Category talk:Dialogues of Plato/Archive 1

This archive page covers approximately the dates between 13 Mar 2005 and 20 Aug 2005.

Post replies to the main talk page, copying the section you are replying to if necessary. (See How to archive a talk page.)

Please add new archivals to Category talk:Dialogues of Plato/Archive02. Thank you. Girolamo Savonarola 11:45, 1 September 2005 (UTC)

Update - Francis Schonken 12:23, 13 Mar 2005 (UTC)
The new scheme has been implemented as fair as I could, note however:
 * Move requests at Requested_moves for Phaedo -> Phaedo (Plato) and Parmenides (dialogue) -> Parmenides (Plato)
 * I tried to solve all second level disambiguation issues, but improvements might still be necessary, see for example: Sisyphus, Halcyon, Demodocus, Ion, Lysis, Republic, Letters, Laws, Symposium, Apology.

The proposed scheme
Naming of articles treating Plato's dialogues seperately is confusing, I propose following renamings (per tetralogy):


 * note 1: Since
 * works marked (1) (scholars don't generally agree that Plato is the author)
 * and
 * works marked (2) (scholars generally agree that Plato is not the author of the work)
 * might lead to discussion if marked "(Plato)", I'd mark these "(dialogue)", except where these works are no dialogues.


 * note 2: This proposition is on Talk:Plato too – I propose to have the discussion here

--Francis Schonken 12:56, 5 Mar 2005 (UTC)


 * I.
 * Euthyphro -> Euthyphro (Plato)
 * Apology -> Apology (Plato) (Note that technically this is not a "dialogue", so in fact Category:Dialogues of Plato is a misnomer if one wants to include this text by Plato... but that's maybe a bit too far-fetched)
 * Crito -> Crito (Plato)
 * Phaedo -> Phaedo (Plato)
 * II.
 * Cratylus (Plato) (OK!)
 * Theaetetus -> Theaetetus (Plato)
 * Sophist (Plato) (OK!)
 * Statesman (Plato) (OK!)
 * III.
 * Parmenides (dialogue) -> Parmenides (Plato)
 * Philebus (Plato) (OK!)
 * Symposium (Plato) (OK!)
 * Phaedrus (Plato) (OK!)
 * IV.
 * First Alcibiades (Plato) (1) -> First Alcibiades (dialogue)
 * Second Alcibiades (Plato) (2) -> Second Alcibiades (dialogue)
 * Hipparchus (2) -> Hipparchus (dialogue)
 * Rival Lovers (2)  -> Rival lovers (dialogue)
 * V.
 * Theages (2) -> Theages (dialogue)
 * Charmides (Plato) (OK!)
 * Laches (Plato) (OK!)
 * Lysis -> Lysis (Plato)
 * VI.
 * Euthydemus (Plato) (OK!)
 * Protagoras (dialogue) -> Protagoras (Plato)
 * Gorgias (Plato) (OK!)
 * Meno -> Meno (Plato)
 * VII.
 * Greater Hippias (1) -> Greater Hippias (dialogue)
 * Lesser Hippias -> Lesser Hippias (Plato)
 * Ion -> Ion (Plato)
 * Menexenus -> Menexenus (Plato)
 * VIII.
 * Clitophon (1) -> Clitophon (dialogue)
 * Plato's Republic -> Republic (Plato)
 * Timaeus (Plato) (OK!)
 * Critias (Plato) (OK!)
 * IX.
 * Minos (Plato) (2) -> Minos (dialogue)
 * Plato's Laws -> Laws (Plato)
 * Epinomis (2) -> Epinomis (dialogue)
 * Letters ((1) for some) -> Letters (Plato)

Remaining works (most of them considered spurious already in antiquity):
 * Axiochus (2) (OK!)
 * Definitions (Plato) (2) (OK!)
 * Demodocus (2) (OK!)
 * Epigrams (Plato) (OK!)
 * Eryxias (2) (OK!)
 * Halcyon (2) (OK?)
 * On Justice (2) (OK!)
 * On Virtue (2) (OK!)
 * Sisyphus (Plato) (2) -> Sisyphus (dialogue) (or treating this work in the Sisyphus article?)

Remarks
I don't understand why you have created this convention which seems to me both unnecessary and contrary to the conventions already in use. Works should be named by their title when there appears to be no other usage of the name (eg Phaedo), and by standard naming convention otherwise [eg Laws (book) or Laws (Plato book) only in the case that Laws (book) already refers to another work which has higher priority]. That being said, I would imagine most any work named as "Title (book)" would likely have the name priority, being a Platonic work. But this "Title (Plato)" convention in my opinion smacks of bad form and largely unnecessary disambiguation. I respect your work in the Philosophy section, but I beg you to reconsider on this matter. Thank you. --Girolamo Savonarola 23:25, 2005 May 8 (UTC)

Using this quote: "there is no written work of my own on my philosophy, and there never will be. For this philosophy cannot possibly be put into words as other sciences can. The sole way of acquiring it is by strenuous intellectual communion and intimate personal intercourse" (Plato's Letters, No. 7, 341 B-E.), it would be hard to assign the term "author" or "authorship" to any works of Plato, seeing authouship implies writing. Nobs 16:59, 18 May 2005 (UTC)

Francis
Sorry I didn't know about the naming convention for literary works (had been looking for it but didn't find at the time I proposed the Plato scheme). Note however that the scheme you mention somehow has difficulties for these writers from antiquity (and beyond - I think even till about 19th century):
 * 1) Writers from Antiquity: there's not always uniformity as to the translation of the title in English - for Latin (etc.) writers, using Latin script, there's not so much of a problem (one can give the title in the original language, e.g. De re publica) - Greek script for article names in English wikipedia doesn't seem all that obvious - or would that be an option?
 * 2) Because those antique writers were not inhibited to use the same title for their works, this means the "... (book)" method does not always disambiguate properly, e.g. Republic (book); Apology (book); Histories (book), Letters (book), Lives (book), etc... would be quite meaningless, referring to several authors each of them.
 * 3) For writers from antiquity (and later) a single work can be subdivided in several books: Tacitus' Annals; Bodin's Republic, Plato's Republic, etc... all have this structure - makes e.g. "Republic (book)" seem a bit odd for someone acquainted with antiquity, even if reffering to the work of a single author.
 * 4) For Plato nearly each of his titles has another meaning: most of his titles are names of persons which already have (or soon might have) a separate article; other works by Plato mostly share a title with works of other authors (Laws; Letters; Republic...)
 * 5) Note that the scheme I proposed borrows from naming conventions in classical music (e.g. Symphony No. 1 (Mahler)) - which was the nearest naming convention I could find to solve most of the issues relating to Plato.

For the dialogues which are not in certainty to be ascribed to Plato, I had proposed "... (dialogue)" (instead of "... (book)") as a naming scheme (note that at the time I proposed that, there were already some Plato dialogues marked "... (dialogue)").

"... (Plato book)" appears to me as a very unelegant way to tackle this - at least I'd prefer "... (Plato dialogue)" in most cases but don't think this particularly elegant either; but if this is the agreed naming convention, no problem to change to it.

See also above on this page: this might make you understand better why & how I proposed what I proposed.

