User talk:Stevenzenith

Your comments on Talk:Main Page

Please see my user page - I am developing my arguments there.

Definition of authority in the following discussion

By authority in the following discussion we mean the level of competence to address a given subject.

Authority is acquired by two means - either by direct familiarity with individuals or by convention.

Steven Zenith 18:36, Jun 3, 2005 (UTC)

There is some kind of stub on what a credential is but it's so recent that one suspects no one thinks about convention around here. The m:person DTD standard is sort of evolving, you can find tags now on biography pages. But since there is no use real names requirement, you'd think with all these geeks around here someone would be keen to explain at least a blind credential as invented (and patented) by David Chaum. Credentials became an issue recently in the nasty debate on kuro5shin between those two well known trolls, Wales and Sanger:

With the founders of Wikipedia both accusing each other of (a) never understanding the project, (b) being trolls, and (c) wilfully facilitating trolls, it is fairly obvious we are all trolls now. So perhaps it would be useful to look harder at some old trollwork.

That is, to compare Steven's view of authority with the m:TIPAESA framework originally defined by anonymous trolls as part of a general effort to address these same issues years ago which was of course ignored.

Now that we are all trolls (except Steven maybe), it would be wise to revisit the trolls' attempt to frame deliberation without so much hearsay, and certainly without the requirement to respond to it. For instance, if I say I am a troll, then, that should be enough: I claim no authority for my statements other than that of reference for further study. One cannot cite a troll. This is important.

Re: Skype discussion Thu 2 june 2005

Hello! Thank you very much for taking the time to talk with me!

Let's see if I can summarise your position correctly:

Wikipedia is a (perpetual) work in progress, articles are improved on a daily basis. Some articles are of excellent quality, while others are not so good. An experienced wikipedian knows how to use the tools at his/her disposal (history, talk page, tracking down user pages, finding sources, etc, etc.) to determine the quality of an article, and perhaps use it for their own purposes.

Like many open source projects, the criticism here is that wikipedia is perhaps made too much for the use of the wikipedians themselves.

A lot of users of wikipedia are not wikipedians at all. They don't know how to determine article quality. They just go "I read it on wikipedia, so it must be true!" They don't have academic training or anything, and thus it's possible that they get wrong information off of the wiki.

Something needs to be done to increse peoples awareness that wikipedia is indeed a work in progress.

At the moment all the wikipedia manuals are written for people who want to write in wikipedia, and are prepared to take their time to learn all the intricacies.

Wikipedia is a great teaching tool for critical reading.

But there's no good information on wikipedia itself on how to do that. What we need now is documents on How To READ Wikipedia (and perhaps also other sources, like Britannica, for instance ;-))

Does this represent your position correctly? Please help me correct it if I got anything wrong. Feel free to edit it, or to comment!

Kim Bruning 00:41, 3 Jun 2005 (UTC)

<mindspillage> I like the idea of a "how to read wikipedia" document. Basically, the disclaimer fleshed out, along with all the stuff that's obvious to those of us who see how the sausages are made?

Quoting User:Mindspillage, from irc

Thanks to you Kim for paying attention to this. You are certainly getting there and I applaud a How To READ Wikipedia project. To be satisfied it would have to be balanced and not self-aggrandising - and on that basis I would be willing to contribute.

I would add or rephrase what you have said this way: Wikipedia is not simply a work in progress. While you may have the expectation that the quality of the information will improve it is as likely to degenerate unless you take further steps. What is more, it is impossible to predict under the current protocols the state of the information on any given visit.

You might consider a real peer review process and editorial board that sits on top of the Wikipedia that locks down authoritative content and identifies authoritative content and contributors. Authority comes from identified individuals not from an unidentified mob - even a so-called "smart mob." You could go one step further and have an open review process in which authorities can challenge locked down articles. This would indeed make Wikipedia more authoritative than conventional encyclopedias for those articles that are locked down.

Whatever the case I continue to believe that this needs to be a prominent feature of the main pages and each of the internal pages - if you lock down authoritative content and mark it clearly then this will begin to establish some real authority here.

One additional thought is that authoritative challenges to locked down articles could be appended to the main article in some way.

