User talk:Kwamikagami/Archive 5

I, Ikiroid, award this Barnstar to Kwami for helping me with effectively editing language pages.

Here's a stamp from the Faroe Islands for you! Stamps from the Faroe Islands somehow promote WikiLove and hopefully this one has made your day better. Spread the WikiLove by giving something friendly to someone else, whether it be someone you have had disagreements with in the past or a good friend. Make your own message to spread WikiLove to others! Happy editing! Vatomanocu (talk) 14:13, 6 December 2007 (UTC)

		The Barnstar of Diligence
		I, Agnistus award this Barnstar to Kwami for his invaluable contributions to the Origin of hangul article.

Template consonants

I don't know if you know this, but I've merged bilabial approximant with voiced bilabial fricative so we don't need links to both in template consonants. I thought it would be neat if I had the symbol appear in both the fricative and approximant rows like the uvular, pharyngeal, and epiglottal symbols.

For some reason your edit of template consonants looks a little funny so I'm going to revert it but I didn't know if I should accomodate what you were trying to do or if I've convinced you otherwise. Ƶ§œš¹ _{[aɪm ˈfɻɛ̃ⁿdˡi]} 05:30, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

With my browser the table didn't display properly, because it uses Arial Unicode as the default font for such things, and Arial's bad for IPA. There was a recent edit comment of having converted the entire table to IPA format, but it evidently didn't work, so I reverted to the original formatting. (I think the problem may be with the table class "IPA wikipedia", which does not actually force the table to an IPA compatible font. If you know how to fix that, that would be the superior solution.)

As for merging the bilabial and dental fricatives and approximants, the problem is that the IPA symbols are purely fricative. The uvular etc. symbols are different: they are not defined as either fricative or approximant, since no language distinguishes the two. However, since we don't have separate articles for the anterior approximants, it probably doesn't matter, and I'm not going to argue for it either way. kwami (talk) 05:49, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

Mine uses Ariel Unicode too. I think most people's computers will probably do as well. I don't quite have the table skills to do too much with that table. Otherwise I'd fix the funky alignment of the stuff on the right (this is apparantly an IE issue since the table looks superb on firefox) and add some of the other affricates. Ƶ§œš¹ _{[aɪm ˈfɻɛ̃ⁿdˡi]} 06:35, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

Hawaiian phoneme is /w/

There is no Hawaiian phoneme /v/, nor /ʋ/. The phoneme is /w/. In native Hawaiian, [w] and [v] are in free variation, along with [β] (voiced bilabial fricative), but the [w] predominates. That's why "w" is the chosen representative in both English and Hawaiian spelling of Hawaiian words. You wrongly put the "ʋ" into the Wikipedia article on Hawaii. There is no published authority on Hawaiian that claims that Hawaiian has /ʋ/ instead of /w/. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 4.248.13.190 (talk) 20:05, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

Sorry, what I've seen has [ʋ] rather than [β]. However, transcribing it [w] gives the impression that it's just like English [w]. kwami (talk) 20:09, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

In the majority of instances of actual utterances, it is in fact just like English [w]. Like with Hawaiian [t] and [k] in free variation for /k/, most of the time [k] is uttered, and there's no big difference from English [k]. Hawaiian [k] (and [t]) can be aspirated or not, but English [k] (and [t]) can also be aspirated or not, depending on the phonological environment (and also on things like whether the speaker is drunk or not). —Preceding unsigned comment added by 4.248.13.190 (talk) 20:28, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

Image copyright problem with Image:Taiwanese tones.png

Image Copyright problem

Thank you for uploading Image:Taiwanese tones.png. However, it currently is missing information on its copyright status. Wikipedia takes copyright very seriously. It may be deleted soon, unless we can determine the license and the source of the image. If you know this information, then you can add a copyright tag to the image description page.

If you have any questions, please feel free to ask them at the media copyright questions page. Thanks again for your cooperation. NOTE: once you correct this, please remove the tag from the image's page. STBotI (talk) 08:01, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

I had already supplied the info, so I will just delete the tag. kwami (talk) 08:09, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

Russian

Two things.

• Firstly, I like your use of Template:Near-close central unrounded vowel. It's a nice choice and I recommend that you use Template:Near-close central rounded vowel in a similar manner. We might even want to have a Template:Close front compressed vowel (etc with other compressed vowels) and Template:Mid front unrounded vowel (etc with other mid vowels except for the mid central vowel) though we should probably bring it up on a talk page somewhere (like Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Phonetics)
• Secondly (and I may have already asked about this a long time ago), Russian phonology says that /r/ is postalveolar/retracted. Do you have a source for this? I can't seem to find anything that backs that up. — Ƶ§œš¹ _{[aɪm ˈfɻɛ̃ⁿdˡi]} 03:47, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Knock yourself out with the vowel templates!

For the Russian, Larisa Skalozub, Palatogrammy i Rentgenogrammy Soglasnyx Fonem Russkogo Literaturnogo Jazyka, Izdatelstvo Kievskogo Universiteta 1963, summarized in SOWL, has palatograms of /r/ and /rʲ/ that are quite distinct in place. L&M say "in some languages different places of articulation are contrastive for apical trills. […] In Russian, Skalozub (1963) shows a post-alveolar trill as typical for r, but a dental contact for the palatalized trill rʲ. This difference is illustrated by the palatograms in figure 7.4 from one of the speakers she studied. Variations in the shape of the tongue behind the forward contact are also apparent in this figure, which shows much greater lateral contact for the palatalized trill. Skalozub reports that the post-alveolar trill had typically 3-4 contacts, whereas rʲ often has only one. The raising of the blade and front of the tongue that is required for the palatalization may make it more difficult to maintain the aerodynamic conditions for trilling. Variation in place of contact can also be inferred from acoustic records. Lower spectral peaks are likely to indicate more retracted articulations." kwami (talk) 05:08, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Iapetus (moon)

Hiya. A bit late in posting this, since it's been a busy week or so. Just wanted to say you were absolutely right in your revert of my revert. Sorry for the bad edit, and thanks for paying close attention! I do suspect that one of the theories (probably theory #1) may account for the positioning of the ridge, but this information - if it ever was on Wikipedia in the first place - has been obliterated (probably by theories of the ridge-building moon men or something). Or maybe that was the theory which explained its placement. Who knows! Anyway, thanks. --Badger Drink (talk) 17:51, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Barq's

needs an IPA thinger and I'm too lazy. Thanks. :) vıdıoman (talk • contribs) 01:01, 12 January 2008 (UTC)

No problem. kwami (talk) 01:05, 12 January 2008 (UTC)

PronAusE

Just seeking an opinion - is there really a need for this template? The words which are expressed in it seem like they could be done in normal IPA quite easily (eg Division of Indi, Canberra or Brisbane). I'm asking your advice in case this is a hard fought compromise from some past war of sorts. I'm all but a native speaker of Australian English, and none of the words I've seen flagged with this template would sound much different, apart from normal accent differences, in any other variety of English. Orderinchaos 08:21, 12 January 2008 (UTC)

I agree with you there. We have two templates, a phonetic one for foreign languages (where we can't expect people to know the phonemics), and a simpler phonemic English one. Some Ausies weren't happy with the generic English template when it came to Aus. place names, so I made this and its twin IPAusE. Since then, however, there have only been 17 articles linked to them (last I looked), so they don't seem to be going anywhere. I'd suggest converting to the conventions of our help:pronunciation key, and if you can manage that without any bad feelings, then delete the templates. kwami (talk) 08:30, 12 January 2008 (UTC)

Image copyright problem with Image:Arabic speaking world.png

Image Copyright problem

Thank you for uploading Image:Arabic speaking world.png. However, it currently is missing information on its copyright status. Wikipedia takes copyright very seriously. It may be deleted soon, unless we can determine the license and the source of the image. If you know this information, then you can add a copyright tag to the image description page.

If you have any questions, please feel free to ask them at the media copyright questions page. Thanks again for your cooperation. NOTE: once you correct this, please remove the tag from the image's page. STBotI (talk) 00:41, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

Speedy deletion of Image:Arabic speaking world.png

A tag has been placed on Image:Arabic speaking world.png requesting that it be speedily deleted from Wikipedia. This has been done under section I8 of the criteria for speedy deletion, because it is available as a bit-for-bit identical copy on the Wikimedia Commons under the same name, or all references to the image on Wikipedia have been updated to point to the title used at Commons.

If you think that this notice was placed here in error, you may contest the deletion by adding {{hangon}} to the top of the page (just below the existing speedy deletion or "db" tag), coupled with adding a note on [[Talk:Image:Arabic speaking world.png|the article's talk page]] explaining your position, but be aware that once tagged for speedy deletion, if the article meets the criterion it may be deleted without delay. Please do not remove the speedy deletion tag yourself, but don't hesitate to add information to the article that would would render it more in conformance with Wikipedia's policies and guidelines. The Evil Spartan (talk) 19:29, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

Bastian Sick

Hi! Indeed it seems strange, to pronounce Bastian Sick's last name like "Siek", but as far as I know, the name contains the so-called "Dehnungs-c", which is seldom but not uncommon in Northern Germany, see for example "Mecklenburg", with the first vowel being long. I've heard him pronounce his name with a long /i:/ on TV as well. — N-true (talk) 12:15, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

Thanks! kwami (talk) 19:58, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

Spanish/Italian phonology and the IPA

Hi Kwami,

I write you here because I think it doesn't belong to the IPA discussion page. I was thinking over again about these r-signs, and there is still some point that for me is not too clear. As I know, though IPA can be used to transcribe phonemes, it is used more generally to transcribe real sounds and not phonemes, that's what makes it international and unique for everybody. But this supposes that it should be independent of the phonemic/phonological system of a certain language, I mean, when I transcribe the real pronunciation of a word in any language, every people all over the world should interprete it the same way. So, from this, returning to the r-problem of Spanish and Italian: we have a pair of words that exist in both languages, Spanish and Italian: caro ("expensive", or also "dear" in Italian) and carro ("car"). The real pronunciation of this pair is exactly the same in Spanish and Italian. So, from the internationality principle of IPA, you could not use two different signs just because they are different languages, when the phonological string is the same in both, because there would be a contradiction: if caro sounds the same in both languages, theorically we cannot apply different signs for the same sound, so it should be or ['karo] or ['kaɾo] for both languages, and the same way, carro should be or ['karo] or ['kar:o] for both languages, but not ['karo] for Spanish and ['kar:o] for Italian, as there are absolutely no difference in the lenght or number of trills between these languages. So, now I approached the question from the side of internationality and unanimity. What's your opinion? (Sorry for my bad English.) Regards, --TheMexican ^(talk) 09:17, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Hey, your English is perfect. Better than my Spanish, at any rate!

I agree with you, but with a couple caveats:

If you try to use the IPA for exact values, you'll find that you'll need an unwieldy number of diacritics for nearly every sound. Not only do English and Spanish /k/ differ in terms of aspiration, one is probably further forward or back than the other. Certainly the [k] in key isn't the same sound as the [k] in cookie. Also, the Spanish [r] may have more or fewer vibrations depending on where it is in a word, or simply what mood you're in when you pronounce it. So it's simply impractical to be too exact. This is part of what motivates using a broad or narrow transcription.

Secondly, according to Ladefoged, the Spanish and Italian ars are not the same sounds: the short Spanish ar is a tap, whereas the short Italian ar is a short trill. However, you're correct: If the Italian sound is articulated as a tap, then it should be written that way (assuming, of course, a phonetic (objective) rather than phonemic (subjective) transcription). Likewise, if the Spanish 'tap' is actually a short trill, it should be written as such.

Going by ear isn't always the best way to go, however. Our brains have learned to filter out all the sounds that aren't relevant to our language. Young babies, for example, hear the differences of all languages equally well. After they're a year or two old, however, they loose the ability to differentiate sounds that aren't distinctive in the language they're being raised with. So, one possibility is that the reports and laboratory measurements that Ladefoged relied on were wrong, and Spanish and Italian ars should be transcribed the same way, but another is that you're hearing Italian through Spanish ears, and since Spanish doesn't have a short trill, you just think you're hearing a tap.

To really know, you'd need to know how the tongue is being held in the two languages, which would be difficult to do. However, you can get a pretty good idea by digitally recording a bunch of different speakers saying a bunch of different words, and comparing the recordings. You can use a free download like Praat to check out the spectrograms of the sound files: If the Italian short ars sometimes have one contact, but sometimes two, then they're short trills; if the Spanish short ars never have more than one contact (between vowels, I mean), then they're most likely taps. (See the images at the right of the last link. The contacts of a tap or trill will show up as white vertical bands, narrower and (for a trill) closer together than the t's of 'tatata'.) kwami (talk) 09:56, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Thank you, I will listen to some pronunciation of both Spanish and Italian. --TheMexican ^(talk) 11:47, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

PS: Just an interesting observation, some Spanish speakers are unable to pronounce the long trill, and they pronounce a "long tap" instead, like [ˈkaɾːo]. --TheMexican ^(talk) 09:46, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Hmm. How is that different from an English [d]? kwami (talk) 09:56, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

As I hear, it will be like a voiced alveolar-lateral fricative (you hold your language in the position as to pronounce a trill, but it will not trill). The stranger thing is that one of these persons I know is a radio speaker (and cannot trill the Spanish rr) :) --TheMexican ^(talk) 11:47, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Lateral? You mean it's a [ɮ], as in Zulu? kwami (talk) 18:45, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Hmm, not exactly... more precisely it would be an apico-alveolar [z] sound, which has no IPA sign. Btw, some Latin-American speakers pronounce the single r as a retroflex r or d, this is very characteristic for example in Mexico: pero sounds like [ˈpeɽo] or [ˈpeɖo]. --Mex^talk 19:23, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Some sound samples

I have found some samples.

• for the short trill or tap: and
• for the (long) trill: (the first is a trill, the second I think is a long trill). --Mex^talk 17:00, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Thanks, I'll take a look at these later. kwami (talk) 18:45, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Sorry, I don't know how to decompress them. kwami (talk) 00:24, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

Shall I convert them to MP3 or WAV? --Mex^talk 07:14, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

WAV, please. And which program are you using? kwami (talk) 07:15, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

I have two methods, one is to open the sound in GoldWave (it's a sound editor) and to save as WAV, and the other is using the "Disk Writer" option of Winamp. I'll be able to convert them this evening, because here on my office computer I don't have these programs :( --Mex^talk 07:43, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

Here you go the converted files:

• Vibrante simple
• Vibrante múltiple

Regards, --Mex^talk 14:23, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

In 'simple', raro has 4 contacts, then 1; pero, bravo, tronco have 1; amor, comer may have 1 (certainly not more than that), but it's not a clean contact like we have in pero. In 'multiple', raro has 3 contacts, then 1; perro has 4. I wonder what perla or barca would have. kwami (talk) 23:23, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

Thank you! And here you go some of that type you said (I've applied some noise reduction so you could hear it clearerly):

• puertas, partido, arder, pobre bebé, cuervo.

Regards, --Mex^talk 08:50, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

In puertas, partido there are 2 contacts (the second isn't released but goes directly into the [t]: [pweɾ^əɾtas]); in arder and cuervo there are 2 or 3 (there are 2 released contacts, and it looks like maybe a 3rd that joins the [ð]: [aɾ^əɾ^əðeɹ] or [aɾ^əɾ^əɾðeɹ] (again, the final ar in arder doesn't seem to be a tap or a trill, but fades out maybe as a kind of approximant. It's not exactly the English [ɹ], but I don't know how else to write it.)); in pobre there are 1 or 2 (1 if the bee is released: [poβ^əɾe] or maybe [poβɾ^əɾe]).

Certainly in your pronunciation, r is a trill before stops, and I would guess that if you'd supplied carne or perla it would be there too. This fits my impression of Spanish, but contradicts the references I've seen. After stops, it can be seen as a tap, but one that doesn't connect directly to the stop, unlike English tree, where there is no separate release of the tee. That could simply be a property of taps: if they connect directly to another consonant, they might lose the tapping sound that makes them distinctive. It would be interesting to see Enrique, el real, and -sr-, to see if they have more contacts than pobre. kwami (talk) 09:34, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

It's not me, but a native Spanish speaker :) (The audios are from the Spanish Wikipedia). I edited some more with r after n/s:

• enroscar, sin radio, Israel, trigo, argos, jugar, trasgo, va a ganar, las garras.

Thank you again, --Mex^talk 10:37, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

Water fluoridation

I reverted your recent edit because 1) You didn't provide a reference to support the statement that fluoridation prevents tooth decay, so "believe" is the better phrasing; 2) Water fluoridation does cause, or at least contribute to, dental fluorosis. I have no objection to your removing the "causes bone cancer" part as that is unsupported in any case. Cheers! Franamax (talk) 02:45, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

Sorry, but the article should have plenty of refs for that already. This is the most researched medicine/additive in history. I'll get more refs later, but meanwhile the wording stays. kwami (talk) 06:05, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

I'm not going to get into a scrap over it, I'm neutral on the subject. I'm not familiar with how fluoridation prevents children from dying. You may already be aware that there is an article in Scientific American January 2008 issue (a fairly reliable source) that discussed the issue of safety and beneficial effects extensively. It is a well-balanced article and includes ref's to, e.g., an NAS study. I'll go over it again tomorrow. Franamax (talk) 06:43, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

I remember a few years back when they found a forgotten cemetery in Britain that had been used from Roman times to I believe the 16th century. Half of the people in it had died from tooth abscesses. It was a bigger killer than TB, famine, warfare, or the plague. We just had a 12-yr-old girl die in the US from a tooth abscess, and a 4-yr-old boy who nearly died. Abscesses are mostly due to untreated caries, which are largely prevented by fluoridation. When Los Angeles stopped fluoridating, the number of emergency-room visits due to dental problems skyrocketed - at one point, half of all ER visits were due to dental problems. Three hospitals hired full-time dentists for their ERs. I haven't seen the SciAm article; I'll look it up. What I have seen are summaries of research going back to the 1930s. Not even aspirin is this well researched. As with aspirin, you can OD, but that's a local issue due to ground water, and is not the reason people object to fluoridation, which is what that passage implied. The longer article covers fluorosis. kwami (talk) 07:03, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

Thanks. I see your point now on preventing deaths and I seem to remember some of those historical findings as well. One could argue that the issue here is health awareness and open access to medical/dental care as opposed to the necessity of the problematic "involuntary medication" approach. If you can find the references for the Los Angeles experience, they would be an excellent addition to the article(s).

The SciAm article presents some comparative statistics on dental outcomes and also discusses over-fluoridation due to the combination of fluoridated water supply and high fluoride levels in modern (processed food) diets. It's a good read in any case, since it is likely the source of some of the recent additions to the wiki article. Franamax (talk) 07:56, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

I hope do to so, but it might take a few weeks. California is a great case study, because (1) it was fluoridated, fluoridation was stopped, and has now been re-mandated but not fully implemented; (2) their are good records; and (3) other states with similar demographics, health care, and diet can serve as a control. kwami (talk) 08:09, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

A few weeks is fine, it takes me three hours to make a single edit :) I'll see what I can dig up in the meantime. It's a sensitive topic, after all concerns over fluoridation once destroyed civilization :) Franamax (talk) 10:24, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

List of "basic functions of speech or language"

There's a standard list (a very short one) of the "basic functions of speech or language" -- asking for information, giving information, expressing emotion, requests or orders -- like that.
I can't remember what this is called, and since I can't remember what it's called, I can't look it up and find out what it's called. :-)
Do you have any idea? Thanks. -- Writtenonsand (talk) 17:40, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

Pragmatics is the relationship between language and its speakers. A rather sketchy article, but check the links in the sections 'Significant works' and 'Topics in pragmatics' for more details. They cover all the points you mentioned. kwami (talk) 02:32, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

Thanks much.

Looks like I'm thinking of the "nine primitive speech acts" (Dore 1975) - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speech_act#In_language_development

-- Writtenonsand (talk) 12:08, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

Unit order

Hi Kwamikagami,
Please do not swap the unit order on the great lakes articles. They have been customary (metric) for a long time a and most of the source units are U.S. customary or Imperial. Also, you incorrectly, changed some of the precision of the values when you did so. Thank you, —MJCdetroit ^(yak) 02:14, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

Hi..

Hi Kwamikagami, can you let me know why my edit to article Hindi was reverted? I did not make any wrong edit did I? Mugunth^{(ping me!!!,contribs)} 12:03, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

Fine.. But if I'm not wrong, it either isn't the National Language... The constitution does not say anything about that. Mugunth^{(ping me!!!,contribs)} 12:59, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

Zouch, Nottinghamshire

It's pronounced "Zotch"; unlike Ashby de la Zouch which is like as you would if you were French ("Zoosh") Swithlander (talk) 09:48, 9 February 2008 (UTC)

Caspian Sea an ocean?

Hi! Thanks for your help with the List of lakes by area! (I’ve also always loved your map of writing systems.) However, I’ve never before heard the Caspian Sea referred to as an ocean – the ocean article indicates that "ocean" refers to the large interconnected body of water that covers 71% of the earth, and the Caspian Sea article does not describe it as an ocean. If you have sources which support your edit, I’d love to take a look; otherwise, this seems like a rather minority view. Many thanks! Citynoise (talk) 18:38, 9 February 2008 (UTC)

Hello again! I agree completely that trying to define "ocean" is like trying to define "planet." There are many self-consistent rationales one could use, but in the end any hard-and-fast definition will have to be enforced by consensus, rather than any compelling force of logic. Let’s lay out the various rationales for "ocean":

• Geological. By this reasoning, an ocean might be any body of water which overlays oceanic (i.e., relatively young) crust. You’re certainly right that geologists classify parts of the seabed of the Black and Caspian seas as oceanic (this [1] is perhaps the best map I found; oceanic crust in blue).
• Historical-Geological. Here, an ocean would be any body of water which is a remnant of the single large body of water as it existed millions of years ago. There are many sources which list the Mediterranean, Black, Caspian, and Aral seas as remnants of the Tethys Ocean.
• Hydrological. For oceanographers, the large body of water that covers 71% of the earth presents scientific problems that are not found in any other body of water. The limits of this "ocean" would be defined through things like water circulation, currents, stratification, etc. (Note that this is the rationale that defines the "Arctic Ocean" as a Mediterranean sea (oceanography), along with the Gulf of Mexico and Caribbean.)
• Etymological. The word "ocean" comes from the Greek Okeanos, meaning the great river which encircles the earth – the great outer sea in contrast to the inner (mediterranean) seas. See [2]
• Conventional. That is, the common dictionary definition stabilized through everyday use. Here all the dictionaries I have consulted define "ocean" as the single large body of water covering 71% of the earth, or its conventional subdivisions. Here [3] are many such definitions; the OED gives the most complete, but alas I can’t link to it. No dictionary defines ocean scientifically, and the OED suggests that "oceanic crust" is defined by its subjacency to the ocean, rather than vice versa.

My own preferences would rank these rationales in the opposite order in which I have listed them. From my point of view, words are defined by use, and thus can have different meanings in different contexts. A geologist speaking to other geologists would be right to refer to the southern part of the Caspian Sea as "oceanic," and an oceanographer would be right to call the Arctic waters a mediterranean sea, and in everyday conversation we would use ocean in its everyday dictionary sense.

One could, of course, make a similar list of definitions of "lake" or "sea," and reach the same conclusions.

For the various lists of lakes, I see three possible solutions:

• 1, Make implicit use of the dictionary definition of "ocean" and "lake" without much qualification, as was done before your edit.
• 2, Same as #1, but with notes where appropriate to show different possible definitions. I did this for the Michigan-Huron Lake, to make it clear that the article is using a hydrological definition, and that this is a technical use. I could imagine a similar note pointing out that while most definitions would classify the Caspian or Aral seas as lakes, there are some contexts where it makes more sense to see them instead as "waters superjacent to oceanic crust" or "remnants of the Tethys Ocean." (But note that I would be very surprised if even geologists would see these phrases as straightforwardly synonymous with "ocean.")
• 3, Include all bodies of water in the world and dispense with labels altogether. Thus the article would be renamed "List of Water Bodies by Area," and the first entry would be the World Ocean. This is an approach similar to the one taken in the List of islands by area.

Any of these solutions would seem perfectly reasonable. The way you’ve arranged it now, however, suggests that there is one simple way to define ocean or lake, and that the Caspian Sea is unambiguously an "ocean." And this is simply not true.

Looking forward to your thoughts on these issues! Citynoise (talk) 14:33, 10 February 2008 (UTC)

Reversion of phonation page

Please discuss problems you are having before reverting information on the talk page. Reversions are to be used for purposes of vandalism and inaccuracy and other similar reasons. The information added in this case is well cited from good sources and should therefore not be reverted. Any issues you have with content should therefore be discussed on the talk page before removal. Thank you.Nrswanson (talk) 22:23, 11 February 2008 (UTC)

AfD nomination of Register (phonology)

An editor has nominated Register (phonology), an article on which you have worked or that you created, for deletion. We appreciate your contributions, but the nominator doesn't believe that the article satisfies Wikipedia's criteria for inclusion and has explained why in his/her nomination (see also "What Wikipedia is not").

