Wikipedia talk:Vital articles/Archive 12

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FAILED
2–4, not added Gizza (t)(c) 23:51, 21 March 2018 (UTC)

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Add Cai Lun

"He is traditionally regarded as the inventor of paper and the papermaking process" which is in his lead and which says it all. If we have Johannes Gutenberg then we should have him. If someone has to be removed i'd support a swap depending on who it is (weakest is Dali, in my opinion.)

Support
  1. Support as nom. GuzzyG (talk) 12:54, 21 February 2018 (UTC)
  2. Support Long-ranging influence. "The creator of this extremely important invention is only somewhat known outside East Asia. After Cai invented the papermaking process in 105, it became widely used as a writing medium in China by the 3rd century. It enabled China to develop its civilization (through widespread literature and literacy) much faster than it had with earlier writing materials (primarily bamboo and silk, the latter of which was a more expensive medium). By the 7th century, China's papermaking technique had spread to Korea, Vietnam, and Japan. In CE 751, some Chinese paper makers were captured by Arabs after Tang troops were defeated in the Battle of Talas River. The techniques of papermaking then spread to the West. When paper was first introduced to Europe in the 12th century, it gradually revolutionized the manner in which written communication could be spread from region to region. Along with contact between Arabs and Europeans during the Crusades (with the essential recovery of ancient Greek written classics), the widespread use of paper aided the foundation of the Scholastic Age in Europe." Though somewhat surprising that his invention spread to Europe 10 centuries following his death. Trans-cultural diffusion is not usually that slow.Dimadick (talk) 09:53, 22 February 2018 (UTC)
Oppose
  1. Oppose While paper is undoubtedly a vital topic, its inventor himself may not be an equally vital topic. Whether Gutenberg as a person should be a vital topic can be doubted for similar reasons but his name is much more related to his movable type printing press than Cai Lun to paper. Also - if the "whatever" technology is vital than also its inventor must be vital argument would be opening the door for endless discussions. Arnoutf (talk) 10:54, 22 February 2018 (UTC)
  2. Oppose --Thi (talk) 11:08, 22 February 2018 (UTC)
  3. Oppose, we already have paper as an article which is more significant, RJFJR (talk) 16:39, 22 February 2018 (UTC)
  4. Oppose. Paper is enough. Rreagan007 (talk) 21:45, 23 February 2018 (UTC)
Discussion

I'm sorry but paper is more important then most of the things our listed inventors have invented. If Cai Lun never did what he did, Gutenberg wouldn't be known. How can Benjamin Franklin be in inventors but not the inventor of paper? GuzzyG (talk) 13:48, 22 February 2018 (UTC)

And where is the inventor of the wheel? Or textile? or pottery? Benjamin Franklin is an important historical person in his own right not only for his inventions (e.g. also as one of the founding father of the US). So what makes Cai Lun a vital person in his own right beyond his invention of paper? (as I said above, I agree that you can doubt whether Gutenberg should be listed among the vital inventors; also your proposal to swap 1 out of 9 artists (Dali) and replace by yet another inventor (we already have 20) seems leaning to a technophile bias - a swap for another inventor would be more reasonable). Arnoutf (talk) 14:13, 22 February 2018 (UTC)
I'd say yes to all three, but the inventors are unknown, so that's not a reasonable argument. As for Franklin, this list has an agreement where we generally don't list two people in the same period. (Which is why Tchaikovsky got removed for Armstrong, why FDR or Socrates is not on here etc). Now Franklin overlaps with Washington, is Franklin more vital then FDR or Socrates? No, but i wouldn't even bother nominating Franklin because it's hard enough to get pop culture favorites off these lists (see Alec Guinness on the level 4 one.. Paper is so significant and changed the world so much that Cai Lun probably impacted people more then the majority of this list. That's vital enough. GuzzyG (talk) 14:45, 22 February 2018 (UTC)
"is Franklin more vital then FDR or Socrates?" Possibly.:
  • As an inventor, Franklin is credited with inventing "the lightning rod, glass harmonica (a glass instrument, not to be confused with the metal harmonica), Franklin stove, bifocal glasses and the flexible urinary catheter".
  • In his studies of electricity, "Franklin proposed that "vitreous" and "resinous" electricity were not different types of "electrical fluid" (as electricity was called then), but the same "fluid" under different pressures. (The same proposal was made independently that same year by William Watson.) Franklin was the first to label them as positive and negative respectively, and he was the first to discover the principle of conservation of charge".
  • In the field of population studies, Franklin was apparently a pioneer: "Franklin had a major influence on the emerging science of demography, or population studies. Thomas Malthus is noted for his rule of population growth and credited Franklin for discovering it. Kammen (1990) and Drake (2011) say Franklin's "Observations on the Increase of Mankind" (1755) stands alongside Ezra Stiles' "Discourse on Christian Union" (1760) as the leading works of eighteenth-century Anglo-American demography; Drake credits Franklin's "wide readership and prophetic insight." In the 1730s and 1740s, Franklin began taking notes on population growth, finding that the American population had the fastest growth rates on earth. Emphasizing that population growth depended on food supplies—a line of thought later developed by Thomas Malthus—Franklin emphasized the abundance of food and available farmland in America. He calculated that America's population was doubling every twenty years and would surpass that of England in a century. In 1751, he drafted "Observations concerning the Increase of Mankind, Peopling of Countries, &c." Four years later, it was anonymously printed in Boston, and it was quickly reproduced in Britain, where it influenced the economists Adam Smith and later Thomas Malthus. Franklin's predictions alarmed British leaders who did not want to be surpassed by the colonies, so they became more willing to impose restrictions on the colonial economy."
  • In his studies of Atlantic Ocean currents, Franklin charted and named the Gulf Stream.
  • Franklin was a supporter of the wave theory of light, a fringe scientific theory of his era: "Franklin was, along with his contemporary Leonhard Euler, the only major scientist who supported Christiaan Huygens's wave theory of light, which was basically ignored by the rest of the scientific community. In the 18th century Newton's corpuscular theory was held to be true; only after Young's well-known slit experiment in 1803 were most scientists persuaded to believe Huygens's theory." Dimadick (talk) 22:52, 23 February 2018 (UTC)
My personal preference as a general rule (there are always exceptions) is for the inventor to be listed at one higher level than the thing invented. We seem to follow that most of the time. Unfortunately, the inventors of many crucial inventions are unknown. Gizza (t)(c) 02:45, 28 February 2018 (UTC)
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NO CONSENSUS
Swap failed 2-3, no consensus for straight removal 3-0 Cobblet (talk) 22:56, 30 March 2018 (UTC)

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Swap Johannes Gutenberg for Printing press

Since inventors seem to be less vital then their inventions as per the Cai Lun discussion. Yes, you may have heard about Johannes in a western textbook unlike Cai but it's exactly the same situation. Except Johannes invention is a derivative of Cai's. The printing press is "more significant" then it's inventor, without it we would not have the modern world.

Support
  1. Support per nom. GuzzyG (talk) 17:02, 22 February 2018 (UTC)
  2. Support removal The printing press is certainly more vital. Gutenberg didn't even invent the printing press, he only invented movable type. Rreagan007 (talk) 17:04, 22 February 2018 (UTC)
  3. Support removal --Thi (talk) 17:20, 22 February 2018 (UTC)
  4. Support swap The printing press revolutionized book production and helped spread ideas, and it is quite vital. As the article explains, Gutenberg took already extant ideas and solved some of their technical problems. "In Europe, sporadic evidence that the typographical principle, the idea of creating a text by reusing individual characters, was well understood and employed in pre-Gutenberg Europe had been cropping up since the 12th century and possibly before. The known examples range from Germany (Prüfening inscription) to England (letter tiles) to Italy. Lipinsky surmises that this typographical technique was known in Constantinople from the 10th to 12th century and that the Venetians received it from there (p. 78). However, the various techniques employed (imprinting, punching and assembling individual letters) did not have the refinement and efficiency needed to become widely accepted. Gutenberg greatly improved the process by treating typesetting and printing as two separate work steps. A goldsmith by profession, he created his type pieces from a lead-based alloy which suited printing purposes so well that it is still used today. The mass production of metal letters was achieved by his key invention of a special hand mould, the matrix. The Latin alphabet proved to be an enormous advantage in the process because, in contrast to logographic writing systems, it allowed the type-setter to represent any text with a theoretical minimum of only around two dozen different letters."Dimadick (talk) 23:06, 23 February 2018 (UTC)
  5. Support removal. Undecided on whether printing or printing press is the better choice. Gizza (t)(c) 21:11, 25 February 2018 (UTC)
Oppose
  1. Oppose addition. We already list Printing and I don't think we need to list both it and Printing press at this level. Rreagan007 (talk) 17:23, 22 February 2018 (UTC)
  2. I agree with Rreagan007. RJFJR (talk) 16:10, 23 February 2018 (UTC)
  3. I agree as well. Printing is also a broader concept than the printing press. --Katolophyromai (talk) 03:23, 19 March 2018 (UTC)
Discussion
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FAILED
1–4, not swapped Rreagan007 (talk) 21:40, 5 April 2018 (UTC)

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Swap Portuguese Language with Hebrew Language

I feel that the Hebrew Language had a greater impact upon the formation of history and theology than the Portuguese Language. Not trying to pick on Portugal, but I believe that all the other languages on the list had enough of an impact to keep them. Portuguese, while important in trading and South American culture, hasn't had as much of an impact (imo) as Hebrew, which is the language of an entire religion and, while not directly impacting it, has a role in the current conflict on the Gaza Strip. Portuguese is a sister language of the Spanish Language, which is already on the list, while Hebrew is the only surviving language of the Canaanite languages. I realize that if Hebrew were to be placed on the list it would have to be taken off the Indo-European languages list, but it's not my understanding that there is a set number of Indo-European languages.

Support — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2600:8806:3302:F200:F894:10D1:23D2:2AC1 (talk) 22:44, 6 March 2018 (UTC)
Oppose
  1. Oppose Hebrew is spoken by 9 million people while Portuguese is spoken by 260 million people. Maybe if the number of speakers were closer I would agree with you, but the disparity in number of speakers is just too great to justify replacing it. Also, we currently list both the Bible and the Talmud, which are the most historic works written in Hebrew, as well as Judaism, the religion of which you reference, so I don't think adding the language article is necessary. Rreagan007 (talk) 23:08, 6 March 2018 (UTC)
  2. Oppose per Rreagan007. Also Hebrew is related to Arabic, another Semitic language, which is listed. The Malay language is spoken by 250 million people and is not related to any language on the list. Gizza (t)(c) 00:00, 7 March 2018 (UTC)
  3. Oppose According to List of languages by number of native speakers, Portuguese is the 6th language worldwide in number of native speakers (following Mandarin, Spanish, English, Hindi, and Arabic). It has had much more of an impact than Hebrew. Dimadick (talk) 18:55, 11 March 2018 (UTC)
  4. Oppose I might consider a different swap (I'm undecided on Malay) but not this one. From a "history of linguistics" perspective I'd rather include Phoenician alphabet; from a biblical perspective there are multiple articles that would be better. power~enwiki (π, ν) 22:45, 12 March 2018 (UTC)
Discuss
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FAILED
4–3, not added Rreagan007 (talk) 18:07, 31 March 2018 (UTC)

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Add Farm

The house vs. home debate made me think of this. Farming redirects to Agriculture, which we have. Is there room on the list for both the process of farming and its physical manifestation in the form of land use? While the two concepts are obviously related, there is a clear enough distinction between them, and both are of such fundamental importance, that I think both should be listed.

Support
  1. Support as nom. Cobblet (talk) 20:44, 25 February 2018 (UTC)
  2. Support per nom and Carlwev. Gizza (t)(c) 21:07, 25 February 2018 (UTC)
  3. Support Dimadick (talk) 16:52, 26 February 2018 (UTC)
  4. Support I think it's important enough. GuzzyG (talk) 17:28, 26 February 2018 (UTC)
Oppose
  1. I'm not convinced Farm is sufficiently distinct from Agriculture to warrant adding it as a vital article. But now you've got me thinking, why isn't Foraging or Hunter-gatherer a vital article? Foraging was the way modern humans obtained food from at least 200,000 to 8000 BCE. It seems like extraordinary recentism to include domestication, animal husbandry, fertilizer, pasteurization, and garden as vital articles, but omit foraging/hunter-gatherer, when agriculture has only existed for 4% of modern human history. But </endrant>; this probably isn't the place to raise this point. AdA&D ★ 21:10, 25 February 2018 (UTC)
  2. Oppose I don't think there is a need to include farm at this level. We already list both agriculture and garden and there is a good bit of overlap there. The analogy to manufacturing and factory below is a good one, and I'm inclined to say we don't really need to list factory at this level either. Rreagan007 (talk) 01:38, 26 February 2018 (UTC)
  3. Oppose per AdA&D and Rreagan007. RJFJR (talk) 14:48, 26 February 2018 (UTC)
Discussion

We list Manufacturing at level 2 then factory here at level 3, that would be a similar position to having agriculture at level 2 which we do then farm at level 3.  Carlwev  21:05, 25 February 2018 (UTC)

Good point. It's another symptom of the pro-industry, anti-agriculture bias that I've previously noted on level 4. (How are nine metalworking techniques still listed there ahead of center pivot irrigation?) Cobblet (talk) 21:54, 25 February 2018 (UTC)

@Anne drew Andrew and Drew:: Presumably for the same reasons we do not include gift economy or barter alongside money, or stateless society alongside state, etc. That Homo sapiens existed for a very long time without certain things does not in itself make the lack of those things a vital topic. Cobblet (talk) 21:54, 25 February 2018 (UTC)

By that same coin, just because agricultural societies have been in the vogue for a few thousand years does not make them more vital to human history than hunter-gatherer societies. AdA&D ★ 22:12, 25 February 2018 (UTC)
The existence of agriculture has had somewhat more of an impact on human civilization than a change in fashion. Cobblet (talk) 22:15, 25 February 2018 (UTC)
We could add an important development that occurred during the pre-agricultural period of human existence, such as control of fire by early humans or spear. Though we do have human evolution and knife (a tool that has been around for millions of years in some shape or form). Gizza (t)(c) 23:09, 25 February 2018 (UTC)
Fire as a technology ought to be covered by fire. Prehistoric weapons seem less important to me than other prehistoric technologies we don't have here like basket weaving or sailing. Cobblet (talk) 03:27, 6 March 2018 (UTC)
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FAILED
2–5, not removed Rreagan007 (talk) 21:42, 5 April 2018 (UTC)

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Remove Opera

Derivative of theatre and classical music, i don't think it fits on this level. Not a top 50 article that you'd cover for arts.

Support
  1. Support as nom. GuzzyG (talk) 02:08, 6 March 2018 (UTC)
  2. Support power~enwiki (π, ν) 22:54, 12 March 2018 (UTC)
Oppose
  1. Oppose --Thi (talk) 06:59, 6 March 2018 (UTC)
  2. Oppose Dimadick (talk) 18:57, 11 March 2018 (UTC)
  3. Oppose I hate opera, and I'm borderline on this nomination, but given its historical significance I think it's important enough to stay, especially since it appears that musical theatre will be removed soon. Rreagan007 (talk) 02:39, 13 March 2018 (UTC)
  4. Oppose - Agree that opera is vital at this level. Jusdafax (talk) 20:13, 18 March 2018 (UTC)
  5. Oppose Opera is extremely historically significant. --Katolophyromai (talk) 03:26, 19 March 2018 (UTC)
Discussion

I think it's right around number 50, and I'd like to keep the quota for "The arts" at 50. If there's no addition that can gain consensus, I'd support keeping this. power~enwiki (π, ν) 22:54, 12 March 2018 (UTC)

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PASSED
Removed, 6–0 Rreagan007 (talk) 01:48, 22 March 2018 (UTC)

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Remove Musical theatre

Derivative of theatre and has not really had worldwide impact, i don't think it fits on this level. Not a top 50 article that you'd cover for arts. Only in 64 different language articles which is low for a artform.

Support
  1. Support as nom. GuzzyG (talk) 05:01, 6 March 2018 (UTC)
  2. Support --Thi (talk) 07:00, 6 March 2018 (UTC)
  3. Support as covered by Theatre and Music. RJFJR (talk) 16:04, 6 March 2018 (UTC)
  4. Support Rreagan007 (talk) 20:05, 6 March 2018 (UTC)
  5. Support Gizza (t)(c) 23:52, 6 March 2018 (UTC)
  6. Support redundant to Theatre at this level. power~enwiki (π, ν) 22:54, 12 March 2018 (UTC)
Oppose
Discussion
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PASSED
Removed, 7–0 Rreagan007 (talk) 01:50, 22 March 2018 (UTC)

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Remove Computing

We already list Computer and Computer science. There's too much overlap to also list computing at this level.

Support
  1. Support as nom. Rreagan007 (talk) 21:02, 6 March 2018 (UTC)
  2. Support There's also overlap with algorithm (the article refers to computing as any task that involves using an algorithm) and even abacus. Cobblet (talk) 23:37, 6 March 2018 (UTC)
  3. Support per above. Gizza (t)(c) 23:52, 6 March 2018 (UTC)
  4. Support  Carlwev  18:26, 11 March 2018 (UTC)
  5. Support --Thi (talk) 18:45, 11 March 2018 (UTC)
  6. Support GuzzyG (talk) 19:54, 11 March 2018 (UTC)
  7. Support computer and algorithm are essential, and computer science is a good overview topic. Computing is not needed. power~enwiki (π, ν) 23:24, 12 March 2018 (UTC)
Oppose
Discussion
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PASSED
Added, 8–0 Rreagan007 (talk) 17:46, 27 March 2018 (UTC)

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Add Amazon rainforest

This seems to me to be on the same level as the other terrestrial features we list at this level like the Sahara desert and Grand Canyon. Per the article, "The Amazon represents over half of the planet's remaining rainforests, and comprises the largest and most biodiverse tract of tropical rainforest in the world, with an estimated 390 billion individual trees divided into 16,000 species." Seems vital to me.

