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Erdős number

The Erdős number describes the "collaborative distance" between mathematician Paul Erdős and another person, as measured by authorship of mathematical papers. The same principle has been applied in other fields where a particular individual has collaborated with a large and broad number of peers.

Overview
Paul Erdős (1913–1996) was an influential Hungarian mathematician who in the latter part of his life spent a great deal of time writing papers with a large number of colleagues—over 500—working on solutions to outstanding mathematical problems. He published more papers during his lifetime (at least 1,525 ) than any other mathematician in history. (Leonhard Euler published more total pages of mathematics but fewer separate papers: about 800.) Erdős spent most of his career with no permanent home or job. He traveled with everything he owned in two suitcases, and would visit mathematicians he wanted to collaborate with, often unexpectedly, and expect to stay with them.

The idea of the Erdős number was originally created by the mathematician's friends as a tribute to his enormous output. Later it gained prominence as a tool to study how mathematicians cooperate to find answers to unsolved problems. Several projects are devoted to studying connectivity among researchers, using the Erdős number as a proxy. For example, Erdős collaboration graphs can tell us how authors cluster, how the number of co-authors per paper evolves over time, or how new theories propagate.

Several studies have shown that leading mathematicians tend to have particularly low Erdős numbers (i.e. high proximity). The median Erdős number of Fields Medalists is 3. Only 7,097 (about 5% of mathematicians with a collaboration path) have an Erdős number of 2 or lower. As time passes, the lowest Erdős number that can still be achieved will necessarily increase, as mathematicians with low Erdős numbers die and become unavailable for collaboration. Still, historical figures can have low Erdős numbers. For example, renowned Indian mathematician Srinivasa Ramanujan has an Erdős number of only 3 (through G. H. Hardy, Erdős number 2), even though Paul Erdős was only 7 years old when Ramanujan died.

Definition and application in mathematics

To be assigned an Erdős number, someone must be a coauthor of a research paper with another person who has a finite Erdős number. Paul Erdős himself is assigned an Erdős number of zero. A certain author's Erdős number is one greater than the lowest Erdős number of any of their collaborators; for example an author who has coauthored a publication with Erdős would have an Erdős number of 1. The American Mathematical Society provides a free online tool to determine the collaboration distance between two mathematical authors listed in the Mathematical Reviews catalogue.

Erdős wrote around 1,500 mathematical articles in his lifetime, mostly co-written. He had 509 direct collaborators; these are the people with Erdős number 1. The people who have collaborated with them (but not with Erdős himself) have an Erdős number of 2 (12,600 people as of 7 August 2020 ), those who have collaborated with people who have an Erdős number of 2 (but not with Erdős or anyone with an Erdős number of 1) have an Erdős number of 3, and so forth. A person with no such coauthorship chain connecting to Erdős has an Erdős number of infinity (or an undefined one). Since the death of Paul Erdős, the lowest Erdős number that a new researcher can obtain is 2.

There is room for ambiguity over what constitutes a link between two authors. The American Mathematical Society collaboration distance calculator uses data from Mathematical Reviews, which includes most mathematics journals but covers other subjects only in a limited way, and which also includes some non-research publications. The Erdős Number Project web site says:"... One drawback of the MR system is that it considers all jointly authored works as providing legitimate links, even articles such as obituaries, which are not really joint research. ..." It also says:

"... Our criterion for inclusion of an edge between vertices u and v is some research collaboration between them resulting in a published work. Any number of additional co-authors is permitted,..." but excludes non-research publications such as elementary textbooks, joint editorships, obituaries, and the like. The "Erdős number of the second kind" restricts assignment of Erdős numbers to papers with only two collaborators.

The Erdős number was most likely first defined in print by Casper Goffman, an analyst whose own Erdős number is 2. Goffman published his observations about Erdős' prolific collaboration in a 1969 article entitled "And what is your Erdős number?" See also some comments in an obituary by Michael Golomb.

The median Erdős number among Fields medalists is as low as 3. Fields medalists with Erdős number 2 include Atle Selberg, Kunihiko Kodaira, Klaus Roth, Alan Baker, Enrico Bombieri, David Mumford, Charles Fefferman, William Thurston, Shing-Tung Yau, Jean Bourgain, Richard Borcherds, Manjul Bhargava, Jean-Pierre Serre and Terence Tao. There are no Fields medalists with Erdős number 1; however, Endre Szemerédi is an Abel Prize Laureate with Erdős number 1.

Most frequent Erdős collaborators
While Erdős collaborated with hundreds of co-authors, there were some individuals with whom he co-authored dozens of papers. This is a list of the ten persons who most frequently co-authored with Erdős and their number of papers co-authored with Erdős (i.e. their number of collaborations).

Related fields
, all Fields Medalists have a finite Erdős number, with values that range between 2 and 6, and a median of 3. In contrast, the median Erdős number across all mathematicians (with a finite Erdős number) is 5, with an extreme value of 13. The table below summarizes the Erdős number statistics for Nobel prize laureates in Physics, Chemistry, Medicine, and Economics. The first column counts the number of laureates. The second column counts the number of winners with a finite Erdős number. The third column is the percentage of winners with a finite Erdős number. The remaining columns report the minimum, maximum, average, and median Erdős numbers among those laureates.

Physics
Among the Nobel Prize laureates in Physics, Albert Einstein and Sheldon Glashow have an Erdős number of 2. Nobel Laureates with an Erdős number of 3 include Enrico Fermi, Otto Stern, Wolfgang Pauli, Max Born, Willis E. Lamb, Eugene Wigner, Richard P. Feynman, Hans A. Bethe, Murray Gell-Mann, Abdus Salam, Steven Weinberg, Norman F. Ramsey, Frank Wilczek, David Wineland, and Giorgio Parisi. Fields Medal-winning physicist Ed Witten has an Erdős number of 3.

Biology
Computational biologist Lior Pachter has an Erdős number of 2. Evolutionary biologist Richard Lenski has an Erdős number of 3, having co-authored a publication with Lior Pachter and with mathematician Bernd Sturmfels, each of whom has an Erdős number of 2.

Finance and economics
There are at least two winners of the Nobel Prize in Economics with an Erdős number of 2: Harry M. Markowitz (1990) and Leonid Kantorovich (1975). Other financial mathematicians with Erdős number of 2 include David Donoho, Marc Yor, Henry McKean, Daniel Stroock, and Joseph Keller.

Nobel Prize laureates in Economics with an Erdős number of 3 include Kenneth J. Arrow (1972), Milton Friedman (1976), Herbert A. Simon (1978), Gerard Debreu (1983), John Forbes Nash, Jr. (1994), James Mirrlees (1996), Daniel McFadden (2000), Daniel Kahneman (2002), Robert J. Aumann (2005), Leonid Hurwicz (2007), Roger Myerson (2007), Alvin E. Roth (2012), and Lloyd S. Shapley (2012) and Jean Tirole (2014).

Some investment firms have been founded by mathematicians with low Erdős numbers, among them James B. Ax of Axcom Technologies, and James H. Simons of Renaissance Technologies, both with an Erdős number of 3.

Philosophy
Since the more formal versions of philosophy share reasoning with the basics of mathematics, these fields overlap considerably, and Erdős numbers are available for many philosophers. Philosophers John P. Burgess and Brian Skyrms have an Erdős number of 2. Jon Barwise and Joel David Hamkins, both with Erdős number 2, have also contributed extensively to philosophy, but are primarily described as mathematicians.

