User talk:Warrenmck

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Happy editing! violetwtf (talk) 22:37, 8 March 2023 (UTC)

Uralo-Siberian?

Are you certain that Uralo-Siberian is fringe, as there are more than just one or two linguists open to a relation between Eskaleut and Uralic? Although I can see how it becomes fringe if we start adding in Nivkh and Chukchi, however Fortesque himself does not hold that either one of them are in the family. Although Uralo-Siberian or Uralo-Eskimo is not the consensus, it is generally not seen to be a theory like Ural-Altaic or Sino-Uralic, which in actuality do have very low support. I added in that the theory is speculative, however the term "fringe" I feel is too radical. --ValtteriLahti12 (talk) 19:21, 14 June 2023 (UTC)

"Are you certain that Uralo-Siberian is fringe"

Absolutely, 100%, and beyond any reasonable doubt. This is a very small opinion in linguistics which is pretty much universally rejected. It may, with more evidence, turn out to have more substance, but for now it is firmly a fringe theory. So far only one major proposed macrofamily has any acceptance, which are the Dené–Yeniseian languages. You can check how the cautious and slow acceptance of that contrasts to a wild macrofamily which attempts to link languages that very clearly don't have a strong genetic relationship.

Almost all the references to Uralo-Siberian which treat it seriously are from Fortescue himself, and apparently all which appear to treat it seriously accept other fringe theories regularly rejected by the majority of mainstream linguists (Nostratic, and the Altaic languages which show up in the cited works, for example). There's a reason there's zero mention of Uralo-Siberian on the pages for the languages that supposedly comprise it; because the evidentiary standard simply hasn't been met. I'm not even convinced that there has been enough published outside of one single author to warrant inclusion of Uralo-Siberian on Wikipedia, rather perhaps it should be relegated to a footnote on the articles about those languages, as many fringe language relationship (see this section on the article for Basque, for example) theories are.

As is, this wikipedia article is actively misinforming people, which as a historical linguist is slightly bothersome. You won't find mention of it in any mainstream text on historical linguistics, apart from in the same breath as Nostratic. Warrenmck (talk) 19:51, 14 June 2023 (UTC)

Well I think a problem here is that Uralo-Eskimo and Uralo-Siberian are in two different pages, although being almost identical (with the exception of Yukaghir), although the Uralo-Eskimo theory has been mentioned by more reputable scholars such as Ante-Aikio as plausible (although he did not dogmatically state it). Instead of having a separate article for Uralo-Siberian, it could be better idea to perhaps mention the theory in the Eskimo-Uralic wikipedia page? --ValtteriLahti12 (talk) 19:56, 14 June 2023 (UTC)

Eskimo-Uralic doesn't particularly have a good claim to being taken seriously over Uralo-Siberian. I hadn't seen that page, and that one appears to have similar issues of presenting a fringe theory as legitimate. There is one singular macrofamily proposal taken seriously at present in historical linguistics. Actually, I worry a bit about how prominent Fortescue is on these pages considering his propensity for fringe.

I've started a thread on Wikipedia:WikiProject Linguistics about the possibility of merging these into a Proposed Linguistic Macrofamilies article, since a lot of these macrofamily proposals aren't really meeting WP:N given how few people are taking them seriously at present. That may change, but for now I think this part of WP:FRINGE presents a real problem for some proposed macrofamilies:

The notability of a fringe theory must be judged by statements from verifiable and reliable sources, not the proclamations of its adherents. Additionally, the topic must satisfy general notability guidelines: the topic must receive significant coverage in reliable sources that are independent of the subject.

The only real discussion and coverage of these theories, post historical-linguistic consensus going "nah" is from adherents continuing to work on it, arguably with the exception of Altaic, which does have a lot more discussion all-around. Don't get me wrong, that's good and may produce real evidence in the future, but that evidence doesn't yet exist. Warrenmck (talk) 20:11, 14 June 2023 (UTC)

To note, I am not a dogmatic follower of either theory, but I have read of the existence of a higher number of linguists who have proposed Eskimo-Uralic than with Uralo-Siberian, although I am not an expert so I do not have the same knowledge to make as educated statements, for me linguistics is more of a hobby I like to look into, while theology is my main study. --ValtteriLahti12 (talk) 20:20, 14 June 2023 (UTC)

I'm a historical linguist by education and training, so these are quite within my wheelhouse (and while I want to avoid WP:NOR, these's some very, very blatantly bad comparative linguistics in those word pairings. Quick example, but "a[m/b]a" as some indicator of parental terms is pretty widely accepted to result from those among being the easiest sounds for infants to make).

