I would like to receive explanations to the edit to my post.
I have recently posted a question.
Here is how I typed a sum there: $\sum_{i=1}^{i=N}$.
Here is how it was edited: $\sum_{i=1}^{N}$.
The comment to the edit reads: "... for correctness".
I cannot understand what is incorrect in my way of writing the sum. However, since I am not a mathematician, I assume I can be wrong.
Thus, I am wondering what exactly is incorrect in my expression.
Clarifications.
- The edit was suggested by @Flomic and approved by @Peter Taylor.
- I could not find a way to send them a private message asking for explanations.
- I edited the post back because I consider my original expression correct. I will edit it if I receive mathematically rigorous intelligible explanations.
- The reason I wrote it the way I did was because I like it that way and I think it is a better, clearer and more rigorous way than the suggested edit. With that in mind, if the editors made the edit simply because they like their way better I would like to express my objections. Here they are. Such behavior implies that you put yourselves above me because you think your opinion is more important than mine. Such behavior implies abuse of power, because you used your position to enforce your opinion on me. The later is associated with assault on personal freedom when, instead of giving the reasonably largest freedom of expression to the users, the team reduces the freedom of expression justifying it by a common good of providing to the world, what the team thinks, the best formatted content. If the assumption is correct, I would like you @Flomic and you @Peter Taylor to explain yourselves.
1 answer
The following users marked this post as Works for me:
| User | Comment | Date |
|---|---|---|
| Ivan Nepomnyashchikh | (no comment) | Sep 13, 2023 at 22:17 |
Assuming good intent
On Codidact it is standard practice for people to edit each other's posts, and it is intended to be positive and collaborative. The guidance for reviewing edits is as follows:
This edit was suggested by another user. Good edits:
- Improve clarity or fix errors like broken links.
- Do not drastically change the post or add content the author would reasonably object to.
- Do not change the style unnecessarily (for example, do not change spelling that is valid in other English dialects).
Usually when someone edits to fix a typo, there is no offence caused. However, sometimes someone fixes what they think is a typo, but it is actually a valid alternative spelling that they were not aware of. This is an easy mistake to make, because there are many words which have subtly different spellings in different English speaking regions.
Even though such a fix is intended to be helpful, it can still cause offence because it can appear to be imposing the spelling of another region on the author.
The situation you describe sounds like a similar confusion. You have chosen to use a notation of your own, which looks very similar to standard notation, so the editors can easily mistake it for a typo or misunderstanding of convention, and not realise that the subtle variation from convention is important to you, and is a conscious decision.
If you wish to use an alternative notation, it's worth introducing this fact in your question, so people realise that you want it to be left that way. Otherwise, people may not realise that they are offending you by editing to match to convention.
Asking for help
It's also worth bearing in mind the difference between publishing and asking for help. If you publish your own mathematical paper you can define your own notation that best fits that particular piece of work. However, if you ask for help on a question and answer site, it will be easier for people to help you if you use the same notation that they are accustomed to.
Otherwise you are asking not only for people to do unpaid work to answer your question (which as volunteers they are happy to) but also to do additional work to think about whether they have understood your new notation correctly. Even though it is more readable to you, that small difference can add a significant burden for someone who is accustomed to the standard notation and now has to decide whether this small change indicates a subtly different meaning.
There is no best way to write mathematics. The conventions we use are often accidents of history. The benefit of convention is simply that it saves having to define terms every time we use them.
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