Talk:Main-group element

message: The modern periodic table use column numbers 1-18. 
The old nomenclature (N-A and N-B) is misleading because the different conventions.
JF Gal
gal@unice.fr  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 134.59.7.72 (talk) 14:01, 10 March 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Column numbering of the periodic table 

message: What is a main group element? Does anyone know?
I don't, even after reading this article and trying a few google searches...
Will someone with a little chem knowledge add some love? and a clear sentence or seven....
Czeese (talk) 10:22, 23 March 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: Short answer: anything in group 1, 2, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, or 18, except hydrogen. Some will also include group 12; some will not. (A very few will also include group 11, though that practice seems to be dying out now.) Double sharp (talk) 14:09, 27 September 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: But why is this a useful catagory? Is there some set of qualities they all share? And why exclude Hydrogen?--Klausok (talk) 13:08, 17 June 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: All the main group elements use only their valence s- and p-orbitals for chemical bonding. (Hydrogen, I imagine, gets excluded because its chemistry is really sui generis.) There are borderline cases: relativistic effects blur the divide between groups 11 and 12 in periods 6 and 7, and the heavy group 2 elements Ca, Sr, Ba, and Ra can use their inner d-orbitals when bonding. Double sharp (talk) 15:34, 4 July 2016 (UTC)
thread_title:  What is a main group element? 

message: In other articles (e.g. Abundance of the chemical elements) hydrogen is called the most abundant element. --Klausok (talk) 08:55, 5 September 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  Most abundant 

message: I don't know if the move today from main group element to main-group element is an improvement. The Red Book  (pdf) p63/377 spells "main group element"
"The elements (except hydrogen) of groups 1, 2 and 13–18 are designated as main group elements and, except in group 18, the first two elements of each main group are termed typical elements. Optionally, the letters s, p, d and f may be used to distinguish different blocks of elements. For example, the elements of groups 3–12 are the d-block elements."
We must take in view that IUPAC does not reflect the actual professional usage (common name), and meaningful nameFor example, the quote shows that the "d-block elements" is more commonly referred to as "d-block" (note, this is also a change from bunch into a single noun; the difference between "the FC Barcelona players" and "the FC Barcelona team"). The same for groups: "group 1 elements" are quoted here as "group 1". It is for this that we can deviate from the literal spelling of IUPAC.
But I don't think we should divert to the hyphenated (adjective) form of "main-group elements". I think the class noun shold be "main group", possibly wiki-disambiguation by "main group (periodic table)". -DePiep (talk) 18:09, 21 December 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: It's the same name, just with different punctuation. Because these are elements from the "main group" (not group elements that are main), the prepended phrase is properly hyphenated in English (which is often inconsistenly followed, but that's no reason to follow suit). If "element" is removed from the title, it is properly not hyphenated. (And "main group" redirects here, and I can't find any need for disambiguation, so I don't mind a move to "main group".) --JorisvS (talk) 18:27, 21 December 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: Tehy are not the same, or else you could not & would not have moved the page. -DePiep (talk) 00:14, 23 December 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: They're the same name, just a different punctuation. This does mean that there is a difference characterwise, and so that this page can be moved between them. --JorisvS (talk) 11:42, 23 December 2014 (UTC)

text: "Main group" raises the question: group of what? It is very likely that several other fields have something called a or the main group. "Main group element", with or without hyphen, shows what the article is about.Klausok (talk) 21:13, 21 December 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: The title does not describe what it is, it is the thing itself. What you are looking for should be in the first sentences. -DePiep (talk) 00:14, 23 December 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: FWIW - people who work with chemistry call these elements main group elements.  No hyphen.  We work with transition metal elements too.  Titles of chemistry articles probably shouldnt be set by nonchemists because of their perceived rules.  --Smokefoot (talk) 12:54, 23 December 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: Specialists often omit such hyphens that are technically required by good English. Because they are very familiar with the topic, the hyphen does not add anything meaningful for them. WP:COMMONNAME refers to the name, but with or without the hyphen is the same name, only different punctuation. Therefore, that part of the policy is silent here. --JorisvS (talk) 13:01, 23 December 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: re Smokefoot : a bad guideline that is. Chemists gave us the article title "group 1 element", while the root, used name, and common name is "group 1" (just read its first sentence, what a knot it is). Same for "period 1 element" instead of the root, used, and common name "period 1". Chemists use but don't grasp the difference between class and class members. I expect proposal move "periodic table" to "periodic table elements". And CF Barcelona into "CF Barcelona players". -DePiep (talk) 21:27, 23 December 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: re Cobblet: the two external links prove my point and show that any "... element" title is wrong: your links have titles "Main Group Chemistry" and "Main Group Metal Chemistry". (not: "Main Group Element(s) Chemistry"). -DePiep (talk) 21:30, 23 December 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: I wasn't responding to you, but to the original issue of whether there should be a hyphen or not. You are correct in the sense that if we name other articles boron group and carbon group, we should do the same here. Klausok's point shouldn't be dismissed out of hand (Urbandictionary has a very different definition of main group) but it does appear that the phrase is primarily used in chemistry and is not standard anywhere else. Cobblet (talk) 21:50, 23 December 2014 (UTC)

