Espoused Theories - Overhaul with Wiki Integration

[Tempus]

Hi, I am fairly new to the forum here, but I've noted that many forum regulars have an espoused theory tag as their signature. At the moment, I've found that the forum is hip-deep in theories, and it's impossible to find many previous theories without those signature links. Many theories are fantastic, well thought out, and highlight important quotes or passages I would not have or would never have noticed.

 

I'd like to suggest an overhaul to the system, where theories could be added to the coppermind wiki. This would have the following benefits:

 

• Theories would all be gathered in one place

• Theories would be easily accessible through categories and navigation pages

• Theories would be formally laid out, updateable, and contain links back to the forum discussion thread

• Pages on the wiki have the benefit of easy citation, easy linking to other relevant pages on the wiki, and all the information gathering power that implies

• Theory pages on the wiki could have a list of the author/maintainer of the theory, as well as any individuals who espouse it

 

 

I've gone ahead and made a sample page for a miniature theory I posted the other day. If there is interest in this system, I am volunteering to make a category framework, all necessary templates, and any other wiki formatting necessary to make the system very easy to use. In addition, I'll also transcribe maybe a dozen theories floating around into the wiki myself right away to give it a bit of a push.

 

 

So, I'd like to have from the community and moderators the following:

 

• Permission to create a theories category and section on the Coppermind

• Feedback on the presentation of the theory pages, what information should be included, and the topic headers

• A dozen choco chip cookies

• General thoughts about the proposal and ways to make Espousing and viewing theories easier

• Throw around possibilities for a better term than 'espoused theories' and people who espouse them

[Windrunner he/him]

Hrm. There is merit to this idea. We're actually having a meeting of all the active wiki admins this weekend, so I'll throw this up on the agenda, and get back to you. If anyone else has anything to say on the subject, I'd love to hear your thoughts.

[WeiryWriter he/him]

Hrm. There is merit to this idea. We're actually having a meeting of all the active wiki admins this weekend, so I'll throw this up on the agenda, and get back to you. If anyone else has anything to say on the subject, I'd love to hear your thoughts.

 

bum, bum, BUM... (It's already there)

[Tempus]

Alright, let me know how the meeting goes then!

[NutiketAiel he/him]

I don't think this is a very good idea. I personally would be opposed to the idea of putting theories on the wiki. No matter how carefully labeled they may be, they could still easily be confusing to an inexperienced reader, especially if they end up being linked to articles. The wiki should be for facts, information that we are sure of either from a clear text reading of the books, or the WoB. Theories should stay here, in the forum, for discussion.

[Tempus]

Those are strange arguments. 

 

No matter how carefully labeled they may be, they could still easily be confusing to an inexperienced reader

 

 

 

It's trivial to put a nice bright notice at the top saying 'This page is for a theory, and is not factual!'. In addition, Wikis have namespaces, it would be reasonably simple to make all theory pages "Theory:MyTheory". Frankly, I'd be a little shocked if just the large, bright coloured notice at the top wasn't enough for people.

 

 

 

 

especially if they end up being linked to articles

 

The theory links will of course link to articles, that is part of the attractiveness of putting them on a wiki. I don't see how that makes them more confusing. Certainly they won't be linked TO from articles, if that's what you meant - there's no particular reason for that. The theory section can stay off in it's own corner until proven wrong or right.

 

The wiki should be for facts, information that we are sure of either from a clear text reading of the books, or the WoB.

 

 

The wiki currently has a number of theories on it. They are placed in-article, and have a 'theory' tag on top of them. Far more intrusive than anything I suggested.

 

Theories should stay here, in the forum, for discussion.

 

 

The forum is great for discussion and debate, but terrible for indexing, reference, and clarity. Easy hyperlinks to (factual!) wiki info, superior formatting options such as columns and tables, the ability to add footnotes, the ability to group and cross-reference theories by category, author, or other criterion - these are all things the forum theory threads lack.

 

Mostly though, it's just difficult to find things on the forum. I don't know how many times Kurkistan or Argent has told me 'This was discussed in X thread, 2.5 years ago, on page 19 of thread 82 in post 26 in the third paragraph, and it was concluded that it is true, here is a link'. Having a nice little section on the wiki will offer a place to keep the core theories updated, to have links to the forum discussions, and to let people interested in speculation on the books or the cosmere see the variety of theories many people have proposed over the years.

 

You seem to feel that putting theories on the wiki will somehow 'invade' the other pages, or impinge upon them, and that wasn't my intention at all.

[Kurkistan he/him]

I'm generally in favor of this idea, though it could be a lot of work to get off the ground (even I, in my link-oholic-ness, still don't even recall the basis for half the theories I pseudo-espouse) and there is a potential for abuse of the system in the worst case as people might arbitrarily "upgrade" theories they like.

