Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Geology/Archive 4

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Archive 1 Archive 2 Archive 3 Archive 4 Archive 5 Archive 6 → Archive 8

Template:Period color, which color set should we use?

Type URL Supporters Total number of votes,percentage
1. USGS Colors http://pubs.usgs.gov/fs/2007/3015/
2. Dr Oggs colors https://engineering.purdue.edu/Stratigraphy/charts/rgb.html 107.3.117.228 (talk) 18:34 27 October 2013 (UTC) 2:34pm 10/27/2013 EDT. 1,50%
3. ICS 2010 colors http://www.stratigraphy.org/ICSchart/StratChart2010.jpg
4. ICS 2012 colors http://www.stratigraphy.org/ICSchart/ChronostratChart2012.jpg
5. ICS 2013 colors http://www.stratigraphy.org/ICSchart/ChronostratChart2013-01.jpg

Codes sitting at the Hungarian Wikipedia. This colos in wiki-code http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Alnagov/sandbox

DanHobley (talk) 19:07, 31 October 2013 (UTC) 1 50%
Total number of users voting 2

There are many ways to use which color for what piece of the geologic time scale. Many users/Wikipedias disagree about which color set to use then started edit warring and this ends up with a protection of Template:period color. Older discussions about this exact topic had no agreement and 1 admin edited the template using the color set he wanted. One of the discussions ended up off topic because the links linked to the jpg links and the users started arguing about jpg vs pdfs files. I hope this doesn't happen here so leave the links on this page. A complete list of color sets is shown above. 107.3.117.228 (talk) 18:34 27 October 2013 (UTC) 2:34pm 10/27/2013 EDT.

I'm struggling to follow the chain of thought here; IIRC previous discussions on this page concluded an active preference against USGS colours (which I have reiterated my preference against in the above table), and for the ICS colours. However, subsequent discussion seems to have degenerated into argument over what the ICS colours exactly were in terms of RGB. The above table seems to convolve these two issues pretty badly. As I interpret it, all of the entries 2-6 are supposed to be ICS colours, but differ from each other. I note Dr Ogg's colours are definitively not the ICS 2013 tones on my monitor; I have no way of assessing User:Alnagov's version or the Hungarian versions as they are just RGB codes and aren't displayed. My strong preference is for the actual 2013 ICS colours, and it really shouldn't be beyond us as a group of rational people to agree what these colours actually are. DanHobley (talk) 19:07, 31 October 2013 (UTC)
If one looks at the PDF version of the chart and converts to Postscript, it can be seen that the chart was produced in Illustrator and that the colors are specified in CMYK space using the setcmykcolor operator. So one could extract those CMYK values and convert to RGB, or simply take the JPEG version into Gimp and extract the apparent RGB values using the eye dropper. I suspect the latter was done for the Hungarian values, but I haven't checked them. If we are going to be using these colors, we should probably cite the paper in which the chart was presented, at [1]. As for which color set to use, I have no strong preference. --Mark viking (talk) 20:29, 31 October 2013 (UTC)
User:Mark viking if you have no strong preference the default one would be Dr Oggs color set. User:DanHobley The places where I got the chain/refs is now visible as invisible comments and you should tell your geology neighbors about this then comment+vote, or I move this discussion to the village pump. Plus the one you think is the worst should be a invisible comment and put your vote in the one you support. To assess Hungarian codes please see the Hungarian version of the Geologic time scale article I'll put a notice over there in the miscellaneous form and some geology editors I know/find/see due to a long wait for the 1st reply. 107.3.117.228 (talk) 13:40 2 November 2013 (UTC) 8:40am 11/03/2013 EST.
One word: colour-blind. --NaBUru38 (talk) 22:39, 4 November 2013 (UTC)

Dune the primary topic?`

Why should "dune" meet significance and popularity criteria enough to be primary? I did propose long ago, but that was a failure. Why can't "dune" be equal to the novel or the film called Dune? --George Ho (talk) 07:42, 22 November 2013 (UTC)

well the book got its name from the geographic feature and the movie from the book. Only for SF fans will they think of the book first. The book and movie will fade in importance over time, leaving the sand dune without rival. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 11:34, 22 November 2013 (UTC)
Same reason that Avatar is the Hindu concept, and not the James Cameron film. There are topics made primary by popularity, and others where it is more inherently primary. Chris857 (talk) 14:50, 22 November 2013 (UTC)
I did propose that dabpage be primary, but many opposed. The sand land, the novel and the film look equally popular. Yet you are saying that Dune will fade into oblivion for the next 10 to 50 years? George Ho (talk) 20:18, 22 November 2013 (UTC)
I think it will fade, even though I have read several of the series. Perhaps it won't be oblivion, but just more obscure. Think of the Foundation series was popular but now less so. I enjoyed Earth (Brin novel), but we won't retarget Earth. 2001 should be about the year, but it could have been about the film or book in the previous millennium. While the film is showing you might get more people wanting to read about that, but it was not really that huge that it would take over the primary topic on any permanent basis. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 21:41, 22 November 2013 (UTC)
Of the two main reasons for choosing a primary topic if it is "highly likely—much more likely than any other topic, and more likely than all the other topics combined—to be the topic sought when a reader searches for that term." The numbers you provided show that none of the choices fit this criterion. That leaves "long-term significance". RockMagnetist (talk) 22:15, 22 November 2013 (UTC)
Some sand land is more notable and well-valuable than the novel and the film? George Ho (talk) 22:56, 22 November 2013 (UTC)
I can't believe I need to argue this, but here goes: Deserts cover one fifth of the Earth's surface, and more than one billion people live in desert regions. Sand dunes account for 1/10 of that area (see this National Geographic article). That's about 3 million square kilometers, the size of India. The novel was published in 1965; the English word entered the language about 1790, but God knows when the first word for dune was coined. RockMagnetist (talk) 23:44, 22 November 2013 (UTC)
As for the usual measure of notability in Wikipedia, mention by reliable sources, consider this: If I search Google Scholar for "dune", I get 331,000 hits. If I search "dune -herbert -novel -movie", I get 311,000 results, so the novel and movie account for about 6% of the hits. If I do the same in Google Books, where you'd expect that the novel would have an advantage, the results are 5,410,000 and 4,990,000 - about 8% difference. RockMagnetist (talk) 00:08, 23 November 2013 (UTC)

Deformation zones

I don't know too much about this topic but should be an article about deformation zones? It just came to my mind since I am planning to rewrite/expand an article about a deformation zone. Volcanoguy 21:18, 28 November 2013 (UTC)

What is the context, deformation zones can be on all sorts of scales? Mikenorton (talk) 22:19, 28 November 2013 (UTC)
Well it is definitely used to describe fault structures because the article I am planning to rewrite/expand (Net Lake-Vermilion Lake Deformation Zone) is a fault structure. But I am not sure what else "deformation zone" refers to. Volcanoguy 22:34, 28 November 2013 (UTC)
I think there should be an article on deformation zone. But don't just copy a dictionary definition, recently we have had to clean up some articles that copied other people's work! Graeme Bartlett (talk) 10:05, 29 November 2013 (UTC)
We'll need to cover "deformed zone"[2], "deformed belt"[3] and "disturbance"[4] as well (there are probably others that I can't think of right now). Mikenorton (talk) 20:13, 29 November 2013 (UTC)
Deformation_(geology) redirects to deformation engineering - if it was to become a stand alone article based on splitting out content from that I'd be thinking it might need/want to include reference to Fold (geology), Shear (geology) and Orogenic belt and maybe Metamorphism#Dynamic_metamorphism, Dome (geology), anticline, syncline hmmm I'll stop spamming article links, I could go on, when you've finished put a link to the article here and I'll drop by and either link these terms or populate a 'see also' section.EdwardLane (talk) 21:20, 1 December 2013 (UTC)
There's nothing special about deformation in geology, apart from it affecting rocks of course. We currently have fault (geology), shear zone and fold and thrust belt, all of which fit within the concept of a deformation zone - @Graeme no worries about just a definition - I can't actually find one, it's a bit of a woolly concept, which makes it more difficult to write an article. Mikenorton (talk) 07:46, 2 December 2013 (UTC)

Wikipedia talk:Articles for creation/Franklinphilite

Dear Geologists: This submission at Afc has some references. but they are not online. Is this a notable subject, and are these reliable sources? —Anne Delong (talk) 04:39, 10 December 2013 (UTC)

@Anne Delong: Refs 1 and 3 are available online. I don't believe the other two are:
I'll let someone more involved in the project also chime in, but I would conside the four sources as reliable. Also, the article (at least once it hits mainspace) really ought to have {{Infobox mineral}}. Chris857 (talk) 14:24, 10 December 2013 (UTC)
Thanks, Chris857. Since it's in mineralogy books, it must be a real mineral, so I will accept the article and add an infobox request. —Anne Delong (talk) 15:13, 10 December 2013 (UTC)

Missing articles

Editor User:Valich created and contributed to a 168 articles that are under review at Wikipedia:Contributor copyright investigations/20130908. The review began on 8 September 2013 and continues. A large number of these articles are under the scope of this project, and some have been removed and replaced by redirects, had the articles blanked, or reduced to one line stubs. This may be what Graeme Bartlett meant when he said recently we have had to clean up some articles that copied other people's work! Anyway, many of these topics are appropriate for full page or longer articles, also if we can replace the copyright violations without doing serious damage to the articles, that would be great. I just finished restoring a shorter version of Zimbabwe Craton. I've been gone for awhile, so if this has already been discussed, please accept my apologies. --Bejnar (talk) 22:07, 10 December 2013 (UTC)

That is what I was talking about. Much was copied from Geological dictionaries to start articles off. The topics are good. However not much has been totally deleted. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 04:12, 11 December 2013 (UTC)
I haven't checked all of this 168 articles yet, but the following are still missing. --Bejnar (talk) 18:48, 11 December 2013 (UTC)

Controversial IP edits

An anonymous editor has been making some very controversial changes to WikiProject Geology-related templates. I just reverted two of them [5][6]. Other edits by this editor seem 'more legitimate,' but I can't really tell. Could someone check on them? --Omnipaedista (talk) 06:19, 19 December 2013 (UTC)

I gather (possibly incorrectly) from the threads that have previously been on this page that the ip 24.218.110.195 is being used by more than one user - one who seems to make a bunch of edits without discussion and a second who does discuss things a bit but doesn't want to register as an editor. I'm leaning toward saying the one is being slightly disruptive, and so I guess that ip might get temporarily blocked for vandalism and the other user might need to actually register. With regard to the particular edits by that IP I don't know enough to check whether something should be left/not. EdwardLane (talk) 21:48, 19 December 2013 (UTC)

The ICS discouragement of Tertiary

In a recent bold move I decided to expunge any mention to the Tertiary that isn't established terminology or relates to the history of Geology. This, however sanctioned it may be by the International Commission on Stratigraphy, raised opposition.

While I do believe this change needs to be made for internal consistency, and to follow a recommendation with nearly a decade from the governing body in these matters, I agree with what Paul H. proposed and am disposed to clean up after myself and continue at a surer pace.

I would also take the opportunity to note that the Cretaceous is now defined to have ended 66 million years ago and statements otherwise will be corrected as well.

If agreement is reached that I should go forward, any help would be much appreciated. --Dracontes (talk) 03:29, 20 December 2013 (UTC)

Before changing dates I would urge you to check the references, and if there is any more updated reference on the topic, because it may be that the "Cretaceous" has to be changed rather than the date. Also the references may say Tertiary. Just because an official body changes terminology, Wikipedia does not unless the predominant use supports it. However I have not objected to changing Tertiary to Cenozoic, as long as you check the supporting references to confirm. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 10:51, 20 December 2013 (UTC)
Regarding the change of 65/65.5 to 66, it will be only in statements where they are associated with end/beginning of Cretaceous/(Tertiary/Paleogene) or the pertinent mass extinction, which I believe should be uncontroversial. Renne et al. simply provided a more constrained date for the iridium anomaly marking the boundary. The same should go for changing mentions to the Cretaceous-Tertiary boundary to Cretaceous-Paleogene.
I should note that most of the pertinent templates already display the revised time scale: Template:Cenozoic graphical timeline, Tyrannosaurus (take a gander at the taxobox). Then there is the pickle of determining what value has predominant use in these matters.
As alluded above the K-Pg boundary presents no problem: a search in Google Scholar shows loads of recent papers using the new nomenclature. How is it argued, since the changes are transparent and the dates shift sooner than the correlated strata, that more laggard subjects are exempted from translation into the current recommendation? I admit I should have done the legwork from the start and give the necessary references that show the nomenclature changed and that one term corresponds to another. In any case I would think it due to use more precise chronostratigraphic nomenclature whenever possible.
Yet, how should one handle the generic use of those terms? Paul H said the Tertiary doesn't exactly correspond with the Cenozoic, but the difference is the exclusion of the Quaternary, 1.8-2.6 Ma depending on what stages are included in the definition and when one was measuring. Not to mention these are nested categories and thus Tertiary strata never stopped being Cenozoic before the former was dropped. True, even I have a twinge at the slight imprecision of using one over the other. Probably various combinations of Paleogene and Neogene are better.
Though there is the case of "pre-Tertiary" as I've often encountered: there never was a difference for the past century between saying that and "pre-Cenozoic". --Dracontes (talk) 15:50, 20 December 2013 (UTC)
As far as that goes "pre-Paleocene" is also equivalent, since all of these terms essentially reference all time prior to a certain point in time. Perhaps it could be argued that the broadest term should be used, on the basis that a narrower term would be less familiar. (Although Tertiary/Quaternary seems to be exception.) ~ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 23:25, 20 December 2013 (UTC)
It seems to me that (unless I've missed it) it would be helpful to have a section in a relevant article on the geological timelines which speaks to the various changes that have been made over the years to the dates of period boundaries (same applies to other boundaries too but these have the highest profile - and not least the K-Pg (former K-T) boundary. It would help the hapless lay-person (and perhaps the hapless specialist!) to make sense of the numerous dates offered up in the literature over the decades for certain of these boundaries. In this case, both the 65 and 66 million year figures are now likely to occur in material read by schoolkids and academics (and everyone in between) for decades to come, just as (though formally deprecated) Tertiary will continue to be encountered for decades to come. One of Wikipedia's roles is to help the reader make sense of all this seeming confusion. cheers Geopersona (talk) 06:57, 21 December 2013 (UTC)
I think Geological time scale is the place to address "current revisions" (and related controversies). And I think all of the "geological time" articles should have links back to Geological time scale. I may suggest this there. ~ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 19:46, 21 December 2013 (UTC)
J. Johnson, I'm good with the "pre-Paleocene" option. Here it's more a case of rank: relative time span doesn't enter much into it if that is what you're alluding to with 'narrower term'. Cenozoic is an era; Tertiary, Paleogene and Neogene are/were (sub)periods; Paleocene, Eocene, Oligocene, etc. are epochs; Danian, Gelasian, Calabrian, etc. are ages. This detail of using proper rank is something I saw used inconsistently across the articles I edited in my spree.
Geopersona, I have access to both GTS2004 and GTS2012 so I can very well do the necessary revisions. --Dracontes (talk) 15:25, 24 December 2013 (UTC)

Thanks Dracontes. For my part I've been able to construct the table below from a variety of publications in my possession, all by reputable authors & publishers. Each figure is the quoted date (in millions of years of course) of the start of the period/era mentioned.

