Talk:Paramylodon

GA Review

This review is transcluded from Talk:Paramylodon/GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

Reviewer: Dunkleosteus77 (talk · contribs) 23:05, 12 June 2022 (UTC)

Dunkleosteus77

• First thing I'm noticing is the formatting is inconsistent with other mammal articles, which usually is Discovery --> Taxonomy --> Description --> Paleobiology --> Paleoecology. The layout you're using is used for dinosaurs.
• The text in the Taxonomic history sections seems to be entirely redundant with History of research. I'd say just delete Taxonomic history Dunkleosteus77 (talk) 23:05, 12 June 2022 (UTC)

  What do you mean the layout I'm using is used for dinosaurs? Patachonica (talk) 23:14, 12 June 2022 (UTC)

Butting in here, I think taxonomy should be kept, and history merged into it, as is customary for other promoted mammal articles. But yes, I don't think there is need for a separate history section, it should do the same job as taxonomy. FunkMonk (talk) 23:40, 12 June 2022 (UTC)

Yeah the title of the section is up to you, but all the text in the current Taxonomic history section is entirely redundant and somewhat more confusing than the text in the current History of research section. As for the article layout, the way you arrange all the sections and subsections, it should be modelled off of an article like Woolly mammoth or Ambulocetus or Catopsbaatar. Normally I'd expect to see History of research, then Description, then Paleobiology, then Paleoecology (or in this article's case, Distribution, then Interactions with humans, then Extinction). Also, "Latest evidence" is vague because that to me sounds like it's about the most recently discovered fossil finds, as opposed to the most recent appearance in the fossil record; I'd say rename it to Extinction or something. For an article of this size (I assume a lot is known about this animal), I'd expect to see a section entitled "Extinction" Dunkleosteus77 (talk) 00:54, 13 June 2022 (UTC)

Also, out of curiosity, why did you change the image? of the taxobox? Patachonica (talk) 01:46, 13 June 2022 (UTC)

It's brighter and doesn't have anything distracting in the background, but you can change it back if you disagree Dunkleosteus77 (talk) 02:29, 13 June 2022 (UTC)

• When you give measurements like 11 cm, use {{cvt}} or {{convert}}. For example, "The lower jaw reached lengths of 31.5 to 43.6 cm (12.4 to 17.2 in)" Dunkleosteus77 (talk) 23:05, 12 June 2022 (UTC)
• The paragraphs are huge, so see if you can try to condense them more or split them up into smaller paragraphs since they're pretty daunting to read Dunkleosteus77 (talk) 23:05, 12 June 2022 (UTC)
• Just quickly glossing through, I think the reason this article is so huge is because there's a lot of unnecessary verbiage throughout. For example, you have, "The mylodonts are generally considered to be sloths more adapted to grass diets; the assumption is based on the high-crowned teeth and the flat chewing surfaces, which differ from other sloth lineages and thus resemble those of the ungulates that feed in this way." You could easily shrink this down to, "Mylodonts are generally considered to be grass eaters (graminivores) based on their high-crowned teeth with flat chewing surfaces, similar to those of modern grazers." Dunkleosteus77 (talk) 05:04, 13 June 2022 (UTC)
• You shouldn't have a section called Miscellaneous because it's not obvious what kind of info you've hidden away there. I'm sure there's appropriate sections to move all that info to Dunkleosteus77 (talk) 05:07, 13 June 2022 (UTC)

  Maybe I should move Miscellaneous to Diet? Patachonica (talk) 11:24, 13 June 2022 (UTC)

For Diet I think only the sentence on digestion and maybe niche competition (if you can explain more on what Paramylodon ate or avoided as a result of competition), but the rest can be put into like a Sociality section or something Dunkleosteus77 (talk) 19:00, 13 June 2022 (UTC)

"For Diet only the sentence on digestion and maybe niche competition, but the rest can be put into a social behaviour section or something?" I'm sorry, but are you telling me to put the sentence on digestion and niche competition into the social behaviour section or are you telling me to keep it within the diet section? Patachonica (talk) 00:41, 21 July 2022 (UTC)

