Misplaced Pages

martha!!!! — Preceding unsigned comment added by Erutas1 (talk • contribs) 17:53, 22 November 2012 (UTC)

Merge elephantidae into this

The terms are basically synonyms, and the articles cover the exact same ground. FunkMonk (talk) 14:09, 17 November 2012 (UTC)

Oppose: This article is about the living species called elephants not every member of elephantidae which includes mammoths and Stegolophodon. LittleJerry (talk) 16:29, 17 November 2012 (UTC)

I've removed the tag for now, since it isn't urgent, but elephant is usually used as a term for even the extinct species, so I disagree. We don't have separate articles for living penguins and Sphenisciformes either, for example. But a merge can wait, no worries. FunkMonk (talk) 16:56, 17 November 2012 (UTC)

Occisonally it is but only the mammoths. The majority of the time it refers to the living species. LittleJerry (talk) 17:08, 17 November 2012 (UTC)

It seems that the elephantidae article is too inclusive, as it lists many genera outside it for some reason. So it may seem harder to integrate here than it is. A book about mammoths written by Adrian Lister specifically mentions "true elephants" (i.e. elephantidae) as referring to living elephants and mammoths collectively. I think it would be easy to absorb the little material there is in that article. FunkMonk (talk) 17:17, 17 November 2012 (UTC)

• Oppose. FunkMonk has a good argument but I am concerned that the "Elephant" article is already rather long, and "Elephantidae" is certainly not a stub. There is enough text in "Elephantidae" to justify its position as a stand-alone article, and it has the potential for further expansion. Axl ¤ 10:12, 18 November 2012 (UTC)

The other article is only long (or rather, has a long list) because it includes taxa that are not widely regarded to be part of elephantidae. Cut these out, and it's only a few. Michael Benton also terms elephantidae "elephants and mammoths". It would take about five minutes to redirect that article here, and add a couple of lines about the extinct species, if that hasn't been done already FunkMonk (talk) 11:43, 3 December 2012 (UTC)

Editing politeness

LittleJerry, you recently made multiple changes to the section on seismic communication in this article. Your revised version deleted relevant information and contained inaccuracies and typos. You left no edit summary so there was no indication of your motivation behind these changes, therefore I manually reverted to the previous version. Your subsequent immediate revert indicated the motivation was "(your verison contains close paraphasing and direct copying of the sources.)" Yes, I may have closely paraphrased, but this is permissible according to Wikepedia:Close paraphrasing if suitable in-line attrubition is given. I have done this. Similarly, with direct copying, this is attributed to the author from where I have taken the information although I felt it did not require quotes. I use the highest quality material when researching my edits and sometimes this means the statements of authors simply can not be improved upon. Please revert your changes and please use the Edit summary for each of your changes. __DrChrissy (talk) 18:09, 28 November 2012 (UTC)

Direct copying without qoutes still violates copyright. Your wording is not an example of "suitable in-line attrubition" because it is not being attrubited to a person (e. g. John Rawls says that, to reach fair decisions, parties must consider matters as if behind a veil of ignorance). In addition, your wording is way to technical and needs to be put in laymen's terms. Wording like "Elephants may also use seismic communication from signals generated through percussion on the substrate or acoustical waves that couple with the substrate" is not appropriate for an encyclopedia that's meant to be accessable to the general public. LittleJerry (talk) 18:38, 28 November 2012 (UTC)

If you had these concerns you should have raised them with me on the Talk page rather than reckless editing in an almost complete absence of giving edit summaries (something you have been warned about several times on your User Talk page). It is your own single opinion what material is accessable to the general public - making a unilateral series of heavy editing without discussion indicates you may be in violation of thinking you own this article__DrChrissy (talk) 19:10, 28 November 2012 (UTC)

I did, and I'm not the only one who feels that way. Axl pointed that out in the PR. LittleJerry (talk) 19:28, 28 November 2012 (UTC)

Guys, we are all trying to improve the article. I am sure that we can collaborate and do so. The references for the "Communication" subsection are of good quality, and we can use them to support statements in the article. Let's avoid accusations of ownership. Collaborative editing is one of Misplaced Pages's principles; we can all expect have our work edited by others. Thanks. Axl ¤ 23:33, 28 November 2012 (UTC)

I'm sorry but this has not been a collaborative effort. It has been editors other than LittleJerry making good faith changes only to have these pounced upon and deleted or changed with no discussion and no edit summaries. This leads to much work for other editors to follow which edits LittleJerry has been making. I will be making no further contributions to this article until it is submitted for Featured Article status.__DrChrissy (talk) 16:06, 29 November 2012 (UTC)

Ongoing review

The peer review has now closed. However I still have comments to make. Axl ¤ 12:15, 8 December 2012 (UTC)

• In "Elephants and humans", subsection "Attacks", several incidents are listed that all seem to have the same pattern: elephants go on a rampage, locals claim drunkenness, officials deny drunkenness. Perhaps these incidents could be combined into a single sentence that summarizes them? I don't think that it is helpful to list them individually. Axl ¤ 12:15, 8 December 2012 (UTC)

Done. LittleJerry (talk) 14:03, 8 December 2012 (UTC)

• From "Elephants and humans", subsection "Cultural depictions", paragraph 2: "Similar beliefs existed among certain other African tribes, who believed that their chiefs would be reincarnated as elephants." Are these "other African tribes" named? Axl ¤ 11:57, 12 December 2012 (UTC)

Nope, just the Igbo-Ukwu. LittleJerry (talk) 16:45, 12 December 2012 (UTC)

Okay. Axl ¤ 13:03, 16 December 2012 (UTC)

• From "Elephants and humans", subsection "Cultural depictions", paragraph 3: "Elephants in fiction are typically surrogates for humans and their concern for the community and each other is depicted as something to which to aspire." Can you simplify this sentence please? Perhaps split it? Axl ¤ 12:45, 14 December 2012 (UTC)

Better? LittleJerry (talk) 14:44, 14 December 2012 (UTC)

Thanks. Axl ¤ 13:03, 16 December 2012 (UTC)

Okay, I have finished reviewing the text. I have not checked the references. Axl ¤ 13:11, 16 December 2012 (UTC)

Thanks again. LittleJerry (talk) 13:13, 16 December 2012 (UTC)

Sri Lankan elephant

• From Sri Lankan elephant: Only 7% of males bear tusks.(ref= Jayewardene, J. (1994) The elephant in Sri Lanka. Wildlife Heritage Trust of Sri Lanka, Colombo) However, according to the elephant census conducted in 2011 by the Wildlife Conservation Department of Sri Lanka, only 2% of the total population are tuskers.
• From Asian elephant Some males may also lack tusks... and are especially common among the Sri Lankan elephant population... (ref= Clutton-Brock, J. (1987). A Natural History of Domesticated Mammals. London: British Museum (Natural History). p. 208. ISBN 0-521-34697-5.)
• BBC
• Sunday Times

Edit request on 28 December 2012

Text apparently contains a spelling error:

"Female same-sex behaviours have been documented only in captivity where they are known to mastrubate one other with their trunks."

Perhaps "masturbate" is more appropriate?

219.117.23.10 (talk) 05:18, 28 December 2012 (UTC)

 Fixed, thanks. Well spotted! Adrian J. Hunter 11:55, 28 December 2012 (UTC)