Talk:20th century/Archive 3

Page contents not supported in other languages.
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia


cleanup

This article needs major cleanup. It is our article on the 20th century, an extremely important topic, and it begins with a rambling paragraph about whether 1900 or 2000 should be considered part according to various opinions and ISO definitions?? And it peters out in endless lists of names? The "20th c. vs. 1900s" cruft deserves a footnote at best. The lists should be exported to various list articles. What we want here is a description of the nature of the 20th century in fluent prose, not cruft. dab (ᛏ) 09:59, 30 June 2006 (UTC)

Perhaps you want to edit The 20th century in review? --Sean Brunnock 11:30, 30 June 2006 (UTC)
And then there's Survey of the 20th century. Why are these articles different from each other? Xaxafrad 05:14, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

I agree. There should be one 20th century article, not three.Lijakaca 19:52, 2 May 2007 (UTC)

I agree. See new section #Merge proposal. Teemu Leisti 02:32, 14 June 2007 (UTC)

Three into one

I think Xaxafrad makes a good point. Why can't all three articles be condensed and merged into one article under a common name and the titles of the other two articles turned into redirects to the new article? It might cause less confusion for someone researching on the site. GordonJTaylor 03:06, 11 February 2007 (UTC)

I agree. See new section #Merge proposal. Teemu Leisti 02:32, 14 June 2007 (UTC)


Why was section "Wars and politics" deleted?

I updated the "Wars and politics" section yesterday (while not logged in, because of laziness), and today someone has removed it completely, with no word of explanation. Yesterday I also restored a big chunk of quite reasonable text (though I also edited it somewhat) that had been deleted a few days ago, and put it under the "General" and "See also" sections, which I created. I'm restoring the "Wars and politics" section, unless someone makes a good argument why it shouldn't be there. Teemu Leisti 00:12, 14 June 2007 (UTC)

Merge proposal

Yesterday, I added "Merge" templates pointing to articles Survey of the twentieth century and The 20th century in review, which both had merge templates pointing to each other, and to this article. I agree that these three articles should be merged. But perhaps there should still be two articles: a shorted one to act as a very short review of the subject, under the title of the present article ("20th century"), and a longer one to carry most of the material of the present revisions of these three articles. This way, the length of "20th century" would not be too radically out of step with the other "century" articles. (Today, I edited the merge templates of these three articles to point to this talk page, to concentrate the discussion in one place.) What do you think? Teemu Leisti 00:20, 14 June 2007 (UTC)

Talk about history repeating itself. Years ago, each century article had a corresponding "Year in Review XXth Century" article. It was voted to merge all of those articles.
The standard layout for century articles is on Wikipedia:Timeline standards. --Sean Brunnock 13:10, 14 June 2007 (UTC)
OK, so you're suggesting all three articles should just be merged into one big twentieth-century article? That might be the cleanest solution, even if the resulting article would be quite long. Teemu Leisti 14:52, 14 June 2007 (UTC)
Ditch The 20th century in review. It's incredibly Eurocentric. For example, compare that article's treatment of the European theater in WWII to the Pacific theater. --Sean Brunnock 15:31, 14 June 2007 (UTC)
Merge as much as possible. It's both redudant and uneccessary to have so many articles concerning the same view of the same subject. vlad§inger tlk 19:29, 30 June 2007 (UTC)
OK, I'll get on it when I have a bit of time. Teemu Leisti 11:39, 4 July 2007 (UTC)
Haven't forgotten my promise. But in the meanwhile, article "Survey of the twentieth century" has been deleted, so I deleted it from the merge template. Teemu Leisti 10:30, 7 October 2007 (UTC)

Merge. I can't think of any reason to suggest these should be separate articles, nor why there should be a short-article, long-article pairing. BTW, I can sympathize with the characterization of the articles as Eurocentric. In particular, only one of the three articles mentions the profound changes wrought by the end of colonialism, and even there it's greatly underplayed. Ipoellet 16:55, 22 July 2007 (UTC)

MERGE, no doubt about it! I agree it could become quite long, but it is likely to eventually be dwarfed by the nascent 21st century article.  ;-P By then optical computers and subspace internet will have no trouble dealing with it...
I really like the layout of the 19th century article with its list of years and links to the most important topics for those years, followed by lists of people with links to their contributions (good or bad). I believe it would serve well here and greatly assist in shortening the length of the 20th Century article.
Contrast that with the 21st century article, which is dichotomized first by topics then by years. I like it less because it is not in keeping with timeline format, but it is more important that a consistent approach be agreed upon for all the century articles.
I'd be glad to get the ball rolling, but I'm already up-to-my-eyeballs in unfulfilled promises.
Badly Bradley 16:10, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

Merge. It is nonsensical to have different articles on the exact same subject. -- Kevin Browning (talk) 01:44, 30 November 2007 (UTC)

Done. There were no opposing votes, so I merged the "Survey" article to this one by appending its content to the end. Both articles are so long that a proper merge will take time, and I just wanted to get this accomplished technically first. I also archived the talk page of the former article as Talk:20th_century/Archive_2. Teemu Leisti (talk) 06:19, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

Replaced page "The 20th century in review", and its talkpage, by appropriate redirects. Teemu Leisti (talk) 22:59, 27 December 2007 (UTC)
Someone moved the following text, which I'd added to the top of the article, here: Note: as per the merge suggestion that has been in both articles for many months now, I have merged the contents of article The 20th century in review into this one. For now, to get the merge accomplished technically, I simply copied the contents of the latter article to the end of this one (see #The former article The 20th century in review). I am currently properly merging the content. I archived the talk page of "The 20th century in review" as Talk:20th_century/Archive_2. Teemu Leisti (talk) 06:15, 27 December 2007 (UTC)
In any case, I just completed the merge of the contents, with lots of editing, copyediting, and adding some new text. Teemu Leisti (talk) 16:24, 3 January 2008 (UTC)


photos

The article could use more photographs, and not just of wars.

why no discussion about religion?

Formatting

The formating in this article is significantly different than other similar articles, such as the 19th Century, 18th Century, etc. articles. I believe that this article should be re-formated to match the other similar articles. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Dragonsgames (talk • contribs) 05:47, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

I disagree. The other century articles have a lot less material than this one, and they mostly consist of lists. I don't think we should force all articles of a certain class to conform to a certain format in case it doesn't make practical sense.
That said, perhaps "Significant people" and "Introductions" could be added as sections. (The latter instead of "Inventions, discoveries, introductions", as in the other century articles, since inventions and discoveries are already taken care of in the section "Developments in brief".) Teemu Leisti (talk) 04:33, 3 February 2008 (UTC)

external links

I would like to place an external link to an online history portal that I believe offers added-value to wikipedia's history enthusiasts. This portal, http://www.saecularis.com, offers a good selection of history books, DVDs and posters that can be purchased online. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Anasl001 (talk • contribs) 15:36, 15 April 2008 (UTC) --Anasl001 (talk) 16:05, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Spammity spam, spammity spam... Groupthink (talk) 01:02, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Literature

I see no mention of 20th Century literature. Hemingway, Kerouac, Steinbeck, et cetera. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 12.176.249.232 (talk) 21:00, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

Image copyright problem with Image:Miles-davis-in-a-silent-way.jpg

The image Image:Miles-davis-in-a-silent-way.jpg is used in this article under a claim of fair use, but it does not have an adequate explanation for why it meets the requirements for such images when used here. In particular, for each page the image is used on, it must have an explanation linking to that page which explains why it needs to be used on that page. Please check

  • That there is a non-free use rationale on the image's description page for the use in this article.
  • That this article is linked to from the image description page.

