Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Geology/Archive 5

This is an archive of past discussions about Wikipedia:WikiProject Geology. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

Archive 1

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Archive 3

Hot articles section

Hi,

I was intrigued to see a section here for Hot articles. However it is not clear to me why a listing of a few thoudand stubs is named Hot? Ottawahitech (talk) 17:11, 19 June 2016 (UTC) please ping me

Hot Articles shows a small number of articles that have received the most edits in a given time period (in this case, it's configured for the top 10 most edited articles in the last 7 days). It helps alert people to articles that are undergoing significant expansion or which are subject to a recent edit war. It's not clear to me why the request to enable Hot Articles for this project was restricted to stubs. And Hot Article subscription has been pending since September 2015; it seems like it should be active by now. Plantdrew (talk) 17:49, 19 June 2016 (UTC)

@Plantdrew: Thanks for responding. I followed the links and I see that user:Kaldari is the one who operates the BOT that populates wp:Hotlists. I wonder if Kaldari can shed some light? Ottawahitech (talk) 13:20, 21 June 2016 (UTC)please ping me

@Ottawahitech and Plantdrew: The hotarticles subscription is now live. I made it inclusive of all WikiProject Geology articles, not just stubs (as the reason for limiting it to a smaller set is no longer applicable). Kaldari (talk) 14:23, 23 June 2016 (UTC)

@Kaldari: Thank you, that looks much better. Could you tell us where is the best place to post questions/report problems for this service. Thanks in advance, Ottawahitech (talk) 13:49, 24 June 2016 (UTC)please ping me

@Ottawahitech: My talk page is the best place to report problems or post questions. Kaldari (talk) 20:47, 24 June 2016 (UTC)

Looking for feedback on a tool on Visual Editor to add open license text from other sources

Hi all

I'm designing a tool for Visual Editor to make it easy for people to add open license text from other sources, there are a huge number of open license sources compatible with Wikipedia including around 9000 journals. I can see a very large opportunity to easily create a high volume of good quality articles quickly. I have done a small project with open license text from UNESCO as a proof of concept, any thoughts, feedback or endorsements (on the Meta page) would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks

--John Cummings (talk) 14:36, 28 June 2016 (UTC)

Draft:Eric J. Essene

There is a lot of good material available to improve and finish writing an article on Eric Essene. Please contribute if you can. There seem to be a lot of missing geology power hitters on Wikipedia, and I will try to write drafts as I have time. --2600:387:1:809:0:0:0:A3 (talk) 13:54, 7 July 2016 (UTC)

Draft:John T. Andrews (geologist)

Less material available, but, in addition to being a Penrose Medal winner, also a Fellow of the AAAS. Please contribute if you can. --2600:380:B12B:7EE1:FC4D:A2CA:CED4:4BCC (talk) 01:28, 22 July 2016 (UTC)

Category move for discussion

There is a proposal being discussed for moving (or renaming) Category:Science organizations by topic to Category:Organizations by academic discipline. The discussion is here [1] (at CfD). ----Steve Quinn (talk) 03:08, 12 August 2016 (UTC)

Draft:Geology of South Africa

This draft needs expert attention, my knowledge of geology is barely at high school level. On the draft's talk page I am attempting to sort the stratigraphy but I'm quite out of my depth. Roger (Dodger67) (talk) 09:40, 21 August 2016 (UTC)

Looks like a good start - these sort of articles always seem immensly daunting tasks to 'finish', keep it up, just focus on getting all the sections populated and it should be good enough to go live - where others can then improve it without hitting edit conflicts. EdwardLane (talk) 14:47, 24 August 2016 (UTC)

Saganagan Orogeny

Would it be a good idea to move this back into article space? The user hasn't been around for over a year and a half, and it looks like a decent article. — Gorthian (talk) 05:11, 18 August 2016 (UTC)

seems a sensibe idea EdwardLane (talk) 14:48, 24 August 2016 (UTC)

Project tagging, problem and links

For anyone with a substantial amount of categories on their watch list, my edits of recent will have filled your watch list page. I feel comfortable with most edits (no feedback yet either way) but am coming to the point where it would be very useful to get some ideas from here -

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Middle_Ordovician_life

- animals, extinctions, and first appearances -

The question is - continue including it in geology project on talk page and main page links ? Or put into paleontology, or something else?

I am increasingly concerned with the usage of prehistory as a very unhelpful notion for anything to do with geology - anyone else have ideas? JarrahTree 03:28, 28 August 2016 (UTC)

This isn't a very active project, and I'm not technically a "member", but there's an unfortunate history with project tagging. WikiProject Geology (and WikiProject Extinction) existed for a few years before WikiProject Palaeontology was organized. Many fossil organisms were tagged with WikiProject Geology prior to the establishment of the palaeontology project. Geology might have been the best option at that time, but currently palaeontology is more appropriate project for fossil organisms; although a handful of articles on notable index fossils might be appropriate for geology (e.g. foraminifera?). In my opinion, it's better not to include geology project on articles related to "prehistoric" life forms (sorry, I don't have a better idea for avoiding the term "prehistory"). Plantdrew (talk) 04:47, 28 August 2016 (UTC)

I concur with the above people, put those pages into the paleontology project.The more narrow scope project will be more suitable. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 05:26, 28 August 2016 (UTC)

Thanks to both eds for the response, from that I am assuming that when I encounter components of categories and subcategories in the geological sphere that relate to animals, extinctions and first appearances, that the palaeontology project on the talk page and main page is not a controversial 'tag'. Thanks to both eds JarrahTree 05:33, 28 August 2016 (UTC)

Spelling of mineral names

Hi, I have noticed that a few Wikipedia articles about minerals use names with non-english diacritics, like felsőbányaite and fougèrite. These may be the mineral names in other languages, but do not seem to be (and should not be) their names in English.
For example, the second example above seems to be invariably spelled "fougerite" in all English literature.
While articles about persons and place names should try to use the spelling of the name in the original language (when feasible, and when it has not been Anglicized by tradition), there is no reason to extend that show of respect to things that were named after them.
The purpose of giving official names to minerals is not to honor scientists, but to make it easier to refer to the minerals in technical publications. The use of foreign diacritics in names would be contrary to this goal; it would make use of some names rather impractical, or impossible in certain media. Consider that there are literally hundreds of variants of the Latin alphabet with idiosyncratic markings: Polish, Czech, Vietnamese, Turkish, Hungarian, Guarany, ...
So, please rename those articles to use the plain English spelling of the name. --Jorge Stolfi (talk) 03:44, 1 September 2016 (UTC)

Wikipedia uses the mineral names standardized by the International Mineralogical Association. (See {{infobox mineral}} for documentation of that and all the standards used.) According to the IMA list of names, felsőbányaite (page 57) and fougèrite (page 64) are spelled correctly—diacritics and all. — Gorthian (talk) 05:41, 1 September 2016 (UTC)

Well, then take this as a plea to follow common usage in the naming of articles, rather than the IMA.
That is what Wikipedia does in other fields. For example, the article dog is named "dog" rather than "Canis lupus familiaris". And glycerol is named "glycerol", rather than the IUPAC name "propane-1,2,3-triol" -- because the former (or "glycerine") is the universally used name, even in technical articles; while the later is used at most once, parenthetically, just in case some reader on Mars has a different idea of what "glycerol" is.
And, if you have any voice in the IMA, consider this a plea to call them to their senses, and remove the diacritics from those names. All the best, --Jorge Stolfi (talk) 15:36, 1 September 2016 (UTC)

Wiki follows the mos commonly used names and bows to authorities in terms of specific scientific names though, see the vast majority of aniamsl and plants that are not commonly talked about in every day life (eg Langeria and Eorpa)--Kev min § 16:02, 1 September 2016 (UTC)

OK, but you should be aware that the vast majority (if not all) technical articles that mention the mineral use the name without diacritic.
See for example this article by a French chemist who is an expert on the substance. Note that he mentions the IMA approval of the name (in the very title), yet he uses "fougerite" in the English title and text, but "fougèrite" in the French title. (So the omission of the accent is not accidental.) --Jorge Stolfi (talk) 20:52, 1 September 2016 (UTC)

Well, there is a small chance that it is still accidental, I'm capablè of créatïng variõûs diacritics but I can't recall many of the keyboard codes for them, or they are a bit fiddly alt+0253 makes ý but if that diacritic was in the name ýgritte (from game of thrones, and it's not actually there) I'd probably just write Ygritte rather than Ýgritte as I would not want to go and run charmap if I couldn't remember 0221 was the relevant code for a capital Ý, and even if I did the 4 extra keystrokes would probably result in me being too lazy if I had to type it multiple times in a hurry to find it unless the correct pronunciation mattered much, or I was using a keyboard that already had that letter as a standard key. EdwardLane (talk) 07:48, 7 October 2016 (UTC)

Folk Scheme --> Folk classification

Could somebody please make Folk Scheme (currently a redlink, used in at least one article, and I'm guessing possibly in others) redirect to Folk classification?

Thanks. -- 179.210.192.170 (talk) 19:16, 9 October 2016 (UTC)

It doesn't look as if a redirect is really needed. There were two articles that used that phrase: Cementation (geology) and Limestone. I edited the first one so that it links directly to Folk classification. The second one doesn't need a link, because it's in a paragraph that is already linked to the full article name. Also, the title of a redirect should be at least mentioned in the target article and, though "scheme" appears twice on Folk classification, the phrase "Folk scheme" is absent. — Gorthian (talk) 20:44, 9 October 2016 (UTC)

@Gorthian: I think you're setting the bar too high for a redirect. They don't have to be mentioned in the target article (for example, you can have redirects for misspellings). It's a reasonable synonym, and the first few hits in a Google search of "Folk scheme" go to various sites related to this subject. So I created the redirect. RockMagnetist(talk) 04:18, 11 October 2016 (UTC)

@RockMagnetist: Okay, thanks. I've been working on dab pages too long, and things like WP:DABMENTION tend to dominate my thinking. — Gorthian (talk) 04:23, 11 October 2016 (UTC)

Next commons photo challenge: Rocks and Minerals

Please take a look in commons:Commons:Photo challenge/2016 - November - Rocks and Minerals, starting next month. We could need some help to verify the description of picture upload by professional photographer who might make some mistake in the identification, or simply be too generic. Also feel free to join as a participant or to vote at the end of the challenge.--Alexmar983 (talk) 16:12, 28 October 2016 (UTC)

Pre-collisional Himalaya

I was just rated with a C for quality on the article I just made. I was wondering how are the articles rated, and in what way can I improve the page according to the rating system? 11lawpt1 (talk) 11:37, 22 November 2016 (UTC)

Notice to participants at this page about adminship

Many participants here create a lot of content, may have to evaluate whether or not a subject is notable, decide if content complies with BLP policy, and much more. Well, these are just some of the skills considered at Wikipedia:Requests for adminship.

So, please consider taking a look at and watchlisting this page:

Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/Optional RfA candidate poll

You could be very helpful in evaluating potential candidates, and even finding out if you would be a suitable RfA candidate.

Many thanks and best wishes,

Anna Frodesiak (talk) 17:46, 22 November 2016 (UTC)

Shaanxi tiankeng cluster

Shaanxi tiankeng cluster is a new group of karst sinkholes discovered in China in 2016. It comprises forty-nine sinkholes and more than fifty funnels ranging from 50-100 metres in diameter. I can't find the coords. Can anyone help? Many thanks. UNESCO and the International Union of Speleology just went down there to check it out and get toasted on local wine, so it should be findable. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 07:58, 25 November 2016 (UTC)

Wow, that's impressive. One article I found online says it's between 32 and 33 degrees north latitude, and they call the area a "belt". It's also "difficult to access". I have a feeling that the coordinates may be withheld while it's being assessed. Any word on publication dates? — Gorthian (talk) 18:25, 25 November 2016 (UTC)

Well, I found this article in Chinese, 陕西天坑发现飞猫陕西发现罕见"天坑群" 填补世界岩溶地质研究空白, but all it says about location is "distributed in latitude 33 degrees with nearly a total area of 5019 square kilometers." 陕西发现天坑群地质遗迹并发现少见植物和飞猫 says that structually it is in the Yangtze block of the Qinling orogenic belt in the southern part of Hanzhong, Shaanxi Province. It is located in four counties. The first place that article mentions is 禅家岩镇 (Zen rock home town or Family Zen rock town), in Ningqiang County, which the Chinese Wikipedia says is at 32°43′42″N 106°25′37″E / 32.72833°N 106.42694°E. But it indicates that the most structurally developed part of the field is in Sanyuanzhen (三元镇 or Three-dollar town), Zhenba County, and Nanhai Town (南海镇), Nanzheng County. Unfortunately. the Chinese Wikipedia does not have an entry for Nanhai Town, and that is the same name as a town in Hubei. Zhenba County (镇巴县) is listed at 32°32′N 107°53′E / 32.533°N 107.883°E, and 三元镇 is at 32°27′32″N 107°43′14″E / 32.45889°N 107.72056°E. --Bejnar (talk) 06:16, 27 November 2016 (UTC)

Thanks for the input, folks. I am watching, but have nothing to add at this point. Again, thanks. :) Anna Frodesiak (talk) 06:22, 27 November 2016 (UTC)

Reading a little further, the Shaanxi government website article on the find, at 陕西发现世界级地质遗迹天坑群, says that the largest sinkhole is in 三元镇 (Sanyuanzhen) in Zhenba County (coordinates above), with its largest diameter at 520 meters and a maximum depth of 320 meters. See also http://www.zb.gov.cn/ssxw/zbxw/201611/t20161125_373374.html. --Bejnar (talk) 16:41, 27 November 2016 (UTC)

Heads up on student assignments

Not sure if this has been mentioned here already, but there is a relevant course that appears likely to create or expand a number of articles on geologists and paleontologists, and possibly other geology topics: Wikipedia:Wiki Ed/University of Calgary/Introductory Geology (Fall 2016). Feel free to offer advice and support to new and inexperienced editors, and see more info at Wikipedia:Student assignments, especially advice for (established) editors. --Animalparty! (talk) 19:10, 1 November 2016 (UTC)

Another bunch of articles will come out soon from Education Program:University of Hong Kong/Regional Geology (Fall Semester 2016). These are due to become articles on 18 November. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 11:28, 2 November 2016 (UTC)

quite interesting - I just went and left helpful hints on one of the article drafts - nice, if I had more time I'd do that for all of them now. maybe over the next week I might manage that. EdwardLane (talk) 17:13, 4 November 2016 (UTC)

The articles for HKU are now live in article space. I am also nominating them for WP:DYK. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 00:17, 23 November 2016 (UTC)

can someone have a look at the articles mentioned here Education_Program:University_of_Hong_Kong/Regional_Geology_(Fall_Semester_2016) - I've made a couple of minor fixes in Okavango Dyke Swarm but I'm still perplexed that there is a mention of 'grain' rather than 'crystal' - perhaps it the metamorphic/bedrock that is being described here?? - but if it's volcanic, unless it's volcanoclastic I'd have thought the rock would be described as entirely crystaline? Also several of the sentences stand out as being 'unconnected' such as "This allows magma to flow laterally from east to west." which doesn't seem very encyclopedic I think the original author is saying that the entire dyke system has horizontal laminations which allow magma to spread from east (where it arrives from a deeper source) to the west as it cools. But it would be good if someone feeling confident in the underlying geology could fix things. EdwardLane (talk) 15:47, 4 December 2016 (UTC)

Grains or Crystals ?

I spotted a couple of mentions of 'grains' in an igneous article - and I thought that was odd - then I happened to look at the article Mafic where I feel certain it should say crystal not grain - and similarly Phaneritic where it has 'grain size' linked to 'particle size' which has this in the lede "The notion of particle size applies to colloidal particles, particles in ecology, particles present in granular material (whether airborne or not), and particles that form a granular material" - as I understand things igneous rocks are not granular - they are crystalline. But perjaps I've got the wrong end of the correct terminology (I'm confused when I see the following) Aphanite, or aphanitic as an adjective (from the Greek αφανης, "invisible"), is a name given to certain igneous rocks that are so fine-grained that their component mineral crystals are not detectable by the unaided eye (as opposed to phaneritic igneous rocks, where the minerals are visible to the unaided eye). ((surely that should say where the crystal matrix is so fine.... ))

This strikes me as something to fix - anyone able to rubber stamp my going ahead and changing 'grain' to 'crystal' ? or wants to do it themselves? we probably need to look at each igneous rocktype and category.

Or am I just overreacting? (to me this seems crazy error at a basic level - but maybe I'm actually wrong ?! could it be! - ok I do see a couple of articles using the word grain size and then saying crystals from x mm to y mm - but those feel like incidental errors to my fevered mind). I notice limestone mentions travertine being non granular - but travertine itself mentions neither crystal size (nor incorrectly grains). EdwardLane (talk) 16:45, 4 December 2016 (UTC)

Go for it. The particles in igneous rocks are always crystals (well except for fragmental pyroclastics, included grains or fragments along the margins of intrusives, or some cumulate rocks perhaps). The term "grain size" is used (at least informally) in discussing crystal size in igneous and crystalline sedimentary rocks, but should be changed to crystal size in most cases. Probably would apply to most metamorphics as well. Vsmith (talk) 21:10, 4 December 2016 (UTC)

Hold on thar! What we have here is a misunderstanding of what granularity means. Just because things are called grains does not indicate that they are formed by the coalescence of previously free moving particles. It is perfectly correct to call the groundmass of a porphyritic basalt "fine-grained", and in the same way a granite might be termed medium- to coarse-grained. Pyrop e 01:15, 5 December 2016 (UTC)

Oppose as per Pyrope. Coarse-grained and other such terminology describes the granularity of a rock. It would be incorrct, or at least less meaningful, to change it to "coarse-crystalized". --Bejnar (talk) 22:03, 6 December 2016 (UTC)

OK so granularity - fair enough - think therefore that flags up a problem with Phaneritic where it has 'grain size' linked to 'particle size' - and that should instead link to granularity - right ? EdwardLane (talk) 14:20, 7 December 2016 (UTC)

Crystals are the particles that make up the igneous rock, unless it has particles of amorphous material such as volcanic glass. I think you are over-thinking, or have a restrictive sense of the meaning of grains. --Bejnar (talk) 14:27, 7 December 2016 (UTC)

I've accepted that granularity implies the use of the word grains- but I think that still leaves phaneritic needing an edit (but having just accepted my imperfection - I'd like confirmation that this is actually an inconsistency that needs fixing - and it's not just me getting stuck on the same thorn).