Your opinions on whether the article meets inclusion criteria and what should be done with the article are welcome; please participate in the discussion by adding your comments at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Register (phonology) and please be sure to sign your comments with four tildes (~~~~).

You may also edit the article during the discussion to improve it but should not remove the articles for deletion template from the top of the article; such removal will not end the deletion debate. Thank you. BJBot (talk) 16:59, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

Let's not edit war

Let's please talk about these issues. I don't want to have to bring in a mediating administrator but I will if I have to.Nrswanson (talk) 02:23, 13 February 2008 (UTC)

All right, then don't delete information you don't understand. kwami (talk) 02:25, 13 February 2008 (UTC)

But I do understand it. At least i think I do. What is it exactly that you think I am not understanding?Nrswanson (talk) 02:27, 13 February 2008 (UTC)

The fact that you say Burmese can't have a high creaky register because creaky phonation is low tone suggests that you are confusing phonation with tone. Very low tone does tend to go along with creaky phonation (e.g. at the end of an intonation unit in English), but creaky phonation can occur at any pitch - in fact, in the section on singing (something which I don't know about), it states that people get vocal fry when they try to sing high notes. kwami (talk) 02:32, 13 February 2008 (UTC)

That information on high notes in uncited and I think false. Dr. Greene in the Voice and It's Disorders says the following, "Observable vocal fry phonation through stroboscope measures its fundamental frequency at 36.4 hertz. These sounds may extend down 87 hertz or approximately two octaves below modal phonation. Vocal fry can extend up into the lower part of the modal voice but not any higher." pg 96Nrswanson (talk) 02:42, 13 February 2008 (UTC)

You also have not responded to the information on creaky voice on that web page. Every source on the internet says it occurs at a low frequency. You persist in saying I am wrong after I show you source after source.Nrswanson (talk) 02:43, 13 February 2008 (UTC)

Give me more than two minutes to respond before you start getting indignant. kwami (talk) 02:57, 13 February 2008 (UTC)

Responded at Talk:Register (phonology). kwami (talk) 03:32, 13 February 2008 (UTC)

IPA English key

I happened to notice that the "dictionary.com" uses IPA in almost exactly the same way as our broad English phonemic key. See IPA key. Is that a coincidence? Or is there a common source hiddden behind te scene? Anyway it's nice to have at hand in arguments. This includes the double quality/quantity indication in vowels and the explicit r plus schwa in rhotacized vowels. It does not use the barred i however (replaced by small cap i). −Woodstone (talk) 21:13, 13 February 2008 (UTC)

We're both using pretty standard English IPA conventions. Maybe some of the people working on this chart before it went public were influenced by dictionary.com, but the overt motivation was to avoid using the ambiguous vowel symbols a e i o u.

I should take a look at the rhoticized vowels. I don't like our convention. kwami (talk) 21:37, 13 February 2008 (UTC)

I saw you added the broad IPA as a column in the article detailing the several dialects. Good move. I had been thinking about doing the same, but hesitated during the heated discussions a while ago. −Woodstone (talk) 05:07, 3 April 2008 (UTC)

Affricates (reply)

Yes, sorry, User:Woodstone and I have been discussing this on his talk page; I guess we should have moved the discussion to the Help talk page to let others in on it. Anyway, just letting you know now. --Kotniski (talk) 12:26, 15 February 2008 (UTC)

Earth (pronunciation)

There have been several reversals on the pronunciation given at Earth. It had one conforming to the help:pronunciation page and was replaced by various other forms in succession. I reverted a few times. Currently it has separate forms for US and UK English. Neither of them in line with the help file. What do you think is a wise way to act here? Leave it be, or revert to the "broad" transcription? −Woodstone (talk) 14:37, 15 February 2008 (UTC)

Water fluoridation again

Hi again, I'm interested in your comments on this. The whole section needs more references, I'm thinking of a few more, but I'm gonna hang back to see how well received my work to-date is. You are probably well-placed to fill out ref's for some of the other statements there too. Cheers! Franamax (talk) 00:44, 17 February 2008 (UTC)

I need to find my sources. Will do what I can. kwami (talk) 00:45, 17 February 2008 (UTC)

IPA Scots Gaelic

Hi there. I can see why it might be debatable how to show velarisation (tilde vs superscript gamma) but could you please explain the other changes you made to the IPA on the lenition page? You marked Gaelic labials as palatalised for example, but they aren't and you've also changed the palatal nasal to a palatalised alveolar - what's your rationale please? Thanks Akerbeltz 00:18, 19 February 2008 (GMT)

By the way, why did you put the comment that spirantisation of /m/ to /v/ is unusual (m>v occurs in all modern celtic languages by the way, not just Irish)? Akerbeltz 20:00, 20 February 2008 (GMT)

As far as I know, it's unique to Celtic, which we can take to be a single example if this is a feature inherited from proto-Celtic. It's more than just spirantization: it involves a shift from nasal to oral articulation. The other types of lenition are found in language after language throughout the world. kwami (talk) 20:52, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

Triton

I put in back, and am removing the tags from other articles. These pronunciations can be found in most any dictionary (dictionary.com will usually give a couple), so I don't see the point. Traditionally Wikipedia hasn't bothered with citing such things: the only pronunciations we've been citing are ones that are difficult or contentious, like Charon. kwami (talk) 20:18, 19 February 2008 (UTC)

I used the pronunciation from Marrion-Webster in an article, along with a citation, and it was promptly reverted. I was informed that they must use IPA pronunciations, such as in in the Cambridge dictionary. Thus I can not use the pronunciation from "any" dictionary. So I put in citation requests where they do not match Cambridge. Under these conditions the fact tags are perfectly acceptible.—RJH (talk) 20:42, 19 February 2008 (UTC)

I seriously don't think we need fact tags on the pronunciation of 'Earth' or 'Mars', but you can get IPA transcriptions from dictionary.com. You also can convert the Webster transcriptions to the IPA using the help key that's linked through the word 'pronunciation'. kwami (talk) 20:48, 19 February 2008 (UTC)

The IPA transcriptions from dictionary.com do not match what is on the Triton (moon) page. So you tell me, what do I believe? It is unacceptible that the pronunciation guide should be able to bypass the standards that the remainder of the article is required to meet in order to satisfy FA criteria. An editor's word is not sufficient evidence.—RJH (talk) 20:53, 19 February 2008 (UTC)

P.S. manual conversion of pronunciations would fall under WP:OR.—RJH (talk) 20:57, 19 February 2008 (UTC)

Yes, they do: they list /ˈtraɪtn/, which is equivalent to what we have. The other pronunciation is covered under our comment 'or as in Greek xxx'. kwami (talk) 20:57, 19 February 2008 (UTC)

Equivalent? Do you mean you manually converted it? Well my browser doesn't display the characters you are showing, so I can't tell. But the dictionary.com shows a nu-like character before the final n, while wikipedia shows a backwards 'e'. If it is a consistent character set, why do they show up differently?—RJH (talk) 21:01, 19 February 2008 (UTC)

There is no nu-like character, so there must either be something wrong with your browser or your fonts. If you go to the help key, you'll see that we chose to write syllabic consonants with a schwa. That's a convention used in some dictionaries but not others. People find the IPA confusing enough without us using half a dozen different IPA conventions. If we have to find an exact match to use a citation, then we're not going to be able to cite very many pronunciations. kwami (talk) 21:08, 19 February 2008 (UTC)

Well it's always possible that there is a font difference. I'm using a standard IE browser with no special fonts installed, so as with many viewers that makes the pronunciation entry less than useful, even if I was familiar with the encoding. If you are converting the encoding from a different dictionary format, however, that may be considered OR and is frowned upon.—RJH (talk) 21:13, 19 February 2008 (UTC)

---

I asked for clarification of the MoS page regarding pronunciation entries. Your input at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style (pronunciation)#Referencing would be appreciated.—RJH (talk) 23:01, 19 February 2008 (UTC)

Huh?

I'm not sure I understand what you mean about conflicting with the help key. Also, I pulled the pronunciation for Pluto straight out of the OED. I'm looking at it right now. Perhaps you are looking at a different edition? (I have checked both online editions: the 1989 and the 2007.) Silly rabbit (talk) 21:01, 19 February 2008 (UTC)

The OED uses əʊ for the sound in no. We use oʊ. If people look up əʊ in the help key, they won't find it, and moreover they'll have to draw the conclusion that it is not the sound in no, since we transcribe that differently, and our transcription is phonemic. You can use the OED as a source, just convert əʊ to oʊ. kwami (talk) 21:13, 19 February 2008 (UTC)

Got it. Now I understand. Thanks for the explanation. Silly rabbit (talk) 21:15, 19 February 2008 (UTC)

Berber

On your map of world writing systems, you have a big blue bland (er, band) across Morocco, indicating, presumably, that the locals do their writing in a Berber script. Not so. Take a note in that in to your local greengrocer and you'll get a blank look. Perhaps a blue dot would be in order. PiCo (talk) 16:56, 22 February 2008 (UTC) (Nice map though :).

You're probably right about the greengrocer but even though the Arabic script is a lot more common there's people here and there who can read and write Tifinagh. So I think the band is ok... or possibly a series of dots... And things are a-changing, Neo-Tifinagh is being taught in schools in Morocco since last year and so it's likely to become much more widespread. Akerbeltz 17:07, 22 February 2008 (GMT)]

I didn't worry too much, as I assume people know how widely spread Arabic is. You could make the same criticism of Syllabics in Canada - they haven't supplanted the Latin ABCs as the map suggests. kwami (talk) 22:03, 22 February 2008 (UTC)

vandal 99.238.15.112 on hangul, hanja

99.238.15.112 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RDNS · RBLs · http · block user · block log)

I think this vandal should be blocked for his/her repeated vandalism and racist slur on the talk.[4] Thanks--Appletrees (talk) 07:33, 27 February 2008 (UTC)

Done. kwami (talk) 07:34, 27 February 2008 (UTC)

Thank you. :) --Appletrees (talk) 07:36, 27 February 2008 (UTC)

If anyone complains about me blocking them, here's a sample of their 'contributions':

==Rampant anti-Korean misinformation by Japs and chinks==

Just like to point out the rampant misinformation that Japs and Chinese editors are doing here. I've already tried discussing, at which point it turns into a barrage of insults. Therefore we are going to just continually vandalize these pages until something is done. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.238.15.112 (talk) 07:15, 27 February 2008 (UTC)

I'm making the blocks indefinite. (The other blocked address is 78.129.142.154.) These two addresses, as well as a named account Truepropagnda, have been replacing text and images with "unreferenced bullshit by chinks and japs" in the article namespace as well.[5] kwami (talk) 07:43, 27 February 2008 (UTC)

I appreciate your all effort. I think these anon and blanking socks are related to Wikipedia:Requests_for_checkuser/Case/Aneconomist--Appletrees (talk) 07:57, 27 February 2008 (UTC)

99.238.17.112 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RDNS · RBLs · http · block user · block log), sock ip vandal appears to vandalize the pages again. --Appletrees (talk) 08:07, 27 February 2008 (UTC)

I just blocked him. However, it appears that we may need a range block. You can request that from someone more experienced than I. kwami (talk) 08:09, 27 February 2008 (UTC)

I'll make a RFCU file on the vandal --Appletrees (talk) 08:16, 27 February 2008 (UTC)

It's quieted down. Maybe it was just the three IP addresses. kwami (talk) 08:26, 27 February 2008 (UTC)

(We could also protect those few articles from edits by anonymous or (I believe) new accounts.) kwami (talk) 08:27, 27 February 2008 (UTC)

I already submitted a file to RFCU. Wikipedia:Requests_for_checkuser/Case/Aneconomist --Appletrees (talk) 08:40, 27 February 2008 (UTC)

Kwami, the RFCU result confirms that they're all socks of Aneconomist. --Appletrees (talk) 09:11, 27 February 2008 (UTC)

==Sections Yoon and Stroke Order On Language Desk==

:While the English language article Yōon only lists the the palatal -j, historically and also dialectically there was also a labial -w. For example, kwazi "fire" which once contrasted with kazi "house chores". The palatal -j only followed the orthographic -i. However, the labial -w followed the orthographic -u. Bendono (talk) 09:00, 29 February 2008 (UTC)

I'm confused by what you mean with the word: "followed".

And regarding ==Stroke Order==:

Stroke Order

:::::::I didn't make this up; the article katakana lists it.Asrghasrhiojadrhr (talk) 06:13, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

Asrghasrhiojadrhr (talk) 06:33, 3 March 2008 (UTC).

The first part wasn't me. However, Bendono means that you use yagyō yōon (small ya, yu, yo) with syllabographs ending in i (ti, si, ni, ki, etc.) and wagyō yōon (small wa) with syllabographs ending in u (ku, gu).

Also, I said just now on that page that I wasn't accusing you of making anything up! kwami (talk) 06:43, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

Pardon me, I meant http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Katakana#Table_of_katakana lists it with references.Asrghasrhiojadrhr (talk) 06:44, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

Oops, your right, that wasn't you, it was Bendono. Haha.Asrghasrhiojadrhr (talk) 06:46, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

Kindly stop.

I request that you stop edit warring on pages such as List of albedo features on Mercury. I have offered to compromise by having no pronunciation listed at all, but apparently you insist on forcing your pronunciation system on these pages (which you have no other interest in). This has the character of harassment, and if continued, I will have no choice but to deal with it as such. RandomCritic (talk) 03:55, 4 March 2008 (UTC)

If you want to bring it up at MOS or wherever, fine. But I hardly see how adjusting the transcriptions to fit Wikipedia's IPA conventions is "vandalism". My interest is in seeing that people are able to pronounce words and names that they're likely to have trouble finding in a dictionary, and that we stick to one standard. If you want to change the standard, fine. Bring it up at MOS. kwami (talk) 07:06, 4 March 2008 (UTC)

My guess is that for the average native speaker of English, most of the IPA transcriptions are gibberish. How many people can really read the one for EARTH? I'm not against having IPA pronunciations, but I think a realistic and user-friendly approach would be to use some-thing more like what English dictionaries (OED, Merriam-Webster, American Heritage - I don't really care much which, since all of them are readily understandable in a short time, unlike IPA) use (or give parallel examples) in addition. User:Kdammers 01:39, 2008 April 6

Kdammers, that's just not practical because they're not "absolute" systems but use "regional". You'd end up having to come up with a different regional standard for every language/language family. And actually you're wrong... it's true that relatively few English monoglots are very familiar with the IPA but outside the English speaking world it's much more common. Look into any major French/German/Spanish/Italian dictionary and you'll find they use the IPA rather than come up with a new system for each dictionary. You can't just look at your region alone and extrapolate to the rest of the globe.

I don't see it that way. As long as there is an IPA transcription, the purists should be satisfied, and the average user can get a pretty good idea from any of the common transcriptions. The comment about regional differences applies to a cetain extent to IPA as well (consider Marry/merry/Mary and cot/caught). Yes, European dictionaries usually use IPA, but at least in Korea it is not particularly wide-spread. Even though I've studied linguistics, I just ignore a lot of the Wik IPA transcriptions as not worth the bother.Kdammers (talk) 00:18, 7 April 2008 (UTC)

And the approach is totally counter-intuitive. If the IPA is a good thing but English speakers are ignorant of the IPA then we should find ways of helping them familiarise themselves with it, not give up and resort to unreliable methods. Look at it this way, if your children were bad at long division, would you want the teachers to help them improve or would you want them to dumb down maths instead? Akerbeltz 20:33, 6 April 2008 (GMT)]

The IPA was designed to cover ALL languages (which it does with a great deal of success, though certainly not perfectly). It's like using a cannon to kill a mosquito: sure, it works, but it's over-kill. I'm not going to have my kid do long division to calculate 8/2. Kdammers (talk) 00:18, 7 April 2008 (UTC)

Then perhaps you should consider collaborating with the Simple English Wiki Project, not the main English one. People who are looking for the kind of "detail" you seem to be suggesting rarely use any sort of pronunciation guide but will usually just make a stab at reading the word and live with the result. I agree that there's no need to be deliberately obscure but the idea of an encyclopedia is to give information as accurate as possible, not to cater for every level of education/ignorance. And by the way, pronounciation isn't a mosquito... more like an elephant. I'm suprised you seem to think it's such a negligible element of language. Every intro to linguistics lecture covers the fact that sounds are the basic units of a language, even in English speaking countries ; ) Akerbeltz 11:38, 7 April 2008 (GMT)]

Sentence comparisons

Kwamikagami, let's look at sentences. A: Although no country has adopted the language officially, it has enjoyed continuous usage by a community estimated at between 100,000 and 2 million speakers for over a century. B: No country has adopted the language officially. Esperanto had continuous usage by a community estimated at between 100,000 and 2 million speakers for over a century.

B is better as it is not implying that Esperanto has this super-special innate quality that made it overcome an obstacle. WhisperToMe (talk) 05:54, 4 March 2008 (UTC)

Well, sort-of. I read it as simply saying that despite not achieving its goals of gaining official recognition, it has increased somewhat in popularity. I don't see how that implies any "super-special innate quality". However, the "had" implies that currently it has no speakers at all, and that's why I reverted it. (Sorry, I think that's the edit where I hit the 'enter' key when I tried to type a dash to add a comment explaining my edit - on my keyboard, 'hyphen' and 'enter' are adjacent.) kwami (talk) 07:11, 4 March 2008 (UTC)

ǂHõã language (clicks)

Ah, I read it as 'velar' being the click onset. Like 'alveolar click' being an apical click at the alveolar ridge, regardless of where the closure is. And a click with a velar onset is impossible. I don't know why I didn't realise that it was about the closure, because I saw it in the phoneme inventory. Still; is this the right way of referring to it? Because I find it rather ambiguous. I'm not very familiar with languages with clicks (I just know how they work and I can pronounce a few), so I don't know what is the common way of describing a click in words. But the way it is in the introduction of ǂHõã, it seems to suggest that 'uvular clicks' contrast with 'dental clicks', 'alveolar clicks', etc. Thanks for your clarification. —Nay 4 March 2008

Rongorongo

Half-way through this article and loving it! Absolutely fascinating. Lots of sourced material, with sober comments regarding significance. Great variety of sources and opinions, suggesting thoroughness without creating confusion. Clear and appropriate text, logical structure. Will think more about overall layout and details of prose style and comment or edit.

Thanks for alerting me to this article. An education in a topic I thought I'd never get a chance to research. Cheers. Alastair Haines (talk) 02:57, 5 March 2008 (UTC)

I'm glad you're enjoying it. We don't know how much it truly represents language, but it doesn't seem to resemble the structure of the proto-writing systems I've seen. And the cultural transfusion hypothesis doesn't hold up IMO - which means this could be one of only three ex nihilo inventions of writing in the world - quite remarkable. kwami (talk) 03:29, 5 March 2008 (UTC)

Thank you so much for providing the article. As you say, it could be an altogether independent script, which is really quite significant. I noticed the austronesian cognate vocab. Javanese script was probably around prior to the settling of Easter Island, but obviously there's no connection. Easter Island is an amazing microcosmic cultural history. If only we had more documents! Thanks again, I'll have another look, and I'll drop a line at FAC. Alastair Haines (talk) 15:02, 30 March 2008 (UTC)

Rings of Rhea

Hi KK. Nice work. This seems to me like a good opportunity to submit to DYK. I've never done that; have you? Please let me know if there's anywhere I can chime in with support. --BlueMoonlet (t/c) 19:05, 9 March 2008 (UTC)

Hey, that's an idea! I never have either. — kwami (talk) 19:37, 9 March 2008 (UTC)

Hiragana misinformation?

Greetings! I have had the chance to talk to you years ago about something linguistic, if I remember correctly, and I randomly stumbled on your talk page again right when I was thinking that the hiragana page is slightly incorrect. On the Gojūon page about ordering hiragana, (and on the hiragana page to some extent) it claims Gojuon is "a Japanese ordering of kana. Gojū (五十) means "fifty," and on (音,On'yomi) means 'sound', so gojūon means 'fifty sound' ordering. Despite the name, it only contains 46 common sounds, plus two no longer in use." But that seems to be in error. According to this page [6] (and others) there used to be a full set proposed in the Meiji era, if I'm　not mistaken. I'm half asleep right now, and should go to bed. If you back me up on this, I'm willing to somehow change the wording and add the two missing archaic (since two other archaic characters make the chart) characters into the chart. I made two images to do that, you are welcome to do it yourself if you see fit. I just want some feedback before changing something that seems so "set in stone" in the wording of the article. Check out this one, (yi) and (ye) this one ... Best regards, Nesnad (talk) 18:41, 10 March 2008 (UTC)

There are several possible interpretations of that. We'd require the actual promulgation of the name. I'll answer on your talk page. — kwami (talk) 18:46, 10 March 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the reply. I guess I didn't express my question in the right way though. I am wondering if you think it would be out of the place to add these meiji era characters to the chart, since it already has archaic characters. Of course I would put a foot note and what not on there if I did that. Although as you mentioned, I am also wondering if the page is mistaken to say it is named after the spaces in the chart. Evidence seems to point to characters for all slots. Hentaigana and what not. But you're right about that part, we'd need more evidence to show that I suppose. Nesnad (talk) 05:12, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

Speak of the devil, I was making that hentaigana comment on your talk page while you were writing here. I think the hiragana would be inappropriate. They seem to be plain ol' hentaigana, and if they were coöpted, that use wasn't widespread. As far as I can tell, they aren't parallel to the three extra katakana. — kwami (talk) 05:19, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

Great minds think alike. haha. So you are saying these were not in common use during the era of their introduction? As in, they don't need to be added to the chart? Although I just went and looked at the katakana chart and it has these characters, and even a link to one of the pages I looked at. Why not on the hiragana charts? Cheers. Nesnad (talk) 05:26, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

Sorry, I am simply clueless as to the history of this. The three extra katakana appear to have been created for the purposes of filling in the chart. Yi and ye appear to my eyes to be graphic modifications of i and e. Katakana wu is somewhat different: It comes from the same kanji as katakana u, 宇, but from the bottom element rather than the top. That is, it is an invented hentai katakana.

The hiragana ye and yi, however, are merely existing hentaigana for e and i that were coöpted to serve as distinct characters. That is, they aren't distinct in normal usage. I have no idea how common or widespread this ad hoc pedagogical use ever was, but I know that the regular use of hentai i and e as i and e was normal — millions of people used them in writing, and they can still be found on shop fronts. If I had to guess, I'd say that, maybe, the person or committee that invented this system to fill out the kana charts with a distinct kana for each cell used hentaigana for the hiragana chart because they were convenient, but had to invent new kana for the katakana chart because the katakana system didn't have hentaigana (or not many, anyway).

The question, then, is why the ad hoc katakana should be covered in our charts when the hiragana aren't. We're getting really close to just making things up here. However, there can be no confusion with the ad hoc katakana: AFAIK (which isn't much), they were never used for anything but this pedagogical purpose. Therefore while adding them to the chart may or may not be justified (I don't want to hazard an opinion), it won't do much harm even if it isn't justified, and is just a bit of fun, a historical curiousity. However, in the case of the hiragana, these are normal forms for i and e. Claiming that they represent yi and ye is extremely misleading. It would be like saying in English that <a> is the letter for the vowel in cat while <ɑ> is the letter for the vowel in father. You might do that when teaching children to read, but it doesn't belong in a chart of the English alphabet. It would make people think those words should be spelled "cat" and "fɑther", and that the spelling "father" was incorrect — clearly not an appropriate thing to say in an encyclopedia.

