@amWhy if that is true then that wasn't always the case. I got banned multiple times for deleting my own not accepted answers. Once after such a ban all i did was delete one of my not accepted answer to a closed and downvoted question and i got a re-ban. So not only was the deletion reverted - i was banned on top of it.
@PeterSheldrick Wow, I had never known that. I've occasionally deleted an answer here and there, usually when in error, or when it pretty much replicates another similar timed-post. Perhaps it's the quantity of attempts to delete answers (within some narrowly construed period of time) that may trigger a warning and/or ban?
@amWhy at the start i deleted too much at once and that was a mistake. since then i am marked. the absurdity really was obvious when i deleted, after a long break, a rambling answer on a closed question and got reverted and re-banned for it.
or another time i got a re-ban after i deleted an answer i just wrote
user131753
12:50
@Alt. You have not much to do probably. However, if enough users cast undelete votes then the answer can be undeleted.
@XanderHenderson @amWhy @Did @user21820 math.stackexchange.com/questions/2741417/… "I don't know it's in my exercise book" is one of the funniest examples of a PSQ - don't worry though he still got a complete answer, ready to hand in
@user21820 Then we shall have to explain for the nth time that "gibberish" here should be taken in its technical sense of "language that is (or appears to be) nonsense" and that it says nothing about the OP, who, for all we know, might be a very nice person, who nevertheless happens, and this is a fact, to post gibberish on the site. :-) (I know that you know this.)
@XanderHenderson: Lol! I have once suggested this, but it didn't catch on. Notice that we are getting a terribly biased deal here, because we don't have sufficient support from our own community. See how in Science we can call those anti-vaxxers "evil quacks" because they literally intentionally cause preventable deaths.
So we are forced here to coat our words with sugar. Donuts anyone?
Indeed. In the topic "Is CRUDE healthy?", the one and only answer is spot on: MSE is having trouble. CRUDE is the medicine. If we can't call a spade a spade, there is no hope of "curing" the site.
In fact, while donut lovers have singled me out, I am actually the kindest, in that I only use terms that I can explicitly justify. It is likely that I get all this unwarranted attention because I present the most compelling case against donuts, and donut addiction is hard to quit.
And so far, it's always them who make a big fuss on Meta first.
At the risk of offending the donut lovers, one wonders if there is a correlation between donut consumption and diagnosable narcissistic disorder? A narcissist would be prone to believing that they have solved a problem that no one else ever has (e.g. the Collatz conjecture, or a disproof of Cantor's diagonalization), and narcissists generally react very poorly to criticism.
Hopefully MathSE is not perceived as "a hostile or elitist place, especially [by] newer [members], women, people of color, and others in marginalized groups", unlike what has reportedly happened on StackOverflow
@user21820 The distance is 5. Seems pretty small to me. But you can go on pretending not to get it, if you want. It was only a small amusement, not some grand punchline.
@rschwieb Uh thanks for clarifying! On the internet, it is hard to tell whether something is a serious point or a little joke or sarcasm. And believe me, the Cantor-deniers are serious about their work and how important it is for madthematics.
@GabrielRomon I think those impressions among 'newer' members are pretty common. I remember having some of the same thoughts way back when I started, but within months I began to understand more of what was going on. I didn't see exactly what they were using as the benchmark for "newer" but it seems to be an important factor.
@MarkMcClure If that post was written, but not read, is it still gibberish? =) As for votes, posts cannot be deleted immediately after closing unless its score is sufficiently close to −∞.
@MarkMcClure We can. The analogy is that we are constrained to talk about duck dropping 1, duck dropping 2, ... instead of just saying hey look I saw a duck on my land!
@MarkMcClure I'm genuinely curious; how did it help? I totally didn't want to comment on that Meta post until someone brought up the 'search in CRUDE', which obviously was not a fair picture.
Well, I've seen that user in the past. I even cast one of the delete votes on one of the links you posted.
So, while I don't think it's a great idea to refer to a person directly as a crank, it's still reasonable to try to put a complete picture together when thinking about this stuff.
@amWhy I noticed you responded to me but quickly deleted your comment. I'm sorry if you feel that you cannot interact with me after our exchange here in CRUDE a few weeks ago. While I stand behind the facts that I stated at the time, I am willing to attempt to ameliorate the situation, if you like.
@amwhy If you wish to leave it at that, then that's fine. If you wish to try to discuss the situation, perhaps in a private chatroom, then I'm open to that.
