Misplaced Pages

Revision as of 06:51, 23 September 2008

Welcome

Hello Esterson, and welcome to Misplaced Pages. I'm sure that your edits to Mileva Marić were well-intentioned. Unfortunately, I do not think that your blog counts as a reliable source, so I have removed much of what you added. Please see the Reliable Sources guideline here. Skoojal (talk) 04:23, 28 August 2008 (UTC)

• Have you two editors met in another forum? If so, please remember that Misplaced Pages is not a battleground. ·:· Will Beback ·:· 07:29, 29 August 2008 (UTC)

This information is relevant: ·:· Will Beback ·:· 07:37, 30 August 2008 (UTC)

User talk pages

Constructive contributions are appreciated and strongly encouraged, but your recent edit to the userpage of another user may be considered vandalism. Specifically, your edit to User talk:Skoojal may be offensive or unwelcome. If you are the user, please log in under that account and proceed to make the changes. Please use the sandbox for any tests you may want to do. Take a look at our introduction page to learn more about contributing to our encyclopedia. Thank you. De728631 (talk) 09:20, 3 September 2008 (UTC)

Relax for gods sake. Esterson (presumably accidentally) removed some comments from my talk page; I've no reason to think that was deliberate vandalism. His comments weren't particularly offensive or unwelcome; if they had been, I'd have dealt with it. Skoojal (talk) 10:25, 3 September 2008 (UTC)

Will Beback: I do not know what you are referring to. I am a novice at handling these behind-the-scenes pages on Misplaced Pages, and if I accidentally removed someone else's comments I apologise - though how I did this I have no idea.Esterson (talk) 11:30, 5 September 2008 (UTC)

Will Beback: Elsewhere you wrote: "I don't normally cross-post, but the fact that you're editing topics with someone you call an enemy from off-wiki appeared to me to be an unusal circumstance, one which the other editor should be aware. Added to the Crews matter there's an appearance of using WP to settle scores." •:• Will Beback •:• 10:03, 30 August 2008 (UTC)

http://en.wikipedia.org/User_talk:Skoojal

I am bemused by this comment. It's a long time since I edited the Freud page so I don't know what you mean by "the Crews matter" (and at that time I had not discovered the talk pages). I am not the least interested in "settling scores", only with providing reliable information as far as it can be ascertained. In both the cases of Freud and Mileva Maric received historical accounts and frequently recycled claims do not necessarily reflect the true facts based on close scrutiny of the historical documents (often far from it).Esterson (talk) 11:30, 5 September 2008 (UTC)

The 'Crews matter' is discussed here and also here . Skoojal (talk) 22:40, 5 September 2008 (UTC)

Will Beeback: You wrote: "Have you two editors met in another forum? If so, please remember that Misplaced Pages is not a battleground."

Having followed up the links that you posted on 5 September, I am now in a position to understand that remark (and I can fully understand why you would be concerned). As you are presumably aware I didn't contribute to the Crews issue on Misplaced Pages (not that I can recall, anyway), but Skoojal chose to cite my name in connection with it: "When I debated this with Allen Esterson..."

Having now read Skoojal's comments on the Crews Talk webpage, I must express my concern about the tone of his comments. The fact that he refers to a debate with me identifies him as Richard R. Warnotck, with whom I had exchanges on this issue on the Butterflies and Wheels "letters" page. My concern is particularly with this sentence: "I thought this was willful obscurantism on Esterson's part, motivated by the desperate desire to hide a truth that it would be disastrous for Crews's (and Esterson's) credibility to admit." I agree that Misplaced Pages is not a battleground, but I really must express my dismay that Skoojal should make a derogatory statement about my motivations, especially as it is on the basis of his own misreading of Crews. Please bear with me while I give the quote in full that Skoojal claims demonstrates Crews' "homophobia" (and my bad faith):

"Critics have pointed out that the third edition of the DSM (1980), like its predecessors, reflects political as well as medical and scientific opinion. When smoking replaces homosexuality as a mental aberration, more of the credit must go to caucuses than to new findings. For that very reason, however, we can safely regard the DSM's demotion of 'neurosis' as a sign of waning psychoanalytic influence." (Analysis Terminable and Interminable, 1986, p. 36, n1.)