Steven Zenith 02:39, 3 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Wikipedia 1.0

see: Wikipedia:Version_1.0_Editorial_Team

To prevent duplication of effort

Hi, I noticed that some of the things you're saying seem familiar. Might help to check this page and note where you think it doesn't meet your concerns yet.

See: Wikipedia:Replies_to_common_objections

Kim Bruning 20:48, 11 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Thanks Kim, I have reviewed this page several times - perhaps you could point out where my issues are addressed. I have started to write up my concerns on my User page.

Steven Zenith 19:08, Jun 12, 2005 (UTC)

Interesting! Okay, your user page was starting to look really familiar, is all. If you've already seen that page, then that's great :-) Kim Bruning 22:09, 12 Jun 2005 (UTC)

You mean familiar in the sense that the issues are those we discussed on Skype or that others have covered this ground before? Is there anything I missed? I did not see these issues addressed on the common objections page - someone could usefully rewrite that page in my view - it is a little too arrogant for my taste.

Steven Zenith 02:37, Jun 13, 2005 (UTC)

Royal Prerogative

I can't say I agree with your comment about the possibility of a monarch acting against the elected government and legally moving the country to despotism. The UK is one of the most stable countries in the world, if not the most stable, even though the constitution has few checks and balances on the theoretical power of the monarch. The last time a monarch refused royal assent was 1708, and you can see by the example of the Military Action Against Iraq (Parliamentary Approval) Bill that the government can even instruct the Queen to withhold royal assent, confirming the Queen has no volition when exercising her (nominal) powers. With regards to the monarch's public image/position, this is not strong at the moment, and has deteriorated in the last 10-15 years. I don't know if you've every lived in the UK, but the Royal Family don't command much if any respect in the press, and they're more figures for ridicule and scandal than respect.

The idea that the UK could become a depotism in the future is frankly impossible, even if it is possible in theory. What you're suggesting is as unlikely as the President of the US using his powers as commander-in-chief to send troops to abolish Congress and the Supreme Court and installing himself as a dictator. Despite the differences in constitutional protection with the UK, the monarch's current political position is impossible to restore to the pre-Restoration period, when the monarchs's power could be absolute, and it is practically impossible for the monarchy to restore some power of decision making. To look in the current medium term situation is not good for the monarch-Elizabeth II is elderly, Charles commands no respect at all from the press or public (I'm not exaggerating) and Prince William, like many young royals just wants to be treated as a normal person, and has little enthusiasm for potential kingship. Even in the golden-age of the post-restoration monarch, in Victorian/Edwardian times, the idea then that the monarchy would act against the elected government was not treated as conceivable or possible, let alone today, where EU membership, membership of the UN, a human rights culture, the lack of an empire and the need for dipomacy with democratic countries and the centuries of constitutional evolution since the monarchy lost its absolute power mean that it is impossible for it to have a proper political role again, let alone take over the country.

In political science, one must distinguish between political theory and political realities. Even if the monarchy attempted to overturn conventions and assert its power than derive from its traditional authority, this would simply mean it would be abolished. The monarch no longer has the support of the armed forces, the aristocratic elites have lost political power-the UK is run basically by the middle classes, very little attention is paid to the monarchy in academia from the mid 19th century (Walter Bagehot called them the "dignified", not "efficient" part of the constitution]]. In short, constitutionally, politically, socially, militarily, academically and in terms of public support now, or in the future, the monarch is any irreverence.

Sorry for the length of this, but I simply cannot agree that the monarchy could even take back decision making power, and if you ask anyone else the same question who edits a lot of UK politics on wikipedia, I'm sure you'd get the same answer. The Parliamentary report you refer to, if you mean this one certainly does deal with the extent of the prerogative, but it seems to have been written to attempt to understand and rationalise the concept of prerogative. It makes the underlying assumption that the monarch is powerless-if you search "monarch" or "crown", you'll find there is only one reference to the Queen-the assumption is that she or her successors will never regain any power or decision making. You'll find the same underlying assumption in this too. Deus Ex 10:01, 18 Jun 2005 (UTC)

