Talk:Utopia/Archive 1

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Archive 1

Misrepresentation and ommissions of the Republic

Suggesting the Republic had pacifist ideals is absurd. The idea of a world without war never appears in the conversation. In fact in the dialogue the moment the idea of other states is put into the general thought experiment it is immediately stated that a conflict over territory or resources would result in war. The idea of compromise is not even considered.

It is true that the Timocracy was expected to experience very little war as it was to have a highly trained, spartanesque military force and to lack any superfluous treasures.

Also the idea of universally shared resources, including everything from homes, to families is omitted despite being a very important aspect of the dialog. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Pcw27 (talk • contribs) 19:42, 24 April 2011 (UTC)

Unsupported Claim

..indicating that More was utilizing the concept as allegory (true) and did not consider such an ideal place to be realistically possible. (really?)

Any support for this? I see no reason why one would assume "impossible" from the raw statement of "doesn't exist" (perhaps "doesn't exist currently"). I'm not claiming the interpretation is wrong, just that it's an interpretation of More's intent that appears in the first paragraph, and is not supported elsewhere in the article. 24.17.180.126 (talk) 12:58, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

American Example

Even though it may sound a little bit silly, the big rock candy mountain would be very tast and an example of an imagined utopia in american folklore. 70.16.204.109 (talk) —Preceding comment was added at 17:15, 26 February 2008 (UTC) =Old talk==--203.199.15.46 (talk) 18:01, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

( This list can't possibly be a complete one, but it's something to get started on. Do the Shakers count as a utopian community?

That whole portion of the 2nd Great Awakening is often called the Utopian Society movement. I don't know how accurate the term is, but it is in fact used. Could that be mentioned in the article? User:Fishal

Robert Owen's New Lanark?

And all those millenial cults of the middle ages? )

Don't confuse a utopia with a commune.

Utopian ideals are also not the same as a Utopia.

As long as we have sewers that have to be unstopped, we'll never have a utopia.. (hmm. might make a nice .sig )

More's Utopia even mentions the conveniences. Of course, in his day, they were chamber pots made of gold....

—Preceding unsigned comment added by 216.60.221.xxx (talk • contribs) 21:34, 16 August 2001

Do the Shakers count as a utopian community? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Conversion Script (talk • contribs) 15:43, 25 February 2002 (UTC)

That whole portion of the 2nd Great Awakening is often called the Utopian Society movement. I don't know how accurate the term is, but it is in fact used. Could that be mentioned in the article? User:Fishal (19:38, 25 August 2004 (UTC))

A talk-type note moved out of article. Bky1701 08:11, 19 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Note: The article Utopian and dystopian fiction is an old placekeeper with notes on various books and should be refactored into the Utopia and Dystopia articles.

Mikkalai 03:30, 3 Nov 2004 (UTC)

I read the Giver last year and it talked about Utopia —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.162.62.161 (talk) 01:28, 6 November 2004 (UTC)

RHaworth knows I would like New World Order Utopia included here. But he feels it to be original research. This is not an argument I think I will win until it sinks into people's skulls a bit more. See the Utopian Guidelines at my MySpace Blog under Daniel Christoph if you wish. That change and the fact this article should more be about the philosophical concept and politcal system of Utopia and only mention the 1516 (?) book. And Titles and Subtitles of an article should be more appropriately capitalized as I have added a minor edit here. Or I'll just put my Guidelines here as exposure and concensus will help shape it and not be Original Research any longer. Utopianism:

1. We must do away with all form of monetary funds; we are just supplying a service.

2. We must do away with competition. Company A and Company B are making the same thing. There is simply no point.

3. The issue of a practical energy source. We need to develop other sources of energy in lieu of eventually getting of this planet.

4. We should initially refurbish housing of all to pleasing and acceptable standards then for every family unit to inhabit equitable residences.

5. We develop a free universal health care system.

6. The issue of the penal system. Prisons need to be less cruel and inhumane.

7. Education is free.

8. Our world governments shall dissolve under the above system concentrating a great extent on space exploration in lieu of the fact that Earth will not last forever.

9. The above steps will allow for an alleviated workload on ourselves meaning our times of labor will be cut in half if we wish.

10. Lastly not least, the above will allow us for more time to create a world of art.

Ezdan1022 12:07, 22 October 2007 (UTC)

Death to false Utopias!

Alright, after noticing that there wasn't actually an article for Thomas More's Utopia, I went through and fixed all the ones I could find in the list of pages linked to Utopia. I think I found them all, but if someone else wants a really crappy job they can re-check my work.--[[User:TheGrza|TheGrza]] 22:52, Nov 8, 2004 (UTC) EDDIE LOVES COCK!!

Why merge with Eutopia

There is a difference between the two, so why should they be merged? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Tooto (talk • contribs) 18:26, 11 December 2004 (UTC)

YEAH - I AGREE - I put up the article on "eutopia" because someone specifically requested for this word, even though "utopia" was up. And what's more, someone has put a link from "utopia" to "eutopia" which right now gives a redirect straight back to "utopia"... Utopia is "no-place", with a play-on-words between "no-place" and "good-place" (eutopia). In utopian studies literature, eutopia is distinguished from the broader phenomenon of utopia, as a specific type or genre of utopian writing/thinking dealing with social dreaming of better, perfected, and/or good societies, as opposed to the broader phenomenon which refers to social dreaming of any kinds of societies including dystopias, arcadias, etc.

