Talk:Alexander du Toit

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[edit] Merge proposal

I've recently spotted that a page I created on this subject, Alex du Toit, overlaps this article. I suggest merging the content of this page into that of the other (the latter is much more detailed). It might be an idea to move the result of this over to Alexander L. du Toit or Alexander Logie du Toit instead of either of the current article pages. Unless anyone objects in the next couple of days I'll just go ahead and do this. Cheers, --Plumbago 17:21, 10 July 2007 (UTC)

I agree, we need to merge these articles. However, it seems to me that Alexander du Toit may be the preferred article name, given that "Alex" is just a short-form of his first name. Maybe it is best, if someone can find a publication by him, to see if he preferred "Alex" or "Alexander" when giving his name? Awolf002 20:38, 10 July 2007 (UTC)

Is there a specific policy on this? I'd have thought that we should use Alexander. Anyway, I should have reversed the merge direction - I was getting confused because the "Alexander" article is a stub, while the "Alex" one is more detailed (i.e. regardless of the name of the final article, it's liable to look like the "Alex" one). Another thing I wanted to canvas views on was whether we need to use his middle initial/name too. There are already redirected articles for "Alexander L. du Toit" and "Alexander Logie du Toit" - I was wondering if one of these should be co-opted instead. If so, I'd favour the latter. Cheers, --Plumbago 21:02, 10 July 2007 (UTC)

Further to the above, the biennial lecture series named after him is labelled "Alex du Toit" (see the link on the "Alex" page). Also, IIRC, the Oxford Companion to The Earth also refers to him as "Alex du Toit". That said, the obits and bios seem to favour "Alexander", though that might just be because they're more formal. I'll see if I can rake up any other sources. Cheers, --Plumbago 21:19, 10 July 2007 (UTC)

I think we should just apply the general policy, that in a set of possible article names, WP should place the text at the "most used name". I'm unsure how the chips would fall here, but I did find a publication entry by du Toit here that demonstrates that he published using the name "Alex". So, I think we should consider merging, there. Awolf002 23:23, 10 July 2007 (UTC)

A merger is in order - it would be nice if we had a way to avoid these duplicate articles - don't need both. I would opt for the more formal Alexander, that's the way Arthur Holmes referres to him in his Principles of Physical Geology (where I first met him back in the late '60s). Besides, the Alexander article has priority, been around longer (July '04) even if it's a stub. Don't think we need to include the middle name or initials - du Toit isn't as common as Smith :-). Vsmith 01:12, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

OK, sounds like there's agreement to merge. I'll do this today. And I'll merge onto "Alexander do Toit" as per Vsmith. Although it does sound like he used "Alex" rather than "Alexander" - c.f. my remark last night, the Oxford Companion to The Earth does refer to him that way too. Anyway, so long as the redirects are all fixed up, there shouldn't be a problem. As for the commonness of "du Toit" as a surname, well, for all I know "du Toit" might be the South African "Smith"!  ;) Cheers, --Plumbago 07:39, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

Right, done. I hope the result is to everyone's satisfaction. I think the merge has retained all of the information that the two articles separately contained. One inconsistency I have spotted is du Toit's place of birth - previously I'd listed this as Rondebosch, but one of the sources I latterly consulted (the Royal Society obit) claims that it was Newlands instead (the original "Alexander" article favoured Rondebosch too; probably from the Charles Smith bio). Anyway, as near as I can tell, they're geographical neighbours, so it may not be possible to source either definitively. Cheers, --Plumbago 08:06, 11 July 2007 (UTC)