Wikipedia talk:Reference desk/Archive 49

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Create a Technology reference desk

Thank you for moving the above question. In my opinion, there should be a reference desk for (non-computer) technology. Right now, technology lies under the Science desk, but the desk is overcrowded, and I believe that technology (at least everyday technology such as cars, bicycles, home appliances, cameras and similar stuff) does not attract the same audience as science. /Yvwv (talk) 00:47, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

You mean a sort of Engineering Desk as such? Would it have the traffic, do you think? Fribbler (talk) 00:49, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

Sure it will - howstuffworks.com is really popular. /Yvwv (talk) 06:37, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

Oppose. The desks are fine as they are. Science and technology are closely related disciplines and it would make no sense to separate them. --Richardrj ^{talk email} 13:57, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

The Science desk is rather crowded with a very wide range of topics being discussed. It might be helpful to split it. I'm not sure splitting between science and tech is the best option, though. Splitting Biology off to its own section might be best - I think it's the largest single group (based purely on my own perceptions, I haven't actually counted), and it would concentrate all the medical advice questions on a smaller board where they are easier to deal with consistently. We can then keep Physics, Tech and Chemistry together. --Tango (talk) 14:24, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

Perhaps an interested party could go through last week's archives and sort out exactly what types of questions are being asked on the Science desk. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 14:39, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

A week is a bit much, but I've done the 12th and 13th. If a couple of other people want to do the rest, that would be great. Dividing up the topics is a little difficult, but this is what I got:

Biology	10
Biotech	1
Physics	6
Aerospace	1
Astronomy	1
Geology	1
Chemistry	1
Philosophy of Science	1
Maths	1
Technology	2

Clearly, some of those can be grouped together. Astronomy falls under physics, Aerospace can either be physics or tech, biotech can be biology or tech, geology could be physics. However you group it, though, it seems my assertion that biology is a major component was accurate, at least over those 2 days. --Tango (talk) 15:38, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

I think we should only split off more desks if there is a need traffic-wise, or if the topics are completely unrelated and non-overlapping.

As for traffic, for June 12-18 the Science desk currently features 79 questions (11.3/day), less than 98 (14/day) for the Computing desk, and 82 (11.7/day) for the Miscellaneous desk. In terms of size, the Science desk currently has 116 kB, a bit more than the Computing desk (112 kB) and less than the Miscellaneous desk (145 kB)

Though Tango is probably right about Biology being the bulk discipline within the Sciences, some Biology questions overlap with Chemistry and other fields, and it is helpful having generalists and specialists of related disciplines read and answer them as well. I'm not convinced we need another split. Each fork-off adds complexity and also confusion, and makes the desks more difficult to monitor. ---Sluzzelin talk 16:32, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

I also oppose for the reasons stated by Sluzzelin. --Anonymous, 22:25 UTC, June 18, 2008.

I also oppose as others, but note that it's not the fault of the desks when questions turn up in the wrong places and there's been more of that lately (that I've noticed). I did think it might be a cool idea having a mechanics desk, but then we'd need a bot wearing a white coat and pen in pocket to send questions down chutes to their best destination and that isn't going to happen. Julia Rossi (talk) 23:30, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

I oppose this. The RD is fragmented enough. Also, if you want to get into "this falls under this" game, first see http://xkcd.com/435/ (yes, it is one of those stick-people XKCD comics). -- kainaw™ 12:23, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

>bookmarked< Julia Rossi (talk) 12:37, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

I also oppose. However, I'd like the Computer Desk renamed to Computers and Technology. This might convince some people who post on the Misc Desk to post tech question there. StuRat (talk) 23:41, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

I've gone bold! Computers & Technology I thought was a good suggestion, StuRat. Mac Davis (talk) 02:23, 22 June 2008 (UTC)

I would oppose that as well. Technology is more closely linked to science than it is to computing. And we now have the word "technology" in two headings, which looks silly and confusing. --Richardrj ^{talk email} 15:56, 23 June 2008 (UTC)

I concur with Richardrj, I don't think it's a practical title. If anything, I always thought "Science and Technology" might sort of work. But I'm happy with the way it was too. Not that I mind the ambiguity of having "Technology" at two desks that much (see below), but I think Technology questions generally fit better with the Science crowd. If "Computing & Technology" is to stay, I would like an explanation why people who know about mechanical or electrical engineering, bio- and medical technology, etc. are more likely to hang around at the Computing desk. It already had "Information technology" as a subcategory, I think that is sufficient. ---Sluzzelin talk 17:39, 23 June 2008 (UTC)

It is interesting that the words "electronics" and "engineering" (which I think are two of the main topics people might have in mind under "technology") appear nowhere in any of the capsule summaries at the main RD page. —Steve Summit (talk) 02:01, 24 June 2008 (UTC)

I would like to propose 'Computers and IT' as the title on the main RD page. 'Computers' sounds better than 'Computing' to me. 'Computing' sounds like something that computer geeks do, whereas 'computers' sounds more like what the lay person would look for. And we already have "information technology" in the capsule summary, so it makes sense to have IT in the title as well. --Richardrj ^{talk email} 11:11, 24 June 2008 (UTC)

"Computers and IT" works for me. Re:Steve: We could replace "technology" with "engineering and technology" among Science's subcategories, and maybe add "electronics" to the subcategories under "Computers and IT"? ---Sluzzelin talk 12:36, 24 June 2008 (UTC)

I've also been bold and, in the absence of any dissenting voices to my suggestion above, have changed the title to Computers and IT. Any objections? --Richardrj ^{talk email} 10:03, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

I think it's a helpful improvement in terms of question triage. I added "electronics" as subcat of "Computers and IT", and added "engineering" as subcat of "Science". The final serial commas were intentionally removed, because I saw last two subcats as a unit in both instances now ("software and hardware", "engineering and technology"). My punctuation is notoriously horrible, however, and I hope someone double-checks. ---Sluzzelin talk 12:59, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

Alright, I've also removed "psychology" from the Science desk. I just think it's too interdisciplinary to remain under Science. Plus this thread reflects a certain sentiment of too many fields being currently packed into the Sci desk. When it was added, no one really protested, but people did point out that psychology question occasionally sit better at the Humanities or even Miscellaneous desk. I suspect no one protested partly in order to appease the person who added "psychology": a user who loved to leap into long semantic arguments and also tried to create a psychology desk against consensus. If we needed to list psychology somewhere, I guess I'd currently favor the Science desk, but I'd prefer not listing it anywhere. Nevertheless, if anyone disagrees, simply revert me. (Here's the diff). ---Sluzzelin talk 15:18, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

Just to butt in - shouldn't electronics actually be under science (or relabled 'digital electronics'), and should psychology be added to humanities?87.102.86.73 (talk) 19:23, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

lol - these pigeons just won't fit, will they. Both points can be argued, certainly. I have no clear preference with electronics. In my understanding electrical engineering questions belong on the Sci desk. Electronics can mean a lot of things, I guess. I was thinking of digital electronics, yes. Or of electronics as they relate to "Computing and IT". But of course it's easy to imagine electronics questions that clearly belong in the Physics department, i.e. Sci desk.

