Lyndon Ashmore. You can object to a page here. You don't just delete the whole thing... especially a talk page! If you have a problem, you can say something about it here. Be aware that it is not a personal attack to point out errors in your physics, or to say that it is full of trivial errors. —Duae Quartunciae (talk · cont)
Please note that while this is a user page, it is still subject to WP:BLP. I have removed several statements from the page because they contain unsourced negative information about a living person; these must not be restored without a citation. Stifle (talk) 09:16, 2 November 2009 (UTC)
You removed a part of an analogy by DeepBlueDiamond. The edit is at 09:14, 2 November 2009.
I am pretty sure you have simply misunderstood this deleted material. DeepBlueDiamond is a native German speaker, and his English is often unclear. The removed sentence reads:
In this extract, DeepBlueDiamond is speaking of a hypothetical seller of engines for a car. It is not any kind of remark about any living person; any imputed criticism is not biographical, and is intended to refer to ME, not Lyndon. The whole analogy is rather bizarre, and he implies in parenthesis that I have called Lyndon a crank. Ironically, I have been pretty careful about that; I have deliberately not included any such statement in these pages, to my knowledge.
I am going to restore this sentence unchanged to the record of our discussion, since it is not a comment on any living person except possibly to myself, and there's no reason to remove it. It's simply the conclusion of DeepBlueDiamond's hypothetical analogy about a used car salesman. However, I'll wait for a week so that you may comment further first, if you wish. —Duae Quartunciae (talk · cont) 15:49, 2 November 2009 (UTC)
Your second edit removes two sentences from my remarks. The edit is at 09:17, 2 November 2009.
The first sentence you removed reads
This is not attack or criticism. It is simply about whether his ideas belong in wikipedia, per our policy WP:Notability. It is perfectly normal to point out that someone is not "notable" by wikipedia standards. To underline why this remark is made, I propose to replace this sentence with
This makes it clear that the sentence is not an attack and is a normal part of engagement and discussion between editors dealing with sources in wikipedia. Note that Ashmore's paper appeared in "Galilean Electrodynamics". There used to be a page for this "journal" in wikipedia, and it was quite properly deleted as fringe rubbish. See Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Galilean Electrodynamics. Ashmore has no publication record in any legitimate science journals and no notability in the world of science. I don't think there should be any problem with this comment on Ashmore's lack of notability; but again, I'll wait a week before making this replacement, so that you may comment. —Duae Quartunciae (talk · cont) 15:49, 2 November 2009 (UTC)
The second sentence you removed in this edit reads
This sentence is not biographical. It is a comment about a paper. I've already cited the original paper. If this was in wikipedia article space then I agree a claim about errors should be sourced. As it is, I can only assure you that anyone with any reasonable background in physics would see this to be true on reading the paper; and that the errors have been pointed out at length in various discussions which are not valid wikipedia references.
I can't source this comment, in part because the paper is so bad! It's not actually used by anyone; and the errors in it are described only when Ashmore shows up in some webforum to try and push his ideas. It would be negative personal comment to describe how he engages these discussions.
It seems to me that this sentence is not something for which WP:BLP applies. It's a comment on a paper, not a person. I've never heard of this policy being applied to prevent editors from saying in discussion that a book or essay includes many errors! I could, perhaps, source it by giving something like this:
Neither of these links would be acceptable in a wikipedia article, and both are to material written by me, under the name "Sylas" in physics related discussion groups. There's a lot more in each discussion thread; with all kinds of people participating, including Lyndon himself. But I don't think it sets a good precedent to require sourcing in a case like this; I don't think these are the kinds of links we want to encourage, and I don't think we should prevent editors from saying that an online essay includes lots of errors.
However, I will await a comment before doing anything about this sentence. I think it is improper use of the WP:BLP to remove this sentence, but I'll await more feedback from you or another experienced administrator before making any replacement or restoration. —Duae Quartunciae (talk · cont) 15:49, 2 November 2009 (UTC)
In your third edit, you have removed some comments about the paper. They are not biographical remarks in any way; and they are backed up in the rest of the paragraph anyway.
The edit in this case is an edit on 09:17, 2 November 2009. You removed a passage which refers to errors in the paper. In all honesty, it would be impossible to overstate just how physically absurd this error really is. However, I can be a bit less scornful if it helps.
Another thing I can do here is remove the word "Ashmore..." at the start of the extract, since in fact I am referring to the paper and not the person. It's common in academic writing to refer to a cited reference in this way; and this way of referring to a paper comes naturally to me. But in wikipedia, it may be better to be explicit that this is specifically about the paper.
I propose to rephrase this section, removing Ashmore's name also from where it appears even in material you have let remain in the page. I propose to restore the deleted introduction, but drastically rephrased to be less scornful; though I shall still be blunt. I'll wait a bit before proceeding, however. —Duae Quartunciae (talk · cont) 15:49, 2 November 2009 (UTC)
Your edit is an edit made on 09:18, 2 November 2009. This is similar to the case in your second edit, where I refer to errors in a paper. Again, it's not biographical claims about a person, but a statement about a cited paper.
I propose to replace the deleted sentence as follows:
As before, I will await your comments before making this proposed change. —Duae Quartunciae (talk · cont) 15:49, 2 November 2009 (UTC)
The unusual format of this page is a consequence of issues that W. Kehler had with appropriate use of conventional talk pages.
This page is essentially an archive of communication with W. Kehler. W. Kehler presented wikipedia physics editors with a problem some years ago. He made many nonsensical edits to physics pages, and took enormous exception to anyone reverting them. He complained all over the place, in fragmented English and with strange formatting such as the use of heading markup for emphasis, and discussed by fragmenting replies from other people with his own rather incoherent inserts. He used IP addresses in the range 84.158.2??.*
Since he was using an IP address, I made a sort of pseudo-user page for him, in my own user space, attempting to introduce him to normal wikipedia conventions, and directed him to engage there. The end result was astounding; and even got a bemused query on the administrators notice board, by a passing admin who couldn't figure it out.
In the end, I gave up on the usual "talk" format, and adopted the side by side format seen in this page; though it is all still an attempt to communicate with a new editor struggling to work with wikipedia.
You can get an idea of how this came about with some of these links:
The page is a good faith attempt to help an editor work effectively with wikipedia. It is essentially a communication page, rather like a user talk page; and it is kept as an archival record of the attempt. —Duae Quartunciae (talk · cont) 15:49, 2 November 2009 (UTC)
Please keep this page as it is. In 20 years time when i am proved correct and the BB is old news then historians will want to see how forward thinkers such as I suffered at the hands of Ludites. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Lyndonashmore (talk • contribs) 19:13, 4 November 2009 (UTC)