text: Specialists understand that there is no such thing as a "group element", but the general reader may well not and look at it with a moment of unnecessary confusion, wondering whether these are maybe the main ones from the group elements. Wikipedia is written as much for the general public as for specialists, and therefore should include such hyphens that indicate the proper relation between words. --JorisvS (talk) 22:11, 23 December 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: And I have pointed out that the lack of hyphenation is standard even in non-specialist sources. It is standard because there is no sensible alternative interpretation. If you're so concerned about eliminating such "uncertainty" for the general public, I'd like to see you take your crusade on to the page they're most likely to read: the Main Page. Several compound noun phrases are not currently hyphenated there, and therefore it is possible that a "non-specialist reader" could look at "passenger car design" or "self-supporting steel structure" or "World War II" and wonder whether the blueprints for a car are being ridden or whether "self-supporting steel" is a new type of alloy or where the local version of War II might have come from. Cobblet (talk) 23:13, 23 December 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: "Passenger car design" is indeed properly hyphenated, and although I'd still prefer to see it so, it is less easily argued because it is a compound composed of common terms and so any non-specialist will still be able to quickly parse it properly, without a moment of confusion. "Self-supporting steel structure" is naively parsed as a steel structure that is self-supporting, which is its meaning and therefore it is correctly hyphenated. "World War II" has a different structure altogether: it is not a noun preceded by a compound modifier, nor a compound simple noun preceded by a simple modifier. --JorisvS (talk) 10:58, 24 December 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: Why do you only worry about the momentary confusion caused by standard orthography (not likely, since it's standard, after all) and not about the distracting nature of nonstandard orthography? If your intention is truly to make Wikipedia more accessible to a general audience by putting hyphens everywhere you see fit (never mind how Wikipedia doesn't even stick to one variety of English, surely a much greater source of confusion and distraction than unhyphenated compounds; and yet our poor readers survive), at least focus your efforts on pages a general audience is most likely to read. If on the other hand, your goal is to alienate Wikipedia's specialist contributors by forcing nonstandard orthography down their throats on a page defining a technical term, all in the name of "good" (as opposed to standard) English, proceed as you currently are. Cobblet (talk) 07:50, 25 December 2014 (UTC)

text: When responses include the terms "properly", "required", and accusations toward "specialists",  it is time to duck for cover. Good luck with this debate. --Smokefoot (talk) 13:05, 24 December 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: "... shouldnt be set by nonchemists because of their perceived rules". - duh. People whose argument is authority for being a member of a professional group should not bother to feel accused in the first place. Interestingly, again this contains the core mistake: members of a group is not the same as a group. In other words: speak for yourself. -DePiep (talk) 22:07, 24 December 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: I was speaking for myself, not sure how I could do otherwise.  "duh" probably is not the appropriate term to refer to a colleague.  But no hard feelings, best wishes, --Smokefoot (talk) 22:25, 24 December 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: , please tell: in publications, do you use "group 3 element" always and never "group 3"? -DePiep (talk) 08:33, 25 December 2014 (UTC)

text: The policy that applies to article names has precedence over style guides.  So the title of this article should be folowing the name commonly used by reliable sources.  From evidence given above, this does not include a hyphen or dash. So the move should be reversed. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 07:20, 28 December 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  Name improvements