User talk:Eric Kvaalen

I have cleared this page because it was all old. For older stuff, see [1], [2], [3], [4], [5] and most recently [6] Eric Kvaalen (talk) 08:06, 2 January 2018 (UTC)

Metre sea water

When you made this edit to Metre sea water, had you seen the discussion at Talk:Metre sea water? Multiple definitions abound, so I'm very tempted to revert your amendments as by giving undue emphasis to one source I don't believe they actually improve the article. --RexxS (talk) 11:26, 27 July 2017 (UTC)

@RexxS:: No, I had not seen that discussion. I agree with you that these units are not very rigorously defined. I think my edit actually emphasizes that fact, since I mention that the USNDM gives two slightly different conversions into psi! Feel free to modify the article after my edit, but don't revert! I fix'd several things.

By the way, another thing that influences the pressure change per foot or per metre (besides the density of the sea water) is the strength of gravity (or to be more accurate, gravity minus centrifugal force!). That changes considerably from one part of the world to another, similar to changes in density.

Eric Kvaalen (talk) 12:37, 27 July 2017 (UTC)

Indeed, Eric, the inconsistency in the USN Dive Manual is why it wasn't specifically attributed before, although Peter (I think) had used it as a reference. It's not a big deal, and as you say, the unit is a rather fuzzy quantity. I'm not going to revert your edits over such a small matter. Cheers --RexxS (talk) 16:09, 27 July 2017 (UTC)

Alpha Centauri

I backed out your change. The source does not appear reliable (it appears to be an archive of an adaption from a defunct web page, and then the entry for Alpha Centauri is flagged as differing from other sources). Please find a better source, and investigate why that entry indicates it differs from Baily. Regards, Tarl N. (discuss) 05:22, 22 December 2017 (UTC)

@Tarl N.: Well, it's a good thing you question'd it. I've been lookin' into it and I realize now that the latitudes Ptolemy gives are ecliptic latitudes! As for the value, I find on p. 368 (or 377/673) of [Toomer's English translation a note sayin' that 41°20' "is the reading of D,Ar and an alternative reading in A. Other Greek mss. have 44°20'. −41°20' is more correct, but all other stars in this group are assigned too great a southern latitude, so −44°20' may have been Ptolemy's measurement. It is adopted by P-K." A text with 41 can be seen at [7], page 181. There are quite a few misprints in one or the other source – places where they don't agree. I will re-edit the article on Alpha Centauri.

That certainly make more sense, but then precession isn't involved - the ecliptic does not vary (our equator precesses relative to the invariant ecliptic). The current ecliptic latitude of α Cen is -42.5, which is more likely obtainable by simple proper motion in 2000 years plus measurement errors - Without doing the spherical trigonometry, I work it out to about ½ degree proper motion in that timeframe. But that's WP:OR. I'll just remove the comment about precession. Regards, Tarl N. (discuss) 21:15, 22 December 2017 (UTC)

@Tarl N.: Yes, precession is involved. It doesn't affect ecliptic latitude but it does affect equatorial latitude (what is important for whether someone can see the star from a certain country). You can think of precession as the stars circulating around the ecliptic pole, in other words around a certain point in Draco. They "move" eastward on circles around this point, which implies that they also move north and south as they go around. Each star "moves" northeast for about 13,000 years and then southeast for 13,000 years. Alpha Centauri is currently in the phase where it moves southeast. The zodiac constellations Gemini, Cancer, Leo, Virgo, Libra, and Scorpius are also "moving" southeast. The other six are moving northeast.

Added on to this apparent motion is the proper motion. According to the article, α-Centauri A has a proper motion northward of about 0.47 arc seconds per year, and α-Centauri B about 0.8. As I understand it, they differ because they are moving one around the other in orbit. They have similar masses, so the centre of gravity is moving northward about 0.6 arc seconds per year. So in 2000 years, the ecliptic latitude will go north by about 20 arc minutes, that is, one third of a degree. So back in Ptolemy's time the ecliptic latitude would have been about 42.8 South.

By the way, simple calculations are not consider'd "original research".

I will put back something about precession in the article.

