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Should we upvote answers more often, and/or comment more?
I don't upvote when I don't understand the answer
Often other people post answers, to questions which I don't know the answer to.
If I read their answer, and suspect that it's a good answer, even so I don't upvote their answer because I'm not certain that it's correct, because
I worry is that the sequence of events might be:

Someone posts a difficult question
Someone writes a plausible but incorrect answer
I read the answer and (being ignorant) think "it looks good to me", and (being careless) I up-vote it
The next person who reads it sees, not only a wrong answer, but an up-voted wrong answer: my up-vote will have made the problem (bad answer) worse, and would be wrong speech.

Therefore there are answers which I don't up-vote, because I'm not sure of them: they're not bad or boring answers, they are answers to difficult questions.
I don't upvote if I think it's not a good answer
Theoretically there might be another, completely different reason for not up-voting an answer: which is that the answer isn't very helpful.
Can we tell the difference between different kinds of upvote? What does it mean if an answer has no votes?
Here's a proposal: if you read an answer that's not helpful, if you don't want to up-vote it because you think it could be better, if you see a way to improve it, how about add a comment to criticize it?
At the moment when I see an answer with no up-votes and no comments, I can't tell the difference between:

This might be a good answer but there's no-one competent enough to judge (up-vote) it
There are people competent to judge and they have decided that it was not worth up-voting

If you answer this question feel free to include personal answers: e.g. "yes, criticize my answers" or "no, don't criticize my answers" and/or "I do/don't like to criticize other people's answers".
I admit that criticism can seem dis-harmonious, and that SE is not intended for discussion/dialog.
OTOH some people post answers in public, not only to help others but in the hope that if their answer can be improved, someone will point that out.
See also Vote Early, Vote Often

Re: voting, if you don't really understand an answer, do not vote.
Re: criticism, I only downvote and criticize an answer when I see the topic clearly enough that I can be certain that my understanding is complete and the answer is mistaken.
If you have only a vague understanding of the topic, and can't really follow the reasoning of the answer, but the answer seems to mismatch some postulates/axioms you have heard about, ask a new question!

Yes. A consequence of that is that expert answers to difficult questions may have few up-votes. sigh

I obviously prefer it if you post a critical comment when you down-vote. In this topic I'm suggesting going further: post a (less-critical) comment if for some reason you decide to neither up-vote nor down-vote.

I get it, and my response to your suggestion is: if your comment were to be based on my answer mismatching some of your preconceptions, but you don't clearly see that the answer is wrong, I would appreciate if you asked a new question.

It's also reasonable to post a comment asking for clarification of a concept you don't understand. This may prompt the answerer to provide more information in the answer, or at least point you in the direction of further reading. This makes the options: 1. upvote a good post; 2. downvote a post if you're sure it's bad; 3. comment if you need further information to understand and judge the answer.

@abbyhairboat, right, I think what we're trying to understand here is a fine line between a request for clarification and a challenge. My position is, if you have doubts but generally agree with the answer, feel free to clarify in a comment. But if you feel the answer is off-base (but are not certain enough to directly point out why), I personally would rather see your challenge in a separate question.

If an answer is bad (useless or worse), then you should down-vote it and leave a comment. The comment is:

To tell the person who posted it why it's down-voted, so that they can (if they wish) improve or delete their answer
To warn other readers that there may be something wrong, and specify what you think is wrong, so that they can judge for themselves.

If you totally don't understand an answer then you can ask a separate question. If there's an expert answer which contains several complicated expressions, which were intended as an answer to the original question, it doesn't make sense to question those too much:

Because comments aren't a suitable place for expert answers: asking a separate question allows room for one or more corresponding answers
Because changing the subject might detract from the original question and original answer

If you see an answer you don't really like (which is "meh"), make sure that a better answer exists even if you have to write that answer yourself. You can write a whole answer; or just write a partial answer, for example instead of asking someone to add to their answer, you could write,

In addition to the other answers, ...

or

Further to so-and-so's answer, ...

Comments to an answer are for minor conversation about that answer, between you and its author. You nearly understand something but not quite, or you're not sure? You think you understand, but maybe the answer can be worded in an alternative way? Then comment. The author can:

Ignore the comment
Reply to the comment
Edit their answer
Flag the comment as unhelpful

About me:

I like to comment occasionally, e.g. to verify whether I understand an answer
I hope I don't mind receiving comments on my answers
Feel free to delete any comments of mine if they are not or if they stop being useful


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Correcting English?
I recently made some extensive corrections to an answer (catpnosis's here), purely to improve the English and to make it easier to read and understand. The author was clearly not a native speaker, but the answer appeared important enough to be worth the effort. So I was doing it as a small "service" to the author and the group as a whole.
However, after doing it I realized I might be offending the author. I'd seen yuttadhammo doing similar edits, but his were always very minor. My changes, on the other hand, were extensive.
Given that the site language is English but, given the subject, we are likely to have lots of non-native-English speakers, the scope for such "gardening" is going to be extensive. Any thoughts on whether it is to be encouraged or not? If this were a public Wiki, like Wikipedia, clearly gardening is an important part of the culture. What about SE?
P.S. The OP did revert some of my changes (re-violating idiom again but maybe because I'd fudged the meaning) but left most of them. However, I don't want to assume that means it's OK to do this in general.

The general consensus at SE is that this is okay, and even encouraged (see, e.g. [meta.SE]: http://meta.stackexchange.com/q/16276/224428). We want the information here to be useful to as many people as possible, and to that end, it makes sense to edit everything into some flavor of standard English.

Thanks senshin.

@senshin Can you post your 'answer' below? Thanks.

@Tommy Big thanks for the edit. I changed one sentence back to emphasize some point.

The general consensus at SE is that this is okay, and even encouraged (see, e.g. Meta.SE: Is it acceptable to edit broken English?). We want the information here to be useful to as many people as possible, and to that end, it makes sense to edit everything into some flavor of standard English.

From the perspective of someone who's post has been corrected with regard to spelling and grammar, I didn't mind. It feels a little bit like a reprimand, but a fair and necessary one. I'm not a native English speaker and therefore I need to be mindful of my spelling. When I slip up I would rather have my post be corrected than having a bad post.

I am a native speaker and still get my stuff corrected, so don't let it bother you too much :-) I'm just glad we're not using Pali as the group language.

I think it is a good idea to edit for spelling and grammar. Native English speakers make mistakes as well. But I do think it is important to account for the writer's style and cadence. I recently had one of my answers edited(What is the Pure Land?), and although I agreed with most of the changes, I reverted back some of the corrections.
For example, I changed "Pureland" back to "pureland" because in English speaking Mahayana, the convention that I am aware of that when referring to "turning this world into a pureland", "pureland" has a lowercase "p". Others had to do with my message's natural cadence. There could be conventions that an editor is not aware of, so the original writer's rebuttal should be taken into account as well.

Sometimes it is difficult for me to proof read my posts, so I appreciate feedback on such things as well.

I think it is rude. It would be like correcting a persons speech in public.
The person may have dyslexia. Asking people is the right thing to do.

source: Stack Exchange

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

sort: votes


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decorating our page
I just visited English language SE here. the appearance of the page is quite catchy. can we do something like that for our Beta page? will it be good to attract more traffic, resulting in increased possibility of more discussion?

No, English SE is not a Beta site, it is a full-blown site designed by a professional UI designer commissioned by Stack Exchange company. All Beta sites look the same, by design. We need to prove that this community is sustainable before the site can graduate from Beta.

where are we standing right now?

@sangharsh Current beta status is discussed in this topic. The site has been running for about 100 days? Sites might spend more than a year in Beta.

all_licenses: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/


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Unnecessary post locking
@Andrei, your locking of this post was unnecessary and premature, given the reason you stated. The first comment I made was exactly as SE suggests when downvoting. The remaining three hardly constitute a "high amount", especially since it was clear the discussion was over (Lee didn't seem receptive to what I'd said, so I left it at that.)
I would have taken this to chat as the lock message suggests but for some technical reason I cannot login to chat.

I believe Andrei locked the post because it seemed likely to spark an extended conflict in the comments. His instinct was correct, although I don't think the pre-emptive lock was the right way to deal with it. As such I have unlocked the post.
That said, I'm also deleting the irrelevant comments. From the Help Center guidance about commenting:

When should I comment?
You should submit a comment if you want to:

Request clarification from the author;
Leave constructive criticism that guides the author in improving the post;
Add relevant but minor or transient information to a post (e.g. a link to a related question, or an alert to the author that the question has been updated).

When shouldn't I comment?
Comments are not recommended for any of the following:

Suggesting corrections that don't fundamentally change the meaning of the post; instead, make or suggest an edit;
Answering a question or providing an alternate solution to an existing answer; instead, post an actual answer (or edit to expand an existing one);
Compliments which do not add new information ("+1, great answer!"); instead, up-vote it and pay it forward;
Criticisms which do not add anything constructive ("-1, see previous comments you scallywag!"); instead, down-vote (and provide or up-vote a better answer if appropriate);
Secondary discussion or debating a controversial point; please use chat instead;
Discussion of community behavior or site policies; please use meta instead.

