User talk:Pdbailey/Archives 1

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Archive This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

Contents

Welch article

Sorry for the mix-up, when I saw the article, all that was there was a stub tag. On another note, leave messages for people on their talk pages, not their main user pages (I moved what you put on my userpage to my talk page). On yet another note, it's generally not a good idea to blank your talk page, since it gives other users insight to your contributions. [[User:Lachatdelarue|Lachatdelarue (talk)]] 03:35, 7 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Do you mean when you clicked on the article title (from another page) it took you straight to "edit this page"? If that's the case, no, the article didn't already exist. If that's not what you meant, could you explain what happened better? [[User:Lachatdelarue|Lachatdelarue (talk)]] 21:50, 7 Nov 2004 (UTC)
No problem, I'm here to help. [[User:Lachatdelarue|Lachatdelarue (talk)]] 00:17, 8 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Nuclear magnetic resonance

This edit is a bit garbled, but I can't figure out what it means so I can't fix it myself. --Yath 03:14, 13 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Thanks for pointing that out, I hope that does it Pdbailey 04:20, 13 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Standard deviation

Finally I see what you meant when you said my mention of normality came too late in the article. It looks as if you meant an assumption of normality is used in showing that a certain statistic is unbiased for σ2. But it's not. As long as

\operatorname{var}\left[\begin{matrix}X_1 \\ \vdots \\ X_n\end{matrix}\right]=\sigma^2 I_n,\,

where In is the n×n identity matrix (in other words, all of the variances are σ2 and the n random variables are uncorrelated (not necessarily independent!) then

E\left({1 \over n-1}\sum_{i=1}^n (X_i-\overline{X})^2\right)=\sigma^2,

where

\overline{X}=(X_1+\cdots+X_n)/n.\,

Neither normality nor independence is needed (although uncorrelatedness is). Michael Hardy 01:59, 5 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Richard Durbin

Please remember to sign your comments on article talk pages. DS1953 01:44, 24 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Lee-Jon

regards for the clarification on the NMR page. Lee-Jon 13:37, 9 September 2005 (UTC)

degrees Celsius

See this section of NIST SP811, clearly showing that you have jumped to the wrong conclusion. Gene Nygaard 14:34, 27 September 2005 (UTC)

Rudy Giuliani

Over at Talk:Rudy Giuliani on 4 October 2005 I asked for verification of the crime statistics you recently added to the article. If they can't be verified, they will be removed from the article. patsw 03:38, 9 October 2005 (UTC)

Image:MaxwellBoltzmann.png up for deletion

Image:MaxwellBoltzmann.png has been listed for deletion, since it has been obsoleted by Image:MaxwellBoltzmann.gif. --℘yrop (talk) 03:35, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

Generalized linear model

Hi, I reverted the page because I thought your edits made the topic less, not more understandable (to me, at least). You removed a good deal of material, including clarifying examples. Something funny is going on right now, though, because the page isn't parsing correctly (but if you link to it through the history, it parses OK...don't know what is happening.) Bill Jefferys 16:44, 19 April 2006 (UTC)

Hi again, I think that your re-edited article is much better and satisfies (more than satisfies) my objections to your original edit. Separating the main idea from the examples does the trick. I think that we can proceed from here. Bill Jefferys 02:38, 20 April 2006 (UTC)
Thanks for clarifying the GLM article a bit. Some of it is still unclear, but we will work on that. There's one sentence I still don't understand though, please see my comments on the GLM talk page.  :) -shaile 22:26, 20 April 2006 (UTC)

contact

I thought I'd mention that User:Drummond has been inactive since July. If he doesn't respond to your message or his account doesn't have an email address, he may also be able to be reached via his website, www.adaptivity.org .--Nectar 17:58, 28 April 2006 (UTC)

Reply from JQ (also on my talk page)

My idea would be to have a hierarchy of articles, starting with a top-level article on the General Linear Model, which would include results valid for the GLM and a brief taxonomy, including discussion of discrete v continuous dependent variables. Each element of the taxonomy would be linked to a more detailed article. In the case of discrete regression, there would be a general discussion, and a taxonomy linking to logit, probit and so on. JQ 10:53, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

