User talk:PStrait#top

Because Wikipedia is founded on verifiability, not Truth, it often lags behind changes in the field until someone thinks to document such changes. Thus, in the case of the straw man/person article, a change would require a reliable source that talks about this new usage (note that an example of this new usage doesn't suffice—it has to discuss the new usage). (See Wikipedia:Verifiability.)

Beyond this, our article naming policy says that an article about something with multiple names must be titled with the most common variant. In this way too, Wikipedia often lags the cutting edge as new usages spread outward and overcome the old usage. In this case, I would think that the new usage has not yet gotten beyond academic circles. The term "straw man" has a lot of currency beyond academic rhetoric still, and even though this is the field that spawned the term, it doesn't "belong" to rhetoric exclusively. So, the common usage is just as relevant as the academic usage. (See Wikipedia:Naming conventions.)

Quite apart from that, be mindful of our vandalism policy in case you misquote it. Content disputes are explicitly discluded from Wikipedia's working definition of "vandalism". Rather, such things are considered content disputes and it is the responsibility of the editors involved to settle the dispute civilly. Sometimes, this will require soliciting the input of the wider community, or an investigation of the applicable policies or editorial guidelines. Confrontational stances tend to inhibit the smooth working of the consensus-building proces. (See Wikipedia:Vandalism and Wikipedia:Resolving disputes.) — Saxifrage ✎ 08:08, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

:Wikipedia generally prefers accuracy. Since the goal of the project is to document existing knowledge and usage rather than act as a force for change, gender issues aren't pro-actively addressed from within. A distinction is that, as editors, our own gender bias should actively be countered. But, this doesn't extend to actively countering the gender bias of the "real" world or sources.

:In this case, what I think would be the best for the article is to add a significantly-sized section about the trend in universities and academia in general to use the gender-neutral "straw person" instead. Since Wikipedia isn't static, at some point in the future when "straw man" is obviously outmoded usage, the article can be changed again to have the new term as its title and change the section on the "straw person" trend to a section about the historical "straw man" term. How does that sound?

:Re: mediation cabal, my apologies for jumping to conclusions. I thought you were misrepresenting the case, and I'm very sorry for not assuming good faith and looking for alternative explanations for what I saw as a discrepancy. — Saxifrage ✎ 19:40, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

No problem. Being able to have one person rough out the content and have another person polish it up is part of why Wikipedia is collaborative. — Saxifrage ✎ 16:34, 10 October 2006 (UTC)

Hey mister the "recent changes patroller" I have a really bad english cause i'm french. Even if I try hard, it's always bad. Son what can I do if I want to add informations in an article with my bad English??? Instead of reverting things, (on the Bremen (manga)'s page) why not backing me, when I'm writting, by correcting my sentences? In french, I did good things on Wiki fr. On this english wiki's page, I wrote links where I found my informations and points that I wanted to tell on the discutions page...But I think that it's frustating to see someone deleting what you did instead of correcting... why users like you never communicate, in the discussions pages, before doing it? So what should I do? only writting in discussion's page? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 132.203.236.67 (talk • contribs)

Well, since no one has done it for you yet,...

Welcome!

Hello, {{BASEPAGENAME}}, and welcome to Wikipedia! Thank you for your contributions. I hope you like the place and decide to stay. Here are some pages that you might find helpful:

• The five pillars of Wikipedia
• How to edit a page
• Help pages
• Tutorial
• How to write a great article
• Manual of Style

I hope you enjoy editing here and being a Wikipedian! Please sign your name on talk pages using four tildes (~~~~); this will automatically produce your name and the date. If you need help, check out Wikipedia:Questions, ask me on my talk page, or place {{helpme}} on your talk page and someone will show up shortly to answer your questions. Again, welcome! 


I am willing to adopt you if you would like. I am also willing to assist you with your userpage. :-) Leave me a message on my [http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk:Hunterd&action=edit§ion=new talk page]. Note that on Wikipedia, each article has a talk page; similarly, each user has one. This page is your talk page. I don't mean to sound patronising, but it took me three months to figure it out :-) The Duke of Copyeditting, Bow before me! ^{You can't control me!} _{I'm a P. I.!} 11:18, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

Howdy ... I happened to notice that your userpage was listed under :Category:Intelligence user templates, where it doesn't belong. That's when I discovered that you were using template code directly on your page!

Instead of all that code, use "{{tl|User Mensa member}}" or "{{tlu|User:UBX/vigil}}" ... see :Category:Vigil Brother Wikipedians or :Category:Wikipedians by IQ for examples of how to use templates.

