[WikiEN-l] The Community vs. Scholarly Consensus

[WJhonson at aol.com]

In a message dated 12/17/2008 7:01:26 PM Pacific Standard Time,  
snowspinner at gmail.com writes:

But  current policy explicitly forbids even summary of sources that   
require expert knowledge to understand.>>


----------------
I don't concur with that interpretation of what we were trying to  convey.
We already have articles that require expert knowledge in order to  summarize 
sources.
So apparently others, also view the policy a bit looser than you are doing  
now.
Summarize the effect of the Chandrasaker limit on the properties of a Black  
Hole ?
That requires an expert to understand, or at least a grounding in  
Astrophysics that the typical reader wouldn't be able to grasp.
 
When we write, we write to the typical reader (say tenth grade level or  
below), that doesn't mean that all of our editors must also *read* at that level  
or *understand* at that level, or consistently with each other.
 
Which is why we have experts in areas, and our policy specifically states  
that an expert in the area of the subject material should agree with your  
summary.  Not that all readers in the world should.
 
Novels, fiction in general, is usually not of such a technical nature that  
it requires jargon or a great amount of in-depth study to understand what the  
novel is saying.  The in-depth study would be reserved to understanding  what 
the novel is *meaning*.  The "why", not the "what".
 
We don't allow physicists to go spinning off into theories about what  
broader meaning Black Hole behaviour has on the rest of the cosmos, without a  
source.  And we don't allow literary critics to expound on the deeper  meaning of 
Kafka turning into a giant cockroach versus say a giant turtle,  without a 
source.
 
We state what occurs, or did occur, without going into deeper issues of why  
and what-if.
 
Will Johnson
 
 
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