User talk:David Tribe

Hello. Just so you know, the right way to add yourself to a workgroup is to add the Category:WG Authors to your user page (as you did with CZ_Authors and CZ_Editors). I fixed it for you on the Biology authors page. Also, based on your résumé, it looks like you may want to be a Biology editor instead of an author. Have a nice day, and thanks for your edits so far --ZachPruckowski 08:45, 21 November 2006 (CST)

I'm still trying to figure out the hierarchy too. As I understand it so far, if you're an editor you're also an author. So at present you should have six categories. The CZ author and editor, and similar for biology and agriculture. As far as being more specific, then you did the right thing by adding your initials to the topics that represent your expertise. I added you back to the areas in biology with this edit. Let me know if you still need some pointers with regard to the code. It is a little frustrating if you are not familiar with it, however, it is quite intuitive once you get started. Chris Day (Talk) 18:15, 22 November 2006 (CST)

Images...

David,

No problem about the images. Please feel free to browse the net for any images that you would liked added and just let me know so I can direct you on how to do it. Don't forget to sign your comments with four tide marks ~ This will automatically turn into your signature and time of posting so other users can tell who is talking!

Some further reading is here:

http://pilot.citizendium.org/wiki?title=Help:How_to_use_talk_pages&action=edit&section=7

Eric Pokorny 16:34, 8 December 2006 (CST)

B McClintock article

David, I re-wrote the first paragraph. It struck me that the emphasis on maize was a bit out of hand, after all it's not that her work was important because it elucidated corn for the world. Would you please read it and make sure that I didn't get things wrong. I think it's fair to say that her work initiated genomics, but maybe it's not. If not, could you explain it to me? thanks, Nancy Sculerati MD 20:43, 8 December 2006 (CST)

Nancy, I agree with you except I feel genomics generally has a different meaning to your use here. hence a small further edit David Tribe 22:27, 8 December 2006 (CST)

Thanks, and you are right about genomics. Take a look at legacy also.Nancy Sculerati MD 00:15, 9 December 2006 (CST)

David, please look at the biology talk page. Thanks for that article on Morgan, it taught me a lot and it's a great tribute. Of course, Eric Kandel is a political creature, as well as a great scientist, and he is at Columbia :). As an aside, it's wonderful to be learning and thanks for all you write. Nancy Sculerati MD 12:23, 12 December 2006 (CST)

Hi David, i noticed you didn't give the McClintock article the same treatment as the the biology article with respect to all the non-reference sources and links. Any particular reason for this? I thought it seemed like a good approach having such material on a separate holding page. Chris Day (Talk) 02:57, 13 December 2006 (CST)

Hi Chris, no reason really ; I agree with you in general and Still see advantages of routinely doing this on "main portal" type pages. I will try and explain the several advantages of this through workgroups forums. On looking at McClintock agan I think there no pressure save more space and feel that we can forgo this on that article David Tribe 04:38, 13 December 2006 (CST)

microbiology

I noticed you were working on the microbiology page. I added the subgroup on the biology draft page (don't know how to link this) since it was absent in the list of types of biology. maybe someone with your editing power can get a microbiology link added to the real biology page. -Tom Kelly (Talk) 20:56, 20 December 2006 (CST)

There are several links to microbiology in the real biology page. About Pasteur:

"His life's work in bacteriology",

where bacteriology is a redirect to microbiology. Also, when Leeuwenhoek work is mentioned:

"It was realised that tissues were composed of cells, the field of microbiology was born, and the ground was prepared for the germ theory of disease"

as well as in the "General subfields within biology" template. I agree it should also be in the section Biology today, a survey of the science of life, although that section has not really been discused in detail and is clearly not exhaustive in its present form. I'm not sure we want it to be exhaustive either. Chris Day (Talk) 21:20, 20 December 2006 (CST)

I only was referring to the list of advanced biology fields at the bottom of the biology page. I added the microbiology link on the biology/drafts page but I wanted some editors to see if it should go to the approved article. http://pilot.citizendium.org/wiki?title=Biology/Draft&diff=prev&oldid=100013668

I understand that there are links scattered through out the biology page directing to microbiology, but I just figured it should be listed at the bottom of the page as well, with the other biology fields. I guess I need to read up on how the drafts actually get taken up in to the real page. Because it feels like the turn over time will be a long time for such a minor thing like adding a link. -Tom Kelly (Talk) 00:40, 21 December 2006 (CST)

metabolism

David, please look at metabolism when you have a chance. thanks, Nancy Sculerati MD 09:44, 29 December 2006 (CST) sorry, David! I'll stop conflicting with you on metabolism! Nancy Sculerati MD 18:13, 30 December 2006 (CST)

Hi David - Pedro has put a newer version for approval (down at the bottom of the talk page). If I have two more editors on board, I'd be happy to approve it this evening. -- Sarah Tuttle 14:50, 4 January 2007 (CST)

Cereals template

Hi David, see if the cereal navigation box works with images now. i tried to recode the navitgation box template to fix the problem. Chris Day (Talk) 22:22, 2 January 2007 (CST)

Wheat

I think the article is really excellent in scope. Well written. Great illustrations. Problem seems to be that you are our only knowledeable editor in agriculture. I just e-mailed 2 chapters on wheat that may help as references. sent to the g-mail URL, listed forums. Reagrds, Nancy Sculerati MD 10:40, 3 January 2007 (CST)

thanks Nancy. Ive already drawn it to the attention of the listed Ag editors but cannot determinine from their sparse CV details if they are specially suited to comment or even active on CZ. I wanted to make sure the article wasnt only seen by biologists. David Tribe 17:55, 3 January 2007 (CST)

I don't understand why "you have to shorten the article..." what's wrong with it at this length or longer?

Because at aroond 32 kbytes in size there are sometimes problems with some browsers reading the pages, so we try and keep total page size 31 kb or less to solve this problem. Currently the article is at 32 kb. A warning comes up on the editor when you save the full article if you're near this size limit David Tribe 16:48, 20 January 2007 (CST)

Impressive work

Just wanted to express appreciation for your outstanding article in progress. Exemplary writing. Anthony.Sebastian (Talk) 19:57, 9 January 2007 (CST)

Radiation and life

On the talk page for nuclear chemistry you wrote that you had read that it is thought that hydrogen generated by the radiolysis of water served as a food for bacteria. Please could you give me a reference to this idea.Mark Rust 15:23, 18 January 2007 (CST)

Nice to meet you

Nice to meet you David. If I stick around I will probably be wandering into "your" articles fairly often, based on where I have ended up so far. Ian Ramjohn 08:39, 23 January 2007 (CST)

Biology Draft Talk and Science Images

David, of course I'm famously thinned skinned, and so I ask that you go over to the Biology Draft talk page and look at the top at the new comments, re:anonymous e-mailed letter. Also, I was thinking, if we put the copyright stuff-the attribution-directly on the actual image so if the image was copied the attribution was too, we might have a way around. Nancy Sculerati MD 15:14, 24 January 2007 (CST)

NOW THIS SUGGESTION IS PRAGMATIC BRILLIANCE. Medical practice does teach you stuff, indeed! David Tribe 15:43, 24 January 2007 (CST)

Please look at section just below where you just commented, and comment there too. The first comment is by Zach, about a letter. That's where I'm a bit offended.Nancy Sculerati MD 15:19, 24 January 2007 (CST)

I replied there and on your Talk page before reading this. Great to get to know you as a person! Feel like calling sometime and chuckling and seeing what your (New York?) accent is like!. But Ive gotta go to work now. David Tribe 15:42, 24 January 2007 (CST)

Yes, we all should meet each other. But where? I vote for an international conference! Anyway, you did a nice job on that last paragraph, it's a real improvement. Would you kindly add your 2 cents (your real ones, not for my benefit) to that "outside person letter" thread on the Draft/talk page. Nancy Sculerati MD 22:20, 25 January 2007 (CST)

Ciao!

