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The Holding Pen

Ocean acidification

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Misplaced Pages:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Abd-William M. Connolley

Fools and their foolishness

Current

I just found this

Oh look: http://ourchangingclimate.wordpress.com/2009/10/15/web-iquette-for-climate-discussions/ Isn't that good? William M. Connolley (talk) 22:31, 15 October 2009 (UTC)

He used web-iquette for medical discussions as a guide. That reminds me of How Doctors Think which is a great work on how brilliant, well trained, experienced people can get things wrong every day. I wonder if there is a way to do the same thing. Ignignot (talk) 13:17, 16 October 2009 (UTC)

Wondring aloud

I have to wonder if there isn't some deliberate foot dragging, given sentiments previously expressed by Arbcom and other insiders. Lt. Gen. Pedro Subramanian (talk) 22:59, 29 November 2009 (UTC)

Um. I missed the Raul stuff in August and now feel guilty about not expressing my sympathy (literally in this case :-(). Old score settling I suspect William M. Connolley (talk) 23:05, 29 November 2009 (UTC)

What Raul stuff in Aug? Email if you prefer. --BozMo talk 07:03, 30 November 2009 (UTC)

Nothing secret, just not common knowledge. It is off on some arbcomm-y type page; Raul dropping CU tools; I'd find the link except someone watching can probably find it quicker William M. Connolley (talk) 09:39, 30 November 2009 (UTC)

Misplaced Pages:Arbitration Committee/Noticeboard#Raul654 -Atmoz (talk) 17:06, 30 November 2009 (UTC)

