Talk:Gallifrey

message: "The novels are not considered canon by most fans" - I can see this sentence causing some debate... Angmering 22:12, 14 Jul 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: Is that really a disputed term? The novels are not even considered canon by the novelists. Nobody seriously expects Russell T. Davies to adhere to what's been done in the novels, and books like Sometime Never and audio plays like Zagreus have also implied that the novels and the audios show alternative universes. Ultimately, I've always maintained that the nature of time travel and changing history in Doctor Who means that what is "canon" and what is not can be constantly in flux. --khaosworks 22:40, 14 Jul 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: Oh I wouldn't dispute it personally, I'm no John Blum-style novel crusader! It's just that the novel ranges do have their... how shall I put it... "enthusiastic" supporters, just as any other area of fandom, and I can see a remark like that fanning the flames of debate! Angmering 23:23, 14 Jul 2004 (UTC)
thread_title: Canonicity of novels?

message: I know where the anon thinks he's getting the info from, so I should explain why I'm reverting it. Firstly, the 29,000 light years figure is from Terror of the Autons, where the Time Lord emmisary sent to warn the Doctor about the Master says he's travelled 29,000 years. However, although it was probable that Robert Holmes intended that to be the distance from Earth to the as-yet-unnamed Time Lord homeworld, it is never made explicit that is precisely where he's come from. He could have hopped from somewhere else. Holmes's weak grasp of scientific concepts and distances aside, this is explictly contradicted by the TVM which places Gallifrey 250 million light years away. So between one vague reference and one specific one, the one to be preferred becomes obvious.
Which brings us to where Gallifrey is. Mutter's Spiral is assumed by many to be the Time Lord name for the Milky Way, but nowhere does it say in the television series that Gallifrey is in Mutter's Spiral. Earth is in Mutter's Spiral, that much is certain from The Deadly Assassin, but we are never told what Mutter's Spiral is. As Lawrence Miles points out, for all we know, from Gallifrey's viewpoint, the area of space Earth is in looks like a spiral, even if Gallifrey was within the same galaxy. So it's not at all certain that Gallifrey itself is in Mutter's Spiral.
Yes, it is implied in Pyramids of Mars (where the coordinates for Gallifrey come from) that it must be within the same  galaxy, but it is again not explicit, and besides, the Doctor wasn't exactly trying to be cooperative. Once again, we come back to 250 million light years away, which definitely places it outside our galaxy. Considering the orders of magnitude from 29,000 to 250 million, a drift of that much is really implausible, so that's a further strike against the credibility of the 29,000 figure. 
Just wanted to make it clear. :) We now return to non-anorak programming. --khaosworks (talk • contribs) 06:21, 29 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Another bit from the Discontinuiy Guide (with some further extrapolation and ignoring or -simply not mentioning- the other constellation stuff). Of course, that ignores the issue of how one can be in a constellation in the first place. But whatever, that's fine.--Sean|Black 07:37, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

text: Maybe the Gallifreyan year is 8620 times as long as an Earth year, so the distance light travels ... I'll stop right there ;) Tim! (talk) 17:42, 29 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Reviving an old conversation here - to point out here that at the same time as the Doctor says "250 million light years away" he also describes Gallifrey as being "on the other side of your galaxy". Surely that places it inside the Milky Way? And if no two objects in the Milky Way can be 250 million light years apart (given that the Milky Way is only 300,000 light years across) then maybe the TARDIS at that moment in the TV movie wasn't actually near the Earth, but was 250 million light years outside the galaxy. 80.93.170.99 16:54, 10 November 2006 (UTC)

text: But this is still all speculation and unsupported by anything we actually see in the television series, and as a result is not encyclopedic. That's really the bottom line, here. --khaosworks (talk • contribs) 02:36, 1 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I very vaguely recall gallifreys co-ordinates being given various times, including once as the Scotland yard phone number, once as being alsmot identical to earths own in some weird way, and as very tiny number, as it is meant to be one of the oldest planets in the galaxy, the one to first evolve both life, and humanoid life at that. Its also supposed to be extremely close to Galactic Center.  Jaime9526 22:05, 7 June 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Reversion on 29 December 2005

