User talk:Robertinventor/Archive 1

Image copyright problem with Image:Hexany.png
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fixed Robertinventor (talk) 00:20, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

"orphan"
I see that you recently created the article titled hexany and then someone put an "orphan" tag on it. That means that very few other articles link to it. Generally it's a good idea when creating a new article to figure out which existing articles ought to link to it and to put the links there. In this case, I notice you've named three composers about whom there are Wikipedia articles. It may be a good idea to figure out where in those articles one could put links to hexany, and similarly in musical tuning and musical scale. Michael Hardy (talk) 23:12, 8 February 2008 (UTC)

I've done as you advised, thanks, Robertinventor (talk) 23:34, 11 February 2008 (UTC)

AfD nomination of Hexany
I have nominated Hexany, an article you created, for deletion. I do not feel that this article satisfies Wikipedia's criteria for inclusion, and have explained why at Articles for deletion/Hexany. Your opinions on the matter are welcome at that same discussion page; also, you are welcome to edit the article to address these concerns. Thank you for your time. uɐɔlnʌɟoʞǝɹɐs 19:13, 11 February 2008 (UTC)

I've edited it to remove the hexany phrase transformations section, hope this helps, it's the only part that I think perhaps could count as original research, not by me, but possibly by Gene Ward Smith.

link syntax on your personal website
For me (using Firefox), at least, the links at the top of your home page go nowhere, because they have a backslash where a slash belongs. It would be simpler to replace "..\cubeetc/index.htm" with "/cubetc/" anyway: beginning the address with a slash takes it back to the site's top level, which is better for a template because that way it can be used at deeper levels of the tree without changes; and omitting "index.htm" protects you against the possibility that you might someday have "index.php" instead. —Tamfang (talk) 19:22, 16 February 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for alerting me to this! Hopefully it is fixed now. Robert Walker (talk) 02:28, 18 February 2008 (UTC)

Your recent edits
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Contributions to Carbon cycle
Hi Robert, I see that you've been working a bit on the Geological carbon cycle section of Carbon cycle. First of all thanks a bunch - I've been doing some major revision over the course of the last month and am thankful for the contributions. I've been working over the page from top to bottom and am about to arrive at the geological section, so I wanted to give a heads up that I'll be doing some copyediting. I'll try to leave all previous goodies in there and add some additional ones as well :)

In this first pass I'll basically be doing style edits, then I'll be working on the ocean sub-site for a week or two, maybe more. In the end though I should be coming back with some more sources, etc. My problem, though, is that I'm a geographer, not a geologist, and although I do have some good articles on the geological carbon cycle I wouldn't call myself an expert. That's also the reason I won't be making a subpage for that section like I have for the other sections. Any suggestions/sources/etc.? Otherwise feel free to be bold like you have been thus far and continue editing it on your own - I just didn't want to step on your toes by modifying fresh edits.

Daniel Lee (talk) 15:20, 24 June 2012 (UTC)


 * Hi Daniel
 * Glad you find my edit useful. The thing is I'm a mathematician myself. I have a keen interest in Astronomy and have read up much around the subject for most of my life, so I've come across the geological carbon cycle in that context, e.g. comparisions of Venus and Earth, why Venus is so different when they started similar, because of its runaway greenhouse effect. So, knew enough to make a "stub" type article, and looked up details to fill in gaps in my understanding, especially about how the limestone forms in seas on the Earth. But I'm no geologist unfortunately. What I wrote there is probably about as much as I should do. For the details you want, it needs someone with more knowledge about it. Sorry about that. Anyway so don't worry about stepping on my toes! Thanks again.Robert Walker (talk)


 * Hi Daniel, saw your reworking of the long term geological carbon cycle, interesting to read about the Kerogens. Anyway just a quick note, I was under the impression that Limestone is the major carbon sink, so just now went to check it up with a google search. According to this NASA page, it's 80% Limestone and 20% organic for the long term sink. Also looks like a good article and being a NASA page expect it to be reliable: http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Features/CarbonCycle/page2.php I know it repeats the Oceans section and so it might need thought about how to link them together, but I think probably limestone has to be mentioned in the long term section if it is the main sink as that page says - anyway leave it to you as I've said not knowledgeable about it myself. So can't add anything over what you see on that page or any other primary sources you consult. Good article anyway, described it all really clearly.


 * Hi Robert, you're absolutely right. In fact, I've already sited exactly that site in that paragraph as well. I kind of edited that in a rush and was under the impression that I'd mentioned sedimentation as an important process. I didn't want to go into into sedimentation of shells from sea organisms because that's covered in the ocean section. However, as you correctly note, limestone and its derivatives are very important sinks for organic carbon. Upon reading the section again, I also think it needs to be explained more clearly. I've edited the page accordingly. Does the new version seem more clear to you too? Thanks a bunch for the tip! — Preceding unsigned comment added by Erget2005 (talk • contribs) 06:12, 26 June 2012 (UTC)


 * Hi Daniel, yes that looks great now, accurate to the best of my knowledge, which isn't very much :). Reads well too. Robert Walker (talk)

Edit summaries
Thank you for your contributions to Wikipedia. Please make sure to include an edit summary. Please provide one before saving your changes to an article, as the summaries are quite helpful to people browsing an article's history. Thanks! Hyacinth (talk) 03:50, 5 November 2012 (UTC)


 * Sorry about that. I do try to do them usually but sometimes I forget. Also many of my edits are minor edits, e.g. fixing formatting errors or whatever, and I need to remember to mark those as minor edits. Will pay more attention to this in the future. BTW last night I got called away after clicking the "save changes" button and before the page came up - sorry for leaving it in a mess as I saw when I looked at the page in my browser this morning - and thanks for fixing it. Robert Walker (talk) 11:09, 5 November 2012 (UTC)

Second order logic
Please note that the article second order logic uses parenthetical citations. So if you add a new reference, you should put it in the references section and then add a parenthetical comment to any specific sentence. But the ref you tried to add is already in the references section, and the sentence you added it to already has an inline citation to it! The footnotes in the article are just for side comments, not for bibliographic details. &mdash; Carl (CBM · talk) 01:32, 12 November 2012 (UTC)


 * Oh sorry didn't understand. Makes sense now. Though it would be useful if you could just click to jump to the citation, I wonder if there is any way to do that - to turn the parenthetical citation into a link that takes you to the bottom of the page just like a footnote does?


 * Yes, it is possible to make them clickable, as you saw. It can also be done with the existing citation templates. There is one subtlety about parenthetical references. When the entire reference is parenthetical, it looks like this:
 * The sky is blue (Smith 1995).
 * But when the author's name is part of the sentence, it should look like this:
 * Smith (1995) says that the sky is blue.
 * AMSRefs also has different commands to handle these different uses in LaTex. Some math authors write things like
 * According to [1], the sky is blue
 * but that is usually avoidable and is not what style guides would recommend. &mdash; Carl (CBM · talk) 02:22, 12 November 2012 (UTC)


 * I have found from experience that the "harv" template is flaky and it works better to just use a direct link and add a "ref" field to the cite template. &mdash; Carl (CBM · talk) 02:24, 12 November 2012 (UTC)

FYI, the documentation is at Template:Harv. Tijfo098 (talk) 02:30, 12 November 2012 (UTC)


 * Okay thanks that all makes sense. Anyway that works fine the way you did it. Makes it much clearer too. I'm familiar with that style of course, but somehow perhaps because used to clicking on footnotes in wikipedia must have just ignored it when I read the page.

Disambiguation link notification for December 19
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Wikipedian in Residence at the National Library of Scotland
I'm just dropping you a quick note about a new Wikipedian in Residence job that's opened up at the National Library of Scotland. There're more details at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Scotland. Richard Symonds (WMUK) (talk) 15:01, 22 April 2013 (UTC)

Proposed deletion of International Committee Against Mars Sample Return
Hello, Robertinventor. I wanted to let you know that I’m proposing an article that you started, International Committee Against Mars Sample Return, for deletion because I don't think it meets our criteria for inclusion. If you don't want the article deleted:


 * 1) edit the page
 * 2) remove the text that looks like this:
 * 3) save the page

Also, be sure to explain why you think the article should be kept in your edit summary or on the article's talk page. If you don't do so, it may be deleted later anyway.

You can leave a note on my talk page if you have questions.  DGG ( talk ) 00:33, 23 May 2013 (UTC)


 * Have removed the notice and added a note to the talk page about reason why I think it is noteworthy enough for inclusion in wikipedia and inviting discussion about it.

A better citation format for large quotations included in citations
Hi Robert. Per our discussion on the Talk page of the Talk:Mars sample return mission a few days back, I have provided two examples of what I think is a better citation format for cleaning all those up. See what you think, and give it a try yourself. Cheers. N2e (talk) 17:23, 23 May 2013 (UTC) N2e (talk) 17:23, 23 May 2013 (UTC)


 * What you added there Robert looks very good. N2e (talk) 20:55, 23 May 2013 (UTC)

June 2013
You currently appear to be engaged in an edit war&#32; according to the reverts you have made on Concerns for an early Mars sample return. Users are expected to collaborate with others, to avoid editing disruptively, and to try to reach a consensus rather than repeatedly undoing other users' edits once it is known that there is a disagreement. Please be particularly aware, Wikipedia's policy on edit warring states: If you find yourself in an editing dispute, use the article's talk page to discuss controversial changes; work towards a version that represents consensus among editors. You can post a request for help at an appropriate noticeboard or seek dispute resolution. In some cases it may be appropriate to request temporary page protection. If you engage in an edit war, you may be blocked from editing. Based on this diff, you may not realize that the three-revert rule is a limit'', not an entitlement. Sanctions including blocks can be levied even if you are in technical compliance of the 3RR.'' VQuakr (talk) 20:04, 3 June 2013 (UTC)
 * 1) Edit warring is disruptive regardless of how many reverts you have made; that is to say, editors are not automatically "entitled" to three reverts.
 * 2) Do not edit war even if you believe you are right.


 * Okay sorry I misunderstood. Anyway, I stopped edit warring immediately when I realised I was in an edit war, don't think I did 3 reverts (but not totally sure).


 * Am trying to resolve it, have done so for over a week on the talk page but not working too well though with progess in some ways. Asked for third party opinion but not had anyone step in yet to help resolve it, will see what happens. Thanks. Robert Walker (talk) 20:19, 3 June 2013 (UTC)


 * Re-reading what you say above I see I could have asked for a temporary page protection to force Warren to discuss his bold edit on the talk page rather than continue editing the main page. I didn't know about that. It would have made the whole thing a lot simpler. Robert Walker (talk) 07:53, 4 June 2013 (UTC)

Hello, I'm BracketBot. I have automatically detected that [//en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?diff=560348823 your edit] to Concerns for an early Mars sample return may have broken the syntax by modifying 1 "<>"s. If you have, don't worry, just [ edit the page] again to fix it. If I misunderstood what happened, or if you have any questions, you can leave a message on [//en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?action=edit&preload=User:A930913/BBpreload&editintro=User:A930913/BBeditintro&minor=&title=User_talk:A930913&preloadtitle=BracketBot%20-%20&section=new my operator's talk page].
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Thanks, BracketBot (talk) 20:50, 17 June 2013 (UTC)
 * to be practical ... Thus, objectives that might require high latitudes, high elevations, deep ( 2 m) drilling, and large sample masses, for example, were given lower priority. The intent was not
 * Findings	from:	“Exploration	Telerobotics	Symposium” May	2-3,	2012	NASA	Goddard	Space	Flight	Center

Hello, I'm BracketBot. I have automatically detected that [//en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?diff=560348926 your edit] to Concerns for an early Mars sample return may have broken the syntax by modifying 1 "<>"s. If you have, don't worry, just [ edit the page] again to fix it. If I misunderstood what happened, or if you have any questions, you can leave a message on [//en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?action=edit&preload=User:A930913/BBpreload&editintro=User:A930913/BBeditintro&minor=&title=User_talk:A930913&preloadtitle=BracketBot%20-%20&section=new my operator's talk page].
 * List of unpaired brackets remaining on the page:

Thanks, BracketBot (talk) 20:51, 17 June 2013 (UTC)
 * to be practical ... Thus, objectives that might require high latitudes, high elevations, deep ( 2 m) drilling, and large sample masses, for example, were given lower priority. The intent was not
 * Findings	from:	“Exploration	Telerobotics	Symposium” May	2-3,	2012	NASA	Goddard	Space	Flight	Center

Hello, I'm BracketBot. I have automatically detected that [//en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?diff=560649574 your edit] to Concerns for an early Mars sample return may have broken the syntax by modifying 1 "[]"s. If you have, don't worry, just [ edit the page] again to fix it. If I misunderstood what happened, or if you have any questions, you can leave a message on [//en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?action=edit&preload=User:A930913/BBpreload&editintro=User:A930913/BBeditintro&minor=&title=User_talk:A930913&preloadtitle=BracketBot%20-%20&section=new my operator's talk page]. Thanks, BracketBot (talk) 19:40, 19 June 2013 (UTC)

Edit summaries
Can you please consider using edit summaries for both your talk page and article space edits? They help others follow along in conversations, particularly when seeing the edits in a history window or watchlist. Thanks! VQuakr (talk) 07:15, 4 June 2013 (UTC)


 * Sorry. I do it sometimes but then forget. Will do my best. Part of it is that I occasionally have lost text and so tend to save a post when I am half way through writing it when it would be better to use preview. It is a habit really rather than needed any more, as it is a fair while since I lost text in that way so if I use preview more that should help. Robert Walker (talk) 07:50, 4 June 2013 (UTC)

Notice of Neutral point of view noticeboard discussion
Hello, Robertinventor. This message is being sent to inform you that there currently is a discussion at Neutral point of view/Noticeboard regarding an issue with which you may have been involved. The thread is Concerns for an early Mars sample return. Thank you. VQuakr (talk) 03:42, 5 June 2013 (UTC)

Nomination of Concerns for an early Mars sample return for deletion
A discussion is taking place as to whether the article ARTICLE NAME is suitable for inclusion in Wikipedia according to Wikipedia's policies and guidelines or whether it should be deleted.

