Misplaced Pages

Revision as of 05:13, 8 April 2009

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Note that this talkpage may be semiprotected due to disruption by anonymous users. If you have a very new account, chances are that you do not absolutely need to send me a personal message before you have made your first ten edits elsewhere. currently unprotected, courtesy of AuburnPilot (talk · contribs). Also, if you want to discuss an encyclopedic topic, feel free to attract my attention by using article talkpages. I usually do react to e-mails, but as a rule I prefer to keep my interactions regarding Misplaced Pages above-the-board and up for everyone to see. This is also the reason for which I absolutely reject IRC admin discussions, and why I am unsure about the merit of the Misplaced Pages mailing-list. Decisions regarding the administration of Misplaced Pages in my opinion should be made on-wiki, not off.

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Sanskrit versus Prakrit inscriptions

Sanskrit was deliberately not written down as early as Prakrit . This is from academic written sources, so to mention that both Sankrit and Prakrit were written from the same time is an absolute lie or misleading to those who read this article. I have more than one academic RS sources that back it up. Thanks Taprobanus (talk) 13:40, 17 November 2008 (UTC)

"Sanskrit and Prakrit" at the time were different registers of the same language, not actually different languages. The distinction is irrelevant for the purposes of the list. Still, your references may be a useful addition to clarify this point. --dab (𒁳) 16:30, 17 November 2008 (UTC)

Look at thissource, pleaseTaprobanus (talk) 17:01, 17 November 2008 (UTC)

That they were different registers of the same language is a fact. It is clear from the words that were applied to call them so. "saMskRtA vAk" was that word, and here saMskRta/adorned is an adjective describing the noun vAk/speech. Similarly prAkRta vAk(artless/ungrammatical speech) has prAkRta as an adjective of vAk. There was no language called just as "prAkRta". On the other hand, several prAkRta based languages evolved out of "prAkRtA vAk" which are identified as "prakrit languages".­ Kris (talk) 13:35, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

Cite or OR Taprobanus (talk) 15:44, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

I have no idea why you are telling me this seeing that I have just told you. The language under discussion is "Old Indic". It's "high" register is known as Sanskrit, its vernacular as Prakrit. --dab (𒁳) 16:02, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

Dab u's talk page has become a substitute for the article talk page. Should we move the contents to the article talk page ? second then should'nt the article then refer to old indic as the language attested not Sanskrit and Prakrit because the cite clearly says those who inscribed knew the difference and made a choice to do what they did ? Taprobanus (talk) 16:07, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

You had said in the article's talk page: "ffs, I don't want to "get" anywhere, I'm just protecting the article's integrity. WP:RS: Iravatham Mahadevan (2003). Early Tamil Epigraphy from the Earliest Times of 3rd BCE to the Sixth Century A.D. Cambridge, Harvard University Press. Any questions? dab (𒁳) 20:06, 23 July 2008 (UTC)". The reference in question] does not mention any of 3rd BCE at all, whether in the title or in the contents. It is a false reference. Iravatham Mahadevan has said nothing here of the sort that is attributed by the Dravidian zealots to him. ­ Kris (talk) 23:02, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

two points

Hi!

• Umm, the management of your talk page is entirely your business, and I would never suggest otherwise. But I have a reasonably speedy internet connection, and it takes noticeably longer to load your talk page than, say, CNN. Think of the poor slobs out there with dialup; it might take them even longer. So...perhaps... archiving a bit... might be considerate to others. But it's your call.
• Hey thanks for the edits to List of endangered languages in Europe, but you seem to be shedding languages as you go. Forex, you ditched Krymchak language asserting that it isn't spoken in Europe. I'm not a geographical genius, but I'm reasonably certain that the whole of Crimea is in Europe. Other languages seem to have been deleted as well....Ling.Nut 13:56, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

yeah, sorry about this, I was going to hand the archiving of this page to a bot soon... Regarding Krymchak, according to SIL, it is spoken in Uzbekistan (most), Georgia, Kazakhstan, ostensibly omitting the Crimea. It would seem that the language is already "extinct in Europe", and just hanginng on by its fingernails in Asia. Other languages I removed for lack of reference. I suppose this entire "endangered languages" thing should be rebuilt strictly based on the Red Book of Endangered Languages. dab (𒁳) 16:08, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

Turko-Mongol/Turko-Mongol

Hi dab. I liked your idea of redirecting these articles (Turko-Mongol, Turco-Mongol) to Mongol Empire or Mongol invasions. However, the article Turco-Mongol has been restored again, with some really dubious statements. Your advice is needed. Cheers. Tājik (talk) 14:45, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

I still agree it could be redirected, but I'm fine with the present disambiguation page too. dab (𒁳) 16:25, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

Jesus Christ in comparative mythology

Hi. I reverted back my edits on Jesus Christ in comparative mythology. You did not even give a reason for deleting the specifics of Harpur's accademia background, but anyways I added a source. I discussed the inclusion of the disagreement on entymology on the Talk:Jesus_Christ_in_comparative_mythology page. Madridrealy (talk) 15:15, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

Sanskrit

Could you do something about this please? I had merely added other classes of Sanskrit Compunds that were not mentioned earlier. Thanks ­ Kris (talk) 23:24, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

You have made mistakes with Sanskrit in the past, showing that it is best that you source your additions of this kind. Mitsube (talk) 23:28, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

I am sorry, but there is a reason we have a Sanskrit compounds article: it's so that the main article doesn't need to lose itself in discussing different types of dvandvas. Please see WP:SS. --dab (𒁳) 10:05, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

Obama Family lead

Consensus is on my side in the Obama Family article lead...Please do not edit again, otherwise your edits will be nothing but trolling.Sourcechecker419 (talk) 01:13, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

you really have no idea how this works, do you. --dab (𒁳) 10:02, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

You may wish to comment ...

You may wish to comment on this absurdity. I had already redirected it once per DICT, and the new "text" isn't getting any better. It also seems to be a significant copy of the .de article, with some cruft left out and new nonsense added. The .de page is apparently by the same newbie editor who is stuffing cruft here. It seems to be an endless loop ala .en wrote crap, which was copied to .it, which was copied to .de, which is now back on .en. -- Fullstop (talk) 05:57, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

Talk:India

I know u did comment to Dinesh but it kind of gets lost in the massive discussion. Would u mind commenting or moving your comments to the end of here. I would understand if you choose not to. thanks. Docku: What up? 16:31, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

Xiongnu

Can you take a look at the article quickly...users are pushing one viewpoint which has been discredited by serious scholars. --Nepaheshgar (talk) 20:46, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

• See the Talk:Xiongnu and this before. Best, E104421 (talk) 20:53, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

Note to summarize, there are many theories on their origin, but E104421 is trying to erase other theories from the intro. The article had a tag for months before I edited it. Where-as Nlu kept my categorization (which means he kept it) but kept the previous intro for further discussion (since I was WP:BOLD. Another use came and agreed with my info-box change and someone rated a B after I changed the intro. Please look at the diffs and let us know. With all the floating theories and specially Turkologists like Doerfer rejecting in the strongest term any connection with Altaic, it does not make sense to claim they were Altaic in the intro. So I created a category with all the current theories. You can judge based on the talkpage and the last edit I did which is more scientific. --Nepaheshgar (talk) 21:01, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

POV?

Oh please, obviously, you have done way more edits than me and you are trying to balance POVs, which is fine. One one hand you have someone pushing a Sanskritist Hindutva agenda and on the other hand you have me, someone trying to cite and write. Now just because you disagree with both of our edit contents does not mean both are POVs. It still means one is a POV and one is a normal edit. What you are trying to do is clubbing someone like Srkris and me on the same POV side, however, you are obviously missing the point since I do not enlarge labels, do not push POV, do not ruthlessly edit without proper citations, do not exaggerate the contents of the citation and most importantly not refrain from making appropriate talk page points. Replacing bias with content information does not make the content information bias.

I am a professional linguist and I am concerned about the nonsense being written here in the name of linguistics, which is actually pure POV garbage and random usage of terms without the faintest relevance to what it actually stands for, linguistically. All I am saying is this, please do not brand POV and a POV-cleanup together and push both of them off the cliff. In this process, you are discouraging cited edits and, in essence, the whole process of Misplaced Pages upgradation. ] (] · ]) 21:31, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

I am glad to hear you are a professional linguist. Then surely you have heard of the difference between a script and a language? You are adding nothing new. All you are doing is pushing the inclusion of material that has been covered for years at the proper location into an article where it is off topic. I agree your sources are valid. So please stop wasting my time and yours, and begin working on the articles to which they are actually relevant. --dab (𒁳) 22:14, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

I do understand what you mean when you talk about the difference between a script and a language. However, two points. Firstly, the script has been allegedly 'deciphered', perhaps not the full lexicon or syntactic structure, but a hint has been provided by all the decipherment claims about what language family or 'language' it belongs to, it is just that there is no consensus. Secondly, it is very much unfalsifiably arguable that this 'script' is not just an arbitrary collection of random symbols and that it corresponds to the writing system of a language, the decipherment claims of which have no consensus. It is a code, the characters stand for something, that much we can say, since it has a system. Certain characters corresponding to a certain semantic domain, which follow a pattern. You have a set of characters in pottery, another set in clay jars, etc. If all the disclaimers are mentioned and the claims also listed, it makes several things clear - that there is no consensus as to whether this corresponds to a language, or if it just a script, or if it is just garbage - all these viewpoints are presented in the Indus Script page. We make a cross reference to that and provide a very brief summary of the decipherment claims. I hope this helps. ] (] · ]) 03:18, 20 November 2008 (UTC)

no this doesn't help. It just establishes that you really want the Indus script to encode Dravidian. No, it isn't established that this is a script rather than a non-linguistic symbol system. Yes, your observations are perfectly notable to the Indus script article, but there is no coneivable reason why they should need to be duplicated at List of languages by first written accounts other than your personal obsession with the topic. We could just as well burden the list with full discussions of the Phaistos Disc or Linear A. --dab (𒁳) 08:33, 20 November 2008 (UTC)

I agree with your point about the Phaistos Disc. However, as I see your edits, you are deceiving me and reverting my edits in the Indus Script page in spite of mentioning that my citations are proper and that it should be in that page, is this some kind of a joke? Can you please explain that? There is a sense of partial consensus now, but you seem to be hell bent on tricking me out of this whole game. Are you also a part of the Sanskrit-Hindu POV agenda like User Srkris? Or do you really want consensus and NPOV? ] (] · ]) 10:13, 20 November 2008 (UTC)

I agree with you. I do disagree that I was pov pushing there, however, you have indeed pointed out that these mentions do not belong to this page but the Indus Script page. Thanks for all your efforts in cleaning up the scum. We can start our academic discussions there. Thanks again. ] (] · ]) 23:07, 20 November 2008 (UTC)

As a professional linguist, he is trying to bring in all his Original Research claims into wikipedia like saying that the indus script is a dravidian language??? and that there were tamil inscriptions on 6000BCE pots.­ Kris (talk) 07:54, 20 November 2008 (UTC)

Mind staying off a sensible discussion? I am a Sociolinguistics teacher and my current research (amongst others) is on the seven vowel system of Kikuyu language and other Bantu languages, which has nothing to do with IVC. Indus Script has been deciphered as many things and Dbachman himself agrees that the citations are proper and need a mention, the argument is about this article featuring that. So now you agree that the 'scratch marks' are suddenly inscriptions? IVC is not from 6000 BCE, so stop your usual exaggeration nonsense and start looking for bogus citations that quote Sanskrit as being from the freakin' 3rd millennium BCE to glorify it further. ] (] · ]) 10:13, 20 November 2008 (UTC)

Cut the holier than thou attitude, and try to make some sensible edits. That you are pushing your agenda by quoting irrelevant stuff in articles is quite clear, and doing it intentionally despite being a "holier than thou" sociolinguistics professor makes it all the more malicious. I would stay off your level of sensible discussion if you would mind keeping your agendas off wikipedia. And oh, I was referring to your forthcoming excavation reference with scratches on pots that are in Tamil dated to 6000 BCE now that you successfully claimed that there is a 600BCE inscription in Tamil Brahmi. It was not my claim that IVC (so-called) script dates to 6000BCE.­ Kris (talk) 16:07, 20 November 2008 (UTC)

Your history of five blocks, a thousand warnings and bad editing makes it evidently clear. Stop using phrases without the faintest understanding of what it means. You are just a charlatan, a mere troll running your Sanskrit-came-from-Mars agenda here without any clue of languages, whatsoever. I wish I was as jobless as you are, to actually spend so much time, organize it and inject the Sanskrit-Hindutva agenda in every page. ] (] · ]) 23:02, 20 November 2008 (UTC)

Potential superpowers

Hi, I'm one of the main users that works on the Potential Superpower pages as well as other Power in International Relation pages. I've noticed that you put up some things like merging, but didn't post it in the talk pages. However, I'd like to inform you that Potential Superpowers has it's own subsection. But since the entire thing of Academics discussing what's a superpower and, and what's a potential superpower and not. And unless we want Potential superpower taking up half the superpower pages, then we shouldn't merge. Lastly, the reason why it's considered Potential is because according to experts in the field of IR, Polisci, Geopolitics, these specific countries are the ones that are most talked about of what could be the next superpower, due to them having good ______ and ______, which falls under the futurology tag you added. However, some of the potential superpowers like China and EU, the entire community is mixed about those. For instance, Fareed Zakaria believes that China and EU are rising and might become superpowers in the near future, while Parag Khanna believes that China and EU are already superpower. And since the whole community is divided among that issue, it's considered a potential superpower. While some IR/Polisci/Geopolitic experts believe that America isn't a superpower any more, the majority still believe that America is still a superpower. Being a Potential Superpower is a category of power as it's more then a great power but not quite yet a superpower. Deavenger (talk) 01:04, 20 November 2008 (UTC)

Would appreciate some independent advice

on the kind of model we should use in dealing with pages that are being constructed to explore triliteral or triconsonantal roots in Semitic languages. I'm thinking of K-B-D and Q-D-Š. You have a broad and deep familiarity with pages on linguistics, and a glance at the issue to provide us with a larger perspective would be much appreiciated. The question is whether on every page a Hebrew paradigm should be used to illustrate the root, or not. I think a comparative paradigm is useful on a mother page e.g. Triliteral to which subpages can be linked, while on each sub-page, discursive description of each language's particular derivations is more economical than rote, and predictable paradigms. The alternative appears to me to invite several exponents or speakers of each semitic language to follow up by plunking in an illustrative conjugation repeatedly, to parallel the precedent set with the introduction of Hebrew, a principle that would tend to distract attention from aspects of pure philology and the semantic-cultural 'Sprachfeld', and push the pages into ethnic elbowing for space and attention, of the usual kind - a danger I, for one, see in that proposal. Still, I may be wrong, and would appreciate guidance. Thank you.Nishidani (talk) 14:50, 20 November 2008 (UTC)

I am not sure I follow you completely. In my view, dedicated articles on specific rules need to remain the exception, viz. reserved for cases of extremely notable roots. Less notable roots should be relegated to wiktionary. Once we have established that we do want a Misplaced Pages article on a specific root, we should of course try and collect material from as many Semitic languages as we can.

At present, we have nine such articles, and there are some even among these that I would contest:

• A-D-N should be on the world for "lord" (adonai), not the root.
• K-F-R, K-T-B should just go to wiktionary
• Ḥ-M-D could be a disambiguation page
• Ḥ-R-M may be worth keeping, but it could also be a disambiguation page.

I also feel that the List of Proto-Semitic stems would be better off on wiktionary, like wikt:Appendix:Proto-Indo-European roots. --dab (𒁳) 09:37, 21 November 2008 (UTC)

Thanks indeed for the input. I'll notify the page. The work done there has been substantial, and is new, and as an outsider looking on, I'd be reluctant to see the enthusiasm shown by a very knowledge pair of contributors repaid by some rapid measure of cancellation, removal or relocation. I hope there is time to allow us to see how it develops, before pondering the merits or otherwise of shifting it to, for example, wiktionary. Best Nishidani (talk) 15:50, 21 November 2008 (UTC)

Names of Syriac Christians

Just wanted to say that you've done a very good job with the article, it now reflects the dispute in a much better way than the previous version of the article. I also wanted to say that I myself and Assyria 90 (talk · contribs) will support a move for the Assyrian people article to Assyrian/Syriac people, and I hope, and I'm guessing, more will do. The TriZ (talk) 15:39, 21 November 2008 (UTC)

thanks -- I am glad we seem to be making progress with this. --dab (𒁳) 15:55, 21 November 2008 (UTC)

non-exclusive ethnic groups

DB, normally I would say your deletions of material from this article are entirely justified. But at this specific moment, I think they are inappropriate. I just nominated the article for deletion. By deleting material after my nomination, people will be assessing an article that I did not actually nominate for deletion. In other words, as long as the voting process for deleting the article is on, I ask you to restore the contents you deleted. let people read and comment on the article as it was when I nominated it for deletion and then vote on whether it should be deleted or not. Then, if the consensus is to keep the article, you can delete material that is not policy compliant and in most cases I am sure I will completely support you. Slrubenstein | Talk 16:29, 21 November 2008 (UTC)

I don't understand, what you are AfDing is the article title, not specific content. If the article content is broken, it can be fixed without AfD. An AfD is about articles that cannot be fixed. Removing uncited information makes it only so much clearer that the topic has no merit. It also looks like your AfD will succeed without problems anyway. --dab (𒁳) 17:41, 21 November 2008 (UTC)

Okay; my reasoning was: the contents removed shows what people thought the article was or should be about. Slrubenstein | Talk 18:51, 21 November 2008 (UTC)

By the way, I have never heard of "state nation" as a topic; we already have an article on "nation-state." We do not yet have an article on "ethnonational" which is a term I have heard a lot, maybe you would want to create on on that or ethno-nation? Slrubenstein | Talk 18:53, 21 November 2008 (UTC)

I take it "ethnonational" would be the same as "nation state"? No, I haven't heard of "state-nation" myself, but it's the only bit of information that had any kind of reference. Apparently just a term coined to convey non-nation-states. Meaning that, as in the US, allegiance to ethnicity is replaced by allegiance to nationality. --dab (𒁳) 18:55, 21 November 2008 (UTC)

Vedic refers to only the attested and not unattested sanskrit of the vedic corpus

Talk:Vedic_Sanskrit#Attested_vs_unattested_language

Please participate in the discussion and record the reasons for your repeated reverts. ­ Kris (talk) 18:38, 21 November 2008 (UTC)

please stop your childish and uneducated WP:SYN and spin campaign. --dab (𒁳) 18:43, 21 November 2008 (UTC)

You need some serious learning, so please go and see http://www.utexas.edu/cola/centers/lrc/RV/ ­ Kris (talk) 19:20, 21 November 2008 (UTC)

We'll find out who is the child later. Thanks ­ Kris (talk) 19:21, 21 November 2008 (UTC)

I am not taking your permission for each edit that I make when I properly cite academic references. Apart from accepting the few corrections you occasionally do to my edits, you are a nothing to me. You be careful not to step on my toes as I am not your typical Indo-Aryan buffoon you are accustomed to play with, as per your own admission. ­ Kris (talk) 20:18, 21 November 2008 (UTC)

Adjectives

We say the "English people" or the "English," but we don't say "Englishs" with an "s." Same is for French, Japanese, Chinese, etc. Adjectives do not take "s" in English. HD86 (talk) 19:25, 21 November 2008 (UTC)

I see you are reading the article now. Hint, there is no need to notify me of every paragraph you have understood. Although I am glad you seem to manage to use Misplaced Pages to improve your understanding, this makes you part of, well, about a billion literate netizens. --dab (𒁳) 19:31, 21 November 2008 (UTC)

Instead of all that poetry of yours, you could have just thought before undoing my correction of "Syriacs." HD86 (talk) 19:44, 21 November 2008 (UTC)

You really haven't grasped the concept of actually visiting links you are pointed to, have you. Copy-paste from the section I have referred you to about four times now:

• Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL books: 620; scholar 179
• Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL books: 53; scholar: 10

You are welcome. --dab (𒁳) 19:47, 21 November 2008 (UTC)

In dictionaries , the word Syriac as a noun means only the language, much as the nouns "English" and "French" do. I'm sure you are aware of that, but my point is that dictionaries are probably a better reference. HD86 (talk) 19:58, 21 November 2008 (UTC)

WTF, can you read, Mr. non sequitur? I don't know if English is your first language, but you certainly aren't behaving as if cogitation was your principal pastime. You may want to read up on a thing called nominalization. Happended to adjectives such as "Syrian", "Egyptian", but not in the same way to "English" or "French" (excepting Frenchies). Oh, but I forgot, you don't follow links. Please just leave me alone now, ok? --dab (𒁳) 20:01, 21 November 2008 (UTC)

You just violated 3RR

{{uw-3rr}}

I'm sorry, before I could warn you after your second revert in Rigveda, you were too quick in reverting.­ Kris (talk) 20:32, 21 November 2008 (UTC)

Actually, I vaguely recall from primary school that more than three = 4 at least, so it is probably too early to feel sorry. Colchicum (talk) 21:13, 21 November 2008 (UTC)

indeed you are sooty, dear pot. --dab (𒁳) 08:57, 22 November 2008 (UTC)

Persistent vandalism of Sanskrit page

Why, in spite of several of your mentions, are you allowing Sanskrit to become a Voice of India featured article? Srkris pointed the link India to the Indian Subcontinent and is constantly involved in enlarging labels. In his edit summary, he cites it as a copyedit, which is basically a dirty trick. How is it that you don't seem to be concerned about the persistent vandalism happening there all this time, in spite of your repeated assurances? Please help me there. Thanks ] (] · ]) 03:43, 22 November 2008 (UTC)

I know. Srkris is just about done here. --dab (𒁳) 08:56, 22 November 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for your work. ] (] · ]) 23:52, 22 November 2008 (UTC)

Orphaned non-free media (Image:RIG G-172.jpg)

Thanks for uploading Image:RIG G-172.jpg. The media description page currently specifies that it is non-free and may only be used on Misplaced Pages under a claim of fair use. However, it is currently orphaned, meaning that it is not used in any articles on Misplaced Pages. If the media was previously in an article, please go to the article and see why it was removed. You may add it back if you think that that will be useful. However, please note that media for which a replacement could be created are not acceptable for use on Misplaced Pages (see our policy for non-free media).

If you have uploaded other unlicensed media, please check whether they're used in any articles or not. You can find a list of 'image' pages you have edited by clicking on the "my contributions" link (it is located at the very top of any Misplaced Pages page when you are logged in), and then selecting "Image" from the dropdown box. Note that all non-free media not used in any articles will be deleted after seven days, as described on criteria for speedy deletion. Thank you. BJBot (talk) 05:43, 23 November 2008 (UTC)

You might be interested...

