Talk:Rudolf Diesel/Archives/2018

On Diesel's death

We look at him like a realey bad figure, but just like all of us he had some problems. With all his breakdowns in the past, it is lead to believe he killed himself by jumping off the ship. Have a nice swim Rudolf! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 209.174.137.10 (talk • contribs) 2006-03-17T14:02:06

While this is possible it is more likely that he was killed by the German Military, as he was on his way to a conference in the U.K with more advanced designs that especially the German Navy was not eager to see him present. The most advanced diesel engine to come out of WWI was the M.A.N. 10 Cylinder 3000 HP Diesel engine used on some later German U-boats built at Augsburg plant piston speed 1320 cycles per minute. (Dristen) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Dristen (talk • contribs) 05:39, 27 January 2011 (UTC)

I read he was probably killed by coal magnates, his business rivals. Brand 18:41, 30 April 2006 (UTC)

Update, 2010

The coverage in the article has matured since 2006 (when the above comments were added). The fundamental question (which the above comments validly come near to discussing) is presenting the right balance between theories based on their likeliness, soundness in reality versus fringe/conspiracy/paranoia, etc. It currently says (as of this writing):

"There are various theories to explain Diesel's death. Grosser (1978)[3] presents a credible case for suicide. There are conspiracy theories that suggest that various people's business interests may have provided motives for homicide. Evidence is limited for all explanations.[4]"

I just undid a good-faith edit that wanted to remove the words "credible" and "conspiracy". This was a good-faith but slightly misguided effort to reduce "bias", i.e., to increase the NPOV factor. However, the existing wording is nevertheless better, for reasons that I will explain. There is a dynamic tension in life between "being unbiased / neutral / even-handed" and giving undue weight to ideas that are fringe / extremist / conspiracy-laden, compared to ideas that reliable sources would present as the most likely to be true. This spectrum is encountered both at Wikipedia (where it is covered by the WP:UNDUE guidelines) and in the profession of journalism, where journalists are rightfully derided if they let the valid seeking of balance degrade into mere "on the one hand, on the other hand" presentation—which is rightfully recognized as lazy journalism (the easy way out of the harder responsibility to seek the truth amid uncertainty). Cheers and happy editing, — ¾-10 16:01, 24 October 2010 (UTC)

I have to disagree with your edit for the following reasons:

1. The only reference provided to support the assertion that suicide theory is credible -- "Grosser 1978" -- is unspecific and thus unverifiable. What pages in the book, if any, support the claim? Should one read the whole book just to discover it doesn't support the theory? That would place an undue burden on someone who would want to verify the reference. An unverifiable reference cannot be considered as a reliable source, see WP:VERIFY.
2. Who decides that the theory presented in the Grosser's book is credible? Grosser himself? Wouldn't that be a biased conclusion? Currently, the article doesn't present any independent and reliable sources at all confirming that Grosser's theory is credible.
3. There are [http:// www.helium.com/items/1651841-the-strange-death-of-rudolf-diesel other sources] that suggest a murder theory may be credible as well: "The German [murder] theory has some traction because they [the Germans] had the motivation, the means and the wherewithal to execute a professional assassination quickly and quietly."

Unless you can address the above points, I'll revert your edit, as my version is less biased and thus more appropriate. C1010 (talk) 04:56, 25 October 2010 (UTC)

Meh. I take your points. I still feel that the murder theories do not deserve undue weight, but there's no way to objectively pry the consensus toward my view. Your version is certainly very even-handed, and any reader willing to use his/her brain can decide for him/herself. I suppose I can't ask for anything more than that. I have read Grosser 1978—good book—but I don't own a copy, I read a library copy, so I don't have it on hand to narrow down a page range for the citation. Will see about chasing that down sometime; it'd be well worth adding here, as it might prompt a few readers to actually seek out the book and read (parts of) it. By the way, on this topic (reason why lost overboard), see also my earlier talk page comments. — ¾-10 21:43, 25 October 2010 (UTC)