Talk:Alpine orogeny

Alpine and Alpide
Are not the same and cannot be used as synonyms. The Alpine Orogeny covers only structures relating to the Alps, Carpathans, Dinaric Alps and Hellenides. Alpide is not an orogeny. It is a system of orogenies developing during the closure of Neotethys. True, the Alpine Orogeny is Alpide, but not vice versa. Everything said about Alpide has to come out. Material on the Alpine has to go in. There is an Alpide article but it is not "Alpide Orogeny" and rightly so. I put the source and definition of "Alpide" in a note of Delphi on which I happen to be working. Note that the reference is a huge encyclopedia but no article or pages in it are referenced. In view of the fact that this is inappropriately mixed-topic material and the picture is wrong for the title I put the "stub" tag in. I have seen all the Internet copies of this article. Just because something can be copied does not make it right.Botteville (talk) 10:07, 5 November 2020 (UTC)


 * The situation has an additional complication: the orogenic belt/orogen formed by an orogeny is often given the suffix -ide. For example, the Caledonide orogen was formed by the Caledonian orogeny. An orogen is also often indicated by the suffix -ides e.g. the Caledonides, the Alpides etc. I've also seen the orogens formed during the closure of the Tethys Ocean described as the Alpides (sensu lato), meaning the Alpides (sensu stricto) plus the Tethysides. — GeoWriter (talk) 14:50, 16 December 2021 (UTC)

The class
Whether this is a stub or a start is not really relevant. It isn't something I care to argue about. But I don't see any discussion of Alpine vs Alpide! The material of this article is a duplicate more or less of Alpide belt. Why have two articles on the same topic? We have to present Alpine proper somewhere and Alpide proper somewhere. I know there are compound names of Alpine-x that mean Alpide but these are not the same as pure Alpine. It seems to me the right place to start is Alpide belt so I am covering the terminology there. As part of that process I will have to rob this article of its Alpide material. After I do that there will not be anything left here; true "Alpine" is not covered here. And yet, there is a distinct orogeny of the mountains traditionaly named "Alps." So, I wil have to be filling that out, starting with the definition of "Alps." You will agree, the Himalayas are NOT the "Alps?" From what I can find out, no one ever thought they were. So, this article does not "start" anything, it duplicates "Alpide belt" material. There is no start on Alpine. If you have any further objections, you have until I start putting this material in "Alpide belt." I just started a brief history of the concept there so you might feel better about the whole thing if you follow that. If I'm wrong I will be the first to eat crow. Recantation is good for the soul, but prove it first!Botteville (talk) 13:21, 26 February 2021 (UTC)

The answer
It is I again. Here is the way it seems to be coming down after the perusal of not a few documents (and I always used to think geology is clear-cut). Alpine orogeny is multi-vocal, it has a number of different definitions. So, it has all the confusions of a phrase with many meanings. As is usual in such cases no one wants to define it. They just use it without explanation. Orogenies are named on many different bases. The original sense was probably that of Suess. It meant the orogenesis of the Alps mountains. Then there is the question of what are the Alps Mountains. But Suess opened the door to chaos when he started bundling different orogenies under the name of one of them with the -ides suffix. Then there was the question of what should be included under Alpides. Kober, another Austrian, used Suess' names in quite different ways. Alpides became the name of the Tethyic zone, which Suess called Altaides after the Altai branch. That use stuck. That wasn't too bad, but then he went and defined Alpine orogeny as a chronological phase of the evolution of the whole zone. So, we have the mountains of the Far East arising in the Alpine orogeny. The Himalayas too. But, unless you know that Kober changed the basis for defining Alpine orogeny you are likely to get pretty confused, while not much you are able to read makes any sense. That is probably where the -ine/-ide identification of this article comes from. Kober is out now. There are no cratons any more than geosynclines. But it gets worse with the compound alpine names. What are we to do here, where the Alpide belt is the result of the Alpine orogeny, even in Malaya. I think we need to be honest with the reader and list the different possible meanings. It shouldn't be a duplicate of the Alpide belt article. We need to start covering the major theorists such as Suess, Kober, and cover some of the linguistic contortions of the modern geologists, who never dare to define their terms. It's beneath their exalted statuses, you know. Caveat lector. I found a source that said that. I can't do this right at the moment; I have to finish Alpide belt.Botteville (talk) 02:55, 27 February 2021 (UTC)