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==Fast review by ]==
:::'''<-- Comments indented to this point are my responses to Garrondo's comments.''' (Garrondo, as I keep saying this is going to take some time, and I'll have to do it in pieces. Since your points and mine, new and old, cross-reference one another, it might be the best use of your time if you wait until I say I'm done before you go over it. Really your "points 1-5" posted Feb. 15 are the most important thing, but I want to address your earlier points first.) ] (]) 03:26, 7 March 2010 (UTC)
===Garrondo's comments and edits===
First of all I want to congratulate EEng for his work. The article is very complete right now, with many citations and a well researched.
However after a fast review I find several issues; specially with style:
In general I found the tone most according to a novel, historic book or journal article, but not to an encyclopedia: style in an encyclopedia should be more "cold" with less adjetives and valuation expressions, even if they are in the original sources. Some examples are:

:*Weighing 13–1/4 lb (6 kg), this ''"abrupt and intrusive visitor"'' (completely irrelevant)
:::'''I cannot agree that an article is supposed to be "cold," as you say. Factual, neutral, verifiable, etc. -- yes. But not cold. Quite the opposite: an article should be engaging and inviting, including details which, perhaps, don't ''have'' to be there, but which nonetheless increase the reader's understanding of the context, sometimes operating at different levels for different readers. So, for example, ''Boston Medical & Surgical Journal's'' reference to Gage's tamping iron as an "abrupt and intrusive visitor" to Gage's noggin is just a fun detail many, but to a sophisticated reader interested in the history of medicine, it conveys the sense of bemused wonderment found in writing about Gage at the time (foreshadowed in the lead -- "The case...calculated to excite our wonder...) and offers a window into the less stuffy and more stately, more literate style of medical wrioting of the time in contrast to today (one of delights of researching Gage, by the way). You won't find writing like that in ''New England Journal of Medicine'' -- which believe it or not is the modern title of ''Boston Med & Surg J!'''

:*Despite Harlow's ''skillful'' care (Irrelevant and common sense: otherwise is clear to everybody he would have died)
:::'''See below.'''

:*Harlow's 1868 presentation of the case is ''by far'' the most informative (An irrelevant valuation)
:*A similar concern was expressed ''as far back'' as 1877 (better to say in 1877 since we can not know if there has been anybody saying it between him and McMillan)
:*''Aside from the question of why the very unpleasant changes usually attributed to Gage would inspire surgical imitation'': that is quite irrelevant and highly journalistic. It could simply be eliminated.
:::'''Macmillan's paper on the (lack of any) relationship between Gage and lobotomy explains why this ''is'' relevant, and I've added a note on the subject to the article,'''
A second problem I find is the great overuse of verbatim citations. The importance of the longer ones is out of discussion. However sentences such as
:''By November 25 Gage was strong enough to return to his parents' home in Lebanon, N.H., where by late December he was "riding out, improving both mentally and physically." In April 1849 he returned to Cavendish and paid a visit to Harlow, who noted at that time loss of vision (and ptosis) of the left eye, a large scar on the forehead, and "upon the top of the head...a deep depression, two inches by one and one-half inches wide, beneath which the pulsations of the brain can be perceived. Partial paralysis of the left side of the face." Despite all this, "his physical health is good, and I am inclined to say he has recovered. Has no pain in head, but says it has a queer feeling which he is not able to describe."''
are really tiring for the reader; when they could easily converted into prose My proposal in this case would be something similar to:
:''By November 25 Gage was strong enough to return to his parents' home in Lebanon, N.H., where by late December he was improving both mentally and physically. In April 1849 he returned to Cavendish and paid a visit to Harlow, who noted at that time loss of vision and ] of the left eye, a large scar on the forehead, and a skull depression of two inches by one and one-half inches wide. Despite all this Harlow considered that he was almost completely recovered.''

Finally there is also an overuse of unneeded brackets and '' (I do not know the name in English), both quite tiring to reading:
In addition to verbatim citations examples are:
:*then compact ''("tamp down")'' : Could simply be eliminated
:::'''People don't seem to know what a "tamping iron" so some explanation is needed. But I rewrote to eliminate the quotation.'''
:*A "fungal" infection: Why not A ]?
:::'''Because to Harlow a "fungus" was (OED) "spongy morbid growth or excrescence, such as exuberant granulation in a wound" i.e. the body's own reaction to the wound, not an infection (though this growth was itself clearly infected severely, probably by bacteria; see Macmillan 2000, p.61 for more). Putting "fungal" in quotes alerts the reader that the word is not being used in the usual sense. Even though I'll be reverting your change in this and many other cases, the exercise has been extremely helpful, because it shows where explanatory text (or a note) should be added (e.g for "fungus").'''
:*consistent with a "social recovery" hypothesis: consistent with a social recovery hypothesis.

I'll try to propose further improvements (probably more important than the stylistic changes proposed) along this week. Bests.--] (]) 08:09, 8 February 2010 (UTC)

====Editing====
I have the article according to some of the simplest of my above points. However other possible eliminations are more open to discussion. I am going to go ahead with some changes with the aim of simplifying language and structure of some sentences and eliminated not very relevant data. I will add here any sentences I eliminate and their rationale for elimination so if somebody does not agree it can be added back.--] (]) 15:20, 9 February 2010 (UTC)
====Gage's accident====
*''(via a laborious process which today might best be thought of as chiseling)'': Not really relevant to topic and complicate too much structure. Topic is Gage and his accident, not the method of drilling rock
*''this "abrupt and intrusive visitor" was said to have landed some 80 feet (25 m) away.''. Too much novelesque language but does not really add info (abrupt and intrusive). "Was said to have landed": As everything else in the article we base it in original and secondary sources. Unless there is a reason to doubt it it can be eliminated. Sentence changed to: ''it landed 80&nbsp;feet (25&nbsp;m) away''.
:::'''It would be incorrect to say, "it landed X distance away" because reports of the distance varied, and since it's a quantitative statement it needs to be qualified as inexact. The only alternative to "...said to have landed..." would be to just say it landed "far" away and that's hardly helpful to the reader. (The distance does matter because it puts a limit on the speed as the bar left Gage's skullm yucky as that sounds).'''
*''Despite Harlow's skillful care''. Eliminated skillful: Do we have any indication that it was above what is expected for a physician of that time? Did he do anything unusual? It probably was an average care.
:::'''Harlow's management of the case was creative and well above the norm for the time. I've added cites to Macmillan's and Barker's discussion of this.'''
I will continue with other sections along the week.--] (]) 15:20, 9 February 2010 (UTC)
====Subsequent life and travels====
*''in New York City (the curious paying to see, presumably, both Gage and the instrument that injured him) although there is no independent confirmation of this. Recently however, evidence has surfaced supporting Harlow's...'' There is no confirmation for this but neither there is for almost everything... We base our knowledge on Gage in Harlow's, and there is no reason to doubt on its veracity, specially with the later sentence. Changed to: ''both Gage and the instrument that injured him). Evidence has surfaced supporting that Gage made public appearances in the larger New England towns'' For the second sentence a reference is needed.
Bests.--] (]) 15:29, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

===EEng's thougts on above===
:::Garrondo, your careful attention is very much appreciated! And I want to mention that you (along with ] and others) did the really hard work of building the article from scratch long before I got involved two years ago. Many of your recent changes point out weaknesses (some of which I knew about and hadn't got around to ). But many show misunderstandings -- you don't seem to have absorbed the sources cited for the material you're changing, and often the statements in your edit summaries are factually incorrect. To avoid the article carrying misinformation too long, I'm going to revert some of those changes immediately, making the best explanation I can in the edit summaries; later (maybe over the weekend) adding further explanation here.

:::Beyond straight-out factual issues are your concerns about whether certain material is relevant, or whether material can be paraphrased, rather than quoted, without loss of meaning. Again, you really need to read the context of a given quote, as found in the cites, before paraphrasing it in a way which you assume to be equivalent, or which changes the meaning in "minor" ways which you assume are safe. Similarly, you can't assume that omitting this or that material won't damage the reader's understanding of the case ''it its context,'' unless you carefully check the cited material from which it came and secondary sources discussing it. Interpreting Gage -- particularly, making sense of the conflicting things written about him in the 19th century -- requires careful attention to the shifting medical and popular meanings of terms we take for granted as settled today. An example of how much less settled ideas about the brain were in Gage's time: it wasn't even generally recognized that injury to one side of the brain tends to affect movement or sensation on the opposite side of the body, much less did many mid-19c physicians accept that brain injury might affect "higher functions" such as language and behavior. So in saying a patient "recovered," he might -- depending on his training and doctrinal inclination -- only mean that movement and sensation are unimpaired, any behavioral changes being ascribed to something other than the brian injury, or simply ignored as not even medical issues in the first place. That's why the article ''quotes'' Harlow's and Bigelow's statements about Gage's "recovery" -- to acknowledge them as the two men's individual wordings, each needing individual interpretation according its source. (For example, Bigelow was hostile to phrenology, while Harlow was almost certainly influenced by it to some extent.) To simply write, by paraphrase, that Harlow said Gage was almost fully recovered, leads the reader to interpret the word ''recovered'' in its modern sense, comprehending the far wider range of functions for which we now believe the brain is responsible, compared to some (but not all) physicians 150 years ago. And to change Harlow's words, "His health is good, and I am inclined to say he has recovered," into a narration that ''Harlow considered that was almost completely recovered'' absolutely changes the meaning as a modern reader will interpret it, especially when one considers the question in light of everything else Harlow writes. These issues are extensively discussed in Barker, Macmillan 2000, Macmillan 2008, and other cited material.

:::You omitted Harlow's mention of Gage's hard-to-describe "queer feeling in the head." This is a phenomenon often associated with certain brain injuries -- see A.R. Luria's ''The Man with a Shattered World'' -- and tying Gage in to Luria's description 100 years later vividly ties Gage to the modern theory of brain-injury rehabilitation, for those with the background to recognize it. This is another example of text working at different levels for different readers, and should be retained.

:::Contrary to what you say, not every physician was a "doctor" at the time (and in fact for a long time in the UK, some classes of surgeons were styled ''Mr.'' not ''Dr.'').

:::In other cases, you've made edits which, on simple grammar and punctuation alone, change the meaning into an incorrect or ambiguous one on its own face, having nothing to do with interpretation. Example: ''Harlow noted loss of vision (and ptosis) of the left eye'' makes it clear that the loss of vision, as well as the ptosis, affected the left eye ''only.'' Your text ''loss of vision and ptosis of the left eye'' is unclear as to whether ''of the left eye'' applies to ''loss of vision,'' or to ''ptosis'' only -- ambiguously suggesting that the loss of vision might have been in both eyes. The parentheses correct this. (Commas could be used instead, but in a sentence with many commas already, parentheses help subordinate this phrase to the larger structure. You seem to dislike parentheses for some reason, but they are completely acceptable in good writing, when used carefully. The same goes for dashes (&mdash;) as well, I might add.)

