This article is about the discovery of nuclear fission in 1938. It is better known than other scientific discoveries because nuclear fission led to the development nuclear power and nuclear weapons. It is also controversial. The award of the Nobel Prize for Chemistry for 1944 to Otto Hahn (but don't mention the war!) raised issues about whether the discovery was about physics or chemistry, and what indeed is meant by a scientific discovery. It has also been touted as an example of the Matilda effect. This carries over to Wikipedia as well; in the English language version, Lise Meitner gets more page views than Otto Hahn, but in the German Wikipedia the reverse is true.
Hawkeye7(discuss)05:29, 17 August 2020 (UTC)reply
"Irène Curie" You probably have your reasons for not including the Joliot?
Yes. Everyone is consistently referred to in the article by the name under which they published their scientific papers. This affects four individuals mentioned. Curie never published under her husband's name.
Hawkeye7(discuss)20:24, 17 August 2020 (UTC)reply
" But after Rasetti went on his Easter vacation before preparing the polonium-beryllium source, " After and before makes it feel a little unclear.
"When they got to fluorine, they had their first success. Induced radioactivity was subsequently found through the neutron bombardment of 22 different elements.[35][36] " The "subsequently" makes it unclear if fluorine is included in the count.
"What they found was three different decays series, all alpha emitters—a form of decay not found in any other heavy element, and for which Meitner once again had to postulate multiple isomers. They did find an interesting result: these (n, α) decay series" should "decays series" be "decay series"?
A clearer timeframe for the first two paragraphs in "Nobel prize" might be helpful.
"During celebrations in Germany of the 100th birthdays of Einstein, Hahn, Meitner and von Laue in 1978," Does it matter that Einstein was born in 1879?
"discovered that barium had been produced". Optional: 'discovered that barium was produced'.
Sticking with this wording. The point here is avoid giving the reader the impression that have that barium is what you get from fission. In fact, it is one of the less common fission products. It was found because they went looking for chemically similar radium.
Hawkeye7(discuss)23:08, 9 September 2020 (UTC)reply
"Protactinium" section: paragraphs 1 and 3 commence "In 1913". Can a reader assume that everything in paragraphs 1, 2 and 3 took place in 1913?
"They noted that positron emission continued after the neutron emissions ceased. Not only had they discovered a new form of radioactive decay". Possibly a brief in line explanation/summary of what this new form of radioactive decay was?
I am not sure that it will be clear to a reader that a neutral neutron is the same thing as a slow neutron. Why not stick with "slow neatron", as used in the rest of the article?
Gog the Mild (
talk)
23:15, 9 September 2020 (UTC)reply
By "neutral neutrons" I mean that they have no electrical charge. If a proton approaches the nucleus, it will be repelled, because the nucleus is also positively charged. In order to hit it, they have to have enough energy to overcome this repulsion. But a neutron has neutral charge, so it can hit the nucleus at any speed. As it happens, if it comes in slow, it is more likely to be captured. Changed to "neutrally charged".
Hawkeye7(discuss)00:30, 10 September 2020 (UTC)reply
"The current model of the nucleus was" → 'The model of the nucleus in 193X was'.
I (think I) understand why you do it, but your extended quotes, especially the one in "Eureka!", seem to me to fall foul of
MOS:QUOTE: "While quotations are an indispensable part of Wikipedia, try not to overuse them. Using too many quotes is incompatible with an encyclopedic writing ... It is generally recommended that content be written in Wikipedia editors' own words. Consider paraphrasing quotations into plain and concise text when appropriate". I feel that the article would actually benefit if this were applied to Frisch's quote.
Hi Hawkeye, mostly typos and questions etc as my knowledge of physics and chemistry is very sketchy (though I will say I could understand 95+% of this story of discovery) ...
Otto Robert Frisch in full twice in lede - intentional?
"that alpha decay caused atoms to shift down two places in the periodic table, while the loss of two beta particles restored it to its original position." and in caption "beta decay shifts one element up." - I know very little about the periodic table but that caption means 2 x beta means 2 x up?
Hahn's and Meitner's assistants - drop the apostrophe from Hahn's for consistency per "Cockcroft and Walton's feat" and per "defending Meitner and Frisch's claim"?
Before she left, Otto Hahn gave her a diamond ring he had inherited from his mother. - just out of curiosity, was that a friendly/romantic gesture or for Meitner to sell to gain some money?
