Talk:El Niño

"El Niño is Spanish for "the little boy" and refers to the Christ child,"

Uhh, it's a little more subtle than that, you need to pay attention to the UPPER/lower case letters.

"El niño" (lower case initial 'n') is indeed Spanish for "The little boy", but it means no more than that; ie, a generic little boy.

"El Niño" (upper case initial 'N') would in English be more like "THE little boy", and that then specifically refers to the infant Jesus, for the reason stated.

58.166.120.215 (talk) 11:03, 17 August 2012 (UTC)

" El niño is Spanish for "the niño" " is a reference to the Chris Farley sketch, and is probably someone's idea of a joke. 12.22.204.1 (talk) 22:08, 17 April 2014 (UTC)

Why Peruvian fishermen notices the fluctuations was because of the diminished upwelling of the ammonia-rich deep waters, reducing algal blooms and thereby diminishing the anchovy harvest. The coldness of the water wasn't the reason for the anchovy reduction per se. Not to insult anyone, but the article is heavily meteorologic and climatologic and skimps on the biologic; but it would be more useful if worded in a more common parlance and a human aspect. Alas, most science is written for other scientists. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.95.126.251 (talk) 06:09, 25 June 2017 (UTC)

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The gap

The picture in 'Occurrences' shows a gap in el Niño occurrences between 1926 and 1941. Should there not be reference to this in the text? Brian Josephson (talk) 15:42, 25 July 2023 (UTC)

Is it notable enough for reliable sources to talk about it? ABC paulista (talk) 16:31, 25 July 2023 (UTC)

Less overlap with the ENSO article?

I think it's important that this article does not overlap more than necessary with the article on ENSO, El Niño–Southern Oscillation. This applies in particular to the content about the history section and also for the future (how will climate change affect ENSO). Therefore, I have now added an excerpt to this article from the ENSO article for the section that I've now called "Interactions with global warming". More can be done in that area. Perhaps we should also merge the two history sections into one and then bring it to the other article by using an excerpt. Similar thoughts might apply for the La Niña article. EMsmile (talk) 12:04, 8 December 2023 (UTC)

Maybe it would be best to merge the El Niño into the El Niño–Southern Oscillation article? EMsmile (talk) 09:55, 13 December 2023 (UTC)

EMsmile, I'd argue that both El Niño and La Niña should be merged here, there's a lot of overlapping information between each of them that would be better presented if were altogether. My only fear is that it becomes too El Niño-centered and La Niña info becomes sidelined, especially now seeing how you've been concentrated on working in both ENSO and El Niño articles, but for now the same effort hasn't been seen on La Niña one. ABC paulista (talk) 16:35, 13 December 2023 (UTC)

I'd be happy to also merge La Niña as I think it'll be easier to talk about all three things in one article. It's interesting when you look at the page views that El Nino gets far more page views than the other two, see here. Maybe because the heat and drought from El Nino (at least in Australia) is scarier and more troublesome than the colder and wetter conditions from La Nina?

Interestingly, this is what Kevin E. Trenberth (expert on ENSO) told me about that: "El Niño is the name of a phenomenon. So is the Southern Oscillation. Neither are good names but there you are. ENSO is only in the science community really. A big YES to combining the articles. - ENSO is used by scientists. I doubt it has meaning for the public. I always use El Nino for the public, or El Nino phenomenon" (see also the other content I have put on the talk page of the ENSO article).

Would you have time & energy to help with such a merger? I would be struggeling to do it myself, both time-wise and intellectually, but I'd love for this to be worked on. EMsmile (talk) 22:20, 13 December 2023 (UTC)

El Niño is how the phenomenon is mostly referred as by the general public, and is the most famous of the phases, so it doesn't surprise me that it has the most views compared to La Niña, and in general the oceanic side is way more known than the atmospheric one, with the El Niño term sticking with the public easier that "Southern Oscillation".

