Wikipedia talk:Reference desk

fixing the shortcut link

{{editprotected}} please delete the lines 3-4 of tis header: I have a neon lightbulb that spells my name , I want to hook it up, what do I need?

These lines create a shortcut link back to the page in question, which overlaps with the edit link if first-section edit links are enabled.

This request is paired with a request on Wikipedia talk:Reference desk/header/leftside which adds a conventional shortcut box into the subtemplate. -Us_talk:Ludwigs2|Ludwigs2]] 05:16, 19 March 2010 (UTC)

 Done. Let me know if anything needs changing. —  (MSGJ · talk) 13:33, 19 March 2010 (UTC)

Header for the Computing Reference Desk

Can we tell posters to specify their operating system, computer make and model, and web browser in their posts? I just wasted 15 minutes giving advice to someone before I realized he was probably using Firefox (by his use of the word bookmarks instead of favorites). My advice was written for someone using Internet Explorer. This isn't the first time this has happened to me. We're not talking to these people in person. We wait hours for them to respond. We need to know all the details of their problem up front.--Best Dog Ever (talk) 05:48, 12 September 2012(UTC)

mobile accessibility

It was noted on RD:Talk that the refdesk header's floating elements had visual conflict with the iOS browser. Can this be addressed? SamuelRiv (talk) 22:01, 8 March 2011 (UTC)

Removed text from top of Entertainment Desk

I removed this edit[1] which had been made at the top of

Side by side search fields

This may be the wrong place to write this, but I am having difficulty tracing through all the RefDesk Header templates. Recently (noticed 2013-01-13) the header has changed to the RefDesk pages. The Search Wikipedia and Search archives fields in (say) RefDeskMaths are now side by side and often cause the page width to exceed 100% requiring sideways scrolling as well as vertical scrolling. Could someone put them one after the other vertically. -- SGBailey (talk) 22:11, 18 January 2013 (UTC)

Add shortcuts to Reference desk Language

I've add these shortcuts to Reference Desk Language and want it to show in the header:

• WP:Refdesk/Lang & WP:Refdesk/lang
• WP:Refdesk/Language & WP:Refdesk/language
• WP:REFDESK/Lang & WP:REFDESK/lang

--Tyw7  (☎ Contact me! • Contributions) 13:04, 27 May 2013 (UTC)

Unprotected. There were only a few transclusions of this template and all of the subtemplates, so I've reduced the protection to semi-protection on all of them. Best — Mr. Stradivarius ^{♪ talk ♪} 13:18, 31 May 2013 (UTC)

article gripes

Along with the "We will not answer" section, there ought to be a line like "This is not the place to suggest improvements to a Wikipedia article; each article has a discussion page for that purpose." —Tamfang (talk) 08:05, 21 January 2016 (UTC)

Removal of question "‎Ideas for what to get a good friend of mine for her birthday"

I hope this is works for justification. The poster is a currently active troll and doxxer on RationalWiki, particularly with the personal details of the person they named in this particular Reference Desk question, and had left several links to this page from a page on RationalWiki. Please let me know if this is not sufficient justification, or if an alternate route must be taken to keep this removed. Thanks. Noir LeSable (talk) 21:49, 22 March 2016 (UTC)

Shoot, wrong talk page. Please disregard. Noir LeSable (talk) 21:55, 22 March 2016 (UTC)

Edit request (minor); 01:38, 21 June 2016 (UTC)

First of all, pardon my ignorance if this is not the proper method for requesting the following:
The instruction section of this header states: We'll answer here within a few days -- This might give the wrong impression; it typically takes only a few minutes; an hour or two at the most. Therefore, my request is that this be modified (at the editor's discretion). --107.15.152.93 (talk) 01:38, 21 June 2016 (UTC) (modified:01:41, 21 June 2016 (UTC))

Layout problem

...related to vertical positioning of the "skip to bottom" item in the right column. See Wikipedia talk:Reference desk#Protection-template spacing. DMacks (talk) 22:42, 15 January 2017 (UTC)

Topics are not desks

The list below "Choose a topic:" is not a list of topics. The addition of "desk" to each topic should be removed. Additionally, the different sections of the Reference desk are not separate desks; they are different sections of one Reference desk. So unless there are serious objections, I'll proceed to replace "Computing desk" by "Computing", etcetera.  --Lambiam 07:36, 11 November 2020 (UTC)

"Choose" or "Select"?

