User talk:SchreiberBike

Extinctions at Pleistocene-Holocene Boundary

Hi SchreiberBike,

A few months ago I included the following opinions at end of my comment on a talk page about a tangentially related topic. I would appreciate your help starting a separate thread about this, and I would be curious to hear your own opinions:

We should adapt the consensus for Lists of extinct species by region.

• I think all of the existing points still apply, except for the 1500 CE cutoff. However, we still need to define some cutoff. In particular, should our articles be primarily about the Quaternary extinction (Late Pleistocene to present) or Holocene extinction (mid to late Holocene, to present)?
• Although all of these articles say "Holocene" in their title, in part because of edits I made a few years back, in reality several of these articles include numerous species from the Pleistocene-Holocene boundary. In effect, this means that some but not all of the Pleistocene megafauna appear on the lists.
• I support an all-or-nothing approach to the Pleistocene megafauna. Either we put the cutoff early enough to include all of them, or late enough to include none of them, but an Pleistocene-Holocene boundary cutoff while the extinction was still ongoing is not ideal. Personally I favor the "nothing" side of the debate, but I would still prefer "all" over these weird middle ground we have today. Columbianmammoth (talk)

Beyond what I wrote at the time, I would also like to add that that I support a mid to late Holocene cutoff for the following reasons:

• The "extinct in the Holocene" by region articles articles are primarily about human-induced extinctions, so including Pleistocene megafauna on these lists implicitly or explicitly supports the debated Pleistocene overkill hypothesis.
• The "extinct in the Holocene" by region articles articles are intended to be about recent extinctions, and the Pleistocene-Holocene boundary stretches the definition of recent.
• Including large numbers of Pleistocene-Holocene boundary extinctions in articles like List of North American species extinct in the Holocene may clutter the page and make it difficult for users to appreciate the recent extinctions. However, using a sharp 1500 CE cutoff would harm regional articles that have large numbers of extinctions only slightly before the cutoff (like Hawaii and New Zealand).
• Even if Pleistocene megafauna are not included in the extinctions by region articles, we can still create a single, global list of Late Pleistocene extinctions, perhaps by heavily editing the existing article: Late Pleistocene extinctions.

Columbianmammoth (talk) 20:15, 19 May 2026 (UTC)

@Columbianmammoth: I'm not ignoring this, but I'm in a crunch in the real world and have little time for Wikipedia. I'll come back to it. Thank you. SchreiberBike | ⌨  22:01, 20 May 2026 (UTC)

No worries! Thanks for checking in. Columbianmammoth (talk) 02:24, 21 May 2026 (UTC)

@Columbianmammoth: I think those are all good ideas. I ran out of energy in my attempt to make species of place lists consistent at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Tree of Life/Archive 70#Inclusion criteria for List of organisms of Place. There was general agreement that the ideas we discussed were good, but it didn't seem like there was enough gumption to make it into an official guideline or to establish standard edit notices.

I think next time I have that kind of energy, I will just start editing lists by adding language that is consistent with the consensus of the discussions above. I'll do a couple and see if that starts any discussion, then go on from there.

My feeling is that Wikipedia, which is pretty mature at 25 years old, does not have a big appetite for standardization beyond what it has now. Perhaps I can work some in little by little and discuss as needed, but creating new standards seems unlikely. Just sharing my impressions; if you have other ideas, you'll have my support. SchreiberBike | ⌨  22:23, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

@SchreiberBike, thanks for following up and thanks for your encouraging words.

I think your message addresses two different points. Regarding the original conversation about standardizing organisms of place, it's a big task so it's not surprising that you needed to take a break. Perhaps it's better addressed in bite-sized pieces, as you said. I just want to reiterate my original concern, that the 1500 CE cutoff should be enforced in most cases, but not strictly enforced. List of birds of New Zealand uses human arrival (c. 1300 CE) as the cutoff, and trying to implement a 1500 CE cutoff would arguably ruin the article.

The second point is regarding my suggestion of implementing a mid to late Holocene cutoff for all pages mentioned in Lists_of_extinct_species#By_region. Arguably, this falls under Wikipedia:Be bold, if these changes are limited mainly to Lists_of_extinct_species#By_region and Late Pleistocene extinctions. However, based on past experiences, I'm concerned that some people will be upset with the changes and attempt to revert them. So, to preempt that, I would ideally have:

1. A strong scientific reason for a mid to late Holocene cutoff date, rather than just personal preference.
2. And/or a discussion consensus backing me up.

To be clear, although I support a mid to late Holocene cutoff, this is still only a mild preference. Another option that I think should be seriously considered is broadening the scope of the articles to include the entire Late Quaternary (Late Pleistocene and Holocene), which allows for all Late Quaternary extinctions to be considered without undue weight being given to the exact timing of the Pleistocene-Holocene boundary.

Columbianmammoth (talk) 01:19, 26 May 2026 (UTC)

@Columbianmammoth: I think "a discussion consensus backing me up" is a good idea. Where do you think the best place for that would be? Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Tree of Life or Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Palaeontology sound like they might have some good input. SchreiberBike | ⌨  22:37, 27 May 2026 (UTC)

@SchreiberBike: Thank you, I'll think about it. On second thought, the status quo might be best.

I'd have a hard time thinking of a watertight scientific reason for any cutoff other than the start of the Holocene, at least as a global standard. An earlier cutoff at the beginning of the Late Pleistocene might benefit Australia (which lost it's megafauna earlier), but an earlier cutoff would seem to be nonsense for the British Isles (which were part of continental Europe until the Holocene). A post-colonial (1500 CE) cutoff would work for the Americas and Australia if you're mainly interested in modern extinctions not megafauna, but this would harm New Zealand and Hawaii which have a wave of extinctions starting just a little earlier (1200 or 1300 CE) with Polynesian arrival.

There's also the fact that multiple users (including myself) have spend the past several years polishing Lists_of_extinct_species#By_region, so any major changes to the cutoff date might be unwelcome. Columbianmammoth (talk) 04:52, 28 May 2026 (UTC)