text:
Talk:The Buddha

Requested move 31 March 2023
The Buddha → Gautama Buddha – I have gone through the previous two RM requests but I fail to understand how we still arrived at this conclusion. Although. Dwayne Johnson is more popularly known as The Rock, we can clearly see how the Wikipedia page is titled. And while I'm not advocating for the name change to Buddha, someone correctly said in a previous RM that there are many moons but the wiki page refers to our Moon. While, a case can be made that Captain America (please note, the lack of The) is a title for many characters but the page references to the character that is primarily known by that name (Steve Rogers), another case can also be made that Ant-Man is a title and many of the characters using that title have their own separate pages. So, what I'm trying to say is while Buddha would make sense, Siddhartha Gautama would make even more sense but The Buddha makes the least amount of sense. Since, Siddhartha Gautama was previously denied during a RM and the title of the article was not changed for over 15 years, I would suggest a RM back to Gautama Buddha. If it ain't broke, don't fix it. CaseNotClosedYet (talk) 12:00, 31 March 2023 (UTC)
 * Strong oppose - I'm not sure what the rationale for the RM is. The RM proposal does not say why the current title is problematic, nor why the proposed title should be used, nor is any evidence provided to show why the article should be renamed. If it ain't broke, don't fix it is cited, yet the RM is an attempt to fix something that isn't broken. As was made clear in the previous RM that changed the title to its current one, English-language sources do not support "Gautama Buddha" as the WP:COMMONNAME for the subject, and this subject is the overwhelming WP:PRIMARYTOPIC for this title. Apples-to-oranges comparisons to articles like Dwayne Johnson (who perhaps was as one point more commonly known by The Rock but his career as an actor has overshadowed that) are not a sufficient rationale to try to overturn a recent move simply because the proposer "fail[s] to understand". Consensus can certainly change, but we just had this discussion and it's only been a few months. The nom brings forward no novel argument that would warrant reopening this topic so soon. - Aoidh (talk) 12:36, 31 March 2023 (UTC)
 * Every other Buddha's in this portal has similar naming structure, so I don't see how this needs further reasoning how or why English-language sources do not support this. Eg- Kassapa Buddha, Sumedha Buddha, etc.
 * Also, this is relating to a cultural and religion topic, why you are looking for English-Language sources only, is quite ignorant and probably very offensive to people who are not primarily English speakers, hence why, I have read many people citing other Wikipedia language pages for Gautama Buddha as the preferred naming structure.
 * I compared with a wrestler and fictional superhero as that's what this naming structure has brought Siddhartha Gautama down to. You are treating him like fictional character, a superhero or a person trying to go by the stage name for a profession. He is a person yet his article is referring to him by the title that was most associated to him. Let's not forget this article is related to Siddhartha Gautama. Please give example's where title has only been used to refer to a person.
 * A few examples for my reasoning.
 * 1) Mahatma Gandhi - Mahatma is a title not a name yet the title is mostly if not only used for Mohandas Gandhi.
 * 2) Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother - First of all, Queen Elizabeth is the most popular queen at this age and according to the logic of why The Buddha should be used, perhaps Elizabeth II should have her page renamed to The Queen. Anyway, to avoid confusion with Elizabeth II, Queen Elizabeth is most popularly known as The Queen Mother and her page reflects that. But somehow, here we are trying to create confusion than trying to educate people and remove confusion.
 * 3) Mansa Musa - Same reasoning as above.
 * 4) Jesus - No one could say, if Christ is more popularly known or Jesus. And, while Christ is a title that is only used to refer to one person, it is not the name for the page. In fact, the title has a separate page - Christ (title).
 * It is quite ignorant and blasphemous to make light of the subject. People need to know about the person in this article not the title. According to me, this naming structure is encouraging a mindset that this is a fictional or mythical person. I could then understand why some people would be against the idea for change to create confusion and spread misinformation or rather the lack of proper information. The core principle of Buddhism is that every person can and probably someday will achieve the state of Buddha, so referring to Siddhartha Gautama as The Buddha is quite against the idea of what Buddhism is about or what he taught. Which from a religion standpoint I presume is very offensive to non-English speakers, some might see this as a win but I consider this as a disrespect to the person behind the title and mystifying title itself. CaseNotClosedYet (talk) 18:34, 31 March 2023 (UTC)
 * Oppose: What Aoidh said. Overall, a somewhat baffling RM. The message seems to be "Siddhartha Gautama" would be best, which is consistent with the Dwayne Johnson material further up, but failing that, since it was already tried last year, a default back to the previous poorly supported page title would suffice ... hang on, what? Setting aside the general comparisons with fictional super heroes and pro-wrestlers, umm, sourcing? "Gautama Buddha" went the way of the dodos because it was a total flunk of a common name. Iskandar323 (talk) 14:06, 31 March 2023 (UTC)
 * Kindly refer to the above comment for any confusion you have. Also, Gautama Buddha is quite a common name in non-English speaking communities or people who actually follow Buddhism. It gives respect to both the person and also his status as a Buddha. Hence, the case with Mahatma Gandhi. CaseNotClosedYet (talk) 18:43, 31 March 2023 (UTC)
 * Oppose: per the above, and previous discussions. पाटलिपुत्र  (Pataliputra)  (talk) 14:11, 31 March 2023 (UTC)
 * Oppose move and snowclose. This request is nonsensical.  O.N.R.  (talk) 18:42, 31 March 2023 (UTC)
 * Oppose and WP:SNOWCLOSE per other editors comments. –  City Urbanism  🗩   🖉  19:04, 31 March 2023 (UTC)
 * Neutral. It's not inherently wrong or bad, but it makes infinitely more sense to me to have this page at, following Britannica. — kashmīrī  TALK  19:47, 31 March 2023 (UTC)

Biased/Controversial take on Hindu Synthesis
This Hindu synthesis emerged after the lifetime of the Buddha, between 500[393]–200[394] BCE and c. 300 CE,[393] under the pressure of the success of Buddhism and Jainism.[395] In response to the success of Buddhism, Gautama also came to be regarded as the 9th avatar of Vishnu

• Apparently, the paragraph begins with a "this," a pronoun. Suggests you it was made by some immature who even lacks common knowledge of English language. • Then comes an uncalled term under the pressure of success of Buddhism even though I tried to change it to "following the success of Buddhism." • The comes another mention of "in response to the success of Buddhism;" seems like redundancy and bad grammar.

But, when I changed it into more appropriate language, I was called a "disruptor" and "pov edit warrior." I am letting the bullying slide but someone change the phrasing on this one. It's very unprofessional. Anant-morgan (talk) 11:09, 10 March 2024 (UTC)

 * Please refrain from personal attacks like "some immature who even lacks common knowledge of English language," and stop your pov-pushing. You changed
 * into
 * This Hindu-synthesis did not simply follow after the rise of Buddhism, it emerged under the pressure of the popularity of, and support for, Buddhism; it was a response to this popularity, which you're trying to hide.
 * Idem, the Buddha came to be regarded as an avatar of Vishnu in response to this popularity; there is a causal relation between this support for Buddhism, the pressure it put on Hinduism, and the incorporation of the Buddha into Hinduism. You're concealing this relation.
 * Joshua Jonathan -  Let's talk!  11:57, 10 March 2024 (UTC)
 * This Hindu-synthesis did not simply follow after the rise of Buddhism, it emerged under the pressure of the popularity of, and support for, Buddhism; it was a response to this popularity, which you're trying to hide.
 * Idem, the Buddha came to be regarded as an avatar of Vishnu in response to this popularity; there is a causal relation between this support for Buddhism, the pressure it put on Hinduism, and the incorporation of the Buddha into Hinduism. You're concealing this relation.
 * Joshua Jonathan -  Let's talk!  11:57, 10 March 2024 (UTC)

It's not a personal attack. It's my take against the writing that has been here for a longer time; not against its editor. PS do not shift the topic to elsewhere and read what I edited and how it was before and how little sense it made (and I'm not calling you 'senseless' just so we're cleark). Also, stop personal attacks against me by referring to me as 'another one' and 'pov warrior.' Anant-morgan (talk) 14:10, 10 March 2024 (UTC)

 * I'm not concealing amyth. I'm not even Hindu. Terms like 'under pressure' are suggesting as if it's a high school situation of stealing boyfriends. This language is starighup antagonizing Hinduism by saying it stole something. The references are all estimates and different point-of-views (I know how much you hate povs). You can't write stuff in that tone on a neutral website; at least not without adding 'allegedly.'
 * Also, now my official pov: Hinduism adapted it because they thought it was divine, happened in India, so it must be an Avatar of Vishnu. It seriously didn't need to feel any pressure from comparatively minor religions (Jainism doesn't even have anything to do with it). Hinduism wasn't particularly threatened by Buddhism (it is now though); it always saw Buddhism as its own subset. Anant-morgan (talk) 14:16, 10 March 2024 (UTC)

 * Modest suggestion: follow WP:RS, instead of WP:OR. Joshua Jonathan  -  Let's talk!  14:36, 10 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Your personal pov isn't enough to change what it says, especially if the cited reliable sources disagree with what you think it should say. Which they do, to be clear. XeCyranium (talk) 20:19, 30 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Sorry dude but I already won my case a month ago the bad grammar has been fixed. Look here what your little brains failed to see in light of cancelling me, insulting me, calling me 'another one of those destructive edit warrior'
 * The adoption of the Buddha as an incarnation began at approximately the same time as Hinduism began to predominate and Buddhism to decline in India, the co-option into a list of avatars seen to be an aspect of Hindu efforts to decisively weaken Buddhist power and appeal in India.