Eric Kvaalen (talk) 15:49, 23 December 2017 (UTC)

You need a reference for the geocentric latitude. The reason I removed the comment about precession was that the sentence at the time had reference to only ecliptic latitudes. I'd rephrase the sentence you added, to something like "Although Alpha Centauri isn't visible in Alexandria today, it was in Ptolemy's time due to precession". Then if you can find a reference to what it would have been at the time, give the geocentric coordinates. Regards, Tarl N. (discuss) 18:09, 23 December 2017 (UTC)

December 2017

Please refrain from using talk pages such as Talk:Criticism of Windows 10 for general discussion of the topic or other unrelated topics. They are for discussion related to improving the article in specific ways, based on reliable sources and the project policies and guidelines; they are not for use as a forum or chat room. If you have specific questions about certain topics, consider visiting our reference desk and asking them there instead of on article talk pages. See here for more information. Thank you. Codename Lisa (talk) 11:22, 26 December 2017 (UTC)

It was for improving the article based on reliable sources! Eric Kvaalen (talk) 11:38, 26 December 2017 (UTC)

Eric, it's unfortunate that you felt it necessary to go straight to WP:ANI because you weren't satisfied with hearing that Wikipedia's talk pages aren't a place for you to vent your frustrations about a subject. I already told you this once already, and I offer this comment as a second reminder. I've been here 12 years and I know what's what, so take my word on this -- being adverserial about this will not only fail to accomplish whatever goals you have in mind for the encyclopedia, it will make your time at Wikipedia even more frustrating than your experiences with Windows 10. Things always go better if you take the time to research the subject, then contribute from a position of expertise combined with proper attribution for the information you add. Warren -talk- 23:25, 26 December 2017 (UTC)

I did not see what you wrote to me earlier – you didn't Ping me. I know that we cannot put our own bad experiences into a Wikipedia article, but what I am asking for is for people to give us references for the kind of problems I have found. I am astounded that nothing is said about all the problems I mention. I certainly have the right to bring this up on a Talk page, and Lisa does not have the right to delete it. Eric Kvaalen (talk) 06:47, 27 December 2017 (UTC)

Please stop your disruptive editing. If you continue to use talk pages for inappropriate discussion, as you did at Talk:Criticism of Windows 10, you may be blocked from editing. Codename Lisa (talk) 11:51, 26 December 2017 (UTC)

(This was because I put back a question I had written on a talk page which she had deleted!) Eric Kvaalen (talk) 06:47, 15 January 2018 (UTC)

Windows 10 advice

I come here after seeing your question on the refdesk and reading your list of problems on Win 10 criticism talk page. I'll write here because the refdesk thread is long enough already and the people there tend to follow the "buy parts until everything works" approach, which you might not want/have money for -- given that your "problem" is that your hardware is very old (last Pentium Dual-Core came out 10 years ago). You will never be able to get rid of most of your Win 10 problems without buying a bunch of new parts, for that reason. Windows 10 is optimized for computers with new CPUs running with 8+ GB RAM, so naturally after it crams whatever it wants to run in the background with 2 GB, you won't get a nice user experience. (Do note that if you do buy a new CPU and motherboard, you might not be able to go back to older versions of Windows, and if you buy a whole new PC with Windows pre-installed, it might be very hard/impossible to switch to another OS later on). Moreover, Windows 10 is a free upgrade because it's riddled with ads, telemetry and bloatware. That Twitter app is there because Microsoft wants to make money off of you and figures pre-installing and running stuff like this is more profitable than having you fork over $100-200 every 4-5 years. Now, you have several options:

1) Keep running Windows 10 and try to patch up everything. Some of this stuff will go away if you upgrade your PC, some will require 3rd party software or tinkering with settings. The latter might be a tall order and some stuff (e.g. the Microsoft Store) might never be able to be fully removed, or might re-install/re-enable itself in a later update. You will also need to at least buy new RAM. If your motherboard is very old and doesn't support more than 4-8 GB RAM, you might want to replace it, and if you do so you will need to replace the CPU as well, as well as any PS/2 keyboard/mouse. (Also, you might still be using DDR2 RAM, which hasn't been supported for years now.) All of these will set you back a few hundred dollars. The upside of this approach is that you won't have to reinstall anything to get a somewhat more useful PC. The downside is that you will want or have to remove some ways in which Microsoft makes money off of you (selling ad impressions, charging companies like Twitter for access to your personal data), and they have the home field advantage.

