Candy on my "Tekkie Nonsense Ghetto Blog"

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Any attempt to engage UK metal detectorists in serious discussion about anything remotely connected with ethical collecting will inevitably lead to them trying to deflect the discussion onto all sorts of inflammatory side issues. They cannot focus on the topic in question for more than eight minutes. This is the case on archaeological forums whenever the topic strays beyond patting detectorists on the head and calling them "partner", and forum members are heartily sick of it and tend to avoid talking to or about artefact hunters over there. That was one of the reasons I decided to start up a separate blog of my own devoted to artefact hunting and collecting. But then as was only inevitable, the tekkie nonsense started there too, so I decided to open a parallel one to deal with it in a separate venue to avoid the main blog getting clogged up with minutiae.

Candice Jarman does not like this, she calls this "Metal Detecting" side issues blog one "specifically dedicated to rubbishing metal detector users". She fails to note that this is by and large merely the place where I answer those who are themselves trying to use diversionary tactics to "rubbish" my main blog, the one people read. So yes, here her own nonsense is discussed, very little of it has merited discussion on the main blog since she does not deal with any substantive "portable antiquity collecting and heritage issues", merely snipes from the sidelines.

She observes:

If you take a look at his earlier posts on this blog, you will see how he rants and raves to the pitch of total silliness.

Quite, the detectorist nonsense to which I am replying there is totally silly (Buffy, Sheddy and all the rest), which is why it is discussed over here in the same terms and with the ridicule it deserves and not on the main blog.

One point to note is that this blog has adverts

and then goes on the speculate by the huge income I must be getting from them on a blog nobody reads. Hmm. "Mr Barford’s income" is zero, because the adverts come with a widget (National Geographic, Treasures and Artifacts) which I installed for fun which flashes pictures of "antiquities" which seemed in theme with the blog. I think Mr Google gets the revenue for the adverts, I get pretty pictures to liven up a boring blog about tekkie buffoonery. Seems a fair deal to me.

Candy, oh Candy what is the TRUTH?

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"Candice Jarman" is still refusing to discuss the issues of where what I write about artefact collecting is misinformation. Instead she continues her vendetta against the author (This is Mr Barford - Part 2 ) with "what do we know about Mr Barford?" - well actually rather less than she thinks, and report as "fact". But then, she is not exactly being honest with her own readers is she?

I am not going to comment on the sketchy reconstruction she offers - I really have nothing to defend, nor be ashamed of, she is rather the person who should be ashamed.

1) "Mr Barford had his own entry on Wikipedia". This page was a spiteful hatchet-job made by a person who also had an anonymous blog on so-called "Barfordisation" surprisingly close in tone and style - and graphic content to Candy's. The abysmal lack of real content padded out by personal attacks and cheap jibes was not worthy even of Wikipedia, and that is why it was removed.

2) "worked as a field archaeologist on a number of excavations, mainly in south Wales" No. I worked on the finds from these, it's why I am a co-author of the reports she cites. Regretfully I have never worked or lived in Wales. "Candy" seems totally unable to work the Google Scholar Search engine, this is why the blog's author simply misses a whole mass of references to article published by me (including some on the themes of collecting). According to my CV, the total should be somewhere around 176 (I've not updated it recently and really have no intention of doing so just because "Candy wants to know", if she wants to do "archaeology for all" let her join an academic library). The alleged review of my book is misquoted, quite tellingly so and should be compared with the seventeen published properly in academic journals and not by some pseudonymous individual on Amazon.

3) "why was the cross taken and for what reason!" [I think the solicitor's secretary intended that to be a question] Simply because it had the name of the person inscribed on it, given the nature of the project, it was important to document the identity of the source of the DNA. After the cross had been photographed, it was replaced back in the same place on what was left of the body in the vault when it was sealed and is still there. By that time the person who wrote the text you were reading had got bored and gone. Cheap shot based on incomplete information.

