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Wikipedia's approach to taxonomy

I am trying to get a feel for how writers of Wikipedia articles about taxa approach the issue of what classification they use. I have not really understood the template system very well but it looks as if an automated taxobox is used by an author they will be importing the higher ranks with the taxobox. The data in the taxobox will represent the classification.

Presumably if an author wanted to make use of a different classification they could manually complete a taxobox with the higher ranks chosen by them to reflect the classification of their choosing.

I would like to be corrected on this if it is wrong and would also be interested in any discussions on Wikipedia's approach to classification which may be available. Gourdiehill (talk) 23:07, 5 March 2023 (UTC)

@Gourdiehill: at least in the areas in which I work, the relevant WikiProjects have discussed and agreed on a default taxonomy to be used in taxoboxes and article titles. This is necessary to ensure consistency among articles in the same area of the tree of life, and avoids the same taxon having multiple articles under different names. However, all well sourced alternative taxonomies should be always discussed in the text.
The automated taxobox system does allow alternative agreed taxonomies that could overlap. For example, bird authors and dinosaur authors use somewhat different approaches, which is why the taxobox at Bird shows a different set of parent taxa from the taxobox at Ornithurae, even though the latter says that Aves is an immediate child taxon. As another example, the taxobox at Reptile shows Reptilia as a class, even though it treats Aves as a child taxon, whose taxobox says it is a class. These variations are achieved by having things like skip taxonomy templates.
So if you want to know why a particular classification is used in taxoboxes, then ask at the talk page of the relevant WikiProject, where you can discuss possible alternatives. Peter coxhead (talk) 17:42, 6 March 2023 (UTC)
Yep, which taxonomy is used generally is agreed upon by the relevant WikiProject- generally, it is some combination of agreement of relevant taxonomy databases and "does this taxon/taxon change seem to be widely accepted in the field?".
For instance, the Mammals WikiProject uses the Mammals of the World (Wilson & Reed 2005) as the base, with any changes based on the agreement of the IUCN and Mammal Diversity Database (see here). Happy editing. SilverTiger12 (talk) 19:52, 6 March 2023 (UTC)
An author could use a manual taxbox ({{Taxobox}}) with "the higher ranks chosen by them to reflect the classification of their choosing" (as opposed to the higher ranks given in the taxonomy templates used by automated taxoboxes). But that isn't desirable. A big reason to use automatic taxoboxes is to keep classification consistent (and easy to update). We don't want to have a situation where different species in a single genus show different families in the taxobox. If an author thinks that the classification in the taxonomy templates is incorrect, they should get consensus to change the templates rather than using manual taxoboxes to override it.
Many of the WikiProjects have achieved consensus to follow a particular database or publication for which species/genera to recognize. There is often also a consensus to follow a particular source for classification at higher levels (family, order, etc.), which may be the same source used for species/genera, or may be a different source (flowering plants and fish use different sources for species/genera and families/orders). For some groups of organisms that have few editors interested in them, the classification may have been chosen by the editor(s) that do the most work on that group, without any formal discussion to achieve consensus. And there are cases where there is a detailed classification of higher level clades in the taxonomy templates that hasn't been discussed anywhere; the sources used for bird and mammal classification (from species to class) don't go into clades between the ranks of class and order, but there are taxonomy templates for various bird/mammal clades, that (as far as I am aware) have never been discussed. Plantdrew (talk)
The taxonomy templates should have a reference that supports the recognition of the taxon in question and its stated parent taxon. In practice, many templates lack a reference. Plantdrew (talk) 20:10, 6 March 2023 (UTC)
Indeed. I've tried to be strict in adding references in any taxonomy template I create or edit, but it does slow down fixing "obvious" errors and organising the taxonomy for whole groups. Perhaps we should start a category for unreferenced taxonomy templates. Unfortunately, I think they may be the majority. It might be possible to add a special parameter to taxonomy templates to indicate that a particular source is used for that taxon and its subordinate taxa, e.g. |taxon_ref=WoRMS (using a proper citation) in the {{Taxonomy/Gastropoda}} template or |taxon_ref=AGP IV for angiosperms. —  Jts1882 | talk  20:34, 6 March 2023 (UTC)
Taxonomy is usually referenced in the text of the article in question, which I think is usually enough. Hemiauchenia (talk) 22:20, 7 March 2023 (UTC)
@Hemiauchenia: the placement in the immediate parent is usually stated and referenced, but not all the higher taxa that are shown in the taxobox. I think it should be possible to find a reference for each of these via the taxonomy template hierarchy. If nothing else, the refs in taxonomy templates are a resource for editors. Peter coxhead (talk) 22:35, 7 March 2023 (UTC)
It would be possible, but it would be incredibly onerous to do so for something that ultimately does not direct affect readers. Automatic taxobox temples by design only document the immediate parent rank, with the taxonomy of the parent presumably documented by its own article. Hemiauchenia (talk) 22:40, 7 March 2023 (UTC)
I don't think anyone is suggesting going back through existing taxonomy templates and adding refs where absent, but I believe they should included when a template is created, and be added if the parent taxon is changed. Peter coxhead (talk) 23:09, 7 March 2023 (UTC)

Thanks for interesting responses to my question. I have been trying to understand the Catalogue of Life Checklist which seems to be an attempt at a single classification based on consensus views from experts in different areas. They do make the case for the advantages of a single classification. There are a series of six papers published in 2021 they have released called "Towards a global list of accepted species 1" (to VI). I presume they would hope Wikipedia adopts their classification. I am hoping to get round to reading more about it and perhaps editing some Wikipedia articles... — Preceding unsigned comment added by Gourdiehill (talk • contribs) 21:12, 7 March 2023 (UTC)

@Gourdiehill:, the problem with Catalogue of Life's classification is that it achieves monophyly by (mostly) ignoring extinct organisms, and changing the ranks of traditionally recognized groups that are inescapably paraphyletic. This goes for some other databases that to present a classification of all (extant) organisms. COL treats Osteichthyes as a "parvphylum" (traditionally it is a class, and is paraphyletic with respect to amphibians, reptiles, birds and mammals which are also traditionally treated as classes (and reptiles of course are paraphyletic with respect to birds)). Paraphyly of Osteichthyes is "solved" by elevating to parvphylum. COL "solves" the paraphyly of reptiles by splitting them into 4 (extant) classes and completely ignoring dinosaurs. For plants, paraphyly is "solved" by demoting 8 taxa traditionally recognized as divisions (or phyla) to classes, and ignoring anything extinct (actually, the paraphyly isn't solved at all, since COL recognizes a class Magnoliopsida corresponding to dicots and Liliopsida corresponding to monocots; dicots, in the loose circumscription adopted by COL, are paraphyletic with respect to monocots), Plantdrew (talk) 22:06, 7 March 2023 (UTC)
@Plantdrew
thanks for giving me some detail about that. I think their view is that it is not possible yet to build a correct classification and that an incorrect one which everybody uses is the best alternative. I will try and read up on the examples you refer to. Gourdiehill Gourdiehill (talk) 15:29, 8 March 2023 (UTC)
An incorrect classification is incorrect regardless of how many people use it. Peter coxhead (talk) 22:02, 8 March 2023 (UTC)
Exactly, which is why modern cladistics has abandoned most higher ranks. Hemiauchenia (talk) 22:10, 8 March 2023 (UTC)
Hi, not sure if anyone has mentioned this already in the thread but direct scientific references are more reliable than CoL. CoL is indeed a huge attempt at condensing all the taxonomic information, however it does not catch up very fast with the latest information. Not just fossil groups, but also extant groups that are being discovered or revised in the last 4 years.
In Adl et al. (2019) an alternative to CoL for eukaryotes (especially protists) is shown, called UniEuk, which has in its website a treemap of the different groups (here). But like I said, catalogues are unreliable when dealing with newly discovered organisms and newly-revised classifications.
This is the reason why Taxonomy of Protista utilizes many papers post-2019, even though it is largely based on the 2019 publication. It's all just a matter of trying to update everything to date. The only reason why there are many non-automatic taxoboxes with old classifications (at least in WikiProject Protista) is because they haven't been yet converted. ☽ Snoteleks ☾ 16:56, 16 March 2023 (UTC)

Since @Gourdiehill: brought up the series of papers I was involved in as part of the Global_Species_List_Working_Group the first paper in the series from 2020 is on Wikisource here. Ok with respect to Catalogue of Life, they are changing things significantly but for their release of CoL+ rather than the current iteration. The problem CoL has had is they are using roughly 180 checklists to develop their species list and there is problematic conflict resolution in this. The series of 6 papers released are also all available I can provide them to anyone interested went into the development of a governence system for a single global species list and ways to assess the quality of the various checklists on different organisms around the world. This system still being developed is being developed in conjunction with CoL and many other checklists.