Law
Judge Richard Posner, having coauthored with Alvin E. Roth, has an Erdős number of at most 4. Roberto Mangabeira Unger, a politician, philosopher, and legal theorist who teaches at Harvard Law School, has an Erdős number of at most 4, having coauthored with Lee Smolin.

Politics
Angela Merkel, Chancellor of Germany from 2005 to 2021, has an Erdős number of at most 5.

Engineering
Some fields of engineering, in particular communication theory and cryptography, make direct use of the discrete mathematics championed by Erdős. It is therefore not surprising that practitioners in these fields have low Erdős numbers. For example, Robert McEliece, a professor of electrical engineering at Caltech, had an Erdős number of 1, having collaborated with Erdős himself. Cryptographers Ron Rivest, Adi Shamir, and Leonard Adleman, inventors of the RSA cryptosystem, all have Erdős number 2.

Linguistics
The Romanian mathematician and computational linguist Solomon Marcus had an Erdős number of 1 for a paper in Acta Mathematica Hungarica that he co-authored with Erdős in 1957.

Impact
Erdős numbers have been a part of the folklore of mathematicians throughout the world for many years. Among all working mathematicians at the turn of the millennium who have a finite Erdős number, the numbers range up to 15, the median is 5, and the mean is 4.65; almost everyone with a finite Erdős number has a number less than 8. Due to the very high frequency of interdisciplinary collaboration in science today, very large numbers of non-mathematicians in many other fields of science also have finite Erdős numbers. For example, political scientist Steven Brams has an Erdős number of 2. In biomedical research, it is common for statisticians to be among the authors of publications, and many statisticians can be linked to Erdős via John Tukey, who has an Erdős number of 2. Similarly, the prominent geneticist Eric Lander and the mathematician Daniel Kleitman have collaborated on papers, and since Kleitman has an Erdős number of 1, a large fraction of the genetics and genomics community can be linked via Lander and his numerous collaborators. Similarly, collaboration with Gustavus Simmons opened the door for Erdős numbers within the cryptographic research community, and many linguists have finite Erdős numbers, many due to chains of collaboration with such notable scholars as Noam Chomsky (Erdős number 4), William Labov (3), Mark Liberman (3), Geoffrey Pullum (3), or Ivan Sag (4). There are also connections with arts fields.

According to Alex Lopez-Ortiz, all the Fields and Nevanlinna prize winners during the three cycles in 1986 to 1994 have Erdős numbers of at most 9.

Earlier mathematicians published fewer papers than modern ones, and more rarely published jointly written papers. The earliest person known to have a finite Erdős number is either Antoine Lavoisier (born 1743, Erdős number 13), Richard Dedekind (born 1831, Erdős number 7), or Ferdinand Georg Frobenius (born 1849, Erdős number 3), depending on the standard of publication eligibility.

Martin Tompa proposed a directed graph version of the Erdős number problem, by orienting edges of the collaboration graph from the alphabetically earlier author to the alphabetically later author and defining the monotone Erdős number of an author to be the length of a longest path from Erdős to the author in this directed graph. He finds a path of this type of length 12.

Also, Michael Barr suggests "rational Erdős numbers", generalizing the idea that a person who has written p joint papers with Erdős should be assigned Erdős number 1/p. From the collaboration multigraph of the second kind (although he also has a way to deal with the case of the first kind)—with one edge between two mathematicians for each joint paper they have produced—form an electrical network with a one-ohm resistor on each edge. The total resistance between two nodes tells how "close" these two nodes are.

It has been argued that "for an individual researcher, a measure such as Erdős number captures the structural properties of [the] network whereas the h-index captures the citation impact of the publications," and that "One can be easily convinced that ranking in coauthorship networks should take into account both measures to generate a realistic and acceptable ranking."

In 2004 William Tozier, a mathematician with an Erdős number of 4 auctioned off a co-authorship on eBay, hence providing the buyer with an Erdős number of 5. The winning bid of $1031 was posted by a Spanish mathematician, who refused to pay and only placed the bid to stop what he considered a mockery.

Variations
A number of variations on the concept have been proposed to apply to other fields, notably the Bacon number (as in the game Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon), connecting actors to the actor Kevin Bacon by a chain of joint appearances in films. It was created in 1994, 25 years after Goffman's article on the Erdős number.

A small number of people are connected to both Erdős and Bacon and thus have an Erdős–Bacon number, which combines the two numbers by taking their sum. One example is the actress-mathematician Danica McKellar, best known for playing Winnie Cooper on the TV series The Wonder Years. Her Erdős number is 4, and her Bacon number is 2.

Further extension is possible. For example, the "Erdős–Bacon–Sabbath number" is the sum of the Erdős–Bacon number and the collaborative distance to the band Black Sabbath in terms of singing in public. Physicist Stephen Hawking had an Erdős–Bacon–Sabbath number of 8, and actress Natalie Portman has one of 11 (her Erdős number is 5).

In chess, the Morphy number describes a player's connection to Paul Morphy, widely considered the greatest chess player of his time and an unofficial World Chess Champion.

In go, the Shusaku number describes a player's connection to Honinbo Shusaku, the strongest player of his time.

In video games, the Ryu number describes a video game character's connection to the Street Fighter character Ryu.

title: Erdős number


text:
Talk:Edgar Allan Poe/Archive 4

Possibly misleading grammar
the first para line "has been attributed to alcohol, brain congestion, cholera, drugs, heart disease, rabies, suicide, tuberculosis, and other agents" seems to imply that all these were the cause of death. The line might read "has variously been attributed to alcohol, ..."

Heffernon
Does anybody know if there is a character called Heffernon (a gardener or odd job man) in any of Poe's stories? I ask because in the 60's there used to be a TV series called Tales of Mystery and Imagination, and I think it was based on Poe's stories. i think in the tell tale heart the butler has a name sort of the same

I have a vague recollection of a story with this character, but just cannot pin it down.
 * There is no butler in "The Tell-Tale Heart". I'll help as best I can: there is no Poe-created character named Heffernon. If something comes to mind, it's almost definitely some more modern adaptation. --Midnightdreary (talk) 21:38, 17 December 2007 (UTC)

Eureka
i found this mentioned in the article on spacetime, which suggests EAP was indeed the first person to proposition this theory. the Eureka (Edgar Allan Poe) article also mentions very interesting scientific importances, however i can find no mention of it in this article. can someone with a comprehensive grasp of this page's structure add this where appropriate? it seems highly relevant. --132.170.34.22 03:53, 1 August 2007 (UTC)
 * He has all kinds of original theories in there. But it may be stuck in Edgar Allan Poe's literary influence right now, along with his influence on cryptography, etc. Otherwise, it seems just fine to me to be in Eureka. Any other thoughts on this one? --Midnightdreary 19:56, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

Poe's Occupations
I'm not sure what Poe's exact occupation/s was/were. As you can see I listed what I believed to be his correct occupation/s in the "Occupation" section but I now believe what I have contributed to be incorrect information. If anyone knows his correct occupation/s could you please correct my mistakes? Thanks. This I what I put for in the "Occupation" section: poet, short story writer, playwright, editor, literary critic and essayist. I also added that Poe was a playwright to various pages, this is because Poe has written a script (perhaps more than one) though playwriting was not (as far as I am aware) his main focus. If you think Poe should not be listed as a playwright due to his minimal contribution to this field please let me know. Conrad McGrath 03:21, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

 * I think this is over the top. Let's keep it simple. Just because someone writes a single (unfinished) play does not make them a playwright. By the way, remember to add new discussion topics to the END of these pages, not the top! :) --Midnightdreary 03:49, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

