User talk:MarkGall

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Hello REAL MARK GALL!!! LessThanAverageJosh 14:01, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Hi, and thanks for the welcome. --TheRealMarkGall 14:11, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

How you found us

Good to see you here, although this edit is a little sad. Despite what TK would have you believe, very little "vandalism" comes from here these days. We're more concerned with highlighting Andy's insanity, as well as the peccadilloes of his hand-picked goons. At least you finally saw TK and Andy for what they are. Btw - please run your liberal style bot on TK and let us know what number comes up. --PsygremlinHable! 15:47, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

I think Jacob already ran it on him -- he apparently scored an impressive 1.28 (see TK's talk page). --TheRealMarkGall 16:10, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Can you share the script for the liberal style bot? Tetronian ^{you're clueless} 16:20, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

For obvious reasons already discussed at CP which I don't think need to be rehashed, no. This is particularly crucial now as I think it will soon be put into more active use by JacobB. --TheRealMarkGall 16:23, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

I thought the "formula" was already posted? Can't any two-bit script kiddie bang one out? ^{— Sincerely, Neveruse513 / Talk / Block} 16:25, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

The actual script involves some deviations from the formula, for the same reasons that I won't reveal the script. The bot in actual use is even more accurate than the formula in the article. If one of you kiddies wants to implement it again you're welcome to, but I doubt it will surpass the existing bot. --TheRealMarkGall 16:28, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

My bot can put people into a smaller box than your bot. ^{— Sincerely, Neveruse513 / Talk / Block} 16:30, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

I tried to make a bot like yours, but it just keeps trying to stick its thumb up my arse. I think my Python needs a bit more work. Crundy^{Talk nerdy to me} 16:42, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

1.28. Must be a flaw in your bot. After all, it does count talk-page edits negatively, and that's the only place TK posts. Although, I guess he is helped by the fact that he deletes most user's talk-pages after talking there... like yours. --PsygremlinParlez! 17:06, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

If memory serves, he scored much higher than that when I first ran it. My guess is he's expressed a lot of conservative ideology (reflected in vocabulary) in his recent posts; that gets a fairly heavy weight and can compensate to a certain extent for talk talk talk. --TheRealMarkGall 17:12, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

HI!

HI MARK GALL!! LessThanAverageJosh 16:46, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Hi there (again). --TheRealMarkGall 16:51, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Bot

OK, so you don't want to hand out the source code, but could you at least run your bot against a few of us on here and let us know our scores? What's mine? Oh do tell! Crundy^{Talk nerdy to me} 16:52, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Look I've even made a userbox in preparation!

LS	This user's Liberal Score is 1,000.

Crundy^{Talk nerdy to me} 16:57, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

And let you lot try to reverse engineer it? No, I don't think so. Take it up with Jacob if you're curious, perhaps he'll oblige. Nice userbox, by the way. --TheRealMarkGall 17:00, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

If you wanted to keep parodying, you should have stuck with CP. If you think such a thing as a liberal style bot would be effective (or anything but insanely ridiculous)...you should have stuck with CP. ^{— Sincerely, Neveruse513 / Talk / Block} 18:05, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

It would be very sad to waste a huge amount of time reverse engineering a silly bot that won't be very accurate anyway. Cubic evil Hoover! 17:07, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Indeed, there are guys here experienced with making bots and I know people who are very good with computer programing to the point where reverse engineering would be more difficult than making one from scratch. Unless, of course, the bot doesn't particularly exist. Anyway, what would be the problem reverse engineering it? We might find out that it's a scam and spill the beans to Andy (to be honest, I'd want to actually see his face when he figures that out)? ^sshole 17:12, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

I think the fact that Jacob explicitly offered to provide the source to TK, and has posted several scores already, refutes the suggestion that the bot doesn't exist, or isn't accurate. In any case, I'm not interested in discussing the matter further -- any additional questions should be directed to its current operator, JacobB. --TheRealMarkGall 17:18, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

(UI) What the hell are you talking about? I meant for you to run your app on your machine against my contributions and then post my score. How on earth would I reverse engineer anything from that? Crundy^{Talk nerdy to me} 17:26, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