Linear regression

Please leave a summary of the work you have done. Thanks! Chris53516 13:59, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

SmackBot

Smackbot recently edited Radiation hormesis and changed "fact" to "Fact." in all but one instance (where it added a date). Is it really necessary to change "fact" to "Fact?" would it have made an edit if this was the only change? Pdbailey 20:58, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

No, but it's neater, no it would be unlikely to edit an article without an undated template, although if the template was dated by a third party between being identified and edited, this could happen in theory. Rich Farmbrough, 10:12 5 March 2007 (GMT).

spam @ organic farming

Hi pdbaily - Apologies for not starting a section re: my reversions at organic farming. I made the reversions to remove the addition of further spam, by a user who'd already been spamming in another article. I did explain my motivations in these reversions in the edit history. Apologies again for not making it more clear. MidgleyDJ 22:27, 23 March 2007 (UTC)

Statistician help needed

The WikiProject Vandalism Studies (Wikipedia:WikiProject Vandalism studies) just finished its first study and I was hoping that you being a statistician could help us formalize our findings. You can find our draft conclusions here [1]. Here's an excerpt of what we found so far:

The current study analyzed a sample pool of 100 random articles. Within these 100 articles there were a total of 668 edits during the months of November 2004, 2005, and 2006. Of those 668 edits, 31 (or 4.64%) were a vandalism of some type. The study's salient findings suggest that in a given month approximately 5% of edits are vandalism and 97% of that vandalism is done by anonymous editors. Obvious vandalism is the vast majority of vandalism used. From the data gathered within this study it is also found that roughly 25% of vandalism reverting is done by anonymous editors and roughly 75% is done by wikipedians with user accounts. The mean average time vandalism reverting is 758.35 minutes (12.63 hours), a figure that may be skewed by outliers. The median time vandalism reverting is 14 minutes.


Thanks. Remember 02:26, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

CAFE graph

The SVG format has many advantages over raster format for images, such as graphs, that comprise lines and solid colors. Since the graph you uploaded is of above-average quality, conversion seems hardly warranted. (Some people like to upload little 100 x 200 graphs that scream for conversion.) Yet, there are still some advantages to conversion; most of them are outlined on Wikipedia:Collaboration to convert graphs to SVG. Please don't be offended by my tagging of your graph. If you really feel it is a problem, go ahead and remove the tag; after all, there are more desperate graphs to be converted. Thanks. MithrandirMageT 11:37, 30 March 2007 (UTC)

There is certainly nothing wrong with your image; however, you are right about SVG being the "preferred" format for line drawings. As for quality: though there is no official policy, the Collaboration to convert graphs to SVG recommends hand-drawing SVG graphs in a text-editor, since most vector image-making programs seem to produce somewhat inefficient or inaccurate graphs. It is certainly possible to make nice-looking graphs by hand -- just check out Image:Netscape-navigator-usage-data.svg for an example. Click the image name to view the full image in your browser, then view the page's source; this shows you the underlying SVG code used to make the image. As you can see, they've come up with some clever ways to include the actual data in the SVG file and transform it geometrically into data points on the graph. Thus, the data are not lost as it can be in other image-making processes. I hope this helps! MithrandirMageT 01:58, 2 April 2007 (UTC)

Providing the source data and the R code to transform it seems to me like a fine solution. Unfortunately, it means that fewer people can modify the image (i.e. only people with knowledge of R), but if it means more high-quality SVGs, then I'm all for it. Perhaps once the transition to SVG becomes more widespread, Wikipedia will adopt a formal set of graph guidelines; until then, what you've done seems great. Cheers! MithrandirMageT 13:29, 8 April 2007 (UTC)

Grinnell College Alumni List

Thanks for your help resolving this situation. Hopefully, between the two of us, we can keep (at least part of) Grinnell College looking nice and clean. Jacobko 00:18, 4 April 2007 (UTC)