The article will be discussed at Articles for deletion/Concerns for an early Mars sample return until a consensus is reached, and anyone is welcome to contribute to the discussion. The nomination will explain the policies and guidelines which are of concern. The discussion focuses on high-quality evidence and our policies and guidelines.

Users may edit the article during the discussion, including to improve the article to address concerns raised in the discussion. However, do not remove the article-for-deletion notice from the top of the article. Warren Platts (talk) 21:27, 16 June 2013 (UTC)

Please do not replace article content with a fork from your user space
As I noted twice earlier on the talk page, forking an article into your user space and then later copying over "your version" into an article is not permissible. Your edit in article space that did this has been reverted; please do not do it again. Thanks! VQuakr (talk) 02:24, 17 June 2013 (UTC)


 * VQuakr but the policy you linked to before is not permissible was just about making sure you keep the chain of attribution. It is normal enough to work on things in your user space and copy back. Most often a single section but no reason you can't do it for an entire article if necessary, most likely, to avoid disruption of the main article while you try out a major re-organization of the material in your user space that will take some time. But that shows it can't be a blanket ban.


 * No-one else worked on it in between, just me.


 * Anyway I have now reverted it to its state before Warren's edits, and this surely is permitted. Since he is the one proposing deletion of his own article, I don't see how he has a leg to stand on if he objects to me editing it. Robert Walker (talk) 06:29, 17 June 2013 (UTC)


 * Here is what the policy says on COPYWITHIN " If a user wishes to copy all or part of an article to work on in userspace, he or she should use an edit summary like creating page with content copied from revision 123456789 of article title." - which surely acknowledges that it is standard practise to work on all or part of an article in your user space for a while before copying it back. Do you not agree? Robert Walker (talk) 21:44, 17 June 2013 (UTC)

Re your question on the AfD
In response to your question here - don't worry about it. The closing admin is not going to be confused by a bolded word; AfD closures are more complex than a simple vote tally. VQuakr (talk) 08:06, 18 June 2013 (UTC)


 * Okay, thanks! Robert Walker (talk) 08:17, 18 June 2013 (UTC)

Brevity
So... there is this. And the talk page - half a meg of plain text, much of it written by you. I know I have mentioned to you before that you need to make more effort to be concise, to write a better article as described in the essay WP:TERSE and to communicate effectively as described at the essay WP:BECONCISE. At this point, I am seriously concerned that brevity is simply something that is outside of your skill set -- and unfortunately, it is a skill that is critical both to encyclopedic writing and to collaborative writing. At some point, WP:COMPETENCE becomes relevant.

Please consider ways you can dramatically improve the brevity of your writing and discussion. Thanks for your consideration, and I hope I do not come off too harsh (survival of the messenger and all that). VQuakr (talk) 03:22, 22 June 2013 (UTC)


 * Okay, first do appreciate you saying this and of course won't take it as a personal thing on your part. As regards the article, much of it is quotation, or extended paraphrase, and much of that is because Warren keeps challenging my interpretations in the paraphrases, so I have to expand them and give more details, and present many minor details from the original papers in order to answer his challenges and show that what I say in the article is accurate.


 * Please see this suggestion here, to put most of this material into footnotes for now: Talk:Concerns_for_an_early_Mars_sample_return


 * I can write with reasonable brevity and accuracy as well, and have been complemented on my writing style, that's the main reason I got given a column on science20.


 * The thing is, when you have such sustained criticism of everything you write, as you write it, you end up having to put lots of material inline in the article itself to answer those criticisms, that's why it gets so long. Robert Walker (talk) 08:46, 22 June 2013 (UTC)


 * It is the same also on the talk page, I can talk with reasonable brevity, and function normally in on-line conversations and wikipedia talk page discussions, except in my conversations with Warren and BatteryIncluded (BatteryIncluded engaged me in a similarly toned discussion in the life on Mars and water on Mars talk pages with many insults hurled at me to the extent that on the life on Mars talk page, another editor stepped in and asked him to show restraint in his insults as also happened here with Warren).


 * With his criticism so sustained and extreme, I feel I have to give lots of details for every reply,, because if I don't he comes down like a ton of bricks on some tiny detail I left out. He does that anyway but more so for my shorter replies, somewhat less so for the longer ones except of course for complaints of length. If the replies are too short he almost always finds something wrong with them. If too long he complains about the length of the reply. You can't win. Robert Walker (talk) 08:52, 22 June 2013 (UTC)


 * Hey Robert, I concur with VQuakr. I've tried to help a few times in the online debate you've been having with the other editor; but I simply don't have the time to read and parse all that has been said.  I do suggest more brevity, especially in Talk page discussions.  It will help the other editors who get involved have a shot at understanding your argument, and will therefore give you a possibility of gaining support from other editors.  N2e (talk) 12:15, 22 June 2013 (UTC)


 * Okay N2e will do. I think the best solution actually for brevity is simply not to answer many of Warren's crticisms and let him have the last word when e.g. he accuses me of lying and cherry picking etc, so will try that and keep to the point in my replies and not get distracted by his criticisms of me personally, or my motivations, or wider issues not to do with the article. Robert Walker (talk) 12:41, 22 June 2013 (UTC)


 * Yes, that seems wise. I have warned Warren once for uncivil comments, and that was for just one thing I saw in one part of the vast corpus of your and his "dialogue" over recent weeks.  If you write less, but still be willing to be open and honest, I'm guessing that other editors may be able to spot incidents of uncivil or not assuming good faith behavior more easily.  Cheers.  N2e (talk) 05:12, 23 June 2013 (UTC)


 * Okay. Will just stop any conversation when it reaches the point where his reply is "uncivil" There are several conversations I have let stop since making the decision to do that, and he has the last word on them, things like "All you're doing is proving that you are recalcitrant " and "Figure it out Robert. This is a test" and several others like that.


 * I haven't been strict about it as I answered one now where he said "What a bunch of baloney. You just cannot help but twist things". Plus another where he says "Maybe you should stick to your areas of expertise--like microtonal music" where it is pretty certain from the context he meant it as an insult, I replied to that but probably shouldn't have - but perhaps I should take those types of reply as an indication not to answer - then will be obvious to others reading the discussion how often he makes these remarks. Robert Walker (talk) 06:04, 23 June 2013 (UTC)

WP:CANVAS
Just to say I have naturally mentioned this article and my frustrations to my friends on facebook who include astronomers, astrobiologists and scientists. But I have asked those who are wikipedians not to intervene on the debate as per WP:CANVAS - is just to talk about my frustrations with them and for sympathy. Robert Walker (talk) 08:25, 23 June 2013 (UTC)

I have removed all the Mars Sample Return pages from my watch list
If anyone wants to talk to me about it any more please notify me here, as I have removed them from my watch list.

I feel I have nothing to contribute to the topic, since the AfD decision to ignore everything except Zubrin's views, including even the official NASA / ESA / PPO views on the matter.

It is time to get on with my life. I feel I have loads I can contribute on this topic, but can't contribute anything about it to wikipedia, not for as long as this current policy on MSR and contamination issues prevails.

I don't want be drawn into more debates with the opposing editor. I feel is hopeless for a single editor to contest his passionate editing in support of a "mainstream view" which closely aligns with Robert Zubrin's minority single author POV.

Instead I will find other outlets for my work.

However if another editor feels strongly about this too, and has got involved in a similar edit war, and wants a bit of moral support - do let me know!

I would come back right away with the support of other editors knowledgeable about the NASA / ESA / PPO studies who wish for more accurate treatment e.g. of the NRC and ESF studies.

I would be really keen to return to help an editor keen to cover it more fully with minority views as well (on all sides of the debate) in an accurate way. AfDs can be overturned if a new article is submitted which is substantially different from the one deleted.

It would only need two editors interested in presenting a more diverse picture to turn that all around.

A 2:1 or 2:2 edit war I think would be enough to force dispute resolution of the issues. But a 1:1 edit war with an editor who continues to do bold edits and won't stop to discuss and who hurls insults at you all the time and just keeps at it until he wins the war is impossible to do anything about, I would say from my experience of one here. Robert Walker (talk) 23:45, 26 June 2013 (UTC)

Advocacy of Zubrin's views in the current version of the Mars Sample Return article
By neglecting mention of all other views on the matter, except the ICAMSR which is portrayed as putting forward an eccentric view of their own not held by anyone else, and misrepresenting the official reports, then the current article amounts to advocacy of something close to Zubrin's view. So who is it who is the advocate here?

For the wikipedia NPOV about writing for different POVs see the wikipedia article on "writing for the enemy". I did quite a bit of this in my version of the article, now deleted, see Concerns for an early Mars sample return.

For wikipedia, my wish is just to have the official POV of the PPO accurately represented along with adequate treatment of the many interesting minority views.

In my article on concerns about an early Mars sample return, I went to a lot of work to find out about Zubrin's views to add a section on him (hard to find but eventually I tracked down a transcript of an interview with him where he stated his views, also tracked down an article he wrote but sadly it is not available online and wanted to buy a copy but haven't managed that either). My section on Zubrin's view about back contamination risks of a MSR and his view Robert Zubrin's view that there is no need for a MSR before human colonization of Mars I would say more but found hardly any published material by him or about his views on these matters, and nothing at all by any other authors with his view that the environmental risks of BC have no scientific validity.

The way this section is now written it is no more than an advocacy argument for an unsourced POV that the risk of back contamination can be safely ignored if you take a few simple precautions. Of all the papers and other material I researched for the article, it is closest to Zubrin's attitude though Zubrin goes a bit further and says that the back contamination risk is scientifically invalid. I didn't come across anyone that published the stated view as given in the current version of the MSR page.

That's why I have given up. I can of course present Zubrin's POV and did so in my article. But there is no way can I contribute to the topic when the entire section is written within such a framework. Robert Walker (talk) 12:12, 27 June 2013 (UTC)

Am willing to try again if anyone else wants to join in to help create a more balanced approach
I am willing to try again if anyone else wants to join in - e.g. anyone who works for the PPO or perhaps a COSPAR representative - there are more than a thousand of them world wide, so perhaps some of you edit wikipedia? Must also be many who took part in the official NRC and ESF studies. Perhaps some of you who helped with these studies or contributed to them indirectly, may also be wikipedians?

Also in my experience many microbiologists and astrobiologists consider that it is wise to proceed with great caution in a situation that might bring unstudied and not yet directly observed alien micro-organisms from Mars back to Earth.

With even 2 editors working on the topic then it would be a different situation from a single editor. One editor with a single passionate opponent I have discovered is helpless in wikipedia. But two editors would not face the same problem and could force dispute resolution and prevent an AfD from immediately deleting your work. An article deleted in an AfD can be normally be recreated if it is substantially changed, enough to challenge the AfD decision on the grounds that it was a decision about a different article.

Also, whether or not some extensive article on this topic can be created, for sure the current section in the MSR article can definitely be challenged and changed - it just needs one other editor to join in the challenge. I will return if someone else wants to give this a go and needs some support from another editor. Robert Walker (talk) 12:53, 27 June 2013 (UTC)

My own POV (not published in a citable source)
My views differ from those of the ICAMSR and also from the official mainstream view. It actually shares some elements with Zubrin's approach to MSR as well (though of course with different end goals).

None of my views were presented in my version of the wikipedia article which got deleted.

I wouldn't dream of using wikipedia for advocacy.

Actually I am not a member of ICAMSR and haven't signed their petition or encouraged anyone else to do so. Just saying that because the opposing editor has repeatedly implied that I am and can't seem to take a No as an answer to this. It is really frustrating to be told repeatedly that you are a member of an organization when you don't belong to it and have said frequently that you don't belong to it. There is nothing at all wrong with someone choosing to belong to it, but it so happens that I do not.

But that is beside the point. You can be an advocate of a POV and still write for wikipedia, either to make sure your own POV is represented or indeed for all POVs if you master the art of "writing for the opponent". I wrote many sections in that way presenting POVs such as Zubrin's without comment written as he would write it, using quotes or his own words, "writing for the opponent".

I have been completely professional throughout in my editing of wikipedia and of this article.

In the article that was deleted, I declared my POV at the start as you can see on the discussion that still remains on the MSR talk page. I asked other editors to help me with dealing with any bias that might creep into the article such as favouring one POV over another.

The article gave extensive treatment of the official view indeed by word count this was by far the main part of the article (unusually for a criticism type page) and it gave full treatment to all the POVs on the debate.

It all goes to show you can do everything right and yet have your work destroyed within a few weeks by a single vocal wikipedian who shouts loudly and ignores most of the wikipedia guidelines on etiquette.

The one thing I have learnt from this is that if you want to write an article for wikipedia that you think might get opposed in this way, be sure to find someone else to collaborate with first and not try to face it on your own. If you do, you simply don't stand a chance against someone sufficiently determined to destroy what you did. Robert Walker (talk) 21:33, 27 June 2013 (UTC)

Recommendation, new article on the Present-Day Habitability of Mars
I highly recommend that Wikipedia should have an article on this subject.

This is the conference on the subject "The Present-Day Habitability of Mars 2013".

There are many papers on it every year by researchers in the US, UK, and Germany, and including scientists from JPL, DLR in Germany, and the NASA Ames Research Center. It has been a major subject in the literature since 2008 and undoubtedly passes WP:NOTABLE.

Paige is planning to create a new journal solely devoted to this subject. See UCLA holds Mars habitability conference:

If another editor feels as strongly as I do that creation of this new page is a good idea, please let me know here.

I am certain that it would be immediately subject to edit warring and probably an immdediate AfD. But it is clearly notable and with two editors in support of its creation then can't imagine that this opposition could stand up for long. On my own I don't think I have a chance.

