User talk:Prekladator: Difference between revisions

Whale

I recollected that I had made long ago some notes on the whale here. One or two of the sources are the same as the main whale article. Good for yuo to expand instead of translating! Saggy (talk) 15:22, 14 January 2017 (EST)

WikiIslam:Sandbox/Diversity in Islam

What columns do you plan to add in it? Saggy (talk) 03:09, 1 April 2017 (EDT)

I don't know, maybe "Tolerate homosexuality"? Just controversial topics that most of the sects would agree on. You can work on it if you want. --Prekladator (talk) 05:50, 1 April 2017 (EDT)

Ok. topics should be Vertical or horizontal? If we get too many topics... Saggy (talk) 09:15, 1 April 2017 (EDT)

I personally would let it as it is. The sects list is also not complete. I think Ahmadiyya is divided into two sects, one thinks Mirza was a nabi and the other rejects it. There are also sufi, salafi.. I think that if there were too many columns, then we could create more tables and instead of "Overview", every table would have a name like "Women", "Violence" etc.

Also I was planning above the table to have some info about those sects like "sunni" with subsections hanbali, salafi etc. and the table(s) would be only an overview. --Prekladator (talk) 10:37, 1 April 2017 (EDT)

Now I realized, topics should definitely be as they are - in columns, so that people can sort the column by yes and no, so that they can easily find sects that say yes. --Prekladator (talk) 10:49, 1 April 2017 (EDT)

And I got two more things to say. I think we should use the Discussion page for the aricle to talk about it so that other understand why it is as it is. And second, I got exhausted by looking for references in those big Arabic books and that's why I stopped working on it. So maybe some english sources would be better. Although I wanted to use the primary sources of the sect. Also I am afraid that english materials will be too modern and not as barabaric as the Arabic originals. --Prekladator (talk) 11:11, 1 April 2017 (EDT)

Ok we will take it to that article's page. Saggy (talk) 16:12, 1 April 2017 (EDT)

Hie. The table is not becoming larger on right side. do you know how to fix this? Saggy (talk) 09:46, 9 April 2017 (EDT)

In columns or cells? Cells are added by putting the "||"s on every row. --Prekladator (talk) 05:56, 10 April 2017 (EDT)

I did that but the screen does not become scrollable to right side. Saggy (talk) 14:57, 10 April 2017 (EDT)

That would be ugly. I have divided it. But now I think that this article will take infinite time. Either we need someone who studied Islam in Arabic to fill it, or we should at least finish some columns and publish at least a smaller table. I think there eventually should be two pages, one in the sandbox (unfinished) and one in the main-space (smaller, but with all answers and referenced). --Prekladator (talk) 19:20, 10 April 2017 (EDT)

Taking it to article's talk page. Saggy (talk) 11:35, 11 April 2017 (EDT)

Need an opinion on genocides

Here is the list I made and expanded [1]. I am reading nowadays about many Muslims massacring Muslims throughout history. If I continue with listing all these massacres, do you think it weakens the article? Saggy (talk) 12:58, 27 May 2017 (EDT)

No, I think the article should show that Islam produces violence against both Muslims and non-Muslims. If it was only about killing non-Muslims, then one (Muslim) might think that after all non-Muslims are killed, there will be peace on earth. --Prekladator (talk) 06:11, 28 May 2017 (EDT)

You bet. Saggy (talk) 06:22, 28 May 2017 (EDT)

Can you aprove this page? Not too time consuming but has many added interesting questions for Muslims (maybe can be expanded). Saggy (talk) 07:14, 15 July 2017 (EDT)

Good day

Good day. I would like to contact admins. Are yourself an admin? Guillotino (talk) 18:35, 2 March 2018 (EST)

Hi, nope. I got only rights to write articles and accept pending changes. If you want someone all-powerful, Lightyears seems to be. Or just write into the WikiIslam:Discussions. Prekladator (talk) 02:19, 3 March 2018 (EST)

Both of them are not look very active. Guillotino (talk) 14:41, 4 March 2018 (EST)

Hello again! Can you expand with some cruel names of Allah in your recent article? I can remember of reading names in the verses like the worst of deceivers and torturers. Can I add these names? Guillotino (talk) 10:09, 17 June 2018 (EDT)

I'm still working on that article. I will move it from "WikiIslam:Sandbox/99 names of Allah" to "99 names of Allah" when it's finished. Prekladator (talk) 11:14, 17 June 2018 (EDT)

