User talk:Raymond arritt/Expert withdrawal

One important choice to be made

This is interesting stuff. I believe there's an important choice we need to make, so I'm sticking it here on the talk page for now. Our wiki ideal of "anyone can edit" makes it much harder to maintain good quality articles on controversial topics. I'd personally like to see us place higher important on quality than instant editability. A great many of the articles that are the difficult ones are already mature and in good shape. There's no particular need for lots of frequent editing, and when we have lots of editing, they need lots of babysitting. Why not leave these articles protected as a general rule, and make people discuss changes first? People may object that such a practice runs afoul of a foundation principle, but it would make things easier, would it not? I personally care way more about having accurate content free of kookery, than I do about whether some random 12 year old can edit the page. Friday (talk) 15:57, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

I don't disagree with you. What ever happened to the idea of allowing 'proven' editors to tag good versions, which would be the default display? Somehow, that seems to have died away. I was just reading this - Speculations regarding German Wikipedia- which makes some interesting points on why the German version seems to be much better. Cheers! Wassupwestcoast (talk) 16:06, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

See Wikipedia:Flagged revisions Cheers! Wassupwestcoast (talk) 16:17, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

It's a matter of critical weight. There simply are not enough people pushing for "peer-review only" for it to gain traction. Instead of trying to change policy wiki-wide, I would suggest the correct approach is to fork the discussion either to out-pedia space, or a fork of policy for science articles. I really doubt the latter will gain consensus as it's been proposed and dropped for inactivity before. There are wiki-projects which *do* require peer-review, credentials, etc. They just haven't gained serious notability yet. Wjhonson (talk) 20:14, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

If all we do is create more interest in other projects already underway, we will have done a good thing.--Filll (talk) 22:24, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

Agree with Filll and with Friday, above. The approach Friday endorses might have a better chance of flying because it doesn't smack so much of the "elitism" that WP, in its undending quest for mediocre mobocracy, seems so to despise. --Jim Butler^(talk) 11:30, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

We have been here before...

WP:Expert retention and WP:Expert rebellion, along with a number of similar essays, have all discussed this in depth. The sad, sad emergence from these discussions and incremental edits seemed to be that yes, the wikipedia community as a whole cares not for scientific professionals :( The matters run further still than just the science articles, or also the philosophy and religion fields. I have regularly seen arguments on WP:V which state that we cannot use a primary source at all (which is many cases is absurd). Much of the current mess regarding characters and stories in fiction would also have been resolved a lot quicker. LinaMishima (talk) 16:13, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

It is unfortunate that there are problems in economics and religion and philosophy. But honestly, that is not our problem here. The jewel in the crown of Wikipedia is science, not that other cruft, to be honest. And scientists are fairly unhappy with the situation.

We can do as you suggest; just throw up our hands and say, oh well, lets let the enterprise get flushed down the toilet. Or we can send a strong signal to the powers that be, THERE IS A PROBLEM HERE. And if we make a big enough stink (which we can in all likelihood), then the mainstream media will notice it, and Wikipedia will be forced to act. That is what this page is about. (And does anyone really care that the religion and philosophy articles here are crap? Could anyone tell the difference? Honestly?)--Filll (talk) 16:23, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

Don't disagree with you. Let's focus on science. Cheers! Wassupwestcoast (talk) 16:26, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

Strongest possible disagree. Economics, religion and philosophy have professionals and experts who are forced to fight against the exact same garbage that the hard sciences do. There is an obvious united front between historians who have to fix constant disruption from 9-11 cranks, biologists who have to fix constant disuption from homoeopaths, economists who have to fix constant disruption from goldbugs and physicists who have to fix constant disuption from big-bang denialists. Do not shoot yourself in the foot by throwing diciplines you don't study under the bus. PouponOnToast (talk) 16:27, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

(multiple ec) Don't you think your efforts here will be more successful if you don't go out of your way to alienate other editors? Any steps we take to maintain high quality would hopefully be applicable to any area of subject matter. Friday (talk) 16:28, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

Both Filll and Friday make important points. Filll is correct in that change will come only when there is external pressure. It was the Siegenthaler affair that led to a meaningful BLP policy. Let's face it, nobody on the inside cares about the situation (which is the point of this whole exercise). Friday is correct in that it's counterproductive to alienate others.

Which brings me to a special plea: let's all be unfailingly civil in our interactions with the community. It's tough and it's something that I've not done myself sometimes. But the smarter pseudoscience and fringe types have learned that civility matters more than content. They've already got the sympathy of many highly-placed people because of Wikipedia's anti-expert (or if you prefer, anti-elitism) bias, so let's not allow them this advantage. Raymond Arritt (talk) 16:41, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

Yeah, I really think we should include as many people as possible in this action (whatever specific action we might decide on). If nothing else, it'll have a stronger impact. This isn't just a battle between science and pseudoscience. It's a battle between the mainstream expert opinion and the fringe. The problem we're facing is that what's fringe among people who know what they're doing has sizable numbers overall, and elements of it are more likely to want to push their views on Wikipedia. --Infophile ^{(Talk) (Contribs)} 16:47, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

It is true that the same problem plaguing science is plaguing everything. See this neat page User:Moreschi/The Plague where Moreschi (talk · contribs) bemoans nationalist lunatics. Substitute 'science' for 'nationalist' and you'd hardly notice a difference in the problems. Still, I agree with Filll because science is actually the easiest to set up as an example. Cheers! Wassupwestcoast (talk) 16:55, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

Ok point taken. I will be more civil. But in the case of religion, comparing it to physics, it is going to be far far easier to decide what is physics and what is pseudoscience than it is to know what is religion and what is just spew by cranks.--Filll (talk) 17:13, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

Trust me, the religion and philosophy pages have more pseudo- and crank editing than anything you could see at Evolution. You can't say anything, no matter how neutrally, calmly, or supported by what weight of centuries of expertise, without someone coming to either a) insert his for-profit guru, b) redefine all of it to suit a personal guru, c) add "in popular culture," d) pre-empt with a rock band name or album or single, e) replace it all with "is bollocks", f) change the whole thing to reflect what the author just heard in 10th grade history class, g) change it because the term was once used in a political argument, and the author wants to change the winners. Humanities articles are pretty shiny jewels in Wikipedia's crown, and yet they get more editing than anything on topology would. (They also require experts just as much.) Geogre (talk) 19:51, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

WP:POINT

I just wanted to raise here a potential issue: Any large-scale boycott/strike such as this will likely be declared a WP:POINTy act. If you look at it a certain way, our goal here is to demonstrate how bad articles will get quickly if experts withdraw from the project. That could definitely be characterized as disrupting Wikipedia in order to make a point.

