User talk:SemanticMantis

Welcome to my talk page

Please feel free to leave any civil comment you like. Please:

 do not delete, revert, or otherwise remove anything from my talk page. 

And please do not judge me for excessive typographic emphasis; recent experience has proved that my request must be made very clearly and prominently.

more about my request

A discussion of my polite request No one owns a page at Wikipedia and the normal procedures that apply to all other pages will apply here. The ref desks are largely inhabited by people who like exchanging opinions and who often want almost all contributions preserved. The rest of Wikipedia is not like that. As your contributions are almost entirely focused on posting at the reference desks you may not be aware of the norms that apply at Wikipedia so I should explain that the way disruption is handled can be a bit of a lottery because the community is extremely tolerant so people are often free to continue down the wrong path. However, if the disruption reaches a certain point, strong action may be taken and it is conceivable that, after a lot of back-and-forth, you could end up being indefinitely blocked. That would only happen if the mood at WP:ANI were that the nonsense must stop, and if an admin there decided to implement that consensus, and if you were to insist on continuing your campaign after a couple of short blocks. Consider what follows on this talk page, otherwise known as WP:POLEMIC violations—yes, they are minor, but they are nothing to do with building the encyclopedia. They are an encouragement to a banned user, and WP:NOTFREESPEECH applies. The fact that there are lots of like-minded people at the ref desks may be misleading—Wikipedia is not the place for soapboxing of any kind (WP:NOTSOAPBOX). Johnuniq (talk) 03:44, 19 February 2016 (UTC) Hi @Johnuniq:. Thanks for your comments. I know that nobody owns their own talk page. That's why I make a polite request, not a demand. I am familiar with how WP works, and in fact I used to edit mainspace more in the past, I only opened this account a few years back when I got interested in preserving my identity for the purposes of the reference desk. Let me ask very clearly: are you saying I have done something that deserves blocking? Are you threatening to block me? Are you filing some grievance against me? Please clarify, because this is all very vague to me, yet it seems to have an air of threat and intimidation, but I hope I am mistaken. I have no idea how much of my activity you've been watching, or how you came to my page, so let me explain myself a bit: I only started this putting this request at the top of my page and keeping a list of users who have disrespected my wishes after repeated polite, personal and discrete requests had failed to have any effect. If there is something wrong with me posting a username and a diff on my talk page, please point me to the appropriate guidelines. I personally felt it would be nice to have a record, in case I ever needed to reference these actions. I don't really think it's that interesting or important, which is why I have this stuff boxed up. As for WP:SOAP, I think you'll find that very few people will say that my own comments on my own talk page that I have in fact concealed in boxes constitute soapboxing. You see, we call it soapboxing by analogy to people who used to stand on a soapbox in a public square in order to better address/harangue the masses. I.e. it is a shorthand for publicly demanding attention for one's views. I have not done that, nor will I. I have no interest in arguing with you over anything really, my only interest is in WP:VOLUNTEERing at the reference desk. If you've looked at my contributions there in any detail, you'll see I'm rather good at it. I have a broad background in science and math, and deep expertise in a few areas. I have lots of formal credentials and accolades in the real world too, but I know that we should not lean on those for purpose of WP. I know how to WP:AGF, I know how to be WP:CIVIL, and I know how to find WP:RS and explain them in helpful ways. I have good access levels to scientific literature, and know how to use it. I believe in WP:HUMAN, WP:NOTCENSORED, and WP:5P3, and I know I am not alone, that those are fairly central principles. SemanticMantis (talk) 16:07, 19 February 2016 (UTC) Oh, and I see from WP:POLEMIC that " The compilation of factual evidence (diffs) in user subpages, for purposes such as preparing for a dispute resolution process, is permitted provided it will be used in a timely manner." So thank you for pointing that out, as I had not read it before, and it quite clearly states that my cataloging of diffs is permitted. SemanticMantis (talk) 20:59, 19 February 2016 (UTC) List of users who have disrespected my polite request Extended content 1: User:Elockid [1], who did not even give an edit summary or reason. I suspect it is thought that the post in question originated from a banned user. I suggest that removing content from my talk page is neither an urgent nor a particularly helpful task, and that Elockid's time would be better spent doing virtually anything else. In this case, I probably would have collapsed or deleted the content anyway. The point is that it's ok to let things stand on my talk page for a few minutes, especially when I've clearly asked for others not to remove content here. 2: User:Future_Perfect_at_Sunrise [2]. The user to whom I have clearly explained, repeatedly, that I prefer to manage my own talk page. 3: User:Future_Perfect_at_Sunrise, again [3]. List of users whose requests I will respect Extended content Fut.Perf. - who has asked that I not post on his talk page. Until notified otherwise, I will not. Here is a record of the exchange, which was quickly deleted by FPAS. However, I wish to save this diff [4] in case it proves useful in the future.

