Talk:Discovery of Neptune
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[edit] Additional sources/references
Whatever the position on NPOV (which I think is not as extreme as has been suggested), may I recommend two additional reference sources.
1: There is an excellent, also non-sensational, summary history (in French) written in 1946 by Prof A Danjon, himself a notable astronomer and inventor who was then director of the Paris Observatory ("Le centenaire de la découverte de Neptune", Danjon, A., in 'Ciel et Terre' (1946), Vol. 62, p. 369). The full paper is downloadable (pdf or gif pages) at http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/1946C%26T....62..369D
It seems to me that Danjon's account succeeds in combining accessibility with mathematical truth and proportionality. He gives interesting data (and some quotes from LeVerrier which I haven't seen elsewhere), and includes a summary of the parallel work of Adams.
Danjon's information gives a useful technical perspective to some points in the existing article page.
For example, it's useful to cross-refer to Danjon in regard to the claim currently on the page that both calculators had "greatly overestimated the planet's actual distance from the sun. Further, they both succeeded in getting the longitude almost right only because of a 'fluke of orbital timing'."
Danjon attributes this particular criticism to the US astronomer Peirce and shows that it was not very well taken. Danjon gives a diagram showing that while hypothetical orbits calculated by both LeVerrier and Adams for the new planet were very different on the whole from that of the real Neptune (and actually similar to each other), they were both much closer to the real Neptune, over the crucial segment of orbit covering the interval of years for which the observations and calculations were made, than for the rest of the calculated orbits. So the fact that both the calculators used a much larger orbital major axis than the reality, this was not so important, and not the most relevant parameter, because, so the figure illustrates, there were temporarily compensating errors made by both Leverrier and Adams in the orbital eccentricity and direction of perihelion. (This is quite a common type of occurrence with early attempts to calculate orbits for other bodies for which data are available only over a short arc.)
2: Adams' paper of November 1846 read to the Royal Astronomical Society is also available in full on the internet. It gives many mathematical details, but it is especially notable here for Adams' specific acknowledgement of LeVerrier's credit for the discovery (para 5 of the paper) :- "I mention these dates merely to show that my results were arrived at independently, and previously to the publication of those of M.Le Verrier, and not with the intention of interfering with his just claims to the honours of the discovery ; for there is no doubt that his researches were first published to the world, and led to the actual discovery of the planet by Dr. Galle, so that the facts stated above cannot detract, in the slightest degree, from the credit due to M. Le Verrier." Download is available at -- http://www.archive.org/details/appendicestovari00grearich (NB that this is a 50Mb pdf download, because it's a photoscan of a large 1851 book, a collection of astronomical reprints published by the Nautical Almanac Office, of which the Adams paper is only one.)
In this connection it is worth mentioning that Danjon's account points out that LeVerrier and Adams both stood back from the quarrelsome aspects of the controversy, they met each other the following year and developed good relations.
Terry0051 (talk) 11:19, 15 January 2008 (UTC)
[edit] English POV bias
This article reads like a sporting event, with a pro-English (home team) bias. France and Germany (vistors) are not given the credit due. This should not be a teleological story that begins with Adams. As noted, Le Verrier's work was done independently, and Galle was the first to positively match an observation with data...in part because of a brilliant idea (using the maps) and diligence (he did it that very night).
Thus, shouldn't the article have more on LeVerrier and Adams than it does?Ryoung122 05:16, 23 September 2007 (UTC)
I see, so you want to take even more away from LeVerrier-Galle now. Actually, the entire article is hyperbole. Perhaps a complete re-write is needed. This should be an encyclopedia article, not a movie script.Ryoung122 06:03, 23 September 2007 (UTC)
- You seem to be referring to my edit. It was my first edit of the article, and should not be interpreted as biased wrt the controversy. This use of the word "very" is a pet peeve of mine because the word is unhelpful and, as you might agree, not encyclopediac in tone. I remove it wherever I see it.
- There is no need to tell the reader that the match is remarkable - the author of the sentence remarked on it so it must be remarkable. I did leave the word "only" in place because it implies that the difference is small.
- The link to planet is unnecessary because the link is in the introductory paragraph.
