Talk:Finland

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Few Mistakes (I think)

I think Helsinki-Vantaa Airport is nowadays called Helsinki International Airport. And Olkiluoto 3 will be late few years more. 128.214.81.195 (talk) 09:48, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

Prehistory

The opening statement "According to archaeological evidence, the area now boreing and peolpe there get alot of humans at the latest around 8500 BCE during the Stone Age as the ice shield of the last ice age receded." seems to have several typos and a general lack of coherence. Specifically "boreing and peolpe" and "alot." Could someone with a clearer view of Finland's prehistory make sense of what this is trying to say? 208.28.13.66 (talk) 21:17, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

It seems that nobody noticed what an obvious vandal did. Uikku (talk) 22:37, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

It is not clear whether the 8500 BCE date refers to calibrated or uncalibrated radiocarbon years. Presuming the former, the current oldest C14 date, from Orimattila Myllykoski (9480 +/-90), calibrates to a mean of c. 8900 BCE. The oldest dates from northernmost Finnish Lapland calibrate to c. 8300-8200 BCE. All of the earliest sites point to origins in the south or south-east (present-day Estonia or Russia). There is no unambiguous evidence of actual settlement from Norway from this or from any later period; the few known individual artefacts of possible (northern) Norwegian origin found in northern Finnish Lapland may have been imported, since the earliest eastern immigrants to the area are now known to have reached as far as the Norwegian coast. --Death Bredon (talk) 15:02, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

Length

This article is far too long and detailed for what it needs to be: a summary of Finland. The huge sections on "gender equality", "agriculture", "forestry", and "occupational and income structure" are unnecessary. They are also entirely unwikified and unsourced. If they can be sourced, they should be moved to more specific articles such as Politics of Finland and Economy of Finland. Otherwise, they probably should be deleted. Hayden120 (talk) 12:19, 14 August 2010 (UTC)

Agreed, although the sections don't seem to be unsourced but copy-pasted from an old PD source. I dropped a note to the user who added them. Prolog (talk) 15:56, 15 August 2010 (UTC)

They are not unsourced. I don't see how agriculture is unnecessary, a good encyclopedia should cover a country's agriculture. Forestry is especially important in Finland's case considering that forest related industries are historically the most important branch of Finnish industries. Occupational and income structure should also be covered in a good encyclopedia, I think. I don't see how the users of Wikipedia would be served if they had no information available about these topics. --Tungsten (talk) 21:58, 15 August 2010 (UTC)

Gender equality is important considering Finland's position in world history as the first country in the world to provide full political rights to women and still a global leader in these issues. Again I don't see how readers would be served if there was no information about these issues. --Tungsten (talk) 22:01, 15 August 2010 (UTC)

I went ahead and moved the sections to the daughter article - this article was huge (143kb) and those sections were simply too detailed (half a dozen paragraphs about forestry, etc.) (I didn't put shorter versions in their place, which should probably be done.) Nobody is saying that we shouldn't mention this stuff, it was simply too long. (See WP:Summary style). AlexiusHoratius 22:16, 15 August 2010 (UTC)

@Tungsten: mostly unsourced, then. There were multiple paragraphs with a single citation at the end. I do not consider that adequate. Agriculture, etc. are important, but they don't need to be discussed in that much detail. This article should be a relatively concise summary of Finland with links to more detailed "main articles" or "further information" in each section. Hayden120 (talk) 22:34, 15 August 2010 (UTC)

I think readers would appreciate if there'd been left at least a short summary of these topics in this article. The citation is in the end of the sourced text, even if that's long in some cases. --Tungsten (talk) 08:17, 17 August 2010 (UTC)

I'll work on adding some shorter versions for the three sections tonight. AlexiusHoratius 19:38, 19 August 2010 (UTC)

Okay, I've added back summary versions of the old sections. (I didn't do too much on these, mostly just cut out most of the historical background stuff.) More work could always be done on these, (by more work I don't mean adding more info but rather rewording it and adding sources) but I think this should work as a decent placeholder between having the previously gigantic sections and nothing at all. By the way, I couldn't remember where the Gender equality section had been, so I stuck it at the end of the Demographics section; it seemed like a decent fit there. Again, feel free to mess around or re-word these if you want. AlexiusHoratius 04:18, 20 August 2010 (UTC)

Excessive text

the following text is excessive for a country article. LibStar (talk) 02:42, 21 September 2010 (UTC)

Finland's climate and soils make growing crops a particular challenge. The country lies between 60° and 70° north latitude - as far north as Alaska - and has severe winters and relatively short growing seasons that are sometimes interrupted by frosts. However, because the Gulf Stream and the North Atlantic Drift Current moderate the climate, Finland contains half of the world's arable land north of 60° north latitude. Annual precipitation is usually sufficient, but it occurs almost exclusively during the winter months, making summer droughts a constant threat. In response to the climate, farmers have relied on quick-ripening and frost-resistant varieties of crops, and they have cultivated south-facing slopes as well as richer bottomlands to ensure production even in years with summer frosts. Most farmland had originally been either forest or swamp, and the soil had usually required treatment with lime and years of cultivation to neutralize excess acid and to develop fertility. Irrigation was generally not necessary, but drainage systems were often needed to remove excess water. Finland's agriculture was efficient and productive—at least when compared with farming in other European countries.

