Archive
Seemed time for a new archive and a nice, fresh discussion page. Wazronk 04:13, 10 May 2007 (UTC)
It appears that it might be appropriate to change the topic heading from The Urantia book to simply "Urantia" with the Urantia book as a sub heading. I only suggest this as the book has evolved into a rather large developing movement which has in excess of 25 titles having to do with Urantia and hundreds of study groups and Internet websites which have nothing to do with the Urantia foundation as well as translations in excess of 10 languages by authors other than Urantia foundation.User:Majeston 13 May 2007
- It would seem to be necessary for documentation of the 25 or so titles as offspring of The Urantia Book, and then would need to be noteworthy for inclusion in an encyclopedia. Is the suggestion for change of The Urantia Book title warranted on those criteria? Richiar 04:18, 16 May 2007 (UTC)
1. The Urantia Book by Urantia Foundation (Hardcover - Mar 2000)
2. The Urantia Book: Indexed Version With Free Audio Book on DVD by Uversa Press (Hardcover - Mar 2005)
3. How I Found The Urantia Book by Saskia Praamsma (Paperback - Sep 5, 2001)
4. The Birth of a Divine Revelation : The Origin of the Urantia Papers by Ernest P. Moyer (Paperback - Feb 16, 2000)
5. Urantia United: Tapping Into The Mind Of God For Religious Equality by A Transcendentalist (Paperback - Jan 22, 2007)
6. The Great Chain on Urantia by Nicholas P. Snoek (Paperback - Jul 5, 2006)
7. The Secret Revelation: Unveiling the Mystery of the Book of Revelation by Stella Religa and Byron Belitsos (Paperback - April 1, 2001)
8. The Sherman Diaries, Volume One: Dawning Revelations 1898-1942 by Matthew Block and Saskia Praamsma (Paperback - Feb 10, 2003)
9. Urantia: The Great Cult Mystery by Martin Gardner (Hardcover - April 1995)
10. SONSHIP AND THE URANTIA PAPERS: Sharing the Mind of God by Robert Crickett (Paperback - 2000)
11. An Introduction to the Urantia Revelation (2nd Edition) by David Bradley (Paperback - Mar 2002)
12. The Center Within: Lessons from Heart of the Urantia Revelation by Fred Harris and Byron Belitsos (Paperback - Dec 1998)
13. The Fifth Revelation : A Collection of Key Passages from The Urantia Book by Kelly Elstrott (Paperback - Oct 1, 1998)
14. Edgar Cayce and The Urantia Book (Hardcover )
15. Source Authors of the Urantia Book by J. T Manning (Hardcover - Jun 2002)
16. Concordex of the Urantia Book by Clyde Bedell (Hardcover - Mar 1986)
17. Urantia Book Concordance by The Urantia Foundation (Hardcover - Jun 1993)
18. The Urantia Book Workbooks: Topical and Doctrinal Study (Urantia Book Workbooks) by Urantia Foundation,
19. The Tao of God: A Restatement Based on the Urantia Book by Richard Omura (Paperback - April 2000)
20. A History of the Urantia Papers by Larry Mullins and Meredith Justin Sprunger (Hardcover - Dec 18, 2000)
21. El Libro De Urantia (Spanish) / The Book Of Urantia by Urantia Foundation (Hardcover - Nov 30, 1999)
22. Het Urantia Boek (Hardcover - Jun 1998)
23. Das Urantia Boek (Hardcover - Dec 2005)
24 Urantia-kirja (Paperback - Feb 2000)
25. The Urantia book basics by Mary Ebben (Unknown Binding - 1994)
26. Khnta Ypahtnn by Urantia Foundation (Hardcover - Jun 1998)
27. Birth of Revelation: The Story of the Urantia Papers (Paperback - 1994)
28. Le verbe s'est fait livre: La révélation protégée par la Fondation Urantia (Collection Rencontres d'aujourd'hui) by Jacques Rhéaume ( - 1990)
29. LES JUMEAUX D'URANTIA by NORMAND CANAC-MARQUIS (Paperback - 1992)
30. Study aids for part IV of the Urantia Book: The life and teachings of Jesus by Ruth E Renn (Unknown Binding - 1975)
31. Kick Start: Cosmic Biker Babe's Guide To Life And Changing the Planet by Carol Setters (Paperback - April 27, 2005)
32. Spiritual Leadership: Wisdom for Work, Wisdom for Life by Erik Van Praag (Paperback - Aug 1, 2004)
