Misplaced Pages

Revision as of 09:30, 28 April 2007

I'm fairly busy in the Real World at the moment. Expect delays here... or not. But it's my excuse anyway...

You are welcome to leave messages here. I will reply here (rather than on, say, your user page). Conversely, if I've left a message on your talk page, I'm watching it, so please reply there.

If your messages are rude, wandering or repetitive I will likely edit them. If you want to leave such a message, put it on your talk page and leave me a note here & I'll go take a look. In general, I prefer to conduct my discussions in public. If you have a question for me, put it here (or on the article talk, or...) rather than via email. If I've blocked you for 3RR this applies particularly strongly: your arguments for unblock, unless for some odd reason particularly sensitive, should be made in public, on your talk page. See-also WMC:3RR.

In the dim and distant past were... /The archives. As of about 2006/06, I don't archive, just remove. Thats cos I realised I never looked in the archives.

Atmospheric circulation pic

Thanks for the pic you added to this article. It's very interesting, and I am intrigued by some of the anomalies it shows. Denni☯ 01:00, 21 October 2005 (UTC)

Hi Denni. Thanks! All part of my very very slow atmospheric dynamics project... more to come... slowly... William M. Connolley 22:09, 24 October 2005 (UTC).

Trend estimation with Auto-Correlated Data

William: This article you started is a great topic! I am just wondering if you have detailed information to add to the section about auto-correlated data. I am facing this problem now, and am trying to get information from papers and textbooks. --Roland 21:46, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

Ah well, IMHO what to do with auto-correlated data is an ongoing research topic. Top tip: divide the ndof by something like (1+ac1) (or is it ac1^2...) if the autocorr isn't too extreme. There is some formula like (1+ac1^2+ac2^2+...) if its strongly auto-correlated... but... its a bit of a mess, I think. Err, thats why I never expanded that bit. The von Zstorch and Zwiers book covers it, somewhat. William M. Connolley 22:54, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

I added a link to autoregressive moving average models JQ 23:17, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

Linda Hall editor

User:204.56.7.1 has been blocked four times in the last month for 3RR (once by you). He is now performing wholsale reversions without comment (see at Radio ) This user as you probably know, has a long history of refusing to collaborate. He ignored my talk page request. Any suggestions? --Blainster 20:33, 29 June 2006 (UTC)

My feeling is that 204. is Reddi. Reddi is limited to 1R per week. Establishing the connection past doubt is difficult; but the edit patterns are very similar. You could post a WP:RFCU. Or you could just list 204. on the 3RR page together with the note of Reddis arbcomm parole and see if that does any good. Or maybe I'll just block it... shall I? Oh go on, yes I will... William M. Connolley 21:37, 29 June 2006 (UTC)

My Reddimeter displays 8.5 on a scale from 0 to 10: Selection of topics. likes patents, likes templates. Only the tireless lamenting on article talk pages is missing. --Pjacobi 21:43, 29 June 2006 (UTC)

User:Reddi apparently back

... with another sockpuppet KarlBunker 19:25, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

Is there no stopping him? I've blocked that one; if he persists, will semi it William M. Connolley 19:28, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

And to think

..I knew you when. Why didn't you mention this?

• KNOW IT ALL - Can Misplaced Pages conquer expertise? KillerChihuahua 16:38, 24 July 2006 (UTC)

Oh dear. I did my best with them :-( William M. Connolley 17:31, 26 July 2006 (UTC)

WP:AN3

• The few times that I've dabbled in WP:ANI/3RR, I've tried to be fair, but I universally get hit with a barrage of malcontents on my talk page and others that send me threatening e-mails. I don't know why you continue to take care of this for us, but thank you for doing so, as I know that I wouldn't be able to last more than a day at it. Many thanks -- Samir धर्म 14:23, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

Thank you :-) William M. Connolley 16:36, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

The Templeton Foundation

The Templeton Foundation used to provide grants for ID conferences and courses. According to The New York Times, Charles L. Harper Jr., senior vice president at the Templeton Foundation, later asked ID proponents to submit proposals for actual research. "They never came in," said Harper, and that while he was skeptical from the beginning, other foundation officials were initially intrigued and later grew disillusioned. "From the point of view of rigor and intellectual seriousness, the intelligent design people don't come out very well in our world of scientific review," he said. The Templeton Foundation has since rejected the Discovery Institute's entreaties for more funding, Harper states. "They're political - that for us is problematic," and that while Discovery has "always claimed to be focused on the science," "what I see is much more focused on public policy, on public persuasion, on educational advocacy and so forth."

I'd think that while individual members/beneficiaries of the Foundation's largess may embrace ID, the the Foundation itself is trying to distance itself from the ID movement, but keeping in mind that the Discovery Institute, the hub of the ID movement, actively tries to cultivate ambiguity around its own motives, actions and members with the aim of portraying ID as more substantial and more widely accepted than it actually is, as the Dover Trial ruling shows (it's worth reading). FeloniousMonk 21:24, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

Thanks. Thats interesting and useful William M. Connolley 21:26, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

Improving the models

I find this to be a fascinating example of the improvement of weather models over time. Do you happen to know of any comparable quantitative metrics by which climate models can be seen to have improved over time? Dragons flight 07:06, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

Nice pic. The one I'm more used to seeing is the length-of-useful-forecast graph, which shows similar improvement. However... no I don't know comparable pics from climate models. The obvious problem would be that you can't do it year-on-year, climate models being far less frequent: the hadley center has arguably only had 3 model incarnations. They do have a "model index" which finds that hadgem1 is better than hadcm3, but I don't know if that was ever applied back to hadcm2, much less to other centres William M. Connolley 13:28, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

when you say 3 models, does that include or exclude improvements in spatial resolution as computing power has improved? Dragons flight 16:48, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

I meant hadcm2, hadcm3 and hadgem1. There are others, but it could get complex. Do you want to include atmos-only models? Those are the "official" releases, sort of. There are various experiments with different spatial res, but its not clear if those were meant to be improvements... William M. Connolley 17:27, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

Well at the moment I am just sort of curious about what is being labeled a "model". I could see the term being used to refer to either a set of coupled differential equations (which might then be implemented on a variety of different grid sizes), or to a specific implementation on a specific grid size. Do you ever take your differential systems, and leaving them as is, try to increase the number of grid elements through the use of more powerful computers? Dragons flight 17:40, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

Yes and no. "GCM" means the full set of code, on the whole. Ie, big set of PDEs and params on top. But also, in general, it means a specific config and setup. "hadcm3" means a given code version, plus given ancils (e.g. land sea mask), plus a given resolution. You *can* run it at, say, higher rez; but there is no guarantee that its better. But yes, I know there were various projects with higher rez versions... the problem is that because of the about grid^3-4 dependency, you can't run much higher rez, if the model is anywhere close to state-of-the-art William M. Connolley 22:52, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

I know I've given you one before, but...