Using "{{tl|User TNS}}" instead of trying to copy&paste the template code avoids mistakes like getting listed in a Template Category, and getting correctly (alphabetically) listed in :Category:Wikipedians in the Triple Nine Society.

By having your own copy, you also miss out on changes like how "{{tlu|User:UBX/vigil}}" now adds your userpage to :Category:Arrowman Wikipedians and :Category:Wikipedians in the Boy Scouts of America in addition to :Category:Vigil Brother Wikipedians. (Your userpage is not listed in any of them, but it is listed in :Category:Scouting user templates, where it does not belong.) —141.156.240.102 (talk|contribs) 14:32, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

:thanks for the advice RE: userboxes. I really appreciate it. PStrait 21:29, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

::No sweat ... BTW, you might want to check out the discussion pages at {{tlu|User:UBX/RC}} and :Category:Roman Catholic Wikipedians. (Someone should probably copy the examples in the former article to the latter.) I've been cleaning up Boy Scout/OA related templates/userboxes/categories lately (see Category talk:Wikipedians who survived Philmont), so I don't have the time/inclination to deal with it myself. :-) —141.156.240.102 (talk|contribs) 03:24, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

Consider yourself adopted! Damn, now I'll have to go to Centrelink and pick up my Sole Parent's pension. Heh heh.

At the moment (for the next fortnight) I'm on Wikibreak (holiday from Wikipedia) as I have my exams. Feel free to leave me any questions on my talk page. The Duke of Copyeditting, Bow before me! ^{You can't control me!} _{I'm a P. I.!} 06:56, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

Today I just had my first exam for the last year of High School. I'm 17, turning 18 on December 21st. You?

For more of my personal details, see this subpage of my userpage.

• You can make subpages of ANY page by typing /(name) after the page's name; for example, User:Hunterd/About.

1. Using this same method, you can make an archive for your talk page. Most people do it when the page becomes long, but I am weird and do it at the change of the financial year... once the subpage is created, you can simply cut and paste the stuff on your talk page into the subpage, and then provide a link to the subpage from the main talk page.
2. There isn't really any software one can use to interface with MediaWiki code (what Wikipedia runs on), unfortunately it's a matter of either using the buttons at the top of the edit page or remember a lot of code.

• To use this bullet point, use an asterisk.

1. To use numbers, use a hash.
2. Pictures can be uploaded by clicking the "Upload file" link to the left of every page, under the Search box. Alternatively, you could simply click here... anything that you upload must provide usage licences. This, this, this and this may help.

• To make links with a different name, use desired display name rather than article name for simple links. You can also use article names to add the s to a link, for example: apples (note that this doesn't link to "apples" but "apple").
• People tend to get angry about spelling, but I have been brought up unlike the majority of my generation; that is, I (hopefully) have reasonable spelling. A spell checker within a word processor (i.e. Microsoft Word) should be able to assist if this is a problem.

1. To check your contribtuons, see Special:Contributions/PStrait. There are various ways of having a counter display the number, but I am unaware of the specifics at the moment. I'll do some digging around and find something :-)

• To look at an article's edit history, click the History tab at the top of any page. You can check the code itself for each revision by click the date for that revision in the history log. Alternatively, to find the difference(s) betwen two revisions, select the two versions (by clicking on the radio buttons - the circle ones between "(last)" and the date) and clicking the Compare selected versions button at the top and/or bottom of the page.

To leave a line between text, use
.

:To indent a line (as I have done here), use a colon (or as many as you like to further indent).

• ::Finally for tonight's lesson, to make the page ignore MediaWiki code, use MediaWiki Code, such as article page .

I hope I haven't confused you too much.
Happy editing.

The Duke of Copyeditting, Bow before me! ^{You can't control me!} _{I'm a P. I.!} 12:35, 27 October 2006 (UTC)

1. This is a subheading of Your answers. It will show up in the table of contents as a section of Your answers. This is done by adding an extra equal sign on either side of the heading, so for this I used ===Some other things...=== , and to get that to display, I used the nowiki tags that I discussed above: ===Some other things...=== .
2. _Subscript can be made by using _text ; ^superscript by using ^text> .
3. There was something else I intended to say here, but my memory has failed me... it was soething important, too... oh well. I'll remember it once I go to sleep. I'll remember IN my dream. :-)

The Duke of Copyeditting, Bow before me! ^{You can't control me!} _{I'm a P. I.!} 12:50, 27 October 2006 (UTC)

I just wanted to let you know that I've accepted. Thank you again for the kind words! — Saxifrage ✎ 06:46, 28 October 2006 (UTC)

