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Mass limits beyond Neptune

At Planets beyond Neptune, we cite calculations that conclude there are no planets beyond Neptune. However, the data's from 1990. We've had another quarter century of our probes heading out of the Solar system, so what can we say now? It would be nice to update the article. Can we place mass limits on any bodies that might be out there, and how far out can we be certain there is nothing planetary? What about things out of the ecliptic? etc. — kwami (talk) 00:40, 9 January 2014 (UTC)

That's clearly wrong, as we now know that giant planets shift orbits, so there could be a giant planet out there that was thrown out there by interactions with other giant planets (explaining the late heavy bombardment, the shift of all the orbits of the outer planets outwards) according to some theories. And how to explain the Kuiper cliff, Sedna, the more remote SDOs... There's also Nemesis. -- 70.50.148.122 (talk) 07:05, 9 January 2014 (UTC)

We know there are no large bodies because they would effect the orbits of known bodies, so that wouldn't seem to be the case. And Nemesis is spurious. But s.t. like Sedna, moving slowly enough that its effects have not been noticed, maybe? — kwami (talk) 08:59, 9 January 2014 (UTC)

No we don't. We know there are no large bodies near Neptune or the closer Kuiper objects, we don't know if there's any large objects that are more distant. Neptune's orbit places a limit on how close a large object can be, it does not mean there's no large objects out there. The 1990 research is based on the density of the protoplanetary disc, but if planets shift orbit, and can be thrown out of their zones of formation, that takes all those assumptions out the window. The cause of the Kuiper Cliff is still not known, and that can be the influence of a distant large body, one which is too distant for Neptune's orbit to be affected in a measurable way. The scattered disc objects that are beyond the influence of Neptune also may be indication of that object. Several papers already propose that, and they're all post-1990, since the Kuiper belt wasn't discovered until after 1990 anyways. -- 70.50.148.122 (talk) 00:59, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

WP:OR. If you find a source which discusses this, go ahead. Otherwise, it's perfectly possible that no astronomer has bothered to update the calculations, because the situation has hardly changed. The Voyagers and Pioneer 11 have got a bit further away, but they passed Neptune decades ago and nothing else has been out there. Modest Genius ^talk 12:20, 9 January 2014 (UTC)

The further a gas giant is from the Sun, the less effect we will notice on the Oort Cloud. But at this point there is no reason to expect a gas giant as massive as Jupiter as such an object would be detectable by WISE. At this point the obsolete Nemesis theory is a joke. -- Kheider (talk) 13:11, 9 January 2014 (UTC)

I can't tell who is responding to who, or whether we have consensus that the article is up-to-date. I don't mean s.t. Jovian, but maybe s.t. around the mass of Mars. Far enough out & slowly moving enough, as well as small enough, that it has no measurable effect on Neptune, but not so far out or massive enough to be Nemesis. What about st 90° out of the ecliptic and currently at the high point in its orbit? As the article currently stands, we claim that nothing that massive could exist anywhere at all in the Solar system, and I suspect that the Pioneer & Voyager data isn't strong enough to support such a claim. And then there's Sedna: I take it that a stable orbit requires that there be nothing significantly larger than Sedna (w say a planetary discriminant of > 1) out to Sedna's aphelion? Anon. speaks of papers published about this, but doesn't mention any. I'm wondering if our claim needs to be qualified or updated. If we actually know it to be true, that would mean we know more about the SS than I suspected. But if we have a Mars-sized body out there that doesn't qualify as a planet, that could throw a wrench into our definitions. If we know that there can be nothing that massive out to the Oort Cloud, then our def of 'planet' is safe, at least in the SS. — kwami (talk) 18:53, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

I have heard discussion on podcasts of possible scenarios and sizes on podcasts. Like everything else, the best course of action is to add information from recent reliable sources discussing the matter. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 19:06, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

• doi:10.1006/icar.2002.6935Bibcode:2002Icar..160...32B
• doi:10.1023/B:MOON.0000031958.97062.7dBibcode:2003EM&P...92..447M
• doi:10.1111/j.1365-2966.2009.15458.xBibcode:2009MNRAS.400..346I
• doi:10.1088/0004-6256/135/4/1161Bibcode:2008AJ....135.1161L

etc -- 70.50.148.122 (talk) 08:34, 14 January 2014 (UTC)

