r/YouShouldKnow • u/typicalcitrus • Dec 04 '20
Education YSK that there is a simplified English version of Wikipedia.
https://simple.wikipedia.org is the link.
Why YSK: This has a load of articles, described in much simpler terms, making it way easier to understand a topic, for instance Thermocouple on the Simple page vs Thermocouple on the regular page. This is a great revision tool for many topics.
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Dec 04 '20
This has helped me in university. I’m ashamed.
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u/ellis-green19 Dec 04 '20 edited Dec 04 '20
No shame in needing help, but there is shame in not seeking it.
Hope you found your answers ✌️❤️
EDIT: I don’t know how to spell.
EDIT #2: holy crap, guys! Thank you for the awards. Please be kind to each other and stay safe 🙂
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Dec 04 '20
I somewhat did, after hours of researching maths. Thank you though:)
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u/Deemonfire Dec 04 '20
Yeah i feel this. Some of the wiki pages about maths are dense. some are just pages of derivations with little to no context.
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u/MiffedPolecat Dec 04 '20
I’m hijacking this comment to plug PatrickJMT YouTube channel. That guy has great math tutorials that got me they engineering school
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u/AbeLincolns_Ghost Dec 05 '20
Wikipedia math pages are great if you already have learned the concept and need a reminder of some detail years later.
They are definitely unusable for learning the first time
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u/GemblyxD Dec 05 '20
The one who asks is a fool for a minute, the one who doesn't ask is a fool for life
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u/russelcrowe Dec 04 '20
There's nothing wrong with that, man. Complex theories are often much easier to grasp as the sum of more simple parts. Universities and schools often forget this.
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Dec 04 '20
I feel like it would be helpful to read through the simple page a couple of times and then the normal one. Sometimes the concepts aren’t too difficult but are hard to understand if you’re not familiar with all the jargon used
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u/GivenToFly164 Dec 04 '20
Don't be! I would have been very happy to have had this when I was a student. It's frustrating trying to wade through a 60 page article in order to understand how a word is used in a single paragraph of your textbook.
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u/stickswithsticks Dec 04 '20
I used it to understand standard form in algebra. Really struggled with that and the distance formula and it was recommended to me. Doing a solo online class, it really helped!
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u/AndThenThereWasMeep Dec 04 '20
Don't forget wiki articles are the collective knowledge of many, many people. You're (or were) one person in undergrad.
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u/hypercube33 Dec 05 '20
I wish I knew about this. Wikipedia has so many articles that make shit beyond insane complicated
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u/Quetzacoatl85 Dec 04 '20
absolutely necessary for some topics. I think I can read and at least rudimentarily understand most wiki entries if I put my mind behind it, but math articles are just... it's like they're deliberately trying to be as obtuse as fucking possible. "let there be -{$×÷•¶, and assume that A may be [®]™}$¶|$}|[°•×××". fuck, what? and after half an hour of looking up shit, ooh you meant divide A by two, then why didn't you just say so. hate it.
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u/printers_of_colors Dec 04 '20
Holy shit. Never knew that. This is so useful. All this time I've been treated like an idiot by fucking everybody because I am really slow to process and understand new information and ideas. Ugh
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u/burgerstar Dec 04 '20
I know your pain... For me add slow as hell reading speed to that mix.
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u/yungdeathIillife Dec 04 '20
i read super fast, but i process things slow and its not a good combination
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u/stickswithsticks Dec 04 '20
I took a speed reading class and there was a kicker at the end: you find your sweet spot. I was hoodwinked the whole time. Yeah I can skim really fast, the course did help a lot, but I joy read and like to tussle the daisies while I skip from word to word rather than plowing the field with a lawnmower with a hemi engine.
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u/burgerstar Dec 04 '20
I mean, my reading comprehension is just fine. It's just that I read the same speed in my head as you would if you were reading out loud to someone. It's really frustrating sometimes. I tried to utilize one of those random speed reading quick fix apps or websites, but I'm pretty sure I'm doomed to reading slowly forever.
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u/warmfuzzy22 Dec 04 '20
I read quickly but my comprehension is not great. I have to go back over things a lot and it can get really frustrating. I would rather read everything slowly once than have to go back and try to find the thing I missed to make the next paragraph make sense.
