User talk:Mathsci/Archive 12

This is an archive of past discussions with User:Mathsci. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

Archive 5

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Archive 10

Archiving

Just a suggestion, but if you want a quick way to keep track of archives, you can add {{archives|auto=yes}} to the top of your page. Also, if you want, I could set up a bot to automatically archive any threads on your page which were older than a certain age (such as a week or something). Up to you though, as archiving (or not) is really at your discretion. Some users archive everything, some delete any message as soon as it's read, so it's really your decision on either of those, or anything in between. If I can be of assistance, let me know. :) --El on ka 17:27, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

Thank you for that kind advice. Perhaps you did not realise that I destroyed the links I normally have to my talk archives (11 now) deliberately. I have decided to stop editing this encyclopedia. You in fact have frightened me away. I am not sure you can be of any further assistance. Thanks, Mathsci (talk) 17:36, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

Ah, I'm sorry you feel that way. Perhaps a break is a good idea, but you are always welcome back. You may find the {{wikibreak}} template to be of use. In any case, best wishes during exam season at Cambridge.[1] I used to live near there, and would often visit as it was the only nearby locale in the 1970s where I could find good gaming supplies (it was either there or London). I remember Cambridge as being a very beautiful city, I hope you enjoy your visit. If I can be of assistance with your friend who wishes to provide pictures of Edgar Wallace, please feel free to put them in touch: elonka@aol.com --El on ka 18:25, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

Your recent actions terrify me. [2] This is not a break. Mathsci (talk) 22:18, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

Elonka's recent statements about other editors, in particular Jehochman, MastCell, Cailil, Ramdrake, Wobble, Slrubenstein and me, and her championing of Jagz have brought me out of retirement. It is still very hard for me to understand her actions. However, after discussions off-wiki with other administrators, I now feel at ease editing WP, even if she chooses to resume tracking my edits and again threatens to impose editing restrictions upon me. She seems to be in dispute with me; I hope it is not because I have a Ph.D. Mathsci (talk) 07:58, 14 June 2008 (UTC)

To be clear, we are not in a content dispute. Instead, I have been an uninvolved admin pointing out some disruptive behavior. It is routine for editors at the receiving end of this, to claim "bias" on the part of the admin, but I assure you that that is not the case. BTW, Mathsci, coming out of retirement simply to post a misleading message at ANI,[3] is not reassuring about your ability to contribute in a constructive manner. If you would like to resume editing articles though, please do, as many of your contributions have been excellent. --El on ka 14:09, 14 June 2008 (UTC)

I wish Elonka could learn to read. Her dispute with me concerned the page she was preparing on me on the now-deleted User:Elonka/Work1. This page has been seen by several administrators whom I have contacted off-wiki. It suggested that she was in dispute with me: not a content dispute, but some other form of manipulation, possibly aimed at restricting my editing. Elonka seems to be out of touch with the facts and is currently, for reasons best known to herself, misrepresenting and maligning good faith editors and administrators. The fact that she has gone out of her way to side with POV-pushers such as User:Koalorka or recognized problem editors such as User:Jagz, while criticizing a series of administrators, is astonishing. Mathsci (talk) 22:44, 14 June 2008 (UTC)

I think several editors have been very clear that you may not continue to make these kinds of personal attacks. You are welcome to disagree with other editors on Wikipedia, but you may not make things personal, period. Since your return from "retirement", which lasted longer than a few hours this time, you've done nothing but attack Elonka in several venues. This is the only warning you will get this time. Shell ^babelfish 22:55, 14 June 2008 (UTC)

(ec) This seems to be a lack of good faith on your part. I have made very few edits today. In my absence I already started preparing the article Zonal spherical functions, using an IP from Christ's College, Cambridge, for a large number of additions and corrections: today I have been preparing material on the representation theory of SL(2,C) from papers by Harish-Chandra, Gelfand & Naimark and Helgason. It will be another day or so before the material is ready for WP. In the light of this and considering my established mathematical editing record, your remarks seem slightly misjudged. Cheers, Mathsci (talk) 23:20, 14 June 2008 (UTC)

