Wikipedia:Move review/Log/2013 November

Swami Vivekananda (talk|edit|history|logs|links|archive|watch) (RM)

I disagree with this move and want to ask these questions—

1. If a requested move is restarted based on previous arguments. should we include the arguments of previous RMs too? Do one need to provide dozens (or hundreds) of references each time, or one may expect that as he provided a bunch of reliable references last time, if he says "please see my posts of "this" RM," that'll be sufficient?
2. Was this RM closure based on vote counting or merit analysis?
3. And the most important question— is Swami an honorific?

Points analysis

• Their source: Yes, the source they have provided is against their opinion. If you go to Google Books and search with "Vivekananda - Swami", you’ll find only few results where the name is in title. But when you search with "Swami Vivekananda" you get hundreds of results where the full name is in book title. So their source show that the name "Swami Vivekananda" is the common name.
• Last name mention: As you know in writing, we start mention the first name (eg. Albert Einstein") and then use just first name or last name to refer him (eg. "Albert went to school" OR "Einstein attended college"). This never means only "Einstein" is his common name.

Actually it was the only point they gave in the RM and they just kept on saying "Swami" is an honorific without any source. On the other hand that unsourced point was challenged with a list of sources which showed "Swami Vivekananda" is the common name. I am once again providing few references—

1. President of India's speech from his official website
2. Indian Prime Minster's speech from Indian Government website
3. Gujarat Government official portal (note this is the only portal of the world which is created, sponsored an maintained by a state government)

If I start provide sources, it'll be excessive long, but I'll do if needed.

Actually we have source in Wikipedia itself. Please see the list and numbers of scholarly books which have the full name "Swami Vivekananda" in title and only "Vivekananda" in title. It was also told there are even airports and railway stations on "Swami Vivekanand/a". Everywhere it is the common name.

Now Vrajaprana's analysis— "Swami may refer to any Hindu monk, but it has become attached with and it mainly refers to Swami Vivekananda from the time he assumed the name in 1893. (translated from Bengali)" I am providing sources here, please see these all 1893—1900 newspaper cuttings — very valuable documents — these will show from 1893, he is known as "Swami Vivekananda." Last time User:Bill william compton told— I've never heard "Vivekananda" alone in my life. You are challenging titles of Saint Matthew, Saint Nicholas, Saint Peter, Saint Joseph, etc. Have you ever read WP:COMMONNAME clearly? I too think, WP:HONORIFIC should be read here which states— "Where an honorific is so commonly attached to a name that the name is rarely found in English reliable sources without it, it should be included." And there are hundreds and thousands of reliable sources. I end my comment here. --Tito☸Dutta 02:28, 5 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

•  Administrator note Just so we are clear, I have no opinion on this matter and no concern with which way this move review turns out. That being said, what you have identified as the most important question in your opening statement is actually the least important question. Your second question, regarding how the close was determined, is the only valid question so far as a move review is concerned. The purpose of this board is to review how move requests were closed, not to argue the requested move all over again. Remember that consensus is Wikipedia's primary method for decision making so what you need to do here is establish that the closer was wrong about the consensus reflected in the previous discussion. As far as I am aware there is no process for reviewing a move review so unless you can present some sort of compelling reason that the close itself was so seriously flawed that it should be overturned it is likely this review will continue to be largely ignored until it is itself closed. I would suggest you consider collapsing or otherwise refactoring portions of this statement so that it only discusses the closure itself. Beeblebrox (talk) 20:09, 18 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

• Closer was wrong for the following reasons a) he (apparently) did/could not assess the merits of the arguments and moved on counting votes. Only the first vote of the discussion provided some evidence or source — but that was a boomerang — as that source itself showed the number of books with "Swami Vivekananda" in title is much more than only "Vivekananda" in title b) most of the other votes are either repetition of the same point "per above" type comments, b) the arguments (actually one argument) given by the support voters was challenged or rejected, but please note the points given by oppose voters — those was not challenged. c) a list of sources were presented to show it is a "common-name" — that point went unaddressed too. --Tito☸Dutta 03:00, 19 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

• Comment by the closer of the original move discussion: See my close at Talk:Swami Vivekananda#Requested move 4. I'm aware that this article's title has also been the subject of past discussion. But in the present case the move was justifiable on two grounds. There was not only a majority favoring the move, but there was also a good case in terms of the style guidelines. Those who opposed the move and wanted the title 'Swami' kept as part of the name cited COMMONNAME as their argument. This does not appear relevant in the present case. There is no indication in the wording of MOS:HONORIFIC that it intends to defer to WP:COMMONNAME. Otherwise the value of MOS:HONORIFIC would be lost and we would start to have very ornamental article titles, purely based on frequency of use of the honorific. The removal of 'Swami' is also encouraged by WP:Naming conventions (Indic)#Titles and honorifics. That page calls out the title 'Swami' as one of the "commonly used honorifics which should be questioned". I believe that this answers the question raised above by User:Titodutta, 'Is Swami an honorific?' People sometimes present unusual examples (like Mother Teresa) where we would not know what person was indicated if the honorific was left out, but the title Vivekananda is quite clear and understandable on its own. EdJohnston (talk) 20:47, 18 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

