User talk:Reinis/Archive Sep 2007

Re: Sam Harris

First of all, I wasn't ignoring you. It just so happens that I was smack in the middle of adding the very info you asked for, when you were posting your note on my talk page. I assumed that was in itself a sufficient reply. Apparently you never bothered to check the article, or you would have seen that the statement you questioned is, in fact, well sourced. (I might add, that it's also verified in the Washington Post article, as well as the Toronto Star.) I've already reverted your edit, so I guess this issue is now fully resolved. Cgingold 13:26, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

Oy, vey. I have a serious, um, hunch that you're stretching things to an absurd degree. If that standard were applied to every article on Wikipedia, we would be caught in a veritable straitjacket. Every single mention of parentage, ancestry, etc. anywhere in Wikipedia would require that the individual in question, or some trusted person in a position to know the facts, has made an explicit statement that was quoted in the news media, stating unambiguously that the subject of the article either was or was not adopted, or alternatively, was or was not raised by his/her biological parents. Have you ever applied or insisted on this standard of proof anywhere else? Cgingold 16:37, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

Okay, seeing as you haven't felt the need to apply this absurdly strict standard anywhere else, and since the differing standards of various streams of Judaism have no bearing on Wikipedia categorization, I really see no compelling reason to give this further consideration. Mr. Harris has made a point of revealing to reporters that his mother his Jewish -- one of the few tidbits of personal info he has been willing to share with the public. Clearly, he wishes people who learn of that fact to make the obvious inference -- that he is Jewish -- otherwise he would not have revealed the information. There is no other credible interpretation. I'm sorry if it bothers you that this particular individual is, in fact, Jewish. But it's just not permissible for any editor's personal feelings about an issue to dictate the contents of an article. C'est la vie. Cgingold 21:58, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

Rewrite of homeopathy article

I plan to implement the rough draft( link) by September 1st, 5 days 3 days from now. Unless of course more proposals are made to change it, in which case I will postpone the implementation until it is ready. Some things concerning the rough draft are still in discussions, which can easily continue once it goes live. An example is the inclusion of mentions of Jacques Benveniste. Other things can easily be fixed after a week or so of copy editors from the general public going over it and removing redundancy and rewording sentences to be more brief and precise, which will cut down size of the article including the lead without removing relevant info. So If by September 1st I receive no more suggestions on improving the rough draft then I will replace this article with it. Those of you who see problems with the draft, please make suggestions on improving it. Remember, Silence equals consensus. Here is the link to the rough draft again: Link to rough draft. Thanks. Wikidudeman ^(talk) 19:15, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

Sorry, I copied that from an earlier message I sent out. Wikidudeman ^(talk) 19:40, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

Actually I've found it much much better to segregate criticism into it's own area of an article opposed to integrating it into the article as a whole. This way we avoid edit wars from constant point/counterpoints from supporters and opponents of the topic. This has worked very well in the Parapsychology article which is now stable and soon to be FA when it was previously edit warred over daily. Wikidudeman ^(talk) 12:38, 30 August 2007 (UTC)

Well maybe you can take the reasoning further, but I don't. I simply believe that in some cases where edit warring was prevalent, it is best to segregate the article into two equal parts of an explanation of the topic and then a criticism of the topic. While this is discouraged by the Manual of Style, It is very beneficial in some cases. In my experience, articles which attempt to jumble it all together (even when well written) invariably end up with people continually adding more counterpoints to the points raised about criticism. For instance an article might say "And therefore it is criticized." and then in the very next sentence someone will come along and add "but..." and then someone else will come along and counterpoint that counterpoint with another "however..." and the process goes on and on until the end result is unreadable and confusing. While someone who is reading the article could ignore the "Criticism" section, they could also ignore the individual sentences sprinkled throughout the article criticizing the topic. I believe that if someone doesn't want to learn about the criticism of a topic then they won't bother to read about it regardless of where it is. If someone wants to learn about what critics of the topic have to say, they can simply click a button and scroll down to the relevant section to read about it. Wikidudeman ^(talk) 13:40, 30 August 2007 (UTC)

P.S., You can respond here opposed to on my talk page. Wikidudeman ^(talk) 13:41, 30 August 2007 (UTC)