33. Steve Vai, Flex-able ( Urantia , 1984), Flex-able Leftovers ( Urantia , 1984),
34. Paramony by Duane L. Faw (Paperback - Oct 1, 2002)
35. The Technology of Love, Vol. 1 by Charles E. Hansen (Hardcover - Aug 2005)
36. Nebadon: Our Creative Universe Series by Darka Watters (Paperback - May 11, 2005)
37. The Celestial Songbook by James W. Cleveland (Paperback - Mar 2, 2004)
38. The Alien Intimacies by James W. Cleveland (Paperback - Jul 3, 2003)
39. Celestials OVER Cincinnati: Lessons of the Planetary Correcting Time by James W. Cleveland (Paperback - Jan 6, 2004)
40. Beyond Cynicism by James W. Cleveland (Paperback - Dec 1, 2003
41. Discovery Of Atlantis by Robert Sarmast (Paperback - Oct 1, 2003)
42. Trillion by Mark Kimmel (Hardcover - Jun 2002)
43. Mandala: Journey to the Center (Whole Way Library) by DK Publishing
44. A Study of the Master Universe - bill sadler
45. CORRECTING TIME by Fred Harris
46. THE STORY OF EVERYTHING by Michelle Klimesh
47. The Seven Circles- Richard Omura
48. How To Recycle A Disposal Planet- Tommy L. Clendening
49. God, Man, and Supreme- Origin and Destiny by Stuart R. Kerr, III
50. Jesus - A Revelation of God by Laurence Whelan
51. Urantijos Knyga (Lithuanian Paperback)
52. Cartea Urantia (Romanian HTML CD-ROM)
53. Kniga Urantii - Russian Hardcover
54. The Urantia Book - Korean Hardcover
55. Il Libro di Urantia - Italian Hard Cover
56. Up Close and Personal with the Urantia Book- by J. J. Johnson 2007
57. UFO Cults and Urantia by Kevin Lewis, Kenneth B. Samples
58. Adam and Eve: A Tragic Love Story (Paperback) by Louis J. Bartolomeo (Author)
59. Gospel Gospel- by Louis J. Bartolomeo
Tenskwatawa eclipse of 1806
In paper 90, section 2 of the The Urantia Book, there is a statement about Tenskwatawa:
- "Ever and anon, true prophets and teachers arose to denounce and expose shamanism. Even the vanishing red man had such a prophet within the past hundred years, the Shawnee Tenskwatawa, who predicted the eclipse of the sun in 1808 and denounced the vices of the white man."
This has been cited in the article as a mistake in the book under the "Criticism of science" section with this language:
- "The book says that a solar eclipse was predicted in 1808 by the Native American prophet Tenskwatawa. The eclipse actually was predicted in late April of 1806 and occurred on June 16, 1806."
Every so often, a person will come by the article, and add commentary that there were in fact 3 solar eclipses in 1808, and they will cite a source such as NASA to prove it. This is true, there were 3 solar eclipses in 1808. But unfortunately, these edits are not made with a full understanding of solar eclipses, or with the well-documented historical record of this event.
Most critically, the idea that any of these three could have been potentially the Tenskwatawa eclipse is mistaken because any given solar eclipse is only visible to a very small slice of the earth's surface. The three eclipses of 1808 were extremely remote and were not visible to Tenskwatawa or his followers:
- May 25 -- Antarctica, south of Africa
- Oct 19 -- Antarctica, south of Australia
- Nov 18 -- Northern Russia
Also, the prediction by Tenskwatawa according to historic references was for a total eclipse. There are 3 different types of eclipse -- partial, annular, and total -- and only two total eclipses during the lifetime of Tenskwatawa that were viewable in North America. The first was on June 16, 1806. This is perhaps best represented visually with a graphic of the paths of occlusion for total and annular eclipses during that time period according to NASA (1801-1820). The other one was in 1834, two years prior to his death (1821-1840). The three solar eclipses that occured in 1808 were not only extremely remote, they were underwhelming partial eclipses.
