User talk:Erasmocbc

Welcome

Hi Erasmocbc, and welcome to wikipedia. I've been here a couple months and would be glad to help you out if you have any questions. The biggest thing is to remember to always sign your name to talk pages with ~~~~. The Intelligent Design page is pretty controversial, and I'll tell you right now that you are better off with articles like that discussing the changes you want to make on the talk page, and then making them once there is consensus. David Bergan 20:35, 16 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Reply:

[Erasmocbc]I am not sure if you will receive this answer, or how to follow up on your welcome. But thank you for your offer. I see, by the authors you quote in your talk page that we have a lot in common. Since many in that list are part of my favorites also. Congratulations on your wedding.

In terms of discussing the changes before making them, I guess, I will begin by making direct modest contributions slowly and allow for others to improve upon them, in order to see which part of my suggestion requires further discussion.

BTW: where can I learn how to do footnotes?

Thank you. erasmocbc 21:44, 16 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Hi again. Thanks for the congrats! She's a keeper. I have no doubt that you have excellent contributions for us, but there is a sort of learning-curve to wikipedia, and my suggestion is to start with involvement on the talk pages of the articles. Jump into the discussions that already exist, start up new discussions with insightful questions, respond back and forth and look for consensus. This is especially good for the hot topics like ID and anything related to it. It's even thougher if you're pro-ID, because we're in the minority... which means you really have to know your stuff and back all your points up with references if you want to bring it into the actual article. But if you go to a more "settled" topic (like CS Lewis, Blaise Pascal, or just about anything that isn't immediately political) you'll find a much greater range of freedom. I did a massive copy-edit of Pascal's page last month and no one objected to the changes. Solid, factual additions are welcome on most any topics. But ID is a tough one because most of the main editors haven't even read a book by the design theorists explaining what ID is. So while you and I might have a pretty good idea what ID is, we will have to spend a lot of time educating the others. And they don't think they need education... they think that ID is only another form of creationism and a bundled package of a dozen logical fallacies. But they are (mostly) reasonable people. Take the issues one at a time and you'll see (eventual) progress. The article IS much much more fair and accurate than it was when I first saw it. But you have to resign yourself that it will probably always reflect an anti-ID bias (although not as much now as it did), and that it will never attain a featured-article level of quality. That's just a fault of wikipedia. Standard articles will blossom and sparkle with the insight of dozens of perspectives. Controversial articles will become a sludge of words slanted toward the POV of the majority of the editors.

Ok - little things.

Messaging - usually you make your response on the other person's talk page. It would be customary for you to now go over to User_talk:Dbergan and make your reply there.
Footnotes - in the article you place a {{ref|MyFootnote1}} and at the bottom of the page you place a corresponding {{note|MyFootnote1}}

Let me know if you have other questions. Kindly, David Bergan 02:32, 17 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, wiki messaging is open to the public. If you feel you have something confidential you would like to share, you can click the "Email this user" link (over on the left, in the "toolbox"). Also, you might be interested in the ID wikiproject, a list of ID related sites I put together. If we ever get an ID community going, we would discuss things amongst ourselves there. I understand about time restraints. My rule is that real-life always trumps wiki-life. But we would love to have your insight and contributions when you can afford the time. David Bergan 17:25, 17 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the book suggestion, and I added the Sternberg page to my watchlist. I don't know a whole lot about his particular situation, but will keep my eye on it. I'd love to hear comments about my creed! Feel free to email, if your prefer. Let's keep in touch. David Bergan 17:59, 22 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I just cleaned up my creed in line with the language you suggested and requests for clarity. Your a priori/a posteriori distinction is precisely what I was looking for, but didn't think of it. I also added two "Further explanations" for the part on reason, experience, and authority. Thanks a ton. Hope to see more suggestions. David Bergan 22:00, 22 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]