Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates/Camouflage/archive1

Resolved comments from Cryptic C62

• There is a difference between language used in textbooks and language used in encyclopedias. "consider the Common Cuckoo, a brood parasite." is an example of the former. This should be avoided. *: done
• Avoid one- and two-sentences paragraphs, such as that which appears at the end of Mimesis and Eliminating shadow

  done

  Nope, not done. Check the Lying still, Transparency, and Fashion sections. --Cryptic C62 · Talk 19:10, 8 February 2013 (UTC)

  Lying still: have extended section with additional examples

  Transparency: merged paragraphs

  Fashion: merged paragraphs

• Why does the Crypsis section have a bulleted list of the subsections? This is redundant with the table of contents; the bulleted list simply takes up space.

  removed

• Decoration, keeping still, lying flat It doesn't make sense for this to be a section title, because these are three very different ideas. They should either be split into distinct sections, or the name of this section should be shortened to a single phrase which summarizes the overall idea (if one exists).

  sections split

• I see hyphens where there should be en dashes in the footnotes.

  done

• Why is an entire paragraph of the lead dedicated to non-camouflage material? None of this content appears in the body of the article, and it shouldn't, as it is not directly related to the topic.

  removed

• "as with young Giraffes" Why is "Giraffes" capitalized?

  lower case

• "zebra stripes include what Tim Caro calls" Who is this guy?

  clarified (zoologist reviewing the literature)

• It does not make sense to me that there so much content and so many images relating to military camouflage in the Mimesis and Crypsis sections when there is an entire top-level section dedicated to Military. I would think that a much more logical organization would be to strip Mimesis and Crypsis of military content, then place them under a heading called Biology or In nature.

  This is because these sections describe principles which apply to anything - living or not - that are to be camouflaged. We would need to refer back to them from the Military section if they were in a Biology section. An alternative would be to have Principles, Biology and Military sections, all three, but then what would we use as examples of Principles? It seems logical to me to explain the principles with real examples, grouping text, diagrams, and photographs together. The military history clearly does not fit into that scheme, which is why it is separate.

  As I see it, there are three plausible schemes:

  • Principles/Biology/Military
  • Biology/Military
  • Principles, in which each principle subsection discusses both Biology and Military applications

  Arguments could be made for all three, but the status quo does not work. It is simply nonsensical to have a top-level Military section without a top-level Biology section. Furthermore, I disagree with the suggestion that the Principles/Biology/Military scheme would make it impossible to give non-redundant examples in the Principles section. You proved it yourself when you made this image. Lastly, I have now realized that the organizational problems affect the History section as well. What criteria are you using to differentiate military material that belongs in the History section versus that which belongs in Development? It seems rather arbitrary to me. (As a side note, I don't mean to suggest that organizing an article like this is easy. It's not. We may never find a "perfect" scheme, but I believe that there are possibilities which are significantly better than that which exists now.) --Cryptic C62 · Talk 23:16, 12 February 2013 (UTC)

Thank you for the sympathy and the valuable suggestions, which are both very welcome.

:: I think we can readily rearrange the materials (there are plenty, text and images) to suit any of these schemes. The question is, which one. I am going for a long walk now to weigh the choices; will then perhaps make one or more prototypes (not sure). What I have made is a List of camouflage methods which shows some of the diversity of approaches that exist . This could be a stand-alone list. Chiswick Chap (talk) 10:30, 13 February 2013 (UTC)

Reorganisation

--- (in work, suggestions welcomed) ... (some hours later) OK, I've rearranged the article as

History (with 5 sections, Ancient times ... After 1945), merged from old 'History' and 'Military'; there was indeed some overlap, which I hope is now gone.

Principles (Mimesis, Crypsis with 11 sections), with just 3 mil images (actually one's basically a principle drawing), 9 zool images, and 4 diagrams. Hope that feels more balanced.

Civil applications (brief), not a great title but 'Phone masts, hunting' doesn't seem too good

Fashion, art, society (quite brief too), again could be retitled but it's clear enough

--- Have linked List of camouflage methods in a see also at the top of 'Principles': it's a table with examples of each method in land and sea animals, and in military, so this article doesn't have to deal with a lot of images.

--- I believe this works a lot better (and resolves the structural issues) but am too close to it to know.

• Reading through the new History section, I find myself wondering if it would be better to to have Biology and Military subsections to avoid having to switch back and forth between paragraphs. Perhaps Biology should come first, then Military can refer back to important people and examples as necessary. --Cryptic C62 · Talk 14:27, 15 February 2013 (UTC)

  Yes, why not. That's done now. There are connections between zoology and military cam, but they are quite subtle and inconclusive: it seems that Thayer, Kerr and Cott did make some difference but it was at best indirect. In the other direction, zoologists took on the name camouflage, and perhaps added interest, but there's little sign of any direct influence on research.

