Talk:Chrysippus/GA1

GA Review

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Reviewer: FormerIP (talk) 15:53, 2 August 2010 (UTC)

Criteria

A good article is—

1. Well-written:

(a) the prose is clear, concise, and understandable to an appropriately broad audience; spelling and grammar are correct; and

(b) it complies with the Manual of Style guidelines for lead sections, layout, words to watch, fiction, and list incorporation.

2. Verifiable with no original research:

(a) it contains a list of all references (sources of information), presented in accordance with the layout style guideline;

• Bibliographic details appear to be missing for classical writers including Diogenes Laertius, Cicero, Plutarch, Clement of Alexandria, Sextus Empiricus and Eusebius. Even though the texts are likely to be easy to find, full bibliographic details are needed for WP:V.

(b) reliable sources are cited inline. All content that could reasonably be challenged, except for plot summaries and that which summarizes cited content elsewhere in the article, must be cited no later than the end of the paragraph (or line if the content is not in prose); and

(c) it contains no original research.

3. Broad in its coverage:

(a) it addresses the main aspects of the topic; and

(b) it stays focused on the topic without going into unnecessary detail (see summary style).

4. Neutral: it represents viewpoints fairly and without editorial bias, giving due weight to each.
5. Stable: it does not change significantly from day to day because of an ongoing edit war or content dispute.
6. Illustrated, if possible, by media such as images, video, or audio:

(a) media are tagged with their copyright statuses, and valid non-free use rationales are provided for non-free content; and

(b) media are relevant to the topic, and have suitable captions.

Hi Singinglemon.

I'm starting off the review with some general comments, section by section. Please note that you are not obliged to agree to every comment and bend to my will in order to get the article passed. So far, I think there is a good chance of the article getting passed with some amendments, but I will not start going through the criteria immediately.

--FormerIP (talk) 12:34, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

Hi FarmerPip :)

Thanks for reviewing this page. Hopefully it'll pass WP:GA without too much difficulty. Good luck with The Holy Bible (album) BTW. :) Singinglemon (talk) 19:31, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

Your name is like an optical illusion. One minute it's a lemon, singing, the next it is two faces looking at each other and making the outline of a vase. --FormerIP (talk) 01:21, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

Life

• "..through a legal contrivance" sounds slightly mysterious. It would be good to have this desribed more clearly, whilst maintaining breveity unless it is highly interesting/relevant to the article.
  • Thanks for noticing this. This was a sloppy piece of writing left over from an earlier version of the page - his property was actually confiscated by the king - unfortunately there are no further details (not even who the king was), but I've added a more substantial footnote.

• "head (scholarch)" - could this just be "scholarch"? - the piped link should be enought for anyone who doesn't know what it means.
  • Well, scholarch is a pretty unusual word - it can be nice to read a biography without having to click links - I've left it in for now

• "a unique authority for the school" - think this is ambiguous and could be taken to mean that the school never had any other authority (which I presume would not be correct). Would it be possible to find other wording for this?
  • Okay, I've changed it to "preeminent"

• "An unnamed third work may also survive" - more details would be useful here. I'm guessing that a work survives but it is not clear whether it can be attributed to Chrysippus (?). This should be made clearer.
  • Okay, I've changed it to "An unnamed third work may also be by him." I've added a more substantial footnote, but otherwise I can't find much information about this papyrus.

Philosophy

• "..and developed the science of logic". How exactly he did this should be made clear immediately, I think, rather than assuming that the reader will read on. This phrase could be taken to give Chrysippus more credit than he deserved. If you think of this as a question in the TV show Jeopardy, the answer to "he developed the science of logic" is probably not "Chrysippus".
  • I suppose you mean 'developed' could be mistaken for 'created'? I've changed it to "and he was the most innovative logician of the Hellenistic period." I can't exactly start describing his logic at that point because that's what the next paragraph does
    • Okay, I think that formulation is fine, but it is an opinion, so it should be attributed per WP:ATTRIBUTEPOV. --FormerIP (talk) 00:38, 4 August 2010 (UTC)
      • I was going to argue, and say "who else is there?" but I suppose if one was to include Aristotle in the Hellenistic period then it would be a contentious point. Anyway I'll downgrade it to something dull and safe like "and he created much of their [the Stoics] formal logic." If ever I submit this page to WP:FA I'll rewrite that entire paragraph - the whole thing's a bit wishywashy. :) Singinglemon (talk) 01:08, 4 August 2010 (UTC)
        • Or "According to [my friend's mum] he was the most innovative logician..." would be fine. --FormerIP (talk) 01:17, 4 August 2010 (UTC)
          • That's very enlightened of your friend's mum. :)

Logic

• Just through reading this section, I can see that some parts of this article may be tough and it may also be hard to explain to you what I mean in some areas.

• Think it is not easy to concisely explain the difference between propositional and traditional logic, and the way the articles relating to those two topic are organised and written doesn't help (eg there is nowhere, it seems, that you can link to that gives an explanation of "term" in the context of logic). Think the comparison between the classic Aristotelian "All men..." example and "if it is day..." may not help entirely, because modern logic and linguistics would analyse both in terms of propositions. The first two sentences here need re-jigging somehow. Not sure exactly "how", but "some", definitely. Will have a think about whether I am able to be more helpful with this.
  • Yes this section will always read somewhat awkwardly I think. It would be off-topic to devote much space to introducing Logic - all I've tried to do here is list what some of his innovations were. As to those two sentences you mention, well they come from this page: [1]. Singinglemon (talk) 01:57, 4 August 2010 (UTC)
  • Okay, I've had an attempt at re-jigging the paragraph to make it clearer what the difference between terms and propositions is. I also found a reasonable link for the word term. Singinglemon (talk) 12:34, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

Your new version looks an improvement. I'm inclined to say this is okay now, but not being a very experienced reviewer I might go for a Third Opinion. Would you object to this?

