Template:Did you know nominations/Parable of the sunfish

The following discussion is an archived discussion of the DYK nomination of the article below. Please do not modify this page. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as this nomination's talk page, the article's talk page or Wikipedia talk:Did you know), unless there is consensus to re-open the discussion at this page. No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was: promoted by Allen3 ^talk 11:47, 31 October 2012 (UTC)

Parable of the sunfish

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... ~~that American biologist Louis Agassiz would reputedly "lock a student up in a room full" of specimens and "not let him out until he had discovered all the truths which the objects contained."?~~

Comment: This is my first DYK submission.

Created/expanded by Garamond Lethe (talk). Self nom at 14:58, 2 October 2012 (UTC)

Two big problems jump out with just a quick look and render any further review moot until corrected. First, there is no link to the nominated article in the hook (Wikipedia:Did you know#hookformat). Second, neither the nominated article nor the article linked to by the hook have undergone more than a trivial level of recent expansion (Parable of the sunfish was expanded from 6979 characters of readable prose on August 4, 2012 to a current size of 6986. Louis Agassiz shows a similar lack of expansion). DYK requires a 5x expansion for articles that have not been created in the last 5 days (See Wikipedia:Did you know/Supplementary guidelines#Supplementary article length rules for information on how to calculate article length and size of recent expansion). --Allen3 ^talk 15:23, 2 October 2012 (UTC)

As to the second issue, this is a new article that was moved from my sandbox into mainspace on Oct. 1. As to the hook, probably best to drop the current approach entirely. Where should I put the replacement hook? (And thanks for the quick turnaround!) Garamond Lethe 15:36, 2 October 2012 (UTC)

Substitute hook: ... ~~that Ezra Pound's Parable of the sunfish is based on the teaching methods of Louis Agassiz as recalled by two of his students, Nathaniel Southgate Shaler and Samuel Hubbard Scudder?~~

My mistake for missing the move to article namespace. Dates and lengths all look good and I see no problems with the alternate hook. Problem I am having now is with the citation style used in the article causing confusion about how to verify article facts. First problem with the citations is that there are multiple paragraphs containing no inline citations and a variety of quotations with no information on where the quote came from. Wikipedia:Did you know/Supplementary guidelines#D2 calls for a general minimum of one citation per paragraph while Wikipedia:When to cite#When a source is needed lists direct quotes as an item needing a citation. Second, many of the existing inline citations are curiously placed, making it difficult to determine what information the citation supports. Commonly inline citations are placed at the end of a sentence or, more rarely, after in-sentence punctuation and supports information immediately before the citation. With the difficulties deciphering the citation style used by the article I have been unable to verify hook or article facts or check for close paraphrasing issues. --Allen3 ^talk 23:09, 4 October 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for the recommendation. I've made a pass through the article and I believe every quotation and block quotation now has an individual cite, and these cites appear at the end of the sentence. I'd appreciate any additional comments you might have regarding improving the article. Garamond Lethe 01:54, 5 October 2012 (UTC)

I have read the article and agree that a substitute hook is needed because the 1st hook does not mention the article name. ♥ VisitingPhilosopher ♥ ^{talk ◊ contribs} 10:46, 5 October 2012 (UTC)

Substitute hook2: ... that Ezra Pound believed that no man is equipped for modern thinking until he has understood the Parable of the sunfish?
Substitute hook3: ... that biologist Louis Agassiz would reputedly lock a student up in a room full of specimens until he had discovered all the truths which the objects contained, as retold in the Parable of the sunfish? Not quite accurate, so let's go with ALT2 above. Garamond Lethe 16:57, 30 October 2012 (UTC)

Both of the above substitute hooks are within the size limit. ♥ VisitingPhilosopher ♥ ^{talk ◊ contribs} 10:48, 5 October 2012 (UTC)

Citation style is much better, but I am still seeing problems:
1. Many of the citations are to sizable page ranges instead of just the one or two pages containing the cited information. The extreme case is citation 6 (a 74 page book by Lane Cooper). More specific citations make verification a more practical task for the reader.
2. I was unable to locate several quotations in the cited sources, even using the search function within Google books. The block quote in the "Cooper's Louis Agassiz as a Teacher" section is an example of this.
3. Most troubling is possible original research in the "Interpretation and Criticism" section. The section paragraph of the "Empiricism" indicates that references to the parable within scientific writings are relatively rare and provides to citations to back up the claim ([1] and [2]). While the two references give examples of the parable being mentioned in scientific writings, I could find no analysis in either indicating how common this type of example may be. --Allen3 ^talk 11:08, 7 October 2012 (UTC)

