User talk:Dbachmann

Campaign for less bull more writing

I believe all editors should make a significant contribution to at least one featured article before being considered for adminship, and should make a significant contribution to at least one featured article (or single-handedly write a Good Article) per year or stand for re-election to retain their status. People interested in administrative tasks but not in writing content should be offered a separate status such as rollback privileges without blocking privileges. Checkuser and bureaucrat positions should be scheduled to expire and be rotated among trusted admins.

We are here to write an encyclopedia

As a result of Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Rajput (closed February 2006), my Wikipedia account is exposed to occasional outbursts of trolling by throwaway accounts. For this reason I decided to semi-protect my talkpage. If you are editing logged out or with a young account and you came here to make a good faith comment, please try to get my attention on the pertinent article's talkpage, or consider maturing your account with a few more edits first. If you came here because you were told to, or because you read allegations about my position on India related topics or Rajputs in particular, on-wiki or off-wiki, do make sure you are familiar with the history and context of the case before asking me to explain further. I will only be prepared to discuss recent developments and not repeat my position on the events of the Rajput case of winter 05/06. For my basic position towards any sort of ethnic or cultural supremacism, see [1]. dab (ᛏ) 09:56, 25 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

archive1: 19:40, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC) – 18:26, 10 Nov 2004 (UTC) / 2: – 04:10, 25 Nov 04 / 3: – 08:23, 19 Dec 04 /

4: – 09:31, 11 Jan 05 / 5: – 2:05, 8 Mar 05 / 6: – 09:17, 6 May 05 / 7: – 09:15, 1 Jul 05 / 8: – 08:17, 12 Aug 05 / 9: – 09:27, 7 Nov 05 / A: – 19:40, 13 Dec 05 /

B: – 02:04, 16 Jan 06 C: – 20:47, 22 Feb 06 / D: – 22:26, 21 March 06 / E: – 05:54, 19 May 06 / F: – 06:07, 5 Jul 06 / 10 – 13:16, 9 Aug 06 / 11: – 15:58, 9 Sep 06 / 12: – 09:30, 2 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for clarification

Thanks for clarifying your position concerning my RFCU. Regarding Elst, I wil discuss that later as I have my hands full trying to fix up the Muhammad bin Qasim and related articles right now. Thanks again.Hkelkar 10:28, 2 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Colonialism

Look - I don't wish to bicker with you, but I think that the only thing wrong with Colonialism was that it stopped short and w lost its way. It all came crashing down in the 20th century A.D. and look at the world now! Properly subjegated Africa and Asia should have been achieved and we'd be a hundered years ahead towards peace now. How's that for polictically correct?DocEss 21:53, 2 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I half expected you to think along lines such as these. And you mean subjugated (from sub jugum mittere) - the only thing wrong with the Roman Empire was that it collapsed, bloody barbarians, we would have law and order now, and everybody could spell Latin. dab (ᛏ) 07:11, 3 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

And by the same logic we should have let the Axis powers win in WW2. and we would all be serving the Japanese and the Germans and the world would have been at peace.Haphar 09:05, 3 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

that was my own thought too, but I wanted to avoid Godwin's law, so I took the subjegated lead to the Romans :) After the Romans were gone, the easiest thing would have been a complete Muslim conquest of Europe, so we'd all happily chat away in Arabic now, and with a properly subjugated Europe, we'd have had full 1,200 years of piece, just imagine that. dab (ᛏ) 09:06, 3 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

The examples you cite are examples of how colonialism lost its way. And I was only half teasing you anyway. But hey! without Colonialism there's be no USA; there be no gin & tonics; there'd be no Burma Road; there'd be tea at tea time! And with Colonialism done right, there would still be a Palestine; less poverty in Africa; maybe even more peace (or piece as someone spelled it above). Oh we could go on and on just for the fun of it all. And yes, I dydunt thpell that wird two gud - thorry, and thank fer currectung mee.DocEss 16:34, 3 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

indeed, another futile debate (a habit of yours?) dab (ᛏ) 16:38, 3 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

bot request

Sure, I'll get around to it later, thanks. Martin 11:50, 3 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