The material here could be a basis for the new article: User:Robertinventor/possibility of Mars having enough water to support life Robert Walker (talk) 13:47, 27 June 2013 (UTC)

I have also posted about it to Talk:Water on Mars

You can see what we would be up against by the reply to the suggestion there. BTW this is not an attempt to recruit "meat puppets". "Meat puppets" are people outside of wikipedia which you ask to help you win a debate in wikipedia, such as an AfD.

What I am asking here is for collaborators to help with creation of an article. That is permitted. Robert Walker (talk) 22:09, 27 June 2013 (UTC)

Note, in view of Warren's actions today, and with him also weighing in against me on the proposal to create this article, I am sure that the article would be immediately subject to an all out edit war with him and BatteryIncluded together. Though you can't delete an article without an AfD he would probably rewrite the whole thing to his liking, making sure that it is stated clearly that present day life on the surface of Mars is impossible and revert any edits that suggest that it is possible, no matter how well cited. Whether that can be dealt with even with two editors collaborating on the project I'm not entirely sure, especially with two editors opposing it. Robert Walker (talk) 02:13, 28 June 2013 (UTC)

Contamination Concerns section - how it came about as a response to a request to restore balance to an article perceived by other editors as imbalanced
Backup of a section on the Manned mission to Mars talk page

I first came across this section in the Manned mission to Mars article as a short stub "Concerns" section with a request for a knowledgeable editor to expand it to help eliminate a perceived bias of the page in favour of human missions to the surface of Mars. See Criticism.

In response, I expended it and eventually created the Manned mission to Mars Contamination Concerns, and Telerobotics with a link to the Concerns section of the Colonization of Mars page which I also slightly expanded with a couple of paragraphs. This edit was welcomed by all other editors at the time, and other editors of this page such as Fatherred and others contributed to it with discussion and minor edits.

There was a bit more discussion here Neutral POV.

Then later This article is more of an essay has a discussion of a suggestion to trim down this article.

As you see I planned to do that after first moving some of the content to other relevant sections of wikipedia.

I started on this process, but have had to stop as all the material I wrote is now deleted (most of it with no discussion first) including this original section.

This other content has for the most part now been deleted by Warren Platts and BatteryIncluded, and they will re-delete it if I attempt to recreate it. My original contribution on contamination concerns to Manned mission to Mars has been deleted in its entirety too. So there is nothing left of my work on this topic except for the backups of all this material in my user space.

For a list of all my material from the Wikipedia Mars Project deleted by Warren Platts and BatteryIncluded deleted see Other sections deleted by the opposing editor

Details follow of what remains in wikipedia and of the bias in what remains - expand if you want to see more

All that remains of forward contamination risks for Mars in wikipedia, to my knowledge, is the mention of the Mars specific sub categories of category IV in the Planetary protection article. Since I was the editor who contributed that section, I wouldn't be totally surprised if he removes it too, but whether or not, obviously that doesn't count as adequate coverage for Project Mars.

Outside of this brief mention in the Planetary protection article, there is now no mention of forward contamination concerns for Mars in wikipedia, as far as I know.


 * Just discovered a short section on forward contamination in Life on Mars. So that still exists at least at present. I did not write it and didn't know of its existence until today. Robert Walker (talk) 11:54, 28 June 2013 (UTC)

Backward contamination concerns are now only covered in the description of Category V in the Planetary protection article, a short biased section in the Mars sample return mission page, and a short page on the ICAMSR.

The ICAMSR is a small advocacy group of scientists at the far end of the spectrum on back contamination issues. They were inspired by Carl Sagan, who was deeply concerned about Mars contamination issues. It is opposed to any Mars sample return which is carried out before in situ studies and biohazard testing outside of Earth.

For the bias in the Back Contamination section of the Mars sample return mission page, see The flaws with the current MSR section on BC.

The result now is an imbalance not just of this page but of all the material in the Wikipedia Project Mars. But after spending probably a full working week of my time attempting to save the material on back contamination issues of Mars I know how impossible it is for me to do anything about it in response to the determined opposition of these other editors, and so have given up on any attempt to edit the Wikipedia project on Mars to give it balance on concerns with issues of human missions to Mars.

For more about this see: Other sections deleted by the opposing editor.

For the reasons mentioned there I will not attempt to contest these edits. Just registering my protest to this final bold edit removing just about all that remains of content in Mars Project about Mars contamination issues. All the deleted content is the subject of much publication and it was all well cited with numerous inline citations to notable sources.

For the other sections of the Wikipedia Mars Project he deleted see

'In my view these actions amount to censorship. See What Wikipedia is not'

See also: Educate those who want to censor Wikipedia Robert Walker (talk) 11:58, 28 June 2013 (UTC)

Timeline
The project to trim the Manned mission to Mars contamination section by moving and merging relevant content to other parts of wikipedia went well at first, with new material updating the Water on Mars section on possibility of surface habitats to support life, and the new back contamination section of the Mars sample return mission. But then it all went wrong with the opposition of these editors. I will collapse this, expand it if you want to read the details:

I then was told that my section of the Mars sample return mission was too long and the result of the discussion on that page was that I should have a short summary there and a separate article. That also went well with the other editors saying they liked the new article.

But then BatteryIncluded disputed a brief mention of habitability of surface of Mars in the Life on Mars page, and that ended with deletion of the section there and Battery included also deleted the material in the Water on Mars section (which I only contributed a couple of sections to) and replaced it with a new section saying that the Mars surface is uninhabitable based on pre 2008 research when it was believed that any life on the surface of Mars would be dormant and destroyed by cosmic radiation.

About the same time, Warren Platts did a series of bold edits to remove most of the content of the new Concerns for an early Mars sample return page, and then finally did an AfD on what was left.

I restored my original edit for the AfD, and worked really hard on the article to eliminate the slightest trace of bias, this took ages, also checking all the refs. But the result of the AfD (with Warren Platts and BatteryIncluded as two strong voices opposing me and just one keep in my favour, then some other votes against) was to delete it and to replace the section on Mars sample return with his very biased section which omits almost all concerns even of the offficial policy documents and studies.

Then finally came this last wholesale deletion of all the material so now there is nothing left of any of this material on wikipedia.

In view of what happened to date I have no hope of restoring it. My energies are better spent on other projects where I am a welcome participant.

I would return to Wikipedia Project Mars as part of a collaboration with another editor. It was trying to face all this almost on my own with no major collaborator that made it so impossible for me. Robert Walker (talk) 12:10, 28 June 2013 (UTC)

Other sections deleted by the opposing editor
This editor is on a personal campaign to remove all my contributions from the Mars section of wikipedia - including removing whole sections I contributed to. I have backed them up to my user space.

He said on the Mars sample return talk page that this is his plan:

So far he has deleted:
 * Contamination concerns and human telerobotics sections from Manned mission to Mars
 * Update: another editor restored the telerobotics section. The section on Contamination Concerns remains deleted.
 * Update 2 telerobotics section now removed again, leaving only a brief stub mention of some of the mission plans as a possible precursor to a human landing. Contamination issues mentioned in a single sentence treating it as a minor issue Robert Walker (talk) 08:19, 29 June 2013 (UTC)


 * Part of old concerns section from Colonization of Mars - I contributed a couple of paras to this which he has already removed, and he says on the talk page that he wants to remove the entire section. Now has no mention of contamination concerns
 * He won the AfD to delete this article here:  Concerns for an early Mars sample return. Warren Platts and BatteryIncluded were the two most emphatic proponents of delete and merge in this  AfD.
 * He has deleted my contribution on back contamination to Mars sample return, and replaced it with an inaccurate version and removed the CN and WP:OPINION tags that I added to his new version of the section - for the issues with his new version see above.
 * Another editor (BatteryIncluded) deleted Other surface habitats with liquid water, suitable for life section of the Life on Mars (after a series of edits to add a paragraph that proved to his satisfaction that no habitat on the surface can be suitable for life).
 * BatteryIncluded has just archived the entire talk pages for Life on Mars and Water on Mars both of which had several open sections started by me disputing his revisions of these pages.
 * A week or two back, this same editor (BatteryIncluded) deleted possibility of Mars having enough water to support life from Water on Mars. I only contributed a couple of sections to this, most of the material was by other editors. He replaced it by a "Habitability Assessment" section that says that present day life on the surface of Mars is impossible, due to cosmic radiation. This is an old view from the time when it was thought that only dormant life was possible on the surface. His new section is counter to all the published research on this topic since the observation of possible drops of salty brine on the legs of the Phoenix lander in 2008. See  above for details.

Warren Platts and BatteryIncluded share a personal grudge against me which started about a month ago (for both of them) and involves repeated extremely OTT insults in almost every single post they make when they talk to me or talk about me on the talk pages.

It was probably some off wiki encounter with them both that sparked all this hostility. I know of one possible explanation of this nature, that Warren was involved in (though no-one by name of BatteryIncluded). It was a forum debate with about half a dozen opponents with the same propensity to insult me frequently and all opposed to my views.

I have never insulted either of them, and there is no reason at all for this behaviour to my knowledge except for my differing views on contamination issues, and my preference for telerobotic exploration of Mars by humans in orbit, rather than human landings on the surface of Mars.

The result of all this hostility is that clearly I am no longer permitted by these two editors to edit the Mars sections of wikipedia and I totally don't have the energy to try to fight against them, after the AfD which in total probably took up an entire working week of my time. I have much more productive ways to use my time than this :). Robert Walker (talk) 23:26, 27 June 2013 (UTC)

I have just reverted Warren Platts's bold removal of my material on the Manned mission to Mars section. I know what will happen, he will undo my revert as soon as he notices it. So this is by way of a token protest against his behaviour - permitted under BRD, so not yet edit warring. Robert Walker (talk) 00:22, 28 June 2013 (UTC)

It was immediately undone again as expected. No point in attempting discussion or dispute resolution. Historically this is the first section I wrote on this material in response to a request to restore a balanced POV on this page. The other deleted material came about in response to a discussion on the Manned mission to Mars talk page where the outcome of the discussion was that I should look into options to move some of that material to other sections of wikipedia on Mars. See next section here for more about that. Robert Walker (talk) 03:14, 28 June 2013 (UTC)

Your Post to Help Desk
You pointed out a problem at the Help Desk, which is that Warren Platts does indeed appear to be asserting ownership of the Mars Project. However, the quotes of personal attacks were not backed up with diffs, and I can't locate them. If I can locate the personal attacks, we can act on them, whether you continue taking part in Mars or not. There are other editors who are also concerned about his efforts to own the Mars Project. Please provide diffs of the attacks. Otherwise I will have to assume that you wasted the time of the Help Desk tediously. Please provide the diffs. Robert McClenon (talk) 19:02, 29 June 2013 (UTC)


 * I provided the urls to the pages, tried to do diffs but there was too much history to go through. Did those help? I am sorry to have wasted your time. Will help if you think it will help others although am pretty sure I will leave this project for at least a fair while now.Robert Walker (talk) 19:10, 29 June 2013 (UTC)


 * More quotes below

First just repeating the ones from the help desk:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Manned_mission_to_Mars/Archive_1#Contamination_Concerns_section_-_size_and_balance

You need to expand the section - he collapsed my first comment in this section - and then they did another collapse on top of that But you should find this quote there:


 * "Bring it on sir. I'm all for it. Only one condition though: if it goes against you, you promise to go away from the WP:MARS project and never come back, OK?"

This is the other one:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Mars_sample_return_mission#Bias_of_section_on_back_contamination


 * "Your strategic displays of incompetence aren't going to fly this time; I am not going to give you the benefit of the doubt and chalk up your comment to your ignorance. You are intentionally spreading disinformation on the Wikipedia. You will not be allowed to continue."

These are all from: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Concerns_for_an_early_Mars_sample_return#Okay_I_see_the_decision_was_delete_and_merge

Too many edits to do via diffs, but if you do a search of the page text for the text you should find them easily.

"Unbelievable. You must be out of your mind. "

"Every single study that was not extruded by ICAMSR! Who do you really think you're kidding?!?"

"What a bunch of baloney. You just cannot help but twist things. The prevailing view is that MSR is safe. OK, you are on record as refusing to compromise. Fine with me. Let the chips fall where they may"

"And nice cherrypicking of quotes taken out of context! As usual.... You are good at that."

"All you're doing is proving that you are recalcitrant and will actively resist any efforts by other editors to render this article into NPOV"

"Wow. Just wow. You just proved that you never took a geology class in your life, not even "Rocks for Jocks". Maybe you should stick to your areas of expertise--like microtonal music.... That's a very important subject Robert. You're time would be more productively spent on something you something about IMHO" (never explained what it was he thought I didn't understand)

"This seems to be a general editorial strategy of yours: sneak in biased info under the radar, as it were, while leaving out the material that doesn't support your editorial slant. And then only include the contradictory info when other people call you on it. You can read Robert. You know exactly what parts I'm talking about, but you won't include them unless and until someone until someone explicitly points them out." - I've no idea what that was about, and even after several requests to clarify, he never said

"I do not agree because you are literally leaving out figures that do not support your editorial slant/rant."

"See, I knew you would do that. This is your modus operandi. You cannot stand other people editing your WP:OWN articles. All you want from other editors is to do fact checking for you so you can go in and eliminate your stupid mistakes."

"The point is you are twisting Zubrin's words to support your editorial position t"

"But of course you KNOW that kuru disease is caused by prions. This is your way of sneaking in the implication that we also have to worry about Martian prions. A crazy idea that no one, not even ICAMSR mentions. More editorial slanting."

"More outright lies. No one recommends at least 12 years. Also you are inventing official views that do not exist. There are no official views about "a too early" MSR. That is your invention. You are good at that. So I think that handle of yours "Robert the Inventor" is quite appropriate."

"Shall we call it intentional misrepresentation instead? Your word twistage is intentional."