Hello long time no see. I also was busy. I thought of putting some of the things came to my mind before I forget. I also thought of making a separate sand box but the admin told me not to make any sand boxes. so I have expanded this portion for you: [2]. I pray it is ok! Guillotino (talk) 17:58, 24 June 2018 (EDT)

grrr.. I will finish it. I just don't have the time currently. Of course I know about the "best deceiver" thing and I was planning to include it. I think admins, by telling you not to make sandboxes and stuff, they are trying to politely say to stop adding stuff, because your contributions are not scholarly enough. For example in your contribution, "and probably defeat Islam" is just an opinion. Rather show people the facts and let them use their own brain and decide whether Islam is right or wrong. And the last sentences seem to assume that the existence of Satan is an established fact. Prekladator (talk) 16:37, 25 June 2018 (EDT)

Sorry. Let me try to make it right. Guillotino (talk) 14:29, 26 June 2018 (EDT)

Good day. Can I edit your latest article? Guillotino (talk) 17:21, 28 July 2018 (UTC)

Yes. I'm not going to add anything to it now, although I know it could be expanded a lot. I just hope that you want to add something valuable. Prekladator (talk) 17:25, 28 July 2018 (UTC)

Of course I want to. Guillotino (talk) 18:12, 28 July 2018 (UTC)

Can I add something to the exoplanets miracle?

Hello. I have found something that i can add in the article Exoplanets in the Quran. Can I? Guillotino (talk) 21:37, 22 November 2019 (UTC)

I have thought of a section on common sense for Bacteria in the Quran Miracle. It is common sense to remove shoes inside a house. Can I add this also?

It's wiki, you can add anything, but it might get deleted if it doesn't add value. I don't know what you want to add. And do you have sources that show it was common sense to take off shoes? Just because it's common sense now doesn't necessarily mean it was common sense for ancient people. Prekladator (talk) 10:35, 23 November 2019 (UTC)

Raleigh scattering

Hello. I was reading your https://wikiislam.net/wiki/Rayleigh_Scattering_Not_In_The_Quran article. The last line is like awesome. Guillotino (talk) 18:03, 29 November 2019 (UTC)

Thanks. I've moved them into Scientific Miracles in the Quran. If someone still takes "scientific miracles" seriously after reading all of that, then he's an idiot. I'm going to take a big break.

WikiIslam Revamp Project

Hi Prekladator, I am Alan Smith, the new head editor of WikiIslam. I just wanted to let you know that as of a month ago the administrative team of Ex-Muslims of North America has initiated a new project to redefine the scope of WikiIslam and improve the quality of the articles here on WikiIslam. As part of this refinement of scope, we are removing articles which are purely polemic or argumentative in nature vis-a-vis the claims of Islamic apologists. We are doing this because our end goal is to rebuild WikiIslam as THE definitive academic source for information on Islam, its theology, texts, and history. We will be preserving all of this material on our archive which you can fine at archive.wikiislam.net and the links on Google search will also be preserved by redirecting to the archive site. In the fullness of time we intend to migrate this material to a new site focused on apologetics and anti-apologetics which we are currently referring to internally as "WikiExIslam" (name subject to change in the future). As such we will be removing such apologetics/anti-apologetics articles from the front end of the website for now. If we remove anything you think should not be removed or you are unable to find removed material on the Archive Site or if the redirect isn't working correctly, please feel free to reach out to me at [email protected]

I wasn't planning to do more much work anyway. I want to focus more on my life now. I did a lot of work and I was proud, because I've made big portions of systematic debunks and many of them weren't debunked previously. That was before I realized that bad admins can throw the result of dozens of hours of my work to trash. But I hope it will be preserved somehow, although I don't see what's going on, because your plans are not very transparent. From what you're writing, I'm not convinced, that quality equals not arguing against Islam. For me quality is that the claims are true, and the arguments make sense and it's all beneficial for the reader. The concept that "arguing against Islam is baad" sounds islamist. Also I don't agree that apologetics and debunks of apologetics have to be removed to make it more academic. I think academics deal regularly with apologetics. People who study Islam in universities learn apologetic interpretations. So why Wikiislam thinks that apologetics is somehow separate from Islam? We could say that all classical scholars and even Muhammad himself was kinda apologist for Islam. For example the hadith which said that people used to say "sister of Aron" also was apologetic in nature. And it is a part of Islam and it should be analyzed in articles about Islam. Not separately.