Image:SPMA3.png

Hm. I marked Image:SPMA3.png with {{PD-USGov-USDA-NRCS}} because the source leads to an NRCS website ( http://plants.usda.gov/java/profile?symbol=SPMA3 ), but I didn't notice the "© Image generated using gd 1.8" right underneath the image when I went to look at it before. I suppose that means that the image is copyrighted under their policy here: http://plants.usda.gov/java/intellectualPlants . Sorry about the confusion. I didn't look at it as closely as I should have. --Strangerer (Talk) 03:04, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

  • Well, we could bring it up at Wikipedia:Possibly unfree images, or we can list them at WP:IfD with the rationale of CV. I suppose we could also sneakily delete the tags I put on there and list it as {{nld}}. Whatever will involve the least amount of effort is what will make me the happiest. ;) --Strangerer (Talk) 03:19, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the recent message; I had nearly forgotten about those images. I will be happy to help you manage them. Do you have a good way to keep track of which ones they are? Are you just using the user contributions page? --Strangerer (Talk) 12:55, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

  • Awesome, thanks. I started looking at them, and a lot of these wildflower images, like Image:Trillium flexipes.jpg, are pretty confusing. The copyright notice on the source website [2] says that some are public domain (though they want a credit to the USDA Forest Service and the listed photographer), and says that others could be copyrighted, but doesn't tell us how to distinguish between which are public domain and which are used by permission on that website. I think I will send an email to the address listed unless you have already done that. --Strangerer (Talk) 13:20, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
    • I'm glad the organization helped you a bit - I figured it was better if I grouped images so I didn't have to re-check certain websites that were used a lot by the uploader. I am really not sure what to do about the images that don't have copyright notices - it is tough. I don't think there is a form letter for asking about whether an image is PD, but I did use some of the examples at Wikipedia:Requesting copyright permission. Once we get a reply, we can forward it on to OTRS. --Strangerer (Talk) 06:53, 8 June 2007 (UTC)

Dais

You wrote dias on my talk page, but you meant dais. Anyway, you edited Talk:dais, which I didn't even look at before adding the Wiktionary template to dais. The Wikipedia article as it is now is clearly more than just a dictionary entry, and maybe has the potential to become much more. Contrast it with what is already at Wiktionary, wikt:dais, as well as other Wiktionary entries. I am also an active Wiktionary editor, and I would say Wiktionary entries are generally a lot different from Wikipedia artciles. So no, I do not think dais is just a long-winded dictionary, and nothing needs to be moved. The best improvement would be the expansion of both the Wikipedia article and the Wiktionary entry. —Kenyon (t·c) 00:00, 21 April 2007 (UTC)

Also, to answer your other question, dais is encyclopedic because of pretty much everything after that first paragraph (the history, etc.). —Kenyon (t·c) 00:04, 21 April 2007 (UTC)

AMT

At the AMT page I screwed up and was going to make the same point for the other side but couldn't find the reference (I think it was Washington Post editorial that said state taxes shouldn't be deductible anyway, but I couldn't find it).Pdbailey 01:33, 2 June 2007 (UTC)

First, thanks for responding on my talk page to get my attention. The point you were trying to make does belong, although I think it might be better placed as a sub-bullet (or perhaps behind a semicolon; I'll preview it both ways and see what looks better) as a response to the Criticism, rather than an argument against repeal (since it's a related but separate issue from the AMT itself). I'll go ahead and put it there with the, just with a citation needed tag; when/if you find the reference, you can just add it and remove the tag. Sketch051 22:26, 2 June 2007 (UTC)

Image:Silvershiner.gif

Hi. It looks like you are investigating into the copyright status of this image. Given the image's apparent public domain status, I decided to reupload the original full picture as Image:Silvershiner.jpg, without realising that you were looking into it. So, I just thought I should make you aware of that. I'm sorry if I've stepped on your toes a bit. I've left the article's page as it is (pointing to the gif, with the unverifiedimage tag) just to be on the safe side, but I've removed the gif's BadGIF tag and marked it as obsolete, to prevent other people trying to convert it. I hope this is OK. With best regards, CountingPine 10:45, 9 June 2007 (UTC)

