Talk:Panini/Archive 1

Template:Bounty Perhaps a hint on how to pronounce the name..? Pah-nee-nee or Pah-ni-nee or Pay-nee-nee even? --Sam Francis

Pah-nee-nee [G]

IIRR, the first 'n' is retroflex, the second is dental, and the stress is on the first syllable. The first 'i' is short; I'm not sure about the second and will have to find my Sanskrit book to find out. -phma

For the Italian word, same 'n's and second 'i' too is short. [G]

Second i is short too. I've added pronunciation info to the article. -- Arvindn 13:50, 14 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Form of Name

People who understand "Pāṇini" won't be troubled by "Panini" in the remainder of the article, but someone learning about him for the first time will probably be baffled by "Pāṇini". Jacquerie27 13:14, 5 Feb 2005 (UTC)

But the accepted spelling is "Pāṇini", not "Panini". In an encyclopedia such as this one, there is no reason to use incorrect spellings -- people come here for detailed information, not for "dumbed-down" content. --Marnen Laibow-Koser (talk) 14:43, 7 Feb 2005 (UTC)

it's 'not dumbed down' as long as we give the correct transliteration at the beginning of the article. Anyway, we either give Pāṇini exacty once, or always, but not two or three times, mixed with the diacritic-less variant. I'm fine with 'once', but both are possible. dab (ᛏ) 15:02, 7 Feb 2005 (UTC)

I agree that it should be once or always. But I think the once option is a little silly, as it implies that the diacritics aren't really necessary. Too many people ignore diacritics as it is. --Marnen Laibow-Koser (talk) 20:42, 7 Feb 2005 (UTC)

your voice is very welcome on Wikipedia talk:Naming conventions (use English) ;o) dab (ᛏ) 21:20, 7 Feb 2005 (UTC)

It might just be my browser, but when you type in "Pāṇini", I think most people will get a result saying Pa[]ini, with a square to indicate that the ASCII text will not render the diacritic.

I suggest we incorporate a small jpeg or PNG file of the name written out (with the offending diacritic in place) into the bodytext to clarify.

It is not "dumbing down" to exclude diacritics, it's just being realistic, as a lot of keyboards do not have them, so people tend not to use them, and I bet very few people would even know how to pronounce them even if they could.

Nuttyskin 23:22, 21 September 2006 (UTC)

"Topics in Hinduism" template

I'm removing the "Topics in Hinduism" template because it doesn't seem to belong here. I mean, he was presumably a Hindu, but he wrote about language, not religion, right? --Angr/_{tɔk tə mi} 4 July 2005 22:14 (UTC)

I don't think a line can be drawn between language and religion in this case. The whole motivation for his grammar was the correct usage of Sanskrit in ritual. Classical Sanskrit is not a natural language, in this sense, but an artificial language intended for religious use. 83.79.181.171 16:47, 1 November 2005 (UTC)

Move the article

This article is currently at Pāņini , which isn't correct -- the first n should have a . under it, not a cedilla. Paṇini currently redirects to Pāņini, so this should be fixed...

I disagree. This is the English Wikipedia and all articles are supposed to have their usual English spelling. In this case it is simple Panini. The version with diacritics is not English, it's a romanization of Sanskrit or something along those lines. — Hippietrail 23:42, 23 October 2005 (UTC)

The article already has a transliterated name. However, the transliteration is incorrect. And also, see Devanāgarī. Arun 00:24, 24 October 2005 (UTC)

I know it already has a transliterated name, this I belive is wrong as it should have the usual English name in the usual English spelling. I have expressed similar views already on Devanāgarī, Taíno, and Yoruba language. The last of these implemented the move to the usual English spelling. — Hippietrail 15:51, 24 October 2005 (UTC)

I've moved it to Panini (grammarian)

• the article was at its correct name to begin with. Some old browser render n-underdot as n-cedilla because the don't have the right glyph.
  • I realize some misguided soul moved it to the n-tilde version in September. That should just have been silently reverted.
• Paṇini as the correct IAST transliteration is perfectly acceptable. This is the usual spelling in English Indologist literature. I've moved it back.

