Talk:Invasion biology terminology

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This seems like a strong effort, but possibly a waste of time. Creating separate glossaries for scientific articles takes away from the purpose of having articles in Wikipedia by assuming a reader will just open a glossary as part of his experience in reading about a particular subject. I find that a good assumption for a book, but a rather poor one for an on-line encyclopedia. How would you envision connecting this to the article except by making a rather intrusive announcement that a glossary page is available for the article? This is a pointless claim considering that the beauty of on-line text is the ability to have hyperlinks to definitions and further reading on any important terms or subjects raised in the article. A "terminology" page is both redundant and frankly contrary to the reason anyone would consult, read, or write an article online in the first place - Marshman 04:33, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

I must say I also find the article a bit elitist, although I confess I am clearly an elitist myself. But is it really necessary to provide the somewhat POV that various terms are or are not "common in the literature" as opposed to common usage? This approach also seems non-Wikipedian to me, even though I usually always support a strong scientific POV. On this point I certainly invite others to dispute me, as my heart would be to keep this approach as the best one. Overall, this article too much smacks of a sort of scientific back room rather than a "lets lift the masses up" approach to the subject. That is, I really would like to see all of the valuable parts of this contribution in the article on Invasive Species rather than here. I will take the responsibility to move it, but others should comment first.- Marshman 04:44, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

Wiktionary is an option for this page although we maintain that a good deal of the controversy that was originally presented on these wikipedia pages concerning invasion biology, introduced species, invasive species, invasive plants, and other related topics stemmed from the inconsistent use of terms in invasive biology as a discipline. This assertion is backed up in our literature review of these subject areas. We still find the introduction to the terms on this page, and the terms included on this page, to have value when reading through the text in the related pages. That said, we wouldn't be opposed to including this section in wiktionary if that is more appropriate. Our experience with other online reference works is that many of them have hyperlinks to glossary terms of note or interest within the text, and wikipedia is no exception, as many of the pages within wikipedia contain no more than a dictionary definition anyway at this point in time. - PBG250

I understand your point, and your assertions are correct; but not really well served by having a separate "glossary" at Wikipedia as it requires the reader to know where to go when confronted with a "fuzzy" term. Most expect terms to be defined where they read them, or at least within easy reach. I used your glossary at Wikibooks for the Ecology text, where the approach that you are attempting fits very well (it is a textbook). Here, even if you define a term in the glossary, there is absolutely no assurance that a person contributing to Invasive species or other related articles accepts, understands, or agrees with a definition in your glossary. - Marshman 22:20, 18 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] I like it

I just today stumbled across this article, and I think it's an excellent start! I'm sure it could fit into Wikipedia very well; for ideas on how to improve it, try out List of glossaries and in particular List of cricket terms which is a featured list. In particular, I do not see a need to merge into Invasive species.

I'm not sure exactly what Marshman means about fuzzy terms, but he makes a critical point concerning cooperation with related articles. We should probably:

Wikify: use internal links. List of cricket terms would be a good guide here.
Meanwhile, look for conflicts with other Wikipedia articles. If any are found, compare references.
Convert references to endnote style.
Export the prose "introduction" section to a different article and/or inspect it for POV.

Melchoir 08:56, 8 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] I like it too

It's clear that Mr. Marshman has a background in conservation biology or something similar, and he's done a good job of trying to sort out the very confusing terminology in this area. He has tried to keep it non-technical and concise. You will never get complete consensus on these terms, because there IS no consensus out there. BTW: The situation is even more complex in Hawaii, where some writers distinguish between species that were probably present before any human contact [native or indigenous], and species brought to the islands by Polynesians before European contact [sometimes called endemic]. Most people find the distinction useful, but can't agree on what words to use!