Template:Did you know nominations/Neotrogla

The following is an archived discussion of the DYK nomination of the article below. Please do not modify this page. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as this nomination's talk page, the article's talk page or Wikipedia talk:Did you know), unless there is consensus to re-open the discussion at this page. No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was: promoted by Hawkeye7 (talk) 22:34, 28 May 2014 (UTC)

Neotrogla

edit
  • ... that female Neotrogla have penises which are used to penetrate males during mating sessions lasting up to 70 hours?
  • Reviewed: Cassey Ho
  • Comment: I am quite set on using the term penis in the blurb. This is the term used by Nature without scare quotes or other qualification. If it is good enough for Nature, it should be good enough for us. Technically the organ is called a gynosome, which is a reflection that the creature is an insect, not that it is a female organ. If I have to wait until April Fools 2015 to use the desired term, I am fine with that, although my personal opinion is it should be OK to run any time.

Created by ThaddeusB (talk), Sarefo (talk). Nominated by ThaddeusB (talk) at 23:52, 24 April 2014 (UTC).


  • The females use their penises to penetrate reluctant and non-reluctant males alike, so the hook needs to drop that word. The nomination was made after the 5 day limit (although that rule seems to be taken with a pinch of salt). The DYK check reports that the article is marked as a stub but I can't see how to change that. I can't work out how to check for QPQ. Aside from this the article meets all the criteria - the use of penis in this context is non-problematic as the principal researcher refers to it as penis and gynosome interchangeably. Bellemora (talk) 15:53, 2 May 2014 (UTC)
  • It was the WikiProject tag on talk causing the "stub alert". I went ahead and fixed it. --ThaddeusB (talk) 15:57, 5 May 2014 (UTC)

The length is OK, no copyvio issues, sources are reliable. It seems there has been no DYK credit for the author and nominator yet. Age of the article was commented by the previous reviewer. But I am also not very sure about the term penis. I understand that in an article for common readers it can be OK, but I hesitate about the discrepancy when there is something different written here in the hook and something different in the article itself. Therefore I suggest to replace the word "penis" with "a penis-like organ". Jan.Kamenicek (talk) 16:17, 2 May 2014 (UTC)

As I said, if it is deemed it is OK to use "penis" only on April Fools Day 2015 (and it certainly would be OK then), then I am willing to wait. Note, however, that Nature (linked above) and the journal published article both use the term "penis". Indeed, both actually use "penis" more often than "gynosome". If the only concern is that our article doesn't use it, I can safely change "gynosome" to "penis" in a couple places. --ThaddeusB (talk) 15:56, 5 May 2014 (UTC)
I do not think it would be a good solution to introduce some inacurracies into the article. If the discrepancy is to be removed, it has to be done here, in the hook. But that is my opinion, if some other reviewers say it is OK, I will not block it because of this reason. Jan.Kamenicek (talk) 18:30, 5 May 2014 (UTC)
My position is that it's not an inaccuracy, just a more casual term for them same thing. If it's an inaccuracy to call the organ a penis, it is one committed by the authors of the peer reviewed journal article (including in the title of their paper) and by Nature... Anyway, I will simply ask for a 3rd opinion as to whether this can run anytime, or only on April Fools (it certainly can run then, as a lot of leeway is given to hooks that day.) --ThaddeusB (talk) 21:49, 5 May 2014 (UTC)

I think it is fine. I've tried to highlight that the terms gynosome and penis are used equally, but you may want to smooth that out a bit. I would give it a tick except for the ugly "orphan" tag that ruins its main page good looks. I'd like to remove it as this seems like branding the poor article for the misfortune of having no parents, but the truth is I'm scared somebody will shout at me, call me a vandal or an article-wrecker, or duff me up in some dark corner of Wikipedia. Belle (talk) 21:02, 8 May 2014 (UTC)

@Bellemora: I have just added a link to the article and removed the tag, so no need to worry about being shouted at. ;) 97198 (talk) 06:55, 12 May 2014 (UTC)
Thanks, 97198. Belle (talk) 10:30, 12 May 2014 (UTC)

Comment: I also disagree with using the term penis for this entry, for reasons made with this edit by Grayfell at the Vagina article. This edit made by Johnuniq at the Penis article is also worth noting. Flyer22 (talk) 07:08, 12 May 2014 (UTC)

ThaddeusB, it seems like others find the use of "penis" unacceptable, so, if you insist on using it, you'd be better off waiting for April Fools. I'm not giving it a tick now for that reason, despite 97189's sorting out the orphan issue. Belle (talk) 10:30, 12 May 2014 (UTC)

April Fools 2015 will be fine. No objection to waiting. --ThaddeusB (talk) 19:42, 12 May 2014 (UTC)
If someone could give this a April Fool's only approval tick and move it to the April Fool's Day page, I would appreciate it. --ThaddeusB (talk) 21:13, 17 May 2014 (UTC)
  • Can anyone get me the actual report? Here. The actual report (probably not aimed at the general public) uses "penis" in the title; if this is used in the article proper, it might warrant use of "penis" outside of April Fools. (And seriously, can we avoid having penis jokes for 1 April this year?) — Crisco 1492 (talk) 10:03, 23 May 2014 (UTC)
  • Yes, the report used penis and gynosome interchangeably; indeed, if anything it prefers penis. Please email me and I'll send you a copy of the report. --ThaddeusB (talk) 21:17, 24 May 2014 (UTC)
  • Reading through the Current Biology article (thanks Thaddeus) I see the word "penis" used on its own twice: once in the title, once in the body. The title uses "penis" and "vagina" in the title together with the term "Correlated Evolution", suggesting that the terms are used only as a point of comparison (i.e. comparing the insect's genitals to those of humans); this is supported by there being absolutely no mention of vaginas in the article proper, and indeed the Neotrogla males don't even have genitalia which could be compared (from my understanding, in human terms it would be like the penis just fitting into the uterus). The other use is in the sentence "The evolution of a female penis is likely to be strongly constrained," - yes, the source is talking about a female penis, but it's using the term in a general sense, rather than specific to Neotrogla (so this could be the (usually male) genitalia of any species). I'd recommend sticking with "penis-like", which the article uses several times.. — Crisco 1492 (talk) 03:39, 26 May 2014 (UTC)
Also see Pseudo-penis, if any of you have not yet looked at that article or are not otherwise familiar with that topic, though the females of the Neotrogla species do seem to have a "penis" that is unlike pseudo-penises since theirs contribute to reproduction in a similar way that a penis does. Flyer22 (talk) 04:16, 26 May 2014 (UTC)
  • OK:
ALT1: ... that female Neotrogla have penis-like genitalia which are used to penetrate males during mating sessions lasting up to 70 hours?
--ThaddeusB (talk) 15:14, 27 May 2014 (UTC)
  • ALT1 approved for standard DYK. — Crisco 1492 (talk) 15:18, 27 May 2014 (UTC)