@Peter coxhead: brought up the issue of fossils, and as a paleontologist I wish there was a better answer, unfortunately the vast majority of users of scientific names want them effectively excluded, at least the older ones that have no living relatives. We actually surveyed the international scientific community on this and the results of that is in press. However myself and several others have fought not to have this happen. In my own works I am one of the few vertebrate taxonomists that actually does phylogenies with all living and fossil material combined so I certainly am against this. But we do have to find a way to reconcile them. Unfortunately a number of fosssil groups have determined to use PhyloCode over ICZN and this also creates areas of conflict as the two systems are not entirely compatable and yield vastly different results in higher order classification. Most end users of taxonomy refuse to use PhyloCode as it is not accepted as a nomenclatural system by the IUBS and hence has no legislative support with respect to the work many users do in the fields of Medicine, Conservation etc. It takes up to 10 years to change the nomenclature in the legislative framework for CITES for example.

As for what Wikipedia should do, well it depends on what your role is as you see it. On wikispecies we are more and more following the recommendations of the GSLWG as it is becomming an industry standard (at request of IUCN and CITES also) and already has the support of legislative bodies around the world. Which is why when I add turtles to Wikispecies I always standardise the higher order taxonomy according to that standard. Which means this is what ends up in Wikidata also. Checklists that do not meet these Governance standards will in the end not be used in the development of the Global List of Species, which will in the end be managed by CoL+ once it is released. Wikipedia is an encyclopedia, ie review level taxonomy only, my suggestion would be follow the checklists because they are being reviewed using internationally accepted metrics, but its up to you all how you do it.We have a meetuing in two weeks to finalise the metrics that will be applied to this issue.

This is an onging problem and not one with a direct solution right now but it is in process. I thought you should all be aware. If anyone wants more info or any of our papers let me know. Cheers Scott Thomson (Faendalimas) talk 12:40, 9 March 2023 (UTC)

(Just to note that actually it was Plantdrew who brought up the issue of fossils and CoL above, although I have elsewhere stressed the importance of handling fossil taxa consistently. Peter coxhead (talk) 14:28, 9 March 2023 (UTC))
oops apologies for that yes I got you both mixed up cheers Scott Thomson (Faendalimas) talk 14:31, 9 March 2023 (UTC)
The series of six GSLWG papers can be found at this Springerlink search page. They are open access. I read three of them yesterday (I,II, VI) and it was interesting to see some of the problems I had generally recognised laid out clearly, along with additional ones that were completely new to me.
My general feeling about CoL is that it can be divided into its higher level taxonomy which is essentially just a cataloguing structure (which includes some archaic taxonomy concepts) and the group taxonomies which are modern phylogenetic taxonomies. The latter are only as good as the source databases. Some are very good, well-curated and updated regularly, while others are surprisingly outdated (e.g. birds and mammals) because they rely on generic sources rather than specialist databases. —  Jts1882 | talk  17:00, 9 March 2023 (UTC)
I actually try to avoid using CoL, because I have found it has serious limitations- outright excluding some widely recognized genera from its database (e.g., Nalepella). Edward-Woodrow (talk) 21:51, 9 March 2023 (UTC)
@Edward-Woodrow: It is important to remember that Global Lists such as CoL, same goes for Wikispecies, WORMS etc are syntheses of the available checklists upon which they rely. For CoL this is some 180 Checklists. If taxa are missing from those Checklists they cannot add them and to correct CoL in any lasting way requires that the CheckLists they rely on are corrected. The other point is the purpose of the lists in Question. As a taxonomist I almost never use CoL my own lists of the taxa I work with are far more detailed and precise as they need to be as I am actively working with those taxa. But for resource managers, Government agencies etc these Global lists are a good summary. Cheers Scott Thomson (Faendalimas) talk 00:57, 10 March 2023 (UTC)
As a fairly relevant aside, as I have pointed out to Scott on several occasions, the ICZN and the Zoological Code are equipped to accept definitive, discipline-specific, authority lists that are demonstrably achieved via consensus of large groups of appropriate taxonomic experts (under Article 79 in the ICZN Code). It is my own belief that this particular pathway is, at least in the near term, going to be a necessary "stepping stone" if we are ever to achieve stability in both nomenclature and in taxonomy in ANY discipline, let alone across all of biology. So long as it is possible for disputes to fester, unresolved, there will be problems; if, however, each discipline can achieve a consensus list of names, and a consensus classification, share and maintain these on the internet, and taxonomists working in those disciplines agree to adhere to those consensus schema, then we can finally have an easier time making sense of things (and waste a lot less time arguing). Oddly enough, despite the lack of authority, much of the content of Wikipedia and Wikispecies serves the same purpose, and helps contribute to stability, not unlike the proverbial tail wagging the dog. That's a major reason I commit to spending my time and energy here. Dyanega (talk) 00:13, 10 March 2023 (UTC)
Heya @Dyanega: yes we have had many discussions over LANs, I agree with you the section could be a major stabiliser of nomenclature. I tried at one time to start the idea of doing one for reptiles but the support for it under the current wording of Article 79 was low. It was felt the outcome did not achieve a value addition comparable to the workload it would require. Specifically in terms of the 5 year rule, time taken to ratify it and unclear means for updating. Note in Reptiles its biggest value would be a tool for quashing vandalism hence updates would be essential. These concerns led to my submissions on improvements to the wording of Article 79. Cheers Scott Thomson (Faendalimas) talk 00:37, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

Cephalotaxus: Cephalotaxaceae or Taxaceae?

I noticed when Elmutanto (talk · contribs) was changing the taxonomy of gymnosperms based on the proposed classification scheme of Yang et al. 2022 (which I think may have been premature) that they changed the automatic taxobox classification of Cephalotaxus to Cephalotaxaceae rather than Taxaceae as it had been previously. I known reading the literature that "Cephalotaxaceae" is widely used, but does it have consensus amongst the major authorities? Regardless, I don't think we need a separate article on Cephalotaxaceae. given that Cephalotaxus is the only member of the family. Hemiauchenia (talk) 22:31, 20 March 2023 (UTC)

I will usually look to the literature and then see what the gymnosperm database at https://www.conifers.org/ are doing, with a preference to following the latter.--Kevmin § 22:38, 20 March 2023 (UTC)
Looking at their taxonomy, [1] they include Cephalotaxaceae within Taxaceae. Hemiauchenia (talk) 23:21, 20 March 2023 (UTC)
Then we should use Taxaceae. Chiswick Chap (talk) 08:54, 21 March 2023 (UTC)
Plants of the World Online also uses Taxaceae, so I agree that we should. We should (almost) never change classifications based on individual papers, but on the consensus of major taxonomic databases. Peter coxhead (talk) 09:23, 21 March 2023 (UTC)
Nearly all the usual database sources are using the Christenhusz et al (2011) classification, which remained unchanged in his 2017 Plants of the World. An article on Cephalotaxaceae is premature and probably not necessary even if ultimated accepted as a family. What is surprising is that orders Cupressales and Araucariales don't have articles and that they are still covered at order level in Pinales. That seems a much more pressing need if someone wants to wwrite new articles. —  Jts1882 | talk  16:12, 21 March 2023 (UTC)
Speaking of higher-rank classification of conifers, Elmutanto also created Cupressidae following the definition of Yang et al. 2022. Apparently the usual definition of this clade is just monotypic containg Cupressales. Should this be changed into something else? Hemiauchenia (talk) 23:57, 21 March 2023 (UTC)

Merging Nucleariid amoebae as a single page

As stated in Wikipedia:Requested_moves/Technical_requests, I'm proposing the merging of both pages Cristidiscoidea and Nucleariida into a single page Nucleariid. Here is my explanation. There are three completely different classifications of these organisms (that I know of):

  1. As a single order Rotosphaerida. This one is the most extended among protistologists and seems to be the original classification (see this review of nucleariid amoebae by Galardón et al. 2022, and also Adl et al. 2019 and Siver et al. 2022).
  2. As a new Kingdom Nucleariae with two phyla (Nuclearida & Fonticulida). This system appears to be partly sedimented within Wikipedia but I haven't found any mentions of it outside of the original paper which introduced it (see Tendersoo et al. 2018).
  3. As a monotypic subphylum Paramycia with class Cristidiscoidea. This was Cavalier-Smith's take on the nucleariid classification (see his latest, post-mortem paper) and for that reason it's pretty widespread. However the subphylum itself belongs to the paraphyletic phylum "Choanozoa", a taxon that is not accepted by anyone else.

