Wikipedia talk:Getting to Philosophy: Difference between revisions

Content deleted Content added

Inline

Revision as of 01:06, 26 May 2011

Has anyone notice that this is absurd? Let's try "Get to Salad" theory. Any article of Wikipedia, following the rules as stated here, a) leads to "Salad" or b) gets stuck in a loop. Why? Because, using Logics (a part of Philosphy), there are only two possibilities on where an article can lead: I) to any other article or II) to a loop. Well, the articles "Philosophy" and "Salad" are within the category I, as well as any other article whatsoever. [ Sorry for my English, I am not a native speaker ] 155.185.114.76 (talk) 22:49, 6 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Excellent point. Maybe a more interesting hypothesis to investigate is whether the Philosophy page is 'closer' to all pages than any other page is? framed0000 01:06, 26 May 2011 (UTC)

That is really clever! And it just goes to show that deep down all pursuits of human thought can be brought to a philosophical basis. There's a PhD in this... Witty Lama 01:53, 27 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

This makes me laugh. Shalom (Hello • Peace) 03:38, 27 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Wow, even this one works: Avril Lavigne -> September 27 -> Leap year -> Lunisolar calendar -> Calendar -> Time -> Religion -> Reality -> Being -> Ontology -> philosophy! Think outside the box 11:25, 27 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Does this sort of thing work on other websites? I tried it a few times on Everything2, and one of the places I ended up on was good/ethical. — DanielLC 15:45, 27 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Do Wikipedia links count (eg WP:BOLD) ? Think outside the box 17:24, 27 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Nah, in the unlikely event that that's the first link in an article (in which case you are looking at a weird article). Mark J (talk) 18:07, 28 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The first link in most language articles is Help:IPA. Think outside the box 09:48, 29 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Ah, good thinking, yes, I was discounting those. Mark J (talk) 12:03, 29 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

It looks like one main reason why many articles end up linking to Philosophy is because they start with etymologies that link to a language, probably all of which link to language eventually (at least Latin and Greek do), which links to philosophy. 67.70.149.182 (talk) 20:21, 27 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Almost all biographies link to dates which link to leap year and then quickly to philosophy. Most places get to Social Contract quickly, which goes right to philosophy. So if you start or get to a place or a person, or language, it'll end soon. Chris M. (talk) 06:40, 28 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I think you can discount "non significant" links such as birth dates and latin pronunciations etc. Rather, what should be clicked on is the first link of the first descriptive sentence. The sentence that would generally say "X is a Y" where X = the subject in question and Y = the descriptive category it falls into. This test should be clicking on those "Y" links. Witty Lama

Yeah, I think links to Latin should be skipped. Too easy. 134.153.12.58 (talk) 14:36, 28 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Maybe you should delete all the links then! But the proposal is one worth considering. Thanks for all the input and talk guys. Mark J (talk) 18:06, 28 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I tried it about 15 times from Random Article and didn't get to philosophy once. However I did get into a loop with Indo-European Languages about 80% of the time. --Anonymaus (talk) 20:37, 28 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

How's that? Indo-European is part of this chain: Indo-European languages

Language family Language Symbol Object Object (philosophy) Philosophy Ethics Philosophy

The reason for Anonymaus's confusion is valid; someone changed the first link in the Symbol article. I hope this doesn't cause problems! Mark J (talk) 12:03, 29 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I only found a handful of loops (vehicles, and some computer related articles go towards loops usually. Chris M. (talk) 07:34, 29 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Other loops involve landforms, and any film article. Mark J (talk) 12:03, 29 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia weekly discussion

Just thought I'd let you know that I raised this essay/game in the most recent recording of Wikipedia Weekly podcast. It will be at the end of episode 50. The others on the panel hadn't seen it before and we spend some time testing it on air. Good times, good times.... Witty Lama 08:28, 29 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I just listened to that - thanks for the awesome publicity. Being 16, it's probably the most publicised thing I've ever done!

The funny thing is you managed to get quite a few chains wrong! The rule about non-trivial links seems to have led to a few problems, as evidenced by the different threads you went to after Manga! If you ignore the non-trivial links, as far as I can see the chances of getting to Philosophy are quite a bit lower; so I reckon we should keep them in. Anyway, the important thing is not whether the chains you tried were actually right... hopefully it will inspire some people to make chains of their own and have fun putting them here

Cheers again Mark J (talk) 13:17, 29 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

That's sorta' the fun of it really - ignoring the trivial links. I think it loses a lot of interest if ever single person or event goes directly to Latin via Calendar because of the birthdate. Yes, we did get it a bit confused in the show, but it proved it was possible to get there by two ways. The point of the game is that it doesn't really matter which article you go to, you'll still end up at the right place! :-)