'As opposed to whatever crap this was: This Hindu synthesis emerged after the lifetime of the Buddha, between 500[393]–200[394] BCE and c. 300 CE,[393] under the pressure of the success of Buddhism and Jainism.[395] In response to the success of Buddhism, Gautama also came to be regarded as the 9th avatar of Vishnu.'

 * Was that so hard for you?
 * But you keep carrying on targeting people instead of seeing a platform like Wikipedia has such an immature language on The BUDDHA's page.
 * Also, I made edits yesterday, why am I blocked now for 2 years, right after your late response here? Did you do something impulsive again? Complained me or something? Better make it right then. Anant-morgan (talk) 19:22, 1 May 2024 (UTC)
 * Please refrain from personal attacks, however bizarrely worded they may be. I'm assuming you're not blocked given you posted this comment, unless you're saying an alternate account of yours was blocked and you are using this account to evade said block. XeCyranium (talk) 19:05, 2 May 2024 (UTC)
 * Looks like you just edited out one of your own personal attacks which claimed that the text I edited was still there.
 * Why is that? Were you seriously gloating on bad grammar and phrasing??? Lol. Anant-morgan (talk) 08:06, 4 May 2024 (UTC)
 * Doesn't this other source say the same thing? "Co-opted" to "weaken Buddhist power"? It suggest that Gautama was absorbed as part of a political calculus by the clergy. If anything it's stronger. Iskandar323 (talk) 09:20, 4 May 2024 (UTC)
 * I'm only discussing grammar here. I'm well aware of facts; I even added Pushyamitra Shunga as the culprit who caused this decline but that change was reverted to.
 * Don't know anymore what these elite Wikipedia editors think of themselves or want? It's like they'll reject any improvement until their little brains can't themselves come up with it a decade later. Anant-morgan (talk) 20:28, 4 May 2024 (UTC)

Lead Sentence needs to focus on "Notable" aspects
Current lead: Siddhartha Gautama, most commonly referred to as the Buddha ('the awakened'), was a wandering ascetic and religious teacher who lived in South Asia during the 6th or 5th century BCE and founded Buddhism.

Notable: I think The Buddha is not primarily notable or known for being a wandering ascetic, but rather for being a religious teacher and founder of Buddhism as per majority of WP:RS reliable sources

Giving such high priority to "wandering ascetic" seems to violates several WP guidelines

"Wandering ascetic" can be mentioned in relevant subsequent sentences.

Therefore, the lead voice needs to updated to:

Siddhartha Gautama, most commonly referred to as the Buddha ('the awakened'), was a religious teacher and founder of Buddhism who lived in South Asia during the 6th or 5th century BCE.

See similar: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socrates

RogerYg (talk) 19:56, 28 April 2024 (UTC)

 * I wonder if you understand of those policies. Regarding WP:WEIGHT, is there a majority of researchers who doubt that he was a sramana? What's the best-known story about the Buddha? His ascetic life, that is, a wanderer. And: the Buddha was a sramana; that's relevant, as is his teachings did not exist in a vacuum, but are related to the broader sramanic tradition. Furthermore, he encouraged people to follow his example, and also become sramanas.
 * How this violates WP:NOTABILITY is a mystery to me; maybe you should actually read that policy. Same for WP:RS; are there sources which dispute the fact that he was a sramana? Regards, Joshua Jonathan  -  Let's talk!  20:05, 28 April 2024 (UTC)

 * Thanks Joshua Jonathan - Let's talk! for kind response.
 * I understand that I got confused between Notable and Notability, and I would like to withdraw the '' WP:Notability argument, as Notability is more about whether a topic is important enough to be published on Wiki.
 * My main argument is regarding Wikipedia policy for First Sentence: "what is notable" for the first sentence: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Lead_section_TT_first_sentence_content
 * The article should begin with a short declarative sentence, answering two questions for the nonspecialist reader: "What (or who) is the subject?" and "Why is this subject notable?
 * You seem to have very good knowledge of Buddhism, and I respect that. I never disputed that Buddha was a wanderig ascetic. Of course, he was . But is "wandering ascetic" the top notable aspect about Buddha.
 * The answer to that is probably no. The most notable aspects are that he was a spiritual/religious teacher and the founder of Buddhism.
 * Though, I think we need to add philosopher to it
 * The next sentence can be about the wandering ascetic aspect. RogerYg (talk) 06:00, 29 April 2024 (UTC)

 * That he was a sramana, a 'wandering ascetic', is one of the most notable aspects of the Buddha; 'religious homelessness' is the essence of his vocation. "Philosopher" is tricky, and has been debated many times before. You're right that "wandering ascetic" was repeated; I've edited the lead diff to change this. Regards, Joshua Jonathan  -  Let's talk!  06:15, 29 April 2024 (UTC)

 * Dear Joshua Jonathan,
 * Many scholars have been debating on "what is the most notable aspect" of Buddha for thousands of years, and I don't think we have sources to support that there is a clear winner and "wandering ascetic" was accepted as the most notable aspect.
 * Please think of a many common Wikipedia users, who come to Wikipedia page to get a very brief information on Buddha, and are likely to get confused with "wandering ascetic" aspect and lose focus on Buddha being a religious teacher and founder of Buddhism.
 * Also, there is problem is Translation. I have myself studied Pali language, and find this translation very problemetic especially in the opening sentence. Many scholars will not agree that "wandering ascetic" is that correct translation for Śramaṇa spritual tradition /path.

 * Also, "Wandering" in English has a tone and sense of being lost, which is clearly not the meaning of "Sramana", where the focus is on spiritual goals and spiritual seeking; hence, "wandering" does not make for a good translation.

 * A better translation for Śramaṇa, used by several scholars is a "spiritual ascetic" or "spiritual seeker"

 * Several scholars also translate Śramaṇa as a "spiritual seeker"

 * So, I think good options are:

 * Siddhartha Gautama, most commonly referred to as the Buddha ('the awakened'), was a spiritual seeker, religious teacher and the founder of Buddhism who lived in South Asia during the 6th or 5th century BCE.
 * OR
 * Siddhartha Gautama, most commonly referred to as the Buddha ('the awakened'), was a spiritual ascetic, religious teacher and the founder of Buddhism who lived in South Asia during the 6th or 5th century BCE.

 * RogerYg (talk) 06:56, 29 April 2024 (UTC)

RogerYg, your entire argument is a non-starter; please read up on basic elements of Wikipedia articles such as Notability and Verifiability, two very different concepts. For one thing, WP:Notability is about topics and not about articles; that is number one. In particular, notability is a threshold which describes whether a given topic deserves to have an article or not. Once that question is answered in the affirmative, Notability has absolutely zero to do with the content or development of the article. Claiming that any given part of the article, whether the lead, or the WP:FIRSTSENTENCE or anything else has to be "notable" is just nonsense. In fact, the Notability policy specifically rejecs this notion in the Nutshell box at the top:
 * "The notability guideline does not determine the content of articles."

and then lower down there is a whole section entitled, that underlines it again in more detail. So, you can just forget about the idea that notability has anything to do with the lead sentence—it does not.

Secondly, what goes into the lead sentence is described by MOS:LEADSENTENCE (guideline), which starts out:
 * "The first sentence should introduce the topic, and tell the nonspecialist reader what or who the subject is, and often when or where."

Reasonable people can disagree reasonably about what are the most salient points to include in the lead sentence, but stating that the Buddha was a "wandering ascetic" cannot be denied, and in my view is a defining characteristic of the Buddha and his life. You may reasonably argue against it, but appealing to Notability is irrelevant. Also, the idea that "wandering" has connotations of "lost" are idiosyncratic imho; that is not what it means to most native speakers (it's more like "aimless", or "no fixed goal", but not "lost"). In conclusion, the proposal inherent in your section title "Lead Sentence needs to focus on 'Notable' aspects" is contrary both to Wikipedia's policy on WP:Notability, as well as Wikipedia's guideline on the WP:LEADSENTENCE, leaving your proposal without a leg to stand on. Mathglot (talk) 08:32, 29 April 2024 (UTC)

