User talk:CarlDrews

Wikilinks

Just a note regarding use of Wikilinks in articles. Only the first occurrence of a significant word should be wikilinked. Also, commonly understood words should not be wikilinked. There have been many duplicates and some common words wikilinked in Crossing the Red Sea in recent days.^rossnixon 02:48, 20 September 2010 (UTC)

Conflict of Interest: Crossing the Red Sea

I am adding background information to the article "Crossing the Red Sea" because there has been a lot of exciting research on the topic that was sorely lacking. I have recently published a scientific article on the subject, and I plan to cover that publication in Wikipedia someday if no one else will. I am careful to take the Neutral Point of View in my contributions, and cite verifiable sources. CarlDrews (talk) 22:49, 20 September 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for declaring this. Can I also point out that sources generally need to discuss the subject of the article? I'm not convinced that your sources about wind setdown do that. It looks to me as though you are using wind setdown to interpret something, rather than use sources that themselves use wind setdown to do that interpretation. Please read WP:ORDougweller (talk) 17:49, 23 September 2010 (UTC)

And if the article you are talking about is going to be about wind setdown, your sources need to use that word. Dougweller (talk) 17:50, 23 September 2010 (UTC)

Hi Carl. I was the one who deleted your contribution on wind setdown from Crossing of the Red Sea, and so I'll give you a fuller explanation of my reason. I deleted because a section of such length on one explanation, when there are many, disrupts the balance of the article. I don't know whether you personal work on wind setdown related specifically to the Exodus story or is more general - but a quick google search suggests to me that this is in fact a serious scientific subject. If so, then you might consider starting an article on it - but be careful to give a wide range of scientific or other wise reliable sources, not just your own work. (Bit of a problem I guess - if the source is too technical no-one will be able to understand it).

Your work has been picked up by Claude Mariottini, a professor of OT - meaning an expert on the biblical side of things. In his blogpiece he makes a valuable point: the Bible story is about God and Israel ("A mighty act of God in the deliverance of Israel"). That's the second of the three viewpoints I outline in my paragraph above, and it's the generally held one amongst professors. If you explain the story in terms of natural events, you remove God from the equation: the Israelites came to the Red Sea/Sea of Reeds, a perfectly natural wind happened along at the same moment and blew the waters aside, and they, poor benighted folks, thought it was God and built a whole religion on a silly mistake. Oh dear :). PiCo (talk) 05:51, 25 September 2010 (UTC)

I am adding a correction here regarding what Professor Claude Mariottini posted:

There are several references in the Bible to the people of Israel crossing the sea. The parting of the waters and the crossing of the sea is presented as a mighty act of God in the deliverance of Israel from Egypt. If the work of God can be explained by a wind setdown theory or by any other hydrodynamic explanation, that can be helpful. But believers do not need a scientific explanation for the things God does.

I do not subscribe to a God-of-the-Gaps theology. Professor Mariottini does not remove God from the equation, and neither do I. CarlDrews (talk) 20:04, 30 September 2010 (UTC)

Carl, I've found your paper online and it was interesting. I've added it in the External Links section of the article.PiCo (talk) 06:05, 25 September 2010 (UTC)

Conflict of Interest: MOPITT

I maintain the official website for the MOPITT scientific instrument on the Terra satellite. I am clarifying some of the External Links already listed at the bottom of the MOPITT article. CarlDrews (talk) 22:08, 7 January 2011 (UTC)

Carl, thanks for noting your conflict of interest. For the record, I have no doubt of your good faith. PiCo (talk) 23:08, 7 March 2011 (UTC)