Wikipedia talk:Contents/Lists/Archive 2004

Older discussion
After going to all that effort, I've realized that this should be a list of lists of topics, not lists of articles. By listing topics, we also create check-lists for possible future articles. The Anome
 * --Kenny sh 11:11, 15 Feb 2004 (UTC): I agree. We can make a new one yet another category list.


 * But then we can take List of reference tables as starting point and extend it, making more tables of topics, so that eventually all articles are in one of these tables. - Patrick 11:59 May 1, 2003 (UTC)


 * You might want to build on one of the Category schemes or on Wikipedia arranged by topic and expand some of the topical lists included in the main subject articles. This new list somehow duplicates those. BTW we recently merged Talk:List of topics lists and List of topic lists back into List of reference tables. User:Docu

I think it would be best if this list served as an entry point to the general fields of knowledge, while List of reference tables remained a quick jump to specific articles with a common theme, as the title implies. And why not use the subject categories that are used on the Main Page, since that is what our browsing visitors see first? Except for Opera, I think it divides knowledge up fairly evenly and logically.

None of the lists on this page are comprehensive and up-to-date. Most, like List of parapsychology topics are barely started, while List of mathematics topics has become so large that it is difficult to edit. Therefore, I've been adding categories (such as Cooking and Geography that include a list of subcategories on the page until someone creates a separate page for a longer list. GUllman 20:58 20 May 2003 (UTC)


 * Rats - I just (partially) reinvented this particular wheel at list of science topics. Martin 16:26, 3 Aug 2003 (UTC)


 * LOL - BTW there is also: List of academic disciplines -- User:Docu


 * I've been trying to make a new front page category scheme at Main Page/Temp5... but it's not easy :( Help appreciated! Martin 16:53, 3 Aug 2003 (UTC)


 * Maybe it's just like changing tires. Hard to say what to suggest, given that Search may or may not be available. -- User:Docu

User:Kenny sh, I have been carefully considering the major rearrangment that you have done, and I respectfully disagree with just about all your changes and am just about to revert the page.
 * User:Kenny sh: I am sorry for too big rearrangement.

1. The category groupings are intended to be in the same order as on the Main Page, so that subjects can easily be found. The Main Page is an entry point to top-level articles, while this page is an entry point to top-level lists of articles.
 * User:Kenny sh: I understand you. IMHO order of Main Page is not ideal.

2. You moved Chemistry and its subfields from the Natural Sciences to the Applied Sciences. Perhaps the articles include both natural phenomena and man-made applications, but so do the other Natural Sciences and Mathematics. And chemistry is certainly not a study of humans like the social sciences and arts.
 * User:Kenny sh: I agree.