 

Mostly though, it's just difficult to find things on the forum. I don't know how many times Kurkistan or Argent has told me 'This was discussed in X thread, 2.5 years ago, on page 19 of thread 82 in post 26 in the third paragraph, and it was concluded that it is true, here is a link'. Having a nice little section on the wiki will offer a place to keep the core theories updated, to have links to the forum discussions, and to let people interested in speculation on the books or the cosmere see the variety of theories many people have proposed over the years.

 

Actually, we had a very similar discussion last summer, where concerns about bruised feelings were a major factor in not doing this kind of thing. You can read up on the arguments if you want.

 

Also, I think that you and Nutiket may be talking past each other a bit. I believe that Nut's concerned primarily about people starting to "cite" theories flat-out, while you are assuming (fairly enough, I think) a pretty firm separation. By my understanding, you (Tempus) primarily just want to use the Coppermind as a convenient place to host this "theory database", rather than really fully incorporating it.

Edited March 24, 2014 by Kurkistan

[Tempus]

Yes, Kurk, you might be right. that was my intention, to use the coppermind as a convenient hosting and reference place for. Much like how Rithmatist articles don't link to Mistborn, there is no need for any core Coppermind articles to link to the theories.

The arguments presented previously though, are sound, but it seems like you never gave it up, so perhaps this time will fare better.

Edited March 24, 2014 by Tempus

[Chaos he/him]

I don't have any objection to putting theories on the Coppermind. You are completely right about the forums being a pretty poor place to store theories. My concern for putting them on the wiki is that it is entirely possible very few people will end up choosing to put their theories on the wiki. It'd have to be user-submitted, unless there was something so fantastic that another editor would like to submit in their stead. Otherwise, we just have a ton of canonical work to do.

However, I do think I need to make a comment about theories in articles, which is sometimes necessary, especially in cosmere subjects. Usually this is reserved for a particular section. But look at Shard, Hoid, Cultivation, and Odium. I would argue that all the information in the theory sections there are very important. Without them, readers would not have a complete a picture as they should. There are other articles which may want to include the theoretical tag throughout the entire article, such as the Manywar article. This is because some small leaps in logic may be required to make a high quality article. (Go read that one and see what I mean)

I feel that the wiki mods--Joe, Windy, Weiry, and I--will be sufficient gatekeepers to ensure that theories on articles does not get abused. Good citations are very important, but for example in the Manywar, it is not out of line to write something like "it is possible that...". I will vigorously defend the practice, because on articles like Shard or Hoid, some prominent theories are critical to properly contextualize things.

As you can see from: http://coppermind.net/wiki/Special:WhatLinksHere/Template:Theory there aren't any cases where the theory tag is abused in articles.

Anyways, that was a tangent; I generally support a Theory namespace, but there are a nonzero amount of cases when theories are very relevant in an article.

[Tempus]

I did not mean to be critical - I find the coppermind wiki to be generally well wriiten and well edited. When dealing with topics where all we have are clues, it's important to paint out the most likely possibilities. It is on a different scale than the forum theories we're discussing.

As far as getting theory authors to make pages, I think that the most dedicated will. For others, though, even a stub with a link or copy-pasta of the original post would be sufficient for basic referencing. Again, since I proposed it, I'm willing to put in the effort there to get the ball rolling, and at least get a few major ones as articles, stubs for at least all the current espoused theories in sigs, and stubs and notices for new theories to spread awareness. Of course with moderator approval, and under whatever stipulations you'd like (doesn't mean I won't push for what I think would be the path of highest awesomeness, though ).

[skaa he/him]

I really like this idea!

 

Last month I decided to use my Coppermind User Page to store theories that I am not yet ready to post on the forums. An actual Theory Category would allow people to see the theories that other Sharders are working on, which might be useful for idea gathering or even theory-development collaboration.

 

One possible issue, though, is when people start using a theory article's Talk Page to discuss the theory instead of going to the forums. But I suppose it shouldn't be too much of a problem since it's trivial to create a forum post that links to the article and its Talk Page.

[king of nowhere]

As a guy who read the coppermind every once in a while, I'd definitely agree to putting theories there, as long as they are clearly labeled as such. there are many fields where most of what we have are speculation, and sometimes putting well-founded speculation is better than putting nothing.

Also, one may want to visit the coppermind to update himself on the current state of art of speculations.4

[NutiketAiel he/him]

 

It's trivial to put a nice bright notice at the top saying 'This page is for a theory, and is not factual!'. In addition, Wikis have namespaces, it would be reasonably simple to make all theory pages "Theory:MyTheory". Frankly, I'd be a little shocked if just the large, bright coloured notice at the top wasn't enough for people.