So the new question arises from this article Grain size which says "Particle size, also called grain size, refers to the diameter of individual grains of sediment, or the lithified particles in clastic rocks. The term may also be applied to other granular materials. This is different from the crystallite size, which refers to the size of a single crystal inside a particle or grain. A single grain can be composed of several crystals. Granular material can range from very small colloidal particles, through clay, silt, sand, gravel, and cobbles, to boulders." - Now that all seems pretty clearly aimed at clastic rocks. So far so good.

There is another article Particle size which says "Particle size is a notion introduced for comparing dimensions of solid particles (flecks), liquid particles (droplets), or gaseous particles (bubbles). The notion of particle size applies to colloidal particles, particles in ecology, particles present in granular material (whether airborne or not), and particles that form a granular material (see also grain size)." and that links to the grain size article I mentioned - and thus also seems to be in our context about clastic rocks. Still all consistent I think.

this is where I think we get the inconsistency - the Phaneritic article says "Phaneritic[1] is a term usually used to refer to igneous rock crystal or grain size. It means that the size of matrix crystals in the rock is large enough to be distinguished with the unaided eye as opposed to aphanitic grains (which are too small to be seen with the naked eye)." It has [crystal or grain size] piped to particle size - when I think (if I've understood this correctly) it should pipe to granularity which is about coarseness. EdwardLane (talk) 13:16, 8 December 2016 (UTC)

EdwardLane: "Grain" and "crystal" are often interchangeable when talking about rock texture. But that link to particle size was a poor choice. I have edited Phaneritic to try to clarify the concept. See if it makes better sense now. — Gorthian (talk) 19:52, 8 December 2016 (UTC)

Correction: The article is now phanerite. — Gorthian (talk) 20:12, 8 December 2016 (UTC)

One of your project's articles has been selected for improvement!

Hello,
Please note that Tectonics, which is within this project's scope, has been selected as one of Today's articles for improvement. The article was scheduled to appear on Wikipedia's Community portal in the "Today's articles for improvement" section for one week, beginning today. Everyone is encouraged to collaborate to improve the article. Thanks, and happy editing!
_{Delivered by — MusikBot ^talk 00:07, 26 December 2016 (UTC) on behalf of the TAFI team}

Look2See1's editing behavior

Just a heads up, a related discussion to the one we had here a few months back regarding Look2See1's editing has been started at WP:Categories, here, take a look and contribute, since I have noticed that the edits are still happening on occasion.--Kev min § 15:54, 29 December 2016 (UTC)

Andean palaeolakes

I'd like to get some extra opinions at Talk:Lake Tauca#Article structure and organization. The question is whether the sources, which are plentiful, permit an article to be written in the absence of any secondary source summarizing the various papers, or if it would be better to try to write Andean palaeolakes or something similar instead. Thanks. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 12:53, 31 December 2016 (UTC)

Should stratigraphic units be categorized by depositional environment?

It seems odd to me that when I read scientific papers that discuss strata it's often in terms of their depositional environment, but we don't take it into consideration in our category scheme here on Wikipedia. What do you think of categorizing strata based on their depositional environment (eg aeolian deposits, fluvial deposits, deltaic deposits, etc)? Abyssal (talk) 14:47, 2 January 2017 (UTC)

VEI

There is a discussion on Talk:Volcanic Explosivity Index for whether or not the title should be decapitalized. Volcanoguy 16:22, 6 January 2017 (UTC)

Missing topics list

My list of missing topics about geology (and some geography) is updated - Skysmith (talk) 13:43, 8 January 2017 (UTC)

WikiJournal of Science promotion

The WikiJournal of Science is a start-up academic journal which aims to provide a new mechanism for ensuring the accuracy of Wikipedia's scientific content. It is part of a WikiJournal User Group that includes the flagship WikiJournal of Medicine.^[1]^[2]. Like Wiki.J.Med, it intends to bridge the academia-Wikipedia gap by encouraging contributions by non-Wikipedians, and by putting content through peer review before integrating it into Wikipedia.

Since it is just starting out, it is looking for contributors in two main areas:

Editors

See submissions through external academic peer review
Format accepted articles
Promote the journal

Authors

Original articles on topics that don't yet have a Wikipedia page, or only a stub/start
Wikipedia articles that you are willing to see through external peer review (either solo or as in a group, process analagous to GA / FA review)
Image articles, based around an important medical image or summary diagram

If you're interested, please come and discuss the project on the journal's talk page, or the general discussion page for the WikiJournal User group.

^ Shafee, T; Das, D; Masukume, G; Häggström, M (2017). "WikiJournal of Medicine, the first Wikipedia-integrated academic journal". WikiJournal of Medicine. 4. doi:10.15347/wjm/2017.001.
^ "Wikiversity Journal: A new user group". The Signpost. 2016-06-15.

T.Shafee(Evo&Evo)^talk 10:39, 24 January 2017 (UTC)

Need help at Late Devonian extinction

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

Thanks, Leschnei (talk) 13:01, 24 January 2017 (UTC)

The article Geosyncline is confusing and could use revision

The article Geosyncline keeps flipping between [A] detailed and rather technical discussion of this term and [B] assertion that the concept of "geosyncline" is obsolete.

Can the article be edited to clear up this contradiction?

Thanks -- 179.210.201.86 (talk) 16:47, 2 February 2017 (UTC)

Made a stab at clarifying. The concept was developed over the last half of the 19th and first half of the 20th centuries to explain valid observations. The geological observations "explained by" the theory were (and still are) valid -- just that the theory was made obsolete when evidence for lateral motion of crust segments became irrefutable - leading to the acceptance of plate tectonics. Vsmith (talk) 18:35, 2 February 2017 (UTC)

Thanks! -- 179.210.201.86 (talk) 01:13, 4 February 2017 (UTC)

Fonts and significant figures for geological periods in Geological History template

The navbox {{Geological history}} contains beginning and end dates for various geological time spans. We're having a discussion about what font size we should use and how many significant figures in these dates to keep. If you'd like to join the discussion, please feel free to do so at Template talk:Geological history#MOS:ACCESS and small font explanation. —hike395 (talk) 18:06, 4 February 2017 (UTC)

Rocks and minerals portal

Hi all, I'm thinking of creating a portal for the rocks and minerals WikiProject, which is a sub-project of geology. Thoughts? Laurdecl ^talk 07:19, 14 February 2017 (UTC)

Should Arc be capitalized in fault names?

Right now, there are pages at Izu-Bonin-Mariana Arc (Capital A) and Northeastern Japan arc (lower case a), which is proper?Naraht (talk) 15:30, 9 February 2017 (UTC)

The names of volcanic arcs are generally capitalized. Volcanoguy 15:46, 9 February 2017 (UTC)

MOS:CAPS#Science and Mathematics is pretty clear about this. Because volcanic arcs aren't named after Joan d'Arc :-) :-), the arc should be in lower case. —hike395 (talk) 17:10, 9 February 2017 (UTC)

That clearly states proper names of specific places, persons, terms, etc. are in accordance with standard usage. The Izu-Bonin-Mariana and Northeastern Japan arcs are specific features. Volcanoguy 17:17, 9 February 2017 (UTC)

Hike395 by your logic that means Mammoth Mountain should be lower cased because it's not named after Mountain. The names of volcanic arcs are capitalized for the same reason mountain names are capitalized. Volcanoguy 19:23, 9 February 2017 (UTC)

"Mammoth Mountain" is clearly a proper name. Is "Northeastern Japan arc" a generally capitalized proper name? MOS:CAPS tells us that Wikipedia relies on sources to determine what is a proper name; words and phrases that are consistently capitalized in sources are treated as proper names and capitalized in Wikipedia. A quick look at Google Scholar for Northeastern Japan arc and Izu-Bonin-Mariana arc shows that, for journal article titles, the "arc" is lower case. Is there data to support general capitalization of "arc"? —hike395 (talk) 13:12, 10 February 2017 (UTC)

@Hike395: If you want to play like that this also means Cascade Volcanoes should be Cascade volcanoes. This suggests "Cascade volcanoes" is more common than "Cascade Volcanoes". Volcanoguy 23:02, 10 February 2017 (UTC)

@Volcanoguy: Huh. I didn't know that Google Ngrams was case sensitive. Between what you found, and Google Scholar, I would say yes, let's rename Cascade Volcanoes to Cascade volcanoes. It never occurred to me that "Cascade Volcanoes" was a proper noun. —hike395 (talk) 01:27, 11 February 2017 (UTC)

These kinds of names should definitely have a capital "Arc" as the whole thing is a proper noun. Just because part of the name is a proper noun does not preclude the whole being a proper noun. If "Northeastern Japan" was being used as an adjective on "arc" then it would have had a hyphen in it. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 22:21, 10 February 2017 (UTC)

So, MOS:CAPS says that we have to rely on sources to tell us what's a proper noun (and what should be capitalized). Are there some good sources or data that says that volcanic arcs or chains should be capitalized? I'm open to seeing new data (instead of personal preferences of editors). —hike395 (talk) 01:27, 11 February 2017 (UTC)

According to the Collins English Dictionary, a proper noun is a noun that is used to denote a particular person, place or thing. Therefore the rule holds in the following ways:

lake - This is not a particular place, lakes are common, lake is a common noun, not capitalized.
Crater Lake - This is a particular place and so should be capitalized. The fact that "Lake" is used within the place name is not so much a noun as simply the choice of the person who named it.
Kirchhoff stress - Kirchhoff is a person, a proper noun and so is capitalized. "Kirchhoff stress" is a measure and so should not be capitalized, however the "person" component of this measure remains a proper noun, names of people are always capitalized.
nominal stress - This is a measure of force divided by area. This is neither a person, place or thing and so would not be capitalized.
stress - this is neither a person, place or thing. This would not be capitalized unless you turn it into a proper noun by accurately naming your first child "Stress".

Since the Izu-Bonin-Mariana Arc is a particular place/thing, the name should be capitalized. Chains should be capitalized for the same reasons. In fact, this is proof of just that. Volcanoguy 18:00, 11 February 2017 (UTC)

Agree, the two arcs (Izu-Bonin-Mariana Arc and Northeastern Japan Arc) are specific named arcs and the name should be capitalized just like any specific named place or feature. Vsmith (talk) 02:08, 12 February 2017 (UTC)

I could argue that the Izu-Bonin-Mariana arc is 2800 km long, so it isn't a particular single place or thing. The problem with any of these kinds of logical arguments is that there isn't a rational way to settle it (e.g, I could argue that Abraham Lincoln was a collection of cells). The whole point of MOS:CAPS is for us not to logically deduce whether something is a proper name from a definition, but to follow what it says in reliable sources. Let me repeat the sentences from the top of MOS:CAPS:

Wikipedia relies on sources to determine what is a proper name; words and phrases that are consistently capitalized in sources are treated as proper names and capitalized in Wikipedia.

I made a first attempt at finding out whether these arcs are capitalized in reliable sources: they don't seem to be capitalized in journal articles indexed by Google Scholar. Now, maybe there are other reliable sources where they are capitalized. I was hoping that we could find more data about capitalization usage (not personal opinions, nor logical arguments derived from definitions)

If Geology participants want to make an exception to MOS:CAPS for geological features, then I would recommend going to WT:MOSCAPS and bringing it up there. We shouldn't quietly build a local consensus --- that's generally discouraged. —hike395 (talk) 03:53, 12 February 2017 (UTC)

I don't see how the length of something supports your argument. The Rocky Mountains are over 4,800 km long, yet it's name is capitalized because it's a specific mountain range just like the Izu-Bonin-Mariana Arc is a specific volcanic arc. The problem is that there are reliable sources that use both caps and no caps. Just because there are more sources that use no caps does not necessarily mean it's correct. Volcanoguy 21:42, 14 February 2017 (UTC)

I think we've come to the crux of the matter. There is no "right". There is no "wrong". There is no logic to this. This is just a (somewhat arbitrary) style guide of Wikipedia. We can either follow the style guide, or argue with it at WT:MOSCAPS. But I wouldn't ignore it silently.

Note that the style guide says only to capitalize if it is consistently capitalized in reliable sources. Even if there is an even mixture of caps and no caps in reliable sources, Wikipedia defaults to no caps.

I'll leave a note at WT:MOSCAPS to see if style experts want to weigh in. —hike395 (talk) 06:26, 15 February 2017 (UTC)

As one of the sources that Wikipedia relies on: have you considered USGS usage? For press releases they use AP style (more congenial for newspapers, etc.), but for maps and technical reports they use the venerated "Suggestions To Authors" (STA). Under "Capitalization of Geographic Names" it says (7th ed., p.87): "With few exceptions, all words considered part of a proper geographic name are capitalized, including all adjectives, common nouns, and the definite article" (followed by examples). Similarly for (p.90) "Geographic-Geologic Names": "Formal geologic-time and stratigraphic units are considered to have proper names, and the usual rules of capitalization apply." ~ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 20:28, 15 February 2017 (UTC)

That's good, although I noticed that the USGS style guide doesn't explicitly state whether a volcanic arc is a proper geographic name. As a check, I did a Google search restricted just to the USGS, to check whether USGS authors are capitalizing these phrases. Here's what I found:

Izu-Bonin-Mariana Arc @ USGS --- pretty much all lowercase the arc

Northeastern Japan Arc @ USGS --- lower case, although these all look like references, so could be following general technical usage

Cascade Volcanoes @ USGS --- mixture. It isn't clear whether the usage on these pages is the same as the Cascade Volcanoes article.

My conclusion is that the USGS is not systematically capitalizing "arc" at the end of these phrases. —hike395 (talk) 09:49, 16 February 2017 (UTC)

So geologists are not always consistent. (I am shocked!) And you are also failing to distinguish between formal and informal usage (which you would have noticed if you had spent any time with the STA), which suggests that it may not be a Really Big Deal to have consistency. But if you really want to Get It Right, then note that there is an official list of the proper, formal names of geographic features. Off-hand I don't recall just where to find it, but I'm sure that you will be able to find it quite easily. ~ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 21:41, 16 February 2017 (UTC)

Different jurisdictions maintain gazetteers of official place names (e.g. Australia). However, note that these only tend to include features that a lay person could point to and name, such as a mountain range, island chain or volcano. A more abstract concept such as an 'arc' (an interpretive term, not simply descriptive) would not usually be included. This distinction is also widely reflected in the debate above (see the difference between Cascade Volcanoes and Cascadia subduction zone) with proper nouns being associated with simply understood features, and simple nouns for the more technical ones. There are references for official geological names (e.g. Canada's WebLex) but again these tend to be for discrete units, groups and formations. Pyrop e 22:43, 16 February 2017 (UTC)

Yes. For the U.S. see the NGA GEOnet Names Server (GNS) Per the United States Board on Geographic Names: "The GNS database is the official repository of foreign place-name decisions approved by the U.S. Board on Geographic Names." ~ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 00:15, 18 February 2017 (UTC)

It's not that the geologists are inconsistent. For volcanic arcs, they seem to be consistently lower-casing "arc" in journal papers (see scholar link, above). And journal usage is formal, not informal.

I was unable to find Izu-Bonin-Mariana Arc or Northeasten Japan Arc in the GEOnet Names Server, nor in the Canadian WebLex system, even after some amount of messing around.

My challenge to the WikiProject members still stands -- I have found usage data from formal geological papers that supports lower casing these article titles. There have been several suggestions about where else to look for contradictory data, but we've yet to find data or explicit guidelines (as opposed to inferred guidelines) that contradicts the lower-case usage data.

Can we agree on applying MOS:CAPS to volcanic arc articles ending in "arc", and making arc be lower case? —hike395 (talk) 21:44, 18 February 2017 (UTC)

I'm still in support for caps despite whatever the guidelines say - Wikipedia is not a guideline of the English language. It's worthy to note that Bermuda-New England Seamount Arc is a gazetted name approved by the United States Board on Geographic Names for the New England Seamounts as shown here and here. Volcanoguy 14:46, 19 February 2017 (UTC)

I'd be willing to compromise and have Bermuda-New England Seamount Arc be capitalized. There's nothing in the guidelines that say that there needs to be an overriding rule about capitalization of all articles ending in the same word. —hike395 (talk) 17:58, 19 February 2017 (UTC)

Oops, there doesn't seem to be any articles related to Bermuda-New England Seamount Arc. More of a hypothetical compromise :-/

If the local consensus in this WikiProject is for capitalization, then I would beg you to please go to WT:MOSCAPS and carve out some sort of an exception for geological articles. Local consensus that goes against global guidelines is really not healthy for Wikipedia. —hike395 (talk) 18:04, 19 February 2017 (UTC)

This is not the only area where lineal geographical feature are always upcapped, and our MOS style used to handle them with ease. MOS are based on two sources- Fowlers and The Chicago Manual of Style. Up until and including the edit of January 2016, this was clearly stated, and we could see this.

