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The contents of this page were initially copied directly from Wikipedia:Disambiguation, where they have previously been long established as a guideline. Cosmetic changes have been made here (addition of subheaders and the like), but no changes have been made to the substance of the guideline. bd2412 T 04:13, 20 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]

There are some common sense tests that I like to use when examining potential dabconcept situations. One of these is what I call the "I'm an expert" test. It goes like this: could a person reasonably represent themselves as an expert in [term], without having to be an expert in multiple fields of knowledge (i.e. without having degrees from different departments in the typical university)? Although there are many species of tuna that are called "bluefin tuna" person could be an expert in "bluefin tuna" without needing to specify a particular species. Compare that to a person claiming to be an expert on "Mercury", or a "battery" expert. The expert on "Mercury" would need to have both Roman mythology and astronomy in his knowledge base. The expert on "battery" would need both chemical engineering and law, as well as some military history and (depending how significant the subtopic was considered) baseball, too. bd2412 T 17:21, 24 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]

This strikes me as an excellent test, and should be incorporated into the guideline. The Mercury expert would need some physical chemistry as well, IMO. Andrewa (talk) 14:24, 6 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Done. bd2412 T 22:16, 29 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]

I would like to add a line indicating that lists of cuisines featuring a common element or combining common elements and cooking styles are not ambiguous under this guideline. I just de-disambiguated Fish stew, and would use that, and Rice cake, as examples. Any objections? bd2412 T 17:30, 8 October 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Do you think Academy is an instance of broad-concept article? Thanks. Fgnievinski (talk) 14:06, 18 May 2015 (UTC)[reply]

After resolving ((Dabprimary)), how can we tag a broad-concept article as so to avoid it being confused for the primary-topic article? For now, I've created a Wikipedia-maintenance Category:Broad-concept articles. I'd like to create a Template:Broad-concept article, similar to ((Set index article)) and ((Disambiguation)). Your thoughts? Fgnievinski (talk) 18:30, 14 June 2015 (UTC)[reply]

In a sense, the broad concept article is the primary topic; it's just primary for an unusually abstract topic with a range of discrete subtopics. Examples that I particularly like include Size, Schedule, and Enemy, which address the variety of perspective for each of those topics. bd2412 T 20:00, 14 June 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the clarification; I was confused by the wording of ((Dabprimary)), which I just tried to improve now [1]. Let me try and rephrase my original inquiry: is it desirable to tag a broad-concept primary-topic article as such, so as to avoid it becoming conflated with less general, more specific related concepts? I'm thinking specifically of Undersea mountain ranges. Secondly, while ((Dabprimary)) is to be applied to disambiguation pages, can we come up with a template to apply in WP:Chimera articles? Now I'm thinking specifically of Academy. Thanks. Fgnievinski (talk) 03:07, 15 June 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Re: Undersea mountain ranges, it is important to note that broad concept articles still need to be reliably sources and cited. That is good example of a broad concept topic, however. The test is very simple. All "undersea mountain ranges" are some kind of range of mountains found under a sea. bd2412 T 04:18, 15 June 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for improving undersea mountain ranges. While we don't conclude the discussion about the template ((Broad-concept article)), I intend to make such articles members of the hidden Category:Broad-concept articles. Fgnievinski (talk) 06:36, 15 June 2015 (UTC)[reply]

If you want to have a hidden category to track them, that is fine. But I fail to see how a separate, visible ((Broad-concept article)) template would be practical or useful. ((Set index article)) and ((Disambiguation)) both were also intended to give editors reminders in the fine print to change internal links to point directly to the intended article instead of the disambiguation/set-index page (if necessary). But in many cases, internal links pointing to broad-concept articles are useful. As BD2412 stated, the broad concept article is treated as the primary topic. And a number of broad-concept articles are usually written per Wikipedia:Summary style, with the discrete subtopics treated as detailed subarticles of the main broad-concept article. Furthermore, putting such a ((Broad-concept article)) template could get buried on long articles like Football, where it could get barely noticed.

