Talk:Laboratory experiments of speciation

A fact from Laboratory experiments of speciation appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page in the Did you know column on 11 April 2018 (check views). The text of the entry was as follows:

Did you know... that fruit flies have been used extensively in laboratory experiments of speciation?

A record of the entry may be seen at Wikipedia:Recent additions/2018/April. The nomination discussion and review may be seen at Template:Did you know nominations/Laboratory experiments of speciation.

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Organization

So, I don't know the best way to make this article up to standards. It seems odd having an article that is mostly table. Then again, it seems relatively frequent. I tried to give it a descent lead paragraph to put it in context. It could probably use more detail and explanation. I did find it odd using the lead to discuss aspects of the table (such as what terms mean or columns indicate), but I was not sure of a better way to do this. Thoughts? Andrew Z. Colvin • Talk 10:11, 10 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Sources citing themselves

In order to say that a study was important to a field, you cannot cite the study. You must find a meta-analysis or review paper that makes the claim. Abductive (reasoning) 03:01, 11 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]

They are listed and explicitly referenced in the text. From the second paragraph: "Six major publications have attempted to compile, review, and analyze the experimental research on speciation: John Ringo, David Wood, Robert Rockwell, and Harold Dowse in 1985;[2] William R. Rice and Ellen E. Hostert in 1993;[3] Ann-Britt Florin and Anders Ödeen in 2002;[4] Mark Kirkpatrick and Virginie Ravigné in 2002;[5] Jerry A. Coyne and H. Allen Orr in 2004;[1] and James D. Fry in 2009.[6] The table summarizes the studies and data." Only the most recent 7 are not, but some of those sources do review eachothers experiments. Andrew Z. Colvin • Talk 08:12, 11 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]

You have made a claim, which I shall call "six major". This is a qualitative assessment of the sources. Fry says Rice and Hostert 1993; Florin and Ödeen 2002; Kirkpatrick and Ravigné 2002; Coyne and Orr 2004. You can't use Fry to cite himself, and where did you get Ringo et al 1985? Right now it looks like the claim that Ringo et al is "major" is cited to Ringo et al. Abductive (reasoning) 03:01, 12 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]

I think you have a misunderstanding. Each of the "six major" sources reference, review, and discuss many of the experiments listed in the table. Ringo et al. 1985 for example reviews the current literature on speciation experiments in his paper while also conducting an experiment of his own. I see no reason to object to Fry 2009, as his chapter in the book Experimental Evolution reviews the most recent literature on speciation experiments. All the experiments (and their papers) listed in the table up to 2009 are reviewed and discussed by the "six major" I listed, hence why they are explicitly referred to. If some textual clarification is needed, that can certainly be done, but removing important data is not in the interest of the article. Andrew Z. Colvin • Talk 19:48, 14 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]