Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Evolutionary biology/ Archive 5

Survival of the fittest article needs help
I posted this a few days ago at Talk:Evolution, to no response. This section in particular is of concern. Samsara (FA • FP) 13:56, 27 October 2012 (UTC)

Peer Review of Flying Spaghetti Monster
Hi! I have listed Flying Spaghetti Monster for peer review at Peer review/Flying Spaghetti Monster/archive1. any input on how to improve the article would be very much appreciated. Thanks! --Guy Macon (talk) 22:48, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

Category:Evolution by taxon article titles are not homogeneous
Hi, I noticed that the names of articles dealing with evolution of taxa are titled in completely non-uniform ways. This makes my head hurt.

Specifically, we tend to have the variants:
 * Evolution of [taxon]
 * Evolutionary history of [taxon]
 * [Taxon] evolution

plus stuff like "Origin of [taxon]" and even a Prehistoric fish. No variant is clearly in the majority. Sometimes these things overlap, like with Plant evolution and Evolutionary history of plants, but I guess we should tackle one problem at a time.

Can we discuss and agree on a standard title for these articles? I personally like "Evolution of [taxon]" but anything goes provided it is consistent. Thanks! -- Cycl o pia talk  16:58, 26 November 2012 (UTC)
 * Just so this doesn't get confused, some of these deal with distinct topics. Origin of birds and Evolution of birds cover non-overlapping topics. MMartyniuk (talk) 12:41, 27 November 2012 (UTC)
 * There is a degree of overlap IMHO but yes, these two are meaningfully separated. Thanks for the clarification. -- Cycl o pia talk  12:53, 27 November 2012 (UTC)

Massive undue weight problem in Peppered_moth_evolution
The section Peppered_moth_evolution seems to give massive undue weight to ID/creationism. I'd like some eyes on that to comment. -- Cycl o pia talk  16:00, 3 December 2012 (UTC)
 * You've tagged the section but not raised your concerns on article talk: the section has useful analysis refuting both some sloppy journalism and the ID creationist claims. It's of interest because of the further research by the scientists concerned, proposals for improvement will be welcome. . dave souza, talk 19:18, 3 December 2012 (UTC)

Wikipedian in Residence: Natural History Museum, London
Hi all,

The Natural History Museum in London is advertising for a Wikipedian in Residence, working jointly there and at the Science Museum next door; it's a paid post for four months, and applications are open until 10th February. I've worked with Ed Baker at the NHM to define the scope of the program, and it looks really promising - there's some real opportunities for interesting projects here. Details are available on the National Museums site, and there's some details about other upcoming UK residency programs here.

Please pass this on to anyone who might be interested, and feel free to get in touch with me if you've any questions. Thanks, Andrew Gray (talk) 11:52, 25 January 2013 (UTC)

Peer review
I'm suggesting that we have peer review. Due to the lack of it.--Apidium23 (talk) 02:27, 19 January 2013 (UTC)


 * There is Peer review. Are you suggesting something similar here? --Fama Clamosa (talk) 07:58, 19 January 2013 (UTC)


 * Yes. On the Wikiproject Directory, it states that this wikiproject has no peer-review. --Mr.23 (talk) 15:09, 17 February 2013 (UTC)

Color
Is human skin color a result of human evolution? Pass a Method  talk  22:16, 12 February 2013 (UTC)


 * Yes.--Mr.23 (talk) 15:36, 17 February 2013 (UTC)

Evolutionary psychology of language
The recently created page Evolutionary psychology of language seems to cover a topic quite similar to that of Origin of language and may constitute a content fork. Please see my comments at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Linguistics and contribute your opinions to that discussion. Cnilep (talk) 03:33, 15 April 2013 (UTC)

Hoyle's fallacy
Hello, there are two ongoing discussions at Talk:Hoyle's fallacy which have relevance to this project, one move request and one content suggestion. --Cerebellum (talk) 16:07, 14 May 2013 (UTC)

Abiogenesis
Hi! Could someone review the recent changes to Abiogenesis? Thanks! --Guy Macon (talk) 15:17, 15 May 2013 (UTC)

RfC of interest
Editors in this WikiProject may be interested in commenting at Talk:Creation Museum. --Tryptofish (talk) 21:27, 12 June 2013 (UTC)

Missing topics page
I have updated Missing topics about Biology and related subjects - Skysmith (talk) 08:58, 29 August 2013 (UTC)

Source list helpful for this project
You may find it helpful while reading or editing articles to look at a bibliography of Anthropology and Human Biology Citations, posted for the use of all Wikipedians who have occasion to edit articles on human genetics and related issues. I happen to have circulating access to a huge academic research library system at a university with an active research program in these issues (and to other academic libraries in the same large metropolitan area) and have been researching these issues sporadically since 1989. You are welcome to use these citations for your own research. You can help other Wikipedians by suggesting new sources through comments on that page. It will be extremely helpful for articles on human genetics to edit them according to the Wikipedia standards for reliable sources for medicine-related articles, as it is important to get these issues as well verified as possible. -- WeijiBaikeBianji (talk, how I edit) 15:07, 15 September 2013 (UTC)

Call for expert attention at "Species" article (evolutionary/organismal biology, microbial evolution, history of science)
Please see:

[Section] Request: Subject matter experts with broad understanding of species meaning across Eucarya, Archaea, and Bacteria, a/o expertise in historical development of concept

at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Species

I believe the structure of the article needs to be redesigned so that it reflects current understandings and priorities in the field, and that the quality of the article needs to be addressed to remove systemic issues (redundancy, substandard sourcing/idea appropriation/plagiarism, etc.). I will try to interest John Wilkins in providing some high level guidance [ see http://www.ucpress.edu/book.php?isbn=9780520271395 ]. In the mean time, thank you for any kind attention by true subject matter experts that might be brought to bear. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 50.179.92.36 (talk) 06:05, 25 November 2013 (UTC)

Article alerts
This is a notice to let you know about Article alerts, a fully-automated subscription-based news delivery system designed to notify WikiProjects and Taskforces when articles are entering Articles for deletion, Requests for comment, Peer review and other workflows (full list). The reports are updated on a daily basis, and provide brief summaries of what happened, with relevant links to discussion or results when possible. A certain degree of customization is available; WikiProjects and Taskforces can choose which workflows to include, have individual reports generated for each workflow, have deletion discussion transcluded on the reports, and so on. An example of a customized report can be found here.

