Talk:Bed bug

Requested move 18 October 2018

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: Reverted to status quo ante, procedural close. See my comment below. No such user (talk) 13:36, 19 October 2018 (UTC)

---

Bed bug (insect) → Bed bug – Undiscussed move from a long-standing name, no other article with the same title, WP:COMMONNAME applies Brandmeister^talk 22:26, 18 October 2018 (UTC)

This is a contested technical request (permalink). Sam Sailor 22:44, 18 October 2018 (UTC)

• Ping Doc James for comment. — Frayæ (Talk/Spjall) 22:47, 18 October 2018 (UTC) — @Frayae: ... just in case he did not see Special:Diff/864504012/864707183? :) Sam Sailor 23:40, 18 October 2018 (UTC) I didn't see that, he definitely knows now. — Frayæ (Talk/Spjall) 23:45, 18 October 2018 (UTC)

Survey

Feel free to state your position on the renaming proposal by beginning a new line in this section with * '''Support''' or * '''Oppose''', then sign your comment with ~~~~. Since polling is not a substitute for discussion, please explain your reasons, taking into account Wikipedia's policy on article titles.

• Oppose The term Bed bug is used equally to refer to bed bug infestations and the bed bug (insect). So a disambig makes sense. Stipulation that the article about the insect is about the insect will keep that article from filling full of none insect related stuff. If one looks at a google search for the term nearly all pages are mainly about the infestation with these bugs. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 00:14, 19 October 2018 (UTC)
• oppose agree w/ Doc James comment search for the term nearly all pages are mainly about the infestation--Ozzie10aaaa (talk) 00:25, 19 October 2018 (UTC)
• Support reversion of this recent undiscussed move per WP:OVERPRECISION and WP:PRIMARYTOPIC [1]. A bed bug is an insect. A bed bug infestation is an infestation of those insects. A bed bug infestation is not a bed bug and the article about it would not be titled "bed bug". If anything, the bed bug article could be viewed as a broad concept article, since it has a section "Infestation" with a "main article" link to bed bug infestation. Sending anyone searching for "bed bug" to a dab page is not helpful. (And as a matter of procedure, as a contested undiscussed move, this should have been automatically returned its stable title before this proposal was opened.) Station1 (talk) 04:43, 19 October 2018 (UTC)
• Support, this isn't how disambiguation is supposed to work. Considering that this article title was stable for 14 years then I don't see the need for an RM, just revert it. —Xezbeth (talk) 04:49, 19 October 2018 (UTC)
• Support. The disambig is redundant since the infestation is a daughter article of the original bed bug page.

That being said, I would prefer to see the two pages merged someday since infestation pages have a tendency to have major redundancies that can usually be handled fine under one article. Not to mention that the human relation aspect is what usually drives significant content for most larger insect articles, so of course searches are going to talk about infestations primarily. That's for down the road though. Kingofaces43 (talk) 06:45, 19 October 2018 (UTC)

• Strong support Per WP:DABCONCEPT the Bed bug infestation is a sub article. The other 3 topics are minor and appear to be "Bedbug" rather than "Bed bug" anyway, of which Bedbugs (album) is the only full match so I'd support keeping "Bedbug" redirecting to the insect to and maybe moving the DAB to Bedbug (disambiguation). Crouch, Swale (talk) 08:38, 19 October 2018 (UTC)
• Support. And remind that no consensus means it gets moved back to what was before. Hyperbolick (talk) 12:56, 19 October 2018 (UTC)

---

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

• Comment I reverted the undiscussed move before seeing that this RM was open. Nonetheless, I think that the move overstepped being WP:BOLD far into "reckless" territory, leaving hundreds of incoming links to dab page for other people to sort out. Now that I saw that the RM is headed in the same direction, I'm inclined to procedurally close it and leave the onus of changing status quo to its challengers. I tend to agree with DABCONCEPT point that the infestation is a sub-article of the bug page, and the links that are meant for the infestation should be retargeted there, rather than inventing a dab page where there's nothing ambiguous. No such user (talk) 13:33, 19 October 2018 (UTC)

Proposal

Having reverted to status quo ante, I think that Doc James has a point that anyone searching for, or linking to, Bed bug, has in mind more epidemiological aspects of bed bug infestations rather than learning about lifecycle and biology of the bed bug itself. As a matter of fact, most of our articles about parasitic and infectious diseases are structured so that the primary topic is about the illness, and near the top they link to an article about the causing organism itself (e.g. Toxoplasmosis is a parasitic disease caused by Toxoplasma gondii...). This one is a counterexample by necessity, because the "common name" "bed bug" relates to the organism rather than the infection/infestation.
I'm thinking about reshuffling the contents (mostly swapping the two pages) so that we have:

• Article about the bug's biology and physiology at Cimex, its binomial name
• The "main", broad-concept article at either Bed bug or Bed bug infestation, with Bed bug as the primary redirect.

I'm just thinking aloud, but I think we all should come to the best setup in an informal discussion rather than through a RM or similar process. Thoughts welcome. No such user (talk) 13:53, 19 October 2018 (UTC)

• Just merge them. Not like a disease where symptoms are known ages before the organism is determined. A bed bug infestation is just bed bugs in numbers. Hyperbolick (talk) 14:06, 19 October 2018 (UTC)

• The catch is, the merged article would be somewhat overlong. If anything, the lengthy Bed bug#Description section is somewhat too technical entomology for an overview article and would be better placed into Cimex (now redirects here) or Cimex lectularius (the common bed bug). Once we get rid of that, I think they could be safely merged. No such user (talk) 14:12, 19 October 2018 (UTC)

Just discovered /Archive 2#Challenges to organizing content written by Blue Rasberry back in 2017 so pinging him as well. You don't seem to have implemented much of your proposal from the time, did you? No such user (talk) 14:56, 19 October 2018 (UTC)

User:No such user and User:Hyperbolick agree those are excellent suggestions. The information about this genus can go at Cimex. The disease can go at bed bug.

