Why is there a homework tag if the posts keep getting closed?

Question

Almost every time I ask for a specific concept using an example in a book, my post keeps getting closed. I didn't want for an answer to the specific problem or get my answer checked, but only to understand certain concepts. However, the only answer I get is the infamous "Homework are considered off-topic here, particularly when asking about specific computations instead of underlying physics concepts".

The problem is I'm not sure what I do wrong. I guess I keep repeating the same mistake, but I'm not sure to understand. I thought that by giving the book and the page could place a certain context. Furthermore, since I can't reach any moderator and I would like to fix this problem, the only place I found to find an answer is here, and to be honest I don't know if this is the right place.

Answer 1

I think this post emphasizes, once more, a real problem of PSE: some inconsistency between the stated policy of the site and how it is applied in practice.

The stated policy says

"A 'homework question' is any question whose value lies in helping you understand the method by which the question can be solved, rather than getting the answer itself."

Reading such a statement and taking into account the stress on conceptual questions, one would be induced to think that a question not asking for hints on a mathematical step or not confined to a specific exercise but focused on the right use of concepts would be acceptable.

In practice, this is not the case. I think a recent example is this question closed today as homework-like and check-my-work question. The question explicitly mentions its origin from an exercise in Pathria's Statistical Mechanix textbook. However, whatever its origin, I see a question on the issue of applying a formula thought valid for distinguishable particles to a case where no mention of distinguishability was present. In my opinion, the only possible answer to this question would address the method by which the question can be solved rather than getting the answer itself. Thus, perfectly in line with the policy statement, and useful for more persons than the OP. Instead, it was closed.

I am using this question as an example. Therefore, I would not like to discuss the motivations for its closure in detail. Certainly who voted for its closure thought it was the right thing to do. Nevertheless, as a member of this community, I would have a hard time explaining to a newcomer the exact reason this question infringed the stated policy of the site.

Without clear evidence of coherence between the stated policy and the practice, I see the risk of establishing on this site a tendency I often saw in forums about Physics. The community of the most experienced users unconsciously tends to adapt the threshold for acceptable questions to its increasing standards of quality. I think that some reflections on such a potential risk would be useful for keeping the PSE site an open and inclusive community.

Answer 2

In my opinion the homework tag shouldn't exist. This site should care about question quality only, not the motivation behind the question.

Furthermore, the homework policy should be renamed and not involve the word "homework". We want good questions, and we want to avoid questions that ask for solutions to specific problems without context; if we ask a question about a specific problem, we want to show what we've tried and ask for how to get unstuck, because that's useful insofar as it generates an answer likely to call out a pitfall or clarify a point of confusion.

More about this here.

Answer 3

In general, tags are very useful tool in searching the site.

Whether a question is on-topic or off-topic is determined by the Phys.SE community (partly via close & reopen votes), and its conclusion should in principle be independent of whether certain tags are applied or not.

Note that banning certain tags would not cause users to stop asking certain questions. It would only make it more difficult to identify them.

Answer 4

I follow GiorgioP answer and as first, maybe trivial, thing I stress the conceptual uncertainty about the word "homework": if I have a question about a passage regarding a propagator I can certainly ask for it, by experience I asked myself and I saw it done many times, but how if this is leaved as an exercise for the reader in some books; is this an homework? It clearly is not, because it wasn't in the first case.

This uncertainty seems to be solved, stated in the advice you cite, because a question is very likely to be categorized as homework if you are interested only in the conceptual structure of your passages and not of the theory you are considering: at the same time though, physics uses mathematics as a tool, and is inevitable that many physical questions involves mathematical uncertainties and errors, not just physical errors regarding the way the theory is thinked by the asker.

Also, as a personal opinion, the conceptual privilege reserved to the site quality, that make the site go against this type of questions, is dangerous since it puts the site way above the heads of the users and the moderators too, that make it exists, posing it far away from the intent of discuss physics; seems to be this idea of purity in the background that repels discussion and dialectic. Also this makes the site to have a too rigid approach that I think also quite ansiogenic for the new users, so detrimental for the site on the long term.

To conclude, I personally don't have anything against homeworks, but I understand that a low-limit should be put to avoid questions like: "solve me this exercise". I agree on this, but I think also there is too strict and rigid moderation on this, that in my opinion should be relaxed to make the site breathe a bit more. Nobody gains anything, and the richness should be in the discussion and in putting on the table different opinions: maybe I idealize too much, because every-day moderation I imagine to be quite harsh, because not everyone wants really this and many people want to just have their problem solved, but at the same time I think the site should remain open to give space to this spirit. And if an homework is a way to discuss physics, why not.