2) Downgrade to Windows 7. You can follow the instructions here, which may or may not work (it's been two years since you installed Windows 10). An alternative is to follow the instructions on this forum to install Windows 7 from scratch while retaining the original files on your hard drive (this will require reinstalling the programs you have on Windows 10). I'm not up-to-date if your Win 7 would still be valid, so you might need to buy a new Win 7 license on ebay for a couple bucks (FYI nobody will bother you even if it isn't legal). You might also want to buy another HDD and install Win 7 on it (500GB costs around $35-50, 1TB $40-60) if you don't have your data backed up or are otherwise worried you might screw up and overwrite your data. Windows 7 still works with all apps that you use on Windows 10, and will run a little slow on your hardware, but nothing like Windows 10. A small downside is that Windows 7's support for updates runs out in 2020. This is largely unimportant, as Windows 7 is already a pretty secure OS and there are a lot of good 3rd party security apps, but it might require a bit of extra work to keep your PC secure past that date, or you might want to install another OS or Windows version.

3) Switch to Linux. Linux has changed a lot since its early and newbie-hostile days and has become a competitive OS. The apps you mention you use (Firefox, VLC, LibreOffice) work perfectly there; some even stem from Linux originally! You will have to re-partition your disk and at least backup your data somewhere, so you will probably want a new HDD (it's a good idea to have at least a second HDD to back stuff up anyway). The main distros aimed at new Linux users are Ubuntu, Linux Mint, Q4OS and Zorin OS - they should all work fine on a 2GB PC (Q4OS should probably run the fastest). You can download live ISOs for these distros, burn them on a CD or DVD and boot, and see which you like the most, and then follow instructions to install (be careful not to overwrite your old hard drive!!). All of these are based on Debian, for which most 3rd party Linux apps are written. This will not require any hardware changes (except maybe a new HDD as mentioned before), as Linux has good backward compatibility. This is the cheapest approach and has the advantage of not having to care about Windows 7's end-of-life in 2020, but you'll have to familiarize yourself with a bit different OS.

Cheers Elephas X. Maximus (talk) 03:22, 2 January 2018 (UTC)

@Elephas X. Maximus: Thank you very much for the advice. A couple comments:

My processor is a Celeron N2840. According to List of Intel Celeron microprocessors it's from July 2014. So it's not ten years old. I bought it in the summer of 2015. (I see that there's a Celeron N4000, release date December 2017, with only 2 cores.) That list says that for memory it uses 2 × DDR3L-1333. I don't know what that means, but I guess it's not the DDR2 you mention.

My computer is a laptop, so I don't know how easy it is to make all the hardware changes you suggest.

I have installed Linux on computers in the past, in dual-boot with Windows. But as I have mentioned on Talk:Criticism of Windows 10, this computer came with all four partitions in use, which complicates things.

Some of the problems I have with Windows 10 I think are not due to my limited hardware. Do you think all of them are? Here is the list again, for reference:

1. Slow to start up
2. I've noticed using the Task Manager that it loads all kinds of things that I never use, like Twitter.
3. Even when I'm not doing anything the Task Manager shows that it's using quite a bit of CPU and disk IO.
4. Often the Task Manager shows that "System" is using a lot of disk IO.
5. As I look just now, I see that Microsoft Store is using a lot of disk IO, pushing my disk IO up to 95%. I have never used Microsoft Store!
6. Many times my computer almost grinds to a halt. This seems to happen when I'm using Firefox, so maybe it's partly the fault of Firefox. But even if I kill Firefox (using the Task Manager) it continues to run slow. The cure is to reboot.
7. It has happened that I couldn't even reboot without holding the power switch down for four seconds, which basically crashes the computer.
8. Often when I try to reboot, it tells me that it's closing down various applications (which takes an inordinate amount of time) and then, after closing some of them, it stops trying to reboot and just goes back to normal operation. I have to tell it to reboot again.
9. It takes a long time to do simple things like starting up Windows Explorer. Or if I do a right-click on a file in a folder, it takes a long time just to display the menu of options!
10. When I open a folder, it takes a long time to display my files. It seems to be sorting them by date (as I want), but takes forever to do so. (Even with just 20 files!)
11. When I press the Windows key, it usually takes a long time for the Start Menu (or whatever it's called) to open up. And then if I try to use the arrow keys to select something it doesn't respond for quite a while.
12. When I press Alt-Tab to switch tasks, it often doesn't actually switch to the task I select. I may have to do it several times before it "takes". (Sometimes I use a trick – I hit the left Alt, then while holding it down I press the right-hand Alt, and then I press Tab. This forces it to use an older version of the task-switching facility, which works much better.)
13. Sometimes it switches back and forth between windows without me asking it to do so at all.
14. When I open a new task, it usually opens in a window that is not on top. I have to go find it with Alt-Tab.
15. Windows 10 came with a Mail app that is a disaster. I won't bother saying what's wrong with it because of course you don't have to use it. I managed to get Windows Live Mail to work instead.
16. If you try to save a new document, it usually (or always?) opens a pop-up window, for you to say what to save it as, in OneDrive. Several times I have accidentally saved a file to OneDrive instead of on my computer. Which of course means that when I look for it, perhaps when I don't have Internet, I can't find it.