Hi David, thanks for your comment on my page (though I might move it to the talk section): what were you doing in Lodi? By looking at your bio I'd say it was related to the farms there. Cheers --ripa 05:33, 25 January 2007 (CST)

Access to protected pages

I just noticed you updated the biology article :) So you are now able to update the protected approved articles? Good to know for future. Chris Day (Talk) 11:01, 25 January 2007 (CST)

Plos

Scanning electron micropgaph of Vibrio cholerae

I see what you mean, I found this one in no time. I accidently saved with a terrible name, will not make that mistake next time. Chris Day (Talk) 15:56, 25 January 2007 (CST)

Hi David

• Yes I live in Melbourne, though I am currently overseas. The problem with photo uploads is not that I don't know how to do them here, but that I have uploaded nearly 500 photos to Wikipedia and I don't want to have to upload them again.
• I see you have a background in HIV research. I was heavily involved in the community response to AIDS in 1983-93 and was at one time President of the Vic AIDS Council. I haven't looked at Wikipedia's AIDS article for a while but I'm sure it is dreadful. Perhaps we can do some work on this some time. Adam Carr 04:21, 26 January 2007 (CST)

A comment here was deleted by The Constabulary on grounds of making complaints about fellow Citizens. If you have a complaint about the behavior of another Citizen, e-mail constables@citizendium.org. It is contrary to Citizendium policy to air your complaints on the wiki. See also CZ:Professionalism.David Tribe 00:15, 28 January 2007 (CST)

Thanks for the "image" template in "Systems Biology" article

David: Thanks. Did not know how to configure the image. Learning slowly. Appreciate your help. --Anthony.Sebastian (Talk) 22:51, 28 January 2007 (CST)

Biology montage

Hi David, i made a change to the wikicode of the montage on my user page. It seems to have fixed the problem on my MAC using a mozzila browser. Could you check it on your computer to see if it has solved the problem? See User_talk:Chris_day#Pictures. Thanks Chris Day (Talk) 13:37, 29 January 2007 (CST)

Welcome template

I see there is a welcome template that is currently being used at Template:Awelcome. This could be modified to reflect some of the issues we discussed on my talk page. Chris Day (Talk) 14:14, 29 January 2007 (CST)

The Mystery of Consciousness

Repeat from Biology/draft--

David: Regarding the "mystery of consciousness": An interest of mine for decades, starting when I read: Jaynes J. (1976) The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Co. I have in hand advanced drafts of three papers I plan to submit to the Journal of Consciousness Studies, someday, of course, Multiverse willing. I’ve had several posters accepted for the biennial Tucson conference "Toward a Science of Consciousness", the abstracts of two of which you can find at http://groups.msn.com/Anthony-Sebastian/. If interested, click there on 'documents' and look for files entitled:

• Consciousness Made ‘Easy’ - The Perspective of a Lay Enthusiast.rtf
• Defining 'Experience' As Prerequisite To Explaining 'Conscious Experience' [post conference revision].rtf

I’d love to start a draft on 'conscious experience' for CZ, but I’d have to give up my academic life first. I know the players in the (controversial) field fairly well, but I can’t think of anyone who would qualify as 'non-POV'. Will give further thought to whom we might try to recruit.

You have thoughts? --Anthony.Sebastian (Talk) 22:09, 29 January 2007 (CST)

Just in case you miss it

See the talk section here. Talk:Biology/Draft#Montage_updated_to_individual_pictures Chris Day (Talk) 13:28, 30 January 2007 (CST)

Re Two-Column References Biology/Draft

David: Sounds good to me. Easier than reading a long line for each reference. And might eliminate some white space, or not. I'd try it on the my article drafts if I knew how to do it, and keep the columns evenly filled as new references added. Will try looking up the methodology. --Anthony.Sebastian (Talk) 19:07, 30 January 2007 (CST)

OK, I've done some testing. I have Firefox 2.0.0.1 (latest version) on a Mac correctly displaying two columns right now. Are people reporting problems on anything earlier, like Firefox 1.5?

Safari is a different story. It does not work in Safari 2.x on Mac OS 10.4.x (latest browser, latest OS) There's no way around that. However, the next version of Safari will support columns (I tested a (very unstable) pre-release version). I added support for that to the <div> tag in Biology/Draft. I assume that Safari 3 will come out with the new Mac OS X sometime before June.

Anyways, the point is that this is a browser issue, and not one we can fix on the CZ site. Ultimately, my goal is to overhaul the site's current CSS set-up, so that we can do 2 column references without the extra work. But that isn't going to happen until the rest of my life gets canceled for a day or two. -- ZachPruckowski (Talk) 23:54, 2 February 2007 (CST)

protection - not without a twist

Hi David, Protection of pages doesnt seem to be working properly since it is impossible for me to set the protection to edit=sysop and move=sysop. I cant get rid of the other two selections (default, unregistered user). Probably my thick fingers fail me there, but on a MAC it seems very tough. Got anu hints there? Robert Tito 03:19, 31 January 2007 (CST)

That W on the Biology/Draft history logs

The W did show up after you removed some comments, but that's because that's when the "from Wikipedia" feature was implemented. It seems to default to ON, so you likely made that edit without noticing the box (I've done this about a dozen times so far). It's the checkbox marked "Content is from Wikipedia?". Go ahead and set the Biology/Draft article's checkbox to the appropriate setting (depending on whether or not you use WP material), make a minor edit (add or subtract a space somewhere pointless), and then save it. --ZachPruckowski (Talk) 07:28, 31 January 2007 (CST)

recruitment letter

could you help me with this? http://pilot.citizendium.org/wiki/Citizendium_Pilot:Recruitment_Letter#Version_2_for_Biological_.2F_Health_Sciences -Tom Kelly (Talk) 23:48, 31 January 2007 (CST)

In "Life" entry, added subsection "Linguistic Considerations Relating to the Definition of Life"

David: In the "Life" entry, I added subsection "Linguistic Considerations Relating to the Definition of Life". I may presume too much in this case. Feel free to delete or put somewhere else. --Anthony.Sebastian (Talk) 16:43, 3 February 2007 (CST)

Comparisons between draft and approved versions

I accidently came across a way to directly compare these two classes of page. Since each edit has its own unique number it is possible to compare any two edits whether they are on the same page or not. Comparing the current last two versions of biology (approved) vs bioogy/draft gives this result. Clearly it would be possible to have a radio button option in the history of biology/draft to compare it with the most recent version of biology. Obviously this is for the developers to work on, but I think this is a tool that is important for CZ given the importance of both the draft versions in relation to the approved version. Should we propose this to the developers? Chris Day (Talk) 11:46, 5 February 2007 (CST)

Recent Vandalism

Complex though this may sound, you need to undelete "User:Tim Starling", delete "User:Larry Sanger", and then move "User:Tim Starling" to "User:Larry Sanger", then re-delete "User:Tim Starling" (which should just be a redirect at that point. Note that this is the only way to preserve the page history that I know of. -- ZachPruckowski (Talk) 01:25, 7 February 2007 (CST)

noted David Tribe 01:28, 7 February 2007 (CST)

It's now at User:Jimbo Wannabe. -- ZachPruckowski (Talk) 01:35, 7 February 2007 (CST)

Hi David & Zach,

I'm up for trying to preserve the page history involved. I see User:Jimbo Wannabe - is this Larry's original page? Any pointers on how to go ahead with this? By the way- there's now a User:Michael Johnson. Different than me. --Mike Johnson 01:53, 7 February 2007 (CST)

Delete anything on Larry's current page (should just be a redirect) and move User:Jimbo Wannabe back to his page (but don't include the talk page). In your case, delete your page and talk page, and move User:Mike Hunt and it's talk page back to your page. -- ZachPruckowski (Talk) 01:57, 7 February 2007 (CST)

Thanks- looks like it's straightened out for now. If you'd like anything protected... --Mike Johnson 02:05, 7 February 2007 (CST)

vandal

Could you please look at contributions of Hillary Hildegard IlI...[2](or just recent changes). Best regards, Aleksander Halicz 03:42, 7 February 2007 (CST) Reverted to pre-vandalized version a few comments lost perhaps. C'est la vie 20:30, 7 February 2007 (CST)

Thanks for your comment. Please do not regard my previous remarks as a sign of impatience. By a chance, I've spoted the vandals on the recent changes page and you were just the first recently active constable to notify. By the way, it looks like our vandals are not so numerous but well prepared and motivated to make damages to the system. Best, Aleksander Halicz 06:02, 8 February 2007 (CST)

bioinformatics

Hi David,

I saw your remark in bio-info about the dna-databases. how about the ethics of illegally obtained dna-profiles. blood tests that (unknown to the testee are stored and used for a dna profile? (it has happened in my country, it will happen in yours, and any other country. where discuss that? Robert Tito | Talk 23:06, 7 February 2007 (CST) David, I remembered the name from yesterday - I instantly blocked with reminder to you. Robert Tito | Talk 16:43, 8 February 2007 (CST) Thanks David, I really wasn't sure there, cation seemed logical, kation more known. So much for distraction by multi-lingual. Robert Tito | Talk 23:06, 8 February 2007 (CST)

Vandalism

Ok, first of all, why'd you ban me? I'm trying to help you clean up the vandalism.

Anyway, couldyou delete User:Jared Brogan, now that he's vandalized it? Thanks. Chris Day 03:01, 9 February 2007 (CST)

Italiano

David, I have Italian background but Io no parlo Italiano :) --Versuri 06:26, 10 February 2007 (CST)

everything?

I thought I had undone everything again? Robert Tito | Talk 17:44, 10 February 2007 (CST)

) that seems the continuous thing here :)))))

On the lookout again. Robert Tito | Talk 17:52, 10 February 2007 (CST)

Biology (and you thought it was a finite process?)

