This page is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page. |
Should Hawaii and Easter Island get their own entries here? They are both geographicly in the Oceania "continent" even if they're integral parts of mother countries that are in other continents. Inkan1969 14:05, 17 August 2006 (UTC)
Geographically I think it is clear the Hawaiian Islands are part of Oceania, even if politically they are a US state. This is not an unusual circumstance- look at Turkey (Asia and Europe) for example. I suppose the same would apply to Easter Island. 66.183.217.31 23:31, 1 February 2007 (UTC)
Yes, they are both Pacific Islands and both Polynesian. Hugo999 08:42, 11 July 2007 (UTC)
Just passing through, but I agree these two islands which define and are included in the Polynesian triangle should be listed in the Pol section of the table. Politically they are parts of other countries but the same applies to other islands in this table. Geographically, historically and culturally they are part of Polynesia. Mhicaoidh 04:48, 16 July 2007 (UTC)
This is odd... In the table on this article, it says that Indonesia's population is 4 million. However, a census in the year 2000 (Saw it on the Indonesia page, in the infobox) reveals that the country's population was well over 200 million (206264595 to be exact) at the time. So, what's going on here? CeeWhy2 08:00, 3 October 2006 (UTC)
The population table needs to be updated. Australia's population currently stands at 20,683,504 and New Zealand is over 4.1 million now. We should start updating the population figures for all countries and states listed in the Oceania table.-- Just James 21:37, 17 October 2006 (GMT+10:00)
Going through the whole English side of Wikipedia you will understand that one of the 5, 6 or 7 continents is called Australia, just as the country. In my opinion, this is due to the large presence of people writing from that country. But this is a Synecdoche and in this case is a unfair behaviour. If I'm in New Zealand why should I be in Australia (continent)? For this reason the term Oceania (3 oceans) exists. Confront also Wikipaedia in other languages, or read for example https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/as.html. I would like to remember the case of people from the US calling America their country. Gelpiac 17:27, 1 November 2006 (UTC)
I suggest there is also a problem of classification in this article: if Oceania is a region, why does it contain territories and regions again?
I see from the history page that most of the people watching this page are from Australia. Some are also from NZ. You are doing a good job, but I would like to focus to the fact that also other parts of the world have opinios about this topic and their opinion counts as well. In that point of view, Australia is not a continent and Oceania is. Gelpiac 15:11, 5 November 2006 (UTC)
Why? Your statement doesn't refute the comment above it. Your comment is akin to saying Baffin Island or Hispanola are not part of the North American continent. This would be absurd! 66.183.217.31 19:53, 1 March 2007 (UTC)
As we have now (see above) finally been able to discard the somewhat ridiculous example of "newspeech" of the term of Autralasia, time may indeed be mature to question the term Oceania, being a geopolitical unit, whose scope basically extends eastward from Australia. As was remarked above the term does not make sense, since in analogy we would have to refer to Italy as Mediterranea, Europe as Atlantiania and the Earth as a part of Galaxiania, which appears a bit awkward. //Copywriter March 4th
It is not possible to apply the argumentation given by Copywriter because it appears to be invalidated by a serious slippery slope fallacy. Also the assumption of "There is no such thing as an Oceanic continent", as given by Cyberjunkie, cannot be regarded as a definitive standpoint because it does not quote its sources. Please add more to contribute to the discussion. Finally, why should the quotation of the website of the CIA be a mistake? Gelpiac 15:00, 26 June 2007 (UTC)
The key point I have been seeking to advocate is that as a geopolitical entity, Australasia is not quite as coherent a conception, as would have been desired, to treat it on equal basis as a continent, quasi-continent etc. It may be valid though, that in other contexts it is being generally applied, such as for example in connection to cultural matters. In order to support my point I would like to mention the book by J M Coetze ("Elizabeth Costello"), not so old, where there are indeed references such as "the foremost contemporary author of Australasia", although I would not necessarily call it a continent, but rather a geographical sphere, with some distinction from surrounding territories and in that capacity almost being a one of its kind. //Copywriter August 17th 2007
There ws discussion on this in the continent article. Definition of the 'Australia' as a continent is far more prevalent than oceania but there are places in the world where oceania is regarded as a continent. As for the remark concerning the number of Australian people joining this debate... well you'll probably find a large number of New Zealanders commenting on the New Zealand page too... dah. But in any case, the comments in the continent article were mostly coming from North Americans. Despite the odd spurious canadian Atlas using the term 'Oceania' to depict a continent, it seems that in the USA and many other places on earth people are taught that Australia is a continent. To be honest, the entire classification system is completely arbitrary. there is no solid definition for what does and what does not constitute a continent Far Queue 00:47, 23 September 2007 (UTC)