I think that what you're talking about here is why I'm reacting so strongly to some of these articles, to be fair. The notion that these are given serious weight in historical linguistics isn't really backed up in the field (though we're not out to condemn those trying to find links for macrofamilies, that's obviously valuable and the research may turn out to be fruitful in the long run!). I don't think the theories should be given undue weight prior to evidence being presented to a standard that it can receive meaningful acceptance in the linguistic community, lest people who are hobby linguists (of which there are many!) accidentally misunderstand the fact that these are, well, fringe theories. Warrenmck (talk) 20:26, 14 June 2023 (UTC)

Well on the topic, would you think the "Eskimo-Uralic" page is somewhat better written? --ValtteriLahti12 (talk) 20:39, 14 June 2023 (UTC)

It definitely does a better job in mentioning that it's not really accepted, but I still think it give undue weight to the topic. Particularly the "proposed evidence" section fails the WP:FRINGE guideline:

Fringe theories in a nutshell: To maintain a neutral point of view, an idea that is not broadly supported by scholarship in its field must not be given undue weight in an article about a mainstream idea. More extensive treatment should be reserved for an article about the idea, which must meet the test of notability. Additionally, in an article about the minority viewpoint itself, the proper contextual relationship between minority and majority viewpoints must be made clear.

Emphasis mine. I do think the solution here is to merge these theories into a single article, since it comes across as trying to make a case, rather than inform what the scholarly understanding of the topic is. Warrenmck (talk) 20:46, 14 June 2023 (UTC)

I tried to find a source on the acceptance of Eskimo-Uralic, and found one which states "On the one hand, it is not yet clear whether the morphological comparisons given are striking enough, and the chain of argumentation leading to them to be justified enough, to make a case in favour of the suspicion of relationship" (direct quote), and attempted to add it into the Eskimo-Uralic page. --ValtteriLahti12 (talk) 20:58, 14 June 2023 (UTC)

That does help! I don't want to make too many drastic changes without talking about this with the Linguistics Wikiproject, but I don't think that the "evidence for" section should be more than a short paragraph or two, which should be paired with an equal amount of content (at least) addressing the linguistic consensus. Warrenmck (talk) 21:01, 14 June 2023 (UTC)

"Fringe"

Hello, I'm David Eppstein. I noticed that you made an edit concerning content related to a living (or recently deceased) person on Allan R. Bomhard, but you didn't support your changes with a citation to a reliable source. It's been removed and archived in the page history for now. Wikipedia has a very strict policy concerning how we write about living people, so please help us keep such articles accurate and clear. If you think I made a mistake, or if you have any questions, you can leave me a message on my talk page. Thank you! —David Eppstein (talk) 18:50, 15 June 2023 (UTC)

@David Eppstein That citation was present on the article, I’ve reverted your revert with comment, but I’m aware of the policy in question. I won’t revert again if you roll it back, but that link I provided is from a Nostraticist linguist in a peer reviewed journal explicitly calling out the person in question as fringe. Hope that helps, and sorry for not providing that in-line citation on the first reference to him being a fringe theorist. Warrenmck (talk) 18:53, 15 June 2023 (UTC)

@David Eppstein Just to be clear, Nostratic theory is inherently considered fringe in historical linguistics (at this juncture, that was certainly not always true). A lot of the lack of direct evidence for that individual comes from the fact that he’s publishing fringe theories. It’s like being a bit bothered that not all flat earthers are explicitly named by astrophysicists; the sheer degree of fringe creates a catch 22 for evidence dismissing the claims. Unlike physics, linguistics lacks the pop culture cachet for people to be familiar with the issue at hand, which is why I’ve tagged the wikiproject noticeboard. I don’t intend to edit war, but I do see this as a problem with people unfamiliar with the issue falling victim to a middle ground fallacy. Warrenmck (talk) 18:58, 15 June 2023 (UTC)

The citation you used does not appear to characterize Bomhard's work as fringe. It does heavily criticize Bomhard in other ways, but not for being a fringe researcher. Please do not abuse sources to push your point of view. —David Eppstein (talk) 19:00, 15 June 2023 (UTC)

@David Eppstein Again, I will not further revert. I am not abusing sources to push a view, this is scholarly consensus in the field that Nostratic theory is a fringe theory. That this isn't apparent is a problem, and is why I am trying to work with the linguistics wikiproject at large to clean up the serious WP:FRINGE issues that are present on macrofamily articles.