Obviously my problems with Mail (Windows) are not due to my hardware! I'd say Problems 2, 8, 12, 13, 14, 15, and 16 are not due to hardware.

Do you have any references we can use in Criticism of Windows 10, for instance about it not working well if you have less than 8 GiB RAM?

And out of curiosity, why did you make a new account just to write to me?

Eric Kvaalen (talk) 08:06, 2 January 2018 (UTC)

Re: Celeron, sorry about that, when you said "dual-core", I assumed you were talking specifically about Pentium Dual-Core and not just that your CPU has 2 cores. So, forget the part about needing to upgrade CPU & motherboard (it's for the best anyhow, these are the hardest parts to replace in a laptop), although it still stands that you need more RAM to comfortably run Win 10 in any case (and definitely to fix problems like 6,9,10,11).

The problems you mentioned, yeah, some can be improved by hardware, some by software. If you want to fix them all while keeping Win10, you'll have to get more RAM and new software. I don't really know which software fixes which problems. Some of this will require installing apps (e.g. [8] - this doesn't apply to your list of problems, but is something I installed before I decided that Win 10 just isn't worth it), some will require tinkering with registry and such (e.g. possible fix for your Twitter problem). In any case, it'll take a lot of Googling. That's why I'm suggesting to go back to 7 or to Linux -- it's less of a hassle and you get a working system out-of-the-box.

Re: changing components, the HDD is the easiest part to change. Usually there is a hard drive bay at the bottom of the laptop that can be accessed once you unscrew a couple of + shaped screws. RAM is harder to change and will require some more unscrewing and some finger twisting. There should be ample videos on Youtube showing how it's all done if you search for your laptop brand & model. Always remember to ground yourself e.g. by touching a heating radiator before touching the inside of a computer, you don't want to fry your components with static electricity. (Actually you don't have to replace anything if you just get an external HDD to backup the contents of your current HDD. Then you can reformat (a partition on) your current HDD if you want to install Linux.)

BTW you mention you have 4 partitions. If you have enough unused space, you can install Windows 7 on one of the partitions that don't have Windows 10 without overwriting anything, although you'll have to install all your programs again. Also, you can install Linux on one of the data partitions, although you'll then lose the contents of that partition. If you do this, you should probably get/borrow an external HDD for backup in case you screw up something while installing the OS.

Re: references, I don't know really. I don't think there's going to be much about RAM amount necessary, this is really user-dependant -- 2GB could be enough for some configurations of hardware & software & behavior expectance on the user's part, but on some, like yours, it's gonna be damn slow. For other topics things like [9] [10] [11] might count as reliable sources; I found them with this search. You can try similar searches if you want, although there seem to be a lot of people inexplicably happy with Win 10 on Wikipedia who could be ready to undo your edits.

As for the account, I don't normally do this. I read Wikipedia a lot and edit as an IP sometimes, and it's just that often I come across questions like yours on the net, and how often they get idiotic responses that bog down to "buy this and that and cope with what it doesn't fix", and this time I was too annoyed to keep browsing :) The username is because I'm uncomfortable having my IP associated with anything more than spelling fixes online. Elephas X. Maximus (talk) 02:11, 4 January 2018 (UTC)

Thanks, Elephas X. Maximus, I will look into those things. By the way, there has been more discussion of this (by FleetCommand and Andy Dingley) at Talk:Criticism of Windows 10 and by Codename Lisa at Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Computing/2017 December 28#Problems with Windows 10. She now thinks the reason is not a lack of RAM. It seems that my computer is atypical for some reason. Eric Kvaalen (talk) 15:37, 7 January 2018 (UTC)

Proxima's orbit

I put the image back. As best we can tell, that is indeed the shape of the orbit of Proxima, as viewed from Earth. You had no reason to remove it. That the foreground stars will be in front of other background stars is irrelevant, they aren't marked as landmarks. Tarl N. (discuss) 22:26, 10 January 2018 (UTC)

I will respond at Talk:Proxima Centauri. Eric Kvaalen (talk) 06:37, 11 January 2018 (UTC)