:::Another important point (I had meant my comments to be brief, but it's not working out that way...): Contrary to what you say, almost everything Harlow tells us about Gage's movements ''has'' been independently verified one way or another -- see Macmillan 2000, 2008 especially. That's why, for example, it's specially called out that the Barnum appearance is unverified (despite several ransackings of Barnum archives in locations throughout the US).

:::As I said, I'll make certain more urgent reversions now, others in time, and if the edit summaries don't satisfy you please start a list here, where we can continue discussion on individual points. In the meantime, please continue to make further changes you think are helpful. I'll either leave them alone (or build on them), revert with explanatory edit summaries, or (in many cases) revert while adding explanatory text so the text won't mislead future readers the way it has you. That seems the most efficient way to do this -- no need to discuss everything in advance (unless you feel the need) -- just be bold and we can revert-discuss as necessary. But please do more carefully review the cited sources before making further changes. Misplaced Pages Excelsior! ] (]) 22:13, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

:::''(Later)'' Well, Garrondo, I'm sorry to say I ended up reverting almost all your changes. There's an explanation on each individual edit summary, though in a few places I'll add more explanation here on Talk, but that can't be for a few days. But (and I really mean this) this has really helped, because it showed how many places extra explanation is needed. You'll see one added note already (which I fear you might think frivolous, but it's really not -- the tenor of the times was important to the fate of the case in medical history) and I'll be adding at least two others, one on "fungus" and one on "drilling" -- probably a few more as well. Please do keep making proposed changes, frustrating as that may seem, because they really are helping me see the article in a new light. And please feel free to "push back" here on any of my reversions. ] (]) 02:31, 11 February 2010 (UTC)

I do not agree with most of your explanations and I believe that at least in most cases they are related to a conscious or most probably unconscious sense of ownership over the article. From now on I won't edit any more the article since I do not feel that collaboration is really welcome. Having said this I still hope that we could make a better article together. I will point out some comments, if I feel they are heard and addressed I will continue pointing more, if not I will simply leave you at your own. --] (]) 09:48, 12 February 2010 (UTC)

:::Oh dear! I was afraid something like this might happen. I really don't want you to feel that way -- remember, I contacted you especially asking for your thoughts, and that was sincere. But look, the only way to work together to make the article better (and there's lots to be done) is to discuss our different points of view. I said I would annotate your original comments in the next few days, and I'll do that, and then we can discuss from there. I don't know any other way. In the meantime if some of my edit summaries don't satisfy you, list them here for discussion. Similarly, please annotate my reasoning above where you disagree. But you really, really have to read the sources cited (the secondary ones, I mean) to understand why many things are the way they are. ] (]) 12:38, 12 February 2010 (UTC)

More than offended I had the feeling of work being useless. Nevertheless I still want to try to work in the article because it is an article I am really interested and in general I believe you have done good work. However I would change to an approach which leaves to you all decisions regarding the article. I will only do peer review, commenting in the talk page. It will be up to you to decide on using it or not and it is there and then were you would have to prove how much open to change you are. Bests.--] (]) 18:23, 12 February 2010 (UTC)

===More comments from Garrondo===
Some of my editions were intended to eliminate some quotation marks. I have counted more than 140 which makes 70 quotations. When I read the full article they make me really tired and they are far from improving prose. From my point of view the article will improve if many of the direct quotations are converted into prose.
(More comments soon).--] (]) 10:09, 12 February 2010 (UTC)
:::'''I did a quick check and only two or three of your changes involved dropping quotes, and in those cases they set off unusual terms with which most readers would be unfamiliar, such as "social recovery." If there's a Misplaced Pages article to link to, that would be better than quote marks, but I can't find one. As I write I realize some of these cases could use italics instead, and maybe that would be better. But I have to get to work now. Let's talk later. ]''' (]) 12:38, 12 February 2010 (UTC)

That is because I preferred to try what I thought that were going to be simpler editions to more complex ones. I would not use italics, since the problem is exactly the same and additionally the article will not be consistent. Solution should be to convert into prose. There are many places that using the exact same words as in the primary source is not at all a necessity. Some probable examples
*"a vainglorious tendency to show off his wound," an "utter lack of foresight: why not simply ''a tendency to vainglory from his wound'' and ''lack of foresight''
*"up and down stairs, and about the house, into the piazza," and while Harlow was absent for a week, Gage was "in the street every day except Sunday," his desire to return to his family in New Hampshire being "uncontrollable by his friends...got wet feet and a chill." He soon developed a fever, but by mid-November he was "feeling better in every respect...walking about the house again; says he feels no pain in the head." Harlow's prognosis at this point: Gage "appears to be in a way of recovering, if he can be controlled." (There are 4 quatations in 3 sentences!!!) A possible alternative for the second part would be something similar to: He soon developed a fever, but by mid-November he had recovered from it, was walking again and had no pain in the head. At this point Harlow thought that he was going to get over his injury if he could be controlled. (I am really tired today; I have just given an speech in which curiosly I have talked about Phineas Gage; so I do not feel capable of thinking something for the first part of the sentence; and anyway these are only examples).
*"riding out, improving both mentally and physically.": is it really necessary to say the "riding out"? Does it add ANY information? Why not simply improving both mentally and physically and no quotes?
*"upon the top of the head...a deep depression, two inches by one and one-half inches wide, beneath which the pulsations of the brain can be perceived. Partial paralysis of the left side of the face." I think the part of the pulsations is probably much to gory and does not really add much. How about something like: and at the top of the skull a depression two inches by one and one-half inches wide which put in direct contact the scalp skin with the brain's surface. Gage also suffered from partial ] in the lef side of the face.

With rephrasings similar to the ones above we should be able to eliminate many of the messier quotations(I will point some more ones on Monday).--] (]) 18:25, 12 February 2010 (UTC)

On the other side I agree completely with delldot on the article having a non-neutral, essay-like tone with the bullets section being the most clamorous example.--] (]) 20:09, 12 February 2010 (UTC)

In a more general perspective the article from my point of view gives undue weight to the misuse of the case in comparison to the importance of the case: While in the lead it is commented that it has had great importance in the history of neuroscience nothing else is said but a line to Damasio's theory afterwards. I find the misuse section very interesting but it should come only after a whole section commenting at least some of the following points:
*1-How has the case influenced the knowledge on the relationship between behavior and brain.
*2-How has been used by different schools of thought (again only a line in the misuse of the case is said, while the fact that two different schools used it as an example on opposite theories is not really a misuse).
*3-How it is in accordance with the knowledge on the functioning and damage consequences knowledge we have today on the frontal lobe
*4-How it is still used as an example in many textbooks (lead should only be a summary of the text below, the line that it is said in it should be expanded in the text)
*5-A more in-depth coverage of Damasio's theory.

Otherwise it is using a Non Neutral Point of View. The fact is that the consequences commented by Harlow are common in people with frontal lobe damage, so Harlow's description of Gage sequels is still today a valid one. The fact that there may be some factual incorrections in the description should not be given more importance. In this sense only one author (an important and fruitful one nevertheless) says that the description is not correct so the article would be greatly improved if this was shown.--] (]) 11:37, 13 February 2010 (UTC)

:::Hey, Garrondo, I've started work on adding my comments and explanations to your comments above, but it's a big job and not nearly done (it's not really something that can be done piece by piece). But I have made some changes to the article which I hope address some of your concerns. Your points 1-5 above are good ones, and I'd much rather talk about them (substance of the article) and worry about use of quotes and other stylistic stuff later.
:::One particular thing I'm realizing is that you seem to think the article questions the accuracy of Harlow's description of Gage's behavior. It absolutely does not do that, and I've tried to make that even more clear. The issues with Harlow's description are these:
:::*it's unclear ''when'' the different things he says about Gage apply -- some may apply soon after the accident, others years later. And once you realize the possibility of Gage having made a substantial recovery over the years, it becomes really important to figure that out.
:::*''Some'' of what he says comes second or third hand, and so must be taken with caution (in particular, such stuff may be incomplete)
:::*As discussed already in my comments further up, words like ''recovered'' are very tricky to interpret, depending on the medical training and background of the writer
:::I think it's also very important that you read up on the key secondary sources -- pardon my saying, but from some of your comments it's clear you haven't done that. And I can understand that -- there's a lot to go through. But the fact is you're the ''only'' person taking a substantial interest in the article, your concerns are quite sensible, and there's no way we can have a productive discussion on e.g. your POV concerns unless you have access to the cited materials. Here's what I consider essential reading: Macmillan 2000 (the book), Macmillan 2000 ("Restoring" paper), Macmillan 2008 (), Barker, Ratiu, plus and , and finally a Macmillan paper not cited, "Phineas Gage: A case for all reasons" . If you have trouble getting any of those I can help -- I'll even send you Macmillan 2000 if you really need it. It's that important to me that we be able to work together well. (I'd also like to know more about your talk on Gage.) ] (]) 15:28, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

The truth is I do not have neither access nor time to read the secondary sources that I have not red (Mostly McMillian). It is true that I have not red them, but I do not doubt on the conclusions you draw from them. In that sense I believe that the distortion and misuse is a section that clearly should be maintaineed. The problem is that what I do not see anywhere in the article (but a line in the lead which should be a summary of the article which is not right now) why the case has had such an impact. This missing section is probably the most important point in the article, since with out it the article would be a non-notable anecdote of a survivor. Moreover the misuse section does not make sense without a previous section where it is said how the case has been used since its occurrence until today. We should center our efforts to decide wether this section is a neccesity and what should include.--] (]) 16:11, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

== Great article! ==
I read the whole thing, was drawn in and was fascinated, really fantastic. It's appropriate for subject. Should be featured. Shame so many people don't recognize talented and quality work, commercial encyclopedia's would pay good money for this. The comments above about "cold" writing being required at Misplaced Pages is just lol. In fact Misplaced Pages is 95% awful writing (myself included) so when we see actual rare good work, the crowd can't stand it because it sets off the rest to look so bad and amateur. Anyway, don't take my word, look at the user reviews at the bottom of the page, and article view statistics. People love this article. ] (]) 03:38, 13 September 2011 (UTC)
:Yes. A lot of that "professional" quality comes from the work of ] in 2008-2010. This article was once rated a "Good Article" (in 2007), but was delisted in 2008, before EEng started working on it. It might be worth renominating -- however EEng has not edited since March of this year, so would probably not be available to deal with issues that arise. I could probably take care of minor stuff, but I'm definitely far from an expert on Gage. ] (]) 15:29, 13 September 2011 (UTC)

::<del>I'm sorry to say I just got out after six months in prison (they block Misplaced Pages) so it's comforting to find such friendly voices here on the outside.</del> ''('''Just kidding about being in prison -- you didn't really believe that, did you?''')'' I can't deny I'm tickled by the praise for the article above and below. I did put a lot of work into it, but it's no false modesty when I say that it was others (Garrondo especially) that did the essential work of putting it together in the first place. If I'd started it on my own from scratch it wouldn't be nearly as good. ] (]) 01:09, 16 September 2011 (UTC)
::::<small>Just stating for the record that it was me who missed the "just kidding" part. You are all, therefore, warned as to the competency of my editing! --] (]) 18:14, 14 March 2012 (UTC)</small>