--Francis Schonken 08:03, 13 May 2005 (UTC)

Savonarola
The points you have raised are technically interesting and curious. However, I believe that much of this may have precedent, so I'm going to do a little digging around the policy and style pages... I've edited your bullets into numbers so as to make responses more clear.

I concede the book vs. dialogue point - I was writing quickly and thus wrote book. Clearly dialogue is the more accurate term.

Before all else, I should like to point out that Naming_conventions has created specific specialized conventions for particular naming quandries. That being said...I do believe that most of these problems mentioned are not native to this particular instance, and come down more to disambiguation decisions and language style preferences which already are in effect for most articles on creative works. In any case...


 * 1) Naming_conventions_%28use_English%29 very clearly seems to point towards English titles unless the vernacular is overwhelmingly used. I'd simply say that the transliteration of the vernacular should be a redirect to the main article. As for the Greek alphabet - leave that to the Greek version of the Wikipedia. I'm not saying it shouldn't be rendered in the opening paragraph - that's standard style - but if someone's searching the English version, they generally would be searching with a Latin alphabet.
 * 2) I would argue that most titles have a dominant point of reference. See Disambiguation, but if several have an equal claim to dominance, then a disambiguation page (eg Mercury) would be the article, which could be further clarified within the established conventions - "Republic (book)" and "Republic (dialogue)" or "Republic (Plato dialogue)" and "Republic (Smith dialogue)". You certainly don't need to shackle ever Platonic dialogue with a parenthetical, though - I am certain that many of the titles are more or less unique. If a title has clear dominance over others, then the article for that dominant title should occupy the space, along with a link at the top for diambiguation of the other titles (eg DNA). I would posit that "The Republic" predominantly belongs to Plato's work, while "Republic" clearly should discuss the form of government at large, but possibly link to Plato's work as a diambiguation.
 * 3) I concede the point of using another term than book for parentheticals - I should indeed be a more specific form or genre of literary work attributed.
 * 4) I believe that the article "Parmenides" should refer to the man. And "Parmenides (dialogue)" should refer to the work. I am not familiar with the number of works which can fit the title "Republic (dialogue)", "The Republic (dialogue)", or "Laws (dialogue)", but I am confident that it is nothing that cannot be handled with either disambiguation or a moderate usage of (Plato dialogue) where there truly are several well-known dialogues acknowledged as having that title.
 * 5) The classical music scheme is biased, however, to work around a difficulty posed by the previously established naming convention of classical music. It would be superfluous to clarify "Symphony No. 1 (Mahler)" as "Symphony No. 1 (Mahler symphony)". It is not usually as obvious that a title refers to a dialogue.

It does seem to me silly, however, that we're content to have "The Apology" as an article as it is, and then encumber "Euthyphro" to be "Euthyphro (Plato)", when clearly there is no need to; nothing else needs that name except the dialogue. And so on.

I am not familiar with the rest of the community here who are working on the philosophy sections, but I would imagine that there are many titles which require some degree of disambiguation. It would be curious to see what strategies were adopted. Absent of that, I propose sticking with the established conventions, which seem to me more than able to handle these titles.

Thank you.

--Girolamo Savonarola 08:38, 2005 May 13 (UTC)

Francis
Thank you too... I worked on my scheme proposal some time ago, trying to trigger reactions from other wikipedians (by posting links to this page on several talk pages) - glad finally someone takes the thing at heart too.

I'm aware I should do some effort w.r.t. to the "literary works" naming conventions guideline too - I'm glad you have the intention to dig in that - since this "Plato" naming conventions is quite far out of my usual competences I agree to whatever this results in.

I only started this because the names of articles related to Plato were a complete mess when I arrived here first (... when working on Satie's Socrate ...) - Some were "Plato's Title" others were "Title (dialogue)" and what not...

What I'd propose, if you care to work on this, is that you make a list too, like I did above, of all of Plato's works. Note that this list, if it is agreed upon, traditionally features on the Plato page, all of Plato's works hyperlinked - that's where the creation of new articles on Plato's works usually starts.

A last hint: indeed some of the English titles of Plato's works are particularily cumbersome. The most cumbersome I think the one that is now Republic (Plato) - if you'd have a good alternative for that article title I'd be more than glad - see e.g. politeia, Res publica, De re publica, Republicanism, Republic (disambiguation), Republic, and the 7 (sic) archives of the talk page of that last page of how confusing the usual English title of that dialogue by Plato is. Other (comparatively minor) issues include e.g. the present symposium (Plato) - symposium (Xenophon) ambiguity (note that both of these are qualified "socratic dialogue"); another the maybe yes-or-no by Plato "definitions" and "epigrams" (...which are no dialogues); the fact that some titles in classical litterature are about as "generic" as "symphony" is for a classical composer (e.g. Letters); etc...

--Francis Schonken 10:03, 13 May 2005 (UTC)

PS: The Apology presently redirects to a disambiguation page - indeed there are two Socratic dialogues most often translated as The Apology of Socrates (where Plato's is more a monologue) - only by intuition I suppose that when talking about "The Apology" without naming an author, the work by Plato is more often intended than the work by Xenophon (Newman's Apologia Pro Vita Sua, a classic in the Catholic world, would, for some, be a good candidate too I suppose), but who am I to start a discussion on that; to disambiguate in a first step, as it is now, appears a very suitable option to me. --Francis Schonken 13:32, 13 May 2005 (UTC)

New scheme by Savonarola & comments by others
I understand that you were the first on the scene to propose a reform; it's good that someone made the effort! Here is my revised list as I would like to see it. I have omitted links at the moment. Your Republic example is notable, but again, nothing that cannot be effectively and fairly dealt with via disambigs, redirects, and so on.

''Note that I have made all these recommendations in the good faith that these titles are the agreed upon standards. If a work has several potentially dominant titles, please inform first. Non-English titles do not count unless overwhelmingly used over the English ones.''


