Talk:List of historical animals

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[edit] Historical Animal ?

Terribly conducted. A true rouse. Watercolors.

What is an historical animal ? How are cats, dogs and mokeys historical animals ? Jay 15:53, 21 Dec 2003 (UTC)

Although it's currently not at all clear, this is not actually a list of historical animals, but a list of lists of historical animals. If you click on "cats", you will be taken to List of historical cats, which lists individual cats of historical significance. And so on. —Paul A

Oh! in that case the title needs to be changed. Jay 21:21, 24 Dec 2003 (UTC)

Jay would presumably prefer "List of lists..." or "Index to lists..." but despite the stretch of the concept "list" that this title entails, such a change would call for a major change of WP style. See List of people by name, which is actually closer to an index
Just accept it that some articles that are lists need to consist of an index "article" page that has the lists title, and other "article" pages that are sublists and have non-article-like titles bcz of it. You'll sleep better that way. [smile] (And no, we don't do articles that are sub-pages or sub-articles of other articles. But i'm too much of a newbie to formulate a convincing argument showing that this isn't a case of doing just that. [shrug]) --Jerzy 18:41, 2004 Jan 3 (UTC)

If the titles were something like List of historical animals: Cats, List of historical animals: Dogs, it would make sense, according to your examples. The current form of the title is simply misleading. Jay 03:14, 4 Jan 2004 (UTC)

Please indicate what you think people will conclude and how you think that is mistaken, and you might also comment on my conjecture abt what you meant by what you previously wrote above. --Jerzy 10:13, 2004 Jan 4 (UTC)
I was concerned about the meaning of 'historical animal' and not of lists or indexes as such. My idea of a historical animal was something like a dinosaur or other extinct animals, but after having a look at the dictionary I feel historic/historical makes sense. Jay 20:35, 14 Jan 2004 (UTC)

I feel the title should be changed to Lists of historical animals to be consistent with Lists of people, Lists of companies, etc., which are also list repositories. Jay 18:15, 7 Feb 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Historical or Historic ?

I've added List of historical animals and its kin to Cleanup in order to provoke a discussion here. My own opinions are an edit in progress as you read below. --Jerzy 17:12, 2004 Jan 3 (UTC)

My concerns are several:

  • The history implies this is an effort to revive a deleted article, without determining why it was deleted. If no one offers up an explanation, the previous deletion must be researched to avoid the articles being fast-tracked on VfD.
  • My impression is that on WP "historic" means "notable", and "historical" would mean "neither fictional, imaginary, nor conjectural". (My 1930 Webster's 2nd doesn't support me, however; haven't checked further.) If i am right, then one of these is out of place:
    • the title and the contrast with "fictional animals", or
    • ""individual animals of historical significance" and the contrast with "extinct animals".
  • There should be in either case some discussion of whether the intent is encyclopedic and non-redundant. (As to redundancy, sabre-tooth cats and the dreaded Komodo dragon are both historical and historic, but probably the restriction to individuals (perhaps the first one discovered by paleontologists and zoologists respectively) is good for this page, leaving the species to the Tree of life structure.) --Jerzy 18:41, 2004 Jan 3 (UTC)
Make that Scientific classification or Three-domain system, tho i think they're at least tangled w/ a Tree-of-life wiki-project on WP. --Jerzy 19:12, 2004 Jan 3 (UTC)
dictionary.com says there is a difference in usage between 'historic' and 'historical'. 'historical' need not mean 'significant' but 'historic' will always be related to significant in history. Hence the title for this page and all sub-pages should be changed to 'historic' and each page should have the meaning of the word so there is no ambiguity. Jay 20:35, 14 Jan 2004 (UTC)
For the List of historical dogs, "historical" is definitely the better word. Elf | Talk 17:50, 12 Mar 2004 (UTC)

I don't think discussions happen at Wikipedia:Cleanup. Rather Wikipedia:Peer_review is a better place for getting feedback. Jay 03:14, 4 Jan 2004 (UTC)

I agree they shouldn't be conducted there (whether or not they are), but IMO that audience is likely to respond to a perception of need to discuss, by discussing here.
But in any case, tnx for mentioning Wikipedia:Peer_review, which i had no idea of the existence of. --Jerzy 10:13, 2004 Jan 4 (UTC)

I feel List of historical monkeys should be made a redirect to List of historical chimpanzees. There is nothing at all of real substance in List of historical monkeys. List of fictional monkeys and List of historical animals are 'See also's. List of historical apes has the monkeys excluded from it. And the only remaining entry is the one for chimpanzees. Jay 20:59, 14 Jan 2004 (UTC)