• I don't see any information about amateur game hunters employing camouflage. This is a fairly obvious application of the concept that is somewhat distinct from military usage.

  Thank you, excellent suggestion. New section on non-military camouflage, existing cellphone paragraph and new hunting paragraph.

• I don't see any information about camouflage in fiction. The concept has been explored extensively in science fiction films, books, and video games.

  Added an example from science fiction, another from literature. Please let me know if we should have more here; as in fashion, the list could become long.

• The examples given in the 19th century origins section highlight that the use of camouflage was unusual at the time, but they don't answer a much more significant question that the reader is likely to have: Was it effective?

  There is unsurprisingly little hard evidence. I have added a description and reference to a rare early study by Charles Hamilton Smith in 1800 of the effectiveness of different coloured uniforms.

• The Military section provides plenty of detail on the development of camouflage techniques, and the modern use of camouflaged equipment, but there is essentially no information provided on modern camouflage clothing or the techniques used to create it. I don't see any mention of "digital camouflage".

  added paragraph

• "During the late 1960s and early 1970s in the United States, anti-war protestors often ironically wore military clothing during demonstrations against the American involvement in the Vietnam War." Relevance?

  added mention of symbolic significance, moved sentence to connect with existing mention of symbolism

  What makes this a reliable source? If the claims presented there reflect the consensus of historians, why not use a journal article or book instead? --Cryptic C62 · Talk 23:16, 12 February 2013 (UTC)

  removed sentence. Canadian War Museum should be reliable but agree a book would be better.

• "In ancient Greece, Aristotle commented..." The question of when this observation was made is likely to be of interest to the reader.

  added Aristotle's dates. The publication date of his text is not known.

• The quotes at the beginning of the In zoology section are of questionable value. The first is a translation, not a direct quote, and as such is not any more useful than our own paraphrasing. The second, while elegantly composed, could easily be summarized in 15 words without losing any meaning.

  Well, the closer we can come to the actual words, the better. Darwin's own words are of interest for how he framed his argument - characteristically at length, and with many examples, working very gently towards a simple conclusion; and he precedes Poulton, Beddard, Thayer by over 30 years. Aristotle's original Greek could be quoted directly but I fear it would help very few readers. The translation gives a good idea of what he wrote - briefly, directly and with little detail. A paraphrase would not achieve this.

• If you do decide to keep the quotes, avoid easter egg links. It is not at all clear to me why "keeping that color" should link to genetics.

  removed wikilinks from quote. I can explain the reason for the links on my talk page if you're curious.

• This may not be an easy task, but were there any studies of animal camouflage done in the other civilizations of the ancient world? Everything here is from the post-1800s West. Chinese scholars began documenting nature a long time before that, and I wouldn't be surprised if there were earlier works from India or Persia. It may be worth checking out the Kitāb al-Hayawān.

  Other civilizations - that is a tough cookie. I'll give it a try, and it would of course be delightful to find something. However there is an obvious caution - I'd have expected anyone as well-read as Cott to have found anything that his fellow Cambridge scholars knew about in his time, so it would have to be a "recently-discovered" manuscript. And this would surely be a bonus, rather than an essential for the current FAC. Now, let's see what JSTOR has to offer.... OK, I've added a couple of early examples of hunting camouflage with refs. They seem few and far between.

  By the way, the Kitab is a translation from Aristotle, so it won't offer fresh insights.

  For ease of reviewing, could you point out where those early hunting examples have been added? --Cryptic C62 · Talk 14:40, 26 February 2013 (UTC)

  Yes, it's in the History, Military, Before 1800 section. It could be moved to a new History, Hunting section if that's felt to fit better, but apart from the existing sentence or two in Civil applications there isn't much to say about the history of hunting camouflage.

• "The presence of bold skin markings does not in itself prove that an animal relies on camouflage... when standing among trees and bushes their [Giraffes] camouflage is effective at even a few metres' distance." This paragraph is somewhat confusing to me. The second sentence seems to be a direct contradiction of the first; the idea presented in the first sentence is not substantiated until the very end of the paragraph.

  I've reworded the paragraph to flow better and to emphasize the to-and-fro of the argument between the 'camouflaged' and 'conspicuous adult' camps. There is good evidence for camouflage and hiding in giraffe calves, and for aggressive conspicuous behaviour in giraffe adults.