 * I.
 * Euthyphro
 * Apology - set page to Plato work, with disambiguation link at top of article, which should handle Xenophon fine. Make certain The Apology redirects to Apology instead of being slightly slimmer second disambig. (Though the Xenophon parenthetical is another matter altogether, and my mind is not clear about how to characterize it at the moment.)
 * Needs creation of Apology (disambiguation), with the present content of Apology (OK, already performed that "move" operation)
 * Crito
 * Phaedo
 * II.
 * Cratylus
 * Theaetetus - merge with mathematician, given the lack of info for him found outside the work
 * According to French wikipedia, Theaetetus is also mentioned in Theodorus of Cyrene (but that appears to be a person not a work).
 * Yes, but it seems that the only attribution they give him is that he is mentioned in the work. I don't think that's enough to warrant a seperate page.
 * Sophist (dialogue)
 * Disambig, or at least "see also"-link at sophism - what happens with sophist page (which is presently redirect to "sophism")?
 * Agreed. I left this implied; should have specified.
 * Statesman (dialogue) - will need a disambig at Statesman page.
 * III.
 * Parmenides (dialogue)
 * Philebus
 * Symposium (Plato dialogue) - also revise Xenophon's accordingly
 * Phaedrus (dialogue)
 * IV.
 * Alcibiades (dialogues)|First Alcibiades
 * Alcibiades (dialogues)|Second Alcibiades
 * Hipparchus (dialogue)
 * Rival Lovers
 * V.
 * Theages
 * Charmides
 * Laches (dialogue) - add disambig to Laches top or make Laches a disambig page entirely
 * Lysis (dialogue)
 * VI.
 * Euthydemus (dialogue)
 * Protagoras (dialogue)
 * Gorgias (dialogue)
 * Meno
 * VII.
 * Hippias (dialogues)|Greater Hippias
 * Hippias (dialogues)|Lesser Hippias
 * see: Stephanus pagination, it uses Hippias minor (that could of course be made a redirect page)
 * Ion (dialogue)
 * Menexenus
 * VIII.
 * Clitophon
 * Republic (dialogue)
 * Cicero's Republic is also a dialogue! - so would need to be Republic (Plato dialogue) and Republic (Cicero dialogue), which would give new discussion between the factions that have their preferred translation of the title of the Cicero dialogue (see De re publica, "what's in a title" section)
 * Keep with conventions. The ambiguity of titles is adequately mentioned within both articles. I say leave De re publica as it is and Republic (dialogue) go to Plato, if only because that is the traditional English title. (Cicero's traditionally seems to remain in the Latin, since as you note, there is no traditional English title.)
 * Timaeus (dialogue)
 * Critias - merge with Critias (Plato), as article is minor
 * IX.
 * Minos (dialogue) - make disambig at top of Minos
 * The Laws - make disambig at top that sends them to Laws
 * This I think incoherent - would Plato's Laws be the only one with a "The", why not "The Republic (Plato dialogue)", etc - I'd suggest Laws (dialogue) instead
 * I have already moved this to Laws (dialogue), but thinking about it again, The Laws already redirects to the article. Apparently no one else does use The Laws! The Republic is only not used because of the plethora of articles which can legitimately lay claim to it. Laws refers to several things. The Laws does not. I'm not averse to moving the article again, but perhaps we should think about it.
 * Epinomis
 * Letters (Plato) - leave as is, only because the alternative is Letters (Plato letters). See my comments above about musical works' naming conventions.

Remaining works (most of them considered spurious already in antiquity):
 * Axiochus
 * Definitions (dialogue) - needs to be added to the disambig for Definition, too
 * I hadn't realised this was a dialogue
 * Do we have further information on it? I read somewhere that Apology was the only Platonic work not in dialogue form.
 * Demodocus (dialogue)
 * Epigrams (Plato) - leave as is for same reasoning as Letters
 * Eryxias
 * Halcyon (dialogue)
 * On Justice
 * On Virtue
 * Sisyphus (dialogue)

Furthermore, all links and redirects need to be conformed ASAP to point directly to the new agreed upon name.
 * Well, here is the crux of the issue, who's going to perform all that??? - please also respect talk pages to be moved coherently, check double redirects, etc, etc --Francis Schonken 07:28, 15 May 2005 (UTC)

Opinions?

--Girolamo Savonarola 03:22, 2005 May 15 (UTC)


 * Most redirects now implemented. Three (Apology, Phaedo, and Theaetetus) require admin intervention and have been noted at WP:RM. I have responded to comments on particular names above. Redirects still need to be dealt with; I am happy to do that soon (but need sleep now...). --Girolamo Savonarola 04:27, 2005 May 16 (UTC)

Objections to renaming
My worries fall into two categories: worries concerning the procedure, and worries concerning the policy.

With regard to the procedure, this has been pushed through very quickly by one person, with one other editor participating in the discussion. I, for one, was unaware of what was going on until a dialogue on my watch list was moved, with no reason given; it was only when I reverted the move and queried it that I discovered this page. That is surely not acceptable practice.

With regard to the policy: first, I frankly can't see the point. The existing names were perfectly clear, and the single style made it easy to refer to one of them in another article; now, one will have to check each link to discover whether it's a redirect or not. Secondly, Many of the dialogues are named after one of the main characters, some of whom warrant separate articles. The current change prejudges which of those articles will be written, for no good reason. Mel Etitis ( &Mu;&epsilon;&lambda; &Epsilon;&tau;&eta;&tau;&eta;&sigmaf; ) 14:37, 16 May 2005 (UTC)


 * To address your two concerns, I agree with you that the procedure was rushed, and concede the point. I will leave off any further changes until a fuller concensus is reached. (I guess I was a bit too bold!)


 * However, as far as policy goes, it is my opinion that while the existing names were clear, they were also unnecessary and contra to the standard and consistent formatting that one should be able to expect. Are we to name all works with parentheticals for their authors? That is quite silly and superfluous, in my opinion. I also vigorously disagree as far as the characters go - Plato's characters exist as foils to bounce ideas off of or represent other modes of thought. Those who have a significant attribution outside of Plato's works (eg Parmenides) should have their own pages, yes. But to use your example, Meno? Do we really need an article on the character Meno? It would seem to me that there is little to say that cannot and should not ideally be addressed within the article on the work. Just as I would oppose the idea of an having a page for the work Romeo and Juliet as well as seperate pages for Romeo and Juliet each (disambigs not included). Hence I do not understand why someone should be redirected to Meno (Plato) or Euthyphro (Plato) or Phaedo (Plato) when dropping the parentheticals is intuitive, clear, direct, and has no ambiguity with regards to the content. That's why I started all this - I was reading the first tetralogy and saw no good reason why each article a) needed a parenthetical (The Apology exempted) and b) the articles which did use parentheticals didn't use standard works ones. If we are not going to adhere to accepted standards and conventions with regards to naming, then why are we putting so much effort into defending an excessive non-convention? Again, to use the Romeo and Juliet metaphor, must we name every article on a Shakespeare play with the (Shakespeare) parenthetical?


 * If there are specific works to which you believe the proposed renaming to be inadequate or inappropriate, I would very much like to hear your objections and reasoning so that we can indeed come to concensus.


 * This all being said, the entire history of this page has consisted of two users prior to you. While that is not an excuse for my rushed actions, I hope you will understand if the lack of input led me to decide to shrug my shoulders and just get the ball rolling. At least it has allowed for someone else to bring their thoughts to the table! --Girolamo Savonarola 20:46, 2005 May 16 (UTC)


 * With regard to the last point, it's also mine &mdash; how would anyone have known that this debate was going on? people with interests in the dialogues won't always have the Category page on their Watch list (I didn't).


