About

The aim is to make complicated subjects accessible without flattening them into simplistic summaries. Most things worth understanding are made of several smaller things that are themselves worth understanding, and an explanation that hides this is usually an explanation you cannot build on.

So topics are connected. A piece links to other pieces in the middle of a sentence, sits inside a series, and carries subject tags shared with everything else on that subject. Reading one thing should make the next thing findable without going looking for it.

What Reference tries to do

Answer four questions, mostly: how does this work, what happened, what is this, and how do these things connect. It is explanatory rather than argumentative, and it tries to be confident where the ground is firm and clear about where it is not.

Sources are listed on every piece. They sit behind a disclosure at the end rather than in the middle of the reading, because the research should be checkable without the piece looking like a journal article.

Corrections and revisions

Pieces can be updated as understanding improves. Where a piece has been substantially revised, the date of the revision appears alongside the original publication date. This is a feature of the format, not an apology for it.

Contact

Corrections, suggestions and arguments are welcome. Add an email address here before launch.