Regarding psychology, I still think it's an even split with neuroscientifical, ethological, or medical aspects on the one side - the social sciences and psychoanalysis on the other side. Sometimes questions on empirical social sciences and statistics receive good answers at the Sci desk. I'm not opposed to your suggestion, but it would be my last personal preference, after leaving it out completely, or putting it back on the Sci desk. ---Sluzzelin talk 20:05, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

I don't like the use of the term "IT", since many won't know what IT means. I'd write IT out as "Information Technology", instead. I also like the idea of balancing the size of Desks, so, when one discipline could fall under either of two desks, I'd put it on the smaller desk. For this reason, I'd like to see all electronics questions go to the Computer Desk. StuRat (talk) 20:05, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

How disappointing...

(I've been wondering whether to post this since I didn't want to give the troll the attention but decided to go ahead, hope no one minds). I removed some new trolling [1] from the Avril troll (and also asked for the account to be blocked). However I was a bit disappointed to find the troll is still here when he/she promised to stop... Okay I jest I'm not since I didn't expect him/her to actually stop. But what is 'disappointing' is that after reading one of the responses I've realised this troll isn't even apparently original, he/she just seems to be copying questions from Yahoo [2]. I mean I knew the troll was lame, but I didn't realise he/she was that lame! N.B. I don't think the Yahoo user questioner is the same person as from the question history, the Yahoo user doesn't have the same 'fascination' with Avril that the apparently troll does. Nil Einne (talk) 17:39, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

You're right Nil, there's nothing too lame or too low to have maximum impact for minimum effort. Julia Rossi (talk) 13:02, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

It's a bit annoying, yes. But, still, if the most serious problem we had was too many questions about Avril, I'd be quite happy with that. StuRat (talk) 23:32, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

I have a question about this particular troll: Why is it when I go to certain pages (on the page for Avril Lavigne and, oddly, on the page for the Irish group Clannad) I see the following that scrolls with the page: "AVRIL LAVIGNE ROCKZ MY SOCKZ! Brought to you by the Avril Troll - On return from Wikibreak!" It makes reading the Clannad page (I was looking up some of the albums - I could care less about Avril) very difficult. (Example here. --Joshmaul (talk) 18:01, 9 July 2008 (UTC)

I see the "AVRIL LAVIGNE ROCKZ MY SOCKZ!" message on Jules Verne as well. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.9.120.18 (talk) 19:21, 9 July 2008 (UTC)

And here. Jes Suis Muzzy! - Bonjour 03:08, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

The comment is also on the Coldplay link. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 216.54.20.194 (talk) 19:41, 9 July 2008 (UTC)

The comment is also on Anais Nin of all people. I can't figure out how to get rid of it. --72.128.94.139 (talk) 20:45, 9 July 2008 (UTC)

the troll hit Spacehog as well. i wonder how he picks his victims.... must be manatees and idea balls..

There is some discussion of this on WP:AN/I; try refreshing your page with CTRL-F5. --LarryMac | Talk 20:48, 9 July 2008 (UTC)

The troll also attacked the page of actor Leonard Sachs.

As mentioned in the AN/I thread (which might have scrolled off into the archives, I haven't checked), the troll was attacking templates rather than individual pages, so his handiwork was quite widespread. --LarryMac | Talk 17:12, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

Today's questions

I see that the Help Desk has a link at the top of the page to skip directly to "today's questions". Seems like a good idea to me. Of course, doing that here would require the cooperation of Scsbot. --Anonymous, 22:21:20 UTC, 19^H^H^H June 18, 2008.

No bottity required! The Help Desk does it with something like

[[#{{CURRENTMONTHNAME}} {{CURRENTDAY}}|Skip to Today's Questions]]

—Steve Summit (talk) 04:07, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

It seems a bit silly to me, when the END key on the keyboard (usually right above the UP arrow) will likely do the same thing. But, I suppose it's no big deal, it just makes an already way-too-busy header just a bit busier. StuRat (talk) 23:28, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

I didn't know that. Very useful. Thanks! Zain Ebrahim (talk) 23:32, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

You're quite welcome. BTW, the HOME key, right above that, jumps to the top of the page. StuRat (talk) 02:53, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

Using a label such as "Today's questions" seems problematic to me. Whose "today" are we talking about, Greenwich's? We all go to sleep and wake up at different times, even when we live next-door. I personally find it more productive to scroll to the bottom, then start working upwards until I start recognizing what I've already seen, then I keep going up 'til I'm sure it's all stale.

Also, for at least the Science desk where I curmudgeon often, good responses keep popping up for at least a day or two. It would be nice to have a link to jump to the "most-recently-responded-lately" thread, that is, the earliest thread posted to in (say) the last 48 hours, then I could work down from there. Now that would require a bot's attention. Franamax (talk) 03:11, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

Cannot undo edits

Due to the rate of vandal edits, I couldn't undo the edits in Miscellaneous. Protect the page? --Ouzo (talk) 23:21, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

Spoke too soon. Thanks! --Ouzo (talk) 23:23, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

Moving threads about

User: 68.148.164.166 keeps moving the questions he asks around after repeated requests not to do so. See Wikipedia:Reference desk/Science#Pubews. I think this is quite disruptive. Should we WP:RBI? Zain Ebrahim (talk) 08:28, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

He is not the only one. I told Interactive Fiction Expert that he shouldn't do that (as well as telling him it was uncivil to threaten and abuse people who try to help). He responded to me with his stock "How dare you..." and threatened to report me to WP:AIV. Then, he decided it was necessary to remove my posts from the RD. -- kainaw™ 12:17, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

That's blatantly abusive behavior, which nobody should have to put up with. —Steve Summit (talk) 13:46, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

I think we need to form a consensus first. Should a person be allowed copy/paste or bump posts to keep them as the newest post? Please keep in mind that this includes copying responses from other people into new sections of the RD for the selfish purpose of keeping the questioner's post in the "new" area of the RD - as well as pushing other threads out of the new area. -- kainaw™ 12:17, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

Agree with not allowing people to punt their posts into the newest position whatever. But do we still copy and paste questions to actually relevant desks when they turn up in the wrong place? (I might be confusing two things here.) Also is there recourse when people punish a proper action by removing posts in retaliation? or is restoring enough. Just asking, Julia Rossi (talk) 12:29, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

Reposting to the correct Ref Desk is fine. As for people who remove posts out of spite, that is a definite violation of the rules. I'd suggest the first time someone does this you just post an edit comment on the restore that says something like "It's never appropriate to remove a post just because you disagree with it." The next time that person does so I'd post a message on their talk page saying essentially the same thing. If they persist after that, I'd report it to an Admin, via ANI, who can block them if they continue to delete the posts of others. StuRat (talk) 23:22, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

(ec) I think that Kant's moral philosophy should apply. If every OP who receives an unsatisfactory answer (in their opinion) tries to move their question to the bottom, the result would be chaos. I understand that one's questions may be missed by an expert during high-traffic periods but moving your threads to the bottom to try and get more attention is selfish and unfair. If this happens to be consensus then I think we should go to the Guidelines' talk page to try and get something to this effect in there. Zain Ebrahim (talk) 12:35, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

There is no rule against making a new post that says, "If you see my post [[here]], you can see that my question was not answered. Does anyone know...." -- kainaw™ 12:38, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

Maybe a new guideline could be added if this continues to be a problem, something like: Do not move questions - If you feel your question received an unsatisfactory answer you can repost it with a link to your orignal question. JessicaN10248 18:57, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

We don't really want them reposting the exact same question again either (or posting a link to the original question), unless there is some new aspect to the question (like if they first asked "Which nation has the greatest number of elephants ?", and then ask the follow-up: "Where can I get a breakdown of elephant populations by country ?"). If they didn't get an answer the first time they posted, they likley won't get it just by posting the same question again. StuRat (talk) 23:14, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

Medical question discussion

Moved (mostly) from the Science desk by Zain Ebrahim. Here's what was pasted in.

