Talk:Pular (volcano)

GA review

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.

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This review is transcluded from Talk:Pular (volcano)/GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

Nominator: Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk · contribs) 17:42, 7 January 2025 (UTC)

Reviewer: Vanamonde93 (talk · contribs) 16:52, 13 May 2025 (UTC)

I'll take this. Detailed comments in a day or two. Vanamonde93 (talk) 16:52, 13 May 2025 (UTC)

Checklist

GA review – see WP:WIAGA for criteria

1. Is it well written?

   A. The prose is clear and concise, and the spelling and grammar are correct:

   B. It complies with the manual of style guidelines for lead sections, layout, words to watch, fiction, and list incorporation:

   No issues

2. Is it verifiable with no original research?

   A. It contains a list of all references (sources of information), presented in accordance with the layout style guideline:

   B. All in-line citations are from reliable sources, including those for direct quotations, statistics, published opinion, counter-intuitive or controversial statements that are challenged or likely to be challenged, and contentious material relating to living persons—science-based articles should follow the scientific citation guidelines:

   All citations appear reliable

   C. It contains no original research:

   D. It contains no copyright violations nor plagiarism:

   Spotchecks are clear

3. Is it broad in its coverage?

   A. It addresses the main aspects of the topic:

   B. It stays focused on the topic without going into unnecessary detail (see summary style):

4. Is it neutral?

   It represents viewpoints fairly and without editorial bias, giving due weight to each:

5. Is it stable?

   It does not change significantly from day to day because of an ongoing edit war or content dispute:

   No issues with stability

6. Is it illustrated, if possible, by images?

   A. Images are tagged with their copyright status, and valid fair use rationales are provided for non-free content:

   Licensing checks out to the best of my abilities

   B. Images are relevant to the topic, and have suitable captions:

7. Overall:

   Pass or Fail:

Comments

• The word choice with respect to naming this massif is sometimes confusing. The article is titled "Pular", but then sometimes refers to its subject as "Pular-Pajonales", "Pular and Pajonales", and once as "Cordon Pular". More consistency would be helpful to the reader.

  I must confess that myself I am not sure how people delineate between the two volcanoes. Or if they are the same volcano. That said, most sauces discuss it as one so that's what I went with. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 08:57, 16 May 2025 (UTC)

• The lead has very little geographic information for the layperson. I would suggest inserting "in the Northern Chilean Andes, in the region of Antofagasta", or equivalent

  Expanded a little. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 08:57, 16 May 2025 (UTC)

  Better, but it is entirely normal within geography articles to include sub-national jurisdiction - I strongly suggest doing that, in the lead and body

  Added. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 08:51, 17 May 2025 (UTC)

• "northwest of the frontier with Argentina." this is a very confusing description - the frontier is 5000km long; essentially all of Chile is northwest of some part of the frontier.

  Rewritten. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 08:57, 16 May 2025 (UTC)

• The article would benefit greatly from glossing a number of its technical terms, or non-technical terms that the reader is unfamiliar with: Kunza language, Salar de Pular, Salar de Atacama, equilibrium line altitude, a few others in the geology section.

  Linked a few, are there any others? Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 08:57, 16 May 2025 (UTC)

  The links are good but there are instances where they aren't sufficient, in my view. Obviously a full technical explanation is out of scope - but a reader has no idea what a Salar is, or that Kunza is an indigenous language, what Aracar is. Equilibrium line altitude links to "glaciology", where a reader would need to scroll down for an unsourced and quite technical description. In each case just a couple of words of explanation would go a long way.

  On these I must disagree - Salar here is a placename and Aracar is already mentioned as a volcano. Added a parens about ELA. I confess that I am not so great at spotting others that need explanation, though. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 08:51, 17 May 2025 (UTC)

  Is "Salar" not a prefix used for a salt flat? And "Aracar" is mentioned, but not explicitly as a mountain even - but those two points are minor and not GA-level. The remaining technical ones I'd suggest doing something about are: "perennial ice" (I assume this means "year-round" in the scientific sense, rather than "all the time" in the colloquial); "insolation" (our article title of "solar irradiance" should do it there)

  Actually, I just realized that you were talking about a different mention of Aracar, and one that was unclear; fixed it. Salar is part of proper names, like Owens Lake. Explained these other two terms. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 07:26, 18 May 2025 (UTC)

  Yes, but the "Lake" in Owens Lake is English, and "Salar" is not...

