Wikipedia talk:WikiProject History of Science

This is the talk page for discussing WikiProject History of Science and anything related to its purposes and tasks.

Put new text under old text. Click here to start a new topic. New to Wikipedia? Welcome! Learn to edit; get help. Assume good faith Be polite and avoid personal attacks Be welcoming to newcomers Seek dispute resolution if needed Shortcut WT:WPHOS

Archives: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5Auto-archiving period: 12 months

This project page does not require a rating on Wikipedia's content assessment scale. It is of interest to the following WikiProjects:

History of Science This page is part of the History of Science WikiProject, an attempt to improve and organize the history of science content on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, you can edit the page attached to this page, or visit the project page, where you can join the project and/or contribute to the discussion. You can also help with the History of Science Collaboration of the Month.History of ScienceWikipedia:WikiProject History of ScienceTemplate:WikiProject History of Sciencehistory of science

There is a Merge discussion at : Talk:Timeline_of_atomic_and_subatomic_physics#Merge_proposal. ReyHahn (talk) 15:42, 11 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Hello all, I am here trying to resuscitate this project. I leave you with another issue I was having recently. Atomic theory is mainly an article about the history of atomic theory, I was thinking of renaming it to History of atomic theory that way the subsections become sections. There are other articles for atom, hydrogen atom, quantum chemistry, AMO and so on. Please feel free to leave a comment at Talk:Atomic theory#Rename?. The change of name would be in line with History of molecular theory. ReyHahn (talk) 10:09, 26 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@ReyHahn, I see you haven't opened a formal move discussion at WP:RM. I think you should probably do that, rather than just trying an informal one on the talk page. -- asilvering (talk) 01:33, 21 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Done--ReyHahn (talk) 10:58, 21 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

A more request has been started at Talk:Atomic_theory#Requested_move_21_February_2024.--ReyHahn (talk) 10:58, 21 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

See Talk:Melancholia#Merge_proposal. cheers, Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 23:57, 20 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

What is this: Heisenberg's entryway to matrix mechanics? It reads Werner Heisenberg contributed to science at a point when the old quantum physics was discovering a field littered with more and more stumbling blocks. [..] Heisenberg determined to base his quantum mechanics "exclusively upon relationships between quantities that in principle are observable." By so doing he constructed an entryway to matrix mechanics. Is this a true historical term? If it is not is it an introduction to matrix mechanics? What is the notability of this subject? Should it be renamed Introduction of matrix mechanics? Do we need this article? ReyHahn (talk) 09:52, 23 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

"History of the Heisenberg picture" ? (IMO should be "Heisenberg representation").

Seems far too detailed. Merge in to Heisenberg picture as #History? Johnjbarton (talk) 15:18, 23 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I think Heisenberg picture has become a modern term now fairly distinct from matrix mechanics. As it is mostly about his groundbreaking work in 1925, I was thinking of merging into Über quantentheoretische Umdeutung kinematischer und mechanischer Beziehungen.--ReyHahn (talk) 15:22, 23 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

The Heisenberg's paper looks like a good merge target. The Entryway article is all about that single paper and its reception. There's a lot of unreferenced interpretation, but perhaps the few non-primary references (Aitchison, Born, Jordan) are of some use in the target article. Jähmefyysikko (talk) 14:23, 24 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Merger seems good, but the titles are not useful in my opinion. The untranslated German title may be accurate but it's cryptic. "entryway" is also cryptic, esp. considering that "matrix mechanics" is cryptic. "Heisenberg's first quantum mechanics paper" or "History of matrix mechanics". Johnjbarton (talk) 16:25, 24 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Merged. Further cleanup can happen at the target. XOR'easter (talk) 01:02, 27 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Wright brothers has been nominated for a good article reassessment. If you are interested in the discussion, please participate by adding your comments to the reassessment page. If concerns are not addressed during the review period, the good article status may be removed from the article. ~~ AirshipJungleman29 (talk) 00:56, 1 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I am trying to figure out how to best improve Volta Conference. I wanted initially to make 1927 Volta Congress article because this event is so famous in the history of physics (we also have a couple of pictures). However I found that Volta Conference refers to many conferences with very different topics with no particular official website. I cannot even find what is its official name (congress? conference? lecture?). Even the current wiki article claims that the second Volta "conference" was about some political stuff, but I believe the second one was about physics and was in Rome (1931). So I am looking for two things: (1) an official archive of all the conferences (probably from Accademia dei Lincei website) (2) a proceeding of 1927 conference or a historical article specifying what happened there and who was there. Any additional source to the article would help. Maybe the article could be just about the 1927 conference and just mention other conferences in a section. ReyHahn (talk) 09:37, 14 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I believe that human history has become a nadir of problems that English Wikipedia has with writing about history. The article itself (at least the recorded history part) is mostly just a collection of historical events that are considered notable and relevant for inclusion by individual editors. The view of professional historians is being toned down, ignored or selectively presented to fit individual opinions. Several users also appear to be engaging in some sort of campaign against the validity of the entire sub-discipline of world history. The impression I'm getting is of openly disparaging and hostile view of academic historians to an extent that in other fields of research would be considered fringe. Peter ^Isotalo 12:21, 22 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Please name these users or withdraw the accusations. Doug Weller talk 13:09, 22 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@Peter Isotalo Just a suggestion: when appealing to a WikiProject for additional input on contentious content discussions, opening with a sentence that amounts to "everything you folks do is awful" will probably not be the best way to encourage helpful inputs. A sentence like "The article human history has an ongoing content dispute that could use more inputs" might be more effective. Johnjbarton (talk) 15:15, 22 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I'm standing by my wording. This is a major top-level article and I think both the article and the general topic is being overall shoddily treated by Wikipedia. I've canvassed article discussions before, so I know the drill.

