Talk:Colin Angus (explorer)/Archive 2

POV issues
I am an armchair adventurer, and have followed Angus’ adventures along with any other individuals and teams that have challenged the poles, mountains, rivers and oceans. I just read through this biography of Angus, and it appears to me this page has simply been used as a battleground between the supporters of Angus and the detractors tied to his controversial circumnavigation of the world. While it should be addressed that his circumnavigation does not conform to the guidelines issued by Guinness World Records, there is much more to Colin’s career, and more information should be provided on his other adventures. I have done a bit of research, both online, and through his books I have on my shelf and have done my best to write an informative, and unbiased bio. Here goes:

Colin Angus is an adventurer from British Columbia, Canada (source: http://www.ereader.com/servlet/mw?t=author&ai=4650&si=59). Expeditions Angus has been involved in include rafting and kayaking descents the Amazon and Yenisei Rivers, a human-powered journey around the world (which does not comply with Guinness World Record’s definition of a circumnavigation), and, most recently, a journey by rowboat from Scotland to Syria. (Source: http://www.nationalgeographic.com/adventure/best-of-adventure-2007/achievements/colin-angus-julie-wafaei.html) He has written three books chronicling his expeditions (http://www.randomhouse.ca/author/results.pperl?authorid=688)

Adventures

Sailing across the Pacific Ocean: Angus’ first adventure was a five-year sailing trip across the Pacific. He bought a 27’ sailboat with high school friend Dan Audet and spent the following years sailing through the South Pacific Ocean across to Australia, New Zealand, Australia and Papua New Guinea where he sold the boat. Angus says he was inspired to do this journey at the age of 12 when he read the book Dove, detailing the sailing odyssey of Robin Lee Graham. (Source http://www.vimff.org/07site/speakers.html)

Rafting the Amazon: Angus and two other team mates) Ben Kozel, Australian, and Scott Borthwick, South African) rafted the Amazon from its source in the Andes Mountains to the Atlantic Ocean in 1999/2000. The most difficult part of the journey was navigating the whitewater in the upper Andes. Angus’ team followed the route pioneered by Piotr Chmielinski, the first to descend the Amazon from source to sea in 1986. (www.randomhouse.ca/catalog/display.pperl?9780385660099)

Rafting/Kayaking the Yenisey River: In 2001 a four-person team including Angus voyaged the fifth longest river from its source in Mongolia to the Arctic Ocean. The journey took five months and covered 5,500 km through Mongolia, Siberia and across Lake Baikal. A documentary, the Yenisey River Expedition, was made about this journey aired on the National Geographic Channel. (source: http://www.randomhouse.ca/catalog/display.pperl?isbn=9780385660143&view=excerpt

Human Powered Circumnavigation of the World: In June 2004 Angus completed a journey around the world using human power. This included rowing across the Atlantic Ocean and the Bering Sea, and cycling, canoeing and walking over North America, Asia and Europe. He began the journey with Tim Harvey, but had a falling out in Siberia. His then-fiancée, Julie Wafaei, joined him in Moscow and the two continued together for the remaining half of the journey. (http://www.randomhouse.ca/catalog/display.pperl?isbn=9780385663649)

Angus received the National Geographic Adventurer of the year for this accomplishment, but the expedition was also prone to controversy. Jason Lewis, the second to complete a human-powered journey around the world claimed that Angus’ journey wasn’t a true circumnavigation because it didn’t reach antipodes, two diametrically opposed points on the globe. Guinness World Records did not credit Angus for this circumnavigation because he rowed tandem across the oceans and did not cross the equator (http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2007/mar/06/travel.travelnews). Lewis’ expedition did not meet Guinness criteria either. (http://www.angusadventures.com/circumnavigations.html)

Rowed Trip: A journey from Scotland to Syria by Oar: Most recently Angus and his wife Julie Angus completed a 7000 km journey from Scotland to the Middle East using bicycles and rowboats. The theme of the journey was to connect their ancestral homelands using a novel form of human powered transportation. They built rowboats that were capable of carrying bicycles and trailers. The bikes could then be used to tow the boats when long portages were required.

