Talk:Pararhabdodon

Koutalisaurus merge

From the text here, it seems Koutalisaurus is considered a dubious genus rather than a synonym of Pararhabdodon. Merging it here therefore goes against long established dinosaur project procedure, where all dubious dinosaur genera have articles. I can't say I feel strongly about this case (saw it because I have every other dinosaur article on my watchlist), but it opens up for anyone to randomly merge any article about a dubious genus into whatever it has at one time been suggested to be a synonym of, which is probably not a good idea. So this should at least be discussed, what should the standards be? Perhaps it should be taken to the dinosaur project talk page. FunkMonk (talk) 07:49, 19 November 2018 (UTC)

The same situation has been put into place at the Irritator article, where Angaturama is covered as part of that article. Angaturama and Koutalisaurus are both genera traditionally considered synonymous with their respective taxon but recently posited as unviable for referral and instead considered invalid taxa. I would've objected to the coexistance of Angaturama with Irrirator in one article early in its expansion, but seeing it put into practice I saw that having the subjects covered together makes far more sense. Almost everything there is to say about Angaturama and its history of study is said in context of its relationship to Irritator, they're intertwined in a manner which makes neither topic whole without the other. So it is with Koutalisaurus, although in this case I'd say the connection is even stronger since there's almost nothing to say about the taxon other than its history with Pararhabdodon. You could cite precedent that they're two taxa and so they should have two articles, but in my opinion this would simply leave you with one topic awkwardly chopped up into two places. Lusotitan (Talk | Contributions) 21:32, 19 November 2018 (UTC)

Irritator has never been considered dubious, though, which is the point; dubious genera are never redirected. Therefore, we should be looking at such articles as precedents. Irritator is an entirely different situation (comparing apples to oranges, so to speak), where it might be a synonym or it might be distinct, depending on authors (though most lean to the former option). It is more similar to situations like Ajancingenia or Megapnosaurus, which do not have anything to do with dubious names either (and which we also need to figure out what to do with, though in a separate discussion). I lean toward merge in in those cases, but again, that's a different issue entirely. FunkMonk (talk) 10:32, 20 November 2018 (UTC)

I wasn't talking about the status Irritator, I was talking about the status of Angaturama, which is the exact same situation - a taxon of questionable validity that can't be referred to the article's genus, but which is never talked about apart from that genus. The merge of the Koutalisaurus, prompted by the way the Irritator article is written, is based on three things: 1) The history of Koutalisaurus is very important to the history of Pararhabdodon 2) Pararhabdodon isonensis is the context for any and all discussion of the Koutalisaurus specimen in the literature; namely whether it is or is not referable to it and 3) there is next to nothing to say about Koutalisaurus beyond its referral or lackthereof to Pararhabdodon (tellingly, Prieto-Márquez et al. (2013) don't even use the name when talking about its indeterminate status, merely the specimen number). Koutalisaurus and Pararhabdodon are two halves of one whole subject, just as with Irritator and Angaturama, and cutting out part of that whole into its own articles would weaken the way we cover both topics. Using the Ajancingenia comparison, that taxon has been discussed as its own entity with no special connection to Heyuannia huangi, it merely happens to share a genus with it in one recent paper. In that example, we have two subjects awkwardly competing for space in one article after a merge made too hastily, and H. yanshini is moor poorly covered because of it. Lusotitan (Talk | Contributions) 20:35, 20 November 2018 (UTC)

Well, the same goes for Angaturama (which is what I should have said) anyway, it has never been considered dubious, only a possible synonym, so replace Irritator with Angaturama in my comment above, and the point is the exact same. So again, these are two different situations; one is what to do with dubious names, the other is what to do with possible synonyms. I can see there is some overlap in this case, but that's not uncommon for dubious names. For example, it is pretty likely that Agathaumas is Triceratops, but I don't think anyone would argue for merging the two. In the end, I think we should just have a guideline for what to do with dubious names on the dinosaur project, instead of discussing individual articles. FunkMonk (talk) 17:22, 21 November 2018 (UTC)

I don't know why you're making this about dubious names. I never said anything about what to do with dubious names, my points were about the specific case of Koutalisaurus. Its case is very comparable to Angaturama in the way the topic relates so heavily to the associated name (Pararhabdodon and Irritator respectively). Agathaumas is completely incomparable, it has history with Triceratops, but most of what there is to say about it isn't about Triceratops and the association of the two topics isn't completely consistent like with the two cases I've mentioned. If you want to argue against my actions, address the points I've made justifying it instead of falling back into the slippery slope of the precedent this sets for other articles on dubious taxa. Lusotitan (Talk | Contributions) 20:02, 21 November 2018 (UTC)

But that's the important thing, what our precedences have been (not Agathaumas in particular, but any dubious genus), and it is always to keep dubious genera as separate articles. The onus is on those arguing against long standing consensus to gain support before overturning it (forgot this discussion for about two years, whoops). FunkMonk (talk) 12:29, 7 July 2020 (UTC)

This is overwhelmingly a non-standard case. They are fundamentally two aspects of the same topic and awkwardly hacking it into two articles would harm both. Lusotitan (Talk | Contributions) 19:36, 7 July 2020 (UTC)

Bu that's a subjective, non-standard interpretation of the case though, which is why it would need wider discussion. FunkMonk (talk) 11:02, 9 July 2020 (UTC)

Well it's been a long ass time and nobody has expressed interest in this question other than yourself. Lusotitan (Talk | Contributions) 12:29, 9 July 2020 (UTC)