 * Thanks Mathglot for your insightful views. We had already discussed the confusion about Notable and Notability, and we are no longer discussing Notability, but about the Notable aspects as per Wikipedia's guideline on the WP:LEADSENTENCE. We need discuss in good failth as per WP:TALK, rather than giving one-sided conclusions. Thanks again for the discussion.
 * My main argument is regarding Wikipedia policy for First Sentence: "what is notable" for the first sentence: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Lead_section_TT_first_sentence_content
 * The article should begin with a short declarative sentence, answering two questions for the nonspecialist reader: "What (or who) is the subject?" and "Why is this subject notable?
 * I never disputed that Buddha was a wanderig ascetic. Of course, he was . But is "wandering ascetic" the top notable aspect about Buddha?
 * As Wiki editors, we need to understand that Wikipedia has broad readership, including both native and non-native English speakers, who are likely to get confused with "wandering ascetic" aspect and lose focus on Buddha being a religious teacher and founder of Buddhism.
 * Also, there is problem is Translation. I have myself studied Pali language, and find this translation very problemetic especially in the opening sentence. Many scholars will not agree that "wandering ascetic" is that correct translation for Śramaṇa spritual tradition /path.
 * As mentioned by Mathglot "wandering" to most native speakers "(it's more like "aimless", or "no fixed goal", but not "lost")."
 * As anyone, with some knowledge of "Sramana" knows, it is not at all : "aimless", or "no fixed goal"; rather, it's about a spritual pratice focussed and aiming towards spritual goals.
 * A better broader translation for Śramaṇa, used by several scholars is a "spiritual ascetic" or "spiritual seeker"
 * Several scholars also translate Śramaṇa as a "spiritual seeker"
 * So again, I think better options are:
 * Siddhartha Gautama, most commonly referred to as the Buddha ('the awakened'), was a spiritual seeker, religious teacher and the founder of Buddhism who lived in South Asia during the 6th or 5th century BCE.
 * OR
 * Siddhartha Gautama, most commonly referred to as the Buddha ('the awakened'), was a spiritual ascetic, religious teacher and the founder of Buddhism who lived in South Asia during the 6th or 5th century BCE.
 * RogerYg (talk) 09:21, 29 April 2024 (UTC)
 * RogerYg (talk) 09:21, 29 April 2024 (UTC)

 * Regarding your claim about two questions to be answered at the top:
 * The article should begin with a short declarative sentence, answering two questions for the nonspecialist reader: "What (or who) is the subject?" and "Why is this subject notable?"
 * 'Yes' to the first, and a big 'No' to the second. The article is presumed notable due to the fact that an article exists. (If you disagree that it is notable, the proper venue is WP:AFD, not the lead sentence of the article.) I presume you have not the slightest doubt about the notability of the topic, but I'm here to tell you that the lead sentence is not about demonstrating notability. I realize that you are still relatively new here; please spend some time with the policies and guidelines about these key issues. As for your other points about "Sramana" and everything else, feel free to take that up as to whether it belongs or doesn't in the lead sentence, but please just stop referring to Notability here, which plays absolutely no role in it. I find that I am repeating myself, and that means it's time for me to bow out. I'll leave you to the wonderful folks here, who may be better suited than I to deal with your other arguments about content of the lead.
 * (P.S. Your indentation is all over the place, which makes it hard to see who or what you are responding to, and which part is your message and which may be someone else. Please see WP:THREAD and follow the recommendations there.) Best, Mathglot (talk) 09:40, 29 April 2024 (UTC)

 * Comment: I'll concede that in some marginal cases the lede might be used to help address issues of relative notability. That's not an issue here, where it's clear the subject meets many criteria for inclusion. I agree with the assertions of User:Mathglot and urge User:RogerYg to find some other aspect of this article which needs improvement. I'll also agree with Mathglot that the non-standard indentation makes points harder to follow in this discussion. BusterD (talk) 12:57, 29 April 2024 (UTC)
 * @Joshua Jonathan: All of this said, I'm not sure your earlier tweak was especially beneficial. There is nothing intrinsically wrong with a few duplicate terms. The first paragraph is something of a microcosm of the rest of the lead. By contrast, tweaking the terms purely to eliminate duplication in the diction can yield pitfalls. I'm not convinced by "seeker" as a term that necessarily conveys much meaning to the lay reader. Also, "homeless" is not a word that to me conveys any of the right connotations. Homelessness is usually non-elective and quite involuntary, which is quite the opposite meaning of a vocational ascetic. I'm not even sure if it's accurate: is it fact that the former prince had no palace to go back to and call home had he so wished? Eschewing a home is not the same as not having one. Iskandar323 (talk) 16:57, 29 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Agree with Iskandar323 regarding "homeless" which was a very poor mistranslation. Thanks Joshua Jonathan: for reverting that.
 * Meanwhile, we need to discuss several more mistranslations and duplicates, including "wandering ascetic" in the lede.
 * As mentioned by Mathglot "wandering" to most native speakers : "it's more like "aimless", or "no fixed goal", which is not the correct tone & translation for Śramaṇa
 * RogerYg (talk) 08:59, 30 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Since "wandering ascetic" is mentioned in the second sentence, there is no need to duplicate it in the first sentence, especially as we have noted issues about mistranslation and notable aspects.
 * Therefore, based on the points discussed, a good option for the lede can be:
 * Siddhartha Gautama, most commonly referred to as the Buddha ('the awakened'), was a religious teacher and the founder of Buddhism who lived in South Asia during the 6th or 5th century BCE. RogerYg (talk) 09:05, 30 April 2024 (UTC)
 * While you or anyone is welcome to propose improvements to the WP:LEADSENTENCE as well as to any part of the article, please be aware of WP:LEADFOLLOWSBODY, and of the fact that it is a common newbie conceit to head straight for the lead sentence to propose changes, and to ignore pretty much everything else. The article has approximately 12,000 words, and the WP:LEADSENTENCE has eleven words, so, 1/1000th of the article. Given the number of words expended already in this discussion section, that seems highly disproportionate to me.
 * Secondly: you have mentioned "the correct tone & translation for Śramaṇa", but this is English Wikipedia, and it is not our role to discuss what is the "correct" translation for this or that term from another language. Rather, we rely on what the reliable sources *in English* have to say about this point, and we do not substitute our own opinions about this for what the sources say. If you wish to discuss the meaning of Śramaṇa, please confine your comments to what reliable English sources have to say about this; it is not up for debate among Wikipedia editors to opine about this based on private study or knowledge. If you wish to expound on the topic based on your own knowledge about the topic, please write it up and publish it at Medium or Substack, but not at Wikipedia. Thanks, Mathglot (talk) 10:38, 30 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Thanks Mathglot for the informative comments. I agree with most of your suggestions such as we should discuss the meaning of Śramaṇa, mainly from reliable English sources and editors should avoid "our own opinions about this ".
 * RogerYg (talk) 06:16, 2 May 2024 (UTC)
 * I'd like to propose a slight modification of the lead actually, and add the name "Śākyamuni." I believe it's fair to include this title, as it is a very common name for Gautama Buddha, used primarily in Mahayana tradition and by Buddhists of East Asian heritage. So the lead would read something like:
 * Siddhartha Gautama, commonly known as Śākyamuni or most commonly as simply the Buddha ('the awakened'), ...
 * I'm open to suggestions on how to better word this or if it should be placed in another section of the lead. Invokingvajras (talk) 16:20, 20 May 2024 (UTC)

parinirvana translation
Parinirvana is a complex concept in Buddhism. In the first paragraph, it has been translated as "Complete extinction", without sufficient sources to support such translation.

I note that 1 source, The Buddha: A Beginner's guide by John Strong, which is more like "Buddhism for Dummies" translates parinirvana as "Complete extinction"

But, more respected sources, such as Gethin, Rupert (1998), Foundations of Buddhism, Oxford University Press

mentions parinirvana as "physical and mental phenomena that constitute a being cease to occur."

"Modern Buddhist usage tends to restrict 'nirvāṇa' to the awakening experience and reserve 'parinirvāṇa' for the death experience."

Guang Xing, The Concept of the Buddha: Its Evolution from Early Buddhism to the Trikaya, RoutledgeCurzon, Oxford, 2005, p. 89

notes the Mahayanists of the Nirvana Sutra understand the "mahaparinirvana to be the liberated Self of the eternal Buddha"

"One of the main themes of the MMPS [Mahayana Mahaparinirvana Sutra] is that the Buddha is eternal ... The Mahayanists assert the eternity of the Buddha in two ways in the MMPS. They state that the Buddha is the dharmakaya, and hence eternal. Next, they reinterpret the liberation of the Buddha as mahaparinirvana possessing four attributes: eternity, happiness, self and purity.

Only in Mahaparinirvana is this True Self held to be fully discernible and accessible"

Further, Sager Qu in his book, Lord Buddha: The Universal Emperor by Sager Qu

translates parinirvana as "the final deathless state"

Based on these sources, better translation will be ""final liberation" or "final liberation from being" or "the final deathless state"

RogerYg (talk) 07:20, 2 May 2024 (UTC)

 * Based on the sources, such as Guang Xing, Gethin, and Paul Williams, the more appropriate & brief translation from the sources is "eternal liberation"
 * Guang Xing,  The Concept of the Buddha: Its Evolution from Early Buddhism to the Trikaya , RoutledgeCurzon, Oxford, 2005, p. 89 "They state that the Buddha is the  dharmakaya  , and hence eternal. Next, they reinterpret the liberation of the Buddha as mahaparinirvana  possessing four attributes: eternity, happiness, self and purity."
 * RogerYg (talk) 05:19, 7 May 2024 (UTC)
 * With more emphasis on widely accepted Gethin source, more appropriate is "final liberation", instead of "eternal liberation", eternal concept is primarily from some Mahayana sources RogerYg (talk) 06:24, 7 May 2024 (UTC)
 * With more emphasis on widely accepted Gethin source, more appropriate is "final liberation", instead of "eternal liberation", eternal concept is primarily from some Mahayana sources RogerYg (talk) 06:24, 7 May 2024 (UTC)