  • Column 1 after p23, Ager, D.V. 1961 Introducing Geology (1968 reprint) Faber & Faber, London
  • Column 2 Whitten, D.G.A. 1972 The Penguin Dictionary of Geology Penguin Books, London
  • Column 3 after p178, Wilson, J.T. 1976 Continents Adrift and Continents Aground Readings from Scientific American, WH Freemand & Co, San Francisco
  • Column 4 after p160 & p203 in Gass, I.G et al (eds) 1972 Understanding the Earth (1977) Artemis Press (The Open University)
  • Column 5 from p165 Windley, B.F. 1977 The Evolving Continents (pt after House) (1982 reprint)
  • Column 6 from pp22-23 Whittow, J.B. 1977 Geology & Scenery in Scotland Pelican Books, Bungay
  • Column 7 from Anderton, R. et al 1979 A Dynamic Stratigraphy of the British Isles et al. Allen & Unwin
  • Column 8 from Bryant, P.H. 1979 Physical Geography made Simple Chaucer Press, Bungay
  • Column 9 from p7, Woodock & Strachan Geological History of Britain & Ireland (after Gradstein & Ogg 1996 & Tucker et al 1998)
  • Column 10 after p16 Toghill, P. 2000 The Geology of Britain: an introduction (2003 reprint) Airlife Publishing
  • Column 11 after Howells, M.F. 2007 British Regional Geology: Wales British Geological Survey, Keyworth
  • Column 12 2008 UK Stratigraphic Chart (North) British Geological Survey, Keyworth
  • Column 13 ICS chart version 2013/01 (retrieved from web)
Period 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13
Quaternary 1 2 3 n 2 c1.5 1.8 2 n 2 1.8 2.6 2.588
Neogene 25 n n n n n n 26 n 24 23 23 23.03
Tertiary/Palaeogene 70 65 65 65 65 65 65 65 65.0 65 65 65.5 66.0
Cretaceous 135 135 140 136 135 136 135 135 144 146 145 145.5 145.0
Jurassic 180 195 180 190 190 195 c194 190 206 208 199 199.6 201.3+/- 0.2
Triassic 225 225 230 225 225 225 235 225 248 245 245 251.0 252.17 +/- 0.06
Mesozoic/Permian 270 280 280 280 280 280 280 290 290 290 299 299.0 298.9 +/- 0.15
Carboniferous 350 345 n 345 345 345 360 340 362 363 359 359.2 358.9 +/- 0.4
Devonian 400 395 n 395 395 395 418 400 n 409 416 416.0 419.2 +/- 3.2
Silurian 440 435 n 430/440 440 440 443 430 n 439 443 443.7 443.4 +/- 1.5
Ordovician 500 500 n 500 500 500 495 500 n 510 488 488.3 485.4 +/- 1.9
Palaeozoic/Cambrian 600 600 n 570 n 570 545 580 n 544 542 542.0 541.0 +/- 1.0
Ediacaran n n n n n n n n n n n 630 ~635
Cryogenian n n n n n n n n n n n 850 850
Neoproterozoic/Tonian n n n n n n 1000 n n n n 1000 1000
Stenian n n n n n n n n n n n 1200 1200
Ectasian n n n n n n n n n n n 1400 1400
Mesoproterozoic/Calymmian n n n n n n 1600 n n n n 1600 1600
Stratherian n n n n n n n n n n n 1800 1800
Orosirian n n n n n n n n n n n 2050 2050
Rhyacian n n n n n n n n n n n 2300 2300
Palaeoproterozoic/Siderian n n n n n n n n n n n 2500 2500
Late Archaean n n n n n n 3000 n n n n 2800 2800
Middle Archaean n n n n n n 3500 n n n n 3200 3200
Early Archaean n n n n n n 4000 n n n n 3600 3600
Eo-Archaean n n n n n n n n n n n n 4000
Hadean 4500 4500 n n n n 4500 4500 n n n n ~4600

It does demonstrate the multiplicty of dates that have been assigned at one time or another. cheers Geopersona (talk) 20:26, 24 December 2013 (UTC)

AfC submission

Could anyone have a look at this submission? Thanks, FoCuSandLeArN (talk) 22:15, 7 January 2014 (UTC)

Africa East

"East Africa", "Eastern Africa", "Southeast Africa", "Central east Africa" are up for discussion, see the two interrelated discussions at talk:East Africa and talk:Central east Africa.

The meaning of "East Africa" is being discussed, as to the sociopolitical definition, geopolitical definition, geographic definition (ie. East African coast), geologic definition (ie. East African Plate)

-- 70.50.148.122 (talk) 04:57, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

Wikipedia talk:Articles for creation/Infrasonic passive differential spectroscopy (IPDS)

Dear geologists: The above article has been declined at Afc because it needs inline citations. It is abandoned by its original submitter, and I don't know enough about spectoscopy to cite it properly. I have added some references which I hope are appropriate. Is there someone here who is willing to move the references into citations? There doesn't seem to be a Wikiproject for Geophysics. Is this the correct Wikiproject for this question? —Anne Delong (talk) 03:31, 7 January 2014 (UTC)

Thanks; the article is created now. —Anne Delong (talk) 14:41, 21 January 2014 (UTC)

Wikipedia talk:Articles for creation/Pyrobitumen

Dear geologists: Here's another Afc submission that may be of interest. —Anne Delong (talk) 04:03, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

At first glance it looks good to me - but I'm not an expert on pyrobitumen - a quick google gave this which suggests that the subject is broadly the same as the content on that page - and that looks to be pretty well written - whether the references support the detailed content should probably be checked. I've never handles an AFC so not sure how to proceed and not got time at the moment to read up. EdwardLane (talk) 10:40, 23 January 2014 (UTC)

Okay, I have accepted it. It probably needs some editing to make it more understandable to a general audience, but that will be more likely to happen in mainspace. —Anne Delong (talk) 18:44, 23 January 2014 (UTC)

Fake (?) category

Category:Silicate minerals has parent cats, lots of subcats and some articles. Category:Silica minerals is a red link without a parent category, but attached to a lot of pages. I do not understand enough about minerals to fix this. Could someone please make it tree properly, or fix the cats on the articles? 71.234.215.133 (talk) 09:19, 21 January 2014 (UTC)

Seems it was due to its inclusion in the silica minerals template. I've deleted it from the template. Vsmith (talk) 13:15, 21 January 2014 (UTC)
It still has some entries. I've turned it into a redirect, a bot will more the entries in a couple of days to the correct cat. --Randykitty (talk) 11:54, 27 January 2014 (UTC)

Archived some threads

I've archived some inactive threads to subsections which were notifications about discussions that have since been closed. — Cirt (talk) 18:12, 6 February 2014 (UTC)

Category:Earth and atmospheric sciences journals

Hi, could someone here perhaps have a look at this category and its subcats (especially Category:Meteorology journals)? I find the current situation not completely satisfactory. For example, I'm not sure that climatology journals belong in "meteorology". Other journals that currently are in the main cat could perhaps be diffused, but some may be difficult to place in the current subcats. Would it make sense to create a "climatology journals" cat? Would that be a subcat of "meteorology journals", the other way around, or a equal level/parallel subcat within Earth and atmospheric sciences journals? Thanks for any advice! --Randykitty (talk) 16:23, 26 January 2014 (UTC)

User:Tillman might have an advice. 'Climatology journals cat' as interface between meteorology, history of the Earth and geology? But I could be wrong. --Chris.urs-o (talk) 19:32, 1 February 2014 (UTC)
I'll take a look in the next few days. --Pete Tillman (talk) 21:16, 1 February 2014 (UTC)
  • I think adding a new cat for Climatology would be good. There will still be overlap, eg Journal of Applied Meteorology and Climatology. Alternatively, rename to "Atmospheric Sciences" with subcats? Have fun, Pete Tillman (talk) 20:13, 6 February 2014 (UTC)

AfC submission

It's a pretty small stub, but could be notable. FoCuSandLeArN (talk) 18:47, 31 January 2014 (UTC)

Accepted and expanded. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 05:31, 1 February 2014 (UTC)
Thanks! There's a whole bunch of these too. FoCuSandLeArN (talk) 16:17, 10 February 2014 (UTC)

Invitation to User Study

Would you be interested in participating in a user study? We are a team at University of Washington studying methods for finding collaborators within a Wikipedia community. We are looking for volunteers to evaluate a new visualization tool. All you need to do is to prepare for your laptop/desktop, web camera, and speaker for video communication with Google Hangout. We will provide you with a Amazon gift card in appreciation of your time and participation. For more information about this study, please visit our wiki page (http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Research:Finding_a_Collaborator). If you would like to participate in our user study, please send me a message at Wkmaster (talk) 14:10, 12 February 2014 (UTC).

Hotspot infoboxen

FYI, {{Infobox hotspot custom}} and {{Infobox moon hot spot data}} are under discussion, see Wikipedia:Templates_for_discussion/Log/2014_February_18 -- 70.50.151.11 (talk) 00:39, 19 February 2014 (UTC)

Sonoma orogeny

New user Ahlitanah (talk · contribs) replaced this article with a much longer version, and was reverted by Derek Andrews (talk · contribs). Ahlitanah complained at WP:REFUND#Sonoma orogeny, where I have explained WP:BRD and said that this is a content dispute to be discussed on the article talk page. More eyes on this might be useful. Ahlitanah's new version looks to me as though it had been copy-pasted from somewhere, but Googling a few sentences does not identify a source. JohnCD (talk) 10:32, 26 February 2014 (UTC)

It might be a unpublished university essay or a chapter of a bachelor thesis? It would seem almost impossible to find the source if it isn't machine readable and on the internet. --Tobias1984 (talk) 10:38, 26 February 2014 (UTC)
Parallel situation at Antler orogeny (another chapter?), except that Hiker395 has put a lot of work into wikifying it. A curious point is that while most of the references here do not have parentheses (USGS style), two of them do. Copied from two different sources? I wonder if Ahlitanah is posting his own work. ~ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 21:00, 27 February 2014 (UTC)
Please see his posting on his talk page (timestamp: 00:52, 28 February). I've replied there attempting to explain as he obviously doesn't understand Wikipedia ways - and asking him to be patient and work with us. Vsmith (talk) 03:34, 28 February 2014 (UTC)
I think the matter is satisfactorily resolved (no copyvio). ~ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 23:25, 28 February 2014 (UTC)

Portal:Paleozoic up for featured portal status

Today I nominated the Paleozoic Portal for featured portal status. Your comments and criticism are welcome at the nomination page. Abyssal (talk) 05:52, 1 March 2014 (UTC)

Class Project

I just wanted to let the group know that I have students in a 300-level Sedimentary Geology course working on creating, expanding, improving Wikipedia articles. Please be gentle, helpful, and forgiving with this group of 20 new Wikipedians! Rygel, M.C. (talk) 14:31, 19 February 2014 (UTC)

Thanks for letting us know. Could your students sign their name here so we can look at their contributions. --Tobias1984 (talk) 15:54, 19 February 2014 (UTC)
Do you need assistance organising things on Wikipedia? There are some things that to be wary of: copyright infringement, not citing sources, not writing for our audience, and getting into controversial areas and having all the edits reverted. Hopefully Sedimentary Geology will not stray into the last problem, but steer clear of global warming for example! Graeme Bartlett (talk) 20:39, 19 February 2014 (UTC)
@Rygel, M.C.: Forgot to ping. --Tobias1984 (talk) 20:41, 19 February 2014 (UTC)
You and your students may want to read this: "Ten Simple Rules for Editing Wikipedia". PLOS Comput Biol. 6 (9): e1000941. September 30, 2010. Bibcode:2010PLSCB...6E0941L. doi:10.1371/journal.pcbi.1000941. PMC 2947980. PMID 20941386. {{cite journal}}: Cite uses deprecated parameter |authors= (help) --Chris.urs-o (talk) 16:54, 27 February 2014 (UTC)
That article has a very apt error in it: "Many new editors feel intimidated about contributing to Wikipedia at first, fearing they may a mistake. " I almost wonder if it was deliberate. RockMagnetist (talk) 18:10, 27 February 2014 (UTC)
Thanks to all for the support and feedback! I gave them an introduction to Wikipedia, am helping them select appropriate pages, and talked about editing etiquette. The simple rules paper looks like a great resource, I will be sure to share with the group. I decided to make this an extra credit project, so I am not sure how many people will actually contribute. I will ask the students to sign this page and will provide a list of target pages below. Rygel, M.C. (talk) 12:19, 3 March 2014 (UTC)

Target pages for class project

Allochem — Preceding unsigned comment added by Rygel, M.C. (talk • contribs) 16:26, 3 March 2014 (UTC)

Dendrite (crystal)

Mucrospirifer

Ooid

Salt diapir

Skolithos

Ventifact

Zoophycos

Orphan articles in Geology

Hi all. There are a number of orphaned articles in WikiProject Geology (Complete list). Some seem to be true orphans (unlinked-to by any other article), others are only linked to by one or two other articles, making them susceptible to re-orphaning. If you can add relevant links to the articles and remove the orphan tags, please do! --Animalparty-- (talk) 19:19, 1 March 2014 (UTC)

I have proposed a merger for Buoyant flows. RockMagnetist (talk) 17:11, 3 March 2014 (UTC)

AfC submission - 02/04 - require geology editors to accept/reject

User:Nickhugon/sandbox. FoCuSandLeArN (talk) 15:54, 2 April 2014 (UTC)

Is there a question or problem with the submission? A little surprising there isn't an existing article on the Chukchi Plateau, but do you have concerns about the submission? --(AfadsBad (talk) 16:26, 2 April 2014 (UTC))
Can it be accepted as is? Wikipedia talk:Articles for creation/Kanehekili Fluctus is another one. Thanks, FoCuSandLeArN (talk) 23:53, 7 April 2014 (UTC)
So, you are requesting that geology editors review and accept or reject these articles? Again, is that because you see a problem? I am retitling this thread so editors understand that you have request. --(AfadsBad (talk) 01:02, 8 April 2014 (UTC))

Chukchi Plateau is live. Seems that Chukchi Cap exists ... probably should merge 'em. Vsmith (talk) 02:09, 8 April 2014 (UTC)

Wikipedia talk:Articles for creation/Kanehekili Fluctus is now in article space. It should not have gone to AFC, the creator should have used the move button themselves. I suspect there are too many confusing alternatives round here! This is part of a class project I am involved with. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 11:38, 8 April 2014 (UTC)
Oh, good. I did not check the articles, but a glance had me confused about their presence at AFC and why AFC editors would be holding them up. Thanks for clearing this up. --(AfadsBad (talk) 12:47, 8 April 2014 (UTC))

Christopher Monckton, 3rd Viscount Monckton of Brenchley

How much space should be discussing his climate change views? See Talk:Christopher_Monckton,_3rd_Viscount_Monckton_of_Brenchley#Undue_weight. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 22:34, 19 April 2014 (UTC)

Wikipedia talk:Articles for creation/Wilmcote Limestone

Dear geologists: Is this old Afc submission about a notable topic? Should it be kept and improved instead of being deleted as a stale draft? —Anne Delong (talk) 19:28, 19 April 2014 (UTC)

I suppose so, but it depends how 'small' a stratigraphic subdivision is considered worthy of an article - looking at Blue_Lias there is a redlink there, but it doesn't look to have any other redlinks, so perhaps its contents should be merged in as a section of the blue lias article? EdwardLane (talk) 20:05, 19 April 2014 (UTC)
According to the BGS lexicon this is the Wilmcote Limestone Member and only 6-12 m thick. We do have Cotham Marble and Purbeck Marble, but that is because of their distinctive nature and use as decorative stones. A section in the Blue Lias article sounds like a good plan. Mikenorton (talk) 21:45, 19 April 2014 (UTC)
Would someone at this project like to move whatever is appropriate? Then the draft can be promoted and made into a redirect to maintain attribution. I'd do it myself, but I am suffering from a profound ignorance of geology. —Anne Delong (talk) 01:10, 20 April 2014 (UTC)
I have merged the content. Do you want to give the writer credit on their talk page? Graeme Bartlett (talk) 07:46, 20 April 2014 (UTC)
I have moved the redirect to mainspace, marked it as a merge attribution redirect, and thanked the editor. That should be all that's needed, I think, so thanks for your help with this. —Anne Delong (talk) 13:07, 20 April 2014 (UTC)

Please curb my enthusiasm

I joined this project a couple of weeks ago; since then, I have been zooming along doing assessments of articles, adding stub templates, and checking categories. It suddenly occurred to me that perhaps I should ask for some spot-checks of my edits. Bold is one thing, rash is another! There are vast swaths of Wikipedia I’m unfamiliar with; to be prudent, I’d appreciate it if some of you could take a look--at my assessments in particular. Thanks. - Gorthian (talk) 02:18, 27 April 2014 (UTC)

@Gorthian: - Thanks for putting so much work into Wikipedia lately. The edits you did on items on my watch list were all needed. Keep up your enthusiasm! --Tobias1984 (talk) 19:33, 30 April 2014 (UTC)

AGU journals

Good news about the AGU journals -- they are releasing content published from 1997 to 24 months ago as open access. See [7] -- phoebe / (talk to me) 19:59, 28 April 2014 (UTC)

Nice. ~ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 19:13, 1 May 2014 (UTC)

AfC submission - 28/04

Wikipedia talk:Articles for creation/Resonant Ultrasound Spectroscopy. FoCuSandLeArN (talk) 19:15, 28 April 2014 (UTC)

Looks good to me (although - there are a bunch of links that are pointing at disambiguation pages to fix). EdwardLane (talk) 02:26, 1 May 2014 (UTC)
I accepted it, but how different is it from Acoustic resonance spectroscopy? Graeme Bartlett (talk) 11:39, 2 May 2014 (UTC)

Halite/Rock salt

A discussion is taking place on the title of this article at Talk:Halite#Requested_move. All input welcome. Thank you. walk victor falk talk 15:06, 4 May 2014 (UTC)

Invitation to Participate in a User Study - Final Reminder

Would you be interested in participating in a user study of a new tool to support editor involvement in WikiProjects? We are a team at the University of Washington studying methods for finding collaborators within WikiProjects, and we are looking for volunteers to evaluate a new visual exploration tool for Wikipedia. Given your interest in this Wikiproject, we would welcome your participation in our study. To participate, you will be given access to our new visualization tool and will interact with us via Google Hangout so that we can solicit your thoughts about the tool. To use Google Hangout, you will need a laptop/desktop, a web camera, and a speaker for video communication during the study. We will provide you with an Amazon gift card in appreciation of your time and participation. For more information about this study, please visit our wiki page (http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Research:Finding_a_Collaborator). If you would like to participate in our user study, please send me a message at Wkmaster (talk) 20:26, 5 May 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) 03:03, 29 April 2014 (UTC)