		The Working Man's Barnstar
		For doing a task that makes me grind my teeth just thinking about it, this star is for you! Syrthiss 22:55, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

Ah well, thanks even more :-) William M. Connolley 09:23, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

)

Just for amusement

AfDing articles on people can be quite interesting. This one for example: Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion/Jules Siegel has written far more in the AfD debate than he ever did in the article he wrote about himself... He may well be notable but... --BozMo talk 20:20, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

Hmm well. I don't think I'll vote William M. Connolley 20:57, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

No. But smile perhaps. He probably deserves to stay but the indignation is disproportionate to the point of entertaining--BozMo talk 21:28, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

I learnt my lesson at William Connolley a long time ago and now stay away William M. Connolley 21:42, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

Hmm, yes. BTW I have some nice (low res) pics of the family of baby stoats which live in my garden which I might send you for your blog. They are very playful. --BozMo talk 21:50, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

Delightful! I'm very jealous. Do send the pic. In return, I could start a stub about an ex-oilman turned charity exec. Err, or I could *not* start it in exchange... William M. Connolley 21:54, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

Not. Okay, I will find some pics/small vid clips) on the other PC and email them, probably tomorrow. As for the threat... I have enough scientific publications to pass WP:BIO and not enough appetite for it to knit a baby gnat's sock "like I want a wart in the middle of my forehead" I think is the expression. We also boast some baby owls, bats in our attic, three varieties of deer, hares, rabbit and badgers in the garden but no pics yet. Glorious Suffolk. --BozMo talk 22:17, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

okay try http://catesfamily.org.uk/stoats.jpg and then in a couple of minutes stoatsclip.mov from the same place. First is 2M second is 6M. --BozMo talk 23:00, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

Cute or what! I'm now insanely jealous. When I blog them, do you want (or unwant) attribution and/or copyright? William M. Connolley 23:07, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

Any copyleft with attribution to my homepage would be kind (but I wouldn't insist). I notice Stoat has no picture and will put a cut jpg up there. I think the way that they bounce around in the movie is quite informative and if you can find a way to get that into Misplaced Pages format you are welcome to aswell. I don't have the tools. --BozMo talk 09:42, 30 January 2007 (UTC)

stoats again

Aha! The userbox on your userpage has the deleted stoat image in it. You could update the box with the new one. I'd do it if I could work out where these silly boxes live. --BozMo talk 14:38, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

Just when I was going to upload that stuff, I find you've done it! Still I've put it into my userbox now. Thanks again William M. Connolley 21:54, 26 February 2007 (UTC)

Congrats!

		The Defender of the Wiki Barnstar
		for boldly speaking the truth... sbandrews 23:21, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Oh thank you. Now I can hit people with it :-) William M. Connolley 23:32, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Photo of pulpit in Stephansdom in Vienna

I want to express my appreciation for the photo you uploaded; its shadow and contrast really bring out the relief and allow the user to see it well. I wish all the photos uploaded were as carefully composed. --StanZegel (talk) 20:02, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

Thank you, thats very kind to stop by so politely. I did take care over the photo - I have very fond memories of that pulpit from a cycle trip in 1986 William M. Connolley 20:10, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

Energy portal & future selected articles

GW is our best article. The ones that are more directly relevant to energy are not so good, though some are quite passable - and those are the ones I tend to be less interested in. The ones about future energy use should be most relevant - the SRES scenarios, for example. But that one is a bit thin. We had an "exciting" edit war about peak oil which would potentially be interesting but sadly that didn't lead to improvements in the article, the war being a bit premature William M. Connolley 12:12, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for your comments! I'm thinking that it would be good to have Global Warming to coincide with Live Earth in July. Peak oil deserves to be there too at some point. Gralo 23:18, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

Reverts or other edits

I do not mind marking my edits as reverts, when that is what I am doing, but if I am not simply reverting but making my own point, I may not do it. I may also simply forget sometimes. I am not doing it to annoy you, but I will not mark rv every time you believe that I ought to. It's just not gonna happen. Not a matter of being rude or unpleasant, but I have been on wikipedia a while and I mark every edit using my best judgment on how to do so.--Blue Tie 16:33, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

You should mark as rv anything that counts towards 3RR - that includes partial reverts William M. Connolley 18:04, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

Is that a policy on wikipedia that you can cite or is it your personal rule? --Blue Tie 18:31, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

Please stop trolling William M. Connolley 18:46, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

Global Warming

Might be time to protect the page for 24 hours. The changes/reverts are running pretty fast and non of it is adding value to the article... --BozMo talk 22:05, 25 March 2007 (UTC)--BozMo talk 22:05, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

I can't protect it myself William M. Connolley 08:26, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

Not quite sure why. For any reason which would prevent me from doing it next time? --BozMo talk 09:32, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

I'm too heavily involved. You're not, I'd say. Tell you what - unprotect it and then you can block Uber and Blue Tie for 3RR :-) William M. Connolley 10:18, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

UBeR only did three on my count: the edit correcting my error wasn't a revert (and I apologised on his talk page). I also wouldn't block UBeR on principle this time since he once reverted once me in the period and another admin should do it. Blue Tie I agree was 5RR, and none of the reverts were to me but as you say the article is now protected. --BozMo talk 10:51, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

Count again: , , , William M. Connolley 10:55, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

Okay agree. Anyway lets see how a newbie Admin on his third day since election runs the consensus discussion... --BozMo talk 10:59, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

Best of luck :-) Does having more people to take on the trolls help? To get rid of trolls you need (a) people prepared to ignore them and (b) people prepared to rm their comments when irrelevant William M. Connolley 11:19, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

One must also consider the possibility that their own certainty about a topic may numb them to the need to move away from 'objectivity' and into the realm of 'neutrality'. If there is a dispute at Misplaced Pages about whether something "is a fact", shouldn't the article refrain from endorsing any side in that dispute?

Is it trollish or vandalistic to suggest that an article refrain from drawing conclusions about conflicting views; permit all significant published points of view are to be presented, not just the most popular one; refrain studiously from stating which is better; and to leave reader to form their own opinions?

