Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Mathematics/Archive/2023/Oct

Draft: Mathematical Growth

I have looked for but could not find a good overview of the different kinds of growth that could be described mathematically, so I tried to write one. The article has been reviewed and found to be lacking technical depth or adequate references. As I explained in the Talk section for the article, I was aiming the article at non-mathematicians, and more technical explanations can be found in the articles on the individual types that are linked. Can anyone give me guidance on finding and citing better references? Thanks Pbergerd (talk) 16:53, 11 October 2023 (UTC)

PS: I could search the University of Wisconsin libraries for sources, but am not sure what to look for. Pbergerd (talk) 16:59, 11 October 2023 (UTC)

I gave some suggstions on Draft talk:Mathematical growth. However, the draft appears as an informal introduction to Asymptotic analysis. So, a possibility is to use it for providing a less technical introduction of this article, and, possibly, add a new section "Motivation". In this case, Mathematical growth could be a redirect to Asymptotic analysis. This deserves to be discuted, and this is a better place than the talk page of the draft. D.Lazard (talk) 18:10, 11 October 2023 (UTC)

Good article reassessment for John von Neumann

John von Neumann has been nominated for a good article reassessment. If you are interested in the discussion, please participate by adding your comments to the reassessment page. If concerns are not addressed during the review period, the good article status may be removed from the article. Thebiguglyalien (talk) 07:21, 23 September 2023 (UTC)

There are two {{citation needed}} tags that I don't have the books on my shelf at the moment to fix immediately (but the text they're attached to doesn't seem controversial). XOR'easter (talk) 19:21, 24 September 2023 (UTC)

One {{citation needed}} yet remains. I've tried my hand at reorganizing the article to make more clear what can be trimmed. XOR'easter (talk) 17:36, 25 September 2023 (UTC)

Specifically, the question is how to source this paragraph:

With the contributions of von Neumann to sets, the axiomatic system of the theory of sets avoided the contradictions of earlier systems and became usable as a foundation for mathematics, despite the lack of a proof of its consistency. The next question was whether it provided definitive answers to all mathematical questions that could be posed in it, or whether it might be improved by adding stronger axioms that could be used to prove a broader class of theorems.

--JBL (talk) 17:46, 25 September 2023 (UTC)

This is an entirely uncontroversial claim that probably should never have been tagged "cn", but I added a source. –jacobolus (t) 19:28, 25 September 2023 (UTC)

Thanks. It did seem like a statement that could equally well be supported by any of a bajillion books. XOR'easter (talk) 20:00, 25 September 2023 (UTC)

I guess on the upside, the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy page I linked there (found via googling) is a pretty good summary which talks about Von Neumann's contributions and puts them in context, so would probably be useful to a hypothetical reader interested in following up on the section here. –jacobolus (t) 01:53, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

The quote is obviously true. Completeness cannot be expected. JRSpriggs (talk) 18:45, 25 September 2023 (UTC)

Thanks for all the work that has been put into this. I don't think I'll have time to do more (and to be honest, the box-checking attitude on display has soured me the rest of the way from ever dealing with GA/FA business). XOR'easter (talk) 16:09, 29 September 2023 (UTC)

I thought some more about this and tried to identify any portions that could be split off into their own articles. The only part that seemed like it could prosper more as its own page was the list of publications (see here for further background). XOR'easter (talk) 21:14, 12 October 2023 (UTC)

C_4v point group

I'm trying to find the meaning of $C_{4v}$ point grup, a pyramidal symmetry of order 8, while in few days ago I have googled on it. My interpretation about this point group states that a solid with square base is symmetrical as one rotates for every quarter-turn of a full angle around the axis of symmetry, two vertical planes pass through diagonals of a square base, and two other vertical planes pass through the midpoints of the edges of square base. Is it correct?

I'm not actually expert at this subject. I would appreciate for the explanation or correction about my interpretation. Dedhert.Jr (talk) 06:24, 16 October 2023 (UTC)

That's correct. You just extend the symmetry group of a plane square (a dihedral group $D_{4}$ of order 8) to act on the 3-space by acting trivially on the direction orthogonal to the plane (the symmetries of the pyramid must preserve the base since it's the only square face, and they can't reverse the orthogonal direction since they have to fix the apex). The article you linked could use some editing. jraimbau (talk) 08:49, 16 October 2023 (UTC)

@Jean Raimbault Thank you. Sadly, I cannot edit the article I linked due to lack of knowledge. Hopefully someone can explain more detail about the generalization of $C_{nv}$ point group, a symmetry of order $2n$. Dedhert.Jr (talk) 09:42, 16 October 2023 (UTC)