World's largest airlines

Some lists are encyclopedic, some are not encyclopedic. We'll see what the community thinks on this one, that's what AfD is for. DGG (talk) 23:18, 19 August 2007 (UTC)

AfD

You're AfD on World's largest airlines is deformed, because, well, there's no reason. Cool Bluetalk to me 23:31, 19 August 2007 (UTC)

Well, they've already closed the AfD, you can give it another round if you'd like, but other editors have already given other reasons. Cool Bluetalk to me 16:29, 20 August 2007 (UTC)
Actually, yes. Per Wikipedia:Guide to deletion cites "In many cases, the decision to "keep" or "delete" may be conditional on the community's acceptance of the additional action. These recommendations do represent the community consensus and also should not be overturned lightly. However, these are actions which can be taken by any editor and do not require "admin powers". If they are challenged, the decision should be discussed and decided on the respective article Talk pages. A second AFD discussion is unnecessary." In this case, there was a strong keep consensus, which resulted in a non-admin closure. However, on your part, there is a special situation at hand, which is the failure to give a reason at the AfD, which the keep would be upheld at WP:DRV, but you are constituted a second chance to run this through AfD, since you gave no reason the first time. Normally, AfDs so close to eachother are frowned upon, but this is a special situation. Regards, Cool Bluetalk to me 16:39, 20 August 2007 (UTC)
I'd go the WP:DRV route. Speedy keeps can only be performed by admins, as non-admins cannot close before 5 days. You'll have a good chance of having the AFD reopened, rather than having 2 close AFDs. That said, given your problems with the other main contributor fo the article, your AFD appears to be sour grapes, and I'd strongly suggest you just let it drop (no threats there, just a suggestion). This is information that really can't be presented any other way than in list format, and I do beleive it has a place on Wikipedia. The real issue is a content dispute, and those should be handled in a different way. - BillCJ 16:54, 20 August 2007 (UTC)
Well, you can try the WP:DRV route in the way Bill suggests, but anyways, the AfD was closed because there was consensus on the AfD for a keep. I'm not saying that there would have been consensus that way if you would have had a reason, but nothing new popped into our heads. Honestly, I would just try to open a new AfD, rather than try the WP:DRV process which can take up to five days, too, and there's no guarantee that it will be re-opened. Don't take it personally, there have been many an AfD that I didn't like the outcome of, and there have been many AfDs before that have been closed by a non-admin, (e.g. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Pants). My advice, just run it through the process, again. Cool Bluetalk to me 16:59, 20 August 2007 (UTC)
you asked me also. I agree with Cool Blue, that the better way is to do it again, but see the considerations on my talk page first, where I've given you a longer answer. Several other editors with various views in general all think the article has merit. DGG (talk) 17:03, 20 August 2007 (UTC)
My apologies - I confused you with another editor, Huaiwei, in my mind. However, I still feel that an AFD is not the way to go on this, but that's just my opinion. THere appears to be some confudsion as to whether or not one can renominate after a speedy close. If you chose to rnominate it again, I won't revert it, as I was apparently mistaken on that being a hard and fast rule. - BillCJ 17:29, 20 August 2007 (UTC)

In response to the message on my talk page: the reason I closed the debate was because there was clear consensus on the page to do so. I considered that you might later add a reason for deletion, but my opinion was that by the time I reached the debate, it wouldn't have received a fair hearing if you had placed your reasons on the page, due to the number of keep arguments that would have appeared beforehand. If you feel I was incorrect to do so, I will not contest a DRV about the decision. I thing DGG's correct, however, that starting an AFD again is probably the better approach. I see no reason why that shouldn't be an appropriate action. JulesH 19:59, 20 August 2007 (UTC)

The process for relisting is fairly simple: follow the instructions at WP:AFD, being careful to use {{subst:afdx}} instead of {{subst:afd1}} in the first step. I'd recommend using the "preloaded debate" link on the message added, as that should help you avoid the mistake you made first time. Preview everything to make sure it does what you expect: a small mistake can have nasty results when working with templates. JulesH 20:14, 20 August 2007 (UTC)

deletion

I processed the speedy request for your subpage. It had an associated talk page which you had also blanked and I deleted that as well. If that was a booboo, let me know and I'll restore it. Cheers, Carlossuarez46 20:35, 20 August 2007 (UTC)