 * I think tou put too much emphais on one specific Mahayana understanding. This edit unclear; it added:
 * Gethin (1998)(The Foundations of Buddhism) p.76 does not state something akin to "widely considered," nor does he use the term "state" ("state" is an eternalist stance...). Gethin also doesn't state that "the five aggregates of physical and mental phenomena" are reborn. What Gethin doe state is that "Instead of being reborn, the person 'parinirvana-s', meaning in this context that the five aggregates of physical and mental phenomena that constitute a being cease to occur"; the aggregates don't occur again.
 * Eternal bliss: Gethin (1989) p.98-99 does not mention the Mahāyāna Mahāparinirvāṇa Sūtra.
 * Guang Xing does not refer to "mahayanists," but to the Mahayana Mahaparinirvana Sutra.
 * Note that the section where you added this is about the Buddha's (sipoosed) biography, not Mahayana Buddhism or the essentialist tendencies of the Mahayana Mahaparinirvana Sutra, on which Gethin has very things to say. "Eternal liberation" is certainly not an appropriate translation, as it is specific for only one text, not for all of Mahayana Buddhism, even less for Theravada. "Final liberation" is better. Joshua Jonathan  -  Let's talk!  06:50, 7 May 2024 (UTC)
 * Okay, thanks, lets keep final liberation, instead of final nirvana, to avoid being tautological with nirvana, and for better WP:Readability.
 * Further, the additions were in the parinirvana section, and we can debate later, whether they are better placed in the Mahayana section. Also, regarding "widely considered,", I meant in general Gethin (1998)(The Foundations of Buddhism) is a widely accepted source, while I agree Guang Xing is a specific Mahayana interpretation. RogerYg (talk) 07:28, 7 May 2024 (UTC)
 * Since no one has provided any objection or arguments against final liberation, and the changing final nirvana, is need to avoid being tautological with nirvana, and for better WP:Readability, therefore this change is made. RogerYg (talk) 02:55, 18 May 2024 (UTC)
 * Further, the additions were in the parinirvana section, and we can debate later, whether they are better placed in the Mahayana section. Also, regarding "widely considered,", I meant in general Gethin (1998)(The Foundations of Buddhism) is a widely accepted source, while I agree Guang Xing is a specific Mahayana interpretation. RogerYg (talk) 07:28, 7 May 2024 (UTC)
 * Since no one has provided any objection or arguments against final liberation, and the changing final nirvana, is need to avoid being tautological with nirvana, and for better WP:Readability, therefore this change is made. RogerYg (talk) 02:55, 18 May 2024 (UTC)

 * Buswell & Lopez (2014), The Princeton Dictionary of Buddhism, p.1544:

 * Bikkhu Bodhi, The Connected Discourses of the Buddha: A New Translation of the Samyutta Nikaya, p.51:

And.... K. R. Norman (2005), A philological approach to Buddhism, p.14, explains that, while the term is used in connection to the Buddha's death, it is also used for living arahats, and therefor cannot mean "final nirvana." What it should be, them does he not explain, unfortunately... Note that Gethin also explains that parinirvana is kind of a verb: " the person 'parinirvāṇa-s'." Joshua Jonathan -  Let's talk!  09:42, 18 May 2024 (UTC)

 * Okay, I agree "final release from conditioned existence" is a reasonably good translation, supported by relevant sources. Thanks. RogerYg (talk) 20:53, 19 May 2024 (UTC)

Origin of Name Josaphat (The Buddha in Christianity)
Though Josaphat may be a character inspired by Buddha, I think it would be wrong to derive Josaphat from Bodhisattva. I have already studied about this name in the Septuagint (Josaphat happens to be a name of one of the kings of Israel), and I believe it is correct to say it derived from Yeho-shafat, clearly meaning "Yah(weh) has Judged".

Pax. 49.205.211.162 (talk) 18:39, 15 May 2024 (UTC)

 * Please provide the sources for your statement, such as article, or book and Page number. I think it is mentioned that some sources consider Josaphat may be a character inspired by Buddha. A definite claim is not being made here. Thanks RogerYg (talk) 03:16, 18 May 2024 (UTC)

Capitalization in Lead
In the third paragraph, "his teachings" should be changed to "His teachings" because "His" is the first word in the sentence. Cordially, BuzzWeiser196 (talk) 12:45, 14 July 2024 (UTC)
 * Done; thanks. Joshua Jonathan  -  Let's talk!  13:43, 14 July 2024 (UTC)

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: Talk:The Buddha


text:
Bridge

A bridge is a structure built to span a physical obstacle (such as a body of water, valley, road, or railway) without blocking the path underneath. It is constructed for the purpose of providing passage over the obstacle, which is usually something that is otherwise difficult or impossible to cross. There are many different designs of bridges, each serving a particular purpose and applicable to different situations. Designs of bridges vary depending on factors such as the function of the bridge, the nature of the terrain where the bridge is constructed and anchored, the material used to make it, and the funds available to build it.

The earliest bridges were likely made with fallen trees and stepping stones. The Neolithic people built boardwalk bridges across marshland. The Arkadiko Bridge, dating from the 13th century BC, in the Peloponnese is one of the oldest arch bridges in existence and used.

Etymology
The Oxford English Dictionary traces the origin of the word bridge to an Old English word brycg, of the same meaning.

The Oxford English Dictionary also notes that there is some suggestion that the word can be traced directly back to Proto-Indo-European *bʰrēw-. However, they also note that "this poses semantic problems."

The origin of the word for the card game of the same name is unknown.

History

The simplest and earliest types of bridges were stepping stones.

Neolithic people also built a form of boardwalk across marshes; examples of such bridges include the Sweet Track and the Post Track in England, approximately 6000 years old. Ancient people would also have used log bridges consisting of logs that fell naturally or were intentionally felled or placed across streams. Some of the first human-made bridges with significant span were probably intentionally felled trees. Among the oldest timber bridges is the Holzbrücke Rapperswil-Hurden bridge that crossed upper Lake Zürich in Switzerland; prehistoric timber pilings discovered to the west of the Seedamm causeway date back to 1523 BC. The first wooden footbridge there led across Lake Zürich; it was reconstructed several times through the late 2nd century AD, when the Roman Empire built a 6 m wooden bridge to carry transport across the lake. Between 1358 and 1360, Rudolf IV, Duke of Austria, built a 'new' wooden bridge across the lake that was used until 1878; it was approximately 1450 m long and 4 m wide. On April 6, 2001, a reconstruction of the original wooden footbridge was opened; it is also the longest wooden bridge in Switzerland.

The Arkadiko Bridge is one of four Mycenaean corbel arch bridges part of a former network of roads, designed to accommodate chariots, between the fort of Tiryns and town of Epidauros in the Peloponnese, in southern Greece. Dating to the Greek Bronze Age (13th century BC), it is one of the oldest arch bridges still in existence and use. Several intact ,arched stone bridges from the Hellenistic era can be found in the Peloponnese.

The greatest bridge builders of antiquity were the ancient Romans. The Romans built arch bridges and aqueducts that could stand in conditions that would damage or destroy earlier designs. Some stand today. An example is the Alcántara Bridge, built over the river Tagus, in Spain. The Romans also used cement, which reduced the variation of strength found in natural stone. One type of cement, called pozzolana, consisted of water, lime, sand, and volcanic rock. Brick and mortar bridges were built after the Roman era, as the technology for cement was lost (then later rediscovered).

In India, the Arthashastra treatise by Kautilya mentions the construction of dams and bridges. A Mauryan bridge near Girnar was surveyed by James Princep. The bridge was swept away during a flood, and later repaired by Puspagupta, the chief architect of emperor Chandragupta I. The use of stronger bridges using plaited bamboo and iron chain was visible in India by about the 4th century. A number of bridges, both for military and commercial purposes, were constructed by the Mughal administration in India.

Although large bridges of wooden construction existed in China at the time of the Warring States period, the oldest surviving stone bridge in China is the Zhaozhou Bridge, built from 595 to 605 AD during the Sui dynasty. This bridge is also historically significant as it is the world's oldest open-spandrel stone segmental arch bridge. European segmental arch bridges date back to at least the Alconétar Bridge (approximately 2nd century AD), while the enormous Roman era Trajan's Bridge (105 AD) featured open-spandrel segmental arches in wooden construction.

Rope bridges, a simple type of suspension bridge, were used by the Inca civilization in the Andes mountains of South America, just prior to European colonization in the 16th century.

The Ashanti built bridges over streams and rivers. They were constructed by pounding four large forked tree trunks into the stream bed, placing beams along these forked pillars, then positioning cross-beams that were finally covered with four to six inches of dirt.

During the 18th century, there were many innovations in the design of timber bridges by Hans Ulrich Grubenmann, Johannes Grubenmann, as well as others. The first book on bridge engineering was written by Hubert Gautier in 1716.

A major breakthrough in bridge technology came with the erection of the Iron Bridge in Shropshire, England in 1779. It used cast iron for the first time as arches to cross the river Severn. With the Industrial Revolution in the 19th century, truss systems of wrought iron were developed for larger bridges, but iron does not have the tensile strength to support large loads. With the advent of steel, which has a high tensile strength, much larger bridges were built, many using the ideas of Gustave Eiffel.

In Canada and the United States, numerous timber covered bridges were built in the late 1700s to the late 1800s, reminiscent of earlier designs in Germany and Switzerland. Some covered bridges were also built in Asia. In later years, some were partly made of stone or metal but the trusses were usually still made of wood; in the United States, there were three styles of trusses, the Queen Post, the Burr Arch and the Town Lattice. Hundreds of these structures still stand in North America. They were brought to the attention of the general public in the 1990s by the novel, movie and play The Bridges of Madison County.

