Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Astronomical objects

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Archive 1: September 2002-April 2006
Archive 2: April 2006-October 2006

Contents

[edit] Debates on dwarf planet and asteroid names

Debates on dwarf planet and asteroid names have spilled over into Wikipedia talk:Naming conventions (astronomical objects). As best as I can tell, this debate would benefit greatly from a planetary scientist with a Ph.D. who can provide credible professional input. Someone should also contact the Minor Planet Center and get information from them (or get them involved in Wikipedia). (I'm just an extragalactic astronomer, so I am not going to get involved further in this debate.) George J. Bendo 08:52, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

Sorry about that! I thought that they should at least be aware of what was being changed if they wanted to change it. Adam Cuerden talk 14:35, 11 October 2006 (UTC)
The debate is in the right place. I just think the debate could benefit from people with more professional experience with asteroids. George J. Bendo 14:38, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

I just wish that some of them actually knew anything about astronomy - there's a bizarre reaction against MPC numbers that I find incomprehensible. Adam Cuerden talk 14:40, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

Ah, well. Give it a few months to settle down, then re-vote on the issue if it turns out to be unworkable? Adam Cuerden talk 14:49, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

The reaction against the numbers is understandable. Most of the general public (any probably some professional astronomers like me) do not commonly see asteroids referred to by number (for example, we do not see the asteroid Vesta commonly referred to as "4 Vesta"). This still looks like an unresolved issue with naming asteroids. Galaxies are generally easier. For example, a layperson or a professional looking up NGC 5005 will find it listed as NGC 5005. George J. Bendo 15:19, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

I suppose. But the bits about how it's a personal offense to a lump of rock and all the other anthromorphosizings are kind of scary. Adam Cuerden talk 15:57, 11 October 2006 (UTC)
One of the problems with asteroid names, is that they are generally named after someone or something notable - and unless it is described as going to hit/pass very close to the Earth, or has been visited by spacecraft - the vast majority of minor planets virtually never appear in "popular" media. This means that, whilst NGC 5005 is at NGC 5005, very often, something else is at just the name part of the asteroid on wikipedia. Even Vesta is a disambiguation page, and is perhaps one of the best known asteroids. Some, like Juno links directly to the goddess. The minor planet articles generally have to be disambiguated. Besides, it'd be a huge task to change a few thousand article titles, and countless thousands of links to them! Richard B 19:47, 12 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Minor planet names

It attempts to be an overview of how the MPC handles names, the process, and the history (expansion and clarification of Minor planet number). It could really use a look-over by an astronomer, since I'm about to be trounced by the non-astronomers if I got this wrong. Adam Cuerden talk 18:26, 12 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Dysnomia (moon) → Dysnomia (natural satellite)

User:Cool Cat has proposed to rename Eris/Xena's moon. 132.205.44.134 00:45, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

That would be inconsistent with the naming convention of the multitude of other moons listed on the natural satellite page. Why use two words when one will suffice? — RJH (talk) 22:20, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Galaxy group work

Just to stir up conversation a little...

I have been working on trying to clean up the galaxy groups on Wikipedia lately. I currently have four categories (Category:M51 subgroup, Category:M101 subgroup, Category:NGC 6703 group, and Category:Galactic groupings) nominated for deletion, and I would like to rename the Coma cluster of galaxies and Leo I group of galaxies pages. It also looks like more work on the categories is needed; Wikipedia currently contains three categories for the M96 Group and three categories for the M66 Group. (Can you guess which categories correspond to each group?)

On another note, in a brief discussion with WilliamKF, I came to the conclusion that Wikipedia may need two galaxy cluster templates: one for extended nearby clusters (where group boundaries, centers, and redshifts are hard to define) and one for Abell clusters, compact clusters, and distant clusters (where group boundaries, centers, and redshifts can be clearly defined). What do other people think? (Is anyone out there?) George J. Bendo 00:22, 21 October 2006 (UTC)

I just proposed renaming Category:Leo cluster as Category:Abell 1367. (I have the sense that this seems too esoteric for people.) George J. Bendo 19:23, 21 October 2006 (UTC)
I don't really have any strong opinion on the first topic, other than to ask that the templates have a consistent appearance (color, format, order, row tags where they match, &c.). For the cluster name, "Abell 1367" seems to make more sense if only because it receives many more ghits (16,000 versus 137 for "Leo cluster".) — RJH (talk) 20:05, 27 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] AfD: Field of the Nebulae?

After briefly looking over the Field of the Nebulae article, I figured out that it is probably talking about the Virgo Cluster, although I am not 100% certain. I did a Google search on both "Field of the Nebulae" and "Coma-Virgo Cloud" and found very little except for a few articles that say the same thing as what is written in the Wikipedia article. (One of those articles may be the source for the Wikipedia article, but I can't tell.) NED and the ADS Abstract Server do not return any information when I do a search on either "name". The term certainly is not used often, and it probably should not exist as an independent article in Wikipedia. My questions are:

  1. Should this be deleted or turned into a redirect to the Virgo Cluster?
  2. If it should be turned into a redirect, can I just do this myself?

George J. Bendo 00:13, 22 October 2006 (UTC)

How about proposing a merge, if the article really needs to exist and become a redirect. From your description, though, I would go the WP:AfD route. Awolf002 01:03, 22 October 2006 (UTC)
I guess my vote would be to go the AFD route as well. I've never heard the term used before and multiple queries outside of Wikipedia turn up no results. (www.answers.com uses Wikipedia as a source) I am nearly positive that it would fail WP:N if it was put to an AFD debate. If you decide to change it into a redirect however, I am not aware of any reason why you could not do that yourself. --Nebular110 01:05, 22 October 2006 (UTC)
Personally I'd just check WP:redirect and go ahead. But if deletion is preferred, then I'd just {{prod}} it and paste in a brief explanation. It's usually less painful than AfD's in clear-cut cases like this. — RJH (talk) 18:12, 22 October 2006 (UTC)

I have decided to prod the article. If it is not deleted, I will use it for jokes among other professional astronomers, as I have already done with the W cloud article. George J. Bendo 20:45, 3 November 2006 (UTC)

If somebody removes the prod we can always take it through for an AfD. That is usually more than sufficient in cases when a rational deletion criteria is presented. (Although I've had some negative experiences with that process, so you never know for certain...) — RJH (talk) 19:46, 5 November 2006 (UTC)
132.205.44.134 removed the PROD on the last day. He/she/they/it provided references indicating that "Field of the Nebulae" is the Virgo Cluster. Would anyone mind if I turn Field of the Nebulae into a redirect to Virgo Cluster while noting the (obscure) name on the Virgo Cluster page in the infobox? George J. Bendo 07:35, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

I turned Field of the Nebulae into a redirect for the Virgo Cluster. However, I did not have the stomach to note the ultra-obscure name on the Virgo Cluster page itself (but I did leave a lengthy note explaining why on the talk page). George J. Bendo 16:34, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Proposed rename for Moon

Someone has proposed renaming Moon as Luna or something else (possibly Moon (natural satellite)). This is as silly as the asteroid rename discussion a couple of weeks ago. However, it is not as silly as the older proposal to rename Moon as [[Moon (moon)]. Please go to the talk page for Moon and voice your opinion. George J. Bendo 17:29, 22 October 2006 (UTC)

This requested move died a quick and painless death. It was closed less than one day after being proposed. The opposition was so overwhelming that an administrator invoked the snowball clause to close the debate. George J. Bendo 21:06, 22 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Project directory

Hello. The WikiProject Council has recently updated the Wikipedia:WikiProject Council/Directory. This new directory includes a variety of categories and subcategories which will, with luck, potentially draw new members to the projects who are interested in those specific subjects. Please review the directory and make any changes to the entries for your project that you see fit. There is also a directory of portals, at User:B2T2/Portal, listing all the existing portals. Feel free to add any of them to the portals or comments section of your entries in the directory. The three columns regarding assessment, peer review, and collaboration are included in the directory for both the use of the projects themselves and for that of others. Having such departments will allow a project to more quickly and easily identify its most important articles and its articles in greatest need of improvement. If you have not already done so, please consider whether your project would benefit from having departments which deal in these matters. It is my hope that all the changes to the directory can be finished by the first of next month. Please feel free to make any changes you see fit to the entries for your project before then. If you should have any questions regarding this matter, please do not hesitate to contact me. Thank you. B2T2 23:30, 25 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] More galaxy group work

I have some more administrative requests for galaxy group/cluster pages pending:

  • I have a proposal pending to move HCG 87 group of galaxies to HCG 87.
  • In undoing some of the chaos of Hurricane Devon, I have submitted a request to merge Category:M96 group, Category:M96 subgroup, and Category: Leo I group into Category:M96 Group and Category:M66 group, Category:M66 subgroup, and Category: Leo Triplett into Category:Leo Triplet. ("Triplet" will be spelled without a stutter.)
  • To give the group categories a more uniform appearance, I have proposed speedy renaming the Category:Centaurus cluster, Category:Fornax cluster, Category:Norma cluster, and Category:Perseus cluster pages.