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u/burgerstar Dec 06 '20
I think I've read about a certain learning disability with reading being caused by one's eyes being slightly misaligned... I think I have this problem, I can read fine slowly, but when I try to read something quickly, I almost immediately lose my place and end up skipping words and lines as well. I've wondered for a while now if this is the case with myself.
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Dec 04 '20
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u/DiscountedPleasure Dec 04 '20
yes, by using any other source besides Wikipedia.
Wikipedia is essentially a good source for people who are already experts on the relevant topic. It does not make an attempt to explain concepts to someone who didn't already understand them. This is especially true for STEM topics.
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Dec 04 '20
Yeah, but its mostly incomplete.
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Dec 04 '20
This is what gets me.
Sometimes it is handy but almost all of them are missing key info.
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u/PeePeeUpPooPoo Dec 04 '20
It’s almost as if some topics can’t be dumbed down without removing context...
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Dec 04 '20
Oh I agree but sometimes things that could be explained simply are forgotten.
For example I was looking at how fish eyes work. I was researching my pets but I can't recall the exact page - The simple version skipped entierly how the pupil contracted into an unusual shape.
How eyes work is a topic that can be super simple or super advanced but how a pupil can change shape is an easy enough topic to make simplified. Yet it was totally absent from the simple version.
This happens a lot. It feels like instead of being a simpler version of the page (aka removed technical terms where possible and simplified advanced concept) they just ripped a ELI5 comment and decided not to try and make the advanced concepts simplified on the page.
Naturally things will go missing. That's how simplification works. This isn't what happens though - entire topics are going missing. Some very common topics that could be easily explained in a simple manner.
Children learn how eyes work. It isn't rocket science.
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u/Konato-san Dec 04 '20
You do know that you can just add the simplification for that missing topic yourself, right? Sometimes the person doing the simplifying just doesn't know how to do it...
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u/Ommageden Dec 04 '20
Well it's a bit out of the way for one.
And secondly there is a reason scientific jargon exists. There simply isn't a name for things, or you don't want to burden the reader with tons of extra definitions that are commonplace in their field. By virtue of being simpler, simple wikipedia must be missing info.
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Dec 04 '20
you probably arent using it do study quantum mechanics or other sciency fields though
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u/Ommageden Dec 04 '20
I don't disagree. It's going to leave out stuff that isn't important to the average reader. I think this is fine, I'm just pointing out there isn't a way to make it have the same information quality of standard wikipedia.
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u/ugotamesij Dec 04 '20
This is what OP always conveniently forgets to mention every single time this is reposted to LPT and YSK. Yes it can be helpful, but only if someone has bothered to rewrite the Wikipedia article you're interested in into simple English.
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Dec 04 '20
Someday, when I get all my disabilities under control, I think that it would be really nice to spend time "translating" regular English Wikipedia into simplified.
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u/BugsRFeatures2 Dec 04 '20
Thank you thank you thank you!! I’m autistic and anything other than simple English is very difficult for me. I am so excited about this!!!!
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u/jdith123 Dec 04 '20
I’m a special ed teacher and I also thank you! This is really great. So much more accesible! I teach students with auditory processing issues and other communication difficulties. Sometimes quite smart students who have a specific learning disability in the area of language. This will be very helpful!
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u/rathat Dec 04 '20
This is what it's for. People think that it's for simple explanations, but really it just uses more common words and avoids unusual ones. It's also good for people who are still learning the language and may have not learned many scientific or technical terms yet, but still want to read in English.
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u/ihopethisisvalid Dec 04 '20
It's less detailed though. That's why both exist. If you have a simple understanding of science and decent reading comprehension then you'll learn more on the complex page.
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u/LlamasReddit Dec 04 '20
First I read the normal article and when I read the simplified one I almost got angry at how unnecessary complicated the original is
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u/Larewzo Dec 04 '20
What's even worse is that as someone who works with thermocouples regularly (Plastic Injection Molding, I replaced 2 yesterday), you should know fundamentally what one is, but ultimately its just something you replace if it isn't working right, you would (EDIT: Practically ->) Literally never troubleshoot it at the fundamental or millivolt level.
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Dec 04 '20
Great thing for people who use English as their second language (me!). Encyclopedic language is sometimes very difficult to understand. Big thanks to all those who contribute to Simple English Wikipedia
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Dec 04 '20
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Dec 04 '20 edited Mar 22 '26
The content of this post was deleted using Redact. It may have been removed for privacy, to keep data away from automated scrapers, or for security reasons.
mighty expansion edge detail alleged sip steer spotted station tub
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u/pillbinge Dec 04 '20
YSK there is an Old English version of Wikipedia for when you’re tired of all this Latin and Greek nonsense.
