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The following discussion is an archived discussion of the proposal.Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.
Zadoc Dederick →Dederick's Steam Man – Since this person is only notable for his invention, I wonder if this article should be moved to Dederick's Steam Man, or something like that, per the notability policy, which states that " If, however, there is only enough information about one notable event related to the person, then the article should be titled specifically about that event"WP:Bio.Relisted.BDD (talk) 22:21, 8 July 2013 (UTC)HighFlyingFish (talk)02:56, 29 June 2013 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the proposal.Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.
Should the man really be referred to as a "robot" in the article? The word robot didn't exist at the time, and also the steam man wouldn't have had any capacity for programming or sensing its environment, which would better fit the definition of a robot. Would "automaton" or even "android" be better?— Precedingunsigned comment added by2A02:C7E:2FEB:3E00:D380:B03F:A8AE:5D94 (talk)12:50, 4 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]
The following is a closed discussion of arequested move.Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider amove reviewafter discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
Zadoc Dederick →Daniel (Steam Man)Daniel (Steam Man) – While I've been able to find more on the guy, such as how he began working on the invention at 16, completed the prototype at 22, and died in 1921 in Houston, Texas, nearly all information about him is only found in relation to his Steam Man. Almost all the text in this article could also apply to the other inventor, Isaac Grass, who was 15/16 at the time. Dederick and Grass' steam man could also work for the title since the name Daniel was not given to him by the inventors but used by the workmen they hired.Wowzers122 (talk)13:20, 9 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose. This article is about the inventor, not the invention. It needs work... It starts outZadoc Pratt Dederick, named after inventorZadock Pratt, a claim that is unsourced, and the article on Zadock Pratt does not mention him being an inventor. But this article (on Zadoc Dederick) does have sources and probably passes the GNG. It just needs a lot of work. A redirect from the proposed new name to the article would be a good idea... If this RM closes asnot moved I'll create it (assuming nobody else does in the meantime... feel free to do so).Andrewa (talk)06:28, 17 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
@Andrewa: Honestly, I would not support the move now. When I made this proposal, the article was almost completely about the machine, but I have since found a lot of information about him (some of which I've added). The problem is that, beyond him being the inventor of the machine, the details of his life are so conflicting (especially before the invention) that I just gave up on it. This is already present in the article where there are conflicting death dates. The source for him being named after Zadock Pratt is the first inlineref, which does call him an inventor, though you are right that this is not mentioned in his article. The closest thing I could find to him being an inventor in another source is thisone that says he invented an improvement to a type of leather pump. I would agree that this article definitely needs work from an expert to properly mention and sort the differences between sources. It’s definitely out of my field of expertise, I just like historical oddities. The best I can do is add a talk section of some more free sources that a future editor could look at, along with their differences.Wowzers122 (talk)03:58, 18 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
The discussion above is closed.Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
Chapter 2 - Black Steam from the book Victorian Automata (can be accessed via the wikipedia libary) - Analyzes previous interpretations of the steam man in a broader historical context, arguing for a different way of understanding the steam man and other Victorian Black automata. Provides some biographical information on co-inventor Grass, Dederick's namesake, Dederick's workplace, and some extra stuff.
Dei ex Machinis (google book preview) - Provides a lot of biographical infromation, including a birth date and a photo. The birth date given would make him 21 at the time of the invention, which conflicts with other sources. It also mentions a different workplace, among other discrepancies.
cyberneticzoo - Website covering early robots that made an article on the steam man
Joseph Rainone's book "Art & History of American Popular Fiction Vol 1." - The latter two sources mentioned here mention this book which supposedly has a more complete history of Dederick's life.Wowzers122 (talk)04:28, 18 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