I'm pretty sure Modest Genius hit the nail on the head - if there's research out there, there's nothing stopping someone from updating the page. Primefac (talk) 20:16, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

Lykawka has some papers about this: see the links to his papers off his home page. He thinks there's still a good chance of a large body out there. Tbayboy (talk) 21:29, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

AfC submission

Here's a submission relevant to your Project. Regards, FoCuSandLeArN (talk) 17:16, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

And another one. FoCuSandLeArN (talk) 21:34, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

I have no idea what the relevant policies are in these cases. Both articles would appear to be written by interested (or perhaps even "involved") parties, but are accurate (to the best of my abilities), well-written, well-sourced, not controversial, and on subjects that probably should be in Wikipedia. Lithopsian (talk) 21:42, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

I appreciate your help. That's the kind of feedback we're looking for. You can be bold and accept them, or even get involved with AfC. We sure need more astronomy Wikipedians! We see quite a few submissions, such as this other one. Regards, FoCuSandLeArN (talk) 23:02, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

I agree with Lithopsian, and the same thing applies to the LAB-1 article. They're not exactly GA material, but are better than most stubs. I consider myself a pretty experienced editor, but can't get my head around the AfC process at all. Modest Genius ^talk 00:14, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

I think the first article is okay to be published but GEOS-3 should have some work done. It is primarily a list of instruments and milestones rather than a detailed description in prose. Wer900 • talk 02:05, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

The blob looks cool - I moved it into mainspace. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 04:24, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

The use of quadrant field in constellation infobox

In the constellation infobox there is a quadrant field. I thought this would be straightforward to reference but finding material on this has been difficult enough to make me wonder about its usefulness. I also saw Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Astronomy/Archive_10#PROD_of_Quadrant_.28astronomy.29.E2.80.8E. As far as I can tell, the quadrant field has been added in 2012, here. What do folks think? Is it useful or obscure to the point of being redundant (and hence should be removed)? If so does someone know a reliable source that I can use as a reference? Cheers, Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 20:45, 18 January 2014 (UTC)

I think the only way we could really get a "source" on this is if we were to consider figuring out this value from the RA and Dec not synthesis, but rather as a simple calculation. It's quite borderline on whether it becomes synthesis or not IMO. Anyways, I think if we don't consider this synthesis, and instead consider it a calculation, then we should include it, but if the consensus is that it is WP:OR, then I don't see much point in keeping it. StringTheory11 (t • c) 03:10, 19 January 2014 (UTC)

Main thing is I was surprised at how lacking the sourcing is - I was under the impression it was a pretty straightforward citable fact but am having trouble finding anything and am beginning to think that even if it is sourceable, then its lack of widespread presence indicates that including it in the infobox may be giving it undue weight....but am a bit of a neophyte so happy to wait for more opinions on this. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 12:03, 19 January 2014 (UTC)

The term is in use but it is hardly commonplace. Search journals for "galactic quadrant" and you'll see what I mean. Maybe it should be a category rather than in the infobox? The existing Wikipedia article already lists the constellations by quadrant, complete with some references. Lithopsian (talk) 14:00, 19 January 2014 (UTC)

There's no issue with synthesis - it's a simple calculation from the RA and dec, no worse than working out which constellation a star is in. Should an article on galactic quadrants exist? Yes. Should this information be included on every object's page via an infobox? No. It's not vital information, and is easy to calculate for anyone who wants it. However, I don't think it hurts to have it on each constellation page. There aren't that many of them, and I think it's borderline of whether that information is useful when considering an entire constellation. I don't object to its usage on constellation pages, but I don't think we should expand this into other infoboxes. Modest Genius ^talk 14:38, 19 January 2014 (UTC)

I agree. For an individual object, Galactic longitude is a more useful number anyway -- it tells you the quadrant but much more precisely. For a constellation, the range of longitudes can be so great that maybe the quadrant is useful. —Alex (ASHill | talk | contribs) 21:46, 19 January 2014 (UTC)

