Timeline for "What have you tried?"...
Current License: CC BY-SA 3.0
67 events
| when toggle format | what | by | license | comment | |
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| Sep 12, 2018 at 22:08 | comment | added | Shaun Mod | This answer needs a mention here. | |
| Jul 16, 2018 at 2:39 | comment | added | Michael Hardy | @SimplyBeautifulArt : I proposed that same "comment template" here on meta in my earliest days on stackexchange and it met with immense anger from nearly all of the users who are in the habit of closing newbies' questions. | |
| Jul 15, 2018 at 19:04 | comment | added | Michael Hardy | "What have you tried?" is not silly when it MERELY means "What have you tried?". But if it's an attempt to say "You shouldn't post homework questions when you don't have an actual question in your own mind?" then it's worse than silly. If that's what the commenter means, then the commenter ought to say that plainly. | |
| Apr 4, 2018 at 17:32 | comment | added | Simply Beautiful Art | Related: new comment template | |
| Apr 1, 2018 at 15:59 | comment | added | MaximusFastidiousIrreverence | @JohnMa here's one people are just down voting without any explanation, and frankly I don't see why: math.stackexchange.com/q/2717264/419507 | |
| Apr 1, 2018 at 15:45 | comment | added | MaximusFastidiousIrreverence | @JohnMa see the convo here math.stackexchange.com/q/2717294/419507. It was down voted to negative when I first saw this question | |
| Mar 30, 2018 at 3:21 | comment | added | copper.hat | WHYT means I know the answer and I am not going to tell you without a little pain. That said, my perspective on answering is (sadly) very influenced by the OP's style of interaction. | |
| Mar 26, 2018 at 12:00 | comment | added | Sarvesh Ravichandran Iyer | @DRPR See, in the end it is your job, as the asker of the question, to ensure it attracts attention. If that is done through posting an image, then so be it. However, if you do consume the time of keeping the MathJax reference page next to you and even copying formulas from it, then you will be in a far better position to receive attention and better answers. On that note, I have seen your profile, and your questions are getting good attention, so you have probably seen the benefits of MathJax. That will keep you in good stead. As for other users, not using MathJax is at their jurisdiction. | |
| Mar 25, 2018 at 13:28 | answer | added | Discrete lizard | timeline score: 14 | |
| Mar 25, 2018 at 13:16 | comment | added | user99914 | @amateurmathguy the first post is a clear duplicate and I voted to closed. Indeed in my comment i was questioning the closure by moderators, but since you have clarified my comment is moot. | |
| Mar 25, 2018 at 5:48 | comment | added | MaximusFastidiousIrreverence | @JohnMa and another math.stackexchange.com/q/2706927/419507. If you leave it up you help other people learn. | |
| Mar 25, 2018 at 5:27 | comment | added | MaximusFastidiousIrreverence | @JohnMa here's one that's about to be closed for no good reason math.stackexchange.com/q/2706943/419507 | |
| Mar 24, 2018 at 18:56 | comment | added | DRPR | some people like myself (and sometimes the newcomers) are not too familiar in writing equations in mathjax .Its a time consuming process.If uploading picture would be allowed at a lower reputation ,then it would be easier to verify the said persons work, However this is just my opinion on this matter . | |
| Mar 22, 2018 at 1:59 | comment | added | silvascientist | "where I was stuck was thinking of something to try" - Thank you. Honestly, it is endlessly frustrating when the situation is, "If I knew what to try, I would have tried it", and yet people insist on asking, "What have you tried?" | |
| Mar 21, 2018 at 13:30 | vote | accept | David C. Ullrich | ||
| Mar 21, 2018 at 13:16 | comment | added | MaximusFastidiousIrreverence | @Hurkyl thank you for that clarification. Allow me, then, to redirect my ire at those who close good yet more basic questions at those with 3000 rep. | |
| Mar 21, 2018 at 11:09 | comment | added | user14972 | @AmateurMathGuy: To clarify GerryMyerson's comment, the "moderator tools" are available to anyone with 10000 rep. Casting close votes can be done by anyone with 3000 rep. In the lingo of stackexchange, these people are not called moderators. The term "moderator" is reserved specifically to the handful of people with the ♦ symbol next to their name, such as Jyrki Lahtonen above. | |