...in the most recent discussion on my talk page, since it involves you. AKRadecki 06:03, 23 November 2008 (UTC)

Hittite mythology

In this edit you introduced an unfinished sentence "The Sun goddess of Arinna (Xanthos)", not containing a verb and not ending with a full stop. Could you complete it?  --Lambiam 18:26, 23 November 2008 (UTC)

yes, sorry, I suppose this was just a brief edit to place the link. Feel free to flesh it out. --dab (𒁳) 08:47, 24 November 2008 (UTC)

Template:About lists of countries and territories

Hi. Template:About lists of countries and territories is up deletion again at Misplaced Pages:Templates for deletion/Log/2008 November 23#Template:About lists of countries and territories. Input welcome. -- Quiddity (talk) 19:00, 24 November 2008 (UTC)

Would appreciate your guidance

Hi dab, I'm placing a message here that was mistakenly left in your user page. -- Sundar 08:06, 27 November 2008 (UTC)

Hi

As a new wikipedian,I was keen to create two articles on a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and a fellow of the Royal Society of Canada . Both are highly respected societies but I am trepidated to note that there has been some debate as to whether their members merit sufficient notability!!!To my way of thinking they do but I would welcome your advice as an adminsitrator .

Regards

(RNaidu (talk) 07:09, 27 November 2008 (UTC))

I did look up the evidence on schizpophrenia but the person that I had in mind was Ashok Vijh,a very eminent scientists and a member of the Royal Society of Canada

who also headed section 3 and Roddam Narasimha a Chennai based scientist who is a member of the American Aacdemy of Arts and Sciences. —(RNaidu (talk) 07:31, 28 November 2008 (UTC)) (UTC)

dab, I know you've responded, but you may be interested talk-- Hoary (talk) 13:04, 27 November 2008 (UTC)

I am not interested in this. The article was deleted. If RNaidu wants to undelete it, let him go to WP:DRV. --dab (𒁳) 07:35, 28 November 2008 (UTC)

Civility, Denial Hate Speech

First and foremost I would like to thank you for helping out on assyrian articles. Your input and patience is appreciated. I want to bring to your attention this. HD86 has made numerous comments such as "The Assyrians are EXTINCT people of ancient Mesopotamia whose name was stolen by some modern politicians and used in reference to the modern Syriacs. To label the modern Syriacs by "Assyrians" and to claim that "The Assyrian people trace their origins to the population of the pre-Islamic Levant" is indeed stupidity in its purest form." These comments are inflammatory, racist, unhistprical and outrageous. This user continues to deny that a whole race even exists. He needs to be wiki disciplined. This is unacceptable inflammtory denialist behavior. The equivalent of his statments would be that jews or arabs do not exist. Do you not see the point. His languge is very hateful and dimeaning to those of us involved in the project. If you take a look at his history he has similar incompetent statemetns regarding other controverisal topics. I ask for assistance in order to remove this hateful user from this discussion. He has denied the existence of an entire race that through ample ancient and modern evidence has existed for thousands of years. I will be waiting for your response. Ninevite (talk) 20:50, 27 November 2008 (UTC)

yeah, well, we are familiar with the dispute of Aramaeanism vs. Assyrianism, aren't we -- no need to keep reenacting it on-wiki. Apart from that, I recommend WP:DENY. This HD86 character will get himself blocked all by himself if he keeps going like this. --dab (𒁳) 21:56, 27 November 2008 (UTC)

I was just visiting your page to request for your attention in this matter, but it seems someone has beaten me to it. Gabr-el 00:12, 28 November 2008 (UTC)

Well it's kind of pathetic though. You have no problem of denying that Syriac is an ethnicity and no problem with the "racists" that talks about an extinct Aramean people. So please, keep the double standards for yourself and an advise for you Ninevite, get your head out of your ass and please, realize that you're as much biased or probably more biased than any other user involved in this matter. You saying HD86 and my vote is to be neglected, it just says alot... The TriZ (talk) 03:16, 28 November 2008 (UTC)

I suggest you take your own advice by "get your head out of your ass and please, realize that you're as much biased or probably more biased than any other user involved in this matter. You saying HD86 and my vote is to be neglected, it just says alot... " First and formeost you lack communicational skills to speak with people. You are in dire need of some matters. I never doubted your vote on the talk page I respect your outlook on this issue. I suggest you have someone who speaks proper enlgish to read you my comment. I have a problem with the user denying that entire people do not exist. This is inflammatory behavior that is not accepted on an encylcopedi. You lack communication skills, civility, matters, you attack other users who disagree with your minority view, and the only thing you have contributed most to is deleted page that was considered to be one of the largest forks in the encylopedia. This user is clearly biased towards this topic. I can care less If this title mover over to the Assyrian/Syriac People I am entitled to my opinion however. Thirdly you have no absolutely no right to tell me what to do. Your vulgar comment above shows how unreliable you are in cooperating with other people. I do not deny there are people out there who claim a different ethnicity, I have a problem when people such as yourself attack and wiki stalk users who have worked on for this project to preserve and expand articles on a peoples history. This will be the only comment I leave for you because you are an incompetent person who attacks users without due process of law. This comment was not by any means pt forth for you so I suggest minding your own business when it comes to comments and remarks directed towards other users. Know your place in a conversation. This users history has shown nothing but conflict. He is of three or four people who have attributed to an article Aramaean Syriac People that was unhistorical and unsourced. I suggest this situacion disinclude users who have previously sought to only destroy and devalidate established articles. This user will stop at nothing until Assyrian Peoples page is the way he wants it. Alot of unbalanced wieght has been given to this user who has seeked only to fulfill his or her minority views for far too long. I have grown tired of this issue, on the grounds that users like this will stop at nothing until they have completely changed a page to liking despite all the sources provided. I will take a leave of absence until I have recooperated from this users blatant vulgur attacks not only against me but against many other users he or she seems to disagree with. Select you languge wisely when speaking to people you do not know. Your behavior will eventullay catch up to you in getting blocked or banned. Ninevite (talk) 06:26, 28 November 2008 (UTC)

Guys, I realize I am the only one here with no personal stakes in the question. Can we still try to not keep reenacting the dispute on-wiki and just sit down and find an amicable compromise, please. It's your only option other than endless circular name-calling. --dab (𒁳) 07:21, 28 November 2008 (UTC)

Yep, I'm up for that dab. Though I must say Ninevite gave me alot of laughs... and oh, by the way, I barely did anything in the Aramean-Syriac people article, and it was historical and referenced, that wasn't the issue. And what did I get wrong with this:

"The main people who disagree with this title are users who have created and contributed to unhistorical articles like Aramean Syriac People who only exist in name and not ethnicity. Article should be voted by users and admins who have not been directly involved in this topic to get the most nuetral vote.".

This is you denying Syriac (Aramean) as an etnicity and saying my vote shouldn't be count since I'm indeed involved in this topic. Are you not? If you are, then why did you vote and why are you encouraging other Assyrian users to vote on keeping the article as it is? The TriZ (talk) 12:01, 28 November 2008 (UTC)

Dab, if you need somebody uninvolved to swing the banhammer in any particular direction, just let me know. (I can imagine outside admins are not too likely to wade into this mess and independently sort out the wheat from the chaff all on their own, and you yourself probably consider yourself too involved to take admin action yourself, but as I said, just give me a hint where to look and I will.) Fut.Perf. ☼ 15:29, 28 November 2008 (UTC)

More on Ortega

I came accross Ortega yesterday, and thought it looked pretty dodgy; a trip through the history showed that the work you and User:Alex contributing from L.A. had been undone by User:71.163.112.21 and User:ZeroRT3GA (again). As one who was an outsider to the original dispute (but who has since seen my cleanup attempts reverted), I've left my view of the edits on Talk:Ortega and User talk:71.163.112.21, though I suspect the editor in question is in WP:OWN mode. Ergative rlt (talk) 21:55, 28 November 2008 (UTC)

Umm...

I think you missed something -- Fullstop (talk) 18:22, 29 November 2008 (UTC)

Sanskrit

{{uw-3rr}}--neon white talk 18:55, 30 November 2008 (UTC)

Ortega

Look, I am new to Misplaced Pages, so sorry for not properly posting on your discussion page. When I first posted on Misplaced Pages, I had all the information I needed for Ortega, yet I needed to leave out some gaps and what not to give it a vague outlook. I know you mean well, and you added information that I never thought about, thank you, but some of it is rather mistaken. I never added other romance languages because, they tie to Urtica, but do not mean Ortega in the literal sense. But I can see where you are making your ties. I thank you for that. Yes there are 3 different sources to the name, which have been added through out the years, they are all considered correct. I put in the royal side figuring that is what people would like to know. Yes, my family does come from the royal side, I have all documentation to prove it that I had to send for from Spain and Mexico, with numerous other shields added and what not. So yes there are other shields, but the most commonly accepted worldwide is the Military revolt Shield. Anything that you had found about me, please remove from all talks or discussions, I do not want my name thrown across the internet, I posted on genealogy.com to find other relatives. You can, I encourage the use of the info you found. But please note that the split shield is Aragonese Infanzones, because it married into it. The other (my family crest), which is the quartered kept all ties to the original crest even though it was changed in Aragon, which does make it original to Aragon, does not mean the lineage began there. I have added the information you have found on the other romance languages to my personal studies into my family name, which is not on my user page. Thank You. ~ZeroRT3GA

School of Nisibis

I would appreciate it if you fix the academic citations I have placed on this webpage. For whatever reason it is not working. The weblinks are on the discussion page. I've tried placing the ref signs but it refuses to work. Here they are http://books.google.com/books?id=pXstU5Kt-_kC&pg=PA182&dq=school+of+nisibis+assyrian#PPA181,M1 http://books.google.com/books?id=_7RD2jwMU2wC&pg=PA91&dq=school+of+nisibis+assyrian Best Regards Ninevite (talk) 05:29, 1 December 2008 (UTC)

Comments

You may wish to comment on this, since you are also an involved and frustrated editor. Also, I did not bring up this issue. ] (] · ]) 01:26, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

• I've suggested an alternative of a 3-6 month ban for reasons I've stated there, and one administrator has supported this measure. Your input/vote would be appreciated on this alternative. Ncmvocalist (talk) 17:02, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

'Move to Commons' tag in German

Dear Admin Dbachman,

• Can you help place the German form of the 'move to commons' tag for this picture: ? I don't know what the tag is in German. I can't move it to Commons without the tag, It could be used in the article on Kharga Oasis which lacks any pictures. What do you think? --Leoboudv (talk) 04:05, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

I would just upload it to commons and then tag it with de:Vorlage:NowCommons. I am not sure why you are saying you can't upload it. --dab (𒁳) 10:14, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

Assyrian Genocide

Hello, I just want to point out that the Assyrian Genocide ] has been vandalized by some Aramean nationalists ... From the point of 'Conditions before WWI' all the cases where the article said Assyrians, the nationalists have changed it to say Arameans!! This needs to be dealt with. Thank-you. Malik Danno (talk) 17:27, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

yes, but you need to understand that we will be able to reduce such vandalism by using "Assyrian/Syriac" throughout, because we will avoid needlessly annoying the Aramaeanists. --dab (𒁳) 17:42, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

Dab you have to realize that the Assyrian Genocide is not that recognized in the world. The little number of people (politicians etc) who are aware of such a genocide know it as the Assyrian Genocide. It would be very confusing for all those who are trying to learn about the genocide for it to be changed to the Assyrian/Syriac Genocide. You also have to realize that this 'aramaeanism' is brought on by 'some' and not many. Even though they are a minority, unfortunately the loudest voice is heard and that's why they seem so prominent. It has internationally (even though small) known as the Assyrian Genocide and should be kept as such. We also can't forget the Chaldean members who siffered under the genocide as well. Leaving it Assyrian and having it explained under that Nestorians, Chaldeans and Syriac Members were genocided is better than putting Assyrian/Syriac Genocide (which brings to a point that Assyrians are somewhat different than Syriacs) and not including Chaldeans (because if Syriacs are somewhat different than Assyrians then so are Chaldeans). I hope you know what i mean by that because it does sound somewhat confusing. Malik Danno (talk) 01:41, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

yes? I never suggested the article should be moved to "Assyrian/Syriac genocide"? The victims of the "Assyrian genocide" (1910s terminology) were the "Assyrian/Chaldean/Syriac people" (2000s terminology). --dab (𒁳) 09:59, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

I can also easily say the same thing "The victims of the "Assyrian genocide" (1910s terminology) were the "Assyrian" (2000s terminology)." You are not looking at both sides in dealing with this issue. Sure there is a minority of Chaldeans and Syriacs who hate the Assyrian name, but why favour them over all the Assyrians (incuding the majority of Chaldeans and Syriacs who call themselves Assyrian). You have 2 or 3 members here who are from the same region who are fighting this constantly! Why listen to those guys and not listen to all others? You have to realize that they have an agenda going. Malik Danno (talk) 18:02, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

I am not "favouring" anyone, which is why I used the awkward "Assyrian/Chaldean/Syriac people" used by the US government. If nobody likes this term, that's at least a good sign in the sense that nobody is being favoured. Such is WP:NPOV. --dab (𒁳) 09:29, 5 December 2008 (UTC)

Dab, this guy is lacking reality insight. I hope your not taking anything he says for real. The TriZ (talk) 09:21, 6 December 2008 (UTC)

AN/I

There is a post discussing you on AN/I, here.// roux   editor review 18:00, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

Aramaen-Syriac people

Can you fix the redirect for this? Thanks. Gabr-el 00:14, 5 December 2008 (UTC)

done. --dab (𒁳) 09:27, 5 December 2008 (UTC)

I hope you can overlook my anger recently. Gabr-el 17:28, 8 December 2008 (UTC)

User:Aramaen-Syriac

This user is not respecting the status quo. We need it protected again, and any changes can be implemented by yourself should you feel we have extra verifiable information to add. Gabr-el 23:14, 6 December 2008 (UTC)

Lendering and Farrokh

Hi, I seem to have become involved in some edit wars here.... You redirected the Lendering article, but I have presented arguments on its talk page towards Lendering's notability. With all that is going on, I have had no time to improve the article yet, but I have undone the redirect. Yesterday, Nepaheshgar made three reverts, which I re-reverted. Looking at the edit history now, I see that I may inadvertently even have broken 3RR, because a while before I reverted Babakexorramdin. Perhaps I should revert my last revert so as not to have violated 3RR? Whatever the case for the 3RR, the larger issue is these two articles. Up till some hours ago, I supported your merge of the Farrokh article, but this morning I felt that it was not logical to continue do so, because the argument I use for the Lendering article (no consensus for merge) seems to apply to the Farrokh article, too. However, as your latest edit summary there indicates, the difference is that the Farrokh article went to AfD and was closed as no consensus. The Lendering article never has been to AfD, so I think a position that Farrokh (whom I still think is not or at best very marginally notable) should remain merged and Lendering should not, may make sense. Any advice on how to handle this situation would be welcome. I'm starting to get rather tired of this whole situation as I am not really interested in Iran, Peria, or anything related with what somebody may have done to another somebody 3000 years ago. (And although I am very much interested in reading about history, it is beyond me why anyone could think that something that happened that long ago has any direct implications for today's world). I just got here, I guess, because of the original Farrokh AfD being listed on the list of Academics and educators-related deletion discussions in which I rgularly participate. Sorry for the long message! Cheers, --Crusio (talk) 10:07, 5 December 2008 (UTC)

I have tagged the article, which is good practice, and would give you every opportunity to produce evidence of notability. The actual merger was done by Nepaheshgar (talk · contribs), apparently one of the Iranian kids miffed at Lendering for the Farrokh review. Oh well. Note that it is undisputed that there should be one "Lendering article". The question is, should it reside at livius.org, at Livius Onderwijs or at Jona Lendering. My position is that Lendering's notability is mostly due to his "Livius" stuff, and hence a full WP:BIO article is unwarranted. This makes Lendering different from Farrokh, where it isn't clear why there should be any article dedicated to him or his work. I am afraid I cannot follow you in that there should be two Lendering articles, one about his life and one about his work. --dab (𒁳) 10:13, 5 December 2008 (UTC)

Well, my reasoning is that Lendering is a notable author and therefore there should be a bio article on him. Livius Onderwijs is a school at multiple locations. Given that every highschool, no matter how obscure, seems to be automatically notable, I would think that this goes for LO, too. Mind you, I don't agree with the highschool thing, but as long as that is current use, we should at least try to be consistent. But I'm certainly open to other opinions on this. --Crusio (talk) 11:22, 5 December 2008 (UTC)

I think that Livius Onderwijs is just an association of teachers who gives courses of lectures at various venues. Whether it should have its own article is another question, but the current article is more associated with Lendering than it should be I think. dougweller (talk) 11:30, 5 December 2008 (UTC)

I really don't care what the article is called. I am convinced that livius.org is a notable website, being one of the premier online resources on classical antiquity. This alone should establish there should be one article discussing Lendering, perhaps simply called livius.org. I am doubtful whether there is enough notability here to warrant a second article. Mergism is a good thing. We can also merge discussion of livius.org and LO into a Jona Lendering article, if we make clear that justification for the article derives at least partly from WP:WEB, not WP:BIO. What I am interested here is making a point addressed to our Iranian patriots that we're not using double standards. If we are sceptical about the Kaveh Farrokh article passing WP:BIO, we need to apply the same criteria to Jona Lendering. --dab (𒁳) 11:34, 5 December 2008 (UTC)

Oh, absolutely, standards should be the same, I agree! I'll have another look at both articles as they currently stand (just see Dougweller's edit on Livius being an association) with an eye on merging. Perhaps I have been to rash, I admit to getting very irritated, which is not the best state for well-considered actions/decisions.... Not today any more, however, I have several meetings coming up and a lot of real-world work to do :-) --Crusio (talk) 11:44, 5 December 2008 (UTC)

Just a rapid final remark for today: I think the most sense is to merge all to Jona Lendering. LO is not run by Livius.org, and it doesn't make much sense to list Lendering's books in neither LO nor Livius.org. Livius.org may have notability independent of Lendering, but LO probably not (yet). However, the common point to all these things is Lendering, so I think it would make most sense to redirect LO and Livius.org to Jona Lendering. --Crusio (talk) 11:51, 5 December 2008 (UTC)

Atheism in Hinduism

Hi, as one of the contributors of this article, could you please provide your opinion on this "title change" proposal here. Thanks. Docku: What up? 15:54, 6 December 2008 (UTC)

Assyrian/Chaldean/Syriac Religion

You have to edit this section of the page, there is clear bias in this page and the sources are not reliable. 3/4 of the section only deals with Syriac Orthodox/Chatholic Churches and there is even mention of Maronite Church (Even though they aren't part of the Assyrian/Chaldean/Syriac people). Majority of Assyrians aren't Syriacs as the first line points out, but rather Chaldean Catholics! Also there aren't 4 000 000 Assyrian Syriac Orthodox members as there is a larger Syriac Orthodox population which is Indian. Also the editor is using the largest figure from the source ignoring all other figures (100 000). Edit this ASAP please. Malik Danno (talk) 03:07, 7 December 2008 (UTC)

I suggest you look at and change all the negative inputs which User:AramaeanSyriac has put from 15:51, 6 December 2008 to 16:08, 6 December 2008 and again from 21:52, 6 December 2008 to 23:02, 6 December 2008 on the Assyrian/Chaldean/Syriac People page. We need to stop this form of vandalism from continuing on this page. How can you have this guy banned from Misplaced Pages? Malik Danno (talk) 03:13, 7 December 2008 (UTC)

The question is, how can we keep you out of the article? You are a far much bigger threat to the article. The TriZ (talk) 10:22, 7 December 2008 (UTC)

yeah, both Malik and ArameanSyriac aren't exactly doing well, are they. In the best Misplaced Pages tradition, their effects will tend to cancel out. It's not a problem, TriZ. Help me with maintaining sanity and reasonable balance, and the pov-pushing will just go away over time. --dab (𒁳) 10:30, 7 December 2008 (UTC)

Dab I must say that your bais in this matter has now become unbelievable. It is clear with every new post that you make. How can you ever say that I am like ArameanSyriac when it comes to vandalizing pages. Did you just not see what he posted on the Assyrian/Chaldean/Syriac/Maronite/Malankara/Malabar/Nestorian/Jacobite/Babylonian/Aramean/Armenian/Iraqi Christian People page. He posted paragraph after Paragraph of bias information about Syriacs. We agreed with the Name Assyrian/Chaldean/Syriac and after having decided that you see how they take advantage of the situation and try to turn the page into a "Syriac" page by flooding the page with only Syriac information while discounting all Assyrian and Chaldean related issues. I did not delete and Vandalize the page after that happened, rather I posted on the admin's page who is responsible to handle the page. His (your) response was to do nothing and critique the person who informed you of what just happened. I regret now not Vandalizing the page because I can clearly see that Vandamism is the only way that Misplaced Pages (most bias piece of shit ever) works. You are not capable of dealing with any such problems as you have made the situation 20x worse. You clearly do nothing about "Aramean" vandalism on the Assyrian page, while you claim those who change the page after giving a reason for the change and after a discussion for vandalizing. We agreed with the name Assyrian?Chaldean/Syriac people as a name yet the page has become about Syriacs and you do nothing about it. You have a clear Bias and that is why I don't want you to deal with the Assyrian/Chaldean/Syriac People page and get a "REAL" admin to deal with the problem. Malik Danno (talk) 23:16, 7 December 2008 (UTC)

get a grip man. Your fit of temper only reconfirms the rampant immaturity in this "dispute". I am reverting ArameanSyriac on sight, ok? But him being a bad guy doesn't automatically make you a good guy just because you happen to be from a different camp. You fail to identify my "bias". Seeing that I am being attacked from both sides, I must be doing rather well. --dab (𒁳) 06:09, 8 December 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for editing your post at patriarchy

I had a response that I won't post now because it's no longer relevant, but this is what it was:

I do beg your pardon! You are one of the Wiki editors I admire most. I am saddened to read your comment here, even if you were right about me, it is not the right thing for you to post this kind of speculation regarding a fellow editor as an assertion. It's easy to overlook it, thankfully, because I'm grateful that you're willing to be honest about your opinion. Better I know it, than live suspecting it. But Herr Bachmann, there's not a shred of plausibility to your view. If you would care to pursue this further, please feel free to do so, on my talk page, not at this page, where it doesn't belong. I'll remove my comment if you'll remove yours. Tchüss Alastair Haines (talk) 12:03, 7 December 2008 (UTC)

I must say that it doesn't surprise me at all that you modified your post without being asked. Herzlichen Danke. We agree about more than we disagree about, but we do disagree about some things, and our disagreements will be settled by sources. You are a gentleman and a scholar, let us both avoid politics and personal comments. My German stinks Dieter, but I'm an endless admirer of the work German speaking scholars have done in the ANE over centuries. Alastair Haines (talk) 12:03, 7 December 2008 (UTC)

Yes, I agree with you, both history and sociology can be added to the article to good effect ... if sourced well. As I think you realise now, I don't oppose addition of sourced material, nor even unsourced material where it is in line with my own limited knowledge or goes beyond it; but isn't it our privelege to challenge things we think questionable against other sources? I know you understand. I observed your deft handling of the ehtnographies to produce the start of a useful matrilineal etc. societies list. Perhaps I will seek to extend that list at some point, when I can find sources to support it. I do hope you understand I am not the man you were supposing, and you are very welcome indeed to have felt miffed by my removal of your contribution to the lead. Such emotions are human. I trust you'll forgive me for not asking permission to have done what I did. You are a quick worker yourself. ;) Alastair Haines (talk) 12:17, 7 December 2008 (UTC)

no problem - I appreciate your constructive attitude. --dab (𒁳) 12:19, 7 December 2008 (UTC)

Seriously Dieter, I feel honoured to meet you. I will read your article with interest, and perhaps start following your work more closely. Published "psuedo scholarship" in all manner of subjects is a reality. The Wiki foundations allow for this to be handled responsibly, or I wouldn't still be here. I expect I'll learn much from observing your treatment of such things. Your articles are likely to contain much that I don't already know, but need to know. I'll be working on my thesis rather than at Wiki over the next month, but I look forward to chatting again later. Regards Alastair Haines (talk) 12:34, 7 December 2008 (UTC)

Hi Dieter, I just removed your tags at List of patriarchal cultures that have been claimed to be matriarchal. You tagged the list without leaving discussion. I left a note on the talk page some time ago against the merge. One of my concerns is that you did a great job separating out the matrilocal and matrilineal societies and starting a new article for those. Why spoil that work?

