Wikipedia talk:Historiographical approach to the GNG

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I'm feeling the need for the historiographical, information-focused, primary/secondary source typing and matching information-independence classification approach to be written into an essay. I am completely confident that it is the right approach as a theoretical basis, and cannot deny that many good editors reject it while mismatching it to other concepts like reliability and bias/POV.

Accordingly, "Wikipedia as an encyclopedia" belongs squarely in the field of [[historiography ]], not science, not journalism, and then, for the sake of sensible communication, let's adopt the language of historiography (as is largely the case in Wikipedia policy,  [[WP:PSTS ]] especially, if not always in practice (eg NSPORT)).

Who wrote it, and why, and to what audience? Note that "information" is " [[secondary source ]] d", as distinct from data, which is pure, testable, or provable. Information and knowledge is interpretive, subjective, depends on perspective, and not necessarily subject to being tested or proved. If an interpretation of the data becomes testable and reliable and provable, that interpretation becomes data.

"Reliable" is not a bad word, indeed, quality secondary sources are expected to be published in publications, by publishers, and editors, with a reputation for reliability. Never discard "reliable", Wikipedia does not want to open a door to analysis of unreliable data. -- [[User:SmokeyJoe|SmokeyJoe ]] ( [[User talk:SmokeyJoe|talk ]]) 01:08, 19 March 2022 (UTC)



If it were, the entire world would agree on whether the color here was blue or green – or even agree on whether blue and green are separate colors, [[Blue–green distinction in language|which they don't ]]. The color itself is absolutely "pure, testable, provable data". You can get out a spectrometer and measure the wavelength to the exact nanometer, if you want to. But when you decide to call that wavelength "blue" or "green", you are already interpreting that "pure, testable, provable data". And yet I don't think that you would be satisfied if a source said "They sell a blue-green widget" that you were looking at a subjective interpretation and therefore a secondary source that demonstrated notability. [[User:WhatamIdoing|WhatamIdoing ]] ( [[User talk:WhatamIdoing|talk ]]) 02:43, 19 March 2022 (UTC) SmokeyJoe (talk) 03:21, 19 March 2022 (UTC)


 * Primary sources transition into secondary sources. Data transitions into information, and information into knowledge. The first challenge is for all to agree in the meanings of words.  This doesn’t mean that everyone has to use words the same way, but that differences can be recognised and translated. —SmokeyJoe (talk) 04:22, 19 March 2022 (UTC)