Well, I was thinking for of a hatnote like ((Split-apart)) -- do you think it could be applied to, e.g., Academy, which is an undesirable WP:Chimera article that could/should become a nice broad-concept/summary-style article? Or would we need a ((Split-apart2)), offering more specific wording? Fgnievinski (talk) 18:27, 15 June 2015 (UTC)[reply]

And good luck trying to find articles to put into Category:Broad-concept articles. First, I do not think many of them are obvious. It is easy to spot a disambiguation/set-index page because it's basically a short list of related links. But as I mentioned, a broad-concept article can look like any normal article written per WP:SS. Second, I think such a category would eventually be unmanageable. If you take the Nokia Lumia example mentioned on WP:BROADCONCEPT#Product brands and multiple commercial product lines, you could wind up tagging almost every single product brand and multiple product lines article. Under that example, it could be argued that anything from a series of software products like Microsoft Windows with its multiple versions (Windows 7, Windows 8, etc), to a media series like Star Trek with its multiple TV shows and films (Star Trek: The Original Series, Star Trek (film), etc.) could be considered a "broad-concept article" and would be required to be placed in that category. Zzyzx11 (talk) 08:06, 15 June 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Agreed; although I'm uncertain the poor distinction between summary-style articles and broad-concept articles implies that either or both wouldn't benefit from a category of their own. Nor would the large number of candidate articles be a valid reason not to get started. Fgnievinski (talk) 18:27, 15 June 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Wouldn't Microsoft Windows, for example, be an SIA rather than a BCA? Just asking, I'm new here! Andrewa (talk) 22:23, 6 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

User:Fgnievinski, I'd like to look at reviving this. As a newcomer to the area of BCAs I found it very hard to get a handle on what a BCA is (still working on it), and the lack of entries in Category:Broad-concept articles was part of that. See #Examples... I'm not sure whether any of those are in the category!

How can I help? Andrewa (talk) 21:43, 6 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

There is currently a deletion discussion taking place regarding the article Report, a broad concept article which is one step short of (or, depending on how you look at it, one step beyond) being a dictionary definition of the word "report" (and not really comprehensive at that, but that's not the point for now). I am thinking that perhaps this editing guideline should have a subtopic for English words that are BCAs (right now the guideline has subtopics for physics, geography, aspects of sports, etc., but not for broad concept terms like "report" which have lots of meanings in English, none of which are related to any of the existing subtopics specifically mentioned here now). I am not certain to what extent this would simply provide a method to circumvent WP:NOTADICTIONARY (have you ever tried to think up a term that you were pretty sure was just a dictionary definition and then came to Wikipedia to see what was there and sure enough there was a whole article on it? Try it sometime-- think of a word, and see if there is not an article on that word. Cause I betcha there is... and maybe there shouldn't be) but then maybe WP:NOTADICTIONARY is in the end a toothless policy: I have yet to see it applied in an WP:AfD with success (maybe the policy should be changed! No, no, not going there, not today!). Thoughts?? If there aren't any in a day or two I will consider opening up a WP:RfC before implementing the idea of creating a subcategory on English words on my own. KDS4444 (talk) 08:40, 3 September 2016 (UTC)[reply]

I'm trying to get a better idea of what a BCA is and how it's useful.

WP:BCA#Common examples currently lists as examples particle, triangle center, Supreme court, Finance Minister, Ministry of Finance, Central Asia, Northern Europe, Southern United States, football, dead ball, out of bounds, and Nokia Lumia.

Frankly I find these a bit confusing. For a start, Nokia Lumia seems to me to be a prototypical topic for a set index article rather than a BCA. Am I missing something? Andrewa (talk) 21:33, 6 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Nope. It is confusing. older ≠ wiser 02:39, 7 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

I'd like to help fix it, but I don't want to be like what Sir Lancelot Sprat brilliantly termed an elephant reversing into a greenhouse. wp:creed#13

User:BD2412 suggested I look at Color code, Enemy, Guessing, High priest, Schedule, Size, World domination, and Worst-case scenario as good examples of BCAs. Maybe these might provide some better examples for the guideline.