Sorry about putting my discussion at the top, I'm quite new here and am adjusting. Well I suppose if you think it's over the top for Poe to be labeled a playwright you want his name to be removed from the various lists of playwrights and from this page, correct? :). Conrad McGrath 15:05, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

Legacy
So I collapsed a bunch of stuff into one big Legacy section. Not sure how I feel about it. I pulled in the section on "Preserved homes" from the new literary influence article (it clearly is not literary). I'm not sure if putting it all under Legacy (formerly "Legacy and lore," which sounds cool but doesn't really mean anything) is the most sensible, but it's separate from the biography stuff (which I think was the original point of a lot of these splits). Clean-up might be needed, or perhaps better sectioning. --Midnightdreary 19:58, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

Poe Portal
If anyone is interested, I'm now maintaining the brand new Portal:Edgar Allan Poe. The idea is to have a fun entry to serious and casual fans of Poe. Contributors welcome! --Midnightdreary 19:30, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

Categories
I'm bringing this up for discussion because there seems to be some (unvoiced) contention. This article is currently not listed in any Christianity-related categories. I don't think they are relevant (i.e. Poe is not first and foremost a "Christian writer") and difficult to identify (i.e. I would suggest finding a source that he self-identified as a Christian). The same is true for "Former atheists" and "Christian converts." My personal opinion (and I hope this doesn't come across as a personal attack) is that anonymous users are pushing a minor agenda. Anyway, I would suggest discussion of potential new categories so we can come to some kind of consensus or, at least, an understanding for the reasoning for these (potentially contentious) categories. Make sense? Thanks! :) --Midnightdreary 21:25, 12 August 2007 (UTC)
 * These same categories were added again today. I removed them again. This is another offer to discuss. :) --Midnightdreary 00:13, 19 August 2007 (UTC)

Literary and artistic theory
'Poe argues in his literary theory essay "The Philosophy of Composition", the ending should be written first.' No, he argued that the ending should always be borne in mind when writing what precedes it, and that the beginning and middle should tend to the ending and ultimate effect. Writing the ending first and bearing the ending steadily in mind are two different things.

'Much of Poe's work was allegorical, but his position on allegory was a nuanced one: "In defence of allegory, there is scarcely one respectable word to be said . . . .' What evidence is there that much of his work was allegorical?  The statement that his work was allegorical is not supported by a quotation showing his dislike of allegory.Hodgson

 * I agree. I think this particular section is in the most need of citations. I'll dig around, but help is welcome. --Midnightdreary 22:45, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

Categories
This comment is directed to Midnightdreary.

It was me who added the categories "Christian writer", "american Christians" and "former atheists".

Sincerely, I think that, probably, like many other romantic writers, Poe held some christian beliefs, or at least, he believed in the existence of God. His last words were "Lord, help my pour soul!" and i don't think that he would start to believe in God in his last seconds of life. He was also raised in a christian home, and both his foster and biological families were christian.

I also think that, probably, like many other writers, he passed through an atheistic period in his life. This are two quotes of Poe that made think that: "The pioneers and missionaries of religion have been the real cause of more trouble and war than all other classes of mankind." "No man who ever lived knows any more about the hereafter ... than you and I; and all religion ... is simply evolved out of chicanery, fear, greed, imagination and poetry." (Probably, this quotes don't make him an atheist. Probably, like many writers, he was in favor of religion, but against organized Churches.)

I also want to warn you that i am a little bit stubborn so, PROBABLY, i will add those categories again!--Buchinha 18:14, 22 August 2007 (GMT) —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Buchinha (talk • contribs).

 * Thanks for responding here. So you are basically admitting that your adding of these categories is based on pure speculation or on original research ("like many other writers, he passed through an atheistic period" - that's purely speculative and probably not provable). That's certainly a no-no. If your best evidence is Poe's final words being "Lord, help my poor soul!" you certainly have more work to do: Poe probably never said those words (see Death of Edgar Allan Poe for the reliability of that source). The text of the main article really should include a discussion about religion if he is going to be categorized into religious categories. That discussion must be sourced with reliable sources. Stubborn or not, we're trying to make a solid encyclopedia article here. Keep adding it if you must, but I'll keep reverting it until there is solid evidence to make those additions appropriate. I'm not trying to be a pain, but it's worth reading the Wikipedia policies so you get a better understanding of some standard norms we follow here. (By the way, don't forget to sign your comments. Thanks!) --Midnightdreary 17:38, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

i think that Edgar Allen Poe was really crazy, because he would just rite about is ppls ddieing !!! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.211.107.173 (talk) 22:14, 4 September 2007 (UTC)
 * Well, I think you're bad at English because all you write has bad grammar and spelling. Well, at least all that I'm familiar with. Maybe if I was more familiar with your writing I wouldn't make such a broad assumption or, really, if I knew more about your personal life story I wouldn't judge you based on your writing. Hmm... I wonder if I'm being didactic? =) --Midnightdreary 22:23, 4 September 2007 (UTC)

Vandalism
School is clearly back in session... you can smell it in the air and see it in all the vandalism on this page. =) Any interested editors out there, now is the time to add this article to your watchlist. It might be worth semi-protecting this article (again) soon, too. --Midnightdreary 21:48, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

 * I have managed to get the article semi-protected for a month; the inane vandalism should therefore decrease now. (finally) --  Chris B •  talk  •  contribs  17:13, 6 September 2007 (UTC)
 * Pictogram voting support.svg Semi-protected ;) - A l is o n  ☺ 17:16, 6 September 2007 (UTC)
 * Awesome. Thanks! I'm sure in a month any given night in the lonesome October will have just as much vandalism. I look forward to it. ;) --Midnightdreary 18:03, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

I dont think u even need 2 ask that question —Preceding unsigned comment added by Funkyfrog333 (talk • contribs) 22:20, 2 December 2007 (UTC)

4-chan has vandalized this page too (probably more than one person), I suggest protected status.142.177.110.164 (talk) 03:06, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Football team nickname (from "Other")
In 1996, the NFL franchise known as the Cleveland Browns relocated to Baltimore and assumed a new identity, including a new nickname, the Ravens (...)

It's not a nickname, it's a name. Unless they mean that the full name is "Baltimore Ravens"? Or is there something I'm missing? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Tvon (talk • contribs) 20:08, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

 * Technically, it is a nickname. Their actual name (usually used only on contracts) is something like "The Professional Football Club of Baltimore, MD." (This is true of all sports teams; for example, the Boston American Professional Baseball Club is much better known by its nickname, the Red Sox.) Fumblebruschi (talk) 18:10, 6 December 2007 (UTC)

Removed false A-class status
Even though this article did not pass during its recent A class review, the Wikiproject tags at the top of the page all listed the article as A class. I have now corrected this. However, I still think this is an excellent article and I encourage the editors here to either reapply for an A class review or try for FA status. --Alabamaboy 03:07, 5 October 2007 (UTC)

weird stuff due to some template or another?
Maybe it's just me but right now, if I go into edit mode on this article there are a bunch of "documentation" showhides and some stray noincludes showing at the very bottom of the article. These are not present if just viewing. No time to determine exactly why right now, sorry. Perhaps someone else knows why? ++Lar: t/c 00:56, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

Who?
I looked Poe up yesterday and it showed something really weird. It said Remeis McFillmin in place of EAP's name. Anyone got any idea why? Mack-the-random 20:54, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

poe's mother died died when he was about three. she died of tuberculosis and she wasn't last woman poe loved to be stricken with this deadly disease. his had left him and his mother when he around 1 year of age. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.145.121.246 (talk) 23:31, 16 October 2007 (UTC)

