User talk:18.85.28.163

From Meta, a Wikimedia project coordination wiki
Note: This IP account is associated with the MIT Media Lab.


Bearing Accurate Witnesss[edit]

"Whereof we cannot express a theory, we must narrate a story instead." —Umberto Eco

One of the oldest admonitions in the written word is the admonition to Bear Accurate Witness (sometimes expressed as the admonition to refrain from bearing false witness).

Note that False Witness does not necessarily mean outright lying. It might also mean erroneously uttering, promoting, or propagating an untruth that one is not consciously aware of being a disproven (or disprovable) falsehood.

In mathematics, a theorem is statement that has been rigorously proven to be a true statement. An hypothesis (or story) is an account that has not yet been established as the ground truth, nor conclusively falsified as an incorrect model.

Here are some examples of Scientific Hypothesis Testing from the associated discussion page of this account

Scientific Hypothesis Testing 101[edit]

Let's do a little Scientific Hypothesis Testing.

Consider these two hypotheses:

H0: (Null Hypothesis of Good Will and Good Faith) — WMF Project Sites conform to the published WMF Charter, Vision, Mission, Values, and Policies of the Wikimedia Foundation. Specifically, the mission of the Wikimedia Foundation is to empower and engage people around the world to collect and develop educational content under a free license or in the public domain, and to disseminate it effectively and globally. The Wikimedia Foundation values Freedom, Accountability, Transparency, and Community, and is committed to fostering a world in which every single human being can freely share in the sum of all knowledge. The Wikimedia Foundation intends to comply with all laws and regulations that apply to the organization so as to avoid any departures from its representations to the IRS or to the donors that potentially jeopardize the status of WMF as a 501(c)(3) tax-exempt educational enterprise, or that potentially jeopardize the Foundation's Section 230 immunity from liability for content that is properly and legally construed as the sole responsibility of the individual authors who compose and publish their personal contributions to the sum of all human knowledge.

H1: (Alternate Working Hypothesis) — WMF Project Sites depart from the published WMF Charter, Vision, Mission, Values, and Policies of the Wikimedia Foundation in ways that significantly or potentially jeopardize the status of WMF as a 501(c)(3) tax-exempt educational enterprise, or that potentially jeopardize the Foundation's Section 230 immunity from liability for content that is properly and legally construed as the sole responsibility of the individual authors who compose and publish their personal contributions to the sum of all human knowledge. The departures transform the projects into a variety of game or drama that resembles Mafia Wars on Facebook and/or Vexagonistic Lunatic Scapegoat Psychodrama in the style of Post-Modern Theater of the Absurd.

Now we take a measurement:

{{unblock declined|Please unblock this IP address of the MIT Media Lab so as to affirm '''H<sub>0</sub>''' and falsify '''H<sub>1</sub>'''. —Firelion 22:07, 3 April 2011 (UTC)|2=Your primary account is blocked indefinitely. As I'm sure you are well aware, you are not allowed to bypass that block by editing under anonymous IPs. [[User:Jafeluv|Jafeluv]] 23:25, 3 April 2011 (UTC)}}

Thank you for participating in Scientific Hypothesis Testing 101, Jafeluv.

Let the outcome show that Jafeluv has falsified H0 and affirmed H1.

Let the outcome also show that Jafeluv has posited a haphazard theory of mind as to my state of knowledge.

—Firelion 00:17, 4 April 2011 (UTC)

Part Deux[edit]

Now consider these two hypotheses:

H2: It is within the scope and remit of WMF projects to adopt, teach, employ, encourage, and illustrate such 21st Century concepts and practices as Fairness, Due Process, Ethical Governance, Human and Civil Rights, the Scientific Method, and Evidence-Based Reasoning.

H3: It is beyond the scope or remit of WMF projects to adopt, teach, employ, encourage, or illustrate such 21st Century concepts or practices as Fairness, Due Process, Ethical Governance, Human and Civil Rights, the Scientific Method, or Evidence-Based Reasoning.

Once again, let us take a measurement:

{{unblock declined|1=Please unblock this IP address of the MIT Media Lab so as to affirm '''H<sub>2</sub>''' and falsify '''H<sub>3</sub>'''. —Firelion 00:17, 4 April 2011 (UTC)|2=It's getting boring. [[User:Barras|Barras]] 17:39, 4 April 2011 (UTC)}}

Firelion 00:17, 4 April 2011 (UTC)

The Political History of Banning[edit]

This would be a good opportunity to point out the earliest known reference to a "ban" in the written law. Oddly enough, the very first law ever set in stone makes reference to a ban. 3770 years ago, Hammurabi of Babylonia (Mesopotamia) set 282 laws into stone. Here are the first three of them:


  1. If any one ensnare another, putting a ban upon him, but he can not prove it, then he that ensnared him shall be put to death.

  2. If any one bring an accusation against a man, and the accused go to the river and leap into the river, if he sink in the river his accuser shall take possession of his house. But if the river prove that the accused is not guilty, and he escape unhurt, then he who had brought the accusation shall be put to death, while he who leaped into the river shall take possession of the house that had belonged to his accuser.

  3. If any one bring an accusation of any crime before the elders, and does not prove what he has charged, he shall, if it be a capital offense charged, be put to death.

The second of Hammurabi's laws is a rather odd one. Perhaps it's the origin of the expression, "Go jump in the lake."

Isn't it a tad ironic that here in cyberspace in 2011, the Bureaucrats, Custodians, and Stewards of Wikiversity and Wikimedia, acting under the direction of the Trustees of the Wikimedia Foundation, are reprising a practice first defined in law by none other than Hammurabi himself? And according to Hammurabi's version, the Bureaucrats, Custodians, and Stewards have to establish and prove their cause of action to make a ban stick.

So what is the cause of action, and where is the Due Process through which the purported cause of action is proven to a skeptical public?

Caprice 21:07, 22 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

The Rules[edit]

Rule #1: No Narcissistic Wounding.

Rule #2: No Narcissistic Wounding.

Rule #3: No Narcissistic Wounding.

Violators will be summarily stigmatized, reverted, humiliated, scapegoated, blocked, banned, baleeted, blacklisted and made to stand in the corner with a dunce cap and a scarlet letter.

Caprice 21:07, 22 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

References[edit]