Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Science/2021 June 17

= June 17 =

What is meant?
The article Appleby Parva talks about this place being the centre of the population of Great Britain and links to the island of the same name. A colleague in Germany, like many in Germany, puts the link to United Kingdom in the translation, which in my view is not correct. The only remaining source available, a terse news item from the Daily Mail, speaks of "Britain", which is not really helpful, at least not to most Germans (and probably only a few residents of the United Kingdom?). So what is meant? United Kingdom, just the island (incl. Wales and Scotland) ... or what? Can someone shed some light on this, please? Many thanks already --Pretzelbody (talk) 07:00, 17 June 2021 (UTC)


 * What is meant is the island of Great Britain which is wikilinked in the article, which is not the same as the UK. See also Center_of_population.--Shantavira|feed me 07:26, 17 June 2021 (UTC)
 * And see Terminology of the British Isles for some discourse on the various bits and pieces of islands and countries. Bazza (talk) 07:47, 17 June 2021 (UTC)


 * Thank you very much. --Pretzelbody (talk) 08:06, 17 June 2021 (UTC)


 * I've fixed it (again). But the one readable source does not truly support the statement (also not here); better sources are needed. --Lambiam 08:11, 17 June 2021 (UTC)
 * Usable sources can be found in the paragraph Centre of population of . --Lambiam 08:16, 17 June 2021 (UTC)


 * The calculation is attributed to Danny Dorling, on whose website is this 1995 paper explaining the details of how to do it. It shows the result for 1991 and that place is just a few miles from Appleby Parva.  I did not search for a later result.  Anyway, while Dorling himself sometimes uses the ambiguous short form "Britain", the paper is clear that it's talking about the island of Great Britain and not the UK. --184.145.50.201 (talk) 08:44, 17 June 2021 (UTC)
 * In fact, the person who equates United Kingdom with Great Britain now claims that Great Britain includes several islands, citing this very paper... At least he no longer links to UK now. --Pretzelbody (talk) 12:03, 17 June 2021 (UTC)
 * Unfortunately the term "Great Britain" is sometimes used to include the whole of England, Scotland, and Wales, and by this meaning it does include several islands. --184.145.50.201 (talk) 00:13, 18 June 2021 (UTC)
 * Yes, it would be a bit odd to claim that the Isle of Wight wasn't part of Great Britain. Alansplodge (talk) 11:21, 18 June 2021 (UTC)
 * It all depends on what you mean by "Great Britain". DuncanHill (talk) 15:57, 18 June 2021 (UTC)