Talk:R.J. Rummel

I have no idea exactly what is going on, but I think I broke something when I tried moving this page over from R.J. Rummel to Rudolph J. Rummel - it seems like Rudolph J. Rummel is acting like a redirect to R.J. Rummel, even though it's not when you view its contents. Does anyone know if this looks like the result of a known bug? Bryan

Someone seems intent on not using his full name and changed it back again to "R.J." (without the space). Although he does use R.J. on his books, there is at least one reference on his own page that uses Rudolph. Unless the evidence is strong for a person being popularly known by his initials we should use the proper given name. Outside of people familiar with the subject area, he is probably unknown. ☮ Eclecticology 02:59, 2003 Nov 5 (UTC)

He is generally known by his initials. Google test: R.J. Rummel - 3,440; Rudolph J. Rummel - 294. And it is also the most common usage not to use spaces between initials (just think of "U.S."), so the article belongs at R.J. Rummel. --Wik 03:39, Nov 5, 2003 (UTC)

I'm no slave to Google! The "Google Test" is often a means for perpetuating and magnifying errors. There are adequate arguments for both using the full first name or just the initials, and I prefer to expand the first name in all but the most famous cases like Tolkien. However, I'm not going to insist on a change for now.

Using a (non-breaking) space between initials is, however, the more common usage, and is supported by the 2003 edition of the Oxford Style Manual. That change I have made. ☮ Eclecticology 04:54, 2003 Nov 5 (UTC)

Well, I dispute that claim. But since Google doesn't differentiate between "R.J." and "R. J.", there's no easy way to prove what's more common, so I'll let this stand for now. --Wik 05:30, Nov 5, 2003 (UTC)