Talk:American Anthropometric Society

American Anthropometric Society has been listed as one of the Natural sciences good articles under the good article criteria. If you can improve it further, please do so. If it no longer meets these criteria, you can reassess it.
Review: January 6, 2024. (Reviewed version).

A fact from American Anthropometric Society appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page in the Did you know column on 1 February 2024 (check views). The text of the entry was as follows:

Did you know... that Walt Whitman's brain was donated to the American Anthropometric Society but was accidently destroyed?

A record of the entry may be seen at Wikipedia:Recent additions/2024/February. The nomination discussion and review may be seen at Template:Did you know nominations/American Anthropometric Society.

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Untitled

This article was translated in part from the corresponding article in the Polish Wikipedia. Eastmain (talk • contribs) 23:04, 11 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

GA Review

Passed. Chiswick Chap (talk) 14:23, 6 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

This review is transcluded from Talk:American Anthropometric Society/GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

Reviewer: Chiswick Chap (talk · contribs) 19:22, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Comments

The article is remarkably improved from its stubby state for many years, good work!

Lead

Admirably clear, good writing.

History

Wikilink pseudoscience.
- done Dwkaminski (talk) 14:01, 6 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

"Dercum, however, pathologist" -> "Dercum. Pathologist"
- made change Dwkaminski (talk) 14:09, 6 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

"the society contained" " the society possessed"
- made change Dwkaminski (talk) 14:12, 6 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

"approximately 50" and "only two dozen" don't tally. Needs a word of explanation.
- added copy that the approximately 50 brains of non-eminent persons were not transferred to the Wistar Institute. Dwkaminski (talk) 14:12, 6 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Analysis of brains

Edward Anthony Spitzka, M.D., professor of anatomy at Jefferson Medical College, published a paper on his study of six brains - please drop the glosses, they aren't helpful to the reader. Suggest "Edward A. Spitzka published a paper on six brains" is all that's needed here.
- made change Dwkaminski (talk) 14:03, 6 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

In Spitzka's analysis: this comes across as gossip (leaving aside how the numbers add up, or don't). Suggest we drop this.
- dropped comments about number of damaged brains Dwkaminski (talk) 14:03, 6 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

"Spitzka claimed in his analysis" -> "Spitzka claimed".
- made change Dwkaminski (talk) 14:03, 6 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

"They observed no significant differences in his brain" - differences from what?
- Changed to "they observed no unusual characteristics in the surface of his brain" and "no significant differences were observed between his brain and those of less eminent persons" Dwkaminski (talk) 14:27, 6 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

"but not much else." -> ", or of anything else of significance." (or something of that sort).
- changed to "but nothing else of scientific interest" Dwkaminski (talk) 14:03, 6 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Walt Whitman's brain

This section stands out as a bit of fun, a bit of gossip, and I'm afraid a bit of a WP:COATRACK, a diversion which might be somewhat relevant to Walt Whitman (but gossipy even there), and somewhat more, perhaps to Frankenstein (1931 film), but not very much to this article. I suggest we cut it down to a single short paragraph within the 'Analysis of brains' section; the current section occupies about a third of the main text (not counting lead and refs), which is clearly WP:UNDUE in this context, a serious institution.
- deleted Walt Whitman's brain section - moved one paragraph to Analysis of brains section under the discussion of Spitzka's paper Dwkaminski (talk) 14:04, 6 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Notable donors

Allen, Donaldson, Leidy, and Osler are uncited.
- added references for all notable donors listed Dwkaminski (talk) 14:19, 6 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

References

Stanley Finger is listed as a source but is not the source of anything in the article. Use it or remove it?
- Removed Finger source Dwkaminski (talk) 14:07, 6 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

All the sources are clearly relevant and verify the claims made of them.

Images

The only image is of the Wistar institute, from Commons. It seems to be a valid user-created CC-by-SA image.

Summary

Well, that's about it from me, just a few comments which I hope will be quick to fix. Good work and I look forward to seeing this at GA soon. It would be helpful if you could mark "Done" or something after each item so I can see when you feel you've addressed the comments. Chiswick Chap (talk) 20:52, 5 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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: promoted by DirtyHarry991 talk 10:50, 27 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

(

Comment or view
Article history

)

... that Walt Whitman's brain was donated to the American Anthropometric Society but was accidently destroyed? Source: ""The brain of Walt Whitman, together with the jar in which it was placed, was said to have been dropped on the floor by a careless assistant. Unfortunately, not even the pieces were saved." (Reference: Spitzka page 176) However, in his personal diary sometime between 1891 and 1893, Henry Ware Cattell confessed to accidentally allowing Whitman's brain to decompose during the preservation process by "not having the jar properly covered". (Reference: Gosline page 160)
- ALT1: ... that members of the American Anthropometric Society agreed to donate their brains after their deaths for studies to correlate intelligence with brain size? Source: Members agreed to donate their brains after their deaths for analysis by living members of the organization in order to correlate intelligence and other mental qualities with brain morphology. (Reference: Wright)
- ALT2: ... that twenty-two brains from the American Anthropometric Society are currently stored at the Wistar Institute in Philadelphia? Source: Twenty-two brains from the collection are currently stored at the Wistar Institute in Philadelphia.(Reference: Burrell page 124)
- Reviewed: Winsted Citizen

Improved to Good Article status by Dwkaminski (talk). Self-nominated at 14:52, 6 January 2024 (UTC). Post-promotion hook changes for this nom will be logged at Template talk:Did you know nominations/American Anthropometric Society; consider watching this nomination, if it is successful, until the hook appears on the Main Page.[reply]

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: Done.

Overall:

I only did a spot check on the copyvio aspect given the more thorough GA review, and didn't find any issues in the sources I looked at. The first hook is very interesting and I'd suggest using that over the others. — Wug·a·po·des 03:46, 15 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]