(Emphasis mine.)
In summary:

Andrei's instincts were correct, but he used a jackhammer where a trowel was needed;
Explaining the reason for a downvote in the comments is perfectly acceptable, but;
Comments should not be used for secondary discussions or site policy.

(Andrei's instincts were correct,...)  I agree. It was the jackhammerness that I was flagging, not the principle of the thing. (Comments should not be used for secondary discussions...) OK, understood.

Got it boss. Should I have instead commented like "Ok folks, take a deep breath"?

Something like that @AndreiVolkov, or just clean up the comments (and leave your own comment explaining why you did so). Locking is for a situation where the post just won't stop attracting the wrong kind of attention, lasting more than several hours and amassing tens of comments, etc.

Understood. Somehow I was hesitant to delete comments...

Having ones comments disappear is a good thing. (I've seen some of my comments get deleted for the better) Sort of like a zen monk getting wacked with a stick to get them to focus again.


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Deletion of comments?
I made a comment -- superficially flippant, perhaps, but in fact carefully constructed given the context -- to this answer. However, it appears to have been deleted, but I can't be sure because I never saw any notification of the deletion. Is that normal, or should one see a notice (and reason) for a comment deletion?

Hmm, that link doesn't seem to point to the answer I'm referring to. It's one of FaithfulBuddhist's two answers; the one to which @yuttadhammo has added a comment beginning "just the sort of answer we're looking for ..."

I deleted it... the comment said: This is a non-comment. Did you really think that comment added something to the discussion?

Yes. It was an example of the same kind of position taken by "non-buddhists". I was "showing", where "saying" is difficult to impossible, what "non-buddhism" is. I admit there was a touch of whimsy about it, but I was being serious.

What's wrong with just saying, "A non-Buddhist comment would be something like 'this is not a comment.'"? I may be dense, but I didn't see it as showing anything, except maybe snark. But then again, I'm not sure I really understand non-Buddhism in the way you do.

Leave it deleted. Neither it, nor (IMO) non-buddhism, is worth any more attention :-)

Bleh, I just put it back thinking I was being a jerk. No need to delete stuff that people feel adds to the conversation unless it gets flagged, right?

OK, well given that you have, I'll answer your question above. The reason I didn't just make your suggested statement was because I wanted to give a statement that was itself internally problematic (as the NBs say XB is), and having little or no "content" or "truth" (as FaithfulBuddhist claimed of NB). It was in the spirit of the Epimenides paradox, even Magritte's "Ceci n'est pas une pipe". BTW I notice that we've actually now been mentioned on the old home page of NB. But as I said, for me I'm at the end of my limited interest in the whole thing.

You're famous ;) I'm still not convinced that we want such clever comments on the site - giving an example of something seems a little too smarmy (in another context I'd applaud it, but on SE?)

You won't normally see notifications of deletion. Comments are frequently deleted on SE websites as a matter of bookkeeping, especially +1s etc.


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buddhism.SE not a sangha
I commented here that we may need to be open to the possibility that Buddhism in general (as opposed to the more restricted "Buddhist Studies" or "Buddhology") may be unsuited to the SE style of forum. I think part of what was niggling me became clearer this morning -- namely, that while many online Buddhist forums can act as some kind of online sangha, the nature of SE (Q&A, not discussion and chat) means that it cannot.
I don't know if that means the whole notion of buddhism.SE is ill-founded, but I just thought I'd raise the point. At very least it's probably a useful thing for newbies to be aware of, so as to set expectations. I already feel as if I'm beginning to "get to know" a few of the regulars here, and I like that. But I suspect it's something that users need to be aware is at most a side-effect of contributing and if they're looking for an e-sangha experience, they need to look for something in addition to SE.
Yea? No? Shuddup?

This is the approach I took in the beginning as a moderator; when we got posts that were too "Buddhist", it seemed we were expected to remind them that this is not a Buddhist site. Or, in the words of this post, "this is a Q&A web site, not a church".
But, after being on the receiving end of some textual abuse from irate answerers (e.g. being called "passive aggressive"), and doing a bit of digging and a bit of reflecting, I'm not so sure there isn't room for a bit of church-ness here.
While there are certain things we aren't designed for (pastoral therapy, for example), I'm not sure that we need take such a hard-line stance against being at least a bit Buddhist, and certainly against being communal. Here's some points to consider:
1. SE sites are considered communities.
As it says on the stackexchange.com front page:

Expert communities.
Each of our 125 communities is built by people passionate about a focused topic.

So, at the very least, we have to remember that this is more than just an encyclopedia, it actually is a community for people passionate about Buddhism. Just as stackoverflow.com is a programming community, I would suggest that Buddhism.SE is a "Buddhism community" (though not, perhaps, a "Buddhist community").
2. SE sites are designed to provide answers to real-life problems.
As it says in the 2-minute tour:

Focus on questions about an actual problem you have faced.

So, again, the focus is on helping people with their problems; Christianity draws the line on giving pastoral advice, but I would argue that this has to do with the fact that such advice is more likely to be opinion-based in Christianity. In Buddhism, on the other hand, there is much advice that can be given drawing completely from expert sources.
For example, photography.SE is full of real-world problems about taking pictures, not just abstract theoretical questions. SO is primarily a resource for people actually writing programs. Etc. Buddhism.SE should, by analogy, be a place where people actually practicing (or teaching, studying, etc.) the teachings of Buddhism should be able to get expert (meaning text-based, not guru-based) answers to their practical problems.
3. Stack Exchange is about making the Internet a better place.
On the company information page, it says:

Stack Exchange
Make the Internet a better place to get expert answers to your questions.

With this in mind, we have to ask what we are really trying to do; I think I can at least answer that we are not trying to create a second Wikipedia. So what does that leave us besides a sangha? Granted, we are not meant to be primarily a discussion forum, but we have chat rooms where we can discuss to our hearts' content.
What exactly would be the problem with allowing for a communal feel to the site? I think we've (read: I've) already managed to chase a few users away with our hard line; probably we've scared others from even posting in the first place. Look at the Judaism site's blurb:

Mi Yodeya is a question and answer site for those who base their lives on Jewish law and tradition and anyone interested in learning more. It's 100% free, no registration required.

Going by this, I would actually be in favour of site name like "Sangha" or something. No way I'd recommend "E-Sangha" (still have nightmares!) but just "Sangha"; we could be the Sangha of the Internet.
After all, a sangha is not about discussion or touchy-feely campfire pow wows; it's about getting support in our practice of the teachings of Buddhism, something that I think, on reflection, SE is uniquely designed for.

There's nothing wrong with us allowing for a communal feel; personally I want/need more than a sterile Q&A. My only concern is that we may be fighting against the underlying spirit and mechanism of SE, although more the former than the latter; I don't see anything inherent in the SE machinery that works against a more "church-ish" experience. OK, given that, and also Robin's response, here's an alternate view. Instead of reminding newbies that this is "just" a Q&A site, maybe we non-newbies should just permit ourselves to be less hard line, as you, yuttadhammo, appear to have done already.

Oh, I too shudder at "E-(most anything)". As I do with "(most anything) 2.0". However, Vince Horn and pals are already experimenting with an online sangha at http://www.buddhistgeeks.com/community/. Not sure how it's going, but if it's as useful as their conference and podcast  think it'll be cool.

I don't think there is anything wrong with fighting the underlying spirit. Or put a different way, we aren't necessarily fighting the spirit as we are expanding it to include more things. Maybe that's good or bad, I dunno. But I really like this site. I am a lay person just starting to learn all I can about Buddhism, and some of the questions are excellent to see / read. I think whatever needs to happen (to let that continue) should happen.

I definitely get a community feel here. I've asked many questions and each one has been given thoughtful consideration and useful answers. And for that I am appreciative and inspired to answer when appropriate or edit when needed. I notice lots of people helping to edit questions for others so they don't get closed down and that sort of thing.
There is something very clean and efficient about actually not having endless discussion, debate, etc. The internet is full of those type of forums already for people who are energized by that. This is different and quite nice really.
I do think it would be useful to have a FAQ or introduction page of some sort to guide new users in how to make best use of Buddhism SE and avoid common misunderstandings before one is accustomed to the format. Is that something that might become available?

Every SE site has a 'tour' that explains the SE site model; voting, reputation, badges that sort of thing. Furthermore all SE sites have a help center with FAQs.
Once we agree on what is on-topic and what not (which is something to be discussed here on meta) we can use that to improve this FAQ template.

Technically, the Sangha is the community of the ordained monks and nuns. People have just started to use the word to mean Buddhists in general.
I think what Buddhism.SE isn't is an institution (like the sanghas with buildings and administrators), in the sense of an institution that can hand out official rulings on anything, which I think a lot of people secretly want.
And in a lot of traditions, what we official are supposed to want is a teacher with the dharma transmission, someone who is an accomplished yogi and enlightened, and so on. Nothing stopping from those people from answering, but there is nothing in an SE system to put those sort of teachers answers on top.
I can't count the number of times I've read a Buddhist book that admonished me about picking a good guru and being wary of all those other teacher or trying to rely on one's own wits.
Anyhow, for me that is fine, and if people do want to find out more about whose answering, they can always follow the profile links.