Poe Toaster
The full section on the Poe Toaster was removed (without discussion) and relegated to a link under "See also." Are there any thoughts on this? --Midnightdreary 02:36, 4 November 2007 (UTC)

The Poe Toaster has absolutely nothing to do with the circumstances of the death of Poe. It's a fabricated and much hyped event that started more than 100 years after Poe's death, and thus belongs to the realm of popular culture surrounding Poe. Since there is an article on "Poe in popular culture", and since the toaster would fit very well there, I'm taking the section out again. Tomixdf 08:13, 4 November 2007 (UTC)

 * You should consider trying to reach a consensus before making such a drastic change. I, for one, am more than mildly opposed to the removal of the Poe Toaster section. Anyone else? --Midnightdreary 13:29, 4 November 2007 (UTC)

 * Consensus is fine. I didn't think this would be an issue, actually. Removing a section that is so blatantly irrelevant can hardly be called "drastic". The Poe Toaster has absolutely NO relevance to either work or life of EA Poe, and does IMO not deserve such a prominant place in the article. The toaster started this practice more than 100 years after Poe's death. Does some prankster that leaves notes about American football and the war in Iraq on Poe's grave once a year really deserve a whole subsection in the article on Poe? Think not. Tomixdf 15:35, 4 November 2007 (UTC)
 * I'm opposed to this removal, it might not be especially relevant here to the point of getting its own section, but it deserves more than a link in See also. At least a sentence in the "death" section would be desirable. If by much hyped event, you mean there are dozens of sources to establish notability and importance, then yes, it is "much hyped." Mr.  Z- man  18:45, 4 November 2007 (UTC)

 * I mean hyped, as in mentioned all over the place without justification. The PT has nothing to do with Poe's life or work, and as such does not deserve to be discussed at length in this article. The PT most certainly deserves to be mentioned in the context of Poe & Popular culture etc. Tomixdf 19:10, 4 November 2007 (UTC)

 * Thanks for discussing. I see your point, but I disagree with you. Poe's life (as we know it) is made up in large part with hearsay, rumors, intrigue, and mystery. The Poe Toaster is a part of that. In the Poe circle, he/she plays a part in Poe discussions. Perhaps it's in the wrong spot, but it seems it deserves some place in this article - possibly under "Legacy" rather than "Death"?. --Midnightdreary 22:51, 4 November 2007 (UTC)

 * Being new to E.A. Poe and having just read a short biography about him, I read the wikipedia entry and right away wondered what Poe Toaster was doing so prominently in this article. It has no relevance to his live and work. It might be important to a group of people and deserve a place under "Poe in the modern day", but I can't see what the interest of this is to world wide readers, searching for information about Poe, and especially I can't see why it is so prominently featured. -- By the way, I also opened the talk page to ask why under Virginia's photo it says her premature death may have inspired some of his work. May and some seem to totally undermine the statement, plus she died only two years before he did, or is that just me? Joost 99 (talk) 13:30, 27 November 2007 (UTC)

 * I think the Poe Toaster's current placement written in a pretty decent summary style works okay. As far as Virginia, how should we undermine the statement less, considering it's an unproven opinion? Unfortunately, all the opinions come from critics after the fact, with Poe himself not suggesting it himself (unless I'm wrong here?). But, with that said, you can't read any critical work on Poe without a mention that it has to do with Virginia, especially "Annabel Lee", et al. I don't agree, myself. Nonetheless, I'm open to changing the caption. --Midnightdreary (talk) 14:22, 27 November 2007 (UTC)

 * Thanks for the reply. Virginia's importance is why I mentioned it, because the statement seemed to me to diminish that. Maybe: her sickness and death had a major impact on Poe's life (I'm not familiar with the exact rules of making a statement like that. The role in his work is more accurately stated in citation 35). As far as Poe Toaster (I realize my text is quite blunt, sorry for that) I believe it would fit far better under legacy, especially because it has nothing to do with the death of Poe in 1849. It started 100 years after his burial by (probably) just one person, and, in my opinion, is therefor out of place in that section of the text. Joost 99 (talk) 16:40, 27 November 2007 (UTC)

(Undent) Joost, you're absolutely right! I had thought we had already moved the Poe Toaster under "Legacy" but apparently I was wrong (and, typical of me, I didn't bother looking). I'm glad you agree with the suggestion, though, so I went ahead and moved it. I'm not 100% sure of where it belongs under "Legacy"... if you're interested, feel free to move it up or down - as an admitted outsider looking in, your fresher eyes might be better suited than mine! Again, sorry for my confusion! --Midnightdreary (talk) 17:24, 27 November 2007 (UTC)

Pseudo science
The article says "Poe often included elements of popular pseudosciences such as phrenology[41] and physiognomy[42] in his fiction." But were phrenology and physiognomy in Poe's time not considered as bona fide sciences? Tomixdf 10:42, 4 November 2007 (UTC)
 * From Pseudoscience: Pseudoscience is any body of knowledge, methodology, belief, or practice that claims to be scientific or is made to appear scientific, but does not adhere to the basic requirements of the scientific method. - This suggests that if something is pseudoscience now, it always has been and always will. Mr.  Z- man  18:49, 4 November 2007 (UTC)

Death
Didn't Poe die in Baltimore Medical Hospital? I believe that another hospital is listed, but I'm not sure. I was told that he was brought to the Baltimore Hospital. I really don't know, some of these facts may be wrong about him, but who really knows exactly everything about his life?-BlueAmethyst .:*:. 04:46, 6 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Well, we certainly know a lot... As far as the hospital, I've always seen it referred to as "Washington College Hospital" (which is in Baltimore) in multiple sources. See Death of Edgar Allan Poe for a lengthy note on the name of the hospital. It seems to be referred to differently colloquially. I did a search for "Baltimore Medical Hospital" and found nothing, so it goes to show that "actual" names vs. what the locals name it can be different. --Midnightdreary 12:55, 6 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Ah, thanks for searching! I will stick to "Washington College Hospital" from now on.  Yes, actual names and local names really can mess up anybody!-BlueAmethyst .:*:. 16:26, 9 November 2007 (UTC)

What's next?
What's next with this article? I suggest we take it to Peer Review to prepare for another attempt at Featured Article. We'll also ask whether or not dedicating space to the "Poe Toaster" is relevant or not (see above) and if we've finally gotten enough citations. Are we ready now, or should we do more work first? --Midnightdreary 19:32, 12 November 2007 (UTC)
 * I think the "Literary and artistic theory" section needs more citations from peers and scholars, and some examination of his writing style and its development. (We shouldn't just fall back on The Philosophy of Composition!!!) Perhaps consider mining the "Legacy" article for information about Poe as a writer. Malkinann (talk) 03:23, 17 November 2007 (UTC)

