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User talk:Rossnixon

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Archived Discussions: page 1, p2, p3

ABC hypothesis FYI

I opened up a mediation here. - RoyBoy 03:10, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

The mediator would like another agree to him mediating on the talk page. - RoyBoy 23:23, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

Rollback

Please don't abuse the rollback feature. Your edits to Jesus were not simply reverting vandalism. You may want to read Misplaced Pages:ROLLBACK again, if you haven't already. It's also shameful that you used rollback to get up to your 3RR limit as well. Please be more careful in the future. Thanks for your consideration.-Andrew c  03:43, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

I checked it again as you suggested. It said "When an admin or rollbacker sees an unworthy change to an article (usually vandalism)". It was "unworthy" as there was no consensus to change it. It then became vandalism when the editor in question kept reverting without adequate discussion. 08:37, 27 January 2008 (UTC)


Request for mediation accepted

A Request for Mediation to which you were are a party has been accepted.
You can find more information on the case subpage, Misplaced Pages:Requests for mediation/Abortion-breast cancer hypothesis.
For the Mediation Committee, WjBscribe 15:30, 27 January 2008 (UTC)
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Just stumbled on your page

You seem to be a longtime user here, who supports Intelligent Design. What do you make of that project? I've been banned twice for disagreeing with people there, and I'm pretty much fed up with wikipedia.GusChiggins21 (talk) 08:53, 5 February 2008 (UTC)

By 'project', do you mean the Misplaced Pages page? Or the Discovery Institute's ideas? I stopped looking at the WP page long ago, as I don't really keep up with the subject. I'm more into creationism of the YEC variety. You can't be banned for merely disagreeing with people, if you were following WP guidelines. 05:44, 6 February 2008 (UTC)

sarfati book?

Are you sure that is a book you added to the Sarfati article? No sign of it on Amazon yet. David D. (Talk) 03:54, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

references on being complex

Ross, my objective is only to produce a reference for stating the doctrine is complex due to the editor that stated it was POV. I think the request is absurd; I did a quick search and took the third one that I checked. It stated the doctrine was complex and I did not look at anything else. Regardless, I think the reference is reputable, but would be happier if there was another one. Do you know of one? If so, please use it. If not, it should stay because it is both reputable and verifiable. --Storm Rider 01:25, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

I think we need a more neutral POV, see my comments on talk:Christianity. OK, I see your answer already. 01:33, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

Global warming

Your persistent low-level disruption at global warming violates several Misplaced Pages policies (see WP:V, WP:TE, etc). Please stop. At the next occurrence, I will request advice on handling the matter from other administrators by initiating a thread at WP:ANI. You will of course be free to present your perspective there, but it would be best if matters did not reach that point. Raymond Arritt (talk) 01:32, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

I apologize, not because the edit is wrong, but because I thought about it further and realized that it would need a citation to explain or back-up the "inconsequential" nature of the temperature change. It was a "good faith" "bold edit". 01:40, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

Historicity of Jesus#Jesus as myth

You quickly dismissed my edit to http://en.wikipedia.org/Historicity_of_Jesus#Jesus_as_myth as 'WP:OR and unreliable source'. I assume you were referring to reference and quote of John Remsburg? You did not make this clear. Remsburg is published and therefore seems to not fit your definition of WP:OR. Your claim of 'unreliable' is puzzling when sat next to the clearly Christian apologist references and quotes that litter this page.

Hopefully you are interested in providing a balanced article and not simply defending Christian beliefs and desires to suppress any information that demonstrates Jesus is a mythological construct? Thanks. MonoApe (talk) 17:37, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

I will take a closer look. I spotted some "leading weasel" phrases. I will check to see if the source authors have qualifications in the relevant fields. 02:16, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

Revert on Noah's Ark

Hi there, In the interests of avoiding further reverts, I've put back my changes that you removed here]. You had put the language which fails to treat this from a neutral voice (e.g. talking from within the religion rather than as a neutral party). The article is about more than just the ark, it's about the story surrounding the ark (which you've put it back to). You also removed the quote with the geological viewpoint (referenced), the mention of sacrifice, the period of the deluge, put back the amateurish sentence structure and also re-inserted the spelling mistake "reappeares". I'm sorry if I've treated your edit as unhelpful: but if you've got something more to add perhaps we can discuss how best to incorporate that into it. But drive-by reverting with an obvious ignorance of the fixes isn't real helpful. Thanks, NathanLee (talk) 06:42, 18 August 2008 (UTC)

Scientific Concensus and Pseudoscience

This is exactly what I said to Christian Skeptic when I reinstated this sentence the last time.