I think that all examples given in WP:BCA should be members of Category:Broad-concept articles, and I'm reluctant to add some of those already there... notably the Nokia one, I still think that's just plain wrong. So I guess that means removing it.

As part of my education (and because it needs doing anyway) I'd like to write some BCAs. Can you suggest some members of Category:Disambiguation pages to be converted to broad concept articles that it would be good to start on? Andrewa (talk) 03:58, 7 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

As I said elsewhere, I think Category:Broad-concept articles is problematic in that there really are not any defining features for what a BCA is. Without that, the category is likely to be populated by arbitrary subjective criteria (i.e., identifying a BCA is in the eye of the beholder--what one editor might think of as a BCA, to another editor would simply be an overview article). A category that *might* work is something more like Category:Disambiguation pages changed into broad-concept articles which could be used to track such transformed entities. older ≠ wiser 10:21, 7 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Just one other of a similar type of article Category:Introductory articles. older ≠ wiser 11:24, 7 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

@Andrewa: Note that I have about three dozen dabconcept resolver drafts in various states of disrepair listed at User:BD2412/sandbox#Disambig resolvers. On the current list, Fish sandwich is ridiculous as a disambiguation page (it's just a list of fish sandwiches; compare Rice cake); Finding water also deserves encyclopedic treatment. Godhead is another one that I have had my eye on for a while. bd2412 T 12:31, 7 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

I'll have a look, thanks! Not sure I'm game to take on fish sandwich, it's a shame IMO it passed RfD in quite the way it did. Rice cake is awesome but flagged as inadequately referenced and it is, and I fear fish sandwich might end up a lot worse. But thanks, this is very educational. Andrewa (talk) 13:42, 7 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Understood, but in that the category does exist, the prototypical examples used at WP:BCA should be in it, surely?

It could serve a useful purpose even if we just have these articles and ones that go through the process of listing at Category:Disambiguation pages to be converted to broad concept articles and subsequent de-listing when they've been converted. Put a notice on it stating how waffly the definition is (perhaps not in quite (;-> those terms)... still thinking about that... Andrewa (talk) 13:05, 7 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

I would also point out that as of now, WP:DABCONCEPT is the only guideline we have on converting poorly styled disambiguation pages into something other than disambiguation pages. We could have separate WP:DABSIA and WP:DABLIST guidelines for disambiguation pages that should be converted into SIAs or lists (or we could have all three rolled into one page). However, there has to be some means of marking disambiguation pages that do need to be converted into something else, because they are merely listing types of a single thing rather than listing ambiguous things. bd2412 T 13:37, 7 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, good point. Tempted to jump to a solution on that but I'll resist. Andrewa (talk) 13:46, 7 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Please consider using Open source as an example. I recently opened a can of disambiguation worms by improved the disamb page and redirections creating thousands of disamb links. But we've since discussed it and think Open source would be better as a Broad-concept article. The article may need summary paragraphs for each section and the 3 or 4 main usages but I think it's pretty good. Also, I'm wondering if there needs to be a new tag to replace the disamb tag. If anyone responds please be sure to ping me. Thanks in advance. ~ JasonCarswell (talk) 11:22, 19 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Opinions are needed on the following: Talk:Scare-line#WP:Content fork. A permalink is here. Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 05:37, 10 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]

This guideline has been used a lot recently in AFDs (see here, here and here) to justify articles that at present include nothing but original research (usually specifically WP:SYNTH) and seem by their very nature to be necessarily based on such. Should the text Please remember when writing a broad-concept article that the concept must have been discussed specifically as a concept in third-party reliable sources. Do not synthesize sources that seem to you to be talking about something similar into an original broad concept. (or equivalent) be added to the page? Hijiri 88 (聖やや) 20:10, 15 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Some kind of warning against WP:SYNTH is due, but it should not be too stringent. Otherwise it will kill articles like Secretary (title).