For the record, though, I think it should say here that there was very briefly a message to me from amWhy that started: "You are correct, I do not feel that I can interact with you in any way that is respectful to me ..." I'm really not sure why that's the case but that message was quickly deleted, like the last one. If CRUDE has an image problem, I think it's in part due exactly this type of drama.
@MarkMcClure Well, the one sentence you caught is sufficient. Sometimes one learns that it is better to say less than to say more. Part of being mature and responsible is knowing when it is best to remain silent, than to speak up, whether due to personal safety, or personal preference. So, there is nothing image shattering to CRUDE, that's on you, and not on CRUDE. I am not CRUDE.
I do have to say that it is really quite nice to see the interest generated today in this chatroom! I hope the interest persists, and doesn't just die out until the next rant against the chatroom!
@amWhy Indeed, the more people are active here, the better it is for the overall health of the site.
The block of instructions in the "Help Center" that talks about questions that are better asked elsewhere needs to be more firm, I think. This question is a math history question, WHICH ALREADY HAS AN ANSWER on the math history SE.
We are duplicating effort, which wastes everyone's time. :\
(indeed, the HSMSE answer is vastly superior, even)
@XanderHenderson I voted to close with a custom reason ("off topic" - custom reason: this question has been asked and answered at the historyOfMath.SE site, with attached URL.
@XanderHenderson Yeah, I clicked on off topic: seeking personal advice $\checkmark$. Often the same idea is often why many use "primarily opinion based": both appropriate here.
@XanderHenderson Not as nice as simply "removing" but as a room owner, you can "move messages" to "trash". On the right, immediately above the user icons, you'll see "room" with an upside down triangle. Click it, and the drop down menu includes "move messages". If you click on that, you need only click (CTRL+click) on the entry/entries you think should be removed. There is a dialogue box: Relocate; click ... (just type in "trash". Then click, select this.
@Xander As you can see, the messages are still transparent, but moving them helps make clearer the flow of activity, e.g., in this case.
One too many messages got moved to the trash. For the record:
That being said, I have kind of mixed feelings about it; @MarkMcClure provided a very nice answer to the previous version of the question, and I would feel a little bad losing that answer. On the other hand, there is a mismatch between the question as currently stated and the answer.
@JyrkiLahtonen Are we all in for a lecture? Of course I don't mean that in any nasty way. Actually, I'm sort of at a loss for words re: the recent meta post about CRUDE.
Not from me! I just happened to see the link to this chatroom, and decided to check what's going on. A bit heated in Meta. Because I got involved I shouldn't make any rulings there.
One more final exam to grade. Then I will write to a few people in the SE staff, and ask them for help. They aren't gonna solve the site problems for us, but they might be able to offer some perspective. Like, what happened to the older sites at approximately this point in their "development".
@XanderHenderson A proper answer to that question is actually quite deep. There's a major open conjecture in complex dynamics that states that the interior of the Mandelbrot set is equal to the union of it's hyperbolic components. I think that the question is essentially equivalent to that conjecture.
Thing is, I don't see any evidence that that response would make any sense to the asker.
@amWhy I'm not sure why you moved these comments to the trash?
@MarkMcClure I figured it would be related to a currently open question. If you don't think that the question answerable in a way that would satisfy the questioner, is it worth closing?
I would regard this comment as kind of silly (and yet another example of a particular user having a very specific but idiosyncratic definition for a common term).
If the expression is undefined, then the limit doesn't exist
I've voted to close this question as "Too broad", though I can see closing it for lack of clarity or lack of context, as well. As @MarkMcClure points out, it relates to an open problem, and likely can't be answered in its current form in a way that is understandable to the original questioner.
@MarkMcClure I only did so because Xander wished he could remove the post in which he linked your answer as being the question in need of closure. (mistake), and after correcting it (with a link to the correct question I provided in a now trashed post). Just to spare confusion, Mark McClure; is there anything else you wanted to try and make a dig against me?
@amWhy Thanks. Honestly, it seemed odd to me and, rather than make a dig, I thought I'd ask for clarification first. Thanks for your response which I will assume to be quite genuine. :)
@amWhy No, it's not a spam. It's not advertising anything. If you read the contents of the linked post on Zhihu, you'll know that it's simply a question about some properties of the number systems defined by the Peano systems. Since I can't find the question, I can't judge whether this satirical comment is rude/off-topic, but at least, that's no a spam.
I've overlooked the timestamp. I've found the question. The remark is inappropriate, but the link is relevant.