Talk:Johannes Hevelius

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[edit] Talk of 2003

In 1611 Gdansk was a Part of Poland not Germany and its name was Gdansk not Danzig. It wasnt Danzig till after the Partitons of Poland, So will some of you people stop renaming it. And Jan Heweliusz was Polish and dedicated his first book to Sobieski and the Polish Crown.

See:http://www.ampolinstitute.org/people/heweliusz.html —Preceding unsigned comment added by Kommiec (talk • contribs) 04:41, 2 October 2003

We use current names on Wikipedia.Vancouverguy 03:42, 2 Oct 2003 (UTC)

[edit] Current Name

And the Current name is Gdansk so stop renaming it. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Kommiec (talk • contribs) 04:44, 2 October 2003

The Britannica lists Gdansk: http://www.britannica.com/eb/article?eu=41189 12.243.94.55 04:31, 2 Oct 2003 (UTC)

City was refrenced as Gdansk in 1611 then it became Danzig not as the page is currently stated see biography: http://www.hao.ucar.edu/public/education/sp/images/hevelius.html —Preceding unsigned comment added by 12.243.94.55 (talk • contribs) 04:58, 2 October 2003

He wouldn't be renaming it if it hadn't been part of your "program" to change all Danzig's to Gdansk's without explanation. You're better off explaining your changes, that way when they are not incorrect they won't be reverted -- Someone else 03:57, 2 Oct 2003 (UTC)


Only changed the names to when it was a Part of Poland. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 12.243.94.55 (talk • contribs) 06:33, 2 October 2003

As I said, it is best to give reasons for making a change when you make it, at least in the edit summary. That's what it's there for. By the way, you can sign your comments with four tildes ~~~~: they'll be converted to your username and the date when you save the page. Someone else 04:02, 2 Oct 2003 (UTC)

[edit] Johannes Hevelius Polonus

John Hevelius was Polish astronomer in non stricte ethnical sense - see Mikołaj Kopernik casus. He was Polish citizen, supported by Polish king. See also casus of G.F. Händel who had German origins but he was British.

Mathiasrex

The article was based on Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition, which asserts that Hevelius was German.[1] The next day, after someone tried to assert him as Polish, someone else reckognised the conflict and left out the nationality[2], in line with WP:NPOV. Nevertheless battles ensued. As you can speak German a little, you might want to have a look at a page from Das Erste for German-Polish affairs [3]. (Roughly translated) "Like in the case of Nicolaus Copernicus, Hevelius' nationality, too, was disputed. Germans put forward Hevelius' ancestry and language, Poles his reverend loyalty to the Polish kings. Today - at least in science - other tones prevail." At the very least it explains why the web contains several sources that either attribute him as German or as Pole. To argue which of the two nationalities should be asserted is what WP:NPOV tries to prevent. These two point of views, which in Hevelius' time probably didn't conflict one another, can be fairly described in Wikipedia ... or left out. As his nationality is not his most famous attribute, (and because it is easy to do this) I'd suggest to simply exclude it. Sciurinæ 01:01, 8 May 2006 (UTC)

The modern Britannica however clearly states that he was Polish[4], and updated source take precedence over outdated ones. I don't understant why information on country of birth is being deleted. Both Scinurea and Matthead seem to be obsessed with determing ethnic bloodlines, instead of acccepting that countries were mutltiethnic and a Polish astronemer could have ethnic Jewish, Lithuanian,Ormanian,German roots, it is irrelevant as long as he was a Polish citizen belonging to Polish culture. --Molobo 13:18, 22 June 2006 (UTC)

Molobo, I've said it all before: the policy WP:NPOV will not be replaced with a redirect to Britannica. You cannot deny there are two (or more) different point of views here. Even an "argument" that one POV is far more frequent than the other cannot really be applied here (cf. 'Hevelius "Polish astronomer"' 'Hevelius "German astronomer"'). And Wikipedia:Neutral point of view does not even redirect to Wikipedia:Majority point of view, either. So it is safe to assume that NPOV is still enforced.
The "modern Britannica"? Its article on Hevelius makes no mention of nationality. So you had to find another loophole to get your message across that the astronomer belongs to your nation. Well, you picked another article of the current Britannica that says Hevelius was Polish. But omniscient Britannica is not only inconsistent as to whether or not to attribute a nationality to Hevelius — in another current article of the encyclopedia, they said he was "German". [5]
So which point of view is correct? Finding that out is not the job of a wikipedia talk page. In articles POVs are to be "presented fairly, but not asserted". You can adopt whatever POV you like in your mind (yes, even that Matthead and I were "obsessed with determing ethnic bloodlines"[sic]). But in Wikipedia, don't try to impose that view. Merci d'avance! Sciurinæ 17:01, 22 June 2006 (UTC)

You are unable to distinguish between culture and ethnicity. --Molobo 12:23, 23 June 2006 (UTC)

Molobo has to be a joke, right? He/she can't possibly be for real. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 217.98.20.195 (talk • contribs) 13:45, 23 June 2006

[edit] Stop edit-warring about Danzig/Gdańsk issues here and let Johannes Hevelius rest in peace!

Discuss Danzig/Gdańsk issues on pages covering the history of the city, not in biographies like this here. -- Matthead discuß!     O       23:38, 27 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Johannes Hevelius, Danzig

Google book search brings up 174 books with Hevelius Gdansk and over 600 with (Johannes) Hevelius Danzig

[edit] Halophänonem

'A Halophänonem was observed by many in Danzig...'  : May I enquire what, precisely, a 'halophänonem' is? --Nalco 17:21, 5 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Bit of a contradiction?

The following is written on Tycho Brahe's page:

"Tycho was the last major astronomer to work without the aid of a telescope, soon to be turned toward the sky by Galileo."

while this article states:

"He (Hevelius) is thus considered the last astronomer to do major work without lenses."

I think that this should be resolved. Since Hevelius clearly did his work after Tycho's death, it would appear that the claim for T. is a bit of an exaggeration. H. did use telescopes, but not for his positional observations. Michael Daly 20:34, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Plaque

Some translation of the plaque might be nice...

[edit] Cats

Dear Poeticbent, I was neither involved nor knew that Hevelius had been put into the see-also section at Category:German astronomers until today. I'd disapprove of that in that the same should have been done with the Category:Polish astronomers and approve in that it is a better idea than asserting him into that group as really a German (Polish). Since you have now done the same with the Polish astronomer cat, meaning there is absolutely no current double standard in that regard, you needn't have solely put in that cat again to point out in the edit summary that there had been a double standard, thus also creating one. See the old talk on his nationality (above) and couple it with the thought that "Categories appear without annotations, so be careful of NPOV when creating or filling categories. Categories that are not self-evident, or are shown through reliable sources to be controversial, should not be included on the article; a list might be a better option." (Wikipedia:Categorization#Some_general_guidelines). That said, I undid the undiscussed introduction of the category again. Sciurinæ (talk) 19:43, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

I have also noticed the sneaky attempts at inserting often incorrect Polish categories.

Also, several people at Wikipedia persistently keep re-adding wrong country Poland or Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth [6] , [7], [8] as country for Danzig.

That is incorrect. Danzig was in the country of Prussia or (Royal Prussia). Prussians from eastern Prussia (Ducal Prussia, East Prussia) held in common with people from western (Royal Prussia, West Prussia) ius indigenatus - citizens of Prussia status (not Polish). MfG 8 January 2008 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.133.64.78 (talk • contribs) 01:44, 9 January 2008

Royal Prussia was a province within Poland, not a country. --Molobo (talk) 01:12, 9 January 2008 (UTC)