Talk:Excavata

explanation

Do we need the excavation explanation at the top?

It's useful because people sometimes make links to this page when they're talking about excavating. At the moment, for instance, the page on Huguenot tunnel has made this mistake.

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Does anyone have any info regarding the phylogenetic relationships between the Excavate taxa? I rember reading somewhere that the Metamonads had ancestors with mitochondria (destroying the old "Archaezoa" hypothesis of basal Eukaryote phylogeny) and that the mitochondria-bearing Jakobids may be the most primitive and most deeply branching Eukaryotes.

--Odin2006 20:04, 13 August 2006 (UTC) (Taylor Selseth)

Jakobids

Why isn't there a jakobid page? Could someone with knowledge on this group please create a page? Werothegreat 12:22, 8 December 2006 (UTC)

Discicristates

Why isn't there a page on discicristates (discicristata), they are a distinct group that are passed over and redirected to this article.

Also, was this article just copy-pasted, because I get that sense from it. Wiki wiki1 20:16, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

Discicristates are a group of excavates, including the Euglenozoa and Percolozoa. Yes, it should be expWerothegreat 19:25, 4 June 2007 (UTC)lained here.

I added it to the table and the text. --Kupirijo (talk) 22:59, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

higher classification

For the time being, I'd like to suggest we remove the reference to Cabozoa from the taxobox. Some studies have contradicted the hypothesis that Excavates are sister group to Rhizaria, for example Burki et al. 2007. Phylogenomics Reshuffles the Eukaryotic Supergroups. PLoS ONE 2(8): e790. Cephal-odd (talk) 14:24, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Is it uni-cellular?

I have no idea at all about biology and can't believe I'm asking a question like this. I was just curious if this type of creature is mostly uni-cellular? Thanks in advance!Senantiasa (talk) 17:32, 22 March 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for bringing this up. Including this kind of information is very important in writing an good encyclopedia article. Took me a few tries to find a reference, but yes they are all unicellular. I've added it to the article. Kingdon (talk) 13:05, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

Depends on how you define uni-/multicellularity. Excavates contain acrasid slime moulds (Acrasida, Heterolobosea, Discicristata), which are cellular slime moulds similar to Dictyostelium. Some (eg. King 2004 Dev. Cell) would argue that cellular slime moulds are a type of multicellularity, as there is spatial cell differentiation. So I'd say excavates are *mostly* unicellular, to avoid generalising too much. Perhaps that would be too nitpicky though, I don't know... --Psi Wavefunction (talk) 01:02, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

Definitely worth a mention; thanks. My thinking is that they are "unicellular enough" that we can say "unicellular" in the lead and expand later in the article, but feel free to tweak the wording if you think that is taking too many liberties. Kingdon (talk) 16:04, 18 January 2010 (UTC)

Malawimonas

First paragraph: "the genus Malawimonas is generally considered to be a member of Excavata". Second paragraph: "Malawimonas appears not to belong to Excavata". Ain't Wikipedia wonderful? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 173.180.151.49 (talk) 19:57, 24 December 2016 (UTC)

Origin of the name?

What we need at the top is an explanation of the peculiar name. Who dug it up? Are they digging something up? Where does it come from? -j — Preceding unsigned comment added by 37.201.195.81 (talk) 19:01, 20 June 2022 (UTC)

Ok, I see it hidden away in characteristics but it deserves more prominence at the beginning of the article. It's more important information than when it was created (history section) or that "protists" is outdated. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 37.201.195.81 (talk) 19:05, 20 June 2022 (UTC)

A question about Excavata

Hello. My name is Mohammadsina Mokarmipour from Iran and I am a Persian speaker, but I plan to contribute to the improvement of English articles. About the Excavata article on Wikipedia: In the table, this category of organisms was introduced as "unranked". But due to the importance of this category that I have seen on other pages of Wikipedia, I suggest that this category be introduced as a "kingdom" in Wikipedia. With thanks for your attention. Mohsina881018 (talk) 09:11, 15 January 2023 (UTC)

The importance is not the issue. Do you have a reliable source (WP:RS) stating that the Excavata would represent a Kingdom? IAmNitpicking (talk) 02:41, 16 January 2023 (UTC)

The group is being broken up as paraphyletic, so I'm not sure that talking about any particular taxonomic grades is really feasible. This makes the article itself moot: it could be broken up, redirected, or preserved as a description of a moment in taxonomic history. The taxobox in particular needs to be removed as misleading. Chiswick Chap (talk) 19:24, 6 April 2023 (UTC)

The taxobox is just an infobox that summarises information about the group in convenient and quickly accessible form. It includes a variety of information including taxonomic information. It's use makes no assumption about the validity of the group as a monophyletic or paraphyletic taxon, but can provide the information about what it contains. This change needs consensus. An edit summary of the citing the talk page one hour after an unanswered comment is not consensus. —  Jts1882 | talk  06:53, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

Thanks for discussing, but I dispute the suggestion that a taxobox makes no taxonomic claim: it patently does, indicating to every unsuspecting reader that this is a clade. I am minded to mark the article as disputed now, but I see you've stated "obsolete" in there, which I guess mitigates its rather bizarre survival. To be clear, since we (and scientists) agree it's not a valid taxon we should not have a taxobox. I suggest we do remove it - to say the least, having such a box for a not-a-clade would set a terrible precedent - but there's no immediate hurry as long as it's clearly understood that the box is basically up for deletion. Chiswick Chap (talk) 07:15, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

