Talk:Gaia (mythology)

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Contents

[edit] References

Quote: "Gaia's voice is heard throughout the first God of War, voiced by Linda hunt, telling the story of the main character's, Kratos, journey from Spartan general all the way through to his becoming the new god of war. She also appears in God of War 2 and helps Kratos get out of Hades and on his way to exacting revenge against Zeus" - What is this paragraph doing in the references section? I propose to delete it if nobody objects.Watasenia 19:08, 3 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Gaia's children

Wouldn't a comma be more appropriate to insert between the names of the children of Gaia, instead of two hyphens? Because name lists are exactly what serial commas are used for. The hyphen makes it look like the first listed child give birth to the second, and the third. --Menchi 04:39 14 Jun 2003 (UTC)

Hopefully that'll work; commas tend to make things a bit close together. - Hephaestos 04:46 14 Jun 2003 (UTC)

[edit] Subheading inconsistency

A question of style. The header ==Gaia in mythology== has a preceding "1". But I was always taught that you should never have a numerical heading of you're only going to have one of them. If this header is going to be preceded by a "1", shouldn't there be another header down below preceded by a "2"? Is there a way to remove the numerical prefix? RickK 01:16 29 Jun 2003 (UTC)

That's because you personalized your Preferences to make it show #s. Most ppl's broswer show a big bold subheading.
--Menchi 01:37 29 Jun 2003 (UTC)

Moved from Village Pump

Please see Gaia. A question of style. The header ==Gaia in mythology== has a preceding "1". But I was always taught that you should never have a numerical heading of you're only going to have one of them. If this header is going to be preceded by a "1", shouldn't there be another header down below preceded by a "2"? Is there a way to remove the numerical prefix? RickK 01:17 29 Jun 2003 (UTC)

Just to clarify, you're talking about a number that's there because you've got "Auto-number headings" turned on in your preferences, yes? If so, no, I don't think there's anyway to get rid of it (apart from switching off that setting, of course, or rewriting a bit of code). --Camembert
Apparently so. When I unchecked it, the numbering went away. But there's no way in the code to check to see if there are any further numbers below to tell whether or not to turn on numbering? On another note, is there some way to explain to newbies like me what the preferences mean? I keep getting confused by what's turned on and turned off. RickK 01:26 29 Jun 2003 (UTC)
That's a good question actually - we ought to have such a page if we don't already. I don't know of one. Maybe a friendly soul will see this and decide to write one :) --Camembert
Wikipedia:User preferences help. --Brion
Any chance of linking that from Special:Preferences? (Or maybe it's linked already and I'm missing that as well...) --Camembert
Well, it's linked from the Help link at the top of every page. ;) But I'll see about putting in a specific link. --Brion 18:44 29 Jun 2003 (UTC)


End move

[edit] Deity and Ecosystem

I side with Anthere in the edit war. Pizza Puzzle 01:57 29 Jun 2003 (UTC)

Perhaps we can relocate Gaia as an modern ecosystem personification to Gaïa, the spelling that Ant uses and presumably used, though not exclusively, in the modern Gaïan environmentalism? --Menchi 02:03 29 Jun 2003 (UTC)

what do you mean ? Please explain. Ant

You used Gaïa frequently when referring to the ecosystem entity (not the Greek goddess), right? So I assume:
  • Gaïa = ecosystem entity
  • Gaia = Greek goddess
The uses may not be completely exclusive, but they'd make the distinction clear. And we could mention their alternative names in their respective articles: "Gaïa, also knonw as Gaia, is an ecosystem..."
But if this is not the reason why you chose to use Gaïa, then maybe you did it to clarify the pronunciation (Gah-yiah???). Either that or something I can't figure out.
--Menchi 02:18 29 Jun 2003 (UTC)

But those are just different spellings of the same thing...This is a concept named for the Greek goddess. Pizza Puzzle


Unfortunately no, Menchi. These are the same name. You may also add Gaea, which is less often used, and never in the ecosystem theory I think. So...that won't help.:-( ant

Gaea is the spelling I am most familiar with; but its all the same thing. Pizza Puzzle

IMHO Gaia should focus on the mythological meaning of Gaia, since that was obviously the inspiration for Lovelock to name his hypothesis. However, given that Gaia is now primarily associated with the Gaia hypothesis and theory, these should both be briefly discussed in the intro. Perhaps the articles Gaia hypothesis and Gaia theory should also be merged into one. --Eloquence 03:53 29 Jun 2003 (UTC)

Your rephrase of Gaia is ok to me.

However, merging gaia hypothesis with gaia theory will do no good. Gaia theory is no more about science. It is about social, political...aspects

The point in separating things is that if everything is merged in a whole big article, people will get lost between the scientific aspects of the theory (which rather deal with chemestry for Lovelock hypothesis).
There many different theories. It makes sense to have a specific article about the most famous one, under the name it is famous, which is gaia hypothesis. This said, a tip if you all want to drive me out of these articles, merge everything in one big article, which will be unreadable....and above 32ko :-)

[edit] Triple Goddess and other modern Neopagan beliefs

I changed the claim that Gaia was a tripartite goddess, because there is much debate about whether the maiden/mother/crone idea was around before the 20th century. Tuf-Kat