The informal name "nucleariid amoebae" agglutinates all amoebae in these groups. For this reason, I believe the title "Nucleariid" for a common page will avoid any controversial use of one name over the other. How many of you would support this? ☽ Snoteleks ☾ 13:54, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

Would we not then also have to merge Fonticulida and Parvularia? Chiswick Chap (talk) 14:03, 23 March 2023 (UTC)
I don't think so, from what it looks like Fonticula and Parvularia are two different genera. ☽ Snoteleks ☾ 14:36, 23 March 2023 (UTC)
Oh wait I think I see what you mean. The answer is Fonticulida would be moved to Fonticula. Since Parvularia is already a genus-level taxon page it doesn't need any changes. ☽ Snoteleks ☾ 14:36, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

Module talk:Science redirect#Edit request 2 April 2023

Your feedback and/or implementation is appreciated at this edit request. Izno (talk) 18:52, 11 April 2023 (UTC)

Project-independent quality assessments

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

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

However, if your project has decided to "opt out" and follow a non-standard quality assessment approach, all you have to do is modify your wikiproject banner template to pass {{WPBannerMeta}} a new |QUALITY_CRITERIA=custom parameter. If this is done, changes to the general quality assessment will be ignored, and your project-level assessment will be displayed and used to create categories, as at present. Aymatth2 (talk) 21:41, 13 April 2023 (UTC)

Patternless delma vs Olive legless lizard

Hi all. We have an issue regarding Patternless delma. This article been created twice by two users with the common name 'Patternless delma', with the IUCN also utilizing that name. However, the common name 'Olive legless lizard' seems to be more robustly sourced, with 64 hits on Google Scholar vs 9 for 'Patternless delma'. @Pvmoutside and I were having a discussion on the talk page, and would like to hear from other editors to weigh in on what is the more appropriate title. For the life of me, I can't understand why the IUCN has chosen this apparently minor common name. Have other editors experienced this? SuperTah (talk) 11:35, 3 April 2023 (UTC)

@SuperTah:, I'm pretty sure IUCN just goes with whatever common name(s) that have been selected by the authors of an assessment. I'm certain I've seen typos/misspelling in IUCN common names, although I can't point to any examples at the moment. It wouldn't surprise me if there were multiple organisms with the same common name in the IUCN database. For organisms that are endemic to non-English speaking countries, IUCN has sometimes labelled names of non-English etymology as English, with no common name listed for the language spoken in the country where the species occurs. The IUCN entry for Aphanius anatoliae used to have "Dislisazancik baligi" listed as an English common name; that name is now listed as Turkish, but if you check FishBase, the Turkish spelling has several diacritics that aren't given in IUCN. The IUCN still shows Alburnus kotschyi with "Iskenderun Shah Kuli" as an supposed English name and no Turkish name. IUCN has deleted their record for the undescribed Mexican fish "Perritos de sandia", but that was (according to IUCN) an "English" name. In short, IUCN gets sloppy with their common names, and there is no guarantee that the names they show are either more widely used or more recognizable than any alternatives. Plantdrew (talk) 22:03, 11 April 2023 (UTC)
I forgot I had some notes about problematic IUCN common names:
Mexican dace; IUCN uses this common name for three species
Michoacan deer mouse; IUCN uses for two species
Kahuzi swamp shrew; IUCN uses for two species
Vily; Malagasy term for various small fishes (akin to English "minnow"?); IUCN has decided it's a common name for just Teramulus kieneri
Staghorn coral; IUCN uses for three species; name is commonly used for the entire family Acroporidae; Wikipedia article at this title is the species Acropora cervicornis (epithet translates to staghorn)
Yellownape tripplefin; misspelling on IUCN and Fishbase; both have other common names with "triplefin"
Corded purg; article created at this title in 2007 by Polbot, based on IUCN data. IUCN now has the common name as "corded pyrg" (other Pyrgulopsis also have "pyrg"). Appears to have been a typograhical error at IUCN that was corrected sometime after 2007. Plantdrew (talk) 00:28, 13 April 2023 (UTC)
@Plantdrew Ah super, thank you very much! This is interesting. Seems like the IUCN isn't as reliable as I thought they were, as per your numerous examples. I wouldn't be surprised that a somewhat obscure species such as Delma inornata there could have been a bit less care taken with selecting a commonly used 'common name'. Perhaps this info can get some energy back into the conversation on the talk page. SuperTah (talk) 07:09, 14 April 2023 (UTC)

Stramenopile or Heterokont?

We have since at least 2008 had this pair of articles covering what is now the same taxon with two different names, both rather familiar to biologists. Heterokont is the older name, so might have precedence, but its definition has shifted as genomics has come to bear and it seems that the newer name Stramenopile is becoming accepted as the name of the clade (e.g. "A Phylogenomic Framework to Study the Diversity and Evolution of Stramenopiles (=Heterokonts)", Derelle et al 2016). Suggestions for a merge have been made in 2008, in 2014, in 2021, and now again in 2023 from User:Snoteleks, so it is about time we merged the two. I actually don't care which direction the merge is in, but as I've just mentioned, it looks as if Stramenopile is probably the best name at the moment. The team's thoughts would be gratefully appreciated. Chiswick Chap (talk) 11:31, 16 March 2023 (UTC)

Thank you @Chiswick Chap. I support the transfer into Stramenopiles since it appears to be more in use by the latest classifications (such as "Revisions to the Classification, Nomenclature, and Diversity of Eukaryotes", Adl et al. 2019). The older Heterokonta name should still appear as a clear synonym both in the lead of the page, the taxobox synonyms and perhaps an entire section dedicated to the history of both names (maybe inside a bigger section on the taxonomic history?). This joining will definitely be good for every page that links to either of these, since it will stop confusing readers that might end up thinking they are two different clades. ☽ Snoteleks ☾ 12:05, 16 March 2023 (UTC)
I support as well, though it might be worthwhile to put a formal merge request on the appropriate page as well. - UtherSRG (talk) 12:14, 16 March 2023 (UTC)
I also prefere Stramenopiles: In Talk:Heterokont I wrote
A) The consensual position of many protistologists – taxon of no formal rank Stramenopiles Patterson 1989, emend. Adl et al. 2005 [syn. Heterokonta Cavalier-Smith, 1981 stat. n. 2017] (2018; DOI 10.1111/jeu.12691; PMID 30257078) (btw implicitly accepted by all recent systems using SAR)
B) Broadly accepted is also the last Cavalier-Smith's system – Superphylum Heterokonta Cavalier-Smith, 1981 stat. n. 2017 (stramenopiles) (2017; DOI 10.1007/s00709-017-1147-3; PMID 28875267 - Table 1) (btw implicitly accepted by all recent systems using Halvaria or Harosa)
Both respect the valid recent diagnosis of the clade/taxon. I would prefer A) because B) is formally a junior synonym and because Heterokonta is sometimes used with different diagnosis (=Ochrophyta/Heterokontophyta or =Xanthophyceae). But there may be other opinion – e.g. preferring the formal taxon with specified rank (superphylum). To be frank, I don't know the consensual position of phycologists; maybe somebody could add for better support of the final decision. --Petr Karel (talk) 13:27, 16 March 2023 (UTC)
I also can add a different recent cladistic proposal:
C) clade name Stramenopila C. J. Alexopoulos, C. W. Mims, and M. Blackwell 1996 [A. G. B. Simpson and M. Dunthorn], converted clade name (DE QUEIROZ, K.; CANTINO, P. D.; GAUTHIER, J. A. Phylonyms: A companion to the PhyloCode. Boca Raton, FL: CRC PressTaylor & Francis Group, 2020. ISBN 978-1-138-33293-5. Section 1, Registration Number: 103) --Petr Karel (talk) 13:43, 16 March 2023 (UTC)
This group is one of the few that have taken up use of a List of Available Names per article 79 of the ICZN, in there they seem to be using Stramenopile and as such this is the valid name, as this is an accepted LAN this name is accepted irrespective of any other inferred priority. So I also would support this nomenclature. Cheers Scott Thomson (Faendalimas) talk 13:50, 16 March 2023 (UTC)

OK, I think we agree that we should merge them, and in the direction Heterokont to Stramenopile. I'll propose that on their talk pages. Chiswick Chap (talk) 16:44, 16 March 2023 (UTC)