I am still tracking down information on half of the groups and clusters in Wikipedia. I might tackle the "Ursa Major North Group" and "Ursa Major South Group" next. George J. Bendo 18:11, 28 October 2006 (UTC)

I figured out that the "Eridanus Cluster" is more commonly referred to as the "Eridanus Group" (although this is an example of an object that lies in the gray area between galaxy group and galaxy cluster). I have therefore proposed renaming Category:Eridanus cluster as Category:Eridanus Group. George J. Bendo 19:04, 28 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Problematic article: Canes Venatici Cloud

The Canes Venatici Cloud article has been tagged as needing professional help for a while now. I did a little bit of research on the "Canes Venatici Cloud", and I am finally able to make some sense of it. This article seems to be written using the term in the context it is given in a 1982 paper by Brent Tully. As far as I can tell, only Tully's works and a few amateur websites that copy his 1982 paper use "Canes Venatici Cloud" in this sense. However, it appears that astronomers are more likely to use the term "Canes Venatici Cloud" to refer to the Canes Venatici I Group (currently called the M94 Group on Wikipedia), as revealed by searches on the ADS Abstract Service, the SIMBAD Astronomical Database, and the NASA/IPAC Extragalactic Database. I recommend that Wikipedia makes "Canes Venatici Cloud" a redirect to the M94 Group page, although I would like to note that this is ultimately an obscure term. What are other people's thoughts? (I have noticed that my work on galaxy groups has become increasingly esoteric for Wikipedia. I do not know if I expect a response.) George J. Bendo 15:32, 1 November 2006 (UTC)

I guess if I were looking to do something along those lines I would first check the "what links here" list and see if it would make sense to modify all of the pages (not in user space) to use M94 Group instead. — RJH (talk) 15:42, 2 November 2006 (UTC)
Most of the other stuff in the "what links here" are galaxy groups that are supposed to be part of the Tully version of the Canes Venatici Cloud. These links were presumably added by someone involved with creating the awful Canes Venatici Cloud article. I could easily remove these links or rewrite them to point to the Local Supercluster/Virgo Supercluster article instead (which would be much more appropriate). George J. Bendo 17:03, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

I have begun to turn this into a redirect. First, I am going to delete all of the inappropriate links to the article. (Some of the links even misidentified the objects "cloud membership" in the Local Supercluster.) I will also reference NED and SIMBAD as giving "Canes Venatici Cloud" as a synonym for "M94 Group" on the M94 Group page (which need to be renamed). George J. Bendo 11:41, 4 November 2006 (UTC)

I have finished converting the article into a redirect. George J. Bendo 13:28, 4 November 2006 (UTC)
A leftover item from the redirect work: The redirect Local Cloud no longer makes sense. I cannot think of where to redirect a search for "Local Cloud" either, so I have nominated the redirect for deletion. George J. Bendo 12:54, 6 November 2006 (UTC)
Local Cloud could instead be the article title for the Tully version. 132.205.44.134 23:53, 8 November 2006 (UTC)
Tully does not use the term. The term is more likely to refer to a cloud within the Milky Way (as a search with the ADS Abstract Service reveals). The term could be used in this sense, although Wikipedia may already have an article that already describes this somewhere. George J. Bendo 07:31, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Comet Halley → Halley's Comet

Comet Halley has been proposed for renaming by user:Wknight94 132.205.44.134 23:51, 8 November 2006 (UTC)

See Talk:Comet_Halley#Requested_move. — RJH (talk) 16:55, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

The article was renamed as Halley's Comet by a roughly 2:1 margin. The major objections came from people who did not like the informality of the name "Halley's Comet". I encourage those people to start a requested move for NGC 5194. George J. Bendo 19:51, 12 November 2006 (UTC)

NASA calls it the Whirpool Galaxy in their press releases. 132.205.93.88 04:05, 21 November 2006 (UTC)
If I took some people's attitudes, I would belligerently insist that it is called NGC 5194, or UGC 8493, or IRAS 13277+4727. After all, "Whirlpool Galaxy" sounds so colloquial.
By the way, the current name could have problems for other reasons. NED indicates that "Whirlpool Galaxy" applies to both NGC 5194 and NGC 5195. However, I think that most people searching for the "Whirlpool Galaxy" are looking for NGC 5194 (the spiral galaxy), so I have not recommended the change. If this bothers people, however, maybe we should change the name for NGC 5194. (The two galaxies should also remain in separate articles; NGC 5194 and NGC 5195 are very different from each other and have been studied as separate objects.) George J. Bendo 17:36, 21 November 2006 (UTC)
I would think that many people looking Whirlpool Galaxy would have encountered it in various press releases dealing with the former, so we'd encounter the common name problem that "Halley's Comet" captured, if it were to be renamed to NGC 5194. 132.205.93.32 01:35, 28 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Category:Barred disc galaxies

I have nominated Category:Barred disc galaxies for deletion. The logic for this nomination is simple: this category is redundant with Category:Barred spiral galaxies and Category:Barred lenticular galaxies. I just wanted to explain the nomination here in case anyone asks (and feel free to disagree with me). George J. Bendo 12:37, 10 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Article for Deletion: W cloud

I finally nominated W cloud for deletion. Please go here to vote on the deletion. In my opinion, this is one of the most bizarre articles on Wikipedia (although it is real). I use this article as a joke among other professional astronomers. (We need entertainment while testing the equipment for the Herschel Space Observatory.) George J. Bendo 00:01, 11 November 2006 (UTC)

W cloud has been deleted. I will be nominating the correspinding category for deletion shortly. George J. Bendo 18:35, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Possible merge between Ursa Major South group of galaxies and M109 Group

After studying the reference material available for the Ursa Major South group of galaxies, I have come to the conclusion that it is part of the M109 Group (with the final page being named "M109 Group").

Currently, the Wikipedia article relies on material from the "Atlas of the Universe" page, which is not peer-reviewed. I checked Hyperleda, the reference within the Atlas of the Universe page, and I found that the reference gives results that are different from the Altas of the Universe page. This means that the Atlas of the Universe is a bogus reference on this topic.

I then checked the article by Fouque et al. (1992) which uses the term. Fouque et al. may be the only refereed paper that uses the term "Ursa Major I South" for the group. Apparently, many of the galaxies in the Fouque et al. "Ursa Major I South" group correspond to galaxies listed by the Nearby Galaxy Catalog and by Giuricin et al. (2000) as part of the same group as M109 (NGC 3992). The Giuricin et al. results are particularly robust; they used three different algorithms for group detection and derived similar results from all three for the M109 Group. I therefore think that Fouque et al. are probably in error and that the thing currently listed as the Ursa Major South group of galaxies should be merged with the M109 Group.

Before I undertake such a merge, what do other people think? Please respond by 17 Nov, at which time I will undertake the merge. George J. Bendo 16:26, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

I received no comments on this in three different forums. I am moving ahead with redirecting Ursa Major South group of galaxies to M109 Group. Note that the LGG Catalogue specifically identifies UMa I N and UMa I S as belonging to one group and that the results from the LGG Catalogue are representative of the other group catalogs. The merge is therefore justified. George J. Bendo 10:39, 17 November 2006 (UTC)
As a consequence of the merge, I have nominated Category:Ursa Major South group for deletion. George J. Bendo 10:50, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Controversial category debate: Category:Extraterrestrial natural disasters

Soon after someone created Category:Extraterrestrial natural disasters to include things like moonquakes, Venusquakes, and the Great Red Spot, I nominated the category for deletion. The debate on the category is almost split 50/50 in favor of deletion and could use additional votes. (In my opinion, this looks like a really bad category even if it is renamed. Everything from Arp 220 to Copernicus Crater could fall in this category.) George J. Bendo 14:12, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

I don't see any votes to keep the current category, although there are some proposals for a rename. Perhaps the various quake articles could be merged into a single article on extraterrestrial quakes? That would leave just the red spot article. — RJH (talk) 17:00, 17 November 2006 (UTC)
The votes to rename were effectively saying to keep the category. I honestly think that the category, even renamed, is still ineffective. George J. Bendo 19:27, 17 November 2006 (UTC)
True. But most of the Wikipedia admins seem like pretty reasonable and rational people, so hopefully common sense will rule. — RJH (talk) 19:14, 18 November 2006 (UTC)
...and the category is history. — RJH (talk) 23:26, 24 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Halley's Comet naming debate continuing

If you look at Talk:Halley's Comet or Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Physics, you will see that the debate on the naming of Halley's Comet is continuing. Other Wikipedians, especially those with Ph.D's in fields related to astronomy, may want to contribute to the debate. —Dr. George J. Bendo

[edit] Olympus Mons

Hello, I just nominated the Olympus Mons article for the Article Creation and Improvement Drive because I think that that article deserves to be class A. I thought this nomination might be of some interest to you all. Thanks! S.dedalus 07:06, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Astronomy versus Astrophysics