• The Self-decoration section does not adequately explain why such a technique is effective. Presumably the idea is that if a person or animal covers itself with a particular material, and then positions itself near or among that material, it will be more difficult to detect. Without the bit that I've highlighted here, it may not be clear to the reader why putting seaweed on a crab would make it harder to see.

  Have said explicitly "to hide by decorating themselves with materials ..." and "to break up their outlines and conceal the features of their bodies".

• The Lying still section does not present much new content, and the notion of why lying still would be considered a camouflage technique is not articulated well. All of the examples given show how the animal relies on other principles, and the leafy sea dragon example directly contradicts the title of the section. How does an animal lie still and sway like seaweed at the same time?

  The point of the section is that behaviour is a necessary additive to the other methods (not a thing that works on its own), so I've reworded it to say that more clearly. Avoiding looking like an animal in motion characterises all the entries in this section; both predators and prey have sensitive motion detection, which must be defeated for crypsis to be achieved. I've therefore renamed the section to 'Cryptic behaviour', added an introductory sentence to explain that movement catches the eye, and explicitly talked about combinations of behaviours and other methods of crypsis. Chiswick Chap (talk) 09:13, 25 February 2013 (UTC)

  I frequently employ cryptic behavior. --Cryptic C62 · Talk 14:40, 26 February 2013 (UTC)

• "The big blue octopus has been observed to change colour about 1000 times in an hour." This is a fun factoid, but it doesn't really enhance the reader's understanding of the subject. I think this paragraph could be fleshed out better, perhaps by explaining in more depth the mechanism by which chromatophores work.

  I've added a diagram of chromatophore action, and compared fish, frog, and octopus mechanisms.

• "Again, similar principles can be applied for military purposes." Avoid using phrasing that assumes the viewer has been reading the entire article from start to finish. If the reader jumps down to the Changing skin pattern section before reading anything else, the "again" here will be somewhat confusing.

  reworded sentence

• "making the countershaded animal nearly invisible against a matching background." There is some ambiguity as to what "a matching background" means here. The most literal interpretation is "a background which is also countershaded", but that seems unlikely.

  said "suitable" instead of "matching". The goal of countershading is to match a flat (single toned) background.

• "Countershading is widely used by terrestrial animals such as gazelles, snakes, lizards, amphibians, caterpillars and grasshoppers. It is common among marine animals including sharks, barracuda, herring, dolphin and sea snakes. Many birds are countershaded." Three sentences which state the same thing about three categories of animals. This chunk could easily be combined into a single sentence, with or without specific examples: "Countershading is widely used by terrestrial animals, such as gazelles and snakes; marine animals, such as sharks and dolphins; and birds, such as example and example."

  done as suggested.

• "Countershading is less often used for military camouflage, despite Second World War experiments that showed its effectiveness." Why?

  The WWII explanation is, briefly, that Cott failed to persuade the British authorities, Forbes pp. 146–150. The wider explanation is that camouflage as a whole has been supplanted (radar, aerial photography...); and at the risk of WP:OR, that countershading has been seen as a minor detail compared to the tasks of making equipment roughly match the colours of backgrounds, to have disrupted outlines, not to shine, and to get shadows more or less hidden. If one looks at photos of "camouflage" on Commons, etc, it's quite rare for all of these to be achieved at once. I've extended the Cott sentence to say "but despite his authority on the subject, failed to persuade the British authorities."

• "English zoologist Hugh Cott ... observed that soldiers viewed camouflage netting as "some kind of invisibility cloak: just throw it over the truck and now you don't see it", as Peter Forbes comments." So who said the invisibility thing, Cott or Forbes?

  Reworded. Have added a definite source, Barkas p. 36.

• "Counterillumination has rarely been used for military purposes." Why did this practice end after WWII?

  It never entered service, as radar became the main means of observing aircraft. Have said so.

• Is "mesogloea" the same thing as Mesoglea?

  Yes, it's the English spelling. Wikilink added.

• "This conveniently makes them buoyant, but it also makes them large for their muscle mass, so they cannot swim fast." Relevance to camouflage?

  Yes, it shows the price paid for the camouflage - it must be very useful to be worth having at such a price, that's the evolutionary trade-off. Have added "making this form of camouflage a costly trade-off with mobility."

• The following two sentences appear to contradict each other:
  • "Many marine animals that float near the surface are highly transparent"
  • "transparency is most effective in deeper waters"

  Not really. For transparency to work in shallower waters, it has to be highly complete; whereas even quite poor transparency works well in deeper waters. The facts and figures given in the section do explain this. Have changed second sentence to "transparency is more easily achieved in deeper waters." which may put the point across better.