I think "Select a topic:" is more appropriate terminology for the navigation column. "Choose" would be better for someone not having a concrete question but seeking a chat room to hang out in that suits their interests; here there is already an issue and the question is which section of the RD is appropriate.  --Lambiam 07:49, 11 November 2020 (UTC)

Where are the recent archives???

I've just tried to look for questions archived from early November, and they are nowhere to be found -- the archives only run through October, and there are no recently archived questions here! So what happened, and where are they??? 2601:646:9882:46E0:C195:DC40:D019:40A6 (talk) 07:52, 12 November 2023 (UTC)

What do you mean? Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Science/November 2023 exists, so do others. Which specific page are you having a problem with? --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 23:38, 12 November 2023 (UTC)

 Skip to the bottom 

Insecticide Question

Is WP:RD/Science#insecticide a good faith question or a thinly veiled advertisement? Nimur (talk) 16:05, 13 August 2009 (UTC)

I'm not sure. There are a lot of superlatives in the section, however a Google search genuinely turns up nothing; as the questioner states, so it may be a legitimate plea for information. Fribbler (talk) 16:13, 13 August 2009 (UTC)

I believe he spelled the product's name wrong. I gave him a link to the product with the correct spelling. -- kainaw™ 22:25, 13 August 2009 (UTC)

I think it's better to err on the side of assuming good faith.Gary (talk) 23:33, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

Nonsense

Is this question nonsense or not Wikipedia:Reference_desk/Entertainment#Inignorance ? Please delete, and probably block again. Bizarre behaviour.83.100.250.79 (talk) 19:07, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

Also http://en.wikipedia.org/enwiki/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Reference_desk/Language&diff=308545631&oldid=308529896 ??83.100.250.79 (talk) 21:19, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

Removed. It's the same guy. Nimur (talk) 21:37, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

The person who posted this has been blocked for this, and other things I think. (2 weeks) If it happens again please report it.83.100.250.79 (talk) 22:39, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

Archiving

Hello all. Just to be clear, I am the one who did the latest archiving of talk page material. At the time (Aug 16), the page seemed to be getting a bit long and, while archiving is all about keeping pages short enough read easily, the RD talkpage is typically archived around the 4th of the month. I left it a bit longer than that as it is the size that matters! At the time, every thread seemed to be pretty quiet, so I pulled everything except the last question as that was the only one that seemed to still be "live". If I'd noticed that our favourite secular humanist had decided to join the discussion, I suppose I would have cut the archive off above that, but I didn't see it. Mea culpa and all that.
I've done the archiving stuff for the last couple of months; I figured it needed doing and I'd never done it before and wanted to learn how. Now I know how and just keep doing it when I figure it needs doing ;-). Anyway, it can be difficult to tell if/when a topic is truly dead, so I sure won't take it personally if someone in good faith feels the need to restore part or all of what I've done. By that same token, I am always open to feedback if I've messed something up. You can see who did the latest archive by checking out the history of this page. Matt Deres (talk) 23:36, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

There's something very wrong with the info-box above - none of the links point to the Talk:RD archives. SteveBaker (talk) 00:51, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

??? Seems fine to me. What are you seeing instead of the archives? Matt Deres (talk) 00:55, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

What's wrong is that too much was archived. When archiving it seems to me that about half of the talk page should remain to show continuity of what's "hot" during the last week or three. The remnant after the last archiving is too brief IMHO. -hydnjo (talk) 01:05, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

That's cool and I appreciate the feedback, but that doesn't seem to be the problem Steve is having. Matt Deres (talk) 01:22, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

Perhaps Steve is referring to the fact that the year links (which are all that is visible until you click the 'show' button) don't point directly to the archive for that year, but to a page listing Wikipedia-related events for the year. In order to get to the archives themselves, you have to click 'show'. I suspect that this behaviour is deliberate, but at the same time I would question the necessity of having those links to the WP chronologies. --Richardrj ^{talk email} 02:04, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

Probably, yes. Quite confusing, in my opinion. It would be better if clicking the year opened the box, displaying the links to archived pages in exactly the same way that clicking "show" does. --NorwegianBlue ^talk 09:20, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