ArB and PerB templates

The templates are useful because when arabic script is used to translate the title of an article, which is also in bold, the arabic text also should be in bold. The default lang-ar template produces text that is not bold, and in my mind quite unreadable. Notice that in the arabic and persian wikipedia's the default font size is larger than the one produced by the default arabic font in the English Wikipedia. The boldness makes the text more readadble. -- Jeff3000 19:50, 3 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Bakaman's vandalism and incivility

Hi. Bakaman did this. I warned him. He retorted with this. Please look into this matter. Thanks. Sarvagnya 23:36, 3 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Itmaam-i-hujjat and Mizan

DBachmann, please take a look at these if you can find the time. User:Truthspreader has created an article for a book Mizan, published by Pakistan's Al-Mawrid Institute of Islamic Sciences, and has busied himself spreading its message across Wikipedia.Proabivouac 06:48, 4 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Well, I give up. If even you find this type of article reasonable, then you and Wikipedia can prepare yourselves for many, many more of the same. It's not the Mizan article per se, it's that this was created to establish the illusion of notability, so that the book could be cited in other articles. As a source for cosmological fact, no less.Proabivouac 08:29, 4 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

There seems to be a mistunderstanding. I'm not opposed to an article on the book, only to the use of the book as a reliable source in articles such as Itmaam-i-hujjat, and to the original article only to the extent that one might assume it to have been creaed precisely to establish an illusion of notability to support its use in other articles.Proabivouac 08:38, 4 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

"If there are other, more notable books on the concept, of course they should be given precedence, but unfortunately I am not at all familiar with contemporary Islamic theologica discourse"

Nor am I, but the only indication that I know of its notability is User:Truthspreader's article. For all I know, he is the author of this book and the originator of the concept, the existence of which the Esposito quotes don't support.Proabivouac 09:02, 4 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

myths and legends

personally, i dont have any problem with calling them myths. But Chrisianity related pages never refer to biblical stories like Noah's Ark or Moses parting of seas as myths. Isnt it then under WP:CSB.

Secondly, if we refer to the proponents of OIT as nationalist proponents, why cant we say According to Marxist historians, the date of the Avesta could also indicate the date of the Rigveda. when they are the only ones who say so.--nids (♂) 09:43, 4 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

IIRC, C. S. Lewis does refer to the Old Testament stories as myth, in the technical (not the popular) sense the word is used in mythography. See the disambiguation page at myth—the word isn't pejorative.

On the other hand, "Marxist historians" are not the only ones who believe the date of the Avesta could also indicate the date of the Rigveda. In fact, the view in the article is attributed to JP Mallory, who certainly isn't a Marxist! (And I could name others...) It's not a question of insults; it's a question of accuracy. Including that line would imply that Mallory is a Marxist. And he's not. --Xiaopo ℑ 17:32, 4 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I agree with the myth part but have an issue with the label "Marxist historian" . Most respected academic historian are labelled as Marxist if they do not tow the right wing line. Whether the historian is marxist or not. Instead of Marxist if we could use the word "mainstream" it would be more illustrative of facts. Haphar 09:53, 4 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

