User talk:Martin Baldwin-Edwards

Citizendium charter drafting commitee nomination

Hi Martin, You've been nominated by a fellow Citizendium member to be a candidate for election to the Citizendium charter drafting committee.

If you haven't been following the discussion in the forums, we're getting ready to establish a charter for Citizendium that outlines the project's goals, ideals, and basic structure. To get the process moving, we put together a plan for electing a group of Citizens to compose a draft of the charter, which will then be submitted for community review. You can find more about the plan here.

You've been nominated by another Citizen to be a candidate for election to that committee. The next step is up to you: you may either accept or decline the nomination by going here and following the instructions at the top of the page.

If you have any questions, just let me know. --Joe Quick 14:58, 18 September 2009 (UTC)

Charter drafting candidacy

Hi Martin,

Thanks for accepting your nomination to be a candidate for election to the drafting committee for the Citizendium charter.

If you'd like, there is a provision in the plan that provides a place for you to compose a position statement. You are not required to do this in order to be a candidate for election to the committee, but it would be helpful to others during the voting period. Even if you don't compose a statement before the election period concludes, should you be elected it might be helpful for other members of the committee to know what you feel are the most important issues to address with the draft. You can find a red link to the page where you can write your statement here, along with instructions for doing so.

If you have any questions, just let me know. --Joe Quick 19:29, 19 September 2009 (UTC)

"The Time of the Tribes" by Michel Maffesoli

Martin. I am reading "The Time of the Tribes" by Michel Maffesoli. I have made it to about half-way into the second chapter and am beginning to wonder if it makes sense to continue reading it. I assumed it was a work of sociology, but the narrative wanders all over the place and it comes across more as a work of obscure philosophy than one of scholarship.

Are you familiar with this work or the author? If so, what is your view on either? I have to decide whether to continue slogging through it or to put it on my "decided not to finish" bookshelp. Thanks. Dan Nessett 19:16, 6 October 2009 (UTC)

I must confess that I know neither the work nor the author, so I am not able to comment. Is it about contemporary issues or historical? Martin Baldwin-Edwards 19:57, 6 October 2009 (UTC)

Contemporary. His thesis appears to be that the age of individualism is over and society is organizing itself into "tribes", in which individual identity is merged into the "emotional community." It is hard to follow his arguments, which may partially be due to the fact that I am reading an English translation of the original French. The backcover says he is Professor of Sociology at the Centre d'Etudes sur l'Actuel et le Quotidien, UER de Sciences Sociales, Paris. I have no idea whether this is a legitimate academic institution or some self accredited collection of esoteric seekers. Dan Nessett 20:12, 6 October 2009 (UTC)

I did a quick search. He is indeed in a proper university, but all of his appointments (as professor, to the national research bodies of France, etc) were denounced by the scientific community. His appointment to CNRS (a reputable national institute I have worked with) elicited this response:

… il est pour le moins étonnant de voir nommer comme représentant des disciplines « Homme et Société » Michel Maffesoli, un universitaire bien connu pour ses prises de position anti-rationalistes et anti-scientifiques.

... It is somewhat surprising to see appointed as representative of the disciplines "Man and Society" Michel Maffesoli, an academic well known for his anti-rationalist and anti-scientific position.

Martin Baldwin-Edwards 20:42, 6 October 2009 (UTC)

Thanks. That is something of a relief. I can now put this very confusing book on my "decided not to read" bookshelf. Dan Nessett 21:10, 6 October 2009 (UTC)

Please realize I am smiling with both of you, not at you, but I'm reminded a bit of the kerfluffle over Ayn Rand as a philosopher, and the immense discussion thereof. Howard C. Berkowitz 21:08, 6 October 2009 (UTC)

I found a review in the Canadian Journal of Sociology. The reviewer drew a positive but not glowing picture. It was too heavily postmodernist for him. --Joe Quick 21:15, 6 October 2009 (UTC)

I am surprised the reviewer even finished the book (I supposed he was either paid to do so or required by professionalism). It reads like the author was on drugs when he wrote it. Dan Nessett 21:45, 6 October 2009 (UTC)

Ah, that's postmodernism for you: hallucinations without the cost and risk of drugs :-) Martin Baldwin-Edwards 22:14, 6 October 2009 (UTC)

Has Dan made the immensely useful suggestion of a workgroup or page, Books not to start? It presumably has subgroups for "believable unless you know something about the subject". Howard C. Berkowitz 22:34, 6 October 2009 (UTC)

I have a category of "books not to finish". IN this is another French book -- "L'être et le néant" by Jean-Paul Sartre. I think I got to page 21 and decided it was all too much trouble :-) Martin Baldwin-Edwards 23:16, 6 October 2009 (UTC)

There is much similarity between post-modernism and existentialism. In fact, one view of the former is it is the heir of the later. Dan Nessett 23:22, 6 October 2009 (UTC)

