I'm a social philosopher[1] and strategic consultant by profession. I studied Mathematics (with a good deal of Physics) at Trinity College Cambridge, where John Polkinghorne was one of my Professors. My book on management Constructive Engagement was dedicated to Charles and Liz Handy, and my most recent book Questions of Truth is co-authored with John Polkinghorne. I also collaborate with Martin Nowak and Robert May and David G. Rand. I'm married with 3 children and 4 grand-children. I play the piano, run marathons, and sail.
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This user rescues articles for the Article Rescue Squadron. |
Personal Policies
editTo save typing I'm wondering about developing some Personal Policies, and posting tags for them, for example:
NRPA
editI have a policy of not responding to personal attacks. If I can be bothered I might post a tag to this effect.
+CP
editPositive contributions please. It's too easy just to delete stuff we don't like. Worth being constructive.
3+CP
editIf you have made 3 negative contributions in a row, could you please make a positive one. Otherwise it might be best to ignore contributions until a positive one is made. Sorry.
Contributions in Wikipedia
editMy contributions are mainly in:
- Science, Religion and Philosophy. I contribute from a generally Polkinghornean perspective to articles about the existence of God including Dawkins and "The God Delusion". I have originated a few of these such as the Argument from beauty, the Argument from love, the Ultimate Boeing 747 gambit, the articles on the ISSR, the Royal Institute of Philosophy, the World Congress of Philosophy, International Federation of Philosophical Societies, Admiralty Research Laboratory, Philosophy of Engineering, God and Other Minds, Self refuting ideas and several books by Alister McGrath and Keith Ward. I worked hard on The Dawkins Delusion? and I also contribute on evolution and esp. evolution of altruism. I originated Militant Atheist now Militant atheism and worked a bit on Atheism and Epigenetics. At user:Madprime's suggesting I stared an article on Social misperceptions and oversimplifications of genetics. I occasionally contribute on purely scientific or technical topics, such as the YORP effect, hydroskimming and Systems biology. I created the article on Kids for Kids.
- Biography I have created a number of bios incl Martin Nowak, Denis Noble, Karl Sigmund, Peter Koslowski, Bill Castell, Ruth Palmer, Nick McKeown, Emma Darwin (Novelist), Frederick Nolde, Susannah Feinnes, Marie Galway, Charlie Gere, William F. Vallicella, H. Allen Orr, Denis Alexander, John Hedley Brooke, Warren S. Brown, John White (scientist), Martin Bott, Bob White FRS, Carl Feit, Heup Young Kim, Malcolm Jeeves, Ernan McMullin, James J. McCarthy, Shaun Bailey, Colin Howson, Gilbert Hottois, Ronald Giere, Nicolas Rashevsky, Zhao Xiao, André Pichot* and Michael Burleigh and contributed to many others including Polkinghorne, Einstein, Martin Chalfie, Dirac, Charles Handy, Simon Conway Morris, Freeman Dyson, Alastair McGrath, Nicola LeFanu, Elizabeth Maconchy, Kenneth R. Miller, George Ellis, Eric Priest, Louis Schweitzer and E. M. Delafield.
- Music I'm esp interested in Johann Sebastian Bach and have contributed a fair amount in that area, including some of his works and relatives, and a bit on Shostakovich. I've also created the articles on Vytautas Barkauskas following an amazing performance by Ruth Palmer and on the Solomon ex-Lambert Stradivarius, and as noted above worked on LeFanu and Maconchy.
* Basically a quick lift of the French Wikipedia article - since Dennis Noble refers to him and anglophone people won't know who he is otherwise
A strange vendetta
editFor some bizzaire reason I appear to be the subject of a strange vendetta from SlimVirgin and Rjanag. In addition to creative wikilawyering and manifest untruths[2]to persuade editors to delete articles about me, they have now resorted to changing WP:AUTHOR to retrospectively legitimise their conculsions[3], and nominating articles I created for deletion[4]. What next, I wonder?
- I appreciate the palindrome on my talk page....However, I'm intrigued by your avant-garde spelling....I find it quite buzzard.PalindromeKitty (talk) 18:05, 23 September 2010 (UTC)
If this is not a vendetta, could someone find a precedent?
editI have repeatedly asked for another example of the co-author of a notable book which has received mutiple periodical reviews (some from notable reviewers) who has been deleted from Wikipedia. No-one has been able to supply one. It would certainly reassure me on some aspects of this problem if anyone could find such an example. If you can please put it on the talk page.
Responses there...
Wikihounding and Personal Attacks
editI posted this warning on User talk:Rjanag - he just deleted it removed it into his archive:
Hi Rjanag. I must ask you to desist from hounding and personal attacks. This has gone much too far. These are core polcies in Wikipedia and as an admin you should know better. Any further incidents and I shall have to make a formal report. NBeale (talk) 07:23, 25 January 2010 (UTC)
Notes & References
edit- ^ There has been some rather absurd debate about this on Wikipedia. For those who do not wish to take the word of Onora O'Neill or the Faraday Institute the Royal Institute of Philosophy and CUP should surely suffice, see here :-)
- ^ see eg latest AfD and Rjanag's "analysis of sources"
- ^ see the talk page of WP:AUTHOR esp the "WP:AUTH" section
- ^ eg this one strangely nominated by Rjanag a few minutes after a personal attack on me in the WP:AUTHOR talk. Amazing coincidence