# Talk:Fish

Currently the first sentence is:
"A fish is an aquatic, anamniotic, gill-bearing vertebrate animal with swimming fins and a hard skull, but lacking limbs with digits."
However, later on it says that fish contain all tetrapods, which are mostly not aquatic and gill-bearing. 97.113.253.255 (talk) 19:16, 6 October 2025 (UTC)

I think the article says it quite clearly and accurately: "Despite the cladistic lineage, tetrapods are usually not considered fish." Vpab15 (talk) 19:34, 6 October 2025 (UTC)
Yes. Further, the lead must be a simple summary, and a fortiori its start is no place for clever complexity or exceptions. Chiswick Chap (talk) 00:23, 7 October 2025 (UTC)
Hagfish do not have fins but are still fish so perhaps that characteristic should be removed from the list. ~2025-33080-83 (talk) 17:06, 12 November 2025 (UTC)
Thanks but that is missing the point I made just above, which is that the lead, *especially its first sentence*, is designed to be an easy and gentle lead into the article. It is always and necessarily a simplification, as it is impossible to put all the clever details and complicated exceptions-to-exceptions in weird minor groups back in the Miocene at odd-numbered weekends into the very first sentence of the article, hope this is clear to everyone. Chiswick Chap (talk) 17:13, 12 November 2025 (UTC)

Most articles on diverse animal groups have a gallery instead of a single example as a picture in the infobox. Given the diversity of fishes, I'd be happy to try and make one. cyclopiaspeak! 09:02, 7 October 2025 (UTC)

