User talk:Stephan Schulz/Archive 2

Identity on Commons: commons:User:Stephan Schulz

I'm also Stephan Schulz on the Wikimedia Commons. --Stephan Schulz 15:52, 28 February 2007 (UTC)

Dutch law

Hi Stephan,

Where nl:Wikipedia is hosted may be relevant to corporate law, but not to many other kinds of law. I hope this makes it clear. Regards, Guido den Broeder (talk) 15:09, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Not really. Wikipedia en: is under exactly the same jurisdiction as nl: or de:. The Wikimedia foundation is a public charity chartered under Florida law. If you have a personal conflict with another user, national law might apply. I suspect I should point you to WP:LEGAL, though. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 15:33, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Under Florida corporate law, only. We are still citizens of our respective countries. Guido den Broeder (talk) 15:47, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Global warming

I see that you just erased my sentence in the global warming. Your comment is accurate - there is a conspiracy to censor the global warming article. Grundle2600 (talk) 12:53, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

Indeed. And we use the UN to force the spurious "theory" of evolution down innocent children's throats, too! --Stephan Schulz (talk) 13:06, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

Evolution is real. The emergence of new strains of antibiotic-resistant bacteria is proof of that.

The sentence that I added the the global warming article is real, too.

It is you, not me, who is against scientific evidence.

There is a conspiracy to keep certain scientific facts out of the global warming article. Grundle2600 (talk) 22:37, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

Either your sentence is obvious, given the diagram, in which case it is superfluous, or it is not, in which case it is original research. In either case, it is extremely misleading, as it ignores that 1998 was an extreme outlier with one of the strongest El Nino events recorded, and that climate is a long term process that cannot be assessed year to year, but only over longer periods. If you have any "key facts" with reliable sources, you will find me more then willing to address them, and to incorporate them into the articles if they meet Wikipedia's requirements. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 23:02, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

Can you give more detail on why you reverted my edit to Hockey stick controversy? Looking through this talk page, it seems you are less than neutral on the issue. The refs I gave may be blogs but one is by McIntyre and hence both notable and relevant; the other is internally verifiable because it is math. This has been picked up by more reputable news sources too: Christopher Booker in the Daily Telegraph PT (talk) 21:26, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

If you have reliable sources, you have not, so far, added them. The edit I reverted cited exactly one source, a completely unnotable blog by someone who himself admits that he is not a statistician, and who obviously is not a climate scientist. And the argument at that blog post is completely confused - the only thing that is "internally verifiable" is that the writer does not lie about his skill as a statistician. And no, an opinion piece in the Daily Telegraph is not a reliable source, either. If you want to criticize a peer-reviewed scientific publication, bring a source of comparable weight, not a blog post or an opinion piece from (rather partisan) popular press newspaper. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 21:52, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

Whoops, sorry! Got muddled. Ok, so I hadn't mentioned McI on that one (I'm currently engaged in similar debates on a couple other articles). I'll cite him now: Climate Audit. Now, Steve McIntyre is the guy who demolished the first hockey stick (MBH98) in a scientific paper (collab with McKentrick).

Climate Audit has been highlighted by the press including The Wall Street Journal[2] and United Press International,[3] and was co-winner of the 2007 Best Science Blog award.[4]

from the wikipedia page on Climate Audit. Now he demolishes the new hockey stick (Mann et al 2008), ok so he hasn't written a paper yet, but Mann08 only came out in September and Mann's been very reluctant to give out data. And what precisely is 'confused' about Jeff Id's blog? It shows, mathematically, that the CPS/EIV procedure used by Mann and indeed practically every paleoclimatologist in the field will a) produce 'hockey sticks' even from random data, and b) distort the scale of historic temperature. While the specific blog post I linked was not the whole story, the other posts on that blog complete the picture: Mann is either consciously defrauding, or has even less statistical ability than Jeff "not a statistician" Id. Id intends, as he mentions elsewhere on his blog, to write a paper on this; the math is nearly sorted and he's already had an offer about publication. It is hard to get anti-AGW papers published though, and it doesn't help that the IPCC, whose position everyone assumes is the 'consensus', owes its funding to the continuation of the Great Global Warming Scare. But even if his paper does not get published, in a secondary source such as Wikipedia even a blog post is enough to say that 'So-and-so has argued that...' because it is verifiable that they have indeed argued it, and if their argument is mathematical in nature, then to be notable it need only be true. This is where the policy in WP:TRUTH and elsewhere falls down: with mathematics, truth is verifiability is a math proof. And I say that as a mathematics student who's applying to Cambridge, and whom is considered by teachers to be a shoo-in (and this is at a school that got four pupils into Cambridge last year out of four who applied). This is no idle boast on my part: I'm good at maths; you probably don't want to challenge me on mathematical grounds. Just a friendly warning on that one. Lastly, the Telegraph. It may well be partisan, but you find me a newspaper, or indeed an academic journal, that isn't. The peer-review process in climate science is not impartial - it would be laughable if it weren't so serious. To go back to my main point though, math says AGW is wrong. Math is universal truth. What matters it who did the math, so long as it's right? PT (talk) 22:27, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

Nonsense. I can enumerate an infinite number of true statements that are in no way notable, from "2 is even, 4 is even, 6 is even..." over "there are infinitely many integers greater than 1", "there are infinitely many integers greater than 2"... to slightly more surprising things like "there are exactly as many integers greater than 3 than there are integers greater than 1", "there are exactly as many integers greater than 5 than there are integers greater than 1",.... You may be a wiz kid with respect to math, but then I do know a bit about proofs and proving myself.

Jeff Id's blog post shows nothing of the nature you claim. Neither he, nor apparently you, understand even the basics of the method applied. Of course you always get the blade of the hockey stick - that's where you correlate the proxies with the measured data, and the measured data shows a strong warming trend in the 20th century. The proxies for the preceding 1000 or so years, on the other hand, are fairly flat. That also means that neither mirroring nor miss-dating will affect the macroscopic look of the result very much. The post you linked to is none to clear about what Jeff Id tries to do, but I am completely unimpressed. If Id has an offer for publication without a finished paper, and indeed with "math that is nearly sorted", than that only tells us that the publisher does not use reasonable scientific quality controls. And of course AGW does in no way depend on the Hockey Stick. The basic mechanism have been understood by Arrhenius more than a century ago, and without any reliable temperature record. Nowadays we can take more factors into account, but the basic physics is the same - adding greenhouse gases to the atmosphere results in a higher infrared opaqueness and slows the radiative loss of heat from the surface. To compensate, Earth heats up until equilibrium is achieved again.

If you think that an opinion piece in the Telegraph has comparable weight to a peer-reviewed article in PNAS, I don't know if we have any common ground to continue this debate.

Finally, if "anti-AGW papers" are indeed hard to publish, may I suggest that you consider two explanations? One is that there is a giant conspiracy of thousands of scientists who try to suppress the truth, the second being that those papers are lousy... --Stephan Schulz (talk) 23:23, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

While I do not deny that you have a considerable mathematical background which doubtless trumps my own, perhaps it would help if you had noticed that we were discussing verifiability not notability. The source is verifiable because it is math. The statement is notable because it shows, in essence, that the method will always produce a flattened 'handle' whether the past temperatures match it or not. The problem is not with the 'blade' (although the temp data used for that are suspect too), but with the 'look, temps have never gone up like this before!' claim. Perhaps you should look at some of the other posts on Id's blog, and also at McI's blog Climate Audit.

Also, you (and, presumably, whichever scientists you are getting your info from) seem to be assuming that the only thing that can maintain equilibrium is a (large) change in temperature. The Earth is big. I do not see anything in the literature which gives valid evidence that it would need more than a part per million of a degree to homeostase humanity's entire CO2 output. Of course, given the potency of methane, there's more GW from farting cows than there is from the Industrial Revolution.

The AGW claim is that temps are rising faster than natural variation has caused them to in the past. If the paleos' methods flatten out the historic temp reconstructions (as Jeff Id shows is the case), then any comparisons between current rises and past rises are immediately invalidated.

The reason for citing the Telegraph article was to show that AGW is not universally accepted. Have you looked at the figures lately? You're actually in the (popular) minority. I suspect you are also in the scientific minority... but I don't have figures there.

Iirc, Arrhenius studied dynamic equilibria in fairly simple, controlled chemical systems. To generalise from that to the entire atmosphere, ecosphere and biosphere of a planet is a little rash. But please keep discussing; I'm learning something here, and enjoying doing so. PT (talk) 20:31, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Sorry to quote your own text back at yourself, but you wrote "if their argument is mathematical in nature, then to be notable it need only be true", which is nonsense. As I wrote before, the blog post you pointed to is to vague to be even close to verifiable. If he really manages to get his stuff published in a peer-reviewed journal, then we can discuss it. I don't hold my breath. But let me try just once more: The proxy data for the last 1000 years is essentially flat. No matter if you shift it, or flip it, it remains flat. That what Id did - as far as I can determine from his muddled text. As for your interesting idea about the "big Earth" - have you found any scientist making that argument? If not, why not? Here is a hint: Most of the Earth is hot and is a net source (if a small one) of heat for the atmosphere. Luckily, it's fairly well insulated. And while methane is a potent greenhouse gas, it's influence is less that that of carbon dioxide (of which there is a lot more). And cows are far from the only source of methane. May I suggest you first spend some time to get the basics right? I'll give the blog posts on polls all the weight they deserve. As for the scientific minority, I suggest you check out the scientific opinion on global warming article. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 22:35, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Actually, what Id did was to show that whether the proxy data is flat or not, Mann's methods will always make it LOOK flat, except for the calibration period which, consequentially, will appear considerably magnified relative to the rest. Perhaps I made a bad choice of specific post to link to; try 1 and then 2 The basic point being made is that "Selective sorting of data distorts the temperature scale of the historic temperature range. Until this effect is compensated for sorting based paleoclimatology reconstruction can not be accepted." The fact that, at the same time, a recent temp signal (the 'blade' of the HS) can be created from nothing is merely a side issue.