I found a scientific source using it, namely Spiral structure of the Third Galactic Quadrant and the solution to the Canis Major debate, here it is defined. I cannot make up my mind whether it is useful or not, but privately I would prefer galactic coordinates of the center of the constellation in the place of galactic quadrant, which by the way seems very far fetched regarding Coma Berenices. Rursus dixit. (^mbork³!) 10:12, 4 February 2014 (UTC)

I have seen it in a source before (can't remember for the life of me which one and I'm stuck in physics lecture so I can't run off and look) but I don't think it's essential to have in an infobox. Just my 2 cents. Keilana|^{Parlez ici} 19:07, 4 February 2014 (UTC)

Hence proposal - shall we remove it from the constellation infobox?

If it is this esoteric, even if it has a few sources here and there, I'd say it is not worth including in an infoox. Anyone really wanna keep it? Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 08:14, 5 February 2014 (UTC)

Template_talk:Infobox_constellation#RA.2Fdeclension

Have also opened up a discussion on whether these are better as points or ranges in infobox for constellations. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 21:23, 18 January 2014 (UTC)

V342 Velorum

I stumbled across this article while doing some other work, and I honestly don't know what to do with it. While it seems very interesting and deserving of an article by looking at it, it is totally unsourced and I'm having a hard time finding sources that verify many of the statements in the article. Thoughts on what to do? StringTheory11 (t • c) 19:52, 25 January 2014 (UTC)

Starting with SIMBAD.....Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 20:11, 25 January 2014 (UTC)

If I had to hazard a guess, it might be that the editor assumed that "luminous blue variable" meant any blue giant/supergiant that was variable rather than the specific class....Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 20:14, 25 January 2014 (UTC)

It is just a standard bright supergiant, and not an LBV. I'll sort out the article because it has a number of inaccuracies. Lithopsian (talk) 20:19, 25 January 2014 (UTC)

In that case, it doesn't seem to pass the notability guidelines, so I think a PROD or AfD is the best solution here. StringTheory11 (t • c) 20:27, 25 January 2014 (UTC)

Aaawww, it's a variable star....they're always interesting...but yeah I can see your point. Maybe it should be redirected and listed at List of stars in Vela..that way no need to prod and we can revert if new data bcomes available. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 20:33, 25 January 2014 (UTC)

Only variable in the minor random way that virtually all luminous supergiants are. I have data, but I agree it isn't really a notable star. Lithopsian (talk) 20:40, 25 January 2014 (UTC)

I agree, and I'll do that now. I've gone through the other articles the editor started, but there don't appear to be any other problems like this, thankfully. StringTheory11 (t • c) 20:34, 25 January 2014 (UTC)

Standard to redlink stars in the list without their own articles? 20:47, 25 January 2014 (UTC)

Yes. Red text is fine - it won't hurt anyone. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 20:57, 25 January 2014 (UTC)

I assuming you're referring to when I delinked V342 Vel from the list of stars in Vela. I did that since we determined that it was not deserving of its own article here. Basically, we should leave redlinks when the star deserves its own article, but not when it doesn't. StringTheory11 (t • c) 04:39, 26 January 2014 (UTC)

Actually, I think that if there are star articles found and all we have are base stats and they fail notability, we could probably redirect all and migrate stats into the List of....articles Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 20:39, 25 January 2014 (UTC)

I agree with this to a point, but there has to be some point that we don't merge to the list, since otherwise the lists would get nearly infinitely big. Like it somebody created an article on RandomStar123, a typical star with absolutely nothing of note, then there's no reason to merge. StringTheory11 (t • c) 20:46, 25 January 2014 (UTC)

True, but I don't think anyone has made random articles on 12th mag stars. I have no problem with random 7th-9th mag stars being added. I don't think there'll be that many.Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 20:57, 25 January 2014 (UTC)

The user who created this article, Obiwan042 (talk · contribs) has multiple level-3 warnings on his/her talk page about veracity of statements added to star articles, so perhaps all the articles created by this person should be reviewed. -- 70.50.148.122 (talk) 06:12, 28 January 2014 (UTC)

