Talk:John C. Baez

message: I could say a lot more, but it'd be hard to stay NPOV.
-- Toby 22:24 Mar 8, 2003 (UTC)
Hahahahaha -- Miguel
:Hi Toby and Miguel, I created Baez's mathematical geneology as an xfig file, then exported it to png file and uploaded it.  Unfortunately the text isn't quite a readable as I would like (have an idea to fix that, perhapsn not a very good one).  Let me know if you want me to add you guys to the bottom so you can put your "family tree" on your user pages.
:Actually, we might be distant "cousins".  I simply cannot get my own former advisor to divulge details of his career at St. Petersburg University, but he seems to regard Anatoly M. Vershik at his mentor, and Vershik is a direct "descendent" of Dmitri Egorov, and thus, through Nikolai Bugaev, of Gauss.
:Here's an idea: someone should use the Mathematics Geneology Project to make one of those enormous posters, one in which the "family relations" (directed graph, not a tree) of Guass's most famous mathematical relatives are shown.  In playing around I found many fascinating and even ironical relationships.
:Another idea: a project to provide a Wiki article (perhaps stubby) for every mathematical biography in the MacTutor History of Mathematics Archive Currently there are many awkward omissions.
:Yet another idea: some volunteer database expert should create a search tool for Baez's website which actually works (the existing one seems to be entirely broken).---CH  (talk) 16:37, 13 August 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Never mind; WebGlimpse seems to work very well for me now in searching that site.  The underlying glimpse and "agrep" (approximate grep) is a fine full_text/full_site indexing tool.---CH 16:50, 24 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Some initial comments

message: I contributed to an 2006 version of this article and had been monitoring it for bad edits, but I am leaving the WP and am now abandoning this article to its fate.
Just wanted to provide notice that I am only responsible (in part) for the last version I edited; see User:Hillman/Archive. I emphatically do not vouch for anything you might see in more recent versions.  I would not regard Baez as controversial figure (although his research has involved a minority approach to quantum gravitation which some proponents of string theory regard--- rather absurdly, in my view--- as a dangerous heresy), but he seems to personally disliked by cranks such as permabanned , who has apparently edited this article as an anon.  Given this, I have reason to believe that at least some future versions of this article are likely to be vandalized, or to contain slanted information, misinformation, or disinformation.
Good luck to all students in your search for information, regardless!---CH 01:00, 1 July 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Students beware

message: Most of the previous version of this article was devoted to Baez' mathematical genealogy: this is actually a rather trivial detail in his overall biography; I have relegated it to a trivia section, and converted the huge mathematical genealogy chart, which took up most of the article's space, to a thumbnail image. -- The Anome 08:39, 7 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Trivia section 

message: The article may be improved by following the WikiProject Biography 11 easy steps to producing at least a B article. If you have any questions, please feel free to contact me here. -- Jreferee 19:41, 12 March 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  [[Wikipedia:WikiProject_Biography/Assessment#Class_parameter|Biography assessment rating]] comment 

message: This article was automatically assessed because at least one WikiProject had rated the article as stub, and the rating on other projects was brought up to Stub class. BetacommandBot 09:56, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  WikiProject class rating

message: I added an infobox and photo to this article, and a bit more information.  Since I guess it's considered naughty to add information to ones own biography --- and I can understand why it would be --- maybe someone can check it out and eliminate anything problematic. John Baez (talk) 00:35, 17 August 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: It's naughty to add claims to fame, but there shouldn't be any problem with mundane biographic details. —Tamfang (talk) 02:36, 17 August 2009 (UTC)
replies: text:  I have heard that some celeb tried to correct her place of birth and was reverted for lack of a Reliable Source, until she put the datum on her own blog. —Tamfang (talk) 01:30, 7 April 2011 (UTC)

text: Okay, good.  Now it says "clarification needed" next to the statement that I got a "bachelor's degree" in mathematics at Princeton.  Is there something confusing about the idea of a bachelor's degree?  If more precision is needed: I got a B.A. (bachelor of arts) in math at Princeton.  (It may be surprising, but at Princeton math majors get a bachelor of arts instead of a bachelor of sciences.)    John Baez (talk) 03:46, 27 August 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  John Baez added some information 

message: I see that "This biographical article needs additional citations for verification".  Presumably that's because of the claim (not put here by me!) that "This Week's Finds anticipated the concept of a personal weblog".  If someone wants a source for that, try
http://www.scientificblogging.com/adaptive_complexity/blog/john_baez_math_blogging
or
http://www.danamackenzie.com/moon/?tag=john-baez
or 
http://www.ams.org/notices/201003/rtx100300333p.pdf
The last is written by me, so maybe it doesn't count.
John Baez (talk) 21:56, 29 March 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Wikipedia is not at its best trying to referee claims like 'the X was the first ever Y on the internet'. We prefer that some respectable outside publication has checked out the early blogs and said who was there first.  The title 'first physics blogger' is probably true and if the New York Times said it, we could include it. There is no problem for us to link to a very early post that looks bloggish and is by you. Incidentally, your Wikipedia article seems rather minimal considering all the interesting work you've done, and perhaps you could draft up some new material here on the Talk page, that we might consider including!  EdJohnston (talk) 23:05, 29 March 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  It's All True 

message: Dr Baez has been in Singapore lately, and thus probably not teaching at UCR ... —Tamfang (talk) 20:02, 9 December 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Update needed