Support
  1. Support as nom. Rreagan007 (talk) 07:35, 12 March 2018 (UTC)
  2. Support A topic far more essential to understanding the planet we live on than the Grand Canyon or Mount Everest. Cobblet (talk) 13:21, 12 March 2018 (UTC)
  3. Support Supremely vital. GuzzyG (talk) 16:34, 12 March 2018 (UTC)
  4. Support Galobtter (pingó mió) 17:43, 12 March 2018 (UTC)
  5. Support per above and previous discussion in the archives. Gizza (t)(c) 21:02, 12 March 2018 (UTC)
  6. Support we have forest, but not rainforest or tropical rainforest or Amazon rainforest, one of them is necessary. Since The Amazon represents over half of the planet's remaining rainforests it's reasonable to include the specific example. power~enwiki (π, ν) 22:40, 12 March 2018 (UTC)
  7. Support Dimadick (talk) 23:13, 12 March 2018 (UTC)
  8. Support --Thi (talk) 08:15, 13 March 2018 (UTC)
Oppose
Discussion
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FAILED
1-4, not removed (or withdrawn by nom, if you prefer) power~enwiki (π, ν) 04:02, 13 April 2018 (UTC)

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Remove Rock music

During the 50s and 60s, rock largely overlapped with pop music, which is also listed. I don't think modern rock is important enough to justify two separate entries here. The rock music article is better, but pop music is a more general term.

Support
  1. Support as nom power~enwiki (π, ν) 23:03, 12 March 2018 (UTC)
Oppose
  1. Oppose removal of just rock music, as I don't think it is any less vital than folk, pop, or jazz music. However, perhaps we should just remove all of the musical genres, with the possible exception of classical. Rreagan007 (talk) 02:18, 13 March 2018 (UTC)
    (edit conflict) I agree that jazz should be removed as well if we remove rock. I'm less sure about "pop" and "folk"; perhaps we should have popular music over pop music (though popular music isn't even L4). We do have folk music over contemporary folk music. power~enwiki (π, ν) 21:06, 13 March 2018 (UTC)
  2. Oppose pop music overlaps with every genre to an extent. Not sure if I would support removing all genres unless they are replaced by something better. Music deserves more than 3-4 articles here. Gizza (t)(c) 21:01, 13 March 2018 (UTC)
  3. Oppose Dimadick (talk) 23:05, 13 March 2018 (UTC)
  4. Oppose - as vital at this level. Jusdafax (talk) 23:29, 26 March 2018 (UTC)
Discussion

We have Orchestra and History of music (and Opera for now) categorized elsewhere. I do agree that something musical should be added if this is removed; String instrument is redundant to musical instrument; there's no way to add Piano or Guitar, and we clearly won't add Beethoven's ninth. power~enwiki (π, ν) 21:13, 13 March 2018 (UTC)

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PASSED
Added, 5–2 Rreagan007 (talk) 19:28, 30 March 2018 (UTC)

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Add Calligraphy

There will be space in the arts section if proposed removals happen, and this is a plausible addition. Calligraphy is prominent in countries such as China, where it has a 2000 year history.

Support
  1. Support as nom power~enwiki (π, ν) 23:03, 12 March 2018 (UTC)
  2. Support Dimadick (talk) 23:16, 12 March 2018 (UTC)
  3. Support Not just China, Japan, etc. but the most important art form in the Middle East and Islamic world. Was prominent in Europe during the Middle Ages. Gizza (t)(c) 23:50, 12 March 2018 (UTC)
  4. Support Cobblet (talk) 23:52, 12 March 2018 (UTC)
  5. Support GuzzyG (talk) 00:03, 13 March 2018 (UTC)
Oppose
  1. Oppose We already include writing and I think that's enough for this list. Rreagan007 (talk) 02:20, 13 March 2018 (UTC)
  2. Oppose Per above. --Thi (talk) 08:22, 13 March 2018 (UTC)
Discussion

@Rreagan007:: That's like saying we don't need literature (the art form) because writing and book (the intangible and tangible media of literature) are on the list. There's more overlap between Amazon River and your proposal of the Amazon rainforest, which simply refers to the dominant biome in the Amazon basin, than there is between calligraphy and writing. Cobblet (talk) 17:00, 13 March 2018 (UTC)

I don't think Calligraphy is important enough to list on its own. My point is that calligraphy is really just a certain type of writing. The Amazon rainforest is not a type of the Amazon River. And literature is also not really a type of book or writing, though they are certainly related. Calligraphy is really just a more specific form of writing that I don't think we need to include at this level. Rreagan007 (talk) 20:45, 13 March 2018 (UTC)
The second sentence of the literature article says "literature is writing considered to be an art form, or any single writing deemed to have artistic or intellectual value." The first line in the calligraphy article is "Calligraphy is a visual art related to writing." So both are art forms related to writing, just in different ways. Now, it would make no sense for an article about a river not to talk about the natural environment within the river basin; indeed the article on the Amazon mentions the rainforest several times. Meanwhile the article on writing mentions neither literature nor calligraphy. To be fair, it's a little less well developed than the article on the Amazon, but not much less so. When I speak of overlap I am talking about the likelihood of one article covering the other subject, not one thing being an example of the other. Cobblet (talk) 21:33, 18 March 2018 (UTC)
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FAILED
1–5, not added Rreagan007 (talk) 16:54, 13 April 2018 (UTC)

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Add Nonmetal and Metalloid

Metal is already listed, so I think Nonmetal and Metalloid should also be listed.

Support
  1. Support as nom. 2601:183:101:58D0:65B7:902A:BCC7:C2F0 (talk) 12:58, 13 March 2018 (UTC)
Oppose
  1. Oppose Not everything listed requires that its opposite should also be listed. Metals are just a far more special groups of elements (as alloys, and a lot of applications and production techniques are shared amongst them) than any of the other elements. Arnoutf (talk) 15:01, 13 March 2018 (UTC)
  2. Oppose --Thi (talk) 16:18, 13 March 2018 (UTC)
  3. Oppose We list what is by far the most important metalloid, silicon; and nonmetal is not even on the level 4 list. Cobblet (talk) 16:30, 13 March 2018 (UTC)
  4. Oppose per above. Nonmetals are very broad and diverse. Something like noble gases are a group of elements with shared characteristics and are more vital despite being a smaller group than nonmetals. Gizza (t)(c) 20:56, 13 March 2018 (UTC)
  5. Oppose Rreagan007 (talk) 01:54, 22 March 2018 (UTC)
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FAILED
1–5, not added power~enwiki (π, ν) 04:01, 13 April 2018 (UTC)

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Add Mahavira

He is considered as one of the most prominent figure in the history of Eastern religions.

Support
  1. Capankajsmilyo (talk) 12:15, 13 March 2018 (UTC)
Oppose
  1. Oppose The currently listed religious figures are (e.g.) Mozas, Jesus, Muhammed and Gautama Buddha. To be listed as well Mahavira should be at that level of prominence and I doubt it. When I read the article, this figure seems not anywhere near that level of prominence. Arnoutf (talk) 15:09, 13 March 2018 (UTC)
  2. Oppose --Thi (talk) 16:19, 13 March 2018 (UTC)
  3. Oppose At this level I think Jainism is sufficient. Cobblet (talk) 16:32, 13 March 2018 (UTC)
  4. Oppose I think Mahavira is slightly below Zoroaster in influence if anything. Perhaps in the top 20 of religious figures but not top ten. Gizza (t)(c) 20:46, 13 March 2018 (UTC)
  5. Oppose Rreagan007 (talk) 01:54, 22 March 2018 (UTC)
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FAILED
Not added, 2–3 Rreagan007 (talk) 17:10, 27 April 2018 (UTC)

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Add Indian philosophy

Ancient and followed by huge portion of population.

Support
  1. Support as nom. Capankajsmilyo (talk) 05:06, 17 March 2018 (UTC)
  2. Support Influential in Western thought and philosophy: "In appreciation of complexity of the Indian philosophy, T S Eliot wrote that the great philosophers of India "make most of the great European philosophers look like schoolboys". Arthur Schopenhauer used Indian philosophy to improve upon Kantian thought. In the preface to his book The World As Will And Representation, Schopenhauer writes that one who "has also received and assimilated the sacred primitive Indian wisdom, then he is the best of all prepared to hear what I have to say to him" The 19th century American philosophical movement Transcendentalism was also influenced by Indian thought. " Dimadick (talk) 23:38, 26 March 2018 (UTC)
Oppose
  1. Oppose Already covered by Eastern philosophy. --Yair rand (talk) 02:38, 13 April 2018 (UTC)
  2. Oppose Per above. --Thi (talk) 06:59, 13 April 2018 (UTC)
  3. Oppose I agree it's unnecessary at this level. Rreagan007 (talk) 20:28, 14 April 2018 (UTC)
Discussion
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.


Mathematics section "layout"

The mathematics section doesn't have the same layout (or format if you prefer) than the other sections. This doesn't help to process that page by a computer program (in that case wikimark). The other section have an h2 for the category and then h3 for subcategories. Instead math category is a list of list. It would also help the reader to easily spot the main aspect of mathematics that are covered by the vital articles. It's not an easy fix to do for me because it requires creating subcategory labels for that section. i⋅am⋅amz3 (talk) 22:24, 23 March 2018 (UTC)

I'm not sure the Mathematics section really needs subcategories, but I've gone ahead and added subcategories to the Mathematics section. We'll see what other people think of it. Rreagan007 (talk) 09:36, 24 March 2018 (UTC)


PASSED
Removed/Added, 7–0 Rreagan007 (talk) 04:00, 20 April 2018 (UTC)

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Remove Beer and Wine; Add Alcoholic drink

The broader subject matter should be used for this list. The article on alcoholic drinks covers beer, wine, and many other alcoholic drinks.

Support
  1. Support as nom. Rreagan007 (talk) 20:39, 4 April 2018 (UTC)
  2. Support Galobtter (pingó mió) 13:28, 6 April 2018 (UTC)
  3. Support Dimadick (talk) 13:40, 6 April 2018 (UTC)
  4. Support --Thi (talk) 14:03, 9 April 2018 (UTC)
  5. Support power~enwiki (π, ν) 03:20, 13 April 2018 (UTC)
  6. Support GuzzyG (talk) 03:47, 13 April 2018 (UTC)
  7. Support per nom. RJFJR (talk) 14:34, 13 April 2018 (UTC)
Oppose
Discussion
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.


PASSED
Added, 5–0 Rreagan007 (talk) 03:53, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

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.

Add Civil engineering

We list mechanical engineering at this level, and I think civil engineering is of equal vitality.

Support
  1. Support as nom. Rreagan007 (talk) 21:37, 5 April 2018 (UTC)
  2. Support Relatively significant in history and archaeology, as a driving force behind monumental buildings and infastructure: "Engineering has been an aspect of life since the beginnings of human existence. The earliest practice of civil engineering may have commenced between 4000 and 2000 BC in ancient Egypt, the Indus Valley Civilization, and Mesopotamia (ancient Iraq) when humans started to abandon a nomadic existence, creating a need for the construction of shelter. During this time, transportation became increasingly important leading to the development of the wheel and sailing. Until modern times there was no clear distinction between civil engineering and architecture, and the term engineer and architect were mainly geographical variations referring to the same occupation, and often used interchangeably. The construction of pyramids in Egypt (circa 2700–2500 BC) were some of the first instances of large structure constructions. Other ancient historic civil engineering constructions include the Qanat water management system (the oldest is older than 3000 years and longer than 71 km, the Parthenon by Iktinos in Ancient Greece (447–438 BC), the Appian Way by Roman engineers (c. 312 BC), the Great Wall of China by General Meng T'ien under orders from Ch'in Emperor Shih Huang Ti (c. 220 BC) and the stupas constructed in ancient Sri Lanka like the Jetavanaramaya and the extensive irrigation works in Anuradhapura. The Romans developed civil structures throughout their empire, including especially aqueducts, insulae, harbors, bridges, dams and roads. In the 18th century, the term civil engineering was coined to incorporate all things civilian as opposed to military engineering. The first self-proclaimed civil engineer was John Smeaton, who constructed the Eddystone Lighthouse. In 1771 Smeaton and some of his colleagues formed the Smeatonian Society of Civil Engineers, a group of leaders of the profession who met informally over dinner. Though there was evidence of some technical meetings, it was little more than a social society." Dimadick (talk) 13:49, 6 April 2018 (UTC)
  3. Support Longer answer above captured many of my thoughts. AbstractIllusions (talk) 00:39, 14 April 2018 (UTC)
  4. Support per Dimadick. Gizza (t)(c) 02:22, 16 April 2018 (UTC)
  5. Support per Dimadick power~enwiki (π, ν) 02:20, 22 April 2018 (UTC)
Oppose
Discussion
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PASSED
Removed, 5–0 Rreagan007 (talk) 06:07, 21 April 2018 (UTC)

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Remove Transistor

We already list Semiconductor device, which is what a transistor is. I don't think we need to list both at this level.

Support
  1. Support as nom. Rreagan007 (talk) 04:38, 6 April 2018 (UTC)
  2. Support per nom. RJFJR (talk) 08:37, 9 April 2018 (UTC)
  3. Support --Thi (talk) 14:03, 9 April 2018 (UTC)
  4. Support per nom. GuzzyG (talk) 02:30, 13 April 2018 (UTC)
  5. Support per nom power~enwiki (π, ν) 04:00, 13 April 2018 (UTC)
Oppose
Discussion
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.
PASSED
Added, 5–0 Rreagan007 (talk) 06:07, 21 April 2018 (UTC)

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.

Add Armour

We currently list 8 types of weaponry, but they are all offensive. I think we need to list at least one article on defensive weaponry at this level.

Support
  1. Support as nom. Rreagan007 (talk) 05:03, 6 April 2018 (UTC)
  2. Support  Carlwev  08:04, 6 April 2018 (UTC)
  3. Support Relatively significant development in Bronze Age warfare. One of the oldest surviving examples of armour is the Dendra panoply (15th century BC) from Mycenaean Greece. "Several elements of body armour (body cuirass, shoulder guards, breast plates and lower protection plates) from the late Mycenaean period have been found at Thebes, some bronze bands have been also found at Mycenae and Phaistos. Bronze scales were found at Mycenae and Troy; scale armour, the oldest form of metal body armor, was used widely throughout the eastern Mediterranean and the Near East. In May 1960, Swedish archaeologists discovered the earliest example of a beaten bronze cuirass at Dendra, dated to the end of the fifteenth century BC. Isolated bronze shoulder pieces and apron plates are known from Dendra, Thebes and Phaistos in Crete: they "extend the chronological range of the Dendra type back to 1450 and forward to 1350", according to King 1970. It forms part of the Late Helladic (LHIIIa) Dendra Panoply, which consists of fifteen separate pieces of bronze sheet, held together with leather thongs, that encased the wearer from neck to knees. The panoply includes both greaves and lower arm-guards. The arm-guard is unique but greaves, probably made of linen, are often depicted in late Mycenaean art. The few bronze examples that have been found only covered the shins and may have been worn over linen ones, as much for show of status Diane Fortenberry has suggested, as for protection. Although we have only this one complete panoply to date, armor of similar type appears as an ideogram on Linear B tablets from Knossos (Sc series), Pylos (Sh series) and Tiryns (Si series)." Dimadick (talk) 14:00, 6 April 2018 (UTC)
  4. Support though perhaps Body armor should be merged to Armour? power~enwiki (π, ν) 04:08, 13 April 2018 (UTC)
  5. Support - Agree that it’s vital at this level. Jusdafax (talk) 06:16, 13 April 2018 (UTC)
Oppose
Discussion

I am surprised the article does not appear in that many languages only 23 other wikis. I thought maybe another article like defense may be better, but there is no article there at all. I got fortification added a while back, but that is obviously about buildings and structures defense rather than defensive stuff for people animals and vehicles. shield is another alternative, that is quite important but armour is a wider article, I think it is important enough for this level. I think spear is important enough too, being one of the most widespread weapons geographically and chronologically, perhaps the most widespread, used across more time and land than bows, swords and firearms.  Carlwev  08:04, 6 April 2018 (UTC)

I considered shield, but a shield is a type of personal armour, which is why I just went with the article on armour itself. Spear is probably another article that should be listed. Rreagan007 (talk) 15:20, 6 April 2018 (UTC)

I'm not sure why Armour and Body armor are separate articles; I do know why they disagree on the spelling but am not happy about it. The article located at Armour should be preferred here as the most generic term. Armour is a more general topic than shield, and there isn't room for both. power~enwiki (π, ν) 04:08, 13 April 2018 (UTC)

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.


PASSED
Removed/Added, 5–0 Rreagan007 (talk) 05:12, 26 April 2018 (UTC)

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Remove Major trauma, Add Injury

Major trauma is a type of injury. As in previous nominations, the broader subject-matter article should be the one used at this level.

Support
  1. Support as nom. Rreagan007 (talk) 05:06, 11 April 2018 (UTC)
  2. Support --Thi (talk) 07:56, 11 April 2018 (UTC)
  3. Support I agree (though injury is tagged as being better if it were prose rather than list like as it is now.) RJFJR (talk) 00:18, 12 April 2018 (UTC)
  4. Support GuzzyG (talk) 02:23, 13 April 2018 (UTC)
  5. Weak Support only weak because Major trauma is a significantly better article. Still support because the article can be improved. power~enwiki (π, ν) 03:22, 13 April 2018 (UTC)
Oppose
Discussion
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.


Discussion has run its course. Status quo maintained. Rreagan007 (talk) 17:05, 27 April 2018 (UTC)

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.

