Wikipedia:Featured article review/Infinite monkey theorem/archive1

The following is an archived discussion of a featured article review. Please do not modify it. Further comments should be made on the article's talk page or at Wikipedia talk:Featured article review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The article was kept 01:32, 9 March 2007.

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Infinite monkey theorem

Review commentary

Messages left at Thesilverbail and Mathematics. LuciferMorgan 16:49, 2 February 2007 (UTC)

This subject of this article is barely encyclopedic. It deserves little consideration in any article because it is about the history and future of Émile Borel's simple thought experiment (the moral of which is: "do the math") followed up with a one-sentence quip by Eddington. It is a legacy FA that seems to me to be overrated by the Math WikiProject at even "Mid" importance. At least the Monty Hall problem requires more than five seconds of thought by the middling college freshman and it gets a rating of "Low". To anyone who wants to learn something about Math, it amounts to little more than a quip along the somewhat more rude lines of: "use your head, dummy". The very idea of calling it a "theorem" is artificial to the point of being ludicrous. If Borel or Eddington were alive to see the time wasted on one-upmanship with ever more ridiculous and flawed restatements of their "theorem", they would go back and scratch their quips out of their original papers and ask the World to think more about Math and less about showmanship. --Farever 23:56, 1 February 2007 (UTC)

Sounds like you disapprove of the subject matter of the article, which is an inactionable objection to Featured status. What needs to be done to improve the article? — Brian 05:29, 2 February 2007 (UTC)

I kind of agree with the nominator that featured articles ought to be about more important topics than this. However that doesn't seem to be a current criterion -- we have a featured article about spoo, of all things. I think the FA process is a bit broken, but I'm not sure starting with this one case is really going to help.

Unfortunately I don't really see a fix for this problem in mathematics in general. Articles on important mathematical subjects -- say Stone–Čech compactification -- have too narrow an audience ever to be featured on Wikipedia's main page. The only thing that the general public is likely to be interested in seeing there, is this sort of fluff. --Trovatore 06:36, 2 February 2007 (UTC)

I think this nomination is flawed. User:Farever does not even allege that this article falls short of the standard for featured articles. I think Farever should either follow the rules of the FAR process, go agitate for better standards, or withdraw his objection.

On a more whimsical note, would you be happier if the article were retitled "Infinite Wikipedians theorem"?  ;^> DavidCBryant 10:43, 2 February 2007 (UTC)

• Comment no need whatsoever to withdraw the review, as the article (at first glance) has the same problems we've seen in every math FAR so far - often the problems are less 1c and more 1a. This article - like Monty Hall problem prior to FAR - does not follow WP:LEAD and WP:MOS. The problem is introduced in the lead; it should be introduced in the text and the lead should be a summary of the entire article. I didn't read any further yet, as this is symptomatic of the issues we've seen in every math article that has come through FAR. Notes are not correctly formatted, and there are direct quotes which are not cited. Work to be done here. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 15:34, 2 February 2007 (UTC)

If we want to cite sources, then who first postilated the I.M. "theorem"? Huh? Who is the author? Cite me a source. Did the author provide their version of a proof? Was the proof correct? Who later further developed and generalized the proof? There are no sources because they do not exist. Look at how the lead section has already again descended into a lecturing, pandering tone with phrases like "almost surely", "slings and arrows" and "graphically illustrates". That's not Math, that Show Biz. Have any one of you ever heard a qualified mathematician, even when intoxicated with ethanol to the point that he can no long legally operater a motor vehicle in his locale, ever use the phrase "almost surely" in reference to a theorem?!?--Farever 15:52, 2 February 2007 (UTC)

See almost surely.