Vandal warning

Welcome to Wikipedia. We invite everyone to contribute constructively to our encyclopedia. Take a look at the welcome page if you would like to learn more about contributing. However, unconstructive edits, such as those you made to User:BillCJ, are considered vandalism and are immediately reverted. If you continue in this manner you may be blocked from editing without further warning. Please stop, and consider improving rather than damaging the work of others. Thank you. - BillCJ 00:55, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

FYI, I consider ANY unwanted changes to the userspace with my name (since I can't say "my userspace") to be vandalism. Vandlism is against WIkipedia POLICY - it's not a guideline, so how did I bereka my own rules?? Idiot. I know we didn't start off on the right foot today, but I did aplogize for it. Yet you insisted on redacting my userspace, like I was a common vandal, wtihout even the courtesy to appraoch me first liek a real adult would. If the wiki-break notice is a personal attack on my paer, then I'm sorry your feelings were hurt. I've had it today with people protecting the real vandals and abusers, then going after me like I'm worse than the vandals. Well, I've had it with idoits like you. And you really are stupid for nominating the largest airlines list. THere, now THAT was a REAL personal attack. GO get me blocked if you wish, but I'm gone from WIkipedia anyway. THought I may come back as an IP, since they get more respect than regular users from the likes of morons like you! - BillCJ 03:27, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

BillCJ, please don't template the regular and assume good faith. @pple 08:40, 21 August 2007 (UTC)
BillCJ had what I considered to be a clear personal attack on his user page and I thought it was policy to delete them unilaterally. I was wrong, it is not. But I made the edit in good faith and told him as much on his talk page. Obviously it ended poorly, I'm sorry to have pushed your buttons, I hope you accept my apology. Pdbailey 03:32, 21 August 2007 (UTC)
PDB, I'm sorry for my behavior last night, and I've stricken my comments - feel free to remove them as clean-up! I've had the joy of being the target of a wiki-stalker with multiple IPs,a nd there's not a thing that can be done to stop him short of blocking all IPs, which won't happen to Hilary opposes all abortion, or hell freezes over. Anyway, I'm leaving WIkipedia because of Jimbo and his lackeys' unwillingness or inability to protect me in anyway, due to their own silly rules regaring open editing. I just wanted to let you know I'm sorry for taking my frustration out on you, you just caught me on a very bad day! I have NEVER written something like that beofre,a nd know my harasser is posting it all over Wikipedia! Good luck with your endevors here, and I hope my shadow doesn't decide to stick to you next! - BillCJ 04:57, 22 August 2007 (UTC)
BillCJ, your appology is accepted. No hard feelings. Pdbailey 01:00, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

Re AWB

I crawl the stub category with AWB to find ones that shouldn't be there. Also, the edit summary is generic, as the article sometimes gets cleaned up as well. However, I will select a more appropriate one when changing tags from now on. robertvan1 22:12, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

"Sufficient" accolades ;)

I want to commend you for sticking to the Talk page and not reverting despite posting several comments there which, as I read it, have still not been answered to your satisfaction. I stand by my thoughts on the general wordings for now, but am quite confident that a really good consensus can be achieved. FYI, I asked a small question regarding Fisher's work there which I think will go a long way towards working everything out.

I should note I saw your note to Michael Hardy. I don't condone his style (and have pointed that out to him in the past, albeit softly) but at the end of the day if you just ignore it, he does know a lot about math/stat topics, does do good work on articles, and can be a valuable collaborator. I do hope you find conversing with me slightly less grating though ;) Baccyak4H (Yak!) 17:05, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

