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List of works by Joseph Priestley

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The following is an archived discussion of a featured list nomination. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page. No further edits should be made to this page. The closing editor's comments were: 11 days, 6 support, 0 oppose. No further debate since Aug. 1. Promote. Geraldk 15:07, 8 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I believe that this list meets the featured list requirements, but I am unsure if this is the kind of list usually "featured". Awadewit | talk 13:48, 28 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

  • Oppose Neutral
    • The lead does not properly indicate the topic within it's first paragraph (that should be easy to fix, though).
    • Some notes do not make much sense (cf. the Socrates and Jesus Compared one)
      • This was supposed to be explained in this sentence from the lead: "This list of Joseph Priestley's works is taken from Ronald E. Crook's A Bibliography of Joseph Priestley 1733-1804 (unless otherwise noted)" - is this not clear? Awadewit | talk 18:41, 28 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • Of all the works linked, not a single one is blue.
      • Is this a requirement? I am not ready to write pages on these texts (I am still working on Joseph Priestley). If this is a requirement, I will withdraw the nomination. I am not interested in creating articles for all of these texts at the moment. Awadewit | talk 18:41, 28 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • Comprehensiveness of the list is far too fuzzy
      • The list is as comprehensive as it can be. It is based on the only scholarly bibliography of Priestley's works. It has been supplemented using the bibliography of Priestley's modern biographer. That is the best I can do. Anything else would be original research. In fact, some might even consider the combination original research. Awadewit | talk 18:41, 28 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Circeus 17:52, 28 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • Generally, if items are linked, I think it is reasonable to expect for a FL some/most of them will be blue.
    • Maybe not be so uncertain as to the comprehensiveness. Removing the notes about "It is not known whether or not it is complete." in the sections would be a good idea. Circeus 19:27, 28 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
      • But those sentences give the list integrity! I cannot say with certainty that those are all of Priestley's scientific papers, for example. I see no reason to pretend that the lists are complete if we can't prove that they are. Awadewit | talk 19:38, 28 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Leaning towards Support. I've not got time for a full comment ATM; I just didn't want the nomination removed before I got round to it. This list should be tested against 1a3 of the FLC. That removes the requirement for blue links provided the items in the list are generally not notable enough for articles. The set of items is certainly well defined and finite. I'm prepared to accept Awadewit's explanation that this is as complete as we expect for such a historical subject. I'll add some more suggestions/questions later... Colin°Talk 19:09, 28 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Suggestions: Since this list/article is about his literary work, could you perhaps spend a little longer discussing this aspect in the lead. Additionally you could do so in the lead for certain sections. There is no rule that says all the prose must be up the top. We have several FLs were each section has a short paragraph or two. For example, the main article says "his most important scientific works are the six volumes of Experiments and Observations on Different Kinds of Air". You mention he published "a seminal work on English grammar" but there's no indication of what that was (either in the text or a footnote). I guess it is The Rudiments of English Grammar. (Note: I haven't read the main article yet, but am inspired to do so...) Were there any books/papers that he had difficulty publishing or that were discovered after his death? I'm looking for extra info about the works themselves rather than the experiments, theories or beliefs.
The list is a little dry (lots of lists are). Could it be enlivened with some pictures of the books or papers (title page or an illustration he drew)? I see there are some in the main article. They will all be out-of-copyright.
The "Full-text online works" section is really an "External links" section and perhaps should be renamed as such, with an sentence introducing the list of full-text online works. The editions Google scanned are subtly different from those in the list (later date, different publisher, etc). I don't know how much that affects the text, but if I wanted to be completely thorough/anal, I'd reformat them into full cite-book style entries with Google's publisher/date/location/etc as listed in the "About this book". Colin°Talk 08:41, 1 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Do you think the "Last retrieved on..." is strictly necessary? I can understanding it for sources and for using archive.org if the link breaks, but I'm not aware that archive.org looks at Google Books. Colin°Talk 16:01, 1 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • I don't know what they archive. If they don't archive it now, they may in the future, which would make these dates useful. I was simply trying to be thorough. You can remove them if you want. Awadewit | talk 16:47, 1 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • I don't know about writing paragraphs for each section. That starts to look like an annotated bibliography and I have no sources for such a thing. Also, privileging the publication history of one book over another is highly suspect (why should I only tell the history of the ones with which Priestley had trouble?). I will fix the grammar reference - that should be clearer, I agree. I'm glad that the bibliography made you interested in the article. :) Awadewit | talk 14:58, 1 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • It was just a suggestion and I didn't know whether it was feasible. I just thought it would be appropriate to focus more on the works themselves. As you say, you can only work with what sources you have. Colin°Talk 16:01, 1 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • Most of Priestley's books would not warrant a separate page. I have redlinked the ones that I believe could be written, with the available scholarship. That undertaking is vast, though, and not one I am committed to at the moment. Awadewit | talk 19:38, 28 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
