User talk:J.r.wordcraft

Welcome!
Hello, J.r.wordcraft, and welcome to Wikipedia! Thank you for your contributions. I hope you like the place and decide to stay. Here are a few links to pages you might find helpful:
 * Introduction and Getting started
 * Contributing to Wikipedia
 * The five pillars of Wikipedia
 * How to edit a page and How to develop articles
 * How to create your first article
 * Simplified Manual of Style

You may also want to take the Wikipedia Adventure, an interactive tour that will help you learn the basics of editing Wikipedia.

Please remember to sign your messages on talk pages by typing four tildes ( ~ ); this will automatically insert your username and the date. If you need help, check out Questions, ask me on my talk page, or to ask for help on your talk page, and a volunteer should respond shortly. Again, welcome! Rahat  (Message) 17:22, 14 March 2015 (UTC)

A summary of site policies and guidelines you may find useful

 * "Truth" is not the only criteria for inclusion, verifiability is also required.
 * Always cite a source for any new information. When adding this information to articles, use, containing the name of the source, the author, page number, publisher or web address (if applicable).
 * We do not publish original thought nor original research. We're not a blog, we're not here to promote any ideology.
 * Reliable sources typically include: articles from magazines or newspapers (particularly scholarly journals), or books by recognized authors (basically, books by respected publishers). Online versions of these are usually accepted, provided they're held to the same standards.  User generated sources (like Wikipedia) are to be avoided.  Self-published sources should be avoided except for information by and about the subject that is not self-serving (for example, citing a company's website to establish something like year of establishment). -- Wikipedia is not a reliable source for Wikipedia, because circular sourcing is effectively no sourcing.
 * Articles are to be written from a neutral point of view. Wikipedia is not concerned with facts or opinions, it just summarizes reliable sources.  Real scholarship actually does not say what understanding of the world is "true," but only with what there is evidence for.  In the case of science, this evidence must ultimately start with physical evidence.  In the case of religion, this means only reporting what has been written and not taking any stance on doctrine.
 * Material must be proportionate to what is found in the source cited. If a source makes a small claim and presents two larger counter claims, the material it supports should present one claim and two counter claims instead of presenting the one claim as extremely large while excluding or downplaying the counter claims.

Ian.thomson (talk) 17:38, 29 March 2015 (UTC)

March 2015
Please do not add original research or novel syntheses of published material to articles as you apparently did to Zoroastrianism. Please cite a reliable source for all of your contributions. Thank you. Ian.thomson (talk) 17:44, 29 March 2015 (UTC)
 * And as I explained above, Wikipedia is never a reliable source for Wikipedia. Wikipedia is written by volunteers instead of academic or journalistic professionals (and so fails our reliable sourcing guidelines), and citing Wikipedia on Wikipedia opens the door to circular sourcing (which is effectively no sourcing). Ian.thomson (talk) 17:46, 29 March 2015 (UTC)

Thank you for your response. However, could you explain to me in what way you believe I have added original research or presented a novel synthesis? All I'm trying to do is restore neutrality to the only contentious part of the article that I spotted, which was the unverified and controversial (and irrelevant) claim that Judaism originates after Zoroastrianism. I think my edit is fair, balanced and justified, as it allows for the uncertainty that exists about the age of Judaism, without taking a one-sided position, unlike the original paragraph. I hope you will therefore restore my edit or explain fully your reasons for challenging it. Thank you.

