> From: John Lee <johnleemk(a)gawab.com>
>
> vanity page? A page written by someone seeking glorification? But, why,
> Isn't Wikipedia supposed to be a
> compendium of human knowledge?
Let's take a little tour through the dictionary. I'm going to use AHD4
(running the risk of being trumped by people with access to the full
OED) but, here goes.
com·pen·di·um, NOUN: Inflected forms: pl. com·pen·di·ums or
com·pen·di·a (-d
-
) 1. A short, complete summary; an abstract. 2. A list or collection
of various items. ETYMOLOGY: Latin, a shortening, from compendere, to
weigh together : com-, com- + pendere, to weigh.
In other words, the word compendium implies some kind of distillation
or selection.
en·cy·clo·pe·di·a A comprehensive reference work containing articles on
a wide range of subjects or on numerous aspects of a particular field,
usually arranged alphabetically. ETYMOLOGY:Medieval Latin
encyclopaedia, general education course, from alteration of Greek
enkuklios paideia, general education : enkuklios, circular, general;
see encyclical + paideia, education (from pais, paid-, child; see
pau- in Appendix I). WORD HISTORY: The word encyclopedia, which to us
usually means a large set of books, descends from a phrase that
involved coming to grips with the contents of such books. The Greek
phrase is enkuklios paideia, made up of enkuklios, “cyclical, periodic,
ordinary,” and paideia, “education,” and meaning “general education.”
Copyists of Latin manuscripts took this phrase to be a single Greek
word, enkuklopaedia, with the same meaning, and this spurious Greek
word became the New Latin word encyclopaedia, coming into English with
the sense “general course of instruction,” first recorded in 1531. In
New Latin the word was chosen as the title of a reference work covering
all knowledge. The first such use in English is recorded in 1644.
In the case of what an encyclopedia is supposed to cover, things are
less clear, but there is a strong implication that it has something to
do with education or teaching or school. Encyclopedias don't cover
everything, they cover "book-larning." They have some vague connection
(not ironical here) with the idea of being a universal _textbook,_
covering those areas relevant to a _general education_.
Now, compendium of human _knowledge:_
knowl·edge 1. The state or fact of knowing. 2. Familiarity, awareness,
or understanding gained through experience or study. 3. The sum or
range of what has been perceived, discovered, or learned. 4. Learning;
erudition: teachers of great knowledge. 5. Specific information about
something. 6. Carnal knowledge.
I think we can agree that "universal compendium of human knowledge" is
not referring to meaning number #6. Inclusionists seem to feel that it
ought to mean #3, "The sum or range of what has been perceived,
discovered, or learned." But I think there is often an understanding
that knowledge, _in the context of an encyclopedia,_ has meaning number
#4. In other words, book-larning.
Naturally, we extend this quite a bit, for a number of reasons. Paper
publishers are quite happy to publish an "encyclopedia of baseball" or
an "encyclopedia of vaudeville" and Microsoft has published an "MS-DOS
encyclopedia," and we include material of this kind in Wikipedia.
However, business directories, gazetteers, Who's Who, and the American
Ephemeris and Nautical Almanac are _never_ called the "encyclopedias of
businesses," "encyclopedias of place names," "the Marquis Encyclopedia
of Vanity Pages," or the "Encyclopedia of Ephemeral Astronomical Data
Useful for Navigation."
--
Daniel P. B. Smith, dpbsmith(a)verizon.net
"Elinor Goulding Smith's Great Big Messy Book" is now back in print!
Sample chapter at http://world.std.com/~dpbsmith/messy.html
Buy it at http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1403314063/
> Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] Compendium
>
> So, to try to avoid the constant posturing for a
> while, how does this help us to navigate the different
> understandings of what should and should not go in?
> Are you in favour or against schools, for example? I
> can't really tell from your message.
1) That wasn't the purpose of the message. Someone had used the phrase
"compendium of human knowledge" as if it meant "everything." I was
pointing out that the word "compedium" implies _selection._ And I was
pointing out that, while acknowledging Wikipedia is _different_ from
other encyclopedias, the word _encyclopedia_ does imply an emphasis on
certain kinds of "knowledge" over others.
2) If you frame the question in the form "are you in favor of or
against schools" you would not be able to understand any answer I could
give. Watch my behavior in VfD and make your own deductions.
> It would seem that your definition would exclude many
> RamBot articles?
I'm a pragmatist. I don't think the Rambot articles on towns were a
good idea, but I accept them as a fait accompli. No, I do not think
they fall within even a loose definition of an encyclopedia. They are
database tabular data that's been gussied up into pseudo-English.