I reverted your deletion of the the statement in Answers in Genesis about YEC being considered
pseudoscience.   Your reasoning was perfectly valid, in that scientific concensus has no bearing on pseudoscience.  
However the statement was also perfectly true, in that going against concencus is the reason that YEC is considered
pseudoscience.  I.e. because the conclusions of YEC are philosophically unacceptable, the methods are non-specifically
dismissed as unscientific.  If anti-YECs want to hang the illogic of this conclusion out there for the world to see, I
say let them.

I was very tempted to remove the sentence myself when it was first added, but on further consideration I came to the above conclusion. LowKey (talk) 02:52, 29 August 2008 (UTC)

I fixed up and moved the sentence. And actually the 'pseudoscience' is mentioned already in the Criticism section, so now it is mentioned twice and my previous edit summary was correct. 11:12, 29 August 2008 (UTC)


There is a RfC on Talk:Flood geology regarding a statement in the lead of the article. I don't know if you watchlist this article, but your input would be appreciated.LowKey (talk) 02:23, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

Abortion debate

Abortion debate. You mention that the right to life accrues at something like the pro-nucleus stage (?). Your very interesting biology reference, however, (which I read in full) makes no reference whatsoever to right to life or personhood, so I must conclude that such is your opinion. My opinion is that any such lines you draw have no basis in science and are therefore purely political. Korky Day (talk) 21:24, 13 September 2008 (UTC)

Very christian of you -- NOT

How Christian of you to replace the image of Helen Clark with something that might be considered to denigrate her. Try reading Misplaced Pages:Biographies of living persons which says material (including images) requires a high degree of sensitivity. Kaiwhakahaere (talk) 03:12, 25 September 2008 (UTC)

It was done as a joke. The un-photoshopped, more realistic image is in widespread use. She has denigrated herself by her actions, a photo is going to make little or no difference. Why is a false image of her acceptable anyway? 02:43, 26 September 2008 (UTC)

I know you're a better editor

This edit would be considered vandalism if it were from an IP editor. You are a much better editor than that. OrangeMarlin 01:22, 29 September 2008 (UTC)

I know. It was a bold, if somewhat 'cheeky' edit that one! 01:22, 30 September 2008 (UTC)
Look, I get your sense of humor. Unfortunately, a lot of admins have none. And again, placing humorous edits does qualify as vandalism, and you're not a vandal. And of course, maybe it's one of the funny things that hits just a bit too close to home. Just a thought. OrangeMarlin 02:27, 30 September 2008 (UTC)

Flood geology/chronology

Ross, I just added a para about flood chronology (meaning when the flood occurred in terms of modern chronology) to the Flood geology. I said that the Genesis chronology (A begat B in his nth year, and B begat C in his nth year, and so on) places the flood 1600 (approx) years after Creation, which I believe is pretty correct. But then I say that Creationists, taking the biblical chronology as their basis, date Creation to the 3rd millenium. But this may not be correct, as I gather that many date it to about 10,000 BC. Why do they do that, and what's the range of opinion in creationist circles? Thanks PiCo (talk) 07:04, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Creation is dated at 4000 to 4100 BC using very conservative/literalist reasoning, but to avoid being quite so dogmatic, we generally say the earth is 6-10 thousand years old (i.e. 4000 to 8000 BC). This allows for nearly any "unknown" factors. Note than this does not pull the flood back to 6400 BC, it only pulls back the earlier genealogies. The flood is still thought to have been circa 2300-2500 BC. 01:15, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

Ghosting

Hey Rossnixon, just letting you know I reverted back the change to the above page. Per the manual of style, disambiguation pages are intended to help readers to navigate through Misplaced Pages articles, which was the main reason I made the change. It was an additional benefit that some of the stuff removed was unreferenced nonsense (the "ghosting sexual position" crap, Halloween pranks etc). I know the Hamish & Andy part wasn't nonsense, but it was tagged as unreferenced since June, and belongs in their main article anyway. As an aside, I'm looking forward to Hamish & Andy's Re-Gifted show this week, because I missed some of their Rove appearances and this will be a great opportunity to catch up. Somno (talk) 10:11, 17 November 2008 (UTC)

Sure, fair enough. Whaddya mean "you missed some Rove episodes"? How can a true blue Ozzie do that?!? ;-) 01:32, 18 November 2008 (UTC)
I know! I tend to forget that it's on, which isn't even a good excuse. I expect the disambig page will be expanded again after the Regifted special airs, but we can move whatever's useful to their main article, perhaps just leaving "A game described by Hamish & Andy" as the last entry in the disambig page? Somno (talk) 11:44, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

RFC at Talk:Noah's Ark

Since you've contributed to the recent discussion at Talk:Noah's Ark, this is just a courtesy note to let you know a RFC has been filed here. Thanks, Ben (talk) 22:38, 29 November 2008 (UTC)

The lede for Noah says this:

Noah saves his family and represenatives of all animals in groups of two or seven...