I just nominated Category:Astrophysicists for deletion today, since it appears to duplicate Category:Astronomers. The discussion on the nomination led into a discussion about whether "astrophysics" can be considered a subcategory of "astronomy". My immediate perception as a professional astronomer/astrophysicist is that the difference does not really exist, as most astronomers use physics in their analysis. When I do a Google search on "difference between astronomy and astrophysics", I get links to a bunch of "ask the experts" pages that seem to say the same thing. This led me to look at the astronomy and astrophysics articles in Wikipedia. Unsurprisingly, the two articles contain duplicate information. Additionally, some of the things described in astronomy are physics oriented, and some of the things in astrophysics are not physics intensive. Similar statements can be made for Category:Astronomy and Category:Astrophysics. In my opinion, it looks like all of this stuff should be merged together. What are other people's opinions? GeorgeJBendo 18:05, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

I have an undergraduate degree in astrophysics and graduate degrees in astronomy and I think we should delete Category:Astrophysicists and merge astrophysics into astronomy. To me, the difference between astrophysics and astronomy is a subtle one, with astrophysics being more theoretical and astronomy more observational. However, there's a lot of overlap and I don't see a good reason to have both terms on Wikipedia. --Fournax 21:27, 19 November 2006 (UTC)
Whilst there is a lot of overlap, perhaps if you consider amateur astronomers, I don't think I'd class many of them also as amateur astrophysicists. Many amateur astronomers are only looking at and recording (e.g. by photographing) the objects they look at. Few will try to look at an object and use data to try to understand its properties. I realise that there is little difference if you consider professional astronomers, but if you also include amateurs, then I think there becomes a distinction, if slightly blurred. Richard B 21:30, 19 November 2006 (UTC)
If we use "astronomy", that would be more inclusive of both amateurs and professionals. Also note that articles and categories for amateur astronomy do exist on Wikipedia. GeorgeJBendo 23:36, 19 November 2006 (UTC)
Is Tycho Brahe an astrophysicist? What about Hipparchus (astronomer)? Are they amateur astronomers? If we dump all "modern" astronomers into the astrophysicists category, it would solve your problem right? (and what of cosmologists?) 132.205.93.88 03:50, 21 November 2006 (UTC)
What is the definition of "modern" in this case? Does it mean post-Galileo (who first used the telescope for astronomy), post-Newton (who first applied physics to astronomy), post-astrophotography (when quantitative measurements for flux became feasible), or something else? We should just choose one category name for both historical and modern astronomers. I preferred "astronomer" for its simplicity, but I have the sense that most other people would rather see professionals labeled as "astrophysicists". (It is as though other people want me to have a more pretentious job title.) I have the sense that this is going to be discussed further anyway.
I am inclined to leave Category:Cosmologists alone simply because it is a fairly clear subfield within astronomy/astrophysics. Cosmologists study the structure and evolution of the universe as a whole. Many other astronomers (extragalactic astronomers like me who work mostly on nearby galaxies, stellar astronomers, planetary astronomers, and astronomers who study the ISM and star formation) are clearly not cosmologists. Hence, a category for cosmologists is useful.
Anyhow, the Category:Astrophysicists discussion detracts from the larger issue: Wikipedia has separate articles on astronomy and astrophysics that effectively provide information that should be on one page. This should probably be fixed. Moreover, we should consider merging Category:Astrophysics with Category:Astronomy, although I would like to continue discussion before proposing such a merge. GeorgeJBendo 09:58, 21 November 2006 (UTC)
Personally, I would divide modern and pre-modern at the point where physics dominates over cartography, and theory gained on observation... This would be around when Hubble describes the expanding universe, Einstein revolutionizes gravity, nuclear processes are discovered (thus making sure the Sun is not made from coal), etc. So that theory is more than just descibing orbits with Universal Gravitation, and a two body problem, or predicting eclipses. I suppose an early point would be the characterization of elements in the Sun by emission spectra... 132.205.44.134 00:16, 22 November 2006 (UTC)
One thing is clear though, you cannot merge astronomers into astrophysicists, since amateur astronomers are still astronomers but a great many are not astrophysicists, and astronomy has existed for a long time, with stellar cartography being its main mission. 132.205.44.134 00:18, 22 November 2006 (UTC)
As for astrophysics and astronomy... astrophysics is a clear subcategory of astronomy. But, how is cataloging star positions astrophysics? Or creating constellations? Or naming things? We should bear in mind historical context, and the millenia of stargazing people have been doing. Some of that would bear on astrology and astronomy, but would not bear on astrophysics. Astronomy isn't just something of today, and WikiPedia isn't just a repository of what is in current practice in the field of astronomy. 132.205.44.134 00:23, 22 November 2006 (UTC)
An issue with merging astronomy and astrophysics into one page is the problem of page size. Astronomy is already at or past the recommended size limitation, and that after cutting it down to almost a bare-bones summary. It is usually more practical to cover topics in more detail on separate pages, such as astrophysics. So I'd have to say that I would be opposed to a merger due to practical aspects. Would it make more sense to rename it to theoretical astronomy, as a counter-part to the observational astronomy page? — RJH (talk) 22:07, 24 November 2006 (UTC)

I am going to leave most of this issue alone for now, as everyone appears to have mixed opinions on the topic and as we may have some technical issues with the mergers. (I do like RJH's suggestion for moving/merging astrophysics to theoretical astronomy.)

One thing I am contemplating is proposing a merger between Category:Astronomers and Category:Astrophysicists to make Category:Astronomers and astrophysicists. Would that satisfy people's desires to be inclusive of professionals and amateurs and of "pre-modern" and modern researchers while avoiding some problems with determining whether people qualify as astrophysicists? Dr. Submillimeter 09:54, 25 November 2006 (UTC) (Note the name change.)

[edit] space wikiproject

what do you think of the idea to make all the 15 or so current Space-related WikiProjects into task forces of a single WikiProject Space, as in WP:MILHIST? it would involve moving all the pages here to subpages of Wikipedia:WikiProject Space/Astronomical objects task force, and changing the banner to a Space WikiProject banner (which could get complicated, as in {{WPMILHIST}}). does that sound like a good idea, or a bad one? Mlm42 18:10, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

It's a rather larger umbrella than military history... commericial space exploitation, military space exploitation, and astronomy are not exactly all that connected, you could potentially say astrology is space related. 132.205.93.88 03:48, 21 November 2006 (UTC)
you say space is larger, but we are talking about wikiprojects.. WPMILHIST has over 300 members, i believe, whereas all the space ones combined have well under 100. and wikiprojects are about the people, mostly, not the subjects.. and you say other uses of space aren't closely connected with astronomy.. as i see it, to use space you need to have space missions, and some space missions are purely astronomical. and yes, i suppose astrology would be included.
this likely won't happen for a very long time, but i'm just thinking about the future here :) Mlm42 16:43, 21 November 2006 (UTC)
Is there an actual reason for the proposed merger? Otherwise I think it makes a certain amount of sense to keep the projects separate and more focused. Thanks. — RJH (talk) 23:26, 24 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Hurricane Devon?

Is Hurricane Devon still a member of this project? He's on the list, but he doesn't have a user page anymore (so there is no userbox), and he's still blocked. 132.205.93.88 04:15, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

I boldly removed him from the Wikiproject. Also note that someone named AstroHurricane001 has joined the project. I have currently drawn no conclusions on this new person. It could be someone who has interests similar to Hurricane Devon's and simply chose a similar user name, or it could be Hurricane Devon using a new name. George J. Bendo 16:02, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Green Fireballs?

I'm not a member of this project, but I was wondering about the article Green Fireballs. Is that within the scope of this project? If so, would someone like to comment on it? Bubba73 (talk), 23:53, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

I think it's more for UFOlogy... or possibly weather..., just MHO. 132.205.44.134 00:25, 22 November 2006 (UTC)
I thought the fireballs were meteors. Bubba73 (talk), 02:01, 22 November 2006 (UTC)
I agree with 132.205.44.134. This is something better handled by a pseudoscience group than an astronomy group. George J. Bendo 08:54, 22 November 2006 (UTC)
It is listed with the Pseudosciene and Rational Skepticism projects, but they are pretty inactive. I thought someone here might want to have a look. But thanks anyway. Bubba73 (talk), 14:44, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Username change

Just for people's information, I changed my name from George_J._Bendo to Dr. Submillimeter. Google was returning my userpage as the first or second item in their searches. I just wanted those searches to turn up my real-life work first. Dr. Submillimeter 08:10, 24 November 2006 (UTC)

That's an interesting choice in naming. Considering the kind of bad jokes you might potentially receive on your talk page from now on (consider the number of sophmoric users Wikipedia has). 132.205.45.206 02:25, 25 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Unilateral infobox changes by Friendlystar

Friendlystar, while well-intentioned, unilaterally changed many of the templates for the infoboxes, including Template:Galaxy and Template:Galaxy cluster. The change did not make sense, as it appeared to provide separate lines for data and references for both RA and Dec. I reverted Friendlystar's edits (which were causing format problems for many pages where the infobox RA and Dec included references), and I suggested that Friendlystar discuss future template changes here. I personally do not like the changes, but if a consensus of other people agree with the changes, then I will use them. Dr. Submillimeter 12:09, 24 November 2006 (UTC)