Your feedback would be appreciated at Talk:Allopathic medicine#Make this page a disambiguation page. Thanks, Mathglot (talk) 06:34, 17 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Apologize for the ping if it's unwanted, but we could still use opinions at this discussion. Pinging top ten editors at WT:BCA: @Fgnievinski, SilkTork, Philg88, JasonCarswell, Brightgalrs, Zzyzx11, KDS4444, and Hijiri88: (Skipping already notified: Andrewa|BD2412|Bkonrad). Thanks, Mathglot (talk) 23:06, 20 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]

 You are invited to join the discussion at Wikipedia:Village pump (idea lab) § Merge reform. ((u|Sdkb)) ^talk 17:00, 10 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Can it be that Interim is a BCA? If yes, how to indicate this (or edit the page)? - Altenmann >talk 21:35, 7 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I agree with the above concern that this guideline opens wide gates to WP:SYNTH. There definitely must be some roadblock againts it. --Altenmann >talk 23:06, 3 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

The examples of broad-concept articles (e.g., Particle, Supreme court, Out of bounds) seem like appropriate subjects to me, with no unusual or unacceptable risk of SYNTH violations.

We do not appear to be drowning in BCAs. We have relatively few disputes over BCAs. For example, the above comment from 2018 appears to be complaining about an AFD, but this idea appears to be mentioned in less than 0.1% of AFDs. This page is linked in only 316 AFDs out of 537K (0.06%).

It seems to me that we probably don't need any extra roadblocks against it, and that adding some would likely be WP:CREEPY.

I wonder whether your concern was prompted by a problematic example, rather than by the typical BCA page. WhatamIdoing (talk) 01:26, 4 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

While Particle, to my tastes, is a perfict BCA, but the remaining two are glaring examples of bad articles. If out of bounds is simply underreferenced and salvageable (although tagged since 2009; looks like dgaf case), but Supreme court leaves an impression that it was written by a student who got an assignment from a wikiphile professor and who knows how to write a good essay, but blissfully ignorant of our rules WP:CITE and WP:NOR. Legal area is not the topic where verifiability is an trivial matter. Regarding your final question, my concern comes from here: Talk:White Terror#Primary topic? --Altenmann >talk 02:32, 4 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

The articles can be poorly written without the subject being inappropriate or at risk of SYNTH. Supreme court probably ought to be sourced to books like these:

• Rogowski, Ralf; Gawron, Thomas (2016). Constitutional Courts in Comparison: The U.S. Supreme Court and the German Federal Constitutional Court. Berghahn Books. ISBN 978-1-78533-273-9.
• Goldsworthy, Jeffrey Denys (2006-02-09). Interpreting Constitutions: A Comparative Study. Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-927413-0.

or some intro-to-international-law textbooks, but even if it's completely WP:Glossary#uncited, that doesn't mean that even a single sentence in the article represents "material—such as facts, allegations, and ideas—for which no reliable, published source exists...somewhere in the world, in any language, whether or not it is reachable online—even if no source is currently named in the article", to quote the definition of OR from that policy. (The key, and sometimes overlooked, part of OR is that it's only OR if it's impossible to cite the material.)

I don't know enough about the historical events in White Terror to know whether some portion of them are "the" White Terror (but it looks like it would only be some of them). It's possible that there could be a viable article on the subject of related events. I see books talking about "the White Terrors", in the plural, which suggests that we could combine some of them into a broad-concept or overview article without violating any of our usual standards. Some of them are about the French Revolution, and others are about the Russian/communist ones. WhatamIdoing (talk) 03:36, 4 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

The articles can be poorly written without the subject being inappropriate or at risk of SYNTH. - I agree, but the point is that for a BCA the risk of WP:SYNTH is especially high due to the very broadness. Therefore I think some words of caution would be handy, to prevent pages like "Supreme court" to be written in SYNTH style in the first place. I would very much like do delete half of its lede. --Altenmann >talk 04:16, 4 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not sure that the risk of SYNTH is especially high. I think the risk of Wikipedia:Wikipedia is not a dictionary problems are high, but I don't see why a "broad" (or "vague") subject would be at high risk for people making stuff up.