If you are already subscribed to Article Alerts, it is now easier to report bugs and request new features. We are also in the process of implementing a "news system", which would let projects know about ongoing discussions on a wikipedia-wide level, and other things of interest. The developers also note that some subscribing WikiProjects and Taskforces use the  parameter, but forget to give a link to their alert page. Your alert page should be located at "Wikipedia:PROJECT-OR-TASKFORCE-HOMEPAGE/Article alerts". Questions and feedback should be left at Wikipedia talk:Article alerts.

Message sent by User:Addbot to all active wiki projects per request, Comments on the message and bot are welcome here.

Thanks. — Headbomb {{{sup|ταλκ}}κοντριβς – WP Physics} 09:08, 15 March, 2009 (UTC)

Evolution and Aliens
I will respect Wiki`s need to enter the suppositions of man, which they named facts by the accord of some important individuals, in oppose to logic reasoning. If you need to give this encyclopedia a part to discus man`s deductions of fossils, nature, and creation of them, please give accurate example in which meaner the "discoveries", more appropriate -suppositions-, where made, and how they spawn further. For example: the reasoning of technologies it simple - electricity - chips - computer - programs - internet, and the steps are quite clear, well its mostly because they can be verified buy objects (chips - computer) or direct information (electricity - programs - internet), in the same method the reasoning of everything can be done, some ideas of man are more exact being more earth bound or related to matter which is relatively knowable, but there is some deductions that are reaching for the unknown, and the answer to a lot of questions in them its: "can`t be known" or " will be known in the future" and the reasoning behind them its locked in the persons mind ho tried to answer them and can`t be proven in a reasoning line of thought of history, unless they are forced upon matter as facts and lies, to show a step or a finished resolution. As you look for answers in the world or references to prove a point, you can see the difference in which bought (proven and proven by force) reside, and the history of proliferation be from an idea of man or a proven discovery of technology or knowledge. I will not try to specify in which part evolution stands and who where the once who created supported and influenced the people by it, I will not give blame to dead man. But let me show the result of evolutionary thinking: Most people think that science of medicine its a result of understanding evolution, but they are wrong, most improvement in medicine are made by direct study of nature and they rarely require the understanding of an evolution tree of the problem, mostly never. The input of evolution its not on technology, since it`s not a direct deduction of matter - idea, but a deduction of idea - fact in matter, this is why the possibilities are so many an so unbelievable "stupid", Aliens for example its a reasoning deduced from evolution, the reasoning of different groups that think this universe without information only action on to which they give a God like power of creation on its one, the deduction of most young minds for their past actions in society since there only animals, and a lot more, this, like internet its a product of electricity, are the product of evolution, not science "wins" form evolution thinking, but our perception in reasoning our worldly actions, and I don`t know how much of a win it is. PS: I am sorry for posting this here, I know its not an improvement of the article ,and I will delete it myself if asked to, this is just a example on what you should tread carefully and on what you can be light and shed light on. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Iron Gen ([[User talk:, 9 September 2012 (UTC)

VASECTOMY - Call for expert on differing reproductive strategies as applicable to 'Vasectomy' and female reproductive age
Need an evolutionary biologist to add section on reproductive strategies (and battle of sexes) over vasectomy, and following idea: "An alternative viewpoint of contextualizing vasectomy debate is the evolutionary "battle of the sexes" conflict of interest. From an evolutionary Darwinian standpoint, males may increase their genetic fitness by mating with multiple mates over the course of their lifetime (see Sexual Conflict). As a woman's reproductive capacity reduces significantly with age towards menopause, eventually ceasing while a male partner is still able to produce offspring (see Age and Female Fertility), she benefits in evolutionary terms from her partner undergoing vasectomy - eliminating or greatly restricting his ability to mate with other women in the future, thus helping to ensure or protect her partner's investment and resources for herself and any offspring. Vasectomy may in this way be advantageous to female reproductive strategy (after a threshold number of offspring are born), and detrimental to the male reproductive strategy, if viewed in generalized evolutionary fitness terms alone."

On the Wikipedia 'vasectomy' page, feminist researchers had hijacked the 'psychological issues' section, with heavy bias on 'seeking to decrease levels of reproductive burden on women', in relation to men 'taking responsibility. This was initially muddled into a section on 'effects after vasectomy'. The academic articles they cited were samples where they asked men positive about vasectomies to come forward, then selected 16 of the best, then used it as a demonstration that vasectomies left men in a psychologically happy place. Only reading into the academic article could one see the initial sample bias.

This was separated out into 'Ideological issues'. While the psychological impact was added to with almost every article on the subject undertaken, to try and provide a more balanced picture.