• This question has been removed as it may be a request for medical advice. Wikipedia does not give medical advice because there is no guarantee that our advice would be accurate or relate to you and your symptoms. We simply cannot be an alternative to visiting the appropriate health professional, so we implore you to try them instead. If this is not a request for medical advice, please explain what you meant to ask, either here or at the talk page discussion (if a link was provided). Regards, CycloneNimrod ^talk?_contribs? 18:38, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

My 25 year old cousin has Asperger yet she seems normal (normal meaning she doesn't appear to have Aspergers). Maybe just slightly a little too shy and sometimes she fumbles her words when she speaks. She has a lot of trouble explaining to people that she has this condition because they simply don't believe her. She was diagnosed a long time ago with this. How could this be? --Anthonygiroux (talk) 18:31, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

I've restored the question, as I see no sign of a request for medical advice here. As for Asperger's Syndrome, I suggest you read up on it by following that link. StuRat (talk) 21:00, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

Sounds like medical advice to me - I get the feeling we're being asked to confirm or deny the diagnosis. --Tango (talk) 21:12, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

That's because it is asking for medical advice. I don't appreciate overly harsh messages being left on my talk page either, especially when this could be seen from either viewpoint. Perhaps I was a little hasty in removing the question but this sort of thing SHOULD be left in the hands of physicians. Regards, CycloneNimrod ^talk?_contribs? 21:19, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

I think that this is handled a lot better when the person who removed the question reports it at the RD talk page so that it stays removed until consensus deems it should be reposted. Definitely prevents harsh messages on the remover's talk page. In this particular case, I would ask whether we should bend our backs to protect someone who would take the diagnosis of random people on the internet over a professional (note that I'm not accusing the OP of requesting a second opinion). This question appears to be of the form: "Is X necessarily a symptom of disease Y?", which I don't think is a request for advice. Zain Ebrahim (talk) 21:33, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

I agree with taking it to the Ref Desk Talk Page, but not with deleting the post first. The deletion should only occur AFTER a consensus to do so has been reached. Otherwise, deletions without any consensus behind them may very well be reverted, by myself and others. StuRat (talk) 22:27, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

I think it's better to delete first - consensus may take a while to reach and potentially harmful advice/information could be provided in the interim. Here's an except from Wikipedia:Reference desk/Guidelines#When removing or redacting a posting:

Please do not restore a question that was removed by another editor acting in good faith using a reasonable interpretation of the Wikipedia policies and guidelines, just because you disagree with the reasoning, and also do not discuss this on the Reference desk pages themselves. Instead, discuss the issue on the Reference desk talk page, so that, hopefully, consensus may be reached.

If you want to change the guidelines, you'll have to go to Wikipedia talk:Reference desk/Guidelines. Zain Ebrahim (talk) 22:37, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

Deleting a question is like a slap in the face to the OP, so should only be done when we are certain there is a request for a medical diagnosis or advice. This can best be done by FIRST gathering a consensus on the talk page. StuRat (talk) 23:02, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

I see where you're coming from but I don't think we should go against the guidelines. Zain Ebrahim (talk) 23:07, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

Guidelines are not policy; there's no obligation to follow them. --Bowlhover (talk) 03:17, 22 June 2008 (UTC)

Good idea, I will report it in future. As for whether we should 'bend our backs' to help, I think so. As I've said on StuRat's talk page, it's better to be safe than sorry. Regards, CycloneNimrod ^talk?_contribs? 21:40, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

What do you mean by 'sorry'? Even if this were a request for medical advice, it doesn't seem like the type of question that would create any immediate danger, and as shown can be answered in a way that doesn't involve giving medical advice. So I do think you were a bit hasty to delete.Fletcher (talk) 21:59, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

Agreed, there was absolutely no danger here under any possible interpretation of the question. Therefore, there was no reason to remove the question. StuRat (talk) 23:05, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

I understand the question in a way if there is Asperger in females. As the article states that cause of Asperger is not fully understood and no specific gene has yet been identified, it is not limited to male, so a female dignosed with Asperger is possible.--Stone (talk) 21:43, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

I also read the question as asking about Asperger's in females, not a request for medical advice. According to this link males with Asperger's outnumber females 9 to 1, which could explain why the OP's cousin has trouble getting people to believe her. Fletcher (talk) 21:59, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

My reading of the question was that the "how could this be ?" was asking why people don't believe her when she says she has Asperger's Syndrome. That question deals with the perception of the disease in the public mind, and is in no way a request for a medical diagnosis or medical advice. StuRat (talk) 22:21, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

Whereas, I read the question as "She was diagnosed a long time ago with this. How could this be?". Difference in opinion, I think. Regards, CycloneNimrod ^talk?_contribs? 22:28, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

The "She was diagnosed a long time ago with this" sentence appears to be misplaced between the thing she was questioing and the actual question. The OP opened by stating "My 25 year old cousin has Asperger", a rather definitive statement, not that the OP questions the diagnosis. If you take the question to be "How could this be that she was diagnosed a long time ago with this ?" that doesn't make much sense. We would have to answer "Well, if she went to a doctor a long time ago, that would be how it could be that she was diagnosed with this a long time ago". Many OPs here post questions in confusing manners, many because English isn't their first language. Clearly the bulk of the post was about other's not believing she had it, and there's no mention that the poster doesn't believe it or wants our diagnosis. StuRat (talk) 22:51, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

I have to agree with CN here. From my POV, it seems to me that the OP is asking 'how could it be she was diagnosed with Aspergers when she shows no signs of having it (and everyone agrees that she has no signs of having it)'. The fact that the statement "My 25 year old cousin has Asperger" seems a definitive statement to you appears to reflect your POV which I don't share. It could resonably interpreted to mean, 'she is considered to have Aspergers because she was diagnosed with it'. As you yourself agree, the question appears at least somewhat confusingly worded. Bear in mind as well that I suspect quite a number of people (more so in some cultures then others) have difficulty actually disagreeing with a doctor's diagnosis so if the doctor says you have condition X then many people may treat it as fact they have condition X even if they have difficulty accepting the premise. So they may question the diagnosis without actually saying or implying 'I think the doctor was wrong' Nil Einne (talk) 02:25, 21 June 2008 (UTC)

I guess we won't really know how the OP intended the question unless they come back and respond. All I know is that I removed a question since I thought it best interest to the OP if they went to see a physician to get those sorts of answers. I had the OP's best interests at heart here, I don't at all see it as slapping them in the face. Regards, CycloneNimrod ^talk?_contribs? 08:48, 21 June 2008 (UTC)

I disagree with the policy of deleting all questions that request advice. I can imagine many reasons why someone, including myself, would adamantly refuse to consult a professional and instead ask for help on the reference desk. For medical questions, there's almost always much more harm in resorting to self-diagnosis via the Internet and suffering medical student syndrome than in receiving possibly-incorrect advice from likely-knowledgable people. For example, if a user is absolutely convinced that he or she has a serious disease even though the symptoms suggest the flu, removing the user's question would not be a responsible choice.