Wikipedia:Nobody reads the directions, so I don't think adding anything to this low-traffic will make any practical difference. WhatamIdoing (talk) 04:19, 4 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

(I've moved most of that "lead" – which was longer than most articles – to other sections.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 04:23, 4 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Based on the examples of supreme court and out of bounds, the problem there is that it's only a brief broad overview and then "here's a laundry list of examples". The "one section for each country" format is especially prominent, and it's very rare that it's the best way to present information. More generally, there is a risk of synth with these articles, but it's the same risk of synth anywhere that someone might try to handpick "here are the most important aspects" instead of following the sources (plugging my essay). Thebiguglyalien (talk) 01:28, 5 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I sympathize with this concern. Particle is well constructed because it does talk about a single broad concept. But supreme court and out of bounds are in a sorry state because they are effectively a disambiguation for many different things, poorly written and poorly sourced. There are lots of words that are effectively homonyms, referring to multiple different things. This is a call for disambiguation / navigation aid, not a single article about several things. Shooterwalker (talk) 16:25, 4 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I don't think that Supreme court is many things. The article's subject is the highest judicial body in a given system. That's "one thing". WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:43, 4 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

If it is an identifiable "one thing", then it is no longer a broad concept article. For example, we have "Federation", and it does have the list of federations, but we dont classify the page as BCA.... Or shall we? --Altenmann >talk 19:32, 4 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

A page can be a broad-concept article even if it's not (manually) placed in Category:Broad-concept articles. I think Federation is a BCA.

A broad-concept article is about "one thing". See the first sentence: "A broad-concept article is an article that addresses a concept" – "a concept", as in "exactly one concept", aka "one thing". BCAs are pages that are about "one thing" (the concept of a particle, a federation, or having a judicial entity that outranks the lower courts) with many related specific instances (see the contents of Category:Particles, Category:Federations, Category:Supreme courts).

To use the White Terror example above, someone could probably write a BCA on the White Terrors around the French revolution, and someone could write a different BCA on the White Terrors connected with the Russian revolution. You wouldn't write a single BCA on all of those, because those are "two things". I would suggest to any eager editor that the model of Wikipedia:Set index articles (=one concept + same name) would be a better fit, because White Terrors aren't as abstract as a typical BCA subject, but it wouldn't be impossible. WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:37, 4 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

P.S., and while we are at it we do have IMO a really weird disambig page Federation (disambiguation), which defies all rules of WP:DAB/WP:MOSDAB. --Altenmann >talk 19:36, 4 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Wow! Looks like the main thing that this guideline says not to do. North8000 (talk) 19:41, 4 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

List of federations redirects to Federation. WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:38, 4 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I was talking about the current state, and I agree with you that the supreme court article should be about "one thing". I can imagine a better version of that article where it focuses on legal principles and separation of powers, instead of the mishmash of badly sourced stubs pasted together. Alternmann brings up an interesting comparison with federation. I think there is a way to steer editors in the right direction to make better articles, where one word can refer to many concepts. Shooterwalker (talk) 19:50, 4 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Supreme court is exactly what it needs to be. Almost every country in the world has a judiciary with a unitary court to which final appeals are taken, but legal principles and separation of powers vary widely across the globe, to the point that discussing them in this context except in the most general terms would be WP:SYNTH. What we have, rather, is a basic definition, some discussion of the broad categories of variation, and then a country-by-country list where any reader can find just about any country of interest, and either glean what they need to know or follow the link in that section to a more detailed discussion. What we can not have is either a disambiguation page (because the concept is unambiguous, and the examples are just instances of the concept) or a set index article (because not all highest courts share the name "Supreme Court"). BD2412 T 01:54, 5 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I find it extremely weird that an unreferenced lede with oversweeping statements "is exactly what it needs to be." This version was hideous SYNTH. This intervention simply spread the lede thinly over the article, but this did not make the article less SYNTH. If you don't believe me, I can readily add a dirty dozen of ((cn)) tags, starting from the very definition. "would be WP:SYNTH" is an outrageous statement to hear from a seasoned Wikipedian. --Altenmann >talk 03:29, 5 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Is "the very definition" the first sentence's claim that "a supreme court...is the highest court within the hierarchy of courts"?