So can we have eutopia back please?

—Preceding unsigned comment added by 62.253.32.6 (talk) 23:38, 7 February 2005 (UTC)

Hear-hear. And maybe we should have EUtopia to? Marcu

How can the word utopia be a play on words or have a "double meaning" as the article says? Written with "u" it's unambiguous. Mere homophony with another word doesn't give a word double meaning. Usage does in this case, but that's a separate issue.--88.73.5.203 (talk) 11:44, 28 July 2012 (UTC)

Omnitopiae

All right, I fixed up the bullet point which defined omnitopia, but for the life of me I can't figure out what the sentence is supposed to mean. Asking Al Gore's Information Superhighway gives about 450 hits, most of which seem to be parts of adventure games' dungeon maps. (Nintendo apparently used the term in Secrets of Evermore, but a cursory inspection doesn't tell whether or not all uses stem from that source.) According to A. Wood's "A Rhetoric of Ubiquity",

The places that describe us seem to be increasingly mobile. Not fixed for permanence, they are built for change. Within them, we stream atomized from space to space, finding the ever-present structure of these fluid locales difficult to discern. Analysis of this structure as a matrix of text and context demands a rhetorical approach and a guiding concept: omnitopia.

Omnitopia represents the construction and performance of geographically distinct spaces as perce,kibjvhukjhudn,rkdhyukybiquitous place.

...and so on. While maintaining a higher coherency quotient than the Dada Engine's output, it still sounds like academic hyperbabble discussing things Chuck Palahniuk described much more fully. (Funnily enough, the article does cite Fight Club, but only as a movie.) I'm sure somebody has professional training in making this jargon make sense; if you do, please help me out.

Anville 22:25, 28 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Thomas More

We need an article on Thomas More's book.. currently [Utopia (Novel)] (It's not really a novel) redirects here. I dont have the background on the topic, but came here looking for info. --Stbalbach 15:01, 8 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Definitely. I think Utopia (book) would be the place for it, assuming we didn't want to go all out with De Optimo Reipublicae Statu deque Nova Insula Utopia. For the record, Utopia (Novel) is wrong for two reasons: it's not a novel, and it's miscapitalized. I'll put in a request for deletion on the redirect. --Quuxplusone 01:20, 20 August 2005 (UTC)

Has any one noticed that the opening paragraph starts of talking about Plato's republic, but then switches to Moore's Utopia with any indication what so ever? ~Anonymous Reader

Dinotopia

Dinotopia should be on the "Example" list. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Bky1701 (talk • contribs) 08:11, 19 April 2005 (UTC)

Utopian Socialism

I need someone to give me information about people who worked on utopian socialist ideals exactly like it is described in the Economic Utopias section, referring to Utopian Socialism..

thanx, Waldir (waldir@email.com)

—Preceding unsigned comment added by 212.13.33.178 (talk) 20:35, 3 June 2005 (UTC)

Why nothing on Roosevelt NJ?

Utopia (game)

i believe that Utopia the game, given its long-running popularity and irrelevance to this article, should be given a separate article. --Plastictv 06:01, 20 Jun 2005 (UTC)

It?

It was an inspiration for the Reducciones established by the Jesuit to Christianize and "civilize" the Guaranis.

Is this 'it' referring to More's book, or to the idea of Utopia?

--babbage 30 June 2005 02:21 (UTC)

Moved Utopia (Web Game) to it's own page

I forgot to type it into the edit summary, so I thought I would clarify it here. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 170.61.20.228 (talk) 17:54, 20 July 2005 (UTC)

Hello, I need some advice concerning the link between UTOPIA and American culture for my M.A. dissertation! gamic@poczta.onet.pl —Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.28.107.113 (talk) 21:32, 27 November 2005 (UTC)

Biblical Refs

The article reads: "The Christian and Islamic ideas of the Garden of Eden and Heaven..." - well, to mention the obvious - it was the Old Testiment that first mentions the Garden of Eden and Heaven, so to leave this out seems an oversight of no small degree. I would include that in the sentence as follows: The Jewish, Christian and Islamic ideas of the Garden of Eden and Heaven..." —Preceding unsigned comment added by 140.186.252.156 (talk) 12:18, 23 December 2005 (UTC)

Merge Utopia and Utopianism

Basically, all beyond the very original Utopia book is utopianism, and having the two (both very poor, BTW) articles leads to clumsiness and repetitions. mikka (t) 18:15, 22 February 2006 (UTC)

Both articles do need a lot of work, but I'd like to see a clear suggestion of the new article's structure before I vote in favour of the merging. I'm in favour of it in principle at this time, however. Nach0king 14:06, 25 February 2006 (UTC)

I'm also in favor of the merger. The article ought to be called Utopia. Like NachOking, I would like to see someone suggest an outline here, or see them just be bold and start modifying. CGMullin 18:42, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

I 'm also favouring it. Both of these articles needs lot of work and it will be easy if they both are merged.Sauron 09:17, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