  I get it, but I still don't see a reason to gloss a placename. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 08:24, 20 May 2025 (UTC)

  At the GA level I will let this slide. Vanamonde93 (talk) 16:43, 20 May 2025 (UTC)

• "Monturaqui" is referred to before it is introduced

  Fixed. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 08:57, 16 May 2025 (UTC)

• Similarly, a few other terms are linked at second or third usage - links should be at first use, in general

  Got some. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 08:57, 16 May 2025 (UTC)

• The usage of the conversion template renders "The massif consists of a 12 kilometres (7.5 mi) long" ungrammatical - should be 12 kilometer-long - can you find a way to adjust?

  Done. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 08:57, 16 May 2025 (UTC)

• "which shares the name with a 5,732 metres (18,806 ft) high peak on the western side of the ridge" unclear if this means there are two volcanoes named Pajonales in the same massif, or if you are referring to something else altogether.

  There are two peaks with the same name in this volcano system. I rewrote this a bit, but oh joy. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 08:57, 16 May 2025 (UTC)

• "younger unit consisting of 0.8–1 kilometre (0.50–0.62 mi)" height would usually be expressed in meters/yards, is there a reason to do km here?

  Thick enough to work in kilometres. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 08:57, 16 May 2025 (UTC)

  In an article where volcanoes of 6 km are described in meters, it's very jarring. I cannot compel this change at the GA level however.

  Did it anyway. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 08:51, 17 May 2025 (UTC)

• Sentence beginning "Other volcanoes in the area..." uses short hand that I don't think is ideal: should be "Tanque to the east-northeast" etc.

  Done. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 08:57, 16 May 2025 (UTC)

• You switch between using the singular "volcano" and plural "volcanoes" for the subject of the article, perpetuating the confusion above.

  Standardized a bit. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 08:57, 16 May 2025 (UTC)

• " it would be the highest eruption during the 20th century if it actually took place" future tense is odd here - also, what is meant by "highest"?

  Yeah, unconfirmed eruption which may be supported by later research. "Highest" in the sense of highest vent altitude, I am not sure how to formulate this. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 08:57, 16 May 2025 (UTC)

  No I understand what you're trying to say, but the grammar is off. "...if confirmed to have taken place, it would have been..." or equivalent is what you need. For "highest", suggest explaining it how you do here. I confess my first thought was the height to which things were ejected.

  Done. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 08:51, 17 May 2025 (UTC)

• Some sources are using all caps, suggest sentence- or title-case for all, though I suppose it's not strictly a GA-level issue

  Done. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 08:57, 16 May 2025 (UTC)

• Commons has a few images besides the one in the article; one more would be nice. this, perhaps?

  Added. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 08:57, 16 May 2025 (UTC)

• "while herds of animals roam its lower sides" this is vague. What animals? At this elevation only Lama would form herds, yes?

  Specified. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 08:57, 16 May 2025 (UTC)

• What do the giant lakes have to do with this article?

  It's one of the few mountains there where glaciation has been investigated in detail, and the giant lakes are the main glacial era feature there. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 08:57, 16 May 2025 (UTC)

  If those lakes are geographically adjacent to Pular, that isn't clear at all - if they are a generic product of glaciation, then this information seems extraneous.

  Explained a bit. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 08:51, 17 May 2025 (UTC)

  I still don't get this...what is the connection to Pular? Atmospheric conditions changed, creating giant lakes in the Altiplano (such as), and growing glaciers. None of this is Pular-specific: the lakes are in Bolivia, 300 km away...

  Climate variability patterns in the region work on much larger scales than 300km and lack of precipitation is a main brake on glacier development. Glacier fluctuations are typically correlated to paleolakes because paleolakes are the main piece of evidence of former climate variability there. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 08:24, 20 May 2025 (UTC)

  None of that demonstrates relevance to this article - indeed, if as you say climate variability in the region occ

  Removed it, but I think you accidentally a word. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 07:07, 21 May 2025 (UTC)

  Yes I suspect I had the review open in two tabs and saved the wrong one. I think what I was trying to say was that if it's only relevant in the sense of the climatic history of the region as a whole, then inclusion is borderline but if included it needs to be presented as the climatic history of the region. Removal is also okay.