However now that the Ideological section of Vasectomy has been separated off, it had the feminist slant arguments, of men their share of taking reproductive burden. It needs an EVOLUTIONARY BIOLOGY counter-balance, to why different reproductive strategies of male / female, particularly women approaching menopause. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Scholarlyfemme (talk • contribs) 09:39, 28 January 2014 (UTC)

Seeking advice on possible AfC: Limb evolution
I am an instructor for a Developmental Biology class in which students have a WP editing assignment (course page is here). I generally encourage them to choose a stub or start article for expansion. Two students would like to create a new article on Limb evolution. I have discouraged new articles for class assignment and have no experience with creating a new article, but this seems like an important topic that is not included in WP. Related articles, or sections of articles, include: Tetrapod, Polydactyly in early tetrapods, Fish fin, Evolution of mammals, and Bat wing development. I would greatly appreciate feedback from the community on whether I should tell the students to select another topic or encourage them to create a Limb evolution article. Any advice on possible obsticles they may face and how to avoid them is also appreciated. Many thanks, Biolprof (talk) 00:59, 5 February 2014 (UTC)
 * That sounds like a great article, to which the above-mentioned articles can be linked for further coverage. It could be a centralized spot for paleontology and (inferred) genetic innovations through time. There is also a related Template:Fins,_limbs_and_wings, and Limb development, which gives the mechanism but not the evolutionary history. --Animalparty-- (talk) 02:34, 5 February 2014 (UTC)
 * I think it sounds like an appropriate article as well. I would discourage using the AfC process. wp:simpleintro gives some (what I hope are simple!) instructions on how to start a new article, Biolprof. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. ) while signing a reply, thx 22:56, 5 February 2014 (UTC)
 * Thanks, Animalparty and Biosthmors. I wasn't clear on the AfC process and when it is required, but I did notice a lot of biographies & companies on the backlog list so I can guess. Biolprof (talk) 02:26, 6 February 2014 (UTC)

Archived a few threads
I've archived some inactive threads to subsections which were notifications about discussions that have since been closed. &mdash; Cirt (talk) 19:01, 8 February 2014 (UTC)

Evolution of the brain
I'm not sure how many people watch--or regularly post on--this page, since I just found out about it about 60 seconds ago, but I nevertheless wanted to request that someone reading this look at evolution of the brain. I personally think it's inexcusable that Wikipedia's page about such an important topic is so short. Jinkinson  talk to me  00:41, 14 March 2014 (UTC)
 * It's pretty terrible. A better solution would be to copy and paste the content at Brain. --Animalparty-- (talk) 00:55, 14 March 2014 (UTC)

Royal Society journals - subscription offer for one year
I'm delighted to say that the Royal Society, the UK’s National Academy for science, is offering 24 Wikipedians free access for one year to its prestigious range of scientific journals. Please note that much of the content of these journals is already freely available online, the details varying slightly between the journals – see the Royal Society Publishing webpages. For the purposes of this offer the Royal Society's journals are divided into 3 groups: Biological sciences, Physical sciences and history of science. For full details and signing-up, please see the applications page. Initial applications will close on 25 May 2014, but later applications will go on the waiting list. Wiki at Royal Society John (talk) 02:57, 29 April 2014 (UTC)

Expert input required on Template:Primitive fishes
Template is for discussion at TfD, expert opinion is welcome.-- cyclopia speak! 16:13, 26 May 2014 (UTC)

A similar issue is now present at Categories_for_discussion/Log/2014_May_29. Please contribute to the discussion. Many thanks! -- cyclopia speak! 17:38, 29 May 2014 (UTC)

AfC submission - 27/05
Draft:Scladina. FoCuSandLeArN (talk) 17:11, 27 May 2014 (UTC)

Use of recently coined vernacular names vs. scientific names for fossil & subfossil species
Participants in this project may interested in this discussion about the naming of articles on extinct birds only known from fossil or subfossil record: Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Birds. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼  10:05, 22 August 2014 (UTC)

Comment on the WikiProject X proposal
Hello there! As you may already know, most WikiProjects here on Wikipedia struggle to stay active after they've been founded. I believe there is a lot of potential for WikiProjects to facilitate collaboration across subject areas, so I have submitted a grant proposal with the Wikimedia Foundation for the "WikiProject X" project. WikiProject X will study what makes WikiProjects succeed in retaining editors and then design a prototype WikiProject system that will recruit contributors to WikiProjects and help them run effectively. Please review the proposal here and leave feedback. If you have any questions, you can ask on the proposal page or leave a message on my talk page. Thank you for your time! (Also, sorry about the posting mistake earlier. If someone already moved my message to the talk page, feel free to remove this posting.) Harej (talk) 22:47, 1 October 2014 (UTC)

Expert attention
This is a notice about Category:Evolution articles needing expert attention, which might be of interest to your WikiProject. It will take a while before the category is populated. Iceblock (talk) 00:00, 19 October 2014 (UTC)

Baldwin effect
This is my first post here. I could easily get sucked in because I love Wikipedia and evolutionary biology. Anyway, I agree with Dennett that the Baldwin effect is not really controversial any more, the article's importance is unrated, and I'd like it to be rated mid-level importance. I don't know how to make that suggestion, so here I am on the talk page. Thanks in advance for any help. Jonathan Tweet (talk) 02:59, 3 December 2014 (UTC)

Launch of WikiProject Wikidata for research
Hi, this is to let you know that we've launched WikiProject Wikidata for research in order to stimulate a closer interaction between Wikidata and research, both on a technical and a community level. As a first activity, we are drafting a research proposal on the matter (cf. blog post). Your thoughts on and contributions to that would be most welcome! Thanks, -- Daniel Mietchen (talk) 02:15, 9 December 2014 (UTC)

Evolution (disambiguation)
There is a discussion about Evolution (disambiguation) and other summary structures, such as the evolution navigation templates, at Talk:Evolution (disambiguation). Input would be appreciated. --Epipelagic (talk) 20:30, 26 December 2014 (UTC)

WikiProject X is live!


Hello everyone!

You may have received a message from me earlier asking you to comment on my WikiProject X proposal. The good news is that WikiProject X is now live! In our first phase, we are focusing on research. At this time, we are looking for people to share their experiences with WikiProjects: good, bad, or neutral. We are also looking for WikiProjects that may be interested in trying out new tools and layouts that will make participating easier and projects easier to maintain. If you or your WikiProject are interested, check us out! Note that this is an opt-in program; no WikiProject will be required to change anything against its wishes. Please let me know if you have any questions. Thank you!

Note: To receive additional notifications about WikiProject X on this talk page, please add this page to WikiProject X/Newsletter. Otherwise, this will be the last notification sent about WikiProject X.