Can you please explain precisely what you find unscientific about these blog posts? To me they appear to be a model of honest science.

As for the 'scientific opinion on global warming' article... now you're using a biased article to justify another biased article. The fact is that anything that dissents from the AGW orthodoxy, no matter how verifiable and/or notable, is being systematically removed from wikipedia by overzealous editors such as yourself. If I appear to be insulting you, then I apologise - I am merely suggesting that you are mistaken.

"I'll give the blog posts on polls all the weight they deserve."? Is this intended as a (slightly ironic) derogatory expression? If a blog is a secondary source, and cites its primary sources (which are valid sources), then I believe WP policy allows for its inclusion.

About Id's blog: he also published the code he's been using (in R); if you look at 3 you can copy/paste his code and see for yourself. PT (talk) 17:34, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

(Dedent) "Actually, what Id did was to show that whether the proxy data is flat or not, Mann's methods will always make it LOOK flat" - No, what Id actually did was conclusively demonstrating that he has no clue about the methods employed by Mann and other paleoclimatologists. From your source at [1]: "Next I decided that I would assume a temperature rise from -0.2 to 0.6 degrees C in the last 100 years. Since the assumption is that temperature is rising I couldn’t accept any negative slopes in the data (this identical to what is done with temperature proxy data)." (bolding from the original). No, this is not what is done with the proxy data. It is complete nonsense. I suspect this is not the only error, but it is a major howler that completely devalues all the following discussion. And that is why I'm sceptical about blog posts on climatology from random engineers. Any decent peer review would have caught this - I did, and I'm a computer scientist, not a climatologists. It's to easy to write things that look scientific, but are nonsense. The ratio of crackpots and well-meaning, but simply incompetent people to undiscovered geniuses is not in favour of the geniuses. No one can afford to evaluate each and every self-published opinion. The purpose of peer-review is not to censor papers based the the conclusion, but to ensure that the authors demonstrate at least some understanding of the field and do not make basic mistakes. It's a quality control measure that ensures that most scientists do not need to filter a vast amount of crap, and hence makes reasonably efficient communication in the scientific community possible.

You are wrong about blogs as well. See WP:SPS. Blog posts are ok if they are from recognized experts in their field of expertise. Even then, other sources are preferred. Just referencing reliable sources does not make a blog post itself reliable. Reading a scientific paper is HARD. We don't spend 10 years to train scientists to develop their creative energies, we train them to understand their field of research. Here is a challenge: Check out my paper A Comparison of Different Techniques for Grounding Near-Propositional CNF Formulae from [2]. It's only 6 or so pages, and written for a general AI audience, not for logicians. The basic topic is fairly simple, and in principle most of the work could have been done 30 or so years ago. The paper also won the best paper award at the FLAIRS conference, so the reviewers presumably found it well-written and clear. Could you reasonably find an error in that work? Or could you improve it? There are many quite obvious potential improvements. If yes, we need to talk about finding you a job. But if no, would you accept that it is not trivial for laypeople to read and understand scientific papers?

Finally, on the scientific opinion on global warming article: It is a fair selection of opinions. There is no recognized scientific organization of any standing that still opposes the basic facts of climate change. If you find one, add it. But don't hold your breath while searching. Quite regardless of the text, check the references. And if you find any edit where I have removed a verifiable and notable critical point about climate science, please show it. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 19:16, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

Sorry I've not answered for so long; I haven't been logged into Wiki for months... To resume where we left off:

Actually, Id did do a later post using the precise scaling method used (based on sd and regressions iirc), and showed that for all practical purposes it is close to equivalent. Admittedly, it was an error on his part to use the word "identical". As regards peer review, I am aware of its intended purpose, but it at least appears that some reviewers are misusing the process to achieve other aims besides the stated one. As for "devalues all the following discussion", I am still convinced that Id showed quantitatively that applying a scaling process to each dataset based on recent trends (which is the class of methods used, even though the specific method Id used in that particular post was not the specific method used by Mann et al) attenuates (or amplifies, depending on the frequency of the Brownian noise on the signal) past values relative to the values in the 'calibration period'. As regarding blogs, the policy on SPS would of course allow Climate Audit to be used as a reference - though, it seems, not Id; I stand corrected on that one.

As regarding the paper you linked to, I can just about understand the splitting method described and might even be capable of implementing it in C, albeit inefficiently (though I haven't tried, so I can't be sure). This in fact raises an interesting issue with this type of work; that is that the performance of each algorithm, being determined empirically, is dependent (perhaps quite heavily) on the efficiency of the code and indeed of how successful the compiler is at optimisation of the code. How much did your research consider this, and what conclusions/opinions did you reach? Is there decent literature on this to which you could direct me? Unfortunately I can offer no suggestions for mitigating this issue as it seems inherent in the empirical nature of the testing method, whereas a theoretical big-Oh determination of the algorithms' performance may not be practical (I haven't studied big-Oh properly, I'm afraid) or indeed useful (it being difficult to determine which of the memory and time orders is most important). Incidentally, I have managed to find an error - s/"can be to large"/"can be too large" in the last para. of the Introduction - perhaps not the type of error you were asking for(!), but I would have expected peer-review to include proof-reading; maybe this is not the case.

Of course it is not trivial to understand it, but then, it is in a fairly inaccessible region of mathematics. Climate "science" (yes, scare quotes. They happen sometimes) on the other hand hasn't (in my opinion) really progressed beyond repeating dogma which is understandable to anyone with an A-level in Chemistry (and yes, I do have one of those).

By the way, please can you comment on the following (which is somewhat off-topic): I have a problem with Godel's Incompleteness Theorem - the proof basically implies that G is true (since ¬G implies Prov(G) which is a contradiction, whereas G implies no such contradiction), but that means if the theorem is provable in T, then so is G, and hence T is inconsistent. So either there is a flaw in Godel's work, or all rich axiomatic systems are inconsistent, or there are consistent rich axiomatic systems but they somehow forbid Godel arithmetic while producing normal arithmetic, or I've simply made an error somewhere. It's probably the last, but I'd like the opinion of someone of your expertise in this area.

Finally (to echo your style), on the scientific opinion on global warming article, my problem is that it over-represents organisations relative to individuals; also, many of the organisations listed are not really notable (or are not relevant), thus producing a puffed-up effect of "Whoa, that's a long list of supporting organisations, so they must be right". In other words, the emphasis is constructed in such a way as to make a POV judgement, even though no small fragment of the text itself contains one. PT (talk) 21:29, 13 May 2009 (UTC)

I'd just like to add that I've spotted the error in that bit about the Incompleteness Theorem, so please ignore that paragraph. PT (talk) 23:16, 18 June 2009 (UTC)

Your participation requested

(Cross-posted to several users' talk pages)

Your participation on User:Raul654/Civil POV pushing would be appreciated. Raul654 (talk) 19:47, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

Thanks. I'll look at it. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 20:13, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

Theodor Landscheidt

I've AFD'd TL. IWS claims to find a source for him being a judge, viz [3]. Its a crappy astrology text probably recycling his own biog. Any chance you could find out if he really was, and if so a reliable source for it? William M. Connolley (talk) 22:40, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

I tried to find out more about it, but online sources in German are also rare. He seems to have been a judge who did some work on solar cycles as a hobby, and had some weird ideas about astrology as well. In general, people seem to have found him a likable person. Sorry, I could not find more... --Stephan Schulz (talk) 22:58, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

Oops, forgot to say I'd read this. Thanks for looking William M. Connolley (talk) 22:22, 23 April 2008 (UTC)

Anže Kopitar

Hi, Stephan. Just letting you know that I toned down my remarks in accordance with your request. However, I don't agree with your argument that the user merely "pointed out that Slovenia did not exist as an independent country"; he quite clearly stated that Slovenia did not exist at all. --WorldWide Update (talk) 11:06, 23 April 2008 (UTC)

Replied to at User talk:WorldWide Update --Stephan Schulz (talk) 11:55, 23 April 2008 (UTC)

S. Fred Singer

Is: S. Fred Singer, an atmospheric physicist, Professor Emeritus of Environmental Sciences at the University of Virginia, and former founding Director of the U.S. Weather Satellite Service. *What* The Independent Institute *is*, is not in question, this is where this *noted* scientist decided to publish his opinions on the The Great Global Warming Swindle and he is an *expert* who's opinion is germane. Don't erase my contributions without an entry on my talk page. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Supertheman (talk • contribs) 12:31, 27 April 2008 (UTC)