About helping out with the merger, I'll see what I can do, but I can't make promises. I'm also been busy, and haven't been having much time to work here outside small cleanups. ABC paulista (talk) 00:40, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

I also agree with the merger of all 3 articles and would go further and suggest a renaming of the main article to a better title such as The El Niño phenomenon with the appropriate redirects. That way we can incorporate all 3 phases of the phenomenon (El Nino, La Nina and Netural) and work on the article to be make it more accessible to the public. I am not sure how much time I have at the moment, so can not make any promises to help with the merger.Jason Rees (talk) 15:12, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

I, similarly (or better yet "much the same"), struggle to write good German! … and thus congratulate your efforts with English. "I would be struggling" should be spelt (not to confused with the grain spelts, fed to livestock) thusly: I struggle in various circumstances, struggled in the past, shall or will (subtle distinction) be doing so in the future, am now struggling, and will be, or have been, or would be, doing so — or "doing the same" (… as I am doing now.). (Sorry, but I can't currently offer you any means to ask about the numerous other nuances and situations, but only (and instead, or as a inadequate substitute) my best wishes for your future success! 173.220.230.26 (talk) 12:04, 12 October 2024 (UTC)

I would be fine with the three articles being merged, but I think the details in each article should be preserved. Sfoske70 (talk) 06:15, 21 December 2023 (UTC)

I checked again with Kevin Trenberth and he replied "I typically refer to it as

The El Nino phenomenon. It embraces El Nino, Southern Oscillation, La Nina, as well as metrics for those (indices) that include the neutral stage and Walker Circulation, and links to teleconnections and impacts." - Do we like to have "the" in an article title? EMsmile (talk) 23:48, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

I think that we should look around to see how the phenomena, in general, is mostly referred as per the general public, meteorological agencies and media outlets. I don't think that "The El Nino phenomenon" is a WP:COMMONNAME for this case. ABC paulista (talk) 00:21, 15 December 2023 (UTC)

Yes we can look around. But I suspect there is no "common name" for this yet as it's not something that most people are aware of. Or maybe I am just speaking as a European where this is rarely in the news. When I lived in Australia, I heard it far more often in the news, usually just as El Nino or La Nina or oscillation index but never as ENSO. EMsmile (talk) 09:07, 15 December 2023 (UTC)

I don't think "The" is needed here at all, since both "El" and "La" are already definitive articles. "El Nino phenomenon", or perhaps "El Nino/La Nina phenomenon" should be the best title.

I also don't think we should worry about WP:COMMONNAME too much, considering that volcanic eruption redirects to types of volcanic eruptions, which is obviously a much more technical and less accessible title, yet it has apparently been that way for a long time (got a GA in 2010). InformationToKnowledge (talk) 18:05, 15 December 2023 (UTC)

The only term I know of for El Nino and La Nina in combination is El Nino/Southern Oscillation. Some people use El Nino/La Nina, but that just seems clunky. Sfoske70 (talk) 06:10, 21 December 2023 (UTC)

Where do we stand now with a proposed title for a combined article? How about El Nino and Southern Oscillation phenomenon or shorter El Nino and Southern Oscillation? (also, do we need to use the Spanish letter with squiggle over the n inside of Nino?) EMsmile (talk) 12:44, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

AFAIK, most academics and specialists use the current name, El Niño–Southern Oscillation, as the most common denominator for the whole prenomenon, oftenly shorted as ENSO, so I think it would be best if we'd follow suit. Separating both El Niño and Southern Oscillation with an "and" might mislead the readers into thinking that they are separate phenomena, which is not the case, and I never saw people referring to it as such.

And per WP:UE, the usage of the letter "ñ" is required since most English-language reliable sources include it. ABC paulista (talk) 14:14, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

Good points. But I don't understand what purpose the dash between Nino and Southern is really serving. For lay persons it looks as if "Nino Southern" thus belongs together. I still quite like the point made by Kevin above (he has published a lot on this issue, not only in academic publications but also for the masses): "I typically refer to it as The El Nino phenomenon. It embraces El Nino, Southern Oscillation, La Nina, as well as metrics for those (indices) that include the neutral stage and Walker Circulation, and links to teleconnections and impacts." so I think I would go for El Niño phenomenon. This indicates that the article is about more than just El Nino on its own. EMsmile (talk) 18:22, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

From my own perspective and experience, the term "El Niño" is mostly used to refer for ENSO's warm phase, more specifically when talking about the ocean temperature and meteorological impacts it's usually associated with. I've never seen it being used to refer especifically to the cold phase, and almost never when referring to the whole picture.