I thought so as well when I started the archiving, but the show/hide thing is a javascript function; I don't know scripting, so can't comment on how easy it would be to have the year perform the same function. I was also thinking about simply removing the links in the year completely so that folks really only had one thing they could press. If there are no objections, I'll remove the links and perhaps bold the text or something. Matt Deres (talk) 22:21, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

How to ask a software question

Refdeskers, questions like this have inspired me to write Wikipedia:Reference desk/How to ask a software question. Please comment or improve on it as you see fit. I've also created the shortcut WP:RD/ASK. --Sean 15:22, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

That appears to be a very well-written tutorial. Should we start forwarding such questions to it and "deferring" any answer until the user properly phrases the question? Maybe we need a programming-help-template with easy to fill in fields (e.g. language, general problem description, etc). Nimur (talk) 16:01, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

Thanks. No, I don't think we should have any policy about it at all. It's just a good thing to point to when questions (as the one above) are basically unanswerable. --Sean 16:20, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

I'm tempted to borrow that for my day job and give it to people who are supposed to write requirements :-) --LarryMac | Talk 16:26, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

Good idea to have that page. I added a 'discussion' page to it with my comment. Tempshill (talk) 04:43, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Religion reference desk

How about starting a separate religion reference desk, just like computers is split from science? DRosenbach ^{(Talk | Contribs)} 18:17, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

I like the idea. Bus stop (talk) 18:33, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Will there be enough questions? DJ Clayworth (talk) 18:35, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Will there be enough trolls? A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 02:51, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Maybe you didn't see User:Elen of the Roads's coined expression on ANI: "Trolls for Jesus". Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots 02:54, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

I'll echo DJ Clayworth's question, and add a bit more: are there enough questions to justify a new desk? Do the questions at present overload the existing desk? Is religion a sufficiently divergent topic from existing desks? Do gains in these areas offset the probable loss of eyeballs viewing questions on yet another desk? My view is that the existing desks (most specifically, Humanities) aren't overloaded, and that humanities/religion isn't near the topical divergence of science/how-do-I-use-X-program. — Lomn 18:49, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

To be more clear with the somewhat snarky comment at the end of my response: I see Humanities/Religion as analogous to a Science/Computer Science split. However, we don't have a Sci/CS split -- we have a Computing desk that answers (mostly) questions about how programs work, or what various peripherals do, or how to use the internet -- questions that never belonged under Science in the first place. There's a smattering of Science-related (or Math-related, depending on your preference) CS-type questions, but they're quite the minority. By contrast, religion is clearly a subset of the Humanities. As such, I don't see "just like computers is split from science" to be a useful comparison. — Lomn 18:55, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Finally, on usage: Just looking at the present desk contents, I count about 10 topics a day at Misc, 15 topics a day at Science, and about 11 a day at Humanities. I judge Humanities not to be overloaded. Reading topic headers and including broadly, I see 10 religion-related topics at Humanities (plus 1 at Misc), less than 2 per day. I judge Religion traffic insufficient for its own desk. Entertainment, the most often-cited case for Ref Desk contraction, presently pulls 4 topics per day. — Lomn 19:01, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

The presence of a Religion desk "welcomes" religion-oriented questions. The Humanities desk is swamped in non-religion questions. A Religion desk would really welcome questions specifically about religion. In fact an off-topic question would be moved to the Humanities desk if it wasn't genuinely about religion. "Religion" would be basically synonymous with organized religion, that much maligned institution. A Religion desk would be a very special place in that it would be one place where all religions could be discussed. They would be discussed separately to the extent that they exist separately — which is a great extent. But they would be discussed under the umbrella of the name of a separate reference desk. That could possibly propel dialogue on the subject. I am not advocating for the blurring of the lines between various religions. Quite the contrary I am excited by there being a single place where all can exist distinctly. Bus stop (talk) 19:21, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

We had the same argument put forth with the short-lived Psychology and History ref desks. Both were soundly rejected (see Archive 33, particularly subsections for Psychology Ref Desk, Fragmentation of Ref Desks, Poll on Desks, etc, etc). We have no reason to believe that questions are left unasked by people who don't know where to best place them. I see no reason to begin mucking about before a need is established (note: I do not wish to imply that participants in this thread are prone to mucking -- it's just that such behavior was a real problem a couple years back). — Lomn 19:56, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Psychology is a science and it is rational. History spans more than one discipline — and it is rational. The closest thing to religion might be something like science fiction — and that isn't even close. (Science fiction is often literature; it is an art.) Religion sits in a category apart from everything else.