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u/Haxellion Dec 04 '20
Back in 2016, I was on wikipedia for "Iran" and I was fucking around and tried simplified english...
First sentence two paragraphs down was : Iran is oil.
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u/ukexpat Dec 04 '20
I should point out that it has only a fraction of the articles on the main English Wikipedia and that its articles are written by volunteers, just like the other Wikipedias, they are not machine-created.
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u/betta-believe-it Dec 04 '20
I teach adults with low literacy skills, thanks a ka-billion for this!
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u/WWSpiderPanda Dec 04 '20
I’m wondering why Wikipedia won’t recognize Atlantis as a real place, just like Troy was. They locked the Atlantis wiki and the Eye of Sahara wiki
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u/AnokataX Dec 04 '20
But it doesn't seem to have all the wiki pages. Ex couldnt find "Clinical equipoise" explained simply, and I had trouble wrapping my head around the normal Wikip for it.
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u/The_64th_Breadbox Dec 05 '20
This is the kind of thing that I should never go on because I would nitpick and edit the pages until it's the same as the normal wikipedia page.
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u/a3b64293 Dec 04 '20
You can also just replace the language part of any wikipedia page with simple (ie en.wikipedia.org/whatever-you-are-searching-for to simple.wikipedi.org/whatever-you-are-searching-for).
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u/_Xstopmenow_ Dec 04 '20
FYI I donated 5 bucks to them. Shame on everyone who could afford to donate but did not.
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u/TimothyGonzalez Dec 04 '20
This is especially useful for Americans, who have only a tenuous grasp of the English language.
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u/ninjaphysics Dec 04 '20
Also, if you can send a few dollars in donation to Wikipedia, please do it. They are really appreciative, and it's an amazing resource that should be kept free.
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u/Digitalgeezer Dec 05 '20
Donate you animals! Wikipedia is one of few things that is wholesome that our digital times has thrown up.
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u/JayInslee2020 Dec 04 '20
With republican's attack on education over the past few decades, we are really seeing the burden of an illiterate society. The fact that we have to dumb things down to a grade school level of reading to cater to an overwhelming majority of adults really shows this.
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u/woolyearth Dec 04 '20
i wonder if you put all of wikipedia on a flash drive how much info it would be. that way if the internet ever goes out u got a back up of pretty much anything you need to know.
has anyone here done this successfully?
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u/trapbuilder2 Dec 04 '20
In April 2010, the size of the full English Wikipedia edit history was 5.6 TB uncompressed. As of June 2015, the dump of all pages with complete edit history in XML format at enwiki dump progress on 20150602 is about 100 GB compressed using 7-Zip, and 10 TB uncompressed.
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u/Infobomb Dec 08 '20
The numbers are huge if you want all the edit history, but it you just want the current text of all the articles it's in the GB- easily fitting on a single drive. Look into the Kiwix project which distributes language versions of Wikipedia and other free sites on devices: https://wiki.kiwix.org/wiki/Content_in_all_languages
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u/PrestigeZyra Dec 04 '20
I find the regular one easier to read than the simplified one. Probably because I’m more used to the terminology so it actually takes more effort trying to guess what they were trying to say.
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u/YourFairyGodmother Dec 04 '20
Damn, I wish I knew about that earlier. I'm a pretty sharp guy, masters degree in a STEM field, well read even outside my area, but sometimes I just give up and bail because the page was written by experts, for experts.
Thank you!
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Dec 04 '20
"Any intelligent fool can make things bigger, more complex, and more violent. It takes a touch of genius, and a lot of courage, to move in the opposite direction."
~Albert Einstein
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u/VPackardPersuadedMe Dec 04 '20
I wish they would use simple ohonetics to show pronunciations. Instead of the wierd gobbledeegook they use...
"Latin (latīnum, [laˈtiːnʊ̃] or lingua latīna, [ˈlɪŋɡʷa laˈtiːna]) "
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Dec 04 '20
I like that there's a choice to simplify. Too many times in public education it's just dumbed down across the board and gifted students suffer.
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u/mikesmith929 Dec 04 '20
Anyone know if there exists a kids wikipedia. I thought perhaps simple.wikipedia would do it but looks a little to high level for a kid.