Ultimately, each one of us is responsible for our own liberation/enlightenment. The ultimate guru/teacher is the inner guru, as the ultimate teaching is that while we are all unique, we are all "arisen from the same substance" (like waves of a ocean or glasses of water from a river). (Is there a reward for most uses of the word "ultimate" in an answer?) To get to the point of being able to identify and trust one's inner guru is very difficult.
A place to ask questions freely of some sort of realized teacher is very hard to find online. (If not impossible.) The number of truly liberated teachers, or any sort of "qualified" teachers, online who will or even can answer such questions is very small or so small as to be unfindable. (Outside of online classes, like the FPMT, Kagyu Samye Ling, etc.) I find myself thinking, "Well, if no one else will or can do it, perhaps I must, even though I am hilariously unqualified." I think some or many of you have the same thought. So, (to stretch the life preserver analogy to great silliness) perhaps as we flounder and dog-paddle in this ocean of Life but feel we know the way (thata way!), we can offer Dharma Life Preservers to others, a little hope, and point to a goal on the horizon which very much narrows down the search for our fellow seekers. (I think I have stretched that analogy as far as it should go.) Cheers!


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Edit existing answer, or offer alternative?
This question, about the three characteristics, seems pretty succinct and should be easy to answer. In fact someone has already given an answer that is, one level, perfectly fine. However, they've also offered translations that are not, in my opinion, at all correct.
My preferred approach would be to simply go in and offer better translations. That keeps the focus on one answer(1), lets it get voted up, and in general should make the whole thing more useful for subsequent readers. But it risks trampling on another user (the first person who answered).
Any guidance?
(1) Presumably the ideal SE Q&A is a single succinct, well-targeted question, with a single, succinct, and universally accepted answer. ("Q: What is 1+1?", "A: 2"). That's hard to get, but I assume we should try to approach it when possible, no?

No, I think we're trying for multiple competing answers... Area51 says:

2.5 answers per question is good, only 1 answer per question needs some work. On a healthy site, questions receive multiple answers and the best answer is voted to the top.

Changing an existing answer risks offending the answerer and causing comment storms, I would think.
BTW, I think the best answer in this case should probably be a lot longer than the one given.

Ah, OK. Cool. Actually in this case I'm not going to answer, because I know there are several of us (e.g. you) who know that stuff a lot better than I do. But it was a good example to ask my base point about.

People should feel free to edit answers if the answer needs editing (and the OP is nowhere to be found) due to factual incorrectness or updated information. But to add a new answer to the question (a new perspective, a competing viewpoint), a new answer should be written.

Personally, other then minor edits such as spelling or fixing links, if I come across an answer the I can significantly improve on I edit it.
I only add a new answer if there is some new or different information to add.


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Bad-fit questions: answer, ignore, vote down?
@yuttadhammo comments that this question is not a good fit for SE. I can't disagree with that and so on the one hand, one approach is simply to decline to answer, so as not to inadvertently endorse the question as being a good fit. And of course there's always the more substantial responses of voting down or even voting to close.
However, on the other hand, my tendency is always to try to help out as much as I can (see my very limited answer to the above).
Is there a generally accepted best SE practice in these situations? Is answering a bad-fit-question considered unhelpful for SE?

This comes up on stackoverflow a lot. It really depends on the personalities of the people involved. There is a good argument that responding to bad questions encourages more of that behavior, on the other hand, if a stranger came to an office and asked the right question and was reasonably polite, I'd try to answer, regardless to if it was a good question or not.
The goals of the website (a very specific sort of Q & A answers that are high quality and eventually attract high volumes of traffic) are in conflict with the answering crowd, so sometimes just want warm fuzzies for helping someone with a question. (And people with low quality questions have an even greater gap between SE's goals and their own goals, the question asker really just wants an answer, they aren't too worried if the question and answer will get a lot of google hits and page views in the future)
So I sometimes will vote down, vote to close, comment to suggest a fix and then answer it anyhow, if I can.

I answered it too. Erm I guess I felt I had something to add but reading the answer back I don't think it was one of my best but worth keeping on I thought. TBH I was going to improve it but yuttadhammo comments (which i agree with) put me off
But generally I think we should do our best with questions, particularly ones from new users. I would much rather see questions be nudged along to better ones than shut down. Answering them would be part of that nudge i think. I think that asking questions is HARD and maybe those of us who know a bit can perhaps forget this. Philosophy SE does well at this I think. Asking philosophy questions is REALLY HARD and the people there have been really considerate when I tried and I felt encouraged to ask more.
Two of my better (best??) answers have been to questions that were in danger of being closed down - here and here. I think those questions have become decent now because of the answers. Particularly the Western Sutra one actually is decent and meaningful to me but I can appreciate to others it seems like very poor quality.
Bit of a ramble - sorry

This is an important question for figuring out our strategy as to this site. After thinking this over for the last three days, I'm inclining to say, such answers should NOT be answered. In a 1:1 teaching setting, it may be appropriate to answer all questions, including those types that are traditionally answered with a stick. But because, on this site, an answer stays long after OP is gone, the emphasis should be on quality content and not on addressing the OP's (mistaken) mindset.

"...an answer stays long after OP is gone..." This isn't necessarily so. You as a moderator can choose to delete a closed question with all of its answers. Also users with over 2000 reputation can vote to delete a closed question (5 votes will delete it). So IMHO there is little harm in answering a bad question before it is closed.


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Judging a question by its "cover"
At first sight, this question is sufficiently different from this later question to not be a duplicate. The first asks about the meaning of "anatta", the second asks about the best English translation. However, when you look at the main texts of the questions, they're pretty much identical, and both are asking about meaning. As a result, there's been a bit of back and forth in the comments about whether it should be closed. Based only on the titles I considered them clearly different, but then looking at the content I changed my mind. As a result I cast a close-as-duplicate vote. My assumption is that the OP will either change the text to match the title, in which case I'd remove my close vote (assuming I can do that -- at very least I'd discourage others from closing), or they'll let the content stand and change the title to match it, in which case I think it's clearly a duplicate.
Or they may just leave it as is, with title mismatching the content. Any thoughts on assessing a question when its title doesn't match its main text content? Overall, I think that's problematic, in terms of keeping the quality of Q's and A's high, and should be fixed.

If a question title doesn't match the question content and the OP doesn't respond to comments asking for clarification, then I think it is ok to edit and improve the question title yourself.
However, before you do this I think you should look at the answers that are already given. In my experience most people base their answer on the question text and not on the title, but sometimes people will add an answer that only deals with the question title. If that's the case it may be better to try and change the question title so that it covers both the original title and the question text (if they don't differ too much).

In this case the only answer given (by @Andrei) answers the title, not the content, and as a result is fine. The only problem here is Suminda's question content is a duplicate of (my) earlier question. If he fixed that to match his actual question, it would be fine. I don't want to make a mountain out of a molehill though. Andrei's answer is a good one, so it's all good.

The above question aims to reconcile the different translations/ interpretations rather than what it is or what it means and choose the best.
This will differ from the definition of the concept.
Also some concepts different definition based on linage, so answers will not adequately cover all the variation. Many will provide what they are familiar with which is also acceptable in the definition context. In my question evaluate alternatives and choose the best translation.
The bar is higher in this context.

Suminda, that's the whole point of this meta question. You are correct that the title of your question asked about translation, but the content does not. For example, in your content you offer a 28-word phrase as a possibility. Clearly the single word "anatta" isn't going to be rendered as 28 English words. Your title makes it seem as if you're asking about a translation, but then you instead effectively ask about the meaning of the concept.

This trys to rectify a common miss translation.


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Should we encourage people to fill in their profiles?
Just moving on from the sectarian affiliation question - should we encourage users to fill in their profiles with a few details about their own affiliation and practice. It may help new users understand where an answer is coming from if they can click through to a user a see this kind of information. Obviously it would be entirely up to the individual if they wanted to do it but we could maybe think of ways to give them a gentle nudge into filling in the profile with this kind of information.
I have to say my own profile is very unhelpful. It's a poem taught to Japanese school children as a way of memorising their alphabet (or the equivalent). I do like the poem though.

Some Pros & Cons here in the comment thread:
Encouraging users to add a bit to their own profiles to identify the perspective from which they answer might be helpful as a way of addressing the issue being asked about in Overt Sectarian Affiliations.
I think asking people to tell us about their perspective might be more accurate than just throwing a label on an answer in the form of a comment or edit from another user; as this answer shows the nuances of perspective.
It's just something to consider as the site grows and more participants become active. I'm sure we all want our site to be helpful to newcomers to the site and newcomers to Buddhism. We do have different teachings within Buddhism and we do pretty well presenting the different views without animosity. But it's a valid point that while long time users will recognize User X as being from Tradition Y as per information they've given in prior answers, new users won't know that. And we want to be user friendly I think. :)
So just a suggestion as an option.

You are right - people do have complex viewpoints that aren't easily pigeonholed. Thiago has just filled in his profile and it's very informative. A good model perhaps

Should we encourage people to fill in their profiles?

Yes however no.