Thermal underwear

Idealized greenhouse model, or the section below

May I ask a question? I stress that I am not trying to do any original research, but only want to improve the GW article by explaining what is fundamental to the AGW hypothesis. I don't think the current article really explains it very well. My question: I did some Googling and the Stefan-Boltzmann equation (or rather a derivative of it) seems to be fundamental. But there are two versions of it, as follows: S0/4*(1-alpha) = e*sigmaT^4 S0/4*(1-alpha)+G = sigmaT^4 where alpha is albedo, S0 is a constant solar radiative flux (units W/m^2), T is temp in K, and sigma is a constant. The two sides of the equation both have units W/m^2. In the first equation e is 'emissivity' which is unitless and is the ratio of energy radiated by a particular material to energy radiated by a black body at the same temperature. I think of it as an 'underpants factor'. You have a black body throbbing with radiation, which will cool unless you keep it warm. So you put some underpants on it, to keep the cold out, i.e. stop it radiating so much. Hence CO2 and water vapour are like thermal underwear to keep the earth warm (if e is 100%, the temperature is about -18 deg C, for if you solve for e with current temperature, assume 15 deg C, you find e is about 60%). I am assuming e is constant whatever the temperature for exactly the same material, is that correct? In reality e will change as the material of the atmosphere changes (more CO2, or more vapour). In the second equation G is a number, units also W/m^2, which is a measure of the influence a factor has in altering the balance of incoming and outgoing energy in the Earth-atmosphere system. If you solve for G for 15 deg C, you get about 150 W/m^2. My puzzle is whether G is also constant, if for other reasons (e.g. change in solar radiation, change in albedo) the temperature changes. Intuitively it won't be constant. Why represent it this way? Apologise if I have misunderstood, and please correct any mistakes (I am quite new to this, but it is interesting). Again, I am not trying to do any research, just finding out some facts that could be put into layman's language and hopefully into the article. I think thermal underwear is a better analogy than greenhouses, e.g. HistorianofScience (talk) 11:52, 10 January 2010 (UTC) I really don't think all this talk of underwear and throbbing bodies is appropriate. Please keep such impulses to yourself. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 19:24, 10 January 2010 (UTC) You are the Walrus and you talk about throbbing bodies? --Stephan Schulz (talk) 19:28, 10 January 2010 (UTC) My personal preference is for exploding underpants, but they banned them :-( William M. Connolley (talk) 19:31, 10 January 2010 (UTC) Actually it was Long Johns I was looking for but couldn't find the category until now. Anyway I prefer the leather ones. Seriously, can anyone answer my question above ? HistorianofScience (talk) 19:37, 10 January 2010 (UTC) I think you're looking for the one-sentence summary of the greenhouse effect, which is the earth is warmer with an atmosphere, because it receives heat from both the sun and the atmosphere. Your G, above, is the heat from the atmosphere. Put that way, it becomes obvious that G is not contstant, in time (long or short term) or space William M. Connolley (talk) 20:15, 10 January 2010 (UTC) Thanks for the explanation but I'm still not sure I understand. Suppose we turned off the sun like an electric light. Then the earth no longer receives heat from the sun. Does it still receive heat from the atmosphere? Until the atmosphere cools down, yes. Then no William M. Connolley (talk) 20:41, 10 January 2010 (UTC) Surely not. Isn't the correct explanation that the atmosphere is acting like a blanket around the earth, preventing it from cooling as fast as a black body would? No. You need to read what I wrote and understand it. Until you do, you will get nowhere William M. Connolley (talk) 20:41, 10 January 2010 (UTC) So it's not heating the earth, it's preventing it from cooling as fast as it would in the black body case. No William M. Connolley (talk) 20:41, 10 January 2010 (UTC) And the heat energy it is losing should be identical, at the instant the sun turns off, to what it was receiving from the sun. If that is correct, G is the difference between the W/m^2 that the black body would emit, and the W/m^2 actually emitted. No? HistorianofScience (talk) 20:35, 10 January 2010 (UTC) As a very very broad-brush approximation, the atmosphere receives no heat directly from the sun, since it is transparent to SW. The atmosphere is heated by LW from the earth (which itself, of course, is ultimately sourced from SW from the sun absorbed at the earth's sfc. Can you cope with maths? If you can, this is easily written down - indeed it is somewhere, I only need to point you at it William M. Connolley (talk) 20:41, 10 January 2010 (UTC) I can cope with maths. HistorianofScience (talk) 20:46, 10 January 2010 (UTC) Would it be more like those rude transparent underpants then? HistorianofScience (talk) 20:50, 10 January 2010 (UTC) Fine. Writing it all out is quicker than finding it, so... simplifying, the sun shines 4S units on the uniform earth (and since the area of a circle is 1/4 the area of a corresponding sphere the 4 drops out), which is a black body (forget albedo for the moment, it makes no real difference). The atmosphere is transparent to SW, and can be considered as a single layer not in conductive contact with the surface. There is no diurnal cycle, all is averaged out, all is in equilibrium. So at the sfc (with atmosphere) we have the following equation: S + G = rT^4 (the surface is black, captures all solar SW and transforms it into LW which it re-radiates) and G is the radiation from the atmosphere. Meanwhile, in the atmosphere, 2G = rT^4 (the atmospheric layer is totally opaque to the surface LW, is itself isothermal, and being a layer radiates both up and downwards). As it happens G = r(T_a)^4 but we don't care about that for tihs analysis. Hence, S + G = 2G, hence S = G, hence T_1 = (2S/r)^0.25. Meanwhile, in the absence of the atmosphere, we clearly would have T_2 = (S/r)^0.25. T_1 > T_2 (by a factor of 2^0.25) and (T_1 - T_2) is the greenhouse effect. William M. Connolley (talk) 21:02, 10 January 2010 (UTC) Also, this and the linked also refers, but is harder William M. Connolley (talk) 21:12, 10 January 2010 (UTC) Thanks (appreciated). How do you get from S + G = rT^4 to 2G = rT^4 without the assumption that S=G (which you later derive). The intervening bracketed "the atmospheric layer is totally opaque to the surface LW, is itself isothermal, and being a layer radiates both up and downwards). " seems like an explanation, but I didn't understand it. The atmospheric layer absorbs all the surface LW, which is the rT^4. It is in equilibrium. It radiates , equally, upwards and downwards, G. So it gains rT^4 and loses 2G, so those two are equal William M. Connolley (talk) 22:05, 10 January 2010 (UTC) If the earth receives all the SW, then reflects it back to the layer, why do you say earlier that the layer heats the earth? Why isn't it the other way round. No, it doesn't reflect the SW - it is assumed black. It absorbs all the SW and re-radiates it as LW. Yes, "the earth heats the atmosphere" can also be regarded as true William M. Connolley (talk) 22:05, 10 January 2010 (UTC) Thanks for taking the time. HistorianofScience (talk) 21:51, 10 January 2010 (UTC)

Blast from the past

Not to creep you out, but I was looking through old RfAs and I found this, from your second, and succesful, RfA. To the question of: How do you see Misplaced Pages in 2010 ?

OK, for what its worth, here is the rest: I see wikipedia continuing its growth and influence. The problems of scaling will continue: how to smoothly adapt current practices to a larger community. At the moment this appears to be working mostly OK. Problems exist with the gap between arbcomm level and admin level: I expect this to have to be bridged/changed someway well before 2010. I very much hope more experts - from my area of interests, particularly scientists - will contribute: at the moment all too few do. To make this work, we will have to find some way to welcome and encourage them and their contributions without damaging the wiki ethos. This isn't working terribly well at the moment. I predict that wiki will still be a benevolent dictatorship in 2010 - the problems of transition to full user sovereignty are not worth solving at this stage. William M. Connolley 20:36, 8 January 2006 (UTC).