Indeed there is very little antiquarian interest in myth before the 18th century (1700s), and very little collecting of folk tales and mythology before the late 18th century, and very little analysis of myth at all before the 19th century. Still, even though there was no Freud in the 1st century, may not one think of the psychology of Nero, say? Mythology is more than picturesque heathen nonsense, we all agree. I suggest Carl Kerenyi, Eleusis: archetypical image of mother and daughter (available in paperback). TUF-KAT is correct that Gaia is not a tripartite goddess. 'Mother Earth' is Mother Earth. Wetman 13:46, 17 Jan 2004 (UTC)
Dead silence. Now, months later, we have a new editor User:DreamGuy, who is suppressing quite standard information wholesale, apparently on the basis of a mythology course somewhere. The usual vague references to 'scholars" and "some say..." I've had to revert, in hopes of eliciting something better. --Wetman 05:50, 24 Nov 2004 (UTC)
Wetman, you can't complain about my not providing sources when you reverted to an article that was claiming incredibly biased and controversial information as true without any sources of its own. I am reverting back to my version. If you have a problem with it, you should get sources for those things you want to reintroduce, not just assert your side as true and ignore that the other side even exists. DreamGuy 17:51, Nov 24, 2004 (UTC)

(This user tells us that besides mythology, his other interest is Jack the Ripper, where, one hopes, he is culturally better equipped. "A little learning is a dangerous thing," Alexander Pope said: "Drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring. There shallow draughts intoxicate the brain, And drinking largely sobers us again." A look at the page History shows what has been subverted by this intoxicated brain who has apparently read one book, but can't recall its title... --Wetman 22:01, 24 Nov 2004 (UTC))

Wetman, all you're doing here is making personal attacks. I have read hundreds of mythology books. I am in my non-wiki life an author and scholar of mythology and folklore, having been cited by other authors for my research. If anything, your boorish attacks show how you have an inadequate understanding of the field. I am, in fact, a recognized expert in the field, for crying out loud. All you've done is whine about my edits, insulted me, and made stupid insunations. You should just give it a rest and try to live up to the scholarly goals of Wikipedia. DreamGuy 03:29, Nov 25, 2004 (UTC)
This user cannot name a single overview of Greek mythology he finds acceptable. Just one title would give us something to follow, since we must all fall in line with this sophmoric "de-bunker". One title, for our education. --Wetman 22:33, 26 Nov 2004 (UTC)
Oh, grow up. He's hardly the only editor who would prefer the Triple Goddess POV to be kept out of articles' lead sections. -Sean Curtin 02:18, Nov 27, 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Clumsy formatting

Part of the point of a longer introduction before introducing subsections was to eliminate the big blank area that has been returned to this entry... --Wetman 05:10, 27 Nov 2004 (UTC)

If you mean the empty space between the subsection box on left and mythology links on right, it's not ideal, but I think it's better than having a subsection index box more than halfway down the article. We can probably come up with an introduction that's a little bit longer (two or three paragraphs with multiple sentences), but I can't see throwing the whole mythology article up there, as that defeats the prupose of having the subsection list. DreamGuy 05:21, Nov 27, 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Profile Picture

Someone needs to add one, I'm no good at picking out pictures. JONJONAUG 16:18, 1 January 2006 (UTC)

In my opinion Gaia is like vedic Mulaprakriti the principal of material, or, so to say "the soul of the element earth" and not the planet earth. I think, that a later degenerated culture the had lost the original meenings maked her mother earth, or the planet earth. aut. Tom Dorbeck

[edit] In Greek Mythology

This section should be cleaned up and reworded significantly, with a little background on the significance of Gaia. It seems too inconsistent to someone (like me) not familiar with the context. (I couldn't understand anything for a long time). I feel it also lacks a good flow. --Soumyasch 06:38, 9 April 2006 (UTC)

Such significance is something one has to apply to Gaia, in editorial interpretations based on readings of remarks made by poets: these have been avoided in this opening explication, which sticks close to the written sources to describe Gaia's inherent nature. Gaia does not appear in Hellenic anecdotal narrative: that is to say, Greeks did not relate how Gaia did this and then she did that, as they did in telling of the Trojan War or the exploits of Heracles. So there's little to tell aside from her natural relationships. I'm probably missing the inconsistencies detected in the article. --Wetman 18:21, 9 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] In Greek Religion

One thing I've been able to glean from reading various sections of Walter Burkert's Greek Religion is that when an ancient Greek god or goddess doesn't do much in mythology, they're usually important in religious rituals instead. The article should include a description of Gaia's significance in the context of ancient ritual, not just neopagan ceremonies. -- D.M. 69.248.116.112 03:51, 23 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] see also Ge from Γῆ

...see also Ge from Γῆ

What does that mean? —Michael Z. 2006-10-12 23:41 Z

[edit] Primordial deities missing

Take a look at the primordial deities table. Chronos and some other deities are missing. Nitro4ce 04:46, 17 July 2007 (UTC)

That's why we call it a Misinfobox. --Wetman 09:49, 17 July 2007 (UTC)
But shouldn't the missing deities be added to the table? Nitro4ce 14:59, 17 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Uranus

Was Uranus created through parthenogenesis or with Aether? Or are there different sources stating different views? --jftsang 13:50, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Vandalilsm??

I don't exactly know why, but this page has been vandalised at least five times last two weeks. It might be a little too early, but I'd like to propose a semi-prot if it keeps up in this pace... -- Bakabaka (talk) 11:16, 14 April 2008 (UTC)