Talk:Bean

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[edit] Vegans and Flatulance

I'm not sure how this works so I just add it here, whoever doesn't like it can move it someplace else. I wanted to add the observation that people who eat beans very frequently like vegans have less to zero problems with flatulence when eating beans, so there seems to be an adaption mechanism of the bacterial environment. I can't find any references though for this, it's anecdotal. I feel this should be added, given that many people avoid beans because of the feared gas, which is a shame given the nutrition value. However, I wouldn't know were to add this best, and in a way that it is NPOV. Obviously I can't write that "Hey, if you go vegan and eat beans a lot, they won't make you fart."

  • I have been eating beans or lentils at least three days out of pretty much every week for four years or so (with some exceptions, of course) and I have also noticed this. I also have noticed that it seems to be short-lived. When I come back to beans after not eating them for 5 days or more, it seems like I am more flatulent for a few days after that. But you're right... at this point it is merely anecdotal evidence. I'll try to dig up something in the say of a reference.--Hraefen Talk 19:01, 31 August 2007 (UTC)
I am not sure if it is about getting used to the beans or about the method of cooking. Firstly Indians generally do not use beans without soaking it overnight, they cook the beans really well and the spices and condiments used while preparing a dish with beans take care of offsetting the bad effects of beans like flatulent. For example. Hing (Asafoetida) is useful in reducing flatulance. Also, not all beans Indians eat have the characteristics of creating flatulance - Moong beans never creates flatulance and is actually good for people who cannot digest well. Neither does Masoor and Urad. Chana or chick pea and Rajma / kidney beans are notorious for flatulance. While many of the beans I have seen people eat in US have the characteristics of causing flatulance.--Kaveri 17:54, 4 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Rewrite and Subject Bredth

I have completely rewritten this page and discovered what a mine FIELD the subject is. In the first place, in the English language we use the word "bean" in a much broader sense than botanically correct and lump together true beans (leguminous plants) with others like coffee bean, cocoa beans etc and in the second place there are so many synonyms for the same thing. Dry beans are known as kidney, pinto, navy, haricot beans just to name a few. Thirdly, the botanical classification of leguminous plants has changed a lot and is still changing (Vigna vs Phaseolus for instance).

I have included a link to Pulses (which include basically dried seeds of legiminous crops) but this gives overlap with the content of the chapter beans.

Any suggestions how to solve this problem are welcome. - Edolin

[edit] Suggestions for Improvement

It's been about 18 months since Edolin asked for ideas or editted, but there are others working occasionally on this article.

I'm just someone who wandered in by clicking "Random page", but here's a concrete thought:

  • When two areas overlap, think in terms of 3 articles one covers what applies to A but not B; one covers what applies to B but not A; one covers what they have in common.
  • The A and B articles don't necessarily have to reference each other, but both should reference the A-and-B article, and be referenced by it.

IMO, this article still needs a lot of reformatting.

Stuff about growing beans with 100-year-old large-scale-production technology has a place, but it is not on this page, tho it should be linked from here.

The detailed taxonomy should likewise be accessible from this page, but it is too extensive to be on the main Bean page & obscures the structure of what may be more widely interesting info.

This page is on my list to poke at eventually if i've got nothing else to edit, but it sure would benefit more from attention from someone like Edolin with gardening, agricultural and/or botany training. --Jerzy 00:56, 2003 Oct 14 (UTC)

[edit] Reworking and division of Pulses and Beans

I am slowly making this article over. It has a lot of info in it from when it was "Beans and Pulses" I am taking out and referring to pulses (which needs a similar level of work). I am also updating the nomenclature as I go. WormRunner 04:21, 3 Mar 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Magical fruit????

I question the paragraph reading

Beans are often said to be the "magical fruit". Members of certain religious sects include beans as a part of their religious ceremonies. They consider them to have magical aspects unrivaled by any other fruit of its sort.

I think it's a joke.

Beans are never called "fruit" except in the context of the joking rhyme about farting ("Beans, beans, the [musical|magical] fruit/The more you eat, the more you toot/The more you toot the better you feel/So eat your beans at every meal.") [[User:Dpbsmith|Dpbsmith (talk)]] 14:22, 24 Nov 2004 (UTC)

I think i comes from the kid's doodle:

 Beans, beans, the magical fruit
 The more you eat, the more you toot 
 The more you toot, the better you feel
 So eat your beans, for every meal.