There are two or three articles I have wanted from the Royal Society, but not worth a whole subscription. Is there anyway we can contact those with the subscriptions to request specific articles? ~ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 19:16, 1 May 2014 (UTC)
email me Wiki at Royal Society John (talk) 22:34, 1 May 2014 (UTC)
Thanks. I'll see if I can dig out which articles I wanted. ~ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 22:49, 1 May 2014 (UTC)
Hmm, only one article from RS, and I already have that. ~ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 20:46, 3 May 2014 (UTC)

Another Royal Society offer

I'm also trying to organize a release of some images in various categories from their Picture Library. One of the categories is historic (out of copyright) natural history books, mainly for the illustrations. Are there particular books or other holdings that people would like to see images from, or particular images? Unfortunately much of what they have is not digitized and much of what is digitized is not presently online at the last link. The main library catalogue search page is here. Before asking, please try to see if decent quality images are not available elsewhere, as they often are, from the Library of Congress etc. Thanks, Wiki at Royal Society John (talk) 09:58, 7 May 2014 (UTC)

Wikipedia talk:Articles for creation/Geochemical cycle

Dear geologists: This abandoned page was never submitted at AfC for inclusion in the encyclopedia. Now it's on the list to be deleted as a stale draft. Is this a notable topic, and should the draft be kept and improved instead? —Anne Delong (talk) 10:31, 12 May 2014 (UTC)

This is definitely a notable topic! It should be kept and improved. Thanks for bringing it up here. It looks as if it was a class assignment, given the user name (and subsequent abandonment). Can it be submitted as is, or is something else needed first? - Gorthian (talk) 20:38, 12 May 2014 (UTC)
I have moved it, fixed up references and wikified it a bit, and remove gratuitous quotes. If this is a class assignment, then there may be more out there too. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 21:30, 12 May 2014 (UTC)
Thanks, Graeme Bartlett. Several of us are trying to give a quick check of all of the abandoned drafts before they are deleted, and that includes ones that were never submitted. There are a lot of them, though, so I can't promise that none will be missed, or that there'll be time to report all of them in the appropriate places. —Anne Delong (talk) 19:25, 21 May 2014 (UTC)
Perhaps I should be looking at all the drafts too, particularly the unsubmitted ones. I do restore the deleted ones on request, but if no one asks then no one will restore them either. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 22:19, 22 May 2014 (UTC)
That would be great,Graeme Bartlett. If you have the new search installed in your preferences (it looks inside templates), you can use this search box to find ones you are interested in. For example, if you type "geology qualifies to be deleted" in the search box, it will find submissions with the word "geology" in them that are facing deletion. —Anne Delong (talk) 13:55, 23 May 2014 (UTC)

Leaflet For Wikiproject Geology At Wikimania 2014

Are you looking to recruit more contributors to your project?
We are offering to design and print physical paper leaflets to be distributed at Wikimania 2014 for all projects that apply.
For more information, click the link below.
Project leaflets
Adikhajuria (talk) 13:38, 25 May 2014 (UTC)

Requests for assessment?

Is it time to get rid of requests for assessment? Requests are rare, and responses even rarer. Editors are better off requesting an assessment on this talk page. RockMagnetist (talk) 17:04, 23 May 2014 (UTC)

If I were wanting a reassessment, I'd come straight to this talk page. I think you're right. - Gorthian (talk) 03:20, 30 May 2014 (UTC)
I removed it. RockMagnetist (talk) 17:17, 30 May 2014 (UTC)

Candidates for inclusion in this project

I used catscan2 to find all the articles that are in Category:Geology but not yet tagged by this project. With a search depth of only 1, I found about 700 articles! The results are in WikiProject Geology/Candidates for inclusion. I encourage you to add articles from this list to the project, where appropriate, or improve the categorization when they don't really seem to belong. RockMagnetist (talk) 17:09, 21 May 2014 (UTC)

I would suggest that if the page is already in WikiProject Paleontology, WP:WikiProject Evolutionary biology, WikiProject Mars, WikiProject Moon, WikiProject Environment, WikiProject Volcanoes that we don't need to put it into the Geology project, as there is already a suitable related project taking care. But some topics I think we should include anyway. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 22:06, 22 May 2014 (UTC)
It's a tough call. I sometimes wonder, for example, whether we should leave all the obscure minerals to WikiProject Rocks and minerals; but if we stopped supporting all the articles that are in WikiProject Earthquakes and WikiProject Volcanoes, our featured article list would be pretty short. I'm not sure where to draw the line. Geology is inherently multidisciplinary; if we only included articles of no interest to other projects, what would that leave us? RockMagnetist (talk) 22:35, 22 May 2014 (UTC)
Well I am counting these as child projects of the Geology one. You can add the project banner if you like, I am adding banners to those that have no relevant Geology type project. I have now come across Wikiproject soil and WikiProject Civil engineering (moving that earth or rock around) or WikiProject Oceans. So should we include these too? WikiProject Rocks and minerals has a very narrow scope of creating an infobox, so tough for them to claim credit for FAs! But I suppose that means that Geology project should have rocks and minerals too. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 10:21, 23 May 2014 (UTC)
I can't think of any down side to tagging articles that are shared by other projects. We can keep our priorities straight with the importance rating. At worst, no one from this project works on the page. RockMagnetist (talk) 17:11, 23 May 2014 (UTC)
My own view is that it really does depend on the article e.g. few of the articles on specific earthquakes are in WP:Geology, but many other seismology articles are; all the articles on seismically active fault zones should sensibly be in both and most are. At one time I moved a lot of fossil genera/species articles from WP:Geology to WP:Palaeontology, because that seemed more sensible - articles on fossil bearing formations are however mostly in both, which seems logical to me. Mikenorton (talk) 21:55, 23 May 2014 (UTC)

A couple of problematic categories

Working through this list, I kept finding articles tagged with Category:Geological history of Earth where that category didn't seem appropriate. Digging into the histories, I see that quite a few of them were "migrated" from Category:Earth evolution, per this CfD discussion. I've changed the category to something more suited to each article or, in some cases, just deleted it outright.

The other category that I see as problematic is Category:Geoengineering. It's thanks to its listing as a direct subcategory of Category:Geology that we get articles like Berm, Shallow foundation, Cut (earthmoving), and Fill dirt on this otherwise very useful list. What I'd like to do is move Category:Geoengineering to Category:Subfields of geology, where it really belongs. That would narrow this list to articles more relevant to our project. Does anyone object to my doing that? - Gorthian (talk) 03:16, 30 May 2014 (UTC)

@Gorthian: Thanks for all your work on this. It's really gratifying to set this up and see someone run with it. I noticed that Category:Geological history of Earth has some other oddities like Desert (I removed that one). I think moving Category:Geoengineering to Category:Subfields of geology sounds reasonable, although maybe there should be a Category:Applied geology. I give you fair warning, though: if we make enough headway against the current list, I might be tempted to try a search depth of 2! RockMagnetist (talk) 03:34, 30 May 2014 (UTC)
Oh, no, Mr. Bill! Not a depth of TWO! :-D
Personally, I'm not sure what I'd do with Category:Applied geology. I have enough trouble with Category:Geoengineering as it is; I don't know enough about what geoengineers actually do. And I think I'd end up tagging way too many articles as "applied geology." Take paleomagnetism, for instance. My brain could convince me that it's really geology applied to physics, or vice versa, and doesn't that make it applied geology? ...sorry, it's past my bedtime... - Gorthian (talk) 05:33, 30 May 2014 (UTC)
I was thinking of Petroleum geology as an example. Turns out it is in Category:Economic geology, which is a subclass of Category:Subfields of geology. There you'd be safe from me until I went to DEPTHCON 3! RockMagnetist (talk) 06:17, 30 May 2014 (UTC)
I put Category:Geoengineering in Category:Economic geology, and 44 articles dropped out of the list. RockMagnetist (talk) 14:50, 30 May 2014 (UTC)
Cool. - Gorthian (talk) 21:29, 30 May 2014 (UTC)

@RockMagnetist: Oops, I finally realized that I wasn't meaning Category:Geoengineering at all; the category I was having trouble with was Category:Geotechnical engineering! I moved it to Category:Subfields of geology. My apologies--I really shouldn't be editing here when I'm tired. - Gorthian (talk) 05:27, 31 May 2014 (UTC)

Well, isn't that ironic? Because it turns out it was really Category:Geotechnical engineering that I meant when I said Category:Geoengineering. Two wrongs sometimes do make a right. Good night! RockMagnetist (talk) 05:54, 31 May 2014 (UTC)

"Attention needed" flag in template

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.
The result of this discussion was Move discussion to RfC.

{{WikiProject Geology}} has the flag |attention=, which puts articles into Category:Geology articles needing attention. My suspicion is that this flag is useless because it doesn't say what aspect of the article needs attention. I doubt anyone looks at the category either. Better to use a tag on the page itself. Shall I remove the flag? RockMagnetist (talk) 17:25, 30 May 2014 (UTC)

I'd support removal, as the flag is too vague to be helpful. Even if an editor wanted to give attention, without a more specific tag or a talk page explanation of the problem, it would often be unclear as to what was needed. --Mark viking (talk) 18:07, 30 May 2014 (UTC)
I think it could be useful; I'd rather see it kept. Isn't there a place we could provide guidance on using the flag? Maybe the template doc? We could "strongly urge" editors not to use it unless they also put an explanatory comment on the Talk page. Or maybe there's a way to expand the parameter, or add another one? - Gorthian (talk) 21:26, 30 May 2014 (UTC)
Consider the {{Expert-subject}} tag, whose documentation strongly recommends that you provide a reason; I have yet to see anyone follow that recommendation. And if we kept the attention flag, we would need some way of drawing attention to the flagged articles. Look at all the ways of prioritizing work we already have. There is the importance assessment in the wikiproject tag; there is the todo list at the top of this talk page (which covers mostly high- or top-importance articles); and there is the Open Tasks tab. If we have any more lists of priorities, we'll need to prioritize the lists! RockMagnetist (talk) 21:49, 30 May 2014 (UTC)
After looking at several articles, I found one where the attention flag was clearly explained: Talk:Impact_event#Attention. It basically asked for the article to be expanded and more citations added. It dates back to 2006, and the article is now B quality. RockMagnetist (talk) 00:36, 31 May 2014 (UTC)
I have added a few recently. However if no one ever looks at the list needing attention it will be useless. It is no coincidence as the project tagging has been triggered by the list posted earlier of possible Geology project articles. I suppose that we need criteria for using attention flag, and detag if the reason is unclear. Since it says immediate attention, this may mean that it needs attention from a Geology project member within 24 hours. But instead perhaps we can post a message here, as those with it on the watch list or interested can then not have to check yet another category. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 22:06, 31 May 2014 (UTC)
Right. Using that flag for anything that really needs immediate attention, like contentious BLP issues or copyright violations, would be a big mistake. The other problem with the attention flag is that it is generally not removed when the problem is solved, and it can still be there years after anyone knows the reason for it. RockMagnetist (talk) 22:15, 31 May 2014 (UTC)
When properly used, it is potentially useful, RockMagnetist visited the category, and I have visited the category on other projects. But people seem reluctant to use talk pages, but that is true whether or not the tag is there. It is harmless and potentially useful. --Bejnar (talk) 22:47, 31 May 2014 (UTC)
Actually, the only reason I visited the category is that I wondered if it is any use. My conclusion is no. At best it is harmless, at worst it leaves someone with the impression they have done something for the article when they haven't. If the flag didn't exist, they would look for a better solution. RockMagnetist (talk) 22:50, 31 May 2014 (UTC)

I have decided to start an RfC to remove the attention flag from all WikiProject banners, so it's probably best to close this discussion. RockMagnetist (talk) 03:57, 1 June 2014 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Portal:Paleozoic renominated for featured portal status

Today I renominated the Paleozoic Portal for featured portal status. The last nomination failed because no one, apparently, could be arsed to comment on it. :( Your comments and criticism are welcome at the new nomination page. Abyssal (talk) 03:05, 2 June 2014 (UTC)

AfC submission - 04/06

Draft:Piston-cylinder apparatus. FoCuSandLeArN (talk) 13:35, 4 June 2014 (UTC)

Accepted. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 22:10, 4 June 2014 (UTC)

Wikipedia talk:Articles for creation/Glass Mountain (Capitol Reef National Park)

Dear geology experts: This old AfC draft was declined with a note that it should be added to Capitol Reef National Park. Is this a notable geological formation, and if not, would someone who knows about geology like to do the merge? —Anne Delong (talk) 22:18, 6 June 2014 (UTC)

New categories

As a result of User:RockMagnetist's work on inclusion I have made up some new categories, but they do not seem very satisfactory, so I will ask for opinions for better names.

There is not much in them at the moment, so it is currently easy to change. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 09:55, 2 June 2014 (UTC)

Here are my thoughts:
- Gorthian (talk) 21:57, 2 June 2014 (UTC)
I agree with all of the modifications suggested by Gorthian. These are all clearly useful categories. RockMagnetist (talk) 22:05, 2 June 2014 (UTC)
"Spontaneous" refers to causation, "persistent" refers to duration. I can see both as possible categories, but perhaps the latter is more notable? ~ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 23:12, 2 June 2014 (UTC)
I have started to move to Gorthian's suggestions. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 12:29, 3 June 2014 (UTC)
+1, this all sounds good to me, per Gorthian. DanHobley (talk) 05:15, 7 June 2014 (UTC)

Crater depth

The article crater depth has a whopping 1477 incoming links, but not a single reference. I think if enough sources were found, they would reveal that there isn't a single universal definition of crater depth. RockMagnetist (talk) 14:50, 1 June 2014 (UTC)

I think that you're probably right - this ref [8] defines two depths just for a simple impact crater. This ref [9] does use mean rim height to crater base for the Tycho Crater, but it's hard to judge how prevalent that is as a measure, although it would make sense for craters where the measurements are entirely down to remote sensing. Mikenorton (talk) 15:27, 1 June 2014 (UTC)
Melosh's Planetary Surface Processes has a whole section on crater scaling that would be ideal to frame this off. I've got a copy knocking about at work, but can't promise anything on the speed front. Also, could try poking Wikipedia:WikiProject_Mars into action on this, or one of the other planetary groups. DanHobley (talk) 05:29, 7 June 2014 (UTC)

Timescale templates

{{Jurassic}} (Example to right). Is there a reason why these are formatted in the way that they are, particularly with respect to column headings, which only describe terms in stratigraphy? As a non-geologist, I find this quite confusing, particularly at articles titled according to divisions of time. For example the text of the Middle Jurassic article refers to it as being an epoch, but the accompanying template lists it only as a series, with no mention of the term epoch. In the Early Jurassic article, the text describes it as an epoch that corresponds to the Lower Jurassic series in stratigraphy, but the timescale template lists Early Jurassic as a series—not Lower Jurassic as a series, and not Early Jurassic as an epoch. Is there a way of making things clearer? Or am I just misunderstanding something? PaleCloudedWhite (talk) 23:10, 31 May 2014 (UTC)

Hi I've edited the Cretaceous one in a sandbox to include both time and strat terms - User:Mikenorton/Cretaceous template. Does that look better, or even more confusing? Mikenorton (talk) 10:41, 1 June 2014 (UTC)
Your version using both is an improvement as it helps remove confusion. Vsmith (talk) 19:09, 1 June 2014 (UTC)
Yes, your sandbox version is much clearer - thanks for that. Is there a reason why you've linked half of the 'split' table entries, but not the other half? PaleCloudedWhite (talk) 10:04, 2 June 2014 (UTC)
That's because if I linked the unlinked entries, they would just redirect to the linked ones - e.g. Lower Cretaceous redirects to Early Cretaceous, and I'm not sure that would be helpful. Mikenorton (talk) 14:00, 4 June 2014 (UTC)
Ah, yes - you are right about those entries. But what about the column headings - system/period, series/epoch etc. - should not those all be linked? PaleCloudedWhite (talk) 22:26, 4 June 2014 (UTC)
Agreed, so I've linked Period, Epoch and Age and linked the radiometric age 'Age' to absolute dating. Mikenorton (talk) 07:11, 5 June 2014 (UTC)
Yes that's better - it looks 'good to go'. Thanks for making the changes - I was a bit cagey about tinkering with a geology template myself, in case I unwittingly mucked something up (I find geological nomenclature almost wilfully complicated). PaleCloudedWhite (talk) 21:46, 5 June 2014 (UTC)
OK, that one's done - I'll update the others when I get a chance. Mikenorton (talk)
So, I've updated Devonian, Permian, Triassic, Jurassic, Palaeogene, Neogene and Quaternary. However, the Carboniferous is a problem on account of those pesky sub-systems that were visited on us. In fact the template should be updated to include a different column as each of the sub-systems is divided into three, which our template isn't - I'll see how that looks. Mikenorton (talk) 18:34, 7 June 2014 (UTC)
Well it looks difficult, because I don't entirely understand the markup that's used, so I'll leave it for now. Mikenorton (talk) 18:51, 7 June 2014 (UTC)

