User talk:Andrewa/Great Western Main Line

Detailed comments on these edits, copied below. Feel free to reply here or at Talk:Great Western Main Line#Requested move 9 March 2017. Please follow the talk page guidelines and particularly wp:stringing here.

I'd also prefer that you don't use <p>, but I recognise that the guidelines don't forbid it. It just makes them a bit pointless IMO! TIA Andrewa (talk) 00:56, 18 March 2017 (UTC)

• Nah. WP:ILIKEIT is never a good enough reason for IAR. Overcapitalisation here does not objectively improve the encyclopedia, so IAR does not apply. "Within English grammar" doesn't make sense here; this is not a grammar question of any kind. What is causing "unnecessary grief" is two or three railfans (and now anti-MoS campaigners) pursuing a course of special pleading and the specialized-style fallacy, no matter how many times it gets rejected. Tendentious resistance, RM-by-RM, against guideline compliance is not how to address a guideline you don't like. Try an RfC proposal at WP:MOSCAPS. (But see first the result of another recent RfC pursuing the "trainspotters are special so normal style doesn't apply to us" angle.)

  PS: If IAR applied not to content but to internal, editorial conflict reduction, it would be instantly WP:GAMEable, pretty much to infinity. That scenario is obvious: "I don't like X, so if I keep objecting to X, that manufactures a 'controversy', and then I can apply IAR as a controversy-reduction meta-rule to get what I want, against WP's consensus-adopted rules." IAR doesn't and couldn't possibly work that way. It's about WP:Common sense overriding a rule the rigid application of which to something unusual, and to which it wasn't intended to apply or cannot reasonably apply, would make the content worse for the readers. Clearly not the case here. There is nothing unusual about this, and it is precisely the sort of thing to which NCCAPS and MOSCAPS were intended to apply. We've already been over this hundreds if not thousands of times. If we're not going to capitalise method acting, Julian calendar, long-tailed meadowlark, and general relativity, we're not going to capitalise "line" in cases like this.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  21:18, 17 March 2017 (UTC)

Nah. WP:ILIKEIT is never a good enough reason for IAR. Agree. But as that's an essay on deletion discussions, it seems to have little if any relevence here (and if it did perhaps you'd be guilty of it too?).

Overcapitalisation here does not objectively improve the encyclopedia,... Agree. But this begs the question. What is overcapitalisation? (And who decides what is objectively... but we need not go there to dismiss this particular clause, fortunately.)

"Within English grammar" doesn't make sense here; this is not a grammar question of any kind. Really?

The question of grammar deserves its own section, see #Grammar below. Andrewa (talk) 19:20, 19 March 2017 (UTC)

What is causing "unnecessary grief" is two or three railfans (and now anti-MoS campaigners) pursuing a course of special pleading and the specialized-style fallacy, no matter how many times it gets rejected. Tendentious resistance, RM-by-RM, against guideline compliance is not how to address a guideline you don't like. Try an RfC proposal at WP:MOSCAPS. (But see first the result of another recent RfC pursuing the "trainspotters are special so normal style doesn't apply to us" angle.) I'm certainly not an anti-MOS campaigner. You are well aware of my essay at wp:correct, so that's a ridiculous charge. But I do think that the MOS is not perfect and sometimes needs updates, and that while discussing these updates it's useful to go back to first principles, and particularly to reader experience, on some specific cases, to give the discussion some grounding in practice. Not you?

The allegation that there are anti-MoS campaigners also deserves its own section, see #The MOS below. Andrewa (talk) 19:20, 19 March 2017 (UTC)

PS: If IAR applied not to content but to internal, editorial conflict reduction, it would be instantly WP:GAMEable, pretty much to infinity. That scenario is obvious: "I don't like X, so if I keep objecting to X, that manufactures a 'controversy', and then I can apply IAR as a controversy-reduction meta-rule to get what I want, against WP's consensus-adopted rules." IAR doesn't and couldn't possibly work that way. Can you say that again, a little more clearly? I'm lost.

It's about WP:Common sense overriding a rule the rigid application of which to something unusual, and to which it wasn't intended to apply or cannot reasonably apply, would make the content worse for the readers. No. WP:IAR is about that but not only about that. That's not what it says at all. Actually it's rather short, to the point, and sweeping. And a policy.

Clearly not the case here. There is nothing unusual about this, and it is precisely the sort of thing to which NCCAPS and MOSCAPS were intended to apply. Agree.

We've already been over this hundreds if not thousands of times. Many times, yes. There is a great deal of concern that the rigid application of Larry Sanger's personal opinion on capitals is not the best thing, and also a great deal of resistance to any change. Ain't gonna be easy.

If we're not going to capitalise method acting, Julian calendar, long-tailed meadowlark, and general relativity, we're not going to capitalise "line" in cases like this. Disagree. But some of these cases are better examples than others. There are only four of them, so I may find time to deal with each individually later. Busy weekend. About to drive four hours for a gig. Best. Andrewa (talk) 00:50, 18 March 2017 (UTC)

Grammar

...this is not a grammar question of any kind.

Having both studied and taught linguistics at tertiary level, I frankly find this a ridiculous statement. But we are all learners here, myself included, so let us examine it.

Written English certainly does use capital letters, and in particular circumstances, to convey meaning. (Oh dear, Written English redirects to Standard written English, which is actually a different topic, poorly referenced and should probably be a section of an article on Written English.)

Is this use of capitalisation grammar, or style, or a bit of both? It would seem to me to be a bit of both. Morphologically, it is a bound morpheme indicating that a noun phrase refers to a particular instance of the referent, rather than to all of them.