So, sorry. I think the hiragana article needs to be reworded, and please go ahead and add a asterisk to those cells to explain that (perhaps in teaching alphabets?) some kana charts coöpted hentaigana for this purpose, but my opinion is that it would be unfair to actually add them to the chart as if there were real hiragana with these values. — kwami (talk) 06:00, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

Pardon my thickness on the matter, but don't characters such as ん also come from hentaigana? So just not including the characters because they are from hentaigana, doesn't seem fair. Also, I must point out worrying about "confusing the learner" has nothing to do with an encyclopedia page. It's about information, not teaching someone how to spell in Japanese... and besides being that characters such as ゑ are on the hiragana page even though they are rarely used at all in modern Japanese. It seems with a proper footnote these characters should be able to be added to the chart, even if simply a "historical curiosity" as that is what Wikipedia is about, liberating knowledge, no? Am I confusing myself about this? Cheers, Nesnad (talk) 15:10, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

I believe you're correct, that ん originated in a hentaigana for mu, but it is now completely standardized with the value N. On the other hand, these other hentaigana continued to be used for their original values (AFAIK) long after their new ad hoc values were forgotten. ゑ is different: It is a normal kana that became redundant when Japanese /w/ dropped out before all vowels but /a/, but nonetheless it continued in standard use until just sixty years ago. It's easy enough to find books with ゑ in them, but I've never since these special hentaigana values anywhere but those Meiji Era pedagogic charts. As far as I can tell, they're the kana equivalent of the extra letters in Pitman's teaching alphabet.[7] I would object to adding Pitman's extra letters to English alphabet; however, you'll notice that article includes an obsolete order ending in X Y Z & ⁊ Ƿ Þ Ð Æ, which is equivalent to including ゑ etc. in kana (except that it's a thousand years old, not just sixty). — kwami (talk) 18:37, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

Black holes

Just wanted to say that was probably the most fascinating question I’ve seen on the Reference Desk in a very long time. — Knowledge Seeker দ 02:59, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

Thanks. It'll be nice if we get an answer! — kwami (talk) 05:04, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

Kwomtari languages

Thanks for a very nice job incorporating material from Baron's survey into the Kwomtari and Left May - Kwomtari pages. MarcusCole12 (talk) 08:02, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

List of words of disputed pronunciation

This edit http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=List_of_words_of_disputed_pronunciation&diff=next&oldid=172889508 seems to have broken all the external links on the page. Since there have been a number of subsequent edits, the 'undo' button doesn't work here, and they'll have to be fixed by hand. Nohat (talk) 06:20, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

Sorry. They should now be fixed. — kwami (talk) 06:31, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

Harvard refs

Hi Kwami. If you don't get an answer to your question at WT:CITE, try the GA or FA folks. - Dan Dank55 (talk) 23:44, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

Intelligibility of Chaozhou with other southern Min dialects

Hello Kwami, I see that you have added an analogy to the intelligibility between southern Min dialects and was wondering where you obtained this piece of information from and whether you could quote the source, or I'm afraid it does not comply with Wikipedia's policy of verifiability and has to be taken out:

"It has low intelligibility with other Min Nan dialects, having fewer words in common than German has with English." Shingrila (talk) 05:53, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

That comes from Min Nan#Mutual intelligibility. If those sources are not adequate, please delete or modify the comment as you see fit. — kwami (talk) 06:00, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

Thanks. I think that's adequate, but does Wikipedia have a system of quoting sources from another Wikipedia entry? Shingrila (talk) 06:19, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

No, not unless you're summarizing another article with a {{main}} tag or something similar, in which case you likely won't need refs. Otherwise it's best to copy over the sources you want. Sorry, that was one of a couple dozen articles with tone that I was making quick fixes to, and I didn't spend the time to do it right. — kwami (talk) 19:33, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

Meitei Mayek script

I did, but who knows who is right.68.148.164.166 (talk) 09:36, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

I don't have any qualms interpreting "18 alphabets" as "18 akshara". Meithei isn't a likely candidate for 18 alphabets. — kwami (talk) 19:41, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

Alsatian lenes

In the article voice (phonetics), you have written an interesting remark on Alsatian stops: That the glottis may be "positioned for voicing" without vibrating. That sounds like an interesting idea to me, so I'd be interested in the sources. -- machᵗᵃˡᵏ 10:05, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

Sorry for eavesdropping here, but I think the same happens in Thai /k/ (ก). That many be the reason English textbooks sometimes transcribe it by "g". −Woodstone (talk) 10:28, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

Mach, I could've sworn that was in Ladefoged SOWL, but the closest I can find now is a comment that 'voiced' stops often have no vibration in Germanic languages. Godefroy might be able to help you; I made that edit after a discussion with him.

Eavesdropping, Woodstone? I'm outraged. You'd think this was a public discussion or something! Well, two can play at that game: Just you wait, some day I might chime in on your talk page!

I'd always thought that Thai /k/ was transcribed <g> because its VOT was closer to half-voiced English /g/ than to aspirated English /k/. SOWL doesn't say anything in particular about Thai tenuis stops, but does say that the voiced stops are stiff or even creaky. But maybe you're on to something: If the voiced stops are further along the voicing scale than modal voice, perhaps the tenuis stops are as well, if for no other reason than to maximize the distinction between /th, t, d/. — kwami (talk) 10:42, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

I guess you're referring to User talk:Kwamikagami/Archive 4#Alsatian (which was in response to User talk:Godefroy#Alsatian) which refers to [8]? That does not seem to be a very solid source.

I understand that the habit of using 'voiced sign' + 'voiceless diacritic' ([b̥ d̥ ɡ̊]) belongs to a diversity of transcriptions that have originated because the IPA signs taken from French orthography, a language with a clear voiced-voicless opposition, are perceived to be inappropriate for the transcription of the Southern German all-voiceless fortis-lenis oppositions. I think 'voiced sign' + 'voiceless diacritic' is nothing but an ad-hoc transcription that has spread, though it is by no means an accepted standard. It seems to be quite common in works on Alemannic dialects (see for instance as a random example the transcription [z̥iːb̥ə] 'to sieve': [9]) – and it is also extended to all lenes even though they don't correspond to a voiced sound in any variety of German (for instance [ʒ̊lɑːv̥]: [10], p. 11, which corresponds to standard German [ʃlɑːf] 'sleep'). While it seems to me that the transcription of the lenes in this way is comparatively widespread (though there are those who use simple 'voiced sign' for voiceless lenes, for instance [blibə] 'stay' in the graph [11]), the transcription of the corresponding fortes seems to vary between single 'voiceless sing' (see [b̥et] or [b̥rux] in the first above example [12]) and doubled 'voiceless sign' (see [v̥iʃʃ] 'fish' or [ʒ̊ritt] 'pace' in the second above example). I've also seen a monography that suggested transcribing the lenes with single 'voiceless sign' and the fortes with doubled 'voicless sign' (in a similar manner as in the Finnish orthography): Astrid Kraehenmann [sic] (2003): Quantity and Prosodic Asymmetries in Alemannic, Synchronic and Diachronic Perspectives, Berlin/New York: Mouton de Gruyter, ISBN 3-11-017680-7. That monography argues that what is traditionally called a fortis-lenis opposition is phonologically a quantity opposition. I think I've seen other works that also have measured a difference in acoustic quantity. However, it seems to me that there is no unanimity about the phonological interpretation, so for the time being, the diversity of transcriptions will stay – at least in what concerns Alemannic varieties; I don't know about Thai.

So I suppose there is no source for 'glottis disposed to vibrate but not vibrating'? -- machᵗᵃˡᵏ 13:55, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

I don't recall what the source was. There may have been discussion on a different page, though I can't find one. That's what you should ask Godefroy about. It wasn't the Orthographe de l'alsacien site. — kwami (talk) 17:27, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

Are you sure? He made no other contributions in that time.[13] But sure, there are many more means of communication then en.wikipedia-contributions: I'll ask him anyway. -- machᵗᵃˡᵏ 18:03, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

I only remember that I had changed voiceless voiced stops to tenuis stops in some Alsatian names, and that Godefroy argued for restoring them. I don't know if there might have been discussion on a user IP page, or if I found some other source, because the discussion you've pointed out is hardly enough to make such a claim on. Best to delete it if we can't justify it. However, we need some justification of the transcription, either that or change the IPA transcription of Alsatian place names, and that's what got Godefroy involved in the first place. — kwami (talk) 19:54, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

I think sources as the ones I've pointed to are a sufficient source. They show that this kind of transcription is in actual scientific use for Alemannic varieties. -- machᵗᵃˡᵏ 06:51, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

Yes, it's used. But if we're going to use it, we need to explain what it means. What's the difference between [b̥] and [p]? If we can't explain it, then we can hardly expect our readers to understand it. — kwami (talk) 17:14, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

It's easy to explain: It's a fortis-lenis contrast that does explicitly not rely on voice. -- machᵗᵃˡᵏ 16:48, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

Question about IPA

Hi, I'm getting interested in IPA system but do not read the whole article yet. Why does Hangul article have the two pronunciation templates like the below? Doesn't the article have to have only one template for consistency? What is difference between the two? Thanks in advance. --Appletrees (talk) 04:26, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

Hangul (/ˈhɑːŋɡʊl/, or Korean )

They are the English and Korean pronunciations, respectively. Wikipedia pronunciations should be in English unless otherwise stated. Also, if you follow the first link (the "pronounced"), you'll find a simplified IPA key specifically for English. — kwami (talk) 06:38, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

Thank you for the answer, but I still don't understand why the two pronunciations are needed because slight difference makes people misunderstand or mistake with another word. If I spell and read the first one in Korean, it is "항굴", not "한글". I also wonder why "ㄱ" is spelled "k" sound with th IPA. --Appletrees (talk) 13:57, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

Why would you spell an English word in Korean and expect it to be good Korean? Also, I don't understand your comment about the "k". — kwami (talk) 17:10, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

Hmmm.. 'hangul' is a purely native English word? It is from Korean language. The above two pronunciations are so different, I think putting one IPA template is enough for the article, because it is confusing. As for the "k", as you know that in the revised romanization, 'ㄱ' and 'ㅋ' sounds are spelled "g" and "k" respectively. I put IPA pronunciation into Bulgogi and it is weird that bulgogi is sounded "pulkoki" in the system. The IPA help or main article don't have the Korean phonology and I am curious it is designated by scholars or you or other editors here.--Appletrees (talk) 17:40, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

Of course it comes from Korean. That's irrelevant: it has an English pronunciation. Bulgogi was incorrectly linked to the English IPA chart. That's now been fixed. Revized Romanization is also irrelevant. — kwami (talk) 18:05, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

Maybe I'm confused because I have not read the whole related articles on IPA but I referred the pronunciations from Korean phonology article. "ㄱ" consonant is spelled "k" according to the article. The reason I mentioned the revised romanization is to show the different pronunciation. I must learn liguistic terms to explain what I feel weird about the system though.--Appletrees (talk) 18:08, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

Okay, I see where you're coming from. The IPA was designed to be independent of orthography. It doesn't matter whether you use RR, Wade-Guiles, Yale, hangul, or hanja to write Korean; the IPA indicates the pronunciation, independently of any of that. That said, you can transcribe phonetics or phonemics. Phonetically, ㄱ is [k] at the beginning and end of a word, but [g] between vowels. Phonemically, it's always the same speech sound, which you can transcribe however you see fit. (As long as you explain yourself.) Normally, however, ㄱ is transcribed /k/, while ㅋ is transcribed /kʰ/, because voicing is not important in Korean, while aspiration is important. — kwami (talk) 18:19, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

Thank you for the kind answer. I strongly feel like I need to learn the system first to communicate with you or raise anything related IPA. I just wanted to insert an IPA template to Korean related article because for non-Korean speakers, Korean titles are hard to properly pronounciate such as Tangpyeongchae. I frequently saw someone complaining about the inconsistency of Korean romanization, so using IPA is a good option for them (uploading relevant ogg file is much ideal though). --Appletrees (talk) 18:38, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

Excuse me for overreading your conversation. Providing transcriptions for IPA-literate folks may be a very good idea, but will also lead to more inconsistency due to this project being a wiki. Try it, but be aware that people will disagree on how to transcribe Korean and frequently "correct" each other's transcriptions, resulting in different IPA for (roughly) the same sound in different articles. If there is a 국립국어원-sanctioned pronunciation dictionary, let's use that. The 표준국어대사전 provides neither phonetic nor phonemic IPA transcriptions, just ordinary Hangul, e.g. “곱소리 [-쏘-]”. Wikipeditor (talk) 21:39, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Nesnad#gojuuon

Hello,

Yi and wu have never been allowed by Japanese phonotactics, as far back as we can trace the language.

— — kwami (talk) 05:16, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

Could you explain the phonotactics? Why were have yi and wu have never been allowed/Why are yi and wu never allowed?68.148.164.166 (talk) 07:00, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

It's very common for languages not to use these combinations of sounds. The y sound is very similar to i, so it's difficult to distinguish them. The same is true for w and u. They're also not found, or at least not distinguished from i and u, in Korean, Mandarin, Spanish, Malay, Portuguese, Swahili, Italian, French, Vietnamese, Arabic, etc. etc. — kwami (talk) 07:33, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for your information, but I'm looking for information specfically to Japanese. Is it a specific phonological process, etc.?68.148.164.166 (talk) 23:49, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

Excuse me for butting in. Morphologically, Japanese undoubtedly did have yi and wu. This is clear in the verbal paradigms. A few examples include:

• oy- "age": oi > *oyi, oi > *oyi, oyu, oyuru, oyure, oi(yo) > *oyi(yo)
• suw- "plant": suwe, suwe, suu > *suwu, suuru > *suwuru, suure > *suwure, suwe(yo)
• uw- "plant": uwe, uwe, uu > *uwu, uuru > *uwuru, uure > *uwure, uwe(yo)
• uw- "starve": uwe, uwe, uu > *uwu, uuru > *uwuru, uure > *uwure, uwe(yo)

However, as far back as we have Japanese texts (c. early 8th century), there is no phonological contrast between /i, yi/ and /u, wu/. You could posit two phonological rules to account for this:

• y -> Ø / _i
• w -> Ø / _u

FYI Bendono (talk) 00:21, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

The palatal lateral fricative

Dear Kwarmi,

As you are the main manager of the IPA article, I report you something that I think it is wrong. In the IPA table, the [ʎ] appears as a palatal lateral approximant. It is not an approximant, but a fricative. It is pronounced the same way as an L, but the difference is in the point of articulation: it is not alveolar but palatal. Also the sample sound recording is wrong in the main article. If you listen to this recording in Old Castilian, you will here this sound: [14] I also commented it in the discussion page of the article. Regards, --Mex^talk 17:35, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

Hi, Mex. [l] and [ʎ] are both approximants. You're right about the sample, though: that's just [j]. — kwami (talk) 17:44, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

I see now. Thanks for the explanation. I can try to cut out a correct sound sample from a Spanish recording if you want. --Mex^talk 18:26, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

That might be better than a fake sample, as we now have it. You'd probably want to bring it up with the people who are working on that, though, since I think they're trying to keep all the samples parallel ([Xa, aXa] etc.). I haven't done anything with the sound files. — kwami (talk) 18:31, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

I looked for it, User:Peter Isotalo made all the recordings. I'll ask him to re-record it then. --Mex^talk 18:37, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Reference_desk/Archives/Language/2008_February_28#Yoon

/Cj/ and /Cw/ were, I believe, first found in Chinese loans, and only later spread to native words, rather like /ʒ/ in English. Regardless, they've been around for a millennium. ティ and the like come from English (and perhaps other European languages) and are very recent; there are many people who cannot pronounce them 'correctly'. Orthographically, I don't know if they were ever used other than as yōon, but my guess would be no. However, くわ certainly was.

— kwami (talk) 09:05, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

I am throughly and utterly confused.Asrghasrhiojadrhr (talk) 06:29, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

AFAIK (and I may well be wrong), Japanese is thought to have only had vowel (V) and consonant-vowel (CV) syllables before the influence of Chinese. With Chinese borrowings came new types of syllables, like myo, kwa, and hun (if you want to call the latter a syllable). Much later, under English influence, we get new syllables again, such as ティ. — kwami (talk) 06:42, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

User:Ling.Nut/Funerary art

Hi Kwami,

If you know anyone reliable who could help with the "Africa" section (or any section, actually) of User:Ling.Nut/Funerary art, I'd be deeply in your debt. later! Ling.Nut (talk) 03:10, 28 March 2008 (UTC)

Sorry, I can't help you there, except maybe to point out the elaborate modern coffins in parts of Ghana. — kwami (talk) 06:07, 28 March 2008 (UTC)

OK, thanks! :-) Ling.Nut (talk) 06:09, 28 March 2008 (UTC)

email

... is served... Ling.Nut (talk) 06:56, 28 March 2008 (UTC)

Sign language#Sign languages

I enjoyed reading your recent contribution to this page, but I'd like to see some references, please. Cbdorsett (talk) 23:38, 28 March 2008 (UTC)

I just merged that from a list article. I think I might have written it originally, but a lot of people have added to it since. I'll see what I can dig up, though. — kwami (talk) 23:42, 28 March 2008 (UTC)

Palatal lateral approximant (again, corrected)

Hi Kwami. As the user who made the recordings for the sound samples seems to be inactive, I decided to make the correct recording, according to the other samples. I've put the corrected audio link into the article, please check it. I think it won't be bad until that user connects again and makes a better one, what do you think? Regards, --Mex^talk 22:05, 29 March 2008 (UTC)

The laterality of it is much easier to hear in your version, but you didn't make it [lʲ], so I think it's good. — kwami (talk) 22:24, 29 March 2008 (UTC)

Free-electron scattering extinction

The idea is as follows:

1. Assume that the Thomson scattering cross section applies for each free electron.
2. Assume that the density of the intergalactic medium is one atom/electron per cubic meter.
3. Assume that the distance traveled by a photon is on the order of 1 billion light years.
4. Multiply the cross section by the distance to obtain the effective volume which is on the order of 0.002 cubic meters. This means 2 photons out of every thousand will be scattered by an electron.
5. Realize that a magnitude difference of 0.25 is associated with 10^0.25/2.5 ratio in flux that corresponds to a difference in flux of about 25%.

And you're done.

ScienceApologist (talk) 08:41, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

By the way, it's okay that you're skeptical. Most astronomers were skeptical the first time they saw the results. Most are now convinced that the results are real and not due to extinction, but not everyone is convinced that dark energy is the only explanation. ScienceApologist (talk) 08:43, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

Yes, take the total Thomson cross-section which is 6.652 x 10^-29 square meters. If you assume 10 Glyrs then it is indeed 2%, but notice that the magnitude difference between zero cosmological constant and 0.7 becomes greater too (approaching 1). Another issue is that eventually the nonlinearity of the Hubble Constant due to matter domination becomes too great an effect to see flux decrement at 10 Glyrs. We do, however, see the scattering of light due to free electrons/ions in the optical depth of the CMB due to reionization. ScienceApologist (talk) 10:14, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

The resolution you are looking for is Kruskal-Szekeres coordinates. The problem was that people looking at Schwarzschild coordinates were not taking into account that objects which actually fall into the black hole do not use those coordinates: only people looking at the black hole from afar do. The physical properties of the black hole are determined by the stress-energy tensor associated with it and to find out what that is, you have to change to the new coordinate system. Also note that in Eddington-Finkelstein coordinates you can also resolve the paradox you outlined of the apparent singularity at the event horizon with nothing ever apparently "falling in". ScienceApologist (talk) 15:16, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

This is a somewhat rough estimate, but it's in the right order of magnitude and better constrained than many other measurements. The best constraints are from the WMAP anisotropy data that is directly sensitive to the baryon density in the universe. ScienceApologist (talk) 13:41, 2 April 2008 (UTC)

April 1

Arr, matey! Ye have been blocked for an infinite amount of time fer makin' the followin' joke responses to these pages: This is a prank, obviously.

• Pirates
• Ninjas
• Zombies
• Robots
  

Ungggggh....for more information, please see here and donate braaaaainss....
IF YOU WISH TO DISCUSS THIS BLOCK PLEASE DO SO ON THE TALK PAGE. BUT RESISTANCE IS FUTILE. YOU WILL NOT BE UNBLOCKED. THANK YOU.

And you were almost geeky enough to get it at the stroke of midnight my time! — kwami (talk) 09:01, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

IPA for Azulejo

Hi, is this transcription right for Azulejo? IPA: [aθulexo]

I have zero knowledge of Spanish and Portuguese, so I need your confirm. Thanks in advance.--Appletrees (talk) 17:32, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

Thank you very much and have happy April! --Appletrees (talk) 17:50, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

Ytpo

"Typo" is so boring. I picked up that habit here, I think it was User:TenOfAllTrades I saw do it first. --Milkbreath (talk) 20:07, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

Nitrogen

With ref to this edit: I had some refinery confined-space training where nitrogen was specifically discussed (remanent purge gas danger). The explanation was that pure nitrogen would flood the CO2 sensor cells (a patch of cells in the chest near the heart?) and disable the breathe-out response, thus obviating the breathe-in response. This was accompanied by a video re-enactment and a trembling-lip statement from the safety officer that he was on shift the day those two guys died. They seemed really really serious about nitrogen. I appreciate that you made a one-off comment on the refdesk, but I'm curious myself - what is the mechanism, and after unconsciousness due to nitrogen inhalation, will the body naturally revive in air atmosphere, or is it game over? Thanks. Franamax (talk) 07:13, 3 April 2008 (UTC)

Wow, I have no idea. I was under the impression you would breath normally (after all, you're still producing CO₂, and so should still feel the need to breathe), but that without inhaling CO₂ you'd have no sensation of suffocation, and so would be oblivious to the danger and simply pass out. I find it a little difficult to believe that N₂ could saturate the CO₂ sensors, since our air is 70% N₂ to begin with, but I'm out of my depth here. — kwami (talk) 07:32, 3 April 2008 (UTC)

My understanding is that you breathe normally and "would be oblivious to the danger and simply pass out" - that's exactly what they were saying. Watch out for that 70%/100% nitrogen reasoning, the liveable limits for oxygen are 19.5 to 21% as far as I know, it's not necessarily some, none or all. I'll try to find some more comment on this - it does interest me. Thanks! Franamax (talk) 10:22, 3 April 2008 (UTC)

Most healthy people can get along at 18,000 ft with no exertion (half normal air and thus oxygen pressure), but they need to accomodate. The FAA thinks normal people pass out in 30 min at 18,000 ft (I'm sure that isn't everybody), but they make pilots use O2 at altitudes above 12.5 - 14,000 ft for more than 30 min. And above 14,000 pilots all the time, and passengers above 15,000. [15]. So if we use the 14,000 ft limit (less than Pike's Peak in the US!), that gives us 57% of normal or equivalent of 12% O2. 18,000 ft is 10.4% O2. Somewhere in there is the danger zone for "sudden" unacclimatized hypoxia and loss of ability to think clearly. Of course, people have climbed Everest without O2 at the equivalent of 6.5% O2 or so at sea level-- but that would kill you within minutes if you tried that unadapted.

Now, as for mechanism. CO2 sensors do make you breathe, so you continue to breathe in any non-irritating atmosphere, including inert gas, N2, or hypoxic mixes. Nitrogen doesn't saturate any receptors. Instead, what happens is this: humans don't have very good "low O2" sensors. Unlike burrowing animals and diving animals, we don't sense low O2 very well, directly. Thus, there is very little if no sense of discomfort or warning for atmospheres which are low in O2, but ALSO normally low (or zero) in CO2. That's what happens at sudden high altitude, or in nitrogen. It can also happen in scuba rebreathers when the oxygen isn't flowing-- the CO2 is scrubbed out, but no O2 replaces it, then the O2 level in the mix goes down and down and the diver doesn't notice till they lose consciousness (this is usually fatal, but I've seen one guy survive when it was noticed that he was just floating on the bottom unconcious, and one of his students got him to the surface). This is probably the most common rebreather fatality, and has happened to at least one Nobel Prize winning nuclear physicist! You might have seen Dr. Jonathan Miller actually do this experiment on himself in The Body in Question series in 1978. He lost consciousness without ever feeling short-of-breath. It's what happened to the NASA guys.

Now, what does it look like? Well, the unconscious person continues to breathe for a while before the hypoxia stops even that, so if they are returned to normal O2 within a certain time, they spontaneously wake up. If they quit breathing or go to agonal gasping, they'll need artifical respiration to recover.