Yes, you might (or should) want to know about the teacher in order to understand the teaching.
On the other hand I for example have tried to answer some newcomer questions (hoping that helps the newcomer, and makes it easier for the experts on the site to answer remaining expert-level questions) ... but I am not a teacher, and I cannot be counted on to represent a specific sect.
Still apparently people do read the user profile, if you want to put something you find interesting there: e.g. Jayarava's profile has been viewed 103 times in its first 11 days.
No, because what matters is whether an answer helps you to "know for yourself".
I also vote "no" because I don't very much like greeting people with a canned response. I don't know what you mean by "encouraging" but a boilerplate response to newcomers like ...

Welcome to the site. We've put together this introduction to get you started, and for these reasons we encourage you fill in your profile with a few details about your own affiliation and practice.

... isn't a hearty welcome, it's (just) another (pointless) rule, another hoop to jump through, a way to pigeon-hole people.
And, in the subset of Q&A topics where you think it's worth saying, there are other ways (other than the user profile) to convey that information (e.g. state in your own answer to the topic, that one answer represents a sectarian view and that your own answer represents a different sect's).

In summary it's not a bad idea in theory or ideally, perhaps it's a counsel of perfection (wouldn't it be nice if all the answers, or per this suggestion all the users, were neatly catalogued), but I fear it's more trouble (more alienating to current and future users) than it's worth.

we could maybe think of ways to give them a gentle nudge into filling in the profile with this kind of information

For example you could insert or append that nudge to the new user welcome page.

P.S. forgive me but I too like the poem in your profile.

I like your boiler plate; with a couple of tweaks. "Welcome to the site. We've put together this introduction to help you get started. Please consider adding a bit about your Buddhist perspective on your Profile Page. This is optional, but helpful, to introduce yourself to the community."  Just a thought. :)

That's more gently worded, yes.

I think the new user page is good - but it's also established users that would be good to encourage. I'm very conscious though that not everyone has a straightforward viewpoint - i.e. I belong to sangha XXXX. We are after all a site about Buddhism not for Buddhists so I expect that many people will not identify with any formal Buddhist tradition at all.


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Where has this bounty come from?
I'm just curious. This question has got a generous bounty from Community. I've never seen this before. How does the Community user grant bounties? I thought only 'real' users could do this. What's the story here?. It's also sending us nice messages.

Before I leave, I give this bounty to you. May it bring you peace and
  happiness.

It was bountied by a real user who subsequently deleted their account. Note that this means the bounty can only be automatically awarded: when it expires, if any answer is above +2, the highest-voted answer will receive the bounty.

That was generous of that person. Thank you to them


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Should/could we have four moderators?
Following on from Robin111's answer
Is there a case to have 4 (or more) moderators on this site?
The case for

Most people are Buddhists and could and do take extended leave from the site for retreats and other observances. Yuttadhammo is currently our most active moderator and he when to Asia for a couple of months
There is a precedence. I notice Hinduism SE has 4 moderators
People have been the subject of quite personal attacks on the site. I think emotions can run quite high. Whether it is surprising (aren't we or meant to be 'nice' Buddhists') or not - it does happen. We need a full moderator team to deal with these

I might be trying to talk myself in a job - I have to be honest - i would stand for a moderator post. But really my motivation is that this site becomes a welcoming and safe place for people to ask about issues that are important to them.

Abby asked the current moderators about this and both Andrei and I felt that three was enough. It's better to have an odd number for tie breaking, and I don't think that moderation is that difficult that it requires four people.
Of course, our track record for attendance does show a potential problem keeping three moderators moderating... Hopefully our new group will buck that trend?
Also, more moderators means more cooks... I can't see four or five moderators being less problematic than three; I'd imagine more arguments and complaints, rather than less.

fair point - particularly about the tie breaking which I didn't consider. Hopefully the new group will be an active bunch.

I think 4+ moderators will work especially if they are chosen to balance out the lineages / schools also. 5 or 6 may work even better.

I think there are two roles, i.e. users and moderators. Now users add to the site, they contribute positively: users add questions, add answers, and add comments. Whereas moderators remove from the site: close questions, delete answers, delete comments. I understand why the site wants a good balance of users (i.e. of contributors): it's so that several users can contribute/add answers for many lineages. But then the moderators (as opposed to users) shouldn't have to do very much, they just delete things sometimes; so maybe a site doesn't need too many of them, and ...

... maybe it doesn't matter what lineage they are or aren't. There just needs to be enough of them that they're available within some reasonable delay, if a user has a problem (e.g. raises a flag). And they mustn't do  (nor delete) too much.

In addition to simply providing regular moderator coverage (even when one mod needs to drop offline for a time) and lessening the chances of moderator burnout, having a larger mod team could have the advantage of allowing an amount of specialization. For example, those with greater knowledge and expertise might spend more time reviewing answers to ensure quality content. Others might focus on reviewing comment threads and taking charge when things are getting unwieldy. Others might concentrate on handling the routine items in the Review queue or editing weak questions to be better questions, since we seem to fall short on having enough good questions.
Granted, regular users can and should be doing many of those things as well. But they are likely to be done less evenly by regular users who come and go and come and go. In a newer site that's trying to make it out of beta, why not create a large, strong group of moderators to support each other in all that needs to be done to make the site meet all expectations?

All of the activities you're describing should be undertaken by mostly regular users, and not moderators. Moderators are here to handle exceptions when for some reason an issue cannot be handled by the community. The whole Q&A engine is designed to let everyone in the community be responsible for the upkeep of the site to whatever degree they like. Expecting the moderators to take the lion's share isn't efficient (or fair).

@abbyhairboat, I understand and agree that regular users should be responsible for routine maintenance. I didn't mean to imply that all routine maintenance should shift to moderators. I was trying to argue that having a larger moderator team than we currently have could allow each moderator greater flexibility to participate in the site as they best enjoyed. My assumption being that without sufficient moderator coverage; an active mod might not get a chance to do what they actually want to do as they'd be trying to cover what they "had" to do. Thanks for giving me a chance to clarify. :)

Uugh...I just reread my answer and it really did sound like I was saying everything should fall to the moderators. Bad argument on my part. I should have just said "More moderators would provide better coverage, better support for one another when things get sticky, and allow each more time to participate in the site as they best enjoyed." :)

I said I'm willing to be a moderator, because I want the site to have (and benefit from having) moderators; and because I'm glad other people volunteer so it's fair to help them if I can.
If someone answers What's difficult about moderating this site? that might help explain what the job requires.
I don't know (because I've never been a moderator) but having four sounds harmless, doesn't it: what disadvantage? If two of those are away often that leaves only two, and if one of those two is away ever then that leaves just one, which is only just enough. If there are usually at least two then so much the better, presumably. And handling exceptions (e.g. disputes) is better with two, if "two heads are better than one". Or three might be enough, if only one (not two) were away often?
I see why I'm suggested, i.e. I have experience as a user of other SE sites; and I have been active as a user here, on meta and the main Buddhism.SE site.
A disadvantage of me as a moderator is, being inexpert, I am not good/confident with handling poor-quality questions/content: see Whether and how to moderate low-quality questions? Someone else more expert than me might be better at seeing the good within a poorly-phrased question, and/or more confident about closing questions.

See my comments below on "specialization". =)

So far as I can tell, the consensus is that most questions don't need to 'moderated'.


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Why is the 'thought experiment' question so divisive
I'm at a bit of a loss of what to do with this question - A thought-experiment about the importance of Buddhist traditions
It has received as many downvotes as upvotes, it is attracting multiple moderator flags (i don't think that's confidential that it has been flagged) but it is answered and answered well. I don't really understand why it is so unpopular but it is. I don't think it can be voted to close (by non-moderators) because it has an open bounty (i could be wrong).
Should it be closed down - is it really terrible? Why is it so bad? I can't in all conscience close it if I don't think it's bad so I just need someone to help me understand why it should be closed.
Thanks

Many thanks for the responses. I have left it open and I think that is the right decision. If it gets 5 close votes then it will close anyway or it will gradually drift out of view. I think that is the general consensus but obviously there is a range of opinions here.

To me, the first part of the question, a request to forecast entire society's(!) reaction to hypothetical (and controversial) situation is an invitation to engage in wrong speech and should be deleted.
The second part, "are Buddhist cultural habits and traditional ways of dress, behavior, speech etc. important for making spiritual progress?" looks totally fine to me and can be answered for the benefit of the OP.

In the case of words that the Tathagata knows to be unfactual, untrue, unbeneficial (or: not connected with the goal), unendearing & disagreeable to others, he does not say them.

Any answer to it would be founded completely in conjecture. Any conceivable situation given the pretenses in the question would yield different results dependent upon the infinite amount of varying circumstances that could arise.
In this way, at best, any answer would be the opinion of the person giving it, because the question is tantamount to asking for a prediction of something that has yet to happen.
The question ITSELF asks "What's your opinion?"
On this basis alone I do not understand why the moderators haven't closed it.

I didn't close it, for example because a question like this (as well as many others) also seems a bit "opinion-based" to me ... but that's a "practice" question which we welcome. So I can't just say to myself, "all 'opinion-based' questions must be deleted". I don't yet have a clear way to tell the difference between welcome and unwelcome..I didn't like the question partly because it seemed so hypothetical (i.e. useless). Maybe there's a purposeful intent behind the question but if so that question seems to be asking in an indirect way.

