Talk:Selenography

Page title
The page geography of mars has been changed to areography. Following this, I will change "Topography of the Moon" to "Selenography," defined as "The scientific study of the Moon's geographic features; geography of the Moon" as that more accurately reflects the nature of this article after the merger, with topography of the moon being a subset of selenography, like the topography of Earth is a subset of geography/geology. Further, the current definition of topography of the moon needs significant changes, as topography means "the arrangement of the natural and artificial physical features of an area," not the mapping or study of these features. GeogSage (talk)

Outdated by LRO topography data
… which was first published in 2010 :) --Mtu (talk) 14:43, 28 September 2018 (UTC)

Requested move 1 December 2022

 * The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion. 

The result of the move request was: moved. —usernamekiran (talk) 12:03, 9 December 2022 (UTC)

Selenography (Geography of the Moon) → Selenography – Primary topic should take the unqualified article title. The existing redirect Selenography and its talk page have history which should be preserved. Certes (talk) 10:24, 1 December 2022 (UTC)


 * Agreed. I included the Parenthetical disambiguation when I moved the page in large part because "Selenography" was taken and it wouldn't let me use the title. However there is another page for Selenography (album) and I thought that specifying geography of the moon might therefore be appropriate. I agree with dropping the parentheses if others think it is best. GeogSage (talk) 15:24, 1 December 2022 (UTC)
 * "Selenography" is certainly ambiguous: it could mean moon study or the album. Per WP:PRIMARYTOPIC, moon study should take the unqualified base name if is highly likely ... to be the topic sought when a reader searches for that term and has substantially greater enduring notability and educational value than any other topic.  I think that's true here but we'll see what other opinions appear.  By the way, WP:RMTR can help with moving pages to a title that's already occupied, though we should now leave this page at its current title until this discussion ends. Certes (talk) 17:15, 1 December 2022 (UTC)
 * Thank you for letting me know about WP:RMTR as a way to move a page when the title is already occupied. I agree the topic Selenography is probably more notable then the album. I believe that the 7 days are past, and the support for your request seems to be unanimous. GeogSage (talk) 16:58, 8 December 2022 (UTC)


 * Support per nom.--Ortizesp (talk) 18:27, 1 December 2022 (UTC)
 * Support; it certainly seems reasonable for the article to have the unqualified title. ╠╣uw [ talk ] 19:46, 1 December 2022 (UTC)
 * Support per nom. Shwcz (talk) 12:04, 5 December 2022 (UTC)
 * Comment: This needs work but is this RM the best way to start fixing it? is the study of lunar geography. There is room for a separate overview article on the features of the moon. That could be at, essentially reversing the merge of 2020. Agree that the page history of the target needs to be preserved if this move does go ahead. Also agree that this topic is the primary topic of selenography. Andrewa (talk) 22:14, 8 December 2022 (UTC)
 * If we want two articles then a split is the best way forward. If one, a simple move will do.  Perhaps we should first decide whether we want one article or two. I've no strong feelings either way but the topics seem connected and small enough to fit on one page.  Logically, "Topography of the Moon" would be a plausible title for a combined article, as selenography is a subtopic within that.  However, that idea seems less clever on actually reading the article, which is 90% study and 10% topography. Certes (talk) 22:33, 8 December 2022 (UTC)
 * There is obviously plenty of material for an article on selenography, as we have it already, and there is no shortage of material on lunar topography either. I can't see any justification for the merge, nor any consensus adequately supporting it. It appears to have been performed in 2020, following very brief discussion at Talk:Selenography that began almost exactly a year earlier and reached no consensus on the direction of the merge. Previous and also brief discussion at Talk:Selenography occurred in 2006 but was not actioned. It needs to be more thoroughly discussed. Andrewa (talk) 06:22, 9 December 2022 (UTC)
 * Yes. I'm realising that this RM provides the right answer to the wrong question.  We need to consider a split (or rather un-merge) first. Certes (talk) 10:06, 9 December 2022 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Topography of the Moon
Creating a new topic because the last is closed.

Certes, topography of the moon is a subset of Selenography, not the way around. Geography is not a subset of topography on Earth, but geographers study topography. Topography is a geoscience on Earth, geoscience is not a subset of topography. I don't see any reason that topography would not be a subset of selenography, any more then geography would be a subset of topography. Inclusion of a topography section on this page makes sense, as topography is a major part of the moons surface features, and selenography studies those. I do not see any reason for a split.

GeogSage (talk) 18:27, 9 December 2022 (UTC) GeogSage (talk) 18:29, 9 December 2022 (UTC)


 * That's one valid way of looking at it. Another is that selenography includes the content of the article: the story of how humans discovered and documented the topography, which is a subtopic of the topography itself.  We don't really have an article on that wider topic, though there is plenty of relevant material in Moon, Geology of the Moon, etc. Certes (talk) 18:42, 9 December 2022 (UTC)
 * I would support an un-merger of Selenography and lunar topography if you wanted to create a separate page for lunar topography that would fall under the broad category of selenography. There certainly is plenty of content on that. It is not my priority however, but if you want to take the lead I wouldn't oppose. GeogSage (talk) 22:24, 1 January 2023 (UTC)