Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Retreat of glaciers since 1850

Retreat of glaciers since 1850 edit

Renominating this article for featured status. The original nomination is located here and we believe the majority of concerns noted have been addressed. This article is a discussion of the worldwide phenomenon of glaciers in retreat, a listing of those glaciers that have been well documented from various sections of the Earth and a discussion of how measurements are obtained and what the long term implications may be. The article is long and has many facts and figures that make it fairly cut and dry, but it is valuable research tool with cited evidence and a diverse listing of readily available references. The major contributors have all agreed that though the facts and figures may seem overly abundant, we are not in favor of reducing them as this would compromise the scientific integrity of the article. If nothing else, we hope to continue to get feedback and welcome all commentary. I also wanted to mention that as an offshoot of this effort, Doug Bell implemented a new cite style that automagically now superscripts the Harvard style referencing.--MONGO 11:48, 29 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Support~~, on one condition~~. It is an excellent article, thoroughly referenced and comprehensive. I do not personally like Harvard citation style, but I accept that that is just my opinion. But one thing (I have copied this to the article's talk page too): it is not an article about glacial retreat. It is an article about "glacial retreat over the last 150 years". Glacial retreat is different; it is conceptual, and there have been many examples of glacial retreat (and indeed glacial advance) throughout geological time, although obviously the ones in the holocene are the best known. A new article, detailing the mechanisms, processes and some examples of glacial retreat ought to be created at Glacier retreat (or as a redirect to Glacial retreat); this article should be moved to (something like) "Post-Industrial Revolution glacier rereat". What do others think? Batmanand | Talk 12:42, 29 March 2006 (UTC) This has now been changed; now full support. Batmanand | Talk 06:38, 30 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Appreciate your imput...and I repost this from the article discussion page and hope it fully adresses your concerns. Peltoms is the "resident" glaciologist that worked on this article a lot. He defined "Glacial retreat" as the end of the ice ages...in other words, essentially the period also know as the Holocene glacial retreat. This article discusses Glaciers...as in more isolated smaller masses of glaciers that are not even necessarily remnants of the last ice ages, as many of the glaciers now retreating actually developed during the Little Ice Age. It doesn't actually fit into a Post-Industrial period as that is still ongoing and the industrial age only really just started at about the same time as the end of the little ice age...in other words, (I am not sure on this) there isn't much data to support evidence that the coal burning that became big in the early to mid 18th century actually hastened the retreat of glaciers...Glacier retreat is the term used by glaciologists for the period since 1850, generally. I orginally had the article titled as Glacial recession...but I agreed to change it as the other major contributors correctly commented that this is incorrect since we do not discuss the period that that title would need to incorpoarte in text...the holocene period from 12 thousand until maybe 3 thousand years ago. We did spinoff Glacier mass balance Glacial Lake Outburst Flood and Holocene glacial retreat, all created as byproducts of this effort, with the latter in a rough state but correctly titled to discuss other periods. See also small stub Pinedale glaciation. I appreciate your imput and let me know if I can clarify this any more for you.--MONGO 13:02, 29 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

That previous thread about the title is here in case you'd like a read of the discussion then.--MONGO 13:04, 29 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

~~I have replied on the talk page. Batmanand | Talk 13:31, 29 March 2006 (UTC)~~[reply]