The dash between El Niño and Southern Oscilation is there for more historical and technical reasons: Historical, because in the past it was belived that they were separate phenomena, thus were treated on its own and had their own names, and technical because they are "two sides of the same coin", with El Niño/La Niña being the oceanic half and the Southern Oscillation being the atmespheric one. Still, I've seen many instances where the dash wasn't included, so I wouldn't oppose its removal. ABC paulista (talk) 21:07, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

The three articles are about aspects of the same phenomenon, so logically a merge is legitimate, but not necessarily desirable. Currently, ENSO is about 70kB, El Nino about 86kB and La Nina about 30kB. A combined article (which should probably be merges into El Niño–Southern Oscillation to avoid title disputes) would probably be smaller than 70+86+30 = 186kB (very large) if there is enough overlapping content to combine. So what size would the expected merged article be? Are there any obvious alternative splits envisaged? We can reasonably expect the article to grow in the future as more information becomes available, so somewhere down the line there will be splits and summary sections for main articles. We should not merge if the same splits are likely later. · · · Peter Southwood ^(talk): 07:42, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

There is a lot of overlap between the three articles, naturally. Especially the El Nino and the ENSO article repeat much the same content. So I think it would be possible to condense a combined article to achieve a target size of about 60 kB. I am pretty confident of that. If we wanted to envision further sub-articles it could be along the lines of geography, e.g. "ENSO effects for Australia", "ENSO effect for North America" and alike. There could also be a sub-article in future called ENSO and climate change, maybe.

My suggestion for the article title of a combined article is El Niño Southern Oscillation (without a dash) or El Niño Southern Oscillation phenomenon. EMsmile (talk) 09:49, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

It may be a little optimistic to predict a merged article size smaller than two of the three components individually, without losing information, even if there is significant redundancy, so I look forward with some interest to seeing the results. Cheers, · · · Peter Southwood ^(talk): 14:32, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

I would also support the merge of the three

articles. It appears that much of this size in kB you mention is due to images, which are often duplicative, and the actual prose size isn't large in any of the three - not to mention that a lot of the prose is also repeated. In these articles, some parts would certainly need to be expanded (i.e. coral bleaching and hurricanes) but others, like Walker circulation or the AR6 quotes, appear to be highly condensable, so a split may not be needed for a long while. InformationToKnowledge (talk) 12:15, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

OK friends, I have now merged the La Nina article into the ENSO article. I think it worked out quite well. Current article size now 28 kB (4430 words) "readable prose size". I'll let you guys take a look and comment before doing the second merger, i.e. El Nino into ENSO as well.

El Nino should/must remain as a redirect to ENSO, as should La Nina, and any other high probability search term, so anyone looking fot El Nino or La Nina will get redirected to ENSO no matter which way the merges and renames are done, and pageviews will in future be of ENSO in whichever name style it ends up with, so from that aspect it does not matter. A bot will have to change all the wikilinks anyway if the article's name is changed. Logically ENSO is the broader topic, so it should be less likely to cause editor confusion to merge into ENSO, and either leave the existing title, or move to the version without the dash which would require another bot fix of links and redirect. I do not know how good the bot is at managing multiple merges and moves, but if someone has to fix them manually they will not be impressed. It may be less risky not to make too many changes in short order. I recommend checking to see that the links have been fixed between each stage of the merges and moves, or finding out which bot is tasked and checking if this is likely to be a problem. Cheers, · · · Peter Southwood ^(talk): 17:11, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

I don't think that a bot or any manual checking is needed for that. If another Wikipedia article links to La Niña then the link will now go to the same place as were La Niña now redirects to, which is a specific section with the ENSO article. Same for El Niño later, after I have done the merge (in a few days; if someone else has time sooner, please go ahead). EMsmile (talk) 20:56, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

Are you not aware that Wikipedia:Double redirects do not work? · · · Peter Southwood ^(talk): 04:51, 18 January 2024 (UTC)

Oh I didn't know you were referring to double redirects. I've never really worried about them in the past as they seem to get fixed by bots automatically. The page that you linked to also says that "Double redirects are easily and automatically fixed by bots, and most are fixed within a few days of creation." But yes, I'll pay some attention to that, using the "what links here" page. EMsmile (talk) 09:11, 18 January 2024 (UTC)

Sorry, I probably thought it was obvious from the context that redirects would become double redirects, which are bot fixable, and with a rename before the bot gets to fix them would become triple redirects, which may not be so simple to fix, hence the suggestion to leave few days between merges and renames, and to check for double redirects before moving. It seems it was less obvious than I thought. Also it may not be a problem, I dont know exactly what the bot does. Cheers, · · · Peter Southwood ^(talk): 10:52, 18 January 2024 (UTC)

OK, I've carried out the merger now (my brain is spinning!). Lots of work still remains to make the ENSO article easier to understand. The size of the combined article is only 48 kB so that's pretty good. I suggest we move further discussions about the article and its title to the talk page of the ENSO article now. EMsmile (talk) 13:38, 18 January 2024 (UTC)