Crews' comments are a criticism of a characteristic of the DSM, that on occasion it follows societal fashion, e.g., previously smoking was not an aberration and homosexuality was, but with changes in attitudes, now smoking is an aberration and homosexuality is not. This says absolutely nothing about Crews' view of homosexuality (and certainly not, as Skoojal claims, that Crews "was objecting to the replacement of homosexuality by smoking as a mental illness"). (Elsewhere Crews makes plain his view when he writes that among serious adverse influences of psychoanalytic orthodoxy: "Thanks to the once imposing prestige of psychoanalysis... gays have been told that their sexual preference is a mental disorder women have accepted a view of themselves as inherently envious, passive and amoral." )

Incidentally, it speaks volumes that out of the many reams that Crews has written on Freud and psychoanalysis, Skoojal should single out this one sentence (which he misreads as denigrating homosexuality) as "among the most relevant" in Crews's books, "since they concern his reasons for attacking psychoanalysis..." (as if he hadn't written many hundreds of sentences doing that).

Will Beeback: Please excuse the length of the above, and note that I intend saying no more on this (and shall not respond to any reply by Skoojal). I just wanted you to be clear that it was not I who introduced the element of a "battleground", it was Skoojal with what I regard as offensive, and totally unjustified, aspersions on my motivations. I leave you to judge my motivations from my argument above. Esterson (talk) 09:22, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

My only observation on this is to point out that, each and every time Esterson mentions this, he is giving me and my views on Crews more publicity. Skoojal (talk) 11:00, 9 September 2008 (UTC)

Sources

Articles published in peer review journals are among the best sources available. The fact that an article is also posted on its author's website is irrelevant, but the citation should be to the journal and not to the website (though you can add a link to the website for the convenience of readers). Also, if you're going to be editing here much you might want to learn a bit more about wiki markup (which is different from HTML). See Misplaced Pages:Cheatsheet. Also, the citation and footnoting techniques are unusual here. See WP:CITE. ·:· Will Beback ·:· 20:41, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

Regarding the addition of links, there are three pottential problems to watch out for. First, if the pre-publication versions are significantly different from the published version then a link to the final draft may be misleading. Second, links to pages that contain copyright violations are forbidden. Very lengthy excerpts from books may represent copyright violatations, but shorter excerpts would be OK. However if the book is available in libraries, etc, then linking to a page of excerpts is not necessary. Also, if a short excerpt will help readers gain context then it might be added directly to the citation or footnote. Third, linking to ones own webpage is always a bit delicate. Adding too many links may give the impression that one is using the links to promote the website. It's best to minimize the additions of links in such cases. If there is a central index to related materials that might be used in place of many individual links to pages, for example. The most revelant policies and guidelines are probably WP:V, WP:RS, and WP:EL. ·:· Will Beback ·:· 18:44, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

Jeffrey Masson

Esterson: I think your additions to the article on Jeffrey Masson need to be, at the very least, reworded. I am resisting the temptation to simply remove them, but I think that they have been added to the 'Life and Work' section in a way that does not read smoothly. To include the sentence that starts, 'However a number of Freud scholars and other academics have argued that...' immediately after the part about Masson's response to Webster seems to suggest that it is because of any failings that particular edition of The Assault on Truth may suffer from that Masson may have failed to understand the true nature of the seduction theory, and I presume that this is not your point. Skoojal (talk) 22:04, 18 September 2008 (UTC)

I'll be a little more clear about where the problem lies: Including the sentence starting 'However a number of Freud scholars and other academics have...' immediately following Masson's response to Webster makes it sound as though it is the failure of Masson's reponse to Webster that is responsible for his not understanding the true nature of the seduction theory. That is an unfortunate thing to imply. I will remove this unless it can be worded in a way that isn't misleading. Skoojal (talk) 23:52, 18 September 2008 (UTC)

Skoojal: You write: "I'll be a little more clear about where the problem lies: Including the sentence starting 'However a number of Freud scholars and other academics have...' immediately following Masson's response to Webster makes it sound as though it is the failure of Masson's reponse to Webster that is responsible for his not understanding the true nature of the seduction theory. That is an unfortunate thing to imply."