This is an automated notice by FairuseBot. For assistance on the image use policy, see Wikipedia:Media copyright questions. --07:17, 20 September 2008 (UTC)

Illustrations

This article has a number of images but, without exception, they all deal with the western world. It would be good to have at least one or two pictures representing events / significant people from Asia, Africa, Oceania and/or Latin America. The 20th century was a time of tremendous change in all those regions. Perhaps we can have a little brainstorming and select the most appropriate images. My first idea was to include an image of a prominent 20th century independence leader, to illustrate the section on decolonisation. Aridd (talk) 12:13, 25 September 2008 (UTC)

Length

Per WP:SS, this article is just too long. A WP article doesn't need to have a "summary" (aside from the intro); it should be a summary. Also, the "major events" section in this article seems to be a conglomeration of information that can be found in other articles (such as Vietnam War). So, per WP:SS (and WP:BB), I'm thinking of cutting out all the text from this section, and simply leaving it with wikilinks to relevant articles. These links, along with the sections currently named "summary" and "developments in brief," should be enough for a decent, succinct article. Any thoughts? Cosmic Latte (talk) 00:28, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

I agree with your premise. An alternative solution would be to create "X in the 20th century" sub-articles, e.g., "War in the 20th century", "Technological developments in the 20th century", etc. Either would be fine with me. Groupthink (talk) 06:17, 5 June 2008 (UTC)
I guess you guys are right. Teemu Leisti (talk) 00:53, 23 June 2008 (UTC)
I would like to suggest that the summary be limited to a certain number of words as a way of challenging editors (ourselves) to be succinct. It seems to me that extraordinary brevity is whole point of a page like this: give the reader a broad over view of the century and a lot of links to take them to articles about other interesting stuff. Personally, I like the number 100. One hundred words look like three paragraphs and fills up about half my screen. I also think the lists of events and people should be limited to 100, there are other pages with longer lists. On this page, I think less is more. -ErinHowarth (talk) 07:42, 14 November 2008 (UTC)

I don't think it's too long. It's true that it's much larger than most other articles, but the subject is so enormous that it might be difficult to trim without leaving out important details. At the very least, we should trim every topic equally. 195.241.69.171 (talk) 16:47, 26 December 2008 (UTC)

Rewriting

I believe that this article has great potential. However, I believe a few major changes could and should be made to this article. For example, the "developments in brief" section should be eliminated and integrated into the newly-renamed "summary" section. I already took the liberty of moving the mini-summary already in the "general" section to the intro, where it is better suited, and increasing the amount of info in the "summary" section to include some critical missing points (such as the United Nations and conflict in the Middle East).

Eventually I think that even the current summary and major events sections could be integrated. Both are very well-written, but I don't think that there's ultimately a need to include two different sections that essentially cover the same things (just one in more detail and one in less detail) and especially not a third section (the current "developments in brief" section). I think if other people helped me out with this (I think I'm going to do as much work on this as I can) and help from people in finding references (my specialty is in writing prose, not finding references), we could even make this a featured article eventually. It's ambitious, but I think the basics are there for it...honestly the biggest problem is referencing. Anybody want to help out? Anybody have any thoughts? Additional suggestions? bob rulz (talk) 10:42, 3 April 2008 (UTC)

I've done a fair amount of work on this article, and am still looking over it now and then. (I modified it a bit just now.) So, I'll be willing to contribute. Could you give an outline of what you think the structure should be, and what material should be moved or modified? (Personally, I think the section on WW2 is too long; detailed descriptions like that belong in their own articles.) Teemu Leisti (talk) 22:35, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
There's definitely the potential of a great article here; what is here is generally of pretty high quality. The World War II section is definitely much too long. I think we could slowly combine the various sections. The "developments in brief" section could be wrapped into the rest of the article fairly easily. It's essentially just a summary of a summary of the article. Eventually everything can be pared down into just one description divided into the separate sections needed, such as cultural and societal trends, major events, technological and scientific developments, etc. 1970s would be a good template for how to organize the article, although it has the potential to be a very good article if we work at it. bob rulz (talk) 06:29, 21 April 2008 (UTC)
I've not done anything about this yet, but on reading the new talk subsection "Length", I think they're right. This is getting too long, and should be broken into subarticles. Teemu Leisti (talk) 00:52, 23 June 2008 (UTC)
I changed the end of "The age of dictatorships";the Jews killed by Hitler were not all Ashkenazi (for example the Sephardi community of Salonica) so I opted for European Jews as a more accurate term, and the Great Purge (or Great Stalinian Terror) occurred no later in the 20th century, but in the 1930s, and affected many nationalities of the Soviet Union, not just the Russians Drepanopulos (talk)Drepanopulos (talk) 12:08, 4 January 2009 (UTC)

Post-WWI German Government

"yet it had to accept a liberal democratic government imposed on it by the victors after the abdication of Kaiser Wilhelm."

This is wrong - the Weimar Republic was in no way imposed. Anyone disagree? StevenWT (talk) 21:28, 30 July 2009 (UTC)

Help us choose the best images for the 20th century montages

Please participate in the following discussion pages and help us choose the best images for montages in the decade articles of the 20th century.

TheCuriousGnome (talk) 20:19, 25 March 2010 (UTC)

Africans in Australia?

I have removed reference to Africans fighting for equal rights in Australia. Unless you didn't know Africans are only recent (21st Century) phenomanon in Australia and have only recently arrived. Little to almost no Africans (probably about 10-20) existed in Australia during the 20th century as a result of the White Australia policy. Africans arrived AFTER the civil rights movement therefore it should not be referenced. You can however reference the Chinese fighting for equal rights in Australia as they already had large population centres and had began migrating 100 years earlier during the 19th Century. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 124.189.192.240 (talk) 06:15, 7 March 2012 (UTC)

Global Warming?

Why is global warming featured here? It is not a proven theory, and most scientists agree the world has been cooling for the past 15 years.--Collingwood26 (talk) 07:47, 13 February 2012 (UTC)

The vast majority of scientists in the field agree that global warming is a reality. I don't know where you get the idea that the "world has been cooling for the past 15 years"; probably from some global warming denialist website. There is always noise in the temperature curve, corresponding to minor influences, but the trend for the last hundred years or so has been a steadily increasing global average temperature. See, for instance, the first chart in Instrumental temperature record. For more information on the subject, see Global warming. --Teemu Leisti (talk) 22:18, 23 August 2012 (UTC)


The Bede and modern labeling systems

The foregoing discussion might usefully be focused more narrowly on the two systems for labeling years that are in most common use today. The traditional labeling 2 BC, 1 BC, 1 AD, 2 AD was standardized in England by the Venerable Bede in the 8th Century and popularized in Europe by Charlemagne. As explained in articles such as Millennium, Year zero, Proleptic Gregorian calendar, etc. there is another more modern system also in common use which labels those four years -1, 0, 1, 2.

Wikipedia articles that mention either of these systems generally mention both (and in some cases their many less commonly encountered variants resulting from minor adjustments to dates). For no apparent reason this series of articles on centuries has taken a hard line on the illegitimacy of the modern system, as illustrated by edits like this.

There are a number of factors militating against this hard line on the modern labeling.