It is not a matter of people not knowing where to presently place religion questions. It is a matter of actively welcoming religion questions. The establishment of a Religion reference desk actually does that. It prods people to ask that unasked question that might have been in the back of their mind. Bus stop (talk) 20:21, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Being a tad glib here — I figure our role as a reference desk is to answer the asked questions which are at the forefront of people's minds, not to try to generate 'new business'. People who wish to have long, philosophical discussions about the meaning of life would be better off seeking a more appropriate venue — I believe that Wikiversity is better-targeted to this sort of issue. We've never gone out of our way to create new desks to encourage specific types of questions before, and I don't see a pressing need to start. Desks have always been added in response to evident demand, not in hopes of driving new questions. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 20:39, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Wrong spin. Not "hopes of driving new demand." "Welcoming" was the word I used. I would agree that we are "not to try to generate 'new business'." (Do you really think such a thing is possible?) Religion is unlike most subjects. It is not concrete. Even entertainment is quite concrete. The arts are real, even if sometimes intangible. Religion carves out a unique space for itself. Unless someone sees a sign saying, "Religion questions here," they are unlikely to speak up.

Also, "the meaning of life" would not necessarily be a question addressed at such a religion desk. Such a question would be tossed to the humanities desk, where it would probably be thrown out. If the question weren't about a particular point of, say, Islam, Christianity, Judaism, or any other recognized religion, then it would not belong at a Wikipedia Religion reference desk. I agree that such a desk would not be for idle musing. Bus stop (talk) 20:58, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

The sign is out. From the RD front page, Humanities encompasses "History, politics, literature, religion...". On RD/H, religion questions are present (and answered). Your claims of religion's singular drive for uniqueness, in terms of the reference desk, are unsupported and unpersuasive. — Lomn 21:04, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Additionally, the comparison of religion to science fiction is highly offensive to many participants, as well as being an extremely dubious statement. The nuances of religious doctrine, for example, are no less rational and well-defined than much of history. The basis for such doctrine is no less irrational than much of what has passed for psychology over the centuries. — Lomn 21:00, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

I said that religion was not very closely related to science fiction. But I did say that religion might be more closely related to science fiction than other fields of study. But I don't think I put too fine a point on it. It isn't a major theme which I have developed, is it? I think you may be suggesting that psychology is in some ways related to some aspects of some religions and I may not necessarily disagree with you concerning that. Concerning rationality and irrationality — they may be flip sides of two closely related things. If I used those words incorrectly I stand corrected. But I think we are getting off track. Bus stop (talk) 21:43, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

I'm not in favour of the addition of any desks, including one on religion. Bus stop's assertion that religion sits apart from other studies ignores the huge intertwining religion has with history, and, to a lesser extent, fields like psychology, philosophy, and the arts. My feeling is that fewer desks makes it easier for people to catch all the questions they want to help with. For example, my education in anthropology and archaeology might prove useful on a small subset of religious questions, but not enough of them to justify me wading through an entire desk of "Are any green eyed people Zoroastrian?" and "Is it true secular humanists eat their young?" type stuff, which I'm afraid make up a sizable minority of the so-called religious questions we encounter.

In fact, I'll step onto a tiny soapbox for a second to use this platform to once again suggest the removal of the entertainment desk. Matt Deres (talk) 21:55, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Why remove the Entertainment desk? Bus stop (talk) 21:59, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Maybe a good idea would be to have just one reference desk with some sort of code indicating a category for a question. Choosing a category would be mandatory; choosing more than one category could be acceptable. Perhaps abbreviations for a variety of categories could make their appearance along with the section heading. This could arguably allow for a greater number of categories, but still keeping all questions in one centralized location. A table of these abbreviations could appear at the top of the reference desk. Bus stop (talk) 22:19, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Per the archive I linked above (proof that those who do not know history are doomed to repeat it?), "I believe that's how the Ref Desk started out, but the sheer volume of questions made it umnanageable, which is why it was split up in the first place. -- JackofOz 03:44, 23 May 2007 (UTC)". — Lomn 22:53, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