Um.... what exactly is that crack referring to? In the discussion you seem to have in mind, I wrote this:
If it is meaningless to speak of the distribution of the data, then it is likewise meaningless to speak of the distribution of any statistic. But on this one you're just belaboring a semantic point. There is an obvious interpretation of the word "data" according to which you are right, and another obvious one according to which you are just as clearly wrong. As to the sample mean being sufficient for the population mean: that is certainly right if the variance is known and the whole family of distributions is indexed only by the mean. But obviously your inference about μ given the sample mean would be quite different if the variance is small, from what it would be if the variance is big.
Some people seem offended if "belaboring a semantic point" is attributed to them. Is that what you're talking about? Michael Hardy 19:10, 10 September 2007 (UTC) Answered your Talk page, Michael. Baccyak4H (Yak!) 19:46, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

Bios

Thanks for the note. I understand the concern for notability--Michael Johnson hasn't had a lot of press coverage, but he is a key government official. Ms. Graham definitely is within the guidelines spelled out in WP:BIO and has significant press coverage. Several DOD leaders are in Wikipedia; I was going to the same for the ODNI. - WilsonjrWikipedia (talk) 20:07, 22 September 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the note on Jimi Haha, but I should say he does fall within the standards of notability as he is the frontman for a signed band Jimmie's Chicken Shack, who are in the allmusic.com guide. If you dispute this, please let me know on the discussion page.  immunity  talk  22:23, 23 September 2007 (UTC)
Continuing from before, I saw you still questioned this, and as I recently have been helping to build this article, I have provided many points of notability on the article's talk page with references to make his notability stronger to your skepticism. If you are so inclined you can help and formulate both his article and the band's article to make them more full and fit to standards. Thank you in advance!  immunity  talk  05:36, 24 September 2007 (UTC)
Great response over at the talk page. I think incorporating that information into the article should make it much better. You appear to be a bit defensive about this claim of notability (sorry if I'm making that up), and I think (if you are) it is understandable since it's obvious to you that the person in question is notable--and to me now that you've enumerated the reasons with verifiable sources. I think me pointing this out, and you responding has been a very valuable exercise for the article in question. If you don't see it that way, please tell me and I'll consider that when thinking about so marking other pages. Pdbailey 15:21, 24 September 2007 (UTC)

Deleting your user subpages

Just so you know, you don't have to use prods or MFDs to get rid of your own userspace items. Simply tag what you don't want to use anymore with {{db-u1}}, and it will mark it for speedy deletion. --UsaSatsui 23:43, 30 September 2007 (UTC)

Thanks, I thought I'd combed through the speedy reasons, but I didn't see it--guess I should have looked closer. Pdbailey 01:15, 1 October 2007 (UTC)

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Radiation hormesis rv by WolfKeeper

this discussion moved here in this edit by WolfKeeper and regards this edit.

Wolfkeeper, would you please tell me why you made this edit comment, "(rv effect of edits indistinguishable from vandalism (although it's unclear that vandalism was the intention))" with respect to these edits. I'm asking for this because I'm a longtime contributor, we have discussed topics on that page several times (I think amicably) and to my mind, the edit comment and text on the discussion page was clear. Pdbailey 22:03, 7 October 2007 (UTC)

