Talk:Sahara

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Sahara is a former good article candidate. There are suggestions below for which areas need improvement to satisfy the good article criteria. Once the objections are addressed, the article can be renominated as a good article. If you disagree with the objections, you can seek a review. Date of review: No date specified. Please edit template call function as follows: {{FailedGA|insert date in any format here}}

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Contents 1 Arabic pronunciation of the word "sahara" 1.1 History of Sahara and the origin of the word Sahara 1.2 Pronunciation 2 Asinine revisions 2.1 Identity of participants and style of editing 3 Shipbuilding in the Sahara 4 Antarctica? 5 4,000 BC 6 Climate 7 Nabta Playa 8 french version 9 America 10 Mostly rock? 11 Deletions by me. 12 Age of Sahara 13 Temperature 14 All those links removed 15 Cairo as largest city in Sahara 16 Good Article nomination has failed 17 Climate History 18 Camels 19 Challenged etymology 20 Azalai?

[edit] Arabic pronunciation of the word "sahara"

What we have a recording of is an arabic speaker saying the word for "desert" an arabic, which is usually transliterated "sahara". Is this what the Sahara desert is called in arabic? Or is this supposed to be the "correct" pronunciation of the English word "Sahara" (never mind that I don't think English contains either the h sound or the r sound that are used in that file)? It also means wilderness in the form of a name.

Don't get me wrong, I think it's cool having an arabic ogg file, but my friend the arabic speaker was immediately surprised that this was being listed on this page. --Andrew 05:24, Apr 9, 2005 (UTC)

For the record, the Sahara in Arabic is as-Sahra al-Koubraa (the greatest desert). Sahara means either desert or 'wilderness' in Arabic, but generaly "desert." (collounsbury 03:43, 4 March 2006 (UTC))

[edit] History of Sahara and the origin of the word Sahara

The history of Sahara at those early times can be found here.

The word Sahara is of Arabic origin which means Desert in English. You can have a look at the List of English words of Arabic origin.

Svest 05:38, Apr 9, 2005 (UTC)

Well i hope nobody lies on this page cause many ppl use it for projects and stuff!!!!!!

person

[edit] Pronunciation

Look, the pronunciation file is not a recording of the name of the desert. It's a recording of the Arabic word for desert, from which the English name for the desert is derived. It would be misleading to give the impression that that's the correct way to say the name of the desert in English - the English vowels are all different, and the h in particular has a completely different sound. Perhaps unfortunately, the Arabic would normally be transliterated to look just like "Sahara". --Andrew 05:16, Apr 16, 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Asinine revisions

===>Let's be reasonable: 70.49.170.143, please don't put claims that directly contradict evidence in an article - that is confusing and useless to readers. Please also do not delete relevant sections without commenting on the Sahara Talk page. Please also do not insert childish diatribes with poor punctuation in the middle of an article. The web page referenced doesn't have a bibliography because it's just an abstract. Did you even look at this page? It's not racist to mention this study - please be reasonable. If you have a political axe to grind, feel free to consult some message board, this is a place for learning and fact. Justin (koavf) 16:32, Apr 15, 2005 (UTC)

look i sent you an e-mail about this the fact is that the study is a bunch of bs.. race does genetically exist and it is impossible to know what a person's race through looking at his gene code.

this is a fact http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,8122-1331319_1,00.html

secound that link claims to have examined one of the southern most parts of morocco in the sahara.Even if you were to agree with the so called study then you should know it is not talking about north africans but about saharans. who live between the two areas,the caucasian north african and black africa.Also morroco has different populations too like arabs,berbers,europeans and black sub-saharans so you can't pick 20 or whatever random morrocans.

Another thing morocco is a coutry that has a lot of different people like european looking people in the atlas part of and saharan people in the souss area that the article claims to study.

I don't have any political axe to grind i just don't want people to read this false info or should i say abstract info.Anything in an encyclopedia should have bibiography and not some abstract bs that anyone can write.

lastly race only exists on the physical level according to any bio or socalogy professors

i know this because i am a socalogy and bio student in university

http://www.rednova.com/news/display/?id=10801

Europe, North Africa, western Asia and the Indian subcontinent, whose people have wavy or somewhat curly hair, sharp facial features (especially a narrow, prominent nose), and abundant facial and bodily hair

Please stop giving people mis information by using some site that does not give proof for what it says.

this is one of the reasons why many professors in my university don't accept internet sources as true sources when one is writeing an essay.

