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Questions tagged [closing-questions]

This tag is for general questions about questions that have been closed because they are off-topic or otherwise do not meet the criteria defined in the FAQ.

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10 votes
1 answer
102 views

Amending the "closed as duplicate" message?

Currently, the closed-as-duplicate message states: This question already has answers here: followed by a link to the duplicated question(s). However, it happens that someone who asked the question ...
J-J-J's user avatar
  • 5,482
7 votes
2 answers
151 views

Should we close questions asking for help with model interpretation if the general issue has been discussed elsewhere?

Some questions on this site are of the basic form: "I ran this model and I don't know how to interpret these results." The individuals who ask these sorts of questions sometimes have a ...
Graham Wright's user avatar
2 votes
1 answer
115 views

How to request reason for closing

My question was closed for lack of enough detail and no private feedback was provided as to what detail is exactly missing, which is not how I read it is supposed to be. Even though I cannot think of ...
Feri's user avatar
  • 187
7 votes
4 answers
231 views

What's the difference between "needs more details or clarity" vs. "needs more focus"?

I often get locked into comment stalemates trying to get specific conditions on open-ended questions so that there is a clear answer or two to address the question. The problem arises when posters ...
AdamO's user avatar
  • 64.1k
11 votes
5 answers
263 views

How can we encourage new users to edit their closed posts?

New or inexperienced users are sometimes faced with their question (or answer) being closed without any detailed feedback, or even without any comments on their post. While this is definitely the way ...
Ute's user avatar
  • 2,596
9 votes
0 answers
216 views

Programming or data request confusion

I haven't been reviewing long, but it seems like almost daily I see questions closed due to programming or data requests. But to me the majority of these are more often statistical questions rather ...
Shawn Hemelstrand's user avatar
4 votes
2 answers
162 views

Why was this question closed if they are not directly asking for the answer of their homework?

As the title suggests, I saw this question from a new user here. The question was closed as self-study and I can understand why...on the surface it appears to be asking for someone to solve the ...
Shawn Hemelstrand's user avatar
3 votes
3 answers
189 views

Why are these blog recommendations questions considered off-topic?

There are a few Mathematical Statistics/Statistical Learning Theory blogs I enjoy reading, and wanted to ask on the main site for recommendations of similar theory-focused Statistics/ML blogs, as I ...
Stratos supports the strike's user avatar
12 votes
2 answers
299 views

How to ask a good [references] question?

It's very common for users to want to find references about a specific topic in machine learning, statistics, or probability. Often, these questions start from a place where the user doesn't know what ...
Sycorax's user avatar
  • 92.6k
11 votes
1 answer
195 views

Why does the “programming” closure message not mention Stack Overflow?

When we close questions that appear to be about programming, a message appears that links to Open Data or to a CV Meta post about software support. Not mentioning Stack Overflow seems like a gigantic ...
Dave's user avatar
  • 65.7k
-8 votes
3 answers
357 views

Problem with moderators trying to keep my question closed

I respect the moderators in general but this time their behaviour is just super weird to me. Please read these 2 links nn.embedding similar general purpose for float values how nn.Embedding algorithm ...
Farhang Amaji's user avatar
-8 votes
1 answer
187 views

Why can some people close others answer

So , it has been quite some time i started using this platform , and I was just looking at few questions that showed " this question is not accepting any answers " which means it must have ...
simran's user avatar
  • 387
0 votes
0 answers
78 views

How do I know if I added enough detail to satisfy the "question needs details or clarity" after being closed?

I recently asked this question: Why is the two-sample test giving me inconsistent results? It was closed afterwards and a comment was left requesting more details. I updated the question, but I'm not ...
Klik's user avatar
  • 197
11 votes
3 answers
748 views

3-vote close - how's it going?

UPDATE: While the testing period has ended, this change has been well-received by the community so we have opted to not reset the votes needed to close/reopen to 5 while we look at data. Please let me ...
Catija's user avatar
  • 101
5 votes
1 answer
129 views

How to make the question about the relation between statistics and set theory clearer?

Question in question: Is there any relation between intersection in set theory and correlation in statistics? It is closed as lacking details or clarity. According to one mod, the question "might ...
Ooker's user avatar
  • 329
10 votes
1 answer
396 views

Should we replace the "data set request" with distinct "this is an off-topic software question" and "this is not about statistics" closure reasons?

This is a follow up to Should we retire the "data set request" closure reason? My interpretation of the votes and answers on that thread is that there is some support for retiring the "...
Sycorax's user avatar
  • 92.6k
9 votes
2 answers
280 views

Should we retire the "data set request" closure reason?

