[news.groups] Humanities domain

gsmith@garnet.berkeley.edu (Gene W. Smith) (01/25/90)

In article <9001242301.AA08664@apee.ogi.edu>, mehuld@APEE (Mehul Dave) writes:
>In article <899@athen.sinix.UUCP> es@sinix.UUCP (Dr. Sanio) writes

>>On the other hand, I don't blame anybody insisting in that
>>sytematic distinction (unless she/he explicitly expresses that)
>>to regard philosophy, social sciences or other fields of human
>>thought as non-serious or irrelevant.  On the Usenet itself, I
>>regret that there is no hierarchy which reflects those parts of
>>academic thought and research. Simply putting those topics under
>>soc, alt or talk seems a poor solution to me, too.

>As you say, this would require a very deep revision of structure of the
>news system.  Besides, some of the social sciences such as psychology,
>economics, education etc. have been already placed in the "sci"
>hierarchy so sci is not fully restricted only to the physical sciences.

  "Sci" was supposed to be for recognized sciences, not physical
sciences per se. But the structure could be revised in various
ways. One kluge which would not be too difficult to implement
would be a new top-level domain "hum" for humanities. Thus,
hum.history, hum.philosophy.misc, hum.arts.literature, etc.
--
ucbvax!garnet!gsmith   Gene Ward Smith/Brahmsgangster/Berkeley CA 94720
ucbvax!bosco!gsmith        "DUMB problem!! DUMB!!!" -- Robert L. Forward

xanthian@saturn.ADS.COM (Metafont Consultant Account) (01/25/90)

In article <1990Jan25.081719.2749@agate.berkeley.edu> gsmith@garnet.berkeley.edu (Gene W. Smith) writes:
>  "Sci" was supposed to be for recognized sciences, not physical
>sciences per se. But the structure could be revised in various
>ways. One kluge which would not be too difficult to implement
>would be a new top-level domain "hum" for humanities. Thus,
>hum.history, hum.philosophy.misc, hum.arts.literature, etc.

That looks like an _excellent_ idea.  The use of computers in the
humanities is ever increasing, and a top level domain would allow
schools (in particular) interested in these applications to focus
their interests more easily on pertinent articles, while allowing
those establishments subscribing only for commercially useful
information (and not finding it there) to select against such articles
more easily.

Of course, this could circle back to the (perpetual) arguments aobut
the need for a liberal education for, say, engineers, but let's not,
OK?

--
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