And just because it will come up at peer review, so it's better to get it out of the way now: The following suggestions were generated by a semi-automatic javascript program, and might not be applicable for the article in question. You may wish to browse through User:AndyZ/Suggestions for further ideas. Thanks, Malkinann (talk) 03:23, 17 November 2007 (UTC)
 * The lead of this article may be too long, or may contain too many paragraphs. Please follow guidelines at WP:LEAD; be aware that the lead should adequately summarize the article.[?]
 * The lead is for summarizing the rest of the article, and should not introduce new topics not discussed in the rest of the article, as per WP:LEAD. Please ensure that the lead adequately summarizes the article.[?]
 * Per Wikipedia:Manual of Style (numbers), when doing conversions, please use standard abbreviations: for example, miles -> mi, kilometers squared -> km2, and pounds -> lb.[?]
 * Per Wikipedia:Context and Build the web, years with full dates should be linked; for example, link January 15, 2006.[?]
 * Per Manual of Style (headings), headings generally do not start with articles ('the', 'a(n)'). For example, if there was a section called  ==The Biography== , it should be changed to  ==Biography== .[?]
 * Per WP:WIAFA, this article's table of contents (ToC) may be too long – consider shrinking it down by merging short sections or using a proper system of daughter pages as per Summary style.[?]
 * Watch for redundancies that make the article too wordy instead of being crisp and concise. (You may wish to try Tony1's redundancy exercises.)
 * Vague terms of size often are unnecessary and redundant - “some”, “a variety/number/majority of”, “several”, “a few”, “many”, “any”, and “all”. For example, “ All pigs are pink, so we thought of a number of ways to turn them green.”
 * Please ensure that the article has gone through a thorough copyediting so that it exemplifies some of Wikipedia's best work. See also User:Tony1/How to satisfy Criterion 1a.[?]
 * I agree, I think the Literary and artistic theory section is weakest as far as sources. I'll do what I can. Most of these automated suggestions don't seem to apply in my opinion, but I've seen the article so many times I probably wouldn't notice anyway. Is there a copy editors WikiProject somewhere we can call in? --Midnightdreary (talk) 03:45, 17 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Yes there is, WikiProject League of Copyeditors. Malkinann (talk) 03:57, 17 November 2007 (UTC)
 * I think the section on "Literary and artistic theory" could be a bit shorter, so I removed a couple things that are either difficult to source or trite (no offense is meant). To say, for example, that Poe was a proponent of magazines is silly: of course he supported his own career. Also, the idea that each of his story's held a single theme (i.e. fear or guilt) is interesting but sounds like original research. It seems like an adaptation of Poe's theory on "unity of effect" in poetry extended to fiction; if I find a source, I'll add it back. Other than that, we're moving right along! When we're ready, we'll have to call in the Copy Editors! --Midnightdreary (talk) 13:17, 17 November 2007 (UTC)
 * By the way, how would people feel about removing the "Imitators" subsection entirely? I'm not sure if this Lizzie Doten who claimed to channel Poe's spirit is particularly notable. --Midnightdreary (talk) 02:20, 18 November 2007 (UTC)

Featured article nomination
Well, I think I'm going to nominate it for featured article tonight. Is anyone else willing to keep an eye on the nomination and help make any suggested changes they might have? In the meantime, too, let's self-identify the weakest points of the article. I'd say the lead and the Literary and aesthetic theory section (because it really only discusses two essays). The rest seems fully sourced and well-written and edited. Any other thoughts? --Midnightdreary (talk) 18:14, 5 December 2007 (UTC)

 * Currently undergoing review. I could use some help in responding to some of the suggestions and concerns that have been dropped there (my ability to commit time to Wikipedia has been challenged of late). Any help would be greatly appreciated! Featured article candidates/Edgar Allan Poe --Midnightdreary (talk) 04:14, 17 December 2007 (UTC)

Biography
I think the 'Selected Biography' section shouldn't only include fiction. Does anyone else have this opinion? Dex Stewart (talk) 22:41, 6 December 2007 (UTC)
 * That's a very good point... He certainly had some notable criticism (is that what you are referring to?), not to mention essays. Any suggestions which we should include? By the way, I think you meant "Bibliography." :) --Midnightdreary (talk) 02:47, 7 December 2007 (UTC)
 * Well... I should first warn you that I did not read one single non-fiction work of his, and thus all my suggestions are based on the (seemingly) full Bibliography of Edgar Allan Poe and the articles said bibliography links to. Another problem is, all works which I think should be added are already in the article. So...
 * In the first place, as he was a writer after all, I think either "The Philosophy of Composition" or "The Poetic Principle" should be noted. After that, it seems to me that the Balloon Hoax was the most well known non-fiction work in his time, and still is. You might also want to add "Eureka" and "A Few Words on Secret Writing" to further reflect his interest for cryptography and physics.
 * Also, under fiction, you might want to add "The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket", because it was the only novel he wrote, and it seems to me that if a someone wrote at least one text of a certain type, at least one text of that type should be noted (even if it's the only one) Dex Stewart (talk) 20:01, 10 December 2007 (UTC)
 * Well, I don't want to overdo it; it's just supposed to be an overview section. But, I'll leave it up to you: add whatever you feel is most relevant. --Midnightdreary (talk) 20:39, 10 December 2007 (UTC)
 * As you wish. Also, you mentioned a few rows up that he had "some notable criticism". Could you give some examples? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Dex Stewart (talk • contribs) 20:56, 10 December 2007 (UTC)
 * The only ones I'd consider notable are his review of Dickens's Master Humphrey's Clock and Nathaniel Hawthorne's Twice-Told Tales... on second consideration, though, they're really not notable enough for inclusion here (in my opinion). --Midnightdreary (talk) 21:27, 10 December 2007 (UTC)

Burton Gentlemen's Magazine
The article references both Burton Gentlemen's Magazine and Burton Gentleman's Magazine (i.e. men vs. man). Are both titles correct? Making things more confusing is that the wikilink for the magazine goes to Burton Gentlemen's Magazine, but the scanned image for the magazine article clearly reads Burton Gentleman's Magazine. Unless both name versions are correct, the article needs the minor correction (and possibly the wikilinked article, or at least an explanation for why the image differs from the title). Michael Devore (talk) 13:56, 7 December 2007 (UTC)
 * Actually, in Burton's short run, it had like 10 different minor variations on its title. So, yes, it's confusing. Blame Mr. Burton! There should be a Wikilink in there somewhere, too. On second look, though, that article doesn't mention the variations in title. I'll see if I can find more info this weekend. --Midnightdreary (talk) 15:22, 7 December 2007 (UTC)

 * Ahh, interesting. The change didn't happen when his subscription count went above one? (Mr. Burton probably wouldn't appreciate that remark. But he's been dead for 147 years, so I'll make it anyway). Michael Devore (talk) 15:52, 7 December 2007 (UTC)
 * Actually, I did some further research on this and it seems like "Burton's Gentleman's Magazine" is the standard title, even with the variations it had over the years. I'm having trouble moving the article from Burton's Gentlemen's Magazine... can someone help? --Midnightdreary (talk) 18:45, 9 December 2007 (UTC)
 * Oops, the move fails because Burton's Gentleman's Magazine is an existing page which redirects to Burton's Gentlemen's Magazine. Of course, that's the exact opposite of what you want. On the chance you didn't already know this, you can either copy and paste the Men content over to the existing Man page and #redirect to Man from Men yourself, or ping a favored admin to delete+move if you want the history to go along with it. -- Michael Devore (talk) 15:42, 10 December 2007 (UTC)
 * Yup, that's it. I was hoping to have an admin step in (as I understand, the copy and paste method is frowned upon). Is there a page to request these kinds of moves? --Midnightdreary (talk) 16:13, 10 December 2007 (UTC)
 * Requested moves should do it. Possibly faster to pick an admin you've ever dealt with in the past who seems like a decent sort and ask them to do it on their talk page. I have seen similar requests on many admin pages. -- Michael Devore (talk) 16:29, 10 December 2007 (UTC)
 * Mission accomplished! Thanks for catching this to begin with! --Midnightdreary (talk) 18:34, 10 December 2007 (UTC)

Ravens mascots
Shouldn't we mention the Baltimore Ravens mascots, named Edgar, Allan, and Poe? Dalekusa (talk) 16:15, 14 December 2007 (UTC)
 * Absolutely. I think it's a necessary piece of information for the Baltimore Ravens article. As for this one...? Not really. It's really not that notable to Poe's personal biography. --Midnightdreary (talk) 17:05, 14 December 2007 (UTC)

Proofreader's comments
Hi Midnightdreary (talk). I've picked a few nits here and there, nothing that I'd call big except for that one citation fix. I hunted for nits only and did not bother my head much with content. Hunting for missing en dashes is a nice vacation from the harder stuff. Good luck with the FAC. Finetooth (talk) 23:32, 1 January 2008 (UTC)

Works at Internet Archive
The article is currently locked for anon edits. Could someone add the Internet Archives collection of over 100+ scanned books by Poe to the External Links section, right underneath the Project Gutenberg line:

 * Works by Edgar Allan Poe, available at Internet Archive. Scanned illustrated books.