If they go to actual cardiac arrest, they'll need full CPR and may or may not spontaneously restart their hearts when oxygenated blood is delivered to the coronaries (this happens more likely with children). Adults often need a heart shock as well, since they'll be in ventricular fibrillation. What the limits to how long this can go on? Once the heart stops it's the standard 4-6 min before permanent brain damage in adults, even with resuscitation. 10 if you're very, very lucky but odds are against you. If you saw resuscitation after drowning scene in The Abyss you get the idea. Post-resusciation treatments like brain-cooling and chemicals show promise, and dogs have been resuscitated to normal after 15 minutes of cardiac arrest. One day people will, too SBHarris 21:44, 3 April 2008 (UTC)

Okay, that's what I suspected. I don't recall for sure what the resuscitation records are in humans, but I believe one was ~ 45 min. for a boy who slipped under the ice. kwami (talk) 22:04, 3 April 2008 (UTC)

Yeah, but that's another category of pre-insult and during-insult hypothermia (brain cools a lot before heart stops, then continues cooling by conduction, especially in kids, during arrest). There's a case in Utah where a 6 year old child fell into an icewater snowmelt brook and was under for over an hour, surviving with minimal brain damage after heart-lung machine resuscitation. But any case with cooling before cardiac arrest is special, and all times change drastically. They can stop the heart for zero blood pressure brain artery surgery for 45 min, after cooling to just 15 C. Dogs have been resuscitated from 4 hours arrest at 1 C (packed in ice). The figures I gave are all for total brain ischemia (no blood pressure) at normal body temp, and the treament referred to is cooling AFTER resusciation (restoration of blood pressure and oxygen), not before. So they're about effects to the brain's responses to the damaging insult by a little bit of post-injury cold (like ice to a sprained ankle or burn), and don't include the much grosser changes that happen to brain metabolism from deep hypothermia applied before and during the insult. SBHarris 03:17, 4 April 2008 (UTC)

Of course, you're not going to be able to pre-chill someone who chokes during dinner! kwami (talk) 03:27, 4 April 2008 (UTC)

Hangul and Phagspa

I understand the Phagspa–Hangul connection is a minority opinion. But I believe displaying full genealogical list of scripts linking from phagspa is more informative to the reader. In order to clarify its disputed status, I have added "(contorversial)" next to phagspa in the genealogical table explaining its status. - Agnistus (talk) 03:06, 4 April 2008 (UTC)

That would be my preference too. I'm just think you may have a fight on your hands. kwami (talk) 03:25, 4 April 2008 (UTC)

I believe adding the word "(controversial)" into the table right before phagspa would be more informative that having absolutely no info at all. BTW, I had no option but to be anonymous while using my friend's computer due to the risk of keyloggers. - Agnistus (talk) 17:19, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

Okay, no problem with signing in. (Some people abuse it.) I really do think that consensus should be reached here. We can probably come up with something that's acceptable to everyone. Ledyard's a respected scholar, so this isn't some crackpot; I'm not sure "controversial" is the proper word. Maybe just "minority opinion" or something. On the other hand, he doesn't believe the derivation of hangul from 'phagspa is parallel to the derivation of 'phagspa from Tibetan, or Tibetan from brahmi, so a simple table is misleading. He's even gone on record to say that the last thing he wants is for people to interpret his work as simply saying that hangul derives from 'phagspa. kwami (talk) 20:54, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

Taoiseach

I have to disagree wholeheartedly. The pronunciation is incorrect as quoted in the OED. The IPA entry on any page should reflect the actual pronunciation and not an erroneous one. I shall start a discussion on it on the page in question. Jamesnp (talk) 10:49, 4 April 2008 (UTC)

Okay, but we should have the pronunciation of those who don't speak Irish. kwami (talk) 16:33, 4 April 2008 (UTC)

Ivybridge

Can you check the IPA pronunciation for this article. Note: uses British English. Bsrboy (talk) 12:49, 5 April 2008 (UTC)

Perfect, except for minor formatting. (A cap "I" looks like a small "L" in a lot of fonts, and if you don't specify to the browser that it's IPA, it won't display properly on IE.) kwami (talk) 17:36, 5 April 2008 (UTC)

Thanks! Bsrboy (talk) 19:22, 5 April 2008 (UTC)

Arabic /ɬˤ/

Classical Arabic had */ɬˤ/. This has become /dˤ/ in Standard Arabic (and /zˤ/ in Egyptian Arabic). According to Watson (2002) parts of the Hadramawt of southern Yemen still retain the lateral pronunciation (p 2). She also says that in some southern Yemen dialects, including that of Ghaylħabbān [sic], this lateral pronunciation is preserved, though it becomes [ðˤ] if there is a liquid in the same word (p 16). — Ƶ§œš¹ _{[aɪm ˈfɻɛ̃ⁿdˡi]} 19:13, 5 April 2008 (UTC)

Are those mutually exclusive? I don't know either way. I could speculate that the presence of nearby languages could have prompted the preservation (as is the case with the palatal lateral of South American Spanish dialects in close contact with Quechua). But, of course, this is OR. — Ƶ§œš¹ _{[aɪm ˈfɻɛ̃ⁿdˡi]} 20:21, 5 April 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Rongorongo/archive2

Hello. I've restored that page. The FAC was closed here. The bot just does the paperwork. Gimmetrow 06:04, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

Just a note about FAC: nominations get closed after a certain period of time when there is still outstanding opposition. This way the FAC list doesn't get too long. My comments, for example, would require a lot of work before I would be willing to strike the oppose. General practice is that when your nomination is closed, finish fixing all of the issues, contact the opposers to have them look at the article again and see if their objections have been met, and then renominate the article. It is preferred that you wait at least one week and probably longer before renominating to be fair to other nominators. Karanacs (talk) 14:09, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

Image:Rongorongo_X_Birdman_(color).jpg listed for deletion

An image or media file that you uploaded or altered, Image:Rongorongo_X_Birdman_(color).jpg, has been listed at Wikipedia:Images and media for deletion. Please see the discussion to see why this is (you may have to search for the title of the image to find its entry), if you are interested in it not being deleted. Thank you. Mangostar (talk) 14:08, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

Rongorongo

Hard luck. If you can get people over the barrier of your unusual (for Wikipedia) approach to referencing, I don't see many serious obtacles to success next time. That may or may not be effective consolation! (If you're wondering why I didn't vote support, I don't very often because I feel I shouldn't if I haven't checked out the whole article in detail. Of course I never have the time to do that....) 4u1e (talk) 19:07, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

Hey, no worries, and thanks for sticking up for me when you did. kwami (talk) 19:11, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

Sorry it wasn't more effective! ;-) 4u1e (talk) 20:15, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

Generally articles are encouraged to have at least one citation per paragraph. If the whole paragraph comes from a single source, cite it at the end of the paragraph. If several paragraphs in a row come from the same source, it should still appear at the end of every paragraph. That makes it easier for someone to come along later and verify the information (or search out additional information from teh source). Good luck! Karanacs (talk) 20:43, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

Stricture Hierarchies?

Back in 2005, in the article for raising you said that laterals and nasals have their own hierarchies. Can you add them to the page? Or provide reference on the page to information on stricture hierarchies? Thank you. Augur (talk) 07:24, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Okay, I've reworded it so that hopefully it's now clear. I'll try a chart too. kwami (talk) 07:45, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Templates

Please undo your changes to the templates starting with 'IPA', there's no consensus for them. Unlike the format 'pronounced X', the format 'X' doesn't give any indication as to what 'X' is, while the format 'IPA: X' does. There's also the issue of the double brackets in the countless articles that formerly had 'IPA: [X]' enclosed between parentheses. Timeineurope (talk) 17:52, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Okay, easy enough to change, but let's get feedback from other people too. There are also countless articles where the "IPA:" is redundant. kwami (talk) 17:59, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Genre

That genre can be pronounced with both [ʒ] and [dʒ] doesn't mean that the phoneme /ʒ/ can ever be realised as [dʒ]. Some people won't have [ʒ] in certain positions, but that's not because they realise the phoneme /ʒ/ as [dʒ] in such positions – it's because they use the phoneme /dʒ/ instead. While it makes sense to say that German Rat and Rad, both [ˈʁaːt], are /ˈraːt/ and /ˈraːd/, respectively, because other forms of the lexeme Rad, such as Räder, have [d], I don't find that it makes sense to say that journal and genre – when both are pronounced with [dʒ] – have /dʒ/ and /ʒ/, respectively, because there is no word related to genre that has [ʒ]. Timeineurope (talk) 19:02, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Change the wording, then. This is the same issue as with /ʍ/. The point is that if someone who does not have initial /ʒ/ (the vast majority of the monolingual population) looks up "genre" in the IPA key that you keep reverting to, they won't know how to pronounce the word. That takes precedence over any philosophical quibbles you may have. kwami (talk) 19:44, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

No, it's not the same issue. While /ʍ/ and /w/ are separate phonemes only for some people, /ʒ/ and /dʒ/ are separate phonemes for everyone, and so /ʒ/ can't double for /dʒ/ the way /ʍ/ can double for /w/. The IPA key was fine with beige as an example; you were the one who introduced genre as an example of /ʒ/. Since you have now provided a reference that it is in fact pronounced either with /ʒ/ or with /dʒ/, it was obviously a bad example of a word with /ʒ/ and you should never have substituted it for beige. The several dictionaries I consulted indicated that genre was always pronounced with /ʒ/ and so I had no qualms letting it stay as an example of /ʒ/. If those dictionaries were right, everyone would have initial /ʒ/ and so the problem of someone not having initial /ʒ/ not knowing how to pronounce the word wouldn't arise. As it turns out, genre can be pronounced in two different ways (and I have edited the article Genre accordingly), but get this: genre can be pronounced in two different ways not because /ʒ/ is ever realised as [dʒ], but because genre can be pronounced both with /ʒ/ and with /dʒ/. There's no need for anything taking precedence over something else, as it is perfectly possible to combine the necessary level of accuracy with accommodating those monolingual speakers. As long as the false statement about /ʒ/ ever being pronounced as anything else than [ʒ] is removed, everything's fine. The problem for the monoglots would only be that a word, genre, that's pronounced with /ʒ/ by some and /dʒ/ by others, was falsely said to be pronounced with /ʒ/ by everyone. Again, I only let genre stay as an example of a word pronounced with /ʒ/ because several dictionaries say that's the way it's pronounced. Had I known that it can also be pronounced with /dʒ/, I wouldn't have let it stay as an example of a word with /ʒ/. As for philosophy, that doesn't come into it. This is linguistics, it's a science. Linguistic statements can be right or wrong, and yours was wrong, so it had to be removed. Timeineurope (talk) 02:10, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Some people have initial /ʒ/, most don't. In initial position, it's exactly parallel to /ʍ/, which some people have, and most don't. We need the example, or the chart will be incomplete. kwami (talk) 05:43, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

This dicussion was continued at Help talk:Pronunciation#Genre.

Pronunciation respelling key

I am baffled by your reversion of my edit of this article. The column headings, as you have written them, imply that there exists such a thing as a "Wikipedia IPA" -- and there is no such thing. The current headings also fail to make clear that we are contrasting a respelling transcription with the IPA transcription.

Can we agree that the first column should be headed, perhaps, as "Respelling Symbol" and the second column simply as "IPA Symbol"? It seems to me that that would be simple and clear. Morris K. (talk) 20:14, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

I agree that the wording you've just suggested is superior. My main motivation was to avoid the impression that this secondary system is how pronunciation needs to be indicated on Wikipedia. (You had labeled a column "Wikipedia Stress Symbol", as if it were the Wikipedia stress symbol.) There are also many different IPA conventions for English; my wording of "Wikipedia IPA" was to clarify that it is the consensus convention for the IPA on Wikipedia. However, with the link we don't need to do that. kwami (talk) 23:47, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Help:IPA -- Kaiserslautern

Kwami, I corrected your example of Kaiserslautern here. The second "er" is actually /er/, so I shortened it to "Kaiser." This caught my eye because I used to live in the town. Funny, huh? Morris K. (talk) 18:23, 20 April 2008 (UTC)

Yeah, odd. Okay, I'll un-bold the second syllable. I agree Kaiser's a better example overall, but some editors want examples with sound files whenever possible, which is probably a good idea. kwami (talk) 18:27, 20 April 2008 (UTC)

Re: Haumea

I'm not sure how I could prove I'm not making it up. I shot him an e-mail about 2005 FY 9 and extrasolar planets in general and he revealed that information to me. -- §HurricaneERICarchive 23:47, 20 April 2008 (UTC)

I'm not the one who reverted you! I even added the info to other articles. But I agree the privacy issues need to be considered. kwami (talk) 23:53, 20 April 2008 (UTC)

IPA pronunciation of Duquesne

Thanks for working on the correct IPA representation for "Duquesne," especially correcting the syllabic stress. However, I would like to note that in Pittsburgh, the way we pronounce "Duquesne" is closer to /duːˈkeɪn/ than /djuːˈkeɪn/. I believe this is a dialectal difference; should the location of the university have bearing on the way the pronunciation is represented? Alekjds ^talk 04:12, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

According to the key that transcription links to, /djuː/ is to be pronounced as you'd pronounce the word dew. Since Pittsburghers pronounce dew as [duː], the local pronunciation is automatic. However, people who pronounce dew as [djuː] generally use that pronunciation for Duquesne as well, so this transcription as it is now works for everybody. I'll go ahead and add the comment "(locally [duːˈkeɪn])" for clarity. kwami (talk) 07:09, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

Dubh Artach

Kwami, I'm not sure if the /a/ to /ɑ/ is appropriate here. It's related to the Taoiseach discussion in some ways - Scots (most people from Yorkshire north actually) have /a/, not /ɑ/. Added to that, someone who has /ɑ/ most likely won't have /x/ either and would probably have /k/ or /h/ or something. I think if we are going to keep the /x/ then we need the /a/ too.

I think we need some general rules actually - something along the lines of rules about pronunciation in bilingual English + 1 other language countries (like Wales, Ireland, Scotland, New Zealand...) where place names will involve phonemes not in standard English. Although what they'd exactly look like I'm not sure. For the sake of practicality it might be better to create an infobox for those listing 1) indigenous name and pronunciation 2) local English pronunciation(s) 3) elsewhere.

What do you think? Akerbeltz (talk) 10:44, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

Do SSE speakers distinguish mar from marry? If not, then I think we need to look at how the name would be pronounced in London. If it's still ambiguous, then yes, we need to figure something else out.

People who don't have /x/ know they're going to sub /k/, but they will be concerned about which vowel to use. Since SSE only has /a/, it won't matter to them which symbol we use: they'll know they need to collapse the distinction. kwami (talk) 11:13, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

But why did you choose /ɑː/? Because of your instinct that this is the closest English vowel to [a]? If so, that's an American instinct: there are lots of examples of words where British and American anglicised pronunciations differ in this way (pasta is a well-known example). I (a northern English speaker) would certainly use /æ/ (phonetically [a]) in this name.--JHJ (talk) 07:59, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

I was going along with other articles. Both a's, or just the last one? Go ahead and change it to /æ/; you know better than me. kwami (talk) 08:11, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

They're tricky to keep apart (Scots and SSE I mean) but my impression is that both mar and marry would have /a/ except in those areas where _r is included in the vowel length rule which give you /aː/. And I'm not sure most Scots can read the IPA much less be aware of the fact they need to distinguish/collapse things. Trust me, I've taught IPA to enough Scots to know. I think we should rely as little as possible on people being "aware" of things, since the intention of an encyclopedia is that someone goes and looks something up they're not sure about in the first place. And for that mixing two pronunciation systems isn't a good idea in my view. Akerbeltz (talk) 11:20, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

Which two systems?

The problem you bring up is the same for all dialects. I don't distinguish half the vowels in the IPA chart, but if since we use sound alikes (/ær/ as in marry, even though I pronounce it [mɛri]), it works the same as a pronunciation respelling. kwami (talk) 12:16, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

One that mixes a local pronunciation with an over-regional one I guess. Just looked into my Collins, they have /lɒx/ and /lɒk/... I guess there's no ideal answer. Very well, I concede ; ) And I agree, there's some weird vowels listed in some dictionaries, not just in English. I think the problem is that linguist A who likes vowels lists all he can get his hand on, lexicographer A uses the list cause he can't be bothered and lexicographers B-Z23 copy A... Akerbeltz (talk) 14:13, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

The idea so far has been that if the local pronunciation can't be predicted from the transcription, then we give a separate local transcription. In practice, I suppose if it's predictable but drastically different, we should list it separately too. But then there are people who don't feel pronunciations belong in an encyclopedia at all, and having the distraction of multiple alternate pronunciations at the beginning of an article really gets their goat. Keeping it down to a minimum helps out with that, but it's not worth it if we leave our readers in the dark. kwami (talk) 17:22, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

Dr. Seuss

I definitely agree, but Seuss himself pronounced it differently. It would make more sense to have a paragraph discussing the pronunciation—perhaps you could put the IPA pronunciation there? Mr. Absurd (talk) 00:18, 23 April 2008 (UTC)

Most Usonians, at least, know the pronunciation, but it's an odd spelling, and I don't know about 2nd-language speakers, so do I think it belongs at the top. His pronunciation of his family name should be at the top too. The details of exactly who, when, and where can be left where they are.

However, although he may have pronounced his family name /zois/, I'd like to know if he did the same with his pen name Dr Seuss. It wouldn't strike me as odd if he used an anglicized pronunciation for that even while keeping the German pronunciation for everyday matters. kwami (talk) 01:53, 23 April 2008 (UTC)

Pronunciation of Rwanda

Hello. I can definitely see where you would consider the appearance of a g to be downright baffling and illogical, and this is what I first thought as well. However, check any good Kinyarwanda book (they're hard to come by) and you will see that Kinyarwanda words like 'Rwanda' morph from their actual spellings. (One particulary good book for this is Alexandre Kimenyi's A Relational Grammar of Kinyarwanda.) A few examples:

    rw --> rgw     
    pw --> pk      
    bw --> bg      
    mw --> mŋ      
    my --> mɲ      
    tw --> tkw     
    dw --> dgw     
    cw --> ckw     
    by --> bjy     

I can give real examples of many of these. If you want to hear rgw, listen to BBC Kinyarwanda, available on the BBC website. The speakers repeatedly use the word Rwanda with the rgw sound. It is also notable that there are instances when these morphings are omitted, such as in the singing of Rwanda Nziza, in which I've never heard the g inserted before. If you want to hear tw --> tkw, watch Sometimes in April, a movie about the Rwandan Genocide, and near the vey end of the movie, you will see a gacaca hillside court meeting. The inyangamugayo (gacaca judge) asks if anyone wishes to testify. A woman (one of the main characters walks up and says "Nitwa Martine Kamanzi. [I am named Martine Kamanzi.] I was there. I'm a survivor.". When she says nitwa, it is very obviously pronounced as if it is spelled as nitkwa. As for mw --> mŋ, watch Ghosts of Rwanda or Rwanda : Do Scars Ever Fade ?, and you will see that when the native speakers of Kinyarwanda say Interahamwe, it comes across as Inherahamŋe. One of the most obvious is bw --> bg. Take for example ubwoko, the word for clan or ethnicity. I met Dr Alison des Forges, a Human Rights Watch expert who has worked closely with Rwanda for ages and has travelled to Rwanda some 30 times since the genocide. She pronounced the word as ubgoko. In fact there is even an old dictionary of the neighboring Kirundi language (which shares many of the same phonemes and is similar to Kinyarwanda to the point that BBC and VOA each give the two a joint language channel) which changes the spelling of bw to bg. If you want a link to this dictionary, I can dig it up for you. If you have any more questions or want more supporting evidence please let me know. Thanks for your interest. -74.79.7.214 (talk) 10:33, 23 April 2008 (UTC)

The r in rw is a flap. Honestly, I don't know the difference between [ɾw] and [ɾʷ]; I had always assumed they were the same. Could you clear up that difference for me ? As for your other question, no I have never heard these combinations as coarticulations in Kinyarwanda, but as sequences. Now that I think of it, I had read somewhere of a similar phenomenon in chiShona in Zimbabwe. I vividly remember reading that the pw in chiShona could be pronounced as pk just like in Kinyarwanda. I shall see if I can dig up the book I found that in. You're right, this should definitely go in the Kinyarwanda article. If I have time in the next few weeks, I may do a major renovation of the Kinyarwanda page, as I know a lot of it now. Let me know if you have anymore questions. It's nice to see interest in this sort of thing. -74.79.7.214 (talk) 22:31, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Okay, thanks for clarifying that. Yes it's definitely a sequence, not simultaneous articulation. -74.79.7.214 (talk) 13:58, 26 April 2008 (UTC)

I'm totally certain that the r in rw is a non-syllabic flap. -74.79.7.214 (talk) 21:03, 27 April 2008 (UTC)

That is correct, it is a nonsyllabic flap in both pronunciations. -74.79.7.214 (talk) 22:24, 27 April 2008 (UTC)

IPA wikitable

Hi, you added IPA template calls to the tables in the IPA article: diff. However, IPA characters show up fine in MSIE6 without adding individual templates, because all relevant tables had class="IPA wikitable" set on them, influencing all the cells. Is there something I'm missing? Cheers, --Kjoonlee 20:48, 23 April 2008 (UTC)

class="IPA wikitable" doesn't work in Firefox, or at least it doesn't match {{IPA}}. I've brought that up for discussion a couple times, but no-one responded, so I just started doing it manually. kwami (talk) 20:52, 23 April 2008 (UTC)

I don't understand. The IPA class is recognized by all versions of Firefox which I have used, which include Firefox2 and Firefox3 (alphas and betas) and the nightly builds. I can style the cells as I wish from my own user styles at Wikipedia. If you mean the fonts at {{IPA}}, the fonts are meant to work for MSIE only. --Kjoonlee 21:08, 23 April 2008 (UTC)

Ah I see. You've got "span.IPA" in your stylesheets while I have ".IPA" only. Maybe you'd want to switch to .IPA..? --Kjoonlee 21:11, 23 April 2008 (UTC)

Is that all it took? Silly me. kwami (talk) 00:29, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Nope, doesn't work. It still displays in Arial. kwami (talk) 08:09, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Clear your cache, please. ;) --Kjoonlee 08:15, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

That's not it. I tested it with two new tables, one as class="IPA wikitable" and one as class="wikitable", so there was nothing in the cache. They displayed identically. Do these look any different to you?

Wikitable

ɡ ʁ ɳ ɮ

IPA Wikitable

ɡ ʁ ɳ ɮ

Wikitable with IPA template

ɡ ʁ ɳ ɮ

Only the last one displays properly for me, and I currently have my CSS keyed to .IPA. kwami (talk) 08:26, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

You might want to try refreshing this link and checking if it shows an old cache. --Kjoonlee 08:32, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

That was it. Thanks! kwami (talk) 08:39, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Lao

If such is the case, why is China's article titled People's Republic of China? Bob the Wikipedian, the Tree of Life WikiDragon (talk) 14:27, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

Because there are two nations named "China". Cf. France, Russia, Mexico ... kwami (talk) 00:05, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Non-existent speaker icon

Kwami, What are you doing? There is NO speaker icon anywhere in the Help:IPA article. At least not on my browser, which is IE7. Do you have a magic browser which translates a superscript (i) into a tiny picture of an speaker?? Morris K. (talk) 03:23, 29 April 2008 (UTC)

The speaker icon shows up for me, and everyone else so far, on both IE and FF. The (i) doesn't play the sound but instead takes you to the page with the sound file, so you can access the file info. (Several people have removed the (i) links as an annoyance, but evidently they're required by wikipedia policy.) I don't know why you're not seeing the speakers. kwami (talk) 05:12, 29 April 2008 (UTC)

Esperanto diphthongs

I noticed in this edit that you undid my change in the representation of diphthongs. We can both make a case for our respective choices but I'm wondering how the literature generally represents them phonemically. The only thing I could find is this which doesn't really use IPA but chooses to represent non-vocalic /u/ and /i/ as <ŭ> and <j> respectively. What is your experience on the matter? — Ƶ§œš¹ _{[aɪm ˈfɻɛ̃ⁿdˡi]} 05:55, 29 April 2008 (UTC)

There's a lot of confusion about the existence of a /w/ in Esperanto, so I prefer to avoid the transcriptions <aw> and <ew>. The <w> there is not a consonant, which is what it represents in the IPA. Also, Kalocsay and Waringhien say that the letter <j> represents two phonemes, and that if Esperanto orthography were consistent, the diphthongs would be written <aĭ> and <oĭ> rather than <aj> and <oj>. There's a discussion in the Talk page of one of the articles. kwami (talk) 07:36, 29 April 2008 (UTC)

From your description, I'm not sure how detailed Kalocsay and Waringhien get. Do they use IPA? My concern here is that we're needlessly using the semivowel diacritic between phonemic slashes, especially since Esperanto has phonetic variation depending on speaker. — Ƶ§œš¹ _{[aɪm ˈfɻɛ̃ⁿdˡi]} 08:21, 29 April 2008 (UTC)

/ai̯/ is clearly distinct from /ai/: Any word ending in /ai/, such as balai, will take stress on the <a>. A word ending in /ai̯/, such as balaj, will not. K&W did not use the IPA, but their meaning was clear: The letter <j> represents two sounds, consonantal and vocalic. <ŭ> only has the latter use, except in mimesis and proper names, and even in the latter it becomes /v/ when they are fully assimilated. When you start using <w>, people want to add it to the consonant inventory, creating a contrast between /v/ and /w/. kwami (talk) 15:51, 29 April 2008 (UTC)

r in parentheses

You agreed back in October that transcriptions like /ˈhɑː(r)wʊd/ can be used in articles (see Help talk:Pronunciation/Archive 1#Rhotic vowel formatting), so you have no basis for undoing such transcriptions. Timeineurope (talk) 17:43, 29 April 2008 (UTC)

Bring it up at MoS. kwami (talk) 18:12, 29 April 2008 (UTC)

No need for that, the consensus already exists. Timeineurope (talk) 18:14, 29 April 2008 (UTC)

You equate my comment, that such a transcription would be understood, with consensus? kwami (talk) 18:17, 29 April 2008 (UTC)

No, I equate the half-year absence of disagreement with your comment that such transcriptions are OK (not would be understood) with consensus. Timeineurope (talk) 19:04, 29 April 2008 (UTC)

American Heritage Dictionary on Halley

This dictionary confusingly uses ā for both /æ/ and /eɪ/. The sound clip resolves the ambiguity of the transcription. Timeineurope (talk) 21:56, 1 May 2008 (UTC)

Thank you for such a nice response! Yes, it looks like ā is substituted for ă throughout. I'll ref with Webster's. kwami (talk) 22:03, 1 May 2008 (UTC)

(Halley's pronunciation of his own name is at the top of the article, of course, but I've never heard it used for the comet, and Webster's doesn't list it as an alternate. When the comet came around last time, most Usonians pronounced it with an /eɪ/, though there was a movement to "correct" it to /æ/.) kwami (talk) 22:10, 1 May 2008 (UTC)

We're not bound by Webster's. Some people do pronounce it as /ˈhɔːlɪ/. Timeineurope (talk) 22:20, 1 May 2008 (UTC)

