Talk:Human uses of living things

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Former good articleHuman uses of living things was one of the Natural sciences good articles, but it has been removed from the list. There are suggestions below for improving the article to meet the good article criteria. Once these issues have been addressed, the article can be renominated. Editors may also seek a reassessment of the decision if they believe there was a mistake.
Article milestones
DateProcessResult
February 1, 2017Good article nomineeListed
February 6, 2021Good article reassessmentDelisted
Current status: Delisted good article

Rename to "Living beings in culture"[edit]

I propose to rename the article "Living things in culture" to "Living beings in culture" because a living creature is by definition not a thing, it is a being. Andreas Mamoukas (talk) 17:37, 3 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]

No, please not, and I do hope you are not going to go about from one article to another with any kind of religious or ethical point of view. This is absolutely a neutrally titled article. We as editors should not want any implication that it is connected with any religious point of view as the proposed title and the proposed reason above would give it, something clearly against policy. Further, the article covers living things such as fungi and bacteria used in fermentation, where the term "being" would frankly just seem strange. Chiswick Chap (talk) 17:50, 3 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]

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GA Reassessment[edit]

Human uses of living things[edit]

Article (edit | visual edit | history) · Article talk (edit | history) · Watch • Watch article reassessment page • GAN review not found
Result: Delist Consensus here to delist, with broadness concerns and concerns about irregularities in the original assessment being most frequently mentioned. Eggishorn (talk) (contrib) 16:48, 6 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

This article was rubber-stamped as a "Good Article" by a now banned sockpuppet. It was brought to our attention by a posting at WP:FTN. While it is not clear to me that the article is promoting any fringe theories, it may be a complete WP:SYNTHesis. Rather than AfD'ing the article, I thought it best to go through reassessment here. Since this is likely to be controversial, I'm opening it to the community. jps (talk) 17:18, 16 September 2020 (UTC)[reply]