 * On the main points, I can only repeat my initial arguments. If the dialogues weren't named as they are, and the proposal was to change them, perhaps your arguments would have had some weight &mdash; but I don't see that it's a good enough reason to change them all, together with all of their redirects and the links from other articles.  Wouldn't your time (and ours) be better spent working on the articles themselves, many of which are in need of work? Mel Etitis  ( &Mu;&epsilon;&lambda; &Epsilon;&tau;&eta;&tau;&eta;&sigmaf; ) 21:56, 16 May 2005 (UTC)


 * That's merely argumentum ad antiquitam there. Just because things are as they are doesn't mean that they necessarily are properly in order. I don't see how that truly affects your work - we clean up the links and the article is otherwise the same. Wikipedia needs content writers as much as it needs editors; if you prefer to do the former only, then by all means do it. My knowledge of Plato is somewhat limited - I don't feel up to the task of editing a full-scale article. That does not, however, disqualify me from doing what I can to improve the naming standards, which are within my capabilities (I believe). But if you have a good argument for why the names are better as they are (beyond the fact that they are what they are), then I'm curious to hear it. I'd also like to note that Francis did put up a note regarding this discussion on the Plato page itself. Perhaps the error then has arisen from not properly posting it within all the articles to be affected. Again, I take responsibility for the mistake. But we're here now. --Girolamo Savonarola 00:32, 2005 May 17 (UTC)


 * Furthermore, I would like to refer to specific conventions - Naming_conventions, where it clearly states that disambiguation priority goes to the general type of work, then to the author's name only if needed. Also see Naming_conventions_%28precision%29, where it states "The basic rule is that, unless you are absolutely sure that a related usage deserves or has an article, no disambiguation is necessary." This can be seen reflected in Naming_conventions, where the War Requiem does not have disambiguation, whereas the other two do. But note that the usage of the last name for disambiguation is due to the superfluousness of trying to disambig a Symphony No. 6 as Symphony No. 6 (Mahler symphony) instead of just (Mahler). Virtually all Platonic texts can either be freed of an disambig parenthetical or use (dialogue) at the end. Understand that I'm not trying to browbeat here, but rather to elucidate my methodology. --Girolamo Savonarola 00:43, 2005 May 17 (UTC)


 * 1) It is often the case that positions are finely balanced, so that while a certain argument would count against change it's not strong enough to justify change. I hold that your argument here is at best in that position
 * 2) General conventions are flexible enough to be adapted to different cases. Here, we have a body of work by a certain author, consisting of individual pieces often bearing the names of characters (who were often real people), and sometimes with titles duplicated by other works.  The choice is between applying a unifying convention that takes into account the specific issues and adopting no such convention, instead treating each work separately.  I accepted the original arguments for the former approach, and there was consensus for it (which is why it was implemented).  Mel Etitis  ( &Mu;&epsilon;&lambda; &Epsilon;&tau;&eta;&tau;&eta;&sigmaf; ) 08:32, 17 May 2005 (UTC)

Incomplete introduction of new renaming scheme
Which of the schemes I think "best" is of minor importance compared to the general principle of "avoiding mess"... which was not avoided by the incomplete introduction of the new scheme:
 * Plato still has the old scheme
 * Stephanus pagination has never been looked at to implement the new scheme

Of course, Mel has a point there was no real need to introduce the new scheme, and most of all, there was a lack of drawing attention of the persons involved in working on the Plato articles to give their opinion.

Personally, I'd propose to revert to the scheme proposed on top of this page (which is coherent with the links in Plato); and then have a look at the Stephanus pagination article to be made conforming with that scheme too.

Anybody having a problem with that?

--Francis Schonken 07:40, 18 May 2005 (UTC)

PS - Funny quote (as I was re-reading Machiavelli's Prince lately, this is from ch. VI)


 * ... as happened in our time to Fra Girolamo Savonarola, who was ruined with his new order of things immediately the multitude believed in him no longer, and he had no means of keeping steadfast those who believed or of making the unbelievers to believe.

(Of course I have a very bad character to quote such unapplicable quotes just for the fun of it, pfui, shame on me, this is worse than BJAODN) --Francis Schonken 08:07, 18 May 2005 (UTC)


 * I agree with this proposal, and oppose the new naming scheme for the reasons that I've given above. Mel Etitis ( &Mu;&epsilon;&lambda; &Epsilon;&tau;&eta;&tau;&eta;&sigmaf; ) 13:49, 22 May 2005 (UTC)

I've not moved the articles after considering the above opposition, making it one for and one against the move. violet/riga (t) 14:33, 24 May 2005 (UTC)

Survey Proposal

 * Unfortunately, there still seems to be a lack of consensus on the matter, as pretty much this has remained within the same three people involved. Therefore, I'd like to propose, as per Dispute_resolution, that we conduct a survey on the matter. It will hopefully publicize things more successfully than my attempts at Third opinion and Requests for comment. Among the important Survey_guidelines:

'':Consensus must be reached about the nature of the survey before it starts. Allow about a week for this process. You will need to resolve the following issues:''
 * 1) What questions should be asked?
 * 2) What will the possible answers be?
 * 3) Where a question has three or more possible answers, are people allowed to select more than one answer?
 * 4) When is the deadline?
 * 5) How will the survey be totalled?
 * 6) Will there be a summary of arguments, or a series of mini-essays, or some other way to inform users prior to the survey.


 * So can we at least agree to hold a survey and put together an agreed format? --Girolamo Savonarola 20:51, 2005 May 23 (UTC)

I'm lost - what is the issue?
I came here from the RFC, but after reading the whole talk page, I don't understand what's being proposed, or what the dispute is... There seems to be a proposed new naming convention for Plato articles, but I don't really see how this is a dispute requiring further input. I also don't exactly understand what the two (or more) sides are. Could someone clearly lay out the two(or more) suggested naming conventions? Then I (or other innocent bystanders) could more easily provide thoughts on their relative benefits. You all see to want the best for the 'pedia, which is always a pleasure to see in a dispute. Hope I can help. JesseW 10:01, 11 Jun 2005 (UTC) The RfC should now be removed, as there was a poll which gained no consensus, and so no change should be made. Mel Etitis ( &Mu;&epsilon;&lambda; &Epsilon;&tau;&eta;&tau;&eta;&sigmaf; ) 16:26, 12 Jun 2005 (UTC)
 * The issue is whether the naming convention should be either a) every work's name followed by a Plato parenthetical - eg Phaedo (Plato), or b) every work's name followed by a class parenthetical, and then only if needed - eg Phaedo, since there is no disambiguation need, and Parmenides (dialogue), since Parmenides is also a famous philosopher. Basically, we're talking the first scheme at the top of the page (March 5) vs. mine at the middle (May 15). I'd argue that my proposal is much closer to the standards of naming conventions and the manual of style and that the counter-arguements are not compelling enough (all discussed in detail above), but that is of course my opinion... :) --Girolamo Savonarola 15:13, 2005 Jun 12 (UTC)
 * I specifically messaged you, among others, Mel, so as to come to a consensus regarding the survey. You made no effort whatsoever to offer any opinions. If non-participation in a discussion is consensus, I'm boggled. What's more, you called out my original attempts to rename the pages because of lack of consensus. I thought I was being bold, but recognized that if someone was complaining, it was worth sitting down to discuss the issue. That you disagree with me is one thing, but wanting to bury the issue by walking away from it, as if that has decided the matter when clearly nothing was resolved, is completely unacceptable. Either participate or don't. --Girolamo Savonarola 16:57, 2005 Jun 12 (UTC)

(this section below moved to streamline discussion)

Thank you, that does help clarify things. My next question is which system (or combination of systems) is in place now? Where would the "no change" Mel refers to below leave us? JesseW 17:15, 12 Jun 2005 (UTC)
 * Well, the problem is that renames have been performed on most of these pages at least several times - many of them long before this discussion. Therefore, at the moment there is no standard across the board, nor could there be without formal requests to the admins. I did attempt this recently, but Mel protested that it be decided here, where, to the best of my knowledge, he said nothing further on the matter, nor did he encourage anyone else to. I have carefully looked over the dispute resolution steps for many weeks now so as to at least give this entire discussion a clear closure, but every step I have tried (including, until now, RfC) has led to nothing. I believe that I have been bold when necessary, but also acted in good faith where objections were raised. The only other active contributor to this discussion was Francis, who I suppose has a position somewhere in between mine and Mel's. I originally came here with critiques of his proposal, which he seemed interested in at least discussing, even where he disagreed with particulars. --Girolamo Savonarola 17:28, 2005 Jun 12 (UTC)