No, of course we're not bound by any one dictionary. I've checked three, and have three cases of /æ/ and one of /eɪ/. I've yet to come across /ɔː/. kwami (talk) 22:35, 1 May 2008 (UTC)

The Duden-Aussprachewörterbuch has it as a possible English pronunciation of Halley. Timeineurope (talk) 22:47, 1 May 2008 (UTC)

Revised mass of 511 Davida

Thank you for your excellent work on the article 511 Davida. You recently brought the mass of 511 Davida into conformity with the observed size based on an "assumed density" of 2.0 g/cm³, but provided no source to explain the assumption about the density, so it's not clear why you changed the mass to conform to the listed density instead of changing the density to conform to the listed mass. Astronomy & Astrophysics 374, 703-711 (2001) indicates the mass of 511 Davida as 3.34 × 10^-11 solar masses, much higher than the mass you have indicated. Could you give us some further pointers? --arkuat (talk) 20:06, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

I was working on the assumption that the mass was estimated from the size and assumed density, based on phone conversations I had with Conrad and other people cited in the references. Sorry, I'm out of town and don't have access to my notes. If the mass has been reliably estimated independently, then of course we should recalculate the density based on that. I'll go ahead and make the change. kwami (talk) 22:01, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

Wow, beautiful. Thank you very much! I haven't delved into the methodology behind that Astronomy & Astrophysics article or anything, but it's more of a citation than we have for the density estimate. --arkuat (talk) 05:37, 16 May 2008 (UTC)

South Caucasian / Kartvelian

I see your point, but I don't agree. On that particular page were listed only the families, not the genera or any subfamilies, so confusion should not occure. I have experienced that "Kartvelian" is rather rare in contemporary literature. It seems to me that it was used more often in the past in old German and English books and articles. Furthermore, you didn't (and for the same reason shouldn't) replace Northeast Caucasian and Northwest Caucasian by "Nakh-Dagestanian" (although this term is still in use today) and "Abkhaz-Adyghe" or "Pontic" (never seen any of them in use nowadays), respectively. So I don't think there's any striking reason to rename the links or even the article. — N-true (talk) 11:43, 14 May 2008 (UTC)

Presumably because Pontic to European linguists means Pontic Greek, no? Akerbeltz (talk) 12:21, 14 May 2008 (UTC)

Canadian Aboriginal syllabics

Hello! I understand you undid my edits (Brahmi introduction into subj article) for a good reason. Yet, there is something I would like to know. From the article it is not evident that Evans' knowledge of Devanagari is documented, and not his knowledge of related scripts. I would be glad if you add a reference to devanagari version. At the moment, "triangles for vowels" as an invention of Evans in the article text looks no less strange than the proposal that it was taken from Brahmi. Tar-ba-gan (talk) 21:37, 14 May 2008 (UTC)

Sorry, I'm out of town and can't help you with the refs. I don't see much resemblance to Brahmi, unless the vowels were all taken from /e/, and in any case, once you start allowing comparisons to multiple scripts, you can prove just about anything. If you don't like the speculation about the vowels being invented, feel free to delete it. kwami (talk) 05:16, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

I can only find refs to his knowledge of non-Roman shorthand and Devanagari. kwami (talk) 20:42, 16 May 2008 (UTC)

I guess this will do. You did wonderful job creating the article. It eventually got translated into Russian and there, I introduced the Brahmi idea (and naturally as you were not there, noone could revert that coz with no refs Brahmi connection is just as encyclopedic as the rest of the article!) Now I need to correct myself. I need ref for Russian wiki exactly, to state ref to Devanagari (and probably leave one mention of Brahmi, as a proposal only). Tar-ba-gan (talk) 15:37, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

If we're going to speculate, both Nagari e and Latin A are possibilities. Just as likely is that this was a blank in Nagari, which has no generic vowel letter, and just as Sejong created a vowel-initial letter from a circle, since Phagspa didn't provide one, Evans may have used the triangle as the most symmetrical rotatable shape. I'm sure we could think of other possibilities. What makes the other letters convincing is the regularity of multiple correspondences. kwami (talk) 18:04, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

re: Hunmin Jeongeum and Hunmin Jeongeum Haerye

Hi, I think things are moving in the right direction. Thank you.

However, there's still a bit of a problem with the images. (There had been some mention of the Hunmin Jeongeum images, at either Wikiproject Korea or the Korean Wikipedia itself.) The Hunmin Jeongeum Haerye image is fine now, but the Hunmin Jeongeum image needs to be switched to something which is written in Classical Chinese.

Since the latter image has descriptions in Old Hangul, it belongs to the Hunmin Jeongeum Eonhaebon manuscript. (I don't know whether the Eonhaebon manuscript is an edition of the Haerye or not. Sorry...) --Kjoonlee 22:35, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

There's only the one copy of the Haerye. kwami (talk) 23:00, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

Yes... it looks like the Haerye is the de facto original copy of the Hunmin Jeongeum at the moment so it would be better to use the beginning of the Haerye at the Hunmin Jeongeum page IMHO, instead of the Eonhae image. --Kjoonlee 23:18, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

Why do you say it's not just another copy? Also, do we have an image of the Hunmin Jeongeum from the Haerye? kwami (talk) 00:07, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

I got the impression that Korea's national treasure no. 70, the Hunmin Jeongeum Haerye at the Kansong Museum, is the only extant copy of the full version of Hunmin Jeongeum without Hangul annotations. According to ko:훈민정음, the "Haerye book" has Sejong's foreword, a Ye-eui part, a Haerye part, and Jeong Inji's Seo (序). The Eonhaebon is only Sejong's foreword and the Ye-eui part. Now, I have no idea whether the Hunmin Jeongeum Haerye image deals with the Ye-eui part or the Haerye part. --Kjoonlee 03:18, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

If the ye-eui is the copy of the hunmin jeong-eum (I've never heard the term), then the image is from the haerye part. The hunmin jeong-eum had long been known; what made the haerye famous was that for the first time it explained the design of the letters in terms of articulatory phonetics, which is exactly what these pages do: "gieuk is the outline of the root of the tongue blocking the throat," etc. It makes sense that the museum display would be open to the most important page of the book, not to a copy of a known document which is not considered a national treasure. kwami (talk) 03:36, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

In any case, although the Eonhae image may not be the best for the Hunmin jeong-eum, it's a better illustration for the hangul article. kwami (talk) 04:15, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

Capitalization

Hi, Kwamikagami;

Thanks for your contributions to the Sei Whale article. Unfortunately, what you're doing seems logical, to change the name of whales to sentence case, but the issue has been long debated at WikiProject Cetaceans and the standard that has been adopted is to capitalize the common names of whales. It's not a standard that I agree with, but I'd like to ask that you revert your recent capitalization changes and begin a discussion over on that project's talk page before doing any more. I'll support you in your quest to change the standard, but as I understand it, it was a long and acrimonious debate in the past that led to this standard. If you have any questions, please reply here or on my talk page. Thanks, Neil916 (Talk) 06:44, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

PS: You can see that I initiated a disussion that is currently at the top (oldest) part of the WikiProject Cetations talk page some time ago, and received pointers to where those dissusions and standards were. The rest of the discussion is buried in the archives. Neil916 (Talk) 06:47, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

Okay, done. We have so much capitalization is some of these articles that they look almost German. kwami (talk) 06:52, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

I agree. Apparently, several have tried and failed to generate consensus to revise that standard. Can you also undo your page moves to the uncapitalized versions of the articles? Thanks. Neil916 (Talk) 06:55, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

Already done. kwami (talk) 06:58, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

Not yet. When I go to Sei Whale, it redirects to Sei whale. Neil916 (Talk) 07:00, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

Sorry. I didn't notice it hadn't taken. kwami (talk) 07:04, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

Thanks. Sorry about the hassle, hopefully I noticed before you invested too much time in making those changes to a bunch of whale articles. Still looks like a fair amount of lost effort to make the changes to two articles. Thanks again. Neil916 (Talk) 07:07, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

Sneaking in here...are you talking about capitalization of the title only, or within the article as well? I have been creating lots of articles and using sentence case for both the title and the article text. Bob the Wikipedian (talk) 12:13, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

Bob, I've replied on your talk page so Kwami's page doesn't get too cluttered. Neil916 (Talk) 15:39, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

I agree that the cetacean capitalization convention should be changed. Sentence case is general Wikipedia policy, and matches the usage in the scientific literature. Rracecarr (talk) 16:22, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

Add you comments after mine, and maybe we can get this re-opened. kwami (talk) 19:49, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

Vinča signs

When I reverted the spelling change, I explained in the edit summary that 'artefact' was correct - the editor who had changed the spelling gave no reason in the edit summary. I'm sure you know as well as I do that guidelines say fill out edit summaries, so why did you revert my rv? --Doug Weller (talk) 08:41, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

He corrected the link, not the spelling. kwami (talk) 08:55, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

Ok, I clearly need to clean my glasses. But it is an example of why edit summaries are so useful (not that I never forget to add one). Doug Weller (talk) 09:25, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

I have gotten really really bad with summaries. Sorry. kwami (talk) 10:04, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

Hadza Language

What was wrong with the consonant chart how I put it? Munci (talk) 11:13, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

The clicks were wrong: there are no velar clicks, etc. kwami (talk) 11:45, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

Now I see it. I accidentally changed the clicks section when I was trying to changed it so that affricates would be separate from the plosives. I have tried to change so I'd sort the clicks as well but the current table doesn't seem to make sense with the clicks because | is used for dental clicks and ! for alveolar yet in the table it uses | for sibilant and ! for non-sibilant. Munci (talk) 12:32, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

I don't object to the change, but I didn't have time to correct it. kwami (talk) 18:19, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

I made it so the clicks are in a separate table. Is this fine? Munci (talk) 03:47, 24 May 2008 (UTC)

That suggests there's something different about them that requires their separation. They're just ordinary consonants. Most people think there's something odd about clicks, and this just reinforces that perception, as if there were three types of speech sound, consonant, vowel, and click. Sorry to keep reverting you, but I feel strongly that exotic languages shouldn't be presented in such a way that makes them look unnecessarily bizarre, while more familiar languages are presented as normal. kwami (talk) 05:16, 24 May 2008 (UTC)

I've never noticed this perception. I thought they were just seen as weird consonants. How about having ejectives separate as well and have thelast as pulmonic since all 3 are different sorts of airstream? Or should it just be figured out to keep all the consonants together?

I'd keep all C's together. Separating them does not reflect the behavior of the language the way that separating C's and vowels does. And in the Hadza language, they are not weird consonants. The outside perception that they are odd can be seen in the very IPA symbols they are written with: a pipe. Every one of Hadza's twelve clicks is written with a variation of that same symbol, as if they were all basically the same thing. Also, /k'/ varies between being a plosive and an affricate. kwami (talk) 09:56, 24 May 2008 (UTC)

I only meant about outside perceptions. I did the table again with all the consonants in and footnotes for allophones, variations and rare phonemes. Munci (talk) 11:21, 24 May 2008 (UTC)

You state that the pulmonic consonants vary between dental and alveolar. They aren't: they're simply alveolar. kwami (talk) 18:27, 24 May 2008 (UTC)

So why did it say Dental/Alveolar in the original version? Are you happy now? Munci (talk) 03:29, 25 May 2008 (UTC)

It just didn't distinguish them, just as you haven't bothered to distinguish postalveolar from palatal. Okay, but I'll add the nasals in with the other stops. kwami (talk) 05:09, 25 May 2008 (UTC)

Volapük

Hi, would you be able to direct me to the relevant part of MoS please? Thanks. +Hexagon1 ^(t) 12:01, 25 May 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Manual of Style (pronunciation)#Foreign names. I usually don't worry much about the order, but Volapuk has an English pronunciation, so it should be included. Besides, why remove information from an encyclopedia? kwami (talk) 12:37, 25 May 2008 (UTC)

We are not an indiscriminate collection of information, and are we sure that's the ubiquitous English pronunciation? Do we know if any other dictionaries use it other than the Oxford one? Not attacking or anything, just want to discuss. +Hexagon1 ^(t) 06:16, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

Well, of course all sorts of dictionaries could have all sorts of fanciful pronunciations, but the OED is researched. Random House and American Heritage (the latter not a very good dictionary) also have /voʊl-/ as an alt. kwami (talk) 06:21, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

OK, I was just trying to establish whether it was an English word or a foreign word. Looks like the former, so I agree with keeping it there. +Hexagon1 ^(t) 10:13, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

It's both. Often the dieresis will be left out in English. kwami (talk) 10:17, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

zanzibar

Whether it goes without saying or not, it is wrong. Pemba is part of the Zanzibar archipelago, so to say Zanzibar and Pemba, would be wrong. please see the wikipedia entry on Zanzibar, for clarification:

Zanzibar IPA: /ˈzænzɨbɑːr/ forms part of the East African nation of Tanzania. It is an archipelago in the Indian Ocean 25–50 km (15–30 mi) off the coast, consisting of numerous small islands and two large ones: Unguja (the main island, sometimes informally referred to as "Zanzibar"), and Pemba. Zanzibar was once a separate state with a long trading history within the Arab world; it united with Tanganyika to form Tanzania, and still enjoys a high degree of autonomy within the union. The capital of Zanzibar, located on the island of Unguja, is Zanzibar City, and its old quarter, known as Stone Town, is a World Heritage Site. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Petridish01 (talk • contribs) 10:22, 27 May 2008 (UTC)

That's analogous to Hawaii. If you're in Maui, and say you're headed to Hawaii, you obviously don't mean the archipelago. Likewise, if you're in Tanganyika, and say you're going to Zanzibar, you mean the island, not the archipelago. There are Tanganyikans who can't even recall the name Unguja if you ask them. If you mean the archipelago or the country, you have to state that explicitly. kwami (talk) 10:27, 27 May 2008 (UTC)

Besides, what "goes without saying" is that Zanzibar is currently known as Zanzibar. That's like saying "in the language currently known as English, it is pronounced ...". kwami (talk) 10:43, 27 May 2008 (UTC)

Well I have just been in Unguja recently, and many of the locals were offended when you called it Zanzibar. A reference point such as Wikipedia should be aiming to be accurate, not enforce incorrect generalisations. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Petridish01 (talk • contribs) 06:03, 28 May 2008 (UTC)

Okay, that certainly needs to be considered. As it is now, it should work either way. kwami (talk) 07:48, 28 May 2008 (UTC)

Poor editing edicate

Kwami you need to think before you make sweeping changes. First, you should not move articles without discussing it first on the articles talk page and without notifying relevant wikiprojects. Second, some of your edits are bordering on NPOV and I may be adding neutrality tags on certain articles. Please talk about edits first as it will avoid problems.Nrswanson (talk) 02:10, 28 May 2008 (UTC)

Um, I agree this is a problem when integrating different traditions into a single article, but if you're going to criticize others, you should follow that advice yourself. You've also made substantial changes without prior discussion, some of which were biased. You make it clear on the talk page that you believe there's your way and the wrong way, and this came through in your edits. kwami (talk) 02:28, 28 May 2008 (UTC)

Also, please don't copy and paste articles to new titles. It screws up the article history, which should be moved as well. kwami (talk) 02:34, 28 May 2008 (UTC)

IP block

I noticed you blocked 69.54.131.48 (talk · contribs · WHOIS) indefinitely, citing that it is a vandalism-only account. However, guidelines for blocking IP addresses explain that you shouldn't block an IP address indefinitely, especially for single incidents. I'm not aware that this is an open proxy, so I'm assuming this is a mistake, and encourage you to reduce the block to something more appropriate; if you decide not to, you should at least add the necessary templates to the page. --Haemo (talk) 21:52, 30 May 2008 (UTC)

Okay, I've reduced the block. However, this wasn't a single incident: Today is the second anniversary of that account being used for nothing but vandalism. The amount of time lost to such nonsense is pathetic. kwami (talk) 22:09, 30 May 2008 (UTC)

Missing verb in Abugida article

Hi. In your latest addition to the Abugida article, you left out a verb, and I'm not sure which one you meant to put in, since it isn't obvious to me how a consonant can have a default vowel, without it being determinable what that default vowel is. —Largo Plazo (talk) 02:41, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

Looks like the next editor took care of it. kwami (talk) 05:31, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

Laredo

Hi,

You recently added a "local" pronunciation to Laredo, "Lah-reh-dou." Do you mean an English pronunciation, or Spanish? If English, I'm guessing you mean /ləˈrɛdoʊ/ luh-RED-oh, with the only difference from the outsider pronunciation being that the stressed syllable sounds like red rather than raid. Hope this helps. kwami (talk) 01:27, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

thanks a lot but I meant Laredo in Spanish, because 1, Laredo is a Spanish surname 2, Laredo, Texas's population is 94% hispanic and even speaking in English, we (I'm from Laredo) pronounce it in Spanish (local pronounciation). I may have gotten it wrong this is what I meant: LA as in LAtin, R as in Red, E as in Echo, D as in Doing, and O as in Oh pronounced La-re-do. -AMAPO (talk) 01:52, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

Okay, but we shouldn't use English conventions for Spanish. I'll add in the Spanish when I get the chance. kwami (talk) 03:03, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

Sure, gracias for the info and help -AMAPO (talk) 03:08, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

Willamette

Thanks for the IPA help.Somedumbyankee (talk) 03:16, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

Rongorongo

Is Rongorongo a script? I notice that you start calling it a script in Etymology and variant names. To meet Tony's objections, I had removed the use of "inscription" in the lead. –Mattisse (Talk) 22:04, 9 June 2008 (UTC)

The texts are certainly inscriptions, as they are inscribed, regardless of whether RR is a true writing system. It's commonly assumed to be a "script", though perhaps the term is not very well defined. kwami (talk) 22:08, 9 June 2008 (UTC)

Maybe inscription is best, better than script which implies writing to me. Whether it is writing is open to question, is it not? –Mattisse (Talk) 23:14, 9 June 2008 (UTC)

Okay, though I think everyone agrees it's at least proto-writing. Does that count as a "script"? kwami (talk) 08:02, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

Note regarding a message a user left to me

I just thought you should probably review User talk:Xenocidic#requesting check for suspected sock puppets and advise. I believe he left it for at least one other admin as well. Thanks, xenocidic (talk) 17:12, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

Thanks! kwami (talk) 17:52, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

Plutoids

Sorry to have had to revert you, but the IAU's release states there are only two "plutoids" at present. (Others will be named at a future date.) Cheers. --Ckatz^chat_spy 18:07, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

So a plutoid "for naming purposes" does not count as a plutoid, and should not even be cat'd as a plutoid? Shouldn't that get some discussion? kwami (talk) 18:27, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

Semi-syllabary

Hi, regarding your revert in semi-syllabary, do you have any citation that zhuyin was originally designed for varieties other than Mandarin? Zhuyin originated in the same commission that was tasked in defining Guoyu (Standard Mandarin in the ROC). Regardless, though zhuyin has extensions for a few other Chinese dialects, it is rarely used to transcribe anything but Standard Mandarin. Lastly, I have a big problem with the way the sentence is currently worded because it promogates the mistaken view that all the varieties of Chinese are one language, which is certainly up for debate. Can we reach some kind of compromise here? —Umofomia (talk) 10:24, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

Well, the link is to "Chinese languages", plural. I'm not one to claim Chinese is a language, but I don't think this is the place to get into details.

I doubt I can trace all the way back to the formation of zhuyin. However, old zhuyin tables show consonants such as ny and v which do not exist in standard Mardarin. There are also syllabic nasals, written m, n, ng with an extra stroke. I never see any of these in modern tables, unless they also include Hakka etc. extensions. Perhaps they were used to transcribe Sichuan dialect, which nearly became the basis for Guoyu? The fact that you get non-Beijing phonemes, but not final p, t, k as in the southern languages, leads me to believe these date from before the establishment of Beijing dialect as the standard written language, but after it was established that the standard would be Mandarin. So "Mandarin", okay, but "Standard Mandarin" appears to be wrong. kwami (talk) 10:37, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

My main point is that the current sentence implies that zhuyin can be used for all varieties of Chinese, which is incorrect. If you don't want to list the details, that's fine, but I much rather have the sentence say something like "...a phonetic script devised for transcribing certain spoken Chinese varieties" rather than just "...a phonetic script devised for Chinese." BTW, I believe saying "transcribing" and linking to "spoken Chinese" is important because zhuyin is not meant as a replacement for the standard written language. —Umofomia (talk) 10:59, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

Sure, that's fine. I just didn't want it to be wrong. kwami (talk) 11:01, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

Thanks. I've made the change. —Umofomia (talk) 11:12, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

I'm not an expert on zhuyin but those extra symbols may have something to do with language change. If you check older Mandarin dictionaries you will occasionally find pronunciations indicated which contain consonants not present in modern Mandarin. I can't for the life of me find the dictionary right now but I am 100% I've seen odd stop finals indicated in an old Mandarin dictionary. Akerbeltz (talk) 11:04, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

That might be Jin dialect. I would imagine the dictionary dates from before the establishment of Guoyu, or else they are giving dialectical pronunciations. There's no way Beijing had final stops in the 1920s. kwami (talk) 11:09, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

There was also that first attempt at Guoyu that tried to retain some vestige of final stops. The Guoyin dictionary in 1919 was a Mandarin dictionary that noted which words were supposed to have the entering tone (and thus a final stop) but did not actually make any indication about how to pronounce them (theoretically such words would have ended with a glottal stop, like in Jin). This attempt failed because there wasn't anyone, except maybe Yuen Ren Chao, that could speak the language that was described in the Guoyin dictionary. —Umofomia (talk) 11:32, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

Ah, thank you for that Umofomia, I remembered the dictionary that discusses this when you mentioned old Guoyu. It's Mathhews Chinese English Dictionary (first printed 1931). He says ... The initials and finals of Peiping as given in the Wade system, the Inland Mission system (as far as it corresponds to the Peiping dialect), the International Phonetic Alphabet and the National Phonetic Alphabet are exhibited in Tables I and II. These contain the zhuyin for -f ng- and ny-. He goes on to say that The initials [3 zhuyin] in the old National Pronunciation, representing [v], [ŋ] and [ɲ] respectively are abolished in the new standard. They are now replaced by w-, zero and n- respectively.

He also states that In the old National Pronunciation of 1920, as well as the Inland Mission system, both of which take features of Central dialects into consideration, a fith tone ju-sheng or 'entering tone' is recognized. Words in this tone are derived from those ending in -p, -t and -k in Ancient Chinese, and are now pronounced with a short vowel, ending in a glottal stop when it is at the end of a phrase, as in Nanking, or simply form a separate tone class without being either short or ending in a glottal stop as in Changsha.

So it would seem to me that these extra symbols date back to the time when they were playing around with different Mandarin dialect variants before they settled on something. Interestingly though he seems to consistently mark words for these 3 sounds. Akerbeltz (talk) 12:43, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the information, Akerbeltz. So it looks like zhuyin was devised for Standard Mandarin, just not the Standard Mandarin we know today. The extra letters weren't used to represent dialectical sounds, but rather the sounds in one of the preliminary standards. That's probably why those letters were eliminated after they decided on the Beijing standard. The dialectical letters for Min-nan and Hakka were likely introduced later on Taiwan because of the number of Min-nan and Hakka speakers there. —Umofomia (talk) 18:58, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

You're welcome and yes, I agree. Here's the full ref if you need it (I'm not going to touch the article :b): RH Mathews Mathews' Chinese - English Dictionary (Revised American Edition) China Inland Mission & Presbyterian Mission Press 1931, Shanghai. Mine is a reprint from 1975 though. Akerbeltz (talk) 19:56, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

I think I'll leave the semi-syllabary article as it is since the sentence is now correct enough, but I'll add the information to the Zhuyin and Standard Mandarin articles when I get a chance (it might not be for a while since I've been way too busy lately). Thanks! —Umofomia (talk) 20:22, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

I'm sorry for making your work more difficult

Kwamikagami, I need to apologize to you for my hyperlinking of all the years in the Esperanto article. I was wrong in what I did, the MoS says specifically only years relevant to the article should be linked, and most, if not all, of the years mentioned in the article are not relevant whatsoever. Thank you for correcting my mistake. By the way, I have initiated a peer review of the Esperanto article, but so far have not received much feedback. If it is not too much of a bother for you, I would appreciate your feedback on the quality, style, and format of the article. My ultimate goal is to raise it to featured article status. Thanks! TFCforever (talk) 02:30, 13 June 2008 (UTC)

Yeah, FA review has been really slow recently. I'm trying to get rongorongo up to FA, but there's been very little feedback. Since I've done a fair amount of work on Esperanto, I don't think I should be one of the people reviewing it, but if there are issues on the FAC page, please let me know. Sometimes people oppose for the oddest reasons! kwami (talk) 02:39, 13 June 2008 (UTC)

Upset & Appalled

Hello User:Kwamikagami,

You’re admin, why are you so threatening and lack politeness [Wikipedia:Civility] to fellow editors? You have extraordinary powers (your have rightly earned) over the majority but you seem to been in many heated 3RR when you should know better.