Support merger, there doesn't seem to be much significant difference at that point. Gathering info in one articles will give us a more comprehensive info, and the even combined, both articles are far from reaching any significant 'size limit' we may have.--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus ^Talk 20:54, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

If you are to merge Utopia and Utopiansim there should be a clear divide as Utopianism can be described as an utopian impulse and not necessary a vision of a eutopia —Preceding unsigned comment added by 217.206.129.25 (talk) 15:49, 18 April 2006 (UTC)

I also think that Utopianism should be moved to Utopia. I have just added a picture and I am planning a lot of hard work in these two articles, is someone else here so interested in them as me? --Pichote 18:03, 24 June 2006 (UTC) 22:54, 20 June 2006 (UTC)

To satisfy CGMullin, Nach0king, et al. I will be bold making the following proposal of a structure for the merged utopia article. (Warning! :) I favour an explanation of the topic focused on the evolution the concept has undergone throughout History) --Pichote 18:03, 24 June 2006 (UTC):
BEGINNING OF PROPOSAL
- Introduction: Rewrite the current Basics of Utopia in a more encyclopedic tone rather than an anecdotal one including all the missing secondary ideas (poetry, fiction, etc.). Additionally, to mention the two main categories distinguished by the literature: i) The traditional utopia (before the revolutionary movements emerged halfway the 18th and 19th centuries); ii) The revolutionary utopia (after those). Finally a brief outline of some historically important figures and their contribution to the utopia concept.
- The traditional utopia will include the following subsections:
  - The early utopia: Golden Age (Hesiod, Virgil, Horace, Ovid, Plutarch), Garden of Eden, etc. Trying, when possible, to make use of the best contents from the utopianism article.
  - The exemplary utopia: Plato's dialog Republic, etc.
  - The first religious utopia: Old testament (Amon of Judah, Hoses, and above all, Isaiah), Church Fathers (Augustine of Hippo's City of God). Also worth mentioning the Middle Age's reformers and early revolutionaries: John Wycliffe, John Ball and Girolamo Savonarola inspired by a somewhat utopic impulse.
  - Middle Ages and the popular utopia: Cockaigne (that is, Cucaña, Cocagne, Schlaraffenland, Pomona, Venusberg, The land of the loafers, The land of the children, The land of milk and honey, The paradise of the poor, The sugar hill, The big rock candy mountain).
  - The Renaissance utopia and the New World:
    - El Dorado, Jauja, Hy Brasil, but also the influence exerted by the just discovered western paradise on the works of José de Acosta, father Mariana, Matienzo, the very Thomas More's Utopia itself, Francis Bacon's technocratic utopia, Novum Organum, (the minor Samuel Hartlib's Macaria), Tommaso Campanella's The city of the sun, Johann Valentin Andreae's Christianopolis.
    - After Bacon, Andreae and Campanella's utopias, a lot of them where written in the 17th and 18th century:
      - British utopias include: John Milton's The lost paradise, James Harrington's Oceana, Henry Neville's The island of the pines, Gerrard Winstanley's The New Law of Righteousness, as well as the works of John Bellers (precursor of Robert Owen)d
      - 17th century French utopias include: Cyrano de Bergerac's The other worlds (influenced by Campanella), François Fénelon's The Adventures of Telemachus (the first pedagogic utopia) and Denis Vairasse d'Allais's The History of the Sevarambians.
      - In this period a great amount of artistic works included an utopic inspiration: i.e. Insula Barataria in Miguel de Cervantes' Don Quixote, Jen Johson, John Marston and Geroge Chapman's Eastward Ho comedy presenting North America as a new El Dorado. Neither of these works is an utopia by itself, but their framework is indeed utopic, as in these three great novels: Jonathan Swift's Gulliver's Travels, Daniel Defoe's Robinson Crusoe and Jean-Jacques Rousseau's Émile, (influenced by Vairasse's works). A curious precursor of Swift's works is Margaret Cavendish's Description of a New World, Called The Blazing World that together with the Gulliver, are considered the first somewhat ironic utopias (and by the way, almost dystopic in their arguments). Another similar vision is Robert Paltock's The Life and Adventures of Peter Wilkins where the utopia is the European lifestyle, ready to be exported to the New World
    - Apart from the fiction, it worths mentioning the specific experiments by the jesuite Diego Torres in the Reducción de Paraguay (a region comprising Paraguay, eastern Bolivia, Chile, Argentina, Uruguay and part of Brazil), by the quakers Peter Cornelius Plockboy and William Penn (in Pennsylvania).
  - The century of the lights utopias
    - Return to the natural state', Voltaire, Rousseau... (expanding this subsection soon)
    - The pedagogical utopias, about the first feasible utopias, Pestalozzi, Goethe, William Godwin... (expanding this subsection soon)
    - The utopist poets: Shelley, Wordsworth, Southey, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, the visionary William Blake... (expanding this subsection soon)
- The revolutionary utopia will include the following subsections:
  - Coming soon
- The other sections coming soon...
END OF PROPOSAL

Please, feel free to share your opinions about my idea :) --Pichote 18:03, 24 June 2006 (UTC)