However, I don't think it really applies (but I do expect it to be brought up if this goes through). There's a qualitative difference between disrupting through action and allowing disruption to occur through inaction. There's no rule against taking a wikibreak, and there never will be. Even a coordinated wikibreak can't be against the rules - there's no way you can force people to edit. In any case, I think as soon as someone tries to play this card against us, we've succeeded in making our point: We're needed here to prevent this sort of disruption, so we should be granted more respect.

In the end, I think respect is what this is all about. Our goal is to get Wikipedia to give more respect to mainstream expert opinions and less to the fringe. We've tried talking about it, and that's consistently failed, because we just don't get any respect. Akin to real world actions, striking may be our only recourse here. Let them see for themselves our worth by taking it away. --Infophile ^{(Talk) (Contribs)} 16:57, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

As I said on the main page of this discussion, we might not have to "strike" but just have to express a willingness to let the trolls have their way for a few days to implement "their version of NPOV" (which is not NPOV at all, of course). It would be an interesting experiment to try, if nothing else. And if and when we get the attention of the bureaucracy, then we have to have meaningful proposals to present to address the problems. And that is what I am trying to spur people to think about on these two pages.--Filll (talk) 17:11, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

Have it been tried to attempt to petition the beurocracy on this matter? Just that I'd rather not let the articles deteriorate any further :(. Jefffire (talk) 17:13, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

It's easy enough to revert back however long we need to after the strike ends. PouponOnToast (talk) 17:19, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

This is the one occasion where I would cite WP:IAR as applicable. ~ UBeR (talk) 17:18, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

There is no need for IAR. The power lies in the people, always. When a project is built on volunteers, it is built on the volition of the workers. They can withdraw it at any time. A mass action is simply a new consensus, and Wikipedia beats any hierarchical structure precisely because it has no bones against which a new movement must push. We are exactly as we are. Geogre (talk) 19:53, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

Speculations regarding German Wikipedia

In our search for policy, this might be an interesting starting point. Cheers! Wassupwestcoast (talk) 17:24, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

It's tough to say why German Wikipedia has done so well, but one possible speculation is this: According to Kim Bruning, German Wikipedia is run as an "Adminocracy." In other words, they have a very low tolerance for trolling and admins are given a great deal of deference in dealing with trolls and vandals. Other wikis, such as Dutch Wikipedia, which are dominated more by inclusionist populism, are crumbling due to majoritarianism and bureaucracy, two things Wikipedia is not. Jimmy himself seems to have an appropriate understanding of Ignore all rules that is not shared by the community. On the one hand, Jimmy has stated:

If I see [a contributor] is publishing shit, maybe by swearing or not making sense, I warn him ...the second time he turns on, I block him.

— Jimmy Wales, May 2006

This may shock some people, but it's perfectly acceptable if, in fact, Jimmy is in the right when he does that. And the claim above is in direct contradiction to the flowchart which describes how to build consensus.

In that flowchart, Ignore All Rules isn't present and the result has been an unwritten policy that Ignore all rules is to ignored, which favors violations of WP:NPOV, WP:RS, and WP:FRINGE.

It could be speculated, then that German Wikipedia has been more effective because the role of administrators and ignore all rules in the wiki process has been more clear. The four main principles of German Wikipedia are:

1. Wikipedia is an encyclopedia
2. A neutral point-of-view (where rationality and objectivity are both heavily emphasized)
3. Free content
4. No personal attacks

This is far more simple, more clear, and apparently more effective empirically, and this essay recommends all wikis follow the example of German Wikipedia and reject the absurd proposals made in Wikipedia:Wikipedia is succeeding. A more thorough review of their proposals will be published in the future.

I don't think becoming authoritarian will help us. It might cut down disturbances, but in the long run it won't help the encyclopedia. ~ UBeR (talk) 18:18, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

Agree with UBeR. It would never fly. It also puts a lot of power in the hands of admins -- and counterproductive (if well-intended) admins are a big part of the problem. Raymond Arritt (talk) 18:40, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

Well, maybe a tangential issue there is trying to get some admins on our side. I've seen a couple admins that have seemed sympathetic to science in the past, but after what happened to Adam, it might be a tough road to get any of them to consider it now. --Infophile ^{(Talk) (Contribs)} 18:48, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

From the german version of WP:NPOV roughly translated:

Critical evaluation of the sources

2nd Statements that are contradict secured scientific knowledge, must be presented as refuted or as superseded (in the light of recent, but not the latest findings). Statements that shirk the investigation by science (see falsification), must be represented as speculative . See also the difference between hypothesis and theory.

3rd A serious article should not relativize secured (not recent) scientific knowledge by mentioning various position on a subjekt. This error often occures in articles on para-and pseudo-scientific subjects.

Also funny in the german version of WP:V

The contribution to a lexicon incorporated information should be transparent in its origin and its nature verifiable. Therefore, in principle sources that are written according to the principles of scientific work are to favour. If such sources are not or not sufficiently available, you can also use journalistic sources, which can be considered as solidly investigated.((...)). If scientific sources are in conflict with journalistic sources, the scientific sources are preferable. A scientific evidence for a source, is whether they are cited in the academic discourse, as in academic journals of the topics area.

So according to the german policies, academic sources kill all other sources. 80.133.164.147 (talk) 15:04, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

This seems like a really bad idea.

