Questions tagged [answers]
The answers tag has no usage guidance.
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Better to post an answer with no source, or not to post at all?
Sometimes I read a new question, and I want to provide an answer, but I don't have the time at that moment to find the appropriate source citations.
Then, I will receive comments in my answer asking ...
user1095
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answer
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How should I cite an answer elsewhere?
Sometimes a Web page off-site — or a passage in a book, for that matter — answers a question perfectly. How should I refer to or quote that external source as my answer?
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Using Christian interpretations in answers
This question as inspired by the comments to my answer here. (See also my answer here.)
Is is proper, in the context of this site, to use Christian or other non-Jewish sources (for example, secular ...
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How should we handle Hebrew-only answers?
The language of Stack Exchange is English. On this site, many answers (and questions) will also involve Hebrew, and we don't want to discourage that.
This answer contains a citation in English and ...
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Dealing with incorrect answers
Suppose an answer is blatantly incorrect. (E.g. it quotes a Talmudic passage to answer the question, but the passage in question actually says the exact opposite.)
I would assume that normally the ...
- 49.8k
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Why comments and not answers?
Why is it that so many people leave answers in the "comments" section, as opposed to the "answer" section? (You may leave your answer in either section 😉)
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How to avoid answering in comments
Mi Yodeya has a very high standard for answers, and I highly respect them (us) for that. This is both in strongly asking for sources, always necessary in Judaism, all the more so with the inherent and ...
- 3,510
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How do we deal with Kabbalah mysteries as answers?
After recently asking for an explanation on a certain custom, I was given an answer that was garbed in kabbalistic language. Not being a kabbalist myself (nor would I suspect most readers), I asked ...
- 11.8k
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What is the benefit of combining answers?
I posted 3 different answers to a question and was prompted in a comment to combine my answers. I do not see any benefit to doing so as the answers are different, not necessarily complementary and I ...
- 14.7k
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Askers should see their answers' vote counts
Question authors should be able to see the count of upvotes and downvotes on answers to their questions in order to better evaluate the answers: an answer with 100 upvotes and 100 downvotes is ...
msh210Mod
- 73.7k
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Criterion for Voting
This community deals with questions that are subject to "eilu va'eilu divrei Elokim Chaim -- these and those are the words of the 'Living' G-d / G-d of Life." Such questions have a range of valid ...
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Is Mi Yodeya a Judaism Stack Exchange, or a Rabbinic Judaism Stack Exchange?
Before I really began to understand the profound nature of Orthodoxy, I was thinking to leave the forum because I tend to approach Scripture from a different perspective than Orthodox Jews do. I do ...
user2411
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answer
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Answering a question hinted to in a comment
Is it OK to answer a question, where someone had commented on the question with information that can really be used as an answer?
I thought of this when I came across this link where Menachem ...
user9643
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answer
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Answers that say "I asked my Rabbi and he said..."
Given that this website is not intended for issuing halachic decisions, are answers that offer no source other than "I asked my Rabbi and he said..." valid answers? What your personal rabbi tells you,...
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Is it OK to post extensive comments as answers?
Here and there, I see answers prefaced by "this is really just a comment that got too long" or the like (and after seeing this a few times I felt comfortable doing it myself, twice in fact). Is that ...
- 23.1k
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What to do when you only have a partial answer
Many times I find myself with relevant, sourced information when I look at a question, but won't have a complete answer. For example, in this recent question, the question asked for when large-scale ...
- 19.2k
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Multiple upvotes on a single question
Is there anything wrong with upvoting all of the answers to a single question? I realized that I've done this several times already, because I liked all of the answers. On the one hand, אלו ואלו, ...
- 23.1k
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Partially redundant answers
Mi Yodeya may have an issue that is somewhat unique among StackExchange sites. Because of the nature of questions and answers about Judaism, there can be many completely different answers to one ...
- 49.8k
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How much of an external article is it fair to quote?
The issue recently came up in some comments about how much of an external article it is fair to quote. I noticed some answers paste very long responses from elsewhere on the web, but this seems unfair ...
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Notification when an answer to your question is edited
I've noticed that as the question author you get notifications if there is a new answer, but not if an existing answer is edited. That doesn't seem right, as often edits are worth seeing, and as the ...
- 32.2k
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What's the point of posting an answer based on something that's already online?
If I find an English-language article online that directly addresses a question on Mi Yodeya, why should I bother going to all the trouble suggested in our citation guideline - citing, summarizing, ...
Isaac MosesMod
- 48.4k
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Are "see this source" answers link-only?
Is an answer that says basically "see what book x says about this" considered a link only answer?
Not that i've been seeing lots of these, i was just curious.
- 23.2k
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Someone answered a duplicate question
I was surprised when I saw a question rise to the top of Mi Yodeya's stack, that said "answered," while the question title said duplicate.
Is this a bug?
Here's a link to the question; here's a link ...
- 19.2k
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Questions asking to prove a negative
When someone asks a question asking to prove a negative (such as "is this true" or the like), should it be left up forever, or should it be closed after a certain amount of time, and would an answer ...
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Later comment(s) vitiates answer
Scenario: After the OP words a question in a general way and elicits a valid answer (and sometimes the answer) OP then comments (usually under the question) and includes qualifications which ...
- 12.1k
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What to do with now irrelevant answers?
I asked a question and wasn't sufficiently clear as to what kind of answers I was looking for. This resulted in several answers that didn't really address what I wanted at all. I edited my question to ...
