Talk:Verfasserlexikon

comprised of
This discussion was moved from User talk:Pfold

If you would please read why User:Giraffedata and I keep undoing your reverts on the phrase "comprised of" on the article Verfasserlexikon, please read the link attached to the title. It is incorrect english. There is an entire essay on why it is wrong. Here's the basic explanation: It has long been disputed by English Language critics. So please, stop reverting that change because it isn't "pointless" as you call it. Redditaddict69 09:21, 18 August 2018 (UTC)
 * "to comprise" is defined as "to consist of"
 * therefore, "comprised of" means "consist of of"
 * Sorry, I simply don't accept your assertion that "comprised of" is wrong. Changing an article solely to reflect your own stylistic preference is a breach of MOS:VAR. --Pfold (talk) 15:33, 18 August 2018 (UTC)


 * The thing is, it's not a preference. It's an essay and if you search for it anywhere on Wikipedia, you won't find it.

insource:"comprised of" will turn up with no results. Redditaddict69 20:04, 18 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Well, considering that you have made it your life's work to remove "comprised of", the absence has no evidentiary value whatsoever, has it? A more representiative corpus, Google Books, finds >8m examples, and the ngram viewer shows a wide historical spread:
 * Your crusade has been roundly criticized by a number of folk, so it's not just me who finds it objectionable. Go and do something useful on WP - add some content rather than carping about what others have contributed. --Pfold (talk) 21:05, 18 August 2018 (UTC)


 * hmm okay, I'm just confused why you won't let this be. Comprised of may be correct, but so is "consisting of". There's nothing wrong with changing it. And it's not my life's work, I'm just assisting Giraffedata's "life's work" if that is what you choose to call it. Redditaddict6<b style="color:#3399FF">9</b> 05:48, 19 August 2018 (UTC)


 * To me, that's the critical point. Changing "consisting of" to "comprised of" is at least as pointless as changing in the other direction.  And that an edit is pointless is never a reason to revert it.  Doing so is an abuse of the Wikipedia editing privilege.  A reversion is an edit, and a good edit is one that the editor believes in good faith improves the article.  One shouldn't edit Wikipedia to make a point.
 * While objection to using "comprise" to mean "compose" is not universal, it is far from a personal stylistic preference of Redditaddict69 or me. It is widely subscribed-to usage, which is why it deserves consideration in choosing the optimal wording for a Wikipedia article.
 * MOS:VAR, by the way, is inapplicable to word usage. As has been discussed many times on the MOS talk page, even with respect to this particular word, MOS just doesn't get involved in wording.  The style MOS covers is technical things like punctuation.  A policy much more applicable when we speak of someone watching an article and methodically reverting to a certain wording just because he got there first is WP:OWN.  Bryan Henderson (giraffedata) (talk) 20:02, 19 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Well said. Nothing wrong with changing it because both mean the same thing. A version that is 100% recognized as correct is better than one that is 90% recognized as correct. <b style="color:#3399FF">Redditaddict</b><b style="color:#339900">6</b><b style="color:#3399FF">9</b> 21:26, 19 August 2018 (UTC)


 * When your original change was reverted, with no discussion you insisted on repeatedly attempting to enforce your own preference. Look at your choice of words - "I'm just confused why you won't let this be". This is just bullying. Imposing your own linguistic preference on an article to which you have previously made no contribution, and without the support of other editors, is bad manners apart fom anything else. After a few tries, you came not to the article's talk page to get a consensus for your change, but to my user talk page. That's not where this discussion should be - if you can get support from other editors of the article, fair enough. If you can't, then you're obliged to abandon your efforts. --Pfold (talk) 06:12, 20 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Pfold asked me if I would have a look at this as an uninvolved observer. I tend to agree with him: once the change was reverted there was no reason to keep changing it, even if "consists of" is just as correct. Wikipedia is not bound by the preferrences of a few pedants, I would argue. "comprised of" is not "90% correct," it is 100% correct in the 21st century, and has been for some time now. I was not even aware that anyone objected until I ran into Giraffedata's edits.--Ermenrich (talk) 13:23, 20 August 2018 (UTC)

"is comprised of" is accepted usage
The trouble with the position of User:Giraffedata and User:Redditaddict69 is firstly, that no linguist nor any professional writer/editor regards a linguistic form as incorrect because of a supposed illogicality. The only criterion of correctness is usage. A usage that is widespread amongst competent users of a particular register (and which they don't themselves correct) is de facto correct. I don't accept that "English language critics" (i.e. prescriptive grammarians, all of whom, notice, are self-appointed) should be the arbiters of what is and is not an acceptable usage. Have a look at Attention Grammar Pedants, the English Language Isn’t Logical by Lynne Murphy (Professor of Linguistics at Sussex).