No of the alternative denominations in circulation – Australia, Oceania and Australasia – appears to contain a final answer, each of them rather having their specific advantages and proponents. Australia has a certain colonial flavour, whereas Oceania breathes decolonization and Australasia in a way comes out as a sort of political compromise. Provided that the Australasia term after all is in use, also in serious contexts, it might however also be of interest to break it down into components, for example asking wheather it should be understood as an extended Australian sphere or as a sub-territory of the larger entity Asia. Nietzsche referred to Europe as an appendix of Asia and maybe the Australasia school is to be understood as an eastward analogy to this ingenious metaphore. //Copywriter October 6th 2007 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 85.231.76.234 ( talk) 20:53, 6 October 2007 (UTC)
Hello All. For all those for "Australia" being the name of the continent, so be it as it appears this is what is presented on wikipedia at present however on the other hand sorry to disapoint anyone against "oceania" but schools up and down the UK will regularly refer to it as the title of the continent - even "Australasia" in some cases. This issue will take a long time to change so it should be either/or for the time being. User:DarkMauve 21:36, 04 February 2008 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 78.151.111.97 ( talk)
Although "Australasia" might be part of established terminology - you will find it already in texts by Kipling - I believe it must be possible to rule it out as the most adequate official or scientific denomination. "Australasia" has never been the preferred name among geographers, but rather is a remnant of colonial vocabularly, from this point of view most properly defined as everything beyond India except for the Far East. This probably is as close to a clearcut definition as it is possible to get. The fact that it has grown increasingly popular ni recent time probably has to do with a resignation to the ambivalence between the competing names "Australia" and "Oceania", well illustrated by the previous contribution. //Copywriter May 20th 2008
It should be called Australasia and Oceania--If we put these two together it goes in accordance with a scenitific and english def. Dance-pop ( talk) 22:51, 6 February 2009 (UTC)
Are Micronesians considered Asian or Aboriginal? This is a serious question and I am not trying to offend people of either background. I ask because I know a fellow from this area and he said he is not asian. He said there is a word for his people but he couldn’t remember it at the time. I know Taiwan once and probably does still house a population of aboriginal people. ( Ghostexorcist 12:34, 23 December 2006 (UTC))
It is requested that a map or maps be
included in this article to
improve its quality. Wikipedians in Oceania may be able to help! |
I suggest adding a column to the table of "Territories and regions" correlating to the two-letter abbreviations used on the "Political map of Oceania." — Dodiad 22:11, 2 February 2007 (UTC)
According to the article Transcontinental country#Countries in both Asia and Oceania, East Timor is wholly in Oceania, both geographically and culturally, and is considered to be Asian only because of its past ties to Indonesia. So why is it considered to be Asian in this article? 124.187.6.213 08:05, 16 February 2007 (UTC)
I was rather intrigued at this simple reversion of the lede recently made: [1]
My edit summary of my work said: "Changed lede to reflect rest of article and place undisputed constituents first as per talk page (Australia was mentioned and internally linked twice before in 1st 2 sentences!)" and the revert was marked m for minor.
May I ask, given the contents of our Manual of Style, exactly why it is thought
...Gaimhreadhan (kiwiexile at DMOZ) talk • 22:08, 6 August 2007 (UTC)
Corticopia. Please be more careful when excising the work of others [4]...Gaimhreadhan (kiwiexile at DMOZ) talk • 14:54, 8 August 2007 (UTC)
Should these two islands be on the list? They're both very far away from the Pacific Ocean. Maybe an entity can be considered part of Oceania geographically only if it is located in or borders the Pacific and it is not a part of a continental landmass ( excluding Australia of course ) or closely associated with one ( i.e. no Japan or Taiwan ). Inkan1969 00:06, 26 October 2007 (UTC)
I'm unsure why there is continual insistence on adding this country to this table, despite notes. The comments by Alice indicate as good a
point of view as any, without little if any rooting in consensus or fact. For sources that may say East Timor/Timor-Leste is in Oceania (and I may not dispute that), I see only one source provided (the World Gazetteer); however, there are many reputable ones that indicate otherwise:
Britannica Concise,
Merriam-Webster, Oxford, the
CIA World Factbook, the
Columbia Encyclopedia,
Encarta, and
National Geographic are among those that indicate it is in Southeast(ern) Asia. This table and others are largely based on the UN scheme for classifying territories – which
also places East Timor/Timor-Leste squarely in Southeastern Asia. As well, your argument is based on an incorrect premise and information: if anything, ET/TL is in
Melanesia, well outside the
Polynesian triangle and not in that subregion; moreover, the failure to remove the relevant note in the table, coupled with your insinuation of how Timorese 'wish' to be categorised, signifies to me that
something very different is at play. Notes in the table already deal with the duality of its location, without unnecessarily double counting; so, unless you or others can compel otherwise – i.e., provide convincing evidence, not yet done – I will be removing this entry from this table.