Anyway, the framers of NPOV didn't think so. --Uncle Ed 13:25, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

I think the issue is one of undue weight. There are people who disagree with all sorts of theories (evolution for example has far more opponents amongst scientists than global warming does). The article should represent the overall size and importance of differing groups. Personally I doubt that things are as cut and dried as the current scientific consensus makes out (because narrow scientific judgement is always myopic; as per Y2K) but I edit Misplaced Pages to reflect the consensus not my own personal views. --BozMo talk 14:01, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

I agree with Bozmo (except I don't think the current assessment says things *are* C+D). Ed, you're in danger of trolling here yourself. The talk page of GW is drowning in words; the last thing we need is more philosophical wurbling. It is trolling to go round the same loops again and again. We could also do with fewer black helicopters William M. Connolley 14:11, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

Apologies for a tangent, but... BozMo, OOC, what is this scientific consensus on Y2K which you mention? I think I saw you mention it one other time and I'm not sure to what you are referring. --Nethgirb 10:13, 28 March 2007 (UTC)

I woz wondering too. I'd blame anything there on the computer folk William M. Connolley 10:29, 28 March 2007 (UTC)

The analogy is not perfect but exists. See Year 2000 problem depending what you remember: in 1998/1999 every relevant expert told everyone disaster was imminent, salaries for IT specialists and the cost of IT systems went through the roof, people were claiming the cost of Y2K was more than that of World War 2. NO ONE said "don't worry". Then the moment arrived and nothing went wrong. One guy in leeds had a credit card refused because the computer thought it was 99 years old. No mid-air aircraft crashes, no auto-launches of Russian missiles, none of the disaster. Was it just that the whole planet was so systematic and careful that every tiny glitch was sorted or was it a huge con? With hindsight I am sure it was mainly a "con" of some sort (cock-up not conspiracy) and it shows that a huge community of specialists can con the wider population. Was it the same kind of consensus: no. Are there other differences: yes its only an analogy. Does it mean that the broad scientific community should take salt with the next scare: yes. --BozMo talk 10:30, 28 March 2007 (UTC)

BozMo, I think that is rather selective memory and press hyping again. In 1998/99 I already was a relevant expert at least to some degree, and my opinion has always been that things can break, but that it is unclear how many things will break. Of course, most at risk were large old legacy systems, and much of the Y2K work that was done was on exactly these systems. Fixes included such seemingly trivial things as rules about how to interprete two-digit years in various fields (i.e. a system will be broken if 2 digit years are always implicitely prefixed with "19", but the same system with the same behaviour will be fine for its likely lifetime if years<=30 are interpreted as years after 2000).--Stephan Schulz 13:12, 28 March 2007 (UTC)

Well, however you look at it, it wasn't a *scientific* misjudgement William M. Connolley 13:28, 28 March 2007 (UTC)

There aren't such clear edges to what is and isn't science. I am not, I repeat, saying this is the same scenario: but there is a lot of trust involved between experts and the rest of us. --BozMo talk 13:43, 28 March 2007 (UTC)

Post hoc? I was sure of the gender of all my children post hoc. I said it was an analogy not a repetition. But for context, young Stephan, in 1998/1999 I was the CEO of a fuels business with $1bn of turnover (3% of the world's acid rain) across 60 countries and recipient of countless audits/customer queries/shareholder enquiries/consultant presentations about the impending doom triggered by every media article... not to mention writing legal letters of reassurance left, right and centre and getting "red traffic lighted" by spotty teenagers who claimed to be experts (not you since I think you were already 30 by then Stephan :) ). There was not even a doubter of the stature of Monckton to be seen writing in the right wing papers. Perhaps the communication between technical and management was imperfect but I can assure you that the level of consensus even when based on very flaky science meant you had to have some character not to hand the vault keys to the IT department. I have managed through about 20 deaths, >$100m liabilities (and been unsuccessfully sued for more than this) but that one was a nasty experience I remember well...No doubt in some ivory towers the concern was less. Where were the deniers then when we needed them? Easy these days when we won't know for a decade.. --BozMo talk 13:40, 28 March 2007 (UTC)

BozMo, no doubt you had warnings of doom from the media, lawyers, customers, shareholders, consultants, and spotty teenagers who claimed to be experts. But none of those people are scientists. The media, lawyers, consultants, and spotty teenagers all had something to gain, financially, from increased hype. And the customers and shareholders probably had a biased assessment of the risk due to media hype.

"Where were the deniers then when we needed them?" Probably sitting at home, chuckling at the people stocking up on water and canned goods in preparation for Y2K. I think that in general, you need to seek these people out; it's not their job to find you. My opinion at the time was that there were likely bugs that had to be fixed, but all the hype was unwarranted—when aren't there bugs that have to be fixed? Most companies audited their code, fixed the bugs, and had no problem—a straightforward process. I was not an expert at the time but I suspect you would have found a similar opinion had you talked to disinterested experts like CS professors (rather than "the right wing papers" -- no offense, but are you suggesting every bit of hype is due to liberals? :-) ). --Nethgirb 20:45, 28 March 2007 (UTC)

Not that simple: most code was unauditable, poorly commented and got replaced. My ring-wing comment was a dig at Monckton/torygraph who can attack GW now because they are fairly safe of consequence. I repeat "scientist" is not a clear cut thing (see for my thoughts on this). Plenty of the IT people called themselves computer scientists. In the UK there used to be a distinction with tenured academics who were reasonably independently minded but even that is going. And did I talk to CS professors? Sure, I was living in Cambridge back then. They were all delighted by the new found prominence of their expertise and as hypey as anyone else. There is an element of interest in most climatology experts in GW being "bad": personally I don't doubt their integrity but it is an interest nonetheless. --BozMo talk 13:30, 29 March 2007 (UTC)

You have a point; I shouldn't have suggested that professors would be entirely disinterested. If you say they predicted disaster, then I am surprised; if they said that it was a real problem that had to be fixed or else there could be major problems, then that makes sense. --Nethgirb 19:02, 29 March 2007 (UTC)

And you are also right to underline it isn't identical to GW, only an analogy. For Y2K most academics only said there was a risk (that's enough to cause a big headache). Small risk of big downside is a serious problem for companies with deep pockets. --BozMo talk 19:06, 29 March 2007 (UTC)

There is an element of interest in most climatology experts in GW being "bad": personally I don't doubt their integrity but it is an interest nonetheless - FWIW, I somewhat agree. You'll notice that I have edited on wiki to tone down excess enthusiasm of the "consequences" sort. Whenever I give public talks I emphasise that the "consequences" bit is the weakest part of the consensus. At the moment the public debate (as exemplified by our recent edit war) is - fruitlessly - stuck on are-we-doing-it, which is effectively settled (we are). Far more interesting, potentially, is what-will-happen. You could argue that WWH is more the preserve of bios and econs than climate scientists; perhaps the CS are benefitting from the septics desperately keeping the battle on our territory. *Thats* why the AR4 spm was released on a friday :-) William M. Connolley 13:38, 29 March 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, I cringe at the "we're all gonna die" stuff, as do my colleagues. I suspect that it helps to sell newspapers, though, which is why so many in the public think that it's part of the scientific consensus. Raymond Arritt 19:16, 29 March 2007 (UTC)

I respect that. Also on a lighter note as a former mathematician I cannot help pointing out that statistics do not support the claim that "we are all going to die". Specifically only 85% of people die as 15% of people have not died; or put another way 15% of the entire human race who have ever lived are currently still alive on the planet. Exponentials can be frightening. --BozMo talk 19:29, 29 March 2007 (UTC)