David, please look at the Discussion Forums at the new Biology (PHILOS) stuff and comment. Hey, I looked you up on Wikipedia , and, after all, you are generally slated as a famous secularist ! Further, you spearheaded the last approval. So, please do comment and please be explicit about exactly what you think of the issues. Thanks, Nancy Nancy Sculerati MD 19:40, 10 February 2007 (CST)

Perhaps you're the infamous one, then. Anyway, please do comment. :-) Nancy Sculerati MD 19:51, 10 February 2007 (CST)

so was your reply. Nancy Sculerati MD 21:31, 10 February 2007 (CST)

Yes, David- but that's why I think we should keep working on other articles. I don't know enough to say about that finch, and the critic has no bio on his user page. We can race Achilles, or chase our tails, forever and get no where. I say bag it for a while and go on. We can keep a running list of corrections. The Einstein portion needs no correction. Work on getting more stuff going. Please - for example- edit DNA tonight. Thanks, Nancy Nancy Sculerati MD 21:32, 11 February 2007 (CST)

DNA

Pierre. Take a look at DNA and Talk:DNA, s'il vous plait? (spelling?)

And no travel to the Dordogne, Sarlat. J'de'soletDavid Tribe 15:51, 12 February 2007 (CST) tu est désolet?. aucun raison.

Right now, I'm pretty busy, but be sure I'll have a look at this page in the next few days... sincerily PYC 17:02, 12 February 2007 (CST)

Advice on 'Life'

Taking the Life article in its current draft, what would you like to see further developed or modified. I have much more in mind for this article, especially work on the later sections, but would like to consider the practicality of getting out a draft that qualifies for consideration of approval. --Anthony.Sebastian (Talk) 15:00, 13 February 2007 (CST)

Suggested novice-targeted Intro to RNA interference

• David: To answer some critiques, and make the Intro more 'introductory', I swapped 1st and 2nd pgraphs, and edited with try for more clarity. Check it out, below. If you don't like it, ignore it.

Messenger RNA (ribonucleic acid) (mRNA) is a single-stranded polymer whose sequence of nucleotide bases transports information, present as the double-stranded deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) code of genes, to regions of the cell where that genetic information is used for synthesizing proteins. Understanding the flow of information from DNA to mRNA to proteins - a process known as gene expression (see figure) - is necessary for understanding the process of RNA interference (RNAi), as RNAi potently inhibits that information flow, thus effectively silencing gene expression. Hundreds of human genes are affected by natural regulatory circuits that involve RNAi mediated processes.

Specifically, RNA interference (RNAi) is a mechanism in eukaryotic cells that is triggered when such cells are exposed to certain double-stranded ribonucleic acid (dsRNA) molecules. The process has been detected in many organisms, including animal, plant and protist cells. The distinguishing characteristic of RNAi is destruction of mRNA molecules that share at least some of the sequence characteristics of dsRNA trigger molecules to which the cells have been exposed.

The discovery of RNAi is a major technological breakthrough in biological research, perhaps as important as the development of the so-called polymerase chain reaction (PCR), an in vitro technique that enables even tiny amounts of specific mRNAs to be measured easily. In experiments using RNAi in the fly Drosophila or in the worm Caenorhabditis elegans, the effect of the loss of function of every known gene on a molecular pathway, cellular structure, or organism phenotype can now be determined rapidly and easily.

--Anthony.Sebastian (Talk) 15:57, 13 February 2007 (CST)

I just added Anthony's intro to the article and then ended up rewording it a bit. One good thing about the new version is that it actually referes to the central dogma diagram. i moved the RNAi summary diagram up to the top too, although this may be a bit too much. In its old location it was too small and the legend was too long. Note i edited out two of the sentences from the legend to try and make it more succinct. Chris Day (Talk) 17:12, 13 February 2007 (CST)

Confused re your remarks re User:talk Anthony.Sebastian

David: Couldn't quite follow you. I know of other persons with name Anthony Sebastian. My nephew Anthony Peter Sebastian, knows about CZ, may have registered.

I use Anthony.Sebastian (dot separator) to login CZ & CZ forum. I could put my pic on my User page. Bad idea?

P.S. Hope I didn't confuse things with my RNAi intro suggestion. Wanted you to review before actually editing article.

--Anthony.Sebastian (Talk) 17:48, 13 February 2007 (CST)

BTW: 4~ sends me to: http://pilot.citizendium.org/wiki/User:Anthony.Sebastian. Seems right. Should I sign other than with 4~? Anthony.Sebastian (Talk) 18:04, 13 February 2007 (CST)

Ok. Now I see that clicking Talk gets me wrongly to http://pilot.citizendium.org/wiki/User_talk:Anthony_Sebastian. Can you fix.

Anthony.Sebastian (Talk) 18:07, 13 February 2007 (CST)

This is going to require a little patience further advice, and some help.

First please document what happens and what outcome you want HERE, please.

My current guess is that I may have to move your dot pages to the no dot pages, as your 4~ button brings you there. This I think is all caused by vandal shuffling far enough back that its a challenge to fix it up. I may need Zachs advice before we do it. Bear with me, and thanks. Im keen to get onto Life.! Its much easier by telephone can you email yours to detribe --AT--gmail.com David Tribe 18:15, 13 February 2007 (CST)

• David: I emailed you my phone number.

What happens: 4~ gets one to my correct User page (on clicking Anthony.Sebastian segment), but to wrong User talk page (on clicking Talk segment). Correct User talk is http://pilot.citizendium.org/wiki/User_talk:Anthony.Sebastian . Wrong User talk is http://pilot.citizendium.org/wiki/User_talk:Anthony_Sebastian.

What I want: 4~ to get one to http://pilot.citizendium.org/wiki/User:Anthony.Sebastian, with Talk portion getting one to http://pilot.citizendium.org/wiki/User_talk:Anthony.Sebastian. --Anthony.Sebastian (Talk) 18:41, 13 February 2007 (CST)

Thanks.

What a doozy For the moment my day job!!! David Tribe 19:07, 13 February 2007 (CST)

I think this fix should be simple. Anthony needs to go to preferences and cut n' paste the following into his Nickname box and remember to check the raw signatures box:

[[User:Anthony.Sebastian|Anthony.Sebastian]] [[User talk:Anthony.Sebastian|(Talk)]]

that should look like the following after signing with ~~~~

Anthony.Sebastian (Talk)

I think this will work. My guess is that there is currently a typo in there. Chris Day (Talk) 22:01, 13 February 2007 (CST)

David: Chris had it right--a typo in my Nickname box. Made another typo trying to fix it, but think it correct now. Thanks to both you and Chris for taking time to worry about this for me. --Anthony.Sebastian (Talk) 21:16, 14 February 2007 (CST)

Move Locks

Are you trying to move lock everything? because there's probably an easier way. I just don't know what it is. But if we want to talk about changing the blanket rules such that users must meet certain criteria to do moves, file a bug (after talking about it with constables). -- ZachPruckowski (Talk) 14:56, 14 February 2007 (CST)

Welcome template

[User-supplied bio goes in User:Your Name]

Welcome

Tasks: start a new article • add basic, wanted or requested articles • add definitions • add metadata • edit new pages

Welcome to the Citizendium! We hope you will contribute boldly and well. Here are pointers for a quick start, and see Getting Started for other helpful "startup" links, our help system and CZ:Home for the top menu of community pages. You can test out editing in the sandbox if you'd like. If you need help to get going, the forum is one option. That's also where we discuss policy and proposals. You can ask any user or the editors for help, too. Just put a note on their "talk" page. Again, welcome and have fun!

You can find some more information about our collaboration groups if you follow this link Citizendium_Pilot:Discipline_Workgroups.You can always ask me on my talk page or others about how to proceed or any other question you might have.

Kind Regards, David Tribe 15:28, 14 February 2007 (CST)

thanks

Of course I continue, as long as I have access ;) --Alex Halicz (hello) 15:31, 14 February 2007 (CST)

Power law + Self-organized criticality

Hi David — can you just clarify for me what you did to the pages on power laws and self-organized criticality? I guess it is to protect them from the recent spate of vandalism involving moving pages. I note that these pages are no longer showing up on my Watchlist so I wonder if this is related.

Many thanks, —Joseph Rushton Wakeling 17:08, 14 February 2007 (CST)

Further to the above, the disputed articles are reappearing on my watchlist after being edited, so it looks all right. Thanks again! —Joseph Rushton Wakeling 18:10, 14 February 2007 (CST)

Graffitti free

I would like that David, as long as you think they can be maintained that way. Nancy Nancy Sculerati MD 21:08, 14 February 2007 (CST)

Image Copyright

David, I uploaded a file on the Chiropractic page in December that is apparently a copyright violation. I deleted the image to avoid further exposure, but since I am the one that uploaded it, I think somebody else should fix the image violation that I made. Rob said you were the one thatcould help me. Can you check into it? Matt Innis (Talk) 22:36, 14 February 2007 (CST)

Removed red link. Need substitute image of some sort Constable David Tribe 23:04, 14 February 2007 (CST)

Input needed on how to educate more people on category importance

http://forum.citizendium.org/index.php/topic,539.0.html -Tom Kelly (Talk) 19:42, 15 February 2007 (CST)

go to the biology workgroup wiki page http://pilot.citizendium.org/wiki/Citizendium_Pilot:Biology_Workgroup and check out the cool things Chris has done with the recent changes in the biology workgroup articles. this is why we need any related biology articles tagged properly. look at the link underneath "all articles" in the table at the top.-Tom Kelly (Talk) 21:01, 15 February 2007 (CST)

Chris Day's effort answers this question. Tell people to take advantage of this workgroup tool to make their work VISIBLE David Tribe 00:24, 16 February 2007 (CST)

Yup, spread the word. Just start posting all over people's talk pages, forums, email, whatever it takes. We need to educate the new authors and current and new editors. -Tom Kelly (Talk) 00:26, 16 February 2007 (CST)

When you are done blocking.