Aztec Empire vs Aztec

While looking through the archives, I noticed that the article on the Aztec Empire was nominated to be added at level 3 and passed here; however, the article that was ultimately added to the list was the article on Aztec culture, the reason being that the article on Aztec culture was the one then listed at Level 4. I think this was a mistake. When a nomination passes to include an article at a higher level, it should automatically be added at the lower level. Regardless, the article on Aztec was never properly nominated and passed, so it can't currently be included in this list. I also think that the article on the Aztec Empire is a better article to include at level 3 than the article on the Aztec culture, since we already include the article on Mesoamerica, which has a significant overlap with the article on the Aztec culture, since Aztec culture is a Mesoamerican culture. Rreagan007 (talk) 01:42, 18 April 2018 (UTC)

"When a nomination passes to include an article at a higher level, it should automatically be added at the lower level" has never been the procedure here. I regret having originally overlooked that the article listed at level 4 was Aztec, not Aztec Empire; but the swap you've made there is just as unilateral and procedurally incorrect. I don't really care which article's listed at either level (although I'm surprised you prefer the polity over the culture here when you usually prefer the broader article; compare Maya civilization to Maya city), but making changes like this without any sort of notice is poor form. Cobblet (talk) 01:57, 18 April 2018 (UTC)
Yes, I do prefer the broader article, but as I said the overlap with the article on Mesoamerican culture makes the Aztec Empire a better choice here. And I'm not really sure an article on Aztec culture is broader in scope than an article on the Aztec Empire. And there was never a discussion to include Aztec at Level 4 as far as I can tell looking through the archives. It seems to have been added without any discussion. So the only discussion on adding Aztec or Aztec Empire to either Level 3 or 4 was the one I linked to above that was about the Aztec Empire. Had I found any nomination on Aztec at level 4 I probably wouldn't have done it unilaterally. Rreagan007 (talk) 02:04, 18 April 2018 (UTC)
It's been there since the moment the list was created. At the very least you could've consulted User:Maunus who not only contributes here but is also a major contributor to Aztec. Mesoamerica covers both the cultural and the political history of the region. Cobblet (talk) 02:18, 18 April 2018 (UTC)
I admit I was being rather bold, but we're having a discussion about it now. Between the two articles, which one do you think should be included at Level 3 and why? Rreagan007 (talk) 02:25, 18 April 2018 (UTC)
For pre-modern civilizations the tendency on the level 3 list is to include the civilization first: hence Ancient Egypt, Greece, and Rome rather than some Egyptian dynastic period, Athens/Sparta/Alexander's empire, or Roman Empire. Choosing Aztec would be consistent with those choices and with our choice of Maya civilization instead of a Mayan polity like Tikal. Cobblet (talk) 03:10, 18 April 2018 (UTC)
"Mayan Empire" redirects to "Maya civilization", "Inca culture" redirects to "Inca Empire", "Greek Empire" redirects to "Rise of Macedon". In fact, a lot of articles on "XYZ culture/civilization" redirect to "XYZ Empire" (or vice versa), or to some other article. The Aztec articles are somewhat unusual in the articles we list in that they have separate articles for the empire and the culture, though there are others like "Ancient Rome" and "Roman Empire". And I also have to wonder if maybe Roman Empire would be a better choice, as the empire is what had the large impact on the western world, just as the Aztec Empire is what influenced Mesoamerica. Rreagan007 (talk) 04:02, 18 April 2018 (UTC)
Well for starters there never was a Maya empire, so that is why it redirects to something else. Inca civilization redirects to History of the Incas. So the actual pattern is that we do not try to impose a one-size-fits all solution for how our articles are named or framed, but instead we use the nomenclature and framing of the topics that is found in the literature. The literature about the Aztecs tends to use the term "the Aztecs" to escribe the cultural complex that preceded, surrounded and outlasted the specific political configuration of the triple alliance that has been referred to as "the Aztec Empire". The idea that it was the shortlived Aztec expansionist empire that influenced Mesoamerica, and not the Aztecs more broadly as a culture and civilization seems odd, and it is not in line with the literature.·maunus · snunɐɯ· 10:43, 18 April 2018 (UTC)
Maunus makes a very good point. I also think it would be a very serious mistake to replace Ancient Rome with an article that doesn't deal with early Roman expansion. Cobblet (talk) 15:31, 18 April 2018 (UTC)
  • The broader article is Aztec - because Aztec culture or what we may call "Aztec civilization" is broader temporally and geographically than the shortlived Aztec empire. If we only include one, then the vital one is Aztec, not Aztec empire (which is about a short period, and only covers the political expansion of the Aztec state, not the earlier history, nor the cultural and social aspects). Also there is no more overlap with Mesoamerica than there is overlap between "European history" and "History of Ancient Greece" for example. The change should be reversed.·maunus · snunɐɯ· 06:31, 18 April 2018 (UTC)

I think there is some effort and logic to keep the different level lists consistent with each other, I'm not sure if we ever agreed it to be proper official procedure or not, but common sense and discussion has done us OK so far. I would prefer the article Aztec in the 1000 list. In the 10'000 list I think we should list Aztec, and possibly Aztec Empire as well at that level. I agree with the comments comparing Aztec choice of articles and terminology compared to others like Egyptian, Greek, Roman, eg the general article about the culture/civilization seems to be the better choice most of the time. Also if it matters or not Aztec is in 110 languages, Aztec Empire in 21 languages. Aztec has 2987 average daily page views compared with 1271 for Aztec Empire. Aztec article is 125'000 kb in size compared to 56'000 kb for Aztec Empire. [1] [2]  Carlwev  16:08, 18 April 2018 (UTC)

Keep Aztec

Given the discussion above I think it is appropriate to vote on whether to keep the article Aztec on the list. I may have added it originally myself without a vote back before I understood how the vital system worked. I think this is clearly the right article to include, because Azted empire describes a much narrower topic, since the article Aztec deals with "The Aztecs", meaning their entire culture, history and society - what could also be called a civilization, but which is generally not (probably because of the short time period in which the Aztec flourished). The Aztecs do not overlap significantly with Mesoamerica (an area with 3000 years of civilization and hundreds of ethnic group of which the Aztecs are only one and only covers a small geographic area and some 300 years) - and if the list were to have only one of them Aztec would perhaps be the more notable chocice, because of how well known the Aztecs are in the western culture. ·maunus · snunɐɯ· 12:06, 18 April 2018 (UTC)

support
  1. Support as nominator.·maunus · snunɐɯ· 12:06, 18 April 2018 (UTC)
  2. Support see my comments above.  Carlwev  16:08, 18 April 2018 (UTC)
  3. Support Cobblet (talk) 17:55, 18 April 2018 (UTC)
  4. Support per discussion. Gizza (t)(c) 21:46, 18 April 2018 (UTC)
  5. Support GuzzyG (talk) 01:44, 19 April 2018 (UTC)
  6. Support power~enwiki (π, ν) 02:16, 22 April 2018 (UTC)
oppose
discussion

Vikings vs Viking Age

The discussion of Aztec vc Aztec Empire has made me think of this again, it's been on my mind for ages. The topic of the Vikings appears in several encyclopedias other books I have, and it is nearly always referred to as the Vikings, not Viking Age. Again the article on Vikings is wider and more consistent with other choice of articles. Vikings appears in 128 languages compared to 44 for Viking Age. Vikings gets 5812 average daily page views and is 126'000 kb in size, compared with 1737 average daily page views and 75'600 kb size for Viking Age. Vikings is much more than double in all those aspects. My instincts say it is Vikings we should be listing? But then could the argument be if we list Vikings why not Celts, or Goths. But is it as simple as the Vikings are generally seen as more vital than them? Thoughts? should we swap out Viking Age for Vikings? (both are listed at level 4 by the way) [3] [4]. Also on Google Vikings has 56 million matches compared with 1.8 million matches for Viking Age. But that might not be that relevant.  Carlwev  16:08, 18 April 2018 (UTC)

  • The problem is that "viking" is an extremely problematic term that historians use reluctantly. In the strictest sense a viking is a summer expedition by boat, in the slightly less strict sense a viking is a person who participates in such a boat expedition. In layman's terms "vikings" are all the members of the entire cultural complex of norse Europe in the iron age. I think Viking Age is the best way of referring both to a concept that makes sense to an academic historian, has a literature and is intelligble to the reader. So here "viking" is the narrower term and Viking Age is the broader term. ·maunus · snunɐɯ· 16:25, 18 April 2018 (UTC)

Vikings literally refers to Norse pirates, raiders, and seafarers. As a misnomer, it has been applied to the entire Scandinavian population, culture, and colonies of the era, and our article seems to attempt to cover them all.

Viking Age is a historical period, lasting from the late 8th century to the 11th century, when most of Europe faced Viking raids and attempts at Norse settlement. Besides the Norse themselves, the article attempts to cover the impact on various European regions. The scope is wider, but the article seems to receive less attention by editors. Dimadick (talk) 13:50, 21 April 2018 (UTC)

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.


These articles

Someone added vital article tags to the articles Dave Meltzer and Ric Flair (among others), but I can find no evidence that there had been any discussion to add them to the vital article list.★Trekker (talk) 15:39, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

@GuzzyG: did so because they are on the level-5 list of 50k articles. I'm neutral as to whether adding these boxes for the level-5 list is worthwhile at this time. power~enwiki (π, ν) 16:28, 30 April 2018 (UTC)
Yeah, thanks for the ping. they're on the level 5 list .Some of the articles probably won't make the final list but it's better to just do it and i need something to distract me right now. Although out of the ones you mentioned Flair has no chance of removal and Meltzer is arguably one of the most respected sports journalists so i would vote to keep him too. Tagging the articles also helps in that it stops people unintentionally listing doubles. Also i am keeping track of the removals/additions so nothing will slip through the crack. GuzzyG (talk) 16:35, 30 April 2018 (UTC)
@GuzzyG: Where are these things decided exactly then? What are the standards even?★Trekker (talk) 19:44, 30 April 2018 (UTC) Also, not to be too anal, but if John Cena's article is going to be a vital article then Bret Hart and Roddy Piper's really should be too. Both those guys have an almost immeasurable legacy in wrestling and their articles really should be on featured level.★Trekker (talk) 19:52, 30 April 2018 (UTC)
@*Treker: There's no central deciding place yet, or we'd have to individually decide 50k articles. People add to it and then when it's filled people will debate from there likely. But it's not a free for all, i know what i am doing and there's a reason for every person. I am covering it so everything as at least one representative, since you're from the professional wrestling project, here's our final-ish list [5], now would you say that's not an accurate and fair coverage of the complete chronological diversity of professional wrestling's history? Benoit may be odd with Sammartino, Gagne and Hart or Andre not on there but because he was the main reason for the switch to PG content i would take him over the overs. The problem with Piper is that his era is already covered and Cena is the biggest star of his. GuzzyG (talk) 19:57, 30 April 2018 (UTC)
Hart's era is not represented at all and his importance is insanely relevant today, it's because of him that WWE even trusts/has main eventers that weight less than Hogan or Randy Savage's ilk and have moved in a direction where in-ring work in WWE is considered vital. He has had more direct impact than Cena supposedly getting credited for making WWE become PG. He's literally the only wrestler to be on The Simpsons and many doubt WWE would even be around today if Bret Hart hadn't been such a draw in Canda and Europe during the worst part of their history where the sex and steroid scandal crippled the company in the US. Not to even mention his later career during the rise of the Attitude Era with Montreal, Stone Cold and The Hart Foundation. I don't even know what to say about Andre the Giant not being there, both their legacies make Cena's supposed contributions look rather miniscule by comparison. I really don't mean to be a dick but I don't care for this list at all.★Trekker (talk) 20:16, 30 April 2018 (UTC)
I'd like to add that if having their era already represented is a problem then both Stone Cold and Dwayne Johnson shouldn't be there at the same time as well. Also, why does this section list both amateur and pro wrestlers? That makes no sense, pro wrestlers shouldn't even be under sport.★Trekker (talk) 20:21, 30 April 2018 (UTC)
Too add even more, there are right now two separate sections on that page, one of which also lists Jerry Lawler, again, I don't really understand how he could be there over Hart or Andre.★Trekker (talk) 20:30, 30 April 2018 (UTC)
Also, Toots Mondt, this list needs this guy. This list really breaks the whole keeping living people of the vital article lists by the way.★Trekker (talk) 21:03, 30 April 2018 (UTC)
@GuzzyG: This darn ping doesn't seem to work.★Trekker (talk) 21:23, 30 April 2018 (UTC)
@*Treker:I've made room for Hart and Andre because i agree with you there. Stone Cold and The Rock are obviously more important then Piper. I agree i wanted professional wrestlers under entertainers and professional wrestling under art but the vote didn't go my way. The separate section if you paid attention is "Sports Business", which Lawler is on as a commentator known by the mainstream via Kaufman, so he's a step above Ross. I added Mondt because there was space but someone else could remove him. The list you're commentating on now has that rule (LVL 3, 132 people), LVL 4 (2k) and now LVL 5 (10k) does not have that rule because of how unrealistic that is. Either way Cena stays because he is the most successful strictly 21st century wrestler and that kind of pop culture figure is exactly the reason why i suggested and supported a LVL 5 list as we could not have them on the LVL 4 list. (People like Bieber etc). As for wrestling only Vince would have a shot on the 4 list. GuzzyG (talk) 22:30, 30 April 2018 (UTC)
@GuzzyG: Thank you a lot. It still really grinds my gears that arm wrestlers, amateur wrestlers and pro wrestlers are in the same section there. Like, how did that end up seeming logical to our fellow Wikipedians??? :/★Trekker (talk) 22:39, 30 April 2018 (UTC)
I agree that should be fixed at some point. As long as "martial arts" stays under quota, I'm trying to avoid it while there are other sections that need much more work. power~enwiki (π, ν) 22:55, 30 April 2018 (UTC)
@*Treker: No worries, i always had it in the back of my mind but like i said others can do what they want. Easier to list them all under "wrestling" then have them spread out i think. Also this list is still in the early stages so it's a tiny bit chaotic.
PASSED
Swapped, 5–0 Rreagan007 (talk) 18:08, 6 May 2018 (UTC)

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Swap: Remove Recreation, add Play (activity)

Entertainment is more essential article than Recreation at this level. "Recreation is difficult to separate from the general concept of play, which is usually the term for children's recreational activity." Play is crucial for children’s development and the concept of play also describes other activities (Homo Ludens).

Support
  1. Support as nom. --Thi (talk) 07:46, 6 March 2018 (UTC)
  2. Support though both words are common in the English language, play is the topic that has been thoroughly researched and discussed in academic circles. Gizza (t)(c) 02:20, 12 March 2018 (UTC)
  3. Support per Gizza. GuzzyG (talk) 06:22, 12 March 2018 (UTC)
  4. Support Play seems to be the better article. Rreagan007 (talk) 22:25, 12 March 2018 (UTC)
  5. Support Play is the theoretically and historically interesting topic - and the one that has a major literature.·maunus · snunɐɯ· 08:37, 6 May 2018 (UTC)
Oppose
Discussion

Should this be formatted as a swap with play? RJFJR (talk) 16:08, 6 March 2018 (UTC)

All right. --Thi (talk) 16:19, 6 March 2018 (UTC)
Actually in vital articles there is not Leisure due to fact that it is too much similar to Recreation. What in the case if Recreation will be swap with Play? Dawid2009 (talk) 15:39, 19 March 2018 (UTC)
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.

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.

Add Art

It is as equally important as other vital articles such as Architecture. 2601:183:101:58D0:1817:A6CE:1070:6D03 (talk) 01:39, 27 March 2018 (UTC)

This was removed in favour of adding the arts a long, long time ago. Cobblet (talk) 02:09, 27 March 2018 (UTC)
I am not saying we should remove The arts. I am saying it should be at least a level 3 vital article because it is as important as The arts. In Portal:Contents/Overviews, The arts is listed next to Art. 2601:183:101:58D0:1CE2:D302:5822:24E2 (talk) 21:35, 27 March 2018 (UTC)
But in the portal art and the arts are mentioned within one single line, emphasising the overlap. Here they would be listed as separate entries and should have very limited overlap. That is why we opted to include only one of them and the arts was selected as the more comprehensive one. Arnoutf (talk) 06:32, 28 March 2018 (UTC)
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.
PASSED
Swapped, 5–1 Rreagan007 (talk) 06:23, 11 May 2018 (UTC)

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.

Remove Advertising, Add Marketing

Marketing is the broader subject matter, so that's what we should include at this level instead. Advertising is merely one type of marketing, other types of which include publicity and public relations, among others.

Support
  1. Support as nom. Rreagan007 (talk) 19:32, 31 March 2018 (UTC)
  2. Support i agree. GuzzyG (talk) 10:42, 4 April 2018 (UTC)
  3. Support Galobtter (pingó mió) 13:28, 6 April 2018 (UTC)
  4. Support removal. --Thi (talk) 14:02, 9 April 2018 (UTC)
  5. Support both remove and add. AbstractIllusions (talk) 04:03, 7 May 2018 (UTC)
  6. Support per nom — pythoncoder  (talk | contribs) 21:14, 10 May 2018 (UTC)
Oppose
Discussion
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SNOW FAIL
Not swapped, 2–9 Rreagan007 (talk) 23:53, 10 May 2018 (UTC)

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Remove Ship, Add Watercraft

Watercraft is a broader subject matter than ship.

