Talk:Theano (philosopher)

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Golden mean

Removed "and was responsible for the concepts of the golden mean, golden ratio, and golden rectangle" since there is no citation for this. As no writings by Theano survive, and the article on the Golden Ratio http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golden_ratio#History says:

"The ancient Greeks usually attributed its discovery to Pythagoras (or to the Pythagoreans, notably Theodorus) or to Hippasus of Metapontum."

there does not appear to be any evidence to support the idea that she originated these concepts. Also, "golden mean" and "golden ratio" are generally used as synonyms, not separate concepts. 156.34.38.255 - 26th May 2006

Golden mean, part deux

Although there is a reference in the current page to "her most important work was related to the philosophical principle of the golden mean", it would be nice to know the ancient source of this information. All that I can find is a modern source that claims it was in her treatise On Virtue. Singinglemon (talk) 19:50, 23 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

More specifically, the earliest work I can find which asserts that Theano wrote about the golden mean is Mary Ritter Beard, (1931), On Understanding Women, page 139 [1]. It could just be that Mary Ritter Beard noticed that one work attributed to Theano was called On Virtue and simply conjectured that this work was about the golden mean. Later books which assert this [2] just seem to be uncritically copying and improving upon what Mary Ritter Beard wrote. Singinglemon (talk) 17:59, 6 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, there are many bogus sources, like those that mix up the golden mean (philosophy) with the golden ratio. But that's not sufficient reason to conclude that all sources are bogus. If Ritter made a mistake, one would need to find some specific indication of that. Dicklyon (talk) 05:46, 8 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I should make it clear that I do not assert that all sources are bogus, but I have looked into this matter with some care. The only books that I can find which associate Theano with the Golden Mean are either unreferenced tertiary works, or specifically reference Ritter as the source [3]. Feel free to provide any primary source, or or a secondary source which which explains why it is believed that Theano wrote about the Golden Mean. Anyway, I shall explain in more detail what the problem is on Talk:Golden mean (philosophy), since that's the page this is most affecting. Singinglemon (talk) 08:49, 21 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Is Theano an inspiration for the name of the machine learning package of the same name.

I'm wondering if the python machine learning library Theano was named after her. With her being an early mathematician, and all.

There might be some documentation somewhere that states what the Theano package was named after, and if it is, maybe a short statement could be added to this page?

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theano_(software) Nateguimondart (talk) 03:57, 16 March 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Rewrite

I've rewritten large parts of the page, referencing modern scholarship.

Added ancient attributions of the various conflicting biographical details.
Added scholarly interpretations of the preserved fragment and letters. the Stobaeus fragment seems to have been written as part of a polemic to counter the criticisms of Aristotle, which is worth discussing in detail, and the letters have had a fair bit of modern scholarship on them as well due to their insight into the role of women in the Hellenistic period. Probably more can be said about this, I've added a few more sources that discuss this to the Further Reading section.
Removed Waithe's theory of Theano I and Theano II: Given how harsh her reviewer was about the Theano section and the Two Theanos theory specifically (which doesn't actually seem to be based on any previous philological scholarship and cites none), I think we should exclude Waithe's theory from the article as WP:UNDUE. Pretty much every classical scholar agrees that all the writings are pseudepigraphic, so the number of pseudepigraphic authors isn't necessary and the existing scholarship seems shaky, probably best to take an agnostic approach until there's scholarship based in philological evidence to cite directly.
Removed the bit about children - the children are typically ascribed to Pythagoras, and only some traditions have Pythagoras as the husband of Theano, so we can't conclude that all children attributed to Pythagoras are attributed to Theano.
Removed the mathematics categories - The only modern source in the article is about how she wasn't a mathematician.

- car chasm (talk) 02:05, 20 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]