Every human being shares more than 99.9 per cent of their DNA with everybody else, and the tiny variations that remain differ more within ethnic groups than between them, a major review of the evidence says.

It is impossible to look at people’s genetic code and deduce whether they are black, Caucasian or Asian, and there is no human population that fits the biological definition of a race, the study found http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,8122-1331319_1,00.html

please stop giving false facts ok

thanks Posted by 70.49.170.143

The idea that population genetics is impossible is completely inconsistent with the facts. However, that the Souss Valley is scarcely representative of Morocco is a whole is certainly true - and no genetics study should ever be cited as if it were the last word on the subject, because (as I've seen at Berber) they frequently disagree with each other. The field is still young. - Mustafaa 04:18, 16 Apr 2005 (UTC)

i think the human genome project and top universitys would have have facts straght and most university today teach what that article states. about it being impossible to tell a person's race through genes. so i think those are the facts. and i belive even some polical figures in the states have quoted this.

and even if it isn't just one study should be posted as fact here...

that is why i wanted that part removed... Posted by 70.49.170.143 at 06:37, Apr 17, 2005

Yesterday, in a special issue of the journal Nature Genetics, the published results of a survey of human variation as expressed in the human genome map conclude that race and ethnicity are no longer satisfactory categories for discerning differences among the human race. "It is impossible to look at people’s genetic code and deduce whether they are black, Caucasian or Asian, and there is no human population that fits the biological definition of a race, the study found."[1] Race and ethnicity are nothing more than culturally based forms of taxonomy. The study also concluded:

"The human genome map has shown that if two people of any ethnic origin are selected at random, only between 1 in 1,000 and 1 in 1,500 of their genes will differ. This makes our species among the most homogeneous known to science: populations of chimpanzees and fruit flies differ much more from one another in genetic terms. A typical Caucasian’s genes will be as similar—and as different—to those of another Caucasian as they will be to a black African or a Chinese person."

http://www.newquaker.com/2004_10_24_blogarchive.htm

http://www.religionnewsblog.com/9124-Gene_tests_prove_that_we_are_all_the_same_under_the_skin.html

science,regelion all these people are accepting the fact... Posted by 70.49.170.143 at 06:43, Apr 17, 2005

[edit] Identity of participants and style of editing

Hi 70.49.170.143! Your comments are very welcomed. However, they should be explained here and not in the main article. I see that you've stopped "commenting" there and that you are participating here instead. You may be right but everything needs to be discussed and agreed about before any major edits in the main article.

Another comment I have regarding your edits here is about the way they are structured. It is very hard to realize where your comment starts and where it does end plus that there is no identity information (no identity mark, no dates included) unless one goes checking on the history page; which is time consuming. I am sorry I got to fix that without your consent but it was for the sake of clarity. It would be very nice if you just add a note in order to help readers and participants find out about that fact. I would also suggest,-if you don't mind, that you get a Wikipedia account as probably you will be contributing from time to time. Svest 12:46, Apr 22, 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Shipbuilding in the Sahara

There are facts about shipbuilding in the area in the Babalus period. I reverted the article to the last version indicating these facts. Please check out these references : Race and history, Physicsdaily.com. Cheers Svest 00:56, May 21, 2005 (UTC) ^{Wiki me up™}

Please refer to Verifiability, Wikipedia:Reliable sources and Wikipedia:Check your facts for reasons why not any old website can be used as a serious source. Additionally, the content we are talking about has been added by Roylee (talk • contribs) in an attempt to lend credibility to all sorts of outlandish claims added to other articles. He has responded evasively to several inquiries of other editors questioning his sources and editing patterns on his talk page. Also, if you check out the links referred to above, you will see that there actually are no facts whatsoever about shipbuilding in this area. All we have are weak 'indications' and 'hints' that require a great stretch of the imagination (or indeed a pervasive Afro-centric bias) to serve as 'evidence' for shipbuilding in the Sahara. The theory is not notable. Anyone who wants to promote theories like this should keep them at his own website. Wikipedia is not the place for this. — mark ✎ 09:13, 24 May 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Antarctica?