 

I am familiar with namespaces; I have a fair bit of experience as an editor on Wikipedia.  I had assumed that you were talking about making a new namespace for theories when I first read your idea.  However, that still leaves the problem of users who are less experienced with the Coppermind, or wikis in general, wandering into a page and being confused.  I'm not saying that it's an enormous problem, but I still think that it is a problem.  Perhaps it is just me, and perhaps this is because I am used to Wikipedia and not fiction wikis, but I see a wiki encyclopedia as a reference source for facts, not speculation.  When a fan opens a page, any page, on the Coppermind, they should be sure that everything they are going to read is something that has been confirmed either by a plain text reading of the novels, or the direct words of the author- not the oft-times wild speculations of we crazy people here at the 17th Shard.

 

 

The theory links will of course link to articles, that is part of the attractiveness of putting them on a wiki. I don't see how that makes them more confusing. Certainly they won't be linked TO from articles, if that's what you meant - there's no particular reason for that. The theory section can stay off in it's own corner until proven wrong or right.

 

Yes, factual articles linking to theories was what concerned me, not theories linking to articles (I worded that poorly, I now see).  This rule would assuage that one particular concern, provided that it was rigidly enforced.

 

 

The wiki currently has a number of theories on it. They are placed in-article, and have a 'theory' tag on top of them. Far more intrusive than anything I suggested.

 

Yes, I know, and I cringe every time I see them.  However, not every time something is tagged with the "theory" tag is it actual theory.  For example, I just picked a random article with that tag in it: Allomancy.  The overwhelming majority of that section is not theory- it is fact, confirmed by the text of the novels, the text of the annotations or the WoB, and is cited as such.  There are maybe 2 paragraphs worth of information in there that is not confirmed, and one of them was marked with a cite tag (I have taken the liberty of so marking the other).  So, were those two sections to be omitted (or cited with relevant quotes), the theory tag could be removed in its entirety.

 

My point being that some of the articles that contain "theories" actually have very little information that is theoretical, and that information could be removed without harming the articles.  Indeed, I think it would greatly improve the articles to have that information removed, to allow the articles to stand solely on the facts contained therein.

 

 

The forum is great for discussion and debate, but terrible for indexing, reference, and clarity. Easy hyperlinks to (factual!) wiki info, superior formatting options such as columns and tables, the ability to add footnotes, the ability to group and cross-reference theories by category, author, or other criterion - these are all things the forum theory threads lack.

 

Mostly though, it's just difficult to find things on the forum. I don't know how many times Kurkistan or Argent has told me 'This was discussed in X thread, 2.5 years ago, on page 19 of thread 82 in post 26 in the third paragraph, and it was concluded that it is true, here is a link'. Having a nice little section on the wiki will offer a place to keep the core theories updated, to have links to the forum discussions, and to let people interested in speculation on the books or the cosmere see the variety of theories many people have proposed over the years.

 

You seem to feel that putting theories on the wiki will somehow 'invade' the other pages, or impinge upon them, and that wasn't my intention at all.

 

Of course it's not your intention.  That doesn't mean that it isn't going to happen.  And I agree that the forum is sadly limited in this regard, but I don't think adding speculation to the wiki en masse is the right solution.  All this would do would be to try to solve one problem by creating another- the dilution of the reliability of the Coppermind.

 

As I stated, I believe that the forum is the proper place for theories because on the forum, they can be discussed.  On the Coppermind, they would just be presented.  This can lead to any number of problems.  Debate of the theories taking place on the talk pages of the Coppermind, for example.  Besides perforce exclusion from the discussion of any 17th Sharders who don't participate in the Coppermind, it would be confusing and counter-productive to have discussions going on in more than one place.

 

Another problem from the presentation of theories on the Coppermind is that an article written solely from the perspective of the user who proposed the theory would likely (not always, but likely) be biased in the theory's favor.  Looking at your sample theory page, Tempus, I see several points that I would want to contest in a discussion.  I can't, however, because there is no room for discussion on a wiki page.  I could edit it, but then I would be changing your theory page.  If you disagreed with the changes I was making, you'd likely revert them, which could lead to an edit war.  Even if you and I were mature enough to come to a compromise on how the page should be worded, that will not always be the case.  And that's assuming just two conflicting views; what if 3, or 6, or 10 Sharders all have different views of the merits and flaws of a theory and, rather than discussing it in the forums as we do now, simply started edit warring on the theory page?  I think that presenting the theories like this would very likely lead to acrimony and needless strife, not to mention a lot of extra work for the poor, overworked and under-appreciated Coppermind admins as they sort through the various edit wars.