From a 2007 paper in the SKY Journal of Linguistics:

As the Nostratic affinity is in itself a fringe theory based on near-zero evidence, such speculation hardly lends credence to the model.

(Turning Puns into Names and Vice Versa, Lillo, 2007)

Like I said, this is a challenging one because linguists don't actually still talk about Nostratic much outside of a very small cadre of Russian linguists, who still represent the minority (Notice that my edits on Sergei Starostin, himself a nostraticist, have only been to point out that his macrofamilies have not seen acceptance. While he himself advocates for nostratic, he is a credible publishing linguist with a minority opinion. This is simply not the case for Allan R. Bomhard). This is not an issue of "pushing my point of view" any more than denying infinite free energy in an article about thermodynamic laws is "pushing a point of view", it's an attempt to improve the scholarly quality of wikipedia to bring it in line with current linguistic understanding.

If this was me trying to push a specific view I can't imagine why I would attempt to reach out to the entire linguistics wikiproject on this issue. If someone whose life work is advocating a fringe theory, which is known to be a fringe theory, and is called in peer-reviewed publications in the field a fringe theory, cannot be labelled a fringe theorist then I am uncertain how that label could apply to anyone. I guess researchers could maintain a peer-reviewed database of fringe theorists per-field which meets Wikipedia's standards, but that seems exhausting.

There is a real issue with people who adhere to macrofamily fringe theories on Wikipedia. A lot of the macrofamily articles are directly against the scholarly consensus and make a pleading case for plausibility with huge WP:UNDUE issues. As I said, I will not revert anymore, but I encourage you to look up the consensus among linguists on this one, because it's not controversial. Warrenmck (talk) 19:18, 15 June 2023 (UTC)

Please undo your major removal of sourced content

Please undo your removal of 10kb (147 paragraphs) of sourced content at Proto-Human language, and stop insisting it be kept out, citing WP:FRINGE and WP:DUEWEIGHT. You are still new here, and you clearly don't yet understand how Wikipedia handles WP:FRINGE topics, or how WP:DUEWEIGHT works within the context of an article about a fringe topic. That's okay, you're not expected to know everything right away. You seem to have bumped up against some opposition on the subject of fringe topics already before, however, so this is clearly an area you could benefit from reading up on, and avoiding bold edits on fringe topics until you understand better how Wikipedia deals with them.

Additionally, when a WP:BOLD edit of yours is reverted at an article, as at Proto-Human language, don't just double down and redo your removal of content again (whether you "respectfully disagree" or not)—that may be considered edit-warring. Iinstead, go to the Talk page (which you did; kudos) and talk it out. While it is under discussion, the status quo ante should prevail. This means, you should undo your last removal of content until there is a consensus at the Talk page in favor of removing that content.

I hope this helps, and if you have any questions, you can {{reply}} to me below, or feel free to contact me anytime on my Talk page. You can also get help at the Wikipedia:Help desk. Cheers, Mathglot (talk) 20:14, 14 July 2023 (UTC)

@Mathglot just because someone viscerally disagrees with your read of a situation does not mean that they're new. Warrenmck (talk) 20:38, 14 July 2023 (UTC)

I apologize if I misread your seniority level here; I saw a March welcome message above, perhaps I misread the situation. Cheers, Mathglot (talk) 20:44, 14 July 2023 (UTC)

Fair enough, this is a WP:CLEANSTART account since I wanted to use my real name for uploading photos while ceding rights to them. I do not edit under any other account name, though my most recent active account is somewhat easily figured out. :) Warrenmck (talk) 23:22, 14 July 2023 (UTC)

Proto-IE reconstructionists

Some things are just too weird that you wouldn't even think of them to exist in the literal sense. Initially, I also read "reconstructionist" in a besmirching sense, in fact, I was actually about to make scathing comment in reply to what I have perceived as an overt disdain for the object of our passion (= historical linguistics), but then **ḱréddʰh₁etiyeh₂, the IE Goddess of Assuming Good Faith inspired me to search for "IE reconstructionists" in Google, with baffling results which left me doing countless dental clicks. Austronesier (talk) 20:56, 5 August 2023 (UTC)

I definitely was trying to strike a balance between assuming good faith and clarifying if they were viewing PIE reconstruction as fringe but I think I may have failed slightly.