Glad to have you here

With all the disinformation around, it's nice to know that there are a few scientists here on WP who aren't willing to parrot whatever their corporate masters send in a memo. Be well and to the extent that it even matters, know that you have the respect of a lot of us! :) -- User:RyanFreisling @ 14:44, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

Oh. Thanks. It *is* nice to know that occaisionally :-) William M. Connolley 17:25, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

Let me second Ryan's statement - I find it very reassuring to have you around on the climatology articles. Raul654 19:51, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

Thanks. I hope you don't feel like taking it back after I hack Inhofe... William M. Connolley 20:01, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

To Bdj

Can you give an outsider who's been pretty much frustrated to the point of leaving the page a quick-and-dirty as to why the page on Global warming dedicates less than a dozen words to the highly publicised controversies surrounding the science? --badlydrawnjeff talk 15:02, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

Yes, I think I can. Firstly, this page is primarily about the *science* over GW - not the politics or press. Hence, it tries to give a balance of the science, not the press coverage. If you're basing your expectations on the latter, you'll be disappointed.

Secondly, what do we have? there are a few scientists who disagree about the primary causes of the observed warming and A hotly contested political and public debate also has yet to be resolved, regarding whether anything should be done, and what could be cost-effectively done to reduce or reverse future warming, or to deal with the expected consequences and Contrasting with this view, other hypotheses have been proposed to explain all or most of the observed increase in global temperatures, including: the warming is within the range of natural variation; the warming is a consequence of coming out of a prior cool period, namely the Little Ice Age; and the warming is primarily a result of variances in solar radiation. and There is a controversy over whether present trends are anthropogenic. For a discussion of the controversy, see global warming controversy. . And a whole section on solar variation. So I guess your "less than a dozen" is meant rhetorically.

Thirdly, what controversies are you expecting? Solar is in there; HSC isn't (and maybe should be touched on, though its not all that relevant).

Fourthly... its just about impossible to talk about this on t:GW while everyone is wasting time rehashing old arguments about "consensus" and sourcing William M. Connolley 17:25, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

Okay. That makes sense about the science, although it would be nice to see a better cross-section of the interpretations. Regarding your "fourth," it's why I just cut to you. Thanks for the straight answer. --badlydrawnjeff talk 00:42, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

Your query

Hi William, it's correct that we're not supposed to use wikis as sources (except in very limited circumstances, namely in the same way we'd use any self-published source), but I don't see how that would apply to the instrumental temperature record. We're allowed to use any primary, secondary, or tertiary source that's reliable. I don't know what kind of source the ITR is, but it seems to me something we ought to be using. SlimVirgin 18:30, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

What we are talking about here is to not repeat references already contained in sub-articles. I.e. when referencing the instrumental temperature record in global warming, it should be sufficient to Wikilink there, not to repeat the references over and over again. --Stephan Schulz 18:39, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

It would depend on the context. It's almost always better to repeat the references, unless the material is completely uncontentious, in which case you could simply link to the Misplaced Pages article and anyone who wants to know more can read that. But if the claims are "challenged or likely to be challenged," as the policy says, then it's better to supply citations even if they've been repeated elsewhere. SlimVirgin 18:46, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

I don't see how that is compatible with your original reply, sorry. How can we cite ITR in this way if tertiary sources are forbidden? WP:OR sez Tertiary sources are publications, such as encyclopedias, that sum up other secondary sources, and sometimes primary sources. Misplaced Pages is a tertiary source... All articles on Misplaced Pages should be based on information collected from published primary and secondary sources... Although most articles should rely predominantly on secondary sources, there are rare occasions when they may rely entirely on primary sources (for example, current events or legal cases). This, as written, would appear to imply that tertiary sources are forbidden. I would suggest that it needs to be re-written. William M. Connolley 18:50, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

Also, I don't see how this can work with WP:SUMMARY. For complex topics, it's easily possible to go multiple levels of recursion. Repeating all references will destroy the whole idea of using summaries. --Stephan Schulz 19:15, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

I agree, though the wikilawyers would tell you thats only a guideline :-). It points you are History of the Yosemite area, which indeed is woefully unreferenced, by the absurd standards some are pushing. So I think WP:OR is miswritten, and needs revision William M. Connolley 19:20, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

I would need to see the specific example to understand what the issue is. But generally, tertiary sources are allowed if they're high quality; the Encyclopaedia Britannica, for example, would be allowed. The secondary/tertiary distinction can be a bit of a red herring that's best ignored: what matters is whether the source is a good one, and whether it's used correctly in the article. As for summary style, you summarize the contents of another article, but in summarizing, you presumably make a couple of claims, so these particular claims should be sourced. That doesn't mean you have to repeat every single source that's in the main article — just sources for the particular claims you're repeating. SlimVirgin 19:50, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

OK, thats what I would have thought. But I don't see how this is compatible with a literal reading of the OR policy, as quoted above. Its all very well to agree in friendly discussion with you that the policy is a red herring... but its not pleasant to have the policy quoted in unfriendly edit wars. If you want an example, then consider: For example, I could just write "John Adams was born in 1735," and leave it at that because that Misplaced Pages article SAYS he was born in 1735 SO IT MUST BE TRUE! Wrong. That is not how Misplaced Pages works, I'm afraid. Misplaced Pages is a tertiary source. How does that sound to you? William M. Connolley 19:57, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

Yes, fair point, the policy needs to be tweaked. At the moment, there's a discussion about whether V and NOR are to be merged into ATT, so I hope we can leave any tweaking until after that's decided. Cheers, SlimVirgin 22:24, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

I'm not sure its a good idea to leave it, otherwise we'll get edits like this being done on the basis of over-zealous interpretation of the current policy William M. Connolley 22:27, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

Are you arguing the article adequately cites it sources? ~ UBeR 22:48, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

When an article achieves FA status, the adequacy of sourcing is a major criteria. The article passed that hurdle a little while back and the quantity and quality of citations have improved even after that. Are there areas that could be improved? No doubt, but overall the article is adequately sourced and the current round of nitpicking is not helping to improve the article. Vsmith 01:00, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

For your information

I've just removed from WP:AIV a bad faith report placed by UBeR which accused you of vandalising History of the Yosemite area‎. Sam Blacketer 22:40, 28 March 2007 (UTC)

That's a shame because "do not remove them unless you are sure that all stated reasons for the dispute are settled. As a general rule, do not remove other people's dispute tags twice during a 24 hour period" seems to be pretty clear to me. Shame on you for not assuming good faith. Are you so naive to think an administrator cannot possibly break a rule? I asked you to ignore that and actually look at the edits. How unfortunate. ~ UBeR 22:49, 28 March 2007 (UTC)