Forests play a key role in the country's economy, making it one of the world's leading wood producers and providing raw materials at competitive prices for the crucial wood-processing industries. As in agriculture, the government has long played a leading role in forestry, regulating tree cutting, sponsoring technical improvements, and establishing long-term plans to ensure that the country's forests continue to supply the wood-processing industries. To maintain the country's comparative advantage in forest products, Finnish authorities moved to raise lumber output toward the country's ecological limits. In 1984, the government published the Forest 2000 plan, drawn up by the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry. The plan aimed at increasing forest harvests by about 3 percent per year, while conserving forestland for recreation and other uses.

If you need help, I could be the right person. I live in Finland. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 80.221.112.196 (talk) 11:01, 25 September 2010 (UTC)

salut vous sais quoi vous voullers quoi? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.56.140.31 (talk) 23:47, 3 October 2010 (UTC)

Finnish name

Its not mentioned in the article that Suomen tasavalta means Finnish Republic, not Republic of Finland. Am I right? --maxval (talk) 15:32, 13 November 2010 (UTC)

Wouldn't that be redundant? The article already states that Suomi refers to Finland. (The name Suomi (Finnish for "Finland")). Tty29a (talk) 15:49, 13 November 2010 (UTC)

Actually, Suomen tasavalta best translates as "Republic of Finland". Prolog (talk) 17:55, 13 November 2010 (UTC)

OK, but LITERALLY it is Finnish Republic, isnt it? --maxval (talk) 11:09, 14 November 2010 (UTC)

Nope. "Suomen" is a genitive form of Suomi. Prolog (talk) 18:19, 14 November 2010 (UTC)

Thanks. --maxval (talk) 20:10, 14 November 2010 (UTC)

The civil war

I see that little or nothing in the section on the Civil War is in the claimed source A Country Study: Finland — The Finnish Civil War. I suppose the section has been heavily edited since the source was introduced. I think the text is mostly ok now (in fact quite good as a short summary), but it is effectively sourceless.

I removed the dubious statement about the Bolshevik Russia supporting the Red (that was part of war time and after war propaganda, but I have not seen it in any reliable source) and changed "legal government" to "white government", as the legality of the elections was questioned. The socialist actions are characterized as a "coup". I do not understand why, but do not want to introduce any wording of my own on the delicate issue.

--LPfi (talk) 14:13, 8 December 2010 (UTC)

Hanko – Nuorgam

The distance from the southernmost – Hanko – to the northernmost point in the country – Nuorgam – is 1,445 kilometres - This is apparently incorrect. According to de:Finnland, it's 1160 km. --Espoo (talk) 08:51, 26 December 2010 (UTC)

I think 1160 is the distance by air and ~1445 the distance by road. Prolog (talk) 14:18, 26 December 2010 (UTC)

Yes, that's what they answered on the German talk page. So i changed it to 1160 because no countries dimensions are (should be) given in road distances. --Espoo (talk) 22:44, 27 December 2010 (UTC)

Bias in religion statistics

There is a bias in religion statistics. Those statistics are not about religiosity, but about membership in officially registered religious communities. The term "Not religious" in the table, which is given a value of 17.7 %, is misleading, because the 17.7 % includes many people who are very religious but do not belong to any officially registered religious community. I suggest that the headline "Religion in Finland" be changed to "Membership in religious communities" and "Not religious" be changed to "Not affiliated" or something like that. As far as I know, many immigrant muslims who are religious are not official members in any official muslim communities, because that is not an important custom to them. Branding those people "not religious" is misleading. 82.181.250.242 (talk) 23:15, 1 January 2011 (UTC)

Mostly true, but not that big a bias. The muslims are probably mostly Arabic, Somali or Kurdish speakers, together 0,5 % of the population. Those and non-registered christian communities might change the "others" column a bit, but would not matter much in the "Not religions" column. And I think quite a few lutherans would count themselves as non-religious.

Membership of the lutheran church has traditionally been very high, all though many are not religious. In later years non-believers have left the church in quite large numbers (together with some believers critical to the church) and explain most of the non-religious column. They have not left for other religious communities. The 41% figure of Finnish citizens responding that "they believe there is a God" (and a similar fugure believing in some spirit or life force) describes the situation.

--LPfi (talk) 11:20, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

The 17.7 % is given the title "Not religious" when in fact it refers to the number of people who are not members in any officially registered religious communities. So I'd at least change the "Not religious" to "Not affiliated". I'm not sure whether your intention was to oppose this change or were you just voicing your opinion about the importance of the matter. If there is no opposition, I'll do the editing in a few days. 82.181.250.242 (talk) 13:36, 8 January 2011 (UTC)

"Not affiliated" is the correct formulation. Even the source given here (official Statistics Finland) uses the classification "Lutheran/Orthodox/Other/No religious affiliation". It is definitely about membership numbers, not about "religiousness". --Surfo (talk) 13:49, 8 January 2011 (UTC)

I made the change encouraged by the preceding comment. 82.181.250.242 (talk) 19:26, 9 January 2011 (UTC)