Corticopia (
talk)
16:59, 9 January 2008 (UTC)
(deindent) As you say, there are a substantial number of references for Timor being in SE Asia, and fewer but still a substantial number for it being in Oceania. I'm not arguing against it being listed as part of South East Asia; I don't see a problem with it being listed in both Asia and Oceania. Your references don't "trump" my references; both have a validity.
I also don't see that whether the Timorese people see themselves as part of Oceania or not is the issue (I agree that the majority seem not to). We had a former Prime Minister of New Zealand (I think it was Bolger) who declared that New Zealand was now part of Asia, but that didn't make it so.- gadfium 04:59, 11 January 2008 (UTC)
(de-indent)I'm in robust and vigorous health myself - so at least you won't have that "problem" with me.
The lead, per WP:Lead summarises and encapsulates what is in the rest of the article. The rest of the article spends a lot of time summarising the various controversies and uncertainties as to what is in and what is out of Oceania. The only uncontroversial and unequivocal statement that can be made is " Ethnologically, the islands that are indubitably included in Oceania are divided into the subregions of Melanesia, Micronesia, and Polynesia."
Indubitably (or some such other equivalent wording) should stay and if you remove it again I would consider it as "sterile edit warring".
Now, there only seem to be a maximum of four of us currently discussing these matters, so where is this consensus for your edits (and against mine) that you keep mentioning? Alice ✉ 23:30, 11 January 2008 (UTC)
A request was made for a third opinion re the inclusion of East Timor. The request noted that there were three editors involved, so this dispute was not "technically" eligable for a 3O: "If, after discussion, only two editors are involved, you may list the dispute below in the Active Disagreements section. Otherwise, please follow other methods in the dispute resolution process."
3Os are limited to disputes between two editors for good reasons and I see no good reasons to ignore those good reasons. Understand my reasoning? Good.
In any event, I will suggest this much: One of you linked to WP:BOLD in your discussion above. I would suggest, instead that you try WP:BRD. So, this (15 -> 14) was "bold", this (14 -> 15) was "revert", now discuss.
A thought: the info box need not ignore the question. The number of countries (etc.) could reflect the lack of worldwide concensus on the issue, "Countries 14 or 15 (see [[Oceania#East_Timor|East Timor question]])." Either that or you can edit war for a while longer, go through various long, long and unpleasent dispute resolution procedures to "solve" the issue, then have it all stir up again in a couple of months. Mdsummermsw ( talk) 21:32, 11 January 2008 (UTC)
Before we leave the subject of "reverting to insinuate unclear or contradictory ones" I remain baffled by a portion of your edit summary for this edit: "...removing East Timor/Timor-Leste: ... locator map excludes Timor, ...". Which locator map did you mean? Surely not this one since the legend for that locator map quite clearly includes East Timor: "Map of Oceania, with ISO 3166-1 pt · en country and territory code. SVG format. Map legend in Portuguese and English, with name of sovereign state given in parenthesis, where applicable:
On map, but part of Asia:
Alice ✉ 04:50, 12 January 2008 (UTC)
I believe that good sources have been provided above to indicate that Timor can be considered part of Asia, and part of Oceania. I am not disputing that Timor is part of Asia. Corticopia is removing Timor from Oceania, but so far, no sources have been provided in support of the removal. Please provide some reliable references that Timor is NOT part of Oceania. Until such references are supplied, do not continue to revert the article.