UBeR, William M. Connolley had not edited History of the Yosemite area since 09:00 this morning when you made the report at 22:36. I did look at his edits and your report was demonstrably not made in good faith. Sam Blacketer 22:55, 28 March 2007 (UTC)

Thanks. Uber knows full well this is not vandalism but a dispute over policy William M. Connolley 22:58, 28 March 2007 (UTC). But it does look like he has learnt from his error: compare to William M. Connolley 23:00, 28 March 2007 (UTC)

3RR

I don't understand. The anonymous user in question reverted it three times. If the rule does not ban three reverts, why is it called the Three Revert Rule? Did you actually look at the history of the article in question and follow up on the complaint, or just read the entry? XINOPH | TALK 19:26, 30 March 2007 (UTC)

Because you are allowed 3 reverts and are in trouble with the fourth. --Stephan Schulz 20:51, 30 March 2007 (UTC)

References in global warming

Hi William, we seem to disagree about the usefulness (if not the necessity) of extra references in global warming. Anyways, if you remove them, please make sure that you either remove all occurrences of a named reference, or none. Otherwise you leave later references to the same name dangling. --13:49, 1 April 2007 (UTC)

Hi Stephan. Sorry we disagree on this. I doubt I'll go to the stake on this. I thought this was part of the straw poll. But as you know - I don't like the ref system - if it breaks down when you take out a ref, thats its fault not mine (in fact I don't really know what you mean by this so I'm guessing) William M. Connolley 21:37, 1 April 2007 (UTC)

I agree that the references are not neccesarry from a sourcing point of view. But if it keeps us from having to refight this particular battle over and over again, having a few superscripts hanging around is well worth it. Even UBeR defends the now current compromise version. As for the refs: I know your opinion. Time has passed you by ;-). One great thing is that refs can be reused (i.e. you define them once, and then use them over and over again). That saves typing and improves consistency and quality of the references. But of course, if you delete the one definition, the other occurrences break. And remember: We all have to agree in every detail, all the time!--Stephan Schulz 22:09, 1 April 2007 (UTC)

Time has passed me by... I fear so. But the deal for those that like the new refs has to be, that if people who don't use them break them, then the ref-likers have to fix them (the old system was simpler: the new system would be an intolerable burden on new contributors if rigorously enforced) William M. Connolley 22:12, 1 April 2007 (UTC)

Using the full {{cite XXX}} template, yes. But adding a simple hyperlink is not much more difficult than before.--Stephan Schulz 22:19, 1 April 2007 (UTC)

Yes. But the same applies to removing links. I still don't know what I did wrong William M. Connolley 22:20, 1 April 2007 (UTC)

I wouldn't worry about it. As long as the substance is there, someone will fix the formatting eventually. Save your time and energy for bigger issues. Raymond Arritt 22:26, 1 April 2007 (UTC)

Here is an example: Muller claims X and Y. In the source: Muller claims X<ref name="muller2001">Muller, 2001: Very valuable full citation with all the right information and hyperlinks.</ref> and Y<ref name="muller2001"/>. Notice how the second reference has no details, it just reuses the first. Also see the two back-links in the references (a,b) that tell you that this is referenced twice. You deleted the full version. --Stephan Schulz 22:38, 1 April 2007 (UTC)

1. ^ Muller, 2001: Very valuable full citation with all the right information and hyperlinks.

Sulfur/Sulphur

According to Sulfur#Spelling the Royal Society of Chemistry adopted the spelling sulfur in 1990. Like to change sulphate back? --BozMo talk 21:53, 1 April 2007 (UTC)

Is there anything new to say on this since march? Talk:Global_warming/Archive_19#Sul.28ph.7Cf.29ate William M. Connolley 21:57, 1 April 2007 (UTC)

As far as I can see that discussion concludes go with "F". The article should be BE but both are now correct in BE with a preference for "F". I think you shouldn't have taken the "F" off? --BozMo talk 22:00, 1 April 2007 (UTC)

PS our female stoat has just reappeared so I am hoping she has a new litter. --BozMo talk 22:01, 1 April 2007 (UTC)

My best wishes for the stoat. But not for the "f". That discussion ended in statis. You want to reopen it, please do, but my arguments are the same: IUPAC applies to chemistry, which this isn't; in climate science its ph (certainly was in the TAR; the ar4 SPM uses neither but if they change to f in the report I'll change my views) William M. Connolley 22:05, 1 April 2007 (UTC)

Understandably, being a Briton, you would like to use British English. However, the entire global warming article is written in American English, and American English uses "sulfate," as does the does the rest of the international community adhering to IUPAC (Royal Society, anyone?). The term originated from the Latin sulfur. There's no reason to be defiant against the majority opinion that it should be written correctly. ~ UBeR 23:28, 1 April 2007 (UTC)

Be careful UBeR, many people object to "Briton" in favour of English, Scottish etc. :) William, Clearly I was brought up on "ph" too, and "f" jars. There are places where the BE/AE is very blurred "ise" versus "ize" being an obvious one (Cambridge University Press has always used ize since before anyone in the US could spell "Klu Klux Klan"). Now, both are good British English. With the new 2007 Misplaced Pages CD Selection I am planning on going with "f" mainly cos UK schools have now followed the Royal Society and we are becoming dinosaurs. I didn't revert you and won't but perhaps this is one to demonstrate your statesmanship. --BozMo talk 06:16, 2 April 2007 (UTC)

I seems to me that nothing much has changed William M. Connolley 09:33, 2 April 2007 (UTC)

Alternate source

Do you have any other sources for the forged graphs and other malarkey in TGGWS? As you know, Team Skeptic is making a big deal over using RC -- the real point, of course, being to score one against you personally. I'd rather just cite another source and be done with it (until they pick their next fight). If the RC source was picked up by another media outlet we could use that instead. Yeah, I know it's all silly, but... Raymond Arritt 20:37, 2 April 2007 (UTC)

I'm not sure re the graphs. But I am sure that compromising with the fools is a bad idea - why pander to them? William M. Connolley 20:45, 2 April 2007 (UTC)

Because I'm getting old and lazy. That's my excuse and I'm staying with it. Raymond Arritt 21:15, 2 April 2007 (UTC)

All that is needed for the triumph of evil... William M. Connolley 21:28, 2 April 2007 (UTC)

McK

Generally, "see talk" means look in the talk/discussion page because the explanation of the changes would be too long to place in the edit window. And again "it didn't" does not constitute an argument. Perhaps I am misunderstanding the exact details (and please, if so correct me in a logical manner) but from what I have read, McK stated that Mann made an error, Mann corrected some of those errors and claimed that the errors did not effect his results, McK then took question with that. However, as Mann's graph was a product of numbers and in any equation even the slightest error will alter the results, it cannot logically follow that Mann's results were perfectly the same. The question then becomes one of degree; Mann is not claiming that the errors didn't change anything, but rather that the errors were so minor as to not affect the end result data in a significant manner. McK, on the other hand, attempted to argue that, indeed, the end variance was significant. Therefore, while Mann's claim that the error was not significant may hold as much weight as his original research, until such time as peer-review issues (though perhaps one can't call an economists review of other sciences peer) are resolved, it is irresponsible to state as fact (indeed, it is irresponsible to talk of science as facts in general, but that is another issue altogether).