::P.S. I'm amazed at how little (relatively) the article has changed while I've been gone, but of course I'm gonna look it all over now. Y'all please let me know if I you think I do something unwise. ] (]) 01:35, 16 September 2011 (UTC)
:I echo the praise. Far too many Misplaced Pages articles are cold and sterile (if sometimes littered by the leftovers of earlier POV wars). The passion in this one makes it much more informative and interesting. Where such passion would get in the way of objectivity and NPOV, it of course would need to be toned down. And it's unrealistic to assume that all of our articles will ever get such treatment. But let's not tone it down in a search for anodyne consistency of style. I respect that there are a range of criteria for this, but as far as I am concerned, this is more deserving of being a Featured Article than many others we have. ] (]) 17:10, 13 September 2011 (UTC)

: Yes. Very interesting read about a very interesting man. The author(s) of this article certainly did him justice. By the way, does anyone else thing that Phineas Gage bears a striking resemblence to Christopher Reeve? ] (]) 19:17, 13 September 2011 (UTC)
::The resemblance to Reeve is frequently commented on. Search for ''Reeve'' (see esp. the July 24 comment). ] (]) 01:09, 16 September 2011 (UTC)

== Comments ==
I see this excellent article has been the subject of numerous comments already so I'll try and keep this relatively brief. I should also say at the start that I haven't consulted any of the secondary sources cited in the article so my comments should be read under the presumption of my own ignorance (I could probably get most of the articles cited but I'm less certain I could locate Macmillan's book-length treatment).
Coverage: As a reader, the one item I'm left dissatisfied about is the coverage of the manner in which the Gage case was used to advance or support theories relating to cerebral localisation or other aspects of psychology, behaviour and brain function. As it stands this is limited to a brief mention of a 19th century dispute in regard to localisation theories and Antonio Damasio's hypothesis linking the frontal lobes to emotions and decision making. indicates that Harlow's (1868) account was, at least until 1974, the second most cited source in 20th century psychological texts. I would like a better sense of what theories or hypotheses Gage's case was used to illustrate or support, however erroneously.

Style: In regard to the writing style, I should preface my remarks by stating that it is excellent overall and I wouldn't favour changes that are likely to render it less engaging. However, I feel there is at times an overuse of both parentheses and dashes. I think, personally, these should be used somewhat more judiciously. Dashes are useful in lending a particularly emphasis to a section of text but retain that effect only when used sparingly. Parentheses, used to clarify a point or term, I'd really only include when absolutely necessary. Otherwise, if overused, both dashes and parentheses can lend something of juddering effect to the reading experience. In regard to the use of dashes, I think that this is most evident in the lead where in many instances I would advocate the use of commas instead. If say, you removed about half of the dashes, the text they are removed from may flow better whereas their effect where they are retained would be greatly enhanced. Similarly with the use of parentheses, some should probably be retained but many, I think, should not and the information would be more easily digested if commas were substituted for brackets or if new sentences were introduced. In fact, in some instances notes could be used.

Footnote 38 should follow the bracket, no?

Note C: I'd actually like to see some of this note integrated into the main text (esp. "The leading feature of this case is its improbability ... This is the sort of accident that happens in the pantomime at the theater, not elsewhere").

Note K: "Contrary to common reports" - assuming this observation is derived from Macmillan, why would it need a separate citation?

An excellent article overall. Will it be nominated for Good or Featured article status? ] (])

==GAN, McMillian and Gage==
First of all I want to say that I greatly admire the work done by EEng in this article, which has led it to probably become a great piece, with fine writting and really good documentation. However, I have stated several times that while McMillian is probably a great source, it is not a definitive one, and certainly there is no consensus with his position regarding the well-doing of Gage.

In the section above EEng said: ''Just for the record though, it turns out Gage did not function "badly", but actually quite well.'' This comment defines exactly the problem I find with several parts of the article, since it clearly overstates the importance of McMillian theories: it would certainly be more accurate to say that ''it has been proposed by an investigator that he did quite well'', or that ''some evidence points towards him doing better than previously thought''.

I find all sections till the "theoretical use and misuse" very balanced, but from it (included) to the end of the article I believe that some undue weight is given to McMillian, giving the impression that there is consensus on his theories. I find specially troublesome the "use of the case" section, where only a few lines are given on how the case has been used along the history of neurology. However, this section should probably be one of the most important ones in the article, since independently of how truly was the case of Gage he has been an icon used for over a 100 years to explain frontal lobe disorders. This section should explain how has he become such an icon, and it certainly should give minimal importance to McMillian. Moreover, the article should also make clear that many of the problems that at some point have been proposed that he suffered are consistent with frontal brain injuries and that the MRI and neurological knowledge on the prognosis of other similar cases point towards him certainly suffering some kind of cognitive problems for the remaining of his life.

EEng has stated several times that he only has basic knowledge on neurology and neuroanatomy, and he recently indicated in other article that he was involved in the preparation of one of McMillians works. While none of the two facts actually invalidate his huge acomplishments in this article, they may be hindering the advance of the article in what I think are the final stages towards GA and even FA and work with other editors is probably the only way of moving forward from this point.

In summary: I do not think right now the article is up to GA status although it is probably close, with only some (not huge) problems in balance of content along the full article (McMillians importance should be down-toned at some points) (criterium 3) and an (important) lack of content in another section (criterium 4).

I have been involved in the article, so my evaluation does not count as the requiered review for GAN, but I hope that nevertheless is taken into account.

--] (]) 07:40, 31 May 2013 (UTC)

:Some editors know from earlier discussions that I am the second author of Reference #20, and first author mentioned in Note Z, of . I prefer not to broadcast this because (a) I do not want to be seen as playing the "expert card" and (2) my professional work requires that any internet presence connected to my real-life identity be extremely low-profile. I ask that other editors help keep it that way by referring to my identity only obliquely. (I'm not in the CIA or anything, so it's not like you'll be responsible for my death, but it's the nature of my work that everything I write can become the subject of discussion.)
:To get this discussion restarted, let me pose a question which I think will be illuminating:
::''The article says that Gage died in 1860, citing Macmillan. But most sources () say Gage died in 1861. So how come the article doesn't present this as some kind of controversy, explaining that sources conflict as to the year Gage died? Or should it?''
:Discussion of this question should encapsulate, in miniature, the larger question Garrondo is raising.
:] (]) 02:22, 17 June 2013 (UTC)

== Soft hyphens ==
:::::::::<small>''The following is copied from ]. The edit in question, by Bender235, changed the markup (a) <code>&amp;emdash;</code>, (b) <code>&amp;endash;</code>, and (c) <code>&amp;shy;</code> to (a) a literal em-dash(—), (b) a literal en-dash (–), and (c) a literal soft hyphen, which is nonprinting and invisible in the edit window.</small>

What was the purpose of these changes? En- and em-dashes are hard to distinguish in the markup, and soft hyphens improve layout and appearance -- why did you <del>remove them</del>? <small>''''</small> ] (]) 01:52, 29 May 2013 (UTC)

:Soft hypens are a bit too much Insp. Gadget for Misplaced Pages. If you look at the source of the article then, it is basically unreadable, which is something Misplaced Pages should always avoid. --] (]) 09:05, 29 May 2013 (UTC)

::I see. And you changed the mdash/ndash markup to literal mdashes/ndashes because...? ] (]) 11:33, 29 May 2013 (UTC)

:::Because ] suggested it. And I don't see any reason not to do it. --] (]) 18:07, 29 May 2013 (UTC)

::::I said why you shouldn't do it in my initial post here: the literal em- and en-dashes are very hard to distinguish in source. So in removing the soft hyphens you impaired the quality of what the reader sees (and summarily discarded a lot of someone's work) in the name of improving what the editor sees -- a tradeoff already made, in the opposite direction, by those who actually edit the article. Then you changed symbolic dashes to literal dashes, which does nothing at all except impair what the editor sees. Please don't make choices about what is or isn't convenient for the article's editors if you're not one of them. ] (]) 13:07, 30 May 2013 (UTC)

:::::Okay, you better get off the high horse here. I've been editing Misplaced Pages long enough to have an educated opinion on what's convenient for editors and what is not. That ] overkill you (or whoever) introduced to that article is simply ridiculous. I mean, <code>...sec&amp;shy;ond, com&amp;shy;pen&amp;shy;sat&amp;shy;ing...</code>, what the hell is that? Could you name any plausible scenario in which it would be necessary for the viewer's browser to break a single word three times? Is there anybody browsing Misplaced Pages with a 10px screen, or what? --] (]) 13:34, 30 May 2013 (UTC)
:::::Brought this case to ]. And by the way, just because you contributed to a particular article more than I did ]. --] (]) 13:54, 30 May 2013 (UTC)

::::::I'm perfectly comfortable up here on my high horse, thank you.
::::::*Multiple soft hyphens allow a word to be broken at the one best point among several choices. That you think they imply breaking a single word over several lines calls into question your claimed extensive experience.
::::::*As it turns out your edits didn't even remove the soft hyphens -- what you actually did, using an automated tool you apparently don't understand, was to substitute a literal soft hyphen for each occurence of <code>&amp;shy;</code>, similar to your substitution of — and – for <code>&amp;mdash;</code> and <code>&amp;ndash;</code>. But since literal soft hyphens are nonprinting (except at end-of-line), by doing so you have made it not only (as previously explained) very difficult to visually distinguish an en- from an em-dash in the edit window, you've now made it ''completely impossible'' to see where the soft hyphens are. Good work.
::::::*This article is full of medical terms and majestic 19th-century quotations, making hyphenation very helpful in avoiding unsightly underfilled lines, particularly in narrow captions and multicolumn notes/references. Your argument that readability of source text (seen by less than one editor per day) trumps readability of formatted text (seen by thousands of readers per day) is nonsense.
::::::*In any event this particular choice, in this particular article, was made (or accepted with no hint of objection) by editors actually working on (or at least monitoring) it. This has nothing to do with ownership -- if you showed any interest in substantive edits to the article that would be quite a different matter from what actually happened i.e. you dropped in to impose your personal ideas of what markup should look like, and moved on.
::::::*When you gain consensus at MOS for regulations micromanaging soft hyphenation please let us know, assuming the universe has not run cold by then. In the meantime, since you apparently don't know how soft hyphens work, or what the automated tool you're using actually does, think twice before applying the word "ridiculous".
::::::] (]) 22:42, 1 June 2013 (UTC)

::::::::You're barking up the wrong tree. I'll give you a chance to reply at ] and explain what people there describe as a "joke edit" of yours, before I revert your edit. --] (]) 13:46, 2 June 2013 (UTC)

:::::::::Please, no more metaphors -- so far you've got me "barking up the wrong tree" while on "the high horse".
:::::::::*Your insistence that you are combatting "soft hyphen overkill" is ludicrous since, as already explained above, ''your edit did not remove the soft hyphens'' but merely changed them to a form making then impossible to see in the edit window. (That the soft hyphens are still there is easily seen via the hyphenated linebreaks in the live article e.g. in most image captions.) This makes no sense at all.
:::::::::*Talk:MOS is for discussion of changes to MOS or of MOS interpretation, not forum-shopped editing disputes unrelated to anything in MOS.
:::::::::*Soft hyphens are part of Misplaced Pages markup, and in the absence of guidelines to the contrary they exist to be used according to the consensus of editors of the article in question. I am copying this discussion to ] so we can hear if any of them finds soft hyphens as objectionable as you do.
:::::::::] (]) 03:47, 4 June 2013 (UTC)

:::::::::::::<small>''End of copied discussion</small>

I would recommend that both of you take a deep breath... The tone of this conversation has not been really productive. Regarding hyphens... I agree with EEng that to change them with literal literal mdashes/ndashes is a bad idea with no positive effects. On the other hand the use of soft hyphens is a tradeoff between readibility of text and accesibility of editing, being the two of them important (this is the encyclopedia that anybody should be able to edit). I have to say that sometimes I have taken a look at the editing text and it does take quite a lot of effort to understand it, so Bender may have a point there. On the other hand in the absence of policy changes in format in an article should be first consensuated.

