User talk:Hans Adler

If I left a message on your talk page, then I will be watching it for a while. So you can simply reply there, and the discussion will be in one place. Similarly, when an experienced editor comments here I will usually respond here. I do not use "talkback" templates, and it rarely if ever makes sense to leave me such templates.

Mediation Case

A request for formal mediation of the dispute concerning Genesis Creation Myth has been filed with the Mediation Committee (MedCom). You have been named as a party in this request. Please review the request at Wikipedia:Requests for mediation/Genesis Creation Myth and then indicate in the "Party agreement" section whether you would agree to participate in the mediation or not.

Mediation is a process where a group of editors in disagreement over matters of article content are guided through discussing the issues of the dispute (and towards developing a resolution) by an uninvolved editor experienced with handling disputes (the mediator). The process is voluntary and is designed for parties who disagree in good faith and who share a common desire to resolve their differences. Further information on the MedCom is at Wikipedia:Mediation Committee; the policy the Committee will work by whilst handling your dispute is at Wikipedia:Mediation Committee/Policy; further information on Wikipedia's policy on resolving disagreements is at Wikipedia:Resolving disputes.

If you would be willing to participate in the mediation of this dispute but wish for its scope to be adjusted then you may propose on the case talk page amendments or additions to the list of issues to be mediated. Any queries or concerns that you have may be directed to an active mediator of the Committee or by e-mailing the MedCom's private mailing list (click here for details).

Please indicate on the case page your agreement to participate in the mediation within seven days of the request's submission.

Thank you, Weaponbb7 (talk)

Wilhelm von Gottberg

Thank you very much for your help.Xx236 (talk) 07:40, 30 August 2010 (UTC

Swansea / City twinning

Hello Hans, I'm sorry for the late reply. I didn't intend to ignore you I just had to 'restrict' my Wiki usage due to urgent work commitments. I also know I've missed the debate, but I've added a final message to Mannheim's talk page[1]. Danke schön/ Diolch yn faw. --Richardeast (talk) 15:01, 3 October 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for letting me know you are back. I am drafting a post to WT:MOSICON now, as promised. Hans Adler 17:19, 3 October 2010 (UTC)

Sounds good and I look forward to helping shape a universal Wiki policy which accommodate the unique political situation here which essentially creates 'countries within a country' [2]. --Richardeast (talk) 18:16, 3 October 2010 (UTC)

Sorry for being so blunt, but if you think this makes the UK special you are deceiving yourself. The only reason the constituent countries of the UK get special treatment that the two entities of Bosnia and Herzegovina or various autonomous regions of other countries don't get is that en.wikipedia has so many vociferous editors from these countries. One could argue that that's a reason for special treatment, but then it needs to be made explicit.

I have started a discussion at WT:MOSICON#Town-twinning and flags. Hans Adler 18:21, 3 October 2010 (UTC)

We're not a special case but rather quite a simple; the United Kingdom is not a country but a political union of countries who've pooled their sovereignty to make collective political decision. When discussing culture, sports or someone's nationality I think there's general consensus that the countries which form the UK cannot realistically be called anything other than countries - For example, Sean Connery is Scottish - yes he is british with an EU passport - but ask anyone and he's Scottish. In regards to town-twinning, as we discussed, here in France if there's a 'Villes jumelees' involving a Welsh or Scottish town - I've only ever seen the respective national flag displayed on signs and on documents (with the town said as being in Pays de Galles or Ecosse) - never with the union flag (or in Royami-uni) [3] [4] [5] [6]- It often takes a while for me to explain to people in France, but Socially, culturally and even mentally, we are an independent nation (surveys say 87% of people born in Wales consider their nationality to be Welsh - and Welsh alone[7]. Only 13% consider themselves at all british or even Welsh & british) - politically the closest entity to the UK is the EU... and, despite the Lisbon treaty, no one is arguing about displaying the EU flag instead of it's member states.

In my opinion Forcing the union flag to be displayed on articles instead of the respective national flag, contrary to every other indisputable source (such as Mannheim's own website!), would devalue the encyclopaedia - by us choosing not to report the realities on the ground we're allowing our political opinions to reflect the article. If a town calls itself Welsh and it's twinned with another town that calls it Welsh - what right do we have to force a different nationality on them? --Richardeast (talk) 19:04, 3 October 2010 (UTC)

"(such as Mannheim's own website!)" – Not that I would consider this a very strong argument even if true, but I have not been able to verify this. [8] I can only see the arms of Swansea. (And of course the Union flag as an icon for language choice, but obviously that doesn't count. The text, by the way, treats Wales as a curious, culturally atypical region of the UK, not as a country.) It's exactly the analogous situation for the twinship Heidelberg-Cambridge. Here you can see that Munich only displays the city arms of its twins, including Edinburgh.