4) "In June 2009, Mr Barford reportedly cynically compared the Tiananmen Square protests of 1989 [...] with his own struggle [...] ". Cheap shot. That is not exactly what I said. http://paul-barford.blogspot.com/2009/06/was-tank-man-archaeologist.html

5) "Candy" is another one who does not want to understand the Heritage Action Erosion counter. So be it. It is of course not "Mr Barford[']s Heritage/Artefact Erosion Counter". So that is another cheap shot - but hey, here we are actually getting on to some discussion of the merits of the matter - but it does not last long.

6) "Mr Barford's personal life". Hmmm. "what a remarkable woman Mrs Barford must be" - Yes indeed "Candy", she is, more than you suspect. She has a few choice words about you too, and some professional connections you'd probably feel safer not knowing about. Since she neither sells antiquities nor collects them, nor writes on the topic, I do not see what my wife has to do with my views on portable antiquity collecting. "Candy" even has posted on her blog a picture called "Barford_home.jpg". Instead of showing Mrs Barford's home, it is in fact a technical school, draw your own conclusions. I really do not see how anyone can call the Zoliborz district of Warsaw "dreary".

7) "Candy" writes: "Below is a short biographical entry on Mr Barford picked up on the internet by a correspondent (my emphasis):" Perhaps somebody might like to challenge her on where her correspondent's "source" can be found. I doubt very much that there was ever a text with that precise wording anywhere on the Internet, certainly not one produced in consultation with me. More to the point, as far as I can see there is currently no such text on the internet, not even cached, so the question arises when and where "Candy" claims to have accessed this text. After all, we recall that she claims she only started collecting this material after "she" became annoyed with what I wrote about the Crosby Garrett helmet. I suspect this has come from the same "source" as the fabrications of the spite-ridden Wikipedia page.

For similar stuff (in fact probably the "source" of some of "Candy's" ideas): http://culturalpropertyobserver.blogspot.com/2009/06/paul-barford-voice-of-archaeological.html .

NOW "Candy" has got that off her chest, can we get onto the discussion of artefact hunting and where what I say about it is allegedly wrong? No more beating about the bush, take the bull by the horns, let us see the thrust of your argument. Just one ordinary bloke with another. No need to be shy.

Vignette: British metal detectorists try to put their case the only way they know how.

The Buffy Tapes

The anonymous author of the Barford-response Blog now kids himself I am going to give him an interview and answer personal questions about myself and my work and aspirations which he no doubt hopes will reveal answers he can then use against me. What a jerk. They are not even interesting questions.

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If Mr Buffy wants to conduct an interview with anyone, he must first introduce himself properly. There may be other archaeologists perfectly willing to give an interview to a nameless sniper who has not done his research, but personally, I really am not interested in playing his games.

Hiding behind a curtain

Buffy the anonymous hate-blogger pretends he cannot see this blog anymore, so he has removed the link (the one that had the numeral "zero" in the place of the letter "o" which is why he could not get it to work) from his own blog. Of course the reasons are transparent, he realises that the reader of his blog need only follow that link to find that his "responses" to the Portable Antiquities and Heritage Issues blog were being noted and answered. They are then found not to be "responses" at all, but merely a series of personal attacks. Now based on the "wikipipedia" dictionary (sic) page he has cached away, he has concluded, from the fact it contains a paucity of information that its author could not find on the internet, that Paul Barford is "hiding behind a curtain". That is rich from somebody who cannot even put his real name under what he writes. Mr Buffy or Mr Welton whatever his name is, is coming very close to stepping over the line here with his speculations and innuendos. First about me and now he is attacking my wife into the bargain. This is intolerable.

By all means let us have some responses to the issues I raise on my blog, let us have some discussion with any "metal detectorists" able and willing to have a proper discussion. Are there any? Certainly the author of the "Barfordisation" blog has well shown his inability to fulfill that role.

This big red round thing Mr Buffy is what we call a "zero", recognise it now?

'Arry Stottle's got a lotta bottle but Buffy takes the Biscuit

Buffy, apparentrly the alter ego of Steve Welton the Phantom Biographer reckons he can find examples of all thirteen of “Aristotle’s fallacies” in my writing, specifically on my blog. So he’s found a “filosofy fer dummies” webpage, and is successively copy and pasting bits of it onto his blog as though he’d written it and then added some examples of these logical fallacies that he claims he has found on my blog. ("Paul Barford is often found stumbling over his own arguments and conclusions drawn thus, yet he uses the smokescreen of erudition to provide the defensive cover to the paucity of his arguments.") Well, lets have a look at them. So far he’s only got as far as two of these posts, and seems to have run out of stamina.

