Talk:Alpha

older

Is there a reason there is no "Alpha" Article, but instead an "Alpha (letter)"? It would seem better to have an "Alpha" article, and an "Alpha (letter)" to describe the cases where the greek letter is used. -- Egil 13:41 Apr 15, 2003 (UTC)

That's right. SCCarlson 01:36 Apr 16, 2003 (UTC)

It might be that way, to exploit the "pipe trick". This link -- alpha -- displays as alpha but links to the "alpha (letter)" article. --Uncle Ed 14:29 Apr 15, 2003 (UTC)

As I recently discovered, the pipe trick is even neater: [[alpha (letter)|]] displays as alpha. SCCarlson 01:36 Apr 16, 2003 (UTC)

Is alpha really used as a symbol for direct proportionality in mathematics? So far as I know, what is used is a symbol which looks like an elongated alpha, but is not in fact a Greek letter.

Alpha is a cool name. By the way I think it is, it says on certain websites. Thomas Bell, widnes Tom Jo:)

rollback

I've rolled back to the last version prior to the redirect. - brenneman^{L} 14:55, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

Moving

I have recently been thinking about moving to . Please tell me what you think soon.--Veraladeramanera (talk) 19:45, 12 November 2008 (UTC)

NO. Do not do this without gaining consensus. These are as they should be. 21:15, 12 November 2008 (UTC) Dlohcierekim 21:16, 12 November 2008 (UTC)

Requested move

The following is a closed 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.

The result of the proposal was no consensus to move. --RegentsPark (sticks and stones) 23:26, 14 September 2009 (UTC)

Alpha (letter) → Alpha — The letter is definitely the primary usage, with all other usages derived from the existence of the letter. @harej 05:40, 6 September 2009 (UTC)

• Alpha → Alpha (disambiguation)

Comment. The stated rationale is the claim that Alpha (letter) came first. That is irrelevant; WP:PRIMARYTOPIC is not about what is oldest. --Una Smith (talk) 04:57, 7 September 2009 (UTC)

• Oppose. At first I was pretty sure that the letter was primary topic here, but after looking at the page view statistics I have to disagree. Alpha particle, for example, gets more page views than this page, and I'd assume that "alpha" is a common search term for the particle. Alpha (biology) also comes close to the page views of this page. Yes, these usages derive from the letter, but what we're concerned about here is making it as easy as possible for readers to find the right article. Moving the letter to Alpha would force a lot of readers to click three times to find the article they were looking for, instead of two clicks when the first one brings them to a disambiguation page. Jafeluv (talk) 23:20, 9 September 2009 (UTC)

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.

Greek spelling of 'alpha'

The ancient Greek spelling of 'alpha' starts with the letter " ἄ " rather than " ά ". The difference is that the first letter indicates that the following first vowel of the word is not aspirated, i.e. there is no 'h'.

Please refer to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smooth_breathing

The German version of the page also uses " ἄ ".

Edit request from 74.39.163.185, 5 May 2011

Please remove explicit impertinent photos...there are FOUR

74.39.163.185 (talk) 16:21, 5 May 2011 (UTC)

Not done: no idea what you mean. — Bility (talk) 16:48, 5 May 2011 (UTC)

Edit request on 22 January 2012

In the brief "Math and science" portion of the Alpha article, there should be a sentence or phrase which refers to the fact that Alpha is also used to represent the fine-structure constant in physics, preferrably with a hyperlink to the "fine-structure constant" page itself. As for sources of this information, please see those cited on the fine-structure constant page. The fine-structure constant represents the strength of electromagnetic interaction in matter, is one of the tools key to understanding the fundamental constituent properties of the universe, and has been in use since 1916. Justinwilliamm (talk) 00:01, 23 January 2012 (UTC)

 Done Check and tell me if this is what you were saying. --SMS ^Talk 03:44, 23 January 2012 (UTC)

Yes that is exactly what I was hoping to have added, thank you.24.114.255.83 (talk) 13:34, 23 January 2012 (UTC)

Edit request on 15 November 2013

Symbolically, it is an upwardly pointing arrow arising above the horizontal (horizon) line. Words beginning with this letter often have the meaning of "arising" or "arising above." GreekAlphabeta (talk) 14:40, 15 November 2013 (UTC)GreekAlphabetaGreekAlphabeta (talk) 14:40, 15 November 2013 (UTC)

No, they don't. Please stop trying to push the delirious stupidities of that crackpot website greekalphabeta.com onto Wikipedia. Our project here works on the basis of what reputable academic literature says, not on the basis of the speculative whims of some amateur out on the internet. Fut.Perf. ☼ 14:50, 15 November 2013 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 1 August 2014

Hello, I want to add in the article that the Phoenician alphabet itself a descendant of Egyptian hieroglyphs. --POTDL (talk) 14:59, 1 August 2014 (UTC)

I was under the impression that the relation between Phoenician and Hieroglyphic is still rather unclear and speculative. We'd need to have some very authoritative sourcing to indicate that this is now a commonly accepted view. Besides, I don't really see how this is particularly relevant to each individual letter article. Fut.Perf. ☼ 15:20, 1 August 2014 (UTC)

Not done: please provide reliable sources that support the change you want to be made. Anupmehra -Let's talk! 15:36, 1 August 2014 (UTC)

First of all, I don't think that there are many people will read every article about that; so I think should you condense the informations, no need to talking about that because everything is clear and exist here, this in Aleph article "shape of the letter derives from a Proto-Sinaitic glyph based on a Egyptian hieroglyphs F1". As for Anupmehra primarily I can't editing the article --POTDL (talk) 16:27, 1 August 2014 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 8 January 2015

I'd like to request clarification on the two distinct IPA phonemes that point to the same link:

"In Ancient Greek, alpha was pronounced [a] when short and [aː] when long."