So at first I guessed my personal preference – no flags at all – might be a typically German one, due to our history. On the other hand, the one Polish city I looked at is doing it the same way: [9] Cork is an interesting case: [10] (no flags or arms at all; twinned with a "UK" city and a "Wales" city). Pau's site doesn't say much about twinning and has no symbols at all for twin cities, but it does put Wales as Swansea's country. [11]

But we must really continue this discussion in the MOSICON talk page thread, where people can reference it in the future. I note that there was one earlier discussion about the topic, with very little input (including yours), in which another editor also favoured no flags at all. This seems to be the cleanest solution. Hans Adler 19:39, 3 October 2010 (UTC)

I think, with so many articles dealing with so many towns twinned it's going to be hard to get uniformity - and that's without touching on partially recognised states like Kosovo. But, if you think your opinion is a typical German one... I think my preference of having a Welsh flag may be a very Welsh one! - we're a very proud race... apparently only the Scots and Dutch are more patriotic than us in all of Europe [12].

You're right about not having the debate here - but thank you for starting the one on the MOSICONs page... it could be an interesting one. --Richardeast (talk) 20:01, 3 October 2010 (UTC)

Errors in reporting Egyptian mathematics

Your reference to one or more errors on my part needs to specified. Typos can only be corrected if they are pointed out. Intellectual errors are another matter. Speaking in general terms, allowing a bit of original research on your part, and your friends part, and none of my part, or Egyptian math posts with which you may disagree, reads like a double standard. No one should be getting by with a bit of original research. Discussing disagreements in open ways is highly recommended. It is sad that the Egyptian math scholarly record is filled with major and minor controversies. For example, I wish that today's issue, the 2/n table controversy and connections to scribal division were resolved. But Wikipedia is not the place to paper over the scholarly record by reporting one side of two-sided issues. Best Regards, Milogardner (talk) 16:13, 4 October 2010 (UTC)

You obviously don't understand what we here at Wikipedia mean by "original research". It's not about the kind of thing a scholar can be proud of as an achievement. It's about much more trivial things such as claiming that Robinson Crusoe is a book about a man who gets shipwrecked and survives on a desert island. If there weren't any reliable sources who have said the same thing before (i.e. what the book is about), then it would be original research to summarise the book in this way based only on having read it. That is the kind of original research that we sometimes cannot avoid, and even that can be problematic. (Even my apparently harmless example was problematic because it omits the very important religious dimension of the book – something most reliable sources would not neglect.)

What you are doing is much worse and is very far from what is acceptable here. Wikipedia is not a research platform. If you think that scholars are generally getting things wrong, the place to set things right is elsewhere. The general principle is: Change the real world first, then come here and update Wikipedia. You disagreeing with the actual tenured experts doesn't make something a "two-sided issue", and it does appear that that's what you are talking about. Hans Adler 17:06, 4 October 2010 (UTC)

Nazi Germany

This is ridiculous; instead of following your own political agenda: why do you not first have a look at the sources cited. Many of the current numbers given in the article do NOT match their source. (see talk) Quotations, ie. cited data has to match its source. That applies also to you, Hans Adler!--IIIraute (talk) 20:59, 4 October 2010 (UTC)

WP is not a dictionary?

Hans, you're encouraging people to link "town" and "city" in articles that list the mayors of a city? Why? Please note that the title to this section is not policy: it is a pillar. Tony (talk) 07:00, 6 October 2010 (UTC)

What does that have to do with anything? As a general comment: If you really think that usability aspects such as linking to trivial articles are on the importance level of the five pillars, then your view of Wikipedia is severely distorted. Ultimately Wikipedia is about facts, not about style.

Here is what "WP is not a dictionary" actually means:

• It gives instructions about the content of articles. They are primarily about topics, not about words. (Except in the few cases in which a word happens to be notable as such and the word is the topic.) This is why our article on town does not start with something like this:

Template:BlockquotetopTown (noun), from Old English/Old Saxon tūn (Old High German zūn, German Zaun = fence), often contracted to dūn in place names.Template:Blockquotebottom

• It gives instructions about the existence of articles. An encyclopedia does not try to have an article on every single word in the OED. It does not even try to have an article on each of the n most frequent English words. Notability must be verified for articles about words in the same way as for articles about any other topic. Mere use of a word does not count towards notability. Mere appearance in thousands of dictionaries does not count towards notability because while dictionaries mention and discuss the word, they only do so trivially. However, a linguistic scholarly article about a word does count towards notability. That's why cancellation is a redirect to cancel, and cancel is a disambiguation page with none of the articles on it being about the word's primary meaning in a general context.
• A minor corollary of WP not being a dictionary sometimes affects what to do about words that we suspect will not be understood by the majority of our readers. In a dictionary a very natural solution (apart from avoiding it) is to link to its definition. In WP this is often also an option because for many words there is an article whose topic and title are sufficiently close that the reader will come away with an understanding of the word. This is usually but not always acceptable as a pragmatic solution because in most cases there is some other valid justification for linking to such an article. In the few cases when there is none, an alternative must be found. If neither avoiding nor explaining in the using article itself works, a link to Wiktionary may be acceptable. I think they are generally frowned upon, but ultimately that's a (WikiMedia-)political and style decision, and has nothing to do with the five pillars.

