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Archives: Archive 1 (August 29, 2004-March 3, 2005) - Archive 2 (March 11, 2005-March 28, 2005) - Archive 3 (March 28, 2005-April 17, 2005) - Archive 4 (March 20, 2005-June 6, 2005) - Archive 5 (June 6, 2005-July 4, 2005) - Archive 6 (July 4, 2005-July 26, 2005) - Archive 7 (July 30, 2005-September 26, 2005) - Archive 8 (September 27, 2005-October 13, 2005) - Archive 9 (October 14, 2005-November 18, 2005) - Archive 10 (November 18, 2005-February 12, 2006) - Archive 11 (February 12, 2006-February 17, 2006) - Archive 12 (February 18, 2006-February 26, 2006) - Archive 13 (February 26, 2006-May 13, 2006) - Archive 14 (May 13, 2006-July 31, 2006 ) - Archive 15 (July 31, 2006-September 20, 2006) - Archive 16 (September 20, 2006-October 30, 2006)- Archive 17 (October 30, 2006-January 13, 2007) - Archive 18 (January 13, 2007 - May 21, 2010) - Archive 19 (May 2010 - May 2012) - Archive 20 (December 2009 - present) Current
I'd like to explore your argument that BC/AD is POV here in user space where there's not as much noise. I disagree with your claim, but I'm interested in a rational debate about it, and maybe you can convince me (or I can convince you). At the very least, we can come up with things for you and/or me to muse over. Let me know if you're not interested in discussing this here, but if you are, feel free to respond either here or on my talk page, whichever suits you best.
You continue to state unequivocally that BC/AD asserts the deity of Jesus, yet faced with the parallel problem in Thursday, you say that Thursday is not a problem because few, if any, people worship Thor. It seems to me that you're effectively suggesting that BC/AD would be sufficiently NPOV if very few people believed in Jesus. Is that a reasonable conclusion to draw from your argument? Alanyst 06:34, 3 Jun 2005 (UTC)
Thanks for the reply. I think the dilution argument is precisely where I'm coming from. I don't think anyone seriously argues that "Before Christ" and "Anno Domini" express no POV, but since the initialisms "BC" and "AD" have been used so extensively in so many contexts without reference to their expansions, they no longer mean what they originally stood for. In essence, they have become new words: "beesee" and "ehdee". Their modern meaning is nothing more than "before the start of the current era" and "after the start of the current era"—not what the letters stand for, to be sure, but what they now mean.
It is difficult to provide evidence for (or against!) my argument that the meaning of BC/AD has changed enough to dilute the original POV such that BC/AD is acceptable for Wikipedia's NPOV policy. I guess I would cite as evidence the fact that BC/AD is so widely used that, statistically speaking, among those who comfortably use the term are probably millions of people who do not espouse a Christian POV. So your conclusion as a child that "non-Christians can't use that term" was naïve (no offense intended) because you did not recognize that the original meaning, which you had just learned, could be diluted by time and by the diversity of those who use it—in other words, you thought the original meaning was necessarily the current meaning, which is a very forgivable yet mistaken conclusion for a ten-year-old to draw. Since many non-Christians comfortably use the term in an identical manner to how Christians use the term, one cannot tell whether a particular usage of BC/AD is, by itself, expressing a Christian POV or not; the context in which it is used must be known to gauge whether it lends to a POV or not. (On the other hand, if I saw someone write "500 years before Christ" or "Anno Domini 300" then I could more readily conclude that a Christian POV is being expressed, since non-Christians are much less likely to express dates in this manner, and the trouble taken to go beyond the common abbreviations is indicative that the author is trying to make a rhetorical point beyond the mere expression of the date.) So, writing "500 BC" in Wikipedia cannot reasonably convey an endorsement of the Christian POV by itself or in an otherwise neutral context. But in contexts where use of BC/AD would be unusual, its appearance would in fact be indicative of POV. Does this make sense, or do you see problems with this argument? Alanyst 15:44, 3 Jun 2005 (UTC)
You said: As I see it, POV or NPOV is not a function of the intention of the writer, but in the possible interpretations of the readers...What the writer meant to say is irrelevant. What the writer said is all that matters...Majoritarian POV (like BC/AD) would only work if we circumscribe our audience.