  1. It's an ISO standard.
  2. It's the one preferred by a great many software packages (the article Proleptic Gregorian calendar cites MySQL, SQLite, PHP, CIM, Delphi, Python, and COBOL as examples).
  3. It's the one used by astronomers.
  4. It provides for fractional years such as 0.75 meaning 3 months before the start of 1 AD and 0.25 meaning 3 months after the start of 1 BC.
  5. It's the one implicit in the common acceptance by the public of 2000 as the start of the new century and millennium; as mentioned here the Australian press derided Prime Minister John Howard as "party pooper of the century" for favoring a 2001 celebration.
  6. It's more convenient, e.g. the century of a year is given by its first two digits.
  7. It's consistent with all modern conventions about age and birthdays when one takes Jesus's first logical birthday (whatever his actual first birthday) to be January 1 in the year 1 AD. (So Jesus celebrates his n-th birthday on January 1 of n AD and is n years old throughout n AD. Moreover his logical age was 3 months in 0.25 AD.)
  8. Its legitimacy is acknowledged by almost all relevant Wikipedia articles except this series on centuries. That makes this series the one that's out of step with the rest of Wikipedia.

Arguing that the modern labeling should not even be mentioned in this and the other articles about centuries is at about the level of what differentiates sects of the same religion from one another. People can get quite heated about the illegitimacy of all other sects than their own. This in turn serves to undermine the credibility of Wikipedia: people can and do cite the first sentence of this article, "The 20th century was the period between January 1, 1901, and December 31, 2000" as proof of the illegitimacy of the modern labeling when this is obvious nonsense. --Vaughan Pratt (talk) 20:23, 25 January 2013 (UTC)

Timeline

I've been thinking for a while now that Timeline of modern history should redirect to Timeline of early modern history, since "modern history" begins in ~1500, and that its contents should be split into a timeline for this article, just like the one for 19th century, 18th century, etc, and 21st century. Serendipodous 21:51, 3 May 2013 (UTC)

correction

"Despots such as Kim Jong-il of North Korea continued to lead their nations toward the development of nuclear weapons."

[Explanatory note] The label: despot has a pejorative connotation of tyrant, oppressor and dictator. The label of despot may be apt, but the label distracts the reader from the main topic: nuclear arms proliferation. The word despot implies that only dictators would have the power to lead their people into and arms race toward a the security of the balance of power.]

[Revised text] Heads of state, such as Kim Jong-il of North Korea and various democratic governments in India, Pakistan, South Africa and Israel continue to lead their nations toward the development of nuclear weapons. Some international agencies and NGO watchdogs suspect other states of opaque nuclear arms development.

--David Faubion (talk) 23:15, 12 September 2013 (UTC) --David Faubion (talk) 23:28, 12 September 2013 (UTC)

Israel, India and Pakistan all went nuclear before the 20th century ended. Serendipodous 08:53, 13 September 2013 (UTC)

Dates

I seriously believe that this century began in 1900, not 1901. In fact, as far as I know, it is widely believed that centuries/millenia start in the '00 year, not the '01 year. Feel free to agree/disagree with me on this. --66.94.154.5 (talk) 00:30, 18 February 2008 (UTC)

Disagree. See Century#Start and End in the Gregorian Calendar. The rule is quite established. Teemu Leisti (talk) 10:25, 11 April 2008 (UTC)
Disagree. 1st century 1 A.D. - 100 A.D. 2nd 101 A.D. - 200 A.D. See previous Source. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.191.70.153 (talk) 21:48, 23 April 2008 (UTC)
Agree. Just because people were ignorant many years ago is no reason to accept this now. This is a situation similar to the commonly-misused date format template; CCYYMMDD. This is the 21st century, so the CC portion = 21. However, many people think they are being more correct by specifying a template of CCYYMMDD, instead of the correct template, YYYYMMDD. Michael.Urban (talk) 18:09, 1 May 2008 (UTC)
Disagree. Like it or not, there was no year zero. Groupthink (talk) 18:27, 1 May 2008 (UTC)
Agree. The answer is simple: Since there was no year zero, the 1st Millenium only had 999 years instead of 1000. Plus, how exciting is to celebrate the turn of '00 to '01? zzzz... --66.167.11.88 (talk) 22:04, 4 May 2008 (UTC)

Counting years is more difficult as it seems.87.208.3.170 (talk) 01:58, 11 May 2008 (UTC)

Agree with the first poster. There actually WAS a year 0. Reasoning: the date commonly given for the birth of Jesus Christ (1 AD) is inaccurate. He was actually born sometime between 3 and 8 BCE. Lately, I believe it has been the work of liberal bloggers that have set the gospel that "there was no year zero." That there is no year zero is actually a poorly conceived Western model. Come on guys, it's just like believing the idea that Frankie Valli was born in 1937 is gospel without analyzing the situation and the facts first. Marcus2 (talk) 02:53, 2 October 2008 (UTC)
Is "...it has been the work of liberal bloggers that have set the gospel that "there was no year zero."" a joke? Political leanings have nothing to do with the fact that the Gregorian calendar has no year zero. "That there is no year zero is actually a poorly conceived Western model." You know what? I actually agree that it would be nicer if there was a year zero, so that the third millennium and the 21st century would have started at the beginning of 2000. However, Wikipedia is an encyclopedia, and the task of its editors is not to vote on facts, but to describe them. Teemu Leisti (talk) 20:44, 10 January 2009 (UTC)
The inaccuracy of the birth of Christ is inconsequential. THe calendar has named such years retrospectively and 1 AD (CE for the anally rentetive about political correctness) clearly follows 1 BC. The Romans certtainly had no zero, but it is intereestingly more of an Eastern than Western tradtion of aging things by the current year i.e. it (or someonw) is 10 if it is in its 10th year rather than in the west where it (or someone) is 10 until the end of the eleen th year when the twelve year starts. Dainamo (talk) 12:52, 16 April 2009 (UTC)
Disagree. To say that the first millennium only had 999 years is going against the definition of "millennium", which is always equal to 1,000 years. If all are familiar with a "number line", then just draw one. With zero in the middle, there is +1 to the right and -1 to the left. The plus one (+1) represents the very end of the very first year, 0001. So on the very first day of the first year, right after the zero, comes January 1st, 0001. (Please remember that the number "0" has no value and is just a point on the number line that separates the year -0001 from the year +0001. There was not and cannot be a "year zero".)
Exactly ten years later we come to the number 10. That was the first "decade", and it came to an end on December 31, 0010. The second decade begins the very next day on January 1, 0011. This works the same way on up the number line. The first day of the third decade is January 1, 0021. The first day of the fourth decade is January 1, 0031, and so on.
We eventually come to number 100. All years to the left of the 100 were in the "first century". The very next number is 101, which is the end of the first year of the second century. The very first day of the 2nd century (right after the number 100 and between 100 and 101) is January 1, 0101. The first day of the 3rd century is January 1, 0201. The first day of the 4th century is January 1, 0301, and so on.
Then we reach the number 1000. All the years to the left of the 1000 were in the "first millennium". Between 1000 and the number 1001 are all the dates of the first year of the 2nd millennium. The very first day is January 1, 1001. The first day of the 3rd millennium is January 1, 2001. The first day of the 4th millennium is January 1, 3001, and so on.
Now when we focus on the date in question, we see that the end of the 2nd millennium is the number 2000 on the number line. All dates and years before the 2000 (back as far as the number 1000) were in the 2nd millennium. All dates after the 2000 (up to the number 3000) are in the 3rd millennium. All the dates between 2000 and 2001 represent the first year of the 3rd millennium. The very first day of that first year is January 1, 2001, which is the first day of the 2001st year, the 201st decade, the 21st century and the 3rd millennium.
Hope this helps!
 —  .`^) Paine Ellsworthdiss`cuss (^`.  20:58, 6 September 2009 (UTC)
  • PS. It's no large matter, of course, because people had a tremendous amount of fun on both Jan. 1, 2000 and Jan. 1, 2001. "Party on!"
Agree with the first poster. There was no year 0, but there was also no year 1 or 2 or ... "The Anno Domini dating system was devised in 525 by Dionysius Exiguus". See Anno Domini. It's no use reasoning forward from what people would have done at the start of the first century if they had had our calendar, because they didn't. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 173.48.204.140 (talk) 22:52, 9 May 2010 (UTC)
That's not what those of us disagreeing with the first post are saying. What we are saying is that when our calendar was established, no year zero was made. Therefore, the first century ran from year 1 to year 100 inclusive. Following forward, the twentieth century ran from 1901 to 2000 inclusive. The simple meanings of the words and the facts of the design of the calendar make any other interpretation erroneous. --Khajidha (talk) 15:14, 17 September 2010 (UTC)