Support
  1. Support as nom. 2601:183:101:58D0:14B:BBC0:133D:DB71 (talk) 00:37, 6 May 2018 (UTC)
  2. Support. It is the broader subject matter, the same way we list aircraft rather than airplane. Rreagan007 (talk) 06:28, 6 May 2018 (UTC)
Oppose
  1. Oppose Only formally. Ships are important culturally and economically. The encyclopedia needs first the article about ships. Watercraft is in comparison more like a disambiguation page or a glossary. --Thi (talk) 07:26, 6 May 2018 (UTC)
  2. Oppose absurd idea.·maunus · snunɐɯ· 08:18, 6 May 2018 (UTC)
  3. Oppose Dimadick (talk) 10:19, 6 May 2018 (UTC)
  4. Oppose While Watercraft would be a more general term, Ship is the most important type of watercraft (generalizing enough to include boat which is a small ship). I'm trying to think of watercraft that aren't ships, boats or submarines (which we already have) and all I'm coming up with is a Jet Ski so not much expansion by changing the term. RJFJR (talk) 16:58, 6 May 2018 (UTC)
  5. Oppose per Thi and RJFJR. We could replace aircraft with airplane too though at least aircraft is a commonly used term and there are a variety of aircraft that are used (including helicopters, airships and air balloons). Gizza (t)(c) 22:20, 6 May 2018 (UTC)
  6. Oppose the Airplane/Aircraft analogy doesn't hold. Ship=2 million google scholar hits, Watercraft=under 100,000 hits. Airplane=under 1 million hits, Aircraft=3 million hits. (note: added various nautical terms to Google Scholar for 'Ship' to avoid authors named "Ship" and other pointless hits and 2 million was the lowest any search got) Not that that should figure everything out, but it at least makes it a poor analogy. It can't be said to be the "broader subject" if it gets 1/20th the number of hits...right? AbstractIllusions (talk) 03:51, 7 May 2018 (UTC)
  7. Oppose Watercraft is an obscure term, ship is that much more common that this change is unlikely to make sense to Wikipedia readers. Arnoutf (talk) 11:46, 7 May 2018 (UTC)
  8. Oppose Would not make sense. GuzzyG (talk) 15:46, 7 May 2018 (UTC)
  9. Oppose per Thi — pythoncoder  (talk | contribs) 21:15, 10 May 2018 (UTC)
Discussion
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PASSED
Added, 5–2 Rreagan007 (talk) 21:09, 27 May 2018 (UTC)

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Add New religious movement

We recently removed 2 articles from the religious section (Theism and Agnosticism). I think this would be a good article to add back in. Most of the specific religions we list are obviously the older religions for good reason, but I think newer religious movements deserve to be covered on the list too. Rreagan007 (talk) 22:35, 12 March 2018 (UTC)

Support
  1. Support as nom. Rreagan007 (talk) 22:35, 12 March 2018 (UTC)
  2. Support Dimadick (talk) 23:14, 12 March 2018 (UTC)
  3. Support GuzzyG (talk) 13:48, 2 May 2018 (UTC)
  4. Support NRM is a cover term for a lot of the religious groups that attract an enormous amount of public interest. Should be vital for a general encyclopedia.·maunus · snunɐɯ· 08:36, 6 May 2018 (UTC)
  5. Support dawnleelynn(talk) 16:56, 27 May 2018 (UTC)
Oppose
  1. Oppose If we had to add something back in I would prefer something more universal in scope (e.g. ritual) than something that is by definition niche and recent. Cobblet (talk) 23:06, 12 March 2018 (UTC)
  2. Oppose as per above. I would also prefer something more universal. --Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 21:20, 27 April 2018 (UTC)
Discussion

I'm concerned about how this term is used as a catch-all for Mormons, Baha'i, Rastafari, Scientology, and Falun Gong (among others). However I don't see a better option; History of religions is basically a stub. power~enwiki (π, ν) 23:09, 12 March 2018 (UTC)

It's not just about covering the newer religions in the list. New religious movements are also an important social phenomenon in their own right, and that's another reason why this article is vital at this level. Rreagan007 (talk) 20:15, 2 May 2018 (UTC)
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PASSED
Added, 5–0 Rreagan007 (talk) 22:28, 21 May 2018 (UTC)

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Add Ritual

Ritual is a human universal and an aspect of all religions. And there is a major body of theory and literature about it. Clearly a vital topic in religion.

Support
  1. Support As nom.·maunus · snunɐɯ· 08:36, 6 May 2018 (UTC)
  2. Support Dimadick (talk) 10:17, 6 May 2018 (UTC)
  3. Support Gizza (t)(c) 00:27, 8 May 2018 (UTC)
  4. Support I'd also support removing prayer. Ritual is the more fundamental topic dealing with the human behaviour as a whole, not just in a religious context. Cobblet (talk) 14:11, 12 May 2018 (UTC)
  5. Support Okay, let's go with it. Rreagan007 (talk) 22:28, 21 May 2018 (UTC)
Oppose

Oppose There is overlap with worship and prayer. And I would rather have Tradition listed at this level, as it encompasses rituals, which are religious traditions. Rreagan007 (talk) 18:29, 6 May 2018 (UTC)

Oppose 1. Neutral. Support for swap with Worship or Prayer. --Thi (talk) 18:33, 6 May 2018 (UTC)

Discussion
  • There is no overlap with worship or prayer. Ritual is found in all religions (and also arguably outside of religion), prayer and worship is only found in religions with deities. Ritual is the major concept in all theories of religion, Worship and prayer are restricted to specific religious traditions. Indeed some argue that ritual is the origin of human symbolic culture. You cannot have an encyclopedia without an article on ritual.·maunus · snunɐɯ· 19:50, 6 May 2018 (UTC)
  • I still think tradition would be a better article to add at this level if we're going to add one. Rreagan007 (talk) 21:42, 6 May 2018 (UTC)
The concept "tradition" is covered by "culture", ritual is a much more central concept bothin social theory and the study of religion. Also ritual is not simply religious tradition. Rituals are meaningful social events that transform the social status of people, mark the transition between life stage, or constitute communion with the sacred. ·maunus · snunɐɯ· 15:58, 7 May 2018 (UTC)
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FAILED
Failed, 3-3. --Thi (talk) 11:11, 24 May 2018 (UTC)

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Add Hatred

This emotion is on par in terms of vitality with the other emotions that we list (i.e. love, anger, fear, happiness), and is increasingly important in terms of things such as hate crimes and hate speech, which the article on hatred covers.

Support
  1. Support as nom. Rreagan007 (talk) 21:29, 5 April 2018 (UTC)
  2. Support Important concept in psychology and neurology: "In psychoanalysis, Sigmund Freud defined hate as an ego state that wishes to destroy the source of its unhappiness. More recently, the Penguin Dictionary of Psychology defines hate as a "deep, enduring, intense emotion expressing animosity, anger, and hostility towards a person, group, or object." ... "The neural correlates of hate have been investigated with an fMRI procedure. In this experiment, people had their brains scanned while viewing pictures of people they hated. The results showed increased activity in the middle frontal gyrus, right putamen, bilaterally in the premotor cortex, in the frontal pole, and bilaterally in the medial insular cortex of the human brain." Dimadick (talk) 13:44, 6 April 2018 (UTC)
  3. Support GuzzyG (talk) 15:50, 15 April 2018 (UTC)
Oppose
  1. Oppose emotions are not good encyclopedic topics - they are not for the most part actually used in psychological explanation models (except for the five basic emotions). Hate crime or hate speech would be better candidates. ·maunus · snunɐɯ· 08:22, 6 May 2018 (UTC)
  2. Oppose --Thi (talk) 08:29, 6 May 2018 (UTC)
  3. Oppose Discrimination already covers the topics cited in the nomination. And hatred is sometimes contrasted with love which is already on the list – we seem not to list opposing emotions, like sadness alongside happiness. Cobblet (talk) 14:08, 12 May 2018 (UTC)
Discussion
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FAILED
Failed, 3-3. --Thi (talk) 11:11, 24 May 2018 (UTC)

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Add Polymer

An important class of molecules that I think should be listed at this level.

Support
  1. Support as nom. Rreagan007 (talk) 05:09, 6 April 2018 (UTC)
  2. Support Galobtter (pingó mió) 08:10, 6 April 2018 (UTC)
  3. Support Dimadick (talk) 16:55, 6 April 2018 (UTC)
Oppose
  1. Oppose as too specific an article. Covered by the more important plastic article. Though polymer is listed at L4 which I think is the correct level. RJFJR (talk) 08:36, 9 April 2018 (UTC)
  2. Oppose Per above. --Thi (talk) 14:04, 9 April 2018 (UTC)
  3. Oppose per RJFJR. We have petroleum but not hydrocarbon, and this feels similar. Most of the most important polymers are plastics (and DNA, apparently also considered a polymer, is listed as well). If we have extra spaces in chemistry, I'd rather add Phosphorus, Sulfur, Lead, or Halogen. power~enwiki (π, ν) 03:32, 13 April 2018 (UTC)
Discussion
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FAILED
Failed, 5-5. --Thi (talk) 11:11, 24 May 2018 (UTC)

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Add Wright brothers

From the article's lede, "generally credited with inventing, building, and flying the world's first successful airplane". One of the last truly important biographies not on this list. They had more impact on the world then someone like Ford. Without them the 20th century would be completely different. Needs no other explanation.

Support
  1. Support as nom. GuzzyG (talk) 03:19, 13 April 2018 (UTC)
  2. Support without comparing to Ford, but clearly vital at this level. Per discussion would be willing to consider a swap. Jusdafax (talk) 06:11, 13 April 2018 (UTC)
  3. Support Dimadick (talk) 14:58, 13 April 2018 (UTC)
  4. Support. Including this article makes sense, and I think we currently have room to add it. I would be opposed to adding aviation, as we already list aircraft, and I don't think we need both of those at this level. Rreagan007 (talk) 16:49, 13 April 2018 (UTC)
  5. support An encyclopedia with no Wright brothers would be a bad encyclopedia.·maunus · snunɐɯ· 08:19, 6 May 2018 (UTC)
Oppose
  1. Oppose The stories of early pioneers are fascinating, but Aviation seems more vital article to me. --Thi (talk) 07:02, 13 April 2018 (UTC)
  2. Oppose clearly early pioneers in heavier than air independent take-off planes, but the race was on and many people were close to that aim. Besides that single achievement the Wright brothers' influence (of themselves or their company) was fairly minor (and did not come close to industrial political and economic relevance of e.g. Henry Ford). So Aviation would indeed more relevant. Arnoutf (talk) 12:30, 13 April 2018 (UTC)
  3. Oppose per Thi. RJFJR (talk) 14:32, 13 April 2018 (UTC)
  4. Oppose tend to agree with Arnoutf and think that van Leeuwenhoek had a bigger impact on society. Gizza (t)(c) 03:28, 16 April 2018 (UTC)
  5. Oppose Ed [talk] [majestic titan] 04:57, 16 April 2018 (UTC)
Discussion

I don't think they're more important than Ford, but that's not necessarily the requirement. The only swap I think I would support would be for Werner Heisenberg. power~enwiki (π, ν) 03:25, 13 April 2018 (UTC)

I think flying is more important then driving but that's me (i wasn't suggesting a swap, just a comparison). I do not think a swap is needed, but if people want one, i would do it. The only swap needed on this list in my opinion is Chopin for Debussy. GuzzyG (talk) 03:52, 13 April 2018 (UTC)
The motivation for a swap is that we've been at 132 biographies for quite some time, and there's not really any room to increase that number. And I disagree; the automobile is more important than the airplane to today's society. power~enwiki (π, ν) 03:56, 13 April 2018 (UTC)
I think that among inventors they would not be first in line to be upgraded from level 4 (where they are listed) to level 3. E.g. the inventor of the microscope and father of microbiology Antonie van Leeuwenhoek (also level 4) should be prioritised over the Wright brothers in my opinion. Arnoutf (talk) 12:38, 13 April 2018 (UTC)

We list aircraft, but we don't list aviation or airplane the most important aircraft. Also, we list ship but we don't list sailing either.  Carlwev  19:09, 13 April 2018 (UTC)

I definitely think we only need one of those 3 at this level, and of those 3 I would pick aircraft, which is the one we currently list. There is just too much overlap in those articles to list more than one here. Rreagan007 (talk) 20:29, 13 April 2018 (UTC)

Then why was van Leeuwenhoek removed ages ago? We kept Microscope so there'd be a significant overlap with van Leeuwenhoek. Aviation nor airplane is on this list and they would overlap with aircraft so the brothers are the better pick. If the Wright brothers do not make a list like this but people like Hemingway, Amundsen, Kurosawa or Noether do then i think it makes this list silly. No serious encyclopedia would skip the Wright brothers even on a shoestring budget. Just seems preposterous a area we don't cover (aviation/airplane) gets skipped over because we don't list both the invention and it's inventor, for yet we denied the inventor of paper for the exact same thing. GuzzyG (talk) 04:49, 16 April 2018 (UTC)

Part of the problem with adding the Wright brothers is that their claim to being first isn't universally accepted; it wouldn't surprise me if French and Brazilian encyclopedias didn't give them a full entry. Leeuwenhoek was essentially swapped for Pasteur. The existence of paper is known to predate Cai Lun. I'm not saying your views aren't valid – in each case they represent a consensus among a wide group of people; my point is only that those consensuses aren't universal, and it often isn't straightforward to credit a single person with having "invented" something or "parented" a scientific field. Cobblet (talk) 19:32, 19 April 2018 (UTC)
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Merger proposal

A formal request to merge Wikipedia:Vital articles/Level/1 and Wikipedia:Vital articles/Level/2 into Wikipedia:Vital articles has been received at Wikipedia:Proposed mergers, with the rationale that Wikipedia:Vital articles also lists Level 1 and Level 2 vital articles and therefore separate pages are unnecessary for the latter two articles. However, as this affects changes to key Wikipedia pages and the nomination was made by an IP (the same one that recently changed the order of the articles on the vital articles pages without consensus), I am holding off on placing merger tags on the pages and letting the community know about the merger request, so that it can be discussed here. Richard3120 (talk) 01:23, 17 April 2018 (UTC)

I oppose this, and don't think it's worth tagging/voting on it unless a registered editor with some experience is willing to support it. If the IP editor gives an argument beyond "redundancy", I might reconsider. That argument would suggest deleting this list in favor of WP:VAE, which is even sillier. power~enwiki (π, ν) 02:18, 22 April 2018 (UTC)
I oppose this merger. The current level structure of vital articles helps with organization. Lists of articles this large are very difficult to maintain and keep track of, and this merger would only make it more difficult. Rreagan007 (talk) 17:00, 27 April 2018 (UTC)
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PASSED
Added, 7–0 Rreagan007 (talk) 20:21, 11 May 2018 (UTC)

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Add Drink

It is as important as food. It is a level-4 vital article, and a lot of drinks are Level-3 vital articles.

Support
  1. Support as nom. 192.107.120.90 (talk) 17:35, 26 April 2018 (UTC)
  2. Support I think it's a good article to include at this level. Rreagan007 (talk) 19:15, 26 April 2018 (UTC)
  3. Support --Thi (talk) 07:13, 27 April 2018 (UTC)
  4. Support obvious add. GuzzyG (talk) 09:39, 27 April 2018 (UTC)
  5. Support power~enwiki (π, ν) 23:15, 28 April 2018 (UTC)
  6. Support Dimadick (talk) 06:18, 4 May 2018 (UTC)
  7. Support duh — pythoncoder  (talk | contribs) 21:14, 10 May 2018 (UTC)
Oppose
Discussion
Interesting that we have it as a heading but not as an article. We do have several drinks articles under that heading. Would add drink as an article impact our opinions about keeping those listed drinks? RJFJR (talk) 21:06, 27 April 2018 (UTC)
We did recently remove Beer and Wine and replaced them with Alcoholic drink. I've also wondered whether or not we need to include Drinking water at this level as we already list Water, whose article covers drinking it as one of its uses. Rreagan007 (talk) 01:55, 28 April 2018 (UTC)
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FAILED
Failed, 1-4. --Thi (talk) 11:11, 24 May 2018 (UTC)

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Remove Drinking water

I don't think we need to list both Water and Drinking water at this level, especially with the inclusion of the general article on Drinks looking likely. The article on water includes a section on drinking water under uses as does the article on drink.

Support
  1. Support as nom. Rreagan007 (talk) 17:07, 29 April 2018 (UTC)
  2. Support Water resources and Water supply are perhaps worth considering. --Thi (talk) 17:36, 29 April 2018 (UTC)
Oppose
  1. Oppose water and drinking water doesn't seem like huge overlap compared to vegetable and potato, wheat and bread, or for that matter water, rain and snow. Drinking water on its own is more important than every other type of drink. Gizza (t)(c) 22:16, 29 April 2018 (UTC)
  2. Oppose per Gizza. Uniquely important and vital at this level. Jusdafax (talk) 20:13, 30 April 2018 (UTC)
  3. Oppose Water is about the chemical; drinking water is about the social and health issue. Cobblet (talk) 20:59, 2 May 2018 (UTC)
  4. Oppose Dimadick (talk) 06:22, 4 May 2018 (UTC)
Discussion
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PASSED
Removed, 5–0 Rreagan007 (talk) 17:04, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

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Remove Abacus

Historical calculating tool. In my opinion not vital at this level.

