[WikiEN-l] Can sweet reason still work on en:wp? Occasionally.

[Ryan Delaney]

On Tue, Oct 20, 2009 at 2:44 PM, Thomas Dalton <thomas.dalton at gmail.com>wrote:

> 2009/10/20 Ryan Delaney <ryan.delaney at gmail.com>:
> > This is a bizarre, but ancient, misunderstanding of IAR. All IAR means is
> > that priority number one is doing what is right, rather than pedantic
> > allegiance to a dictatorial interpretation of rules. Since IAR is not
> itself
> > a justification for anything, there is never any useful information added
> by
> > saying "I am invoking IAR." The only defense is "I did this because X"
> where
> > X is the reason that what you did was a good idea, so you might as well
> skip
> > to the end. Rather than saying "I am invoking IAR and I did this because
> X",
> > just say "I did this because X."
>
> It's not a misunderstanding, it is an understanding of how things
> actually work in the real world. "X" will need to include an
> explanation of why the usual rules don't apply (that may be obvious
> from just explanation why what you did was a good idea), so it makes
> sense to acknowledge from the beginning that you aren't following the
> usual rules.
>
>
Do you think a reason X that persuaded you that A was the right thing to do
despite rule R that seems to forbid A would cause you to believe that the
rules didn't apply, or would you need to be specifically reminded of that
fact every time?

- causa sui