--ZacBowling 14:31, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Sections on Phaseolus, Vigna and Fava bean

It seems that each of these sections is a proper subset of the corresponding article. (Phaseolus, Vigna, Fava bean). They are also not as up-to-date as the articles. Any objections to their removal? Pekinensis 21:24, 31 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Trim it liberally, but I think you should leave links to the species --nixie 23:01, 31 Jan 2005 (UTC)

The section "types of bean" had three different lists, in three different formats. I merged them together, and removed the parts which were subsets of other articles.

[edit] toxins

On the section on toxins, do you think it is relevant to mention that many members of the legume family (including plants that look like beans and many that bear the common name of "bean") are actually quite poisonous and not usable as food sources? Cazort 18:08, 30 April 2006 (UTC)

I for one would say yes, so long as the contextual meaning of "bean" is clear and the information is properly sourced in the References section. The more expansive definition of the term 'bean' is explicitly included in the article, so information pertinent to that definition belongs somewhere. Geo.per 19:39, 26 June 2006 (UTC)

sometimes when my mommy gives me brown beans i get the runns

[edit] source request and/or removing "Other Meanings"

Under "Other Meanings" it is said it was said, "It can also refer to the act of removing all their limbs, leaving them resembling a bean." I checked with Merriam-Webster Online, Dictionary.com and the Oxford English Dictionary online; none of them listed this as a definition.

Does anyone have a source for this meaning? As it stands it doesn't seem to pass the Verifiable test, so I removed it. I'm also doubtful as to whether a relatively obscure slang clarification like that belongs in the article, even if sourced and verified (perhaps a candidate for Wiktionary?) The Wiktionary vs. Wikipedia distinction might also apply to the use of "bean" as a verb, which would imply the entire "Other Meanings" section should be deleted. Others' thoughts would be appreciated.

I'm also thinking of deleting the bulgarian soup recipe at the bottom of the page (relevancy concerns), perhaps linking to the Bob_soup stub.

Geo.per 19:29, 26 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Picture of green beans

I believe that the picture of green beans being included on this page is misleading. Green beans are actually vegetable-like fruits.

I think it's a placement and/or caption issue. The picture belongs, but the context should indicate precisely what you said here. Geo.per 19:36, 26 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Toxins

Could this page include a note/table on which beans are poisonous uncooked? Njál 17:35, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

Image:Beans visit anchorage.jpg


[edit] spam "beaning"

I removed the following phrase, as it seemed like spam for a corporation.

"Beaning" someone has become a popular office game in which co-workers attempt to send an email from an unlocked computer in which the message must state something about beans. This game was made popular by the creators of gobruh.

Has ANYONE else heard of this? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Wiserd911 (talk • contribs) 02:17, 21 April 2007 (UTC).

[edit] Major merger

Merge - I have proposed a merger between Bean, Legume, Pulse (legume) and Fabaceae. These are all articles about the same thing. Possibly I could see two seperate pages, one at bean (or legume) focusing on the food aspect, another at fabaceae for the botanical aspect. JohnnyMrNinja 01:18, 7 July 2007 (UTC)

While we're at it, let's merge Canidae and Dog, Asteraceae and Artichoke, and Muridae and House mouse. That there is even any consideration of merging these articles is a measure of their imprecision (with the exception of Fabaceae, which is clear-cut). Before any merging takes place, editors should consider what separate subjects need to be covered. IMO, to get the discussion started, Legume should be a disambiguation page, pointing to both the family and a general agricultural article. A separate article covering edible seeds and fruits ("beans") might be warranted, or could be part of the agricultural article.--Curtis Clark 04:50, 7 July 2007 (UTC)
I agree that there are separate topics to be covered, but the current articles have way too much overlap, are unclear as to distinction, and are (in some cases) poorly written. The talk page for Legume attempts to redirect to Talk:Fabaceae. The infobox in Fabaceae says Legumes. This could lead a person to believe that there is no distinction. The three articles Bean, Legume and Pulse (legume) need to be reworked (probably into one article), and I included Fabaceae because that article needs to be heavily considered while they are reworked, so that they are two articles that compliment each other without overlap. Or instead of two articles, would it make sense to work these articles into three articles: botanical, culinary and agricultural? This all makes sense in my head and I hope this makes sense here. I am certainly no expert in any of these topics, but as it is, these articles don't help that. JohnnyMrNinja 06:27, 7 July 2007 (UTC)
Thanks for the clarification; I better see where you're coming from. I like the idea of botanical, culinary and agricultural. How about this suggested new text for Legume as a disambiguation page, to serve as a framework:

Legume can refer to:

