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Cyclopaean Masonry

What is the correct form for supporting the "orthodox" view on the subject? How should I present my support in the call for comment you have launched? I am still learning about wiki, you see. --5telios 08:07, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

Hi Akhilleus. Thanks for your kind message. I will look into the article on Cyclopean structures when I have time, hopefully very soon! Bests. --- (Bob) Wikiklrsc 18:03, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

I've commented there; if it is not all you would wish - you did ask for an independent opinion. Septentrionalis 18:44, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

Hi Akhilleus. You're quite welcome. A very complicated subject I had found out. Bests. --- (Bob) Wikiklrsc 13:59, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

Trojan War

Thanks for your great works. I am not as I have said a professional Φιλολογος (thank God, else I'd be desparate for work) but an agricultural engineer. Unlike most Greek I recongnise that I do make mistakes and thank you for your input that balances the article for a Greek POV to a NPOV. Ikokki 09:36, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

Troy

You told me that I don't seem to understand how bizarre Wilkens' theory is: "it's like saying the Old Testament came from India, or the War of the Roses actually happened in Italy." On the contrary; when I started reading Wilkens I was just as sceptical as you are and as probably anybody else would be. The difference is: I read Wilkens book completely before forming my opinion, got convinced and thus set aside my prejudice, cause that's what's going on.

Stating that a theory is bizarre is allright but you should never forget that once people considered the theory that the earth is round a bizarre idea too. This might seem a silly argument but it really isn't. 2600 years of believe (that Troy was in Turkey) are hard to blow away. You claim you do seem to understand how bizarre the idea is and in this line you show your prejudice, which is allright cause everybody is prejudiced, but also, and this is bad, you're unwillingness to overcome it. In order to form a decent opinion on a theory it's not the conclusions that should be judged by their probability or liability at first sight but the arguments that are given.

Nobody would argue that horses don't have the ability to speak, but most agree that there was a war around 1200 B.C. The question is: where did it take place? Though there are, apart from religious and mythical contents, inconsistencies in the descriptions of locations and distances it's been fair, I agree, to claim that the most probable location is Hissarlik. But now there is an alternative. Wilkens gives us probabilities that are far more convincing. The Cambridgeshire and Gog Magog Hills area with its thousands of bronze weapons found and many corpses , two war dikes, its rivers, and the wells all do fit the description, I repeat dó fit the description of Homer almost precisely.

I'm not claiming, as neither Wilkens is, that everything in his book is true, because a lot of it is hypothetical. But reading the book I got convinced against my prejudice.

And then there is this: Have you read the part of Wilkens book in which he mentions Cadiz as the probable location of Ithaca? It's very plausible!

212.123.163.102 06:15, 29 July 2006 (UTC)

Ithaca

I agree that we stop posting on each others talk pages so this will be the last time;

"Amphi-" rather means: "with two items on different sides" like an "Amphora", which has two ears. Translaters, with the Greek island in their minds, ofcourse translated it into "sea-girted." See how 2600 years of thinking in one direction interferes with every aspect of dealing with the issue? Again, as you eagerly jump on every detail and refuse to read the whole chapter by Mr Wilkens, I mentioned the word "amphialos" only as a direction, not as proof. Consider it circumstantial evidence, o.k., but there's more than plenty of it.

I would like to thank you for your patience and the efforts you've made addressing me and I apologize for staying anonymous. I'm just an enthousiastic guy from Rotterdam, and I didn't bother registrating. Maybe I will later, for now, farewell Akhilleus, I sign:

212.123.163.102 07:22, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

Thanks . . .

. . . for adding in the references in the Homosexuality in ancient Greece. Not that they will convince true believers. Haiduc 03:09, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

Add my thanks to the pile, whatever the outcome! -Smahoney 04:45, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

Ratings

I would imagine that ratings will be useful to various entities sorting through the Misplaced Pages to create offshoots, printed versions, CD's what not. They are not without value. Of course, the problem is that they are to some extent subjective. For example, on looking over the category of "Top-importance Classical Greece and Rome articles" I find there the Parthenon (a mistake, perhaps it should be the Acropolis, but even that is a stretch), the agora (yes, markets are important but what is so special about the Greek market?), and Atlantis (with or without Atlantis the Greeks would still have been Greeks). By the same token, critical articles are missing from the category. The Eleusinian mysteries, for one. The Olympics. Pederasty, which in the opinion of Plato differentiated the Greeks from the barbarians. I agree with your implied critique that a ratings system can lead to disagreements among the editors. Let's try to use outside sources, whenever possible, for buttressing our views, so as to avoid tomayto / tomahto type arguments. I would rather not be bothered with them at all either, but if they are here, then at least let's be accurate. Haiduc 10:07, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