Your reasoning for Nature is certainly much more persuasive, but as I mentioned on the talk page, articles "in submission" and "in review" are quite legitimate categories for various documents like CVs and Biosketches. There is an academic difference between articles "in review," which McK basically claimed his article was, and those flat out rejected. Perhaps saying that the article was cut due to length concerns is giving too much credence; however "rejected" is a tad too far in the other direction. Thought 22:25, 2 April 2007 (UTC)

You don't really seem to be up on the situation. McKs submission is over - look at the dates. There is no question of it being still in review - its rejected. As for the corrigendum, again you don't seem to know what its about. It corrected a misdescription of datasets. *Therefore* it didn't change the results. Mann is indeed saying that the corrigendum didn't change *anything* in the results. Where did you get your "but rather that the errors were so minor as to not affect the end result data in a significant manner". This is certainly *not* what Mann is saying William M. Connolley 07:46, 3 April 2007 (UTC)

Certainly you are well aware of the difference between an article flat out rejected and one reviewed then rejected (regardless of when it was rejected), but as you are also better suited at judging the particular weight of such things in the field in question, and since the point was quite minor to begin with, and since the information is still quite readily available via citation, I will happily yield the point.

As for the corrigendum, certainly I must be missing something. Mann states quite clearly in Nature that some data had been mistakenly included and other mistakenly excluded. With a change of input, one should reasonably expect a change of output. Such a statement is in line with the conclusion of National Research Council's Board on Atmospheric Sciences and Climate's report ("statistical shortcomings in the MBH analysis, but... small in effect"), as well as the Wegman Report. This is not to say that the change of output necessitate an alteration of the conclusion drawn from that output, but that a change did occur. As such, I find your statement that "as far as I can tell the corrigendum doesn't affect the results because... it didn't" odd since 2 out of 3 of Mann's statements in the corrigendum indicate the opposite, as do two reports on the matter, as well as MM. Perhaps you might be willing to point out where the discrepancy is?

Mann states quite clearly in Nature that some data had been mistakenly included and other mistakenly excluded - thats not what I understand. I thought that the only change was to the description of the datasets. Can you quote which bit you mean? The thing itself is here William M. Connolley 18:11, 3 April 2007 (UTC)

1st paragaph of the corrigendum (pg 10), "It has been drawn to our attention (S. McIntyre and R. McKitrick) that the listing of the ‘proxy’ data set in the Supplementary Information published with this Article contained several errors. In Table 1 we provide a list of the records that were either mistakenly included in the Supplementary Information, or mistakenly left out." Am I misjudging the actual applicability of this information? Thought 19:02, 3 April 2007 (UTC)

The "Supplementary Information" is the description of the data sets, not the data sets actually used. So the description of the data sets has been updated, not the data itself.--Stephan Schulz 19:07, 3 April 2007 (UTC)

On one final note, your statement, "had the results changed, Nature would have noted that," is so out of sync with my understanding of the peer-review process that I hope you will tolerate my attempts to clear the matter in my own mind. To my understanding, a researcher submits an article for publication, at which point it considered, sent to reviewers, and ideally eventually published. At which point does Nature (or any academic journal) run the experiments contained in such an article so as to be in a position to judge (let alone note) when an alteration to the data does and does not affect results? I must confess, it has been my experience and belief that such a task is not shouldered by the journal but rather other researchers. Thought 17:55, 3 April 2007 (UTC)

Indeed, journals do not re-run results. But if someone publishes a corrigendum stating that None of these errors affect our previously published results. I think we can assume Nature accepts that William M. Connolley 18:11, 3 April 2007 (UTC)

Some interesting data

I was playing around with a script I recently wrote, to fetch and analyze article histories, to see who the most prolific editors for a given article are. Here's the results for Global warming:

hydra > get_hist --summarize --threshold=20 "Global warming"

Fetching Global warming

William_M._Connolley 777

UBeR 333

Stephan_Schulz 264

Raymond_arritt 233

Ed_Poor 221

Dragons_flight 197

Silverback 157

Vsmith 153

Cortonin 120

Guettarda 110

Raul654 95

Natalinasmpf 86

JonGwynne 83

Thejackhmr 79

Tawkerbot2 67

Count_Iblis 66

Rd232 65

Poodleboy 61

SEWilco 60

Lesikar 59

TeaDrinker 55

Judgesurreal777 55

Bikeable 54

Aude 51

Alhutch 50

EWS23 48

AntiVandalBot 48

Omicronpersei8 45

Nrcprm2026 45

Antandrus 41

Richardshusr 38

Hardern 38

Blue_Tie 37

Atlant 37

Viriditas 36

LordsReform 34

KimDabelsteinPetersen 33

JoshuaZ 33

Anastrophe-wikipedia 33

BozMo 32

Spiffy_sperry 31

NHSavage 31

Denorris 28

Brusegadi 25

Michael_Johnson 24

JohnDziak 24

Graft 24

217.23.232.194 24

TheOuthouseMouse 23

Narssarssuaq 23

Tjsynkral 22

SirGrant 22

RexNL 21

Haseler 21

Wiki_alf 20

Skyemoor 20

Peter_Andersen 20

MrRedact 20

This article has been edited 10839 times

To put that 10k edits into perspective - that's by far the most I've seen - twice as many as the second largest I've encountered. Raul654 05:43, 4 April 2007 (UTC)

Try Israel or Ronald Reagan which must be pretty close to this. --BozMo talk 07:51, 4 April 2007 (UTC)

They're close, but still lag behind. Raul654 08:11, 4 April 2007 (UTC)

Ronald Reagan

hydra > get_hist --summarize --max=20 --wikify "Ronald Reagan" Fetching Ronald Reagan

• Happyme22 555
• Rjensen 180
• SNIyer1 172
• SNIyer12 119
• Jpgordon 95
• Flcelloguy 73
• Ellsworth 72
• Kaisershatner 62
• 162.96.105.78 56
• Smokingmaenad 52
• Jiang 50
• Texture 49
• 68.96.76.118 48
• Accurizer 42
• Griot 39
• RexNL 34
• RJII 34
• Mytwocents 32
• JackofOz 32
• Commodore_Sloat 30

This article has been edited 9321 times

Israel

hydra > get_hist --summarize --max=20 --wikify "Israel" Fetching Israel

• Jayjg 239
• Amoruso 167
• Tasc 166
• Humus_sapiens 138
• Jpgordon 111
• Okedem 89
• Gidonb 89
• Zero0000 81
• El_C 74
• 24.150.168.211 74
• Shamir1 70
• Schrodingers_Mongoose 70
• Doron 66
• Ynhockey 62
• Garzo 58
• 209.135.35.83 52
• GabrielF 50
• Guy_Montag 49
• Sarastro777 48
• Daniel575 48