Please look at this thread

Martin, this thread might be worth bringing to the attention of the charter drafting committee. See here Milton Beychok 02:20, 4 November 2009 (UTC)

e-mail

Hi--dropping you a note because I just sent e-mail and one of your addresses bounced, so I don't know if it went through. Hope you're well. Aleta Curry 00:00, 20 January 2010 (UTC)

Proposed article "History of U.S. citizenship"

Hi Martin, Howard Berkowitz suggested I might consult with you about a possible article for CZ. I've been a Wikipedia contributor but recently switched over. Wondering if you have any interest in this topic and what your thinking is? The article is in a sandbox: User talk:Thomas Wright Sulcer/sandbox2. If interested wondering your opinion, or do you know who else here on CZ might be interested in giving it a look-over before approving it for going online?--Thomas Wright Sulcer 19:24, 18 February 2010 (UTC)

The gist of the article is this: U.S. citizenship transformed from a mostly political relationship (ie participation in town hall meetings circa 1640s) to an economic relationship (consumers, workers, investors uninterested in politics). So the article tries to show how political -> economic transformation happened. It's based on civics and history books, some academics, political philosophers (eg Tocqueville), contemporary writers (Wolf, Kaplan etc), but basically it's trying to be like a high school civics primer. While most history as you know is about a country or a person but in this case it's the history of a relationship -- citizenship, so it's somewhat different from most histories. I hope it's not too boring so I tried to include lots of pictures. One of my biases is that I think citizenship is important but I realize most Americans don't even bother to think much about it. I tried to include contrasting points of view -- writers like Ginsberg feel that citizenship decline (ie political participation) is not good, while writers like Kaplan think it's no big woof as long as there are jobs and money. Wondering what you think or what I might do next.--Thomas Wright Sulcer 05:05, 18 February 2010 (UTC)--Thomas Wright Sulcer 19:24, 18 February 2010 (UTC)

Hi. I had a quick read-through, and found it interesting. My only worry is that precisely because it is so analytical, it might be perceived as original research or an opinion piece, or suchlike. Possibly there is a way to handle this -- but I need to think about it a bit. It's also relatively long, so could be split up into smaller articles or even use the CZ cluster facility to link different parts of it to one main article. So, for example, the main article could simply chart fairly factual changes in US citizenship history; another one could discuss different approaches to the idea of citizenship; yet another could look specifically at legal or political aspects, etc. These are just some thoughts, nothing properly thought through. For the moment, can you delay putting it on wiki? See if you have any thoughts along the lines I mentioned. There is also an interesting parallel you might like to make, with T H Marshall's idea of social citizenship in the UK and the reasons for its historical evolution. Martin Baldwin-Edwards 20:49, 18 February 2010 (UTC)

Martin, perhaps you might be able to suggest some titles of articles to derive from this, or relate to it, which could, as neutrally as possible, let me do some things on the intensely political issues of "illegal immigration" in the U.S. I put that in quotes because the specific words are a red flag. "U.S. immigration policy" is too broad, unless it were to state the current, if confused, situation..."U.S. immigration issues"? Ideally, the varied issues of "guest workers", "restricted entry", "undocumented aliens", etc., might be phrased in reasonably internationalized terms. --Howard C. Berkowitz 21:38, 18 February 2010 (UTC)

I'll wait and think. I'll be glad to reorganize/rewrite it along lines you suggest. I don't know how to do the cluster facility. It would be great if this article was superior to Wikipedia's (which I wrote earlier). In the meantime I'll work on other projects such as Philosophy of Spinoza or perhaps import others I did such as "Handyman". I wrote quite a few articles and revamped many more on WP; is there a tool to move them quickly here? Also something weird happens with some of the repeated references. And should I check "Content is from Wikipedia" even if I wrote it initially on WP? Also wondering what the policy is about redlinks (ie wikilinked terms for which there is no corresponding article).--Thomas Wright Sulcer 22:38, 18 February 2010 (UTC)

Please look over the work of John Foster

Martin, four days ago, I confirmed the account of John Foster. Since that time, he has created a number of new articles (mostly with content ported from his work at Wikipedia):

• Anti-nuclear protest
• Anti-nuclear movement
• Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament
• Social movement
• Renewable energy
• Renewable energy development
• Renewable energy commercialization

I have been able to review, edit/modify/comment on the three about renewable energy and to offer him considerable guidance about porting WP articles and how we format articles in CZ to include subpages.

However. the first four above are more oriented toward Politics and Sociology ... where I am not really qualified to review and comment. As an Editor in those workgroups, would you please review those four and "take him under your wing", so to speak? Regards, Milton Beychok 20:45, 14 May 2010 (UTC)

Will do. Thanks for telling me. Martin Baldwin-Edwards 21:01, 14 May 2010 (UTC)