The opening sentence states that Antarctica is the largest desert in the world. I have not heard that one before and was under the impression that glaciers don't count as deserts. I know there are cold ice-free deserts in Antarctica but rather small compared to the glacier itself. Any thoughts on this? --Bjarki 23:37, 20 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Does nobody at all have a comment on this? Anyways, this piece of "fact" was added with this edit which is the only actual edit that the user has made (there are 2 other sandbox edits). With such a dubious source and the fact that I have never ever heard of Antarctica being referred to as a desert I am changing it again. --Bjarki 19:22, 24 Jun 2005 (UTC)

And I support you because you're right. — mark ✎ 19:32, 24 Jun 2005 (UTC)

===>Antarctica is a cold desert See [www.nationalgeographic.com/xpeditions/lessons/08/g35/antarctica.html here]. More sources here. It relates to precipitation. Justin (koavf) 21:09, Jun 24, 2005 (UTC)

It's a definitional problem at best, and the most common understanding of 'desert' does not only take precipitation into account but also things like temperature and climate. Simply put: people think of deserts as hot places. Wikipedia should be descriptive, not prescriptive, so I think it's reasonable to call the Sahara the largest desert. However, it might be a good idea to qualify the statement and say that the Sahara is the largest hot desert. — mark ✎ 21:53, 24 Jun 2005 (UTC)

These links don't convince me of anything, there are hot and cold deserts and then there are glaciers, simply not the same thing. --Bjarki 22:49, 24 Jun 2005 (UTC)

===>Hot/Cold deserts It's certainly true that colloquial understandings of deserts imply warm regions like the Sahara or Gobi. To quote from the article on desert:

That said, there are different forms of deserts. Cold deserts can be covered in snow; such locations don't receive much precipitation, and what does fall remains frozen as snow pack; these are more commonly referred to as tundra if a short season of above-freezing temperatures is experienced, or as an ice cap if the temperature remains below freezing year-round, rendering the land almost completely lifeless.

I'm all in favor of saying hot desert and linking Antarctica. Also, remember that Antarctica is not simply a glacier, and there is soil underneath the ice shelf - it has actual territory. Justin (koavf) 22:57, Jun 24, 2005 (UTC)

I'm not going on a crusade for this, but I do disagree... glaciers are not deserts. I will leave it to you guys to find a suitable way to phrase the half-truth that will inevitably be the final outcome according to my experience of the wiki process. --Bjarki 00:05, 25 Jun 2005 (UTC)

===>I don't understand Clearly, Antarctica is a desert. You're not actually offering any proof otherwise. Do you care to explain your position? Have you uncovered some meteorological research that supports Antarctica getting more precipitation? Justin (koavf) 04:28, Jun 25, 2005 (UTC)

Nevermind, my troubles swallowing a definition of a desert that includes areas made out of water are probably due to the fact that I'm thinking in a foreign language. --Bjarki 22:08, 25 Jun 2005 (UTC)

We shouldn't lose the point here. Wikipedia should be descriptive, not prescriptive. It's a bit like the naming policy: articles should have the most common title. Almost everyone thinks of the Sahara as the largest desert ('hot place'), only a few geographers who like to define 'desert' with reference to precipitation alone would want to call Antarctica the largest desert. I think Wikipedia should just say that the Sahara is the largest hot desert in the world. No need to clutter the lead with a confusing mention of Antarctica. — mark ✎ 00:48, 26 Jun 2005 (UTC)

I agree. Wizzy…☎ 15:29, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

I don't buy the precipitation bit. If that were so the Nile valley would also be desert. These geographers may have good reason to define desert in the way they do but until they can get their definition accepted Antartica should be mentioned as a desert only as an aside. For the time being most people mean by desert a place without water and that includes places where the water is locked up as ice.82.44.21.216 15:02, 12 August 2005 (UTC)

Antarctica may have low precipitation but there is low evaporation so what falls stays there. Dejvid 15:13, 12 August 2005 (UTC)

I found the following on Yahoo Answers:

What is the largest desert in the world? Best Answer - Chosen by Asker

Sahara, in North Africa, is the largest non-polar desert covers 3.5 million sq. mi.

The polar deserts are larger. Antarctic - 5.5 million Sq. mi. Arctic - 5.4 million sq. mi.