It's an infobox, which has an unusual name because it predated the infobox system. What is important is what faces the reader, not the name of the template behind the page output. There is nothing to suggest a taxobox only deals with monophyletic taxa. And as they include images, conservation status, and range maps, it's clear the intent was not to be strictly a {{taxonbox}}, let alone a {{monophyletic_taxonbox}}. The case that it should be restricted to monophyletic taxa is weak as paraphyletic groups are still widely used in taxonomy. Some people object strongly, some people think they have validity, and others think they are an unnecessary evil while we learn more (even Hennig used taxa he thought paraphyletic). We have to be neutral and present opposing points of views. In this particular case, "excavate" is still widely used in discussion of the evolution of Eukaryotes and this article should try and present the information in an easily assessable form. Infoboxes are one means to do this that is used widely on Wikipedia. —  Jts1882 | talk  08:32, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

OK, some good points there, but "widely used" is, you'll agree, something of a weasel term: and old taxonomists never change their minds, they just die off eventually. It fries the Darwinian brain to think of deliberately using paraphyletic or polyphyletic groups as taxa – if it doesn't have a common ancestor, whatever can it mean?? (though para- might seem better than poly- if we're down to that) Coming down to earth, the box is certainly much less confusing now than it was. Chiswick Chap (talk) 08:51, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

About Eukaryotes, not Excavata

"With respect to the origin of the metamonada s.l. a.k.a. Excavata s.l. a.k.a. Eukaryotes, in 2023, Eme, Tamarit and colleagues reported that the Eukaryota emerged deep within Asgard, as sister of Hodarcheales within the Heimdallarchaeia.[19]" (+ cladogram)

Um, with respect, this is not about the excavata at all, but about the origin of the Eukaryotes. In this sensu lato (or should I say (sensu latissimo, the broadest imaginable sense which totally changes the meaning), the name becomes a synonym for the whole of the Eukaryota, which is not the topic of this article (I note that the tree is already in Asgard, where it belongs). I'd also gently remind editors that we are writing for the general public, and s.l. a.k.a. i.bet.they.cant.make.head.nor.tail.of.this style is really not appropriate; but the main problem is that the added material is simply and frankly out of scope of this article. I'd simply have removed it as obviously and grossly WP:OOS but would prefer to do this with everyone's agreement if possible. Chiswick Chap (talk) 18:06, 4 May 2023 (UTC)

Discussing the sister taxa and ancestral should always be in scope. With the rest of the Eukaryotes emerging within the Excavata and metamonada case, this looks like it coincides with the Eukaryotes. Eukaryotes is not a "special" domain boundary anymore, beyond one should not dare to look. Jmv2009 (talk) 18:22, 4 May 2023 (UTC)

The meaning change is exactly commensurate with the realization that the rest emerged in them. There is then no other meaning left to "Excavata" and "metamonada", really (following cladistics). In this case we end up with junior and senior synonyms. There is actual biological meaning to the statement that animals belong to the metamonada, and that animals are in a group which is sister to one of them. Jmv2009 (talk) 18:27, 4 May 2023 (UTC)

Many thanks. Chiswick Chap (talk) 20:56, 4 May 2023 (UTC)

Um, since it "coincides" with the Eukaryotes, and the tree is already in Asgard, all the material is redundant here. Ancestral taxa can't just be taken as "in scope", or Hominids would be "in scope" for an article on Homo sapiens, as would Primates, as would Mammals, as would Vertebrates, as would Metazoa, as would Eukaryotes, in short every one of a million taxo-articles would have a tree of eukaryogenesis in scope. Of course not, the whole point is that each article discusses its own scope, and wikilinks related topics. You are completely correct that there is no meaning left to "Excavata", so we should not be wasting time building up this article: it should be a brief stub on a blind alley in taxonomic thought. We should never create Content Forks by writing stuff that belongs in the senior article in the junior synonym article. We should delete the Eukaryote tree now. Chiswick Chap (talk) 18:37, 4 May 2023 (UTC)

There is a useful distinction between the full ancestry and the immediate sister context that we should not gloss over. Jmv2009 (talk) 18:45, 4 May 2023 (UTC)

No objection to mentioning the sister context, but we should now remove the rest forthwith. Chiswick Chap (talk) 18:50, 4 May 2023 (UTC)

Ok, because biological groups are logically defined by exactly which ones in reality have not emerged within them (rather than e.g. which were historically erroneously excluded), and giving the sister is a very good proxy for that. I'll give it another succinct shot. Jmv2009 (talk) 19:19, 4 May 2023 (UTC)

Added the sister. There is no name for the clade Hodarchaeota-Eukaryota yet, but they appear to be part of the Heimdallarchaeia, which include the Heimdallarcheaota. Please note that Eme and Jewari are actually not in conflict. Jewari kind of arbitrarily chose the root between Archaea and Eukaryotes, which explains the difference in appearance. Jmv2009 (talk) 17:24, 6 May 2023 (UTC)

May require a very small tweak, but we mustn't repeat ourselves in one section after another. Actually, on reflection, the mentions of "metamonada" (in two different senses!) in "Phylogeny" is not good either; we don't want to confuse readers with two names for the Eukaryotes, and the "/metamonada s.l." is just a junior synonym which has no hope of adoption, while "within the traditional metamonada group" (before it was seen to be paraphyletic, I guess) is redundant verbiage to "as sister taxon to the Preaxostyla," which says concisely all that needs to be said about the relationship. I suggest we just remove both mentions from the section – they'll mean slightly less than nothing to all ordinary readers, while the taxonomically savvy will wonder why we want to keep saying "metamonada" in different senses all over the place. Chiswick Chap (talk) 17:25, 6 May 2023 (UTC)