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Nominator: Kusma (talk · contribs) 16:25, 2 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Reviewer: RoySmith (talk · contribs) 23:29, 4 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Starting review now...

Overall, this is mostly well written. I would, however, break up the single big paragraph that makes up Early life and education into two or three more manageable ones. I'd also cover some more of her accomplishments and honors in the lead. Earwig doesn't note anything of concern. You should probably put a {{use british english}} at the top to keep people like me from trying to correct the spelling of "rigour".

• the advantages of using the complex variable in [...] boundary problems of mathematical physics MOS:ELLIPSIS says not to use the square brackets.
  • Done. My fingers automatically type these brackets as they are in my internal style guidelines.

As far as sources go, the WP:DAILYMAIL is deprecated and should not be used at all (refs 7 and 8). Other than that, they all appear to be WP:RS. I'll follow up with a spot check later. A few additional comments about sources:

• Perhaps to save her family money, Morris went to Cambridge by bike.[20] I don't see any mention of Morris in this source. Also, speculating about her intent ("Perhaps to save her family money...") is basically WP:OR.
  • I have removed the Daily Mail sources (althoguh their use may be defensible per WP:DAILYMAIL as the articles are quite old), given that [20] (now [18]) rightly points out the Mail's undue focus on her physical appearance. There was very little sourced to the Daily Mail anyway, mostly the fact that they interviewed her, which was sourced to the interview.

No problems vis-a-vis breadth of coverage, neutrality, stability, or illustrations.

• Although it was lacking in rigour,[24][25] I would not say this in wiki-voice, but rather attribute it ("In her 1966 book review, A. A. Mullin said ...") And as for the review by "D. S." (seriously, were they afraid to sign their name???) this is such a strong negative review ("sets the theory back 130 years", I don't think you can just lump it with the previous "lacking in rigor" statement. I don't think you need to trash the textbook, but a review like this needs to at least be acknowledged in some specific way.
  • Both reviews note the lack of rigour, so I think wikivoice is ok. I have expanded on the D.S. review. From my personal experience as a professional mathematician, the whole thing is pretty typical for what happens when a mathematician with fully rigorous training gets in contact with "British Applied Mathematics", a field consisting of methods and rules that often do not have proper foundations. American or European "Applied Mathematics" is typically rigorous, just interested in applications, while British "Applied Mathematics" is more artistic and less bound by issues of actual correctness.
  • "Sets the theory back 130 years" is not a statement about the book, but about an incorrect step in the "proof" of the "theorem" that the Fourier series of a convergent function converges to the function. I think the reviewer alludes to the work of Abel mentioned here.

Picking 10% of the sources from Special:Permalink/1273499458 to spotcheck: [9, 11, 23, 34]

• During this time, Morris, aged 23, published her first articles, on potential theory[9]
  • Behind a paywall, but I guess all we're verifying here is the date of publication and subject, so we're good.

• Her approach showed "the advantages of using the complex variable in [...] boundary problems of mathematical physics"[11]
  • Verified.

• Together with Roy Chisholm, Morris wrote a textbook on Mathematical Methods in Physics.[23]
  • Verified, but maybe you want to say "a textbook titled ..." instead of "a textbook on ..."
    • Done.

• Morris is listed in the Davis archive of about 2500 women who achieved honours degrees in Mathematics in Britain before 1940.[34][35]
• The PhD was still an uncommon degree for British mathematicians at the time, and Morris is among only seven women who received Mathematics PhD degrees in Britain until 1940, and the only one from Cambridge.[34]
  • Verified.

OK, that's it for me. I'll put this on hold for a week to give you time to sort through the minor issues noted above.

• Thank you for the review! I'll probably get to most of this in about 12 hours. I fixed the source [20]: I had confused the issue numbers and copied the wrong link. The speculation about money is from that source. —Kusma (talk) 09:41, 5 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  • RoySmith: responded to all your points I hope. Let me know what you think. —Kusma (talk) 17:12, 5 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

    Overlooked one comment and now added a tiny bit to the lead. Not sure that naming the individual awards is useful, so I stayed generic. —Kusma (talk) 20:50, 5 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

    Looks good, thanks. A nice addition to the encyclopedia. RoySmith (talk) 23:36, 5 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]