Talk:Enrico Fermi/GA1

GA Review
The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.''

Reviewer: Khazar2 (talk · contribs) 14:56, 22 January 2013 (UTC)

I'll be glad to take this review. In the next few days, I'll start with a close readthrough, noting any issues here I can't easily fix myself, and then go to the criteria checklist. Thanks in advance for your work on this one! -- Khazar2 (talk) 14:56, 22 January 2013 (UTC)
 * Whoops, was just starting a copyedit without realizing you were working on it, too--sorry if I edit-conflicted you. Take your time and I'll take a look tomorrow morn/afternoon. Cheers, Khazar2 (talk) 02:12, 23 January 2013 (UTC)

Initial readthrough
One initial comment I want to note before I forget--


 * "Fermi is widely regarded as one of the leading scientists of the 20th century, highly accomplished in both theory and experiment." --Though clearly true, this also seems like a small bit of peacocking; I'm not sure the sentence is needed at all, but if it is, I'd at least suggest giving a clearer citation for this later in the article. (The Snow quote praises him, but it's not clear that Snow alone represents "widely regarded".) -- Khazar2 (talk) 02:13, 23 January 2013 (UTC)
 * Dropped the sentence, but changed the first to say that Fermi was both a theoretical and experimental physicist. The combination is quite rare. Oppenheimer was terrible in the lab, lab workers would run for cover whenever Rabi entered, and it was said that Pauli could ruin an experiment just by passing by the venue where it was taking place.  Hawkeye7 (talk) 20:57, 23 January 2013 (UTC)

More comments. I'm doing a bit of copyediting as I go, so please doublecheck me and make sure I'm not introducing new errors or changing the meaning. I won't be offended by any reverting. Broadly speaking, I would suggest that you do a top-to-bottom copyedit of this article in addition to mine; I'm encountering a fair number of typos, missing words, missing spaces, excess punctuation, etc., and it's likely that I won't catch everything.


 * "one of his ingenious" -- another bit of minor editorializing; not a big deal, but you might consider cutting it.
 * Removed.
 * "recently discovered neutons" -- neutrons is meant here, right? "neuton" links to a footballer.
 * Yes. Corrected. Hawkeye7 (talk) 20:57, 23 January 2013 (UTC)
 * "the new elements were subsequently revealed to fission products" -- should this be "to be fission products"? You should give a readthrough of the lead from beginning to end, as it seems to have several clear copyediting problems. I'm fixing some as I go but I'm not 100% on the science to correct others.
 * Corrected. Hawkeye7 (talk) 20:57, 23 January 2013 (UTC)


 * "Capo Divisione" -- it would be helpful to give an English translation in parentheses ("division head", I'm guessing?)
 * This isn't an issue for the GA review, but you might consider reformatting the sections a bit; right now, the entire article text falls in sections 1. and 2. My suggestion would be to change the level-3 headers under "biography" to level-2 headers.


 * "Fermi learned tensor calculus, a mathematical instrument invented by Gregorio Ricci and Tullio Levi-Civita, and needed to demonstrate the principles of general relativity" This could be read as "Fermi learned tensor calculus ... and needed to demonstrate the principles of general relativity" or as "a mathematical instrument ... needed to demonstrate the principles of general relativity". I assume the second one is meant. Maybe rewrite as "Fermi learned tensor calculus, a mathematical instrument invented by Gregorio Ricci and Tullio Levi-Civita that was needed to demonstrate the principles of general relativity"?
 * Done. Hawkeye7 (talk) 20:57, 23 January 2013 (UTC)
 * " a Laue photograph." -- is it possible to link this or give a one-phrase explanation of what this is? (Perhaps an explanatory footnote if it's more complicated?)
 * I originally linked it, but it links to X-ray crystallography, where it is explained in detail. Hawkeye7 (talk) 20:57, 23 January 2013 (UTC)


 * "sull'elettrostatica di un campo " -- is it correct that the first letter of this title isn't capitalized? FWIW, this has it capitalized, but I don't know the conventions for Italian academia.
 * No. Already been corrected. In Italian you just capitalise the first word. Hawkeye7 (talk) 20:57, 23 January 2013 (UTC)
 * "examined the Principle of Equivalence introduced time the so-called "Fermi coordinates" -- is there a word missing here?
 * More than one. Re-worded. Hawkeye7 (talk) 20:57, 23 January 2013 (UTC)
 * "were slow in embracing the new ideas line relativity" -- is there a word missing here?
 * No, just a typo. Should be "like relativity". Hawkeye7 (talk) 20:57, 23 January 2013 (UTC)
 * "which is all to the good because the first effect of an explosion of such a dreadful mount of energy would be to smash into smithereens the physicist who had the misfortune to find a way to do it" -- not a GA action point, just wanted to comment that that is a terrific quotation.