The first was, appropriately enough, posted the day after April Fools’ Day – this was devoted to ‘Affirming the Consequent’. "Anyone reading this and Mr Barfords Blog will instantly spot that Affirming the Consequent is a favoured tactic of Mr Paul Barfords to foster his pre-agenda (sic) arguments". Examples of this which Buffy claims he has found on my blog are:

" A bad thing was done by someone using a metal Detector. People using metal detectors do bad things"
"An unethically sourced item passed through the PAS.
Items passing through the PAS are unethical".

Now, actually it would be helpful to the reader for Mr Buffy to put a little hyperlink so that the reader can see where I said these things he is using as his “examples” from my blog. Logic would demand that wouldn’t it? But oddly enough this logic does not apply to Mr Buffy’s black propaganda. The reason for this is perfectly logical in fact.

The reason is that nowhere on my blog do I say "A bad thing was done by someone using a metal Detector. People using metal detectors do bad things". What I say may be paraphrased is the opposite, just because some metal detectorists co-operate with archaeology and such things bring benefit to archaeology, not all metal detectorists can be seen as beneficial to archaeology, in assessing the phenomenon we need to differentiate the one from the other and not say that “metal detecting is good for archaeology”. Some of it quite clearly is not.

Equally Buffy is deceiving his readers when he asserts that I said "An unethically sourced item passed through the PAS. Items passing through the PAS are unethical". What I say is that the items recorded by PAS cannot be assumed to all be of licit origin and from the provenance stated, since PAS cannot carry out any independent checks. This means that potentially an unknown quantity of items in the PAS database are of no use as archaeological data and we have no way of knowing which ones. The example illustrates this fact. It is not so much an example of affirming the consequent as raising an issue which calls into question the total (rather than overall) reliability of a dataset.

It took him another three weeks to think up the next post in the series. This is devoted to the "false cause" fallacy. Allegedly “The Assertion of the false Cause if [sic] a favoured tactic of Barfordisation in action. How many times do we see Mr Paul M Barford squirming his way through various topics, presenting his one sided views of a situation, to further his own false cause without giving the reader the true picture.” [I think that is a question but metal detectorists cannot “do punctuation” ]. Well, he has found three examples of what he says is the “Use of False Cause by Paul Barford”:

" Finding and removing metal artifacts destroys the archaeological record"
"YOUR heritage is being destroyed by metal detecting"
" The PAS sanctions the the sale of metal artifacts"

Well, here he’s lost me. I certainly do say that “finding and removing metal artifacts [from the archaeological record] destroys the archaeological record”. Finding and cutting out all the letter ‘b’s from a medieval manuscript Bible would destroy the Bible as it would yesterday’s Times. That is not an example of false cause.

Number two: “YOUR heritage is being destroyed by metal detecting" – Again, this does not seem to be a quote from my blog. Neither is it an example of false cause. Metal detecting and artefact collecting, by removing evidence from the archaeological record without record, is indeed destroying the archaeological heritage, which belongs to everyone, not just a few selfish collectors.

Maybe Buffy has more luck with his third example, also no link sourcing it to a specific point in my blog… " The PAS sanctions the sale of metal artifacts". Where do I say that? [The word sanctions” on my blog is entirely associated with imposition of UN sanctions in Iraq which began the looting there]. I presume that Buffy means the reader to believe that somewhere on my blog it says that artifacts are bought and sold BECAUSE the PAS sanctions such sales. That would indeed be an example of “false cause”, but Buffy if asked would not be able to say where I say such a (stupid) thing. Because I do not.

I find it really puzzling that somebody would set out to prove the existence of logical fallacies in what somebody writes without actually having a single clear example in mind where there actually is such a thing. It’s a bit like somebody setting out to write a biography of a person in an encyclopedia having no idea at all about who that person is or what they have done.