I could not undo this revert:

http://pilot.citizendium.org/wiki/So_i_herd_u_liek_mudkips%3F%21%3F%21116

needs to go to Tom Kelly's page. Chris Day (Talk) 01:34, 16 February 2007 (CST)

Ok, chris's page just got moved and his talk got moved somewhere else I think so I'm responding here. This is my first time dealing with vandals and I want to proceed with these reverts cautiously since I don't know what I'm doing yet. I found this http://pilot.citizendium.org/wiki?title=User:Thomas_E_Kelly&redirect=no redirect, and from the instructions on your page, it appears I should delete this first, correct? -Tom Kelly (Talk) 01:50, 16 February 2007 (CST)

Tom you can't delete it without sysop tools. Just hang out it will get fixed. Chris Day (Talk) 01:51, 16 February 2007 (CST)

No problemo. Will do. See you guys tomorrow while procrastinating. -Tom Kelly (Talk) 01:52, 16 February 2007 (CST)

Your message

I replied on my talk. Stephen Ewen 02:23, 16 February 2007 (CST)

Replied again. Stephen Ewen 02:45, 16 February 2007 (CST)

'lo

Hi, and thanks for the comments at my user talk page. :) I'm terribly sorry I didn't see your earlier messages there, they seem to have been lost in the steady stream of crapcontent from the four or five wiki mailing lists I was foolish enough to sign up to.

As it is, I'm unhappy with a number of articles and the way they've been structured, but Metabolism is the one I've been looking at recently. Any comments on the changes I've been making there, by the way? -- David Still 01:29, 17 February 2007 (CST)

Sure, I'll take a look at it and some others when I have the chance. I'm getting a touch of eyestrain at the moment, and it doesn't help that the article on RNA interference is written for someone with significantly more expertise in the matter than me. The section titles could do with some tweaking, though, which shouldn't be too hard... -- David Still 01:34, 17 February 2007 (CST)

Aaah, I can see why Metabolism is so hard to get through, then -- fair enough. I'll take a crack at it a little later tonight; in the meantime, I'm converting articles like Acid rain to use the correct maths markup. It's quite the learning curve. David Still 01:51, 17 February 2007 (CST)

HGT

Sorry to get to it so late, and after Approval, but I was busy elsewhere. In general it's fine, but i will look for specific details later15:21, 18 February 2007 (CST)

Deleting Linguistics pages

Yes, there are lots of tagged linguistics articles that no-one has worked on, so I suppose these will be deleted. To keep track of live articles I created the Linguistics Live category - pages here have been modified, some extensively, so shouldn't be removed. Also, given that almost all the work on linguistics articles so far has consisted of modifying WP versions, I'd say this mass-cull of pages is a mistake, but whatever. John Stephenson 21:15, 18 February 2007 (CST)

Well, given the choice I'd rather none were deleted at all. But it would help if the most important pages were safeguarded: everything in Template:Linguistics that hasn't yet bitten the dust. and yes, that includes Theoretical linguistics. Thanks. John Stephenson 21:34, 18 February 2007 (CST)

thanks for RNAi

Thanks for addressing my concerns in that article and sorry i did not get a chance to work on it properly. I have an exam due soon and that has been taking up my spare time. Chris Day (Talk) 21:38, 18 February 2007 (CST)

Renaming a page

I think ordinary editors can no longer rename pages for security reasons, so I'm not sure how to get a page moved from an incorrect title. If there's a standard place to request it, please let me know.

The page Cent (British Commonwealth) should be moved to Cent (Commonwealth of Nations), since British Commonwealth is simply an informal term and Commonwealth of Nations is the official title of the organisation.-Charlie Truell 22:46, 18 February 2007 (CST)

I note http://www.thecommonwealth.org/ shows the name is as CT says. I will move it. David Tribe 22:57, 18 February 2007 (CST)DONE David Tribe 23:03, 18 February 2007 (CST)

David - check this first [3] Matt Innis (Talk) 16:46, 19 February 2007 (CST)

Hey, constables: decisions on non-obvious cases need to be made by editors. Constables =/= editors. If none are available, of course, we use our best judgment and see what the arguments of the parties are... --Larry Sanger 16:51, 19 February 2007 (CST)

The fun part is, both ARE editors. Robert Tito | Talk 17:00, 19 February 2007 (CST)

And I carry two passports one "British", both in "The Commonwealth of Nations" :0)

To be serious, It will be helpful to identify the appropriate editor, if any, and politely ask Mr Work to supply checkable verification of his statements. Ill go and look in the latest hard copy coin directory David Tribe 17:10, 19 February 2007 (CST)

I don't know anything about it, so technically I am not an editor in this case. However, that does make me qualified to be the constable for this? This is an editor issue that as a constable I will stay out of. It needs to go to the workgroup first. If you decide that the article should be changed back, I will be glad to do it for you. Matt Innis (Talk) 14:35, 20 February 2007 (CST)

British Commonwealth numismatics

David, in numismatics,the term 'British Commonwealth' is used. It is incorrect to use the term 'Commonwealth of Nations' as far as numismatics go.

A comment here was deleted by The Constabulary on grounds of making complaints about fellow Citizens. If you have a complaint about the behavior of another Citizen, e-mail constables@citizendium.org. It is contrary to Citizendium policy to air your complaints on the wiki. See also CZ:Professionalism.

Please do the proper thing & revert that Cent article back to Cent (British Commonwealth). - (Aidan Work 14:19, 20 February 2007 (CST))

Constable David Tribe 15:29, 20 February 2007 (CST) responded to this by reversing a name chance to avoid (arguable or alleged) transgression of editorial responsibility.

Thanks David, for the welcome

Glad to be back! Nancy Sculerati MD 14:27, 20 February 2007 (CST)

scary mombo jumbo mate

whew you seem to be at it, mate, g'day to ya, laderon. Robert Tito | Talk

"...we cannot afford to keep on quibbling over minute details of good articles."" 100% agree.:-)Gareth Leng 02:51, 25 February 2007 (CST)

Wannsee Conference

Thanks for your comments. Firstly, just for the record, the entire article was written by me, replacing the much inferior one at WP.

I of course have no objection to qualified editors making improvments to the article. The courteous thing to do in such a case, however, would have been to raise any matters of substance at the article's Talk page. In this case, however, Mr Cowie (who is an Egyptologist) did not make any edits of substance. Instead he made a large number of stylistic changes, re-arranging sentences in accordance with his ideas of superior prose style. He also wikified all the dates, contrary to policy.

Before I did my doctorate, I was a journalist and subeditor from 1979 to 1995. I still work as a speechwriter and occasional freelancer. I believe my prose style is as good as anyone's and better than most. I am unware of what qualifications Mr Cowie has to rewrite articles in this way, particularly without any consultation or discussion. Does CZ employ subeditors? Is Mr Cowie one? Not so far as I know. In these circumstances I was entirely justified in reverting his edit. I did him the courtesy of telling him so at his Talk page, which is more than he did.

With due respect, I'm not sure that I see why it is your role to take sides in a matter such as this. If you revert my edit, and I revert your reversion, I am then placed in a position of having a conflict with you in your official capacity, when all I am doing is defending an article, which I researched and wrote, against an edit which I, in "good faith," object to. I think you should leave this matter to Mr Cowie and me to resolve. Adam Carr 10:16, 25 February 2007 (CST)

Finish up HGT

David can you move Talk:Horizontal_gene_transfer to Talk:Horizontal_gene_transfer/Archive 1. After that add #redirect [[Talk:Horizontal_gene_transfer/Draft]] to the Talk:Horizontal_gene_transfer page and protect it from further edits. Once that is done the talk page archive will kick in and automatically catalog the HGT archived pages. I have already added the archive box to Talk:Horizontal_gene_transfer. Thanks Chris Day (Talk) 16:16, 25 February 2007 (CST)

Looks good. And now I think about it, protect the archive (Talk:Horizontal_gene_transfer/Archive 1) too. There is no reason why anyone would need to edit that page. I'll write this up as a protocol, if you think this looks like a good system. Chris Day (Talk) 19:16, 25 February 2007 (CST)

Hi David, i have been playing around with the HGT talk page approval process and I'm at the stage where some feedback would be useful. In the long term, the approval notes that are currently at the top of the draft talk page might be more useful if they are on their own page.