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User_talk:SemanticMantis/Archive_1 through 01/21/2016

New Threads

intent

Since you asked: I almost replied to this earlier comment of yours to say, "But we have to determine intent! Otherwise someone asking what appears to be a medical information question might be secretly looking for advice, so if we didn't figure that out, they might get away with something!! " But if there's one thing I've learned, it's that sarcasm doesn't always work in these debates. —Steve Summit (talk) 16:46, 22 January 2016 (UTC)

Ha! Yes @Scs: I would have gotten the point, but sarcasm often works poorly in text-only communication, and almost always does if there is at least one reader who won't AGF with the post!

The other related issue is that I am presumably allowed to ask what, if any, were Hitler's positive contributions to Germany, but IP users are implicitly not. I think it is an interesting and important question, and deeply related to how he rose to power. And I suppose lots of real historians have spilled much ink over the matter, regardless of the fact that some anti-semitic jerks and trolls might also be interested in the question and resultant POV pushing. I'm actually a bit curious about it, but asking at this point would be POINTY. Then again, there is also perhaps something to be said for the other side, vis. WP:COMPETENCE, etc., and even using AGF to start from positive intent won't necessarily defend posts on sensitive topics, because someone trouble might be stirred up. But COMPETANCE is just someone's essay/opinion/advice, whereas AGF is an official guideline... Oh well, I'm glad at least a few of us seem to be roughly on the same page on these issues :) SemanticMantis (talk) 17:09, 22 January 2016 (UTC)

Disambiguation link notification for January 26

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Thanks, fixed. SemanticMantis (talk) 14:39, 26 January 2016 (UTC)

Not actually indefinite

You wrote:

Seconded!

Thanks.

Of course now the desk is protected again [5] indefinitely...

Actually you were looking at the expiry time for move protection, not edit protection. --76.69.45.64 (talk) 23:18, 28 January 2016 (UTC)

@76.69.45.64: yes, my mistake, (I know a lot about science and how to find references, but still a bit ignorant of some WP issues). Fortunately I did notice and correct my error before I posted about the issue on the ref desk talk page. Perhaps you have something to add to that conversation? I used to just edit under IP for a long time before I bothered to get an account, so I know how frustrating it is to be locked out due to the problems caused by other people. Even more infuriating is when the others aren't even really causing problems :-/ SemanticMantis (talk) 15:03, 29 January 2016 (UTC)

Most Wikipedia pages are almost always indefinitely move-protected, because moving a Wikipedia page without consensus is disruptive and would be something that vandals would try to do if they could. Robert McClenon (talk) 02:40, 11 February 2016 (UTC)

See my comments on my talk page

Robert McClenon (talk) 02:40, 11 February 2016 (UTC)

Time to vote, if you'd like

Hello ref deskers, Jayron has put up a proposal on the ref desk talk page [6]. I have decided to ping a few reference desk users who may be interested in voting, I hope none of you mind this notification. Lest anyone think I'm doing something wrong or shady, note that I'm including people who will most surely vote in a different way than me, and many people whose vote I cannot guess. I just want a high turnout, and in particular wanted to hear from some of the folks that stick to the math desk and don't show up much on the talk page.

@SteveBaker: @Scs: @Robert McClenon: @Medeis: @Guy Macon: @Modocc: @Drmies: @Deor: @StuRat: @Mandruss: @Wnt: @Tevildo: @Nil Einne: @The Rambling Man: @Dbfirs: @CiaPan: @RDBury: @Meni Rosenfeld: @Tamfang: @Gandalf61: @Bo Jacoby: @JackofOz:

Thanks for your consideration, SemanticMantis (talk) 21:02, 11 February 2016 (UTC)

Thanks for thinking of me, I appreciate it. But I'll stick to sticking to the math desk :). I haven't followed up on this issue, nor am I inclined to catch up now and voice an opinion. Good luck and may the best proposal win :) -- Meni Rosenfeld (talk) 23:42, 11 February 2016 (UTC)

