Talk:Willis Fletcher Johnson

Possible copyright problem

This article has been revised as part of a large-scale clean-up project of multiple article copyright infringement. (See the investigation subpage) Earlier text must not be restored, unless it can be verified to be free of infringement. For legal reasons, Wikipedia cannot accept copyrighted text or images borrowed from other web sites or printed material; such additions must be deleted. Contributors may use sources as a source of information, but not as a source of sentences or phrases. Accordingly, the material may be rewritten, but only if it does not infringe on the copyright of the original or plagiarize from that source. Please see our guideline on non-free text for how to properly implement limited quotations of copyrighted text. Wikipedia takes copyright violations very seriously. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 20:13, 31 January 2023 (UTC)

Removing UNDUE content

With these edits, from this version, I have removed a large section incorrectly labeled as "Selected works", which was instead an UNDUE and somewhat biased accounting of the critical reception of one minor work of Johnson's. The section also had a lot of redundancy and some grammatical errors. We should not rely on older lesser scholarly accounts to refute a recent, scholarly account, and Hunt's accounting is not a favorable view of the Ludington Memoirs; the version I removed left an impression of that work distinctly different from what Hunt writes. (I made quite a mess of this cleanup as I mistakenly reverted too much content, which had to be restored; I did that without checking source-to-text integrity.

On a separate matter, WP:INFOBOXes are not required; pls gain consensus to use one. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:50, 4 January 2023 (UTC)

Removal of cited text

Thomas Trahey please explain why you removed here text cited to a scholarly source (which by the way can also be verified by viewing the title page of the book on two different sites).[1] We can't use original research to refute a scholarly source. Also, when removing cited text,[2] please use an edit summary so others can follow your reasoning. After you removed the explanation for why Hunt states the source is not wholly reliable, you left the text unclear and vague, resulting in a maintenance tag. Please do not remove well-cited text from articles without explaining your reasoning, and please engage talk when making such edits. Gwillhickers my apologies for mistakenly stating in edit summary that the same editor who removed the information had then placed the tag; I see you placed the tag after the info was removed by Thomas Trahey. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 04:46, 13 January 2023 (UTC)

A review of Wikipedia's WP:COI policy might also be helpful.[3]

Also, I have set up a separate para for the Memoirs in Critical reception, as there should be other critical reception of Johnson's other works. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 04:49, 13 January 2023 (UTC)

For example, other critical reception can be found:

1. https://www.jstor.org/stable/pdf/1944159.pdfs (overall positive but considerable inaccuracies detailed)
2. https://academic.oup.com/jah/article-abstract/16/4/581/803884?redirectedFrom=fulltext
3. https://books.google.com/books?id=z1UCAAAAIAAJ&pg=PA279&lpg=PA279&dq=%22Willis+Fletcher+Johnson%22+review&source=bl&ots=D95LlBVKFu&sig=ACfU3U2tJUmTnjZS01EHk_TaTxhGUvJWiw&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwje3Lv08MP8AhVLlIkEHWC3C0Y4HhDoAXoECAQQAw#v=onepage&q=%22Willis%20Fletcher%20Johnson%22%20review&f=false
4. https://books.google.com/books?id=i6s0AQAAMAAJ&pg=PA76&lpg=PA76&dq=%22Willis+Fletcher+Johnson%22+review&source=bl&ots=8GOHee4h6S&sig=ACfU3U1T0R7CoVBfSvPNCZq-KUtm9WbsPA&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwje3Lv08MP8AhVLlIkEHWC3C0Y4HhDoAXoECAIQAw#v=onepage&q=%22Willis%20Fletcher%20Johnson%22%20review&f=false
5. https://www.nytimes.com/1916/07/02/archives/history-of-americas-foreign-relations-professor-johnsons-narrative.html?searchResultPosition=1

That is, we should not imply with one para that Hunt is the sum total of the critical reception; the section can be/should be expanded. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 06:11, 13 January 2023 (UTC)

Re-stubbed per cut-and-paste copyvio from New York Times (sample: He later received the honorary degree of Master of Humane Letters from his alma mater). As discussed here at ANI, there are too many similarities and the possibility that offline sources are plagiarized or misrepresented exists. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 13:39, 15 January 2023 (UTC)

Edits of 30 January

Put back the material. WP:Verifiability. Picking out a sentence does not a copyright violation make. Indeed, all of that ancient stuff is in the public domain. We can put in quotations marks. Expand the article and put in the contrary views. 7&6=thirteen (☎) 15:23, 30 January 2023 (UTC)

That isn't what happened. One of the (many, there are more) problems with the content is WP:OR, conflating a printer with a publisher, but there is much more, including UNDUE, POV, and using original research on archaic sources to refute a scholarly source. Even one of the sources used indicated that the printer was not a publisher. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 15:27, 30 January 2023 (UTC)

The problems also include the prose style. For example, Johnson's first teacher was his father who had literary tastes and had a library of a variety of books. He became knowledgeable in Science, History, and General Literature. This reads like a middle-school student's essay: literary tastes is so vague that it says basically nothing, and likewise for a variety of books (it would be remarkable if a library contained only many copies of a single book!). What is General Literature, and why is this utterly unspecific description being elevated to a proper noun?

This is not the first time I've found this problem in Coldwell's writing. XOR'easter (talk) 19:35, 30 January 2023 (UTC)

Article restoration

@SandyGeorgia: — As you may know, the picture of Johnson is from Chamberlin, 1901, Universities and their sons. I noticed this source was used to cite the Early life section and figured it may contain a picture of Johnson, which it did, so I added it. If this source is acceptable, we can use it to cite the Early Life section again. -- Gwillhickers (talk) 21:52, 19 January 2023 (UTC)

Alas and alack, I don't speak images on any level, so don't know if the copyright is safe ... which is why I hesitated to restore it myself. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 21:58, 19 January 2023 (UTC)

Regarding using Chamberlain as a source, I noticed that the edits I reverted did not carefully use all the sources, as different sources say different things. It's still unclear to me if he graduated from NYU, for example, and whether Chamberlain simply parrots the less-than-relaiable Johnson in some places. So care must be taken to integrate all sources. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 22:21, 19 January 2023 (UTC)

The book was published in 1901, so at this late date that would put it in the public domain. The photo of Johnson appears to have been taken when he was relatively young, well over 100 years ago, so I believe that by itself would make it public domain, but if there are still doubts, we can always get other opinions. You seem to be more familiar with the subject and its sources, so I'll leave matters in your hands. -- Gwillhickers (talk) 22:35, 19 January 2023 (UTC)

It's not that I have doubts; it's that I know nothing about images. I would have no problem if you feel it's OK. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 22:39, 19 January 2023 (UTC)

Indeed, you are again taking inconsistent and mutually exclusive positions. "cut and paste" copyright violations and WP:OR. You can't have it both ways. 7&6=thirteen (☎) 15:28, 30 January 2023 (UTC)

It's possible for one more thing more than one thing to be true at a time. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 15:30, 30 January 2023 (UTC)

Yes, it is possible on some things.

But these are mutually exclusive by definition. You need to spend some time on a logic course if that is your position. Res ipsa loquitor 7&6=thirteen (☎) 17:58, 30 January 2023 (UTC)

No, they are not "mutually exclusive by definition". For example, an article could contain verbatim copying of multiple sources, followed by a conclusion that is not stated by any of them. This would be both cut-and-paste copyvio and Original Research by synthesis. XOR'easter (talk) 19:24, 30 January 2023 (UTC)