References

Thank you for contributing to Wikipedia. Remember that when adding content about health, please only use high-quality reliable sources as references. We typically use review articles, major textbooks and position statements of national or international organizations (There are several kinds of sources that discuss health: here is how the community classifies them and uses them). WP:MEDHOW walks you through editing step by step. A list of resources to help edit health content can be found here. The edit box has a built-in citation tool to easily format references based on the PMID or ISBN. We also provide style advice about the structure and content of medicine-related encyclopedia articles. The welcome page is another good place to learn about editing the encyclopedia. If you have any questions, please feel free to drop me a note. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 00:41, 13 January 2018 (UTC)

@Doc James: Speaking of references, what are you referring to? What was my sin? Eric Kvaalen (talk) 06:05, 13 January 2018 (UTC)

Primary source http://stm.sciencemag.org/content/10/422/eaal3175.full rather than review or major textbook Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 15:51, 13 January 2018 (UTC)

@Doc James: It could be years before that research gets into major textbooks or reviews! The researchers found a treatment that gives good results for sufferers of "somatic" tinnitus. Do you not trust the results of this study, published in Science? Eric Kvaalen (talk) 06:30, 14 January 2018 (UTC)

Was not in Science but Science Translational Medicine. It is a single trial of 20 people. So yes would want to see it repeated and would want to see the totality of the evidence discussed in a review. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 17:32, 14 January 2018 (UTC)

@Doc James: Yes, I know it was Science Translational Medicine -- I was just abbreviating. (It's the same outfit isn't it?) The article says

"Eleven participants noted subjective changes in volume, pitch, or quality that resulted in their tinnitus becoming less “harsh” or “piercing” and more “mellow.” Even participants who did not experience a complete elimination of their tinnitus reported anecdotally that their tinnitus was noticeably less obtrusive and easier to ignore."

It's not entirely clear to me whether that means all 20 participants, or all of the eleven. But that's not too important. The point is, it gave significant benefit to the majority of the subjects. Do you think this was just due to chance? Remember, there was a sham treatment as control, so it's not just psychological.

Eric Kvaalen (talk) 06:47, 15 January 2018 (UTC)

Windscale core

Pleaae see table 1 on page 6, this has the activity in the different parts of the core, fuel, graphite, isotope cartidges and total

https://web.archive.org/web/20071019073030/http://www.irpa.net/irpa10/cdrom/00322.pdf

Cadmium (talk) 15:14, 11 February 2018 (UTC)

Inex

You asked about the origin of the name "Inex". Probably it should be discussed on its Talk page; but anyhow, as I recall I got that explanation from the books of van den Bergh who coined the term. In any case it inspired him to order eclipses on a 2D grid with saros and inex as axes: maybe from that you can see how saros series relate through an inex. The books are rather obscure but Leiden University had them in the library in the 1980's when I studied there. Tom Peters (talk) 16:13, 27 February 2018 (UTC)

Thanks Tom. I recently modified the Inex article and explain'd how the saros series relate to the inex.

If ever you find yourself in Leiden, take a look and write me again!

Eric Kvaalen (talk) 18:51, 27 February 2018 (UTC)

Orbital inclination

Hello! I tightened up your contribution here, then decided it didn't fit where you put it. The rest of Section 1 (except for the discussion, just before yours, with the table of planetary inclinations) is on terminology rather than real-world implications. So I put those two bits in a new section following the terminology discussion. Spike-from-NH (talk) 03:10, 2 March 2018 (UTC)

@Spike-from-NH: I put back the words "than that distance", but I accidentally removed two commas and an "n"! Sorry. (What happened was that I took my version and moved the blocks of text till when I would do "Show changes" it looked like yours, in order to see what exactly you had changed. I didn't see the two commas and the "n" when doing "Show changes", so I left those places as they were in my version,) Eric Kvaalen (talk) 06:32, 3 March 2018 (UTC)

Yup, I figured; there was no good way to see I had not just moved your paragraph but tweaked it. I deleted "than that distance" during my Tightening, as it occurs just beyond the definition of "that distance," but your revert is fine. Spike-from-NH (talk) 14:13, 3 March 2018 (UTC)

Superconductivity

I reverted your changes; please discuss them. Which reference are you citing for 93K? The original discovery in 1987 had wide error margins. Tarl N. (discuss) 15:20, 9 March 2018 (UTC)