Your comments against me are unbelievable.

1. Insult me with this jibe, as if your in some way superior – SEE “okay, the source can be discussed, but meanwhile the writing is incoherent” [16]
2. Then you used my user name to carry out a bit of vandalism – SEE (remove redundant material from intro per Vufors) [17]
3. Then you participate in a 3RR. SEE – (Never mind. I used my 3rd revert for that.) [18]

I am upset & appalled at your behaviour towards me. And have been in two minds to report you to the admin.

Thus I propose that we call an end to this behaviour, work towards consensus and discuss our issue in the discussion area using facts and good defences.

My best regards,

Vufors (talk) 08:15, 13 June 2008 (UTC)

If I have been rude, I apologize.

When I said the writing was incoherent, I was not insulting you. You had asked for the reason I reverted you, and that was it: what you wrote was incoherent. You even restored it without bothering to reword it. What does "this define the principal nature of the postulates" mean? Which postulates? It adds no content to the intro of the article, and simply leaves readers scratching their heads. We had an intro that was clean and concise, and which several editors were happy with.

When you insist on having your way with an article, despite multiple editors opposing you, and revert 5 times in 24 hrs, I don't consider it a threat to tell you that you risk being blocked. I also haven't been in an 3RR battle for some time (though I suppose as an admin I shouldn't get in any, so you certainly have a point there), but I wouldn't block you, as I've already said, because I'm too close to the article. I'd have to call in someone else just like you would, so in this case being an admin doesn't give me any extraordinary powers.

As I've said before, my stripping of all redundant information from the intro was to show you what your reasoning (for taking out the stuff you didn't like, supposedly because it was repeated in the body) would lead to. You even objected to using the dictionary (and the OED at that) as a reference for the meaning of a word, claiming the reference had to be "scientific". You call what I did vandalism, but no-one else objected, and at least one other editor liked it better that way, at least as a starting point to rewriting it.

You say that we should "work towards consensus and discuss our issue in the discussion area", but you have a history of making changes and insisting on restoring them when other editors (four or five, I believe) object to what you're doing. Simply stating your reasons doesn't make it consensus.

Also, you got the timing of the events backwards. The "insult" was the last event, not the first.

kwami (talk) 09:44, 13 June 2008 (UTC)

Whoa using /r/ for English.

This is sloppy linguistics. It doesn't matter in a phonemic or phonetic transcription, if we are using IPA and claiming a pronunciation is IPA then only /ɹ/ or [ɹ] is acceptable. Claiming that a transcription is IPA and then using the symbol "r" can only be the alveolar trill. If you want to use a pronunciation with "r" that is fine, but don't label it IPA when it uses the symbol not according to the IPA's definition. Wikipedia does not make its own rules, it follows those established. Azalea pomp (talk) 05:16, 14 June 2008 (UTC)

English r revisted

Well, I still don't agree with the policy. Wikipedia should not decide how it should interpret IPA. Just because readers may not be familiar, that is not good reason to dumb it down to their level. I could not imagine ever in the linguistics world using the IPA incorrectly for phonology or phonetics. I mean if I used a generic transcription for English such as "r" to mean English r that is fine, but I would not claim I was using IPA, maybe I would say "IPA-based". Yes, "r" in English varies greatly by dialect. English does not have an academy or standard, so I may concede that using an "r" would make it simple, but I would remove the term IPA before any transcription so not to mislead readers. This is why wikipedia gets a bad rap. So, "read", /rid/ may be ok but IPA: /rid/ is not. Azalea pomp (talk) 15:58, 14 June 2008 (UTC)

note on incivility notice

I just wanted to inform you that a warning was left at User talk:SUVx regarding a violation of WP:Wikiquette in one this this editors latest edits in which you called you a troll. LonelyBeacon (talk) 19:50, 14 June 2008 (UTC)

Thank you, though I must admit I haven't been very civil with him. kwami (talk) 19:59, 14 June 2008 (UTC)

English r again

OK, I'll concede the point. :) Azalea pomp (talk) 20:10, 14 June 2008 (UTC)

Discuss the changes on Pahawh Hmong

Before you make any changes to Pahawh Hmong, make sure you have your fact straighten out, because new comers to Pahawh Hmong can be confused. First of all, the one shown on Pahawh Hmong page have 7 Yu (rime) tones, not eight (some Pahawh Hmong uses the eight tones because they do not understand the significance of it) and 19 La sound (I do not know where you got the 20th from); this was the second version and the final product of Yang Shong Lue’s before his death. The third and fourth version, or as many as there exist, are not Yang Shong Lue’s original work. These changes are conducted by people who lacked true understanding of Pahawh Hmong, and therefore they make these changes to confuse the Hmong people since they do not have their own writing system until 1959 (when Shong Lue created Pahawh Hmong). Some of your facts about Yang Shong Lue’s biography or history seem correct but the truth can only be told from Shong Lue’s family and friends who are with him at the time.

My questions to you about Pahawh Hmong: How much do you know about Pahawh Hmong? What does Pahawh mean or translated to be in English? Can you read in Pahawh Hmong? How do you say the United States in Pahawh Hmong? How do you say number(s), Monday, hello, etc. in Pahawh Hmong?

Why do I ask you these questions because I know and can speak the elementary form of Pahawh Hmong (37 yrs after Shong Lue’s death), the language is still being developed, there is no advanced form of it at this point. Only those who learn the second version of Pahawh Hmong can understand my point of view and the truth behind Shong Lue’s struggle for his people; and anyone who have their own writing system will be able to understand this perspective as well.

For those who do not learn the second version of Pahawh Hmong (the one created by Shong Lue), even if they are Hmong or foreigner, they will never be able to find words for the (new or)modern Hmong language, never be able to find definitions, and never be able to translate foreign languages to Pahawh Hmong as accurate as possible, etc.

So next time before you make changes make sure that your facts are accurrate.

Pahawhcentury (talk) 00:24, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

The article is about the script, not the religion. We need to distinguish the two.

Pahawh is used to write two languages. As explained in the article, the 19-20th la is used for Hmong Njua (Hmong Leng). I assume you speak Hmong Daw, but I thought Daw only used 18 la.

The final version of Pahawh, phajhauj txha, is not used by many people. Shong published it shortly before he was assassinated, and it never spread very far.

The 8th yu is a phrase-final variant of one of the others. You're right, it isn't necessary, but there is provision in the script for it. If some people use it, we should include it, even if you think it's wrong.

I wonder how to write kaa. There are no yu for aa that I can see. Maybe they use ia, which isn't needed for Njua? —kwami (talk) 00:59, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

Discuss the changes on Pahawh Hmong 2

Hmong Daw used 19 La not 18. You are right about one thing; the eight Yu does appear in the third and maybe the fourth version; but not in the second version. Instead, the eight Yu is added to the “history” section in the second version because it represents a tone in the Hmong language (the majority of the Hmong population speaks Hmong Daw, it is not necessary). It is not a “must” learn in order to speak to both Hmong Daw and Hmong Njau, that is why it is not included in the Yu and La Pahawh Table in the second version.

And you say that Shong Lue published phajhauj txha. That is wrong. That is probably the fourth version published by some of his “followers” who wanted to reduce the accurate and difficulty in the second version. If you have proof of this, with his hand writing in that final product then I will believe you. Shong Lue did not published any more after the second version. Shong Lue did not want Hmong to be divided. By creating more branches of different writing system, this will occur. He already see farther than the normal man.

You can say all you want about the eight Yu and nineteenth and twentieth La in the third and fourth version. Whether they are true of false, that I do not care, but the second version, please make sure that you have it correct, even if it is about the script and not the religion. That is the reason why I put the second version on Wikipedia because much of the Hmong website about Pahawh Hmong ignored the second version, the most important version.

If you plan to make more changes, please state the difference between the four versions because new comers to Pahawh Hmong will think that they are all the same and that the newer version is “correct.” Anyone can learn which ever one they want as long as it met their needs.

You seem to know a bit about Pahawh Hmong. Why are you interested in Pahawh Hmong? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Pahawhcentury (talk • contribs) 02:51, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

I think it's interesting. It's unlike any other script.

Sorry about the edit summaries. Last time I looked, there was no article on Pahawh, and I started from scratch. I only found your article after I had written most of mine. Since I was the only one editing, I didn't bother with summaries.

The 20 la and 8 tones are second version, according to Smalley, Vang, and Yang, 1990, and Ratliff 1994, though I do admit that their descriptions are somewhat unclear. It would be a good idea to display all three (four?) versions so that we can document exactly which changes were made and when. The main article should be about the 2nd version, as you say, but we could have a History section with versions 1 and 3. kwami (talk) 03:24, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

I'm sorry, I see there were actually four stages, but stage 1 was not a practical system, so some people don't count it. What I was counting as stage 2 may be what you were counting as stage 3. I'll add the Hmong names of the stages to the article so that we can all be on the same wavelength. kwami (talk) 19:32, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

I think I've got the basics of the history straightened out, but there's a lot more that could be written. kwami (talk) 19:59, 16 June 2008 (UTC)

ja.interwiki

Plutoid this is not same Trans-Neptunian_object. this diff is error. - John Belushi (talk) 11:01, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

Actually, 冥王星型天体 means "Plutonian object", not "Trans-Neptunian object". It is the Japanese name as released by the IAU, which also released French plutoïde and Spanish plutoide.[19] I will clean up the link, though. kwami (talk) 19:17, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

I created a dedicated page as a placeholder and made it a redirect. kwami (talk) 19:24, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

Talk:Titan (moon)

Could you possibly go over there and have a talk with the guy posting at the top of the page? I've tried to answer his questions but he doesn't seem to get what I'm saying and is now bordering on personal attacks. I am really not clear on what he's trying to say. I suspect he may be a creationist but I'm not sure.Serendi^podous 08:34, 17 June 2008 (UTC)

Thank you. I appreciated that :-)

		All the tea in China
		Just don't demand exclusive rights from the Chinese Communist Party. Serendipodous 09:29, 17 June 2008 (UTC)

Admire

I admire the way you have hung in there and patiently defended your article at FAC. It looks like you will be rewarded and I am so glad. I really like that article. Regards, –Mattisse (Talk) 23:28, 17 June 2008 (UTC)

Thanks! I never intended to spend this much time on it. kwami (talk) 23:30, 17 June 2008 (UTC)

I think the white space issue is impossible because it depends on screen size, browser window size etc. The white space disappears if my browser window (Firefox) is not fully open. –Mattisse (Talk) 00:03, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

...and congrats from me as well; just revisited & noticed the well deserved FA had come thru. Great job! Cheers, --cjllw ʘ TALK 07:16, 23 June 2008 (UTC)

Phonemic orthography

Hi, Kwami, I have a question regarding phonemic orthography because you have profound knowledges of linguistics. There are several slow edit wars between two users such as Nanshu (talk · contribs) and Cypoet (talk · contribs) over whether Korean language is a good example of phonemic orthography.[20][21][22][23] Well, they don't have any backup sources for their claim though. I briefly looked through information on hangul and Korean language in EncyKorea which says hangul is indeed a good example of phonemic orthography, but since it is from a Korean site, so I don't know how international scholars consider it as such. If you comment on this, I would appreciate your help, Thanks.--Caspian blue (talk) 00:41, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

Spanish is a good example of a phonemic orthography. Hangul goes a step further: it's morphophonemic. kwami (talk) 00:51, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

I really appreciate your help, so hope there would be no edit warring on this. By the way, I notice that quite a lot of articles regarding linguistics do not have any citations for editors or readers to check whether the articles have their credibility. I think that should be cleaned up as well.--Caspian blue (talk) 01:21, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

Hangul is morphophonemic perhaps, but it is certainly also phonemic and should be listed as such Cypoet (talk) 14:11, 30 June 2008 (UTC) Edit: On second thought, I think you are right, it may not be purely phonemic.

For me, if I had to find the sources for all that stuff, I wouldn't write half of it. kwami (talk) 01:53, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

Oh, I did not mean to push you to clean up everything (I believe that you're usually writing articles with reliable sources per the past experience, well I changed my screen name, :D ), but just expressed my concern on sourcing. Since people like me with almost no knowledge on the subject, however, who want to learn more about it could not fully thrust the article, it would be nice if the article has sources. That is all what I wanted to say to you. --Caspian blue (talk) 02:02, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

Khoisan Languages

Hi Kwamikagami, thanks for your many insightful and well-informed updates to the various Khoisan languages pages. Great work!

WmGB (talk) 03:23, 21 June 2008 (UTC)

P.S. How do you find so much great unpublished information? Willing to share your sources with a fellow linguist?

Some are informal papers put out by universities (UCLA got rid of the overstock of their Working Papers in Phonetics a couple years ago for $1 apiece), some conference papers, mostly I just ask people. kwami (talk) 04:13, 21 June 2008 (UTC)

re: thanks

You're welcome. - Agnistus (talk) 19:59, 21 June 2008 (UTC)

what of this?

"Grammar of Modern Standard Hindi"? the seeds of it. Tuncrypt (talk) 21:39, 21 June 2008 (UTC)

I'm not sure what you're asking. How is this different than Hindi-Urdu grammar? kwami (talk) 01:27, 22 June 2008 (UTC)

Right. So it should be subject to "speedy deletion" (or whatever it's called) then? Tuncrypt (talk) 01:50, 22 June 2008 (UTC)

Or turn it into a redirect. kwami (talk) 05:47, 22 June 2008 (UTC)

Agim Kaba page help

Any way you can take a look at his page, Agim Kaba? The same guy keeps vandalizing the page with strange claims. The IMDB and this biography of him: http://agimkaba.com/biography.htm make no mention of him being Southern Baptist, Jewish, or naming his daughter Shequanda... Azalea pomp (talk) 14:48, 25 June 2008 (UTC)

Looks like vandalism to me, but who knows. Anyway, I dropped him a line and will keep my eye on it. kwami (talk) 18:32, 25 June 2008 (UTC)

Thanks! Azalea pomp (talk) 19:25, 25 June 2008 (UTC)

Yeniseian and Dene-Yeniseian

Hi Kwami, as you have (co-)authored the two articles, I think you might be interested in a critique by a scholar who belongs to reknown Yeniseists. As it is part of my personal correspondence, I cannot reproduce it here, I can only send it to your personal email address which I do not know. But if you look at my signature, you should be able to extrapolate my email and contact me. If you do so, I'll send you what I've got.--Pet'usek ^{[petrdothrubisatgmaildotcom]} 09:32, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

Thank you

		The Anti-Flame Barnstar
		I think you deserve a golden fire extinguisher for helping me deal with that misguided revolutionary Serendipodous 10:47, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

No problem. Maybe he'll stay under his bridge. kwami (talk) 10:51, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

2 Pallas

For your addition, "Because of this, it will not be visited by the Dawn asteroid mission", you added the following sources:

http://spacefiles.blogspot.com/2007/11/pre-dawn-french-soviet-vesta-mission.html]

http://www.planetary.org/explore/topics/our_solar_system/asteroids_and_comets/asteroids.html

However, neither states that the Dawn will not not visit Pallas 2. The second says that, "I've heard it's not ruled out that Dawn will be directed to rendezvous with 2 Pallas (for a slow flyby) in 2018, after the main mission at Vesta and Ceres is completed and enough fuel is left." If you read wikipedia the article, you can see that a fly-by is still entirely possible. Thus, unless you have a definitive statement from the mission management, your addition seems questionable.

Kindly correct your statement. Thank you.—RJH (talk) 22:52, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

Okay, a quick flyby may be possible, but not entering orbit. kwami (talk) 00:20, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

Help needed

Hi Kwamikagami,

Nice to meet you.

Some people are proposing to close down Xhosa Wikipedia. It is hoped that you could join in to vote and voice your opinion regarding this matter Here. Thanks. --Jose77 (talk) 00:21, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

Thanks! However, I don't use Xhosa, and don't know the community, so I don't have an opinion to offer. kwami (talk) 07:03, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

RE:Viewing deleted content

Click this link: Image talk:Rongorongo Z Poike.jpg, at the top of the page, just below the "From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia" it says "View or restore one deleted edit?" Click that link, at the bottom of the page the "View and restore deleted pages" page, there is a section called "Page history" which would basically be the page's history if it wasnt deleted. Click on the time link (called "22:23, March 1, 2008") and there ya go, that is the text that was on the page when it was deleted. Also, if you want to keep it, you can always just copy it to a Microsoft Word document. If you have any other questions, feel free to let me know. « Gonzo fan2007 (talk ♦ contribs) @ 20:23, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

Your welcome! « Gonzo fan2007 (talk ♦ contribs) @ 07:27, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

Writing system

Kwami, I reverted your recent addition to Writing system because you did not provide any cite to support it. Maybe if you can explain who uses abreviations like "LRTB" and why, it would help. Where have you seen this abbreviation in use? Of course, it's perfectly logical, but if it hasn't been used anywhere, it would be your own original research, which can't be included in Wikipedia articles. Let me know what you think. Cbdorsett (talk) 14:21, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

I deleted an article by that name, since the only content was its existence, but I didn't want to delete the info completely, so I made it a redirect and included the term in the article. (I also deleted an article for its opposite.) I have no problem with you taking it out, but now should delete the article entirely. kwami (talk) 16:51, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

Sicani

Hello, I just added over ten scholary references from books into the article on the part you two were debating. Please do not revert it. If you request additional citations please put a "fact" tag and I will see to it. - Cradashj (talk) 05:40, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

Sorry, already reverted. Your references are on an entirely different subject—the settlement of Gozo & Malta from Sicily—and so are irrelevant to the article unless we can establish that the settlers were Sicani. As the request for a third opinion agreed, that is not supported by any reliable source. kwami (talk) 05:45, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

The word 'Sicilians' in the context of that time period is used to mean Sicani and Sicels. I think actually the anon is right on the part about saying Sicels were not on Sicily yet at that time. If we don't have it there I think this will be bad because a huge chunk of early history of Malta will just be "missing" from here. Especially as its very well sourced as scholars and archeologists consensus that the first to come to Malta were tribe farmers from Sicily. Thanks. - Cradashj (talk) 05:49, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

But what makes you think the Sicani were there at that time? That's the whole point. If you can demonstrate that then sure, we can and should add all sorts of stuff about Malta. If you can't, then Malta is irrelevant. kwami (talk) 05:55, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

Also you may wish to calm down I think you're nearly over 3RR. Also please stop claiming the new sources are unreliable, they are from SCHOLARS like Aquilina and well known experts like National Geographic; the new sources are good and certainly reliable. - Cradashj (talk) 05:52, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

But if your sources don't address the issue, they're irrelevant. I could add a hundred reputable sources stating that the Earth is round, but so what? kwami (talk) 05:55, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

You seem to have quite a bad attitude with me already. This is about the people, the Sicani are the Sicilians of that time period. Who else do you suggest the Sicilians from that time are? It can't be aliens from out of space. Its blatantly relevent to the page, but stating whether of not the earth is round has nothing to do with the topic. - Cradashj (talk) 06:01, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

I'm irritated that you haven't bothered to read the material that you're pushing, despite voluminous debate on the talk page that explains why your sources don't address the issue, and then make threats when I disagree with you. You're making an assumption and insisting that others accept it ... why? You need to support your claims, just like anybody else.

Of course the Earth being round has nothing to do with anything! That's the whole point. Unless you can demonstrate that Malta has something to do with the article, it no more belongs here than the shape of the Earth does.

Anyway, unless someone has something new to say, or actually addresses the issues, I'm done debating this. It's like talking to a wall. kwami (talk) 06:09, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

Sicani et. al.

Hey there.

Careful at Sicani, you're edging dangerously close to using your tools in a content dispute; that's bad mojo. Don't let your temper flare overmuch; I'm looking into probable socking. — Coren ^(talk) 22:25, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

Diacritics

Perhaps you should change the main page on Diacritics, and get that some consensus on the terminology there before modifying various language pages according to your preferred terms. As of today, the correct terms are either diacritic or diacritical mark, but not diacritic mark. VasileGaburici (talk) 10:33, 30 July 2008 (UTC)

Okay, will change it. "Diacritic marks" seems somewhat preferable per the OED, but there is no such thing there as "diacriticals". kwami (talk) 16:22, 30 July 2008 (UTC)

Actually, if you read the intro of the article carefully, it said that diacritic can be used as an adjective (diacritic mark), but that diacritical is not used as a noun. kwami (talk) 16:52, 30 July 2008 (UTC)

Esperanto

Not sure why you removed the IPA? Lothlerarhlichliarmetlialeta (talk) 20:30, 30 July 2008 (UTC)

The spelling reforms are not based on pronunciation, but on simple one-to-one substitutions of the letters. As such, how the letters are pronounced is entirely irrelevant, except for the fricative-affricate dichotomy, which is already covered, and (in the 2nd-last example) palatalization, which is not reflected in the IPA anyway. Also, people tend to find the IPA intimidating. Can you tell me how adding the IPA adds anything to the article? kwami (talk) 20:35, 30 July 2008 (UTC)

Well it would help people understand the reasoning between joining for instance, 't' and 'c' together to make 'tc', since many Anglophone speakers don't realize that the English "ch" is actually two consonants (well, one affricative consonant). Lothlerarhlichliarmetlialeta (talk) 20:38, 30 July 2008 (UTC)

I agree, and just added that to the text. It's much more likely to be understood there than hidden in the chart, where it will most likely just be glossed over. Also, had an edit conflict with you restoring Maltese. That's just a bad example, and anyway, who knows Maltese? It would be different if it were a language our readers are likely to be familiar with. I'd delete Basque too if it weren't for the fact that it's the best match, since tx is marginal in Catalan and Portuguese. kwami (talk) 20:45, 30 July 2008 (UTC)

Ok that's a good idea. I know Maltese isn't that big a language, but I think it shows the extent of the connection between "x" and /ʃ/ in Southern European languages, to some extent. Lothlerarhlichliarmetlialeta (talk) 20:48, 30 July 2008 (UTC)

Yes, but it's misleading. Why not use Maltese as an example of the c system? (I'm not being serious, it would be misleading there as well.) We don't need to list every language, just an example or two to show where the idea came from. Please remove it. kwami (talk) 21:02, 30 July 2008 (UTC)

RE

You are mistaken. The dates of the arrivals of the tribes to Sicily is given, and the date of the arrival of the Sicilians on Malta is given. The two of them together clearly highlight that according to the dates, the Maltese could not have been the other tribes. Kyarichy (talk) 10:09, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

Firstly, how does the fact that they were Iberian imply they were recent immigrants? In fact, far from it - they were the first tribe to reach Sicily. Secondly, this may be of interest to you. The source states that the language spoken by the Maltese population about 5500 BC was most likely an Indo-European one. This may have some relevenence to the Sicani language. Kyarichy (talk) 19:31, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

[24]

May I ask how you came to the conclusion that the user was POV pushing?? Kyarichy (talk) 19:54, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

He's been insisting for months that everyone use his spelling convention, despite evidence that the existing convention is the norm in the literature. In the hangul article the final word in the debate was that such things should be left alone, just as we leave AD vs. CE and UK vs. US spelling alone, but he has repeatedly moved the article against my objections and without any attempt to gain consensus (only he is right, we "have" to do it his way, etc.) kwami (talk) 20:00, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

The user simply capitalized "Hangul" though Kyarichy (talk) 20:05, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

Sock accusations

Until such a time comes when there is evidence to support this claim of sockpuppetery, it is considered a personal attack to express the viewpoint that they "are". By all means, you can suggest I am, and RFCU it, but it is considered bad practise to then assume for sure before given evidence, that I am a sockpuppet of anyone. Due to this, I advise you strictly adhere to AGF, since you are already in gross violation of 3RR on multiple pages as it is.

Anyway, there is a new reference I have left on the mediation page. I suggest you have a look. 78.149.145.54 (talk) 10:03, 2 August 2008 (UTC)

Lovely. A mirror of the very Wikipedia article you're claiming to reference on a "Cheap flights to Malta" site. Now that's scholarship. kwami (talk) 10:07, 2 August 2008 (UTC)

Thanks

Thanks for taking an interest in the language families of South America - they really need a hand! ·Maunus·ƛ· 08:32, 3 August 2008 (UTC)

Thank you. I just wish I were able to spend a little more time on them; what I've added is hardly adequate! kwami (talk) 16:10, 3 August 2008 (UTC)

Hi again. I disagree very much with the notion that Macro-Mayan should be mentioned as a possible family affiliation in any infoboxes. The proposals of Macro-Mayan have been so extremely flawed and rebutted that they are not to be given any credence currently. For Huave specifically it is judged much more likely (by Lyle Campbell for example) that it may prove to be Oto-Manguean. As for Mixe-zoque and Totonacan proposals that have been better received include penutian - although that is also very far from being generally accepted. I have reverted the inclusion fo Macro Mayan in the infoboxes where you added it. Your other edits are very good and welcome - especially the cleanup of tequistlatecan which I had thought about doing but never came round to (we should create pages for the individual languages though)·Maunus·ƛ· 19:30, 3 August 2008 (UTC)

Sure, no problem. Could you add a summary of what you've just said to the Macro-Mayan stub? kwami (talk) 19:36, 3 August 2008 (UTC)

Yep.·Maunus·ƛ· 19:50, 3 August 2008 (UTC)

Request.

