Change in Moderation?

I certainly didn't intend to imply you did any plagerism.I just try to be sensitive about massive postings comming from the evolution side, because the creation side tends to get dumped on for doing things reminisent of such.Such a large single message is difficult for the membership to digest, especially those (the majority) not having an extensive biology education. The context of this forum is not that of a technical journal. Breaking your message down into smaller servings would better serve you, as far as getting your message read and understood.Bill Birkeland tends to do (at least vaguely) simular type messages, concerning geology subjects. I don't know if the general membership has problems following and digesting Bill's messages. I have the atvantage in that I have a geology degree in my background.That's my impression of things. I may be wrong.Adminnemooseus

Hi Nicolas, This is the source of the confusion. Where I come from, thesis and dissertation are synonyms, and dissertations are generally much longer than your paper because they present original research. Your paper is pretty short and contains no original research. Was this perhaps a Bachelor's or Master's thesis? Or dissertation, if you prefer?Don't be put off by the suspicious treatment. You just happened to join during a period where the forum has been experiencing a lot of abuse, unprecedented really. I suggest you edit the link to your paper back in.--Percy

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The paper is not plagiarised, it was graded as a first class dissertation that I submitted as part of my Cambridge degree

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Surely this indicates that I wasn't submitting a 6000 word PhD thesis to the forum (a thesis is a HUGE work, taking place over years). A dissertation (masters in this case) can be a theoretical critique and analysis of existing works or subjects, just as scientific journals are full of such work of varying lengths. Our dissertations must be 6000 and 10000 words as part of the masters degree, as an exercise in writing articles for journals (as many are good enough for that anyway). New research does not have to be presented in a thesis anyway.I never claimed to have undertaken my own research, and this subject (bar examination of the chimpanzee foetal growth allometries) is more a debate about what the agreed research results indicate. My critical approach to the subject is also in marked contrast to most authors in the field, I am not simply repeating the conclusions of someone else (i.e. it contains original critiques, analysis and contributions to the debate). It is an extremely complicated area, as evident by the fact that numerous authors contradict themselves or fail to even define heterochronic processes properly. Results are one thing, but analysis of those results is quite another, and the results in this area of research have often been misinterpreted in my opinion.It seems that you jumped to the wrong conclusions about what that paper was and what I was aiming to achieve with posting it. Like I said before, I only posted it for the original topic starter who was interested in this topic (and hadnt been replied to for 5 months), I had no other motives. I had not even planned to post again unless specifically asked about the paper by the original poster. I think your response was fairly presumptious given that you had not read my comments fully

If I read the site correctly, you were just banned at Terry's Talk Origins. Perhaps you and/or Percy would like to start a thread comparing Terry's moderating "technique" to EvCs to illustrate to the Boot Campers why EvC is a better and fairer system?

I think you can pretty much rely on the fact that when I see a 6,000 word post that I haven't read the comments fully. The Forum Guidelines specify that you shouldn't post lengthy material here:

10. Do not cut-n-paste long excerpts into message boxes. Please instead introduce the point in your own words and provide a link to your source as a reference. If your source is not on-line you may contact the Site Administrator to have it made available on-line.

My comments were a response to Moose pointing out why I didn't believe it was a PhD dissertation.Most of the complaints at EvC Forum are from Creationists claiming biased treatment. We try to compensate by holding evolutionists to higher standards.--Percy

Do you have a link to the thread? I can't wait to read where Moose "let loose a barage of name calling".--PercyThis message has been edited by Percy, 11-29-2004 09:32 AM

Moose is banned threadUnfortunately the above link is all that I found. Like many things on that site, you have to take Terry's "word" for what has transpired. I was there reading up on John Davisons tirade against me and the "moose is banned" thread caught my eye.Maybe Moose could elaborate on the events?This message has been edited by Admin, 11-29-2004 09:43 AM

I gave up even visiting TTO some time ago. It may well attract an audience and if so, fine, but it is certainly not the place for a thinking Christian.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

If Mr. Gallagher's paper is of the calibre suggested by the comments on this thread and the one it was originally posted in perhaps it could be accomodated in the datadropsite in a similar way to JA Davison's 'Prescribed evolutionary hypothesis' paper. That would save Nicolas having to e-mail people a copy if they are interested in reading it.TTFN,WK

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I think you can pretty much rely on the fact that when I see a 6,000 word post that I haven't read the comments fully.