Thanks. -- 71.191.42.242 (talk) 03:36, 9 January 2008 (UTC)
 * Looks like a good link. I'll add it. Thanks! --Midnightdreary (talk) 14:31, 9 January 2008 (UTC)

Poe As a Philosopher
In view of Poe having penned 'The Philosophy of Composition' and the 'Philosophy of Furniture', could he not, in his own right, be deemed a 'philosopher' (albeit an aesthetic philosopher)? For many a man deemed a 'philosopher' has completed an equal or lesser body of work. -- Grammaticus VII (talk) 14:20, 9 February 2008 (UTC)
 * Giving suggestions for how to decorate a parlor doesn't make one a philosopher. If so, the writers of Better Homes and Gardens would have to be considered philosophers... and I don't think we wanna go there. If anything makes Poe a philosopher, it'd be Eureka: A Prose Poem, but I haven't seen any biographers or critics make that leap. "Literary theorist" applies for "The Philosophy of Composition" and there's already a section on that in the article. Either way, I think the word "philosopher" is a bit strong if you're referring to Poe. --Midnightdreary (talk) 14:45, 9 February 2008 (UTC)
 * Yes, I intended to state Eureka as well after I had submitted the post. Now, how is Eureka much different than De Rerum Natura? They both rife with scientific faults, but both are philosophical in their own right -- and for this, Lucretius is deemed both poet and philosopher. Do you believe that Poe is wanting in terms of philosophical sentiment? Moreover, to clarify, I am not presenting an argument; rather, I was curious as to how this would be received. I simply wish to discuss the matter. -- Grammaticus VII (talk) 19:17, 9 February 2008 (UTC)
 * Well, it's an interesting point... for the purpose of this article, of course, we'd need a source if we wanted to add the assertion that Poe should be considered a philosopher. I'm not familiar with Lucretius or De Rerum Natura... but what always makes interpretations of Eureka so difficult is that Poe himself said it should be judged solely as a poem. An odd suggestion, that's for sure. --Midnightdreary (talk) 23:44, 9 February 2008 (UTC)

Scots-Irish
I see that User:Mayumashu has deleted the claim that Poe was born to a Scots-Irish family. He wrote in the edit summary that there was no source for this information. Was this fair? I assume that sentence was sourced to Hervey Allan's introduction in The Works of Edgar Allan Poe (ref #4), but I don't have access to that book at the moment. Zagalejo^^^ 21:52, 10 February 2008 (UTC)
 * I'm digging through my sources as time permits. Frankly, I'm not bothered by its removal anyway. I have seen sources that claim he's Irish, German, Polish... everyone seems interested in claiming Poe as one of their own! --Midnightdreary (talk) 21:53, 10 February 2008 (UTC)
 * Well, this, this, and this claim that he is of Scots-Irish descent. I'm kinda curious who argued he was Polish. :) Zagalejo^^^ 22:07, 10 February 2008 (UTC)
 * Apologies, he seems to be at least 1/4 Ulster-Scottish through his paternal grandfather. and his mother was an American working in London (acting). He has English ancestry through the Weekes family and one other Mayumashu (talk) 22:20, 10 February 2008 (UTC)
 * Mayumashu, I reverted you again... I have no particular problem with the order of the categories (though there is a policy somewhere on here if you want to review it)... I do have a problem with the source you are using to discuss Poe's ancestry at length. Keeping in mind that this is a featured article, sources must be rock solid - I have no reason to believe the web site you are using is particularly solid. No offense is meant, it just took nearly two months to get this article approved as featured and I'm very protective of its quality. --Midnightdreary (talk) 22:24, 10 February 2008 (UTC)
 * I understand - I unwittingly attempted the edits, which were in fact partly erroneous, unaware that this article is a feature one. Yes, as I am sure you know, RootsWeb is by no means a reliable secondary source when any particular single piece of info on it is taken at face value.  A look at the several EAP family trees on it does rather confirm what citations provided by User:Zagalejo just above most likely show (I haven t looked at them yet).  But in the end, looking at a unpublished secondary source discerningly to make educated guesses about the truthfulness of its info approaches original research, does nt it Mayumashu (talk) 22:37, 10 February 2008 (UTC)
 * It's not a major deal. Glad you're willing to talk here, of course. I think, though, we should just consider how relevant Poe's ancestry is... We say in the lede that he's an American author. Maybe we can just leave it at that? I'd be comfortable with that. --Midnightdreary (talk) 22:42, 10 February 2008 (UTC)
 * Well, given that its a feature article, that its info needs not only to be throughly sourced but that it needs to be complete in what it says and the ancestry info, even assuming that the unpublished info is correct, in even getting back to Europe with Poe's "pedigree", is incomplete. I ve readded the cat page links (down at the bottom of the list) without any talk of ancestry in the body of the text.  I ll leave my involvement here at that.  best of luck with the article Mayumashu (talk) 22:51, 10 February 2008 (UTC)
 * I think that's a good compromise for now. Thanks for bringing all this up to begin with! --Midnightdreary (talk) 23:00, 10 February 2008 (UTC)

Unblocked
I say that this page should be unblocked. New discoveries may be found out about Poe and the information should be updated. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Dipper4life (talk • contribs) 17:42, 21 February 2008 (UTC)
 * Dipper4Life, this page is only on temporary semi-protection. That only means that unregistered or relatively new users can't edit it; most Wikipedia editors still can. It will soon be removed from semi-protection anyway. In the meantime, if you do have suggestions for updates, let us know! --Midnightdreary (talk) 18:02, 21 February 2008 (UTC)

A New Theory
I have come up with a new theory on how Edgar Allen Poe died. I know some poeople will diagree with my new discoveries but please just hear me out. There is evidence that supports the fact that Poe wanted to quit drinking, like letters to family members. If this is true then i believe that it could be possible that poe died from Alcoholic Withdrawl. All of the symptoms listed are compatible with Alcoholic withdrwal cases, He had fevers, blackouts, hallucinations, Convoulsions, A state of confusion, also he had no recollection of some past events, all these symptoms are linked to Severe cases of Alcoholic Withdrawl. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.200.170.203 (talk) 19:57, 27 February 2008 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the suggestion... but where's the new theory? This one has been around for about four decades now. Anyway, this page is for talking about improving this article, not just discussing Poe. If you're suggesting your theory be added here, it constitutes original research and so we can't really include it. By the way, have you read Death of Edgar Allan Poe? It's a fairly substantial article. --Midnightdreary (talk) 20:04, 27 February 2008 (UTC)

great article
Thank you to all editers of this articke it really helped me with my school project and is well worth FA status keep up the good work--Mdavies 965 (talk) 11:42, 11 March 2008 (UTC) matthew