As a conclussion: I would rather not to use them unless in very specific cases since it is true that use is really extensive at several places of the article and they might be contributing to editors not being able to contribute in the article, while their positive effect is a matter of subjective aesthetic preference (I have for example no problems with spaces).

--] (]) 06:57, 4 June 2013 (UTC)

:I actually don't want to have this discussion here, but rather with a broader audience on ], but let me just reply to this: ''"Your insistence that you are combatting "soft hyphen overkill" is ludicrous since, as already explained above, your edit did not remove the soft hyphens but merely changed them to a form making then impossible to see in the edit window. (That the soft hyphens are still there is easily seen via the hyphenated linebreaks in the live article e.g. in most image captions.) This makes no sense at all."''
:It makes perfect sense, because the problem with soft hyphens aren't the soft hyphens themselves, but the effect they have on the readability of source code. I mean, lines like <code>inap&amp;shy;pro&amp;shy;priate sex&amp;shy;u&amp;shy;al behav&amp;shy;ior, ina&amp;shy;bil&amp;shy;ity or refus&amp;shy;al</code> are practically unreadable to human eye. Imagine a new editor (or any, for that matter), spotting a typo in this line and wanting to fix it: he/she would most likely have no idea what to do with this mess.
:Like I said, the problem aren't the soft hyphens themselves. What matters to me is keeping the source code readable. --] (]) 08:44, 4 June 2013 (UTC)

::These <code>&amp;shy</code>s certainly make the code much harder for the editors. Is it worth this inconvenience in order to give the reader a better article? Sure but I don't agree that this is happening. You might be reducing the blank space at the end of lines but you do so at the expense of breaking words up. A word broken over two lines is harder to read. I could see a use for soft hyphens where the word is very long and/or the space is very narrow but this is not the case here. Also, I believe Bender's suggestion to take the discussion to WT:MOS is quite reasonable; the use (or misuse) of soft hyphens is not just an issue for this article but is relevant for most articles. ]<sub>&nbsp;]·]</sub> 13:45, 7 June 2013 (UTC)

{{od|2}}
]
]
Well, I think the difference seen in these screenshots ''does'' represent giving the reader a better article.

Most of the soft hyphens are in captions and notes, where the layout is narrow. I also added them in places I saw bad breaks and underfilled lines, particularly in verbatim quotes not subject to editing anyway.

I agree I've never seen any article so generously hyphenated, but so what? I don't buy the idea that soft hyphens are the straw that breaks the markup-complexity camel's back -- the markup in this article, as in any extensively annotated article, is already very complex. (Garrondo, just today in reference to a certain quotation you said "I was going to be bold and move it but I have been unable due to the complex syntax used." Um, but this was ''after another editor had removed all the soft hyphens'' -- so should we now remove all the < refs> as well?)

Based on the screenshots I hope most can agree that soft hyphens are justified in at least ''some'' places. If editors want to discuss particular instances (or classes of instances, or some systematic way of deciding where to soft hyphenate) that's fine, but if not then mass-removal is throwing the baby out with the bathwater, and smacks of ] or perhaps WHAT&shy;THE&shy;FUCK'S&shy;ALL&shy;THIS&shy;SHIT&shy;I'VE&shy;NEVER&shy;SEEN&shy;ANYTHING&shy;LIKE&shy;IT&shy;SO&shy;IT&shy;MUST&shy;BE&shy;WRONG.
{{clear}}
] (]) 02:47, 10 June 2013 (UTC)

:I'm not convinced. Most articles never use soft hyphens, and they look OK. If long words in narrow columns cause problems now and then, you might sometimes justify a soft hyphen in such words if you can't fix the formatting to not have images on both sides or whatever is causing the squeeze. But the only way to get there is to remove all the soft hyphens and start over. Where did they come from, anyway? You? ] (]) 03:57, 10 June 2013 (UTC)
::Consensus at MOS discussion for this specific articles seems that they are overall unnecessary. Moreover, the theoretical improvement throught their use is quite subjective: personally from the two images you show I find more aesthethically pleasant the first, since I really dislike breaking a word in two and have no problem with double blank spaces. I agree with their removal and then discussing if there are any places where they are essential. Also: my problem with editing is specific to this article which is really, over-marked up (and I think I am an experienced editor). Eliminating the soft hyphens might not be the solution (as you say I would have neither been able to change the quote), but it will certainly make editing easier. In this sense I think that your example using my comment is not really fair. --] (]) 07:31, 10 June 2013 (UTC).
:::Thank you, EEng, for the screen shots; I think that they well illustrate my point. Given the choice between the text with overly wide spaces and the one with a broken word, the first seems a whole lot more readable. Of course, this isn't actually the choice we're faced with; WP doesn't adjust spacing to fill the line but leaves a blank space at the end of the line (as far as I'm aware, though I've only checked Chrome, Firefox & Internet Explorer). Either way, though, it seems to me that in general breaking a word up over two lines is too high a price to pay for avoiding a little stray space. On looking at versions of the page with and without soft hyphens, it seems to me that the soft hyphens don't really do much in the way of removing line length inconsistency and the most prominent/noticeable difference is the broken words. When and where soft hyphens may be beneficial is under discussion at WT:MOS; the general consensus is that they are undesirable unless we're dealing with quite long words and/or quite narrow spaces. I don't see either here. Throw out the bathwater, there was no baby in the first place. ]<sub>&nbsp;]·]</sub> 07:25, 12 June 2013 (UTC)

==Undue weight of first quote==
To have a long quote on the misuse of the case in the lead is in my opinion to give undue weight to such misuse. It certainly is not mentioned in most sources on Gage and is only a central point in McMillans theories. While I think the quote is a good one, I feel that it would better fit in the specific section within the article. I was going to be bold and move it but I have been unable due to the complex syntax used.--] (]) 19:24, 9 June 2013 (UTC)

:It's not mentioned in most sources on Gage because most sources on Gage are just a few sentences. There are only two modern authors I can bring to mind who discuss ''in any way'' the theoretical treatment of Gage, and both emphasize the doctrinal misuse of the case. One of those is Barker (cited in article) and the other is Macmillan's 600-page book and 15+ papers over 25 years. There is no controversy or dispute about Macmillan's conclusions (which are not, as you call them, "theories") and much commentary on it explicitly highlights Macmillan's theoretical-misuse point with approval -- for example (among many others, and detailed cites on request):
:*Ammons, ''Psychological Reports'' (2001)
:*Goldenberg, ''Cortex'' (2004)
:*Eling ''Contemporary Psychology'' (2003): "Macmillan’s study is a colorful picture of how scientists (and subsequently all kinds of people in society) used a particular case to convince others of their own theories."
:*Crichton, ''Lancet'' (2001)
:*Saling, ''Australian & New Zealand Journal of Psychiatry'' (2001): "a study of the mutations that creep into the historicoclinical record in medicine"
:*Long, ''Neurosurgery Quarterly'' (2002). "Even some of the most prestigious academic researchers have disseminated erroneous information about this most important injury and its outcome"
:*Hayward, ''Br J for the History of Science'' (2002): "a stunning example of the ideological use of case histories and their mythological reconstruction."
:Among early sources, exasperation with theoretical misuse and distortion was expressed by Smith, Dupuy, Ferrier, and Jackson (all cited in article)
:] (]) 21:13, 9 June 2013 (UTC)
:P.S. Wait a second... I just realized there is no "long quote on the misuse of the case in the lead"! What are you talking about? ] (]) 00:45, 10 June 2013 (UTC)
:OK, now I know what you're talking about -- the pullquote just after the lead. I agree it looks awkward there, and I've moved it as you suggest. ] (]) 04:45, 10 June 2013 (UTC)
::<s>I do not say that McMillian is wrong and he certainly makes a point that Gage could have recovered better than thought (although it is a theory since it is far from proven as we still have very little information- him appearing in pictures or even having a job are not a clear-cut proof that he had no personality changes-. He does however prove that the case has been exagerated) , but the misuse of the case should be given similar importance to other parts of the article. Right now the quote of the lead seems to indicate in my opinion that the case is most famous because of its misuse than because of its use, which it is certainly not the case. I am just proposing that it is moved to the specific section of "misuse of the case". Independently of whether the case was true or not as told, he is not famous because of the misuse, but because it is believed that his personality changed.

::At the very least (I am not an expert on the bibliography) A Damasio disagrees with McMillians, and uses his case as an example of personality changes due to frontal lobe injuries, with his theories having a great impact and no mention in them of the "abuse". Similarly Stuss in his (really important) book on the frontal lobes also uses Phineas as an example of personality changes due to frontal lobe injuries without any mention to its overuse. Finally all recent modellings (Ratiu, H Damasio) of the injury should also be some indication that Phineas is still more important because of what his changes could have been and have been thought to be than to what they might really have been.</s> --] (]) 07:23, 10 June 2013 (UTC)
:::I had neither seen your last comment nor your change: problems of following the watchlist from bottom to top.--] (]) 07:41, 10 June 2013 (UTC)
::::I have finally moved the text down to the specific subsection on misuse. --] (]) 09:25, 10 June 2013 (UTC)

{{Talk:Phineas Gage/GA1}}

== Revision to the introduction ==

I have made to the Introduction, but only to put it forward. I did like the previous introduction, but maybe it can be simpler, and I hope this will help. If it is reverted, perhaps we can discuss the following and incorporate any that are agreed upon.

'now remembered'->'remembered' as he has only ever been 'remembered' for these things.

+'at the age of 25' as I think it helps the first sentence stand alone - combined with birth and death dates it helps the reader understand he lived many years after the accident.

Regarding '—at least for a time—', I feel that any recovery he made is best relegated to later in the introduction, as his fame is due to the improbable nature of the physical accident and survival, and the medical interest in the effects. The extent of his recovery was not known until recently, meaning it was not an important aspect of his notability, and in any case the recovery fits within 'effects on his personality and behavior'.