Hi Kwami, its Agnistus here. I was wondering if you could do me a favor by using your admin privileges.

Please delete my main user page User:Agnistus. I will be qutting WP completely by July 10 and wish to leave no records of my presence behind. Thankyou. Agnistus (talk) 11:34, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

You mean Aug. 10? Sure. Are you going to continue editing for a few days? Why don't you drop me a line when you want to be disappeared. (Ah! such power!)

I'll be sorry to see you go. kwami (talk) 18:20, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

Yes, I meant August 10th. I will continue editing for a few more days. But you can delete my main user page (User:Agnistus) immediately. And I'll certainly let you know if I'm coming back. Regards. Agnistus (talk) 09:57, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

Thing is, I've only done this once before, and I don't know if you'll be able to continue editing as Agnistus once your user page is gone. I can always try, and restore it if there's a problem. kwami (talk) 16:45, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

I'm sure you've tried deleting my user page. But when I checked today, the page is still there. Is it possible to delete it? Thanks. Agnistus (talk) 12:05, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

Okay, done. I've left your Talk page. Do you want that to go too? kwami (talk) 17:06, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

Thanks a lot. I don't want to delete the talk page. I'll be leaving WP tommorrow. So Good Luck and Good Bye! - Agnistus (talk) 08:43, 9 August 2008 (UTC)

Tengwar

I disagree with this edit. As far as I'm aware, "Tengwar" is a proper noun, and should be capitalized. Yngvarr (t) (c) 09:15, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

The article mixed the cases, upper and lower, together, as in a lot of articles on unfamiliar scripts. Since it simply means "letters", I don't see what would make it a proper noun. kwami (talk) 09:23, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

IPA help pages moved to article space

You probably noticed that someone moved all the help:IPA-xx pages to WP article space. Do you want to keep it like that, or should it be reversed? They may become subject to the recurring original research objections again. −Woodstone (talk) 20:04, 10 August 2008 (UTC)

I was waiting to see if anyone objected. I don't know enough about the article spaces to know which is better, but they are help pages. Are OR constraints stricter in wiki space? Also, I don't like the new title of the main page. I think I'll revert that regardless. kwami (talk) 20:16, 10 August 2008 (UTC)

Ubangi languages

A tag has been placed on Ubangi languages, requesting that it be speedily deleted from Wikipedia. This has been done under the criteria for speedy deletion, because it is a redirect to a nonexistent page.

If you can fix this redirect to point to an existing Wikipedia page, please do so and remove the speedy deletion tag. However, please do not remove the speedy deletion tag unless you also fix the redirect. Alinnisawest (talk) 20:36, 10 August 2008 (UTC)

If you give me five minutes, I'll save the article I'm writing at that location. kwami (talk) 20:54, 10 August 2008 (UTC)

'Kay, no problem! I'll be removing the template then! Alinnisawest (talk) 21:00, 10 August 2008 (UTC)

Cushitic

I'm sorry but your protestations are absurd. If all you really wanted to do was correct a few typos and whatnot, then that shouldn't have necessitated removing from the lead-in all the material that you did. I was also being very generous when I said that you were manipulating the Theil source. In truth, you gutted it of all reference as to why exactly Theil omitted Omotic from Afro-Asiatic in the first place! Here's your version: Rolf Theil (2006) suggests that, not only is Omotic not Cushitic, but it is not even Afro-Asiatic. And here's my paraphrase of the Theil source: Rolf Theil (2006) demonstrates that, in fact, there are no closer genetic relations between Omotic and Afro-Asiatic than between Omotic and any other language family. You also claim that I manipulated the Theil source, right? That's funny because this is what Theil actually wrote: No closer genetic relations have been demonstrated between OM and AA than between OM and any other language family -- virtually identical to my paraphrase. Causteau (talk) 10:00, 11 August 2008 (UTC)

No, I said that Theil misrepresented what he showed, not that you did. "Any other language family" implies that there is more than one language family in question. In the conclusion, however, he did say basically what I did, that there is no reason to believe Omotic is Afrasiatic. THAT is the point of his paper, so I don't understand your objection to making that explicit.

However, now that I look at it more closely, I see you misrepresented him as well. You state that he demonstrated there were no closer relationships, which is a much stronger statement than his, which merely says that he wasn't able to demonstrate any closer relationship. For your interpretation, I'd want to see this peer reviewed and have people say that Theil proved the rest of them wrong.

You also state that the notes say where this is published, but I have not been able to find it. Could you give me the citation? kwami (talk) 10:15, 11 August 2008 (UTC)

I think, actually, I know, that what you personally feel or believe in this affair does not really matter because, according to Wiki policies: The threshold for inclusion in Wikipedia is verifiability, not truth—that is, whether readers are able to check that material added to Wikipedia has already been published by a reliable source, not whether we think it is true. So it really is of no consequence whether you have looked into or personally disagree with Theil. His paper is reliable per Wiki's reliable source guidelines: Self-published material may, in some circumstances, be acceptable when produced by an established expert on the topic of the article whose work in the relevant field has previously been published by reliable third-party publications. Here's a direct link to Theil's personal site. I invite you to write him and repeat to him all that you have said here about him and his work to me. Let's see what he makes of your assertions, especially given his long history of publication and the fact that that cited paper was well received at a conference at Michigan State University in October 2006. I've also rewritten the Theil quote to remove all doubt as to what he actually said. Causteau (talk) 10:48, 11 August 2008 (UTC)

I'm sorry that you can't take criticism, but my point stands: He didn't show that Omotic isn't closer to AA that "any other language family", and you misquoted him by making the statement sound far more conclusive than he did.

I also find your hostility at being asked for a citation baffling. kwami (talk) 10:55, 11 August 2008 (UTC)

In that case, you should get your eyes checked and pronto because, again, Theil states in no uncertain terms on the very first two pages of his paper that: No closer genetic relations have been demonstrated between OM and AA than between OM and any other language family. Kindly keep your own personal interpretations out of what the man said. Causteau (talk) 11:03, 11 August 2008 (UTC)

Could you give me the reference for where he shows that? Because he doesn't even address it in that paper. He only compares the proposed Omotic-AA cognates to IE. Surely that's not difficult to see? kwami (talk) 11:07, 11 August 2008 (UTC)

Never mind, my bad. With his original wording, "any other language family" is just fine, as it's only a negative claim. kwami (talk) 11:16, 11 August 2008 (UTC)

Coming from you, Kwami -- an editor who has the audacity to tell another editor that what the latter has just quoted an actual source as saying is not true even though that other editor also provided a direct link to that very source AND specified which exact page number the quote was drawn from -- that is truly the height of irony. Spare me the fiction and headache; neither one of us needs it. And in case you hadn't noticed, my assertion is sourced. I know it's a challenge, but try and respect that. Causteau (talk) 12:03, 11 August 2008 (UTC)

Hey, I just apologized for not seeing that you'd corrected the error, and you attack me for it? What's wrong with you? kwami (talk) 12:11, 11 August 2008 (UTC)

Don't play coy. I was obviously responding to what you wrote on my page. Causteau (talk) 12:25, 11 August 2008 (UTC)

I didn't know what you were talking about. I still don't. Are you saying that "many other linguists hold this view and increasingly so with more updated research coming in" is a quote from Theil? That seems to be what you're currently upset with me about. kwami (talk) 12:38, 11 August 2008 (UTC)

I'm stating what I just wrote above; namely, that I was obviously responding to your statement on my talk page to the effect that only some linguists do not consider Omotic a part of Afro-Asiatic i.e. your last post dated 11:36, 11 August 2008. I said that that is not the case, and that my assertion in the article that many linguists do, in fact, hold this view is supported by actual references. That's pretty much it, really. By the way, you wouldn't happen to know that IP that just vandalized my talk page, would you? He does seem to know an awful lot about our most recent edits. Causteau (talk) 12:54, 11 August 2008 (UTC)

Other than the fact that it's the IP that you reverted on my user page & I reverted on yours, no, I can't see who's behind it. I suspect that it might be the author of numerous sockpuppets trying to push the claim that Maltese is not Semitic but Sicani, and who's pissed at me for getting him blocked, but that's just a guess, and probably not a very good one since the IP number isn't a good match. But the IP is now blocked for 24 hours. kwami (talk) 13:11, 11 August 2008 (UTC)

LOL Understood. Causteau (talk) 13:18, 11 August 2008 (UTC)

"Group"

In the language templates, please kindly stop removing "group" from behind the names of subgroups. The word doesn't need to be wikified because it is crystal clear in English--"group" means that it is not a single language. I do this to clarify the difference between a single language as a descendant of a family (as in "Egyptian" and "Ongota" on the Afro-Asiatic page) and a subgroup. There are many smaller language families where the novice isn't familiar with the names and may think that particular names are single languages. I don't know why you object to such a clear and unambiguous usage. (Taivo (talk) 13:00, 11 August 2008 (UTC))

Actually, it's quite ambiguous. Japanese and English are a "group". The term is meaningless linguistically. But you're distinguishing "groups" from "sub-groups", where Cushitic is a "sub-group", which suggests you have very precise meanings in mind! That, AFAIK, is not normal terminology, which makes it OR. If I'm wrong, please update the Language family article on the difference between a family, a group, and a sub-group. Otherwise I think we should stick with defined terms like family, branch (of a family), dialect cluster, etc.

I sympathize with wanting to distinguish languages from families, but IMO inventing terms like this is not the way to do it. Another possibility, which I have seen in the lit, is to italicize the names of languages and leave families (groups) in roman typeface. kwami (talk) 13:17, 11 August 2008 (UTC)

Also, the language family info boxes are fairly conventionalized. You've got hundreds to convert to your terminology, and lots of other editors to convince, if you want this to stick. kwami (talk) 13:22, 11 August 2008 (UTC)

Actually, there is no such ambiguity. Usage of such terms as "group", "subgroup", etc. is nowhere near as standardized as you seem to think it is. And I did not "invent" the term. It is a common English word and cannot be used for either "Japanese" or "English" in a linguistic sense. I have been a linguist for 30 years and have no problem using "group" in this context. It is clear and unambiguous. I have not been on Wikipedia for a few months and notice that you have been trundling around in my tracks undoing my editing not just here in Afro-Asiatic, but in other areas as well. You are reducing clarity in all these places. Please refrain from this. Unless you have a better reason to remove "group" from the templates than your own whim, then please accept my better reason for retaining it for increased clarity. (Taivo (talk) 15:02, 11 August 2008 (UTC))

You're repeating part of my argument! I said exactly that, that "group" is not a precise term. I objected for example to saying that Cushitic is a "subgroup" which in turn is divided into "groups", as you had left the article on June 15.[25] That implies that "group" is a precisely defined linguistic term (otherwise, why should Cushitic be described with the more precise-sounding word "subgroup" [of Afro-Asiatic languages] rather than simply as a "group" of Afro-Asiatic languages?), and one with the bizarre semantics of the subset containing the set.

I was concerned about using a word to indicate a genealogical relationship when it has no such connotation, but that's a minor point, and if you're comfortable with it, I have no real objection. However, I do continue to object to the falsely precise-sounding "sub-group", especially with the potentially confusing contrast between the lead and the info box in the Cushitic article. That reduces clarity!

I haven't been following you around. However, if I am "reducing clarity" elsewhere, would you please tell me where, so that I may correct it? kwami (talk) 21:11, 11 August 2008 (UTC)

Algonquian languages, for example. You deleted "group" at that point as well. I am not talking about the article, but only about the template boxes and using "group" there only to distinguish individual languages from genetic groups of languages that are the immediate descendants. (Taivo (talk) 22:16, 11 August 2008 (UTC))

Alright, I won't change any more of those. I've been using the italics-for-isolates approach. There are hundreds of info boxes to convert if you want a different convention! kwami (talk) 22:25, 11 August 2008 (UTC)

It's not a question of changing an existing convention because there simply was no convention. (Taivo (talk) 04:17, 12 August 2008 (UTC))

Woleai and attribution

Please see the Talk page for Woleaian. I'm afraid you've got some explaining to do. :-( -- Evertype·✆ 19:10, 13 August 2008 (UTC)

I've got explaining to do? Maybe a thank-you for bringing it to your attention? kwami (talk) 19:21, 13 August 2008 (UTC)

You should explain why you posted this image to Commons and gave it the tags and description you did. You did not bring it to my attention. It came to my attention. I am now asking you why you used my work without attribution and why you claimed it was Public Domain. -- Evertype·✆ 22:46, 13 August 2008 (UTC)

Ah, I thought you were talking about a different image, since you didn't specify the image or even the article you were upset by. Well, first, I did give attribution, and linked to the source. If I didn't put the attribution in your preferred format, I'll be happy to change it. (I figured you were pretty much synonymous with Unicode anyway.) Second, AFAIK, it's public domain because you can't copyright a script. I may be wrong there, as I'm not a copyright lawyer, but that was my reasoning for what I did. kwami (talk) 22:55, 13 August 2008 (UTC)

Replying at Talk:Woleaian_script -- Evertype·✆ 10:28, 14 August 2008 (UTC)

Rwanda demographics and attribution

I'll reiterate: unless you or anyone else is able to source the various claims within, say a week or so, I'm going to be removing it. Claims of the magnitude being made there need to be sourced. You're the one who keep restoring it, so the onus is on you so ensure it lives up to standards. El_C 03:31, 15 August 2008 (UTC)

And I would appreciate it if you were honest enough to state your motives. You give this ridiculous claim of a mere 6 lines to cover a very notable demographic trend being "undue weight", accuse me of bias when I disagree, and when I refuse to buy it, you change your story to improper sourcing. You don't give the impression of someone who wants completeness or accuracy, but only to cleanse the article of things you find distasteful. As I've said many times, of course it needs to be properly sourced. I am, after all, the one who fact-tagged it. However, I think we can wait longer than a week, since the person who added it is not very active and may not have easy access to the internet. It's not like the Rwanda article is in respectable shape to begin with, or that you're doing anything to improve the situation.

I would also appreciate it if you didn't place personal attacks in the text of the article, and will of course revert your edits until you stop. kwami (talk) 08:00, 15 August 2008 (UTC)

Sound change and Phonological change

Back in November you proposed merging sound change and phonological change. No one ever did make a case in favor; I eventually suggested an alternative, and in reponse Alsihler made a reasonable case (so it seemed to me) that the subjects are separate. The proposal is still hanging around, though, even though there's never been a case made in favor of it. Would you be willing to close (or withdraw, if such a thing is within propriety) the proposal? (Alternatively, do you have a case to make in favor of it? I don't see any contributions from you in the discussion.) I mention withdrawing, which I imagine would be removing the merge templates, as a possible alternative to closing because there has never been a talk section specifically about the merge proposal — the discussions that touch on it are not specific to it — so there's nothing to remove to an archive on the specific proposal. Pi zero (talk) 13:55, 15 August 2008 (UTC)

KFc in mongolia

A KFC in Hohhot. All street signs must be bilingual in Mongol and Chinese.

doesnt look vertical to me... the words are displayed horizontally. —Preceding unsigned comment added by ㄏㄨㄤㄉㄧ (talk • contribs) 14:53, 16 August 2008 (UTC)

True, the three syllables are arranged horizontally, but each is composed vertically, as if we wrote in English

Ken

tuc

ky.

That isn't really vertical writing, it's horizontal writing with very short lines. Besides, your reasoning that vertical Mongol is bad for signs was completely unsupported. English is often written truly vertically on restaurants, but that doesn't mean horizontal English is bad for signs. kwami (talk) 15:02, 16 August 2008 (UTC)

im just wondering, can this kind mongolian be typed? not the cylliric one because we all know that ㄏㄨㄤㄉㄧ (talk) 13:27, 17 August 2008 (UTC)

You mean with a manual typewriter? I'd think you'd have the same problems you have with Arabic: You'd need a different key for each position of each letter, and people might not bother with all of them. I have no idea if there are such typewriters, though. kwami (talk) 20:16, 18 August 2008 (UTC)

Good Article sweeps for 2 Pallas

As part of the Good Article sweeps conducted by Wikipedia:WikiProject Good articles/Project quality task force, I have completed a reassessment of 2 Pallas and placed the reassessment on hold for one week to allow some minor things to be fixed. I am contacting you because you have been a major contributor to the article. The reassessment can be found here. Please contact me with any concerns or questions. Thank you, GaryColemanFan (talk) 19:41, 16 August 2008 (UTC)

the falg of georgia on your userpage

im positive thats actually the flag of the COUNTRY georgia, so why is it small like the other provincial and state flags. im not trying to be rude here, just pointing it out.ㄏㄨㄤㄉㄧ (talk) 13:37, 17 August 2008 (UTC)

How in the world did I miss that?! Thanks for pointing it out. It was of course supposed to be the US state of Georgia. I've only spent a few minutes in Sakartvelo (I couldn't talk my way past the Russian border guards, who were in Ajaria at the time), so unfortunately this flag doesn't belong on my list. kwami (talk) 19:00, 17 August 2008 (UTC)

Footnote inline citations on language pages

Hi Kwamikagami. You are doing good and careful work on the language pages. I just realized that I had not been understanding some of the citations you were adding on some of the pages we have both been editing recently. For example, I failed to understand that "(L&M 1996:56):" was a citation as I interpreted it as some sort of esoteric language table cross reference for a table of which I knew not. Sorry for the confustion. I guess the colon threw me, or just the fact that I don't grok IPA and linguistics technical details. I was only trying to get WP to be a better sourced encyclopedia. I added WP standard footnote citations to a couple of articles as an example of how they can be done with the Ladefoged source. See Stiff voice or Slack voice and see what you think. (Respond here as I will follow the thread in just this one place.) N2e (talk) 13:26, 18 August 2008 (UTC)

Yeah, that's better. I was being lazy, since the articles are little more than stubs. We lose the page numbers this way, but the book has a good index. kwami (talk) 19:34, 18 August 2008 (UTC)

Thanks, sorry for my lameness in not even recognizing them as sources though. I guess I just thought Linguistics=GREEK and turned off the interpretive section of my head. N2e (talk) 20:41, 18 August 2008 (UTC)

Spiritual culture of the Hadzabe

Dear Kwamikagami,

Thank You for Your message. Thank You also for Your patience in waiting for the answer. I release it with heavy heart, because it is necessarily incomplete because of the sophisticatedness of the topic, but I do not want to make You wait longer than a fortnight.

I appended my summary after Talk:Hadza people#removed section, but the detailed answer is on a subpage User:Physis/Spiritual culture of the Hadzabe.

Best wishes,

Physis (talk) 13:55, 19 August 2008 (UTC)

TFA protection

Move protection of a day's featured article is pretty standard; semi-protection is generally only permitted in instances of extreme vandalism; here it seems you've even fully protected the article? Was that intentional? – Luna Santin (talk) 08:21, 23 August 2008 (UTC)

Sorry, I just assumed that full protection for 24 hrs would be appropriate in this situation, since we don't want the homepage shouting FUCK YOU to the world. I'll revert the protection. kwami (talk) 08:31, 23 August 2008 (UTC)

No problem. If it does get nasty, there's ample precedent for (usually shortish) semi. Full protection is pretty rare, though, I think. I do try to keep an eye on TFAs, when I can, so hopefully I'll be pulling my own weight here. Sorry to bother you. :) – Luna Santin (talk) 09:22, 23 August 2008 (UTC)

I really don't understand this. These articles aren't really open for editing, so what's the point of leaving them unprotected? They'll be back to normal status soon enough. They are also the face Wikipedia presents to the world, so having them shout obscenities (or "cockroaches are delicious", which is what I've seen here) is in IMO completely inappropriate. Even if we catch it within a minute or two, there are lots of readers who will have accessed Wikipedia homepage in the meantime. kwami (talk) 09:27, 23 August 2008 (UTC)

Periodically this does get debated back and forth, with mixed and strong feelings on both sides. Some users argue that it's important that one of the first articles a user may visit is open to editing, and that protecting our most prominently displayed article goes against the philosophy of the project; others, obviously, feel as you do and wish to protect it against vandalism. Lately it seems the compromise is that TFA gets semi-protected for short periods in cases of extreme pattern vandalism (raids and such, mainly). Either way, I believe there's a general agreement that full protection in particular should rarely if ever be used with TFA. I don't mean to brush you off, really, but you have more minds to change than just mine. =\ Probably best to start a thread at WP:VPP, WP:AN, or WT:NOPRO if you're interested in getting a debate going. – Luna Santin (talk) 09:41, 23 August 2008 (UTC)

Nah, I doubt I'd change anyone's mind. kwami (talk) 09:43, 23 August 2008 (UTC)

Fair enough, I guess... if you'd like, I could send an email your way, if I spot a debate on the subject getting some momentum? Contingent on my remembering, of course, but I hopefully would. – Luna Santin (talk) 09:56, 23 August 2008 (UTC)

Thanks. I'd appreciate that. kwami (talk) 10:12, 23 August 2008 (UTC)

Rwanda

I'll reply on the talk page. But basically, I don't think there had to be an edit war about this. I am half-guilty too, but can you just please show me the specific sources that can be used to replace the {{fact}} tags? I can even do it myself. But no one was asking you to rewrite anything. I know that takes time. I think El C just wanted you to replace the citation tags with the refs. Khoikhoi 01:36, 24 August 2008 (UTC)

Warning

As the admin who saw you revert warring with the anon last week, you are hereby warned: if you continue to revert war, you will be blocked without further warning. *** The first sentence of wp:burden places to burden of citing sources on you. I have no opinion as to the disputed content, despite your repeated protests to the contrary. *** And don't misuse your rollback, either, or I will revoke your rollback flag. Thanks. El_C 21:10, 24 August 2008 (UTC)

Who are you to warn me, since you are involved in censoring the article? And which "abuse" of my rollback feature are you talking about: reverting your snide remarks on my talk page? If you're an admin, you need to learn to take responsibility for your own edits.

Alright, since you're going to be so intransigent about it, I'll add the refs without bothering to integrate them into the article. I don't like making such unbalanced edits, but it's better than being in this stupid argument. kwami (talk) 21:19, 24 August 2008 (UTC)

I am a Wikipedia editor and administrator who saw you revert warring last week. I have been trying, in vain, to make you understand that I have no opinion as to the un-cited material, but that wp:burden (first sentence) places the burden on you, the individual who restored them (against the anon, who removed them). Any further WP:POINT disruption ("add[ing] the refs without bothering to integrate them into the article") and you will be blocked without further warning. Thanks again. El_C 21:24, 24 August 2008 (UTC)

You mean I have to rewrite the article just because I'm the one to add the sources which you already know are there? You call that unbiased adminship? That's abuse of your admin privileges, which could get you blocked. kwami (talk) 21:26, 24 August 2008 (UTC)

I mean, add sources [only] to the un-cited material you are restoring, per wp:burden. How do you arrive from a three sentence passage that needs sourcing to re-writing the article is beyond me. Best to keep things simple and avoid hyperbole. Thanks, El_C 21:35, 24 August 2008 (UTC)

'Demographics' in 'Rwanda'. Alright, the section, if you wish to play petty semantics. You know perfectly well from what I was referring to, since I've said it before. kwami (talk)

Petty semantics? You write in a confusing way and I'm expected to telepathically know that by "article" you meant "section"? Sheesh. How difficult. El_C 22:48, 24 August 2008 (UTC)

So, had I not stepped in, would you and the anon just be reverting each other back & forth, indefinitely? I really don't understand your approach. El_C 21:42, 24 August 2008 (UTC)

Stop misrepresenting the situation. You are the one who originally gutted the article, and your rational was not lack of citations, but "undue weight"—claiming that a notable demographic trend should be deleted just because other parts of the article are stubs. You only picked up the citation argument—which you are not applying elsewhere in the article—when I pointed out that you were abusing the concept of 'undue weight'. You are not some disinterested party "stepping in" to stop an edit war, but a primary party to the edit war. Frankly, I initially suspected the anon. was you not bothering to sign in, since he picked up where you left off. That may not be the case, but considering your repeated misrepresentation of events, which are needed to make your threats credible, I wouldn't be surprised. kwami (talk) 22:07, 24 August 2008 (UTC)

If you suspect that anon was me, initiate a checkuser, otherwise, you are out of line. Your modus operandi is questionable, and ultimately, unsustainable. El_C 22:30, 24 August 2008 (UTC)

"Without bothering to integrate them"

Putting all the citations at the end is not good enough. You need to place a citation for each fact tags, so the reader knows: this citation sources this claim, this citation sources that claim, and so on. I just don't understand why you'd choose to do this, on purpose. Thanks again. El_C 21:48, 24 August 2008 (UTC)

I don't understand: why not do a good job? You're trying to punish me by doing it poorly, purposefully? El_C 21:54, 24 August 2008 (UTC)

Because I don't want to edit that article! How many times do I have to say it? I'm not interested in developing it, because I want to put my time into other things. I'm merely trying to prevent you from gutting it of material you don't like. You know the sources are sitting right there in the religion articles, so I hope you can understand how I see deleting that material, and nothing else that is fact tagged, smacks of bias, and that changing your argument to whatever you think wight work best makes all of your arguments look insincere. kwami (talk) 22:07, 24 August 2008 (UTC)

But it is your responsibility, and to do it well enough. You restored it, you source it: I've probably linked wp:burden ten times now. It's not that I don't like the material, I just want balance. I could not care less about its claims. I'm not backing down this time. El_C 22:27, 24 August 2008 (UTC)

I have sourced it, and it's not my responsibility to rewrite the section to your liking. I don't know where you get the idea that others need to follow your dictates. kwami (talk) 22:32, 24 August 2008 (UTC)

You don't need to rewrite anything to put the sources where the fact tags are, instead of all at the end. Which is just subpar, as you yourself admitted. El_C 22:44, 24 August 2008 (UTC)

But I did put the sources where the fact tags were. I really don't understand you. kwami (talk) 22:48, 24 August 2008 (UTC)

Oh I see: the fact tag used to be individually tailored to each unsourced claim, like so. Then you rollbacked(!) my edit which had a lengthy edit summary (you're not supposed to do that), and instead, add just two citations, one at the end of each paragraph, even though there were more than one issues in each. Even you seem to have forgotten about that stunt; now you suddenly remembered, and feign innocence? ("But I did" [etc.]) El_C 22:58, 24 August 2008 (UTC)

Oh knock it off: I put in all those fact tags, as I've already reminded you. What, I'm not allowed to revert my own edits now? Six fact tags were way out of line, but I did it to appease you. When you continued your edit war, I reduced the number down to normal wikipedia practice: Sources typically go at the end of the paragraph they support, even in featured articles. Surely you know that.