Yes, it's bizarre that the two articles have coexisted for so long. A merge is necessary.
I've always considered Heterokonta the proper name as it is older, hence with precedence and the senior synonym, and stramenopiles always seemed more like a vernacular name. But clearly the trend is towards stramenopiles, as without it the SAR supergroup makes little sense. The alternative is to consistently use the Cavalier-Smith names, so Heterokonta in Harosa, which he has recently redefined to include Telonema (i.e. =TSAR), Corticata for Diaphoretickes, etc. But there seems a reluctance to do this, even though his names would often seem to have precedence. Having recently waded though his 2022 classification and seen his frequent dismissal of names by others for not complying with the code, or not falling under the code when they do, or for basically coining a name without understanding the proper cell biology, I can't help wonder if this is a bit personal.
Anyway I'd support the move either way and stramenopiles seems the best choice. I notice that the Burki et al (2020) review uses Stramenopila (the phylocode name mentioned above) which sounds like a proper taxon name. Also, I can't find the ICZN list of names so would appreciate a link. —  Jts1882 | talk  17:59, 16 March 2023 (UTC)
It looks as if the Heterokontists have been in decline for some years, and that the Stramenopilists have been on the rise. Recent papers all seem to use S, with H in parentheses. Anyway, I've put the formal thingy at Talk:Stramenopile#Merger proposal. Chiswick Chap (talk) 19:26, 16 March 2023 (UTC)
Frankly I've also noticed Cavalier-Smith's personal vendetta against certain aspects of modern classification. In his 1998 "A revised six-kingdom system of life" he wrote much slander against preferring to use monophyletic taxa over paraphyletic taxa, saying that it's "dogmatic" and "confusing" (even though the terminology he used was only used by him and his vision was a subjective "balance" between cladistics and phenetics, as he himself writes). It's no surprise his classification is falling out of use, it's a very stubborn attempt to maintain paraphyletic groupings when the trend is the complete opposite. ☽ Snoteleks ☾ 23:36, 16 March 2023 (UTC)
Tom Cavalier-Smith (1942–2021) did seem to hold out for his views until his death. I assume he handed the text of the 2022 paper to the journal's editors while he was still alive, or we may start to wonder where some of that ghostly IP editing to Tree of Life articles is coming from ... Chiswick Chap (talk) 09:54, 17 March 2023 (UTC)
Ah, I hadn't realised he had died. The 2022 paper was submitted in late 2020 and accepted just after his death. That might explain the poor copy editing and apparent errors in the text. I wonder if his new names for the Rhodophyte-Rhodelphis-Picomonas groupings will stick? —  Jts1882 | talk  13:35, 17 March 2023 (UTC)
To be fair I think Rhodaria (Rhodophytes+Rhodelphis+Picomonas) do appear as monophyletic in other papers that aren't his own, so I think they will stick. Biliphyta won't, but only because it also contains glaucophytes, making it paraphyletic. ☽ Snoteleks ☾ 13:47, 17 March 2023 (UTC)
You are right, Rhodaria proposed by Cavalier-Smith (supported by both chloroplast- and nuclear-coded multiprotein trees) are recovered as clade (i. e. monophyletic) in other recent studies e. g. by Schön et al. (2021) or Yazaki et al. (2022), so it is a usefull name. When I tried to apply it in the Archaeplastida classification box, I found out that it is occupied in wikipedia for a synonym for a moth genus Pyrausta. I think it is time to move the article to new name "Rhodaria (moth)" to have "Rhodaria" free for the archaeplastid inner clade. Petr Karel (talk) 08:36, 14 April 2023 (UTC)
Agreed. ☽ Snoteleks ☾ 08:39, 14 April 2023 (UTC)
Another thing to consider for the merge is templates in the automated taxobox system. Most currently use Heterokonta. Only Bacillariophyta uses Stramenopiles. This raises a broader issue on the automated taxobox system, which currently uses Chromista, Hacrobia (both not generally supported), Harosa (instead of SAR), and Halvaria (is there an alternative for SAR+Alveolata?). These need to be updated, which shouldn't be too difficult as only a few templates need editing, but we do need to decide on what taxonomy to use and a good source. This has come up before with no consensus resolution, which means Chromista remains (it's easy to source). I would suggest Adl et al (2019) for the main framework, but iirc there was resistance to this when last discussed. —  Jts1882 | talk  17:17, 17 March 2023 (UTC)
As a cladist, I support the use of either Harosa or SAR, Harosa sounds better as a formal name but if the consensus is SAR I'd have no issue with it. But Hacrobia definitely needs to go away, especially after Alveidia has ceased to exist because of Provora, and Hacrobia is starting to get polyphyletic in a consistent manner (see: the CAM clade Cryptista+Archaeplastida+Microheliella).
Chromista needs to go too, because of the same reason: Chromista is paraphyletic because of Cryptista being closer to Archaeplastida. It's the same reasoning behind not using the kingdom Protozoa when it comes to Obazoa, Malawimonadida, Discoba or others; the kingdoms are just too paraphyletic. I also suggest Adl et al. (2019) for the main framework, as it is the main reference used for Taxonomy of Protista. What is the point of automated taxoboxes if they can't be updated according to the latest phylogenies? ☽ Snoteleks ☾ 17:32, 17 March 2023 (UTC)
The sooner Chromista goes the better. SAR on the other hand is a clade, and a much better-known name than Harosa. Chiswick Chap (talk) 18:11, 17 March 2023 (UTC)
@Snoteleks: I see you have started editing the automated taxonomy templates (e.g. {{Taxonomy/Bigyra}}). It would help if you added references. The lack of sources in the taxonomy templates is a major problem with the automated taxonomy system, which isn't exempted from Wikipedia guidelines on reliable sources just because the information is in a template. While updating the taxonomy we should take the opportunity to properly source the taxonomy. —  Jts1882 | talk  13:21, 18 March 2023 (UTC)
Yeah I know, I noticed that the reference (originally added by me) still keeps the name Heterokonta. I completely agree, the unreferenced taxonomy templates is a big issue. I always try to add references to those whenever I can, especially if I create them or need to modify them. ☽ Snoteleks ☾ 17:16, 18 March 2023 (UTC)
If following Adl et al (2019) should Bigyra and Gyrista be phyla?
I've created a new template {{Taxonomy/Diaphoretickes/displayed}} with |always_display=yes and used it as parent for {{Taxonomy/TSAR}}. This results in the taxobox showing Diaphoretickes and Eukaryota rather TSAR as the top rank. This should probably also be used for Haptista and Cryptista when they are removed from Chromista, but not for plants where it has been decided that Plantae or Archaeplastida should be the top taxon displayed. —  Jts1882 | talk  18:09, 18 March 2023 (UTC)
Now that's ingenious. Chiswick Chap (talk) 19:22, 18 March 2023 (UTC)
Excellent. And yes, I guess Bigyra and Gyrista are phyla. That brings into question what we should do with Ochrophytina since it is more widely known as Ochrophyta... ☽ Snoteleks ☾ 19:46, 18 March 2023 (UTC)

Taxonbar template for tables

I've created a request regarding this at Wikipedia:Requested templates#Taxonbar template for tables to determine how difficult they would be to create; there has been some discussion on how to do this in the past, but any members of TOL have thoughts on the two different proposals I have made there, please share them either here or there. Please do not object at this time to the general notion of up-merging some species articles; these discussions are simply to determine how taxonbars can be included in tables - I will be opening other discussions where such comments will be welcome and appropriate. BilledMammal (talk) 06:46, 8 April 2023 (UTC)

I don't think you can separate the issue of merging species into list articles and creating taxonbar output suitable for the species list tables, but here are a few comments.
  • The taxonbar essentially contains a list of identifiers in a cell of a table so the module can be modified to produce a simple list output if there is a need. However, the code is quite convoluted so I don't think it is a trivial change.
  • The taxonbar output is of interest only to some readers. I use it a lot, but appreciate many have no interest and you don't want to overwhelm other readers with specialist information they are not interested in. That is why the taxonbar is at the bottom of the article, readily accessible to those who want the information, and out of the way of those who don't.
  • Your collapsible list option, hides the information, at least for those using desktop view. But unless it has changed recently, collapsible elements don't work in mobile view so the whole output would be visible. Depending what else is in the table, it could come to dominate.
  • Your note scheme ends up with a table with a list of species followed by a list of taxonbars. While it keeps the taxonbar output in a separate place, it's not a very nice format if there more than a few species.
  • At the moment the taxonbar doesn't appear in mobile view, as it is a navbox. How would your two schemes handle this. You don't want a footnote with no content or a cell with no content. Furthermore, there has been discussion that changes will be made so that the taxonbar is visible in mobile, so this should also be considered.
  • The taxonbars for species where there are different views on the binomial name often have entries for more than one name. How would you handle this?
—  Jts1882 | talk  08:30, 8 April 2023 (UTC)
For the collapsible list option, I suspect that for mobile users we would have to hide the information entirely? In line with current practice, it may be the best to always hide table taxonbars from mobile users - I also doubt that they are useful for mobile users. BilledMammal (talk) 18:36, 8 April 2023 (UTC)
For the note schema, we would need to do something to handle how the taxonbars are displayed at the bottom - one option I considered was for them not to be displayed at all.
Currently, for species with multiple different views on the binomial name, do we include multiple taxonbars? If we do then I think the note option can handle this by including multiple notes; the list option is less clear. BilledMammal (talk) 18:36, 8 April 2023 (UTC)
See Acanthocalycium thionanthum subsp. glaucum for an example of what we currently do with multiple names. * Pppery * it has begun... 02:12, 9 April 2023 (UTC)
With the note option that would display like this: [note 1].
I don't think there is a way of suppressing the note list at the bottom. You can specify where it is with {{notelist}} but otherwise it will be displayed at the bottom. However, I don't think we want the list suppressed. If someone wants to check a number of links the static navbar is much easier than the popup list, especially when there are many items.
If the note approach was chosen, does the template needs changing? Any choices of display for mobile would have to be done another way, e.g. with templatestyles. —  Jts1882 | talk  07:07, 9 April 2023 (UTC)
That actually looks quite good; the only issue is that it extends over the side of the notebox, but I believe that can be addressed, and it addresses the issue raised by Peter coxhead. BilledMammal (talk) 02:22, 12 April 2023 (UTC)
The note option is abysmal.
It's important that anyone who works on taxonbars understands that by "taxon", Wikidata actually means "taxon name". Hence many taxa rightly have multiple entries in Wikidata, one for each synonym. It would be quite wrong to include only the taxonbar values for the accepted name listed in the table, since this would often miss out important taxonomic databases that, for whatever reason, use alternative names. See Category:Taxonbars with multiple manual Wikidata items which shows there are currently over 13,000 articles with multiple taxon names in the taxonbars. For an example with five see Acmispon prostratus. (Acmispon species have been moved around regularly, and will often still be found in different genera.) Peter coxhead (talk) 08:36, 9 April 2023 (UTC)
How odd. The preview of [Note 1] in my comment above works in edit mode (showing a taxonbar in the popup), but on the saved page the preview shows the first section on this talk page: "Carabidae.org has left the building". Why would it do that? —  Jts1882 | talk  11:53, 9 April 2023 (UTC)
Because you added a group, you need to include a template telling the system where to put that note; see the subsection below. BilledMammal (talk) 02:09, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

