User talk:DWmFrancis

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Hello, DWmFrancis! Welcome to Wikipedia! Thank you for your contributions to this free encyclopedia. If you decide that you need help, check out Getting Help below, ask me on my talk page, or place {{helpme}} on your talk page and ask your question there. Please remember to sign your name on talk pages by clicking Image:Signature icon.png or using four tildes (~~~~); this will automatically produce your username and the date. Finally, please do your best to always fill in the edit summary field. Below are some useful links to facilitate your involvement. Happy editing! - CobaltBlueTony™ talk 15:52, 27 November 2007 (UTC)
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==Your recent edits==

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Contents

[edit] Criticism of the Book of Abraham

A proposed deletion template has been added to the article Criticism of the Book of Abraham, because another editor is suggesting that it be deleted according to the proposed deletion process. All contributions are appreciated, but this article may not satisfy Wikipedia's criteria for inclusion, and the deletion notice should explain why (see also "What Wikipedia is not" and Wikipedia's deletion policy). You may prevent the proposed deletion by removing the {{dated prod}} notice, but please explain why you disagree with the proposed deletion in your edit summary or on its talk page. Also, please consider improving the article to address the issues raised. Even though removing the deletion notice will prevent deletion through the proposed deletion process, the article may still be deleted if it matches any of the speedy deletion criteria or it can be sent to Articles for Deletion, where it may be deleted if consensus to delete is reached. If you agree with the deletion of the article, and you are the only person who has made substantial edits to the page, please add {{db-author}} to the top of the page. Blanchardb-MeMyEarsMyMouth-timed 11:41, 25 November 2007 (UTC)

DWmFrancis 15:16, 3 December 2007 (UTC)I'm going to stick to my position that the pattern set in other articles on religious texts is the way to go. The article on the Qu'ran has no NPOV flag set and has small section on criticism that redirects to a separate larger article on Criticism of the Qur'an.DWmFrancis 15:16, 3 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] BOA Notables and other thoughts

Sorry - I realized I posted my earlier comments on your front page, so I removed them.

Couple of thoughts - the fact that the Koran mentions the BOA doesn't mean that they were the same thing. I would be interested to see if you have other research that gives more credence to that connection.

Second - I need to read up on wikipedia guidelines as far as primary, secondary, and tertiary sources are concerned. I know that wikipedia says we should be very careful about primary sources, because we start to tread on thin ice as far as original research is concerned. I have been guilty of that myself in the past.

I do, however, think that some articles could benefit from weeding out amateur scholarship. There is so much of it on the internet these days and it is hard to tell the difference between solid, peer-reviewed work, and the rantings of a well informed amateur. But maybe that is a whole other discussion. Descartes1979 (talk) 05:36, 7 December 2007 (UTC)

DWmFrancis (talk) 14:21, 8 December 2007 (UTC) Yes, I agree that the reference in the Koran need not be connected to the LDS BoA. That is why in my last comment to you I said "a" book of Abraham was mentioned in the Koran, not "the" Book of Abraham. Still, it raises some interesting possibilities. I was not aware of the reference before, even tho it is mentioned in a footnote in "Traditions About the Early Life of Abraham" on page 297. I've added a bit to the Disambiguation section to reflect that. I also agree on the sources comment, etc. It's my plan to go thru the article one paragraph at a time and be scrupulously accurate in footnoting and referencing, including drilling down into the other citations and try to notate and clean them up.

[edit] Book of Abraham - recent edit

I am very disappointed at your recent edit on the Book of Abraham article. You and I both know that the controversy surrounding the Book of Abraham is directly related with the fact that the recovered papyri have been examined and bear little to no resemblance with Joseph Smith's translation of the Book of Abraham. Yes there are apologist stances on the issue, but to remove that statement from the leading paragraph was a gross disservice to the truth of the controversy. Continued edits like that will get you blocked from Wikipedia if you are not careful. --Descartes1979 (talk) 19:22, 14 January 2008 (UTC)


Descartes - I'm sorry, but you and I do *not* know that the content of the facsimiles bear no resemblance to Joseph Smith's translation of the text. Some Non LDS Egyptologists think they do, but I am not aware of any LDS scholar who has taken that position. In the absence of that the statement was unreferenced, inaccurate and misleading. I could have simply added <reference needed> but in the mean time the claim that LDS and non LDS scholars agree that the facsimilies are unrelated to the text is at least unsupported and probably wrong. BTW, Nibley and others have addressed this issue.DWmFrancis (talk) 20:02, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