Harej (talk) 16:57, 14 January 2015 (UTC)

TfD: Nomination for deletion of Template:Infraspeciesbox
Template:Infraspeciesbox has been nominated for deletion. Given that these templates are of interest to WikiProject Evolutionary biology, you are invited to comment on the discussion at the template's entry on the Templates for discussion page. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 23:21, 15 March 2015 (UTC)

There is an RFC that may affect a page in this project
There is an RFC that may affect a page in this project at WikiProject Tree of Life. The topic is Confusion over taxonomy of subtribe Panina and taxon homininae (are chimps hominins)?

Please feel free to comment there. SPACKlick (talk) 17:04, 20 March 2015 (UTC)

Skeletal changes of organisms transitioning from water to land
Discussion taking place on a new article at:

--Harizotoh9 (talk) 11:14, 13 April 2015 (UTC)
 * Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Palaeontology

Shaw-Mohler Equation
Richard F. Shaw of the Shaw-Mohler equation has just died at the age of 90. His work has been cited as influential in Charnov's book The Theory of Sex Allocation (1982) and called 'superb' by C. J. Williams in Adaptation and Natural Selection (1996). I have created a brief stub in my own sandbox, but I understand that as his daughter, Wikipedia might consider my creation of Wiki page for him, linking to the citation of his work in the wiki article on Fisher's Principle to be a conflict of interest. If someone else would like to write this, please feel free to contact me for whatever information you need. Statoun (talk) 14:49, 16 May 2015 (UTC)

Article on Evolution of human altruism -> pls help out
So recently the article on the Evolution of human altruism was deleted because it didn't meet the quality requirements. It is now edited under the sandbox of the original creator of the article until it's at an acceptable state. Could you please help out improving it? (I think it's the characteristic of Wikipedia to not bring the burden of an article upon a single person - it's meant to combine the knowledge & skills of many.) Here's the link to the sandboxed article: User:Ed Hagen/sandbox --Fixuture (talk) 13:49, 17 May 2015 (UTC)

Rate of evolution
Somewhat incredibly, until a few moments ago, we had no article on this central topic. I created one by pasting out-of-context material from koinophilia. However, the article will need a lot of work to be a comprehensive overview of this important topic. The more, the merrier! Samsara 08:23, 20 April 2015 (UTC)
 * Thanks for creating that. I think it'll need a think-through to work out what needs to be in there and making clear the difference between evolution rate, mutation rate, evolvability, molecular clock and which sections are discussing DNA sequence or phenotypic traits. T.Shafee(Evo&#65120;Evo)talk 11:16, 18 May 2015 (UTC)

Article on Avi Tuschman and Our Political Nature: The Evolutionary Origins of What Divides Us
This article is up for deletion, if people want to have a look here. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Avi Tuschman (talk • contribs) 22:30, 20 May 2015 (UTC)
 * Yes, indeed, thanks. Is there a way to automatically sign with the username and time stamp code? - Avi — Preceding unsigned comment added by Avi Tuschman (talk • contribs) 22:39, 20 May 2015 (UTC)

Requested move of Selection
Some additional perspective might be helpful at Talk:Selection. Cheers! bd2412 T 19:38, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

The hierarchical thermodynamics is the fundament of Darwinism
Georgi P. Gladyshev (2015). Natural Selection and Thermodynamics of Biological Evolution. Natural Science, 7, No 5 117-126 Published Online March 2015 Pub. Date: March 9, 2015 DOI: 10.4236/ns.2015.73013 http://dx.doi.org/10.4236/ns.2015.73013 Georgi P. Gladyshev (2015). Thermodynamics of Aging and Heredity. Natural Science, 7, No 5 270-286 Published Online May 2015  http://dx.doi.org/10.4236/ns.2015.75031

85.140.248.205 (talk) 14:26, 19 June 2015 (UTC)

Candidate for pilot testing, round one
Hello, WikiProject Evolutionary biology!

On the recommendation of Snow Rise, I am happy to announce that this WikiProject has been selected for the first round of WikiProject X pilot testing! Pilot testing candidates were selected on the basis for potential success of the WikiProject.

The goal of WikiProject X is to improve the WikiProject experience through research, design, and experimentation. On that basis, we've prepared a new WikiProject design template based around modules. These modules include features you are already familiar with, such as article alerts, but also new features such as automated work lists, a feed of discussions taking place on the 663 talk pages tagged by WikiProject Evolutionary Biology, and a new member profile system with opt-in notifications. The new design is available for your review at WikiProject Evolutionary biology/New. Please let me know what you think. (Note that some of the modules depend on output from other bots, meaning there will be some visual inconsistencies for now. I hope to resolve this in the long term.)

The next steps:
 * 1) If you are all satisfied with the design, I will implement it on the WikiProject page. Unless there are major points of contention, I hope to get this done by Friday, July 10.
 * 2) Using information from WikiProject Directory/Description/WikiProject Evolutionary biology, I will work on recruiting new members for the WikiProject. I will also reach out to your current listed members.

Please let me know if you have any questions. Cheers, Harej (talk) 20:58, 7 July 2015 (UTC)
 * Anyone home? :) If no one objects, I will proceed to make the change in the next 24 hours. Harej (talk) 02:04, 10 July 2015 (UTC)

Integration of 'Discussions' and Talk page
I'm a fan of the new WP:EVOL mainpage. I've a couple of suggestions: The related WikiProjects list is currently formatted to use a lot of vertical space. It could work better if formatted into multiple columns. Hope these suggestions are helpful. T.Shafee(Evo&#65120;Evo)talk 00:57, 11 July 2015 (UTC)
 * If there are meant to be independent, paired main and talk pages (WP:EVOL & WT:EVOL) then:
 * there needs to be a more obvious link with the navigation icons from WP:EVOL→WT:EVOL.
 * the discussion section could be instead transluded at the top of WT:MCB so that all discussion grouped together.
 * If the main page is meant to be a one-stop shop for participants then:
 * should this talk page be integrated into the 'Discussions' section?
 * will there be an easy way to go through the archives of everything that was in the 'Discussion' section?