I'm glad that people have finally circled back around to this topic, after earlier issues about content forking and page merges. It sounds like a technical fix to display multiple taxonbars may be attainable, but please do bear with my concerns about when and when not to merge, and issues with tables. Briefly, I can certainly see a "clutter reduction" utility when, for example, there are multiple higher taxon pages of different ranks that are all just lists of constituent sub-taxa and have no other text. In insects, at least, it is fairly common for a family page to have a lot of text, and I would not merge lower ranks into the family page under those circumstances. But it is ALSO not uncommon for a subfamily article to be nothing more than a list of tribes, each of which in turn is an article containing a list of genera, or even a list of subtribes. In such cases, I can see that merging all of the "list-only" articles into a tabular form would work, and make navigating the taxonomic hierarchy a little more straightforward. At the other end of this scale, I would be concerned about merging species articles into a single table in a genus article unless those species have - essentially - no actual text (i.e., nothing beyond distribution, year described, or maybe host data), and unless most of the species in the genus have data to include in the table. If you have a moment, look at the genus article for Trogoderma. It's almost entirely redlinks, like 130 of them, and a handful of actual species articles. But 4 of those actual articles refer to pest species about which there is information and text, and one of them (the Khapra beetle) has a rather substantial individual article. I would never want to see a species-level article like that reduced to a simple table entry because of a merge. But I also point to the Trogoderma article as an example of what I earlier voiced as a problem with making a table; every one of those redlinked names would have a large number of empty "cells" in a table, and waste a lot of space. The more columns in the table, the more blank spaces, for every redlinked name. Over the past 2 decades editing WP articles, I've seen hundreds of genus articles with over 100 species, and very, VERY few of those articles are NOT mostly redlinks. I don't feel great about pushing forward with this if it's just trading one form of wastefulness (too many forky, listy articles) for another (large sprawling tables with hundreds or thousands of cells, only a handful having any content). I have no objection to having the ability to do this sort of thing, but would advocate using it sparingly. Dyanega (talk) 23:05, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

When to merge is a discussion to have after we determine how to merge, but articles like Khapra beetle and Trogoderma variabile will not be considered for merger; they clearly meet the criteria for a standalone article. BilledMammal (talk) 18:58, 13 April 2023 (UTC)
Why would the decision to merge be independent of how to merge? If the decision is not to merge then all the discussion of how to merge is completely pointless. —  Jts1882 | talk  19:22, 13 April 2023 (UTC)
Because there are practical objections to merging that need to be overcome before we can determine if merging is suitable. BilledMammal (talk) 20:00, 13 April 2023 (UTC)
(edit conflict) I've been trying to articulate a distinction between how to merge, when to merge and whether to merge at User talk:BilledMammal/NSPECIES. "How" is mechanics; taxonbars in tables, categories (redirect and standard), change talk page assessment, etc. "When" is individual articles; e.g. not merging Khapra beetle, but perhaps merging Trogoderma primum (the least developed Trogoderma species article). "Whether" is whether to merge at all, versus long standing practice of having each species covered in an individual article (often a stub). Discussing "how" to merge may end up being pointless if there's isn't support for "whether" to merge (I'm not sold on that), but I think BilledMammal is engaging in good faith in terms of reaching out to TOL to discuss the potential mechanics. Plantdrew (talk) 20:06, 13 April 2023 (UTC)
I think there are enough cases where merging would be desirable IF we can find a format that is efficient. I'll point to another example of an existing page that shows some of the issues we face: Aeonium. This article has BOTH a list of species, and a table. the table is not alphabetical, so it is not user-friendly, and it is mostly wasted space because the photos in the third column are large relative to the tiny amount of text in the other columns. This is certainly not a suitable candidate to merge species articles into, also because the taxonbar is just for the genus alone, and the table is not really an improvement over the list. Dyanega (talk) 20:29, 13 April 2023 (UTC)
I've alphabetized the table at Aeonium, checked the species against POWO and removed the additional list.Plantdrew (talk) 00:30, 14 April 2023 (UTC)
RE: trying to fit a taxonbar into a table: would it be possible to arrange the table so the taxonbar is placed below each entry, like a divider? SilverTiger12 (talk) 18:30, 14 April 2023 (UTC)

Notes

  1. ^

Carabidae.org has left the building

Carabidae.org appears to have long been used as the authoritative reference for Carabidae taxa - we have ~7.4k active links to the site [2]. Unfortunately, and I don't know when that happened, they seem to have switched to a subscription model [3] which has disabled all direct links. As a consequence, what we've got now are 7.4k x 404 errors. Example subfamily, example genus, example species.

What to do? Many, possibly the majority of these articles (hard to tell without Quarry-ing, I suspect) are only sourced to this reference. Those would need to be switched over to CoL or some other database that would be expected to include all these taxa. In other cases the ref could possibly just be deleted if other sources are also given. In either case some bot assist would be needed due to the sheer volume. (Dropping a note at Beetle project) --Elmidae (talk · contribs) 13:11, 13 January 2023 (UTC)

It's been subscription for some time. I have some notes in a file that was last updated in June 2022 that says it is subscription. A lot of the pages are available on archive.org, e.g. brachininae so possibly a bot could convert to archived links. Shame it doesn't use a template as then we could just add the archive url.
An alternative source is the checklist at CarabCat, which is not the most user friendly interface. Fortunately, it's the source used by CoL so you can get most of the information there. —  Jts1882 | talk  13:43, 13 January 2023 (UTC)
is GBIF also a valid alternative ? Edisstrange (talk) 01:09, 14 January 2023 (UTC)
I don't see why not. They both use Carabcat as their source. It would be interesting to know how often CoL and GBIF update their records. —  Jts1882 | talk  15:08, 14 January 2023 (UTC)
CoL does monthly updates, but I'm not sure they comprise complete sweeps. --Elmidae (talk · contribs) 15:19, 14 January 2023 (UTC)
I suppose the real question is here, why would anyone pay €50 a year for a list like this? Also lol [4] the sole purpose of [Fominykh et al. 2020] was to describe new taxa in order to sell their paratypes. Is this actually something that happens? I would support using CarabCat as a replacement. Hemiauchenia (talk) 21:01, 15 January 2023 (UTC)
Describing the paper as "excellent" is an odd choice of words given the accusation. There is some market for biological specimens. I suppose the value for these wouldn't be as paratypes per se, but as specimens of a "new species" that have been definitively identified (i.e., identified by the describer of the species). Plantdrew (talk) 22:25, 15 January 2023 (UTC)
I don't think CarabCat is suitable because there seems to be no way to make hard links to individual entries, while this can be done for both GBIF and CoL. However, for both of those websites as well, the link consists of the ID (GBIF, CoL) and can't be generated from the taxon name without going through the search interface. Hmm. - Qbugbot linked to CoL during its runs, so presumably this has been solved? Maybe the bot could be employed to help in the changeover? Pinging @Edibobb: for his opinion. --Elmidae (talk · contribs) 09:40, 16 January 2023 (UTC)
I can fix these with qBugbot. It can get to it in March. CoL may be the best reference for Carabidae. I can add GBIF as well, if that would be useful.
Bob Webster (talk) 20:09, 29 January 2023 (UTC)
Cool, glad to hear it! Thank you! --Elmidae (talk · contribs) 20:43, 29 January 2023 (UTC)

I've submitted a Bot Request for Approval to replace the dead Carabidae.org references with Catalogue of Life references. I'd welcome any comments, criticism, or suggestions. Bob Webster (talk) 01:18, 8 March 2023 (UTC)

Thanks for doing this. One problem with replacing a carabidae.org reference with a CoL reference is that they may not contain the same information. For instance, the example genus article above, Eurylychnus, is a stub that lists nine species, citing the now dead carabidae.org page. CoL only lists eight species. However, the caribidae.org page is available on archive.org). Would it be possible to add the archive url and make the relevant citation status parameter changes to the existing citation, as well as adding a new CoL citation. That would keep the originally cited source and add a source where people can find the updated information. —  Jts1882 | talk  13:13, 8 March 2023 (UTC)
This is a good point. (Sorry for the slow reply.) It may be good to update the genus (and above) pages so they reflect modern information. The archived links are generally more than 10 years old, and discrepancies are probably due to age more than the source. Most of these stubs have had no species updates for the past 10 years.
Another challenge I've run into is that many older "Carabidae of the World" articles that have had their taxa become invalid since they were created. I've manually corrected hundreds of these (all I could find), since the bot wouldn't handle redirects, moves, synonyms, misspellings, etc. In fact, these were not included on the bot's list of input files.
There are about 1379 articles of genus rank and above that were edited by qBugbot. I plan to check them and manually update the ones that need it, starting with the higher and larger taxa. (I have to question my use of the word "manually", using a incredibly fast computer with fast access to large databases, transmitting large amounts of data all over the world in milliseconds. It's not exactly manual. Manually should involve a shovel or a hammer.) In case anybody would like to join the fun, these articles are listed on my sandbox. I should probably mention that this updating is needed because some of the articles are old and have not been updated recently, not because of qBugbot. Articles that contain Carabidae of the World or other archived references are probably more likely to be in need of attention because they're older. Bob Webster (talk) 01:26, 15 April 2023 (UTC)

