Keithpickering

Anti-Adams POV bias in the 'Discovery of Neptune' article (May 2008)

Dear Keithpickering: With recent edits (May 2008) (some of which I believe you added), substantial parts of the article now appear to have a clear anti-Adams POV bias. This may be inadvertent. 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 'Discovery of Neptune' 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. There is a sarcastic question and discussion on the talk page headed 'what date was Adams going to discover Neptune on?' and this 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, there is some glitch that I haven't been able to sort out up to this moment.) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.7.25.215 (talk) 12:29, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

Adams published his computations?? This is certainly news to me, and to the entire history of science community. Please provide a reference to Adams' pre-discovery publication. Until then, the article is factually correct as written: Adams' computations were (a) unpublished; (b) unstable, i.e., all over the sky; and (c) less accurate than LeVerrier's -- who, in fact, did publish his predictions in full. Indeed, were it not for LeVerrier's public confirmation of Adams' private computations, no English astronomer would have attempted to find the planet at all. In other words, even if Airy had succeeded, LeVerrier would still deserve the lion's share of credit. The fact that Airy didn't succeed can be lain mostly at the feet of Adams -- whose 1846 predictions were increasingly far from where the planet, and Adams' own 1845 predictions, were. --Keithpickering (talk) 03:32, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

Let me also state that Adams' work deserves respect, and I believe the article as written gives him his due. But such respect does not, and should not, extend to credit, or even partial credit, for discovery of the planet itself, in which Adams played no role. --Keithpickering (talk) 03:34, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

Also, while I agree that the talk page comment was sarcastic, such attitudes are not wholly inappropriate for talk pages dealing with controversial subjects. The point is to keep such attitudes out of the article itself. The main reason for having a talk page is to hash out such disputes in frank discussion. Can you point to a statement in the article itself to which you take issue? --Keithpickering (talk) 03:42, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

File source problem with File:DennisRawlins-ca2002.jpg

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Discovery of Neptune

Hello. I'm trying to get the article up to feature level, but there are a number of quotes in it that are uncited, and I was wondering if you knew where they had come from. Thank you. Serendi^podous 06:47, 24 September 2009 (UTC)

Reference formatting in Tycho Brahe

Thanks for putting the Rawlins ref in standard Wiki format. But could you possibly kindly explain what the advantage of that format is, if any, compared with the original simple format I used ? Thanks. --Logicus (talk) 19:02, 26 October 2009 (UTC)

Unreferenced BLPs

Hello Keithpickering! Thank you for your contributions. I am a bot alerting you that 1 of the articles that you created is tagged as an Unreferenced Biography of a Living Person. The biographies of living persons policy requires that all personal or potentially controversial information be sourced. In addition, to ensure verifiability, all biographies should be based on reliable sources. If you were to bring this article up to standards, it would greatly help us with the current 7 article backlog. Once the article is adequately referenced, please remove the {{unreferencedBLP}} tag. Here is the article:

1. Gilbert Melville Grosvenor - Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL

Thanks!--DASHBot (talk) 07:58, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Mongol map

Hi Keith, thanks for the great work on your recent map of the Mongol Empire, File:MongolEmpire.jpg I'm currently working on bringing the Mongol Empire article up to FA status, and would love to include your map there. However, in order to use the map, it needs to have sources on it showing where the information came from. Would you happen to recall what you used? Thanks, --Elonka 20:20, 26 February 2012 (UTC)

Hi Elonka, Sven Manguard posted terrible-looking map of the Empire and tributary states at the map request page and asked for a newer, better looking version. Most of the borders I took from that map. Apparently at some point he renamed my new map to the same name as the old map, because I can no longer find the old one anywere; it's even gone from the map request page, and my map is in its place. So I suggest you start with Sven. He may still have the old map around somewhere.

I drew the borders of the Vietnam region from this map. Keithpickering (talk) 08:18, 28 February 2012 (UTC)

Thanks, I will followup with Sven Manguard (talk · contribs). --Elonka 16:23, 29 February 2012 (UTC)

Horseshoe Curve map

I really like your Horseshoe Curve topo map and would like to offer some tweaks to it. Could the scale bars be repositioned such that there is no gap between the metric and English scales? Also, could a color key for the elevation be added? Not as important, but is it possible to make the changes in elevation "more defined"? Sorry for taking awhile to get back to you on this. Thanks, ​​​​​​​​Niagara ​​^{Don't give up the ship} 23:12, 14 March 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for your input. I have made the changes you requested, although it's not really possible to put "no" gap between the scales, as there has to be someplace for the numbers to go. Keithpickering (talk) 23:03, 20 March 2012 (UTC)