ISBN 9780195557558 (Oxford Reference) defines "Supreme Court" as "The highest court in a court hierarchy". Therefore, the definition is not a violation of the original research policy. WhatamIdoing (talk) 03:42, 5 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Well, what prevented you from adding the footnote to make me look completely stupid? But this is just sweeping the bug further under the carpet. How about "also known as a court of last resort, apex court, and high (or final) court of appeal, and court of final appeal"? Also I heard there is such thing as Constitutional court. Isn't it a court that can defenestrate decisions even of the supreme court? How about a logical sloppiness in the lede? "the highest court" and then a bit below "tend not to have a single highest court". It may be not exactly WP:SYNTH, but sloppily written out of someone's head (which is if not SYNTH, then definitely OR) and hence in a sore need in citations for verification. --Altenmann >talk 03:47, 5 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

So... just to make sure we're both using the same words to mean the same thing, are we actually agreed that uncited text is not automatically a violation of NOR?

For example, I could write "Smoking causes lung cancer", just "out of my head" (i.e., using prior knowledge), with no citations in sight. Are we agreed that even if this would be a violation of all that is right and decent, it would not technically be a violation of the Wikipedia:No original research policy? WhatamIdoing (talk) 03:57, 5 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

A really bad example, colleague. If you don't provide an ironclad reputable ref, I can readily expand it "..., but its danger is greatly exaggerated", citing top notch researchers hired by tobacco lobby. --Altenmann >talk 04:03, 5 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Sure, leaving it uncited is a bad idea. But are we agreed that it's not OR? WhatamIdoing (talk) 04:05, 5 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Let's not split hairs on hypothetical examples. I can readily nitpick that taken out of context the statement is vague up to the degree of incorrectness. --Altenmann >talk 04:10, 5 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

But yes, we read WP:V in the same way. I know, tl;dr and stuff, but at the very beginning I wrote Legal area is not the topic where verifiability is a trivial matter. Otherwise lawyers would not be filthy rich :-). --Altenmann >talk 04:06, 5 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

The question is really whether we read WP:NOR the same way.

But proceeding under the assumption that we do, then the fact that it's uncited is irrelevant to the NOR policy, and what matters is that someone, somewhere in the world, published this. It's possible that the synonyms would have to be cited separately, but I don't believe the list of synonyms introduces anything that hasn't already been published elsewhere. Apex court appears to be a generic term,[2] as does court of last resort.[3] (Oxford Dictionaries says the former is "chiefly in South Asia and Africa".) The others look like they may be the 'local' name for the subject, e.g., Court of Final Appeal (Hong Kong). Adding citations looks like it would just be a matter of spending some time finding and spamming in citations. I doubt that a single word in the first paragraph would change as a result of that effort. WhatamIdoing (talk) 04:32, 5 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

You can argue what you want, my only answer will be "Sorry, colleague, you may be mistaken". I am sorry to sound WP:BLUECHEESE, but let me give you my own a piece of WP:SYNTH: "All material in Wikipedia must be attributable to a reliable, published source" + "any material challenged or likely to be challenged must be supported by inline citations." Meaning that if I question something, I have no idea how the text landed into the article: whether you copied from a book but forgot to footnote, or after reading very many books you formed an educated opinion, which may or may not reflect WP:TRUTH, or simply decided "it must be so, because it is self-evident". Now, the question is indeed "whether we read WP:NOR the same way". My view is paranoid: until proven otherwise using WP:RS, I treat any sufficiently nontrivial statement as Wikipedian's opinion, i.e., OR. Of course, I am not that paranoid. Using the "no smoking" example from the above, I would let it go in an article, say, about gamers who smoke too much and thus create nuisance to their roommates. But in an article about cancer among gamers I would surely demand a ref. --Altenmann >talk 05:21, 5 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

It sounds to me like your opinion, no matter how rational, does not align with the policy. The NOR policy is about whether a source exists "somewhere in the world". Your view is about whether a source is cited in the Wikipedia article, which is an important point, but also a separate point.