Bloody hell, I even noted this 3 years ago....hmmm. time to check. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 13:23, 28 January 2014 (UTC)

There are a whole series of stubs, mostly border-line naked eye stars. Many are already tagged for lack of references, some are not. I'm making a list. Back shortly. Lithopsian (talk) 14:47, 28 January 2014 (UTC)

Lacking references:

• Omicron1_Canis_Majoris
• HD 36960
• upsilon Orionis expanded
• HD 72561
• Rho Ophiuchi
• HD 165516
• V4381 Sagittarii
• Lambda Mensae
• HD 48099

Lacking references and not tagged:

• 1 Scorpii
• 119 Tauri
• Thuban
• Vela X-1
• S Coronae Borealis
• Mu Normae
• RW Cephei
• Mu Mensae
• Zeta Mensae
• HD 133683
• HD 115337
• 17 Camelopardalis
• Lambda Cephei
• Phi Cassiopeiae
• HD 168476
• Phi Cassiopeia is a redirect that should probably be removed

I deleted the last as a non-probable redirect. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 19:55, 28 January 2014 (UTC)

FWIW, expanded upsilon Orionis for a DYK Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 05:48, 1 February 2014 (UTC)

Those list of ... tables

Just looking at the List of stars in Vela, I see columns for "vis mag" and "abs mag". "vis mag" points to the apparent magnitude page, so the meaning is fairly clear, but it really should say apparent, eg. "app vis mag" or perhaps just "app mag", or perhaps "app mag (M_V)". "abs mag" points to the absolute magnitude page which really leaves us in ambiguous territory. Both visual and bolometric absolute magnitudes are in common use, although there are others too. I suspect from looking at the data that this is a visual absolute magnitude, but is it really? Would a reader know? Do all the editors know? Should it be clarified? Lithopsian (talk) 20:52, 25 January 2014 (UTC)

groan -not looked at this for a long time. My impression is that discussion is more about luminosity than abs mag these days. Will take a look. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 20:59, 25 January 2014 (UTC)

Yeah, seems to be the visual absolute magnitude from calculations. Anyways, improving these lists is on my long-term radar for things to do, but it will be a huge job (maybe even bigger than the {{stars of xxx}} templates that I'm currently working on), since they're currently in quite bad shape. StringTheory11 (t • c) 23:23, 25 January 2014 (UTC)

Solar physics article

I've recently done some work on the Solar Physics article. It was mainly adding some information about solar observations through history and some of the projects/satellites looking at the Sun at the moment. If you can think of anything else that would be worth adding, I'd appreciate the ideas. I feel that most topics are already covered in the Sun article. Cheers, Careless Torque (talk) 11:44, 29 January 2014 (UTC)

Solar physics isn't within our remit of astronomy. You might do better with WikiProject Solar System. At first glance, the article needs a lead section and a discussion of the actual science (not just the tools and history). Modest Genius ^talk 14:15, 29 January 2014 (UTC)

Solar physics is part of stellar physics, and solar astronomy is one of the oldest branches of astronomy, so I would think it would fall in our scope. -- 70.50.148.122 (talk) 06:31, 30 January 2014 (UTC)

What's the point in having a separate Solar System WikiProject if they don't handle the stuff within the Solar System? I'm not saying solar physics isn't part of astronomy, I'm saying it's not within the purview of WikiProject Astronomy. Different things. Modest Genius ^talk 22:11, 5 February 2014 (UTC)

True, though WPSOLAR also handles the meteorology, geology and geography of various bodies, which is somewhat less related to traditional astronomy. And space missions beyond Earth orbit, which is not in the scope of this project per se. Solar physics is tightly bound into stellar physics, as the Sun is used as a model for distant stars, it would be something that should be in our scope. -- 70.50.148.248 (talk) 06:26, 6 February 2014 (UTC)

While I agree with Modest Genius that WP:SOLAR is the best place to put this notification, it's not like it's harmful to post it here as well. I've posted notifications on astronomy-related articles in the WT:PHYS because they were marked as being in the purview of both projects. Besides, someone in this project who isn't part of the Solar group may be interested in helping out. All part of hitting a wider audience. (PS, Careless Torque, remember to log in). Primefac (talk) 10:58, 6 February 2014 (UTC)