Blue eye image and blue eye primacy for the image caption at the Physical attractiveness article
Opinions are needed on the following matter: Talk:Physical attractiveness. A WP:Permalink for it is here. Flyer22 (talk) 06:13, 11 July 2015 (UTC)

Use of Unicode dagger symbol for extinct taxa
Please see Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Tree of Life (thread on usage and styling of the dagger). — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼  05:57, 1 September 2015 (UTC)

Atheistic evolution
Pretty poor article, needs work. Doug Weller (talk) 15:43, 25 October 2015 (UTC)
 * It could be expanded a bit. But I think of 'evolution' as being the same as 'atheistic evolution' (i.e., an unguided natural process), so then Atheistic evolution, if it warrants its own article, would have to specifically focus on arguments why religion and gods don't need to have anything to do with evolution, and not focus on evolution itself. Similar to how Theistic evolution discusses certain religious viewpoints. Gap9551 (talk) 16:53, 25 October 2015 (UTC)
 * It probably should be merged into Theistic_evolution. The hatnote of that section would then link to Evolution and the section would begin "The main stream view of evolutionary biologists is that evolution occurs by natural processes without the need for intervention by a supernatural being." or something similar.--Wikimedes (talk) 20:57, 25 October 2015 (UTC)
 * The merge above seems appropriate. Any aspect of naturalism could be termed atheistic, but we don't have, nor need, separate articles for say atheistic chemistry or atheistic plate tectonics. --Animalparty! (talk) 22:22, 25 October 2015 (UTC)
 * Good points by both of you. I support the described merge. Gap9551 (talk) 23:46, 25 October 2015 (UTC)
 * Agreed, it's far more relevant as a section of theistic evolution with a see also to Evolution than as a stand-alone article. T.Shafee(Evo&#65120;Evo)talk 03:57, 26 October 2015 (UTC)

WikiProject X up for renewal
First of all, I would like to express my appreciation for WikiProject Evolutionary biology for testing the new WikiProject interface and tools. Thank you.

WikiProject X is up for renewal at the Wikimedia Foundation. We would like to continue working to make our existing tools better: to make them easier to use, and to integrate them with other Wikimedia projects, including Wikimedia Commons and Wikidata. Please review our renewal proposal and leave feedback.

As always, if you have any questions or feedback, please let me know on this talk page or the WikiProject X talk page.

Thank you again, Harej (talk) 18:58, 27 October 2015 (UTC)

Maintenance work
To let everyone know, I will be making a change to the Load WikiProject Modules Lua module, used on this project to render the different sections. This change involves, among other things, moving the different section headers out of the subpages and onto the main WikiProject page. This change will make the WikiProject easier to use and maintain. During this change, there may be a brief time window where the WikiProject page looks broken. Once the changes are finished, everything should be restored to normal. If not, purge your cache and it will work. If there are any bugs, please let me know promptly on my talk page. Thank you, Harej (talk) 01:27, 15 December 2015 (UTC)
 * This work should now be done. Please let me know if there are any bugs. Harej (talk) 02:08, 15 December 2015 (UTC)

Gut (anatomy) listed at Requested moves
A requested move discussion has been initiated for Gut (anatomy) to be moved to Gastrointestinal tract. This page is of interest to this WikiProject and interested members may want to participate in the discussion here. —RMCD bot 07:30, 27 December 2015 (UTC)
 * To opt out of RM notifications on this page, transclude, or set up Article alerts for this WikiProject.

Discussion about generally considering articles from predatory publishers unreliable
There is a discussion here if that topic is of interest. It has been going on since Feb 26, but just wanted to make sure folks here are aware of it. Jytdog (talk) 18:06, 4 March 2016 (UTC)


 * The gist is that we'll need to be very careful sourcing anything to papers released by flaky open access publishers. If better sources exist, we should use those.


 * My personal view: If no better sources exist, we need to consider very carefully on a case-by-case basis whether such sources are reliable enough for whatever is being claimed. Where a paper is just summarizing existing knowledge before setting off on its own ideas, it's probably usable but also presumably replaceable. The (primary) thesis of such papers may sometimes be usable with care, as with all primary sources, or may be considered too poorly reviewed to be usable. Chiswick Chap (talk) 18:25, 4 March 2016 (UTC)

Check-in
Hello, WikiProject Evolutionary Biology! Just checking in. How has your work on Wikipedia been going? Have the tools and reports on the WikiProject been useful? Running into challenges using or maintaining the WikiProject? Anything you would like to see changed? Harej (talk) 15:14, 2 June 2016 (UTC)

Geodakyan's evolutionary theory of sex
Please check out this new article, Geodakyan's evolutionary theory of sex. Staszek Lem (talk) 18:08, 27 July 2016 (UTC)

BioRxiv support in citations
This project's feedback would be appreciated in this discussion, as this could greatly (and positively) affect biological citations! Headbomb {talk / contribs / physics / books} 21:53, 7 September 2016 (UTC)

WikiJournal of Science promotion
T.Shafee(Evo &#38; Evo)talk 05:42, 13 February 2017 (UTC)

Applications of evolution
Article is pretty short and could be greatly expanded. --Harizotoh9 (talk) 20:27, 27 February 2017 (UTC)

Extension of 'Topic Page' review articles from PLOS Computational Biology to PLOS Genetics
T.Shafee(Evo &#38; Evo)talk 12:30, 25 March 2017 (UTC)

Request for Reviews....
Hello all,

I have made a wiki draft on 'Species Branding': https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Draft:Species_Branding_Hypothesis  ...This wiki could help find solution to the long running "Species Problem" of Biology... I will be happy to have Experts in the field Review my Draft...

