Questions tagged [off-topic]
The off-topic tag has no usage guidance.
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Are religious questions on-topic?
At some point we will have to decide if religious questions are on-topic, and where exactly we will draw the line to off-topic questions. There is a significant overlap between the skeptic and atheist ...
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Are political questions on-topic?
We just got the question "Is Obama going to shutdown the internet?" and despite the title there is a more or less objective question in there, namely if there are any plans to create a "kill-switch" ...
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Are questions of the "Did X say quote Y" on-topic?
Are quote/misquote attribution questions of the "Did X really say quote Y" kind on-topic for Skeptics SE?
Examples
Or are they more appropriate for https://history.stackexchange.com/ or https://...
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What sort of skepticism is on-topic?
I ask this question because of the number of questions which could (and should, I think) be considered off-topic, because the crux of the question is not skepticism. This question about statistics is ...
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Why was the evolution of sex question closed?
I noticed that the question "Do we know why animals have evolved to have sex for reproduction?" was closed by the community. I am curious why this is the case, as I can't see any comments explaining ...
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Should questions about "motivation" of organizations, rather than individuals, be considered OT?
I've just had my question Was Aeroflot SU2074 intended target in MH17 shooting? closed with reason "This question is about motivations, as such, it's off topic.".
This of course refers to Politics, ...
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How can reduce the number of off-topic questions?
There's an alarming rate of questions that are not skepticism. Rather, the user has a question about science and feels this is a good place to ask. It's very obvious in this question:
At any ...
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What if I don't have an online or easily accessible reference?
I have a question about something I'm skeptical about, and being a SE user, I naturally immediately checked the Help Center and FAQ. I found this FAQ post, and I'd like a bit of clarification for my ...
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Are legal questions on-topic?
Are specific questions regarding law and the interpretation thereof on topic? I can see it both ways. On the one hand, there are some widespread, but incorrect beliefs about some laws which I think ...
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Political campaigning to influence a presidential election on Skeptics, no one cares?
Once I read here that Sorry, but we don't care about your political opinions
But are we indeed so careless as to allow blatant political campaigning?
We witnessed a non-skeptical question on HNQ ...
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Is this a good question?
The question "Are people who win the lottery more likely to go bankrupt?" has already received 14 upvotes.
I think this not a good question.
It begins with:
It's been suggested that people who ...
- 18.1k
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Are questions about reasoning behind results off topic?
Just going over some of the unanswered questions today and came across these questions:
Are people who win the lottery more likely to go bankrupt?
Interpreting people's motivation from body language
...
- 18.1k
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Are applied mathematics questions on-topic?
This question currently has 2 votes to close. Hopefully I'm not asking this question prematurely, but are we to consider all future applied mathematics questions off-topic or on-topic?
I see where ...
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Questions about stuff learned in school
Is, "I learned [x] in school, is it really true" on topic or does there have to be a notable claim. Sometimes the things we learn are based on just A.) The half-informed understanding of our teachers ...
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Is asking "was the typo in the headline on this picture of a news site genuinely made" on-topic?
There is a picture circulating on social media of a BBC headline from 2017 about a major UK political figure with an unfortunate typo: https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Es5oYlpWMAYbvLg.jpg. I want to ask ...
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What questions can I ask at Skeptics SE?
I'm interested in making this site a better place and I want to make sure that if I'm asking a question this is the right place for it.
My main angst comes from trying to understand exactly what is ...
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How do you skeptically investigate Hitler's religion?
I ran across the following question on main:
https://skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/1821/hitlers-religion
On one hand, the question is formally a skeptical question, on the other how can one ...
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Why is this question about ET off topic?
Why is this question about https://skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/776/life-in-other-planets closed as off topic? Subjective & argumentative sure, but why off topic? Where would it be on ...
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When is the number of statements to verify too large?
My question from August 2015 got closed as too broad because it had too many statements (8) to check. OK.
But recently we had this one with 6 statements, and I remember seeing a similar one not too ...
user22865
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Is the strange lights question off topic?
This question:
What is the nature of ghost lights like Naga Fireballs, Will-o'-the-Wisp, Min Min Light, Hessdalen lights, Chir Batti, et. al
Asks for a scientific explanation of these phenomenon. My ...
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Is the question about "training while wearing weights" actually off topic?
I recently posted my first Skeptics question: Does training while wearing weights improve body performance?
I got some criticism towards some aspects of my question and even a down-vote before I ...
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Isn't it a bad sign that this site requires 3 one-page FAQs just to explain what it is about?
I love the stackexchange network of websites, and use a lot of them to learn stuff. I have a problem with skeptics, though.
I'm having a hard time figuring what the site is really about. Some ...
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Should topics covered by other StackExchange sites be considered off-topic?
This is a question spawned from comments to my overly broad opinion piece on the 90 day review. I started responding there before realizing that this really deserves its own discussion thread.
The ...
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Are religious miracle questions on-topic?
One meta-question has asked before if, in general, religious topics are on-topic.
The accepted answer from @MadScientist says:
I would personally consider pure religious question off-topic here. ...
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Why my UFO question has been closed and removed?
My question: I've found UFO on Google Maps, what is it? has been closed as off-topic.