My rationale for doing this is as follows:

1. It might be less confusing to have the history for the approval documentation less tangled with the talk page history.
2. When we archive the talk page we do not have to decide how much of the top to keep on the page since it is mirrored from its own page. All we need to do is make sure the {{Approval history}} template is maintained on the current draft talk pages.
3. If the approval information/discussion becomes too long, or "in the way", it will be possible to have it in a collapsible window such that it will be hidden unless people wish to expand that window.

I have set up a test scenario for HGT at Talk:Horizontal_gene_transfer/Draft/approval. This page is transcluded on the Talk:Horizontal_gene_transfer/Draft page using the {{Approval history}} template. Sorry if this seems over complicated but it might actually make things easier later on. Chris Day (Talk) 10:43, 26 February 2007 (CST)

Another favour

Could you remove the top from the last few articles in the Category:Biology_Workgroup_(Top). i have depopulated it in order to streamline based on the unanimous consensus in the forums. i am assuming the sooner we lead the way here the sooner it will bebome the precedent in all workgroups. Thanks Chris Day (Talk) 11:08, 26 February 2007 (CST)

Moving articles

Now that Aidan Work has been banned (I did try to warn you and Larry about him), someone needs either to delete all his articles (since their accuracy cannot be guaranteed), or at least to go through them and change "British Commonwealth" to "Commonwealth" or "Commonwealth of Nations." This will entail moving several articles to new titles. Do I gather this is something only Editors can do? Adam Carr 20:43, 26 February 2007 (CST)

David - when you get a minute can you or someone else move Cherokee Language to Cherokee language, i.e. decapitalise 'language' to be consistent with other articles. Thanks. John Stephenson 02:07, 2 March 2007 (CST)

Nicknames

Yes you may call me Kattles, perhaps a nickname for yourself..? Something less formal like "Tribal" lol..

Oh and colaboration on micro stuff sounds great ^.^ Kathleen Reinoga 22:07, 27 February 2007 (CST)

Thanks for the message

sorry to have missed you. Nancy Sculerati MD 06:11, 28 February 2007 (CST) as am I Tribal as am I, biochemist that is :)

Your suggestion to simplify Intro in article 'Life'

David: Took your advice, simplified Intro, 'Life' article. --Anthony.Sebastian (Talk) 11:04, 1 March 2007 (CST)

Boris

Am i allowed to contribute to any article? Or only biology ones? Biology is haaaaaaarrrrd! Kathleen Reinoga 04:56, 5 March 2007 (CST)

thanks

for your contribs

squawking

No wonder we have seen neither hide nor hair of you recently.[4] Or am i misinterpreting this? Chris Day (Talk) 00:24, 20 March 2007 (CDT) LOLOL, way to go Chris, David delivered my baby (article) as in finalized the approval process. LOL cheers this keeps humor running HIGH TIME. Robert Tito |  [[Talk]] 

Physical chemistry

Thanks for marking this article as approved. I noticed, however, that the article is not fully protected, but only protected against pagemoves. It may have appeared to be fully protected since the MediaWiki software displays an "unprotect" tab rather than a "protect" tab on any page which is protected in any way, even if only against pagemoves. To fully protect the page, it would be necessary to select the "unprotect" tab, then enter the edit=sysop and move=sysop options into the resulting dialog box. Also, the article version would need to be re-marked as approved after protection, as it is currently displaying the unapproved article disclaimer "The article below may contain errors of fact, bias, grammar..." above template:approved. Thanks. David Ellis 21:23, 22 March 2007 (CDT)

Wheat/Draft

Heya. I've fixed the problem with the table that you mentioned, as noted here. What do you think of the new version? -- David Still 23:52, 22 March 2007 (CDT)

Cool, glad you like it! Personally, I think the Draft desperately needs approval, based both on its age, and the fugly-ness of the original table. Incidentally, would you mind commenting on this for me? :) David Still 00:42, 23 March 2007 (CDT)

Please take a look:

at the talk page for Talk:Critical views of Chiropractic. I noticed. :-) Nancy (or help me finish Dog)

I missed it! But responded as well after Nancy. Thanks for joining in - and I haven't seen anybody's opinion that I thought was trivial yet. Please feel free to jump in anywhere! We have so much work to do... so little time:) --Matt Innis (Talk) 22:38, 23 March 2007 (CDT)

Thanks:) --Matt Innis (Talk) 22:06, 24 March 2007 (CDT)

Dogs

The veterinary stuff-that's remnants of Wikipedia, if you could add or rephrase, please do. Thanks so much, I'd like to get this approved. Nancy Sculerati MD 06:24, 24 March 2007 (CDT)

David, I tried to fix things. Look it over please- I can't get some of the captions to show. I asked Chris Day to also look over. I'd like to either get it nominated for approval, or a list of things lacking generated on the talk page so I can fix it. -or thers can. Thanks, Nancy Sculerati 12:45, 31 March 2007 (CDT)

Thank You

David, thank you for your warm welcome. I am honored to be here Joel Leyden 19:00, 26 March 2007 (CDT)

Coding question

David: How can I revise the following to give a box of desired width light blue located at the left edge of an article:

left edge use align="left" can also use center or right. light blue change to background-color:lightblue selected width can use either percent (with respect to screen width) or pixels. Either width="80%" (as this example, note it adjusts size as browser window changes) or width=600 for fixed size of 600 pixels in all broswers (regardless of the window size). Anthony, There are many other parameters too but these few are a good place to start. Chris Day (Talk) 14:41, 26 March 2007 (CDT)

Approval for Life

David, you wrote:

"As an editor in biology, I'd support an approval tag with a 1 to 2 week deadline."

"My major suggestion is that the synthesis of perspectives should be introduced very early (with a different title), not at the end. My argument is that this is journalism, not a scientific manuscript. Readers need to find their take home message, simple version, quickly, IMHO. Your diagrams are wonderful, and the whole article is well done, I think." David Tribe 18:20, 26 March 2007 (CDT)

David: I have taken your suggestion to rearrange. I think you are right, and it seems to work well. Please take look, and critique. If you think it okay, I'd appreciate your discussing with the group about the approval tag. I will continue to work on the 'images' issue (see article Talk page). --Anthony.Sebastian (Talk) 22:50, 26 March 2007 (CDT)

Regarding title change for Life article

David: Nancy feels strongly about having the phrase 'living systems' somewhere in the title of the Life article. I suggested, among others:

• Life (principles of living systems)

Nancy says that might be okay with her, but to run it by you, Gareth and Chris.

I feel strongly about keeping "Life" as the primary title, but have no objections to a parenthetical qualifier.

Could you go with "Life (principles of living systems)"? If so, would you consider nominating the article for approval. --Anthony.Sebastian (Talk) 16:02, 30 March 2007 (CDT)

Hey, and request for help

Thanks for your warm welcome. ---

Thanks. Yi Zhe Wu 00:55, 10 April 2007 (CDT)

Anthony.Sebastian agrees to approval of Life today, April 10

Seems folks want to get Life approved today. No objections. --Anthony.Sebastian (Talk) 17:40, 10 April 2007 (CDT)

Life

David, I can approve Life now. --Matt Innis (Talk) 17:51, 10 April 2007 (CDT)

Is the version # correct? --Matt Innis (Talk) 17:59, 10 April 2007 (CDT)

I have chosen a version that ovoids ASs last few edits which were more than needed an debateable. There is no issue raised buy this as he can add them to Draft. Ill just recheck I did the last URL update correctly David Tribe

Andrew J. Swinehart

My friend Andrew requested that I vouch for his identity, hence, my presence. I do solemnly swear that he does exist, and is not a figment of his own imagination. If ever this is proved not so, I will personally plead for his insanity and revert all of the wonderful articles he has written to a null page. --Joshua David Williams 22:18, 10 April 2007 (CDT)

Dog

David, I will begin the approval action for Dog. Is the version correct? --Matt Innis (Talk) 08:46, 12 April 2007 (CDT)

Help me out on the bottom of the Dog page. --Matt Innis (Talk) 09:03, 12 April 2007 (CDT)

Dog Approval complete! Good job! --Matt Innis (Talk) 09:55, 12 April 2007 (CDT)

John Calhoun move

I've already copy-paste moved John Calhoun to John C. Calhoun, but if a conventional move with preserved history should have been done, please reverse my copy-paste move and perform the constable-style move. Thanks! Yi Zhe Wu 19:24, 13 April 2007 (CDT)

Darwin

Dear Anthony, Thats neat. Did you see that I started chopping into Organism. It that needs a lot of work to give it life.

BTW I never did get to express my personal appreciation for your effort in Life. It was a tough task, and very ambitious of you (and us all), and my view always, was that it had to be done really well. And it was I think, even though there are still minor blemishes. I saw my role as to try and mediate a completion - as a go-between almost - that had multiple-editor support. I realise now that there is value in having at least one editor not feeling strong ownership/authoriship and to be well, an editor. It was wonderful to see different inputs, like Gareth and Chris, beavering away in different capacities. I think it worked because all the participants mutually respected the different other participants and their different strengths and good intentions, all useful. That's what I think.