"However" might be a word to avoid, but people have ways of introducing such counterpoints to articles without using words specifically listed in WTA. For instance the John Edward article went through a huge dispute because of all of the words being added that are synonymous with "However" such as "But" etc. Also other variants such as "it should be mentioned however" could also easily be added in a "point/counterpoint war" over who gets the last word in a paragraph. Generally people tend to turn the articles into arguments where each sentence seems to represent a different viewpoint and it gets terribly confusing. In my experience the best way to prevent this kind of thing is to have specific sections for specific discussions. One section for discussion the "history" of homeopathy, one for it's philosophy, one for it's statistics today etc, and one for what critics say about it. Wikidudeman ^(talk) 19:04, 30 August 2007 (UTC)

Spam Links?

I am confused by your perception of links to BBC content about philosophy, science, religion and history as spam. This is great, complementary content which allows users to listen online to 45 minute programmes on the relevant subjects. Each link goes to a unique page with an audio link to a 45 minute discussion. There are no links to generic content. How can this be spam? It is directly relevant to the subjects and enriches the breadth of information available to the audience. Would it help if I made the audio links direct from the links section?—Preceding unsigned comment added by Herakles01 (talk • contribs) 08:14, 31 August 2007 (UTC)

Brian Sapient

Hi. I'm contacting some people who have worked on the Rational Response Squad article because someone changed my redirect of "Brian Sapient" (which I made to redirect surfers to the RRS article) into an article on Brian Sapient himself. I'm not sure one is merited, particularly given what that editor started off with the article, and have begun a discussion on that new article's Talk Page. Your input would be appreciated. Nightscream 01:40, 2 September 2007 (UTC)

Category on Astrology

Hey there. Seems we've had a bit of a mix-up. I removed the protoscience category from Astrology, not pseudoscience. The arbitration result seems to support that edit, yeah? --Brad Beattie (talk) 17:33, 3 September 2007 (UTC)

All's good. :) --Brad Beattie (talk) 19:03, 3 September 2007 (UTC)

WorldNetDaily reliability

No quibble with Amazon links, that was just copied from another page. If WorldNetDaily can't be used in one place, it can't be used elsewhere simply because you want to use it. Why insist on trying to use an unreliable source when information is available from unquestionable sources like MSNBC? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Xday (talk • contribs) 14:08, 31 August 2007 (UTC)

Ha, ha. MSNBC "unquestionable". :-)

Sorry, I'll go away now. --GunnarRene 16:03, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

Evangelion: 1.0 You Are (Not) Alone

Please don't template the regulars, it's insulting. I don't need you to welcome me to Wikipedia, or to give me newbie advice about previewing the changes. The section heading was completely content-free, and I removed it on purpose. Reinis^talk 16:10, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

Help:Section#Section_stubs <-- not a template --GunnarRene 16:16, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

"[N]ot a template" what? I'm not a psychic, I can't understand your cryptic comments. Reinis^talk 16:35, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

This is why we can't have nice things. I meant, "Look, since you asked I'll just feed you a link instead of using a long-winded explanation". Me, I don't mind getting templates. Like, um, barnstars ;-) --GunnarRene 16:48, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

By the way, since you care about this article, do you have an opinion on how to handle production information, which is largely in common for all four movies in the series - especially since the last two movies are a double-feature? --GunnarRene 16:54, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/MediaWiki:Disclaimers

Please do not disrupt Wikipedia for fun. Continuing to do so may result in a block. Mr.Z-man 21:54, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

If you didn't figure it out, MediaWiki:Disclaimers is a system message. For a full list of these see Special:Allmessages. Prodego ^talk 22:01, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

Religion of Peace

I am working on a rewrite of the Religion of Peace at User:Mike Young/Sandbox2 would value your comments on this, and especially any references you can add. Mike Young 13:19, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

#wikipedia

Your victim pose would work much better if you'd try to stop ascribing ideologies to others without reason for a moment. I don't think you have any evidence that the people you disagree with are actually nationalists. Reinis^talk 18:14, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