I'm somewhat persuaded by this reasoning, although I'm not entirely satisfied. Let's suppose for the sake of argument that the author's intentions don't matter; only the readers' interpretations are of concern. Under that assumption, consider the problem of "Thursday". (I don't mean to keep harping on this example but I haven't really been satisfied with past attempts at refuting it.) Almost nobody considers that "Thursday" is POV—but, if the Thursday article is to be believed, some Quakers do in fact eschew the term because they feel it communicates a pagan POV. Let's compare the possible interpretations of BC/AD and Thursday:
Now, under what principle do we allow "Thursday" in Wikipedia, despite knowing that a Quaker might find an unacceptable POV in that term, but ban "BC" and "AD" from Wikipedia because some people find an unacceptable POV in those terms? In other words, what are the criteria for establishing that a particular term carries an unacceptable POV? Because the mere fact that someone can find an offensive POV in a particular term doesn't seem to be sufficient. Does it matter how many people may or may not subscribe to a particular interpretation? Alanyst 15:43, 6 Jun 2005 (UTC)
For information about participants in SEPP, you might try asking SEPP. There is an infrequently updated list of participants. The Virginia State Corporation Commission Clerk lists several officers/directors:
CORPORATE ID: 0400828 CURRENT AR# 204-69-1330 DATE 09/24/04 CORP NAME: SCIENCE & ENVIRONMENTAL POLICY PROJECT, THE STREET: 1600 S EADS ST STE 712 S CITY: ARLINTON STATE: VA ZIP: 22202 S C DIR REQUIRED: N E A OFFICERS/DIRECTORS DISPLAY FOR AR# 204-69-1330 L T NAME TITLE SIGN B S F SINGER PRESIDENT D MARK BRANDSDORFER DIRECTOR D CHARLES GELMAN DIRECTOR D FREDRICK SEITZ DIRECTOR
(SEWilco 08:11, 9 Jun 2005 (UTC))
I'm sorry to hear about your disillusionment with Wikipedia. I think you are a valuable contributor, I would rather have you around. On the other hand, it isn't important enough in the grand scheme of things that is should cost you that much stress. Wish you all the best, whatever path you take. Guettarda 16:59, 8 Jun 2005 (UTC)
OK, so I'll remove Pitch Lake from this category, but I'll leave the category for future. Really no natural lakes on Trinidad and Tobago? - Darwinek 14:50, 10 Jun 2005 (UTC)
I nominated you for an admin. Just go to accept nomination and answer few questions. I like you, so I wish you good luck! - Darwinek 15:58, 13 Jun 2005 (UTC)
Well, I was mainly talking about edits like this. For your own user space, as well as new articles, I guess it doesn't matter much. For talk pages, it may help some watchlisting people if you were to say 'respond to <foo>' or something like that. But if you're willing to promise that, I'd be happy to support. Yours, Radiant_>|< 12:45, Jun 14, 2005 (UTC)
I don't know Bhojpuri. I've heard it a few times and all I can say is that a few words are different, but not very difficult to understand from Hindi. I'd just created a stub as there was a red link. Regards, =Nichalp (Talk)= 10:31, Jun 17, 2005 (UTC)
Hi Guettarda! Thanks for supporting my adminship nomination! Sjakkalle (Check!) 13:09, 17 Jun 2005 (UTC)
Thank you for supporting me! --Kbdank71 13:20, 17 Jun 2005 (UTC)
Hi, there Guettarda. In regards to the "American Dependencies" Catagory for Anguilla I thought it was honestly a mistake? Did you happen to have something in mind with Anguilla? As far as I knew, it was apart of St. Kitts/Nevis/Anguilla (Now just St. Kitts & Nevis). Then, they had voted to rejoin the UK. Were you accidentally thinking US dependency? but meant UK? Let me know if otherwise. You may know something about Ai. that I have no idea about. CaribDigita 18:45, 17 Jun 2005 (UTC)
About- the "infoboxes" I was refering to, that would be the "Countryboxes". Sorry to run these together in the same section of your talk page. I Just wanted to ask this quickly while I did have an instance of your attention. Thanks on this as well, your answer did answer my question. I'd been updating a few of the country profiles and realised that many (in the Carib'n) had the "Countryboxes" cropped from it's own separate template and pasted 'within the country' profile. I just wanted to ask and make sure I wasn't doing anything 'bad' by firstly: by relaying any new information onto these templates as well, and then secondly: refering the articles back to getting their country info from the "Countryboxes" --with-- an easy "Edit this template" link also included and visable on the Countryboxes. Thanks again, as always you remain an asset to the wikipedia community. CaribDigita 10:17, 25 Jun 2005 (UTC)
Please feel welcome to add to my list at User:ScottDavis/Caribbean. You look much more qualified to look for them than I feel. I interpret you feel it's a useful stub category that's currently missing? --ScottDavis 00:52, 18 Jun 2005 (UTC)
Thankyou for your help. I've created {{Caribbean-stub}} and Category:Caribbean stubs and populated them from the list. --ScottDavis 12:39, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)
I thank you for supporting my nomination. Another two days, and you'll most probably will be an administrator yourself. Good luck ! JoJan 15:08, 18 Jun 2005 (UTC)
You added Snowflakes' nom within JoJan's. I have moved it to the proper place.