Your edit was not related to the facsimiles, but very clearly to the recovered papyri in general. Also, references are less important in the summary section, since statements there just summarize what is referenced in the article below. Later sections of the article are fully referenced and discuss the controversy. If you think there are well cited scholars that dispute the translation of the papyri fragments, then lets put them in the article, but that doesn't take away from the fact that every non-LDS Egyptologist that has written on the subject agrees that the papyri bear no resemblance with Joseph Smith's translation/interpretation. Hence the statement in the summary section. To be honest, I am starting to question your motives, because your language comes across with a heavy apologetic bent. I am actually ok with that, because we need an apologetic eye as well as a critical eye to keep articles NPOV - but please don't try to water down the article at the expense of the established and well referenced facts.--Descartes1979 (talk) 01:46, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] I reverted your recent Book of Abraham edits

I just reverted three of your edits that you made on the BOA article - I reviewed them, and wanted to keep some of it, but in the end, each of the edits had what I believe to be a violation of NPOV or OR, and it was too difficult to try and keep some of the changes, and reject others. Here are the reasons why I reverted them:

  1. Your first edit here, removed the phrase "purporting to be the writings of Abraham" which is quoted from Times and Seasons, and is one of the sources of the controversy. This came off as a very POV edit by removing this phrase.
  2. This edit here, you removed the phrases "According to Joseph Smith's translation", and "it is a source of some distinctive and controversial Latter-day Saint doctrines". Once again, this appears very POV, as you are minimizing the controversy, and suppressing the idea that Joseph Smith's translation is different from everyone elses.
  3. This edit here you added the phrase "There is significant disagreement between and among LDS and non-LDS Egyptologists and linguists concerning the interpretation of the facsimiles. Current understanding of ancient Egyptian religious beliefs is still somewhat fragmentary and the graphical and textual expression of those beliefs was very symbolic" -- this strikes me as original research, plus you put it right before a previously entered reference, which made the phrase seem to take on the verifiability that was already established, when in reality the reference has nothing to do with this sentence. Also, you added in the section about the other Book of Breathings and difference between them and the Joseph Smith Papyri. Please, lets dicuss this further on the talk page - please review my comments there.

--Descartes1979 (talk) 21:02, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Barnstar of Diligence

The Barnstar of Diligence
For diligence in checking references which resulted in identifying a crucial piece of misinformation, which was subsequently and appropriately removed from the article Book of Abraham. Great job! --Descartes1979 (talk) 05:14, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Book of Mormon

Please do not make edits to the BOM article until you have discussed the issue on the Talk page. This article is highly charged and in order to keep the POV tag off we MUST discuss every edit BEFORE it is made. It took weeks and weeks to hammer out compromises in order to remove the POV tag. Please respect those who have worked on that article before and bring your issues up on the Talk page BEFORE making edits. I will continue to revert your edits (which seem to be clear POV in my opinion) until you start discussing things on the Talk page FIRST and get a CONSENSUS agreement on the new wording. (Taivo (talk) 13:25, 2 May 2008 (UTC))

We have asked you several times now to STOP making edits on the Book of Mormon page without discussing those changes on the TALK page FIRST. As we have asked before, respect those who have gone before you and DISCUSS your changes BEFORE you make them. (Taivo (talk) 05:11, 7 May 2008 (UTC))
I'm not sure if you are watching my page, so I'll place my response to your comment on my Talk page here as well:
I'm afraid you won't get far [comparing edits in the BOM to edits in the NT] because you are comparing apples and oranges. The BOM is a unit that can be traced from a single source in 1830 (the first printed edition). That single source has been subject to X number of changes in 178 years of editing and printing. The NT is NOT a single source. It is composed of multiple copies (the Greek manuscripts, of which there are several hundred) of multiple documents (the 20-some-odd books of the N.T.). You can't even reasonably compare one book of the NT with the BOM because we do not have the original author's copy of any of the books. There is also the problem of time-depth. It is entirely different comparing 178 years of a document's history after the printing press to 1900 years of a document's history, 1400 of which were before the printing press. Any comparison is absolutely meaningless since you are comparing totally different things. I will oppose any such comparison being placed in the BOM article because it is irrelevant. (Taivo (talk) 16:21, 14 May 2008 (UTC))


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[edit] Book of Abraham

Why there is a neutrality tag at the top of the page? Otolemur crassicaudatus (talk) 13:42, 23 May 2008 (UTC)