Regarding the whole ratings concept, it is an obvious apple of discord and I too would much rather be rid of it. Until it is removed, I will make an attempt to straighten out at least the "top" section (which I actually started last night before receiving your last message). I'll certainly not resist any changes you might want to make (like restoring the agora to top importance).

Regarding pederasty, this exchange, and in particular its removal to "mid-importance," have led me to work on a new section in the article documenting the importance of the practice to the Greeks. Just today I came across a very lucid discussion of just that topic in Nick Fisher's intro to Against Timarchos. It is also on the web, here, in particular p.27 ("pederasty was widely held to have long been an essential element in Greek culture from Homer onwards"), though the whole piece is very well put together. Regards, Haiduc 11:29, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

Parthenon

Did you remove the two forms of the Greek name because you think one or other is incorrect, or because you don't think both forms should be given? In either case, why do you think this? Adam 14:59, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

The Parthenon is a building which still exists and is located in modern Greece, and therefore has a modern Greek name. This is in a sense its "real" name, since that is what it is currently called by the people of the place in which it is located, and I presume it is also its official name, since demotic is now the official language of Greece. Therefore I think both names should be given. Adam 15:34, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

Cretanpride, Homosexuality in ancient Greece

Is there any other policy I am not aware of that we can utilize here? Mediation and Arbitration don't seem to cover what's going on in the article, or do they? The fact that this has gone on so long is ridiculous. CaveatLector 00:27, 25 August 2006 (UTC)

• Perhaps your request will give him pause. Or us. Haiduc 03:15, 25 August 2006 (UTC)

(copied from User talk:Josiah Rowe): Josiah, thanks for exercising your admin powers, and for suggesting inclusion of the opinions of a "small but vocal minority"--you have an excellent knack for suggesting a reasonable compromise.

However, our problem editor is not citing Thornton accurately (I have his book, and have been checking the quotes). As far as I can tell he's getting his material from right-wing websites, especially the Greco report. I'm going to take out the Thornton citation, but I don't have anything better to replace it with right now--I don't want to link to the homophobic and racist websites that are pushing the line of argument Cretanpride is advocating. --Akhilleus (talk) 04:36, 25 August 2006 (UTC)

No problem. I meant to remove that citation as well, but was working from an old version and didn't notice that it was listed in the "references" section as well. I'm about to post to the article's talk page about my attempt at a compromise wording. (I was tempted to put something in about how the scholarly consensus was not widely accepted in modern Greece, but decided that would be a bit too provocative.) —Josiah Rowe (talk • contribs) 04:47, 25 August 2006 (UTC)

Hi Akhilleus. In my opinion, asking helping to WP:RFI is often a loss of time; instead, I would advice you to ask help from the admin user:Dbachmann, an editor extremely competent in ancient Greek topics. As for me, for now I'll wait a checkuser control of User:Ellinas; if I find he's just another sock, I'll consider measures against him.--Aldux 13:59, 25 August 2006 (UTC)

Hi, Akhilleus. I'm glad that you like my suggestions, and I wanted to make sure that you realized that I wasn't scolding you in the last paragraph. I really do understand that you must be sick and tired of dealing with Cretanpride's POV-pushing and obstinacy, but I think that Ellinas has the potential to be a productive Wikipedian — and who knows, he might even learn a thing or two. (I could comment further on his classmate, but would be violating WP:NPA myself.) —Josiah Rowe (talk • contribs) 07:37, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

Elinas indeed. Thanks for the info. Haiduc 23:17, 28 August 2006 (UTC)

And thanks for the kind words. I was feeling a bit dim for being fooled. —Josiah Rowe (talk • contribs) 04:49, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

Upon examination of Cretanpride and Ellinas' styles, you're right; the two do make similarly defensive comments about "Greek pride" and both misspell Michel Foucault as "Focault". I was probably seeing more differences than there really were, in an attempt to assuage my own pride (since I had spent so long either assuming that they were two people or hoping that it was still possible).

