h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Entry: Cnidaria - A3406150
Author: Scandrea & Tracer- Dreaming for another two years - U186740

Anything I've missed? What wasn't in the entry from the Flea Market, I got out of my paleontology book, so it's going to be preservation-heavy.

* in waving a notepad and now scouting for you*

protien>>protein

distingueshed>>distinguished

lengtth>>length

primarilly>>primarily

wibbly!!!??

types of plant but in fact they >>comma between plant and but

Cnidaria evolved a long time ago, the oldest known fossils of Cnidaria date from around 680 million years ago. Before then little is known of their evolutionary history. >> Evolved from what to what? Sounds a bit like they popped into being or something.

hard parts, like bones, which >> Snigger...you can't write that!!! Perhaps something more technical?

The cnidaria are>> throughout the article needs to be "is" and talked about as a singular

effectiveness in this task>> at this task

Their bodies are radially >> just another example of needing to talk in the singular

exhibit two adult shapes; polyps and medusae. >> You haven't talked to us about how the shapes differ! I mean I haven't got a clue what either might be.

is exclusively found in marine >> split infinitive. "is found exclusively..."

What medical attention is needed from a jelly fish sting? I once saw on "Friends" that urine was good for it...true?

evolutionary distant or physically distant >> what's the difference between those two?

Coral reefs are obviously important for many species >> Well I know why but it might be nice to put a quick "why" because if you happen not to know you're going to feel pretty dumb.

If the temperature changes by sometimes as little as a few degrees >> water temp or general temp or what?

unfortunately on the up >> too colloquial? I think I'm being picky now actually.

I think that generally there needs to be more indepth information about each point. Much of this is already assuming that you have some idea about the things addressed and coming from a complete beginner's view, I don't understand a lot of what has been said, not because of the way it is set out, but that there is too little information about things that appear to be important to the article.




Having said all of this criticism I have to say that I'm really looking forward to this article coming to fruition. It's a good start about something that I had not previously given much consideration to. It's nicely written, technical whilst remaining friendly, and I am interested in more information...in a sort of "yeah well it's a bit sad but I'm going to quietly read about this anyway" sort of way


Katkat

Hi Kat,

I made a few of the reccomended changes, but I feel that I need to defend the article as it stands in other ways.

1)What's wrong with the word wibbly to describe jellyfish? It was made for that sort of thing!

2)Read the evolution paragraph a little more carefully. I said little is known of their evolutionary history because they don't have hard parts that fossilize.

3)Why can't I say they don't have hard parts?

4)When I say Cnidaria, I'm talking about the organisms in the class Cnidaria. It's plural. Trust me.

And some of this stuff is already in the Guide. I just have to link it!

"The donkey has a rough coat with large ears and a stubborn disposition"



It's not that you can't say they don't have hard parts I just thought there might be a more technical posh way of saying it...

Err...

Well, if I tried, then no one without a paleontology background would be able to understand it.

Oh the donkey was an example of using the singular to talk about a mass of creatures.

This is a good point. Would it be easier to just say they don't have skeletons? or is that not what it actually is?

Well, the thing is, things that fossilize aren't always skeletons- arthropod exoskeletons get preserved, and so do shells, and neither is made of bone. Hard parts is a better term.

And another thing- A donkey is a singular animal. Here's my logic:

Cnidaria- a group of animals with nematocysts
Cnidarian- an animal with nematocysts
Cnidarians- a group of individual animals with nematocysts

Cnidaria- a group of animals with nematocysts

Cnidarians- a group of individual animals with nematocysts

What's the difference?

OK- I'm back from my literature review, and it seems that Cnidarians is the correct term, so I went through and changed it. *grumble grumble* pedants *grumble*

But I'm really glad I did that, because apparently I missed a whole class of Cnidaria! And I put Portuguese Man O'War in the wrong class!

Go back through, and let me know what you think!

Ref use of the term 'hard parts': Well, I've just been teaching about fossils today to a GCSE class, and the text books mostly all refer to 'hard parts'.