I favour your idea in the sense that it should follow a historical pattern (as opposed to a purely genre-based pattern) but I think it is perhaps very slightly too specialised in some places and should give the most emphasis to Plato and the Renaissance, which seem to be quite briefly covered in your proposal. However, I realise that it is simply that - a proposal - and that good content will come with time and editors. Ergo, I think yours is a good idea. Nach0king 18:07, 26 July 2006 (UTC)

Sorry to be a pain, but I'm not sure I necessarily agree with the merger of utopianism and Utopia, which seems to me to be a little like merging nuclear physics and the atom bomb, but what do I know? Anyway, if utopianism is to be merged here, then an actual reference to it should be included, rather than just a list of "utopias of escape", which implies that utopianism is some kind of religious belief, rather than a serious philosophy.161.73.237.160 (talk) 09:38, 31 October 2012 (UTC)

Example of Examples

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Utopia#Examples_of_utopia could suggest that the links are a subset of a wider group that actually do illustrate a Utopia. So could it be altered to "Examples of examples of Utopia" ? or something else that shows that the links attempt Utopia ? --Podz2 17:17, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Americanisation

I note that one of my compatriots, apparently oppressed with a surfeit of leisure, has taken the trouble to Americanise every -ise spelling: Bush league. Our apologies, folks. --Wetman 08:29, 14 May 2006 (UTC)

Was this, perhaps, in response to that compatriot of yours' who went through and attempted to Anglicize the "-ize" spellings a little while back? ;) --Awakeandalive1, 14 May 2006

Leibniz and utopia

under the headline Examples of utopia is listed "Gottfried Leibniz's assertion of the best of all possible worlds". Leibniz was talkiong about this world as the best of all possible worlds, thus it can't be described as an utopia, since it exists. I think the reference should be removed. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 85.81.58.103 (talk) 17:16, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

Several of the examples don't belong

Many of the examples listed here (1984), Brave New World, and others aren't generally regarded as Utopias (except perhaps from POV of the rulers) but are in fact usually regarded dystopias. 168.166.196.40 19:19, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

The Giver

The Giver is mentioned two times in the examples section. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Starwarskid (talk • contribs) 05:25, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

Lede

Utopia is a place/society/location. It is not the efforts to reach it. Goldfritha 22:46, 24 September 2006 (UTC)

Plural of words ending in -topia

What is the plural form of -topia words?

I'm writing my English coursework and struggling to find the plural of dystopia!

Help!

Geollyn 20:55, 2 January 2007 (UTC) Well, I'm two months late... but, er, it's -topiae, I believe. ~Switch ^{t c g} 05:37, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

related terms & concepts / outopia, utopianism

The "related terms & concepts" section has basically become a "see also" section. For instance, "outopia" and "utopianism", like many other terms on the list, were not separately defined; instead they simply linked to pages that redirected right back to this page. I took them out for now. However, if this section is really going to stay basically a "see also" section, then we should rename it in conformity with wikipedia practice ("see also"); otherwise, if the desire is still to have this be a "relaetd terms & concepts", then it needs to get more glossary-like content, like presently there for "omnitopia" and "heterotopia". --lquilter 05:51, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

list of utopian literature

I propose the creation of such a page, in parallel with List of dystopian literature, and cutting out the section here of Utopia#Examples of utopia. BrainyBabe 15:11, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

Good idea. There's also the article Utopian and dystopian fiction which supports this. I would suggest rewriting the section to be two sentences long, mentioning Thomas More and one or two other works, and then linking to separate list. (When separate sections are spun off from a major article, they're still supposed to be summarized in originating article.) --lquilter 15:52, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for responding so quickly. I can't always log on as often as I would like. I have read your user page and think you might be very well placed to help me, by interest as well as by Wiki-knowledge.

I am aware of the article you mention, and had made some edits to it when it occured to me how much overlap -- and areas uncovered -- there are in the whole field. For example, there is ecotopian fiction, which I agree is a major subgenre, but not feminist utopias, which is surely as big. How much of science fiction is utopia, and vice versa? There's also an overlap, potentially quite big, between lesbian science fiction and feminist science fiction. Many novels broadly within this field derive some dramatic tension from placing utopia and dystopia next door to each other, with the latter posing a threat: how then can these books be characterised? I am not sure of my position on this, but think I would prefer to see them grouped together on one page.

Is it sensible to list these utopian works of imagination divided into sections labelled novels, films, manga (as I did see at one of the related pages, though annoyingly I can't track it down now)? I would prefer chronology to be the main sorter, as often a book is turned into a film, or one medium merges into or is re-imagined as another.

I have worked on other unrelated sets of articles, where long lists get confused. We took the approach with one to herd the lists and definitions into one article that could have a lot of eyes on it to keep it up to date and unvandalised, and "patrol" the other articles, removing incorrect additions and pointing readers towards the master list. I am not sure if that approach is relevant here.

I will start adding titles and brief descriptions now, and when this discussion is resolved (assuming this gets some response!), will carry out its recommendations. BrainyBabe 12:04, 11 February 2007 (UTC)

I'm just sort of jumping in here with an opinion. You've given folks here a couple of weeks to respond, now write this up, seperate it out and post it up the way that you feel it should be done. Make it . . . .... your Utopia. Carptrash 16:08, 1 March 2007 (UTC) Just do it and deal with what comes as it comes.