About the specific case: The argument that we should not link to articles about trivial topics is of course valid in general, and I guess you know that it's an important argument to me. However, it breaks down in articles that are already about trivial topics themselves. Mayors in England is not an article that lists the mayors of a city. It is an article about the concept of the head of a city or town as it exists in England. (Not a good article at all, by the way. The most obvious problem is the principle "one headline per sentence", which someone once also insisted on applying to one of my DYK articles.) We can only speculate why a reader would get to this article, but it's the kind of article that some people might think can be pipe-linked under "mayor" from an article on an English city (I disagree; mayor should be completely unlinked on such an article), and that can have valid links from articles such as Lord Mayor of the City of London or articles about local governance in England. It's ultimately an article about a trivial topic, but localised to England. Therefore links to articles about other, related, trivial topics are certainly not out of place there. These links need to go to the localised version where available (e.g. towns and cities in England; list of towns in England is less appropriate because it doesn't give the same category of information as mayors in England), and otherwise to the non-localised version. The important thing to remember is that we should link similar articles to each other. That's like what Amazon does: If you have bought a book about cats you will probably be interested in other books about cats. If you are reading an article about cats, you are probably interested in other articles about cats, including some that may be a bit more trivial. And in the special case that you are reading the article cat it is reasonable to assume that you will also be interested in the article dog. Hans Adler 10:39, 6 October 2010 (UTC)

Hans, to respond to selected points: "we should link similar articles to each other. That's like what Amazon does: If you have bought a book about cats you will probably be interested in other books about cats." Amazon is all about making money out of readers by getting them to stay on the site and buy more. It is a commercial ploy that sometimes works. And of course it doesn't involve watering down a reader-oriented functionality such as a wikilinking system, which concerns what might be helpful in increasing readers' understanding of a topic. Similarity is the driving force behind the category system of WP, which is linked prominently at the bottom, after the reader has finished reading (or scrolling/skimming through) the article.

One of the limitations of wikilinking is that is not always possible to incorporate a link smoothly into the grammar of a clause without piping it to an item that is deceptively broad. "List of towns in England" is a great step up in focus from "town", but if it is piped to "town", the reader will ignore it as a dictionary term (and possibly wonder why their reading is being disrupted by it). That is why "List of towns and cities in England" is much more appropriate unpiped, clear and specific, in the "See also" section at the bottom. Wikilinking is not a (dare I say it, lazy) substitute for a well-thought-out "See also" section. Same for "Mayors in England". On the matter of specificity, you may be interested in the other thread I've engaged with, here. (I am intimidated by the goings-on at WT:MOSLINK at the moment.)

Please consider that those who are being branded as "delinkers" may not be the wreckers but the optimisers of the wikilinking system. The system grew like topsy in an undisciplined fashion for the first four years, reaching a peak density of > 6% (first quarter of 2005). Since then, the emphasis on intelligent, selective application has probably been the greatest—although not the only—factor associated with the steady reduction in link density to around 4.2% by the start of 2010. This phenomenon can be seen in all of the WPs, although to varying degrees and and with varying gradients.

Wiktionary: I am concerned about the reliability of that source; besides, it is a slight failure if readers have to divert to another page to learn what on earth we are talking about in an article. The same is true of all items (e.g., names of organisations; abbreviations) that are likely to be unfamiliar to most readers. The brief gloss on the spot, or perhaps a link in "See also", us usually preferable. Perhaps occasionally an on-the-spot link, but not if it's a mystery to the reader without clicking. This is one aspect of linking that has been abused, I think. Tony (talk) 11:07, 6 October 2010 (UTC)

PS Love the town/fence morph from German! Thanks for that. Fencing was, of course, a major social/political force much later than the etymological fact—at least in England. Tony (talk) 11:12, 6 October 2010 (UTC)

Tony, I don't know if you started as one, but you are clearly an unlinking fundamentalist now. We hade huge problems with a general overlinking enthusiasm, and I guess the problem can still be seen in many articles. It was a real problem, and that's why we ultimately got a majority for a clear rule against it. But you seem to think that this majority was a consensus for what most editors actually see as creating the opposite problem. See false consensus effect. The polarisation between overlinkers and underlinkers is no more useful than the polarisation between inclusionists and exclusionists, and both ultimately damage the encyclopedia because they cause a breakdown in communication about the borderline cases. Borderline cases should be decided consistently and after weighing all the evidence, not based on accidents such as the relative numbers of members of the two camps who turn up in a discussion. And since there are so many more overlinkers than underlinkers (rough guess: 20% overlinkers, 2% underlinkers, the rest moderates; of course the numbers don't mean anything because I didn't define a threshold), you are not going to profit from this polarisation.

