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Improving Mindat.orgMinerals missing from mindat

17th Oct 2014 19:23 UTCJosh Golden

Greetings,

I have noticed several minerals missing from mindat.

Baumhauerite II, ~~Cerium~~, and Domeykite-β are IMA-approved minerals not listed in mindat.

The following IMA-approved minerals are listed in mindat, but are not listed at any localities:

Calclacite
~~Eringaite~~

Ferro-pedrizite

Fluorotetraferriphlogopite
~~Iodine~~

Jusite

Kenotobermorite

Metauramphite
~~Oxystibiomicrolite~~

Potassicmendeleevite-(Ce)

Weilerite

Rathite-IV is listed as synonym of Sartorite, however, Rathite-IV and Sartorite are separate IMA approved mineral species.

Renardite is listed as a synonym of Dewindtite, however, Renardite and Dewindtite is a separate IMA approved mineral species.

There are no polytypes of Gersdorffite listed. The three polytypes are Gersdorffite-P2₁3, Gersdorffite-Pa3, and Gersdorffite-Pca2₁.

Josh Golden

Research Specialist

University of Arizona

Dept. of Geosciences

17th Oct 2014 19:52 UTCFrank Keutsch Expert

Not sure, but perhaps because some are questionable:

Baumhauerite II and cerium are questionable species according to IMA.

Rathite IV is also listed as questionable, but the sartorite homologues etc. definitely need work.

Frank

17th Oct 2014 20:20 UTCJosh Golden

Thanks for the reply Frank,

It is true some are questionable, however, there are many questionable minerals listed on mindat. Even questionable minerals are considered valid and included in the 4963 currently valid species by the CNMMN/CNMNC.

Josh

17th Oct 2014 23:25 UTCNorman King 🌟 Expert

I noticed that questioned minerals, such as stibiconite, are listed on Mindat locality pages (not on the mineral data pages) in single quotes (e.g., ‘stibiconite’). At first glance that might seem to be satisfactory, but those names have not been discredited, so I don’t think they should be listed as if they are informal names. You can also see that names that were never intended to be formal mineral names such as ‘clay’ and ‘chert’ are also in single quotes. Also, mineral names that were once accepted but now have, in fact, been discredited are listed in single quotes as well, such as 'limonite.' All of these examples can be found on the Lookout Pass Thallium Prospect locality page, for example. Nomenclatorial conventions on Mindat thus seem to have been conflated in these cases, and this undoubtedly leads to confusion over what the single quotes mean in the mineral lists on locality pages.

I know this does not exactly following the beginning of this thread, but I agree with Josh, who seems to be saying that still-valid minerals that have been questioned should not be handled differently than other still-valid minerals. In my opinion it would be OK to do so, however, if a unique system can be established, perhaps with a note on each locality page about the conventions we follow.

18th Oct 2014 00:58 UTCAlfredo Petrov Manager

For questionable things like native iodine and native cerium, I'd like to see at least a little bit of evidence for their existence, or at least one single alleged specimen. Iodine was reported as a fumarolic mineral from Italy (Vesuvius?), but I wonder whether there's enough evidence for that to add it to Mindat's locality list. Recently we've been getting more picky here about standards of evidence required for adding species to locality lists.

Calclacite: anthropogenic, formed inside museum cases, not any "real" mineral localities. And we have a policy NOT to list museums (or rock shops) as "localities" on Mindat.

Kenotobermorite: We are still waiting for the first publication, which will (we hope) publish some specific localities.

18th Oct 2014 01:14 UTCAlfredo Petrov Manager

There is a very common misconception that anything on the IMA list is "approved". Strictly speaking, that is not the case. IMA approval is a formal procedure with a strict protocol, which has only existed since 1959. A lot of the older minerals are just considered "grandfathered", which is not quite the same thing as "approval". Approval is an action taken, whereas in "grandfathering" no action was taken; grandfathering is a lack of action.

"Grandfathered" minerals are valid species if "generally accepted" by the mineralogical community (which means that well-studied materials like quartz and native gold do not have to go through the formal approval procedure but are nevertheless considered valid species). But when a grandfathered "mineral" loses its "general acceptance", or never had it, then there is no reason at all for the rest of us to consider it a valid species, regardless of whether any individual decides to keep it on a list or not. Remember that horsfordite remained on official lists for decades after we knew it was probably an artifact.