"rebuild WikiIslam as THE definitive academic source for information on Islam, its theology, texts, and history" - Islam, its theology, texts and history are defined by Islam and therefore are pro-islamically biased. This bias should be balanced by criticism.

I don't know if I can trust that the archive will be preserved, because I think you want to delete the argumentations because some people are complaining, but they will probably keep complaining until you delete the archive as well and they will be complaining until the website doesn't become pro-Islamically biased. Which would be a pity, because it used to be the center of criticism of Islam. That was what made WikiIslam special.

I don't like WikiExIslam. "ex-Islam" would mean that something stopped being Islam. And for example "The Apostate Prophet" also doesn't make sense, but at least it's funny. But ex-Islam, co me on. If pure anti-apologetic polemics were on a subdomain apologetics.wikiislam.net, that I would find acceptable, although I just think that apologetics have to be dealt with in regular articles. In my opinion, Islamic apologetics are internal parts of Islam. You can't make an academic article about Aisha's age of consummation without mentioning the apologetics. And if you mention the apologetics then it would be a crime not to mention the problems in those arguments. But if it's purely "Responses to apologetics" maybe then it could be something like apologetics.wikiislam.net or polemics.wikiislam.net or something. But please not ex-Islam. I myself am not an ex-Muslim, although I'm in contact with ex-Muslims and I like their culture when it comes to criticism of Islam. But the criticism shouldn't be "ex-Muslim thing". There are many non-Muslims interested in criticism of Islam and need sources.

When it comes to the changes that I've seen. And before I say it, I want to say that I can understand some changes that were made and I'm not saying that everything new is bad, but I just think like, if the change is good, then let it be and if it's bad let's talk about it. I've notice one change, it was in a sense of "this verse calls for violence" changed to "this verse is used by extremists" - the new version indicates as if acting upon it was something not desired by the author of the text and as if it was a misinterpretation of some lunatics. But Muhammad, his companions and classical scholars understood the calls for violence to be calls for violence. So are we now going to pretend that "nooo all religions are peaceful and only baad people don't understand them" for the sake of political correctness?

As for my deleted content, I miss my overview of deceptive tactics in Muhammad's prophecies. It was inspired by a similar part in word count miracles article and I find it useful, because when you have something that has a high quantity (for example scientific miracles, or word count miracles or prophecies), it's not enough to just point out the inconsistencies in every particular miracle. Because there are some things that are wrong in general in the whole topic and it should be summarized. It should be pointed out that there is something wrong with the whole apologetic methodology.I think that a long lists of miracles presented by apologists can be overwhelming and it's good to see that it's actually not amazing, because it all relies on similar strategies. I could handle if it was moved to the purely anti-apologetic part, but it seems it's just deleted and Muhammad's miracles is not in the archive website, the archive is from some old version of Wikiislam. Maybe it's a pity I wasn't in contact with you guys, because sometimes I had a deep thought behind an article, but you see only the article. Not that I want to now cooperate, as I've said, I want to move away from dealing with Islam. I don't see the religion challenging anymore anyway. In times of Zakir Naik and ISIS, it looked like it's strong intellectually and politically. But now with Muhammad Hijab, the religion look pathetic. I don't see new arguments for Islam. It seems that now it's just people in echo chambers slowly realizing the truth.

I will continue studying Arabic, but I don't see why I should study more of Islam. It's dead for me. Prekladator (talk) 18:53, 9 September 2020 (UTC)