Chlorophyta and Prasinophyta

The Chlorophyta article begins "Chlorophyta or Prasinophyta is a taxon of green algae informally called chlorophytes." Obviously if these are actually synonyms we should not have two articles on the same subject; and if they're not synonyms then the article should not be claiming them as such. Chlorophyta does seem to be a valid clade; Prasinophyta is variously interpreted as a synonym for the same clade, and as a paraphyletic group with additional members from other clades. Actually the cladograms in Chlorophyta#Phylogeny have a strange attitude to synonymy as Viridiplantae are equated to Green algae, and Streptophyta are equated to Charophyta. Not sure what's going on here but a bit of clarification would be desirable. Chiswick Chap (talk) 12:44, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Prasinophyta doesn't belong in the lead because they don't refer to the same group. Prasinophytes are paraphyletic with respect to chorophyta, although they may once have been considered sister clades. Prasinophyte has been synonymised with chorophytee because they are included within, not because they refer to the same group.
The cladogram is one of those Frankenstein construction and mixes different concepts. In some classifications the charophyte classes are raised to divisions. I've changed the cladogram to the classes as used in the Leliaert et al 2011, which is the supposed main source for the cladogram. I've also used right hand bars to indicate the prasinophyte and charophyte terminals and removed the sublabels on the clades.
Now there are two cladograms showing different hypotheses, I suggest reverting the first one to Leliaert et al 2011 and removing all the modifications (e.g. moving the trio of basal "charophytes"). There might be a better choice of source, in which case we use that strictly instead. The second cladogram can then show the more recent hypothesis. —  Jts1882 | talk  13:49, 19 April 2023 (UTC)
Visibly better. I'll see if I'm feeling up to tweaking the cladogram back to Leliaert. Chiswick Chap (talk) 15:11, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

A bunch of new incorrect images added to articles by User:Dinosaursroar127809

Hey all, a bunch of new incorrect prehistoric reconstruction images were added to articles by User:Dinosaursroar127809. Does anyone have rollback rights to undo all of them? Thanks. Cougroyalty (talk) 16:22, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

i'm working on it —Trilletrollet [ Talk | Contribs ] 17:22, 19 April 2023 (UTC)
@Cougroyalty: I think everything has been reverted now —Trilletrollet [ Talk | Contribs ] 17:29, 19 April 2023 (UTC)
Awesome, thanks! Cougroyalty (talk) 17:30, 19 April 2023 (UTC)
apparently this user is blocked on commons and the Russian wikipedia for similar edits, so I think I'll report them to WP:AIV —Trilletrollet [ Talk | Contribs ] 18:15, 19 April 2023 (UTC)
@Cougroyalty: They have now been indef blocked 🦀🦀🦀 —Trilletrollet [ Talk | Contribs ] 18:24, 19 April 2023 (UTC)
Wow, that was fast. Thanks for helping resolve this! Cougroyalty (talk) 18:29, 19 April 2023 (UTC)
it took literally 1 minute between me filing the report and the user being blocked. never seen it happen that quickly before —Trilletrollet [ Talk | Contribs ] 18:38, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Bacteria not validly published

There is an open deletion discussion for five bacteria "not validly published" at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Gabonia, and there was another one a couple weeks ago at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Saccharopolyspora salina. Wikipedia has hundreds, if not more than a thousand articles on not validly published prokaryotes.

Validly published describes the concept under the botanical code, but it is similar for prokaryotes (and is quite different from the zoology term "valid"). Aspects unique to prokaryote nomenclature are that valid publication is done in a single journal (IJSEM), and requires designating a cultured type strain deposited in institutions in at least two different countries. The LPSN database is apparently the source for Wikipedia's bacteria classifcation (albeit sometimes indirectly, e.g. citing NCBI records based on LPSN). LPSN has entries for many names?/taxa? that aren't validly published. These are enclosed in quotes on LPSN. In cases where the entity hasn't been cultured, the name is preceded by Candidatus. For non-candidatus invalid names, the most obvious and common reason why the name is invalid is that it has been published somewhere other than IJSEM (although there may be other less-obvious problems with the publication). IJSEM regularly validates names that have been published elsewhere, and has recently been publishing lists of candidatus taxa (without validating them).

I would certainly not encourage anybody to create articles for invalid bacteria, but they can't be entirely avoided. There are invalid higher taxa that have valid children. I went though phyla, classes and orders in LPSN, and found the following non-candidatus invalid names with valid children. Phyla: Abditibacteriota, Euryarchaeota, Nanoarchaeota. Classes: Methanomicrobia, Tissierellia. Orders: Parvularculales, Synechococcales, Vibrionales. I didn't look into invalid families. Some invalid names may represent bacteria of significant interest: Mycobacterium orygis is a human and veterinary pathogen. Achromobacter obae has a unique enzyme that has been the subject of many research papers (Wikipedia claims the entire genome of this species has been sequenced, but I think there may only be a complete sequence for the enzyme).

What should be done about articles for invalid bacteria, if anything? Plantdrew (talk) 18:47, 17 April 2023 (UTC)

Invalid under the codes doesn't mean it doesn't meet WP:WNG. We should be careful of distinguishing between using valid taxa under the codes as a reason for WNG and using the codes to dismiss WNG. However, I wouldn't expect many examples, if any, to make WNG while invalid under the codes. —  Jts1882 | talk  19:28, 17 April 2023 (UTC)
At the risk of sounding flippant- it's bacteria, just how many of these invalid taxa do you think are going to meet GNG? The answer is, very, very few. I'd say delete any invalid bacteria taxa unless they meet GNG independently of NSPECIES. SilverTiger12 (talk) 19:56, 18 April 2023 (UTC)
Four of the taxa nominated in the deletion discussion I linked above were published in the journal New Microbes and New Infections. I find that title pretty concerning. They do say in their aims & scope that "it covers new microbes that are evolving from existing organisms..." which I would interpret as covering newly evolved strains, but then they go out and try to publish new genera and species. Plantdrew (talk) 22:00, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

Meanwhile, in another domain

Nomenclature rules blocking recognition of species discovered by DNA sequencing.

  • "Dark fungi: discovery and recognition of unseen fungal diversity". www.biomedcentral.com. Retrieved 2023-04-18.
  • "Mycology's 'dark fungi' debate turns on recognition of mystery species". Washington Post. ISSN 0190-8286. Retrieved 2023-04-18.

- Donald Albury 18:31, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

Taxobox authority citations

Recently on the WikiProject Paleontology discord server, FunkMonk pointed out the unconventional way that Fama Clamosa implemented the references for the taxonomic authorities in the infobox for Icaronycteris. I personally like how they're implemented, as it seems like a neat and tidy way to make the citations for the taxonomic authorities available in the infobox. However, Carnoferox pointed out that implementing citations this way prevents the authors from being wikilinked. As such, I felt it was a good idea to bring this topic up for wider discussion. Of note is WP:INFOBOXREF; it is generally encouraged to structure articles in such a way as to avoid needing citations in the infobox, but taxonomic authorities are a special case where making the citation readily available from the infobox is obviously desirable. I think formatting it in the way currently implemented at Icaronycteris looks tidier than using superscript-based references, and keeping the infoboxes tidy is desirable. Ornithopsis (talk) 23:59, 16 April 2023 (UTC)

