Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Palaeontology/Archive 3

Stubs

Link to paleo-mollusc-stub discussion: User talk:Abyssal#Stubs 2. --Snek01 (talk) 22:42, 5 April 2009 (UTC)

Burgess Shale

The Cambrian Explosion Taskforce is undertaking a re-write of Burgess Shale to celebrate the centenary of its discovery. We have proposed a draft structure for the new article, and would greatly appreciate any comments on this! Martin (Smith609 – Talk) 22:29, 18 April 2009 (UTC)

The Updatedness of Non-Dinosaur Articles

A friend of mine is complaining about how some of the articles for prehistoric non-dinosaur animals are outdated. This is from his mouth:

"If it wasn't for me, you'd still see marsupial sparassodonts (when they were non-marsupial metatherians) and fish eating istyodactylids (when they were scavengers). In fact, the information on dinosaurs also gets old; until VERY recently, heterodontosaurs were still the closest relatives to ceratopsians and pachycephalosaurs on Wikipedia, while everyone else already knew they weren't since, like, 2007! It kinda of reminds me of an actual encyclopedia, which is always outdated."

So I have decided to bring it to your guy's attention that you might need to get editing. Giant Blue Anteater (talk) 21:59, 22 April 2009 (UTC)

I'm glad your friend has done something to reduce the problem. --Philcha (talk) 22:19, 22 April 2009 (UTC)

The non-dino paleo articles are pretty terrible and badly sourced. If I had sources to update them I'd help but it would take a major initiative to really get them up to WP:Dino type standards. On the other hand your friend seems a little too sure of some things... The placement of heterodontosaurs is controversial, with many people online pointing out that Tianyulong, contrary to whats said in the paper, actually is very similar to marginocephalians in several characters and might add support to that hypothesis. As for Istiodactylids, the source he added is from Mark Witton's blog and the only published statement was a "suggestion" that they "may" b scavengers. Like it or not encyclopedias, even Wiki, is NOT supposed to be bleeding edge, but err on the conservative side. Including "research" that is years away from even hitting print is really pushing it. That's what blogs are for! ;) Dinoguy2 (talk) 22:22, 22 April 2009 (UTC)

Also, now that I check on it, even the sparassodont thing is based on differences in definition (crown vs branch definition for marsupials) rather than differences in phylogeny. Dinoguy2 (talk) 22:31, 22 April 2009 (UTC)

Are you implying that blogs such as Darren Naish's and PZ Meyers' should not be cited as sources on Wikipedia? Giant Blue Anteater (talk) 23:25, 22 April 2009 (UTC)

Probably not, no. Not for science articles at least. Dinoguy2 (talk) 00:19, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

Should I invite my friend to this conversation? Giant Blue Anteater (talk) 22:09, 15 May 2009 (UTC)

Fossil animals for identification

Similar to the frequent birds for identification sections on the bird project talk page, here are some free images of fossil animals found on Flickr and elsewhere with no description, that would be helpful on Wikipedia if they were identified.

Some fossils from a Russian museum called palaeontological institute, synapsids[1][2] a temnospondyl[3], what appears to be a juvenile hadrosaur[4], an assemblage of early tetrapods I'm unable to identify further (maybe synapsids or temnospondyls)[5], some sort of crocodylian[6]

The first synapsid is definitely Titanophoneus[7], and the second one might be too, I believe it is the exact same specimen as this[8]. FunkMonk (talk) 13:36, 10 May 2009 (UTC)

From North American Museum of Ancient Life, a marine reptile[9], a cynodont[10], a pterosaur[11], a theropod[12] an ichthyosaur[13], a fish[14], another fish[15], a proboscidean[16]

The "Marine Reptile" is Keichousaurus hui which we have a good image on commons (Keichousaurus hui fossil.JPG)--Kevmin (talk) 23:00, 8 May 2009 (UTC)

Oh yeah I see, it's the exact same specimen. The image on Commons isn't in the article though, I'll put it in. FunkMonk (talk) 02:03, 9 May 2009 (UTC)

From North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences, an ichthyosaur[17], an eurypterid[18]