But the problem is, the current operator is running it on a flawed premise - namely the arbitrary constants you assigned to it, unless you tweaked them, in which case the formula is outdated on CP. Still, it's nice to see you remaining so loyal to that bunch of wingnuts. --PsygremlinParla! 17:42, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Ahem, paranoid bunch of wingnuts. Don't forget what this thing supposedly is and why it's there. ^sshole 17:52, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Just because I retired doesn't mean I'm all of a sudden on your side here. I remain a Conservapedian in outlook. Also, I think it would be hard to argue that their "paranoia" about parodists isn't entirely justified. --TheRealMarkGall 17:57, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

It's not just their paranoia about parody - look at their paranoia in regards to real life. Andy, for example, sees liberal bias everywhere. Tetronian ^{you're clueless} 17:59, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Perhaps the issue with parodists is justified. But it's Schlafly and co's own fault, not the fault of any parodist. The alarm bells were sounding about Bugler for months and he was treated like Andy's own little sprog because the guy falls for anyone who sufficiently brown-noses him. Also, is it actually parody when the real senior editors actually agree with it? Probably not. The problem with parodists is of CP's own making. ^sshole 18:02, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

(EC²) Whyever should they be paranoid about parodists? Their genuine contributors produce more parody than any parodist ever did. There were a few parodists that were there for an extended period of time and in much favor with the brass, despite constant speculation here on RationalWiki that they were parodists. ListenerX^TalkerX 18:05, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

You'd have sounded more credible if you'd said you remain a conservative in outlook, but a Conservapedian in outlook? You seem pretty educated, how can you read their stuff on relativity (or maths and science in general), not to mention Andy's "essays" and "mysteries", and not see them for what they are? And as has been said, when Andy welcomes people like Bugler and RodWeathers, who were obvious parodists, to his bosom just because they make the right noises (as does TK, but you don't know the history there, follow the link), then he deserves everything he gets. Even more so when he starts branding his hand-picked sysops (Philip Rayment, CPAdmin and JessicaT as liberals all of a sudden). The man is paranoia defined. --PsygremlinSprich! 18:19, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Of course there is no bot. Fifth Horseman 18:41, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Well, the fact that he refuses to run it for me suggests that either:

1) This isn't the real Mark Gall, or

2) The bot doesn't exist / work

Which is it? Crundy^{Talk nerdy to me} 18:47, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

I'm calling MC on this one. ^{— Sincerely, Neveruse513 / Talk / Block} 18:54, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Nah, not nearly enough ad homs to be MC. Tetronian ^{you're clueless} 20:36, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

HI!

HI MARK GALL!! SJ ^Debaser 17:05, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Occasional trolling???

How are you an occasional troll? Lord Goonie ^{Hooray! I'm helping!} 19:45, 5 December 2009 (UTC)

OK, not really occasional trolling. I registered and trolled for a day. --TheRealMarkGall 19:47, 5 December 2009 (UTC)

I wouldn't even say you're a troll, really. At least not compared to other trolls around here like MarcusCicero. Your just a (now former?) CONservapedia editor who stumbled upon this site. Lord of the Goons ^{The official spikey-haired skeptical punk} 19:52, 5 December 2009 (UTC)

The red link of your nonexistant userpage is reflective of the fiery rage it inspires in me

Seeing as you've been here for approaching two months now, would you please, please, pretty please make a userpage already? I find the red link to be an eyesore. Radioactive afikomen ^{Please ignore all my awful pre-2014 comments.} 00:03, 13 January 2010 (UTC)

I second RA. No true RWian has a redlinked userpage! Tetronian ^{you're clueless} 00:06, 13 January 2010 (UTC)

Red links make even the mightiest phallus droop. --Thor's Mighty Phallus (talk) 00:08, 13 January 2010 (UTC)

Consider it for now my revenge against the vandal site. Maybe I'll fix it one of these days. --TheRealMarkGall (talk) 00:17, 13 January 2010 (UTC)

Don't make me bust out my "lazy" template on you. : ) Radioactive afikomen ^{Please ignore all my awful pre-2014 comments.} 00:24, 13 January 2010 (UTC)

