Talk:Fomalhaut

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

WikiProject Astronomy This article is within the scope of WikiProject Astronomy, which collaborates on articles related to astronomy, and WikiProject Astronomical Objects, which collaborates on articles related to astronomical objects.
Start This article has been rated as start-Class on the assessment scale.

This article has been rated but has no comments. If appropriate, please review the article and leave comments here to identify the strengths and weaknesses of the article and what work it will need.

Contents

[edit] Arabic

A friend of mine who can prnounce Arabic (taught it phentically to read the Qu'ran) says that the Arabic giving in the article would come out as roughly "tuahlamof" - maybe the letters were typed in backwards in the editor?

Arabic is written from right to left.

[edit] Similarity to the Eye of Sauron

The concentric rings around Fomalhaut on the picture from Hubble are artefacts from the coronagraph. These artefacts make the image similar to the Eye of Sauron. But without these artefacts, Fomalhaut system is only a single star surrounded by a dust ring. In my opinion, going from Fomalhaut through an image with artefacts to the Eye of Sauron is too far for this article. Hubble image caption should not contain link to the Eye of Sauron. Ghalas


Hi

well the resemblance is incontestably noteworthy: there was an article in New Scientist this week about it. I hear what you say about lens artefacts, but the fact is that many many mainstream news articles have commented on the resemblance, which is therefore noteworthy by definition. The article would be incomplete without some mention of it.

best wishes

Robinh 29 June 2005 10:16 (UTC)

I'm not sure I agree with your reasoning. While it may be a fact that many news articles have commented on the resemblance, it is not enough to render it relevant; this is the strategy of tabloid newspapers, not encyclopedias. I'm willing to argue this further, but if there will be no objections, I'll remove the paragraph in a while. Naphra 23:04, 25 September 2006 (UTC)
Removed. If someone wishes to revive the paragraph, I would like to suggest the (in my opinion much more approppriate) Star systems in fiction article for doing so. Naphra 03:43, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Trivia section

Fomalhaut is possibly the star that Frodo saw from Rivendell after the Councel of Elrond: The Hunter's Moon waxed round in the night sky, and put to flight all the lesser stars. But low in the South one star shone red. Every night, as the Moon waned again, it shone brighter and brighter. Frodo could see it from his window, deep in the heavens, burning like a watchful eye that glared above the trees on the brink of the valey. (Book two, chapter III The Ring Goes South.)

I've not been able to find any references to this on the internet. I would say it's probably unlikely to be Fomalhaut, since Fomalhaut is a white star and therefore doesn't fit the But low in the South one star shone red section. Richard B 19:06, 24 November 2005 (UTC)
Fomalhaut is white, but it is often described as a reddish star. At higher northern lattitudes, Fomalhaut never rises very high above the horizon, so there it may always seem red due atmospherical and optical effects. (Like sun, moon and other stars around rise or set.)
The statement that Fomalhaut might be the star of Rivendel is my personal opinion after thorough research on starmaps. This statement still needs some field observations for verification. Unfortunately last autumn was very cloudy; at any rate I have seen Capella, low in the Northeast and as red as Mars. To be continued in a next autumn.
Doesn't is my personal opinion after thorough research on.... contradict Wikipedia's no original research policy? Richard B 00:05, 4 January 2006 (UTC)
I thought that that passage referred not to Formalhaut, or any other red star, but to Sauron's growing power in Mordor (due south from Rivendell). Sentinel75 05:34, 28 January 2006 (UTC)
Might you mean a physical line-of-sight or something entirely symbolic? Corgi 21:33, 11 February 2006 (UTC)
Regardless, the author of this passage said that it was his/her own original research, and I'm going to remove it. Feel free to revert if anyone can provide a published citation Richard B 22:06, 11 February 2006 (UTC)

In response to Corgi, Mordor is not due south from Rivendell. It is south-east from Rivendell. But the idea is interesting. Carcharoth 10:34, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

Wouldn't the talk page of Star systems in fiction be a more approppriate place for this talk about a star system, in, uh, fiction? Naphra 23:10, 25 September 2006 (UTC)
For this, yes. For the fact that Fomalhaut was noted as "resembling" the Eye of Sauron in the media (see above discussion which Naphra also replied to), no, because that's not a "star system in fiction", that is a star system in popular culture, which is quite a different matter (fiction can be part of pop culture, but not all pop culture is fiction, as much as we may wish it was sometimes!). Why was this expunged from the article, really? Well, not the literary analysis stuff, because that's obvious bunk (Tolkien wrote LotR during World War I, people, before Hubble was even created). But the vaguely amusing, somewhat interesting fact that it's been compared to the Eye of Sauron, yes. It's probably the most buzz this thing got for centuries, and it is way more than most stars ever get as far as mentions in the news - how can you seriously argue against even the briefest (one or two sentences) of mentions of that fact? That makes no sense to me at all; generally notability is based on "is it covered in mainstream news" - this was, and it's not fiction, it's just referencing fiction, or rather, it's referencing other people's notable references to its resemblance to something fictional, which is so far removed from "reference in fiction", that your argument for its inclusion in the article on just that just seems increasingly strange to me. I'd just like to see a better argument (assuming you're even still responding on here) than "let's insert a rhetorical question as if that satisfies any potential arguments". Why do you think the media comparisons of the images of it to the Eye of Sauron definitely should not be included in a very brief, cited reference? Because I have yet to see very strong arguments supporting the information's removal from you, let alone very strong arguments for including it in an article that has nothing to do with it.
Please do sign your comments. Now I don't know who you are or are you still responding.
The rhetorical question wasn't addressing the inclusion of the Eye of Sauron reference; it was directed at the misplaced talk about a fictional star system. Also, including the reference in the Star systems in fiction -article was just a suggestion; I welcome better suggestions.
I'm quite certain that the Eye of Sauron reference isn't the most buzz Fomalhaut has got for centuries or even decades, but I sufficiently can't argue that any more than you can argue the opposite.
As for arguments, I offer you the following quote from WP:Notability:
Notability is not temporary. A short burst of present news coverage about a topic does not necessarily constitute objective evidence of long-term notability.
The article does continue, though, that:
Notability guidelines give guidance on whether a topic is notable enough to be included in Wikipedia as a separate article, but do not specifically regulate the content of articles, which is governed by other guidelines such as those on using reliable sources and on handling trivia. The particular topics and facts within an article are not each required to meet the standards of the notability guidelines.
But as there really is nothing else of interest in the Eye of Sauron reference (say, that the Eye of Sauron actually was modeled after Fomalhaut) other than that such a reference has been made, I don't see how the reference would satisfy criteria for notability (in particular as trivia sections are discouraged).
Also, please don't assume, as you seem to, that I rigidly feel that the reference "definitely should not be included" (in particular when I explicitly state my willingness to hear arguments against my position); this is an iterative medium, and I am well aware of that. Please assume good faith. --Naphra (talk) 20:45, 22 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Heh

"Bears no known resemblance to any dark entities" ... That's funny.