Wikipedia talk:Wikipedia is not a dictionary/Archive 12

Archive 5

←

Archive 10

Archive 11

Archive 12

Archive 13

Archive 14

Archive 15

Pointers to Wiktionary

Is it worth adding something like the following to the project page?--Rumping (talk) 22:14, 20 August 2010 (UTC)

A template can used to point to a Wiktionary page from a Wikipedia article which has encyclopedic content; for example, the code {{Wiktionary|dictionary}} produces a pointer to the Wiktionary definition of dictionary as illustrated here. For Wikipedia articles which could only ever be dictionary definitions and keep being re-created and re-deleted, it is possible to salt them with a soft redirect to Wiktionary using code such as {{Wi|dictionary}}.

No objections yet (despite various comments in the thread below) so in it goes.--Rumping (talk) 00:36, 24 August 2010 (UTC)

Let the bots roll!

OK, I'm going to be setting up some bots to copy all the terms from the Wikipedia. There's absolutely no definition of what it is that makes a term encyclopedic or not, so I might as well copy them all across and mark them as stubs. Since they're terms and terms are allowed, there's no point in anyone deleting them!!! The Wikipedia should be a lot bigger! That's good right?- Wolfkeeper 22:43, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

Be sure to seek WP:BRFA before commencing any bot operations. –xeno^talk 22:55, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

Of course.- Wolfkeeper 23:09, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

There's also no restrictions on verbs or adjectives or adverbs anymore, they're all terms right? So we might as well remove these bits of the policy.- Wolfkeeper 22:43, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

Congratulations, the Wikipedia is now a dictionary as well!!! My compliments to all involved that voted for it! I now see how wrong I was.- Wolfkeeper 22:43, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

Give it a rest. Fences&Windows 23:24, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

I'm probably going to do another call for deletion of this policy. We can replace it with something a lot shorter that people can actually stick to:

• all articles have noun titles
• all short articles on words should be deleted

That seems to be all we need and we can fit that in ISNOT. There doesn't seem to be any point in doing anything more.- Wolfkeeper 23:36, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

Even the point on noun titles is very arguable, there's probably several that are verbs in the Wikipedia.- Wolfkeeper 23:36, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

You made the same suggestion about bots, at Wikipedia talk:What Wikipedia is not/Archive 32#Removal of WP:Wikipedia is not a dictionary, and it was pointy, unhelpful, and sarcastic then, too. As are your edits today at WP:Deletion policy.

Everyone else seems to be capable of understanding the nuanced views that allow Chemistry (etymology) as a legitimate article (versus Chemistry#Etymology and wikt:chemistry). That you continue to not understand, is as frustrating for us, as it must be for you. -- Quiddity (talk) 23:42, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

It's not pointy, because nobody ever deletes an article under that criteria anyway. People simply quote that phrase from WP:ISNOT, and it doesn't count anymore. There's simply no reason to continue to have it. It's not pointy to delete something that no longer does anything.- Wolfkeeper 23:47, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

TBH I always assumed that the real subtlety was that you could override any policy in any particular article by consensus, like it says in WP:Policies and guidelines, apparently it's not that, it was that I was incapable of understanding that really articles on words are really encyclopedic after all; I'm clearly just thick as shit.- Wolfkeeper 00:36, 24 August 2010 (UTC)

Sarcasm still not helpful!

What you clearly are, is desirous of "a hard and rigorous division" between Wikipedia and Wiktionary (or, dictionaries in general).

But that's not reality. You asked for, and have been given, precedent (wikisource:1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Abated, wikisource:1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Act, etc), and practice (all the past examples, eg Chemistry (etymology), Thou, etc), and references (all the citations in encyclopedia that point out the development of the encyclopedic form, and the content overlap that often occurs).

Short entries, on non-notable words, are still routinely soft-redirected to Wiktionary.

The criteria for a "notable word", a word that deserves its own article, is currently uncertain, and many editors have expressed a desire to discuss that. The unmentioned/general/rule-of-thumb, seems to be quantity of available verifiable content. (standard WP:N and WP:V).

For example: Nobody is currently clamouring to add an etymology section to Image, but if an editor decided that there was sufficient interest or relevant-context behind the word, then that editor should be free to summarize that information in an encyclopedic fashion, in a couple of sentences or paragraphs (eg. Herpetology). If that editor discovered numerous books and articles about the word, then they could, in standard summary-style fashion, split that etymology section off into a new article (eg Chemistry (etymology)). Dozens of books have been written about swear words, hence they are considered "notable", and there is a lot of available verifiable content.