Amazon is doing the right thing because it helps them make money. We should be doing the right thing because it's encyclopedic and our readers profit from it. A link from cat to dog, or a link from mayor to town and city or vice versa is not "watering down". These links are part of the site's core functionality. They are not even borderline cases. Hans Adler 11:21, 6 October 2010 (UTC)

I'd have thought I was a moderate. You are interpreting links as binding articles on similar topics (dog and cat?), without accounting for whether this is useful. What are the categories for, then? Tony (talk) 12:51, 6 October 2010 (UTC)

A link from cat to dog is useful because of the demographics of the readers of the cat article. (There is of course no need to talk about dogs just so that the article can be linked to.) A link from cat to canidae is less appropriate but still makes sense if the word happens to appear in the article. A link from cat to poodle is much less appropriate and could constitute overlinking, depending on specifics.

The important thing to keep in mind is that what is trivial and what is relevant depends on the article. Tent is a trivial link in dog but a relevant link in house. Cat is a trivial link in house but a relevant link in dog. Both are trivial links in doghouse. Our articles cover a vast range of topics and a huge range of difficulty from house to o-minimal theory. Any simplistic rule that decides for an article whether it can be linked to or not, without giving strong consideration to the article where the word appears, will be wrong in a lot of cases. Hans Adler 13:39, 6 October 2010 (UTC)

Responses:

• "A link from cat to dog is useful because of the demographics of the readers of the cat article. (There is of course no need to talk about dogs just so that the article can be linked to.)" I cannot see this—either the assumption about some demographic scope or the utility of the link for a reader who has chosen to go to "Cat", not "Dog". Nor should other domestic animals be specifically linked, such as "domestic rabbit" or "budgerigar", if they occur in the article. These are "dictionary terms" (here I will use these words, because such targets seem to be either for semi-random browser-readers or for those who don't know what a dog is, etc.). If the point is made in the "Cat" article concerning behaviour, or disease, or food, that is common to both, or different, a link to the specific section in the "Dog" article might make more sense—preferably not piped deceptively (the limitation of wikilinking, as I discussed above), and if there's a temptation to pipe thus, maybe reserved for the "See also", unpiped, where readers are more likely to click on it, I believe. Where you regard me as a fundamentalist, I regard myself as trying to improve linking practice. Sorry to be so blunt, but I really want to see it from the readers' point of view, and I have a healthy doubt about whether readers click on many links at all.
• "A link from cat to canidae is less appropriate but still makes sense if the word happens to appear in the article." Do you mean from "Dog" to "Canidae"? If so, I agree entirely.
• "A link from cat to poodle is much less appropriate and could constitute overlinking, depending on specifics." I agree. But the converse would be good linking practice, probably right at the opening.
• Dog is a trivial link in "Doghouse", but not in "Cat"? You've lost me here. Again, your take is siblingness; mine is the likelihood of utility, defined as increasing most readers' understanding of the anchor topic. To me, relatedness alone is not "relevance" or "utility" in the wiki-reading experience. Relatedness is for our very excellent system of categories; and perhaps for "See also". When relatedness is conjoined with the other criteria as a justification for linking, the system is weakened by vagueness of purpose and an unnecessarily higher link-density.
• "Tent is a trivial link in dog but a relevant link in house." Well, that's where we disagree more fundamentally. I'm looking at "Tent" now; how is it relevant to the article "House"? It doesn't even mention "house", and the converse is probably true. Perhaps if the history section of Tent were actually written, and drew parallels with "House", there might be a case for section linking. But just linking these two articles because they have in common that they are human methods of shelter seems tenuous in the extreme. Am I missing something?
• "Any simplistic rule that decides for an article whether it can be linked to or not, without giving strong consideration to the article where the word appears, will be wrong in a lot of cases." I think "simplistic" prejudges; I'd substitute "simple". Then I agree. But the practical application will always involve a set of (almost all) possible link targets that are easily rejected, a few that are easily accepted, and a few in a grey area that might cause one to think carefully, or to seek/accept other judgements on. These three classes are basic to optimising wikilinking with social harmony. Tony (talk) 15:05, 6 October 2010 (UTC)

I am sorry, but this discussion is getting tiresome. If you are unable to intuitively understand that the rule of not linking to trivial topics obviously can t apply to articles on closely related equally trivial topics, then I don't know how to help you. It appears I can't prevent you from running into the wall, so I will stop trying. Hans Adler 15:18, 6 October 2010 (UTC)

That is a rude, belittling and dismissive response. I'm disappointed, since I thought we were getting somewhere. It appears that you construct "running into the wall" as disagreeing with you. Tony (talk) 03:43, 7 October 2010 (UTC)

As I said above, IMO part of the problem is the false consensus effect. There isn't much I can do if you don't believe me, other than to encourage you to take some specific edits with which you agree and that have already been criticised by many, and then run them by a random sample of editors and a random sample of FA contributors to see what they think. But there is only so much time that I am willing to invest into discussions with any one editor who is pushing an eccentric viewpoint. Hans Adler 06:53, 7 October 2010 (UTC)