Thought you'd be amused. Shadowjams (talk) 07:02, 12 January 2010 (UTC)

Hmm yes. "Prediction is hard, especially of the future" as they say William M. Connolley (talk) 08:25, 12 January 2010 (UTC)

Ha. So they say. I'm really good at the past prediction part though. Shadowjams (talk) 08:49, 12 January 2010 (UTC)

More thermals

                          |
                   G ^    V Solar input. (4S ->) S
                     |
                ----------------------------
                Atmosphere. Emits G, up and down, thermal radiation. Absorbs S+G.
                ----------------------------
                     |    |
                     |    V Solar straight through - atmos transparent, still S
                   G V
                                      ^ S+G
                                      |
                -----------------------------
                Sfc. Abs S(SW)+G(LW). Thus emits (S+G)(LW). Thus S+G = rT^4

                          |
                   0 ^    V Solar input. (4S ->) S
                     |
                ----------------------------
                Atmosphere. At 0K. Doesn't radiate.
                ----------------------------
                     |    |
                     |    V Solar straight through - atmos transparent, still S
                   0 V
                                      ^ 0
                                      |
                -----------------------------
                Sfc. Abs S(SW)+0(LW). At 0K. Doesn't radiate.

                          |
                   0 ^    V Solar input. (4S ->) S
                     |
                ----------------------------
                Atmosphere. At 0K. Doesn't radiate.
                ----------------------------
                     |    |
                     |    V Solar straight through - atmos transparent, still S
                   0 V
                                      ^ G_T
                                      |
                -----------------------------
                Sfc. Abs S(SW)+0(LW). Has warmed up somewhat, to T. Emits rT^4, call this G_T.

Service award update

Hello, William M. Connolley! The requirements for the service awards have been updated, and you may no longer be eligible for the award you currently display. Don't worry! Since you have already earned your award, you are free to keep displaying it. However, you may also wish to update to the current system. Sorry for any inconvenience. — the Man in Question (in question) 10:21, 14 January 2010 (UTC)

Argh, I hate it when these things change :-( Oh well, I'll see if the new one looks any prettier than the old :-) William M. Connolley (talk) 12:59, 14 January 2010 (UTC)

Some help with links would be appreciated

I see that you're (still) neck deep in "The Dramaz!", but when you get a chance I'd appreciate it if yourself or someone you know could take a look at Eric Rignot and try to straighten out the climatology related redlinks there. Don't worry about the link to Lew Allen Director's Award, I'll take care of that myself eventually (unless someone else wants to write a little article about the award. Don't let me stop you!). Thanks!
— V = I * R (talk to Ohms law) 15:25, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

OK. By golly, but that is an awful photo! William M. Connolley (talk) 15:49, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

Done a bit, others have too. You might want to pay attention to the regrettable possibility of it being a copyvio, mind William M. Connolley (talk) 19:57, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for the assist, I appreciate it.
— V = I * R (talk to Ohms law) 10:23, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

On refactoring and a higher standard of civility

Following Misplaced Pages:General sanctions/Climate change probation/Requests for enforcement#William M. Connolley refactoring and interjecting his comments in those of others and engaging in antagonistic attacks on fellow editors:

User:William M. Connolley is required to refrain until 2010-07-27 from editing others' talkpage posts in pages subject to this probation even in cases where the talk page guidelines would otherwise indicate that it could or should be done; he is further warned to refrain from using septic and similar derogatory terms, and to promptly refactor any unintentional typos.

The area of probation is to be interpreted to include anywhere that a topic related to or a dispute stemming from climate change is being discussed, including but not limited to articletalk, usertalk, and WP and WT namespaces. Editing others' posts explicitly includes adding {{cot}}, {{discussion top}}, and similar templates used to close discussions; an exception is made for archiving discussions which have received no posts for at least one week. Your right to point out cases where refactoring should occur is in no wise restricted. Please be careful when throwing around terms that might be interpreted to refer to your fellow volunteers - even if a subtle dig falls within the letter of WP:Civility, it can still sting and contribute to the level of dysfunction at those pages. - 2/0 (cont.) 21:33, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

This is silly and a victory for the yahoo's; unfortunately you've succumbed to the mob. Ah well William M. Connolley (talk) 21:48, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

Following discussion with the other admins who commented on the original discussion, the above restriction has been clarified: removing whole comments from this page is fine. - 2/0 (cont.) 14:24, 2 February 2010 (UTC)

Code fragments found

Just thouht you might be interested in this news item about code fragments being found. It came to my attention as it was next to this story which has a pretty decent subheading. I don't have access to more than the abstract, doubtless this will lead to interesting discussions. Perhaps a bit offtopic at the moment, but something to look forward to. . . dave souza, talk 17:59, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

Re: the water vapor, email me and you will get a PDF. (Re: Roman law - very cool.) Awickert (talk) 18:06, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

was due to an increase in water vapour in the high atmosphere - odd, the version I heard was stratospheric *drying*. Yes, pdf please William M. Connolley (talk) 18:09, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