On reflection, I really liked your new list and will probably end up extending it to the probably dozens of matrilineal or matrilocal societies, because I'm intrigued by them, would like to learn more and might as well document that as I go.

As for the (de-)tagged list, it is a very specific list, expanded from Goldberg's work and suited to the articles on his books and to the patriarchy and matriarchy articles.

I'm pretty open, both about what name we give that list, and about whether it is held as a List article, a template, or is retained in the body of one or all of the articles to which it applies. The multiplicity of articles it applies to argues for it being a template or a list, its specificity argues against a free-standing list. I still think a collapsible table in a template is the best solution, but different people have had different views. Others have moved it from one to another at various times, and I've not been fussed to comment on those. It doesn't really matter, I think, and it doesn't really matter if people move it from place to place over time either.

Regarding the content, it's all bibliography or quotes, so content is RS. The selection criteria are also from RSs. As for the title, it describes precisely the selection criteria for the list: societies alleged to be matriarchal (by Bachofen et al.), but considered patriarchal by ethnographers and current anthropological consensus. It is a POV list, the POV of anthropological consensus, afaik, the only notable alternative POV is recorded, because on reflection I felt WP:UNDUE or not, an ethnographer dissenting against her own observations being used as evidence against her own conclusions is inherently notable, and the point is not laboured or blown out of proportion.

I imagine you're busy. Perhaps sometime when it suits you, you could drop a note at my talk page or at the list to discuss this further should you feel it worth it or necessary.

Also at some time, I'd appreciate discussing your view that modern western societies are egalitarian rather than technically patriarchal. I not only have many sources that think differently, but some are quite cute, like a feminist bemoaning women in New Zealand being silent about ongoing patriarchy, because they assume a female prime minister, governor general and chief of the high court prove equality, which, in her opinion is not the reality of NZ society in general. I can see room for diversity of views here, but would like a chance to hear your opinion and interact more closely ... but at your convenience. Urgency spoils the possibility of full and fair discussion.

Best regards, Alastair Haines (talk) 09:20, 15 December 2008 (UTC)

Courtesy note: AN/I

There is a post discussing you on AN/I, here. // roux   13:41, 8 December 2008 (UTC)

re: Assyrian/Childaen/Syriac

I've left a reply under your zen stick (ouch). Xavexgoem (talk) 19:40, 8 December 2008 (UTC)

AfD nomination of Jona Lendering

An article that you have been involved in editing, Jona Lendering, has been listed for deletion. If you are interested in the deletion discussion, please participate by adding your comments at Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion/Jona Lendering. Thank you. EALacey (talk) 20:24, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

For the Love of God

Block this son of a gun: User:Shagz12345 for (a) constantly vandalizing the Assyrian page by adding a picture of an obese man on a computer as a "modern Assyrian" (b) approaching now breaking the 3 revert rule violation

And whilst your at it, protect the Assyrian page whilst we all try to get our heads straight. I don't know why you are not taking the situation into your hands fully at this point; I don't mean to be kissing ass, I certainly don't agree with a number of your edits, but at least they're not POV either way. Gabr-el 01:40, 11 December 2008 (UTC)

I needed a break from that. It will be alright though, it's going to be chaos for another few weeks, but it will stabilize eventually, once everyone has learnt that their current approach is fruitless. --dab (𒁳) 09:05, 12 December 2008 (UTC)

Akhenaten

Dear Dbachman, Will you kindly consider placing some level of protection for Akhenaten?

• His article seems to attract all the crazies...rather than productive contributions. These Anon IP's keep vandalising his article. Doug Weller had to do an indefinite protection for Hatshepsut because too many anon IP's were calling here a btch, mfckr and all those vicious, ugly things whenever a temporary protection expired. Unfortunately, Doug is on a break at present. Regards, --Leoboudv (talk) 08:55, 12 December 2008 (UTC)

Tajikistan

Hi, please see my reply to you on Talk:Tajikistan#Perso-Arabic script, again. Best, --Zlerman (talk) 15:24, 12 December 2008 (UTC)

Hands off Kosovo related articles, please

As I see the RoK-Infobox is at the top at last, like in all other Wikipedias, except the serbian. Don't dare to interfere! It was a shame that it took so long and it was also your shame, Dieter. Hands off Kosovo related articles, please. Now and forever. --Schwarzschachtel (talk) 02:49, 14 December 2008 (UTC)

strangely, I do not feel any "shame" for helping implement WP:NPOV. --dab (𒁳) 10:26, 14 December 2008 (UTC)

NPOV? There is a worldwide consensus in every Misplaced Pages, even the Russian one, (with the only exception being the seriban Wikipeda) that the RoK-Infobox should be at top. Why not on english wikipedia? Because of some serbs and an admin calld dab? Again, you want to tell us the whole world is POV about this topic? Earnestly? --Schwarzschachtel (talk) 15:57, 14 December 2008 (UTC)

great, then build a consensus on en-wiki too. Remember, build consensus first, edit later. For example, if we move the article to Republic of Kosovo, the infobox problem would be solved. Kosovo would then be a disambiguation page. --dab (𒁳) 16:24, 14 December 2008 (UTC)

Again, there is also a worlwide consensus that RoK is Kosovo! Do you deny this? --Schwarzschachtel (talk) 16:26, 14 December 2008 (UTC)

can you please stop talking about "worldwide consensuses"? I must say the world must look very simple from where you sit. Please go and read Political status of Kosovo before posting any further comments. --dab (𒁳) 16:30, 14 December 2008 (UTC)

If there is not a worldwide consensus, how comes all wikipedias and all encyclopedias (with the exception of serbian one) are stating that RoK is Kosovo and so in the Kosovo articles they do show the Infoboxes about RoK? Or do you want to deny this? --Schwarzschachtel (talk) 16:33, 14 December 2008 (UTC)

Greek dab page

Sorry but I'm not quite happy with your edits to the Greek dab page. I've been fighting long and hard to keep dab pages like that short and manageable and pruning them down to those entries that are real disambiguation terms in the narrow sense: entries for topics that could really be called "Greek" pure and simple, and which a reader could reasonably expect to be led to directly when typing "Greek" in the search box. Per WP:MOSDAB, dab pages should not grow into topic directory pages, listing links of sub-topics and other articles dealing with individual aspects related to the main topic. History of the Hellenic Republic and List of Ancient Greek tribes are such examples, as are the entries about individual periods in Greek history. People who want to go there should go through the summary Greece and Greek people pages and find navigation aids there. Otherwise the dab page will always have a tendency of growing uncontrollably and chaotically.

Also, entries in dab pages should not be piped; it should be maximally transparent to the reader where a link is going to lead him, so the full name should always be displayed.

Maybe I'm something of a purist in this matter, but I hope you'll at least see where I'm coming from. Fut.Perf. ☼ 09:16, 15 December 2008 (UTC)

In my view, it is better to have one comprehensive Greek dab page, than a stubby Greek and a stubby Hellenic one. I feel Names of the Greeks (Greek (name)) should be linked on Greek for those looking for information on the term "Greek", but it is true that Graecus and Yona may be over the top. I share your concern on dab page cancer, but I have also met with the opposite problem, viz., people trying to prevent a dab page from doing its job per WP:MOSDAB efficiently by insisting on extreme brevity. It is my view that, yes, a dab page should list topics that may in principle be intended by the term in question in a certain context. Note that this may include Hellenic College of London, because it is easy to imagine a context (say "I'm at Hellenic" in a conversation of two London students), where "Hellenic" may refer to this entity. Dab pages should also organize the various meanings in an informed and organized manner that provide insight into the nature of the polysemy in question. This is relevant in the case of words with complicated histories, and the rationale behind most of my dab page edits, such as those at Diwan. --dab (𒁳) 09:20, 15 December 2008 (UTC)

I'm not too sure about "Hellenic College" (anybody who uses that colloquial short appellation will be perfectly aware what long form it stands for, and is unlikely to be surprised if typing the colloquial short form doesn't take him there immediately.) What I object to are entries like "Byzantine Greeks" for Greeks. That's a sub-topic. Nobody talks of "Greeks" and means specifically and exclusively Byzantine Greeks. They may of course mean Greeks in a Byzantine context, but that's a different issue. "Byzantine Greeks" is not a separate, different meaning of the word "Greek" side by side with that in Greek people, it's only a sub-aspect of it. Fut.Perf. ☼ 09:36, 15 December 2008 (UTC)

yes, I admit "Hellenic College" isn't absolutely necessary on the dab page. I was trying to illustrate that it is a question of good judgement how far you are willing to go in constructing contexts for possible disambiguation. Otoh, I strongly disagree with "Nobody talks of "Greeks" and means specifically and exclusively Byzantine Greeks". The entire point is that the link to "Greek" may come from any coherent paragraph of prose. If the context of the text is the Early Middle Ages and the text talks about "Greeks", the intended link target would be Byzantine Greeks. This is very much a real-life situation. E.g., Early Middle Ages mentioning "Greek influence on the Balkans" or similar. WP:MOSDAB says the only purpose of dab pages is helping find the intended link as quickly as possible. It is perfectly possible that the intended link may be Byzantine Greeks, coming from a discussion in historical context. Again, this is a matter of WP:UCS. It is important, for example, that India (disambiguation) link to Gupta India, Mughal India and British India because many pages discussing India in a historical context will erroneously link to India (the article on the 1947 Republic), and depending on which epoch is under consideration, the intended link may be any of the above. --dab (𒁳) 09:42, 15 December 2008 (UTC)

Technically, I disagree. No link to Greek should in fact ever come from any paragraph of prose (coherent or non-) . The case you are thinking of should be handled by doing ] in the article directly. Dab pages should never be linked to from text. The only way a user should get to them is when they manually type "Greek" in the search box. That user should be led to Greek people, and then to the sub-articles from there. Fut.Perf. ☼ 09:49, 15 December 2008 (UTC)

you misunderstand. I was saying, it is a real-life situation that someone will write "there was Greek influence in the Balkans in the Early Middle Ages". Now, as you say, that link to Greek should be disambiguated. So, you will go to the disambiguation page and look at your options. And lo and behold, there is the link to Byzantine Greeks, which you can then go back and fix the sentence to "there was Greek influence in the Balkans in the Early Middle Ages" as it should be. I hope this clears up any confusion and shows that we are really talking about the same thing. --dab (𒁳) 10:28, 15 December 2008 (UTC)

Hmm, so you are talking about the dab page as a service to the wikipedia author in deciding what to do with their links. I see what you mean, but I'm talking about it as a service to the reader only. Fut.Perf. ☼ 10:32, 15 December 2008 (UTC)

it isn't really necessary to distinguish these two cases as orthogonal. You get the same situations in a reader-only situation. Suppose, sticking to the same example, you read "there was Greek influence in the Balkans" in a book or webpage somwhere. Then you tell yourself, "hm, let me read up about this 'Greek' thing on Misplaced Pages", you go and type "Greek" in the WP search box, and there you are in the same situation. Also, there are many de-facto links to dab pages readers will encounter, they keep appearing faster than the editors can disambiguate them. --dab (𒁳) 10:36, 15 December 2008 (UTC)

Greek people

Btw, this particular case, I have long have doubts whether it is wise to have a single article on Greek people, ancient and modern. This is like merging Italians and Ancient peoples of Italy, French people and Gauls (etc.) in a single article. When talking about the Ancient Greeks, it isn't advisable to link to Greek people (the modern ethnic group) any more than it is adisable to Greece (the 1974 Republic). These things is what disambiguation pages are really needed for: fixing anachronisms. --dab (𒁳) 10:28, 15 December 2008 (UTC)

Hmm, but here you are somewhat in danger of projecting your own POV concerns into our coverage. Like it or not, Misplaced Pages editors have a rather strong consensus that both the country and the people can and should be treated as unified entities across time, and you'll have a hard time proving that this is against a consensus in scholarship, and an even harder time actually effecting a split here. As matters stand, both "Greeks" and "Greece" are legitimate summary articles for all periods of their histories, so if the outside reader in your example comes to the dab page, there's nothing wrong with them being led to those two articles first. Fut.Perf. ☼ 10:45, 15 December 2008 (UTC)

"Misplaced Pages editors have a rather strong consensus that both the country and the people can and should be treated as unified entities across time"? Are you talking about Greece in particular, or generally? This is a very tall claim (WP:REDFLAG), and treating ethnicities as "unified entities across time" is the hallmark of ethnic nationalism, which is an ideology completely unreconcilable with encyclopedicity. Of course articles on the "history of $PEOPLE" may always go into antiquity or even prehistory. Thus, it is perfectly possible to discuss the Gauls in the French people article, but this doesn't mean that they are an "unified entity". It's a question of WP:SS. Ancient Greeks and Byzantine Greeks are valid sub-articles of History of the Greeks. --dab (𒁳) 11:52, 15 December 2008 (UTC)

I am as much aware as you of the dangers of reification of ethnic and national identities, thank you, but I'm still of the opinion that we ought not to be more nitpicky about link targets than common English parlance itself is about the use of names. The world is full of country names that were continually used as ethno-geographical entities long before they became political nation states, or where common English parlance uses country names retrospectively, and where ethnonyms have a continuity of identity far beyond the historical boundaries of modern statehood. In all these cases, we have articles whose lead sentence and infobox primarily deal with the modern political entity, but which nevertheless act as de facto WP:SS main articles for much more, and in all these cases we commonly link to these main articles even from (politically speaking) extraneous contexts. That's no error, in my view; I believe it is just what readers want and expect, because these entities are actually conceptualised in this way. Italy and Germany are perfectly legitimate link targets for Grand tour or Baroque music: English speakers actually do think of 18th century Italy as somehow the same thing as modern Italy. In the same way, Syria and Egypt are perfectly legitimate for Fourth crusade, and Greece is a legitimate target for, say, Amber Road. We shouldn't be using the disambiguation system to artificially create distinctions that common usage doesn't make; where it is legitimately vague between a political and an historical-geographical concept, our linking practices should follow that. That means: primary link target to the main article only, including the dab page, and more specific sub-articles to be navigated through there. Fut.Perf. ☼ 11:20, 16 December 2008 (UTC)

I think we are basically on the same page here, there is no need to create controversy artificially. I may disagree with you in individual cases, but this is very much a matter of case-by-case discussions. I would not agree to linking Syria, Egypt or Germany in historical contexts. Usage of "Germany" in the 18th century is a very complicated question (as you are of course aware). Greece may be less problematic, since "Greece" has indeed referred to the same geographic entity for centuries. The problem is that our country articles tend to begin "Syria, officially the Syrian Arab Republic", "India, officially the Republic of India" etc., unambiguously narrowing the article scope further than would be necessary, or than common use has it. It isn't terrible to have "Frederick II campaigned in Italy", but it would be an improvement to make that "Frederick II campaigned in Italy", since this is the intended meaning. The problem of course only arises when we insist on a wikilink, and it would be best to just make it "Frederick II campaigned in Italy", also in the interest of avoiding overlinking. The good thing is that both you and I understand these things, so we will likely always find a reasonable solution. The problems will only really begin when we get additional noise from editors who do not understand questions of terminology. This usually means a lot of time is wasted over meaningless semantic confusions. --dab (𒁳) 15:12, 16 December 2008 (UTC)

I've thought a few times about starting the process of creating articles based on historic regions rather than what happen to be the name of modern states or countries. For most people, the latter are a priority but not for everyone. One way is to create a series of articles with (historic) disambiguating them. I think all historically minded people do have an obligation to the rest of society to inform them about semantic drift and the non-eternalness of the modern fantasies of dyed-cloth worshipping nationalists, but ignoring that, as you say we need relevant links. Examples are Greece (historic) (varied meaning from the area south of Thermopylae to the entire Aegean seaboard of Europe and Asia; obviously the modern borders are fairly random), Germany (historic) (the definition of which is relatively clear and consistent from the 13th until the 19th cent.), Scotland (historic) (land north of the Forth before the late 13th cent.), Spain (historic) (Iberian peninsula), Russia (historic) (most of European Russia, Belarus and the non-steppe part of Ukraine), Romania (historic) (where'd you start?), and so on. Deacon of Pndapetzim (Talk) 21:33, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

Kosovo Info Tab

Dab, what are you doing with this? The current info tag map with Kosovo within Serbia is so POV that it isn't funny. The Kosovo page needs to be aligned with most of the other wikipedia pages. We will have to wait for the almanacs and encyclopedias next year, but we already know the National Geographic maps with regards to Kosovo. For precedence, Rhodesia which declared UDI back in the 1960s which practically no state recognized had "country" status in almanacs and encyclopedias in the 1960s and 1970s. Kosovo has partial recognition which is good enough to warrant a different info box. Azalea pomp (talk) 19:37, 15 December 2008 (UTC)

I have no opinion on this. I was just reverting unilateral changes to an article on probation. If you want to change this, seek consensus. --dab (𒁳) 19:54, 15 December 2008 (UTC)

This article is NEVER going to have a consensus due to the inflamed arguments on both sides. There needs to be serious fixings from higher ups of Misplaced Pages. By you reverting back to that POV map has not helped matters at all. Azalea pomp (talk) 02:28, 16 December 2008 (UTC)

I am willing to support the change to a map where Serbia isn't highlighted. Before I can support such a suggestion, you will need to make it. --dab (𒁳) 08:44, 16 December 2008 (UTC)

Check out the new discussion. I suggest breaking the article in Republic of Kosovo and Province of Kosovo and Metohija. There must be something done at least temporarily to make the Kosovo article reasonable. Azalea pomp (talk) 16:58, 16 December 2008 (UTC)

I find the article perfectly reasonable at present. It is ostensibly an article about a disputed territory, and that's as it sould be. --dab (𒁳) 17:10, 16 December 2008 (UTC)

Ive replied to you about disambiguation on the Kosovo talk page. Regards Ijanderson (talk) 17:47, 16 December 2008 (UTC)

WP:OWN

Please stop vandalising pages on ethnicities in Europe with your home made original research. I find it hillarious that you've written "I was just reverting unilateral changes to an article on probation. If you want to change this, seek consensus." above. If you want a consensus, go to the talk page and seek one. This far, the consensus among the six users there is that you're contributions are not helpful. JdeJ (talk) 21:06, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

"vandalising", eh? "original research", eh? I am sorry, but repeating untruths doesn't make them any truer. --dab (𒁳) 09:30, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

how extremely "mature" to resort to "vandalism" warnings after failing to back up your opinions by the citation of a single source on the article talkpage. I don't care whether you "agree" with the "ideas" I report on the basis of bona fide WP:RS. They aren't even necessarily "my ideas". Accusing me of "vandalism" and "original research" for presenting perfectly valid academic sources you just so happen to disagree with is extremely poor style, and the very opposite of good faith or good grace. --dab (𒁳) 10:31, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

Please don't start this "I'm-the-victim"-drama once again. Edits such as these , deleting large parts of an article and removing content that nobody has even discussed is rather obvious vandalism.JdeJ (talk) 10:36, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

so you deny that you have been trying to remove the linguistic map in the past? You deny that you have called my contributions to the article "unhepful" right above? The "large parts of an article" you deign to mention happen to be my contributions under GFDL. I am free to retract them, just as you are free to re-publish them under the terms of the GFDL. Or what do you want? You have shown you are not interested in collaboration. I would ask you now to stay off my talkpage. Thank you. --dab (𒁳) 10:41, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

User Aramaean Syriac is creating another FORK

Here is the link:

http://en.wikipedia.org/Syriac_people

This user has been warned several times regarding this situcation and he is still defiant. Ninevite (talk) 03:29, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

Hey Dab, Nineveh 209 (talk · contribs) has now on his own decided to move the article back to Assyrian people. It's meaningless to try discuss anything with these guys, and I'm all alone against them and their attacks. You might wanna take a look, if you bother caring for this, because i'm starting to not care.

Take care and Merry Christmas! The TriZ (talk) 22:22, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

Ah, no worries, Moreschi fixed it. The TriZ (talk) 22:49, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

Dab no pay any attention to this bigot who uses Meglamottis as reference who denies the exisitence of kurds, says arabs should be thrown into concentration camps, and so on. I have justified my edits he is unhappy with it so he has come crying to you for some nurturing. I dont want to bother you on christmas eve but I humbly ask you to read over the posts on Move to Assyrian towards the bottom of the page. This ill answer alot of questions, by the way it will show you this bigots true intentions where he discounts all of our findings including google scholar, google books, cia fact book, world ethnic groups, politcal hadnbook to the middle east, library of congress, and so on. We have proven him wrong and he is unhappy with it so he tries to foolishly prove our sources wrong by saying we are stupid, biased, propaganders, and so on. He is a problem of keeping double standards, again I humbly ask you to take a look over at that page where we talk on the title move to assyrian towards the bottom, I know where you stand on this issue and I respect that but you have to see what this user does to all our claims, Edokh briktha- Assyrian for Merry Christmas Ninevite (talk) 06:55, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

Good humor

Re: this, it's supposed to be cold but sweet, very much like Good Humor. Best wishes, Durova 18:20, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

I realize this, but don't you think spelling it out rather spoils the effect? --dab (𒁳) 18:25, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

It changes the flavor, like letting salt mix into the ice cream. I wouldn't want to have to throw out the batch. :) Durova 18:42, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

European ethnic groups

I answered your question on the article's talk page. I would also recommend your try to assume good faith from editors who disagree with you. Right now, most of your reactions on the talk page come across as if editors were attacking you personnally (which isn't what they set out to do), and you come across as doing the same. This can only lead to escalation into a verbal brawl. Better to try to talk it over and reach some sort of mutually acceptable compromise. Well just my twopence' worth. Do with it as you wish.--Ramdrake (talk) 19:41, 22 December 2008 (UTC)

the length of the talkpage bears ample testimony for my assuming good faith and willingness to "talk it over". But these things have limits. Once it becomes clear there is no "it" that could be talked over. It is not possible to assume good faith at this point. Of course you cannot ask anybody to read such a talkpage, but if you would read it, you would see that good faith has been exhausted. Compromise implies arguable suggestion, not airy ad libbing. I am as open to compromise as I have always been, but I am not holding my breath here. --dab (𒁳) 21:26, 22 December 2008 (UTC)

File deletion warning

Hi Dbachmann, I have nominated a file, which you uploaded to en-wp, for deletion on Commons, because you didn't specify any source information on upload. If this is your own work, please say so on the deletion request and I will keep the file. Thanks and best regards, --ChrisiPK (talk) 23:10, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

Greeks

I would like to ask if you can provide a peer review for that article noting any errors, inconcistencies and areas for improvement in the prose and subject matter. Thank you for your time and I am always at your disposal for any comments and suggestions.--Xenovatis (talk) 12:51, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Shoeing

With the exception of removing that half sentence, you did some nice clean-up work on the article. Thank you. I agree with you, I think it is an Arab cultural phenomenon, and I think that is the mainstream view - thus the article is written from that perspective. Even the Kruschev example I threw in was kind of shaky. But the edit-warring on the page about the issue caused me to research it, and I realized it was a significant minority view, and EI is notable enough. The half sentence, more a passing reference, stopped the edit-warring, without actually changing the article substantively away from the mainstream. I appreciate your assistance on the article, otherwise. --David Shankbone 22:09, 29 December 2008 (UTC)

thanks, but I do not think we were "edit warring". We are arguing on talk, and in a constructive manner. This is the way articles should be written. Minor disagreements are good and lead to improved articles. --dab (𒁳) 22:14, 29 December 2008 (UTC)

I'm sorry - I wasn't very clear; i was referring to edit-warring that took place weeks ago. It began before the fork from Shoe-tossing - I may need to move the talk page over here, actually. But when I forked it to Shoeing a person against raised this issue, politely, by tagging it with a fact tag - the first thread on the talk page is the person/people I was referring to. Not you. --David Shankbone 22:18, 29 December 2008 (UTC)

AfD nomination of Ἐνέργεια (disambiguation)

An article that you have been involved in editing, Ἐνέργεια (disambiguation), has been listed for deletion. If you are interested in the deletion discussion, please participate by adding your comments at Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion/Ἐνέργεια (disambiguation). Thank you. Mikaey (talk) 07:40, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

Re:WP:CITE

I apologize. It was my mistake. I thought you didn't answer at Desiphral's edit. --Olahus (talk) 13:29, 2 January 2009 (UTC)

Editing Romani people

I attempted to edit Romani people and after completing my edit, was denied permission to post. Did I make a technical error, or are editors now supposed to request your permission to edit? Who can edit and who cannot? Is there a list of names? My impression based on past experience with Romani people is that some of the editors of this project are also Wiki managers, and that managers that are not value-neutral can empower themselves as gatekeepers to ensure their own POV prevails. Please formally announce to me and to other editors on the Romani people talk page that you have recently instituted gatekeeping and why, and specifically what it means for those who now want to edit the article. Steviemitlo (talk) 14:35, 2 January 2009 (UTC)

Happy New Year, a couple of questions

Rktect is back -- look at this (using Misplaced Pages as a source, nice) and . Is this stuff for the Fringe NB, or?