The core of this policy, was written in 2001-2003, and needs to be understood in that context. People were prolifically creating stubs, on notable topics that hadn't even been started yet. In the rush to create stubs, and wikilink everything, many people were creating what were "essentially dicdefs".

E.g. See NOTDIC in 2003

Particularly, read all of Wikipedia talk:Wikipedia is not a dictionary/Archive 1 - For example push is mentioned there. It was a redlink until 2005, and was first created as a dicdef, and then removed, to be replaced by a disambig page. That is the problem that this policy is intended to counteract.

Feeeshboy wrote a fairly good explanation. If nothing else, then I hope you read that, and the Archive 1 for this talkpage. Many insights to be had, as to why this policy exists. -- Quiddity (talk) 02:48, 24 August 2010 (UTC)

The wiki article on science

The policy in this article WP:NOTDIC is being used to support trying to equate science to natural science, and avoid other uses of the word in the science article lede, including historical ones.

See [1] for the discussion.

The problem with saying that WP articles should be about things and concepts, rather than words, is that one needs to be careful to note that concepts (in particular) change over time, and words mean more than one thing. Thus, if you want to talk about the history of a concept, you often have no choice but to talk about the history of the word(s) that describe it. Especially since these words often were used to define it. So how do you explain THAT without explaining the history of the word?

If you use English to talk about the history of a concept, you cannot avoid talking about some of the etymology of the English terms used to describe it, since that is what etymology often is. Here is a prime example: "science" is now used as a short form for natural science, which used to be called natural philosophy. These changes mark differences in the CONCEPT, not just the word.

People who want to avoid talking about the history of ideas and alternatve usage in naming them (which should be part of many encyclopedia articles about ideas) often use THIS policy to beat others over the head with. But this WP:NOTDIC policy only discourages articles forcusing on the words themselves-- it does not say discussion of the concepts behind the words and the concepts' histories, must be removed because they look like etymology. Such stuff, etymology or not, cannot be avoided completely in any complete encyclopedia. But the understanding is that we should use this only to focus on changes in ideas, not as a focus on language. The policy here, should split that out and note it.

What say you all? SBHarris 05:32, 14 September 2010 (UTC)

I agree with your position: WP:NOTDIC was wrongly used at Talk:Science#Intro/definition, and of course, where appropriate, discussions of etymology and changes of word meaning need to be included in articles (provided, as you have clearly stated, the article is about more than the word itself). I don't want to engage in the actual dispute atm, although I will say that having two articles (Science and Natural science) means that it would be difficult for Science to have a lead that fully satisfies the person who claims that the current lead supports the conclusion that fine crochet work is science. Johnuniq (talk) 06:58, 14 September 2010 (UTC)

In the older and still-used sense of the word we could say that the non-artistic part of crochet IS a science. I can teach you how to do it even if you have no artistic talent. Indeed I can make a machine to do crochet. [2] I've got it DOWN to transmittable pure knowledge. There is no mystery. It's down to a science. If you read the article, you will see that at one point, people thought natural philosophy (study of nature) might not be capable of being made into a science (reduced to a transmissable method, guaranteed to produce success and progress in knowledge, like (say) improved string theory or cosmology). How ironic. Even more ironic is that even those who understand (or claim to understand) the modern scientific "method," admit and widely discuss the fact that there's a part of it, that machines still can't do. It's this part that is the insight that makes for genius, and it's closer to imagination and art, just as Einstein said. Thus, in this sense, science (in the loose sense of term, meaning natural science) is not completely reduced yet, to a science! It's still partly art and inspiration. See the point? SBHarris 08:24, 14 September 2010 (UTC)