3. "About Humans" is a very awkward phrase, and is not a parallel construction to "Natural Sciences" and "Abstract Sciences" (and what does the latter term mean? -- that it doesn't have any practical applications?) GUllman 01:31, 13 Feb 2004 (UTC)
 * --Kenny sh 11:11, 15 Feb 2004 (UTC): It would more nice to say 'Human sciences', but not every knowledge is science.  For example, Government is Applied Art or Sciences? IMHO, it is something related to Humans environment. I think, that it could be some basic knowlefge domains: General (instead Abstract Sciences), Humans ("About Humans", contains Culture, Government, Psyholgy, Domestic environment, etc), Nature (sciences and not sciences, "Green Peace" for example), and Techlology (Cars, Robots, Computers). It is my point of view. What do you think about it? Were can I imlement it?
 * Go ahead and create your own page by adding it to the list at Category schemes. You will know whether it gains support if other people add to it. GUllman 22:52, 16 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Which namespace to use
Can we settle on where all these topical lists belong, so we can cut down on the self-references and cross-namespace links? A lot of this stuff is still at Basic topics and its relatives. If we're going to have this in the article namespace, it seems like a lot of that stuff should be migrated. --Michael Snow 22:02, 16 Apr 2004 (UTC)
 * This was originally the list at Basic topics, but most of those lists were never created, while lists of articles at the bottom of articles overgrew the page and were placed on a separate wiki page. You are probably right that they should be in one namespace or another. However, this serves much the same purpose as other non-article pages Main Page and List of reference tables -- should those pages be moved to meta and avoid self references as well?  And some encyclopedic pages that include a list of articles range from one sentence of content to 90% content -- where do you draw the line? Move all lists of articles to a separate page in meta? Or remove self-references and move them to wiki? GUllman 22:52, 16 Apr 2004 (UTC)
 * The Main Page is really dual-function, even though it's located in the article namespace. List of reference tables, and List of academic disciplines, have a lot better separation than this page currently does. Honestly, I think the name of the page itself is problematic, because it's almost inherently self-referential. (It's a "list of articles". A list of articles in what? A list of articles in Wikipedia, of course.) I'm thinking the name of this page could be improved, and all the Basic topics stuff migrated to the article namespace. Probably leaving the single Basic topics page behind as a guide telling people where they should go if they want to contribute their knowledge about a particular subject. --Michael Snow 23:17, 16 Apr 2004 (UTC)
 * Now I see your point. A list of academic subjects or reference tables is encyclopedic and does not depend on the existence of Wikipedia. The lists would be the same if Wikipedia did not exist, were partially reproduced elsewhere, or printed on paper. This list of articles by category (like the list of basic topics) really should be a Wikipedia maintenance page, like the WikiProjects. It discusses and refers to all the articles Wikipedia as an external entity.  Per your suggestion, I'll put on my to-do list the moving of this page and all subordinate pages to meta space. GUllman 23:40, 16 Apr 2004 (UTC)
 * I'm not sure that all the subordinate pages have to be moved, or it seems a little more extreme solution than I was looking for. To choose a random example, the list of medical topics linked here seems okay given Wikipedia's nature, considering all the far shoddier lists we tolerate and the fact that Wikipedia is not paper. But this one, which is sort of a list of lists of topics, does feel a little meta, and the intro sort of reflects that. --Michael Snow 00:11, 17 Apr 2004 (UTC)
 * I don't see any difference between this page and its subordinate pages in the content or intent; they were all created with the purpose of providing an overview of the articles that have been created and finding holes in the coverage. They are not indisputable, factual lists like the List of reference tables used to be (when it was originally intended to have only almanac-type reference lists, before they dumped the lists from this page into it, creating a misnomer.) This list, and its subordinate lists, contain one possible way of organizing knowledge (chosen by our consensus), listing only the articles that are on Wikipedia, including unique projects that other encyclopedias don't have. GUllman 09:08, 17 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Could there be some kind of consistency with regard to the number of lists a subject is allowed to put up here, and with regard to how developed they are? As it is currently, mathematics has thousands of articles, indexed by close to a hundred different math lists, but there is only ONE line given to math here -- this is okay, since by clicking on the link, one can find the hundred sublists. But business and some other fields have around a dozen separate independent sublists on THIS page, instead of putting them all together as a link to other sublists. Furthermore, many of the lists given here are barely lists at all, if you click on them. This page is getting very long as it is now, it's annoying for the reader to scroll through; there has to be a saturation point where when a certain number of sublists is reached, a LINK to a list of sublists is made. Otherwise, the page will just grow beyond all control.
 * Yes, that was EXACTLY my intent. I wanted it to grow until I could nest them hierarchically like the Yahoo! subject browse. It's ridiculous how long list of reference tables is getting, even though they have enough links in each subject that they can do this.  As for this page, there were enough links in 'Mathematics' that someone did break it off as a separate page, and so I replaced the list with a link.  The 'Business' links are next, but the list is at the bottom of the long main article on Business instead of its own page.  As for the rest, it doesn't make much sense, and doesn't same much space, to move two or three 'lists of articles' on a subject to its own page (and I don't have expertise in these subject to create more of them.)  During the first two years of Wikipedia, people were creating lots of these 'lists of articles' to make sure all broad topics are covered, but nobody is creating them any more.  Seems everyone has settled into their favorite Wikiproject, making trivial lists of items that have something in common, and has forgotten about completing the broad subject lists and articles on broad subjects. GUllman 17:57, 5 May 2004 (UTC)

Move complete
Couldn't move it using the move tab, since there was already a history here.

Sister project: List of basic topic lists
The Basic topics page is in the process of being converted into a list of basic topic lists.