Talk:Erich Schumann

WikiProject class rating

This article was automatically assessed because at least one WikiProject had rated the article as start, and the rating on other projects was brought up to start class. BetacommandBot 09:49, 10 November 2007 (UTC)

WP:NPOV issues

I am adding a {{pov}} template to the article because the sentence "his role in the project was obfuscated after the war by German physics community apologia" in the lead, and similar statements in the body of the article, particularly in the "Post World War II" section, are clearly presenting an opinion rather than presenting facts in a neutral manner. Phil Bridger (talk) 22:28, 21 March 2010 (UTC)

Support for Removal of NPOV

The sentence “His role in the project was obfuscated after the war by German physics community apologia.” is an accurate statement concerning Erich Schumann and it reflects the published findings of historians, such as Mark Walker and Klaus Hentschel. The well-documented section “Post World War II” lays out some specifics.

The myth of the German atomic bomb was a highly visible part of postwar apologia. The apologia was that a small group of Nazis had taken control, but they had been removed. Note that the real leaders of the German nuclear energy project, Abraham Esau, Erich Schumann, and Kurt Diebner, were ostracized after the war. Hence the German scientific community denied its past and purged itself of the Nazi elements, thus making way for their acceptance back into the international scientific community. Mark Walker, in his book “German National Socialism and the Quest for Nuclear Power 1939 – 1949” [pp. 231-232], said: “The role of Heisenberg as spokesman for the German nuclear power project was important for the apologia as well, for his erroneous claim, that he had been in control of nuclear power research, was accepted uncritically by friends and critics alike. In part, this acceptance is to be attributed to the perception of science by scientists and laymen as reducible to the work of a few ‘great’ scientists. Control is the key aspect of the apologia, for only if Heisenberg and his colleagues had been in command of their research, could their claim, that they had steered it deliberately away from nuclear weapons and towards ‘peaceful nuclear energy,’ appear believable.”

I firmly believe the material in the works of the historians Walker and Hentschel, as cited in the Wikipedia article on Erich Schumann, warrant removal of the NPOV tag.Bfiene (talk) 14:59, 26 March 2010 (UTC)

Response to Third Opinion Request:

Disclaimers: I am responding to a third opinion request made at WP:3O. I have made no previous edits on Erich Schumann and have no known association with the editors involved in this discussion. The third opinion process (FAQ) is informal and I have no special powers or authority apart from being a fresh pair of eyes. Third opinions are not tiebreakers and should not be "counted" in determining whether or not consensus has been reached. My personal standards for issuing third opinions can be viewed here.

Opinion: Both the Walker and Hentschel works noted in notes 15 and 16 are available for viewing at Amazon.com. Being from respected university presses, they certainly seem reliable, and Walker clearly supports the position taken here. (I'm not quite so sure what Hentschel is being cited to support, unless it is the postwar objection of some German scientists to the continuing presence of Schumann in their midst.) On the other hand, I do think that there is a POV problem caused by the "Post World War II" section being too long and too disconnected from Schumann. The article appears to be being used as a home for a sub–article about the apologia, thus giving undue weight to the apologia issue in this article about Schumann. That could be easily remedied here by removing all of the first paragraph of that section except the first sentence and all of the second paragraph including the bullet points, all of which seem far too detailed for this article. The remaining first sentence of the section needs to be rewritten to include a few words — no more than a sentence, but a phrase or a clause would be better — explaining what is meant by the reference to the apologia, i.e. why the apologia took place, as that phrase might be a bit too obscure for the average encyclopedia user. (Indeed, it might be well to avoid the use of the term "apologia" altogether and substitute a phrase such as "the effort of the postwar German physics community to explain away its participation in, and distance itself from, the Nazi atomic weapons program and research." While that's a bit more wordy, it explains the context more clearly.) The material that is removed would seem to be more appropriately included in German nuclear energy project or perhaps in a separate article.

What's next: Once you've considered this opinion click here to see what happens next.—TRANSPORTERMAN (TALK) 15:01, 31 March 2010 (UTC)

Suggested Replacement Text for NPOV Issue

I appreciate the role of Phil Bridger and TransporterMan in this issue. From their suggestions, I propose replacing the text in questions as noted herein.

For the sentence in the introduction, I propose: His role in the project was obfuscated after the war by the German physics community’s defense of its conduct during the war.

For the Post World War II section I propose the following (in Ref #17, in the Wikipedia article, the parenthetical text on the Goudsmit/Heisenberg controversy will be elimianted):

In the German scientific community’s defense of its conduct during the war, the military’s Schumann and Diebner led aspects of the Uranverein were minimized, ridiculed, and ascribed to Nichtskönner (incompetent scientists) and leadership that owed its positions to politics. Additionally, the Heisenberg component of the project was made to appear as the leading and dominant element of the project. The motivations of the German scientists were to distance themselves from the military aspects of the Uranverein and, in the denazification environment, also distance themselves from those who had visible positions under National Socialism. Regarding Schumann’s scientific abilities, they are, however, attested to by the fact that members of his Habilitation committee for experimental and theoretical physics at the University of Berlin included the eminent scientists Max von Laue, Walther Nernst, and Max Planck, and the Habilitation was well before Hitler came to power.

After the war, Schumann wrote a book to get out his view of the German nuclear energy project, but publication was blocked by the British occupation authorities. Telling of some of the story from this perspective would have to wait until his right-hand man in the HWA, Kurt Diebner, published his book in 1957.

Again from 1951, Schumann was director of the Helmholtz Institute of Sound Psychology and Medical Acoustics in Berlin. He died in Homberg-Hülsa.

I look forward to commentary by Phil Bridger, TransporterMan, or anyone else, and a resolution to this issue. Let me know. Thanks. Bfiene (talk) 16:54, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

I may not be able to comment due to my personal standards as a 3O Wikipedian (linked in the disclaimer section, above), but before we get that far I'm not quite sure what you're proposing. I've created a

workpage (click here)

as a subpage of my user page with the full existing text of the article (except for categories). Would you just go ahead and make the proposed change there so that we can see exactly what you want to do? Leave a note here so folks will know that it has been done. I'll leave it up for a few days after you've done that. Regards, TRANSPORTERMAN (TALK) 17:49, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

Changes Posted to the Workspace Page

I have posted the changes to the workspace page created by TransporterMan. Bfiene (talk) 19:11, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

Let's see if the other editor weighs in. — TRANSPORTERMAN (TALK) 19:49, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

I do not believe that the revised article still has undue weight problems as you have proposed to revise it. I'd suggest that you go ahead and make the change in the article itself. I'm going to take down the workspace page. — TRANSPORTERMAN (TALK) 13:37, 5 April 2010 (UTC) PS: When you do, feel free to remove the {{POV}} tag, too. — TRANSPORTERMAN (TALK) 13:41, 5 April 2010 (UTC)

The agreed to changes have been made to the Erich Schumann page, and the NPOV tag has been removed. The work space page may be deleted. Thanks, TransporterMan. Bfiene (talk) 13:56, 6 April 2010 (UTC)