1. My posting follows a paragraph that contains the general statement about Masson's 1998 Postscript that: "It contained a new postscript replying to critics of Masson's work..." My posting therefore applies to the Postscript as a whole, not merely to Masson's response to Webster. By writing that my paragraph follows "immediately after the part about Masson's response to Webster", you have chosen to highlight the sentence about Webster, leaving aside the previous sentence in the same paragraph containing the words "replying to critics of Masson's work", as if that were not also part of the paragraph in question.

2. You write that my posting "seems to suggest that it is because of any failings that particular edition of The Assault on Truth may suffer from that Masson may have failed to understand the true nature of the seduction theory, and I presume that this is not your point."

The 1998 edition of The Assault on Truth is identical to the original edition, with a short Postscript added to the previous edition. Masson's short 1998 Postscript cannot be understood except in the context of the book itself, so the 1998 edition must be taken as a whole – the Postscript cannot be treated in isolation. It is evident from both the book itself, and also (more specifically), from the 1998 Postscript, that Masson doesn't understand the true nature of the seduction theory (as is argued by nine authors of journal articles that I cited), so my posting applies both to the Postscript, and to Masson's supposed rebuttal of Webster.

You write that my posting "makes it sound as though it is the failure of Masson's reponse to Webster that is responsible for his not understanding the true nature of the seduction theory. That is an unfortunate thing to imply."

That is your idiosyncratic reading of my posting, only made possible by your isolating the comment about Webster from the paragraph as a whole. (And it would be an idiosyncratic misreading even if we consider the "Webster" sentence in isolation.)

I suggest you raise this issue on the Jeffrey Masson discussion page so it can be opened up to other editors. However, I'd like you to be clear about the issues involved, so I shall extend the discussion here by quoting from your paragraph to give just one illustration of what I wrote above. Your paragraph includes "Masson criticised Webster for... unjustifiably concluding that Freud's early patients had not been sexually abused."

Webster nowhere makes the assertion that Freud's "early patients" had not been sexually abused. He writes in relation to the specific period when Masson maintained the seduction theory (limited to late 1895-1897), and about a limited group of patients: "There is no evidence that any of the patients who came to Freud without memories of sexual abuse had ever suffered from such abuse." (Webster 1996, p. 517, my emphasis).

By citing that particular item in Masson's response you have inadvertently highlighted one of Masson's 1998 responses that shows that he misrepresents what Webster actually wrote, and also that, on the evidence of both his book and the 1998 Postscript, he fails to grasp the essence of the seduction theory. (Incidentally, throughout the section of the Postscript devoted to his critics Masson likewise mis-states (or evades) their actual criticisms.) Esterson (talk) 09:49, 19 September 2008 (UTC)

Regarding the first point of your response, ("My posting therefore applies to the Postscript as a whole, not merely to Masson's response to Webster"), all I can say is that this is not automatically clear from the article on Masson. It could be interpreted (and many readers may interpret it) as applying only or primarily to Webster (please allow for the fact that not all readers of Misplaced Pages are likely to interpret things in the same way you would; anything that can be misunderstood will be by someone). That would be a good enough reason to remove your addition, although I would prefer to wait and let you rewrite it rather than remove it immediately. Skoojal (talk) 23:01, 19 September 2008 (UTC)

Regarding the part about the failure of Masson's reponse to Webster, I'm not saying that I read the passage that way, only that someone could read it that way. This is the same problem as described above. Things have to made perfectly clear; they cannot be worded in a way that is easily subject to misinterpretation. Thus, I'll have little choice but to remove this from the article from Masson unless it can be reworded. You seem to accept that that section needs some rewording anyway, judging from your comments about how it describes Masson's criticism of Webster (despite the fact that I added this, it shouldn't be called "your paragraph"; people do not own their contributions to Misplaced Pages). Skoojal (talk) 23:09, 19 September 2008 (UTC)

Skoojal: I shall reply first to your second paragraph, as it relates to what I already posted above. In the paragraph in question on the Jeffrey Masson page, you posted as follows:

"Masson criticised Webster for blaming him for the interest in recovered memory and for unjustifiably concluding that Freud's early patients had not been sexually abused."

