Talk:Évariste Galois

Citizenship

I am not sure why Galois' citizenship is subject to doubt. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.136.176.33 (talk) 11:26, 21 March 2016 (UTC)

External Link to La vie d'Évariste Galois

I would like to propose the following link as a better alternative to the one in the current article. Maybe it isn't so much a better replacement, but we could add it anyway to get the biography in a diferent format... Also the sources cited aren't in italic style in contrast to book names cited on the "Final Days" section of the article.

French Pronunciation of "Galois"

The French pronunciation is given in the article at present as "eva<inverted R>ist galwa". The surname would therefore be pronounced with what in English are called short a's, as in cat, pat, hag, cast, rat, etc. In other words an American would say (suppressing the final x) 'gal-wax'. That can't be right. Shouldn't it be 'gall-waw' ? Are those the right IPA symbols there? (will fix the 4~ thing later) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 64.2.143.28 (talk) 14:53, 28 September 2011 (UTC)

You are incorrect. The English "short a" is /æ/ in IPA. 2.24.117.101 (talk) 15:55, 17 April 2015 (UTC)

As a native French speaker (WP:OR alert), I'd pronounce the ending sound of "Galois" just as I would the ending sound of "Benoit" (à la Chris Benoit): it would be best transcribed as "wah". Gall-wah. ☺ · Salvidrim! · ✉ 04:33, 28 March 2016 (UTC)

Liouville, reign of terror, etc.

An IP editor recently added a "quotation needed" template to the paragraph

Given that France was still living in the shadow of the Reign of Terror and the Napoleonic era, Liouville might have waited until the June Rebellion's political turmoil subsided before turning his attention to Galois's papers.

(which is referenced to Lutzen), along with the following comment: As evidence that the source really suggests that the reason was the Reign of Terror and the Napoleonic era. This sounds like an extreme reactionary attempt at justification of the repression, stigmatisation and, in this case, erasure of republicans on the grounds that 'Robespierre evil and Napoleon fight Britain' or something. I think this is likely to be an unfruitful way to address the question, and I'm not convinced that a quotation is actually needed (as opposed to discussion here). OneSkyWalker, since you are the person who originally added this text (in this edit), do you have any thoughts? --JBL (talk) 19:09, 25 October 2024 (UTC)

As noted in an earlier sentence I added to the article, "Jesper Lützen explores this subject [why it took Liouville so long to review Galois' papers and/or publish an analysis] at some length in Chapter XIV Galois Theory of his book about Joseph Liouville without reaching any definitive conclusions." As I recall (I do not have a copy of Lützen's book handy), Lützen explores the turmoil of (and fear/intimidation engendered by) the June Revolution as a prominent potential explanation.

It didn't matter what faction one supported back then. An allegation of support for the wrong faction could get one guillotined.

And it is an intriguing mystery why it took Liouville so long. OneSkyWalker (talk) 20:05, 25 October 2024 (UTC)

Well, once again, I am questioning whether Lützen really says what OneSkyWalker says it does and I am asking for a quotation. I have the right not to trust his interpretation and summary of the source and no amount of 'discussion' here, devoid of quotations, is likely to change that. According to WP:V, 'As with sources in English, if a dispute arises involving a citation to a non-English source, editors may request a quotation of relevant portions of the original source be provided, either in text, in a footnote, or on the article talk page.' And 'When there is a dispute as to whether a piece of text is fully supported by a given source, direct quotes and other relevant details from the source should be provided to other editors as a courtesy.' By reverting, JBL is denying me the basic right of even asking for a quotation with the extremely vague justification that he feels that my demanding a quotation is 'unfruitful'. Just refusing other editors' demands for verification like this is not legitimate per WP:V. I don't see what is 'unfruitful' about my 'approach' - if OneSkyWalker or somebody else with access to the source adds a quotation, that would be a suitable 'fruit', and if not, a tag doesn't hurt anyone, this is the standard approach to the matter on Wikipedia.

Going into what OneSkyWalker is saying here - once again, just as with mentioning the Reign of Terror and Napoleon before, he somehow manages to lay the blame on the June Revolution and the republicans, which is clearly absurd in this context, because Galois himself was a republican. Clearly, whatever you may think of French republicans and revolutionaries, the threat for those who would have associated their names with Galois by publishing his work came not from the Revolution and the republicans, but from the Counterrevolution/Reaction and the monarchists. The relevant 'fear and intimidation' was from repressions by monarchists against republicans, not vice versa. By referring to this as 'fear/intimidation engendered by the June Revolution', OneSkyWalker succeeds in implying that the republicans themselves were responsible for the repressions against them and, accordingly, for any resulting self-censorship. This is classic victim blaming. The logical formulation would be that the fear and intimidation were caused by the defeat of the June Revolution and the subsequent repressions. Similarly, by referring to the 'recent Reign of Terror and Napoleonic era' as an explanation, he is presenting any repressions against the republicans as a natural response to 'all the evils they had wrought' decades earlier. (Presumably, monarchists would have never thought of repressing their opponents if Robespierre and Napoleon hadn't invented repression /sarcasm/.) He is further obscuring this issue here by saying that 'It didn't matter what faction one supported back then'. Again, whatever you may think of French republicans and revolutionaries, it clearly mattered what faction one supported, because the monarchists were the ones who won and were in a position to exercise repression, and 'the wrong faction' were the republicans. (Or perhaps the idea is that the only thing that you could possibly be afraid of after the defeat of the June uprising was not the actually occurring repressions by the monarchists who were, in fact, in power both before it and after it, but rather the slight possibility that those deranged republicans could possibly come to power anyway and then guillotine you for publishing the work of one of their supporters, because you see, that's the kind of thing French republicans do, they're deranged.) All of this expresses extreme prejudice against the French revolution and French republicanism, and I am questioning whether the source really described the situation in the same highly prejudiced terms and had the same unusually reactionary attitude, as opposed to OneSkyWalker letting his own attitudes and prejudices colour the way he summarised the source. If it did, fine, that is the way the formulations will have to stay. But I find that implausible, so I am demanding a quotation.--62.73.72.3 (talk) 04:47, 26 October 2024 (UTC)

62.73.72.3 wrote, "The logical formulation would be that the fear and intimidation were caused by the defeat of the June Revolution and the subsequent repressions." I agree with 62.73.72.3 that a naive reader might assume that the June Rebellion was successful and that revolutionaries were again in charge. I have edited the last sentence of the paragraph in a way which I hope clarifies the meaning. OneSkyWalker (talk) 22:53, 27 October 2024 (UTC)