Citations and/or rp's are now in a 1-2 page range for all quoted material. For sake of clarity some citation have move back within sentences. If this is not preferred I'm happy to discuss individual cases.
I have verified all of the quotes except Goodridge (which required a trip to a university library to track down the first time). I'm not sure why the search function isn't working with the Cooper book on google books, but the added page numbers should now allow you to verify the quotes without undue effort.
WP:OR makes it difficult to state that "X hasn't been written about very much, here are the only examples I'm aware of". That's not a problem I'm going to solve here, so I've modified the text to remove the frequency information. Likewise there is a second bit of WP:OR that you might have missed: I don't have any source that points out that Pound's taxonomies (Ichthus Heliodiplodokus, Heliichtherinkus) are closer to pig latin than latin ("Diplodocus" being, of course, rather unlike a fish). If you're a biologist, this warrants a giggle but no other comment. If you're not a biologist, the joke — whether intentional or not — will probably go over your head. In the article I limit myself to noting that the terms are Pound's creation. If that's too close to WP:OR I'm happy to remove it. Garamond Lethe 07:42, 8 October 2012 (UTC)

Your commments are definitely improving the article, regardless of whether or not it ultimately succeeds at DYK. I would appreciate hearing any other thoughts you might have. Garamond Lethe 07:42, 8 October 2012 (UTC)

I figured out a way to reword this section that allows the reader to draw their own conclusion. Garamond Lethe 13:27, 8 October 2012 (UTC)

Allen3 mentioned he might not be available to review this again in a timely manner and that I should ask for another reviewer to take this up. Garamond Lethe 08:36, 9 October 2012 (UTC)

Please consult the Wikipedia:Copyright violations for general guidelines with regard to excessively long copyrighted excerpts and WP:NFC for particulars. Copy-paste quotations (some with © expired, some not) amount to the staggering ~ 4,000 chars across the entire article. For example, section the Parable is composed only of copyrighted text (which is my main concern). Subsection Shaler's Autobiography is composed of 1,328 chars of copy-pasted material, with only 887 chars of prose. I'm afraid (as it stands) this article would rather qualify for {{subst:copyvio}} investigation (re: Parable) than for the DYK front page exposure right now. NFC policy is the reason why we don't publish lyrics to most pop songs either even though others do. Poeticbent talk 19:12, 14 October 2012 (UTC) — Try to follow in full De728631 recomendations from Wikipedia:Media copyright questions#Copyright concerns in Parable of the sunfish. Use your own words. Thank you. Poeticbent talk 01:32, 17 October 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for taking the time to do a review. I don't believe there is a copyright issue here. Those 4,000 characters are spread over 10 sources (several of which are now in the public domain). The parable is indeed copyrighted and clocks in at 16 lines of a 210 page book. As such I think I'm well within the Fair use exception, especially as the material is quoted and cited.

Out of an abundance of caution I checked to see how my sources handled this issue (as several of them also reproduce the parable in full). Four out of the five I checked do not list any permissions: (the Sieburth cite in Cabinet, the Scholes cite in the peer-reviewed journal College English, Perelman book published by the University of California Press and, the strongest example, Thomas's book which scrupulously lists permissions granted for quotation from 15 different copyright holders, but not from Pound's publishers. The only counterexample I can find where permission was requested is Baker's book put out by the University of Florida Press.

If you don't find the above convincing I'm happy to ask for a third opinion. Garamond Lethe 20:01, 14 October 2012 (UTC)

I just submitted a third opinion, Garamond Lethe. Sorry. Poeticbent talk 21:21, 14 October 2012 (UTC)

If there is a copyright issue I'd like to resolve it regardless of the DYK status. I've asked for a third opinion at MCR. Garamond Lethe 22:46, 14 October 2012 (UTC)

I took a quick glance at the quotes in the article, and many of the quotes seem to be from very old books, often from the 19th or early 20th century. English Wikipedia uses United States copyright law, and for that, there is a very simple rule to check: if a book was published before 1923, then the book is in the public domain in the United States, and so it is legal to quote unlimited amounts of text from the book. A few quotes seem to be from books first published in the 1990s. Such books are normally still copyrighted, and the copyright expires either 70 years after the death of the author or 95 years after the book was published, depending on what it says in the contract between the author and the publisher. I am more specialised on image use policies and don't know exactly how much text you would find permissible under a fair use claim. --Stefan2 (talk) 23:01, 14 October 2012 (UTC)