General readers will still use Wikipedia just as much even with such a strike. I don't see what it would actually accomplish other than make a large variety of fringe-pushers have free reign for extra time. JoshuaZ (talk) 19:29, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

We're looking long-term here. The goal is that such a demonstration will help make it clear to fence-sitting admins that there's a problem, and without our input, these articles will quickly descend into chaos. Hopefully this will lead to a change in policy and attitudes that will be less favorable to fringe viewpoints. --Infophile ^{(Talk) (Contribs)} 19:31, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

Kangaroo got mainstream press which made Conservapedia look stupid. PouponOnToast (talk) 19:32, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

Well, the point of threatening to take a break on editing or patrolling one or more controversial science-related articles, or even actually doing it, is to bring attention to a set of ideas to try for improving the science/pseudoscience articles. I have advocated trying to collect a suite of ideas to suggest, and then if any of these need support from the bureaucracy, getting the attention of the bureaucracy with a bold announcement or move, or alarm of some kind. I am not sure we actually NEED to strike (although an experiment or two on a couple of controversial articles I think would be very interesting, to just let the fringe elements have their way and see the results).--Filll (talk) 19:37, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

Any action will need to be decisive, swift, and not a warning but an irrevocable and non-negotiable action, and result in enough disruption (by unmonitored kooks) to get the attention of the press. No press coverage = a waste of time. Negotiations and policy changes here will come in the wake of press coverage, not before. We have talked and complained for far too long. -- Fyslee / talk 04:44, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

Part of the problem is that for many fringe topics, many people don't know much about them to have a decent understanding of the scientific consensus on matters and similar WP:UNDUE issues (this is a serious problem for example at Homeopathy). To use the same example, if we let the POV-pushers on Homeopathy have a free reign, to many admins and general users it wouldn't look so bad because they just have no knowledge of the subject at all. JoshuaZ (talk) 20:24, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

Here's another problem with what's happening. Admins being "elected" today really lack any usefulness to the project. Admins like Raymond arritt, Mast Cell, JoshuaZ and others just don't get elected anymore. Instead, we get admin candidates who have no understanding of NPOV or even SPOV, some are secret racists and POV-warriors, and some who are just plain plain. OrangeMarlin ^{Talk• Contributions} 21:05, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

Absolutely true. Which is why I have suggested that after our "experiment" we then submit the article before and after the experiment to a panel of outside experts for advice. We might enlist the assistance of the outside media in the experiment (possibly). We agree on what experts should be; like professors of medicine at Harvard and Yale and Johns Hopkins. We can even contact some of the scienceblog people to help us in this regard. We get a group of real experts, and have them look. And see. And thereby, shine the light of reality on this problem. And who knows what we will find out?--Filll (talk) 20:47, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

Something tells me Orac would be interested in helping review here, though the problem with that is that we already know what his opinion on Homeopathy (and all things fringe, really) is. He does qualify as an expert, though. If not him, there are certainly some other experts around ScienceBlogs who haven't expressed an opinion on Homeopathy yet. --Infophile ^{(Talk) (Contribs)} 21:59, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

Didn't you hear? According to at least one banned user's off-wiki outing campaign, I am Orac. :) MastCell ^Talk 04:07, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

Non-experts and science articles

I've been following User:Raymond arritt/Expert withdrawal with interest. It has certainly attracted a lot of attention. For the record, I have an undergraduate science degree. I actually tend to avoid editing science articles because I know how fast some areas move and how easy it is for non-experts to get things wrong, even in good faith (well, in reality I've forgotten nearly everything I learnt...). I also know that editing on the basis of popular science books and textbooks can be tricky compared to editors who are using peer-reviewed articles and syntheses of front-line research (or knowledge of such). That might be part of the problem. In areas like science, non-experts and even those with a basic education in the subject, tend to either steer clear, or unhelpfully fall inbetween the two camps and satisfy no-one. That tends to leave highly-educated scientists tearing their hair out in frustration as they try to discuss things with those with less education or training in assessing sources and science and science-related materials. Carcharoth (talk) 19:22, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

Very true. And the disputes between science and pseudoscience are different than the disputes about Kosovo or Palestine or Chechnya or Islam or Christianity or Sufi or Ron Paul or George Bush, in most cases. Frequently, it is very obvious for those who are highly trained in the sciences and related areas what is mainstream science and what is nonmainstream science to put it politely.

We have many people who are highly trained in science here, with Masters and PhDs in science and mathematics and engineering as well as MDs etc. To someone who is an artist or a philosopher or a kindergarden teacher or a barber or a real estate agent, the conflicts in science just look like the conflicts in politics or religion.

But the conflicts between science and pseudoscience are very different than these other conflicts. Otherwise, there would not be well in excess of 99.99% of all biologists dismissing creationism and anti-evolution beliefs, although to some of the general public, the distinction between the two ideas seems pretty minimal and not important. And this sort of belief that one has to be "fair" to both sets of ideas is extremely destructive when trying to produce some sort of reliable and not completely ridiculous resource, like an encyclopedia.--Filll (talk) 19:36, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

But to get back to my point, what role do people like me (undergraduate science degree) have to play? I actually want to read about both sides of the issue and judge for myself. I don't want the fringe views completely cleared out, if only because they are interesting. I want to go to what I know will be (or should be) the mainstream article, and read about homeopathy. I want there to be at least a link from there to the [[water memory] article, and I want to be able to read over there what this is about (its history and what its proponents have to say), not just what science has to say about it. I want Wikipedia editors to trust me, as a reader, to not have to be constantly reminded that what I'm reading is not mainstream - as long as there is something in the article saying "care! not mainstream", allow some latitude for the other side to say something. ie. give more weight to science in the main article, but give more weight to homeopathy in the appropriate subsidiary articles (such as water memory), while still covering everything in both. Does that make sense? There is nothing wrong with starting an article with "as described in homeopathy, the water memory effect has no scientific basis" - followed by a series of paragraphs about the history and the impact and reception - all the time carefully avoiding endorsing it in any way whatsoever. That is how I understand NPOV. Different articles have different balances according to what their "topic" is. Overall, this may give the impression that Wikipedia is unbalanced if you select the wrong articles, but, correctly done, links and introductions should guide readers to the right areas and, overall, a topic area can be balanced, while the individual articles may have different balances. ie. put all the homeopathy-related articles together, and the whole is balanced. Look at individual articles (which should really be seen as subsidiary articles, not separate ones), and the balance is harder to see. I'm not in any way advocating POV-forks, as all the articles should still make clear how they relate to other articles and the mainstream, but there is no need for all homeopathy articles to be 60% science (or whatever). Carcharoth (talk) 20:03, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