- The explanation that planets move and stars don't is incomplete and implied in the Galilean reference. If it should be included explicitly, it should be mentioned earlier in the story.
- For the record, I agree with your initial comment in this talk page.
- Have a look at Help:Reverting to see WP guidelines on reverting edits. Ronstew 06:31, 23 September 2007 (UTC)
- The extensive reliance on the 1911 edition of the Encyclopedia Britannica also seems very NPOV. 193.132.242.1 (talk) 11:15, 2 January 2008 (UTC)
[edit] Anti-Adams POV bias (May 2008)
With recent edits (May 2008), substantial parts of the article now appear to have a clear anti-Adams POV bias. So far as Adams' own actions are concerned, he did original research, and then published it, simultaneously making full acknowledgement of credit and priority to the other researchers (LeVerrier, Galle) whose results had been published first (see main article reference to Adams' November 1846 paper, with link to online image-text). It is hard to see how those actions of Adams were blameworthy in any way. The anti-Adams invective seems quite inappropriate. The sarcastic question and discussion headed 'what date was Adams going to discover Neptune on?' both shows anti-Adams POV bias, and is answered (along with some of the other anti-Adams material) by the content of the website of the Observatoire de Paris.
See for example the content of a biography page for LeVerrier at the Paris Observatory ( http://www.obspm.fr/histoire/acteurs/leverrier.fr.shtml ). The authors/editors of the biography page (S. Débarbat, S. Grillot, J. Lévy), all professional staff at the Paris observatory, write, in a footnote:- "Un jeune mathématicien britannique, J.C. Adams (1819-1892) avait fait un calcul analogue, moins précis mais qui aurait suffi à faire découvrir la planète si les astronomes de Cambridge avaient été plus diligents dans l'analyse de leurs observations." ("A young British mathematician, J C Adams (1819-1892) had made an analogous calculation, it was less precise, but it would have been sufficient for the discovery of the planet if the Cambridge astronomers had been more diligent in the analysis of their observations.")
In other words, this French-language article acknowledges that the theory and observations were both sufficiently present in Cambridge to have made the discovery, but the astronomers at Cambridge were slow in analysing their observations. (Part of the story of that slowness is given in the 1946 French-language article by A Danjon, referenced, with a link to the online text, on the main page.)
The actions of Airy and Challis are another matter, but an anti-Adams POV bias seems to be unjustified and unhistorical. (terry0051, not signed-in.)
[edit] What date was Adams GOING to discover Neptune on?
Credit isn't simply coming up with an idea; you have to get it first to 'market.' Since the Galle-Le Verrier team was first (after all...you DID put this on Sept 23 1846...what date was Adams GOING to discover the planet Neptune, had it not already been discovered?), I question the current wording as politically-correct muckery.Ryoung122 05:59, 23 September 2007 (UTC)
- I may be biased, but to me the whole pother smacks of farce. Galle acted on Le Verrier's calculations, which had been PUBLISHED, while Adams alleged predictions were not. If their roles were inverted, Le Verrier would barely get a footnote, and a sneering one at that. L'omo del batocio (talk) 16:42, 11 January 2008 (UTC)
- "Airy wrote to Leverrier on the 14th of October congratulating him, ‘You are to recognized beyond doubt as the real predictor of the planet’s place,’ then added a week later on the 21st:‘no person in England will dispute the completeness of your investigations, the sagacity of your remarks on the points it was important to observe, and the fairness of your moral convictions as to the accuracy and certainty of the results. With these things we have nothing which we can put in competition. My acknowledgement of this will never be wanting; nor, I am confident, will that of any other Englishman who really knows the history of the matter.’". Yeah, sure. Then he changed his mind. I got the above from this English academic site, where the story is told with ample quotes from the original documents. L'omo del batocio (talk) 17:13, 11 January 2008 (UTC)
[edit] An apology and a defence
I am the person guilty of writing most of this article so I thought that I would try to defend by reputation. I originally got involved because I wanted to write the William Grylls Adams article, being interested in 19th century technical education. I found the John Couch Adams article with a POV template and comments that it seemed to give too much priority to Adams. I carefully worked through the article verifying all statements from the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. I then went carefully through the Sheehan, W. et al. (2004) Scientific American article and then the Kollerstrom website carefully interpolating those views and adding references. I would say that the ODNB is by far the most reliable source of those three. Of course, this was all from the viewpoint of the Adams article.