Agree. The year 1900 did begin the 20th century and the year 2000 did begin the 21st century/3rd millennium. Please read this article: http://www.mindspring.com/~jimvb/year2000.htm. It does a good job of explaining why the year 2000 was the first year of the third millennium and 21st century. I am posting more articles on my talk page in the future also explaining why 2000 was the first year of the 21st century/3rd millennium. Bjoh249 (talk) 07:40, 31 May 2011 (UTC)

That article is stupid because it argues that there was (not should have been) a year 0. Well, there wasn't, case closed. --91.10.48.101 (talk) 15:52, 8 February 2012 (UTC)
That article is not stupid and gives a compelling argument as to why there is a year 0. Just because the calendar you use arbitrarily does not have a year zero doesn't mean there isn't one.Jones5150 (talk) 05:57, 10 October 2013 (UTC)

'Agree. How are decades different to centuries? I have checked the articles 1990s,1980s and 1970s and have found that they start on 1st January 19*0 and end on 31st December 19*9 (where * = the number (etc. 1990, 1980))ThomasRules 17:38, 4 May 2012 (UTC)

Centuries are designated by ordinal numbers: 1st, 2nd, &c. Decades are designated by terms that include years beginning with a specified number (eg, the 1980s were the years numbered 198x). The two numbering systems are not related. 66.232.240.121 (talk) 01:55, 23 August 2012 (UTC)
The twentieth century began in 1901, but I am not so sure about it ending at the end of 2000. No one I know celebrated the occasian as the end of the century, and very few even knew, so from a cultural perspective the 21st century began at the end of 1999, making the twentieth century 99 years long in most places. I did hear something about the German Kaiser mentioning the new century in 1900, but he got a bit of mocking for it from overseas. This is an article about the actual measurable time period known as the 20th century, but perhaps it would be a good idea to mention the public perception somewhere? 130.216.68.86 (talk) 07:38, 26 June 2013 (UTC)

Agree. 1: The Gregorian calendar was arbitrarily defined centuries after year 1 AD, its supposed reference year (more on that in point 4). It is based on the Julian calendar that was around since 46 BC. They were definitely not calling it 1 AD during the year 1 AD. It was obviously changed years later. Thus, by stating you can't change a calendar reference point after the fact while you continue to use a calendar that was changed after the fact is hypocritical.

2: When the Julian calendar was modified in the 6th Century, it was arbitrarily changed to have a starting reference point of 1 AD. This is a decision based on an estimate of when Jesus Christ was born, when it is widely believed he was born years earlier. The reference year chosen is just that, a choice; and it is based on an incorrect guess.

3: The people who made up the Julian calendar did not have a concept of the number zero. Today, pretty much everybody does. Most people define starting points with the number zero, not 1. The day someone is born, that person in most cultures is said to be zero years old, not 1 year old. When you use a stop watch, it starts at zero, not 1. Yes, one can argue that zero is also an arbitrary starting point, but it is a universally accepted starting point in math, science, and the general public.

4: Most people believe that the century ended at the stroke of midnight Jan 1st, 2000. Only a small minority believe it ended Jan 1st 2001 by referencing the Gregorian calendar. However, that calendar is defined with a convention based solely in opinion and not fact. Also, the Gregorian calendar doesn't really define year one. It is just continuing on with the Julian calendar in 1582 with added accuracy for the time the earth revolves around the sun. All dates before 1582 are not accurate with reference to the Earth's position to the sun. So technically, the Earth did not revolve around the sun exactly 2000 times between Jan 1st, 1 and Dec 31st 2000. The Gregorian calendar is inaccurate with it's year one reference when over 75% of that 2000 year span used leap years incorrectly. The Astronomical Calendar uses a year zero. By using this calendar, everything that is current stays the same. Everything before year zero gets a 1 year shift and is a negative number. If you still like using BC/AD, then the Gregorian calendar can be changed so that 1 BC becomes 0 AD.

Conclusion: The bottom line is this, neither side of the argument can claim with fact that one is true and one is false. It is all based on opinion. Since the overwhelming custom today is to start with zero, it is best to define the centuries and millenniums to reference a year zero. This will remove confusion among the general public. Especially when most people think the 21st century began Jan 1st, 2000. Here is an article that gives a good argument in favor of this definition. When Does The New Century Start?Jones5150 (talk) 05:57, 10 October 2013 (UTC)

Disagree. Grumble. You have not added anything new to the argument, and it doesn't have even the weight of popular opinion any more. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 14:22, 10 October 2013 (UTC)

I have offered plenty and you have not offered anything at all. The weight of popular opinion (as in the majority of the populous) believes contrary to your view but for a different reason. The average person would say the 20th century ended in 1999, even if that belief is based on not knowing the Julian calendar did not have a year 0 AD. The Gregorian calendar has no definition at all referencing year 0 AD or year 1 AD. It's starting point is 1582 AD. What age do you define yourself as? I bet your answer is based on your first year being zero and not one. So if you were born on Jan 1st, 1960, as of October 2013, you would be 53 years old, not 54 years old. You would be in your 54th year alive, not 55th. Why cling to a numbering convention that does not acknowledge the number zero?Jones5150 (talk) 15:32, 10 October 2013 (UTC)

Disagree. Honestly, what a typhoon in a teacup! Yes, there is a year 0, if you are using the more recent astronomical numbering of years (which was invented in the 18th century). No, there wasn't a year 0 before that, and certainly not before there was a number "0" (which was imported into Europe only in the 12th century from Arabia, where it has existed for up to 3 or 4 centuries before that, and even then wasn't widely known much less adopted in Europe until most people stopped using Roman numerals around the 17th century).

But having or not having a year 0 does not influence the matter at all. The word "twentieth" is an ordinal number, labeling the next item in a series after nineteen previous items. The word "century", derived from Latin "centus" (one hundred), means "one hundred years", not more, not less. We entered a twenty-first century only after a period of twenty full centuries, 2000 years, had elapsed. The only real question is: 2000 years "from when"?

The only real answer is "from A.D. 1, or 1 C.E. if you prefer". This is because the epoch of a calendar always begins with day 1, also year 1 if it counts years (not all calendars do). That's (now) a convention, not a numerical necessity, but it's a convention that has existed throughout the world since antiquity (when it was a numerical necessity, since there was no zero). Changing it would not only require full agreement throughout the world, but it would also require the conversion of all past references to the old convention, every time they're used. That would cost effort, money, and confusions. It's not going to happen, because there's just no compelling reason to go through the exercise, making it worth the expense. Forget about it.