"You need help Robert"

"HAHAHA!! You crack me up Robert. You really cannot control yourself when it comes to cherrypicking."

"OMG... The truth is finally coming out. It's clear you truly don't have a clue about what you are talking about;"

"Well, at least you admit to cherrypicking quotes to support your editorial opinion. I guess that's progress.." - (I didn't say that)

" It is a word you coined for the purpose of your editorial rant"

"EVERYTHING you just said is word twistage and a gross mischaracterization of the literature."

"ou merely cherry pick items you think support your cause, embellish the hell out of them to make them scary, leading the unsuspecting reader by the nose to your smelly corner step by step to your conclusion that MSR will cause doomsday! It's a bunch of unredeemable editorial crap is what it is."

". I insist that you add a section on Doomsday phobias in "your" article that explores the POV that these so-called concerns are psychological in origin since they have no basis in real science."

"Yep, removing all of a page and replacing it w/ nonsense. That pretty much describes it"

"You said it was "unsourced". This is so blatantly false--as I am sure you must be aware if you are not crazy--it is absolutely ridiculous. Intentionally hurling false accusations (lies) is a form of ad hominem argumentation. It's a personal attack. An insult, in other words...."

"Um, yes, you have insulted me, numerous times, in your back-handed, passive-aggressive, condescending, ever so WP:civil POV pushing manner"

" On the 3rd party discussion page you misspelled my name so many times, it's very hard to believe that it was a coincidence; I'm sure a statistical analysis would show it was not a coincidence." - I think I'm slightly dislexic and told him so

""I do not try to get other people to join any organisation or to hold any kind of a view." I call BF on this: bad faith. It's either that or you need professional help to deal with a split personality in addition to your OCD, dyslexia, and doomsday phobia. It is obvious to everyone that you are on a mission to change hearts and minds. Now you want to use the Wikipedia as a vehicle to promote your fringe theory that we are all in potentially great danger because of MSR. Sorry, but your days of running amok here are over. I suggest you stick to music and leave the science to the experts."

Many more but that gives the idea.

The wikipedia editors and admins for WikiProject Mars clearly approve this censorship
See WikiProject Mars.

For the material I wrote which has now been deleted see

Clearly WikiProject Mars is not a place for an editor who wants to write about forward or backward contamination issues, or about the present day habitability of the surface of Mars.


 * a near total ban on any mention of contamination issues that might impact on human colonization of Mars. - a token sentence has been added to the Manned Mission to Mars section to show it is not a total ban, plus a short section in the MSR that totally plays down the issues and is full of inaccuracies.
 * a total ban on reports of the recent research on present day habitability of Mars.

The relevance there of course is that if the surface of Mars has microhabitats potentially habitable by micro-organisms then the forward contamination issues for human colonization are more severe. Indeed on current understanding, if these habitats are widespread, as some of the recent research suggests, I don't know how it can be possible at all unless or until you give up on your wish to study a pristine Mars.

It is not me that's being censored here. It is NASA, the ESA, the PPO, all those researching into the Present Day Habitability of Mars, and those who inspired the present day policies: Carl Sagan, Ledeberg, etc in the sense that any accurate statements of their views on this matter are now banned from wikipedia.

This censorship and ban is being carried out by a single user who is not an admin. There has been no banning notice or anything of that sort. It is simply a unilateral personal decision on his part.

Robert Walker (talk) 08:36, 29 June 2013 (UTC)


 * Realised - that perhaps calling it censorship is a bit too strong. You tend to get caught up in material you spent a lot of time researching into and think it is more important than it is. Call it instead, almost complete removal from wikipedia of three different topics (forward, and most of backward contamination and habitabilty of surface of Mars) that are the subject of a fair amount of research and many papers, studies and some books. But most people would consider them to be minor topics all the same. Robert Walker (talk) 19:15, 29 June 2013 (UTC)

Hello Robert Walker
Can I offer some friendly advice? My thought is that you get too excited by dwelling on the injustice done to you by other Wikipedians. This sort of mental excitement can prevent someone from making logical decisions and clearly considering what things are important and ought to be addressed. A first step in achieving a calm mind could be recognizing personal limits. One cannot always make things like Wikipedia articles conform to one's ideas of how they ought to be. If one does not calm one's mind and take a detached nonchalant attitude, and in a fury attempts to do important work, then the likely result is one harming one's own interest. Remember that on There is no deadline. Take a day or two to decide what is important. Edit less. Edit better. If one can make a convincing case for one's position, changing an article after a couple of days will be sufficient, and one wins the support of other editors. Read what other editors write. If there is a way to accommodate there concerns, try to do that. If they insist on being completely unreasonable, someone else will handle the situation eventually. Unreasonable editors do not last long on Wikipedia. It is better to have an article suffer from some other editor's unreasonable editing than to edit in anger and have one's own anger damage the article. Accept that although some other editors have done very good things that make Wikipedia interesting and helpful, some other editors write misleading articles and advocacy. Sometimes there is nothing one can do about it. Wikipedia is not perfect and never will be. I hope this helps. - Fartherred (talk) 22:26, 29 June 2013 (UTC)


 * Thanks yes those are all good points. Actually I've been discussing this over on reddit.com and someone there said he saw the previous version of the Manned mission to Mars as biased because he saw it as an advocacy piece convincing him of the need to use telepresence to explore Mars. Which I totally didnt intend but now that he puts it like that I can get what he is saying. Basically I added the telerobotics section partly because there was no mention of telerobotics, which fitted the topic of human missions to Mars, and also it followed on well from the previous section, and gave balance and meant that you end up with a positive message rather than just "anti mars colonization". But didn't realize, if you take into account the whole page and read it from the start, it reads like advocacy for telerobotics. Which is something that can of course be argued for or against with many different POVs.


 * So perhaps, long term, it can benefit from being re-organized and going through a phase as a human surface colonization advocacy page.


 * What you probably don't know is that I have been through an exhausting and very stressful edit war - well if you call it an edit war where Warren edited his version of my original article in the main space and refused to stop and discuss his bold edits - and I edited it in my own use space. Anyway so it ended in an AfD proposed by Warren, and my article was deleted. And that whole process played out over about a month now, with him repeatedly insulting me several times a day.


 * So anyway - yes good advice to go away from this for a few days. I probably should have done that a lot earlier and perhaps just let him win the edit war - and leave him with a drastically trimmed down and inaccurate article - but hardly anyone would read it anyway - and as you say, wikipedia isn't perfect. With hindsight that is probably what I should have done and the last few weeks would have been much more pleasant for all concerned.


 * Hopefully in the future I can learn to behave more like that and less like the way I have to date. And I am glad to see that there is a request for comments on the Manned mission to Mars page now. Perhaps once things calm down again I can think about contributing again, will see how it goes and will take a break. In fact plan to write some articles for science20.com based in part on the research I did for the wikipoedia pages here, already did the first, an opinion piece on mars sample return, next one is probably going to be about the habitability of surface of mars.


 * I know you are in favour of a coverage of concerns for manned missions to Mars surface and good that there is someone here who is. Indeed I think in the last month you are the first one I have seen on the talk pages I got involved with to speak up strongly in favour of including materials on concerns with human colonization here in Project Mars.


 * Thanks, it does help and thanks for taking the time to talk to me in this way, I appreciate it. I will do what I can to calm down and get on with things that I find less stressful and to get it all more in perspective. Robert Walker (talk) 23:34, 29 June 2013 (UTC)


 * It is good to see that you take this well. Let us improve Wikipedia for a long time.  - Fartherred (talk) 06:41, 30 June 2013 (UTC)


 * Thanks, nice to have a calm voice of reason amongst all this. Robert Walker (talk) 20:34, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

Blanked out section
Wow Robert, WP:AGF much? I suggest you blank this section because I really do not see how speculating about these two accounts is productive. For the record, though, I just had a look at the two accounts. One was created six years ago; the other seven years ago. They have had no significant interactions except this family of Mars biology articles in the last couple of months. I find it implausible that a person created an extra account six years ago just to votestack an AfD. VQuakr (talk) 05:14, 1 July 2013 (UTC)


 * Okay blanked it out. I'm not experienced in these things, what you say makes sense! Thanks for looking into it for me. I wrote that to run it past someone else for comment, not because I was sure the conclusion was true. Robert Walker (talk) 05:29, 1 July 2013 (UTC)

Comment on the AfD
This is the page that was deleted: Concerns for an early Mars sample return Many references to notable sources. I don't see how anyone uninvolved can doubt its notability

This was the discussion AfD discussion No discussion of the sources at all. No questions about any particular part of the article to check if what I wrote there is true. Just a decision to delete the whole thing based apparently on Warren's assessment of it, rather than reading any of the sources or checking anything in the article against the sources.

The only ones in the debate who write regularly about Project Mars, if you look at their contributions, were BatteryIncluded and WarrenPlatts both of whom have been insulting me regularly in all their interactions with me for the last month and obviously have a personal grudge against me and great personal distaste for the subject of the article because of its implications for human colonization of the surface of Mars, that taking the precautions discussed will delay the Mars exploration program (in their view).

I know it went through due process. But still it doesn't seem fair that such a well cited carefully researched article was deleted without any discussion of the sources in the AfD, and without any attempt to check if any particular statement in the article was correctly cited and reported.

The decision to delete was done apparently solely on the basis of the subject of the article. Basically, a decision was made that an article with that subject shouldn't be included in Wikipedia

Really the only substantial argument against it was that it discusses the possibility of disruption of the environment of the Earth which Warren Platts portrayed as an obsession of the ICAMSR only. Just a glance at the sources cited in this section to find the quotes and read them in context in the original pages, and it is clear that it is something accepted in all the NASA / ESA / PPO sources as a matter of concern and that what Warren Platts and BatteryIncluded said about it is simply incorrect.

View presented in the NRC and ESF study group reports and Planetary Protection Office summaries

A secondary argument was that because I am personally concerned about a MSR and have written an opinion piece in my science20 column about that that therefore I can't write a balanced article. But again you just need to read the article and check the sources to see that most of it describes the official POV accurately, and that I did a lot of writing for the opponent, and nowhere do I express my own POV.

And no single instance of misrepresentation of anything in the article was given in the AfD. Just a general claim that the article as a whole was biased. No attempt to help me to correct the perceived bias or explain what it is.

All there was to explain the percecption of bias was this general remark that apparently, although environmental disruption of the Earth is extensively discussed in the source documents from the NRC, ESF, Planetary Proteciton Office etc, the general agreement in the AfD was that it should not be attributed to any of them, and should only be attributed as a fringe view of the ICAMSR.

Follow up the quotes and check for yourself if these sources discuss it as a seriously accpeted possibility or not:

View presented in the NRC and ESF study group reports and Planetary Protection Office summaries

I know that others here have problems with my behaviour, others complain that I said too much in my talk page comments I wrote to attempt to save the article. But though that is reason to censor me for saying too much, that is not a valid reason to delete the article.

Just writing this as an expression of my frustration with the whole process of AfD in this case. It went through due process and was closed by an admin who was uninvolved with the subject.

There were some irregularities in the process, particularly, that the article that was nominated for AfD originally was written by Warren Platts who for the start of the AfD did not permit me to revert to my version of the article, so for a while, it was the situation of an opposing editor who nominated his version of the article for deletion and merge, and didn't permit his opponent to edit it to make a more substantial article.

But that it seems is not enough to be of concern. Apart from that, it went through due process. I have no expectation of any change in the decision.

Robert Walker (talk) 06:01, 1 July 2013 (UTC)
 * The decision of the AfD for (Concerns for an early Mars sample return) was merge to (Mars sample return mission), not delete. I see that from your point of view merge might be effectively the same as delete.  This is a case of the community deciding that (Concerns for an early Mars sample return) was too much and biased according to WP:UNDUE.  You do not have much choice other than to accept the judgment.  I cannot make an independent evaluation of the article except to write that it is too long for me to read.  I might use a full version of it that you edited for reference in the future.  I can find it in the history.


 * As I see it, the main objection to your edits in articles, on talk pages, and at the help desk is that they are too long. No one wants to read that much.  To accommodate the Wikipedia community I suggest that you make a concise summary of any communication in your sandbox to get it right so you do not need to make numerous changes and corrections; then post it with one edit where it belongs and not come back to it until at least 3 hours later, perhaps the next day.  Become involved in other things in the intervening time so that you will not be thinking about your Wikipedia concerns.  Somehow you must avoid annoying most editors or risk being blocked under the policy Competence is required.  Also work on maintaining the structure of any article that you edit.  Avoid putting the same material in two or three locations in an article.  I would like to see your work become more valuable than the trouble you cause.  There is much potential.  - Fartherred (talk) 16:06, 1 July 2013 (UTC)


 * Thanks, good tips. Yes repetition and structure is my main problem, and part of the reason for all the edits, as well as typos, especially reversing letters and typing the wrong word, changing the meaning of the sentence. That plus sometimes omissions and mistakes. Yes, for communications as well as article pages. Good idea to work on communications in my sandbox before posting them to talk pages or elsewhere in wikipedia - never thought of that. Have done a bit of working on material for articles in my user space. Yes, I can do a lot more of that, following your advice. It is easy enough to work that way, and good to have a possible solution for this issue for the future. It might need to do a bit of extra editing if someone else has done something in between on the copy back but it's not a big deal.


 * If you want to use content from the AfD, it is better to use the version in my user space as I did more work on it after the AfD, to improve it further with things I didn't have time to do during the AfD. So will be a bit easier to read. Concerns for an early Mars sample return backup


 * In fact I have also worked on the article some more since then, converting to a more journalistic less encyclopedic tone, to use it outside of Wikipedia, as is permitted for deleted articles under the CC by license (e.g. as for the star wars wiki etc). I have it as an unpublished draft for my science20 column at present. I haven't decided what to do, but may publish that too. Of course, it is not suitable as a primary source, but could be useful for locating material cited in it, and is a much easier read than the version in my user space. I find the third person passive voice somewhat hampers expression and readability for my style of writing.