I said 'You might do better'; I didn't tell them to go away. There's no harm in posting here, but they're more likely to get a good response elsewhere. I do notice that I'm the only one to have actually commented on the article so far. Modest Genius ^talk 21:16, 7 February 2014 (UTC)

Merger of Twinkling into Astronomical seeing

I'm proposing merging the Twinkling article into Astronomical seeing, as the former is an effect of the latter. The discussion can be found here -- Primefac (talk) 22:14, 31 January 2014 (UTC)

AfC

FYI, there's a notice at WT:PHYSICS about Wikipedia talk:Articles for creation/Clumping factor -- 70.50.148.248 (talk) 05:57, 2 February 2014 (UTC)

Wikipedia talk:Articles for creation/Bill Wakefield

Dear astronomers: Here is an old abandoned Afc submission about an interesting person. I'm not sure whether this is the right place to report it, but in any case, is this submission notable and worth keeping and fixing up? A lot of work has been put into it, although some material needs removing. —Anne Delong (talk) 22:00, 6 February 2014 (UTC)

Formatting numbers

We're modifying the {{val}} template for formatting numbers, which could affect the display of astro info boxes.

For cases like

1.111 ^+0.002
_−0.001×10⁻³,

do we want parentheses the way we do for

(1.111 ±0.002)×10⁻³ ?

Also, is the default formatting of the uncertanties we have here adequate, or do we want to force a fixed-width font, so we have mixed fonts in our numbers?

— kwami (talk) 20:00, 7 February 2014 (UTC)

I see no problem with example one. I think it is obvious that the super- and sub-scripts are specifically part of the first number, and in my opinion mixing regular-sized parentheses with the scripts looks a bit odd. Default formatting seems fine as well; I don't think mixing fonts is visually attractive or solving any problems. — Huntster (t @ c) 20:13, 7 February 2014 (UTC)

The fixed-width font is necessary in the case of asymmetrical uncertainties, otherwise you end up with unreadable horrors like 1.123456789+0.111111111
−0.999999999. Headbomb {talk / contribs / physics / books} 20:55, 7 February 2014 (UTC)

That hardly ever happens in practice. (I've never seen it here on WP, at least.) We could have an option to force fixed width in the rare cases it's needed, but it should apply to the whole number so the super & sub-scripts aren't different shapes or larger than the main number when they're supposed to be smaller.

The SI standard is to use parentheses, but then it's to use parentheses w units too, and we don't bother with that. — kwami (talk) 00:50, 8 February 2014 (UTC)

Uncertainties should never be quoted to more than 2 significant figures, so that situation should never arise. Modest Genius ^talk 10:05, 10 February 2014 (UTC)

Wikidata

Those of you that are interested in the classification of stellar objects and building the future astronomical infobox should take a look at d:Wikidata:WikiProject Astronomy. For those of you that don't know: Wikidata is trying to centralize essential data across all Wikimedia projects and languages. In the future there will be lots of ways to use this data. The prettiest we have so far is:

• http://tools.wmflabs.org/reasonator/?lang=en&q=3030

Again: Any help we can get would be much appreciated. --Tobias1984 (talk) 00:00, 8 February 2014 (UTC)

That brings up an issue about astronomy on the sister projects. We don't have a Commons:Commons:WikiProject Astronomy or a Wiktionary:Wiktionary:WikiProject Astronomy, and considering the number of media we have on commons for astronomy, that is needed, and the lack of astronomical knowledge amongst the wiktionary administrators would seem to lead to deletion of astronomy terms. -- 70.24.244.161 (talk) 06:41, 8 February 2014 (UTC)

I agree that Astronomy should have projects on every Wikimedia site. It just takes a few didicated people to start them. The Wikidata project is doing great already but we would like people from every language of Wikipedia to participate. It would be great if a few people could watchlist the page and sign the participants list. --Tobias1984 (talk) 10:46, 8 February 2014 (UTC)