Read / Write Comments | By Vexen Crabtree 1999 Feb 01
Unimaginative people and beurocrats like disclaimers.
All pages are Copyright Vexen Crabtree. All rights reserved. If you want to copy any of my text, then quote and attribute it properly. If you want to put any images I have created on your site, then contact me and ask! There are widely used legal precedents for taking reasonably sized quotations from published material and using them as long as you properly attribute it.
Sources of information should always be checked. No authority, claim or assertion should exist unchallenged or be accepted unconditionally. This is why I provide extensive sources and try to always state where I obtained information from. Nonetheless, sometimes mistakes get through the net. If somebody tells me something then it has first been filtered, translated, stored, recalled, re-interpreted and then re-transmitted by at least two fallible Human Beings. Sometimes I may have been misinformed. I could have read an ill-researched book or somebody could have lied. Perhaps it's a conspiracy to deceive or a popular delusion that has undermined my data. No matter what the reason is, I rectify mistakes upon becoming aware of them. So, please, make me aware using the feedback pages I have put on nearly every page.
I am always appalled at how many spelling mistakes, misconstructed sentences and English eccentricities haunt my writing. It seems every time I review a page, I spot English errors that need correcting. If you spot some, please let me know. I do not mind the occurrence of some Americanisms, just like I will occasionally use Latin, French or German phrases (etc). I try to employ spellcheckers but as I write nearly everything in Notepad, sometimes I forget! Don't judge me too harshly about that, ok! This quote from a school report (10 years ago) is amusing and relevant:
“[Vexen] is quiet in class, but is an industrious worker. His imagination is easily fired and he writes with real flair, using good vocabulary to express himself. He writes at length and presents his work well. Obviously he thinks about things and has an individual mind. His weakness is spelling. I want [him] to use the dictionary, to check spellings and to check his final draft after completion.”Gilliam Tomlinson (1992), English teacher report.
Some of my pages are opinionated, arrogant and immature. Be warned. If the information on any of my pages offends or insults someone; then so be it. There are so many people that everything written will insult someone. I do not do it on purpose and any such insult is not an attack on any individual. Such forcefulness comes from my enthusiasm for truth and the advancement of humanity.
I am a provider of information. What people decide to do with that information is out of my hands, and not my responsibility! People should take into account the long term consequences of their actions and I provide information to help with people's lives as best I can. All information provided is given with the intent of improving the secure, stable, truth-centered life, and is not to be used destructively.
I thrive on factual arguments. To argue with strong arguments is my favorite method of learning. I have no problems with admitting that I'm made a mistake. I've made mistakes in the past and will continue to do so. You cannot annoy me by having a differing opinion (only by failing to learn or engage). If you do a contrary web page I'll link it in the relevant place, or quote you. Use the Contact Vexen! page! Anything that makes people think is good.
“I think acceptance of personal criticism is an essential part of self development. I think being able to automatically accept criticism is better than automatically rejecting it.”"On the Acceptance of Personal Criticism" by Vexen Crabtree (2002)
If you want to use an image from my server, copy the image to one of your own stores on the Internet. Do not merely embed my image into your page or profile. When I notice an image getting hits from alien servers, I will rename the image, which means the image on your profile will disappear and break. It steals my (precious) bandwidth when you steal images like that, and is bad netiquette.
I want to pick words that are insulting to the fewest people. I want to pick words that do not reflect unnecessarily on the sex, race or religion of the person I am talking with/about.
“CE means Common Era and is the name of the most popular dating system. The current year is 2000ce.
BCE means Before Current Era and it counts the time before CE, counting backwards. 1bce is the year before 1ce.
BC means Before Christ and is a reference to a prediction of the Christian messiah's birth date made in the second millennium. The date of Jesus Christ's birth is known to be about 4 bce, so the reference is poor. It is also being replaced for the same reason that AD is being replaced.
AD means Anno domini which means "in the year of our lord". Less than a third of the world is Christian, and expecting someone to conform to a religious convention that is not their own is immoral.
CE has the same value as AD, and BCE has the same value as BC. The reason to use the politically correct terms of CE and BCE is so that you do not assert Christian mythology onto non-Christians. When a person chooses to use "BCE" and "CE" they are showing that they do not discriminate against people on account of their religion - they are showing themselves to be considerate and moral. Using the term "BC" and "AD" shows inconsideracy for others' feelings and beliefs (unless of course they do not know the difference (like most people), which is why this page exists).”
"Human Temporal Measurements: Time Measurements and Date Formats"
Vexen Crabtree (2005)
“The YYYY MMM DD date format is the internationally agreed concise format for unambiguous dates and is to be adopted by everyone. It is logical, with the biggest denominators being listed first (same as numbers, times, weights, etc), making it easily sortable and utterly clear. The International Organization for Standardization specification for the International Date Format is the ISO-8601 format, adopted so far by the United Nations, commerce groups, scientific communities and most Western governments. "2005 Feb 29" is an example of an ISO-8601 compliant date print.”"Human Temporal Measurements: Time Measurements and Date Formats"
Vexen Crabtree (2005)
Hir is a short word for "His/Her" or "Him/Her". Instead of writing the awkward sentence "Where is his/her file?" we write "Where is hir file?". Many other languages (such as Cantonese, Chinese and French) have a word that means "him/her" or "she/he". There is no easy way to write (s)he, possibly because the construct (s)he is a good enough method.
When I say I "study theology" some people assume I mean Christianity, because this is what it most frequently means however the term doesn't only mean the study of Christian theology:
“I am using the plural ['theologies'] here deliberately. A polytheistic religion gives many different accounts of the divine beings, and these accounts, or theologies, reflect the divine patronage of their inventors. People sometimes raise their eyebrows when they hear of Pagan theology, but in fact the word 'theology' dates from Pagan times and was first used concerning Pagan deities.”
Prudence Jones in
"Pagan Pathways" by Hardman & Harvey (1995)1
[Book Review]
Read / Write Comments | By Vexen Crabtree 1999 Feb 01
Last Updated: 2009 Nov 23
Harvey, Graham & Hardman, Charlotte
"Pagan Pathways" (1995). First published by Thorsons 1995. All quotes taken from Thorsons 2000 edition.