We already have an article about the family which is Cimicidae

So basically it would be a merge of bed bug infestation into bed bug with a split off of much of the description into a new article on the genus Cimex. Happy to carry this out if their are not objections. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 15:18, 19 October 2018 (UTC)

Good. Hyperbolick (talk) 15:47, 19 October 2018 (UTC)

Let us wait for a week or so, shall we, to iron out the details? There is no deadline. For example, in the meanwhile I learned that most of the content of Bed bug#Description actually pertains to Cimex lectularius, as the genus Cimex contains several bug species affecting bats and birds, and only two affecting humans. Cimex should thus only be either a short taxonomic article, or perhaps a redirect to Cimicidae. Let us not rush to implementation like you did the last time... :) No such user (talk) 15:51, 19 October 2018 (UTC)

Been working on this article for more than 8 years. Waiting another week is no big deal. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 17:49, 19 October 2018 (UTC)

agree--Ozzie10aaaa (talk) 14:31, 22 October 2018 (UTC)

Took an initial attempt at it. We could bring back more material from Cimex but agree it is fairly technical. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 19:32, 25 October 2018 (UTC)

I would argue at the very least that the infobox should contain a picture of an adult specimen rather than bites. IAMGOOMBA (talk) 20:21, 25 October 2018 (UTC)

Yah the first image was a little blurry anyway. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 17:27, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

I restored some of material from Cimex, summarizing the key aspects of bug description and behavior without entering into too much detail. No opinion about the best infobox picture. No such user (talk) 09:29, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

First sentence

Keeping the first sentence simple IMO is very important. Thus

• "Bed bugs are a type of insect that feed on human blood, usually at night."

is better than

• "Bed bugs are insects from the genus Cimex that feed on human blood, usually at night."

The genus can go later in the lead. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 23:13, 8 November 2018 (UTC)

The goal is not to fill the first sentence with none common words. The term "genus" is not well known and not really needed in the first sentence. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 22:52, 10 November 2018 (UTC)

• Option #2, "...are insects from the genus Cimex..." is what I prefer. I don't think it complicates things. Yilloslime (talk) 00:46, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
• Option #2. Neither the MOS nor general practice require keeping the first sentence that simple, and I was arguing #1 is downright dumb. Species and genera are basic biological terms and, as far as I remember, they are introduced around 8th grade of the basic school; thousands of our articles about plants and animals start off in manner similar to #2. Per MOS:OVERLINK the following are not usually linked... Everyday words understood by most readers in context, and both "insect" and "blood" qualify. Instead, we should immediately provide links to the most relevant article, and it is certainly the one about the lifecycle of bed bugs themselves, i.e. Cimex. No such user (talk) 08:44, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

Redirect

Hi, Bed bug (insect) redirects to Cimex. Only two of the Cimex species are known as bed bugs, according to the article Cimex. But the article Cimex is about the whole genus. So please redirect from Bed bug (insect) to the article about the two species known as bed bugs, which is this article here, Bed bug. @Doc James: --Distelfinck (talk) 11:21, 28 February 2019 (UTC)

The insects known as bed bugs are discussed at Cimex so no issue with it directed there. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 11:23, 28 February 2019 (UTC)

The insects known as bed bugs are also discussed at Bed bug, as they are the only topic of the article bed bug. Bed bug is the more specific article as the Cimex article also discusses species not called bed bugs. What you are getting at I think is that maybe the Cimex article has more information. But then that information should be moved over to the Bed bug article --Distelfinck (talk) 13:15, 28 February 2019 (UTC)

Doc James, Bed bug and the redirect Bed bug (insect) have the exact same topic, but you think it's better to redirect from Bed bug (insect) to the supertopic Cimex in this case. Wouldn't it then follow that Bed bug should also redirect to the supertopic? --Distelfinck (talk) 01:17, 3 March 2019 (UTC)

Bed bug also discusses a lot of information not specifically about the insect such as the bits and health consequences.

Cimex is a subtopic about the organism itself. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 02:05, 3 March 2019 (UTC)

The word "insect" doesn't indicate that it's only about the organism itself. You could make a redirect Bed bug (organism) and redirect it to Cimex. But Bed bug (insect) belongs to the topic of Bed bug and therefore should redirect there --Distelfinck (talk) 03:00, 3 March 2019 (UTC)

Okay, wait a minute. If as you say the article Bed bug includes information that is not fit for an article about the insect, that would mean we should remove that information. Or rename the article to indicate it's not only about the insect --Distelfinck (talk) 03:10, 3 March 2019 (UTC)

Wording

Plantdrew, you reverted an edit I made in the first sentence of the article. It seems you prefer "Bed bugs are a type of insect..." over "Bed bugs are insects...." Your rationale, as far as I can tell, for the former, is, "not all bloodfeeding insects are bedbugs" The sentence ""Bed bugs are insects that feed on human blood" does not in any way suggest that bed bugs are the only insects that feed on blood. I disagree that it is preferable, in terms of style or accuracy, to say "Bed bugs are a type of insect..." because bed bugs are not a type of insect. The term, as the article says, refers to two species of the genus Cimex.

I agree "exclusively" should be changed. It was intended to convey obligate hematophagy, but if bed bugs do feed on other species, this could be read as inaccurate.Michaplot (talk) 22:38, 11 July 2019 (UTC)