I'll make you a deal: sysopship for a userpage. --TheRealMarkGall (talk) 00:29, 13 January 2010 (UTC)

Would that unduly increase your liberal quotient? Corry (talk) 00:32, 13 January 2010 (UTC)

Only if I have to keep talk, talk, talking here to get it done. --TheRealMarkGall (talk) 00:33, 13 January 2010 (UTC)

Perhaps if you contributed substantively to this project, you would open your mind and spend 80% of your time reading or translating the bible. Corry (talk) 00:39, 13 January 2010 (UTC)

Really? That's the easiest deal ever. Radioactive afikomen ^{Please ignore all my awful pre-2014 comments.} 00:36, 13 January 2010 (UTC)

Name change

Let me know if you want your name changed to Mark Gall, MarkGall or whatever permutation thereof. 00:36, 13 January 2010 (UTC)

I renamed your account. You deserve a leg up, buddy. Sorry for my poor wikiskills, however. 02:34, 13 January 2010 (UTC)

Sysopship

My condolences for meeting our incredibly high standards for sysopship (carbon-based and not a hapless screw-up) and being demoted. Here is your bucket, mop, and instruction booklet. Try not to go too wild now. : ) Radioactive afikomen ^{Please ignore all my awful pre-2014 comments.} 00:39, 13 January 2010 (UTC)

Elsevier

I suppose you've seen this (from WP 01:47, 12 March 2010 (UTC)   ^Contribs_Talk

Probably somewhere along the way, but thanks for the reminder. wp:Australasian Journal of Bone and Joint Medicine, Mohamed El Naschie, and the journal Homeopathy are also going to go in too. --MarkGall (talk) 01:51, 12 March 2010 (UTC)

Pictures for mathematical (and other) articles

Hello! About the comment in this edit summary: Rational Wiki can use directly pictures from Wikimedia Commons (no need to upload anything). There are lots of maths stuff there, you just need to find a suitable image.--ZooGuard (talk) 07:22, 29 November 2010 (UTC)

Ah, thanks, I'll poke around. I don't have anything too elaborate in mind, so it won't be much trouble to just make my own if I don't find anything. --MarkGall (talk) 15:51, 29 November 2010 (UTC)

Pseudoscience

Hi Mark, I heard that you are interested in pseudoscience. I'm interested in problems caused by pseudoscience merging with science in universities where some professors are members of Opus Dei. I see it at my unuversity where I'm doing my PhD in general relativity. I'd appreciate your taking a look at my PhD stuff (just 4 pages without Acks). If you want to see my essay "Grawitation demystified", it is it's here, and "Einsteinian gravitation for poets and science teachers" is here. Any level of courtesy will ne appreciated. JimJast (talk) 13:30, 7 May 2011 (UTC)

Hi Jim, Your ideas could well be interesting, but you really ought to find someone who knows about physics to assess that. I may be able to read your essays, but without already understanding the mainstream alternatives I can't really judge their worth. I don't think RW is the right place to find someone who will have an educated opinion about this -- you'd be better off at a physics site. They'll probably take you more seriously there if you don't mention the opus dei and creationism stuff, and just stick to the physical theory. Sorry I can't be of more help. --MarkGall (talk) 14:32, 7 May 2011 (UTC)

Hi Mark, MISUNDERSTANDING! I didn't send you my PhD paper to evaluate it but to see how simple it is that the universe is not expanding. A calculation that Big Bang aficionados "overlooked". Just high school calculus. You said you are a math student. You surely know high school calculus.

The problem with my stuff is that presently the universities turn out physics PhDs who don't understand even that.