I can't work on things this week, but I can help out with thinking next week, or editing whatever you do. --lquilter 20:12, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

As you see below, I'm back in wikipedia and thinking about structure of this article. I think this proposal works well with my proposal below for a restructuring. --lquilter 18:36, 11 October 2007 (UTC)

Inclusive classroom

A person who believes in inclusive education is a utopian. Inclusive education is not possible. It may be true that we will be in perfect happiness. I'm going to add inclusive classroom. Please comment on this if you don't agree with me. thanks. (69.117.20.128 - Talk)

Do you have a reference for this claim? Goldfritha 22:11, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

Picture of Utopia

I think that the picture here doesnt represent real Utopia as it shows a false garden of Eden (there is a two headed bird and the cat has caught the mouse...something that doesnt occur till Adam and Eve eat the fruit.)

i think another picture of Eden or something else (shangrila) would be more appropriate.

71.230.25.109 05:18, 16 April 2007 (UTC)Maraudingmuggle 23:51, 15 April 2007

I think that it does depict the lafe that utopia portrays. You are mistaken good sir.

Yeah what about a picture of a big city or something? What kind of society has but 2 people and a tree in it? And some animals. Request for new picture seconded. (Also, Garden of Eden was not around for long time where as a Utopia would last a very long time being a perfect society, So would you really call it a Utopia if it is so easily corrupted?)--Vagrantdead (talk) 21:33, 16 December 2008 (UTC)

Level of characterization and Mrs. Browns

The article says:

Virginia Woolf was deeply critical of the level of characterization shown in many utopias, flatly asserting in her 1924 essay "Character in Fiction," "There are no Mrs. Browns in Utopia."

It is unclear to a reader unfamiliar with this matter (myself, for instance) what is meant by the "level of characterization" (is it too involved? too undeveloped?) and "Mrs. Browns" (is she an everywoman? a reference to some specific character?). Christian Campbell 08:50, 27 May 2007 (UTC)

I think this level of analysis should move to utopian and dystopian fiction, where it can be explored in greater depth without the distraction of dealing with social movements in the same article. .... --Lquilter, 18:35, 11 October 2007 (UTC)

Outopia = Utopia

I think Outopia should be removed from Related terms, since it just seems to be a different spelling of the article's topic - Utopia. See the first line - Utopia (from Greek: οὐ no, and τόπος, place, i.e. "no place" or "place that does not exist") and compare to Outopia derived from the Greek 'ou' for "no" and '-topos' for "place" "a perfect place" a fictional, non-realistic place. It is the same thing. --V111P 18:44, 5 June 2007 (UTC)

On the contrary, I think the existence of outopia and eutopia prove that the word Utopia has a dual origin: ou-topos and eu-topos. I have been surprised to notice most dictionaries opt for the former etymology: did they ask Thomas More? As he first used the word, have they any grounds for favouring ou-topos over eu-topos? Usage would seem to indicate the latter, and I would be happier to see the lead paragraph indicate at least the play on words. Kevin McE 09:14, 9 June 2007 (UTC)

Thank you, Kevin. As a student of Greek, I always liked what I saw as the pun in eu-topia and ou-topia--that such a good place doesn't exist--and am similarly daunted by the unlimited supply of short-sighted etymologists. Mfryc 06:53, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

I was going to voice doubt that More had thought of the pun as I suspected that in 16th century English, the pun might not have worked – as the pronunciations of eu and u might not have fallen together yet – but Utopia (book)#Title proves my suspicion wrong; apparently the pronunciations were close enough at least for the association to work. Also, of course, the reading "eu-topia" is a precondition to form the antonym "dys-topia". So the article is entirely justified and correct to mention the homophony under "Varieties". --Florian Blaschke (talk) 23:57, 1 February 2011 (UTC)

Raphael Hythloday

I'm not sure the translation of Hythloday to be "knowing in trifles" accurately depicts the wry and ironic intent that More seems to have. The Norton Critical Edition (2nd Ed) has a very interesting footnote relating to Hythloday that reads as thus:

Raphael will not be known specifically as the "affable archangel" till Milton writes Paradise Lost a century and a half hence; still, he is already known as a comfortable, sociable, archangel, as contrasted with Michael the warrior: witness his befriending of Tobias in the apocryphal Book of Tobit. The first root of "Hythloday" is surely Greek huthlos, meaning "nonsense"; the second part of the name may suggest daien, to distribute, i.e., a nonsense peddler. A fantastic trilingual pun could make the whole name mean "God heals [Heb., Raphael] through the nonsense [Gr., huthlos] of God [Lat., dei]."

I'm not sure if it's worth mentioning in the article but I think it's interesting enough to warrant discussion on the matter. Bellfazar 17:11, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

lede & structure

The structure of this article is a bit all over the place. It starts by defining utopia as a fictional place (which would be better discussed in De Optimo Reipublicae Statu deque Nova Insula Utopia), but the rest of the article addresses primarily the current uses of the term. That makes more sense, so I tweaked the lede paragraph to better reflect the content of the article.