Oh okay then Seeing as I know nothing on the subject I'm just chucking random things out.

sessile>>can I have a footnote telling me what it means? Possibly I just don't read the dictionary enough. Yes I looked it up

Also....oooh pedantic me is really coming out here! Your coding is in lower-case a lot. Could you put it in upper? Just for...neatness and then your Sub won't have to do it

Gave a definition of sessile in the sentence- spends its whole life rooted to one spot.

And will change those others ASAP

I think this suffers from too many Latin and technical terms, and not enough common names that people will recognise. The Cnidarians includes quite a few types of animal that most people will know: the Jellyfish, the Anemone, the Coral, the Portuguese Man-Of-War etc. You need to talk about these and bring them out where people can see them.

Can you be a bit more specific on how I can do that?

I could write another article on coral alone!

Uhh probably just make them more obvious by using the layman term and then the latin in brackets? Perhaps refer to more things that the average person might know about so they can go "oh yeah that thing" and then find out the more technical stuff? I don't know.

Wot I done:

- Went into much more depth about nematocysts, how they work, and why Cnidarians have them.

-Went into a little more about the soft parts, and how they are.

-Added a bit on alternation of generations.

Wot I'm doing now:

-Adding a little more on each class and subclass. I still don't think I can do corals justice here...

And sorry, but the only way I can see going about this in a manner that makes sense is to use the Latin names for the classes and subclasses. I'm trying to make it a little more user-friendly, so any advice you can give me will help a lot!

It's a great entry, Scandrea, but I think it still needs some work to make it clearer. I'll try and have a detailed look through it later and make suggestions.

OK. Here are some suggested changes.

Simplifying:

The part that needs to be simplified is the section entitled "Phylogenetics". For a start that title will have to go. You should say something like "Types Of Cnidarians".

Only one of the subheaders has "Class" at the start. They all should have. I think, and this is debatable, that each Class header should include a few typical members:

Class Anthozoa - Corals and Anemones
Class Scyphozoa - Jellyfish
Class Hydrozoa - Portuguese Men Of War
Class Cubozoa - Box Jellies

If you did that, if would bring these examples to mind, and you wouldn't have to make any changes to the individual paragraphs.

General Comments on Content:

"In some species of colonial Cnidarians, individual polyps will specialize for roles such as food gathering, defence or sexual reproduction. This is known as polymorphism."

There's a lot more that could be said on cnidarian colonies. But if you don't want to write a section on colonies, that's OK.

"This alteration of generations is unique to Cnidarians, although not all follow this pattern."

I believe that some types of insect do it as well. You could say "virtually unique".


Here are some of the picky details:

alteration of generations --> alternation of generations
Use a small 'c' for cnidarians except in the obvious places such as at the start of sentences.
Put commas in numbers, such as 9,000 rather than 9000.
Use 'single quotes' instead of "double quotes".
convergant --> convergent
Add a full stop after "most often fossilized".
distingueshed --> distinguished
when the succumbed --> when they succumbed
primarilly --> primarily


The following changes will make sentences read better:

dating back to the Middle Cambrian. -- provide a date please.

which are easily preserved in rocks --> which would be easily preserved in rocks

a nerve impulse from the animal tells --> when a nerve impulse from the animal tells

jellyfish, Portuguese Man O' War, fire coral --> jellyfish, Portuguese Men O' War, fire coral

must go out the way it came --> must go out the way it came in

Tabulata: This colonial coral --> Tabulata: This extinct colonial coral

Scleractinia: This is the only surviving Order of Zoantharia --> Scleractinia: This is the type of coral that builds coral reefs and is the only surviving Order of Zoantharia

"The lucky turtles receive help from conservationists who remove the indigestible bags. The unlucky ones often die as their digestive systems become clogged."
-->
"A small number of lucky turtles receive help from conservationists who remove the indigestible bags. Most are unlucky, however, and they often die as their digestive systems become clogged."

about this ancient phylum --> about the ancient phylum of cnidarians (this change is necessary because in the previous sentence you were talking about turtles).

G

Are you still around, Scandrea?

Yes I am! I'm still working on this, though I've been pretty busy over the past month with a RL research project of mine! I'll get back to it as soon as a few fires get put out here!