Should I quote what you've been saying about the Russians the other day? vodka, pravda, vobla, and all that? I remember a Latvian who liked to say: "The eyes of a Russian may be blue, but his arse is black". I suggest everyone keeps his nationalist stereotypes to himself. --Ghirla^-трёп- 18:30, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

Excuse me, what? Is this a misplaced response to someone else? Reinis^talk 20:16, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

If you don't like the response, you should make it clear who you are to lecture me on this page. I have never seen you in Wikipedia, but I have certainly seen your name on IRC, and I'm not impressed by your conduct there. --Ghirla^-трёп- 20:24, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

I've never, ever made comments on IRC about Russians (especially not anything like what you've quoted), I can't imagine what else I might have said to get bees in your bonnet, and I was just commenting that you should WP:AGF instead of making undue claims about others' ideological affiliations. I don't understand why I'm being attacked now. Reinis^talk 20:40, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

Your victim pose would work much better if you had not come to my talk page with lectures. I saw a group of teenagers (whose conduct is under scrutiny in ArbCom) engage in racial slurs and Russophobic comments on IRC, with the full encouragement of an operator. I'm not sure what exactly you were saying, but you certainly did nothing to stop the circus and witch-hunt that eventuated. I guess I will move this thread to your talk page. --Ghirla^-трёп- 20:46, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

I'm not reading IRC most of the time, I haven't seen the "racial slurs", and opining about your conduct does not legitimize attacking me. You also don't need to move this thread anywhere, as it's about your words, not mine. Reinis^talk 20:55, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

Ghirla, simma down now. The victimhood spiel is getting a bit long in the tooth, and if you'd like to keep rolling it out on display, you might want to start providing some evidence. It'll help you avoid sounding silly. - CHAIRBOY (☎) 20:19, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

I know that I'm being discussed on IRC at the moment, and I don't like every inhabitant of the channel pop up on this page. Check your logs for evidence of abuse. I will certainly discuss it but not here. Probably in a letter to Jimbo. --Ghirla^-трёп- 20:24, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

Your name hasn't been mentioned for about 3 hours. Reinis^talk 20:40, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

There is the main channel, and there are back rooms (or whatever you call them), as I'm sure you know. --Ghirla^-трёп- 20:48, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

Reinis and Chairboy, please get the hell out from Ghirla's back. You both know perfectly what was happening on IRC in the last days and last hours even. Ghirla has every reason to be offended as every person with decency should. Take it back to the communication medium where your conduct is approved and welcomed. If you continue taunting this user here, I will remove your further entries myself. This is disgusting and won't be tolerated onwiki even if other media are open to such behavior and welcome it with approving laughs. --Irpen 20:59, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

No, sorry, I don't know. Reinis^talk 21:18, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Article message boxes/Reinis demo

Hi Reinis. I got an idea. Could you code up your suggestion (perhaps together with some others if they have similar ideas) as a page similar to Wikipedia:Article message boxes? That is, with an explanation of your reasoning for the design, and a bunch of examples on white background so we can see how they would look on an article page.

I suggest you name the page like we did with our suggestions before deployment: Wikipedia:Article message boxes/Reinis demo

The key idea here is to have it on a separate page since that would make it clean and readable and more "static" so people can look at it and discuss it over a longer time. That also gives them time to get used to the design. And if the page is named "Reinis demo" then others probably will not edit it (they shouldn't!) and you can just send them off by saying "code up your own demo". (And with some luck some will actually code their own demos.)

It seems I can edit the project page without causing controversy. So then I'll add a section on Wikipedia:Article message boxes named something like "Other design suggestions" with links to your demo. And next to the link I will place one or two sentences mentioning the basics of the design, like: "A design with tinted background for greater impact and a new set of icons." (You'll have to give me a proper sentence describing your design.)

I'm really curios to see a complete example of what it is you are thinking of.

--David Göthberg 08:07, 19 September 2007 (UTC)

I've actually been planning to do that since this began, but got a bit carried away with the discussion. If no one "scoops" me on the kind of thing I had in mind, I'll probably have it by the weekend. Right now I've got lectures and assignments to attend to. Anyway, thanks for being so forthcoming. Reinis^talk 19:27, 19 September 2007 (UTC)