Talk:List of recently extinct mammals

Baiji (Chinese river dolphin)
In the article, one finds this comment: "officially listed as critically endangered, possibly extinct, It is thought that some people have them in captivity". I don't think this is correct - I think the official IUCN status is "functionally extinct" i.e. it is possible that a few ageing individuals exist naturally and none are known to exist in captivity. Anyway, the current statement is not referenced and I cannot find any corroborating reference either. It is unlikely to be true since it has proven to be extremely difficult to keep these animals in captivity. Many details are available on the wikipedia Baiji page. Unless there are any objections I will modify this page.... (Quantum.wells (talk) 16:30, 7 April 2010 (UTC))
 * Now I have changed this to link to the page on functional extinction. Quantum.wells (talk) 13:14, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

Era
Perhaps "Common era" is not the best term to use here. The article breaks extinctions into two groups: prehistoric and Common era. Common era usually refers to the period after 1 AD. Clearly much of history occurred prior to the Common era, so the page would appear to exclude extinctions that took place in historical times prior to 1 AD.Ordinary Person 21:57, 12 December 2005 (UTC)
 * Also puzzling is the article's implicit assertion that "all hominids except homo sapiens" went extinct in the 'Common era.' from what I can recall, with one possible exception, there were no hominids other than homo sapiens even going back to the start of recorded history.

Suggested restructuring
I suggest to restructure the article like the following: (Ucucha 14:27, 22 May 2008 (UTC))

I like the idea. This would make it alot better for people wanting to use this as an encyclopedia, which is... that's right, EVERYONE! {| class="prettytable" ! Common name !! Scientific name !! Date !! Country !! Comments
 * colspan="5" |
 * colspan="5" |

Bats

 * Panay Giant Fruit bat || Acerodon jubatus lucifer || 1892 || Philippines || Formerly considered a separate species, A. lucifer.
 * colspan="5" |
 * colspan="5" |
 * colspan="5" |

Artiodactyls

 * Bubal Hartebeest || Alcelaphus buselaphus buselaphus || || Algeria, Egypt, Libya, Morocco, Tunisia ||
 * }
 * }
 * }

Confusion re: times and dates
The most obvious head-scratcher of this article is that it does not clearly define the chronology it is using for these lists of mammalian extinctions. Common era should be defined as starting from 1AD. But how does that relate to "historic" and "pre-historic"? I gather "historic" refers to times after humans began to settle and grow crops and possess written languages. If that is right, "historic" is no earlier than 5000 years ago. "Pre-historic" could then mean anything since the start of life itself circa 3.8 billion years ago, but it is often taken to refer to the early history of Man, and that would make it no more than a million years ago, and about a hundred thousand if only Homo Sapiens is to be considered.

The article might begin to clarify these matters at the outset. It is not enough to use the ambiguous term "historically known" or "known to science", as in both cases, "known" can mean known by contemporary science or known by the science of that time. It needs something like "These lists are of those mammals which became extinct during the time that humans were present on the Earth, and whose existence was recorded either in picture or written word or orally by the humans of that time." If no one does anything, I will make some changes like that when I next pass this way. Myles325a (talk) 01:24, 26 September 2009 (UTC)


 * This article needs a full restructuring, preferably along the lines of the proposal I gave in the section above here. Such a restructuring should also include clear inclusion criteria. I am afraid I don't have the time to do this myself. Ucucha 02:10, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

Japanese wolf
Japanese wolf has the year as "1930s" in the list. But when I click it, there is a disambiguation page which has two supspecies. That page says they are both extinct, earlier one in 1889 and latter one in 1905. So the years do not match (though I did not look their articles, only disambig page). 82.141.125.5 (talk) 12:41, 9 March 2012 (UTC)

Missing
Your missing some animals.

Presumably, Quagga is not listed, since it is a subspecies of Burchell's zebra.

Artiodactyls
. Malagasy hippopotamus, three species (Madagascar)

Primates
. Monkey lemurs, two genera (Madagascar)

. Sloth lemurs, four genera (Madagascar)

. Koala lemur, three species the genus Megaladapis (1500, Madagascar)

. Giant ruffed lemur, two species in the genus Pachylemur (Madagascar) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 50.128.204.201 (talk) 01:17, 24 January 2013 (UTC)

Scope of this article
The lead section defines this article as covering mammals that "have been described by science, but which have subsequently become extinct". My thought was that this article was supposed to cover modern extinctions, and that List of prehistoric mammals was supposed to cover older extinctions (the lead of List of prehistoric mammals certainly implies that). However, there is some gray area in what should be in each list. Groups like the International Union for Conservation of Nature usually define "modern" extinctions as those occurring after the year 1500 (as mentioned in the Extinction article). However, an animal could have gone extinct after 1500 but without having been scientifically described. By the current scope specified in the lead, those animals wouldn't be included here. Also, some animals went extinct in historical times but before 1500 (e.g., the elephants currently listed in this list). They wouldn't properly fit on a list of prehistoric mammals, but aren't "modern" extinctions by the common definition. Where should such animals be placed? My thought is that this list should at least include all mammals that went extinct after 1500 (even if they went extinct before being described by science in the sense of being given a scientific name and a description published in a formal paper). However, I think it might also be best to keep all mammals that were historically known on this list (such as those known to the ancient Greeks and Romans, like the Syrian and North African elephants). That way there would be a place for extinctions that are neither modern nor prehistoric. Calathan (talk) 20:39, 15 September 2014 (UTC)
 * The list inclusion criteria stated in this list's lead paragraph are what they are, and no more. Past editors have wrestled with this question (see above). I think restricting this list to a specific time period is a good idea, but is a change that should be made by consensus. Let's undergo RfC to get some traction on this. Ibadibam (talk) 21:53, 15 September 2014 (UTC)