I have written elsewhere:- Going back to Mandrusses last edit Naming_conventions_(capitalization) January 2016 WP:NCCAPS you will see that we take authority from Fowlers 3rd edition. In the paragraph on capitals (p=128) section 2, in my edition, we see quite clearly Parts of recognised geographical names should be capitalised- and examples are given of Addison Walk (In Magdelen College Oxford), Regent Street, London Road (if official name) but the London road (thats leading to London).

Parts of recognised geographical names should be capitalised- is the line that is now missing too. Please go back in the edit history log and see what else needs to be restored. To my mind revert to Fowlers until there is a proven consensus for change. This is not a matter of Local consensus that goes against global guidelines, it is more one of were global guidelines have been changed before scrutiny, and without global consensus.

--ClemRutter (talk) 19:00, 19 February 2017 (UTC)

Hike395: It seems to me that you are not sincerely asking whether "Arc" should be capitalized, that you are pushing a view point. I am particularly annoyed by your recent statements of "not finding ... explicit guidelines" when I gave you an explicit guideline (the USGS STA). And your quibbling that "the USGS style guide" (presumably the STA?) "doesn't explicitly state whether a volcanic arc is a proper geographic name" isn't making any points with me. Perhaps you should consider that consistency in all trivial matters is not a requirement, and perhaps you could find something more useful to work on. ~ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 00:51, 20 February 2017 (UTC)

I am sorry if I am annoying you, J ---- that is certainly not my intent. I did not have an opinion about this at all, until the original poster asked, and I went and read MOS:CAPS. Then I did the searches and came to my (current) conclusion. I would be truly happy to flip the conclusion if I can get some other solid data. I only care about following style guidelines. I don't give a damn one way or the other about capitalization.

After you posted your link about the USGS STA, I went through and read it, looking for guidance. Like other style guides, it says to capitalize proper geographic names. OK, that's great, makes a lot of sense. But i went through it very carefully --- it doesn't talk about whether these volcanic arcs we are talking about have proper geographic names or not (see User:Pyrope's comment, above: it isn't clear). To get a sense of whether volcanic arcs have proper geographic names, I went through and checked USGS writers on the web, and found that they lowercased them. So, there isn't an explicit guideline there (about volcanic arcs), and the implicit one actually goes the other way (i.e., volcanic arcs do not have proper geographic names).

It may not be apparent, but I am spending a lot of time following up on your and other editors' suggestions. It's been a giant time sink, and pretty frustrating for me, because I feel like I'm doing much of the legwork to pursue more data, and then when I come up empty, editors either ignore my results, question my sincerity, or tell me to go away.

Per your (not very friendly) suggestion, I give up: I can't seem to sway the local consensus. —hike395 (talk) 01:36, 20 February 2017 (UTC)

I allow you were not intending to be annoying, and that you have spent some time and effort looking into the topic. But it seemed to me that you had not done much research initially, and when I gave you an explicit guideline you were evidently already leaning to a particular point of view. While you may have been agnostic initially, I would say you were too quick to pick a position, which kind of soured the rest of the input. Okay, no one hurt, possibly a lesson learned (wait until all the results are in before picking the winner?), and we move on. ~ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 01:09, 21 February 2017 (UTC)

Hike395 you stated earlier that geologists seem to be consistantly lower-casing "arc" in journal papers and that journal usage is formal, not informal. I could argue otherwise. For example, the title of this journal article uses Gulf of Alaska seamount province when Gulf of Alaska Seamount Province is in fact a gazetted name as shown in the GEBCO Undersea Feature Names Gazetteer and marineregions.org. This suggests that geologists can be inconsistent in journals and that there is no reason to think they can not do the same with the names of volcanic arcs. You say there doesn't seem to be any articles related to the Bermuda-New England Seamount Arc when in fact there is already an article for it under the name of New England Seamounts. Volcanoguy 09:26, 21 February 2017 (UTC)

In the News:

Wikipedia:In_the_news/Candidates#Oldest_evidence_of_life_on_earth

Currently discussing this topic and expertise would be useful. Harizotoh9 (talk) 03:13, 2 March 2017 (UTC)

Earliest biological evidence for life on Earth:

Would it make sense to create an article specifically dedicated to this subject? As far as I know, no such article exists. Right now, it is covered as a subheading in several other articles. Harizotoh9 (talk) 03:45, 2 March 2017 (UTC)

Split up List of exoplanets

Hello, WikiProject Geology. You have new messages at Talk:List_of_exoplanets#Split_apart.
You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{Talkback}} or {{Tb}} template.

I have asked to split up List of exoplanets into sublists, for the discussion, see talk: List of exoplanets#Split apart As exoplanetology is a field of geology, I thought I'd let you know. -- 70.51.200.162 (talk) 05:42, 3 March 2017 (UTC)

Moved to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:List_of_exoplanets#Split_apart_.5B2017.5D

Geology lede:

The lede is incredibly short, and doesn't really summarize much of the article. It needs to be expanded. --Harizotoh9 (talk) 00:56, 26 February 2017 (UTC)

Ledes should be short. A more pertinent question would be whether it is adequate. but that is a question for the article's talk page. ~ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 22:07, 26 February 2017 (UTC)

Ledes should be about 4 paragraphs. They should both introduce and summarize the article. Geology will never reach FA status with only a few short setences. --Harizotoh9 (talk) 19:13, 27 February 2017 (UTC)

This is a question for the Talk:Geology page. Why are you raising it here? ~ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 22:02, 27 February 2017 (UTC)

Presumably, Wikiproject Geoology should care about the article Geology, considering it is the most important article for the project by far. Harizotoh9 (talk) 22:47, 27 February 2017 (UTC)

Also, remember that a large percentage of people only read the leds. Harizotoh9 (talk) 23:14, 27 February 2017 (UTC)

Wikiproject Geoology cares about all of its articles, but the place to discuss article-specific issues is in the Talk page of the article. If you think there aren't enough watchers there then you can post a notice the issue here. But you start on the article's Talk page. Which you have not done. ~ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 00:34, 5 March 2017 (UTC)

Sabinoso Wilderness

Hey folks. Maybe someone here can help. I've been working on this article and I found a really good report from USGS here. It has what seems to be a pretty in depth analysis of the geology of this location. Unfortunately, it's so in-depth that it looks like it may be beyond my personal ability to summarize it in the article. Any help turning this into a section would be appreciated. Thanks in advance. TimothyJosephWood 17:38, 15 March 2017 (UTC)

I threw something up for you. Enjoy! DanHobley (talk) 22:18, 16 March 2017 (UTC)

WP:CHEMISTRY/WP:CHEMICALS shorcut updated

Note that per this RFC, the shortcuts to WP:CHEMISTRY/WP:CHEMICALS have been updated.

WP:CHEM now refer to WP:CHEMISTRY
WP:CHEMS now refer to WP:CHEMICALS
WP:CHM is deprecated

Old discussions have had their shortcuts updated already. If I have made a mistake during an update, feel free to revert. Headbomb {talk / contribs / physics / books} 16:07, 23 March 2017 (UTC)

New draft, not yet submitted Art Boucot

I started Draft:Arthur_J._Boucot, who doesn't appear to have an article. I am on my mobile, and it's hard to write and source. If anyone is interested, please edit, add citations and wikilinks, and move into main space?

If no one else gets to it, I will be back. Thank you, --2600:387:6:80D:0:0:0:77 (talk) 16:48, 11 April 2017 (UTC)

No need to panic on notability, as I can take care of it, but if other editors are interested, the draft is available, and I encourage editing. --2600:387:6:80D:0:0:0:77 (talk) 17:04, 11 April 2017 (UTC)

New draft submitted for AFC for geologist Ian S. E. Carmichael

Pretty big omission, Ian Carmichael. He has an article on the Danish Wikipedia, and there is a lot of bibliographic info about him online. I just slapped something together. My other draft in AFC has been sitting for 2 weeks, at least, so there's lots of editing time for this one if anyone on the project would like to help get it expanded a lot before it goes live.

Draft:Ian S. E. Carmichael

thanks, --2601:648:8503:4467:E192:CC35:AE20:54DC (talk) 02:35, 26 March 2017 (UTC)

How is this person notable? "Carmichael is the recipient of numerous awards and recognitions" – so? Many geologists have received "numerous awards and recognitions". If that is the most significant thing you can find of the "lot of bibliographic info about him online" then I say he is not notable enough for an article. ~ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 07:47, 27 March 2017 (UTC)

I see no notability problems here, per WP:NACADEMIC. Those awards and FRS are plenty, following points 2 & 3 there. Article looks good as a basic stub. DanHobley (talk) 14:03, 27 March 2017 (UTC)

Does every Fellow of the Royal Society, and even the GSA, get an article? If so, perhaps we should have a list, and then work through the rota. If his point of notability is his FRS, then shouldn't that be mentioned first, with the "numerous awards" (unspecified) follow? If his notability is for his scientific work, then there ought to be some mention of that work and why it is notable and/or significant. If it is for teaching, then I would expect that some of his students are notable enough to warrant mention. As it is, the sense of the article is that he was born, received "numerous awards and recognitions" (for what?), and died. Dull as ... well, I have seen dirt that was more interesting. Even as a stub I think the current draft needs more substance. ~ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 20:15, 27 March 2017 (UTC)

Lol. A gedenkschrift doesn't make him notable? That's funny. --2600:387:6:80D:0:0:0:77 (talk) 16:52, 11 April 2017 (UTC)

You can always nominate it for deletion, if you're concerned about his notability, but it would be snowball closed by the first person who spent 30 seconds on Google. Still, that is always an option. --2600:387:6:80D:0:0:0:77 (talk) 17:06, 11 April 2017 (UTC)

Two new Infoboxes that were missing, discussion requested

Hi fellow geologists and geology lovers. I have created two new and necessary infoboxes recently and added them to new articles written. They are placed under /sandbox for now to be able to improve and edit the infobox template for better browsing and informative value. Some things are too much code for me, so may be solved here by others:

Infobox sedimentary basin - used in new article (and nominated for GA) Cesar-Ranchería Basin and pre-existing article Middle Magdalena Valley
Infobox fault - used in new article Bucaramanga-Santa Marta Fault and added to the scandalously poor San Andreas Fault

Comments and suggestions welcome. Cheers, Tisquesusa (talk) 06:29, 21 June 2017 (UTC)

Simple thing - how do you assign point coordinates to large geographical areas like basins, or probably worse, linear features like faults? There's also perhaps an issue here that these inboxes will get attached to a lot of articles that are otherwise stubs, which will look graphically very odd. Still, for me, better to have some info there than not. DanHobley (talk) 09:19, 21 June 2017 (UTC)

For large features such as basins, the advice is to give coordinates close to the basins centre, but to the nearest degree, emphasising the low precision for such a location. For faults, perhaps best to give two coordinates for either end, although I don't know any fault articles that do that - otherwise chose a location near the middle of the fault, although with enough precision to have the location lie on the fault trace. Mikenorton (talk) 16:02, 21 June 2017 (UTC)

Thanks for the points raised. I think the other geographical infoboxes with possibly an extensive subject as waterbodies/seas, mountain ranges (the Andes...) and valleys also have coordinates and pushpin maps. Indeed I agree with Mikenorton; for basins try to find the centre of the basin or maybe the depocentre. For faults; not every fault is regional and it depends on the map. The centre point may be an option, or a point where the fault outcrops/is active/caused a notable earthquake. I think maps are always useful and visually it is much clearer to plot a point on a map (even if it is just one point) than describing it with words. Also there is the option to include a map image, which can be made using the maps-for-free webpage I used for the Cesar-Ranchería Basin. And there is always the option to just not use the map.

And DanHobley, yes I think (even) stubs should have infoboxes. That is also the case for so many other topics (the villages in Iran and Poland come to mind...). Especially for stubs it is useful to have the most basic information concised and presented in a familiar way with an infobox. And also there, the author/editor can decide not to include information, but for those who want also that option exists.

The infoboxes have been moved out of /sandbox by another user, I don't know why, no edit summaries given. Tisquesusa (talk) 16:11, 21 June 2017 (UTC)

Basins I think makes good sense for the coordinates - approx depocentre would be ideal, if available. Faults: seems like it would be nice to have (optional) categories for coords of the ends as well as the rough centre point. The important thing will be to annotate the infobox entry notes to emphasise these, to avoid future confusion. (I'll do this now.) I'm fine with having big infoboxes on stubs, but IIRC some people have objected to this kind of thing in the past, so thought I'd raise it. DanHobley (talk) 08:22, 22 June 2017 (UTC)

Deep Carbon Observatory looking to sponsor a Wikipedia Visiting Scholar

Of possible interest to WikiProject members:

The Deep Carbon Observatory (DCO) is looking to sponsor a Wikipedia Visiting Scholar.

DCO is an initiative involving about 1,000 chemists, physicists, geologists, and biologists collaborating to study various aspects of carbon deep within Earth. The project's Engagement Team, which is based at the University of Rhode Island (URI), would like to facilitate improving Wikipedia's coverage of topics related to deep carbon by providing an experienced Wikipedian with access to 9,000 deep carbon-related publications as well as full remote access to the URI library's online resources (databases, ebooks, etc.). The Visiting Scholar will also receive a $3,000 honorarium and, if convenient, will be invited to URI for a visit (expenses paid).

The Visiting Scholars program connects Wikipedians with educational institutions based on shared interest in a topic. Any editor in good standing is welcome to apply. Professional experience is not a requirement. For more information, see the Deep Carbon Observatory Visiting Scholars page. If you have questions, you can ping me here or leave a message on my talk page. --Ryan (Wiki Ed) (talk) 18:53, 24 June 2017 (UTC)

Updated. --Ryan (Wiki Ed) (talk) 20:05, 30 July 2017 (UTC)

Category:70th millennium BC has been nominated for discussion

Category:70th millennium BC has been nominated for possible deletion. A discussion is taking place to see if it abides with the categorization guidelines. If you would like to participate in the discussion, you are invited to add your comments at the category's entry on the categories for discussion page. Marcocapelle (talk) 06:05, 1 August 2017 (UTC)

Mars Tectonics

Interesting article, virtually all by one author and parts read like an essay. Doug Weller talk 10:50, 16 July 2017 (UTC)

I took a look at this on 17/7/17. Should be much better style-wise now. DanHobley (talk) 16:41, 1 August 2017 (UTC)

Wiki Science Photo Competition 2017

FYI Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Science#World_Science_Photo_Competition_2017--Alexmar983 (talk) 08:55, 6 August 2017 (UTC)

Commons Photo challenge of August 2017 is "caves, mines and sinkholes"

Please take a look here if there is some picture you'd like to reuse. Or if you have something more scientifically interesting to upload. You just min a banstar.--Alexmar983 (talk) 08:57, 6 August 2017 (UTC)

Cutans

Would anyone be able have a look at Cutans and Clay cutan: these two articles seem to be covering really similar ground. – Uanfala 22:41, 12 August 2017 (UTC)

Geologist needed to review Zirconian

Nothing alarming about this article, however I was concerned that this might be a novel or alternative name for a concept in geology. --Salimfadhley (talk) 21:49, 14 August 2017 (UTC)

American Geophysical Union, Fall Meeting cleanup

Please see WT:JCW#Invalid cleanup. This concerns the usage of |journal= in |cite journal=. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 16:19, 18 August 2017 (UTC)

merge discussion at Baltic amber

There is a merge proposal that could benefit from additional eyes at Baltic amber--Kev min § 17:29, 25 August 2017 (UTC)

ISO 4 redirects help!

{{Infobox journal}} now features ISO 4 redirect detection to help with the creation and maintenance of these redirects, and will populate Category:Articles with missing ISO 4 abbreviation redirects. ISO 4 redirects help readers find journal articles based on their official ISO abbreviations (e.g. J. Phys. A → Journal of Physics A), and also help with compilations like WP:JCW and WP:JCW/TAR. The category is populated by the |abbreviation= parameter of {{Infobox journal}}. If you're interested in creating missing ISO 4 redirects:

Load up an article from the category (or only check for e.g. Geology journals).
One or more maintenance templates should be at the top of page, with links to create the relevant redirects and verify the abbreviations.
VERIFY THAT THE ABBREVIATION IN |abbreviation= IS CORRECT FIRST

There are links in the maintenance templates to facilitate this. See full detailed instructions at Category:Articles with missing ISO 4 abbreviation redirects.
|abbreviation= should contain dotted, title cased versions of the abbreviations (e.g. J. Phys., not J Phys or J. phys.). Also verify that the dots are appropriate.
If you cannot determine the correct abbreviation, or aren't sure, leave a message at WT:JOURNALS and someone will help you.

Use the link in the maintenance template to create the redirects and automatically tag them with {{R from ISO 4}}.
WP:NULL/WP:PURGE the original article to remove the maintenance templates.