I quite like the format on Icaronycteris, as Ornithopsis said, it's clearer and more tidy. As for wikilinking the authority, I think using author-link in the citation is sufficient. Edward-Woodrow (talk) 00:16, 17 April 2023 (UTC)
As long as it's not implemented haphazardly, but consistently, I'm fine with either. But it sounds like a huge task. FunkMonk (talk) 00:31, 17 April 2023 (UTC)
It is misleading. It appears as a wikilink to more information on the person who named the taxon rather than as a reference for the authority of the taxon (see WP:SURPRISE). It's also not suitable as a general approach as it only works on pages using the Harvard referencing system. Most articles in this project don't and Wikipedia policy is not to change the referencing system on a page without gaining consensus.—  Jts1882 | talk  06:24, 17 April 2023 (UTC)
I disagree with your assessment that it is misleading and surprising. I think it is sufficiently clear and intuitive as to not present any problems; to your particular concern, the fact that the entire citation is linked should be sufficient to make it apparent that it is not a wikilink to the author. As far as using Harvard citations is concerned, using them for this one specialized purpose does not behoove us to switch the entire article over to Harvard citations. Taxonomic authorities are already inherently something of an exception to standard Wikipedia citation formats anyway. Ornithopsis (talk) 00:30, 18 April 2023 (UTC)
They are not acceptable sources for the correctness of the authority. They do not show that the name was validly published; it may be a homonym or fail to meet the requirements of the relevant nomenclature code in some other way. Only a secondary source that shows the name is accepted by other biologists establishes the correctness of the authority. Peter coxhead (talk) 06:07, 18 April 2023 (UTC)
It doesn't work for any names under the ICNafp, since dates are not included in botanical authorities.
Also, it doesn't work for any authorities in parentheses, where the original author's publication tells you nothing about the revised/transferred name.
This idea has just not been thought through. Peter coxhead (talk) 06:38, 18 April 2023 (UTC)
Makes sense to follow the ICZN recommendation. https://code.iczn.org/authorship/article-51-citation-of-names-of-authors/?frame=1 Shyamal (talk) 07:48, 18 April 2023 (UTC)
I don't like it, myself, for various minor reasons, a few of which are mentioned above by Jts1882 and Peter Coxhead. It would be another source for potential errors, place undue emphasis on invalid names (synonyms, homonyms, nomina nuda) and their publications, and for VERY old references it would threaten to introduce disputes over dates of publication (e.g., where the journal data do not match what taxonomists universally recognize as the year of publication) that themselves would require additional secondary sources showing that taxonomists DO use a different date. It's not that the information is not worth having, but it shouldn't be in the taxobox - I feel full citations like this are only appropriate for articles that contain a section on the taxonomic history, where the citations to the original literature are directly relevant to the content of the article. It's not just that it's taxobox clutter, but that it appears out of context, can be misleading, and it replaces (in cases where the original authority was notable) the link to the original authority. For a taxon name that is of recent vintage, has no notable authors, and no synonyms, it could certainly work well, but the older a name is, the worse this approach would be. Dyanega (talk) 15:56, 18 April 2023 (UTC)
Thank you both for your comments; it is helpful to understand some of the challenges and limitations to implementing this idea.
  • Because taxonomic authorities are handled differently in botany than zoology, the most appropriate way to handle them may differ on Wikipedia as well.
  • As already noted, the authority can be linked via the author-link field of the citation template, so it only presents a small obstacle to providing links to notable authorities.
  • #CITEREF can be used as an alternative to Harvard-style citations to allow the authority to be formatted in whatever manner necessary.
  • I would argue that implementing this would actually be advantageous in many of the cases Peter coxhead and Dyanega are describing, as it allows for a distinction to be drawn between the citation of the taxonomic authority itself and citations to sources being given in support of it being the authority. In cases where there is sufficient dispute as to render it inappropriate to cite a specific work as the original reference, my suggestion would be to simply not do it this way in those specific cases.
  • As far as the taxonomic authority not giving information on who revised or reassigned the taxon goes, take that up with the ICZN. It's not my fault that the parentheses don't tell you who reassigned it.
  • I don't really understand how it would place undue emphasis on invalid names.
  • In general, for some of the issues brought up by Peter coxhead and Dyanega, I simply don't see how this is creating a new problem. Aren't those concerns already relevant to citing taxonomic authorities in general?
I have created a tweaked version of the Coloradisaurus page in my sandbox for an example implementation. Ornithopsis (talk) 02:24, 19 April 2023 (UTC)
  • For the misleading point that was brought up earlier in the discussion: by formatting it to appear as though it's a wikilink, it does bring the expectation of such a link leading to some en.wiki article or another. While linking the entire citation, date and all, might help people recognize "this does not lead to the author's article", it also might not (the expectation that it may lead to, say, a Bibliography section in an author's article is not an unreasonable one, after all. But even if readers don't expect it to lead to (anywhere in) an author's article, they may instead expect it to lead to, say, an article on the specific publication in which the description took place). So no, linking the entire citation is not enough to avoid it being misleading, or to make the outcome intuitive, in my opinion.
  • I would argue that implementing this would actually be advantageous in many of the cases Peter coxhead and Dyanega are describing, as it allows for a distinction to be drawn between the citation of the taxonomic authority itself and citations to sources being given in support of it being the authority. - In which case the linked citation would still need to be followed by one or more trailing references, leaving the taxobox no less cluttered than before.
  • As far as the taxonomic authority not giving information on who revised or reassigned the taxon goes, take that up with the ICZN. It's not my fault that the parentheses don't tell you who reassigned it. There is a difference between "not giving information on who revised/reassigned a taxon (while showing the taxon *has* been revised/reassigned)" and "not showing the taxon has been reassigned at all". The ICZN system does the former (which is, indeed, not always ideal), but by using the original description as, essentially, a reference on itself, this format does the latter. (And yes, the parentheses in such a citation do still show "taxon has been reassigned/revised at some point", but as this is not backed up by linking solely to the original description, we're once again right back to needing those trailing references.)
  • In general, for some of the issues brought up by Peter coxhead and Dyanega, I simply don't see how this is creating a new problem. Aren't those concerns already relevant to citing taxonomic authorities in general? That depends. If, as your original post implied, this is effectively meant to replace the superscript-based references for taxon authors, then yes, it is creating new problems—because the solution for most of those issues is "back it up with sources" and by removing those sources, problems will be (re)introduced.
    If it's meant to be used in addition to the superscript-based referencing system currently being used for author citations, many (though not all) of these issues are indeed not new, and solved by appending the relevant sources to the author citation just as currently is being done—but in that case, the proposed idea also does not at all solve the infobox cluttering problem it is suggested it would resolve, while still introducing some potential issues (and a whole lot of work)
AddWittyNameHere 04:27, 19 April 2023 (UTC)
Briefly: as for my comment regarding "undue emphasis on invalid names", giving the full citations for synonyms, homonyms, and nomina nuda could give the impression that these works are as important as the one in which the valid name was coined, in much the same way as citing ALL of the competing opinions on a controversial topic can give the wrong impression. The WP:UNDUE policy warns editors not to give undue weight to minority opinions in such cases, and I would argue that in taxoboxes, the synonym list is composed of the equivalent of taxonomic minority opinions (they are hypotheses about classification, which have been rejected by the taxonomic community). If this sort of citation tweak moves forward, I think it would be a mistake to apply it to the synonyms and such, and urge instead to restrict its use to ONLY the valid name. Dyanega (talk) 14:44, 21 April 2023 (UTC)
I'm not sure that I follow your logic. I do not understand how providing the full citation for a taxonomic authority of a junior synonym somehow causes it to violate due weight. Besides, from a verifiability standpoint, it seems like it would be best practice to provide the full citation of any mentioned taxonomic authority on the page anyway. Ornithopsis (talk) 15:26, 22 April 2023 (UTC)
Perhaps I should clarify what I'm trying to accomplish here: I just think it's a neat feature to have the full citation of the original reference pop up in the taxobox when you scroll over it. The fact that it does so without adding clutter to the taxobox is a bonus. I'm not thinking of this in terms of it being a citation supporting any particular claim per se. Ornithopsis (talk) 11:20, 19 April 2023 (UTC)
Adding more citations for the taxonomic authority in infoboxes would be great, regardless of the formatting. It seems to me that the majority of pages have no references for the authority. Edward-Woodrow (talk) 12:10, 19 April 2023 (UTC)
Based on WP:INFOBOXREF, citations in the infobox are generally kept to a minimum because any information provided in the infobox should be included in the body of the text as well, and properly cited there. Adding citations to the infobox is only really necessary if a claim made is likely to be disputed and needs the citation reinforcement. My suggestion is not so much about providing sources for claims as it is to make the full citation of the taxonomic authority easily findable as a courtesy to the reader. Ornithopsis (talk) 15:41, 22 April 2023 (UTC)

Replacement names for preoccupied homonyms - Policy?

