Talk:History of the world

GA review (transcluded from Talk:History of the world/GA1)

I am quick failing the article because a cleanup banner has been in place since September 2007. Please address the concern (lack of references) before renominating the article. Everything in the article should be attributed to a reliable source. As present, almost nothing is sourced. Please note that references should also be properly and consistently formatted (with, at minimum, a title, publisher, url, and accessdate). See Wikipedia:Citing sources for the {{cite web}} template.

Because this is a quick fail, this is not a thorough review, and other problems may exist in the article. I recommend placing it for Wikipedia:Peer review when you are considering nominating the article again. GaryColemanFan (talk) 18:36, 7 June 2008 (UTC)

History of Ideas inaccuracies

I suppose it should be expected that such a broad overview would mischaracterize a lot of traditions. But it's surprising that such simple factual problems are glossed over as the founding dates for traditions.

Beginning in the 7th century BCE, the so-called "Axial Age"

The Axial Age is a model posited by Jaspers for categorizing the period from 800 BC to 200 BC. This means it encompasses 8th, 7th, 6th, 5th, 4th, and 3rd centuries BC.

During the 6th century BCE, Chinese Confucianism, Indian Buddhism and Jainism, Persian Zoroastrianism, Ancient Egyptian Monotheism, and Jewish Monotheism all developed.

(More or less) correct on Confucianism, Buddhism, Jainism, and monotheistic Judaism. Incorrect on Zoroastrianism (6th c. is just when Herodotus first took notice of Zoroatrianism, not when it was probably founded, which could have been anytime from 1800 to 500 BC). The fact that our earliest historical information on Zoroastrianism (or proto-Zoroastrianism, perhaps) dates from this century says a lot more about Greek civilization than it does about Persian, since it's only really a reflection of the increasingly cosmopolitan and literary character of the Greeks. Egyptian monotheism (or monolatry) per se was more an aberration than a long-term cultural shift, and occurred in the 14th century BC, not the 6th.

In the 5th century Socrates and Plato would lay the foundations of Ancient Greek philosophy.

Greek philosophy predates Confucianism, Buddhism, and Jainism. The 'foundations' of ancient Greek philosophy were laid by the proto-scientific Thales and the metaphysician Anaximander at the start of the 6th century BC. This tradition was then spread from Ionia to Athens by Anaxagoras in the 5th century BC; Socrates did not lay the foundations, but rather popularized the existing tendency toward speculative disputation, resulting not just in the Platonic school (and its Aristotelian offshoot), but in three other major schools founded by disciples of Socrates: the hedonistic Cyrenaics (replaced by the more moderate Epicureans), the antisocial Cynics (who birthed the Stoicism that came to dominate Rome, Christianity, and the entire modern world-view), and the logical Megarians. I say all of this not to in any way suggest that we should include this all in the article, but only to complicate the notion that Socrates and Plato popped out of nowhere and single-handedly built philosophy; both were borrowing from a tradition that had already been firmly established over the past 150-200 years by such luminaries as Pythagoras, Parmenides, and Heraclitus. Plato's real significance is the impact he had much later, since (via Plotinus and Augustine) he is the source for much of the orthodoxy of western Christianity over the last 2000 years, and for most of our modern Western views about 'mind/soul' and 'matter.' But we could just as easily trace the start of Western philosophy to any of the other figures I've mentioned above.

In the east, three schools of thought were to dominate Chinese thinking until the modern day. These were Taoism, Legalism and Confucianism.

This is a controversial claim. The conventional view is that Legalism largely died out until a few decades ago; certainly it may have been partly incorporated into Confucianism thousands of years ago, but all three schools borrowed views from one another. You also already mentioned Confucianism above; re-repeating a bunch of names without doing anything to even cursorily explain their significance is not very informative. If you read a good history book (including a textbook or encyclopedia), does it focus mainly on giving long lists of names, or does it put its main effort into cultivating an understanding of why certain historical events occurred as they did? In the case of China, the key event is of course the Warring States Period during which the Hundred Schools of Thought (not just the aforementioned three, but also the Mohists, who invented the first form of utilitarianism and Chinese logic) arose, and the subsequent consolidation under the Qin and Han.