  • A member of the plant family Fabaceae
  • Certain herbaceous members of that family grown agriculturally, for human food, fodder, and soil renewal, collectively called pulses.
  • The edible seeds and fruits of pulses, called beans and peas

--Curtis Clark 13:49, 7 July 2007 (UTC)

I agree with Curtis Clark's treatment. While there is a lot of overlap, beans/peas are food items, pulses are the plants that produce them, and Fabaceae is a botanical family that includes pulses, but also many other plants and trees without edible fruit. Legume would be best treated as a disambiguation page as it really is used to refer to the family, the food and the crops. As Mr. Ninja suggested, all articles should be reworked to reflect these boundaries. The idea of combining them all into one article could lead to trouble as each are distinct enough (with the exception of Legume) to merit their own articles. I think further confusion could be avoided by placing notices at the top of any article that might not be clear in its subject matter. For example, in the article for Pea, we could write "This is an article about the food item. For the pea family, see Fabaceae". Djlayton4 | talk | contribs 14:42, 7 July 2007 (UTC)

Curtis, good idea for a disambiguation page and making three distinct articles on the three topics, from Johnny's suggestion. JohnnyMrNinja, the botanists on Wikipedia have already discussed and formulated policy on how to go about having separate articles on the economic, horticultural and botanical aspects of plants. Three distinct articles could hardly do a topic as large as the Fabaceae the least bit of good, but making them all one article is impossible due to the nature of the various areas. KP Botany 22:05, 10 July 2007 (UTC)

India which is the largest producer and importer of pulses so I am assuming largest consumer of pulses assigns distinct meaning to the word. Beans is a more general word eg coffee beans which is not a pulse. Also, peas are not pulses. I think the pulses page explains that clearly in the intro. I think we should leave the pulses page alone. We might want to change the photo on the pulses page though. It looks like a beans mix available in american supermarkets and is also named beans. It is confusing. --Kaveri 03:02, 18 July 2007 (UTC)

What about coffee beans as seeds? They are unused legumes maybe? Is there a real need to disambiguate legume? Merge to seed or seeds as food -like article? Perhaps legume is closer to terminology (culinary, food science and if the article as organized through links and disambig pages + for the see article headers it could stay. -maxrspct ping me 21:04, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

while were at it, we should merge people, parasites and monkeys, i mean after all people tend to have a parasitic nature when it comes to their interaction to the world we live in, the way we use resources and each other is completly selfish and we give back little in return, and as for monkeys, well, half the time people show less intelligence than a brain damaged monkey... ok maybe thats all just a hunk of junk, but in all seriousness, as much as there is allot of overlap between the subjects, if one wants to research the family fabaceae they may not really be wanting to filter through the unwanted information about this and that, when all they want is information on FABACEAE, how about it? as for the poorly written articals, well how about someone does something to help about that? make a few usefull sujjestions as to how u would prefer it to be, other than merging the articals together. wikipedia is a great tool to find usefull information, and i use it often in my studies, lets not start making things more complicated than is necessary. KISS KEEP IT SIMPLE STUPID.. p.s. sorry about the sarcasm, iv had my fair shair of monkeys the past month n a half... yours truly ĢōÐ

  • I could see merging bean and pulse (legume) into beans and pulses, because they are virtually the same thing, because they are both legumes that humans eat. But Fabaceae is a scientific designation and should stay as it is. Legume should stay as it is because it encompasses all nitrogen fixing plants, whether they be for human consumption, or for animal consumption, like clover or alfalfa. I think this approach, plus some cleaning up, will remove all redundancy and streamline the info and navigation. Nomenclature often overlaps... this is no reason to just throw everything into one massive, undoubtedly overblown, confusing page and call it good simply because it reduces the number of overall pages used.--Hraefen Talk 19:11, 31 August 2007 (UTC)
  • Addendum to my above comment. The appropriate way to think of these overlapping "concepts" is thus:
    • Fabaceae (the super category): includes all legumes for human and food animal consumption as well as some genera such as Laburnum, Robinia, Gleditsia, Acacia, Mimosa, and Delonix are ornamental trees and shrubs.
    • Legumes: includes all of the above, EXCEPT the ornamental trees and shrubs, as they are not used for human or food animal consumption
    • Beans and pulses: those legumes eaten by humans (but excludng clover, alfafla etc, which are eaten by food animals).