On this you now say: "I'm not saying that I read the passage that way, only that someone could read it that way." But the sentence says "Masson criticised Webster for…" – nothing there about "could be read" that way. In any case, to provide an unreferenced reading on the grounds that a passage "could" be read that way is so open-ended that it leaves it open for an editor to make a statement of virtually any idiosyncratic reading on the grounds that it could be read that way. Again, if you're saying that you didn't read it that way, how strange to write it in that manner: why didn't you write the sentence in question in terms that you did read? And how interesting that you should seemingly distance yourself from the import of the sentence now that I have pointed out that the Masson assertion about Webster that you specifically mentioned is erroneous.

You write: "Things have to made perfectly clear; they cannot be worded in a way that is easily subject to misinterpretation... That would be a good enough reason to remove your addition, although I would prefer to wait and let you rewrite it rather than remove it immediately." What this means in practice is that any time you choose to interpret something in a way that enables you find something to criticise, it gives you grounds for deleting the posted passage. That gives you virtual carte blanche to remove almost anything you take issue with.

You write: "You seem to accept that that section needs some rewording anyway…"

The last sentence of the paragraph you posted as it stands is correct: Masson did criticise Webster for supposedly "unjustifiably concluding that Freud's early patients had not been sexually abused." The fault lies not with this sentence itself, but with the fact that, contrary to what Masson claims, Webster nowhere concluded this in his book Why Freud Was Wrong.Esterson (talk) 17:47, 20 September 2008 (UTC)

I can only repeat my point, which I made above: your addition makes it sound as though it is only or primarily the failure of Masson's reponse to Webster that is responsible for his not understanding the true nature of the seduction theory. The point still stands. It did not concern the interpretation of the sentence from the article you quote in isolation, but rather its relation to the following sentence, added by you. Skoojal (talk) 23:47, 20 September 2008 (UTC)

Now to the second paragraph you wrote above (23.01, 19 September): "Regarding the first point of your response, ('My posting therefore applies to the Postscript as a whole, not merely to Masson's response to Webster'), all I can say is that this is not automatically clear from the article on Masson. It could be interpreted (and many readers may interpret it) as applying only or primarily to Webster (please allow for the fact that not all readers of Misplaced Pages are likely to interpret things in the same way you would; anything that can be misunderstood will be by someone)."

There is a paragraph on the Jeffrey Masson page. The paragraph I posted clearly alludes to that paragraph as a whole. This is evident from the fact that Webster is not mentioned in the paragraph I posted. What is happening here is that you are choosing to interpret something in such a way that you purportedly find "good enough reason to remove addition." As I already noted, you are thereby giving yourself carte blanche to remove anything you take issue with, simply by choosing to interpret in such a way as to give yourself justification for removing another editor's posting. Esterson (talk) 17:51, 20 September 2008 (UTC)

Now I have re-examined the whole of Masson's 1998 Postscript, and realised that the paragraph you posted contains an inaccuracy I had not previously recognised, I may reword the current paragraph that I posted to spell out more comprehensively an alternative position to Masson 1998 (as taken by the ten Freud scholars and academics I referenced on one issue or another in my posted paragraph). Esterson (talk) 18:01, 20 September 2008 (UTC)

Allen Esterson

Esterson: this is to let you know that I have started an article about you. I am informing you as a courtesy. Skoojal (talk) 06:46, 19 September 2008 (UTC)

Esterson please see this page for advice on dealing with this issue. I understand from your post to Skoojal's page you wish to have the article about you removed from Misplaced Pages. Also from my reading of said article, there seems to be too little sourcing for it to stay either. I recommend you seek advice here as I am not expert in this area of BLP (wikipedia's strict policies on Biographies of Living Persons) - dealing with subjects of BLP articles who wish to have the articles removed - but another sysop at the BLP noticeboard will be able to advise you--Cailil 17:29, 19 September 2008 (UTC)

Esterson is, in my opinion, over-reacting to this. Really, he should be flattered that I've started the article. Why should he be unhappy to see a description of his work on Misplaced Pages? If Cailil thinks that there are not enough sources in the article, then I can add more, in order to show how widely influential Esterson's work has been (for instance, I could add things to show how it has been used by Frederick Crews, Richard Webster, or Malcolm Macmillan - all influential figures in the field of Freud scholarship). Skoojal (talk) 21:52, 19 September 2008 (UTC)

Skoojal writes of my published work that he can show "show how it has been used by Frederick Crews, Richard Webster, or Malcolm Macmillan", thereby demonstrating both his limited knowledge and the inappropriateness of there being an Allen Esterson Misplaced Pages.

