Template talk:Bronze Age

". How is listing archaeological cultures in alphabetical order helpful? It has no conceivable use, but breaks "what links here". We have categories for that. There can be an intelligent "Bronze Age" template, but it will need to group articles by region and/or period. --dab (𒁳) 12:31, 19 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I presume you mean me as I created the infox. Quit calling me non-helpful. Also, are you following me around? 93,000 edits does not give you the right to be a bully. That isn't too helpful. Now, for the box, I found the system in place going back to the Palaeolithic. There is a series of boxes. The holocene box was already in place - I added the color and and expanded the list of cultures. Why put in only a few and leave the others out? It did bother me somewhat that the list was so long and I did make a request for an ace to handle it. I didn't see much hope of an ace turning up. I guess 93,000 edits makes you an ace and you seem to be able to work on infoboxes all right. Your solution seem OK but since you are taking a look at it, why not look at the entire system, which starts with the geologic periods? Just follow the arrows back. But there is a point here which you evidently are not yet seeing. This isn't a list of all archaeological cultures, it is a list of Bronze Age cultures. That might be of interest. The list is alphabetical because the holocene box had an alphabetic list. The problem as you generally perceive is that the descent of cultures is regionalized so if you are trying to give a descent over wider regions there are no matching stages; that is, you can't find a single list that is in chronological order. I wasn't entirely happy with alphabetizing either so if you want to regionalize I don't see anything wrong with that. It is a simplification but I don't see any other choices; reality is not always convenient. As far as "clutter" is concerned the box was no more cluttering than any other longer box and certainly not the longest of boxes. So I disagree about it being "clutter" but since I am agreeing to the solution that is irrelevant.

also, the Bronze Age does not "follow" the Holocene. The Holocene is a geological epoch while the Bronze Age is a cultural epoch. The Bronze Age begins as early as 3500 BC in the Caucasus, and as late as 1200 BC in Scandinavia: it's part of the three age system, and not useful as an indication of absolute dates. Most places (Africa, Americas) even skipped the Bronze and Iron Ages entirely. dab (𒁳) 12:34, 19 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Yeah, yeah, I never said it did. the mesolithic, chalcolithic, bronze age and copper age all fall within the Holocene, which runs to the present time. The problem as I say is the geologic series of boxes leading up to it. The inventor of that system lumped together geologic periods with cultural periods, a dangerous approach, as you perceive. You have a solution to the long list all right but you haven't solved the bigger problem. Geologic periods are not cultural periods. I assumed it would be more of a social problem to overthrow the whole concept than to follow the previous, which, despite the changes, you have done also. Now, we are going to need another box on the iron age. That can be done with listing general articles; there are some of those. I suggest you do it yourself or finalize your solution so I can do it on your model. I'm going to do something else for a bit. That will give you a chance to do a little more design. Then I'll be back. I may not read all of your comments on me everywhere but I do wish you would make an effort not to call me names. Other than that I got no problem with your solution here and will back you up.Dave (talk) 16:10, 19 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
PS. The three-age system. I wouldn't call Africa and America "most places"; Eurasia covers half the globe. Furthermore, Africa and America did not skip those stages in the course of natural development. Those stages were abrogated by the intrusion of Europeans. For example, there was a native iron-smelting tradition in central Africa. As soon as the first Europeans brought in manufactured metal utensils it vanished, as Africans did not care to reinvent what the Europeans had done and was available to them. As for the dates, well that is true, relative chronology does not provide that information, which was not available when it was devised. However, classification of prehistoric cultures by stage of technological development is pretty well established and you cannot just throw it out and still be a useful encyclopedia. Those who use it are familiar with its shortcomings and yet use it. There are as yet no general alternatives. Naturally an absolute chronology is better if you can get it, but radiocarbon dating is not so sure either. I'll be back on this later and I do hope I will be pleasantly surprised and astounded at your intelligent solutions as an editor of 93,000 edits.Dave (talk) 16:10, 19 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]