Though the Julian calendar took official effect in Rome in the year we call 45 B.C (or -44), it did not (at that time) count years at all. Year counting at that time continued the common practice of beginning again at year 1 every time a new emperor was crowned. The ancient Christian church (there was only one then) needed to determine the date on which Pascha (later called Easter in the west) should be celebrated, and to do so, made tables listing the proper dates for a succession of years in advance. It thus required a numbering of years beyond the common civil usage. Cyrillus made one for the years 228-247 since the reign of Emperor Diocletian, what we would call AD 512-531. The famous Dionysius Exiguus completed one for 532-550, for the first time numbering the years as we came to: Anno Domini, or AD. The calculation of the date of Pascha was still a live issue in Northumbria (now northern England) in the time of the scholar Bede, who likely was exposed to the AD dating of Dionysius. Dionysius was the one who assigned the year 1 to the year in which he thought Jesus had been born, using the best information he had. But the church had left no written record or verbal tradition which could be conclusive even at that time, much less now. Through multiple time references in the Bible, scholars can now be sure he was off, probably by about 3 or 4 years, but no more precise or definite timing can be guaranteed. Over time, Dionysius' epoch became the established accepted epoch for counting years in the Julian calendar. The actual year of Jesus' birth does not affect the agreed calendar epoch.

The (present) Gregorian calendar is a derivative of the Julian, the result of a calendar reform instituted by Pope Gregory XIII as of 15 October 1582. It changed the timing of leap years a little, to be more astronomically accurate, and shifted dates by 10 days forward to match the time of year to dates as they had been in the third century, when the church first started to calculate the timing of Pascha observances for itself (not relying on the Jewish calendar). The reform did not touch the year of the calendar epoch; it remained 1 AD as it had been. 1 AD Julian is the same year as 1 AD Gregorian, except for a couple of days' shifting due to recalculation of leap years.

The fact that the Gregorian calendar began in 1582 does not prevent its epoch from being year 1. The epoch is merely a foundational reference point in time for the calendar. Historians, when referring to times before 15 October 1582 use Julian calendar dates. However, they go back as far as needed in Julian dates, despite the calendar's establishment in 45 BC. There is nothing preventing the same from being done in Gregorian dates. But normally, nobody does; it's another convention, for which historians have their good reasons. And yes, it would cost to change those too.

For verification of modern-day conventions, find a copy of Calendrical Calculations, by Nachum Dershowitz and Edward M. Reingold, Cambridge University Press, c. 1997. The authors are (or were) computer scientists at the University of Illinois, Champaign-Urbana, and designed algorithms for computer automation of calendar functions widely used today. Try them out; the details are in the book. Page 14 shows a table designating Jan 1, 1 as the epoch date for both Julian and Gregorian calendars. (Those days are actually two days apart, because of differences in the two calendars in assigning leap years.) But the year of the epoch is year 1, not year 0. I guarantee these guys understand the application of 0 and its relevance to calendars. They also adopt a convention whereby AD/BC year designations are used for Julian calendar dates, but integer (positive/negative/zero) year numbers are used for Gregorian calendar dates. That is a convenience for their book, not a global standard, but it does demonstrate how use of year zero does not affect epoch or adversely impact calculation. For both calendars, though, the epoch year is 1, according to world standard usage.

Therefore, the first century was years 1 through 100, inclusive. Keep going and you get the 20th century as 1901 through 2000, as the article states, as the sources state.

One final thing for the benefit of user Jones5150. You celebrated your twentieth birthday when you turned twenty years old, right? That is, when you had just completed living for twenty years, and were at the point of entering the start of your twenty-first year of life? Me too. But I've always wondered why that is the convention. After all, wasn't my first birthday the actual date of my birth? So maybe at twenty years of age I should have celebrated my twenty-first birthday. Hey, I could retire a year early with full benefits! If I can convince the SSA. That's the thing about accepted conventions. Evensteven (talk) 05:48, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

Note: a few edits to my earlier entry were applied at this time, for clarity. Evensteven (talk) 00:18, 16 January 2014 (UTC)

Btw, why should these facts have affected the fun of seeing all the year digits roll over in 2000? What a kick to have lived at the time! Not everybody is so lucky. A new century and new millennium in 2001 - what a bonus! I hoped you all enjoyed all of it thoroughly, whenever you celebrated! Evensteven (talk) 00:26, 16 January 2014 (UTC)

That was a well-written summary of the issues around counting years in the Julian and Gregorian calendars. Maybe it should be incorporated into some article? (Not this one, though.) Teemu Leisti (talk) 22:53, 19 January 2014 (UTC)
Thanks. I'll consider that. Evensteven (talk) 01:56, 20 January 2014 (UTC)

Agree: If one is to suppose that a period of 2000 years is to be measured, then the correct period would be for 30 dec 2000, because the adjustments of the two calenders (Julian and Gregorian), is correct at 200, and the gregorian is behind the julian for years before this. This is not what is going on. It's not a period of '2000 years', but a series of names '20xx' that the watch is for.

Dates in a year are ordinal. The first day of the first month means 0 months, 0 days, and some fragment of a day have passed. When you say that you are in the seventh year at school, it means that you have been there 6 and some fraction of a year, the seventh year ends at 7.000000.

Years are currently seen as cardinal. That means that the year 2000 is treated as 2000.xx.xx, ie 2000.fraction. This is in part because we don't experience the full scale to make centuries ordinal. So when we say, this is the 21st century, we say that we have allocated dates from 20 previous centuries (including omissions and extras), and that the current package is the twentyfirst.

Since this question is raised every century (i have clippings from 1900 for this), one supposes the custom of the century watch is to see the new century in, is held from 99.12.31 to 00.01.01, we must suppose the year is read as a cardinal, and the month and day are ordinals.

The arguments might have held some water if there were a major watch for 2000.12.31 to 2001.01.01, but this did not happen kiddies. So we must suppose that the common reading is that years are cardinal, months and days are ordinals, and that 2000.000000, which ends the 20th century, is the point before 2000.01.01:00:00:00 and that the watches are correct only when one supposes years are cardinal.Wendy.krieger (talk) 09:39, 22 August 2014 (UTC)

The ordinal number is "20th", as in 20th century. The year numbers are cardinal, as in 1901-2000, which comprise the 20th century. The century from 1900-1999 was indeed a century, known as the 1900s. And if there had been thought of a year zero far enough back, it would have been a rational thing to equate the 1900s with the 20th century. But that's not how it was, so that's not how it is. It's a convention. And the convention is not readily changeable, which is why it hasn't (and won't be) changed. It would cost too much time, effort, and money. That's the way it is, kiddies. I'm a messenger, not the originator. Evensteven (talk) 18:26, 22 August 2014 (UTC)
Everyone, none of this talk belongs here. All centuries must follow the same accounting, so this discussion on just the 20th century, however interesting, can't change anything. Please see WP:CENTURY, and (if you persist at tilting at windmills) take it up on that talk page, and good luck. --A D Monroe III (talk) 21:52, 22 August 2014 (UTC)
RE "can't change anything": not true. It discourages vandalism, which is rampant on this point. Sad, but true. I wouldn't wish anyone good luck in pursuing this. Evensteven (talk) 00:13, 23 August 2014 (UTC)
Vandals aren't going to read this discussion before acting. Even if they did, the WP:SYNTH arguments here wouldn't dissuade them, but instead just encourage them to invent their own reasoning. Wikipedia policy decided this, not our individual opinions. It's not about "right" or "wrong"; if people change the policy, then we'll change this to match. --A D Monroe III (talk) 13:25, 25 August 2014 (UTC)
Re "Vandals aren't going to read this discussion before acting.": agreed; I probably shouldn't have said "discourages". The "discussion" demonstrates continuing community involvement with the issue that can be pointed to directly in reverting the vandals. It also provides something for non-vandals to consider before they make an edit counter to consensus and policy. The arguments are not WP:SYNTH; they are backed by reliable sources. My own words in the discussion have declared it's not about truth, but is founded on a convention that has not and will not change, for good reasons. And that is one good reason that it is WP policy. Sure, that policy could (theoretically) change, but it's not especially likely, because it's WP's goal to articulate, accurately, as it already does. Evensteven (talk) 17:09, 25 August 2014 (UTC)
I agree with everything you say, but that doesn't matter. None of this section matters, except the mention that it's WP policy. That trumps all this discussion. Having this discussion here (without refs) implies it is up for discussion! Since it's not, this is pointless at best. Link to WP:CENTURY. That's it. --A D Monroe III (talk) 14:02, 26 August 2014 (UTC)
Then we're agreed what is WP policy, and what the article should read, and that's good. I guess there's more than one way to look at discussion. Evensteven (talk) 22:12, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