-- Khazar2 (talk) 13:50, 23 January 2013 (UTC)
 * "Physics Institute" -- two sentences ago the title "Institute of Physics" was used; this should be consistently titled if it's the same place.
 * Yep. Re-worded. Hawkeye7 (talk) 20:57, 23 January 2013 (UTC)
 * "they had no electric charge. They constructed" -- "they" switching back and forth here
 * Re-worded. Hawkeye7 (talk) 20:57, 23 January 2013 (UTC)
 * "and during their experiments with When they reached thorium and uranium" -- What happened here?
 * God knows. Repaired the text. Hawkeye7 (talk) 20:57, 23 January 2013 (UTC)
 * " they concluded that they had created new elements" -- what results led them to conclude this?
 * They've got a Geiger counter set up, so when the count shot up they knew that there were additional radioactive elements present. This was correct; but the radioactive elements detected were not neptunium and plutonium but mostly Caesium, Xenon and Iodine. That's not to say that he hadn't made any plutonium; but he had not detected it. Hawkeye7 (talk) 20:57, 23 January 2013 (UTC)
 * All the above fixes look great. Thanks for your fast responses. -- Khazar2 (talk) 02:56, 24 January 2013 (UTC)

Continuing readthrough
This looks really solid to me so far--great work on an important figure. Take a look at the above; once you've had a chance to respond to those, I'll give the article a second read, go through the criteria checklist, and hopefully close this out. Thanks! -- Khazar2 (talk) 02:56, 24 January 2013 (UTC)
 * "a pile of bricks with uranium oxide blocks surrounded by graphite bricks" -- this seems a little redundant, and mildly confusing. Would it be correct to just shorten it to "a pile of uranium oxide blocks surrounded by graphite bricks"?
 * Done. Hawkeye7 (talk) 08:24, 24 January 2013 (UTC)
 * "an igneous experiment" -- I assume ingenious was meant here (unless he experimented somehow with the rocks?), but I tentatively removed it for now since it seems like a minor bit of editorializing anyway. (Probably not undue editorializing, but just not needed). If you disagree, though, feel free to revert.
 * Okay. Hawkeye7 (talk) 08:24, 24 January 2013 (UTC)
 * "He wrote a paper "On the Origin of Cosmic radiation"" -- should radiation be capitalized here?
 * Done. Hawkeye7 (talk) 08:24, 24 January 2013 (UTC)
 * "He examined the issues surrounding magnetic fields" -- Fermi or Teller?
 * Fermi. Re-worded. Hawkeye7 (talk) 08:24, 24 January 2013 (UTC)
 * Is http://graveyards.com/IL/Cook/oakwoods/fermi.html a reliable source for the quotation? I realize a photograph is also provided, but the tombstone epitaph seems like a minor enough inclusion that I wonder if this might just be cut.
 * Cut. In fact, I have reliable sources for the inscription. What I need this source for is the cemetery location, which I haven't been able to find elsewhere. Hawkeye7 (talk) 20:41, 24 January 2013 (UTC)
 * "which are still in print." -- the source for this dates to 2001; can another source be found to verify that they're still in print now? Or perhaps just add "as of 2001 were still in print" or "were still in print x decades after his death".
 * Re-worded. Hawkeye7 (talk) 08:24, 24 January 2013 (UTC)
 * "Bibliography" -- it might be a good idea to rename this "Partial Bibliography" -- sounds like he's got tons of papers out there.
 * I'll fix it. Hawkeye7 (talk) 08:24, 24 January 2013 (UTC)
 * "Compton, Arthur (1956). Atomic Quest. New York: Oxford University Press." -- this is not at all something to worry about for GA, but seems to be the only book on the list without ISBN
 * Yeah, it doesn't have one. But it's not the only one; the official history (Jones) doesn't have one either. Hawkeye7 (talk) 08:24, 24 January 2013 (UTC)

Second readthrough

 * "(On the Quantisation of the Perfect Monoatomic Gas)" -- Sometimes you follow Italian capitalization style in the English translations; here it appears to be English-style. I don't have a preference, but I'd suggest making these consistent. Not an issue for GA, though.
 * File:Ragazzi di via Panisperna.jpg does not appear to have a public domain tag for the US; I'm always shaky on this, but I think a 1930s photograph without a clear source would not automatically be public domain. I'm sure a fair use rationale could be written, though, given the importance of the photograph.
 * I've corrected the rationale. It's not a problem at all. I've added a US tag. However this one has me concerned. Hawkeye7 (talk) 20:38, 24 January 2013 (UTC)
 * Great, thanks. What concerns you about the second one? -- Khazar2 (talk) 20:58, 24 January 2013 (UTC)
 * If it is considered an artwork, then there is no freedom of panorama in Italy, so it would still be copyrighted unless it dates to before 1976. Hawkeye7 (talk) 21:21, 24 January 2013 (UTC)
 * Hmmm. I hadn't thought of it that way. Perhaps a fair use tag could be added on the model of this one. This a low-quality, fairly low-resolution image of a work relevant to the biography, and shouldn't infringe on commercial opportunities for the work. But you're more knowledgeable about this than I; I leave it to your discretion. Simply removing the image is okay with me, too, as the article's already well illustrated. -- Khazar2 (talk) 21:40, 24 January 2013 (UTC)

This looks very close to ready. Let me go through the checklist to see if I'm missing anything.