Gunter Faure

This stub article is on the list of candidates for inclusion (though I found it via a different route). Gunter Faure is the author of several well-regarded books in geochemistry, but is he himself notable enough for an article of his own? The article has had a single edit since its creation four years ago, and the one reference cited is his contact page at Ohio State University, where he is now a professor emeritus. Going by the guidelines at WP:ACADEMIC, I looked for some online indication that he is as well regarded as his books, but came up empty. I hate deleting articles that have any potential at all, so I thought I'd ask here if anyone has any ideas to establish his notability. Or is it truly an article that doesn't belong in Wikipedia? In which case, I'll go ahead with the PROD I was considering. - Gorthian (talk) 03:41, 8 June 2014 (UTC)

{{Lunar crater references}}

Template:Lunar crater references (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs) has been nominated for deletion -- 65.94.171.126 (talk) 07:57, 8 June 2014 (UTC)

AfC submission - 06/06

Draft:Hsanda Gol Formation. FoCuSandLeArN (talk) 16:37, 6 June 2014 (UTC)

After looking for sources on the geology of the formation, I came across this, which describes the geological and stratigraphic setting of the fossils and gives an updated view on the stratigraphy (dating from 2007). The draft as it stands is based entirely on the work of James Millett in the late 60s, so it needs to take later work into account. Mikenorton (talk) 18:56, 6 June 2014 (UTC)
Accepted. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 12:40, 8 June 2014 (UTC)

Geological unit

I investigated Geological unit, a high-importance article, because it was tagged for having no references. It turns out that one section was a clear copyright violation; and the other two main sections were added by the same person in a large block at around the same time. So I had to assume they too were copyvios. That leaves a very sad looking article with almost no content in it. A good candidate for the next collaboration! RockMagnetist (talk) 02:24, 2 June 2014 (UTC)

I've made a start on it - the biostrat subsections need expanding and need to add something on magnetostrat units. Mikenorton (talk) 22:25, 4 June 2014 (UTC)
Thanks, Mikenorton. I hate to do this after you have put work into the article, but - I have been wondering about both Geological unit and Geological province. As far as I can tell, these are rarely discussed as a group except in maps. Instead, geologists talk about the different types of units and provinces. I wasn't able to find a single source that discussed geological units collectively; and I have found one definition for geological province. Should these topics have their own articles? Or should they just be disambig pages? RockMagnetist (talk) 14:55, 7 June 2014 (UTC)
I think that they should have their own articles. See the ICS Stratigraphic Guide for a full discussion of geological units, although I think it's fair to say that the term stratigraphic unit might be more appropriate. Mikenorton (talk) 22:38, 7 June 2014 (UTC)
And thanks to Vsmith, the article is now "Stratigraphic unit". Mikenorton (talk) 14:45, 8 June 2014 (UTC)
I think that's the right decision. RockMagnetist (talk) 21:10, 8 June 2014 (UTC)
Oh so busy, but this is crying out for a pretty hand-drawn field slip/geological map, or indeed a nice km-scale professional one, as its key image in the intro. But WP appears extremely poor on fine scale map images. If I remember, I'll scan one of mine in - though an alternative might be better. Also, will probably forget to do so. DanHobley (talk) 05:21, 7 June 2014 (UTC)
Incidentally, shouldn't we have an article on structure contours? Given this can be a nightmare to explain, and shows up early in many Geology 101 classes, it would be nice to have. DanHobley (talk) 05:30, 7 June 2014 (UTC)

Wrong category name?

Please express your opinion here. --Daniele Pugliesi (talk) 02:23, 9 June 2014 (UTC)

Proposed changes for Mudslide

A brand new editor who is a geologist might need editing help at Talk:Mudslide. Some good ideas there! - Gorthian (talk) 06:38, 13 June 2014 (UTC)

More notably, we may be leading up to replacing "mudslide" with "mudflow". ~ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 22:46, 13 June 2014 (UTC)

Leaflet For Wikiproject Geology At Wikimania 2014

Hi all,

My name is Adi Khajuria and I am helping out with Wikimania 2014 in London.

One of our initiatives is to create leaflets to increase the discoverability of various wikimedia projects, and showcase the breadth of activity within wikimedia. Any kind of project can have a physical paper leaflet designed - for free - as a tool to help recruit new contributors. These leaflets will be printed at Wikimania 2014, and the designs can be re-used in the future at other events and locations.

This is particularly aimed at highlighting less discoverable but successful projects, e.g:

• Active Wikiprojects: Wikiproject Medicine, WikiProject Video Games, Wikiproject Film

• Tech projects/Tools, which may be looking for either users or developers.

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• Wiki Loves Parliaments, Wiki Loves Monuments, Wiki Loves ____

• Wikimedia thematic organisations, Wikiwomen’s Collaborative, The Signpost

For more information or to sign up for one for your project, go to:
Project leaflets
Adikhajuria (talk) 09:28, 13 June 2014 (UTC)

I took a stab at it. Have a look! RockMagnetist (talk) 17:05, 27 June 2014 (UTC)

Coastal upwelling of the South Eastern Arabian Sea

The new article at Coastal upwelling of the South Eastern Arabian Sea is really geophysics, so I have not added the WP Geology template to it. What do you all think? --Bejnar (talk) 07:03, 3 July 2014 (UTC)

Not my area of expertise at all, but is this article about the same phenomenon? Could the two articles be merged? Rocksandwaves (talk) 08:45, 3 July 2014 (UTC)
I've added links to full text versions of the two cited papers. It appears that these two phenomena are related but separate features of the system of currents around the Arabian Sea. Mikenorton (talk) 18:14, 3 July 2014 (UTC)
The article is about an oceanographic feature. Oceanography is part of the earth sciences, but that article is not in WP:Geology, although it is in WPs:Geography, Physics and Oceans. Unless we expand this project to encompass the full range of Earth Sciences, I'm personally happy that we leave oceanographic topics to these other projects. Mikenorton (talk) 15:18, 6 July 2014 (UTC)

Project banners on categories or files?

Is it accepted practice to add WikiProject banner templates to category talk pages? What about images (files)? I ask because many of the pages labeled with "Class=NA, Importance=Low" are either files or categories. (Most of the rest are probably redirects.)

If the class is NA, importance should also be NA, as I understand it. — Gorthian (talk) 17:45, 4 July 2014 (UTC)

Some projects have augmented tables of article statistics that have separate rows for classes like file and category (see, for example, Wikipedia:Version 1.0 Editorial Team/Physics articles by quality statistics). Probably the best approach is to add the banner with the explicit class; it shows up as NA in our table, but if we ever change to the augmented table the banners will be ready. And yes, the importance can be NA or just left empty, which has the same effect. RockMagnetist (talk) 00:20, 5 July 2014 (UTC)
I did notice that other projects had more possibilities for "class." I was all ready to take the banners off; now I'm glad I asked about it first. Though it means there are suddenly a whole lot more pages to add to the project! Sometimes I forget that Wikipedia is endless never finished. — Gorthian (talk) 10:22, 6 July 2014 (UTC)
There are also list, disambig as well as those redirects. I have been taking categories off redirects, as although they seem to work the user ends up on a page, not the one they selected. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 13:27, 6 July 2014 (UTC)
Good. I've been doing the same. Per WP:RCAT, redirects shouldn't have categories (other than their own special maintenance cats). — Gorthian (talk) 17:58, 6 July 2014 (UTC)

Shield volcano

Hey, can an expert take a look for me at Shield volcano and give me some to-do pointers in terms of what content is still needed (also, any good sources you know)? Much appreciated, ResMar 15:50, 27 June 2014 (UTC)

Hi Res, I think it might be worth checking this out as VolcanoGuy and I (plus additional support) spent a little while trying to work out what defined a shield volcano, and the current description looks (I only checked quickly) to exclude rare scutiform volcanic types (pyroclastic shields, and any non mafic lava shields). Perhaps I missed it - but if not then a definition and reliable source for that definition would be a good start. EdwardLane (talk) 11:05, 7 July 2014 (UTC)

Subscription to Mineralogical Magazine

Does someone have access to the Mineralogical Magazine articles? The current first source at Orbicular granite is Mineralogical Magazine; April 2006; v. 70; no. 2; p. 238-239: (Lahti, S. (Editor) Orbicular Rocks in Finland 2005, with contributions by P. Raivio and I. Laitakari. Espoo (Geological Survey of Finland) 2005. ISBN: 951-690-911-6. 177 pp.) http://minmag.geoscienceworld.org/cgi/content/extract/70/2/238?ck=nck, but it's behind a paywall. The source of the article in Finnish, Lahti, Seppo I.: Orbicular rocks in Finland, s. 11. Espoo: Geological Survey of Finland, 2005. ISBN 951-690-911-6. http://arkisto.gtk.fi/ej/ej47/ej_047.pdf sounds almost identical to the one at Mineralogical Magazine, even the ISBN. Only the page numbering differs, it's 181 in the PDF. I'd like to check if the source is one and the same, in that case the paywalled could be replaced with the free PDF. —Nelg (talk) 12:39, 11 July 2014 (UTC)

I have access to seemingly all the articles right around those pages, but not those themselves from Min Mag. Given that Min Mag has two pages on it, it might be a book review, whereas the other link you gave looks to be the whole entire book. Chris857 (talk) 01:11, 12 July 2014 (UTC)

Formation of delta-shaped river basin

This page is unsourced and a bit "fictional geology". --Bramfab (talk) 14:38, 15 July 2014 (UTC)

I have deleted it. Thanks for your help. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 08:21, 16 July 2014 (UTC)

"Unique" Upper Portlandian fossils

The Tisbury, Wiltshire article currently makes some claims about palaeoanthropological significance of the area, based on an assertion that certain Upper Portlandian fossils are "unique" to the area. I'm a bit concerned that some of the sources aren't as reliable as they should be, and that the statements in the article are WP:OR and/or WP:SYNTH, but I'd appreciate input from geologists, if anyone has a bit of time to have a look (the statements in question are the first 5 sentences of the 'History' section). Thanks. PaleCloudedWhite (talk) 05:18, 13 July 2014 (UTC)

@PaleCloudedWhite: I suggest you pose this question at Wikipedia:WikiProject Anthropology or one of their related projects. I'm not sure many of us in this project have the right background to intelligently answer your request. — Gorthian (talk) 02:34, 17 July 2014 (UTC)
Thanks for replying. I might try the anthropologists, although I still feel the nub of my question is geological: are the fossils referred to in the article unique to the Tisbury area? If they're not, the article's claims are false. (If they are unique, then the claims may be true, but it may be a case of WP:SYNTH anyway - I'm not sure because I can't access one of the sources. Maybe the anthropologists would enjoy pondering over that question). PaleCloudedWhite (talk) 05:56, 17 July 2014 (UTC)

National categories of geologists

I have been working through Category:Geologists by nationality, and have found that each nationality category is included in the category "Geology of" the nation involved.

As an example, Category:Danish geologists is included in Category:Geologists by nationality, Category:Danish scientists, and Category:Geology of Denmark. The first two categories are good supercategories, but I believe "Geology of Denmark" is out of place. Danish geologists do not necessarily study the geology of Denmark.

I think these categories are inappropriately used; I want to remove all these "Geology of" categories, but thought I'd ask for feedback here first. Any thoughts? — Gorthian (talk) 02:14, 17 July 2014 (UTC)

Interesting, but it does seem out of place, though when I write about a regional geology I will write about the famous geologists from there. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 02:48, 17 July 2014 (UTC)
I think that "Geology of country X" is not a defining characteristic of "Geologists from X" and should not be a supercat. RockMagnetist (talk) 03:42, 17 July 2014 (UTC)
I expect most of the people doing research on the geology of Denmark to be Danish geologists, and similarly for most other locations.
So I think there is enough of a weak connection that the category pages Category:Danish geologists and Category:Geology of Denmark should link to each other.
I agree that neither one should be a supercategory of the other.
I attempted to edit those two pages to make that happen -- feel free to revert if you think you have a better way. --DavidCary (talk) 19:16, 17 July 2014 (UTC)
I think your edits are fine, removing the connections from those two categories but creating links that can be followed by interested readers. A nice idea, thanks. — Gorthian (talk) 06:16, 18 July 2014 (UTC)

Highland continent

At WT:AST there is a query about this newly created article, Highland continent (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) -- 65.94.171.126 (talk) 06:41, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

what happens between ice ages?

The articles ice age, greenhouse and icehouse Earth, history of the Earth, etc. are currently vague on the time between ice ages.

I hope people interested in geology will be interested in helping us find reliable references that name the periods of time between ice ages -- preferably a proper name for each one of them that we know about -- analogous to the proper names "Cryogenian", "Karoo Ice Age", "Pleistocene glaciation", etc. -- or at least a general term for those ages -- analogous to the general term "ice age".

Thank you. --70.177.113.174 (talk) 19:23, 17 July 2014 (UTC)

Does the article Interglacial help with your query? — Gorthian (talk) 06:22, 18 July 2014 (UTC)
As far as I can tell, today's version of the Wikipedia article "interglacial" never says anything about the time between ice ages. Should it? Where can I find reliable references that name the times between ice ages? --70.177.113.174 (talk) 02:03, 20 July 2014 (UTC)
Timeline of glaciation would be a good starting point. Besides naming the various ice ages, it names and dates the intervals of time during the various stages of the Quaternary glacial cycle. So far as I am aware there are no names for the vast intervals of time (hundreds of millions of years plus) between the extended glacial periods that are known to have taken place during the Proterozoic (eg during Cryogenian), Palaeozoic (Permo-Carb and Siluro-Ordovician) and the Quaternary. cheers Geopersona (talk) 10:55, 26 July 2014 (UTC)

Empty lists

Are list articles like this really necessary? 130.88.141.34 (talk) 09:05, 29 July 2014 (UTC)

This is just one of a large number of lists with nothing in them and one-line articles on formations - all with no source besides a generic link to Fossilworks - that were created recently by @Abyssal . It appears that Abyssal has done a lot of good work on stratigraphy lists and articles, but I can't see the rationale for creating all these articles. Maybe Abyssal can explain. RockMagnetist (talk) 21:19, 29 July 2014 (UTC)
Plan is to use an automated process to expand them with more specific information on age, fossil content, location, etc. They won't be featured article candidates when I'm done, but they'll at least have have some meaningful information. Abyssal (talk) 21:35, 29 July 2014 (UTC)

Low islands, coral islands, and atolls

I see that between 17 and 19 months ago, there were others asking some of the same questions I am asking now, with little intermediary response. I wonder if the topics have rather fallen between the cracks among multiple projects, especially as these are all stub articles. In particular, even the lead sentence descriptions/definitions of these topics are contested on talk pages, demonstrating a real need for solid information based on reliable sources. I might suggest some merging of articles (if/where appropriate) and sharing of development across projects, as this might raise visibility of the issues and spots to improve. Finally, I am no specialist in any of the project areas concerned, yet I would like to have found some good basic information on these topics. While I appreciate that elementary topics can easily escape the notice of more specialized and knowledgeable editors, they necessarily form foundations upon which an encyclopedia is built, and where neglect can be seen as a real deficiency. Please consider reviewing their priority status within the projects in that light. I am sure that even some well-accepted college textbooks could provide some answers and support for the articles. Thank you. Evensteven (talk) 08:08, 10 August 2014 (UTC)

  • There is no WP:Deadline at Wikipedia.  There is no Quality Assurance department, and there are no managers prioritizing work.  What you see is what you get.  One of the bottom lines in a volunteer organization is the people willing to do the work.  Hope that helps.  Unscintillating (talk) 14:07, 10 August 2014 (UTC)
    • Yes, of course. But my comments needn't be taken as criticisms. Projects have priorities, listed as such on article talk pages, and they have active work lists, and they have editors who watch article and project pages. I'm just asking if someone would be willing to look this over. Especially at its current level, it doesn't take a high level of expertise to clear up some very fundamental things. And since the questions have been asked before, there is some interest. I'm renewing the awareness of that interest. And I'm supporting the general process of WP in drawing attention to a weak spot that could use some help. Would someone competent in this area be willing to get involved? Thanks. Evensteven (talk) 19:33, 10 August 2014 (UTC)

Geology of Iceland – any takers?