I posted a reply to you at Talk:Radiation hormesis, in a day or two, I will take your continued silence there as tacit consent to all but point 4. Pdbailey 15:23, 10 October 2007 (UTC)
Your edit removed large sections of text, not because it was inaccurate, but because you disagreed with it, you also edited so that you left the following sentence:
It has a very high radiation from naturally occurring radium-226 (with an observed maximum of 260 mSv/year) due to its geology but is found to have no increased cancer risk relative to an.[18]
Basically, I've seen better edits from vandals; but I'm sure you're not a vandal. I would recommend you reread WP:NPOV, and consider why removing all the points (particularly referenced points) that are on one side or other of a discussion is a bad idea. Contributors to the wikipedia are supposed to try to edit from both sides of an argument, and it's a much better idea to add stuff pointing out why particular studies are bad (for example) than deleting studies that you claim (quite possibly with very good justification) aren't high quality.WolfKeeper 16:39, 10 October 2007 (UTC)
I don't have any problem with removing references in self-published work, but the criticism on the Taiwanese radioactive steel study was unreferenced, whereas the support for it was actually referenced. The article had weasel words about the referenced journal being of low quality, but that doesn't really cut it, there was no referenced criticism. And ultimately, even if the study is complete c**p, if it is notable, and this one seems to be, you still need to include it, with referenced rebuttals; that way we capture the counterarguments in a public place.WolfKeeper 16:39, 10 October 2007 (UTC)
Wolfkeeper, I'll reply here because you appear to have an aversion to having this discussion on your talk page. I made my edit in good faith (as you appear to have). I think you will find that assuming good faith is a great way to treat other Wikipedia editors and will make the pages better with less nastyness. In particular, I think you would find the discussion to date illuminating as to my reasons for the edit and openness to its modification. I'm fine with my edit not standing, and even the rv. But I think personal attacks (i.e. references to vandalism in your edit summary and above, and claims of bad faith on my part) are overboard and uncalled for. I'd appreciate it if you were more sparing in the future in rving long time editors--even if you think the edit looks a lot like vandalism. This is because, in part, in order for an edit to be vandalism, its intent must be to harm and not help Wikipedia, and I think you should impute good intentions in others. It's especially hard to imagine bad faith on the part of long time editors. Pdbailey 19:47, 10 October 2007 (UTC)
Look, I reverted it because I considered it to be a bad edit, but I'm not accusing you of acting in bad faith. The problem I'm seeing with the article is that anything that supports radiation hormesis is entirely removed from the article. Good you probably say- and with justification.WolfKeeper 12:35, 11 October 2007 (UTC)
Now, I completely believe you when you say that it's all very probably rubbish, published in dubious ways (probably the funding comes from a nuclear lobby somewhere). But the fact remains that notable sources, such as one of the Horizon programs on Chernobyl, repeated the claims about radiation hormesis. That means that we can't really remove them from the article, because they're notable. On the other hand we can present the issues that there are with these theories and this will leave us with a go-to place for people that may google for these kinds of things and show them how the best evidence points towards there not being any major radiation hormesis effects. Right?WolfKeeper 12:35, 11 October 2007 (UTC)

Giuliani Crime Rate

Hi,

I'm examining the crime data (from which you constructed a chart) found here [3] out of curiosity. The national data are available from the given source [4], but I can't seem find the individual city data. The FBI has years of crime data available, but they do not provide the city points, only the national ones. I'd presumably find the 1995 New York City statistics under "Crime in the Unites States" and Table VI, but a search for "New York City" in the 1995 PDF [5], for example, yields nothing, and a search for "city" yields three matches, none of which relate to the chart. From what I can see, the individual city statistics in Table VI relate to the number of law enforcement personnel and not to crime rates. I assumed you were referring to "Section VI" and not "Table VI"; that was the only "VI" in the PDF. Could you explain where the city statistics are to be found?

Thanks, Aristotle1990 20:05, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

Aristotle1990, I don't think the tables are searchable, but I'm not sure. there is one massive table the breaks it down by city, you will have to look for that. If you go to the library and look in the book, you will have no problem finding it because (as I recall) it's most of the book. Pdbailey 23:22, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

negative binomial distribution

original comment posted on Bo Jacoby's page, coppied here

In this edit you essentially rved an edit I made. I'd appreciate it if you started a discussion of it on the talk page. Also, your edit comment makes little sense to me. Pdbailey (talk) 13:56, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

subsequent discussion

Hello Pdbailey. Your edit on negative binomial distribution stated that the variance goes from the mean and down to zero. That is true for the positive binomial distribution, but not true for the negative binomial distribution, where the variance goes from the mean and upwards. The link to cumulant, states that the variance/mean ratio is <1 for (positive) binomial distributions, =1 for poisson distributions, and >1 for negative binomial distributions. So that link contains the information that your edit probably was supposed to mean. I hope you will return if I misunderstood you edit. Have a nice day. Bo Jacoby (talk) 11:51, 26 January 2008 (UTC).