"S. Fred Singer, an atmospheric physicist, Professor Emeritus of Environmental Sciences at the University of Virginia, and former founding Director of the U.S. Weather Satellite Service" is an example of WP:PEACOCK. He is also talking about TGGWS in the article you reference, not about AIT. And, with or without your leave, I will edit as I find it appropriate. If I want to discuss some changes I make, I'll usually have that discussion on the appropriate talk page of the article, in this case talk: An Inconvenient Truth. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 12:50, 27 April 2008 (UTC)

I completely disagree that his title and credentials are WP:PEACOCK, if that were the case then we would remove mentions of An Inconvenient Truth being awarded an Oacar and it's box office success. There are no words like "famous" or "acclaimed" in that sentence, it is simply a statement of his position, credentials and past credentials that are completely relevant to the article. I challenge you to point out even *one* word that is even remotely WP:PEACOCK in this sentence:

"S. Fred Singer, an atmospheric physicist, Professor Emeritus of Environmental Sciences at the University of Virginia, and former founding Director of the U.S. Weather Satellite Service"

It might be a bit lengthy, but his credentials are extremely important given the statement I contributed there concerning his opinion of AIT and it's science. Perhaps this discussion is more relevant on the talk page of AIT, but we started it here so it seems appropriate that we'd finish it here. If you disagree, I have no objection to moving it to AIT. By the way, I wasn't saying you couldn't "edit as [you] find appropriate", I was simply asking for you to mention on my talk page when you revert contributions I make, which is a Wikipedia suggestion. Supertheman ^(talk) 00:22, 3 May 2008 (UTC)

You are comparing apples and oranges. We mention Singer's credentials on Singer's page, and AIT's awards on the AIT page. We don't repeat Singer's credentials when we mention him elsewhere, and we don't repeat AIT's awards whenever we mention the movie. That's what Wikilinks are for. You may think his credentials important, while I find it more relevant that he hasn't published a decent paper in 20 years, that he jumps between different "it's not us" positions faster than one can keep track off, and that the National Academy has strongly criticized his petition project. All of this can be adequately explained in Singer's own biography. It does not have a place in another article. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 23:09, 4 May 2008 (UTC)

Richard S. Lindzen

Lindsen IS quoted as commenting on the BASIC SCIENCE:

"Richard S. Lindzen, a climatologist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a member of the National Academy of Sciences, who has long expressed skepticism about dire climate predictions, accused Mr. Gore in The Wall Street Journal of “shrill alarmism.”

Lindzen has, "...long expressed skepticism about dire climate predictions" - that is a comment on the science, and refutes Gore's claim that they "agree on the fundamentals". Do not erase my contributions without doing the research.Supertheman (talk) 12:39, 27 April 2008 (UTC)

Lindzen is not talking about the science of the movie. It's your original research that assumes that "dire climate predictions" refers to AIT. Lindzen is one of the very few scientists with some skepticism about global warming. But he does not deny that anthropogenic contributions raise atmospheric CO2 or that increased CO2 causes a positive forcing. He does have a somewhat unusual theory that most of the effect will be cancelled by negative cloud formation feedback. I can very well imagine that Lindzen has commented directly on the science of AIT, but if so, you do your homework. The current quote is a comment on the style, not on the substance. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 12:55, 27 April 2008 (UTC)

This is patent sophistry. Lindzen is most certainly commenting on the "science of the movie". Read the quote, please:

"Richard Lindzen, a climatologist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology who has long expressed skepticism about climate predictions, accused Gore in The Wall Street Journal of "shrill alarmism."

Clearly he is commenting on Gore's "predictions" in the movie. Perhaps it would be wise to come to an agreement on the definition of terms.

"Shrill", being an exaggerated cry; "alarmism", being unfounded and baseless warnings. Clearly, when one says that someone is guilty of "shrill alarmism", that means that both the content and manner of their "science" is in question.

From the article itself:

"In talks, articles and blog entries that have appeared since his film and accompanying book came out last year, these scientists argue that some of Mr. Gore’s central points are exaggerated and erroneous. They are alarmed, some say, at what they call his alarmism."

The article references: the scientists, the film and the science. Clearly, Lindzen (and the other scientists) are "talking about the science of the movie". Also, ad homenim attacks on Lindzen "He does have a somewhat unusual theory..." are neither germane or edifying to the debate, don't you think?

Rigidity in your definition of "commenting directly" and blatant ignoring of other statements in the article won't make them go away.Supertheman (talk) 13:56, 27 April 2008 (UTC)

In reference to your WP:3RR warning

I reverted three different things, once... not "more than three". This does not violate policy. Please review the policy before posting irrelevant warnings on my page. Thanks. I noted, however, that you did four yourself. Interesting. Supertheman (talk) 13:42, 27 April 2008 (UTC)

I'm very hard trying not to pull rank here. However, I've been on Wikpedia since 2003. I know WP:3RR and I encourage you to carefully read the policy and to check out WP:ANI/3RR for the existing practice. I can assure you that your edits I referred to will be considered at least 3 reverts by the Wikipedia community and by the admins enforcing Wikipedia rules, and that my edits from today will be considered just two reverts. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 14:14, 27 April 2008 (UTC)

I'm not sure what *rank* you want to pull (haha), but I think this has gone far enough. The page in question is watched very carefully by many, many editors. It has been returned to it's previous state, despite my cited and relevant contributions, so why are we continuing to discuss this? It has — in my opinion — really gone quite far enough. Don't you agree? Lets strive for some civility here, ok? Supertheman (talk) 22:35, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

[4]. If I say I that I know WP:3RR, I mean it. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 22:53, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

I already knew you were an admin, Stephan. Supertheman (talk) 08:45, 1 May 2008 (UTC)

Landscheidt

Since I provided all of the relevant information, can you tell me what you see on page provided? And as noted on the article talk page, please confirm, volume, etc. --I Write Stuff (talk) 15:03, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

Answered at the talk page in question. In general, I prefer to keep the discussion in one place. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 15:09, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

Singer

I asked William, however your most recent revert suggests you may know. What is the source being used in the following [5]? The publication, magazine, book, whatever, as far as I can see, was not published in 1960, but 1963, and further was not published by Singer himself. There is also the issue of a page missing, and publisher. If you can fill in that information that would be great, that way I can verify the source. --I Write Stuff (talk) 17:47, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Guido den Broeder

Hello. I've started a RfC/U for this editor, and in the evidence section I included part of a discussion he had with you. Fram (talk) 12:51, 30 April 2008 (UTC)

No problem. I'll be traveling the next few days, and will be offline most of the time, so there will very likely not be any input by me. Why am I "an uninvolved user" and most others are "an admin"?  ;-) --Stephan Schulz (talk) 13:27, 30 April 2008 (UTC)

Because I didn't realise at the time that you were an admin, and didn't check (insert blushing icon here). I did not mean any disrespect, obviously. Fram (talk) 13:30, 30 April 2008 (UTC)

A contributor of character - Stephan Shulz

I put this on my page also, but I wanted to say it here as well (hope you don't mind, Stephan)

This editor, Stephan Shultz - a person I was in the middle of a heated argument with — cleaned up the mess that I created in archiving my page.

This is an excellent example of how contributors can control their emotions and remain civil and friendly in the midst of (sometimes) emotional circumstances - a lesson I take to heart as well. I just wanted to publicly thanks Stephan for showing his excellent character in helping me out when it would have been easy for him to ignore the situation. Instead he took the time to clean up my mess in a kind and friendly manner. Kudos to a good man. Thank you, Stephan. :-)

PS It might be time for you to archive a bit, my friend! I'd be glad to help, but that would be the blind leading the sighted. Haha. Supertheman (talk) 05:04, 1 May 2008 (UTC)

Thanks. I appreciate the sentiment. As far as I'm concerned, a content conflict is no reason to let an easily fixed technical problem stand. Yes, after having looked at my talk page over a fairly fast dial-up connection, I agree that its time to move some of the old stuff out of the way. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 22:04, 4 May 2008 (UTC)

Civility remedy

Noted your concerns. If you have any ideas, please leave a note at Wikipedia_talk:Requests_for_arbitration/C68-FM-SV/Workshop#Civility_remedy. Cheers. Ncmvocalist (talk) 09:26, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

Now you are forty

In case you missed my reply: [6]. --BozMo talk 20:11, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

Indeed, I am...for about 97 more minutes. ;-) More there --Stephan Schulz (talk) 20:25, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

I thought I would reply here. It could be worse we could divide up on age and then as I was 41 and 42 ahead of you I would get lumped with you... I am not a fan of Dawkins but partly because popularists irritate me when the subjects are too complicated, also I think he borrows without crediting others too much. As for why I believe things (which was probably rhetorical) I have already told you I wrote this up once here: [7] and probably won't ever repeat it. --BozMo talk 20:55, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

Indeed, people might confuse our friendly banter with a serious flame war. Yes, the question was a rhetorical one - in plain, the question is why people, with essentially the same objective evidence, arrive at very different and usually violently incompatible opinions on relgion - and why those nearly always match the ones of their parents and culture. I've seen your write-up before, but have not, unfortunately, read all of it. But I notice that you essentially discuss memetics in the introduction, which brings us back to Dawkins. I actually became consciously aware of him by accident - I ran out of books in an airport, and got The Ancestor's Tale on sale. I had vaguely heard about The Selfish Gene, The Blind Watchmaker, and Climbing Mount Improbable in online fora, but never connected them with a particular person, let alone the same person - I'm not good with arbitrary facts like names. And as you probably know, the Creation-Evolution debate and hence religion in general is much less important in Western Europe than in the US. As far as I can make out, Dawkins is scrupulously honest, even if it hurts his argument. He also handles the English language, both written and spoken, in a beautiful way. And, at least in my opinion, he argues from a coherent, consistent, and deeply thought through position. On the other hand, he is fairly weak on the history of religion and philosophy, and has a somewhat cavalier attitude to these topics. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 21:26, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