There is nothing wrong in being a Marxist. Karl Marx has been one of the greatest thinkers of his era. Just because his ideas were once used by Stalin, marxism now has negative connoations. I would just call this reductio ad stalinum.nids (♂) 10:01, 4 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

still, an author should only be characterized as "Marxist" if the work in question has noticeably Marxist traits, otherwise it is just inappropriately suggestive. dab (ᛏ) 10:04, 4 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

no, no, not all OIT proponents are Hindu nationalists. It's just that they make the most noise about it. Schlegel for wasn't one. Elst is at best sympathizing, but he is probably not dyed-in-the-wool. Indian nationalists apparently do not even understand the hypothesis, the only thing they care about being that they just 'know' a priori that Indian culture must have evolved in hermetic insulation ( and jump on any bandwagon they think will uphold that conviction of theirs. It is perfectly possible to discuss OIT as an academic topic, it's just that the names of Frawley or Knapp (not to mention links to Hindutva websites) then would not appear at all. The problem is that we have a large number of such nationalists of scanty learning here on Wikipedia, and if we do not impose stern restrictions of WP:RS no the topic, they will always turn it back into a pathetic joke. Regarding 'myth', I don't know why everybody is so touchy about the word. I've had talks with rather stubborn Christian editors about it, too. See mythology (I hope; dare I look if its been made a mess of again?) dab (ᛏ) 10:04, 4 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

What about if we source the statement? The Bryant book mentioned in the article has a long chapter where he details how the academic debate is distorted and filtered in the popular press and discourse in India, with books with titles like Indian Asuras Created European Civilization and suchlike. --Xiaopo ℑ 17:38, 4 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Dab, you are taking it as if I am attacking you. Right now, I am just referring to your changes to AMT. I have told you that i dont have any problem with the word myth, I just want wiki to be consistent. If you could persuade the stubborn christians to use the word myth, then no one will dare object to your changes.

Secondly, you can go through the views of those historians. They were hardline marxists, (and so the result that india had to take desperate economic measures in 1990.) I am not against marxism, but the hardline marxist ideology is no good, if you know about the basics of economics.nids (♂) 10:11, 4 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

not at all, I am just rather in a hurry because I just spent half my day cobbling together stuff related to descent to the underworld. I tried to make clear my position wrt "OIT and nationalism". I do not feel you are attacking me at all, please do go editing in the present spirit; I have to run just now, dab (ᛏ) 10:14, 4 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

right now, i am just reverting your last change to AMT. Will discuss with you later when you will be free.nids (♂) 10:20, 4 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

so what's wrong with the 'patriotic sentiment'? it's a plain fact that about 95% of the buzz about this is socio-religious turmoil and not bona fide research. dab (ᛏ) 10:28, 4 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

so what's wrong with the 'Marxist Historians'? it's a plain fact that about 95% of the buzz about this is socio-religious turmoil and not bona fide research.nids (♂) 10:32, 4 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I am just saying that either we should include both, or none. Nothing else.nids (♂) 10:34, 4 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I don't see the connection. is this some sort of deal like "you will be allowed to say that Frawley is an extremist crank if we can say that Witzel's uncle was in the Hitlerjugend"? I don't understand what Marxism is supposed to have to do with the connection of Avesta and RV. Who is a marxist, Parpola? Comparing RV and Avesta helps us guess a date range for Proto-Indo-Iranian, that is perfectly obvious, what does that have to do with Marxism? dab (ᛏ) 10:39, 4 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I am not talking about Frawley. I am just referring to the change wherein you included (as is often postulated by Indian patriotic sentiment), as if warning readers about the uselessness of the theory. This is not the article on OIT. it was Aryan Migration Theory.nids (♂) 10:45, 4 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

The economic crisis in the 1990's was due to flawed economic policies of preceding governments ( including the Janata party which when in power threw out Coke and IBM and were even more regressive than the Congress in economic terms). And not due to any historians. Also the "theory" of the historians being Marxist is mostly BJP propoganda about historians who do not support the "swadeshi" theory of Indian might. Haphar 10:52, 4 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

yes, I realize this. OIT is in fact rejected by mainstream academia, and, again, 95% of its notability is due to patriotic sentiment, that is exactly the meaning of the phrase you have removed. I am fine with having a detailed article on OIT and what not, but that will not serve as a justification for obscuring these facts. Regarding "Marxism", it is fair enough to point out some particular author is a Marxist (which one?), it won't do to just repeat the blanket propaganda. Nids, surely you can tell Hindutva propaganda when you see it? Then why do you pretend to be unaware of its context? dab (ᛏ) 10:55, 4 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