This is already being discussed at Talk:List of historical monkeys - make any comments there. —Paul A 08:14, 20 Jan 2004 (UTC)

I plan to remove the word "historical" from the article names. These lists do have animals that were significant in the past, and also animals that are known in the present. Compare this to List of people which has a category of people by date. There the timelines/time categories are very specific. Maybe the animal lists will also come to that level of specificity someday. For now, let there be no 'historical'. Hence,

Jay 13:09, 10 Mar 2004 (UTC)

I disagree with the idea. a "List of apes" could include any apes. the "List of historical apes" lists only apes that are deemed relevant to history, i.e. apes that made some sort of difference. Kingturtle 15:41, 12 Mar 2004 (UTC)
I would like an analogy to people. We don't have a List of historical people. But we do have a List of people, people who were relevant in the past and the ones who are relevant today. Jay 15:57, 12 Mar 2004 (UTC)
I also disagree. Wikipedia:Lists_(stand-alone_lists)#Naming_conventions seems to say that "famous" isn't a valid adjective. This discussion seems to say that "historical" isn't a valid adjective. But the naming conventions also says "Lists that are too general or too broad in scope have little value." My concern is List of historical dogs. There's a list of fictional dogs, and this list is its counterpart. Merely "list of dogs" doesn't clarify that "this is a list of dogs who actually existed and are well-known for some reason", and in fact with that generic title, there's nothing to stop it from containing fictional dogs, mythical dogs, dog names that are popular but don't apply to any particular dog, and so on. Somehow we need to distinguish this as *real* dogs with some fame to them. I guess we could put a paragraph at the top that clarifies it but it seems that the title should reflect that as well. If it can't be "famous" and it can't be "historical", could it be "List of real, well-known dogs"? That seems silly--"List of famous dogs" says the same thing but shorter although "list of historical dogs" is probably more accurate--famous dogs could still be fictional, presumably. Elf | Talk 16:54, 12 Mar 2004 (UTC)
Good point on the "Lists that are too general or too broad in scope have little value" on Wikipedia:Lists_(stand-alone_lists). Check out the page now, the para has a few minor formats ;) For the rest of your discussion I'd like you to re-frame it from my previous post on the "List of historical people" analogy. Jay 18:21, 12 Mar 2004 (UTC)
Consider the user. When I did a search for "dog" on wikipedia, "List of historical dogs" came up among many others. I didn't need to go there to udnerstand what the page contained. However, if it had said merely "List of dogs", I'd have had to go there to understand what that meant. I don't see the value of making a heading less clear. Elf | Talk 02:35, 16 Mar 2004 (UTC)
To the unsuspecting user, List of dogs could mean List of dog breeds too. It is important to distinguish between the list of fictional and non-fictional dogs. Kingturtle 03:00, 16 Mar 2004 (UTC)
You're right about categorizing information. But categorization need not be always bi-polar, and in the case of dogs, certainly there can be many categories. My point throughout has been that "historical" isn't a category at all, and that "List of dogs" can be a master article which can contain categorical lists like the "list of dog breeds", in the future. (Show me one list article that has "historical" in its title, apart from the animals thing we've got here) And user Elf is right, the user will have to go to list of dogs to find what it is about, just the way the user will have to go to lists of pairs and list of people to find what they are about. Jay 14:33, 18 Mar 2004 (UTC)
Here is another argument: the term historical here is to distiguish a list from another list called fictional. "List of dogs"/"List of fictional dogs" makes less sense than "List of historical dogs"/"List of fictional dogs." Kingturtle 14:40, 18 Mar 2004 (UTC)
How is this another argument ? Its the same argument we've been discussing all along. As said previously, don't look at categories as bi-polar (this vs. that), take ideas from how lists actually develop from the examples I've given and show me an instance where "historical" is used as a valid category. Jay 15:39, 18 Mar 2004 (UTC)

[edit] "Historical" again

Looks like this hasn't been discussed since 2004 (wow), but I agree with Jay: this list should be moved to "List of animals", as should the various sub-lists. "Historical" generally means of historic significance, and many of the animals on these lists don't have historic significance. Historical/fictional is not a functional dichotomy - things can be both historical and fictional. It's certainly not the case that on Wikipedia, we classify "real" or "actual" people as "historical" in order to distinguish them from fictional people, I don't see why we should do so with other animals. schi talk 18:23, 30 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] List of (historical) horses

The list of horses vanished.Albmont 11:13, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

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