Geology of Iceland has been a measly stub ever since its creation in 2006. Expansion should be an easy task for any geology buff. --Florian Blaschke (talk) 07:32, 7 August 2014 (UTC)

Well I'm interested, but not sure I have enough time to put to it at the moment. On the plus side I do have a tectonic map of Iceland by Johannesson and Saemundsson from 2009 that I picked up while I was there a few years ago. Mikenorton (talk) 20:18, 10 August 2014 (UTC)

Wikipedia talk:Articles for creation/Caldasite

Dear geology experts: This abandoned AfC submission will soon be deleted as a stale draft. Is this a notable topic, and should the draft be kept and improved? Right now caldasite is a redirect to chvaleticeite baddeleyite, but that article doesn't mention this mineral. —Anne Delong (talk) 18:39, 7 August 2014 (UTC)

It should be a variety of baddeleyite. --Chris.urs-o (talk) 19:46, 7 August 2014 (UTC)
It's apparently not a variety of baddeleyite. It's not a mineral at all, being a mixture of zirconium-bearing minerals (often including baddeleyite), but an ore. I think the article should be rescued; all it needs is to have the references converted to inline citations, and it'd be good to go, Unfortunately, the only references I can access are those online, so it might be hard for me to check the ones already listed. I can give it a shot, though. Zirconium's an important material, and one ref I ran across says that caldasite is one of only three (or four) commercially mineable host rocks, so I think notability is a given. — Gorthian (talk) 22:48, 7 August 2014 (UTC)
I have postponed its deletion for six months. Inline citations are not required in a start-class article if it's not about a living person whose reputation may be damaged and if the information is not controversial. Still, perhaps someone here is familiar with at least some of the referenced articles and can vouch for their relevance. Please let me know if the article can be moved to mainspace. —Anne Delong (talk) 23:19, 7 August 2014 (UTC)
I have moved it to article space, as it does not appear to be a hoax. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 21:24, 11 August 2014 (UTC)

Partial magma

I've created this redirect to a math article, but I'm well aware that the term is far, far more common in geology. If someone can find an actual definition for partial magma in geology (I found many, many uses of the phrase but no luck with a def), then please add it to magma and change the redirect accordingly. JMP EAX (talk) 09:35, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

I just searched Google Scholar using "partial magma" [10], and found that many of the hits were for partial magma + mixing, differentiation, crystallization, melting and such. There is also an older meaning that has a few hits, which appears to be simply "part of an original magma", which is hardly notable I think. Mikenorton (talk) 22:31, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

Update needed: Stage

(1) The section Stage (stratigraphy)#International standardization is in need of a rewrite. It says in part: As of 2008, the ICS is nearly finished a task begun in 1974, subdividing the Phanerozoic eonothem into internationally accepted stages using two types of benchmark. and In many regions local subdivisions and classification criteria are still used along with the newer internationally coordinated uniform system, but once the research establishes a more complete international system, it is expected that local systems will be abandoned. I also find speculation without a citation to be inappropriate. --Bejnar (talk) 08:19, 27 August 2014 (UTC)

(2) The section Stage (stratigraphy)#Defining uses series rather than stages in its example: Thus, for example in the local North American subdivision, a paleontologist finding fragments of the trilobite Olenellus would identify the beds as being from the Waucoban Stage [Cambrian Series 2 ?] whereas fragments of a later trilobite such as Elrathia would identify the stage as Albertan [Cambrian Series 3 ?]. --Bejnar (talk) 08:19, 27 August 2014 (UTC)

Assessing interest in a page titled "Geological Slang"

Hello! I was looking through the requested pages, when I stumbled across this:

:FRGOK - "Geologists have a category of rock called FRGOK, pronounced fergock, meaning, Funny Rock, God Only Knows, which is used enough to occasionally make it into their scholarly journals. (Would that all scientists were so humble.)" Anne Herbert, The Next Whole Earth Catalog. Quoted at [11]; this is literally all I know about this; Ms. Herbert does not normally write hoaxes, fringe theories, or silly humor. -- Writtenonsand (talk) 15:02, 7 November 2009 (UTC)

I was wondering if there would be any significant interest in creating a page titled Geological Slang, and perhaps combining all of these stubs into one hopefully good quality article?

I am relatively new, and would appreciate any help that anyone would care to render. Thank you for taking the time to read this!

Icarosaurvus (talk) 23:00, 28 August 2014 (UTC)

I would be more than willing to help, and work on this, though I wished to see if others thought this a good idea, first, and also if anyone else would like to work on this, as well. Icarosaurvus (talk) 23:25, 28 August 2014 (UTC)

Are there any writings in journals and magazines on geological slang, rather than just using it? That will be our criteria as to whether we should have an article. Even April 1 stuff may be OK. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 01:53, 29 August 2014 (UTC)
It seems that we already have articles on particular items of geological slang, thought they seem to be stubs. My thought was that these stubs could be combined, rather than left as orphaned bits of knowledge in articles of mediocre quality. Icarosaurvus (talk) 02:24, 29 August 2014 (UTC)

Should stratigraphic units get their own categories?

I'm a contributor at Wikiproject:Paleontology and we have some issues with our categorization scheme. Take dinosaurs for example. In our dinosaur articles we tend to classify them by period and by continent. However, very few of the dinosaurs listed under either category would have lived anywhere near the same time and place as each other. Further, these overly broad categories often have hundreds of articles that are difficult to navigate. I recently proposed that we categorize prehistoric taxa by the stratigraphic units wherein they are found. That way prehistoric organisms can be arranged in moderately-sized categories including the contemporary life forms that they actually lived along side. Obviously this would be a significant change to Wikipedia's many articles on stratigraphic units themselves, so I thought it would be prudent to raise the issue here before any action is taken. Abyssal (talk) 15:53, 2 September 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)

Template trouble

The infobox created by {{Geological era}} is showing up broken on some articles—see Mesoproterozoic, for example. I don't see any edit to the template itself that might be responsible for the problem, and I'm too ignorant about the workings of templates to figure out where the trouble may lie. Someone with more knowldge about templates should look into this. Deor (talk) 11:25, 13 October 2014 (UTC)

Never mind. I figured out that someone had made edits to Template:Mesoproterozoic graphical timeline and Template:Paleoproterozoic graphical timeline that messed up the timelines. I reverted the edits for now, but someone may want to take a look to see what the editor was trying to do and whether those changes sould be implemented in a proper way. Deor (talk) 11:42, 13 October 2014 (UTC)

"Thalassoid"

FYI, there's a notice about Thalassoid at WT:AST -- 67.70.35.44 (talk) 02:32, 16 October 2014 (UTC)

Geological era query

How come all of our articles delineate the K-Pg boundary as being 66 million years ago when everything I've been taught for the past 20 years has been 65 million?—Ryūlóng (琉竜) 01:16, 17 October 2014 (UTC)

Seems to be based on Husson, D., Galbrun, B., Laskar, J., Hinnov, L. A., Thibault, N., Gardin, S., & Locklair, R. E. (2011). Astronomical calibration of the Maastrichtian (late Cretaceous). Earth and Planetary Science Letters, 305(3), 328-340. with a value of 66.23 Ma Graeme Bartlett (talk) 05:02, 17 October 2014 (UTC)
The accuracy of the dating has improved over time. RockMagnetist(talk) 05:14, 17 October 2014 (UTC)
Then how come there are still several sources that define the boundary at 65 mya (and by boundary I mean the meteorite event that resulted in the extinction)?—Ryūlóng (琉竜) 06:32, 17 October 2014 (UTC)
Because people are slow to catch up with the new timescale. I've just been trying to compare the ages of the Aptian break-up along the South Atlantic in published papers and found that almost no-one is using the newest timescale yet, so it's not just that boundary where workers stick with the numbers they're familiar with. It also takes time to write and publish papers of course. Mikenorton (talk) 06:54, 17 October 2014 (UTC)
Perhaps this should be a question of whether or not the 66 Ma figure is widely accepted or acknowledged as the new and correct boundary.—Ryūlóng (琉竜) 11:12, 17 October 2014 (UTC)
Once the International Commission on Stratigraphy has published an updated timescale (see here for the latest), the rest of the geological world pretty much follows it, although some changes, such as Tertiary to Cenozoic take longer to filter through. Just occasionally a change meets with sufficient resistance, such as the move to abolish the Quaternary period, that it gets changed back, but this is unlikely to happen to chronostratigraphic ages, as RockMagnetist says, accuracy improves with time. Mikenorton (talk) 18:17, 17 October 2014 (UTC)

Geological Society's 100 Great Geosites list

Following the publication of the Geological Society's 100 Great Geosites list (http://www.geolsoc.org.uk/100geosites), I've now added a list of the sites on that are currently missing Wikipedia articles to Wikipedia:Requested articles/Natural sciences/Environment and geology#Places -- The Anome (talk) 13:31, 13 October 2014 (UTC)

Thanks, in some cases it will probably just mean adding a short section to an existing article, or pair of articles, such as Crinkle Crags and Borrowdale Volcanic Group. Mikenorton (talk) 18:23, 17 October 2014 (UTC)

Extending assessment table

The assessment table for this project has over 1100 pages rated NA-class. Many of these are probably page types like redirect, category or project page that the default wikiproject banner doesn't classify. But some may be uncategorized articles. We could use a custom class mask to get an extended table like the one for WikiProject Physics. All in favor? RockMagnetist(talk) 01:15, 19 October 2014 (UTC)

yes lets have it, pretty harmless at worst, and good for gnomes at the best. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 06:56, 19 October 2014 (UTC)
You're right, it's hard to see why anyone would object. I am making the change. RockMagnetist(talk) 02:52, 20 October 2014 (UTC)

Viking Bergen Island → Viking-Bergen Island?

Should the article Viking Bergen Island be at Viking-Bergen Island (currently a redirect) or even Viking–Bergen Island or Viking/Bergen Island? "Viking Bergen Island" strikes me as orthographically incorrect, and even the article is internally inconsistent about the use of the hyphen. Unfortunately, few sources appear to use the term (with or without "island") at all, so I can't determine any preponderance of spellings. Which also raises the issue whether the term is even established or a Wikipedian neologism, more or less. --Florian Blaschke (talk) 19:10, 31 October 2014 (UTC)

The term is barely used at all and doesn't generally include island, other than as a description of what it is (as far as I can tell), so just Viking Bergen would seem most correct based on the limited sources, as they were apparently hills before they became an island, according to the maps in Coles' 2000 paper. Mikenorton (talk) 23:57, 31 October 2014 (UTC)
I just realised a stupid mistake of mine. Somehow I had assumed that Bergen refers to the Norwegian city here and for that reason suggested the dash or slash. But Viking Bergen really means "the Viking mountain/hill" or "Mount Viking" in Norwegian, right? Then, of course, Viking Bergen is indeed the most appropriate title. --Florian Blaschke (talk) 16:08, 1 November 2014 (UTC)
Not quite, the Viking and Bergen Banks are two separate but related shallow water areas in the North Sea e.g. here. Viking Bank gives its name to the marine forecast area 'Viking', just as the Dogger Bank gives its name to 'Dogger', so Bergen Bank would likely be named after the Norwegian city. File:North Sea map-en.png shows the location of Viking Bank, perhaps the Bergen Bank is the slightly smaller bank to the southwest of that. However, this all goes to show that it is a compound name, a shortening of Viking and Bergen, which is why it's sometimes hyphenated and sometimes with a slash. I hope that helps in understanding where the names come from, not sure it proves anything as far as the article title is concerned. Mikenorton (talk) 19:01, 1 November 2014 (UTC)
Ah, OK. Then I got it right initially after all, and I affirm my initial suggestion. Now the remaining question I have is whether to move the article to Viking–Bergen Island, Viking–Bergen island (probably not) or simply Viking–Bergen. --Florian Blaschke (talk) 20:55, 1 November 2014 (UTC)
A possibility would be to use Viking-Bergen Banks as the title, allowing the article to cover the full history, including their use as fishing grounds today. Mikenorton (talk) 22:15, 1 November 2014 (UTC)
That would clearly be the optimal solution, but unfortunately that would mean the content of the article (which is now focussed on the island) would have to be changed. I'm not up to a rewrite because oceanography is very far from my field of expertise. --Florian Blaschke (talk) 00:38, 2 November 2014 (UTC)
I've opened a discussion on the article talk page, proposing a page move to that title. Mikenorton (talk) 10:38, 2 November 2014 (UTC)

Peer review request for Coal ball

A user has requested input on Coal ball. Please see Wikipedia:Peer review/Coal ball/archive3. --Animalparty-- (talk) 20:46, 12 November 2014 (UTC)

Question

What is this? Continental arc and Continental arcs
Note: Education Program:Louisiana State University/GEOL 4066 Plate Tectonics (Fall 2014)
:/ --Chris.urs-o (talk) 16:14, 16 November 2014 (UTC)
It's an article and a soon-to-be-redirect. RockMagnetist(talk) 18:26, 16 November 2014 (UTC)

Moon-related images

FYI, several images on Commons have come up for discussion at WT:MOON concerning images of geological samples. -- 67.70.35.44 (talk) 21:14, 26 November 2014 (UTC)

Capitalization of divisions of geological time

The USGS guide here capitalizes all words in time divisions such as "Mesozoic Era", "Jurassic Period", "Late Jurassic Epoch" – a style I've always used in writing about fossil plants in Wikipedia. Recently there have been some editors keen on de-capitalizing, resulting in, e.g., "Mesozoic era", "Jurassic period", "late Devonian". Is there an agreed style for use in the English Wikipedia? Peter coxhead (talk) 10:04, 10 November 2014 (UTC)

I agree: part of a formal name. USGS and International Commission on Stratigraphy are good refs. --Chris.urs-o (talk) 17:53, 11 November 2014 (UTC)
The examples above are correct ("Mesozoic Era", etc.), but there are some exceptions to capitalization. To quote from a commentary taken from the Journal of Sedimentary Petrology: "All words in formal units are capitalized. Only the geographically derived name in informal units is generally capitalized." See Tables 2 and 3 for examples. RockMagnetist(talk) 18:35, 11 November 2014 (UTC)
Thanks for your responses. It would be really useful for non-geologists who need to use geological time divisions to have some style guide available within Wikipedia. Peter coxhead (talk) 19:38, 11 November 2014 (UTC)
The agreed style in wikipedia is as specified in MOS:CAPS: Wikipedia avoids unnecessary capitalization. Most capitalization is for proper names or for acronyms. Wikipedia relies on sources to determine what is a proper name; words and phrases that are consistently capitalized in sources are treated as proper names and capitalized in Wikipedia. Recently some specialist editors have been changing to capitalize according to the specialist guides like that of the ICS or USGS. See WP:SSF. I think we should follow our own MOS instead. Sources written for general audiences mostly do not capitalize these terms. See for example [12]. Dicklyon (talk) 04:38, 15 November 2014 (UTC)
I don't understand your argument, Dick. Isn't "Mesozoic Era" a proper noun? It refers to a unique time period (there are not two "Mesozoic Eras"). It's analogous to capitalizing the name of a historical period, like "High Middle Ages". —hike395 (talk) 06:25, 15 November 2014 (UTC)
There seem to be two different capitalization issues.
  1. Capitalizing the noun which determines the type of the time span (i.e. "Era", "Period", etc) in expressions like "Mesozoic Era" or "Jurassic Period". I don't think decapitalizing matters as much in such cases since the meaning is generally the same, although it does seem to me that grammatically and semantically "Mesozoic Era" is the same as "Bronze Age" or "Iron Age", so I can't see any grounds for decapitalizing the one and not the other.
  2. Capitalizing qualifiers (e.g. "Late Jurassic", "Middle Ordovician"). Here it matters considerably: the "Late Jurassic" is a specific internationally defined time period; "late Jurassic" often means "somewhere late in the Jurassic".
The problem with Google ngrams is that we should only be considering sources of an encyclopedic standard written for a general audience, i.e. sources that care about the precise and careful writing essential in an encyclopedia. Peter coxhead (talk) 17:46, 15 November 2014 (UTC)
Excellent comments, Peter. Thank you. Assuming that the USGS standards are largely consistent with other authorities, I would say there is a good case for capitalization. However, as Dick noted, there is WP:SSF, which basically says that WP:MOS rules, and there are editors for whom capitals are anathema, and who will de-capitalize every case not explicitly allowed by the MOS. There is an obvious solution: let's expand the MOS to cover geological terms. ~ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 20:07, 16 November 2014 (UTC)
That sounds like a good plan. A quick scan through various British Geological Survey publications in my possession shows the strong preference of this UK body for capitals, certainly in material published in recent decades. Go back to the 1960's and you'll find 'era' and 'period' rather than 'Era' and 'Period' following the specific names. I guess we're looking at similar treatment of 'Stage', 'System', 'Series' too. cheers Geopersona (talk) 19:03, 17 November 2014 (UTC)
Some useful guides to the usage of stratigraphic nomenclature are:
Owen, D. L., 2009, How to use stratigraphic terminology in papers, illustrations, and talks. Stratigraphy, vol. 6, no. 2, pp. 106-116.
Owen, D. L., 1987, Commentary: usage of stratigraphic terminology in papers, illustrations, and talks. Journal of Sedimentary petrology, vol. 57, no. 2, pp. 363-372.
"North America Stratigraphic Code" Paul H. (talk) 18:52, 2 December 2014 (UTC)
I think it is simple enough to harmonize the specialist style guides with the MOS. In the phrase quoted by @Dicklyon, the key phrase is "proper names". If a term like "Late Jurassic" refers to an internationally defined time period, a unique entity, it is a proper name. SSF (which is an essay, not a guideline or policy) argues that specialists are not authorities on style. True, but they are authorities on the difference between "Late Jurassic" (proper name) and "late Jurassic" (an approximate time frame). RockMagnetist(talk) 20:50, 2 December 2014 (UTC)
The specialist guides, such as the those linked above, that suggest capitalizing "formal" terms are not suggesting that these are proper names. And I am told that the MOS:CAPS phrase about "proper names" is also not very sensibly based, since a lot of what get capitalized are not names at all. In any case, the question becomes how should WP's general style principle of avoiding unnecessary capitalization be applied in these cases. Does the existence of specialized recommendations to capitalize mean that we interpret caps as "necessary" in such cases? In some broad discussions (e.g. birds) we have decided not. In others (e.g. comets) we still do, even though things like "Halley's comet" are commonly not capitalized in non-specialist sources. I don't know the answer, but I favor avoiding caps when they're not really necessary. Dicklyon (talk) 23:09, 2 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)