I am came here because the user SBHarris has brought this to my attention. I am saddened by the fact that he once again mischaracterized the position of the other editors such as myself who disagree with him that they are trying to make the science article a duplicate of the natural science article, which is clearly not the case. Speaking for myself for example, I did not say we cannot discuss the use of words. Rather, there are appropriate sections for them within the article. For example, if a person was interested in the etymology of science, he or she can read the history section or a subsection of the article. The etymology of the word is not and should not be main focus of the entire article, as the article is about science as a body of knowledge and the process that is used to create that knowledge. Editors like myself do not agree that this article should be a "usage guide" but rather an informative piece of encyclopedic article that serves to inform the general public about science as it is understood today. This is not an unusual position. Readers are invited to view natural science, social science, psychology, neuroscience, or fine art as examples. There are "history sections" in those articles. A much more lucid example would be evolution. Anyone who reads that article will clearly see that evolution no longer means to "unravel." They will not find in that article a usage guide on how to use the word evolution. In fact, there is a history section, and readers are invited to read history of evolutionary thought. SBHarris has consistently propose a definition of science that is vacuous and at variance with conventional use of the term by scientists and science educators, be they natural and social scientists. He has not provided a single reference to support his position. His viewpoints are not mainstream and constitute original research. Given that this discussion at the Talk:Science has yet to be fully resolved, I will not try to start another one here about it. I invite anyone who is interested about the subject to come to the Talk:Science page to discuss it further there and come to a consensus. mezzaninelounge (talk) 21:44, 17 September 2010 (UTC)

In its broadest sense

I submit that any article with an introductory sentence which is about the term, such as "X, in its broadest sense... ", is a violation of this guideline since that wording is clearly referring to the term X rather than to a concept X.

That is, concepts don't have broad or narrow senses; concepts are either broad or narrow. Now, a term may be used to refer to various concepts, some of which are broader than others, and among which one is the broadest.

Therefore, I suggest that any article in this form is problematic. I don't think it's a coincidence that articles that open like this are typically poorly organized and lack coherency. That's because they are not about any single coherent topic, but about several (often only loosely) related concepts. I think such articles should either be renamed to be Forms of X, or changed into dab pages. The articles I know about that fit in this category off the top of my head include:

• Science "in its broadest sense... "
• Atheism"in a broad sense, is ..."
• Libertarianism "Various more elaborate definitions exist, ..."
• Conservatism "The term has been used to describe a wide range of views".

In contrast, the following topics are susceptible, but avoid this problem, suggesting that sometimes at least a rewrite into a coherent single topic is possible:

• Christianity
• God
• Liberalism

I wonder if others wouldn't mind reviewing the intros to each of these articles and see if you understand what I mean, and agree that there is a problem. Thanks. --Born2cycle (talk) 00:45, 14 September 2010 (UTC)

You made two points that need to be distinguished, and I disagree with both.

About the existence of articles with such titles: There are articles that genuinely have the problem of being about a too vague or ill-defined term, so that we don't know what to do with them. Good examples include Germanic Europe, militant atheism and Christ myth theory. But your examples are not among them. These are core topics that require articles, not disambiguation pages. In some cases it may make sense to create subarticles for various more specific topics. But we need the main article.

If you look closely enough you will see the same problem with almost every title that is not a proper name. The articles chair and mountain would certainly have this problem if anyone was stupid enough to start a huge debate about the precise definitions.

About the first sentences in articles about ill-defined terms: Wikipedia is not a bureaucracy, and articles are not forms that must be filled in in a specific way. They also don't have to be about a clearly demarcated topic. Not even everything that has a common name is clearly demarcated. Take any city, for example: Most have official boundaries, some have different official boundaries for different purposes (e.g. elections, tax, etc.). Cities are also settlements, and as such tend to have natural borders as defined by geographers and statisticians. These are almost always different from any official borders. For some purposes cities are also regarded as including many surrounding villages that are outside their borders. A correctly written article about a city uses different definitions/demarcations in different sections: the most appropriate for each context.

Whenever there is a debate about the precise definition of an article topic, e.g. a political or philosophical debate, it can well make sense to start an article with the kind of language you complain about. Hans Adler 01:01, 14 September 2010 (UTC)

AfD

Please see:Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of English words of Chinese origin Kitfoxxe (talk) 15:36, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

Nominating articles for deletion

I started a discussion on EAR here. I questioned why articles like bachelor - and later added articles like want, either,purpose, and that - existed in light of WP:DICTIONARY and WP:NOT. One editor defended the bachelor article saying that it was "much more than a mere dictionary definition." However, I pointed out that according to policy, "a dictionary article is primarily about a word, an idiom or a term and its meanings, usage and history." Other than perhaps being a bit long-winded, the bachelor article is precisely that. Another editor suggested proposing the article for deletion, to which I responded that I was hoping for more global discussion on the issue. Finally, an editor suggested coming here.

