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Reverts on Chinese origin theory and lead section
I have reverted the edit by MountainPriest of oct 13 for the following reasons:
- That edit was in part a revert of my work on the china section in early history, in which I had neutralized the text and given an extra reference. Please give a good reason for that revert.
- The reference to Murray in the lead section was changed. The reference to Murray should be 1913, not 1985 (Murray died in 1955. The book A History Of Chess was republished in 1985, but was first published in 1913).
- I feel that the explanation about hasty-asva-nauka-padata does not merit mention in the lead section and should remain where it is (other material specific to the dynamics of chaturanga should go in the same section or should be on the Chaturanga page.)
HermanHiddema 08:25, 15 October 2007 (UTC)
The statement about the origin of Chinese chess in India is flawed ("As a strategy board game played in China, chess is believed to have been derived from the Indian Chaturanga."). It uses the reference of Britannia Encyclopedia, which in fact just makes a simple statement without any reference or proof, a typical case of the blind leading the blind.
The conclusion of the origin of chess in India according Persian and Arabic accounts is also ambiguous. The methodology is simply flawed. You cannot draw a conclusion about the origin of Chess by reciting accounts. The Persian and Arab accounts only mean that they got to know the game from the Indians, no more, no less. However, this has nothing to do with the origin of the game! Let's use an analogy, there is no dispute about the origin of the game of Go, an ancient board game invented in China. However, the game was introduced first to the west by Japanese, as can be seen from its English name Go, a transliteration of the Japanese word for the game. So, following that flawed logic, can the rest of the world draw a conclusion that the game of Go originated in Japan, because the Europeans attribute the game to the Japanese (before they were told the real origin of the game)?
The origin of chess is better put in this way "Just as chess is a difficult game, its origin is a difficult puzzle. We may never know the truth of its birth." (http://chess.about.com/od/history/p/aa06a14.htm)
Havelock the Dane, "mainstream academic opinion", you make me laugh. "As a strategy board game played in China, chess is believed to have been derived from the Indian Chaturanga." is this your so-called "mainstream academic opinion"? I suppose the "mainstream academic opinion" about the origin of Chinese chess in the place where it is mostly played is quite different from this "mainstream academic opinion". Who defines which is the "mainsteam"?
In reply to J.S. Ayers question about chinese scholarship, I suggest reading Facts on the Origin of Chinese Chess by Peter Banaschak, which sets out 5 theories proposed by chinese scholars and discusses the evidence for and against them.
As a brief summary, Banaschak lists 5 theories, these are:
- Origin in 28th century BC, proposed by a 14th century scholar
- No evidence, probably an attempt to add status to the game by connecting it with a revered legendary emperor
- Origin in 27th century BC, proposed by a 11th century scholar
- No evidence, probably an attempt to add status to the game by connecting it with a revered legendary emperor
- Origin in 12th century BC, proposed by a 16th sentury scholar
- No evidence, probably a confusion between Zhou Wuwang (12th century BC) and Beizhou Wudi (6th century AD)
- Origin in 3rd century BC, proposed by 16th century scholar
- Earliest mention of XiangQi in literature is from this time, but the game is not described and XiangQi can also refer to other games
- Origin in 6th century AD, proposed by 10th century scholar
- There is significant evidence that a book called XiangJing about game called XiangXi was written at this time. This may have been a predecessor of XiangQi
Theory 5 (XiangXi) is also the basis of Joseph Needham's theory.
HermanHiddema 15:39, 14 November 2007 (UTC)Unsourced Edits
HermanHiddema, You made this edit on 12:39, 25 October 2007 with the edit summary "revert bad edit that removed properly sourced material"
I would like you to throw some light on the following questions:
1.) You claim that the lines "The oldest surviving remnant of ancient Chinese Liubo (or Liu po) dates to circa 1500 BC. Nevertheless, Liubo, though sometimes considered a battle game, was played with dice." constitute "properly sourced material."
Where are the sources for these lines in your revert ? If you don't have any sources for these lines then how is my removal of unsourced material a bad edit according to you ?
2.) You're using the German historian Peter Banaschak in the same lines as David Li, without mentioning what he has to say about Li's theories.
Do you not think that if you're mentioning Peter Banaschak in connection with David Li then it would be proper for you to mention this as well ?
As far as notability in an encyclopedia is concerned, Li made none I researched, and I still made sure he was represented in the article but representing Peter Banaschak in connection with Li will have to be done completely, not partially as has been done.
Of course then it would raise WP:UNDUE issues on why we're giving the Banaschak-Li connection such heavy place (in terms of kilobytes), so it's best to leave it only to what Li has to say, which again did not make any other encyclopedia of note.
3.) Why have you altered David Li's profession ? Why not let people know that he was an accountant who started writing books after he retired ?
Kindly refrain from making such colorful edit summaries,
With Regards,
Havelock the Dane Talk 20:13, 25 October 2007 (UTC)
- If we keep our cool, I think together we can make this article better. It has suffered from having a lot of unsourced and just generally bad claims, and both of you have helped clean them up. Personally I think Li is just wrong. If he was a professor of accounting then I would say his professorship grants absolutely no added status as a chess historian. Claims of Chinese origin of chess need to be discussed in this article, and Li's theory should be mentioned. Havelock, I like your recent work on this article and think it has really improved it. We should be able to work out language that would be acceptable. Quale 20:36, 25 October 2007 (UTC)
1.) The date of 1500 BC is referenced on the Liubo page, and could be repeated here, though I personally do not see any particular need for that. The bad edit part mainly refered to the fact that you removed the reference to Banaschak as being a dubious source .
2.) I am aware of what Banaschak has to say about Li. An earlier version of the article gave (IMO) undue attention to Li, and I edited the section by adding material from someone other than Li. My intention was not to make it seem that Banaschak supports Li, and I do not think the text gave that impression.
3.) Regarding the profession of Li, I feel the current edit by J S Ayer is neutral enough. I don't know why Li gets such attention anyway, why not refer to eg Joseph Needham?
HermanHiddema 21:40, 25 October 2007 (UTC)
Look, regardless of the Li/Banaschak/XiangQi discussion, I think you're doing good work on an article which badly needed it. The only reason I reverted you was because I had recently made this edit and this edit, in which I tried to neutralize the text on Chinese origin and make it lean less heavily solely on the work of David H Li. I added (IMO) a good extra source on XiangQi. When someone the makes a change back to a text leaning only on the work of Li, with an edit summary that calls Banaschak a 'bad source', I think it is only natural for me to revert that edit, and I still think that makes it a bad edit among many good ones. As you state above about the text after your edit: It gives proper due, unnecessary due even, to Li's theories . I agree, Li gets to much attention when there are other source with (IMO) better credentials (Needham, Banaschak). HermanHiddema 09:11, 26 October 2007 (UTC)
Chaturanga/Chaturaji
Given that Havelock is currently heavily editing, I will try not to touch the text until his work is done. I would like to point out however, that the current text contains the following:
Chaturanga was a battle simulation game played by fou
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