EvoWiki:Discussions/Manual of Style
From EvoWiki
I think we should work at formulating some style guidelines so that we can have some consistancy across the site.
Where there are polls you can add your vote/opinion under the option you'd perfer, general discussions can go at the bottom of each section.
Contents |
Article layout
Introductions
Some ideas:
- Where appropriate putting the article title in bold (or bold italics for book titles etc)
Resources
The options for resources sections titles:
- For links:
- For references:
- References
- For further reading:
In the order:
- 1, 2, 3 (Links, Refs, Further)
- 1, 3, 2 (Links, Further, Refs)
- 2, 3, 1 (Refs, Further, Links)
- 2, 1, 3 (Refs, Links, Further)
- 3, 1, 2 (Further, Links, Refs)
- 3, 2, 1 (Further, Refs, Links)
- Whatever order the user wants
- No opinion
How should the lists be formatted?
- Bulleted lists
- Numbered lists
- I'm definitely with one of the formatted list types, I don't think the double-returned lists look good at all -Steinsky
- I have the same opinion as Steinsky. I have no preference between bulleted or numbered but it should definitely be one of the two because it is more orderly --Jesse 08:50, 9 July 2006 (BST)
- Inserting double returns between entries
- No opinion
Spelling
- All American English spellings
- I vote for American English for two reasons. First, because the vast majority of people accessing this encyclopedia will prefer American. Second, because I've found that International English users are less confused by American English than American English users are by International English. It doesn't take too many appearances of "centre" or "programme" to convince the average American that the page is hopelessly misspelled. --Suttkus 12:06, 22 March 2006 (GMT)
- I think I'd prefer that too. At least the spelling of the same word within a page should be consistent.
- I also prefer American English spellings for the resons stated by Suttkus. Since there is no specific mention of it elsewhere on this page I'll mention it here: I also prefer American English punctuation. --Jesse 08:58, 9 July 2006 (BST)
- All international English spellings
- Whatever the user prefers?
- Having written everything in english english I'd be with this option! -Steinsky
Encyclopedia articles
Should we start similar projects to the Genetics encyclopedia for all the other relevant fields?
For those not familiar with the genetics encyclopedia, I mean this:
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This page is part of the EvoWiki encyclopedia of genetics and molecular biology. Topics: Genetics - Transmission genetics - Molecular genetics - Population genetics - Quantitative genetics - Molecular biology - Genomics |
Nomenclature
At Steinsky's suggestion, ive started this to hopefully end the ridiculous back-and-forth that been going on when editing certain pages. I hope we can all agree to what I mention below.
1) Im of the strong opinion that Linnaean nomenclature is a bad thing, and as such, refuse to us it if I can. Syn disagrees. Thus I propose that groups with both Linnaean and phylogenetic definitions be described as clades or assemblages, unless said group is being described in an appropriate context (e.g. "X was historically considered a family..."). This is a neutral term we can all agree with.
- Any page I create will adhere to the standard of taxonomic science, which regretfully means that the PhyloCode will be neglected as the brainless rot that it is. If for no other reason, the traditional taxonomic lexicon should be employed because this is an encyclopedia and thus it should conform to the language with which most of its readers are most familiar (this is, e.g., why field guides still use and almost certainly will always use very traditional, Linnean terminology). Considering your pontifications on consensus and sanctimonious lecturing on acknowledging only consensus in any given wiki page, you should at least concede that the PhyloCode is held to by a very limited number of researchers and has hardly gained widespread support amongst the taxonomic community. Your attempt to convert the wiki to the PhyloCode to save us from the evils of perceived fallacy in science notwithstanding, I think we can do without missionary zeal. (JGK, 4/8/04, 12:51am, GMT -5)
2) Please, put all non-monophyletic taxa in quotes. For example, everyone (including Feducciaries) admit that "Graculavidae" is non-monophyletic. Using it without quotes, particularly when discussing phylogeny, can give people the wrong impression.
- And all binomials should be italicized in non-italicized text. If you wish to link them fine, but italicize them as well (JGK, 4/9/04, 4:22pm GMT -5).