All scientific evidence, all calculations, all historical records point to the Tenskwatawa prediction eclipse as the total eclipse having occured on June 16, 1806. See the book The Life of Tecumseh and of His Brother the Prophet for historical documentation of 1806 as the year (because its copyright has expired, it can be obtained for free from books.google.com). Editors will have to provide published scientific and historical evidence to support any theorized doubts about 1806 as the correct date of the eclipse that Tenskwatawa is associated with. Wazronk 05:38, 16 May 2007 (UTC)
NASA lists 3 eclipses during 1908
1908 Jan 03 Total 130 1.044 04m14s ne Australia, w N America, nw S America
[Total: Atlantic, Costa Rica]
1908 Jun 28 Annular 135 0.965 04m00s America's, w Africa, w Europe
[Annular: Mexico, U.S., Mauritania, Senegal, Mali, Burkina Faso]
1908 Dec 23 Hybrid 140 1.002 00m12s S America, Antarctica, s Africa
[Hybrid: Chile, Argentina, Uruguay, s Atlantic]
The June 28 annular eclipse shows a path directly over northern florida http://sunearth.gsfc.nasa.gov/eclipse/SEplot/SEplot1901/SE1908Jun28A.GIF The quotation in the Ub does not say anything about a "total" eclipse. The material now contained in Wikipedia regarding an error in the Ubook is mis-leading at best. user:Majeston
- I didn't say that TUB says the eclipse was total, and the article hasn't said it either. I said that "the prediction by Tenskwatawa according to historic references was for a total eclipse". This event was in relatively recent times (compared to the history of human civilization as a whole) and is well-documented, see here for a write up available online:
- "At around noon on the appointed day, June 16th 1806, a total solar eclipse crossed the region. A long eclipse with a band of totality stretching from near the southern tip of Lake Michigan to just north of Cincinnati it encompassed most of the lands inhabited by Tenskwatawa's followers. In Greenville, where Tenskwatawa and Tecumseh waited for the event, close to a thousand had gathered to see the Prophet's sign. The Prophet waved his arms towards the eclipse at the appropriate time, and the people were truly impressed."
- The article is accurate and clear. What is misleading is that you suggest an annular eclipse that took place in Florida 62 years after Tenskwatawa was dead and gone has anything to do with this. You are off by a century in your list of eclipses. Wazronk 17:36, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
Adding chalkboard
I've added a link to a chalkboard to display proposed revisions to the article so people can see the proposed revision and comment on it.
I think the dots under "Comparison to Christianity" are hard on the eyes, and would propose a wikitable instead. I am constructing one to show what I mean, and comments would be welcome here. Richiar 20:06, 16 May 2007 (UTC)
- Hi Richiar,
- I'm not sure about the bullet points being hard on the eyes. But then, I didn't have a problem with all the links that used to be in the "Overview" section, which drew enough comments over time that made it seem better to do without. It would be good to hear multiple comments. Wazronk 19:14, 20 May 2007 (UTC)
- It was pointed out to me by another editor that the "chalkboard" was an inappropriate use of
the namespace. What seems to be more standard I've been told is a sandbox for TUB. So, that has been activated. The idea is to be able to place and arrange content so the article can be trimmed and developed without disturbing the entire ecosystem, if you know what I mean. More on that below. I'm not sure where to put the sandbox link for TUB. Richiar 21:41, 20 May 2007 (UTC)
Removal of link
The link for the Urantia readers international was removed recently. It seemed like an appropriate link to me, and seemed to contribute to this article. There was no explanaton of why
it was removed, and if there are no comments to the contrary, I'll put it back in shortly. Richiar 14:07, 20 May 2007 (UTC)
- I see the link was just placed in a different position. Never mind. Richiar 15:30, 20 May 2007 (UTC)
- Hi Richiar,
- I'm glad you mention this link. I did move it to a lower position the other day, and have done so in the past. I've not had overly strong opinions about its legitimacy in the article, but more and more I am becoming convinced this is an inappropriate link, which is only being placed on wikipedia for advertising purposes. This is top of the list under WP:LINKS as a reason for a link to not be included on wikipedia.
- The only person who has maintained the link in the article over time is 66.177.21.64. Actually the only contributions to wikipedia by this IP has been to propagate the link. I see now that 66.177.21.64 has again shifted this link up the list of "External links", and my growing impression is that this person is not just satisfied with a link from this wikipedia article, but 66.177.21.64 wants to make the organization appear more prominent than it is by manipulating its placement on the external links list.