Tarl_N., I specific'ly went to that article because I redd something in New Scientist that gave −173°C as the temperature for "cuprate superconductors", which is 100 K, and I didn't remember seeing such a round number for cuprate suuperconductors before. I looked at the YBCO article and at the High-temperature superconductivity article, and I saw the paper giving the range 80 to 93 K. Then I looked at the Superconductivity article, and I found that someone way back in 2003 had put in the figure of 92 K, with no reference. Later someone put in a reference to the original paper, which in its title says 93 K (though it gives the range in the abstract). The Wikipedia article has a graph made by a woman in Denmark for her Master's degree thesis, which shows YBCO at over 100 K. It uses various colors and symbols for different kinds of superconductors. So I edited the article to include an explanation of the colors, and to correct the figure of 92 K to 93 K. And I wrote in parenthesis in the caption that her point for YBCO is higher than what's in the text. I think that's better than deleting the whole graph! And I don't see what's wrong with putting 93 K when that's what the original paper says in its title. Why should we (or you) put it back to 92 when there's no support for that and we know that the range goes higher than that? Eric Kvaalen (talk) 13:40, 10 March 2018 (UTC)

O.k. - points:

• • The 1987 paper says "from 80 to 93 K". The issue is that each batch made at the time had different transition temperatures, and they couldn't come up with a single number, they cited a range of what they had seen. That does not say they saw 93 K, they saw a range between 80 and 93. That does not mean they saw 93 K, and indeed, if my recollection serves (it has been 30 years since I read that paper), they saw 92.something.
  • We know now that the reason for the variation is that the transition temperature varies very sharply with the oxygen content, and with the methods they were using at the time, it was hard to control for that.
  • Specifying a single critical temperature for YBCO is incorrect; the temperature will vary considerably between O(6.5) and O(7). I don't know if they have explored values higher than 7, they are hard to reach. In any case, for that material it's probably best to say "up to" a value.
  • The graph in question was derived from an earlier graph by the same author, here. It looks like the author simply mispositioned that point - it's a low resolution graph, intended to show relationships not precise values. Perhaps you should ask.
  • I would prefer you not add confusion to captions. That simply makes the article harder to read, and presumably nobody is extracting precise values from low resolution graphs.

Regards, Tarl N. (discuss) 17:20, 10 March 2018 (UTC)

I don't think the original graph was by Pia. It dates back to 2011 and she only did her Master's in 2015. She says hers is "based on the Wikimedia Commons figure "Sc history.gif" at https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Sc_history.gif where the timeline stopped at 2010 and did not contain more than one iron-based compound." So she made her own improved version for her thesis.

So what do we do? Leave the article as it is with an arbitrary number of 92 and no explanation for the different colors and symbols in the graph?

Eric Kvaalen (talk) 17:48, 10 March 2018 (UTC)

Yup. Unless you have WP:RS to justify removing things, I'm simply not going to allow you to make changes you don't understand. Tarl N. (discuss) 18:02, 10 March 2018 (UTC)

References

Thank you for contributing to Wikipedia. Remember that when adding content about health, please only use high-quality reliable sources as references. We typically use review articles, major textbooks and position statements of national or international organizations (There are several kinds of sources that discuss health: here is how the community classifies them and uses them). WP:MEDHOW walks you through editing step by step. A list of resources to help edit health content can be found here. The edit box has a built-in citation tool to easily format references based on the PMID or ISBN. We also provide style advice about the structure and content of medicine-related encyclopedia articles. The welcome page is another good place to learn about editing the encyclopedia. If you have any questions, please feel free to drop me a note. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 17:30, 15 March 2018 (UTC)

You're repeating yourself. We already had this argument. Eric Kvaalen (talk) 18:49, 16 March 2018 (UTC)

April 2018

You currently appear to be engaged in an edit war according to the reverts you have made on Mary in Islam. Users are expected to collaborate with others, to avoid editing disruptively, and to try to reach a consensus rather than repeatedly undoing other users' edits once it is known that there is a disagreement.

Please be particularly aware that Wikipedia's policy on edit warring states:

1. Edit warring is disruptive regardless of how many reverts you have made.
2. Do not edit war even if you believe you are right.