18th Oct 2014 10:55 UTCOlav Revheim Manager

Dear Josh,

Thank you very much for preparing this list. Please see the actions taken for the list you have prepared.

Eringaite - http://www.mindat.org/loc-2759.html- Added

ferro-pedrizite- http://www.mindat.org/loc-22165.html - Added- the entry should probably be one of the Mindat sub-localities for this locality, and it may have to be moved later.

Fluorotetraferriphlogopite - http://www.mindat.org/loc-185580.html - not added as locality given in type description abstract has several sub-localities in Mindat, and I have no access to the full article

Jusite - Not added, the type locality, Jus in the Schwabian Alb, Wuirttemberg is not listed in Mindat, and I am not sufficiently knowledgeable in German political division to feel comfortable adding a new locality

Kenotobermorite - Not added. newly defined mineral in the Tobermorite group. The nomenclature paper is not yet published on the CNMNC home page and IMA list only lists South Africa as the type locality, which is a country, not a locality.

Metauramphite- Not added, questionable mineral- I have no access to the Russian type description that may include the locality

Oxystibiomicrolite -Added, A.G. Christy and D. Atencio (2013), set the type specimen of former species stibiomicrolite transferred to new name- changed name of stibiomicrolite entry

Potassicmendeleevite-(Ce) - contains no reference in the IMA list

Weilerite - http://www.mindat.org/loc-16142.html is the type locality, I have not added it, as there might be a good reason for it not to be added

Olav

18th Oct 2014 11:40 UTCPeter Haas

Olav Revheim Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> Jusite - Not added, the type locality, Jus in the

> Schwabian Alb, Wuirttemberg is not listed in

> Mindat, and I am not sufficiently knowledgeable in

> German political division to feel comfortable

> adding a new locality

There is no settlement of the name "Jus" in Baden-Württemberg. If it is the name of a brook, or an obscure topographic place name, it will be difficult to locate without a look at the original paper. The only place I could find with a remotely similar name is "Jusiberg", a hill on the border between Kohlberg and Neuffen.

> Weilerite - http://www.mindat.org/loc-16142.html

> is the type locality, I have not added it, as

> there might be a good reason for it not to be

> added.

There is a good reason. What was originally described as "weilerite" from Weiler turned out to be something else. Weilerite was re-approved in 2010, presumably from a different locality. Uwe should know more on this.

18th Oct 2014 11:55 UTCMarco E. Ciriotti Manager

Iodine is not a valid mineral species.

The texte of the "type description" remarks that iodine was only a gas production.

18th Oct 2014 12:12 UTCOlav Revheim Manager

Thanks Peter,

There might not be any localities for weilerite if the weilerite of Walenta (1961) is discredited. The other reference, Scott (1987) listed in the IMA list of approved minerals have no data on weilerite, weilerite is just listed without any data, references or localities. The alunite nomenclature report refers to Scott (1987) for weilerite. Hopefully, Uwe can clarify as you say.

Olav

20th Oct 2014 20:47 UTCJosh Golden

Thank you all for the responses.

The IMA master list provided by Marco Pasero lists currently 4963 VALID species, this number INCLUDES "questionable" species as VALID.

Mindat currently lists at the top of the homepage as including 44,501 mineral names. So only about 10% of the names are even listed in the IMA list. I don't think it is unreasonable to add the mineral names that are in the IMA list and listed as questionable that are not listed in mindat. Just because a mineral is not "approved" does not mean it is not VALID. I am quite aware that there are questionable minerals in the IMA list, they are still considered valid species. The "grandfathered" minerals have since been vetted and approved or discredited and are not the result of inaction.

13th Jan 2015 21:55 UTCReynaldo Contreira Expert

Hi everyone,

What about Domeykite-β?

It still does not appear in the database.

Thanks

Reynaldo

13th Jan 2015 23:02 UTCRob Woodside 🌟 Manager

Added, but little info available. Please check it http://www.mindat.org/min-46462.html At the IMA site there's a number IMA2008-B, so maybe some research is going on?

13th Jan 2015 23:30 UTCReynaldo Contreira Expert

Thank you!

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