• Here the proboscidean is labeled as a "pygmy species of Elephas"[19], but it would be nice to know exactly which one. The pterosaur is labeled as Pteranodon[20], which I didn't recognise at first due to the short crest. FunkMonk (talk) 14:25, 9 May 2009 (UTC)

A few more, a moa in Paris[21], another ichthyosaur[22], a cool trilobite[23], some kind of mammal[24], what seems to be an entelodont[25], a Phorusrhacid in Argentina[26]

There are also a bunch of unidentified fossils on Wikimedia Commons, check out this category and its subcategories for images of fossil animals to identify: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Unidentified_Fossil_Animalia

The trilobite was Ceratarges.[27] FunkMonk (talk) 12:33, 9 May 2009 (UTC)

And by the way, anyone know what "Camptosaurus nanum"[28] is? Isn't listed as a species in the article.

This list will grow as I find more images I'm unable to identify, feel free to add images yourself. FunkMonk (talk) 19:55, 8 May 2009 (UTC)

The "Camptosaurus nanum" is probably a typo for Camptosaurus nanus (which is synonymous with Camptosaurus dispar). Firsfron of Ronchester 02:52, 9 May 2009 (UTC)

Thanks, I didn't see the name was mentioned in the body of the text, only looked at the taxobox. FunkMonk (talk) 12:33, 9 May 2009 (UTC)

The eurypterid looks like Eurypterus. The ichthyosaurs look like Ichthyosaurus or Stenopterygius. Abyssal (talk) 19:51, 9 May 2009 (UTC)

I was thinking the first ichthyosaur might be Opthalmosaurus, I think I can make out an O on the label over it, and it could look like it[29], but I'm not sure.FunkMonk (talk) 21:13, 9 May 2009 (UTC)

You're right, the first one seems to be labeled as Ophthalmosaurus (I missed that link). Of the latter two, I think the second one is probably Ophthalmosaurus as well now that I look at it. The second one still looks like Ichthy or Steno to me, with me leaning to the former. Abyssal (talk) 03:05, 10 May 2009 (UTC)

Yeah, looking at the ichthyosaur list, it's the only genus starting with O it could be. Ichthyosaurs look so damn alike, working with them taxonomically must be a nightmare. FunkMonk (talk) 13:36, 10 May 2009 (UTC)

It's probably a lot easier with actual specimens in hand, though. :P Abyssal (talk) 00:31, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

A few more, from a museum in Santa Barbara, a giant toothed whale[30], and an apparently (at the time the picture was taken) unnamed African pterosaur[31], turtle and pterosaur from the Field Museum[32][33]. FunkMonk (talk) 18:11, 23 May 2009 (UTC)

• Pterosaur was Nyctosaurus.[34] FunkMonk (talk) 00:28, 6 June 2009 (UTC)

My mystery fossil gallery at deviantart. Abyssal (talk) 01:15, 4 June 2009 (UTC)

• Cool! Maybe you can get them identified at some museum? In my country, Denmark, scraps like that cause sensation. FunkMonk (talk) 14:57, 5 June 2009 (UTC)

As much as I'd like to cause a sensation, I really don't think they're significant. I have doubts about a couple of them even being fossils (especially the dark blobby thing). Then again, you never know. Abyssal (talk) 16:19, 4 July 2009 (UTC)

Bit hard to tell, but I think that round thing is just a piece of speleothem. It does appear to have an interesting texture in one of the views, but the rest just looks like a chunk of cave-formation... The black chunk I'm not sure about. It's hard to tell by the photo, but it looks older than the encasing sedimentary rock. I'm not sure, but I'm going with mineral rather than fossil... I'll just add, if anyone has photo's of Australian vertebrates they might like identified, I might be able to help (the higher the resolution, the better). T.carnifex (talk) 08:03, 21 November 2009 (UTC)

Dalinghosaurus or Dalinghesaurus?