I was ditto (at a loss of what to do with this question), i.e. it seems to me too that it's not exactly in breach of any of the defined/specific moderation policy for questions, so I'm not sure I ought to close it.
It wasn't a question which I very much want to read an answer to, so I didn't upvote the question, but my "not upvoting" isn't the same as "wanting to close" it.
Jayarava suspects that it may be an ad hominem reaction, i.e. that people are targeting this question because it's from Krishnaraj:

My other comment is that it seems like @Krishnaraj is being targeted unfairly. I think he asks interesting questions, if not always in an elegant way.

I think that's not the whole truth but I think there's some truth to that. Krishnaraj has asked 9 questions in the last 2 days.

The first three questions implied some 'secular' or 'skeptical' view, controversial or irreverent.
The next five questions were all closed

If we assume that the five closed questions were all "too bad" in one way or another, it may be that the few unclosed questions (like the one you're asking about) are "not quite bad enough" yet still the community wants to stop that stream of (unusual and/or naive) questions from the user.
Robin suggested that  the community actually have a right to do this, and I can't disagree with that.
Experienced moderators advise not to become too entirely rule-bound: if you draw "a line in the sand", some people may walk right up to that line too often, so it's useful to have left yourself some leeway.
My personal opinion about that question is that it's not too bad and that closing it could be more trouble (cause more fuss) than leaving it open. If you simply leave it alone it will drop off the front page and into history. To me it looks tidy at the moment, none of the answers are bad, so no problem. If the "proof is in the pudding" (i.e. a question is good or bad to the extent that it gets good or bad answers), the answers are all OK therefore it's not too bad a question (and "well done" to the people who were able to answer it).
As for Krishnaraj here was his latest question. Matthew explained what was wrong with it (i.e. that as asked it didn't fit our site for a couple of reasons), there's a revised version of that question open now.

Just wanted to clarify, in my suggestion yesterday to close more questions, the "close" is of course really a "hold" that gives everyone involved a chance to cool down and reasonably consider a question and what may be needed to make it a good fit when possible. I do think there's been a backlash against a particular user. We get plenty of vague questions and they barely get a single down vote so this recent down voting stands out. Hopefully we can all move forward respectful of one another. :)


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Should we be making the titles of questions clearer?
I've noticed there are quite a few questions that the question title is a statement or just a few words rather than an actual question. Recent examples are
Buddhism and Darwin
Specific sutta in the Tipitaka
Equanimity, aversion and anatta
To my mind the title of a question should indicate what the content of the question is. Often I'm seeing great questions hiding under a vague title and I suspect search engines and people generally just won't ever find the content.
For instance with this question I've just changed the title from

Theravada Buddhism and Animal Liberation

to

Does Theravada Buddhism encourages animal liberation?

People can always roll back changes they don't like. Does that sound reasonable? I'm happy not to do it if it's treading on toes
Thanks

@Lanka IMHO they're a lot clearer now. Thank you for that

The title is the HTML heading (<h1>).
Maybe the contents of the heading is significant for search engine optimization, i.e. a well-written and on-topic heading will help search engines to index the site, and help search engine users to find the topics they may be looking for.
I think it's more important that the title contain relevant key/search words (e.g. "meat" or "vegetarian", to take yuttadhammo's example) than anything else, more important for example than phrasing it as a question with a question mark ... though phrasing it as a question usually also helps, to clarify what the actual question is.
In the example that you have in the OP, changing "Theravada Buddhism and Animal Liberation" to "Does Theravada Buddhism encourages animal liberation?": because it contains the same nouns I don't (although I might be wrong) expect that change will do much if anything to help search engines.
The one good thing about that change is that it introduced a specific verb ("encourages"). Sentences are often clarified by a verb.

Yes, absolutely... I'm not sure they need to actually be formed as questions, but a title should be specific enough to indicate what is being asked. A recent one, "Theravada Monks and daily meals", for example, was actually about whether monks can eat meat. That should definitely be somewhere in the title.


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Suggestions for resources section
Leading on from this question we are starting to put together a resources section under the help section. The idea is that we can collect some generally useful resources in this section and redirect new (and old) users to them to assist in asking and answering questions. Unfortunately the help section is only editable by moderators - so I'm asking what resources people would like under this section.

I've made a start by adding a few links with the help of Lanka. Let me know if the links are OK or not or you want a change in wording. Also, if you think this is an terrible idea or would like to do it differently then please let me know.

http://www.tipitaka.net/tipitaka/dhp/ has the story as well as each verse.
http://www.buddha-vacana.org/ has Pali next to English for several suttas; combine that with a http://dsal.uchicago.edu/dictionaries/pali/ (because often a sutta depends on the meaning of a word).
Several web sites (each with many books) were mentioned in the Dharma Books chat room.
Wikipedia describes four noble truths, noble eightfold path, four stages of enlightenment, five precepts, etc.
There are several introductory books that people have recommended e.g. In the Buddha's Words, etc.
Many of the questions on the main site may be helpful for beginners (e.g. this one).
Maybe http://www.realbuddhaquotes.com/ instead of http://fakebuddhaquotes.com/
Some questions (especially FAQs) are answered by Yuttadhammo's videos.

For Venerable Yuttadhammo's videos, his Q & A Video Wiki is a bit easier to navigate as all questions are categorized.

Thanks for that. I've added your links. Let me know if I've missed anything.

Following may be a good addition also.
Meditation centres:

International Meditation Centre in the tradition of Sayagyi U Ba Khin
Meditation Centres in Achan Cha Tradition
Pa Auk Monasteries

Books:

Forest Dhamma Books - Books in the tradition of Ajahn Mun
Abhidhamma - the third division of the Pāḷi canon or Tipiṭaka (three baskets)
Dhamma Talks - transcriptions of talks by many authors and speakers
Dhamma Talks of Thanissaro Bhikkhu - from the Kammatthana (or Thai Forest) Tradition of Buddhism.

Free Books by Pariyatti

Corporate Body of the Buddha Educational Foundation
Inward Path Publications
WAVE Publication - hockchai2009@yahoo.com
Selangor Buddhist Vipassana Meditation Society (SBVMS) - sbvms@yahoo.com

Tripitaka Translations:

The Dharmafarers - in-depth analysis of suttas.
Abhidhamma - the third division of the Pāḷi canon or Tipiṭaka (three baskets)

Maybe we shouldn't have (should remove) all Meditation and Retreat Centres (including the 3 which are currently on http://buddhism.stackexchange.com/help)? Because there are so many of them and if we start we wouldn't know where to stop? Or we should only include any directories (lists) of centres rather than individual centres? E.g. http://www.buddhanet.info/wbd/ has 7,500 entries, world-wide.

Maybe we can include ones with a multiple branches and wide outreach.

http://www.buddhanet.info/wbd/ seems like a useful resource.
You could describe it as, "World Buddhist Directory - may be helpful when you're looking for local communities."


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Is there a better term than Hinayana that we should be using?
I asked this question on the main site a few days ago. I'm concerned that Hinayana isn't the right term to be using with it's negative overtones. THelper has been kind enough to provide some alternatives.
So my question is - should we be using the term Hinayana on the site? If not could we/should we agree on an acceptable and accurate alternative that we will use? Also would we edit and correct Hinayana when we see it used on the site?

Of the traditions that were labeled Hinayana, do traditions other than Theravada exist today?

Just thinking it might make sense to use a term such as Early Buddhism for historical questions and Theravada for present day practice questions; unless there are other traditions outside of Theravada still in existence today.

@Robin111 really good point. Not sure so I have asked the question on the main site http://buddhism.stackexchange.com/q/2336/157

The answers to the above question and also http://buddhism.stackexchange.com/questions/1260/please-explain-when-and-where-to-use-the-terms-theravada-and-hinayana are very helpful to understanding correct usage of Hinayana. I like catpnosis' suggestion of replacing it when it's used incorrectly. Maybe with a short comment to explain why it's been changed?

if you look at the answers, there are quite distinctive differences: 1) it represents the ones seeing mahayana as not-real Buddhism 2) it represents a clinging to literal interpretation and is the first step in the hina-maha-Vijayanagar hierarchy 3) it's a derogatory term to Theravada. Will we use the one with the highest votes (1) as way  the "canon" definition?

It is completely mistaken to call Hinayana "Early Buddhism". That would imply that the Mahāsāṃghikas were not "early"? The roots of Mahayana Buddhism are as early as the roots of Theravada Buddhism.

Term hinayana is from sutras. So, from mahayanistic point of view it's word of Buddha. Who we are to disregard it?
But term hinayana have it's context. It is not as widely applicable as it's used contemporary, which is unfortunate.
So, probably, what is truly called hinayana in appropriate sutras and sastras—we should leave that use as correct. But if used as blind synonym for 'early schools' or 'Theravada'—in that case why not replace.

Good answer. The idea that we have to censor or redact Mahayana sutras because they are perceived as somehow "politically incorrect" by modern standards is a bit silly. "Hinayana" simply means small vehicle, and this isn't derogatory, at all. Since it's a much more demanding path to say, Pure Land, and requires amazing discipline, concentration, and training, with its goal of arahantship it's quite logical to call it "smaller"; not smaller in worth but smaller in scope because it embraces less people. The Mahayana way is more universal and embraces even spiritual idiots like me.