Support
  1. Support as nom. --Thi (talk) 08:02, 3 May 2018 (UTC)
  2. Support. I've been thinking about nominating this one for a long time. It simply doesn't belong at this level. Rreagan007 (talk) 08:32, 3 May 2018 (UTC)
  3. Support per nom. GuzzyG (talk) 00:47, 4 May 2018 (UTC)
  4. Support per above. Gizza (t)(c) 03:58, 4 May 2018 (UTC)
  5. Support So many more important topics could be here. AbstractIllusions (talk) 04:16, 7 May 2018 (UTC)
Oppose
Discussion
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Recent politicians

One of the sections of the FAQ mentions that vital articles try to avoid recentism, but I noticed that Wikipedia:Vital articles/Level/5/People/Politicians and leaders has 52 articles in a "21st century" section. Of course, most of the people in there are still living and still politically active (and some of them, still sitting heads of government). Does level 5 have a more relaxed criteria, or should that whole section be removed? Cambalachero (talk) 15:07, 16 May 2018 (UTC)

Avoiding recentism doesn't mean having no recent biographies, it just means we avoid giving undue weight to more recent articles. There are recent politicians in Level 4, such as Barack Obama, which is perfectly appropriate. And it is appropriate to have some in Level 5. So no, the entire sections should not be removed. But some of the recent politicians such as Mitt Romney, Donald Rumsfeld, John McCain, and Sarah Palin probably don't really belong there. They will probably be removed eventually. Rreagan007 (talk) 15:46, 16 May 2018 (UTC)
 – for extended discussion power~enwiki (π, ν) 01:08, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

L5 quota change proposal

I've proposed some changes to the quotas for the "Level 5" list at Wikipedia talk:Vital articles/Level/5#Quota change proposal. It increases the People quota from 10000 (20%) to 12000 (24%), decreases the Geography quota from 6000 (12%) to 5000 (10%), and removes 1000 quota from other areas. Please comment and "vote" on that page, if you are interested in the proceedings of that project. power~enwiki (π, ν) 04:53, 17 May 2018 (UTC)

6-5, not added Gizza (t)(c) 22:09, 24 June 2018 (UTC)

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Add Spear

This was brought up in the recent Armour nomination. Spear does seem to be on par with other weapons listed in terms of its historical significance. Rreagan007 (talk) 16:54, 27 April 2018 (UTC)

Support
  1. Support as nom. Rreagan007 (talk) 16:54, 27 April 2018 (UTC)
  2. Support One of the most used weapons, chronologically and geographically  Carlwev  16:58, 27 April 2018 (UTC)
  3. Support used throughout history, used by nomadic tribes, used by almost every civilization that's existed? sounds vital to me. GuzzyG (talk) 22:30, 28 April 2018 (UTC)
  4. Weak Support would prefer swapping this with tank or submarine (quite specific military technology). Spears are among the oldest military technology in the world, making them more vital than generic technology like boxes. Axe is similar to knife (listed) while bomb and missile are covered by explosive material and nuclear weapon. Gizza (t)(c) 22:31, 29 April 2018 (UTC)
  5. Support One of the oldest weapons. "Archaeological evidence found in present-day Germany documents that wooden spears have been used for hunting since at least 400,000 years ago,[1] and a 2012 study suggests that Homo heidelbergensis may have developed the technology about 500,000 years ago.[2] Wood does not preserve well, however, and Craig Stanford, a primatologist and professor of anthropology at the University of Southern California, has suggested that the discovery of spear use by chimpanzees probably means that early humans used wooden spears as well, perhaps, five million years ago.[3]" Dimadick (talk) 06:21, 4 May 2018 (UTC)
  6. Ed [talk] [majestic titan] 04:29, 18 May 2018 (UTC)
Oppose
  1. Oppose I feel that is too specific. RJFJR (talk) 21:03, 27 April 2018 (UTC)
  2. Oppose Who needs an encyclopedia article to tell them what a spear is? Chris Troutman (talk) 23:01, 28 April 2018 (UTC)
  3. Oppose I don't see this as more important than Axe, Bomb, or Missile. power~enwiki (π, ν) 23:19, 28 April 2018 (UTC)
  4. Oppose --Thi (talk) 04:45, 29 April 2018 (UTC)
  5. Oppose as per above. --Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 22:08, 24 June 2018 (UTC)
Discussion
  • I'm generally against really simple topics being considered vital. I would think anything "vital" for an encyclopedia would be biographies or articles about nations and wars. Why not make box a vital article? They get used everyday everywhere. Chris Troutman (talk) 23:01, 28 April 2018 (UTC)
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References

  1. ^ "Lower Palaeolithic hunting spears from Germany". Nature.com. 1997-02-27. Retrieved 2017-01-09.
  2. ^ Monte Morin, "Stone-tipped spear may have much earlier origin", Los Angeles Times, November 16, 2012
  3. ^ Rick Weiss, "Chimps Observed Making Their Own Weapons", The Washington Post, February 22, 2007
Chaucer is 6-6 and not added. Hemingway is 3-7 and not removed Gizza (t)(c) 22:14, 24 June 2018 (UTC)

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Remove Ernest Hemingway, Add Geoffrey Chaucer

All that needs to be said is we have 4 English language writers from the 20th century but not the "father of English literature" himself. Hemingway is the weakest on the list. I think this has been suggested before. It makes no sense whatsoever not to have Chaucer on this list when writers like Hemingway or Poe are on it. Chaucer easily has a more secure and longer lasting contribution to literature.

Support
  1. Support as nom. GuzzyG (talk) 15:46, 7 May 2018 (UTC)
  2. Support adding Chaucer, oppose removing Hemingway. Both are important and should stay. — pythoncoder  (talk | contribs) 21:16, 10 May 2018 (UTC)
  3. Support swap Per the article: "Widespread knowledge of Chaucer's works is attested by the many poets who imitated or responded to his writing. John Lydgate was one of the earliest poets to write continuations of Chaucer's unfinished Tales while Robert Henryson's Testament of Cresseid completes the story of Cressida left unfinished in his Troilus and Criseyde. Many of the manuscripts of Chaucer's works contain material from these poets and later appreciations by the romantic era poets were shaped by their failure to distinguish the later "additions" from original Chaucer. Writers of the 17th and 18th centuries, such as John Dryden, admired Chaucer for his stories, but not for his rhythm and rhyme, as few critics could then read Middle English and the text had been butchered by printers, leaving a somewhat unadmirable mess.[1] It was not until the late 19th century that the official Chaucerian canon, accepted today, was decided upon, largely as a result of Walter William Skeat's work. Roughly seventy-five years after Chaucer's death, The Canterbury Tales was selected by William Caxton to be one of the first books to be printed in England." Dimadick (talk) 20:47, 11 May 2018 (UTC)
  4. Support addition. This list is supposed to be tailored to the English language Wikipedia, and he is one of the most important early English authors. Rreagan007 (talk) 20:54, 11 May 2018 (UTC)
  5. Support addition I think there has to be a recognition of relative importance. We only have Shakespeare because two of his friends got annoyed by competitors pirating his plays and he didn't get into Poet's Corner until 1740. There's a long list of authors considered 'vital' 50 years ago that hardly feature today or whose reputation rests on one or two works eg Compton Mackenzie, Kipling, Jack London, even Mark Twain. That doesn't mean Hemingway won't last (although I suspect Old Man and Farewell to Arms account for the vast bulk of what people have read) but the survival of Chaucer's writings, 200 years before Shakespeare is an even greater miracle. If you think of the relative volume of surviving work, I'm stunned he's as close to Hemingway as he is in terms of Google hits. He matters, not just because of the quality or quantity of his writing but what it symbolises ie when English starts to be a literary language. It's like explaining the importance of Marconi to an I-Phone user. Or why Citizen Kane continually appears in the top five movies list.Robinvp11 (talk) 16:08, 27 May 2018 (UTC) Apologies but I was reminded of this recently :) Contrary to the claim below, Troilus and Criseyde is often considered Chaucer's finest work, not the Canterbury Tales and without going into detail, its significance goes beyond literature. It forms part of a remarkable but often ignored cultural movement under Richard II, which prefigures much of the Renaissance. Robinvp11 (talk) 12:06, 1 June 2018 (UTC)
  6. Support removal. Gizza (t)(c) 22:12, 19 June 2018 (UTC)
Oppose
  1. Oppose Hemingway is probably the most vital English language author after Shakespeare. Chaucer is not a vital author at all - Canterbury Tales is a vital work and should be added if it is not already on the list.·maunus · snunɐɯ· 15:51, 7 May 2018 (UTC)
  2. Oppose Would be fine with a list that had neither, but in terms of a pure swap, I don't see it (then again, I've never gone for the first=vitalness standard). Google Scholar hits (full names in quotations) since 2014: Hemingway=12,000, Chaucer=4,000. Just last names since 2014; Hemingway=20,000, Chaucer=14,000. All time full names: Hemingway=55,000, Chaucer=30,000. In Jstor full names: Hemingway=6,000, Chaucer=4,500 (Fun fact, both are dwarfed by Milton or Paradise Lost, but alas). In Oxford University Library stacks in title of book: Hemingway=142, Chaucer=214. Most other non-UK or USA universities showed slight preferences for Chaucer-depending on specific search terms. Searching for just a period shows similar trends to the books gram here. I think it comes out a wash. I don't think it is clear that Chaucer is more vital than Hemingway, so opt for the status quo. Might go for a straight add, but would have to see clear vital-ness over John Milton. AbstractIllusions (talk) 18:54, 15 May 2018 (UTC)
  3. Oppose --Thi (talk) 11:11, 24 May 2018 (UTC)
  4. Oppose mainly as a reaction to the !votes for an addition rather than a swap. IMO we do not need more writers. Cobblet (talk) 05:24, 19 June 2018 (UTC)
  5. Oppose addition 19 writers is plenty and if anything, is probably a few too many. Gizza (t)(c) 22:12, 19 June 2018 (UTC)
  6. Oppose on the removal, support addition. Jusdafax (talk) 22:57, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
  7. Oppose --Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 22:08, 24 June 2018 (UTC)
Discussion
  • Note: The FAQ has included a statement for a decade that the list is NOT supposed to be tailored with an English-language focus, and indeed should actually go quite the other direction: "since this is the English language Wikipedia, the majority of editors come from either the United States or the Commonwealth. This creates a systemic bias towards topics better known in the Western world. To counter this, the list includes a number of important topics less-known to the average American or Brit." Don't want to mess up the flow of the debate with this, but just saying we should have the discussion if we actually want this to be a relevant standard. AbstractIllusions (talk) 18:54, 15 May 2018 (UTC)
  • I must admit I've never really read the FAQ, but the front page of the Vital Articles has since 2011 stated that "This list is tailored to the English-language Wikipedia." I don't know why this list would even exist if it weren't tailored to the English Wikipedia, as there already exists the List of articles every Wikipedia should have. The FAQ should probably be updated to reflect this. Rreagan007 (talk) 19:39, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
  • Comment I'm neutral here; it's hard to imagine an English-language encyclopedia without either of these, but with the quota limitations and the world-wide focus they're both close to the cut-off. I think Kahlil Gibran is the weakest entry in writers currently, but I'm not going to propose a removal purely for WP:ILIKEIT reasons. The other option is to remove filmmakers; I'm not sure any of them are more vital than either of these people. power~enwiki (π, ν) 01:59, 22 May 2018 (UTC)

There seems to be two supporting votes by Robinvp11 above. --Thi (talk) 16:43, 4 June 2018 (UTC)

You're right. I didn't notice that. I'm reopening the nomination. Rreagan007 (talk) 18:38, 4 June 2018 (UTC)
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NO CONSENSUS
1-1, no consensus. --Thi (talk) 17:43, 12 June 2018 (UTC)

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Remove Frédéric Chopin, Add Claude Debussy

This [6] says more then i ever could. I think for the purposes of this list Debussy is a much better add then Chopin.

Support
  1. Support as nom. GuzzyG (talk) 15:46, 7 May 2018 (UTC)
Oppose
  1. Oppose Chopin had an influence on other composers: "Edvard Grieg, Antonín Dvořák, Isaac Albéniz, Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky and Sergei Rachmaninoff, among others, are regarded by critics as having been influenced by Chopin's use of national modes and idioms.[2] Alexander Scriabin was devoted to the music of Chopin, and his early published works include nineteen mazurkas, as well as numerous études and preludes; his teacher Nikolai Zverev drilled him in Chopin's works to improve his virtuosity as a performer.[3] In the 20th century, composers who paid homage to (or in some cases parodied) the music of Chopin included George Crumb, Bohuslav Martinů, Darius Milhaud, Igor Stravinsky[4] and Heitor Villa-Lobos.[5]" Dimadick (talk) 20:56, 11 May 2018 (UTC)
Discussion
  • What does that link say exactly that serves as a way to compare Debussy with Chopin. The two were not contemporary, so the fact that Debussy was one of the major composers of his time is not directly relevant for comparison.·maunus · snunɐɯ· 15:55, 7 May 2018 (UTC)
  • I don't think we need a second 20th-century composer of classical music. Cobblet (talk) 13:50, 12 May 2018 (UTC)

References

  1. ^ "From The Preface to Fables Ancient and Modern". The Norton Anthology of English Literature. Stephen Greenblatt. 8th ed. Vol. C. New York, London: Norton, 2006. 2132–33. p. 2132.
  2. ^ Temperley (1980), p. 307.
  3. ^ Bowers (1996), p. 134.
  4. ^ Mariola Wojtkiewicz, tr. Jerzy Ossowski, "The Impact of Chopin's Music on the Work of 19th and 20th Century Composers", in chopin.pl website, accessed 4 January 2014.
  5. ^ Hommage á Chopin on IMSLP website, accessed 27 October 2014.
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PASSED
5-0, removed. --Rreagan007 (talk) 23:37, 18 June 2018 (UTC)

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Remove Factory

This was brought up in the recent farm nomination that failed due to its overlap with agriculture. We already list Manufacturing, and a factory is just a place where manufacturing takes place, so I don't think we need to list it separately at this level.

Support
  1. Support as nom. Rreagan007 (talk) 18:09, 31 March 2018 (UTC)
  2. Support per nom/ the fact farm was not added. GuzzyG (talk) 15:12, 3 April 2018 (UTC)
  3. Support per above and previous discussion. Consistency is key. Gizza (t)(c) 02:27, 16 April 2018 (UTC)
  4. Support as per above. --Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 21:22, 27 April 2018 (UTC)
  5. Support per nomination. AbstractIllusions (talk) 19:50, 18 June 2018 (UTC)
Oppose
Discussion
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PASSED
6-0, removed. --Thi (talk) 17:44, 12 June 2018 (UTC)

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Remove Upanishads

It's part of the Vedas, which is also listed. There is no need to list them both at this level.

Support
  1. Support as nom. Rreagan007 (talk) 04:33, 23 May 2018 (UTC)
  2. Support --Thi (talk) 05:49, 23 May 2018 (UTC)
  3. Support --dawnleelynn(talk) 16:52, 27 May 2018 (UTC)
  4. Support Duplication, limited discussion apart from the Vedas from what I can see. AbstractIllusions (talk) 03:01, 28 May 2018 (UTC)
  5. Support There are important parts/sections/books from the other religions' holy books that are not listed separately after the main work. Also, we already removed the Sikhs holy book too, although Hindus greatly outnumber Sikhs, but still.  Carlwev  08:35, 30 May 2018 (UTC)
  6. Support GuzzyG (talk) 12:59, 3 June 2018 (UTC)
Oppose
Discussion
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PASSED
5-1, removed. --Rreagan007 (talk) 21:32, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

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Remove Vajrayana

According to the articles, Buddhism can be viewed as having 2 main branches, Theravada and Mahayana (with Vajrayana being a part of Mahayana), or Vajrayana can be viewed separately as a third branch. Since we can only list 1,000 articles here, I think we should just list the 2 main branches of Buddhism here. This is in keeping with our attempts to remove articles at this level that are unnecessary due to significant overlap with another article.

Support
  1. Support as nom. Rreagan007 (talk) 16:54, 28 May 2018 (UTC)
  2. Support not quite comparable to Theravada and Mahayana. Gizza (t)(c) 21:51, 28 May 2018 (UTC)
  3. Support --Thi (talk) 12:55, 30 May 2018 (UTC)
  4. Support GuzzyG (talk) 12:59, 3 June 2018 (UTC)
  5. Support power~enwiki (π, ν) 21:19, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
Oppose
  1. Very influential outside India (Tendai is deeply influenced by it), and now the list contains 999 articles.--RekishiEJ (talk) 03:25, 13 June 2018 (UTC)
Discuss
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per WP:SNOW; this is already on the L4 list. power~enwiki (π, ν) 00:15, 18 June 2018 (UTC)

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Add September 11 attacks

This event impacted many people all over the globe. 192.107.120.90 (talk) 17:55, 11 June 2018 (UTC)

Support
Oppose
  1. Oppose Terrorism already a vital article. In a hundred years 9/11 will just be another terrorism attack of the 21st century, not a lasting event. — Preceding unsigned comment added by RJFJR (talk • contribs)
  2. Oppose power~enwiki (π, ν) 18:39, 11 June 2018 (UTC)
  3. Oppose Rreagan007 (talk) 03:53, 12 June 2018 (UTC)
  4. Oppose --Thi (talk) 08:10, 12 June 2018 (UTC)
  5. Oppose too recent but on the other-hand it's completely unrealistic to think this will "just be another terrorist attack" considering it led to two wars and what not. Clearly in any definition a lasting event. GuzzyG (talk) 23:13, 13 June 2018 (UTC)
  6. Oppose The War on Terror may be vital but 9/11 is just one part of it. Gizza (t)(c) 00:12, 18 June 2018 (UTC)
Discussion

I agree it may too recent and perhaps not sufficiently vital to include. But it might in the long run turn out to be a relevant addition under war on terror at level 4, just like the Assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand is for WWI. Arnoutf (talk) 07:48, 17 June 2018 (UTC)

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WITHDRAWN
3-0, See Wikipedia_talk:Vital_articles/Level/4#Add_Overweight. --2601:183:101:58D0:C5F2:FD9C:2766:CEFE (talk) 18:50, 17 June 2018 (UTC)

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Add Overweight

Obesity may be a vital article, but overweight should be added because more people are overweight than obese. --75.67.58.188 (talk) 22:45, 16 June 2018 (UTC)

  1. Oppose. There is too much overlap with obesity. Rreagan007 (talk) 23:11, 16 June 2018 (UTC)
  2. How about making it a Level 4 vital article? --2601:183:101:58D0:1119:4FFF:1508:1FCA (talk) 01:02, 17 June 2018 (UTC)
  3. Oppose --Thi (talk) 06:47, 17 June 2018 (UTC)
  4. Oppose too much overlap indeed. Arnoutf (talk) 07:44, 17 June 2018 (UTC)
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7-4, not added Gizza (t)(c) 22:10, 24 June 2018 (UTC)

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Add American Revolution

We list the French Revolution in the modern history section, and I think the American Revolution is just as vital to the English Wikipedia, perhaps even more so since it directly involved the two largest English-speaking nations, the United States and Great Britain.