Does Farever care to reveal their identity? Why go through the trouble of creating a single-purpose account to rag on this article? Lunch 15:59, 2 February 2007 (UTC)

I stand corrected about the "almost surely" phrase. Of course, in the article, there is no discussion about the fact that, given the infinite time and even given that the monkeys will type on the keyboards as oppose to just break them or drool on them, that there is a zero probability that the monkeys will still fail to produce the stated literary work. There is no distinction made between zero-probabiliy events and prima facia impossible events. The driver of this vaunted mathematical lesson is some South American poet. The rest of the "citations" are news articles that amount to little more than "human interst stories". Please: the next round of citations that will appear to try to prop up this old nag of article will be dreged up from Cartoon Network. This is a math article about a fairly simply concept that is being bloated and swamped by non-math drek. Please demote this thing on the inferior quality and low number of its sources.--Farever 16:35, 2 February 2007 (UTC)

We don't demote an article during FAR. We have a two-week review period during which issues are identified and (hopefully) worked on; if there is no progress at the end of FAR (featured article review), the article moves to FARC. This will become a very long review by the end of the month if editors rant at each other rather than identifying specific issues failing WP:WIAFA so they can be improved. In its current state, the article is not at FA status: I suggest that editors focus on content and WP:WIAFA. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:42, 2 February 2007 (UTC)

I acknowledge that I am getting ahead of myself, but I can see the writing on the wall. Thre is not enough math to talk about to merit a math FA. In the words of Gertrude Stein: There is no there there.--Farever 18:09, 2 February 2007 (UTC)

The article doesn't have to fit into a certain category topic (e.g.; math) in order to be featured; it has to meet WP:WIAFA standards. If you are saying it's not a notable topic and doesn't belong on Wiki at all, you should establish that via WP:NN standards. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 18:28, 2 February 2007 (UTC)

Take a look at Category:Mathematical theorems and Category:Probability theory and then tell me that this article is best that Wikipedia can do. This article barely rises above the level of an Internet meme. It is notable enough for an article, primarily so that space is not wasted in serious FA-destined articles about math. Personally, I despise quotes in math or science articles because it suggests that the author does not yet understand the subject of the article. I accept that WIAFA is the criteria. Both this and the Monty Hall "math/logic" article (which just went through a FAR so I will have to hold off for a while) violate criteria #4 in that they do not focus on the subject nearly enough: they dwell on the fanfare and drek swirling around the "math" subject. That drek deserves no more than a sentence or two (which would take along with them most of the monkey footnotes). Otherwise, they should be exiled from the Math category and tossed over to the "Media" category where they would fit right in and have plenty of company.--199.33.32.40 20:39, 2 February 2007 (UTC)

Three things.

• Are you AWM? You're using AWM's address.
• The singular form of "criteria" is "criterion".
• The subject of this article isn't "math" – it's the "infinite monkey theorem".

If your real concern is with one of the categories in which this article has been placed, why not just remove that category tag and see what happens? As to the "drek" and "fanfare", what other kind of article that's even remotely associated with mathematics is ever likely to attract enough public attention to be considered for the "FA" designation? Wikipedia is not for profit, but it still has to sell itself in the market. Most of the "serious" math topics are so dull and boring (to the typical reader) that nobody would ever vote to make them featured articles, no matter how well they were written. This article isn't perfect, but it is entertaining. The first criterion for a featured article is that it should be "well-written, comprehensive, factually accurate, neutral, and stable." Can anyone offer substantive criticism of the article in any of those five areas? Is it poorly written? Are there inaccuracies? Are there any violations of NPOV? Let's focus on questions like that in this review process. DavidCBryant 21:36, 2 February 2007 (UTC)

It would be most helpful if issues unrelated to FA status were hashed out on the article talk page - one such issue is categories. At minimum - without looking at the entire article - there are problems with 1c and 2 (WP:LEAD) already explained on this FAR. Hopefully editors can get busy correcting the deficiencies. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 23:18, 2 February 2007 (UTC)

I agree. So far, Farever's criticisms amount to, "This is pop culture, not math." So what? It's a pop culture article. Let's concentrate on making it the best pop culture article it can be. Sandy and LM have outlined some problems, so that's a start. — Brian (talk) 01:19, 3 February 2007 (UTC)

• Comment Needs more citations.

"It is most unlikely that Huxley would have referred to a typewriter."

Says who? Sounds like original research.

"The association of the debate with the infinite monkey theorem is probably..."

Probably? Sounds dubious with that word there. Who has speculated this?

"It is sometimes reported..."

It is sometimes reported? By who? What people have reported this?

