WikiEN-l October 2003

wikien-l@lists.wikimedia.org

91 participants
397 discussions

Adam Carr addendum (double)
by Adam [name omitted for privacy reasons] 25 Oct '03

25 Oct '03

I sent a second email (which I don't think was received), noting that Adam hadn't really neglected the Muslims -- I dunno. Im not trying to cast him as some crazy; its just, he is being rude to me and I don't like it. Anyways, Im sure Erik Moller is getting pretty sick of seeing my rapidfire mailing list posts, so Ill stop trying to clarify what Im trying to communicate.

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Adam Carr
by Adam [name omitted for privacy reasons] 25 Oct '03

25 Oct '03

At [[Talk:Jesus]], besides being (in my not at all humble opinion) a most disagreeable person; Adam has stated that Jews hate Jesus (for good reason). I just think people should be aware that he said this, I am sure it has some bearing on...something or other. I also noticed that he didn't include Islam in his list of major world religions...Im sure you see what Im getting at.

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Re: [Wikipedia-l] Saints
by Adam [name omitted for privacy reasons] 24 Oct '03

24 Oct '03

I agree with Delerium; we should try to avoid including titles as part of a formal statement of the person's name.

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Re: Deletion policy needed
by Alex Rosen 24 Oct '03

24 Oct '03

The Cunctator wrote: > It's also disturbing that pages that aren't offensive or illegal are > being listed on VfD. There is *no need* to delete stub entries. We have > methods of indicating them as stubs, which is much more constructive > than simply deleting them. There are plenty of things that are not offensive or illegal that are fine to list on VfD. "List pages that you believe will simply will never become encyclopedia articles. For example, articles that represent completely idiosyncratic non-topics, articles that could never be more than dictionary definitions, etc." says the deletion policy. I agree that stubs should not be deleted, but "sub-stubs" should be. Whether something is a stub or a sub-stub is a matter of opinion of course. Jake wrote: > Agreed. Very few of the pages listed have any particular reason to be > deleted. If you think that Wikipedia is for any kind of knowledge whatsoever, then you're right. If you think (as I do) that Wikipedia should only be for topics of a certain importance, then in fact most of the pages listed there should be deleted. Again, I find it amazing that we have no policy on this. The deletion process cannot be fixed until we agree on the most basic criteria for deletion. We're supposed to delete pages that "will simply will never become encyclopedia articles", yet we have no basic agreement about what this means. Alex

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The mailing list
by Adam [name omitted for privacy reasons] 24 Oct '03

24 Oct '03

If the mailing list html page would place the newest emails at the top; then, a user wouldn't have to wait for the whole long thing to load, in order to view the newer information. They could just click stop and view the email. The same holds true for pages like the Village Pump.

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RE: [WikiEN-l] Adam Carr
by Poor, Edmund W 24 Oct '03

24 Oct '03

Toby is right, and I'll add that BOTH Adam's seem to be making personal remarks. Ironically, it's on a page about someone who said [[turn the other cheek]] (see Wikipedia article). I hope neither of them "takes this observation personally". Uncle Ed

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RE: [WikiEN-l] Re: [Wikipedia-l] Saints
by Poor, Edmund W 24 Oct '03

24 Oct '03

The reason the [[Mother Theresa]] article starts off '''Mother Theresa''' and not "Blessed Mother Theresa" can be explained in two words: * Uncle Ed * (Those are the two words :-) As Vicki explained before, our primary rule-of-thumb is that we call a person the way most people call them. So the article on X@QJKjqjz (or whatever her birth name was) uses her adopted name of Theresa because not one reader in 50 would recognize her Albanian (or whatever) name. It also adds the title "Mother" because she's been famous as a convent leader for the past 2 decades. Her recent title, from her beatification this month, makes her the "Blessed" Mother Theresa (for Catholics and others who believe in beatification by a sitting pope). I placed her title, if I recall correctly, at the end of the paragraph with (I hope) a short note explaining that (a) it's a recent title upgrade and (b) hardly anyone but Catholics 'recognizes' the title. I'm not -- and James and Vicki are not -- suggesting that Wikipedia take a POSITION on whether the title is justified. It's just the handiest way to refer to her. *sigh* about twice a year, there's a big re-examination of our style sheet. I hope this isn't that time... Ed Poor (aka Uncle Ed)

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Simple solution to deletion policy
by Poor, Edmund W 24 Oct '03

24 Oct '03

Oh, Alex, you're making it too complex; stop thinking like a lawyer. And, Cunc, stop being a dick ;-) All we have to do is define the Wikipedia Inclusion Policy. Then, we can start our deletion policy based on: "Delete anything that shouldn't be included" Logical, right? Ed Poor