I want articles well-sourced, but I don't claim that uncited material is a violation of the NOR policy. If you were to take my advice, I'd suggest that you stop calling that "OR" and start calling it "something WP:Likely to be challenged" – a category that is always required to have an inline citation per WP:V, and that is entirely dependent upon the personal judgment of editors. You could treat a statement like "the human hand has five digits" as something WP:LIKELY to be WP:CHALLENGED, and nobody can gainsay you in that (because it actually happened once). WhatamIdoing (talk) 07:00, 5 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Well, I disagree with your interpretation of the policy. Unlike you, I directly cited from the policy. I agree that a suspicious phrase or two is hardly NOR, but when a whole huge section goes uncited and is fullfilled mit astaunishing ken then something is wrong with Wikipedian's research. --Altenmann >talk 07:58, 5 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Wiki editing is a summary of what the source(s) says/say. And the lead is a summary of those summaries. You need to treat sentences individually. The operative definition is: If it's unchallenged, it's normal editing. If it's challenged and then not sourced according to WP:NOR/WP:Ver then it's synth and a violation of both of these policies. North8000 (talk) 14:04, 5 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@Altenmann, I quoted the policy: NOR says that a source has to exist "somewhere in the world". I wonder if you have been under the impression that "All material must be attributable" refers only to sources already cited in the article. WhatamIdoing (talk) 15:34, 5 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Nice cherrypicking. NOR further say "To demonstrate that you are not adding original research, you must be able to cite reliable...". Meaning that if you cannot cite, then it is probably OR. Even if a source exist there is no guarantee that a Wikipedian (mis)reads something biased, suiting their agenda. Just as you did now :-) (no offense, just teasing) --Altenmann >talk 15:49, 5 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

{od} I feel like you keep confusing "did not" and "cannot". If you "cannot" cite, then it is probably OR. But if you "could" but "did not", then it's definitely not OR.

A few years ago, I set up this table to explain the differences:

Only the last two are technically OR. The first one might not be a problem (we [still] don't have a cite-everything rule), but assuming that it requires a source, then all of the first three are WP:V – but not WP:OR. The last two are WP:OR (and also WP:V, because all OR additionally violates WP:V).

The first sentences of Supreme court are the first one in this table. It wasn't cited, but a couple of minutes with a search engine easily proved that it could be. WP:NOR doesn't require the existence of a single citation. It requires that everything be "attributable", but that means "possible to attribute", not "already attributed in the form of an inline citation". None of that is a NOR violation. (But you can still claim that it's a WP:V violation if you either WP:CHALLENGE it or declare that you think it is WP:LIKELY to be challenged.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:12, 5 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

(edit conflict) IMO the "probably OR" is not correct. The process is that it needs to be challenged, and then if nobody sourced it the material needs to get removed. "Challenged and not sourced" is not a determination of whether or not it was OR. Sincerely, North8000 (talk) 16:14, 5 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I don't think that these have any particular danger of wp:Synth specifically. I also don't think that these are some type of special case. Many topics are broad. Often they are groupings (of items covered in other articles) created by a term, where they have something in common. And sometimes the term gives a slanted view of the group. I think that sometimes we need to acknowledge that they are more of just a term and that the article should be about the term rather than everything in the group covered by the term. The latter can turn into a random coatrack, even if not technically wp:synth. In other cases the linkage itself (which could be a concept) is a topic worth covering which is a good example where the concept itself is suitable to cover in a separate article. North8000 (talk) 18:24, 4 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

There's been a lot of activity here in the last day, so I'll just reiterate that the supreme court article is C-class for a reason. It's not our best work. I'll leave it to other editors to argue whether it needs structural changes, or just some better prose and research. I think there is at least a consensus that supreme court and federation are good examples of discrete topics, and not merely a single term referring to multiple things. If someone has a proposal to improve this guideline to encourage better articles, I am open to it. Shooterwalker (talk) 16:39, 5 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Both article could use some work. And the Supreme straddles the fence on whether it about a concept or a term, but in this case I think that that is inevitable. "Federation" probably needs a more specific title because it is about "national-level" type federations. While I question whether "broad concept" is a distinct class of article, I think that this provides much needed analysis and guidance for articles with this aspect and could be further developed to do that. Sincerely, North8000 (talk) 21:24, 5 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]