So that would make Sahara the THIRD largest desert in the world. --Jibran1 15:09, 17 April 2006 (UTC)

We've gone through this quite a few times before. The thing is that the most common definition of 'desert' doesn't take into account just precipitation, but also temperature. Like I said above: Wikipedia should be descriptive, not prescriptive, so it's best to use this common-sense definition of desert and leave the confusing mention of Antarctica out of it. To satisfy those people who insist on using that specialist definition of desert which includes the polar ones too, the first line of the article says "largest hot desert". — mark ✎ 15:54, 17 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] 4,000 BC

I need to learn about the sahara in 4,000 B.C and what the people did yo survive?

[edit] Climate

Yes, people discuss the climatic differences between hot deserts and ice deserts right here on the Talk page.

However, the article is lacking (IMHO) any relevant information on the climate in the Sahara. Important pieces of information, IMHO, apart from the fact that most of the desert is covered with sand :-)

What's the average/peak temperature at day? What at night? How often does it rain? And how much does it rain, if it happens to rain? I mean, it's said more people die of drowning in the desert than of lack of water (yup, campers do get surprised by the sudden appearance of substatial amounts of water in wadis).

What about Fauna? And Flora?

Just suggestions on how to improve the article. IMHO. --Klaws 22:20, 28 October 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Nabta Playa

Can someone verify the edits regarding Nabta Playa ? I refer you to User:Mark Dingemanse/Roylee. Wizzy…☎ 09:48, 6 November 2005 (UTC)

I have pulled the Nabta Playa part out pending verification, and I mean verification based on Reliable Sources. I know that Nabta Playa is a well-known archaeological site but there is no reason to trust Roylee's original research on this. Roylee's strategy is usually to cite sources from all over the internet, which when partly combined serve his POV and fit into his original research. Roylee has never engaged in productive discussion of WP:V, WP:NOR, and WP:RS policies despite being asked several times by several editors. I see the bulk of Roylee's edits as one of the most disruptive forms of vandalism to Wikipedia. — mark ✎ 09:29, 26 November 2005 (UTC)

[edit] french version

I was reading a book by Paul Bowles (The Sheltering Sky), and I came across terms which I was not familiar with (oued, erg, bled, etc.) I assumed the wikipedia page on the Sahara would have everything, but unfortunately, there is nothing in English on these terms. To my surprise, I found that the French article has all these topics. However, I don't speak French. So I think someone in the community interested in improving the Sahara article would do well to translate those portions of the French article missing from its English counterpart.

I'm not actually a community member, but I thought I could help out.

[edit] America

The U.S is nearly 3 times as large as the Sahara (Sq Miles 9,631,418)so it would be impossible to fit the entire U.S. in the Sahara this claim should be removed

Removed. -- Svest 23:15, 5 December 2005 (UTC)  ^{Wiki me up™}

Ugh. The U.S. is 9,631,418 square kilometers, not square miles. The Sahara desert is about as large as the U.S. -- 130.74.96.32 21:07, 11 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Mostly rock?

I've heard from a few places that the Sahara is primarily rock, and only something like 20% sand. Yet, all the photos I ever seem to see of it show endless sand dunes. Is it true that the desert is mostly rock, and if so, why aren't there more photos of this?

Funnyhat 01:40, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

The Hoggar in Algeria is a famous part of the Sahara formed of mountains. There are many more parts that have mountains and rocks. Think for example on all the places with rock paintings, in Algeria, Libya, Niger. The west of Tunisia close to the Algerian frontier consists also of mountains. Think of the movie The English Patient: the desert parts are almost completely filmed in west Tunesia...--User:AAM | Talk 15:42, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Deletions by me.

I took everything mark marked as citation required and deleted them. I am not even knowledgable in the field. If you must reinsert said content, either include a citation on the talk page or in the article - I will revert any addition of information that does not include a reputable cite. Hipocrite - «Talk» 20:42, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Age of Sahara

The intro says it's 2.5 million years old. Then the article says that during the last ice age, it was a much wetter place. The last glacial period ended just 10000 years ago. Then the article (and the Sahara Desert (ecoregion) article) claims that domestication of the pig resulted in desertification. The ecoregion article also says that 5000 years ago the desert was more like a savanna. So which is it? There are a lot of conflicting claims here. -- 130.74.96.32 19:51, 11 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Temperature

I've searched the internet to no avail, but hopefully someone here will help me. What was the highest and lowest recorded temperature in the Sahara?