This article has been edited 9267 times

66.194.104.5

66.194.104.5 (whom you've marked as a suspect sockpuppet of Licorne) appears to be having some civility issues:

—SlamDiego 17:53, 4 April 2007 (UTC)

(I'm noting this also to Fastfission.) —SlamDiego 19:11, 4 April 2007 (UTC)

Hmmm. We he did alter the fu fairly soon after to something sensible. Um. I'll leave it to FF William M. Connolley 08:35, 5 April 2007 (UTC)

Good handling of the issues at the global warming article

I'd just like to say that you have been handling all the edit wars and attacks from the dissenters quite well, despite their accusations of incivility on your part. Keep it up; Misplaced Pages needs more people like you. -- Cielomobile 17:50, 11 April 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the support, I appreciate it William M. Connolley 21:17, 11 April 2007 (UTC)

My apology to you

Mr Connolley - First please accept my apology for using the phrase "POV editor" in regards to yourself. I was unaware of how offensive it is considered in wiki-speak. Second, Kim D. Petersen has informed me that you are a WP:RS yourself, in the field of climate science, and auburnpilot has informed me that you are, in fact, a Wkkipedia Administrator. Please excuse my "ignorant newbie" errors regarding this matter. So that I don't embarrass myself again in the same way, could you please explain to me here, in this less public forum, exactly how this bit:

When contacted, like fellow skeptic Richard Lindzen, he refused to accept any bets as to whether temperatures would drop, even bets that survive the bettors' lifespan by being given to a charitable foundation. (In Gray's case, he stated that as a man in his seventies, he did not want to make bets that exceeded his expected lifespan.)

From http://en.wikipedia.org/William_M._Gray, the biography of Bill Gary, a living person

does not violate WP:BLP section on RS, or, what exception to the policy justifies its inclusion in contradiction of this policy?

Thus fully informed, I will happily publicly apologize to you on Bill Gray's page and publicly admit to being an "Ignorant Newbie".

I include the section to which I refer here, not because I think you are unfamiliar with it, but so that there will be no mistake about exactly which policy I refer to:

Reliable sources

Any assertion in a biography of a living person that might be defamatory if untrue must be sourced. Without reliable, third-party sources, a biography will violate our content policies of No original research and Attribution, and could lead to libel claims.

Material available solely on partisan websites or in obscure newspapers should be handled with caution, and, if derogatory, should not be used at all. Material found in self-published books, zines, websites or blogs should never be used, unless written or published by the subject (see below). These sources should also not be included as external links in BLPs, subject to the same exception.

Thank you for taking time to address this with me, KipHansen 19:48, 15 April 2007 (UTC)

I regard the source as reliable and the material as non-defamatory William M. Connolley 08:05, 16 April 2007 (UTC)

Mr. Connoley; Thank you, that seems to clear that up. I didn't even know that a Misplaced Pages Administrator could designate another individual as a "reliable source".

As far as I understand it, no one can designate anybody or any source a "reliable source". The recognition that something is or is not a reliable source is based on consensus. If a consensus of editors of a particular article agree that X is a reliable source, then it can be used. If not, then out it goes. --Richard 15:48, 20 April 2007 (UTC)

One more little point I'd like to clear up regarding this post. Its about what appeared to me to be a violation of the WP on "No Original Research".

In this case, a chap named Brian Schmidt makes a private personal phone call to Dr. Gray and then records his impressions of the phone call on his personal blog site. Brian then edits the Wiki Biography of Dr. William M. Gray (a living person) to include his report of the phone call, and links to his personal blog.

Can you explain to me how this does not violate WP:No Original Research or what exception to the policy justifies its inclusion in contradiction of this policy?

Thanks again,

KipHansen 00:21, 17 April 2007 (UTC)

You don't understand the OR policy. OR applies to wiki-editors not external sources William M. Connolley 07:25, 17 April 2007 (UTC)

But, when Brian Schmidt edits the Misplaced Pages biography of Dr. William Gray, he is acting as a wikipedia editor. The private personal phone call, Schmidt's notes thereof and Schmidt's personal blog are all not considered reliable sources. Sounds like OR to me. What is the "reliable source" in this instance? Brian Schmidt? On what basis? Why is he more reliable than I am?

--Richard 15:48, 20 April 2007 (UTC)

eGads! A ray of light and reason! Bless you, Richard.

Brian Schmidt's entry is clearly disallowed, forbidden in fact, by WP:BLP, WP:RS, and OR. The idea that a Wiki Admin can simply assign the classification of "Reliable Source" to a person (as opposed to a source) boggles the imagination - especially for the purposes of WP:BLP.

KipHansen 18:42, 20 April 2007 (UTC)

Global Warming Swindle

I made absolutely no reverts. Please don't threaten me, I don't play those games. --Corwin8 18:20, 22 April 2007 (UTC)

Ah. Now I see, William. YOU are the one that made the revert, aren't you??? You are putting in extraneous and incorrect information that no longer applies and adds nothing to the article. Just to warn you, William, re: WP:3RR on TGGWS. --Corwin8 18:29, 22 April 2007 (UTC)

You don't need to warn me, I've very familiar with it. This is a revert; and what makes you think PC is a Dr anyway? William M. Connolley 19:21, 22 April 2007 (UTC)

The second change I made I thought was a reasonable compromise. I even left in your biased reference (which got the sunspot theory wrong). Now, you made two changes, already 2/3rds of the way there to 3RR. And you seem intolerant to any discussion of changes. Because of your intolerance I've requested moderator intervention. In the meantime, right after I finish this note I'm changing it to my compromised version. I'm confident a moderator will see that you are constantly reverting back to the exact original with no attempt at compromise --Corwin8 21:06, 22 April 2007 (UTC)

Please see ]. Look at the differences between your paragraph and mine. Exactly what are you upset about, Williams??? --Corwin8 21:21, 22 April 2007 (UTC)

Actually 2 reverts would be only halfway to violating 3RR :-) --Nethgirb 01:04, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

"Moderator intervention" is a curious phrase. Anyway, what was it that made you think PC was a Dr? William M. Connolley 08:17, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

Thanks

I got a little too irritated there and started going overboard. Thanks for the message. I'll try to keep those out of my comments. --squeakytoad 09:56, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

Birds of a feather fly into plate glass windows together

You'll love this one: Raymond Arritt 03:12, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

ROTFL! ;-) --Stephan Schulz 07:12, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

Bring back the toilets! William M. Connolley 08:15, 24 April 2007 (UTC)s

Correa is a published author in natural sciences and a skeptic. I'm waiting for your revert. Thanks in advance. Cheers!DonaldDuck07 19:08, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

In a similar vein, y'all might appreciate this: (or, more verifiably: ) --Nethgirb 08:13, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

I like it!, even if its not as funny as the Correas William M. Connolley 08:47, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

Suspected Sockpuppet: Mattisse (4th) case

I have opened this case, having seen too little real action taken on this situation, and not wishing to be told once again that it is too late to investigate the issue. Rosencomet 21:52, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

Thought you'd like to know that due to this case suspected sockpuppets User:BackMaun, User:Alien666 and User:RasputinJSvengali have been blocked indefinitely. User:Jefferson Anderson has decided to change his User name without posting the new one on his talk page, but continue editing. Rosencomet 19:17, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

OK, thanks for the info William M. Connolley 19:37, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Don't bite!