Our community has 3 custom closure options (self-study, either not stats or about software, data set requests), plus two immutable closure options (migration, other/leave a comment). Users with more ...
Sycorax's user avatar
  • 92.6k
12 votes
3 answers
216 views

Handling of cross-posted questions when flagged

I have been flagging questions that are cross-posted. Usually this leads to the question being closed; sometimes, my flag is marked helpful but no action is taken and the question is left open. Can ...
D.W.'s user avatar
  • 6,708
6 votes
1 answer
278 views

Why is motivation important

Why should questions contain motivation and why does the absence of motivation make questions ambiguous? I wrote this question Probability Mass Function making the Truncated Normal Discrete and it was ...
George Ntoulos's user avatar
3 votes
1 answer
118 views

Are closed questions eventually deleted?

I asked a question about a derivation once, and someone supplied an answer to it. Soon after, the question was closed, however, but I was still discussing and referring to that person's answer there. ...
develarist's user avatar
  • 4,015
22 votes
0 answers
313 views

Closing "software questions"

TL;DR: Recently, it seems to me like we have been a little trigger-happy about closing questions as "only about software/programming". I ask that we please ease off a bit. Our help page on ...
Stephan Kolassa's user avatar
17 votes
1 answer
256 views

Question closed, user asks it again

I made an interesting observation today. A user asked a question which was closed some time later, because the question needed more focus. As I scroll up, I see the same question being asked again ...
Stochastic's user avatar
29 votes
2 answers
536 views

Should we reduce the vote threshold for closing questions?

Currently, it takes 5 close votes from users with the vote-to-close privilege ($\ge3000$ reputation), or 1 vote from a moderator, to close a question. If the question is being closed as a duplicate ...
gung - Reinstate Monica's user avatar
10 votes
2 answers
315 views

I object to the closing of the following question

I see no other forum to raise this, so I'm raising it here. Question: Is there any consensus or literature on the proportion of font parameters within plots? I feel that this is a reasonable thing to ...
baxx's user avatar
  • 936
1 vote
1 answer
62 views

Why was my flag declined while the question was closed for the flag reason?

I flagged this post as "needs details or clarity"; my flag was declined, while the question was closed as such. Am I missing something?
desertnaut's user avatar
3 votes
1 answer
101 views

Should we have a close reason like 'low value/level or trivial question'

It is nice that people can ask questions and get answers to whatever question they have. However, we tend to close and deleted questions when they are out of the bounds of the website (not interesting ...
Sextus Empiricus's user avatar
2 votes
0 answers
81 views

My question was closed, why? [closed]

I'd like to know why my question (Quadratic terms in glmer) was closed here. I think my question is not off-topic because it's about statistics and not about the programming itself. My question is ...
Numbermind's user avatar
2 votes
1 answer
136 views

Why was the question closed?

The post, General expression for $\hat \beta_1$ in multiple linear expression is asking for a closed form expression of part of the coefficient vector in a linear regression model. Nevertheless it has ...
Jesper for President's user avatar
14 votes
1 answer
199 views

Quant.SE is no longer in Beta. Can we add it as a migration target?

Occasionally we get questions with no statistical content, such as Return on bonds and stocks So our choices are to either close as off-topic or migrate. But right now, only a mod could migrate ...
Sycorax's user avatar
  • 92.6k
8 votes
0 answers
296 views

Homework question put on hold for "demanding an answer" even though, I did show what my own thinking/approach to the problem was?

This post about a question that came up in a test was put on hold, presumably because I am "demanding an answer". But I'm not, I clearly explained what my thinking was and how it differed from the ...
Akaike's Children's user avatar
19 votes
1 answer
235 views

Community moderating vs systemic attacks

I see a lot of programming questions here. I remind people that programming questions are off-topic here, that they could be useful for Stack Overflow, and that the requirements are a minimal working ...
AdamO's user avatar
  • 64.1k
10 votes
2 answers
236 views

Should we remove the "datasets" close reason from the list?

Our recent proposal for adding one more close reason was declined. The reason was that we could re-use the "datasets" reason Questions about obtaining specific datasets are off-topic on Cross ...
Tim's user avatar
  • 140k
2 votes
2 answers
102 views

Question titles cannot be similar to those of a closed question

I wish to ask a question with a similar (or identical) title to a question that is closed. But I'm not able to do this. It seems to me that this is a mistake. If the previous question is closed ...
user664303's user avatar
-5 votes
2 answers
170 views

Is my closed question without merit?