You can mention all this on the main page of OIT. But i dont understand that why should it be kept on Indo-Aryan Migration, when there is just one sentence about OIT in the article, which i removed here.nids (♂) 11:03, 4 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

By the way, do you think that Stepehn Knapp, David Frawley and Koenraad Elst are Indian patriotic Nationalists.nids (♂) 11:10, 4 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

could you do me a favour and read my comments above? I answer both your questions there ("Mature Harappan was Indo-Iranian" is one main feature of OIT). dab (ᛏ) 11:15, 4 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Just like there are two aspects of AIT (one dealing with migration of people and other one with migration of language), similary, there are many aspects of OIT. No doubt that one of them deals with the point you noted above. But I think that Elst's OIT does not say so. I am not an expert on either of these, so leave this discussion for the moment. I was just asking you if it is relevant to include as proposed by patriotic indians with OIT in Indo-aryan migration page.nids (♂) 11:23, 4 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

With this discussion, I just remember the Encarta entry on Hinduism where they introduced Hinduism as saying something like they worshiped Rama and Krishna as Gods but they were later proved to be humans. They may not be factually wrong. But since they did not used the same words for Jesus,(like saying Christians worshipped Jesus as son of god but he was later proved to be a human), they were definitely biased.nids (♂) 11:31, 4 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I think I know what you mean, and I will of course support equal treatment of all mythemes on Wikipedia, but I don't see what this has to do with AIM/OIT. I think you misunderstand OIT: OIT is strictly a theory of Indo-European linguistics, claiming that the IE languages originated in India. That people moved in and out of the subcontinent all the time is undisputed and beside the point. dab (ᛏ) 11:50, 4 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

But i guess there was a theory on racial Aryan migration. I dont know what exactly it is called. One of the main points of the theory was that upper caste Hindus were Aryans and lower caste were Dravidians. Its an old theory but and i guess it has been refuted. nids (♂) 11:58, 4 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

you are in muddlehead territory there. Such "racial migration" would just be called "genetic diffusion" today. No, there are some genetic studies identifying a (slightly) larger pan-Eurasian admixture in higher caste Hindus, but I do not know if these studies are tenable (they are recent and may yet be overturned), and such findings play a very minor role in discussion of linguistic history. In either case, higher caste Hindus are not "the descendents of Central Asians", at best they have a "slightly above-average admixture of certain genetic traits prevalent in Central Asia" (this is about percentage, lower caste Hindus will have the same admixtures, just possibly in slightly lower frequency). I didn't want this to turn into a discussion of archaeogenetics, since these findings, again, are still uncertain and have little or no impact on the debate. dab (ᛏ) 12:23, 4 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

-> see (and improve!) Genetics and Archaeogenetics of South Asia for this topic. dab (ᛏ) 12:39, 4 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

what you are saying are plain facts and nobody argues about them. But once upon a time in our history, there was a theory that upper caste hindus are purely aryans (sigh! godwin's law again). This theory has been refuted. Am i right?? And it was just called Aryan invasion theory.--nids (♂) 17:18, 4 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

this was never anything else but a crackpot theory, so it didn't need much refuting in the first place. It is a popular myth, apparently spread by our notoric Hindutva crowd, that this is the content of 19th century (British Raj!!) mainstream "western" opinion. People were not stupid, even in the 19th century (but some people were, of course, just as today). So yes, inasmuch there ever was a serious theory that "upper caste hindus are purely aryans" I am sure it was resoundingly refuted as soon as it was forwarded. dab (ᛏ) 17:21, 4 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Yes it was a crackpot theory which didnt needed much refuting. But then there were quiet a few of british academics who supported this theory. For example Emile Burnouf. It may not be a mainstream western opinion, but it did gain notability. Its notability is reflected in the fact that Max mueller had to come up with this kind of statement.

