Talk:Peter Woit

message: A large number of anonymous edits both here and at not even wrong appear to be emanating from an AOL account.  (AOL addresses start with 172.188 and similar numbers).  I just removed a huge amount of linkspam and Peter-Woit-promotion from there.  zowie 00:14, 5 June 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I just got an e-mail from Peter.  He says it's not him.  zowie 14:34, 6 June 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Is Peter Woit self-promoting? (apparently not)

message: Zowie and others, stop editing Wiki if you don't know the rules.  You should discuss proposed changes here before deleting content, or it is VANDALISM.  The links you have removed are to newspaper articles, and it is a feature of Wikipedia that information can be added of this sort.
You aren't doing any service by removing information.
Peter Woit does not do a good job of keeping a concise list of relevant information and links abailable to the media coverage of the problems in string theory, so this is not a duplicate.  You have destroyed the work over the last year of keeping an up to date list of relevant references.  172.189.165.249 15:47, 28 June 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: (For what it's worth, I responded to this on my personal talk page 'way back in June...) zowie 19:52, 3 September 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Can you not delete links without discussion here first?

message: There seems to be a battle going on between someone semi-anonymous ("The Undertow") and someone completely anonymous (193.164.130.30) about whether it matters - if true - that PW took a French exam for Nathan Myhrvold at Princeton and whether PW's grandfather was a Nazi collaborator in Latvia. These things - if they can be verified - ought to belong to a separate "trivia" section rather than being in the main article. Cgoakley 09:04, 2 October 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Irrelevant trivia

message: Peter Woit has confirmed on his blog at  that he was born on September 11, 1957. 82.21.56.129 (talk) 16:42, 13 October 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Birthday confirmed

message: I'm pretty sure he's an atheist, not in the anti-religious sense, but I'm hesitant to add the tag because I haven't found a reference for it. I have found his review of Hawking's new book, which states that he's all for leaving God out of physics (but then also states that Hawking is pretty pathetic to use M-theory as a weapon, well, not pathetic, but that's the tone, heh). Anyways, I was wondering if anyone found any actual sources. 64.234.0.101 (talk) 23:31, 28 September 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Atheist? 

message: This is an easy one folks.  Look up his faculty bio on Columbia's website.  It is clear and completely unambiguous.  It seems that some interested parties (Woit himself?) are intent on covering up the fact that part of his employment status at Columbia is as the Departmental Computer Administrator.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 108.85.192.227 (talk) 05:53, 23 February 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: I suppose it's about the relative importance of those positions. Per the guideline on the manual of style for biographies (WP:OPENPARA), the opening paragraph of a biography should only say why the person is significant. Judging by the article Woit's position as departmental computer administrator is of neglible importance and this information is not appropriate in the lead. 92.2.91.151 (talk) 03:56, 7 May 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: To further the point, Woit is significant because of his book, blog and related opinions about string theory. In turn these are significant because they come from someone with a background in professional physics and who is a senior lecturer in mathematics at a reputable university. Being departmental computer administrator does not factor into this. — 92.2.91.151 (talk) 04:09, 7 May 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: Yeah it kinda does, if you know how academic departments operate. But then, if you know this, you will also have a good feel for how this character should be rated. I just wonder how young folk and lay outsiders can tell the wheat from the chaff, when wikipedia pages can make a person look more accomplished than they really are.137.205.183.109 (talk) 16:00, 30 March 2016 (UTC)
thread_title:  Position at Columbia 

message: Hello fellow Wikipedians,
I have just modified 2 external links on Peter Woit. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
*Corrected formatting/usage for http://www.kitp.ucsb.edu/~joep/A%20dialog.html
*Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20060928180318/http://www.twis.org/audio/2006/09/19/ to http://www.twis.org/audio/2006/09/19/
*Added  tag to http://www.slac.stanford.edu/spires/find/hep/www?rawcmd=a+peter+woit&FORMAT=WWW&SEQUENCE=
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thread_title:  External links modified