Thank you for your support for my adminship. PS, it looks like the entry for "category:Presidents of Trinidad and Tobago" on your user page might be "live". Either that, or we should refer to you as "your excellency." Cheers, -Willmcw 21:38, Jun 20, 2005 (UTC)
Thanks! - I'll let you know later - MPF 23:17, 20 Jun 2005 (UTC)
My pleasure; I just hope that you don't come to resent those who helped push that bloody mop into your hand... Mel Etitis (Μελ Ετητης) 23:41, 20 Jun 2005 (UTC)
Congratulations! Enjoy your new mopping powers and don't let 'em overwork or stress you too much :-) -Vsmith 23:50, 20 Jun 2005 (UTC)
Hey there, Guettarda. I just thought you might want to know that your User page is broken on 800x600 displays. The table containing the flags is overlapping the text and rendering it unreadable. Might I suggest that you adapted the table to the div HTML element, which overall is easier to manage? Or you could simply place it below the image to fix the layout. Also, congrats on the succesful RfA. Best regards. --Sn0wflake 00:28, 21 Jun 2005 (UTC)
No worries - Good luck and happy editing! --Silversmith Hewwo 00:44, 21 Jun 2005 (UTC)
Congratulations! It's my pleasure to let you know that, consensus being reached, you are now an administrator. You should read the relevant policies and other pages linked to from the administrators' reading list before carrying out tasks like deletion, protection, banning users, and editing protected pages such as the Main Page. Most of what you do is easily reversible by other sysops, apart from page history merges and image deletion, so please be especially careful with those. You might find the new administrators' how-to guide helpful. Cheers! -- Cecropia | explains it all ® 04:15, 21 Jun 2005 (UTC)
I appreciate the kind words on my RFA! - Ta bu shi da yu 05:08, 21 Jun 2005 (UTC)
I have changed my vote to support for Democratic Labour Party (Trinidad and Tobago)'s FAC. In-line cites are not necessary to become a FAC, though they would be nice. This article, though, is fine without them now with more refs and more comprehensiveness. Keep up your excellent work! Flcelloguy | A note? | Desk 21:33, 21 Jun 2005 (UTC)
P.S. I can't miss this chance for promo! :) Wikipedia:Mind Benders (which I am the maintainer of) has now opened pre-round one, a creative artistic competition. ALso, round one, which will be a competition consisting of ten or more creative, logical, and rhetorical questions, will open soon! So why not check it out and have some Wikifun! Hope to see you there!
Looks pretty good to me , although I know nothing about snakes - only saw one Tigre and several tree boas (the latter all at Caroni. I've fixed a typo, and make a couple of other minor changes. It would look better if the tables were all the same width, but I don't know if this is possible. Would it be more user-friendly to put English family names as well, where they exist, eg coral snakes, boas?
Hope this helps, jimfbleak 16:48, 22 Jun 2005 (UTC)
The Congressional biography says Wolpe lives in Lansing.