Purely on a talk page, I actually think given the cognate of *H₂weh₁yú with Vayu, I kind of suspect that in the long run that synthesis will turn out to be correct, since that's (as far as I recall, again, Assyriology, not IE lingustics!) what the situation looks like with Dyaus (from *dyā́wš) etc. Warrenmck (talk) 21:05, 5 August 2023 (UTC)

Have you seen User:KHR FolkMyth's comment in the AfD? I think that nails it. But then, IE isn't my field either. My actual expertise obviously lies with a different major language family (my username is a tongue-in-cheek self-outing of my broader ancestry and research area at the same time).

Btw, have you seen this discussion: Talk:Indo-European_migrations#Hybrid_Hypothesis? It might be of interest for you since it is about the same methodology that we have discussed in the Dravidian article. But this time it's Gray & associates themselves.–Austronesier (talk) 19:28, 8 August 2023 (UTC)

I haven't yet, I'll take a look! I've always sort of got as far back as Hittite and then just lost the plot with PIE, sadly. I'd love to have had a chance to learn more. Warrenmck (talk) 20:58, 8 August 2023 (UTC)

Hi! Not sure if have ever put an eye on Elamo-Dravidian languages, but it is one those pages that slowly build up in-universe content if not constantly monitored, and comes as perfect illustration for your point that having such individual pages can be quite a structural problem for Wikipedia (but it's not that I'm finally convinced of your proposed remedy of a single fringe dump page😂). I recently de-fringed the lead which apparently makes some people unhappy. –Austronesier (talk) 19:26, 13 September 2023 (UTC)

It's been on my watch list, but I try to only poke a few at a time so as to not be accused of WP:DRIVEBY since the easiest thing to do is throw up the fringe tag. I also want to be careful to avoid coming across as tag teaming since you've already got this one going a bit.

I still stand by the idea that a central page plus expanding Macrofamily is the right call, but obviously that's a bit of a hot take still. :) Warrenmck (talk) 02:13, 15 September 2023 (UTC)

Though that comment about Brahui needs to be excised right-quick at this point. Warrenmck (talk) 02:16, 15 September 2023 (UTC)

Notice of Dispute resolution noticeboard discussion

This message is being sent to let you know of a discussion at the Wikipedia:Dispute resolution noticeboard regarding a content dispute discussion you may have participated in. Content disputes can hold up article development and make editing difficult. You are not required to participate, but you are both invited and encouraged to help this dispute come to a resolution. The thread is "Allan R. Bomhard".

Please join us to help form a consensus. Thank you!

NotAGenious (talk) 12:49, 27 September 2023 (UTC)

The discussion has been moved to WP:BLPN, feel free to join. Enjoy your vacation! NotAGenious (talk) 18:02, 28 September 2023 (UTC)

@NotAGenious Thanks! I was mid-reply to that when I noticed this tirade so I'm going to bow out of pretending there's a good faith discussion to be had here. This is very clearly a case of WP:NOTHERE. Warrenmck (talk) 19:25, 28 September 2023 (UTC)

Clarity/POV issue

Hello, I generally agree with your comment about the balancing issue at Altaic languages talk page but Altaic languages hypothesis can still be seen in academic publications. In such case, I do not find the change in question appropriate without adding sufficient resources. The article can be described as "widely rejected" rather than "controversial" if sufficient sources are collected in the "Arguments" section. Kyzagan (talk) 21:03, 28 September 2023 (UTC)

I agree it has a higher degree of acceptance, but the amount of acceptance still represents a very slim percentage of linguists. That said, I’ll try to put some effort into further citing that. My concern with “controversial” is “controversial” risks a false balance, though I could be wrong there. There are some other language macro families with “Spurious” as their status, which I wouldn’t go so far with with Altaic, but I don’t disagree that maybe finding a way to add some nuance to it is best? There was a discussion about this at the Linguistics Wikiproject, and we could probably bring it up there if we’re at a bit of an impasse, but I still think “widely rejected” is accurate, as the article points out it’s generally accepted as areal influence rather than a family at this point. Warrenmck (talk) 21:10, 28 September 2023 (UTC)