"no longer Gage" - the sentence was already used 'profound effects'. I think "no longer Gage" can be omitted without loosing too much of the punchiness, and removing it simplifies the sentence considerably.

I feel that the last paragraph of the introduction, about the daguerreotype and social recovery hypothesis, needed to be more of a summary of the recent findings (the 2008 advert, 2009 daguerreotype, and 2010 portrait) and the impact these findings have had on scholarship and our understanding of the man. Describing the 2009 daguerreotype and not talking about the 2008 advert and 2010 portrait felt a bit imbalanced and odd.

It would be nice to say something like 'With no new primary sources about Gage having been made public since 18??, there has been three new portraits and a report unearthed since 2008, sparking a scavenger hunt in North and South American.' :-) When was the last 'new' info, prior to 2008? <span style="font-variant:small-caps">] <sup>'''(])'''</sup></span> 05:26, 13 June 2013 (UTC)

== The accident ==

I note that we don't have any details about his life before the accident. Did he have brothers or sisters? Who were his parents? Where did they live in New Hampshire, and what type of home did he enjoy? We know of one sister, and that her husband was "D.D. Shattuck, Esq." and we know a little of there whereabouts.

The nature of the accident feels a bit hard to grasp quickly, due to the interspersion of quotes. A nice tight and clear description of the rod and its trajectory, using modern language, would be a good addition as it would give people something they can easily quote/reuse, afterwhich a few choice quotes could then add colour and details that only have precision in the original words.

In the process of adding a concise summary of the accident, it might be necessary to drop "the American Crowbar Case" from this section, as it could be mentioned in a section more about the myth rather than the fact. It would be nice to known when this term first appeared, and how it was popularised.

The ride into town is described by the distance traveled, however I recall the duration of the journey also being recorded, or perhaps it was the time period between accident and being seen by the physician that is known?

We read that friends attended. Are there any details available about family visiting him in Cavendish? If not, we might revise "his desire to return to his family in New Hampshire" to indicate he had not yet seen his family "his desire to return to in New Hampshire to visit his family". <span style="font-variant:small-caps">] <sup>'''(])'''</sup></span> 00:27, 14 June 2013 (UTC)

== Abbreviations in infobox ==


== Odd citation style ==
I don't like having things abbreviated in the infobox; on first use they should be spelled out in full as not everybody will know what they mean. --] (]) 14:20, 15 June 2013 (UTC)


Is there a reasoning behind the strange citation style of this article? Why are some references demarcated by their "difficulty" while the others are listed as usual? Besides this, surely the letter system does not work as well as a normal style, as you cannot click the citation in the References section to see where a source appears in the main body? ] (]) 23:18, 24 January 2023 (UTC)
==Image widths==
:All I know is this is {{u|EEng}}'s child. – ] (]) 23:46, 24 January 2023 (UTC)
The apparently randomly varied widths of the images, all down the right hand side, are ugly and distracting. I understand the problem that the indented quotes go wrong if images are as is usual alternated, but I don't see why we need images of four different widths, clumped higgledy-piggledy in rustic fashion near the top of the article, where frankly several of them do not belong. We can work around the indentation problem using <nowiki>::</nowiki> instead of the quote mechanism (yes, I know, it's klunky), and while it is never possible to have every image exactly where it should ideally be, we can surely do a little better than the mess it is now. Take an objective look at it for yourselves. ] (]) 21:13, 15 June 2013 (UTC)
::I assume that defaults to "not going to be changed"? ]<sup>]</sup> 00:44, 25 January 2023 (UTC)
:::::BTW, where there's an image at left, ''::'' doesn't work any better than <nowiki>{{quote}}</nowiki> i.e. the presence of the photo at left keeps the quote text from being indented relative to article text proper. ] (]) 01:36, 16 June 2013 (UTC)
:::More accurately, it means "will be changed if the editors who actually care about the article reach a consensus that some other approach will better serve the reader's understanding, but won't be changed just because some drive-by editor thinks all articles should look the same." As to the original question:
:::*The ''For general readers'' section, the ''For younger readers'' section, and the ''For researchers and specialists'' section identify sources which will be particularly useful to readers in those groups who want to learn more about the article topic. The ''Other sources cited'' section lists sources which, well, will not be particularly useful to those who want to learn more.
:::*The {{t|ran}}/{{t|rma}} referencing system allows sources to be organized in logical, useful ways instead of the chaotic, random mish-mash seen in most articles.
:::*Where a source appears in the main body is trivially found simply by text-searching for e.g. ''''.
:::Quite substantial discussions (found primarily in ]) led to the decision to do things the way they're done. Any other questions? ]] 09:03, 25 January 2023 (UTC)


== Bug Report: The ran callout links are inactive on mobile site. ==
:I agree with this. --] (]) 21:41, 15 June 2013 (UTC)


I first encountered {{t|ran}} on this page and see more discussion of it here than on the template page.
:: It's not my placement and sizing but the result of two other editors' actions . So now I've restored the placement and sizing which obtained for several years, though in a moment I'll change the order a little. ] (]) 00:45, 16 June 2013 (UTC)


The template which creates the manual superscript has a bug on the Minerva theme used by the mobile site. You can see it if you use these links:
:::Per ] the images should be at the default size to allow logged-in users to set their own sizes, unless there is a special reason to depart from this. --] (]) 08:12, 16 June 2013 (UTC)
# https://en.wikipedia.org/Phineas_Gage?useskin=Vector2022
# https://en.m.wikipedia.org/Phineas_Gage
# https://en.wikipedia.org/Phineas_Gage?useskin=Minerva


In each link try clicking the superscript callout links. In the first link, the desktop site has a tooltip and a functional link to References. The second and third links show the bug.
:::::Better look again at WP:IMGSIZE, which explicitly endorses use of the ''upright'' parameter, which multiplies image size relative to the user's Preferences-selected default image size.
:::::*''You'' complained about the uneven img sizes introduced by other editors, I fixed it, and you have twice now returned them to their uneven-sized state. I will now once again restore the uniform sizes.
:::::*I have also moved the iron-through-skull diagram back to the lead, where's it's been for a very long time and where I think it's appropriate. Can we leave of discussion final img placement and sizing until the text is more settled?
:::::] (]) 01:39, 17 June 2013 (UTC)


On the second link, the mobile site callouts for {{t|ran}} do nothing when clicked. The superscript callouts created by {{t|r}} and {{t|refn}} on this page will cause a popup with the reference. The popup is the expected behavior. The links from < ref >, {{t|efn}}, and {{t|sfn}} all create popups. The {{t|citeref}} template is slightly different and works on mobile the same way that it works on the desktop site (visible in the Notes section on: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/Computer_mouse ); the superscript works as an in-page anchor link with {{t|citeref}}.
== "Remarkably" ==
I removed this but I see it's been restored. We don't usually use words like "notably" (as it's self-evident that we are noting it) or "remarkably" (as it's self-evident that we are remarking on it). Why would we do so in this instance? --] (]) 07:52, 16 June 2013 (UTC)
:Because you misunderstand ]. (We're talking about .)
:*Saying something is ''remarkably small'' is little different from saying it's ''very'' or ''unusually small'' -- though sources are needed to support such adverbs, which is all WP:EDITORIAL calls for.
:*The cites in the "First-hand reports" and "Distortion" sections amply support that the remarkability of the smallness of the body of known fact, but for the avoidance of doubt I'll add specific cites on this point.
:] (]) 01:23, 17 June 2013 (UTC)
:::I agree with EEng - this is not editorializing, but simply good varied language. ] 01:37, 17 June 2013 (UTC)


In the third link, the mobile skin (Minerva) is used on the desktop site. The tooltip still works, but something in Minerva breaks the link regardless of the desktop or mobile version.
== Final comment ==


] and ] are worth a look if anybody ever felt like getting this to GA standard. The verbose notes could be trimmed by about 90% as well. Good luck! --] (]) 18:06, 16 June 2013 (UTC) I hope that this helps and that it is not a strange place to post a bug report. ] (]) 02:27, 6 February 2023 (UTC)
:This is above my pay grade. I suggest you post this at ]. ]] 04:04, 6 February 2023 (UTC)
:As the reviewer, I disagree with your assessment that the current state of MOS compliance or lack thereof should be a hindrance for GA status. I agree that the notes should be trimmed and the prose made clearer, but it is not a requirement for GA.] 18:13, 16 June 2013 (UTC)
::Thanks for pointing me in the right direction! ] (]) 04:25, 6 February 2023 (UTC)
:: I have just moved one note definition from the infobox to the notes reflist. I will move the rest in a series of edits (please though continue to edit the article as normal). This will make the source correspond more closely to the display and the note text will be easier to review. --] (]) 21:00, 16 June 2013 (UTC)
::Just updating this thread. The rma/ran references now function on mobile. To implement a ], I needed to add "CITEREF" to the handwritten links on this article's references. As an unplanned bonus, those links now create the popup reference on desktop themes/browsers.] (]) 00:21, 24 May 2023 (UTC)
:::A belated thanks for taking care of this. ]] 01:22, 3 September 2024 (UTC)