message: I've updated the bit about the Gallifrey audios, per the Big Finish website.  I'm not sure whether it's been officially announced that this is the last series, but Gary Russell said so on a panel at the Gallifrey convention with Louise Jameson and Mary Tamm, which is good enough for me. —Josiah Rowe (talk • contribs) 23:33, 10 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Gallifrey audios 

message: Does anyone else think perhaps some of this article should be made past tense.  Since the Time Lords are all dead now, I think some change may be needed.
Example:
"The Eye provides the power required for time travel, and all Time Lord TARDIS time machines draw their power from it."
It became apparent in the episode Boom Town that the Doctor's TARDIS is no longer powered by the Eye of Harmony.  Whether any other TARDISes exist anymore is also debatable.
:Part of it was to avoid spoilerage and part of it is due to the debate as to whether fictional events should always be spoken for in the present tense (for example, yes, Gallifrey may be gone in the current series, but it's still there when I slip in The Deadly Assassin into the VCR). I'm personally in favour of leaving it as it is, and am not discounting that Gallifrey will be back one day, but what do other people think? --khaosworks (talk • contribs) 09:21, 16 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: It is convention to speak of fictional events in the present tense.  DonQuixote 14:08, 16 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: But Gallifrey stands!https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fr5a45aa1HQ --Drewder (talk) 00:26, 9 September 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  Tense? 

message: I've added a few bits in, and taken one or two ickle bits out that didnt make much sense in terms of various novels texts/stories....but I'm new to wiki, so the format probably isnt quiet right. So I'd love it if one of you clever regular people could fix it when you have time (or show me how to get things right for wiki.). Also........should I put stuff about the Pythia, Heroes and the Rational Revoloution here, or is that for the Time Lord entry I wonder? Its hard, because Gallifrey is very tied in with its peoples. Almost inseperable. Jaime9526jaime9526
:I'm sorry, but this is about the planet and its basic history, not about the war with the Enemy, not about Faction Paradox, not about The Ancestor Cell, not about the Edifice, so all of this detail is not necessary to get across the simple point that in the EDAs, Gallifrey was blown up. Wikipedia is not an indiscriminate collection of information. --khaosworks (talk • contribs) 06:19, 13 June 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: logically though, the multiple gallifreys are about the planet? yes? so how else to explain them? Jaime9526 22:32, 1 July 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  edits about The War etc 

message: While in terms of content this is a most pleasing page, I can't help but thinking it is undermined by some of the quality of writing. Flagging it for clean-up.Sjc 04:52, 13 June 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: This was due to basically a bunch of edits that were really not directly relevant to the article anyway. I've removed them, and the cleanup tag. Thanks. --khaosworks (talk • contribs) 06:20, 13 June 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: im guessing that meant excising pretty much everything i went to huge pains to write..... Jaime9526 22:32, 1 July 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Cleanup flag 

message: About the neat footnote concerning the Shobogans/Outsiders--while I think it's mostly on the mark, a rewatching of 'Invasion of Time' put a spin on those characters that I'm (absent a well worded and vociferous dissent here) going to add in. In conversation between Leela and Nesbin, the chief of the Outsiders, he asserts that they were at one point Time Lords that dropped out of Time Lord society (Serial 3, 19:35). This point is picked up in the  BBC web site, which distinguishes  outsiders like the ones Leela ran across from the Shobogans mentioned in Deadly Assasin. 
I think the FASA reference should stay in, but the reference to Outsiders should 1) unequivocally distinguish Shobogans as separate from the Outsiders, and 2) following 'Deadly Assassin' classify the general class of non-time lords as Shobogans, people who are ruled by the time lords, live outside Gallifrey city, and (in some capacity) consent to be governed by the time lords. 
Don't know how this squares with the NAs, so any advice is welcome.Jahenderson 02:10, 23 June 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I think this can be dealt with very simply: just clarify that the Outsiders are dropped-out Time Lords. There's nothing on screen that links the Shobogans with the Outsiders, so we should leave it as that. An additional note: while in this case the continuity bits on the BBC website are correct, the web site itself, as I've often pointed out before, uses Cornell, Day and Topping's The Discontinuity Guide as a basis for its "continuity" sections, which as a source has its own speculative problems, so should not always be taken at face value. --khaosworks (talk • contribs) 02:44, 23 June 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I added the note because, originally, the article mentioned that Shobogans were Outsiders.  I excised the erroneous passage and turned it a footnote referencing FASA's RPG.  DonQuixote 03:39, 23 June 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Shobogans & Outsiders