 

I hope this makes the reasons behind my objection more plain.  I am sorry I waited a few days to respond to your rebuttal, but I wanted to wait until I had time to respond in detail and give you the well thought out response that your case deserved.  It's fairly obvious that I am in the minority on this issue, and I fully expect that your proposal will be approved in some form.  If it does come to pass, however, I just hope that you, and the Coppermind admins, keep my concerns in mind as you decide how to implement it.

[Chaos he/him]

Yes, I know, and I cringe every time I see them. However, not every time something is tagged with the "theory" tag is it actual theory. For example, I just picked a random article with that tag in it: Allomancy. The overwhelming majority of that section is not theory- it is fact, confirmed by the text of the novels, the text of the annotations or the WoB, and is cited as such. There are maybe 2 paragraphs worth of information in there that is not confirmed, and one of them was marked with a cite tag (I have taken the liberty of so marking the other). So, were those two sections to be omitted (or cited with relevant quotes), the theory tag could be removed in its entirety.

My point being that some of the articles that contain "theories" actually have very little information that is theoretical, and that information could be removed without harming the articles. Indeed, I think it would greatly improve the articles to have that information removed, to allow the articles to stand solely on the facts contained therein.

As the author of that section of Allomancy (and almost the entirety of the article in its current form, with exception of some questionable edits I later saw), I feel the need to defend this practice. In the specific thing you had issue with (the other few cite tags are things that I know to be factual, but still need their citations):

 

It may be quite unclear that Allomancy is of Preservation. After all, Pushing and Pulling on metals isn't an effect that "preserves," so to speak. However, it is important to know that saying "Allomancy is of Preservation" has a very specific meaning: the way an Allomancer accesses the power is of Preservation, but the actual effect of the power is unrelated to Preservation. This is a fundamental difference between Allomancy and Feruchemy. In Feruchemy, its power comes from your own energy, but Allomancy is of Preservation. The act of burning a metal--accessing the power of Preservation--must be in line with the intent of Preservation. So burning a metal needs to "preserve" one's own energy, and so the power must come from the external source of Preservation's body.

The bolded part is the jump in logic, the part that is not directly confirmed by Brandon, but pretty implied, in my opinion. This paragraph provides critical information on the subject of Allomancy. Do you know how many people, back in the day, were confused by the question of why, exactly, Allomancy is of Preservation? A great deal. That was why I had to include this paragraph of explanation, and it does require a small leap. In fact, the argument I present here is, in fact, the argument I originally presented in my Principle of Intent. Yes, it is a small supposition, but I do think it gives a good context on why things work. The cosmere is very logical, and if a person comes out of an article thinking that something does not make sense, we've failed.

Some day I'm going to write a Realmatic Theory article, and it's going to be an awesome article. Right now the Realmatic article is utter trash. It's a placeholder article for someone to make it awesome. And honestly, I don't think there will be any way to write a truly good wiki article on Realmatics without including some theoretical thoughts on the subject. Sure, you can stick directly to the books, but I genuinely think that's doing a disservice to readers. Why? Because a wiki article, in my opinion, needs to provide a reader a full picture of what is known on the subject at hand, and that will occasionally require context. A list of facts and confirmations is a terrible wiki article. There's a flow to them that is critical. It's like an expository essay on the subject.

Were I to neglect theories on Realmatics that Brandon RAFOs, but implies that we are on the right track, that is a disservice. The cosmere is freaking hard to newbies, and I feel a strong responsibility to fully educate people to the best of our combined knowledge. There's a logic and flow to the cosmere that is not immediately apparent.

Let's look at some other articles with theoretical sections, and I will argue the necessity for these to exist:

Southern Peoples of Scadrial:

 

It is theorized that the southern peoples are the men of "red and gold" that Miles Dagouter refers to shortly before his death.

This does provide something extra to the article, and gives readers something to think about. In this case, there is no citation, and it's pure speculation. But you know, I'm very okay with that, because maybe casual readers skipped over that line, when they should probably be quite concerned with it or its implications.

Ironspine Building

 

The owners of the Ironspine building have as of yet remained unmentioned. It seems rather unlikely that the construction of a lift and an enormous tunnel beneath the building would have gone unnoticed. It is possible that the building is owned by the mysterious group known as the Set. This would also make sense in that the Set was attempting to destroy House Tekiel financially, which seems to parallel the Ironspine's attempt to be taller than Tekiel Tower.

Again, good ideas for someone to think about, and totally adds to the article.