It seems like Wikipedia has a LOT of articles that are pretty much long dictionary defintions. What actually triggered this for me was the practice of many editors wikilinking common words in articles, which is contrary to WP:OVERLINK. Yet, that part of WP:OVERLINK wouldn't even be necessary in the first instance if there weren't so many dictionary articles.

I'm hoping to get more comments here.--Bbb23 (talk) 13:17, 3 March 2011 (UTC)

• This policy is more of a style guide than a content guide. The nutshell for the policy is "In Wikipedia, things are grouped into articles based on what they are, not what they are called by. In a dictionary, things are grouped by what they are called by, not what they are.". In other words, we ought to cover synonyms together rather than having separate entries for each distinct word.

The bachelor article needs some work. It exists here to provide a foundation for that work per our editing policy. It has been graded as start-class by the Law project but otherwise seems to have been neglected. If you think it needs improvement then you should please work upon it. So far as the DICDEF policy is concerned, the main issue is whether such work would be better done at rival articles such as single or unmarried.

None of the words discussed should be redlinks because they represent common concepts which are essential to a comprehensive encyclopedia because an encyclopedia, by definition, is about everything worth knowing. Dictionaries and encyclopedias will both cover such topics; the difference is the way that they do it.

Colonel Warden (talk) 18:22, 22 March 2011 (UTC)

NEO

"as these articles are often created in an attempt to use Wikipedia to increase usage of the term" -More mindreading garbage (see WP:POVFORK Anarchangel (talk) 22:27, 28 April 2011 (UTC)

Status RfC

I propose that this page be marked as a guideline instead of policy. It's mostly an inclusion/notability page like WP:N, because it says that some terms or phrases are acceptable article topics. It also contains detailed advice how to handle problems, advice not usually found in policies, e.g. "A good encyclopedia article can and should begin with a relatively short but discrete explanation of what the subject of the article ..." is something one finds in WP:LEAD—a MOS guideline, not a policy. Tijfo098 (talk) 05:20, 1 May 2011 (UTC)

(Also, this policy is pretty confused as to what the word dictionary can actually stand for in publishing practice, e.g. single-field dictionary. For example, practically every entry from The Blackwell dictionary of Western philosophy or Oxford dictionary of statistics would be a suitable Wikipeidia stub. Tijfo098 (talk) 06:14, 1 May 2011 (UTC))

• I don't see anything wrong with the status quo. It's a small semantic change to go from treating something as a guideline to treating it as a policy and vice versa. I'm not rejecting this proposal off hand. But you'd have to show where we've gone wrong and what this proposes to fix. Shooterwalker (talk) 14:23, 1 May 2011 (UTC)
• Oppose. I also don't really see a need to make the change. I think the common sense message of the page is that editors should not create pages that are essentially the same thing as what one would see at Wiktionary, or what one finds in basic English language dictionaries. That's a basic principle of what Wikipedia is not, and as such, it's appropriate as a policy. --Tryptofish (talk) 17:44, 1 May 2011 (UTC)

• Support Tijfo098 is correct about the impact of the guidance here - it is some general advice which is commonly misunderstood and not followed. It is so weak that it does not represent a hard policy. Colonel Warden (talk) 18:25, 1 May 2011 (UTC)
• Support As per Colonel Warden. I've also seen people remove etymological sections of articles that are mostly NOT about etymology, and use WP:NOTDIC as rationalization. Yes, they don't understand the thing. But maybe demoting it to guideline will de-fang it a bit. SBHarris 22:44, 1 May 2011 (UTC)

  Comment That suggests to me that the WP:DICT page needs to be improved, to more clearly address the fact that etymologies are an acceptable part of an encyclopedia article. "Demoting" this page to Guideline status won't make the page clearer. People would still be able to type [[WP:NOTDIC]] in their edit summary, and they would still be just as wrong. —DragonHawk (talk|hist) 18:10, 2 May 2011 (UTC)

• Oppose I don't see why you would want to make a change, that would only encourage people to make articles that are really the same thing, we don't want people making separate articles on kneecaps and patellas. And don't nearly all policies refer or link to articles? Articles aren't even policies or guidelines at all, so Colonel Warden's argument seems ridiculously dodgy. Just because you link down to a lower level thing, doesn't make it not a policy.Rememberway (talk) 00:37, 2 May 2011 (UTC)