Support
  1. Support as nom. Rreagan007 (talk) 16:19, 23 May 2018 (UTC)
  2. Support --Thi (talk) 11:11, 24 May 2018 (UTC)
  3. Support --dawnleelynn(talk) 16:51, 27 May 2018 (UTC)
  4. Support - Support per nom. Jusdafax (talk) 04:21, 12 June 2018 (UTC)
  5. Support Of the revolutions considered by AbstractIllusions below, the American was the only liberal revolution, or at least the only that stayed that way. The French and Russian revolutions had an initial liberal phase that was supplanted by the authoritarian left; the Iranian and Chinese revolutions never had anything liberal in them to start with. --Trovatore (talk) 05:35, 12 June 2018 (UTC)
  6. Support per Trovatore. GuzzyG (talk) 23:12, 13 June 2018 (UTC)
  7. Support Presidentman talk · contribs (Talkback) 19:17, 22 June 2018 (UTC)
Oppose
  1. Oppose The textbook examples of the great revolutions of world history are: French, Russian, Chinese, (and maybe Iranian). See: Skocpol 'States and Social Revolutions', Goldstone's reader on Revolutions which didn't even include a reading on the American Revolution until the 3rd edition (and only includes one compared to four/five on Russian revolution) (to be fair: Goldstone does stress its importance elsewhere). But for the clearest statement, Axworthy's History of Iran begins "The Iranian Revolution is sometimes spoken of as the third great revolution of modern times, after the French and the Russian." I'd say it is a vital revolution, and I would list it: But it has to be added after Russian Revolution and Decolonization (at least). There seems to be as much overlap with Russian Revolution and people, ideologies included as there would with the American revolution where we already include George Washington, Benjamin Franklin, and liberalism (throw in Locke, too, cause why not). American Revolution is of equal vitalness to many others. We might be better served simply with Revolution added. (Final note, Great Britain is not one of the "two largest English-speaking nations." India, Nigeria, and Pakistan all have at least twice the number of English speakers--even with most conservative estimates. Another point for decolonization being the better topic.) AbstractIllusions (talk) 03:46, 28 May 2018 (UTC)
    It depends on what you define as an English-speaking nation. According to Wikipedia, Britain has a population of 65.6 million, and 95% (~62.32) are monolingual English speakers. Nigeria has a population of 180 million, and approximately 1/3 (~60 million) speak English. Pakistan has a population of 213 million and 8% (~17 million) speak English as a first language. India has 1.2 billion people and approximately 10% (~125 million) speak English. To me, if a majority of the population of a country doesn't speak English, then I don't consider it to be an English-speaking nation. Rreagan007 (talk) 09:56, 28 May 2018 (UTC)
    The Indian statistic is from 17 years ago and AFAIK Pakistan does not keep census statistics on English-language proficiency. Moreover, even assuming the truth of the statistics you've quoted, it makes no sense to ignore the existence of 125 million and 60 million English speakers merely because they don't form a majority within their own country. Cobblet (talk) 01:32, 29 May 2018 (UTC)
    I'm not saying we should ignore them, but we do have to maintain the proper perspective. The U.S. has been a majority English-speaking nation for hundreds of years, since even before its founding, and Britain is obviously the birthplace of English. Those other countries with a minority population of English speakers haven't had significant numbers of English speakers nearly as long, and that does make a difference in terms of what history articles are more vital relative to others for the English Wikipedia. The American Revolution is probably the historical event that has had the most impact on the English-speaking world. Rreagan007 (talk) 01:17, 31 May 2018 (UTC)
    So you're suggesting that we should prioritize the interests of English speakers whose ancestors also spoke English over the interests of first-generation English speakers. I don't believe in segregating readers of the English Wikipedia into such classes. Cobblet (talk) 14:28, 23 June 2018 (UTC)
    When we're talking about which history articles to add to the English Wikipedia's vital articles list, yes I do think people who were speaking English during those historical time periods deserve extra consideration. Rreagan007 (talk) 15:09, 23 June 2018 (UTC)
    Who cares who spoke English then? They weren't the ones reading Wikipedia now. Cobblet (talk) 15:47, 23 June 2018 (UTC)
  2. Oppose per AbstractIllusions. Adding Decolonization definitely seems like a good idea. A global trend that impacted every country, English-speaking or otherwise. Gizza (t)(c) 21:52, 28 May 2018 (UTC)
  3. Oppose per AbstractIllusions. Plus the Indian independence movement also involved the UK as well as all of South Asia, which according to the same table Rreagan007's quoting from, apparently has slightly more English speakers than the US (and I suspect the number for India is a significant underestimate.) Even if we were to accept Rreagan007's argument, that's what should be listed first. Cobblet (talk) 01:32, 29 May 2018 (UTC)
  4. Oppose I'd say the American Revolution was the formation of the United States which is covered by the article United States. RJFJR (talk) 19:58, 6 June 2018 (UTC)
Discussion
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Vital categories

There seem to be quite a lot of red-linked Vital article categories finding their way onto the WantedCategories report at the moment, for instance at the moment there's Category:Wikipedia level-5 vital articles in Life‏‎ and Category:All Wikipedia vital articles in Physics‏‎. I tend to assume that the editors responsible know what they're doing, but someone more familiar with the Vital process might want to have a scan through that report, to confirm what's going on. Le Deluge (talk) 16:32, 11 June 2018 (UTC)

Galobtter created some of these, and I'll check the rest. The category links are generated by template. A few are simply due to bad tagging (there's no "Ba-class" of articles), others are missing (not all the level-5 pages exist yet). power~enwiki (π, ν) 03:57, 12 June 2018 (UTC)
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1-3, not removed Gizza (t)(c) 00:02, 20 July 2018 (UTC)

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Remove Moon landing

In my opinion, space exploration is more vital than Moon landing. --192.107.120.90 (talk) 17:51, 11 June 2018 (UTC)

  • Oppose I think they should both remain listed. Rreagan007 (talk) 03:56, 12 June 2018 (UTC)
  • Oppose - Agree with Rreagan, keep ‘em both. Jusdafax (talk) 04:00, 12 June 2018 (UTC)
  • Oppose --Thi (talk) 08:09, 12 June 2018 (UTC)
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FAILED
4-3 after 50+ days, not added Gizza (t)(c) 22:42, 12 August 2018 (UTC)

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Add Norman conquest of England

A major turning-point in English history. This list is supposed to be tailored to the English-language Wikipedia, and I think this article is vital at this level for the English Wikipedia.

Support
  1. Support as nom. Rreagan007 (talk) 16:17, 20 June 2018 (UTC)
  2. Support since this had a major effect not just on England but all future speakers of English; the Norman influence changed the language forever. While I must note that we should try for diversity and not have too many British-centric subjects, this is still one of the most important British subjects to have.  — Mr. Guye (talk) (contribs)  16:58, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
  3. Support Transforming event in the history of England. Among other things, the Anglo-Saxons held slaves, while the Normans did not. "The impact of the conquest on the lower levels of English society is difficult to assess. The major change was the elimination of slavery in England, which had disappeared by the middle of the 12th century. There were about 28,000 slaves listed in Domesday Book in 1086, fewer than had been enumerated for 1066. In some places, such as Essex, the decline in slaves was 20 per cent for the 20 years. The main reasons for the decline in slaveholding appear to have been the disapproval of the Church and the cost of supporting slaves, who unlike serfs, had to be maintained entirely by their owners. The practice of slavery was not outlawed, and the Leges Henrici Primi from the reign of King Henry I continue to mention slaveholding as legal." Dimadick (talk) 21:49, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
  4. Support - Important historical addition to this level. Jusdafax (talk) 22:53, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

#Support --Thi (talk) 06:20, 22 June 2018 (UTC) Only if American revolution is added. --Thi (talk) 19:43, 30 June 2018 (UTC)

Oppose
  1. Oppose This topic is much more limited in its impact on world history than anything else on the History section of the list. Even the degree of its impact on the course of English history is debated. "Major turning points in English history" with at least as much of an impact could also include the Roman conquest of Britain, the Anglo-Saxon settlement of Britain, the Magna Carta, the Hundred Years' War, the English Reformation, the English Civil War, the Glorious Revolution, the Seven Years' War, the Napoleonic Wars, or the Reform Act 1832, none of which are listed. Cobblet (talk) 14:20, 23 June 2018 (UTC)
  2. Oppose the only truly lasting legacy of the Norman conquest is the common law system. Apart from the events that Cobblet mentioned, the Acts of Union 1707 was a much more pivotal event in history. Gizza (t)(c) 22:04, 24 June 2018 (UTC)
  3. Oppose too specific and per above. RJFJR (talk) 19:16, 30 June 2018 (UTC)
Discuss

I am English, I think this i an important event, and it is of personal interest to me. But that aside, is the Norman conquest of England singularly more vital than England, or the Normans or even perhaps William the Conqueror?  Carlwev  17:29, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

That's a good question. When comparing articles to determine relative vitality, it's usually done within that particular category. So I would compare the Norman conquest to other historical events listed at Level 3 and the Normans to other historical peoples listed here (like Vikings and Aztecs). England is a bit different as it's a sub-national area. We don't currently list any of those at Level 3, but if we were going to, England would certainly be the most vital national subdivision. I'll have to give it some thought, but maybe England is vital enough for the English Wikipedia to list it at Level 3. After all we do list English literature here but no other language literature articles. Rreagan007 (talk) 18:22, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
What my thoughts are of England... We list UK which is kind of the successor of England (in addition to smaller regions) it has been called United Kingdom since 1801. If the UK and England are thought to be close enough it may not matter. It's not that England is a large populated region today but that it existed as a sovereign nation for over 700 years from the late tenth century to the early eighteenth century, (then it merged with Scotland and was Great Britain for a century then it was joint with Ireland and became the UK up until today.) At the moment we list Elizabeth I, a queen of England (not UK), we list a queen of England but not England. We also list the British Empire by the way. Many well known people and events Like William I Norman conquest, Elizabeth I, Henry VIII, Hundred Years War, Shakespeare and many others are technically within the scope of England, and it's history not the UK. If the UK and England are thought to be close enough none of this really matters. Other European powers like Germany and Italy among others didn't become the nation they are today until the nineteenth century either, and the history of the land and people of the area is included in the articles a bit even much of it was before the state as it is today even existed...now I'm waffling on a bit.  Carlwev  18:46, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
That's a good point that the UK is somewhat like the political successor to England. We also list Russia and the Soviet Union, and Russia is like the political successor to the Soviet Union. But as you point out we also list the British Empire. I think we also used to list the Russian Empire at this level, but it was removed due to too much overlap with Russia and the Soviet Union. Rreagan007 (talk) 19:24, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

I'm abstaining for now; I had considered suggesting William the Conqueror but I'd rather avoid increasing the proportion of biographies. power~enwiki (π, ν) 21:22, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

That's actually not a bad suggestion either. I think the number of people at Level 3 used to be 133, so adding one to get back to that number wouldn't be the end of the world. Rreagan007 (talk) 21:31, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
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PASSED
Removed, 5–0 Rreagan007 (talk) 21:09, 9 July 2018 (UTC)

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Remove Pendulum

I really don't see the need to list this article at this level. The pendulum's main historical usage has been in clocks and it is covered adequately in the clock article that is already listed at this level.

Support
  1. Support as nom. Rreagan007 (talk) 21:43, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
  2. Support as per above dawnleelynn(talk) 22:28, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
  3. Support I'd rather include Watch (as in wristwatch) or Atomic clock based on their importance to time-keeping, but don't think either of those make the cut either). The concept in physics isn't important enough either. power~enwiki (π, ν) 23:34, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
  4. Support --Thi (talk) 06:20, 22 June 2018 (UTC)
  5. Support --LaukkuTheGreit (Talk•Contribs) 15:48, 30 June 2018 (UTC)
Oppose
Discuss
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NO CONSENSUS
No votes in 30+ days Gizza (t)(c) 22:45, 12 August 2018 (UTC)

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Add Folk religion

We have recently removed several religion articles, so there is some room on the list now. Our current coverage of religions leans heavily towards organized religions. Adding this article would give us a little more balance in that area.

Support
  1. Support as nom. Rreagan007 (talk) 00:38, 22 June 2018 (UTC)
  2. Support Pretty major concept in the field of religion and I agree that our current coverage is biased towards more globalized religions. - Presidentman talk · contribs (Talkback) 19:20, 22 June 2018 (UTC)
  3. Support There's nothing "academic" at all about the topic of non-organized religion. Many cultures around the world are characterized by such practices. Cobblet (talk) 13:45, 23 June 2018 (UTC)
  4. Support per above. Folk religion tends to be the least academic topic within the study of religion. Funeral is an interesting idea. Probably more important than birthday and in similar territory to marriage which is listed. Gizza (t)(c) 22:07, 24 June 2018 (UTC)
Oppose
  1. Oppose Too academic concept. Main religious practices are listed except for Funeral. --Thi (talk) 06:23, 22 June 2018 (UTC) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Folk_religion#Problems_and_critique The article is about definition of a problematic concept used in religious studies and other disciplines, not about practice. Folklore is already listed. --Thi (talk) 14:36, 25 June 2018 (UTC)
  2. Oppose Covered by religion. RJFJR (talk) 04:48, 25 June 2018 (UTC)
  • So is just about every other article we list in the Religion section. Rreagan007 (talk) 06:22, 25 June 2018 (UTC)
Discuss
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FAILED
4-4 after 45+ days, not added Gizza (t)(c) 22:48, 12 August 2018 (UTC)

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Add American Revolution

I'm renominating this because I think the previous nomination was closed too early. While it had been open for just over 30 days, it has been a norm to leave open nominations longer than 30 days that have a reasonable chance of success, which it clearly did have. I still believe that this article deserves to be listed at this level for all the reasons stated in the previous nomination. The American Revolution was a profound historical turning point. It was the first European colony to break away from their mother country and arguably was the inspiration for all others to do so. It was also a source of inspiration for the French Revolution, which is also listed at this level.

Support
  1. Support as nom. Rreagan007 (talk) 02:05, 25 June 2018 (UTC)
  2. Support - This seems clearly vital to me. Agree it was closed too quickly. Jusdafax (talk) 00:57, 29 June 2018 (UTC)
  3. Support per my previous rationale. --Trovatore (talk) 01:13, 29 June 2018 (UTC)
  4. Support Utter mind boggling that it is not on. GuzzyG (talk) 08:27, 10 July 2018 (UTC)
Oppose
  1. Oppose I'd say the American Revolution was the formation of the United States which is covered by the article United States. RJFJR (talk) 04:47, 25 June 2018 (UTC) (repeat of prev argument.)
  • And the French Revolution is covered very will in the article on France, but we still list both. Rreagan007 (talk) 06:20, 25 June 2018 (UTC)
This is whataboutism. That fact doesn't impact op's opinion.★Trekker (talk) 09:09, 10 July 2018 (UTC)
  1. Oppose per previous rationale. Gizza (t)(c) 02:58, 29 June 2018 (UTC)
  2. Oppose I still find User:AbstractIllusions's comments in the previous discussion more convincing. Add decolonization first, especially since it's the broader article. Cobblet (talk) 01:33, 11 July 2018 (UTC)
  3. Oppose Revolution or decolonization are the better add. If you all want there to be an English-bias on this list (why?), let's have that discussion openly rather than some back-door efforts to gradually whiten the vital articles list. The FAQ has said for over a decade that we should have a bias against English. Let's be transparent and open about changing that, if we want to (obviously, I'll vote oppose). In addition, "first European colony to break away from their mother country" is wrong (unless you define that so narrowly that it becomes a pointless statement). It is quite frankly too absurd of a statement to correct...but I'll give it a go. Pueblo Revolt of 1680, Scottish war for Independence (which inspired the American revolution, by the way), Serbian independence in the 1500s, Portugal, and the list goes on and on. AbstractIllusions (talk) 13:53, 13 July 2018 (UTC)
Discussion
  • Is there a procedure we could use to reopen the previous nomination instead having a new one? RJFJR (talk) 13:41, 25 June 2018 (UTC)
  • You can ask the closer if he would reopen the previous nomination. Rreagan007 (talk) 15:38, 25 June 2018 (UTC)
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NO CONSENSUS
No votes in 30+ days Gizza (t)(c) 22:49, 12 August 2018 (UTC)

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Add analytical chemistry

Since it is vital in both geochemistry and toxicology, is one of the four major sub-disciplines of chemistry, and listed in meta's equivalent page, this article should definitely be added.