Also, I seem to have read about this pair of editors before (if they aren't the same), H5+R1A (talk · contribs) who edited H5andh5 (talk · contribs)'s page as though it was his own. Do you know anything about them? I've reverted a couple of H5andh5's edits this morning where he was removing text about the Solutrean hypothesis and Pre-Siberian American aborigines. Thanks.

happy new year, Doug.

I think this is mostly material for your rollback button... --dab (𒁳) 15:35, 2 January 2009 (UTC)

Reported at WP:SSP. I've also blocked one for edit warring. dougweller (talk) 22:20, 2 January 2009 (UTC)

A Little help with stopping Abuse?

Regarding the Asatru Alliance article, the person deleting the reference in the bibliography is doing so on malicious grounds. All of their edits are designed to attack one person.

I see your point that the Mirabello book does not directly relate to the Alliance (actually, it does, but as a Wiccan you would not be aware of that), but my point here is that by reinforcing the vandal's edits you are reinforcing bad behaavior.

--Tsmollet (talk) 03:54, 3 January 2009 (UTC)

are you somehow implying that I am a Wiccan? If you can link Mirabello to AA, you are perfectly free to do so, in a verifiable manner. Something that cannot be verified lies outside the scope of Misplaced Pages, even if perfectly True. I can assure you that I know many truths that I do not discuss on Misplaced Pages, either because I do not care to, or because I cannot present verifiable evidence. --dab (𒁳) 10:00, 5 January 2009 (UTC)

On the Odin Brotherhood

On the Odin Brotherhood deletion debate, I remember that well.

Note that the article was moved here whene it was deleted at wikipidia, and it has received more than 16,000 hits in a couple of years. I think the movement is notable.

http://tinwiki.org/Odin_Brotherhood

--Tsmollet (talk) 04:00, 3 January 2009 (UTC)

I do not think that the "Odin Brotherhood" has any notability independent of the Mirabello book. Is Mirabella's book notable within WP:BK? I don't know, I wouldn't object to an article on it, but what you cannot do is sneak in references to the book in articles that have nothing to do with the topic.--dab (𒁳) 08:58, 5 January 2009 (UTC)

Yoga

Would you mind putting that on your watchlist? A nationalist troll who has attacked numerous Hinduism-related articles in the past has targeted that article. Thanks, Mitsube (talk) 06:45, 4 January 2009 (UTC)

Question between Me and You

I don't want to judge the edits of this user but it seems to me that he is clearly massively changing redirects as you have charged him here awhile back His current history going back 3-4 days shows massive redirects which many of which have no meaning whatsoever. I wanted to bring this up to your attention, perhaps you can judge whether or not these edits are unwarrented, useful, or just POV pushing old habits coming back to life from User:AramaeanSyriac thanks in advance Ninevite (talk) 01:23, 5 January 2009 (UTC)

AramaeanSyriac's behaviour is less blatantly disruptive than it used to be, but yes, it clearly still needs close supervision. --dab (𒁳) 08:54, 5 January 2009 (UTC)

Question

Was this intended to link to a comment by Folantin? I also put those up 100% voluntarily and have put standards above and beyond those necessary as ideals to reach. However, I believe that you were making a comment about my civility as of late. I am not sure of that, hence the question. Sorry if I am being intrusive, I normally don't respond to those comments (in order to be more welcoming to criticism), but I wanted to find out if there was a mistake or not in order to clarify things. Ottava Rima (talk) 00:08, 6 January 2009 (UTC)

well, I was trying to be polite. I was pointing out that in my opinion, you have been falling rather short of your own ideals, which are in themselves commendable in principle -- it is just slightly comic to pompously state your committment to excellence beyond the call of duty when in reality you are struggling to satisfy minimal requirements. I have made my stance perfectly clear, I believe you have been making a mountain out of a molehill. This isn't in any way a major problem, it has just been very unnecessary. If you had just put it as "hey, I think 'romantic' may mislead some readers (I certainly understand the term differently), so how about we replace it with 'romance' for the sake of clarity?" this may have been over in half an hour. Instead this has become a pathetic drama surrounding your credentials, your competence, and your being right. You must understand that there are a few very erudite people on Misplaced Pages. They usually survive only by a great dose of good grace and self-deprecating humour, so it may not be obvious you are dealing with seasoned academics at first glance. Folantin and Moreschi are two of our best editors, they are erudite, patient, have extremely good judgement, little egos, and they take are able to enjoy the foolishness Misplaced Pages tends to toss in their way. In this sense, they are just about the worst trees you could you could choose for barking up. You want to convince them that your position has some merit, you do not want to attempt to make them look foolish or incompetent because it'll just backfire. dab (𒁳) 09:12, 6 January 2009 (UTC)

I'm a tad confused about a few things. You say that I have fallen short. Really? Have I reverted others instead of trying to discuss with them? Have I used cuss words? Foul language? Called them "troll" or "childish" by chance? And if you think that this isn't "necessary", then you do not accept what literary critics think. I don't mean just myself, but even Geogre verified what I stated. And Folantin and Moreschi as two of the best editors shows a poor understanding of this community, of their background, and of content. And little egos? Yes, because "little ego" is why they refuse to choose the proper term, why they have insulted one of the best content contributors here, and why they persist against what literary criticism has stated. Dbachmann, I have talked to many, many people about this situation and your view is the minority. If Moreschi and Folantin persist with their personal attacks, they will end up blocked for their action. That is a fact. If you want to defend them in a completely unobjective way, especially with your personal attacks above, feel free. Ottava Rima (talk) 15:31, 6 January 2009 (UTC)

Take it or leave it OR, as I said, I have no wish to let this grow into an extended group therapy session. I just gave you my opinion, and I am just one guy. You are perfectly free to disagree with my assessment. So you have "talked to many, many people about this situation" (and I take it by 'vast majority' you are referring to Geogre (talk · contribs), and I hasten to add that "my view" in no way conflicts with what Geogre stated). I don't see any "situation", I just see you trying to create a situation because you wouldn't back down on a minor point even after it became clear that you were wrong. You need to realize that you are the only person who needs to spend 24/24 being you, for everyone else here on Misplaced Pages, you are just a brief talkpage episode, and I cannot picture anyone wishing to inflate this into any kind of major "situation". Let me add that I kind of hope that by "one of the best content contributors here" you are not referring to yourself. --dab (𒁳) 16:28, 6 January 2009 (UTC)

To be perfectly honest, I have talked with over 50 people so far about the issues and to see if my actions have been appropriate. And if you don't see a "situation", then, pray tell, why wont Folantin accept "Romance Epic" instead? Why is there personal attacks lodged against me? Why did even you personally attack me? Your words are contrary to your actions and the actions of others. You have already been proven as naive on Geogre's talk page in your assumptions. I think you should take that to heart and change your ways. Ottava Rima (talk) 16:50, 6 January 2009 (UTC)

"proven as naive", dear me, I had better take that to heart and change my naive ways then, hadn't I. I do appreciate your perfect honesty in the matter of the number of people with whom you have discussed this situation. Now if you would excuse me for a moment, I think I will take a break to poll the European Parliament and US Senate on what I should be having for dinner. --dab (𒁳) 17:38, 6 January 2009 (UTC)

The end?

Dieter, could you just change it to "romance epic" per my comments at the bottom of the talk page. Then maybe we can all get a bit of rest. --Folantin (talk) 17:20, 6 January 2009 (UTC)

hm, but have you talked with fifty people about this? I think I'll have to consult with all of my facebook friends, my co-workers and possibly my students before I can say for sure :p --dab (𒁳) 17:35, 6 January 2009 (UTC)

I've discussed this with at least one other Wikipedian (who's a Bachelor of Engineering in Pedantry Studies), my postman and my window cleaner. While we agree that it's been a "barrel of laughs", the consensus is to put this debate out of its misery because it's becoming a bowl of lame duck soup. --Folantin (talk) 17:49, 6 January 2009 (UTC)

so a "romance epic" it is. You, sir, should have known better than expose your naiveté like this, and I can only hope you profit from this lesson and change your ways. --dab (𒁳) 17:53, 6 January 2009 (UTC)

Sure, I'm planning to write an essay as an alternative to WP:DEADHORSE: "Please stop flogging a dead hippogriff". --Folantin (talk) 17:58, 6 January 2009 (UTC)

Jesus myth hypothesis

I think we're about to enter a revert-heavy period, so if you can keep half an eye on this to make sure things don't get too out of hand that might be helpful. --Akhilleus (talk) 02:14, 6 January 2009 (UTC)

I have no idea why Akhilleus felt there was a revert-heavy period coming up. If anything the changes have been light though the issue of the definition even is is still being raged on. I just cannot let the fact that the definitions of "Christ myth" and even "Christ myth Theory" do vary to the point that their use as synonyms for Jesus myth hypothesis is very doubtful go.--BruceGrubb (talk) 17:36, 5 February 2009 (UTC).

I think the revert-heavy period I referred to is underway now. --Akhilleus (talk) 14:45, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

Karma, moksha, reincarnation

These articles are currently experiencing high levels of IP vandalism and have been for a few days. Mitsube (talk) 08:52, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

Karma and moksha are of course 100% Sanskritic terms. Their mystical meanings have still developed under the influence of non-Brahmanic "shramana" elements. It is perfectly legitimate to discuss this, but it is a difficult issue, and it should be done by someone who has a good grasp of the topic. Good faith additions that are clearly sub-standard as in the case of this anon should be gently reverted. The core article for this stuff would seem to be History of Hinduism, which already discusses the "acculturation of the various pre-literate tribal societies to the new religious mainstream" of the Middle Ages that lies at the origin of classical Hinduism. --dab (𒁳) 09:23, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

Quiz

Guess who the subject of the following quotes drawn from ANI is:

“Whenever I disprove something, he spins the argument in a new direction so that what ever I said about one thing is 'wrong' in whatever new context makes up.”

“This is not just a content dispute - this is an editor refusing to admit interpretation of sources, an editor ignoring sources that don't fit their viewpoint, taking material in sources out of context, claiming sources are things they are not, and spinning arguments in circles to get that angle where he's right and everyone else is wrong. This has nothing to do with content; it is in fact a pattern of remorseless tendentious editing.”

“I didn't say you were right about anything, I said you 'insist that you are right'. there's a difference. 2+2=5, and I insist that's true! doesn't make it true, but I'm insisting I'm right. Similarly, you continue to insist in multiple venues that you're right about whatever the topic is, no matter how much else is said by however many others...”

I admit it's a toughie. Enjoy. --Folantin (talk) 20:49, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

"however many" is a bit of a giveaway. fifty people obviously aren't enough, this clearly needs the attention of the entire admin population. The very thing ANI was designed for. --dab (𒁳) 20:56, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

Heh heh. User:MSJapan made the first two comments after engaging in this "discussion" with our learned friend about Freemasonry . In other news, can you guess why a certain someone might have a grudge against Moreschi . --Folantin (talk) 21:10, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

Folantin, I am glad you are beginning to enjoy this. I am reminded of the sorely missed Dr. Boubouleix. It is no secret people have difficulties growing up, and we should remember to always look on the bright side of the pedia. And life. But I still think the fun factor in this has been more or less exhausted :/ --dab (𒁳) 21:15, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

Yeah, oddly enough he tried to "pull rank" on us by huffing and puffing about his academic credentials too. But Docteur Faustroll - I mean Dr. B - was far funnier and less wearying. The guy had imagination - his name was in the Almanach de Gotha (Very Limited Edition) and was listed amongst the ranks of the Anglican clergy... and he had an entire army of Shambhala Buddhist warriors at his disposal to enforce his will. --Folantin (talk) 21:28, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

ah, the Shambhala warriors -- hard to beat Dr. B, isn't it... but we can still consider writing the Dalai Lama an email and ask how would he classify Orlando. --dab (𒁳) 21:33, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

LOL, lol. In other news, do you reckon it's time to ban AramaeanSyriac? All he's doing is stirring the pot and making it really tricky to calm things down, with virtually no useful contribs. Moreschi (talk) 23:11, 8 January 2009 (UTC)

I guess so. We can also just proceed in the warn-block-cycle: a consistent doubling of block lengths will in effect be similar to an indef ban, but still give him a chance or two to wisen up. --dab (𒁳) 09:05, 9 January 2009 (UTC)

Flagged Revs

Hi,

I noticed you voted oppose in the flag revs straw pole and would like to ask if you would mind adding User:Promethean/No to your user or talk page to make your position clear to people who visit your page :) - Thanks to Neurolysis for the template   «l| Ψrometheăn ™|l»  (talk) 06:55, 8 January 2009 (UTC)

Proto-Indo-European religion

Massive changes with statements such as correspondences cannot be coincidences, a section called 'Newest section', etc. dougweller (talk) 19:08, 8 January 2009 (UTC)

Animal style

I noticed that some time back there was a proposal to merge Persian-Sassanid art patterns with Animal style. I would suggest that would be the correct thing to do. Neither article is in particularly good shape, but "Animal style" is a real subject, and since it is a subject that interests me I will do some work on it soon. Malcolm Schosha (talk) 20:27, 9 January 2009 (UTC)

yes, please do, this has been in most unsatisfactory shape for a long time. --dab (𒁳) 20:48, 9 January 2009 (UTC)

I'm leaving

I just wanted to let you know that I don't any longer consider Misplaced Pages worth my time. I've tried to improve the article Adolf Hitler with an exact statement why he could be classified as Catholic from a reputable academic source, and the discussion has been going on for two months now. I've tried to cover the decision of the Bunderverfassungsgericht über die Gebühr die beim Kirchenaustritt fällig wird. I know that Discrimination against atheists is probably not the best heading for this, but I can't take it when I am accused of original research for something that is as close to the sources as it can get. I wished that you or some other editor could convince me that these are only temporal throwbacks, but I have come to the conclusion that the majority of people is not able to discuss a controversial issue in a fair and balanced manner. Since there are many issues that are controversial, Misplaced Pages as a project is going to fail. Only popular culture topics and that like are going to be well-covered. Nothing is going to change the way people are, not even Misplaced Pages. Zara1709 (talk) 14:42, 10 January 2009 (UTC)

you are right, and also wrong. Misplaced Pages is a bit of a koan that way. It is true that certain problems are going to persist, but it isn't true that there isn't any progress, and it is defninitely incorrect that "Misplaced Pages is going to fail" since it has already succeeded far beyond the wildest dreams of the 2001 pioneers. --dab (𒁳) 16:20, 10 January 2009 (UTC)

Since Dab also commented on my recent edits, I wonder if both of you read all the discussion on the talk page that led up to the removal of the material that Zara1709 restored. It seems as though most editors agreed that without sources saying such and such was discrimination of atheists, the material should not be included. So far as I can see, that is pretty non-controversial except to AzureBlue whose argument seemed to be that since other editors did it those editors were actually the consensus and policy was wrong. Zara1709, please don't leave. The article can be sourced, I provided some sources earlier for instance. dougweller (talk) 19:39, 10 January 2009 (UTC)

I don't feel strongly about it, in fact I view Discrimination against atheists similarly as I view Discrimination against neopagans: both about movements for which I have some sympathy, but which I think cut a pathetic figure in trying to depict themselves as poor persecuted victims. So German atheists need to pay 50 Euro for leaving their church -- big fat persecution (not). But I still think that summarily blanking half the article body isn't helpful. --dab (𒁳) 09:27, 13 January 2009 (UTC)

But that didn't happen until AzureBlue reinstated material removed by several different editors on the basis that since other 'discrimination' articles ignore WP:OR consensus is with him. See the talk page. Only after he reinstated material that had been removed piecemeal was there massive change, and not just by me. He's already been blocked once for this. dougweller (talk) 10:09, 13 January 2009 (UTC)

alright -- as I said, I don't care too much for this article. If Zara1709 leaves the project because a paragraph of his was removed, that's his problem. But I think he is frustrated because his bona fide efforts to find a solution were ignored. Thus, he tried to move the scope of the article from "discrimination of" to a more general "situation of". I don't know if that's a good idea, but it is at least a valid suggestion. --dab (𒁳) 10:12, 13 January 2009 (UTC)

Kemetic

Can I ask on reason for deleting of the entire article and raplacement of it by redirect?
And what the hell means cfork?
thanks
--Niusereset 10.I. MMIX, 18:30 CEST

"content fork", please see WP:CFORK. You may also be interested in WP:COI. --dab (𒁳) 17:37, 10 January 2009 (UTC)

Time to Archive

Hello Dab, I wanted to let you know that the discussion page on the Assyrian People article is getting very long as seen here I am not sure how to archive it but perhaps we can archive only about half the page since the bottom half is still used frequently whereas the top is not at all. Here is the suggested area, it falls right in between the article where it talks about the flags, Although I have DSL the page still takes a long time to load it, thanks in advance Ninevite (talk) 20:59, 12 January 2009 (UTC)

Askok Kamte

Can you kindly look into this Talk:Ashok_Kamte BalanceΩrestored 06:19, 13 January 2009 (UTC)

the relevant page is WP:NOTMEMORIAL: Misplaced Pages isn't a memorial site for deceased people. All articles on people who are notable only because they were killed in the Mumbai attacks belong merged into Casualties of the 2008 Mumbai attacks. --dab (𒁳) 09:13, 13 January 2009 (UTC)

Ashok Kamte is very noteable and we may need to add a current flag to this article as well.BalanceΩrestored 09:52, 13 January 2009 (UTC)

read WP:BIO. What you are citing are 119 google news hits for the Mumbai attack which mention Kamte as a victim. They aren't sources dedicated to discussing Kamte. We don't have a single source that show Kamte was discussed as a notable guy while he was still alive. All of these are obituaries. I am sorry, you asked me to look into this as an experienced editor, I did, and I am telling you that based on the sources we have we cannot keep the article. --dab (𒁳) 09:58, 13 January 2009 (UTC)

NP I will try locating a separate article on him. BalanceΩrestored 11:15, 13 January 2009 (UTC)

I found these , , , , all articles are just talking about him. BalanceΩrestored 11:20, 13 January 2009 (UTC)

maybe this person will become notable enough for a standalone article if coverage keeps piling up, but a bunch of newspaper articles isn't necessarily sufficient for WP:BIO, already for reasons of WP:RECENTISM. Misplaced Pages isn't a recent events blog service. --dab (𒁳) 11:39, 13 January 2009 (UTC)

Their posters are now all over India. I don't understand any more of these, you are a wiser and more experienced person than me. I updated the details. If you need anything more let me know. BalanceΩrestored 11:51, 13 January 2009 (UTC)

Nobody is saying these people shouldn't be mentioned on Misplaced Pages. The question is, do they qualify for a full, standalone, biography article? In my view, it is sufficient to dedicate a brief paragraph to each in the Casualties of the 2008 Mumbai attacks article. This is the default solution. The burden of establishing WP:BIO lies with those who want to "split" this into so many independent articles. --dab (𒁳) 11:57, 13 January 2009 (UTC)

More international , and almost 1000 pages indexed google dedicated just to Ashok Kamte BalanceΩrestored 12:04, 13 January 2009 (UTC)

BR, it is not a question of "international", it is a question of "notability of Askok Kamte" as opposed to "various press features in the wake of the Mumbai attacks". Can you present any reference discussing Kamte that predates his death in the attacks? Proving that he was notable as a living person, not just as a dead victim? But never mind, I will not press this. --dab (𒁳) 12:06, 13 January 2009 (UTC)

Proposed deletion of Tamil activism

A proposed deletion template has been added to the article Tamil activism, suggesting that it be deleted according to the proposed deletion process because of the following concern:

rarely used neologism

All contributions are appreciated, but this article may not satisfy Misplaced Pages's criteria for inclusion, and the deletion notice should explain why (see also "What Misplaced Pages is not" and Misplaced Pages's deletion policy). You may prevent the proposed deletion by removing the {{dated prod}} notice, but please explain why you disagree with the proposed deletion in your edit summary or on its talk page.