I have created several templates to refer astronomical coordinates to sky map on wikisky {{AstroCoord}},{{AstroCoord-RA}},{{AstroCoord-Dec}} and included them in tempates that have astronomical coordinates like starbox and galaxy box. In order to accomodate references that are right after coordinates I separated these data in two tempate lins: ra→(ra,ra_info) and dec→(dec,dec_info). The result on article page looks like:
Messier 88
Galaxy List of galaxies

Spiral Galaxy Messier 88
Observation data
(Epoch J2000)
Constellation Coma Berenices
Right ascension 12h 31m 59.2s[1]
Declination +14° 25′ 14″[1]
Redshift 2,281 ± 3 km/s[1]
Distance 47 +8−7

fr:Modèle:± Mly (14.5 +2.4−2.0

fr:Modèle:± Mpc)[2]
Type SA(rs)b[1]
Apparent dimensions (V) 6′.9 × 3′.7[1]
Apparent magnitude (V) +10.4[1]
Notable features Receding at ~2,280 km/s
Other designations
NGC 4501, UGC 7675, PGC 41517, VCC 1401[1]

There's another way to implement astro coordinates link that would not require template modification, but it have to be implemented on every article (see second info box):

Messier 88
Galaxy List of galaxies

Spiral Galaxy Messier 88
Observation data
(Epoch J2000)
Constellation Coma Berenices
Right ascension 12h 31m 59.2s[1]
Declination +14° 25′ 14″[1]
Redshift 2,281 ± 3 km/s[1]
Distance 47 +8−7

fr:Modèle:± Mly (14.5 +2.4−2.0

fr:Modèle:± Mpc)[2]
Type SA(rs)b[1]
Apparent dimensions (V) 6′.9 × 3′.7[1]
Apparent magnitude (V) +10.4[1]
Notable features Receding at ~2,280 km/s
Other designations
NGC 4501, UGC 7675, PGC 41517, VCC 1401[1]

Visually in article there're no differences, but first method require template modification and few articles that are using references in coordinates lines and second method would require change in every article. What method is more appropriate? Thanks. friendlystar 14:03, 24 November 2006 (UTC)

Thank you for the explanation. Your changes now make much more sense. It would be nice if someone could provide more information on wikisky.org. It does not appear to be linked to wikipedia.org.
I am going to recommend against these changes. While wikisky.org is a useful website, other equally useful websites are available on the web, including the STScI Digitized Sky Survey and Aladin. We could potentially have multiple sky survey websites link to each page's article. Moreover, some of these sky surveys are more complete than wikisky.org. The wikisky.org website relies on the SDSS data, which does not cover the entire sky. Other surveys (including those at the STScI Digitized Sky Survey) include full coverage of the sky. For example, wikisky.org returns a blank image of the sky for the Sombrero Galaxy, whereas the galaxy is included in other online astronomical image services.
I also worry about wikisky.org being external to wikipedia.org. If links to wikisky.org are integrated into the infoboxes and if wikisky.org should, for some reason, cease to exist, then hundreds or thousand of Wikipedia articles will include busted links deeply integrated into templates. We would need to rewrite all the RA and Dec in all the infoboxes (or design a bot) to fix the problem. Also, I would like to indicate that wikisky.org appears to be the effort of two individuals rather than the efforts of the SDSS or another larger organization. If something happens to those two individuals, wikisky.org could cease to exist.
For the above reasons, I do recommend that wikisky.org should be linked to by some Wikipedia articles (including the Sloan Digital Sky Survey but that it should not be integrated into the infoboxes.
I would also like to indicate that if it is decided that wikisky.org should be linked to Wikipedia articles through the infoboxes, then the links should be added using a bot. This is simply because the number of astronomical objects listed in Wikipedia is probably too large for one person to do by himself or herself.
Please keep in mind that this could affect virtually all articles on astronomical objects in Wikipedia. Feedback would be incredibly useful. Dr. Submillimeter 14:39, 24 November 2006 (UTC)
All the links to the WIKISKY.ORG done though template with neutral name AstroCoord, that can be changed anytime to link on another resource or even page page with choice from multiple resources without changes of every article that uses it. For now, as I aware, it is the only resource that provides interactive browsing through the sky. It covers entire sky in terms of data with more than 500,000,000 objects, that used to generate maps. It linked to CDS services (Simbad,VizieR) and several sky surveys that are available from object page. We got approval from SDSS for using their survey images for our optional browsing capabilities, but you're right it covers just 1/4 of entire sky. In addition WIKISKY designed to allow any visitor to add and correct data just like wikipedia does and it will be pretty close linked to wikipedia from object pages. I believe WIKISKY is very useful resource from wikipedia, in fact it already helped me to fix few coordinates problems in wikipedia articles while I was just testing links. Thank you friendlystar 15:33, 24 November 2006 (UTC)
The STScI Digitized Sky Survey and Aladin are also all-sky interactive browsers. Wikisky.org is not the first website to do this. Dr. Submillimeter 15:40, 24 November 2006 (UTC)
Dear Dr. Submillimeter, I am really confused by your statement about the necessity to “rewrite hundreds of thousands of Wikipedia articles”. It’s evidently that if something will happen to wikisky.org, only several templates need to be changed to fix the situation. Also if “more interesting” resource appears – it’s not a big deal to change the templates so that all links will be redirected to this new resource.
Speaking about “STScI Digitized Sky Survey and Aladin” that from your point of view are “also all-sky interactive browsers”, I would suggest you to click on these links and try to “browse” the sky and then to go to wikisky.org and try to do the same. These two sites are great but they definitely can’t be called “interactive”. These resources are oriented on advanced users while wikisky.org targets general public – regular wikipedia’s visitors. In general currently as I now there is nothing like wikisky.org on the Internet.
Thanks,
Regards,
K.L. Kostya30 16:50, 24 November 2006 (UTC)
True, these other browsers are oriented towards professionals. Nonetheless, you cannot make the claim that you have the "only interactive browser" on the web. (I also have no problems using the Digitized Sky Survey or Aladin myself.) As for your claim that only the templates need to be changed, you are mistaken. Friendlystar's edits caused formatting problems with all the galaxy and galaxy cluster templates that contained references. His fix was to add new lines to the galaxy and galaxy cluster templates, which would need to be duplicated a few hundred times for proper formatting. I respect the usefulness of the wikisky.org website, and I think keeping links on Wikipedia to wikisky.org is OK, but I think hard-wiring external links into the templates is a bad idea. Dr. Submillimeter 20:39, 24 November 2006 (UTC)

Dear members of Wikipedia’s astronomical society,

We would like to explain our position and to get your opinion about this situation.

There is a lot of interactive geographical resources on the Internet (Google Maps, Map Quest, Maps MSN and so on) but there was nothing like that about celestial map. We were speaking with many astronomers and nobody could name for us anything similar to wikisky.org.

We think that wikisky.org is a unique and interesting resource. We developed it because we love astronomy. We have kids and we hope that this kind of resources may help to involve kids into science. We also think that wikisky.org may be interesting and useful to students and with time it also may become interesting to the professionals. Our project is absolutely non commercial in all senses.

Now we think that wikisky.org may make the pages about astronomical objects on Wikipedia significantly more interesting. And it cannot be substituted by any articles or another internal Wikipedia’s resources.

We think that unlike other resources (STScI Digitized Sky Survey or Aladin) wikisky.org may be interesting for general non professional public, including kids and students who, in our opinion, are the major audience of all the astronomy related Wikipedia’s pages.

We think that it’s very useful that Wikipedia links geographical coordinates with Internet resources like Google maps (i.e. Sarajevo). And we believe that astronomical part of Wikipedia would only benefit from similar linking.

