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Confusing faith with knowledge

No, thank you for the patience to keep going back and wading through all of that mess. It's easy for a third person to say "This is what should be done." The real accomplishment is for someone to follow through and do it. Especially if the third person makes it harder by getting exasperated and addressing the core issue directly, instead of having the patience to keep running a gauntlet of faux issues.
It's up to you wrt those Wildwinds cites - but personally I'd really recommend replacing them if you can't count on the links to be good. Otherwise you run the risk of someone being able to remove a nonworking or nonspecific link, then remove text as uncited. Just my opinion. Best regards, arimareiji (talk) 06:09, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

Matthew and Luke's Nativity Accounts

I decided to write on your talk page about question why Luke has that the family going back to Nazareth while Matthew indicates that they went and made their home in Nazareth to fulfill a prophecy. I will also try to present that it is not true that the two Gospel accounts present two conflicting narratives. Of course, it is only my opinion and others can disagree with me.

The events are in the following order:

  • First we have Luke's narrative (1.5-79) – Zechariah, Elizabeth, angel Gabriel appears to Mary in Nazareth before pregnancy, birth of John.
  • Matthew (1.18-25) – during Mary pregnancy angel of the Lord appears to Joseph in a dream
  • Luke (2, 1-21) – census; Joseph with Mary go to Bethlehem to register. Mary gave birth there. She wrapped Jesus in cloths and placed him in a manger. The same day is Adoration of the shepherds. Circumcised is after eight days.
  • Mt (2, 1-12) – Magi visited Herod in Jerusalem and then, they have visited Jesus in Bethlehem. Matthew says that in a house. Then the Magi returned to their country.
  • Luke (2, 22-39) – Forty days after birth, Jesus presented in Temple in Jerusalem. Simeon the Righteous and Anna the Prophetess. When Joseph and Mary had done everything required by the Law, they returned to Nazareth.
  • Mt (2, 13-23) – Angel tells family to flee to Egypt because of coming massacre of innocents by Herod. They immediately flee. Return from Egypt & can't go to Judea due to Archelaus, so move to Nazareth.
  • Luke (2, 40-50) – child Jesus grew, became strong and was filled with wisdom. At the age of twelve Jesus at the Temple.

Now I must clear up something. It will be of course my opinion.

  • When Mary was engaged to Joseph, before they lived together she was discovered to be pregnant by the Holy Spirit (Mt 2:18). And before she was pregnant, she lived in Nazareth (Luke 1:26). So it means that Joseph was not the ownership of the house in Nazareth, it belonged to Mary family. And because in Bethlehem they were looking a room for them in the inn and they placed a newborn son in a manger, I believe that Joseph had no land neither in Bethlehem and lived only by his handicraft. And that's way Joseph travel from Nazareth to Bethlehem for census – I think only the people who are not resident anywhere and have no land on which they can be taxed have to present themselves at their birthplace. And this manger was in a cave (Gospel of James 19.1-3; Gospel of Pseudo-Matthew 13.2; Arabic Infancy Gospel 1.6) just outside Bethlehem. Now why Matthew say “in a house”? Because contemporary houses were often a adapted appropriately caves in which part of space were for animals, and part for humans. Justin Martyr is saying that Christ was born in a cave and that the Adoration of the Magi was in that cave. About your question- Luke say they came from Nazareth to Bethlehem and return = it was for census, and Matthew say that made their home in Nazareth to fulfill a prophecy = yeas, in his opinion it was fulfilling a prophecy, and after returning from Egypt due to Archelaus thay made their home in a house in Nazareth, which belonged to Mary family.
  • Quirinius was governor of Syria from 6 AD to 12 AD and absolutely not in the time of Herod the Great. But because Luke 1:5 to 2:52 was based on a hebrew text (see her) I believe that during the translation to Greek they made similar mistake like translating "rope through the eye of a needle" to "camel through the eye of a needle" (for Luke-18.25). In Aramaic, the word for "camel" (גמלא) is spelled identically to the word for "rope" (גמלא). For more information about that I can direct you only to italian ([1]) and polish sources now. Sorry. But if so, than which governor of Syria was it? Gaius Sentius Saturninus (Tertullian, Against Marcion, book IV, 19).

