One thing that Wikispecies will not have is having a high reliance on "vernacular names". Vernacular names are highly un-scientific with same names covering many species, with many species without vernacular names, with species being covered by many often regional names.
When Wikispecies is to interface from wikipedia, one obivous place to put the links are the Taxoboxes. They would relate to the current correct name for a taxon. This would imply that this should be a two-way street. When Wikspecies decides that a name is not longer the currently valid name; it would flag the taxobox as problematic.
The problem with one unified database is, that all users would find all wikispecies data in the wikipedia space. But, WHICH wikipedia space? Consequently having one database is impossible. As to the Wikispecies being multi-lingual, at this moment in time two languages are the languages of taxonominal science: English and Latin. So the question is why should Wikispecies be multi-lingual, and should it be Latin or English :) ? Obviously, Wikispecies would be a resource available from within all wikipedia by the same syntax.
Using the taxons (species genus kingdom etc) as a category is in my view not a great idea. The taxobox would be part of each article and consequently the information would already be there.
Thanks, GerardM
On Tuesday 24 August 2004 09:06, Gerard Meijssen wrote:
One thing that Wikispecies will not have is having a high reliance on "vernacular names". Vernacular names are highly un-scientific with same names covering many species, with many species without vernacular names, with species being covered by many often regional names.
Two examples: quandong and cohosh. Quandong is the fruit of the sandalwood tree, of which two species are called bitter quandong and desert quandong; but the blue quandong is in a completely different family. Cohosh is the name for any of several medicinal North American berries; three of them, red, white, and black, are in Ranunculaceae, while blue cohosh isn't.
When Wikispecies is to interface from wikipedia, one obivous place to put the links are the Taxoboxes. They would relate to the current correct name for a taxon. This would imply that this should be a two-way street. When Wikspecies decides that a name is not longer the currently valid name; it would flag the taxobox as problematic.
How do you handle disagreements between taxonomists? There are splitters and lumpers: splitters may see seven species of Taraxacum in a region, and lumpers say they're all T. officinale.
The problem with one unified database is, that all users would find all wikispecies data in the wikipedia space. But, WHICH wikipedia space? Consequently having one database is impossible. As to the Wikispecies being multi-lingual, at this moment in time two languages are the languages of taxonominal science: English and Latin. So the question is why should Wikispecies be multi-lingual, and should it be Latin or English :) ? Obviously, Wikispecies would be a resource available from within all wikipedia by the same syntax.
I think it should be in English and Latin, and should have links to Wikipedia in all languages. Here's an article in which a new species, Salvia divinorum, was named and described: http://sagewisdom.org/epling&jativa.html . The article is in English, except for the description of the plant in Latin.
phma
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