To do

The article requires:

  • lists to be converted to referenced text;
  • all claims to be cited;
  • any remaining editorial opinions to be removed or replaced with cited quotations. Chiswick Chap (talk) 19:29, 23 December 2014 (UTC)
Agreed. Evensteven (talk) 22:27, 23 December 2014 (UTC)

Question about "The Better Angels of Our Nature"

A new source, at the end of the fourth introductory paragraph. The last sentence of that paragraph makes the extraordinary claim that violence worldwide has decreased since 1945. Is this really what the source states? There should be a page number at least, in order to check the reference. To me, the claim also seems inflated or questionable if not downright wrong, and I'm wondering if the source is talking about violence due to war, or due to war by major powers, rather than violence itself. I think this needs some verification. Evensteven (talk) 23:01, 23 December 2014 (UTC)


Question about obviousness

"The 20th century was a century that began on January 1, 1901 and ended on December 31, 2000." - Haha, no shit?

What's your question exactly? Information being obvious is generally no reason to leave it out. Also, to how many readers and even editors this information is not obvious, as evidenced by attempts to change it. Gap9551 (talk) 19:43, 5 February 2016 (UTC)

That's very true and I appreciate your response. The '20th century' for me has always felt so emotionally suggestive that I was shocked to see it pegged down by the dates and facts. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.16.93.122 (talk) 21:12, 5 February 2016 (UTC)

Map of territorial changes in Europe after World War I (as of 1923).

The "Map of territorial changes in Europe after World War I (as of 1923)" doesn't show the partition of Ireland (prior to WW1 entirely part of the United Kingdom) into the Irish Free State and Northern Ireland. 86.162.48.216 (talk) 18:35, 24 February 2017 (UTC)

"century"

An IP has been removing "was a century" from the lead as being obvious. I think it appropriate, at least, to have the word century linked in the lead. Comments? — Arthur Rubin (talk) 20:14, 14 May 2017 (UTC)

External links modified

Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just modified 3 external links on 20th century. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:

When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.

This message was posted before February 2018. After February 2018, "External links modified" talk page sections are no longer generated or monitored by InternetArchiveBot. No special action is required regarding these talk page notices, other than regular verification using the archive tool instructions below. Editors have permission to delete these "External links modified" talk page sections if they want to de-clutter talk pages, but see the RfC before doing mass systematic removals. This message is updated dynamically through the template {{source check}} (last update: 18 January 2022).

  • If you have discovered URLs which were erroneously considered dead by the bot, you can report them with this tool.
  • If you found an error with any archives or the URLs themselves, you can fix them with this tool.

Cheers.—InternetArchiveBot (Report bug) 08:34, 22 June 2017 (UTC)

Climate Change model image

Is the climate change model image necessary at the beginning of the article? It seems out of place with no context. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2606:A000:478B:EB00:4C1A:5E6E:BA2C:2BFC (talk) 11:12, 18 May 2017 (UTC)

I've removed it. Seems a bit strange and the description in the frame doesn't really explain how this is particularly an issue to this century compared to say the 21st century, could be argued that human-cause climate change could span multiple centuries. Also doesn't have a lot of paragraph context around it. --Kuzwa (talk) 04:21, 17 October 2017 (UTC)

Significant People section: Is this needed

Section removed by Modernist in September power~enwiki (π, ν) 23:44, 6 February 2018 (UTC)

The following discussion 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.

Does these sections need to be in this article?

Of course they are; every other century page has them. Serendipodous 16:18, 4 August 2017 (UTC)
Then make sure they are both relevant, and valid without being in violation of WP:NPOV...Modernist (talk) 19:25, 4 August 2017 (UTC)
I've modified the header of this talk section to clarify (correct me if I'm wrong).
Per Template:Example farm, this section will consume editors' time and do little to inform readers. Unless we can find some very narrow criteria for inclusion, delete. --A D Monroe III (talk) 20:03, 4 August 2017 (UTC)
  • Delete per above...Modernist (talk) 20:46, 4 August 2017 (UTC)
  • Delete. Even if appropriate in prior centuries, too long and controversial here. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 15:58, 7 August 2017 (UTC)
  • Keep This article should follow the format of other centuries. Dimadick (talk) 22:35, 7 August 2017 (UTC)
I don't think the format for centuries long past automatically applies to one in living memory. --A D Monroe III (talk) 00:09, 8 August 2017 (UTC)

I have deleted the section pending new agreements...Modernist (talk) 21:53, 2 September 2017 (UTC)

Significant people: discussion

Has anyone noticed the growth of this section during this discussion? Given that WP has thousands of articles on notable people that were alive in the 20th century -- maybe tens of thousands. I foresee no end to this; in a year's time, this list will be 90% of the article. This is not helpful to our readers, and not helpful to WP as it consumes much of our editor's efforts.

This situation is unlike other centuries. The fact that WP articles for other centuries have no limits to similar lists is irrelevant.

We need to establish some criteria for inclusion of people in this article. In addition, that criteria must be exact and definite, or endless edit wars will ensue. If no one can suggest such criteria, we should delete the list now for everyone's sake. (If, later, we do agree on such a criteria, the list can be easily remade using the criteria.)

--A D Monroe III (talk) 22:24, 28 August 2017 (UTC)

  • Frankly there are hundreds of thousands of notable people that could be included....the idea is ridiculous; and impossible...Modernist (talk) 22:13, 2 September 2017 (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.