It seems there are lot of questions about UFO here, like:
Is this a genuine UFO sighting or a hoax? (which is ...
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Is this question suitable for the site? "Did Gaza have the potential to become a 'Singapore' in the Middle East?"
I have seen claims by pro-Israeli commentators that, after Israel disengaged from Gaza in 2005, Gaza was no longer occupied and could have become a āSingaporeā of the Middle East if the international ...
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Appropriate question: Are gold prices a bubble?
Is the question "Is price of gold a bubble?" appropriate for skeptics?
My take is that skeptics is both an appropriate place to ask this question, and the best place to ask it of the available SE ...
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Victims of crime
Further to this chat, I find topics about non-notorious individual victims of crime distateful.
I understand it may be in the public interest, and/or relevant to public policy (e.g. because of police ...
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Are questions about repeatable experiments on-topic?
Are questions about the existence of repeatable, scientific experiments to validate a hypothesis on topic?
For example, there are two questions asking for experimental evidence for evolution, one of ...
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Are claims from conspiracy websites off-topic?
I had a comment on one of my questions that started like this:
in fact it's a conspiracy theory website. The mere fact that something is mentioned as "fact" there almost certainly means it's not.
...
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Is notability a sufficient (not just a necessary) condition to ask a question here?
Stemming from this meta-exchange and also in view of some recent disputes on a q, is notability a sufficient (not just necessary) condition to ask a question here?
As defined
A claim is 'notable' ...
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May I question the past findings of a tribunal or investigative body?
One of our standard close reasons is
Questions about unresolved current events and issues currently under investigation by a court of law, government, or other similar investigative body are off-...
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Are allegations of infamous crimes off topic for Skeptics?
This question was inspired by Did Michael Jackson sexually abuse children? as some moderators discussed the question with the OP in comments and suggested that perhaps Skeptics can not replace the ...
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why aren't question about religion closed as off-topic?
According to FAQ, religion questions are off topic, see: Are religious questions on-topic?
So why aren't all the questions about Catholic Church being closed? Why is there even a tag catholic-church? ...
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Are etymology claims off-topic?
I read the faq :
it's for researching the evidence
behind the claims you hear or read.
So why was my question, about a rumor I heard about the etymology of a word, closed ?
The point of this ...
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Are political questions on-topic here?
For example, "What's the real reason Bush attack Iraq?" or "Why people are religious?
user4951
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Should questions regarding public perception of skeptic issues be allowed?
I suspect my question title is a little vague, but the issue I am questioning is based on the closure of this question:
https://skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/1598/has-a-legal-case-ever-been-...
name removed
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Are very old claims on-topic?
The vast majority of questions on this site cover recent claims, but I have not been able to find anything in the Help Center or Meta saying that a claim becomes off-topic after a certain amount of ...
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Are questions about supposedly haunted places or objects on-topic?
There are a fair number of claims about supposedly haunted places or items, and some of these claims have been documented in articles and documentaries with somewhat specific claims (e.g. here) of ...
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Are questions about claims that can be empirically verified, but not at this time, on topic?
One of the basic requirements on this site is that questions must be empirically verifiable.
If a claim is notable, and could in theory be subject to empirical verification, but the likelihood of ...
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Question deleted
My question here https://skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/7098/is-there-enough-evidence-in-bible-quran-that-earth-is-indeed-5000-years-old
was deleted. Ok it was closed as duplicate first and I ...
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Asking for sources
Skeptics is a great place to get information on reliable sources and facts. Usually, one posts a claim (one is skeptical about) and the community comes back with really good links or citations for ...
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Change link in 'Notable claim' off topic close reason?
The first off-topic close reason has a link titled unreferenced notable claims pointing to FAQ: Must all questions be notable?:
Shouldn't the link text be notable claims? The way it is formatted now ...
user22865
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Why do you put a question on hold after OP shows an effort to improve it?
I asked a question 12 hours ago.
Do more "animal sacrifices, desecrations of cemeteries" happen at Halloween?
When I checked it back there was 2 close-votes and explanations about why it ...
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Is taking an idiom literally necessarly off topic?
When I hear idioms like "it's hard finding a needle in a haystack", "you can't have too many lifeboats on a ship", or "You can't teach an old dog new tricks", I sometimes wonder if it's actually true, ...
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Reasons for Conspiracy Theories
A lot of the questions on Skeptics revolve around the legitimacy of conspiracy theories or other theories. Is it considered off-topic to ask for the origins of these theories as separate questions? If ...
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Are questions about pyramid schemes and other scams off-topic?
We have the following question on our site about a possible pyramid scheme:
https://skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/232/multi-level-marketing-and-pyramid-schemes-how-to-recognise-pyramid-scheme-...
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Answers to the current issues that considered on-topic are helping to promote propaganda rather than clarify
One of the reasons I believe the current unconfirmed issues should be closed (deleted) ASAP is that answer to such questions are so weird and it helps to promote propaganda quickly instead of clarify ...
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Question about a dog collar
I have a question about what evidence there is for claims made by a company for a dog collar that treats certain things affecting your dog. I think on the Pet SE (for pet owners, breeders, caretakers, ...
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