message: ok...its been a while since i came by and sat up all night with books n my lap to expand on the point someone else had made about The War and gallifrey's discussion....at great length.
And it got cut out.
Apparently we are keeping it simple now....so i propose we cut all of the doctro who pages to one page mentioning that its a very nice sci-fi series that ran/runs for a very long time?
since anything else may be deemed too much information....
Oh and the capitol may be in the citadel, but it is not and has never been, named gallifrey...thats just silly.
and the tower of rassilon was referred to onscreen as the dark tower.
but i dont know anything me.
I actually think I may leave this little community, so soon after joining, on the grounds that its entries on gallifrey and time lords are run by people exactly like gallifreyan based time-lords.
file under imagination, lack of.
:Heya, just sit back chill for a bit.  Your amendments haven't been erased--they're still stored on the servers.  If you think they have been erased unfairly, then make a case for it on this talk page.  Personally, I think some of your stuff belonged on the Time Lord page rather than here because it pertained to Time Lord history rather than Gallifrey geography. DonQuixote 02:33, 2 July 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: some, yes, all, no....and its impossible to talk about gallifreys destruction without explaining bits of The War....its not just my bits that bother me, all sorts of peoples stuff gets eaten, or has things thrown into that take away from them.....the bit about The Watcher in the docor section for example......its stated just about everywhere in the 80s that this unequivocally is the doctors next incarnation, just that the doctors not as good at doing it to make it as useful or finished as K'Anpo was in Spiders....A-z of doctor who....JNT at the time....the writer etc....its all perfectly clear. I editted out the disclaimer saying this wasnt certain and tried to make the wording make a bit of sense...gone. Now it wasnt about any info I put in, it was about making sure that little disclaimer didnt make the original watcher bit all airy fairy.....but we have to keep injecting bits and pieces about how uncertain or certain something is. Its a bit gay. I should find or found the doctor who equivalent of wookiepedia somewhere....
I dont like the way that unless certain people have read the same bits or seen the same bits you have, it just gets eaten. I dont mean opinions...everyone can have those, and everyone can use those when appropriate. 
For example...I would mention that the only Doctor in Dimensions in time is the seventh, but he is being pushed through his own timeline to become the other Doctors....I know this because he says so in the story, and because the writers on the episode said so (David Roden and JNT, nice chaps...signed my ghost light script book for me...) If I put that up here, it'd be shot because...well its open to interpretation as to whether or not Dit is canon. It was supposed to be of course....to be honest its only when some areas of fandom gave up on DW in the 90's and didnt bother with the NA's that canon rears its head. The NAs were official, were the continuation, until Gary Russel (pretty much) chnged his mind in the magazines comic strip....and again in the Audio's. Everything to Dying days is on elong thing....then it all goes tits up, and people like Larry Miles have to do clever things in the books to tie it ll up again...and then it all gets eaten alive for the audios. And it all comes down to whether or not you like the NA's and how much power in fandom you have. Thats what lead to canonicity problems in the big way, and the factionalism that now exists in fandom, and indeed the Doctor Who wiki entries.....All sent up recently in Love and Monsters oddly enough.
Can you talk of britain without mentioning its invasions and races? only if your only entry would be its a couple of islands
Can you talk about Gallifrey without mentioning its wars? Its very Destruction?
If my information was wrong...then fine. But it wasnt wrong, it just wasnt liked....and I've noticed a cadre of people who are fed up with this, not just me....and I cant be bothered getting into petty intellectual squabbles, without any real discussion.
Its so...pointless.
I guess this is a tad of a rant, but its also my critique of the wiki who project.....love for the subject has been superseded by pride and a love of the power wiki's open approach allows. 
The thing is...the right thing for me to do would be to go on sticking bits in here and there...but after a while that becomes pointless, I dont have time to fight a battle with people I should be friends with. And those with more constant connections and time will always rule the roost here...there is no community, just heirarchy. And I will just be another person who came along, tried to help, and realised that that wasnt actually what anyone wanted.
Others have said it left right and center on here, so I dont think I have the wrong idea.
ANd I say again...its not my bits getting the chop that bothers me, so much as it is happening to lots of people across the board.
I quit.
For the most part, before i began.
Oh I'll pop by now and then, but I really cant be bothered bringing anything to this, I'll enjoy my 20 plus years of books and whatnot piled around, I'll enjoy DW.
But I'll leave this banana republic alone...should have known better really, I read about the factions before I met them. And here I am letting one win. Jaime9526 14:43, 2 July 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  changes..... 