Excuse me if I too much write at length on this topic, but I couldn't briefly. What is your opinion about this? Alorkezas (talk) 01:38, 15 November 2008 (UTC)


Narratives in which are the same accounts as in Luke (going to Bethlehem for a census) and simultaneously as in Matthew (Magi, Massacre of the Innocents or Flight into Egypt) we have in Apocrypha (Gospel of James, Gospel of Pseudo-Matthew, Arabic Infancy Gospel, History of Joseph the Carpenter, Latin Infancy Gospel). Even in writings of the Church Fathers we can find both accounts (for exemple Tertullian and Justin Martyr). So in my opinion, combining the events isn't unfounded. Of course, I absolutely agree that the stories are different, but it doesn't necessarily mean that the two accounts present two conflicting narratives. I just think Matthew and Luke's Nativity Accounts are complementary to each other.

Household? This for me is interpretation. But I say that you have right, Matthew leaves with no possibility to think that Mary was in Nazareth. This information we have from Luke. Why Matthew remain silent on this? For Mark and John suitable start of narative was baptism of Jesus. For Matthew it was his birth and that's way we have no particular information from him about what was before Christ birth (Mary in Nazareth, Joseph came to Bethlehem for a census etc.). But we shouldn't hold something against Matthew for that - he might just as well start the narrative from the baptism! It's Luke who decide to start narative about 15 month earlier (from Zechariah and the conception of John). You have also right that Nazareth doesn't come until 2:22-23. I think it is because Matthew wants underline that it was fulfilling a prophecy, so he mention the village not till it could be related to “He will be called a Nazarene" - because from now on Jesus will lived there until he will start preaching.

“Why must you force them together?” I really must say that at the beginning I believed that Matthew was fantasizing about almost everything writing the Nativity and that Luke maybe (maybe!) was true about his account. Over time reading other sources I change my mind, concessive that they accounts can be possible without conflict. Peace out.

P.S. Please see too my comment in Talk:Nativity of Jesus about “after 66 days”. Alorkezas (talk) 22:47, 17 November 2008 (UTC)


I think that better reference to Leviticus would be 12:4 than 12:5

That according to Matthew they lived in Bethlehem and that they been in Nazareth only after returning from Egypt is a assumption based on that that the events described by him were directly alter and that they are the only events that have occurred in The Nativity of Jesus. But it is only a assumption. On the other hand we can assume that he didn't described the events directly alter and that he didn't wrote everything what has happened on the Nativity. Why we should assume the first supposition? Also, you wrote in footnote: The writer's presentation doesn't allow the reader to think that there was any change of venue – I think Matthew's presentation does allow the reader to think so. It doesn't indicate, suggest or imply, but why doesn't allow?

About that reading Matthew's narrative in the light of Luke's creates a new narrative – it must not mean that the “new” narrative will be anywhere conflicted with the “old” narrative and it must not mean that it would not tell the truth. I will give a example when a comparison of sources can be useful: if we will only based on Suetonius (Tiberius 49.1) about Aemilia Lepida, we will find out that in the twentieth year after, Quirinius accused Lepida of trying to poison him. We must ask, “After what?” It's seems logic that “the twentieth year after the divorce”. But now if we will comparison this with Tacitus (Annals III, 22-23) we will find that Lepida (who was accused in AD 20) had originally been betrothed to Lucius Caesar, who died in AD 2. Quirinius could only after Lucius death married Lepida, not to mention divorced her, and so we have that 20 years. So it shows that based on Tacitus we should read Suetonius as “the twentieth year after the marriage”. Not to mention that we often read Suetonius in the light of Tacitus or Cassius Dio (or in other combination) about Tiberius, Claudius, Nero or the Year of the Four Emperors. Alorkezas (talk) 00:52, 23 November 2008 (UTC)


Unverifiability? What about Apocrypha or that none of the Church Fathers denies them, eg that there was no massacre or flight to Egypt or a census?