From my limited understanding, the point is increase = warmer climate, subsequent drying = recent lack of warming predicted by some models, outcome possible solution to puzzle and improved modelling. All very interesting. . . dave souza, talk 19:18, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

Apologies to all: my subscription doesn't work until it appears in print (e.g., until it stops being a "Science Express" article). Shoot. Sorry. You'll all get it once I can access it. I will send emails to friends at other institutions and see if they can get it though. Awickert (talk) 19:47, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

I don't have this page watchlisted anymore. I am willing to provide copies for papers behind paywalls within reason. -Atmoz (talk) 17:35, 3 February 2010 (UTC)

Outcome of Misplaced Pages:General sanctions/Climate change probation/Requests for enforcement#TheGoodLocust, MarkNutley, WMC

Outcome of Misplaced Pages:General sanctions/Climate change probation/Requests for enforcement#TheGoodLocust, MarkNutley, WMC:

• William M. Connolley is restricted until 2010-05-03 from making more than one revert to any article in the probation area in any 24 hour period.
• William M. Connolley is required until 2010-08-03 to initiate or participate in discussion at the relevant talkpage any time he makes a revert to any article in the probation area, excepting to revert blatant, obvious vandalism.

- 2/0 (cont.) 04:01, 4 February 2010 (UTC)

Your editing privileges have been suspended for 48 hours

I have enacted a 48 hour block on your account LessHeard vanU (talk) 13:49, 2 March 2010 (UTC)

Your lack of interest in the actual content of the wiki is duly noted; as I said above: you've chosen the worthless, the yahoos, the septics and the fools above those who actually have a clue William M. Connolley (talk) 15:18, 2 March 2010 (UTC)

Note: I've removed the goo and dribble from the above, leaving only the substance William M. Connolley (talk) 23:10, 2 March 2010 (UTC)

Simple:Misplaced Pages

I want to make sure that you are aware of this edit to Black Body. I had never heard of Simple:Misplaced Pages before, but apparently, I can now create a page there with the same name as a page here and they will be automatically linked. I don't know how to get that bot banned, so I am telling you. If you think that this is no big deal, please say so. (And yes, I know you have an account there. As of today so do I. Do you want **baby or should I take it:) Q Science (talk) 19:42, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

24 hour block, and extension to warning regarding inappopropriate words and phrases

Per the preceding section, you have been blocked for 24 hours for violating your 1RR restriction on Climate Change related articles.
You are also further notified that you shall not use demeaning or derogatory terms or phrases, broadly construed, when interacting with or discussing other contributors in respect of the General sanctions/Climate change probation area of articles (that is, not specifically on the article talkpages and probation pages but anywhere within the project). LessHeard vanU (talk) 21:06, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

Good grief you're a biased bozo William M. Connolley (talk) 19:57, 3 April 2010 (UTC)

Thanks

		The Tireless Contributor Barnstar
		Although I usually disagree with you, I just wanted to say thanks for all your contributions to the various global warming related articles. And also for occasionally making me smile. Thepm (talk) 11:12, 8 April 2010 (UTC)

Why thank you, that is very kind, both for the thought and the manner of giving William M. Connolley (talk) 11:59, 8 April 2010 (UTC)

My Compliments

I don't often see myself agreeing with /these, so when I do, I thought I'd take the opportunity to compliment you. Fell Gleaming 23:05, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

Judith Curry

Can someone do me a userified copy of Judith Curry plus tell me who made it and why it was deleted? We're bound to have one, you know William M. Connolley (talk) 20:36, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

The complete text appears below not counting tags and categories. User:Atmoz started it, it was deleted because he requested it. Dragons flight (talk) 20:47, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

Thanks. At /Judith Curry now William M. Connolley (talk) 22:09, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

CYA

Any experience of  ?--BozMo talk 07:22, 24 April 2010 (UTC)

I think we went once to one of the wednesday evening meetings at the observatories. But that was ~2 years ago William M. Connolley (talk) 20:27, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

Kick, again

Please don't do stuff like this. It doesn't help your case. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 00:47, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Yes, you're right. Thanks William M. Connolley (talk) 09:06, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Indeed, I just volunteered you to play nicely if others stop harassing you. But you should play nicely even if others do harass you. Someone has to end the wasteful bickering. There's no reason (except maturity) that we can't have a civilized debate, and like SBHB says, whoever turns the other cheek the most makes everyone else look bad. And I make this same challenge to all of your talk page stalkers who disagree with you. Awickert (talk) 17:17, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

