@MartinSleziak: Indeed none of the other flags seemed appropriate. I agree that it's not spam, but it's certainly self-advertisement that more importantly is logically incorrect and that also contains nonsense that has been repeatedly pointed out by others on prior posts of his (most of which have been deleted or downvoted a lot).
What I highlighted in bold is my primary criterion, but the latter point is what I feel is sufficient reason for others to agree that it is not worth keeping such posts on this site. Crackpots have varying rates of spamming crank posts, but that doesn't make their posts any more or less acceptable. Their posts are not even a wrong answer in good faith from which one can learn something if a comment points out the errors.
A user flagged a comment of another user, with the specific request to delete the other user's comment because it is "factually incorrect".
Now, I'm inclined to just ignore flags like this, as I've thought that the job of the moderator is to look after the community's interests and to catch/pre...
I recently flagged an answer as "not an answer", and what came back was "declined - flags should not be used to indicate technical inaccuracies, or an altogether wrong answer." I found that surprising, so I had a look at the faq on flagging and, sure enough, an answer being altogether wrong is no...
Are mathematical errors in an answer that is otherwise reasonable and on-topic ever a sufficient reason for users (other than the answer-author) to delete that answer?
For a recent answer, the author might still delete or repair it on their own or in response to comments, given enough time...
Thanks for that. I read the first two already but felt my situation was somewhat different, since there was precedent (previous two answers unilaterally deleted but my flag denied).
As for the third, it seems quid is taking a slightly different stance now, or am I mistaken?
He says:
> I do not see the problem with deleting the occasional utterly wrong and not useful answer where OP shows no intention to fix them.
This is indeed the case with this user in question, so what makes his answers not fit quid's criterion?
@MartinSleziak: It's not a problem at all. I think I care too much for the quality of mathematics on this site and that's causing my slight obsession with getting rid of obvious junk. Imagine trying to learn mathematics from any other forum on the internet. It's extremely painful to have to sieve through the junk, and most students aren't even capable of that even if they want to.
But here, on Math SE, for the first time I see a potential for it to be a reliable mathematical resource. Except for these irritating crank posts...
It seems that zyx's question lists 7 links which are either about a very similar problem as your flag or at least a discussion which explicitly mentioned that moderators do not delete answers simply because they are incorrect.
Yes, but quid's answer at that time seems to imply that, if the answer cannot be salvaged or the poster insists that there are no errors, then it is worthy of deletion.
@user21820 Well, even if it fits the last paragraph from quid's answer, nobody knew what answer you were talking about. (Until a few minutes ago, when it was mentioned in Mod's Office and c.r.u.d.e.)
So probably it is not that surprising that nobody cast second delete flag.
But it was in the delete queue. If I brought attention to that post straightaway, it may be easy for the crackpot to accuse us of coordinated censorship, so I simply wanted to ask the moderators about the inconsistency with the prior deletions.
Of course, now that people seem actually interested in looking at the post I'm talking about, I can't exactly say "I'm not telling!" haha..
Well, the moderators has answered, and now we have 7 other instances saying that moderators do not (or should not) delete post simply because it is incorrect.
Perhaps the situation might be different in the case if the user is repeatedly posting blatantly wrong answer.
@user21820 Well, I understand that your question was directed to moderators, but also regular users read meta. So the reactions of non-moderators, who do not have access to your flag, are clearly affected by the fact that we do not saw the specific case and could only talk in general. (As you have noticed, I had a guess which users it might have been and the guess was completely different than what you flagged.)
Yes I get that. But anyway judging from the reaction I got, I doubt mentioning the specific post would have made much difference, and it is highly likely that it would stick around Math SE for some time before some moderator finally decides to whack it.
Now you have answers from mods to the meta post about specific-flag from moderators and if we assume that zyx correctly summarized them in his question, links to 7 other posts saying that mods are not supposed to delete answers because they are incorrect.