83.79.181.171 16:56, 1 November 2005 (UTC)

Wikipedia is not Indologist literature. It is a generalist encyclopedia. The spelling "Panini" is used by other widely known generalist publications such as Encarta [1], Merriam-Webster [2], The American Heritage Dictionary [3], and The Columbia Encyclopedia [4]. — Hippietrail 20:35, 1 November 2005 (UTC)

It's worth noting that the postage stamp pictured in the article also uses the usual English spelling with no diacritics. — Hippietrail 02:28, 9 November 2005 (UTC)

• Support move to Panini Philip Baird Shearer 08:35, 2 November 2005 (UTC)
• I support move suggestion made by HT & PBS too. Mark 10:58, 4 November 2005 (UTC)
• predictably, I oppose. Already because Panini is a disambiguation page. "generalist", give me a break. It is Pokemonist and Runologist as well as Indologist, that's the beauty of it. Indological articles on WP are Indologist, and Runological articles are Runologist, and that's no problem, because it is not paper. That said, "Panini" is an acceptable spelling, but it is ambiguous, because it is also the name of a type of sandwich, and of collectible stickers. I might add that I have actually written most of this article, so I am not "style-trolling" here like others I could mention. dab (ᛏ) 18:01, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

• I respect your opinion and tend to agree that as long as we can be accurate, there is no need not to. However I'll point out that I have a lot of unicode fonts installed and I see the title as Pā ini or with a square in the middle. Also it's transliterated anyway, so having the diacritics in the Latin characters is pointless for the title at least. I'd have to say I think Panini (grammarian) is the best article name. The current one seems arbitrary; at that point why not use IPA? - Taxman ^Talk 18:28, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

Panini (grammarian) is fine. I guess I was objecting more to the "WP is not Indological literature" statement. I am looking forward to the day Microsoft decides to fix their browser however; it's not like you need OSX or Linux, just use Firefox on Windows, and you'll see the title alright (so it appears the issue is not the number of fonts installed on the system). It is not Wikipedia's fault if people use broken browsers. dab (ᛏ) 09:23, 28 January 2006 (UTC)

Computerworld rip-off

FYI, most of this article has been copied, with little modification, as a ComputerWorld short: [5]. No attribution, as far as I can tell. (Apologies if nobody cares, or this isn't the proper procedure - my first Talk entry.) (John 13:55, 20 March 2006 (UTC))

While Wiki articles are GFDL, I don't think it is a fair commercial use. Just another instance of websites/print media pirateing wiki. --ΜιĿːtalk 15:15, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

what a jerk, "Geek's Garden, today's top stories copy-pasted fresh from WP". Although they have a better image of the stamp, we could take that in return :) dab (ᛏ) 06:47, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

Ancient Indian??

I think this comment makes a good point: http://goreism.livejournal.com/105511.html

no. it would be anachronistic to call him an "ancient Pakistani grammarian" of course, but "India" is first and foremost a geographical term. It can of course also be used as short for "Republic of India" in post-1947 contexts, but that doesn't make usage of the term in pre-1947 contexts anachronistic. It may, btw, be a good idea to have India disambiguate (India (disambiguation)) between Indian Subcontinent and Republic of India, but I imagine this would raise too much of a stir (and most links to India will assume a contemporary context, I assume) dab (ᛏ) 11:06, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

Perhaps the best course of action would be to call Pāṇini an ancient hindu grammarian? While he most certainly were a native of what is today Pakistan, he was as certainly a hindu. Asdfgl 10:23, 15 September 2006 (UTC)

no, that's a complete anachronism. Panini was from India (the subcontinent). Whether we was a "Hindu" is a matter of definition, he certainly much predates what we know as "Hinduism" today. "Hindu" entered the English language in the 17th century, from the Persian, meaning "from (NW) India". Hinduism summarizing "Indian polytheism" is from 1829 [6]. We are not discussing Panini's religious faith, in any case, just his geographical origin. dab (ᛏ) 11:58, 15 September 2006 (UTC)