We do need to sort out the population and area tables, but it makes sense to sort out which countries are involved, first.- gadfium 01:21, 12 January 2008 (UTC)
This page is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page. |
Should Hawaii and Easter Island get their own entries here? They are both geographicly in the Oceania "continent" even if they're integral parts of mother countries that are in other continents. Inkan1969 14:05, 17 August 2006 (UTC)
Geographically I think it is clear the Hawaiian Islands are part of Oceania, even if politically they are a US state. This is not an unusual circumstance- look at Turkey (Asia and Europe) for example. I suppose the same would apply to Easter Island. 66.183.217.31 23:31, 1 February 2007 (UTC)
Yes, they are both Pacific Islands and both Polynesian. Hugo999 08:42, 11 July 2007 (UTC)
Just passing through, but I agree these two islands which define and are included in the Polynesian triangle should be listed in the Pol section of the table. Politically they are parts of other countries but the same applies to other islands in this table. Geographically, historically and culturally they are part of Polynesia. Mhicaoidh 04:48, 16 July 2007 (UTC)
This is odd... In the table on this article, it says that Indonesia's population is 4 million. However, a census in the year 2000 (Saw it on the Indonesia page, in the infobox) reveals that the country's population was well over 200 million (206264595 to be exact) at the time. So, what's going on here? CeeWhy2 08:00, 3 October 2006 (UTC)
The population table needs to be updated. Australia's population currently stands at 20,683,504 and New Zealand is over 4.1 million now. We should start updating the population figures for all countries and states listed in the Oceania table.-- Just James 21:37, 17 October 2006 (GMT+10:00)
Going through the whole English side of Wikipedia you will understand that one of the 5, 6 or 7 continents is called Australia, just as the country. In my opinion, this is due to the large presence of people writing from that country. But this is a Synecdoche and in this case is a unfair behaviour. If I'm in New Zealand why should I be in Australia (continent)? For this reason the term Oceania (3 oceans) exists. Confront also Wikipaedia in other languages, or read for example https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/as.html. I would like to remember the case of people from the US calling America their country. Gelpiac 17:27, 1 November 2006 (UTC)
I suggest there is also a problem of classification in this article: if Oceania is a region, why does it contain territories and regions again?
I see from the history page that most of the people watching this page are from Australia. Some are also from NZ. You are doing a good job, but I would like to focus to the fact that also other parts of the world have opinios about this topic and their opinion counts as well. In that point of view, Australia is not a continent and Oceania is. Gelpiac 15:11, 5 November 2006 (UTC)
Why? Your statement doesn't refute the comment above it. Your comment is akin to saying Baffin Island or Hispanola are not part of the North American continent. This would be absurd! 66.183.217.31 19:53, 1 March 2007 (UTC)
As we have now (see above) finally been able to discard the somewhat ridiculous example of "newspeech" of the term of Autralasia, time may indeed be mature to question the term Oceania, being a geopolitical unit, whose scope basically extends eastward from Australia. As was remarked above the term does not make sense, since in analogy we would have to refer to Italy as Mediterranea, Europe as Atlantiania and the Earth as a part of Galaxiania, which appears a bit awkward. //Copywriter March 4th
It is not possible to apply the argumentation given by Copywriter because it appears to be invalidated by a serious slippery slope fallacy. Also the assumption of "There is no such thing as an Oceanic continent", as given by Cyberjunkie, cannot be regarded as a definitive standpoint because it does not quote its sources. Please add more to contribute to the discussion. Finally, why should the quotation of the website of the CIA be a mistake? Gelpiac 15:00, 26 June 2007 (UTC)
The key point I have been seeking to advocate is that as a geopolitical entity, Australasia is not quite as coherent a conception, as would have been desired, to treat it on equal basis as a continent, quasi-continent etc. It may be valid though, that in other contexts it is being generally applied, such as for example in connection to cultural matters. In order to support my point I would like to mention the book by J M Coetze ("Elizabeth Costello"), not so old, where there are indeed references such as "the foremost contemporary author of Australasia", although I would not necessarily call it a continent, but rather a geographical sphere, with some distinction from surrounding territories and in that capacity almost being a one of its kind. //Copywriter August 17th 2007
There ws discussion on this in the continent article. Definition of the 'Australia' as a continent is far more prevalent than oceania but there are places in the world where oceania is regarded as a continent. As for the remark concerning the number of Australian people joining this debate... well you'll probably find a large number of New Zealanders commenting on the New Zealand page too... dah. But in any case, the comments in the continent article were mostly coming from North Americans. Despite the odd spurious canadian Atlas using the term 'Oceania' to depict a continent, it seems that in the USA and many other places on earth people are taught that Australia is a continent. To be honest, the entire classification system is completely arbitrary. there is no solid definition for what does and what does not constitute a continent Far Queue 00:47, 23 September 2007 (UTC)