Hindu–Arabic numeral system

There is an editorial dispute concerning possible Chinese origins for the Hindu–Arabic numeral system, please see talk:Hindu-Arabic numeral system. Paul August ☎ 21:33, 18 October 2023 (UTC)

Edit an article at first time

Hello! I'm old man enough and now try to do something useful. I'm interested in computational math and got some results on OEIS etc. So now I’m dealing with centroidal Voronoi tesselations, imho very interesting subject. The Wiki paper Centroidal_Voronoi_tessellation

- is a stub

- contains inaccuracies (stable and unstable CVT mixed)

- very outdated

So I'd like to edit it and got enough data for it, but

- feel self-doubt

- don't know is it useful

So will be very glad of any support and advice here!

UPD

Thank you very much for your support, but the question is more complicated than I thought. If ones has rights of OEIS editor please look at these drafts: https://oeis.org/draft/A363822 https://oeis.org/draft/A366544 but it's just tip of the iceberg ((

Dharmacat (talk) 18:17, 10 October 2023 (UTC)

I think it would be a good idea if you can i,prove the article (or any others). Changes should be referenced, if needed. Bubba73 ^{You talkin' to me?} 19:15, 10 October 2023 (UTC)

Is there a kind of sandbox in Wiki? Dharmacat (talk) 08:51, 11 October 2023 (UTC)

@Dharmacat: There is the main sandbox at Wikipedia:Sandbox, but you may prefer to use a personal sandbox at Special:Mypage/sandbox. —Kusma (talk) 09:32, 11 October 2023 (UTC)

Aha, many thanks! Dharmacat (talk) 11:45, 11 October 2023 (UTC)

If you need help, feel free to come back here to ask questions (or even on my Talk page). But the basic guidance here, especially when you're improving a stub article, is to be bold: make the changes that will improve things, don't worry too much about making mistakes. You can fix them or someone else may come along.

Honestly, this is probably the best way to get started (the worst would be on an established, controversial article).

- CRGreathouse (t | c) 12:56, 11 October 2023 (UTC)

Actually, if you have never edited anything on Wikipedia, I suggest to not "be bold" but instead start by doing a few small fixes on existing articles, just to get the hang of it. Could be something really simple like fixing spelling or grammar mistake, adding a reference, etc. PatrickR2 (talk) 16:40, 11 October 2023 (UTC)

I have a page of advice about writing mathematics/physics on Wikipedia that may be helpful. XOR'easter (talk) 17:58, 12 October 2023 (UTC)

I'd say that this is a very good write-up. Bubba73 ^{You talkin' to me?} 19:18, 12 October 2023 (UTC)

There is a lot of overlap between the topic of this article and of Lloyd's algorithm. So if you're going to improve the article (please do!) you might also check that the two articles divide their topic matter in the appropriate way. —David Eppstein (talk) 21:49, 12 October 2023 (UTC)

I suggest that you read Help:Wikitext, WP:Citing sources, Help:CS1 and Help:CS2; it might help to play with the templates in your sandbox. I endorse the advice to BEBOLD, at least in stub articles. -- Shmuel (Seymour J.) Metz Username:Chatul (talk) 13:18, 25 October 2023 (UTC)

FPSAC, and notable conferences

I notice that the International Conference on Formal Power Series and Algebraic Combinatorics (FPSAC) has been proposed for deletion. This is a highly prestigious conference with extended abstracts, comparable in several ways to a journal; I think it is the main conference in algebraic combinatorics, broadly considered. Does WP:NJOURNALS apply? If it is not notable, does a similar argument for deletion apply to e.g. Symposium on Discrete Algorithms (SODA)? (While the SODA article is better developed, the concern of primary sourcing still holds.) I think that there may be several similar conferences around theoretical computer science and nearby areas. Disclosing that I served on the scientific committee of FPSAC the year that it was in Slovenia. Russ Woodroofe (talk) 09:05, 28 October 2023 (UTC) Addition: or alternatively, do proceedings published in well-established journals satisfy GNG? Russ Woodroofe (talk) 10:46, 28 October 2023 (UTC)

It is very difficult to source articles on conferences, even major and well-established ones, and even considering selective indexes to be sources as NJOURNALS does. They are not generally indexed except by specialized sources like DBLP (which is not very selective), it is difficult to find people who write much about them rather than merely publishing in them, and often when they do write about them it is in non-independent sources such as prefaces to the conference proceedings. For SODA, it is possible that there is something about it in SIGACT News, like a report from an instance of the conference, but as an ACM publication that might not be considered independent enough. —David Eppstein (talk) 16:54, 28 October 2023 (UTC)