Day of Recreance

 

It is speculated that the Day of Recreance was actually the day when Odium vanquished Honor, the Almighty, Splintering him. This caused all Knights Radiant to lose the connection that they had, possibly through their Spren. Believing that they had been abandoned, they lost all hope and abandoned their duties.

This is still not an unreasonable theory. A Day of Recreance article that doesn't put some possibilities of why the Recreance happened is a bad Recreance article. It just doesn't contain all the relevant information a reader might want to know. (However, note this does not contain Words of Radiance knowledge at the moment)

Investiture

You might be able to get away with removing the theoretical tag here, I'll give you that.

Intent

This entire article is marked, and this is because of the perspective it takes. It is written providing evidence that such a thing exists. Perhaps you could rephrase it to not be like that, but I feel it's fine.

Ghostbloods

Again, discussing the objectives of the Ghostbloods is relevant. Note this article is particularly terrible in its current state, though.

Manywar

Windy wrote this one, and he could probably explain his rationale here better than I could, but this is marked as theoretical due to small leaps of logic that are marked with phrases such as "It seems". These are necessary for making this article truly great, with a proper narrative structure that explains everything we know.

Skaze

Once upon a time, this was less confirmed that Skaze are Splinters of Dominion. I'm still not sure that it was directly confirmed, but there's a lot of evidence supporting this that could be included in this. Ultimately, however, the conclusion is not totally confirmed, and again, this is a critical piece of information on a subject we know virtually nothing about.

Oathpact

A terrible article, but I think you'd be hard pressed to give a comprehensive look at the Oathpact without some theoretical discussions.

Voidbringers

This article is also terrible--I believe Windy has been drafting a new version--but the speculation here is very benign, and if you don't mention Odium in a Voidbringer article, it's pretty bad.

Dakhor

This refers to the Dakhor magic system. There are small suppositions in this article, but they are important in giving a comprehensive look at the subject.

Chasm

This refers to the line "The chasm is unlikely to have been caused by Odium's visit to Sel." That's supposition, but it is absolutely relevant.

Elantris (city)

An entirely reasonable supposition. Connecting smaller articles to the greater cosmere is always a good thing.

Odium

To give a full discussion on the abilities of Odium, supposition is required, and so the theory tag is required.

Spren

This only has the line referring to the Ryshadium, which we now know from a WoR tour signing that Investiture is related to this. This is relevant and makes readers wonder what other effects spren have.

Cultivation

While now there is more information on the connection with Cultivation and the Nightwatcher, this was not present before the Words of Radiance tour, hence the theory tags. And considering that we still don't know what that exact relationship is, there is still room for theories in this article.

Hemalurgy

The theory tag on the Bind Points section is there at my behest because I was unconvinced by Windy's analysis. It requires citations, and if there might exist speculation, I feel it is better to mark things as theoretical. But I don't think you can argue this information is not relevant--indeed, a Hemalurgy article should get into the nitty-gritty of bind points.

Shardblade

Read this article in a pre-Words of Radiance world and the theory tag on its respective section was a darn good one. Now most of that is factual. Windy is going to revise this, and it is wonderful.

----------------

So, that's just a sampling, but I think on the whole, you can't say that there should be no theoretical information on the Coppermind. It is absolutely relevant in certain cases, mostly cases involving cosmere implications. I very much disagree that that information should be lost, as that's antithetical to the Coppermind's purpose of being comprehensive.

 

My point being that some of the articles that contain "theories" actually have very little information that is theoretical, and that information could be removed without harming the articles.

In this swath that I present, there are some that do add information and important context to the article. But, more importantly, shouldn't a theoretical section, in general, have a higher threshold for citations than most other subjects? In the Manywar article, which is one of the best articles on the Coppermind, there are just citations everywhere, and the article is very upfront with possible supposition. Yet, its supposition is totally relevant to the article.

In the Allomancy article, there is a bit of supposition, and yet most of it is factual. The speculative part is tiny, and is a natural conclusion given the things we know. That's exactly how a theoretical section should be, especially cosmere ones! It's like saying, "here's my conclusion, but it's so well-cited and reasonable that you should believe it." And that's what you should do. Look at theory sections with a grain of salt, and if they persuade you, well cool. You've now learned something new that you wouldn't have before.

The fact that I looked through, say, the Shardblade article and the theoretical knowledge is actually true reinforces my opinion that it, upon occasion, has a place on the Coppermind.

You are more than welcome to come to me, Windy, or Weiry regarding specific cases of the use of the theory tag. I'm more than happy to listen and accept that changes can be made. However, on the whole, I hope I have persuaded you that including theoretical information is sometimes critical.