The Confucian tradition, which would attain dominance, looked for political morality not to the force of law but to the power and example of tradition.

I'm not sure this even makes sense. Because I'm already familiar with Chinese history, I can suss out that you mean to be drawing a distinction between Legalism and Confucian 'traditionalism;' but what is a law if not a codified tradition? And in what sense is Confucianism not interested in 'the force of law'? 'Tradition' is simply absurdly too general a term here, and is doubly ridiculous insofar as Confucianism is by definition a new school of thought in the period in question. What distinguishes Confucianism from its rival traditions isn't that it's the 'most traditional' (which may be so, but nearly all the traditions claimed to be 'more traditional' in one way or another), but that it places its emphasis on Virtue and on the interconnected web of obligations sustaining everything from the family's morality to the sovereign's.

In the west, the Greek philosophical tradition, represented by Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle,

Again, why take the time to say the words 'Greek philosophical tradition,' 'Socrates,' and 'Plato' twice in such close proximity, when you could spend the same time instead giving some notion of what it actually means that these figures existed? Why is Alexander's conquest, which radically changed the course of every society on the Mediterranean (and going as far as India in the Greek-ruled, largely Buddhist northwest) for the next 2300 years, treated as nothing more than a crude vehicle for Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle? Socrates didn't even write; if he had any influence, it was only through the views of other philosophers who appropriated him. Yet the complete restructuring of the Mediterranean political landscape is significant chiefly because it let more people know who Socrates was? Instead of wasting readers' time with lengthy discussions of meaningless names and rambling about aliases ("Alexander III of Macedon, more commonly known as Alexander the Great" -- why do we need to know that there were two other Alexanders and that he was known by several names that all feature 'Alexander'?), one could actually include useful historical information in this deeply unfortunate and malnamed page.

-Silence (talk) 02:09, 26 May 2011 (UTC)

Thanks silence ... I'll try to work your more constructive points into the article. --J. D. Redding 04:07, 30 May 2011 (UTC) ps., do keep in mind that this article is a broad overview and, personally, any mis-characterizations are not as much as you imply.

Human History

Shouldn't this article be moved to Human History (now a redirect to this article)? This is a fantastic article, but it's not about the history of the Earth, or even of Life. It's about the history of humans, so that's where it should go. I would do this myself but a) I wanted to get some other opinions first, and b) Human History already exists as redirect to this article, so an admin is needed to delete that before this can be moved. Thoughts? ☻☻☻Sithman VIII !!☻☻☻ 08:04, 29 May 2011 (UTC)

Human History ... Human history. Human History should be redirected to Recorded history, JIMO ... or {{disambig}} it. --J. D. Redding 04:05, 30 May 2011 (UTC)

I would vote for "History of the world" to remain the main article, with "Human history" as a redirect. Either way would be OK, but "History of the world" seems more idiomatic to me. The article Human also offers a perspective -- a more biological approach at least to prehistoric human history.70.179.90.182 (talk) 04:25, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

Requested move

The following discussion is an archived discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: not moved. Favonian (talk) 19:19, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

---

History of the world → Human history –

• Support please. If this video doesn't convince you, please consider that the "History of the world" title is a confusing and inaccurate rarely used idiom which is incompatible with the very idea of extraterrestrial intelligence. The title "Human history" would solve those problems. Dualus (talk) 18:38, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

It is not true that "History of the world" is confusing, inaccurate or rarely used. Google search shows "History of the world" to be twice as common (20,800,000) as "Human history" (9,140,000).