On the issue of Entertainment, do you think those questions would be better answered under some other desk (presumably Misc)? I observe that questions there generally get fewer answers, but I'm not sure if it's an issue of eyeballs or one of questions being about obscure minutiae. My impression from previous iterations of this discussion is that Misc/Humanities regulars are often grateful that said minutiae have been shuffled off. — Lomn 22:53, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

I think we are missing out on the social engineering aspect of all this. Our aims involve facilitating activities of a reference desk variety. Many people stumble upon something that is interesting that they were not even thinking of getting involved in. What is called for in my opinion is the least intrusive means of designating questions as falling into one or more categories. I am almost thinking of a purely visual, non-verbal, means of representing this. Color coding would be an idea, but it would not work for the many people who are color blind. Abbreviations would seem like the next best thing. I think 3 or 4 letter abbreviations, separated by a comma in the instance that there are more than one category designation for a question, and placed in a field directly beneath the question's section heading, could accomplish this neatly. I am aware of the argument that the sheer volume of questions might tend to make this sort of solution seem unmanageable. But — has it been tried? Or has what's been tried merely been the undifferentiated mixing of all questions into chronological order? Bus stop (talk) 23:22, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

I am against the creation of any new desk, for the reasons hashed out previously, except perhaps for the "What Color is Jupiter Really? Are There Any Left-handed Sinhalese Muslims in Toronto? Aren't Proctologists Predatory Bottom Touchers?" desk. --Sean 23:35, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

I'm very surprised at the response my question has garnered, and would like to respond to a number of the comments made:

I. I like BusStop's insight into welcoming religious questions. I, for one, have been on Wikipedia since 2005 and only found out about the reference desks about 2 weeks ago when I stumbled upon the science desk...but not from the main page. So yes, someone who happens to find the main desk page will see that religion is included in humanities, but it's definitely not very welcoming. I had a language questions that I hadn't been able to find an answer to for a while, and only because I noticed earlier today that there is a language desk did I ask the question.

II. I appreciate TenofAllTrades' concern, but I don't thing we will be getting what Matt is worried about any more than the science desk receives an overload of sexually-charged-dressed-as-a-science-question from wackos. The science desk will often have tangential questions asked that run off of previously posted questions -- that could happen nicely on a religion desk, but not in the current format, where the last religion question is followed by a question on Napoleon's last meal.

III. To say a desk does not belong until we a currently existing category is overloaded to the point that we split it is an interesting premise that I did not think about. But as a religious man myself, I sense that I can be a help to some people in answering their questions. There are "yahoo answers" out there that gather lots of religious questions, and Wikipedia is IMO a far better forum to garner thoughtful, constructive answers than yahoo. If we are out there to provide information on everything, we can't say that we won't start an article until more than 3 request it. We do not delete articles that have existed for 1 week without more than 1 editor contributing to it. Perhaps this is nothing more than an inclusionist/deletionist argument, and I for one have not decided yet to which category I belong...but I think a religious help desk would be a good thing. DRosenbach ^{(Talk | Contribs)} 00:04, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

It would certainly be an "interesting" can of worms to open. Even now we have a hint of things to come, with the user who keeps trying to foment a debate about Secular Humanism. Just as a starting point, I can see someone asking, "How do I know which religion is the 'right' one?" You can point him to an article that leads to a website where such things might be debated; or you could foment the debate right there; or simply delete the question as being a mine field. Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots 00:21, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

I think that's a great question...and a great comment on your part -- except at the end where you recommend censoring the desk. Just as Wikipedia regulates itself in terms of accuracy and vandalism, so too will a desk regulate itself in terms of what questions belong and what does not. Questions are only as good as their answers. If vandals are ignored, they will eventually go away. On your larger theme, though, I say there is nothing different about religion than electricity -- as electricians do not hide their tools and pamphlets, hoping no one will ask them how the darn appliance works, so too, a religion should not hide in fear that someone will figure out the undermining factors. If there are burdensome fundamental questions, perhaps it speaks more loudly about that "religion" than anyone could ever do while using superlatives. DRosenbach ^{(Talk | Contribs)} 01:11, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