Well, I am off now so Happy Birthday for tomorrow. --BozMo talk 21:21, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

...and just when I finished my essay! Thanks anyways. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 21:26, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

Well I am just in time to pretend offence at the possible implication in the above that you think I might be from North America. Yes I think Dawkins is pretty honest (including on his lack of originality and ignorance of religion), although I have only skimmed his books. He is also a great communicator. But for goodness sake did any decent mind ever come out of Oxford? Don't bother trying to read my screed by the way. Unlike Dawkins I am an atrocious communicator (although I do have th advantage of being right of course). --BozMo talk 21:34, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

Good to know that we have one thing in common at least. I've been right ever since I turned 12 ;-). --Stephan Schulz (talk) 21:50, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

Happy Birthday

To a fellow '67er :-) --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 22:00, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

Thanks, and just on time. Well...do birthdays go by summertime? --Stephan Schulz (talk) 22:01, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

Yep, either they go by summertime, or by real birthtime. So when exactly should the congrats be in? Virtual or realtime? ;) --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 23:00, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

Maths

[8] "Relegated" to the realm of maths? Shurely some mishtake? Elevated you meant. --BozMo talk 06:08, 28 May 2008 (UTC)

Well, I probably meant "limited" or "restricted" or "apply only" or something like that. And I don't even do soccer... --Stephan Schulz (talk) 06:50, 28 May 2008 (UTC)

The Royal Society is not a "Source"

Hi Stephan

I just wanted to make sure you understood this. Per WP:RS, a source, in the context of when they are used to verify wikipedia content, is not the same thing as the author of the source,(such as the IPCC, NAS, etc.), but rather it's the actual material which was produced by the author. See wikipedia definition of reliable sources below.

Wikipedia articles should use reliable, third-party, published sources. Reliable sources are credible published materials with a reliable publication process; their authors are generally regarded as trustworthy or authoritative in relation to the subject at hand. How reliable a source is depends on context. As a rule of thumb, the more people engaged in checking facts, analyzing legal issues, and scrutinizing the writing, the more reliable the publication. Sources should directly support the information as it is presented in an article and should be appropriate to the claims made; if an article topic has no reliable sources, Wikipedia should not have an article on it. See Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard for queries about the reliability of particular sources.

Hope this helps.

--Sirwells (talk) 02:27, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

I think this is a bit splitting hairs. Yes, if we write "the Royal Society is an excellent source for topic X", we refer to their publications or statements. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 07:28, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

It may be a subtle distinction, but it is a very important one and it was set up that way for a reason. WP:V makes it clear that:

• "Sources should directly support the information as it is presented in an article and should be appropriate to the claims made: exceptional claims require exceptionally high-quality reliable sources."

• "...the most reliable sources are peer-reviewed journals and books published in university presses; university-level textbooks; magazines, journals, and books published by respected publishing houses; and mainstream newspapers."

• "...the greater the degree of scrutiny involved in checking facts, analyzing legal issues, and scrutinizing the evidence and arguments of a particular work, the more reliable it is."

None of these criteria fit if you want to consider the author as the source and not the publication/statement being made by the author. You seem to trying to grant absolute infallibility on certain organizations so as to just assume every document, pamphlet, statement, etc coming from them should be arbitrarily excepted without question and without having to meet any of the criteria by which wikipedia content policy measures the credibility of sources. This is not what wikipedia's content policy is about (and is a dangerous way of thinking in my opinion.) Even though the organizations producing the source may be considered as "authoritive" and "credible", none of the documents produced by them are immune to the other policies I mention above. --Sirwells (talk) 18:35, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

• It is hard to think of any more convincing way to establish a scientific consensus than a declaration by the Royal Society (as the representative of the most important body of scientists) though. However I agree we have to make sure it was a properly authorised officer of the Society and not a tealady covering the switchboard when a journalist rang. --BozMo talk 18:40, 1 June 2008 (UTC)
• Indeed. I do not grant "absolute infallibility" to certain organizations. I do grant them their due weight. The main national academies are the most respected scientific organizations in the world. Their members are usually as free from political and economical pressure as you can be - the members are world-renown scientists, usually tenured, with a long history of successful scientific work. They do not make statements lightly. Their formal statements are among the most reliable sources you can get. And, as far as they make statements on the topic of climate change, they all agree - the US NAS, the Akademie Leopoldina, the Académie des Sciences, the Lincei, the Chinese Academy of Sciences, the Royal Society, the Canadian Royal Society. They all agree on the topic and they all agree that there is a consensus. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 19:06, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

User:ScienceApologist

this user has been blocked numerous times (see block log), which is why i don't consider this user "long established" nor "reliable". how can we take users seriously who steadily violate various wiki rules and get blocked for numerous reasons. sincere SomeUsr|Talk|Contribs 22:35, 7 June 2008 (UTC)

SA is a valuable contributor. Whatever you think of his contributions or behavior, he is a long-time user. WP:DTTR applies. I also find your template surprisingly badly chosen - deleting bad sources is not "adding commentary or personal analysis". --Stephan Schulz (talk) 22:51, 7 June 2008 (UTC)

At least he keeps the same account, some users manage to get into an edit war, find their own way to WP:3RR, and edit their monobook --all on their first day! It's enough to make a person wonder, what did your block log look like before you used the SomUsr account? R. Baley (talk) 23:01, 7 June 2008 (UTC)

NAC and Global Cooling

I'm well aware of the fact that "NAC shut down" and "Global cooling" ain't exactly the same, but this is not about what me or you are thinking: it's about what the media responded to Bryden's study. And what they say is: Scientists forecast global cold snap and "Mini Ice Age" May Be Coming Soon. There is one half of a sentence ("… several daily newspapers as well as some popular science magazines proceeded on the assumption that global cooling was imminent.") and there are five sources given. Where is the problem? ––Bender235 (talk) 23:30, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

Answered at talk: global cooling. Please keep discussions in one place. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 23:37, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

If you never listen to the opposition you'll never understand why not everyone agrees with you. 98.169.241.244 (talk) 11:21, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

Mirror, mirror on the wall... --Stephan Schulz (talk) 11:38, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

EU gdp

THIS sounds more like NOT assuming good faith to me :[9]

Please, before you accuse someone of not having a good faith, you have to take a look at the facts, and the reality, and who actually does what.Read my response on the gdp talk page and you will see what is going on. There were attempts to make this whole thing of national importance and there were attempts to blame the whole discussion on sensitivity of certain nationals.This is an obvious and blatant, cynical discrimination against the people. This is shameful and this is absolutely alarming.I was not the one who brought the United States issue to the light.--Geographyfanatic (talk) 22:53, 17 June 2008 (UTC)

Answered at Talk:List of countries by GDP (nominal). Please keep discussions in one place. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 23:18, 17 June 2008 (UTC)

I am not going to laugh at all. Giving the whole issue nationalistic appearance should not be tolerated. "I understand his anger" what does that supposed to mean? So is it all Americans' fault that the discussion is intense or are they doing this on purpose to provoke people?--Geographyfanatic (talk) 23:31, 17 June 2008 (UTC)

There are few things lamer than explaining a joke. The smiley ";)", especially the variant with the semicolon ("winking") indicates that the previous statement is intended as a joke and not to be taken serious. This is a convention that's older than the Wikipedia, and in fact older than the WWW. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 23:40, 17 June 2008 (UTC)

Well, if they were telling that user himself all that with smiling and winking then it would be a joke, but when telling someone behind his back, winking and smiling get a double, completely different meaning.--Geographyfanatic (talk) 23:48, 17 June 2008 (UTC)

Thanks

Doubts getting clear ... --Bhadani (talk) 18:16, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

You're welcome! --Stephan Schulz (talk) 18:23, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

Question

Hey, on an edit today you wrote "(ec)", what does it mean? Thanks, Brusegadi (talk) 02:14, 21 June 2008 (UTC)

ec == edit conflict. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 03:27, 21 June 2008 (UTC)

Thanks! Brusegadi (talk) 04:41, 21 June 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the pointer you left me. I expressed further mystification on my own page. Doc Tropics 00:18, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

"Nothing on the IHR web page or in the JHR has any credibility"

That article I cited is published in full by the United States Government Printing Office as an introduction to a US Senate Committee report. See the "Records of the Morgenthau Diary Study, 1953-65. Guide to the Records of the U.S. Senate at the National Archives (Record Group 46))". Is it your view that the United States Senate doesn't have "any credibility"? Or are you of the view that some cyber truck that zooms around the WWW must have bumped into the web page by "accident" and dumped stuff endorsed the United States government?Bdell555 (talk) 05:55, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