I guess the answer to the question on playing nice back to harrassment is "why should you?". And I guess actually if you wanted to you could answer that question yourself. --BozMo talk 17:34, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Being mean is mean. And being mean on WP means that you get sanctioned in some way; civility seems to trump all. But perhaps most importantly, if everyone is nasty to each other, vile unproductive commentary results, and there is no forward progress on article writing. Progress on articles can only happen with mutual respect and civility. Awickert (talk) 17:43, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Cue "mutual" and "respect". Neither fake civility alone nor even real civility without respect are sufficient. That's why I'm so pissed off when people politely ignore the mainstream science and cherry-pick some outliers or blog posts to present a completely misleading picture. Of course, in the current climate, civility trumps all, so we have to politely point out errors... if necessary 5 times, or 20 times, or forever. Eternal vigilance and all that... --Stephan Schulz (talk) 17:57, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

"Respect" is a problem. Taken literally, your "Progress on articles can only happen with mutual respect..." means that the people who can't be respected (becasue they attempt to edit past their level of knowledge) need to leave those articles they can't cope with William M. Connolley (talk) 18:14, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

I think there are different categories of respect (personal, knowledge-based, etc.). I agree with Stephan, and think that a lot of this is the unfortunate communication of extreme views around global warming. Ideally, someone using blogs or not knowing what they were talking about would need to be confronted only once about this, and then would respectfully ask for suggestions for better sources, which would be provided. But this is idealism. Awickert (talk) 20:52, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Few people are beyond meriting some respect; those who appear to be generally are not responsible for their predicament and I do not think civility should be limited to people who are aware of their own limitations. I have chaired company AGMs and put up with tiresome shareholders asking questions about how much money was spent on paperclips when management have tripled the value of their shares and if Gordon can keep his "bigoted" type comments until he thinks no one is listening then I think we should all be able to do the same on WP. --BozMo talk 22:02, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

We're in a specialised environment. I merit no respect when attempting to discuss the details of string theory; we have people here who merit no respect when attempting to discuss the science of GW. The difference is, I know it William M. Connolley (talk) 22:40, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

We're in a particular kind of collaborative work, and Comment on content, not on the contributor (lifted from LHvU's comment elsewhere) is a good and necessary requirement. Respect or otherwise for people is irrelevant, comment on their actions without drawing or implying anything about themselves. If their edits are rubbish, point out how the info is rubbish but don't suggest that implies anything about the editor. Also, I've had cause to advise another editor to stop classifying other editors into groups, which is similarly uncivil. We gotta be professional, or at lesst nice, in our interactions. . . dave souza, talk 20:45, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

What Boris said. And you overwrote my comment... --Stephan Schulz (talk) 21:00, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

Oops, my apologies. Fortunately, Bozmo has done the right thing. I see you couldn't resist taking the piss out of TGL's spelling William M. Connolley (talk) 21:20, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

Yes, I'm not prefekt iether ;-) --Stephan Schulz (talk) 21:23, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

Curious

Hi WMC, I am lurking as usual on the sanction page and the RFC/u (which I have absolutely no comment on). I just want to ask you a question. ;) I was a part of your cabal, did I get booted by you! :) I'm talking about the claims of a cabal at 'shocking' at the RFC/u. I want to still be part of the cabal even if I don't join in the 'fun' (yeah, right, don't know why you all don't give this area a rest for awhile before you lose your sanity.) For anyone reading, I'm joking here, in case anyone takes me seriously. On a serious note, I am finding that a lot of the problems going on seems to be misunderstandings by all involved. Maybe everyone should rethink their way of dealing with everything? Anyways, you be well and all your talk page lurkers too, --CrohnieGal 18:11, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

As to the cabal stuff, I think they are projecting. Misunderstandings? Maybe. There are fundamental differences of opinion though, the science / anti-science split is fairly wide William M. Connolley (talk) 20:46, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Yes, I agree, the groups are camped in a very wide split which is a shame. Everyone needs to start writing for the enemy, maybe that would help but i doubt it. A lot of what's going on though is a misunderstanding of the words you use. I know sometimes I am confused by something you say only to find out that the meaning is way different than what I am used to. Maybe you'd have less problem if you curbed the use of words that people in the US would misinterpret or wikilinked them like the treats I got on my talk page, yummy? Just a thought, it may help, then again maybe not, it's hard to tell to be honest. I just don't want to be bumped from the cabal! :) Take care, --CrohnieGal 23:03, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

I can be terse. But I think people tend to play up the surface disagreements, and it fools the admins, or at least the ones that want to be fooled. It is far far easier to "win" your argument by talking about civility than talking about science, and this is wrong, and the admins should know it, and in fact they do know it. The underlying disagrements remain, and are the real problem, and the real source of all the trouble, and would be the same if the surface were skimmed William M. Connolley (talk) 09:25, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

WMC, you can't be terse in the current editing environment. Even if you think you're arguing in self defence there are some things you must explain in full if you mention them at all, and best not to mention them at all. . . dave souza, talk 09:48, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