RfC: Inclusion criteria
Should the inclusion criteria for this list be amended to include only extinctions occurring on or after the year 1500 CE? Ibadibam (talk) 21:53, 15 September 2014 (UTC)
 * Comment as nominator: 1500 is the cutoff for "recent extinctions" as defined by the International Union for Conservation of Nature, and is the cutoff for List of extinct birds. Ibadibam (talk) 22:02, 15 September 2014 (UTC)
 * Agree - 1500 is a reasonable date and is in line with the IUCN which I think is important as it affects the category of the species under their definitions. Faendalimas  talk 01:31, 16 September 2014 (UTC)
 * Support - I support 1500 as a cutoff, rather than requiring the animals to have been scientifically described before going extinct. I want to note that I think this change would be expanding the criteria to allow more animals than are currently allowed.  Ibadibam's use of the word "only" in the RFC statement, as well as his edits and edit summaries, imply to me that he thinks this change would be limiting the list to fewer animals than are currently allowed.  However, "described by science" normally means formally described in a published work using the type of scientific naming scheme developed by Carl Linnaeus and first used in his Systema Naturae, published in 1735.  The current lead would thus only allow animals that went extinct after 1735, and only ones that were formally described before they went extinct.  That obviously isn't the criteria actually being used in the article, and doesn't really seem like a sensible criteria to me.  Changing it to just use a cutoff date of 1500 will be much simpler and will align better with how the article is currently written. Calathan (talk) 03:07, 16 September 2014 (UTC)
 * Support and Comment General support for a clear scientific definition of species to include in the list. However that would limit this article to Recent or Modern extinctions. Should the page be similarly renamed?
 * Support, but then the title should be changed as well. "Recently extinct mammals" or something. FunkMonk (talk) 10:13, 16 September 2014 (UTC)
 * Comment The lead has a definition. We seem to ignore it with the woolly mammoth et al. ("...been described by science, but which have subsequently become extinct.") The article name doesn't match the current definition, and won't match this proposed new one. HiLo48 (talk) 00:12, 19 September 2014 (UTC)
 * I recognize that this is a natural science article and as such most of the interested parties are unswayed by relativist arguments, but I like to think that a cave painting or oral folktale is the best equivalent of "described by science" for a preliterate culture, in the cases of the mammoth and the Malagasy hippopotamus. But I suppose an advantage of the proposed definition is that it obviates debates like that Ibadibam (talk) 23:10, 22 September 2014 (UTC)
 * Comment as nominator - It sounds like there's a fair amount of demand for a change of page name, and has made a good suggestion for one. Do we have a consensus to move this list to List of recently extinct mammals? Ibadibam (talk) 23:10, 22 September 2014 (UTC)
 * I support changing the name to "List of recently extinct mammals". That name seems to better describe what the scope of the article will be if the criteria for inclusion is changed to mammals that went extinct after 1500. Calathan (talk) 18:06, 23 September 2014 (UTC)

The bot has delisted the RFC since it was open for 30 days, and it seems that there is a consensus to make the article have a cutoff of 1500 CE and move it to List of recently extinct mammals. Unless anyone thinks the RFC should continue longer, can someone please go ahead and make those changes? Calathan (talk) 06:22, 16 October 2014 (UTC)
 * Agree and suggest to change the name to List of recently extinct mammals. Silvio1973 (talk) 00:49, 24 September 2014 (UTC)
 * Agree: that was my immediate reaction when I finally worked out what this article was intended for. Either there should be just one article for extinct mammals (which I should prefer) or the topic should be split into as many category articles as preferred, with a clear and prominent a definition as possible in each lede, including clear and prominent links to all related articles (such as "prehistoric", and "doubtful" or "cryptozoology" or whatever might be relevant). JonRichfield (talk) 06:35, 27 September 2014 (UTC)
 * Weak support. Some defined cut-off date is needed. 1500 (used by the IUCN, see first response above) seems the best choice. Maproom (talk) 06:46, 1 October 2014 (UTC)
 * Agree rename When I joined this RFC and only saw the article name... I was baffled why it would have a cutoff date at all. The name should definitely be modified to indicate that this a recently extinct list. Assuming a name change, 1500 CE sounds like an extremely reasonable cutoff definition. A different definition that included Mammoths and other painted animals is certainly interesting and appealing, but that might run into messy cases. I'm not actively opposed to that option, but it does raise hesitation. Alsee (talk) 16:35, 1 October 2014 (UTC)
 * Support - as per above and positive comments. &mdash;  C ute st Penguin Hangout 16:00, 8 October 2014 (UTC)
 * Weak support - The list should probably be of mammals whose extinction is thought to be due to human activity. Some mammals, such as the North American horse, are due to human activity prior to 1500 CE, but having a cutoff is basically not a bad idea.  Robert McClenon (talk) 14:19, 12 October 2014 (UTC)

Article Renamed
I've gone ahead and moved the article. No one seemed to object to renaming the article, and several people supported it, so I think there is a consensus for the move. Calathan (talk) 14:54, 29 October 2014 (UTC)
 * I just renamed List of recently extinct birds for the same reasons. FunkMonk (talk) 15:39, 29 October 2014 (UTC)
 * ✅ that there was consensus for these moves. If anyone objects, move it back as a technical move and start an official move request. Ibadibam (talk) 18:33, 29 October 2014 (UTC)

Comment, Further context: Holocene extinction ~  R . T . G  02:33, 3 November 2014 (UTC)

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