Bo Jacoby, I generally like to keep talk on one page, so I'll respond here and then you can continue to respond here. You are right that the mean and variance are related not in the way I said, but the opposite (divide by a number less than one, how stupid can I be!) and I thank you for the correction. Nevertheless, I'd appreciate it if you added the comments on the talk page after you rved the edit. I have more comments on the topic, I'll put them on the talk page since they are about the article, not the process of writing the article. Pdbailey (talk) 17:36, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

Great! I look forward to study your comments on the talk page. Sincerely 22:14, 26 January 2008 (UTC). —Preceding unsigned comment added by Bo Jacoby (talk • contribs)

U.S. National Debt

PD! Buddy! Your data on the United States public debt page is almost exactly 2 years out of date. That's like throwing a 9 ft rope to a drowning man 10 ft away! The Fiscal Year 2006 and 2007 figures for the debt, GNP and deflator are found at almost the exact same White House webpage you cited. It's at this shortcut. The new numbers have been out for while, so the White House figures (which follow the Bureau of Economic Analysis and the Treasury), are relatively solid (low likelihood of revision) numbers for GNP for Fiscal year 2007 (October 1, 2006-October 1, 2007). Sorry to ask you to redraw the graph so soon after you made it, but come on, we're talking two years! 216.165.199.50 (talk) 07:23, 7 February 2008 (UTC)

216.165.199.50, thanks, I'll go fix it. The code is there, so it should not be that hard for others to do too! Pdbailey (talk) 21:55, 7 February 2008 (UTC)
I wasn't shirking or anything, if that's what you think. I just didn't know what that mysterious "R" was you used to make the graph. 216.165.199.50 (talk) 05:02, 8 February 2008 (UTC)
R (programming language) is an Open-source software implementation of S (programming language), it generally rocks at plotting and has a huge amount of statistics software written for it that makes it a statistician's dream. Pdbailey (talk) 01:35, 9 February 2008 (UTC)

help request

{{tnull|helpme}}

I just looked at Talk:Radiation_hormesis#Further_reading and noticed that there is a bunch of garbage that appears to be signed by me. When I try to edit the section, I appear to be editing some other wikipedia article. When I try to edit the whole page, I can't even find the section. What is going on? Pdbailey (talk) 17:17, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

Hi there, I am not entirely sure, but would you like me to remove the statements for you? --The Helpful One (Review) 17:58, 3 March 2008 (UTC)
Fixed. You were using {{...}} where you should have used [[...]]. The former transcludes the other page (like a template), whereas the latter just links. Bovlb (talk) 18:04, 3 March 2008 (UTC)
Bovlb, Thanks. Pdbailey (talk) 23:37, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

Alternative Minimum Tax

Your graphs are helpful to understand the concepts, but they would be even more helpful if you relabeled the AMT curves as TMT or Tentative Minimum Tax. Also, you might want to replace the 2000 and 2004 regular tax curves with a single 2007 regular tax curve.

I have developed an elaborate Excel file to perform a similar computation that can include California state income tax and allows fixed amounts for property taxes and such to be added. By the time you do that the gap between TMT and regular tax virtually vanishes, making the graphs very hard to read. So your graphs are better for illustrating the point that the gap between regular tax and TMT starts large, narrows down or reverses between $100k and $500k, then increases again. Except that when you add California state income tax, the gap closes quickly and never re-opens, even at very high incomes.AMTbuff (talk) 18:47, 5 March 2008 (UTC)

AMTbuff, Thanks for the feedback. Are you sure it shouldn't be the AMT (not the label, but that I should actually be graphing)? Pdbailey (talk) 20:45, 5 March 2008 (UTC)

The graph is much more instructive when it shows a curve for TMT and another curve for regular tax. Those two curves are monotonic and look like what you might expect from a curve of tax vs. income. The difference between the two (AMT, when positive) is completely non-intuitive, especially in the absence of curves for these two components. It is best represented as a shaded zone in the region where TMT exceeds regular tax. If you were to add a modest state tax component to your formulas you would see such a zone across upper middle incomes. I can work with you on formulas if you like.AMTbuff (talk) 00:11, 6 March 2008 (UTC)

Okay, I'll do it. It might take a few days. Pdbailey (talk) 02:02, 6 March 2008 (UTC)
Done. Thanks for pointing out the problem! Pdbailey (talk) 22:30, 8 March 2008 (UTC)