Just read the water memory article. Very nice! :-) I think I chose a bad example there. But I think the general principle holds. When discussing topics for which there is no science, concentrate on documenting the history and the reactions of society and each side of the debate. To look at something where there is science involved, I tried to get involved with the Wikipedia coverage of the results of Arthur Eddington's 1919 solar eclipse expeditions. Eddington's article presents this experiment as a success. So does General relativity. You have to go to Introduction to general relativity#Experimental tests to get the line "Eddington's results were not very accurate". I remember raising this at Wikipedia:Featured article# candidates/Introduction to general relativity. There was a better explanation at predictive power, but it has since been removed. Compare the current text at predictive power: "Although the measurements have been criticized by some as utilizing flawed methodology[2], modern reanalysis of the data[3][4] suggests that Eddington's analysis of the data was accurate." (quoting sources from 1993, 2005 and 2007 - a nice illustration of how things change over time - looks like I'm now behind the times) with the previous version. There is a whole story there that has been excised and condensed into a sentence or two. I've added a comment at Talk:Predictive power. Another article that does a better job of covering this is (logically) Tests of general_relativity#Deflection of light by the Sun. My main points about the inconsistent presentation of Eddington's experiment across Wikipedia articles were made at Reliability of the results of Eddington's eclipse experiments (with a link to an interesting article here). See also the exchange here and here. I would present all of that as an example of how civil discourse is possible, and also how dangerous it can be to let loose someone (ie. me) with a little bit of knowledge, but not the up-to-date knowledge needed. Luckily there was an expert around to bring in the latest verdicts and keep things under control (actually, I only participated on the talk page - don't think I even edited the article). Carcharoth (talk) 20:52, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

I think someone with a bachelor's degree in science can contribute. I think someone who is a dedicated amateur like User: WillowW can contribute. I am a physicist with a bunch of graduate degrees in physics and mathematics, and almost no training in biology, but most of the science I have been involved with here is biological. Nevertheless, I think I have been able to contribute, and I have learned something in the process.

The reason I do not try hard to contribute in my own areas of expertise is that dealing with trolls and POV warriors is so discouraging that I do not think I could deal with it in an area where I am a real expert (and I do not want to edit articles where my own work and name might appear; that makes me feel strange). I can barely tolerate dealing with trolls and POV warriors in an area of science in which I am not an expert. Just look at User: Orangemarlin. He is a cardiologist, but he has tried to edit some medical articles, and it is incredibly frustrating for him. It is painful to watch. The same is true for User: Jim62sch who is a linguist and computer expert. Once in a while Jim62sch steps into linguistic articles, but it is much more painful for him to edit those than it is for me, as an amateur linguist who is just interested in it but knows almost nothing. WillowW is an expert in knitting, and I have seen her in agony when people who do not appreciate her expertise attack her knitting articles. It is less painful to work in areas in which a person is not an expert for most people, frankly.

I am not advocating clearing out WP:FRINGE material. I do not think anyone is advocating removing FRINGE material, or at least very few if any pro-science editors that I know would advocate clearing out this material.

What I think we are worrying about is the efforts by homeopaths (for example), who do not want any information in the homeopathy article that states that

• there is no scientific basis for their field or medications
• there have been no confirmed scientific studies showing their treatments work

They want to include blogs of fellow homeopaths. They want to remove negative studies, or peer-reviewed studies in mainstream journals. They want to explain away negative results with WP:OR etc. They want to deny that scientific bodies or publications have denigrated homeopathy. They claim there are all massive plots and conspiracies against them to keep them down.

Many proponents of assorted WP:FRINGE theories believe that NPOV means that no negative material whatsoever should be included, since negative material is not "neutral". In other words, they want to remove all scientific and allopathic medical content from the article. That is what the fights are about on the talk pages. Over and over and over. By a never ending flow of sock puppets and meat puppets and POV warriors and trolls. Over and over and over. Same arguments, again and against. Edit wars. Administrative actions. Just a huge waste of time and energy for everyone.

This sentiment is expressed over and over at the talk pages of irreducible complexity or intelligent design or many others. Almost every alternative medicine or complementary medicine page has the same situation. Go to the FRINGE theories noticeboard to see an amazing parade of the most incredible material; acres and acres of the most outrageous articles imaginable, without a single contact with the scientific or medical mainstream.

Of course a lot of this material is interesting and fun and humorous. I think that it should be here, but the mainstream view should be there as well. If all we do is promote offbeat and screwball material, we will soon lose all credibility. I even think that if another place like Wikinfo or Para Wiki is willing to feature it without any input from mainstream science, that is fine and maybe preferable for many of these proponents of these views.

On your experiences with general relativity; this was not too contentious, because there is no one bottling relativity to sell to the public. And in the case of homeopathy and intelligent design, this is what is going on. There is an immense financial motivation to remove any negative material. The only financial motivation involved with the case of general relativity serves to promote it because GPS relies on it, and some research funding depends on it. There is no huge anti-GR lobby. GR is not condemned in churches. There are no rallies of thousands of anti-GR proponents where speeches are made claiming all people who use or work in GR

• are doing the work of the devil
• are corrupting the youth
• were responsible for the Holocaust
• should be imprisoned or even put to death.