Of course, this upset the balance of the Adams article. It's not his most important claim to fame. I broke it out into a separate article "summary style" and added links to articles of the other main players. I have, despite your comments, worked very hard to make this NPOV and verifiable. I am painfully aware that there is more detail here about Adams than anyone else. That is because of the article's origins, my limited time to spend on mining Sheehan and Kollerstrom, and the fact that my sources are principally English. If the story reads like a film script then I would submit that that is because of the inherent excitement of the story rather than editorial colourisation. To defend again my bona fides, I started the Heinrich Louis d'Arrest article and, I think, all Wikipedia references to his pivotal role were contributed by me.
I'm sorry that my editing has not met your high standards and look forward to your improvement of the article.Cutler 21:51, 16 October 2007 (UTC)
Thanks for admitting as much. It may not even be advertent bias, but the problem is the article starts from Adams and works backwards, instead of starting from the actual discovery of Neptune and working forward. So, there are macro-issues to deal with, not just details.Ryoung122 01:15, 17 October 2007 (UTC)
- I have amended and edited the article to remove some of the NPOV bias in favor of Adams, though it still could use more work. I have also added a graph of my own making showing the positions of Neptune on the day of discovery according to the various hypotheses. (I got the data from Rawlins 1992, which is now listed in the bibliography.)
--Keithpickering (talk) 08:10, 17 December 2007 (UTC)
[edit] Lassell
William Lassell, a brewer from Liverpool, seems to have suffered from a series of disasters, ranging from a lost letter to an injured ankle. They prevented his finding Neptune at that time, it is said. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 172.143.97.30 (talk) 15:09, 7 January 2008 (UTC)
[edit] Personal search
The planet Neptune has a magnitude that ranges from 7.78 to 8.00 and should be visible in a small telescope. The question arises as to why Adams did not try a personal search for Neptune. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.194.4.21 (talk) 10:20, 15 January 2008 (UTC)
The question arises as well as to why Le Verrier did not try to search for Neptune himself. Adams asked Airy, and when the latter didn't immediately send telescopes a-whirring, Adams was content to return to his theoretical calculations. Le Verrier asked Arago and the Paris observatory mounted a search for a while but abandoned it in 1846. The difference though was that he kept bugging astronomers to look for it (he even asked Airy), ultimately having to go (figuratively) all the way to Germany to get someone to actually find it. 122.2.111.174 (talk) 09:50, 3 April 2008 (UTC)
[edit] Diameters
Galle's telescope had a diameter of 9 inches, that of Challis, 11.25 inches, and that of Lassell, 24 inches. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.194.4.21 (talk) 10:01, 16 January 2008 (UTC)
[edit] Two more
Bessel and Fleming took some part in the discovery of Neptune. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.145.11.103 (talk) 12:30, 16 January 2008 (UTC) Bessel died on 17/3/1846, just before the discovery of Neptune. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.194.4.21 (talk) 09:56, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
[edit] Seven
In the main article, "only seven planets" should be "only seven major planets". Five minor planets were known in 1846. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 217.44.111.24 (talk) 15:09, 29 February 2008 (UTC)
[edit] Challis
In the main article, it is said that "Challis lacked an up-to-date star-map". Neptune should have shown a disc in his telescope. I think Challis actually said in his notes, "It seems to have a disc." In addition, Challis could see Neptune move, if he saw it more than once. It has an apparent diameter of 2.2 to 2.4 seconds of arc, when seen from the Earth. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 217.44.108.15 (talk) 12:37, 1 April 2008 (UTC)
Challis admitted that he didn't analyze/compare his observations until after Galle found Neptune. When he did come back and look at them, he found that he actually "saw" Neptune move in his 30 July and 12 August observations. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 122.2.111.174 (talk) 09:54, 3 April 2008 (UTC)
[edit] Not
About six other observations of Neptune are not mentioned in the article. They were made by Lalande and others, who mistook it for a star. See the MacTutor article. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 217.41.51.240 (talk) 11:36, 3 April 2008 (UTC)