Nobel prize v Prize - (other than proper names) ie these 4: "was collecting his Nobel Prize in Stockholm" and "awarded the Nobel Prize for discovering" and "his Nobel Prize acceptance speech" and "using Bohr's Nobel Prize medal" have cap P but section head and elsewhere do not
caption Lise Meitner in 1946 with physicist Arthur H. Compton and actress Katherine Cornell. - spelling should be Katharine (even though file has it wrong)?
Imma make some comments on the sourcing. First, the |ref=harv can probably be removed. It seems like the source formatting is consistent and has the requisite information. I note that the bibliography relies heavily on books written by physicists - I take these are good enough sources for a heavily historical physics article? Likewise, many of the references are to individual academic papers. I am a little too unfamiliar with the topic to judge NPOV on the subject matter.
Jo-Jo Eumerus (
talk)
17:25, 7 October 2020 (UTC)reply
Yes, most of the books in the References section are by physicists;
Otto Hahn is the only chemist. The others are notable historians of science:
Ronald W. Clark,
Richard Rhodes and
Ruth Lewin Sime. Sime wrote a biography of Meitner, whose article has been languishing at GAN since July. The article is almost entirely sourced from the secondary sources in the References section; the original papers are provided to allow the readers to look them up themselves, as is usual in scientific articles.
Hawkeye7(discuss)03:24, 12 October 2020 (UTC)reply
Source review - Pass
I'm not really sure if the above comments were meant to be a formal source review but just in case I'll do one below.
University of California Press is given different locations in it's two uses: Berkeley and Los Angeles vs just Berkeley
I'm not really sure what's going on with the second further reading link, it's missing a publisher/work/website and what are those words supposed to be? (needs a space in any case)
Just minor things here – I don't see any issue with reliability, all scholarly/academic sources. Spot Checks not done since the user is an experienced FA nominator.
Aza24 (
talk)
05:38, 12 October 2020 (UTC)reply
Just two things missed, ref 31 needs a translated title still and 48 should have the German title in the title parameter and the English title in the translated title one. In order to not hold up this nomination, I'll give a preemptive pass with the expectation that these two minor things are addressed. Good work here.
Aza24 (
talk)
19:02, 12 October 2020 (UTC)reply
This article is about the discovery of nuclear fission in 1938. It is better known than other scientific discoveries because nuclear fission led to the development nuclear power and nuclear weapons. It is also controversial. The award of the Nobel Prize for Chemistry for 1944 to Otto Hahn (but don't mention the war!) raised issues about whether the discovery was about physics or chemistry, and what indeed is meant by a scientific discovery. It has also been touted as an example of the Matilda effect. This carries over to Wikipedia as well; in the English language version, Lise Meitner gets more page views than Otto Hahn, but in the German Wikipedia the reverse is true.
Hawkeye7(discuss)05:29, 17 August 2020 (UTC)reply
"Irène Curie" You probably have your reasons for not including the Joliot?
Yes. Everyone is consistently referred to in the article by the name under which they published their scientific papers. This affects four individuals mentioned. Curie never published under her husband's name.
Hawkeye7(discuss)20:24, 17 August 2020 (UTC)reply
" But after Rasetti went on his Easter vacation before preparing the polonium-beryllium source, " After and before makes it feel a little unclear.
"When they got to fluorine, they had their first success. Induced radioactivity was subsequently found through the neutron bombardment of 22 different elements.[35][36] " The "subsequently" makes it unclear if fluorine is included in the count.
"What they found was three different decays series, all alpha emitters—a form of decay not found in any other heavy element, and for which Meitner once again had to postulate multiple isomers. They did find an interesting result: these (n, α) decay series" should "decays series" be "decay series"?
A clearer timeframe for the first two paragraphs in "Nobel prize" might be helpful.
"During celebrations in Germany of the 100th birthdays of Einstein, Hahn, Meitner and von Laue in 1978," Does it matter that Einstein was born in 1879?
"discovered that barium had been produced". Optional: 'discovered that barium was produced'.
Sticking with this wording. The point here is avoid giving the reader the impression that have that barium is what you get from fission. In fact, it is one of the less common fission products. It was found because they went looking for chemically similar radium.
Hawkeye7(discuss)23:08, 9 September 2020 (UTC)reply
"Protactinium" section: paragraphs 1 and 3 commence "In 1913". Can a reader assume that everything in paragraphs 1, 2 and 3 took place in 1913?