Thank you, Joseph J PhD. Jayabalan.joseph (talk) 17:54, 29 March 2017 (UTC)

Caucasian race
Caucasian race is in need of attention and improvement, I am discussing how to improve the article with another user particularly regarding the currency of typological views of human races (as opposed to a genomic/population based view). Any input will be appreciated. ·maunus · snunɐɯ· 20:18, 29 March 2017 (UTC)
 * Good luck with that. Ref 16 "bhopal" is nowhere defined. Chiswick Chap (talk) 21:37, 29 March 2017 (UTC)

Cretaceous–Paleogene_extinction_event needs expert attention
Could someone take a look at the paragraph on sharks and survival past the K-T boundary. It appears to have been written by someone not too familiar with the English language (although mostly grammatically correct) and I can't make sense of it.--Wikimedes (talk) 20:23, 7 April 2017 (UTC)

Spandrel (biology)
There is a discussion in progress at Talk:Spandrel (biology) about whether Gould and Lewontin's 1979 paper on the subject was "influential". Editors are invited to contribute. Chiswick Chap (talk) 09:04, 11 May 2017 (UTC)

Taxonomy of wheat
There is a discussion in progress at Talk:Taxonomy of wheat about whether the changes leading to modern wheat are evolution. Editors are invited to contribute. Chiswick Chap (talk) 13:37, 16 June 2017 (UTC)

International Code of Area Nomenclature
This seems to have been a proposal to create some standardization and rules for naming or creating biogeographic areas, does anyone know if it went anywhere? -Furicorn (talk) 22:32, 27 August 2017 (UTC)

Vicariance
There is an AfD concerning Vicariance if anyone is interested in discussion. Articles for deletion/Vicariance  Andrew Z. Colvin  •  Talk  15:48, 21 September 2017 (UTC)

Constructal law
The AfD for "Constructal law" may be of interest to this community. XOR&#39;easter (talk) 19:49, 4 December 2017 (UTC)

Please mention classifycation system in infobox
I have a request on improving taxobox. On a taxobox for a taxa; it should be explicitely mentioned; which system of classification has been used. If a mixture of system has been done (although that is highly unrecommended). It is important because classification systems change; where not only the taxa fusion and splits; but ranks of the taxa sometimes changes; and although quite rarely; rank names too changed. So whenever publish a taxobox; please mention which system of classification is followed. Best if a taxobox contain 2 or 3 columns for the hierarchies according to separate classification systems. This not only improve correctness of the articles; but also will work as better reference and would help literature search.

RIT RAJARSHI (talk) 16:47, 13 February 2018 (UTC)

Overlaps of articles on biological relationships
There is a merge discussion at Biological interaction concerning the overlaps of that article, Symbiosis, and Ecological relationship. Opinions are invited. Chiswick Chap (talk) 10:11, 23 February 2018 (UTC)

Sneaky fucker strategy
I recently read a book that described sneaky fucker strategy. I am surprised to see that Wikipedia does not have an article about it. Don't you think we should have an article about it? Here is a reference. Axl ¤ [Talk] 18:20, 25 May 2018 (UTC)


 * There's been a redirect for many years to Sexual conflict which doesn't fit specially well and doesn't say anything about it. I've added a brief mention to Harem (zoology) where it seems to fit nicely.


 * However there is a whole spectrum of sneaky and parasitic behaviour in fish reproduction which can't be covered there. (Michael Taborsky, Sneakers, Satellites, and Helpers: Parasitic and Cooperative Behavior in Fish Reproduction. Advances in the Study of Behavior, Academic Press, 1994, Vol. 23, pp. 1-101, ISBN 0-12-004523-0). Chiswick Chap (talk) 19:20, 25 May 2018 (UTC)


 * We have Goby. --Mark viking (talk) 20:20, 25 May 2018 (UTC)


 * I believe the common term is called sneaking. The term "kleptogyny" gets 10 results on Google scholar which is a good indicator of its widespread use (or lack thereof). Sneaky fucker strategy gets a lot of hits, but the ones relating to animal behavior are all the same source. The rest are unrelated. Maybe a discussion of it belongs in Alternative mating strategy. Though, quite frankly, I would not support the usage or either term mentioned above. They are not widespread enough to be notable. What is widespread, is sneaking strategies where males (or sometimes females) use tactics to mate without the dominate individual noticing. This seems to be in line with the sneaky fucker strategy. Andrew Z. Colvin • Talk 23:20, 25 May 2018 (UTC)


 * Yes, Maynard Smith seems to have used the more colourful term informally, whether for amusement or shock value, who can say. There are however tens of thousands of scholarly sources for "sneaking mating strategy"; other terms in the literature include "sneaking behaviour", "sneak copulation" and "sneak mating", along with "to sneak", "a sneak", and "sneaky". Seems to be pretty well established. Chiswick Chap (talk) 10:36, 26 May 2018 (UTC)

WikiProject collaboration notice from the Portals WikiProject
The reason I am contacting you is because there are one or more portals that fall under this subject, and the Portals WikiProject is currently undertaking a major drive to automate portals that may affect them.

Portals are being redesigned.

The new design features are being applied to existing portals.

At present, we are gearing up for a maintenance pass of portals in which the introduction section will be upgraded to no longer need a subpage. In place of static copied and pasted excerpts will be self-updating excerpts displayed through selective transclusion, using the template Transclude lead excerpt.

The discussion about this can be found here.

Maintainers of specific portals are encouraged to sign up as project members here, noting the portals they maintain, so that those portals are skipped by the maintenance pass. Currently, we are interested in upgrading neglected and abandoned portals. There will be opportunity for maintained portals to opt-in later, or the portal maintainers can handle upgrading (the portals they maintain) personally at any time.

Background
On April 8th, 2018, an RfC ("Request for comment") proposal was made to eliminate all portals and the portal namespace. On April 17th, the Portals WikiProject was rebooted to handle the revitalization of the portal system. On May 12th, the RfC was closed with the result to keep portals, by a margin of about 2 to 1 in favor of keeping portals.