“

I have declared again and again that if I say Aryans, I mean neither blood nor bones, nor hair nor skull; I mean simply those who speak an Aryan language… in that sense, and in that sense only, do I say that even the blackest Hindus represent an earlier stage of Aryan speech and thought than the fairest Scandinavians...To me an ethnologist who speaks of Aryan race, Aryan blood, Aryan eyes and hair, is as great a sinner as a linguist who speaks of a dolichocephalic dictionary or a brachycephalic grammar.

”

--nids (♂) 17:43, 4 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

That's not to suggest that it be discussed under Indo-Aryan migration, is it? That would be like discussing phrenology seriously in an article about human anatomy. It should be discussed at Aryan Invasion Theory (history and controversies); this article isn't the place for people to deal with the ghosts of the past. --Xiaopo ℑ

I never said that this be discussed on AMT. Just pointing out that once upon a time there was a theory which argued for a racial migration and was not restricted to linguistics.nids (♂) 17:55, 4 October 2006 (UTC)\[reply]

what is a 'racial migration'? Of course people, migrating or not, always have a genome. The point is that there may be substantial linguistic change with only very modest genetic diffusion (say, population movement of 15% leads to 95% language shift). dab (ᛏ) 18:03, 4 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

sure, if we go into 19th century scholarship, a lot of stuff that is laughed out of court today was still around. Your Muller quote still proves that even then that sort of muddleheaded approach was frowned upon. Our problem is that a lot of our "anti-Hindu cabal on teh Wikipedia!!1" people still think in terms of a Burnouf worldview, and spend their time shooting Burnouf strawmen. Now it's one thing to chuckle at bizarre views of a 100 years ago, but I meet these every day on Wikipedia, in live people (although some of them are consciously trolling). dab (ᛏ) 18:01, 4 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Dab you are right on facts and I am not arguing on them. But if you say that It is a popular myth, apparently spread by our notoric Hindutva crowd, that this is the content of 19th century (British Raj!!) mainstream "western" opinion, then you are wrong as there were britishers who were responsible for spread of these theories. Hindutva crowd is wrong on more than one occasion but not here. As a matter of fact, the fundamentalistic hindutva grew only after 1990s. Two of the main reasons which catalysed this were

banning of Satanic Verses in India.(when even Pakistan acted like a grown up and (initially) refused to ban the book)
Shah Bano case.--nids (♂) 18:12, 4 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I am not a fan of fanatic Hindutva. But if i have to choose between a Shariat ruled state and a Hindutva ruled one, than i will definitely go for the latter option. Please see that i am not choosing between good and evil, just between bad and worse.nids (♂) 18:14, 4 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Latin alphabet ligatures

Hi there, was browsing the new pages when I saw these new articles. They look like identical boxes to me on my system but are being treated unique by WP. Is there any prerequisite to being able to read the characters properly? Thanks! zephyr2k 13:59, 4 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the link dab. Haven't figured out how to fix my browser but I'm working on it. zephyr2k 14:47, 4 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Kurgan

Hi can you keep an eye on the Kurgan article. Barefact claims the Issyk inscription is proto-Turkic and does not seem to understand that proto-Iranian, proto-Turkic, proto-Indo-European, Proto-Dravidian, Proto-Semetic.. do not have scripts! Plus Encyclopedia Britannica says the oldest Turkish inscription is the Orkhon (8th century A.D.) and this page does not mention the Issyk inscription as Turkic. [2]. The Issyk inscription has not been deciphered yet and to claim it is something or another when it has not been deciphered yet is really baseless. --alidoostzadeh 17:14, 4 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I've seen it. And Scythian European Kingdoms :o\ dab (ᛏ) 17:16, 4 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Yep that article is really unfortunate. I do not claim to be able to write the most eloquent English, but that article is really below average. --alidoostzadeh 17:49, 4 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]