And yeah, I did try to find that supposed academic journal. I even did searches for "Adonis Georgiadis" on the Social Sciences Citation Index, the Library of Congress catalogue, and Google Scholar, and got no hits anywhere. There's no evidence of him in English at all, and I couldn't even get that biography page Cretanpride linked to to load.

The problem is that although POV-pushing and distortion of external sources are reprehensible, I don't think they're blocking offences. There may be an argument that the sum total of Cretanpride's editing (the AfD, the sockpuppets, the distortion of sources, etc.) constitutes disruption, or that Cretanpride has exhausted the community's patience, but I don't quite feel ready to make that argument. Cretanpride has behaved very badly, and we shouldn't forget that; but it's not helpful to sink to his level and match his bigoted rants with rants of our own.

If Cretanpride continues to be disruptive, perhaps we should consider a user RfC. I'm going to respond on the article's talk page to your comments there as well. Best, —Josiah Rowe (talk • contribs) 04:28, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Never mind; I've blocked him for a month for the continued sockpuppetry. So much for rehabilitation. —Josiah Rowe (talk • contribs) 04:09, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

Yeah; I will admit that a part of me is relieved that there's a clear policy violation here. I've put a note up at AN/I in case anyone wants to contest the block; he's complaining at User talk:MegasAllexandros, but not, interestingly, denying that he's Cretanpride. —Josiah Rowe (talk • contribs) 04:49, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

I was about to start making the new checkuser request, but I wasn't sure how to do it, since the old one is still on the page. Do we just edit Misplaced Pages:Requests for checkuser/Case/Cretanpride and leave it where it is on the main checkuser page, or do we move it back up to "Outstanding Requests"? —Josiah Rowe (talk • contribs) 04:56, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

Right, but Misplaced Pages:Requests for checkuser/Case/Cretanpride says "If you are creating a new request about this user, please add it to the top of the page, above this notice." I guess I'm just confused about the procedure. Maybe I (we?) should just move the completed case into the <noinclude> box and put the new one where the old one was? —Josiah Rowe (talk • contribs) 05:10, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

I've made the checkuser report. I think that it's OK to have them listed both under checkuser and WP:SUSPSOCK; this way, when checkuser gets back from vacation the Cretanpride case will be the first on the docket. I think I'll go ahead and block 66.53.237.254, since WP:RCU says "Obvious sock puppets may be treated as such without using checkuser." —Josiah Rowe (talk • contribs) 05:21, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

Joan of Arc vandalism

You've been a voice of reason on this article for several months now. While I was on Wikibreak it looks like you were combatting the reappearance of one troublemaker who has been a problem for nearly two years. I've written a summary of "Editor X" at User:Durova/Complex vandalism at Joan of Arc. It's long so skim the bullet points for characteristic behavior. Some of the distortions (including footnote damage) remained in the article for months until I tracked the changes today. Durova 05:39, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

Update

Would you mind adding Joan of Arc bibliography and Cultural depictions of Joan of Arc to your watchlist? I've uncovered more vandalism by Editor X there. Fixed what I found. Durova 18:34, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

Good work

I feel like an idiot removing that bit of trivia regarding Joe Mauer living with Morneau, but I never found any articles relating to it when I did an internet search on Google. Thanks for supplying the source and keep up the good work! Wikipediarul|es2221 00:11, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Helen

oh dear, the current version cannot be all mine, can it? It was quite a while ago but I do remember mentioning saranyu -- but the saranyu comparison should merely be mentioned as a possibility, not as fact! I think this is a idea from some recent (2000s) article but probably not in any dictionaries. The wel version should be presented as uncertain too. To the best of my knowledge, the name's etymology is not known with any certainty. It would be either from a wel, yel or sel root, wouldn't it, , if it is Indo-European at all that is, but further than that it's just guesswork. I was much taken in by the saranyu idea because of the mythological parallel, but I'd have to do some research to recover that reference, sorry. dab (ᛏ) 17:52, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

Cretanpride

The reason Cretanpride can't wait is that, like almost all systematic sockpuppeters (and I've met quite a lot) they simply can't resist; breaking rules is part of the fun of being in wikipedia; and generally they also feel themselves wronged for this or that. The good news is that Cretanpride is quite a mediocre sockpuppeter, and is extremely easy to detect.--Aldux 19:28, 13 September 2006 (UTC)

...and the latest sock is confirmed... —Josiah Rowe (talk • contribs) 01:22, 14 September 2006 (UTC)

Looks like another sockpuppet to me. See his contribs]: three edits to an article about Cretan history, then straight into the homosexuality debate with Thornton details? It's either Cretanpride or one of the meatpuppets he promised to recruit.

