50
votes
On the Bachelor/ette "correction"
Personally, I don't think the question is sexist towards women, or that the edit is sexist towards men. With that said, the fact that I'm not offended by it doesn't invalidate the feelings of the ...
- 26k
48
votes
Are intuition-based questions off-topic?
Intuition is extremely important in mathematics and not always explicitly taught in math courses.
As a working mathematician, I need "hard" knowledge to prove and define things in detail, but "soft" ...
- 24.9k
48
votes
I am a student and have reached my limit of 50 questions per month what do I do?
I think the answer here is to be more selective in your questions. The site has to protect itself against getting bombed by low-grade questions from any particular user, hence the limit. (I'm not ...
- 60.3k
43
votes
Answers composed entirely mechanically, e.g. by computer algebra systems
I appreciate people taking the time to show how a problem can be solved using a computer (I have done it myself several times) and, honestly, I do not see why they should be deprived of the little ...
43
votes
Enforcement of Quality Standards
Since this policy was announced, we have witnessed a shift in attitude from the moderators. No longer are users trusted to make their own decisions on what can be posted and what cannot, given their ...
- 15.8k
36
votes
On the Bachelor/ette "correction"
There are two issues at play, here. This post deals with the way the post was edited, rather than the end state of the post.
The Editor is an SE Representative
Regardless of whether or not Jaydles ...
- 17.2k
36
votes
Is there an MSE-like site that is more pleasant to work in? Or are there other solutions?
I haven't been here long, and I rarely follow meta. That said, I am surprised and dismayed by what I perceive to be very open hostility among several prominent users here, over something that I ...
- 113k
34
votes
Accepted
Is it OK for a user to ask other users to vote for him as a quid pro quo for voting their questions?
It is not allowed to make deals about mutual voting, definitely not explicitly and not even implicitly. This would be considered as a voting-ring. Even to just vote on many of a user's post because ...
quidMod
- 40.9k
30
votes
Accepted
Rude comments embedded in user profiles
You can try to flag a post by that user for moderator attention. At present (and likely far into the future) there is no way to flag a user profile.
But be aware that users have quite free reign on ...
- 49.9k
29
votes
Accepted
Suggested Guideline for "I Don't Know Where to Begin" Questions
Tim Gowers has a series of blog posts on this topic and related topics. In one, he says:
Let me introduce a notion of fake difficulty. Every pure maths supervisor at Cambridge has had conversations ...
- 62.4k
28
votes
What is a mod to do? (Traceless edits and "deletions".)
Let's delete the post. I didn't see the original question, but it looks like it was about an incorrect computation of $0.657_8$ in decimal. Future readers are unlikely to benfit from such a highly ...
- 37.6k
27
votes
Is this account suspension abuse of moderator power?
If you actually, truly and honestly believe that there was an abuse of moderator power, the appropriate thing to do would be to contact the SE staff using the contact us link found in the footer of ...
- 49.9k
25
votes
Accepted
I voted mistakenly to close as duplicate. When I realised my mistake, my comment explaining why was deleted.
Your Comment contained a link to an older Question. Although this Question was not the final target chosen by voting to close-as-duplicate, someone may have voted to consider that target the ...
- 35.3k
24
votes
Accepted
Is arithmetic mathematics and can we answer questions about it?
The question you mentioned should be closed. The argument given for closing it is arguably prone to cause confusion and dissent though.
In our guidelines How to ask a good question. it is mentioned ...
quidMod
- 40.9k
22
votes
Are intuition-based questions off-topic?
I find these questions about intuition to be extremely valuable. A perfect example of an intuitive explanation appears on p. 553 of Terence Tao's book Analysis II:
Intuitively, one can think of ...
- 48.3k
21
votes
Why don't we use a homework policy... like physics.SE?
A note from the other side
This may not be evident from a single superficial look at Physics SE's homework-policy canonical meta post, but please do not come away with the impression that it is ...
- 2,318
20
votes
"Context" vs. "your work" redux
After giving it some thought, I think the basic principles governing the discussion on context are:
Determine where the OP stands. Have they tried anything? Are they trying to get their homework done ...
- 17.2k
20
votes
Enforcement of Quality Standards
A week has passed since this post, and I'd like to leave some useful pointers for everyone, which I think will help everyone continue to have a positive experience in the site, and keep the community ...
PedroMod
- 117k
19
votes
What is a mod to do? (Traceless edits and "deletions".)
While it most certainly is possible, I don't expect that majority of these type of questions to induce - within those five minutes - deep and thought provoking answers.
It's not that deep answers ...
- 371k
19
votes
On the Bachelor/ette "correction"
As a preamble let me say that I consider questions touched upon here as important in general, yet the precise instance seems in any case minor in the general context of the problematic so that I think ...
quidMod
- 40.9k
18
votes
Proof Verification of Open Problems
The absence of a set policy regarding open questions seems reasonable, since questions about them (including naive attempts to prove) may entail nothing more than high school algebra or a simple ...
- 9,714
18
votes
Accepted
Should there be a policy about "hints"?
I agree that hints that lead the OP in the wrong direction or barely offer any help at all aren't valid answers, as are hints that simply restate information the OP has already stated. However, ...
- 3,328
17
votes
Accepted
Proving that $e^\pi-\pi<20$ Without Using a Calculator
I find this sort of Question mildly interesting, susceptible of Answers backed by mathematical reasoning, and hence opportunities for learning something new.
While this doesn't guarantee all or even ...
- 35.3k
17
votes
Is this account suspension abuse of moderator power?
Makoto Kato: You wanted community to respond to the question whether you were abused by the moderators. Look at the voting on your question: 6 votes say that you were, 24 votes say that you were not. ...
- 124k
16
votes
Blindly answering easy questions without considering whether the question satisfies MSE policy.
This really should be a comment to an answer from a now deleted account, but I want to elaborate on a point, and also get a reality check from others. So an answer it is.
Quoting
The truth is that 99%...
- 124k
Only top scored, non community-wiki answers of a minimum length are eligible