I'm not taking the extreme view that absolutely all requests for advice should be retained, even though I noticed the French Wikipedia is following such a policy. I'm only arguing that the other extreme--forbidding every single question related to advice--is illogical and not beneficial. --Bowlhover (talk) 03:17, 22 June 2008 (UTC)

Firstly, regarding your note above that guidelines are not policy and we therefore are under no obligation to follow them. While they're not policy, they do represent consensus and I think that we are under an obligation to follow consensus. The guidelines are very useful and they would become totally pointless if we allowed people to randomly contravene them. Of course, consensus may be changed and I urge you to take your concerns to Wikipedia talk:Reference desk/Guidelines.

Regarding your other view, see Wikipedia talk:Reference desk/Archive 47#New approach to legal/medical advice and Wikipedia:Reference desk/Guidelines/Medical advice. People have done a lot of hard work to set up these guidelines and I think that we should treat them as policy. The current practice works as follows: people report any questions they removed and then have to defend their removal (to people like me) unless it was a good removal. I think that this is a good system. Zain Ebrahim (talk) 08:53, 22 June 2008 (UTC)

I'll respond to each of your comments separately, Bowlhover. "I disagree with the policy of deleting all questions that request advice." — As Zain has said, it's a guideline not a policy. Feel free to not follow it but it's not encouraged. "I can imagine many reasons why someone, including myself, would adamantly refuse to consult a professional and instead ask for help on the reference desk." — No one is denying that one may be very nervous to visit a professional or feel uncomfortably doing so, but that is not what is being discussed. We are discussing the ethicacy of answering these questions as unqualified people. "For medical questions, there's almost always much more harm in resorting to self-diagnosis via the Internet and suffering medical student syndrome than in receiving possibly-incorrect advice from likely-knowledgable people." — I couldn't disagree more with your logic, i'm afraid. I could self-diagnose myself with influenza fairly easily but if I state my symptoms on here and get told i've just got a common cold and i'm an elderly citizen who the flu could actually kill, then it's very dangerous to accept the medical views of an unqualified person because I as an elderly citizen may require medical treatment rather than bedrest. "For example, if a user is absolutely convinced that he or she has a serious disease even though the symptoms suggest the flu, removing the user's question would not be a responsible choice." — What?! Again, I couldn't disagree more, sorry! If a user is absolutely convinced they have a serious disease then it is our duty to emplore them to seak medical attention. If they require urgent medical treatment, knowledge is not a replacement for drug or physical therapy. For example, if someone presents here with the symptoms of tension pneumothorax then me telling that person my OPINION of their condition is far more dangerous than them seeking proper emergency advice from a physician. "I'm not taking the extreme view that absolutely all requests for advice should be retained" — Good! "I'm only arguing that the other extreme--forbidding every single question related to advice--is illogical and not beneficial." — Well, I hope i've explained my reasons why it is not at all illogical in my answers above. Regards, CycloneNimrod ^talk?_contribs? 13:47, 22 June 2008 (UTC)

I will take issue with one point that Bowlhover raises; the others seem to have been fairly thoroughly addressed. I'm very concerned about statements along the lines of

"...there's almost always much more harm in resorting to self-diagnosis via the Internet and suffering medical student syndrome than in receiving possibly-incorrect advice from likely-knowledgable people."

On its face, that statement is pure speculation; it also doesn't account for human nature or established history on the Ref Desk. While I have no doubt that many editors on the Ref Desk are 'knowledgable people', very few of them have formal medical training. (The few Deskers who do have medical training have tended to stay well away from offering advice.) What I have observed is a tendency to fall into what I've seen described as 'Engineer's Syndrome'—the mistaken assumption that great skill and expertise in one area automatically translates into expertise in another area. (I know it's a trap I've fallen into from time to time.) Give a smart – but untrained – person a fast internet connection, a web browser, and Google, and in five minutes you're well into 'A little knowledge is a dangerous thing' territory. While the results of this Syndrome applied to most questions range from amusing to frustrating, they very easily slide into 'genuinely dangerous' when applied to medical questions. Frankly, our egos get in the way.

I'm sure I'm also not the only person to notice a certain collegial competitiveness on the Desks. Many editors want to be the first to answer a question, and collectively we pride ourselves on our speedy responses. There's the old handyman's saying—"I can give you any two of fast, cheap, and good." The culture at the Ref Desk leans towards the first two options, I'm afraid. Just a little while ago, I added an answer to a question about what makes different materials at the same temperature 'feel' colder or warmer. The question had received its first answer in just five minutes; that answer talked about the relative specific heat capacities of the materials. Now, that's not totally incorrect, but it omits the most important issues to the question—heat conduction and (since fluids were also involved) convective heat transfer. Those answers arrived about twelve hours later; I don't know if the original poster will actually ever read them. I assume it's unecessary to spell out the risks associated with offering rapid-fire, incomplete, partially incorrect diagnoses to our readers.

Finally, the Ref Desk has its share of editors with axes to grind, just as much as any other part of Wikipedia. They will range from the obviously-kooky "You can cure your cancer with crystals and herbal tea" to the subtle-but-insidious "You shouldn't trust your doctor; he's paid to overdiagnose. Just ignore the symptom unless it gets worse." While a hurly-burly free-for-all might be intellectual fun for us, it's unhelpful at best for the poor sod who asked the question. It also does a disservice to readers with a confirmation bias—depending on what they are looking for, they might go away happy as long as one of our answers says that their symptom is probably harmless. Honestly, if someone is sufficiently concerned about their symptom that they're seeking outside advice on it, they should be encouraged to seek trained, competent advice. We are not a good substitute, and those of us who think that we are are dangerously unaware of our limitations. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 14:50, 22 June 2008 (UTC)

Oh, and I shouldn't forget this opportunity to plug my essay on Why we shouldn't give medical advice on the Reference Desk. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 14:56, 22 June 2008 (UTC)

Those arguments are completely valid, but they're far from being absolute truths. Some answers will harm the questioner, some editors are overly competitive, some self-diagnoses are more accurate than the reference desk, and some would agree to see a medical professional if refused an answer, but those generalizations are not always applicable. --Bowlhover (talk) 15:34, 22 June 2008 (UTC)

I was only objecting to your near-absolute statement that there is "almost always much more harm" in not answering as compared to trying to diagnose or prescribe here. I certainly wouldn't deny that – sometimes – Ref Deskers would give an answer that is potentially correct. On rare occasions, we might even come up with an answer that is complete. But we're not trained to give those answers, and we're not qualified to evaluate them. There are many, many, many examples every week of responses from people who don't know when they don't know something. Given that those people reply to questions on every topic from Avril Lavigne to cosmology, I see little hope that they would hold their fire when giving medical advice.

While only some editors are competitive to an unhealthy extent, it only takes one to give a fast, dangerous answer. While only some answers will be harmful, we don't want to harm even one reader. While only some readers will see a doctor when told to, that's better than our not telling them to do so. The absolute best, safest advice we can give is to tell a reader to speak to someone who is genuinely qualified to answer their request for medical advice. If they are unwilling to take that sound advice, then we shouldn't expect them to critically evaluate any of the suspect, untrained, dodgy, snap-answer, best-guess, off-the-cuff responses we might offer instead. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 16:21, 22 June 2008 (UTC)

Page in need of some translation

In the past I could swear I've seen a tag along the lines of "This page is in need of attention from someone who speaks such-and-such a language" - I have a page in need of having some lyrics translated and was wondering

1) how do i make the tag?

