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Talk:Theresa M. Korn

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Did you know nomination

[edit]
The following is an archived discussion of the DYK nomination of the article below. Please do not modify this page. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as this nomination's talk page, the article's talk page or Wikipedia talk:Did you know), unless there is consensus to re-open the discussion at this page. No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was: promoted by SL93 (talk) 23:19, 16 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

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  • Reviewed: Kate Clark (writer)
  • Comment: Technically, CMU had a different name (the Carnegie Institute of Technology) at the time; I am proposing the hook with their current name because I think it's more recognizable, but I have no strong objection to replacing it with the old name if that is deemed necessary. If that change is made, the word "university" should be replaced by "institute" to maintain the parallelism. However, I do feel strongly about keeping the "rejected ... in order to" linkage in the hook, rather than replacing it with something less causal: the paradoxical nature of this wording (how does rejecting a scholarship enable you to go there?) is what makes it hooky to me.

Created by David Eppstein (talk). Self-nominated at 08:07, 27 March 2021 (UTC).[reply]

  • The article itself is fine, new enough and long enough, well cited, neutrally written, and Earwig finds nothing except titles and names. The hook is cited, the QPQ is done, and the "rejected ... in order to" linkage is fine. So we are nearly there. But you have put your finger on one problem, David Eppstein. The rules tell us to use established facts, and as there was no Carnegie Mellon University at the time, Korn could not have had the aim of becoming “the university's first female engineer”. The second problem I see is that the obituary makes it clear that if she had accepted the scholarship she could have taken all the same engineering classes and graduated, but her degree would have been called a Science degree and not what she eventually got, which was a “Bachelor's degree in Electrical Engineering”. So it was a problem of the name, rather than the substance. She would have been an engineer, but without the qualification to make that crystal clear. You are happy to re-work this, so would you like to find an Alt which builds on that? Moonraker (talk) 02:29, 28 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]
    • @Moonraker: It is very likely that without an engineering degree she could well not have been an engineer at all. I'm not familiar with the exact timing of the introduction of engineering licensing requirements in Pennsylvania, but in many states and times it has been a crime to practice engineering without being a licenced engineer and it has been a requirement that obtaining a license requires an engineering degree. Also, being able to take some courses is very much not the same as being able to take all of the courses for an engineering degree (most of which involve a regimented course sequence which does not allow much room for variation) at the same time as fulfilling the requirements for a different degree, nor the same as convincing employers that a degree intended to steer her into work as a high school science teacher somehow qualified her for engineering work. I don't want to get into the weeds of researching exactly what was required in Pennsylvania in the 1940s, but basically I think you are making unlikely excuses for how sexist the society was back then rather than actually facing what the sources actually say of it. And even if there were some unlikely path for her to have obtained engineering work with the wrong degree, I don't think that would make the hook inaccurate, because even if she did all that she would still not be "the university's first engineer" because she would not have been an engineer at the university, only elsewhere. I think readers are capable of figuring out from context that "the university's first engineer" is shorthand for "the university's first engineering student and first engineering graduate", and I think using that shorthand is necessary to make the hook hooky rather than pedantic and to get it to fit into DYK hook length requirements. So no, I do not think we need to go casting around for other hooks. I think you need to rethink your objections. —David Eppstein (talk) 07:21, 28 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]
David Eppstein, the trouble with wanting to say something in a hook that is not in the source relied on is that it leads to where we are now! I am not making unlikely excuses for how sexist the society was back then, as you put it, I am just trying to steer us to an established fact that is cited. You say "the university's first engineer" is shorthand for "the university's first engineering student and first engineering graduate", but you have yourself pointed out that the university had not then come into being. You said before “I have no strong objection to replacing it with the old name if that is deemed necessary. If that change is made, the word "university" should be replaced by "institute" to maintain the parallelism.” That was fine, but now you do not want to go casting around for other hooks, I am confused. On my other point, we are not far apart. There are many engineers who never held any formal qualifications in engineering, not even having completed an apprenticeship, the issue here is surely whether Korn could get an Engineer's degree, which she wisely wanted, but which the sexism of the 1940s was fighting against letting her have. Could we perhaps say something like to become the first woman to gain a degree in engineering from the Institute? Moonraker (talk) 19:31, 28 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]