K-Pg boundary

Cretaceous-Paleogene boundary controversy
Deccan Traps: Gerta Keller, Vincent Courtillot, Blair Schoene and others
vs.
Chicxulub impact: Luis Walter Alvarez, Paul R. Renne and others
A secondary literature with an overview is needed
Summary
Husson, D., Galbrun, B., Laskar, J., Hinnov, L. A., Thibault, N., Gardin, S., & Locklair, R. E. (2011). "Astronomical calibration of the Maastrichtian (late Cretaceous)". Earth and Planetary Science Letters. 305 (3): 328–340. Bibcode:2011E&PSL.305..328H. doi:10.1016/j.epsl.2011.03.008.{{cite journal}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link) Note: K-Pg boundary with a value of 66.23 Ma
US-geologist Paul Renne, Berkeley Geochronology Center: Chicxulub impact (c. 66.038 Ma)
Blair Schoene, Kyle M. Samperton, Michael P. Eddy, Gerta Keller, Thierry Adatte, Samuel A. Bowring, Syed F. R. Khadri & Brian Gertsch (2014). "U-Pb geochronology of the Deccan Traps and relation to the end-Cretaceous mass extinction". Revue Science.{{cite journal}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  • Deccan Traps: the main phase of eruptions initiated c. 250,000 years before of the K-Pg boundary
  • Deccan Traps: more than 1.1 million km3 of basalt erupted in 753,000 ±38,000 years
  • C29r/C29n magnetic reversal is at c. 65.552 Ma
Chicxulub impact ocurred after the K-Pg boundary
The Deccan Traps and the Chicxulub impact killed the nonavian dinosaurs and the ammonoids --Chris.urs-o (talk) 15:37, 16 December 2014 (UTC)
Why are you posting this here instead of at talk:Cretaceous–Paleogene extinction event? RockMagnetist(talk) 16:42, 16 December 2014 (UTC)
Done. I thought that ppl would like to know (Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Geology/Archive 4#Geological era query). --Chris.urs-o (talk) 20:30, 16 December 2014 (UTC)

Templates

Several geological feature templates are up for discussion at Wikipedia:Templates_for_discussion/Log/2014_December_21 -- 67.70.35.44 (talk) 05:15, 22 December 2014 (UTC)

Paulins Kill will be at Featured article review

I intend to nominate Paulins Kill for a FAR. I've opened up a discussion here. « Ryūkotsusei » 21:53, 31 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 Wikipedia:WikiProject X/Newsletter. Otherwise, this will be the last notification sent about WikiProject X.

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

AfC request

Could someone please give the page at User:Inezzzzz/sandbox a look over? I've asked at two other wikiprojects as well, but I can't even begin to understand what is happening at this article. --TKK! bark with me! 23:47, 15 January 2015 (UTC)

Requested articles Helen Niña Tappan Loeblich

I started the article on Helen Niña Tappan Loeblich one of the world's leading micropaleontologists. There is a lot of biographical information about her and her work available online if other editors want to jump in and make it a much better article. MicroPaLeo (talk) 19:06, 18 January 2015 (UTC)

Request for help

Hello. Since September, I have been editing the article on Sleaford, a town in Lincolnshire in England. I have recently put it up for Peer Review and one of issues raised is that it could do with a description of the town's/area's geology. However, I know very little about geology and I am unsure even where to start or what sources to use. I do intend to nominate the article for GA (as it seems to be complete enough in every other aspect), and so any assistance or advice on this matter would be greatly appreciated. Many thanks, —Noswall59 (talk) 19:23, 31 January 2015 (UTC).

The overall geology of the Sleaford area is simple enough to describe, a sequence of easterly dipping Jurassic strata, which can be seen from the British Geological Survey's mapviewer (just zoom in to the Sleaford area). There is a source [13] which explains about the Lincolnshire limestone, the main aquifer used for groundwater extraction in the Sleaford area, and another [14], which looks at mineral resources in Lincolnshire, describing a little about the sands and gravels around Sleaford. This report (pages 11-5 & 11-6), looking at a road scheme near Sleaford, suggests that there is little remarkable about the local geology. Mikenorton (talk) 11:50, 1 February 2015 (UTC)
Hi, I will take a look at those soures - they seem like they are going to be very helpful. Thank you, —Noswall59 (talk) 12:13, 1 February 2015 (UTC).

Article at AfD

The newly created article High Pressure Iron Phases is being considered for deletion here. On balance I think that it's worth keeping and developing, but other views would be good. Mikenorton (talk) 21:24, 5 February 2015 (UTC)

RfC: Precipitationshed

Request for comment on whether or not this is a neologism or misspelling. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Precipitationshed ηoian ‡orever ηew ‡rontiers 12:27, 7 February 2015 (UTC)

Requesting eyes on Matthias Kuhle (Tibet glaciation hypothesis)

Last month there was a thread at NPOVN concerning Matthias Kuhle and related articles. (See thread here). Several SPAs seem to be interested in promoting Kuhle's work, and from what I can tell it looks like they're editing articles to state his ideas more matter-of-factly than perhaps they should. One of the SPAs added a number of sources, I tagged the article, and frankly haven't looked back since. Now another SPA is edit warring over removing the tags without improvements in the meantime. I can deal with edit warring well enough, but this article could really use some more knowledgeable editors taking a closer look. I'm not feeling well equipped to assess WP:WEIGHT on this subject, for example. For that reason I'm cross-posting this as WikiProjects Geography, Geology, and Glaciers (to members of more than one of the three: sorry for the spam). --— Rhododendrites talk \\ 16:12, 18 February 2015 (UTC)

Craters

Note, there's a question about crater articles at WTSOLAR -- 70.51.200.101 (talk) 03:24, 6 March 2015 (UTC)

Proposal to add age of lake parameter to Template:Infobox body of water

Hi, could someone take a look at this request to add a {{{lake_age}}} parameter to {{Infobox body of water}}? Would this be a good idea? Alakzi (talk) 18:38, 31 March 2015 (UTC)

Geology of the Capitol Reef area FAR

I have nominated Geology of the Capitol Reef area for a featured article review here. Please join the discussion on whether this article meets featured article criteria. Articles are typically reviewed for two weeks. If substantial concerns are not addressed during the review period, the article will be moved to the Featured Article Removal Candidates list for a further period, where editors may declare "Keep" or "Delist" the article's featured status. The instructions for the review process are here. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 22:00, 14 April 2015 (UTC)

Removal of content in several meteor articles

Hi, this is not purely a geology issue, but the related portals I found are completely inactive. See those edits - I don't know enough about the topics to tell how useful they are, but it is a lot of content that gets removed. Maybe someone can have a look? --mfb (talk) 18:10, 21 April 2015 (UTC)

Looks like vigilant editing to me: enforcing high standards of WP:V and WP:RS. Have you spoken to Geogene on his talk page? Any editor can ask another to explain what they're doing. —hike395 (talk) 02:47, 22 April 2015 (UTC)

Terminology

There is a discussion at Wikipedia:Redirects_for_discussion/Log/2015_April_26 on the redirect Late Quaternary --> Quaternary, with the deletion proposer pointing out that the article doesn't in fact mention "Late Quaternary" at all. Clearly, late Quaternary is part of Quaternary, so there's nothing intrinsically wrong with the redirect, but my question is whether there is a recognised geological period known as "Late Quaternary" that should be linked as a single term like this, or would the linking articles be better to link as "late Quaternary". Colonies Chris (talk) 08:26, 26 April 2015 (UTC)

Peer review for Phanerozoic

The article Phanerozoic, which is rated as high importance to this project, has been put up for a peer review. Please comment at Wikipedia:Peer review/Phanerozoic/archive1. - Ugog Nizdast (talk) 09:48, 15 May 2015 (UTC)

Opinions?

I'm having some trouble with "stone laterite Borneo" -- the original author seems to have had some difficulties with English. Is there anything here that distinguishes this from just ordinary laterite ? Is this really a valid article? Thanks in advance. DS (talk) 12:52, 21 May 2015 (UTC)

Tough one. The author has clearly put in quite a bit of effort, but I'd say "Stone laterite Borneo" as not notable as it stands. Presumably the intent is "Stone Laterites of Borneo". Even so, I don't see much in here that distinguishes from the main laterite article. I'd support a merge, but being careful to actually preserve as much of the content of this article as possible. Plus a redirect. DanHobley (talk) 17:11, 21 May 2015 (UTC)
I don't suppose you'd be willing to handle that yourself? DS (talk) 18:19, 21 May 2015 (UTC)

Pluto-Charon system

We are having a discussion at WT:AST about the newfound geology of Pluto and Charon. -- 67.70.32.190 (talk) 05:14, 17 July 2015 (UTC)

Titanian karsts

According to [15] we've discovered karst on Titan. So, would that be a section or a new article? -- 70.51.203.69 (talk) 07:38, 21 June 2015 (UTC)

You could start up the geology of Titan page, perhaps as a Draft:Geology of Titan. In itself this idea would not yet have enough detail to make an article. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 06:22, 17 July 2015 (UTC)

Knowledgeable eyes needed

Please see this AN/I report. BMK (talk) 07:01, 18 July 2015 (UTC)

List of geological features on Pluto

Does this geology list fall under WPGEOLOGY? -- 67.70.32.190 (talk) 05:16, 25 July 2015 (UTC)

yes. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 08:45, 25 July 2015 (UTC)
I have restored the project banner based on this response -- 67.70.32.190 (talk) 08:19, 26 July 2015 (UTC)

Template for discussion

Template:Geology2 has been nominated for deletion. You are invited to comment on the discussion at the template's entry on the Templates for discussion page. RockMagnetist(talk) 23:50, 2 September 2015 (UTC)

Need to upgrade importance of Coastal erosion in southeast Louisiana article

For the life of me, I cannot understand why low importance is being placed on the Coastal erosion in Southeast Louisiana article, as indicated in the template, when so much is at stake for the survival of my region. Sorry folks, but that that is unacceptable. How would you feel if your state lost the equivalent of 30 football fields of land a day? I'm sure that if it happened to any other state, it would get a higher level of importance. The Louisiana wetlands serve as a critical barrier against storm surges during hurricanes and tie into the ecosystem of the whole nation. Keep in mind that New Orleans sits at a crucial strategic point the mouth of the largest river of commerce in the world and has a tri-axial port: 1) sea port 2) North-South river port, and 3) an east-west port, the Intercostal waterway, which runs East and West. What do you think Jefferson had in mind when he bought Louisiana? In his writings he said that the primary reason was to gain access to the port of New Orleans. But, our region is threated and needs more than this kind of lackluster response. Upgrade the article's importance please! Garagepunk66 (talk) 01:30, 7 September 2015 (UTC)

The importance is on the talk page, and does not say that the problem described in the article is of low importance. What it means is that someone thought that the page was of low importance to this project. If you find that there are thousands of page views per day, than that may justify boosting that value. 03:08, 7 September 2015 (UTC)Garagepunk66 (talk) 15:29, 7 September 2015 (UTC)
@Garagepunk66: in your description of the importance of this article, you mention ecology, weather, infrastructure and history, but I don't see a single word related to geology. This article is at best marginally relevant to our project, hence the importance rating. However, you have done a fine job with the article. If you were to tighten the prose a bit and add more links, I'd be happy to nominate it for a DYK. RockMagnetist(talk) 15:23, 7 September 2015 (UTC)
I'd be happy to do that. I just want to make sure that attention is drawn to this issue that relates to the survival of the region I call home, but our land is rapidly vanishing due to man-made causes. Garagepunk66 (talk) 15:28, 7 September 2015 (UTC)
A DYK would help, but we're just an encyclopedia. RockMagnetist(talk) 16:30, 7 September 2015 (UTC)

Geology of Pendle Hill

Is anyone available to offer guidance in this geology related discussion? Talk:Pendle Hill#Pendleian Thanks. Trappedinburnley (talk) 16:50, 15 September 2015 (UTC)

Need comments

Any comments on Talk:Monadnock#Requested_move_12_September_2015 are welcome. -Lappspira (talk) 17:22, 15 September 2015 (UTC)

Scientific Committee on Antarctic Research 2016 Malaysia conference

Hello all,

I have just found out that the SCAR 2016 conference is looking to host an edit-a-thon to improve the coverage of prominent female Antarctic researchers. For any members of this wikiproject that are thinking of attending, please let me know if you would be interested in helping out by leaving a message on my talk page. Similarly, feel free to let me know if you've any suggestions of people to cover! T.Shafee(Evo﹠Evo)talk 11:33, 24 September 2015 (UTC)

Split proposal for Erosion -> Erosion/Soil Erosion

Hi all - someone has flagged Erosion for a split. A quick scan tells me this looks like a solid idea, but more opinions needed. DanHobley (talk) 05:51, 5 October 2015 (UTC)

This one should be monitored closely. Erosion is a level-3 vital article with 1.4 million views per year. RockMagnetist(talk) 22:54, 5 October 2015 (UTC)

Graphical Timelines e.g Template:Cenozoic graphical timeline

I noticed that not all graphical timelines don't have a same format. For example Template:Cenozoic graphical timeline is different then all other era graphical timelines , because it is the only era graphical timelines showing epochs. It is a problem to include epochs because the Proterozoic does not have epochs. The Carboniferous timeline shows epochs but most Phanerozoic period templates don't. The Silurian timeline is missing stages/ages. The Ordovician and Cambrian timelines contain an extra section for something else even though they belong somewhere else. 24.218.110.195 (talk) 16:50 17 April 2013 (UTC) 12:50pm 4/17/2013 EDT.

Here is the bar section format.

period10-color-

period10-width-


period11-color-

period11-width-

The period section format.

period10-color-

period11-color-


period10-width-

period11-width-

24.218.110.195 (talk) 18:50 17 April 2013 (UTC) 2:50pm 4/17/2013 EDT.

Here is the assessment on the tables as of Quarter 4 of 2013. 24.218.110.195 (talk) 03:38 05 May 2013 (UTC) 10:38pm 5/04/2013 EDT.

Legend
No
Partly (Not for Era table)
Yes
Page is not existing/Does not need
Not in the Phanerozoic
Page is protected
Era templates ✓
Name No Epochs Not show events Use period section format for periods e.g Quaternary
Template:Cenozoic graphical timeline Yes Yes Yes
Template:Mesozoic graphical timeline Yes Yes Yes
Template:Paleozoic graphical timeline Yes Yes Yes
Template:Neoproterozoic graphical timeline Yes Yes Yes
Template:Mesoproterozoic graphical timeline Yes Yes Yes
Template:Paleoproterozoic graphical timeline Yes Yes Yes
Period templates ✓
Template name Show epochs Show ages Use Template:Period color for all 100% Not using epoch colors. Use Stage colors Use bar section format for stages e.g Kimmeridgian
Template:Quaternary graphical timeline Needs to be created
Template:Neogene graphical timeline Yes Yes Yes Yes
Template:Paleogene graphical timeline Yes Yes Yes Yes
Template:Cretaceous graphical timeline Yes Yes Yes Yes
Template:Jurassic graphical timeline Yes Yes Yes Yes
Template:Triassic graphical timeline Yes Yes Yes Yes
Template:Permian graphical timeline Yes Yes Yes Yes
Template:Carboniferous graphical timeline Yes Yes Yes Yes
Template:Devonian graphical timeline Permanent Protection. Can only be edited by admins due to vandalism. Lock color is red on page. IPs and registered users may file a request on talk page.
Template:Silurian graphical timeline Yes Yes Yes Yes
Template:Ordovician graphical timeline Yes Yes Yes Yes
Template:Cambrian graphical timeline Yes Yes Yes Yes
Template:Ediacaran graphical timeline Part of the Proterozoic
Template:Cryogenian graphical timeline Part of the Proterozoic
Other graphical timelines ✓
Template name Show Epochs Show ages Use Template:Period color for all 100% Not using epoch colors. Use Stage colors Use bar section format for stages e.g Kimmeridgian
Template:Canidae graphical timeline Does not require epoch ages requirements Yes Does not require this requirement
Template:Aetosaur biochronology timeline Yes Yes Yes Yes
Template:Permian–Triassic extinction event graphical timeline Yes Yes Yes Yes
Template:Fish graphical timeline Yes Yes Yes Yes
Template:Windermere Supergroup graphical timeline Yes Yes Yes Yes
Template:Timeline of plant evolution graphical timeline Yes Yes Yes Yes
Template:Cambrian explosion graphical timeline Yes Yes Yes Yes
Template:Early Echinoderms graphical timeline Part of it inside Proterozoic
Template:Ediacaran biota timeline Most part inside Proterozoic

This section can't be archived until all of the templates reach all green. 24.218.110.195 (talk) 21:05 30 April 2013 (UTC) 5:05pm 4/30/2013 EDT.

