User talk:SlamDiego/Archive 4

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Orc Hives
Some earlier messages may be found
 · in the first orc hive, or
 · in the second orc hive, or
 · in the third orc hive.

[edit] Marginal utility

thank you so much for the improvements. At the time, I was writing a paper on marginal utility and wasn't sure if I understood it completely, so I looked to wikipedia for some help... obviously I was dissapointed. Had this version of the article been there then, I'm sure it would've helped me a lot. —Xiaoxitu 03:28, 28 December 2006 (UTC).

Good job on the marginal utility article. I'm glad someone finally showed up who understands it more thoroughly than me and others. You may want to improve the marginalism article too. Also the labor theory of value, subjective theory of value, and paradox of value articles may be of interest. Thanks for your efforts. —Anarcho-capitalism 01:26, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

Thanks. After I've done some more work on that article, I plan to tackle the Marginalism article. I may deal with some of the others later. —SlamDiego 01:40, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

By the way, if you could provide sources that would be great, otherwise the information is eventually going to be deleted by someone who doesn't like what it says. —Anarcho-capitalism 01:31, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

The history section has lots of explicit referencing, so I assume that your concern is for the earlier section. I could put sourcing thereïn, but a problem would be that those same foes could reject any of the potential sources. —SlamDiego 01:40, 10 January 2007 (UTC)
Well, according to policy, as long as the sources are from books that are not self-published by the authors or from articles that were published in journals, they they can't reject them. If they delete sourced information, it's considered disruptive and vandalistic. If something is not sourced, according to policy, anyone is free to delete it. And believe me they will. —Anarcho-capitalism 01:47, 10 January 2007 (UTC)
Yeah, I don't deny your point. It's just that there's a limit to what can be done here. —SlamDiego 02:05, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Regarding reversions made on 10 March 2007 to Marginal utility

You have been temporarily blocked for violation of the three-revert rule. Please feel free to return after the block expires, but also please make an effort to discuss your changes further in the future. The duration of the block is 12 hours. William M. Connolley 17:39, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

There's an old joke about nuclear grenades: “Who'd throw it?” I guess that we have one answer. —SlamDiego 17:52, 10 March 2007 (UTC)
For the record: These reversions weren't of the same set of changes, and weren't (on my reading of the 3RR) a violation of the 3RR. But the issue probably wouldn't be worth argument even if it weren't moot. —SlamDiego 23:31, 12 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Peace? (Rieger attempts to pick-pocket with an olive branch!)

Dear Slam,

In the following I assume that you are doing all your edits and discussions in good faith, that you are not trolling or intentionally insult people. Under this assumption I would suggest the following:

  • You also assume the same of me, iNic and others and do not claim that we are silly, we troll or that we make "bad faith edits", unless there would be further evidence of that.
  • We all return to working on articles rather than on run-away discussions.
  • We come to a conclusion what to do with the changes you did to the St.Petersburg Paradox to which iNic and me independently objected. This conclusion would be either to revert them, or to cut them short in the heading part of the article and to elaborate on them (with quotation) in the main part of the article ("possible solutions").
Given the amount of time we spend on discussions that have already exhausted their potential for exchange of arguments, it should not be a problem to redirect the effort towards this final solution. I obviously favor the first option, but I completely support the second one. I do, however, not support the current state.
  • Regarding the marginal utility, I would suggest we work on an improvement of the Expected Utility article and replace the link once this is done. (Of course, in this improvement the concept of marginal utility in the context of Expected Utility should also have to be explained.)

If you agree to this plan, then please let me (and iNic) know, that would help to improve the currently unsatisfying situation of both the article and the relations. (And, btw, we all could devote more time for articles again...)

As personal advice, and I apologize for giving it so boldly: It often happens that what sounds fine to the writer may sound insulting for the recepient, in particular when in written form, e.g. "Silliness" as headline for a correction of a statement somebody else added to an article might be fine in oral conversation when it is clear that it is not meant insulting, but might seem quite insulting when in written form. Maybe this advice (which to follow everybody may have difficulty from time to time) can reduce the number of problems you will encounter in the future - not only in Wikipedia!

And now I hope we can all work again peacefully together.

Rieger 14:09, 21 March 2007 (UTC)


  1. All that iNic needs for peace with me is to stop trying to damage the St. Petersburg paradox article, and to stop otherwise trying to compel me to work on it. (Once kicked, the goose will not give eggs.)
  2. The proper conclusion to those changes is to wait for agr. Earlier, iNic asked agr to make the expansions that I am not making. (Naturally, iNic insulted me in the course of doing this.) agr agreed. iNic told him “Take your time.” (Your proposed alternative, with iNic finding himself shot in the foot, is that I should instead agree to all the very damage against which I have been fighting, or that the goose should give eggs after being kicked.)
  3. In the meantime, if iNic or you really wants a citation, then one or both of you can just copy-and-paste the citation which I provided (at agr's request) long before iNic started insisting that one should be placed in the article. Nothing is so plain a proof of iNic's bad faith as his repeated insistence that there should be a cited source in combination with his not simply copying-and-pasting that citation from discussion.
  4. If you still favor reversion, then I suggest that you stay away from articles on economic subjects.
  5. I suggest that you expand the Expected utility article appropriately. I don't presently want to work on it, and I may never want to work on it. (For me to be comfortable with an extensive involvement in that article, I'd have to provide a proper discussion of Ramsey's model.) I expect that it always be appropriate for there to be some link in the St. Petersburg paradox article to the marginal utility article, because Cramer and D. Bernoulli did not motivate their solutions with risk aversion per se but with diminishing marginal utility. From Carl Menger (father to Karl Menger), we get a very good explanation as to why marginal utility should often or usually be diminishing, and that argument has been incorporated in the article on marginal utility; whereäs risk aversion is otherwise a deus ex machina.
  6. I would be pleased if you reformed, but you have been documented trolling, and will have to reëarn any assumption of good faith. The passive-aggression of your “personal advice” moves you further from any such goal.
—SlamDiego 22:39, 21 March 2007 (UTC)