Morphology is of course part of grammar. Andrewa (talk) 19:53, 19 March 2017 (UTC)

The MOS

... two or three railfans (and now anti-MoS campaigners) pursuing a course of special pleading and the specialized-style fallacy,...

Nothing could be further from the truth. But I have a great deal of sympathy and respect for those campaigners on the other side of the worm who do lots of good work making Wikipedia more correct by fixing non-compliances to the MOS.

The specialized-style fallacy is another essay, written originally [1] and still mostly by the editor who quotes it above. It's currently labelled as a supplemental page, but this seems controversial [2] and a bit strange when the far more widely accepted WP:official names remains just an essay (as does WP:correct).

The MOS (or MoS) is not set in stone, and this for the very reason: It's sometimes not right. Sometimes there are exceptions which are not just individual exceptions but systematic ones... cases that the MOS fails to cover well, either because English or something else has changed, or sometimes because, in glorious hindsight, we got it wrong.

I think that capitalisation is a case in point. More to follow. Andrewa (talk) 20:18, 19 March 2017 (UTC)

Cambrian Line

We also have a similar (previous I think, just slightly) post at Talk:Cambrian Line. Some different and interesting arguments, especially concerning wikt:downstyle, and some of the same arguments (some of the same text in fact). See above for some replies, and I'll deal with the new arguments below in due course. Andrewa (talk) 17:43, 24 March 2017 (UTC)

*:Nah (in response to Andrewa and to B2C's "me too"). WP:ILIKEIT is never a good enough reason for IAR. WP's avoidance of unnecessary capitalisation is known as "down style", and it's long been the norm in academic and general publishing (since at least the 1980s). The principle of avoiding over-capitalisation whenever possible is a rule MOS:CAPS and WP:NCCAPS got from The Chicago Manual of Style, Garner's Modern English Usage, and other mainstream style guides, not from Larry Sanger. The over-capping style is a marketing and (to a minor extent) journalism style. WP is an encyclopedia – an academic work for the mainstream – not marketing or journalism. Adding a capital letter to "line" does not "clarify" anything, but only adds potentially confusing implications. The most obvious is that "Cambrian Line" is a trademark (which would be a proper name). We have no evidence it is, despite a request for such evidence. Thus, there's a WP:OR problem in treating it that way. The over-capping is not an objective improvement to the encyclopedia, so IAR does not apply. The "primary-school grammar notion" at play here is that this is a grammar question at all, which it is not. Finally, no, campaigning tendentiously against MoS and the naming conventions one RM after another no matter how many times it doesn't go your way is not an appropriate way to see if consensus will change; it's just forum shopping. Try an RfC at WT:MOSCAPS; guidelines change by the WP:PROPOSAL process, not by one-against-many (or two-against, in this case) stubbornness.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  20:53, 17 March 2017 (UTC)

Here's the diff if you'd like to check me. Andrewa (talk) 17:43, 24 March 2017 (UTC)

Nah (in response to Andrewa and to B2C's "me too"). WP:ILIKEIT is never a good enough reason for IAR. See above.

WP's avoidance of unnecessary capitalisation is known as "down style", and it's long been the norm in academic and general publishing (since at least the 1980s). Downstyle is practised by some and not others. Wikipedia is unique in some ways, and our choice of styles is tuned to reader experience rather than following any external guide.

The principle of avoiding over-capitalisation whenever possible is a rule MOS:CAPS and WP:NCCAPS got from The Chicago Manual of Style, Garner's Modern English Usage, and other mainstream style guides, Agree (with the proviso that the phrase over-capitalisation begs the question as observed above).

not from Larry Sanger. That is simply a false statement.

The over-capping style is a marketing and (to a minor extent) journalism style. WP is an encyclopedia – an academic work for the mainstream – not marketing or journalism. Partly true. Over-capping is again emotively begging the question. The phrase academic work for the mainstream is an interesting one (is it original? I like it) and underlines the unique nature of Wikipedia. Yes, we resist marketing in that we don't adopt styles just to comply with corporate imaging, but to avoid a style just because it's also used in marketing (or in journalism for that matter)... are you serious?

Adding a capital letter to "line" does not "clarify" anything, Disagree, obviously.

but only adds potentially confusing implications. The most obvious is that "Cambrian Line" is a trademark (which would be a proper name). We have no evidence it is, despite a request for such evidence. Disagree that there is any such implication.

Thus, there's a WP:OR problem in treating it that way. That point escapes me. How could it possibly be OR when sources exist supporting it?

The over-capping is not an objective improvement to the encyclopedia, so IAR does not apply. Objective? This seems your opinion.

The "primary-school grammar notion" at play here is that this is a grammar question at all, which it is not. What's your definition of grammar? It seems a bit strange. Our article to which you linked lists morphology as part of grammar, and that was what I was taught when I studied it. So, you are denying that capitalisation in written English is (or at least can be) a morpheme (the smallest grammatical unit in a language (my emphasis), according to our article)? Elsewhere you seem to assume that it is one... as I believe too.

Finally, no, campaigning tendentiously against MoS and the naming conventions one RM after another no matter how many times it doesn't go your way is not an appropriate way to see if consensus will change; it's just forum shopping. If you wish to raise behavioral issues, please use the appropriate forums for that.

Try an RfC at WT:MOSCAPS; guidelines change by the WP:PROPOSAL process, not by one-against-many (or two-against, in this case) Agree that an RfC is going to be appropriate, in good time. These individual cases will be the evidence supporting it.

And by far the best evidence so far is that almost all the arguments against such capitalisation seem to be either personal preference, or citing the rules, while the arguments for capitalisation also cite reader experience. The one exception is your claim above that it's confusing to the reader. We might need to take that one further. Andrewa (talk) 18:25, 24 March 2017 (UTC)