I'm saying you should put anything related to diet into the Diet section and anything related to social behavior into the Social behavior section Dunkleosteus77 (talk) 00:46, 21 July 2022 (UTC)

@Dunkleosteus77:Thing is, I've closely checked the sections and there doesn't seem to be any sentences related to diet in the social behaviour section and no social behaviour sentences in Diet. Patachonica (talk) 18:23, 21 July 2022 (UTC)

I was talking about your Miscellaneous section which you've since removed Dunkleosteus77 (talk) 02:11, 26 July 2022 (UTC)

I didn't "remove" the Miscellaneous section, I renamed it to Sociality, then Social behaviour. Patachonica (talk) 02:13, 26 July 2022 (UTC)

• Also, if you address a comment, make sure you tell me you did it because I'm not watching the page Dunkleosteus77 (talk) 18:53, 14 June 2022 (UTC)

  @Dunkleosteus77 Which sections should I remove? Patachonica (talk) 21:04, 14 June 2022 (UTC)

Taxonomic history Dunkleosteus77 (talk) 01:14, 16 June 2022 (UTC)

@Dunkleosteus77 And which sections should I move to other sections? Patachonica (talk) 23:24, 25 June 2022 (UTC)

I haven't actually begun reading this yet because I was hoping you'd read through it again and try to condense the article yourself a bit more. Like my comment above about the grass diet statement, there are a lot more examples of this throughout the article; and you still haven't gone through and put all the unit conversions yet. You could split the Skeleton section into a section about the torso and another section about the limbs, and break up those paragraphs more. Same goes for the Skull and dentition section Dunkleosteus77 (talk) 17:23, 26 June 2022 (UTC)

• "Paramylodon is an extinct genus from the also extinct family of Mylodontidae. The Mylodontidae in turn form part of the suborder of sloths (Folivora). In a classical skeletal anatomy Features based systematics, the Mylodontidae together with the two-toed sloths of the family Choloepodidae and the Scelidotheriidae represent the superfamily of the Mylodontoidea (in many studies however, the Scelidotheriidae is listed as a subfamily within the Mylodontidae),[1] which in turn is the second major and important sloth lineage, along with the Megatherioidea." This is probably the most long-winded way of presenting this info. You can easily cut it down to "Paramylodon is an extinct genus of sloth from the extinct family Mylodontidae. Mylodontidae is grouped together with modern two-toed sloths (Choloepodidae) and the extinct Scelidotheriidae, in the superfamily Mylodontoidea."
• Diagnostic characteristics of Mylodontidae and discussion on all the groups of sloths are unnecessary for the Taxonomy section Dunkleosteus77 (talk) 18:27, 5 July 2022 (UTC)

  Straight up removing the diagnostic characteristics of Mylodontidae and discussion on all the groups of sloths would literally be griefing. Oh well, if that's what I have to do, then I'll go ahead and do it. Patachonica (talk) 09:04, 6 July 2022 (UTC)

All that discussion is entirely irrelevant in this article. Also make sure to note that Choloepodidae are their closest living relatives, emphasis on living Dunkleosteus77 (talk) 18:15, 6 July 2022 (UTC)

• "but the relatively similar Glossotherium forms the sister taxon to the Lestodontinae" how is this relevant? Dunkleosteus77 (talk) 18:15, 6 July 2022 (UTC)
• I'm now realizing the rest of the Taxonomy section doesn't make any sense because you discuss Glossotherium way later Dunkleosteus77 (talk) 18:15, 6 July 2022 (UTC)

  Should I remove the information that discusses Glossotherium? Patachonica (talk) 18:19, 6 July 2022 (UTC)

You should very briefly say what Glossotherium and Lestodontinae are, and then talk about how they're relevant to Paramylodon Dunkleosteus77 (talk) 18:28, 6 July 2022 (UTC)