You are still overinterpreting. The source clearly states that she refused the scholarship for the purpose of becoming an engineer at the university, and that she did in fact become the first female engineer at the university. Whether there was some other path to becoming an engineer that she might have taken instead, or whether other people at other times might have been allowed to take at different times, is irrelevant. And no, "the first woman to gain a degree in engineering from the Institute", besides being far too long, is also far too pedantic and by being so overspecific it undermines her accomplishments. —David Eppstein (talk) 19:54, 28 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]
With respect, David Eppstein, the source doesn’t say that. What it says is “Theresa was the first woman accepted into the Engineering program at Carnegie Tech.” and later “She earned her Bachelor's degree in Electrical Engineering in 1947, the first woman to graduate from Carnegie Tech's Engineering program.” You started out by saying you were not going to insist on referring to a university which didn’t exist at the time, so taking you up on that suggestion can hardly be called pedantic. On the overall length, you are trying to include three established facts in the hook, which isn’t against the rules. The first two are solidly cited, the third not. The reason why the hook is so long (and not awfully hooky) is surely that there is rather a lot fighting for space in it? Moonraker (talk) 01:43, 29 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]
You have failed to convince me of the inaccuracy of the hook. You are arguing that it does not use the exact words of the source, but that's a stupid argument to use because copying the exact words of a source would be plagiarism and forbidden. We are not forbidden from using our brains to understand the meaning of our sources. Can I have a new reviewer who is interested in actually reviewing the article and hook accuracy and not in arguing and in searching for desperate and dubious arguments for downplaying and minimizing the achievements of the hook subject, please? —David Eppstein (talk) 01:49, 29 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Oh, no, that is quite wrong. Anyone looking over the thread will see I have not said anything about the hook not using the exact words of the source. There is of course no reason for it to do that, and as you say it would be plagiarism, so a bad idea. I quoted what the source says simply to try to get you to see that it does not say what you thought you were quoting. Please try to respect Wikipedia:Civility, no one is “searching for desperate and dubious arguments”. Frankly, I do not think it is a good idea for nominators to use personal abuse to set about dismissing reviewers. Let’s wait to see if anyone else comments on this page before we work out where we go next. Perhaps leave it for a day or two to cool down. Moonraker (talk) 02:05, 29 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Given that it is still completely evident to me that (1) she was CMU (or CIT, whatever)'s first female engineer, (2) she refused her scholarship, (3) she refused her scholarship for the purpose of becoming an engineer there, and (4) she succeeded in this purpose, I am finding it very difficult to understand your continued objections to saying this and instead making the hook all quibbly. At this point I have lost faith in the quality of your review. So unless you are going to back down, we absolutely do need a new reviewer. —David Eppstein (talk) 05:32, 29 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]
David Eppstein, with the word “whatever”, I think you are back to your first position on what the teaching institution was, which is fine. Korn clearly was CIT’s first woman to graduate in engineering, you have a good citation for that which also covers the other facts in the hook. It doesn’t say “first female engineer”, perhaps she was indeed that, but the question is whether we should speculate and join those dots. It’s surprising how often joining dots gets to the wrong conclusion, you will know that. Anyway, as you said “whatever”, could we please have an Alt and see where we are then? Moonraker (talk) 03:54, 30 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Can we please have another reviewer and not these interminable not-getting-any-better bad replies by Moonraker? —David Eppstein (talk) 07:01, 30 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]
  • It’s a No from me to the only hook the nominator is willing to offer. This is on the basis of the DYK rule that we need established facts. The words “the youngest radio ham and airplane pilot in the US”, are cited, no problem there, but the rest is skating on thin ice. On “rejected her scholarship to Carnegie Mellon University” the university came into being more than twenty years later; the trouble with “in order to become the university's first female engineer” is that we do not have a citation that Korn was the university’s first anything. She was the first woman to graduate with a degree in engineering from CIT, but it would be joining dots to say she was the first woman engineer at CIT, it is not in the source and may or may not be correct. As stated in my first review, the only problem is with the hook, which David Eppstein is adamant he must have exactly as it is. I am now signing off. Moonraker (talk) 01:07, 31 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]
    • Will you please go away and stop blocking my attempts to find a third opinion on this nomination, as you have done already three times? Or do I need to escalate your misbehavior to the drama boards? I am willing to entertain arguments from good-faith reviewers that the hook needs adjustment; I am not adamant about anything with respect to this DYK other than that YOU must stop trying to be its reviewer. You have thoroughly convinced me of your inability to do an adequate job at it. —David Eppstein (talk) 01:28, 31 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]
David Eppstein, once again, please try to respect Wikipedia:Civility. I said above that I was signing off, so there was no need for you to hurl yet more personal abuse. I shall not be reviewing one of your nominations again. Moonraker (talk) 02:31, 2 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

- WP:DROPTHESTICK New reviewer requested. — Maile (talk) 01:44, 31 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]