 * Really good article, agreed. I hope Raul holds off 'main page-ing' it until January next year (assuming it's still featured then). Not every day you get a chance for a 200 year anniversary! —Preceding unsigned comment added by Adacore (talk • contribs) 11:31, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

 * Your school lets you use wikipedia? our papers are declined if it shows up on works cited because of possibility of false information, though i know that the infromation is carefully checked. Through extensive testing i know that bogus information is rapidly corrected and only valid changes can be made. Weisert (talk) 01:36, 16 May 2008 (UTC)

spelling of name
Whoever put this page together I am pretty sure that it's Edgar Allen Poe, not Allan. We have just covered this in my history class so I am pretty sure that it is spelled in this article. Oranges1fan (talk) 22:26, 21 April 2008 (UTC)
 * It's probably the most common mispelling in American literature (except for the word "misspelling"). Your history teacher needs to read a book: his name is Edgar Allan Poe, not coincidentally spelled the same as his foster-parents John and Frances Allan. --Midnightdreary (talk) 02:22, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

Poe's brother
An article on Poe's brother, William Henry Leonard Poe, was recently started (not by me). It's currently up for deletion though it seems to be heading for a keep (I'm not at all canvassing for votes on the AfD and don't even know if folks who work on this article think Poe's brother is worthy of an article or not, obviously anyone who wants can weigh in over there). If the article survives, I'm wondering if any of the editors who helped bring this to Featured status would mind putting in a bit of work over there. Henry (as I gather he was known - I don't know anything about the Poe family but I tried to clean up the article a bit, though it's still not much and might even have inaccuracies) apparently had some significant involvement in Edgar's life and has been discussed in secondary sources. I'm imagining he's mentioned in most good Poe biographies (from looking at the article it seems he's at least mentioned in the Hervey Allen book and the one by Arthur Quinn), so I figured it might be relatively easy for editors who work on this page to add some material about him if they have access to sources. If not, no worries. Right now the article just lists a few books in the bibliography but is largely based off of an unreliable online source. I'll be keeping an eye on the page (again assuming it isn't deleted) if anyone wants to lend a hand there at some point in the future. Thanks!--Bigtimepeace | talk | contribs 07:54, 13 May 2008 (UTC)
 * Help was provided, thanks Midnightdreary!--Bigtimepeace | talk | contribs 20:53, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

Poe's Death and Voting Gangs
I heard once that Poe may have been picked up by a voting gang before his death. The story goes that these gangs used to pick up "voters" who were drunks and transport them from town to town, having them vote in each town. They were rewarded with drinks along the way. Any way to verify this? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.3.6.207 (talk) 03:59, 3 June 2008 (UTC)
 * FWIW that theory is covered in the article on Cooping and is mentioned on the website of the Poe Society of Baltimore here but it seems like it's an unverifiable story. He was found at a place that apparently was a pub and voting place, on election day, but facts beyond that appear to be straight speculation. Jkraybill (talk) 06:13, 3 June 2008 (UTC)
 * The anon IP editor is a little off in his/her description... but read Death of Edgar Allan Poe for this and other theories. As far as verifying this, well, unless you know a witness... --Midnightdreary (talk) 12:38, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

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

title: Talk:Edgar Allan Poe/Archive 4


text:
Talk:European Community

(old comments)
Please note that it is not technically correct to describe the EC as the EU. The EC will remain until all three pillars are amalgomated under the draft constitution.

---

Are you sure Sweden is a member of the European Community? It was not a member of the European Union when it was established, and the other 'new' EU members are not on the list.

Yes, Sweden is an EU member -- every member of the EU is in the EC, and every member in the EC is in the EU. The EU and the EC are basically the same organization. (Techincally, only the EC is legally an organization, and the EU is composed of the EC and also wider non-EC responsibilities in areas such as foreign policy, security and defence, policing and crime co-operation.) Also, all the the 'new' EU members are on the list -- your not thinking of the candidate countries are you? (They are not yet members.) --- Simon J Kissane

I expect there is some good Wiki reason why there isn't a list of country names here.

In regards to the date change... from the EU website: http://europa.eu.int/abc/treaties/index_en.htm

"The Treaty on European Union, which was signed in Maastricht on 7 February 1992, entered into force on 1 November 1993. The Maastricht Treaty changed the name of the European Economic Community to simply 'the European Community'."

I think that the entry into force date would be the appropriate changeover moment for the EEC name to the shortened EC, despite any preceding signings/ratifications.

-Mike Hollis

I think that the redirect from the European Communities to "European Community" is wrong. Here is a short summary to go with. "The European Communities" used to mean three European Communities: the European Economic Community (which was changed to "European Community" by the Maastricht Treaty), the European Steel and Coal Community (which does not exist any more) and the European Atomic Energy Community (which still exists). Now, the European Communities legislation always refers to "the Community" (which used to be, as necessary, any one of the three Communities which was issuing the respective legislation, and now means one of the two remaining Communities) while "the Communities" used to mean all three. Therefore, reference to "the Community" could mean any one of the three while reference to the "European Communities" used to mean all three and nowadays mean the two left (EC and EURATOM). Hence, the European Communities are not the same as the European Community. The European Union includes the Communities but has some additional "ingredients" (pillars). Basically the Communities are becoming more and more a thing of the past while emphasis is laid on the term "European Union". E.g. the Council of the European Communities was renamed to "Council of the European Union" some years ago etc.

As for information regarding this quite complex structure, I find the information contained in this article quite poor. I hope that someone with better editing skills than mine could fix this. -Anonymous Commenter

 * I concur. European communities and European community are two different matters. Leonr (talk) 23:55, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Rated

 * Article rated--if there are sources it should be nominated for Good Article Candidate (WP:GAC). → James Kidd ( contr / talk / email ) 12:25, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

European Union and WTO.
"For legal reasons the European Union is known as the European Communities in WTO matters." This is nonsense. The EU ist _not_ a WTO member, but the EC is. I'll delete this, okay? Henning Blatt 21:19, 11 February 2007 (UTC)

Expiry
Are EEC/Euratom treaties going to expire just as ECSC treaty ? Siyac 21:19, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

This article needs cleaning...many points are repeated.

Merge of articles explaining the relationship of "European Community", "Europea Communities" etc. to EU
I think it would be a good idea to merge the two articles, as flagged on the article page.--Boson 14:44, 2 September 2007 (UTC)

It might also be a good idea to change the title of this article to "European Communities" (i.e. change the direction of the redirect). The text should indicate the different usage of the terms even more clearly, also bearing redirects in mind.--Boson 14:44, 2 September 2007 (UTC)

 * Yes to the first, why that article is there I don't know. We should also try to expand this, it is way to limited. But to the second, the current name is "European Community". That is the formal name of the pillar, the plural is an old and/or informal term. - J Logan t: 15:15, 2 September 2007 (UTC)

Infobox
FYI: In the same manner as the European Coal and Steel Community article, I've put together an infobox to be used here post-2009: User:JLogan/Sandbox.- J Logan t: 23:28, 18 March 2008 (UTC)

 * Good idea. Writing about the EU will be much easier once the various communities and pillars are gone. - $\mathrm{S}$ $\mathrm{Solberg}$ $\mathrm{J}$ 11:53, 19 March 2008 (UTC)

Split
I've been thinking about this for a while, although we don't have much separate data I think it might be good to have individual articles for European Economic Community, European Communities and European Community. For a start, the nature of the pillar is different from that of the EEC which was a direct predecessor. Having them all link to the same page might sound good from a continuity point of view but it may confuse some people who need to understand the differences better. The European Communities page would be small, just explaining the three different ones, the term and how they were interlinked. The EEC page would show everything pre-1993 of the individual development, members, institutions etc. while the EC page would concentrate on the pillar system, policies etc. Sticking them together gets a bit messy, like talking about members as post-1993 we go into repeating EU information.

