Talk:Charles Coulson

message: I think Charles deserves a much longer entry than has been here so far. I have done as much as I can tonight. I have restructured and kept old material that had not become redundant relative to new material that is more extensive.
Details that need to be fixed. 
1. Provision of full names (or at least initials) of people missing these, and hyperlinks when these exist.
2. Check spelling of names, particularly Alan Lidiard, Joop der (or ter) Heer, and find name of Spanish professor who spent months with us, and later became Rector of major university.
3. What was Crawford's initial?
4. Was Eric Pitts in Coulson's group before goint to work with McVittie?
5. Did Carl Moser spend long visits at King's?
3. More detail from before and after King's -- I am bit vague about this.
4. Check date of Brasenose conference.
Delighted if anyone takes care of these before I can get back to this.
Thanks Michael P. Barnett (talk) 04:41, 2 January 2011 (UTC)
thread_title: extension 1/1/2011

message: 1. Overall styling. Tentatively, the only references in the lead (introduction) are to the three most informative obituaries that I have seen so far, and to the four books by Coulson that I think are regarded, by consensus, as most important.
2. The name of the Fellowship at Oxford and the college where it was held need to be found. I thought the article about Roy McWeeny implied Charles was at University College, and emailed their archivist, but think now that it meant Roy was there. I think Charles had an ICI fellowship, and that this may be mentioned in a Nature article published at the time he joined King's Nature 159, 632 (10 May 1947) | doi:10.1038/159632a0. I cannot read the text until later this week, but hopefully it will give the necessary information. If it was published after his inaugural lecture, it may contain part of that, including the "key to the room that is in disorder" metaphor (my words). 
3. Will put in date for start of Mathematical Institution.
4. Will reorder medals chronologically. The reference for the Davy medal was a short obituary notice that gave negligible information about Coulson, and certainly not about the medal, so I took it out.
5. For sections 1 and 2, have provided hyperlinks, and put reference at end of each paragraph that applies to all the sentences in it -- hope this is adequate -- can be explained at start of list of references.
6. I used the style of back-referencing obituaries with page and paragraph number. I hope I can avoid the style of numbered notes and bulleted references that seems prevalent in WP. I assume it is not mandated because I think I have seen articles where it is not used.
7. I emailed the Labour Party office in Cambridge asking if the Alex Wood who stood for parliament in the 1930s was the physicist.
8. re Christopher: I took out the "distinguished" because it boxes us into arbitrating the adjectives to apply to Charles' other students. I took out the theochem reference because it points to preface of a thematic issue about quantum chemistry, that can go back later in the article, in due course.
9. For references to Waves, Electricity and Valence, I intended to show the time span over which they have been considered significant. I need to add reference to Roy's posthumous revision of Valence, and to Pauling's review: Coulson's Valence, Linus Pauling, Nature 284, 685-686 (24 April 1980) doi:10.1038/284685a0 
 
10. I asked three people well qualified to comment if they thought someone who was deeply religious might be describable by the sentence I have used and they said yes. 
11. I emailed Chairman of Chemistry dept at U. Pisa asking if Roy can be reached by email
Michael P. Barnett (talk) 02:03, 3 January 2011 (UTC)
thread_title: Revisions 1/2/11

message: In case anyone else is interested in this article, I have reached an impasse. I wanted the opening sentences to link to reasonable articles, but was unimpressed by theoretical chemistry, reactivity (chemistry), molecular structure, molecular dynamics. I have tried tactic of replacing lede with a sentence that I think is reasonable, followed by Another approach over the material that was there already. With a hatnote questioning the content. But with applied mathematics I seem to have run into an Editor who controls articles about mathematics. I put quite a bit of effort into a suggested revision of the lede, which has been cut off rather contemptuously. Meanwhile, in another context, I seem to have been told that "experienced editors" can warn off critics of articles that are atrocious. This is discouraging. 128.112.70.138 (talk) 00:36, 5 February 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: I commented on one aspect of this at your talk. Johnuniq (talk) 02:41, 5 February 2011 (UTC)
thread_title: Impasse Feb 4

message: This article is to my mind not as neutral as it should be.  The opening sentence that he was a "religious leader" seems to be going too far.  He was a religious author and broadcaster, but that is far from being a leader.  The final sentences are uncited and seem to be a personal reflection, which is not wikipedia practice.  If it is a quotation it should be given as such.Chemical Engineer (talk) 16:55, 22 April 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: I have removed the last sentence in the lede, and the one above does need attention. I think the term "religious leader" is appropriate as he was Vice President of the Methodist Church, a yearly appointment to a senior lay person in the church (The President is always an ordained minister). However, I looked long ago and could not find a list of the Vice-Presidents. I recall he was VP in the late 1960s or maybe very early 1970s. --Bduke  (Discussion) 22:53, 22 April 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Opening Section POV