There are two unsourced articles about some sort of Chinese reptile, Dalinghosaurus and Dalinghesaurus, a mistake seems to have been made. Anyone know what the real name is? FunkMonk (talk) 22:05, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

Its Dalinghosaurus. Evans, S. E. & Wang, Y. 2005. The Early Cretaceous lizard Dalinghosaurus from China. Acta Palaeontologica Polonica 50 (4): 725–742. Burmeister (talk) 22:42, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

(ec) Dalinghosaurus definitely exists, as there's a published paper here. It was described in 1998. The type species is Dalinghosaurus longidigitus. "Dalinghesaurus longidigitus", appears to be a common typo, originated by China Scientific Book Services Firsfron of Ronchester 22:48, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

Thanks! The article could need the ref. FunkMonk (talk) 22:59, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

I've done a bit of expansion; since the paper is free, anyone should be able to add more. Firsfron of Ronchester 23:53, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

Article for deletion

Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Palaeooölogy may be of interest to members of this project. --LadyofShalott 02:11, 12 June 2009 (UTC)

Using better sources

I think that many articles use un-satisfactory references (i.e., Enchanted Learning, Walking with Dinosaurs and its periphery, and ameteur websites). To improve articles, use the primary literature and sources with bibliography. I find Google Books helpful, and a trip to a local library is also good. 76.112.48.72 (talk) 15:53, 4 July 2009 (UTC)

I am trying to put as many links to free peer reviewed papers on the front page. There is too mach information for one person to read, as I have little time these days. Others could help. Library, we are not in the stone ages. Enlil Ninlil (talk) 00:34, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

Changes to popular pages lists

There are a few important changes to the popular pages system. A quick summary:

• The "importance" ranking (for projects that use it) will be included in the lists along with assessment.
• The default list size has been lowered to 500 entries (from 1000)
• I've set up a project on the Toolserver for the popular pages - tools:~alexz/pop/.
  • This includes a page to view the results for projects, including the in-progress results from the current month. Currently this can only show the results from a single project in one month. Features to see multiple projects or multiple months may be added later.
  • This includes a new interface for making requests to add a new project to the list.
  • There is also a form to request a change to the configuration for a project. Currently the configurable options are the size of the on-wiki list and the project subpage used for the list.
• The on-wiki list should be generated and posted in a more timely and consistent manner than before.
• The data is now retained indefinitely.
• The script used to generate the pages has changed. The output should be the same. Please report any apparent inconsistencies (see below).
• Bugs and feature requests should be reported using the Toolserver's bug tracker for "alexz's tools" - [35]

-- Mr.Z-man 00:26, 12 July 2009 (UTC)

Cretoxyrhina

I've been working on this for a while at my user sub page here. Anyone is free to paste it into the article (merging the history, if that could be done, would be nice too) or too continue working on it. I put in more refs than there are citations throughout, so it sure is incomplete, but it is better than what we currently have their. --Spotty ¹¹²²² 20:15, 26 July 2009 (UTC)

How come you didn't put it on the original page, it looks great but will read it later and give feedback. Enlil Ninlil (talk) 21:30, 26 July 2009 (UTC)

Heads up.....

Lystrosaurus is at FAC. Casliber (talk · contribs) 10:52, 3 August 2009 (UTC)

Cryptospores

I have attempted to de-orphan the article Cryptospores by adding links to it from the pages Spores, Paleobotany, and Evolutionary history of plants. The page Fossils also links to Cryptospores. I would appreciate it if someone would review these edits and work them in a more appropriate manner if necessary. Thanks, --Sophitessa (talk) 06:00, 4 August 2009 (UTC)

Paleo image review section?

Images are still removed from paleo articles due to anatomical inaccuracies, so wouldn't it be a good idea to finally have a review page for paleoart in general up in this project? Some earlier discussion of this here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Palaeontology/Archive_1#Illustrations_for_extinct_species

I could start it up myself if there was support for it, by using the dinosaur review page as template: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:WikiProject_Dinosaurs/Image_review FunkMonk (talk) 16:44, 7 August 2009 (UTC)

I think it's definitely a good idea and I'd support it if you put one together. WP:dino has done a great job of shaping up the dinosaur section but most other paleo pages are really, really awful unfortunately with a lot of out of date or incomplete info and possibly some poor images. However, aside from pterosaurs I don't know if I could be much help in actually reviewing them as it's not my area of expertise. For example, I've spoken with people who have said a few of AW's crurotarsan images are way off base, but I don't know jack about crurotarsan's so I wouldn't know where to start ;) Would be great to find a few 'experts' to help review images. Dinoguy2 (talk) 19:27, 7 August 2009 (UTC)