Any objections to this proposal?- J Logan t: 10:39, 13 July 2008 (UTC)
 * I think this is a very good idea, if people know enough about the different things to actually write three separate articles. - SSJ ☎ 12:05, 13 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Draft EEC article: User:JLogan/Sandboxa . Communities would be small by nature. The only thing that might be hard to get the proper amount of data is the EC one but time will build it.- J Logan t: 12:43, 13 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Done, I know I should have waited but it takes ages for anyone to notice things here unless you actually edit it.- J Logan t: 20:04, 13 July 2008 (UTC)

Treaty of Lisbon
Presently this treaty is dead and irrelevant. The text regarding it was written when it was under serios consideration. May we agree to delete speculation about it until there is some real prospect that it will come into force? Raggz (talk) 22:48, 6 September 2008 (UTC)
 * Who says its dead? Arnoutf (talk) 10:04, 7 September 2008 (UTC)
 * Ditto, ratification is still continuing. It is the full intention of the leaders to continue with the ratification (and failing that, a treaty doing exactly the same).- J.Logan`t : 16:45, 7 September 2008 (UTC)
 * Fine. Raggz (talk) 23:09, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

Euratom is not defunct
The article starts with the note that "...three defunct European international organisations (the EEC, ECSC and EAEC),...", but this applies only to ECSC (lapsed in 2002) and EEC that transformed into EC and was then "integrated in the EU" by the Treaty of Lisbon. The EAEC is still functioning as before. Alinor (talk) 11:13, 1 December 2009 (UTC)
 * Good catch, might just be the redirect note but best be accurate.- J.Logan`t : 22:09, 1 December 2009 (UTC)

European Community/European Communities as a Pillar
Hello from Russian Wikipedia, and sorry for my poor English. I'm a member (perhaps, the only active one) of the Russian version of European Union Project. I've noticed that two years ago you've came to some consensus about what is European Community and what is European Communities. However, studying various official sources I found no basis for considering the European Community, not European Communities, the first pillar of EU. E.g. the Treaty of Maastricht clearly covers all the communities; the same is in European NAvigator (note the picture); the official glossary; even the picture in the article itself states 'European Communities', not 'European Community', the same is with the diagram in Three pillars of the European Union. So, shouldn't the text in the beginning of the article, 'This article is about the abolished pillar of the European Union,' be changed with the corresponding changes to related articles (at least European Communities)? Volgar (talk) 19:06, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
 * The EU is founded on distinct treaties, the EU treaties are what was the EEC Treaty and the EU Treaty. The ECSC and Euratom were totally distinct and did not form part of the EU. If you recall, the integration of Euratom into the failed constitution was put aside as they feared addressing nuclear issues would needlessly put people off the treaty. Euratom/ECSC are/were defacto part of the EU but not legally as they had distinct treaties and legal personalities. The confusion arises when people mix up the terms (as they do frequently) but the European Community was the renamed EEC and alone legally formed the first pillar. The Communities was referring to them all but there was no single legal personality - only common governing institutions. That is also why there is a slight lack of Parliamentary power over Euratom issues.- J.Logan`t : 20:18, 31 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I called Europe Direct yesterday, without having seen this section, believe it or not, and asked whether the first pillar was called European Community or European Communities. The answer was that the EU's first pillar was collectively called "European Communities". It is clear that, since the European Community was by far the most dominant part of the pillar, the pillar was often called just "the european community pillar". But as the European NAvigator chart and the Europa.eu glossary clearly state, the European Community was not a pillar in it self. The Lisbon Treaty says (I've copied the quote from the treaty): "The Union shall replace and succeed the European Community". It seems like only the European Community part of the European Communities pillar had a legal personality. The first pillar never had a legal personality. Do we agree? - SSJ t 17:06, 1 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Hmmm, I think the misunderstanding we have here is due to the fact the European Communities never really existed and the pillar system never legally described in the treaties. I've been trailing through the treaties to find something solid but given the lack of definition of the pillars there I haven't dug up anything either way. However the EU treaty does amend all three community treaties so I'll agree, unless someone can come up with new evidence, that the Communities did all form the first pillar. However I would like to stress that we should agree here what to do with the articles before people move things around - in order to make sure everything is consistent.
 * We currently have three articles;
 * European Economic Community
 * European Communities
 * European Community
 * If we move the data that currently resides on European Community to European Communities, we still have the question of a name change between European Economic Community and European Community. So, do we maintain two articles or do we have one (my preference) and if we do have one, what do we call it? Furthermore, we need to ensure appropriate redirects and clarifications in intros. Another question is the infoboxes.- J.Logan`t : 20:05, 1 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Now that we finally have settled this question, I think we should sort out the three articles and get the facts straight in the first round at least. What we need to do is to clarify the following across all articles:
 * European Economic Community: Most prominent of the communities established by the treaties of Rome, had legal personality - shared institutions with Euratom and ECSC from 1967 - was in 1993 transformed into the biggest component of the 1. pillar of the EU (and changed name), retained its legal personality.
 * European Community: The name of the biggest portion of the first pillar of the EU from 1993 to 2009. Was effectively what the EEC had been transformed into with the Maastricht Treaty. Obtained the legal personality that had belonged to the EEC. Passed its legal personality on to the EU and was succeeded and replaced by the EU in 2009.
 * European Communities: a term that is used to refer to the Communities that were created by the Treaties of Rome as well as the ECSC. Was a common term even before the Merger Treaty, but with the common institutions that were introduced with the Merger Treaty, the term "European Communities" became formal (purely) in the sense that the common institutions had names that included the term (e.g. Commission of the European Communities and Court of Justice of the European Communities), yet the term European Communities never was a legal term in itself nor had a legal personality. Was from 1993 to 2009 used to refer to the first EU pillar, due to the fact that the first pillar was composed of the same three communities which had been given common institutions with the Merger Treaty. European Communities was still not a legal person or a formal name in itself. The first pillar never had a formal name - the treaties only defined its content. The term ceased to be used in 2009 as all communities but Euratom were abolished, and at the same time the pillar of which "European Communities" had been an informal name, was also abolished.
 * Any objections? - SSJ t 23:59, 1 September 2010 (UTC)
 * The only thing I'm not too sure about is whether the European Communities never had a legal personality. Should we call Europe Direct? :) - SSJ t 00:17, 2 September 2010 (UTC)
 * As each of the three communities had their own legal personalities, I doubt the collective of all thre,e being very informal, would have had one. As for your outline, I think we can combine the first two, the European Community article is very short (especially as pillar data would be under European Communities) so I think we can get away with it. We should also use the EEC name as that is most distinct.- J.Logan`t : 08:36, 2 September 2010 (UTC)
 * I agree, even though the "European Community" is the latter name of the organization, it'd be almost indistinguishable for a reader, since it's too close to the "European Communities". Thanks guys! I'm glad I was right with my case. —Volgar (talk) 08:48, 2 September 2010 (UTC)

title: Talk:European Community