Please consider improving the article to address the issues raised because, even though removing the deletion notice will prevent deletion through the proposed deletion process, the article may still be deleted if it matches any of the speedy deletion criteria or it can be sent to Articles for Deletion, where it may be deleted if consensus to delete is reached. Ravichandar_{My coffee shop} 08:17, 17 January 2009 (UTC)

Demographic information on membership of religious organizations in Iceland

It may amuse you to play with this tool: For Ásatrúarfélagið it's interesting to see the relatively low number of women and children. Note that Reykjavíkurgoðorð is another Ásatrú group. Haukur (talk) 23:41, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

Note

I asked you someting here. I also expect an answer here. --Olahus (talk) 18:39, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

please stop disrupting the tedious progress in an already difficult topic for no good reason. Take care to note that this is plain vandalism. dab (𒁳) 18:47, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

Your edits are simply POV. See WP:POV. Such important edits have to be explaned. And stop to accuse me to accuse of vandalism I asked you this question two weeks ago and you didn't aswer, but you persisted to change the article. If you want to know what vandalism is, read WP:VAN. Cheers! --Olahus (talk) 18:55, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

nonsense. Just pointing me to WP:POV doesn't establish you have a case. I don't even know what you mean to imply my "pov" is supposed to amount to. --dab (𒁳) 19:25, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

You are modifying the pages without any explanation. You reverted the articles without answering to my questions in the talk pages. Such a behavior is not just unpolite, but also pov-ish because changes without explanations are only the expression of a personal point of view. I ask you politely to revert those dubious changes before the beginning of an edit war. --Olahus (talk) 19:32, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

you keep repeating yourself. You still fail to point out where you think the problem or "pov" lies. My edits are fully explained here. --dab (𒁳) 08:45, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

Kalo

Dab, FYI I started a page of the Kalo group of the Romani people. However, due to the hue and cry over the creation of a "Roma" article, I moved it from mainspace to User:Zalktis/Kalo, to prevent it from being AfD'd as POV, OR, or what have you. If you are interested in the subject, then I would of course appreciate your comments as to the usefulness of what I have done as the starting point for an article. —Zalktis (talk) 15:39, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

good job -- I especially like your map. But I am not sure this should be a standalone article. I suppose these things should be explained under Romani people#Terminology. Since this section is already inflated, I think we'll need a "Romani people (terminology)" or Names of the Romani people or Self-designations of the Romani people (or similar) article dedicated to terminology, much like Names of the Greeks, and "Kale" would be a section there. --dab (𒁳) 15:46, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

Hello

There is anon user removing content from the Chaldean Christians article. This user has deleted an entire paragrapgh as well as changing words to meet his views despite the established sources. Here is the history . The last revert was mine when I reverted it back to moreschis edit after someone deleted the image. One solution maybe protecting the page for awhile, I'll leave that up to you, just wanted to let you know so you can fix it. best regards Ninevite (talk) 06:57, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

Avestan Iran

What have you got to say about this: File:EpicIndia.jpg? I uploaded my image only after I found other images like these here.-Ravichandar_{My coffee shop} 10:12, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

No reply??? Yeah, you can go ahead with the delete if you feel that it violates copyright laws. I uploaded it over an year back when I was new to the project-Ravichandar_{My coffee shop} 10:25, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

wow, "no reply???" after I left you languishing for all of 13 minutes? What poor customer care on my part. well, if you agree that your image violates copyright law, I don't see why you need to act all miffed at me, let's just delete it and move on. I agree File:EpicIndia.jpg is suspicious, the background map seems to be watermarked, but I cannot be bothered to figure out where exactly this map originated. --dab (𒁳) 10:30, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

Where did I say that it was "poor customer care"? You threaten me in my talk page that the image "might get deleted even while I'm having a look at the message". Of course, how do you expect me to react? I didn't act miffed at you. How can you imagine that? -Ravichandar_{My coffee shop} 10:39, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

I dropped you a standardized note out of courtesy. Get a grip, man. --dab (𒁳) 10:44, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

Okay! Yeah, you may delete the image. I wouldn't mind much. All I wish is to explain my reasons for having uploaded that image and bring your notice to EpicIndia.jpg and it is all because you had raised a question on the image page.-Ravichandar_{My coffee shop} 10:56, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

fine, I am glad we had this conversation. I do invite you to tag File:EpicIndia.jpg yourself. strike that, I realize the image is watermarked "JIJITH NR" because it was created by Jijithnr (talk · contribs). The background map may well be generated from PD data. I see no reason to suspect this image. But you are of course free to conduct further investigations. --dab (𒁳) 10:58, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

Horses in warfare

Hi. Horses in warfare is getting a push toward FAC; now would be a good time to weigh in about any issues you may have with it. Much better now than during the FAC. --Una Smith (talk) 06:41, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

Romani people intro

About the changes you've made to the intro for the Romani people article I have two comments:

1. "South Asia" is better than "North India", since its not exactly clear from where in the subcontinent they came from. There was an initial move from Central India to NW India, and after that, the departure from the subcontinent. So, a Northern Indian origin can be disputable, while with a South Asian one you can't go wrong.

2. The info about the Romani language should not go there. AKoan (talk) 10:21, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

(1) "South Asia" includes the Maledives and Sri Lanka. The Romani are clearly Indo-Aryans, and clearly origniate in "India proper", i.e. NW India. Of course, they ultimately originate in Africa like everyone else, but that's hardly the point.

Then we will use India. Trying a more precise location will bring out the question of their linguistic/ethnic/cultural place inside of India, and thats an open question. AKoan (talk)

(2) why not? --dab (𒁳) 10:26, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

Because the intro should avoid more in depth and detailed info. AKoan (talk) 10:53, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

the current lead summary is well within WP:LEAD. I agree excessive detail should be avoided. --dab (𒁳) 10:56, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

More Issues

Hello Dab, the term "Assyrian/Syriac" has been accepted as to replace the titles "Syriac" and "Assyrian" and both sides have used this term to deal with the people. This can be seen in many diaspora and homeland Assyrian/Syriac people pages. User:The TriZ has himself been responsible for changing many pages to incorporate the "Assyrian/Syriac" identity rather then just "Assyrian" and I as long as other have accepted this term as being most neutral. I have recently made some edits to some pages from "Syriac" to "Assyrian/Syriac" and User:The TriZ keeps undoing them. He is breaking the neturality which we have compromised. I suggest you deal with this (if you want to of course) so that the neutrality will not be broken resulting in edit wars changing the changes which The TriZ has made from "Assyrian/Syriac" back to "Assyrian". Malik Danno (talk) 23:10, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

Romnichal to Romanichal

Can you move Romnichal to Romanichal, its a redirect there, I don't know how to handle it? I have explained here the reason: Romnichal#Move_to_Romanichal AKoan (talk) 12:51, 26 January 2009 (UTC) And also "Roma minority in Romania" to "Roma in Romania", please. AKoan (talk) 14:28, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

The language of the Domba and the language of the Dom

As you have a much better knowledge of Indian languages than me, can you take a look at this: Talk:Domba#Dom_language_and_Domari_language? AKoan (talk) 14:45, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

Arabic transliteration

Please see: T:ROA-Stevertigo 06:52, 27 January 2009 (UTC)

Ethnic groups in Germany

I don't think that the article Ethnic groups in Germany should be redirected to Immigration to Germany. Many ethnic minorities live in Germany at least for centuries (some of them lived there even before the foundation of the German state) and they are officialy recognized as ethnic minorities: Frisians, Danes, Sorbs, Sinti/Roma, Jews. --Olahus (talk) 16:46, 28 January 2009 (UTC)

already fixed. --dab (𒁳) 16:48, 28 January 2009 (UTC)

Re:Romani infobox

First of all, if you want to insert "your" infobox, you must reach a concensus about it because the "old" infobox was there since one year or more and nobody had problems with it. I sincerly want to know what exlactly you improved in it (that's why I asked you about it in the talk page. You advocate for the insertion of some reliable sources, but also for the exclusion of other reliable sources. This in unacceptable and I already wrote you about it right here. Besides, I also made other changes in the article Romani people and you reverted them too. Can you tell me why? There is no concensus for the infobox inserted by you. Your infobox hurts the WP:NPOV, because it excludes unexplanedly RELIABLE INFORMATION. But why should I repet mayself? I already wrote here and here everything and you seem to be blind (but I still hope you're not).

You accuse me for "sabotaging" ? Is the insertion of reliable sources a sabotage? You cannot insert your own POV just because it took time to preapare it.

Nobody agreed with your POV-ish infobox, so remove it please before we start an edit war here. --Olahus (talk) 17:04, 28 January 2009 (UTC)

Your personal attacks against me

You wrote in my talk page "you seem to be some weird kind of Romanian patriot causing disruption at Latin Europe and elsewhere in the attempt to highlight your precious ethnicity." I expect an excuse from you for this. --Olahus (talk) 17:07, 28 January 2009 (UTC)

Also,

Dieter A. Bachmann, das Letzte, was ich will ist ein Editkrieg zu starten. Und weil es es nicht gerne tuhe, werde ich es auch nicht tun. Es ist bedauerlich dass der Meinungsunterschied zwischen uns zu persönlichen Angriffen geführt hat. Ich erwarte nicht eine Zustimmung für meine Ansichten, aber eine respektvolle Haltung würde bestimmt mehr bringen als die jetztige Lage. Du musst einsehen dass auch andere Benutzer das Recht haben ihre Meinung auszudrücken und wenn "beide" Parteien Recht haben (oder zumindest so zu sein scheinen) dann ist eine Übereinstimmung unentbehrlich. Wenn du mit meiner Version der Infobox nicht einverstanden bist (niemand verpflichtet dich dazu), aber ich auch nicht mit deiner Version (niemand verpflichtet mich dazu), dann sollten wird alle Infoboxen am Besten rausnemen, es in der Diskussionsseite besprechen und nach dem Erlangen einer Einigung eine definitive Infobox einfügen. Hochachtungsvoll, --Olahus (talk) 17:29, 28 January 2009 (UTC)

PS: meine ethnische Zugehörigkeit ist nicht rumänisch, aber ich lebe auch nicht in der Schweiz und muss mir auch nich diese faschistische Verunglimpfung ansehen -zum Glück. Aber ich kenne Rumänien dennoch besser als viele (ethnische) Rumänen. --Olahus (talk) 17:39, 28 January 2009 (UTC)

Why is not your Roma infobox not editable?

0,6m-0,8m Roma in Turkey might be reasonable, but if we're going to mention fantasy estimates like 3,5m or 5m, I should remind you there are sources which gives an estimate of 433.940 (with breakdown to provinces, cities, towns etc). The estimations can be as low as 21,000 (as people who identify themselves as Roma) according to KONDA Research And Consultancy --Mttll (talk) 13:22, 29 January 2009 (UTC)

wht do you mean, not editable? You are perfectly free to edit, at Template:Romani infobox. --dab (𒁳) 13:45, 29 January 2009 (UTC)

Radio and terrorism

Hi Dieter. I ran across an article (Radio and terrorism) that I can't quite decide the nature of. It appears to be a users essay pasted into article space about a year ago, and promptly abandoned. My concern is that it comes across like a personal essay or polemic, draws conclusions which are not supported by sources cited, and has indications of being a WP:COATRACK designed to link certain nations with terrorism. Not having a lot of experience in evaluating criteria for deletion, I wonder if you could lay another set of eyes on it? Thanks! - LuckyLouie (talk) 18:52, 29 January 2009 (UTC)

OK, I see it's just been listed for deletion review. - LuckyLouie (talk) 22:14, 29 January 2009 (UTC)

Me again

So I am not getting myself to leave the project after all, although I am still highly critical about it. What made me consider the issue at Discrimination against atheists so offensive was the whole deletionist attitude of several editors (and admins): I've spent hours writing a balanced account of the Rob Sherman controversy, the whole question of whether Bush senior actually said that atheists shouldn't be considered as citizens. The material was originally in the Persecutions by Christians article, then in Separation of church and state in the United States, then in Discrimination against atheists and now it has hopefully come to rest at Robert I. Sherman. But the problem is - if I hadn't merged the material there myself it would have been deleted and the hours I've worked on it would have been wasted. What does Misplaced Pages expect from its editors? To continually watch over their contributions for all eternity? It weren't new editors or vandals who deleted valid content - it were experienced editors and administrators in a rather heated debate. I can only see that they have never reflected about their attitude. This is not an encyclopaedic, but a battleground, in despise of a guideline that says otherwise: wp:not#Misplaced Pages is not a battleground. But would it be better if I left? I am still undecided about that. However, I certainly can't stand it when rather bildungsferne people with Internet access, who might not even be able to notice the difference between James Herbert and Hans Mommsen, criticise my work, see the recent discussion about Nazi occultism. (Help, as always, would be appreciated.) SO I suppose I can't leave that easily. Zara1709 (talk) 07:38, 1 February 2009 (UTC)

I sympathize, but my sympathy is qualified:

• first of all, you need to remember what "deletion" means here: Your material is merely hidden from view in the current revision. You will still be able to access and link to your version by a permanent link.
• it is important to remember what Misplaced Pages is not. I appreciate that it is possible to invest hours in a detailed account of "whether Bush senior actually said that atheists shouldn't be considered as citizens". The question remains, is this material for an encyclopedia, or is this journalism. Good journalism is very valuable, but it isn't really what Misplaced Pages is intended for.
• yes, we get a lot of bildungsferne rednecks here. These are particularly frustrating, but I like to think of this as Misplaced Pages actually making a difference not just in "sharing the world's knowledge", but in actively force-feeding people with minimal standards of attribution and verifiability.

--dab (𒁳) 11:08, 1 February 2009 (UTC)

I will be going back to the discussion at Talk:Discrimination against atheists as soon as I'll find the time. With his last comment , AzuryFury should have given me enough basis for argumentation. However, I won't be able to do that until I am finished with the issue at the Ancient Egyptian race controversy. After previously I was arguing with Moreschi (who was at least open to argument, although I was being rather polemical), now I am up against deeceevoice and Wapondaponda at Talk:Ancient Egyptian race controversy. It is going to be so hard to actually make some progress with this article. Zara1709 (talk) 12:00, 3 February 2009 (UTC)

I am somewhat disturbed to see that deeceevoice is active again. No reasonable discussion is possible with this user, that's a pure waste of time. --dab (𒁳) 12:58, 3 February 2009 (UTC)

Well, by now I understand Moreschi's concerns. Anyway, I think the situation is clear. The revision she wants to push through is highly disputed and it is an article on probation. I am going to revert to a previous version and then leave for the afternoon and evening. You can decide what to do. Zara1709 (talk) 14:19, 3 February 2009 (UTC)

To bad, I just missed the train, but anyway, enough editing for today. I noticed that you wrote: "Radical Afrocentric Historiography should redirect to Afrocentric historiography" in the edit summary. Well, actually I think can justify the 'Radical'. If you could find the time, simply read the preface of Yaacov Shavit, History in Black. As long as the discussion on Talk:Ancient Egyptian race controversy‎ is going on like that, I won't be able to give a summary of it on one of the discussion pages. Zara1709 (talk) 14:42, 3 February 2009 (UTC)

how is "radical Afrocentrism" different from "Afrocentrism" on a scale that would justify a separate article? Do we have "radical nationalism as opposed to nationalism? If "RAH" (Radical Afrocentric Historiography" can be shown to be a notable, fixed term for a particular movement, creation of the article my be arguable.

Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL

A simple google search establishes that it is not. Case closed. We can discuss justification of Yaacov Shavit or History in Black under WP:BIO/WP:BK though. --dab (𒁳) 14:47, 3 February 2009 (UTC)

Yeah, I have only read two of the most reputable academic sources on the topic. This doesn't mean that an article titled Radical Afrocentric Historiography or Radical Afrocentric universal history would be totally unjustified, such an article would only give a huge, and probably undue weight to one author, namely Shavit. Probably such an article name is unjustified, and if it wasn't for Wdford's stupid unilateral actions, I would have all the time I need to search the appropriate title. I'll check some more literature. Zara1709 (talk) 14:57, 3 February 2009 (UTC)

we can start searching for a proper WP:SS title once there is reason to spin-off a sub-article to the existing Afrocentrism one. Creating "sub-articles" out of connection with the main article is very bad practice, and almost always pov-forks. Should be merged on sight. --dab (𒁳) 15:02, 3 February 2009 (UTC)

Some more literature

Oh great, now the full protection has been lifted, which will only make the discussion more difficult. Since no other editor actually was willing or able to carry out the necessary "good research" to deal with the issue (as suggested by wp:NPOV), I did it. As you can see on the right side, there is 'heavy' academic literature on the topic. In detail, these are:

• Stephen Howe , 1998, Afrocentrism. Mythical Pasts and imagined Homes
• Wilson Jeremiah Moses, 1998, Afrotopia. The Roots of African American Popular History
• a familiar name: Yaacov Shavit, 2001, History in Black. African-Americans in Search of an Ancient Past
• and the well known collection by Lefkowitz and Rogers (ed.), 1996, Black Athena Revisited

Now all I need to do is to convince Team B (if I may consider you and Moreschi and some others Team A) to postpone the edit war until I have explained the basics that everyone should be familiar with according to these history books. Do you think that an image might help? Zara1709 (talk) 19:43, 6 February 2009 (UTC)

Team B won

Where have you been the last two days? - I could have really used some help. Now Wapondaponda could push through the bad revision diff with the barely accurate justification: "overwhelming consensus on the talk page to expand the scope of the article". All I needed was a small note that you disagree with the version, too, to keep Wapondaponda from concluding a "overwhelming consensus" with creative accounting. I didn't mind reading the literature on the topic, since I've learned a lot from it. I also would like to improve Misplaced Pages's coverage of the topic, but that is simply not possible with those disruptions. This only confirms my previous scepticism. With people as they are, unable to accept a dissenting view on a particular topic, Misplaced Pages will not be able to cover controversial issues in an encyclopaedic manner. This is not an encyclopaedic, but a battleground. Article like Ancient Egyptian race controversy will continue to be a gathering place for POV-Pushers. This is not the fault of those people - I am not assuming bad faith here. Many people are simply unable to discuss controversial issues; And Misplaced Pages can't change the way people are. Zara1709 (talk) 20:54, 8 February 2009 (UTC)

User:Olahus

Please help us deal with him over at Latin Europe - I've tried discussing on the talk page with him, and other editors have shown their disapproval of him, but he just keeps reverting regardless, based on some odd Romanian POV fringe push. Eukariota (talk) 15:45, 1 February 2009 (UTC)

I'm the IP addresses by the way - I made this account to edit something on commons (and I had to log in again here since your talk page is semi-protected) Eukariota (talk) 15:49, 1 February 2009 (UTC)

Hi, Dbachmann! The sockpuppet 84.13.166.159 mentioned your name here. --Olahus (talk) 20:08, 2 February 2009 (UTC)

The sockpuppet mentioned your name also here. --Olahus (talk) 20:21, 2 February 2009 (UTC)

Muhammad

stop deleting my corrections..those are facts —Preceding unsigned comment added by Hpbiggestfan (talk • contribs) 18:13, 1 February 2009 (UTC)

good luck. --dab (𒁳) 06:36, 2 February 2009 (UTC)

Keep an eye on the Ingushetia article?

...where User:Ingushetia (sic) keeps re-adding dubious information with a strong anti-Ossetian flavour . This is all about the Ossetian-Ingush conflict of the early 1990s (turf war between two Russian Federation republics over the Prigorodny district). The user is trying to depict the Ossetians as an historically evil people. The worst is the insinuation (via synthesis) that the reason why Stalin deported the entire Ingush people in the 1940s is because he was of "Ossetian nationality" (a speculative assertion in itself). Compare: "Trotsky, a Jew, was responsible for the Kronstadt Massacre." He's had this explained to him on the talk page at considerable length by at least three other editors (including me), but he seems unwilling or unable to comply with policy. --Folantin (talk) 15:08, 2 February 2009 (UTC)

Update: Also, other shenanigans about the etymology of the Alans and their Medieval capital in the North Caucasus, Maghas. AFAIK Most scholars think the modern Ossetians are the descendants of the Alans. Our guy is trying to make out these are Ingush names. Presumably, the idea of Ossetians dominating Ingush in the Middle Ages is unacceptable to him. He's now added all of it back again. I think this is his fourth revert today. I've given him the opportunity to revert his last edit . If he doesn't take it, well then...Judging by his track record, this guy knows he's up to no good (hence, too, the lack of response on article or user talk pages). (NB:I've cross-posted this info to Moreschi). --Folantin (talk) 19:36, 2 February 2009 (UTC)

Now starring at 3RR for six reverts plus a phoney "page protected against vandalism" tag. --Folantin (talk) 21:19, 2 February 2009 (UTC)

indef banned already -- cases as blatant as this one usually aren't a problem. It's the intelligent trolls who understand and then dodge the rules who are costly, not the unintelligent ones who don't give a damn about the stinking rules. --dab (𒁳) 10:09, 3 February 2009 (UTC)

Well, not a moment too soon. Judging by his track record, I think he was tolerated for way too long. I imagine the article is still not 100% neutral regarding the Ossetians but at least the blatant stuff is gone now. The guy also made the mistake of picking one of the obscurest of the world's ethnic/national conflicts to edit war over. Had he been into Israel-Palestine or the Northern Irish Troubles he would have had plenty of allies begging for his block to be rescinded. I suspect he will be back before too long in a new incarnation but he can easily be zapped. Cheers. --Folantin (talk) 10:32, 3 February 2009 (UTC)

Vandalism from an IP

Can you stop this nazi 81.129.169.14 from vandalizing the Roma minority in Romania article? Kenshin (ex AKoan) (talk) 09:50, 3 February 2009 (UTC)

you want to avoid calling people "Nazis" because they edited out a section of political editorializing. The anon has a point, a section titled "double standards" basing itself on two romaworld.ro articles is highly dubious. --dab (𒁳) 10:14, 3 February 2009 (UTC)

I didn't called him nazi because he edited out a section of political editorializing, I called him nazi because of his edits on this article and others.

Misplaced Pages's policy is to present all views on an issue. The Romanis can be accused of all the possible crimes, but they don't have the right to respond? Romaworld is an online newspaper of the Roma in Romania, one of the few in the world. Should they have media corporations in order not to be considered dubious? Both, me and the user Dahn, are Romanians and we don't find at all Romaworld as dubious, no less dubious than the Romanian newspapers. Kenshin (ex AKoan) (talk) 11:52, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

Wrong: Misplaced Pages's policy is to present all notable views on an issue, duly. There is a big difference to what you said. I am not saying you cannot cite Romaworld, I am saying you have to be prepared to discuss the notability of your source and the proper presentation of its relative weight. We can and should discuss the notoriety of the Roma for criminal activity, and by all means should we also give a proper summary of how Roma apologetics react to the topic. Why, we have an entire article on antiziganism.

There are two main lines of defense, one that the notoriety of the Roma is an unjustified stereotype born of antiziganist sentiment, and the other that the Roma are forced to resort to large-scale campaigns of petty crime because due to discrimination this is the only line of business open to them. These are somewhat contradictory arguments, but I suppose they can be combined in an argument of a self-perpetuating vicious circle, crime leading to prejudice, and prejudice inciting further crime: after all, if your reputation is already ruined, why shouldn't you at least gather the benefits.

This is a rough outline of the situation as it presents itself to me. What is indisputable is that the "Roma problem" needs to be addressed up front, and that neither the Roma nor Misplaced Pages stand to gain anything from an article that essentially portrays the Roma as jolly fellows universally loved for their music and their colourful antics. --dab (𒁳) 12:26, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

Romaworld is not a "personal gypsy page" and is just as reliable as the other Romanian (from Romania) newspapers.

As I said in other occasions, I am not an advocate of "politically correctness". I personally believe that the infractionality rates are higher among Romanis (though there aren't any real data on that) because that is what you would expect from people living at the margin of the society. But what am I saying is that the real infractionality among Romanis is much lower than some people (a lot of people) attribute to them. Just yesterday I've read an article about a study done by an Italian anthropologist that showed that. She investigated a series of child kidnappings in Italy done supposedly by Romani women, and found that not even one of them was actually true. Here it is: . So the 2 "lines" do not contradict each other.