Global temperature image in environment section

This is a better place for the image that was originally removed from the lead. However, why exactly does this image need to be in the 20th century article as opposed to the 21st century? Based on the description it is demonstrating temperature predictions for the late 21st century which has nothing to do with the 20th... --Kuzwa (talk) 00:47, 1 December 2017 (UTC)

I've removed this picture, basically for these reasons. power~enwiki (π, ν) 20:41, 9 February 2018 (UTC)

The Nobel Prize

The Nobel Prize was established in 1901 and was prominently awarded to many of the most notable people of the 20th century. I feel it should be mentioned in the article somehow. There's no obvious section for it though; science, literature, and peace are all in separate sections. Any suggestions? power~enwiki (π, ν) 02:46, 13 February 2018 (UTC)

Music section

It seems bizarre to me that this section's illustration should be of Led Zeppelin. Not to say that Led Zeppelin is not of huge cultural significance, but that they should receive special mention rather than, say, the Beatles, who, by most metrics such as album sales or hit singles, are the most successful band of all time by a large margin, seems remiss. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 209.195.157.230 (talk) 21:44, 5 March 2019 (UTC)

I was somewhat dumbstruck when I discovered, "The world's most popular / famous music artists of the 20th century include :" and the list that followed. Because I am new to this article I am not going to engage in the slash & burn approach that I was first impelled to do, rather I have put all the artists in alphabetical order. This seems to be a first edit that should not draw too much fire. Then, after I find out that someone is actually interested in pursuing this discussion, we will do that. Einar aka Carptrash (talk) 21:21, 28 November 2017 (UTC)

One way to track "fame & popularity" is by records (or whatever) sold. Of the artists in the top classification here, List of best-selling music artists only Pink Floyd was not included in the list here so I have added them. Once out of the top group that list need not be used (opinion) to determine who should be one our list except as a tangential reference. Our "famous /popular" list should NOT be decided by who has sold the most units. Carptrash (talk) 18:07, 30 November 2017 (UTC)
I am removing the four Beatles as individuals, having them entered as The Beatles should be enough. Carptrash (talk) 21:24, 30 November 2017 (UTC)
I have assigned starting dates to all the artists based on when they first charted or came to prominence. If you want to argue that Louis Armstrong should be 1923 instead of 1925, fine, but these dates will not appear in the article, they are just a way for me (and anyone who wants to see them, so far I am preaching to myself) to review trends in our selection. I have also assigned somewhat arbitrary categories to the various artists on this list. One is “British Invasion”, which I have loosely defined as “British acts during the 1960s.” Of the 50 or so artists we include, 11 are in this group and that is after I removed John, Paul Ringo & George.” As important as this movement is/was, and as much as I love the music, I plan on removing The Animals (1964), The Kinks (1964), The Who (1965), and David Bowie (1966), leaving The Beatles (1962), The Rolling Stones (1963), Jimi Hendrix (1966), Pink Floyd (1967), Elton John (1969), and Led Zeppelin (1969). Are you still with me? Carptrash (talk) 19:30, 1 December 2017 (UTC)
Removed The Animals (1964), The Kinks (1964), The Who (1965), and David Bowie (1966) Carptrash (talk) 00:53, 3 December 2017 (UTC)
The Spice Girls first charted in 1996, giving them 4 (or 5) years in the 20th Century, not long enough to stay on the list. Carptrash (talk) 05:05, 3 December 2017 (UTC)

I am planning on adding these earlier 20th C artists and have included some rational (from their articles on wikipedia) with each one.

  • Al Jolson (1910) In the 1930s, Jolson was America's most famous and highest-paid entertainer. Jolson had nine sell-out Winter Garden shows in a row, more than 80 hit records, and 16 national and international tours. Although he is best remembered today as the star of the first talking picture, The Jazz Singer (1927),
  • Rudy Vallée (1928)He was one of the first modern pop stars of the teen idol type. Vallée also became what was perhaps the first complete example of the 20th century mass media pop star
  • The Boswell Sisters (1930) The Boswell Sisters were among radio's earliest stars, making them one of the first hit acts of the mass-entertainment age. . . . made these recordings unlike any others. Melodies were rearranged and slowed down, major keys were changed to minor keys (sometimes in mid-song), and unexpected rhythmic changes were par for the course. They were among the very few performers who were allowed to make changes to current popular tunes; The Andrews Sisters started out as imitators of the Boswell Sisters. Young Ella Fitzgerald loved the Boswell Sisters and in particular idolized Connee, after whose singing style she patterned her own.
    I am also going to remove a few more, but will talk to myself here before doing so.Carptrash (talk) 16:01, 3 December 2017 (UTC)

What is the criteria to be on this list? Without one, it will grow endlessly, or just be bait for EW to add/remove based only on ILIKEIT. If the criteria is just the 20th century subset of List of best-selling music artists, is it even needed? Music in the 20th century should probably require more notability than just Music. Maybe just the top few, or ones leading new genres? Something with sourced impact beyond just 100k sales, or new sections on Produce, Toys, and Pens will drown everything. --A D Monroe III(talk) 18:20, 3 December 2017 (UTC)

I discovered the list a week or so ago and have been working to improve it. There is no criteria, that I have found, so I am making my own. The Top grounp of Best Sellers are all used, but that is only something like 7 or 8 out of about 50. Since then I have been whittling away and am glad that someone else has shown up to discuss it with. I am including here my rational as to why certain folks should be included. Carptrash (talk) 18:50, 3 December 2017 (UTC)
The criteria used here must be described succinctly so that others can use it. If that's in progress, great, but I'd like to hear something about it. If we don't end up with a published criteria understandable by all editors, then this section will be just EW bait, and is best deleted, making any current changes to the list meaningless. --A D Monroe III(talk) 17:01, 4 December 2017 (UTC)
So just to be clear, we are trying to develop criteria for identifying "the world's most popular / famous music artists of the 20th century?" I suspect that if I were to come up with some they would immediately be classified as the dreaded original research. On the other hand, to have such a section in the article, and I think that it is an important one to include, and not present some names is not good process. What I am attempting to do is support the folks that I am including in the list on the talk page where others came have a go at them. I understand the concerns that the list is a magnet for editors to just add on to, that seems to be what it was when I started hacking away at it. Carptrash (talk) 17:17, 4 December 2017 (UTC)
I have no problem with the recent work done to the list itself. What I'm worried about is this work won't last. Without some established guideline to support it, the list will degrade over time back to a formless mush of drive-by editor bait. Using "famous", as you say, is unsustainable. Remember that the list of "Famous people" has been permanently removed from this article for exactly this reason. --A D Monroe III(talk) 02:14, 6 December 2017 (UTC)
So a better replacement for "popular / famous " is . . . .influential? Significant? Consequential? Do we want to limit it to 20 (to make up a number) names? We could say, "Fine, no names" but really, we are talking about musical accomplishments, so we should have some names. We could break it down to one name per decade, that would be fun. I'm open for suggestions, until then I am just going to continue merrily along my chosen path. On which Bon Jovi will not last much longer.
I'm not saying we shouldn't have musician's names, I'm saying we soon won't have them if we continue down this path of "anyone any editor wants to add". We no longer list all US presidents, or all Nobel Prize winners, or all Academy Award winners, or all UN secretary‑generals. We need to justify adding musicians with less significance to the whole of the 20th century than these others. If we don't, then they will all get deleted, per Template:Cleanup list and WP:LISTCRUFT. (BTW, if you want to use just a number, better make it less than a dozen, similar to the few other very short lists in the article, noting that even the existing ones should actually be WP:PROSE; a random list of 20 is way too many.) --A D Monroe III(talk) 16:56, 9 December 2017 (UTC)
Wikipedia:Listcruft is an essay, not a Wikipedia policy. Dimadick (talk) 20:59, 9 December 2017 (UTC)
What I am trying to deal with here was a seemingly random list of, I think, 52 names. It is now at around 40 and I am about to remove a few more. The apathy referred to as the "anyone any editor wants to add" plan is not happening any more. If we keep an eye on this section (and others) we can hopefully prevent the list from ballooning back up. Carptrash (talk) 22:03, 9 December 2017 (UTC)
"Keeping an eye" on it is unworkable. If an editor adds X-Y-Z, and someone "eyeing" it wants to remove them, what do they use as a justification other than IDONTLIKEIT? It's just EW bait. Besides, 40 musicians is way, way, way too many already. Again, compare to the all the current non-musical people mentioned in the article; are these musicians really as notable as each of them? Plain UNDUE. --A D Monroe III(talk) 15:46, 15 December 2017 (UTC)