To be honest, the credibility of the US (or most other governments) is not particularly high for me *coughgitmocoughextraordinaryredition*. But what is more: the printing office is nothing more than indeed a printing press. It has no editorial control. I cannot find the paper you refer to in the National Archives - the only mention of the report seems to be here. Do you have an accessible source that shows this claim in some context? It might be used as a bad example, or the report may be the responsibility of just one crank senator (of the US has had its fair share). Anyways, simply being printed by the Government Printing Office implies no credibility, and being published by the IHR seriously erodes any potential credibility. I don't know if its useful to continue this discussion in three places at once - if you prefer a centralized discussion (I do), I suggest Talk:Holocaust denial. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 07:50, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

It may seem to have got a bit heated over there but I assure you I mean nothing personally. My apologies if I've been uncivil. I happen to have a very aggressive debating style and I try to push my advantage at pretty much every turn. I respect your engagement with me on this issue, although as I noted you seem to have some genuine antipathy for IHR. In any case, all the best.Bdell555 (talk) 13:24, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

No worries, I'm fairly robust. I don't grant you having an advantage, of course ;-), but thanks for the good wishes. Yes, I do have a genuine antipathy for the IHR, and I'm fairly certain so has anybody who has ever looked at their crap and has a basic interest in honest history. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 13:29, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

Well, without speaking to anything else on IHR, the particular weblink I am attempting to add has real substance to it, in my view, and I like to think I have an interest in honest history. But certainly people can disagree.Bdell555 (talk) 23:31, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

Looking back, I should have said "push my case". Somehow I had "push my advantage" as a turn of phrase in my mind. I didn't mean to come off so arrogant.Bdell555 (talk) 03:05, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

Singer Edits

I have no problem adding the date for context. I did not intend to misrepresent things, rather just the opposite. --GoRight (talk) 17:05, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

Well, Solomon apparently has an interest in misrepresenting, or he cannot read worth shit. Wikipedia never claimed that Singer "believed in Martians" in the present or recent past. It quite properly documents an event in the not-so-recent past. So Solomon' claim about Wikipedia is wrong and his question to Singer is a stupid rhetoric straw man. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 17:11, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

Straw man? Really? What does "article discussing Singer's acceptance of the possibility of an extraterrestrial base on Martian moon Phobos" mean to you? See [10]. --GoRight (talk) 01:37, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

February 1960. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 06:58, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

And you think that the date is significant why? If the point is to make him out to be a crackpot and discredit him for believing in extraterrestrials (a.k.a. UFOs and the like) saying he believed such things in 1960 v.s. today is of little consequence.

You, at least, were willing to allow the direct quote to be included ... which I appreciate. But KDP really just wants to argue about anything I add and he is doing it via edit warring, or so it seems. I have been fairly good on this front, regardless of Raul's assertions to the contrary. I'll revert a few times but if it looks like it is going to be endless I just stop. That is NOT edit warring within limits as Raul suggests. I'm not just coming back every other day and doing it all again and again on the same exact material and constantly pushing the 3RR. Besides, it takes more than one person to edit war.

Why are you guys so attached to this ancient article? Seriously. I don't mean this as a pointy stick here, but if your intent is something other than to ridicule the man then why are you all being so protective on such a trivial item? --GoRight (talk) 18:32, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

Isn't the significance of the date obvious? The fact is that Singer seriously considered Martians in 1960. We report this as an interesting fact. Solomon misrepresents this as if we claimed that Singer considers Martians today. That is the straw man. He then goes on and demolishes it - which is the normal purpose of a straw man. Note that he carefully has not asked Singer if he seriously considered Martians in 1960, as that would possibly not support his deception. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 18:42, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

OK, fair enough. I can see how you might interpret things that way. I am less suspicious of his motives though. I was going to look up some material to relate Singer to Carl Sagan and his comparable beliefs in this area to make the point that, as you say, it is less surprising that people would entertain such possibilities in 1960 as opposed to today. You seem satisfied that the average reader will make this connection, I am less confident thereof.

But this begs the question of why LS would bother to come here to pick a fight if not because he believes what he says. Do you have any theories on what his motive to even bother was? --GoRight (talk) 19:01, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

Well, after having read a good deal of Solomon's writings (as well as the reaction of some of his subjects), I suspect there are two motives. He is trying to strongly push a political point (either because he believes it, or for less savory reasons), and he is trying to generate controversy to spice up his column and other writings. And of course those two go nicely hand in hand. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 19:31, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

Stephan - I've started an RFC on GoRight. Your input would be appreciated - Wikipedia:Requests for Comments/GoRight Raul654 (talk) 22:01, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

I'm traveling, and have a lousy internet connection at the moment. But I might chime in a bit later. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 23:14, 2 July 2008 (UTC)

Whoops!

Thanks for pointing that out about this. Misread the header. -- TRTX ^{T / C} 14:09, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

No problem! --Stephan Schulz (talk) 14:10, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

ship pennant numbers/years for identification

I happened upon the controversy of using either ships launch year or pennant number to identify different ships with the same name. To me it seems self-evident that the year is to be preferred, and I thus acted upon your seconded amendment to use years. Immediately a couple of people appeared claiming they disagreed, though had not posted comment in the last 9 months. I wondered if you were still interested? Sandpiper (talk) 16:50, 9 July 2008 (UTC)

Yes, I saw that (the pages are still on my watchlist). I still think that dates are preferable for all but the most recent ships in most navies. I'll comment over there. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 19:24, 9 July 2008 (UTC)

WP:RS/N#Is Journal of Religion & Psychical Research a RS on comparative religion

Stephan, thanks for rendering an opinion on this topic before. Since you posted, I've elaborated on the reasons I believe that JRPR is sufficietly reliable for a review published therein to be cited in a discussion of a religious book (in Andrew Wilson (theologian) if you want to see it in context). I'd like to hear from you again, now that I've presented my rationale for its inclusion. Even if I'm not persuasive, your revisiting the topic and more detailed analysis would undoubtedly help move the discussion forward. Thanks! Jclemens (talk) 21:04, 9 July 2008 (UTC)

Answered at the noticeboard. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 22:12, 9 July 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for your time. Jclemens (talk) 04:52, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

Sea level rise

Hi. Was this edit appropriate? I have reverted it. In my edit summary I wrote please provide a reliable source but I see a lot of people providing this viewpoint but it could be just POV but since I'm not too involved in actually editing those articles I thought I might notify. Thanks. ~AH1^(TCU) 01:32, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

Hi. This is most likely wrong, and just a random thought, but doesn't Scibaby (talk · contribs) et al also make edits inserting unsourced information that seems to "debunk" global warming? Thanks. ~AH1^(TCU) 01:38, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

The edit is most definitely not helpful. Sea level is indeed rising, nearly all glaciers are melting, and the language is entirely inappropriate. It's also unsourced, of course. It might be SciBaby, but it usually finds a source it can misrepresent. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 06:46, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

t:GW

Hello Dr. Schulz, I took this away per TPG. The copy right explanation you provided in that edit remains in the history where it will clear up any "doubts" the diff collectors may have. Ciao, Brusegadi (talk) 01:51, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

No problem, I expected that. And "Stephan" is with me. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 06:38, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

Einstein's Three styles of religion

Stephan,

I was negligent in citing my single solitary source on Einstein's religion. However, all of my statements about Einstein's three styles of religion are taken from just one speech, not many scattered sources as you imply by your revert comment. I used the online copy at http://www.sacred-texts.com/aor/einstein/einsci.htm. As they note, it "appeared in the New York Times Magazine on November 9, 1930 pp 1-4. It has been reprinted in Ideas and Opinions, Crown Publishers, Inc. 1954, pp 36 - 40. It also appears in Einstein's book The World as I See It, Philosophical Library, New York, 1949, pp. 24 - 28."

I was indeed negligent in not supplying a citation, but my contribution certainly does not "need massive sources", and I don't think anything that can be established from one main primary source ("primary" in the sense it was written by AE himself) qualifies as OR (Original Research).

Regards,

WickerGuy (talk) 14:31, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

Hi Wicker! Adding that source certainly makes for a much stronger case. But I still have my doubts. Interpretation of primary sources is non-trivial. You write e.g. "Einstein distinguished three styles of religion" - but the text never explicitly mentions the word "three". There is an element of interpretation, and for such a complex topic and complex personality, this may well stray into original research. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 15:22, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

Hmmm. Would the word "third" suffice if there is no "three"? Beginning of paragraph four "Common to all these types is the anthropomorphic character of their conception of God. In general, only individuals of exceptional endowments, and exceptionally high-minded communities, rise to any considerable extent above this level. But there is a third stage of religious experience which belongs to all of them, even though it is rarely found in a pure form: I shall call it cosmic religious feeling." I think it's fairly unambiguous that he was dealing with three types.

WickerGuy (talk) 19:17, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

Seeking help?

Hello. Could you pleasae help me with this: I need to post a relative important message to the user Jon Harald Søby (he is a bureaucrat) at the norwegian wikipedia, but i have some problems with my network and cant write there. Could you or someone else please post this on his discussiopn page? I would be grateful :)

Jon Harald Søby;

Jeg er ingen ond person, men har gjort noen dumme ting. Jeg ønsker å be om unnskyldning for at jeg har vandalisert en del på wikipedia som Rodelero. Dvs, det var jeg som startet rodelero på nynorsk wiki. JEg tullet idag, og oppdaget lite morsomme reaksjoner, de har helt rett i at Bubblemaker ikke er bare seriøs. JEg forstår at mine ukonstruktive bidrag ikke er morsomme dor de som skriver på wikåedia, men det har tatt lang tid for meg å oppfatte det. Hvis nettleverandøren får beskjed om å stenge internettet her, rammer det også flere totalt uskyldige internettbrukere.