Support Bigdaddy1204 14:27, 29 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Support, though I still think it should be renamed to Glacial retreat. Just because one supposed glaciologist uses this term and edits Wikipedia doesn't mean we should use a grammatically incorrect different name than most scientists. --Rory0 96 17:15, 29 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I appreciate your support of the article, but the glaciologist that is mentioned as having helped on this article is indeed one of the foremost researchers on mass-blances studies and retreat of glaciers in the U.S. His work is widely published and spans a period of study in the North Cascades of over 20 years now. We don't call it Glacial because that word discusses a process...we don't discusse processes here. Glaciers is what we itemize and dicuss. I recognize that the words may seem to connotate differently to most, but again....Glacial is a process and adjective, glaciers is the noun, and we list glaciers that are retreating. You may also want to chime in on the article discussion page as there is an active discussion involving the title there...I appreciate your time and contribution to this effort.--MONGO 21:32, 29 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Even so, it's grammatically incorrect- and not what most people call it. See Wikipedia:Use common names. (I probably shouldn't be saying anything, considering my FAC below is called "Cannabis," but in this case, even many scientists use this term). Anyway, I'll go complain on the talk page instead. --Rory0 96 23:48, 29 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Support This is a great article! Although it's a little dry, but that's hard to avoid. I changed the wording in a couple places, especially in the captions. I hope I improved it! Glacier retreat is really important, and most people don't know about it. Sarah crane 20:04, 29 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you...your support is appreciated. I'll take a look at the improvements you made:)--MONGO 21:32, 29 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Support of course (I'm not the nominator, but I'm one of the signficant editors there; though far, far less important than the experts who have contributed). Lulu of the Lotus-Eaters 23:00, 29 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Comment I have moved Glacier retreat to Retreat of glaciers since 1850 to maintain the fact that we are talking about Glaciers, not Glacial process, and to honor the need to be time specific in the title. If anyone wants to start an article on Glacial retreat then they will need to discuss the processes and mechanics. This article does not do that, as it is solely a discussion on the recent evidence for those glaciers that are in retreat worldwide, as well as discussion about some of the glaciers that are actually advancing.--MONGO 02:06, 30 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Hey, it's even grammatically correct! --Rory0 96 03:54, 30 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Support — Awesome article. deeptrivia (talk) 03:34, 30 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Support. I did a fact-check of the entire article (yes, even the facts that did not have inline citations directly attached to them) during its first FAC nomination (see article talk page for comments). I am satisfied that everything has been corrected and that additions since then are correct. Btw, the ext.link in "King, et alia" is boken and the first sentence currently does not conform to Wikipedia:Guide to writing better articles#The first sentence. --maclean25 17:26, 30 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you for all the fact checking you did...only a few items changed and I will make the adjustments you mention now to the article. Appreciate all the time and effort you provided to assist us on this article.--MONGO 19:51, 30 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Support for a very well written article on what is admittedly a typically dry subject, although an extremely important one. As noted above, I don't particularly favor the Harvard citation style either, but that's largely a matter of preference and will in no way sway my vote of support for this one. I'm amazed at the depth of expertise contributed to this article - out of curiosity, how many of the editors of this article were geophysicists or geologists? Alexthe5th 14:08, 31 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Also, just another point I forgot to mention - references to notable works in glacial retreat at the bottom of the page for "additional reading" is a terrific touch. Great work. Alexthe5th 14:12, 31 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]
- Thank you for the considerations. There is one glaciologist that worked on this article. Peltoms helped with another FA that is unrelated to this article for the most part. I think the Harvard style is very different to those not familiar with it, but we ended up moving a lot of the sections around and it really saved some time when it came to not having to reorganize the cited references numericaly over and over....the alphbetical listing proved very helpful for us. The rest of the major contributors to the article include at least one person who is brilliant, but not a glaciologist, another who simply has a knack for detail, another who has been involved in near Earth asteroid detection(!)) and myself, I simply have a minor in geology.--MONGO 20:53, 31 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Support for a very well written article. Definitely an example of "our best". --Woohookitty^{(cat scratches)} 06:59, 1 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I Appreciate the kind words and I'm glad you enjoyed it.--MONGO 10:37, 1 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Support. After giving it my fine-tooth comb review, I found very few issues, all of them minor, compared to the previous FAC. Extremely tight and well written article now. —Doug Bell ^{talk•contrib} 07:14, 1 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]
It wouldn't have become "tight and well written" had you not aided us so much in cleaning up a lot of different areas. Thanks!--MONGO 10:37, 1 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Support. A well written and comprehensive article. -- Lewis 09:24, 2 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you and we appreciate your support:)--MONGO 10:10, 2 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Support - good article, however - the photo-diagrams are dire, particularly the one used as the lead image. If the original images are around, I volunteer to try and do something better than the current MS Paint efforts. --zippedmartin 22:27, 2 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]
The lead image is from a page off a U.S. Government website. Aside from the two images taken in the Cascades, all the images are from public domain sources. I agree that the lead image could be clearer. We appreciate your support for the article.--MONGO 22:36, 2 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

The lead image is from [1] and was cropped and cleanedup as a quick peek at that webpage will demonstrate. I don't think much more can be done to this one.--MONGO 22:39, 2 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Sure, but they must have been employing 12 year olds as graphic artists. Something else as lead would be better. Along with that, Image:Bouldert.jpg, Image:Eastonterm.jpg and Image:Larsen_B_Collapse.jpg could be made to look a fair bit more profesional if the originals are available. Hm... I have no idea how big Rhode Island is... I though that the standard unit of measurement for ice shelves were Waleses. --zippedmartin 22:46, 2 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Naturally, I have no objection if Zippedmartin or anyone else wants to make more graphically elaborate images that illustrate the same points about glacier boundaries at different dates. But I sort of don't really care how "pretty" the lines are. To me, the concept illustrated is "the glacier came to here on this date, then it came to there on this other date". Crude lines and mediocre fonts make that point perfectly well, and something with more graphic design pizzazz doesn't particularly affect the underlying concept in any direction. Lulu of the Lotus-Eaters 23:16, 2 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Oh, um...somebody who is really jice has now promoted this article to FA! Thanks...Raul! The area of Rhode Island is 2,706 square kilometers...you could fit that into Wales about 15 times or more...--MONGO 06:03, 3 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]