That may be the case, but until just now, your only edits on returning were attacks. Regardless of what other activities you may have planned, Wikipedia has a clear policy against personal attacks and you have been advised repeatedly to stop. Since you were willing to resolve the issue the last time it was discussed, I felt it worthwhile to try reminding you that this sort of behavior isn't productive and does lead to blocks. Shell ^babelfish 23:49, 14 June 2008 (UTC)

Thank you for this clarification. On WP:AN/I, the possibility has been raised that I might be part of "an organized tag team" operating against Jagz. How would you suggest I react to such a suggestion, which is of course quite untrue? Cheers, Mathsci (talk) 01:04, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

I would say the best way to get your side of the story heard is to calmly explain why you feel you are not part of a group of editors who are harassing Jagz. This might include providing diffs that would support your statements or give context to help explain more of the situation. Other editors are much more likely to respond and investigate what you're saying if its said in more factual or professional manner. Shell ^babelfish 02:05, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

(unindent) The words were "organized group". I have no communication off-wiki concerning Race and intelligence with other editors. WP editors will have to take my word for that, since that has nothing to do with diffs. As Slrubenstein has written elsewhere, it is up to Elonka to make her case about an "organised group". Anybody can consult the talk archives to see the detailed positive discussions in December 2007 about locating academic references, where several university data bases were suggested by me. At that stage, while the article was locked by MoonRiddenGirl, the discussion was quite sensible.

Recently Jagz objected to the inclusion of one neutral sentence about the criticism of Rushton et al by established mainstream academics. I added three references - probably my only edit to the article.

I find the suggestion that I am a member of an "organized tag team" quite odd and against consensus. If you are in agreement with Elonka, please make your views heard with supporting diffs on WP:AN/I.

Here are some representative comments I made on the talk page a month ago:

It is not possible to understand the "scientific method" by reading one possibly inappropriate definition from an online dictionary. Please try to find a sensible source, such as a recognized academic text. A hypothesis is not necessarily a theory. In mathematics this is not the case; it is quite unlikely that an online dictionary would explain this point. However, it would be explained in many introductory textbooks on mathematics. I would expect therefore that the correct place to look is in the relevant academic literature, if you have access to it. Mathsci (talk) 19:46, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

This discussion must necessarily use recognized scientific sources. Dictionary definitions have absolutely no relevance; playing with definitions of single words is an unscientific semantic game. Surely an encyclopedia article must reflect what scientists are actually doing (in sourced articles and learned journals). Do you in fact have access to such learned journals or texts? As an example of the use of recognized sources in writing WP articles, I edited an article on a Bach Cantata using the definitive reference book by Alfred Dürr plus a full urtext score that I own (formerly freely available on the web). Isn't it important to identify a comprehensive set of proper sources before editing a WP article? In this case it involves trawling through the scientific literature as Slrubenstein has suggested many, many times. Online dictionaries are not particularly useful for writing WP articles. Mathsci (talk) 08:21, 8 May 2008 (UTC)

Since you insist, let's just look at the last link you give in detail [a google books search to justify that a view was widely supported]:

The Race Bomb: Skin Color, Prejudice, and Intelligence - Page 152 by Paul R. Ehrlich, S. Shirley Feldman - Psychology - 1978 ... offspring of interracial marriages tell us anything about innate intelligence and race? ... there is no evidence to support the hereditarian hypothesis. .

Race and Racism: An Introduction - Page 118 by Carolyn Fluehr-Lobban - Social Science - 2006 - 278 pages Making a "science" of human intelligence, Galton created the first tests of ...now to the hereditarian hypothesis that race, social class, and intelligence ...

The Scientific Study of General Intelligence: Tribute to Arthur R. Jensen - Page 169 by Arthur Robert Jensen, Helmuth Nyborg - Psychology - 2003 - 669 pages These findings are consistent with the default hereditarian hypothesis. ...theories of race differences make diametrically opposite predictions. ...

Destructive Trends In Mental Health: The Well-Intentioned Path to Harm by Rogers H. Wright, Nicholas A. Cummings - Psychology - 2005 - 346 pages What if the hereditarian hypothesis is true? ... Should we do research on race differences in intelligence? Intelligence, 16(1), 1-4. ...

Race, Change, and Urban Society - Page 47 by Peter Orleans, William Russell Ellis - Social Science - 1971 - 640 pages ... deliberately contentious essay upholding the hereditarian hypothesis, ...analogy between intelligence and electricity, writing that intelligence, ...