 * Thanks for your help! May make quite a difference in the future. Robert Walker (talk) 16:42, 1 July 2013 (UTC)


 * Fartherred is right that the consensus was merge, not delete. The real problem was that the article was too long compared to the length of the "primary" article.  Also, the closing action by Warren Platts was incorrect in redirecting from the deleted article to ICAMSR.  I redirected it to the receiving article.  Robert McClenon (talk) 01:30, 3 July 2013 (UTC)


 * Thanks for the redirect. I think the idea of a short section in the MSR mission page is fine, and the idea to have the more substantial material in an article about backwards contamination generally is also okay if it is permitted to include the official NASA / ESA POVs as well of course as Zubrin's and the ICAMSR views. The existing short section in the MSR article is highly biased towards the views of the Mars surface colonization advocacy IMHO. See . Robert Walker (talk) 08:52, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

Posting to Talk Pages
When posting to user talk pages, if adding a new section, please add it at the bottom. You posted sections to my talk page that were not at the bottom. This is confusing because I don't normally look in the middle of my talk page. Also, the fact that two users share the same viewpoint is not in itself reason to suggest that they are sockpuppets. Also, please try to find the two extremely inflammatory posts and provide me with diffs, because whoever posted them needs to be warned strongly. I don't have the time to wade through your voluminous complaints to find the quotes that you posted. Robert McClenon (talk) 23:53, 29 June 2013 (UTC)


 * Sorry about posting to the wrong place on your page - I thought it should go before the talk page notifications, a little unfamiliar how those work. I was posting to what I thought was the "end of the page" and made a mistake. Robert Walker (talk) 00:35, 30 June 2013 (UTC)


 * Also sorry again about my behaviour on the help desk. Saw what you just said on the MarsProject page but don't want to post there just now, sorry, just a bit scared of Warren right now I suppose is what it amounts to, and trying to calm down and take a break from it all.


 * I could perhaps try some kind of dispute resolution after a break from it all of maybe a week, for everyone to calm down. But if I did it, this time I think if he started insulting me again I would just withdraw from it rather than to try to keep going through it. Not as any kind of a threat, just, that that is what I would do, and let him win, is just not worth the stress plus after that starts there seems zero chance of a sensible outcome.


 * BTW I have never done any edit warring. I just did BRD. When after the Bold edit and my Revert and I attempted Discussion but he went on editing his version of the article so I edited my own version of it in my user space.


 * When the AfD began then I felt that as he was the one proposing to delete it, then surely I should be permitted to edit it again, to make it into the best article I could to try to save it, This he objected to and reverted it back, so was in the strange situation of an editor who is proposing deletion of his own version of a page and not letting the other editor create their version for the AfD.


 * I think I did do a second restore of my version which he reverted - but eventually it was another editor N2e who stepped in and said that discussion was needed before such a massive change as deleting most of my article, and restored my version again so I could continue editing it for the AfD. So -no edit warring on my part.  Robert Walker (talk) 11:42, 30 June 2013 (UTC)


 * This all happened after the AfD started so the AfD for the first day or so was an AfD on his version of the page, and then for the next few days was on my version that was quite a mess for a fair while as I was told I couldn't use my user space version and had to rewrite a lot of it again from scratch, and was working hard to try to improve before the end of the AfD which ended while I was still in the process of checking the citations for my final version of the page.

Here are the diffs

 * I only just realized, you can get the date from the signature and find it that way:
 * http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk%3AMars_sample_return_mission&diff=561730149&oldid=561689953


 * For this one you have to scroll down to 516 in the list of diffs
 * http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk%3AManned_mission_to_Mars&diff=561982672&oldid=561971091


 * I thought you would be able to do a search of the page text to find it - that's how I found it and got it instantly. It's no problem to provide the diffs now that I know how to do it by checking the signature date. Robert Walker (talk) 00:05, 30 June 2013 (UTC)


 * Robert Walker (talk) 00:05, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

Request for Another Diff
I am asking for another diff, the one to the post where he said that he wanted you topic-banned from Mars. On the one hand, he has a right to request that you be topic-banned. He can do that via a user conduct Request for Comments, with resolution by consensus of administrators or arbitration by the ArbCom. On the other hand, he has no right in a project or article talk space to request that you be topic-banned. An attempt to request a formal topic-ban would be likely to boomerang, because the community of administrators or the ArbCom will consider the conduct of the requester as well as the person against whom the remedies are requested. His efforts to have you topic-banned, without invoking formal dispute resolution, appear to me (after having reviewed the policies), to be Wikipedia bullying. Please provide the diff to that statement on his part. Robert McClenon (talk) 01:44, 3 July 2013 (UTC)


 * Hi, it's at the bottom of this diff I just gave. You have to scroll right to the end.

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk%3AMars_sample_return_mission&diff=561730149&oldid=561689953




 * Immediately after that, over a few days, he removed all my contributions on contamination issues from Project Mars or replaced with his own versions. So though he doesn't use the word "topic ban" it's clear what he meant.


 * Is that what you wanted? Robert Walker (talk) 07:39, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

One More Request
Once you have calmed down and gotten over the hurt, can you please consider expanding the article on Interplanetary contamination and merging it with Back-contamination? I know that you can do the research to find good sources. Please don't rely primarily on ICAMSR, which is fringe. Robert McClenon (talk) 01:44, 3 July 2013 (UTC)


 * Yes I can do that. What I might do is try a few test edits first, less substantial material and see if they get deleted. I have started doing a couple of test edits for Project Mars fixing obvious minor inaccuracies. That way I can build up confidence again as a wikipedia editor.


 * I just added a minor edit here and am happy to see it hasn't been deleted, I added the edit about the temperatures recorded by Viking and the Spirit Rover Climate of Mars - Temperture.


 * Please don't rely on Warren's assessment of me as an advocate of ICAMSR in wikipedia. I am not a member of it or connected with it; my only communication with them are a few emails exchanged with the director, mainly to do with correct attribution for citations.


 * Also please don't rely on his assessment of the article that was deleted as presenting the views of the ICAMSR. It does not. Only a couple of short sections presents their views, and most of it they would surely disagree with just as much as Zubrin would do from the other side.


 * It's like in politics where the middle of the road politicians seem right wing to extreme left winger voters, and left wing to extreme right wing voters.


 * I did a word count to check for bias, and you can see that I devoted the majority, 2989 words, to the official POV (unusual for a criticism article)


 * Measure of bias using word count


 * The article has 396 words on the ICAMSR. There are 348 words on the decadal report in favour of an early MSR, and 267 words Zubrin (the opposite POV to the ICAMSR by a noted Mars surface colonization advocate).


 * I would have written more on Zubrin but all I could find was a transcript of an interview with him. He wrote a paper as well but it is hard to find as it is not available online and the organization that publishes it hasn't responded to my request to purchase it.


 * This section describes the official POV as is easy to verify by anyone who reads the cited sources, as do the sections on the NRC and ESF reports - the concerns in those reports and the risk mitigation strategies they recommend - all of that is content from the official reports View presented in the NRC and ESF study group reports and Planetary Protection Office summaries


 * Then after the quotes from Sagan and Ledeberg, which gives the histroical background, all this is back to the official studies again, everything here is in the official studies  National Research Council review of biohazard potential of returned samples. It is only when you get to "Dissenting views" that I present the views of the ICAMSR, briefly, before turning to the legal situation and similar issues:


 * I posted with the word count to the AfD as a comment, and got no reply to the comment.


 * The AfD endorsed Warren's overall perception of the article without discussion. The only discussion was about my competence as an editor, and general statements that the article is biased and should be deleted.


 * No particular fact in the article was disputed for its accuracy in the AfD. No section was singled out as one that should be shorter or deleted.


 * The only votes in the AfD in favour of a delete from editors of the Mars Project were by Warren Platts and BatteryIncluded, the other delete votes on that page are from editors who if you look at their contributions have never done any edits on astronomy (as far back as I checked). The only other Mars project editor in the AfD, N2e, voted with a weak keep.


 * None of the other editors showed any sign of having read any of the material on the subject, even the official PPO page about a MSR.


 * I am saying that just to show that the AfD shouldn't be taken as an accurate assessment of any bias in my presentation of the subject. IMHO the general tone of the AfD was similar to discussions I had with Mars surface colonization advocates on nasaspaceflight.com, opposed to any significant expression of contamination concerns, and close to Zubrin in their views.


 * Hope you understand? Robert Walker (talk) 08:16, 3 July 2013 (UTC)


 * Am absolutely fine with giving due weight to the ICAMSR and also to the Mars surface colonization advocates. But if prevented from giving due weight to the NRC and ESF studies, or required to present them in a way that suggests they endorse Zubrin's views, by omitting any concerns or suggestions in the studies that don't fit with those views - that is a condition which I can't accept. Robert Walker (talk) 14:35, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

The flaws with the current MSR section on BC
For anyone interested - I have totally given up mentioning this on the article talk page itself:


 * It says that the chance of back contamination "is likely to be zero". In fact the Planetary Protection Office say that the "probability of risk is non zero". All the other official studies agree on this. In more detail the sources say that the experts are in general agreement that the probability is non zero. They also agree that there is no way they can accurately calculate the probability but that they assess it based on their own experience as probably very low.


 * Warren has an argument on the talk page to say that "likely to be zero" means the same as "non zero" in this context, using Bayesian probability. Whatever you think about that argument, it is certainly OR and not in any of the sources.Robert Walker (talk) 17:06, 3 July 2013 (UTC)


 * It says a normal biohazard 4 facility is sufficient. In fact, the studies say that it is not sufficient because it also has to double as a clean room and no facility has been built able to do both and there are major technological issues involved in combining the two technologies into a single faciility.


 * It presents the risk of environmental disruption as an ICAMSR obsession. In fact, this element of the risk is extensively covered in the ESF and NRC studies, and NASA, ESA, COSPAR and the Planetary Protection Office all take it seriously.


 * It doesn't mention the international nature of the risks. In fact the studies say that it needs full public debate at an international level because in the (thought to be very low probability) worst case scenarios it could impact on other countries world wide.

It looks fine if you aren't familiar with the material but in fact is deeply flawed.

It totally misrepresents the official position. The bias of this page, and almost throughout the Mars Project now, is strongly towards advocacy of colonization of the Mars surface and playing down contamination issues.

I added CN and WP:OPINON tags to it but the opposing editor removed them immediately a few minutes after I added them. So the reader of the article can't even be notified that there may be questions about its accuracy and POV.

Also he has attacked me personally so often in a totally OTT way, that I have given up in despair.

Your errors
You asked what you did wrong. First, you used talk pages as a soapbox. Maybe you didn't mean to do that, but Warren Platts seems to be mostly right that you seemed to think that justifying your edits at great length made them right. They were partly right and partly wrong. Your talk page posts were too long, and were hard to read because of their length. Second, although you got over this, initially you wasted the time of the Help Desk. If you had felt at the time that you were too tired and frustrated to continue, you shouldn't have gone to the Help Desk until you had calmed down. Third, you seemed not to recognize that you were promoting fringe content as NPOV content. Maybe you didn't intend that, but it did come across that way. Fourth, your allegation of sock puppetry was patent nonsense. Any research would have indicated that Warren Platts and BatteryIncluded could not possibly be the same person. If you still really believe that, go to WP:SPI, and see whether they categorize you as a vexatious litigant. Is that an answer? Robert McClenon (talk) 19:15, 4 July 2013 (UTC) Your conduct didn't justify personal attacks, some of them blatant, let alone bullying on Wikipedia, but it was tendentious. Robert McClenon (talk) 19:15, 4 July 2013 (UTC)


 * Okay, I've said I'm sorry about the help desk. I'm not familiar with sock puppets. What seems obvious to you wasn't obvious to me.


 * Oh and I never thought he was a sock puppet created for the purposes of the AfD, that much was obvious because of his long history of contributions to wikipedia. What I wanted to know if it was possible that he created a second account at wikipedia probably for some other purpose, and then took advantage of it as a sock puppet in the AfD when it arose.


 * There were many strange coincidences which made it seem like the same person to me, especially the way they both started OTT insults against me here on exactly the same day, in unrelated conversations on different pages and when no other wikipedian insulted me ever. Also, the way he thought that a WP:OPINION tag by BI of his version of the page in main space was a tag of the page in my user space (especially when later BI in the AfD supported the version that he tagged against my version), and when both Warren and BI archived entire talk pages including my posts during Warren's campaign to remove my content from Project Mars, and several other coincidences like that.


 * I hope you can understand that to someone not familiar with sock puppets, these all came over as dramatic coincidences, and I felt I needed advice on the matter.


 * Please I didn't do anything like litigation, I put bold text at the start of the section saying they are probably not sock puppets. I just asked for advice from more experienced wikipedians and Mgave ore details when in your reply it seemed you thought I was just basing it on a similarity of POV.


 * Sorry about that, whatever it is I did wrong there. Robert Walker (talk) 06:23, 5 July 2013 (UTC)


 * On the NPOV, I believe that what I presented in the AfD was NPOV. So far also there has been no proper discussion just many comments from Warren insulting me in an OTT way for what he regards as spamming wikipedia. But OTT insults don't make an allegation true.


 * Warren says that what I describe isn't mainstream and claims that his personal POV is the mainstream view.


 * What I describe in the article however, is said as they say in the official reports, including quotes and accurate summaries of the content of the official studies. How can that be POV? How can it be POV just to include that material?


 * Warren's current summary in the MSR article is decidedly POV and I have given my reasons for saying that in detail. It downplays the risk e.g. saying a biohazard 4 facility is sufficient when the studies say a new type of facility must be built, and saying that the risk is probably zero when the PPO says it is not zero. He also leaves out the mention of international debate as a requiremen. This need for international debate, is in all the official reports. So also is the reason for it, because in the worst case scenarios, the consequences could be felt outside of the country that launches the mission..


