I'm going to summer camp for the next four weeks, so I
won't be here on the list. Between now and then, I
expect you'll either make many important policy
decisions about the textbook, keep talking about for a
long time but not do anything, or slowly abandon it.
Since I'm hoping for the first one, here are my
opinions on the textbook:
1. It should not require logins to work on it. We
don't need more regulation, and I see no reason to
change our current policy.
2. I haven't said this yet, but I think we should
delete every page not listed on the structure page
that is worthless or a stub, without discussion on
votes for deletion.
3. A textbook should be DPOV, which is a subset of
NPOV, but completely different than how NPOV is
applied in the textbook. We should also have links to
other online and Wikipedia references that show other
POVs not represented in the book, or perhaps links to
specially created resources for this.
4. From the start, we should be able to print out the
whole textbook, cover to cover, complete with notices
about copyrights and a cover and back. PDF or PS sound
like good formats, or perhaps just a long HTML/CSS
page? Once this is done, we should make that format
accessable online so others can see how the finished
product would look, but only downloaded, say, a
chapter at a time, to decrease server load.
-LDan
__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
SBC Yahoo! DSL - Now only $29.95 per month!
http://sbc.yahoo.com
I have been playing around a bit on
http://test.wikipedia.org building preliminary textbook
structures and am noticing a tendency to build layers of
links which organize the information down into bite-size
modules. The style for this one, about organic chemistry,
is not nearly as linear as the physics one that I had
started earlier as a traditional text ... maybe it is
because of the freedom allowed by hyperlinking. I am
excited to see how all of this develops and facilitates
non-linear learning. BTW I aggree that the modules will be
much smaller than traditional textbook chapters. My plan
for now is to refine each module down to one idea and send
out any other ideas to thier own module unless an
exceedingly short comment is all that is required, or one
idea encompasses the relation between a couple of other
linked modules.
PS Is it just me or does it seem like people are using this
space to rant on non related subjects ? Maybe I am
subconsciously taking it personally or something ..
__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
SBC Yahoo! DSL - Now only $29.95 per month!
http://sbc.yahoo.com
Jimbo wrote:
>At one point, a textbook teaching about
>the Earth and the Sun might say "The
>Sun revolves around the Earth". Bad
>move to say that.
<off-topic>Hm. Given the Church's view on this subject at that time it would
have been a bad move for your own well-being to disagree... </off-topic>
>Better to say "Current scientific consensus
>off-topic>is that the evidence outlined in this
>chapter suggests that the Sun revolves around
>the Earth."
Assuming there wasn't a Church that would burn you at the steak then, in
retrospect at least, I would have to agree. However, the corollary of that is
not true because we know, as a fact, that the Earth does revolve around the
Sun because a couple deep space craft took several pictures of our whole
solar system (not to mention all the hoards of other empirical evidence there
is). So there is no significant controversy on this topic (even the Catholic
Church eventaully accepted this fact).
When there is no real controversy on a topic (in a global sense) then facts
can be presented as facts.
>Respect for the reader entails simply laying
>out all the facts uncontroversially, and allowing
>the reader to draw the appropriate conclusions.
But we don't have room in every article to present every idea on a subject -
we have to pick and choose. If done right then the major arguments are
presented in some detail, with more detailed text on daughter articles and
the minor/crackpot ones get maybe a sentence or two or just a "see also"
link.
>What I'm saying is that it's a big misconception
>to think that an NPOV textbook treatment of
>biology has to include, as if equally valid, the
>views of scientists and creationists. It doesn't.
>It is not _bias_to restrict our focus to a particular
>topic.
<Devil's advocate>Ever hear of a "bias of selection?"</Devil's advocate>
Perhaps the problem is that [[NPOV]] needs to be re-factored? It sure has been
misinterpreted enough.... It was also made for an encyclopedia and so was
framed with the needs of an encyclopedia in mind (sic comprehensiveness
instead of a focus on neutrally presenting the current views of a topic based
on how professionals in that discipline view it - I think that wording is
needed in the textbook version of "NPOV").
>Remember, NPOV is about getting consensus
>between potentially warring factions. If your
>biology text is written properly, then an honest
>creationist will accept it.
Good thing you put the qualifier "honest" in there. Otherwise I would have
listed a few states where creationism is either presented as a valid
competing theory to evolution or as superior to evolution in those state's
public school biology textbooks. It makes me sick to think about that (also
very glad that I didn't grow up in those backward states -- no offense
intended Jimbo :-).
-- Daniel Mayer (aka mav)
PS I'm leaving for a Yosemite field study in about 4 hours and won't be back
to respond to posts until late Sunday/early Monday UTC.
Also, I would prefer us to use the terminology of "module" instead of article
when talking about textbook pages (both are one wiki page but "article" isn't
a good word for our use here - neither is "page" realy).
Magnus Manske wrote:
>....
