Talk:nuclear accident

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WritersCramp 11:30, 27 March 2010 (UTC)

Request for deletion

The following information has failed Wiktionary's deletion process.

It should not be re-entered without careful consideration.

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What else could the words nuclear + accident mean together? Mglovesfun (talk) 12:08, 31 March 2010 (UTC)

baleet — [ R·I·C ] opiaterein — 13:12, 31 March 2010 (UTC)

Nuke it. Ƿidsiþ 13:18, 31 March 2010 (UTC)

By the oft-mentioned any-polysemy-is-too-confusing-for-our-users criterion ("piecewise polysemy"), this is a clear keeper as nuclear#Adjective has 4 senses (MW online shows more, including subsenses, including a more generic sense than any of ours) and accident#Noun has 9 senses, yielding a dizzying 36 possible combinations. These are not close to equiprobable. More than one, but not all, of which will probably be attestable. The "not all" proviso is (almost ?) always met, so we only need to find one other attestable meaning. Accordingly, either we reject the piecewise polysemy criterion or we should move this to RfV to test for other senses. DCDuring TALK 14:44, 31 March 2010 (UTC)

• Keep - fried egg, idioms are allowed, it is a well written definition with citations. In addition, let's clarify what is really happening here: Mglovesfun is stalking me through my contributions trying to get as many of my self created definitions deleted. It is unfortunate we have editors like that at Wiktionary, but there you have it.
• Google Search Results 1 - 100 of about 575,000 for "nuclear accident". (0.28 seconds)
• Google Scholar Search Results 1 - 100 of about 16,900. (0.31 sec)

WritersCramp 19:03, 31 March 2010 (UTC)

• • As I said on my talk page, stop taking it so personally. This debate is about nuclear accident, not about me. Mglovesfun (talk) 19:07, 31 March 2010 (UTC)
  • We both know different. WritersCramp 19:09, 31 March 2010 (UTC)
    • You never read WT:CFI#Idiomaticity in that case. Ill think you'll find I like chocolate gets more Google hits than that. Mglovesfun (talk) 19:12, 31 March 2010 (UTC)

WritersCramp appears to be one of those users who since perhaps 2007 has been told it's doing something wrong, and gets offended when you try to correct. So let's not take it too seriously. — [ R·I·C ] opiaterein — 20:14, 31 March 2010 (UTC)

It is perfectly rational and desirable behavior for someone performing the vital patrol functions to check on the other entries of a user who has made mistakes in form or substance. Once one has found more than, say, a 20% error rate, one would naturally even go back over a longer period of time. With a registered user, the mistakes begin to seem willful, especially if accompanied by ad hominem attacks. RfD hardly seems wrong for this entry. Some might argue for speedier remedies. DCDuring TALK 20:30, 31 March 2010 (UTC)

• Strong delete. This is not a fixed phrase; nor does it have any extended meaning beyond its parts. One can easily replace "nuclear" with "radiation" and "accident" with "incident", "holocaust", "reaction", "poisoning", etc. Google searches do not qualify as criteria for inclusion. What we must determine is whether this combination of words has a meaning beyond its sum, which is demonstrably not the case here. It is unfortunate that that this user, given his/her history, does not fully understand Wiktionary's CFI. ---> Tooironic 03:10, 1 April 2010 (UTC)
  • FWIW I decided not to RFD nuclear holocaust, although I can't remember why. Mglovesfun (talk) 12:36, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

delete

Conrad.Irwin 15:17, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

Delete  Reasons above, plus the definition doesn't support the term—it's both too vague and overly specific. For example, it would apply to the bombing of Hiroshima, certainly no accident, but not to Marie Curie's tragic death. —Michael Z. 2010-04-01 16:31 z

• Comment: A nuclear bomb is a very controlled nuclear reaction, therefore, it would not apply to this definition. You don't delete a word because you don't like the definition, you amend the definition. WritersCramp 10:43, 5 April 2010 (UTC)

The definition of this sum-of-parts term is “a nuclear accident,” or, if I tried hard to humour the entry, “an accident involving nuclear materials or processes.” I suppose you'd have a comment if I amended the definition, too. —Michael Z. 2010-04-05 14:18 z

(Your technical use of “controlled reaction” is both incorrect and irrelevant. A nuclear bomb's effect is a purposefully initiated, but absolutely uncontrolled nuclear chain reaction. But the accidental discharge of it would qualify as a nuclear accident, as would a crash spreading radioactive material on the highway, where there is no chain reaction at all. —Michael Z. 2010-04-05 14:36 z)

Of the five worst-ever nuclear accidents, two involved no nuclear chain reaction at all, and a third was a fire following the shutdown of a reaction: w: Kyshtym disaster, w: Goiânia accident, and w: Windscale fire. So “an uncontrolled nuclear reaction” doesn't define nuclear accident. —Michael Z. 2010-04-07 16:36 z

Ah, thanks, Michael Z. You've explained why we should keep this. The meaning of nuclear in the context of Curie is the same as its meaning in the context of Hiroshima, and the meaning of accident in the context of her death is the same as the meaning not in the context of the bombing, yet this term refers only to the latter and not the former. That means it's not SoP: it is in no way understandable as the sum of its parts. On the assumption it's correct, I say strong keep.​—msh210℠ 22:59, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

Hm, no, we split the senses of nuclear relating to atomic energy and atomic bombs. But they're very, very similar, anyway. I still say to keep.​—msh210℠ 23:07, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

I am too tired to follow the senses, but I'll accept your proof, but... OED, for example, has a sense “relating to atomic nuclei,” with a subsense “Relating to, connected with, or using energy from the fission or fusion of atomic nuclei,” that has 6 subsenses. I believe that nuclear accident as we usually envision it could include at least 4 of these, and I could possibly find citations to support a few diverse meanings. (I haven't even looked at accident.) Are you suggesting that it would be helpful to readers to define a half-dozen or more barely-differentiated senses of nuclear accident, nuclear event, nuclear ambition, nuclear apparatus, nuclear device, nuclear facilities, nuclear technology, nuclear research, nuclear capabilities, and a hundred others? —Michael Z. 2010-04-09 05:15 z

Deleted.​—msh210℠ 16:15, 22 April 2010 (UTC)