This is what I wanted to discuss. Problem is that there are no people who know about gravitation enough to assess that. Please read Feynman's opinion about gravitation physicists who believe that energy can be created (see item 4). Also in my university. This is how pseudoscience got merged with science and members of Opus Dei are propagating this since these physics professors seriously believe that for God nothing is impossible. It is not only in my university but everywhere (Feynman is universal). If we don't do something we'll have new Middle Ages. Maybe it is already to late but do you want to give up without any resistence? JimJast (talk) 16:51, 7 May 2011 (UTC)

Sorry, Jim, I'm afraid I can't help. I simply don't know enough to assess the theories, and at this point in my career I can't afford to be blacklisted by my overlords in Opus Dei. --MarkGall (talk) 18:01, 7 May 2011 (UTC)

I understand, Mark, (except why this wiki is called Rational while no rational things happen here? On the other hand, how rational Opus Dei might be?) JimJast (talk) 21:10, 7 May 2011 (UTC)

Such a pleasure to make your acquaintance

Mark, I must say that it is a pleasure to have made your acquaintance. Many editors here dismiss me as a crank, yet their attempts at refuting my theories are quite poor. On the other hand, your ant example has made me aware of Polya's random walk constants, a fascinating result I was unaware of, and one which poses a major problem for my attempts to argue for the circularity of time based on statistical mechanics. I don't know enough yet to say whether it is a fatal problem, or one I can recover from, but people like you are actually why I participate here — people who can point to real flaws rather than just obvious cases of "I don't get you at all" or "your ideas are so weird they must be wrong" (((Zack Martin)))^™ 10:11, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

Sure, it's an interesting question. I think your ideas about physics are rather cranky, but unlike some you can actually carry on a real discussion about them, so I'm happy to talk. I honestly don't know so much about physics, so you'll end up beyond my ken sooner or later. The Polya result is fun -- whenever I get lost, I just commence a random walk, knowing that I'll eventually get home (with probability 1, anyway).

It's been a few years since I thought much about such things, but I'll let you know if I find a decent reference. Offhand it's probably in "Probability and Random Processes" by Grimmett and Stirzaker, which might treat related questions you'd be interested in. I think it's sitting in my closet somewhere, so I'll check the index. Certainly that book has a treatment of Wiener processes. --MarkGall (talk) 18:58, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

Hi Mark. I was thinking about Polya's result. Especially the 3-dimensional vs. 2/1-dimensional cases. My line of thought is: a 1-dimensional random walk is recurrent, shouldn't a 3-dimensional random walk be just 3 independent 1-dimensional random walks, and hence also recurrent? Then I realised, the problem is that the 3-dimensional case is actually one about correlation. The 3 1d walks aren't independent, because a simple random walk only permits moving in 1 dimension at a time. So I thought, what about a model where the 3-dimensions are independent? Say, in each dimension we have 1/3 probability of moving +1, a 1/3 of -1, a 1/3 of not moving. So that gives nine possibilities, with 1/9 probability each (one of which is to stay stationary). Question is, would Polya's result for such a walk still hold? I think not, since we really have three independent 1-d walks now, each of which should individually be recurrent. Of course, we can separately ask about whether they would correlate, but I would say, if we can get a certain sequence of coin tosses with probability p, then we can get two simultaneous sequences for some smaller p (except here the coins have three sides). (((Zack Martin)))^™ 11:05, 6 June 2011 (UTC)

You're right that if you do this each of the random walks will be recurrent, but I don't think there is much hope that they will all recur simultaneously. Think about the picture: we're walking around in a 3-dimensional space, and let's call the coordinates (x,y,z). It's cut into octants by three planes, corresponding to x=0, y=0, and z=0. Now, do a random walk: say we start at (0,0,0) and proceed as you suggest. It's true that the random walk in the first coordinate will almost surely reach 0 again, and so we'll be at some point (0,y,z), but it's unlikely that y and z are both 0, so the whole walk itself hasn't recurred. In fact that x=0 means that we are crossing one of the planes which divide up the space. So the walk will jump around, and with probability one, it will eventually cross each of the three planes (in fact, it will cross each one infinitely many times). But this doesn't mean that it will ever hit the point (0,0,0) again: it will tend to move further and further away each time it hits a coordinate plane.

Heuristically, I think it's probably true that two of the walks should hit 0 at the same time (basically an analogue of the Polya result for 2d). But that just corresponds to hitting one of the three coordinate axes in which the planes intersect: there's no reason to think that this intersection must be at (0,0,0).