Much opposed; and those other groups should not have a gallery either: it's nearly always facile and frequently unreadable into the bargain. The infobox's job is to present a small and immediate summary of the lead. It must be short. A composite image, itself a thumbnail, presents even tinier images, basically unreadable on any small device; while a gallery up there is simply misplaced: it isn't the infobox's job to try to say everything (even less than the lead, which is meant as a short summary). In this article's case, the task is further complicated by the question of what diversity in fishes might consist of. The article gives multiple answers to that difficult question: size, speed, body shape, ecology, and phylogeny are among its answers. Any attempt to do all that in the infobox would be ridiculous, while any attempt to sketch diversity without saying that would be pointless and counter-productive. No, please, we don't need to make the article worse by over-populating the infobox with inappropriate materials. Chiswick Chap (talk) 09:29, 7 October 2025 (UTC)
Woah, that's definitely an unexpected answer; my title was almost a rhetorical question. I brought other other articles because they seemed to me positive examples. To me it does not make much sense to include just a single image of an "archetypal" fish, when the group has enormous morphological diversity. I've never found the composites of the infobox "unreadable" on my small devices, and it seems to me including composites is necessary to give a better idea of the group. We'll see what other editors think. cyclopiaspeak! 10:41, 7 October 2025 (UTC)
"Necessary": not at all. "Enormous diversity": yes, not at all capturable with a little gallery in the infobox. "Almost a rhetorical question:" you may have thought so, but that just says that you hadn't really thought through any of the implications. Arguing from "other stuff exists" is weak to the point of non-existent; and the genuine diversity of the fishes would totally defeat any attempt of any vaguely reasonable infobox scale. We really can do better than think rhetorically here. Chiswick Chap (talk) 11:12, 7 October 2025 (UTC)
that just says that you hadn't really thought through any of the implications Well, I still do not see these "implications" as even vaguely meaningful, so I guess we simply agree to disagree. cyclopiaspeak! 18:51, 8 October 2025 (UTC)
I could add: I agree "other stuff exists" is a weak argument in itself. Yet, contextually, it might be not. The fact that such composites persist in several widely read and edited essential articles, several of them GA or even FA, means that there is, in practice, a significant tacit consensus on them being at least not a negative, if not a positive. If they were commonly found to be "unreadable" by a majority of editors probably some of them would have complained and now most pages would have got rid of them, especially when evaluated for GA or FA status. That said, I wait to assess consensus here. cyclopiaspeak! 18:59, 8 October 2025 (UTC)
"Tacit consensus" has no basis in policy. Unreadability is not considered by many editors, so what they "probably" would have done is pure speculation and of no consequence. To be clear, there is both a general issue, where you rely on other stuff, and a specific issue, which is the very large diversity in the fishes, far wider than many other groups. You suppose that the implications are vague or meaningless, but that is mistaken: fishes can be fast or slow; gigantic or tiny; marine or freshwater; bony or cartilaginous; toothed or jawless; long or short; round or flat; with fleshy or spiny fins: the number of dimensions of fish diversity is, in short, large. That is totally different from, say, diversity in horses, where a carthorse and a pony together would give a good idea of the range. Policy is for a single image, or if need be a (very) small number of images; they need to be readable by Wikipedia readers, or by definition they have no function (other than decoration, which is deprecated). Chiswick Chap (talk) 05:29, 9 October 2025 (UTC)
"Tacit consensus" has no basis in policy.- Sure thing, it just highlights that I'm not proposing something outrageous, as your comments seemed to imply, but actually something quite part of WP normal practice.
Unreadability is not considered by many editors, - This is a very bizarre comment. Do you think editors do not read articles? If they found an illustration hard to discern, wouldn't anyone notice but you?
which is the very large diversity in the fishes, far wider than many other groups. - That is exactly the point. How is then a single image better than a composite/gallery of, say, 4 images? Of course it wouldn't exhaust the diversity, but it would show that it is a diverse group much better than the single image we currently have. That's why we have composites or galleries at Eukaryote, Animal or Chordate that are, by definition, even more diverse than fish.
Policy is for a single image, or if need be a (very) small number of images Well, it's not like I want to add dozens of images; 4 or 6 would suffice IMHO. Could you link the relevant MOS or policy? I looked for it yesterday but didn't find much.
they need to be readable by Wikipedia readers, or by definition they have no function Could you pinpoint exactly what are your concerns with readability? I sincerely do not understand how is a composite or gallery poorly 'readable'. Thanks!
cyclopiaspeak! 14:03, 9 October 2025 (UTC)
"Normal practice": no idea what it is, and everyone could and would define it differently. For me, a normal article has one lead image, whether in an infobox or (preferably) not in one.
Unreadability: see the item on 'Readability' below, we're talking images. Please keep the "bizarre" to yourself, it's pointlessly offensive and unnecessary. I am not stupid and if I say something I generally mean it.
Diversity: so you are starting to get the point that an infobox can hardly be used for diversity, especially if that diversity is large: better not to try, and just to give an example, which we've done.
Policy: you are now arguing with every single reasoned point I make. MOS:IBI says in terms "When adding an image to an infobox, thumbnails should NOT be used. Infobox templates should implement the InfoboxImage module to help with formatting of images so simply supplying the file name will work. For example, to use File:Image PlaceHolder.png, you can simply use |image=Image PlaceHolder.png.". (my emphasis, indicating a singular/one-and-only-one file with exactly one filename and exactly one parameter to hold it.) Some templates permit two but that's getting close to the practical limit. The statement on thumbnails must apply a fortiori to component images even smaller than thumbnails in galleries or composite images, i.e. such usage is deprecated by the MOS. By the way, MOS:IBI should be read in the context of MOS:LEAD, which says "As with all images, but particularly the lead, the image used should be relevant and technically well-produced. It is also common for the lead image to be representative because it provides a visual association for the topic, and allow readers to quickly assess if they have arrived at the right page." (once again, emphasis added: exactly one image is assumed by the MOS, and it explicitly mentions the "representative" (archetypal) nature of the lead image, contrary to your view above.
Readability: there is a limited width for images in the infobox, and it can't be very long either so height is also a constraint. That makes the area for images small: if you then put many images into that area, each one must be small, and on small devices especially, that means they individual images are way too tiny to be readable (intelligible in any detail, such as a kind of fish, whatever). I imagine that is why the MOS says what it does, but whether or not that is so, the MOS should be obeyed here. Chiswick Chap (talk) 15:35, 9 October 2025 (UTC)
Well I'm late to this discussion, which may have run its course. But for me, those undecipherable "galleries" squeezed into infoboxes just provoke a sense of disorganised clutter. The place for galleries is in the body of the article, where contrasting images can be properly displayed alongside each other and clarified with individual captions. The infobox is a place for, if it can be found, a single striking image that at a glance unmistakenly and memorably captures some key aspect of the topic. You cannot do justice to diversity with a thumbnail gallery.  – Epipelagic (talk) 08:17, 22 October 2025 (UTC)
Hear hear. Chiswick Chap (talk) 08:38, 22 October 2025 (UTC)
I gladly accept to be in the minority on this issue so far :) cyclopiaspeak! 09:41, 22 October 2025 (UTC)

remove the species directory thing, as that should go in Wikispecies. 0̵̨̳̈́1̸̮̈́  Harringstars 0̵̨̳̈́1̸̮̈́ 12:42, 21 October 2025 (UTC)

There is no "species directory" here to remove, nor a list of species or anything like one. Chiswick Chap (talk) 13:16, 21 October 2025 (UTC)