Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Ediacaran biota

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The following is an archived discussion of a featured article nomination. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.

The article was promoted 16:57, 28 June 2007.

[edit] Ediacaran biota

Self nomination

This article's had a few months to mature. Vanished user suggested it was ready for FA nomination; all the suggestions of a peer review have been implemented, and I can't see anything major I want to do to the article. So: ready for your comments! Thanks, Verisimilus T 10:52, 20 June 2007 (UTC)

  • Support: Excellent article. Vanished user talk 18:19, 20 June 2007 (UTC)
  • Support. Impressive piece of work. --Targeman 18:33, 20 June 2007 (UTC)
  • Comment - Is there a particular reason why the article does not follow the guide to layout?--Crzycheetah 20:58, 20 June 2007 (UTC)
    • Reply: The guide to layout says that those sections may be put in any order, and it makes sense to put the huge list last. Vanished user talk 21:47, 20 June 2007 (UTC)
      • I meant to point out that those sections should be a heading of level 2.--Crzycheetah 00:13, 21 June 2007 (UTC)
        • Oh, right. Fixed! Vanished user talk 00:20, 21 June 2007 (UTC)
*"subsequent multicellular life would be based on the Cambrian, not the Ediacaran." you can't base life on a time period. "based on body plans that evolved in the Cambrian..."?
Re-worded. Verisimilus T 11:40, 21 June 2007 (UTC)
*They appeared around.. you just finished talking about the Cambrian, not immediately clear what "they" are.
Re-worded. Verisimilus T 11:40, 21 June 2007 (UTC)
*Their discoverer, A. Murray, a geological surveyor, found them useful aids for correlating the age of rocks around Newfoundland. If you cite him by name, you need a reference. Similarly for the other proposals.
    • I think those are all covered by the historical overview article at the end of the paragraph. I may be wrong, and was about to go to bed, though. Vanished user talk 00:12, 21 June 2007 (UTC)
Yes - all are contained in reference 4 (Gehling 1999). I've cited them explicitly. Verisimilus T 11:40, 21 June 2007 (UTC)
*In the Morphology section you should use the past tense to talk about the animals, but the present tense to talk about their fossils.
This is in places a tricky distinction to make. For example, "Size ranges from millimetres to metres" - this is true for both the animals, and their fossils. But I've done what I can to this section. Verisimilus T 12:03, 21 June 2007 (UTC)
I've rewritten this a bit more, see if you think this is reasonable. TimVickers 16:46, 21 June 2007 (UTC)
Great. I've made a minor alteration to avoid such direct comparison of organisms with fossils, but that's now looking good. Thanks. Verisimilus T 17:22, 22 June 2007 (UTC)
*These traces imply the presence of motile organisms with heads,... Not all motile organisms have heads, did you mean anterior/posterior differentiation?
I'm trying to think this through. Yes, anterior/posterior differentiation must certainly have been present — but I don't see how you can burrow without something that could at least be described as a head, even if there wasn't a complex brain present. As soon as you're moving through sediment, it makes evolutionary sense to concentrate sensory organs towards the front of the body (where new environments are being encountered) and this would logically lead to the development of a head sensu "a gathering of sensors at the anterior end of the body". Verisimilus T 12:03, 21 June 2007 (UTC)
Horizontal surface motion does not necessarily require a "head", I think the problem is that the "head" implication is taken in the text from both sets of traces, while if it is only burrowing which implies this, this should be made more clear. TimVickers 16:46, 21 June 2007 (UTC)
How's this rewording? Verisimilus T 17:19, 22 June 2007 (UTC)
*Why are the sections on "Assemblages" and "Preservations" at opposite ends of the article? These would logically seem to go together.
The reader needs to have been introduced to certain concepts - for example, rangeomorphs - before the Assemblages makes sense. Further, it's helpful to have been introduced to microbial mats early on, as they are mentioned extensively throughout the article. We've had a discussion on article structure previously and settled on this as the best compromise. I agree that they do cover similar ground and it would be nice to have them together, but as a naïve reader I personally feel I'd be best served by a quick introduction to the preservation - which is perhaps one of the most important aspects of the biota - but that the assemblages is perhaps more in-depth and of less passing interest, and is thus better saved to the end. Verisimilus T 12:03, 21 June 2007 (UTC)
*If scientist's names are important enough to link, they could do with stubs to remove the redlinks. Otherwise, remove the links.
Removed. Verisimilus T 12:03, 21 June 2007 (UTC)
Created a page on Mark McMenamin for you. TimVickers 16:46, 21 June 2007 (UTC)
*"palæolatitudes" is not defined by a link to latitudes, I don't understand how these terms differ.
    • Remember significant continental drift has happened since the Ediacaran - the latitudes that they're found in now are not the same as they were at the time. Perhaps we could be more clear... 00:13, 21 June 2007 (UTC)
      • I've added a note about it, though it may be a little excessively complex to put across a fairly minor point. Vanished user talk 00:18, 21 June 2007 (UTC)
I"m confused, surely the latitudes remain the same whatever the position of the landmasses? After all, isn't the equator defined relative to the poles? TimVickers 00:34, 21 June 2007 (UTC)
Yes, but Antarctica, for example, was once in tropical latitudes. The palæolatitude (in this context, anyway) is the latitude the fossils were at when they were created, which may not be the same as where they've now been moved to. Vanished user talk 00:40, 21 June 2007 (UTC)
I see. I'd recommend making a sub-heading for palaeolatitude on the latitude page and making a piped link to this definition. TimVickers 02:34, 21 June 2007 (UTC)
Done. Should we keep the short clarification? Vanished user talk 03:09, 21 June 2007 (UTC)
Yes, I've shortened it a bit. TimVickers 03:32, 21 June 2007 (UTC)
*References should all contain a PMID, DOI or ISBN link.
Oh, you meanie. I'll get onto it. Verisimilus T 12:03, 21 June 2007 (UTC)
P.S. - What if they don't appear online? Is ISSN ok? e.g. Reference 1, "Ediacaran-like fossils in Cambrian Burgess Shale–type faunas of North America"
Looks fine. TimVickers 16:46, 21 June 2007 (UTC)
Great. That's all of them, as last! Verisimilus T 17:07, 22 June 2007 (UTC)
*There is no point in adding access dates to references with no external links.
I think I've removed all of these. Verisimilus T 17:07, 22 June 2007 (UTC)
*Refs 7, 25 and 66 are incorrectly formatted external links.
Sorry, it's not entirely clear what the correct format is. Better now? Verisimilus T 13:13, 21 June 2007 (UTC)
It's best to use the cite web template Template:Cite web. TimVickers 16:46, 21 June 2007 (UTC)
Of course. Done. Verisimilus T 16:27, 22 June 2007 (UTC)
  • Why is Image:Nama_assemblage commented out in the "Nama-type assemblage" section? TimVickers 17:46, 22 June 2007 (UTC)
I'd been waiting for some pictures displaying the assemblages to be created by Mr Fink and was saving a space for them. Whilst it's been some time, I feel I may as well leave the images ready to go, so the captions and references are available when needed. Verisimilus T 18:05, 22 June 2007 (UTC)
OK, suppose that works. TimVickers 18:55, 22 June 2007 (UTC)
  • Support - good work on prose (trickiest criteria to satisfy)cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 02:22, 25 June 2007 (UTC)
  • Support Excellent article M&NCenarius 17:04, 26 June 2007 (UTC)
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.