(Outdent) Like you know, it's best to keep your behavior exempletory which then shows the others behaviror more clearly with less chance of things turning to be about you instead of the other editor(s). Right now I see a strong campaign to get you topic banned or banned completely which you need to be almost perfect in what you say or I guess it's better to say how you say it. I think at times, well a lot of times, civility becomes more important than actual edits to build an encyclopedia. This I think is bad. Civility is important but so is the necessary info to build an enclopedia which this project is about. There is a discussion on AN/i, at least there was, about the SPA's at the Race and intelligence articles and it's subset of articles. Many are agreeing there that the SPA's are bad for project and for these articles. I think the same arguments made there fit the scenerio of articles of the Climate control. I've become undecided about how useful the sanction board has become since it's mostly complaints that are tit for tat types. I think everything needs to be rethought about how the sanction board is to be used. I also think that with the disputes just between the administrators (some of them) that maybe some fresh blood is needed too. Just throwing out some of the things I've been seening going on. --CrohnieGal 10:43, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

it's best to keep your behavior exempletory which then shows the others behaviror more clearly - I disagree, and that is what I tried to say above. This is the std.arbcomm.fallacy - that somehow, if you judge people on civility issues, you'll somehow get the content issues right. This is obvious nonsense, and yet people appear to believe it. The sanctions board persistently cares nothing for content; this is obviously wrong; hopefully one day the fools will realise this William M. Connolley (talk) 11:21, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

I'm not saying that if your behavior is expempletory that somehow the content issues will be sorted. What I'm saying, from what I've been reading, is that if you continue like you have been then those who have a beef with you are going to get you topic banned or blocked for a long time. This is what I am seeing. I don't agree with this but it is what it is. I know that others have asked you to calm it down. A lot of the complaints though are misunderstandings. But I have to say, overall I agree with you. The content needs to be first priority and I don't see that. I see civility being more important, which is really a shame. Just be careful please, I'd miss not having you around. :) You don't have to answer this or you can take it to me via email, but I sense a past history between you and Lar, is there? --CrohnieGal 11:35, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

Time for an uninvited addin which you can delete without giving offence. In so far as improving things goes... personally I think that a legitimate and reasonable goal is to get Lar to withdraw comments about a "cadre/gang" of editors and start using expressions off a neutral list like "core contributors" which do not imply membership or plotting in the same kind of way. However I also think it is reasonable to request that you stop making specific personal comments on him not caring about content, implying he is a sceptic and phrasing disagreement with him using closed language rather than open language. Such comments serve no useful purpose and we all know your view. Personally I think if you put in a tiny bit of effort to conform to social standards then you would start finding it much easier on the content front. However you are a grown up and you take whatever approach to Misplaced Pages you want. I will still buy you (or anyone else) a beer if I ever meet them in person. I got a long way in my career working on the basis that if you outperform you should not have to toady but in the end it put a ceiling in place in the Oil business career. It would be a shame if something similar happened to you here however distasteful you find the toadying bit. --BozMo talk 15:17, 7 May 2010 (UTC)

You're welcome. The toadying bit is definitely out. However, as I've said above I think you are simply wrong to think that some small surface politeness will wish away the underlying problems, which are real. As to Lar - I'm entirely happy to ignore him entirely - if he will ignore me. No-one asked him to turn up, no-one will regret his departure. If Lar will stop attacking me, then the problem (with him, at least) ends. I think that because Lar wears a veneer of civility you haven't put a similar message on his talk page, and I find that asymmetrical and therefore Bad. As to is to get Lar to withdraw comments about a "cadre/gang" of editors - no. It has become entirely clear that this is how Lar *thinks*. There really are Black helicopters in his head; having him stop using the terms wouldn't help at all, other than to disguise his biases somewhat. Lar has firmly declared himself Part of the Problem; we can solve that part at least by truncating your wish to is to get Lar to withdraw William M. Connolley (talk) 15:24, 7 May 2010 (UTC)

Re: Lar's "Black Helicopters": how is your "everyone who disagrees with me is a s(k)eptic" attitude any different? ATren (talk) 16:11, 7 May 2010 (UTC)

Wash you mouth out with soap! If *I* write "s(k)eptic" Lar gets to block me... oops, I've done it now. Sadly my keyboard has no delete button. Ah well. As to the substance of your comment: no, of course not. Remember AJL? He disagreed with me, lots. He wasn't a skeptic, far from it. Do you want more examples? You can have them, after you answer this simple question (if you don't know the answer, go find out, it isn't hard): are volcanoes contributing substantially to the observed rise in CO2? William M. Connolley (talk) 16:15, 7 May 2010 (UTC)

For the record on "you haven't put a similar message on his talk page, and I find that asymmetrical and therefore Bad" a little research on your part would reveal that I have made at least three attempts to engage Lar on these issues on his talk page aside from commenting on his RFC, whereas this is as far as I recall only my second go at you ref Lar. I do not find either of you fundamentally unreasonable (except for the toadying refusal which is hubris) but you and Lar often assume the worse of each other. --BozMo talk 16:23, 7 May 2010 (UTC)