Despite these deficiencies, Buffy soldiers on. Where he can produce no quotes to back up his claim of logical fallacies, he makes them up. He makes up quotes which do not exist, and therefore does not provide hyperlinks to them, safe in the knowledge that the metal detecting populace of Great Britain is not at all interested in checking the facts for themselves. But metal detectorists are a small minority.

All Mr Buffy's insults and innuendos will not change that. Instead of making up quotes in order to say they are nonsense (as they are, they are also fictional), let the pro-collecting lobby take up real arguments, and produce real arguments against them.

I look forward to the third post on the "fallacies" - let us see if Mr Buffy can make an improvement on his first two wholly unimpressive performances in this field.

Welton on the Portable Antiquities Scheme

In his wikipedia attack page on the subject of "Paul M. Barford", Buffy the cowardly critic maliciously writes:

Paul Barford is a vociferous and outspoken critic of progressive, modern archaeology and outreach between the Archaeological community and the general public, in particular the *Portable Antiquities Scheme in the united Kingdom which Paul Barford has called " the Portable antiquities Scam" *[5]

Mr Buffy has clearly not read the text of the TAG paper, so he is unlikely to understand what I say is the "scam". I wonder to what degree a global encyclopedia should be saying that it a "progressive and modern archaeology" that forms partnerships with artefact hunters and collectors. Outside the topsy-turvey world of British archaeology artefact collectors are (rightly) treated as a threat to the archaeological record. Such a "partnership" in most other milieus would be regarded as "retarded and outmoded". Buffy goes on to say about the PAS:

This immensley successful scheme was set up to allow members of the public to formally record objects of historical interest that they may have found, for the greater benefit of the archaeological community and the UK's cultural and historical *Patrimony.

Except as far as I can see no Steve Welton has contributed any information to the Portable Antiquities Scheme. I am checking this with the PAS. So far they have not vindicated him.

Some examples of the success of the *Portable Antiquities Scheme are the *Harrogate Hoard & the *Ringlemere Cup.

In what way I wonder? They are both Treasure items. As any (responsble, informed) metal detectorist should know, The PAS is for recording non-Treasure items. Weston is misleading his readers.

In June 2009, Paul Barford cynically compared the *Tiananmen Square protests of 198, in which 2,600 innocent Chinese protesters were were killed, with his own struggle against the concept of 'Partnership' between The *Portable Antiquities Scheme and members of the public recording items they have found with the *Portable Antiquities Scheme.

Well, of course Buffy neglects to supply his reader with the reference here, because if he had done so, the reader would see that this is not at all what I said, Buffy is deliberately and maliciously twisting the truth. I contrasted the Tankman (now believed to be a Chinese archaeologist) standing up to the Tienanmen tanks with British archaeologists who will not stand up to looters of the British archaeological record with metal detectors. Nobody is "struggling" with the concept of members of the public recording accidental finds with the PAS, what there is concern about is the uses to which artefact hunters and collectors are putting it - and the deghree to which they are simply NOT using the scheme, which is what the Hertitage Action counter does - by giving figures that may be directly compared with those of the PAS database. There is a massive shortfall, which is of course why Buffy is not telling wikipedia readers the truth about what it is intended to signify.

The Pitfalls of writing an Encyclopedia Article if you are an Ignorant Malicious Intellectual Gnome

Somebody calling themselves Steve Welton has written a wikipedia article about "Paul M. Barford". A sample:

Paul M Barford is a British born former archaeologist (*Polish- Archaeolog) who in 1986 moved to Poland and is currently living in central Warsaw. Formerly an assistant lecturer at the Institute of Archaeology, *University of Warsaw (*Polish - Uniwersytet Warszawski) and an Inspector of Ancient Monuments in the *Ministry of Culture and National Heritage of the Republic of Poland (*Polish- Ministerstwo Kultury i Dziedzictwa Narodowego). During his time as inspector Barford, it is believed that Paul Barford personaly inspected many of Polands Ancient Monuments.Paul Barford also wrote articles on conservation during his time inspecting *[1] Paul Barford is the author of various books, articles, Blogs,Internet forum threads and several reports on excavations in England and Poland. Paul Barford now works as a translator. Paul M Barford is interested in *Slavic Peoples ,in particular *Early Slavs and the development of Slavic tribes as they spread across central Europe and has since written a book on the subject. Education & Qualifications Currently unknown.