As per the moderator my question isn't appropriate: Variance formula amplify outlier instead ignoring it! I am learning stats and I tried many resources over internet and books but I could not get ...
VISHAL DAGA's user avatar
1 vote
2 answers
76 views

Can we fix up the "Should we trust statistics?" question

I was just writing up an answer to this question when it was decided that it should be closed. I understand why it is closed; the title alone makes it seem both a bit inflammatory and opinion based, ...
Cliff AB's user avatar
  • 21.4k
11 votes
2 answers
248 views

Extract software-specific default close reason

Almost four years ago there was a discussion on Meta that lead to formulating the "not about statistics" default close reason description as following: This question appears to be off-topic because ...
Tim's user avatar
  • 140k
4 votes
1 answer
83 views

Why do we close programming questions instead of migrating them to SO?

I have the (possibility wrong) impression that most programming questions are closed with the motivation "this is not about stats, but about programming, or etc.", rather than being migrated to SO. ...
DeltaIV's user avatar
  • 18.3k
12 votes
1 answer
218 views

Do we have an authoritative answer on why validation accuracy can oscillate or even increase, when validation loss keeps increasing?

I know that accuracy is an improper scoring rule, thus it shouldn't be used to choose among classifiers. In particular, it should not be used to choose the best hyperparameters for a NN. However, ...
DeltaIV's user avatar
  • 18.3k
18 votes
1 answer
327 views

Do you flag absolute nonsense questions?

Here: https://stats.stackexchange.com/questions/381309/cobbler-needed-right-now Is a "question" from a bot or a troll. Do we ever bypass "vote to close" and use the flag function if a Q is complete ...
AdamO's user avatar
  • 64.1k
10 votes
2 answers
161 views

What to do with a question which is a duplicate of a question on Math SE

This question What is a distribution over functions? is a duplicate of https://math.stackexchange.com/questions/2297424/extending-a-distribution-over-samples-to-a-distribution-over-functions but I ...
DeltaIV's user avatar
  • 18.3k
12 votes
0 answers
57 views

Improve closure-to-migrate voting

We often get questions that focus on how to do something using R (or Python, rarely SAS, MS Excel or others), with little to no statistical content. Such questions are off-topic and should be closed. ...
Stephan Kolassa's user avatar
14 votes
0 answers
202 views

What should we do with HW questions where the person says "I have no idea how to start"?

Our guidelines for homework question say to use the self-study tag and tell what you've tried. But what about when a person says, "I have no idea where to start?" Should such questions be closed? ...
Peter Flom's user avatar
  • 125k
5 votes
1 answer
106 views

What to do with a question which asks about R packages and how to fit RBF networks

This question How to fit a RBF network in R? asks an off-topic question (which R package to use to fit RBF networks) and a question which, while on-topic, is very likely a duplicate. Should I close ...
DeltaIV's user avatar
  • 18.3k
7 votes
1 answer
154 views

Should we have a canonical question about coincidences?

Right now, this question is marked for closing as a duplicate of this one. Yet the titles and subjects are totally different at first glance - and someone searching for something similar will have ...
Peter Flom's user avatar
  • 125k
14 votes
2 answers
1k views

Is there a generic question to which we can redirect questions of the type "why does my neural network not generalize well?"

Thanks to Sycorax, we have an excellent question which can be used to close as duplicate (most of) those questions about neural networks which can't overfit the training set: What should I do when my ...
DeltaIV's user avatar
  • 18.3k
6 votes
1 answer
142 views

When closing old unanswered but upvoted questions, consider downvoting down to zero (right?)

Some of us are actively scavenging old questions and voting to close some of them as off-topic or unclear. This is great. If such a question has zero score, then it will be automatically deleted ...
amoeba's user avatar
  • 106k
6 votes
1 answer
54 views

Is this question in the reopen queue and if not, why not?

This question was edited while being on hold by me. This should have pushed it to the reopen queue. However, this does not seem to be the case: A reopen review task does not appear in its timeline – ...
Wrzlprmft's user avatar
  • 2,341
-6 votes
1 answer
223 views

Why is "kjetil b halvorsen" bumping up old and closed questions?

Our active statistican kjetil b halvorsen is consistently modifying old questions by adding/removing tags. This closed question is an example. The bumped questions ...
SmallChess's user avatar
  • 7,301
6 votes
0 answers
90 views

Issue with locked question

This locked question "exists because it has historical significance, but it is not considered a good, on-topic question for this site, so please do not use it as evidence that you can ask similar ...
luchonacho's user avatar
  • 2,748
26 votes
3 answers
586 views

"Help I have some data and need to analyse it what do I dooo?"

I have been on this stackexchange long enough now to see there is quite a lot of questions along the lines of: Help, I'm a data science intern/amateur statistician and I've been given a load of ...
Ingolifs's user avatar
  • 1,734