For å tat det fra starten: JEg begynte å tulle på nn wikipedia nærmest ved en tilfeldighet. Det gikk på en måte en sport i å prøve å legge inn tull uten å bli oppdaget, men dette tok litt mere av enn det burde etterhvert. Etter hvert begynte også en eller flere å lage sokkerodelero-kontoer, med skitt som jeg ikke ville skrevet noen gang.

Det fortsatte nå og da intil det ble oppdaget for snart et år siden, og vi fikk et klagebrev fra internettleverandøren. Dette husker du sikkert, prosesssor von osv.

Jeg burde da ha innsett at grensen var nådd. Det gjorde jeg inntil nylig, jeg startet med Bubblemakerkontoen. JEg hadde faktsik tenkt å være seriøs, og var det en stund, men ble igjen lei. Istedenfor å bare trekke meg rolig tilbake, begynte jeg å tulle. Det skulel jeg ikke ha gjort, for det ble reagert negativt på idag.

JEg skjønte det selv når det sto nevnt at vi kunne miste internettforbindelsen, og andre fortalte meg også at det ikke var lurt å tulle slik på wikipedia eller lignende nettsteder, fordi det man skirver fort kommer ut av kontroll.

Jeg har full forståelse for at brukere blir irriterte over sabotasje av artikler. JEg har også full forståelse for at brukere kanskje mener at sjansen ifjor høst var brukt opp, siden jeg da lovte å slutte helt med tull.

Jeg holdt dette løftet inntil jeg startet å tulle med bubblemaker.

JEg har først nå fullt forstått at jeg virkelig ikke kan holde på slik. Dette kan du stole på fordi selv ikke en idiot vil miste internett, idag er vi avhengige av det. OG flere enn meg blir rammet om den forsvinner. Tro det eller ikke, jeg har ikke skrevet stygge banneord om personer på nettet. JEg har med vilje irritert mange personer, fordi jeg ikke tenkte meg om. Dette er et utbredt problem, at man ikke tenker seg om like mye på nettet som på gata blant folk.

JEg ønsker å be om en uforbeholden unnskydlning for de problemer min vandalisme har skapt, men igjen, jeg er en snill person i virkeligheten, men så det bare som en katt og mus lek å legge inn tull uten å bli "tatt".

JEg ber om at saken blir avsluttet med dette, for jeg vil aldri tulle her mer når man risikerer trøbbel fra internettleverandøren, det skjønner jeg og alle andre. Jeg er bare en helt vanlig, ung person som lot fantasien gå ut av kontroll på nettet og ikke skjønte hvor irriternde tullingen var før jeg faktsik ble fortalt det.

Om andre vil fortsette å kalle seg liknende brukernavn har jeg ingen kontroll med, men det vil ikke være meg.

Jeg ber altså om unnskyldidning for vandal-problemene for andre, og definitivt, siste gang. --193.216.133.251 (talk) 19:18, 13 July 2008 (UTC)

thank you! --193.216.133.251 (talk) 19:18, 13 July 2008 (UTC)

The Norwegian Wikipedia is on the same servers as the English one, so network trouble is unlikely. You may be blocked, or you may be an innocent victim of a range block. Anyways, I'd gladly transfer a reasonable message in any language I can understand, but I don't quite feel comfortable posting something of which contents I have no idea. I'll let him know where to find it. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 19:35, 13 July 2008 (UTC)

The problem is that he is probably blocked. This is a confession/appology from a vandal Laaknor (talk) 19:43, 13 July 2008 (UTC)

Yes, that is right. I have vandalized from time to another just too much and too long, and has not really undertsanded how stupid it was before now, when iread on admins user discussion, and someone a (a lot older than me) explained me that I have really been stupid, and therefore the only thing i could do was to ask the first admin i saw at en wiki to post this explaination and apologize to him. I am not going to write dumb things at wikipedia anymore, because it is stupid to do it, and can get me trouble with accessing internett. --193.216.133.251 (talk) 20:00, 13 July 2008 (UTC)

Jon Harald is as far as I know on his way to Egypt if he has not already arrived, I will give him a mail so that he gets to read this. info-no@wikipedia.org is also an address this vandal could use if there should be anything else he wishes to communicate with Jon Harald or the norwegian project. -- Atluxity (talk) 21:00, 13 July 2008 (UTC)

info-no@wikiMedia.org maybe? There is no need to pay any attention to him. He has been having raids on several wikis, he has been apologizing to loads of people, but continues to vandalize every time. He’s an obsessed troll. Don’t feed him. — H92 (t · c · no) 00:36, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

That is not right. This time it IS the end of my nonsense. You must understand that H92, that no one in this situation would proceed with it. I will not risk my internett conection. and that is why i finally understanded that enough is enough. I think i have apologized to ca 3 persons before, and i actually stopped each time for a while. But this time it is absolutely no doubt. I think you understand that H92, good bye. --193.216.133.251 (talk) 02:14, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

To be honest, I’m having big problems with understanding that. Here you’re apologizing, and on Jon Harald’s talk page on nowiki suddenly another guy edits from your IP address saying he’s the owner of the computer. That may be, but I have no idea as to how I can verify that. What you have done towards different Wikimedia projects is unforgivable, and loss of internet access would finally stop you. (And my apologizes towards Stephan Schultz for having this conversation here.) — H92 (t · c · no) 11:18, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

No problem. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 11:26, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

Well...I have the fully understanding that my unconstructive edits was a very bad idea. But keep in mind- those edits was easy removed, even if they were irritating. If anyone lose their connection, that is quite a bigger case. You see, sometimes you need a shock to recognize the reality, and I got that shock. Therefore it is no chance at all that i will do such stupid things again. I think everyone understand that. And fortunately, it looks like the case is ended the best way for all parts. Fortunately most people can forgive each other in this world, when you finish problems the proper way. Since the case is finished, I too will not write more at this userpage. --193.216.133.251 (talk) 20:00, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

Pain threshold

I think you will find if you heat water in a pan the point at which you can no longer keep your hand in the water is about 54C-56C. This is a few degrees below the cellular damage point. Unless you have very special feet, your feet are less sensitive than your hands and dry sand conducts heat less well than water. Feet also sweat (not an option for an immersed hand) which helps a bit (e.g. in cool air the threshold for thermal burning from radiation is about 9 kW/m2 versus about 2 kW/m2 from Africa sun but only because your skin can cool in air and of course UV is another issue). So if your pain threshold is a lot different from 60C perhaps you should get your gout/MS/dermomyalgia treated? There is quite good published data on this for human skin but it is all from Nazi doctors in WW2 and not available online. --BozMo talk 06:18, 19 July 2008 (UTC)

Maybe its a matter of definition. Where does "uncomfortable" go to "painful"? To be honest, my evidence is purely anecdotal - I was thinking about warm water mixers in showers. Modern ones often are pseudo-limited to 38 degrees, and it becomes too hot soon after that. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 07:58, 19 July 2008 (UTC)

Well I am sure you would take it in the spirit intended if I said "ah, just a wimp then" but some third party might misunderstand it as a personal attack so I better not. Also as I say you can tolerate more in sand than in liquids. I'd be surprised even so if you didn't drink hot drinks at 50C routinely. I kind of used to do fire and explosions for a living although not that much to show for it [11] --BozMo talk 19:13, 19 July 2008 (UTC)

Well, I'm as wimpy as useful in a given situation, or more so. Let me also state that I don't intend to trust Nazi doctor estimates of other people's pain thresholds. They typically are neither great scientists nor reliable historians. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 15:03, 21 July 2008 (UTC)

Most attempts to quantify pain fail miserably, because it's fundamentally a subjective, not objective, phenomenon. It's not a simple matter of a nerve sensing a temperature of X degrees and triggering "pain"; the association cortex is heavily involved, which is why a sensation that is painful in one circumstance might be less so in another. MastCell ^Talk 18:08, 21 July 2008 (UTC)

Reverting

I am never going to be offended if I do something odd and you revert it by the way, especially if it is right at the end of an editing session. Small kids are very distracting and I have done at least three bad edits (over a few years) in these circumstances. --BozMo talk 13:45, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

No problem. I stumbled over the same edit, read it with the usual amount of distrust, but found it ok. I was wondering if you noted something I missed, so I did not revert myself. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 13:55, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

Help with a source in German

Hi there. When your have some time to spare, can you help me to confirm the content of a source that is written in Germand. In this table in the tourism article, one editor included the right column with a forecast from Dresdner Bank without a source. I Google and found ref 7 cited in an Australian article about tourism. I need help with the German language to confirm it is actually the correct source for the data. Sorry to bother you but you are the only editor I know who is a German speaker. Thanks. Mariordo (talk) 00:21, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Hi Mariordo. The link ("ref 7") you gave me is to a frame with a search mask, not to an actual article. When I search for "Dresdner Bank" there, it comes up with http://www.touristikreport.de/rd/archiv/11875.php. That one mentions 61 billion Euro spend by Germans for 2007, and 63.5 billion Euro for 2008 - which is not a full source for the table, and is not particularly good one even for just the German numbers (because of the highly volatile exchange rate). But is that the article you have in mind? It does claim that Germans have spend more than anybody else in 2007. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 03:22, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for your help, that seems to be the right study, but it seems that ref in particular does not have the edited forecast by Dresdner. The original source I found in English is [12] which leads to [13], but here I get lost, because just part of it is English and the search engine is in German. Mariordo (talk) 04:00, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Academy affirms hockey-stick graph