 * 1) I said that there was no consensus.
 * 2) I'd expressed my objections to the proposed moves. I didn't see any reason to repeat them. Mel Etitis  ( &Mu;&epsilon;&lambda; &Epsilon;&tau;&eta;&tau;&eta;&sigmaf; ) 17:29, 12 Jun 2005 (UTC)


 * Which is precisely why there was a need for a survey - so as to elicit outside opinions to CREATE a consensus, because at the moment all we have is a deadlock between two people. I messaged all those involved in the discussion already to put forth their ideas for a survey. I could've easily just popped one together and placed it onto the Ongoing Surveys section, but I respected that there needed to be an agreement as to how such as survey was crafted, as set forth in the survey guidelines. Mostly, I'm honestly frustrated at this point, because I have tried to follow policy and guidelines throughout, while assuming good faith, and nothing seems to get resolved. I am more than happy to concede my position, but I refuse to do so without there being a clear decision which is within the lines of policy for resolution. If you disagree with me Mel, that's fine. I object to the attempts to block me through inaction, and then suddenly becoming active when I try to do things like RfC and the like. If you want this to be decided, why not just support the idea of a survey, and we'll both agree to respect the results of the outcome regardless of which way it falls? --Girolamo Savonarola 17:35, 2005 Jun 12 (UTC)

OK, it is getting clearer and clearer. Mel, I assume the objections you refered to are found here: Category_talk:Dialogues_of_Plato. And the "proposed moves" are here: Category_talk:Dialogues_of_Plato. If this wrong, please correct me. Assuming this, it seems that some of the "proposed moves" have been already done - does Mel (or anyone else) object to them? Mel, of the remaining "proposed moves"(it would be good to relist them so it's clear what the current status is), I assume your previously stated objections still apply to them? JesseW 04:08, 13 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Mel Etitis's objections
I'm now going to restate Mel's objections (as I understand them): If I have mis-stated or left out any of your objections, Mel, please correct me. JesseW 04:08, 13 Jun 2005 (UTC) (edited 22:22, 13 Jun 2005 (UTC))
 * minor: links will have to be checked to see if they are redirects or not.
 * the "proposed moves" "prejudges" which of the article titles may conflict with articles on characters(i.e. Parmenides)
 * the proposal has been insufficiently justified, considering how recently the article titles were changed

Further discussion

 * The first is a minor one, though of day-to-day editing concern. I'd add (I can't remember where I've said this before, I'm afraid &mdash; it's out there somewhere) that there needs to be good reason to change the naming system, especially when it has so recently been changed; the criteria are more stringent than if we were deciding in advance how to name a set of as-yet unwritten articles.  As the original moves were made without proper consultation, I think that they ought to be reveresd.
 * Girolamo Savonarola's complaint seems to be that, once the issue was made more public, very few people showed an interest, resulting in a rejection of his proposal through "no consensus". Well, that happens; it would be more productive to go on to something else, rather than trying to rerun the debate (with an RfC that has attracted just one extra person, so that the result can't be altered no matter which side you favour).  Mel Etitis  ( &Mu;&epsilon;&lambda; &Epsilon;&tau;&eta;&tau;&eta;&sigmaf; ) 09:12, 13 Jun 2005 (UTC)

I'd like to add that I honestly believe that should a survey be placed on Ongoing Surveys, there will be a substantial outsider interest. Therefore, what I'd like to propose is the following: I will set up a draft survey and place it here in discussions. If there are any objections to the content of the survey (not its existence), then we will work to come up with something within a space of no more than a week. If no objections are heard, nothing will be altered and the survey will go out unchanged. Either way, it allows a survey to actually be created and run within the community. Response to Ongoing Surveys tends to be high, so I believe that it will resolve the issue once and for all. I have no problems letting the issue go if there clearly is a substantial opinion against my proposal. --Girolamo Savonarola 14:50, 2005 Jun 13 (UTC)

Thank you, Mel. I've now edited my re-statement of your objections above to include what you said. Again, let me know if there are any errors in my understanding of your objections. I think it would be good to revert the part of the "proposed moves" that has been completed (BTW, Girolamo, am I correct that this is the them?) until the dispute is resolved, since (AFAIK now) that would put them in a more organized place than the half-and-half position they are in now. Girolamo, please let me know if you agree with this, or have any objections. JesseW 22:24, 13 Jun 2005 (UTC)

The possibilities
Girolamo, I'm still somewhat confused as to exactly what your proposal is. I think a statement of the "old" way(Mel?) and the principle(not examples) behind "proposed moves" would clarify things. I'll take a stab at it, but please correct it! JesseW 22:23, 13 Jun 2005 (UTC)


 * Old way : All the dialogs of Plato are titled beginning with the word "Plato's" followed by the common english name of the work. Any other name is a redirect. (This was never fully implemented.)
 * "Proposed move I (March 2005)" : See top of page; the principle is explained in the "" section below.
 * "Proposed move II (May 2005)" : All the dialogs of Plato are titled with their common english name, unless this is ambiguous (and the dialogue does not have priority for that common name), in which case the word "(dialogue)" is added to the end, unless that is ambiguous, in which case the phrase "(Plato dialogue)" is added to the end. Any other name is a redirect.

Further discussion
So does this mean the dispute over whether the naming convention for Plato's texts should conform to Naming conventions or have a unified naming convention independent of the conventions? If that's a fair summary, that seems a fairly straight forward poll to put to people. Hiding 09:35, 14 Jun 2005 (UTC)


 * Responses: Jesse, I can't agree to a reversion at this point, largely because the whole point is that there was never (to my knowledge) a fully consistent standard at any point in time. The history of a lot of these pages is reversion back and forth and back and forth. I feel that the current situation is no better or worse than before - better that we simply resolve the issue and apply the reform across the board at once than continue to go back and forth. This very discussion's most recent iteration in fact occurred when I tried to apply a standardized move across the board (which was partially impossible without admin interface bc of prior article move wars making some moves blocked). What I'd like is to freeze the names of all Platonic Dialogues until this is settled. What I have been doing lately, and I don't think this is anything other than housekeeping, is making certain the "What links here" links all go to the name of the article, regardless of whose standard it is. I don't believe that biases anything one way or another, it's just standard editing background work and gives less stress to the servers.


 * The oldest standard was a lack thereof. Some things were just their titles, some were "Plato's blank", some were "Title (dialogue)", and so on. The two recent proposals were as follows:


 * 1) Old proposal (March 2005) - standardize all articles to "Title (Plato)". This was never fully realized to begin with, and had no consensus either. Some implementation, largely among the more important works' articles. This was not unopposed by editors, as can be seen by some articles being moved back and forth between two titles.
 * 2) New proposal (May 2005) - conform to naming conventions. Somewhat implemented as well. I'd re-edit Jesse's summary of that only to reflect the word "dialogue" not "dialog". I would also argue (as above) that certain works, like Apology, deserve first-order status among disambiguation, and thus no parenthetical.