In general the recurrence probabilities for any process of this sort will depend heavily on the dimension of the configuration space and the distribution of the step size. I have no doubt that you can come up with lots of things like this in which recurrence does indeed occur, but trying to argue this for some meaningful approximation of "statistical mechanics" seems probably futile -- you're dealing with a huge (dimensionally) set of possible configurations. --MarkGall (talk) 18:27, 6 June 2011 (UTC)

Hi Mark. I just came to your page to invite you to read this and saw an interesting discussion that might cause a problem for (((Zack Martin)))^™ religion. I'm curious how he solves it, so I just stay an read it while weaseloid comments on astronomers' love of God in my page. JimJast (talk) 12:35, 15 June 2011 (UTC)

I just wanted to add that already 2D prevents, in linear space, crossing (0,0) twice. JimJast (talk) 13:01, 15 June 2011 (UTC)

FoxP2

Glad you added that in. I was trying to find out where to work it in, since i kept talking about mapping. My own bias is that i hate it being called the "language gene" as it is found in plenty of other mammals and animals. it seems to be more a cognative mapping, and not specifically language related. though i'm of the mind that language is an off shoot of mapping and symbology, myself. --En attendant Godot 16:34, 24 June 2011 (UTC)

Oh, I hate it too -- I suggest a page Language gene just to debunk the notion that such a thing could exist. I'm not really sure what my thoughts on language origins are. I took a course on biology and linguistics from some hardcore Chomskyian/minimalist program guy, and that's the only side of things I really know much about. Certainly it's a nice story, but I bet other ideas are too. Feel free to mess around with my edits if any of it looks objectionable. --MarkGall (talk) 16:51, 24 June 2011 (UTC)

Philosphical linguistics (more chomskyian) have been largely challenged, i think, by the last 10 to 20 years of biological linguistics. not just genetic, but really trying to understand how the brain works, how it functions, and what that means for language. I've worked with deaf people, who's experience with language is fundamentally non-Chomsky in some ways; The idea that grammar as some sort of formal structure, is necessary rather than "helpful" or a manner to create a more specific language is to me, nonsense. Native deaf signers map their communication into space, rather than "word order" or word function. Then there's the idea that "most" people "think" in words but not all some really do think in images. Which means language, as part of thinking, is secondary (I think) in evo terms, to cognition, to mapping, to critical analysis of some form. But... we won't know for a while, i suspect. Good conv. needed that on a boring friday.--En attendant Godot 17:01, 24 June 2011 (UTC)

Do you know what aspects exactly are challenged? Generative grammar-type approaches seem to work so well in explaining a lot of syntactic structures that it's hard for me to imagine getting away without something like that. Then again, I haven't tried very hard to imagine it. I would think some aspects of a theory like this are largely independent of the underlying biology, though I suppose they do predict that such and such computations take place in such and such an order. What sorts of theories of syntax/morphology/whatever are supposed to play better with the current understanding of cognitive science? --MarkGall (talk) 20:05, 24 June 2011 (UTC)

Quantum consciousness

It seems as though I should have paid a bit more attention to your earlier conversation with the BoN. Had I checked out that WP page earlier, I would have saved myself a lot of time and energy... - GrantC (talk) 01:43, 9 September 2013 (UTC)

Yeah, I ran into jfraatz when he was pushing his "Memeshock" stuff on CP a few years ago. He is definitely one of the more curious characters to pass through these parts of the internet. I actually attempted to decipher one of his essays explaining Memeshock; the mathematical "logic" part of it was both vacuous and wrong once I figured out what he was trying to say, and the linguistics was just buzzwords. TallMan (RW's occasionally-resident philosopher) also spent awhile talking to him, though I can't recall where. My physics background isn't as strong, but I figure this is mostly more of the same... --MarkGall (talk) 15:33, 9 September 2013 (UTC)

I think jfraatz is just crazy, but the BoN seems to be more ignorant than anything else. I get the impression that he was swayed by someone else and is now just pushing the (short) list of papers that seem to anchor his position. He doesn't really seem to understand that this is fringe science that the conclusions he's trying to draw aren't supported by the papers he's actually citing. - GrantC (talk) 15:49, 9 September 2013 (UTC)