But it criticizes the way the controversial climate result was used. Am I missing something? Lucian Sunday (talk) 11:34, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

I thought your edit made it appear that Nature criticizes the use, when, in fact, the NAS does. Sorry, by "reference" I did not mean citation, but the reference of the pronoun, and I did overlook the quotes that made the context clearer. I'm still not particularly happy with placing this there, as that section talks about the reconstruction, not about the use of it (i.e. it deals with the scientific result). I would suggest to move it to the NCR section below. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 11:43, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

Thats fine; I'll respond on the article talk -jusn't wasn't sure where you were coming from. Lucian Sunday (talk) 14:29, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

DYN nom

Hi. I've nominated Leptotyphlops carlae, an article you worked on, for consideration to appear on the Main Page as part of Wikipedia:Did you know. You can see the hook for the article at Template talk:Did you know#Articles created/expanded on August 3, where you can improve it if you see fit. Cheers, T L Miles (talk) 02:58, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

Thanks, nice idea. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 03:49, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

Leptotyphlops carlae

The Leptotyphlops carlae had a lot of specific phrases copied directly from Jennifer Carpenter's BBC report. I did not notice a disclaimer that this in the public domain, either. Please go back to the article and edit these phrases out, using your own words to convey the information, or put her and others' phrases in quotation marks. I took care of a couple, but it probably needs more done. Thanks. --Blechnic (talk) 04:59, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

Thanks. There may have been some, but not in my writing. I'm aware of copyright problems. Words like "hatchling" are just the correct terminology (as I know learned - only knew the word as the smallest Dragon size from AD&D so far ;-). "Spaghetti-thin" is from the original UPenn press release, and is, at this time, the only description of that dimension we have. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 06:56, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

I assumed it was just a quick job putting up the article, and only notified you as the editor who did the most work. It should probably be better checked. I left the spaghetti-thin in, but put quotes around it, I think. If not, please do. I didn't have problems with specific words like "hatchling," though. It was things like enormous egg (or whatever the the term was). I write biology articles and know the limitations of descriptions, so this wasn't the issue. --Blechnic (talk) 07:05, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

No problem. I went over it once more and smoothed it a bit, with a bit more distance from the source. It looks ok to me now. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 07:08, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

Thanks. I've already taken it off my watch list. --Blechnic (talk) 07:09, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

FAQs

Should we do an FAQ on the second law and the greenhouse effect? --BozMo talk 06:59, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

Possibly. Right next to the one on the second law and Evolution? ;-) I'm supposed to prepare a talk before the jet lag gets me (I arrived in Sydney yesterday), but if no-one else steps up I will take a stab later. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 07:01, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

DYK

On 9 August, 2008, Did you know? was updated with a fact from the article Leptotyphlops carlae, which you created or substantially expanded. If you know of another interesting fact from a recently created article, then please suggest it on the Did you know? talk page.

--Gatoclass (talk) 17:02, 9 August 2008 (UTC)

Thank you

for being bold here. :) Ncmvocalist (talk) 07:30, 10 August 2008 (UTC)

No problem. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 07:32, 10 August 2008 (UTC)

Personal Note in Regards to Global Warming

Hi Steve, It seems that you have a bias against anyone who challenges global warming as fact. The notes on the talk page that you want to have it deleted with no apparent reason other than your own biases, IMO, is not being fair or neutral. It shows that you want Wikipedia to reflect what you think is important, not necessarily someone else. I don't mean this to be personal, but in reviewing your talk page, I think you might have a record on this one. Nuking a category because you don't like it is not an excuse to exclude it from being on the category subjects.

Thanks for your time

--Staplegunther

I think you miss the point. Categories on Wikipedia should only be used for unambiguous and uncontroversial categories, as the categorization neither can be supported by references nor qualified by appropriate context. My problems with the category are the following:

1. It's unclear who should be in it. From you comments, I suspect only people who "challenge global warming as fact". But you included several people who do not challenge global warming (the increase in temperature) and at least 3 who do not even challenge humanities role in it (the prevailing theory of anthropogenic global warming). I have no idea why you included e.g. James Annan. Not reference, not obvious -> it fails WP:V.
2. Scientists usually have very nuanced positions. Pielke, for example, does not doubt that CO2 leads to increased temperature. He just claims that we do not pay enough attention to other, more localized causes and effects of climate change. A category that does not distinguish between this position and an out-and-out whacko like Timothy F. Ball is not very useful, and very likely to violate WP:BLP. BTW, should we keep all this on either of our pages? Duplicating it hither and tither is not useful. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 17:37, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

Thank you for your efforts

Just wanted to say thank you for all the effort that you have put into the GW related articles. I know it's difficult to keep that beach from eroding against the constant tide of POV edits, and I appreciate your work. Mishlai (talk) 11:54, 24 September 2008 (UTC)

Thanks. It's appreciated. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 19:08, 25 September 2008 (UTC)

Comment

Please, can you reply here. Thanks Watchdogb (talk) 19:24, 27 September 2008 (UTC)

Done. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 19:36, 27 September 2008 (UTC)

Indo-Aryan loanwords in Tamil

You had participated at Talk:Indo-Aryan loanwords in Tamil yesterday. Kindly have a look at revised Indo-Aryan loanwords in Tamil vote at its AfD. Thanks for your time ­ Kris (talk) 23:16, 28 September 2008 (UTC)

Answer (by the exception that proves the rule) at User_talk:Srkris. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 11:27, 29 September 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for that, I didnt know about WP:Canvass earlier. Thanks also for opining to save the article. Although it is strictly an academic article that was intended, it is a shame that one has to compromise to give way to people with nationalistic or other agendas. In fact that word is a very rare example of how multiple linguistic changes have occured in a loanword that I wanted to point out, one of them being the introduction of a retroflex consonant characteristic to Tamil language. I had cited multiple authoritative sources for it. ­ Kris (talk) 16:18, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

Sources

You wrote: "If you want "re-" in, it's up to you to bring sources - and, in this situation, proper scientific ones, not general purpose dictionaries."

The sources I cited, in addition to the Meriam-Webster dictionary and the American Heritage Dictionary, were:

• Schneider, Stephen H., in Geosphere-biosphere Interactions and Climate, Lennart O. Bengtsson and Claus U. Hammer, eds., Cambridge University Press, 2001, ISBN 0521782384, pp. 90-91.
• E. Claussen, V. A. Cochran, and D. P. Davis, Climate Change: Science, Strategies, & Solutions, University of Michigan, 2001. p. 373.
• A. Allaby and M. Allaby, A Dictionary of Earth Sciences, Oxford University Press, 1999, ISBN 0192800795, p. 244..

These citations were deleted in the reversion I was complaining about.

Wikipedia:Verifiability#Reliable_sources states "In general, the most reliable sources are peer-reviewed journals and books published in university presses." If these don't qualify as "proper scientific" sources, what do you believe qualifies? Geoffrey.landis (talk) 15:46, 2 October 2008 (UTC)

global cooling revert

[Moved to talk:global cooling] --Stephan Schulz (talk) 05:55, 14 October 2008 (UTC)

?

And you think that normal run of the mill nationalist revert wars aren't obvious vandalism? Boonsan (talk) 13:38, 16 October 2008 (UTC)

Nope. Obvious vandalism would make it trivial to recognize which side was the vandal. Most nationalist revert wars, both sides are indistinguishable. Which is why we have WP:3RR to stop them eventually. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 13:46, 16 October 2008 (UTC)

Canadian Forces casualties in Afghanistan

Hi Stephan:

Thanks for your edit to this article.

Please look at the earlier part of the same paragraph.

I'm bothered by both the term "souvenir programme" and the (IMO) undue emphasis on the messages from dignitaries. And to a lesser degree, by the vagueness of "most of whom were in attendance".

Knowing the sensitive nature of the subject matter, I hesitate to edit this article without careful consideration. Wanderer57 (talk) 20:16, 16 October 2008 (UTC)

Talk page stuff

You-know-who is well meaning but has a tendency to go on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on.... perhaps best for the usefulness of the talk page not to encourage such by responding when things veer off the specifics of the article. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 19:29, 18 October 2008 (UTC)

I assume you are talking about the Phil Spector of writing? I doubt anything can influence his total output. But yes, answering him may attract some of the flow our way...I'll keep it in mind. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 19:46, 18 October 2008 (UTC)

Heh... I hope he doesn't fire off pistols while editing. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 20:14, 18 October 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Cold fusion

An Arbitration case in which you commented has been opened, and is located here. Please add any evidence you may wish the Arbitrators to consider to the evidence sub-page, Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Cold fusion/Evidence. Please submit your evidence within one week, if possible. You may also contribute to the case on the workshop sub-page, Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Cold fusion/Workshop.