Thank you. Kostya30 01:45, 25 November 2006 (UTC)

The example Wikipedia article above (Sarajevo) contains external links to Google Maps and several other map sites at the bottom of its page, not in the infobox template. The infobox on the Sarajevo page contains latitude and longitude that link to another Wikipedia page that provides links to a broad range of external websites, not just one.
If we want to include links to wikisky.org, we should use one of the approaches used in the Sarajevo article (either include links at the bottom of the Wikipedia articles or provide a link to another Wikipedia page that then contains external links). If we link to wikisky.org using this method, however, I would also recommend including similar links for at least the SIMBAD Astronomical Database for all objects and the NASA/IPAC Extragalactic Database for extragalactic objects. I also recommend using a bot to insert all of the links rather than inserting them by hand.
Because the two individuals who are promoting linking to wikisky.org appear to have strong vested interests in the website, I have begun to worry that their actions may run afoul of Wikipedia's policies on external links and spam (see WP:EL and WP:SPAM). I have placed a notice at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard asking for advice on this issue. Dr. Submillimeter 09:44, 25 November 2006 (UTC)
Coming from the comment on WP:ANB, I see that Wikipedia:External_links#Restrictions on linking states that one of the external links categories to be avoided is; "Links to wikis, except those with a substantial history of stability and a substantial number of editors.". The further comment; "Use of Wikipedia to link to a website that you own, maintain or are acting as an agent for is strongly recommended against, even if the guidelines otherwise imply that it should be linked to.". also obtains. My personal opinion, for what it is worth, is that Infoboxes should not contain links that remove an editor to an external site. External links belong in a specific location on an article in order for readers to understand what will happen when they are clicked on. (aeropagitica) 14:23, 25 November 2006 (UTC)
I think it is pretty clear, that adding this (or any other 'coordinate link') inside a template is a bad idea. Please, do not try that. Instead, we can entertain a 'geohack' type of link on the top of individual pages of objects outside of the solar system. It would actually be a rather neat idea, to replicate that 'system' (it is still a hack ;) and link the coordinate on the edge of an article (lets say top-right) to another page with multiple links to interactive data portals. We can clearly include all the above mentioned sites, and thus stay 'neutral' in their use within WP articles. Any comments? Awolf002 14:15, 25 November 2006 (UTC)
Thank you all for your comments. I have created page similar to 'geohack' and set of templates to simplify equatorial coordinates reference. I believe we can put a lot of useful links on that page.
12h 22m 54.9s +15° 49′ 21″   {{EqCoor|12|22|54.9|+15|49|21|15|M100}}
Right ascension: 12h 22m 54.9s   {{EqCoor-RA|12|22|54.9|+15|49|21|15|M100}}
Declination: +15° 49′ 21″   {{EqCoor-Dec|12|22|54.9|+15|49|21|15|M100}}
— friendlystar 08:45, 26 November 2006 (UTC)
The page is nice-looking and seems to contain a nice list of links (although I recommend adding object-specific links to the ADS Abstract Service for all objects and to the NASA/IPAC Extragalactic Database for extragalactic objects like M100). However, the example page is still an external webpage. As long as it is external to Wikipedia, it should not be included within the Wikipedia templates. Can this problem be solved? Dr. Submillimeter 08:59, 26 November 2006 (UTC)
The page is freely editable, so we can improve it together. The problem with external page is same as for 'geohack' − both pages require capabilities that currently not implemented in main wikipedia project. I have created extension and published source code on mediawiki project page. When this functionality will be implemented in wikipedia, the page can be easily transfered under wikipedia domain and all links will be fixed by single template change. friendlystar 09:12, 26 November 2006 (UTC)
The key problem is that it is still an external web page. The characteristics and accessibility of the external web page do not matter. As long as the webpage is outside Wikipedia, links to the page should not be incorporated into Wikipedia's templates. Dr. Submillimeter 09:31, 26 November 2006 (UTC)
I agree. The 'astrohack' page must be hosted by Wikimedia, so the policies on WP:NPOV and similar concepts can be applied. My question is, why this page you provide needed to be different from the 'geohack' page? Can that page not be 're-used'? Awolf002 12:04, 26 November 2006 (UTC)
The 'geohack' is really as 'hack', it's not a regular wikipedia's article, but page specially designed to translate geographical coordinates only, that's why we cannot reuse that page directly for our purpose. The page hosted by tools.wikimedia.de — wikimedia tool server. I'm working on placing 'astrohack' page out there. Thanks friendlystar 17:15, 26 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] WikiSky.org

Just what is WikiSky.org?

What kind of information is it supposed to provide? (and should we ask for a /transwiki/ process for articles that do not meet notability criteria here to be transferred there?)

132.205.45.206 02:29, 25 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Galaxy

This is one of those essential astronomy topics that I think deserves a FA-rated treatment. The current page is fairly decent already, but I think there's more to be done. (Particularly with regard to meeting the stringent reference requirements; a prerequisite of a GA article.) Could the members of this group suggest a to-do list to make this page meet the comprehensiveness standards required for an FA article? Thank you. — RJH (talk) 02:13, 26 November 2006 (UTC)

From the standpoint, here is what I see missing in terms of content:
  • The introduction should spend more time describing the basic properties of galaxies (such as their typical sizes and masses). It also contains a lot of redundant information; it seems to describe the interstellar medium using several different synonyms. (I removed at least one synonym: "plasma".)
  • The observational history section should mention the Shapley Kurtis debate. Information of the historical detections of galaxies at wavelengths other than radio wavelengths would be nice. The HST's contributions to extragalactic astronomy and the Hubble Deep Field are not described accurately.
  • The "Types of galaxies" section missed a key point: many galaxies' basic properties are related to their Hubble type, including the basic character of the ISM, the star formation history, the AGN type, and the stellar dynamics. The "Active galaxies" subsection needs an overhaul.
  • The "Large scale structure" section contains the same awkward descriptions of galaxy groups and clusters that is found throughout Wikipedia. (I think someone copied a lot of information from SEDS, which was written by a German person who sometimes used awkward English phrases.) The section needs some revisions. I tried revising the second paragraph, but I am not happy with what I wrote. (I also need to find good references for some of that information.)
  • The "Galaxy formation and evolution" section makes no mention of mergers except for the cheesy discussion of the pending merger between the Milky Way and the Andromeda Galaxy. This is a glaring oversight that needs to be addressed. Changes in galaxy morphology over time also needs to be described.
  • The "Galactic biology" section appears to be given too much weight. I recommend shrinking this section if possible.
  • A "multiwavelength galaxies" section would be nice. (SINGS, a project that I have worked on, should have something somewhere.)
These are just brief comments for now. I will keep an eye on the page and make improvements when I can. Dr. Submillimeter 08:49, 26 November 2006 (UTC)
Thank you, these are helpful. I took the liberty of summarizing these on the galaxy page's to-do list (which I just added to the talk page.) — RJH (talk) 17:32, 27 November 2006 (UTC)
Thank you for transcribing my comments. (I also need to learn how to spell Curtis's name.) Dr. Submillimeter 18:31, 27 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Stablepedia

Beginning cross-post.

See Wikipedia talk:Version 1.0 Editorial Team#Stablepedia. If you wish to comment, please comment there. ★MESSEDROCKER★ 03:30, 26 November 2006 (UTC)

End cross-post. Please do not comment more in this section.

User:Messedrocker/Stablepedia

[edit] Category:Galaxy subclusters up for deletion

Category:Galaxy subclusters has been nominated for deletion by Dr. Submillimetre. 132.205.93.32 01:30, 28 November 2006 (UTC)

My internet connection died while I was nominating this. Otherwise, I would have put this in the "renames and deletions" list.
Aside from the deletion of this category itself (but not its subcategories) is the possibility that Category:Triangulum Subgroup and Category:NGC 3109 subgroup should be merged into something else or renamed. Karachentsev, in a 2005 Astronomical Journal paper, splits the Local Group into two separate subgroups, with the Andromeda Galaxy and the Triangulum Galaxy together in one of the subgroups. He also seems to treat NGC 3109 as a field galaxy. Karachentsev is one of the leaders in this kind of extragalactic work; I would generally trust many of his assessments (although his description of the Local Group is a little confusing). What do people think of this? Dr. Submillimeter 23:54, 28 November 2006 (UTC)
Only two of the four subcategories (Category:Andromeda Subgroup and Category:Milky Way Subgroup) seem to be populated enough to even warrant their own existence-- that is, the two you are suggesting for deletion have precisely 2 members each, and over at CFD this is generally not enough to avoid deletion on grounds of overcategorization. siafu 00:07, 29 November 2006 (UTC)
In general, whether the category can be realistically populated also needs to be taken into consideration. The one reference that I have says that they do not exist as real entities, however, so whether or not they can be populated may be a moot point. Before I nominate these specific subgroup categories for anything, I am going to see if a can find another reference or two that will confirm or contradict Karachentsev's results. Dr. Submillimeter 00:11, 29 November 2006 (UTC)
I think you may have it backwards; unless or until there are sufficient articles to populate these categories (~5), a nom to delete them at CFD with the reasoning of overcategorization would very likely be successful, even if you find a source to contradict Karachentsev. So, I'd say, go ahead and list them, and do the research on their actual validity for the purposes of improving Local Group. siafu 00:17, 29 November 2006 (UTC)
Actually, even if a category is underpopulated, as long as the WikiProject it is part of wants to keep it, it seems to be kept (see WikiProject Ships, which has several categories of one and two articles). 132.205.93.33 03:12, 29 November 2006 (UTC)
Perhaps we should have a list article with a list of primaries and their satellites? 132.205.93.33 03:12, 29 November 2006 (UTC)
What does that mean? Dr. Submillimeter 08:54, 29 November 2006 (UTC)
Perhaps we should have a List of satellite galaxies that lists satellite galaxies and are ordered by the distance from the center of the main galaxy that they orbit, with an outer ordering by Right Ascension of the main galaxy. 132.205.44.134 23:53, 29 November 2006 (UTC)
That kind of list would be chaotic and incredibly difficult to maintain properly. The list would be incredibly unwieldly, as it should include the satellites of virtually all spiral and large elliptical galaxies. Moreover, it does not deal with subregions within clusters, where several galaxies of the same size may be present and none may be called the "primary". (The Triangulum Galaxy may be considered part of a subgroup that includes the Andromeda Galaxy, but the Triangulum Galaxy cannot be considered a satellite of the Andromeda Galaxy.) Moreover, Wikipedia already has several sub-par list of galaxies, and it does not need another.
If we need to list the satellite galaxies for an individual object, we can list them in the individual galaxies' articles. See NGC 4631, for example. Dr. Submillimeter 07:06, 30 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Moon → The Moon

user:Voortle has nominated Moon for renaming. 132.205.93.33 01:47, 29 November 2006 (UTC)

As an additional note, User:Voortle is the same person who gave us the unpopular Category:Quakes and Category:Extraterrestrial disasters, and he also created a couple of articles (Venusquake, Marsquake, and one or two others) without citing references. I would say that his edits to astronomy articles need to be watched carefully. Dr. Submillimeter 09:06, 29 November 2006 (UTC)

This rename failed almost as badly as the last proposal to rename Moon. It took a few days to invoke the snowball clause. Dr. Submillimeter 10:27, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] User:RandomCritic and fiction edits

User:RandomCritic has been building standalone subpages of various astronomical object pages that used to be the sections "in fiction", and created a global category to dump all of them in (rather like his use of the hypothetical extrasolar astronomical object category), instead of using the existing subcategories. I've since corrected the rather ugly concatenation.

