Talk:Dubhe

Watch your language

Can somebody transliterate 斗 & 天樞? TREKphiler ^{hit me ♠} 01:05, 23 August 2009 (UTC)

Dubhe as a pole star?

Currently, the article states that Dubhe is the northern pole star for 5100 BC and 20500 AD. During these points in the Earth's axial precession, Dubhe's declination is less than 60 degrees. On the other hand, Alkaid, which is brighter than Dubhe, will have a declination of over 75 degrees. Though neither is as ideal as Polaris is currently (over 89 degrees and nearly as bright), wouldn't Alkaid be a better choice? --173.51.121.53 (talk) 16:56, 4 November 2009 (UTC)

I agree that Dubhe should not be considered to be a pole star, and recommend that the text stating that it was and will be be removed ASAP. For reference, take a look at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Precession_N.gif, for example. The precession circle comes nowhere near the Big Dipper. Doesper (talk) 17:16, 4 December 2009 (UTC)

I agree. The claim that it was the Pole Star is ludicrous. I'll remove it now. - Gnomon —Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.198.212.130 (talk) 13:22, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

Requested move 11 November 2023

The following is a closed discussion of a requested 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 a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: moved. (closed by non-admin page mover) — Mdaniels5757 (talk • contribs) 01:50, 27 November 2023 (UTC)

---

• Alpha Ursae Majoris → Dubhe
• Gamma Ursae Majoris → Phecda
• Delta Ursae Majoris → Megrez
• Epsilon Ursae Majoris → Alioth
• Eta Ursae Majoris → Alkaid

– I searched on all of these and found out that the names are more common because the stars is in the Big Dipper. So I suggest the page should be moved. For Merak (disambiguation), Merak is to replace Beta Ursae Majoris, so the original Merak has to be moved elsewhere. 117daveawesome (talk) 08:57, 11 November 2023 (UTC) — Relisting. BegbertBiggs (talk) 17:39, 19 November 2023 (UTC)

Some of these proposed moves are probably reasonable, but oppose moving Merak. If it's a disambiguation page, that means there's no single primary topic for it. I'm also confused as to why you moved the Dubhe redirect to Draft:Move/Alpha Ursae Majoris. SevenSpheres (talk) 17:17, 11 November 2023 (UTC)

Ok, removed those two. 117daveawesome (talk) 01:41, 12 November 2023 (UTC)

Alkaid is also commonly known as Benetnasch so keeping the current name might be proper. Killuminator (talk) 12:06, 12 November 2023 (UTC)

Support for the rest of these; the proper names are consistently more common than the Bayer designations in ADS. I could also support a move from Beta Ursae Majoris to Merak (star); what I opposed above was moving the disambiguation page that's currently at Merak. As for Benetnasch, I get less results for it in ADS than either Alkaid or Eta Ursae Majoris. Alkaid is the more common name and also the IAU-approved one. SevenSpheres (talk) 16:53, 22 November 2023 (UTC)

Actually searching for "...UMa" in ADS returns different results than "...Ursae Majoris" (for some designations the abbreviated and full forms return the same results?), so it looks like at least some of the Bayer designations may be more common. Changing to weak support. SevenSpheres (talk) 17:31, 22 November 2023 (UTC)

• Support all, and fine with moving Beta Ursae Majoris to Merak (star) as well. Don't think the ledes are accurate by claiming these are merely old names, given how easily recent sources using them can be found. SnowFire (talk) 05:46, 25 November 2023 (UTC)

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.

Spectroscopic binary?

The article refers to Dubhe as a spectroscopic binary. But this is a visual binary, isn't it? The separation is about half a second of arc, which is a very close pair, but nonetheless there is a well-determined orbit from direct observation of the secondary star. If no one disagrees, please fix (or I will edit it myself in a few days). EllenM4014 (talk) 18:52, 29 December 2023 (UTC)