Good grief. As many as eight factual mistakes and three spelling mistakes in one paragraph. What kind of an "encyclopedia" is that? So if the author actually currently does not know anything about the subject's educational background, why did he put pen to paper before finishing his research? What "qualifications" does the author of the article have for writing on this subject, it is not his knowledge of Polish or what the subject has done for a start. In fact where are the date of birth and death of the subject? What was the subject doing between 1974 and 1986? Was the subject always engaged in research into the early Slavs since 1986, or was there some other field of research involved? Where's the sex scandal?

It is clear from the topics which the writer "selects" for discussion, that he is a "metal detectorist".

This in Wikipedia terminology is an "attack page" and for this reason, I doubt it will be up for long. The author seems not to take into account that not everybody reading an encyclopedia thinks that metal detecting is acceptable. His writing lacks focus.
Besides which he is deliberately and slyly misleading.

"Current interests/ Since the early 1990s Paul M Barfords main interests have been searching eBay and also artefact hunting and collecting and the market in portable antiquities and coins. Paul Barford is also an avid blogger and internet forum user."

and

Coin Collecting/ Paul Barford has a particular interest in coin collecting & *Numismatics and is a regular contributor to internet discussions regarding coins and coin collecting, especially coins offered for sale, where his insight and knowledge has proved invaluable in proving the sometimes disputed *provenance of rare coins.

This no doubt is slanderous in the circumstances, besides which the author displays ignorance, there was no eBay in "the early 1990s".

Interestingly, I found an eBay seller called "Swelton" - and there is no trace of a metal detectorist Steve Welton on the PAS database. I doubt it is his real name. Like the sly individuals who wrote to the Times falsely using my name...

It is obvious that metal detectorists are worried about some of the arguments that are being raised against the glib justifications that are offered in favour of the hobby of the expoloitation of archaeological sites merely as a source of collectables. Instead however of addressing these arguments, a whole bunch of them is merly engaged in diversive tactics of deception like this "black propaganda".

Buffy's kind informant

Over on his hate-blog, Buffy the cowardly anonymous critic says: Someone kindly pointed me in the direction of a Paul M Barford web article re an exhumation".

Well, I wonder who that could have been and whether they really were being "kind"? I do remember having a discussion over this with a certain Scottish archaeologist who insulted the American team that carried out this work, and refused to apologise. Far be it for me to suggest though that he might be the one who is now helping "Buffy" in his scribblings.

Bottle of plonk on the way to Poland then?

I see from the mouse-loving anonymous hate blog which purports to be a "response" to mine on Portable Antiquities Issues that anybody who can point the author "in the direction of Mr Barford with his actual Trowel out" will win "a fab bottle of Chateau Calon Segur 1961 from my own collection". If any of my colleagues or students claim the prize, I'd be glad to hear the coy English gentleman's address. From drinking with them, I think Mr Buffy really needs to offer Polish archaeology students something a little more "hit the spot" than Bordeaux.

Morganization (Re: Buffy the ham Pie Slayer)

Apart from guffawing British “metal detectorists”, „Buffet the Ham Pie Slayer”s has a pal Julian Morgan “a damn fine chap and an educationalist by trade”. I wonder if this is him: Julian Morgan is a writer and Classics teacher at Derby Grammar School and also is one of six partners in CIRCE, a Classics and ICT Resources Course for Europe. I wonder how Mr Morgan would feel about some twerp from the other side of Europe, who he has never met and who has other views on the teaching of "Classics", starting up a “Julian Morgan and Morganization” blog.

“Confessions of a Classics teacher, Julian Morgan, British Classics teacher living and working in a Grammar school in Derby. For a long time a primary interest has been correcting the grammatical mistakes made in a dead language by confused pupils”.

I do not expect Mr Morgan or his literary agent would appreciate it very much. Especially if he finds the author of this personal attack masquerading as a contribution to the discussion on a serious issue has equipped it with "search engine optimalisation tags" clearly deliberately aimed at damaging his professional reputation.