I've been trying to point out the problems for several weeks on talk:human history but feel the problems are simply being ignored. Peter ^Isotalo 15:49, 22 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I can see why editors may choose to ignore problems described in this way. Vague polemics beget vague polemics. I find specific examples with constructive alternatives much more effective. Johnjbarton (talk) 16:14, 22 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Then you should check out talk:human history#Periodization. No lack of specific examples and constructive alternatives there. Peter ^Isotalo 18:32, 22 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I did check out that Talk page. What I mostly saw was @Peter Isotalo arguing against everybody else. Your concerns about periodization are acknowledged and several suggestions were offered. Your response is to condemn more of the article:

• "The whole article needs to be restructured and rewritten from the ground up."

Even this radical proposal was entertained as a project worth considering. However, now you want even more:

• "Are you interested in collaborating in that regard?"

Part of collaboration is building confidence in your partners that their viewpoints will be incorporated. Reading your approach to collaboration in that Talk page makes this question an easy "No" for me.

If you were to go off and draft an alternative and work to acknowledge and incorporate the best parts of the existing page, then I think you might have more success. At least we might know what you are talking about. Or work incrementally, one bit at a time, making positive contributions. However, no one is seems wants to share your scorched Earth.

I hope my perspective is helpful. Johnjbarton (talk) 22:45, 22 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Please offer your opinion on this topic at Request_for_comment:_presenting_Rutherford's_1911_paper_in_Rutherford's_way. Thanks Johnjbarton (talk) 22:35, 28 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

A discussion is taking place as to whether the article List of important publications in geology is suitable for inclusion in Wikipedia according to Wikipedia's policies and guidelines or whether it should be deleted.

The article will be discussed at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of important publications in geology (3rd nomination) until a consensus is reached, and anyone, including you, is welcome to contribute to the discussion. The nomination will explain the policies and guidelines which are of concern. The discussion focuses on high-quality evidence and our policies and guidelines.

Users may edit the article during the discussion, including to improve the article to address concerns raised in the discussion. However, do not remove the article-for-deletion notice from the top of the article until the discussion has finished.

Kevmin § 22:36, 25 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Archaeoastronomy has been nominated for a good article reassessment. If you are interested in the discussion, please participate by adding your comments to the reassessment page. If concerns are not addressed during the review period, the good article status may be removed from the article. Z1720 (talk) 15:50, 31 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]

The article thermodynamic beta claims that inverse temperature ${\displaystyle \beta =(k_{\rm {B}}T)^{-1}}$ was defined in 1971. Reif's Statistical Physics (1965) discusses absolute temperature and this β already. If anybody has any hints on the origin of this quantity, do not hesitate to join the conversation. ReyHahn (talk) 17:25, 19 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Where did the no-communication theorem come from? The importance of the theorem is notable but I had a hard time finding it on textbooks or any other tertiary sources. ReyHahn (talk) 09:15, 6 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I'm unsure which question you are asking:

• What reliable sources discuss the no-communications theorem? or
• Who first enunciated the no-communications theorem?

Either question is likely to be a challenge. The concept comes up in pop-sci discussions of Bell's theorem where writers try to explain why special relativity for particles is not violated in a theorem about a non-relativisitic wave equation. So good sources will be technical and even then I find any thing related to Bell's theorem overwrought.

There are historical studies of Bell's work but much of the no-communications work is newer. Johnjbarton (talk) 17:52, 6 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Both. Maybe I have to dig into the source tree it is kind of weird that such a useful theorem is badly documented.--ReyHahn (talk) 18:45, 6 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I did not know of the existence of this article. Do you think it is worth keeping Line of force? It is a little bit clunky and badly referenced. Maybe it could be reduced to a few paragraphs and introduced in History of classical field theory. I would like to read some opinion moving on. ReyHahn (talk) 14:49, 16 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I am struggling to find a good but short description of history of post-Newtonian classical mechanics with dates and references. I understand that Lagrangian mechanics and Hamiltonian mechanics were not developed in a single paper, but I find very lacking how it is not developed in History of classical mechanics. Any recommendations are welcome. ReyHahn (talk) 17:01, 23 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

These references highlight the role of variational methods on the development of mechanics: (making a summary of History of variational principles in physics also relevant.)

• Helrich, C. S. (2017). Analytical mechanics. Springer International Publishing. Excellent chapter on history.
• Panza, M. (2003). The origins of analytical mechanics in 18th century. A history of analysis, pp-137.
• Maronne, S., & Panza, M. (2014). Euler, reader of Newton: mechanics and algebraic analysis. Advances in Historical Studies (ISSN 2327-0446), 3, 12-21.

This one has a more Newtonian take:

• Caparrini, S., & Fraser, C. (2013). Mechanics in the eighteenth century.

Hamilton-Jacobi is covered in

• Nakane, M., & Fraser, C. G. (2002). The Early History of Hamilton‐Jacobi Dynamics 1834–1837. Centaurus, 44(3‐4), 161-227.

Johnjbarton (talk) 18:09, 23 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I ran in to a couple more but added them toTalk:History of classical mechanics with a link back here. Johnjbarton (talk) 17:11, 30 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

History of the metric system has been nominated for a good article reassessment. If you are interested in the discussion, please participate by adding your comments to the reassessment page. If concerns are not addressed during the review period, the good article status may be removed from the article. Z1720 (talk) 00:04, 18 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

The infobar for Hydrogen conflicts with the article regarding the "discovery". I attempted to fix it but my change was reverted. Please weigh in on Talk:Hydrogen#Discovery_in_article_vs_template. Johnjbarton (talk) 17:08, 22 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]