• Oppose Encyclopedias and dictionaries (of the sort this Policy is concerned with) have fundamentally different goals. Dictionary entries are about words themselves. A dictionary will have different entries for different words with the same meaning. For example, a dictionary would have two separate entries for each of "gas" and "petrol", because those words have distinctly different histories. A dictionary will also combine multiple meanings under the same entry, if they have a common etymology. For example, a dictionary will have one entry for "gas", despite one being a state of matter and another being a liquid motor fuel. An encyclopedia will have one entry for a given topic, regardless of the term used to name that topic. An encyclopedia article can be moved to a different heading and still be a perfectly correct article. We could rename the page gasoline to petrol and the article would be fine. Contrariwise, renaming the page wikt:gasoline to wikt:petrol would be nonsensical. • The fact that encyclopedia articles can contain etymologies doesn't mean they are etymologies, any more than I'm water because my body contains water. • The fact that the WP:DICT page contains guidance as well as Policy doesn't mean the Policy part of the page is invalidated. There's no benefit to having two different pages (one for the Policy aspect, one for the Guideline aspects) for this, so we don't do that. • Finally, the fact that some books are called "dictionaries" but treat subject matter rather than words doesn't change this argument. Those books are using the word "dictionary" to mean something else than what this page uses it to mean. (Little bit of irony there, if you like that sort of thing, ha.) —DragonHawk (talk|hist) 18:05, 2 May 2011 (UTC)

• There is no fundamental difference. The first modern encyclopedia called itself a dictionary too - see Encyclopédie. Wikipedia contains lots of pages which document the meaning of different topics which are known by the same name - see run, for example, which is fundamentally the same as a dictionary entry for that word. - it is listing and explaining all the possible meanings of this common word. Dab pages like that make a nonsense of the supposed core of this policy and the rest is just chaos and confusion. Colonel Warden (talk) 19:06, 2 May 2011 (UTC)

• Yes, but conversely, different words for the same things are listed multiple times in a dictionary, but not in an encyclopedia. So you would support the creation of separate articles for kneecaps and patellas in the Wikipedia? Because that's what watering down this policy leads to.Rememberway (talk) 21:42, 2 May 2011 (UTC)

• And perhaps the destruction of Western Civilization right after that, maybe. Think of the children! Actually, WP supports articles on perspiration, hyperhidrosis, and diaphoresis, and has not yet imploded. A merger has been suggested, but is being resisted since the words have different connotations, and are not quite synonyms. But then, no two words ever are, are they? Kneecaps are not precisely patellae. If you blow off my kneecap you're likely to get much more than just the anatomical bone, after all.

  Whether we merge or split words that mean nearly the same thing depends largely on how much there is to discuss in each use. The point of NOTDIC is that the focus is not on the words themselves (how they are used in language and how they came to be) but rather, in an encyclopedia, the idea is to focus on the concepts that the words stand for, and to discuss these more than the words themselves. However, encyclopedias and dictionaries are cousins, and that's why paper encyclopedias have topics in alphabetical order, like dictionaries. It's merely a matter of perspective, without hard and fast lines. It becomes especially difficult when the word itself defines the concept (for example, with delirium or money), and it becomes extremely hard to write about the concept without defining it as in a dictionary (for example, money is not the same as currency, so if you're going to write about money, you need to start as you would in a dictionary). So this is all a very fuzzy area, and we merely need to have a guideline to remind people that concepts are our primary focus, and not language itself. Although we can't get away from language and discussion of fine distinctions in the same, since we have no other choice but to use it as a tool in thinking about concepts. SBHarris 22:33, 2 May 2011 (UTC)

• Well, if I blow away a kneecap, I lose the same structures as if I blow away a patella. Rememberway (talk) 00:39, 3 May 2011 (UTC)

Point of fact, the dictionaries I checked define currency differently to Wikipedia, and some of the dictionary definitions simply define it as money. And that's another reason why language is bad; it's too vague. You really can define the words twenty different ways and without being wrong. That's no good for what people use an encyclopedia for.Rememberway (talk) 00:39, 3 May 2011 (UTC)

Dictionaries are great for what they do, but they do far different things from what an encyclopedia does.Rememberway (talk) 00:39, 3 May 2011 (UTC)

I agree that they're near cousins, and that's why we certainly don't want the deformed multi-headed articles you end up with when they start having sex! Rememberway (talk) 00:39, 3 May 2011 (UTC)