Thanks. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 13:41, 31 August 2017 (UTC)

Draft:Geology of South Africa

Development of this draft has stalled quite some time ago. The stratigraphy needs to be sorted and described, please see the talk page where an attempt to do some sorting was started. The section on mining is also far from satisfactory given its historical significance. Please help. Roger (Dodger67) (talk) 17:07, 11 August 2017 (UTC)

Anyone, please? Roger (Dodger67) (talk) 08:00, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

I think this is a lot of work. And we are doing other things! However the article is ready enough to enter article space. So you are welcome to move it and mark it as start class. You will attract more editors when it is live. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 11:58, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

Thanks Graeme Bartlett, I've released Geology of South Africa into the wild, hope it doesn't get too badly mauled. Roger (Dodger67) (talk) 16:36, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

Scientific images from WSC2017

Please take a look in here about newly uploaded scientific images on commons during Wiki Science Competitions 2017.--Alexmar983 (talk) 12:09, 17 November 2017 (UTC)

Bankfull discharge

Hi all,

I've just noticed that at present bankfull discharge is a redirect to flood. This doesn't seem right to me, especially when you consider the Flood page does use the word bankfull once. This also seems like to important a topic to be left without a WP page at all. This could do with attention by someone with more time on hand than I do... DanHobley (talk) 16:58, 23 November 2017 (UTC)

Navbox input needed

@Abyssal: has created this navbox and started to add it to pages. I dont really think its something that should be a navbox, but should be incorporated into an article on the Stratigraphy of Colorado if such an article existed. Also its incorrect to have it named Chronostratigraphy, since the navbox does not at all give absolute dates to the formations/units, and does not order then beyond general grouping. Given that navboxes are being used less and less frequently, are not even shown on the mobile version of a page, and are being shown to very rarely actually be used, I think it should be shifted to userspace for now. Thoughts? (Tagged discussion to WP:Paleo and WP:Colorado as well) --Kev min § 19:15, 29 November 2017 (UTC)

I'd really appreciate it if we could delay this discussion until the ongoing renovations are completed. Abyssal (talk) 19:28, 29 November 2017 (UTC)

What will the renovations do that change the situation as outlined?--Kev min § 21:03, 29 November 2017 (UTC)

Disambiguation links on pages tagged by this wikiproject

Wikipedia has many thousands of wikilinks which point to disambiguation pages. It would be useful to readers if these links directed them to the specific pages of interest, rather than making them search through a list. Members of WikiProject Disambiguation have been working on this and the total number is now below 20,000 for the first time. Some of these links require specialist knowledge of the topics concerned and therefore it would be great if you could help in your area of expertise.

A list of the relevant links on pages which fall within the remit of this wikiproject can be found at http://69.142.160.183/~dispenser/cgi-bin/topic_points.py?banner=WikiProject_Geology

Please take a few minutes to help make these more useful to our readers.— Rod ^talk 15:48, 3 December 2017 (UTC)

Vsmith took care of all but one uranium mine location, and even that I suspect the dab is splitting two articles that should be one Žirovski Vrh. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 07:49, 4 December 2017 (UTC)

Help

I am new to geology articles. Please help me to categorize Haflong Thrust and Dauki fault, and to add appropriate banners with appropriate ratings. Aditya^{(talk • contribs)} 13:53, 24 November 2017 (UTC)

Thanks for creating these articles. I have added and changed some categories. GeoWriter (talk) 22:00, 24 November 2017 (UTC)

Thank you. Were the articles any good? Aditya^{(talk • contribs)} 05:46, 25 November 2017 (UTC)

They were rated start and C and did not get deleted. So certainly measurably above the minimum standard for inclusion. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 07:58, 4 December 2017 (UTC)

Oxygen fugacity

Although there is no article on Oxygen fugacity, and we could do with one, how should we style the symbol fO2? Alternatives: f_O2 f_O2 fO₂ fO₂ $f$ O₂ I have also seen it with a tall stretched italic f with a curly bottom. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 07:56, 4 December 2017 (UTC)

Graeme Bartlett, I am not sure if there is any correct annotation but i have seen fO₂ in some publications and its looks fine. Also keep in mind that the usage of the symbol should be consistent across Wikipedia (same symbol everywhere) and consistent with other symbols that appear on the same pages. Lappspira (talk) 09:55, 15 December 2017 (UTC)

Check Scotlandite?

Hi. I'm a new page reviewer and just reviewed and approved the article on Scotlandite. I made a modest edit to the introductory paragraph coz the article creator first mentioned its discovery rather than what sort of mineral? it was. I know nothing of geology so thought it best to ask for someone from the Geology project to give it a check over. Thanks very much Triptropic (talk) 20:39, 16 December 2017 (UTC)

Igneous rock classification

Question: Is it meaningful to have a category for igneous rocks names that are recomended by the IUGS Subcommission on the Systematics of Igneous Rocks? These is a plethora of igneous rock names, some of which have reduced usage or are rather obscure (liparite, felsite, oceanite) or simply obsolete (tholeiite). Among hundred of names the IUGS Subcommission on the Systematics of Igneous Rocks has selected the terms that are recommended. So is the category Category:Rock names recomended by the IUGS Subcommission on the Systematics of Igneous Rocks of any worth? Lappspira (talk) 09:55, 15 December 2017 (UTC)

I don't think a category would be worthwhile. As noone would search by that classification. Though if you write about that subcommission all the detais could be there. However a mention in the article about their recommendations over the years, the names merged/split would be useful. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 22:02, 16 December 2017 (UTC)

Article request - sector collapse

I was copy-editing Lascar (volcano) and came across sector collapse, currently a red link. The phrase appears in about 25 articles. It looks like a fruitful topic for a stub, at least. I know very little about geology, so I am not qualified to create it. – Jonesey95 (talk) 01:55, 10 November 2017 (UTC)

It sounds like "sector collapse" refers to a major landslide. Volcanoguy 02:24, 10 November 2017 (UTC)

Sounds like there's subtlety to it, skimming the literature. Looks like it's a major cone-scale landslide that takes the crater/mountain top with it and cuts down into the plumbing, contrasting with a flank collapse or slope failure. See, e.g., this paper. Would be good to throw up a stub on this, but I won't have time for at least a week. DanHobley (talk) 08:43, 14 November 2017 (UTC)

I was thinking of writing an article on this - not just a stub - next year, but it will take time (there is lots of stuff to write about sector collapses even using just online sources). Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk, contributions) 12:16, 20 December 2017 (UTC)

Crystal Cavern

I've just rewritten Crystal Cavern. Would someone mind reviewing/editing as needed particularly with an eye to its geology (I've left quoted text in a couple of the references). Thanks, ^~Hydronium^~Hydroxide^~(Talk)~ 12:18, 2 January 2018 (UTC)

Proposal to convert eon, era, and epoch boxes to navboxes

There are a number of pseudo-navboxes used as footers for geological eons, eras, and epochs. I would propose converting these to become true navboxes, using the {{navbox}} template and format. You can see the current boxes and my proposed navboxes at User:Hike395/geonav. I propose altering following templates:

{{Hadean Footer (without comment)}}
{{Paleozoic Footer}}
{{Mesozoic Footer}} (currently at TfD due to no mainspace usage)
{{Triassic Footer}}
{{Jurassic Footer}}
{{Cretaceous Footer}}
{{Paleogene Footer}}
{{Neogene Footer}}
{{Quaternary Footer}}

I have two main reasons for performing this conversion:

Consistency --- The vast majority of navboxes in Wikipedia use {{navbox}}. The current templates look inconsistent next to standard navbox footers. They are not full-width and do not autocollapse. The current templates are also quite inconsistent on mobile WP. In mobile, the navboxes disappear (to reduce clutter and bandwidth), but the current templates do not.
Accessibility ---- Navboxes is designed for accessibility. Page readers should correctly read when they see a list in a navbox group. This cannot be guaranteed for the arbitrary table code currently being used for these template. Also, per WP:NAV, navboxes should not be arbitrarily colored. Color-blind readers will have difficulty with the current highly-colored templates. As a compromise, I kept the title and group colors of the existing templates. I'm also fine with defaulting back to the standard navbox blue, if other editors think that is better.

What do other editors think? —hike395 (talk) 04:10, 1 January 2018 (UTC)

Comments

My first suggestion is, to be blunt, delete all, as footers are not useful at all except to a very small subset of regular users and the once in a while random click.--Kev min § 08:38, 1 January 2018 (UTC)

Well, based on WP:BIDIRECTIONAL, these footers are probably placed on far too many pages. I can see doing a cleanup which would substantially reduce the number of transclusions. —hike395 (talk) 05:09, 2 January 2018 (UTC)

I like the idea of switching to the navbox template but prefer the older template's horizontal layout and use of color. Abyssal (talk) 12:55, 1 January 2018 (UTC)

Could you provide some examples here of the existing and proposed cases? ~ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 21:15, 1 January 2018 (UTC)

An example is:

Current

Proposed

All other examples are available at User:Hike395/geonav. —hike395 (talk) 00:11, 2 January 2018 (UTC)

I am inclined to favor the proposal. As to the colors: that is a separate issue, independent of which style of box is used. If we are going to discuss the colors that should be a separate section; any results there can be applied (or not) regardless of the decision here. ~ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 00:46, 3 January 2018 (UTC)

From the perspective of functionality and consistency, it makes sense to adopt the standard {{navbox}} format. --RexxS (talk) 15:18, 3 January 2018 (UTC)

@Kevmin, Abyssal, J. Johnson, RexxS, and Redrose64: We've almost reached complete consensus on the new design. The last remaining issue is that Abyssal prefers having time run horizontally, in columns left to right; while my proposed design has time running vertically, in rows top to bottom. At User:Hike395/geonav, I made "Alternative 2a" for the time-in-rows design, and "Alternative 2b" for the time-in-columns design. I mildly prefer Alternative 2b, because it's a more compact design, but it's a little non-standard. What do other editors think? —hike395 (talk) 08:12, 5 January 2018 (UTC)

* 2b [I'm switching to undecided.] Alternative 2a bothers me a bit because the "Triassic Period" bar goes across the page, but the upper/middle/lower divisions go down. Having them go across better expresses that they are subdivisions of the whole. Also, 2a leaves a large empty area, crowding the information over to the left. Another consideration is how well this scheme could handle sub-sub-divisions. 2a might be a little better for that, but 2b seems to handle that well enough. Although looking at the example above ("Neogene Period") makes wonder if we should look at a more extended example just to make sure it will look okay.

Either way: nice work. ~ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 22:00, 5 January 2018 (UTC)

OK, doesn't sound like there's a strong preference one way or another. I'll use 2b. We can always switch later. —hike395 (talk) 12:46, 7 January 2018 (UTC)

Just seen this. 2b is better than 2a but mainly because the "layers" in 2a are upside down: most recent strata should be above the older strata. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 14:56, 7 January 2018 (UTC)

Good point. I can go back to 2a with time going down-to-up (like strata), if other editors prefer that. —hike395 (talk) 16:21, 7 January 2018 (UTC)

Colors

The colour scheme is not arbitrary, but is what would be used to signal that period on a map. So the colours make it more accessible. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 21:54, 1 January 2018 (UTC)

The proposal keeps the color scheme of the current tables. Looking at it again, though --- I'm pretty sure that the Hadean, Triassic, and Jurassic colors violate WP:COLOR. The link text on all these of those is low contrast (esp. Triassic) --- people with poor vision are going to have problems reading the text. I'll try experimenting with a different design. —hike395 (talk) 00:11, 2 January 2018 (UTC)

Background colors don't matter that much since text color can always be changed to appropriately contrast with them. Abyssal (talk) 03:40, 3 January 2018 (UTC)

Sadly, I don't think that's true. See Help:Link color --- there are seven possible colors for links in Wikipedia, and the colors depend on your history. There's no way (that I know of) to write wikicode to adapt all seven of these cases, because there is no way to adapt the colors to your history. Please correct me if I'm wrong. —hike395 (talk) 04:58, 3 January 2018 (UTC)

Later --- it's even worse than I thought. I tested black, link text, and visited link text against all of these period colors, using a modern web-based color tester. I placed the results here. The only three colors that are accessible with default link text are Paleozoic, Neogene, and Quaternary. All others are too low-contrast. We're going to have to do something else than a flood fill of the period color. Any ideas? —hike395 (talk) 05:48, 3 January 2018 (UTC)

A new alternative --- I just thought of a compromise. See "Alternative 1" for all of the footers in User:Hike395/geonav. We can take a completely standard Wikipedia navbox and wrap it with a 3-pixel-wide border that indicates the geological time span. What do other editors think? This has several nice properties: it is compatible with all of the color guidelines and standard layout of {{navbox}}. It also retains the color hint to indicate the time span. —hike395 (talk) 06:16, 3 January 2018 (UTC)

The border idea has at least two precedents. Top and bottom borders may be seen in the various navboxes that are used for clergy - see for example Justin Welby#External links and click the "[show]" link to the right of "Justin Welby navigational boxes" - here, the background colour is white, ideal when it comes to link colour contrast. Side borders (albeit very thick ones) are used in the navboxes for the various London Underground lines, and may be seen at King's Cross St. Pancras tube station#External links - again, click the "[show]" link to the right of "London Underground lines serving King's Cross St. Pancras" - here, the background colour is the default for navboxes. Both techniques allow links to take up their "natural" colours. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 11:35, 3 January 2018 (UTC)

I simply can't read {{Hadean Footer (without comment)}} and {{Triassic Footer}} or their proposed altered versions at User:Hike395/geonav. Several of the others will fail W3C standards for contrast or colour difference, so from an accessibility perspective, using the existing set of background colours is a non-starter. The alternative of using a colour-keyed border is attractive, functional and accessible. I'd have no hesitation in supporting that. --RexxS (talk) 15:24, 3 January 2018 (UTC)

Maybe we should just keep the hue values of the official colors and adjust their lightness to meet the templates' practical needs. Abyssal (talk) 19:54, 3 January 2018 (UTC)

I've drafted an example of what I mean. Abyssal (talk) 20:39, 3 January 2018 (UTC)

if you check on Snook, you'll find that the darkest background colour with the same hue as Hadean (#CB0381) that meets WCAG fully with a link as foreground is something like #FFE1F7. The background colour you suggest (#F1C0DF) has insufficient colour difference. --RexxS (talk) 22:10, 3 January 2018 (UTC)

Tweaked the Hadean one to comply. I've been struggling to get the Triassic one to look right, but what do you think of these conceptually? Abyssal (talk) 22:58, 3 January 2018 (UTC)

@RexxS: Do we have to use W3C standards or would WCAG 2.0 AAA compliant be good enough? Abyssal (talk) 01:47, 4 January 2018 (UTC)

@Abyssal: the problem with using the very light version of the period colors is that they are no longer recognizable as the official period colors. In the words of WP:NAVBOXCOLOR, those colors are not "identifying" any more. The WP:NAVBOXCOLOR guideline thus directs us to use the default colors for the template (as in Alternative 1). —hike395 (talk) 02:25, 4 January 2018 (UTC)

@Hike395: The WCAG 2 AAA compliant boxes look identifiable as different shades of the official ICS colors to me while complying with a major accesibility and contrast standard. The colors I tried based on that snook web page, don't though. Contrasts of 9.67+ are simply too high for the colors to remain recognizable. Abyssal (talk) 02:39, 4 January 2018 (UTC)

@Abyssal: WCAG AAA compliance ought to be the minimum standard we should meet, and that only requires the contrast contrast ratio to be 7 or more. However, if we fail to meet the older colour difference standard of 500, then it's likely there will still be a range of visually impairment that we're not catering for. Some of this will subjectively depend on each viewer's monitor setting, of course, so the extra complication is that you and I may see different colours as recognisable or not. My personal view is that I don't see a good reason not to meet the earlier standard as well, so I always recommend Snook for the evaluation. --RexxS (talk) 03:05, 4 January 2018 (UTC)

@RexxS:Honestly I think we may be at the point where attempting to increase the contrast further would prove more detrimental to the vast majority of typically-sighted readers than than beneficial for visually-impaired readers. I experimented quite a bit trying to find fully W3C-compliant background colors and found it nearly impossible to fully comply with almost any nontrivial amount of background coloration. I suspect that a significant portion of users who cannot read text with less than a 9.67+ contrast will be utilizing assistive reading software that makes contrast less relevant anyway. The bright-side, though, is that the proposed WCAG AAA compliant templates are still significantly more accessible to readers across a wider range of visual impairment than the old ones were so they still represent a net gain in accessibility. Abyssal (talk) 03:50, 4 January 2018 (UTC)

Use just the border for recognition. It's guaranteed accessible for everybody. --RexxS (talk) 04:10, 4 January 2018 (UTC)

Honestly I think only doing the border looks really ugly. On a semi-related note, I ran my proposed navbox sandbox through this color blindness simulator and they looked pretty good across all the different conditions. Abyssal (talk) 04:15, 4 January 2018 (UTC)

@Abyssal and RexxS: OK, we don't have to do colored borders. How about colored boxes at either end of the title, as in King's Cross St. Pancras tube station (open "London Underground lines serving King's Cross St. Pancras" at the bottom), per Redrose64? That looks attractive and professional to me, and still uses the exact colors from the ICF. What do you think of that style? —hike395 (talk) 06:42, 4 January 2018 (UTC)

While I still think that using the official colors as borders and as backgrounds lightened until they meet the WCAG AAA standards is the most aesthetically pleasing approach and actually exceeds Wikipedia's official accessibility standards ("Ensure the contrast of the text with its background reaches at least Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.0's AA level, and AAA level when feasible"), I prefer the rail-style color blocks to using the ICS colors only as a border mixed with an otherwise default navbox color scheme. Abyssal (talk) 14:58, 4 January 2018 (UTC)

The coloured shapes in the London Underground navboxes aren't boxes. They're borders, at left and right only, drawn 2.7em thick; this is what it could look line:

Or using top and bottom borders like the churchy ones, but without the white background:

Of course, you can make them thicker or thinner if you like. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 15:35, 4 January 2018 (UTC)

It sounds like we have a consensus: a design with title color boxes that we can all at least tolerate. I updated User:Hike395/geonav to reflect the consensus. See "Alternative 2" examples on that page. —hike395 (talk) 08:06, 5 January 2018 (UTC)

Geology time navboxes in categories (again)

I just wanted to check with the Geology community: do we want geological time navigation boxes in our category tree? For an example, see the navboxes at Category:Cenozoic birds. I see that these boxes were added back in 2015 by Look2See1, who is now banned for disruptive editing.