Fair enough, I admit I didn't bother check and can't be bothered to wade over there to I'm happy to take your word for it William M. Connolley (talk) 16:45, 7 May 2010 (UTC)

everyone who disagrees with me is a s(k)eptic - like Romm? Guettarda (talk) 17:10, 7 May 2010 (UTC)

Re: toadying, Richard Hamming provides an analogy (it's long, so I collapsed it). While I agree with you in principle that the facts should be the only important thing, human nature isn't to do that, and I think that Hamming has something interesting to say about picking your battles:

Awickert (talk) 17:30, 7 May 2010 (UTC)

Why this?

With genuine respect, I'm asking why would you post this or this? I can't see what it would contribute and it seems like it might be interpreted as goading another editor.

I am not saying that it's wrong. I'm just saying that if you hadn't posted either of those two, the world would probably be an ever-so-slightly better place :) Thepm (talk) 21:06, 7 May 2010 (UTC)

I will defend both. But to start with one: MN was clearly under the incorrect impression that those were "his" articles. That impression needed to be corrected. I'm baffled that you think that was a bad thing William M. Connolley (talk) 21:12, 7 May 2010 (UTC)

Assuming for a moment that MN believed the articles were "his", I guess I just wondered what benefit was gained from disabusing MN of his incorrect impression. As I said, I don't believe your posts were wrong.

I apologise if I've offended you. That wasn't my intent. Thepm (talk) 21:39, 7 May 2010 (UTC)

I'm not offended, I am genuinely baffled. Unless you're of the "ignorance is bliss" school I really find it hard to understand your position. If MN is creating and editing articles under the impression that they are "his", then he is wrong, and needs to know it. I was being helpful. As to the first edit: that was in the unblock section. It was mostly aimed at reviewing admins. But I will argue that the bit of it aimed at MN was helpful, too, in that it pointed out his obvious logical error (obvious to me and I presume to you, but it seems to have passed him by) William M. Connolley (talk) 21:45, 7 May 2010 (UTC)

To help clear up your bafflement, I'll explain that I didn't think it was helpful because MN didn't genuinely believe they were 'his' except in the sense that he had an interest in them. I don't think that your comments make any difference, except maybe to slightly annoy MN. It's clear that you hold a different view. That's fair enough.

But now, I am off. I have bought a new house and I am off to spend the weekend cleaning it and preparing to make it liveable, so I probably won't be able to reply further for a day or two. The fact that my new house requires an entire weekend of cleaning should tell you something about its current state :) Thepm (talk) 21:54, 7 May 2010 (UTC)

If it only requires a weekend of cleaning then it is in a far better state than mine :-) William M. Connolley (talk) 21:56, 7 May 2010 (UTC)

Dynamic topography

To William and his talk page stalkers:

Would you (ambiguously singular or plural) like to expand the portion of "Dynamic topography" that is about the oceans?

I am planning on doing some expansion of the solid-Earth-geophysics portion of that article (which currently covers both the dynamically-supported ocean elevations and topography due to motion of material in the mantle), but I think it would be a disservice to continue to ignore the ocean part. Ideally, we would have two separate standalone articles.

Awickert (talk) 17:26, 8 May 2010 (UTC)

Good point. How analogous are they? I never got through reading Gill, so maybe now is my chance :-) William M. Connolley (talk) 18:29, 8 May 2010 (UTC)

Well, I don't know anything about it in the oceans; in the Earth it is due to motion in the mantle that creates normal tractions on interfaces such as the surface, the upper/lower mantle discontinuity, the core-mantle boundary, etc. Since it is supposed to be about the motion of seawater, I can imagine how the physics could be identical, but I can't say for sure and about to head out the door: off to see a friend perform in Guettarda's favorite musical, Awickert (talk) 18:51, 8 May 2010 (UTC)

Careful. That is pretty clear evidence of a Cabal, or possibly a Cadre William M. Connolley (talk) 19:22, 8 May 2010 (UTC)

Cadre, I think. In our obligatory red shirts. Guettarda (talk) 21:38, 8 May 2010 (UTC)

I'm thinking about "Gang of N." It has a nice math/science ring to it, and evokes the Gang of Four. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 02:25, 9 May 2010 (UTC)

While "Gang of N" has a certain ring to it (the definitions are so amorphous, no one can agree how many there are), I think "Gang of i" might be more appropriate. Guettarda (talk) 03:43, 9 May 2010 (UTC)

I was totally baffled by "Guettarda's favourite musical"...until I remembered that conversation. It was especially puzzling since I've never seen it, have no idea what it's actually about, and don't even know what comes after the second "Oklahoma!" Guettarda (talk) 21:37, 8 May 2010 (UTC)

It's a good one - you should see it. Back to the topic: if it turns out that the underlying physics are the same, but just expressed in different media, I bet we could leave it at one article. If they are fundamentally different, then let's split. Awickert (talk) 01:21, 9 May 2010 (UTC)

Trout

Whack! You've been whacked with a wet trout. Don't take this too seriously. Someone just wants to let you know that you did something silly.

ref what on earth is the point of this comment, except to irritate? You think this is something people might go and look at to learn?