• Don't forget, it's my time too; you seem to want to cease communications. Fine, but please don't prejudge ("eccentric"). You will find that FA contributors (and FL, I'd say) will be strongly against the "sibling article" model for linking. Linking in featured content is mostly satisfactory, in my view, so you would regard that community of top content producers as eccentric, I guess. Tony (talk) 13:24, 7 October 2010 (UTC)

S

Hello. I just wanted to say thank you for your perspectives on S. I don't want to continue the discussion now, but it was instructive. Regards, William M. Connolley (talk) 19:31, 7 October 2010 (UTC)

Just be careful not to rely too much on my opinion or on others necessarily agreeing with it when this comes up again in a more appropriate forum. Hans Adler 20:39, 7 October 2010 (UTC)

Science reporter (?)

At the CRU emails page you mentioned a widely discussed article; the author is indeed, as his bio states, "a Berkshire-based researcher and science writer", though the piece in question comes under the paper's science blogs.[13] Which leads us to an interesting follow up.[14] Thought you might like the link, . . dave souza, talk 19:19, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

I do. Thanks, I missed that. Hans Adler 19:33, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

My archive fail

[15] Thanks for catching it!  Sandstein  11:02, 11 October 2010 (UTC)

No problem. It wasn't hard to miss or hard to fix. Hans Adler 11:05, 11 October 2010 (UTC)

Template:Vandalism warning warning

Trek Boers crossing the Karoo

Blurry humanoid figure with slightly less blurry canine companion crossing Turner River in sight of a picnicker or washer woman

A bunch of moustachioed over-actors crossing the Yalu

I see. And how did you like my category? Got any file to put in it? P.S., I'll have the Tofu-Bratling, please. Bishonen | talk 21:20, 11 October 2010 (UTC).

Sorry, I have no idea where I would get tofu from at this time of the night. I am sure Commons is already closed. But I can offer some pumpkin soup. Please do take a seat while I am looking for my camera. Hans Adler 21:59, 11 October 2010 (UTC)

Oh, sorry, just choose whatever place looks most appealing and just move the stuff that's lying there elsewhere. Sorry for the mess. Hans Adler 22:02, 11 October 2010 (UTC)

Excellent finds, how clever—love the "Crossing the Yalu"! Now don't leave the job half done—put your pics in Category:Paintings of people crossing geographical features, pleeze. Do you think it would be safe to move the whole shebang to Commons? I've never quite dared; I worry lest it propel it to WP:CFD—my one and only lovely category. Wikipedia feels, somehow, a bit safer. What is a Bratling, anyway? A fry-up? Bishonen | talk 23:03, 11 October 2010 (UTC).

Dear Mrs Bishonen, unfortunately I must tell you that I always leave almost everything half done. I would like to make an exception for you, but I am afraid my pictures are all on loan from Commons. I have found no way to put them in a category on Wikipedia – other than by writing articles for them, that is. I share your concern about CfD. Better play it safe and leave it here, where it sits so nicely between Category:Paintings of Napoleon I and Category:Paintings of the Louvre.

In German, a Bratling (or sometimes Röstling – the canteen in Heidelberg used to alternate between the terms for no apparent reason, but some people theorised that the röstlings were supposed to be even drier and more burnt than the bratlings) is literally a roastee or fryee: Anything vegetarian that you can fry instead of a piece of meat. I think I used to buy such things from Somerfields under the designation "burger", although strictly speaking it should probably be called a burger filling because it's a veggie burger without the ersatz bread. In any case my discounter here in Vienna sells them as "Burger". In England the best and cheapest variant was the theoretically most disgusting one. A pity they don't sell this stuff elsewhere in Europe.

By the way, I wonder: Was Napoleon much of a painter? And why are there so many categories of paintings of museums? I am sure Wikipedia must have the answers somewhere, if only I weren't too lazy to look them up. Hans Adler 06:19, 12 October 2010 (UTC)

Apology.

Whether you believe me or not, I'd like to apologize for edit warring. - Zhou Yu (talk) 23:02, 11 October 2010 (UTC)

No problem. I didn't take it personally anyway. Happy editing, hopefully without further conflicts. Hans Adler 06:21, 12 October 2010 (UTC)

WP:V

Hallo Hans, you commented the other day at the WP:V talk page proposals re science/media sources. The present situation is that a majority of editors seem to be in favour of implementing either proposal 5 or proposal 7, but concerns have been voiced that this will be a big change which perhaps should not be undertaken without wider community input. See Wikipedia_talk:Verifiability#Current_status. Your input would be welcome. --JN466 14:30, 12 October 2010 (UTC)

Thanks. On first sight it looks OK, but I am unlikely to get more involved in the discussion at this point. Hans Adler 15:13, 12 October 2010 (UTC)