These boxes are causing a fair amount of extra work. Back in 2015, Abyssal had to modify {{Phanerozoic eon nav}} to get rid of nonsensical links that would never turn blue (see, e.g., {{Jurassic on nav}}, because birds evolved in the Jurassic). I'm now starting to update these category-navboxes use the latest consensus design, but it's a pain.

Before I pour more work into these category-navboxes, I wanted to make sure that we think we need them. If we think they have low or no value (per Kevmin's comments, above), I can run a big AWB job and delete all of them out of Category space. We can keep the footers in Article space.

What do people think? I'm inclined to get rid of all of geology time navboxes in Category space. —hike395 (talk) 20:33, 7 January 2018 (UTC)

As noted above, I feel these add to the maintenance workload of the projects, only get updated when something wrong happens rather than when new data is published, and are never really used by anyone other then maybe the creators of the navboxes. I really do think they should be deleted en mass from Wiki.--Kev min § 21:08, 7 January 2018 (UTC)

What Kevmin said; the navboxes pose a maintenance burden, and they don't get maintained. Readers can find the same information elsewhere on Wikipedia, and I don't think many are finding it from navboxes in categories. Certainly remove the navboxes from Category space. Plantdrew (talk) 01:50, 8 January 2018 (UTC)

The category navboxes don't pose a maintenance burden, since generally the only reason they would have to be maintained is if there were fundamental change to the geologic timescale itself. I support keeping them. Chronological categories are almost useless without some kind of navigational template, and not just in the geological context. It's been standard for categories related to dates and time to have similar templates long before I applied that principle to the geologic time categories. Abyssal (talk) 06:46, 8 January 2018 (UTC)

As far as I can tell, it wasn't the navboxes themselves that required maintenance, but it was Look2See1 who was placing them on thousands of categories and articles, of which some moderate fraction were not appropriate or sensible. Now that Look2See1 is banned, maybe we can do a one-time cleanup. On the other hand, Look2See1 could come back later, or there could be some other editors who use these navboxes inappropriately. There are a number of strategies we can pursue:

Remove all time navboxes from categories, delete the navboxes themselves (i.e., they are not a good idea)
Remove all time navboxes from categories, keep the navboxes, restart adding them (i.e., reset current mess)
Comb through existing categories, remove navboxes that are not WP:BIDIRECTIONAL or otherwise sensible
Leave all time navboxes currently in categories, simply work on formatting

I have a mild preference for (2), but any of these are OK with me. I don't want to do (3) myself, because I don't think it's worth the effort. What do you think? —hike395 (talk) 11:02, 8 January 2018 (UTC)

Number 2 is fine with me. Look2see1's shenanigans annoyed and created a lot of work for me as well. Abyssal (talk) 15:55, 8 January 2018 (UTC)

I prefer 1 but I can live with 2 if that's consensus.--Kev min § 16:58, 9 January 2018 (UTC)

I'm starting to use AWB to go through all categories that transclude {{Phanerozoic eon nav}} and strip out other navboxes and any odd formatting that I find. I'm attempting to restore the state of these categories before Look2See1 started his/her mass edits. It won't be perfect, though: Look2See1 added {{Phanerozoic eon nav}} to many categories, often violating WP:BIDIRECTIONAL. I'm fixing such problems when I see them, but I probably won't find all such problems.

I could be more aggressive and delete more instances of {{Phanerozoic eon nav}} (a true hard reset on navboxes, per 2), but I am trying to avoid undoing the work that Abyssal put into the categories. —hike395 (talk) 10:39, 10 January 2018 (UTC)

Most of the argument here is about maintenance. I will not comment on that since I have seldom or never been engaged in that maintenance. I can however tell I never use these navboxes. Navboxes are supposed to be an aid to navigate, but categories are in some sense also that so it amounts to an aid within another aid. In my opinion there are some navboxes that are justified in categories (like those small navboxes that helps one to jump between annual categories). This seems not to be the case. Less is more keep categories simple and free from clutter that add little value. Lappspira (talk) 16:46, 12 January 2018 (UTC)

They're literally the same concept, though, in terms of allowing readers to navigate between units of time. Abyssal (talk) 16:54, 12 January 2018 (UTC)

Option 1 - get rid of them. Category navboxes are redundant and simply make clutter. Admittedly, {{Phanerozoic eon nav}} is well designed, but still ... If you are in Paleozoic Norway, all the links in the Paleozoic tab duplicate the subcategories just below the navbox. True, it makes it slightly easier to get to Triassic Norway, if you ever happen to be on this category page wanting to do that. But that's probably not that common; and if this sort of thing catches on, next thing you know there will be a {{Paleozoic era nav}} and a {{Cambrian period nav}}, and maybe a {{Geological time period navs}} to link between all these templates. And if you think that is far-fetched, have a look at {{Medicine navs}} and what it is linking. It's hard enough for @Hike395 to clean up the mess here (and kudos to hike395 for taking that on), but when you get to the point that the medicine navboxes have reached, it is simply too big a mess to fix. The truth is, even in articles very few navboxes are useful. For all but the most closely related articles, people are more likely to use the search box to find something. RockMagnetist(talk) 19:18, 12 January 2018 (UTC)

Uh oh. The weight of consensus seems to be shifting towards removing the navboxes from categories entirely. I will pause cleanup until we can resolve.

@Abyssal: it doesn't seem like you've yet convinced other editors to keep the navboxes. Are there new data or new arguments that you have? How about other editors who have created these categories (like JarrahTree)? —hike395 (talk) 00:57, 13 January 2018 (UTC)

I was thinking of getting rid of all navboxes on categories which are intersections of geological time + geography (e.g., Category:Paleozoic Norway, as discussed by RockMagnetist). —hike395 (talk) 01:00, 13 January 2018 (UTC)

Working on it --- all of these navboxes seemed to be placed by Look2See1, so have no current supporting editors.

Possible compromise --- several editors seem to dislike the navbox itself, because of clutter. How about if we make a template that generates two "see also" links from a category, one to the sister category before and the other to the sister category afterwards? Thus, Category:Mesozoic animals would link to Category:Paleozoic animals and Category:Cenozoic animals. Similarly, Category:Jurassic plants would link to Category:Triassic plants and Category:Cretaceous plants. This addresses the problem raised by RockMagnetist of the navbox being partially redundant to the category itself. The see also links would only go to sister categories at the same level of geological historical hierarchy. What do editors think? Abyssal, would you find this an acceptable substitute for the navboxes? —hike395 (talk) 04:29, 16 January 2018 (UTC)

I got a see also category pair generator working at {{Geological category see also}}. No parameters are required: it's automagic! See it live at Category:Jurassic animals. What do you think: shall we use this instead of navboxes in category space? —hike395 (talk) 08:05, 16 January 2018 (UTC)

@Hike395: That's pretty nifty! It's elegant and unobtrusive. RockMagnetist(talk) 05:37, 17 January 2018 (UTC)

Definitely an improvement in my opinion. It could perhaps be even better (more streamlined/elegant/tidy) if it was "inboxed" like Template:Death year category header. Lappspira (talk) 09:04, 18 January 2018 (UTC)

@Lappspira and RockMagnetist: I tried out Lappspira's idea at Template:Geological category see also/testcases (the sandbox version), but I definitely prefer the unboxed version, because it looks more like a hatnote (which it is, really).

Oh, and note that I adopted {{Cat pair}} as the underlying template, because it says "preceding" and "suceeding" categories. I thought that was helpful for our non-geologist readers. —hike395 (talk) 09:36, 18 January 2018 (UTC)

Both good decisions, in my opinion. RockMagnetist(talk) 16:33, 18 January 2018 (UTC)

Azomite - added article to project - potential COI, mostly primary souced

I've almost sent this article to AfD each time I've come across it. It's been tagged as having some serious issues and these tags have remained in place for a lengthy period. I'm not sure if this article is useful to this project but please take a look and advise. Thanks. Edaham (talk) 05:06, 15 January 2018 (UTC)

I'm having a hard time getting worked up about this, though you're probably right that it gently violates WP:COI in that it reads like someone associated with the company wrote this. The tenor is pretty neutral though, and frankly, there's no proof of it; it could just about plausibly be a very interested gardener. Those references look kind of OK to me - some are borderline primary/secondary, but a good effort has been made to get non-primary stuff. i.e., it's not the company website, it's interviews and books. A brief google indicates that this product, while proprietary, is indeed in widespread use and of general interest to gardeners, so I'd say it's notable. Just about. See, e.g., http://www.underwoodgardens.com/mineral-restoration-of-your-garden-soil/.

Beyond that, it looks like a number of editors have been fairly aggressively challenging the primary author over time, and I'd say this has improved the article, despite that discussion getting pretty bad tempered. I guess what I'm saying is that while I bet the original version of this article was very promotion-y, the current version is only mildly so, and the thing is headed in the right direction. Reducing that history section would help a lot. DanHobley (talk) 10:07, 16 January 2018 (UTC)

The article says "Azomite ... is the registered trademark for a complex silica ore". So first of all, what policies bear on coverage of registered trademarks? Second, is this particular ore scientifically notable, or notably different from any other silica ore in regards of geology or geochemistry? Or is the supposed notability only in one company's branding of their particular supply?

I note that Google Scholar reports "about 228" hits. Some of those are definitely promotional, but nearly all are about its use a soil amendment. In that regard I see the connection to geology being very slight. It is more akin to Miracle-Gro, which is categorized under "Horticulture and gardening". So let's push it over there. Unless we really want to address the issue of a company promoting their branding. ~ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 23:40, 16 January 2018 (UTC)

This question has also been raised by this editor at WT:WikiProject Agriculture. Further to my comment over there, I do have concern about the neutrality and accuracy of this article, the whole thrust of which seems to be to establish it as a worthwhile and beneficial product. Yesterday I removed some WP:SYNTH [2], as well as a ref that supposedly supported a statement about "scientific analysis", but actually went to a deadlink of the Azomite company website[3]. Reading the article doesn't inspire confidence. It states in the lead that the silica ore that comprises azomite contains "an elevated ratio of trace minerals unique to the Utah mineral deposit", but later it states only that they are "rare in the United States, and even in the world". I'm also puzzled by the article's mention of the founder of Azomite seeking to develop a gypsum mine "as a means for neutralizing alkaline farmland", and slightly concerned that the article mentions "minute quantities of naturally occurring contaminants", but doesn't mention what they are. PaleCloudedWhite (talk) 00:55, 17 January 2018 (UTC)

Do we have a sense, one way or the other, on whether Azomite should be retained or deleted? ~ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 20:47, 26 January 2018 (UTC)

Delete as pure promo. Vsmith (talk) 21:12, 26 January 2018 (UTC)

Note: it's gone to AfD. ~ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 21:24, 27 January 2018 (UTC)

Geology and Wikidata

Hi, we’ve found on Wikidata stuffs on the Wikiverse stuffs related to mining that might be relevant for this project. Please feel free to join the discussion on d:Wikidata:Project_chat#Index mineral about how to organize in Wikidata informations on mines and minerals. TomT0m (talk) 12:54, 2 February 2018 (UTC)

Looking for opinions: does Italy dance that fast?

(If you know of a better place to ask Geo-questions please copy this question there)

I was looking at a recent DYK article Zanclean flood when I wondered how Italy could be so misplaced. Please see my complaint at Italy and Sicily doing a dance? It just looks like the whole of Italy was twisted and made near North-South. Shenme (talk) 04:45, 9 February 2018 (UTC)

I replied at Talk:Zanclean_flood#Italy_and_Sicily_doing_a_dance? - the Neogene was a dynamic time in the western Mediterranean. Mikenorton (talk) 11:13, 9 February 2018 (UTC)

Geology of Malta and Maqluba_(Malta)

Hello! I would really appreciate the help of some seasoned geologists with Geology of Malta and Maqluba_(Malta). I am a linguist and so have been helping the Wikipedia project by translating articles for WikiProject Malta from French into English - however, I am not a geologist by any stretch of the imagination so would really appreciate a second pair of eyes on these articles to check that everything within them sounds correct, and of course would welcome any expansion upon the material already there to make these articles the best they can be. Thank you in advance for any and all help that you can offer! Beckettnoti (talk) 09:46, 22 February 2018 (UTC)

I'll take a look at the Geology of Malta article - I found an excellent map (that I may use to draw a more simplified version for use in the article) and a full description of the stratigraphy and faulting here. Mikenorton (talk) 10:51, 22 February 2018 (UTC)

Mikenorton you're amazing, thank you! Beckettnoti (talk) 14:33, 22 February 2018 (UTC)

I have also completed a translation from https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Risque_sismique_%C3%A0_Malte of Seismic risk in Malta for anyone who is interested in the topic. Beckettnoti (talk) 14:33, 22 February 2018 (UTC)

Off-topic but this translation series has got me very excited about geology, which isn't really an area I've looked at before :) Beckettnoti (talk) 14:51, 22 February 2018 (UTC)

does this Featured Article have enough geological information?

The article, currently under review, is Mount Tambora. We would appreciate gaining a sense of how complete it is (relative to available information) in fundamental geology. Thanks, Outriggr (talk) 03:18, 25 March 2018 (UTC)

It is so small that it must be very incomplete. A topic this importance should have a lot more content. It should probably be delisted from FA. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 07:48, 25 March 2018 (UTC)

Archean needs attention from expert

The Archean article needs attention from an expert: there are multiple unsupported claims about early plate tectonics and continents. I'm hoping someone who is familiar with the literature can fix. Thanks! —hike395 (talk) 18:40, 15 April 2018 (UTC)

Dubious "volcano"

See Talk:Turfan_volcano#Dubious. Tisquesusa (talk) 09:16, 15 May 2018 (UTC)

WikiProject collaboration notice from the Portals WikiProject

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

Portals are being redesigned.

The new design features are being applied to existing portals.

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

The discussion about this can be found here.

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

Background

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

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

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

So far, 84 editors have joined.

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

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

Thank you. — The Transhumanist 10:57, 31 May 2018 (UTC)

Era

I have added Era (geology) to Wikipedia:WikiProject Geology/Tasks as it has no references. See also the discussion on the article talk page. DuncanHill (talk) 18:17, 2 August 2018 (UTC)

Added some citations and responded there. Mikenorton (talk) 21:22, 2 August 2018 (UTC)

Infobox rockunit colours

There is a lot of inconsistency in the way editors set the "period" parameter in the rockunit infobox. I take it at face value to mean the Geological period and have added it or changed the existing to that. The only impact that changing it to the relevant stage has is to change the colour used in the infobox. Am I being unnecessarily picky here? Mikenorton (talk) 10:45, 9 July 2018 (UTC)

The change to use stages for coloration started a couple of years ago with edits from both User:Abyssal and User:Tisquesusa. I personally use the stage rather than period as the gradual colour change gives a better sense of the progression of Geological time to the reader as they click underlies/overlies rather than sharp colour jumps at the end of each period. For something like a Geologic group I would usually set the colour to something like Early Cretaceous rather than a stage. The main issue with the colouration is units that go across major boundaries, particularly the many formations and groups that span the K/Pg boundary, where often picking a period is pretty arbitrary. In that instance I would usually pick which one had the longest span of time in either period, or which period is more notable for fossil content.Hemiauchenia (talk) 11:11, 9 July 2018 (UTC)

@Mikenorton: I use the term "period" as a general reference in the English language for a time span, not the restricted "period" defined in chronostratigraphy. Where possible, I have included the most precise datings as range, as in many case it says "Late Cretaceous", which doesn't say much, as it spans 33 Ma. Paleocene is more precise than Paleogene, but ideally where possible I use Danian-Thanetian. In the cases where a detailed dating is absent, I use the most complete range. Indeed the colors are important as that is what we use in geology and it gets much easier to recognize certain epochs. Tisquesusa (talk) 18:24, 2 August 2018 (UTC)

I can see the point of being more specific when you can, but I think that we need to name that field as something other than "period" - perhaps "chronostratigraphic interval", although that's a bit long. Mikenorton (talk) 21:21, 2 August 2018 (UTC)

I think simply "interval" would suffice. Hemiauchenia (talk) 21:31, 2 August 2018 (UTC)

Yes, that's probably enough - particularly if an explanatory comment is added. Mikenorton (talk) 21:45, 2 August 2018 (UTC)

I am ok with either wording, but "interval" even more than "period" refers to a range in time. For the |age parameter that is already set and used, the |period parameter only allows for 1 value, as it defines the color of the infobox. |period_color might be an informational option? Tisquesusa (talk) 21:59, 2 August 2018 (UTC)

I've been asked to comment, perhaps (I don't quite remember) as I set up the automatic colouration in the template back end. My intention then was for "period" to be used in its lowercase sense, i.e. "interval", rather than in the "longer than an Epoch, shorter than an Era" technical sense, so renaming the parameter to "interval" would seem sensible – it is in line with current usage of the parameter, and less prone to ambiguity. Martin (Smith609 – Talk) 09:39, 3 August 2018 (UTC)

Craters

Posting here on behalf of User talk:70.58.250.151 (I have not looked into this at all): "Vredefort Crater article list diameters on itself and Sudbury Crater different than the information in List of impact craters on Earth. Sudbury article has same error for the Vredefort Crater. [email redacted]" Chris857 (talk) 01:20, 8 August 2018 (UTC)

Carboniferous: Mentions ancient coriolis effect and strong winds, but this info not in source cited

Can project members please take a look at our article about the ancient Carboniferous period?

It contains the statement:

The thicker atmosphere and stronger coriolis effect due to Earth's faster rotation (a day lasted for 22.4 hours in early Carboniferous) created significantly stronger winds than today.

The cite given for this is https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/earth-rotation-summer-solstice/ , however I don't see said information given in this source.

