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I made the tag the other day, and set its description to be

For questions about the stability of a concept inside a specific context

The goal for this was to make a tag that would indicate a self-consistent answer was desired. The idea was also to promote logically thought out answers without being as rigorous as was, and that the concept answered with could include handwavium and unobtainium answers, as long as they didn't break the universe.

On thinking on it the day after, I wonder if this is actually an appropriate tag; if this concept is part of the base assumption of answers here on Worldbuilding, so that's the main question; should it remain?

Also, if it fits, is there a better "description text" for it?

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I feel like is a duplicate of . The latter is designed to do what your tag does: ask if an idea is consistent within the laws of physics of the universe in question. You can use on a question whose premise involves the force of gravity falling off as $e^{-|r|}$, rather than $r^{-2}$, whereas it would be harder to justify using ; while we could answer the question mathematically (likely), we couldn't use the physics of our universe to answer it. But we could use the physics of the question's universe; covers just that.

For the record, the tag wiki excerpt for is

For questions asking whether or not a particular concept is realistic in a given context. Answers to these questions should provide a yes or no answer with supporting information. Consider alternatively the science-based and hard-science tags. This tag should never be the only tag on a question, it frames how a question should be answered, not the topic.

I think the third sentence could use some clarification along the lines I gave earlier, but most of it fits what I said. An important point to consider is the last sentence. , along with and , is what's known as a meta tag. It doesn't tell us anything about the content itself, just what kind of answers are expected.

Meta tags are generally not encouraged, although there are exceptions. Some science sites, for instance, use or some variant thereof (though others have killed that with a vengeance!). The consensus on Worldbuilding seems to be that these three meta tags are okay, as far as I know.

So, I guess my main point is that I think should be listed as a synonym of . I think the sentiment behind the tag is indeed appropriate, but it's redundant. If it ends up staying as its own tag, though, I'd recommend looking closely at the tag wiki excerpt and tag wiki, and being careful to distinguish between the two (if such distinctions exist). Mentioning that is a meta tag would also be good.


As per the voting on this answer, I've added as a synonym of .

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  • $\begingroup$ I agree, logical-consistency is a duplicate of reality-check :) $\endgroup$
    – Tim B
    Sep 28, 2016 at 10:46
  • $\begingroup$ Not that a double mod consensus needs it, but I concur. $\endgroup$
    – James
    Oct 3, 2016 at 20:31

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