I just wanted to say thank you for your nod of support during my recent RfA. While I cannot keep John Kerry from saying something that makes us all slap our foreheads, I can now help you out with any administrative tasks on Wikipedia. If you need any help, just drop me a line and I'll be right there. Cheers. youngamerican (ahoy hoy) 13:26, 3 November 2006 (UTC)

Yeah... just letting you know that I am back from WikiBreak. Call upon me at any time. Stuart says: Heweyeweyeweyeweyeweyewey... The Duke of Copyeditting, Bow before me! ^{You can't control me!} _{I'm a P. I.!} 15:03, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

Hi, I thought you'd be interested to know I have nominated Arian Catholicism for deletion. I wonder what you think? Slackbuie 20:58, 21 December 2006 (UTC)

I just saw your comments about the Moonsea article. I had a look at it and couldn't see if it got sorted out to your satisfaction.

I've just created a new area on the Forgotten Realms Wikiproject called Requests. I copied this section from the Dungeons & Dragons WikiProject. It should help peopel to flag up current requests that can then be removed after they are resolved.

If you are still having problems with the Moonsea article I suggest you go back to the FR WikiProject page and make sure people know this is still current. You might also want to put something in the Moonsea article to let people know that they can talk about this in the WikiProject page. Good luck. Big Mac 00:51, 26 February 2007 (UTC)

Long time, no Wiki!

Would like to help, but have no idea about creating a disambig page. You might want to go to the Community Portal, going to the help area and asking somewhere there. The only idea I have is to create all the links manually.

• You can use an asterisk (*) to create dot points, if you need. Good luck. The Duke of PStrait 03:17, 7 June 2007 (UTC)

:Seeing as you're so smart, you may be interested in [http://www.citizendium.org Citizendium] instead of Wikipedia. Everyone who writes articles there has to have their articles approved by experts in the field before it is published. There are very strict rules, which keep vandals away. I think it could be better than Wikipedia if there were as many contributors as Wikipedia. The Duke of PStrait 03:20, 7 June 2007 (UTC)

Sure, you can use it! I actually "stole" the idea from here and expanded it to fit my needs. There's nothing unethical about not asking, by the way; all contributions are licensed under GFDL. Sr13 04:37, 23 June 2007 (UTC)

== Articles you might like to edit, from SuggestBot ==

SuggestBot predicts that you will enjoy editing some of these articles. Have fun!

SuggestBot picks articles in a number of ways based on other articles you've edited, including straight text similarity, following wikilinks, and matching your editing patterns against those of other Wikipedians. It tries to recommend only articles that other Wikipedians have marked as needing work. Your contributions make Wikipedia better -- thanks for helping.

If you have feedback on how to make SuggestBot better, please tell me on SuggestBot's talk page. Thanks from ForteTuba, SuggestBot's caretaker.

P.S. You received these suggestions because your name was listed on the SuggestBot request page. If this was in error, sorry about the confusion. -- SuggestBot 22:00, 25 June 2007 (UTC)

{{tl|helpme}}

I can't fix my userpage, all the boxes keep going on top of eachother-- I know I am missing some key syntax or something. I just want the page to be functional.

PStrait 22:49, 25 June 2007 (UTC)

:I don't see any boxes overlapping. There is alot there, but it's all legible from my perspective. Maybe it is your browser or screen resolution. The best suggestion I can make is to simplify, or perhaps try Firefox is you are currently using Internet Explorer. --After Midnight ⁰⁰⁰¹ 00:32, 26 June 2007 (UTC)

Hello PStrait,

Thank you for your interest in the Wikimedia Board Election. The Election Committee regretfully informs you that your previous vote was received in error and will be struck according to the election rules, described below.

The Election Committee regretfully announces today that we will have to remove approximately 220 votes submitted. These votes were cast by people not entitled to vote. The election rules state that users must have at least 400 edits by June 1 to be eligible to vote.

The voter lists we sent to Software in the Public Interest (our third party election partner) initially were wrong, and one of your account was eventually included to our initial list. There was a bug in the edit counting program and the sent list contained every account with 201 or more edits, instead of 400 or more edits. So large numbers of people were qualified according to the software who shouldn't be. The bug has been fixed and an amended list was sent to SPI already.

Our first (and wrong) list contains 80,458 accounts as qualified. The proper number of qualified voters in the SPI list is now 52,750. As of the morning of July 4 (UTC), there are 2,773 unique voters and 220 people, including you, have voted who are not qualified based upon this identified error.

In accordance with voting regulations the Election Committee will strike those approximately 220 votes due to lack of voting eligibility. The list of struck votes is available at https://wikimedia.spi-inc.org/index.php/List_of_struck_votes.

