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  Violation of policy to close questions?

+ 0 like - 1 dislike
4903 views

According to the policy stated in  vote-moderation-queue,  close vote needs  at least a net score of +2 in order for the respective question to be closed:

The net number of close votes on a question need to be 3 for a question to be closed. Note that the proposing close vote is considered as one close vote, unless the poster of the original close vote explicitly states otherwise. Thus, a close vote generally needs a net score of +2 to pass, unless the original close voter retracts the close vote, or otherwise votes against or stands neutral to the vote.

However, it seems to me that questions are being closed without meeting this requirement. Am I right?  Why is this happening? What about moving questions to chat with no consensus?

PS: This question is not about a specific conflict, It is an inquiry about a policy. Don't move it to "Conflict Resolution". I want it to be on Meta.

asked Jun 10, 2015 in Conflict Resolution by drake (885 points) [ revision history ]
recategorized Jun 14, 2015 by Dilaton
Most voted comments show all comments

 it seems to me that questions are being closed without meeting this requirement. 

Which closed question are you referring to? It is easy to check. 

As for moving questions to chat there are no fixed rules. For example, the post http://physicsoverflow.org/29793/are-quantum-interpretations-physically-meaningful contained a discussion and was not moved.

I can only tell you how I understood the policy, and this is what I have already written.

Its only you who perceives and spreads the smell. For the others it is a place to learn and discuss interesting physics. 

If you think this is an inquiry about policy, you need to phrase it as such. The title still says "Violation of policy". Ironically, you bashed Dilaton below for making the sabre error, except he corrected it. 

Also, I doubt that you really wanted to inquire about policy. See here

Off-topic comments moved to chat.

Most recent comments show all comments

@Dilaton And why are you talking about that closevote when we are talking about another one? This one http://www.physicsoverflow.org/31315/single-double-experiment-resetting-detector-material-impact 

@dimension10 A question about my understanding of a policy (which is interpreted in different ways by you and A. Neumaier)  and its possible violation, it's a question about a policy. 

I said that to Dilaton because after you admitted you had violated the policy, he claimed that the policy had not been violated in an answer with no more content that that sentence (no reasons, not a real answer).

Anyway, I'm starting to feel I'm wasting my time because you mods only care about protecting each other. 

2 Answers

+ 1 like - 0 dislike

Nope. There have been recent cases in which a certain user has downvoted or unvoted a close vote just after the question gets closed, perhaps to incorrectly allege moderator abuse. 

Only rarely do some clearly uncontroversial low level questions (high - school level stuff) get closed with just two votes. 

answered Jun 11, 2015 by dimension10 (1,985 points) [ revision history ]
edited Jun 11, 2015 by dimension10

1) The policy says nothing about "clearly uncontroversial low level questions" as far as I see.  Who has the power to decide what is clearly low level? Are you admitting this policy has been repeatedly violated?  

2) What about moving questions to chat without any consensus (zero net votes)? 

3) I want this question to be visible in meta, where I posted it. 

"here have been recent cases in which a certain user has downvoted or unvoted a close vote just after the question gets closed, perhaps to incorrectly allege moderator abuse."

Are you suggesting that I did that? 

Questions that contain an explicite accusation (conversely to questions that just ask for clarification and information in a neutral way as this discussion for example) are meant to be asked in the category Conflict Resolution as suggested by @ArnoldNeumaier, which has been created to solve conflicts that are only of interest to the people directly concerned.

This practice has been established since quite some time now, you might yourself be interested in discussing this issue in the appropriate category.

My question doesn't contain any explicit accusation. I just modified the title to make it more clear, although it wasn't an accusation but the subject of a possibility.

@drake ok, thanks for this clarification.

@Dilaton No problem. Don't you have anything to say in regard to the subject of the question? Have you ever closed or moved to chat questions violating the policies?

@Drake, I will most probably post an answer later today.
 

1) Yes. About twice, I think, both times by me, and I don't intend to stop. The idea that a question like "how much time does a bowling  ball take to roll down a hill" should be kept in the main page for hours together seems stupid to me. 

2) Anyone with editing privileges can move stuff to chat. You can, too. This had never been a problem. 

3)

4) I'm just saying that anyone who downvoted the thing might have intended to do so. And given that you did raise the issue in meta, I wouldn't be surprised if it were you. 

@dimension10 1)Twice and for stuff that clearly low-level? Only?  Then I'm not sure I understand how questions are closed. When a question is closed, is its close-vote post removed from  the vote-moderation-queue?

2) Without consensus? I didn't know this. So could I move it to another section, say, Q/A?

3) Can you be more specific about what I did before I opened this question?

Yes, and yes.

This question  http://www.physicsoverflow.org/31315/single-double-experiment-resetting-detector-material-impact was (1) closed, (2) without removing it from the close-cote post, (3) with net score lower than +2, (4) and its level was higher than a ball rolling down a hill (it was a quantum mechanics question, not a high-school question).

Can you explain why?

@drake

(2) Sorry, a mistake. I'll remove it once this issue is resolved.

(3) It has a +2 net score now, but I suppose it indeed wasn't when I closed it. Perhaps it looked way too uncontroversially low-level to me, or something. You're right, sorry.

(4) Well, double-slit experiment is pretty much high-school level.

@dimension10 No problem. I just want to understand the policy and check that its spirit is not being violated. Closing a question about parabolic motion with net score +1 doesn't violate the spirit of the policy, for example, in my opinion. 

Now, double-slit experiments start to be studied in the "last minute" of many high-school programs. That's right. But the full understanding (in the quantum sense) doesn't come until college. In fact entanglement plays an importan role in some aspects. And for example certain issues concerning delayed choice quantum erasers are good topics for any physics forum, including this. I guess that you wouldn't be able to answer some questions about double-slit experiments. I think you moderators are too concern trying to look very serious, very high level, very main-stream. You cannot say that a quantum effect is the same level as  "how much time does a bowling  ball take to roll down a hill"". 

Finally, when a question is marked as [closed] but it's not removed from the close-vote post? What was your accusation towards me?

@drake It's supposed to be removed from the close vote queue right away. My "accusation" was just a side remark, I was guessing that you might have downvoted the "what is quantised" close vote after the question was closed. But you turned out to be taking about a different close vote altogether. 

Tangential discussion moved to chat.

+ 0 like - 1 dislike

The policy for closing questions hasn't changed.

answered Jun 11, 2015 by Dilaton (6,240 points) [ revision history ]
edited Jun 11, 2015 by Dilaton

How can you say that?  dimension10 has just said that he did violate this policy twice. 

Me:

Are you admitting this policy has been repeatedly violated?  

dimension10: 

Yes. About twice, I think, both times by me, and I don't intend to stop

One can argue that the policy has been violated for a good reason. But saying that has not been violated is false. 

My previous comment was in regard to the first version of Dilaton answer, in which he claimed that the policy had not been violated. No one has asked or claimed that the policy has changed, so this new version of the answer ("the policy hasn't changed") is strange .

It was obviously what he had intended to say; so he corrected it after you pointed out (in inappropriate hostile words that I edited away) that what he said didn't make sense in this context. Strangeness is in the eye of the beholder.

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