>One more thing (more like a personal request):
>I would like to limit editing to logged-in people
>only. Now calm down, I don't try to rip the wiki
>principle apart. I just think that since this will be
>a more organized effort than wikipedia, and as
>I'd rather not spent my time cleaning up vandals
>on the textbook wiki all the time as well, I think
>it might be a good idea to prevent bypassing vandals
>from inserting "yo mom's stupid". Everyone would be
>free to get a user account, just like on wikipedia. Just
>an extension: "You can edit this page right now. Just
>get a free user account first". People who'd like to
>invest serious time here will most certainly do that.
I don't know if that is such a good idea, but it still might be worth trying
for the first reason you mentioned (that this is a more organized project).
But me being me (a worry wart) I just think the vandals will get user names
and we will loose valid contributors by forcing them to set-up an account
(probably also provide a valid e-mail address) just to correct a typo. IMO it
would also make it much less obvious that anyone /can/ edit any page just by
logging-in -- all they would see was "Protected page" where the edit button
should be and "Log-in." That doesn't make it obvious we are a wiki, no?
We might, however, allow anon edits but limit them to say 10 a day like
Slashdot. But I do recall getting pretty pissed on Slashdot when trying to
submit my 11th post as Anonymous Coward and getting the message "Hold on
there cowboy!" (the SlashCode and my browser were not cooperating and I
wasn't able to log-in in the first place). We could manage that better
though.
So maybe we can coax people in a nice way to log-in by just reminding them
about logging in after they make their 10th (or whatever) edit by having a
short message in bold text under the edit button. And also maybe have those
IPs show up in bold in Recent Changes.
Yeah, I know, I'm babbling and off-topic. So I'll stop now.
I guess I'm not sleeping tonight - oh well.
BTW, I agreed with all your other concept ideas.
-- Daniel Mayer (aka mav)
Magnus wrote:
>The smaller pool of authors is the very reason I'd prefer
logged-in
edits only, as less "real" authors means shifting the
author:vandal
ratio in favor of the vandals.
The one reason I could see the value in this is as a choice
that an individual author could make in case he didnt trust
the wiki system yet. If we had true wiki-style open edit
books next to sign-in edit books we could see which works
better and maybe win some authors that would not otherwise
contribute. Or maybe we would lose contributers. Jimbo is
the expert here and he thinks its a no-go ...
__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
SBC Yahoo! DSL - Now only $29.95 per month!
http://sbc.yahoo.com
I have this sneaky feeling like when we all have some
specific passages in front of us everyone is going to
pretty much aggree on what is appropriate or inappropriate,
and that the different POVs may all have a place. If it is
all built in modules then we can choose to link to any or
all of the ones that are there. I think that applies to the
issue raised earlier about what things should be included
like moral arguments or other perspectives on the subjects
covered. One of the cool things about a hypertext book is
that we can link to all kinds of things that a traditional
textbook doesn't have space to print and the reader can
choose which parts he wants to read.
Karl
__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
SBC Yahoo! DSL - Now only $29.95 per month!
http://sbc.yahoo.com
For the purpose of this general discussion of the relationship
between NPOV and textbooks, we should all dig up some texts and
look for examples.
I used to teach freshman economics 101 at the University of Alabama,
and I remember being frustrated at finding bias in the texts that we
were using. That was some years ago, and perhaps a review of that
text (which I still have at home somewhere) with an eye towards
finding examples of POV that could be made NPOV might be useful.
Samuelson, in particular, was notorious about putting his personal
judgments into the text as if they were consensus science. Had
he been subjected to the discipline of wiki-editing, his text might
have been much improved.
--Jimbo
Toby wrote:
>The text in [[en:Wikipedia:Neutral point of view]]
>of course must be changed, since it refers to a
>comprehensive encyclopaedia on everything.
>But this is /context/, not the /essence/ of NPOV.
That's the only thing I wanted to change, yes (well, that and some refactoring
of the text to make it more readable). The reason I called it something
different is so that people won't get confused between the
comprehensive-based NPOV used in Wikipedia and a more focused-based NPOV
needed for textbooks. This is especially important because the Wikipedia
implementation of NPOV often tends to result in articles that have everything
in them but the kitchen sink ([[abortion]] for example is mostly about the
controversy and history with relatively little by the way of explaining the
various medical procedures).
-- Daniel Mayer (aka mav)
I aggree that we should get some strucuture out there from
the beginning.
Would it be possible to have the option to have some books
and pages edited only by signed-in users and others open to
everyone ? And leave the choice open to the person who
starts the book or is the administrator or someone else who
would have a reason to decide ? I'd imagine that some
people would feel a lot better about contributing if they
had more control over it that way, and others wouldnt care.
Or maybe, in very special cases, modules on the site which
are editable only by the original author ...
__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
SBC Yahoo! DSL - Now only $29.95 per month!
http://sbc.yahoo.com
Jimmy,
I got your last email about POVs after I just sent mine,
and I guess it made my comments irrelevent. I have no
disaggreements with you on what you wrote, and certainly
wouldnt try to find any excuse to support poor or biases
writing.
Karl
__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
SBC Yahoo! DSL - Now only $29.95 per month!
http://sbc.yahoo.com