| Mar 21, 2018 at 4:45 | comment | added | Gerry Myerson | @Amateur, I'm not sure you know what a moderator is. Moderators very very very rarely close questions: users who have the requisite number of points have the privilege of voting to close questions, and practically every time a question is closed it's because several users have voted to close it. | |
| Mar 20, 2018 at 22:40 | comment | added | user307169 | This comment thread is as entertaining as it is predictable. I love seeing WHYT questions in the Hot Meta Posts area. | |
| Mar 20, 2018 at 22:30 | answer | added | ConMan | timeline score: 22 | |
| Mar 20, 2018 at 21:38 | answer | added | Brian Tung | timeline score: 60 | |
| Mar 20, 2018 at 16:05 | comment | added | user99914 | @AmateurMathGuy any specific examples? | |
| Mar 20, 2018 at 14:32 | comment | added | MaximusFastidiousIrreverence | Some of the moderators close good questions, questions that younger, less experienced mathematicians or students could benefit from, for no good reason. Perhaps the mods forget what it’s like to be actively learning more basic concepts. And If regular users are put in check by the mods, is there anyone out there to keep the mods in check? Sometimes they're a little judgemental and assuming. | |
| Mar 19, 2018 at 22:59 | history | edited | Arnaud Mortier | CC BY-SA 3.0 |
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| Mar 19, 2018 at 22:50 | history | edited | Arnaud Mortier | CC BY-SA 3.0 |
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| Mar 19, 2018 at 18:51 | comment | added | user14972 | @user296602: I did not vote either way, but I do not think it's "perfectly obvious what is being asked here". For example, most (all?) of the interrogative statements in the posting are rhetorical, not questions meant to be answered. | |
| Mar 19, 2018 at 18:14 | history | reopened |
user296602 user99914 José Carlos Santos David C. Ullrich Lääne-Viru |
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| Mar 19, 2018 at 16:36 | comment | added | David C. Ullrich | @user296602 Right - for some reason I didn't see it was on hold until I refreshed the page. Yes, the idea that it's unclear what I'm asking is silly - good luck with that. It does seem curious that such a bad bad question should have so many more upvotes than downvotes. Raises the question of whether the upvoters are evil or just ignorant. | |
| Mar 19, 2018 at 16:32 | comment | added | user296602 | @DavidC.Ullrich I was referring to this meta thread. There is a group of users here in meta who seem to use closure as a way to express disagreement. I see that my comment was vague and easily interpreted as being about the linked question on main - sorry about that! | |
| Mar 19, 2018 at 16:26 | review | Reopen votes | |||
| Mar 19, 2018 at 18:28 | |||||
| Mar 19, 2018 at 16:09 | comment | added | David C. Ullrich | @user296602 Voting to reopen what? If you mean this thread, I didn't even notice it had been closed. If you're referring to the question I'm talking about here, I might have voted to reopen. But, although I disagree with the reason for the close vote, that question does deserve to be closed because it's a duplicate. | |
| Mar 19, 2018 at 16:02 | comment | added | user296602 | Once again, a closure vote is not a super-disagree button. I'm voting to reopen because it is perfectly obvious what is being asked here, regardless of whether you like or dislike the premise. | |
| Mar 19, 2018 at 14:37 | history | closed |
amWhy JMP user223391 Ѕᴀᴀᴅ Henrik supports the community |
Needs details or clarity | |
| Mar 19, 2018 at 13:42 | comment | added | Holo | I agree that there is some misusage of WHYT, but when I see a question without anything indicate that the OP tried something I do ask this in the comments because in case that OP did tried something I think that explaining what s/he did wrong can help more than explain an answer. If the OP sit on the question and can't think about a way, let's say it is the same as your example, I think s/he should add it because in that case I'll know to also add what to emphasize in my answer, for example, different ways to approach inductions and such. I hope this makes sense | |
| Mar 19, 2018 at 10:38 | comment | added | DynamoBlaze | @amWhy As I earlier replied to a similar comment by someone else, no one is actively suggesting that everyone who does math is a male. It's just that we're accustomed to such usage. I'm an atheist, and I say 'Oh my God!' all the time. | |
| Mar 19, 2018 at 8:20 | history | edited | Martin Sleziak | CC BY-SA 3.0 |
minor typo