There is no synthesis here. The sources include broad ethnographic works which describe the full span of human interaction with living things including both practical and symbolic uses. Indeed "culture" as studied by ethnographers, anthropologists and scholars of culture is so defined; this is not the invention of a Wikipedia editor. Chiswick Chap (talk) 08:13, 17 September 2020 (UTC)[reply]
This may potentially work as a list if you could get some good WP:LISTCRIT, but the sources in the article are not nearly as expansive as the subject presented here. This just isn't an encyclopedic topic. I can find no sources which discuss this idea as broadly as this. jps (talk) 16:40, 17 September 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I agree with jps here. As a further example of WP:SYNTH, the Three types of use heading actually doesn't cite a single source that divides human use of living things into three: there are sources to support each of the three types, but not secondary sources as to why the types were broken down in that way. (I would support a Delist). —WingedSerif (talk) 19:10, 15 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]
The supposed assessment was incredibly superficial, so much so that I'd recommend delisting as a matter of principle. At the risk of sounding much more blunt than I like to be, I have to admit that I can't call the article as it stands well-written. I keep encountering bits of miscellany that remind me of Wikipedia circa 2004, when everything was just what somebody felt like saying that day. For example: Venus Flytrap, sensitive plant and resurrection plant are examples of plants sold as novelties. Why those three? What distinguishes "novelties" from the "houseplants" of the previous sentence or the "art forms" of the next? Why are the first two items individual species (Dionaea muscipula and Mimosa pudica) while the third is a whole polyphyletic category? And what is the grammar of that sentence trying to be? A little later, we get Major artistic depictions of animals include Albrecht Dürer's 1515 The Rhinoceros, and George Stubbs's c. 1762 horse portrait Whistlejacket. Why those two? What makes them "major"? The source is a "top 10" list on a WP:NEWSBLOG. The "In literature and film" subsection is full of miscellaneous primary-sourced items. Without actual surveys to rely upon, there's no sense of what should be included, or what standard the items that were included are supposed to meet. What makes Middle-Earth, Athshe, and Pandora more important than Barsoom, Camazotz, and the rainforest from FernGully? This is a page of desiccated trivia, not a Good Article. I like the idea of it, but it needs a good spring cleaning and a re-assessment with a more critical eye than the "review" it had before. XOR'easter (talk) 20:28, 17 September 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Sadly, knowing the history of the account that reviewed this article, this sort of thing is not surprising. I'm not sure we should even have an article like this. jps (talk) 02:10, 18 September 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I'm don't see any issue with having such an article. It seems pretty clearly to be a summary article of the other "Human uses of animal/birds/insects" etc. articles, which makes complete sense and discussing it's notability at GAR is pointless and unproductive – take it to AFD if you want to do that. Sure, the prose could use some tidying and some clarification, perhaps one of the users above could offer to do a new GA review. In being a summary article, exclusion is warranted, an example of every living thing can not be possibly given and while I'm unable to properly speak for the plants, the two paintings mentioned are easily among the most notable depictions of animals. Dürer's Rhinoceros is very famous (and influential), while Whistlejacket is the most famous painting by George Stubbs, who is among the most esteemed painters of animals, and probably the most important for horses. Aza24 (talk) 04:37, 18 September 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Completeness is obviously part of a GA review. I don't see how such an article could possibly ever be complete. The issue is not about the inclusion of these points, the issue is the exclusion of others since the article is about the human use of living things. It's not an article about the "most famous animal paintings". See the issue? There can't even be a meaningful review. This article can never be good given its framing and ostensible subject. The fact that none of the references even make oblique mention of the idea beyond the few anthropological works cited makes this even more of a problem. It's just a mess. jps (talk) 12:50, 18 September 2020 (UTC)[reply]
It's not just that the article is incomplete, but that the current state of it is incomplete to such an extent and in such a manner that reading it is legitimately confusing. (Another example: why mention that William Blake wrote about flowers and not that he wrote, probably more famously, about lambs and tigers? How is a "PoemHunter.com" webpage — tagline, "Flower poems from famous poets and best flower poems to feel good. Most beautiful flower poems ever written. Read all poems for flower" — a reliable source?) The Good Article criteria require that a GA addresses the main aspects of the topic and that it stays focused on the topic without going into unnecessary detail. What are the "main aspects" here? And with the focus jumping about and no sense of why the details it includes are the necessary ones, I can't honestly see how the GA criteria are met. XOR'easter (talk) 17:51, 18 September 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delist There's no conceivable way this article can ever meet the "broadness" criteria as its topic so vague and unfocused. I'm not inherently opposed to Human uses of living thing X (human uses of wood, human uses of cows, etc.) but this topic is just too far. (t · c) buidhe 06:30, 5 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep I am not convinced this fails the criteria. Broadness does not mean comprehensiveness and means article like this, as long as they addressees the main aspects, can pass. Whether an article this broad should exist is another question and not one that can be answered here. AIRcorn (talk) 11:06, 5 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep: article passes breadth criterion, it means it covers the full span of the topic. The topic is not unduly broad - it is an aspect of Culture (everything passed on culturally rather than genetically between people), which is a broad but obviously valid topic. As for the examples used, they are among the best-known illustrations; anyone who thinks through what to choose would pick something of the same sort. Editors may also note that the article cites multiple sources from anthropology and ethnography that discuss "multispecies ethnography", with a quote explicitly mentioning "Animals, plants, fungi, and microbes".Chiswick Chap (talk) 08:30, 18 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep: the broadness concerns may be relevant if this was an FA, but as a GA the topic is well researched, sourced, written and touches the main aspects enough. Aza24 (talk) 03:05, 10 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment: I see that "Three types of use" identifies (at face value) that the topic is a subject of study which can be reasonably characterised. Chiswick Chap, can you explain to me the relative weight of each of the three types of interaction (so that we can tell if the section lengths follow due weight)? And when you say "anyone who thinks through what to choose would pick something of the same sort", I'm broadly in agreement that it is immaterial whether we name one famous animal painting or another similarly-famous one, but which sources if any exhaustively list the major forms of animal representation (painting, literature etc.) that we need to give examples of? — Bilorv (talk) 01:30, 27 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delist Without weighing in on the breadth issue, I think that the concerns with the writing quality raised by XOR'Easter and others are enough to justify delisting at this time, especially considering the failings of the original GA approval. signed, Rosguill talk 18:57, 15 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I wrote this article some years ago using over 100 reliable sources. I imagine most editors will agree that humans make and have for many centuries made many uses of animals, for food, for other practical purposes, and symbolically such as in art. These uses are extremely widely attested. I believe the article does a workmanlike job of covering 'the main points' as required for a GA. The original title 'in culture's turned out to be confusing for some editors as its meaning 'what humans do' as in the article on Culture is in some minds overridden by the connotations of high culture -- art, music, etc -- which is just a fraction of the uses intended here. I hope this is clear and the article is found to be a straightforward and honest piece of work. I am to be honest a bit shocked to have this levelled against this article. Chiswick Chap (talk) 17:34, 16 September 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Animals are not the sum total of all living things which makes me concerned that you may have had a different idea in mind than what this article is ostensibly about. What "main points" are you referring to exactly? Can you point to any other reference work which has an article this broad? I am not questioning the amount of work you put into this piece. I am questioning whether this is in the remit of Wikipedia to include such a thing. It is, as far as I can tell, a novel synthesis of material, and that's not allowed. jps (talk) 20:12, 16 September 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Agree, the topic is too broad and is WP:SYNTH, I think the next step is to take this to AfD. Hemiauchenia (talk) 00:20, 17 September 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Ah, yes I had in mind a similar TfD process. The article is of course about the full range of living things, an cited as such.Chiswick Chap (talk) 08:07, 17 September 2020 (UTC)[reply]

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