Support
  1. As nom.--RekishiEJ (talk) 15:25, 1 July 2018 (UTC)
Oppose
  1. oppose Too many articles on chemistry already. RJFJR (talk) 15:27, 2 July 2018 (UTC)
  2. Oppose per RJFJ. --Thi (talk) 16:53, 2 July 2018 (UTC)
Discuss
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FAILED
6-6 after 30+ days Gizza (t)(c) 22:50, 12 August 2018 (UTC)

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Add either New Zealand or Papua New Guinea

Oceania is the only place that does not have at least 2 level 3 vital article countries. I think another country should be added as well. --107.0.6.250 (talk) 12:43, 7 July 2018 (UTC)

Support
  1. Support from nom.
  2. Support adding New Zealand. It's an English-speaking country and this list is supposed to be tailored to the English Wikipedia. Rreagan007 (talk) 20:51, 9 July 2018 (UTC)
  3. Support adding New Zealand --Thi (talk) 20:52, 9 July 2018 (UTC)
  4. Support adding New Zealand - Geographically and historically significant at this level. Jusdafax (talk) 23:09, 9 July 2018 (UTC)
  5. Support Sadly this list isn't concerned about being diverse, clearly a continent should be represented by more then one country, to suggest to remove Australia is just mind boggling, infact there should be a city from every continent too. GuzzyG (talk) 08:26, 10 July 2018 (UTC)
  6. Support adding New Zealand and Papua New Guinea They are geographically significant. Let's not homogenize Melanesia, Polynesia and Australia. These countries are distinct from the ones already on the list (and their neighbors). kiepier (talk) 01:01, 4 August 2018 (UTC)
Oppose
  1. Oppose. Oceania has only half a percent of the world's population, most of which is already represented as Australia. There are five times as many English speakers in Ghana than in New Zealand. The Netherlands has four times as many. Neither are on the list. Neither New Zealand nor Papua New Guinea are particularly significant from a political, demographic, economic, or historical standpoint. --Yair rand (talk) 22:01, 9 July 2018 (UTC)
  2. Oppose As an biased Oceanian, I would love to include more articles from the region but to be frank the region is already overrepresented. Even Australia could be removed as it stands. In any case New Zealand doesn't have much history too (800 years). And there are 44 countries with more English speakers than New Zealand. Papua New Guinea would be a slightly better option with a large overall population and much longer history of 60,000 years but it's still not vital. Gizza (t)(c) 01:33, 10 July 2018 (UTC)
  3. Oppose I think Ireland would be more important than New Zealand (though it may be impossible to pick a single Ireland article for this level). power~enwiki (π, ν) 01:37, 10 July 2018 (UTC)
  4. Oppose Tailoring the list to the needs of the English-language Wikipedia is not the same thing as tailoring it to the interests of native English speakers of British descent. Cobblet (talk) 01:19, 11 July 2018 (UTC)
  5. feminist (talk) 02:52, 26 July 2018 (UTC)
  6. We just can't consider Oceania as equivalent to the other 5 populated continents, each of which has at least 10x the population. pbp 03:31, 26 July 2018 (UTC)
discus
  1. I would rather add New Guinea than Papua New Guinea but I don't support adding either. Australia (either the country or continent) is surely vital here. power~enwiki (π, ν) 01:37, 10 July 2018 (UTC)
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"Vital article" status has little impact:

What actual impact does adding an article to these lists have? It gets a message on the talk page and that's about it. It doesn't get more traffic or more attention. The lists themselves don't get a huge amount of views either. Level 5 history for instance gets 35 views a day, which is pretty much nothing. The stated goal of VA project is to identify the most important articles for where editors can put their focus. Yet, level 1-2 only has a combined total of 3 FA, and a few former FA. Levels 3,4,5, are pretty much the same.

If this project was working as intended, nearly all of the vital articles would be GA or FA status.

So what can be done? Harizotoh9 (talk) 18:32, 10 July 2018 (UTC)

These lists are somewhat aspirational in nature. If Wikipedia were a top-down organization, these are the articles that we would allocate the most resources to improving. But Wikipedia is bottom up, so we can only present these lists as suggestions to volunteer editors as to where their efforts would be most important. Rreagan007 (talk) 20:47, 10 July 2018 (UTC)
I have no interest in participating in the FA process, but somewhat regularly go through the level-3 list looking for articles to improve closer to B-class or GA level, or to remove various cruft that has been added to the lead section. power~enwiki (π, ν) 20:50, 10 July 2018 (UTC)
I plan to be involved in the FA process at least in the articles in my area and possibly beyond. But it's my understanding that the VA articles currently selected in the categories are not finalized, yes? I'm not working on any articles until it is 100 percent certain they will stay vital articles. I also think that would affect their popularity. Wouldn't they become more popular once they are FA class? Does the VA project have some kind of plan in place to encourage editors to bring articles to GA and then FA class once they are final? Is this project backed by "official sources" in Wikipedia? I would hate to work on an article to try to bring it to FA class and meet resistance and not have the backing of Wikipedia behind me. I also am observing flex often in the vital article categories, removals and additions. Also all quotas are not full. And some categories need work, including some categories I have worked in, without going into too much detail, they are not diverse enough, for example. dawnleelynn(talk) 22:28, 10 July 2018 (UTC)
VA is never "finalized". It doesn't make sense to me that you would not want to work on an article just because you're not sure whether it will stay VA. That strikes me as the tail wagging the dog. If you think it's important content, or simply something you would enjoy improving, go for it! If you have specific ambitions to get an FA merit badge, fine, I understand why you'd want to make sure there'll be people to help, but honestly that's mostly independent of VA status, which I think most editors mostly ignore anyway. So you'll just have to read the social tea leaves and get a sense of whether there are people committed to that article.
As far as I can tell, the main purpose of VA is to argue about why what's important to me is more important than what's important to you. If it just went away, I don't think it would be any great loss. That's just my opinion, and I also don't think there's any great harm in it. --Trovatore (talk) 23:37, 10 July 2018 (UTC)
Well, VA lists could be made more prominent. I have no clue how to make it to VA lists from the front page. I'm certain many people aren't even aware of these lists entirely. There could be collab projects to give VA more attention. All non-FA/GA articles would get a daily or weekly collaboration. That would mean thousands of editors would see the article and try to improve it. Harizotoh9 (talk) 22:31, 10 July 2018 (UTC)
A bunch of geography articles (Colombia, Mexico, France) are fairly close to GA class already, and are very unlikely to leave the list. I will also give my semi-periodic plug to improve Government, possibly still the worst article on the project in comparison to its importance. power~enwiki (π, ν) 23:12, 10 July 2018 (UTC)

Ideas: 1. Create a "WikiProject Vital Articles", where people can join. Organizing the list , and improving the articles would be the main goals.

2. Make the Vital Articles accessable from the front page. They could be accessed from the left hand side and the top of the main page, near portals.

3. A collaboration project to improve the articles.

Harizotoh9 (talk) 00:19, 11 July 2018 (UTC)

*cough* Wikipedia:WikiProject Vital Articles power~enwiki (π, ν) 00:22, 11 July 2018 (UTC)
"This WikiProject is believed to be inactive."
That's telling. The Vital Articles are hard to find, and the Wikiproject is pretty much dead. For ti to work, there would need to be thousands of members and for it to be active. Harizotoh9 (talk) 01:07, 11 July 2018 (UTC)
Trovatore and Others Ok, let's both stop making assumptions since we are both wrong. I just want to know how Vital Articles is supposed to work and who is the top dog running it. You are assuming I'm out for brownie points of some kind, which can't be farther from the truth. I am going to take articles in the neighborhood I work in to FA status at some point, VA might only change the order in which I do so. So that's clear now. I had heard there would be some voting at some point and assumed that meant finalization for those articles that were voted in here. So I would be exceedingly grateful for anyone who could tell me exactly how the Vital Article process actually does work, and I won't make any more assumptions. Thank you. dawnleelynn(talk) 01:14, 11 July 2018 (UTC)
In the same way that an article on Wikipedia will never be "finished", the VA lists will never be "finished". There is a formal voting process for adding and removing articles that you can read at the top of this page. Having said that, The Level 1 and 2 lists are quite stable and rarely change. Level 3 is also relatively stable, though changes do still happen. Level 4 is still undergoing refinement and Level 5 is only about half built at this point. Rreagan007 (talk) 03:21, 11 July 2018 (UTC)
Rreagan007 Thank you very much for explaining that to me. I did not realize that the voting going on in the Level 4 talk page was the same voting I'd heard about in reference to categories. I'd somehow got it in my head that once the quotas were filled, they would be voting on them. Which there will be, just not overall voting on everything in every category. Just voting as people bring up articles in the Level 5 talk page. You were so helpful. Regarding working on articles for level 5, that is also helpful. If there are ultimately going to be around 61,110 Vital Articles, my thought was why would I work on others, that's all. That's so many! I mean, you were trying to help the project? No hidden agenda there to help myself. At any rate, now I see where things are more stable, and I could actually do some editing, while I might not want to do any editing on certain areas of level 5. Thank you. I guess I might want to do some quota filling in level 5 too.
The current plan right now is for Level 5 to be 50,000 total articles (the 10,000 Level 4 articles plus 40,000 additional articles). There has been some talk about possibly raising the Level 5 to 100,000 total articles, but the current target is 50k. Rreagan007 (talk) 05:23, 11 July 2018 (UTC)
Rreagan007 Yep, my calculations were for total vital articles at 61,110 including all 5 levels, which included 50,000 at level 5. I used the number at the top of each level's main page. But now I recall how the level 4 articles are repeated in the level 5 articles, so that reduces the numbers as you are saying, so it will be 51,110 instead. I think raising it to 100,000 is too many, but that's just my opinion. Do you have any estimates on how long it will take just to hit the current number, just curious. Thanks, dawnleelynn(talk) 06:17, 11 July 2018 (UTC)
Each level nests inside the other. Level 2 includes the 10 articles in level 1 + 90 more; Level 3 includes the 100 in Level 2 + 900 more; Level 4 includes the 1,000 in Level 3 + 9,000 more. So the total articles across all 5 Levels once Level 5 is completed will be 50,000. Rreagan007 (talk) 06:51, 11 July 2018 (UTC)
Rreagan007 Thank you, I understand now and appreciate your patience with this thick headed girl. LOL. dawnleelynn(talk) 16:00, 11 July 2018 (UTC)
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What are levels?

Vital articles! Looks interesting. Level 1, 2, 3, it is a little confusing, and it took me a while to work it out. Not long, but a bit. Level n means the top 10n most vital articles, excluding the articles already contained in the more vital levels. Level 1 are the most vital. Level 5 are the least vital of the vital system. A backward logarithmic ranking, like Magnitude (astronomy). For non-astronomers, higher numbers usually mean higher. I suggest adding "Top 10 most vital", Top 100 most vital", etc, to the introductory explanations for each level.

I find the system begs for identifying the Level 0 single most vital article. I suggest Philosophy, per Wikipedia:Getting to Philosophy, philosophy is the mother of all science.

The explanations are located at Wikipedia:Vital articles/Level/n, eg Wikipedia:Vital articles/Level/1. That is an unexpected titling format. I suggest changing to Wikipedia:Vital articles/Level n, for n = 1,2,3,4,5. Or just go straight to Wikipedia:Vital articles/Top 10^n, eg Wikipedia:Vital articles/Top 10, Wikipedia:Vital articles/Top 100.

--SmokeyJoe (talk) 07:20, 23 July 2018 (UTC)

I think that the most vital article is Universe, but it is not listed at level 1. --Thi (talk) 07:39, 23 July 2018 (UTC)
What is more important, philosophy, or the universe? That’s a good debating question. —SmokeyJoe (talk) 07:46, 23 July 2018 (UTC)
Philosophy was actually removed from Level 1 a while ago to make room for Human. There are several proposals on the Level 1 talk page to add philosophy back to Level 1, but there isn't currently agreement on which Level 1 article should be removed to make room for philosophy. I could make an argument that either "Human" or "Life" should be the Level 0 article, because without either of those, philosophy would not exist. As for the "Level/1" formatting, I've never liked that and I'm not sure why it was chosen. I assume whoever created Level 1 and 2 did it that way for some reason, and it has trickled down to levels 4 and 5 to maintain consistency. It probably would have been better to just have it be "Level 1" rather than "Level/1", but at this point it might be more trouble to move everything than it's worth. And just fyi, Level 5 breaks the exponential since it's currently only targeted to be 50k articles rather than 100k. Rreagan007 (talk) 18:14, 23 July 2018 (UTC)
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PASSED
Swapped, 6–0 Rreagan007 (talk) 19:18, 4 September 2018 (UTC)

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Swap: Remove Fishing industry, Add Fishing

Maybe i am missing something but in my opinion the activity is more vital then the industry of that activity. The pageviews and different wikidata languages back that up. I understand it's listed under "Industry" but i just don't believe something that is just a certain aspect of the larger topic should be listed before the larger topic itself; especially considering the fact we didn't add farm because of agriculture being listed and we removed factory because we listed manufacturing.

Support
  1. Support as nom. GuzzyG (talk) 05:15, 17 August 2018 (UTC)
  2. Support --Thi (talk) 08:04, 17 August 2018 (UTC)
  3. Support The broader subject matter is what should be listed here. Rreagan007 (talk) 18:26, 17 August 2018 (UTC)
  4. Support This article covers the industry plus others like recreation, sport, history. Many languages don't have separate article specifically for the industry, all info appears to be at fishing.  Carlwev  18:37, 17 August 2018 (UTC)
  5. Support good find. A clear anomaly which needs to be rectified. Gizza (t)(c) 12:21, 18 August 2018 (UTC)
  6. Support Seems to go along with the other articles. AbstractIllusions (talk) 01:48, 27 August 2018 (UTC)
Oppose
  1. Oppose
Discuss
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PASSED
Removed, 5–0 Rreagan007 (talk) 17:36, 8 September 2018 (UTC)

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Remove Worship

I am not convinced that it is vital at Level 3. Seventeen interwikis are not much at this level and it is covered by Ritual.

Support
  1. Support as nom. --Thi (talk) 06:58, 23 August 2018 (UTC)
  2. Support. Ritual should also be reassessed, it is currently start-class while being longer and more detailed than Worship, which is C-class.T8612 (talk) 10:08, 23 August 2018 (UTC)
  3. Support another form of a ritual. GuzzyG (talk) 14:21, 25 August 2018 (UTC)
  4. Support. We don't really need both ritual and worship at this level, and ritual is the brodar subject. Rreagan007 (talk) 22:25, 6 September 2018 (UTC)
  5. Support. While Ritual covers many non-religion items, Worship is not a vital aspect of Religion. Belief is much more vital. wumbolo ^^^ 08:10, 8 September 2018 (UTC)
Oppose
Discuss
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PASSED
Added 6-3 Cobblet (talk) 20:58, 10 September 2018 (UTC)

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Add Tanzania

Africa is underrepresented in the countries list.

Support
  1. Support as nom. --Thi (talk) 06:21, 24 August 2018 (UTC)
  2. Support Tanzania happens to be the most populous country in the world currently not listed. This in itself makes it the logical next country to add; we last added Colombia which has a smaller population. I also think it is important to have a list of countries that is representative of the world's diversity, and adding Tanzania would help achieve that in several ways. Tanzania is a least developed country, of which we currently list only three (out of 35 countries in total), even though they comprise about a quarter of the world's countries and 13% of the world's population. East Africa is also underrepresented – from this region of over 400 million people we only list Ethiopia, which accounts for only a quarter of the region's population. Tanzania is of exceptional interest both geographically (Kilimanjaro, the Rift Valley, the Great Lakes, the Serengeti) and culturally (Olduvai Gorge, Kilwa, Zanzibar). And I wouldn't describe Tanzania as not an English-speaking country: English remains widely used in academia, in the media, and in the legal system. Cobblet (talk) 22:03, 24 August 2018 (UTC)
  3. Support pbp 20:56, 26 August 2018 (UTC)
  4. Support a good nomination. Per above though I would be tempted to add at least one of Tanzania and Kenya onto the list even if they had a smaller population or lacked a English-speaking heritage, simply because they are home to the oldest hominid fossils in the world and IMO punch above their weight in importance. Gizza (t)(c) 23:11, 26 August 2018 (UTC)
  5. Support East Africa is under-represented on the countries list, and there are good arguments above for picking this before Kenya. power~enwiki (π, ν) 23:28, 26 August 2018 (UTC)
  6. Support  Carlwev  18:19, 6 September 2018 (UTC)
Oppose
  1. Oppose. English-speaking countries like Ireland and New Zealand should be added first, as they are more vital to the English Wikipedia. Rreagan007 (talk) 06:31, 24 August 2018 (UTC)
  2. Oppose. First of all, Africa is not underrepresented in the countries list: Africa is one-seventh of the world's population, and is currently represented by precisely 5 out of 34 countries: DR Congo, Egypt, Ethiopia, Nigeria, and South Africa. (Note that the listed number 35 includes the Country article itself.) Regarding underrepresented regions in general: The 200 million inhabitants of the state of Uttar Pradesh are only represented by a single entity with a larger population than Africa as a whole. I don't think that the 5% of the world's population that lives in East Africa being represented by only one country-level article is a big deal, especially when we have other, much more underrepresented regions. By continent-level, though, if we were trying to make everything even by population... (Done quite imprecisely, may be some errors.)
    • Africa: Currently 5, should be 5.
    • Americas: Currently 6 (North America 3, South America 3), should be 5 (North America 3, South America 2).
    • Oceania: Currently 1, should be 0.
    • Europe: Currently 7, should be 3.
    • Asia: Currently 15, should be 21.
      • South Asia: Currently 4, should be 9.
      • East Asia: Currently 3, should be 8.
      • Southeast Asia: Currently 5, should be 3.
      • Western Asia: Currently 3, should be 1.
      • Central Asia: Currently 0, should be 0.
    We probably want to keep some of the region imbalance to preserve some countries that are important beyond their populations, but balancing things does not mean adding more African countries in particular. --Yair rand (talk) 20:14, 26 August 2018 (UTC)
  3. Oppose Tanzania ranks 109 on the Wikipedia:WikiProject Countries/Popular pages list. The fact that Tanzania is a least developed country is likely a reason why reader interest is lower than countries currently on the Level 3 list. Because fewer readers are looking at the article, there is less of a need to maintain its quality compared to countries that receive more views. I'd also note that Tanzania's high population is a relatively recent phenomenon. According to its article Tanzania's population grew from 44 million to 55 million between 2012 and 2016. In fact Tanzania in 2012 had a smaller population than Ukraine (not listed at L3) had in 2001. There is a need to avoid WP:RECENTISM in this regard. feminist (talk) 17:24, 6 September 2018 (UTC)
Discuss

Yair Rand is right...but... China and India account for 2.7 billion people and have two representatives on this list, while the other 33 representatives are divided among the world's other 4.9 billion people. That's roughly 150 million people per representative, which comes out to:

  • The rest of Asia: Should be 12, currently 13
    • Middle East (anything from Iran west, excluding fmr. USSR and Egypt): Should be 2, currently 4 (Turkey, Iran, Israel, Saudi Arabia)
    • SE Asia (anything from Myanmar to Indonesia and the Philippines): Should be 4, currently 5 (Indonesia, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, Vietnam)
    • Elsewhere in Asia: Should be 6, currently 4 (Bangladesh, Japan, S. Korea, Pakistan)
  • Africa: Should be 9, currently 5 (Congo DRC, Egypt, Ethiopia, Nigeria, South Africa)
  • N. America: Should be 4, currently 3 (USA, Canada, Mexico)
  • S. America: Should be 3, currently 3 (Argentina, Brazil, Colombia)
  • Europe: Should be 5, currently 7
    • E. Europe: Should be 2, currently 2 (Poland, Russia)
    • W. Europe: Should 3 currently 5 (France, Germany, Italy, Spain, UK)
  • Oceania: Should be 0, currently 1 (Australia)

pbp 20:56, 26 August 2018 (UTC)

Removing a continent from having a rep no matter how small is the wrong move. Every G20 country should be on here. GuzzyG (talk) 03:52, 28 August 2018 (UTC)
Oh, I have no intention of removing Australia or any other G20 member. But it must be noted that Australia is one of the least-populous countries on the list, and one of the newer ones as well. pbp 13:56, 28 August 2018 (UTC)

In my opinion Swahili language should be added [7] before Tanzania Dawid2009 (talk) 05:32, 3 September 2018 (UTC)

  • Recentism concerns things that happened recently that have no lasting significance. Africa's population growth is expected to continue throughout this century, with profound global consequences. The growth of Tanzania's population is not a dank meme, but a serious social and economic issue. Prejudice on the basis of the youthfulness of a country's population or its lower level of economic development are forms of bias we should be avoiding on this list. Cobblet (talk) 07:30, 8 September 2018 (UTC)
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PASSED
Added, 6–3 Rreagan007 (talk) 19:37, 7 October 2018 (UTC)

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Add Taiwan

We don't list any disputed states on the list. Taiwan is the largest non-UN state in terms of both population and economy. It's a political hotbed, similar to Israel, another relatively small country that we list, which adds to reader interest: Taiwan is one of the top viewed articles on Wikipedia:WikiProject Countries/Popular pages. Also, Taiwan has contributed a lot of technology to our world: TSMC for example is the largest semiconductor foundry in the world, without whom most smartphones and computers would have been impossible.