I do not have time to respond right now - but, I am English. I was raised in London. Briefly, you are under a false apprehension that is the product of Palace PR. And in my opinion it is dangerous complacency. Aside from that, the facts speak for themselves. It is the facts and not your opinion of the facts that Wikipedia requires. - Steven Zenith 22:20, Jun 18, 2005 (UTC)

Well, if that's what you believe, then I won't attempt to convince you further. I agree that we should stick completely to the facts, and as you say let them speak for themselves. But it would still be misleading to suggest to readers that a re-assertation of the monarch's power in the scenario you mention is likely in the present political climate/culture. From what I've read, it seems it is a virtually universally held opinion in academics that in the short term, the monarchy will remain in its present state.

By the way, on the subject of academics, despite our disagreement about the British monarchy, I must say that I agree wholeheartly with your comments about Wikipedia's complete lack of reliability and accuracy. Personally, I would like to see committees consisting of academics (or at the least one or two and some PhD holders) formed to verify subjects and articles pertaining to their qualifications. At the moment, it is very obvious, as you say, that Wikipedia is misrepresenting its authority, and its alarming how many sites mirror (usually out-of-date copies) of Wikipedia's content which of course appear on Google searches. I don't know if you've read this critique by Larry Sanger (who administed the now defunct Nupedia, which was written and peer reviewed by academics), but its represents my view on the situation quite well. Finally, if you want an extremely ironic and amusing example of lack of reliability of wikipedia articles, then take a look at Talk:Jimmy Wales, a talk page about the article of Jimbo Wales, the founder of Wikipedia. Take a look at the section on the talk page called "I was *this close* to editing myself". Its Jimbo Wales, complaining that an article about him, written by wikipedians is inaccurate and unreliable. Deus Ex 23:39, 18 Jun 2005 (UTC)

In responce to Mr Zenith: As an American I know that many of us are ignorant of British constitutional practices (after all we continue to think of George III as some sort of despot on the French model when in fact he was a constitutional monarch who claimed far less power than Mr Bush today claims) so let me make it clearer. Firstly: Though you are obvously skilled and logical in your thinking, your remarks show a distinct lack of knowlege of British constitutional practices and you approach the question from the incorrect context. Secondly: You seem to have little regard for the importance of proper context (a defect in thought that is, sadly, quite common for many of us US Americans.) You try to take what appears to be a semiotic approach to a legal and constitutional matter rather than attempting to understand the nature of the proper context which points to a certain degree of intellectual laziness and obtuseness in thinking. Third: The British use a more traditional definition of constitution, that defines it simply as the organisation and powers of government and governmental institutions. For example by the British definition of the word, the US Senates ability to filibuster would be considered part of the constitution of the US as it is one the Senate's recognised powers. Fourth: One important distinction ought to be made: Much of the British constitution is comprised of precedents that are rigourously adhered to by those who take part in the governance of that country whilst the US constitution comprises mostly of written statute (ie the 1789 Constitution) that is often ignored by those who govern the US. (For example, the written and entrenched bill of rights seems not to have prevented the President from throwing US citizens into navy brigs without any form of due process.) The difference is plain: when the British Executive wants certain powers it will first seek to obtain legislation and if it fails will back off, whereas when the US Executive wants certain powers, it simply takes them without bothering with legal niceties. A constitution is only as good as those it governs, Mr Zenith, and the British constution works because the British can better obey their customs and precedents than we Americans can our entrenched statutes. -Erik Seidel (23 March 2005)

Are you a Lyndon Larouche type? One of those who believe that everything is part of a massive conspiracy contrived by the Privy Council and that the world (including the US Federal Reserve) is secretely governed by a secret cabal of Privy Councillors?

Academic paper about Wikipedia

Ugh, sociology and economics (:-P), and no references to Systems Analysis. Ah well, take a look:

http://www.firstmonday.org/issues/issue8_12/ciffolilli/

Kim Bruning 12:04, 16 July 2005 (UTC)

Hmm, while I'm at it, had you reviewed this page maybe?