This makes the GR case quite different than some of these other scientific areas. And so you have to put some of these things in perspective for this reason. --Filll (talk) 23:05, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

Carcharoth, the term "expert" was an unfortunate choice of words on my part. It was intended to mean any reasonably informed person who is is grounded in reality. The real problem is people who are energetically and disruptively promoting nonsense, and -- especially -- the administrators who insist on giving them near-limitless chances while ignoring the effect they have on constructive editors. My experience is that experts are more than happy to work with non-experts who are genuinely interested in a topic instead of aggressively promoting a far-fringe agenda (quite often, an agenda in which they have real-world COI) with utter disregard for WP:WEIGHT, WP:RS, and so on. What's driving us nuts is the message that disruptive fringers need to be protected and nurtured because with constant mentoring they might, someday, eventually, become constructive editors, and that if this causes endless grief to constructive editors well, tough -- this is an "anti-elitist" community and those pointy-headed science types are only getting what they deserve. Raymond Arritt (talk) 00:15, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

I would agree with this assessment of Raymond Arritt, unfortunately. That is the certainly the appearance, inadvertent or not. And so, we need to brainstorm for how we can correct the situation, if an improvement is possible at all.--Filll (talk) 00:33, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

And don't forget the admins who get elected with what could only be described as cursory knowledge of what NPOV actually means. There's nothing worse then when an admin and their weighty fist (as a leader), who clearly doesn't understand the policy, gives more fuel to the eternal fire of the fringers. Personally, I am of the mind that the very best admins are going to be the ones that constructively edit controversial articles (intelligent design, scientific support for evolution, homeopathy, etc) because they actually understand policy. How good of an admin can you be when the toughest thing you had to do in an article was figure out how to much space to give to the season overview of Buffy (no offense to Buffy fans or editors)? Baegis (talk) 00:24, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

Ah, but "involved" admins are strictly forbidden from acting. One can argue that the best thing for a knowledgeable admin is to avoid editing articles in which he has expertise, so that he will be able to enforce policy on those articles. Weird but true. Raymond Arritt (talk) 00:33, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

I agree on the need for expert oversight, and suggest that pseudoskepticism is at times a problem on WP as well as pseudoscience, and that good oversight would help. Not all pseudosciences are created (designed? ...heh) equal. Filll mentions homeopathy and ID in the same breath, but the latter is for more pseudo for several reasons. It's a mistake -- wrong scientifically, wrong encyclopedically -- to lump all things called "pseudoscience" together for purposes of how we treat them. WP has some decent rules in terms of dealing with topics labelled as pseudoscience, and one of the razors they give is "generally considered pseudoscientific by the scientific community". Expert editors grok the difference between attributable individual and group opinion, right? I've come close to leaving WP myself, and one reason is that I'm tired of having to explain what are adequate sources for sci consensus. Just another angle to consider. --Jim Butler^(talk) 12:17, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

Please Jim Butler direct me to an article where you believe that pseudoskepticism has become a problem. Are there any articles where pseudoskepticism has distorted NPOV and WEIGHT ? Or threatens to distort them?

Also, the pseudoscience is in the eye of the beholder. For example, I guarantee that many who subscribe to intelligent design will state unequivocally that intelligent design is much more respectable and scientific than homeopathy. I also guarantee that many who are proponents of homeopathy will state unequivocally that homeopathy is much more respectable and scientific than intelligent design. Each thinks their belief is totally reasonable and that other guy who believes that other nonsense is a crank that they do not want to be associated with.

I myself am somewhat torn about "branding" articles with pseudoscience labels. There might be methods that might be less offensive to proponents but are still useful to readers to tie these articles together. I am not sure what those might be, but it is worth thinking about. --Filll (talk) 13:53, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

Hi Filll - Acupuncture is not infrequently targeted (notice that what is being deleted is stuff from Edzard Ernst and the Cochrane Collaboration; the editor honestly believes there is a conspiracy among "acu believers" to infiltrate evidence-based medicine reviewers at the highest levels). Admittedly an extreme and rather cranky example, but still, it happens, and guess who deals with a lot of it? I frequently see arguments over use of category:pseudoscience, and editors who should know better assert that individual scientists can be cited for sci consensus. (See User:Jim_Butler#Categories.) This also happens at List of pseudosciences and pseudoscientific concepts. I don't wish to minimize the editorial agony of those undoubtedly fighting greater battles, but the existence of the pseudoskeptical side ought to be on the radar screen of scientific editors, knowing the difference between "unproven" and "disproven". (Actually, there are some good folks at Citizendium who are reasonable in this way. Maybe we should just leave WP to trivia and popular culture.) cheers, Jim Butler^(talk) 10:30, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

Also, re "pseudoscience is in the eye of the beholder", that is true, but the existence of critical sources is not subjective. All we need to do is cite and properly weight such sources. There are far more sci-consensus sources dissing creationism than homeopathy. Agree with you on "branding" and with topics labelled as pseudoscience am an advocate of using WP's lists broadly while using categories sparingly, per Arbcom's comments, now at NPOV, as well as WP:CG. For borderline or disputed cases, we still get to explain the reasoning behind the criticisms, even if we refrain from "branding". best regards, Jim Butler^(talk) 20:20, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

A further clarification that Jim Butler might want to take into consideration. When a paper is published in the Lancet and the author or authors state that "X is pseudoscience" or "X is not scientifically supported", it just does not mean that this is the opinion of the author or the 2, 3 or 10 authors.