Climate change denial

I don't know about what you think, but this article's title should be changed and it is struggling with neutrally presenting the topic. I was reverted in my attempt to fix it, so do you think that there is a good compromise?--Novus Orator 07:12, 14 October 2010 (UTC)

What you apparently don't understand is that the entire climate change debate has been manufactured by advertising companies that are paid by ExxonMobil and other large companies that profit from delaying certain inevitable actions. This is nothing new, since we have had precisely the same mechanisms in connection with other issues previously, most notably smoking and cancer. There are numerous cases of people and front organisations that used to claim that science was divided about whether smoking causes cancer (which it very clearly wasn't), and who now claim that science is divided about whether industry causes global warming. And similarly to the previous cases, there is no genuine scientific debate about this, just smoke and mirrors for the general public. As an encyclopedia we follow the most high-quality sources for such topics and we have a lot of editors with a scientific background. Therefore the advertising companies that offer "real grassroots campaigns rather than astro-turfing" (by which they obviously mean astro-turfing that is harder to detect) for huge amounts of money are currently learning that it's a bit harder to manipulate Wikipedia than it is with the average local newspaper. Hans Adler 09:34, 14 October 2010 (UTC)

October 2010

Please assume good faith in your dealings with other editors, which you did not on Template talk:Countries of Europe. Assume that they are here to improve rather than harm Wikipedia. This edit is unacceptable. Please revert. --Snowded ^TALK 18:39, 14 October 2010 (UTC)

Thank you for reminding me of the month. You can't be serious. AGF is not a suicide pact. In particular it does not force anyone to assume that an editor who is trying to add Wales to the following template has misunderstood its purpose:

There is even a footnote saying "Is a state with limited international recognition". Editors from the UK can be expected to have a basic command of the English language and to be part of the general cultural background on which Wikipedia operates. They must know that the constituent countries of the UK have no international recognition as sovereign states, which this is obviously about.Hans Adler 18:48, 14 October 2010 (UTC)

No one is claiming that the constituent countries of the UK are sovereign states on that or any other page in Wikipedia. The issue which has arisen several times is that any list or template which wants to restrict itself to countries which are sovereign states needs to be appropriately titled. Those arguments have been made. You are free to disagree with them, but the edit I reference above with its accusations and name calling against other editors is a clear failure to assume good faith and addresses the motivation of other editors rather than dealing with content issues. You should strike those comments and focus on the content issues. --Snowded ^TALK 19:26, 14 October 2010 (UTC)

Stop this nonsense. You certainly speak English better than I do, and it's very hard to believe that you or the other editors in question don't understand what the term country means in this context. As I said, the problem is plausible deniability: It's impossible to prove that you aren't simply context-deaf. But given the large number of editors with Welsh flags on their user pages who keep pushing Wales into contexts where otherwise only sovereign states appear speaks for itself. A general statement like the one I made is perfectly proper under the circumstances. The plausible deniability applies individually, but not collectively. Hans Adler 19:40, 14 October 2010 (UTC)

Whatever your argument as to the content, you should not make accusations against editors as you did today. It is not proper. You are speculating on the motivations of editors rather than dealing with the content. You really need to get your mind around this. I am happy to accept that we may have a disagreement about what country means. What is not acceptable is for you to launch an attack on other editors without cause. You "we can't get them blocked" comment is particularly crass by the way. I really do suggest you strike the comment, its in clear breech of WIkipedia rules. --Snowded ^TALK 19:49, 14 October 2010 (UTC)

The only rule my comment has broken is the rule that comments about editors' behaviour should only be made on any of a small number of pages that have been created for that purpose. If that works for you as a compromise I would be willing to move my comments to ANI – even though I think they are proper where they are, because they deal directly with the problem that the proposed move is intended to address. Hans Adler 19:59, 14 October 2010 (UTC)

If you want to make an ANI case based on your comments feel free. I thought it better to give you a chance to withdraw unjustified attacks rather than reporting the behaviour. Its not an isolated case by the way, looking at one piece of advise below and remembering previous comments --Snowded ^TALK 05:45, 15 October 2010 (UTC)

I have no interest in escalating this further. It was an offer, not something I personally want to do. Hans Adler 07:09, 15 October 2010 (UTC)

Sensible, now if you would strike that comment OR make it clear it does not apply to any editor engaged in the discussion then the matter is closed--Snowded ^TALK 08:13, 15 October 2010 (UTC)

Perhaps a rephrasing would suffice. "The constant disucssion over inclusion/exclusion on those articles, templates is becoming frustrating. We should begin changing titles from country to sovereign state, in order to end the continuing arguments". GoodDay (talk) 14:32, 15 October 2010 (UTC)

Coanda-1910

Hello! I will start by saying sorry if, this feels like pushing you. You promised to give some comments still on the Coanda-1910 sources reliability. Would you have time to do so? Thank you in advance!--Lsorin (talk) 22:08, 14 October 2010 (UTC)