There's an article in the current edition of the Signpost interviewing project members about the RfC and the Portals WikiProject.

Since the reboot, the Portals WikiProject has been busy building tools and components to upgrade portals.

So far, 84 editors have joined.

If you would like to keep abreast of what is happening with portals, see the newsletter archive.

If you have any questions about what is happening with portals or the Portals WikiProject, please post them on the WikiProject's talk page.

Thank you. &mdash; The Transhumanist  07:36, 30 May 2018 (UTC)

Does anyone in Evolutionary Biology know if International Code of Area Nomenclature is dead?
Trying to figure out if this code ever went anywhere or was adopted. -Furicorn Never mind, I just noticed that no one responded to my last question on this topic. I'm actually a little bummed out that it probably turns out this project never went anywhere. Womp womp :(. -Furicorn (talk) 11:22, 24 July 2018 (UTC)
 * It does look like it died. Many of the flourishing Wikipedia communities are gone. As for the International Code of Area Nomenclature, are you asking in relation to wikipedia? Or in relation to the scholarly community? It looks like it has been adopted by various researchers in the field but is not a widespread, as it is a rather niche science. If you are able to access these research articles, they give some information you might be seeking. I can access them and provide them to you if you would like (and yes I know we aren't supposed to do that, but who cares).


 * The spectre of biogeographical regionalization
 * Biogeographical regionalisation of the Neotropical region
 * Biogeographical regionalisation of the Andean region
 * International Code of Area Nomenclature
 * A revised area taxonomy of phytogeographical regions within the Australian Bioregionalisation Atlas

Andrew Z. Colvin • Talk 22:46, 24 July 2018 (UTC)


 * Haha, I actually meant that the ICAN project seemed like it never went anywhere, although I guess the point about the communities is also well taken. I do not have access to the articles, I guess I would be interested. It looks like the Code is currently being worked out at lower levels? I was hoping there was information that might let me setup a page similar to List of codes used in the World Geographical Scheme for Recording Plant Distributions or Water Resource Region. If it's developed enough, my goal would be to eventually use it to create something in WP:ANIMALS similar to WikiProject Plants/Categorization -Furicorn (talk) 17:37, 26 July 2018 (UTC)

Request for comments
This is a request for comments regarding the relevance of Denny (hybrid hominin) as it relates to human interspecies breeding. The link to the discussion is at: Talk:Human evolution. Cheers, Rowan Forest (talk) 16:36, 26 August 2018 (UTC)

RfC being planned
Please see WP:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard. Jytdog (talk) 23:42, 6 September 2018 (UTC)

Primordial soup: Controversial statements tagged "citation needed" since at least Aug 2012
Primordial_soup says: The spontaneous formation of complex polymers from abiotically generated monomers under the conditions posited by the "soup" theory is not at all a straightforward process. Besides the necessary basic organic monomers, compounds that would have prohibited the formation of polymers were formed in high concentration during the Miller–Urey and Oró experiments.[citation needed] The Miller experiment, for example, produces many substances that would undergo cross-reactions with the amino acids or terminate the peptide chain.[citation needed] The "citation needed" tags have apparently been there since at least August 2012.

Can anybody edit this as appropriate, and/or add appropriate cites?

Thanks - 189.122.52.73 (talk) 04:23, 20 September 2018 (UTC)

Biological determinism


There is a discussion under way about recent additions to this article's lead section by a new editor. Chiswick Chap (talk) 19:12, 27 September 2018 (UTC)

Featured quality source review RFC
Editors in this WikiProject may be interested in the featured quality source review RFC that has been ongoing. It would change the featured article candidate process (FAC) so that source reviews would need to occur prior to any other reviews for FAC. Your comments are appreciated. --IznoRepeat (talk) 21:50, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

Topic Page on Selfish genetic element
PLOS Genetics has now joined PLOS Computational Biology in its Topic Pages initiative. As part of this, an article was drafted, peer reviewed and published in PLOS Genetics and has now been copied over to the Selfish genetic element wikipedia page. Comments and suggestions welcome! T.Shafee(Evo &#38; Evo)talk 00:41, 17 November 2018 (UTC)

Standard for Naming Articles about Species and Genus?
As of now the article Chimpanzee is not about the species Chimpanzee but the Genus Pan. There is a template to that effect at the beginning of the article but I think it's still very confusing. I came to Wikipedia looking to check some information about the species Chimpanzee and was using this article for quite some time until I saw the disclaimer at the top and realized it's about the genus not the species. And on the talk page, there is a discussion where every editor except one agrees that its misleading as currently named: Talk:Chimpanzee The article about the species is titled Common chimpanzee. I think this is very confusing and should be changed. The page about the genus should be named for the genus and the page Common chimpanzee should just be named Chimpanzee. It's said as an argument against this that: "we always use the name that is in most common use, and that is definitely "chimpanzee" over Pan." I've never seen the genus referred to as Chimpanzee, in every article or book I've ever read if the author is referring to the genus they will use the term "Pan". The page is move protected however so I can't change it. Is there a standard for this? --MadScientistX11 (talk) 00:27, 25 December 2018 (UTC)


 * EN:Wikipedia has very inconsistent standards on this topic (as compared to DE:Wikipedia). WikiProject Tree of Life might be a good place to bring this up, although I'm not sure if there would be a ton of interest. -Furicorn (talk) 17:13, 25 December 2018 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the feedback. I have to say one of the things that I find most frustrating about EN:Wikipedia in general is the lack of clear standards on many topics like this. I think it goes back to the very earliest philosophy of Wikipedia when the web was so new and there weren't many users. The goal then was just to get as much stuff into the encyclopedia as possible. But when things scale up you can't use the same kinds of anarchic methods. For example, I so often see articles on the same topic in computer science with wildly different levels of quality and subtly different article names. Glad to hear that the Deutschland version has a better approach. One thing I'm going to do on this specific case (besides checking the page you linked to) is to check some books I've read recently on evolution of humans from primates. If I'm wrong and the genus is actually referred to as Chimpanzee rather than Pan then I'll just let it go but from what I remember that's not the case. Merry Christmas and thanks again for the feedback. --MadScientistX11 (talk) 18:09, 25 December 2018 (UTC)