I'd support it as well and be able to contribute reviews regarding mammals. --Aranae (talk) 20:26, 7 August 2009 (UTC)

I will see what all the fuss is about over the next week. More imput would be good. Enlil Ninlil (talk) 11:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

• How about simply calling it paleoart review? FunkMonk (talk) 07:13, 13 August 2009 (UTC)

Started it up here[36], anyone can put new or old images up for review there now, and change the page if they want to. FunkMonk (talk) 13:28, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

Elephantidae

Per recent discussion on Talk:Elephant (here), a request to move List of elephant species → Elephantidae has been posted (here). --Una Smith (talk) 01:34, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

What is Peleycornis?

I was looking at some skeletal drawings in Gregory S. Paul's "Dinosaurs of the Air" and found a drawing of a "terror bird" called Peleycornis. I then tried to look this genus up on the web, but all that shows up is a John Conway restoration with no description, and the Google Books version of Dinosaurs of the Air. So what the heck is it? A search for "Pelycornis" gave a few more results, but not many.FunkMonk (talk) 12:50, 30 August 2009 (UTC)

It seems to be a misspelling of Pelycornis. See this article at JSTOR [37] The title is The Fossil Birds of Patagonia and it mentions only a Pelycornis. --Spotty ¹¹²²² 12:59, 30 August 2009 (UTC)

Shouldn'tit be mentioned at least on the phorusrhacidae article or something? FunkMonk (talk) 13:18, 30 August 2009 (UTC)

Turned out to be a misspelling of Pelecyornis, which is a synonym of Psilopterus... Phew! FunkMonk (talk) 11:23, 17 November 2009 (UTC)

Request

I'm currently working on an article covering the evolutionary history of vertebrates. I need an a suitable in the lead paragraph and would to like request one made for this purpose. I searched through the uploaded files on Wikipedia and the Commons, but none were approriate. The image just have to incorporate and contain an image of one organisms from each vertebrate taxa: Mammals, Birds, Amphibians, Reptiles, and Fish. An example of the image structure would be like this:

File:Animals fullquality.jpg

If anyone can help, please do. KnowledgeRequire (talk) 22:46, 31 August 2009 (UTC)

Could you find the images you want to have included in the compilation and link to them here? Then it'll be quite easy to do. FunkMonk (talk) 22:56, 31 August 2009 (UTC)

Sure. KnowledgeRequire (talk) 15:55, 1 September 2009 (UTC)

Here are the images:

• Komodo Dragon(Reptile)
• Shearwater(Bird)
• White Lipped tree frog(Amphibian)
• African Elephant(Mammal)
• Manta Ray(Cartilagnious Fish)

Thanks KnowledgeRequire (talk) 16:13, 1 September 2009 (UTC)

Why did you strike them out and write nevermind in the sumary? FunkMonk (talk) 21:46, 3 September 2009 (UTC)

BOT notice

Hello,

I have created a bot that will be using a database of prehistoric genus to fill in the tables on pages like List of prehistoric starfish#The list. Please see its bot request and comment there. Suggestions for improvements and/or people willing to spot check its work are welcome and appreciated.

Thank you, ThaddeusB (talk) 01:56, 3 September 2009 (UTC)

Looks cool, will it be creating vertebrate articles too? FunkMonk (talk) 20:00, 15 September 2009 (UTC)

Dieter Korn assistance needed

Assistance is needed at the article Dieter Korn, prolific German paleomalacologist specializing in ammonites. It has been tagged as nonnotable, and I do not have enough experience with living persons biography requirements to get much further with the page. The editor who tagged the page stated that RS are needed verses his CV and Museum für Naturkunde page. Could someone with better experience in this area take a look and expand the page more to meet BLP requirements?--Kevmin (talk) 22:39, 7 September 2009 (UTC)