Feel free to archive this now! All of the templates reached green. 24.218.110.195 (talk) 1:23 2 September 2013 (UTC) 9:23pm 9/01/2013 EDT.


GA article - notability

I have taken the unusual step of tagging a GA-class article for notability. See Talk:Kirtlandian#Notability.


Wikidata lists

Wikidata now has the possibility to automatically create really practical lists, that are automatically updated as soon as new information is entered on Wikidata. It would be a great oppertunity to reduce the maintainance is certain areas of Wikipedia.

I created a list of sedimentary lithostratigraphic units for a lot of countries. For some countries we have poor data coverage and additional information is missing. Other countries could probably be fixed up in a day and could be used on Wikipedia then.

Here is the link to all the lists: d:Wikidata:WikiProject Geology/Lists of sedimentary units by country --Tobias1984 (talk) 12:05, 11 October 2015 (UTC)

AfC submission

See Draft:Geophysical signal analysis. Best, FoCuS contribs; talk to me! 14:14, 11 November 2015 (UTC)

Which articles should have a geological time navbox?

User:Look2See1 has been adding the {{Geological history}} navigation box to many articles, including Hawaiian volcanoes (such as Hualālai), and articles on various extinct taxa (such as Parendotherium). This has been controversial (see User talk:Look2See1#Geologic time templates).

I'd like to get community consensus -- what sort of articles should use this navbox? What do editors think?

Pinging involved/experienced editors: @Look2See1: @Abyssal: @Kevmin: @Vsmith:

—hike395 (talk) 13:42, 30 September 2015 (UTC)

Seems there has been massive overuse of the template. The addition to categories such as Category:Neogene Cuba (where it is at the top) is rather absurd. The addition to formation substubs such as Peters Hill Limestone adds nothing except distracting color to a woefully inadequate stub. Rather than adding such a template, a much more productive use of editing talent would be to actually improve and add actual references to such stubs (which appear to have been created by a bot). But its much easier to add distracting templates rather than actually improving an article. Sorry, I'm in a rather grumpy mood this morning :) Vsmith (talk) 14:17, 30 September 2015 (UTC)
I dont see the point of adding the template to extinct taxa articles that should have a mini timeline with age in the taxobox already. As an example, it wold make no sense to me to add the template to Yantaromyrmex, given that ages are already linked in the taxobox, the lead, AND the distribution sections. The template was added to Parendotherium which, though a stub, already has the age linked twice and referenced three times.--Kevmin § 14:43, 30 September 2015 (UTC)
I agree that including the geologic time scale template on articles not about units of geologic time is excessive. Abyssal (talk) 17:13, 30 September 2015 (UTC)
I don't think this template should even exist. Consider this quote from Wikipedia:Navigation templates:

The goal is not to cram as many related articles as possible into one space. Ask yourself, does this help the reader in reading up on related topics? Take any two articles in the template. Would a reader really want to go from A to B?

If someone is looking at Zanclean (5.3 - 3.6 Mya), will they suddenly have the urge to go to Rhyacian (2300 - 2050 Mya)? Or even Danian (61.6-66.0 Mya)? Zanclean already has two much more sensible navboxes: {{Neogene graphical timeline}} and {{Neogene Footer}} (it probably doesn't need both). Going up the scale, Neogene has the same two navboxes and also shares {{Phanerozoic eon}} with Cenozoic. Cenozoic also has {{Cenozoic graphical timeline}}; in principle, this could also be shared with Neogene. And Phanerozoic has {{Eons graphical timeline}}. I don't think there is any article where this template would be useful - not even the main article, Geologic time scale, where there already are tables of time divisions. RockMagnetist(talk) 17:29, 30 September 2015 (UTC)
Summary (as of 1 October)

OK, it seems that the use of this template is quite disfavored in general. Boiling down the choices, we can either:

  1. Go to WP:TfD and propose deletion of the template (per RockMagnetist), or
  2. Put a guideline the template documentation that it should be used on geologic time articles, only. (per Abyssal)

Which path should we take? —hike395 (talk) 11:01, 1 October 2015 (UTC)

My choice would be option one, since its redundant to a number of different templates and has no real use.--Kevmin § 15:46, 1 October 2015 (UTC)
I agree; option 1. DanHobley (talk) 16:32, 1 October 2015 (UTC)
Sounds like there is a consensus for deletion. @RockMagnetist: you eloquently outlined a case for deletion. Would you make the same argument over at WP:TfD? @Look2See1:, @Vsmith:, @Abyssal: what do you think of deletion? —hike395 (talk) 06:18, 3 October 2015 (UTC)
I'd be happy to. I'll give the others a little more time to respond, though. RockMagnetist(talk) 06:22, 3 October 2015 (UTC)
I call for the template to be deleted. Volcanoguy 09:06, 3 October 2015 (UTC)
As it stands, I oppose deletion. I think the template is fine, just over-used. Abyssal (talk) 10:20, 3 October 2015 (UTC)
We need a clear criterion for over-use. Would you support removing it from any article that it doesn't link to? RockMagnetist(talk) 15:38, 3 October 2015 (UTC)
Basically, or at least geologic time-scale related articles generally. Certainly not random units or in the category namespace. Abyssal (talk) 00:53, 4 October 2015 (UTC)
@Abyssal: What articles would benefit from it though, all of the articles that are on geologic ages have the larger template in the infobox, all the taxa articles should have the mini timeline in the taxobox, and geologic formations/mountains/etc should also have it in the infobox.--Kevmin § 15:44, 3 October 2015 (UTC)
I think it's appropriate in articles about units of geologic time. Abyssal (talk) 00:53, 4 October 2015 (UTC)

O.k., I think we have consensus for removing the template from pages that are not about time units. We can start with that while we think about the rest. RockMagnetist(talk) 01:00, 4 October 2015 (UTC)

I'm working through the articles. This editor even added the time templates to a category! RockMagnetist(talk) 01:22, 4 October 2015 (UTC)

While we're at it, I would say that the same should go for templates such as {{Phanerozoic eon nav}} (e.g., in Burgess shale, where the infobox at the top already has a time scale). This same editor has been adding it to a lot of articles. RockMagnetist(talk) 01:03, 4 October 2015 (UTC)

I think that deserves a separate discussion -- let's hold off on removing those. —hike395 (talk) 07:25, 4 October 2015 (UTC)
I agree in general, but I don't think there is any need to discuss removing article navboxes from category pages. RockMagnetist(talk) 21:13, 4 October 2015 (UTC)

This user has been adding article navboxes to a host of categories - over 750 of them - as well as some redundant information. I could use some help cleaning this up.RockMagnetist(talk) 02:36, 4 October 2015 (UTC)

I just used WP:AWB to remove ~400 instances of the template from articles, mostly rock formations and extinct taxa. There's about 1000 left to do (including categories). I'm doing it in batches, so it's less tiring for me and we can check for any further community response to the removal. —hike395 (talk) 07:25, 4 October 2015 (UTC)
Thanks for doing that - a much more sensible approach than doing it by hand! RockMagnetist(talk) 21:13, 4 October 2015 (UTC)
No problem. I'm done: there are only ~200 transclusions for the template left, all geological time spans (I left the template in about 10-20 categories about geological time spans, just to be conservative). I also updated the documentation for {{Geological history}} to reflect our consensus on limiting this template usage. Feel free to edit, if you think I didn't capture the consensus correctly.
I would suggest any further discussion on deleting the template take place at WP:TfD, to get wide community involvement. —hike395 (talk) 04:16, 5 October 2015 (UTC)

Navboxes in categories

In all the documentation on navboxes, they are presented as aids to navigation between articles (my emphasis) and alternatives to categories. I can't find any guideline saying they shouldn't be added to category pages, but it doesn't make much sense. I have never seen this done before; it seems to be the idea of one editor. Should we remove the Geology navboxes from all category pages? RockMagnetist(talk) 21:56, 5 October 2015 (UTC)

I think that the relevant guideline is WP:BIDIRECTIONAL:
Every article that transcludes a given navbox should normally also be included as a link in the navbox so that the navigation is bidirectional.
Navboxes are for navigating between a group of related articles. If the category is not in that group, it should (generally) not have that navbox. I'm not proposing adding the categories to each navbox, because a category cannot be an article in a group, nor can it have a See Also section.
However, as an exception, I have seen between-category navboxes, e.g., {{Years in century}} used in Category:20th century. {{Phanerozoic eon nav}} looks like it was designed to be a navbox between categories, but it could be improved for that specific task. —hike395 (talk) 10:57, 6 October 2015 (UTC)
Thanks for finding WP:BIDIRECTIONAL; some of the guidelines seemed to imply it, but I wasn't able to find an explicit statement. I don't think {{Phanerozoic eon nav}} was intended for navigation between categories; it links to articles while {{Years in century}} links to categories and is in Category:Category namespace templates. @Abyssal: You created it, what was your intention? RockMagnetist(talk) 14:54, 6 October 2015 (UTC)
I made the Phanerozoic eon nav for categories. Abyssal (talk) 14:56, 6 October 2015 (UTC)
Right, it does link categories. It seems I managed to persuade myself I'd checked without actually checking. Time for another coffee! So this nav should not be transcluded on article pages. RockMagnetist(talk) 15:48, 6 October 2015 (UTC)
If that's the consensus, I can certainly remove {{Phanerozoic eon nav}} from articles using AWB. What do other editors think? (@Look2See1: ?) —hike395 (talk) 05:22, 10 October 2015 (UTC)

@Hike395: Apparently there are no objections. I'd do it myself, but installing AWB on my Mac has proved to be very difficult. RockMagnetist(talk) 22:10, 7 November 2015 (UTC)

@RockMagnetist: I tend to be conservative about using AWB. Are there any other editors other than myself and RockMagnetist who would support mass removal of {{Phanerozoic eon nav}} from article space? Abyssal? Bueller? Anyone? —hike395 (talk) 01:27, 8 November 2015 (UTC)
I support the removal from article space totally and category space where its not directly relevant.--Kevmin § 02:14, 8 November 2015 (UTC)
Phanerozoic eon nav was the actually useful template. "{{Geological history|p|m}}" was the most widely used irrelevant one. Abyssal (talk) 02:26, 8 November 2015 (UTC)
@Abyssal: I'm not sure what that answer implies for the question Hike395 asked. RockMagnetist(talk) 02:28, 8 November 2015 (UTC)
Oops. Misread it. Yeah, that template only belongs in categories and should be removed elsewhere. Abyssal (talk) 03:09, 8 November 2015 (UTC)
 Done All instances of {{Phanerozoic eon nav}} have been removed from article space: the template is now only used for category navigation. —hike395 (talk) 05:23, 8 November 2015 (UTC)
Thanks, Hike395. RockMagnetist(talk) 06:20, 8 November 2015 (UTC)

Sent to TfD

Back to the original topic: As all but one respondent here supports deletion of {{Geological history}}, I have nominated it at Wikipedia:Templates for discussion/Log/2015 November 12. RockMagnetist(talk) 07:08, 12 November 2015 (UTC)

Help with an AfC draft?

I'm going to cut/paste this to three boards, so it'll be the same on each. Long story short, there's an article at AfC entitled Draft:Geophysical signal analysis. It was previously declined as reading like a report/essay, so it could use some help from someone familiar with the topic. It looks like it should be a notable topic, so I just want someone experienced with the topic to ensure that everything is in order (since I am not familiar with this at all). Tokyogirl79 (｡◕‿◕｡) 09:45, 14 November 2015 (UTC)

Looks like quite a good chunk of information in there, but it does have a lot of bits that sound like an essay. Encyclopedia's tend to tell you stuff rather than lead you through the though process of getting there. I'm going to carry on on your talk page otherwise this will get very big. EdwardLane (talk) 08:35, 15 November 2015 (UTC)

More time unit templates

{{Geological period}} allows users to provide information on periods such as mean atmospheric oxygen and carbon dioxide content, mean surface temperature, and sea level. To see how well this works, check out Cambrian, where the table uses links to Wikipedia files as citations. After looking at those images, particularly File:Sauerstoffgehalt-1000mj.svg, it's hard to see what use an average would be. Is there more appropriate information that could be put in these tables, or are they just a waste of space? RockMagnetist(talk) 18:09, 16 November 2015 (UTC)

Borneo

I just found an orphan Kutai basin which has a good section on the Geology of Borneo - but it could do with some references, and all the sites I hit for sediment thickness or similar seem to be pay walled. I presume some people here already have access to some of these so might be able to supply references? EdwardLane (talk) 06:45, 16 November 2015 (UTC)

I've added full access urls for most of the existing refs and I have access to the others. From Chambers et al. 2004 [16] "Rose and Hartono (1978) proposed a sediment thickness of more than 13 km in the Mahakam Delta depocenter, whereas Duval et al. (1992) proposed a maximum thickness of 12 km. Regional gravity modeling (Chambers and Daley, 1995) suggests that 15 km may be a more likely maximum figure for sediment thickness in parts of the basin". Mikenorton (talk) 18:59, 16 November 2015 (UTC)
Thanks Mike EdwardLane (talk) 21:29, 16 November 2015 (UTC)

Geologic Ages Inline

The template {{Geologic Ages Inline}} is potentially useful for keeping stratigraphic dates up to date, but it has a serious problem: It gives the start of each time unit, not the range. This works for List of Global Boundary Stratotype Sections and Points, but leads to absurdities in articles like Phanerozoic where the lead says "It covers 541.0 ± 1.0 million years". This needs to be fixed right away! Given the name of the template, I'm thinking that it should provide ranges; and if someone wants to do boundaries, there should be a template like {{Geological boundaries inline}}. RockMagnetist(talk) 17:34, 16 November 2015 (UTC)

Actually, more intuitive templates, {{Period start}} and {{Period end}}, exist, so this template is redundant. I'm going to start replacing it.RockMagnetist(talk) 17:39, 16 November 2015 (UTC)

The only thing that might be worth saving/transferring is the |Reference= field. RockMagnetist(talk) 17:54, 16 November 2015 (UTC)

It has occurred to me that the lead in Phanerozoic can be interpreted in a different way, and my confusion is due to the wording, not the template. My other point stands, though - {{Geologic Ages Inline}} is redundant to a better designed template. I am going to list it at TfD. RockMagnetist(talk) 17:12, 17 November 2015 (UTC)

AfC submission

Possibly passes WP:PROF, but just to make sure have a look at Draft:Walter Heywood Bryan. Best, FoCuS contribs; talk to me! 18:14, 19 November 2015 (UTC)

Draft:Ragnar Stefánsson

Dear geology experts: Here's a draft article about a seismologist. Is this a notable subject? —Anne Delong (talk) 09:59, 4 December 2015 (UTC)

I suspect not. The lack of non-academic (i.e., secondary) references suggests a lack of notability (per WP:BIO). There's also no cites to sources for the actual biographical detail. Someone more knowledgeable about WP:BIO can probably do a better job here though. DanHobley (talk) 17:09, 4 December 2015 (UTC)
Edited to add: I now see WP:ACADEMIC weakens the requirement struck out above. However, the bio appears to still not meet any of the requirements from WP:ACADEMICS. His highest cited publication are still < 200 cites. That's not encouraging. DanHobley (talk) 17:20, 4 December 2015 (UTC)

Globalize tag on Geomorphology

Hi all. There's a globalise tag on this article now. I don't see that it's necessary - there is very little country-specific content, I personally went out of my way to balance the history section, and although the images lean US-heavy, there's a variety there. I've asked the tagger to give a rationale, but 3rd opinions would be very welcome over at the talk page. DanHobley (talk) 22:59, 20 November 2015 (UTC)

For the record, now resolved. DanHobley (talk) 17:21, 4 December 2015 (UTC)

Project related RM

Talk:Tor (disambiguation). Please see Talk:Tor#Requested_move_10_December_2015 In ictu oculi (talk) 20:14, 10 December 2015 (UTC)

Geology of Banff National Park

The geology section of the article on Banff National Park has been tagged for citation needed and clarification with some comments in the edit summaries, e.g. [17] and [18]. The article is currently under featured article review at Wikipedia:Featured article review/Banff National Park/archive1. Please help edit the article so that it can retain its featured status or join the discussion on whether this article meets featured article criteria. If substantial concerns are not addressed during the review period, the article will be moved to the Featured Article Removal Candidates list for a further period, where editors may declare "Keep" or "Delist" the article's featured status. Thanks. DrKay (talk) 09:08, 12 December 2015 (UTC)


Reassessment

Could someone reassess Clay please ? Anthere (talk)

 Done DanHobley reassessed it for Geology, and I changed the Soils assessment. RockMagnetist(talk) 18:42, 29 December 2015 (UTC)
Thank you DanHobley and RockMagnetist ! Anthere (talk)

