User talk:Pqnelson

A belated welcome!

Here's wishing you a belated welcome to Wikipedia, Pqnelson. I see that you've already been around a while and wanted to thank you for your contributions. Though you seem to have been successful in finding your way around, you may benefit from following some of the links below, which help editors get the most out of Wikipedia:

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Again, welcome! Muhandes (talk) 14:30, 3 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Showing scratch work?

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I've been studying semiclassical gravity and would like to give some more explicit examples, but I don't know how much work to show. Consequently, I wondered if I could show minimal work (enough for a textbook) and write annotations on the talk page for semiclassical gravity?

Let me stress: my annotations would NOT be my personal views on the matter, but more work than shown in textbooks and some minor clarifying remarks (akin to marginalia one would write in a book). —Pqnelson (talk) 04:09, 13 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

(Addendum) For a concrete example of what I mean: the regularized stress-energy tensor's expectation value, for the quantum scalar field, would require smearing (in the sense of a smeared field operator). But there is no Wikipedia article on the notion of a "smeared operator", and it's too much of an aside to stick in the article. Consequently, something should be said, and the talk page seems like the best place (in my opinion, at least...) —Pqnelson (talk) 04:15, 13 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

As a general rule, no, as it would make the article too [[WP:TECHNICAL|confusing to the average second. Mdann52 (talk) 05:37, 13 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Pqnelson, I think you misunderstand the purpose of the talk pages. These are mostly used to discuss how best to improve articles. At the end of the day, however, all the encyclopedic content belongs in the articles themselves. Someone hoping to learn about your "marginalia" does not (and should not) expect to find this covered in the talk page. For that matter, a topic that is marginalia to one person could be the main reason for visiting Wikipedia to the next person. If you can't define "smeared operator" in a few lines, then in my opinion it's best practice to start a new article. A new article doesn't have to be a masterpiece. Stubs are fine. Teply (talk) 01:20, 14 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I'll add to that... The beauty of Wikipedia and the World Wide Web is the hyperlink. A separate smeared operator article acts, in a way, as the margin. Interested readers can click the link, and uninterested readers can stay on the original page without being distracted by the minor details. Teply (talk) 01:24, 14 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I see, I see, that thought occurred to me today too (the talk page is more dedicated on improving the article as opposed to marginalia). Thanks for the clarification, I appreciate it Mdann and Teply :) —Pqnelson (talk) 03:46, 14 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

GR template

Hi Pqnelson. I noticed you expressed some interest in a handful of alternative gravity theories. I've recently made some major changes to the Template:Theories of gravitation. Perhaps you'd be interested in improving it. Teply (talk) 06:20, 14 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I'll definitely take a look at it, thanks. I do wonder if it would be better to organize it by paradigms, since there are so many bunk theories of gravity...and every crackpot will want his or hers added to the list. --Pqnelson (talk) 15:21, 14 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

True, but thankfully not all one of those bunk theories is WP:notable enough to have a Wikipedia article. I left some further comments on the template talk. Teply (talk) 05:09, 15 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Also, I see you've meaningfully edited the Cotton tensor article. I've recently made some major changes to the Lanczos tensor article. Perhaps you'd be interested in improving it or know someone else who is. Similar pages that could use some attention are Bach tensor and Schouten tensor. Teply (talk) 23:44, 13 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Hello, Pqnelson. You have new messages at Teply's talk page.
You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{Talkback}} or {{Tb}} template.

I'll see what I can do with them. Just a warning: I've got a job now, so my time to do research is a fraction of its former self. But still, I'll look into them... Pqnelson (talk) 02:13, 15 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]