Can we please provide correct information and good cites for this article?

Thanks - 189.122.52.73 (talk) 01:36, 23 August 2018 (UTC)

Gilsonite

Right now, uintahite, asphaltum, and asphaltite all redirect to Gilsonite, a trademarked brand name. That article uses the name Gilsonite to refer to bitumen deposits across the globe, and even on other planets. Is this appropriate? It seems like a strange exercise in branding to me. -165.234.252.11 (talk) 18:51, 21 August 2018 (UTC)

Thanks for reporting this. I have yet not formed my opinion on the appropriateness of the currect version of Wikipedia's article on gilsonite. Until I have more time, I'll restrict myself to a few preliminary observations:

Gilsonite is listed in the trademark database of the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) at http://tmsearch.uspto.gov and it appears to be a current brand name for asphalt-related material(s). Gilsonite has also entered the English language as a synonym for uintahite, which is a variety of asphaltite (solid asphalt) and gilsonite is listed as a synonynm in numerous dictionaries. The term "gilsonite" is used in this synonymous way in academic journal articles. Much of the effort to make it a synonym seems to have been done long ago in the 1860s by its discoverer, Samuel Gilson. Gilsonite seems to be an example of a generic trademark, where a brand name becomes an ordinary English word (another example is "hoover", a trademarked brand name but also a synonym for vacuum cleaner). GeoWriter (talk) 11:49, 22 August 2018 (UTC)

Thank you for looking into the name. Gilsonite being a generic trademark makes sense (or as much sense as trademarking a rock can make), but those are usually pretty regional, right? Would geologists from, say, India and Australia immediately recognize the term? -165.234.252.11 (talk) 18:36, 4 September 2018 (UTC)

Template problem

Apparently, combining the Geological period template with a timeline template such as Ediacaran graphical timeline breaks the visibility of the key events. See these articles for example: Ediacaran, Cambrian, Ordovician, and Carboniferous. For some reason Devonian works just fine. Th4n3r (talk) 21:13, 4 October 2018 (UTC)

Template for discussion (Tfd)

There is a navbar associated with this WikiProject that has been nominated for deletion at Wikipedia:Templates for discussion/Log/2018 October 6#Template:Holocene epoch. Please come to voice your opinion. Paine Ellsworth ^put'r there 11:48, 6 October 2018 (UTC)

Expert attention needed on Orogeny

A new editor has added material to Orogeny about "rifting orogeny". I'm not 100% sure it's correct --- I thought orogenies happened at convergent plate boundaries, not at rifts. A recent paper is cited. Can an expert take a look at the article? Thank you! —hike395 (talk) 13:17, 2 October 2018 (UTC)

Extensional orogeny is a thing e.g. "extensional orogen" on Google Scholar, "extensional orogeny" on Google Scholar, although it doesn't get that much use compared with convergent boundary orogens and certainly not (as yet) under the term "rifting orogeny". I'll take a look at some point. Mikenorton (talk) 15:03, 2 October 2018 (UTC)

@Mikenorton: As a term for non-experts, "extensional orogeny" makes a heck of a lot more sense: it implies compositional changes in regions like the Basin and Range Province. The editor who added it may be (a) a non-native English writer, and (b) have a conflict of interest by citing his/her own paper (the same editor has added citations to the same authors on multiple WP articles). I'm concerned about POV-pushing and WP:UNDUE, but I'm not enough of an expert to take action. Thanks for any help! —hike395 (talk) 14:29, 5 October 2018 (UTC)

I'm a bit stumped right now as they made a lot of changes to the article and I suspect that some of them were useful, so I need to go through it sentence by sentence so that I don't get rid of anything useful. This may take me a while. Mikenorton (talk) 14:40, 5 October 2018 (UTC)

They've now made major changes to the granite article, which I have reverted for lack of both prior discussion and edit summaries. Mikenorton (talk) 12:40, 6 October 2018 (UTC)

Best base article for Geological history template?

Transhumanist just moved {{Geological history}} to {{Geological history of Earth}} to match the template's new base article, "Geological history of Earth". It seems to me that Geologic time scale is a better base article than Geological history of Earth, and that we should rename the template to {{Geologic time scale}}.

What do other editors think? Why are there two separate articles for Geological history of Earth and Geologic time scale, anyway? Does anyone have any insight into why they are different?

Pinging Paine Ellsworth. —hike395 (talk) 13:37, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

I dunno. The Moon and Mars have their own geologic time scales so I expected that Geologic time scale would compare them to Earth's but the current Geologic time scale article is all Earth-centric. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk, contributions) 13:59, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

Thank you, hike395, for the ping. When I came across that template's rename, I was okay with it, because The Transhumanist is still making an attempt to standardize template names that also have portals by those names. Since there is no Geologic time scale portal, and there is a Geological history of Earth portal, that might be a good reason for the template to keep its new name. To answer your Why are there two separate articles for Geological history of Earth and Geologic time scale, anyway? inquiry, a time-scale article should contain what used to be the {{Geologic time scale}} template's data plus brief descriptions of all the entries. And a history article should be much more detailed about major historical events that are on that time scale. So that's my understanding of the difference between a scale article and a history one. Paine Ellsworth ^put'r there 18:24, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

The Hadean section at the bottom of the table in Geologic time scale#Table of geologic time has unofficial subdivisions imported from the lunar timescale, but their use as subvisions of the Hadean (i.e. early Earth) is unsourced and is possibly novel sythesis of uncited sources. It gives the wrong impression - that there is a single timescale for all Solar System bodies and that subdvisions from several timescales have been merged into a single planetary timescale. I'm not aware of any geologists who use lunar time intervals for the Earth nor planetary geologists who use the Earth's time intervals for the Moon, Mars etc. For a single timescale, reliable sources would be needed, not novel synthesis.

Chapter 15 ("The Planetary Timescale") in Gradstein et al. (editors) (2012) "The Geologic Timescale 2012 (volume 1)" is frustratingly very vague about "the" planetary timescale as opposed to multiple planetary timescales. Near the start of the chapter (on page 277), it states only that "Great strides have been made toward a useful planetary timescale (Figure 15.3)" but that figure comprises four separate stratigraphic timescale columns: Earth, Moon, Mars and Venus (young)/Mercury (old). No attempt is made to merge the timescales of Earth, Moon or Mars with any other planetary body. There seems to be a shared timescale for Venus and Mercury but the justifiction for the merged timescale column for these two planets is not clear from the column in this figure - perhaps it could be due to limited page width! The rest of the chapter describes the timescale of each planetary body separately.

I would expect the Geologic time scale article to include the parallel but separate planetary timescales in a similar way to how it is done in the book chapter that I have described: a Solar System-wide comparison with details of the several timescales i.e. make it less Earth-centric, resulting in content different from the (rightly) Earth-centric Geological history of Earth article.

GeoWriter (talk) 19:07, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

To editor GeoWriter: that sounds like a needed addition to the time-scale article. There is a source in the documentation for the {{Hadean footer}} template, Palaeos Geological Time. Is that helpful to your suggestion? Also, that footer template contains info in its "below" section about the open proposal, I assume to the International Commission on Stratigraphy? Paine Ellsworth ^put'r there 19:22, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

Featured quality source review RFC

Editors in this WikiProject may be interested in the featured quality source review RFC that has been ongoing. It would change the featured article candidate process (FAC) so that source reviews would need to occur prior to any other reviews for FAC. Your comments are appreciated. --Izno Repeat (talk) 21:47, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

Proposal to merge Infobox beach into Infobox landform

The discussion is starting at Wikipedia:Templates for discussion/Log/2018 November 19#Template: Infobox beach. Please feel free to join in the discussion. —hike395 (talk) 17:00, 19 November 2018 (UTC)

A link to a DAB page

Domerian links to the DAB page Lias. Expert help in solving this problem would be welcome. Narky Blert (talk) 09:25, 28 November 2018 (UTC)

In German, "Lias" can refer to "Early Jurassic". Rectified it. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk, contributions) 09:26, 28 November 2018 (UTC)

Thanks! Narky Blert (talk) 13:01, 28 November 2018 (UTC)

I've found two more ambiguous links to Lias, in Geology of Iraq and Geology of Italy. As before, expert help would be welcome. Narky Blert (talk) 08:12, 29 November 2018 (UTC)

Got these as well. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk, contributions) 15:16, 29 November 2018 (UTC)

Thanks again! Narky Blert (talk) 03:09, 2 December 2018 (UTC)

Proposed deletion of unused Geological period category nav templates

I've proposed the deletion of a number of unused Geological period category nav templates. You're welcome to join in the discussion. Thanks! —hike395 (talk) 13:47, 12 December 2018 (UTC)

Request to assess Carbonate platform

Some students of the Geosciences Dept. at University of Padova added substantial contributions to the article on carbonate platforms. This was in the framework of a project of the university, see here. May anyone independently assess the article again please? Thanks in advance! --Nereo Preto (talk) 13:19, 17 January 2019 (UTC)

Minerallurgy

Hello, came across this and was wondering if this is a legitimate concept, or someone's neologism? I don't know enough about geology to know. If it is legitimate, does it need to be a standalone article, or could it be merged somewhere? I'm happy to do any legwork, I just need to be pointed in the right direction. ♠PMC♠ (talk) 22:12, 19 January 2019 (UTC)

Many instances on doing a Google search are mirrors of Wikipedia but there is this substantive document which appears credible -https://www.dbc.wroc.pl/Content/2070/PDF/Drzymala_mineral.pdf It is a neologism of course appearing to be a portmanteau word of sorts - mineral+metallurgy - though the intro to the article talks of mineral+lurgia (=processing). Neologism is not in itself problematic, it's the substance behind it which must be verifiable. cheers Geopersona (talk) 05:29, 20 January 2019 (UTC)

Discussion of an Argentine speleology source at the reliable sources noticeboard

Discussion of an Argentine speleology source at the reliable sources noticeboardThere is a discussion on the reliability of an Argentine speleology publication from Carlos Benedetto of the Instituto Argentino de Investigaciones Espeleológicas (IN.A.E.) at the reliable sources noticeboard. If you are interested, please participate at WP:RSN § Argentine speleology source. — Newslinger talk 09:59, 31 January 2019 (UTC)

Coal not created by lack of fungi, say 4 scientists

Three years ago Stanford scientists published a paper refuting the popular idea that lack of organisms to decompose lignin was responsible for coal deposited during the Carboniferous Period. Three weeks ago I added details and reference citations at the bottom of the appropriate Talk page here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Carboniferous but I'm thinking that nobody has seen it, and may never see it, which is why I mention it here. I suspect the page should be updated to deal with the old/incorrect view and incorporate the new/corrected view but I don't have the expertise to do it. 209.239.1.216 (talk) 06:33, 4 February 2019 (UTC)

previous name for tantalite

The mineral tantalite was the mineral in which Ekeberg discovered tantalum in 1802. I wanted to update the history section of the tantalum article and now I wanted to know what was the name before Ekeberg chose tantalus to name tantalum. --Stone (talk) 09:45, 10 February 2019 (UTC)

You can read an English publication referenced in the tantalum article about this here: https://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/item/15589#page/267/mode/1up . On page 253 the mineral is described as "a problematical variety of tin garnet (zinngraupen)". It appears that the first English name of the metal is Tantalium. And Ekeberg named the mineral in the same publication. You can also read the foreign langauge version here: https://archive.org/details/kungligasvenskav2231kung/page/80 where the mineral is called "problematisk Zinngroupen" So not an official kind of name but a local one. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 11:48, 10 February 2019 (UTC)

Draft:Iron Quadrangle (Brazil)

I think that Draft:Iron Quadrangle (Brazil) is ok. German, French and Portuguese have this article already. --Chris.urs-o (talk) 04:53, 20 February 2019 (UTC)

Yes, nice article. I wikified a bit and think it is ready for publication. Tisquesusa (talk) 16:28, 20 February 2019 (UTC)

Screwed up image at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caribbean_Plate

The image at the Carribean plate shows the Island of Hispanola split in half. This affects whatever larger image it was pulled from since this shows up on the North American plate image as well. The uploader hasn't been active since 2015. Ideas?Naraht (talk) 20:22, 22 February 2019 (UTC)

Actually the larger image it's based on no longer has that split in Hispaniola - File:Tectonic plates boundaries detailed-en.svg. I guess that detailed maps were prepared from the global map before that error was corrected. The map also doesn't show the Gonâve Microplate. Basically I think that we need a new map. Mikenorton (talk) 20:37, 22 February 2019 (UTC)

I agree with @Mikenorton:, in recent years quite some more microplates have been defined and described. The "tongue" of the Nazca Plate shown in the image is now split from the larger Nazca Plate into the Coiba and Malpelo Plates, so new mapping in the same clear style would be good. Tisquesusa (talk) 22:22, 22 February 2019 (UTC)

The first update of the larger image in September 2015 changed the source to remove the division in Hispanola.Naraht (talk) 01:39, 23 February 2019 (UTC)

WP 1.0 Bot Beta

Hello! Your WikiProject has been selected to participate in the WP 1.0 Bot rewrite beta. This means that, starting in the next few days or weeks, your assessment tables will be updated using code in the new bot, codenamed Lucky. You can read more about this change on the Wikipedia 1.0 Editorial team page. Thanks! audiodude (talk) 06:48, 27 February 2019 (UTC)

Marker horizon and key bed articles

Are the Marker horizon and the Key bed articles supposed to cover separate concepts, or should they be merged? They are both described with the synonym "marker bed." — — ★Parsa ☞ talk 18:38, 9 April 2019 (UTC)

I think that a merger is in order. "Key bed" is the less used term on Google Scholar, with "Marker horizon" five times more common. However, "Marker bed" is just as common as "Marker horizon" and then there's "Key horizon" which is used, but somewhat less even than "Key bed". The merged article could be either at "Marker horizon" or "Marker bed", but as we already have the former, probably best to use that, with all the others as redirects. Mikenorton (talk) 10:34, 12 April 2019 (UTC)

Janet Watson article

The Janet Watson article is the subject of an assignment to a student editor. A large section has been added that does not to me seem relevant to the topic. I have removed it twice and it has been re-added twice. I have opened a discussion on the talk page, but had no response. I have also attempted to explain my objections on the student editor's talk page, but I'm not convinced that they have understood my reasoning. I don't want to engage in an editwar and as this is a little personal to me - I was lectured to by Janet and I carried out the original expansion of the article, so I may not be being entirely dispassionate about this. I would be grateful if someone else took a look. Mikenorton (talk) 11:22, 12 April 2019 (UTC)

Citations in {{Geological period}} template

Hi all. The citations for the {{Geological period}} template have some issues. First, they're just a bare link, which is discouraged when citing. Second, they all end up linking back to images. Not only is this not particularly helpful if I want to know where to find more about O₂ and CO₂ content over time without reading even more footnotes, they're particularly inaccessible for people with screen readers.

I would suggest instead to fix the citations so that they link to some appropriate evidence, like some of the sources that File:Sauerstoffgehalt-1000mj.svg links to (Devonian rise in atmospheric oxygen correlated to the radiations of terrestrial plants and large predatory fish; The oxygenation of the atmosphere and oceans; etc.) with a full citation. I would have done this myself, but I can't seem to find out where to do this. — Preceding unsigned comment added by A garbage person (talk • contribs) 20:56, 22 April 2019 (UTC)

Huh? Your comments don't make much sense. E.g., the template at Template:Geological period (which is what {{Tl|Geological period}} links to) does not have any citations. Perhaps you meant the article at Geological period? That has only one full citation (so-called "reference"), which actually comes in via the {{Geology to Paleobiology}} template. So where are these "citations" (plural) are you referring to?

You suggest "fix[ing] the citations so that they link to some appropriate evidence," but that shows a misunderstanding: citations do not link to "evidence". They identify, and possibly link to, sources (such as books, articles, etc.) where content in an article has been taken from. Images may also have citations in their documentation identifying where they come from, but that information is usually not included in an article where the image is used.

By the way, you should sign your comments with the "four tildes": "~~~~" ♦ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 21:16, 23 April 2019 (UTC)

I'm talking specifically about the infobox that pops up in articles like Devonian, Carboniferous, Triassic and so on. The particular part I'm interested in are the citations for mean atmospheric O2, mean atmospheric CO2, mean surface temperature, and sea level. If you look at the aforementioned pages, the same four images are the first citations for each. I believe this information is hosted in Template:Geological period, since all these pages start with a template like this: {{Geological period |image= |caption= |o2= |co2= |temp= |sea level =}}. This is also sometimes the only place in these articles where O2 and CO2 are mentioned.

My phrasing was poor: I meant more accessible information. Making that information accessible may mean just putting in more information in the citation. That way users don't have to click to see if the information is what they're expecting it to be. Blind folks will know beforehand they'll have trouble with the image; people hunting for specifics (like me) will know they have to drill deeper to find it. The current bare links are really bad at communicating that context. —A garbage person (talk) 17:48, 24 April 2019 (UTC)

Okay, now I see what you are talking about. In every article using Template:Geological period as an "infobox" (from before we started naming them as such) the first four "references" (citations) are:

   1. Image:Sauerstoffgehalt-1000mj.svg
   2. File:OxygenLevel-1000ma.svg
   3. Phanerozoic Carbon Dioxide.png
   4. Image:All palaeotemps.png

Yes, there are some issues . It's deeper than merely using wikilinks (links within Wikipedia), it's a matter of using a images as a citations (wrong!). My guess is that someone thought it would be good enough to have a graph showing the data, but not understanding that displaying data is not the same as sourcing it. Now the files do have references to documentation. But the first two are in German, and all of these sources are six to thirteen years old, and likely need an update.

I don't see why these files were "cited", and am inclined to remove that. But the place for discussing that is at the template's Talk page.

