Talk:Atheism/Archive 6

message: The article is littered with capital-G God references again! Didn't we just come to a compromise agreement a few hours ago to use "deity" instead of "god" so the issue wouldn't be a problem any more? I don't have time to deal with yet another edit war right now, but come tomorrow unless there's some good reason why that compromise is suddenly unacceptable I'm going to implement it myself. Bryan 06:37, 29 Jan 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: Read the above. I placed deity instead of God wherever it didn't outright contridict available sources. Remember this: our goal is NPOV, and our tool is sources Cite any edits you dubious edits you make, I am ever watchful :) Jack 07:05, 29 Jan 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: Not even slightly good enough. After weeks of arguing against using capital-G god, we finally come to some semblance of an agreement on a compromise, and then you immediately go and blank the talk: page off to Archive 5: January 2004 and stick capital-G God all over the article again. I am quite convinced at this point that you are hopelessly POV on this subject (much evidence is present in the archived talk I linked to), and so I'm taking those capital G's out; I see no need to repeat the entire argument over again. Bryan 23:48, 29 Jan 2004 (UTC)

text: I've also removed those external links you put in the definition. No other Wikipedia article I've come across has seen fit to include dictionary links in the definition like that; instead, use wiki links when you want to refer to the definition of a term, and save the external links for the external links section. Bryan 23:52, 29 Jan 2004 (UTC)

text: It's not an opposition to citation, but rather to the format. External links should go in the external links section, by and large, and when there's a term within the article itself that needs clarification you should link to a Wikipedia article to do that. How many other Wikipedia articles are there that have external dictionary links in their definition? Anyway, your citations are not particularly good, especially not in terms of supporting your particular argument here. For example, take a look at your theism definition link ; the very first line is "Belief in the existence of a god or gods, especially belief in a personal God as creator and ruler of the world." Doesn't that contradict your previous assertions that God is not a god? You have a history of not judging citations very well. Bryan 04:33, 30 Jan 2004 (UTC)

text: It's not an ad hominem if it's actually relevant to what you're doing to the article. Back in Archive 5: January 2004 you brought up many external URLs to support your arguments that turned out to be very poor citations, and I just showed in the paragraph above how I don't think your theism citation doesn't say what you thought it did either. I don't think it's at all unreasonable to question the validity of your citations based on that. Bryan 05:09, 30 Jan 2004 (UTC)

text: Well, that's what I did. I reviewed, and then I edited. Bryan 05:53, 30 Jan 2004 (UTC)
thread_title: '''''Our goal is NPOV, and our tool is sources!'''''

message: Marx's father was a lawyer, not a rabbi. --Jose Ramos 11:42, 29 Jan 2004 (UTC)
thread_title: Marx's papa

message: The NPOV header ends the edit war for me. Its not right, but at least our reader has an advisory so that he knows what he is reading is biased. Jack 06:10, 30 Jan 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: Thank you. We can now at least get on with the rest of our Wikilives, and leave it to others to deal with this mess. Bryan 06:17, 30 Jan 2004 (UTC)

text: I also strongly dislike dispute headers, and will be perfectly happy to see the necessary changes made in order for it to be removed. Jack 19:26, 30 Jan 2004 (UTC)

text: Well, for me it seems to be a choice of this or a resumption of the edit war that started the past few weeks of arguing in the first place. I don't actually think the article as it stands is NPOV myself, but obviously Jack does so there it is. What's the procedure for resolving such situations other than simply waiting for one party to get tired of reverting the other's edits and storm off in a huff? I've already added an entry on this article to Wikipedia:Current disputes over articles. Bryan 01:34, 31 Jan 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: Um.. the guidelines are pretty simple Bryan. Check out wikipedia:revert. It says to make improvements, rather than simply undoing imrpovements made by others. Your ment to be a writer and an editor here, not a saboteur. Jack 02:23, 31 Jan 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: I was talking to Eloquence, not you. We've had this argument about whether a reversion can be an improvement many times before, and it is not relevant here. Bryan 03:33, 31 Jan 2004 (UTC)

text: Jack: Criticising others for things you do yourself (reverting) is trolling. Please stop it. - snoyes 03:42, 31 Jan 2004 (UTC)

text: All of those sound like good options to me. My main complaint has always been the singling out of God as the primary entity that atheists don't believe in, when atheism is much more general than that. Shall I try making the changes, or leave it up to someone who wasn't directly involved in the previous edit wars? Bryan 19:28, 31 Jan 2004 (UTC)

text: Oh, I should also mention that as soon as Jack indicated he'd leave this article as-is with the NPOV header he went over to agnosticism and resumed the reversion war there. It's now in the same state as this article with an NPOV header, so perhaps the same solution can be applied there. Bryan 19:30, 31 Jan 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  [[NPOV]] 

message: User:170.35.224.64 wrote
(XXX: Poor example; though Jewish rabbis symbolicly equate Amalekites with atheism, the actual story of Amalek in the Jewish and Christian Bible does not make this connection.)
I moved this here. Bmills 13:09, 6 Feb 2004 (UTC)
thread_title: Comment moved here from article

message: Santa Claus would be capitalized even though it describes a fictional character. Of course the spanish (latin?) santa would not be capitalized unless used in the context of a proper name of a real or imagined person. The name of the Christian deity would be capitalized because they believe in the personal agency of their god. Christians beleive there is only one god, and they call him God. To write about the one God would be to affirm the Christian belief that their God is the only god, unless in the context of saying the one God of Christian faith. There is an abundance of ways around this conflict, including use of the term "deity" (already done) and coupling reference to Christian faith with any reference to the proper noun God. If parties can't work this out along those lines, maybe I'll come back and sort through the article's references to dieties, but i'd rather not need to bother. Then I would have to go see what articles have developed about monotheism, and the history of monotheistic religion such as Egyptian worship of Ra, etc., Soul kitch 23:20, 8 Feb 2004 (UTC)
thread_title: Conventions in capitalization

message: I am not going to have a revert war (as User:Bryan Derksen appears to be attempting), but this article either needs to be NPOV, or have a dispute header. Either it is disputed (thus needing the header) or not. It is unaccptable option for it to be disputed without the header. Sam Spade 06:31, 10 Feb 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: This dispute is the exact same one that we spent the last few weeks of January working over. The situation won't change just because you've changed your user name and left the article alone for a while. Bryan 06:35, 10 Feb 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  dispute header 

message: All this stuff about charities is a complete red herring unless someone cares to add a balanced discussion on the morality of giving/dependence/etc. Bmills 16:33, 12 Feb 2004 (UTC)
thread_title: Charities

message: You have honestly suprised me with your reasonable nature, believe it or not. Rather than sacrificing article quality based on personalities or POV, you seem to have the interests of the reader at heart. Good recent edits. Sam Spade 03:45, 21 Feb 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  Cheers to Eloquence