AllBestWishes

Hi, this is my thank-you for your note to my page following problems at RD/Math and your helpfulness generally, which is noticed! As a physicist I acknowledge that Plank's constant inherently must have units i.e. Mnudelman's post is spot on and he exposed a flaw in the parenthetical wording of Claim 2, "the Plank claim". I think you had a hard time trying to persuade a pair of mathematicians that it is inelegant to whoop "nonsense" at such a discovery; doubtless they exchange that shorthand rebuttal in various contexts and I did not take it personally. So for me that was not a misused-word problem and I would not have addressed it with anything like the words "you came here to be rude". I'll touch on two examples that you gave: The Gibbs ringing artifact is indeed an oscillating convergence looking like the Fibonacci golden mean convergence though it can be generated as a continuous function rather than a sequence. I suspect that you actually have a cat but if you said it is 10 I really couldn't be expected to know whether that is in years, kilograms or pounds. I have made an offer to enter mediation at this report at ANI as I would prefer to reach a consensus with Slawekb, if possible. Best regards AllBestFaith (talk) 20:48, 12 February 2016 (UTC)

@AllBestFaith: as someone put it at AN/I, there is a fine line between trolling and crankery. I will warn you that people here often don't care to make a distinction, even though the motive and intent may be very different. The point is, in every standard framing of limits, the ratios of successive terms in the Fibonacci sequence converge to \phi. When we say a sequence of real numbers converges to a number $x_{n}\to \phi$, then we also know that the sequence is a Cauchy sequence, and so for any \epsilon>0, there exists an N such that n,m>N implies $|x_{n}-x_{m}|<\epsilon$. That is why the claim that the differences of the Fibonacci ratio sequence approach some positive number is false. You can probably even prove it to yourself if you're willing to invest a little time with pencil and paper, no need for any discussion of computers or conceptual limits to arithmetic computation. The fact that the Planck constant was picked for this constant makes the claim no more false than it would be for any other positive number, but it does make it sound more like crankery. When you persist in arguing that there is some way in which the claim is true, you are leaving the world of orthodox math. Now, leaving the world of orthodox math is fine, and some people enjoy it, but that's WP:OR, and not something we can provide references for. We routinely ignore requests for review of OR, that's not what we do, that's what academic journals are for.

Whether or not you are a crank, the page you cited almost certainly is authored by a crank, and I'd advise nobody to give that guy money for anything. I'll also note that the reference desk may choose to support or refute outside claims, but we have no burden to do so. Every math department in the world gets a letter now and then from some earnest writer who thinks they can perform angle trisection or some similar problem. In almost every case, the paper is thrown out without reading, because it has been proven that such a task is impossible. Occasionally, a very generous mathematician might help the writer sort out their errors. But if the writer persists in saying that they are right, and the mathematician (and Galois!) are wrong, then the mathematician can understandably conclude that the writer is not worth their time, and may indeed be acting in bad faith. Do you see my point?

I'm happy to explain to you why the claim is wrong, and I'm happy to encourage others to AGF, but I also recommend that you simply drop the issue with Slawekb. Whether or not you had any ill intent with that thread, it will be hard to convince anyone that your motives were pure, and you also have very little to gain. If you want to keep your good name, my advice is to continue to give good refs on the desks when you can, and not to argue with mathematicians about things that look like fringe/crank math. Really it's not very useful to argue with anyone on the ref desk, though I do occasionally point out other user's errors or incorrect information. And by the way, I know all about how mathematicians talk, getting plenty of experience in that while getting my Ph.D. in math. Whether or not it is common, I do still think it is rude, unhelpful, and incorrect to call a claim "nonsense" without any further elaboration. Cheers, SemanticMantis (talk) 21:23, 12 February 2016 (UTC)

Your explanation is an exam-passing exposition of convergent sequences that I am sure Sladekw, Dhrm77 and others would endorse, and for Wikipedia content I join that consensus! However the maligned Shareef Fahmy has proposed actually finding the convergence of the Fibonacci, and I read his meaning as a real world experiment. Certainly he is collecting money towards experimental work. Debunking his claim #2 that "[one] will find that it converges on Plancks[sic] constant" took a big step when we agreed that Shareef seems unaware that Planck's constant has physical units (usually joule seconds). But after that, doubt persists about whether that experiment can be demonstrated to give the expected zero result. Can any computer genuinely iterate this calculation to infinity or is a computer the wrong tool? Shareef Fahmy doesn't mention any computing device in his claim, and using a computer was not introduced into the discussion until after I said "The smallest quantisation that is physically possible in a calculating device, whether analog or digital, is not infinitesimal." To be fair to Sladekw who may have an opportunity in confidential mediation to clarify whether that is an acceptable statement I shall not argue it further here.

Angle trisection looks like a good class teaching exercise because the task looks easy at first sight. After spending effort finding how hard it really is, the student is prepared for the serious theory that explains why. I see the value of that kind of learning experience and would encourage it.