Hey all, what is our policy on replacement names for preoccupied homonyms of other names? When do we use a redirect to point to the new replacement name? I know I'm probably not asking this question correctly, so the example I am thinking of is Melanosteus, which was recently redirected by User:Carnoferox to newly created genus name Melanomontanosteus. It looks a little sketchy to me (I didn't recognize the journal proposing the name change), and a bit premature. Anyone else have any thoughts? Thanks Cougroyalty (talk) 20:45, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

The question is whether the publication of the journal is in all ways compliant with ICZN rules. It would definitely be premature to cite names in Wikipedia if they are technically unpublished, but this is only applicable if there is no print version of the journal. Dyanega (talk) 21:13, 12 April 2023 (UTC)
Carnoferox clearly did this improperly, and has created a lot of mess that could have easily been avoided. If the title was going to be changed then they should have moved the article, rather than just copy+pasting the articles contents as a new article at the address, which breaks the editing attribution history required by the Wikipedia license, see Wikipedia:Copying within Wikipedia. The old name could have then been turned from a redirect to an article on the valid genus if that was required. I've never heard of this journal before, and it seems very obscure. That's not necessarily a reason to reject, but I would have liked to have seen its use in placoderm papers before the article was moved. Hemiauchenia (talk) 21:20, 12 April 2023 (UTC)
I just downloaded the work. It contains no evidence within the work that it has been registered in ZooBank, therefore the new names proposed in it are unpublished under the ICZN unless there is a print version that has already been published, and I cannot confirm this. (Sorry, jumped the gun there a bit, the text on the website saying that there is a print version scrolled past before I noticed it) Dyanega (talk) 21:24, 12 April 2023 (UTC)
Given that the Munis website claims to have printed 1756 copies of Volume 18, so far as the ICZN is concerned, the existence of a statement that there is a print version has to be taken at face value; the Code assumes that this is not a false statement. I'm going to remove the text about e-only publications from the talk page, to reduce clutter, and since it is superfluous at this point. Dyanega (talk) 22:03, 12 April 2023 (UTC)
First off, I did not just "copy + paste" the old Melanosteus article. I completely rewrote the article, because the old article was outdated and contained factual errors (incorrect authorship, improperly formatted references, an old cladogram, etc.). Secondly, Munis Entomology & Zoology is published simultaneously in print and online, so it doesn't require ZooBank registration. Melanomontanosteus is an available name in the sense of the ICZN and is demonstrably the correct name to use, since Melanosteus is preoccupied. The journal being "obscure" in your personal opinion doesn't change that. I would greatly appreciate it if my version of the article could be restored. Carnoferox (talk) 22:11, 12 April 2023 (UTC)
It doesn't matter whether you rewrote it or not, it's fundamentally the same topic, so it isn't appropriate to just delete the old version and redirect it. You are free to re-add your improvements to the current Melanosteus article, while there is still discussion about the article title. Hemiauchenia (talk) 22:26, 12 April 2023 (UTC)
I have gone and re-added my changes to the article, except for the title. I don't understand why there needs to be further discussion about the title, considering it is abundantly clear that concerns were misplaced and Melanomontanosteus is the correct name. Carnoferox (talk) 22:40, 12 April 2023 (UTC)
It's up to Dyanega as ICZN commissioner as to whether the article title should be changed. Hemiauchenia (talk) 22:54, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

Going back to the general question asked by @Cougroyalty:: a junior homonym should not redirect to a replacement name. If the senior homonym is regarded as a synonym, the homonyms should probably be treated on a disambiguation page. If the senior homonym is regarded as valid/accepted, it should have an article (with a hatnote for the junior homonym); a dab page can be a temporary solution if there's no article for the senior homonym and you don't feel up to writing one). If the senior homonym is a very obscure synonym, and the junior homonym has been widely used, I would hope that taxonomists outside of Wikipedia would consider conservation/suppression as an appropriate nomenclatural remedy. Plantdrew (talk) 01:26, 13 April 2023 (UTC)

The senior homonym, the melanosclerite Melanosteus, is not particularly obscure. A new species was named as recently as 2011 (M. indica)[5] and a paper on other species was published just last year.[6] The junior homonym, the placoderm Melanosteus, has not been widely used and the 1987 description is still the only major paper about it. There is no way that the ICZN would rule to suppress the senior homonym in this case. Carnoferox (talk) 02:53, 13 April 2023 (UTC)
I would be astonished if anyone even asked the Commission to suppress the senior homonym under these circumstances. My only comment at this point basically echoes what Plantdrew says: you really shouldn't have articles for both senior and junior homonyms; generally, the senior homonym gets sole possession of the title, and the junior homonym gets a hatnote on that page, or maybe a link on a disambiguation page that has "(disambiguation)" in the title, and is - again - linked to by a hatnote on the primary article. If the problem is that a primary article for the senior homonym has not yet been written, then honestly that should be the first step, and an article like that can be created as a very minimalist stub without too much trouble, and fleshed out later. I've seen this done before (I think I may even have done it myself, for that matter), and about the only tricky bit is remembering to find all the "What links here" links that are now broken and pointing them to the article for the replacement name. Dyanega (talk) 15:12, 13 April 2023 (UTC)
What is never acceptable is the situation at Melanosteus right now, namely the text and taxobox of the article not matching the page title. Peter coxhead (talk) 15:28, 13 April 2023 (UTC)
Can we change the title of the placoderm article to Melanomontanosteus then? @Dyanega: Carnoferox (talk) 15:37, 13 April 2023 (UTC)
I don't see why not myself. Arguably Wikipedia:Naming conventions (fauna)#Currency applies here and we should use Melanomontanosteus anyway since it's not really contentious from what I can see (unless I misread this discussion?). But that's a guideline. Monster Iestyn (talk) 16:34, 13 April 2023 (UTC)
My feeling also is that Melanosteus, once turned into a redirect after page move, should then be a redirect to Melanosclerite (which lists the senior homonym Melanosteus Eisenack, 1942), which itself could have a hatnote to Melanomontanosteus added. Unless it makes more sense to place a hatnote on Melanomontanosteus to Melanosclerite instead? Monster Iestyn (talk) 16:40, 13 April 2023 (UTC)
@Dyanega: @Hemiauchenia: Can you please decide and comment so that the page can be renamed? Carnoferox (talk) 23:46, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

There are two ways forward: (1) do exactly what Monster Iestyn suggested above ("that Melanosteus, once turned into a redirect after page move, should then be a redirect to Melanosclerite (which lists the senior homonym Melanosteus Eisenack, 1942), which itself could have a hatnote to Melanomontanosteus added") or (2) create the article for the senior homonym, with a hatnote sending interested parties to the Melanomontanosteus article. Personally, I favor the latter approach, but I don't have the resources necessary to provide content for an article on Melanosteus. A brief glance suggests that there may actually not be very much available information, because "melanosclerites" sound like they're obscure, enigmatic, and very poorly known. In that case, option 1 might be the only appropriate solution. Dyanega (talk) 15:06, 24 April 2023 (UTC)

make cite iucn

For those of you who use the {{make cite iucn}} template, I have changed it. I changed it because using {{make cite iucn}} to translate the raw reference from the IUCN redlist would return a rendering that is plain wikitext. For example, the reference from the African Forest Elephant page at IUCN looks like this:

Gobush, K.S., Edwards, C.T.T, Maisels, F., Wittemyer, G., Balfour, D. & Taylor, R.D. 2021. Loxodonta cyclotis (errata version published in 2021). The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species 2021: e.T181007989A204404464. https://dx.doi.org/10.2305/IUCN.UK.2021-1.RLTS.T181007989A204404464.en. Accessed on 25 April 2023.

The old version of {{make cite iucn}} would take that and produce this:

{{cite iucn |author=Gobush, K.S. |author2=Edwards, C.T.T. |author3= Maisels, F. |author4=Wittemyer, G. |author5=Balfour, D. |author6=Taylor, R.D. |year=2021 |errata=2021 |title=''Loxodonta cyclotis'' |volume=2021 |page=e.T181007989A204404464 |doi=10.2305/IUCN.UK.2021-1.RLTS.T181007989A204404464.en |access-date=25 April 2023}}

which is rather poor form. We should not be displaying the raw wikitext {{cite iucn}} template – even for the hour or so that it takes AnomieBOT to get round to substing the template.

The new version presents a proper rendering while waiting to be subst'd:

{{make cite iucn|Gobush, K.S., Edwards, C.T.T, Maisels, F., Wittemyer, G., Balfour, D. & Taylor, R.D. 2021. Loxodonta cyclotis (errata version published in 2021). The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species 2021: e.T181007989A204404464. https://dx.doi.org/10.2305/IUCN.UK.2021-1.RLTS.T181007989A204404464.en. Accessed on 25 April 2023.|nosubst=true}}
Gobush, K.S.; Edwards, C.T.T.; Maisels, F.; Wittemyer, G.; Balfour, D.; Taylor, R.D. (2021) [errata version of 2021 assessment]. "Loxodonta cyclotis". IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. 2021: e.T181007989A204404464. doi:10.2305/IUCN.UK.2021-1.RLTS.T181007989A204404464.en. Retrieved 25 April 2023.

The above includes |nosubst=true because I want to demonstrate the pre-subst rendering. When subst'd, this is what the {{cite iucn}} wikitext and rendering look like:

{{cite iucn|access-date=25 April 2023|author1=Gobush, K.S.|author2=Edwards, C.T.T.|author3=Maisels, F.|author4=Wittemyer, G.|author5=Balfour, D.|author6=Taylor, R.D.|doi=10.2305/IUCN.UK.2021-1.RLTS.T181007989A64.en|errata=2021|page=e.T181007989A204404464|title=''Loxodonta cyclotis''|volume=2021|year=2021}}
Gobush, K.S.; Edwards, C.T.T.; Maisels, F.; Wittemyer, G.; Balfour, D.; Taylor, R.D. (2021) [errata version of 2021 assessment]. "Loxodonta cyclotis". IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. 2021: e.T181007989A204404464. doi:10.2305/IUCN.UK.2021-1.RLTS.T181007989A64.en. Retrieved 25 April 2023.

This change should make it easier to cite the IUCN redlist. Questions? Comments?

—Trappist the monk (talk) 22:49, 25 April 2023 (UTC)

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