Hindu was used in a religious sense—though admittedly, not necessarily the same religious sense as the modern word—in other languages for nearly a millenium, however. And even though the category it designates (which includes several non-polytheistic beliefs) is of recent construction, that doesn't mean that it can't be applied retroactively. "Jew" only entered the English language in the twelfth century, and yet we say that Abraham and Hillel were Jewish. We read that the disciples of Jesus were only called "Christians" in Antioch in Acts 11, and the term was only used in English much later, but does that mean Stephen (martyred earlier, as mentioned in Acts 7) wasn't a Christian? So Panini can be a Hindu.

On the other hand, Indian already points to a disambig page, so I doubt there's any confusion. But yeah, I agree that India should either be a disambiguation page or a page describing the geographical area, like China or Ireland. --Xiaopo ℑ 03:01, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

Ancient Pakistani

http://www-history.mcs.st-andrews.ac.uk/Biographies/Panini.html

The source which you have given doesnt say he was Ancient Indian. He was from What is now Pakistan, and Direct Descendant of what are now the Pakistani people. i.e Ancient Pakistani. Please dont make up stuff. India doesnt gain history simply because the person is related to Hinduism. Hinduism was founded in Pakistan and Afghanistan, yet Indians claim just about everything Hinduism related. If you want to argue about this, then please go ahead, but dont edit this without proof. User:Unre4L

Pakistan was established 1947. By "Ancient India" we mean "Iron Age India", that is "the Indian subcontinent in the Iron Age". Kindly see also India (disambiguation). It is, of course, undisputed that Gandhara is now in Pakistan, that's not the point. dab (𒁳) 17:24, 11 December 2006 (UTC)

Using the Name India after 1947 implies modern India which was also established in 1947. Ancient India implies to Rebublic of India, in ancient times. You cannot call him Ancient Indian. Ancient South Asian is another matter, but to be specific, it should be Ancient Pakistani.

Let me give you an example: You wouldnt go around calling people "gay", because its older meaning meant "happy". Its the current definition that counts, and you know better than any what Ancient India implies. So please dont use it incorrectly.

User:Unre4L

That might be why the cat reads "Afghan Hindus". There is no such thing as "ancient pakistan", the history of pakistan starts on August 14, 1947.Bakaman 23:32, 11 December 2006 (UTC)

For the love of god THINK before you speak. India was also born in 1947, prior to that it was called British India, and it can only be called that if Pak is included. Unless of course you think India was reincarnated. You cant claim history of people who no longer are related to you. They have their own identity, and their history belongs to Ancient Pakistan. User:Unre4L

Excuse me?saying something?[7][8][9]. No longer related to me? There is no such thing as ancient pakistan, because Islam wasnt even around back then. Ancient India is the geographic term for Akhand Bharat (or Indian subcontinent). Travelers like Zheng He, Ibn Battuta, Marco Polo, etc. visited India. Making bad analogies doesnt prove anything, anyway 1947 was the Republic of India not the region of 'India'.Bakaman 01:14, 12 December 2006 (UTC)

"Ancient Pakistan" happens to be "Ancient India", Ινδια is the region of the Indus river, which is now almost entirely in Pakistan. "Pakistan" and the "Republic of India" are political entities established in 1947. So yes, Bakaman is right, India is primarily a geographical term (and should not redirect to Republic of India) dab (𒁳) 10:22, 12 December 2006 (UTC)

Could you explain why you use the Republic of India's Flag, when mentioning the Ancient History of your so called "India" You are not kidding anyone by using Ancient India. Its obvious you are wanting to cut out the Pakistani people from their own history, and gift the history to modern Indian people. The Term India is now different. Because a modern Country is using the name. You effectively have 2 different Ancient histories related to the same word, and use the reference as it suits you to cut out the Pakistani people. This is absurd! Unre4L