And most of the Romanians do exactly the same thing. They try to throw all the shit in the "Romani yard". When in fact most of the important crimes that I've seen in the Itaian media were committed by Romanians. The Mailat crime was the one that filled the glass, but it wasn't the only one. Before that, an almost identical crime happened when a Romanian girl (Doina Matei) killed an Italian old lady with an umbrella in a railway station. The difference is that in the Romnanian case the guilt is sure because it was caught on camera, while in the Romani case (Mailat), his guilt is not sure, as the only witness was a woman with mental troubles!!! And I intend to bring that out, I'm not trying to hide the (real) Romani crimes. Kenshin (ex AKoan) (talk) 10:33, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

Recently the Italians were again enraged, when 4 Romanians (not Romanis) raped a 21 year Italian girl: Kenshin (ex AKoan) (talk) 10:49, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

Dispute on template again

Hi! There is an antiziganist user who is permanently disrupting this template created by you. Please take a look. --Olahus (talk) 08:14, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

Hello again

Dab, we reached a consensus on changing all 'Assyrian' and "Syriac' to 'Assyrian/Syriac' ... we agreed to this and we changed entire pages from Assyrian to Assyrian/Syriac. Now we are trying to do the same thing changing 'Syriac' to 'Assyrian/Syriac' on many pages relating to the people and The TriZ (talk · contribs) is not letting us do this. This is going against consensus. Some time in the near future the assyrian side will ask itself why we had to change all 'Assyrian' to 'Assyrian/Syriac' while all 'Syriac' remains just that. This threatens the consensus and will ultimately lead to us changing all 'Assyrian/Syriac' back to 'Assyrian' out of frustration from non co-operating members. What should we do in this situation? Malik Danno (talk) 15:27, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

some diffs please? this revert seems entirely justified, as the topic is a pronouncedly Aramaeanist institution. While it is fair to call the ethnic group in general "Assyrian/Syriac", it is silly to suggest enforcing the same for Aramaenist or Assyrianist lobbying groups. In cases such as Abgar IX of Osroene, "Assyrian/Syriac" is an anachronism, the proper term being "Syrian", if linked requiring a piped link, Syrian. If you want my help, you will need to present a specific case, and the case will need to have some merit. I will not take any side in the puerile turf war between Triz and you, because your motivation is equally unencyclopedic and essentially exchangeable even if you are rivals in which string of letters you are trying to impose on articles. --dab (𒁳) 15:36, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

There are sources which state all those as being Assyrian. But I am willing to go with the consensus of Assyrian/Syriac but the TriZ refuses to accept that. Malik Danno (talk) 21:55, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

in contexts of antiquity, the proper term is "Syrian". The Syriac vs. Assyrian stuff is strictly a 20th century dispute, or at the very most one beginning in the 19th century. All pre-19th -century figures can safely be called "Syrian". --dab (𒁳) 12:08, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

But does not the ancient 'Syrian' mean modern 'Assyrian' ... when people read that they are going to think he is ethnically the same as Syrians of today ... but I do get your point and I do accept it. Malik Danno (talk) 13:53, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

New problem is with the intro to Assyrian/Chaldean/Syriac People page ... again we have POV pusher led by their triumphant hero The TriZ ... if you want to, can you protect the page until a consensus is reached, I've asked them to not touch it until we have discussed our sides, but as usual they do not want to. Malik Danno (talk) 13:53, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

Mythology

You mentioned on the talk page of this article last summer that many edits were made to it that were simpistic and dubious hat were being sourced to Segal. A number of very drastic changes have recently been made by that some editor using Segal as his sole source again, and I think that they are even more simplistic and dubious this time around. In fact I think the overall thrust of the article has been severely gutted. We both have worked on that article over the years, agreed on some things and disagreed on others, but based upon the nature of the recent changes as well as the demonstrated willingness of the editor to revert to his version when modifications are made, I think any longtime editor with demonstrated knowledge on the topic should take a look and help hammer out a solution and direction now instead of waiting until it gets changed even more thoroughly by a single editor. DreamGuy (talk) 18:44, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

Check this out if you want a laugh

You're probably already aware of this, but this defence of Ararat Arev as a martyr to the truth made me smile . What's the world coming to when anti-Semitic ultra-nationalists can't spam Misplaced Pages with their stuff? It's just like 1933 all over again! Cheers. --Folantin (talk) 13:45, 6 February 2009 (UTC)

Ebionites article

Dab, an editor has replaced the entire header section on the Ebionites article. I no longer have a dog in this hunt - which is to say that I wouldn't return to editing that article if my life depended on it - but I thought someone should know. Best regards. --Ovadyah (talk) 22:34, 7 February 2009 (UTC)

User:AramaeanSyriac creates another Fork

User: AramaeanSyriac has created another fork for the 100th time. He continues to be defiant of everything we have discussed, critiqued and edited. Here is the link http://en.wikipedia.org/Syriac_people He is constantly replacing the term you suggested which is syrian for edessan kings with aramaean-syriacs. As you have mentioned before if he continues with this disruptive behavior he will be blocked indefinately or he will be banned altogether. I will let you make that decision although the answer to it is obvious. Ninevite (talk) 00:33, 9 February 2009 (UTC)

well, ban him then, he's had enough warnings not to do this. --dab (𒁳) 16:27, 10 February 2009 (UTC)

As a non-admin I do not have the extra tools or capabilities as you do in indef blocking or banning disruptive users who constantly go against status quo. That is the reason why I came to you. You have hands on expierience of the scenario and are well-alert of the situacion altogether. I do not fathom this, had I instigated the same edits over and over again as that user I would have been gone a long time ago. Warnings are irrelevant at this point as he has been warned countless times, regarding the subject matter. Other users such as your friend have even come to a conlusion of settling this issue once and for all. Dab I respect you as admin because where others have come and gone, you have stayed on board throughout criticism and praise. Where others have fled your foundations have remained consistent. I will not waste your time regarding this anymore as I now see you have warned him yet again for the same disruptive behavior. The only question to be answered is how long will it be until he creates another fork? Best Regards Ninevite (talk) 19:41, 10 February 2009 (UTC)

Fringy theories on Etruscan

I wrote a question about the POV status flags you added to Talk:Etruscan language, but no answer so far! I have read up on POV, and cannot see why an old theory, no matter how fringy, can be accused of violating NPOV! Just for fun, I looked up Phlogiston on Misplaced Pages and didn't see a POV flag ;-) Could you clarify your concern? If you just want to restructure the article, that would be fine by me! Thanks in advance! Jpaulm (talk) 12:50, 10 February 2009 (UTC)

Not sure where the best place to put my question - apologies for duplication! Apparently Smackbot changes your "undue" tag to NPOV - to me that puts a different twist on things! Can we just remove the template, now that you have restored the due balance?! It seems OK to me now. Thanks. Jpaulm (talk) 12:42, 13 February 2009 (UTC)

Fair use rationale for File:Maumanorig drawing.png

Thanks for uploading or contributing to File:Maumanorig drawing.png. I notice the file page specifies that the file is being used under fair use but there is not a suitable explanation or rationale as to why each specific use in Misplaced Pages constitutes fair use. Please go to the file description page and edit it to include a fair use rationale.

If you have uploaded other fair use media, consider checking that you have specified the fair use rationale on those pages too. You can find a list of 'file' pages you have edited by clicking on the "my contributions" link (it is located at the very top of any Misplaced Pages page when you are logged in), and then selecting "File" from the dropdown box. Note that any non-free media lacking such an explanation will be deleted one week after they have been uploaded, as described on criteria for speedy deletion. If you have any questions please ask them at the Media copyright questions page. Thank you. Stifle (talk) 21:13, 10 February 2009 (UTC)

Categories on Wikimedia

Do you know how to handle the categories on Wikimedia? I thought I did and I tried to change "Roma people" to "Romani people" but I failed. Kenshin (talk) 12:55, 11 February 2009 (UTC)

Pointed hat

Have you not read the talk page? You may not be aware, but "pointy" is essentially baby talk, and defended as such by the user who moved the page, against concensus, again today. Johnbod (talk) 13:13, 11 February 2009 (UTC)

I am perfectly aware of the stylistic implications, as is clear from my earlier comments on the talkpage. The page has been sitting at the current title for more than three years, so you can bloody well take the time to discuss this properly before indulging in unilateral moves. I fail to see any "concensus" for the move, I for one, as the article's original creator, remain opposed. You'll have to do a better job of arguing your case before I'll be ready to support your suggestion, e.g. a study of actual usage in actual literature. Just because something strikes you as "baby talk" doesn't make it so. Don't make the mistake of assuming you "own" English because you are a native speaker. The Anglosphere is far too large and varied for that to work. You need to base your judgement on actual evidence, not your gut feeling, no matter how ... complete your command of the language (it's consensus, not *concensus, btw.)--dab (𒁳) 13:18, 11 February 2009 (UTC)

I just realize, you're the "illuminated manuscripts" guy, aren't you. That was another lengthy and utterly fruitless discussion of English semantics and stylistics where you completely refused to listen to or consider the points raised over your own conviction of what was "correct". In view of that, I think I will cut this discussion short and ask you to honour WP:CONSENSUS, thanks. --dab (𒁳) 13:27, 11 February 2009 (UTC)

(ec) The name has been objected to by many editors since 2006, and had spent some months at "pointed" until today. I'm afraid native speakers do own the language, annoying as that sometimes is to others. You don't seriously think a "study of actual usage in actual literature" will support "pointy", surely? Mind you, recalling your absurd defence of "illustrated manuscript", it's possible you do. Johnbod (talk) 13:31, 11 February 2009 (UTC)

As I said, I have no interest in debating this with you. Try WP:3O. Fwiiw,

Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL

Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL

both variants are common. It's a matter of taste. I don't ask you to share my taste, but I will thank you for not imposing your taste on others. --dab (𒁳) 16:30, 11 February 2009 (UTC)

hello

Hello Dab, I am just wondering what a member is suppose to do if he finds himself in a position where another member is changing pages at his/her own will without discussion and/or consensus, and when asked to discuss he/she does not and still changes the pages? I am referring to the Assyrian/Chaldean/Syriac people page the first line how one member is unwilling to discuss his changes. Malik Danno (talk) 23:44, 13 February 2009 (UTC)

this is what we have WP:3RR for. If the user is editing against consensus, they will run into this revert limitation very soon, and they will either be blocked, or they will learn that their edits are changed back as soon as they make them. Either way, they are not a problem. --dab (𒁳) 08:17, 14 February 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for all the work you put in.

The Working Wikipedian's Barnstar

I haven't always agreed with everything you have done nonetheless I would like to present you with this working man's award for your tireless and endless contributions to Assyrian-Related topics. During these past years, dozens of admins have come and gone, but what makes you different from all others is that you have endured through criticism and praise. Where others have ran away from criticism you have remained consistent in your foundations. On behalf of many editors involved with the project I would like to thank you for all your continual input and participation. Best Regards Ninevite (talk) 21:35, 14 February 2009 (UTC)

thank you -- it is such appreciations from people with whom I've had disagreements that I value the most. --dab (𒁳) 21:43, 14 February 2009 (UTC)

Linguistics

Hi, do you have Linguistics on your watchlist? Supriyya is back, trying to redefine linguistics according to what she wishes it meant, and Garik and I are having difficulty persuading her she's acting against consensus as there are only two of us at the moment. More contributors to the discussion are needed! —Angr 09:52, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

I'll try to keep an eye on it -- although you seem to be doing ok at present. If this escalates, count me in as an "admin willing to block" for slow revert warring. --dab (𒁳) 10:39, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

subhash kak article

First of all, I made several other changes, and the separation was only a small one. In the future please be respectful of the whole contribution someone makes and go through it. You should have changed it back in the text rather than making a sweeping "undo". As for your point, though they are related, especially since Indian civilization relates to Indian (the nation-state) politics, Indology refers to Indian civilization, whereas Indian politics refers to India the nation-state, and the topics are thus mutually exclusive. NittyG (talk) 16:32, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

I am not aware that I have made any "sweeping undo", nor did I intend to do so. My edit was rather minor, concerning the ToC issue mentioned in the edit summary exclusively.

Regarding your comment on my point, I think you haven't understood what I mean. The topics are inseparable for this author, precisely because he isn't an Indologist, but a Hindu chauvinist, and his "Indology" is thinly disguised ideological pamphleteering. --dab (𒁳) 16:41, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

Thank you for changing the info back. Be careful in the future.

I agree with you at least partially, but that is your POV, and it is not neutral. Maybe we should not use the term "Indologist" if that is in question, but his literary works and political beliefs are mutually exclusive. The books are not about politics, they are about the Vedas (and though this is highly political, they are, once again, separate subjects). NittyG (talk) 17:02, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

NittyG, what are you talking about? You have made a mistake, not me. I have never undone your edits. I have been pointing out that you mistakenly accused me of undoing your edits. I find it peculiar to have you ask me to "be careful in the future" in the light of this. I do not understand your claim that "his literary works and political beliefs are mutually exclusive". I would argue that very much the contrary is the case. --dab (𒁳) 17:04, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

Far right in Poland

I'm sorry but you don't have any idea about the subject.Xx236 (talk) 18:45, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

I do not pretend to. WP:CITE is good enough for me. --dab (𒁳) 19:50, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

Quoting biased or ignorant sources makes you coresponsible.Xx236 (talk) 10:41, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

Cite a better source. It is the best I could find. Complaining about the sources used without suggesting an alternative yourself is rather cheap. --dab (𒁳) 12:31, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

2nd Personal Attack

Hello Dab, User:The TriZ once again launched, what I beleive, is a personal attack against me here ], this is the second time. The first time was here ] and after he posted that I sent him a clear warning that he had in fact sent a personal attack and that if happens again admins would be notified. I am hoping these personal attacks will stop somehow. Malik Danno (talk) 19:02, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

I think you need to take a little less touchy approach. We all know you and TriZ come from opposite sides in this. You both need to learn to collaborate in a spirit of cool respect regardless. There will be no progress if you jump into wikilawyering "zomg WP:CIVIL violation!" mode at every annoyed comment. --dab (𒁳) 21:34, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

Dab, as you can see from my posts I have been nothing but civil, even if you try to find one thing that I said wrong about Dab then I will be guilty, but I have never name called him. And I am just following Misplaced Pages procedures, 1st step is asking the person to refrain from any further personal attacks (done) if happens again second step is to inform an admin involved (done). He has called me an idiot and stupid so far, and I would want the same thing to happen to him that would happen to anyone if he/she called another member idoit then stupid. God forbid if this was be saying half of what he has called me I would be booted in a heartbeat. Malik Danno (talk) 22:14, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

Help

Hi DB. I need your help with something. I tried contacting Moreschi about it, but he seems to be away. Here are the details. Please let me know if you can be of assistance. Regards, Soupforone (talk) 06:20, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

clearly a problem account. These are a dime a dozen, so it is probably not worth wasting a criminal investigation on. I see Paul is already on it, I'll also put the Hamitic article on my watchlist. Editors with this kind of extreme naiveté usually aren't a problem. Pov pushers need a minimal amount of intelligence and erudition in order to be able to "game the system" and cause real disruption. --dab (𒁳) 10:47, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

Issyk Kurgan

Hi, some ips from various places have been vandalizing the article. Can it be ip protected?--Nepaheshgar (talk) 16:24, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

Iberian-Guanche inscriptions

Hey Dab, could you have a look at that page and the deletion discussion going on about it? Thanks a lot, Trigaranus (talk) 19:41, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

Well, that's been quite a struggle, but seems to have worked out. Messi für dîn Komentâr. One of the loons actually went and set up a sock puppet account just for that discussion. And I wasted hours trying to make my point. Had it with WP for a while. Anyway, keep up the good stuff. phil Trigaranus (talk) 20:07, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

hamitic

Like I said on the discusion page I see you are talking about then hamitic language group not the racial theory. I don't know if it was you you who notified wiki to split the article into 2, but I totally agree with the decision that it should be split into 2 and be accessible from a disambiguation page —Preceding unsigned comment added by ProfXY (talk • contribs) 22:23, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

File:Maumanorig drawing.png listed for deletion

An image or media file that you uploaded or altered, File:Maumanorig drawing.png, has been listed at Misplaced Pages:Files for deletion. Please see the discussion to see why this is (you may have to search for the title of the image to find its entry), if you are interested in it not being deleted. Thank you. Stifle (talk) 18:18, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

Swiss Cryptotheological Seminary

Sounds like a great institution! Do they offer research fellowships? I could use some time away... --Akhilleus (talk) 01:58, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

I guess I can offer you Dean, as long as I get to be Head Chancellor. --dab (𒁳) 11:36, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Romani language clean-up

If you have the time can you do some clean-up in some Romani language related articles from "Category:Romani language"? First of all the "Albanian-Romany" should be deleted as it has no base, then the article moves from "Romani" to "Romany" should be reverted. Thanks! Kenshin (talk) 12:03, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

"Iberian-Guanche inscriptions" becomes "Iberian-Guanche script"

Hey dab. Our two (if two different users they are) editors have reinstated their fringe theory under another header, and keep rebuilding links to it that I had already deleted. Now, both chaps only and exclusively contribute the theories of Antonio-Arnaiz-Villena to WP, which I am not so sure is a good thing. Having obviously circumvented WP policy by just setting up the deleted page under a different name, is there any way they could be stopped from being so utterly annoying? Trigaranus (talk) 06:34, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

I deleted the new article and mentions of it elsewhere (it is evidently of primary importance in the commercial value of tuna). I can't speak for dab, but I'll block if they keep this up. kwami (talk) 08:43, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

File:Maumanorig drawing.png

I thought you'd have known that you don't remove IFD tags from pages until the discussion is closed... Stifle (talk) 16:41, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Descent from Adam and Eve

You redirected Descent from Adam and Eve to Generations of Adam because apparantly the articles were on the same topic. I just wanted to express my disagreement with this: the Generations of Adam article is an article about the line of descent going through Seth (according to Genesis 5) which, along with a second line of descent starting with Cain (listed in Genesis 4), ends in the name Lamech (article introduction says this same thing, article content as well, and there is a navigation template at the bottom named "from Adam to Noah", and not something like "from Adam to contemporary people"). If its verifiability (of the attempts/claims of descent, not of the existance of Adam and Eve) and article standards are what concern you, then that is an entirely different matter. The article Descent from Adam and Eve was deemed "acceptable" by "DYK standards" (just deemed acceptable; not that it is necesarry acceptable, by DYK standards). Then again, if you, like many others, believe that the article is unsourced, since, on the other hand, this article was deemed "ok" by DYK standards and some people at its talk page, I believe that it would be only be fair to nominate this article for the standard deletion process AfD, that way consensus can be reached on the future of this article. I believe this would be better in accordance to being bold but not too bold and Misplaced Pages:Consensus, instead of directly redirecting the article without a clear consensus on whether that is the best resolution (absolutely no offense and I'm not saying that that isn't the best resolution, just that that resolution must be backed by consensus). (By the way, if you believe that an AfD will result in delete/redirect, which is its current state, then by nominating it there is nothing to lose, since it would make it all more in accordance to consensus) Happy editing, ♠TomasBat 19:56, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

if you accept the genealogy in Genesis, it is pointless to discuss descent "from Adam to contemporary people", you only need to discuss descent from Noah, the genealogy from Noah back to Adam will be the same for everyone. If you are interested in "descent from Adam to contemporary people", you want to go to Sons of Noah, and further to Semites, Japhetites and Hamites.

I object to attempts at making every article about Biblical narratives into a petty, argumentative quibble about "Biblical literalism". The topic of Biblical literalism needs to be contained strictly to topics addressing Category:Christian fundamentalism. It should not spill into articles about the Bible in general, per WP:DUE. If there was anything of merit in the Descent from Adam and Eve it can always be salvaged from the edit history and added to Generations of Adam or any other article where it may be relevant. I do not wish to delete the article, hence I will not submit it to Afd. Redirection is good enough. DYK is no sort of precedence for the appropriateness of any article title, or any article content. DYK by defninition lists recent, unpolished topics. They often end up merged or redirected. --dab (𒁳) 20:45, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Indus Valley Civilization and Ancient Tamil Nadu

Expecting your opinion here. Regards. -The Enforcer_{Office of the secret service} 13:45, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Rajput article is a mess, I agree, but..

I am from Rajasthan and I am also a Rajput, who is keenly interestd in history not only that of Indian, or that Rajput history. Its a bit sad to see the currrent state of the Rajput page, with its unsystematic jumbles of inof, although I am partly to blame not having have properly try to help with its edition.

Nonethelss, all the facts I put in Wiki always has a reference when I do try try to present a more holistic picture of history rather than the biased and dry eurocentric perceptions. I would apreciate if you would could discuss with me point by point?? about the facts which you argue against rather than undoing a well researched and understannding paragraph of socio-cultural aspects of history, rather than undoing the whole thing particularly my contribution to the Maratha Ascendency and British Suzerainty section which I can assure is not a 'trainwreck' but a well researched and balanced view, unless it may be unacceptable view for you due to it being a 'native' view.

regards Maharaj Devraj (talk)

It is a tired cliché that "eurocentric perceptions" are a problem with this, or any India-related articles. It is exclusively Rajput editors from India who have caused the present mess by trying to add as much stuff on their preferred clans or groups, without regard to structure, article flow, or quality. The edit you refer to introduced random factoids in horrible formatting. I am not saying any of it isn't factual. I am saying, you need to figure out two things

• basic wikiformat, such as how to introduce section headers and citations
• WP:SS structure, i.e. which article your material should go to. In this case, History of Rajputs, not the already overburdened "History" section at Rajput. If you have really a lot of material on Rajputs during the British Raj, feel free to branch out at Rajputs during the British Raj article from a section at History of Rajputs, but please do not add further clutter to the already extremely cluttered Rajput article.

If you really want to help Misplaced Pages with presenting the Rajputs in a more encyclopedic way, you should help cleaning up the material that is already here instead of adding more poorly formated detail on an existing heap of poorly formatted detail. I really hope you can see your way clear to investing some time in the cleaning up of the article on your group, because it is really a shame how this article has been in disrepair for years now. --dab (𒁳) 15:44, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Sorry for the late reply. I have had my personal reasons for not interfereing with the Rajput article, until I thought it time to do so.

I understand and agrees with your point about the need to clean up the article. However, I don't totally agree with the way you have edited it.