See Category:Astronomical locations in fiction, and it's component template Template:Astronomical locations in fiction (I see no need for such an unwieldy template that is a list rather than a navigation aid - it contains every article in the category, and they are not much related). As the preceding category system was developed to separate real, fictional usages of real and fictional astronomical objects, and place them in the correct heirarchy positions in the fictional locations and astronomical object trees, I've already cleaned up the heirarchy. (Note: Category:Locations in fiction is an umbrella for articles dealing with real locations in fiction)

132.205.93.33 04:15, 29 November 2006 (UTC)

Some of RandomCritic's work on galaxies has been quite useful. The Andromeda Galaxy article by itself could easily be overwhelmed with a list of fictional references to the galaxy. Piling the information into a new article instead is much better. Dr. Submillimeter 09:15, 29 November 2006 (UTC)
I agree that his work on galaxies has been nice. It's just collapsing of categorization into one messy container that bugged me. As he was the advocate for it in the hypothetical objects, and had quite a few edits onto the template, and as creator of most of the "in fiction" articles (and sole editor)... my heads up was directed mainly at his "in fiction" article categorization. 132.205.44.134 23:42, 29 November 2006 (UTC)
Well I'm guilty of creating the Template:Astronomical locations in fiction template. My goal in creating the template was to reduce to a minimum the amount of fiction cruft, er... content on the astronomy topic pages. I felt that an inter-link template would redirect the fictional efforts toward separate pages; presumably through topic consolidation(?). (But I do not agree that the articles are unrelated. Space-based science fiction tends to feature interplanetary and interstellar travel, so the links are quite natural.) However I would have no objection with it being replaced by the category Category:Astronomical locations in fiction. — RJH (talk) 17:51, 29 November 2006 (UTC)
The template could be listified. The lack of cohesion of the template's contents is rather ungainly. I have no opposition to the creation of "in fiction" articles, just the formerly rather bad way they were going about being categorized, and linked together in the template. 132.205.44.134 23:42, 29 November 2006 (UTC)
Perhaps it could be split into several more relevant templates: template:Stars in fiction template:Solar System in fiction template:Galaxies in fiction template:Planets in fiction, which would link to categories instead of articles. ? 132.205.93.32 23:14, 30 November 2006 (UTC)
On another note, we don't have a corresponding Category:Fictional astronomical locations for completely fictional locales (all the subcats of astro-locn-fict cat have complementary categories for completely fictional creations (ie. Category:Fictional planets goes with Category:Planets in fiction) 132.205.93.32 23:14, 30 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Complex Draco move

I have made a complex request to move Draco (on the ancient Athenian) to Draco (lawgiver) and Draco (disambiguation) to Draco. In my opinion, more people are probably going to be looking for the constellation (or possibly a fictional character such as Draco Malfoy) than the Athenian. I think this move has been overdue. Please cast a vote if you are interested. Dr. Submillimeter 09:59, 29 November 2006 (UTC)

Seems like a good idea. Did you inform Wikipedia:WikiProject History of Greece and Wikipedia:WikiProject Law? 132.205.44.134 23:49, 29 November 2006 (UTC)
I did not know that those projects existed. I will inform them if you or someone else has not. Dr. Submillimeter 06:55, 30 November 2006 (UTC)
I left a note at Wikipedia:WikiProject History of Greece, but I did not think that leaving a note at Wikipedia:WikiProject Law was appropriate. I also informed Wikipedia:WikiProject Harry Potter. (According to a Google search, Draco Malfoy is almost as relevant as Draco the Athenian.) Dr. Submillimeter 07:37, 30 November 2006 (UTC)
Draco move has been approved and completed. —Doug Bell talk 11:20, 5 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Image captions

The captions for images of astronomical objects lack a common format, and this is now beginning to lead to edit conflicts. I would like to ask a couple of specific questions to gather people opinions:

  1. For images in general, it would be nice to credit the source in the caption. How should we do that? I have been writing the credits following the word "Credit" and a colon. For example, I would use "NGC 5033 as viewed at infrared wavelengths by the CFHT. Credit: CFHT." Do other people like this format? Do other people have suggestions for captions?
  2. A small group of people have recently been changing Hubble Space Telescope image credits from "NASA" to "NASA/ESA". This change, while legitimate, leads to the question of how many organizations we need to credit in the image captions. Should we attempt to be overly-inclusive, including NASA in image credits for Hubble, Spitzer, GALEX, or Chandra images and ESA for the Hubble images (and other telescopes' images when appropriate), or should we be direct and just credit the telescopes?

Dr. Submillimeter 21:03, 29 November 2006 (UTC)

For example, here is what the credit line says in this STScI press release on the Sombrero Galaxy: "Credit: NASA and The Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA)". The ESA websites (such as this one) clearly state that the HST is a joint NASA/ESA venture (although the STScI website avoids using this nomenclature). Following the press release's convention, we would leave out ESA. Following the ESA's convention, we would include it. Which convention should we follow? Should we just go with the organizations in the credit line, or should
Also, what should we do when an image uploaded into Wikimedia is only noted to be a "NASA" image or a "Hubble Space Telescope" image or when no clear credit line is given? (This is partly what prompted my second question above.) Dr. Submillimeter 21:15, 29 November 2006 (UTC)
And please see the edit history for the Andromeda Galaxy that promted this discussion. Dr. Submillimeter 21:18, 29 November 2006 (UTC)
Well the image use policy for NASA requires that they be credited as the source, so I believe we have to include some type of credit line wherever we use their images. I am concerned about adding in the ESA credit, since they have a different and more limiting license policy regarding image use. (Or else I would gladly be employing their SMART-1 images on the lunar feature pages.) In short the ESA limits use to non-commercial sites, which I'm told is too strict for wikipedia. But as long as the image is released under NASA's copyright terms we're probably okay. Other than that I have no particular preference. — RJH (talk) 16:56, 30 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Template:Earth location

Xammer has created Template:Earth location. This may be vaguely useful, but at the moment, it honestly looks lame. The last four entries are "Universe · Multiverse · Space · Spacetime". Do we need these last four entries? Do we even need this template? Dr. Submillimeter 20:29, 30 November 2006 (UTC)

It does look,... less than desirable. I'm certain the ordering at the right end of the template would be open to lots of revision (things past Universe) due to differing POV on that. It also seems to be missing some things... like a galactic arm, etc. Perhaps it could be a talkpage template instead of an article template... 132.205.93.32 23:11, 30 November 2006 (UTC)
I've replaced space and spacetime with omniverse at the end of the template, because the article "Space" is not relevant - it is about something else, and "spacetime" is not a location. Perhaps observable universe should go in before Universe. 132.205.93.32 23:34, 30 November 2006 (UTC)
I deleted "multiverse" or "omniverse" after "universe". We have observational evidence for everything up to "universe" but no observational evidence for "multiverse" or "omniverse". I made several other comments on the template's talk page. I would like to be conservative in terms of what is put into the template (i.e. I would like to see terms routinely used in professional astronomy, and I do not want to see too much inane subdivision, such as adding "observable universe"). I am about to call in ScienceApologist to deal with policing the template. Dr. Submillimeter 00:10, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] NGC 1531 and NGC 1532

I've WP:PRODed NGC 1531 and NGC 1532 - it's not really a disambiguation page, and doesn't seem to be all that useful. 132.205.93.32 02:32, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

Article was deprodded because " edit history needs to be maintained for GFDL compliance ". So this will need to go to AfD. 132.205.93.32 03:28, 1 December 2006 (UTC)
This is now listed at AfD. 132.205.93.32 04:33, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