Both [a] and [aː] link to the "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_front_unrounded_vowel" IPA number 304; yet according the "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Help:IPA_for_Greek" they are in fact two different sounds.

In short, please change:

[a] -> British English cut [to, perhaps, "http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/c9/Near-open_front_unrounded_vowel.ogg". IPA number 325]

SOURCES: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phonological_history_of_English_short_A

5.43.7.54 (talk) 17:33, 8 January 2015 (UTC)

Thanks for raising this matter. I've changed the link to point to Open central unrounded vowel, which seems to be the more appropriate target here. (There's an unfortunate, general ambiguity in the meaning of the IPA symbol "a" which is at play here.) Fut.Perf. ☼ 17:48, 8 January 2015 (UTC)

External links modified

Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just added archive links to one external link on Alpha. Please take a moment to review my edit. If necessary, add {{cbignore}} after the link to keep me from modifying it. Alternatively, you can add {{nobots|deny=InternetArchiveBot}} to keep me off the page altogether. I made the following changes:

• Added archive https://web.archive.org/20110822143239/http://www.une.edu.au:80/WebStat/unit_materials/c5_inferential_statistics/what_alpha_level.html to http://www.une.edu.au/WebStat/unit_materials/c5_inferential_statistics/what_alpha_level.html

Cheers.—^{cyberbot II}_{Talk to my owner:Online} 18:08, 13 July 2015 (UTC)

Sporadic uses

Please let's not make mentions, nevermind sections, about sporadic uses in a discipline or things that have been named "Alpha". That would an endless list. We have a list of widely-recognized things where the letter Alpha is consistently used to represent something. Let's stick to that. I'm referring in particular to this edit by @Azurevanilla ash: which I reverted without an edit summary because I can't click buttons. LjL (talk) 12:10, 18 October 2015 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 31 July 2017

In the Language subsection, please include a template for: {{further|Alpha (ethology)}} 107.15.152.93 (talk) 06:14, 31 July 2017 (UTC)

Done jd22292 (Jalen D. Folf) (talk) 06:23, 31 July 2017 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 14 April 2020

from Proto-Canaanite "Alof" Which is shaped like an ox's head. Sigal Lea Raveh (talk) 21:26, 14 April 2020 (UTC)

 Not done: it's not clear what changes you want to be made. Please mention the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format and provide a reliable source if appropriate. —KuyaBriBri^Talk 21:50, 14 April 2020 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 27 January 2021

Remove "In zoology, it is used to name the dominant individual in a wolf or dog pack." as it is disproven. I have personal experience with wolves, they are polyamorous, no hierarchy. Here is an article that talks about this in different terms; https://www.businessinsider.com/no-such-thing-alpha-male-2016-10 65.189.67.94 (talk) 03:09, 27 January 2021 (UTC)

I've reworded it a bit. We've got an article at Alpha (ethology) which should be linked here. ◢  Ganbaruby!  (Say hi!) 03:25, 27 January 2021 (UTC)

Move discussion in progress

There is a move discussion in progress on Talk:Alpha (disambiguation) which affects this page. Please participate on that page and not in this talk page section. Thank you. —RMCD bot 19:33, 14 December 2021 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 14 January 2024

In electrical engineering, A (alpha) is the symbol for Amperage or units of amps. This significant fact is worth adding to the page. 102.220.159.180 (talk) 16:52, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

 Not done: it's not clear what changes you want to be made. Please mention the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format and provide a reliable source if appropriate. JTP ^{(talk • contribs)} 20:25, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

Can I move the navbox sidebar to the left and add an infobox grapheme?

Here's the infobox i want to add:

Alpha
Α α
Usage
Writing system	Greek script
Type	Alphabetic
Language of origin	Greek language
Sound values	[a], [aː]
In Unicode	U+0391, U+03B1
Alphabetical position	1
History
Development	Α α
Time period	c. 8th century BC to present
Other
Associated graphs	α(x)
Associated numbers	1
Writing direction	Left-to-right

Campeaodaaudiencia (talk) 21:24, 29 July 2025 (UTC)

I personally don't like that navboxinfobox very much. Not much of it is helpful for taking in the crucial ideas about the topic at a glance. The Greek alphabet letters have lived quite well without such infoboxes for as long as they have existed. I find the navbox more useful. Also, having a navbox on the left would be quite uncommon and probably lead to ugly sandwiching of text if an infobox were also present. Fut.Perf. ☼ 03:15, 30 July 2025 (UTC)

Hello, sorry for the late reply. The reason why I wanted this infobox into the article was because in the mobile version of Wikipedia, the sidebar navbox is nowhere to be seen, which led me to another question: How can i make it so the sidebar navbox appears in the mobile version of this page? Campeaodaaudiencia (talk) 00:40, 1 August 2025 (UTC)

The navbox sidebar should be on the right, directly below the infobox grapheme. Also, this would be a better image in the infobox:

MixedDefault (talk) 20:19, 1 May 2026 (UTC)

Why is this article still rated start class

I personally think this article should be rated C class — Preceding unsigned comment added by Charles 091 (talk • contribs) 09:39, 19 January 2026 (UTC)