 * Steve, you pretty much have summed it up. Can we please cook up a poll/survey? :) --Girolamo Savonarola 15:50, 2005 Jun 14 (UTC)

Ok, good. This is useful to know. Thanks, Girolamo, for your clairifications. I've changed dialog to dialogue above, and added a note about priority. I've also added a note about the old way never having been fully implemented. JesseW 03:59, 15 Jun 2005 (UTC)

I assume everyone wants the articles names to follow a "fully consistent standard" (If anyone does not, please say so.) Mel, do you claim that the Platonic dialogue article names before the "proposed moves" followed a "fully consistent standard"? (If not, please let me know.) If so, please state that standard, in the form I did above, i.e. as a principle. If you like, you can also (or instead) suggest an alternative "fully consistent standard". Until I hear further proof that the old way was a "fully consistent standard", I oppose reverting the changes. JesseW 03:59, 15 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Regarding Mel's objection that the "proposed moves" "prejudge" what articles may conflict with artices on characters - I don't fully understand this objection. According to my re-statement of the "propsed moves" (above), dialogues would be at their common english name until (if this happened) another article (say, one on the character) was created, at which time the dialog would be moved to "common name (dialogue)" and the character article would be at "common name". (Unless it was decided at the time that the dialogue had better claim on "common name" than the other article, in which it would go the other way.) I don't see any prejudging here. Mel, please explain that objection further. JesseW 03:59, 15 Jun 2005 (UTC)

There has been no comment on this discussion for (slightly) more than a week. Mel, in my previous comment, I asked you to: You have done neither of these two things. If you still wish to block implementation of the "proposed moves", I consider that you need to make at least some comment. If you do not post such a comment by June 29th, I will help and support the implementation of the "proposed moves", and consider this dispute over. JesseW 21:28, 23 Jun 2005 (UTC)
 * 1) State the standard that the article titles (before the "proposed moves") followed, or state that they did not follow such a standard.
 * 2) Further explain your objection that the "propsed moves" "prejudge" what articles may conflict with articles on characters.

I am not sure I would agree with the proposed moves, as this would make Plato's Republic be titled Republic, which is highly non-standard usage. 30 June 2005 16:08 (UTC)
 * Oy, Ril! :-) Just when I thought this was going to get resolved...  Looking at my description of the "proposed moves" the dialogs would be under their "common english name", which, as you said, for the dialogue titled Republic attributed to Plato would be Plato's Republic, as I understand it.  Ril, will that satisfy your objections? Girolamo, since Mel has not responded by the deadline I set, assuming Ril is satisfied, can you help me make the "proposed moves", and publicise the new standard naming convention? Hopefully we can get this unstuck, finally. JesseW 30 June 2005 21:51 (UTC)


 * Hi, I've been away from this talk page for some time (although I kept following it for about a month after Savonarola's proposal). I tend to be less concerned which of the schemes is adapted, as long as it's coherent (that is, as well coherent internally for for all works by Plato, and those linked to him even if they might be spurious, AND coherent with wikipedia guidelines, even if these guidelines might need an update for writers of antiquity).
 * I think I understand some of Mel's objections (for which Jesse asked further explanation). Not speaking for Mel, but for myself, I would give following clarification:
 * standard that the article titles (before the "proposed moves") followed
 * Before the first proposed move (the one I proposed) there was no standard, there was just mess. I explained this above on this page.
 * Before the second proposed move there was of course the standard I had proposed, which was however not completely implemented yet. I had implemented it on Plato and all Plato-related articles I could find, but at that time I hadn't discovered Stephanus pagination nor Loeb_Classical_Library yet.
 * The "prejudge" argument I understand as something like this: Presently e.g. Loeb Classical Library lists in the Plato section The Lovers (that is: The Lovers ). The inadverted reader of the wikipedia encyclopedia would be under the impression that this dialogue is treated in wikipedia. Nothing is less true: the "The Lovers" article is about a Tarot card... Either the article "The Lovers" needs some disambiguation (which is perfectly possible, I don't thoubt that, and even if the following is done this disambiguation would be welcome); and/or something is done to make the "The Lovers" link on the "Loeb Classical Library" page appear in red, indicating that the article about the ancient dialogue does not exist yet. As said, I'm not completely sure this is what Mel intended.
 * Anyway, I want to draw attention that whatever the final reform would be apart from re-organising the pages devoted to the individual writings, as well Plato as Stephanus pagination as Loeb_Classical_Library need to be tackled carefully too.
 * --Francis Schonken 1 July 2005 08:12 (UTC)
 * Thank you for your remarks! That does help illuminate some things that were previously obscure.  I also agree with you that having a coherent, consistent standard is much more important than which one we pick.  Since you weren't involved when I became involved in this issue, I did't look into your proposal - I'd be delighted if you would like to add a description of the principle used in your suggested standard to The possibilities section above. (That is, if you still think it's a good, active proposal.)  I hope that Girolamo will return, otherwise I may go to your proposal, and help you fully implement it. ;-)  Whoever shows up will get my help, I suppose. In any case, thanks again for re-joining the discussion. JesseW 1 July 2005 08:25 (UTC)

Can't let that happen! ;) Anyway, I (now) understand the rationale behind Francis's NAME (Plato)/NAME (dialogue) scheme that he originally attempted to enact, but again speaking on matters of naming conventions, clarity, and so on would have to say that I don't think that it conforms well to the established conventions. A dialogue is a dialogue regardless of who wrote it. A dialogue with a title that is unambiguous shouldn't have parentheticals. Yes, there are characters within the dialogues who are also namesakes of the dialogues, but being as most of these characters only exist within the dialogues themselves, and are not, in anything other than a generic everyman sense, the subject of the dialogue but rather a respondent, there is not a good argument in my mind towards a separate page for Euthyphro the dialogue and Euthyphro the character within the dialogue, for instance. The latter can be discussed within the article on the former.

On specific matters of the Republic and how it should be named, I also submit that "Republic (Plato dialogue)" or just plain "Republic (dialogue)" are the only two titles that can be justified at the moment. Yes, Plato's Republic comes tripping off the tongue, but it's horrible precedent, and I don't seem to remember my copies of it being appellated anything other than "The Republic". Furthermore, although Cicero's work "De re publica" may be translated the same, and is the source of the Platonic work's modern title translation, the fact is that the Cicero work is generally identified as "De re publica" and not "The Republic", as much as the latter may be an acceptable translation. When I say that I am reading "The Republic", it is not unreasonable to assume that I am reading Plato's work. Therefore I'd stick with "Republic (dialogue)", since I don't think the Plato part of the parenthetical is justified, but I very much believe that the dialogue disambiguation is, but in and of itself, and also to maintain a consistency across the rest of the works which need to be disambiguated. Disambiguation always is aesthetically unpleasing, but inconsistency both internally and externally is far moreso. --Girolamo Savonarola July 1, 2005 16:59 (UTC)