To start with, this page is actually fairly short: only 56KB. It could easily be twice the size; I've added some sub-headings that will hopefully aid in content expansion. The lists of names are a remnant of content from Wikipedia's ancient past (note this version from January 2003). I'd recommend removing them entirely and replacing them with some prose. power~enwiki (π, ν) 23:41, 6 February 2018 (UTC)

Nuclear power

It seems odd to list nuclear power as a defining feature of the century so high up in the intro. The link doesn't include nuclear weapons, and with regard to energy production, there were other transformations during the 20th century. Sdkb (talk) 22:26, 1 January 2020 (UTC)

More united

The intro includes a sentence that says that the 20th century created a word where people are more united. It goes on to list concepts like international law, and institutions like the United Nations. Isn't this a limited view of unification? The 20th century also saw people unified as new nations, as oppressed populations, and in military defense blocs. There are more then those few too - my church held something called a unity walk. The current language seems to define unification in the terms of globalization. How could we better reword this sentence to encompass all the types of 20h century unification? 47.137.181.252 (talk) 02:22, 13 February 2020 (UTC)

20th century culture and entertainment

Are there any conditions for how in culture and entertainment certain film stars/ filmmakers and music artists are applied? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2001:8003:744A:E600:2467:2B2D:6B0B:8A5B (talk) 04:32, 7 May 2020 (UTC)

The Change

The 20th Century was an interestingng changing Point, from Bolt Action Rifles to Assault Rifles, Biplanes to Jets, etc MasterRedditz (talk) 10:41, 7 May 2020 (UTC)

IP edit

Dear IP,

please do not add unnecessary content, however, instead of re-adding, you may explain your points here. Thank You(KIENGIR (talk) 23:42, 23 October 2020 (UTC))

Movie stars

By what measure are Dorothy Dandridge, Lena Horne, and Paul Robeson “among the most popular Hollywood stars of the 20th century?” Carptrash (talk) 20:40, 17 December 2020 (UTC)

Should the fact that the year 2000 is a leap year be mentioned in the lead paragraph?

I think the answer is obviously "no", but @KIENGIR: has reverted me. The lead paragraph (and section) are supposed to summarize the article and describe the most important information about the topic. Of all the things that happened in the 20th century (the moon landing, the development of the internet, automobiles -- NONE of which are in the lead), the fact that the year 2000 was a leap year seems utterly irrelevant. Furthermore, this information isn't anywhere in the article other than the first paragraph. I don't see how that material can stay in its current form. 97.125.232.133 (talk) 19:44, 25 January 2021 (UTC)

Sorry then,
I just noticed it is already in the article's body, where I anyway intended to move now.(KIENGIR (talk) 21:36, 18 February 2021 (UTC))

Significant people section

Someone has recently added a Significant people section. No references. I alphabetized the different sections, but added or subtracted very few, if any, names. The first section, World leaders, activists, I arranged by country, just for a change of pace and, perhaps, make it easier to deal with. So the first question is, is including such a section a fools errand? Secondly, how do we deal with because it is just a matter of time until Madonna appears on the "Spiritual leaders." I mean, who could argue with that? Is it worth trying to find references for something this subjective? Anyone want to talk about it or do I just assume carte blanche and just have fun? Carptrash (talk) 21:38, 2 January 2021 (UTC)


Hi Carptrash, the editing I did was in good faith. I decided to treat the 20th century like the other centuries here on Wikipedia (like the 19th and 18th centuries) by adding people I think are relevant. After all, we are in the 21st century and the 20th century has ended 21 years ago. Well, I already have a historical distance from that century (I was born in the 90s and reached adulthood in the beginning of the decade of 2010). But after you talked about this possibility (a fan putting an 80's singer in "spiritual leaders") I changed my mind, the best thing would have been for me (and/or other editors) to put references of lists that already exist on the web. BioAmazon3 (talk) 15:30, 5 January 2021 (UTC)

@BioAmazon3: I think the key to moving on here is your statement "people I think are relevant." What we think is irrelevant. My guess is that you don't really know who most of the people you added were. I found the lists or lists online that you used to generate a good portion of your additions and some of those names are pretty minor players in the century. But this is what we need to do, talk about it. It seemed clear to me that your edits ere good faith that is why I did not just remove them. Carptrash (talk) 15:52, 5 January 2021 (UTC)
I just removed
  • Edward VII, British, King of the United Kingdom and the Dominions of the British Empire, also Emperor of India
  • George V, British, King of the United Kingdom and the Dominions of the British Empire, also Emperor of India
  • Edward VIII, British, King of the United Kingdom and the Dominions of the British Empire, also Emperor of India
  • George VI, British, King of the United Kingdom and the Dominions of the British Commonwealth, also Emperor of India

if we are to have all these kings, then why not the kings of Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Finland . .... wait, Finland doesn't have a king, fine, so Belgium, Bulgaria etc, etc etc. If you want them back please present a discussion as to why they belong. Now I think I'll get rid of a few more, then we start in on American presidents. Carptrash (talk) 17:21, 9 January 2021 (UTC)

    • As for why all of those particular kings are notable (or "significant" if you will ;D ) : Edward VII took the throne in 1901 - the first year of the 20th century - and was the successor to Queen Victoria, who had been Queen for a large part of the 19th century, to the extent that the "Victorian era" is used as a near-synonym for the 19th century itself. As for the latter three, all of them were kings in 1936, and 1936 was therefore called "the year of the three kings." The last of that list, George VI, was also King during World War II, and is notable for being the last person to hold the title "Emperor of India." He's also the father of the present Queen. Firejuggler86 (talk) 08:59, 23 April 2021 (UTC)

I don't really care that much. I saw no problem with having these monarchs removed from the list. I think the only American president (of those who were removed) who could have been kept on the list would be Kennedy, because he started the Apolo program (but only for that reason). BioAmazon3 (talk) 03:20, 12 January 2021 (UTC)

I agree that it's arbitrary, and have removed it until there's some way to make the list not be completely arbitrary. The Vital Articles project is here if you want to argue about who should be on such a list. 97.125.232.133 (talk) 00:20, 24 January 2021 (UTC)

@Modernist: has reverted my removal. Any thoughts? 97.125.232.133 (talk) 19:39, 25 January 2021 (UTC)
  • There is no consensus for removal; the section is appropriate and should remain...Modernist (talk) 19:46, 25 January 2021 (UTC)
  • Do you have any answers for how the list will not be arbitrary or a fools errand to create and maintain here? 97.125.232.133 (talk) 19:49, 25 January 2021 (UTC)
  • First of all - Consensus will determine which additions should remain; and which additions should be added and which should be removed; there are similar sections in the 19th century and essentially all the other centuries past; the 20th century matters; and these inclusions are historical for the most part...Modernist (talk) 19:55, 25 January 2021 (UTC)
    • BioAmazon3 no musicians or composers? Even with the likes of Chagall and Picasso on the list? Come on now... Btw, I'm not convinced most of the photographers stand up against anyone on the list. The arbitrariness is overwhelming. Aza24 (talk) 07:20, 27 January 2021 (UTC)
      • If you pay attention, musicians, composers, actors, filmmakers and other artists, are already listed in the article, in the section "Culture and Entertainment". But if you want you can remove and put them in the "Significant peoples" section... and also add some other people that you think that are relevant. Now in relation to the photographers: they are listed in the article about the 1920s, so I put them here. As other editors said above: the consensus is that it will determine who gets on or off the list. BioAmazon3 (talk) 19:46, 27 January 2021 (UTC)
Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk:20th_century/Archive_3&oldid=1173052802"