 * Yeah so I think there is a whole tree of life that was officially articulated in German, probably in the 19th century, so there are German language taxonomies (although I get the sense that nowadays is to a certain extent deprecated in favor of latin). Or I guess it's possible this schema was invented for wikipedia but I doubt it. In any case, there is no English version of this since Anglophone taxonomy has always been in Latin, but a lot of people who like to edit animals are not necessarily taxonomists or life sciences people. So a lot of the editing happens to articles with English names, but those names don't always neatly correspond to a taxon. -Furicorn (talk) 04:38, 12 January 2019 (UTC)

A possible Science/STEM User Group
There's a discussion about a possible User Group for STEM over at Meta:Talk:STEM_Wiki_User_Group. The idea would be to help coordinate, collaborate and network cross-subject, cross-wiki and cross-language to share experience and resources that may be valuable to the relevant wikiprojects. Current discussion includes preferred scope and structure. T.Shafee(Evo &#38; Evo)talk 03:04, 26 May 2019 (UTC)

Use of term "Darwinist" on Wikipedia, e.g. in The_War_of_the_Worlds
Our article The_War_of_the_Worlds includes a photo with the caption "Wells's mentor, Darwinist advocate T. H. Huxley."

We have an article on the term Darwinism, but that obviously has nothing to do with whether the terms "Darwinism" and "Darwinist" are appropriate in Wikipedia articles.

Does WikiProject Evolutionary biology advocate or deprecate use of these terms in Wikipedia articles? - 189.60.54.138 (talk) 05:44, 20 July 2019 (UTC)

MfD nomination of Portal:Evolutionary biology
Portal:Evolutionary biology, a page which you created or substantially contributed to, has been nominated for deletion. Your opinions on the matter are welcome; you may participate in the discussion by adding your comments at Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Portal:Evolutionary biology and please be sure to sign your comments with four tildes ( ~ ). You are free to edit the content of Portal:Evolutionary biology during the discussion but should not remove the miscellany for deletion template from the top of the page; such a removal will not end the deletion discussion. Thank you. UnitedStatesian (talk) 02:42, 26 July 2019 (UTC)

Request for information on WP1.0 web tool
Hello and greetings from the maintainers of the WP 1.0 Bot! As you may or may not know, we are currently involved in an overhaul of the bot, in order to make it more modern and maintainable. As part of this process, we will be rewriting the web tool that is part of the project. You might have noticed this tool if you click through the links on the project assessment summary tables.

We'd like to collect information on how the current tool is used by....you! How do you yourself and the other maintainers of your project use the web tool? Which of its features do you need? How frequently do you use these features? And what features is the tool missing that would be useful to you? We have collected all of these questions at this Google form where you can leave your response. Walkerma (talk) 04:24, 27 October 2019 (UTC)

Maximum genetic diversity
The neutrality of the article on Maximum genetic diversity is disputed. Editors are invited to join the discussion on the article's talk page. Chiswick Chap (talk) 10:01, 25 November 2019 (UTC)

Topic Page on Eukaryote hybrid genome

 * Copied from WT:MOLBIO

PLOS Genetics has just published a new Topic Page. As part of this, an article was drafted, peer reviewed and published in PLOS Genetics and has now been copied over to the Eukaryote hybrid genome page. The article overall has a very flat heading structure, so that might be worth multi-levelling a little. The refs are all currently using, so will have to be converted to and  over the coming days. Comments and suggestions welcome! T.Shafee(Evo &#38; Evo)talk 08:40, 28 November 2019 (UTC)

Bringing more attention to hard-to-find overview articles
Some helpful evolutionary articles on Wikipedia are fairly hard to find, essentially isolated essays. This is true for some descriptive biology and comparative anatomy articles.

Examples include:
 * Evolution of olfaction
 * Polydactyly in early tetrapods
 * Vertebrate land invasion
 * Secondarily aquatic tetrapods
 * Tradeoffs for locomotion in air and water
 * Comparative foot morphology

There are obviously tons of examples, but I think articles like these need to be linked more widely in relevant connected topics. I have started linking them in other places to an extent. If you know specific articles like these, then mention them here. Rauisuchian (talk) 09:29, 20 December 2019 (UTC)


 * I suspect that many of these are student efforts rich in WP:OR and, as you rightly say, are essays (deprecated in article space, often full of editorialising), isolated (i.e. underlinked, often both inwards and outwards), and in need of much work or simple old-fashioned TNT. Not a few can be fixed by redirecting them to an existing article... Chiswick Chap (talk) 22:06, 28 December 2019 (UTC)

Talk:Predation
There is a discussion at Talk:Predation on the status of human predation. Project members are invited to contribute. Chiswick Chap (talk) 09:11, 18 May 2020 (UTC)

RfC on the Cognitive-Theoretic Model of the Universe
Hi there is an RfC on the Cognitive-Theoretic Model of the Universe that may be of interest to this project. See: Talk:Cognitive-Theoretic Model of the Universe - Scarpy (talk) 06:44, 8 July 2020 (UTC)

Theory of consciousness
Can this theory be discussed?

User:MarcondesBonaparte/sandbox —Preceding undated comment added 16:39, 7 August 2020 (UTC)

Phylogeny at Neoptera
The taxonomist User:Nikita-Kluge is editing the Phylogeny section at Neoptera using his own publications, which appear to be based only on morphological evidence, and is inserting many names for taxa which are no longer used. The opinions of editors are invited on the matter. Chiswick Chap (talk) 09:49, 17 January 2021 (UTC)