Relatedly, I reckon that when indeed there are loops (such as with transport) then this doesn't mean there's a flaw in the "philosophy game" but rather that means there's a flaw with the article in question not following proper WP:MoS for the lead paragraph. Therefore, this game is actually a good way of testing out the adherence of articles to that particular MoS requirement! Witty Lama 16:36, 29 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The strategy section is an attempt at that PhD analysis you mentioned! (please expand it.) Mark J (talk) 17:35, 29 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I see some of my tips listed in there :). Only #2 now, I should have checked SMB3 myself, one of my favorite games :). Chris M. (talk) 05:58, 31 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I do wonder what will happen when these flaws are corrected, though... We'll end up with chain decay. :-) Any ideas for updates, or at least an encouragement to people to give dates with their chains? Waltham, The Duke of 09:52, 31 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I guess just occasionally testing out the "Top 5" ones to make sure they are still legit. Having people sign them is always nice though. What a fun time-waster. Chris M. (talk) 21:11, 1 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I tried this with "pong" and it appeared to take 30 steps. Could someone else give this a try to make sure I followed the rules correctly? If I did, then it's a tie for the longest chain. Cancilla (talk) 18:38, 23 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Wiki has a length of 27, by my count. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 178.251.131.185 (talk) 06:50, 25 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

The top "five"

How come there are seven in the "top five"? Shouldn't there only be five in the top five? (Unless there's a tie for fifth, of course, or three-way for fourth, for four-way for third, etc.) What we really have, then, is 1st, tie for 2nd, tie for 4th, 6th, 7th. OneWeirdDude (talk) 22:44, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

If entries in boxouts at the top of the page count then I got number 0 to loop after 12 steps - Soviet films of 1958 - 1958 in film - In the Money - Comedy film - Film - Wikipedia:Citing sources - Wikipedia:Identifying reliable sources - Category:Wikipedia content guidelines - Help:Category - MediaWiki - Wikipedia:Article size - Category:Wikipedia editing guidelines - Help:Category

Sazzer (talk) 17:57, 25 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Links to sections

Christianity links to Monotheistic_religion#Christian_view a section in another article. Do we take the first link in the section Special revelation or the article Theology. Z gin der 2008-09-10T18:13Z (UTC)

Off topic

What does this have to do with Wikipedia's goal of being an encyclopedia? Should this really be hosted by Wikipedia? Chillum 02:00, 23 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

It's part of WP:DoF, I think. Kayau Don't be too CNN I'LL DO MY JOB uprising! uprising! 14:20, 12 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Longest chain?

You can start at List of state leaders in 2009, continue to previous year upon previous year until List of state leaders in 110 BC, then go to 110 BC, Jugurtha, Ancient Libya, Nile Valley, Nile, Arabic language, and then sail down the language route. Does this qualify for a chain above 50 links, or as worst abuse of the rules? AGrimm (talk) 00:03, 3 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]

93%?

I always get the loops. Kayau Don't be too CNN I'LL DO MY JOB uprising! uprising! 14:19, 12 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I'm guessing 93% is a 'fun' statistic, since I don't see a claim here that it was ever actually researched. When I first heard about this in 2008 from Wikipedia Weekly, getting to 'philosophy' usually worked, but now I always get loops too. Why has this changed? I suspect some crucial first links have been changed to articles that don't lead to philosophy. I have tried many random articles (using the Wikipedia Weekly method of skipping 'trivial' links) and they never go to philosophy, but they always end up in this loop:

Science → Knowledge → Plato → Classical Greece → Culture → Alfred L. Kroeber → United States → Federalism → Politics → Group decision making → Synergy → Relationship → Interpersonal relationship → Limerence → Cognition → Science

Most articles probably relate to science, culture, or politics. Maybe 'philosophy' used to be in this loop (or a similar one). While 'Get to Philosophy' seems dead, the appealing idea behind it remains: human concepts are all derived from a foundation of common assumptions and logical constructs. ——Rich jj (talk) 19:52, 9 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

New Loops Here

Matter -> atoms -> Matter —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.225.198.201 (talk) 00:35, 22 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

XKCD

Nice little mention of this on today's XKCD hover text: http://xkcd.com/903/ Maszanchi (talk) 09:44, 25 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

@@ Line 1: / Line 1: @@
 Has anyone notice that this is absurd? Let's try "Get to Salad" theory. Any article of Wikipedia, following the rules as stated here, a) leads to "Salad" or b) gets stuck in a loop. Why? Because, using Logics (a part of Philosphy), there are only two possibilities on where an article can lead: I) to any other article or II) to a loop. Well, the articles "Philosophy" and "Salad" are within the category I, as well as any other article whatsoever. [ Sorry for my English, I am not a native speaker ] [[Special:Contributions/155.185.114.76|155.185.114.76]] ([[User talk:155.185.114.76|talk]]) 22:49, 6 March 2009 (UTC)
+:Excellent point.  Maybe a more interesting hypothesis to investigate is whether the Philosophy page is 'closer' to all pages than any other page is? framed0000 01:06, 26 May 2011 (UTC)
 That is really clever! And it just goes to show that deep down all pursuits of human thought can be brought to a philosophical basis. There's a PhD in this... [[User:witty lama|Witty]] [[User talk:witty lama|Lama]] 01:53, 27 May 2008 (UTC)