Sorry for being a bit slow with this. This is going to take quite a bit of concentration and I am currently also a bit busy in real life. So I was going to wait a bit to see if Binksternet's promised source materialises any time soon – I think it would be a waste of effort to work through all this only to have to re-evaluate everything in the light of a new source. Currently it looks to me as if we need to find a compromise version that reconciles the different accounts with each other and also mentions the uncertainties. But it's unfortunate that I have only snippets from many of the key sources to go by. Hans Adler 22:14, 14 October 2010 (UTC)

Battleground

• Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Climate change

I've been following some of your recent comments [16] on climate change, a topic in which I don't think I've seen you editing much before although I think we've seen one another around the place. One of the key things to come out of the recently closed arbitration was the "us-and-them" battleground mentality and behavior that may exacerbate that. In fact a whole heap of quite good editors, some of them excellent editors, were topic banned because their behavior was very polarizing.

So that's why I'm coming and asking you to be very careful about how you refer to other editors, even in a general sense, in this topic area. It's easy to set the stage for more warfare and then we all lose out. It would definitely pay you to look carefully through the arbitrators' comments on the proposed decision page of that case, I think that will help you to pick up the vibe that's coming out of Wikipedia on the topic now. --TS 00:18, 15 October 2010 (UTC)

My comments were the reaction to the obvious cases of astro-turfing that I have seen in a single day. They were all from accounts that haven't edited since September. This is a good example. Of course this may be an ordinary user who happened to become interested in CC on the day the CC Arbcom ruling came out. But it seems more likely that in the 2 years between January 2007 and February 2009 someone did a password guessing attack on abandoned accounts and turned them into sleepers. The first edit in February 2009 was innocuous. Then in September 2009 we have a substantial edit in favour of relaxing rules for testing pharmaceuticals, sourced to the Heartland Institute, as well as one edit writing up a minor Republican candidate. Yesterday the same account added the sentence "There are numerous examples of newspapers printing op-eds from groups attacking Wal-Mart whose funding comes primarily from unions." to The Heartland Institute, but you had to look at the diff very closely indeed to notice, because the account also split a single relatively short paragraph into three for no apparent reason. This user may be an innocent fan of the Heartland Institute and Walmart. AGF still applies. But it does not apply collectively when there is a general pattern.

Nevertheless, thank you for the warning. I will try to take into account that it may be counterproductive if the community is aware of what is going on. After all, there are other ways to deal with the situation. Hans Adler 07:03, 15 October 2010 (UTC)

I don't know if you're fully aware of what's been going on, so forgive me if you already know this. There is a certain banned editor known as Scibaby who is a prolific sock puppeteer. It isn't the only sock in the climate change topic, but it's the most active. We're well aware of this but the arbitration committee has expressed concern about the dangers of treating every opinionated newcomer as a potential sock. See the arbitration case link I gave above for their official opinion of it. So Assume good faith is more important than ever, while of course being aware that jiggery pokery may also be afoot. --TS 11:35, 15 October 2010 (UTC)

I guess I am mostly aware of this, although I haven't got a clue how to distinguish Scibaby and other socks. I certainly agree that we must be careful not to ABF all new editors of a certain POV just because there are many socks active in the area. I have watched a blatant case of this unfold with Unomi when he was new, and I have seen several cases related to homeopathy. I have not observed anything remotely as bad in the climate change area, but this may be simply because I didn't watch the area closely. I think I am generally very careful about accusations of sock puppetry against any individual editor. I have made a small number of SPI reports, and in each case it was preceded by many hours of research. The number of SPI reports I did not file because my research cleared an editor to my satisfaction is much higher.

As I said, you have made me more aware of the problem that a general awareness of the central problem in the climate change area may be counterproductive because it tends to encourage the kind of polarisation in which sock puppets prosper. I have seen the difference at the homeopathy article, where we managed to get from a pro-/anti-homeopathy polarisation to something much more constructive. Nowadays when new editors turn up and make strongly POV edits, we can deal much more effectively with the situation because the established editors trust each other and know there is no chance of subversion by sock puppets. Hans Adler 12:35, 15 October 2010 (UTC)

Thanks. It sounds like your experience in other areas will stand you in good stead. --TS 12:54, 15 October 2010 (UTC)

ANI thread restored

The thread you started at ANI a couple of days ago concerning user Terra Novus rolled off to archives before I could comment. I've restored it from the archive, commented, and informed Terra Novus. I thought it would be right to inform you, as well, since you began it. Best,  – OhioStandard (talk) 16:33, 16 October 2010 (UTC)

No pressure 3RR

I'm sure you're aware of the rule, but I just thought I'd remind you that you can be blocked for reverting an edit more than three times in a 24 hour period.--Yeti Hunter (talk) 13:09, 18 October 2010 (UTC)

Thank you. I would not normally have reverted 3 times, but for my personal ethics I don't count the first time because I had every right to assume that when I was first reverted it was in error. Jprw claimed to remove text that was never in the article and gave no real rationale for adding the text they added. This reminds me of the worst kind of edit warring I have seen so far: Reflexive pressing of the "undo" button, based on nothing but edit summaries and editor identity. This kind of editing should never be rewarded, whether it is intentional or not. Hans Adler 13:35, 18 October 2010 (UTC)