2) is there a page to post the page on that translators check for work to be done? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Foxhunt king (talk • contribs) 06:24, 21 June 2008 (UTC)

For translations from German to English you can post your specific request at Wikipedia:Translation/*/Lang/de. For other translation requests or more general information see WP:TRANSL. I couldn't find the right template immediately, if no one else responds here, you might wish to post your first question at the Wikipedia:Help desk where it belongs (this page is for discussing the reference desks. To find a collection of where to ask for what, see Wikipedia:Requests (though the listed items could do with some explanation). ---Sluzzelin talk 07:19, 21 June 2008 (UTC)

I found Template:Notenglish and Template:Proofreader needed. See also Category:Wikipedia_translation_templates. For an introduction to templates, see Help:A quick guide to templates. ---Sluzzelin talk 07:23, 21 June 2008 (UTC)

Bear in mind that it's not entirely clear to me whether there is any real need for the entire lyrics in the article or whether it might be something better for e.g. wikisource and more importantly perhaps for something like this which requires an accurate representation of the specific meaning a sourced translation is far better. (For translating articles it doesn't matter much since the main issue is that we get the general idea across, if the editor writes something differently it usually doesn't matter a great deal) Nil Einne (talk) 16:53, 21 June 2008 (UTC)

Moving questions to the "proper" desk

kainaw's stickman cartoon on pigeonholing and Julia Rossi's question on whether we should paste "questions to actually relevant desks when they turn up in the wrong place" reverberated. This is something I have been meaning to put here for a while:

Possible advantages of moving a question to the right desk

• Question is more likely to be read and answered by experts or people who understand what they are talking about. In other words, question is more likely to get better answers. (A very strong reason. The principal one.)
• A certain refdeskian aesthetic sense of order is satisfied, and no one needs to point out that "you might receive a better answer at the foo desk".

Possible disadvantages of moving a question to the right desk

• Original posters won't find their questions. They might be looking for it by searching their signature or wording in question. Not everyone remembers their heading (often people use the "new section" function, hit edit without filling out the "subject/headline"-box, the system patiently reminds and insists, and the querents hastily enter "question" or something else they won't remember.
• Occasionally the question isn't even misplaced, in the sense that the querent intentionally put it there, knowing full well that there is a more specific desk. (The most striking example, perhaps, is when questions at the Miscellaneous desk (where anything goes) get moved to the Entertainment desk (which is frequented by far less people). Maybe I want my question on Vincent Gallo answered by that more diverse and larger crew at the Miscellaneous desk).

I know I've seen moves where I would have preferred they hadn't been made, but I have no concrete criticism to offer. Just food for thought. Most of the moves are good in my opinion (and all are done in good faith) and I thank those who take the time do perform this tedious gruntwork.---Sluzzelin talk 07:57, 21 June 2008 (UTC)

I think it should be compulsory to post a direct link to the thread on a different desk if you move it, so that the OP can find it straight away. They can there post if they disagree with the move? Regards, CycloneNimrod ^talk?_contribs? 09:08, 21 June 2008 (UTC)

I'd move questions but leave an easy-to-find link. The question askers get nothing out of posting a question in the wrong place and the question answers get nothing out of telling the user they're in the wrong place. x42bn6 Talk Mess 16:43, 21 June 2008 (UTC)

I do always move questions when I feel they are more relevant on a different desk, unless they have already been answered and concluded. I move it to the correct desk, with a header of :''Moved from [[Wikipedia:Help_desk]]'', and put a "moved to" message in the section where it previously was. That way anybody coming back could find it, and it also finds its proper home. I believe this solves all the problems. Mac Davis (talk) 02:18, 22 June 2008 (UTC)

Having just been a victim of it myself, I can tell you that it can be very annoying to have your question moved, no matter how carefully or well-intentionedly the move is performed.

In particular, it is not necessarily easy to notice that the movement has been done. In my case, a day after asking a question on the Science desk, I first searched that desk for my own name, and then for a word I knew was in the question, and found neither, and then started searching back through the history to discover when my question had been vandalized or accidentally deleted, and only very belatedly discovered that it had been "helpfully" moved.

You might say that this was the wrong way for me to look for my question and its answers, you might think that "obviously" "everyone" would search for the question's title (perhaps in the TOC), but you'd be wrong. I'm the counterexample, and there may well be others.

Furthermore, even if it's "clear" that the question "belongs" on another desk, the questioner might have had good reasons -- perhaps not obvious to you -- for posting it where it was.

Except in extreme circumstances, I think it would be far better to suggest to the original questioner that "you might get better answers over at the Whatever desk" than to peremptorily (er, preemptively) move it yourself. —Steve Summit (talk) 15:39, 23 June 2008 (UTC)

Re: Cyclone, x42bn6, and Mac Davis, I actually wrote all this under the presumption that links to the questions' new home would be provided, but Steve now confirms two of my concerns. How is one to remember someone else's generic heading to a question one has answered? Okay, you can check via diffs and page history, but it is confusing and obviously annoying. I don't think Computing or Math questions necessarily need to be moved from the Science desk, for example. I did originally think that a pure Physics question could be moved from the Language or Humanities desk, while I always preferred leaving questions posted at the Miscellaneous desk alone, no matter what the topic. We have generalists and specialists from every field pitching in there.

I guess one option would be to draw attention to a misplaced question, by posting a new heading with a link at the specialized desk. That way the question will get read by the right people, and no one is confused. Thoughts? ---Sluzzelin talk 16:08, 23 June 2008 (UTC)

I like to ask the questioner if they would like their question to be moved and explain that they may get a better answer. In general, presuming they respond at all, they will say "yes, please!" and they will know where the question is being moved to. (While also leaving the header and adding a "moved to the foo desk" message). Fribbler (talk) 17:06, 23 June 2008 (UTC)

After I caused all of this havoc, I decided to never move questions again. Zain Ebrahim (talk) 17:54, 23 June 2008 (UTC)

Zain Ebrahim, I think WP:3RR applies. Mac Davis (talk) 12:39, 24 June 2008 (UTC)

Zain, you didn't cause it. I move on the inspirations of my whim (as when in tinkering mood) – things get pretty elastic (even Steve Um, didnt you ask a question on your user page one time?) though I do like to leave a trail and keep it light. Otherwise, from the eyeball test, I notice people can be advised but veryrarelyhardlyeversometimesnever bother to act on good advice adn the desks start to look like no-one differentiates seriously. Hopefully a little shuffle with signposts can turn the tide back soometimes. Coffee anyone?  ;) Julia Rossi (talk) 10:14, 25 June 2008 (UTC)

When moving a question always leave the heading with a hypertext link to the new position - that way it's easy to find, and solves the problem. DONT just cut the whole thing..87.102.86.73 (talk) 19:08, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

We recently had a problem with someone intentionally misplacing a question that belongs on a smaller desk (Entertainment) because "more people staff the Misc Desk". Julia moved it over the OP's objections. I agree with this action as we can't allow people to just post to bigger Desks like that or we will end up with one huge desk with every question on it. StuRat (talk) 22:34, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

ClueBot minister to the refdesks?

Up above I wrote:

I think the first thing we should do is list the desks on User:ClueBot/Optin, to see how well ClueBot does at stamping out vandalism. (I asked its maintainer here if he thought this would be a good idea, but unfortunately never received a reply.) What do other people think about this idea?