The most annoying thing is that we're now stuck in this stupid contest of wills with him, just as he's starting to learn how to contribute to the debate in an appropriate manner. If the last edit were from a legitimate editor, it would be something that we could work with and probably incorporate into the article. But we don't want to be encouraging the sockpuppetry of a banned editor. I suppose it's a bit like deciding how to deal with illegal immigration, or how to incorporate former insurgents into civil society in Iraq: balancing the practical needs of the day with the desire not to encourage the illegal behavior. Sigh. —Josiah Rowe (talk • contribs) 00:16, 18 September 2006 (UTC)

And unsurprisingly, it's confirmed as well. I've blocked him indefinitely now — for whatever good it'll do. I suppose we just have to keep playing whack-a-mole with his sockpuppets until he gets the point that he's not going to be able to win. —Josiah Rowe (talk • contribs) 01:35, 18 September 2006 (UTC)

Fair enough; whack-a-mole it is. Mackensen says he's happy to keep confirming the socks, and may be able to put a range block on at some point. We'll see how it plays out. —Josiah Rowe (talk • contribs) 04:50, 18 September 2006 (UTC)

Oh, joy. —Josiah Rowe (talk • contribs) 04:54, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

Your accusations against me

I couldn't help but notice your accusation. FYI my IP was originally blocked because my username was written in Greek and was therefore confusing. The block was lifted and I replaced it with GreekEconomist. My IP is 66.233.19.91. This has been used by me and only by me. It's not my fault Clearwire IPs are similar. I don't want to get involved in back and forth polemics but I felt obliged to inform you given Cretanpride's history. Hope I still don't get blocked. GreekEconomist 05:42, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

I appreciate your response, but given my similar IP, I suspect it will still come out confirmed. Noone else has used my IP but I noticed it is similar to Cretanpride's. I posted on the checkuser something similar I posted on your page. What do I do if it comes out confirmed? Again my IP is as I stated above which has been used only by me.

Cretanpride has not edited on any of the articles I have. My edits mainly deal with Greek musicians. On the Alexander the Great page I merely suggested including more detail on Alexander's military campaigns, I didn't get involved in the discussion. I withdrew what I wrote because I felt it was the wrong time to post that given the discussion that was going on. Thanks. GreekEconomist 05:52, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

I thought you might find this interesting. Someone posted a bulletin in the Greek myspace group "California Greeks" urging people to support Cretanpride's argument. This person also sent me a message over myspace urging me to edit on that article. I decided to join wikipedia because I find it a good place to relax and learn at the same time but I decided not to edit on that article. Not because I don't want to but because I don't know much about the subject. Given the fact that I recieved this email, as well as every Greek on my friends list, it is likely that I know Cretanpride. I don't know who he is but it's likely that I've seen him before and hence the similar IP.

The URL of the person on myspace is this I thought you might find this interesting. If your a myspace member perhaps you can send this little chap a message if youd like. Regards...

P.S. I certainly don't want to get blocked. It will take away my credit for the articles I've created. But since your the one who accused me I would hope for your support for an unblock. Sigh. I guess I'm asking for too much. GreekEconomist 06:11, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

Latest checkuser result

Hmm... we've got a partial result. I'm not sure that GreekEconomist is Cretanpride; most of his edits have been about Greek musicians, rather than any of Cretanpride's usual haunts. It's certainly conceivable that two different Greeks from California could name themselves "Alexander the Great". Then again, I've been fooled before, so I don't really trust my judgment in this case. —Josiah Rowe (talk • contribs) 16:20, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

Yeah, I'll ask Aldux. —Josiah Rowe (talk • contribs) 16:29, 20 September 2006 (UTC)