If you find yourself in an editing dispute, use the article's talk page to discuss controversial changes; work towards a version that represents consensus among editors. You can post a request for help at an appropriate noticeboard or seek dispute resolution. In some cases it may be appropriate to request temporary page protection. If you engage in an edit war, you may be blocked from editing. Chris Troutman (talk) 14:22, 3 April 2018 (UTC)

@Chris Troutman: You and the other guy just revert edits without any discussion. I said I was going to discuss on the talk page, and he didn't even give me a chance. Eric Kvaalen (talk) 14:33, 3 April 2018 (UTC)

First, your ping didn't work. Second, it is not for you to insist on "your version." Status quo ante remains until there's consensus to change, per WP:BRD. You have already violated WP:EW; the next instance will result in me reporting you to WP:ANEW. You should know better than to behave like this. Chris Troutman (talk) 14:35, 3 April 2018 (UTC)

I might understand you better if you wouldn't use all those acronyms. Eric Kvaalen (talk) 14:44, 3 April 2018 (UTC)

You've been an editor since 2004. I assume you've actually read our policies, guidelines, and essays. Further, each of those "acronyms" is a blue-link, so you can click on them and read what they say. Since you need a remedial Wikipedia lesson, here's a translation of what I said before: when an editor boldly makes a change, another Wikipedian can revert them and then a discussion is to take place to determine consensus. We can't abide endless changes back and forth. In fact, Wikipedia disallows more than three reverts in the space of 24 hours, which is what you've done. I therefore have grounds to ask that you be blocked to prevent further disruption. Competence is required to edit Wikipedia. Chris Troutman (talk) 15:20, 3 April 2018 (UTC)

No, I did not revert three times. You and the other guy did though, without allowing time for discussion. You set up watches on articles in order to prevent anyone making changes you don't like, and you revert them within minutes. Eric Kvaalen (talk) 07:19, 4 April 2018 (UTC)

You added, re-added, and one more time, all within 24 hours. I can see that you actually know a lot less about Wikipedia than I assumed. Yes, I have that page on my watchlist. I have almost 10,000 pages on my watchlist. I actively revert edits. You need to learn how to edit before attempting to do so. Chris Troutman (talk) 15:58, 4 April 2018 (UTC)

Wow, what I said was even truer than what I thought. It looks like you now have a watch set on this page too. So as long as we're chatting, and in connexion with Maryam, what do you think of Matthew 1:25? Eric Kvaalen (talk) 07:10, 5 April 2018 (UTC)

Parable of the Mustard Seed

{{ping}} me if you'd like back-up an independent opinion on this ongoing nonsense. Narky Blert (talk) 00:40, 6 May 2018 (UTC)

Napierian logarithm

Eric, in this version, you added some details with many-place numerical values. I'm wondering if there's a source for those numbers, or for this approach more generally. I just changed another number, and added a source, but on further analysis have decided that the old number was closer to correct. I'm thinking of trying a rewrite to make this all more clear, explaining the magic numbers better, but would be happier if I had a good source to follow. Things like this book are simpler, but not precisely right. Can we make it look simpler and also precise? Maybe... Dicklyon (talk) 23:37, 7 May 2018 (UTC)

Dick, it's very vague in my memory, since it was 10 years ago. I don't think I had any source for it. I probably just calculated it myself. As the article says,

$\mathrm {NapLog} (x)=\log _{\frac {10^{7}}{10^{7}-1}}10^{7}-\log _{\frac {10^{7}}{10^{7}-1}}x.$

That means that

$\mathrm {NapLog} (x)={\frac {\log 10^{7}-\log x}{\log {\frac {10^{7}}{10^{7}-1}}}}$

where we can use either the natural logarithm or the common logarithm. Using the common logarithm, we can rewrite it as

$\mathrm {NapLog} (x)={\frac {\ln 10}{\ln {\frac {10^{7}}{10^{7}-1}}}}[\log _{10}10^{7}-\log _{10}x],$

so the constant in question is:

${\frac {\ln 10}{\ln {\frac {10^{7}}{10^{7}-1}}}}\approx 23025849.8$

And if we take the natural logarithm route we get the other formula, with:

${\frac {1}{\ln {\frac {10^{7}}{10^{7}-1}}}}\approx 9999999.5$

Eric Kvaalen (talk) 12:13, 8 May 2018 (UTC)

OK, thanks. Based on reading the source I added recently, I think this entire development is actually wrong. Just wanted to see if there was any source for it. Dicklyon (talk) 13:54, 8 May 2018 (UTC)

I see that you have written about this on Talk:Napierian logarithm, so I will continue there. Eric Kvaalen (talk)

Cable stays

Strictly, and originally, "stays" (on bridges) were rigid, and supported bending forces (although they were never strong for this). The cable-stayed bridge design originated when it was realised that a useful bridge could also be made with flexible stays, i.e. cables. Although the first examples used bar chains, as wire rope wasn't yet available. So it's reasonable to link "stay" as a historical or etymological source for the name, but not as their current function. Andy Dingley (talk) 13:15, 17 August 2018 (UTC)

