Talk:Climate change in Puerto Rico

Student project Uppsala University

Hello! We are students from Uppsala University in Sweden and are taking a course in Ecological Effects of Climate Change. Within the next two months we are going to update this page and fill it with more information. Ricarda L (talk) 16:27, 3 April 2023 (UTC)

@Ricarda L

If you act today or tomorrow you may be able to get on “Did you know”.

Use the blue button in Template talk:Did you know before the time limit Chidgk1 (talk) 09:06, 23 May 2023 (UTC)

Hoping one of you guys will take over the below Chidgk1 (talk) 14:38, 24 May 2023 (UTC)

Did you know nomination

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The result was: withdrawn by nominator, closed by Sojourner in the earth (talk) 16:09, 10 July 2023 (UTC)

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• Comment or view
• Article history

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• ... that climate change in Puerto Rico is damaging coral reefs? Source: will add source if reviewer likes hook
  • Reviewed: Template:Did you know nominations/Khalwa (school)
  • Comment: Nominated so as not to miss deadline but hoping one of the authors will take over as nominator because I don’t enjoy doing QPQ

5x expanded by Hahaohmyhsin (talk) and ClimateTG (talk). Nominated by Chidgk1 (talk) at 14:36, 24 May 2023 (UTC). Post-promotion hook changes for this nom will be logged at Template talk:Did you know nominations/Climate change in Puerto Rico; consider watching this nomination, if it is successful, until the hook appears on the Main Page.

• Comment - hook is interesting, just needs a source. Bneu2013 (talk) 18:07, 22 June 2023 (UTC)
  • Update - sorry for the delay. Looks good. Bneu2013 (talk) 10:58, 28 June 2023 (UTC)

General: Article is new enough and long enough
New enough: Long enough:

Policy: Article is sourced, neutral, and free of copyright problems
Adequate sourcing: Neutral: Free of copyright violations, plagiarism, and close paraphrasing:

Hook: Hook has been verified by provided inline citation
Cited: Interesting:

QPQ: None required.

Overall: @Chidgk1: Bneu2013 (talk) 11:10, 28 June 2023 (UTC)

Articles written for student assignments often turn out to be problematic, so I checked this out and immediately found a major problem in the first paragraph. Before the rewrite, this passage read:

The United States Environmental Protection Agency reports: "Puerto Rico's climate is changing. The Commonwealth has warmed by more than one degree (F) since the mid 20th century, and the surrounding waters have warmed by nearly two degrees since 1901. The sea is rising about an inch every 15 years, and heavy rainstorms are becoming more severe. In the coming decades, rising temperatures are likely to increase storm damages, significantly harm coral reefs, and increase the frequency of unpleasantly hot days". A 2019 report stated that Puerto Rico "is affected by climate change more than anywhere else in the world".

Now it reads as follows:

A wide range of effects of climate change are currently being felt in Puerto Rico. According to the US Environmental Protection Agency, it is more affected by climate change than any other country in the world.

The wrong footnote has been attached to the part about Puerto Rico being more affected than any other country, and the claim is now falsely attributed to the EPA. These mistakes are duplicated in the article body, where the claim has already been tagged as failing verification. Given that the very first paragraph I checked contained a major error, I think this article needs thoroughly going over before it can be featured on the main page. I'll try to spend some time on this tonight (and fix the above error if no-one else gets to it first); just commenting here so the nom doesn't get promoted in the meantime. Sojourner in the earth (talk) 11:38, 4 July 2023 (UTC)

@Chidgk1 and Bneu2013: I started working on this article but quickly came across some serious close paraphrasing problems (see the talk page). I'm not inclined to spend any more time on this since the article may end up being reverted back to its pre-expansion state. Together with the factual errors, the various inline tags, and the need of heavy copyediting, there's unfortunately no chance that this article will be eligible for DYK any time soon. Sojourner in the earth (talk) 15:36, 5 July 2023 (UTC)

Hello @Bneu2013 and Sojourner in the earth: Sorry I have not been able to do anything on this for a while as I am travelling and it is very difficult to edit just with a mobile phone and intermittent internet. Today and on various days over the next couple of weeks I have a proper keyboard and stable internet. Is there any chance you could allow me some time to make serious improvements to this article? Chidgk1 (talk) 07:24, 6 July 2023 (UTC)

For myself I've no objection, but the purpose of DYK is to highlight new content, and I believe there's a general opinion that noms should be rejected if they aren't likely to be eligible within a reasonable timeframe. I'll ask at WT:DYK for further input. Sojourner in the earth (talk) 09:15, 6 July 2023 (UTC)

An extension of a few weeks seems very generous at best and seems unfair to other articles. I'd recommend closing the nomination unfortunately if the issues can't be addressed within the next few days. Narutolovehinata5 (talk · contributions) 12:40, 8 July 2023 (UTC)

OK I hope to have some time on Monday so if it is not good enough by Tuesday feel free to close. Chidgk1 (talk) 15:33, 8 July 2023 (UTC)

I have made a few edits - over to you guys to decide whether they are enough or not - I will not complain whatever you decide Chidgk1 (talk) 09:14, 10 July 2023 (UTC)

I'm closing this as withdrawn per Chidgk1's comment here. Sojourner in the earth (talk) 16:09, 10 July 2023 (UTC)

References

Do we need the “Ocean acidification” section?