message: This is a repost of an earlier comment, about the logic of using the "250,000,000" line from the TVM as definitive, which appears to have been missed.
At the same time as the Doctor says "250 million light years away" he also describes Gallifrey as being "on the other side of your galaxy". Surely that places it inside the Milky Way? And if no two objects in the Milky Way can be 250 million light years apart (given that the Milky Way is only 300,000 light years across) then maybe the TARDIS at that moment in the TV movie wasn't actually near the Earth, but was 250 million light years outside the galaxy. Marwood 15:55, 4 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Location of Gallifrey 

message: The Article says in the article that it was first mentioned in the revival in The Runaway Bride, but I remember the Doctor and Sarah Jane Smith talking about it in School Reunion, and I'm pretty sure it was mentioned by name.77.99.107.117 21:34, 2 June 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Nope, it wasn't. Marwood 15:01, 29 June 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  first mention 

message: In the infobox, there is the field "notable people". Is this only currently-living? Or all? If the latter, I'd say Omega, Rassilon, the Other and Romanadvoratrelundar should be on there... DBD 12:46, 25 June 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Notable people 

message: Doesn't Susan specify in the Sensorites that the sky is orange at night?  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 129.120.207.172 (talk) 19:29, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes Andral (talk) 04:23, 3 February 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Burnt orange sky at NIGHT 

message: According to the article, the coordinates are "1001100x02" which could mean "10011001001100". In binary, it means "TM". So, the planet apparently has a trademark. Weird... Im a bell(Don't ask) 23:07, 11 December 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Coordinates in binary 

message: Hello,
Just a suggestion, but shouldn't the heading 'Geography' be changed to 'Galeography'? Although geography in generic terms describes the features of a planet, but there are some specific terms used for other planets too. For example, Martian 'geography' is areography. Anybody for this? :) George Adam Horváth (talk) 13:35, 28 December 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: It's a fun idea, but unless the word has been used in an official source, we'd be coining the term, which would be original research. --Brian Olsen (talk) 16:32, 28 December 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Geography vs. Galeography 

message: "presumably Gallifrey, but not named as such". Presumed by who? A reliable third party or an editor? If its an editor than this inclusion violates WP:OR.--58.230.124.16 (talk) 08:46, 16 June 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Granddaughter's remarks 

message: Hi I'm a bit new to this, but I thought, in the section on the novels that mentions the Matrix being downloaded into the Doctor's head, you should add the quote from "Forest of the Dead" (s4 e9) where the doctor says of CAL (not sure of exact wording) "having the conciousnesses of 2000 people in your head, that would be, like being me" Surely we could interpret this as a reference to the Matrix memories.
Your thoughts?  —Preceding unsigned comment added by Yankafaust (talk • contribs) 02:01, 25 July 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: That's a subjective reference open to more than one interpretation and would violate WP:NPOV. You need to find reliable sources that quote the said relavance to Matrix Kingkong77 (talk) 12:45, 17 March 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  The matrix 