Cheers David

David: I can't tll you how grateful I feel for your comments. I emphasize as I have done before that my contibution to the Life article found its strongest motivation in a desire to learn as much as I could in a reasonable period of time about the nature of living systems — basically a selfish aim. But, as I have no doubt you too have discovered, sharing what one thinks one has learned serves the learning aim because of the inevitable feedback one gets in critiques, offerings of facts and views, and questions. So one has to try at least to teach in order to learn. I cannot remember a time when I did not intensely wonder how my body worked, or for that matter how the world works. So the rewarding aspects of the experience of collaborating on the subject with the biology workgroup far outweighed the ego-related frustrations such as having one's darling sentences and paragraphs rephrased in someone's style.

I agree with your thought about articles having at least one editor taking a pragmatic stance, in part arbitrator, in part pacemaker. That understates your contribution. I also agree that courtesy derived from mutual respect, especially for the qualities of different strengths and good intentions you mentioned. No one had horns on for more than the time it took to give the bruise a rub.

Though very pleased with article, and proud of our accomplishment, personally I feel the article still needs development if we want shoot for the goal of the best among the articles on the subject, meaning we achieved an explanatory excellence that suggests we learned what we set out learn, achieving our selfish goal. The spirit of the wiki can make that level of article excellence happen. I'd like to see the reader of Life feel as if they've eaten a gourmet meal with fine wine, and now realize what fine 'living' means, but also have them see a path, through citations and other directed readings, to pursue their own learning goals in any area of biology. Surely all areas of biology weave into explaining life. I see Life as a hub, one that must excel in order to give coherence to the sum of CZ's articles in biology, and to serve them by centering them, reminding them about the meaning and value of orchestrating. In my semi-delirious moods, I see a biology book, perhaps multi-volumed, coming out of the groups' articles — a printed book that might survive nuclear winter or global warming, when the net shuts down.

I will check out Oganism. Speaking of 'organism', I appreciated your solomonic decision in Life to move most of the molecules into its own header, and your well-chosen title "Organic chemistry as informatics". I also appreciated the reference to Carl Woese's PNAS article in Evolution of cells. Loved it. As Thomas Huxley said when he read Darwin's natural selection mechanism, so simple I feel stupid not to have thought of it. Figure I'll begin to understand after a few dozen more readings. But I appreciate the importance of horizontal gene transfer as a main player in evolution from cells to organisms to species. I sent Gareth an article interpreting evidence as indicating horizontal gene transfers in the hominine and pongine lineages, bipeds mating with arboreal knuckle walkers.

Cheers to you.

Anthony

Approval of Life draft

David, I did some fixes re silicon and LUCA (latter in Appendix, which we missed). Will you consider making the current revision the candidate for approval. --Anthony.Sebastian (Talk) 22:45, 15 April 2007 (CDT)

Just looked over life and i can't see any changes I disagree with. I specifically like the adjustments to LUCA and silicon, they should be in this new edition. Chris Day (talk) 23:44, 15 April 2007 (CDT)

Thanks for the Welcome

Thanks for the greeting. And--in spite of the Italian surname--I cannot edit in Italian! --Mark Mirabello 18:22, 16 April 2007 (CDT)

Approval page

Since you seem to like the separate approval page I have done some remodeling based on my experience of this additional page over the last month. I think these changes will make things easier. Your feedback is welcomed.

The major change is to incorporate the {{Approval history}} template in the checklist. In this way every talk page article will have an approval area, even before the article is nearing completion. I have added it to my experimental checklist so you can see how this would pan out across on the biology talk page as well as the life talk page.

There are three advantages to this approach:

1. The {{Approval history}} template cannot be archived by mistake.
2. The red link to the approval page on stubs will assure that the correct page is initiated for the approval page (this is important for the template to work correctly). To see how this would look on a stub look at the talk page for Yarrow.
3. Having an approval area earlier, rather than later, is an advantage since prior to approval it can be used to outline the requirements for the article to reach the CZ standards for approval or similar. It may even make people more aware that our goal is to approve articles not just clean them up.

Another change is to rename the Approval page so they are not to long. They are now located at [[Talk:BASEPAGENAME/Approval]] rather than [[Talk:BASEPAGENAME/Draft/approval]].

The final change is that i have recoded the {{ToApprove}} template so that it only adds categories to the talk page not the approval page. With this change it is no longer necessary to comment out the ToApprove templates in the approval area. I'm not sure if this is good or bad but it does become an option.

I would propose that as the approval areas expand we can archive them in the [[Talk:BASEPAGENAME/Approval/Archive 1]] namespace. Does all of this make sense? Chris Day (talk) 12:36, 17 April 2007 (CDT)

Hi David and Chris, I'm thinking we are making the approval process easier, and anything along those lines are welcome. To top it off, we are making it look good, a plus. My last comment is related to Approval page length. It would be nice to be able to "hide" it simialr to the "content box", but that is not necessary. Other than that, we need to try it a few times, but barring any unforeseen quarks, I say you are on to something nice here. --Matt Innis (Talk) 13:14, 17 April 2007 (CDT)

Matt, thanks for looking this over. You are correct that it would be great to hide it. If you look back at the history of the {{Approval history}} template you'll notice I did include the code for a colapsable window. Unfortunately that code does not work in CZ. My first priority has been to get the basic concept in place. The next phase will include getting the developers here to add the patch that will allow the window to collapse (or get them to trouble shoot for me). keep coming with the good ideas. Chris Day (talk) 13:21, 17 April 2007 (CDT)

Great minds think alike;) I'm glad I'm in good company! --Matt Innis (Talk) 13:24, 17 April 2007 (CDT)

Actually i just noticed the code is still in place (but non functional). It may be a template issue too. Now I know we might use this feature it will be worth my time troubleshooting this problem. Chris Day (talk) 13:26, 17 April 2007 (CDT)

Question

Why was Bill Gates deleted? Yi Zhe Wu 22:10, 17 April 2007 (CDT)

Bill Gates

Actually it was neither from Wikipedia or libelous. The article had only one paragraph talking about he was the founder of Microsoft and he was the richest person in the world, which are all true. Is there any way to check the "deletion log" like we can check on Wikipedia to see which constable deleted it so we can ask? Yi Zhe Wu 22:51, 17 April 2007 (CDT)

Hmm I did check the Informant page CZ:Policy on Topic Informants, the policy is still incomplete, and it does state the subject can request deletion of the article on him. However, there is an exception for "politicians, celebrities, and other luminaries", Bill Gates does count as "celebrity" though. I'll ask Steve Ewen. Thank you anyways. Yi Zhe Wu 23:12, 17 April 2007 (CDT)

Also just FYI, I did not write the article, but I copy-edited it once. Yi Zhe Wu 23:16, 17 April 2007 (CDT)

Life

David, did you get my note on the Life approval page? --Matt Innis (Talk) 22:45, 20 April 2007 (CDT)

That's what is holding it back? Is there disagreement by editors on the right way to do it? --Matt Innis (Talk) 23:02, 20 April 2007 (CDT)

David, I repeat my note placed under Life/draft approval tag:

David, I will cease all editing until v1.1 approved and new draft started. I support approving v1.1 as it currently stands. --Anthony.Sebastian (Talk) 13:33, 21 April 2007 (CDT)

Thanks for your note. I hope to get back to the Life article but have been busy lately. --Catherine Woodgold 20:25, 21 April 2007 (CDT)

Wheat

Could you change the approved template to the following {{approved|editor=David Tribe|group=Biology|group2=Agriculture}}? I assume it is an error that agriculture is not included and we need to have a test version using the group2 parameter. Thanks Chris Day (talk) 22:05, 26 April 2007 (CDT)

new editor

David, perhaps you might introduce yourself to this new editor.[5] I just made his account and he is already working on the wiki. I believe you share some specific interests. Nancy Sculerati 18:50, 27 April 2007 (CDT)

Hello

Pleasure to meet you, David. Are you the same David as GMO Pundit? I'll be working primarily on the bacteriophages. Some colleagues and I have been contributing to Wiki, and we'd like to start migrating much of that material over to CZ.

Well it sounds like you are quite a renaissance man. I mostly work with lambda and phi6, but may be branching out to P1 and Mu (among others) at some point. I'd like to do a comparative survey of life history stochasticity.

Funny you mention Joshua L. I used to work in the very same lab space that he used to work in. I'll have a look at HGT, but I'm no expert in that field.

Well, I think you might be referring to my former mentor, Paul Turner and his mentor, Lin Chao. They published a paper in Nature about game theory and the cheating among bacteriophages. However, I sequenced those very same phages and published on their life history traits. I've also done a few "test tube" phage evolution experiments of my own.

Oh and this might be interesting to you, Paul did his PhD with the Original test tube evolution guy: Rich Lenski.

Hey ask Mike Dyall-Smith if he knows Steve Abedon. Abedon was at the Nice meeting, and is a coauthor and friend of mine.