Apart from the spelling mistake, I'm wondering about the reference to the seven animals. I sort of recall a long discussion about this on the Noah's Ark article a long time ago, and I sort of remember we came to the conclusion that it actually meant 14 animals - the Hebrew says, literally, "seven-seven, man-woman" meaning seven male and seven female (it actually uses the words for "man" and "woman"). I don't want to go to all the trouble of researching it again. Do you happen to know what's correct? PiCo (talk) 07:59, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

Unfortunately, there is no way to know for sure. Bible commentators are evenly divided about whether the Hebrew means ‘seven’ or ‘seven pairs’ of each type of clean animal. www.answersingenesis.org/creation/v19/i2/animals.asp 01:41, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

Christmas

If you wish to display a seasonal greeting, please do so on your user page, but absolutely do not vandalize an article to do so. Rklawton (talk) 03:41, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

Not vandalism actually, just a two word addition (a temporary 'decoration' as per my edit comment). 01:09, 5 January 2009 (UTC)
Yes, vandalism, and you should know better. You should also be aware that your incivility has also been noted. Rklawton (talk) 02:12, 5 January 2009 (UTC)

January 2009

You currently appear to be engaged in an edit war according to the reverts you have made on Internal consistency of the Bible. Note that the three-revert rule prohibits making more than three reversions on a single page within a 24 hour period. Additionally, users who perform a large number of reversions in content disputes may be blocked for edit warring, even if they do not technically violate the three-revert rule. If you continue, you may be blocked from editing. Please do not repeatedly revert edits, but use the talk page to work towards wording and content that gains a consensus among editors. If necessary, pursue dispute resolution. Eeekster (talk) 02:31, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

Thank you. I am aware of the rule. I trust that you will not revert me again. My version appears to be long-standing, therefore you should seek consensus on the talk page for your suggested change. 02:35, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

Noah

Good work on editing the Islamic section. PiCo (talk) 09:13, 27 January 2009 (UTC)

A further thought: So you trimmed the Islamic section bcse it was too large (and I agree): and what happens when I try to trim the literalist section of Noah's ark because it's too large? All hell breaks loose... PiCo (talk) 11:05, 27 January 2009 (UTC)
Depends on the method used to calculate the best proportions. Do we go by the current beliefs of the english-speaking general public? Or by the current beliefs of English-speaking scholars in that area of expertise? If a belief is widespread but only introduced recently, do we shrink a long-held opposing view way down in size? Example: X was believed for 2000 years by 95% of people. New view Y was followed for the next 150 years by 80%, the remaining 20% still go with "X". An 8:2 proportion to represent current views would belittle/ignore the literature and cultural impact of the more long-standing view. 01:34, 28 January 2009 (UTC)
Yes, the answer isn't easy.It's interesting though that the literalist view is comparatively recent - it emerged in the early 20th century. Before that, the literal truth of the Genesis story had been accepted rather than examined. It was only in the early 20th century that a whole intellectual structure to support this view was thought necessary. It's all very interesting as part of the intellectual history of the West. PiCo (talk)
I think the literalist view was the only one until the attacks from the European "higher criticism" of the 19th century. There was no reason to examine whether the view was valid - no one had produced a convincing alternative, and still haven't IMHO. The so-called fundamentalist revival was just a fight to reclaim ground lost to higher criticism once it became obvious that it's claims were largely invalid. 01:18, 30 January 2009 (UTC)

Nativity of Jesus

Ross, would you mind commenting on a content dispute at Nativity of Jesus. It concerns a table comparing the accounts of Matthew and Luke. There are concerns over the use of primary sources, OR, novel synthesis, lack of explanation/context which would be afforded by prose, and even its necessity, given the section "The nativity as myth". The table can be seen at this version of the page: at section 1.3, "The narratives compared". Discussion on the issue can be found at Talk:Nativity of Jesus, in the threads "The two narratives compared", "The two narratives compared, part 2", and at "Task List (January 15, 2009)". Your input on the issue would be greatly appreciated, as very few persons have commented on it. Thank you, Ross. carl bunderson (talk) (contributions) 20:03, 11 February 2009 (UTC)

FWIW, I found it interesting...Nazirite and Nazarite are actually different words, says the OED. Nazirites are the people such as Samson and John the Baptist, and Nazarites are persons from Nazareth, or Christians. Just thought you might be interested too. Cheers. carl bunderson (talk) (contributions) 20:22, 13 February 2009 (UTC)

Excuse me

The meaning of this?