== MOS:SANDWICH ==
== Peace, love, and hapiness ==


A recent edit to resolve ] issues causes confusing placement on widescreen monitors. For example, it pushes the "Distinguished Arrivals" newspaper clipping (about a living Gage) down into the section where his skull is exhumed. And so in fixing one MOS issue, it causes a new one (]). ] says, "{{tq|The relevant aspect of the image should be clear and central.}}" Sandwich concerns probably have to be waved on image-heavy articles like this to ensure the relevance of the image is clear to the reader. ] (]) 16:07, 24 August 2024 (UTC)
::::<small>The following comment has been copied from User Talk:EEng</small>
:{{U|Rjjiii}}, you took the words right out of my mouth. {{U|ActivelyDisinterested}}: re your edit summary here , I wrote SANDWICH so I don't need to "see" it, and the article's had this exact same layout for at least 5 years, and very much the same layout for 10 years, and you're the first person to claim there's an actual problem. If you'll specifify at what platform, resolution, and zoom level you're seeing the issue, and describe it more precisely, then maybe we can solve it. But the current layout it looks fine on laptops (with two different browsers), on WP's mobile simulator, on my own tiny-screen Iphone, and on a friend's Android just now. We're not going to mess that all up because you preceive the text column as narrow on one particular configuration you haven't specified. ]] 19:35, 2 September 2024 (UTC) P.S. I appreciate your fixes to the cite formats!
In your recent edit you are doing two separate things: You are dumbing down the prose to "emit facts without relating them to each other", which is not really an improvement, but almost seem to be an attempt to make a point, and you are trimming the quantity of notes quoting primary sources at length, which I think may be an improvement. The GA article is currently at a rather delicate stage where I will be forced to fail it if the article becomes too unstable. I would really hate to have to fail it because it is a great article and your work is impressive. If you remain receptive to critique without taking it personally and discuss the recommendations with the other editors on the talkpage instead of through editsummaries, I think it should be possible to find a way to make the article work as a compromise between your personal preferences for article writing and those of other writers. As I have already said I am not a stickler about the prose, and I will not fail on prose concerns alone - especially not because it clearly is well written, just using a different style from most other articles.] 19:06, 16 June 2013 (UTC)
::Not really, as I said spacing Eth images out would likely be the best option. But I'm not invested enough to stand in the way if you want to go another route. -- <small>LCU</small> ''']''' <small>''«]» °]°''</small> 21:33, 2 September 2024 (UTC)
::::<small>End of copied comment</small>
:::Spacing the images out seems likely the best option until you actually read the article and see why the images are where they are, at which point you realize that blindly spacing everything out in obeisance to a cookie-cutter guideline meant to be applied with common sense solves a trivial problem seen by, apparently, one person in ten years, but introduces a serious problem for everyone else. Unfortunately there's no route to go in if you won't tell us what you're seeing, on what platform. ]] 01:32, 3 September 2024 (UTC)
::{{tqb|the article's had this exact same layout for at least 5 years, and very much the same layout for 10 years, and you're the first person to claim there's an actual problem}}
::I think that the sandwich has become thinner recently despite no changes to the article, with the deployment of Vector 2022, and then the deployment of increased font size on it very recently. For example, here are two screenshots taken on a 1920x1080 screen, which is still the most common desktop resolution according to , as a logged-out user with all default settings (I tried to find the most sandwiched parts of the article):
::* ]: https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/F57439065
::* ]: https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/F57439085
::I agree that just moving all images to the right side is not a good solution, for the reasons you said. Perhaps you might come up with a better one, though. I would consider moving some of the wider images to galleries, or making the images and pull quotes centered, instead of having them float around text. ] <small>]</small> 22:13, 3 September 2024 (UTC)
:::In my opinion, MOS:SANDWICH should be understood as a guideline but not a policy, because that's what it is. For this particular page, there are a lot of images, but they all serve good encyclopedic purposes. And they don't really lend themselves to being grouped into galleries. (Perhaps, there might be a few places where ] could be used to good effect.) But I don't think this is an urgent problem. --] (]) 22:24, 3 September 2024 (UTC)
*(Sorry, I missed these later posts until now.) {{U|Matma Rex}}, I appreciate the screenshots; leave it to the geniuses at WMF to throw away 30% of the screen real estate on some stupid buttons. The density of images is greatest in the accident/treatment/injuries section, and the challenge there is it's tough for readers to understand the circumstances of the accident, and the mechanics of Gage's injury, without these images at hand -- if they're somewhere else I fear the reader is lost. Nonetheless I mocked up a gallery for the early sections, but it came out awful . I just don't see how to do it without some images being too big or small, and far from the relevant text.{{pb}}{{U|Tryptofish}}, I'd be interested to hear your thoughts about how {multiple images} could be used. ]] 03:01, 14 September 2024 (UTC)
::I haven't gotten to the point of having specific place(s) on the page where I would recommend it, but the general idea is that sandwiching can often be eliminated by combining related images together, instead of having them stand-off opposite one another on the page. (You can see a sample of how I did that, at ].) If there are places on ''this'' page, where you feel ''that it makes sense, thematically'' to group any images together (and '''only''' if it makes sense), and if they are creating sandwiched text, then that would be where to look. --] (]) 23:43, 14 September 2024 (UTC)


== Dimensions ==
:*My edit summary was not very clear. In saying I was "copyediting ... conversion of careful prose into short declarative sentences emitting facts without relating them to one another", I was trying to explain I was ''restoring'' the careful prose, which related the facts to one another rather than just emitting them.
:*I didn't trim the notes. An important use of notes is for extensive quotes and so on which may be of interest only to a subset of readers, while keeping the main text uncluttered for other readers.
:*I appreciate your taking on the GA review, though I should point out I didn't nominate it, and what I was afraid would happen is what, in fact, is happening. I think most of the changes have been improvements, but many show misunderstanding of the subject, failure to consider surrounding material related to the text being modified, enforcement of misremembered fragments of alleged policy and guidelines, ], and so on.
:*I am very careful to revert or modify only the parts of others' changes I mean to alter, while leaving the rest in place, and giving very specific edit summaries explaining my reasons. That takes time, and often I've just gotten started on a series of changes when another editor rushes in to mass-revert, giving an edit summary that ignores the reasoning given in ''my'' summaries. Of course some fraction of issues won't be resolved until there's discussion on Talk, but an initial round of edits ''with careful, informative summaries by everyone'' can resolve most issues (e.g. second editor points first editor to appropriate guideline) and for the rest, lays the groundwork for discussion on Talk.
:*It's time to trot out some comments left here about two years ago ( -- some irrelevant text trimmed out):
:::::'''''Great article'''''
::::''I read the whole thing, was drawn in and was fascinated, really fantastic. It's appropriate for subject. Should be featured. Shame so many people don't recognize talented and quality work, commercial encyclopedia's would pay good money for this. The comments above about "cold" writing being required at Misplaced Pages is just lol. In fact Misplaced Pages is 95% awful writing (myself included) so when we see actual rare good work, the crowd can't stand it because it sets off the rest to look so bad and amateur. Anyway, don't take my word, look at the user reviews at the bottom of the page, and article view statistics. People love this article. ] (]) 03:38, 13 September 2011 (UTC)
:::::''Yes. A lot of that "professional" quality comes from the work of ] in 2008-2010. ] (]) 15:29, 13 September 2011 (UTC)
::::::''I echo the praise. Far too many Misplaced Pages articles are cold and sterile (if sometimes littered by the leftovers of earlier POV wars). The passion in this one makes it much more informative and interesting. Where such passion would get in the way of objectivity and NPOV, it of course would need to be toned down. And it's unrealistic to assume that all of our articles will ever get such treatment. But let's not tone it down in a search for anodyne consistency of style. I respect that there are a range of criteria for this, but as far as I am concerned, this is more deserving of being a Featured Article than many others we have. ] (]) 17:10, 13 September 2011 (UTC)
:::::::''Yes. Very interesting read about a very interesting man. The author(s) of this article certainly did him justice. ] (]) 19:17, 13 September 2011 (UTC)


Hello {{u|eeng}}, I think the edit I did on this page was perfectly reasonable for readers who live outside the USA. The number I corrected was the diameter of the “tamping iron”not the hole. It’s normal to have a whole number which is the reason the Misplaced Pages MOS has centimetres for height instead of metres or millimetres, which is also the norm worldwide, so 32 mm instead of 3.2 cm would be normal outside the USA. The point of the tamping iron in the article is in millimetres.
:] (]) 01:52, 17 June 2013 (UTC)
6.0 kg suggests a very accurate conversion, You would not say I weight 200.0 lbs if it were converted the other way around, It’s a superfluous zero. ] (]) 10:25, 14 September 2024 (UTC)
:Your edit was indeed "reasonable", but I don't think it best serves the reader's understanding:
:*{{tq|The number I corrected was the diameter of the “tamping iron, not the hole}}{{snd}}No, you changed the units for both the diameter of the tamping iron and the diameter of the blast hole from cm to mm; and the distance to town from km to m. You also reduced the converted precision of the weight of the tamping iron from 6.0kg to 6kg..
:*{{tq|It’s normal to have a whole number which is the reason the Misplaced Pages MOS has centimetres for height}}{{snd}}No, MOS uses centimeters for height because that appears to be the common practice in English-speaking countries where SI is used for heights. If those countries used meters for height, we'd use meters for height; whole numbers versus decimals has nothing to do with it.
:*{{tq|6.0 kg suggests a very accurate conversion ... It’s a superfluous zero}}{{snd}}No it's not. The original value is given to the nearest 1/4 lb, which is just slightly more than 0.1kg. Thus converting to 6.0kg is appropriate.
:*With regard to the diameters, the 1-3/4 inch figure for the blast hole is a rough generality, and reporting 44.5mm (as you have it) is ridiculous overprecision, and even 44mm implies an innapropriately high precision, which 4.5cm does not. As for the 1-1/4 inch figure, while 32mm and 3.2cm are technically identical, the mm version carries (again) a ''sense'' of innapropriately higher precision than does 3.2cm, and it's best that both diameters use the same units.{{pb}}As to the point being in mm, the precision of the reported value of 1/4 inch is uncertain, so on reflection, converting to 0.5cm (instead of 6mm) seems more appropriate, and consistent with the use of cm for all the other stuff.
:*Finally, converting the 3/4 mile journey to 1200m is absolutely false precision -- 1.2km is obviously what's appropriate.
::I've edited the article to change the 6mm to 0.5cm. ]] 18:26, 14 September 2024 (UTC)
::People who live in a metric world (as 95% of the planet do) would not talk about 0,5 cm, they would talk about 5 mm, one is no more accurate than the other. The centimetre is pretty common in the US as the equivalent to the inch, but not with the rest of the planet deal with only metric units and not conversions. Your interpretation serves a US audience, mine serves the reader who uses only SI. From my house to my village is 1,1 km on my vehicle odometer, but if I talked to someone I would say 1100 metres. Height is given in centimetres because it's a whole number, stated as height in passports worldwide. If I published your weight as 200.0 lbs (I've got no idea of your weight, it's a random choice), you would wonder why the decimal? ] (]) 19:34, 14 September 2024 (UTC)
:::I cannot find the reference in the article to the blast hole, but do see it in the changes to the article. I did change it to millimetres, however in the convert template was round=0.5 which gave it the same (unneeded) accuracy in millimetres as centimetres. I should have removed the round=0.5, placed there by a previous editor. ] (]) 19:58, 14 September 2024 (UTC)
::::Ctrl-F ''blast hole'' and you'll find it.
::::For the rest: I'm sorry, but these are just your claims about what's collquially done in your personal experience, and anyway articles aren't colloquial. Giving a distance as 1100m certainly suggests a precision not implied by 1.1km, and unjustified in the case under discussion. Your comments about personal height and weight are irrelevant because we're not talking about people's heights and weights. You're also confusing accuracy with precision. ]] 20:09, 14 September 2024 (UTC)
:::::True these are from personal experience from my life in countries that use SI, but your replies are your opinion. ] (]) 14:03, 15 September 2024 (UTC)
::::::If you don't understand that 1100m implies greater precision than does 1.1km, then I'm afraid there's no purpose in continuing this conversation. ]] 20:56, 15 September 2024 (UTC)

Latest revision as of 23:58, 6 January 2025

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To-do list for Phineas Gage: edit · history · watch · refresh · Updated 2024-11-10