• Incidentally, why does the article use both "Inca" and "Inka"?

  Fixed. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 08:24, 20 May 2025 (UTC)

Spotchecks

• Fn 20: material is okay, assuming page numbers are different on the arXiv version, where it is on page 2

  I used the Wiley version, specifically. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 07:26, 18 May 2025 (UTC)

• Fn 36: checks out, page numbers as above
• Fn 3a: checks out
• Fn 3b: checks out, but this is a great example of why "Kunza language" would be better as "the Kunza language of the indigenous Atacama people", because the source doesn't say Kunza, it says Atacamemian

  FWIW, Kunza language says it's also known as Atacameno. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 07:26, 18 May 2025 (UTC)

• Fn 15: checks out in essence.
• Fn 29: struggling to verify this: it doesn't mention "Salar de Pular" at all: I see discussion of a scar on Aracar, but if that's what this sentence refers to, I think it's best simply omitted.

  Hmm, p8 for me is Fig5. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 07:26, 18 May 2025 (UTC)

  I was checking the entire text, with the online version - I don't see that the figure helps.

  Yeah, only looking at the text and not checking the figures (5b in this case) of the pages given can miss things. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 08:24, 20 May 2025 (UTC)

  "I don't think the figure helps", meaning "I don't see how the figure verifies the text as written, please explain".

  That map shows the volcanoes around Pular and Socompa, including Pular which has the centre-left red outline of a collapse scar. Spanning the border and right-below of that is the debris avalanche deposit, presumably from Pular. Just below the image centre is Aracar volcano, with its own red collapse scar and debris avalanche deposit. This is one of these images that require cross-referencing with a map ... actually, I am not sure that it is acceptable. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 07:07, 21 May 2025 (UTC)

  I think needing to cross-reference two maps for a conclusion is too much with respect to WP:V, and also an analytical claim like "may have caused..." is not something we should make from a map. But If there are observations from this map that are obvious, per WP:CALC it would be fine to include them. My difficulty with that map is that the relationship between the labels and the visible features isn't clear at all. But that's not your responsibility to fix, obviously. Once you prune this sentence down to what is obvious from this map I will pass this.

  So, from all this distracting sore throat I didn't notice that there is a label (Pular) there, but it's ambiguous whether it refers to the deposit, the volcano, or both. Page 15 does draw a possible connection to Pular, but is again ambiguous about which deposit. Dear, this paper is pretty heavily reliant on image interpretation to make its points. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 08:18, 22 May 2025 (UTC)

  Added another source to this claim. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 08:26, 22 May 2025 (UTC)

• Fn 30: checks out
• Fn 37: am I correct in thinking the sentence you're relying on is "The most recent records of volcanic debris avalanches are probably related to Pleistocene (Pular, Negro de Chorrillos, Cueros de Purulla)"? If so I think "The debris avalanche occurred during the Pleistocene." is a little too definitive: I would suggest "estimated to have" or "thought to have"

  Yes, thus fixed accordingly. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 08:24, 20 May 2025 (UTC)

• Fn 40: "If confirmed to have taken place, it would have been the eruption with the highest vent altitude during the 20th century" is too much of a stretch from this source, which doesn't discuss the uncertainty at all, only offering the height. The source also only says "The highest volcano active"; why the "vent height" qualifier? I think we can't say anything about needing confirmation in wiki-voice, not without a better source.

  I don't remember why but I suspect it was because of Ojos del Salado. Or because in a discussion of sulfur emissions, vent altitude matters and not all volcanoes have their vents at the summit. Anyhow, took it out. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 08:24, 20 May 2025 (UTC)

• This is a pass at the GA level once the above are addressed: if you go to FAC though I might want more spotchecks. There aren't serious issues, but I think you would need to better finesse some of the uncertainties and contradictions in the sources.
• Close paraphrasing spotchecks are clear.

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.