We have Matthew's birth account (1.18-2.23) and telling only a one world more than him, ie that they could be a change of venue or that according to him Joseph lives in Bethlehem (Matthew nowhere says that), is a new narrative. The natural reading is that from Matthew we don't know in which place was the conception of Jesus or Joseph dream. Don't you agree that this could happened anywhere, not necessarily in Bethlehem? He speaks about married, thought of divorce, etc and then that After Jesus was born in Bethlehem in Judea... . So reading the text it indicates that he isin't in conflict with Luke. Matthew's presentation of Galilee is of a new location, and the writer feels the need to justify the change of location - absolutely right. It is a new location in his Gospel but it mustn't mean that the Holy Family was for the first time there. I wrote above why I think Nazareth doesn't come at his book until 2:22-23

Maybe there isn't as much as 10% similar material, but it not prejudge about falsehood of one or both. Simply the Evangelists flash on different events that accord then. About Quirinius and manger I have sad above and in Talk:Nativity of Jesus. My “force to harmony” is only to show that accounts can be with no conflict. You know too that you can say that they conflict, but that would be after assuming they do and finding excuses where they don't. Alorkezas (talk) 17:44, 23 November 2008 (UTC)


OK, I see that we will not get any further. We will not have agreement about if according to Matthew the conception of Jesus was in the same place were birth. Maybe the last think that I will write is that the three statement (according to Mt Joseph lives in Bethleheml; takes Mary into his home; The writer's presentation doesn't allow the reader to think that there was any change of venue) are only opinions, not facts. I don't agree with them and I think that will be all what I must say. Thanks for your comments on this subject. Alorkezas (talk) 02:03, 25 November 2008 (UTC)


To do:

  • Fix links for Julius Caesar, Socrates of Constantinople.
  • Multilinks

Gallus Ammianus Marcellinus Libanius 3x Alexander the Great agape panegyric(s) Neoplatonism 2x + Neoplatonic ie 3 links Gregory of Nazianzus Basil of Caesarea/Basil the Great Theurgy Misopogon Marcus Aurelius Milan Shapur II Sassanid Empire 4x

Jovian (side box) Constantinople (side box) Helena (side box) 363 (incl. side box 2X) -- spincontrol 10:49, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

?

Didnt realise you owned the article on Julian. Is he your father? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.115.15.149 (talk) 01:04, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

Updated Help:Table for floating-images and borders

11-April-2009: I have finally been able to answer your dialogue of 21Feb09 about floating-images. The reply is in:

See talk page: Help_talk:Table#1._Images_and_right-floating_tables_2._Borders_and_cellpadding
See new section: Help:Table#Floating images in the center
See new section: Help:Table#Setting borders

You have been quite clever to ask about those table-features, I have been working for months to try to document the types of high-quality display issues that you had mentioned. Thanks for the insights. -Wikid77 (talk) 05:14, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

Keep hoping for better technology

11-April-2009: You seem to have very good technical insight, and intuition, and I suspect you could re-design a much better wiki-software system for years in the future. As you suspected, the class=wikitable is somewhat garbled, so perhaps use a blank table with no "class=" parameter which might thwart your progress. Blank tables can fit beside images or infoboxes with the following parameters:

  {| width=200px cellpadding=1 style="float:right; <!--
     --> border:1px solid #CCC; margin: 0.46em 0.1em 0 0.2em"
  |- style="font-size:86%; background:#F9F9FC;"
  |...text here...
  |}
...text here...

The font-size of 86% is similar to wording in an image caption. To align with an infobox, add "clear:right" so that the style-parameter contains both, style="float:right; clear:right".

As you know, most everything in Wikipedia is just a bunch of volunteers, in limited part-time hours, trying to define procedures or invent rules for "the entire world" to obey (or else). There is not (as you have seen) very much of an official structure. The 1,630+ admins try to keep things running smoothly, but Wikipedia basically is a runaway train, with admins "shouting to keep the cows off the tracks" and avoid lawsuits. This whole wiki-circus is just air-invented by people with attitudes, so try to tolerate the zoo until some people (actually with authority) eventually figure out, just how or what, the Wikipedia is trying to become, with over 9 million registered users (!!). Meanwhile, keep thinking of better ways to do stuff, and don't let all these volunteers try to upset you. Good luck. -Wikid77 (talk) 05:14, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

Ah yeah, sorry I forgot to remove the one without Julianne, already went and did as you suggested. Although if you meant keeping the one it redirects to, I think it's good to show that the redirect exists and is not a red link. A lot of times the full name doesn't even redirect and people worry about that. Tyciol (talk) 08:34, 20 May 2009 (UTC)

Re: your demand for apology.

