Talk:Comet

Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment
This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 19 August 2019 and 6 December 2019. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Loken97.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 18:06, 16 January 2022 (UTC)

Comet Nuclei
the Word nuclei and the Nucleus should have a disambiguation as this will cause confusion 122.53.185.85 (talk) 21:02, 30 July 2022 (UTC)

"☄️" listed at Redirects for discussion
The redirect [//en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=%E2%98%84%EF%B8%8F&redirect=no ☄️] has been listed at redirects for discussion to determine whether its use and function meets the redirect guidelines. Readers of this page are welcome to comment on this redirect at  until a consensus is reached. Steel1943 (talk) 18:46, 25 November 2023 (UTC)

Gravitationally unbound?
I’m not smart enough to know if this is accurate or not. However, the problem is that this isn’t cited or otherwise referenced. The idea that there are any particles(non-quantum) unaffected by gravity contradicts every physics course I’ve taken. Can someone explain this better in the article? 71.235.216.2 (talk) 03:36, 6 January 2024 (UTC)


 * Gas + particles often exceed escape velocity when leaving a comet. A fart could escape most comets. -- Kheider (talk) 12:28, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

Gallery
The gallery for this article has come into dispute, with editor commenting, "Per our policy in image galleries, we do not encourage indiscriminate galleries with no inherent value. This is the same reason why don't we have galleries of dogs or cats or asteroids on our articles. It would be much better if we can integrate these pictures into the articles somehow", and  saying, "Commons is not Wikipedia, they are not joined at the hip but Commons augments Wikipedia, please don't use the reasoning that there are images on Commons so do not show them on Wikipedia (doesn't make sense actually, one of the main purposes of Commons is to provide these images to Wikipedia". Thoughts? Praemonitus (talk) 22:01, 22 April 2024 (UTC)
 * My experience has been that large numbers of images can clutter up and disrupt an article, so I wouldn't be in favor of distributing the gallery images in that manner. Then again, a gallery should add something of value to the article, so typical comet images should be culled. Frankly, I don't see many of the gallery images that need saving. Perhaps the X-ray image and the active asteroid shots. The McNaught shot would be useful for scale. Praemonitus (talk) 22:01, 22 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Many readers just read the lead, and then maybe look at the pictures. Galleries educate readers who do that. Randy Kryn (talk) 22:19, 22 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Could you give a concrete example where this might happen? CactiStaccingCrane (talk) 09:59, 23 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Sidewalk. Or the pages of many visual artists, museum collections, space exploration pages, the page about the recent eclipse, etc. Randy Kryn (talk) 11:40, 23 April 2024 (UTC)

I'd like to propose removing the following images from the gallery:
 * Comet C/2020 F3 NEOWISE – too faint and it adds no new information
 * Great Comet 1861 – redundant with the image in the Great comets section
 * Comet Siding Spring – shows little additional detail
 * Mosaic of 20 comets discovered by the WISE space telescope – multiple tiny images add nothing
 * NEOWISE – first four years of data starting in December 2013 – what is this even showing?
 * C/2011 W3 (Lovejoy) heads towards the Sun – poor quality
 * View from the impactor in its last moments before hitting Comet Tempel 1 during the Deep Impact mission – no value
 * NASA is developing a comet harpoon for returning samples to Earth – value unclear
 * Comet Encke loses its tail – value unclear

Praemonitus (talk) 14:48, 24 April 2024 (UTC)
 * They all seem fine, and your suggestion would remove 10 of 13 images. Have just quickly looked at the gallery again after your request and all 13 seem to impart information which causal readers will not be exposed to otherwise. Nothing broken here, the gallery is of interest, and keeping it fulfills encyclopedic knowledge while removing it would not maintain this knowledge. Randy Kryn (talk) 14:55, 24 April 2024 (UTC)
 * If that is true, then perhaps you won't mind clarifying the new information in the captions? Praemonitus (talk) 15:11, 24 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Thanks, but not sure what you mean. What new information is needed? Randy Kryn (talk) 23:56, 24 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Took another look and edited some of the captions (check out the video where the comet loses its tail, pretty unique, never imagined something like that). Thanks, good suggestion. Randy Kryn (talk) 04:25, 25 April 2024 (UTC)
 * If this is done, I suggest replacing some of them with other comet images. Perhaps a Philae image of Churry's surface, since the article apparently hasn't that. ArkHyena (talk) 16:45, 24 April 2024 (UTC)
 * I agree, many of the current images are uninspiring and less than informative. Praemonitus (talk) 14:05, 25 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Some possible changes that could be made:
 * Replace the infobox image with the gallery image of Comet McNaught; I'd argue it's more eye-catching and conveys the scale of a cometary tail significantly more effectively whilst still showing both its dust and gas tail.
 * Delete the gallery images of Comet Neowise, historical observations of comets (one of these may be moved up to an appropriate section), the animation of the NEOWISE survey, and the harpoon video at least. These don't really supplement the text.
 * Possible replacement images include Candidate Landing Site J (shows the textured surface of a comet nucleus up close); Comet 67P Activity (Shows how jets which feed the coma form from a cometary nucleus); NAVCAM top 10 and 10 km (image of a comet's landscape from its surface)
 * Adding all comets explored and well-documented by spacecraft, especially images of their nuclei, could help illustrate the diversity of cometary nuclei.
 * courtesy ping for your opinion ArkHyena (talk) 17:15, 25 April 2024 (UTC)