Disputatio Vicipaediae:Numeri Romani

E Vicipaedia

[recensere] Roman numerals/numeri romani

Vide etiam: Vicipaedia:Numeri Romani --Roland2 15:01, 14 Maii 2006 (UTC)

I thought I'd put it up here, as Roland and I have been discussing this. The current accepted policy is to use roman numerals only for articles about numbers themselves. All other usages should be in arabic. Whom does this not satisfy, and why? My reasons for using arabic are these:

  1. They are infinitely easier to read.
  2. They are almost always smaller than their roman counterparts.
  3. Mathematics with roman numerals is unfeasible to someone without great training.
  4. We use several modern orthographical variations to classical orthodoxy, such as spaces, commas, periods, colons, semicolons, the letter v, lowercase letters etc... IHOPENOONEISSUGGESTINGWEDOAWAYWITHTHESEITHINKTHATWOULDBETHEHEIGHTOFABSURDITY. If not, we should accept arabic numerals as a supremely useful development in the history of mathematics, akin to the invention of the alphabet's influence on modern language.

Any thoughts?

Putavi id hic ponere, ita de eo Roland et ego conloquebamur. Ratio quae ad tempus accepta est numeris romanis uti fere pro paginas de numeris ipsibus scribendo. In modis omnibus aliis, opportet arabicis. Quoi haec non placet et quia? Rationes meae pro arabicis utendo sunt hae:

  1. Perfaciliores sunt lectu.
  2. Fere semper parviores.
  3. Mathematica vix potest facier sine docendo magnum
  4. Adhibemus hic plurimas inventiones recentes orthographicas insimiles moribus classicis, it spatia, commas, punctos, colones, semicolones, litteram v, litteras parvas, etc... SPERONEMOSUGGEREHASDIMITTESUMMUMPUTEMHOCABSURDITATISESSE. Si non, debemus arabicos accipere quam inventiones utillisimas in historia mathematicarum, sicut vocalia in historia abecedarii.

Cogitationes ullas?

--Ioshus Rocchio 15:34, 7 Maii 2006 (UTC)

SICUTDIXISTIETMIHIPLACETVSVSNUMERORUMARABICORUMMAXIMECUMOPPORTETNOBISHABEREUNITATEMSTYLORUMSYMBOLORUMQUE. --Tbook 20:01, 7 Maii 2006 (UTC)
Thanks for using some "U"s ... ;-) Ok, these are reasons why you do not want to write or read (i. e. "decode") Roman numbers. I think we have to face, that Roman numbers are funny - or maybe are even fun - and some people like to see it. And they are awaiting to see it especially here. (Maybe like people think, that Austrians are wearing Lederhosen, are riding a Lippizaner and communicate by yodelling.) Obviously this is not encyclopaedic, however, it has some of the spirit old manuscripts show: The monks had fun with writing the books, they drawed little pictures and decorated the letters, sometimes in a way which decreased readability. In that time writing and reading was not something for everybody and the people had time enough to decipher the writings. In our days books are just for providing information, aren't they? They shall offer precise, clear information and it shall be possible to pick up the information quickly and without annoying extra noise. This attitude is even mirrored in other aspects: The wording, the use of "modern" fonts, the use of summaries etc. - I must admit, that I think Roman numbers are a nice decoration for a text and that the Roman numbers are not my biggest problem when I want to read a Latin text. ;-) I think the question is: Why does nowadays someone write some information down in Latin and not in English? It is something more than just the intention to provide information? Just providing information is being encyclopaedic. A word which I avoid. I am looking for a word for "providing relevant and some irrelevant information which is either correct or tagged as dubious, which can be proofed and which is offered in a manner that makes it attractive for the reader". That's not at all what people understand by "encyclopaedic". So, what are we awaiting from this encyclopaedia (sic!)? P. S.: I myself do not like to write or decode Roman numbers, but I think these are aspects which should be considered. --Roland2 21:50, 7 Maii 2006 (UTC)
It's hard not to have POV on this issue. If we decide it attractive to some readers, how do we encourage edits? Myh inclination would always be to delete roman numerals and use arabic ones. I would not be overly inclined to do something like replace CCX with [[210]] ([[CCX]]), because I think it looks sloppy and doesn't help any modern reader, accept the few who care to have fluency with roman numerals. First and foremost we are a provider of information, and hardly an organization that caters to fancy and whimsicalness. Roman numerals, as has been argued, detract from the ready conveyance of information. As such, if not shunned, policy should certainly be to have arabic numerals first and then roman as an afterthought. But I still think we should discourage their use altogether, as Tbook said, we need to have a unified system.--Ioshus Rocchio 01:34, 8 Maii 2006 (UTC)
One more thing about this. If we wanted to get down to it and use a Roman system of dates including Roman numerals, we would have to use an AUC or a co. form of the date. Thus an event in America in 1977 would be CCI auc, or Carter et Mondale praesidentibus. We still would not be using Roman numerals the way that some do here.--Ioshus Rocchio 12:39, 8 Maii 2006 (UTC)
Vide etiam: Vicipaedia:Numeri Romani --Roland2 18:54, 8 Maii 2006 (UTC)
Actually I should mention that I thought the practice had been that articles about the numbers themselves were to be named, not numbered, e.g. viginti rather than XX, or duo rather than II, which seems more sensible. It is hard to tell though, as from the early days some user created identical content on all three titles (name, Arabic numeral and Roman numeral) for many numbers, and they have been cleaned up differently by different people. In general I tend to discourage Roman numerals and replace them with Arabic ones, because people are generally much less, 'fluent' I should say, with Roman numerals, meaning they are harder to read and errors are more likely to creep in and go unnoticed longer. —Myces Tiberinus 22:42, 10 Maii 2006 (UTC)
Definitely, I wouldn't be able to tell at a moment's glance what any roman numeral over 500 would be. I think naming articles about numbers themselves with the actual number name makes infinitely more sense.--Ioshus Rocchio 02:41, 11 Maii 2006 (UTC)
Though, shouldn't duo rather be binio?

--Ioshus Rocchio 03:28, 11 Maii 2006 (UTC)

Puto quod pro numeris annorum etiam numeros Romanos uti possumus. (Nunc magnopere facilia sunt: MM, MMI, MMII etc.) Hic usus erat per saecula saeculorum in multis ecclesiis et in aedificiis publicis in multis civitatibus. Etiam simpliciter quaestio exercitionis est romanos numeros legendi. Alex1011 14:50, 14 Maii 2006 (UTC)

That's exactly what we were arguing, that no, it isn't at all easy to read. Simple numbers like 200, yes easy, long ones not easy at all. As far as saying the church used it for years, you're right, but the church has never really had understandability as their prime objective. I mean they thought the worl was flat for 1000 years, their precedent is not really my icon. To use roman numerals for years would require the renaming of all the articles on years, and would require many edits to existing articles. Note that the policy has been around year for years to use arabic numerals and use roman for basically nothing, we are debating here whether there is a good reason to change policy. That roman numerals are easy for you to read and use I do not think equates a good reason to change.--Ioshus Rocchio 15:18, 14 Maii 2006 (UTC)