The duo started their rowing trip in March 2008 at the northern tip of Scotland and they traveled through the canals, rivers and roads of Britain. They rowed across the English Channel and then traversed Europe on canals, rivers, bike paths and roads to the Black Sea. From Istanbul, Turkey, they cycled the remaining distance to Syria. Colin’s family comes from Scotland, and Julie’s family is from Syria. The journey was completed in September 2008. (http://travel.latimes.com/daily-deal-blog/index.php/rowed-trip-expeditio-1594/)

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So that’s my best shot at expanding and clarifying this bio somewhat. I hope some, or all of this, works for you. I had a look around to see if I could find any information backing Tim Harvey’s claims below. The only thing I could find online was this statement, presumably written by Harvey, on his website on the Team Page – “Alongside Tim Harvey, Colin made history as a member of the first team to row across the Bering Sea.”

Randolph Humes  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 89.145.235.62 (talk) 23:28, 17 January 2009 (UTC)

Copied from my talk
 * Galiano Kayaker: I am a valid source.
 * Quoting from WP:V: The threshold for inclusion in Wikipedia is verifiability, not truth—that is, whether readers are able to check that material added to Wikipedia has already been published by a reliable source, not whether we think it is true. Editors should provide a reliable source for quotations and for any material that is challenged or likely to be challenged, or the material may be removed.
 * Quoting from WP:NOR: Wikipedia does not publish original research or original thought. This includes unpublished facts, arguments, speculation, and ideas; and any unpublished analysis or synthesis of published material that serves to advance a position. This means that Wikipedia is not the place to publish your own opinions, experiences, or arguments. Citing sources and avoiding original research are inextricably linked: to demonstrate that you are not presenting original research, you must cite reliable sources that are directly related to the topic of the article, and that directly support the information as it is presented.
 * Quoting from WP:RS: Wikipedia articles should use reliable, third-party, published sources. Reliable sources are credible published materials with a reliable publication process; their authors are generally regarded as trustworthy or authoritative in relation to the subject at hand. 

The above is out policy. Your statements are
 * 1) A first party source that is not considered to be reliable by wikipedia policy.
 * 2) We are not a court to decide the truth.
 * 3) We report third party and independent sources
 * 4) If you have any misgivings on the veracity of the claims, please have them fact-checked by a neutral observer, and then publish those findings here. Or if it's a legal dispute, please detail the court verdict here. We would be glad to include those findings due to our policy of neutral point of view

As you can see I am only defending the established policies. If you have misgivings on the policies, please discuss changes on the policy pages. But as of now, the policy stays. Sorry. =Nichalp  «Talk»=  19:36, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

POV ISSUES
You owe me no apology beyond what you owe to all users of Wikipedia. Step back for a moment here, and take a good, long look at the situation. Here it is:

Two men on a boat in a stormy sea. One comes off the sea and claims to have used only human power (which the other man refutes). That former claim, clearly, rests entirely on a first-party source. It could only be, as it did not come from the witness to the man making the claim (and in any case, you say witnesses are unacceptable to Wikipedia). And yet that first-party source is the claim that you defend as encylopedic.

Your logic is as mystifying as the meteorology of the Bering Sea, my friend, and just as Angus and I were lost and tossed amid those waves, you are without proper bearings in your thinking.

Recall that:

"1) A first party source that is not considered to be reliable by Wikipedia Policy."

Now please enlighten me as to how Colin Angus' claim should then be allowed to stand, as it relies wholly upon a first-party source. Or, is it that as soon as one's claim is repeated by the media at large, it can be allowed to stand as second-party and therefore acceptable to Wikipedia? Those repetitions by media sources faithful to Angus are the only other source of this information. (The fact that you accept these non-witnesses as more credible than a witness says a great deal).