      • Could you perhaps just create a stub for these? I appreciate a full GA quality article would be loads of work. It isn't a requirement, but would make both this list and the main article look more complete. Colin°Talk 08:41, 1 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
        • That is an incredible amount of work. I have been urged in the past to create stubs like this, but after more experience on wikipedia, I decided that such stubs were not worthwhile. Here is one article that I whipped up recently that I consider a "start". I don't like to create uninformative articles, I'm afraid. I am of the philosophy that a redlink is better than a stub. All of the redlinked works are discussed in the Joseph Priestley article and its associates, Joseph Priestley and education and Joseph Priestley and Dissent. It is fine with me if you want to create all of those stubs using information from the JP pages, but I will only create the pages when I have something a bit more substantial to contribute. Awadewit | talk 12:42, 1 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
          • Wow. I wish I could "whip up" a "start" that was as good as yours. Someone seeing that stub you created might be inspired to expand it. A newbie might be particularly nervous about starting a new article, but happy to contribute to an existing one. Someone Googling for "Of the Conduct of the Understanding" will find the stub in the first page. In fact, I've just noticed it is on WikiSource. I should find out how to link to that... Anyway, I don't know whether redlinks or stubs are better for inspiring contributions. This isn't a necessary requirement for this FL. Colin°Talk 13:10, 1 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
            • It's not that hard to create a good "start" article - you just have to know where to go for the research. That is a good point about google - I had not considered that. Perhaps I will try to make some stubs for some of the redlinks. I feel less comfortable making stubs for the scientific works, so I will leave those to someone else. Awadewit | talk 13:24, 1 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support This is a very detailed bibliography compiled from all the available sources. I have watched it develop and hopefully it will help set a standard on how to do bibliographies at Wikipedia. The commentaries about how complete the list is should remain. It isn't a case of Awadewit not doing the proper research (possibly this is now the most complete bibliography of Joseph Priestley in one place?) but simply indicating where there is some doubt as to whether all works have been found. Obviously there are limits on how complete any list can be, and pointing out those limits will help others to research the subject further. I think it's of real value to those studying Joseph Priestley because as has been stated before such a list cannot be found anywhere else on the internet. Anyways, examples of well done/researched bibliographies are needed in the featured lists category. Hopefully this one makes it.-BillDeanCarter 19:31, 29 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment Why is there a "—" at the beginning of each entry?--Crzycheetah 21:27, 29 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • I have various suggestions and questions; I'll serve them up as I can be bothered to type them in. First, the section on papers in Theological Repository. (i) We read This list of Priestley's theological papers is taken from Robert Schofield's biography of Priestley. It is not known whether or not it is complete. This seems odd to me, as they're all in one periodical, and I'd have thought that Schofield and his assistants would have been able to check that systematically: that it would be the one reliable part of the bibliography. Does he hint otherwise? (ii) Why "—." at the start of every entry? (Just say at the top that all of these papers are by Priestley alone.) (iii) Surely the reader doesn't need to be told "Theological Repository" dozens of times. Change each to "Vol." and at the top of the section; These papers were published in Theological Repository as specified (or similar). -- Hoary revised 14:57, 31 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Because Schofield's bibliography is listed as a "Selected bibliography" at the back of his book, I cannot be sure if the lists are complete. I don't know what he did. Awadewit | talk 15:29, 31 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • I did say all of the works are by Priestley (unless otherwise specified) in the lead. The — is standard bibliographical practice. 15:29, 31 July 2007 (UTC)
  • Again, repeating Theological Repository is standard bibliographical practice. I am following the sources here. Also, if someone were later to add other papers from somewhere else, it would be better to have each entry as specific as possible. Awadewit | talk 15:29, 31 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • What I think is standard bibliographic practice is to have a longish line (not an em dash; more like a line the length of two or three em dashes) at the start of an item to mean "same author(s) as above". Thus: Dickens, Charles. Bleak House; [line]. Hard Times; Trollope, Anthony. The Way We Live Now. But in this section of the Priestley bibliography there is no ultimate "above". If the first line were to have "Priestley, Joseph" instead of the line, then the result would make sense, in one way; but the whole enterprise would still be unnecessary, because they're all by Joseph Priestley. Of course there's the possibility that somebody will later find a paper in TR that should be described as by "Priestley, Joseph, and Joe Bloggs" and that is worth adding, rendering "Priestley, Joseph" necessary elsewhere for contradistinction; but if that happens it can easily be fixed with a text editor.
  • Frankly, I don't see the problem here. I use the lines since there are texts not by Priestley in the list (see edited works). If you want to oppose the list based on its use dashes, that's fine, but I feel that such stylistic decisions are irrelevant to the usefulness of the list. Awadewit | talk 00:23, 1 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • It's certainly bibliographic practice to specify the name of the periodical. I'd have no objection to the repetition of "Theological Repository" half a dozen or even twenty times within a longer list. But when all of these are within a section explicitly titled "Theological Repository" it seems potty. At the very least retitle this "Theological papers" or similar -- though a much more efficient solution would be to retain the title and skip the laborious repetition.