message: Just edited out that line from the first paragraph. I know it's not technically a minor edit. --JohnDoe244 (talk) 21:49, 15 May 2009 (UTC)
thread_title: Dr. Who is Real

message: In The Fires Of Pompeii one of the Soothsayers, mentions that Doctor is from Gallifrey and it's destruction, stating "a planet of fire", it makes sense when put in the context the Soothsayer is speaking in. m w (talk) 21:24, 7 October 2009 (UTC)
thread_title: Other times Gallifrey is mentioned

message: It seems to me we need to do some updating vis a vis Gallifrey, now that we have canon visual evidence to establish certain facts. By my measurements, Gallifrey is about 2.3 times the diameter of Earth. Now, if Earth's mean diameter is 6,371 km, then Gallifrey's should be about 14653.3 km. Moreover, can any of the more science-y and/or hard-core Dr. Who history types hereabouts do some kind of wizardry vis a vis lack of apparent oceans? I understand that "Wikipedia is not the venue for original research" but simply stating the obvious shouldn't be, IMO, "research". Thanks! Capedude2005 (talk) 06:47, 5 January 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Given that, using the naked eye, it's difficult to judge the size of the moon on a good night, I'm amazed that you got an estimated ratio of 2.3.  Unless you can cite this ratio, I'm sorry to say that it is original research. DonQuixote (talk) 07:35, 5 January 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Well yeah, obviously. My point wasn't to say we should add specific measurements into the description of Gallifrey, just that we now kind of have a sense of scale and that I thought perhaps it would be interesting to further embellish the article in those ways possible and practical. As for how I came up with a ratio of 2.3, well, that's what Photoshop is for. ;-)  Capedude2005 (talk) 06:44, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

text: Gallifrey still exists in fictional works.  It's policy to describe fiction from a real-world perspective. DonQuixote (talk) 18:30, 12 January 2010 (UTC)
thread_title: Gallifrey and ''The End Of Time Parts 1 & 2''

message: It is stated that the novels mention moons, but it gives the number as seven yet only has two names. An edit for clarity may be useful. 204.210.115.173 (talk) 23:51, 27 July 2012 (UTC)
thread_title: Moons?

message: very much missing in this article.
For instance, Bob Holmes gives the name in Time Warrior, and fleshes out the location out in Deadly Assassin, together with references to the Time Lords/Gallifrey during his period as script editor (Genesis of the Daleks, Brain of Morbius,). GraemeLeggett (talk) 20:41, 15 May 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree, this needs a lot more real-world perspective. LaundryPizza03 (talk) 08:19, 17 March 2018 (UTC)
thread_title:  Production/real world perspective 

