolfmanSF (talk) 16:00, 5 October 2011 (UTC)

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