  • Given that there has been disagreement about the "first female student/engineer at CMU" angle, perhaps a different direction is needed here?
ALT1 ... that while in high school, Theresa M. Korn was the youngest pilot and ham radio operator in the United States?
ALT2 ... that when Theresa M. Korn was nominated for membership in Eta Kappa Nu, the honor society declined because she was a woman, instead opting to award her a certificate?
Both hooks are mentioned in their sources. ALT2 is rather depressing, it is just offered here as an option. Narutolovehinata5 tccsdnew 03:43, 31 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Can you elaborate why you think the first female engineering student angle is in any way inaccurate or unacceptable, please? Because I didn't get a comprehensible argument for that from the previous reviewer; that's what the entire argument was about. The fact that that reviewer disagreed is not itself a reason for avoiding that hook. —David Eppstein (talk) 05:34, 31 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I never stated that I disagreed that the engineering part was unacceptable and in fact I thought it was acceptable, it's just that the reviewer's argument (that the "first female student at CMU" angle was a stretch at best) is somewhat convincing. Perhaps if the original hook had wording to the effect of "at what is now CMU" or "the precursor to CMU" that could have worked, but even then it's borderline synthesis at that point. Plus, what exactly is wrong with the new proposals? Narutolovehinata5 tccsdnew 05:43, 31 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]
It's not that they're wrong, per se, but that they're missing an opportunity. "Did you know that X held a record?" is good enough for a DYK hook, but not really attention grabbing in the way that "Did you know that X turned down (opportunity for something) in order to (get what sounds like the same thing)?" could be. It just doesn't have the same sense of cognitive dissonance. And I said in the comment at the start of this nomination before the previous reviewer started attempting to review that I'd be ok with changing CMU to Carnegie Institute of Technology (and changing the later "university" to "institute" to match) if necessary; that was never the real issue. —David Eppstein (talk) 06:05, 31 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Given that there are some concerns about the original hook it may be for the best to just move on from it. As you said, her being the youngest pilot is already a hook-worthy fact: why not just let it be reviewed as an alternative then let the promoter make the final decision? Narutolovehinata5 tccsdnew 06:37, 31 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I have asked you once and you responded only with the easily-resolved non-issue of the name of the place. So I ask you again: what concerns? —David Eppstein (talk) 06:57, 31 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]
The concern about naming. As I said, if you really want that particular hook fact to be used, it will need to be rephrased. I suggest you propose brand new hooks with clearer wording that address the issue that was raised here; trying to suggest that it is not an issue and being uncivil while doing so will not help your cause here. Finally, are you willing to accept that a different hook be approved or not? Narutolovehinata5 tccsdnew 07:09, 31 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I was of the opinion that changing the institute's name in the hook was clearly and explicitly suggested in my initial comment. Since you disagree, let me spell it out even more explicitly for you:
ALT3 ... that Theresa M. Korn, the youngest radio ham and airplane pilot in the US, rejected her scholarship to the Carnegie Institute of Technology in order to become the institute's first female engineer?
As for "Finally, are you willing to accept that a different hook be approved or not?": You are not the reviewer, because as a proposer of hooks you cannot be. So why are you presuming to lecture me on what I need to accept? I have explained why I find your alternative hooks deficient. That should be enough input for an actual reviewer. —David Eppstein (talk) 07:17, 31 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I apologize if it wasn't clear in my previous comment, but when I asked for a "brand new hook with clearer wording" I was indeed referring to the original hook being rephrased to address the naming concern. However, now that I think about it, the actual hook itself is problematic. For starters, ALT0/ALT2 seem to imply that Korn was the youngest pilot/operator at the time she was offered her scholarship, which isn't stated in the article. This could of course be solved by revising the wording to instead state "who was the youngest pilot/operator while..." or something to that effect.
Finally, I suggest that you act more civil in this discussion and tone down your comments as well, because frankly you have been very rude not just to me but to Moonraker as well. And given that did explicitly ask for another editor to take a look at your nomination at WT:DYK (which is how I found out about this nomination and why I commented in the first place), I honestly expected that you would have at least been open-minded and willing to engage in a less-heated manner. Indeed, you specified at WT:DYK that you were asking for "Neutral opinions (by which I do not mean opinions that necessarily agree with my positions)" (emphasis mine), which made me assume in good faith that you were open to suggestions. Indeed, my original comment was neutrally worded and I did not even suggest that the original hook was problematic, only that there had been a disagreement. Given that you are an administrator and an experienced editor, I am honestly shocked and appalled at the attitude shown here and expected better. Narutolovehinata5 tccsdnew 09:40, 31 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]