Lancet articles will have been reviewed by at least 3 reviewers, and possibly as many as 10 or more reviewers scientific reviewers, typically reviewers who are not inclined to agree with the conclusions of the paper and who are scientific opponents of the authors of the paper and who are usually chosen as likely to disagree with the conclusions of the paper. The paper must also be inspected by at least one or more scientific editors and meet with their approval. If there is a problem with the article that the scientific community disagrees with, within a short period of time (a year or two at most, a letter or article to the journal rebutting the conclusions of the article will appear in the journal, or a competing journal. This will be easy to find because it will bring considerable attention to the problem typically. So although you are somewhat correct in your views that a peer-reviewed paper by one person represents the views of that author, you are not totally correct. It is a bit more complicated than that.--Filll (talk) 14:03, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

I agree peer review does amount to greater weight than unrefereed or self-published material, but WP:SOURCES already takes that into account. (To be clear, we could say "John Doe, in peer-reviewed Zooboomafoo, wrote blah blah blah".) And I doubt that an author's opinion that a topic is "pseudoscience" is generally going to be as heavily contested by reviewers as an article's more central features, like study design, data crunching, interpretation of results, etc. Besides, reviewers very often let all kinds of BS (even PS!) through, as we know from various infamous examples. best regards, Jim Butler^(talk) 10:30, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

Well of course in science nothing is ever or rarely "disproven". Proof and truth are part of mathematics and logic, but not part of science. The preponderence of evidence just goes in one way or another, and the mainstream of science follows. All of the scientific theories are only provisional and temporary and expected to be replaced by better ones that explain more. I could still maintain that the earth is the center of the universe, or that the earth is flat, and fit the data very well, but the model to that would be very complicated. It violates the parsimony principle associated with Occam's Razor.--Filll (talk) 21:20, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

Why are people still engaging in discussion here? PouponOnToast (talk) 11:51, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

I am not sure what you mean. Sorry.--Filll (talk) 21:20, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

Getting the attention of the "bureaucracy"

I see references here to getting the attention of the "bureaucracy". I think those saying that are misunderstanding how Wikipedia works. It is the community, the editors (and that includes you and me) who set the non-Foundation policies and how things work. ArbCom and the community of admins have some effect, as does Jimbo Wales. But real top-down change needs to be instituted at the Wikimedia Foundation board level. Someone should probably stand for election to the board on this sort of ticket. That would help gauge community support for this kind of frustration. See meta:Board elections. Hopefully that is what was meant by "bureaucracy". Carcharoth (talk) 19:26, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

Some ideas that are suggested for testing or implementation might not require any permission or assistance from the "bureaucracy" at all. They can just be done unilaterally.

Others might require some permission or assistance. And so people should be prepared to try to figure out how to get this permission or assistance. And of course, one method might be to put a representative on a board.--Filll (talk) 19:39, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

I think most people are using "bureacracy" as shorthand for "arbcom and admins." It's not really policy that needs to be changed but enforcement of existing policy. Others can correct me if I'm wrong. Raymond Arritt (talk) 00:18, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

Other people might have different definitions, but I am using "bureaucracy" in the widest possible sense, to include all editors, the rules on Wikipedia, the administrators, Arbcomm, the Foundation, the other assorted hoi polloi like bureaucrats, WikiMedia Foundation employees, checkusers, etc. The whole shooting match. The problem is, we need an entire paradigm and attitude shift, and it is a big enterprise with a lot of parts, and it is like turning the Queen Mary.--Filll (talk) 00:40, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

Filll, as I have suggested elsewhere,t there is a project with just such a shift, Citizendium. The problem is, it is filled with so many professional academics that it moves very slowly--and it turns out they too have their own idiosyncratic point of view--and, being better at disputation than people here, they are even harder to convince that they are not being objective. But there is an acceptance of the paradigm you want, and you should join in actively there to see if you really like it. DGG (talk) 04:26, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

Of course there are several hundred Wikis, all with different principles involved. And all have their advantages and disadvantages. Citizendium requires people to drop anonymity, which some like yourself have no problem with, but others like myself maintain it for a variety of reasons. I have explored some other wikis and I continue to do so. However, I believe that discussing potential ways to improve this and other wikis is only reasonable and prudent. Do you not think so?--Filll (talk) 04:38, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

Given that I have been threatened for calling people "homeopathy promoters" instead of "homeopathy supporters", and that it was viewed as highly uncivil to tell people that we have to abide by NPOV and cooperate or else there would be trouble, I am afraid DGG has convinced me that the harsher position of Raymond arritt might be the more realistic one. Thanks for opening my eyes.--Filll (talk) 13:42, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

Newspaper coverage

Is this really a good idea? It might get change, but maybe not the sort you expect. My experience with newspapers is also that they can easily misrepresent a story. Think of possible headlines that make those who proposed this look silly. Also, if this is, in years to come, seen as the start of the end, do you really want newspaper stories about how Wikipedia lost a chunk of credibility because of an expert rebellion? Even when the experts return, it will be hard to regain that credibility. Carcharoth (talk) 19:32, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

As I said on the main page here, all of these ideas have potential advantages and disadvantages. And one does not necessarily have to actually strike to get the necessary attention. However, I do personally think that a test on an article or two might be very interesting to watch and study.--Filll (talk) 19:41, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

Strikes are best done with the employer, not the world

Look, I understand the frustrations here. I support the volunteers expressing their wills. However, the problems are the Scylla and Charibdis of rapid edits by dedicated deniers and warriors, on the one hand, and the picayune obsessions with the "where is the citation that V/I/R?", on the other. The middle line of academic standards is difficult to establish to non-academic persons. What you are bucking against is that the average age of the "power structure" of Wikipedia is far below graduate school age, and the average group of deniers or agenda motivated individuals can mass numbers more quickly and effectively than we can overcome the "but he's right: a citation to Conspiracy Times is as good as one to Nature" on any given subject.

We're all in this together. I have to deal with philosophy and literature complaints, ideologies, and trash. (E.g. there is feminist literary criticism. It's great. Peace unto it. Rewriting an article to be all the opinion of a feminist scholar is as wrong as rewriting it to be a GradeSaver.com essay. Try to imagine fighting that battle.) I also watch the "official culture" of FAC and FAR dominated by pop culture addicts and youngsters. Again, peace unto them, but they don't know the difference between a J.A.W. Bennett and Anne Rice, when it comes to Anglo-Saxon literature, so how are they going to know what is and is not academic standard?