However, the structure should be better revised. In particular, an article (utopian and dystopian fiction) has been developed that could address the literary genre (although it, too, needs substantial work; you can't even tell the hallmarks of the genre from the article), but this article didn't link to it or refer to it in any way. Also, the intentional communities article should be closely referred to in this article, since it picks up and discusses the other major thread of this article.

I propose that we work on this article to make it more closely reflect what the disambiguation describes it as: a "philosophical concept". Then we can track the development and concerns of the philosophical concept, and how it has been explored in literature, other arts, and social movements (including intentional communities). --lquilter 18:34, 11 October 2007 (UTC)

Problems

I don't think dividing utopias into the types currently listed on the page is useful. The types listed are pretty flimsy: most "economic utopias" are also "political utopias," most "technological utopias" involve descriptions of some economic or political change, etc. In fact, if we accept Lyman Tower Sargent's definition of a utopia - any imaginary human society described in some detail (if memory serves)- then, by definition, all utopias would include at least mention of the imagined society's politics and economy. Unless someone can come up with a source for these "types," I think we should rework these sections. It'd be better to frame them as overlapping themes running through a variety of utopias rather than distinguishable types.

I also think that the section "political utopias" is strange. Not only does it fail to give any examples from literary utopias, it also seems somewhat biased against utopianism. While a number of utopias describe an increased government or community involvement in private affairs, I don't think we can say that this fact is what defines utopian politics, or that utopias are "based on dictatorship."

The paragraph on eugenics is beside the point and should be deleted.

The other thing that really bothers me about the article is the emphasis on perfection or the ideal. While some utopias are presented as "ideal commonwealths," many utopian scholars require only that the society be considered significantly better than the author's for it to count as a "utopia".

I also think the omission of utopian philosophy is glaring. And Tom Moylan's influential concept of "critical utopias" would be good to include, as well. Jordansc (talk) 04:31, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

Examples of Utopia section needs a clean-up

This list seems to be out-of-control, unsourced, containing a lot of 'trivia' bits, and other items that are questionable. For me, at least, the list leads to more questions than actual examples of utopia. TheWizardOfAhz (talk) 22:53, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

I quite agree! The list is getting longer and longer, and most of the examples are literary, not historical, which begs the question: Do we need an article entitled List of utopian literature? The current list needs a serious trimming. ---RepublicanJacobite_{The'FortyFive'} 23:21, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

I think it is a good idea to clean up this article, which is quite a mess, and to add a List of utopian literature voice. I think this Utopia entry shows all the problems inherent to Wikipedia. --Piccic (talk) 10:44, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

removed from Utopianism section

I don't know if anyone else can make use or sense of these fragments, which I've removed in tidying up:

such as Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four became the primary method of Utopian expression and rejection. (Kumar 1987)

Still, the post-war era also found some utopian fiction for some future harmonic state of humanity (e.g. Demolition Man).

BrainyBabe (talk) 16:32, 21 February 2008 (UTC)

Looks like WP:OR. I wouldn't worry about them. Dr.K. (talk) 21:46, 26 February 2008 (UTC)

Al Farabi

Does Al Farabi fit in the picture of an utopia? Does his ideal city need to be mentioned in this article?Mallerd (talk) 18:23, 19 April 2008 (UTC)

Stop repeating the root of the word.

In the second paragraph, we have the root of the word. Great. We have a discussion on how the root is often confused, and we understand the etymology of the word.

In related terms we see descriptions of Eutopia, and Outopia, including their relation to Utopia.

I think that should be the end of it.

In case anyone was confused however, we have a little discussion after that: "people in history have used utopia to define a perfect place, as utopia is a perfect but unreal place. A proper definition of a perfect and real place is eutopia"

Personally I got that in the definition of Eutopia, the definition of Utopia, and the explanation of the root of the word. Yet it doesn't end.

The end of the related terms has more repetition, "the implication that the perfectly 'good place' is really 'no place.'" as if two lines earlier saying "apparent equivocation between the Greek for 'no place' and 'good place'" was not quite enough to convey the message.

Do we have to have 6 to 9 lines saying the same thing in the first two paragraphs of the article?

Baalthazaq (talk) 11:37, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

Akira

How is 'Akira' a dystopia? It seems more like a dismal, futuristic society breaking down, not a totalitarian dictatorship. The film barely mentions politics, focusing instead on Tatsuo and his 'awakening'. 201.242.100.181 (talk) 02:04, 18 August 2008 (UTC)

As I have never seen it, and know little about it, I am not going to comment on whether Akira should or should not be listed. However, who said that a dystopia has to include or involve a "totalitarian dictatorship"? There are any number of examples of dystopias that are not totalitarian, merely dismal. ---RepublicanJacobite_{The'FortyFive'} 02:07, 18 August 2008 (UTC)

The article defines dystopia as ' a totalitarian and repressive world'.