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| Mar 19, 2018 at 6:09 | comment | added | Jyrki Lahtonen Mod | @CarlMummert Yes, it may be somewhat biased. Then again, I'm not seeing a flood of homework questions from a first course in category theory. Or, as another user commented today "very seldom is this site abused by people in chapter 22 of Vakil". | |
| Mar 19, 2018 at 3:55 | answer | added | user14972 | timeline score: 62 | |
| Mar 19, 2018 at 1:26 | comment | added | Martin Sleziak | This is redundant for people who were around for some time, but maybe it is worth reminding that there are various ways to add context, it does not necessarily mean OP's own attempt: How to ask a good question. and Can we stop the “Show your work craze”? | |
| Mar 19, 2018 at 1:25 | comment | added | Martin Sleziak | Some older questions which seem related to the OP not being able show what they tried: Suggested Guideline for “I Don't Know Where to Begin” Questions and Homework, reasonable to have no clue? | |
| Mar 19, 2018 at 1:16 | history | edited | Martin Sleziak | CC BY-SA 3.0 |
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| Mar 18, 2018 at 22:36 | comment | added | Carl Mummert | @David C. Ullrich: as another example, the context given in the answer to math.stackexchange.com/questions/2687983/… should have been included by the OP (or some context). The context - the relation with optics - is the reason for the question. Otherwise, it's just another random inequality. // break // Of course, another reason we look for the OP in particular to provide context and motivation is to help filter out homework, in the sense that we allow homework-type problems that have well-motivated posts | |
| Mar 18, 2018 at 22:33 | comment | added | David C. Ullrich | @CarlMummert "We should not try to filter questions by their level of math:" I suppose not. But we can try to filter them based on how hard they should be to someone with the OP's background, to the extent that we can guess that. | |
| Mar 18, 2018 at 22:31 | comment | added | David C. Ullrich | @CarlMummert Re your second comment: I was about to say that none of their suggestions for how to acquire a clue would have helped me with this specific question, when I realized that would be a lie: I was simply stuck until I decided to think about the case $n=2$. | |
| Mar 18, 2018 at 22:29 | comment | added | David C. Ullrich | @CarlMummert Re your first comment: Excellent points. But it seems obvious to me why this specific question is interesting: If $b_j$ is close to $a_j$ then $\prod b_j$ should be close to $\prod a_j$. How close? | |
| Mar 18, 2018 at 22:28 | comment | added | Carl Mummert | @Jyrki Lahtonen: the main concern I have with the proposal you suggested is that it is biased in favor of more "advanced" topics, while this site is supposed to be neutral about the level of math. On MathOverflow it makes perfect sense to favor advanced topics. But here, "How do I factor $x^2 + 2x + 1$", "How do I prove that $\mathbb{Z}[x]$ is a UFD", and "Why do elementary topoi have initial objects" should be treated as equivalent, in terms of the quality of post that we expect to accompany the question. We should not try to filter questions by their level of math. | |
| Mar 18, 2018 at 22:18 | comment | added | Carl Mummert | In February, several editors also added advice on "Avoid no-clue questions" math.meta.stackexchange.com/questions/9959/… to the canonical "how to ask a good question" post, | |
| Mar 18, 2018 at 22:16 | comment | added | Carl Mummert | My own concern with "what have you tried" is that it is only part of what I really want to know, and often the least important part. I want to know why a question is interesting, if it isn't in a field I already know. I want to know where it came from and what problems it is related to. And, finally, I want to know how the OP thinks about the question and what methods they have at hand. I find I'm not always happy with questions that include a token "My effort" without adding genuine context. I try to avoid asking "what have you tried", instead I like to link to "how to ask a good question" | |
| Mar 18, 2018 at 22:08 | history | edited | David C. Ullrich | CC BY-SA 3.0 |
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| Mar 18, 2018 at 22:05 | comment | added | David C. Ullrich | @amWhy You address borderline insulting comments to me, and when I simply reply I'm "targetting" you? Wow. I mean really, wow... I take it that no, you can't give a specific example of something the OP could have said about that specific question in order to "show some effort"? | |
| Mar 18, 2018 at 21:42 | history | edited | David C. Ullrich | CC BY-SA 3.0 |