Here are some tasks awaiting attention:
Pitch in
  • Labor relations, contractor/sucontractor, blasting skill: Macmillan 2000 discusses (a) Gage's status as a (sub?)contractor; (b) volatility of labor relations in contemporary RR construction; (c) the skill required in blasting -- relate to Gage's preaccident character, personality, and skill.
  • More on accident itself: A feedback item requested more on "how it happened":
    •  Done Not easy because Harlow and Bigelow (and people quoted by them) are slightly discrepant on this (was the sand omitted? was he speaking to his men? where was he sitting?)
    •  Done In relation to this, more on the mechanics of blasting would help (there are plenty of out-of-copyright blasting manuals -- e.g. from DuPont -- that can be used).
    •  Not done Other comments imply need to be more explicit that the iron passed through (i.e. wasn't lodged).
  •  Done Re "Crowbar": Confusion re connotation of a crowbar as having a hook/claw, variation on meaning of this term according to time and place -- still needs clarification. This may require some work on the articles on crowbar, pry bar etc.
  • Re phrase "American Crowbar Case": Barker suggests that the frequency with which this term appears in 19th c literature reflects the ascendency of Bigelow's interpretation of the case, since he (and not Harlow) described Gage's iron as a "crowbar".
    • The specific origin of that specific phrase should be added to the article if possible.
  • "Bigelow describes the iron's taper as seven inches long, but the correct dimension is twelve": See whether modern catalog has this info
  •  Done "the best fit rod trajectory did not result in the iron crossing the midline as has been suggested by some authors" (such as H.Damasio) Need cite here both to H Damasio and to Van Horn's cite to it
  • General review of Van Horn Table 3 for material usable in article
  • Find material on missing molar such as Harlow 1868 p.17, Van Horn (several points)
  •  Done "Gage certainly displayed some kind of change in behavior after his injury" Likely other papers + Macmillan 2000 can be cited here a well ] (talk)]
  • "Gage was hired by his employer in advance":
    • Need to check that cites given here cover this: "report was discovered calling Gage mentally unimpaired during his last years in Chile ... and since then a description of what may have been his daily work routine there as a stagecoach driver, and advertisements for two previously unknown public appearances"
    • More info/cites in Macmillan Gagepage, "Unanswered Questions", Wilgus, "Meet Phineas Gage"; and/or Wilgus/Macmillan "More about Gage"
  • In brain damage discussion, add Macmillan 2000, 2008; van horn p.14 re chain of brain damage uncertainties (blood loss, infection, bone fragments, path, position of brain, individual locations of regions)
    • Greenblatt Bulletin of the History of Medicine, 2001, 75, 798-799 and (apparently a different paper)
    • Macmillan 2000 p.82, 84
    • Bone fragments, infection etc. also mentioned at OKF p.469
  • Bring in discussion (Macmillan 2008) re the importance of the hinging effect in minimizing concussive effects -- this might be integrated with Harlow's quote re the shape of the iron and reasons for Gage's survival.  Not done Your humble colleague (I) has made a thorough search and cannot find this passage, which he concludes he may have hallucinated. EEng (talk)
  • Ordia, JI (1989). "Neurologic function seven years after crowbar impalement of the brain". Surgical Neurology 32: 152–155 discusses significance of projectile speeds below 1000 ft/sec in reduced concussive damage.
  • combined with the lack of information about his behavioral changes In addition to Macmillan 2000 p.290 there are likely additional Macmillan references on lack of info on behavioral changes; maybe Barker too
  • "managed to enlist Gage in support of their theories": Material at Macmillan 2000 p.188 should be brought in as well
  • Ferrier cited Gage as proof that it is :
    • In addition to Ferrier cite this section could use cites re conflicting claims on whether frontal lobes do or don't have any function
    • Localization and frontal function are the main 19th C tugs-of-war; there may be parallels in the 20th C as well
  • Re lobotomy non-relationship to Gage, see Macmillan 2000 cites to Valenstein
    • material from Valenstein may be useful here as well
  •  Done (EEng (talk)) Harlow (1868) gives the date of Gage's death as May 21, 1861: Need pg#
  • American Phrenological J: could use more material from Macmillan 2000 pp.349-50 re similarities to Harlow 1848 etc.

Items taken Sept 2015 from hidden notes in source:

  • For description of tamping iron, see material from Warren Mus. catalog, "smoothly blunt" point, etc.
  • Re the report that Gage's jaw was broken, the cites given may be duplicative; also, a secondary source describing the path of the iron in laymen's terms would be useful; also see Bigelow re coronoid process
  • There are slight conflicts among sources re punctuation and formatting of the tamping iron inscription
  • For Gage's "lecture" appearances, other potential cites are Meet Phineas Gage (Wilgus), More About Gage (Macmillan on Wilgus site), Unanswered Qs in Macmillan 2008
  •  Done The images File:Simulated Connectivity Damage of Phineas Gage 4 vanHorn PathwaysDamaged left.jpg and File:Simulated Connectivity Damage of Phineas Gage 4 vanHorn PathwaysDamaged right.jpg should be combined into a single image, with one caption. ] (talk)]


  • "The use of a single case to prove opposing views on phrenology was not uncommon." Bring in fact that Harlow knew Gage before the accident, and possibly class-based expectations re social behavior.
  • Cerebral location section needs expansion
  • "both sides managed to enlist Gage in support of their theories" Bring in additional material from Macmillan 2000 p.188
  • Ferrier "absolutely dominating feature": Check page #s in {{ran|M5|p=198,253}; add material on basic question of whether frontal regions have any function at all; add more re Goulstonian Lecture's effect on opinion about Gage
  • "It is frequently said that what happened to Gage played a part in the later development of various forms of psychosurgery" Give specific examples of people saying this, plus mention Freeman's use of Gage story as a delay tactic with reporter
  • "Macmillan{ran|M|p=116-19,326,331} gives detailed criticism of Antonio Damasio's various presentations of Gage": See notes in Macmillan 2000 for pages cited, and other Macmillan papers may be useful on this as well; specify which of AD's works
  • Would be nice to have an img of the lifemask at the point it's mentioned.
  • "as could hardly have been done by any one in whose sagacity and surgical knowledge his 'confreres had any less confidence": further background on this should be available in Macmillan 2000 and Barker, possibly Macmillan, "John Martyn Harlow"
  • "A considerable number of medical gentlemen also visited the case at various times to satisfy their incredulity": {ran|M|p=42} page range may need expanding. Possibly this note could be integrated into the main text.
  • Some of the pdfs hosted at Countway/Warren Mus. site could be uploaded to Commons
  • Pagination problems:
    • Add pg #s to Ordia, Mitchell sources
    • Add pg #s to Wilgus (2009, J Hist Neurosci), Wilgus (2009, Daguerreian Soc.), Twomey cites
    • Harlow 1868: Journal version (seen in Macmillan 2000) versus offprint (seen in Commons images) (also need issue # in citation)
    • Macmillan 2008: version linked from the citation doesn't match the pagination from the version available as an offprint from publisher's website
  • Citations need checking (most can be found in Macmillan 2000):
    •  Done (EEng (talk)) rename=anonymous_C: Macmillan 2000 p.40n7 gives reprint information
    • Ref name=ferrier1877_9: check format and citation data
    •  Done (EEng (talk)) Harlow 1848: Harlow 1868 cites this as #20 of volume 39, but this needs confirmation
    • Jackson 1849: Give location in Macmillan 2000 where this is imaged or transcribed; get page # and check case # (and other details) of citation
    •  Done (EEng (talk)) Harlow 1849: Need specific date
    •  Done (EEng (talk)) Macmillan 2008: Check volume and issue #
  •  Done (EEng (talk)) Re "public appearances in the larger New England towns": Add Gage's visit to Bigelow in Boston and his presentation to the Boston Society for Medical Improvement (described in Macmillan 2000)
  •  Done (EEng (talk)) It was the first likeness of Gage identified since the life mask taken by Bigelow in late 1849.: Check the date of the life mask and that cites cover "by Bigelow"
  •  Done(EEng (talk)) Re Ratiu discussion of hole at base of cranium and "skull hinged open": Possibly this should be discussed in main text (instead of note) -- notice there is (or was) an image illustrating the "hinging".
  •  Done (EEng (talk)) The '1850 communication calling Gage "gross, profane, coarse, and vulgar"' should be added to the source list
  •  Done (EEng (talk)) "Most commentators still rely on hearsay and accept what others have said about Gage, namely, that after the accident he became a psychopath..." Need page #
  •  Done (EEng (talk)) "Attributes typically ascribed to the post-accident Gage" : Each of these needs a cite (most are in Macmillan 2008 or 2000 -- or Kotowicz)
  •  Done (EEng (talk)) Harlow's relocation to Woburn should be mentioned. Sources: Macmillan 2000, Macmillan "Simple Country Physician"
  •  Done (EEng (talk)) The 1994 conclusion of H. Damasio et al., that both frontal lobes were damaged, was drawn by modeling not Gage's skull but rather a "Gage-like" one: Explain the "Gage-like" similarity issue
  •  Done Identify issue of s:Recovery from the passage of an iron bar through the head; Someone added a note in the wikitext: "something somewhere says n3 of v2"
  • Would it make sense to add a geo coord for the accident site?
  • Some of the subpage titles for the Phineas Gage Information Page seem to be out of date.
  • Cites in lead for "perhaps the first case to suggest that damage to specific parts of the brain might induce specific personality change", and those later for 'Gage is considered the "index case for personality change due to frontal lobe damage", are presumably saying much the same thing, so see about integrating them.
  • In this version , cites in lead re brain vs. personality, and injury to specific parts of brain vs. specific personality changes, need to be sorted out as to which cites are for which of those two
  • Maybe add some specific popcult examples
  • More could be said about Harlow's ideas re vis vitae, vis conservatrix, vis medicatrix naturae etc. (OKF p.58)
  • Nye cite apparently has the wrong author -- he seems to be the volume editor. The page #s need checking as well.
  •  Done JBS Jackson, "Medical Cases" is quoted as terming Gage "quite feeble and thin", but this is not reported in Macmillan 2000, p.93 -- check original. (Original MS checked.)
  • Exceptionally good presentation:
  • Review Kihlstrom, esp. cite to Gardner . p. 768 re "mental manifestations" as phrenological jargon.
  • Ditto William & Mary Law Review Volume 63 (2021-2022) Issue 4 Imagining the Future of Law and Neuroscience Symposium Article 5 3-1-2022 How Experts Have Dominated the Neuroscience Narrative in Criminal Cases for Twelve Decades: a Warning for the Future - Deborah W. Denno ("striking parallels between how experts have portrayed Gage over nearly two centuries and how experts in the legal community characterize defendants with brain injuries today") (cites: Deborah W. Denno, Analysis of Law Review Articles Mentioning Phineas Gage (July 30, 2021) (unpublished document) (on file with author))
  • Footprints of Phineas Gage Historical Beginnings on the Origins of Brain and Behavior and the Birth of Cerebral Localizationism Shelley, Bhaskara P. Archives of Medicine and Health Sciences 4(2):p 280-286, Jul–Dec 2016. | DOI: 10.4103/2321-4848.196182
  • Phineas Gage: A Neuropsychological Perspective of a Historical Case Study Alan G. Lewandowski, Joshua D. Weirick, Caroline A. Lewandowski, Jack Spector Pages 1079–1109

Odd citation style

Is there a reasoning behind the strange citation style of this article? Why are some references demarcated by their "difficulty" while the others are listed as usual? Besides this, surely the letter system does not work as well as a normal style, as you cannot click the citation in the References section to see where a source appears in the main body? Medarduss (talk) 23:18, 24 January 2023 (UTC)

All I know is this is EEng's child. – The Grid (talk) 23:46, 24 January 2023 (UTC)
I assume that defaults to "not going to be changed"? ~Styyx 00:44, 25 January 2023 (UTC)
More accurately, it means "will be changed if the editors who actually care about the article reach a consensus that some other approach will better serve the reader's understanding, but won't be changed just because some drive-by editor thinks all articles should look the same." As to the original question:
  • The For general readers section, the For younger readers section, and the For researchers and specialists section identify sources which will be particularly useful to readers in those groups who want to learn more about the article topic. The Other sources cited section lists sources which, well, will not be particularly useful to those who want to learn more.
  • The {{ran}}/{{rma}} referencing system allows sources to be organized in logical, useful ways instead of the chaotic, random mish-mash seen in most articles.
  • Where a source appears in the main body is trivially found simply by text-searching for e.g. .
Quite substantial discussions (found primarily in Talk:Phineas_Gage/Archive_2) led to the decision to do things the way they're done. Any other questions? EEng 09:03, 25 January 2023 (UTC)

Bug Report: The ran callout links are inactive on mobile site.