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I was refering to the comments surrounding the paper, which clearly labelled it as a Cambridge University degree based dissertation. You falsely assumed, without benign questioning, that I was trying to pass this off as PhD work and hence was lying. PhD work is called a thesis and is not part of a "degree", nor is original thought constrained to thesis work. By definition, given the grading of that paper, it cannot have been unoriginal

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The Forum Guidelines specify that you shouldn't post lengthy material here

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I didn't know that, it isn't there anymore, it was only for the topic starter.

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Most of the complaints at EvC Forum are from Creationists claiming biased treatment. We try to compensate by holding evolutionists to higher standards.

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You implied that I was lying about the nature of the work. You made these implications without even paying attention to the explanation I had posted just messages before yours and at the top of the original post. You also made assumptions about the content of what I posted without any knowledge of the subject in general. Perhaps you should hold yourself to the same exacting standards you seem to be asking for, or tread with more caution before making accusations in the future.I do not want my paper to be hosted by websites other than my own. Good luck with the forums and I'm sorry that my original post has caused such complaint here, clearly I misunderstood the nature of these forums, which seems to be about general discussion.NicolasThis message has been edited by Nicolas Gallagher, 11-29-2004 11:33 AM

No one said you were lying. If you reread Message 273, you'll see where I identify the fact that you regard thesis and dissertation as distinct terms with different meanings as a source of confusion. I implied no such thing. I was clarifying for Moose in terms that both he and I understand what I thought was the nature of your post. I suggest you not work so hard to detect slights.You should be rightfully proud of the fine paper you produced. It was only the fact that you described it as a dissertation that resulted in confusion and attempts to identify what it really was. In academia here in the states one doesn't often hear the term dissertation applied to anything but a PhD. Bachelor's thesis and Master's thesis, sure (though many aren't happy with this usage), but never a Bachelor's disseration or Master's dissertation. Thus, it is less than obvious that your description of your paper as "a first class dissertation that I submitted as part of my Cambridge degree" is a Master's thesis. Perhaps "first class" is a term Cambridge uses for the Master's program? Anyway, we didn't know what it was, and that is why I described for Moose my opinion that it wasn't really a dissertation, which implies original research, but was more a survey of current thinking on neotony in human evolution. The nature of the forums is pretty clearly laid out in the registration agreement, which also includes a link to the Forum Guidelines. But you didn't cause much complaint here. Your long post is an extremely minor issue, just normal normal day-to-day business. Rest assured, no one thinks you were lying.I'm posting this under my Admin account, but I remain...

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--	Percy
	EvC Forum Director

can be found here : BanMeNow.com(sorry admins, I don't know how to shorten the link)Needless to say, I don't agree with the banning.Cheers !FrankThis message has been edited by Admin, 11-29-2004 01:19 PM

That's a banning offense around here. Fortunately for you we've reached our quota for today. Why would liberals vote for George Bush? Terry puts on a good show, very entertaining. Has anyone ever noticed that most threads at Terry's site are started by...Terry!--Percy

The context is that the now deleted message was message 20 of the Undecided Voters (new) topic. It was a reply to Terry's message 5, although actually a general reply to Terry.You may need to page back as the pages there do not have fixed beginning and end message numbers.To me, it seems Terry is trying to spread the blame for the stupidity of starting the war. That's why I pointed out the "Chief Executive Officer" and "Commander in Chief" titles of GWB.But moderation issues at other forums should not be part of this topic. Further discussion should be taken to the Terry at the Talk Origins board topic, started by (gasp) minnemooseus back on 9/18/02.

Boy is Terry still off in Never Never Land: What evidence could he possibly be thinking of? What alternative universe is he living in?So Terry is allowed to insult half the American people here: And here: But let someone respond in kind, and BANG: banned!He's a character!Drawing this post back on topic, moderation here at EvC Forum requires that members argue constructively, knowledgably and rationally. Sending people to Boot Camp to encourage improvements in these areas hasn't proved successful thus far. In fact, it seemed like they all considered the restriction a license to simply continue just as they had been doing. The purpose of Boot Camp is not to provide a venue for misbehavior (a la the old Free For All forum), and so when they refused to change, their privileges were suspended.--Percy