"They noted that positron emission continued after the neutron emissions ceased. Not only had they discovered a new form of radioactive decay". Possibly a brief in line explanation/summary of what this new form of radioactive decay was?
I am not sure that it will be clear to a reader that a neutral neutron is the same thing as a slow neutron. Why not stick with "slow neatron", as used in the rest of the article?
Gog the Mild (
talk)
23:15, 9 September 2020 (UTC)reply
By "neutral neutrons" I mean that they have no electrical charge. If a proton approaches the nucleus, it will be repelled, because the nucleus is also positively charged. In order to hit it, they have to have enough energy to overcome this repulsion. But a neutron has neutral charge, so it can hit the nucleus at any speed. As it happens, if it comes in slow, it is more likely to be captured. Changed to "neutrally charged".
Hawkeye7(discuss)00:30, 10 September 2020 (UTC)reply
"The current model of the nucleus was" → 'The model of the nucleus in 193X was'.
I (think I) understand why you do it, but your extended quotes, especially the one in "Eureka!", seem to me to fall foul of
MOS:QUOTE: "While quotations are an indispensable part of Wikipedia, try not to overuse them. Using too many quotes is incompatible with an encyclopedic writing ... It is generally recommended that content be written in Wikipedia editors' own words. Consider paraphrasing quotations into plain and concise text when appropriate". I feel that the article would actually benefit if this were applied to Frisch's quote.
Hi Hawkeye, mostly typos and questions etc as my knowledge of physics and chemistry is very sketchy (though I will say I could understand 95+% of this story of discovery) ...
Otto Robert Frisch in full twice in lede - intentional?
"that alpha decay caused atoms to shift down two places in the periodic table, while the loss of two beta particles restored it to its original position." and in caption "beta decay shifts one element up." - I know very little about the periodic table but that caption means 2 x beta means 2 x up?
Hahn's and Meitner's assistants - drop the apostrophe from Hahn's for consistency per "Cockcroft and Walton's feat" and per "defending Meitner and Frisch's claim"?
Before she left, Otto Hahn gave her a diamond ring he had inherited from his mother. - just out of curiosity, was that a friendly/romantic gesture or for Meitner to sell to gain some money?
Nobel prize v Prize - (other than proper names) ie these 4: "was collecting his Nobel Prize in Stockholm" and "awarded the Nobel Prize for discovering" and "his Nobel Prize acceptance speech" and "using Bohr's Nobel Prize medal" have cap P but section head and elsewhere do not
caption Lise Meitner in 1946 with physicist Arthur H. Compton and actress Katherine Cornell. - spelling should be Katharine (even though file has it wrong)?
Imma make some comments on the sourcing. First, the |ref=harv can probably be removed. It seems like the source formatting is consistent and has the requisite information. I note that the bibliography relies heavily on books written by physicists - I take these are good enough sources for a heavily historical physics article? Likewise, many of the references are to individual academic papers. I am a little too unfamiliar with the topic to judge NPOV on the subject matter.
Jo-Jo Eumerus (
talk)
17:25, 7 October 2020 (UTC)reply
Yes, most of the books in the References section are by physicists;
Otto Hahn is the only chemist. The others are notable historians of science:
Ronald W. Clark,
Richard Rhodes and
Ruth Lewin Sime. Sime wrote a biography of Meitner, whose article has been languishing at GAN since July. The article is almost entirely sourced from the secondary sources in the References section; the original papers are provided to allow the readers to look them up themselves, as is usual in scientific articles.
Hawkeye7(discuss)03:24, 12 October 2020 (UTC)reply
Source review - Pass
I'm not really sure if the above comments were meant to be a formal source review but just in case I'll do one below.
University of California Press is given different locations in it's two uses: Berkeley and Los Angeles vs just Berkeley
I'm not really sure what's going on with the second further reading link, it's missing a publisher/work/website and what are those words supposed to be? (needs a space in any case)
Just minor things here – I don't see any issue with reliability, all scholarly/academic sources. Spot Checks not done since the user is an experienced FA nominator.
Aza24 (
talk)
05:38, 12 October 2020 (UTC)reply
Just two things missed, ref 31 needs a translated title still and 48 should have the German title in the title parameter and the English title in the translated title one. In order to not hold up this nomination, I'll give a preemptive pass with the expectation that these two minor things are addressed. Good work here.
Aza24 (
talk)
19:02, 12 October 2020 (UTC)reply