Hi Doktorspin,

I'm disinclined to apologize to anyone who's calling me "an unhappy puppy" and a "disgruntled editor who lacks the ability to put a coherent case". However, I'm happy to acknowledge that from the evidence I can see, you do not seem to have been engaging in sockpuppetry. --Akhilleus (talk) 21:00, 24 May 2009 (UTC)

Not alone

For what it's worth, you wouldn't be alone in having false accusations of sockpuppetry levied against you by Akhilleus. I never received an apology (though I never asked for one either), I doubt others who share our experience will either, and I sometimes wonder if and when that tarred brush will run out or how many others have been smeared by it. ColdmachineTalk 11:56, 25 May 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for your note. I would wonder how many people has Akhilleus attempted to deal with this way. -- spincontrol 04:11, 26 May 2009 (UTC)
Got your message on my talk; I've been following the discussion (hence my message to you) but thanks for the heads up. I think you got your apology, as politician-sounding as it was, and hope you can put this bad episode behind you and continue contributing; I know it took me a while to recover my faith in the project and to start editing again so I understand where you must be 'at'. ColdmachineTalk 08:06, 28 May 2009 (UTC)

Macedonia request for comment

Since you have in the past taken part in related discussions, this comes as a notification that the Centralized discussion page set up to decide on a comprehensive naming convention about Macedonia-related naming practices is now inviting comments on a number of competing proposals from the community. Please register your opinions on the RfC subpages 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5.

Fut.Perf. 07:42, 26 June 2009 (UTC)

Please do not make controversial edits without WP:Consensus, per guidlines you can find at WP:BRD.

Please do not make controversial edits at Template:New Testament people without WP:Consensus, per guidlines you can find at WP:BRD. Some edits would be fine but your constant rvting without consensus is a waste of our time. Carlaude:Talk 23:48, 22 September 2009 (UTC)

Blocked as a sockpuppet

This user's unblock request has been reviewed by an administrator, who accepted the request.

Doktorspin (block logactive blocksglobal blockscontribsdeleted contribsfilter logcreation logchange block settingsunblockcheckuser (log))


Request reason:

There has been no sockpuppetry here, merely a simple accident. There are two accounts in my house, mine and my partner's. Living together you have similar rhythms (and access to the same computers).

Accept reason:

I have unblocked both accounts. While there is some reason to believe it is not as simple as a mere "accident" I trust the message has been received that, accident or no, this is something you must be very careful to avoid doing in the future. Welcome back. Beeblebrox (talk) 17:01, 23 January 2013 (UTC)


I wrote some responses on the talk page of Suetonius on Christians all in the space of a few hours a few days ago. It turned out to be with my partner's account. When I went back to the talk page, I learned of the problem and attempted to correct it, by acknowledging through talk page edits that it was me who wrote the comments. There was no attempt to hide who I was or speak in a different voice in those comments. Here's an example of what I wrote, acknowledging a previous spin|control edit of the article: "I have no interest in Carotta. I merely contextualized him as not being a scholar and holding a non status quo position: his comment has interest because it is a reasonable idea philologically." It should be clear from this comment that I didn't know that I was using my partner's account. This does not reflect sockpuppetry, does it? I have engaged at length with the editor who moved the accusation over a long period of bloody conflict, but no sockpuppetry was used.

How does the edit [4] when read in context of [5] reflect sockpuppet activity? They are reversions of edits, one from an anonymous editor. There is no point for sockpuppetry in that. It was just another accident. Can you see how two accounts that have existed for several years, one apparently a sockpuppet according to the recent investigation, have never engaged in sockpuppetry, apparently until now? It doesn't make sense to me. Here are Wiki examples of sockpuppetry:

  • Creating new accounts to avoid detection
  • Using another person's account (piggybacking)
  • Logging out to make problematic edits as an IP address
  • Reviving old unused accounts (sometimes referred to as sleepers) and presenting them as different users
  • Persuading friends or acquaintances to create accounts for the purpose of supporting one side of a dispute (usually called meatpuppetry)

The few examples that have been noted here and in the investigation point only to using another person's account. The examples themselves point to that being accidental and not in any sense systematic.