Heredity & Environment by A. H. Halsey - Psychology - 1977 - 337 pages Page 11 One can have little confidence in the sociological knowledge about race of a man who ... And we can say on the evidence that the hereditarian hypothesis is ...

Sex and Destiny: The Politics of Human Fertility - Page 310 by Germaine Greer - Social Science - 1985 - 541 pages... up in the scale of intelligence hereditary weakness to the level of hereditary strength. ... was to prove the truth of the hereditarian hypothesis. ...

Annual Progress in Child Psychiatry and Child Development by Stella Chess, Alexander Thomas - Psychology - 1968 - 562 pages Page 214 Eysenck deals much more adequately with the concept of race, and places the hereditarian ... to support an hereditarian hypothesis regarding IQ differences, ...

The Black and White of Rejections for Military Service: A Study of ...by American Teachers Association, Martin David Jenkins - African Americans - 1944 - 51 pages Page 33 Nor are we unaware of the hereditarian hypothesis, advanced by Thorndike and others, ... and rejections for low "intelligence" in the several states. ...

Journal of Intergroup Relations by National Association of Intergroup Relations Officials, National Association of Human Rights Workers - United States - 1965 Page 23 ... hereditarian analysis of group differences in measured intelligence, ... for controversy that has made Jensen's hereditarian hypothesis one of the most ...

Federal Aid for Education: Hearings Before the Committee on Education and ... - Page 347 by United States Congress. Senate. Committee on Education and Labor, Committee on Education and Labor, United States Office of Education, United States, Senate, Congress - Education and state - 1945 Nor are we unaware of the hereditarian hypothesis, advanced by Thorndike and ...opportunities and rejections for low intelligence in the several States. ...

IQ: A Smart History of a Failed Idea by Stephen Murdoch - Psychology - 2007 - 288 pages

That's all. Dates 1978, 2003, 2006, 2003, 2005, 1971, 1977, 1985, 1968, 1944, 1965, 1945, 2007. Germaine Greer? User:Jagz, you really must try harder. Please try to find convincing sources using an academic database. Mathsci (talk) 18:54, 8 May 2008 (UTC)

Could User:Jagz please explain his unsourced sentence on biomedicine and why he twice attempted to add the same citation from an opinion piece in the Guardian making no mention of biomedicine? In this case it looked as if he was just reporting unsourced hearsay. Surely WP is concerned with reporting the current state of recorded human knowledge, with carefully sourced references, not the privately held beliefs of individual editors? Biomedicine seems to be completely unrelated to the current article. What is going on here? Mathsci (talk) 08:41, 8 May 2008 (UTC)

The sentence and its reference came from an earlier version of the article. I added the sentence back once after fixing the reference link. The second time I added two additional references, one of which used the term biomedicine and the other was referenced in the original reference. --Jagz (talk) 18:12, 8 May 2008 (UTC)

Mathsci, he is just a troll - just revert his silly or policy non-compliant edits. WP:DNFTT. Slrubenstein | Talk 10:31, 8 May 2008 (UTC)

I'd rather be a troll than an asshole. --Jagz (talk) 12:25, 8 May 2008 (UTC)

Blessed are the poor in spirit: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. (Matt. 5:3)--Ramdrake (talk) 13:12, 8 May 2008 (UTC)

Instead of using foul language, could User:Jagz please answer my questions? Mathsci (talk)

Mathsci, as a courtesy to the rest of us, could you provide a difflink instead of the pronoun this? It would save us all trying to read between the lines.LeadSongDog (talk) 20:43, 8 May 2008 (UTC)

I'm sorry if you found it difficult accessing the history of the main page. Here is User:Jagz's original edit [21]. It was subsequently removed on 3 occasions firstly by User:Wobble, then by me and most recently by User:Jim62sch. Mathsci (talk) 23:02, 8 May 2008 (UTC)

User:Jagz, please try to express yourself more clearly. "Essentially" means the same either side of the Atlantic. You think it [the article] is complete, but have not said why. It seems to be a personal opinion not so far shared by anybody else. I don't think you can set the rhythm for editing in this article nor can you preclude the addition of new material, because of the very nature of WP. What exactly did you mean? Mathsci (talk) 16:04, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