--BozMo talk 13:30, 14 May 2010 (UTC)

I'm pointing out that TW isn't sme neutral unbiased person who just wandered by. TW is someone who f*ck*d up a mediation and doesn't like it. Please remove your strike William M. Connolley (talk) 13:51, 14 May 2010 (UTC)

Don't do that kind of thing. Anyone whose opinion you should care about can draw their own conclusions without you doing the interpretation in an attacking style. I have struck other stuff on that page and am leaving struck anything which has the potential to inflame. Go chop some wood or do an ergo or something (I have three or four tonnes of logs left to split if you need to). --BozMo talk 14:04, 14 May 2010 (UTC)

So, your opinion is that people should not know about TW's previous, undeclared history in this area? I'm removing the trout until you can provide a plausible reason why that is so William M. Connolley (talk) 14:56, 14 May 2010 (UTC)

You could have easily have changed it to be all three of more accurate (taken with the above explanation), more informative and less of a personal attack. (1) more accurate; his most recent edit had refered to himself alongside "the other admins here" and not newly passing by so if per above your swipe was code for he is wrongly claiming no history it was not right (2) If his fault was wasting other people's time then your failure to even be specific enough to allow a reader to find the mediation case easily with a link was also a time waster (3) the not having a clue and wasting time are both subjective judgements which fail to recognise a good faith approach to a new subject by someone who did not know the history. You should have said something like "Of course Wordsmith himself has learned that becoming involved in the subject is not so straightforward (link to mediation). More people would have followed the link because it was there and sounded more interesting. No PA was needed at all to be more effective in your stated aims. --BozMo talk 19:07, 14 May 2010 (UTC)

the not having a clue and wasting time are both subjective judgements which fail to recognise a good faith approach to a new subject by someone who did not know the history - hmm, well you (and WS, and everyone else) do indeed seem to have missed my point: having people come in who don't have a clue just muddies the waters. Just look at SV over the RFC. This stuff is sufficiently fraught that we don't need people pushing in trying to "help" without finding what is going on, or without the ability to learn. Sometime later they can say "oh sorry we were only trying to be helpful" but by then it is too late. Your trout is rejected; I yield to your superior force re the striking of my comment on the talk page William M. Connolley (talk) 19:19, 14 May 2010 (UTC)

Oh, and is baffling. Has TW "done" anything to award himself the medal of testicular valour? William M. Connolley (talk) 19:21, 14 May 2010 (UTC)

It was his self assessment and who am I to question that. --BozMo talk 19:50, 14 May 2010 (UTC)

Hmm, lets agree to differ on that. As to the trout: I was wrong. I maintain my basic point, but agree I expressed it quite ineffectively William M. Connolley (talk) 21:16, 14 May 2010 (UTC)

Who are you?

And why did you put a notice on my user page that I was some kind of sock puppet? I didn't even know what a sock puppet was until I read that notice. Why did you do that?

AlfredGeorgeWoolsie (talk) 18:45, 15 May 2010 (UTC)

I am who I say I am. If you mean, what right do I have to put that tag on your page, the answer is that anyone can. If you're not a sock, that's fine, remove the tag and edit happily. As to why: joining in an RFC so early in your wiki career is distinctly unusual William M. Connolley (talk) 19:26, 15 May 2010 (UTC)

OK, thanks. In surfing around and reading some of the talk page discussions something ended up pointing me to the page with requests for comments. I'm not doing much of anything else, just practicing by cleaning up the grammar on some stub articles on members of the US congress.

I found those by just hitting the random article link until I found something that looked interesting. Then that had some links to related categories so I have just been going through those looking for more stubs to clean up.

On one of those I found a reference to the biographies wikiproject and decided to sign up since I am working on biography stubs anyway. That page mentioned the template to put on my user page and when I went to do that I found that you had tagged me already. So I just came to ask why.

I assume it is OK for me to go to the pages asking for comments and offering my opinion if I have one. Is that correct or am I doing something wrong?

--AlfredGeorgeWoolsie (talk) 20:03, 15 May 2010 (UTC)

It is acceptable, but as a fairly new editor you risk walking into minefields. If I were you I'd just edit articles, do bio stubs, etc for a while until you find your feet William M. Connolley (talk) 20:05, 15 May 2010 (UTC)

Singer

I've reported the situation at Fred Singer to the probation page. SlimVirgin 20:29, 15 May 2010 (UTC)