Small world, indeed! That is pretty funny. I was planning to email Steve about moving stuff to CZ from Wiki.

DEL or No?

You want Three-domain system? Stephen Ewen 11:15, 28 April 2007 (CDT)

Question

David, in the 'Life' article Catherine added "with a common gene pool" to the following paragraph in section 'evolutionary aspects of living'. Should we add "in virtue of horizontal gene transfer"?

"Therefore, biologists recognize the ability to produce offspring that inherit some of its features, but with some variation due to chance, as an essential characteristic of living systems. They refer to it as descent with modification.[16] Evolution by natural selection will occur if heritable variations produce offspring that differ in their reproductive fitness. The variations occur due to chance variations in the inherited genetic recipe (genotype) for constructing the organismic traits (phenotype). In all living systems, DNA primarily provides the genetic recipe. All living things extant today descended with modification from an ancient ancestral community of microorganisms with a common gene pool. To glimpse beyond that horizon, we will need to take heed of the findings of intense current research on early cellular evolution.[26]"

--Anthony.Sebastian (Talk) 15:06, 28 April 2007 (CDT)

I'd make the point that this remark needs a fair bit of thought. The types of gene transfer involved in this hypothetical stage in the evolution of life are NOT comparable with the common concept of a gene pool. Woese used the term Darwinian transition for a good reason. In fact I think it misleading to use the word "gene pool". All we know, is movement of genetic like materials was postulated to be promiscuous. Give me time to try and think that through. IN any case the comment should be based on cklose reading of the primary literature. Catherine should explain where the literature relates tio the added text, I think. As to your next, give me time to think. (One coffee only, a feverish cold.)David Tribe 16:34, 28 April 2007 (CDT)

David, my thoughts after re-reading Woese, Evolution of Cells:

• Once the Darwinian Threshold was reached for bacteria, they were not subject to HGT from the other pre-Threshold cell designs.

• Woese: "In its subsequent evolution a primitive cell of this type would become ever more complex, idiosyncratically connected, and thereby increasingly refractory to horizontal gene acquisition,

especially the more spectacular forms of it (21)."

• When archaea next reached the Threshold, only the pre-Eukaryotes shared genes with other cells designs that went extinct.

• Because of the temporality of Threshold attainment, one cannot conclude that the extant three cell designs evolved sharing a common gene pool. As each design reached the Darwinian Threshold the entire gene pool became less and less a common one.

• A truly common gene pool only allowed the first cell design to reach the Darwinian threshold. After that the gene pool was no longer common, as the bacteria bowed out of HGT.

• So, to say all three extant cell domains arose from a common gene pool is at best ambiguous.

As I interpret Woese. --Anthony.Sebastian (Talk) 19:49, 29 April 2007 (CDT)

David, regarding your: "By the Way Woese's is so far away from standard frames of refrence, that is a tough topic to discuss dont you think?"

Yes, but well argued, though I haven't read every reference cited. Makes a nice story. Would like to see comments by biologists on the paper. Will try to follow-up.

Would also like to try integrating (synthesizing) Woese's "Evolution of Cells" with Smith/Morowitz's "Universality in Intermediary Metabolism" They could speak to each and yield something new. --Anthony.Sebastian (Talk) 22:19, 29 April 2007 (CDT)

Woese re-iterates with new thoughts.. --Anthony.Sebastian (Talk) 22:35, 29 April 2007 (CDT)

David I did not see where Kurland contradicts Woese, at least data-wise. As I read more papers citing Woese's "Evolution of Cells", it seems many accept his analysis. --Anthony.Sebastian (Talk) 13:24, 30 April 2007 (CDT)

"Fair use" image

Actually, the image is not very recent, but we still need to deal with Image:McClintock_stamp_2005a.jpg Stephen Ewen 23:23, 28 April 2007 (CDT)

Mycobacterium tuberculosis (etc)

David, I started helping out on Tuberculosis and have a real need for a good article on the microbiology and molecular genetics of M. tuberculosis (and the other clinically relevant species) if you are interested. If you are not so interested, maybe I can do you a favor with some other article to help out- because it seems to me that the immunology is getting worked out and that it has to do with specific proteins of the organism, and I'd like to understand it. Nancy Sculerati 20:40, 30 April 2007 (CDT)

Approval process

I like what you did, reverting edits (even though one was mine) so as to approve the exact version that an editor had marked as approved. But, I think it would be better when doing this to move the page history to the Draft page. I'm not sure, but I think this can be done by moving ArticleName to ArticleName/Draft (rather than creating a new page at Draft). I posted something on the forum about this, under Editors and Editorial issues (topic Approval Process). Also, it would be helpful when you do the revert to state in the edit summary the date and time of the approved version you're reverting to. Otherwise it's not immediately obvious how many edits you've reverted. Thanks for handling this! Another couple of approved articles done -- that's good! --Catherine Woodgold 20:23, 6 May 2007 (CDT)

Yes, moving a page leaves a redirect at the original name; but then you can just go to the redirect page and replace the redirect command with a cut-and-pasted copy of the article. --Catherine Woodgold 20:33, 6 May 2007 (CDT)

You said: but dont you then lose all the earlier history log from the approved version? . Well, you don't have the history log at the approved version; you have it at the draft version. But isn't that how it's planned that it will work for all versions higher than 1, that all the detailed edit history will remain on the draft page and only the final approved content will be cut-and-pasted into the approved page? I think the detailed edit history should all be at one place or the other. There may not be a technical way to have all the edit history collected at the main page if the edits happen at the draft page, but there is a way (as I described) to have all the detailed edit history collected at the draft page. I don't think any useful purpose is served by having some of it collected at the main article page and some at the draft page; if anyone thinks so I haven't seen that explained. --Catherine Woodgold 20:48, 6 May 2007 (CDT)

Thanks for considering my ideas. It requires more thought and discussion, actually. After typing the above I thought of a reason to do it the way we're doing it: it's to have as much of the edit history as possible on the displayed (approved) page; and in some cases, maybe not much editing will happen after the first version, so that will be meaningful. I still prefer having the edit history at the Draft page, so it's all in one place and it's easier to search for things. I think there may be a way to move a page that duplicates the edit history so it ends up at both places. --Catherine Woodgold 07:10, 7 May 2007 (CDT)

Whch version? IMPORTANT

Please see my talk page, Russell Potter asks me- with an upcoming article for approval, after nomination the template points to a version, meanwhile the draft is being developed. WHICH version gets approved? I have put this question on the Approval board, please answer there http://en.citizendium.org/wiki/CZ:Approval_Announcements#May_8.2C_2007. Thanks, Nancy Sculerati 09:33, 8 May 2007 (CDT) cc:Stephen Ewan

approval

see my comments [6] --Matt Innis (Talk) 19:36, 8 May 2007 (CDT)

Hi David your input here (CZ_Talk:Approval_Announcements) would be good with regard to trying to finalising the approval process. Chris Day (talk) 02:01, 16 May 2007 (CDT)

Images

David, you can't donate something to the public domain and release it under a creative commons license. It is one or the other. This is regarding Image:Metabolism2.jpg. ---Stephen Ewen 05:16, 16 May 2007 (CDT)

Bacteriophages

Hi Dave, I suppose my phage page is more or less ready to go. Can you start it thru the process? http://en.citizendium.org/wiki/Bacteriophage

       I uploaded some phage images from PLoS Biology. Looks much better now. I'm going to submit for feedback as well.

            Phage display and panning... duly noted. Maybe sometime in the near future I will add.

Intelligent Design

Thanks for you input. I hope you can see where I'm coming from. I am to some extent an ID defender, but I encourage you to blow any foolishness out of the water. Will Nesbitt 16:50, 20 May 2007 (CDT)

Jane Addams College of Social Work

Jane Addams College of Social Work reads like a spam article, can you take a look? Thanks! Yi Zhe Wu 19:46, 19 May 2007 (CDT)

Thanks, how do I flag an article? Regards. Yi Zhe Wu 20:14, 19 May 2007 (CDT)

nanometric edit at Bacteriophage

I wonder whether you would mind if I edit this bit that you put in: "(A typical bacterium cell may be about 1000nm long, which in turn is 1/1000th of a millimeter = 1 micron in length.)". I think it can be shortened and that it's not necessary to mention nm, only microns: "A typical bacterial cell may be about 1 micron long, which in turn is 1/1000th of a millimeter." --Catherine Woodgold 11:26, 21 May 2007 (CDT)

No, you were right and I was wrong. Sorry. There was nothing wrong with your English. I just thought more units were given than necessary; but I had overlooked that nanometers were used in the previous sentence, so it does make sense to use nm again. I have edited the sentence but I didn't shorten it as much as I suggested above -- in fact I think I made it longer! But at least I got rid of the parentheses. --Catherine Woodgold 16:16, 21 May 2007 (CDT)

Well, it isn't always a good thing to have one's suggestions put into practice! I'm now thinking maybe it was a mistake that I suggested having the versiondate or "now" field in the ToApprove template. For example: at Talk:Bacteriophage, the dates of the versions in the "url" field and "now" field don't match, so that it says you've approved a version of 11:47, 20 May 2007, but when you click on it, it actually points to a version of 20:10, 21 May 2007. You can fix that; but anyway, since not everyone uses Universal Time, there can be confusion even if the date and time are correct. By the way, I'm pleased to see that you've nominated a version of Bacteriophage containing a bunch of my edits. --Catherine Woodgold 17:45, 21 May 2007 (CDT)

More ID feedback

I like the direction your edits are taking at ID. However, I think it's extremely imporant to keep the presentation of the idea apart from the criticism of the idea. I would recommend moving this text into "Criticism":

Some ID proponents consider that alternative explanations (including Darwinian evolution) are not feasible, as they assume that well-documented natural selection mechanisms to explain the "apparent design" of numerous components and interactions of living organisms cannot explain some features of organism complexity. They see evolution as an "undirected, chance-based process"; ID does not emphasise that selection for reproductive success intrinsically directs evolutionary change towards functional design solutions, or that numerous genetic mechanisms exist to provide a vast array of genetic diversity from which well designed components can be selected.