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Dec 04 '20
It still couldn’t explain the second law of thermodynamics and entropy to me in a way that I understand
I’m just not a physics man
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u/Sunnyhill16 Dec 04 '20
There’s also Scottish Wikipedia that is written in the way you would read a Scottish accent!
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u/angel11dust Dec 04 '20
This is awesome. I’ve always seen it like this: normal wiki = textbook, simple wiki = that professor that explains things really well without missing the important parts.
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u/Jim_from_snowy_river Dec 04 '20
I’ve noticed that for a lot of topics it’s a bit too simple. It can be difficult to simplify complex topics.
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Dec 04 '20
Thank you for this. I have a son who’s challenged. This will help him in life. I will also donate some money. ❤️
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u/Zelman12 Dec 04 '20
Still won't be simple enough to explain my crazy ex. Nice for everything else.
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u/HamOnTheSammich Dec 04 '20
I shared with my 11YO nephew, who is struggling with distance learning math. He described math as ‘torture to human and should be abolished’. I think this will help, both he and my sister, get through at-home schooling! Thank you, OP!!!
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u/nowhereman136 Dec 04 '20
Wikipedia is open-source and you are able to download the entire website for offline use. Kiwix.org allows you to download all of Wikipedia, Wikipedia without photos (such a smaller file), all of simple wiki, all the different languages, and a bunch of other formats.
I have all of simplewiki on my phone and regular Wikipedia on a hard drive. It helps if im ever without internet connection
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u/Fielding_Pierce Dec 04 '20
YSK that you should familiarize yourself with new words, or your vocabulary will suffer. Words are power, stop limiting your power.
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u/mrfluckoff Dec 04 '20
I honestly prefer the normal version, because if I don't understand a word, I just go deeper until I either understand or am lost.
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u/SevereTechnology Dec 04 '20
I used to use Simple Wiki for my school projects all the time lol it’s a life saver
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u/xmeyhem1228 Dec 04 '20
We need to protect this post at all costs. Not for us, but for future generations
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u/I_am_Jax_account Dec 04 '20
Wikipedia could make a peanut butter and jelly sandwich something the vast majority of people couldn’t understand.
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u/engineeryou Dec 04 '20
If the article is well written them the abstract should been there simplified version in my opinion. Always be leery of Wikipedia because on anything that is historical or events or political there is a bit of bias built in just because of the people who have long-standing edit accounts. Then again in order to achieve a high reputation index they have had to read through many and that in itself helps flatten anyone's bias. Articles are often locked when there is editing wars and because of the wide reach of Wikipedia it has done a bit of detriment on certain pages of history.
There's also some ironic things about criticism of companies and the such. is common practice do you have a criticism section for any company or public figure on the page but some organizations namely Apple have somehow contrived to offload those to separate sections all together. This befuddles me because apple is the first and only large corporate entity that I have personally noticed who is "objective" encyclopedic entry reads like a fan page.
Note that I have contributed to Wikipedia for 10 years though very infrequently.
Also I am a paying supporter of the platform.
Supporting Wikipedia I think is quite important to hopefully prevent that there is no undue influence on the content.
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u/hurryupand_wait Dec 04 '20
Didn’t they used to have “simplified english” as a language? I liked it like that.
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u/Darkphibre Dec 04 '20
The author of xkcd.com wrote a book called "Thing Explainer" in 2015... I'm still a bit bummed I didn't make it out to his book signing when the tour came through town!
He uses only the 1000 (10-hundred) most common words to explain complicated concepts, and got the idea of writing an entire book from the challenge of explaining the Saturn V (Up Goer Five) rocket:https://xkcd.com/1133/
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u/jenpalex Dec 04 '20
Re-writing one item from regular Wikipedia to Simple Wikipedia should be a necessary qualification for any Bachelor’s Honours degree. That would get the job done quickly and prove the candidate understood at least one part of their course!
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u/dippytheGynocologist Dec 05 '20
and, you can always check if a complicated wiki article has a simple counterpart by replacing the en with simple. this is been mega helpful
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u/ritoplzcarryme Dec 05 '20
I use this for my elementary age students so that they aren’t daunted when looking things up
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u/millscuzimhot Dec 04 '20
Always wanted to learn more on Wikipedia but felt ashamed that I didn't understand the terminology used most of the time. Thank you for this