No of the alternative denominations in circulation – Australia, Oceania and Australasia – appears to contain a final answer, each of them rather having their specific advantages and proponents. Australia has a certain colonial flavour, whereas Oceania breathes decolonization and Australasia in a way comes out as a sort of political compromise. Provided that the Australasia term after all is in use, also in serious contexts, it might however also be of interest to break it down into components, for example asking wheather it should be understood as an extended Australian sphere or as a sub-territory of the larger entity Asia. Nietzsche referred to Europe as an appendix of Asia and maybe the Australasia school is to be understood as an eastward analogy to this ingenious metaphore. //Copywriter October 6th 2007 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 85.231.76.234 ( talk) 20:53, 6 October 2007 (UTC)
Hello All. For all those for "Australia" being the name of the continent, so be it as it appears this is what is presented on wikipedia at present however on the other hand sorry to disapoint anyone against "oceania" but schools up and down the UK will regularly refer to it as the title of the continent - even "Australasia" in some cases. This issue will take a long time to change so it should be either/or for the time being. User:DarkMauve 21:36, 04 February 2008 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 78.151.111.97 ( talk)
Although "Australasia" might be part of established terminology - you will find it already in texts by Kipling - I believe it must be possible to rule it out as the most adequate official or scientific denomination. "Australasia" has never been the preferred name among geographers, but rather is a remnant of colonial vocabularly, from this point of view most properly defined as everything beyond India except for the Far East. This probably is as close to a clearcut definition as it is possible to get. The fact that it has grown increasingly popular ni recent time probably has to do with a resignation to the ambivalence between the competing names "Australia" and "Oceania", well illustrated by the previous contribution. //Copywriter May 20th 2008
It should be called Australasia and Oceania--If we put these two together it goes in accordance with a scenitific and english def. Dance-pop ( talk) 22:51, 6 February 2009 (UTC)
Are Micronesians considered Asian or Aboriginal? This is a serious question and I am not trying to offend people of either background. I ask because I know a fellow from this area and he said he is not asian. He said there is a word for his people but he couldn’t remember it at the time. I know Taiwan once and probably does still house a population of aboriginal people. ( Ghostexorcist 12:34, 23 December 2006 (UTC))
It is requested that a map or maps be
included in this article to
improve its quality. Wikipedians in Oceania may be able to help! |
I suggest adding a column to the table of "Territories and regions" correlating to the two-letter abbreviations used on the "Political map of Oceania." — Dodiad 22:11, 2 February 2007 (UTC)
According to the article Transcontinental country#Countries in both Asia and Oceania, East Timor is wholly in Oceania, both geographically and culturally, and is considered to be Asian only because of its past ties to Indonesia. So why is it considered to be Asian in this article? 124.187.6.213 08:05, 16 February 2007 (UTC)
I was rather intrigued at this simple reversion of the lede recently made: [1]
My edit summary of my work said: "Changed lede to reflect rest of article and place undisputed constituents first as per talk page (Australia was mentioned and internally linked twice before in 1st 2 sentences!)" and the revert was marked m for minor.
May I ask, given the contents of our Manual of Style, exactly why it is thought
...Gaimhreadhan (kiwiexile at DMOZ) talk • 22:08, 6 August 2007 (UTC)
Corticopia. Please be more careful when excising the work of others [4]...Gaimhreadhan (kiwiexile at DMOZ) talk • 14:54, 8 August 2007 (UTC)
Should these two islands be on the list? They're both very far away from the Pacific Ocean. Maybe an entity can be considered part of Oceania geographically only if it is located in or borders the Pacific and it is not a part of a continental landmass ( excluding Australia of course ) or closely associated with one ( i.e. no Japan or Taiwan ). Inkan1969 00:06, 26 October 2007 (UTC)
I'm unsure why there is continual insistence on adding this country to this table, despite notes. The comments by Alice indicate as good a
point of view as any, without little if any rooting in consensus or fact. For sources that may say East Timor/Timor-Leste is in Oceania (and I may not dispute that), I see only one source provided (the World Gazetteer); however, there are many reputable ones that indicate otherwise:
Britannica Concise,
Merriam-Webster, Oxford, the
CIA World Factbook, the
Columbia Encyclopedia,
Encarta, and
National Geographic are among those that indicate it is in Southeast(ern) Asia. This table and others are largely based on the UN scheme for classifying territories – which
also places East Timor/Timor-Leste squarely in Southeastern Asia. As well, your argument is based on an incorrect premise and information: if anything, ET/TL is in
Melanesia, well outside the
Polynesian triangle and not in that subregion; moreover, the failure to remove the relevant note in the table, coupled with your insinuation of how Timorese 'wish' to be categorised, signifies to me that
something very different is at play. Notes in the table already deal with the duality of its location, without unnecessarily double counting; so, unless you or others can compel otherwise – i.e., provide convincing evidence, not yet done – I will be removing this entry from this table.