• "understandable" is not a valid argument. If I write "En WP" or just "Einstein", that will be understandable too. Please note, "Vivekananda" has a different spelling "Vivekanand" and many other spelling variations — "Swami Vivekananda" is the common and accepted name. Please check in Google Books and Google scholar yourself Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL --Tito☸Dutta 03:00, 19 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I think WP:COMMONNAME is a policy and WP:HONORIFIC/Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Biographies is a guideline and i think policies out rule guidelines. Well... not out rule, but at least hold a higher order of precedence. So if something is a commonname, even if its honorific, it would be our article's title. Correct me if i am wrong. §§Dharmadhyaksha§§ {T/C} 07:24, 19 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

If that is what you think, then you clearly have not read and understood wp:COMMONNAME. It is only a shortcut to one section of a policy, wp:Article titles. The previous section, wp:NAMINGCRITERIA calls for five distinct criteria in a good article title, each of which is spelled out elsewhere in wp:Article titles. These criteria are: Recognizability, Naturalness, Precision, Conciseness, and Consistency. Looking at them individually in the context of this case: we must consider V and SV to be equally recognizable; V is incontestibly more concise than SV; V is at least as natural as SV; V is as precise as necessary without being too precise. We do not entitle an article Blessed Mother Teresa of Calcutta (not concise, too precise, POV), nor just Teresa (too concise, insufficiently precise, not recognizable). These are respectively a redirect and a disambiguation page instead. Mother Teresa is used as the most concise article title that remains unambiguous. Similar arguments underly the application of MOS:SAINTS as in the example of raised above (far too many subjects are called Matthew to be unique, so Saint Matthew redirects to Matthew the Apostle. LeadSongDog come howl! 19:23, 19 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

So if we had another person with name V, we would have kept this article at SV, just to disambiguate it easily? What my point is that if a large number of people off-wiki choose to call him SV, we should also reflect the same here. None of the books or others refer to him as V alone. Note the difference in second mention when he is called V, which is more like style of writing and for ease. But he is almost negligibly mentioned as V alone. That point was raised in RM and was not refuted. §§Dharmadhyaksha§§ {T/C} 10:50, 20 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

• Weak endorse - I have a number of conflicting thoughts about this one, so it's quite difficult to pick up the pieces.
  • Some things I'm thinking about that aren't really valid in this move review discussion, but I'll note them anyway:
    1. I think personally I would oppose the move itself if it was still being run. I'm not personally familiar with the subject, but there appears to be sufficient evidence that he is referred to with the honorific in a large majority of cases thus meets WP:COMMONNAME as well as the caveat of MOS:HONORIFIC. But I didn't !vote during the RM, so this is not directly germane to the move review.
    2. On the supposed MOS:HONORIFIC vs. WP:COMMONNAME debate, I agree with the comment above - whether or not HONORIFIC "defers" to COMMONNAME is irrelevant. COMMONNAME is part of a policy, and goes hand in hand with the naturalness clause also mentioned in WP:AT. Whereas HONORIFIC is a style guideline. The move closer's comment above that "COMMONNAME [...] does not appear relevant in the present case" is entirely inaccurate. In fact, we should appeal to COMMONNAME first, and if there is no clear cut candidate there, only then do we move to HONORIFIC. HONORIFIC itself notes this fact with its clause about things that are widely used in English. So there are a few alarm bells on the move closer's motivation here, but not in itself grounds to overturn.
    3. As a third, and somewhat minor invalid thought, I am not very keen on the peppering of responses to every single support vote by those who are opposed. Where there's a valid contention to be made on what the voter said, that's fine. But several of these responses are simply restating the opposer's opposition without really explaining what was wrong with the support vote. However, I'm sure free-speech should prevail and if people want to comment a lot then so be it!
  • Now on to things that I think are relevant to the move review:
    1. Validity of arguments: The support !votes from User:Labattblueboy, User:168.12.253.66, User:LeadSongDog address COMMONNAME directly and conclude that the form without the honorific still satisfies it. Those arguments are valid. The support !vote from User:Imc echoes those above it, and is hence also valid. The !vote from User:Snowfire acknowledges the supposed conflict of policies, and plumps down on the side of HONORIFIC. Personally I would disregard that one, or only count it as a very weak support, as I don't think that's the correct interpretation. The !vote from User:Ctg4Rahat appears to be based on WP:OTHERSTUFF, which in turn is an extension of the way WP:HONORIFIC is applied. Again, that translates to a weak support only in my view.
    2. Vote count. In the end, the closer is not some kind of all seeing God and it is the arguments made by those commenting, and their numbers that rule the roost. Taking into account the validities I've described above, there are approximately five in favour (including the nominator) and three against the move. That's good enough, and the close as move was correct.
  • As a final point though, I'd like to reiterate my uncomfortableness with the wording of the close comment: "Arguments that cite COMMONNAME are not persuasive given the plain language of MOS:HONORIFIC." is a false statement, and the fact that this move is correctly closed should not mean this is seen as a precedent. Thanks  — Amakuru (talk) 14:42, 20 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
• Endorse. The closer was clearly within their purview to close as they did. This discussion has had no comment for a month; it needs to be closed.--Cúchullain ^t/c 13:47, 19 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • No comment is not a reason to "endorse". --Tito☸Dutta 08:40, 27 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I endorse the close because the closer was well within their purview to close as they did. The fact that this review has been open for nearly 2 months is a separate issue.--Cúchullain ^t/c 05:49, 29 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]

• Endorse. I think the discussion was leaning in favor, and the calling of a rough consensus in favor was well within the closing admin's discretion. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 11:20, 29 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]