As I was just explaining in a comment to one of my answers, the term "Hinayana" is widely used by Tibetan Buddhism teachers to refer to basic/elementary/foundational (and because of this often simplified) aspects of Buddha-Dharma. If you'd go to their lectures, you'd hear this notion of Hinayana-understanding vs. Mahayana-understanding discussed in almost every other lecture. Amongst tens of books written by the teacher I consider my Root Guru, Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche, a recently published 3-volume set has its first book, of 680 pages, dedicated to Hinayana, with this word used on almost every page.
Again, to emphasize, "Hinayana" is not used to refer to Theravada at all. Rather, it is used in two senses: one, to refer to a primitive interpretation of Buddha-Dharma (by a member of any school, and of any standing, but usually a beginner, or a "senior junior") and two, to refer to the first phase of Buddhist upbringing, during which the student is introduced to the most basic discipline and doctrines, that serve as the foundation for subsequent education & practice.
Imagine two teachers discussing their students with each other: "I have 3 Hinayana-level students, 2 Mahayana-level, and 1 Mahamudra" or "This guy is stuck at Hinayana level. Perhaps I should try Kriyayogatantra."
Whoever thinks the term is derogatory misses the point. The term is indeed used to refer to "primitive" or "elementary" level of Dharma. But we don't consider "elementary education" a derogatory term, do we? Or perhaps, in countries where Parliament comes in two houses, we don't consider The Lower House of Parliament a derogatory term? And when the rental cars come in three classes: economy, business and luxury -- we do not insist that the use of the term "economy" should be discouraged because it hurts the feelings of lower-income people etc.
The term "Hinayana" is an important term, used by thousands of gurus over thousands of years to teach their students a very important point: that Dharma, like any other non-trivial area of human activity goes far beyond simple logic, and requires depth, sensitivity, ability to compromise, to go beyond black-and-white view of the world, to juggle multiple contradicting needs, to understand different perspectives, and in general to not get stuck at the level of mechanical application of formulaic if-then-else rules.

This is a good explanation of how the term Hinayana is understood in Tibetan Buddhism. I think our concern is when people with little understanding simply use it incorrectly because they believe it is synonymous with early Buddhism or Theravada. Does it make sense to edit incorrect use of the term and maybe leave a comment with a link back to this explanation?


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What language should we favour in the text of a question e.g. Kamma or Karma or both
Do we have a preference whether to use kamma or karma in the text of a question or answer? For instance this answer uses kamma and I haven't changed it during an edit. Should I edit it to karma which most 'just curious' users would be most familiar with?
More generally are we favouring certain languages (e.g. Sanskrit over Pali) in the text of a question/answer. Is this dependent on context perhaps. For instance Sutta might be more appropriate for Pali Canon related answers whereas Sutra might be appropriate for Mahayana answers.

This earlier question on meta brings up some points regarding this same question as it applies to tags http://meta.buddhism.stackexchange.com/questions/2/what-language-should-our-tags-be-in

Yes, the question Robin111 linked is the one to discuss this at. I am closing this question as a dupe.

@AndreiVolkov I disagree with this question being a duplicate. There is a big difference between using kamma/karma as tags, or using those words in a question or answer. For tags I agree with the already proposed solution, but there you can use synonyms to automatically correct those words. This is not possible in questions/answers. For questions/answers I think we should allow both words and discourage any edit attempts to change kamma in karma (or the other way around).

@THelper fair, can you edit this question then, from karma/kamma to language in general? And post your comment as an answer?

@AndreiVolkov I've edited the text. Does that improve it?

@CrabBucket yes

I'm in favor of Sanskrit as the more regular/formal of the two. Pali for me is like a vernacular version of Sanskrit, slightly mumbled and simplified.

I think both should be OK as we know what it refers to.

But what if someone only knows the Sanskrit version of a word and starts editing posts and changing Pali words into Sanskrit (or the other way around)?

But person can use either is matter of personal preference. Not need to edit just to change the minor issues like this.

All tags should have a Pali alias. Do you know how to do this?

This question isn't about tags but about Pali and Sanskrit words in questions and answers. There are no aliases for that.


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Is the term Western Buddhist satisfactory?
I've used Western Buddhist in a recent question but I'm not sure if it is a good term. I'm taking it to mean Buddhist practioners of school based in a Western country. To be honest I'm not convinced about the notion of the West generally. It probably lacks precision and when I did a few sessions on development economics a while back people objected to the term.
Is it a good term? Is my usage correct? Is there another better term?

I think it's as reasonable as the use of "Western" in any other context; Western philosophy, Western food, etc. Maybe even more so, since Buddhist originated in the "East", so any Buddhism that has grown up or become established in the West, outside of an Eastern cultural context, is by definition Western Buddhism.

I consider myself a Western Buddhist since I'm Canadian and was raised totally secularly. Being a lay practitioner and without a real Buddhist community, I try to define my practice in a reasonable way that works for me.

As a Western Zen Buddhist in Florida I have never had an issue with the term "Western". However I do hear the term "Modern Buddhist" more often than "Western Buddhist" and I seem to relate these to practically the same thing. But perhaps that is because I am both a Western and Modern Buddhist.

I've never heard the term Modern Buddhist. That's very interesting thank you

To me as a karateka it mirrors when we discuss "Modern Karate" in relation to "Ancient Karate".

Modern Buddhism doesn't have to be Western.


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Should we edit answers to make it clear which Buddhist school/perspective the answer comes from?
Recently I've been (rightly) picked up on answering a question from a particualrly perspective and not flagging this up in the answer (here and here)
I think in both cases I would have been very happy for someone to edit the answer and put at the bottom

Note this answer is from the Theravada tradition

Or words to this effect
Does this seem like an acceptable edit to people? For lower rep users it would always be QAed and in every case the original poster can always rollback (which should be the final word i think). We could agree on a standard format for these edits maybe?
Just on a personal note - it's not always forefront in my mind what perspective I am answering questions from because the sangha I practice with is eclectic. Therefore I would be grateful for these kind of edits - it would serve as a reminder to me and help improve the quality of my answers.

I'm very much in favor of including the particular viewpoint (school/tradition) from which an answer is given as much as possible and where relevant. IMHO any good answer should include this information.
However I'm very much wondering if, in most cases, it is possible for someone else to correctly identify from which particular viewpoint an answer is given. There are so many different kinds of Buddhist traditions, it's probably easy to make false assumptions. Other people may erroneously add that an answer is based on one popular tradition while in fact it is from a smaller, more obscure tradition. That's why I'd like to see the original author add it him/herself. If he/she doesn't include it and it is important for that question/answer, we can always ask to include it using comments.

Yes.
If we imagine the alternative, then answerers will have to post a survey of a dozen of traditions on each topic.
On the otherhand, people will have to realize that if one person asks-- What happens after we die? (tagged sgi, nichiren) is not a duplicate of "What happens after we die? (tagged vajrayana) and isn't a duplicated of "What happens after we die? (tagged pure-land), which as far as I know have very different answers.

We should remember that most of the site traffic should come from search engines and such users might not be familiar with the tagging system (or might have no idea what 'pure land' is). They would just look at the question/title and read one or a few top answers. Thus I believe that relying solely on tags would not solve the problem at all.

Your answer is that questions should be tagged so that answers are from that one perspective. The meta-question was asking, when questions aren't tagged then should answers be 'tagged'.

Good point. I guess this topic would have been better for the general SE meta site since that is a feature that doesn't exist yet.

Even within a particular tradition there are variations of interpretations among teachers and lineages. So if this is important as answer is from a particular viewpoint then it should be mentioned at the discretion of the poster.


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Tag synonyms outstanding
I notice we have 3 tag synonyms that are pending approval/voting/closing down.
https://buddhism.stackexchange.com/tags/synonyms
It would be good if someone could approve or disapprove. A minor point really I guess.
Thanks

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For example, there's currently a suggestion that buddhist-text should be a synonym of texts.
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You can see, there, your opportunity to upvote or downvote that suggested synonym.

Why do you think that [tag:personal-practice] is a good tag to have? http://blog.stackoverflow.com/2010/08/the-death-of-meta-tags/ and http://meta.buddhism.stackexchange.com/a/416/254 suggest maybe it isn't useful.

@ChrisW fair point. I've opened up another question on the personal-practice tag http://meta.buddhism.stackexchange.com/q/1419/157 for further discussion if needed

Thank you, I think the chat room might be a better for 'discussion'.


text:
Should this 'zen type' answer be deleted?
I deleted this answer to the question

Is it wrong to buy a Buddha statue in Thailand from a Buddhist point
  of view?

The answer is brief enough to quote

Yes it's wrong. Throw away your statues and burn your dharma books.

To me it just looked unhelpful and so I deleted it. Robin pointed out that it's probably got merit as a zen type answer. We've discussed this before but I think it's worth revisiting in the light of welcoming all traditions. Should we accept these kind of more cryptic zen style answers and specifically should this answer remain on the site? I've undeleted for now to be as fair as possible.

TL;DR
Current consensus is to delete short answers.
My personal vote would be to allow some (not all) short answers, only if they are good answers.