Plot summaries
I've looked over some of these dialogues, and not to be snotty, but could people make a point of writing decent plot summaries? We had a discussion of the Meno that didn't mention Socrates' confirming that the boy speaks Greek or that he was a slave as of 6/23/05. I worked on it, but that seems a little glaring. I'll say more once I get an account. -Greg
 * Hi Greg, you're so right. Every time I look at (e.g.) the Phaedo article, I'm too baffled by the bad writing, and have not yet been able to find the courage to start rewriting... Nonetheless I did some effort on Republic (Plato dialogue) still this morning, without being sure it was even improvement what I did. But at least I tried. Keep up the good work! --Francis Schonken 1 July 2005 08:20 (UTC)
 * Francis - You might try using a Phaedo (Plato)/Temp article - do a full rewrite there, then request review on the Talk page, and if there are no objections, move it over... JesseW 1 July 2005 08:31 (UTC)
 * Where to work on an article is not the problem. I've experimented with several techniques of draft writing for wikipedia. The problem with the bad writing in articles devoted to Plato dialogues, is that many wikipedians are so tense about what they consider "the only possible interpretation of Plato", that even non-interpretative summaries of the content of such dialogues are easily rejected. So one needs a lot of time, and not get excited over endless reverts to particular non-NPOV discourses inserted in the "summary" section. To give an example: I've no idea whether Leo Strauss' interpretation of Plato's Republic is generally accepted today. But someone insists on this interpretation to be in the "content summary" section of that article... --Francis Schonken 1 July 2005 09:16 (UTC)

Latest updates
I've put up the last three articles for formal moves on Requested moves. (These being Apology, Phaedo, and Meno.) All others have been standardized and double redirects eliminated. The Plato article's Tetrologies list of works all link directly to standardized names in accordance with the naming convention, as does the Stephanus pagination article. I have not yet rolled over all links to the standardized article names, but there should be no double redirects left in existence. I will work on changing all links directly to the proper page names in the next few weeks. --Girolamo Savonarola 18:19, 11 August 2005 (UTC)
 * Good. If you need further help, just let me know on my talk page. JesseW 19:53, 11 August 2005 (UTC)

Here are Mel's latest objections, with absolutely no elaboration whatsoever. I am tired of playing cat and mouse here. We wanted to discuss, we gave plenty of time (during which Mel had no problem staying busy as an editor of many other portions of the Wikipedia), and received no response in any ordinate amount of time. And the new objections are nothing more than lodging a "nay" vote. I am afraid that others may view these without context, so I have referred the debates on the three articles' talk pages here to give the full picture and history of the debate at large.

The only issue that I think still is a reasonable one to be discussing now is whether or not Apology should be listed as "Apology (dialogue)" or have the primary topic as "Apology" and give a header link to "Apology (disambiguation)" for all others.

Nonetheless, here are Mel's comments with my responses.

From Apology


 * Oppose &mdash; for the reasons given before. Apology should be a disambiguation page. --Mel Etitis  ( &Mu;&epsilon;&lambda; &Epsilon;&tau;&eta;&tau;&eta;&sigmaf; ) 20:47, 11 August 2005 (UTC)
 * You refused to participate in the dialogue last time or respond to questions and criticisms specifically asked of you, even after given many weeks. Anyone interested in the naming decision, please see Category talk:Dialogues of Plato. As for the disambiguation issue, which is a separate but important one, the naming conventions clearly state that even if there are multiple topics with the same title, if one of them is considered of greater prominence than the others, it may be considered the primary topic, and all others would be linked from the "Topic (disambiguation)" page that would also be given as a link in the primary topic heading. This has already been done and I believe that Plato's Apology is clearly the prime topic among those listed, given its high status in classical history and ancient Greek philosophy. Regardless, if there is disagreement on that point, then I will still petition to change the name from "Apology (Plato)" to "Apology (philosophy)" in accordance with standard Wikipedia naming conventions. --Girolamo Savonarola 21:09, 11 August 2005 (UTC)

From Meno

Oppose &mdash; for the reasons that led to lack of consensus the last time this was requested. --Mel Etitis ( &Mu;&epsilon;&lambda; &Epsilon;&tau;&eta;&tau;&eta;&sigmaf; ) 20:48, 11 August 2005 (UTC)
 * Mel, you left the dialogue last time and refused to address any of the questions we had for you. I'd like to refer anyone else interested in this discussion to Category talk:Dialogues of Plato. --Girolamo Savonarola 21:03, 11 August 2005 (UTC)

Support all three moves. Mel's "reasons given before" have been rebutted, multiple times. JesseW 21:32, 11 August 2005 (UTC) Support all three moves. In regards to Mel's response below, on point one it should be pointed out Mel was still debating this in the middle of June, and that a discussion can't be closed permanently as Mel suggests. On point two, it's a matter of naming conventions versus Mel's preference. Whilst I respect Mel's position, I see no reason to supercede the naming conventions. Point three is irrelevant to the debate. Hiding talk 04:39, 14 August 2005 (UTC)

Mel Etitis' response

 * 1) The previous debates were officially closed (no consensus) by (t) on 24 May; I saw no reason to continue debating an issue that had been settled. The rather hostile and aggressive tone adopted by Girolamo Savonarola and, to a lesser extent, by JesseW is inappropriate and unhelpful (and puzzling, given the context; why such emotion?), as is the implication that they have been waiting for my reply for two months despite the debate having been closed.
 * 2) I have seen no rebuttal of my points, in fact; I still hold, for example, that consistency of naming is of value, especially in terms of editors adding links to other articles.
 * 3) I might add that it would have been courteous, at least, to have asked me before moving my comments from the individual Talk pages to this one. --Mel Etitis ( &Mu;&epsilon;&lambda; &Epsilon;&tau;&eta;&tau;&eta;&sigmaf; ) 22:30, 11 August 2005 (UTC)

Questions for Mel
Do not disambiguate, or add a link to a disambiguation page, if there is no risk of confusion. (Disambiguation) Phaedo (Plato) should thus be Phaedo, as should Meno (Plato) be Meno. I'm sorry, Mel, but the policy happens to say otherwise. Consistency is of value, I agree. I value the policies set forth, and I'm trying to apply them consistently across the articles. Adding (Plato) to every dialogue is not only ugly, but it sets horrible precedent and completely contradicts the official naming conventions. You disagree with the naming conventions? Fine. Argue about it in policy discussions; I'm happy to respect any changes in policy. Furthermore, if anything, I would think it would be easier for editors to link to Meno than Meno (Plato). And since the one redirects to the other, it's a rather silly point to object to using the simpler one, all other things being equal.

If you have a problem with the comments being moved, you have editing powers too. I thought my reasons were fairly obvious and stated.

Here are the questions we're asking you.
 * State the standard that the article titles (before the "proposed moves") followed, or state that they did not follow such a standard. Francis stated that there was not one to begin with. We are 95% implemented on a standard now. Please let us finish this work or give a good reason why we should completely start over.
 * Further explain your objection that the "propsed moves" "prejudge" what articles may conflict with articles on characters.
 * I would like to know what system you'd like to replace this all with, what policies support the usage of that, and whether or not you plan to implement it yourself and roughly how quickly you think you can do that.
 * I would also like to know why this system, which is so close to being finished now, should be abandoned. Why this particular one should not exist, in your mind.
 * Are you willing to concede and compromise, and if not, why and how do you propose that we solve this situation?
 * Are you willing to conduct a survey to resolve the issue?
 * Are you willing to bring the matter to a mediator to resolve the issue?

