User talk:Quondum

Please don't try to systematically change "which" to "that"

It's unnecessary and disruptive to systematically enforce personal preference for phrasing across the wiki. As explained in English relative clauses § That or which for non-human antecedents, "Both that and which are commonly used. [...] Linguists, according to Stanford linguist Arnold Zwicky, generally regard the proposed rule on not using which in restrictive relative clauses as 'a really silly idea'." –jacobolus (t) 22:05, 30 June 2024 (UTC)

My reasons for doing this go beyond a simple personal linguistic preference. Citing a single dissenting opinion (which here you quote out of context, given that the same passage gives a more reasoned account for the value of its use for disambiguation) is unconvincing, IMO. In everyday English, I agree with Zwicky that imposing a general rule of this nature is "really silly"; however, this does not apply here, as it is helpful to be precise and unambiguous in technical articles, and no-one is imposing a rule. I frequently find, when reading technical articles in Wikipedia, that to understand the sense, that I have to backtrack to disambiguate (often due to an omitted comma before a non-restrictive 'which', or a comma of a previous parenthesis before a restrictive 'which'), so I seek to reduce the unnecessary cognitive load on the reader. I also don't have any cross-wiki intentions; I focus primarily on articles where clarity is helpful. In most cases, I make the change to an article precisely when I found an instance problematic in this way, though that might trigger me into a sweep of the article. Keep in mind that new readers are not able to disambiguate as easily, whereas you may already know the sense in which it is likely meant through familiarity.

By way of analogy, it would be silly to impose a rule of logical punctuation in general given the prevalence of conflicting norms and style guides. Yet, in WP we have precisely this rule, and I believe that it serves us well. We gain by not subscribing to general style guides, but by establishing our own. Indeed, the MoS has many examples of suggested style choice where this serves to make the intended meaning clearer.

I infer that your preference is to use the restrictive 'which' to 'that', since you have been moved to comment. You have not even pointed out why this particular type of edit might actually be disruptive, among all of my edits, many of which have similar reasons, such as consistency of format, or such. —Quondum 23:10, 30 June 2024 (UTC)

Again, please don't try to force all of Wikipedia to conform to your arbitrary personal stylistic preferences. It creates churn for no benefit: The resulting sentences are no prettier, clearer, or easier to read. The only difference is they sound like you (or someone with your preference) wrote them instead of their original authors. But that's not sufficient reason for this. Until there is a wiki-wide consensus leading to a rule in the manual of style declaring that which must be replaced with that (which I certainly hope doesn't happen, because it would be pointlessly disruptive), it is not appropriate to make this type of edit. –jacobolus (t) 23:15, 30 June 2024 (UTC)

Oboy. You have not made a case, nor have you shown willingness to try to understand vantage point. Please do not harass me. —Quondum

I am not "harassing" you. But I do intend to systematically revert all of your which -> that changes. These are not supported by policy, and your disruptive bot-like edits on this point explicitly run counter to WP:STYLEVAR: Wikipedians should not pedantically copyedit based on discredited prescriptions from a century ago instead of prevailing practices of good English writers. If you want to read more sources explaining that "which" or "that" are interchangeable in this context and depend on personal preference, there are many out there. Here's Mirriam-Webster as an example: https://www.merriam-webster.com/grammar/when-to-use-that-and-which –jacobolus (t) 23:37, 30 June 2024 (UTC)

"Logical" punctuation is also an arbitrary stylistic choice, and if it were up to me personally we wouldn't bother twiddling these but would just leave it up to authors' preference. However, it was chosen by community-wide consensus and is enforced as an official policy. –jacobolus (t) 23:21, 30 June 2024 (UTC)

Take time, calm down before you post on my talk page again, and if you ever do, I expect a more cooperative tone from you. I asked you to not harass me, yet you persist doing so on my talk page. I definitely regard your persistence as harassment. This behaviour seems atypical of you: you are not normally so unthinkingly combative. Also before you act on your threat: you may face a harassment claim after this interaction and threat. Systematically reverting what I did prior to any discussion along these lines will definitely bring a complaint against you. Stop it. This is your second warning. Do not post here repeating yourself. —Quondum 23:50, 30 June 2024 (UTC)

I am being entirely cooperative, and talking to you now instead of just starting an edit war. (Though you are now making formal threats, which seems weird.)

You must desist from making this type of edit in the future. Making mechanistic edits to enforce your personal preferences is explicitly against Wikipedia policy, as expressed in WP:STYLEVAR, and against the spirit of a collaborative encyclopedia with many voices. Reverting such edits is the standard practice on Wikipedia, and is neither a "threat", nor is it anything personal. Reversion to the previous variation is indeed the only reasonable remedy for WP:STYLEVAR violations. Take a look at e.g. WP:BRD for a related discussion.

If you think conversion of which -> that should be enshrined as official policy, feel free to start a formal community request to put it into the manual of style.

But note that it is based on an ignorant and obsolete ideology without evidentiary support (which sadly was foisted on a few generations by ignorant English teachers and still persists among even some professional copyeditors who should know better). Here's a data-driven survey from the 70s which turned up in a quick search JSTOR 454721: "The advice that which be used only nonrestrictively is thus so far from reflecting actual practice that it should be abandoned. ¶ "A statement reflecting actual edited usage would read somethin like this: nonrestrictive clauses have only which as a relative; restric tive clauses may have either which or that. The actual choice between the two in restrictive clauses seems to depend on taste and style."

–jacobolus (t) 00:06, 1 July 2024 (UTC)