Zain Ebrahim replied:

Unless there's a compelling reason not to, I think we should go ahead and list the desks there. Note that my understanding of these issues is quite minimal. Some questions, then:

1. Would ClueBot misconstrue legitimate posts for vandalism?
2. Would ClueBot register the AnonTalk spam as disruption?
3. I see from User:ClueBot that it is 1RR compliant, is there a way to avoid this? Zain Ebrahim (talk) 08:39, 22 June 2008 (UTC)

To which I can answer:

1. It might. But probably not.
2. Maybe. And the forthcoming rewrite of ClueBot definitely could, because it can be trained with new examples of vandalism. (In fact, its authors are soliciting our contributions in that regard.)
3. I don't know. I kinda doubt it.

—Steve Summit (talk) 14:23, 22 June 2008 (UTC)

Point 3, um you guys should RTFM? :-P ;-) *grins* I did and "There is one exception: This bot will revert today's featured article or any page listed in the opt-in list for angry mode as many times as it finds vandalism." Nil Einne (talk) 21:34, 22 June 2008 (UTC)

Point 1. Looking at User:ClueBot/Source particularly the score list, the only thing I can see that might be a problem is all caps and no caps often aren't vandalism. But since they only score 10, shouldn't be a great problem. Perhaps there might be legimate questions regarding 'fuck you' (etc) or 'you suck' (etc) which will be considered vandalism although provided the person says something identified as a proper sentence and no other negatives it should be fine. On the other hand, if I ask "is it acceptable for a 10:30 p.m. television news network to broadcast someone saying 'fuck you' uncensored in new zealand? what about cunt? bitch? pussy? asshole? cock?" I'm guessing I'll be reverted. Nil Einne (talk)

There is a User:ClueBot/Sandbox. Sure enough... [3] or even [4] or even [5]... I was blocked for using a Tor node after that (I was using a Relakks account since I decided I didn't want to reveal my IP but it wasn't a Tor node since I'm not running Tor but I guess it has similar issues, i.e. you can easily change IP and it in theory is supposed to be difficult to track a person down if all you have is the IP) which highlights the point if we want to run tests like this it may be wise to mention it somewhere first Nil Einne (talk) 22:31, 22 June 2008 (UTC)

The line

Can I ask what purpose does the format ---- unbroken line have in threads? For me it breaks so that I don't know whether to post above it or below it. Thanks, Julia Rossi (talk) 09:30, 23 June 2008 (UTC)

Can you point to an example? Oh, do you mean a line like this:

---

Ah! Right. One of those. I forgot that wikimarkup even existed. I hardly ever see it used in articles, let alone discussion threads. If there's a purpose, it's an ad hoc one used by an individual poster. —Steve Summit (talk) 13:08, 23 June 2008 (UTC)

It was used to break up different discussions and topics. For example see the reference desk as it looked years ago JessicaN10248 15:19, 23 June 2008 (UTC)

Ye Olde Referinge Deske is quite ugly. Fribbler (talk) 15:26, 23 June 2008 (UTC)

Does anyone else think the OPs expressed their questions a lot more clearly in Jessica's snippet than they do now? Zain Ebrahim (talk) 21:36, 23 June 2008 (UTC)

That must be why MoS recommends minimal use of it then. Thanks for your help everyone, pretty it is...  : ) Julia Rossi (talk) 23:21, 23 June 2008 (UTC)

Comment for Zain, fwiw, there seems to be more unsupported speculation going on at the moment – don't know if that's a passing thing or am being too harsh... maybe just my late nights. Julia Rossi (talk) 23:25, 23 June 2008 (UTC)

May have something to do with the "certain collegial competitiveness" (coined by, AFAIK, TOAT above) eh? Hopefully it goes away. Zain Ebrahim (talk) 15:01, 24 June 2008 (UTC)

Can I crush a Tramadol Pill and drink it in water instead of swallowing the pill whole?

I think we handled that medical advice question pretty well, over on the Science desk. What do you think? Mac Davis (talk) 12:40, 24 June 2008 (UTC)

I think the replies should have stopped after the anon IP; we especially shouldn't be talking about dosage availability and saying that pill-cutters are available, even if the latter was finally followed up with a disclaimer. As far as Cyclone's statement about not removing the question since there had already been replies ... we all need to just get over that. If your reply gets cut along with a professional advice or troll removal, those are the breaks (and maybe you shouldn't have been making that reply in the first place, eh?). It's collateral damage and we're not here to count the number of posts anybody made on the reference desk. --LarryMac | Talk 12:52, 24 June 2008 (UTC)

Here is the thread, by the way. ---Sluzzelin talk 13:15, 24 June 2008 (UTC)

I think we did pretty well, but that's really just because the correct answer happened to coincide with our standard answer ("Ask your doctor.") The explanation of the reasons behind not crushing pills was good in this case, but we need to be careful in other cases that we only explain why *not* to do something against medical advice and never the opposite. ("You should do what your doctor says, but..." would be a bad start to a sentence!) The comment about getting pill crushers from a pharmacy, etc. was borderline, although pharmacists do qualify as medical professionals, so it could be taken as advice to ask your pharmacist, which is a perfectly acceptable response. --Tango (talk) 14:53, 24 June 2008 (UTC)

I was tempted to rush in with alternatives for getting pills down a horse's neck, but I restrained myself to maintain the standards of this noble thread. ; ) Julia Rossi (talk) 10:05, 25 June 2008 (UTC)

Thread bumping

For anyone who doesn't use this terminology... Bumping a thread means that you move it from an older part of the Reference Desk to the new part of the Reference Desk so people will see it as a new thread in the hopes that more people will see it.

Just a few days ago, we discussed thread bumping and the consensus was that it is wrong. You should not bump threads to the "new" section of the reference desk. Related to this, there is a user to continues to bump his threads, pretty much every time he replies to one of his threads. This can be seen here. I warned in his thread and on his talk page. He responded by submitting me to WP:AIV and then WP:ANI. Is there a consensus about what to do when a person insists on bumping threads? -- kainaw™ 17:00, 25 June 2008 (UTC)

I'm squarely in your camp, and recently reverted an anonymous user who did this repeatedly (despite having been warned). -- Coneslayer (talk) 17:21, 25 June 2008 (UTC)

If a thread gets archived before getting an adequate answer, then it might be worth bumping it, other than that, leave it where it is. If someone insists on behaving disruptively despite being warned not to, block 'em. --Tango (talk) 17:30, 25 June 2008 (UTC)

Agreed, consensus is against bumping. We might expand the Be patient. injunction to read:

Be patient. Your question probably will not be answered right away, so come back later and check for a response. Questions are normally answered at the same page on which they were asked. A complete answer to your question may be developed over a period of up to four days. Questions, once posed, should not be moved down the page.