My recollection of the talk page of Race and intelligence is that there has always been a problem of striking a balance between the mainstream academic view of the topic in the title in various disciplines (sociology, anthropology, genetics) and the so-called "popular debate", generated by the work of a small group of fringe scientists. There is no such popular debate in my own country the UK or in the country where I am resident, France. Cheers, Mathsci (talk) 03:00, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

Unfortunately, I'm completely unaware of the dispute at the Race and intelligence page or any background on any of the editors involved, so I'm afraid I can't shed any light on what Elonka's concerns might be. I can say that "organised group" does not necessarily suggest to me that off-wiki coordination was involved, since I have seen groups organized on-wiki before (not all groups are a bad thing). In the snippets that you pasted above it seems like Jagz was called a troll and you were encouraged to dismiss his input; while that doesn't reflect at all badly on you, it does lend some credence to the idea that Jagz may have been provoked, though of course, that doesn't excuse bad behavior on his part either. Since the entire situation is rather new to me, I can't really comment on the appropriateness of the block or any other comments made about the situation, I'd just ask that you deal with anything that comes up and try to remain civil, even when things get heated. Shell ^babelfish 04:38, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

As you see I have been quite civil to Jagz in my very few recent contributions to R&I, despite what he has written himself. My contributions were reasonable and I hope represented the calm voice of scientific reason. Elonka has been the only administrator on WP:AN/I to make accusations of an "organized tag team". Unless she is more specific and provides recent diffs, nobody can in fact tell what she might mean by this. So far all other administrators have agreed with MastCell's block and Jagz's disruptiveness. It is quite possible that Elonka has simply made a mistake in her evaluation of Jagz and other editors/administrators, including Slrubenstein, for whom I have the greatest respect, although I do not know him/her. He is a scholarly editor (and administrator). His recent analysis on WP:AN/I of Jagz's behaviour is spot on: Jagz's answers are always evasive as you can see above. An encyclopedia article cannot be written on the basis of newspaper gossip. Making charges about an "organized tag team" in real life would be called "conspiracy theory". Here it might be called creating wikidrama. Please remember that for at least six months Jagz has been a WP:SPA. That is why it is surprising that Elonka is championing him. In this case with so many administrators having looked at the situation and not agreed with Elonka, it seems quite likely that she has indeed made a mistake. Cheers, Mathsci (talk) 07:46, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

Possibly unfree Image:Europe_flags.gif

An image that you uploaded or altered, Image:Europe_flags.gif, has been listed at Wikipedia:Possibly unfree images because its copyright status is disputed. If the image's copyright status cannot be verified, it may be deleted. You may find more information on the image description page. You are welcome to add comments to its entry at the discussion if you are interested in it not being deleted. Thank you. Rettetast (talk) 22:36, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

Retired

Sorry to see you go, I really appreciate your work and I hope I have not had a hand in annoying you and thus contributing to your departure. Harland1 (^t/_c) 15:12, 7 June 2008 (UTC)

Oh good, I hope that you will continue to add much valued contributions, and not be put off by the actions of some editors. Yes I learned about adding content to much viewed pages the hard way! Ah well maybe I will come back to Europe some time but I think for now I will stick to more out of the way, neglected pages! Harland1 (^t/_c) 12:04, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

Ditto. Whatever drove you away, please consider that thee is still a lot of good you can do here. i hope this turns out to be a (deserved) Wikibreak... Slrubenstein | Talk 11:18, 14 June 2008 (UTC)

Re: Thanks

Don't even mention it. I just abhor people speaking ill of those who aren't there to defend themselves. To me, it felt like someone vandalizing a grave. I just removed the graffiti, no more and no less.--Ramdrake (talk) 15:59, 14 June 2008 (UTC)

Image

Yes I saw that you posted the image to the R&I talk page and thought I misunderstood and that the claim had been that jagz had posted to the R&I page and not to your talk page. Now I see that the claim was that jagz had posted to your talk page, when he clearly had not, so actually I was correct when I said that Ramdrake did not known you had posted the image to Jagz's talk page, because you never did. Alun (talk) 08:04, 16 June 2008 (UTC)