In 1927, welding pioneer Stefan Bryła designed the first welded road bridge in the world, the Maurzyce Bridge which was later built across the river Słudwia at Maurzyce near Łowicz, Poland in 1929. In 1995, the American Welding Society presented the Historic Welded Structure Award for the bridge to Poland.

Types of bridges
Bridges can be categorized in several different ways. Common categories include the type of structural elements used, by what they carry, whether they are fixed or movable, and by the materials used.

Structure types
Bridges may be classified by how the actions of tension, compression, bending, torsion and shear are distributed through their structure. Most bridges will employ all of these to some degree, but only a few will predominate. The separation of forces and moments may be quite clear. In a suspension or cable-stayed bridge, the elements in tension are distinct in shape and placement. In other cases the forces may be distributed among a large number of members, as in a truss.

Some Engineers sub-divide 'beam' bridges into slab, beam-and-slab and box girder on the basis of their cross-section. A slab can be solid or voided (though this is no longer favored for inspectability reasons) while beam-and-slab consists of concrete or steel girders connected by a concrete slab. A box-girder cross-section consists of a single-cell or multi-cellular box. In recent years, integral bridge construction has also become popular.

Fixed or movable bridges
Most bridges are fixed bridges, meaning they have no moving parts and stay in one place until they fail or are demolished. Temporary bridges, such as Bailey bridges, are designed to be assembled, taken apart, transported to a different site, and re-used. They are important in military engineering and are also used to carry traffic while an old bridge is being rebuilt. Movable bridges are designed to move out of the way of boats or other kinds of traffic, which would otherwise be too tall to fit. These are generally electrically powered.

The Tank bridge transporter (TBT) has the same cross-country performance as a tank even when fully loaded. It can deploy, drop off and load bridges independently, but it cannot recover them.

Double-decked bridges

Double-decked (or double-decker) bridges have two levels, such as the George Washington Bridge, connecting New York City to Bergen County, New Jersey, US, as the world's busiest bridge, carrying 102 million vehicles annually; truss work between the roadway levels provided stiffness to the roadways and reduced movement of the upper level when the lower level was installed three decades after the upper level. The Tsing Ma Bridge and Kap Shui Mun Bridge in Hong Kong have six lanes on their upper decks, and on their lower decks there are two lanes and a pair of tracks for MTR metro trains. Some double-decked bridges only use one level for street traffic; the Washington Avenue Bridge in Minneapolis reserves its lower level for automobile and light rail traffic and its upper level for pedestrian and bicycle traffic (predominantly students at the University of Minnesota). Likewise, in Toronto, the Prince Edward Viaduct has five lanes of motor traffic, bicycle lanes, and sidewalks on its upper deck; and a pair of tracks for the Bloor–Danforth subway line on its lower deck. The western span of the San Francisco–Oakland Bay Bridge also has two levels.

Robert Stephenson's High Level Bridge across the River Tyne in Newcastle upon Tyne, completed in 1849, is an early example of a double-decked bridge. The upper level carries a railway, and the lower level is used for road traffic. Other examples include Britannia Bridge over the Menai Strait and Craigavon Bridge in Derry, Northern Ireland. The Oresund Bridge between Copenhagen and Malmö consists of a four-lane highway on the upper level and a pair of railway tracks at the lower level. Tower Bridge in London is different example of a double-decked bridge, with the central section consisting of a low-level bascule span and a high-level footbridge.

Viaducts
A viaduct is made up of multiple bridges connected into one longer structure. The longest and some of the highest bridges are viaducts, such as the Lake Pontchartrain Causeway and Millau Viaduct.

Multi-way bridge
A multi-way bridge has three or more separate spans which meet near the center of the bridge. Multi-way bridges with only three spans appear as a "T" or "Y" when viewed from above. Multi-way bridges are extremely rare. The Tridge, Margaret Bridge, and Zanesville Y-Bridge are examples.

Bridge types by use
A bridge can be categorized by what it is designed to carry, such as trains, pedestrian or road traffic (road bridge), a pipeline (Pipe bridge) or waterway for water transport or barge traffic. An aqueduct is a bridge that carries water, resembling a viaduct, which is a bridge that connects points of equal height. A road-rail bridge carries both road and rail traffic. Overway is a term for a bridge that separates incompatible intersecting traffic, especially road and rail.

Some bridges accommodate other purposes, such as the tower of Nový Most Bridge in Bratislava, which features a restaurant, or a bridge-restaurant which is a bridge built to serve as a restaurant. Other suspension bridge towers carry transmission antennas.

Conservationists use wildlife overpasses to reduce habitat fragmentation and animal-vehicle collisions. The first animal bridges sprung up in France in the 1950s, and these types of bridges are now used worldwide to protect both large and small wildlife.

Bridges are subject to unplanned uses as well. The areas underneath some bridges have become makeshift shelters and homes to homeless people, and the undertimbers of bridges all around the world are spots of prevalent graffiti. Some bridges attract people attempting suicide, and become known as suicide bridges.

Bridge types by material
The materials used to build the structure are also used to categorize bridges. Until the end of the 18th century, bridges were made out of timber, stone and masonry. Modern bridges are currently built in concrete, steel, fiber reinforced polymers (FRP), stainless steel or combinations of those materials. Living bridges have been constructed of live plants such as Ficus elastica tree roots in India and wisteria vines in Japan.

Analysis and design
Unlike buildings whose design is led by architects, bridges are usually designed by engineers. This follows from the importance of the engineering requirements; namely spanning the obstacle and having the durability to survive, with minimal maintenance, in an aggressive outdoor environment. Bridges are first analysed; the bending moment and shear force distributions are calculated due to the applied loads. For this, the finite element method is the most popular. The analysis can be one-, two-, or three-dimensional. For the majority of bridges, a two-dimensional plate model (often with stiffening beams) is sufficient or an upstand finite element model. On completion of the analysis, the bridge is designed to resist the applied bending moments and shear forces, section sizes are selected with sufficient capacity to resist the stresses. Many bridges are made of prestressed concrete which has good durability properties, either by pre-tensioning of beams prior to installation or post-tensioning on site.

In most countries, bridges, like other structures, are designed according to Load and Resistance Factor Design (LRFD) principles. In simple terms, this means that the load is factored up by a factor greater than unity, while the resistance or capacity of the structure is factored down, by a factor less than unity. The effect of the factored load (stress, bending moment) should be less than the factored resistance to that effect. Both of these factors allow for uncertainty and are greater when the uncertainty is greater.

Aesthetics
Most bridges are utilitarian in appearance, but in some cases, the appearance of the bridge can have great importance. Often, this is the case with a large bridge that serves as an entrance to a city, or crosses over a main harbor entrance. These are sometimes known as signature bridges. Designers of bridges in parks and along parkways often place more importance on aesthetics, as well. Examples include the stone-faced bridges along the Taconic State Parkway in New York.

Bridges are typically more aesthetically pleasing if they are simple in shape, the deck is thinner in proportion to its span, the lines of the structure are continuous, and the shapes of the structural elements reflect the forces acting on them. To create a beautiful image, some bridges are built much taller than necessary. This type, often found in east-Asian style gardens, is called a Moon bridge, evoking a rising full moon. Other garden bridges may cross only a dry bed of stream-washed pebbles, intended only to convey an impression of a stream. Often in palaces, a bridge will be built over an artificial waterway as symbolic of a passage to an important place or state of mind. A set of five bridges cross a sinuous waterway in an important courtyard of the Forbidden City in Beijing, China. The central bridge was reserved exclusively for the use of the Emperor and Empress, with their attendants.

Bridge maintenance
The estimated life of bridges varies between 25 and 80 years depending on location and material.

Bridges may age hundred years with proper maintenance and rehabilitation. Bridge maintenance consisting of a combination of structural health monitoring and testing. This is regulated in country-specific engineer standards and includes an ongoing monitoring every three to six months, a simple test or inspection every two to three years and a major inspection every six to ten years. In Europe, the cost of maintenance is considerable and is higher in some countries than spending on new bridges. The lifetime of welded steel bridges can be significantly extended by aftertreatment of the weld transitions. This results in a potential high benefit, using existing bridges far beyond the planned lifetime.

Bridge traffic loading
While the response of a bridge to the applied loading is well understood, the applied traffic loading itself is still the subject of research. This is a statistical problem as loading is highly variable, particularly for road bridges. Load Effects in bridges (stresses, bending moments) are designed for using the principles of Load and Resistance Factor Design. Before factoring to allow for uncertainty, the load effect is generally considered to be the maximum characteristic value in a specified return period. Notably, in Europe, it is the maximum value expected in 1000 years.

Bridge standards generally include a load model, deemed to represent the characteristic maximum load to be expected in the return period. In the past, these load models were agreed by standard drafting committees of experts but today, this situation is changing. It is now possible to measure the components of bridge traffic load, to weigh trucks, using weigh-in-motion (WIM) technologies. With extensive WIM databases, it is possible to calculate the maximum expected load effect in the specified return period. This is an active area of research, addressing issues of opposing direction lanes, side-by-side (same direction) lanes,  traffic growth, permit/non-permit vehicles and long-span bridges (see below). Rather than repeat this complex process every time a bridge is to be designed, standards authorities specify simplified notional load models, notably HL-93, intended to give the same load effects as the characteristic maximum values. The Eurocode is an example of a standard for bridge traffic loading that was developed in this way.