 * He immediately removed my WP:OPINION and CN tags from that section without discussion. That doesn't make it NPOV just because he removed my tags.


 * I never present my own POV in the article anywhere, only the official POV and the POV of some dissenters.


 * The view that a MSR could (with extremely low probability) potentially lead to disruption of the environment of Earth is in all the official studies. AFAIK, the only published dissenting voice on that is from Zubrin.


 * Regarding the back contamination risk, the opposing view by Zubrin (and roughly approximated by Warren's view) also verges on fringe science - because he makes assumptions about transfer of life on meteorites which have been examined by the NRC in detail, which did not support his conclusions.


 * Personally I wouldn't characterize either Zubrin or the ICAMSR as fringe quite. Rather I'd call them both extreme advocacy groups.


 * It is true the ICAMSR has a notable fringe scientist member Chandra Wickramasinghe. The other most notable member, Levin, I would call minority view science rather than fringe science, since the Viking labelled release experiments are not yet fully understand and there has been no follow up experiment. Personally I'd be surprised if it turned out it was life, but without a follow up don't see how anyone can say quite what exactly happened.


 * Hope you understand. I accept the help desk and sock puppet mistakes and say sorry for those. Regards POV I have not engaged in POV pushing, and believe my content that I added to be NPOV especially the material on the Mars Receiving Facility where I went to considerable care and spent many hours of work on it to ensure that it was NPOV. Robert Walker (talk) 06:23, 5 July 2013 (UTC)


 * What is the difference between fringe viewpoints and extreme advocacy? In my opinion, ICAMSR is doing extreme advocacy based on fringe science.  I haven't read Zubrin in the past decade, but he is a fruit with a hard shell (figure that one out yourself), who thinks that we should throw away the Earth and move to Mars.  His views are not reliable except as to reporting on him.    Robert McClenon (talk) 15:59, 5 July 2013 (UTC)
 * As to the strange timing with WP and BI, they are probably in off-wiki communication. They may be meatpuppets, but the policy on meatpuppets is weird and is not worth trying to look into.    Robert McClenon (talk) 15:59, 5 July 2013 (UTC)


 * Thanks, yes could be meatpuppets. I wondered if some of the votes for the AfD were meatpuppets too, as why would several people with no history of editing astronomy sections of wikipedia vote a delete and merge in his favour on the last day?


 * Anyway whether or not, okay seems there is nothing you can do, so okay.


 * Yes, I suppose it depends how you think of it. In the general sense of fringe science, then Levin is definitely fringe science, but not sure it is in the narrower senses of it, because it is an explanation for a result that no-one has conclusively been able to explain to everyone's satisfaction that uses valid science as far as I can tell, but doesn't have general acceptance amongst his colleagues.


 * The thing is, the ICAMSR charter does not depend on Levin's research. Instead it is based on the ideas of Carl Sagan. In that sense I don't think you can say it is based on fringe science, although there are fringe scientists who belong to the organisation.


 * However, their views go beyond those of Carl Sagan who once said, "Perhaps Martian samples can be safely returned to Earth. But I would want to be very sure before considering a returned-sample mission.”


 * I see their views as derived from the concerns of Carl Sagan but used as a basis for somewhat extremist advocacy, since my interest is in their views about MSR, rather than their activities outside of the ICAMSR. And same for Zubrin at the other end of the spectrum. Not sure it matters too much anyway, just because you asked. They clearly both need to be included in any discussion of back contamination issues, as both are notable according to the criteria of wikipedia. Robert Walker (talk) 21:16, 5 July 2013 (UTC)

Why do we need more articles?
At this point I can understand some of WP's annoyance with you. I don't see why we need a new article on the Mars sample return facility. It can be covered in the Mars sample return mission article. The article is not so big that it needs to be split. Creating a separate article gives me the feeling that it is a POV WP:Fork. Do we really need more articles, rather than to expand the articles that we have? Robert McClenon (talk) 23:26, 5 July 2013 (UTC)


 * I think it would be overweight for the MSR article, and focus too much on contamination issues for that page. I originally did try to include this material in the MSR mission page but it felt way overweight to do that, and the consensus on the talk page there was that a new article was needed, which is what lead to the creation of the article that was deleted.


 * Since the main reason for deleting that article was because it was perceived to be POV slanted, then by focusing on just the official POV and leaving other views to the back contamination article, then I feel that the article could be created okay. When you have an AfD then it is recognized that a new article that is substantially different from the one deleted, but that contains some of the same material, can be created.


 * Here the suggestion is to make an article that presents the official POV only, so no-one could consider it POV slanted towards the ICAMSR, and so no longer subject to the reason for deletion given in the AfD.


 * Does that make sense to you? Robert Walker (talk) 23:42, 5 July 2013 (UTC)


 * Oh and BTW I see no reason why it has to be shorter than the main article. as per Wikipedia is not a paper encyclopedia - you just take as many or as few words as are needed to say what needs to be said. Many less important topics have more words on the page than more important topics unlike a paper encyclopedia. The studies are small books (80 pages for the NRC one), and there are several of those, and many papers oh the topics as well, so there is a lot of material to cover  Robert Walker (talk) 23:55, 5 July 2013 (UTC)


 * Actually I'm not sure if there is that much point in creating it. Perhaps in a way it is testing the water. If I can't write this article, then perhaps I should give up on this.


 * Because I can see what would happen. If I did put the article from my user space into the main space, Warren would delete most of it right away with a series of bold edits as he did with the AfD. I would reverse but he would just reverse again and not do a BRD. According to his POV probably the whole thing should just be reduced to "The risk is likely to be zero, but just in case there is a risk NASA plan to construct a biohazard 4 laboratory to contain it". Which would be his summary of all the official studies of the matter.


 * Unless it can be protected in some way from his bold edits, then I see no way forward if he decides he doesn't want it in wikipedia as it seems he surely would. And most of what I would want to put into the forward and backward contamination articles also would probably get trimmed down to one or two lines (a bit like Douglas Adam's "mostly harmless"). Plus I am already getting stressed out by his insults on the Project Mars page, and don't think I'll reply there when he replies again. You can tell yourself it is stupid to get worked up over something so trivial but it is hard to do anything about it even so. Robert Walker (talk) 00:51, 6 July 2013 (UTC)


 * After sleeping on it, did a new section comment about the bias of the back contamination section in the MSR article + rewrite to show what it would be like after correcting the bias as it seems to me + short post on the Project Mars talk page about that, thought it might be a good way to do it, done.


 * This is also a good test of whether I am still topic banned by WP and as you see from his response today, apparently I am, which will be a handicap if I try to write any other material on contamination issues in the main space of wikipedia. Robert Walker (talk) 17:33, 6 July 2013 (UTC)


 * I didn't see a post that says that you are topic-banned. Please direct my attention to it.  If there is such a post, I will file a User Conduct RFC.  Robert McClenon (talk) 21:40, 6 July 2013 (UTC)
 * I still don't think that we need more articles. Perhaps you think that we need more articles because he can delete content from existing articles, which would be edit-warring, but he can't delete articles without AfD.  Robert McClenon (talk) 21:40, 6 July 2013 (UTC)


 * Did you not get this diff? I posted it several times. You have to go right to the end of the page to read it.

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk%3AMars_sample_return_mission&diff=561730149&oldid=561689953




 * That is the post you interpreted as a topic ban, and you asked for a diff to show where he posted it. Immediately after that, over a few days, he removed all my contributions on contamination issues from Project Mars or replaced with his own versions. Though he doesn't use the word "topic ban" it's clear what he meant.


 * I don't feel that I can write anything on contamination issues in Project Mars at present, as he has not gone back on it, or apologised for behaving in this way, nor has he restored any of the content he deleted during his self policed topic ban of me. Instead he keeps re-iterating his view that this material should be removed and not allowed to "contaminate" Project Mars. His comment here makes it clear that he is still of the same opinion of my contributions. Talk:Mars_sample_return_mission


 * As regards the article, I do feel it deserves a separate article. The material on it is extensive. It is also easily notable, and I don't see why this topic has to be left out or not treated in any detail in wikipedia.


 * Also is it edit warring when one of the editors attempts BRD, the other does BRR instead and the first editor then just talks in the talk pages and attempts no more edits?


 * If it is edit warring it is a one sided edit war where Warren's opponent makes no attempt to defend himself with a second revert. I was advised not to do that by VQuakr and have followed his advice. Robert Walker (talk) 22:07, 6 July 2013 (UTC)


 * That statement was made ten days ago and has not been repeated and probably will not be repeated. I thought that you meant that he had restated that statement.  Either go ahead and edit, or don't, but if you continue to say that you can't write anything about contamination issues, then you are wasting my time, just as when you went to the Help Desk, and then said that you were through editing.  Either go ahead and edit, or don't edit, but stop whining about how WP was mean to you in the past.  Robert McClenon (talk) 22:22, 6 July 2013 (UTC)
 * The articles on interplanetary contamination and back-contamination need expanding. Stop wasting my time whining about what WP did ten days ago.  Robert McClenon (talk) 22:22, 6 July 2013 (UTC)


 * I was just responding to your earlier requests to provide the diff, and didn't know you got it before as you never acknowledged my replies with the diffs.


 * As to whether it is still in place, I am sure it is. He has pretty much repeated it on the MSR talk page just now. Said




 * (- as if he doesn't have a strong bias in his own edits of wikipedia on this topic...)

Attempt at NPOV tags on MSR mission page

 * I will attempt a WP:OPINION tag on the Mars sample return mission BC section. If he is still implementing the topic ban then I expect him to immediately delete it. If it stays in place for a while then at least that is some progress as it will alert readers to the bias, and I can start thinking about perhaps contributing more substantially eventually. Robert Walker (talk) 22:45, 6 July 2013 (UTC)


 * Have added those tags, disputed-section and POV. The POV one particularly says it shouldn't be removed until the dispute is resolved. Last time he removed it immediately. Expect him to do the same this time but will see what happens. Robert Walker (talk) 23:14, 6 July 2013 (UTC)


 * He has just said he will delete them. I have warned him that you asked me if he is still topic banning me, and asked if he has any other reason for removing a POV-section tag when the discussion is still open. Robert Walker (talk) 02:30, 7 July 2013 (UTC)


 * He has now deleted the tags. I think that it will be impossible for me to edit the forward and backward contamination articles at present, as he clearly is still policing the topic ban on me. I can try an experimental edit on those pages - but am pretty sure what would happen if I do. Robert Walker (talk) 02:44, 7 July 2013 (UTC)


 * Here is his commment to explain his deletion of the tags:


 * Diff:

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk%3AMars_sample_return_mission&diff=563191015&oldid=563190404


 * Note that I warned him on the talk page that you asked me if he is still topic banning me or not. He ignored that warning.

Test edit of back contamination article
As a final test I added the very short section I proposed for the MSR article to the back contamination page.

I fully expect him to delete it or replace it with his version, and have alerted him about all this on the MSR talk page (he will find out anyway soon enough, so best to know the situation, anyway he can find out here too). Contribution to Back Contamination article

If he does this I will do a R and request discussion as in BRD and if he then does a BRR that will fully confirm his topic ban is still in place.

If he leaves it in place then I can think about contributing more to those articles. Robert Walker (talk) 09:05, 7 July 2013 (UTC)


 * The material was deleted instead by VQuakr who is another editor who voted against me in the AfD. During the AfD he advised me as admin about how to proceed. Since he advised me in this way and has no history of editing on Project Mars or Astronomy as far as I can see I was surprised at the time that he came in on the last day in support of WPs POV in the AfD.


 * On calmer reflection, have hidden suggestion to re-examine the AfD. After the remarks before about the impropriety of allegations of sock puppetry I am concerned that perhaps it is equally improper to contest an AfD on suspicion of meatpuppetry, so take back the suggestion. Want to be sure I remain totally within wikipedia guidelines and proper conduct! Especially since there is a possibility I might be topic banned myself.


 * I now suspect that everyone who voted against me in the AfD was a meat puppet of WP especially as none of them gave consideration of the sources or discussed the article itself. For such a detailed article with nearly every sentence cited and notable sources, you would expect some discussion of the contents of the article and its sources in an AfD. But no such discussion happened. Just repeated assertions of WPs claim in different voices.


 * Is there any way I can raise a protest about the AfD and the conduct of the participants in the AfD? Especially as there were many other irregularities as well. Robert Walker (talk) 19:46, 7 July 2013 (UTC)


 * Anyway it is clear I am now topic banned completely from writing on planetary contamination issues in wikipedia, which I already suspected, and what you asked for confirmation of. By WP and now, it seems, VQuakr as well. Robert Walker (talk) 19:46, 7 July 2013 (UTC)

Summary of what happened
Robert McLenon, I know you are a busy man, so you will prob. appreciate a summary as a lot has happened since we last talked.

In short, Warren Platts now proposes deletion of the page on back contamination (not merge, but just delete it so removing the content on back contamination from wikipedia).

He did that after I made a first attempt at a substantial contribution to the page.

Talk:Back-contamination

I feel that it is clear beyond reasonable doubt that I won't be permitted to edit wikipedia on topics of Planetary contamination. Robert Walker (talk) 17:55, 8 July 2013 (UTC)


 * VQuakr just said they are not an admin many apologies for the misunderstanding! Robert Walker (talk) 18:57, 8 July 2013 (UTC)


 * Here is the D of the BRD where I also ask WP if he will let me continue to edit this article: Proposal to restore the content removed by VQuakr


 * Not too surprising WP reaffirms his proposal that the article should be speedily deleted. Robert Walker (talk) 21:05, 8 July 2013 (UTC)

How it happened
I tried adding POV-section tags to the MSR mission section on BC. WP removed them as expected, although the POV-section pointed to an open discussion on the talk page that was not resolved.