I assume from your response here that you count yourself as within the discussion at the moment. So indulge me and allow that we'll presume that you have no further interest in the matter if you do not respond promptly - say within the next week - but continue to edit other parts of the Wikipedia otherwise.

Thank you. --Girolamo Savonarola 02:00, 12 August 2005 (UTC)

Avoiding mess
I got a kind invitation from Girolamo to give my opinion re. the latest proposed changes to titles of Plato articles.

I don't see much use in these changes. Stronger: I oppose many of the changes already performed. For some of these there was no prior consensus: for instance "Republic (dialogue)" as an article title still strongly suggests there's only one influential dialogue titled "Republic", which simply is misleading.

The reason I rather back Mel than Savonarola in this near endless dispute (without going in all the details) is that Mel's approach, in my appreciation, would better avoid mess in the long run.

I still see no problem in adjusting guidelines to what works best, I think this much better anyhow than applying guidelines in a blindfolded fashion.

Then, even many of the "less hassle" solutions proposed in my original list above didn't even need a rewrite of the guidelines all that much. That's what I mean with a "blindfolded" application of guidelines: the bigger picture is important too, I don't see Girolamo grasping that bigger picture all that much. And now we can explain that in long talk page texts (and that is what has been done, and which I'm not unwilling to continue, but not if it ultimately only continues the discussion as a goal in itself).

So, at this point I back Mel's proposals and not Girolamo's, and kindly ask Girolamo to revert his solutions that were applied without general consent.

--Francis Schonken 11:07, 14 August 2005 (UTC)


 * Mel, I appreciate your comments. Thanks for joining in the discussion again. Can you please elaborate specifically on why you think Mel's approach will be better? And why you think that my method is not effective? I understand your Republic comment, but if you are referring to the other dialogues, specifically Cicero's, I believe that we've already discussed the matter - my conclusion is that none of the other dialogues are generally accepted to have "Republic" as the dominant English-language title of the text. Cicero's usually retains the Latin title, and Bodin's has alternate translations that are often preferred, as well as not being (to my knowledge) an actual dialogue. Furthermore, even if both of these works were in fact dialogues with the common name of Republic, the current title as it stands can indeed still direct to the Plato text if it is considered to be prominent enough to be the primary topic for the title. Given the prominence of the work in the whole of philosophy, as well as the fact that the other two works don't have a clear enough claim to the title as a standard, I think it's more than enough to grant Plato's work the primary topic for the text.


 * Again, as far as the convention as a whole en masse and other specific titles, I'd like some elaboration as to why and how this will negatively affect things. (contribution by Girolamo, see edit history)


 * My name is Francis, not Mel.
 * I have more confidence in Mel's approach. That's the basic reason. Not that I always agree with Mel on everything!
 * The way Girolamo is handling this gives me much less confidence. There was no agreement on the "Republic (Plato dialogue)" -> "Republic (dialogue)" change. Girolamo changed nonetheless. Yes, quoting Girolamo, "we already discussed that matter", but the result of that discussion was not anything near to a consensus to change. So I don't trust all that much how Girolamo is proceeding with regard to this discussion.
 * And I don't like it when wikipedia discussions turn into discussions on whether one prefers the style of one individual over another. In my view that should be avoided, while basicly un-wikipedian. But it has happened nonetheless.
 * That being said, for Plato's republic, I just quote what I wrote yesterday (but similar quotes can be retrieved from the discussion a month, two months, etc... ago): "Republic (dialogue)" as an article title still strongly suggests there's only one influential dialogue titled "Republic", which simply is misleading. and we can explain that in long talk page texts (and that is what has been done, and which I'm not unwilling to continue, but not if it ultimately only continues the discussion as a goal in itself).
 * So I still need to know whether Girolamo is just steering for a "discussion as a goal in itself", after which he reverts to whatever he likes personally, not really taking account of the views brought forward in the discussion. So this is only the first step in clarifications I might add, but let's agree on the basis of such discussion first: no discussions void of meaning please (which also implies: reading what someone else writes). --Francis Schonken 06:13, 15 August 2005 (UTC)


 * Francis, very sorry about the gaffe there!
 * In any case, very well. You choose to side with Mel on the matter. I am not going to continue discussion on this matter and rather am apt to let the whole thing drop. But I remind you that likely one of you two will try to revert the changes as a result. And either of you who does will be doing so unilaterally and with no more or less consensus that I have. So be it. I can only hope that someone else comes in and is able to convince and engage a broad number of individuals to create a naming standard that actually is consistent with the rest of the Wikipedia. I have done everything I can think of to bring more people to this discussion, and I have failed, apparently. If no one else is going to step in to offer their opinion, I believe that we have reached a deadlock.
 * I hope that you and Mel will appreciate that fact as well. --Girolamo Savonarola 06:47, 15 August 2005 (UTC)


 * "[...] likely one of you two will try to revert the changes as a result." ???? I rather expected you to do the tedious work of reverting unsolicited changes... I understand from your words that's not going to happen, and I don't want to aggravate tensions, so I suppose it's rather to be expected most article names will stay as they are for the time being. Which I don't think the most ideal solution, so inviting Girolamo to take initiative in reverting his unsolicited changes re. the "Republic" and "Apology" dialogues (and related disambig/redirect pages). Note that there are still double redirects floating around re. these pages (not caused by me!)
 * Yes I agree with the obvious conclusion (for the time being) that some kind of deadlock occurred regarding an over-all "uniformised" naming scheme for works by Plato. The original error was probably mine, it was probably too much a "top down" kind of approach, which is usually not very workable in wikipedia dynamics (in other words: I should have known). So, indeed, for the time being I don't think Plato "naming schemes" will work, certainly not one forced by a voting procedure. I'm not sorry I tried: that the situation is less messy than when I started is undeniable (e.g. getting rid of "Plato's Laws" and the like, except as redirect).
 * So I remove the sentence that "a new naming scheme is being discussed" from the Plato page. And I think we should all get to work on the articles themselves. The naming scheme discussion did not improve the Phaedo article content (the only improvement being that it was de-doubled, so leaving us with "one" Phaedo article with a "cleanup" flag instead of two nearly identical ones!). The Republic (dialogue) content has gone "bazurk" again over the last few weeks, nobody seeming to be intrested in structuring the article itself (my last attempt in that sense was around the time when I started this discussion here way up on this page). My best guess is that if we manage to improve the content of the articles relating to Plato's writings (and not have Plato's The Lovers redirect to a Tarot card in the mean while, etc...), we'll be happy to find each other here again in a few weeks or months, and deciding on the best names for the articles will resolve itself in a swiff. --Francis Schonken 10:40, 15 August 2005 (UTC)


 * Fair enough, I suppose. I thought I had cleared up all the double redirects, but I'll give that a more thorough look-through tonight - I have no intention to leave those in such a state. Perhaps you are right, we should just give this all a rest for the meantime. Should discussion lapse here for a week or two, I think it best to archive all of this so that the talk page can at least be more easily readable again. If there are no new voices joining us within the next day or two, I suppose I'll probably also withdraw my requested moves from said page. --Girolamo Savonarola 19:39, 15 August 2005 (UTC)

Requested move
The article names need to be consistent and I am not convinced that there is any consensus as to what that convention should be. I will therefore not move the articles at the moment and have closed the move request. violet/riga (t) 21:48, 20 August 2005 (UTC)