And anyway, that was a week ago. As you'd continued edit warring since then, I had naively assumed that you were aware of the state of the article, and that "where the fact tags are" meant "where the fact tags are", not where they were at some unspecified date. kwami (talk) 23:09, 24 August 2008 (UTC)

Adding five sources to the end of the paragraph is overkill, they should be added to the sentences as was my model, which you rollbacked without comment. But, no, "reduced the number down to normal wikipedia practice" — whose dictates are we blindly expected to follow now? Two fact tags per paragraph is the Kwamikagami-rule? Okay, now I know. But, I reached my quota of speaking to, or even thinking about, you for today. It's been frustrating for naught, as always seems to be the case with you. El_C 23:21, 24 August 2008 (UTC)

Now you're exaggerating. Or not bothering to count. What would you prefer, that I add the same sources over and over again to every single statement? What possibly for? If you did that in a featured article candidate, the reviewers would object. And no, the FA process does not follow the "Kwamikagami-rule", but perhaps you should familiarize yourself with GA and FA criteria before you start making outlandish demands. kwami (talk) 23:30, 24 August 2008 (UTC)

If the same source is used to reference more than once claim, than yes, you add it with the refname = and it appears as ^{a, b , c, etc.} This is new to you? El_C 23:37, 24 August 2008 (UTC)

If you look at my edit, you'll see that's exactly what I did. But when a source supports an entire paragraph, it's common practice (not the "Kwamikagami-rule") to cite it at the end of the paragraph. Anyway, I thought you weren't going to bother me anymore today. kwami (talk) 23:41, 24 August 2008 (UTC)

Malta

Seeing as you've been involved at Maltese language with the IP's (and previously with several of his sockpuppets it's transpired), you may be interested in this AN/I thread and this RFCU. It would be very useful to have an admin keep an eye on Special:RecentChangesLinked/Template:Malta_topics who's familiar with the IP's and editors involved for a quick response to this disruption. Many thanks, Knepflerle (talk) 16:34, 25 August 2008 (UTC)

Sure thing. Not a subject I'm very familiar with, though. kwami (talk) 17:07, 25 August 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for stepping in. They're socks of a multiply banned user - see my post at User_talk:Black Kite - so blocking and reverting are order of the day. Thanks again, Knepflerle (talk) 22:12, 25 August 2008 (UTC)

ANI

Hello, Kwamikagami. This message is being sent to inform you that there currently is a discussion at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents regarding an issue with which you may have been involved. The discussion is about the topic Wikipedia:Ani#User:Kwamikagami. Thank you. Toddst1 (talk) 19:47, 25 August 2008 (UTC)

Negative evidence redirect

Hey, Just thought I'd let you know that I redirected Negative evidence to Negative proof. I could be wrong though. Late.--Woland (talk) 21:20, 25 August 2008 (UTC)

That's fine. I figured there must be something out there, but didn't want to look too long for it. kwami (talk) 22:09, 25 August 2008 (UTC)

Acknowledging Your version, asking time for Hadza questions, they are more complex that I thought

Dear Kwamikagami,

Thank You for Your answers and patience. I have just answered on Talk:Hadza people#Acknowledging Your version, asking time for Hadza questions, they are more complex that I thought.

The title expresses the essence. I have set my e-mail address in Wikipedia.

Thank You the many care and congratulation on Your knowledge on Hadza language and folklore.

Best wishes

Physis (talk) 12:25, 26 August 2008 (UTC)

Okay, I'd wanted to write you if I needed to convince you further. My email's also set up, if you like. kwami (talk) 17:20, 26 August 2008 (UTC)

Ossetic IPA

Are you sure your additions to Ossetic language are right? The bit about the digraphs needs clarification, at any rate. Aren't the digraphs the combinations with ъ, which are mostly indicated in the IPA with ’ (indicating ejective). Is it possible that the Ossetic ejectives also have lip rounding, so these aren't actually separate phonemes? If not, the digraphs for the lip-rounded versions should be presented. —KCinDC (talk) 04:08, 27 August 2008 (UTC)

The refs at the end of the article show the inventory, but not with Cyrillic. I've had to look elsewhere: the labialized consonants are written <Cу>. I'll get to it later. kwami (talk) 05:32, 27 August 2008 (UTC)

Kwami, if you're still around, please revert yourself concerning the article move for Abhkazia and South Ossetia RECOGNITON

This is about interntational recognition, limited to Russia as it may be. Justification on the talk page, under one of your entires. The move, if any, should be done via WP:RM, as is the case right now for Kosovo's internatioanl recognition. Best wishes, --Mareklug ^talk 12:55, 27 August 2008 (UTC)

Wow, I had no idea that was going on. Just trying to stop an edit war. I dropped a note on the RM page for Kosovo, explaining that they shouldn't let my move here influence their decision, and voting in favor of the move to "recognition" for both articles. I would normally ask you to come to consensus before reverting myself, but the more I think about it, the more I believe the "condemnation" editor has been editing in bad faith. kwami (talk) 13:38, 27 August 2008 (UTC)

Re: Ibn al-Haytham

Hi Kwamikagami, sorry I haven't replied on this until now. I reckon we should mention something about his faith in the lead, though not necessarily in the place you removed the "Muslim" part from. T|he reason for this is that since the lead is meant to summarize the article, and we have a section about him entitled "Theology", then we should mention something about his beliefs. Especially since (reading that section), his faith seemed very important to why he was a scientist: "Ibn al-Haytham attributed his experimental scientific method and scientific skepticism to his Islamic faith. The Qur'an, for example, placed a strong emphasis on empiricism." So I think some summary of that theology section needs to be made in the lead, though I'm not entirely sure that saying "Muslim polymath" is the right way to do that, since it makes no comment as to why that is relevant. What do you think? Any ideas of say a sentence we could add to the lead about his faith? Deamon138 (talk) 20:25, 27 August 2008 (UTC)

Well, how bout s.t. like FA Isaac Newton as a model? It certainly discusses his faith, which was very important to him too, without saying he was a "Christian physicist" or implying that he developed "Christian physics" or some such nonsense instead of just physics.

BTW, I moved all the "Islamic science" articles to "science in medieval Islam" — come to think of it, "in the medieval Islamic world" would be more precise, but maybe a bit long winded. kwami (talk) 23:40, 27 August 2008 (UTC)

Thanks! ... I think. kwami (talk) 18:05, 28 August 2008 (UTC)

Yes, the Newton example is something to follow, although obviously the wording would have to be different here. Do you have a good idea for a sentence, or where exactly to put it in the lead? Oh and thanks for moving those articles, the new titles make more sense. Deamon138 (talk) 05:11, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

I know nothing about the man, so I really don't think I should be the one doing this. Certainly if he was a theologian, mentioning "Sunni theologian" or some such in the intro is entirely appropriate. I'm just trying to get away from treating Christianity as the default, so that one's religion does not need mentioning unless it isn't Christianity. kwami (talk) 05:52, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

if you get bored...

Hi kwami...if you get bored... you can help out with User:Ling.Nut/ELAS or User:Ling.Nut/ELO. :-) Ling.Nut ^(WP:3IAR) 12:05, 28 August 2008 (UTC)

Delta Andromedae

On September 10, 2007, you added the following remark to the Delta Andromedae article:

“ It has a proper name variously spelled Sadiradra, Saderazra, Sadir Elazra, from its Arabic name الصدر العذراء al-sadr al-adhra'a "Bosom of the Maiden". ”

If you could remember your source for this statement I would appreciate it if you'd let me know it. Spacepotato (talk) 01:50, 30 August 2008 (UTC)

I probably assumed that was one of mine when I merged the star names with their various articles, since it's uncommon for anyone to add Arabic, but it turns out it was s.o. else. It was added here[26] and filled out here[27]. That user added info to other stars as well, but was using a dynamic IP address, so we're not likely to track them down. kwami (talk) 04:12, 30 August 2008 (UTC)

wu dialect tones

hey do you have any tones for wu dialect?ㄏㄨㄤㄉㄧ (talk) 18:14, 1 September 2008 (UTC)

Do you mean descriptions, or recordings? Which dialect? kwami (talk) 18:30, 1 September 2008 (UTC)

i mean diacritics for wu dialect.ㄏㄨㄤㄉㄧ (talk) 14:25, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

I've added IPA tone letters to the articles on the various Wu dialects. You could use those, or you could use the IPA diacritics. I don't know which other diacritics would be appropriate. It might be easier if I knew which Wu dialect you wanted. kwami (talk) 20:06, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

i was looking for the diacritics for the shanghai and ningbo ones.ㄏㄨㄤㄉㄧ (talk) 21:04, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

Shanghainese is easy: all you need is an acute accent. Ningbo may be too complex to use simple diacritics: it has five tones, including high vs. low rising and a dipping tone. However, if you can argue that one of the tones is phonemically LOW or MID, then you might be able to use standard IPA diacritics. kwami (talk) 21:18, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

Are you looking to expand the Wikipedia articles? kwami (talk) 21:19, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

what im trying to do is trying to figure out how to get zhuyin to be perfectly compatible with shanghainese and ningbo dialect. to do that i needed the diacritics and possibly some extra ltters? im not sure though because i only know a few words.ㄏㄨㄤㄉㄧ (talk) 21:45, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

Oh, you want zhuyin ! Okay.

I'm sure there must be more tone marks, since zhuyin is used for Min and Hakka, which have six tones and therefore need five diacritics. As for the extra letters, what they have should be enough for Ningbo. Check out Taiwanese_(linguistics)#Comparison_of_orthographies. (The extra two tone diacritics are unicode substitutes; I haven't seen anything official that would confirm them.) kwami (talk) 22:32, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

{{Jovian satellites}}

Sure! The only reason I added those is because out of 63 entries only ~8 have images - so I was trying to compensate. Anyways, I am going to submit the Moons of Jupiter for FLC really soon, so if you notice other problems just let me know. Nergaal (talk) 06:33, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

Sadly, actual photos of the irregulars are mostly single pixels - Himalia is unusual in this regard. kwami (talk) 08:48, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

96.247.32.90

Thanks for your help with dealing with the vandal at 96.247.32.90 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RDNS · RBLs · http · block user · block log) a few days ago.

Unfortunately, almost immediately after the block you put on 96.247.32.90 expired, he/she started vandalizing articles again, the biggest examples being these edits: 1, 2, 3, sorry to have to bother you with this again, and thanks again for the help. Aoimusha (talk) 03:44, 3 September 2008 (UTC)

And blocked again. Would you mind cleaning up the mess it left? kwami (talk) 06:12, 3 September 2008 (UTC)

Alright, all of it's recent vandalism has been removed, thanks again for your help. Aoimusha (talk) 06:36, 5 September 2008 (UTC)

wp:OR is OR

black is black and white is white..i find no grey..original research is original research..please assume good faith ..Cityvalyu (talk) 08:03, 3 September 2008 (UTC)

It's not a matter of assuming good faith, it's that you don't seem to know what the term "original research" means. I didn't even disagree with your edit, just your misrepresentation of it. kwami (talk) 08:07, 3 September 2008 (UTC)

convention

we usually put "for" first and "against" next..so "support" should precede "criticise"..not the other way..Cityvalyu (talk) 08:03, 3 September 2008 (UTC)

reply

amusement not my problem;) lol..i assumed good faith and neither called you pro russian nor anti r..so , whats the amusement?..my only grouse is that editors must make controversial misquotes AFTER CONSENSUS backing..Personally, I DONT PREFER CHANGING STATUS QUO UNILATERALLY unless i can find RELIABLE NEUTRAL citations that say the opposite..Cityvalyu (talk) 08:29, 3 September 2008 (UTC)

But it isn't the status quo. The stuff I removed was only added recently. All the stuff about how unjust the recognition of Kosovo is, besides being highly POV, is also irrelevant to the lede on Abkhazia and S. Ossetia. If you're interested in consensus, why didn't you delete the material yourself when it was first added?

True, you said mine were 'controversial "western" edits', but that's equivalent to the wording of other editors who've said I'm either pro-Kremlin or anti-Russian. kwami (talk) 08:34, 3 September 2008 (UTC)

pronunciation of "South Ossetia"

Can you please explain why you altered the IPA of the article on South Ossetia? /ɒˈsɛtɪə/ was well-sourced, and even linked to the specific page on the online OED. You removed this, and replaced the reference with a link to the Wikipedia article on the OED. Quite apart from seeming like deliberate misinformation - which I am sure it is not - how on earth does this improve the quality of the article? —Wereon (talk) 12:16, 3 September 2008 (UTC)

That's the pronunciation in the edition of the OED that I have access to. I wasn't able to access your link, because it's a subscription service. We can have both. kwami (talk) 17:54, 3 September 2008 (UTC)

Maltese people: wording

Hello, I just noticed the edit you made as some kind of middle-ground between 'propaganda' and 'influence' (on the Maltese people article). I think the former is too aggressive in context and I suppose 'influence' can be misunderstood (I'm not sure who by) as referring to genetic ancestry. Thanks for your suggestion, I think it works well. Kalindoscopy: un enfant espiègle (talk) 20:17, 3 September 2008 (UTC)

Hello. I have included the word "propaganda" as no current science accepts the maltese people as a pure north italian race or a north african race. Suggesting otherwise would be in clear violation of POV, and I shall not be letting it go if someone tries to suggest this. 89.243.57.7 (talk) 20:44, 3 September 2008 (UTC)

Yolgnu (or whoever you are); the only suggestion of POV is your own. No information is being changed.. a charged word is being dropped in preference for a more neutral one, in no way masking the 'propagandist' elements you're so keen on. Your suggestions of racial motivations are indicative of the (questionable) attitude you bring to this project. Kalindoscopy: un enfant espiègle (talk) 20:51, 3 September 2008 (UTC))

Oh, so now accusations of who I am too? Well if you checked, you would see my IP isn't from Australia, unless I've now moved country or something, just to escape your wikistalking? The use of the word "propaganda" is highly neccessary to ensure people understand that what they are reading was used as propaganda by those ruling powers, and is not accepted as modern day fact. 89.243.57.7 (talk) 20:56, 3 September 2008 (UTC)

Whatever you are, you have a sour agenda. And you will be a momentary disturbance in face of the over-arching truth. Of which I am, at present, a paladin. Enjoy your wikiwork ^_^ Kalindoscopy: un enfant espiègle (talk) 21:05, 3 September 2008 (UTC)

New Name

Talk:International_reaction_to_the_2008_Kosovo_declaration_of_independence#New_Name, i wanted to make sure you saw this Ijanderson (talk) 21:52, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

Okay, added the date back in. I was just trying to clean up the grammar. kwami (talk) 22:12, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

# of moons

Saturn is listed as having 60, and Jupiter as having 63. Do moonlets count as moons? Nergaal (talk) 02:48, 5 September 2008 (UTC)

If a moon is a natural satellite, which we claim, then it shouldn't matter if it's estimated to be 500m across, like the larger moonlets, or 1000m across, like the smallest known outer moons. (And presumably there are ones smaller than that which we haven't yet found!) And it shouldn't matter if it's embedded in a thick ring, like the moonlets and Daphnis, or a tenuous one, like Enceladus. Or for that matter whether our cameras are good enough to resolve a disk. The clumps in the F Ring are numbered as moons; the only question is whether or not they're solid. I've also heard people say that a 1- or 2-km chunk of ice shouldn't count as a moon, but even if we take that track, Saturn has more. Or if we go by named moons, Saturn still comes out on top: 52 to 49. Anyway, I've reworded the Saturnian moons intro to say that Saturn has some 200 moons and moonlets, and then break the numbers down. kwami (talk) 08:29, 5 September 2008 (UTC)

You reverted with the comment "Saturn has more moons. That may change, but right now Jupe is champ". If Saturn has more moons than Jupiter, how do you conclude that Jupiter has the most moons? kwami (talk) 06:28, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

Barnstar

The Graphic Designer's Barnstar

		The Graphic Designer's Barnstar
		For your wonderful moon mass charts, I offer the Graphic designer's barnstar. Serendipodous 12:24, 5 September 2008 (UTC)

I was wondering, do you think you could create an enlarged segment of the Jovian chart at, say 100 times magnification so people get an idea of the scale? Thanks. Serendi^podous 12:24, 5 September 2008 (UTC)

Thanks!

I can see a sliver at 50x, but at that scale I can no longer detect the curvature of the pie, so it's meaningless. kwami (talk) 18:45, 5 September 2008 (UTC)

It is hard to describe this in html but: if you draw an arrow towards a segment (which is not really curved anymore) with the color of the "other moons" the users would understand that between Europa and Ganymede there is a minute segment which magnified 100x times gives "this much of a segment". I just think that giving something visually to estimate the size of that invisible slice is more meaningful than saying in text that it is invisible. Nergaal (talk) 19:55, 5 September 2008 (UTC)

Yeah, you're right. I might get to that later today. kwami (talk) 19:59, 5 September 2008 (UTC)

Moons

This is one of those annoying definition things. It's not a question of who's right or who's wrong; merely a question of how you interpret the information presented. Right now, unlike with planets, there is no official dividing line as to what constitutes a moon and what doesn't; technically, every speck of dust orbiting in a planet's ring system could be considered a moon. Where one chooses to cut off is pretty arbitrary, so I prefer to simply go with the official count until a more stringent definition is adopted. Serendi^podous 07:43, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

But the official count is obsolete. Can you find one that takes the moonlets into account? kwami (talk) 07:46, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

The F Ring is also thought to contain moonlets, and a primary candidate is S/2004 S 6. S/2004 S 6, although unconfirmed, is numbered with the moons. kwami (talk) 08:09, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

No I can't find one. That's the point. And until an official definition of moon exists, there's no reason to declare the official count obsolete, since at the moment, a moon is something orbiting a planet that we choose to call a moon. Since it's not Wikipedia's job to make such calls (Wikipedia's purpose is to report, not to dictate), I think it's better to go with official sources. Serendi^podous 08:45, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

But if the official counts all date to before a hundred new bodies were found orbiting Saturn, then it's also OR to present them as if they were still accurate. kwami (talk) 08:49, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

As far as I can tell, those moonlets were discovered in 2006. The official count has been updated since that time, and those moonlets were not included. So the MPC and the IAU seem pretty clear on their decision to not consider them moons.Serendi^podous 08:58, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

Can you show me where the count was updated? kwami (talk) 09:00, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

Here is a list of all IAU designated natural satellites (that is, all that the IAU have officially catalogued, so Titan et al aren't in it), updated this year Serendi^podous 09:29, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

That's not a count, that's just a list of designations. The moonlets don't have individual designations. No, what I meant was a statement that "Saturn has 60 moons" or "Jupiter has the most moons". Unless we have that, it's OR to claim that 63 for Jupiter is more than 63 + ~150 for Saturn. kwami (talk) 17:37, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

Well, I could ask the same of you. Find me an official statement that Saturn has more than 200 moons or that moonlets are officially counted as moons. I'll try to track down what you want, but either way, unless we find evidence for our respective positions, we're indulging in OR. Serendi^podous 09:26, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

OK. This is an official NASA site. Updated December 28, 2007. Not only does it give Saturn's moon count of 60, it also lists the names and designations of every moon discovered to date. I think that's as conclusive as you can get. Serendi^podous 09:43, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

Okay, pretty good. They do, however, take pains to point out those are the satellites that "are officially recognized by the IAU", and also "The current number of known bodies with reasonably secure orbits". The moonlets were not followed long enough to secure their orbits. That is independent of whether or not they are "satellites". kwami (talk) 00:52, 8 September 2008 (UTC)

Anybody knows why S/2000 J 11 might not be on that list? Nergaal (talk) 02:05, 8 September 2008 (UTC)

That suggests that the orbit was not secured. We can see from the previous link that all the other moons discovered that year by the Sheppard-Jewitt-Fernandez-Magnier team were given names, which also suggests that S2000J11 was not confirmed. kwami (talk) 06:14, 8 September 2008 (UTC)

I'm sorry I got a bit tetchy up there, but I do think this issue is important. Serendi^podous 16:11, 9 September 2008 (UTC)

I don't mean to brag, but you aren't nearly as rude as I am. Hell, you're so not-rude that it's not even noticeable.

It looks like we have 62 moons by the IAU's count. I have no problem stating Jupiter has the most moons, as long as we specify that this is a count by a particular agency, or depends on "reasonably well" established orbits, not absolute. kwami (talk) 19:24, 9 September 2008 (UTC)

phagspa

how did the phagspa script represent chinese tones without diacritics, i thought there were tones in middle chinese?ㄏㄨㄤㄉㄧ (talk) 17:38, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

AFAIK it ignored tone, but I may be mistaken. I've never seen an example of it used for Chinese. kwami (talk) 00:38, 8 September 2008 (UTC)

Lake Eyre

Hi, thanks for letting me know. Odd. I've reuploaded the file. It looks like the list of lakes by area no longer makes use of the graphic in any case; perhaps this is why it was deleted. Since Eyre is a remarkably variable lake, it probably does make sense to include it in the "variable lakes" section and not in the main list. I think my little map shows it at its maximum extent, but I'm not certain. take care Citynoise (talk) 01:07, 10 September 2008 (UTC)

Also, fwiw, I added thumbnails for the rest of the lakes on that list missing them. Let me know if you see anything else amiss. Thanks! Citynoise (talk) 01:50, 10 September 2008 (UTC)

Looks good! kwami (talk) 01:57, 10 September 2008 (UTC)

I need your help on Romanization

Hello, Kwami. I ask you a favor with your expertise. I created Korean dishes, dalk galbi and Andong jjimdalk and named the articles as following Korean Wiktionary http://ko.wiktionary.org/wiki/%EB%8B%AD However, a stubborn editor named Badagnani (talk · contribs) insists on altering the spellings to "dak" and "tak" as referring to English Wiktionary. I've seen many wrong info there and even habitually inserted by him such as Samgyetang. Korean Wiktionary is managed by more strict admins on Korean language such as 아흔. Therefore, I believe that the Korean Wikitory is correct on the Romanization for 닭. Could you clarify the Romanization? I've tried to find the usage on the world from 국립국어원, but could not. Thanks--Caspian blue (talk) 01:27, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

If a name is well known enough with English speakers for them to be familiar with the Wade-Giles transliteration, then I agree with Badagnani that this should be included—but only as an alternate. Otherwise, Wikipedia articles in general follow the official transliteration of South Korea. kwami (talk) 01:34, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

Actually, it looks like he is following the official guidelines. 닭 is written dalg- before a vowel, but before a consonant or at the end of a word it is written dak. Therefore I agree with Badagnani. kwami (talk) 01:44, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

Thank you for the answer. However, there is no official Romanization (RR or Yale or Mr) for 닭. I searched the usage in Korean National Language Institute, but there is none. So are you suggesting me to spell only "dak" "tak" in the Korean infobox instead of "dalk" and "talk"? According to your comment, the Korean wiktionary should be changed? --Caspian blue (talk) 01:47, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

Yes. RR transcribes words according to how the are pronounced. That is, it's a phonemic system, whereas hangul is morpho-phonemic. I do like hangul much better, and wish that RR were also morphophonemic, but I didn't have any say in the matter! kwami (talk) 01:53, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

Thank you for the answer and sense of humor. You make me smile. :) --Caspian blue (talk) 01:57, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

Can I ask you another favor? Could you move Andong jjimdalk to Andong jjimdak because it could not be moved.--Caspian blue (talk) 02:01, 11 September 2008 (UTC)