In the talk page section which the POV-section linked to, I showed by example what the objections were with a rewrite of his section to remove the pro-Mars surface colonization bias and add in missing information.

When it was clear that my suggestion would never be accepted there (as expected of course), I had the idea, that it was a good beginning for the article on BC, and a test of whether I would be permitted to edit that article.

So, I added it as a test edit to the back-contamination article.

WP proposed to delete it, as expected of course, but did not delete it right away. I then spent some time adding sentence by sentence citations to everything in the short section, including "quotes to assist readers in verification".

Then (when I was mid edit on the last section to add citations to) VQuakr stepped in and did the reversion without discussion or mentioning it to me first.

His comment was "Reverted to revision 562274233 by Beefman: rv mars addition, this was major overcoverage that dominated the article"

https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Back-contamination&diff=563270969&oldid=563269804

VQuakr is an admin who advised me on proper conduct during the AfD. This though is surely not acceptable conduct from an admin, to treat an AfD as a topic ban especially since you had already asked me to write on back contamination on those pages. He doesn't write on spaceflight or astronomy topics as far as I can tell.

Mars is of course the only planet likely to be a risk for BC in the near future and on the talk page I had already said that I planned to have material on other possible sources of BC covered in the COSPAR restricted Category V.

I feel that there is no way I will be permitted to write on Planetary contamination issues at all in wikipedia by VQuakr and WP.

The whole thing played out mainly in the talk pages for back contamination and the MSR mission.

My edits were:
 * POV-section and dubious tags for the BC page of MSR mission
 * New section for the BC article.

These have all been removed. Due to the way they were removed I did not attempt the R stage of BRD as it was totally clear they would simply be removed again.

Any questions be sure to say. Robert Walker (talk) 15:29, 8 July 2013 (UTC)
 * I am not an admin, and you are not subject to a topic ban (unless I missed something major). My revert on Back contamination was the "R" in BRD. VQuakr (talk) 18:53, 8 July 2013 (UTC)


 * Oh many apologies! I thought you were an admin. I will go and do the R then. Robert Walker (talk) 18:57, 8 July 2013 (UTC)


 * The "D" you mean? You boldly added to the article, I reverted, so you would discuss the change and come to a consensus on the talk page about what should be added. That's WP:BRD. VQuakr (talk) 19:01, 8 July 2013 (UTC)


 * Yes of course, I realised that immediately after I replied, and have added the D here: Proposal to restore the content removed by VQuakr Robert Walker (talk) 19:15, 8 July 2013 (UTC)

Comments
Stop whining about having been topic-banned. It is getting tiresome. Robert McClenon (talk) 01:07, 9 July 2013 (UTC)

Your edits were too long, and that may be one reason why they were reverted rather than changed or cut. Robert McClenon (talk) 01:07, 9 July 2013 (UTC)

I don't always monitor your talk page. If you want to get my attention, post to my talk page. Robert McClenon (talk) 01:07, 9 July 2013 (UTC)

Sock-puppetry
It would be a good idea to read some of the Wikipedia policies before you start posting as if you know what they are. You wrote: "For sock puppetry, seems there are many legitimate reasons for having sock puppets, and though usually you have to disclose that you are sock puppets, there are quite a few situations where you don't need to or even shouldn't disclose that you are sock puppets." Name one legitimate reason for sock puppets. There are a few uses for legitimate alternate accounts that should normally be disclosed, but contributing to the same discussion using two user accounts is not legitimate and is sock-puppetry. Either your comments about sock-puppetry are some sort of trolling, designed to confuse, or, to assume good faith, after seven or eight years, you don't know that sock-puppetry is forbidden. Don't make unsubstantiated accusations about sock-puppetry, for which you have already been warned. Also, don't post summaries of Wikipedia policy that are blatant distortions. Robert McClenon (talk) 00:06, 12 July 2013 (UTC)


 * Robert, it's here:


 * Legitimate uses


 * Privacy: A person editing an article which is highly controversial within his/her family, social or professional circle, and whose Wikipedia identity is known within that circle, or traceable to their real-world identity, may wish to use an alternative account to avoid real-world consequences from their editing or other Wikipedia actions in that area.


 * In that case obviously the user doesn't disclose that they are a sock puppet, as was discussed in more detail somewhere else but that's the easiest thing to find right now. Yes, I remember it was recommended that they don't edit the same areas of wikipedia, not sure it was an absolute rule or just a guideline.


 * I was hardly aware of sock puppets before, except knew they existed, but researched into sock puppets because I wanted to understand what they were and whether that is what I was facing in the strange goings on here on wikipedia, and because I felt the AfD was irregular and wondered if it could be disputed.


 * Why are you insulting me for saying this? I had no intention to deceive, and as far as I know this is wikipedia policy, I could have misunderstood. Robert Walker (talk) 02:23, 12 July 2013 (UTC)

Reply - No, it's not there
@RW: Robert Walker replied: "Robert, it's here:" No, it's not. The first bullet is an exact quote, but you summarized it by changing a word and thus reversing its meaning, therefore indicating that you misunderstood the policy fundamentally. It says that there are legitimate uses of alternate accounts. Legitimate alternate accounts are not sockpuppets. Sockpuppets are illegitimate alternate accounts. Read the policy again. Since sockpuppets are (by definition) not permitted, the allegation that two long-time registered users are sockpuppets was a serious allegation, rising to the nature of a personal attack, unless you had reason to think that they were sockpuppets. Looking at their histories and behaviors, I found the allegation to be absurd. Do not make serious allegations with no evidence other than that you disagree with both of them. I will take your word that you had no intention to deceive, but in that case, you deceived yourself by reading Wikipedia policy and twisting its meaning to indicate that sometimes sockpuppets are permitted. They never are. Legitimate alternate accounts are not sockpuppets, because sockpuppets are used to deceive. You don't owe them an apology, because you answered personal attacks with personal attacks, but you do owe Wikipedia an apology, as do they. I have more confidence that you will realize that you were wrong than that they will, because you apparently hadn't re-read and reviewed the policy after paraphrasing it in a way that changes its meaning. Alternate accounts have legitimate uses. Sockpuppets are illegitimate alternate accounts. That's the policy. You read it, but you mis-paraphrased it. Please read it again until you are sure what it says. Robert McClenon (talk) 01:19, 13 July 2013 (UTC)


 * Oh sorry I didn't understand that a sock puppet means an illegitimate account, by definition. I understand now. What confused me was that it is listed under Sock puppetry#Legitimate_uses - I assumed the whole page was about sock puppets. If you think "Sock puppet" means the same thing as "Alternative account" which is what I thought it meant, after all the puppet imagery works just as well for alternative accounts. If you read the page again assuming that the reader thinks that "sock puppet" and "alternative account" are synonyms I think you will see how the misunderstanding arose. Robert Walker (talk) 01:41, 13 July 2013 (UTC)


 * Also in the other pages I read I didn't come across anything that put me right on this either.


 * I do still think there is some connection between the two accounts and so long as I don't actually raise it as an official allegation surely I'm free to think that? There have been far too many bizarre coincidences like the things I already mentioned. Recently for instance, they simultaneously found a hard to find conversation I was having, within ten minutes of each other. If that happened just now and again, I would of course consider as a surprising coincidence but this sort of thing has been going on for weeks and sometimes really striking. And as WP had almost no edit history before the debate, I don't see why BI mightn't be his alternate account that he uses for most of his editing, and to me the way they speak seems so similar, and I've never come across anyone else who speaks in quite the same way. But they could be meat puppets who are close friends or belong to the same community of people similar in ideas and outlook. Really hard to see how there could be no connection at all.


 * But I am not making any allegation of sock puppetry or meat puppetry. And I fully agree I could be wrong, totally, it is striking but no way is it conclusive. Robert Walker (talk) 01:51, 13 July 2013 (UTC)


 * As a mathematician I know even one in a million chances can happen, even less likely things, especially in a long complex life. Perhaps 3 sigma or something observations I imagine, that there is some connection or other :). Robert Walker (talk) 01:59, 13 July 2013 (UTC)


 * I asked for comments at another Wikipedia forum, and they agreed that I had read the policy correctly, and that sock-puppets are illegitimate alternate accounts. It is true that legitimate alternate accounts are discussed in that policy, because they are a rare exception to the rule that sock-puppets are a Very Bad Idea, and will get you blocked and banned.  Read the policy a fourth time.  It doesn't say that sock-puppets are occasionally permitted.  It says that alternate accounts are sometimes permitted, but that, if they have the quality of sock-puppets, they are not permitted.  You mis-paraphrased the policy.  It was an honest error, but is was an error.  Before making accusations based on policy, maybe you should read the policy three times.  I do not mean to be harsh, but your accusations of sock-puppetry were harsh.  That is that for now.  Robert McClenon (talk) 02:06, 13 July 2013 (UTC)


 * Thanks for checking, and I stand corrected. Robert Walker (talk) 02:30, 13 July 2013 (UTC)


 * It is clear now I look at it afresh, the first sentence says "The use of multiple Wikipedia user accounts for an improper purpose is called sock puppetry. Somehow I must have missed the word "improper" there. I'm gong to suggest on the talk page that it might be an idea to emphasize improper, to help others who make the same mistake as I did. I read it as meaning something like: "The use of multiple Wikipedia user accounts is called sock puppetry (often abbreviated in discussion as socking). Improper purposes include ..." Robert Walker (talk) 14:46, 13 July 2013 (UTC)


 * I agree that the policy is not as clear as it should be. I also agree that the policy on meatpuppetry is vague and hard to interpret.  There is no rule in general against communication off-wiki between editors who have common interests.  My interpretation is that the rule is meant to prevent the use of members of one's family who are not otherwise regular Wikipedians in electronic voting.  WP and BI are both long-time Wikipedians, who have a common interest in pushing a particular POV, and their communication off-wiki is permitted.  Robert McClenon (talk) 15:00, 13 July 2013 (UTC)


 * Okay. Yes, that's a way of putting it, thanks, and I can now see better why the whole thing is so tricky. For sock puppetry I just posted to its talk page here with a couple of suggestions for a way to rephrase the first sentence to help prevent others from making the mistake I did. Wikipedia_talk:Sock_puppetry Robert Walker (talk) 15:24, 13 July 2013 (UTC)

Improper Merger
Wikipedia policy has been blatantly violated by completing the merger when an RFC was pending. For now, I suggest that you go ahead and make any additions to Planetary protection that you think are needed to present a balanced view. If your additions are deleted, it will provide more evidence for any further dispute resolution. Robert McClenon (talk) 16:39, 13 July 2013 (UTC)


 * Sorry realise I wrote rather a lot here, do you mind if I do a cot and cob and summarize?


 * I didn't want to get involved in the merge because I think it is not appropriate to merge the two articles. Wouldn't know where to begin. And the thing they created is a total mess of an article.


 * I did try to restore the section on Category IV for Mars, and definition of a special region, which they removed. My attempt to do that was reverted.


 * Also restored a sentence that needed a cn I thought, rather than a delete, but that is a minor matter of protesting on procedure, was not too surprising it got immediately reverted by WP.


 * It turns out they kept half of the material on the Category IV but removed the other half during the re-organization which as it was tightly written means they removed significant material. I have protested on the talk page that it needed discussion.


 * They say they were mid merge and going to include it anyway.


 * As for evidence of them removing what I write improperly I'd have thought that the merge which WP also did in Back-contamination during an open discussion of a proposal to restore material to the article in the D of BRD is surely improper too? After he first trimmed it to three sentences that don't mention anything post the 1970s?


 * But Dan Hobley has joined in too, he AFAIK is an independent editor. It really seems that the consensus here is that all this material should be removed and that they all want to follow WPs reform program for contamination issues at least the most vocal and energetic ones. Robert Walker (talk) 19:46, 13 July 2013 (UTC)


 * Sorry if this is complicated. But your instruction to try to rewrite the article to deal with bias was one I couldn't do. The bias in my view is mainly removing all this material in the first place. If it could be included then there is room for discussion about whether it is presented correctly.


 * To be painted into a little 1 cm square corner and told that you have to correct bias in that tiny spot, I can't do it and the 1 cm square corner is in the wrong page anyway.Robert Walker (talk) 20:04, 13 July 2013 (UTC)


 * Sorry, I don't want to edit that article for the reasons I gave on the talk page on Interplanetary contamination. In my view it's not a proper place for this material. I don't want to complicate and spoil a good short article that is an ideal stopping point for someone who just wants to look up the details of the planetary protection COSPAR guidelines. I have used it several times myself in that way. Robert Walker (talk) 16:49, 13 July 2013 (UTC)


 * I notice though that they removed the sections "Category IV for Mars" and "Definition of special regions" which some time ago I mentioned that I contributed to the article. There was absolutely no reason to remove them given and no disussion, and they aren't even mentioned as removed in the edit summaries.


 * I have reinstated those. As for the merger, no way will I collaborate in making a new merged article from the two articles improperly merged in this way and I have been against this merger from the get go. Sorry! Robert Walker (talk) 16:59, 13 July 2013 (UTC)


 * I have also reinstated this statement which they removed from the first para: "The need for planetary protection measures is strongest for missions designed to return a sample from another planet or celestial body to the Earth (back-contamination)." again without discussion.


 * The sentence was not written by me. It could perhaps do with a cn, what source actually says this, and if the reader wants to follow it up further, what did they say exactly? Personally I think forward contamination is also pretty important. But certainly not removed without discussion like this.