Load cast

I stumbled upon Load cast and, after trying to get past the first sentence, tagged it with {{too technical}}. While I dislike drive-by tagging, that one was far beyond my league (and my planet). If anyone wants to deal with it... No such user (talk) 14:46, 29 December 2015 (UTC)

Got it. Thanks for the heads up. DanHobley (talk) 15:55, 29 December 2015 (UTC)
Wow, that was fast. Thanks. No such user (talk) 16:07, 29 December 2015 (UTC)
Good catch and cleanup! I especially like the original statement, 'The expression "load cast" is self-evident.' — Gorthian (talk) 17:45, 29 December 2015 (UTC)
Yep, that was a cracker! DanHobley (talk) 18:11, 29 December 2015 (UTC)

By the way, I created Casting (geology) and Cast (geology) and for the time being, redirected them to Fossil#Cast and marked with {{R with possibilities}} (and fixed the glossary entry). It seems to me that the concept is worthy of a full article (we already have endocast as a part), but you guys certainly know better. No such user (talk) 11:22, 30 December 2015 (UTC)

Informed opinion needed on Continental drip

Hi all. I'm pretty sure, but not positive, that the subject of Continental drip is a light-hearted joke among geologists and cartographers, not a phenomenon taken seriously. I don't think the article should remain as such, but don't know if deletion, merging, or redirecting is most appropriate. Cheers, --Animalparty! (talk) 02:40, 6 January 2016 (UTC)

I think we can keep such an article. Not everything has to be taken too seriously. No merge is needed. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 03:11, 6 January 2016 (UTC)
Agree with Graeme Bartlett. The term is used, if silly, and the article is factually accurate. It's a stub, but that's OK. DanHobley (talk) 22:20, 6 January 2016 (UTC)

Request for comment

Comments from any interested editors would be welcome at Talk:Salt Mud Slide#RFC: Should "Salt Mud Slide" be moved to "Slano Blato landslide"?. Should this article, "Salt Mud Slide" (which is a translation into English from its Slovenian name), be moved to "Slano Blato landslide" (which is based on its place name in Slovenia)? Thank you. — Gorthian (talk) 19:41, 15 January 2016 (UTC)

RfC at Talk:Climate change denial

There is a RfC at Talk:Climate change denial. Please contribute if you are interested. Biscuittin (talk) 00:18, 28 January 2016 (UTC)

Now at: Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Maths, science, and technology. Biscuittin (talk) 11:51, 28 January 2016 (UTC)

Impact Field Studies Group

Please check out this article. It seems woefully outdated, the database linked was last touched in 2010 and there is no hint, that the group existed after 2009. I don't find any evidence, that the group ever did scientific work beyond some loose connection between geologists with interest in impacts that were open to look beyond the strict formalities of the Earth Impact Database. They have made some excursions to relevant sites, but I did not find any publications where the group is mentioned. So they might have been mostly educated tourists. Please decide whether this really was a "sicentific organization" and is notable enough for an article. --h-stt !? 16:01, 4 February 2016 (UTC)

Share your concern that the group has disbanded, though some poking around confirms it was a legitimate academic grouping until at least ~2010. Broken websites are never a good sign. If I were you I'd get directly in touch with User:Ikluft, who created the page and looks to have done most of the work. He might have an in to the group directly. DanHobley (talk) 18:54, 4 February 2016 (UTC)

Seeking geological information

I was recently in Antarctica and photographed this piece of ice. It was explained to me that it was created in a high-density environment and may be quite "old", based on the details of the ridges (at 100% magnification) and the clarity. Can anyone offer any additional information, or recommend where I might go to find out more? Many thanks in advance.--Godot13 (talk) 04:59, 4 February 2016 (UTC)

Not really my expertise, but that looks like a chunk of blue ice, i.e., glacial ice. The bubbles all appear to have annealed out. I suspect this is the main reason for suspecting it's "old" (it's been all the way through the deeper parts of a glacier). Not sure whether "fingerprint" ablation textures really tell you much about age. Sure, it hasn't been pulled out of the ice yesterday, but I don't think you can date with those. The patterning is very reminiscent of a suncup ice ablation texture - which is a classic self-formed pattern in ice and snow, but I think fairly poorly understood in terms of formation mechanism.
You also might want to swing by the Blue ice (glacial) page and ask the same question, and also offer this image for their page! It's nice. DanHobley (talk) 19:03, 4 February 2016 (UTC)
Many thanks!--Godot13 (talk) 20:11, 4 February 2016 (UTC)

Qattara Depression

An IP has queried the statement in the article Qattara Depression that "The depression was formed by salt weathering and wind erosion working together. First, the salts crumble the depression floor, then the wind blows away the resulting sands." Looking at the source for this statement, it seems to me that the article has followed the source, although the latter did contrast the different processes involved in the western and eastern parts of the depression. Cwmhiraeth (talk) 09:31, 9 February 2016 (UTC)

I've modified the text somewhat, mentioning that the depression was initiated by other processes and that the combined salt/wind erosion mechanism is less effective to the east. Mikenorton (talk) 10:18, 9 February 2016 (UTC)
Thank you. Cwmhiraeth (talk) 10:59, 9 February 2016 (UTC)

Junction Fault

I've removed this fault from the list of fault zones after failing to find any information about it at all. I'm now not sure that we should even have an article on something that doesn't show up in searches of Google Scholar, Google Books or the Pennsylvania Geological Survey. Before I propose its deletion, however, I wondered if anyone out there knows more about this? Mikenorton (talk) 10:06, 29 February 2016 (UTC)

It sounds fairly non-notable. I would suggest a merge up to another article on the region, but I don't think that exists either. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 03:20, 1 March 2016 (UTC)
It's a hoax. An old one. Like other hoax unchallenged Wikipedia articles and fake fakes, it's now all over, courtesy of Google ranking Wikipedia articles high, including in a self-published book scraped from Wikipedia. No talk. Just deletion. Plenty of real articles that need work. 2601:285:101:7076:91A1:B546:A209:161A (talk) 19:51, 1 March 2016 (UTC)

New disambiguation page

I created Stratigraphic pinchout. Feel free to update or expand it. ···日本穣 · 投稿 · Talk to Nihonjoe · Join WP Japan! 22:38, 1 March 2016 (UTC)

Not a dab page I think, not to mention that is actually says "stratigraphic trap", which is a different but related thing. Stratigraphic pinchouts occur for a number of reasons of which onlap is only one. Lateral facies changes are the most common reason that stratigraphic units pinch-out. This is probably worth a short article. Mikenorton (talk) 11:59, 2 March 2016 (UTC)
That sounds like a good idea. Can you whip up one? It sounds like you are familiar with the topic. ···日本穣 · 投稿 · Talk to Nihonjoe · Join WP Japan! 20:06, 2 March 2016 (UTC)

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) 18:07, 4 March 2016 (UTC)

Bosques Petrificados de Jaramillo National Park

An IP has questioned some statements in the article Bosques Petrificados de Jaramillo National Park, an article I wrote and which is due on DYK in two days time. I would really like the matter to be sorted out before the article hits the front page and would appreciate it if someone with more geological knowledge than me could look at it. Any alteration I make to the article is likely to meet with more tags and derision. The IP concerned is the same one as mentioned above under "Qattara Depression" and is trolling me. Cwmhiraeth (talk) 19:51, 10 March 2016 (UTC)

Try not to take this kind of think personally. We're always about for a second opinion. I headed over and what you have looks good, so I took the errant tag off. Thanks for creating a nice looking little article! DanHobley (talk) 02:43, 11 March 2016 (UTC)
Thank you. Cwmhiraeth (talk) 06:20, 11 March 2016 (UTC)

Orographic precipitation

I've just discovered we have some issues around orographic precipitation. Small sections discussing it are at Precipitation and Precipitation types, but fuller statements are at Orographic lift (which is a broader topic than just precip, but still) and Orography. Looks to me like the material at Orography is most complete - though under-referenced. However, this is problematic, as the relevant material on that page only kicks in halfway down, and is very easy to miss (and, moreover, in my experience "orography" is a dead term, so it's doubly off-putting to have relevant material at the bottom of a page about a basically obsolete research term).

I think I'd advocate building an actual page for Orographic precipitation, which at present is just a redirect, using the material out of these four pages together. We could then strip it out of Orography entirely, and put actual See Alsos on the relevant subsections elsewhere. I think this would be the clearest way, but wanted a second opinion. I also may not have time to do this any time soon, so if someone else does, have at it. DanHobley (talk) 05:14, 21 March 2016 (UTC)

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There are up to 30 one-year ASP accounts available to experienced Wikipedians through this partnership. To apply for free access, please go to WP:ASP. Cheers! {{u|Checkingfax}} {Talk} 21:22, 25 March 2016 (UTC)

guidelines about living scientists

See Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Biography/Science_and_academia#guidelines_about_living_scientists.--Alexmar983 (talk) 06:15, 30 March 2016 (UTC)

Addition of stages to Template:Geological History

Drbogdan added more detail to {{Geological history}}, see diff. Given our previous discussion about this template, I think the additional details made the template much too crowded. I reverted the additions. I'm bringing it up here to get community input. Comments? Thanks! —hike395 (talk) 02:38, 5 April 2016 (UTC)

I agree, the addition made the template massive and beyond use. I still think its a bit too big, and fully redundant to taxobox/geobox templates plus article prose anyway. --Kevmin § 03:00, 5 April 2016 (UTC)
I second all of the above comments. Of course, I was pushing for deletion in that previous discussion, but was willing to compromise as long as the template was slimmed down a lot. RockMagnetist(talk) 03:23, 5 April 2016 (UTC)
@Hike395, Kevmin, and RockMagnetist: Thank you for the above comments - FWIW - viewing a more complete geological history in a single view seems worthy imo - if interested, a more developed version of the "proof of concept"(?) template is "HERE" - in any regards - "my earlier shorter version" seems more accurate - and perhaps more useful - than the "present version" I would think - Comments on this "shorter version" Welcome as well - in any case - Enjoy! :) Drbogdan (talk) 03:36, 5 April 2016 (UTC)
Drbogdan, if the purpose of a table of this size is to see geological history in a single view, it shouldn't be a navbox. Navboxes are for navigating between articles. Most readers probably don't even realize they are there, unless they are cluttering up the page. They aren't even displayed on mobile web sites. Those readers who do find the navboxes will be put off by complexity; as the Google search page illustrates, simpler is better. Have a look at the navbox guidelines. RockMagnetist(talk) 04:20, 5 April 2016 (UTC)
@Drbogdan: As @RockMagnetist: has already noted, the point of a navbox is to facilitate moving between related articles. As I have already noted, with rare exceptions the Geological history template is redundant to taxobox/geobox templates plus article prose anyway, both of which have the benefit of showing in mobile versions of pages.--Kevmin § 11:39, 5 April 2016 (UTC)
@Hike395, Kevmin, and RockMagnetist: Thank you for the recent comments - esp re the mobile versions, navbox & complexity issues - no problem whatsoever - if interested, a related brief followup has been posted at the following => "Template talk:Geological history#New Simple and Detailed Templates" - in any case - Thanks again for the comments - and - Enjoy! :) Drbogdan (talk) 12:39, 5 April 2016 (UTC)
@Drbogdan: Thank you for being understanding. It can be hard to accept arguments against using something that you have put a lot of work into, and you clearly have put a lot of work into these alternative templates. I appreciate the effort. RockMagnetist(talk) 15:19, 6 April 2016 (UTC)
@RockMagnetist: Yes - Thank You *very much* for your comments - they're *greatly* appreciated - my efforts re the "Geological history" templates were fun for me (regardless of their eventual use) - and a learning opportunity (you can learn a lot by editing an encyclopedia) - I've had similar experiences with some of "my earlier mega-templates" (some were eventually used, like the "{{Mars}}", "{{Comets}}" and "{{Molecules detected in outer space}}" templates; but others were not used (at least for now), like the "Beethoven" and "Mozart" mega-templates) - in any case - Thanks again for your comments - and - Enjoy! :) Drbogdan (talk) 16:39, 6 April 2016 (UTC)

Category:Categories by geological period

I could use some help renaming this category and its subcats. It is a mess at the moment as "geological period" is being used like it refers to the entire geochronological spectrum when in reality it only refers to a subdivison of an era. What would be the correct title? Volcanoguy 05:56, 29 April 2016 (UTC)

The problem is the word period is probably meant to connote span of time but, as you note, it is also a name in the formal geochronological system. Maybe Category:Categories by geological time span That would allow flexibility as needed. Then the subcats would be Category:Impact craters on Earth by geological time span, Category:Prehistoric life by geological time span, and (for consistency) Category:Volcanism by geological time span. And you or someone else can probably come up with something less clunky than time span. Just plain time? Age? — Gorthian (talk) 20:10, 29 April 2016 (UTC)

Draft:Geology of South Africa

Is there anyone here who would like to assist me to finish this draft? I'm not a geology specialist, I just know how to find and read sources. What I don't know is to discriminate between important geological topics and trivia. So far I've set up the draft as a summary of the stratigraphy of the country and a brief section on mining, which obviously needs to be expanded. Roger (Dodger67) (talk) 19:44, 2 May 2016 (UTC)

BTW - When describing the stratigraphy do I start at the bottom or the top? Roger (Dodger67) (talk) 06:48, 3 May 2016 (UTC)
It would be normal to begin with the oldest. Mikenorton (talk) 07:28, 3 May 2016 (UTC)
Thanks Mikenorton, would you mind taking a look at the draft to check that I'm on the right track. Roger (Dodger67) (talk) 11:36, 5 May 2016 (UTC)
I will be away from home and with only very intermittent internet access for the next week (I'm not comfortable with doing much editing just from my smartphone), but I will try to take a look once I get back. Mikenorton (talk) 23:45, 5 May 2016 (UTC)
I think we need draft page Geology of Continent. There should be some system in making pages of different geology of Continet. Continental crust pieces are formed at one point→ Craton formation and since then they have additions through orogens and then they are broken and rifted apart. They maybe dont grow in total, but their history has been growing last 4,5 Ma. So because every continent has craton, every continent has these rocks in it's "core". Craton made of TTG's special rocks which are actually the oldest rocks on earth, they formed only in early history of earth. I will reference that.... I have been lucky to hear lecture from prof Steve Foley who is one of the leading scientist in field. Have even lecture ppt with all the reference and pictures.... So geology of the continet is in my view history of continetal crust piece.... I unfortunately cant help with stratigraphy. By the way impressive work! and sorry I am kind of tired, this sis not draft for Geology Of Africa but south Africa, but still there should be craton (: Obradow (talk) 14:35, 27 May 2016 (UTC)

Tufa

You do not appear to have a peer review for photos so forgive me for posting this here. Etan J. Tal recently asked this question on Ref Desk: Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Science/2016 April 30#Spring_stream_in_Georgia. I think its probably tufa. If so, he has asked me me on my talk page as to what would be a proper description with which to caption his photograph? Tufa is quite common if one only looks – so he and I'm thinking it might be a worthy example to include on the tufa article. Any thoughts?--Aspro (talk) 14:53, 3 May 2016 (UTC)

@Aspro and Etan J. Tal: I am far from being an expert, but "tar-like consistency" would imply to me that the stuff is still forming; it hasn't yet become tufa (which, though often soft or fragile, is a rock). Perhaps in the lithification process, the blackness would leach out of it, since black tufa would be pretty unusual. That's a striking picture—I definitely would not want to wade in it! ;-) — Gorthian (talk) 01:39, 6 May 2016 (UTC)
Aspro, I edited your link so that the discussion can be found now that it's in the archives.
Yes, I have to agree with Gorthian that it not tufa yet. To use you to bounce-ideas-off again. I don't think proto-tufa is a recognized term, yet this black stuff may have the potential to become it. This why I can't think of a geological caption for the photograph. Perhaps after the existing caption of A spring stream near Arakhveti, Road E117 / S3 (Georgian Military Highway) (Georgia (country)) . Orange colour is caused possibly by iron , this could be added Note: The black calcite deposits around the margin of this spring, which may lead to the formation of tufa if it becomes cemented over time. We are going from a photograph here, and so it is only my guess that this is calcite deposits. But on the balance of probabilities I can't think of a better explanation. So I think at the moment it seem a good example of how tufa forms but am at a loss to know how to correctly describe the photograph. I think it would be useful for the tufa article because around the margins of tufa lakes this black stuff can be seen just as Etan J. Tal describes it.--Aspro (talk) 12:59, 6 May 2016 (UTC)
It a appears that from a photograph alone, no one is willing to guess at it (which I half expected, and why I posted it here, in the hope of more informed opinions). The black goo could equally be the result of bacteria sequestering manganese out of the water. As the clumps of such bacteria are not strong enough to resist flowing water they won't appear in the main flow of the spring. If however, manganese is the culprit, it would create rarer black tuffa. Without an analysis, I think the closest we can get to can this transform into tuffa is: perhaps and maybe. Still think though, it is a good image of contemporary geology in the making and in the flux of change but I will leave the image description as it is.--Aspro (talk) 19:34, 29 May 2016 (UTC)
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