• "and most likely share a common ancestor" every creature shares a common ancestor Dunkleosteus77 (talk) 18:28, 6 July 2022 (UTC)
• Detailed anatomical discussion and comparisons between taxa should take place in the Description section, not Taxonomy Dunkleosteus77 (talk) 18:28, 6 July 2022 (UTC)
• The Taxonomy section is needlessly technical, like "This underpinned the branching of the terminal representatives" why do you say it like this? As I said earlier, you should go over the article again and condense it (a lot) before I continue reading, because this article looks like it needs a lot of work prose-wise Dunkleosteus77 (talk) 18:28, 6 July 2022 (UTC)

  It's the translation, that's why. Patachonica (talk) 18:46, 6 July 2022 (UTC)

Then you should keep working at the prose Dunkleosteus77 (talk) 18:53, 6 July 2022 (UTC)

What I'm trying to do is to look for alternative words for those sentences. Patachonica (talk) 18:58, 6 July 2022 (UTC)

It would be better if you read each paragraph and rewrote it entirely in your own words, rather than making micro-fixes to (I assume) a direct machine translation Dunkleosteus77 (talk) 17:14, 7 July 2022 (UTC)

If I can't rewrite it into entirely my own words, then I'm going to have to remove those sentences. Patachonica (talk) 17:18, 7 July 2022 (UTC)

Good, because if you don't understand it, how is the average reader supposed to? Also, if you're confused, you can check what the sources say and see if you understand that Dunkleosteus77 (talk) 17:19, 7 July 2022 (UTC)

I already removed the detailed anatomical discussion and comparisons between taxa before you told me to move it to the Description section. Patachonica (talk) 19:01, 6 July 2022 (UTC)

The 2nd paragraph of Taxonomy has a lot of dental anatomy Dunkleosteus77 (talk) 17:14, 7 July 2022 (UTC)

Which section can I move the dental anatomy information to? Patachonica (talk) 22:55, 8 July 2022 (UTC)

I'd say Skull and dentition where you talk about the dentition. I shouldn't say the Taxonomy section should be void of anatomy. You can give specific anatomical details rationalizing why Paramylodon is a unique genus (its diagnostic characteristics), but the kinds of details you're mentioning (or at least the way you're presenting them) aren't directly related to Paramylodon, they're just sorta generalizations of higher orders of classification Dunkleosteus77 (talk) 23:13, 8 July 2022 (UTC)

What do you exactly mean by "generalizations of higher orders of classification?" Patachonica (talk) 23:17, 8 July 2022 (UTC)

Like, you talk about the diagnostic features of the Mylodontini, which we can say applies here to Paramylodon since Paramylodon is a mylodontine. But these kinds of comparisons belong in the general Description section Dunkleosteus77 (talk) 23:18, 8 July 2022 (UTC)

@Dunkleosteus77:The discussion about the diagnostic features of Mylodontini don't directly mention Paramylodon, even if it is a mylodontin. Patachonica (talk) 02:19, 10 July 2022 (UTC)

Yeah considering they assume you already know all members of the Mylodontini, so there's no sense in enumerating all of them every single time they say something Dunkleosteus77 (talk) 21:23, 13 July 2022 (UTC)

So should I not enumerate all of them every single time they say something? Patachonica (talk) 23:13, 13 July 2022 (UTC)

I have absolutely 0 idea what you're getting at Dunkleosteus77 (talk) 23:32, 13 July 2022 (UTC)

Are you now saying that I should remove it? Patachonica (talk) 03:36, 14 July 2022 (UTC)

I'm saying it should not be in the Taxonomy section Dunkleosteus77 (talk) 02:48, 18 July 2022 (UTC)

I've moved it to skull and dentition Patachonica (talk) 02:55, 18 July 2022 (UTC)

• You're randomly italicizing certain words or places which you should not do Dunkleosteus77 (talk) 02:49, 18 July 2022 (UTC)

• This article requires a lot more work on the prose, most especially condensing sentences and paragraphs. I've given a few examples above of where and how you can condense info, but you need to do this for every paragraph in the article. You also repeat info multiple times across different sections, which is another problem. This review has been open for a long time, and I was hoping you would make progress on your own to fix up the prose, but seeing as you have taken no steps toward this, I will be failing this article and allow you some time to work on it yourself. I hope to see this back at GAN when it's ready Dunkleosteus77 (talk) 22:14, 20 July 2022 (UTC)