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| Mar 18, 2018 at 21:01 | comment | added | David C. Ullrich | @amWhy Cuz I can't. I "worked" on it for a few minutes. While I was working on it it didn't happen once that I tried something that didn't work. I was trying to see how to relate "P(n+1)" to "P(n)", and simply didn't see how until I did. "Had the OP shown some work": I happened to see my notes just now. There is no "work" there! There's the problem statement, and then the solution, with no indication of what heppened in the minutes in between. If I hadn't finally seen the solution there's no way I could give any evidence that I"d worked on the problem, even though I did. | |
| Mar 18, 2018 at 20:55 | comment | added | David C. Ullrich | @amWhy The point being that I can't imagine what else along the lines you suggest the OP could have added. There are no definitions to be added. Can you give a specific hypothetical example of what the OP might have said, regarding that question? | |
| Mar 18, 2018 at 20:51 | comment | added | David C. Ullrich | @JyrkiLahtonen I'm absolutely with you on that. It may not be practicable to implement it as an official rule, but nonetheless people should have a solution in mind before whining about WHYT. In that specific question for example I can't think of anything the OP could have "tried". | |
| Mar 18, 2018 at 19:44 | comment | added | Jyrki Lahtonen Mod | Basically the problem with my proposal is that the number of questionable questions is so high that the implied workflow is not sustainable. | |
| Mar 18, 2018 at 19:42 | comment | added | Jyrki Lahtonen Mod | A few years ago I suggested this. The gist is that anyone yelling WHYT should themself be able to answer the question fully, without breaking a sweat. That proposal never won much support. I guess that problems with the proposal are A) timing (speed is essential when closing a question because we have those answering machines), B) verification (may be having a sufficient number of upvotes in a relevant tag would be a good enough lithmus test?) | |
| Mar 18, 2018 at 19:21 | comment | added | amWhy | I'm saying that, had the OP said "I tried to do it by induction but I don't see how" it would have added nothing. Had the OP made an effort, shown some work, added a definition or two, or specified what exactly has them tripped up, would have added a whole lot to the quality of the question. Mind you, some of us repeat ten or more times each day the same lengthy comment template, with links and all, hoping to prompt a user to improve their question so that it won't be closed. Your question, as I said, is senseless, because an asker stating what you suggest will not have improved the post | |
| Mar 18, 2018 at 19:13 | comment | added | David C. Ullrich | @amWhy Sarcasm? I had a question. I indicated it was a question using standard punctuation, and you nonetheless asked what the question was. Senseless? I don't see how a _question can be senseless. Nobody's said anything remotely like an answer. The question was the question - I don't see how it cann be a misrepresentation of itself. | |
| Mar 18, 2018 at 18:57 | comment | added | amWhy | Sarcasm isn't going to get you far. And if that's your only question, that's senseless, and a misrepresentation of the question. | |
| Mar 18, 2018 at 18:46 | history | edited | David C. Ullrich | CC BY-SA 3.0 |
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| Mar 18, 2018 at 18:45 | comment | added | David C. Ullrich | @amWhy You can locate the question by noting which sentence ends with the character "?". | |
| Mar 18, 2018 at 18:34 | comment | added | amWhy | Not everyone who does mathematics is a man. Consider using gender neutral language such as "they" and "person" instead of "he" and "sir" when addressing or talking about other users. | |
| Mar 18, 2018 at 18:18 | comment | added | Asaf Karagila Mod | So what have you tried to do to solve this problem? Have you tried induction? :) | |
| Mar 18, 2018 at 18:18 | comment | added | amWhy | BTW, meta is not intended to be a repository of editorials. It's a Q&A site, as are all SE sites. | |
| Mar 18, 2018 at 18:16 | review | Close votes | |||
| Mar 19, 2018 at 1:13 | |||||
| Mar 18, 2018 at 17:54 | comment | added | amWhy | What's your question here? It seems to be an essay (with scanty evidence or reasoning) that you believe "Sometimes this "What have you tried" thing seems silly." If you have a question, please ask it. Else, it is unclear what you are asking. | |
| Mar 18, 2018 at 17:24 | history | asked | David C. Ullrich | CC BY-SA 3.0 |