Corticopia (
talk)
16:59, 9 January 2008 (UTC)
(deindent) As you say, there are a substantial number of references for Timor being in SE Asia, and fewer but still a substantial number for it being in Oceania. I'm not arguing against it being listed as part of South East Asia; I don't see a problem with it being listed in both Asia and Oceania. Your references don't "trump" my references; both have a validity.
I also don't see that whether the Timorese people see themselves as part of Oceania or not is the issue (I agree that the majority seem not to). We had a former Prime Minister of New Zealand (I think it was Bolger) who declared that New Zealand was now part of Asia, but that didn't make it so.- gadfium 04:59, 11 January 2008 (UTC)
(de-indent)I'm in robust and vigorous health myself - so at least you won't have that "problem" with me.
The lead, per WP:Lead summarises and encapsulates what is in the rest of the article. The rest of the article spends a lot of time summarising the various controversies and uncertainties as to what is in and what is out of Oceania. The only uncontroversial and unequivocal statement that can be made is " Ethnologically, the islands that are indubitably included in Oceania are divided into the subregions of Melanesia, Micronesia, and Polynesia."
Indubitably (or some such other equivalent wording) should stay and if you remove it again I would consider it as "sterile edit warring".
Now, there only seem to be a maximum of four of us currently discussing these matters, so where is this consensus for your edits (and against mine) that you keep mentioning? Alice ✉ 23:30, 11 January 2008 (UTC)
A request was made for a third opinion re the inclusion of East Timor. The request noted that there were three editors involved, so this dispute was not "technically" eligable for a 3O: "If, after discussion, only two editors are involved, you may list the dispute below in the Active Disagreements section. Otherwise, please follow other methods in the dispute resolution process."
3Os are limited to disputes between two editors for good reasons and I see no good reasons to ignore those good reasons. Understand my reasoning? Good.
In any event, I will suggest this much: One of you linked to WP:BOLD in your discussion above. I would suggest, instead that you try WP:BRD. So, this (15 -> 14) was "bold", this (14 -> 15) was "revert", now discuss.
A thought: the info box need not ignore the question. The number of countries (etc.) could reflect the lack of worldwide concensus on the issue, "Countries 14 or 15 (see [[Oceania#East_Timor|East Timor question]])." Either that or you can edit war for a while longer, go through various long, long and unpleasent dispute resolution procedures to "solve" the issue, then have it all stir up again in a couple of months. Mdsummermsw ( talk) 21:32, 11 January 2008 (UTC)
Before we leave the subject of "reverting to insinuate unclear or contradictory ones" I remain baffled by a portion of your edit summary for this edit: "...removing East Timor/Timor-Leste: ... locator map excludes Timor, ...". Which locator map did you mean? Surely not this one since the legend for that locator map quite clearly includes East Timor: "Map of Oceania, with ISO 3166-1 pt · en country and territory code. SVG format. Map legend in Portuguese and English, with name of sovereign state given in parenthesis, where applicable:
On map, but part of Asia:
Alice ✉ 04:50, 12 January 2008 (UTC)
I believe that good sources have been provided above to indicate that Timor can be considered part of Asia, and part of Oceania. I am not disputing that Timor is part of Asia. Corticopia is removing Timor from Oceania, but so far, no sources have been provided in support of the removal. Please provide some reliable references that Timor is NOT part of Oceania. Until such references are supplied, do not continue to revert the article.
We do need to sort out the population and area tables, but it makes sense to sort out which countries are involved, first.- gadfium 01:21, 12 January 2008 (UTC)