On behalf of the Arbitration Committee, Tznkai (talk) 16:06, 14 November 2008 (UTC)

Historical Climate Change

Hi, a new user (User:Sirosser) has created a new page User:Sirosser/Historical Climate Change. The user had put it in mainspace, but I moved it to his user space for work/comments. Thought I'd bring it to the attention of an expert :) so you can perhaps visit with him and discuss it. Vsmith (talk) 18:45, 15 November 2008 (UTC)

Thanks. But I saw that William, a real expert, already talked to him. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 13:45, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

FYI

Hi Stephen. I added you to WP:RD regulars. Hope you don't mind! Zain Ebrahim (talk) 13:14, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

No problem. I don't know how regular I am, but Wikipedia:Reference desk/Science has some edits from me... --Stephan Schulz (talk) 13:49, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

RS

what is a "rs", see here. --ThurnerRupert (talk) 17:09, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

Short for "reliabe source", as in WP:RS or, in full glory, Wikipedia:Reliable sources. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 17:24, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

Tiefflieger

Gut gesagt - so sehe ich es auch. Interessant, dass wir uns bisher noch nicht über den Weg gelaufen sind. Gibt es noch mehr deutschsprachige Admins? — Sebastian 19:42, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

Hallo Sebastian! Ja, da würde ich blind drauf wetten. Spontan fällt mir aber keiner konkreter ein. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 20:02, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

Wild excitement

I thought about answering you at M's talk page, but getting a comment in there edgeways is tricky, and there are too many over-excitable people commenting. So anyway, I'm not entirely happy about being on a different side of this to you, as we all know all GW editors are required to edit in lockstep all the time :-).

How about the suggestion that (by analogy with judicial process) the arbcomm are the judicial arm, and need an executive arm to enforce their judgements? I don't think the admins can be interpreted as this arm: for one thing, some of them (M most obviously) are clearly doing things without arbcomm sanction, and indeed against the clearly expressed wishes of some of them. For another, they (we) are too vague and diffuse. Perhaps arbcomm should get a (small) corps, somewhat like the clerks, for enforcing judgements?

William M. Connolley (talk) 22:44, 16 December 2008 (UTC)

Given that we two are obviously socks of each other, is this a case of schizophrenia?  ;-)

What I've seen over the last year is that ArbCom has lost the respect of the community. For me, the last straw was the OrangeMarlin disaster. Ever since, ArbCom has tried to enforce its decisions not by publicly explaining them and trying to gather support, but by escalating threats and punishment. There are two possible modes. I prefer the one where ArbCom has the power to sanction because it has the respect of the community. I feel that currently, at least parts of ArbCom have forgotten this and instead try to insist on respect by flouting the power to sanction. In particular, I feel that FT2 expects respect simply because he is an arbiter, and, consciously or unconsciously, tries to elevate that position beyond what it used to be. This is not a good situation. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 22:56, 16 December 2008 (UTC)

I fully agree that this is not a good situation, and I agree with much of your analysis (you've side-stepped my point about who does the enforcement, but if you're not interested in that question, fair enough). I don't understand try to insist on respect by flouting the power to sanction. Do you mean the M block? It seems to me that deliberately flouting an arbcomm ruling should get you blocked (I've seen some stuff that I would call wiki-lawyering asserting that M didn't break the ruling, but that seems specious to me). You've also described the "ideal" situation of how arbcomm should be, and how *it* should behave. But we can't plan based on the wisdom of our rulers (I know, arbcomm aren't our rulers, I'm just invoking Popper), we should have a system that works even if lead badly. And the descent into anarchy that M seems to be leading towards looks to me to be a bad response. William M. Connolley (talk) 23:11, 16 December 2008 (UTC)

If the committee had the support of the community of admins, enforcement would work the same way as other decisions on Wikipedia - by (sometimes painful ;-) consensus. If ArbCom is disfunctional, we should not try to find a way to prop it up, but rather to replace it with something that does work. What's wrong with a little bit of anarchy? What concerns me are decisions like Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration/Motion:_re_SlimVirgin#Restriction_on_arbitration_enforcement_activity, which should be entirely superfluous. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 23:56, 16 December 2008 (UTC)

Is it just me being a curmudgeonly old fart, or did The Giano Follies lose their entertainment value several episodes ago? Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 05:30, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

I don't actually know. I have no TV, and I don't follows soap operas on Wikipedia, either. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 08:05, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

Rethinking WMC's comment on the separation of powers: It might be a good idea if sitting Arbs would perform no non-trivial admin actions themselves (nor via dedicated clerks). If ArbCom cannot find an uninvolved admin willing to enforce its decisions, then clearly there is a strong consensus against it. And it would eliminate that troublesome "I'm arbiter X, and my blocks may or may not be on behalf of the committee and may or may not be subject to normal community review, depending on the phases of Charon as seen from Sedna" nonsense. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 08:20, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

Hope i wasn't being unpolite....

With this [14], i couldn't just remove your comment, which would have been without your consent - on the other hand the other way, it didn't make sense.... --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 00:26, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

Absolutely not. I was about to use strikeout on OxAO's comment myself, for exactly the reasons you gave. But after he stated he wanted to drop the whole matter, I saw no point in keeping it, and it was easier to just remove the whole subthread. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 00:30, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

Seasons Greetings

Wishing you the very best for the season. Guettarda (talk) 06:25, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

Hi Guettarda! Thanks, and all the best for you, season in or season out! --Stephan Schulz (talk) 12:07, 13 January 2009 (UTC)

new WP:RDREG userbox

This user is a Reference desk regular.

The box to the right is the newly created userbox for all RefDesk regulars. Since you are an RD regular, you are receiving this notice to remind you to put this box on your userpage! (but when you do, don't include the |no. Just say {{WP:RD regulars/box}} ) This adds you to Category:RD regulars, which is a must. So please, add it. Don't worry, no more spam after this - just check WP:RDREG for updates, news, etc. flaminglawyer^c 22:11, 5 January 2009 (UTC)

Would you believe ...

That I left in typos so other editors would not be loathe to edit on that page? Collect (talk) 16:24, 10 January 2009 (UTC)

Absolutely! I'm excellent at believing all kinds of stuff! ;-) --Stephan Schulz (talk) 16:42, 10 January 2009 (UTC)

Excellent! Try reading some of the other deathless prose in my userspace like User:Collect/thoughts or the like. Collect (talk) 16:48, 10 January 2009 (UTC)

Handful of Needles

(You don't know me, so I should probably clarify that I do not consider you a needle manufacturer) Handful of Needles, the bare bones of a folk tale told in many versions in the East, the West, and the New World (before Europeans):
The two girls are given a handful of needles by their mother to protect them from witches. They throw the needles, and the witch is forced to count them all before continuing what becomes a fruitless search. A cautionary tale for all witches, or people that are believed to be witches. If you can nail down all the needles (arguments) it may be worthwhile. But know when you are up against a needle manufacturer. Anarchangel (talk) 18:09, 12 January 2009 (UTC)

Hi Anarchangel! I suspect I know what this is in relation too. I usually draw out enough needles to fashion into a nice long ropesteel cable, though... ;-) --Stephan Schulz (talk) 12:43, 13 January 2009 (UTC)

So few notable climatologists...

List of authors from Climate Change 2007: The Physical Science Basis.

I find myself disappointed by the number of red links. Science is just an unglamorous job I guess. Dragons flight (talk) 11:17, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

The problem is that "Physicists X decries gravity conspiracy! NASA supports obscure inverse-square law to overcharge for satellite launches" tends to make physicist X notable all by itself (at the cost of professional respect, ok, but see Timothy Ball), while "Physicist Y models influence of raindrops on net acceleration of heavy objects under gravitational attraction" is much less of a screamer. I'll see if I can find out something about some of them, but I'm rather busy with making aircraft miss each other at the moment... --Stephan Schulz (talk) 12:30, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

I think all the redlinks should be removed (the linking, not the names). The redlinks carry the presumption that the authors should be notable, which I don't think is justified. Per WP:ONEEVENT many are just one of hundreds of people who contributed to a particular report. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 16:45, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

ONEEVENT doesn't apply; you don't get ask to contribute unless you already have a significant academic career. I would presume a substantial fraction would be notable if people took the time to research those careers. Wikipedia does a poor job of covering academics, as evidenced by the many redlinks still in List of members of the National Academy of Sciences, but that doesn't mean they wouldn't belong in a complete encyclopedia. Removing links would be very premature in my opinion. Dragons flight (talk) 17:02, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

RfA thankspam

		Thank you for your participation in my recent RfA, which failed with 90/38/3; whether you supported, opposed or remained neutral. Special thanks go out to Moreschi, Dougweller and Frank for nominating me, and I will try to take everyone's comments on board. Thanks again for your participation. I am currently concentrating my efforts on the Wikification WikiProject. It's fun! Please visit the project and wikify a few articles to help clear the backlog. If you can recruit some more participants, then even better. Apologies if you don't like RfA thankspam, this message was delivered by a bot which can't tell whether you want it or not. Feel free to remove it. Itsmejudith (talk), 22:53, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

Denbot (talk) 22:53, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

:-(

[15]. You have spotted the flaw in my cunning plan William M. Connolley (talk) 09:01, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

I probably shouldn't have blurted it out to the world... It may not be obvious, but I'm an equal-opportunity sceptic - I challenge all questionable arguments I spot. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 09:30, 22 January 2009 (UTC)