I will anticipate this as being your learned opinion, because, as admittedly weak a position as it is, it is your only way out of accepting a contradiction (that you are accepting Angus or his book as a first-party source).

In that case, I will relieve you of further uncertainty by pointing you to the Nome Nugget front-page article of August 16 2004, which was written based on interviews conducted only minutes after the rower-sailors Harvey and Angus stepped off the Bering Sea. If you decline to make the effort of reading this article, then I suggest you not strip editing rights from people who are less negligent in their research, which is, to say the least, rather presumptuous of you. But anticipating a level of investigative sloth only too common among certified Wikipedians, I will make it easy for you by quoting from the front-page story "Russians Save Canadian Bacon" by Sandra Medearis, of the aforementioned date and paper. "In a calm before the gale ... put up an emergency sail on one of the oars".

Sailing, of course, does not, even by the liberal definitions of convenience routinely employed by Mr. Angus, constitute human power. Nor is it constituted by human power, beyond knowing how to set the sails and man the tiller. No sailor has ever claimed a human-powered circumnavigation.

So you are unable to deny, my good man, that we thus now have a second party source sitting in the official archives of Nome, Alaska and in various filing cabinets such as my own, which states unequivocally that the Harvey-Angus Bering Sea journey was not made entirely by human power. Therefore it is absurd that Wikipedia be phrased in such a way that propagates the Angus version, which rests on his gamble that what goes on in Nome stays in Nome.

I have no axe to grind with Angus; forgiveness has unburdened me of that. But I am dedicated to the truth as the highest principle. It would be a disservice to the Wikipedia community if I did not stand up to those, like you, who are more ignorant of the facts of this matter. You can quote Wikipedia policy until you are blue in the face, but that will never change the truth, and if Wikipedia policy blocks the truth, then it is worthless. But such is the nature of Truth itself that the facts I offer are unassailable, even if you find further ways to justifying a new round of apologies. If so, I urge you to direct them not at me, but to the wider community that you will have failed. No go forth, ye, and verify your facts. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Galiano kayaker (talk • contribs) 19:25, 4 November 2008 (UTC)


 * You have a point. I agree with you. The article needs references from third party sources, not Angus's sites. Give me two-three days to reply. In the meantime could you list the problematic sources here? Thanks! =Nichalp   «Talk»=  19:38, 4 November 2008 (UTC)


 * All I ask is that this phrase be removed, because it is not true: "Colin Angus is a Canadian author and adventurer who is the first person to make a self-propelled global circumnavigation". I don't know what the source is, although I could probably find a number of them. They are all mistaken, because he was neither entirely human-powered, nor was it a circumnavigation. This Wikipedia entry makes it seem like the only question at stake is the definition of circumnavigation. I would cease to take an interest in correcting the fallacies of this website if my edit were allowed to stand, which is, essentially, that "Colin Angus is a Canadian author and adventurer who ***claims*** to be the first person..." Further to that, it would also be in the interests of accuracy to acknowledge the nature of the controversy, which touches not only upon the definition of circumnavigation, but also on the question of human power. At the very least, however, the first statement of the entry should not stand. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Galiano kayaker (talk • contribs) 19:51, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

To restate that, I think the issue is that the first statement is presented without citation, it is merely presented as an accepted fact. Any number of sources could be cited, because the media at large did not ask for proof. So, we need to add the word "claims" as this is more accurate. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Galiano kayaker (talk • contribs) 20:15, 4 November 2008 (UTC)



You agreed with my point, and promised to reply, and yet you did not.

Agreement with my point implies that you have abused your privileges as administrator. You are protecting the existence and persistence of a falsehood on Wikipedia. You flagrantly commit a misuse of administrative tools.