Under the head of "accessible information": yes, citation is the information for identifying and accessing sources of information; that is the purpose of citation. Unfortunately, there is another problem here (common to all infoboxes): the inclusion of data without sourcing (citation). My view here (some editors differ) is that each specific datum should have a specific citation, including the in-source specification (e.g., page numbeer) where that datum is to be found. Lacking that, the recommended recourse is to find a suitable source, and add that. If you don't want to do that, I suggest tagging each instance of an uncited datum with {{citation needed}}. Though be warned: that is likely to raise some complaints. Let me know if does, and we can all discuss it. And I'll consider what to do about the template. ♦ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 21:40, 24 April 2019 (UTC)

As a librarian, I agree with you wholeheartedly about citations, both the usage of images and the need to specify pages! However, I've got confusion about adding the {{cn}}s to the affected articles. I could put it after every listing of O2, CO2, mean temp, etc. I'd really like to add it to the template, though.

I've FINALLY figured out that the template information is on that template page, just hidden from view until you hit Edit Source. However, I can't seem to simulate what the change would be using the template's sandbox. If you look at the changes I made, I tried to set the template called on that page have a {{cn}} after every statement, but it looks like it's still pulling from the main template instead. Any thoughts on this, J. Johnson (JJ)? —A garbage person (talk) 20:12, 25 April 2019 (UTC)

You misunderstand. Citations are for identifying the source of content – here, the data that is supplied to the template where the template is invoked. If you put that into the template itself then it shows up all the time and in all instances, even when a citation has been supplied; that would be no good. So I was going to demonstrate on one of the articles how to add {cn}, only to discover that adding it to a template parameter causes an error. And fixing either template to tolerate that would take more time than I have available. So if you want to prompt anyone to add a source you'll have to make an explicit request on each article's Talk page.

To see what a change in the sandbox would do you have call the sandbox version specifically. This can be done in the "testcases" directory. Please note that while playing around in the sandboxes is quite okay, you might avoid messing with the actual templates until you have a better understanding of the arcana involved. ♦ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 23:00, 26 April 2019 (UTC)

I'd never edit a template until I understood it thoroughly, but I appreciate the caution. And I think we're talking past each other regarding citations. My goal is to find a source that has enough data for each geological period to serve as a source for all periods' O2 levels, CO2 levels, etc., so that it could reasonably used as a citation for all instances of the template. That may be unreasonable, but I'm noticing some if/then logic in the template—could citations be called using that logic? E.g. if there's a source for everything pre-Cambrian, make sure that source is cited on pre-Cambrian pages, but hide it if the time period is post-Cambrian. Or might this be too complicated for a simple template? —A garbage person (talk) 15:46, 30 April 2019 (UTC)

@A garbage person: My apologies; I just saw your comment. That could be done, but it's not good to hard-code data that is subject to change. Responsibility for ensuring the applicability and concurrency of a source lies with the article editor, not the template editor. And we shouldn't have to edit a template to update a source. ♦ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 22:50, 6 May 2019 (UTC)

That makes a lot of sense. Thank you for your help, J. Johnson! I really appreciate it. —A garbage person (talk) 14:37, 7 May 2019 (UTC)

You are quite welcome. ♦ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 23:35, 7 May 2019 (UTC)

Ordovician reference problem

There is a problem with some of the references in the article Ordovician. Please see Talk:Ordovician#Reference problem "Stanley1999". Members of this Wikiproject may be able to sort it out, thank you. DuncanHill (talk) 14:05, 10 May 2019 (UTC)

Portal:Geology

Does anyone know why the Portal:Geology has been cleared? After all, this contradicts the decision of a large-scale discussion here. Why was it deleted?--Yasnodark (talk) 13:49, 10 May 2019 (UTC)

It was done by User:BrownHairedGirl with this edit, and the explanation "Reverted to revision 649157022 by Magioladitis: Restore redirect to Portal:Earth sciences, reverting conversion to automated junk built as a fork of Template:Geology". DuncanHill (talk) 14:08, 10 May 2019 (UTC)

Thanks, @DuncanHill.

@Yasnodark, the RFC at WP:ENDPORTALS decided to reject a proposal to delete all portals. It was not a decision to keep every portal which might ever be created.

The pseudo-portal which I reverted was a type of automated spam, which has been clearly rejected by the community. For a full explanation of why this type of portal is redundant, see the two mass deletions of similar portals: one, and two, where there was overwhelming consensus of a very high turnout to delete a total of 2,555 such portals. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 14:40, 10 May 2019 (UTC)

I do not think these portals are spam, this is a place where information on a specific topic is combined.--Yasnodark (talk) 14:52, 10 May 2019 (UTC)

@Yasnodark, established consensus is that they are simply redundant forks of a navbox. Please read the two MFDs on mass deletions of similar portals: one, and two. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 15:17, 10 May 2019 (UTC)

@DuncanHill and Yasnodark: I maintain Portal:Geophysics, and it was nominated for deletion recently for the same reasons. I was able to rescue it, and the result was a fairly successful marriage of the new templates (which make editing a portal a lot easier) and the portal guidelines. If someone in this project is interested enough to maintain Portal:Geology, they could use Portal:Geophysics as inspiration. Keep in mind that very few readers visit these pages, so it may not be worth a lot of your time. RockMagnetist(talk) 15:19, 10 May 2019 (UTC)

I agree with both parts of @RockMagnetist's comment.

If you want to actually make a real portal, then the new templates make it easy. And Portal:Geophysics is great model of how to use it.
Pageviews for portals are in general abysmal. In Jan–Feb 2019, the median daily pageviews for portals was only 12 per day. In nearly all of the hundreds of portals where I have gathered comparative data, the head article gathers between 100 and 2,000 times as many pageviews.

The reason is that two newish features of Wikipedia render most portals redundant:

mouseover: for ordinary readers who are not logged in, mouseover on any of the linked list items shows you the picture and the start of the lead. So the preview-selected page-function of portals is redundant: something almost as good is available automatically on any navbox or other set of links
automatic imagery galleries: for ordinary readers who are not logged in, clinking on an image brings up an image gallery of all the images on that page. It's full-screen, so it's actually better than even a click-for-next image gallery on a portal

So even a well-built portal like Portal:Geophysics adds very little to what readers already have by default. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 17:16, 10 May 2019 (UTC)

Foulden Maar

This page was recently created and has been worked on by various mostly New Zealand based editors. The area covered in this page has been featuring in recent news coverage as there is a possibility that the site will be extensively mined for its resources. Members of this Wikiproject will likely have expert knowledge that can improve the page. I would be very grateful for any assistance given in improving the content, not least as outside views will hopefully ensure that a neutral point of view is maintained.Ambrosia10 (talk) 20:51, 12 May 2019 (UTC)

Geological fold

Fold (geology) has been renamed to Geological fold. I've opened a discussion on the article talk page. I would appreciate others input on this. Mikenorton (talk) 16:39, 16 May 2019 (UTC)

A possible Science/STEM User Group

There's a discussion about a possible User Group for STEM over at Meta:Talk:STEM_Wiki_User_Group. The idea would be to help coordinate, collaborate and network cross-subject, cross-wiki and cross-language to share experience and resources that may be valuable to the relevant wikiprojects. Current discussion includes preferred scope and structure. T.Shafee(Evo&Evo)^talk 02:55, 26 May 2019 (UTC)

Revision to Mid-ocean ridge article

I want to make a series of edits to this article to upgrade its content and accuracy. Significant content is out of date or incorrect. Please go the talk page on Mid-ocean ridge to weigh in and track my edits in coming weeks.BrucePL (talk) 20:06, 5 June 2019 (UTC)

Geology of the Rocky Mountains and Columbias

Many of the pages on mountains in the Canadian Rockies as well in Geology of the Rocky Mountains contain a reference to a source titled "Geology of the Rocky Mountains and Columbias" by Ben Gadd in 2008. If one looks at the source text, it mentions "Notes on lecture by Ben Gadd" at the top. While the contents look credible there are no cited sources. I would certainly find this source more reliable if it was published in a notable peer reviewed journal (which would require the sources). Most of the mountain pages containing this source is linked to the statement "Formed in shallow seas, this sedimentary rock was pushed east and over the top of younger rock during the Laramide orogeny." I would be inclined to replace this source with an article in a notable journal although I have yet to find such an article. In no way to do I intend this as any disrespect to Mr. Gadd who appears to be a notable author in the Earth Sciences field in Canada and USA. I would just find the source "more solid" if it appeared in a book or a journal rather than in its current form. RedWolf (talk) 18:42, 5 May 2019 (UTC)

Partially implemented --- I found information supporting 3 out of the 4 citations in Ben Gadd's books. Still looking to replace the fourth citation. Is that acceptable to you, RedWolf? Any help in finding alternative sources is welcome. —hike395 (talk) 01:02, 6 May 2019 (UTC)

Yes indeed that would be very acceptable. Thanks. RedWolf (talk) 02:26, 6 May 2019 (UTC)

Can you identify the replacement citations here or have you updated any articles with the new citations? Thanks. RedWolf (talk) 17:54, 2 June 2019 (UTC)

I modified Geology of the Rocky Mountains, Banff National Park, Geology of the United States, Rocky Mountains, and Rocky Mountain National Park to add references to the Handbook of the Canadian Rockies^[1] and Canadian Rockies Geology Road Tours,^[2] both by Gadd. I think there are two references left to the lecture notes, one in Geology of the Rocky Mountains and the other in Prehistory of Colorado. Thanks for reminding me -- I want to go back and fix those. —hike395 (talk) 07:30, 6 June 2019 (UTC)

References

^ Gadd, Ben (1995). Handbook of the Canadian Rockies. Corax Press. ISBN 9780969263111.
^ Gadd, Ben (2008). Canadian Rockies Geology Road Tours. Corax Press. ISBN 9780969263128.

Palaeontology collaboration

The WikiProjects Palaeontology and Dinosaurs are happy to announce the brand-new Palaeontology collaboration! This initiative supplements the long-standing Dinosaur collaboration. Everybody is highly welcome to join in, at any time. We especially encourage new editors to participate, as the collaboration is a great way to get easily started with article writing. Article election just started, and will close on June 15. --Jens Lallensack (talk) 10:23, 7 June 2019 (UTC)

Layout of Geological history of Earth now changed

The navbox {{Geological history of Earth}} has a new proposed layout (now live at the template). Please feel free to join in a discussion at Template Talk:Geological history of Earth#Distingish periods from era via box width?. —hike395 (talk) 22:18, 9 June 2019 (UTC)

Plume tectonics?

My geophysics days are long behind me, so I'm rusty, although I still have a little working familiarity with the Mantle Plume debate and possible alternatives suggested by some respected geophysicists. But Plume tectonics? Is that mainstream or fringe? This article could do with some attention. Might even a proposal for deletion be a way forward? Feline Hymnic (talk) 10:25, 22 June 2019 (UTC)

Based on what I've seen in the literature, trench pull is usually considered the principal driving force of plate motions, not mantle plumes. I've seen some of these sources and I don't recall the concept "plume tectonics" being used in them - the idea that there are "superplumes" under Africa and the Pacific from which mantle plumes emanate to Earth's surface is not called that. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk, contributions) 10:32, 22 June 2019 (UTC)

After some searching around on Scholar, it appears to be a term in use, but mainly restricted to craton formation in the early Earth - Hadean to Archean. In that context it is mentioned along with "lid tectonics" and "drip tectonics" - e.g. this paper, which lists as its "keywords", "Continental crust, Crustal evolution, Geochronology, Plume tectonics, Subduction, Yilgarn". So, definitely not fringe in its current usage, although that's not reflected in the article at the moment. Mikenorton (talk) 12:47, 22 June 2019 (UTC)

Thanks. Feline Hymnic (talk) 15:14, 22 June 2019 (UTC)

Talk:Inner core super-rotation/GA1

Hi,

I've done a review of this article, for WP:GA status, but it's got a couple of small issues (basically an extended lead and theory section). The nominator hasn't edited in over a month, so does anyone fancy taking a look? There isn't a great deal to do. Best Wishes, Lee Vilenski ^{(talk • contribs)} 14:21, 20 June 2019 (UTC)

@Lee Vilenski: I'll be happy to take it on. RockMagnetist(talk) 18:49, 22 June 2019 (UTC)

Anybody interested in creating stubs or other content re the very early Earth?

Hadean#Subdivisions says

In 2010, an alternative scale was proposed that includes the addition of the Chaotian and Prenephelean Eons preceding the Hadean...

Chaotian_(geology)#Origins says

This geological era designation was proposed by scientists at the Ames Research Center in 2010 to formalize terminology in the earliest stages of Earth's history. This proposal divides the Chaotian into the Eochaotian and Neochaotian eras. The Eochaotian is proposed to be divided into the Nephelean and Erebrean periods, and the Neochaotian into the Hyperitian and Titanomachean.

Can we do anything with any of these redlinks?

Thanks - 2804:14D:5C59:8300:0:0:0:1000 (talk) 04:17, 26 June 2019 (UTC)

Not yet, I think has to be the answer. Since the publication of the initial paper by Golblatt et al in 2009, none of these subdivisions appear to have been used in publications, so there wouldn't be much to write about, apart from what already appears in the Chaotian article. Mikenorton (talk) 08:04, 26 June 2019 (UTC)

Thanks - 2804:14D:5C59:8300:0:0:0:1000 (talk) 19:57, 27 June 2019 (UTC)

Canadian Arctic Rift System

I created this page a couple days ago as this rift system definitely deserves an article. Any ideas on how to further improve it? Thanks. Volcanoguy 10:53, 8 June 2019 (UTC)

I've looked into this and found that the term is little used in the literature, just 12 hits on Google Scholar for "Canadian Arctic Rift", mainly to Kerr's publications. I'm not sure that the overall structure as described by Kerr is still recognised. Mikenorton (talk) 00:01, 10 June 2019 (UTC)

@Mikenorton: I could not find another term so I went with Canadian Arctic Rift System despite the few scholar results. The lack of its use in the literature may be due to few studies given the remote location of this rift system. Volcanoguy 21:08, 10 June 2019 (UTC)

Likewise there are few results for Southeast Bathurst Fault Zone, Lancaster Aulacogen and other structures associated this rift system. Volcanoguy 21:26, 10 June 2019 (UTC)

Ziegler seems to include the rift located in Arctic Canada in what he refers to as "the Arctic-North Atlantic rift system" in e.g. "Ziegler P.A. (1989) Evolution of the Arctic — North Atlantic Rift System". In: Earthquakes at North-Atlantic Passive Margins: Neotectonics and Postglacial Rebound. NATO ASI Series (Series C: Mathematical and Physical Sciences), vol 266. Springer, Dordrecht, [4]. This term seems to be much more widely used (by many geologists) than "Canadian Arctic Rift" - I get hundreds of search hits for "Arctic-North Atlantic rift system" in Google Scholar. It seems to include e.g. the North Sea rift. I suppose the following question still remains: "Does the Canadian part of this rift system have it's own "local" name like the North Sea part of the system?" GeoWriter (talk) 14:06, 28 June 2019 (UTC)

One of your project's articles has been selected for improvement!

Hello,
Please note that Bedrock, which is within this project's scope, has been selected as one of Today's articles for improvement. The article was scheduled to appear on Wikipedia's Community portal in the "Today's articles for improvement" section for one week, beginning today. Everyone is encouraged to collaborate to improve the article. Thanks, and happy editing!
_{Delivered by — MusikBot ^talk 00:05, 1 July 2019 (UTC) on behalf of the TAFI team}

Assessment of Deep Sea Drilling articles

I've been working on Project Mohole and I noted that this article as well as Deep Sea Drilling Project were rated as low importance. That doesn't seem quite right to me, inasmuch as these projects led to a revolution in our understanding of plate tectonics and other things. It isn't really my area of expertise, however, so perhaps some of those knowledgable can reassess the importance of these articles? Happy to go with whatever the consensus decides. Bdushaw (talk) 00:16, 2 July 2019 (UTC)

(While I am here...are there oceanography or geophysics wikiprojects? Other projects that the drilling articles should be under? I deleted the wikiproject physics from Mohole since that did not seem right.) Bdushaw (talk) 00:16, 2 July 2019 (UTC)

Wikipedia:WikiProject Limnology and Oceanography does exist. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk, contributions) 08:54, 2 July 2019 (UTC)

Orphan talk subpage

I ran across Talk:System (geology)/Geologic Periods to subdivisions, which seems to be existing in limbo. Talk:System (geology) doesn’t exist, though System (geology) does (as a redirect to System (stratigraphy)). The page was created in 2009 by a now-blocked editor, and has seen no editing except once in 2014 by a member of the disambiguation team.

