Editing Talk:Philosophy in Battlestar Galactica/Archive 1

Building a philosophy page within battlestarwiki is a daunting task, one that might quickly spin out of control if the subject is not limited to its relationship to BSG.

In my opinion, BSG is so enthralling to fans not so much due to its own content as it is due to the imagination and pondering it promotes in the minds of its fans. 

Therefore, the potential for this page to be a great and meaningful contribution to battlestar wiki is great. This is a bold move designed to help those who couldn't afford to squander precious years at some stuffy university reading Plato, Holmes, Mill, Locke, Kant, Derrida, Focault, et al- but recognize some of the thoughts floating around in the chimeric battlestar universe.

Perhaps the best thing about battlestar is that it presents characters that are flawed and evolving constantly.  There are few true heroes and villains in battlestar.  Hardly anything in battlestar can be consistently labeled because something that applies to the Cylons might change in the next episode as they evolve as a species/culture, make mistakes, try new approaches, and embrace or shed beliefs. The same goes for humans, be they Capricans, Sagitatarians, or Vegetarians.

Guidelines:

1) In writing this page, let us limit things as they apply to BSG- punt things off to wikipedia's philosophy pages in case people want to explore further. We will need to cut off tangents at the border of the BSG universe or things will get out of control.

2) Distinguish between our world and BSG very clearly. We can briefly explain an ethical principle, and then give an example from BSG where it seems to be at play.

3) Make sure that we are attributing things to BSG speculatively, not in any concrete fashion- only the writers of BSG know for sure what was meant, if they meant anything at all. The show seems to be inherently ambiguous in general and this is probably on purpose. 

4) The more we can identify scenes, specific episodes, time tracks, give quotes, provide citations, and link things to sources such as Wikpedia (but certainly not limited to this), the more solid this will be. For example, cite an event in BSG such as Chief Tyrell's embracing of certain labor concerns and link it loosely to political philosophy as it may apply- perhaps Marxism.

5) This page is as certain to evolve as cylons and man are certain to evolve.  This is God's plan. Embrace it. 

I welcome all the help I can get on this page. I am going to need it!

So say we all? {{unsigned|Maximilian333}}

:Welcome, Max. I appreciate the work you've done. Since Battlestar Wiki is intended as an encyclopedia and not for analysis for commentary, there is some rewriting and sourcing that needs to be done for this article to fit on the wiki. I and other contributors may take a stab at doing this, but it is important that you cite external sources that support the comparisons, contrasts, and information on the series that you show. You can use internal links for characters, of course, but it is very important that the article does not sound as if you specifically wrote it as a personal analysis. Hopefully other contributors will look at what's been done and give other comments that may help. There is much philosophy in the show, but it is difficult to quantify objectively. --[[User:Spencerian|Spencerian]] 09:44, 7 March 2007 (CST)
::Hopefully you'll remove the "major edit" tag soon so I can begin assisting. :)  I personally have tried to use the "Notes" section of many of the articles to show real world parallels and possible influences. Those entries will probably be useful to you. Rest assured this page will be on my watchlist, it sounds like great fun as well as being a very valuable contribution if, as Spencerian notes, everything is cited correctly. [[User:JubalHarshaw|JubalHarshaw]] 01:05, 12 March 2007 (CDT)

== Thanks / call to arms ==

Thank you for the vote of confidence, Spencerian. As I am neither a philosopher nor a professional writer, it is not my intent to finalize this article alone.  I expect this to be a messy and chaotic process, but the end result should be worth the work. 

I can already tell that it will be very important not to overdefine or overattribute anything to the series.  One could kill all of the mystery and allure of the series by overanalyzing or stating their opinions as fact. But philosophy can lead us into deeper examination of the meaning contained in the series. I recently added the statement that the philosophy of battlestar is as much created in the minds of viewers as in the minds of the writers and actors.

I'll do my best to keep things objective, use qualifiers, and provide citations. Additionally, I will try to sift philosophy-related ideas from religion, politics, and mythology and punt these to appropriate pages.

Again, if anyone has any thoughts about something and can clarify or lend support through citations, please do be so bold as to click "edit" above and go for it. Don't let the major edit sign stop you if you want to do some simple formatting or linking, or if a great idea strikes you. -- [[User:Maximilian333|Maximilian333]] 14:14, 12 March 2007 (CDT)

:Remember that you can't use <nowiki>[[...]]</nowiki> to link to Wikipedia articles. The brackets only work for BSWiki. To link to a general concept on Wikipedia do this: <nowiki>[[w:Article name on Wikipedia|Link name on BSWiki]]</nowiki>. Notice the "w".
:And please sign your comments on talk pages, and there only, with four tildes, like this: <nowiki>--~~~~</nowiki> --[[User:Serenity|Serenity]] 06:43, 11 March 2007 (CDT)
:Also, please do not overlink. One link to [[Laura Roslin]] per section is enough (I just encountered a section with no less than three of those). --[[User:Catrope|Catrope]]<sup>([[User talk:Catrope|Talk to me]] or [[Special:Emailuser/Catrope|e-mail me]])</sup> 07:23, 13 March 2007 (CDT)

== Visibility of this article ==

This is pretty interesting. However, at the moment, nothing links here. Any suggestions where to place a link or two, so this gets some love? I also made a similar suggestion on the [[BW:AN#Visibility_of_articles_about_.22meta.22_topics|Admin board]]. --[[User:Serenity|Serenity]] 17:06, 21 May 2007 (CDT)
:I also stumbled across this recently while [[Special:Random|rolling the dice]]. You pose an excellent question! [[User:JubalHarshaw|JubalHarshaw]] 21:47, 21 May 2007 (CDT)
::For now ,I put an link on it on [[Battlestar Galactica (RDM)]]. --[[User:Serenity|Serenity]] 07:19, 22 May 2007 (CDT)

Thanks all, I think that within episode descriptions there may be many opportunities to mention the dilemmas and themes and link them here where those themes are explored more deeply --[[User:Maximilian333|Maximilian333]] 19:40, 25 February 2011 (UTC)

== Accuracy of Science ==
In the Philosophical dilemma section there is the following sentance:
"Water" contains material that can be examined in light of the viewers understanding of determinism versus free will and also responsibility. Sharon Valerii's apparent blackouts or '''split personality'''   Now what is incorrect or inaccurate is not the sentance itself but the fact that the word "split personality" is a link to a Wikipedia article on Schizophrenia; and not the Wikipedia article on "Dissociative Identity Disorder" which would be more clearly about split personality. I would edit it myself; however in respect of users here, I prefer to leave my comments here in the discussions.  This is a well written Wiki.  --[[User:Balator|Balator]] 01:07, 10 February 2009 (UTC)

Thank you very much. It's hard to believe that 4-5 years have gone by since I began this article. Well, now I'm back to clean things up and reinvigorate this page as well as the subject.  --[[User:Maximilian333|Maximilian333]] 19:43, 25 February 2011 (UTC)

== Quality Article Discussion ==

Let's get the discussion rolling so this can be voted on for QA status.--[[User:Jonathan|Jonathan]] 18:49, 30 July 2010 (UTC)

Thank you all for the nominations. This article has achieved Quality Article status. --[[User:Maximilian333|Maximilian333]] 19:45, 25 February 2011 (UTC)