This was originally the page for both NGC 1531 and NGC 1532. I split the page into two separate articles. Afterwards, I needed to decide on what to do with NGC 1531 and NGC 1532. I first turned it into a redirect to NGC 1532 as a short-term solution, and then nominated the redirect for deletion. The nomination failed for two reasons: other editors thought that the edit history should be kept, and other editors thought that external links may still lead to NGC 1531 and NGC 1532. I honestly do not think that the page is needed, and I will be voting to delete this page. Dr. Submillimeter 09:46, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

This has now become a bizarre situation. I think the general consensus of everyone involved is to do the following:
  • Keep NGC 1531 and NGC 1532.
  • Keep the edit history of NGC 1531 and NGC 1532.
  • Delete NGC 1531 and NGC 1532 itself.
I have asked the administration for assistance and advice in the situation. In the future, I think articles on galaxy pairs may need to go through a "requested move" before they are split so as to avoid deleting the edit histories. (It would also be nice if Wikipedia had a "requested split" mechanism.) This looks like it will be a tedious process; I recommend that most people do not try this.
I apologize for being partly responsible for creating the situation in the first place. Dr. Submillimeter 12:09, 2 December 2006 (UTC)
Before anyone else mentions it, I have found that Wikipedia has a WP:SPLIT. The information at WP:SPLIT, however, did not address the issues brought up with NGC 1531 and NGC 1532. Dr. Submillimeter 12:27, 2 December 2006 (UTC)

Well, as you can tell by all the red links up above, "NGC 1531 and NGC 1532" itself was deleted, but NGC 1531 and NGC 1532 were kept, and the edit history was preserved in NGC 1532. To avoid this problem in the future, I will try to find out what to do next time I split a galaxy pair. Dr. Submillimeter 15:22, 3 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Large pathetic galaxy is up at AfD

Large pathetic galaxy is up for deletion at AfD by user:Rampart. 132.205.93.32 04:16, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

The AfD debate reached no consensus. This object (which is incorrectly named) is real and significant; an entire Astrophysical Journal paper was written on it. The article just needs to be repaired. Dr. Submillimeter 18:48, 7 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Naming the M83 Group

I would like to find out other people's opinions on the name for the M83 Group. The name is currently a variation on the one given to it by 132.205.15.4. Karachentsev, in this Astrophysical Journal Article, refers to it as the "Cen A/M83 Group" or the "Cen A/M83 Complex". Other papers may use "Centaurus A Group", "NGC 5128 Group", "M83 Group", "NGC 5236 Group", or variations on those names.

Part of the issue is whether the two clumps of galaxies around M83 and Centaurus A are two separate groups or one group. I would normally trust Karachentsev's results for this because Karachentsev is a leader in this subfield of astronomy, but Karachentsev's treatment is ambiguous. Other group surveys are split on this issue. Given that the Cen A and M83 regions are not moving relative to one another whereas they should be moving apart if they were unbound, I myself am inclined to treat the two groupings as one group. (This will all eventually be noted in the article, of course.) This is part of the reason why NED and SIMBAD cannot be used to check the object names; they both list these groups as separate entries, even though their references do not.

I am personally inclined to go with "Cen A/M83 Group" as the article title but to note all the details about the ambiguous names. Do other people have opinions? Dr. Submillimeter 18:49, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

I'd say not to use the word "complex" in the name, but to stick with "group" consistent with the other articles.
I wonder if using a "/" in the name will have consequences for wiki since slash is a directory separator.
I think I'd go for "M83 Group" given our history of favoring Messier names for groups. WilliamKF 20:46, 1 December 2006 (UTC)
The technical issue with the slash is a good thing to bring up. Wikipedia can handle having slashes in the article and category names. For example, see IC 342/Maffei Group and its corresponding category, Category:IC 342/Maffei Group. Dr. Submillimeter 20:52, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Lack of communication between WikiProjects

Looking at the posts here and in Wikipedia: WikiProject Physics, I see that a lot of people here could provide useful comments in the discussions at the Physics WikiProject and vice versa. I would like to encourage people from both projects to look at the other project's talk pages more often and to participate more in cross-topic discussions. (Unfotunately, Wikipedia: WikiProject Astronomy is not used as frequently, but that could potentially be another useful forum someday.) Dr. Submillimeter 21:47, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

I definitely prefer the look of the WikiProject Physics page. It's avoiding those unwieldy boxes with the unappealing coolish hue. No offense intended to anyone. — RJH (talk) 18:28, 7 December 2006 (UTC)
I may remove the boxes (as well as much of the other useless stuff) sometime in the future. Dr. Submillimeter 18:30, 7 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Planet infobox conventions (km vs. AU vs. miles)

I'm curious if there are any agreed upon conventions regarding what units to use in the Planet infoboxes. While the main unit should obviously be SI, oftentimes there is a secondary unit in parentheses, such as

semimajor axis: KM (AU)

The choice of secondary unit is somewhat subjective, and one could instead choose "miles", though I would be against this for orbital-related quantities. Nevertheless, for "small" parameters, such as a planet's diameter, one might choose "miles" or "Earth radii", or both.

Then there is the problem of speeds. While km/s or m/s should be preferred, some have "miles/h" in parentheses. I don't have anything against this, but "miles/h" is not really consistent with "km/s", and I would not be too keen on quoting "miles/s".

In any case, I think this should be standardized somehow, so that when we revert changes by members of the only english speaking country using imperial units (of which I am one), we can point to some form of census policy. Lunokhod 13:05, 2 December 2006 (UTC)

One more thing. There is also the problem of citing either planet diameters or radii. Planetary scientists almost never use diameters (which seems to be the default for the infoboxes). In my opinion, it might make sense to change all planetary diameters to radii. Lunokhod 13:14, 2 December 2006 (UTC)

For distances, I prefer to have the values expressed in AU, with km possibly expressed in scientific notation in parentheses at the end. Although I am unfamiliar with what is commonly used by professional planetary scientists, AU are commonly used in educational astronomy, and the units are simple to explain. I prefer not to see distances expressed in miles (which are not used by astronomers) or exotic SI units such as terameters (Tm; see Neptune for an example).
For velocities, I think using km/s followed by km/h in parentheses would be appropriate.
Finallly, I would like to say that I agree with Lunokhod in that orbital radii should be used instead of orbital diameters. Orbital radii give the approximate distance from the Sun to the objects. This will be of interest to the casual and the professional reader. In contrast, orbital diameters give nothing terribly useful. Dr. Submillimeter 15:37, 3 December 2006 (UTC)
The convention for the infoboxes now is to use semimajor axis, perihelion and apohelion. However, the size of the planet itself is given as a diameter. My proposal was to change the diameters of the planet to radii. Perhaps astronomers use diameters, but planetery scientists don't. As for the units, the problem is that most americans want conversions to imperial units, and having all three of km, au, and miles is somewhat unwielding in the small space for an infobox. The same goes for velocites; I think it would be overkill to give km/s, km/h, and mi/h; two should be enough. The question for me is, what should the alterative unit be for for each measure? Or should we really give all three? Lunokhod 22:22, 3 December 2006 (UTC)
I misread part of Lunokhod's comments about the size of the planets. If radii are more frequently used in planetary astronomy, then I would support using radii. (Diameters are more frequently used to describe object sizes in extragalactic astronomy.) For planet velocities, maybe just km/s should be used. (Galaxy redshifts are being written as km/s; no one ever expresses redshifts in any form other than km/s and the dimensionless z.) Dr. Submillimeter 09:20, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

I would say:

  • size on the object = m (ft)
  • size of the object = Earth radii (km / mi)
  • distance on the object = km (mi)
  • distance in orbital parameter = AU (km / mi)
  • distance in stellar system = pc (ly / km), if larger than 1,000,000 then kpc (kly)
  • distance in clusters = kpc (kly)
  • distance in galaxies = Mpc (Mly)
  • speed on an object = km/s (mi/s)
  • speed around a star/planet = km/s (mi/s)

Stick with seconds, seconds are SI. If still too cluttered, then maybe a tooltip when the mouse is over and have some image or text to say that a tooltip will appear when you move the mouse over. Thanks, CarpD 04/12/06

The galaxy infoboxes are being written with Mly first and Mpc in parentheses. The convention seemed to be to use Mly when I started working on Wikipedia, and I just stayed with that. WilliamKF added Mpc in parentheses following the Mly. Dr. Submillimeter 09:20, 4 December 2006 (UTC)
Here are the quantities (taken from the Moon infobox) that I'm referring to, and my opinion on what should be used. Alternative units are in parenthesis. As I mentioned above, it is my opinion that including two alternative units would be unyielding. See Saturn and Mars for slight variants. Lunokhod 10:05, 4 December 2006 (UTC)
Semi-major axis - km (AU)
Orbital circumference - km (AU)
Avg. orbital speed - km/s (mi/h)
Equatorial radius - km (Earths)
Surface area - km² (Earths)
Volume - km³ (Earths)
Mass - kg (Earths)
Equatorial gravity - m/s2 (g)
Escape velocity - km/s (mi/h)
Rotation velocity (at the equator) - m/s (mi/h)
I am happy with the proposed units of measurement. Do we really need the surface area in the infobox? Are people really going to want to know the relative surface areas of objects? Dr. Submillimeter 12:37, 4 December 2006 (UTC)
I think there might be an interest in the surface area. It's not uncommon, for example, for books to compare the surface area of Mars to the land area of the Earth. But that value doesn't make any sense for the gas giants, so perhaps the surface area estimate could just be presented in the text? — RJH (talk) 18:32, 7 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Help with Observing the Moon

Recently, a new topic Observing the Moon was created in the domain of the Moon WikiProject, but unfortunately, not much progress has been made. Is there anyone here involved with observational astronomy who would like to help out? Thanks. Lunokhod 23:44, 2 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] WIP on Astronomical Objects

Template:WikiProject Astronomical objects/Structure Sorry for making it very long, but I added more objects and really detailed it. I will still work on it, just taking a break on it. I have seen all the objects in the list in some Asteronimical Research Paper. So, if you have any in question, I might still have the link. Also, if you feel to remove the item, please comment it out, rather than deleting it. Thanks, CarpD (^_^) —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 68.102.99.211 (talk • contribs) 08:03, 3 December 2006 (UTC).