Does Mr Morgan have a metal detector and go out after work to denude local Roman sites of coins to collect or maybe use in his teaching?

[If he sees this Mr Morgan may consider it would save us all a lot of trouble if he would write to me to divulge the name of his fellow but cowardly-anonymous Buffet admirer so suitable action may be taken in response to the manner in which he has chosen to respond to me].

UK Metal Detecting COWARD declines to "respond" to the issues

We find that since 25th February this year there has been no action over on the misnamed “paul-barford-blog-response” blog (“Paul M Barford and Barfordisation” run by some anonymous "metal detecting" coward from Monmouth (or so he claims) who is afraid to post under his own name. Anyway, he has apparently decided (‘Capitulation over erudition’ ) he actually has nothing much to say except to splash a lot of personal comments all over the web and claims that “Judging by Mr Paul M Barfords recent posts and also from correspondence I have been getting, it seems this Blog has effected change within Mr Barfords, previously less than pleasant Blogstyle”. Really? Peter Tompa does not think so. Anyway Buffy the cowardly metal detectorist announces that “So, for now Paul, you can get up from the naughty step”.

He writes something quite remarkable. “View this blog is a sort of Re-hab for archaeologists who have lost thier (sic) moral compass along the way”. Frankly as far as I am concerned, it is archaeologists who support artefact hunting and portable antiquity collecting in any form that have lost their compass bearings.

Buffy the Cowardly Metal Detectorist seems to think that it is his RIGHT to be accepted and lauded by all archaeologists BECAUSE he is a metal detectorist… by what rights Mr “Buffy”? What rights have you to attempt to dictate what I think or say about artefact hunting and collecting and those who engage in it and those that accept, encourage and aid and abet them? Why should you attempt to place me on any kind of "naughty step" (whatever that is) because I think differently about the archaeological heritage from you and your guffawing metal detecting mates?

Connolly comes clean

Professional archaeologist David Connolly admits:

I have now been accused of a terrible thing.... being a quote: persistent purveyor of all those dots marking an inability to formulate complete sentences

It was fairly obvious to those "in the know" that the unnamed person who had sent congratulations and encouragement to Person-hiding-behind-the-pseudonym-Buffet for a "well needed" "pulling the cheesy mat from under the clay footed one" (i.e., Paul Barford) was pro-collecting Scottish archaeologist David Connolly. So it seems we were right.

Any time Dave Connolly feels like having a proper discussion about the archaeological issues involved in artefact hunting and collecting, he knows where your comments are welcome. Why "cheesy"? Where precisely do you see these "clay feet"? Why do you feel confident that the pro-collecting arguments are so much better founded? If they are, then surely it is the pro-collecting archaeologists like yourself that should be putting them forward and defending them against their book-writing critics rather than relying on the sniping efforts of rodent-obsessed "metal detectorists" to do the dirty work.

Who is the mouse?

Buffy the self-styled “middle-class detectorist” who apparently imagines he is the conservation lobby’s intellectual nemesis seems to be losing his grasp of things. Yes, Mr "Buffet", one can edit these blog posts (as Buffy himself frequently does. So what?

The “name plate” he accuses me of “unscrewing” from the banner of my blog of course never existed (he confuses the text of my profile with the banner heading of my blog).

Let us get one thing straight, archaeology is not and never has been for me a
chained library”. There is however as far as I am concerned a difference Mr Buffy between a library and a box of comic books and girlie magazines at a car boot sale. There is a difference between archaeology as a field of human enquiry and mere collecting of isolated fragments of the past. This IS a conservation argument, not one of personal rights. That is what the book I wrote with Nigel Swift (Chairman of grassroots conservation organization “Heritage Action”) is all about. Like it or lump it, but don't try to misrepresent what it is we are talking about.

Buffy is determined to define something he calls “Barfordisation” (of the “known facts” about “metal detecting”) and then seizes on little factoids from the blogosphere support this notion. Anyway he seems determined to represent me as some kind of rodent, but who is the man and who is the mouse, who uses their real name to stand behind their words, and who hides his puerile sniping behind anonymity and aliases?

Paul Barford (Real name)