--Hraefen Talk 19:21, 31 August 2007 (UTC)

  • I removed the links that suggest a merge from Fabaceae. No cause, no consensus, policy per WP:TOL is precedent and overides the vagaries of extensive and unresolved discussion. I hope this simplifies matters here. Cygnis insignis 16:27, 26 September 2007 (UTC)
  • Also - Just so you're aware, WikiProject Agriculture has recently been organized (still sitting in userspace for the moment) and there is substantial interest in field crops there. Right now the group is still small and the focus is on cereals and livestock, where there are tremendous NPOV and verification issues to address, but you'll probably see our voices soon on the talk pages of the relevant articles.--Doug.(talk • contribs) 18:44, 13 October 2007 (UTC)
  • I do not think merging beans and pulses is a good idea. Pulse crops are an entire group, which contains peas, beans, fababeans, lentils, and chickpeas. You cannot cover all these subjects in one page, and in all honesty, a pea has nothing to do with a bean, other than that they are both legumes. Furthermore, legumes also include alfalfa, red & yellow sweet clovers, lucerne, and a host of other plants used for hay and silage. Again, these have nothing to do with beans. ChristianH158 19:59, 13 October 2007 (UTC)
  • I agree Christian, the fact that some of these are stubs or poorly written should not be a consideration. The consideration is notability, separate species probably always deserve separate articles. Often even separate varieties do. Even just a picture and a taxobox or cultivar infobox is a lot of information. Nothing says an article has to go on for pages. I don't think you need any disambiguation pages either, as was suggested near the top of this discussion, those should be reserved for when there are several unrelated things with the same of similar names. Taxoboxes will normally be fine when traveling vertically through the hierarchies, when the problem is lateral, a disambiguation link may be called for.--Doug.(talk • contribs) 22:23, 13 October 2007 (UTC)

I note that there have been only two editors involved in this discussion since the end of August and no one from the prior conversation has responded. The last real talk of merging anything other than beans and pulses was in July. Early discussion involved confusing taxoboxes among other things. At this point those have all been removed by others except for Fabaceae. I've removed the merge tag all of these tags as well as one proposing merger of Legumes and Loment which was put on in May and never discussed. I'm adding these all to WP:FARM's todo and needs attention lists.--Doug.(talk • contribs) 01:34, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

Someone should just do this. Merge the bean articles into one, then remove and farm out 80% of the article content to the various child articles such as broad bean and common bean. I was just working on the toxicity section and see that the information is nearly identical and duplicated between this article and some of those. Instead of repeating information about specific species and types, simply direct the user to them.Wikidemo 17:08, 6 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Nuts as Well

It would be interesting to link (url's) legumes with nuts in general, because some nuts are in fact legumes. Just for the sake of an interesting link-up between some foods we eat: nuts and beans. Makes for good reading. Also, I would like to see a section regarding the differences between nuts and beans, and the similarities (evolutionary and so on), if anyone can write about that.

[edit] Vegetarianism and Worms

Since vegetarianism is a related topic to beans, does anyone know more about the microscopic worms that live inside of plants, beans included. It is worth noting that living worm-like creatures are symbiotic with plants, only for the sake of interest. I find it interesting. Tubular worms? Can't remember the name.

[edit] Vandalism

There's been a ridiculous amount of vandalism recently. Note in particular 33 consecutive changes consisting entirely of vandalism and reversions. Soft protect?

Some of the vandalism & experimenting errors didn't get caught, but I've fixed at least some of that now. (One was due to a popups revert only reverting the last change, and not the 4 before it. Also lost a pic - I think someone was experimenting and tried to fix their experiment but lost the image). --Chriswaterguy talk 16:51, 11 October 2007 (UTC)

Taking a look, it seems semi-protection would have prevented most of this, so I concur. At WikiProject Agriculture we've got several relatively new editors, but I think they've all been editing so heavily since joining that there shouldn't be any problem.--Doug.(talk • contribs) 21:54, 13 October 2007 (UTC)
Since apparently no one watching is an admin, I've posted a request at Wikipedia:Requests_for_page_protection#Bean_.28edit.7Ctalk.7Chistory.7Clinks.7Cwatch.7Clogs.29--Doug.(talk • contribs) 19:38, 23 October 2007 (UTC)
And . . . Request Denied.--Doug.(talk • contribs) 03:14, 24 October 2007 (UTC)
That's pretty typical IMO; there are admins who are more worried about preventing a worthwhile edit by an anon than they are in stopping a hundred acts of vandalism. That's why I removed Apple from my watch list; I couldn't even get vandals blocked: "He hasn't vandalized lately."--Curtis Clark 04:56, 24 October 2007 (UTC)
Do other articles, like Chicken, have admin/editors, so they don't have to "request" protection?--Doug.(talk • contribs) 11:29, 24 October 2007 (UTC)