We are aware of the possibility that some of the people affected may have other accounts with more than 400 edits, and hence may still be eligible to vote. We encourage you to consider voting again from another account, if you have one. If you have no other account eligible to vote, we hope you reach the criteria in the next Election, and expect to see your participation to the future Elections.

Your comments, questions or messages to the Committee would be appreciated, you can make them at m:Talk:Board elections/2007/en. Other language versions are available at m:Translation requests/Eleccom mail, 07-05.

Again, we would like to deeply apologize for any inconvenience.

Sincerely,

Kizu Naoko

Philippe

Jon Harald Søby

Newyorkbrad

Tim Starling

For Wikimedia Board Election Steering Committee

{{Anglicanism COTM}}

Wassupwestcoast 02:17, 6 October 2007 (UTC)

Image:Nuvola apps important yellow.svg

Another editor has added the "{{tl|prod}}" template to the article Melvos Hammerstars, suggesting that it be deleted according to the proposed deletion process. All contributions are appreciated, but the editor doesn't believe it satisfies Wikipedia's criteria for inclusion, and has explained why in the article (see also Wikipedia:What Wikipedia is not and Wikipedia:Notability). Please either work to improve the article if the topic is worthy of inclusion in Wikipedia or discuss the relevant issues at its talk page. If you remove the {{tl|prod}} template, the article will not be deleted, but note that it may still be sent to Wikipedia:Articles for deletion, where it may be deleted if consensus to delete is reached. BJBot (talk) 16:19, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

{{done}} Time has passed since the block. Remember to only use it for vandalism reversion. Also note it will be removed as quickly as it has been granted if you use it for any other reason. Pedro :  Chat  11:56, 17 March 2008 (UTC)

Greetings, please do not cut and paste move articles to new titles, it erases the history of the article so that reader's cannot tell who wrote it, violating the GDFL copyright license. If you want to move pages, use the move tab, but only after there is a consensus in favour of the move on the article's talkpage. See WP:MOVE for more details. Thanks, скоморохъ 11:48, 19 March 2008 (UTC)

:I agree with Skomorokh's sentiment above. The "move" tab should be used to move an article, and "Lew Rockwell" is the common name most used to refer to the article subject, not his full name, which according to custom should be redirected to the common name article. DickClarkMises (talk) 17:21, 19 March 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia:WikiProject Forgotten Realms, a page you created, has been nominated for deletion. Your opinions on the matter are welcome; please participate in the discussion by adding your comments at Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Wikipedia:WikiProject Forgotten Realms and please be sure to sign your comments with four tildes (~~~~). You are free to edit the content of Wikipedia:WikiProject Forgotten Realms during the discussion but should not remove the miscellany for deletion template from the top of the page; such removal will not end the deletion discussion. Thank you. Gavin Collins (talk) 08:31, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

Hi there! :)

As someone who's worked on D&D and/or RPG articles before, I'm inviting you to participate in our goal to both improve articles that have been selected to be placed in the next Wikipedia DVD release, as well as nominate more to be selected for this project. Please see the WikiProject D&D talk page for more details. :) BOZ (talk) 04:18, 19 September 2008 (UTC)

Hi PStrait,

After many years of inactivity on WP, I have returned. Hopefully, you will remember that I adopted you.

How's things?

Hunterd is back! 15:12, 13 May 2009 (UTC)

We had a discussion on Talk:Right-wing politics but it lead us nowhere. My main concern is that he is using sources that talk about few right-wing groups that oppose some scientific theories to draw a conclusion that the right tends to oppose science. That is a violation of no original research policy. -- Vision Thing -- 07:41, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

:Vision_Thing and I have discussed the meaning of left and right in politics ad infinitum on the talk pages. He believes that "right wing" means "in favor of individual liberty". I quote dictionaries and encyclopedias to no avail. He has found one book, "British Politics Today", that agrees with his definiton.

:As for the question of whether the Right tends to oppose statements by scientific organizations, notably in the cases of evolution and climate change, but also in the case of stem-cell research, birth control, and other medical science, I've cited several books and articles. He considers citing books and articles to be original research. I disagree. Rick Norwood (talk) 14:17, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

::I added a section in the chart on the article about how the right and the left both oppose science in their own way -- the left is hostile to genetically modified food and nuclear power (and on the extreme fringe, things like vaccines). The (Christian) right is hostile to orthodox beliefs regarding climate change and humanity's role in causing it, the teaching of evolution, scientific treatment of the Bible (i.e., historical and textual criticism), stem cell research, human cloning, etc.