They're here. I'm not going to use any of my own psychic energy on a
crusade to get rid of them. If someone else tries to get rid of them, I
won't waste any of my own psychic energy trying to stop them. I believe
these feelings of mine are fairly widely shared, by the way.
The thing I hate most about the Rambot articles is people citing them
as precedent for putting in other stuff that shouldn't go into
Wikipedia.
--
Daniel P. B. Smith, dpbsmith(a)verizon.net
"Elinor Goulding Smith's Great Big Messy Book" is now back in print!
Sample chapter at http://world.std.com/~dpbsmith/messy.html
Buy it at http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1403314063/
Mark Richards wrote:
>So, to try to avoid the constant posturing for a
>while, how does this help us to navigate the different
>understandings of what should and should not go in?
>Are you in favour or against schools, for example? I
>can't really tell from your message.
>
Why do you need to be able to tell? Part of the reason Dpbsmith's
attempt at discussion is helpful is because he's trying to explore
general principles _instead of_ "posturing" as either "for" or "against"
schools. If all you're interested in knowing is whether someone is *for*
or *against* whatever side you are on, it's no wonder this discussion is
deteriorating into "inclusionist vs. deletionist" factionalism and
moving no closer to consensus. Most of what I've seen for the past week
in 90% of the messages on this list (and in spite of several attempts at
calling a timeout to the flamewar) is people caricaturing their
opponents in the debate in an attempt to ridicule them into changing
sides. It should not be surprising that this is not an effective method
of persuasion, and it also does very little to get undecided observers
to support either side.
If this sounds a lot like the current political dynamics in the United
States, well ... but that's off the topic, so let's not go there.
--Michael Snow
> I don't think anyone is arguing that we should delete 90% of the
> articles we have. The articles in question are maybe 1-2%, and
> certainly no more than 10%.
Well, you said you "don't see how Wikipedia gains or loses from the creation
or deletion of any of these articles, unless indisputably encyclopedic."
Not all articles which are disputably encyclopedic are listed on VFD.
Rambot articles are of disputable encyclopedicness. Pokemon articles are of
disputable encyclopedicness. Articles on years and numbers, and lists are
of disputable encyclopedicness. But none of these are listed on VFD.
Perhaps 90% was a slight overestimate, but I don't think there are many
articles which are "indisputably encyclopedic". But let's look at some
real numbers. Britannica has 120,000 articles. We have 380,000. So right
there our idea of encyclopedic is 3 times as broad as Britannica (68% of our
articles aren't encyclopedic by the Britannica standard) and we don't even
cover all of the articles Britannica has, so this number is an
underestimate. In the period from October 22-26 inclusive (UTC), 200
articles were listed on VFD, and 4300 were created. So by ignoring VFD
we're cutting out 5% of our encyclopedia. Considering that these articles
are probably those on which the world has the least free information, this
is a significant loss in my opinion. And that doesn't even factor in the
question of what the deletionists would come up with to start cutting out if
they had no one opposing them. Until a compromise is reached, this can't
just be ignored.
Anthony
Well, it finally happened. For the first time, someone has managed to
delete an article I labored more than 4 hours over, in such a way that I
cannot retrieve it even with sysop powers.
My original [[Missing explosives in Iraq]] article is gone, with a
highly biased version in its place.
Please, someone find and e-mail me the original text. I trusted you
guys.
A crestfallen Uncle Ed
> I would propose that no vote would create valid official policy unless
> the vote has been properly sanctioned.
Votes don't create official policy. Official policy is created through
consensus (or less often through declarations by Jimbo, the Board, or the
Arb committee). Surveys are simply something people can point at to say
"see, we have consensus for this".
Having lots of voters, broad application, clarity, a decent voting period, a
static question during the full time of the voting period, and adeqate
public notice are things that can be done to increase acceptance of a poll
as properly reflecting the will of Wikipedians. You may want to mention
some of these things at [[Wikipedia:Survey Guidelines]].
Incidently, VFD polls generally fail at the vast majority of these points.
Sometimes they are clear, and there is somewhat adequate public notice, but
there are rarely many voters, broad application, a decent voting period, and
a static question during the full time of the voting period (the latter
being since the article generally changes during the voting period).
Anthony
This proposed policy ([[Wikipedia:Preliminary Deletion]]) isn't probably
very well named, but it seems to have been well accepted, although I am
perturbed by the lack of discussion on the talk page despite being
advertised on the pump, community portal and RFC. Anyway, in case anyone
here hasn't read the proposal yet, please do.
I've drafted the proposed questions and answers for the poll already.
Can someone more experienced in these matters please double-check them
for compliance with the guidelines?
