Person talk:Edward Bangs (1)

Disputed origins [28 February 2017]

Robert Charles Anderson uses the words not proven to mention he can't prove it, not that he has disproved it. What Mary Ferris has presented seems to be 3 items more than Robert Charles Anderson appears to have presented, so at this point, John Bangs and Jane Chavis seems to be the best working theory that exists, albeit clearly circumstantial... unless there is more evidence than has been presented here. The note alerts all readers of the unproven nature, but I see no need to remove the parents until either they are disproven or there is a proven alternative. --Jrich 14:27, 27 February 2017 (UTC)

It would appear Mr Jrich (or whatever your real name is) that you are attempting to lecture me on the difference between not yet positively proven and disproved. This is the same straw man argument style you use repeatedly. You make the case that I am stating that a fact has been disproved and then attack it by saying that is not the same as not yet proven and imply I do not know the difference. I will not play these type games based on logical facilities with you anymore. Do not use straw man arguments with me ever again. And why don't you use your real name? I think it may help you keep your arguments on a level track.

1) In no way did I ever conflate positively proven and disproved. The statement I added was clear and self explanatory.

2) I did I remove the parents.

So now that I have wasted a minute of my valuable time shooting down this nonsense let's chat, shall we?

As for using merely evidence of year of birth and name to show a Graet Migration Immigrant is identical to a man of the same name in England? This is not acceptable evidence in any peer-reviewed journal or by any fellow of the American Society of Genealogists. FASG members have stated this in print ad nauseum. So no that is not sufficient evidence to include anything more than an internal link to the suspected parents for further research purposes or to satisfy curiosity according to FASG members (of which you are presumably not one).

So what does that leave us to discuss? The remaining factor is that he was called "Mr." in New England and that his grandfather was doubtless called "Mr." Note the Mary Walton Ferris did not say that his grandfather was called Mr. and cites no evidence that he was. But she says he was probably called "Mr."

Personally I agree in Anderson that this is the weakest of possible argument in isolation or in combination with age and name does not even begin to show these two men are identical. But then again both Anderson and I are scientists and so we agree that compelling evidence is required to make a claim. Perhaps you do not. To Anderson a FASG fellow the presumption that his supposed grandfather was called "Mr." is in no way compelling. The burden of evidence is on the person making the claim. And so we can not presume that the claim is valid. Is it improbable? I never made a statement that it was.

This is why I chose to leave that choice of detachment to other users who read the statement I wrote. But as noted above the current connection to these parents does not meet the requirements of modern evidence based genealogy. But I think we know that I have higher standards regarding evidence than you do by now.

To sum Mr. Jrich - if you would discuss things in a more direct and honest way in the future you may get a nicer reply. If not expect the same type of reply because I will not tolerate your straw man arguments. I've seen how you bully other members on here and it is insufferable. Baker

I'm not going to comment on the overall fight, but it seems to me that the Speculative Assertion Template is pretty much designed for this problem. I would also remove the statement of his lineage from the first paragraph under the circumstances. --Amelia 06:03, 28 February 2017 (UTC)

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Go for it Amelia. That sounds like the proper solution.

Baker

Since this is complete I will delete this talk session. Baker

It is not complete. Even if it was, it is still useful material for future readers. But there may be further discussions on this so I am putting it back. --Jrich 17:21, 28 February 2017 (UTC)

I am not responding to any of the inappropriate personal attacks that have been posted in response to the expression of the opinion of one user based on genealogy and policy issues.

I am responding to the policy of using Unknown expressed by one individual in a secondary source, meaning no proven answer according to that one individual's standards, to erase postings on WeRelate that have not been proven to be wrong, which I believe is wrong. I believe it is unbalanced in a collaborative environment to demand evidence for positive assertions without also demanding evidence for negative assertions (i.e, provide proof that something is wrong or incompatible with a proven fact, before removing something). And so, in a collaborative environment, I believe tolerance for others may requiring accepting postings that may not strictly meet one's own standards, unless one can provide fairly definitive and conclusive proof that the previous posting is wrong. (A corollary of this, to avoid frustration by people who are serious about genealogy, would be that sources should be required for all postings, out of common courtesy.)