Poeticbent, it's difficult to reply to your clarifications when you modify text I've already replied to. That being said, I don't understand why you feel the parable text falls outside the fair use exception. If this was a close judgement call then yes, I can understand erring on the side of caution. But the consensus in academic and commercial publishing seems to be that this does fall within fair use: the State University of New York Press, Universal Publishers, Cambridge University Press, Oxford University Press, Transaction Publishers, Praeger, Cabinet Magazine, the peer-reviewed journal College English, and Leicester University Press used exactly this text without going through the process of gaining permission, which I'm assuming would only be done if they were confident that fair use did apply. (To be fair, both University of Florida Press and University of Iowa Press did ask for permission.)

If wikipedia has a stricter standard of fair use excpetions than academic and commercial publishing, that's fine, just point me to the policy (it's not in Wikipedia:Copyright violations). If you have other knowledge or experience that is informing your decision the please let me know what that is. I take copyright very seriously and if this text does not fall within the fair use exception then I will remove it promptly. I just want to understand why you think that is the case. Garamond Lethe 04:59, 15 October 2012 (UTC)

For the stricter standard, see WP:NFCC, with specific examples at WP:NFC. --Stefan2 (talk) 10:18, 15 October 2012 (UTC)

(Responding to Poeticbent's second modification of his original comments.) I belive you are incorrect, but as this is not an appropriate venue for a discussion of copyright policy I'll reply on your talk page. Garamond Lethe 03:05, 17 October 2012 (UTC)

I am commenting only on the copyright issues with the text, not on the issues Allen3 brought up in his review. For starters, the Shaler and Scudder references that make up the bulk of the quotations are in the public domain in the US (published before 1923), assuming they were reprinted exactly as they were originally published with no translations, original interpretations, text modifications, etc (Garamond Lethe or others, please check that this is the case). From what I can see, the only borderline "excessive quote" is the passage from the Perelman source (12). WP:NFCC allows block quotes of text provided they are not "excessive" (which is not defined and is unfortunately subjective as currently written) with the numbered items about frequency involving images primarily. WP:NFC has the same recommendations. The other quotes from either PD sources or copyrighted sources that are 1-2 sentences only and have been appropriately attributed. The Perelman quote is 4 sentences long and attributed with the text in block quotes, not excessive IMHO. Froggerlaura ^ribbit 16:46, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

I would gladly get the ball rolling now that Garamond Lethe removed the copyrighted text of the actual parable from our entry... not before leaving an invisible comment in its place, but he seems also to have abandoned the article since. Further recommendations by De728631 were not implemented, specifically the following (quote): you should sum up the context of the parable in your own words and use the other more recent texts as sources without quoting any full text from them. (See: MCQ archive). Thanks, Poeticbent talk 19:56, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

Glad to hear you're willing to get the balling rolling again. As this is my first DYK I'm still learning the process; it was my impression that you had failed the article. As that's not the case I will put the quoted material into my own words. That should be done by this time tomorrow.

In case anyone else is interested, here is the "invisible" comment.

The text of the parable should fall well within the fair use exception of copyright law (and indeed 9 of 11 publishers who reproduced the text in full did not aquire permissions to do so). However, perhaps due to the amount of vertical space it takes up, experienced editors see this an immediately think there is a copyright violation. Ultimately the best solution is for New Direction to put the text under an appropriate license, but until then it's best if the text is not reproduced in full. --Garamond Lethe, 16 Oct 2012

Garamond Lethe 20:45, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

Nothing is set in stone around here, so roll up your sleeve. Poeticbent talk 21:05, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

I've shortened, paraphrased and/or removed most of the blockquotes. Garamond Lethe 07:12, 30 October 2012 (UTC)

Everything's fine. Good to go. I crossed out the original hook per WP:Did you know#hookformat and ALTs which in my view are less effective, and recomend using ALT2 or ALT3 (above) for the front page. Congrats on your first DYK, Garamond Lethe. I'm confident the next one will be a piece of cake. Poeticbent talk 14:53, 30 October 2012 (UTC)

Thanks everyone, particularly Poeticbent and Allen3. I've struck the ALT3 hook and recommend we go with ALT2. Garamond Lethe 17:00, 30 October 2012 (UTC)