• Sbharris: The fact that Wikipedia has three articles on three slightly different topics doesn't mean Wikipedia is behaving as a dictionary. As you note, they are not quite synonyms. One is sweat, one is abnormal sweat, and one is abnormal sweat associated with shock. We also have articles on history, European history, Spanish history, medieval Spanish history, and so on. Some topics naturally subsume other topics. This is actually in contrast to a dictionary, where all entries are peers. history is topologically equivalent to fork. • Paper encyclopedias are organized alphabetically because it's one of the only feasible schemes available in printed, human-searched books. The personnel file at work is also organized alphabetically; that doesn't mean it's a dictionary. Wikipedia has quite a few different ways to approach organization -- see WP:PORTAL and WP:CAT, for example. • Again, the fact that Wikipedia may contain definitions doesn't make it a dictionary. It's a question of purpose, of what a given entry is for. The purpose of money is not to document the history and meaning of the word "money", it's to document the concept we English-speaking humans call "money". The German Wikipedia puts that same information under geld, because that's the name of that concept in German. In contrast, money is about the word money. The German Wiktionary entry for that word is still money, because the entry is on the word, not the concept. —DragonHawk (talk|hist) 00:52, 3 May 2011 (UTC)

• Colonel Warden: "There is no fundamental difference" - I just spent 266 words explaining why I think there's a fundamental difference. A simple refutation without supporting argument is not discussion. • "The first modern encyclopedia..." - The titles of other works have no bearing on this policy. This policy addresses how Wikipedia pages structure their information; it's not trying to establish a standard meaning for the word "dictionary". • Wikipedia Disambiguation exists to distinguish multiple pages which would otherwise have the same name. Dab pages lack pronunciation, etymology, and language syntax information. Dictionary entries strive to document all appropriate meanings of a word, and are incomplete until they do so. Dab pages simply list Wikipedia pages of the same name, and are complete without non-page names. These also appear fundamentally different goals, to me. • The fact that some information found in a dictionary might also be found in Wikipedia does not make Wikipedia a dictionary. Some information found on my user page might also be found in a dictionary; that doesn't make me a dictionary. —DragonHawk (talk|hist) 00:27, 3 May 2011 (UTC)

• It is a plain historical fact that there is no fundamental difference. Please see encyclopedic dictionary which explains that dictionaries came first. These were then followed by encyclopedic dictionaries which expanded the entries and these then led to the modern encyclopedia in which entries may be more substantial still. The differences between these forms are a matter of degree, not a fundamental one. Both forms require a lexical level in which the headwords are listed for convenient location and a semantic level in which the meaning(s) of the headword are explained in various ways. Colonel Warden (talk) 14:17, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

• The difference between a pigeon and an eagle are also a matter of degree, the latter has longer sharper claws, and a bigger, sharper beak, and slightly different shaped wings and may be bigger, but they aren't fundamentally different, they're both birds; but that certainly doesn't mean that an eagle is a pigeon. According to the logic you're using an eagle is just a bigger pigeon.Rememberway (talk) 14:46, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

• Relatively subtle differences in what something does and how it works can make for major, critical differences in the overall behavior. A pigeon can't hunt like an eagle, even though there's little fundamental difference. Likewise the Wikipedia hunts for information very differently from a dictionary. To move a dictionary entry into an encyclopedia entry you would have to tear it to shreds and put the information into multiple different articles. They're different in very important ways.Rememberway (talk) 14:46, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

• There are various ways to put a dictionary-style lexical entries into Wikipedia: as a glossary, a list or a disambiguation page. Or one can just IAR and write about the word qua word. The scales fell from my eyes when I tried to delete the article dude. It's still there and this policy is thereby shown to be a dead parrot. Colonel Warden (talk) 15:05, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

• Support — I've supported this change (and even attempted to make it myself) for a couple of years, now. It is a semantic change, since there's no actual hierarchy between policies and guidelines, and yet... there is obviously some important meaning behind the semantic change involved in calling this a "policy" or calling it a "guideline". I believe that attaching the "policy" label to this document makes it seem as though the content is a hard rule ("you'll get in trouble if you try to add dictionary content!"), but it's always seemed more like advice to me ("Hey, this is supposed to be an encyclopedia you know. Can you flesh out the definition you just added with more information, or move it to Wiktionary?"). I mean, the document itself doesn't actually say anything like "dictionary entries should be deleted". if you read the page it consists mostly of explanations, advice, and "how to's"... it's just characteristic of a guideline. Would making it a "guideline" prevent it from being used, for example in AFD discussions? Clearly, the answer there is "No". Aside from all of that, there really are a whole bunch of marginal cases that could conceivably exist in both our Encyclopedia and Wiktionary's Dictionary, and there's absolutely nothing wrong with that.
  — V = IR (Talk • Contribs) 04:19, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