Basically the answer seems to be: Don't flag posts like this, it's the job of community to handle this.
@user21820 So you still think that moderators should delete incorrect answers? Or are you specifically talking about incorrect answer by repeat offenders?
I still think that moderators should delete posts that they are confident are crank posts.
More generally, those in bad faith, namely by users who clearly don't want to bother to learn actual mathematics but yet pretend to be capable to teach others.
Unfortunately, given the locking nature of moderator deletion, I can understand that some people will disagree that even my criterion is sufficient.
@user21820 Since I cannot influence the rules for moderators and how they handle flags, to me the more interesting question is: How could this be handled by the community?
That would be an excellent question. Any suggestions? The delete queue doesn't seem to work well.
The big problem is that it is not easy to determine which users actually have the mathematical competence and hence the right and responsibility to handle junk posts
In this answer Asaf explicitly says that some users regularly look at delete votes in moderator tools (What you call delete queue, although it is not really a queue.)
However, I am not sure that many users do that and even if they do, there are much many delete votes now than in 2012. So the sheer volume can decrease the efficiency of this.
Yes that's a big problem. Which is part of why I resorted to flagging serious junk, hoping to get them cleared by people I know are mathematically competent to judge.
But of course that is not what we're discussing now.
Probably the only users who regularly visit that room are me and Daniel Fischer.
I guess that my posts in that room are about duplicates, no deletions. But I will continue to post there. And I will also mention the room on meta in situations where it could (theoretically) help. Both posting there and advertising it meta might be a way to restart the room. (If it is going to be restarted.)
Just guessing. Because I found it tiring to go through the delete votes list too.
I quit Puzzling SE because they upvoted greatly mathematically incorrect and unfixable answers but downvoted mine by appealing to (wrong) authorities...
I see. I'd prefer not to disturb people who do not wish to discuss such posts, and it feels weird telling people in a chat room, hey do you agree this should be deleted?
Hi, @MartinSleziak. I thought I'd ask here, because I don't really know where this question belongs...it's a continuation of your contribution in Const.Feedback.
oops, clicked enter. What are the various ways a user above the 20K threshold can search for deleted posts? I have no problem accessing my own deleted posts, and I can access "recently deleted" posts; I can see deleted answers to open questions...is there a means to access (recently) deleted posts by an asker?
I am unaware of possibility to search for deleted posts of other users directly on site. (You can have some luck if it is in google cache or some scraper site copied it.)
If you favorited some question, it will be shown in your favorites even after it is deleted.
Apart from favorites, maybe some other lists have the same property (flag history, for example...?). But I am not sure about this.
@amWhy I think that this description would be more fitting for quid, Normal Human, Mad Scientist and probably a few other users I do not recall right now. And several of the mods know lots of various technical details.
@MartinSleziak You're far too modest! Though, absolutely, quid is a wonderful resource, across the board!
Is/was Normal Human the user who changed names multiple times, sometimes montly, who came on the MSE scene most aggressively in latter 2014 - early 2015 (and perhaps persisted), in a sort of mission of "quality control"? The user who utilized (or took advantage of) the system's auto-delete function.
@MartinSleziak indeed deleted posts stay in the flag list, other lists including deleted posts are ones vote reopen/close/del/undel list yet not up/down I think. (Not sure about the last but I could not find a deleted post among my dv ones and that seems unlikely. It's also consistent with del votes on deleted posts being 'cleared')
Other than that I'll have to deny the description being more fitting for me. You explained me many things about the site, in particular about chat @MartinSleziak
Nevertheless, if there are situations when I am able to find almost immediately some post on our meta on meta.SE relevant to some issue, the is just confirmation of how much I procrastinate on meta. (And that's even when I have lots of other stuff I could/should be doing.)
Are mathematical errors in an answer that is otherwise reasonable and on-topic ever a sufficient reason for users (other than the answer-author) to delete that answer?
For a recent answer, the author might still delete or repair it on their own or in response to comments, given enough time...