201.242.100.181 (talk) 04:39, 21 August 2008 (UTC)

'The definition isn't perfect. In any case, I'd say that the list of examples is too long. 2 or 3 should be enough. Listing Brazil is absurd since the movie was originally intended as an adaptation of 1984, which is already listed.King Klear (talk) 14:47, 6 December 2008 (UTC)

Combination Utopia

Imagine a combination of improved science, along with our mystical ideals and economic stability. A place where a woman can birth a child and not have any pain. The only people that get hurt our the people that curse you get back seven times the pain they give to you. According to God's judgment.
--Caleving (talk) 03:34, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Saint-simonism

Perhaps the saint simonism, or the founding father, le comte de Saint-Simon can be mentioned. see Saint-Simonianism —Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.245.78.99 (talk) 14:54, 11 September 2009 (UTC)

Harmony Society and recent additions

I added some things to this article, because there was no mention of the Harmony Society, the Oneida Community, or the Amana Colonies in the Religious utopia section. Those were probably some of the most well-known and important religious utopian groups in American history, and how they weren't included before is a bit perplexing. I also added the Society of the Woman in the Wilderness (led by Johannes Kelpius), and the Ephrata Cloister, because they (along with the Shakers) were probably among the earliest of these types of groups to come to the United States. As far as what Keith_D said about my "unexplained deletion of referenced material" regarding Bernhard Müller and his group, well, I will explain my reasoning for doing that now. Bernhard Müller and his group split off from the Harmony Society, and were much smaller and less significant compared to the Harmony Society (a group that had hundreds of members and lasted from 1785 to 1905, and was probably the longest running and most financially successful utopian religious communes in American History). To mention Müller and his comparatively small group of dissenters (most of whom split off from the Harmony Society in 1832), without mentioning George Rapp and the Harmony Society (which lasted from 1785 to 1905) seemed to be putting the cart before the horse. That is why I removed the material about Müller and his group, because they aren't nearly as important (historically speaking) as the Harmony Society, the Oneida Community, or the Amana Colonies are to this article. Nevertheless, now that the more important groups have been added, feel free to add that part about Müller and his split-off group back in (though I think some context about how that group came about, and how they split off from the Harmony Society should be included in the article if Müller and his group are mentioned). Geneisner (talk) 22:59, 29 September 2009 (UTC)

utopian society and dystopian society —Preceding unsigned comment added by 222.184.5.78 (talk) 11:00, 28 December 2009 (UTC)

Theory: Utopia=Atlantis=Santorini

1. Troy: found. 2. Minotaur's Labrynth: found. 3. Circular maps of Utopia, Atlantis, The Aztec Capitol Tenochtitlán & Mexico city, [built on the same site] reveal at least the possibility of volcanic/volcanic lake locations. 4. Santorini, the Mediterranean volcano, and one possible former home of the Minoan civilization, has been cited because of a cronological misplacement, as the source of all the Plagues on Egypt during the Exodus. [A 2006 documentary by Simcha Jacobovici called “The Exodus Decoded”]. Seldon Surak 23:43, 11 October 2010 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Seldon Surak (talk • contribs) Seldon Surak 23:47, 11 October 2010 (UTC)

Opinion related.

There is an awful lot of opining merged in the article. For starters, the first sentence of the second paragraph, Ecology, after the Table of Contents the pejorative ' "perceived" ' is used in a manner that is more of the author's opinion than anything else. It's not like it's just a small minority of people that believe in the concept of man's domineering attitude towards nature and surviving in this harsh world (spend a week roughin' it, and you get a glimpse at early man's life). In fact, it's not only a belief, but a school of philosophy, a growing counter-cultural trend, and the basis for many ideas of Entertainment, especially books. I am about to edit to remove the italicized version, but the word will remain and be linked to Ecotopia to more accurately describe the belief's core ideas without opinion on the part of authors. If you believe there is a policy issue, see Wikipedia: Five Pillars, more specifically, "neutral point of view".Joshua Torelli (talk) 05:40, 29 December 2010 (UTC)

Utopian Literature

I would suggest the list of Utopian literature be limited only to Utopian works. At the moment is seems filled with dystopian examples, and there are several other pages devoted exclusively to those with this being the only spot for utopian literature. 50.101.253.107 (talk) 04:38, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

The Eighth Day?

This new entry is the longest description of any work in the list. No results for the ISBN search. Appears to be a vanity thesis, or at best, a vanity publication if it exists. In which case it is still not acceptable as a source. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 134.134.137.71 (talk) 22:37, 15 October 2013 (UTC)

Indeed. No notability established, no wiki page -- just an amazon link. Removed it. --Rhododendrites (talk) 02:03, 16 October 2013 (UTC)

Call for action

Many of the examples listed here aren't generally regarded as Utopias but are in fact usually regarded dystopias.
— User:168.166.196.40 19:19, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

I propose the creation of a List of utopian literature page, in parallel with List of dystopian literature.
— User:BrainyBabe 15:11, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

These are problems reported since 2006 but never solved --Zarsoft (talk) 09:11, 17 October 2013 (UTC)

Given you created Talk:List of utopian literature, I assume you are suggesting the article be split into List of utopian literature? — Reatlas (talk) 09:48, 17 October 2013 (UTC)

Yes, I support what lquilter said: "I would suggest rewriting the section to be two sentences long, mentioning Thomas More and one or two other works, and then linking to separate list. --lquilter 15:52, 10 February 2007 (UTC)" --Zarsoft (talk) 13:15, 17 October 2013 (UTC)

WP:SODOIT, then. — Reatlas (talk) 02:23, 19 October 2013 (UTC)