Also, comments/brickbats on the proposal would be very welcome,
especially from the inclusionist side (although you may be pleased to
hear RickK is of the opinion that this proposal won't change anything).
John Lee
([[User:Johnleemk]])
Stan Shebs wrote:
> You are talking, but are you listening? If the choice of US president
> matters so much to Europe, then why aren't the Europeans supporting
> Kerry in a way that will get him some more votes? Guardian readers
> lecturing Iowans in letters was a really dumb idea, I can't believe
> that in all the millions of Europe there isn't anyone with a better
> idea for two-way dialogue.
Why was the Guardian's gambit a "really dumb idea"? And if you think
it's easy to come up with a better approach, what's your proposal?
There's nothing terribly intrusive about simply sending letters to
people in the United States, and the Guardian set things up so that
no one in Ohio would receive more than a single letter from their
readers. In any given week, I receive dozens of unsolicited letters
from companies trying to sell me products, organizations asking for
my money, and campaigns trying to sell me their candidates. Getting
one letter from someone in the UK would hardly be a burden and would
actually be a refreshing improvement over the mail I usually get.
The objection can't possibly be that we object to outside meddling,
given the numerous ways that the United States routinely meddles in
other countries' elections. So what's the problem?
What I found most shocking about the Guardian campaign was the
vitriolic response from Bush supporters. One person, for example,
called the British "stupid, yellow-toothed pansies ... I don't give a
rat's ass if our election is going to have an effect on your
worthless little life." Other responses were full of similar
profanity and insults. The level of overt hatred toward the British
is all the more striking since England is in fact the best ally that
the Bush administration has in its war in Iraq. If nothing else,
these responses may help educate a few Brits firsthand about the ugly
depths to which American politics has fallen, which in turn might put
some additional pressure on the Labour Party to change course.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uselections2004/story/0,13918,1329858,00.html
>From: Fred Bauder <fredbaud(a)ctelco.net>
>Reply-To: English Wikipedia <wikien-l(a)Wikipedia.org>
>To: English Wikipedia <wikien-l(a)Wikipedia.org>
>Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] Problematic behavior and ad hominem attacks
>Date: Thu, 28 Oct 2004 08:45:29 -0600
>I believe complete coverage of such events may require setting forth
>several
>points of view at some length. It would be nice if there were no Zionists
>who have such views, but such is not the case nor is it the case that
>extermination is not the view of some Palestinians.
>
>Fred
>
> > From: Harry Smith <lance6wins(a)yahoo.com>
> > Reply-To: English Wikipedia <wikien-l(a)Wikipedia.org>
> > Date: Thu, 28 Oct 2004 07:02:52 -0700 (PDT)
> > To: English Wikipedia <wikien-l(a)Wikipedia.org>
> > Subject: [WikiEN-l] Problematic behavior and ad hominem attacks
> >
> > What is the proper way of dealing with this type of
> > behavior?
> >
> > :::Your statements are accurate and clear but it won't
> > matter. Even if there was a massacre, the Zionist
> > [[hasbara]] campaigners will spin the description of
> > events until it bears no resemblance to reality. See
> > what they did to [[Muhammad al-Durrah]]. To these
> > extremists, Arab civilians killed by the Israeli
> > military do not constitute evidence of a massacre.
> > Like the Nazis who said "the Jew is a parasite, the
> > only good Jew is a dead Jew", the extremist Zionists
> > believe, "'Palestinians' are terrorists, they hide in
> > refugee camps, Israel is just defending herself." All
> > crimes are absolved. Destroy the enemy. Blame the
> > victim. Repeat until death. It's the nature of the
> > conflict. --[[User:Alberuni|Alberuni]] 01:20, 28 Oct
> > 2004 (UTC)
> >
> > taken from Talk:Operation Defensive Shield
Harry's quesion is not about how to cover the issue, but rather about how to
deal with persisent ad hominem comments. " Zionist [[hasbara]] campaigners"
is a label User:Alberuni has placed on those who disagree with him, and the
strawman arguments attributed to those editors are actually invented by
User:Alberuni.
This was sent to the board address. Forwarded here since OTRS is down.
Could anyone help to research these points please?
Dear Sir or Madam
Through books and cross-checking information of your
encyclopedia entries:
Swiad Gamsachurdia, writer, president of Georgia
and
Eduard Schewardnadse, USSR foreign minister, dictator
I believe the information given on your site (from
1989 onwards) to be wrong in parts and in other parts
wrongly interpreted. I have no time to go into details
and leave you to research these two entries, also
taking into account non-encyclopedic information.
Yours faithfully
<name removed>
Switzerland