- My understanding is that the three top-tier organizations in the Urantia movement are: Urantia Foundation, The Urantia Book Fellowship, and the Urantia Association International. The first two have historical roots back to the beginning of the movement in the 1950s and the third is the fraternal organization closely backed and supported by Urantia Foundation for going on 20 years. I agree with having links to the websites of these three organizations, and to me it makes sense that they are the first three links under the "External links" section of the article.
- The reason I moved the placement of the Urantia Readers-International link to a lower position the other day is that it had been placed before the Urantia Book Fellowship and Urantia Association International, but from what I can see these two organizations are more prominent and should be listed first.
- I have now removed the link altogether, pending evidence that it is being placed in the article for more than advertising purposes. The person 66.177.21.64 should address this concern, and I ask that they take a moment to read WP:LINKS. It seems likely to me that there could even be a conflict-in-interest and this person is in some way associated with Urantia Readers-International. From WP:LINKS:
- "Due to the rising profile of Wikipedia and the amount of extra traffic it can bring a site, there is a great temptation to use Wikipedia to advertise or promote sites. This includes both commercial and non-commercial sites. You should avoid linking to a website that you own, maintain or represent, even if the guidelines otherwise imply that it should be linked. If the link is to a relevant and informative site that should otherwise be included, please consider mentioning it on the talk page and let neutral and independent Wikipedia editors decide whether to add it."
- Wazronk 19:28, 20 May 2007 (UTC)
Urantia Readers-Intl
From WP:LINKS, "Adding external links can be a service to our readers, but they should be kept to a minimum of those that are meritable, accessible and appropriate to the article." And "No page should be linked from a Wikipedia article unless its inclusion is justified". Under "Links to normally be avoided", see numbers 1, 3, and 13 in particular. The link to Urantia Readers-International seems to be important to one individual but it isn't clear why it is a meritable organization or unique resource of information regarding the article's topic. As I wrote in the "Removal of link" comment above, I understand the notability of three other organizations from third-party published sources. The pattern of edits on this even is suggestive that it is for advertising purposes, which is a no-no. Wazronk 16:13, 26 May 2007 (UTC)
- ---------
- Regarding you two non-Urantia Book reading nerds - Wazronk and Richiar (and the psycho calling himself Majeston) - if you play games with what you don't know, then you're in for a fight. First of all, if you two idiots even bothered to look at the Urantia Readers-Intl website, you would know that it is not an advertising site, but a legitimate non-profit Urantia organization. Because you are not a member of the Urantia movement, and if you were, we would know who you are, you do not even know the history of the Urantia Readers-Intl - which by the way has a larger dedicated following then either the now falling apart Urantia Book Fellowship, and the failing Urantia Association International.
- For your edification, the Urantia Readers-Intl is the original Urantia Brotherhood from 1950, and the only group still holding the flame of the original Doctrine of Trust from its creation. The Urantia Book Fellowship created itself in 1989 as it broke off from the Urantia Brotherhood and the Urantia Foundation. The Foundation created another group, in 1994, called the Urantia Association International for some ridiculous reason, because they had the legal rights to the Urantia Brotherhood organization, and still do. Nevertheless, the Urantia Association International, as in the same direction as the Urantia Book Fellowship, fell into bad management and nefarious direction, and lost sight of the original Midwayer mandates. During this time, the true remaining "loyalist" migrated from the Urantia Brotherhood to the Urantia Association International.
- Over time the Urantia Association International, because of lack of true sagacity, was infiltrated by members of the rebel Urantia Book Fellowship organization. As such, the "loyalist" members to the Urantia movement, many of whom where members of the Urantia Association of Florida, grabbed the torch and reorganized the original Urantia Brotherhood as the Urantia Readers-Intl. Because you two dummies are not a direct part of the Urantia movement, and again we say this because we would know who you are if you were - you do not know who is who and what is what. You don't even know that the Urantia Book Fellowship is a counter Urantia movement organization. But, you are obviously not true thinkers, but that is not the issue.