But first, I would like address the case in hand, where there are, in fact, sources. The identification of the parents of Edward Bangs was proposed with evidence, albeit circumstantial, by Mary Ferris in Dawes-Gates (actually by other sources before her as well, I believe, though not as thoroughly). She is a respected genealogist, and is often cited by Robert Charles Anderson himself. In fact, in his coverage of Edward Bangs in Great Migration Begins, he says "Mary Walton Ferris did her usual thorough job on Edward Bangs [Dawes-Gates 2:61-68]", despite judging that "the evidence that is printed is not sufficient to prove the origin". But he does not refute any of the evidence, nor does he present any alternate case. Every criticism he had of her argument, was made by Mary Ferris herself, but she (and many others, including Eugene Stratton, former historian of the Mayflower Descendants, and various societies of descendants) still accept that her arrangement is likely. Even Anderson's comment that "she does not present all the evidence" is not caused by Anderson providing additional evidence, rather it is a reflection of Ferris' own apology, "need of brevity requires omission of all detailed findings". Her disclosed evidence is based on a 1631 will showing John Banges of Hempstead had a son Edward, that his baptism corresponds perfectly with the year of birth calculated from the age given in Edward Banges will and some reference to "Mr." which, I presume, is supposed to explain how Edward came be educated and, thus, able occupy positions he did in New England requiring the ability to write, etc. Again, none of this is refuted, and it is fairly coherent, but all of it is admittedly circumstantial. Someone could come along and show the Edward Banges who was the son of John of Hempstead stayed in England, for example. But Anderson does not and Ferris believes, "An investigation of wills, deeds, parish registers and inquisitions post mortem extending over a period of years in the England localities where Bangs families are recorded, has been sufficiently exhaustive to justify the statement above." Other sources point out that both John and Edward employed the Banges spelling, and Edward named his oldest son John, the use of the name Joshua, all of which are very circumstantial but not incompatible.

Genealogy is inherently full of situations where the answer is ambiguous, vague or unknown, and maybe for our lifetime, or forever. But every proof relying on the process of elimination is no stronger than this case. Many assertions made by Robert Charles Anderson are no stronger than this case. Robert Charles Anderson (hereafter, abbreviated RCA) is human, makes and has made mistakes, and only knows what the evidence shows, the same as all of us. His judgement deserves to be respected, but that's all it is, his judgement. The evidence is what makes it true. In this case, RCA provides none to say Mary Ferris is wrong. It just isn't up to his standards of "proof". Are his standards the only one we should use at WeRelate?

What exactly is the definition of proof required at WeRelate to link somebody to possible/likely parents? Is it possible, probable or proven? What are the tests our evidence should have to pass before we can instantiate it with a link? Should proven-according-to-RCA be the measure of proof required for links in WeRelate? When one credentialed genealogist (Robert Charles Anderson) comes to a different conclusion than another (say, Eugene Stratton as above; or even RCA disagreeing with RCA in an earlier work in a different case), who do we follow? What do we do for the 95% of our family tree that is not covered by any credentialed genealogist? Should one WeRelate user be able to arbitrarily decide that RCA rules all, so erase everything not in agreement (in various past cases by various users, by all appearances, without even investigating and documenting what the basis for the completing claim)? Do all WeRelate users come in with their genealogies proven to this degree? Do all WeRelate users even understand proof to this degree? I would argue that in a non-professional community involving users of widely-varying genealogical skills who want to: share their family tree, expose their ideas to review, and contribute to the extent they are able; a proven-only criteria is going to cause problems. In a collaborative environment, evidence should be needed to both add and remove facts, not just when they are being added. And I would argue that RCA's idea of Unknown is inappropriately rigid for use at WeRelate, because unlike publishing printed material which remains in print forever, this is a dynamic environment that is to be built on by future contributors, and documenting working theories is far more valuable to those future contributors than saying unknown.

Now what about "speculative parents" or some other template? Well, I suppose it is one approach, but the problem here is the lack of integration with WeRelate software (not to mention that making it a fact is not a great fit as there is no date or place involved). To do things properly you have to add speculative parents, and also speculative child to the other page. Then, will that future GEDCOM that shows Edward Banges as the son of John match this page, or create a duplicate? Will the upload re-add the parents because some user has only seen sources that say that, or will they be informed those parents aren't allowed for Edward Bangs? Will the speculative child show up in the infobox where possibly it becomes apparent their birth conflicts with a sibling, etc.? And will both be automatically removed if our knowledge ever becomes definite one way or the other? Perhaps this lack of integration is unavoidable given the design of WeRelate. For that reason, in this particular case, I would certainly think a tolerant approach could allow the parents to remain based on a respected genealogist like Mary Ferris saying so and there being no alternative. But in some cases, undoubtedly, there will be multiple speculative parents, none proven, none disproven. Will multiple parents be allowed, or will one case be selected, right or wrong, in the name of cleanup? Hmmm... --Jrich 22:04, 28 February 2017 (UTC)