If there is such a level of frustration that you guys want to withdraw your services, you will find:

1. People will do it themselves, but stupidly (with -bots)
2. Much will be missed
3. Another expert will replace you, find the same frustration, and express it again
4. Another group of teenagers "in power" will turn a deaf ear or try to salve the situation with a clumsy and fumbling blow in the dark.

Many of us want the prejudice against Wikipedia in the academy to be eroded by our quality, but we can only do this if we can hit and maintain academic standard.

The biggest problem, of course, is self-selection. Who joins Project Verification except people who feel strongly about it? Who joins Good Article Review but people who feel strongly about it? People feeling strongly are people who have an opinion already. Some of those most interested in "working on" verifiability are going to be interested in getting their previously excluded thing included. Some of those interested in "working on" Good Article review think there have been "too few articles on cheeses" (or whatever the idiosyncratic interest).

On a less gloomy note, here is a recommendation: Sign up as a person who will withdraw work. Get a good list. Be prepared to be as good as your word. Know what it is that you're going to stop doing (e.g. taking all science articles off your watchlist). Be prepared for stupid statements from the "other side." The point is to make sure that those who are the obstacle learn the price, not to go to the police or press. Geogre (talk) 20:06, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

Good advice and input. Thanks! --Filll (talk) 21:08, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

Development of scientifically-based tools for WP management

As I study the operation of WP, I see that some of our decisions are made more on personal convictions, rather than real data or analysis.

For example, we could and should have far more sophisticated sock puppet detection tools based on discriminant analysis and detection theory and computational linguistics. A bot could ferret out candidates for more careful examination quite easily.

Another area is the claim repeated frequently that a given newbie is worth more than an established user. It seems that there is more good faith extended towards newbies and the system bends over for any bad behavior for disruptive editors than it does for established editors who are productive.

One could easily study the data and survey the editors and get some feedback if this stance is appropriate and productive for the project. What is the probability that a disruptive editor will reform and be productive, based on past behavior? What is the value of an editor who produces 10,000 edits a year and 2 GAs and one FA per year? What is the chance that a newbie will stay on the site and become productive? Does it cost us established productive editors to let disruptive editors and trolls run free and give them repeated chances to continue to be disruptive? One could decide how to balance many policies based on optimizing the productivity of the project.--Filll (talk) 03:28, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

Yes, sophisticated sock puppet detection tools, as well, as sophisticated nonsense detection tools can be implemented. But the incentive to do so does not seem to exist. A much better tool would be a re-write of the editing environment. Contributing to the project is not user friendly. Several months ago, there was some mention at the Wiki Foundation level via Wales that a new editing environment would be forthcoming. I've heard nothing since. Many months ago, there was a serious attempt at forcing all contributions to be accompanied by a citation. This was to be built into the 'new editing' tool. All vapour ware. I agree that contributing - encyclopedia building - editors should be rewarded some how. There is zero incentive. An outside expert has to battle an editing environment from the dark ages, fight off neanderthals, and then a receives a virtual lump of coal as thanks. Cheers! Wassupwestcoast (talk) 03:42, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

I actually encountered a good study into wikipedia quality just the other day, I can't remember exactly where it was referenced from, perhaps WP:FAIL and similar discussions? But interestingly it displayed that, I believe, editors with 10,000 edits or more are responsible for around 40% of all lasting content, and that edit count was a good indication of lasting additions. I shall have to attempt to briefly look for it... LinaMishima (talk) 04:05, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

Found it! Take a look at article, it is actually rather good LinaMishima (talk) 04:07, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

Some corrections: The top 0.1% of contributors (~4,200 editors, no indication of average edit count) give over 40% of quality content additions. A single user is responsible for 0.5% of quality content additions. Of the top-ten quality content addition makers, nine had more than 10,000 edits. LinaMishima (talk) 04:14, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

Natural selection operates on Wikipedia

What we have is a special circumstance here. We cannot promote admins unless they have no enemies, so the only admins that we get are from noncontroversial articles. And they are not aware of the problems on controversial articles, or willing to do much about them. And we are naturally selecting for admins who will do nothing (since those that will like Adam and Durova etc leave or are booted) and also that know nothing about the problems. And so the editors have to deal with this on their own. And they quit because it is impossible. So we naturally select for the least competent editors, and the admins who favor doing nothing and WP:AGF no matter what, even in the face of an onslaught of disruptive socks and trolls etc. And it just gets worse. Positive feedback! Evolution in action !!--Filll (talk) 07:41, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

Durova wasn't booted for knowing about science, if she was booted at all. However, you are correct about admins, and this is why we need quorum on RFA, at least. When an RFA passes with 20 "meh" votes but fails with 110/40 passionate votes, the natural selection is toward people operating -bots and doing single character edits. It's easier for sockpuppets and "outsiders" to get admin status with nothing edits than it is for an active person to get admin status. However, is it admins that is the problem? What is "it" that needs to be done? What normative standard will stop some of the bleeding? Geogre (talk) 12:13, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

Of course, Durova was not "booted"; as I said, "leave or are booted" and I was not necessarily referring to Durova and Adam Cuerden, but only administrators like Durova and Adam Cuerden, who are more actively involved than just running bots.