Support
  1. As nom. feminist (talk) 17:38, 6 September 2018 (UTC)
  2. Support All countries are vital at this level. --Thi (talk) 17:56, 6 September 2018 (UTC)
  3. I'm a Taiwanese, however the reason why I sanction the proposal is not because of my identity but because of Taiwan's high strategic value and semiconductor industry, and the controversies whether Taiwan is indeed a country, and whether Taiwanese form a nation.--RekishiEJ (talk) 13:05, 7 September 2018 (UTC)
  4. Not including this is actually shocking. OhanaUnitedTalk page 04:35, 15 September 2018 (UTC)
  5. Support Dawid2009 (talk) 19:56, 15 September 2018 (UTC)
  6. Support Rreagan007 (talk) 19:37, 7 October 2018 (UTC)
Oppose
  1. Oppose without swap (Bangladesh?). 35 countries are enough imo, unless there is a discussion to increase the limit (and remove other articles).T8612 (talk) 08:23, 7 September 2018 (UTC)
  2. Oppose In Asia, I think Myanmar, Iraq, Afghanistan, and North Korea are all just as geopolitically interesting as Taiwan, and I'd consider the first three to be more significant from a historical and cultural point of view. Taiwan is not only smaller in population than all of these countries, but it's even smaller than a city like Shanghai, which I think I'd prefer listing first as well. Cobblet (talk) 17:55, 7 September 2018 (UTC)
  3. Oppose. We don't need more countries, and this one isn't particularly significant. --Yair rand (talk) 09:55, 4 October 2018 (UTC)
Discuss

@Thi: To clarify: Do you think that every country on Earth (~200 articles) should be on the list? That countries should make up 20% of the list? I just want to make sure I didn't misunderstand your statement. --Yair rand (talk) 18:49, 6 September 2018 (UTC)

I think that all 196 independent countries are potentially vital. Limitations are arbitrary, or can we explain briefly to some outsider why his or her country is not listed? Why Lake Victoria and why not Tanzania? We have reached the consensus of 34 countries. Now editors are in disagreement what to add next. We list 132 people because of diversity reasons, but not more countries to cover more Earth's land area and cultures. Perhaps it is a good thing, because biographies add weight to the arts and humanities area. --Thi (talk) 09:05, 7 September 2018 (UTC)
Yes, it's "arbitrary" to only list 34 countries or 132 people at Level 3, but it's also arbitrary to only list 1,000 articles at Level 3. The reality is that we simply don't have room at Level 3 to list all 200+ countries, which is why we have Level 4. Rreagan007 (talk) 17:07, 7 September 2018 (UTC)
  • I've wondered if our balance between countries and other geographic features is wrong at this level. Most countries are more vital than all but a few dozen cities. I would support having about 50 countries at this level. pbp 13:52, 7 September 2018 (UTC)
Countries tend to be the most popular articles on Wikipedia by a mile. Over the last 20 days, the least viewed country article on the list was DR Congo but it was still the 162nd most viewed article, more popular than 80% of the list. 14 of the top 30 most viewed articles are countries. A similar pattern emerges if you look at pageviews over a longer period of time. A case can be made to increase to number of countries, though I'd prefer to not remove any of the non-country geography articles, apart from a few cities. All traditional encyclopedias cover natural geographic topics like rivers, seas and mountains in depth and Wikipedia should be no exception. Geography as a whole should have 100 articles at least. Gizza (t)(c) 04:45, 8 September 2018 (UTC)
In my opinion if we try add more countries or states to level 2, we also should add more languages. Swahili language and Hebrew language have littly fewer pageviews than Tanzania and Jerusalem but these languages also should be describe in encyclopedia at the level 3. According to global language system Swahili certainly is one of 13 the most important languages ([8]) and Hebrew is historically important language. Dawid2009 (talk) 16:43, 17 September 2018 (UTC)
It would be interesting to see a complete list of countries by page views. Rreagan007 (talk) 05:11, 8 September 2018 (UTC)
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Archived. --Thi (talk) 08:07, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

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Need new/better method for further considering instead of reopen

We need a better method to handle requests to reopen something closed as undecided. Folk Religion sat at 4-2 for thirty days with out a change but now it is reopened. Some people who voted previously won't bother to vote again so there will be even fewer votes and if it is decided this time it will be on a less comprehensive base.

Can we just agree that if someone thinks a just closed item could have been decided with more time they can request it be reopened instead of opening a new vote for the same item? RJFJR (talk) 15:23, 14 August 2018 (UTC)

  • Something that's closed should not be re-opened for at least a year. pbp 23:21, 14 August 2018 (UTC)
    • There is no rule against it, and I don't think there should be. Rreagan007 (talk) 03:18, 15 August 2018 (UTC)
      • @Rreagan007: Why? We don't mess up very often. pbp 03:35, 15 August 2018 (UTC)
        • Because the ones I renominated I don't think the nominations should have been closed when they were. We have a long-standing convention of leaving nominations open that have a reasonable likelihood of success, and I'm really not sure why Gizza felt the need to close them so soon. Rreagan007 (talk) 04:58, 15 August 2018 (UTC)
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.
Archived. --Thi (talk) 08:07, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

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.

Mythology

I already posted this on the Level 4 talk page, but it hasn't seemed to spark any interest over there. An editor has taken it upon himself to merge Mythology into Myth. I have had a bit of a discussion with him about it on the Myth talk page. "Mythology" was a Level 2 article, but "Myth" isn't even currently listed at Level 5. Should we simply swap out mythology for myth at all levels, or should we remove mythology from one or more levels? For some reason, "Myth" doesn't seem as worthy of an article for Level 2 to me as "Mythology" did. Rreagan007 (talk) 04:49, 17 August 2018 (UTC)

I've reverted the merge as it's clearly out-of-process. That said, there's something to be said for the proposal, and for Myth being the merged article's title. I'm not sure if it's a level-2 article (and would prefer not to consider it until the merge proposal is done), it should be swapped at lower levels if the merge happens. power~enwiki (π, ν) 04:56, 17 August 2018 (UTC)
Fair enough. I agree that a merger of this scale should go through a proper discussion process. Rreagan007 (talk) 18:25, 17 August 2018 (UTC)
After more discussion, I've undone my reversion. I'll wait until Tuesday before doing anything more. power~enwiki (π, ν) 01:13, 19 August 2018 (UTC)
So it looks like the merger is going to stand as is. As I say above, Myth just doesn't seem like it's worthy of being a level 2 Vital Article. The myth article says that "myth is a folklore genre" so maybe we should swap out Mythology for Folklore at Level 2. Rreagan007 (talk) 22:06, 21 August 2018 (UTC)
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FAILED
2–4, not added Rreagan007 (talk) 19:58, 2 November 2018 (UTC)

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Add Malaysia

One of the biggest countries not listed.

Support
  1. Support as nom. --Thi (talk) 06:58, 23 August 2018 (UTC)
  2. Support  Carlwev  07:20, 23 August 2018 (UTC)
Oppose
  1. Oppose. English-speaking countries like Ireland and New Zealand should be added first, as they are more vital to the English Wikipedia. Rreagan007 (talk) 20:41, 23 August 2018 (UTC)
  2. Oppose I'd pick Myanmar as the next most vital country from Southeast Asia to add. I also think Southeast Asia is already quite well represented – we list Indonesia, Vietnam, the Philippines, Thailand and Singapore which account for >80% of the region's population. Cobblet (talk) 05:30, 24 August 2018 (UTC)
  3. Oppose how about Taiwan instead? Similar population with larger economy and it may be more interesting to readers as a disputed state. feminist (talk) 03:43, 25 August 2018 (UTC)
  4. Oppose if we're adding ten more countries, sure, but I don't think this is the marginal addition right now. power~enwiki (π, ν) 23:28, 26 August 2018 (UTC)
Discuss

I think we should add more nations. Malaysia just over 30 mil. Tanzania is the highest missing nation at about 55 mil pop. There are 10 missing nations with higher populations. (see here). Morocco, Algeria, Ukraine, Iraq, Kenya and Myanmar (Burma) and 4 more. Many of these had under 10 million in 1950 and doubled in population every 20 something years to being between 30 and 55 mil today, recent boomers. Not that that makes them any more or less vitl alone. Malaysia is quite important I still support, I just think other nations I listed are worthy of consideration also. We also list smaller pop nations, like Israel, and Singapore (in cities I think) and Australia.  Carlwev  07:20, 23 August 2018 (UTC)

It's not just about population. Israel is a tiny country but it makes the news much more often than Malaysia. I support moving Singapore to cities though.T8612 (talk) 23:05, 23 August 2018 (UTC)
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FAILED
1–3, not added Rreagan007 (talk) 19:59, 2 November 2018 (UTC)

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Remove Garden

An article about planned spaces for plants just doesn't seem like a Level 3 article to me.

Support
  1. Support as nom. Rreagan007 (talk) 18:10, 8 September 2018 (UTC)
Oppose
  1. Oppose per previous discussion. --Cobblet (talk) 19:46, 8 September 2018 (UTC)
  2. Oppose Garden or gardening is one of the most important topics. [9] --Thi (talk) 21:52, 8 September 2018 (UTC)
  3. Oppose I think gardening or park are slightly better choices but I won't support an outright removal. Gizza (t)(c) 23:53, 9 September 2018 (UTC)
Discuss

Garden was added 2 years ago, the discussion is here [10]. I know consensus can change, just wanted users to be aware of the previous discussion.  Carlwev  19:04, 8 September 2018 (UTC)

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Archived. --Thi (talk) 08:07, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

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Move proposal at Talk:Hegira

A move proposal is open regarding the correct title/spelling for the article on the prophet Muhammad's journey to Medina. Participants in this project may be interested in participating at Talk:Hegira. power~enwiki (π, ν) 04:35, 9 September 2018 (UTC)

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.
FAILED
4–7, not added Rreagan007 (talk) 20:00, 2 November 2018 (UTC)

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Add Los Angeles

Second largest city in the world's largest english speaking country, and in the top 20 urban and metropolitan areas of the world by population.

Support
  1. Support as nom. Dmartin969 (talk) 22:15, 13 September 2018 (UTC)
  2. Support. No brainer. OhanaUnitedTalk page 04:34, 15 September 2018 (UTC)
  3. Support But If we add Los Angeles, Washington should be added too. Anyway in my opinion cities from USA should be more favorized before small English-language countries. We make encyclopedia for readers of ENwiki (we do not favorize English-language concepts/concepts from English-language world, we favorize concepts for readers of ENwiki). ~~40% readers are from USA and ~~30% are from non-English language countires. Based on it I could say that American who is known only in USA still can has more pageview than American who has more influence worldwide than USA. But person from small English-language country always will has more pageviews if she/he has influence for worldwide. Dawid2009 (talk) 19:55, 15 September 2018 (UTC)
  4. Support Rreagan007 (talk) 19:48, 7 October 2018 (UTC)
Oppose
  1. Oppose I think the better add is 'California': Captures Hollywood, LA, Silicon Valley, San Francisco, etc. We don't have any subnational units that aren't cities despite the fact that states and provinces are a major organizational form of the modern world. And when we talk about subnational units like states or provinces: California is probably the most vital in the world (regardless of language being spoken...and if India isn't counting as an English speaking country then LA certainly isn't an English speaking city). Adding California captures much more important aspects of human existence than just LA does and diversifies our list by adding the most important sub-national unit in the world which is a class that is glaringly absent. AbstractIllusions (talk) 01:33, 16 September 2018 (UTC)
    If we're adding subnational units, I would think that Uttar Pradesh with its population of 200 million people would make a better choice. --Yair rand (talk) 18:58, 16 September 2018 (UTC)
  2. Oppose. --Yair rand (talk) 18:58, 16 September 2018 (UTC)
  3. Oppose I support reducing the number of cities slightly per previous discussion. Otherwise I agree and think that Los Angeles is definitely a top 20 city. Maybe not top 15 though. Gizza (t)(c) 06:05, 17 September 2018 (UTC)
  4. Oppose It's not a terrible choice, but I would take at least Dubai, Karachi and Shanghai ahead of LA. And if we had to add more North American geography articles I think Caribbean and Central America should be added before we include LA (or California, for that matter). Cobblet (talk) 16:58, 17 September 2018 (UTC)
  5. Oppose per Cobblet. RJFJR (talk) 19:32, 20 September 2018 (UTC)
  6. Oppose I'd add another country instead. feminist (talk) 16:19, 8 October 2018 (UTC)
  7. Oppose L293D (☎ • ✎) 12:30, 11 October 2018 (UTC)
Discuss

I live near Los Angeles, but b) I think there's probably already too many cities and too few countries. pbp 01:01, 16 September 2018 (UTC)

So if states are more vital than cities why New York (state) is not before New York City? Dawid2009 (talk) 08:26, 16 September 2018 (UTC)
Because San Diego, San Jose and San Francisco are all more vital than Buffalo, I suppose. California is twice the population of New York and has a lot more going on outside of its largest city. There are 34 million Californians that live outside of the CITY of Los Angeles and only 11 million New Yorkers that live outside the CITY of New York. There are 21 million Californians that live outside the LA Metro Area (25 if you consider San Bern/Riverside to be a separate metro) and only six or seven million New Yorkers that live outside the NY metro area. pbp 13:41, 16 September 2018 (UTC)
I never said that "states are more vital than cities". I said that we don't have any states and that states can be vital as a separate category from cities. I think including 'California' is the better addition and would render LA largely redundant. I did consider Uttar Pradesh too (amongst others), but beyond population, California is the 5th largest economy in the world (UP is #2 in India and above 50 if it was an independent country), it generates almost 1/15th of the world's patents, and then we include Hollywood, the music industry, and the higher ed system and I really don't think anything compares to California. But once again, much of this is outside of L.A. Hence, why 'California' is more vital to a comprehensive list than L.A. AbstractIllusions (talk) 00:29, 17 September 2018 (UTC)
California is the country subdivision with the largest economy on a nominal basis in the world as per List of country subdivisions by GDP over 100 billion US dollars. Not sure if it would be as high on a PPP basis but that's another matter. Another region that stands out is England. There is overlap with the United Kingdom and London but I'd still consider it more vital than say, Ireland. California is arguably more influential than England right now but historically England was much more influential than California over the past few hundred years. Having said that, my preference within geography is to either boost the number of countries or natural geography like another river, lake or desert. The Ganges should be in before Uttar Pradesh. Gizza (t)(c) 06:05, 17 September 2018 (UTC)
@Cobblet So if Dubai is vital at the level 3 and is more vital than California, why you do not suggest add United Arab Emirates to the level 3(by nomination for example)? Dawid2009 (talk) 20:28, 7 October 2018 (UTC)
Because IMO without Dubai the UAE is no more vital than any of the other small Gulf states. If Dubai is the main reason why the UAE is vital, I'd prefer to list Dubai rather than the UAE. Cobblet (talk) 22:32, 7 October 2018 (UTC)
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.
Archived. --Thi (talk) 08:07, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

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.

East Timor, and Technology

First: a move discussion at Talk:East Timor may be of interest to participants in this project.

Second, regarding this diff: how did nobody (myself included) notice this crap for 4 months? Is there any better way to monitor articles of interest to this project for such ridiculous changes? power~enwiki (π, ν) 22:48, 2 October 2018 (UTC)

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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