::As for the question of original research, it seems to me like both parties could be satisified if you quote from some source that draws a general conclusion about the views of the Right or the Left regarding science, rather than by establishing this inductively (i.e., by presenting many examples of people on the right or the left attacking or supporting science). PStrait (talk) 14:38, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

:::As far as I know, there is no reliable source that draws a general conclusion about the views of the Right or the Left regarding science. In my opinion that is because such general conclusion is not possible. -- Vision Thing -- 19:16, 21 July 2009 (UTC)

::::I don't think you are correct re: your comment that no referenced sources draw conclusions about the relationship each side of the political spectrum has with science. For example, see Levin, Yuval. Imagining the Future: Science and American Democracy. Encounter Books, October 2008. I think it is not terribly controversial to identify a few trends: there is a certain Luddite element in the Left that opposes biotechnology and nuclear power, just as there is a certain traditionalist element in the Right that opposes stem cell research, the teaching of evolution, etc. But I welcome opposing viewpoints -- I just think the debate needs to be centered on what the sources actually say... PStrait (talk) 23:27, 21 July 2009 (UTC)

:::::Like I said, I wasn't able to find any sources that discuss this issue in general terms of the left and the right. If "Imagining the Future: Science and American Democracy" is such source, could you please provide some relevant quotes from it on the article's talk page so that we can start a discussion about the issue. -- Vision Thing -- 12:20, 22 July 2009 (UTC)

I agree. I'll add a couple of books on the subject. Rick Norwood (talk) 14:43, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

Glad to see you editing here. The article needs material on Garlasco's false reports on the 2006 Gaza Beach bombing and on his equally erroneous allegations about white phosphorous in Gaza last winter. I'm loggging off, but your edits are appreciated. Don't be intimidated by bullies like Nableezy. Just use reliable sources and take it to the talk page if he tries to delete them.Historicist (talk) 23:41, 10 September 2009 (UTC)

:The reference to the mere rhetoric blog keeps being removed. I get that a blog might not count as a reliable source in general, but in this case it seems only helpful to include the link since that is where the story broke and the news sources cite it anyway. But I have little experience editing controversial articles, so my sense on this may be incorrect. What do you think?PStrait (talk) 23:45, 10 September 2009 (UTC)

::Blogs are not WP:RS. You cannot cite them for facts. Not Even when they have accurate facts. you have to find a reliable secondary source. the only exception is that you can cite the blog of a well known person, (usually an academic or public intellectual) for the opinion of that preson. Or, sometimes, an expert blog on an arcane topid. i.e., the blog of an archaeologist on a fact about an artifact. But even that is usually only acceptable in non-controversial topics. In this case, you have to wait until a newspaper carries the info. I'll probably not be around for a few days.Historicist (talk) 00:38, 11 September 2009 (UTC)

You guys might find [http://justworldnews.org/archives/003787.html this] by Helena Cobban, member of the Human Rights Watch Middle East Advisory Committee, useful for that article. No More Mr Nice Guy (talk) 13:19, 11 September 2009 (UTC)

I was puzzled by your revert. Then I saw your userpage. Ah! A Roman Catholic and a libertarian. Oh, and a Mensa card hoilder as well. I'd watch your templating and your POV antics, unless you'd like to explain to me how people left-of-centre have an "opposition to scientific advancement". There's a [http://www.conservapedia.com/Main_Page Conservapedia] just round the corner if you really want to spread your word. 93.96.182.208 (talk) 17:11, 21 September 2009 (UTC)

:To call the ("libertarian end" of the) Third Way center-left would, in my opinion, be false, and that seems to be the premice of this dissussion. Politics is all about personal opinions, and it seems to degrade these opinions when "typical" positions are created - especially when these positions are not as obvious as progressivism/conservatism. I do not think that generalising the left's (or evn the right's) opinions on science is a particularly valid thing to do when there is a huge amount of conflict within political fields, much more than with other topics. There are obviously strong feelings against stem-cell research on the right, as shown with your citations, but to say that the typical left position is against biotechnology is less obvious, as there is huge disparity. On the other hand, with nuclear power maybe there is more of a consensus.

:So I guess what I've been trying to say from the start, is that biochemistry is too much of an issue in both sides of the spectrum to immediately generalise being against it a leftist position. If anything, it seems to be an issue above political command, as I'm sure that someone that was self-classified right or left wing would not consult their fiscal or social beliefs on a topic such as that. 93.96.182.208 (talk) 14:45, 22 September 2009 (UTC)

::But I never said anything about biochemistry. The fields of science I mentioned included climate science, evolutionary biology, nuclear physics, and agricultural biotechnology. Those fields are politicized-- people do "consult" their political views on those issues. PStrait (talk) 15:12, 22 September 2009 (UTC)