Is this page useful in some way? Should it be moved to some place in project space? Or just deleted as housekeeping? — Gorthian (talk) 02:14, 28 June 2019 (UTC)

I think the page is not useful and e.g. dates ranges are out-of-date. I don't see much worth preserving. GeoWriter (talk) 13:33, 28 June 2019 (UTC)

User talk:Woudloper/Archive#Just the distinction needed is the only mention I see of this page anywhere. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk, contributions) 13:43, 28 June 2019 (UTC)

I’ll tag it with {{Db-subpage}} after a couple of days (in case an objection arises). Thanks. — Gorthian (talk) 19:27, 28 June 2019 (UTC)

Deleted now. — Gorthian (talk) 23:51, 6 July 2019 (UTC)

Article on Tectonics of the Early Earth

I started a stub on lid tectonics a while ago and now looking at the discussion above on "plume tectonics" and having seen "drip tectonics" get a mention, I'm thinking that an article entitled something like Tectonics of the Early Earth would be a useful addition to the project, which could cover all the various proposed mechanisms for what was going on geodynamically before the onset of true plate tectonics. Mikenorton (talk) 17:15, 26 June 2019 (UTC)

I note that we do have an article on Archean subduction, although that doesn't really cover the alternative mechanisms. Mikenorton (talk) 08:45, 27 June 2019 (UTC)

A big omnibus article sounds like a better idea per WP:NPOV although it'd be hard to write. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk, contributions) 08:52, 27 June 2019 (UTC)

Thanks, I may get around to it at some point. Mikenorton (talk) 09:28, 7 July 2019 (UTC)

Head-scratcher of an AfC

Could someone competent deal with Draft:Sedimentary Isostasy? Originally rejected for reading like an essay but since reworked, apparently in good faith and with considerable knowledge. Haukur (talk) 00:33, 10 July 2019 (UTC)

Accepted. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 01:53, 10 July 2019 (UTC)
- Much appreciated. Haukur (talk) 08:27, 10 July 2019 (UTC)

Talk:Uranium–uranium dating#Is this real?

Please take a look at the discussion I just started here — I have reason to believe that this article is either wrong or needs to be rewritten, and only finding references will solve this. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 07:23, 11 July 2019 (UTC)

Reassessment of "Peak Oil"

Peak oil, an article that you or your project may be interested in, has been nominated for an individual good article reassessment. If you are interested in the discussion, please participate by adding your comments to the reassessment page. If concerns are not addressed during the review period, the good article status may be removed from the article. Chidgk1 (talk) 18:25, 21 July 2019 (UTC)

Should Geologic formations be named as XXX or XXX formation?

As an example, Weston Flags and the List of fossiliferous stratigraphic units in England where Weston Flags is listed as Weston Flags Formation. I am fine with piping the wiki link for the list but just wondering, which should be the correct way of listing? Thanks --Xaiver0510 (talk) 07:13, 26 July 2019 (UTC)

Some formations, such as the Kimmeridge Clay, are well known without the "formation". Relatively poorly known units like the one you've highlighted should, I think, get the full name. The BGS Lexicon of Named Rock Units is the thing to go to for British formations. Most of these stub articles were created using the Palaeobiology Database, which does not always use the most up-to-date formation names and should not be relied on for stratigraphic nomenclature in my experience. Mikenorton (talk) 12:16, 26 July 2019 (UTC)

For many of these the "Formation" is part of the name. But there could be other terms such as "Beds" "Unit", "Member" If that is part of the name then it should be capitalised. Don't drop it if it is part of the official name. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 12:41, 26 July 2019 (UTC)

By the way, for the official stratigraphic names for the United States of America, go to National Geologic Map Database Geolex Search. For USA geologic maps search at National Geologic Map Database Catalog Search or go to National Geologic Map Database Paul H. (talk) 19:34, 26 July 2019 (UTC)

Thanks for all the information, I will rename the articles as I come across them during de-orphaning. --Xaiver0510 (talk) 03:24, 29 July 2019 (UTC)

See also the USGS "Suggestions to Authors" (STA, various updates) regarding general principles for names. However, note that Wikipedia practice may vary; see WP:Naming conventions (capitalization). ♦ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 20:54, 29 July 2019 (UTC)

Missing minerals found in guano

Hello! I'm in the process of totally redoing our article on guano. In the process, I've added minerals found in bat guano. Three of these minerals are not represented on Wikipedia at all. I don't like redlinks, especially three in a row. I'd probably get around to it eventually, but figured I'd post here in case some kind souls wanted to churn out a stub or two. The missing articles:

spheniscidite

montgomeryite

~~leucophosphite~~

Thanks, Enwebb (talk) 01:54, 7 August 2019 (UTC)

Tag bombing

A few days ago, someone tag-bombed Robert Hazen. I disputed the tags on the talk page and pinged the editor responsible, but they have not replied. I have a potential conflict of interest, so could someone else look at the tags? RockMagnetist (DCO visiting scholar) (talk) 22:17, 23 August 2019 (UTC)

I have removed most tags. Only issue I see left is excessive use of quotes, giving and unencyclopedic tone, and even for these I have rewritten most. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 23:03, 23 August 2019 (UTC)

Nice improvements. I agree with removing the tags and adding the tone tags. It is a well-researched article, but a was bit chatty and is laudatory at points ("This was published with an amount of advance publicity that was unusual for a popular science book"). Part of the problem might be sourcing content to awards ceremonies, which almost always include exaggerated praise. --{{u|Mark viking}} {Talk} 00:06, 24 August 2019 (UTC)

Glacial meltwater channels

Am I missing something or is there a gap on Wikipedia in respect of this topic? Abandoned meltwater channels are a key component of those parts of the British landscape which were formerly glaciated both in terms of highland areas and lowlands - there are the classic channels around the Preseli Hills in west Wales and numerous example on the Pennine fringe and in the Cheshire, Staffs and Shropshire lowlands, in SE Scotland and again in various parts of the Scottish Highlands (to name but a few regions so blessed) and yet when I come to add glacial meltwater channels to articles, it remains a redlink. I note however that there is an urstromtal page and an iceway page. Perhaps I should be looking to tunnel valleys? cheers Geopersona (talk) 11:16, 25 August 2019 (UTC)

Well, here's a list of sources to start from although you should probably check for synonyms as well. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk, contributions) 11:49, 25 August 2019 (UTC)

Thanks - I'll give it some thought! Geopersona (talk) 12:58, 25 August 2019 (UTC)

There's also the related term kame. —hike395 (talk) 17:09, 25 August 2019 (UTC)

You may also wish to look at esker. —hike395 (talk) 17:15, 25 August 2019 (UTC)

Fluvioglacial landform also overlaps with this as would spillway if it didn't focus largely on the dam-related feature, and so too would Nye channel if it existed yet - it's starting to look a bit confusing as to where to pitch meltwater channel. Geopersona (talk) 19:13, 26 August 2019 (UTC)

See, when I hear "spillway" being used in geological contexts I hear it mostly in the context of lakes, not glaciers (but also pluvial lakes or proglacial lakes). Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk, contributions) 19:20, 26 August 2019 (UTC)

This would be great to have, but (as you seem to be already very aware) be suuuuuuper careful with the terminology. There's an absolute ton of these words, with a lot of overlap and a lot of very outdated thinking behind some of the definitions. That's going to make them pretty hard to write about. We do have subglacial_channel as well, which covers r-, h- and n- (Nye) channels very briefly. All of those deserve breaking out into stubs at least, and ideally a bit more than that. Those definitions have the advantage of being process-based, rather than descriptive, so they should be a bit easier to write about.

Agree about spillway. I also also have a pet peeve about the term glacial meltwater channel itself, as it's so vague (term could be subaerial or subglacial, and IMO is a purely descriptive term masquerading as a process-based one), but that's no reason for it not to have an article. DanHobley (talk) 08:44, 27 August 2019 (UTC)

I've created a stub at meltwater channel and a redirect at glacial meltwater channel to reflect occurrences in literature and the web and explained my rationale on the talk page - cognisant of comments made above, I hope and expect that those with greater knowledge than I will be able to improve upon it! thanks Geopersona (talk) 06:55, 29 August 2019 (UTC)

Geopersona, thanks for creating the article. I've done a few small edits of the article. GeoWriter (talk) 11:58, 29 August 2019 (UTC)

British Geological Survey / Hydrogeology of Africa

Hi there. I'm working with the British Geological Survey, who have openly licensed a selection of text and images from the Africa Groundwater Atlas - a resource which was initially compiled on a MediaWiki based platform, with the intention that it could at some point in the future be migrated to Wikipedia. We're holding a Wikipedia editing event on Monday 23 September, which I'll be running in my role as Scotland Programme Coordinator at Wikimedia UK, during which we aim to use this text and these images to improve the availability of high quality information about groundwater in Africa. We've uploaded a selection of images to a custom category on Commons (there are more to come) and have created a project page Wikipedia:British Geological Survey as a base for this work, which we expect to continue after the event. If anyone here has a particular interest in Hydrogeology, we'd appreciate any suggestions or support you could offer. Thanks! Lirazelf (talk) 12:33, 18 September 2019 (UTC)

Portal:Earth sciences

Proposal to delete all portals

The discussion is at Wikipedia:Village pump (proposals)#Proposal to delete Portal space. Voceditenore (talk) 07:45, 23 September 2019 (UTC)

Geophysical Planet Definition

See Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Geophysical Planet Definition Fdfexoex (talk) 06:55, 28 September 2019 (UTC)

Reassessment of 'Migmatite'

Migmatite has been listed as a level-5 vital article in Science, Earth science but is currently rated Start-Class and of Mid-Importance. The article has recently been revised substantially at request of InternetArchivesBot with additional text and 28 references. Could a participant in this project with experience of metamorphic geology please make a reassessment of that rating? Thanks. Geologician (talk) 21:24, 2 October 2019 (UTC)

Level-5 means very little in importance, and I suspect many level 5 articles have not yet been started at all. InternetArchiveBot is a bot and not a human and will not respond. However I have upgraded to B class. There are some style things that would need fixing for GA, in addition for thorough checking. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 00:10, 3 October 2019 (UTC)

Request for information on WP1.0 web tool

Hello and greetings from the maintainers of the WP 1.0 Bot! As you may or may not know, we are currently involved in an overhaul of the bot, in order to make it more modern and maintainable. As part of this process, we will be rewriting the web tool that is part of the project. You might have noticed this tool if you click through the links on the project assessment summary tables.

We'd like to collect information on how the current tool is used by....you! How do you yourself and the other maintainers of your project use the web tool? Which of its features do you need? How frequently do you use these features? And what features is the tool missing that would be useful to you? We have collected all of these questions at this Google form where you can leave your response. Walkerma (talk) 04:24, 27 October 2019 (UTC)

Category for Deletion (CfD) discussions for Subsidence craters and Unknown origin craters

FYI: I started a couple geology-related Category for Deletion (CfD) discussions: CfD for Category:Subsidence craters (reason: insignificant subset of Category:Explosion craters) and CfD for Category:Unknown origin craters (reason: violates WP:OCMISC/miscellaneous category rule). Both also qualify for deletion under WP:SMALLCAT. These are not eligible for speedy deletion because I already emptied them out of process while cleaning up various categories into impact, volcanic or explosion craters, which avoids recurring confusion around unspecified "craters". See also the 2009 mass-renaming CfR of crater-related categories which I was the nominator for, which was the first time this kind of crater category cleanup was done. These are not expected to be controversial but still need to meet the minimum bar of having had some discussion for the deletions, minimally a few shows of support, to happen. So this brings up a separate question... Do I need to write an essay on categorization of craters? Ikluft (talk) 05:16, 2 November 2019 (UTC)

Structuring a geological formation article

I've spent significant time recently improving the Wessex Formation article, which previously lacked any sort of geological section. However like many articles on wikipedia, it feels like simply a wall of text with poor readability, and I am at a bit of a loss on how to structure it. The only GA geological formation, discounting the "The Rove Formation" article, (which doesn't even have an infobox) is the Marcellus Shale, whose stucture doesn't seem readily applicable to this article. I'd apprectiate some outside feedback, Cheers Hemiauchenia (talk) 22:30, 8 November 2019 (UTC)

I'd probably try sections on its research history&name&outcrops, its geologic history, its composition and its significance. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 07:39, 12 November 2019 (UTC)

I've backed up the call for The Rove Formation to be moved to its redirect at Rove Formation. For myself I've created a good number of stratigraphic stubs, almost all of which are groups rather than formations. All have infoboxes which provides for a whole lot of default characteristics for the unit, if the references are available then I've tended to adapt the structure of the article according to what info is at hand. If not much then it's undivided but often a breakdown into subgroups and formations. A section on its lithology/stratigraphy and one on its extent; the outcrop. If there is a history behind the current name which is interesting or detailed perhaps because there have been several changes then a section on naming can be useful. Clearly the Wessex Formation is a much more detailed article than most and one with a considerable palaeontological interest which is detailed. You've significantly improved the article though I'm not sure I'd agree that it's quite a 'wall of text', though the tables do dominate it rather. I would myself welcome an agreed standard approach - the basics include age range, geographical extent, lithologies, conditions of deposition (or eruption etc), history of study, fossil content (if any), naming, wider geological context, econonomic considerations - is it quarried etc?, cultural associations. Much of that is there within the Marcellus article. cheers Geopersona (talk) 08:33, 12 November 2019 (UTC)

As an addendum, I have started a Good article reassessment on The Rove Formation as it barely even covers the titular formation at all, mostly covering orogenies and local geography and is completely unfocused and overbloated. It doesn't deserve to be considered on the same level of quality as the Marcellus Shale, or above articles like the Tendaguru Formation or Tremp Formation. Hemiauchenia (talk) 13:51, 12 November 2019 (UTC)

More template creep

At the bottom of Earth, there is quite a gallery of navboxes. These include {{Physical Earth}}, which is titled "Earth", and {{Earth}}, which is titled "Earth-related topics". The former is a modest, restrained navbox, but the latter has recently been exploding (I'm looking at you, Drbogdan). I must admit, I find it weirdly fascinating, with entries like MapmyIndia, Landscape painting, and Earth trojan rubbing shoulders; but it doesn't satisfy any of the navbox guidelines. Moreover, some of the same ground is covered by {{Solar system}} (itself almost large enough to qualify as a planet), {{Earth's location}}, {{Earth science}}, and {{Nature}}, all of which are also at the bottom of Earth. It's a wonder the article doesn't fall off the bottom of the page.

Is there any reason to have both {{Earth}} and {{Physical Earth}}? My opinion is that a greatly reduced {{Physical Earth}} should be merged into {{Earth}} and given the title "Earth". Examples of reduction are:

get rid of the group "Formation and evolution", leaving just the link Formation and evolution of the Solar System, which is already in the History group.
get rid of the group "Imaging" (the title of which links to Digital mapping) and add Cartography to the "Geography and geology" section.

Comments? RockMagnetist(talk) 17:55, 2 November 2019 (UTC)

@RockMagnetist: - Thank you for your comments, suggestions and ping - please understand that it's *entirely* ok with me to adjust the templates (including those I've created and/or added) in the "Earth" article and/or "{{Earth}}" template (and those that might be related) any way that's eventually agreeable to others - no problem whatsoever - Comments Welcome of course - hope this helps in some way - in any case - Thanks again for your comments - and - Enjoy! :) Drbogdan (talk) 18:36, 2 November 2019 (UTC)

@RockMagnetist and Drbogdan: I agree with RockMagnetist that {{Earth}} has gotten far too large, with links to articles that readers are unlikely to wish to visit from general Earth-related articles. I support the merge and simplification. I've made a proposed merged template at User:Hike395/Earth, which mostly preserves {{Physical Earth}} and keeps relevant links from {{Earth}}. I propose that we leave the merged template at {{Earth}} and have {{Physical Earth}} be a redirect. What do other editors think? — hike395 (talk) 19:25, 10 November 2019 (UTC)

@Hike395: Seems ok with me atm - esp if it's ok with others as well of course - iac - Enjoy! :) Drbogdan (talk) 19:46, 10 November 2019 (UTC)

@Hike395: Once again, you have done a fine job doctoring a navbox. I support your proposal. RockMagnetist(talk) 22:06, 10 November 2019 (UTC)

Thanks, both, for the quick reply! Let's wait a couple of days to see if any other editors will chime in. — hike395 (talk) 04:46, 11 November 2019 (UTC)

@Hike395: I like it! Coulple of random thoughts: "Climate" seems like a missing thing for Environment? Specific reference to the atmosphere of Earth might be appropriate, given the oceans get their own row to themselves? DanHobley (talk) 13:54, 11 November 2019 (UTC)

@DanHobley: Great idea! I added an Atmosphere row, added the links you suggested, plus Weather. — hike395 (talk) 14:34, 11 November 2019 (UTC)

Good progress so far. But before you decide it's done... At first I was thinking of which other WikiProjects need to be notified that a merge of {{Physical Earth}} into {{Earth}} is under discussion by WikiProject Geology. While those notifications will still need to be sent out, it's about time to start a WP:Tfm discussion process first. This topic has global scope by definition. Ikluft (talk) 05:43, 12 November 2019 (UTC)

@Ikluft: Excellent suggestion: I wasn't following the correct process. @RockMagnetist, Drbogdan, and DanHobley: Please feel free to comment on the merge at Wikipedia:Templates for discussion/Log/2019 November 12#Template:Physical Earth. — hike395 (talk) 11:33, 12 November 2019 (UTC)

Later: I notified creators and active template editors. It looks like the relevant WikiProjects are all covered by Article Alerts, so I wasn't going to leave notifications, unless other editors thought that was better. — hike395 (talk) 11:46, 12 November 2019 (UTC)

The latest proposed merged template is at Template:Earth/sandbox. Please feel free to edit, or propose changes at TfD. — hike395 (talk) 06:07, 16 November 2019 (UTC)

[1] Shafee, T; Das, D; Masukume, G; Häggström, M (2017). "WikiJournal of Medicine, the first Wikipedia-integrated academic journal". WikiJournal of Medicine. 4. doi:10.15347/wjm/2017.001.

[2] "Wikiversity Journal: A new user group". The Signpost. 2016-06-15.

[gadd1-3] Gadd, Ben (1995). Handbook of the Canadian Rockies. Corax Press. ISBN 9780969263111.

[gadd-4] Gadd, Ben (2008). Canadian Rockies Geology Road Tours. Corax Press. ISBN 9780969263128.

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[2]

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v t e Neogene Period
Miocene Epoch	Aquitanian Burdigalian Langhian Serravallian Tortonian Messinian
Pliocene Epoch	Zanclean Piacenzian

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