  • This list of Priestley's scientific papers is taken from Robert Schofield's biography of Priestley. It is not known whether or not it is complete. My reaction: Well of course this isn't known. But what does Priestley say about the likelihood that other pieces are yet to be discovered? And what do the reviewers of the books say? [More comments/questions later.] -- Hoary 14:59, 31 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Priestley doesn't say anything. He is long dead. :) Again, Schofield's bibliography is a "Selected bibliography", so I can't be sure if the list is complete. Note that I did not make this statement at the top of every section - it is not a statement that reflects the vagaries of history. It is a statement that reflects the fact that Schofield's bibliography is identified as incomplete. I can provide no more information than my sources provide. (What reviewers?) Awadewit | talk 15:29, 31 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Sheesh, I hadn't realized quite how sleepy I was when I wrote that nonsense. Of course I was wondering about what Schofield wrote, not what Priestley wrote. But doesn't Schofield comment in a preface or elsewhere about the degree of selectiveness of his "selection"? As for reviewers, I'd have guessed that Schofield's work would have been reviewed, if not in the TLS or NYRB then at least in one or two scholarly journals of the history of science, of theology or whatever. Did you look for such reviews? (Of course this is not the kind of thing that WP editors normally dream of doing, and normally I wouldn't ask; but you seem both to have access to an excellent academic library and to be unusually and commendably energetic and thorough.) ¶ I'll comment more a bit later. Hoary 23:52, 31 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • No, Schofield does not explain his selection criteria. I have never seen a "Selected bibliography" that does. Schofield's book is not the kind of thing that gets reviewed in the TLS or the NYRB - it is too scholarly. Happily, I have read academic reviews of the book. They do not discuss the bibliography (again, I've never seen an academic review that discusses a book's bibliography); they only discuss the content of the biography. Please understand - Schofield wrote the first modern biography of Priestley, that is what is interesting about his book. Reviewers aren't going to waste space talking about the bibliography. Awadewit | talk 00:23, 1 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Strong Support I am stunned at the nit-picking here. I do not know what is normally a FL, but if it is not something like this, then something is wrong. Of course this cannot be known to be complete or not. But it has a tremendously large amount of good material in it ! Maybe in 20 years someone will discover a box of manuscripts that were hidden in an attic and find a few more publications, who knows? But for now, this is a pretty good stab at it, I would venture. And it is also a good foundation to build on, if more are found, or it might even be a spur to some later biographer to get a more complete bibliography than what is here or in the modern biography. That is not a reason to dump on this impressive effort, however. And someone wants these to be linked to completed articles? Wow, those are pretty high standards. Even if we got there, we would have to start with something, and that is a list like this. I am not sure each of these publications would be worthy of an encyclopedic article, however.--Filll 03:13, 1 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Note: Hoary has responded to this and other comments on the talk page.
Filll, this is an unusual list for FLC. I don't think we've had a list before that not only contains no blue links in the entries, but has a good handful of red links to boot. Until 2007, the FLC requirements were that FLs had to serve a navigation purpose by linking to articles. A few exceptions came up (such as timelines) and after some discussion, two more list-styles were introduced. This list falls into the 1.a.3 category in the criteria, and we just haven't had many of those. I don't know whether I speak for others here, but my worry when introducing that category was that we'd get lists of trivia or data-dumps that had no encyclopaedic value. Without the navigational linking, it has got to be that bit special, I think. That may be why so many comments are focussing on presentation rather than content. Colin°Talk 08:41, 1 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I responded on the talk page.--Filll 13:41, 1 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I was hoping that the redlinks would spur others to create the articles. Colin, do you consider this page a "data dump" or "trivia" that has no encyclopedic value? Awadewit | talk 12:03, 1 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Och, no. I wouldn't have supported it if I did. The author of these works is significant enough (and his works are significant enough) that listing them has value. But you can see how someone could just run an author-search on PubMed (for example) and produce a list of papers on a modern author that would almost certainly not be of value to WP. That's why the "significant topic of study" clause was added. Colin°Talk 12:22, 1 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support for superb work. Awadewit deserves kudos for her scrupulously correct and complete (45 kb!) rendering of Joseph Priestley's works, which should benefit all serious students of Priestley and related fields, particularly Unitarianism and the history of chemistry. Reading the titles of his works sheds a new and fuller light on Priestley's thinking (and that of his contemporaries) that neatly complements several historical and biographical articles at Wikipedia. To me, this list fulfills the nominal criteria but, more broadly, it represents the sort of article upon which Wikipedia's claim to being an encyclopedia rests. Willow 09:08, 1 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support, for goodness sake. The nominator is several steps ahead of the quibblers, to say the least, and I suggest this be featured as soon as possible, to save Wikipedia from further embarrassment. This is the best piece of bibliography I've come across on Wikipedia.
I'm sure you are right. It is just the first one we've had on FLC. The process runs for another six days... Colin°Talk 16:01, 1 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
By the way, I don't very much care for the box at the top of this page and would like to record a polite objection to it. Please do not put me in it.qp10qp 14:43, 1 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I don't care for it either. And if people object enough that they don't want to be in it, well then it is useless as well as objectionable. I've removed it. Colin°Talk 16:01, 1 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
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