Wikipedia:Researching_with_Wikipedia

Kim Bruning 12:15, 16 July 2005 (UTC)

British monarchy and blog commentary

Hi Steven, I read your piece on AlwaysOn [1], and I'm interested in hearing your further views on what you wrote there. I'm especially interested in how your experience of engaging in discussion on and rewriting the article on British monarchy prompted such a piece of reflective writing. I'm not entirely sure on how the beginning and the end of that piece tie together - not that blog commentaries have to, mind, but I'm interested in how the one influenced the other, especially about the importance of listening to each other and 'favouring the wise'. Your piece raises some important issues and I would like to hear your views on these matters within Wikipedia, which I have devoted this year to studying - possibly many more. I'd like to instigate a discussion on this and other issues raised on your user page, in whatever medium you feel comfortable with - whether on my talk page, by emailing me privately (also through my user page) or even IRC. I may be a bit tied up for time over the next week, certainly over the weekend with Wikimania, but I just wanted to drop you this note now and let you have a mull over it. Thanks. Cormaggio 10:43, 1 August 2005 (UTC)

Hello again. An interesting read, but I must say I was rather offended your simplistic portrayal of my actions. I'm disapppointed you lazily labelled me "self-righteous" and said you are "more knowledgeable of the facts". At least I have a formal qualification in the subject-an "A" at A-Level in Politics is nothing compared with degree study obviously, but I doubt you have any higher qualfication in studying UK politics. Yes, I reacted strongly to your edits. I suppose, since I am much younger than you, that automatically means I am "self righteous". In respect to my views, I was trying to add context, not spin or 'dilute' the facts. The context that today, Parliament recognises that most of the monarch's prerogatives are exercised by ministers (read the Parliamentary report on royal prerogative) and that there have not been any examples of the monarch personally exercising power for centuries. Why is it wrong that that should be included in an article about the royal prerogative? Your view (which naturally you do not mention on your blog) was that the monarchy still has the potential to take over the country, which anyone who has studied UK politics in detail (like my Politics teacher of 25 years) could not possibly take seriously. Please, if you know any academics who study politics or history, put that view to them. And how did you come to think my view "embodies a completely different view of the matter"? My view was very similar to that of the 16 year old user (Lord Emsworth), I would have thought that was obvious. Thank you for reading this, although I'm sure you will instantly dismiss it as the rant of an ignorant, inconsequential student. And to use your grandiose lexicon, do not fear that I will use assertive belligerence or fierce self righteousnes to dominate free expression any longer-because (unrelated to this matter) I have left Wikipedia for good. Deus Ex 01:56, 31 October 2005 (UTC)

Some Thoughts

Hello Dr Zenith. I was impressed by your remarks about the semiology article. I've given thought to some of these issues as well, and I've succumbed to the (perilous) temptation of providing some unsolicited opinions.

When I first became acquainted with the Wikipedia concept, my first reaction was 'that will never work'. With time though, I have come to see that it usually does work quite well. Even more surprisingly, perhaps, it is possible to identify a fairly uniform tone to Wikipedia articles. Several non-traditional quality controls are at work:

- respect for the unpaid efforts of earlier writers typically creates a threshold of conviction for introducing changes: Community members feel motivated to check their facts.

- more importantly, for an article to be able to stand for any length of time it has to conform to the sense of a large community. There is thus a distributed control (as opposed to the traditional, centralised control of a peer review). Perhaps a comparison could be made with capitalism's 'invisible hand of the marketplace'.

- in many cases the action of many minds 'fighting it out' in a constructive fashion leads to a result which is better than any one author would have been able to achieve. (I have to admit, I was surprised to make this discovery, which only came after I had experienced significant annoyance and despair following large scale revision of contributions I had worked hard on.)

That said, you are certainly right that there are cases where the Wikipedia paradigm breaks down. Articles on recondite subjects are, by definition, not subject to the control of a large community. On topics that people hold passionate, often unjustifiable opinions, community restraint is likely to be lacking: Even seemingly factual topics end up being hijacked to support some polemical position. (Take a look at the article dealing with the origins of the Palestinians some time).

Perhaps such articles would be better left out, or else assembled according to a different paradigm. Still, Wikipedia is already a valuable resource, with an unclear but promising future. I for one wouldn't want to be without it.