I will not fight the deletion of Proto-Altaic language, but let me disagree with your radical defintion of "frige". "Contrary to mainstream theory" should mean "it contradicts a widely accepted MS theory", like Flat Earth contradicts geophysics's claim "the Earth is round", and Creationism contradicts evolution theory "species evolved from other species over millions of years by natural selection". "Contrary to MS" should not mean just "the evidence is not considered convincing by MS researchers". The latter is evidently the case for Proto-Altaic and Greenberg's mass comparison technique, but I am not aware of any way either actually contradicts mainstream linguistic theories.
Mainstream linguists have theories for how languages evolve and diverge, but they themselves admit that those theories cannot let them reconstruct the evolution of languages beyond half a dozen of millennia in the past. However, unless one believes that humans developed language from nothing dozens of times, all over the world, all currently accepted families must descend from a single proto-proto-proto-family. So Japanese and Korean must have a common ancestral language, and also Basque and Navajo, or Swahili and Sumerian. The question is only when they branched off, and which which languages and families branched off before others. Greenberg and those other "fringe" linguists are just willing to accept weaker evidence that suggest branchings that occurred a few millennia further in the past. All the best, --Jorge Stolfi (talk) 07:19, 2 October 2023 (UTC)

I actually don’t think I called Altaic fringe? When I added the fringe tag to a few big articles like Nostratic, I believe I only added an NPOV issues one to Altaic. I’m definitely aware it has serious, credible supporters. I do think attempting to reconstruct a proto language in the absence of enough evidence to even clearly define a relationship is getting into fring-y territory, but not like, say, Borean.

However, unless one believes that humans developed language from nothing dozens of times, all over the world, all currently accepted families must descend from a single proto-proto-proto-family. So Japanese and Korean must have a common ancestral language, and also Basque and Navajo, or Swahili and Sumerian

Monogenesis vs Polygenesis is a pretty hot topic and not something that one can just assert, to be fair. Warrenmck (talk) 22:22, 2 October 2023 (UTC)

Seriously? Are there any rational arguments for "polygenesis"?
Is that "theory" arguing that Homo sapiens spread all over the world with the ability to speak complex languages, but without doing so -- and then various tribes suddenly discovered, "hey guys, we can use syntax and lexicon, not just grunts and growls!"...
All the best, Jorge Stolfi (talk) 22:18, 6 October 2023 (UTC)

Greetings and notification about AE request against a User whom you interacted with

Greetings Warrenmck. I have followed your recent contributions on Fringe Noticeboard with interest. I appreciate your thoroughness and enjoyed reading your style of writing.

On a related note, I have just started an AE sanctions request against Bloodofox for his edits concerning the topic, Falun Gong at that article and at the FTN: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Enforcement#Request_for_Sanctions_against_Bloodofox_for_Disruptive_Editing%2C_Activism_and_PA.

I am notifying you as you appear to have recent interactions with this editor relevant to the matters raised in my request. Hence you might be interested to know. Thank you and cheers. HollerithPunchCard (talk) 03:05, 21 November 2023 (UTC)

When did human language begin?

@Warrenmck: (and others) - Thank you for your recent rv of my edit re an approximate starting age for the beginning of human language - this is somewhat relevant to my own {{Human timeline}} template - the best current determination seems to be between 1.5 to 2.0 million years ago - based on the recent news report - however - you seem to be more knowledgeable than I about all this - just curious - what would be your own current estimate re the beginning starting age of human language (based on the responsible scientific literature if possible)? - Thanking you in advance for your reply - iac - Stay Safe and Healthy !! - Drbogdan (talk) 14:20, 26 March 2024 (UTC)

References

Drbogdan (talk) 14:20, 26 March 2024 (UTC)

Abuse of WP:3RR

You have now reverted the same sourced content 4 times in total while trying to warn me of the exact thing you are doing. Stop reverting sourced content. The content is from an extremely reliable source who has worked with dozens of other professionals in the fields of linguistics, archaeology, and more. The point of the article is to help people understand what the theory proposes, not to convince people of it. There's no need to be so defensive. I assume if I removed sourced content from Vovin, who is extremely biased, you would revert it. This is a warning to not break the same rule again or I will make a report. 2A02:C7E:3011:FC00:68AB:3511:3ACB:5016 (talk) 20:39, 30 April 2024 (UTC)