Merging fossil species into genus articles

I recently merged all articles about mastodon species into the mastodon article.[38] All of the articles where stubs with very little unique info, and the same has been done to most other articles about other fossil species already. But my redirect of Mammut americanum to mastodon was reverted by WolfmanSF, what do other editors think should be the right procedure? This was previously discussed here: [39] FunkMonk (talk) 19:01, 8 September 2009 (UTC)

I can see some problems with the current mastodon article, in that statements that are only applicable to the American mastodon are being made in such a way that they appear to be applicable to the genus as a whole. WolfmanSF (talk) 19:16, 8 September 2009 (UTC)

That shouldn't happen, and if it has been done like that before, it should be changed. My edits certainly didn't do anything like that, I simply put the info about individual species into a species section, like on most other fossil genus articles. Take a look at Smilodon for example. When such problems are solved, how would you propose making separate species articles that aren't just duplicates of each others and the genus article? FunkMonk (talk) 19:19, 8 September 2009 (UTC)

You're right, the problems (such as describing all mastodonts as woolly) predate your edits. WolfmanSF (talk) 19:27, 8 September 2009 (UTC)

I partially reverted some of this. In principle, they are legitimate stubs, but they should be checked. cygnis insignis 19:51, 8 September 2009 (UTC)

Yeah, they're legitimate as stubs, but better off merged, in my opinion, and the opinion of most others that have come before me, therefore we hardly have any fossil species stubs on Wikipedia, apart from sub-fossil species maybe. But I've already argued why I think so, what are the counterarguments? FunkMonk (talk) 19:58, 8 September 2009 (UTC)

I tend to agree that few fossil species warrant an article on their own. I tend to think that, unlike extant species, we should treat genera as the default article level, species as subheadings, and create new articles when those species subheadings get too large. There are definitely some (perhaps all) Mammuthus species that warrant their own articles, and perhaps Mammut americanum does or will warrant its own article, but Mammut furlongi might never. In summary, my suggestion is to merge into genus and treat this like non-TOL topical articles - create species articles when length dictates it. --Aranae (talk) 20:35, 8 September 2009 (UTC)

• Now previously merged Smilodon articles are being recreated, couldn't we at least discuss this first? FunkMonk (talk) 21:09, 8 September 2009 (UTC)

Should that article be a hodgepodge of facts, such as those that could be gleaned from PNAS Supermodeled sabercat, predatory behavior in Smilodon fatalis revealed by high-resolution 3D computer simulation. These were deleted with the argument, 'it is better to have fewer articles'. They haven't been expanded because they were redirected to the genus article, placing facts there is misleading without a constant need to specify which Smilodon yer talkin' about. These have are legitimate stubs! cygnis insignis 21:23, 8 September 2009 (UTC)

It's common practice to have only genus level taxa have articles. It is completely unnecessary to create articles about individual species of Smilodon. It would be preferable to have expanded the genus article's species sections instead of going against consensus. It's been long-standing at WP:DINO that species don't get articles. The same should be applied for WP:PAL. --Spotty ¹¹²²² 21:35, 8 September 2009 (UTC)

If this is some rule, where does it stop. Do you doubt that these can be expanded? WP:NOTPAPER How is this lumping supposed to improve and build the encyclopedia? I have not suggested that cannot be summarised at the genus articles, but they are the same thing as an article on a species. cygnis insignis 21:47, 8 September 2009 (UTC)

To answer your question; It stops at genus articles. I don't doubt that they can be expanded, in their parent articles. Having a stub on each species of a genus containing 57 members is utterly useless, regardless of WP:NOTPAPER. Having them scattered about in several different articles is much more cumbersome than having separate species articles. This "lumping" as you call it, centralizes the information about the specific animal, rather than scattering it around, and provides a usefull, comprehensive article, describing the species within, as well as everything else. Most species are so similar to one another in a genus, that you might as well be repetitive in writing them as they entail mostly the same information. The same information that would fit into all the species article would also fit just as well in the genus articles. Frankly, writing articles at the species level isn't encyclopedic. It just seems to "add more articles" to the encyclopedia rather than adding substance. Even if there is a great deal of information about a particular species, say... the type species, that can easily be worked into the parent genus article, as that particular species is a member of that genus. --Spotty ¹¹²²² 22:02, 8 September 2009 (UTC)