If you say that the details I have added should be put into Rajputs during the British Raj, than your prefered edit should be put under (history of the Rajput States) not the Rajput article, since your prefered edit makes no distinction or differentiation between the history of the Rajput states and the history of the Rajputs as a social sector. The essential point of my edit is that, while the Rajput states were in decline the individual Rajput soldiers were going through an important stage of transformation/modernisation, and thriving in armies across the subcontinent. Rajputs soldiers were undeniably employed by all major factions of the period and we can discuss this in detail if you desire, as I ensure sufficient material to back my claim. Nonetheless, it was the British Indian army that put them to use most sucessfully (including Gurkas whom are of Rajut descent). This is a fact which your edits have convienently ignored, of which I have been oblided to feel that justice has not been given to our history. I shall try to re-edit the article briefly in a way which gives a balanced consideration to these factors, your assistence and cooperation is appreciated.Maharaj Devraj (talk) 16:08, 17 March 2009 (UTC)

User ArameanSyriac

I saw that you had issues with this user. I've been editing a couple of articles today (on Michael the Syrian and James of Edessa and found that he had altered both of them in a rather silly way. It looks from his edit history as if he is spamming all the articles in Misplaced Pages which relate to Syriac writers or personages with some kind of assertion that all Syriac writers spoke Aramaic or whatever (they thought of themselves as descended from the Arameans, but definitely did NOT speak Imperial Aramaic!). I've dealt with these two, but haven't the time to go through and fix all his corruptions. His edits add nothing, as far as I could see. I would support a ban, if he doesn't desist. Roger Pearse (talk) 16:49, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Yes, I'm tired of babysitting this user. He has well earned himself a permaban by now, and he'll likely be slapped with one at the next opportunity. --dab (𒁳) 16:53, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Ancient Tamil country

Hi Dieter. While History of Tamil Nadu is FA, Ancient Tamil country is... not quite there yet. I know you know more than I do about Indian history, but not if this is one of your areas of expertise. Any ideas? Stubify? AfD? Get help from a WikiProject? And is there any more than the average amount of national pride present? Any help at all would be appreciated. Itsmejudith (talk) 23:01, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

It's an Indian topic involving ethnicity and ancient history. What do you expect? People are generally desperate to tear these to shreds just out of crude unmitigaged Homo sapiens ingroup loyalty.

I tried to give the article some shape (toc and lede-wise) to clarify its scope, but I cannot be bothered to clean up the clutter and listcruft in the body. Perhaps a bold soul can blank all that isn't properly referenced, so the article can start over under closer supervision. My gut tells me that this is another Rajput or Kambojas-type Sisyphean task. --dab (𒁳) 09:47, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

You did loads, thanks very much. My greatest number of edits are to Reddy (sigh). But in the end someone else turned up out of the blue to help. I'll sharpen up my kitchen knives to make further progress on this one. Itsmejudith (talk) 23:17, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Regarding criticism of the Qur'an

Hi! In regards to this edit, I was wondering if you plan to move that section to some sort of 'Criticism of Sharia' page/criticism of Islam page, or just keep it deleted. I understand that the section in question does not address the title of the page, but is the section a valid section? Is that section a valid criticism of Islam or Islamic law? lalib 17:50, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

if anywhere, I suppose this would belong on Hudud. Which I think pretty much already covers the topic. --dab (𒁳) 20:24, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

That works. - lalib 01:33, 5 March 2009 (UTC)

Germanic Neopaganism

You reverted what appears, to me, to a helpful edit at Germanic Neopaganism.

In my experience, the racialists use Wotanism. Arguing that Odinism "tends" to be associated with racialism is simply admitting to an incorrect prejudice. --Tsmollet (talk) 20:33, 5 March 2009 (UTC)

I think the problem may be the Goodrick-Clarke quote. In his extensive works, all of which I have read, he only briefly writes about Odinism in Black Sun. Since he studies Nazi and Neo-Nazi thought, he is not a good source to use on a religion article.

To be frank, in the English-speaking world, the difference bewteen Odinism and Asatru is not profound. Very simply, the British use the word "Odinism" and the Americans usually use "Asatru." To argue that Odinism implies racism and Asatru does not is incorrect.

Cheers.

--Tsmollet (talk) 23:46, 5 March 2009 (UTC)

It's a question of terminology. There is a sliding scale between "racist" and "folkish" Nordic paganism. Goodrick-Clarke is our best source for racism in Germanic neopaganism. The article doesn't state "Odinism implies racism", it says "folkish or racist", which is correct. I think it is futile to try and draw a line between mere "folkish" and positively "racist" approaches. Sure, "racist" is a more loaded term (which is precisely why adherents chose a neologism to refer to their school of thought) -- "racist" is popularly taken to imply ethnic hate or violence. This isn't necessarily the case. There is also the term racialism which is sometimes used to designate racist ideology that isn't reflected in activism or emotion.

The point is that the British "Odinists" seem to be "folkish" exclusively, while in the US, following the 1986 split, there are also "universalist", that is to say non-racist "Asatruar". But of course, as you say, mainstream "folkish" US Asatru is exactly synonymous to UK "Odinism".

I do not think we have much leeway here, since we have very few quotable sources and need to stick to those. --dab (𒁳) 06:57, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

To the contrary, Goodrick-Clarke is not a good source on Odinism. If I remember correctly, his entire academic output on the subject of Odinism consists of some thirty pages, and moost of this is quite prosaic.

He is excellent on German Nazi/Folkish thought, but not on Odinism.

Again, I have been an Odinist for years, in both Europe and America, and the simple fact is the British say Odinism and the Americans say, by and large, Asatru. To try to complicate matters is a misrepresentation.

From your edits you seem to be a broadly educated person, but one cannot master everything!

Thank you for the intelligent post on my talk page. Your points are well made.

Briefly, however, the Troth seems to be more "Norse Wicca." The Odin Brotherhood, Odinic Rite, and Odinist Fellowship all use Odinism, and McNallen himself says it is a synonym for Asatru.

My bottom point: the Goodrick-Clarke quotation simply muddles things and should be deleted....

As for Odinism and race, no one at Misplaced Pages seems to realize that the Odin Brotherhood, which proudly uses "Odinism," is racist. We believe there are "no chosen peoples and no master races." And, for the record, we, have many members in Mexico!

Odin Brotherhood of the Sacred Fire

--Tsmollet (talk) 21:31, 16 March 2009 (UTC)

--Tsmollet (talk) 21:31, 16 March 2009 (UTC)

--Tsmollet (talk) 06:32, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

Please delete image

Dear Admin Dbachman, Please delete this image on English wiki:

• File:Shwe_zedi.jpg It is superfluous now as someone placed it on Commons...under another name. Thank You, --Leoboudv (talk) 10:01, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

How do I contact?

Hello dab, mabe you can help me. How do I contact the person that uploaded this image: http://en.wikipedia.org/File:Runen.jpg ? Odinsjarl (talk) 22:34, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

this is their talkpage at commons. this edit seems to place them in the Netherlands. --dab (𒁳) 14:20, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

Thanks dab. Odinsjarl (talk) 16:07, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

Christ myth theory

Dbachmann, I'm having trouble understanding your perspective on this article. For my part, if the article topic seems like a "mess" that's because of another editor's tendentiousness on the talk page, not because of any inherent problem with the article topic or the seondary sources that cover it. What am I missing? --Akhilleus (talk) 13:30, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

I agree, of course, that the problem is first and foremost with the tedious tendentiousness on the part of BruceGrubb's. But suppose that was solved and we could discuss the further fate of the article among grown-ups, it has consistently been my position that the article does not establish its topic as separate from that of historicity of Jesus and quest for the historical Jesus, and that the burden of establishing a well-defined, notable scope for yet another "historicity of Jesus" article on top of

1. historicity of Jesus
2. quest for the historical Jesus
3. historical Jesus

would lie with whoever wishes to keep the article separate. I for one do not think it is proper to keep four separates article on "is Jesus historical?" around even if maintaining them wasn't already a nightmare because of all the ideologized religionist and anti-religionist editors.

A good indicator that WP:CFORK has taken place is that you only get one half of the crowd at each article. It seems that Christ myth theory is the haunt of ideological atheists on a mission to "debunk Christianity". They meet surprisingly little resistance from Christian editors. The reason for this seems to be that those have their "own" article at historical Jesus, and as long as they can depict the historical character there, they don't mind if the atheists keep an anti-Jesus article elsewhere. This is exactly what Misplaced Pages tries to avoid at any cost, the classical pov fork scenario where each faction gets their own article.

Ok, so we as the neutral crowd can try to keep each of these articles within npov, but the basic problem of there being several articles to begin with will only be addressed by merging. --dab (𒁳) 14:32, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

I see your point here, and I wouldn't say that the current division of articles about historical Jesus stuff is necessarily ideal--your point about Christian editors ignoring Christ myth theory because they have their own territory carved out is spot-on; the original form of Jesus-myth or whatever it was called looks like it was intended as a "debunking" article.

However, the subject of Jesus is big, and there's enough room on Misplaced Pages for an article about the history of the (sub-)discipline of historical Jesus study, which is what quest for the historical Jesus tries to do--an overview of around 2 centuries of scholarship, not really that different than Homeric studies. I see Christ myth theory as a sub-article of quest for the historical Jesus, recording the history of a particular train of thought; there could be other articles like demythologization and form-critical school and so forth. Not that I'm going to start those; this article is enough of a headache; I would like to find a way to remove the constant flow of tendentiousness, so that grown-up discussion could take place on the article. --Akhilleus (talk) 02:39, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Armenians

Would you agree that you "admitted that the Armenians are likely descendants of Mitanni via the Hurrians"? . And have you seen (search it for Armenians). dougweller (talk) 16:33, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

please see this edit of mine. Til Eulenspiegel is in one of his tempers, which means he will make a lot of noise for a week or so, without having anything resembling a case. In other words, he is wasting your time. --dab (𒁳) 16:45, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

Thanks. I am only slowly realising what he is like. dougweller (talk) 16:51, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

I don't know how many times this user has wasted my time over non-issues like that, and then spewed vitriol at me for my pains. This isn't how we do things around here, and I consequently suggest that Til shouldn't be considered a Wikipedian in good standing.

Concerning what little topical substance there is behind this, brief WP:DUE mention of Mitanni as one of the predecessor states of the Orontids at Armenians#Origins is perfectly adequate, and perfectly undisputed. Mitanni is a state (its people are known as Hurrians), and it is properly a predecessor state of the state of Urartu, which is in turn a predecessor state of the Orontid kingdom. So yes, Mitanni may have some modest relevance to the topic of Armenian ethnogenesis. Conversely, of course, modern-day Armenians hold no relevance whatsoever to the topic of Mitanni. --dab (𒁳) 16:57, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

I just ran across this. Searching through the ANI archives I see quite a few other references to his name, so I'm wondering whether it's worth adding to, or creating a new thread, to discuss Til's editing. I have plenty I can add to such a discussion, but I've always held off since I tend to be involved in the disputes. What do you think? Cheers, Ben (talk) 12:09, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Traditional procedure would be an RfC on Til. I am not sure if this is done at all these days, at least I don't think these RfCs ever come to much.

But I am frankly so tired of this user that I don't feel like investing any more time in him just to see him banned. But if you have the energy, go right ahead and I will be sure to certify there is a solid basis for questioning this user's standing.

The easier way is to just sit it out and wait until the user has annoyed enough people to attract the attention of previously uninvolved admins, who can then warn the user, and eventually slap blocks on him. If I was uninvolved, I would certainly consider Til more than ripe for the warn-block cycle. Dougweller (talk · contribs) has now become aware of this user, and if Til keeps up his current temper tantrum, I have no doubt he will be facing blocks rather soon.

As I said, I don't want to invest any energy in making this happening any sooner than it is going to happen anyway in Misplaced Pages's natural time. --dab (𒁳) 12:16, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

I would have blocked him, but I made the mistake of commenting on the WP:RSN thread he started first. If I had blocked him after that, I would have been facing the charge of trying to gain advantage in a content dispute. --Akhilleus (talk) 12:41, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

it's ok, he isn't causing much disruption atm. His general pattern is, he produces perfectly valid edits, but goes into "vitriolic crackpot" mode every couple of weeks. Such phases will last for a week or so, and then he'll be peaceful again for some time. I've had a fair number of "debates" with him, and in none of them did he concede any point, he usually just withdraws grumbling after people spent several hours pointing out he has no case. This is a waste of time, but it doesn't do much positive harm. Once you are familiar with his modus operandi, you can short-cut the procedure by pointing out he has no case and then ignoring him. Til is no Ararat arev, he just happened to defend Ararat arev in this particular instance, I imagine coincidentially out of his reflex to defend the underdogs against the evil racist admin cabal. This time, the "underdog" he picked just so happened to be one of the worst trolls known to en-wiki, but you'll see him siding with the random Afrocentrist or Biblical literalist next time around. --dab (𒁳) 12:49, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

I forgot AA was the lovable "Alex mond". I've just removed this comment from his talk page. Racism against crustaceans - whatever next? I mean, where do lobsters stand on the Armenian hypothesis? Cheers. --Folantin (talk) 22:25, 11 March 2009 (UTC)

Schools

We notify schools? Should I be doing something when I block school addresses? Something else I haven't learned yet, sigh. dougweller (talk) 22:15, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

you don't have to. I never do that. But some people are willing to send emails to schools telling them of abuse, so that the school can take measures if they like. As far as I am concerned, this is pointless, IP ranges of High Schools will end up blocked for most of the time no matter what we do. --dab (𒁳) 17:49, 11 March 2009 (UTC)

I agree. There seems no way to stop it. I make a point of checking IPs to see if they are schools, I find a lot of repeat offenders have never been tagged as educational addresses. dougweller (talk) 11:22, 14 March 2009 (UTC)

Armenia

Hi Bachmann,

I noticed that you removed Armenia from the Europe topic template. Would you mind correspondingly removing the "1" on the {{Asia topic}} template which indicates that Armenia is part of Europe? I would do it, but the page is protected and I'm not an administrator.

Thanks,

Neelix (talk) 00:02, 11 March 2009 (UTC)

Content Forks

I note your post at Category:Introductions, and you might like to contribute to the discussion at Wikipedia_talk:Content_forking#.22Introduction_to_XXXX.22_articles. --Gavin Collins (talk|contribs) 17:13, 11 March 2009 (UTC)

Armenianhighland.com

Dear Mr. Bachmann,

I did not know how else to contact you so I include this here. Sorry I am not good at using wikipedia.

My name is Gevork Nazaryan and a friend of mine has told me that you have wanted to remove my page from wikipedia because of some arguments with some users that you had. First of all, let me clear this out, I am in no way the person that you are argued or are arguing with. Second of all, I am about to receive my PhD. very soon (I can send you my credentials scanned diplomas so on) and I am in no way "non credible" individual, in fact I am a scholar who has organized countless historical conferences and seminars. Once again if someone quotes me or uses a page of mine as a source that DOES NOT mean that I do or do not endorse that person and most importantly as I noted that person would somehow be ascribed to me. I don't know how you can check but I hope you can verify this. In fact I have signed up on wikipedia years ago but hardly have used my account, only adding bits of information as of today. My profile was created by a participant to one my lectures and a friend who once again is non of the persons that you were talking to as far as I know. I was informed by one of my friends that because you had a disagreement with a user I believe that you wanted to remove my entry which again has not even be made by myself. Once again as a scholar, I respect difference of opinions no matter on what subject matter, I respect your position and I have never argued with you otherwise, it is once again a pity and completely wrong that you want to erase my profile because certain quotes have used sources from me and my works (and I in turn have simply used Petrie's works for most part).

Please let me know how else I can clear up this misunderstanding and thank you beforehand. Or provide me a contact to send you additional information. With kind regards, Gevork Nazaryan —Preceding unsigned comment added by Arman77 (talk • contribs) 14:17, 14 March 2009 (UTC)

Dear Mr. Nazaryan,

I understand that the user known as "Ararat arev" is your friend. If you could please impress on him the fact that he has been banned from editing Misplaced Pages, a private website which is perfectly within its rights to grant and revoke editing access to anyone. Your friend has caused extremely heavy disruption, and by association has given you and your website a rather dubious reputation. This is not something you want for your website, and I would recommend that you ask your friend that this is stopped.

Regarding your article, Gevork Nazaryan, it is subject to the same criteria of notability as any other article. In the case of academics, the relevant guideline can be consulted at WP:PROF. Note that just having a PhD is by no means sufficient for inclusion. If you can provide evidence that you do in fact satisfy the guidelines quoted, you are most welcome to present them at Talk:Gevork Nazaryan. If no such evidence is presented, the article will be deleted, but can of course be recreated at any time in the future as soon as the necessary evidence is brought forward. --dab (𒁳) 15:24, 14 March 2009 (UTC)

user:Chcoc

Hi Dab,

Lately the user Chcoc (talk · contribs) has been terrorizing the Syriac/Assyrian articles. The most recent article to fall victim for him is Syriac music that you created. I've already reported him in ANI a couple o days ago, though no one bothered to take care of it. Also, I'm dead certain he is one of many socks to the masterpuppet Am6212 (talk · contribs).

Regards /The TriZ (talk) 18:47, 14 March 2009 (UTC)

Ararat arev

Dear Mr. Bachmann,

Thank you for the reply. Sorry if I am replying in the wrong place since as I said I am not good at using wikipedia and wanted to add in this same topic. Can you please tell me how to add info to the talk part of the entry to my page? Also there is misunderstanding with regards to ararat arev, I don't know what he has said or what he has done, but he is as far as my 'friend' as far as an email and he sent saying he is interested in Mitanni and sent me two sources from Egyptian records which. If that makes him a 'friend' that I am responsible for his actions that is completely unjust. Of course, it is wrong to do something after you have been banned for some reason or to give you any headache, I apologize for that if somehow this "association" of him sending me links makes me responsible for his actions. I have not used wikipedia for years until the person who created my entry informed me that page needs more info. Also, the reason I noted my PhD. is I wanted to note that I am a scholar (and I added further bio to point out because I do not remember the exact phrasing there but I remember it wanted some more information on the biographical entry). As I noted earlier I respect differences of opinions on any and all subject matter (and please show me to the contrary if you disagree, but like I noted I have not even had the pleasure of discussing any topic with you so it is not even in this context) and as such you always have my respect, especially when something involves history, which is not precise science we should debate and talk about it in civilized manner. That is my approach, that is why on my own site I do give different approaches and opinions by multiple scholars. I always even thank the scholar with the most opposing views that I have discussion with at the end of any lecture during conferences.

I will try to post this same information on that "talk gevork nazaryan" part if I can, if I cannot I will again post a message here asking for your help. Thank you in advance, Respectfully, Gevork Nazaryan —Preceding unsigned comment added by Arman77 (talk • contribs) 03:16, 15 March 2009 (UTC)

Thank you for these clarifications. Of course you are not responsible for the actions of others. You are most welcome to contribute material to our articles on topics within your academic expertise. As for the article on yourself, I do think it will be best to remove it at the time being, since you do not appear to meet WP:PROF. --dab (𒁳) 09:38, 15 March 2009 (UTC)

Dear Mr. Bachmann, please if you wish to include an email and I can send the copies of diplomas if that is needed. Also, the article in the official Daily Bruin newspaper of the university I attended (UCLA) during the conference that I had a presentation already noted that I was a graduate student (completed his MA) and was already working on my PhD. I am including those links also. My articles of course can be found in many journals like Bazmavep that I already noted (see any issue from 2008 or 2009). Again if you provide me with e-mail I would gladly mail you the scans. If you are in greater LA would be more than happy to meet you personally, it would be my pleasure. Kind regards, Gevork Nazaryan

P.S. Again sorry if this is included under wrong edit and thank you for your directions and contributions. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Arman77 (talk • contribs) 10:53, 15 March 2009 (UTC)

Mr. Nazaryan, please understand that I am willing to accept you have a PhD and various diploma. There is really no need to send them to me, because your holding them is irrelevant to anything on Misplaced Pages. I ask you again to review WP:PROF. If you want a Misplaced Pages article on your person as an academic, you'll need to attain a tenured position at a notable university. Thanks, --dab (𒁳) 11:06, 15 March 2009 (UTC)

Dear Mr. Bachmann, I am teaching in high school and college (have been as soon as I received my M.A.) and will teach in university as soon as I complete my PhD. I am not familiar with the categories, if I am listed in a "professor" category or something to that extent please change it. Most importantly if you feel that my work so far is not enough (and I have written several articles in academic journals and given lectures throughout several countries - you can do a quick google search and see some of my lectures and conferences that I chaired) to have an article, than please remove my entry, I am not here, to maintain its inclusion if you feel that it should not be here, it is up to you, the only reason I included additional cv information because I thought that is what was needed and that the person who attended one of my lectures and created the entry told me about the page being removed because it needed additional information. Once again I am not here to argue about anything, I never have with you or anyone in wikipedia, and as I said I always respect academic discourse and different points of views. If you are ever around greater LA as I said, you are invited to meet, maybe we can talk about history, my passion, would love to talk to you. Once again if I can include additional information for the page please let me know, if not and you feel there should not be an entry on me please delete it. Thank you for your replies, with kind regards, Gevork Nazaryan —Preceding unsigned comment added by Arman77 (talk • contribs) 19:13, 15 March 2009 (UTC)

I understand. Well, it is not up to me: I could not prevent you from creating an article within Misplaced Pages guidelines if I wanted to, nor could I help you create an article in violation of Misplaced Pages guidelines if I wanted to. I am not calling the shots here.

I am in Europe, and I do not plan on going to North America anytime soon, so I don't think it is likely we can meet in person.

Thank you, --dab (𒁳) 21:16, 15 March 2009 (UTC)

Dear Mr. Bachmann, thank you. I just noted it because you have contributed a great deal to wikipedia, especially historical material so on. In any event, if you are ever around here I would give you a booklette that I have published on medieval Cilicia and also would love to talk to you on ancient and medieval history. I don't think there is an email or PM feature here on wiki but please let me know. Thank you, Gevork Nazaryan. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Arman77 (talk • contribs) 13:22, 17 March 2009 (UTC)

There is the "e-mail this user" link under "toolbox". You would also be most welcome to contribute your expertise to the Armenian Kingdom of Cilicia article. Regards, --dab (𒁳) 15:18, 17 March 2009 (UTC)

Your comments would be appreciated

As someone who has contributed to a thread about terminology on WT:NPOV/FAQ, I'd like to point you to a thread that attempts to bring the issue to some sort of closure, here. It's important we try and get to the end of this debate, so your comments will be greatly appreciated. Thanks for your time. Ben (talk) 08:04, 16 March 2009 (UTC)

List of countries where Russian is an official language‎

Maybe worth keeping an eye on this. Abkhazia and South Ossetia are only recognised as independent states by Russia and Nicaragua. User:Russavia is playing around with WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS and WP:POINT. Usual story in this neck of the woods. Cheers.--Folantin (talk) 18:05, 17 March 2009 (UTC)

Manliness

Hi, I wanted to ask about your move of Manliness to Manliness (book) and redirect of Manliness to Masculinity. The ins and outs of WP:MOSDAB are frankly beyond the capabilities of my small brain, and maybe this was exactly what was required under the rules. I'm a bit concerned, though, that users (especially inexperienced ones) who come here looking for information on the book (which is a pretty distinguished book by a distinguished author) may feel stymied when their entry of the precise title Manliness takes them to a general topic article, with no hatnote directing them on to the actual book article. IF they have the presence of mind to text-search the article for the word "manliness", they may eventually find the book listed down under "Further reading", only to find that if they click the linked title they are redirected back to the same "masculinity" article. If they think to try the Harvey Mansfield link, they will eventually find a link to the correct book article, but by this point they may have given up instead.