These are just examples. Anyone working on the article can message me on my talk page if you wish for a more extensive analysis. LuciferMorgan 21:28, 2 February 2007 (UTC)

Please put this list on my talk page; however, I would appreciate it if you did a minute of work checking any of these points before you added it.

To take the first one, for example: the Huxley-Wilberforce debate took place in 1860 (and it is fairly well agreed how monkeys came into it); the first commercial typewriter was sold in 1870; for which Typewriter has a source. (The OED dates the word to 1868.) That this is a legend is contended by the first ten search results for Huxley Wilberforce debate typewriter - and I suspect by all of them; I did not wait to search for an exception.

It is not original research to state the consensus view of the obvious. WP:V says we need a source for those things which are "challenged or likely to be challenged"; this is neither. The other quibbles appear to be the same sort of straining at gnats. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 04:26, 4 February 2007 (UTC)

I disagree with the above. This article fails 1. c. as I stated IMO. Also, are you asking me to highlight further flaws in the article on your talk page? Just clarifying. LuciferMorgan 20:27, 4 February 2007 (UTC)

"With the above"? With what, precisely? This is clarification? Septentrionalis PMAnderson 22:42, 4 February 2007 (UTC)

What I wanted was for LuciferMorgan to list the points which he feels likely to be challenged by a rational and literate reader; either on my talk page or on the article's talk page, as he prefers. The Huxley-Wilberfource nonsense above does not qualify; if none of his first few qualify any more than it does, I would move that this review nomination be dismissed as disruptive.

He has not done so. Is there support for an RfC on this disruptive nomination and bad-faith support? Septentrionalis PMAnderson 04:21, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

I regret that Farever appears never to have heard of the ancient joke that is the subject of this article; it is well known, as the article attests, and some people have taken it seriously. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 22:42, 4 February 2007 (UTC)

Once again, similar problems to other Math article FARs, although the prose is superior to the others. The lead introduces the problem rather than summarizing the article; then the body of the article dives in to the middle. Telling readers what to "note" is redundant. More cite tags can be added if needed; preferably, though, the work will just be done without prodding from others. Footnotes are not in a recognizable citations style, publishers aren't identified on all, one appears to be a personal website, but is a dead link. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 01:16, 5 February 2007 (UTC)

Calling the examples I highlighted "nonsense" PManderson does nobody any favours - what I could have done instead is wait for this article to appear at FARC, and then just vote "Remove" based on 1. c. Instead though, I've tried to highlight problems within the article for any interested editors to address. This article doesn't stand up to current FA standards, is rightly at FAR - this FAR review isn't "disruptive", but merely what it says, which is a review of whether the article adheres to current FA standards. Whether you address the deficiencies I've highlighted is your choice - I'm just pointing them out for the benefit of those who want to keep the article as an FA. LuciferMorgan 01:34, 5 February 2007 (UTC)

LuciferMorgan's comments have been, and continue to be, an abuse of 1c. This review nomination should be summarily rejected; no reasonable grounds for it have been shown. This is the sort of thing which led WP:GA into contempt; it would be a shame to have WP:FA follow it. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 17:53, 5 February 2007 (UTC)

I add, however, that the "nonsense" is the claim that Huxley taunted Wilberforce about typewriters; which is as near to impossible as need be. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 00:41, 9 February 2007 (UTC)

• Comment The piped link to Hamlet in the lead won't work well in hard print. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 00:30, 6 February 2007 (UTC)
  • This is a question, not a counterargument: Is that serious? Wikipedia runs on the argument that WP is not paper, and that explanations can always be found behind a link. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 06:06, 8 February 2007 (UTC)

• Following up Sandy's request. This is the reason for the cite template;

"...it is still very unlikely that any monkey would get as far as "slings and arrows" in Hamlet's most famous soliloquy."

Who says? The article should stick to the facts, and not speculate. Also, this statement draws a conclusion, and for that to happen it should have come from a source. LuciferMorgan 00:55, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

OK, so if a statement draws a conclusion, it has to come from a source? And the source has to be identified? What a thicket of citations that would be!