Traffic loading on long span bridges
Most bridge standards are only applicable for short and medium spans - for example, the Eurocode is only applicable for loaded lengths up to 200 m. Longer spans are dealt with on a case-by-case basis. It is generally accepted that the intensity of load reduces as span increases because the probability of many trucks being closely spaced and extremely heavy reduces as the number of trucks involved increases. It is also generally assumed that short spans are governed by a small number of trucks traveling at high speed, with an allowance for dynamics. Longer spans on the other hand, are governed by congested traffic and no allowance for dynamics is needed.

Calculating the loading due to congested traffic remains a challenge as there is a paucity of data on inter-vehicle gaps, both within-lane and inter-lane, in congested conditions. Weigh-in-Motion (WIM) systems provide data on inter-vehicle gaps but only operate well in free flowing traffic conditions. Some authors have used cameras to measure gaps and vehicle lengths in jammed situations and have inferred weights from lengths using WIM data. Others have used microsimulation to generate typical clusters of vehicles on the bridge.

Bridge vibration
Bridges vibrate under load and this contributes, to a greater or lesser extent, to the stresses. Vibration and dynamics are generally more significant for slender structures such as pedestrian bridges and long-span road or rail bridges. One of the most famous examples is the Tacoma Narrows Bridge that collapsed shortly after being constructed due to excessive vibration. More recently, the Millennium Bridge in London vibrated excessively under pedestrian loading and was closed and retrofitted with a system of dampers. For smaller bridges, dynamics is not catastrophic but can contribute an added amplification to the stresses due to static effects. For example, the Eurocode for bridge loading specifies amplifications of between 10% and 70%, depending on the span, the number of traffic lanes and the type of stress (bending moment or shear force).

Vehicle-bridge dynamic interaction
There have been many studies of the dynamic interaction between vehicles and bridges during vehicle crossing events. Fryba did pioneering work on the interaction of a moving load and an Euler-Bernoulli beam. With increased computing power, vehicle-bridge interaction (VBI) models have become ever more sophisticated. The concern is that one of the many natural frequencies associated with the vehicle will resonate with the bridge's first natural frequency. The vehicle-related frequencies include body bounce and axle hop but there are also pseudo-frequencies associated with the vehicle's speed of crossing and there are many frequencies associated with the surface profile. Given the wide variety of heavy vehicles on road bridges, a statistical approach has been suggested, with VBI analyses carried out for many statically extreme loading events.

Bridge failures
The failure of bridges is of special concern for structural engineers in trying to learn lessons vital to bridge design, construction and maintenance.

The failure of bridges first assumed national interest in Britain during the Victorian era when many new designs were being built, often using new materials, with some of them failing catastrophically.

In the United States, the National Bridge Inventory tracks the structural evaluations of all bridges, including designations such as "structurally deficient" and "functionally obsolete".

Bridge health monitoring
There are several methods used to monitor the condition of large structures, like bridges. Many long-span bridges are now routinely monitored with a range of sensors, including strain transducers, accelerometers, tiltmeters, and GPS. Accelerometers have the advantage that they are inertial, i.e., they do not require a reference point to measure from. This is often a problem for distance or deflection measurement, especially if the bridge is over water. Crowdsourcing bridge conditions by accessing data passively captured by cell phones, which routinely include accelerometers and GPS sensors, has been suggested as an alternative to including sensors during bridge construction and an augment for professional examinations.

An option for structural-integrity monitoring is "non-contact monitoring", which uses the Doppler effect (Doppler shift). A laser beam from a Laser Doppler Vibrometer is directed at the point of interest, and the vibration amplitude and frequency are extracted from the Doppler shift of the laser beam frequency due to the motion of the surface. The advantage of this method is that the setup time for the equipment is faster and, unlike an accelerometer, this makes measurements possible on multiple structures in as short a time as possible. Additionally, this method can measure specific points on a bridge that might be difficult to access. However, vibrometers are relatively expensive and have the disadvantage that a reference point is needed to measure from.

Snapshots in time of the external condition of a bridge can be recorded using Lidar to aid bridge inspection. This can provide measurement of the bridge geometry (to facilitate the building of a computer model) but the accuracy is generally insufficient to measure bridge deflections under load.

While larger modern bridges are routinely monitored electronically, smaller bridges are generally inspected visually by trained inspectors. There is considerable research interest in the challenge of smaller bridges as they are often remote and do not have electrical power on site. Possible solutions are the installation of sensors on a specialist inspection vehicle and the use of its measurements as it drives over the bridge to infer information about the bridge condition. These vehicles can be equipped with accelerometers, gyrometers, Laser Doppler Vibrometers and some even have the capability to apply a resonant force to the road surface in order to dynamically excite the bridge at its resonant frequency.

title: Bridge


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Beadwork

Beadwork is the art or craft of attaching beads to one another by stringing them onto a thread or thin wire with a sewing or beading needle or sewing them to cloth. Beads are produced in a diverse range of materials, shapes, and sizes, and vary by the kind of art produced. Most often, beadwork is a form of personal adornment (e.g. jewelry), but it also commonly makes up other artworks.

Beadwork techniques are broadly divided into several categories, including loom and off-loom weaving, stringing, bead embroidery, bead crochet, bead knitting, and bead tatting.

Ancient beading
The art of creating and utilizing beads is ancient, and ostrich shell beads discovered in Africa can be carbon-dated to 10,000 BC. Faience beads, a type of ceramic created by mixing powdered clays, lime, soda, and silica sand with water until a paste forms, then molding it around a stick or straw and firing until hard, were notably used in ancient Egyptian jewelry from the First Dynasty (beginning in the early Bronze Age) onward. Faience and other ceramic beads with vitrified quartz coatings predate pure glass beads.

Beads and work created with them were found near-ubiquitously across the ancient world, often made of locally available materials. For example, the Athabaskan peoples of Alaska used tusk shells (scaphopod mollusks), which are naturally hollow, as beads and incorporated them into elaborate jewelry.

Beadwork has historically been used for religious purposes, as good luck talismans, for barter and trade, and for ritual exchange.

Modern beading
Today, beadwork is commonly practiced by jewelers, hobbyists, and contemporary artists; artists known for using beadwork as a medium include Liza Lou, Ran Hwang, Hew Locke, Jeffery Gibson, and Joyce J. Scott.

Some ancient stitches have become especially popular among contemporary artists. The off-loom peyote stitch, for example, is used in Native American Church members' beadwork.

Jewelry made of beads was widespread and fashionable in Western Ukraine, which was connected with the familiarity of Ukrainian artists with the artistic achievements of the countries of Western Europe, where from the 18th century. There was a fashion for artistic products made of beads. Modern ukrainian beadwork includes: beaded clothing, collars, bracelets, necklaces, necklaces-gerdanes, clothing accessories, and household items such as pysanka.

Europe
Beadwork in Europe, much like in Egypt and the Americas, can be traced to the use of bone and shell as adornments amongst early modern humans. As glassmaking increased in popularity through the Middle Ages, glass beads began to appear extensively in bead embroidery, beaded necklaces, and similar wares.

In Northern Russia, the Kokoshnik headdress typically includes river pearl netting around the forehead in addition to traditional bead embroidery.

By 1291, artists in Murano, Italy had begun production of intricate glass Murano beads inspired by Venetian glassware. With the advent of lampwork glass, Europeans started producing seed beads for embroidery, crochet, and other, mostly off-loom techniques. Czech seed beads are among the most popular contemporary bead styles.

One technique of European beadwork is beaded "immortal" flowers. The technique's origins, though indistinct, are generally agreed to range at least several centuries back, as far back as at least the 16th if not 14th century. Two mayor styles were developed: French beading, in which the wire only goes through each bead once and the wires are arranged vertically, and Victorian (also called English or Russian) beading, in which the wires go through each bead twice and are arranged horizontally. In the late 19th and early 20th century, the beaded flowers were used to create long lasting funeral wreaths, called immortelles (French for "immortals"). In the mid-20th century, the art was introduced to United States with sales of flower beading kits. In 1960s to 1970s, books by emerging beaded flower designers emerged. In the 1990s and 2000s, there was another revival of interest in the craft, exemplified for example by the funeral wreaths made to commemorate victims of the September 11 attacks.

Ukrainian masters develop exclusively national motifs in their bead collections. Beaded artworks include clothing ensembles, clothing accessories, priestly clothing decorations, and household items. At the beginning of the 20th century embroidery workshops were created on the territory of Galicia and Bukovyna, where, along with weaving and embroidery, jewelry from beads was made. Contemporary beadwork includes: beaded clothing, collars, bracelets, necklaces, clothing accessories like handbags and purses.

North America
Native American beadwork, already established via the use of materials like shells, dendrite, claws, and bone, evolved to incorporate glass beads as Europeans brought them to the Americas beginning in the early 17th century.

Native beadwork today heavily utilizes small glass beads, but artists also continue to use traditionally important materials. Wampum shells, for instance, are ceremonially and politically important to a range of Eastern Woodlands tribes, and are used to depict important events.

Several Native American artists from a wide range of nations are considered to be at the forefront of modern American bead working. These artists include Teri Greeves (Kiowa, known for beaded commentaries on Native voting rights), Marcus Amerman (Choctaw, known for realistic beaded portraits of historical figures and celebrities), and Jamie Okuma (Luiseño-Shoshone-Bannock, known for beaded dolls).