The moderators should do what the community decides
Moderators shouldn't delete answers which their community would want them to keep. I assume we can take it for granted that no-one wants spam, nor anything unintelligible nor utterly off-topic, but apart from that we should look for some community consensus (which is why you opened this meta-topic).
For example see how its author worded this comment:

That notice is pretty much designed for Skeptics, which does have such a policy because of the inherent nature of that site. Skeptics specifically want citations for claims, and their community allows their mods to delete uncited answers.

That says "their community allows their mods" because that community discussed and voted on that policy on their meta site (for example, here and here and here and not to mention all of these).

Maybe moderators should wait until a user flags an answer
FWIW in the past if I disliked an answer, I decided to delay deleting it (i.e. not delete it now) and instead wait to see whether someone else flags it. Because if someone else flags then at least I know there are two people (i.e. me and someone else) who dislike it.
The answer you're talking about was flagged, but it was flagged by the 'Community' bot for being short, not flagged by a real user who could read it.

Just because it's short doesn't mean it's good
We should try to reserve the right to delete some short answers: not every short reply is in any way a useful answer.

Current or previous community consensus
This topic has been discussed before: Should we allow/encourage short answers?
It seems to me that:

Several people answered that we should allow them
Two people (Hrafn and you) answered that we shouldn't, and those answers got by far the most votes

So I think that the current or previous consensus was that short (mysterious) answers are never allowed.

Just because it's short doesn't mean it's bad
yuttadhammo posted links to where this has been discussed on many other sites, and wrote

I've taken a look around SE, and it seems the consensus is actually to allow very short questions, as long as they do actually answer the question. Here's some of the reasoning.

Just because it's short doesn't mean it's mysterious
I might agree that a mysterious answer isn't helpful.
But this answer wasn't very mysterious, it was on-topic, it was about the same length as the question, maybe just long enough to express their considered opinion without starting to write a thesis on what else you could to be doing instead of buying a statue (which would be an answer to a different question).

What about voting?
Theoretically, instead of deleting an answer, people can downvote bad answers.
If the users on this site would upvote (good answers) more and downvote (bad answers) more, that would help in many ways.
This help topic suggests that answers can be deleted if they have a score of -1

Moderators can delete any answer, and trusted community members can vote to delete answers scoring -1 or lower (3 votes will result in deletion).

On a mature site people would vote; on a beta site there may not be enough people actively voting yet, and for that reason moderators intervene with their unilateral/binding actions.

Why are answers ever deleted?
This same help topic says,

Answers that do not fundamentally answer the question may be
  removed. This includes answers that are:

commentary on the question or other answers
asking another, different question
“thanks!” or “me too!” responses
exact duplicates of other answers
barely more than a link to an external site
not even a partial answer to the actual question

Note that "too short" is NOT one of the reasons listed above.

What about posting a comment?
I think we should use comments, to ask for any specific clarification or to suggest some specific improvements. If you don't delete an answer then someone can post a comment, and/or upvote or downvote.
A comment that just says "this answer is too short" isn't necessarily constructive (everyone can already see it's short, what's less obvious is what if anything ought to be added to make it longer).

What about turning the answer into a comment?
One of the moderator tools lets you convert an answer to a comment. If it's short then physically it's not too long to be comment. If it doesn't answer the question (if it's "advice instead of an answer") then maybe it shouldn't be posted as an answer (regardless of its length) but could perhaps be posted as a comment under the question.

I'm going to propose the opposite of @ChrisW, just to see which one is preferred. It seems to me, there is an argument for deleting short answers, simply for the reason that they are useless.
Unless one is an authority on a particular subject, what good is it to the OP that someone they don't know on the Internet says the answer is "Yes."? The use of short Zen (not Zen-like) answers hinges on the authority of the guru; unless they actually provide an argument, they are useless out of the context of one's assumption that one's teacher is enlightened.
I agree with this answer:

Yes.
...that wasn't very helpful in answering your question, was it? If someone asks a yes/no question there's always an implied "and why" even if they don't ask for it.
Even if the original asker only wanted one data point with no reasoning behind it, showing the reason for a yes/no answer makes the answer useful to more than just the single asker, which is the whole point of Stack Exchange.

I don't know. This was pretty much my previous opinion but people seem to be saying that these kind of answers have value. I think there are 2 issues 1. Should mods delete short unhelpful answers that aren't actually spam (probably not - that's why people vote - chris's answer has convinced me). 2. Are zen type answers short and unhelpful and deserved to be deleted. They are certainly short but are they unhelpful? I'm not sure

The accepted answer to this question is interesting. As far as I could see, it wasn't even an answer. But the OP accepted it above others. So "helpful" is in the eyes of the beholder maybe.

@Robin111 In that example, I think the key is the content. An answer of "Mu", for example, isn't about content, it's about context, which I think we have to assume is lacking on an Internet forum like this.

I can see that single-word answers are usually unsatisfactory, but in an earlier answer on meta you did suggest we could condone, "very short answers, as long as they do actually answer the question".

Would it be reasonable to delete short one word answers such as "yes", "no", "mu" that have no context but to leave something like "Yes it's wrong. Throw away your statues and burn your dharma books." to see how the community receives it? Low voting (in general) really does makes this more difficult, but not giving the community a chance to vote on something doesn't seem quite right either.

The particular answer above is problematic because it doesn't answer the question, it gives advice. (Don't worry about statues or studies, go meditate! is how I interpret it.) So the answer is problematic and we'd want to guide the brand new participant in the site expectation that all responses actually answer the question.
But I think where caution is needed, is that the language (or brevity, or cryptic-ness or whatever you'd call it) used in zen is so different that if we're quick to judge what is and isn't an answer, we're likely to reject virtually anything written in this style and push away potentially great new participants to this site.
I've already accidentally chased away someone who answered in zen style and I'm hoping not to do so again. User 5129 deleted his profile after I criticized his answer; but the  OP  actually chose his answer as the Accepted answer; so it had value that I didn't recognize.
My suggestion would be to err on the side of caution and let people vote up (or not) answers they find helpful (or not) rather than delete them in this type of situation.

You say "it doesn't answer the question" ... your complaint about it isn't that it's short, it's that it's advice rather than an answer: as described in the Answers vs Advice topic.

This answer too probably isn't the kind of answer you had been expecting, given that you used the theravada tag on your question.

@ChrisW, you are correct on both of the above comments. However I'm inclined to leave both answers up to be voted on, etc. I think with zen style responses the meaning is not always clear to everyone. A good example is the answer you accepted in the example I linked. I would not have realized that was an answer. But it was apparently a good answer to you, the OP. I think these answers require a bit of special handling.

But it does answer the question... it says "Yes". That's an answer. If it had said, "Don't ask this question, just go meditate." Then you might have a point, but as it stands, this is an answer. Just not a very good one.

Yes, I suppose that's true because the question didn't ask "why" its wrong to buy a statue.

This answer is more interesting (don't think anyone but the mods can see it, since it was deleted). It answer the question with a question, then provides reasons why Buddhism doesn't jive with statue worship. It doesn't ever actually answer the question "in a legalistic sense" (words of a commenter), but I would upvote it.

Non mods (with sufficient rep maybe?) can see deleted answers. They have a pink background.

@yuttadhammo I wonder why that answer was deleted: perhaps the reason why its author deleted it was the comment from the OP ("this is interesting but not exactly related to the question"). Maybe this would "open a can worms" i.e. allow answers to stray too far off-topic, but perhaps we should consider whether an answer might be useful to any of two kinds of reader, i.e. the OP and/or everyone else who reads it (for that reason I wouldn't decide unilaterally to delete it as not-an-answer).

@ChrisW, both of the first two comments seemed to say it wasn't an appropriate answer, so I'm not really surprised the owner deleted it. But the third commenter and also Ven. Yuttadhammo as stated above, saw value in it and others might have too. It sort of falls into that "advice vs. answers" category, but the advice might be very useful to someone if not necessarily the OP. Very hard for one person to judge if something will be useful to someone else.

If the author had been bolder, then they could have replied, "Well (even if this doesn't answer the question you were asking) I'll leave this answer here in case it helps someone else." ... and then, maybe, deleted the answer later only if it received a few downvotes with no upvotes.

This community hasn't really supported answers that don't directly answer the question, so maybe it's not surprising a poster would take down his answer rather than argue the point. But it's another area to possibly revisit. Do we want to accept answers that offer advice/related teachings in place of a straight answer to the question? That's really also the tone of the answer we're discussing in this thread. Advice vs. Answers.

Answers vs Advice seems conclusive/definitive because it has many associated votes. One caveat though is that the OP wrote that it was "triggered by a response to my own question" and so it may have been based on a single case. Maybe everyone agreed that in that case they wanted an answer but not advice, but maybe it's going too far to assume that this site never wants people to post advice instead of an answer.

A moderator from another site wrote this advice for us in a chat (not about that specific policy but about creating policies to handle specific answers versus types of answer): "you don't want to base a policy on a single data point, but you need to consider policies in light of real live data. Expect to iterate some. :-) So you can draft a policy, and then as you apply it you might need to refine it -- that's all good and normal for beta sites."