The type species ...? cygnis insignis 22:24, 8 September 2009 (UTC)

Extant species articles, even sub-species, are justified because they can easily be fleshed out due to description of behaviour, external appearance and similar, but most of these things don't apply to fossil species, so they should be held to different standards. Take the tiger (species of the genus Panthera) article, for example. Could you write that much about a species of Smilodon, without the content being practically identical to the other Smilodon articles, as well as the genus? FunkMonk (talk) 22:09, 8 September 2009 (UTC)

I don't think there needs to be hard and fast rules, surely there are some cases where extinct species surely can be afforded their own articles, particularly when there is a lot of information or the genus is not extinct - Dire Wolf springs instantly to mind. On the other hand I agree that in most cases having the information at genus level makes the most sense from an organisational point of view. Sabine's Sunbird talk 22:18, 8 September 2009 (UTC)

Mammuthus primigenius might also be an exception, since there is a lot of information about this species only, compared to other Mammuthus species. FunkMonk (talk) 22:22, 8 September 2009 (UTC)

Yes there will be exceptions to the policy of genus level only, as noted above, which warrant separate articles. However the predominant amount of extinct taxa should not have species articles created. This is due, as noted, to the serous lack of differences between species, most being separated out by time, location and anatomical differences. all of which do not add up to enough different information to create full article from and thus dooming any species level article to be a duplicate of the genus article with a small section noting why it was considered a different species from the others. Plus the further back one travels in the fossil record the more montypic genera are found and the more likely the article will be at the genus level anyway. I agree that, with agreed on exceptions, extinct taxa should go no further then genus.--Kevmin (talk) 22:44, 8 September 2009 (UTC)

Certainly flexibility is the key - I am trying to think of significant prehistoric species as opposed to genera - the main ones that spring to mind are Homo erectus and maybe some of the separate species of Australopithecus, provided they haven't been split up into genera yet...Casliber (talk · contribs) 23:21, 8 September 2009 (UTC)

Yeah, all extinct Homo species, as well as other hominina species, should have articles I think, the amount of info on them certainly isn't scarce, due to their closeness to man. And thinking a little further, a few fossil sub-species also have articles too, like the cave lion, American lion, and the cave hyena and I agree with that. FunkMonk (talk) 23:34, 8 September 2009 (UTC)

Again. I really think it's a length issue. If the genus article would be too long with specific information included for that particular species then it warrants a separate page. Species-specific information should not be removed or excluded in order to force it to fit on the genus page. I think all of the examples provided would fit this description or easily have the potential to fit the description. --Aranae (talk) 00:15, 9 September 2009 (UTC)

Merging fossil species into genus articles is usual in Wikipedia:WikiProject Dinosaurs only. Every other wikiprojects have a species as de facto a standard and sometimes there there are used also articles about subspecies. Wikiproject Palaeontology blend together with all other wikiprojects in Wikipedia:WikiProject Tree of life, so it should also follow their criteria and to not contradict them, if it is not absolutely necessary. --Snek01 (talk) 01:01, 9 September 2009 (UTC)

I wasn't around when WP:DINO settled on genera. However, it works very well for dinosaurs, for a couple of reasons: the great majority of dinosaur genera have one species (or, if they have multiple, the non-type species are often based on a tooth or vertebra described in the 1800s with little to no context or anything in the way of useful information attached); and it is not uncommon that an author intends Xsaurus sp. when discussing Xsaurus, instead of Xsaurus typespecies, or just ignores species altogether (common, for example, in studies of the biostratigraphy of the K-T boundary, where reptile genera or families are preferred instead of species), so most information should rightly go to the genus. I've found that this holds for pterosaurs, crurotarsans, and the various groups of marine reptiles as well, and is probably the case in many other fossil vertebrate groups. The exceptions are mammals, because of the use of teeth to readily identify taxa, and Quaternary taxa, because there is inevitably more information known on the most recent forms. "Genus instead of species" in prehistoric reptile articles reflects the overall professional attitude. Whether "genus instead of species" is best for prehistoric mammals, I wouldn't be competent to advise. J. Spencer (talk) 01:53, 9 September 2009 (UTC)

Although the bird project has an article for every living species (give or take a few splits we haven't yet decided on) we don't adopt a single policy for fossils - we treat them as described by Aranae above. Even then we have some articles that might be better upmerged - Sinoto's Lorikeet is a good example of such an article. Sabine's Sunbird talk 02:15, 9 September 2009 (UTC)

Abyssal's $0.02: Aranae has the right idea. Abyssal (talk) 06:39, 9 September 2009 (UTC)

Epochs: Upper vs. Early, etc.