- The issue is that you two jerks keep deleting our external link from this section. We never deleted your links to the Urantia Book Fellowship, but instead just added our link, not apparent to what place it was. But over and over now we find our link deleted, so now we have game on... you delete us, we delete you (Fellowship). So, if you put the Urantia Book Fellowship link back in, and keep ours in, the we keep yours in. Because you've pissed us off, if you place the Urantia Book Fellowship link above us, we will place our link above you. This is in retrospect to your piousness. So suffer with it. That's life, and perhaps maybe one of you two idiots will someday realize who the Urantia Readers-Intl really is, who the Urantia Book Fellowship really is, and who is the real Urantia group is following the original Doctrine of Trust - but we already know that you two bozos don't have what it takes to figure this out in this life time. The truce is this... Urantia Readers-Intl first, Urantia Book Fellowship second, Urantia Association International third... at least for now, then maybe someday we'll swap order... just to appease the dark side. But for now this better be it, or we're going to go back and forth with you two wimps and beat you at your own game. Capishe? UrantiaRI 03:20, 29 May 2007 (UTC)
- This link has my vote for permanent deletion. It is nothing but a tiny new Urantia-wannabe association of a few readers from Florida trying to make a big noise. This statement : " the Urantia Readers-Intl is the original Urantia Brotherhood from 1950," is misleading at best. I have viewed the website and it is quite evident that the only purpose here is to direct traffic to their barren website. Majeston 05:01, 29 May 2007 (UTC)Majeston
- _________
- To the psycho calling himself Majeston, who has no respect for the real name and meaning of this title, and hence is a genetic loser. We have viewed your postings and have found you to be unfamiliar and a failure at your understanding of the true ongoings of the Urantia movement. The facts are that the Urantia Readers-Intl is a large, fast moving, and growing organization that stayed with the original Midwayer mandates and the 1950 Doctorine of Trust - that is one reason why we grabbed the torch of the Urantia Brotherhood and still hold it in true light.
- The slow failure of the Urantia Book Fellowship has caused many of their misguided believers to join the Urantia Association International and the Urantia Readers-Intl... and these are the inside facts, which you are not a privy to. So, little man, here are the facts once again reinstated, for your reality.... if you delete us, we delete you (Fellowship); if you put the Urantia Book Fellowship link back in, and keep ours in, then we keep yours in; if you place the Urantia Book Fellowship link above us, we will place our link above you... you want a war, you got it. UrantiaRI 14:00, 29 May 2007 (UTC)
- [edit] Urantia Links
- Please discontinue removing the Fellowship link and replacing it with the urantia internation group link. The Fellowship is an established world-wide organization with hundreds of members worldwide and has been in continuous existence since the 1990's lawsuits with Urantia Foundation. It succeeds the Urantia Brotherhood and organizes International confernces worldwide and publishes the Urantia book among other valuable endeavors. To replace this link with the vandals at Urantia international composed of a handful of beligerrant mal-content activist members whose only purpose here is vandalism as stated in their comments on the talk pages is ludicrous. Next we will have every reader or study group in the world wanting a link to their site or local activities. This is a small group of Florida readers which has a backyard bar-b-que once a year.
- __________
- To the undeniable feeble person who misrepresents the reality of the Urantia Fellowship as an organization that does not legitimately publish the Urantia Book and is a failure with only, as you say, just hundreds of dwindling members. The Urantia Readers-Intl has many hundreds of readers worldwide in places such as Denmark, Saudi Arabia, Europe, Korea, etc. Your self repressed reality is necessary for you to get through each day of your bitter resentful life.
- The Urantia Readers-Intl hosts world wide Internet meetings and has a monthly mailing list that encompasses 6 Continents... whose organization still happens to host an annual get together in Florida for the prior members of the Urantia Association of Florida. The Urantia Book Fellowship is nothing more then a ban of radical beguiled readers who desire nothing more then to create a "golden calf" of an idolatrous Urantia church to appease their pagan animal nature. Anyone not self repressed enough to understand simple religious psychology can already see this.