[Tempus]

So, we've got some excellent back and forths, with some good points all around. Any word from above during the meeting this past weekend? If theory pages are a go, I'll start working on em'. If they're a maybe, I could make just a cross-reference page with forum links to the appropriate discussions, see how they go. If no, I'll move along.

[WeiryWriter he/him]

So, we've got some excellent back and forths, with some good points all around. Any word from above during the meeting this past weekend? If theory pages are a go, I'll start working on em'. If they're a maybe, I could make just a cross-reference page with forum links to the appropriate discussions, see how they go. If no, I'll move along.

 

Actually, for a variety of reasons it had to get postponed.  Hopefully we can get to together soon so we can discuss this, but there has not been a ruling as of yet.

[NutiketAiel he/him]

 

You are more than welcome to come to me, Windy, or Weiry regarding specific cases of the use of the theory tag. I'm more than happy to listen and accept that changes can be made. However, on the whole, I hope I have persuaded you that including theoretical information is sometimes critical.

 

Honestly?  You have not.  In fact, looking at your examples, I am even more convinced that including theories is detrimental to the Coppermind.  I think this comes down to a fundamental difference in views between you and I about the purpose of the wiki.  You seem to be dedicated to providing a "comprehensive" view of the various subjects.  That is a laudable goal, but I do not think it is the right goal for the wiki.  I think the goal of the Coppermind should be to present facts.  By presenting only things that we know to be true, whether from the books, the annotations or the WoB, we provide the reader with information, then allow them to draw their own conclusions, come up with their own theories.  By putting theories, guesses and speculation on the Coppermind, we lend those theories undue weight and rob the reader of the chance to come to them on their own.

 

 

As the author of that section of Allomancy (and almost the entirety of the article in its current form, with exception of some questionable edits I later saw), I feel the need to defend this practice. In the specific thing you had issue with (the other few cite tags are things that I know to be factual, but still need their citations):

 

Quote

It may be quite unclear that Allomancy is of Preservation. After all, Pushing and Pulling on metals isn't an effect that "preserves," so to speak. However, it is important to know that saying "Allomancy is of Preservation" has a very specific meaning: the way an Allomancer accesses the power is of Preservation, but the actual effect of the power is unrelated to Preservation. This is a fundamental difference between Allomancy and Feruchemy. In Feruchemy, its power comes from your own energy, but Allomancy is of Preservation. The act of burning a metal--accessing the power of Preservation--must be in line with the intent of Preservation. So burning a metal needs to "preserve" one's own energy, and so the power must come from the external source of Preservation's body.

The bolded part is the jump in logic, the part that is not directly confirmed by Brandon, but pretty implied, in my opinion. This paragraph provides critical information on the subject of Allomancy. Do you know how many people, back in the day, were confused by the question of why, exactly, Allomancy is of Preservation? A great deal. That was why I had to include this paragraph of explanation, and it does require a small leap. In fact, the argument I present here is, in fact, the argument I originally presented in my Principle of Intent. Yes, it is a small supposition, but I do think it gives a good context on why things work. The cosmere is very logical, and if a person comes out of an article thinking that something does not make sense, we've failed.

 

The bolded part provides your idea on why allomancy is of Preservation.  It is certainly a reasonable theory, but it is just that- a theory.  Even if it were a universally accepted theory (which I am sure it is not), it would still be just a theory.  The article would be perfectly fine without your theory in it.  The cosmere is very logical, but that doesn't mean that we are always right in our understanding of that logic.  If a person comes out of an article thinking that something does not make sense, that means that there is insufficient information available for that person to come to a conclusion about how it works.  We haven't failed.  Nobody has failed.  There is not failure there- simply one reader not drawing the same conclusion that you did.  If, on the other hand, every person who reads that article comes out with the exact same theory that you did because your theory is in there, then we have failed.  In that case, the theory wasn't arrived at independently; the reader saw the theory and concluded that that was the only logical explanation, rather than trying to think of one for themselves and possibly coming up with a new approach to the problem.

 

 

Some day I'm going to write a Realmatic Theory article, and it's going to be an awesome article. Right now the Realmatic article is utter trash. It's a placeholder article for someone to make it awesome. And honestly, I don't think there will be any way to write a truly good wiki article on Realmatics without including some theoretical thoughts on the subject. Sure, you can stick directly to the books, but I genuinely think that's doing a disservice to readers. Why? Because a wiki article, in my opinion, needs to provide a reader a full picture of what is known on the subject at hand, and that will occasionally require context. A list of facts and confirmations is a terrible wiki article. There's a flow to them that is critical. It's like an expository essay on the subject.