No, of course not. I actually think you've done more work here than I would expect for a GA review. I've only ever had one other article GA reviewed, and that page (Cynicism) merely got one query from its reviewer! :) Singinglemon (talk) 00:47, 16 August 2010 (UTC)

Okay I have listed it. This might draw complaints that we are not in a genuine dispute, but that looks like the only process you can call on for this. Hopefully, someone will either say that the paragraph is clear or else make a suggestion for improving it.

I'm new to GA, so maybe I am taking it too seriously. It looks to me like practice here varies quite widely, so I'm struggling a little with what standards to apply. --FormerIP (talk) 01:20, 16 August 2010 (UTC)

Third opinion

I am responding to a request for a third opinion.

I think this edit was a very marked improvement to the introductory paragraph for the logic sections. There is still room for minor improvements in subsequent paragraphs (e.g. "thus because the proposition "if it is day, then I am talking" can be false it is invalid" may be more difficult to understand than "thus, because the proposition "if it is day, then I am talking" can be false, it is invalid"). – Athaenara ✉ 02:48, 16 August 2010 (UTC)

Thanks. --FormerIP (talk) 13:07, 16 August 2010 (UTC)

Okay, I've added in those commas, and a few others in subsequent paragraphs. Hope that helps. Singinglemon (talk) 17:10, 16 August 2010 (UTC)

Propositions

• Question: did he use the terms "molecular" and "atomic", or is that applying terms to his work retrospectively? Think it would be good to be clearer about this. Also, did he coin the terms (in ancient Greek at least) conjunction, disjunction, and conditional? It would be nice to let the reader know this if it is the case.
  • "molecular" and "atomic" are the modern terms - I'll reword the sentence to make that clear. I doubt it's known whether he coined the terms conjunction, disjunction, and conditional - the ancient sources tend to be pretty vague about attributing this sort of information. I'll change the wording of the sentence to "they were listed by Chrysippus" - since we can at least be surer that the systemization was due to him.

Conditional propositions

• Think it would be good to be clearer about whether Sextus Empiricus comes before or after Chrysippus, chronologically speaking. Does it build on his work, or is it a basis for his work?
  • I'll preface the statement about Sextus Empiricus with the words "Writing five-hundred years later." But no, the books of Sextus do not build on Chrysippus' work - his interests lie in philosophical skepticism.

Argument forms

• Similarly to above, are modus ponens etc terms invented by Chrysippus, are they pre-existing terms or are they terms applied by later writers?
  • These terms are medieval Latin, of (I think) unknown origin, I'll add in a footnote pointing that out.

Other logical work

• What is the "doctrine of definitions"? It there something this could be wikilinked to, or would a short explanation be feasible? Ditto "doctrine of categories".
  • I've removed the "doctrine of definitions" bit - it was too vague and wishy-washy. I've expanded very slightly on the doctrine of categories, and I've linked to the Category of being page, which doesn't explain very well what they are, but that's not my fault. :)

Later reception

• Could you look at "This achievement came to be neglected...". At present, it might be taken as meaning that the gods might actually use Chrysippus' logic.
  • I'll change it to "The logical work by Chrysippus came to be neglected..."

Epistemology

• This is good, although the first sentence could do with a cite, I think.
  • Done

Physics

• No comments to make. I re-ordered one sentence.

Fate

• Is the phrase "calling the doctor" a bit anachronistic here?
  • No it's not - the ancient Greeks and Romans had a well developed medical system with doctors on call, etc. This particular example of calling the doctor comes from Cicero - I'll add it to the footnote.
    • Would "calling for the doctor" be better? Calling the doctor, to my brain, implies either that you are using the phone or that the doctor happens to be within earshot.
      • I had a look at the first translation of Cicero I could find - and it refers to consulting a doctor, so I've put that in instead.

Divination

• No comments.

God

• The last sentence of this section reflects an opinion, and ought to be attributed.
  • I thought it was a pretty banal restatement of the blockquote actually, but I'll remove the sentence, and let the blockquote stand on its own.

Theodicy

• No comments.

Mathematics

• No comments.

Ethics

• No comments.

Question

The article includes a quote that "without C there would have been no Stoa", which appears to be adequately sourced. However, the article on Zeno of Citium says that he founded the Stoa in 301 BC, over 20 years before Chrysippus was born. I don't know enough to be sure what to make of this, but is some further explanation needed? --FormerIP (talk) 16:27, 17 August 2010 (UTC)

He was not the origin, What is meant is that without chrysippus the sytem of stoa would have disappeared under the criticisms of its adversaries, the system would have been short lived without his solidifying and formalizing the system of thought and defending it against counter arguments. Hardyplants (talk) 10:08, 18 August 2010 (UTC)

• The review was going well at first, but now there's been nearly no activity in a month. What's the status? Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 02:27, 14 September 2010 (UTC)

• I'll re-review this myself tomorrow after looking over the review and make a final judgment (either pass or fail, no hold), since both the reviewer and writer have completely disappeared. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 04:45, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

Overall, this passes to me as a Good Article. My only concern is near the end, it seems to veer into discussing more about Stoicism itself rather than Chrysippus and his contribution to it. Since he's a main figure in it it's hard to separate the two, and it's not too much of a concern. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 16:13, 8 October 2010 (UTC)