Hello Andy Dingley. Are you referring to the my edit of Ponte Morandi or my edit of Cable-stayed bridge? I'm not sure I understand what you think a stay is. There are two meanings, listed under wikt:stay#Etymology 2 and wikt:stay#Etymology 3. #2 is a support, like a rigid bar. But #3 originally meant ropes used on ships. That is what I linked to in Cable-stayed bridge. They are certainly flexible. Eric Kvaalen (talk) 13:39, 17 August 2018 (UTC)

Cable-stayed bridge. But Wiktionary (or any dictionary) is never a good source for a technical term. It's certainly a mistake (and a fairly big one) to confuse stays in the nautical sense with stays in the pre-cable-stayed bridge era. Andy Dingley (talk) 13:59, 17 August 2018 (UTC)

@Andy Dingley: I don't understand. Are you saying that the term "cable-stayed bridge" was definitely used at a time when such bridges used rigid props instead of bars under tension? If it was bars or chains pulling up on the deck of the bridge, then in my opinion they were called "stays" because of their similarity to stays on a ship, not to things like clothing stays! Eric Kvaalen (talk) 14:41, 17 August 2018 (UTC)

PSR J0337+1715

I made a change to:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PSR_J0337%2B1715

Now I am having second thoughts about what I wrote. Maybe I should not have changed anything. Can you take a look at what I changed/wrote and determine if what I wrote is correct? Thanks.Betathetapi545 (talk) 10:03, 9 September 2018 (UTC)

@Betathetapi545: Looks fine to me. Eric Kvaalen (talk) 15:48, 9 September 2018 (UTC)

Critical T, P

Hi, I'm serious. Could you plaese reply at Template_talk:Chembox#Critical_point? -DePiep (talk) 23:10, 11 December 2018 (UTC)

@DePiep: Sorry, I've been very busy the last couple of days. Eric Kvaalen (talk) 10:41, 13 December 2018 (UTC)

No problem, all fine. I'll wait some more days before adding it live, in case someone has extra thoughts. -DePiep (talk) 10:43, 13 December 2018 (UTC)

• It's availble! It's live! See ammonia, ethanol. (so: the template handles it -- be sure to get the input right ;-) ). -DePiep (talk) 22:37, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

Hi Erik. So we've done this for compounds. Do you think Critical point (thermodynamics) is relevant for chemical elements too? We could put it in their infoboxes. Please go to WT:ELEMENTS to propose this. -DePiep (talk) 23:51, 16 December 2018 (UTC)

@DePiep: Yeah, of course. Will do. By the way, in that stuff that Zackmann gave a link to (below), they all scrupulously refer to you as "they" rather than "he" or "he or she". You are male, aren't you? Eric Kvaalen (talk) 08:43, 17 December 2018 (UTC)

Context

Regarding this comment, here is a little context for you. --Zackmann (^{Talk to me}/_{What I been doing}) 01:35, 16 December 2018 (UTC)

Read this. -DePiep (talk) 23:46, 16 December 2018 (UTC)

Authorship of the Pauline Epistles

I am no longer an active editor. While I appreciate the request, I have no desire to fulfill it. The sentance in question appears to be sourced to Donald Guthrie's textbook, which I do not own (I believe I had it from a university library way back when). Feel free to dig up the original source to see if it adds the needed context you desire. So I googled for a few minutes and found this " He seems, however, in 6, to refer to another work on the Pauline Epistles,--a work of which we have no trace anywhere else, though we learn from Jerome's preface to his Commentary on Titus that Tatian rejected some of Paul's epistles, as Marcion did, but unlike Marcion accepted the epistle to Titus." from https://biblehub.com/library/pamphilius/church_history/chapter_xxix_the_heresy_of_tatian.htm Jerome's Commentaries were published in English in 2010, but I don't have access to them. I also cannot find a free version of the Latin online either. So maybe your google-fu is better than mine, or you have access to a library and can get some of these sources. I found a brief summary of the commentary that says "The Preface speaks of the rejection of the Epistle by Marcion and Basilides, its acceptance by Tatius, but without assigning reasons." so this may just be a dead end. I'm curious now, what is your concern? You just want more context, or you believe we have inaccurate information in the article? -Andrew c ^[talk] 11:54, 30 September 2019 (UTC)