In the case of the poster in question he/she exhibits signs of incontinence - bumping, forum shopping, misplaced appeals to admins, and worst of all, swearing at people who are trying to help him/her. I suggest we continue to revert and remind the poster that he/she is acting against consensus, but anticipate that he/she will probably commit other infractions leading to sterner action being taken. If the bumping continues, we can review the question with a view to recommending disciplinary action. --Tagishsimon (talk) 17:34, 25 June 2008 (UTC)

And I've left a note for the individual in question, noting that bumps will be reverted on sight, that further action will be taken if he/she persists; and that swearing at respondents is always inexcusable. I live in hope that he or she will join us here to discuss the situation. --Tagishsimon (talk) 17:40, 25 June 2008 (UTC)

I will note that, in the particular diff Kainaw linked, we're talking about a thread over three weeks old. Replying at the original location isn't likely to garner a response. That said, the bumping is, if nothing else, confusing. I don't think "revert on sight" is directly appropriate in a case like this; it seems it would be better served with a replacement by a link to the original discussion. As for the specific user's associated behavior... it speaks for itself. — Lomn 20:24, 25 June 2008 (UTC)

In the past IntFictExpert has bumped more recent posts. He moved this post down on a single page. (And also added a line where he swears at someone who was trying to help.) [6] [7] (Admittedly, in that second link, the discussion had gotten rather sidetracked.)

Besides the confusingness, arrogance, and "What if everyone did this?" arguments, I would like to point out that this sort of thing involves messing with other user's signed posts. He hasn't, to my knowledge, modified the content of anyone's posts, just their placement, but unless I'm mistaken, this is sort of a touchy subject around these parts. It's disconcerting to see my own signature at the bottom of a RefDesk I haven't looked at all day.APL (talk) 23:53, 25 June 2008 (UTC)

1. It makes sense to bump posts if no-one has answered them or no-one has given a good enough answer. And posts are easier to see if they are at the bottom of the page. 2. To Kainaw, don't act innocent. You deserved to be reported for thinking you could get away with that comment. 3. About the swearing one...I apologised immediately after I swore. Did you not see my "sorry about the language"? Interactive Fiction Expert/Talk to me 07:01, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

It does not make sense to go against community consensus. You have been warned of this; please do not be so arrogant as to think that you can remake the way in which these desks work. It's called courtesy.

And anyway, that's not the situation, is it? People were answering: you merely wish to grandstand your question over all others ... what are we to make of the fact that even your explanation is a lie? --Tagishsimon (talk) 08:24, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

1. It "makes sense" to? "A good enough answer"? Hmm. "Easier to see" (to who and how long are they there before being taken up by the next round anyway?) 3. I saw your apology. Are you EUI in these situations? Wait a minute, *sweeping the desks clean to accommodate you*, IFE. There, have your way, why not? I am able to follow sequential threads, what's the problem? Julia Rossi (talk) 08:48, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

To see how he honestly feels about the consensus, the following is he real reply on my talk page:

I have responded in your stupid little discussion about me on the RD talk page. Interactive Fiction Expert/Talk to me 07:06, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

It is obvious to me that he has absolutely no intention of listening to anything that anybody here has to say. -- kainaw™ 12:27, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

Sounds like he's all mouth and no trousers, to me. One of the good thing about wikipedia is that chumps tend to be self-identifying. --Tagishsimon (talk) 12:44, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

Please bear in mind that not all wikipedia users are immensly old, wise, and knowledgable; carrying the weight of many aeons of considered thought and judgement on their shoulders - like me! Also please be very civil...87.102.86.73 (talk) 19:22, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

It would be better to get total consensus from all on posting etiquet; including bumping before making demands for apologies.87.102.86.73 (talk) 19:24, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

An apology doesn't really carry much weight if it's in the same edit as the insult you're apologizing for. If it worked like that we could all just put "(Sorry!)" in our signatures and never worry about being civil again. APL (talk) 13:29, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

Is it possible that they think that if a question gets a response on a given day then the whole question should be moved to that day? Nowhere is that explicilty stated - though everyone else seems to understand it. Maybe someone should point that out ie that

"a question is filed under the day it was asked, not the most recent response"

adding

"If a question is still active/unanswered, and is about to be archived ie removed from the current desk then it is accetable to move it to the current date, with a message explaining eg "moved from dd/mm to current date to prevent archiving since topic is still active/unanswered" Don't forget to leave links at the original date forward and the new date pointing backwards as well - otherwise people might get confused if they come to look for it.."

Not that I've ever seen this happen.
It could all be a misunderstanding.87.102.86.73 (talk) 18:40, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

Annoyingly we seem to have lost the 'splash' page that explains

"an answer to a question may develope over several days, please be patient"

To 'Interactive Fiction Expert' - please accept that we don't move questions up.. this is the way it has been for many moons, we also have a section for 'unanswered questions' somewhere.

Also if a question has not received any sort of proper answer and is about to be archived (1week) then I guess it's ok to repost - though usually I'd expect the original poster to do this, not the reference desk volunteers. Don't assume that questions from 2 or 3 days ago have become inactive or are ignored.. Is that ok?87.102.86.73 (talk) 18:47, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

(ec)I think it's good but I don't think it needs to go at the header of each desk - we already have quite a bit there already. It should work as follows: the first time someone moves their post to the bottom, we assume that they don't know how the desks work (for example, they think that new edits make the thread new), we revert and simply point them to the guidelines were it will be explicitly explained that threads stay at the date in which they were created. If they continue then we call it disruption and WP:RBI. I like it.

Regarding the other issue of unanswered questions. This is an ongoing problem which doesn't IMHO have a workable solution. Currently, we store them at Wikipedia:Reference Desk archive unanswered but that list is by no means complete (it was only posted to twice this year) and noone goes there. But I'm not sure about allowing OPs to repost unanswered questions. Who decides if a question is unanswered? If we leave this up to the OPs to decide then the bottom of the desks may become clogged with very difficult and impossible questions. Also, trolls may use this as another avenue to cause disruption.

So we would then have to find a way to determine which questions are acceptable for reposting and this would result in much more arguing. Theoretically, if a question is good enough for the RD then it's good enough to be reposted (if unanswered) but we all know that a LOT of frivolous questions slip under the radar and receive GF responses before anyone can say anything. This is a tough one. Zain Ebrahim (talk) 19:19, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

In general I don't think the re-posting of old questions will prove to be an issue, as it hasn't been in the past as far as I'm aware (ignoring any 'trolls') - so I guess it won't be a problem in the future...

Also, actually I wasn't suggesting any additions to headers, so I agree, but the ref desk guidlines etc do seem to have dissapeared (they used to be here Wikipedia:Reference desk and included such gems as 'be patient','start each new question with a title',, etc. see below section for my question about that..87.102.86.73 (talk) 19:29, 26 June 2008 (UTC) found that with a little help.. see below..87.102.86.73 (talk) 19:33, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

Which still leaves us with the problem of deciding which questions are worthy of reposting. This exercise would beg the question: "But why was that question allowed in the first place?". For example, an OP may decide that the answers to the question: "How many roads does the average person walk on?" are not good and wants to try and repost. I don't think that this question should be reposted.

I do however concede that unanswered questions is a problem and if reposting turns out to be consensus then I'll shut up and comply. Having any solution is better than no solution. Zain Ebrahim (talk) 20:03, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

If they don't get an answer they find good enough I imagine it would be up to them to re-ask the question, hopefully with additional clarification; so that they get a better answer , and we can refer them to the original answers as well. But as I said - I don't expect any big problems. I would expect it to be normal proceedure to leave it to the poster to monitor their own questions, and if necessary re-ask in a different way, or just try again.

