On Sun, 19 Jun 2005, David Gerard wrote:
I've noted that the proposed FoF 6 is trivially factually incorrect - it only applies to US academia, and even then only a certain portion thereof. It notably does not apply to e.g. UK academia. I've written a proposed FoF 6.01. Comments welcomed. (The sentence construction could almost certainly do with improvement, for instance.)
FoF 6:
- "CE" or Common Era has recently come to be preferred among scholars and
those who seek to avoid offense in inter-cultural dialog. "AD" spelled out in its full original form is Anno Domini Nostri Iesu Christi ("in the year of our Lord Jesus Christ) and thus potentially offensive, see research by El_C.
FoF 6.01:
6.01) "CE" or Common Era has recently come to be preferred among certain portions of US academia and those who claim to seek to avoid offense in inter-cultural dialog. "AD" spelled out in its full original form is Anno Domini Nostri Iesu Christi ("in the year of our Lord Jesus Christ) and thus regarded by them as potentially offensive, see research by El_C. This does not necessarily hold elsewhere, e.g. in UK academia.
This sort of thing is why I am profoundly sceptical that content arbitration will not be an utter, utter disaster and just another hammer to use in pushing a POV.
I have no objections to the ArbCom's Findings until I reached section 6; what I found written there yesterday disturbs me greatly, for it appears that they are embracing one side in a POV dispute.
I, for one, would be far happier if the Committee simply dropped all comment about the AD/BC - CE/BCE controversy; I think it is clear to all but a few that there is no consensus either on Wikipedia or in the larger world about which style is preferred.
But if the members feel compelled to make a statement, I would hope they limit it to the observation that both styles are widely used in the English-spekaing world, & that there many arguments for & against each -- acknowledging that for Wikipedia to embrace either exclusively would be to violate our core value of NPOV.
Geoff