There is a problem on the article. I could not identify the problem in the article, so I requested help on the discussion page. It's clear vandalism. Please do not revert my comments without explanation. --Hojimachong 02:11, 11 March 2009 (UTC)

Noah's Ark FAR

I have nominated Noah's Ark for a featured article review here. Please join the discussion on whether this article meets featured article criteria. Articles are typically reviewed for two weeks. If substantial concerns are not addressed during the review period, the article will be moved to the Featured Article Removal Candidates list for a further period, where editors may declare "Keep" or "Remove" the article's featured status. The instructions for the review process are here. --Vassyana (talk) 15:35, 20 March 2009 (UTC)

Please take care

Your recent edit to User talk:Stephan Schulz‎ removed two other editors' comments and Stephan's replies. I'm sure he is aware of your previous edit and did not object when it was removed. Let him decide. Vsmith (talk) 02:08, 23 March 2009 (UTC)

Oh dear, that was not intended, sorry. Please note however that it is vandalism to remove comments from a user talk page other than your own. 01:29, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

Yahweh the god of Shem but not of Japheth

It's at Genesis 9:26-27, the Blessing of Noah:

26And he said, Blessed be the LORD God of Shem; and Canaan shall be his servant.

27God shall enlarge Japheth, and he shall dwell in the tents of Shem; and Canaan shall be his servant.

There's no definite article in the Hebrew - it doesn't say "Blessed be the Lord God of Shem", it says "Blessed be YHWH Elohim of Shem", with YHWH as a personal name - it doesn't mean "Lord". So a better translation would be, "Blessed be YHWH (the) God of Shem".

Note how the text carefully says that YHWH Elohim is the god "of Shem", but omits anything like this for Japheth. This is an ongoing theme in the OT - with each generation, Yahweh becomes more and more closely identified with a narrower and narrower group: first with the descendants of Shem (Japheth and Ham are ruled out), then of the descendants of Abraham (but the Covenant is exclusively with Abraham's descendants through Isaac and Israel), and then finally with one family, that of David (ruling out the royal dynasties of the northern kingdom of Israel).

Something else that intrigues me is the pattern of reversals you find in this chain. Usually the eldest son is favoured, but at key points it's often the youngest who is favoured over his brothers. David himself is the most notable example, but there's also Judah (the youngest son of his mother, although not of his father). The position with Abraham and Shem is unclear, but these four are the four crucial flexion points in the narrative of God's favour towards Israel.

The pattern of generations is also interesting, though God knows what it means: there are ten generations from Adam to Noah, another ten to Abraham, then a group of 3 (Abraham, Isaac, Jacob), then ten again from Judah to David, and ten from David to the fall of the Temple. Clearly the author - and it must have been a single author - was trying to build a chain of generations, but why this structure? And for that matter, why is it only visible if you include Chronicles and Ruth - or at least the last parts from Judah on to the Destruction. The bible is full of mysteries, which is what makes it so fascinating.

PiCo (talk) 08:46, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

NZ swine flu cases

Hi, I see you tried to improve the NZ entry in Template:2009 swine flu outbreak table. However the figures in your edit were wrong; if you read the source cited, you'll see that only four cases have been confirmed through laboratory tests, which is the count that should be given in the first column of the table. I've reverted to the correct figures. -- Avenue (talk) 21:07, 29 April 2009 (UTC)