• Oppose. The basic thrust of this page -- Wikipedia is not a dictionary -- is central to our mission, supporting one of our five pillars ("Wikipedia is an encyclopedia"). If the advice on the page is not useful or not accurate, then it can and should be revised. But the concept that Wikipedia is not to include dictionary content is policy. Sadly, many people these days ignore that first pillar and think any word or phrase that has secondary sources deserves an encyclopedia article. Powers ^T 12:17, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

  Hi Powers. How can we square your view here with those of Cúchullain, below?
  — V = IR (Talk • Contribs) 16:08, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

  Given the confusion that clearly exists, a page that further elaborates on the small section in WP:NOT is obviously needed. Whether it's policy or guideline is apparently something which can be debated; there's no bright line. In my opinion, the concept is inviolable, even if there is room in the concept for apparent contradictions to the most simply-stated version of the policy. Powers ^T 17:28, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

  My stance is that, since WP:NOT is the actual policy (I don't think anyone disagrees with that), that this page provides guidance on how that policy should be applied. Therefore, it should be marked as a guideline. My sense from reading the "oppose" statements here is that opposition to changing the tag to a guideline here is based on a feeling that we would be somehow demoting the "Wikipedia is not a dictionary" idea, but I don't see that in my own view or those of others who "support". I don't see anyone advocating removal of the "Wikipedia is not a dictionary" text from WP:NOT, after all. does that clarify things? Does it affect your opinion on the proposed change here?
  — V = IR (Talk • Contribs) 19:05, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

  The wording at WP:NOT implies that the text there is merely a summary of the expanded document here. I fear it will become more difficult to explain that "Wikipedia is not a dictionary" is policy as a result. Powers ^T 19:28, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

  I can understand that, and even agree with it partially. I just think that the better approach is to update the wording at WP:NOT rather then trying to restate things here. Even just changing the hatnote at the top of the "Wikipedia is not a dictionary" section on WP:NOT ought to be enough to make things clearer.
  — V = IR (Talk • Contribs) 20:13, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

• Support. This is clearly more in line with the intention of a guideline than a policy, in that the bulk of it outlines practices. That "Wikipedia is not a dictionary" is already highlighted at WP:NOT, which is a policy; this page just outlines how to edit in light of that fact. Changing the tag from "policy" to "guideline" just makes official what this page already is and does.Cúchullain ^t/c 13:38, 4 May 2011 (UTC)
• Support This is clearly a guideline not a policy, and should officially declared such. Dream Focus 20:19, 4 May 2011 (UTC)
• Comment You still have to follow guidelines anyway. For example notability is a guideline, not a policy; and yet it determines whether something is deleted or not. But in this case WP:ISNOT identifies it as a policy, so it should continue to be listed as a policy. It's also pointed to by WP:Five pillars, and it's identified there as a fundamental principle. If it walks like a policy, is referred to as a policy and is used as a policy, then it's a policy.Rememberway (talk) 21:02, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

  Right, but... what we're discussing above actually addresses your apparent stance suggesting that this specifica page should remain marked as a policy. WP:NOT is, and should continue to be, a policy, for the reasons that you've outlined above. This document, as a sub-document of WP:NOT, doesn't have to be a policy page itself, though. And, sure enough, the way that this page is written suggests to me that the best characterization of it is that it's a guideline. It provides guidance on good ways to implement what is policy (the "Wikipedia is not a dictionary").
  — V = IR (Talk • Contribs) 21:08, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

  Sorry, but I'm pretty certain, and I'm sure that they'll at least pretend to correct me, that at least some of the people (like Colonel Warden) are trying to get this marked as a guideline as a way to try to get the policy removed entirely. They don't understand the point of the policy at all, it gets in the way of them adding dictionary content. They're trying to go policy->guideline->essay->deleted. But given it actually is hardcore policy, I genuinely don't see that we should even take the first step.21:17, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