"One and one are two. (See Bertrand Russell and Alfred North Whitehead, Principia Mathematica, Cambridge University Press (1910 - 1913).) Two and two are four. (ibid.)"

Get real! DavidCBryant 17:55, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

That particular part is established in the section titled Probabilities - it doesn't need to be cited in the lead. The problem in the lead is the "cuteness" with the piped link. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 01:43, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

"Probabilities" has no cites backing its claims though. Anyway, I'm not highlighting anything else in the article - when its loses its FA star, I won't shed a tear. I've had enough hassle with this FAR nomination, even though I didn't nominate it. LuciferMorgan 03:00, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

That's because it's common knowledge, unlikely to be challenged by anyone qualified to edit the article. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 17:01, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

If it's common knowledge, I wouldn't have asked for a citation. LuciferMorgan 01:08, 7 February 2007 (UTC)

Okay, I don't hang around FAR much, and I broadly agree that this article needs an overhaul. But I'm just flabbergasted to see citations being demanded for a) the statement that a word could not have been used before it was coined, and b) a trivial probability calculation. We aren't far from "The Earth orbits the sun". Opabinia regalis 03:08, 8 February 2007 (UTC)

Common knowledge is a bad term, since obviously there are people who will be ignorant of the fact (i.e. the target audience of the article). The point is more that the statement is unchallengeable; that is, it is universally accepted within the field, so that anyone with sufficient background to assess the accuracy of the statement will understand it to be true. Christopher Parham (talk) 16:29, 8 February 2007 (UTC)

I accept this correction. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 23:53, 8 February 2007 (UTC)

Agreed. It may be alien to people not used to mathematics, but a fact can be true, incontrovertible, and universally acknowledged without being a valid subject for publication in any form. It's impossible to provide a reference for this fact, unless you're after [1]. Tesseran 05:31, 17 February 2007 (UTC)

FARC commentary

Suggested FA criteria concerns include LEAD (2a), referencing (1c), and general MoS issues (2). Note: importance of subject matter is not a Featured article criterion. Marskell 11:49, 18 February 2007 (UTC)

• Remove per 1c. LuciferMorgan 12:05, 18 February 2007 (UTC)
• Remove until additional citations are added. — Deckiller 10:34, 19 February 2007 (UTC) Keep — most problems fixed. — Deckiller 13:55, 3 March 2007 (UTC)
• Strong keep. No case for removal made; Farever's complaint is not one, and I see consensus above that LM's complaints are groundless. Therefore this should be closed as unsupported. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 04:17, 1 March 2007 (UTC)
• 'Remove'2a is undisputed. 1c is disputed at certain points, but there are still citeneeded tags. (And I'd add several of my own if I weren't so late to the process.) Also, 1b: the article is not comprehensive. The slightest effort at verifying this article — in my case, just two queries to Google books — turns up a mountain of interesting material. Melchoir 06:47, 1 March 2007 (UTC)
  • The 1b is the first valid complaint I've seen; but it's not my article. I looked at the lead, and I dispute 2a; it's a two paragraph lead that summarizes the article. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 17:18, 1 March 2007 (UTC)
    • As SandyGeorgia hinted a month ago, the lead currently summarizes only the statement and result of the mathematical problem. The material in "Origins" and "Infinite monkey experiments" isn't represented at all. I apologize for not getting involved in the FAR earlier, but there are enough 1c concerns alone to sustain a "remove" comment. I point out 1b because fixing one problem helps to fix the other, and a small amount of effort would go a long way.
      Well, if it's not your article, then you won't mind if I take the lead in fixing it. I could use the break from divergent series anyway… Melchoir 17:47, 1 March 2007 (UTC)
  • I've solved 2a, but there's still much to be done. Melchoir 18:54, 1 March 2007 (UTC)
  • -> Keep I believe that I (and Paul August and Michael Hardy) have rehabilitated the article. The most dramatic turnaround is the removal of any zero-one law being used to "prove" the theorem, since it doesn't. Lots of other shady but less-important statements had to be taken out, but many could be attributed with only minor revision. Applications have been added to reflect themes in the literature. There is now a comprehensive lead and a hierarchical section structure. Melchoir 08:42, 3 March 2007 (UTC)
    • (By the way, I do recommend that someone copyedit the article, as there's lots of new prose.) Melchoir 09:10, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

