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Sociocultural evolution

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Self nom. An overview of one of the most important theories in sociology and anthropology, also reffered in those respective fields as just social or cultural evolution(ism). From classical unileneal evolutionism to multilenal, with neoevolutionism, sociobiology, modernisation theory, post-industrial theory and yes, I even managed to mention singularity theory in the text :) Lots of big words :) I await your comments. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 21:03, 29 July 2005 (UTC)[reply]

  • Object. The introduction is excessively long, composed of three paragraphs, each of which are way too long. Furthermore, Piotr reverts any attempt to correct his stylistic errors. I tried to seperate the intro into multiple paragraphs, and then to move some material to the article body, both of which were reverted immediately by Piotrus. Short definitions of uinlinear and multilinear are appropriate to the lead. Not this attempted whirlwind history of sociology. Also, the terms in bold should be handled more legibly. --goethean ॐ 14:49, 5 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]
    • I am sorry, but the recent attempt at lead rewritting is against Wikipedia:Lead (recommended three paragrahps, not 5-6) and even worse, it was not comprehensive (one recent attempt simply moved 4/5 of the lead into the next section). As I explained above, this is a complex matter and the lead cannot be short if it is to remain comprehensive. The lead fits on the screen, I see no problem with this. I will see what I can adapt from the new version. I am happy to see discussion here, after few days of near inactivity. I am sure that working together we cn create a 'leaner, meaner' lead :) I am not sure what you mean about illegibility of bolded terms? --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 16:59, 5 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Slrubenstein fixed the problem with bolded terms. Your point regarding three paragraphs is ruleslawyering. Why extend the paragraphs to unreadable lengths and then point to a 3-paragraph policy to revert changes? --goethean ॐ 17:11, 5 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]
After some work we seem to have created a smaller, better lead. Do you still have grounds for objection? --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 10:54, 6 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • CommentThat whole article only had one reference? And I think the use of inotes is detriemental to the article, and at least some of them should be visible similar to other articles. MechBrowman 15:54, August 5, 2005 (UTC)
  • Support The article is very well written, and I changed the inotes my self --MechBrowman 14:48, August 7, 2005 (UTC)
    • Well, long story short: this article is merged from two others, none of which had any references. I expanded this with info from referenced source, plus some material from other wiki articles, again lacking references. After a glance at the references, I see some of them are actually mentioned in the text (especially online version of some 19th century) text and thus may be moved to references. As for inotes, I am not a fan of them, I prefer footnotes - but due to the explained scarcity of references, there is really no need for them. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 16:59, 5 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • Object Not enough references. Dave (talk) 20:39, August 7, 2005 (UTC)
    • I am not aware there is any specified number or references >1 for FA articles. I explained above why there are so few referenes. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 21:13, 7 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]
      • I consider good referencing to be necessary for Wikipedia to be considered authoritative. WP:CITE (which isn't policy, but which has consensus) says that it's important for veryifying facts, preventing sneaky vandalism (changing a date and hoping no one notices), convincing skeptical readers an article is accurate, and avoiding various kinds of confusion. The guide also suggests that you add sources for existing articles on Wikipedia. In general, I prefer in-line citations. Since you didn't write this, and you have no sources, how do you know anything about its reliability? I'm maintaining my objection. Dave (talk) 21:27, August 7, 2005 (UTC)
        • I have added some references, and will add more - there are books (often classics) mentioned in text (like 'White wrote in his book that...') that should add a few more, when I have some time. Article has 4 references now, using footnotes, and will have several more - does this solve your objection? --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 09:38, 9 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]
          • Have you fact-checked the article yourself? Dave (talk) 14:12, August 9, 2005 (UTC)
            • To the best of my knowledge (I read the Sztompka's book, nearly memorised his chapter on this set of theories :>, checked all external links plus some other articles, books and ecyclopedia's entries mentioned in the article (most of which I added)) and I think it is factually correct. I do think it fits with our standards. I admit I have taken much of the info from previous wiki articles, which had no references, on good faith, but they do seem to be confirmed with other materials I found off-wiki (many of it academic class) I read. Wiki being wiki, with other editors beside me constantly improving this article, I can't guarantee personally that all the facts are and will be 100% correct, but I can vouch that to the best of my knowledge most of them, when I read it last time, seemed consistent with referenced/further reading/external links material. If you see any factual errors in the article, do let me know. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 15:52, 9 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment The article is thorough, and I congratulate all who contributed. The new article is much more thorough and organized than either of the two original articles. However, I have two concerns:
  1. More is needed to highlight the distinction between social / cultural evolution (the modern scientific theory) and social evolutionism, the (unilineal, essentially racist) worldview. Some information about this is in the article, but I think it's important to distinguish between the theory and the practice.
  2. As discussed above, the lead is too long. I realize that a shorter lead is not comprehensive, but would argue that a lead is never meant to be comprehensive. A lead's only function is to summarize the topic for the reader, and hopefully entice him/her to read further. Every pool needs a shallow end to be accessible. The first paragraph could be considerably shortened or broken up. For example:

Sociocultural evolution is an umbrella term for theories explaining the development of societies over time, borrowing the term "evolution" from biological theories about the development of living organisms. Early social scientists attempted to identify the stages that all societies must pass through as they mature, and sometimes ranked societies from least to most developed. More modern Anthropologists and Sociologists have rejected this approach, noting that human societies can develop along a wide variety of different possible paths, and that it is difficult to label any society as more or less "evolved" than any other.

Even that is too long... Details in the current lead--about the diversity of the thinkers involved, the specific interpretations of the theory, etc.--will be apparent from the article itself. The lead really only needs to refer to three things: development of societies over time, early theories were unilineal (and often racist), and modern theories are multilineal.
I regret that at the moment I cannot spend more time assisting you in developing this article with more constructive examples of what I mean. However, I generally feel the new article is quite good, and with some fixes would make a great candidate for a front page article.

--Pariah 21:23, 8 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Tnx for your comments. Regarding the lead, Wikipedia:Lead states that The lead should briefly summarize the most important points covered in an article in such a way that it could stand on its own as a concise version of the article. and For the planned paper Wikipedia 1.0, one consensus recommendation is that the paper version of articles will be the lead section of the web version. . I try to make all leads I work in follow this guidelines. Btw, we have already shortented the lead by 1/4 since the FAC process begun. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 09:38, 9 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]
I understand, but effective writing is a nested process. If we say that all the writing before the first subheading is the lead, then the very first paragraph should be a micro-lead, and the first sentence should be a nano-lead. The reader should be able to get a quick definition of the topic from the first sentence. This is esp. important on a wiki, where every link is potentially a black hole of information. The language could be simpler without detracting from the complexity of the information.--Pariah 16:30, August 9, 2005 (UTC)
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