Earlier today, I received a talk page message to review the NFD tag on a “math magic trick” article
. After some review and a lengthy discussion page message
where I analyzed every step in detail, I decided to switch the NFD tag on the article from NFD|jok to NFD|acc because the article relies on flawed math and simply ignoring mathematical rules to reach its desired goal.
That got me thinking - should all of these math magic trick articles be deleted because they are inaccurate due to relying on bad math to manipulate numbers into a desired state? Or regardless of the bad math, should they not be deleted because they do achieve the end goal of tricking your friends?
I’m not talking about the math trick articles that rely on simple misdirection, where the second party starts with any number and ends up subtracting it in the end or other similar tricks, such as this one
, this one
, and this one
. I’m talking about articles that prove 2+2=5
, and other similar conjectures
. I’m happy to let them go through the NFD process and I’d be happy with whatever outcome. However, I do wonder - are they accurate because they achieve their desired goal, or are they inaccurate because of the methods they use to get there?
Edit: I realize there are only two articles that fit this description, but I still feel it’s an important question to ask.
Putting it in simple terms, if the title does not accurately describe that the content is inaccurate (because it is a false “trick” of some sort), then it should be nominated as inaccurate. If some reader came across an article like that and was tricked by the faulty logic presented, it really wouldn’t help them. However, if they were properly informed beforehand (as in suggesting that the article is clearly a trick), then it could be kept as some sort of party trick. I think it all depends on the overall context and title of the article.
This was one of the issues I was thinking about when looking over this article. Sure, from a mathematical standpoint, it is inaccurate and impossible (regarding the 2+2=5 article here). With that being said, it’s not necessarily inaccurate from other perspectives as it’s possible to “trick” your friends when used as a magic trick. I think we need to look at it from a magic trick perspective that simply happens to involve math. I think that right now we are viewing it solely as a mathematical article, which is where the accuracy comes into question. We have articles such as this: https://www.wikihow.com/Make-a-Pen-Magically-Disappear
that are kept around. I hate to be *that* person, but obviously it’s not actually possible to make a pen disappear. The reason it’s kept around though is because of that keyword “magically”. Keeping all this in mind, I think articles such as the 2+2=5 one can be kept as long as it’s clear that it’s a magic trick in the title.
Yes…In magics all things are not right If my article will be deleted so their ate hundreds of articles that must be deleted on this base Thank you
I am requesting Conor Flemming based upon that he is a wikihow admin. Please approve my math magic article in Magic categories If it does not get approved so all magic Articles must be deleted Thanks
Many wikihow articles like Make pen disappear Disappear completely Make card disappear And many other like this are not deserved to be survived on wikihow as based upon your talking…All users must be treated in the same way otherwise it will be injustice to all of us If my article gets deleted as based of this so I will complain to wikihow manager ANNA and previous manager KRYSTLE and JACK HERRICK as per my personal email messages Hope you understand I wrote this article with hard efforts
Well, this was actually a pleasant sight to see. When I was asked to look at an article another trial booster was looking at (one of them noted in the top part of this discussion - that brought upon this discussion), I was like yeah “that’s really cool” - “this is something I might have been forgetting about”. After writing back and forth to this user about this article (who later never got back to me but I don’t mind - we went about 2 messages each), I remember seeing the post @Tiagoroth
posted and was like “Oh boy.” My 3.5 credits of high school math would have failed me again. He brought up some really strong points that would have been a great reminder that this article had flaws.
In my point of view, I’d see a possible keep, if these articles were mentioned with the “trigger word” (math trick) in the title to prevent rather tricky math articles from reaching the general public who’s looking for great information that doesn’t have these flawed math issues.
I remember mentioning to the user (who’s been here a little over a month and is already a trial booster), that if I was the reader, I’d be looking for information of what math concept name was used to explain the concept which the above title was meant to trick me on.
I’ll keep following this post from this point forward.
This is all getting a little silly now. https://www.wikihow.com/Discussion:Prove-2-%2B-2-%3D-5-(Magic-Trick)
. Watrik has said that he is the owner of the YouTube channel that has been plagiarised. @Anna
, please take a look at this when you have time and back online.
To use incorrect math is an issue for people reading these how-to guides. The desired goal should be reached by correct math. WikiHow is supposed to present accurate information, not fake people trying to finish an article while feeding the people reading misinformation. It is not cool, and wholly wrong to do this. So yes, they should be deleted. Feeding people misinformation can really have an impact on people’s learning.