- Deep down inside you know this is true, but your subliminal self hatred keeps you in denial of such facts. And, as such we are going to ask that you... "Please discontinue removing the Urantia Readers-Intl group and replacing it with the Fellowship link". See how that works in contrast? So you want to play sound games, or do you want to fight fire with fire.... jerks. As such let us repeat the same again... if you delete us, we delete you (Fellowship); if you put the Urantia Book Fellowship link back in, and keep ours in, then we keep yours in; if you place the Urantia Book Fellowship link above us, we will place our link above you... you want a war, you got it. We didn't delete your entry, but you repeatedly delete ours, so now we are playing your game. UrantiaRI 20:24, 29 May 2007 (UTC)
- As a follow-up, not too surprisingly UrantiaRI received an indefinite block, see here (also shows more of the outbursts from him or her). Link in question has been removed as spam.
- I wasn't sure if this silliness was actually from somebody who represented the organization, as the posts implied, or more from an overexciteable person who maybe works there or something. But I notice on their website, in the "About Us" section, they used to have a link to The Urantia Book article here on wikipedia with this comment:
- "Obviously, there are many sources in books and on the Internet describing the Urantia Book. One of the better sources to browse for information on the Internet is Wikipedia. Their description and sources on Wikipedia's website in evaluating the Urantia Book seem fair and unbiased for open-source authors who format their statements from an objective third-person understanding (verses an ideal first-person actual experiential understanding)."
- Aw, nice of them to say so. Now that they are in a huff about wikipedia though, that was deleted in the past day or two (still can be seen for the time being through the magic of Google cache). So I guess this behavior really is from someone in charge there! At least someone with the ability to alter their website. Wazronk 23:04, 1 June 2007 (UTC)
- Gentelmen please do not defend your position or your faith with invective and name calling, they are the hallmarks of the faithless. If there is anything to this Urantia let logic and peace be your weapons of persuasion. Dingodog99 10:04, 12 June 2007 (UTC)
Sandbox
The chalkboard is not appropriate, I've learned, but a sandbox is, so here's the link: Talk: The Urantia Book/sandbox. Richiar 21:45, 20 May 2007 (UTC)
I've done a little rewriting of the Intro, Overview, and Teachings, for anyone to look at and comment on. Richiar 22:05, 20 May 2007 (UTC)
Lol
This article treats the book as if it isn't two thousand pages of bullhockey. Wikipedia can be so funny sometimes. - ∅ (∅), 03:37, 25 May 2007 (UTC)
- Wikipedia is not the place to promote your beliefs about what is "bullhockey", please do not mock other peoples beliefs. (H) 13:42, 25 May 2007 (UTC)
- Skeptics generally don't care about facts, they care about supporting a position. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Majeston (talk • contribs) 19:00, May 25, 2007 (UTC)
- That isn't any better of a comment than the bullhockey one. Wazronk 16:13, 26 May 2007 (UTC)
- Wikipedia isn't the place to promote your religious beliefs, either. HAND. :-) - ∅ (∅), 02:35, 27 May 2007 (UTC)
Hello,
the ONLY religion one CAN have is there very own... because one's connection to 'god' is unique. All organized religions and groups that exclude others are cults. a famous man once said " Be yeah free thinkers but do not become a 'group' of free thinkers". ...an open mind does not exclude others beliefs... it either adopts the beliefs or discards them... but the choice is made of free will... not the programming of antecedant causation.
To argue over spiritual data is sillious... and ignorant. lol
14:52, 29 May 2007 (UTC)~ tawQuin Raamany
Popular Culture
proposed additions; Ashtar-Urantia- Audio CD- Celtic-flavoured progressive rock,
Urantia Rising by Various Artists (Audio CD - 2006) -Import
Mykl Lozin -Ascension - the 7th Wave -Audio CD-Australian composer and Violinist - Mykl Lozin. 3.Urantia
- I looked at both those articles: I don't see that either of them as having anything to do with the Urantia Book. I'm not intending that to be a negative comment, but I don't see why those should be added. Richiar 02:11, 2 June 2007 (UTC)
- In the first case I believe Ashtar is the name of the recording group and Urantia is the CD title. I do not believe it has anything to do with the wikipedia entry for Ashtar. In the second case the title is Urantia Rising; In the Mykl Lozin, Urantia is the title of one of the songs on the CD. Of course all 3 have something to do with Urantia and further illustrates that the heading should be changed to Urantia with the Urantia Book as a subheading which was the cause of this explosion in cultural phenomenon. The memes of the Urantia book have and are permeating every part of society on earth, the coming years will only exponentially increase. You can certainly expect more from a fifth epochal revelation, but nothing less. Majeston 03:04, 2 June 2007 (UTC)
- Take a look at the Elvis Presley article; then take a look at the Elvis Presley phenomenon. It seems that to eliminate the Urantia Book article heading, would be similar to placing the Elvis Presley article as a subsection of the Elvis Presley phenomena. No??? Yes??? Richiar 15:50, 2 June 2007 (UTC)
- There's some dispute on wikipedia about how worthwhile trivia sections like this are and whether they are encyclopedic. I think it's okay up to a point to have a section like "In popular culture". But there's a tendency for any little thing to end up in these types of sections, which is a main reason why they are criticized. Some of these entries aren't anything remotely "popular" I would say. From WP:NOT, "Wikipedia is not an indiscriminate collection of information." Wazronk 21:30, 5 June 2007 (UTC)
List of 59
Alright. There's a long list of references. The suggestion has been made by Majeston that the article "Urantia Book" be renamed "Urantia" because there is a Urantia movement. I am trying to visualize this in an encyclopedic manner and see how to relate those two. Maybe if there was more elaboration on those thoughts, I could get a better idea of what is meant.