Great Lakes tribes
Ursuline nuns in the Great Lakes introduced floral patterns to young Indigenous women, who quickly applied them to beadwork. Ojibwe women in the area created ornately decorated shoulder bags known as gashkibidaagan (bandolier bags).

Eastern Woodlands tribes
Innu, Mi'kmaq, Penobscot, and Haudenosaunee peoples developed, and are known for, beading symmetrical scroll motifs, most often in white beads. Tribes of the Iroqouis Confederacy practice raised beading, where threads are pulled taut to force beads into a bas-relief, which creates a three-dimensional effect.

Southeastern tribes
Southeastern tribes pioneered a beadwork style that features images with white outlines, a visual reference to the shells and pearls coastal Southeasterners used pre-contact. This style was nearly lost during the Trail of Tears, as many beadworkers died during their forced removal to Indian Territory west of the Mississippi River. Roger Amerman (Choctaw, brother of Marcus Amerman) and Martha Berry (Cherokee) have effectively revived the style, however.

Sierra Madre tribes
Huichol communities in the Mexican states of Jalisco and Nayarit uniquely attach their beads to objects and surfaces via the use of a resin-beeswax mixture (in lieu of wire or waxed thread).

Métis Nation
Métis were known as the Flower Beadwork People by the Cree and Dene because of their culture of colourful floral beadwork and embroidery. During the early 19th century, European and Euro-North American observers and travelers frequently noted the intricate beadwork adorning Métis clothing. This beadwork, particularly floral patterns, has evolved into one of the most recognizable symbols of Métis culture. Métis artisans employed First Nations beadwork techniques along with floral designs influenced by French-Canadian nuns in Roman Catholic missions. By the 1830s, vibrant and lifelike floral motifs dominated Métis creations from the Red River region. Beadwork adorned nearly every traditional Métis garment, from moccasins to coats, belts to bags. The practice of beadwork became a vital economic activity for Métis women and families, spanning generations and providing both personal and commercial expression. Métis organizations like the Louis Riel Institute and the Gabriel Dumont Institute actively promote and preserve traditional beading through workshops and resources, ensuring its continuation within the community.

Africa
Several African nations outside of Egypt have beadwork traditions. Aggry (also spelled aggri or aggrey) beads, a type of decorated glass bead, are used by Ghanaians and other West Africans to make necklaces and bracelets that may be traded for other goods. These beads are often believed to have magical medicinal of fertility powers. In Mauritania, powder-glass Kiffa beads represent a beading tradition that may date as far back as 1200 CE; a group of women have been revitalizing the craft after the last traditional Kiffa artisans died in the 1970s. Cameroonian women are known for crafting wooden sculptures covered in beadwork.

title: Beadwork


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Board game

Board games are tabletop games that typically use. These pieces are moved or placed on a pre-marked game board (playing surface) and often include elements of table, card, role-playing, and miniatures games as well.

Many board games feature a competition between two or more players. To show a few examples: in checkers (British English name 'draughts'), a player wins by capturing all opposing pieces, while Eurogames often end with a calculation of final scores. Pandemic is a cooperative game where players all win or lose as a team, and peg solitaire is a puzzle for one person.

There are many varieties of board games. Their representation of real-life situations can range from having no inherent theme, such as checkers, to having a specific theme and narrative, such as Cluedo. Rules can range from the very simple, such as in snakes and ladders; to deeply complex, as in Advanced Squad Leader. Play components now often include custom figures or shaped counters, and distinctively shaped player pieces commonly known as meeples as well as traditional cards and dice.

The time required to learn or master varies greatly from game to game, but is not necessarily related to the number or complexity of rules; for example, chess or Go possess relatively simple  but have great strategic depth.

Ancient
Classical board games are divided into four categories: race games (such as pachisi), space games (such as noughts and crosses), chase games (such as hnefatafl), and games of displacement (such as chess).

Board games have been played, traveled, and evolved in most cultures and societies throughout history. Several important historical sites, artifacts, and documents shed light on early board games such as Jiroft civilization game boards in Iran. Senet, found in Predynastic and First Dynasty burials of Egypt, c. 3500 BC and 3100 BC respectively, is the oldest board game known to have existed. Senet was pictured in a fresco painting found in Merknera's tomb (3300–2700 BC). Also from predynastic Egypt is mehen.

Hounds and jackals, another ancient Egyptian board game, appeared around 2000 BC. The first complete set of this game was discovered from a Theban tomb that dates to the 13th dynasty. This game was also popular in Mesopotamia and the Caucasus.

Backgammon originated in ancient Mesopotamia about 5,000 years ago. Ashtapada, chess, pachisi and chaupar originated in India. Go and liubo originated in China. Patolli originated in Mesoamerica played by the ancient Aztecs and the royal game of Ur was found in the royal tombs of Ur, dating to Mesopotamia 4,600 years ago.

European
Board games have a long tradition in Europe. The oldest records of board gaming in Europe date back to Homer's Iliad (written in the 8th century BC), in which he mentions the Ancient Greek game of petteia. This game of petteia would later evolve into the Roman ludus latrunculorum. Board gaming in ancient Europe was not unique to the Greco-Roman world, with records estimating that the ancient Norse game of hnefatafl was developed sometime before 400AD. In ancient Ireland, the game of fidchell or ficheall, is said to date back to at least 144 AD, though this is likely an anachronism. A fidchell board dating from the 10th century has been uncovered in Co. Westmeath, Ireland.

The association of dice and cards with gambling led to all dice games except backgammon being treated as lotteries by dice in the gaming acts of 1710 and 1845. Early board game producers in the second half of the eighteenth century were mapmakers. The global popularization of Board Games, with special themes and branding, coincided with the formation of the global dominance of the British Empire. John Wallis was an English board game publisher, bookseller, map/chart seller, printseller, music seller, and cartographer. With his sons John Wallis Jr. and Edward Wallis, he was one of the most prolific publishers of board games of the late 18th and early 19th centuries. John Betts' A Tour of the British Colonies and Foreign Possessions and William Spooner's A Voyage of Discovery were popular in the British empire. Kriegsspiel is a genre of wargaming developed in 19th century Prussia to teach battle tactics to officers.

American
The board game Travellers' Tour Through the United States and its sister game Traveller's Tour Through Europe were published by New York City bookseller F. & R. Lockwood in 1822 and claim the distinction of being the first board games published in the United States.

Margaret Hofer described the period of the 1880s–1920s as "The Golden Age" of board gaming in America. Board game popularity was boosted, like that of many items, through mass production, which made them cheaper and more easily available.

Chinese, Arabic, and Indian
Outside of Europe and the U.S., many traditional board games are popular. In China, Go and many variations of chess are popular. In Africa and the Middle East, mancala is a popular board game archetype with many regional variations. In India, a community game called Carrom is popular.

Modern
In the late 1990s, companies began producing more new games to serve a growing worldwide market. In the 2010s, several publications said board games were amid a new Golden Age or "renaissance". Board game venues also grew in popularity; in 2016 alone, more than 5,000 board game cafés opened in the U.S., and they were reported to be very popular in China as well.

Board games have been used as a mechanism for science communication.

Luck, strategy, and diplomacy
Some games, such as chess, depend completely on player skill, while many children's games such as Candy Land and snakes and ladders require no decisions by the players and are decided purely by luck.

Many games require some level of both skill and luck. A player may be hampered by bad luck in backgammon, Monopoly, or Risk; but over many games, a skilled player will win more often. The elements of luck can also make for more excitement at times, and allow for more diverse and multifaceted strategies, as concepts such as expected value and risk management must be considered.

Luck may be introduced into a game by several methods. The use of dice of various sorts goes back to the earliest board games. These can decide everything from how many steps a player moves their token, as in Monopoly, to how their forces fare in battle, as in Risk, or which resources a player gains, as in Catan. Other games such as Sorry! use a deck of special cards that, when shuffled, create randomness. Scrabble does something similar with randomly picked letters. Other games use spinners, timers of random length, or other sources of randomness. German-style board games are notable for often having fewer elements of luck than many North American board games. Luck may be reduced in favour of skill by introducing symmetry between players. For example, in a dice game such as Ludo, by giving each player the choice of rolling the dice or using the previous player's roll.

Another important aspect of some games is diplomacy, that is, players, making deals with one another. Negotiation generally features only in games with three or more players, cooperative games being the exception. An important facet of Catan, for example, is convincing players to trade with you rather than with opponents. In Risk, two or more players may team up against others. Easy diplomacy involves convincing other players that someone else is winning and should therefore be teamed up against. Advanced diplomacy (e.g., in the aptly named game Diplomacy) consists of making elaborate plans together, with the possibility of betrayal.

In perfect information games, such as chess, each player has complete information on the state of the game, but in other games, such as Tigris and Euphrates or Stratego, some information is hidden from players. This makes finding the best move more difficult and may involve estimating probabilities by the opponents.

Software
Many board games are now available as video games. These are aptly termed digital board games, and their distinguishing characteristic compared to traditional board games is they can now be played online against a computer or other players. Some websites (such as boardgamearena.com, yucata.de, etc.) allow play in real time and immediately show the opponents' moves, while others use email to notify the players after each move. The Internet and cheaper home printing has also influenced board games via print-and-play games that may be purchased and printed. Some games use external media such as audio cassettes or DVDs in accompaniment to the game.