I also liked in more when you had this in the opening:

Thus, intelligent design remains an intriguing philosophical question to some, but has no basis in science to many.

Forgot to sign. Will Nesbitt 18:55, 21 May 2007 (CDT)

---

David:

Thank you for your earlier message. I have briefly reviewed one section of organism; and will make additional comments should you find these useful:

Ecology

A principle of ecology is that each organism has an ongoing relationship with every other element in its environment (locally, regionally and globally). An ecological system (that is, ecosystem) is any situation where there is interaction among organisms and components of their environment. Such systems embody the entirety of life—the biocoenosis or biogeosphere—as well as the media that that support life that exists in the biotope. Within the ecosystem, species are connected and depend upon one another (for example, within food webs, and exchange energy and matter among themselves and with their environment. The concept of an ecosystem can apply to such units of variable size as a pond, a field, or even a small piece of deadwood. A unit of smaller size (for example, the interior of a cell supporting a microbial parasite) may be called a microecosystem. Not surprisingly, an ecosystem can be a stone and all the life beneath it; a mesoecosystem could be a forest; and, a macroecosystem a whole ecoregion, with its drainage basin (that is, a watershed). In an ecosystem, the connections among species are generally related to their place in the food web. There are three categories of organisms:

• Producers -- usually plants that are capable of photosynthesis but could be such other organisms such bacteria living around ocean vents that are capable of chemosynthesis.
• Consumers -- animals, that can be primary consumers (herbivorous), or secondary or tertiary consumers (carnivorous).
• Decomposers -- bacteria, mushrooms that degrade organic matter of all categories, and restore minerals to the environment.

These relations form food webs with fewer organisms at each higher level of the web. These concepts lead to the idea of biomass (the total living matter in a given place), of primary productivity (the increase in the mass of plants during a given time) and of secondary productivity (the living matter produced by consumers and the decomposers in a given time). Sidney Draggan 09:59, 4 June 2007 (CDT)

need your help

David, I know that this is likely a boring task for you, but could you kindly spend a few miniutes on DNA today? It is such an important article that I havew nominated it for approval and it needs work. Thanks, Nancy Sculerati 09:10, 8 June 2007 (CDT)

Please look at my talk page

david, I am very frustrated, take a look at my user page, at Sean's comments. Can you please fis the two article problem in DNA? I have e-mailed thse involved reeatedly, and put up a notice on the notice board. I've had it. Nancy Sculerati 17:41, 10 June 2007 (CDT)

DNA/Draft

I think I've finished integrating the updates from the DNA/Draft version to the DNA version. some might have slipped through but the majority are there and now DNA should be the one to focus on. --Sean T. Smith 08:26, 11 June 2007 (CDT)

approvals

David, here are some pages that may or may not be ready for approvals depending on your inclination. http://en.citizendium.org/wiki/Frederick_Twort http://en.citizendium.org/wiki/F%C3%A9lix_d%27H%C3%A9relle

Frederick Twort approval went pretty well. I added three edits that looked like mechanical edits rather than content or copyedits. --Matt Innis (Talk) 20:57, 25 June 2007 (CDT)

Another for approval? Brown Institution

OK now I stop working on obscurities and begin working on high priority items. --John J. Dennehy 17:58, 27 June 2007 (CDT)

Félix d'Hérelle

Let me suggest moving the approval date to July 2. It's a weekend and I have sought permission to use two of the images there. Let's give the people time to respond rather than simply jump to fair use. Stephen Ewen 03:45, 22 June 2007 (CDT)

I have yet to hear back. If an editor makes a note on the talk page expressing that they wish to use the images under fair use, I will do all the mechanics of it based upon the statement. ---Stephen Ewen 00:12, 28 June 2007 (CDT)

Hi David, I am ready to do the mechanics on this, but assume you want to look at the pointer? --Matt Innis (Talk) 14:37, 3 July 2007 (CDT)

Dog, second approval

Hi David, long time no hear.

It looks like you were the original approving editor for Dog. The draft page has undergone some major updating and I'd like to see the current draft as the current approved version.

Would you care to review the present draft and take this on, or should I ask someone else?

Aleta Curry 16:23, 17 February 2008 (CST)

Virus

David, what's up with the page on viruses? Maybe I am traveling in the wrong circles, but I've never met a virologist who thinks viruses are non-living. I've always thought viruses are were alive since they evolved by natural selection.

Anyway, I'm teaching microbiology. A student asked me if she had to know stuff about viruses for the exam since "on citizendium it's noted that influenza is caused by a virus, which isn't a living organism so it isn't considered a microorganism."

DNA graphic

Hi David, well, here's another request... Your graphic Image:DNAreplicationFORK.jpg has two arrows in it. But they are so small that they cannot be seen when looked at from the article. Can you take a look at it and if you agree make them very big? About the comment above "...were alive since they evolved by natural selection." why is it that science still is making that remark when clearly natural selection occurs after the fact? Isn't it obvious that the evolutionary step has to occur before selection enters the picture? I mean, isn't he saying above that organisms are to be considered alive because they survived? Survivers survived because they survived. Just a thought...Thomas Mandel 00:18, 18 March 2008 (CDT)

Hi David, me again. I have to leave DNA and work on a different article (General Systems Theory)

I have worked my way half way through it mainly editing for readability. I hope I did a good job. So I am submitting the DNA article for re-approval. (I still would like to see the arrows enlarged.) Chris Day has been holding my hand so you should be able to quickly read through it. I got as far as "translation" (which might be improved by more detail.) Also. in the history section "The Genome Project" is my first shot at it. It could use a sentence pointing out the significance and importance of have a genetic map (I also took the opportunity to start a stub with the same name as the section heading) Maybe I could work on that one a little because it sure is interesting to me how they did all that...Thomas Mandel 22:56, 30 March 2008 (CDT)

Please join us for Biology Week!

Hello David, Long time, no see... I am giving you this personal invitation to join us this week for Biology Week! Please join us on the wiki and add or edit biology articles. Also, please let your friends and colleagues who are biologists, biology students, or naturalists, know about Biology Week and ask them to join us, too. Any way you can help make it an event would be most welcome. Think of it as a Biology Workgroup open house. Let's see if we can kick up activity a notch! Thanks in advance! --Larry Sanger 12:35, 22 September 2008 (CDT)

The first Biology Week took place here from Sep 22-28, 2008.

Article to consider re Micro RNA article

David, As you have started and developed the Micro RNA article, I thought these related articles might fit in:

• MicroRNAs an early feature of metazoans

• Evolutionary biology: Small regulatory RNAs pitch in

• Early origins and evolution of microRNAs and Piwi-interacting RNAs in animals

--Anthony.Sebastian 20:55, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Returning to Citizendium: an update on the project and how to get involved

Hello - some time ago you became part of the Citizendium project, but we haven't seen you around for a while. Perhaps you'd like to update your public biography or check on the progress of any pages you've edited so far.

Citizendium now has over 16,000 articles, with more than 150 approved by specialist Editors such as yourself, but our contributor numbers require a boost. We have an initiative called 'Eduzendium' that brings in students enrolled on university courses to write articles for credit, but we still need more Editors across the community to write, discuss and approve material. There are some developed Biology and Agriculture articles that could be improved and approved, and some high-priority Biology and Agriculture articles that we don't have yet. You can also create new articles via this guide, and contribute to some Biology or Agriculture pages that have been recently edited here and here - or to any others on Citizendium, since you're a general Author as well as a specialist Editor. You may like to contribute to discussions in the forums, and might consider running for an elected position on the Management and Editorial Councils that oversee the project.

If you have any questions, let me know via my Talk page or by leaving a message below this one. Thank you for signing up and reading this update; I hope that you will look in on our community soon. John Stephenson 14:08, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

Returning?

Hi - we are softly relaunching this project and are looking for former contributors to return - please do! John Stephenson (talk) 17:17, 3 September 2020 (UTC)