Wikipedia:WikiProject Military history/Assessment/Enrico Fermi

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The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Article promoted. Anotherclown (talk) 23:56, 16 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Enrico Fermi[edit]

Nominator(s): Hawkeye7 (talk)

Continuing the Manhattan Project series, I present one of the most famous of all scientists. Recently overhauled this article. Hawkeye7 (talk) 22:18, 26 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Support Comments: interesting article, although I couldn't help but feel very dumb reading it, but that's my issue, not yours ;-). Anyway, I made a few tweaks; please check you are happy with those. Also, I have the following points:

While rebuilding the article on Robert Oppenheimer, I had to contend with a lot of material people had added about his private life and political beliefs. But that was unbalanced; the guy was a scientist, and the article needed to reflect that. Same with Fermi, and the result is that if the readers click on the links, they will find a rich world of articles like X-ray crystallography and tensor. From a HPS POV, the reader will probably be familiar with the physicists of Germany, but the achievements of those in Italy may come as news.
  • "...embracing the new ideas line relativity coming from Germany" (I wasn't sure about the terminology "new ideas line relativity")
  • these three sentences all begin the same way: "Corbino hoped that the new chair would raise the standard and reputation of physics in Italy. Corbino also chaired the selection committee,[23] which chose Fermi ahead of Enrico Persico and Aldo Pontremoli.[24] Corbino also..."
    • Probably needed to be re-worded anyway. Hawkeye7 (talk) 20:25, 10 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • I wasn't sure about the wording here: "He also mused about what is now referred to as the "Fermi Paradox": that with the billions and billions of star systems in the universe, one would think that intelligent life would have contacted our civilisation by now".
  • slight inconsistency in presentation: compare Note 30 (p. XXXIX) to Note 68 (pp. xix–xx). AustralianRupert (talk) 12:12, 10 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Support Comments Fine and interesting article.

  • Should the title of Un teorema di calcolo delle probabilità ed alcune sue applicazioni be given in English first and the the Italian name using {{lang-it}} template or not? (The same applies to other such instances in the article, of course.) I'm not sure about application of MOS in such instances, so this comment may have more to do with my ignorance, but I thought to check with you anyway.--Tomobe03 (talk) 11:49, 1 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]
    • I can't see it as being much of an improvement, but done. All the translations are mine, so meh... Hawkeye7 (talk) 03:00, 2 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • The MOS advises (although it does not require) spelling out unit names and using {{convert}} template to indicate the measurement in other relevant units of measurement (if any). Would it improve the article to spell out kilograms in "Leó Szilárd obtained 200 kg of uranium oxide, allowing Fermi and Anderson to conduct experiments with fission on a much larger scale." and provide indication of the measure in pounds?--Tomobe03 (talk) 14:13, 1 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]
    • The Manhattan Project was carried out in metric back in the 1940s. Since everybody understands metric, while most are unfamiliar with imperial, the use of the convert template caused more confusion than anything else. But it this case, it will just give a conversion to pounds, so okay. Hawkeye7 (talk) 03:00, 2 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Support with nitpicks

  • Time should be italicized
  • "He concluded that, as counter-intuitive as it then seemed, slow neutrons were more easily captured than fast ones" - without knowing the science, this seems intuitive; would suggest omitting the intuitive clause or expanding slightly.
  • 'Via Panisperna boys" - check punctuation and consistent italics.

Nikkimaria (talk) 18:03, 12 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Support Comments

  • Structure, detail, image licensing and referencing seem fine.
  • Copyedited prose, so let me know if I inadvertently altered your meaning. Some outstanding points:
    • "A sign of things to come was that the mass was expressed as a tensor." -- sounds nice and dramatic but not sure it means much to the uninitiated...
      • I thought that would be an "Oh wow!" moment for the reader. Added a bit. Hawkeye7 (talk) 20:57, 15 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]
    • "At first glance, the first paper seemed to point out a contradiction between the electrodynamic theory and the relativistic one concerning the calculation of the electromagnetic masses..." -- to avoid repetition, could "At first glance" be "Initially" or something along similar lines?
    • "This paper was so successful that it was translated into German..." -- perhaps I need to get out more but describing a scientific paper as "so successful" sounds a bit odd, like it's a best-seller; do we mean "well regarded" or something like that?
      • Done. Hawkeye7 (talk) 20:57, 15 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]
        • Actually, now I think of it, I quite like the idea of a best-selling scientific paper... ;-) Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 21:47, 15 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]
    • "typical of Fermi's brilliance" doesn't sound too neutral -- "typical of Fermi's approach" or some such?
  • Last thing, Tsung-Dao Lee is listed in the infobox as a doctoral student but there's no mention or citation of this fact in the main body -- this is just an example so pls check that everything in the infobox is mentioned/cited in the main body, or else removed.
    • Done. I am more strict that some other editors, restricting it to his PhD students. But I did include Jerome Friedman, who was still his student when Fermi died. Hawkeye7 (talk) 20:57, 15 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 14:23, 15 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]

P.S. Who's next, Szilárd? IR
Szilárd is on the hit list, but I'm still gathering material on him. Max Born and Hilde Levi are at GA, but unfortunately do not fall within the scope of MilHist. So the next up to bat here will be Luis Alvarez. Hawkeye7 (talk) 20:57, 15 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Alvarez, Alvarez, what can I remember without looking... Nobel Prize, "jet effect" that helped explained why JFK's head jerked back when shot from behind (and not from the grassy knoll after all)... Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 21:47, 15 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]
He's best known for a wacky theory that an asteroid impact wiped out the dinosaurs. Air Force types normally remember him for flying on the B-29 The Great Artiste during the bombing of Hiroshima. But Wikipedian seem to consider his greatest achievement to be the exploding-bridgewire detonator. Hawkeye7 (talk) 22:45, 15 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
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