One of the problems with the "Galaxies" section is that many galaxies would fall into multiple categories in the list. For example, many elliptical and spiral galaxies are Seyfert galaxies, and many ULIRGs and LIRGs are both starbursts and quasars (but do not tell my Ph.D. advisor that I said that). Would that be acceptable to you, CarpD? Also, should I go through and correct any obvious errors that I see? Dr. Submillimeter 15:29, 3 December 2006 (UTC)

LOL, your secret is safe with me... Yeah, correct anything you see. I suppose the nebulae/molecular clouds are my biggest mix up. Thanks, CarpD 03/12/06

Oh, the grouping of the galaxies that I thought was suppose to be is from articles in wikipedia. So, if I am horribly wrong on the orders, then some of the galaxy articles may have to be looked at. Most of my knowledge of galaxies stem from the time I created a user in wikipedia. So, not very long. Thanks, CarpD 03/12/06

At the moment, Wikipedia is not a completely trustworthy reference on extragalactic astronomy information. Some articles (for example, luminous infrared galaxy) are miserably written. I would suggest looking at articles outside Wikipedia to understand how to group galaxies.
Also, CarpD, could you comment on the issue with objects appearing in multiple categories in your list? Is that a problem? Dr. Submillimeter 09:26, 4 December 2006 (UTC)
To prove my point, I saw dwarf barred spiral galaxy in CarpD's list. I don't think the term is used by anyone in professional astronomy. (For that matter, "dwarf spiral galaxy" is hardly ever used as a term in astronomy.) I am still trying to figure out what to do with the Category:Dwarf spiral galaxies substructure (which was created by Hurricane Devon and Zzzzzzzzzzz). In the meantime, please use extragalactic information from Wikipedia cautiously. Dr. Submillimeter 09:39, 4 December 2006 (UTC)
If there is a // tracking, CarpD., those are reminders for me. I need to check on them still and lookup for more information. I added them, so I will not forget them. If it appears as duplicate, it means I am still trying to figure out which section they should be in. They should also, have a tracking note next to them. Thanks, CarpD 4/12/06.

CarpD's revisions look incredibly unwieldly on the main project page. I will remove it on 12:00 GMT Friday 8 Dec unless the list is significantly shortened. I also honestly think that, at this point, this strong overcategorization simply is not very useful for this project. Dr. Submillimeter 16:09, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

If you want, I can trim it down to the main groups and subgroups. Maybe the detailed version should go to Astronomical objects. Thanks, CarpD 06/12/06
That may be preferable. I almost wonder if the main project page needs Template:WikiProject Astronomical objects/Structure, anyway. At one point, a few people were tinkering with fixing the page, but they did not seem to finish. I may attempt to revise it (although I would rather work on several other things). Dr. Submillimeter 07:58, 7 December 2006 (UTC)
OK, I'll update it sometime this weekend. What I'll do is comment out the detailed part and leave the basic object visible. I will only include Distinct Objects. Thanks, CarpD 07/12/06

I removed the Structure box from the project page. Please do not put it back. Dr. Submillimeter 17:50, 10 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Deletion of old and unused templates?

I notice that Wikipedia contains some old templates that are no longer used. For example, see "What links here" for Template:Astrobox observegal; the template is not used for anything! Would anyone object if I brought up some of these old and unused templates for deletion? Dr. Submillimeter 16:29, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

Not I. That looks like a suitable candidate for a {{Db-catempty}}. — RJH (talk) 16:45, 5 December 2006 (UTC)
I added the {{Db-catempty}} template, since it's not being used at all and is only linked on talk pages. Somebody can {{hangon}} if they object. — RJH (talk) 18:25, 7 December 2006 (UTC)
It is a template, not a category. Will db-catempty work? Dr. Submillimeter 18:31, 7 December 2006 (UTC)
Hey, it worked! Dr. Submillimeter 07:59, 8 December 2006 (UTC)
Oops. Yes it doesn't look like they have a speedy delete template for a template. — RJH (talk) 19:13, 8 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Helium Focusing Cone be added to Template:Footer_Sun

Asking if this can be added to the template. Although, I am unsure if it should go under the other section. Thanks, CarpD 04/21/06

Maybe not. Additionally, maybe some items should be removed from the template. The template should try to unite a few similar topics for easy navigation, not collect topics on random articles that may be marginally related to each other. Thois template looks like it could easily be expanded to include every Sun-related article in Wikipedia if not watched carefully. (See the discussion on Template:QED at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Physics, for example; that template has been nominated for deletion.) Dr. Submillimeter 09:24, 5 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Dwarf spiral galaxy revised

After feeling my stomach churn for months whenever I looked at Hurricane Devon's "dwarf barred spiral galaxy" (which identified the Large Magellanic Cloud, among other objects, as such a galaxy), I rewrote the article using references. The article is now located at dwarf spiral galaxy. I may also attempt to expand the article to include some discussion on the history of the search for these objects.

Also, I have proposed that both Category:Dwarf barred spiral galaxies and Category:Unbarred dwarf spiral galaxies should be merged into Category:Dwarf spiral galaxies. I have seen no references that formally identify dwarf spiral galaxies as barred or unbarred. Keeping these two categories encourages original research, which is a violation of Wikipedia policy. Dr. Submillimeter 18:42, 5 December 2006 (UTC)

Would it make any sense to merge all the individual dwarf galaxy articles onto the main dwarf galaxy page? I can't see the sense of having lots of "short" (pardon) articles on a similar topic when just one longer article would do. — RJH (talk) 18:22, 7 December 2006 (UTC)
I would suggest leaving the existing entries as separate topics. As I have discovered through researching dwarf spiral galaxies, those galaxies need their own page to at least describe the phenomenon and the detection of the phenomenon. Dwarf elliptical and dwarf spheroidal galaxies are also worth discussing separately from irregular galaxies, simply because the star formation activity and stellar structure is different between the two classes of objects. However, I recommend against creating a "dwarf irregular" page, as most irregular galaxies are dwarfs. (Maybe the dwarf irregular categories should be merged into irregular categories?) Dr. Submillimeter 18:38, 7 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Category:IAU planet debate nominated for deletion

I have nominated Category:IAU planet debate for deletion. I still think the topic is worth discussing on Wikipedia (although I would prefer to have a logical rather than an emotional debate about the topic). However, I do not think the category is useful for organizing articles related to the subject. The category seems very open-ended; anything that is remotely related to the topic appears to be included. This is why I have nominated the category for deletion. Dr. Submillimeter11:11, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] (50001) 2000 AK15

(50001) 2000 AK15 was prodded by user:Windymilla on Dec 4. 132.205.93.204 05:14, 8 December 2006 (UTC)

The article doesn't demonstrate compliance with WP:N, and it's barely even a sub-stub. It can always be created again in a more comprehensive form. — RJH (talk) 19:17, 8 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Stellar classification - (LeDrew)

In the Stellar classification page, their are several sentences under the O-M class stars that have the (LeDrew) phrase. They been there for a while. I deleted the G star phrase and put citation for the phrase that (LeDrew) left. I think that the information if valid, but no citation is on it.

  • [[1]] - is the date that I removed one of them.

Thanks, CarpD 09/12/06

Perhaps it was intended as a citation? But I don't see a reference by LeDrew at the bottom of the page. The revision was made 2/8/2006 by anonymous user 69.152.226.14, if that's any help. — RJH (talk) 15:55, 11 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Project page revision

Would anyone mind if I do the following:

  • Revise the main project page?
  • Nominate for deletion those project page templates that no longer seem useful (such as the Archive one and possibly the Structure one after CarpD moves his list out of it)?

I can post notes here as I proceed. Dr. Submillimeter 17:53, 10 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Lame article: Host galaxy

I found host galaxy when searching through the Category:Galaxies hierarchy today. This article simply looks lame. It is no more than a definition of the term, and I do not see it expanding beyond stub status. I am tempted to PROD it. However, I could picture this being recreated in the future. Does anyone else have any other suggestions on what to do with this page? Dr. Submillimeter 17:43, 11 December 2006 (UTC)

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