• Strong keep, per Septentrionalis. Will this madness never end? --KSmrq^T 22:16, 1 March 2007 (UTC)
• Comment - "The infinite monkey theorem, or some version of the idea, appears in several novels, short stories, plays, a radio program, television programs in various genres, graphic novels, stand-up comedy routines, musical works, and the Internet." What novels?, what stories, what plays?, what radio programs?, what TV programs, what novels, This section needs more details, actually it needs to be detailed - What it appeared on and when, and it's a short stubby unreferenced paragraph. M3tal H3ad 07:02, 4 March 2007 (UTC)
  • That sentence is just a summary of Infinite monkey theorem in popular culture, the detailed contents of which were purposefully removed from the main article long ago. Melchoir 20:11, 4 March 2007 (UTC)
• Comment Why does Pmanderson have to specifically mention me in his keep vote? Did I mention him in my remove? No I didn't - perhaps people voting can stick to reviewing and voting keep / fail for the article, and not other editors. LuciferMorgan 20:30, 4 March 2007 (UTC)
  • See your talk page in a minute. Melchoir 21:02, 4 March 2007 (UTC)
• Comment — Leaning toward keep after Melchoir's very good rewrite. I've done some copy editing and redundancy killing, and I've added a couple more pictures to spice things up. Further, it's my understanding that the cquote template is best used for pull-quotes (i.e., as a graphical flourish that duplicates text from the article), so I've replaced it with <blockquote> throughout. Still, I have a couple of concerns. First, the chronology of the real-life monkeys-with-typewriters experiment is confused. The lead says that the monkeys typed, then attacked and defecated. However, in the "real monkeys" section, we are told that they first attacked and defecated, then typed. Which was it? Also, where is the statement "it is not inconceivable that a monkey could intentionally describe a character's behavior" come from? It's the one instance where I wished there was a citation, but there was none. — Brian (talk) 12:50, 5 March 2007 (UTC)
  • The "not inconceivable" statement was my own invention to set up the next two sentences. I thought it was harmlessly meaning-free, but I can replace it. Melchoir 16:17, 5 March 2007 (UTC)
    • Looks better, thanks. Can we sort out the chronology of the monkey experiment? Then I'll happily change to full "keep". — Brian (talk) 04:34, 6 March 2007 (UTC)
      • Done. The precise chronology isn't clear from the sources, but I've hedged enough to avoid being wrong. Melchoir 20:53, 6 March 2007 (UTC)
        • Keep it is, then. Good job, Melchoir! — Brian (talk) 00:46, 8 March 2007 (UTC)
• Hold (if possible). I've just returned from two weeks travel, won't be able to read the updated article until Thursday, and would like to be able to weigh in before this closes. If closing can't wait for me, I'll understand. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 18:08, 6 March 2007 (UTC)
  • Excellent save, Melchoir; the article is now quite well referenced and an easy read. A couple of nitpicks, comments, and small points:
    • Strangest thing: the Main article in Popular culture doesn't show on the Printable version, so I was prepared to ask for references, but see it does show on the onscreen version. Does anyone know why that is happening?
    • There was a faulty ref in Ref #14, but either someone has fixed it, or it was another printable version issue.
    • I eliminated the (impossible to read) small text in a blockquote.
    • RNG was not defined: I added that.
    • Why is "quite sophisticated" in quotes in the Random number generation section?
    • The only significant problem I have is that External links could still use some pruning; not all of those sites seem necessary. If someone can deal with the External links, I'm a Keep. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 23:23, 7 March 2007 (UTC)
      • Keep. Checked the edit history, found that Melchoir already deleted the External link farm once but it was restored by another editor. I deleted again; looks like it will need to be watched. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 02:29, 8 March 2007 (UTC)
      • "Quite sophisticated" is a quotation from the authors, but I couldn't think of an elegant way to indicate so. I thought it was a worthwhile point to make that they think it's serious business. If you'd like to clean it up, go ahead! Melchoir 02:39, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article review. No further edits should be made to this page.