I noticed that too when I looked at the edit history, but there had recently been some "denier" pejoratives added in the reception section, so perhaps it was an incorrect assumption on his part. Whatever, AGF. Wiki's been copping some heat over climate change articles lately, let's try to keep the editing sane on this one.--Yeti Hunter (talk) 14:13, 18 October 2010 (UTC)

You shouldn't be editing like this. I don't think your arguments excusing edit warring would cut any mustard in a discretionary sanctions area. Please read the notice I put at the foot of Talk:No Pressure (film). --TS 14:40, 18 October 2010 (UTC)

For the record, this is the sequence of events in article space, and my analysis:

2 October

• Climatedragon adds references to the "skeptical blog WUWT" [17]
• Jprw adds "popular science". [18]

18 October [19]

• I remove "sceptical popular science", explaining in the edit summary that one person's "sceptical popular science blog" is another's "global warming denial blog"
• Jprw reverts with an edit summary that suggests they didn't even look at the edit
• I remove it again
• Jprw adds it again
• I remove it again
• Yeti Hunter adds it again

My first revert did not feel like a revert. A great deal of research was necessary to even find out where the text came from. My second revert was in the spirit of cooperative editing – Jprw seemed to have reverted because of a misunderstanding of the nature of my edit. Of course it looks differently now. The next three reverts (including one by me) were inappropriate and I apologise for mine. Hans Adler 15:04, 18 October 2010 (UTC)

That's edit warring, and taken as a whole it certainly isn't collegial editing by any stretch of the imagination. Anyway, enough lecturing. Please read the arbitration case decision and you may see that it has serious teeth intended to stop exactly this kind of edit war. --TS 15:07, 18 October 2010 (UTC)

I wrote the last sentence for a reason. Hans Adler 15:09, 18 October 2010 (UTC)

Discussions regarding Weston Price

Please do not attack other editors. If you continue, you may be blocked from editing Wikipedia. [20] [21] [22] [23] --Ronz (talk) 17:41, 18 October 2010 (UTC)

Further information: [[:User talk:Hans Adler/Archive 3#Quackwatch|User talk:Hans Adler/Archive 3 § Quackwatch]]

Hans Adler 17:56, 18 October 2010 (UTC)

"Wikipedia is not a place to hold grudges, import personal conflicts, carry on ideological battles, or nurture prejudice, hatred, or fear. Making personal battles out of Wikipedia discussions goes directly against our policies and goals.. "

"Every user is expected to interact with others civilly, calmly, and in a spirit of cooperation. Do not insult, harass, or intimidate those with whom you have a disagreement. Rather, approach the matter intelligently and engage in polite discussion. If another user behaves in an uncivil, uncooperative, or insulting manner, or even tries to harass or intimidate you, this does not give you an excuse to respond in kind. Address only the factual points brought forward, ignoring the inappropriate comments, or disregard that user entirely. You could also remind the user in question of Wikipedia's policy of no personal attacks in such a situation. If a conflict continues to bother you, take advantage of Wikipedia's dispute resolution process. There are always users willing to mediate and arbitrate disputes between others." - WP:BATTLE --Ronz (talk) 18:22, 18 October 2010 (UTC)

I suggest both of you avoid interacting at all. Nothing good ever comes of it. --TS 18:28, 18 October 2010 (UTC)

That is certainly good advice. As you may have noticed, we had only three short episodes of interaction so far: One in March 2008, one in August 2009 and one starting a few days ago at WP:RS/N#Is a paper (possible blog) by a psychiatrist valid regarding old claims regarding dentistry?, when I commented in a thread without having a clue that Ronz was involved. While I generally enjoy getting people with robot-like behaviour, such as telemarketers [24], off-script, I am doing my best to avoid this particular temptation on Wikipedia. It may not be good enough, though. If only I knew a good strategy for ending interaction once someone has started applying their script to me. Hans Adler 18:50, 18 October 2010 (UTC)

I've had this problem and I know how it plays out (which is badly). You're both going to have to try hard to make it work. Avoid the temptation to characterize the other person or his conduct, even in a way that you regard as objectively fair or generous. Forgive and let pass without comment any comment by the other person you find annoying or provoking. Where possible, avoid commenting in discussions on which the other has commented, and when you do so address the subject and not the person. Think generous thoughts about the other person at all times, but don't overdo it, try to see him as a human who finds you as annoying as you find him. Try to live and let live. --TS 19:12, 18 October 2010 (UTC)

Thanks. Hans Adler 19:20, 18 October 2010 (UTC)

Please do not add unreferenced or poorly referenced information, especially if controversial, to articles or any other page on Wikipedia about living persons. Thank you. [25] --Ronz (talk) 23:28, 18 October 2010 (UTC)