If you are going to lecture me on civility, you need to be a lot more polite and a lot less condescending than you are being yourself. I have been trying to be civil with you and respond purely to your comments, but you are unneceesarily personalizing things and it is not helpful. And again, you are trying to wear two hats here: both proposing hooks and then reviewing the other hooks. DYK rules require those roles to be separate. As for "could of course be solved" by adding more explanatory verbiage: did you count characters? We are very close to the 200 character limit already. That is one of the reasons why, for instance, I wrote "engineer" and not "engineering student" (another reason being that she became the first engineering student by starting the program and the first engineer by finishing, and that finishing is the more important accomplishment). There may be enough characters free to write "once the youngest..." rather than just "the youngest"; I doubt there's more than that. And your quibble would be equally valid if you wrote "well, actually, this was nearly 80 years ago, so technically she's not really the youngest any more". It's quibbling for the sake of quibbling rather than something that is actually wrong with the hooks. We write hooks all the time that state multiple accomplishments of the subject without quibbling that technically those accomplishments happened at different times and that we have to clearly specify the timing in the wording of the hook. —David Eppstein (talk) 15:11, 31 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Also, did you know that Theresa M. Korn was once the youngest person in the world? It sounds interesting until you actually think about it. I would prefer a hook that stays interesting after you think about it. But if you insist, here's another ALT:
ALT4 ... that high school airplane pilot and radio ham Theresa M. Korn turned down a scholarship to the Carnegie Institute of Technology in order to become the institute's first female engineer?
We can let the reviewer (whoever that ends up being) decide whether making the hook less catchy in this way, compared to ALT3, is compensated by reducing the ability of picky/clever readers to find ways of misinterpreting it. —David Eppstein (talk) 21:34, 31 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I'm still unsure how this discussion came to this as personally I do not see how my initial comment was impolite or uncivil in any way. As I have said earlier in the discussion, at the time I made that comment, it wasn't even a review of any of the hooks, the comment about "disagreement" was merely an acknowledgement that it existed, so the rudeness shown at me at that moment was shocking to say the least. I also find the statement about "hook reviewers and hook proposers are two separate roles" strange. I don't recall seeing anything in the rules that state that hook reviewers can't propose hooks and vice-versa; as far as I can tell the only rule regarding that is that hook proposers aren't allowed to review their own hooks (except when their new hooks are simple rephrasings of an existing hook), but are still free to comment on ones written by others. As far as I'm aware, anyone is free to propose new hooks, even reviewers, and indeed I've seen such cases happen on a regular basis without complaint. Finally, correct me if I'm wrong, but there's nothing in the rules that state that there can't be more than one reviewer at a time, or that only one reviewer is allowed to comment on a nomination. AFAIK, the guidelines are that any editor is free to comment on a nomination even when a review is ongoing. Narutolovehinata5 tccsdnew 23:03, 31 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Can we focus on the article and its hooks, and get someone to provide a proper review, please? I do not see how my request for clarification of your concerns was in any way uncivil, but continuing to harp on that is a distraction from what we should be doing here. —David Eppstein (talk) 23:34, 31 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Moonraker has already done a review of the article itself and their review remains valid; indeed as they have stated, the article itself is suitable for DYK, their only concern was the hook wording. Plus, as far as I can tell, you have not objected to the review of the article itself, merely their opinion on the hook. As for uncivility, again, I'm not sure if you understood what I said, but my original comment merely acknowledged that there was a disagreement on the suitability of the hook and did not give its own independent opinion, and yet I was still accused of saying that the hook was "inaccurate or unacceptable", words that I never used or even implied at the time. I'll say it again: my comment at the time was an observation that there was a disagreement, not that I agreed with said disagreement. I merely stated that it existed, I didn't say at the time that I thought the disagreement was valid. Narutolovehinata5 tccsdnew 06:31, 1 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Rather than prolonging another argument, let me merely say that I think this is an inaccurate summary of your initial comments, and that anyone who cares can go back and review those comments for themselves. —David Eppstein (talk) 07:22, 1 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]
  • It appears that the nominator and I can't come to an agreement on a hook, and so I am leaving this for another editor. For the record, I think that ALT4 addresses the original concerns, but the attitude expressed here has drained my energy and I am no longer willing to participate in this discussion any further. Narutolovehinata5 tccsdnew 06:41, 1 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]
    • Alt2 is fine and does not require lots of debate. I have no opinions on the other hooks, although the first hook is too complex, and I think we should move on. Victuallers (talk) 15:45, 1 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]
      • @Victuallers: So you're not even going to consider my new hooks, and just take the existence of my disagreement with the first reviewer as a reason to totally ignore my proposed hooks? I don't consider that to be an acceptable level of new review. I still have received no explanation for why those hooks should be passed by, not from the first reviewer, not from Narutolovehinata5, and now not from you. I have explained my reasons for preferring those hooks to Narutolovehinata5: did you even read that explanation? When proposing it, Narutolovehinata5 described ALT2 as "depressing": do you disagree? Do you think that "depressing" is what we should be aiming for in hooks? Since the only thing you give resembling an explanation is "too complex", what about
ALT5 ... that Theresa M. Korn turned down a scholarship to the Carnegie Institute of Technology in order to become the institute's first female engineer? —David Eppstein (talk) 16:04, 1 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]
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