I swear that there was more recent discussion of the issue than this prior to the 7 of July, maybe I just misremembered? If there's nothing to say about Koutalisaurus then it's fine as part of this article. Hemiauchenia (talk) 21:06, 9 July 2020 (UTC)

I'd remind that "A split was proposed, not agreed upon" applies equally to the merging, it was never agreed upon before it was done, so should not have been done. Merging a nomen dubium genus has no precedence and should not be done on the whim of a single editor; Koutalisaurus‎ simply is not thought to be Pararhabdodon anymore. As for "the talk page was actually 2:1 in favor of not splitting", the IP, who appears to be Vahe Demirjian, would make that 2:2 so far. FunkMonk (talk) 10:08, 1 August 2020 (UTC)

If Koutalisaurus is a nomen dubium and not thought to be Pararhabdodon anymore, then it should have its own article, same as with other nomina dubia. Angaturama is a possible synonym, but I think it's not a nomen dubium, so that's a different case. JurassicClassic767 (talk | contribs) 17:39, 17 August 2020 (UTC)

If it is to be split (which I retain is redundant), something must be clarified: the section in this article would remain largely unchanged. As mentioned before, Koutalisaurus is an essential part of the history of the genus Pararhabdodon, so the section would need to remain in existence; and very little of it could be cut - the majority of the text is of importance in discussing the relation between the two genera. First paragraph is essential background info and the initial referral; second paragraph covers why it was thought to be distinct from Pararhabdodon (etymology could be cut); third paragraph is about why they were synonymized; and the last paragraph is of the re-separation and ultimate fate of Koutalisaurus. Bar some trimming here and there, everything has to stay. Last time someone split off Koutalisaurus they copied the section from here - this would not be doable in the situation of a split. Instead it would be reverted to its condition before the merge. Even a fully expanded separate article would be practically a reproduction of the section here in different words, but if the consensus is against me I suppose that's what we'll have. Lusotitan (Talk | Contributions) 02:11, 19 August 2020 (UTC)

I don't completely disagree with you; I agree that Koutalisaurus forms an important part of the history of Pararhabdodon, that's why something has to be mentioned about their synonymization in the Pararhabdodon article (perhaps a brief paragraph), but since Koutalisaurus is now thought to be separate (at least that's what I understood), maybe a separate article should be created for it. JurassicClassic767 (talk | contribs) 18:02, 26 August 2020 (UTC)

A paragraph does not suffice; like I said, the current section in essentially its entirety belongs here regardless of the status of Koutalisaurus as its own article. Lusotitan (Talk | Contributions) 20:16, 26 August 2020 (UTC)

The status of Koutalisaurus is what makes it warrant its own article, and yes, it does forms a very important part for the Pararhabdodon article, but like I said (and FunkMonk as well), Koutalisaurus is now considered a nomen dubium instead of a synonym, so it should have its own article. JurassicClassic767 (talk | contribs) 04:58, 29 August 2020 (UTC)

Yes, there should of course still be info about it in this article, but I don't see why it couldn't be summarised. We don't need detailed descriptive and discovery info about it here, since it's not the subject of this article. FunkMonk (talk) 15:13, 30 August 2020 (UTC)

The discovery info mostly talks about the locality confusion, which was a key point in its referral to Pararhabdodon. As for "detail descriptive info" I'm not sure what you mean, there's all of two sentences dedicated to anatomy given it was only diagnosed on one trait. So, for the third time, I posit that very little of the section is liable to be cut down.Lusotitan (Talk | Contributions) 19:01, 30 August 2020 (UTC)

The standard procedure is that we treat any non-synonymous taxon with its own separate article. Since Koutalisaurus is not a synonym of Pararhabdodon at this point, it should get its own article. While a majority of that articles content would likely be related to Pararhabdodon, it still has its own description and discovery that are independent. Keeping it as part of this article creates a compound article that is not based on Pararhabdodon but instead is "lambeosaurs from that one location" (something like I fear is present at Siamosaurus unpublished as it is). IJReid ^{{{T - C - D - R}}} 02:01, 31 August 2020 (UTC)

Yeah, the difference of course being that the spinosaur material has not received a separate name, but if it does, the info should of course be split out from the Siamosaurus article. FunkMonk (talk) 02:07, 31 August 2020 (UTC)

I stopped arguing about the splitting issue several messages ago, so I'm not sure why you guys are still hung up on that. Split it if you want, I won't stop you. I have shifted my attention to how much of the current section can be cut, and I retain that is almost none of it. The etymology, tooth position count, and 2006 classification could be cut, and you might be able to shave off a bit of the third paragraph. That's it. Lusotitan (Talk | Contributions) 02:21, 31 August 2020 (UTC)

FunkMonk, Hemiauchenia, JurassicClassic767, and IJReid, I have finally put this issue to rest and restored the Koutalisaurus article to its state from before I merged it. I have correspondingly cut down the section in this article to only the details of direct relevance to Pararhabdodon. Any cut material would be liable to re-implement in the Koutalisaurus article, but not any of the material still found here. LittleLazyLass (Talk | Contributions) 19:40, 3 November 2020 (UTC)

The Koutalisaurus article looks quite good to me. JurassicClassic767 (talk | contribs) 15:56, 4 November 2020 (UTC)

Yeah, it needs to be updated with the more recent findings that it is not a synonym, and I'm sure more will be published on it, so it'll be a good place to hang new information about it so this article doesn't get more swamped. FunkMonk (talk) 16:32, 4 November 2020 (UTC)

Oh, when I said "good" above, I meant in terms of it being a stub, as well as the overall structure of the article of course. JurassicClassic767 (talk | contribs) 20:29, 4 November 2020 (UTC)