The case for sockpuppetry hasn't been about sockpuppetry as the term is normally at all, but about the fact that we, my partner and I, beside the time we eat together, spend a lot of time on our computers. The charge is wrong.}}

Ahhh...so meatpuppetry instead. Got it. As you're already well aware of, two persons from the same residence or business should not be editing the same articles as it gives the impression of false consensus. (✉→BWilkins←✎) 10:53, 20 January 2013 (UTC)
You fail with racketeering so you try tax evasion and, maybe later, jaywalking. No evidence of sockpuppetry, so you try meatpuppetry, but I stated up front that I wrote the material in question, so why would you stretch the limits of meatpuppetry? My partner is blocked for a month without being directly involved in this. The claim regarding false consensus has been repudiated in my first paragraph above. Note what led to this comment: "It should be clear from this comment that I didn't know that I was using my partner's account." -- spin|control 12:58, 20 January 2013 (UTC)

I'm going to say the same thing here I did on my talk page. Behaviorally, I think it is far more likely there is only one person behind both accounts. To me, this is reinforced even more by the fact that despite being aware of the screw up for some time, neither account offered a defense until after checkuser results came in. Someguy1221 (talk) 06:11, 21 January 2013 (UTC)

The checkuser results were obtained a full three hours after I acknowledged via the same computer responsibility for the edits on the Suetonius on Christians talk page. That logic is false, Someguy1221. And if you don't live alone, don't you and your partner's patterns become similar? -- spin|control 08:40, 21 January 2013 (UTC)
  • I remain unconvinced either way, and as such I have placed the unblock back on hold and have opened a community discussion at WP:AN. If you have anything to add to that discussion please post it here and it will be copied over. Beeblebrox (talk) 16:34, 21 January 2013 (UTC)

If anyone is interested, we have three computers in frequent usage, for which I do all the maintenance, installs, updates and fixes. That's the only time I touch my partner's computer, though that doesn't stop me from accessing webmail, checking forums, etc, while I'm there. The problem in this recent incident was the computer in the lounge room, which I wouldn't have expected my partner to use, but this was vacation time and it's close to the kitchen. -- spin|control 22:29, 21 January 2013 (UTC)

Copied to WP:AN. NE Ent 23:12, 21 January 2013 (UTC)

  • Hi Doktorspin. Following the discussion at WP:AN, I would like to hear what you think of the following conditions before an unblock can be considered:
  1. Only one account is allowed to edit any article or its associated talkpage, ever.
  2. You both must take great care to logout at the end of any editing session, and will take even greater care in verifying that it is them who are logged in
  3. Future violations will lead to both accounts being indefinitely blocked
  4. require they cross link users pages with {{User_shared_IP_address}} to avoid future confusion

If you can, in your own words, state your agreement to respect these conditions, I believe an unblock may be in order, but first I want to hear what you have to say about it. Note that I expect you to discuss this with your partner and expect to see a reply by User:Ihutchesson on their own talk page to the same conditions. Salvidrim!  02:59, 22 January 2013 (UTC)

I'm waiting for my partner at the moment, so we'll get back, but I can see that there might be a problem with the first item on the list, for we both have an overlap of interest in the field of classics. What are we supposed to do in such a situation? -- spin|control 04:33, 22 January 2013 (UTC)
The challenge of you both editing the same page is that you're literally giving false weighting in consensus situations, which is exactly why WP:SOCK is not permitted (✉→BWilkins←✎) 17:33, 22 January 2013 (UTC)
Over the numerous years we have each been editing Wiki, does anything indicate the slightest tendency to give false weighting in consensus situations? No sockpuppetry. No meatpuppetry. No false consensus building. No grounds for blockage here. -- spin|control 05:25, 23 January 2013 (UTC)
Please understand the situation -- we have no way of confirming whether you are a single editor or not. There is no way to prove that, outside of identifying to the Foundation, and while that would certainly be a solution to everything, I don't think anyone will require that of you. Our policy on multiple accounts specifically dictates that it is fine to use multiple accounts when there is no editing overlap; thus, whether the community believes you are a single editor or not, adhering a strict no-overlap restriction would make the point irrelevant. If you cannot in good faith accept the first condition, I will still request your feedback on points 2, 3 and 4. Salvidrim!  05:17, 22 January 2013 (UTC)
I don't intend to use my partner's account. It just seems that it has happened on a few occasions over the years. I will try to take more care. The third item doesn't require any input from me. It's up to the administrators. And I have no problem with the fourth. -- spin|control 05:25, 23 January 2013 (UTC)