Macmillan's magnum opus Freud Evaluated was published in 1991, before I had published anything, and thus does not cite my name. My name is cited in a short section of a lengthy Afterword (40 pages) to the 1997 edition. In that short section alone Macmillan mentions, among several other authors, David Livingstone Smith, Morton Schatzman, Han Israëls, Max Scharnberg, Frank Cioffi, Mikkel Borch-Jacobsen, Clark Glymour and Edward Shorter. All of these are psychologists or philosophers, mostly with prestigious academic positions, who have each published far more books and journal articles than I, but do not have a Misplaced Pages page.

Richard Webster's book contains a brief mention of my work among scores of other authors. Webster's book would not have been different in any significant respect had my book not been published two years earlier.

When Skoojal has proposed Misplaced Pages pages on, e.g., Frank Cioffi and Clark Glymour (both of whose contributions to Freud studies are but one part of a much wider publication history), and others among the many scores of academics in this field alone with far greater credentials worthy of a Misplaced Pages page, I'll take seriously his starting an Allen Esterson page.

I shall now take steps to have the page removed. Esterson (talk) 16:02, 20 September 2008 (UTC)

Esterson: thank you, but I am not such an ignoramus that I don't know that the first edition of Freud Evaluated was published in 1991, before your book. I specifically stated in the article on you that your book was cited in the second edition of Freud Evaluated. This, along with the other references I added, is enough to show that Seductive Mirage has been cited quite widely and had an impact on the field of Freud scholarship. Again, why should you deny this? I would have thought you would be pleased to see an article about yourself, and a mention of the influence of your book.

The lack of any Misplaced Pages articles about Frank Cioffi and Clark Glymour is no reason why there shouldn't be one about you. See the article specifically on this argument . It would probably be worth creating an aritcle about Cioffi, along with Borch-Jacobsen and Schatzman, but there's no reason why an article about you has to wait until such articles exist. Skoojal (talk) 22:39, 20 September 2008 (UTC)

dropping by, because I have a longstanding interest in the question of our practices in articles about people who are active on Misplaced Pages--quite apart from whether a page on you should exists (I'll take a look at it by our usual standards for researchers & comment on its talk page), Skoojal is correct that the comparison you are making is not a good argument--if you know of notable researchers--by which we usually mean something more or less like the full/associate professor level with 2 or 3 well reviewed academic publisher books or the equivalent in good peer-reviewed widely-cited articles --see WP:PROF-- please do write the articles, including major positions, publications, editorships, and honors. There are probably 50 000 academic researchers who do not have articles here but should. DGG (talk) 03:08, 21 September 2008 (UTC)

DGG: Thanks for dropping by. I accept your point, but the fact remains that I have never had an academic position, have very few publications to my name, and have virtually no public profile (nor eminence) such as would warrant a Misplaced Pages page. Esterson (talk) 11:10, 21 September 2008 (UTC)

BLP Violation at Jeffrey Moussaieff Masson

Esterson, I have reverted your edits to Jeffrey Moussaieff Masson, on the grounds that they are a probable violation of Misplaced Pages's Biography of Living Persons policy. I think you should seriously consider whether it is appropriate for you to continue editing this article, as you appear to have a conflict of interest. Skoojal (talk) 00:40, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

What is the nature of the purported conflict of interest? ·:· Will Beback ·:· 04:53, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

Esterson is one of a group of scholars who for years have been trying to debunk Masson's views about Freud and the seduction theory. They've taken quite an aggressive stance against Masson, and Esterson is carrying this over into the article. The COI guideline does say that, 'Using material you yourself have written or published is allowed within reason, but only if it is notable and conforms to the content policies', but in my view Esterson is not doing this in a way that conforms to content policies (eg, BLP). Skoojal (talk) 06:12, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

Do you have a source for your characterization of this group of scholars? ·:· Will Beback ·:· 06:45, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

What a question. I'm honestly not sure how to respond to that. All I'll say for the moment is that this is my impression of them, having read some of what they've written. The titles of some of their articles alone would support this. "Jeffrey Masson's Assault on Truth" is part of one of them. That's what I'd call aggressive. Skoojal (talk) 06:49, 23 September 2008 (UTC)