If it were up to me, I'd suggest that Manliness lead to a redirect page listing both Masculinity and Manliness (book), or alternatively that the Masculinity article include a hatnote for the book article. In either case the link in "Further reading" needs to be disambiguated. I don't want to overwrite your work, and frankly, I'd rather not attempt all this myself, because I am far too likely to fall afoul of the aforementioned Great Code of MOSDAB. Thanks for your consideration.--Arxiloxos (talk) 18:50, 18 March 2009 (UTC)

you mean a disambiguation page. It's no big deal, and I won't fight over it. Please feel free to go ahead. I was guided by the "principle of least surprise" as I was linking to manliness from an article, and expected to be taken to the article on manliness, not an article about a book. --dab (𒁳) 19:51, 18 March 2009 (UTC)

Africa, fringe ethnicity theories

Could you please take a look at Africa? It is in a very sorry state in general, and some people there keep defending even the strange claim that "the Afro-Asiatic language family unites it ethnically" against citation requests, dismissing them as "silliness". This looks like sheer nonsense to me. First, the AA languages are not spoken in Sub-Saharan Africa. Furthermore, I fail to understand how a language family can unite anything ethnically. It is not a religion, a single language, a culture, its existence can only be established as a result of linguistic studies, and the uneducated public in Africa or elsewhere are certanly not familiar with that concept. Am I missing something? Colchicum (talk) 00:40, 22 March 2009 (UTC) Oh, what did I step in? This guy "explains" that "it unifies Arabia with Africa, the same as the biome, the same as the desert. That's what this paragraph is about.". Still I fail to understand what it has to do with ethnicity. If this is what that paragraph is about, then it is written extremely poorly. Colchicum (talk) 00:48, 22 March 2009 (UTC)

You could change it to "linguistically", if you like, since ethnicity is a rather poorly defined concept. (I suppose Pan-Arabism is not based on ethnicity.) The silliness was not accepting the same geographic parameters for a language family that you were willing to accept for a biome that had no references either. kwami (talk) 01:12, 22 March 2009 (UTC)

please take it to the article talkpage. I don't see why language families should be discussed under "Geography". --dab (𒁳) 01:15, 22 March 2009 (UTC)

Because they're part of geography? kwami (talk) 01:26, 22 March 2009 (UTC)

you mean linguistic geography. then write a decent paragraph about linguistic geography. And take it to talk, cite your sources, clarify the phrasing, improve it iteratively, don't insist on your particular revision. --dab (𒁳) 01:32, 22 March 2009 (UTC)

I have improved it, or at least modified it, iteratively. I'll be happy to respond to Colchicum on the talk page. But insisting on a citation that the AA family lies in both Africa and Arabia is a bit like insisting on a citation that the Mediterranean lies between Africa and Europe. Sure, it's easy enough to do, but at what point does it simply become silly? If you'd like to expand a line into a paragraph, that's great, but for me the main point was mentioning the it, and providing a link for those who might wish to follow up on it. Why does the language family require a developed paragraph, when the bioregions do not? kwami (talk) 01:39, 22 March 2009 (UTC)

read WP:CONSENSUS and WP:OWN. And then continue this at Talk:Africa. --dab (𒁳) 01:47, 22 March 2009 (UTC)

You might be interested in this discussion

Hi Dieter, I think you might be interested in the discussion I'm having at User talk:Spinach Monster.--Berig (talk) 11:07, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

Wikicanvassing? I'm beginning to wonder if an RFC is necessary for Berig's behavior here. I need that like I need a hole in the head, I'd be more than happy put this all behind us and find a solution to all of this, but I cannot condone people calling me a vandal because they just happen to disagree with me. Especially Administrators.

P.S - Good job on this edit, but I'd ask that you change your wording in regards to your wording of "over the line". It was a bit too harsh, and considering the heat in the argument, and initially I construed it as similar to Berig's "vandalism" personal attack. I'll assume good faith and take back what I initially thought now. Spinach Monster (talk) 21:53, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

To clarify

You may be unaware of my discussions with Ben. The essence of that discussion is this: I am going to drop the "myth" issue for the time being, with one exception. The suggestion at ArbCom was that some sort of forum be set up to discuss the issue. I will happily engage in such a forum, knowing that it would take a considerable time to reach any conclusions, whilst avoiding the myth issue elsewhere in the interim. I do not expect that Ben or others will ever agree with me that there is a problem with the way myth is used at present. One point I will reiterate here is that I am not opposed to using the term; only to the way it is sometimes used.

It has reached a point now where a small group of editors are clearly watching my edits and, if I say or do anything that could vaguely be construed as trying to continue the myth debate, they attempt to dive in and scupper further discussion. I am utterly fed up of this, as there have been several seperate issues that I have tried to discuss and have found these editors diving in regardless.

On the specific issue at Wikiproject neutrality, what I have not said there is that, if my idea goes forward and the project decides to discuss religion (in general, let alone myth), I would stay out of that discussion.

I am trying to contribute positively to Misplaced Pages. Your comment about me wanting to bring a level of neutrality far in excess of the current is unwarranted. That is not a stated aim; it would be pointless trying, because Misplaced Pages could never achieve the level that I am currently working to. That does not mean that Misplaced Pages cannot improve to some degree.--FimusTauri (talk) 11:19, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

I admit that all your edits appear to be perfectly constructive. The "neutrality far in excess of the current" is taken from your userpage, and maybe I shouldn't have brought it up. I think I do not understand what you mean by that phrase. It sounds as if you were trying to manipulate npov policy to suit your agenda, but I realize it's probably more complex than that. Fwiiw I agree that "myth" is a difficult term and may easily be abused or used misleadingly. We need to make sure it is used meaningfully and to the point. --dab (𒁳) 15:57, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

Thank you for a measured response and I apologise if my comments at wikiproject: neutrality are harsh; they are a result of exasperation at the tactics of some editors and I recognise that you have not been involved in that.--FimusTauri (talk) 16:09, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

Heide Göttner-Abendroth

I see you've come across this subject before. Her rather bizarre theories on the links between the Berbers, the Mosuo and the Amazons (!) have turned up at Berber peoples - but I don't think this is an isolated problem. Cheers. --Folantin (talk) 23:56, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

And her article has just been edited. We seem to have someone pushing her pov. dougweller (talk) 11:05, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

Yes, we can cite her. How can you help me with that? Jackiestud (talk) 13:19, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

I do not own her collected works, you may need to go to a library. But it should be fair enough for the purposes of her bio article to cite her own websites, at http://www.goettner-abendroth.de/ and http://www.hagia.de/ . You may also want to look aroun don google books. --dab (𒁳) 13:28, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

Hum, Do I need to cite the specific page? Jackiestud (talk) 13:37, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

Ideally. As a rule, you can do what you like until challenged. If there are reasonable complaints or requests for clarification over your edit, you will be expected to provide the full citation so that the possibility of misrepresentation can be addressed. --dab (𒁳) 16:02, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

I'd Like Nothing More To Move On And Resolve The Content Dispute If You Speak For Berig

Spinach Monster (talk) 01:27, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

When it comes to Cimbrian Language, as long as you reference the fact that the Cimbrians were there in the 2nd Century BC, you can say whatever you want and i'll agree. That's insignificant compared to an administrator calling someone the Misplaced Pages equivalent of a criminal. If you don't speak for Berig, i'll be changing back his original section title.

P.S -- What the hell does "Wikilawyering" mean? And how is that bad? If everything on Misplaced Pages is IAR all the time, then this place would be nothing but neverending conflict. I don't want that, and I don't know why you seem to want that. Spinach Monster (talk) 16:43, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

Any relation of the Cimbrian language to the Cimbri would need attribution. I am not aware of any link. Zimbren is probably from the German for "carpenter". Also, I'll ask you once again to spare me your show of hurt feelings or whatever it is you keep complaining about. If you think you take action against Berig, go to WP:AN/I. I have already told you several times that I am not interested in this "case". --dab (𒁳) 16:47, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

If you're not interested in the dispute, i'll ask you to stay out of it from here on then. That is the major point here, not the article, and the fact that Berig dragged you into this only belies that. Hopefully Berig will come to his senses and start acting like an administrator should so this nonsense can end. I layed out a blueprint for that on his talkpage, so hopefully I won't have to deal with this rudeness from you two much longer. Spinach Monster (talk) 22:07, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Berig drew my attention to your misguided edit at Cimbrian language. I went and fixed the article. I "stayed out" of your vendetta from the beginning.

You might as well acknowledge that your edit changing "1000" to "1000 BC"(!) was a mistake and move on. If you want to keep taking potshots at the messenger instead, you can be sure I will stay "out of it", as I predict will everyone else. --dab (𒁳) 05:10, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

Kangxi radicals

Hi, can you help finish up the 200 or so Kangxi radical red links in Template:Kangxi Radicals? Cheers! bd2412 T 05:31, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

I find this task too boring. A perlscript could do it by importing stuff from de-wiki. --dab (𒁳) 09:55, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

Good point - thanks for responding. Cheers! bd2412 T 15:36, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

I didn't want to put you off doing it -- frankly, I've just been hoping for somebody else to finally get it done all along :o) --dab (𒁳) 15:50, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

You good with maps?

Since you made this:

Are you interested in these: for Genetic history of Europe and maybe for Ethnic groups in Europe ? Phoenix of9 (talk) 22:20, 27 March 2009 (UTC)

I don't think I can redraw these -- they are scatterpolts of the study's specific results. --dab (𒁳) 16:07, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

File source problem with File:Babylon 600BC Painting.jpg

Thanks for uploading File:Babylon 600BC Painting.jpg. I noticed that the file's description page currently doesn't specify who created the content, so the copyright status is unclear. If you did not create this file yourself, you will need to specify the owner of the copyright. If you obtained it from a website, then a link to the website from which it was taken, together with a restatement of that website's terms of use of its content, is usually sufficient information. However, if the copyright holder is different from the website's publisher, their copyright should also be acknowledged.

If you have uploaded other files, consider checking that you have specified their source and tagged them, too. You can find a list of files you have uploaded by following this link. Unsourced and untagged images may be deleted one week after they have been tagged, as described on criteria for speedy deletion. If the image is copyrighted under a non-free license (per Misplaced Pages:Fair use) then the image will be deleted 48 hours after 09:23, 31 March 2009 (UTC). If you have any questions please ask them at the Media copyright questions page. Thank you. Wikipeder (talk) 09:23, 31 March 2009 (UTC)

Adnanmuf

Can you maybe review Misplaced Pages:Sockpuppet investigations/Wikzilla/Archive if you get the chance? (It shouldn't be filed under Wikzilla, but there you go.) It is about User:Adnanmuf, a genetics-and-ancient-history-crank who was banned for a year due to pushing bizarre racial theories on Palestinian people, then came back while banned and inexplicably is being allowed to continue under the premise that his edits are "not disruptive." <eleland/talkedits> 17:28, 31 March 2009 (UTC)

I think this user has been permabanned since? --dab (𒁳) 08:23, 1 April 2009 (UTC)

AfD nomination of Character (word)

I have nominated Character (word), an article that you created, for deletion. I do not think that this article satisfies Misplaced Pages's criteria for inclusion, and have explained why at Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion/Character (word). Your opinions on the matter are welcome at that same discussion page; also, you are welcome to edit the article to address these concerns. Thank you for your time.

Please contact me if you're unsure why you received this message. Powers 12:59, 3 April 2009 (UTC)

Enuma Elish

Enuma Elish: "Now, (at this time), When"

Your Industriousness was duly noted on Tuesday-Wednesday. (I was very busy this week at work, My weekend has begun).

But there is more to follow on the Enuma Elish category: I tried reading it completely for the 3rd or 4th time: I did make a table of contents of the dialogue, to figure out who, is speaking, and to whom. It was an effort-(!). If you look at the Talk for the category: (Category talk:Enuma Elish), (it doesn't exactly get at what i was saying, or thinking:)

I think the "religion" that the Peoples created, was a 'social compact' with individuals, and groups, or especially, possibly, 'power-groups'. So I am planning on re-reading the Enuma Elish, and figuring out a little more of what its talking about. I have not completely read the enuma elish article, .....but i suspect it is probably a little off track, and very "mythology-religion" oriented.

(I have not looked at your talk page (much?) or your User page), but i know you know some things, and certainly on the Zodiac (mesoptamian), you had to get industrious. ( I did Category:Birds of the Amazon Basin and Category:Birds of South America by region, as well as some other cool items, not really starting as a conscious decision. I did do the Category:Epic of Gilgamesh, so that is why I had read the Enuma Elish, once, a year ago (late last summer).
There's more to follow, and since you know some hieroglyphs, go to Harpoon (hieroglyph) and then to the commons category that contains the 5-month effort of "Hieroglyphs of Egypt". I recently added two since I was going to do the "tongue of land", where two side by side is a substitute for: the King "of the two lands", and it is in commons: Utcheb: tongue-of-land (to-turn-around hieroglyph). The other I discovered when I looked up Utcheb(wtcheb) in Budge's two-volume, 1 inch dictionaries) is the Big S, "a parade route", for the festival talks in the Rosetta Stone, and any parades, etc; and I named it: Utcheb:dikebanks, etc (to-turn-around hieroglyph), (since it related to the dikes in a field, and turning the water back down into the adjacent row). It was pretty cool to finally understand the origin, meaning, etc of this festival-parade use hieroglyph, It is listed adjacent to-(Gardiner's Sign List) the big long coils, they name "intestine". Anyhow, cheers, I aprreciate your digilence, and some items predate a lot of this religious stuff: the Disputation, by some scribes: see Dispute between bird and fish, also the articles to make: Dispute betweeen Summer and winter, Silver and Mighty Copper, cattle and grain,.... (7 total) late 3rd-millennium BC. Cheers....(Michael) ....(from the HotDesert, SonoranDesert, ArizonaUSA.... Mmcannis (talk) 15:39, 3 April 2009 (UTC)

Lol

Your recent edits to the 12 astro. signs dates weren't that great either. Before I edited it, Aries and Taurus had the same Tropical dates and it sucks enough I can't revert it. So don't put all the blame on me when your edit is just as bad or even worse.

As for the Gemini having the same dates as Aries maybe it looks the same on the article because I can't undo your edit? The twelve signs were fine until you happen to came along.

Also, if it makes you any happier, I changed it back to MY edit but kept the "nr = ____" thing. Someone963852 (talk) 21:56, 3 April 2009 (UTC)

Someone963852 (talk) 21:11, 3 April 2009 (UTC)

Removed personal attack and warned. Verbal chat 21:13, 3 April 2009 (UTC)

I expected to run into unreasonable behaviour in astrogy topics, but this rather tops my expectations. --dab (𒁳) 12:08, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

Ram Sharan Sharma

Quite a bit of copyvio here and puffery, some of which I've removed. Shouldn't all the stuff describing his books go (most still probably copyvio). Thanks. Dougweller (talk) 12:11, 5 April 2009 (UTC)

Celtic maps

G'tag Dieter. I have created some maps depicting the la Tene and Hallstatt cultures in Europe. They are not too dissimilar in sourcing and 'set-up' to your old one. However, I feel they are of better quality. In addition the placement of some of the tribes in your one is incorrect, eg the location of the Scordisci and Dardani. I did not want to just remove your one. Out of courtesy I wish to just inform you that maybe I can use my maps instead ?

I can easily add some major tribe names

Hxseek (talk) 22:18, 5 April 2009 (UTC)

very nice -- I am well aware of the shortcomings of my map. If I may make a suggestion though, for thumbnail use I would crop the map to show little more than the area of interest, and I would avoid set-in map legends seeing that we can provide legends in the thumbnail caption, or even in the thumbnail itself via {{legend}} and {{image label}}. Apart from that, your map is well suited for use as a thumbnail. --dab (𒁳) 05:30, 6 April 2009 (UTC)

Ok thanks mate. Points noted. My aim was to produece a 'panoramic' graphic, encompassing all Europe, given that there is already a close up view of eastern and western Hallstatt sites. But I can also produce a 'zoom in' view Hxseek (talk) 11:09, 6 April 2009 (UTC)

Nice map, but a little bit inaccurate, to my knowledge, classical Liburnia (modern Zadar County in Croatia) was influenced by Hallstat, it also occured more far to the east in Pannonia Savia than shown here. Zenanarh (talk) 12:30, 6 April 2009 (UTC)

The map doesn't show the entire extent of Hallstatt influence in any case, most of Iberia is missing. Also, the area of Britain, and the area not included of Britanny, are very different from those in my map. Compare File:Hallstatt_LaTene.png. I am not sure what it is supposed to represent. Also the "Hallstatt core" is significantly different from that given at File:Hallstatt culture.png. I assume this is a faithful copy of a map in the EIEC? --dab (𒁳) 12:50, 6 April 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for the comments and criticisms. Z, you of all people should know that calling Librunia as a Hallstatt zone is wrong. Stipcevic acknowledges some influences, but nothing more than would be expected than that due to trade. In contrast, Pannonia and Savia had oppida, Celtic coins, etc. By influence, I mean the major cultural influence at the time. The Liburni definitely had their own. A labelling of 'maxinal territorial extent' could be more appropriate.

As for Iberia, there are few Hallstatt finds to speak of. This is one of the conundrums in connecting the Hallstatt culture with Celts, becuase Celtic speech made its way into part of Iberia, but the Hallstatt culture barely did. See the Wiki article, it explains all this. My map was based on Mallory - who excludes Iberia . As a comparison Ramat includes westernm Iberia as Hallstatt . Both exclude Brittany, and definitely Liburnia. Your source, in contrast, includes Iberia and Britanny. His location of 'core' areas fits mine. I can clarify the 'core' areas further if need be (that's the good think about Inskape & paint.NET - very easy to edit). Hxseek (talk) 01:27, 7 April 2009 (UTC)

Well, you're right, Liburnian culture was not Hallstat in its core, nothing close to it. However Hallstat was definitely present there as influence (not just trade) to some degree, which can be seen in ceramical arts (this influence occurred there later than in areas closer to the 'core'), not just because of trade - it's not imported there as merchandise, it was made there. I'm leaning on Suić about Liburnia, Stipčević's work was more about all Illyricum in general. It's always problem to make such maps, you cannot tell whole story with 2 or 3 tones of the colour, so I guess it's nothing wrong if a map stays like it is ;) Zenanarh (talk) 06:42, 7 April 2009 (UTC)

Omkara

Placing here since Talk:Aum is a mess! MWD lists the meanings of kāra as:

• making, doing, working, a maker, doer (ifc., kumbha-k○, yajña k○, suvarṇa-k○)
• an author (e.g. vārttika-k○)
• m. (ifc.) an act, action ( kāma-k○, puruṣa-k○)
• the term used in designating a letter or sound or indeclinable word (e.g. a-k○, ka-k○
• ...

Now it is obvious (to me at least) that the "making" meaning is the "original", while others are derivative extensions to specific use. I therefore agree that "making oṃ" is a perfectly fine literal translation of oṃkāra, but think that "the sound or syllable oṃ" is also valid. I am guessing that by the time the word oṃkāra stared being used, the meaning of kāra as "letter or sound" had already crystallized - but this is guesswork and stated FWIW.

By the way, the entries for oṃ and oṃkāra in MWD themselves make interesting reading. I am reproducing the former below for conveneience:

oṃ

• originally oṃ = āṃ, which may be derived from ā BRD.), a word of solemn affirmation and respectful assent, sometimes translated by 'yes, verily, so be it' (and in this sense compared with Amen

• it is placed at the commencement of most Hindū works, and as a sacred exclamation may be uttered but not so as to be heard by ears profane at the beginning and end of a reading of the Vedas or previously to any prayer

• it is also regarded as a particle of auspicious salutation

• om appears first in the Upanishads as a mystic monosyllable, and is there set forth as the object of profound religious meditation, the highest spiritual efficacy being attributed not only to the whole word but also to the three sounds a, u, m, of which it consists

• in later times om is the mystic name for the Hindū triad, and represents the union of the three gods, viz. a (Vishṇu), u (Śiva), m (Brahmā)

• it may also be typical of the three Vedas

• om is usually called praṇava, more rarely akṣara, or ekākṣara, and only in later times oṃkāra) VS. ŚBr. ChUp. &c

• (Buddhists place om at the beginning of their vidyā ṣaḍakṣarī or mystical formulary in six syllables

• according to T. om may be used in the following senses: praṇave, ārambhe, sviikāre, anumatau, apâkṛtau, asviikāre, maṅgale, śubhe, jñeye, brahmaṇi

• with preceding a or ā, the o of om does not form Vṛiddhi (au), but Guṇa (o) Pāṇ. 6-1, 95.)

The first two points about pre-Upanashadic use are currently missing in our Aum article. Have to rush of now and will add these later, unless you or someone else has already done so. Cheers. Abecedare (talk) 15:23, 6 April 2009 (UTC)

you are right, and perhaps it is over the top to try and give "literal translations" of the names in the lead. MW is in fact the source I used for the "etymology" section. You are right in that its ultimate origin as a mere affirmative particle may be added. --dab (𒁳) 16:51, 6 April 2009 (UTC)

Far from being "over the top", I think giving a literal/etymological translation of omkara was a good idea, since the exact link between om and omkara would not be apparent to significant number (majority ?) of readers. As far as which exact translation is used, or whether it is placed in the lede or later - those are relative inconsequential details, and I am agnostic to the choices. Abecedare (talk) 19:18, 6 April 2009 (UTC)

Pater

Dab, you have a lot of work ahead; as a latin american, who has portuguese brazilian as a mother language, someone who lived two years in France, who speaks french and as you can see english, it is very funny to see these national anthems, dictionaries and all the teachings back in school thrown away with the blink of an eye!! Jackiestud (talk) 18:21, 6 April 2009 (UTC)

Jackie, making incoherent edits to Misplaced Pages is no replacement for a basic education. Try to get that elsewhere. --dab (𒁳) 19:02, 6 April 2009 (UTC)

1. http://www.wordreference.com/enit/country
2. Have patience with this guy: http://www.expat-blog.com/forum/viewtopic.php?id=33

5. The latin etymology of "expatriate" is "out of"+"patria"... "patria"

being only one of the words for "country", and one that has a strong emotional connotation (not unlike "nation"). Think "patriotism".

The neutral, geographical latin word equivalent to the english "country"

would be "pagus" (which became pays, pais, paese etc in a bunch of languages I'll let you recognise).

In this sense, I certainly don't feel "expatriated" in Japan, this is

where I live, period. The fact that one government issues my passport and that another issues my "alien registration card" is just an oddity of our silly little world.

Paese (pagan) has no religious/power/paterpotestas spirit/sense --only neutral, geographic. Patria (patriarch) implies power, religious cult submission. You see the guy above, he know that in a "very easy going way". Too basic ancient history, my dear Dab.

It´s a major constraint to read yr words. Jackiestud (talk) 19:24, 6 April 2009 (UTC)

Although you might have read or copied without hanving a clue of it, now you know (from me) why you wrote that patriarchy is a "hebrew word" or was first found among jews --because they were the first to move from a goddess based religion (pagan) to a terriorial god yaweh male based religion, a patria (potestas). That´s how paternalism, patriarchate was born (although you didn´t have a clue of it!!). Rgds. Jackiestud (talk) 19:40, 6 April 2009 (UTC)

please refrain from spamming my talkpage with your ramblings. --dab (𒁳) 19:52, 6 April 2009 (UTC)

refrain from spamming this encyclopedia with your ramblings. Jackiestud (talk) 20:54, 6 April 2009 (UTC)

Movses Khorenatsi

Hi. I noticed your previous involvement in the article about this historian, could you please help us to resolve a dispute with regard to use of certain sources in the article? Please see the talk. Thanks. Grandmaster 05:13, 8 April 2009 (UTC)