Good morning Prekladator. First off I want to take the time to acknowledge your contributions to the site and to the debunking of Islamic apologetics in general. You are completely correct that Islamic apologetic arguments need to be answered and where false debunked. This is important work, and I once again thank you for it. And I understand your frustration with the opaqueness of the process. It is a problem we recognize and are working right now to fix. We do need to be transparent with the community with what we are doing, and I thank you for underlining the urgency of this. Finally I also want to answer your objection to the "WikiExIslam" site idea. I want to reiterate that this is a working title, and it will be changed. I myself am not an ExMuslim and have spent years of my life studying Islam and yes arguing with its proponents. The name of the site is in no way to imply that never-Muslims like you and I have no place in the criticism of Islam. As for our process, I want to offer some transparency here. The issue is NOT that we are bowing to political correctness in seeking to reform the language and content here. Rather the issue is that we are seeking a degree of academic validity. We want WikiIslam to be a place where specialists - news media, fact checkers and academics who study Islam - will participate, offer expertise and take advantage of the resources here on offer. Although we understand (and perhaps even sympathize with) the reason for the existence of articles such as "The Tragedy of Aisha" or "The Non-Miracle of Solar Flares in the Qur'an" it must be understood that no credible academic will put their name to a project with material such as this, nor would academics consult an encyclopedia with such material. We understand the moral revulsion and incredulity sparked by Islamic scriptures, dogma, doctrine, and claims of revelation and miracles, however, we here at ExMNA believe that the problems inherent Islamic history, scripture, doctrines and beliefs are sufficient to speak for themselves. Invective and inflammatory rhetoric are not necessary to deal with them, but rather make it easier for those seeking to dismiss a critical understanding of Islam to do so. Where polemic or rhetoric might be called for, we will have a site (which will not be WikiExIslam, despite the tentative internal name) which will provide a home to this material. Let me be clear: although we wish to be even in tone, our site will be hosting and making public the devastating historical critiques of the Islamic origin narrative by such luminaries as Patricia Crone, Michael Cook, Gabriel Said Reynolds, and Stephen Shoemaker as well as highlighting original work by various writers, all while continuing to emphasize Islam’s traditional, Arabic sources. Once again I want to thank you for your contributions to WikiIslam. If you no longer wish to write on the subject of Islam I totally understand, however if you change your mind I encourage you to reach out to me at [email protected] We would love to have your help. All the best. asmith WikiIslam Lead Editor and Administrator

As I've said, when something is good, I let it be, so I respond only to what I disagree with. "The tragedy of Aisha", I haven't read it, but it sounds poetic and more like an opinion, so I don't like that title. But I wouldn't mind if you extracted the facts and arguments from it and put it in other articles about Aisha. But as for my article about solar flares in the Quran, if "non-miracle" sounds ironic/funny (and it is), you can change it to "miracle". But I think it is a serious topic whether solar flares are or are not in the Quran. Although for rationally sober people, it might sound like a funny topic, for apologists and Muslims who trust them, the question whether solar flares in the Quran are present is serious. And I think that academics who deal with the concept of "scientific miracles in the Quran" can benefit from such an article. And I want to emphasize, that this science is a science of religion. So it's not an exact science like math or physics. Academics who study religion are studying the questionable claims of self-proclaimed "god-sent people" and interpretations of their followers. So they have to deal with ridiculous claims all the time. You might say as well "oh some guy claimed he met angel Gabriel, this is not an academic topic at all" and you can close the whole website based on that... and also this website could never become a primary source. The best it can do is to provide primary sources, which it does, in my articles I quote the most respected translations and classical interpretations. I don'know.. do you expect that academics will use WikiIslam as a source? :D lol. I wouldn't use the opinion of the academics as a source. The only relevant sources are the early Islamic texts and classical interpretations.

I don't agree that Islamic texts speak for themselves. They are all pro-Islamically biased and it's not apparent, especially not for pro-Islamically biased Muslims, that there are flaws in the narrative.

As for "inflammatory rhetoric", I think that criticism of Islam is inflammatory to pious Muslims in general and I think we should not censor criticism of Islam to not inflame pious Muslims. I think that the problem is that they are inflammable. They should not be inflammable by facts and valid arugments and they should not be shielded from them, but they should be confronted with them. And also I don't think that you can solve the problem of Muslims dismissing criticism of Islam by not criticizing Islam. Even if you stop criticizing Islam and they will read your pro-Islamic articles, they will still dismiss criticism of Islam. And even if they find some problems in the Islamic texts themselves, the will dismiss them.

I'm not currently planning to participate. Btw. I was thinking before of the topic of "Poverty of Muhammad" (سؤال جريء has a nice episode about it), it would be good to shed light on the topic of poor Muhammad who didn't get anything from his preaching versus the war booties etc. so you can write something about it. But if I find a motivation to continue delving in the topic of Islam, I think I would use a different method than writing here. But I don't know the future. I'm just saying I'm not currently planning it. Prekladator (talk) 19:30, 17 September 2020 (UTC)

WikiIslam Discord

I am glad to see you back contributing prekladator. We have set up a Discord server for people who wish to contribute to the wiki to communicate with one another, I would be honored to see you there. Please let me know here or on my email if you would like a username and credentials.-- 21:46, 4 December 2020 (UTC)

I've spent all day on that article and it's finished from my point of view. I thought I would now take a break again. But I guess you can give me a username. I guess I will have to explain why you should not delete my article that I just finished. Prekladator (talk) 22:18, 4 December 2020 (UTC)