Talk:Atheism/Archive 5

message: Check out some sources on common definitions. See 
 or anthing else from a reliable source. I am shocked to think of what source of information many of the contributers to extreme POV articles have been using... Jack 03:39, 12 Jan 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: appears to agree with "undecideable" rather than "undecided". agnostic has many different definitions from a collection of different dictionaries, with the first two agreeing with "undecideable" and the second two with "undecided" (IMO). A better definition to check in this case, though may be agnosticism; all four of those agree with "undecideable" (and indeed the Websters definition there appears to be an expansion of the Websters definition for agnostic that seemed to fall into the "undecided" camp above). The third one is from 1898 and appears written from a Christian POV to me, so I would advise against using that as a reference when others are available. However, it too looks more like the "undecideable" than the "undecided" definitions. I'm going to change that back in the article, and if there's further dispute we should take it to the talk:agnosticism page. Bryan 03:58, 12 Jan 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: I clearly don't agree to anything other than taking this portion of the debate to agnosticism. Fortunately, 10,000 heads are better than two ;) Jack 08:15, 12 Jan 2004 (UTC)
thread_title: Resources

message: In hindsight and after reflection I realize I was wrong to engage in an edit war. Rather I would have been better to make new suggestions, and new, different edits until an agreement was had, and this is what I will strive to do in the future. I was angry due to what I feel to be unfortunate decisions and statements by others, but I should have behaved differently. Apologies to all, and I will go forth to sin no more. ;) JackLynch 10:22, 16 Jan 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: BTW, I reccommend Wikipedia:Wikiquette and Wikipedia:Conflict resolution to any/all. Reading those pages is what swayed me to take a 2nd look, and they seem like a very solid guideline. JackLynch 10:34, 16 Jan 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  [[Apologetics]] 

message: It seems to me, in reading, that first, the article itself does need some help, and second, neither User:JackLynch nor User:Bryan Derksen should be listed as a problem user on Wikipedia:Conflicts between users (though other contributors here might fit the bill).  I would suggest to both parties that they take a one week break from editing this page and come back to it at a later time.  It seems like they may be able to work out a compromise version.
Among the puzzling things in this talk section is the assertion by bothUser:Secretlondon and User:snoyes that adherents.com is POV and biased.
From the front page of adherents.com comes the following:
:We present data from both primary research sources such as government census reports, statistical sampling surveys and organizational reporting, as well as citations from secondary literature which mention adherent statistics.  Adherents.com is an Internet initiative and is not affiliated with any religious, political, educational, or commercial organization.
Clicking on a page at random, "Largest Religious Groups in the U.S.A.", and conducting a cursory examination for sources of data yields the following:  the Pew Research Council, the Graduate School of the City University of New York, the Barna Research Group of Ventura, California, Business Wire, the World Christian Encyclopedia, and Harris Interactive, a polling firm.
Could the users explain where and how they feel this particular source is biased? - Scooter 06:04, 21 Jan 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: I didn't say that adherents.com is biased. I just stated that the way that JackLynch used the link was misleading. Also, I don't see how adherents.com could really be biased (except by omission) - because, as you quoted, they don't gather any statistics themselves, but rather collect that of other sources. --snoyes 06:44, 21 Jan 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: We're in agreement, then.  I must have misunderstood your earlier comment. - Scooter 21:23, 21 Jan 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  Not to jump in, but...