...but how did you know I wanted to make a subpage? --Wack'd About Wiki 18:13, 22 Jun 2005 (UTC)
Go ask Usther your question. My talk board isn't the place to do it, his is. --Wack'd About Wiki 19:53, 22 Jun 2005 (UTC)
Sorry, I didn't know. What I ment by the message above was that I didn't want you to ask your question to Uster on my page. I misunderstood. --Wack'd About Wiki 21:11, 22 Jun 2005 (UTC)
Thanks! --Wack'd About Wiki 21:18, 22 Jun 2005 (UTC)
Yeah, just lazy, I guess. Also I haven't been seriously editing any articles for quite a while now. I'm more of a "contributing editor" than a "managing editor" these days. Graft 05:17, 23 Jun 2005 (UTC)
We're being trolled again. I'm beginning to think that it may be better to simply not respond to the comments on talk, and only address any changes made to the article proper. It is at least apparent that the intent is not to further discussion but to stir up controversy. siafu 23:08, 23 Jun 2005 (UTC)
You may be right, but whether it's intentional or not, it has certainly made me very frustrated in the past. Hopefully we all can better expend our energy elsewhere. siafu 23:19, 23 Jun 2005 (UTC)
Sorry for the delay...i am still very new to editing and communicating on wikipedia. as a result i have only just viewed your two messages to me. Firstly, your are most welcomed. My support for your candidacy seemed appropriate. Secondly, I am Trinidadian. I was born there and moved to NYC when I was about 12. I have never been back since but cherish all my memories even though through a child's eye.
I came to Wikipedia looking for guidance on the usage of the term "West Indies". A friend of mine along with the support of his "learned friend" (an elementary school teacher) conspired to challenge my definition of "West Indies" which to a large degree, I understand to be nations formerly governed by the British Empire. Their understanding was the initial one relating to the Chris Columbus expedition to find the East Indies by venturing westward... of course he came upon the West Indies as we know it today. They were unrelenting in their arguement which was based on the original meaning of the term and I argued that words/terms change meaning over time. I offered the etymology of the word aweful as a paradigm but they discarded my arguement as an emotive retort from a local. So I came to Wikipedia for some consolation. I'm not sure that I found it but I am certain that I found a much more agreeable body for discussion and exchange of knowledge.
I hope this is good for now. I will try to add more to my page once I figure out how to structure it. I have tried to make some additions in the areas of Classics which is my field of study and passion at the moment. Maybe you could give some advice on how best to modify and add information. Thanks.
--rkstaylor 16:44, 24 Jun 2005 (UTC)
Thanks for supporting my RFA nearly a month ago. Unfortunately a sad event occurred at that time in my family, and I have not been able to participate in Wikipedia as much as I would like. I hope to get back to active contribution soon. Congratulations on your own promotion, too! FreplySpang (talk) 01:35, 25 Jun 2005 (UTC)
Thank you very much for your vote of confidence on my RFA. I'll keep trying to make the Wikipedia great! Thanks, Bratschetalk 5 pillars 13:18, Jun 25, 2005 (UTC)
That's a good question. Use the talk page and make a proposal; I'm sure you would get some great feedback. I'm all for it, but at the same time I want to make sure I know what IP addresses MARMOT is using so we can send an abuse letter to NTL. Linuxbeak | Talk | Desk 18:22, Jun 25, 2005 (UTC)
Thank you for protecting the page to avoid this user (66.36.136.123)'s vandalism. We are sorry about violating the 3 revert rule though. -- Mike Garcia | talk 23:53, Jun 25, 2005 (UTC)
No worries on the block. These disputes tend to get very out of control, so I think you did the right thing. When it is discussed and decided upon, feel free to update that infobox, or let me know and I will do it. Thanks again! Cbing01 (talk) 00:06, 26 Jun 2005 (UTC)
I simply have no idea what that one was about, SqueakBox 00:14, Jun 26, 2005 (UTC)
I know nothing about the subject of the article (I did a 10 second google search to aquire those links), but I'd like to see mike garcia not get banned. Ergo, I'd prefer the page stay protected for awhile. ¸,ø¤º°`°º¤ø,¸¸,ø¤º°`°º¤ø,¸¸,ø¤º°`°º¤ø,¸ 01:26, 26 Jun 2005 (UTC)
First of all, splendid pictures all over the user page. The flowers at the top of the talk are absolutely delightful.