message: Noticed an edit war surrounding the infobox, where User:Gothaparduskerialldrapolatkh asserts that Time Lord is a status of a race called Gallifreyans, and User:Edokter and User:DonQuixote claim that Time Lord is the name of the race on Gallifrey. I was going to get round to adding a footnote pointing out all the facts supporting Time Lords as a race, but I wanted to wait until I gathered info from both classic and modern Who as well as a few secondary sources before actually placing it on this page, which is likely going to take a good while. Either way, there is precedent in multiple stories after 2006 (I currently only have access to stories from the TV series from between the 1996 movie and "Death in Heaven" from 2014) that Time Lord is known, at least primarily, as a race.
"School Reunion" (~23:44):
: Mr Finch: And what of the Time Lords? I always thought of you as such a pompous race. Ancient, dusty senators, so frightened of change and chaos. And of course, they’re all but extinct. Only you, the last.
"Smith and Jones" (~39:26):
: Martha: You never even told me who you are.
: Tenth Doctor: The Doctor.
: Martha: But what sort of species? It's not every day I get to ask that.
: Tenth Doctor: I'm a Time Lord.
"Evolution of the Daleks" (~39:26):
: Tenth Doctor: Sorry, I got in the way of the lightning strike. Time Lord DNA got all mixed up.
"Human Nature" (~32:43):
: Voice from fob watch: Last of the Time Lords. The last of that wise and ancient race.
"Utopia" (~16:41):
: Professor Yana: Might I ask what species are you?
: Tenth Doctor: Time Lord. Last of. Heard of them? Legend or anything? Not even a myth? Blimey, end of the universe is a bit humbling.
"The Sound of Drums" (~24:45):
: Tenth Doctor: And on the Continent of Wild Endeavour in the Mountains of Solace and Solitude, there stood the Citadel of the Time Lords, the oldest and most mighty race in the universe, looking down on the galaxies below. Sworn never to interfere, only to watch.
"Journey's End":
~15:18
: Meta-Crisis Doctor: No, wait, I'm part Time Lord, part human. Well, isn't that wizard?
~40:51
: Rose: Is anyone gonna tell us what's going on?
: Donna: He poured all his regeneration energy into his spare hand, I grew out of that, but that fed back into me, but, it just stayed dormant in my head till the synapses got that little extra spark, kicking them into life. Thank you, Davros. Part human, part Time Lord. And I got the best bit of the Doctor. I got his mind.
: Sarah Jane: So there's three of you?
: Rose: Three Doctors?
: Jack: I can't tell you what I'm thinking right now.
: Tenth Doctor: You're so unique, the timelines were converging on you. Human being with a Time Lord brain.
"Planet of the Dead" (~30:09):
: Lady Christina: That lordship of yours, the lord of where, exactly?
: Tenth Doctor: Of time. I come from a race of people called Time Lords.
: Lady Christina: You're an alien?
: Tenth Doctor: Yeah, but you don't have to kiss me either.
: Lady Christina: You look human.
: Tenth Doctor: You look Time Lord.
"A Good Man Goes to War" (~32:04):
: Vastra: Now, I have a question, a simple one. Is Melody human?
: Eleventh Doctor: Sorry? What? Course she is. Completely human. What are you talking about?
: Dorium: They've been scanning her since she was born, and I think they found what they were looking for.
: Eleventh Doctor: Human DNA.
: Vastra: Look closer. Human plus. Specifically, human plus Time Lord.
The closest the 2005 series gets to the other definition is "Listen", which is a vague and ambiguous story already, when it mentions the Doctor going to the Academy instead of the army, and says literally nothing about the term "Gallifreyan" anywhere (in fact, the episode doesn't directly name the planet Gallifrey). All uses of "Gallifreyan" after 2005 refer either to a general demonym for messages ("The Time of the Doctor") or technology ("Dark Water") that originate from Gallifrey the planet or to the fictional language, and in "The Time of Angels", the Eleventh Doctor specifies Old High Gallifreyan as "the lost language of the Time Lords." TardisTybort (talk) 21:27, 27 June 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  Infobox 

message: (Also posted at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Doctor Who)
My source for adding the University of Gallifrey to List of fictional British and Irish universities has been  removed as not being a WP:RS. If anyone has a better source, please add it. The only other sources I can find are dozens of vendors of teeshirts etc. While it could be argued that it's not "British or Irish" I think its cultural roots place it there, along with University of Maximegalon and the Unseen University - at least until someone creates List of fictional extraterrestrial universities or similar. PamD 12:22, 5 March 2020 (UTC)
thread_title:  University? 

message: I think Tecteun technically founded Time Lord society, if The Timeless Children is to be believed. DoctorWhoEditor2 (talk) 19:47, 4 April 2020 (UTC)
replies: text: Be careful not to stray into original research/interpretation. We just need to summarise what the episodes say: Deadly Assassin says this, Three Doctors say this, Timeless Children say this, etc. DonQuixote (talk) 20:13, 4 April 2020 (UTC)
thread_title:  Is Rassilon the founder of Time Lord society?