In the meantime, I'm interested in looking at getting some of the sections we currently have into a more encyclopedic and readable prose. Richiar 02:18, 2 June 2007 (UTC)
- This article is about the book. Any movement based on the book would be a new subject, and if it meets our inclusion criteria would make a fine new article. The book itself is very clear that it is not an how-to to make an organized religion/movement. The book stands alone, and any movement would be an independent entity from the book itself. (H) 13:24, 3 June 2007 (UTC)
- If there's an interest in documenting the movement around TUB on wikipedia, my suggestion would be to develop this starting with "Adherents" section as a good place to incubate the topic. If it evolves to where it's a bit much for this article, it could be split to its own topic, something with a title like "Movement surrounding The Urantia Book". At this time, the article isn't about the movement but about the book itself, so the title to me is right the way it is. And, anyhow, the word "Urantia" is actually a very simple word to explain and a topic with this title would be a narrow and short one: "The Urantia Book defines the word Urantia as the name of the planet Earth." To me it wouldn't be about the book and wouldn't be about a movement surrounding the book per se. Wazronk 21:30, 5 June 2007 (UTC)
- I agree with you on this. Richiar 18:46, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
Simplifying
Looking at the sections "The Nature of God" and "God and the Individual", it seems like they could benefit from a simpler rewording, and make the sections more readable. I'm not going to proceed with that however, unless I hear there are no objections. Richiar 17:08, 3 June 2007 (UTC)
- I've looked through the "Nature of God" proposal at the sandbox link above and the "God and the individual" that you have on your user page.
- I don't see these proposals as being so NPOV unfortunately. For example, the sandbox uses uppercase such as this: "God is the Creator and Upholder of all reality", and this: "God is a mystery to his created beings not because He is hiding from any of his creatures, but because of the absolute nature of His qualities and the perfection of His personality." These types of capitalizations and assertions are POV, and the capitalizations aren't even how the book itself uses those words.
- A lot of the simplification reads to me more like a move from broader encyclopedic context to making non-NPOV assertions. For example, the current article has this wording:
- "God according to the book is one Deity who functions on a range of different levels of reality, both personal and impersonal. God is taught to exist in a Trinity of three perfectly individualized persons who are co-equal: God the Father, God the Son, and God the Spirit."
- The suggested change says:
- "God is a Deity who functions on a range of different levels of reality, both personal and impersonal. God exists in the form of a Trinity of three perfectly individualized persons who are co-equal."
- This is an assertion that is no longer neutral and has taken out the important context of attribution as to who makes this assertion. Wazronk 21:30, 5 June 2007 (UTC)
- Thanks for looking at that and for your comments. You have a way of looking at the issues and bringing in clarity in a succinct manner which I find quite helpful. When I looked at the capitalizations agsin, I agree with you on that. About the assertions, as I look over the style of writing on encyclopedic articles, it seems assertions are the main writing style. So if its communicating a pov, it must be for some other reason, it would seem. I'll try and elaborate a little below. Richiar 18:58, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
- To elaborate on what I was saying, if you were to say "I think what you said assumes too much of a religious stance for a general reader, and thus seems to have too much of a religious pov", I would understand that.