Articles are to be written from a neutral point of view. Wikipedia is not concerned with facts or opinions, it just summarizes reliable sources. Real scholarship actually does not say what understanding of the world is "true," but only with what there is evidence for. In the case of science, this evidence must ultimately start with physical evidence. In the case of religion, this means only reporting what has been written and not taking any stance on doctrine. Material must be proportionate to what is found in the source cited. If a source makes a small claim and presents two larger counter claims, the material it supports should present one claim and two counter claims instead of presenting the one claim as extremely large while excluding or downplaying the counter claims. — Preceding unsigned comment added by J.r.wordcraft (talk • contribs)
 * As I explained above, "Truth" is not the only criteria for inclusion, verifiability is also required. This means that a source has to be cited for any new information.  Wikipedia does not consider itself to be a reliable source, and so the addition was effectively unsourced, making the claim original research from Wikipedia's perspective.
 * The introduction to the article usually summarizes the rest of the article, but the sentence you're objecting to cites a reliable source
 * Also, new talk page material (but not article material) goes at the bottom of the relevant thread (with new threads at the bottom), and should be signed with four tildes ( ~, found next to the 1 key). However, do not add conversational material to the article itself, as you did here.  If you need to discuss the article, use the article's talk page.
 * I also need to warn you that editors are discouraged from reverting edits more than three times within 24 hours. Your next attempt to add the material you wrote, or to remove Judaism from the list of religions it influenced will be counted as "edit warring."  Ian.thomson (talk) 18:07, 29 March 2015 (UTC)

Yes, you're quite right, sending the response to the actual article page was an error on my part. However, you have not adequately explained your objections to my edit. The citation to which you refer is not represented in a balanced way by the article as it stands - as I mentioned earlier, the uncertainty about the age of Judaism must also be acknowledged in this section, as indeed it is the work the original paragraph cites. I draw, then your attention to the following Wikipedia guideline: "Material must be proportionate to what is found in the source cited. If a source makes a small claim and presents two larger counter claims, the material it supports should present one claim and two counter claims instead of presenting the one claim as extremely large while excluding or downplaying the counter claims." My edit corrects this flaw and provides an additional citation for readers to refer to more quickly than having to trawl through the other work, which is still nevertheless cited, for total transparency. — Preceding unsigned comment added by J.r.wordcraft (talk • contribs)
 * I have pointed out that Wikipedia does not cite Wikipedia, and requires other sources for new material. That alone was reason enough to remove your edit.
 * The bit about presenting material in "proportion to what is found in the source cited":
 * requires reliable sources (which, again, excludes Wikipedia)
 * does not mean that we give artificial balance to two opposing positions if one is given more support than the other by the source
 * However, your edit:
 * lacked a reliable source (again, Wikipedia is 'not' a reliable source by Wikipedia's own guidelines)
 * did not reflect the already cited Penguin Dictionary of Religion
 * drew conclusions from the age of Abraham that about post-Babylonian, post-second temple, post-Hellenistic, modern Rabbinical Judaism - (which is original research, and I only link to those articles to more fully explain what I mean by those "post-" terms, not to make a change to the article)
 * tried to create artificial balance to this original research claim lacking reliable sources, and the opposing but reliably sourced idea.
 * To add the material you tried to add, you would need a mainstream academic source focused on comparative religion that explicitly argues that modern Judaism might not have significantly evolved from the time of Abraham (otherwise bringing up Abraham works as well to date Rabbinical Judaism as it does Christianity, Islam, Samaritanism, and some forms of Gnosticism]]), and that influence may or may not have gone in either direction. This source cannot be Wikipedia.  Ian.thomson (talk) 18:55, 29 March 2015 (UTC)

Okay, I think you've established your prowess in the area of Wikipedia beaurocracy. If you could just climnb down from that pillar for a moment, I'd be very grateful if you would be kind enough to recognize what I'm trying to do here, and help out a little! Specifically, as I already tried to indicate, all I'm trying to do is correct what is patently an error in the existing article. I pointed out in my last response (in spite of your incorrect assertion that I didn't reflect the already-cited Penguin publication) that the line I was tring to correct - "have influenced other later religions including Judaism" is wrong because, although the Penguin Dictionary of Religion suggests the possibility of influence, it does NOT place Zoroastrianism as categorically older than Judaism. Therefore it is the original text - not my edit - that, in your words "did not reflect the already cited Penguin Dictionary of Religion". While I don't see the point of not cross-referencing with other Wikipedia articles, if ''them's the rules, then them's the rules. '''However the rules are currently being broken by the existing article, so my question to you is: what can be done about it? My other question, in the interests of transparency, is: are you the author of the oriiginal article?''' Either way, I believe you have been less than helpful so far and not really acting in the spirit of openness, if you'll forgive the opinion. Please don't let your superior knowledge of how Wikipedia works blind your judgement of what is fair and correct.