Were I to neglect theories on Realmatics that Brandon RAFOs, but implies that we are on the right track, that is a disservice. The cosmere is freaking hard to newbies, and I feel a strong responsibility to fully educate people to the best of our combined knowledge. There's a logic and flow to the cosmere that is not immediately apparent.

 

Yes, the current Realmatic Theory article is trash.  You know what would be worse?  Padding out the article with paragraphs and paragraphs of unproven theory and speculation.  There is no way to write a good, comprehensive article on Realmatic Theory right now because we don't have comprehensive information on realmatic theory.  The article we have right now is barely more than a stub, but at least the information we have in there is composed entirely of facts we know to be true.  An article filled with theories would do a disservice to the reader.

 

 

Southern Peoples of Scadrial:

 

Quote

It is theorized that the southern peoples are the men of "red and gold" that Miles Dagouter refers to shortly before his death.

This does provide something extra to the article, and gives readers something to think about. In this case, there is no citation, and it's pure speculation. But you know, I'm very okay with that, because maybe casual readers skipped over that line, when they should probably be quite concerned with it or its implications.

 

The extra thing this provides to the article is an unproven guess.  I don't think that the wiki's purpose is to give the readers something to think about.  I think the wiki's purpose is to give the reader facts and let them come to their own theories.  Sure, Miles' men of red and gold could be the people from the southern continent.  They could also be worldhoppers, or a secret society within their society, or a new race secretly crafted with hemalurgy.  Do I think these theories are likely?  No.  I think the men and gold are the inhabitants of the southern continent.  But I would never put my supposition on the Coppermind.  It leads a reader to that assumption, rather than letting them come to it, or some other theory, on their own.  I see the Coppermind's job as to present facts, not to lead readers by the nose to our pet theories.  Especially when there is no real evidence for or against a theory, which, in this case, there isn't as far as I know.  It's pure guesswork, unless I've missed something.

 

 

Ironspine Building

 

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The owners of the Ironspine building have as of yet remained unmentioned. It seems rather unlikely that the construction of a lift and an enormous tunnel beneath the building would have gone unnoticed. It is possible that the building is owned by the mysterious group known as the Set. This would also make sense in that the Set was attempting to destroy House Tekiel financially, which seems to parallel the Ironspine's attempt to be taller than Tekiel Tower.

Again, good ideas for someone to think about, and totally adds to the article.

 

Again, a guess.  This seriously detracts from the article by, once again, leading the reader by the nose to one particular theory.  There are other possible explanations.

 

 

Day of Recreance

 

Quote

It is speculated that the Day of Recreance was actually the day when Odium vanquished Honor, the Almighty, Splintering him. This caused all Knights Radiant to lose the connection that they had, possibly through their Spren. Believing that they had been abandoned, they lost all hope and abandoned their duties.

This is still not an unreasonable theory. A Day of Recreance article that doesn't put some possibilities of why the Recreance happened is a bad Recreance article. It just doesn't contain all the relevant information a reader might want to know. (However, note this does not contain Words of Radiance knowledge at the moment)

 

A Day of Recreance article that puts unproven possibilities about why the Recreance happened when we have no evidence whatsoever for those possibilities is a bad Recreance article.  It contains irrelevant information based on the guesswork of 17th Sharders.  A good Recreance article would present the information we have and leave the reader to draw their own conclusions.  Even if the theory had merit (which, in this case, i think it does not), it would still be out of place.

 

 

Investiture

You might be able to get away with removing the theoretical tag here, I'll give you that.

 

Indeed; just about all the information in this article is cited to factual sources.  This is a fairly good example of an article that gives a good look at what we know of a subject without straying into the realm of theories and guesswork.

 

 

Intent

This entire article is marked, and this is because of the perspective it takes. It is written providing evidence that such a thing exists. Perhaps you could rephrase it to not be like that, but I feel it's fine.

 

Besides the title itself, which is necessary because we don't have a canon name for the concept, this article seems OK and probably doesn't even need the theory tag, though it could stand to have a few more citations.

 

 

Ghostbloods

Again, discussing the objectives of the Ghostbloods is relevant. Note this article is particularly terrible in its current state, though.

 

Here's the problematic statement:  "Presumably their objective is to seek information about the Desolations and the Parshendi. Because of that they put forth the failed attempt to assassinate Jasnah Kholin, who was their main rival in their search."

 

It's a total guess.  It has no place in the article.  Though I do agree with you, the article is very badly written in its current state.

 

 

Manywar

Windy wrote this one, and he could probably explain his rationale here better than I could, but this is marked as theoretical due to small leaps of logic that are marked with phrases such as "It seems". These are necessary for making this article truly great, with a proper narrative structure that explains everything we know.