--Philopedia 23:13, 4 October 2005 (UTC)

Thank you for your comments - which I have moved to the Talk page. My response is to observe that these 'non-traditional quality controls' as you call them are not at all reliable and that they will inevitably change as the social conventions among Wikipedian's change. Once Wikipedia established authority by a period of such convention the vulnerablity to abuse is all the more great in the immediately subsequent period. So while it might appear to work at times, this indicates a subsequent period of great risk - especially during wide social debates.

--Steven Zenith 03:36, 23 October 2005 (UTC)

Homeschooling project

Hello, My name Master Scott Hall (you can call me Scott). I am relatively new contributing to Wikipedia, though I have been a user of it for some time. I am currently soliciting for interest in a Wikiproject that I have proposed on the subject of homeschooling. Before finding Wikipedia, my wife and I were seriously considering, but not quite convinced, to home educate our children.

After discovering the depth, scope, and long-term goals of Wikipedia, as well as the individuals driving it, I am convinced that WP has the potential to revolutionize homeschooling. I am also convinced that home education is the right choice for my family. I have, however, been somewhat discouraged by the oversight of home education in most of the education related projects on WP. There are many potential reasons for this discrepency, but I have resolved to try to do something about it.

Although I personally have very limited experience in building complex Wikiprojects, -templates, -portals, etc., I am confident that the right team can be assembled to tackle these issues. I would like to invite you to join this effort to make Wikipedia the resource for the home education of our children. If you are interested, please visits the temporary project page I have set up. Thank you --Master Scott Hall 00:13, 12 January 2006 (UTC)

Update: The proposed project on Homeschooling was met with a very positive response. As a result, the project has been ugraded to an official WikiProject and can be found at WikiProject Alternative education. We have several experienced Wikipedians on board, as well as some new faces. We still need contributors with backgrounds in education, education theory and philosophy, and specific alternative education methods, such as homeschooling, charter schools, and E-learning from both teacher and student perspectives. There is also a lack of quality resources regarding anti-alternative education issues. If are interested in contributing or just have an interest, please visit the project page, or if you prefer, ask us a question. Thank you again, Master Scott Hall 18:55, 18 January 2006 (UTC)

Occam?

I assume that you are the same person as the author of the Occam language. --Gwizard 04:20, 22 March 2007 (UTC)

As I have noted elsewhere, I am NOT THE author of Occam, Occam was designed by several people. It is true that I made contributions and that I wrote the primary document "The Occam 2 Reference Manual" published by Prentice Hall in 1987/1988 - I basically pulled it all together. David May, architect of the transputer, wrote the initial terse specification of Occam (a remarkable document IMHO). Occam derived from the work of Tony Hoare at Oxford University and can be considered a partial and imperative programming language implementation of the process algebra CSP, designed by Tony Hoare.

I am the designer and author of the programming language Ease http://process-interaction-models.info/ease.html - Ease was designed by me initially at Yale University in 1990 to ease programming of parallel machines and it was published as part of my doctoral thesis in 1992 - Ease has recently been redesigned to meet the needs of many-core processors and is now called "Carnap" http://www.carnap.info

--Steven Zenith 19:24, 7 June 2007 (UTC)

David May (computer scientist)

StevenZenith, if you are not willing to research facts you are not aware of, please do not undo other's contributions. Thank you.

He is no longer head of Computer Science (as of 2006), and spends the minority of his time teaching - where the majority is spent pursuing University related commercial ventures. —Preceding unsigned comment added by JimpsEd (talk • contribs) 01:03, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

The article does not say that Dave is still the head of CS. And as to your proposal to include what Dave currently does with his time, so what? The information is not relevant in an encyclopedia. It sounds like you are making some personal judgement on how he spends his time.

--Steven Zenith (talk) 08:30, 1 January 2008 (UTC)

Re: Steven Zenith's User Page

It would seem that at some point, you attempted to rename yourself using the 'move' tab. That does not work; please use WP:CHU instead. I've moved your user page and user talk page to their "appropriate" locations. Please let me know if you require any further assistance. Cheers. --MZMcBride (talk) 19:12, 20 May 2008 (UTC)