The first source is older. Look at the newer second source: 13 confirmed, 96 suspected. I will change it back. 23:40, 29 April 2009 (UTC)
The only thing that changed with the "confirmed" numbers between the two sources is that they realised one person hadn't come from the US, so the number decreased from 14 to 13. But the main point is that "confirmed" here doesn't mean confirmed by laboratory tests, which is what goes in that column. See my last post in this section for more. I'm happy to try to explain further if you're still not recognising the distinction after reading that, but it might be best if we carry on the conversation there. -- Avenue (talk) 00:01, 30 April 2009 (UTC)
I see your point. I had assumed the newspaper meant "laboratory confirmed" when it said "confirmed". I think that was a bad choice of word by the newspaper - the virus can *only* be confirmed by laboratory tests. 01:12, 30 April 2009 (UTC)
In fairness to the Herald, the Ministry of Health has often glossed over the distinction between probable and confirmed cases; e.g. here. So virtually all the media reports about NZ get this wrong, or at best do the same. -- Avenue (talk) 03:03, 30 April 2009 (UTC)
Someone has upped confirmed to 16. Want to change it back to 3 for me? Suspected is now 111 08:56, 30 April 2009 (UTC)
Nil Einne‎ beat me to it. I did update the suspected count - thanks for the tip. -- Avenue (talk) 12:53, 30 April 2009 (UTC)
There is a nice NZ map here - click on regions or "NZ Total". Don't know how often it is updated, but will be interesting to check every day or two. 01:38, 1 May 2009 (UTC)

They don't make a warning template for this

But do not use "search and replace" as you did here , most especially for mass date format changes, which is controversial enough. You managed to raise, among other things, the question of "whether Christmas ought to be ADlebrated on December 25 or January 6". I don't know about you, but I don't plan to ADlebrate a darn thing. KillerChihuahuaAdvice 22:37, 30 July 2009 (UTC)

Re your edit to Global Warming

Controversial edits that drastically change the content of an article (like your

Adding politically motivated categories

Hi. I believe the category Critics of NATO bombing of Yugoslavia is a legitimate one. All of the individuals on the list have expressed through written works or public statement their opposition or concerns for the legitimacy of the bombing. So I don't see why it should be deleted. I believe this category is similar to that the categories of critics of feminism, American anti-Iraq War activists, ect.. --Happywith006 (talk) 17:54, 15 August 2009 (UTC)

Copyvio

I've deleted some copyvio material you placed on Talk:Flood geology without even noting where it came from, I've put a link with my reply so people can read it where you found it. Dougweller (talk) 17:19, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

Edit Warring - September 29, 2009

Please do not undo other people's edits repeatedly, as you are doing in Jesus, or you may be blocked from editing Misplaced Pages. The three-revert rule prohibits making more than three reversions in a content dispute within a 24-hour period. Additionally, users who perform a large number of reversions in content disputes may be blocked for edit warring, even if they do not technically violate the 3RR. Thank you. - Peter Deer (talk) 21:44, 29 September 2009 (UTC)

Please, in regards to the thing you keep editing take it to talk and develop a consensus, repeated edit warring with others about this is not helpful. Peter Deer (talk) 08:19, 9 October 2009 (UTC)
Actually, I took it to the talk page, but no one in a week or so has bothered to comment. 01:45, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

Other wiki encyclopaedia

Greetings Rossnixon, I haven't been active here at WP for quite some time but I do recall that we seem to have common areas of interest. You may be interested in this encyclopaedia. LowKey (talk) 03:20, 7 October 2009 (UTC)

Okay, maybe you are not interested, but could you possibly look over our flood geology article and make a few suggestions? LowKey (talk) 13:27, 21 October 2009 (UTC)

AfD nomination of List of scientists opposing the mainstream scientific assessment of global warming

An editor has nominated one or more articles which you have created or worked on, for deletion. The nominated article is List of scientists opposing the mainstream scientific assessment of global warming. We appreciate your contributions, but the nominator doesn't believe that the article satisfies Misplaced Pages's criteria for inclusion and has explained why in his/her nomination (see also Misplaced Pages:Notability and "What Misplaced Pages is not").

Your opinions on whether the article meets inclusion criteria and what should be done with the article are welcome; please participate in the discussion(s) by adding your comments to Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion/List of scientists opposing the mainstream scientific assessment of global warming (3rd nomination). Please be sure to sign your comments with four tildes (~~~~).

You may also edit the article during the discussion to improve it but should not remove the articles for deletion template from the top of the article; such removal will not end the deletion debate.

Please note: This is an automatic notification by a bot. I have nothing to do with this article or the deletion nomination, and can't do anything about it. --Erwin85Bot (talk) 01:46, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

Sanctions warning

Can't be bothered to find the right template, but be aware the GW (and any number of other articles) are covered by Misplaced Pages:General sanctions/Climate change probation William M. Connolley (talk) 08:29, 12 January 2010 (UTC)