Hey guys, I was doing research into this apparent difference in nomenclature and I'm getting a bit confused. According to the intro for the official USGS time scale [40], there seem to be two timescales in use. The USGS, and the ICS. According to the USGS scale, the differences are:

• ICS handles stage/age names, while USGS does not.
• ICS uses the term "Early, Middle, Late" and handle the stages.

Ok, good so far. But I went to the ICS site, and got their official timescale... which uses "Lower, Middle, Upper" exclusively. The only place that uses Early etc. is the USGS, in that their labels say Upper / Late, but this seems like a nod back to ICS? Has ICS eliminated the use of Late and Early and USGS just hasn't updated its scale to reflect this, or is USGS actually endorsing use of Late and Early in the official nomenclature? Either way, since Wikipedia is an international project, shouldn't we prefer the ICS over USGS anyway, especially considering ICS is the source for stage names? Dinoguy2 (talk) 17:39, 15 September 2009 (UTC)

This is an encyclopedia, i.e. for non-specialists. Lower / ... / Upper imply familiarity w basic geology. I'd prefer Early / Middle / Late, which say what they mean. --Philcha (talk) 19:23, 15 September 2009 (UTC)

But if they're not official designations, they should at least be lowercase. And then we may as well start using things like mid-Cretaceous, etc. All the paleo papers I have seem to use upper/lower so there may be OR issues involved too if we're essentially making up a timescale not used by the pros. Dinoguy2 (talk) 19:48, 15 September 2009 (UTC)

The Paleobiology database (pbdb.org) uses both forms. I see no problem with Late/Early. It's certainly not OR, the question is is it too informal. I think not - either is acceptable in my opinion. --Aranae (talk) 20:12, 15 September 2009 (UTC)

For reference: Late/Early are used in reference to dates (because dates can be late or early), whereas Upper/Lower are used for stratigraphic position. Thus, the Morrison Formation is an Upper Jurassic rock unit that dates to the Late Jurassic. And yes, that does sound obtuse, but there you go. J. Spencer (talk) 22:26, 15 September 2009 (UTC)

But my question is, who uses them in reference to dates? Is there a governing body akin to the USGS or ICS? Some publication that lays out epoch/subperiod names other than these two? If there are two systems in play here (chronology vs. stratigraphy), do both use, say, Eocene, or does the srat use Eocene and the chron use "Middle Paleogene"? According to both sites I listed above, many of the Cambrrian, Permian, etc. 'mid, upper, lower' epochs have been getting proper names like Eocene, making it seem like these are almost like placeholders until Upper Cretaceous gets its own snazzy name. Dinoguy2 (talk) 23:27, 15 September 2009 (UTC)

In theory, it's all the "same" system, except strat uses upper/lower and chronology uses late/early. In practice, it looks like the USGS scale is based on a 2004 version of the ICS scale, stopping at a coarser level, and in general is probably tweaked for the concerns of the USGS. I'd guess the reason the ICS only has upper/lower in use on the scale is in the name of the organization: International Commission on "Stratigraphy". The GSA also has a time scale out (2009) which is slightly different again, incorporating the long Late Triassic, and only using Early/Late. I'd say use the dates and the "fancy" names (your Cisuralians, your Wenlocks, etc.) from the ICS unless there is a recognized alternate structure like the North American Land Mammal Ages, and where a fancy name has not yet been recognized use Upper/Lower or Late/Early where appropriate (Late Jurassic, Lower Cretaceous, etc.). J. Spencer (talk) 00:13, 16 September 2009 (UTC)

Nominated article: Batrachotomus

I've nominated Batrachotomus for GA since 14 Sept. Liopleurodon93 (talk) 14:33, 20 September 2009 (UTC)