You know that every claim that Angus completed a global human-powered circumnavigation stems from his personal claim. First person stuff that you say has no place on Wikipedia. I have offered you reports refuting his claim. And yet, for reasons that no logic could possibly defend, you block me from editing.

You may be aware that the addendum "but this status is questioned" was explicitly written regarding the status of "circumnavigation" because of the Jason Lewis - Colin Angus controversy about who actually committed a circumnavigation. The phrase appears right after the word "circumnavigation" and it reads so as to istatus,status,mply that "this status" refers to the status of circumnavigation, which is why the phrase was inserted.

This is not sufficient to render the statement acceptable, because it is an unassailable fact that Colin Angus did not use only human power. He executed parts of his journey by means that contradict his own "rules". For example, it was okay for him to run with the currents of a river, but not to raise a sail. Which he did, which is reported in contemporaneous report to be found in the Nome Nugget by all those not too slothful to check their facts.

Now, I only ask a couple of words be inserted: that "Colin Angus CLAIMS to be the first to complete a .... ."

That is true. I certainly agree that he claims to be the first. I know that be is practicing deception.

If you 1) block me from doing so, and 2) refuse to make this edit yourself, you must live with knowing that you are protecting the rights of people to lie for personal gain on Wikipedia. Some grand administrator that makes you. It is shameful. So do what you know is right, seeing as you feel the need to use your influence. At least use it in the interests of promoting truth rather than deception.

Misuse of administrative tools

Misusing the administrative tools is considered a serious issue. The administrative tools are provided to trusted users for maintenance and other tasks, and should be used with thought, serious misuse may result in sanction or even their removal.

Common situations where avoiding tool use is often required:


 * Conflict of interest/non-neutrality/content dispute — Administrators should not use their tools to advantage, or in a content dispute (or article) where they are a party (or significant editor), or where a significant conflict of interest is likely to exist. With few specific exceptions where tool use is allowed by any admin, administrators should ensure they are reasonably neutral parties when they use the tools.
 * Communal norm/policy — When a policy or communal norm is clear that tools should not be used, then tools should not be used without an explanation that shows the matter has been considered and why a (rare) exception is genuinely considered reasonable.
 * Reinstating a reverted action (sometimes known as "wheel warring") — see below for this and for the very few exceptions.

In most cases even when use of the tools is reasonable, if a reasonable doubt may exist, it is frequently better to ask an independent administrator to review and (if justified) take the action. This is a matter of judgement if necessary. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Ilyich (talk • contribs) 23:31, 14 November 2008 (UTC)

Thank you for those delightful accusations. You are free to take the issue to the Administrator's noticeboard if you believe that I abused those privileges. Thank you. =Nichalp  «Talk»=  09:00, 15 November 2008 (UTC)
 * 1) Please use one id to reply:,  or.
 * 2) I requested you to let me know about the copyright status of the image on Talk:Galiano kayaker you did not get back to me. Please do reply to the post else I would have to delete the image.
 * 3) I agreed that the article was not neutral, I added the appropriate notice tags on the page that the page requires more citations, and also mentions that is was edited by persons that have a conflict of interest in this article. This serves as a warning, and indication for a person to clean up the page. I am "not" obliged to clean up.
 * 4) As I said, we only use reliable sources in our works. There are ample reliable sources such as Forbes that list his achievement. Additional reliable sources can be gleaned from here: Google news search
 * 5) To add the word "claims" you must provide us with a reliable source that has vetted your claim. I'm sure if your claim is convincing enough, reputed sources will take up your story and publish it. If this is the case, please do provide us with reliable and independent sources that support your claim.
 * 6) As hard-hitting as it sounds, we do not publish articles on "truth", we publish articles from sources that are considered to be reliable, whose works have been peer reviewed and considered trustworthy.

Edit protected
editprotected

Category:Living people should be added to this page. Terraxos (talk) 21:35, 9 November 2008 (UTC)
 * Yes check.svg Done --Elonka 23:48, 9 November 2008 (UTC)