Secondly, if you're interested at all in pursuing action against Mike Garcia I'm looking to start coallating evidence for an Arbitration Committee case, as you are at the moment just the latest of his many victims. Get back to me if you're interested. Wally 07:00, 26 Jun 2005 (UTC)
The last line of the Nomination standards block under the About RfA section states "Anonymous users cannot be nominated, nominate others, or vote. They are allowed to comment." Hope this clears any confusion. --Allen3 talk 17:16, Jun 26, 2005 (UTC)
I like your lead. If I may make a few more suggestions: I'd like a "See Also" section with related articles (eg, snake- and T&T-related articles). That way the reader can navigate both more specific (ind. snakes) and more general (see also). Also, some external links would be helpful. It is a good list though! --Dmcdevit 20:14, 26 Jun 2005 (UTC)
It is still a redirect. Maybe you could do the honours. Interesting document. I don't like the sound of them at all. This group have been very active in Trinidad, a[pparently, where their founders wife comes from, trying to convert Rastas to Christianity, SqueakBox 00:55, Jun 27, 2005 (UTC)
looks good - T&T is the only place in the tropics I've ever seen snakes - on the whole they try to avoid us, I think. Seen two of the three UK ones, third is rare and local - maybe I should do snakes of the UK -wouldn't take long! your page looks good now, jimfbleak 05:01, 27 Jun 2005 (UTC)
Thanks. It seems a lot of people have me watchlisted. -- Uncle Ed (talk) June 28, 2005 18:59 (UTC)
Yes. I'm back - although if Wikipedia:Votes for deletion/Nottinghamshire v Yorkshire 26 June 2005 goes the wrong way it will mean the deletion of the whole of our coverage of the 2005 English cricket season and that I won't be staying long. Your "keep" vote on the VfD page would be very much appreciated. Kind regards, jguk 28 June 2005 22:21 (UTC)
If you would like to make the nomination I would accept. It would be nice to revert vandalism with one click :-). I'm not sure what other admin duties I would want to jump into, guess I'd best do my homework. As you know I was a bit involved in the climate wars, mav referred to me as one of the other edit warriers, so some may object. Thanks, -Vsmith 28 June 2005 23:44 (UTC)
Excellent work with getting rid of red links and reformatting - you'll see I've happily changed my vote on WP:FLC to support. My only comment is that you've created the snakes' articles at their Latin names and I'm fairly sure (though I must admit I haven't checked) that standard WP policy is to use common name. But I appreciate that might be a bit of a job, given that most of them seem to have more than one common name. Good work, anyway. OpenToppedBus - My Talk June 29, 2005 08:48 (UTC)
All the existing regional bird lists have the same general format as the T&T one, so I'm reluctant to change the style. It could do with more images, and, as you suggest some references, but my main priority is to actually write up the ones I've seen. jimfbleak 30 June 2005 18:43 (UTC)
I like your idea, count me in. Here are some other Caribbean Wikipedians whom I believe would also be interested. Wrote to them and tell them I sent you. They are: Cjrs 79, Joseph,<<Coburn Pharr>> and User:AntonioMartin, Let's keep in touch. Tony the Marine 1 July 2005 00:45 (UTC)
Once again, thank you and God bless you! Sincerely yours, Antonio El Cheveron del Caribe Martin
Well, I agree with everything you said about some people trying to divide us Caribbeans and Latinos. I think its sad specially since all the things we have in common unite us as brothers. I was impressed one time to learn there are about 50 nations in the Caribbean alone, roughly 25 percent of the world! When you think 100 percent of these countries speak either Spanish, English or French, that should bond us even more. What you are doing here is excellent.
Well, I will say adios now, I hope to hear from ylu soon!
thanks, and God bless you!
Sincerely yours, Antonio Caribbean Fiesta Martin
CaribDigita here, I think that's a neat about Notice Board for Caribbean Wikipedians. I think a lot of 'common' regional good could be brought about by it. I am all for it! Count me in! CaribDigita 2 July 2005 17:55 (UTC)
I'm trying to winnow the geography category, but maybe got carried away. I've added the category back to Landscape ecology. Maurreen 1 July 2005 16:19 (UTC)
I'm somewhat (well, relatively) new to Wikipedia and it seems to me that one of its virtues is that nobody's preference as to the content of an article stands higher than anyone else's. (From a statistical standpoint, I guess it adds to the accuracy of the information.) That said, who arbitrates which style single infobox is "standard"? Would it be the writer of the article, or... just User:Cbing01? I'd be very grateful if you could shed any light on this matter!
This user posted a similar message on my talk page as well. I am not clear what they are asking, or implying (as it seems). If any of this is made more clear to you, would you please pass it along to me? I would be very grateful. Cbing01 4 July 2005 07:16 (UTC)
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