 * The rest is merged material from other articles and as I don't think they belong here I don't want to get involved in editing those sections. The history section was originally much shorter and immediately after the intro, and I don't see the point in the Resilience of life in space section, wouldn't put that as the first, or indeed any section in an article on Planetary Protection. I would just revert the entire thing back to the way it was before WP and BI edited it if it was up to me. Robert Walker (talk) 17:15, 13 July 2013 (UTC)


 * Okay he has undone my attempt to restore the section on the sub categories for Mars and that intro sentence from the original he just removed as "unsourced" rather than add a cn. Not too surprising. He added a talk page comment about his reason for the revision, but not sure it is worth responding to it. It was useful material, accurately summarized the source and no previous editor objected to it. The only possible objection is to say that the article is too long and needs to be trimmed to its bare minimum, which I imagine will be his objection. There is no accepted answer to that, as I have discovered before with the other cited notable stuff he removed, he always seems to win those debates.Robert Walker (talk) 18:11, 13 July 2013 (UTC)

Follow-Up
I think that it is time to file a Request for Arbitration and will appreciate your help. Robert McClenon (talk) 20:29, 13 July 2013 (UTC)


 * Okay I'll do what I can. What can I do to help? Robert Walker (talk) 20:41, 13 July 2013 (UTC)
 * I will be building the case at User:Robert McClenon/Mars Notes. Please add as many diffs concerning violations to the page as you can, clearly identifying the nature of each diff.  Robert McClenon (talk) 21:42, 13 July 2013 (UTC)
 * I had thought that dispute resolution could resolve things, but the last straw, from my standpoint, was the closure of a requested merger (which I supported and you opposed) when my Request for Comments to obtain outside opinions was still in progress. Your pessimistic statements that dispute resolution was impossible appear to be true, short of the "nuclear option", which is arbitration.  Robert McClenon (talk) 21:42, 13 July 2013 (UTC)
 * I have one diff where he said that you could agree to go away and never come back if you lost the AFD. Where did he try to obtain consensus to topic-ban you? Robert McClenon (talk) 21:44, 13 July 2013 (UTC)


 * Is this what you want? I don't recall him seeking consensus, just several statements that he would remove all my contributions on contamination issues, using the AfD as his authority for it. This was at the start of it, after he won the AfD, you have to scroll down to the bottom of the page to find it:

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk%3AMars_sample_return_mission&diff=561730149&oldid=561689953




 * For me the biggest violation recently was the merge of the BC article when it had an open discussion on it to restore content that had just been removed by another editor.


 * Also repeated removal of the POV-section tags for the BC article (which he has just done once again incidentally taking "rough consensus" as his authority for it).


 * There are also the occasions when they archived entire talk pages with many open discussions on them, mainly by BI but WP also did it once and they are clearly working together on this. Should I include violations by BI as well? I think mainly will be just the talk page archives as rest was just loads of insults. But might remember other things. Robert Walker (talk) 22:08, 13 July 2013 (UTC)
 * Yes, please include violations by BI as well, including insults. Add everything. Robert McClenon (talk) 22:16, 13 July 2013 (UTC)
 * By the way, the merge of Planetary protection and Interplanetary contamination was reverted. Robert McClenon (talk) 22:16, 13 July 2013 (UTC)


 * Oh okay, there were some outrageous insults by BI in the discussion on Life on Mars and the attempt at a RfC there.


 * I'll also include the one where WI said I needed to seek mental treatment because of my slight dislexia (or whatever it is) - wasn't one of his worst insults but it is the one that hurt me most personally and they should see that from the diff if I can find it.


 * Glad to see the merge was reverted, can the Planetary Protection one be rolled back to the way it was before the merge as well?


 * It really is quite a nonsense of an article right now especially the section on "Resilience of life in space" reads like a complete non sequitor, doesn't fit anything on the page before or after it, you can tell someone just copy / pasted it from somewhere else to a random place on the page plus expanded it a bit. Robert Walker (talk) 22:23, 13 July 2013 (UTC)


 * Also, please include the diff where someone referred to Paranoid personality disorder in the past few days. I am having difficulty finding it.  Robert McClenon (talk) 22:40, 13 July 2013 (UTC)


 * Okay that's here: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia_talk%3AWikiProject_Mars&diff=563271694&oldid=563269319


 * I'm getting some stuff together in a text document here to avoid continually re-editing your page. Will add what I've found so far soon. Robert Walker (talk) 22:59, 13 July 2013 (UTC)


 * I've added some of it in. You are welcome to edit it and remove also anything not appropriate, I did quite a bit on the AfD because of its many irregularities. Will take a look at it some more tomorrow, takes a surprising long time to do it though getting more used to how you find a diff from a comment.


 * There has been a major development though with the MSR article back contamination section. Dan Hobley has stepped in and edited it, and he seems is accepted as an editor by the others - well will see if WP reverts what he did. But if his edits are accepted, then it is more or less accurate now. He misses a few points especially on quarantine laws and international nature of the legal situation and need for international public debate. But compared to what was there this morning, is an amazing change :). Hope it is kept. I have posted saying as much, also suggesting the things I think still need to be fixed. If he adds in a short section about Zubrin as well to balance the ICAMSR as well as international aspect it would pretty much fix that and I would be very pleased to know that at least that section, which is quite important, is now accurate. Robert Walker (talk) 02:09, 14 July 2013 (UTC)

Request for Arbitration
Please be aware that a Request for Arbitration has been opened. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case#Mars Robert McClenon (talk) 16:22, 14 July 2013 (UTC)
 * Robert, my impression of Arbitration/Requests is that they tend to be long slow and difficult. My advice for WP:ANI was to avoid comment.  I am less sure about what to do with arbitration.  My guess would be to stick with the evidence that you offered at User:Robert McClenon/Mars Notes .  Stop changing it.  In the statement by party 4, (that's you), refer to McClenon's notes and write nothing else.  Do not answer any criticism that WarrenPlatts or BatteryIncluded might make of you at the arbitration case if you can avoid it.  Someone else might have better advice for you, but that is my best.  - Fartherred (talk) 20:13, 14 July 2013 (UTC)


 * Fartherred, thanks for your advice. Yes I have finished with the evidence, just fixed a couple of minor things when I got the notice from Robert McLenon, anyway whether that was right to do or not, it is all done now, no need to do any more.


 * Okay, right so likely to be a long process. Yes that sounds good advice, as you said before, many of my responses to their criticism tend to be flustered and not good, if I can avoid answering is best of all.


 * Am not sure about what to write by way of a statement, what is expected of me. I understand the whole thing is an unusual and a severe step, and so am going to step carefully. Would be expected to write something eventually I think, but won't rush into doing that. Thanks your advice is really helpful. Robert Walker (talk) 20:39, 14 July 2013 (UTC)
 * To Robertinventor: It is good that you are taking your time to make a statement. Careful work is more important than speed.  Try something like: "I have offered a number of statements at User:Robert McClenon/Mars Notes.  That is about all that I wanted to write."  Good luck.  - Fartherred (talk) 21:16, 14 July 2013 (UTC)


 * Fartherred, thanks as usual excellent advice. Maybe I'll try the exact words you posted now. I tried it as a preview in the page to see what it looked like, and it looked good!


 * Tried my own draft, and yours was much better. Mine went into too much detail at this stage, tried to summarize what it was that got most in the way of contributing to wikipedia. If I say it at all should be in response to questions by the arbitors, as they can see for themselves.


 * Also been thinking what is my main objective?


 * I would say, it is to find a way forward so that I can continue to contribute on this topic if possible. As I have been doing to some extent since yesterday with Dan Hobley, he listened to what I said and corrected the article based on it. So that's a big step forward that this can happen, and I am so pleased that that particular section of that article is now reasonably accurate on these issues (if allowed to remain like that of course and still has some minor issues but presumably he will fix them).


 * That is what I wanted to do with my wikipedian friend with the opposite POV to me, who wants to collaborate with me on this topic.


 * I think also that WP has much to contribute to the project, especially on proposed and actual spaceflight missions, but he doesn't seem to know all that much about contamination issues with surprising knowledge gaps that a few minutes of a google search would fill.


 * He did find a few inaccuracies during the long article deletion process (mainly to do with proposed mission plans), which I fixed and was great to have corrected. Robert Walker (talk) 22:51, 14 July 2013 (UTC)


 * To Robert McClenon: You guessed write that my advice was meant for Robertinventor. I should have remembered that there are two Roberts concerned with this thread.  Sorry for the confusion.  - Fartherred (talk) 21:16, 14 July 2013 (UTC)
 * I agree with Fartherred. Keep your statement as Party 4 straightforward.  In particular, presenting too much evidence causes the arbitration to take longer, as the arbitrators have to review more evidence.  Robert McClenon (talk) 22:38, 14 July 2013 (UTC)


 * Thanks, glad to hear it, I think I'll just use what he wrote word for word as I don't think I'll improve on it, and he has always given me great advice. Robert Walker (talk) 22:57, 14 July 2013 (UTC)


 * - done Robert Walker (talk) 00:06, 15 July 2013 (UTC)


 * I see one admin has asked for a summary, and wonder if I should say something? Also wonder if I should say something about the BI dispute just to show that it is not WP:CHEESE?

This is my earlier draft: " The things that most got in the way of contributions to wikipedia are:

"
 * Frequent BRR instead of BRD by Warren Platts removing large sections fully backed up by citations.
 * Archiving of talk pages and merging articles with open unresolved discussions and RfCs.
 * Improper conduct in the AfD, especially, that I was not permitted to work on it continuously until nearly half way through and the AfD started on the version by Warren Platts, with almost all notable content removed.
 * Personal ad hominem attacks by both of them get in the way of discussions of content and interactions with other editors, as do their warnings about me to other editors.
 * Refusal by BI and WP to enter dispute resolution.

This is my draft reply to BI's allegation of WP:CHEESE:

"I don't want to get into details of my dispute with BatteryIncluded but it seems necessary to say enough to show that it is not obviously WP:CHEESE and that it deserves dispute resolution.

See:User:Robertinventor/Present_day_habitability_of_Mars_dispute "

What do you both think? Should I reply to WP:CHEESE? Should we attempt some kind of a summary and is what I wrote above useful? Robert Walker (talk) 16:31, 15 July 2013 (UTC)
 * I have looked at a little of the basis of Batteryincluded's WP:CHEESE allegation. I think arbiters will not need any help to come up with their own conclusions on this point.  There is a real possibility of your being topic banned.  The arbitration request could also be declined.  I do not think a response on the WP:CHEESE point will serve your purpose.  - Fartherred (talk) 19:15, 15 July 2013 (UTC)


 * Okay thanks!


 * Just looked at what this "someone who will not be named" said - saying that VQuakr deleted my stuff on back contanimnation - VQuakr himself said that it was the R in BRD. I started the D on that page, then WP got rid of it all with the merge while the discussion was still in progress about what to do, the D of BRD.


 * I never said in the notes that the R was by BI or WP, or suggested it was, but probably should have said more explicitly that it was by VQuakr though the "Proposal_to_restore_the_content_removed_by_VQuakr" section title for the D seems explicit enough, and the D could have lead to it getting restored.


 * All of that was of course totally proper, the improper thing was the merge while the D was in place, and only on authority of another editor who told him to "go ahead".


 * (removed something here that I got wrong best left out)


 * But feel if I say anything about any of that would probably get into worse trouble than I am in already. Which I don't really understand why I am in trouble for just trying to defend the content from deletion and keeping totally to the wikipedia rules and guidelines, and the only thing that I have really done wrong is to suspect someone of sock puppets which I never took to any official forum, just asked advice about it. Plus writing too much in talk posts. Those seem to be my crimes that may lead me to being topic banned.


 * While hurling insults at someone every day for weeks on end, deleting all their content on a particular topic from wikipedia, warning other editors about them, merging a page with an RfC on it, archiving another similarly, starting an AfD on the article with most of it removed etc etc is all acceptable behaviour it seems. If I did any of that I'm sure it wouldn't be :) (not that I would).


 * Also see that WP has said a goodbye on the admin board whatever that means. Hope I don't get topic banned, knew I would have to step very carefully. Robert Walker (talk) 20:45, 15 July 2013 (UTC)


 * Anyway won't post there, won't do anything, will wait and see what both of you say. Robert Walker (talk) 21:08, 15 July 2013 (UTC)


 * Could add a short summary at the top of each section of my part of User:Robert_McClenon/Mars_Notes if that's thought a good idea.Robert Walker (talk) 00:32, 16 July 2013 (UTC)


 * Also just now wondered, if this is worth saying:


 * Robertinventor, you have just edited your talk page 13 times in 6 hours and 6 minutes. I think you have a case of nerves concerning something that continued worrying about will not help.  The someone not using his/her own name might be an arbiter or other official at WMF who is familiar with arbitration.  These people have some motive for not wanting their writing on particular cases known to the community in general.  They would not want organized blocks of voters voting for or against arbcom candidates based on their comments in particular cases.  Do not worry about the mechanics of arbitration much.  You know even less about it than I do, so worrying will not help much.  Posting something at the arbitration while in an agitated state of mind is almost certain to harm your case.  Just take it easy and read a book.  Do not look at Wikipedia for another 12 hours.  Get some sleep.  Then calm yourself, take a few slow deep breaths and look at developments with a detached nonchalance, as if it all concerned someone else, not you.  Then edit non-Mars articles.  Good luck.  - Fartherred (talk) 02:55, 16 July 2013 (UTC)


 * Yes I'm sure you are right about "someone not using his/her own name" and I'll follow your advice, thanks. Robert Walker (talk) 07:17, 16 July 2013 (UTC)


 * After a break, I'll do some proposals for deletion patrolling, it's ages since I did that. Am good at finding notable citations that other editors missed, and when I've just had so much of my own content deleted, will be nice to help newbies who get content proposed for deletion just because they don't know that they need to add citations or don't know how to do it. Robert Walker (talk) 07:53, 16 July 2013 (UTC)


 * Okay, thanks Farthered, I've done some therapeutic WP:PROD removing. I saved an article describing a star which seemed notable enough to include and started a discussion about the WP:PROD guidelines here: Wikipedia_talk:Notability_(astronomical_objects)

I've drafted out a possible response with a calmer state of mind but will sleep on it