Wikipedia: Ed Poor

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Software Engineer, father of two. Interested in philosophy, science (and the history of both), pizza, music, children, and world peace -- not necessarily in that order.

Among my contributions are:

I have mucked around with:

I have been trying to remove "bias" from Wikipedia articles on controversies dear to me, but I recognize that what I call "bias" may merely be ideas I misunderstand. I may in some cases also fail to distinguish between personal belief and documented fact, whether through wishful thinking or sheer sloppiness. Feel free to set me straight at any time.

I respond to praise, reason, and pizza -- not necessarily in that order!!

Welcome to Wikipedia!

Another way to ask questions is to put them right on this page, then put a summary in the Summary field. Within minutes usually someone will respond.

You can add a Talk page if you have a question on an article, and ask your question there. Someone will answer. You can ask on your own page (this one) if it's not related to a specific article. You can also add a /Talk page to your own personal page when conversations here get too long or annoying, or if you just don't like others adding stuff like this statement for instance. :-) --Dmerrill

I'm going to move some dialogue with other wikipedians to my /Learning page.

Ed, on MichaelTinkler/Talk you'd asked about Galileo and his struggles with the church. After the Greeks a lot had been lost, or put on the back burner, even during Roman times. But there was still a lot there, and throughout the Middle Ages there was a great deal of interest in ancient philosophy. At the time of Galileo the works of Aristotle were widely supported, and the church had recently decided to adhere to them dogmatically. This second was a temporary development, owing to attempts to define a more comprehensive canon for Catholicism in the face of religious criticism. A century earlier the heliocentric theory of Copernicus passed with little remark, and actually the church initially showed a relatively large amount of leniency with Galileo, allowing him for instance to right a comparison of heliocentric and geocentric models so long as he didn't attempt a full scale attack on the church's position. He did, of course, and was forbidden from publishing as a result. Later, when a friend of his became the pope, he decided to risk publishing something anyways, and this is what got him in trouble - mainly because the pope saw the Aristotelian Simplicio as a caricature of himself. All in all it can be said that, though the church was being oppressive, Galileo showed a considerable lack of tact in dealing with it, and was unlucky to be alive at that particular time. Only a relatively short while later Kepler and Newton found themselves essentially unopposed from that quarter.

Actually, LDC took out the addendum to Sociology -- I had specifically left that one alone. I killed the rest because they were...how to put this...too querulous for an encyclopedia article. He's welcome to put them back in if he likes, but I don't believe I'm alone in thinking them unhelpful, so I doubt they'll stay in long if that happens. The beauty of Wikipedia is that armies of eyes now decide who's out of line -- myself, or Mr. Clihor. Wouldn't be the first time, if it's the former. -- Paul Drye

: I tried my hand at wikifying Mr. Clihor's contribution, but if it disappears again I'll concede the issue. I'm new to wikipedia, and I don't know what constitutes a valid article. At first I thought it was jest any topic that may be of interest, like boy band or Pippin?.

Dear Mr. Poor. I've tried to contact Mr. Drye to inquire how to add a sub-section. I knew my criticisms and opines would find little harbour among the rigid formals of academia. Yet, they are important. To ask "What time is." is as paramount as knowing what water is. So, how does one create a page defining time? As for situational dynamics it is a caveat of Social Psychology that launched further studies like those of Asche, Festinger and others. Basically, we define a situation based on a complex interplay of 1) Anchors of Attitude, 2) Self Interest, 3) Social Inhibition, 4) Social interaction and Situational circumstance.

Groups behave similarly. That is the beauty of situational dynamics. Take the Nazi movement of Germany. Simplistically, The German people defined their previous few decades as misery from which they were de-throned from their perch of intellectual superiority. Hitler exploited their self interest to become a super-race again. Their social inhibitions were diminshed through the use of propoganda which weakened their Anchors of attitude on human live as applied to the Jewish people. The social interaction with others helped create a majority willing to sacrifice millions for Hitler's cause.

The same thing happens when you stump your toe. Example. You stump your toe (Circumstance) after your wife is critical of some act you may have done (Social interaction) . Your blood pressure rises (Weakening your inhibitions). You decided (Self interest) that you aren't mad because of your inability to walk correctly (afterall, anyone can walk), so you re-define the situation as your wife's fault for being critical and get angry with her.

While this applies readily to aggression, it also applies to almost any human emotional response as well. It was Leon Festinger who first brought up the idea of Cognitive Dissonance. (Being uncomfortable) and how humans will do almost anything to bring balance and comfort...usually in a way that makes them or the group be seen in the most favorable light.