There are also virtual tabletop programs that allow online players to play a variety of existing and new board games through tools needed to manipulate the game board but do not necessarily enforce the game's rules, leaving this up to the players. There are generalized programs such as Vassal, Tabletop Simulator and Tabletopia that can be used to play any board or card game, while programs like Roll20 and Fantasy Grounds that are more specialized for role-playing games. Some of these virtual tabletops have worked with the license holders to allow for use of their game's assets within the program; for example, Fantasy Grounds has licenses for both Dungeons & Dragons and Pathfinder materials, while Tabletop Simulator allows game publishers to provide paid downloadable content for their games. However, as these games offer the ability to add in the content through user modifications, there are also unlicensed uses of board game assets available through these programs.

Market
While the board gaming market is estimated to be smaller than that for video games, it has also experienced significant growth from the late 1990s. A 2012 article in The Guardian described board games as "making a comeback". Other expert sources suggest that board games never went away, and that board games have remained a popular leisure activity which has only grown over time. Another from 2014 gave an estimate that put the growth of the board game market at "between 25% and 40% annually" since 2010, and described the current time as the "golden era for board games". The rise in board game popularity has been attributed to quality improvement (more elegant mechanics,, artwork, and graphics) as well as increased availability thanks to sales through the Internet. Crowd-sourcing for board games is a large facet of the market, with $233 million raised on Kickstarter in 2020.

A 1991 estimate for the global board game market was over $1.2 billion. A 2001 estimate for the United States "board games and puzzle" market gave a value of under $400 million, and for United Kingdom, of about £50 million. A 2009 estimate for the Korean market was put at 800 million won, and another estimate for the American board game market for the same year was at about $800 million. A 2011 estimate for the Chinese board game market was at over 10 billion yuan. A 2013 estimate put the size of the German toy market at 2.7 billion euros (out of which the board games and puzzle market is worth about 375 million euros), and Polish markets at 2 billion and 280 million zlotys, respectively. In 2009, Germany was considered to be the best market per capita, with the highest number of games sold per individual.

Hobby board games
Some academics, such as Erica Price and Marco Arnaudo, have differentiated "hobby" board games and gamers from other board games and gamers. A 2014 estimate placed the U.S. and Canada market for hobby board games (games produced for a "gamer" market) at only $75 million, with the total size of what it defined as the "hobby game market" ("the market for those games regardless of whether they're sold in the hobby channel or other channels,") at over $700 million. A similar 2015 estimate suggested a hobby game market value of almost $900 million.

Research
A dedicated field of research into gaming exists, known as game studies or ludology.

While there has been a fair amount of scientific research on the psychology of older board games (e.g., chess, Go, mancala), less has been done on contemporary board games such as Monopoly, Scrabble, and Risk, and especially modern board games such as Catan, Agricola, and Pandemic. Much research has been carried out on chess, partly because many tournament players are publicly ranked in national and international lists, which makes it possible to compare their levels of expertise. The works of Adriaan de Groot, William Chase, Herbert A. Simon, and Fernand Gobet have established that knowledge, more than the ability to anticipate moves, plays an essential role in chess-playing ability.

Linearly arranged board games have improved children's spatial numerical understanding. This is because the game is similar to a number line in that they promote a linear understanding of numbers rather than the innate logarithmic one.

Research studies show that board games such as Snakes and Ladders result in children showing significant improvements in aspects of basic number skills such as counting, recognizing numbers, numerical estimation, and number comprehension. They also practice fine motor skills each time they grasp a game piece. Playing board games has also been tied to improving children's executive functions and help reduce risks of dementia for the elderly. Related to this is a growing academic interest in the topic of game accessibility, culminating in the development of guidelines for assessing the accessibility of modern tabletop games and the extent to which they are playable for people with disabilities.

Additionally, board games can be therapeutic. Bruce Halpenny, a games inventor said when interviewed about his game, The Great Train Robbery:"With crime you deal with every basic human emotion and also have enough elements to combine action with melodrama. The player's imagination is fired as they plan to rob the train. Because of the gamble, they take in the early stage of the game there is a build-up of tension, which is immediately released once the train is robbed. Release of tension is therapeutic and useful in our society because most jobs are boring and repetitive."

Playing games has been suggested as a viable addition to the traditional educational curriculum if the content is appropriate and the gameplay informs students on the curriculum content.

Categories
There are several ways in which board games can be classified, and considerable overlap may exist, so that a game belongs to several categories.

The namesake of the board game, gameboards would seem to be a necessary and sufficient condition of the genre, though card games that do not use a standard deck of cards (as well as games that use neither cards nor a gameboard) are often colloquially included, with some scholars therefore referring to said genre as that of "table and board games" or "tabletop games", or seeing board games as a subgenre of tabletop games.

H. J. R. Murray's A History of Board Games Other Than Chess (1952) has been called the first attempt to develop a "scheme for the classification of board games". David Parlett's Oxford History of Board Games (1999) defines four primary categories: race games (where the goal is to be the first to move all one's pieces to the final destination), space games (in which the object is to arrange the pieces into some special configuration), chase games (asymmetrical games, where players start the game with different sets of pieces and objectives) and displace games (where the main objective is the capture the opponents' pieces). Parlett also distinguishes between abstract and thematic games, the latter having a specific theme or frame narrative (ex. regular chess versus, for example, Star Wars-themed chess).

The following is a list of some of the most common game categories:

 * Abstract strategy games – e.g. chess, checkers, Go, reversi, tafl games, or modern games such as Abalone, Dameo, Stratego, Hive, or GIPF
 * Alignment games – e.g. renju, gomoku, Connect6, Nine men's morris, or tic-tac-toe
 * Auction games – e.g. Hoity Toity, Power Grid
 * Chess variants – traditional variants e.g. shogi, xiangqi, or janggi; modern variants e.g. Chess960, Grand Chess, Hexagonal chess, or Alice Chess
 * Configuration games – e.g. Lines of Action, Hexade, or Entropy
 * Connection games – e.g. TwixT, Hex, or Havannah
 * Cooperative games – e.g. Max the Cat, Caves and Claws, or Pandemic
 * Count and capture games – e.g. mancala games
 * Cross and circle games – e.g. Yut, Ludo, or Aggravation
 * Deduction games – e.g. Mastermind or Black Box
 * Dexterity games – e.g. Tumblin' Dice or Pitch Car
 * Economic simulation games – e.g. The Business Game, Monopoly, The Game of Life, Power Grid, or Food Chain Magnate
 * Educational games – e.g. Arthur Saves the Planet, Cleopatra and the Society of Architects, or Shakespeare: The Bard Game
 * Elimination games – e.g. draughts, Alquerque, Fanorona, Yoté, or Surakarta
 * Family games – e.g. Roll Through the Ages, Birds on a Wire, or For Sale
 * Fantasy games – e.g. Shadows Over Camelot
 * German-style board games or Eurogames – e.g. Catan, Carcassonne, Decatur • The Game, Carson City, or Puerto Rico
 * Guessing games – e.g. Pictionary or Battleship
 * Hidden-movement games – e.g. Clue or Escape from the Aliens in Outer Space
 * Hidden-role games – e.g. Mafia or The Resistance
 * Historical simulation games – e.g. Through the Ages or Railways of the World
 * Horror games – e.g. Arkham Horror
 * Large multiplayer games – e.g. Take It Easy or Swat (2010)
 * Learning/communication non-competitive games – e.g. The Ungame (1972)
 * Mancala games – e.g. Wari, Oware, or The Glass Bead Game
 * Multiplayer games – e.g. Risk, Monopoly, or Four-player chess
 * Musical games – e.g. Spontuneous
 * Negotiation games – e.g. Diplomacy
 * Paper-and-pencil games – e.g. tic-tac-toe or dots and boxes
 * Physical skill games – e.g. Camp Granada
 * Position games (no captures; win by leaving the opponent unable to move) – e.g. kōnane, mū tōrere, or the L game
 * Race games – e.g. Pachisi, backgammon, snakes and ladders, hyena chase, or Worm Up
 * Role-playing games – e.g. Dungeons & Dragons
 * Roll-and-move games – e.g. Monopoly or Life
 * Running-fight games – e.g. bul
 * Share-buying games (games in which players buy stakes in each other's positions) – typically longer economic-management games, e.g. Acquire or Panamax
 * Single-player puzzle games – e.g. peg solitaire or Sudoku
 * Space games - e.g. Terraforming Mars (board game)
 * Spiritual development games (games with no winners or losers) – e.g. Transformation Game or Psyche's Key
 * Stacking games – e.g. Lasca or DVONN
 * Storytelling games – e.g. Dixit or Tales of the Arabian Nights
 * Territory games – e.g. Go or Reversi
 * Tile-based games – e.g. Carcassonne, Scrabble, Tigris and Euphrates, or Evo
 * Train games – e.g. Ticket to Ride, Steam, or 18xx
 * Trivia games – e.g. Trivial Pursuit
 * Two-player-only themed games – e.g. En Garde or Dos de Mayo
 * Two-player-only abstract games - e.g. Checkers
 * Unequal forces (or "hunt") games – e.g. fox and geese or tablut
 * Wargames – ranging from Risk, Diplomacy, or Axis & Allies, to Attack! or Conquest of the Empire
 * Word games – e.g. Scrabble, Boggle, Anagrams, or What's My Word? (2010)

Glossary
Although many board games have a jargon all their own, there is a generalized terminology to describe concepts applicable to basic game mechanics and attributes common to nearly all board games.

title: Board game