There is no evidence that those more common usages are the idiomatic form. I'm likely at least 5 million are, but how can we tell what proportion of the 20 million refer to Earth and how many refer to Human history? The unambiguous form is preferred per WP:NC. Dualus (talk) 04:30, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

Extraterrestrial intelligence has nothing to do with the history of the world, which is understood to be the history of humans on planet Earth. Nihil novi (talk) 20:42, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

• Oppose: "History of the world" is idiomatic. In this expression, "the world" is understood as "the human world". "Human history", on the other hand, potentially resonates against "inhuman [i.e., cruel] history". Nihil novi (talk) 20:48, 29 October 2011 (UTC)
  • Please do not remove the {{movenotice}} tag until the period for this requested move is ended. Dualus (talk) 18:25, 30 October 2011 (UTC)
• Oppose. This is FRINGE and disruption, and I quote the proposer "rarely used idiom which is incompatible with the very idea of extraterrestrial intelligence." Fifelfoo (talk) 04:44, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

Article tags

Be helpful to get some points to work on ... --J. D. Redding 07:39, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

• I read the first part of the article (so far) and it certainly seems to have broad enough coverage to be entitled "History of the world". I do not yet get a sense that it is incomplete. In fact, I am impressed by the coverage so far. It is more than I expected. I too would like to know what points the "tagger" of this article has in mind. ---- Steve Quinn (talk) 07:08, 28 August 2011 (UTC)

I guess it would be worth checking out the inaccuracies mentioned above. ---- Steve Quinn (talk) 07:10, 28 August 2011 (UTC)

I've removed the tags now that you've commented. Since Reddi went to the trouble to add the edits below, he really should have explained his concerns in more detail. The inaccuracies are another issue (haven't checked to see if they are in fact inaccurate). Dougweller (talk) 09:35, 28 August 2011 (UTC)

expansion or cleanup

This article is incomplete and may require expansion or cleanup. Please list specific bulleted points here. --J. D. Redding 07:39, 2 June 2011 (UTC) [ps., The #History of Ideas inaccuracies above is noted]

• I think the spread of Proto-Indo-European from Western Europe to Iran should be mentioned as it probably indicates a series of conquests nearly as extensive and significant as Alexander's. That PIE, in one form or another, became the principal language among so many, diverse cultures is also worth noting, though not well understood. In any case, it accounts for why Indo-European is the largest linguistic family in the world today. Of course the date of this diffusion (probably through military expeditions) is controversial—where to put it in the timeline would be a problem.helio 17:59, 25 October 2011 (UTC)

I would like to see more representation of modern life in Human history because the "History of the world" title is a confusing and inaccurate rarely used idiom. Dualus (talk) 18:35, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

worldwide view

The examples and perspective in this article may not represent a worldwide view of the subject. Please list specific bulleted points here. --J. D. Redding 07:39, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

• The "History of the world" article title as written is incompatible with the possibility of extraterrestrial intelligence. "Human history" would be compatible. Dualus (talk) 18:36, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

Extraterrestrial intelligence has nothing to do with the history of the world, which is understood to be the history of humans on planet Earth. Nihil novi (talk) 20:45, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

Please provide sources for this idiom. Is there any source saying that definition is more common than the history of the Earth? Dualus (talk) 01:37, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

H.G. Wells, in his 455-page A Short History of the World (1922), by way of prolog, devoted the first 10% of the book to the evolution of the universe, of planet Earth, and of all life forms prior to "the first true men." The rest of the book recounts the history of those "true men" and their descendants—us. The title and contents of Wells' book exemplify the accepted use of the expression "history of the world." It is not to be confused with the history of planet Earth. Nihil novi (talk) 06:13, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

File:Sumerian 26th c Adab.jpg Nominated for speedy Deletion

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The rest of the world?

Oceania, Sub-Saharan Africa, Russia, and North America are completely absent from the pre-Modern history sections of the article. I think a couple of sentences about the early Polynesians, Inuit, etc, added somewhere, would be helpful. --Yair rand (talk) 00:48, 20 December 2011 (UTC)