The List of utopian literature page creation was proposed six years ago and no one spoke against it during these six years. Is there any volunteer to create this page? --Zarsoft (talk) 09:49, 19 October 2013 (UTC)

Uh...you? — Reatlas (talk) 13:51, 19 October 2013 (UTC)

List of utopian literature

There is now a separate article for List of utopian literature. I took the list from this article, made some heavy revisions (see Talk:List of utopian literature#Revisions), and purged most of the list from this article, reformatting a little bit and adding a few cn tags. Not aware of typical standards for what happens to lists on subject articles when a separate page is created, I should say that I applied pretty arbitrary standards for what to keep -- my own judgment of which are most notable. --Rhododendrites (talk) 23:54, 19 October 2013 (UTC)

Wells

@Mark K. Jensen: - Would you mind rewording or elaborating upon this sentence? : "However, in 1905 H.G. Wells published A Modern Utopia, which was widely read and admired and provoked much discussion." I'm not sure I understand the "however" in context. --Rhododendrites (talk) 02:00, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

I think this zeitgeist movement wikipedia article would be greatly improved if it was deleted right now.Whatofnadngtoday (talk) 12:58, 6 November 2016 (UTC)

Glaring error - "Utopia"

Are there literate, intelligent editors here? Are they hiding? Or asleep?

Introductory sentence: "The word utopia was coined in Greek by Sir Thomas More for his 1516 book Utopia..."

A couple of paragraphs later (after some intervening statements about Plato's Republic, which has some similar ideas but was about /a/ republic", not about /the/ "Utopia")...

"During the 16th century, Thomas More's book Utopia proposed an ideal society of the same name."

So, the claim is that:

(i) More coined (introduced) the name, Utopia; and (ii) More chose "the same name", implying that someone else had already used the name.

Spot the inconsistency? As the textbooks say, finding the inconsistency is left as an exercise for the reader.

Doh!

Also, regarding the first quotation above, More did not "coin the word utopia": he named a specific (fictional) island Utopia. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.182.149.44 (talk • contribs)

Please WP:Assume good faith about your fellow editors and don't be condescending. The good news is that this is wikipedia, so you can WP:BeBold and fix it yourself! Attaboy (talk) 14:16, 17 February 2014 (UTC)

It's also not even an error. I have no idea why the IP would take "the same name" to imply that someone else had already used the term. Not the ideal wording, no, but especially given the context of an article, it seems one would have to be trying to misunderstand in order to take away anything other than a reference back to the word utopia (a book called utopia; a society of the same name). I suspect the issue here is the incorrect final statement. More's "specific (fictional) island Utopia" was how he coined the word. That it has become a common term for referring to the concept of ideal society, it wasn't at that point. --— Rhododendrites ^talk | 04:25, 18 February 2014 (UTC)

I think it's very good point. Is it credible that the English word "Utopia" wasn't purely derived from the title of Thomas More's book? He chose "no-place" to indicate to his more educated readers that the place described was his invention rather than the tales of a traveller as the narrative indicates. The book describes an ideal society and hence the meaning of the word derived from the title. I haven't looked at the two references (2,3) cited but suspect they point out the same etymological coincidence. At best, educated people may have wondered whether More was thinking about "good-place" too but this, surely, is a bit of trivia. The word is derived from the title of the book which was in turn based, certainly, on at least one Greek concatenation, but possibly two. I'm new to Wikipedia and not a historian so I thought it would be rude to amend the article. Shoddie (talk) 12:23, 23 June 2017 (UTC) (Did I do that right?)

Marxism and Communism

Marx advocates for a global revolution where the proletariat overthrows their capitalist overlords and establish a society where everyone is treated equally and according to their needs. The government will whither away. This sounds like a utopia to me. Why is it not included? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.97.30.242 (talk) 19:30, 7 July 2014 (UTC)

Euhemerus

Why Euhemerus (300bce) has been edited out of the article twice? Is it because of his beliefs? Wikipedia elsewhere mentions his Panchaia island as " a rational island paradise", which is exactly what the article is about. And this is one of the earliest examples of the notion. Maybe someone can find a reason, preferably the deleting part?

Jim Jones

Jim Jones, Born May 13, 1931, Died November 18, 1978. Jim Jones created a town called Jonestown. He wanted to create a Utopia, but instead it was a community that was (in future refreneces, a place of Mass Suicide.His destiny(dream) was a failure. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Red mist 21 (talk • contribs) 15:16, 22 October 2015 (UTC)

I removed this, as it is unsourced, and did not fit within the paragraph well. Perhaps a section on failed attempts at Utopian societies could be included, but it would need several examples to be balanced. 78.26 _{(spin me / revolutions)} 15:29, 22 October 2015 (UTC)

Anarchism template

I believe the large "Anarchism" template should be removed because the article contents are not related to Anarchism directly. (Ctrl+F "anarch")

104.228.101.152 (talk) 23:49, 27 June 2017 (UTC)

Done Agreed. This article isn't linked from the sidebar and the word anarchism doesn't appear outside of the lead. They're not mutually exclusive concepts, of course, but the concept of utopia can be preceded by many concepts, most of which wouldn't include the general concept of utopia as one of their key subjects. — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 02:13, 28 June 2017 (UTC)