3) I very much perfer the format style Steinsky is using (e.g. "Anseriformes (Wagler, 1830) is a clade of aquatic birds including..) instead of "Anseriformes (Wagler, 1830)", one enter, and then the start of the text. This is not a style convention, so it can only serve to confuse people. Encyclopedia entries should be as clear to people as possible without sacrificing detail of content.
- Entering the name of the order followed by its history is the standard citation within references to systematic paleontology and the bibliographic works in this field and thus there is no reason not to use it. (JGK, 4/8/04, 12:51am GMT -5)
4) Lastly, please try to remain objective. Ive noticed pages that contain views that are, shall we say, more than a little hetrodox. Authors are free to believe whatever crackpot ideas they like, but in the name of accurate information, please focus on the concesus view of a topic and its evidence. Feel free to note opposition, but put it in context...both in terms of number of adherents, and critiques from the concensus side. --GFA 20:22, 7 Apr 2004 (BST)
- You're quite the one to talk about objectivity...anything that dares question a consensus cladogram is more than likely to be rejected out of hand on your part. And the definition of consensus as "whatever cladists think," seemingly that preferred, is hardly very convincing (JGK, 4/8/04, 12:55am GMT -5).
- I have a proposition: On all such pages we include a taxonomy table (ala the geological time tables) which includes traditional classification (and notable divisions if the group is above species level), and a photo where possible, becuase these are useful little snipets of info that is rarely disputed and needs little explanation. However, in the rest of the article (perhaps an Evolutionary History section) the classification of the group can be discussed further with things like relatedness to other groups bought up.
- The idea may well need refining, like I say I don't know enough about the differences in the systems. --Steinsky 21:44, 9 Apr 2004 (BST)
- This proposition is I think what we currently have, though I think a standard reference to the taxonomy of the specimen in the style observed in discussion of systematic paleontology is more than sufficient. (JGK, 4/9/04, 4:52pm GMT -5)
- Just to add, on the point about objectivity: I think people should be free to add their opinions to evowiki, but that they should go on pages like "A discussion of..." or "... essay", while pages with clade names for titles should be the basic information about those organisms, perhaps with some history and links to the essay pages and so on --Steinsky 21:14, 7 Apr 2004 (BST)
- I think the anseriform page is a good example of what an encyclopedia page should look like (with the exception of those things pertaining to point 1 above). There is discussion of evolutionary history -- but heres what important -- its focus is on the concensus view, with alternatives mentioned as sidenotes. But yes, on other "essay" pages, go to town arguing for those positions --GFA 22:10, 7 Apr 2004 (BST)
- As far as I was aware, I had scarcely fundamentally altered any page with any massive revision to bring it in line with my particular opinion on anything. (JGK, 4/8/04, 12:55am GMT -5)
- I'm currently going through all the articles in Special:Deadendpages because the Special:Statistics page doesn't consider them to be real articles. More importantly, many of these minimal pages provide very little information beyond a type species, which few people will find of any use. I know very little about paleornithology, and the information I'm putting on those pages is just what I find on google that looks informative and authoritative, so I'm staying out of these debates over details!
- Back to the disputes over different views : how should disputes be presented in the encylopedia/glossary articles? (appying to all pages, not just taxa pages.) Should the majority view be presented, with the option for those to dissagree to add their opinions to a seperate article, or should there be a section/sub-page presenting the dispute and all the different views? I'm open to either of those. --Steinsky 22:43, 7 Apr 2004 (BST)
- I think we should keep the pages coherent and thus discuss alternative viewpoints within the actual relevant page without redirecting the reader all over the place, which is simply inconvenient and reduces the utility of the wiki as a reference. (JGK, 4/9/04, 4:54pm GMT -5)
Singular/Plural
There is a usage on Wikipedia on plural and singular of biological entities. Species are always singular, all higher units are always plural. Should we employ that here too? It sounds smart to me.
That would mean that the article about whales is Whales, with Whale being a redirect. That's how it is at the moment in that case, as in most of the others (Chimpanzee, Humans, Insect, Dinosaur, Bird, Mammal are redirects). But Trilobite is the other way around at this moment. I'll change it now. --tk (t) 12:55, 22 March 2006 (GMT)