For sure. Many people voting on the early Meta posts are no longer active. It seems sensible to revisit certain topics with people who are currently active and interested. This answer seems to be more advice than answer.

Conclusion: specific proposal
I propose the following new policy:

Don't automatically delete a short answer (unless it's spam or unintelligible or utterly off-topic)
Anyone (i.e. users and/or moderators) can upvote or downvote (and/or post a comment)
If the answer has a negative score (more downvotes than upvotes) then any 'trusted users' can vote to delete it – there are only 4 trusted users (i.e. with reputation of over 4000) at the moment, and 3 must vote before an answer is deleted, but there will be more such trusted users in future.
If the answer has a negative score then any moderator can delete – before deleting, a moderator should perhaps consult the other moderators to see whether they think that the answer has value
Sometimes moderators will convert an answer to a comment

This isn't a formula for deciding whether an answer has the following desirable attributes:

Is not too "mysterious (and often incomprehensible yet seemingly wise)"
Addresses the question
Leaves little unsaid

... but if we just delay, for a little while, deleting an answer which some people could find valuable, that would let people assess such answers on a case-by-case basis, with up- and downvotes and comments.

If people voted more regularly/freely it might be easier to moderate. I was thinking that if an answer has any upvotes, but still more downvotes than upvotes and therefore a negative score, the fact that someone found it useful and upvoted is a hint that maybe it should stay, undeleted even with a negative score. Conversely if everyone downvotes and no-one upvotes then that's a hint that no-one finds it useful and that it ought to be deleted. But if no-one votes up or down then that's not much input fro the community for the moderators to act on.

The moderators themselves are users and members of the community when it comes to voting. I think that ideally they should express their personal opinion by voting, and do moderator actions (e.g. deleting answers) based on community input (i.e. make decisions based on the results of all the votes including their own).

What about "is informative/constructive/useful"? I mean an answer of "Yes." does answer the question, but what good is it?

I think I pretty much agree with this. But I think the lack of voting remains an issue, I think this is a good example http://buddhism.stackexchange.com/q/9321/157 - 5 people have found this question interesting enough to write an answer to (so presumably has merit) but none have them have as yet upvoted it. There is one upvote and that is mine. Maybe it doesn't deserve it but i think the lack of voting makes quality control harder. I think this issue is also worth a revisit at some point to be honest.

@yuttadhammo Do you have an example? At the moment I'm unable to imagine a circumstance for which I'd feel inclined to upvote "yes". I'm not sure it would satisfy the "leaves little unsaid" criterion. Though (off-topic) I remember a novel about Alexander the Great, where he visits an oracle, who gives him two bits of folded lead, one in each hand, and says to him "Here are two answers: one for the question in your head, and one for the question in your heart", and when he unfolds the lead to read the answers he sees, written on the lead, that both the answers say "yes".

Well, my point is, maybe we should be deleting "Yes" answers because they are useless. Unless you are an established authority, like an oracle, what good is it to anonymous internet person?

@yuttadhammo If everyone agrees that some particular answer is too short, unhelpful, cannot be salvaged, has no redeeming value/virtue/meaning, is useless, then they'll downvote it, no-one will upvote it, and we'll delete it. If someone actually likes some answer for any reason (and it wasn't instantly deleted) then they can upvote it, and then we should think twice before deleting it (or we might convert it to a comment). Or if there's an important problem with the answer, we can post a comment (or not delete and let other users post a comment) to give people a chance to address that concern.

Whether an answer might be useful even if it's not from an authoritative guru is a bit difficult to answer, isn't it? The three answers in question which we identified so far (about not buying a statue; about miracles; and about the poem) each IMO at least have echoes in the allegedly-zen stories that I've read. The whole thing is a bit of a mystery (c.f. the parable of the elephant's parts) but maybe you recognize bits of it. Some of your answers are unavailable to people without prior knowledge of the subject; similarly some of these short answers rely on someone having a prior exposure ...

... so it's true they can't be guaranteed to be "good to any anonymous internet person" and only some (if any) might see any value in it; but then Robin pointed out that by excluding any answer of this form (i.e. "short") categorically then we may be excluding an entire tradition (zen), and/or excluding people, and so we should try to see whether or how i what circumstances they could be accommodated. Opening it to community voting on individual/specific answers (to assess them individually instead of condemning them categorically) seems maybe one way (in fact the canonical SE way) to do that.

@yuttadhammo I agree with you that simply "Yes" or any other one-word answer has little to distinguish it from a coin-toss (except the authority of whoever says it). An answer that's a bit longer than that, though, for example a whole sentence (which would still be "short" compared with paragraphs) might have enough shape to (by matching something which the reader already knows) say something.

I'm obviously new to this board, so I don't know the history of your policies or why they were implemented. The only reason I see to delete any answers would be in cases where they were patently offensive- sexist, racist- or personal attacks, etc.
If people don't like a response, they can downvote it or respond in the comments that it was unhelpful. If the forum were flooded with answers similar to my own in such a way as to inhibit the exchange of ideas, then there'd be a valid reason for tighter policing.
I'd like to coin a phrase to describe this sort of answer- a short pithy response that attempts to dress itself in Zen robes but isn't helpful. I think the term "Zen Burp" is nicely descriptive..

Thanks for the welcome. And of course I'd include myself in the "we who are still learning".


text:
Purpose of downvotes
I've just taken the plunge and answered a few questions. One has attracted two downvotes
Is it possible to recognize a person who has achieved Arhatship?
I think i shall just about survive the shame. But it spurs me on to ask a general question about how we should use votes - specifically downvotes. Are we going to encourage downvoting of content to encourage the best to rise to the top - in a bit of a Darwinian fashion. Or are we going to use them sparingly perhaps only to flag up the worst content and event then only by a little downvote tweak.
I would personally like to keep things as positive as possible. Philosophy SE has always had a positive vibe to me and even quite bizarre questions don't attract a mass downvote fest. Whereas Stack Overflow can be quite an extreme (hostile) place particularly on certain subjects (JQuery is brutal)
Anyway I hope this isn't a moan - but just an opportunity to clarify ethos of the site in it's early days.

I looked at the answer that received two downvotes and did not see anything that would merit those downvotes (though, as a commenter noted, if you happened to find a citation for the story in your first paragraph, that would make the answer better).

My guess is once we open the site up and people calm down a bit, downvoting will decrease; we seem to have quite a few "noobies" here (I'm not so advanced myself), so we'll probably learn proper etiquette over time, I'd think.

This is something important to work out because on a place like Reddit /buddhism, which is where I first experience the up/down vote thing, it was amazing what people downvoted. I can remember seeing posts where the advice and sources were so dubious it was laughable yet when someone comes in with a sutta link and straight up good buddhism it gets downvoted... on a BUDDHIST page.
I suspect this is an issue that will not "go away" per say, it's the nature of the ability to downvote.

There are lots of questions at Meta.SE about downvoting. What I have learned from there:

Voting is merely site-specific. They show what Q&A are good or bad for this particular community

Except several common SE rules;

Downvotes on questions define scope of the site — as it is seen by the community;
Downvotes answers define what the community expects from the answers — again, it may not match what you think on this;
Communities are really different. What's good for one, can be unacceptable for another.

I have abandoned my participation at one of the betas where I'm still in #21 by reputation (an year after abandonment) specifically because of aggressive donvoting. IIRC, I have seen Q&A downvoted to the oblivion (nearly 10 downvotes) there.
To me, it is sufficient to make a Q or A some score of -1 or -2 and cast a close-vote. But again, not many people are actually aware about this.
You actually have several options:

Adopt to what the community expects from you. Maybe this is the most Buddhist approach. :)
You are the part of community. Try to form another attitude:

by commenting on good or bad Q&A, explaining your opinion. This takes a lot of effort;
by trying to invite more people to Meta discussions and raise questions here. You do it already, but not many users visit Meta sites.

Or, as the very last option, just leave.

P.S. I don't want my answer to look very pessimistic, so let me finish it with a statement that we are here to learn and share our knowledge. Let's find out some rules that will make us happy together.

Thank you for this. Very true that aggressive downvoting can be surprising demotivating. I would argue that there could be no down votes for this site other than were something is just balantly wrong and misleading. Otherwise vote up your favourites and and vote to close. IMHO of course

@CrabBucket Exactly. Some of SE creators (can't google for a proof) said that votes is a currency for StackExchange. The best what we can do is vote on whatever we see (and understand enough to vote reasonably). It can be up- or downvote, of course. If you convince more people to vote, received downvotes weren't that frustrating.

I have some experience with moderation on large, busy sites and will offer my experience / advice.
I would suggest downvotes can be used as an opportunity for improvement and are not necessarily intended as some sort of punishment or discouragement.
Part of the puropose of downvotes, at leaset IMO, is to encourage improvement in the quality of answers. When I downvote I try to add a comment as to the reason for the downvote and suggestions for improvement.
If the OP edits the question, I then retract my downvote.
I would also suggest, one alternate to a downvote is to edit the answer.
At the end of the day, moderation is a community effort based on elections of moderators and also one's reputation and IMO the goal of moderation is to improve the quality of answers on this site.
You can not "force" anyone to use downvotes in any particular way without editing the priviliges of this site and it would take a large consensus to do so.