I found that you can find variations from -15C to 50C. These are extremes, I have no reference on exact recordings. From Sahara Ed Guide Marcus (1992) ISBN 2-7131-0073-9 --User:AAM | Talk 15:46, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] All those links removed

I notice that almost every link in this article has been removed. While the article previously seemed to have too many links, now it doesn't look like a Wikipedia article anymore. Is there some common ground on what should be linked? -- Donald Albury (Dalbury)^(Talk) 00:14, 21 February 2006 (UTC)

The wikilink removal was recently done by 86.42.91.254 with no edit summary, thus no reason given. Judging by the remnants left behind they just searched for all occurances of [[ or ]] and blanked the substitution, therefore I don't think any thought went into the edit at all. (Actually they did go to the trouble of taking out the various embedded links to www.touregypt.net under the Cattle Period section. These links being references to the sources.)

For this reason I've reverted the change, as while I agree that it suffers from overlinking, a thoughtful copyedit is required rather than a mass deletion of wikilinks (and source links). — Graibeard ^(talk) 02:46, 21 February 2006 (UTC)

I hesitated to revert, as I've not contributed to the article (other than to revert vandalism at some point). It seems like there are a lot of "linkable" terms in the article. I suspect the article wouldn't look so overlinked after a good rewrite. -- Donald Albury (Dalbury)^(Talk) 03:26, 21 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Cairo as largest city in Sahara

As the population of the Sahara is given as 2.5 million, that obviously does not include the Nile valley, so why would Cairo then be listed as the largest city in the Sahara. In fact, the Cairo metropolitan area has a population over 15 million. I know the article used to name Nouakchott as the largest city. Perhaps the article needs to explicitly exclude the Nile valley. -- Donald Albury (Dalbury)^(Talk) 11:24, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

I for one don't consider Cairo to be situated in the Sahara. — mark ✎ 11:37, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

Thinking about this some more, the Eastern Desert of Egypt is not always considered to be part of the Sahara, and certainly is different. I notice, moreover, that [[Eastern Desert]] is a redirect to Arabian Desert and East Sahero-Arabian xeric shrublands, although that article sets the western boundary of the Arabian desert at the Red Sea. I think a case can be made for setting the eastern boundary of the Sahara at the Nile valley. -- Donald Albury (Dalbury)^(Talk) 12:47, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Good Article nomination has failed

The Good article nomination for Sahara has failed, for the following reason:

Several parts are too short to provide a broad view on the Sahara, such as the lead section, and there are just two sentences on its modern history. Although not mandatory, its history section could have images to illustrate it. King of ♥ ♦ ♣ ♠ 23:33, 24 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Climate History

I added a section on the history of climate in the Sahara. I completely removed the previous discussion of human caused desertification because I couldn't find even one web site on it, even a sketchy one, but I found a number discussing monsoon changes. Also, the page Sahara Desert (ecoregion) seemed to be the source of this, but there it seemed to be based on something someone thought they remembered. Argent Cerulean 01:08, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

Why is there no information about the temperatures? That seems to be very useful information for one looking at the largest desert. --FluffleS 16:48, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Camels

Camels in the Sahara were not introduced by the Arabs. See discussion page of History of Western Sahara.S710 09:57, 20 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Challenged etymology

I have moved the text below here because of the challenge to the statement.

This same Arabic root also means magical or enchanted (this is wrong: the word magic has a different spelling: ﺮﺤﺴ(sin instead of sad); therefore magical/ecnchanted has nothing to do with the root of Sahara!).

I'll have to leave the resolution of this to those who know Arabic. -- Donald Albury 14:28, 29 October 2006 (UTC)

I was the one who originally added that statement. I based my information from a Maltese dictionary and native speakers (Maltese variously being described as a language or an Arabic dialect, depending on which authority you ask). Both words are without doubt etymologically derived from classical Arabic. The sound, at least in that dialect, is identical. It may well be that there is a difference in spelling in the original Arabic script which is not preserved in the Maltese script. Rhialto 21:39, 29 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Azalai?

I saw a link to "Azalai" in another article, which redirects here, although no mention of the term or what it means is in the article. 69.85.180.177 05:54, 2 December 2006 (UTC)

It appears to be the name of a caravan route, or of the caravan journey. See here. -- Donald Albury 12:25, 6 December 2006 (UTC)