I'm not really too keen on censorship. In the case I'm referring to, the guy kept posting the same question over and over, on different help desk sites, talking about being angry about the contents or premise of some book. You're right, the best way to deal with those trolls is to ignore them. But it's abuse of the help desk, regardless. Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots 01:16, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

What people are failing to realize, or perhaps they are realizing it all too well and are trying to avoid it, is how very different a Religion reference desk would be from anything already here. I don't think I am going too far out on a limb to say that there is a lot of contentiousness between religious factions on Wikipedia. This should come as no surprise. That is just reflective of the quarrelsome divisions of the world. On the other hand there is isolation. There is no natural space in which all the world's religions get addressed for their commonality as religions. Let me reemphasize that I am not suggesting a space for the blurring of the naturally existing lines of distinctions between the various religions. Therefore questions such as, "What is the meaning of life?" would have no place on such a reference desk. Nor would "What is the meaning of life according to the Xyz religion?" have any place on such a Religion reference desk. A fairly stringent test would have to be applied to any questions deemed worth addressing on such a desk. It should not be a desk for idle musing on tangentially "religious" questions. Some of those sort of questions, paradoxically, would be better suited to the Science reference desk, or the Miscellaneous reference desk. The sort of questions that would be apropos to a Religion reference desk would be those that would be addressed to an authority within that religion. Needless to say this allows for contradiction, because different religions have different views. Ideally, the more specific the sorts of questions asked the better. References would certainly be preferable to the merely anecdotal on such a desk. Even those who deem themselves authorities should be expected to provide sources for responses given. Bus stop (talk) 01:40, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

It would be worth a try, to see what happens. Where's the harm? At worst, it doesn't work out and you meld it back into the humanities page. How dare you change your post after I've already responded. Just for that, I'm changing this response. So there. Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots 01:53, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

That is funny. Bus stop (talk) 02:09, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

I would look forward to a religion page so that we can explore some of the more obscure topics, like The Church of Baseball, and The Church of What's Happening Now. Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots 02:13, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Forgive me for my apparent partisan platform, but I believe a free market, capitalistic approach would be best. Would we really have security measures on a religion desk? Would we really have criteria? I mean, whatever the market will bear will be what it will be -- sort of like the AfD pages, on which, I think, the initial point was not to vote but rather to discuss. Bit no matter how many times it's mentioned and rementioned, AfD pages are concept elections where the most votes win. The only people who complain about this is the people who lose the vote. So too, to restrict questions...I mean, it's not at all similar to asking someone to stop asking homework questions on the science desk, or to ask someone to refrain from asking literature questions on the science desk. If someone, and yes, we are all considered equal here, thinks that his or her question is religion related, I suppose he or she will place it, and if others feel the same way, they will answer it, even if you, me or someone else thinks its ridiculous. Asking philosophical, theoretical science questions that cannot possibly garner quantitative results, such as time travel questions are no worse than meaning of life questions. DRosenbach ^{(Talk | Contribs)} 03:05, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

I don't really understand what all the brouhaha is. Just be bold, create this new page, and see how it goes. Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots 03:34, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

I'd vote no because I don't want another refdesk link to have to click every time I visit. I disagree that RDH is "swamped" with religion questions. This is a solution in search of a problem. Tempshill (talk) 04:45, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Why not try it for 30 days and see what happens? Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots 04:49, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

I quite like the idea - especially if it reduces the number of nut-jobs on the humanities desk.. Let me put that another way - isn't there a danger or creating a 'honey pot' for the 'wrong sort of question' . Only a "reference desk\race" could possibly be worse. All this is irrelevent.

The big problem is reformatting Wikipedia:Reference desk - a new icon would be needed as well...83.100.250.79 (talk) 11:56, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Also TenOfAllTrades seemed to be saying (see above) that there was a place on wikiversity for those that seek to discuss rather than plain answers - is there a specific page to direct to for such cases?83.100.250.79 (talk) 12:04, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Are there really too many religious questions for the WP:RD/H to handle?

Removed medical advice.

Just a heads-up -- I removed some medical advice. (See diff.) I believe telling someone that they shouldn't be concerned about something they have noticed about their body during a medical examination is a clear-cut case of giving them medical advice -- very vague advice, really, but still. -- Captain Disdain (talk) 09:10, 21 August 2009 (UTC)