Secondly, the method used to establish the illogicality in this case is faintly ludicrous (or perhaps just naive). It runs thus: '"to comprise" is defined as "to consist of", therefore, "comprised of" means "consist of of"' (directly quoted from User:Redditaddict69). The writer seems unaware that if you substitute one verb for another when the two verbs have different semantics, of course you are likely to produce nonsense.


 * [things contained - subject] comprise [container - object]
 * [container - subject] consists of [things contained - object]

You can't substitute these verbs for each other because they have exactly opposite semantic structures. "Comprise" can have a passive, "consist" can't. The whole suggested replacement process shows a lack of linguistic senstivity (and a failure to analyse) - surely unforgivable in anyone who has the nerve to go round telling other people their usage is wrong.

You can easily see how daft it is, if you try another substitution. "Comprise" has a synonym "make up" (explicitly listed as such in the OED):


 * [individual components - subject] make up [final whole - object]

If the procedure cited by these purists has any validity, it would be illogical to say


 * [final whole - now the subject in a passive construction] is made up of [individual components - now the object]

So, where's the crusade against "is made up of"?!

But is the usage "is comprised of" actually used by competent writers of English? The answer is unambiguously yes. If you search Google Books, which contains only published works written (mostly) by professional writers and copy-edited by professional editors, it finds more than 3.5 million examples of "is comprised of".

Given that we are here talking about an encyclopedia, it's worth searching for "encyclopedia is comprised of" - over 300 works are cited. I do not care how right User:Giraffedata and User:Redditaddict69 think they are, I don't accept that they know more about good English writing than 300+ professional authors and editors. The use of "is comprised of" is not just an acceptable way to describe how a encyclopedia is put together, it is one of the standard ways!

This crusade against "is comprised of" is based on ignorance and executed with arrogance, not to mention a basic flouting of WP etiquette. It's an utterly pointless waste of time for all concerned.

I do not propose to debate this matter further. I am reverting to the orignal wording. If you, User:Redditaddict69, insist on changing it again, I will revert to the original wording yet again (you'd be opposing the views of two editors of this page) and report you to WP Admin for edit warring. --Pfold (talk) 16:53, 22 August 2018 (UTC)


 * – I think you're the one that should be reported for edit warring if you change that back again. I only reworded that after I expanded the article and reworded the entire thing. You're changing it back for no reason, a violation of MOS:VAR, as you said yourself. There's nothing to revert since I removed that sentence entirely. <b style="color:#3399FF">Redditaddict</b><b style="color:#339900">6</b><b style="color:#3399FF">9</b> 16:57, 22 August 2018 (UTC)


 * Well, while we're at it: the latest edit says "encompasses", but look at "encyclopedia encompasses" in Google Books and you will see that it is always followed not by the structural components of the book but the subject areas covered. So the use of "encompasses" here is out of keeping with its normal use when applied to encyclopedias. That makes the reversion a perfectly legitimate edit, even if it wasn't before. --Pfold (talk) 17:00, 22 August 2018 (UTC)


 * I'm gonna be perfectly honest, you're taking this argument a bit too far. If both "encompasses" and "comprised of" have opposition here, why can't we just change it to something we all accept? There's no point in defending a view that isn't acceptd by 100% of English speakers if there's one that does work for everyone. If it's reverted back, you know that when we search insource:"comprised of" and see that there, we'll end up correcting it again. We can both save ourselves the time by not doing that and just letting it be something that causes no issues. That's all we have to do here. <b style="color:#3399FF">Redditaddict</b><b style="color:#339900">6</b><b style="color:#3399FF">9</b> 17:11, 22 August 2018 (UTC)