Columbus maps

Hello Keithpickering, I wanted you to know that I like the detailed maps of the four voyages of Columbus you created. I added them today to nl:Christoffel Columbus. Regards, Joplin (talk) 18:56, 25 March 2012 (UTC)

Thanks very much. If you would like to have versions in Dutch, I can create them if you can give me Dutch equivalents to the English words. Keithpickering (talk) 01:35, 26 March 2012 (UTC)

Hi again, thanks for your generous offer and thinking about it, I would actually like to have Dutch translations of the maps. It gives a bit of a home feeling to the article. Most geographical names have no Dutch equivalent, but a few have. However, I am about to leave for a short skiing trip, so I don't have the time now to look at these issues closely. But I can get back on this early next week. If that's OK with you, we'll have contact again then. Thanks one more time and regards, Joplin (talk) 22:02, 26 March 2012 (UTC)

Hello,

I have taken a look at geographical names the Columbus maps and below are my suggestions for the translations into Dutch.

General: Kilometers could suffice in the legenda, but the Dutch word for Miles is Mijlen. A Dutch description on commons could be: Kaart van de eerste/tweede/derde/vierde reis van Christoffel Columbus

First Voyage:

From Canary Islands ==> van Canarische Eilanden

To Azores ==> naar Azoren

Possible route of the Pinta ==> mogelijke route van de Pinta

Second Voyage:

From Spain ==> van Spanje

To Spain ==> naar Spanje

Virgin Isl. ==> Maagdeneilanden

Third Voyage:

From Cape Verde Isl. ==> van Kaapverdische Eilanden

To Spain ==> naar Spanje

Virgin Isl. ==> Maagdeneilanden

South America ==> Zuid-Amerika

Fourth Voyage:

From Spain ==> van Spanje

To Spain ==> naar Spanje

Virgin Isl. ==> Maagdeneilanden

South America ==> Zuid-Amerika

Thanks again for your generous offer. Of course there is no hurry and if you have any questions or remarks, please let me know. Regards, Joplin (talk) 18:21, 3 April 2012 (UTC)

Thanks, this is exactly what I needed. I have created versions of the four maps in Nederlandse and uploaded them. The files are:

File:Columbus_first_voyage_nl.jpg

File:Columbus_second_voyage_nl.jpg

File:Columbus_third_voyage_nl.jpg

File:Columbus_fourth_voyage_nl.jpg

If these look good to you, just modify the nl.wikipedia.com page to use them; if you would like further changes to the maps, let me know and I will modify them. Keithpickering (talk) 22:09, 3 April 2012 (UTC)

Great! I just added them to nl:Christoffel Columbus. Joplin (talk) 20:52, 4 April 2012 (UTC)

Wikipedia mapping

Hi Keith, I saw that you are active contributor of Wikipedia Map Workshop.

I am on of developers of ShareMap.org, Creative Commons mapping tool. I believe that this tool is useful in many cases of articles without maps (it can easily consume Open Street Map geo data) and even users without any GIS knowlege are able to create simple map with it.

You can take a look at maps created with ShareMap here - Commons:Category:Created with ShareMap

I hope you can provide us some feedback. Also people within ShareMap community will be happy to help with mapping within wikipedia - just leave some comment on discussion page - Commons:User:ShareMap

--Jkan997 (talk) 21:39, 23 April 2012 (UTC)

Urgent request

I have uploaded a high-urgency request at the graphic lab's map section here. I really need this, and quick, so as to help me in my FAC going on right now. I'd be really obliged if you could do this soon. Thanks and cheers :). ~*~AnkitBhatt~*~ 05:22, 12 May 2012 (UTC)

New workshop

Hey there. Please take a look at this proposal to start a new workshop in the graphic lab. Please add your views on this. Roshan220195 (talk) 14:59, 4 July 2012 (UTC)

Proposed deletion of Dio (journal)

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Guanahani

Hi! I'm not exactly clear why my revert hereof IP user 200.54.197.137's blanking of a complete section here without an edit summary is considered vandalizing the page. The blanking of the section was replaced simply by "los shanchitos tan riicos" for which I was not able to come up with an English translation. Regards,   Aloha27  talk  23:31, 8 June 2016 (UTC)

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Columbus distances

In this 2006 edit of yours: https://en.wiki.x.io/w/index.php?title=Christopher_Columbus&type=revision&diff=49046786&oldid=49045096

you wrote that Columbus calculated that the distance from the Canary Islands to Japan was 3700 km. How do you believe he calculated that distance? - 68.207.248.247 (talk) 02:05, 12 August 2018 (UTC)