- When I look at the Urantial article in its current state, what I see is an article similar to the Qur'an article. It seems to rely on to many quotations for an encyclopedic entry. Perhaps there could be a link from the article to a page of supporting quotations. This was done for example with the Philosophy article. Richiar 19:15, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
- The way I'm looking at it, assertions are how an encyclopedia is written. I think the issue may be one of exegesis; drawing meaning out of and putting meaning into text; also, there is a kind of pov about pov, meta interpretation, which has to be taken into consideration. I don't think using assertions means one is therefore guilty of injecting pov. See the article on truth properties of language. Richiar 19:31, 6 June 2007 (UTC) truth and redundancy
- It isn't the writing style of using assertions that I disagree with, it's "non-NPOV assertions". Anything can be stated in a crisp, simple, declarative statement but when it is an opinion that is stated this way without attribution it's no longer neutral. A good place to look is this section of the NPOV policy page, WP:NPOV#A_simple_formulation.
- "Assert facts, including facts about opinions — but do not assert the opinions themselves. By "fact" we mean "a piece of information about which there is no serious dispute." ... By value or opinion, on the other hand, we mean "a piece of information about which there is some dispute.""
- It isn't the writing style of using assertions that I disagree with, it's "non-NPOV assertions". Anything can be stated in a crisp, simple, declarative statement but when it is an opinion that is stated this way without attribution it's no longer neutral. A good place to look is this section of the NPOV policy page, WP:NPOV#A_simple_formulation.
- The way I'm looking at it, assertions are how an encyclopedia is written. I think the issue may be one of exegesis; drawing meaning out of and putting meaning into text; also, there is a kind of pov about pov, meta interpretation, which has to be taken into consideration. I don't think using assertions means one is therefore guilty of injecting pov. See the article on truth properties of language. Richiar 19:31, 6 June 2007 (UTC) truth and redundancy
- "Wikipedia is devoted to stating facts in the sense as described above. Where we might want to state an opinion, we convert that opinion into a fact by attributing the opinion to someone."
- To take one sentence as an example, the article currently says this:
- "God according to the book is one Deity who functions on a range of different levels of reality, both personal and impersonal."
- Your suggestion is this:
- "God is one Deity who functions on a range of different levels of reality, both personal and impersonal."
- It takes out the attribution and makes a statement of opinion appear instead as a fact when it's not at all "a piece of information about which there is not serious dispute".
- I looked at the Qur'an article, I see your point on that. I don't think this article is as bad off, but we probably could do without some of the quotes. I don't think it will be realistic for there to be a side article for quotes, the whole book is available online if people really would like to see what's in it, but I think it's useful for some select quotes to appear in the article to get across a few key points and give a small taste for what the text is like. Wazronk 18:32, 8 June 2007 (UTC)
- All right, I've taken out some of the quotes, see if that looks like an improvement or not. The ones I left were ones I thought were making reasonable and clear points where they were, and it seemed to me liked paraphrasing or cutting them wasn't going to be as helpful. The reduction in quotes also made it more reasonable to collapse the "Cosmology" part into one overall section, which I think is a good simplification. Wazronk 02:35, 9 June 2007 (UTC)
- :) Hi Wazronk. I think I'm going to have to print out the two versions and compare them to get a good read on the changes. When I look at them under the history tab, I can't really get a good sense of the differences because of the formatting. Because my printer isn't working, I have to use somebody else's. I won't be able to get that for another 4 days. It will probably be another week before I can respond, but I'll get back to you on that. I did another rewrite and left it on the sandbox. I will have to explain my thinking on it step by step, and that will probably take me a week also. I'm working on it intuitively, and I don't always know what my thoughts are why until I step back from it and look at it from a distance. You probably shouldn't consider a serious response to it until I can put down what I was thinking. At the moment I don't even know. Richiar 04:45, 12 June 2007 (UTC)
- I finally was able to review the changes you made. I agree with the changes. As I look at the article, I think its about 3 % of what needs to be done. I am not saying that in a critical manner, but so you can know what I’m thinking. Why don’t we discuss this some. Maybe we could discuss the details of this on our talk pages: see if we can develop a collaboration. If we hash out some of this on our talk pages it might save the Urantia talk page some tedious discussion. Richiar 20:23, 15 June 2007 (UTC)