Please don't bite the newcomers as you appear to do here - hardly something which is going to encourage people to want to come and improve the article, is it? QmunkE 09:38, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

I disagree - this newcomer seems to have fixed opinions and a regrettable tendency to WP:OR. If you're going to help educate them out of this, that would be great William M. Connolley 09:41, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

The way the few of you that seem to own the GW article treat people who make edits is bad for wikipedia, particularly when it comes to civility. Some of them are only making changes since the article still doesn't meet the basic criteria of an FA. Others apparently reference articles some of you feel aren't up to standards. While I applaud your attempt at using quality sources, your execution is the problem. I hope all your sources are primary, and not blogs (which I saw reference to on the talk page), because that would be another wikipedia problem. Thegreatdr 13:00, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

I just cannot resist asking if the crowd few you perceive as owning the WP article is a greater or a lesser few than the few many eminent scientists who are sceptical about important parts of GW? --BozMo talk 13:34, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

All I will say is that scientists tend to be skeptics, evaluating the data for themselves. I can't think of many topics within the natural sciences where there isn't debate about some fine point of data or logic. I really can't delve into my opinions on global warming, because technically, I have to follow the party line set by the Climate Prediction Center. Thegreatdr 19:44, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

We don't really want your opinions on GW. But it doesn't prevent you editing on the science William M. Connolley 09:30, 28 April 2007 (UTC)

Assuming this is in answer to the message I left on your talk page, then: what I to ask what was specifically wrong with the article. Meta-arguments about ownership are all very well (I disagree with you, of course) but usually unproductive. What is actually wrong with the article? William M. Connolley 13:06, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Other than the tone on the talk page (which all need to work on), all references need to be in the same format. If an author's name is included in one reference, you must have authors in every reference. If you start using ref/cite web/whatever format, you need to maintain that format through the entire page. That appears to be a basic thing even for GA articles nowadays. Every statement, particularly if it states what some may characterize as controversial, needs a reference. The way we seem to work within the meteorology and tropical cyclone projects (as you are probably aware) is to include at least one reference per paragraph...but due to some people's views on the GW topic, this article needs to be referenced even better. You all are correct that wikipedia is about consensus views, not fringe views. You must be able to achieve enough stability on the page that you don't need to protect it every few days. Civility through the talk page appears to be the easiest way to achieve that. Thegreatdr 13:20, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Hmm, I'm disappointed, I was hoping for some science (I'm not saying your complaints are invalid, just not so interesting to me). (a) I have no interest in the ref format (b) I disagree re ref'ing every statement - sub articles do this where needed (c) it hasn't been protected for quite a while now (d) civility - sounds good. I blame the skeptics, of course, but I'll see what I can do William M. Connolley 13:28, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

I will not discuss science concerning that article...it has led to infighting in the past, and I don't wish to get drawn into that fray for the time being. =) It's best to keep the science out of discussions about the status of a wikipedia article. Usually the science will be adequately covered by a well-referenced article...unrepresentative views (which can be found in newspaper or magazine articles, sometimes even in books) usually aren't published in what would normally be considered primary sources (such as refereed articles in journals and government-issued reports). Thegreatdr 13:49, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

I am delighted that you have nothing to criticise on the science - this is my major interest in the article, as I've indicated above. Are you interpreting this too narrowly? It's best to keep the science out of discussions about the status of a wikipedia article - somewhat odd, as the NPOV disputes, which have been the major problem (pointlessly, as its now back to stable with no change from this perspective) have been about the balance of science William M. Connolley 14:21, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

The guy has a job in the field and has identified himself on wikipedia, so it is dangerous for him to discuss the science in this area. I've demonstrated that I am perfectly willing to discuss the science on the GW talk page, if you are interested. Leave him alone. Are you really willing to discuss the accuracy and usefulness of the models frankly and in the open with intellectually honest admissions of valid points? Join me in discussing the substance of peer reviewed articles and not numbers of articles and numbers of scientists. You use the term "skeptic" as if it is a pejorative, instead of the proper approach for any scientist to take when reviewing the literature or conducting research.--Africangenesis 18:43, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

You are mistaking wikipedia for a usenet group. Its clear that you have read a paper or two and have decided that all the attribution results are invalid due to model errors. Its also clear that the PR literature on attribution disagrees with you. Your opinions (unless published) don't belong on wikipedia. As for leave him alone - this is unwarranted and impolite on yuor part. In climate research "skeptic" has a particular meaning - it identifies a loose group of people who oppose GW theory on irrational grounds - it does not have the conventional meaning (we used to have a page on this, but it got deleted: the text was /gws William M. Connolley 09:30, 28 April 2007 (UTC)

I really can't delve into my opinions on global warming, because technically, I have to follow the party line set by the Climate Prediction Center. This has to be the sadest claim I have heard in ages. A research center that dictates opinions to its members is worse than useless, and a scientist who "follows the party line" against better knowledge violates the basic ethos of science. If you cannot speake your opinion, leave. Or speak it anyways, and make them try to fire you. --Stephan Schulz 20:03, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Being silent is at least better than speaking in lockstep. As long as one's own work is not compromised, there is no obligation to correct all the world's or organization's wrongs. Sometimes you get stuck in quagmires, no matter how noble and just your motives and position.--Africangenesis 20:19, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

NOAA is supposed to speak with one voice...end of story. Imagine what would happen if a hurricane approached the coast, and everyone within our organization was free to say what they thought within the NWS/NOAA. Same goes for Winter Storms and climate issues such as the ENSO cycle and GW. The papers/media would have a field day. And on the issue of GW, they have had a field day with Chris Landsea of NHC, amongst other researchers from various universities. We are Borg...oops, I mean a government organization. And please, civility. While all government workers do work for the people since we are your tax dollars at work, it is not your place within Misplaced Pages to tell me what to do, unless there is a specific wikipedia rule that applies to this case that I am breaking. Then you can point it out. Don't shoot the messenger. Have a nice day. =) Thegreatdr 20:16, 27 April 2007 (UTC)