It does not seem to be specific to Puerto Rico. Maybe some specific info can be found? Chidgk1 (talk) 16:55, 24 May 2023 (UTC)

Close paraphrasing

This article contains a substantial amount of close paraphrasing. For example:

• Article: Coral reefs help to establish and protect productive seagrass beds and mangrove forests and provide habitat, refuge, and resources for millions of species, including many that are commercially important. In addition, the reefs serve to protect the coastline and provide space for research, recreation and education.
  • Source (p. 54): Coral reefs aid in the establishment and protection of productive seagrass beds and mangrove forests and provide habitat, refuge, and resources to millions of species, including many that are commercially important ... Reefs provide protection to coastlines, and areas for research, recreation, and education.

Another example:

• Article: Since 1995, the North Atlantic area has experienced an increase in hurricane activity. However, this increase cannot be fully explained by human-induced climate change, but may also be influenced by natural variations. In general, it is difficult to predict future hurricane activity, especially on a regional scale, due to uncertainties in modelling parameters. However, many studies suggest that hurricanes worldwide will become less frequent but more intense, with higher wind speeds and heavier rainfall, resulting in greater destructive power.
  • Source (p. 3): Since 1995, however, hurricane activity has increased. This increase in hurricane activity cannot be entirely attributed to anthropogenic climate change and may also be a result of natural variability. Projections of future hurricane activity are difficult to make, especially on regional scales, due to uncertainties in modelling parameters. However, various studies predict a decrease in frequency, but increase in intensity of hurricanes on a global scale. Thus, hurricanes will have greater wind speeds and heavier precipitation, and therefore greater destructive power.

Bear in mind that slight rewordings of the text (such as replacing "anthropogenic" with "human-induced", or "precipitation" with "rainfall") are not sufficient; copyright law extends not only to exact words but also to the presentation of ideas. Here's another example which changes many of the words used in the source but presents its ideas in the same order; this is still plagiarism.

• Article: In Puerto Rico, there are bioluminescent bays and lagoon ecosystems. In these rare ecosystems, bioluminescent algae gather and emit light. Because of the small, narrow embayments to the sea, water lingers longer in the bays and large populations of algae develop. Factors such as water circulation patterns and wind can also contribute to maintaining high species diversity in these ecosystems.
  • Source (p. 53): Bioluminescent bays and lagoons in Puerto Rico are unique, rare ecosystems where the accumulation and retention of bioluminescent dinoflagellates result in the display of light. Most bioluminescent systems are small, shallow (average depth: approximately 3.5 m), and with narrow inlets to the sea (approximately 100 – 150 m wide), leading to long water residence times and abundant populations of dinoflagellates. Other factors, such as wind and water circulation patterns, may be important for maintaining high abundances of species within these ecosystems.

I haven't surveyed the whole article but I've already come across at least a dozen examples of close paraphrasing or outright copying. The article will likely need a heavy rewrite to address this issue. Sojourner in the earth (talk) 15:26, 5 July 2023 (UTC)

@Bneu2013 - I have deleted these - did you use Earwig or any similar tool as part of your DYK review and if so did it detect any more? Chidgk1 (talk) 17:35, 9 July 2023 (UTC)

@Sojourner in the earth I ran Earwig's Copyvio Detector (copyvios.toolforge.org) and have now deleted all the copyvio I have been able to find. Over to you and @Bneu2013 to decide what to do now. Chidgk1 (talk) 09:12, 10 July 2023 (UTC)

I apologize, but I was trying to do a QPQ, yet was unfamiliar with this process. I apologize for the mishaps. Bneu2013 (talk) 09:44, 10 July 2023 (UTC)

Earwig only detects exact matches, not close paraphrasing. I think it also doesn't include PDFs, embedded content or paywalled content in its search. It probably wouldn't have caught any of the examples I gave above. I'm afraid the only way to be sure there is no more close paraphrasing is to manually check each sentence against its source, or to totally rewrite the article from scratch. This is why I said fixing these problems would require a substantial amount of work. Sojourner in the earth (talk) 09:46, 10 July 2023 (UTC)

I see - thanks for explaining Earwig limitations. I hope someone will eventually write a tool which will be able to check for close paraphrasing. Meanwhile I don't want to spend the time manually checking or rewriting everything so you had better close this DYK I guess. Chidgk1 (talk) 13:48, 10 July 2023 (UTC)