Joke department: I tried to calculate the differences for 0, 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13 but my pencil broke at number 13. Just coincidence? No, it actually confirms my belief that the deep-masonic illuminati are eroding my pencils at night to hide the codes to their world conspiracy, probably using graphite munching nano-insects trained on LSD. Of course they want this to look like trolling and crankery... AllBestFaith (talk) 00:33, 13 February 2016 (UTC)

Ha! Well that is pretty funny. I still think you probably need to think a bit more about the material conditional, and recall that statements in math are not statements about the world. Some interesting reading at mathematical proof, mathematical statement, and logical positivism, but perhaps it's best to let this matter rest for now. SemanticMantis (talk) 14:20, 15 February 2016 (UTC)

Lifting protection of the subpages of the refdesks...

I will not (really) comment on this...but I think that this special case would indeed have to be brought up at the protection policy talk page. That aside.....what came to mind....and I haven't read the RfC completely...but would pending protection perhaps be a way forward? The parties would meet halfway, and it would preserve a certain freedom for IP's to ask their questions. At least technically it would be possible to pending changes protect the refdesks. Lectonar (talk) 20:30, 18 February 2016 (UTC)

Hi @Lectonar:, thanks for looking in to this, even if briefly. I don't think a one-time request requires policy revision, though I also agree that if anyone were to fulfill my one-time request, it wouldn't necessarily help the larger issue. We have been (sometimes heatedly) discussing what is and isn't special/different about the reference desks, as compared to the rest of WP article space. I am of the stance that as an interactive service to the public, WP:5P3, etc, the desks should be open to IP users almost always. Up until relatively recently, they were. I am also of the opinion that we need not seek WP-wide revision to protection policy, though I may take this issue to that talk page eventually. I do not know much about the pending changes and to what extent they would rectify the situation, but I can tell you that some of our regulars ref desk users have suggested that as a remedy, but to my knowledge it does not have consensus. My primary concern with that potential solution is that there are very few users with reviewer status, and this whole problem arises (in my opinion) because a few users are effectively using their special powers to ignore consensus, and adding more privileged users into the fray does not seem to be the wiki way...

I was sort of fishing for input with the unprotect request, so thank you for your comments and suggestion, though I can still hope another admin may review the case and choose to unprotect :) Cheers, SemanticMantis (talk) 21:47, 18 February 2016 (UTC)

If you ever want a trial, implementing pending changes to one page or so, ping me; I am (at least) willing to do that, and I could also give reviewer status to some regulars at the ref-desks. All in all this is a topic where consensus might be difficult to achieve. Lectonar (talk) 10:56, 19 February 2016 (UTC)

@Lectonar: Thanks! I do think it could be more workable if more ref desk regulars got reviewer powers. And I also like the idea of a limited trial first. I'm not sure how the community will feel. On the one hand, it could help us keep the ref desks open to good faith IP users. On the other hand, it strengthens the role of power hierarchy and gated access to privileges... anyway, I need to step away from this for a bit, but I will keep this offer in mind if we can't get any thing else worked out. SemanticMantis (talk) 16:29, 19 February 2016 (UTC)

Why do you listen to Sunshine?

Sunshine says Vote X for Change is banned and you agreed! Said editor was unbanned long ago as a result of a community unban discussion, which is why Zzuuzz said on his talk page that the ban had been "superseded". 89.240.30.97 (talk) 10:35, 19 February 2016 (UTC)

I don't know what you're talking about and I don't especially care to go through edit logs. If you are vote X for change, I do think you could have fun and contribute while following our (actually very loose) guidelines. Main thing is, don't be a dick, be polite, try to be helpful. It's not that hard. SemanticMantis (talk) 15:05, 19 February 2016 (UTC)

Please post a link to the community unban discussion, either here or at my talk page. I haven't seen it, and I have no reason to believe that there was an unban. If there was an unban, why isn't Vote X for Change posting by user name? Robert McClenon (talk) 17:01, 19 February 2016 (UTC)

Myles thanks SemanticMantis

It is rare for me to receive a solitary word of encouragement from the Wikipedian hordes, so your kind remarks about my questions was like sweet nectar to a parched throat. Thank you. Without a trace of false humility, I DO think I have asked good quesions in WP, and will continue to do so, and yes they will continue to be zany. I note that you have a mathmatical background, so I will take the opportunity to remind you of three questions associated with maths which I asked earlier, none of which were answered.

1. What is the least number of possible cages in a game of Ken Ken?

2. Some grubs hibernate for 11, 13 or 17 years in the earth before emerging. These are all prime numbers, and the practice minimises emergences of different species at the same time. Are there any other examples of prime number usage (qua prime number) found in nature?

3. What is the shortest route thru a complex maze? Perhaps if you built one of glass and put it between an ant's nest and a food source, the march of thousands of ants would settle on the shortest route, giving one the answer. Myles325a (talk) 01:32, 23 February 2016 (UTC)