If a question genuinly goes totally unanswered for a week and the poster re-asks I'd imagine that one of the regulars would spot that, and apologise for the lack of answer, and wish them good luck in getting one this time. In general unanswered questions are rare, and more often than not a poster will get indication if their question is just too obscure..87.102.86.73 (talk) 20:15, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

Plus 'dumb' questions usually attract their fair share of 'dumb' answers, so I doubt that the silly question askers will have much cause for complaint.87.102.86.73 (talk) 20:17, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

Also in the case of obscure questions I see no issue with leaving a message on the most closely related wiki-project page requesting help. If a question has been totally unanswered for several days I would consider that, and maybe leave a message on the ref desk noting that.87.102.86.73 (talk) 20:26, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

Maybe it's important not to second guess the poster's questions since some are ignored for whatever reason and pass into the ether, or to nurse it for them too much. Then when it's important enough to that poster, they pick it up and repost it, sometimes to get the answer that it's not a good question. I feel that if it doesn't happen, it doesn't, so either byebye question or it may reappear much later. That's different from someone sticking it in your face every couple of days. Suggest the infox box reads (I've also shortened its wording for tl:dr readers): Be patient and leave your question where you posted it. Questions are not always answered right away, so check again later because answers to your question can develop in up to four days. Prioritising the stay put factor and eliminating too much repetition, cheers Julia Rossi (talk) 23:18, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

Tough but fair - that's how they learn - I like it. I'd leave the message as it is, though, which is: (copied here)

"Be patient. Your question probably will not be answered right away, so come back later and check for a response. Questions are normally answered at the same page on which they were asked. A complete answer to your question may be developed over a period of up to four days."

it's subtly politer (i think), and so far almost no people have had problems.. 'One leaf does not make a winter' or something.. I see no need for change because of one incident.87.102.86.73 (talk) 23:32, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

I was wondering if it bordered on verbiage/rigmarole though, and discourages people from actually reading it and that that could be why people seem to ignore it so much. The current one is softer but does bury it's point -- could it be brief and soft? Julia Rossi (talk) 23:38, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

My guess is that nobody ever reads it - but that they pick up the rules through 'osmosis' or 'energy waves'... It's a bit like queuing - people just queue without being shown the queuing laws.. changing the laws won't do much - they'll just queue anyway, even if you tell them not to. {ref A}

?Could the text be improved? - I guess it is as good as it can be.{ref B}

see Gottfried Leibniz (1646-1716)

ref A."Pre-established harmony. The appropriate nature of each substance brings it about that what happens to one corresponds to what happens to all the others, without, however, their acting upon one another directly."

ref B."if God is omnibenevolent, omnipotent and omniscient, do we account for the suffering and injustice that exists in the world? ... For Leibniz, also of central concern is the matter of reconciling human freedom ... Leibniz' solution casts God as a kind of "optimizer" of the collection of all original possibilities: Since He is good and omnipotent, and since He chose this world out of all possibilities, this world must be good--in fact, this world is the best of all possible worlds." emphasis mine, from wikipedia.87.102.86.73 (talk) 00:00, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

I am personally against bumping questions due to lack of answers or bad answers. If we allow it, we'll have nothing but a bunch of bumped questions every day that nobody wants to answer. There are many questions that go unanswered simply because they are either impossible to answer or nobody wants to answer them. If the policy is "bump it", then we get the same dumb question for another week. Then, we bump it and it hangs around for another week. Soon, there are two bumped idiotic questions, then four, then eight.... then the Reference Desk is nothing but a collection of idiotic questions (like "How many roads does a person walk?") -- kainaw™ 23:37, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

As far as I know everyone agrees with this (ie you, above)- bumping will be stopped when it occurs, and probably reverted - the discussion did drift onto what to do with questions that haven't been answered at all etc . but that really is a different subject. Note if the question is a stupid one - say so. that can be an answer, in exactly the same way we respond to questions that are gibberish, or don't even ask a proper question. Asking for clarification is the tool to deal with 'dumb' questions. And I wouldn't expect anyone sane to re-post a stupid question that hasn't been answered.. so fingers crossed there is no problem?87.102.86.73 (talk) 00:07, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

By the way I believe it is possible to attempt to answer all questions, even if the answer is a no. For instance the question "How many roads does a person walk?" could be answered "It unlikely that anyone will be able to properly answer your question, but as a guess - around 1000"..87.102.86.73 (talk) 00:39, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

Exactly a like question about walking received far more informative replies than yours. Why is it you're engaging with our propositions as if they are a debate, and with a sense of authoritah that overbears the rest of us. I've made a fair suggestion about condensing and clarifying the terminology in the info intro. Besides, you seem to be bumping? or inserting your replies out of time sequence among our posts. Who are you, 87.102.86? Julia Rossi (talk) 05:40, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

Sorry for annoying you. As for bumping - I have no idea what you mean - can you point to an example? It's normal to indent replies in a section, meaning that replies do not necessarily follow in linear order from top to bottom - was that it.?87.102.86.73 (talk) 09:18, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

Ex: you've answered me ahead of Kainaw's contrib instead of after and seem to be peppering this thread with remarks that read like lessons in question answering which wasn't helpful. You could have posted after Kainaw and still answered us both in the same post. We're not the wise old heads people might say, but we didn't come down in the last thread, no? I just hope you're not diluting or trivialising the original topic for some reason. Have a good day, 87.102 – as for me Zzzz Julia Rossi (talk) 12:39, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

Could you just point to exactly where I've made a mistake because all I can find is this http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia_talk%3AReference_desk&diff=221978857&oldid=221975930 in which I answer before 'kainaw' becasue I posted before 'kainaw'??

?87.102.86.73 (talk) 14:23, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

As for you didn't like my posts - there is nothing I can do except apologise, but to suggest I have some sort of agenda to dilute or trivialise the topic suggests to me that you need to take another look at WP:AGF or even paranoia perhaps!!87.102.86.73 (talk) 14:42, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

Legitimate bumping?

If I understand you correctly, 87, you're asking for the guidelines to explicitly state that it is acceptable for OPs to bump their questions verbatim to the current date if the questions are about to be archived (and had not received "satisfactory" answers). I disagree with this. I don't see how any good could come off this. If the OP can demonstrate that the previous archived question was not interpreted properly or if there is a follow up question then this would be fine.

Without referring to Leibniz or God, please explain to me how introducing this into the guidelines will make the desk better. Zain Ebrahim (talk) 17:15, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

you haven't understood it correctly - what I was saying was that such actions would be acceptable in certain situations BUT NOT premature bumping.

I don't require an explicit statement of this in the guidelines or anywhere else..

What I was requesting/suggesting was that the guidlines have a clear statement on 'premature bumping' for the benefit of user:IntFictExpert and others... stating that it's not ok and the obvious reasons for that..

So in general I agree with you ie "If the OP can demonstrate that the previous archived question was not interpreted properly or if there is a follow up question then this would be fine.", and disagreement seems to be imagined (hopefully).87.102.86.73 (talk) 19:06, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

I will not repeat all I said earlier, but I made it clear that I disagree with bumping for ANY reason. As I explained, the end result will be an RD full of repeatedly bumped questions that nobody wants to answer. New questions will be lost in the bumped questions and the RD will become absolutely useless. -- kainaw™ 22:31, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

Just an update (for anyone who hasn't noticed)... Our bumping problem is eliminating itself. I found it strange that it suddenly appeared from a registered user and an IP address at the same time. Now, the registered user is blocked as a sockpuppet and the IP is under investigation for being a sockpuppet of the same account. This is actually very helpful. When another account suddenly appears and starts bumping posts, we can use it as an alarm to check that account's IP and block the new sockpuppet. -- kainaw™ 12:09, 1 July 2008 (UTC)