I first encountered {{ran}} on this page and see more discussion of it here than on the template page.

The template which creates the manual superscript has a bug on the Minerva theme used by the mobile site. You can see it if you use these links:

  1. https://en.wikipedia.org/Phineas_Gage?useskin=Vector2022
  2. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/Phineas_Gage
  3. https://en.wikipedia.org/Phineas_Gage?useskin=Minerva

In each link try clicking the superscript callout links. In the first link, the desktop site has a tooltip and a functional link to References. The second and third links show the bug.

On the second link, the mobile site callouts for {{ran}} do nothing when clicked. The superscript callouts created by {{r}} and {{refn}} on this page will cause a popup with the reference. The popup is the expected behavior. The links from < ref >, {{efn}}, and {{sfn}} all create popups. The {{citeref}} template is slightly different and works on mobile the same way that it works on the desktop site (visible in the Notes section on: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/Computer_mouse ); the superscript works as an in-page anchor link with {{citeref}}.

In the third link, the mobile skin (Minerva) is used on the desktop site. The tooltip still works, but something in Minerva breaks the link regardless of the desktop or mobile version.

I hope that this helps and that it is not a strange place to post a bug report. Rjjiii (talk) 02:27, 6 February 2023 (UTC)

This is above my pay grade. I suggest you post this at WP:VPT. EEng 04:04, 6 February 2023 (UTC)
Thanks for pointing me in the right direction! Rjjiii (talk) 04:25, 6 February 2023 (UTC)
Just updating this thread. The rma/ran references now function on mobile. To implement a workaround, I needed to add "CITEREF" to the handwritten links on this article's references. As an unplanned bonus, those links now create the popup reference on desktop themes/browsers.Rjjiii (talk) 00:21, 24 May 2023 (UTC)
A belated thanks for taking care of this. EEng 01:22, 3 September 2024 (UTC)

MOS:SANDWICH

A recent edit to resolve MOS:SANDWICH issues causes confusing placement on widescreen monitors. For example, it pushes the "Distinguished Arrivals" newspaper clipping (about a living Gage) down into the section where his skull is exhumed. And so in fixing one MOS issue, it causes a new one (MOS:SECTIONLOC). Misplaced Pages:Image use policy says, "The relevant aspect of the image should be clear and central." Sandwich concerns probably have to be waved on image-heavy articles like this to ensure the relevance of the image is clear to the reader. Rjj (talk) 16:07, 24 August 2024 (UTC)

Rjjiii, you took the words right out of my mouth. ActivelyDisinterested: re your edit summary here , I wrote SANDWICH so I don't need to "see" it, and the article's had this exact same layout for at least 5 years, and very much the same layout for 10 years, and you're the first person to claim there's an actual problem. If you'll specifify at what platform, resolution, and zoom level you're seeing the issue, and describe it more precisely, then maybe we can solve it. But the current layout it looks fine on laptops (with two different browsers), on WP's mobile simulator, on my own tiny-screen Iphone, and on a friend's Android just now. We're not going to mess that all up because you preceive the text column as narrow on one particular configuration you haven't specified. EEng 19:35, 2 September 2024 (UTC) P.S. I appreciate your fixes to the cite formats!
Not really, as I said spacing Eth images out would likely be the best option. But I'm not invested enough to stand in the way if you want to go another route. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 21:33, 2 September 2024 (UTC)
Spacing the images out seems likely the best option until you actually read the article and see why the images are where they are, at which point you realize that blindly spacing everything out in obeisance to a cookie-cutter guideline meant to be applied with common sense solves a trivial problem seen by, apparently, one person in ten years, but introduces a serious problem for everyone else. Unfortunately there's no route to go in if you won't tell us what you're seeing, on what platform. EEng 01:32, 3 September 2024 (UTC)

the article's had this exact same layout for at least 5 years, and very much the same layout for 10 years, and you're the first person to claim there's an actual problem

I think that the sandwich has become thinner recently despite no changes to the article, with the deployment of Vector 2022, and then the deployment of increased font size on it very recently. For example, here are two screenshots taken on a 1920x1080 screen, which is still the most common desktop resolution according to , as a logged-out user with all default settings (I tried to find the most sandwiched parts of the article):
I agree that just moving all images to the right side is not a good solution, for the reasons you said. Perhaps you might come up with a better one, though. I would consider moving some of the wider images to galleries, or making the images and pull quotes centered, instead of having them float around text. Matma Rex talk 22:13, 3 September 2024 (UTC)
In my opinion, MOS:SANDWICH should be understood as a guideline but not a policy, because that's what it is. For this particular page, there are a lot of images, but they all serve good encyclopedic purposes. And they don't really lend themselves to being grouped into galleries. (Perhaps, there might be a few places where Template:Multiple image could be used to good effect.) But I don't think this is an urgent problem. --Tryptofish (talk) 22:24, 3 September 2024 (UTC)
  • (Sorry, I missed these later posts until now.) Matma Rex, I appreciate the screenshots; leave it to the geniuses at WMF to throw away 30% of the screen real estate on some stupid buttons. The density of images is greatest in the accident/treatment/injuries section, and the challenge there is it's tough for readers to understand the circumstances of the accident, and the mechanics of Gage's injury, without these images at hand -- if they're somewhere else I fear the reader is lost. Nonetheless I mocked up a gallery for the early sections, but it came out awful . I just don't see how to do it without some images being too big or small, and far from the relevant text.Tryptofish, I'd be interested to hear your thoughts about how {multiple images} could be used. EEng 03:01, 14 September 2024 (UTC)
I haven't gotten to the point of having specific place(s) on the page where I would recommend it, but the general idea is that sandwiching can often be eliminated by combining related images together, instead of having them stand-off opposite one another on the page. (You can see a sample of how I did that, at Sissinghurst Castle Garden#Roses.) If there are places on this page, where you feel that it makes sense, thematically to group any images together (and only if it makes sense), and if they are creating sandwiched text, then that would be where to look. --Tryptofish (talk) 23:43, 14 September 2024 (UTC)

Dimensions

Hello eeng, I think the edit I did on this page was perfectly reasonable for readers who live outside the USA. The number I corrected was the diameter of the “tamping iron”not the hole. It’s normal to have a whole number which is the reason the Misplaced Pages MOS has centimetres for height instead of metres or millimetres, which is also the norm worldwide, so 32 mm instead of 3.2 cm would be normal outside the USA. The point of the tamping iron in the article is in millimetres. 6.0 kg suggests a very accurate conversion, You would not say I weight 200.0 lbs if it were converted the other way around, It’s a superfluous zero. Avi8tor (talk) 10:25, 14 September 2024 (UTC)

Your edit was indeed "reasonable", but I don't think it best serves the reader's understanding:
  • The number I corrected was the diameter of the “tamping iron, not the hole – No, you changed the units for both the diameter of the tamping iron and the diameter of the blast hole from cm to mm; and the distance to town from km to m. You also reduced the converted precision of the weight of the tamping iron from 6.0kg to 6kg..
  • It’s normal to have a whole number which is the reason the Misplaced Pages MOS has centimetres for height – No, MOS uses centimeters for height because that appears to be the common practice in English-speaking countries where SI is used for heights. If those countries used meters for height, we'd use meters for height; whole numbers versus decimals has nothing to do with it.
  • 6.0 kg suggests a very accurate conversion ... It’s a superfluous zero – No it's not. The original value is given to the nearest 1/4 lb, which is just slightly more than 0.1kg. Thus converting to 6.0kg is appropriate.
  • With regard to the diameters, the 1-3/4 inch figure for the blast hole is a rough generality, and reporting 44.5mm (as you have it) is ridiculous overprecision, and even 44mm implies an innapropriately high precision, which 4.5cm does not. As for the 1-1/4 inch figure, while 32mm and 3.2cm are technically identical, the mm version carries (again) a sense of innapropriately higher precision than does 3.2cm, and it's best that both diameters use the same units.As to the point being in mm, the precision of the reported value of 1/4 inch is uncertain, so on reflection, converting to 0.5cm (instead of 6mm) seems more appropriate, and consistent with the use of cm for all the other stuff.
  • Finally, converting the 3/4 mile journey to 1200m is absolutely false precision -- 1.2km is obviously what's appropriate.
I've edited the article to change the 6mm to 0.5cm. EEng 18:26, 14 September 2024 (UTC)
People who live in a metric world (as 95% of the planet do) would not talk about 0,5 cm, they would talk about 5 mm, one is no more accurate than the other. The centimetre is pretty common in the US as the equivalent to the inch, but not with the rest of the planet deal with only metric units and not conversions. Your interpretation serves a US audience, mine serves the reader who uses only SI. From my house to my village is 1,1 km on my vehicle odometer, but if I talked to someone I would say 1100 metres. Height is given in centimetres because it's a whole number, stated as height in passports worldwide. If I published your weight as 200.0 lbs (I've got no idea of your weight, it's a random choice), you would wonder why the decimal? Avi8tor (talk) 19:34, 14 September 2024 (UTC)
I cannot find the reference in the article to the blast hole, but do see it in the changes to the article. I did change it to millimetres, however in the convert template was round=0.5 which gave it the same (unneeded) accuracy in millimetres as centimetres. I should have removed the round=0.5, placed there by a previous editor. Avi8tor (talk) 19:58, 14 September 2024 (UTC)
Ctrl-F blast hole and you'll find it.
For the rest: I'm sorry, but these are just your claims about what's collquially done in your personal experience, and anyway articles aren't colloquial. Giving a distance as 1100m certainly suggests a precision not implied by 1.1km, and unjustified in the case under discussion. Your comments about personal height and weight are irrelevant because we're not talking about people's heights and weights. You're also confusing accuracy with precision. EEng 20:09, 14 September 2024 (UTC)
True these are from personal experience from my life in countries that use SI, but your replies are your opinion. Avi8tor (talk) 14:03, 15 September 2024 (UTC)
If you don't understand that 1100m implies greater precision than does 1.1km, then I'm afraid there's no purpose in continuing this conversation. EEng 20:56, 15 September 2024 (UTC)
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