Wikipedia:Featured article review/Psittacosaurus/archive1

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

The article was kept by Nikkimaria via FACBot (talk) 8:48, 1 January 2016 (UTC) [1].

Psittacosaurus[edit]

Notified: FunkMonk, WikiProject Extinction, WikiProject Palaeontology, WikiProject Dinosaurs, WikiProject Amphibians and Reptiles

WP:URFA nom

I am nominating this featured article for review because as noted on the talk page the article requires update and clarification of content that appears to contradict recent sources, as well as copyediting and clarification of at least one incidence of weasel words. DrKay (talk) 16:35, 6 December 2015 (UTC)[reply]

To be honest, I think the entire List of Psittacosaurus species could be converted into prose, subsections removed, and merged here. Size-wise, there's not much reason for it to be separate. Could bulk up the discovery and classification sections. FunkMonk (talk) 00:05, 7 December 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Yeah, that species list should probably be merged. We don't have lists for other genera that have multiple species, so Psittacosaurus shouldn't be the exception. The reconstruction of P.mongoliensis seems kind of bad compared to the P.sibericus reconstruction, so maybe we should swap it out for something a bit better-looking? Raptormimus456 (talk) 17:54, 7 December 2015 (UTC)[reply]

We don't have other accurate reconstructions of that species, and the current one is not inaccurate. FunkMonk (talk) 17:56, 7 December 2015 (UTC)[reply]

DrKay, the issues you mentioned on the talk page are "There is one part that says "it has been suggested" but doesn't say who suggested it. There is also a mixture of American and British spelling." I have fixed the first issue. What other issues are still not fixed that you can think of? Any thought on whether the list should be merged? FunkMonk (talk) 22:02, 8 December 2015 (UTC)[reply]

There is no opposition to a merge. How can the discrepancy between "400 individuals" in the article and "1000 specimens" in Sandy's source be addressed? Do "specimens" and "individuals" mean different things, i.e. can you have more than one specimen from an individual? DrKay (talk) 09:00, 12 December 2015 (UTC)[reply]

I think the problem is that most of these specimens are not scientifically described/documented, and are stored in various obscure Chinese museums, so an exact number would be impossible to determine (and is not really crucial to have here anyway). Many specimens are also privately owned, and outside the reach of scientists. The case is similar with many other Chinese dinosaur species. I think the best solution would just be to write "hundreds". In theory, you can have several specimens from a single individual (different parts of the skeleton can have different museum specimen numbers, for example), but that is unlikely to be the case here. FunkMonk (talk) 09:19, 12 December 2015 (UTC)[reply]

I have now merged List of Psittacosaurus species into this one, and the resulting article size (77,000 bytes) isn't even that close to the minimum size recommended for splitting (100,000). The article now looks more robust, in accordance with newer dinosaur FAs. I could need some help with merging duplicate refs, though. Anything else needed for this to be closed? FunkMonk (talk) 14:11, 21 December 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you for the changes so far.

The first two paragraphs of the description section are written in the past tense, but the subsequent paragraphs are in the present tense. As present tense is the commoner, is it appropriate to standardize on that?

I'd think so... FunkMonk (talk) 21:43, 29 December 2015 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not so sure. I was happy to convert the second para to present tense as it is mainly anatomy. I changed most of the first except a couple of life things, which sounded odd Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 13:38, 30 December 2015 (UTC)[reply]

I understand that P.major and P.lujiatunensis are the same species, but one part of the article says "a feature also seen in specimens of P. major (=P. lujiatunensis), and to a lesser degree in P. mongoliensis, P. lujiatunensis, ...".

Maybe trim to just "seen in specimens of P. lujiatunensis, and to a lesser degree in P. mongoliensis"? FunkMonk (talk) 21:43, 29 December 2015 (UTC)[reply]

The prose in the first four paragraphs of the Paleobiology section needs copy-editing, and is at its worst in the ungrammatical first clause of "Generally negative allometry for brain size with development in vertebrates, but it was shown that in Psittacosaurus this was not true." DrKay (talk) 21:25, 29 December 2015 (UTC)[reply]

I have had a go at fixing that sentence and copyediting for flow and accessibility. Let me know what you think now. I am thinking we are veering into close without FARC territory but is better for you and @Nikkimaria: to comment on that. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 13:32, 30 December 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Close without FARC. Thank you once again for the changes. DrKay (talk) 18:21, 31 December 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Closing note: This removal candidate has been kept, but there may be a delay in bot processing of the close. Please leave the {{featured article review}} template in place on the talk page until the bot goes through. Nikkimaria (talk) 18:48, 1 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.