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Re: [WikiEN-l] Re: [Wikipedia-l] Saints
by James Duffy 23 Oct '03

23 Oct '03

> >>James Duffy wrote: >> >>>As we have an agreed naming convention, applied to thousands of articles, >>>by a range of people from professional editors like Zoe and bookworms >>>like Deb to experts on constitutional history like John Kenney, any >>>unilateral attempt to abandon what has been agreed because Mark has a POV >>>he wishes to push, would be a gross abuse of wiki and grossly insulting >>>to the many people who solved what had been a glaring problem. Mark may >>>not like titles, but the fact that they exist. Covering them accurately >>>and factually is NPOV. Trying to push an agenda that says 'I don't like >>>them, therefore I will remove them', is pushing a POV, is unencylopic and >>>grossly disrespectiful to the large numbers of people who debated the >>>issue, made observations and have spent a year implementing the agreed >>>wikipedia policy in a professional, encyclopic NPOV manner. >> >> >>I disagree strongly, and your attempt to leverage credentials is both a >>logical fallacy (look up "appeal to authority", or the equivalent Latin >>phrase if you prefer) and grossly un-wiki. >> >>The issue is that Wikipedia is endorsing certain titles, and not endorsing >>others, which is inconsistent and POV. When we use Sir, Blessed, and so >>on, and refuse to use His All-Holiness, His Excellency, and The Honorable, >>this is a POV judgment, and unacceptable in a professional encyclopedia. >> >>If you do wish to use some honorifics, I would like to see some >>conventions adopted indicating which we should use, and which we should >>not. Why should the article on [[Mother Theresa]] start off "Blessed >>Mother Theresa", while the article on [[Clarence Thomas]] does not start >>off "The Honorable Clarence Thomas"? Is there a principle behind this >>decision? > >You're talking about two different issues. James is talking about article >titles. Delirium is talking about personal titles at the beginning of the >text IN an article. It makes it easier to know what we disagree about when >when we agree to disagree about the same thing. :-) > >POV is unencyclopic when it pokes out one's only good eye. ;-) Sorry >James, but I can't resist the temptation of a good typo.! >Ec :-) Actually Ec, the naming conventions deal with whole issue of naming; article titles and textual entries. Whether one likes titles or loathe titles, they do (unfortunately) exist. Using factually existing titles is simply a recognition of reality. ''Choosing'' to ignore them is by definition POV and you are choosing because of a point of view to ignore them. So Delirium's stance, apart from doing a Bobby Ewing and trying to imagine that the last year and the work of many people, not to mention debates, discussions, proposals put to the Wiki-L, etc didn't exist, is POV in that it is taking a policy stance based on personal opinion to ignore something that exists. So on three fronts, ignorance of what titles are, ignoring the work of everyone over the last year who following an agreed naming convention, and seeking to opt for POV reasons to ignore the reality and push a POV agenda on titles, Delirium is wrong. JT _________________________________________________________________ MSN 8 helps eliminate e-mail viruses. Get 2 months FREE*. http://join.msn.com/?page=features/virus

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Re: [Wikipedia-l] Saints
by Delirium 23 Oct '03

23 Oct '03

(replying on wikiEN-l) Matt M. wrote: >>I partially agree, and partially disagree. "Saint Bernard of Clairvaux" >>is perfectly fine, as people who have been beatified are often referred >>to as such, both by those who recognize the sainthood and those who do >>not (there are plenty of atheists who debate the viewpoints of Saint >>Peter, for example). I do think "Blessed ..." is inappropriate though, >>and frankly a little ridiculous. >> >> > >I don't see why. "Blessed" is analogous to "Saint." "Saint" is the title of >a person who has been canonized; "Blessed" is the title of a person who has >been beatified. > > In retrospect I agree partially, and would move towards using neither Blessed or Saint. In fact, I would prefer not using titles at all. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ulysses_S._Grant for an example of this in practice (note that it does not start off "General Ulysses S. Grant..." -- even though in this case "General Grant" was in fact a common way to refer to him before, during, and after his Presidency. There are a few exceptions, of course. "Saint Peter" should be referred to as such, because that's the most common way to refer to him (though I wouldn't object to "Peter the Apostle" either). Popes should probably be referred to as "Pope John Paul II", because "John Paul II" is not actually a personal name, but one adopted with the office. But I don't think this should extend to all people who have titles. So, basically, I'd propose we remove titles from both article names and the beginning of the first sentence of the article, unless they are absolutely integral. This includes both official titles (President, Prime Minister, etc.) and honorific titles (Blessed, Sir, etc.). Then if having the title is important, it can be mentioned later (perhaps later in the first sentence). Thoughts? -Mark

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WikiEN-l October 2003