[Foundation-l] [Langcom-l] Ancient Greek reconstructed an analysis of a proposal for a new Wikipedia

[Mark Williamson]

Well, we're not discussing Latin, are we? They already have every
project besides Wikiversity, as far as I know, so there is no need to
discuss approval of Latin projects.

Mark

On 18/04/2008, Gerard Meijssen <gerard.meijssen at gmail.com> wrote:
> Hoi,
>  If that is all you want to discuss, the status quo is that Ancient Greek has
>  been denied. I do not want to discuss Ancient Greek only. If that is all we
>  are discussing, I am done talking.
>  Thanks,
>       GerardM
>
>
>  On Fri, Apr 18, 2008 at 12:03 PM, Mark Williamson <node.ue at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>  > Stop saying Latin, we already have a Wikipedia in Latin. We are
>  > discussing the denial of a Wikipedia for Ancient Greek.
>  >
>  > Mark
>  >
>  > On 17/04/2008, Pharos <pharosofalexandria at gmail.com> wrote:
>  > > On Thu, Apr 17, 2008 at 5:51 PM, Jesse Martin (Pathoschild)
>  > >  <pathoschild at gmail.com> wrote:
>  > >  >  Further, I've painstakingly followed every thread in this
>  > discussion,
>  > >  >  and I have not seen any strong argument for allowing languages
>  > nobody
>  > >  >  uses natively. Wikimedia wikis exist to make the sum of human
>  > >  >  knowledge available to everyone, not to practice or preserve
>  > >  >  languages.
>  > >  >
>  > >  >  I think the argument that they act as a common language for scholars
>  > >  >  of the ancient language is not valid; we are not a forum for
>  > academic
>  > >  >  exchange.
>  > >
>  > >
>  > > You have to remember that "everyone" includes people who consider
>  > >  written-only languages a part of their intellectual sphere.  If
>  > >  Wikimedia was around 500 years ago, would we deny Latin for purely
>  > >  ideological reasons, even though it was very widely used in
>  > >  literature?  And though that use has declined greatly for Latin and
>  > >  similar classical languages, I do not think we can say that such a use
>  > >  is dead, nor can we at all predict the future course for such
>  > >  languages.
>  > >
>  > >  And is it not true that certain topics are best researched in certain
>  > >  languages?  If one were to collect writers from around the world to
>  > >  write an encyclopedia article on medieval ecclesiastical history,
>  > >  based on the most relevant and important sources, would not the
>  > >  optimal language for collaboration be Latin?  And if one were to write
>  > >  an encyclopedia article on early 20th century artificial languages,
>  > >  would not the optimal language for collaboration be Esperanto?
>  > >
>  > >  Surely such articles, written in one context but translated into many
>  > >  other languages, would be very valuable to all of our Wikipedia
>  > >  editions.
>  > >
>  > >  Not that I agree with Gerard's specific proposal, but the case for
>  > >  Wikipedias in written-only languages is quite clear to me.
>  > >
>  > >  Thanks,
>  > >
>  > > Pharos
>  > >
>  > >
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