  There are people who believe all sorts of things. I don't see that as a compelling argument to do (or not do) anything in particular. Do any of the users that you're concerned with have some magical power to force things on the rest of the community? I just think that things should reflect reality, I guess. Changing the tag here to say "guideline" doesn't actually change how the encyclopedia develops, as you yourself stated above.
  — V = IR (Talk • Contribs) 21:43, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

  I have marked this page as a guideline before and it was over a month before anyone noticed or cared. That was Wolfkeeper who then flipped out but it was he who overreacted on this and other occasions and he has now been banned for his disruption. Me, I'm quite relaxed about this because the policy is largely ineffective. Wikipedia contains lots of lexical content and lots of duplicate articles with synonymous titles. These pages are quite well-established and on the rare occasion that such matters come to AFD, the dicdef argument tends to lose. The main point of this change is to bring the page into line with actual practise so the new editors are not misled and so don't waste their by taking the guidance too seriously. Colonel Warden (talk) 12:49, 5 May 2011 (UTC)

  Rememberway, don't pretend to speak for other editors. Disagreements happen, there doesn't have to be a conspiracy.Cúchullain ^t/c 12:14, 5 May 2011 (UTC)

  Can anyone explain to me why the "dicdef argument" (a misnomer) tends to lose? I haven't figured out yet what the fascination is with having long lexical (non-encyclopedic) articles on words and phrases. Powers ^T 13:46, 5 May 2011 (UTC)

  I think it only tends to lose when it's being misapplied. It has always won out on articles that are just dictionary entries; this was more common several years ago, as most articles like this have already been deleted or transferred to Wiktionary. Where it tends to fail is one articles on words that are more than dictionary entries.--Cúchullain ^t/c 14:17, 5 May 2011 (UTC)

  Sadly, that's not true. The problem is that people continue to think that "a dictionary entry" is short. In fact, a full dictionary article contains context, etymology, usage examples, history, and usage notes. I have seen countless articles here on Wikipedia be kept (or, worse, "Keep and expand"ed but never actually expanded) despite containing nothing but context, etymology, usage, history, and definition. Powers ^T 20:10, 5 May 2011 (UTC)

  I am aware of your understanding of what a dictionary entry is, and I see where you're coming from, but I don't think it meshes with the understanding of most Wikipedians. Personally, I've rarely seen an article get kept at AfD I didn't think met the policy.--Cúchullain ^t/c 20:58, 5 May 2011 (UTC)

  But that's what I'm trying to understand. How is it that people can interpret the policy as allowing articles that are nothing but what would be included in a comprehensive dictionary article? Powers ^T 01:48, 6 May 2011 (UTC)

  Perhaps because, if the potential that the article could be more then a dicdef is there, then many (most?) editors would rather keep the existing content in hopes of working on it in the future?
  — V = IR (Talk • Contribs) 04:43, 6 May 2011 (UTC)

  Well, take Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Salad days (second nomination). I begged, pleaded and cajoled anyone to provide just one single example of something that could be added to the article that was encyclopedic. Not one person provided a single tidbit of information. Not one. Yet the article was kept. Why? Powers ^T 11:24, 6 May 2011 (UTC)

• Further comment The inclusion of the requirement for a definition of the scope of the article seems to be critical to the correct functioning of the Wikipedia. An article that doesn't declare the scope of the article is very often impossible to edit successfully, there's no way to really tell what the purpose of the article is. Without that if there's an article with information a,b,c,d,e,f is a new piece of information, g, on topic or off topic? Or has information f been added erroneously? You really don't know. And if you do add g, how does someone else decide that doing that is right?

The Wikipedia can't function with that kind of uncertainty. It can lead to edit wars. Without having a definition we've got no way to really decide whether the article is self consistent; different people can decide that the article is about one thing or a different thing, without being right or wrong. It's also a huge problem for the users who would have no way to know whether they're reading the right article or not.Rememberway (talk) 21:04, 6 May 2011 (UTC)

That's why this is a policy, not just a guideline.Rememberway (talk) 21:04, 6 May 2011 (UTC)

• Weak support. That Wikipedia is not a dictionary is already policy, as shown at Wikipedia:What Wikipedia is not#Wikipedia_is_not_a_dictionary. But I think that this particular advice page amplifies on that in ways that we would typically classify as a guideline. On the other hand, the difference between policies and guidelines is obscure, and how exactly the page is tagged is pretty much unimportant. I don't mind changing the tag, but I don't really mind keeping the existing tag, either. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:25, 7 May 2011 (UTC)