 

"Truly great"?  We don't need great articles, we need factual articles.  Our goal should not be beautiful prose, it should be to make the most effective and factual resource for the readers.  Brandon can handle the prose.  We're not writing novels, we're writing factual articles.

 

 

Skaze

Once upon a time, this was less confirmed that Skaze are Splinters of Dominion. I'm still not sure that it was directly confirmed, but there's a lot of evidence supporting this that could be included in this. Ultimately, however, the conclusion is not totally confirmed, and again, this is a critical piece of information on a subject we know virtually nothing about.

 

You're right, this is a subject we know nothing about.  There is nothing wrong with a short article, or even a stub, when we have no good information to fill it.  Removing the "speculation" section would allow the article to contain all of the information that we know to be true (or knew to be true at the time it was written) without straying into guesswork, however well founded that guesswork may be.

 

Anyway, I don't have time right now to go through the rest of your examples point by point, but I think you see the gist of where I'm coming from.

 

 

So, that's just a sampling, but I think on the whole, you can't say that there should be no theoretical information on the Coppermind. It is absolutely relevant in certain cases, mostly cases involving cosmere implications. I very much disagree that that information should be lost, as that's antithetical to the Coppermind's purpose of being comprehensive.

 

i can, and absolutely do, say that there should be no theoretical information on the Coppermind.  Relevant though you may think it is, it does a disservice to the reader by its very presence.  I think that the Coppermind's purpose of being "comprehensive" is secondary to its purpose of presenting factual information.  Nothing is being lost by keeping theories off the Coppermind.  We still have the theories, and we still discuss them- but HERE, where speculation belongs.  Not in our encyclopedia.

 

As I said at the beginning of this post, it comes down to the purpose of the Coppermind.  I see the Coppermind as a resource for readers and fans- a place to collect facts, and only facts, in a single, convenient place with appropriate citations for the readers to use on their own, and in their own way.  A place where they can go to find information to help them come up with theories, or find support for their theories, or help them rebut theories with factual information.  I do not see it as a place where we store information on our own theories, or push those theories on others, however reasonable we may think they are.

 

I suppose that I am in the minority in this opinion.  Most of you seem to be fine with including theories on the Coppermind.  And that's fine; if that's where the community consensus is, so be it.  You don't see me moving through the Coppermind, trying to excise large sections of articles that I think are inappropriate, because it would be inappropriate, disrespectful and counter-productive for me to do so.  But I retain my opinion that the inclusion of speculative information is detrimental to the Coppermind and makes it less useful to the readers.  I can only hope that I have convinced some of you of the merits of my position.

[Tempus]

NutiketAiel, the problem with keeping an exclusivity to facts is that we have no guarantee of anything. We have, many, many in-text scenarios where what the characters believe to be true has turned out to be false. Situations where the characters have an incomplete understanding, where they have lied to each other, or just plain old unreliable narrator.

 

So perhaps we can turn to the Word of Brandon for facts? Sadly, no. There have been a few occasions where Brandon has changed his mind, admitted to errors in the texts, where he contradicts an earlier Word of Brandon, or where he just plain misspoke himself. He mentions some occasionally in his interviews, and in his book annotations.

 

So where are we to get fact from, in this mutable and unreliable world of fiction? We cannot trust the texts, we cannot trust the author. So, we do what science has done for hundreds of years - we write down everything we know, make the most logical inferences we can, and accept that what we know may become wrong in the future as more information becomes available. This is why science does not present itself in facts, but in theories and models.

 

Like with science, we have no concrete facts to go on. Only evidence. But that does not mean that we should not record what we know, and what we suspect we know, so that they may be built upon or corrected in the future. If a person wants only what is recorded in the book, or by the Word of Brandon, they may refer to original text or source. If they want an article, however, covering the topic, then it is the proper thing to do to present them with all the information we have available, anything with a high enough threshold of confidence to be deemed acceptable until opposing evidence presents itself.

[Chaos he/him]

NutiketAiel, have an upvote. That was well-reasoned.

However, I do think this does come down to a difference of opinion. I truly do feel that this sort of content does add a lot. I respect your opinion, though totally disagree

[Joe ST he/him]

Indeed, you have a great, well reasoned argument, but I'm still falling to siding with the others, they seem the right choice to me... it might not be the best place for them? but its possibly better than the forums. I would much rather the main articles have more attention first, but maybe it will help the theorizers get in to wikiying XD

[NutiketAiel he/him]

Well, thank you all for hearing me out. I knew mine was the minority opinion, but I felt the need to voice it anyway. I appreciate receiving a respectful hearing, and wish you the best of luck in implementing this new idea, and in continuing to administer the Coppermind.