- 21.1k
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Do we need something in between an answer and a comment?
Take a look at this question.
I submitted an answer. Shalom then submitted an interesting, relevant, additional point, that was meant to enhance my answer.
Someone commented that his answer was not ...
user1095
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Low-rep bounty-setters should be able to comment on answers
Someone with insufficient reputation to comment should nonetheless be able to comment on answers to a (not closed) question he set a bounty on. This would allow him to seek clarification of answers.
msh210Mod
- 73.7k
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Is a link-only answer to within MY acceptable?
@Scimonster I thought we decided that a mi.y link was OK. This is not to say, of course, that the other link shouldn't be expanded on :) – Shokhet 6 hours ago
@Shokhet, 1) 2 upvotes doesn't ...
- 23.2k
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Flagging as Not an Answer
I'm still having trouble understanding when the "Not an Answer" flag should be used.
I recently flagged a couple of answers to Is there a short Daf Yomi shiur online in English? as not being an ...
- 21.2k
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Several answers to single question; one answer or split into separate answers
Since there are "Shivi'im Panim LeTorah" (70 faces to Torah), often there may be several answers to the same question. This is often the case when someone asks for the reason for a custom, or to ...
- 19.1k
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Linking to specific answers or comments
How do I give someone a link to a specific answer or comment? I know I can, but the only way I can do it now is to go to my user's recent activity and grab the link from there.
Is there an easier way?...
Double AAMod
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Should we edit questions to include relevant information that is already in the answer?
Suppose there is a question which is rather sparse on details. Perhaps some readers won't even be able to derive the question from what is posted. But some readers understand what the question is, ...
- 49.8k
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Poor quality answers from the "good old days"
Many have observed that during the early days of the site, standards were still somewhat in formation, and many older posts lack the quality that would constitute a valid answer, sometimes asking ...
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What to do with an answer that's part-right, part-wrong?
Consider this recent answer about dealing with smoke detectors making annoying noise on Shabbat. In it, the answerer, coming from a point-of-view outside traditional Judaism but knowledgeable and ...
Isaac MosesMod
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Should an answer preempt comments
Often times an answer to a question may raise further questions. Sometimes the follow-up questions might be directly related to the original question, while at times they may be tangential.
This ...
- 49.8k
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Weird bug in answer text displayed
I noticed the following weird discrepancy between the answer text shown in my inbox and the actual post. The answer, as it appears in my inbox, begins "I read once that it stems...". However, when I ...
- 21.2k
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Duplicate answers where the higher quality answer was added after the lower quality answer
Following on this question, what should the policy be if an existing question with an existing answer gets a new answer that is higher quality (e.g. provides a source, maybe adds additional ...
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Deleting duplicate answers when the lower quality duplicate was added to an existing question with a pre-existing higher quality duplicative answer
So I had an answer to this question (actually I answered it on this question before Menachem(?) found the duplicate at which point I also voted to close as duplicate) deleted because it is a duplicate ...
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Editing without bringing question up
Is there a way to edit a question or answer without bringing it to the top of the list of questions? Sometimes I notice that I made a mistake in a question or answer (spelling, etc.) but don't fix it ...
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Crediting an answer previously posted by another
How should we relate to an answer where that answer has already been given by a previous poster with the same or greater detail? I assume this happens because the poster failed to read previously ...
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New answers to old related questions
Tosfos Within the Same Mesechta
Who is the voice of Tosafoth?
Tosfos vs Tosfos HaRosh
The above 3 questions relate to the history of the printing and editing of the Tosaphos collections. This page, ...
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Two questions, one answer [duplicate]
What should I do, when I've written an answer that would answer two (non-duplicate) questions, equally well?
One example of this would be my answer here, which answers the question that it's posted to ...
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Are answer posts of the form "your answer isn't..." okay?
One of the questions on Mi Yodeya is:
I remember hearing that Rachel Imeinu was buried in kever Rachel, but was only there for one night and then she went to Mearas Hamachpaila.
I can't ...
msh210Mod
- 73.7k
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Are links strictly necessary when citing a source?
This came up in respect to my answer here. I hadn’t seen a meta post with an official policy on the topic, so I figured I’d ask.
In my time here I’ve almost never linked to a source unless it’s some ...
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Are there any M.Y. criteria or policies in deciding when someone should post an additional answer vs. editing the first answer?
See this question. One user has posted 2 answers. It seems that they are merely different sources for answering the question. I'm wondering if it would have made sense just to merge these 2 answers ...
- 71.2k
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Is there a suggested waiting period prior to answering my own question?
I noticed in the M.Y. rules that it is fine for someone to answer his / her own question.
On a few occasions, I have posted a question that I already have an answer for. I usually don't like to be a "...
- 71.2k
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Summarizing Sources as answers
In this answer on Meta.Islam.SE, Caleb essentially suggests that summarizing the response of another scholar is an inappropriate answer for a SE question. He says
If you can actually research the ...
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Primary vs Secondary sources
Many answers on Mi Yodeya include sources, often from rabbinic literature. Many times the entire answer can be a quotation from such a source.
I would think that the simplest and best way to pose a ...
- 49.8k
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Answering a question that you voted to close
When is appropriate for a user that voted to close a question to go ahead and answer the question as well?
Granted that if their closed opinion wasn't accepted by the community, they shouldn't ...
- 32.2k