Concerns over opting out of community taxon

[lynkos]

@tiwane

FWIW “maverick” isn’t meant to be a judgement or a negative term, just a neutral term denoting that the ID is not in agreement with the rest of the community and may deserve more scrutiny (either because it’s right or it’s wrong).

Sorry if this is going a bit off-topic, but I personally have always loved being called a “maverick” (not infrequently, in “real-life”, not in iNat ), particularly since I read Orson Welles’ definition of the term: “A maverick may go his own way but he doesn’t think that it’s the only way or ever claim that it’s the best one, except maybe for himself. And don’t imagine that this raggle-taggle gypsy is claiming to be free. It’s just that some of the necessities to which I am a slave are different from yours”. How can it be any better than that !

[Ajott]

You could also just tag a few IDers to help you push it back in the right direction.

[jasonhernandez74]

@zoology123

I deal with too many misidentifications to do that.

Jim was referring to “kicking observations up to Kingdom, when even the family is obvious” and then “ghosting you.” That is a different situation than the one you describe; and frankly, I’m not sure someone who does that ought to be an identifier.

@Ajott

You could also just tag a few IDers to help you

That assumes they respond. I have come across observations where other identifiers were tagged years ago and there is no sign of them having looked.

[DianaStuder]

@jasonhernandez74

someone who does that ought to be an identifier

But. iNat won’t let us say - that’s not a palm tree. I don’t know what it is, but it’s not a palm tree.

Not a palm tree - would be valid and useful ID.

PS choose your @mention carefully - both you and ajott respond, thank you!

[papernautilus]

@DianaStuder

Not a palm tree

In those cases, I leave a comment. This is definitely not a Spondylus, or whatever.

[clag]

“iNaturalist does not provide much precision in its data; it is a website for citizen science.”
I think you misunderstand the meaning of “citizen science”. It is not some dumbed down version of science, with less than scientific standards, but citizens contributing to science, in partnership with, or support of, scientific endeavours.

[jasonhernandez74]

@DianaStuder

iNat won’t let us say - that’s not a palm tree. I don’t know what it is, but it’s not a palm tree.

That’s still a different situation from what Jim was referring to. Jim was referring to cases of “kicking observations up to Kingdom, when even the family is obvious.” So, an obvious palm tree, but the observer says “Plants” because they know it isnt that palm tree but dont know which palm tree.

[sedgequeen]

It might be obvious to you and me that the observation is a palm tree, just not that palm tree, but is it obvous to the person putting the higher ID on it?

[stevewoodhall]

I could not agree more. Many lepidoptera (especially some of the butterflies that rest with wings folded) cannot be reliably identified to species level. This may be because, for example, genitalia dissection is necessary to separate them, or because when worn the scale markings needed to identify a species disappear. In such circumstances I agree to the ID at genus level and use ‘can’t be improved’ to take it to RG. Genus level ID data can be just as useful as species level. In some instances, we’ve been able to lump species together into ‘complexes’ and if two people agree at that level use ‘can’t be improved’ again.

[DianaStuder]

I had a plant yesterday which was pushed back to angiosperm.
Where it is now stuck - 2 against - 1 angiosp - going to need 7 …

If the broad ID was - neutral support in the background, but it is Ancestor Disagreement (shock and awe :((

[pahill]

At least in Fungi, there are some who bump up to Kingdom so that hopefully more people will see it. I do NOT usually ID by searching through by a Family, but I know actual experts (not ‘power users’ who over relying on computer vision) who sometimes just leaf through the Fungi kingdom, so some users (neither the original observer nor the experts) throwing it up to kingdom help the specimen get more eyes on it. All the way to “Life” is rude.

Maybe folks throwing it up to family etc. are just trying to get others to look at it. Obviously this can be annoying if this messes with a mixed set of IDs or only the original ID. I have to admit I never completely understood the questions it asks you when you push it up the tree or how that information is used, but I see users here who use “good as it can get” to some how get it into RG quicker, but is that actually defined somewhere as they way it works?

[m_whitson]

I think if the agreed on community ID is lower than family rank (like at genus, for example), clicking “as good as it can be” will move it out of “needs ID” and to “research grade.” For observations that are opted out of community ID, though, doing this moves it to “casual” if the opted-out user and the community haven’t agreed on a species.

[sedgequeen]

I truly do not understand the concept the bumping an observation up to Fungi would get more people to see it. Anybody searching for Needs ID “Fungi” will see observations at the Fungi kingdom level – and everything that is ID’d at a lower level as well. Unless they added a filter to restrict the search to the kingdom level.

[sedgequeen]

@pahill

‘power users’ who over relying on computer vision

See comment #41 above. If you see the little icon with stars on an identification it does not necessarily mean that the computer did the identification. We often use it to fill in the name we know.

[pahill]

That is not a judgement based on one post. I use the species suggestions too.

I am being critical of such users by a PATTERN of throwing up a LOT of IDs that seem to be based solely on suggested IDs.

I was plagued by one obvious such user and I think I have had a few others visit on occasion. My hunch is they over trust the suggestions. For at least one user, I tried the suggestions and sure enough the ID given was suggested usually with genus as #1 and the choice they picked at #2. such an ordering of suggestions means the suggestion is NOT a strong one. But this thread isn’t about naive use of image recognition.

You are right, clicking on the high-level icons in the search pop-up does show you those that have been IDed to lower taxonomic levels and need ID.

[jdmore]

Hey folks, looks like this topic has morphed into a discussion about general ID etiquette around adding higher-level IDs etc., starting about here. If we are done with productive discussion about “Concerns over opting out of community taxon” it may be time to close it.

[Ajott]

I personally do this all the time, e.g. Araneae observations above family level only

[opisska]

I would like to come back to this topic because of a recent experience. I have noticed two weird species of birds while searching an area I know well - I checked the observations, both were from the same person, clearly wrong IDs (similar species which do not occur in the area) refuted by many IDers, but the observer opted out of CID, so nothing can be done about that. Is this really what iNat wants? To have the species lists for any location completely at the mercy of any individual observer?

[maxkirsch]

since the community ID on both observations is now the correct ID (and the observer’s incorrect ID is maverick), i’ve gone ahead and voted “No, it’s as good as it can be” to “Based on the evidence, can the Community Taxon still be confirmed or improved?”, making both observations casual grade.

[Ajott]

That is what I do