However, Geogre raises the more important question; even if we recognize what the problem is, how do we approach it and "fix" it, if such a thing is even possible?--Filll (talk) 20:26, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

Looking at the last batches of promoted admins, I see some rather fearless and objective people there. And for slightly earlier groups, this has been proven by their actions since promoting. Think if every;admin wanted to involve her/himself with these articles. If you think we've been getting some with low quality, affect the evolution by participating. Intelligent control of this is possible within our environment. I almost said ID. :) DGG (talk) 02:43, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

The problem is that admins who want to protect tendentious or disruptive editors carry disproportionate weight. Very often, such admins misinterpret adoption or mentorship to mean that they've now become the editor's advocate. We have too many cases where there's a consensus that someone needs to be blocked, or subject to a topic ban, or whatever, only for an admin to pop in who thinks they need a 37th last chance. Raymond Arritt (talk) 02:53, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

Admins are not chosen based on number of edits. Number of edits has nothing to do with it. Wjhonson (talk) 09:34, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

Then RfA must have changed enormously in the past month or two. How many have been promoted recently with < 5000 edits? Raymond Arritt (talk) 10:33, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

An example of why this is not a good idea

This is a copy of a section removed from the project page, with the comment of "taking it to the talk page" - as it perhaps should have been. But it is instructive how the mindset works - so I reproduce it here for information

As a scientist, and medical doctor, I ask you to think a bit deeper about the issues. For example, did you know that in the 1920's the scientific treatment for asthma was a tobacco cigarette which had been laced with a bit of strychnine? It worked, after a fashion too. Or how about the scorn heaped on Semmelweiss for his (then) radical suggestion to wash your hands before doing a vaginal examination on a post-partum lady? The outrage in Berlin at Koch and his postulates led to cholera parties being held where they (yes!) drank a bouillon of cholera after the party. And only 40% got cholera .... but that is another story. Doctors in WWI permitted men to be shot for cowardice, while today we recognise PTSD and do not shoot the cannon fodder any more. There are any number of examples of perfectly valid scientific principles which have been turned on their heads after some time - butter is good for you or bad for you? - so why do you assume that the current state of science is any better informed than a century ago? I think you are a tad arrogant to assume that, just because you cannot see a scientific rationale for something (speak Homeopathy) you need to charge in to correct the misunderstandings of the hoi polloi. You may well be right, but then again, was Koch or Semmelweiss wrong? docboat (talk) 13:36, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

You are one of those breed of anti-science physicians that are being pushed out of medical school. The ones that believe prayer improves a patient outcome or a dilution that is essentially distilled water has any effect except to clear the kidneys in a few hours. Your examples are plainly wrong, because in the 1920's less was known about cigarette smoke and the lungs. And science is specifically of a method which is testable, not what constitutes an urban legend at best in Homeopathy. I know you are frustrated by the inability to be a god and cure everyone who walks in your front door, but I personally gave up that attitude 20 years ago, when it was clear I wasn't. Science is the basis of medicine, believe it or not. Maybe some native somewhere used digitalis to improve his cardiovascular health. But there were 1000 plants that didn't, and people died. It was a primitive form of clinical trial. And the fact that countries and researchers are wasting money on CAM is sad, when those untold millions of dollars could be spent on real research with real results. Your examples are interesting, prove nothing. OrangeMarlin Talk• Contributions 14:00, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

First off, OM, I graduated 1979 - probably am older than you, and am a believer in good science. Secondly, my examples are good examples, but they do not support your POV, so you may classify them as bad examples if you wish, but they still stand. Thirdly, your knowledge of my psychological state is approximately zero, so you will kindly leave off unreferenced attempts to impugn an attitude to me which plainly does not pertain. Fourthly, it has been proven, quite adequately, that CAM is both less costly, and more beneficial for chronic disease management than classical school medicine. Your US studies have shown that quite well. But, OM, whatever floats your boat. Don't let facts stand in your way. You do, however, manifest quite magnificently the reason why this article has been started - and why it is also wrong to pursue. But as said - whatever floats your boat. docboat (talk) 14:13, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

What you seem to be attempting to point out is that scientific opinion changes and the scientific establishment is unresponsive to new and radical ideas. That is a fair point, but surely you have noticed that those versed in the scientific method are more willing to work with the truth of this and within the framework of current understanding than those who are not. The scientific method is about dealing with the evidence, whilst people who do not follow it tend to deal more in what they would like to work and what appears to work (but under scrutiny is revealed to be something else). The comparison of the history of asthma and smoking to the debate over the efficacy of homeopathy is a very bad one indeed. You might say that it was 'just' 80 years ago, but remember that modern medicine and anatomy is a very new subject that is only just perhaps coming out of it's childhood (with the SSRI missing studies, it seems to have a teenage strop at the moment). At the time, certain aspects of the lung may not have been properly understood (although the general anatomy certainly was), the origin of asthma was not known, and the effects of smoking were only known through observation of people smoking. Using the knowledge they had at the time, it must have seemed an appropriate treatment. However, with homeopathy, boundless ammounts of knowledge exist on the cause of various problems, on biochemistry, and on chemistry and structures within liquids, and indeed the larger, more methodological studies show an effect similar only to placebo. One of the problems I will grant you, however, is that far too many scientifically minded editors want to scratch things out entirely, and dispute that a placebo-based treatment can be of any use (whereas I am sure you will agree, the placebo effect is wonderful and to be encouraged). For example, studies do seem to show that CAM is better with the management of some chronic conditions, and this is entirely what you would expect. Many of them have a very strong link to lifestyle and mental health, and regular long appointments with a CAM advisor who respects them does the world of good. This detail is often not desired by some types in the scientific field because this entire discussion has become polarised into black or white thanks to the blind insistence (often by the supporters) of a single viewpoint being the only true way. In conclusion, thank you for your input here and a very valuable point, however it must be noted that there were far less contentious means to make this statement. LinaMishima (talk) 20:12, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

Excellent post Linamishima. Both of them of course make good points. And you are right, the distinguishing feature of all science is that it is provisional knowledge and expected to be revised constantly; that is its strength. Beliefs that do not get revised except to add more epicycles do not really get classified as science, but fall more into pseudoscience. Unfortunately our ability to use demarcation problem methods to decide what is and is not science is somewhat limited.

I also think that CAM is not all bogus, but a lot of it is. There are hints of interesting things there, like studies showing advantages to chiropractic in certain circumstances over conventional methods in the case of back pain, or accupuncture. Of course, the placebo effect and its counterpart, the nocebo effect, and related phenomena are telling us something interesting about the way the body works. We just do not know how to interpret it yet. Instead of holding dogmatically to some prior belief based on minimal evidence, we should be embracing evidence-based approaches, and highlighting them on a place like Wikipedia, while still accommodating contrary views.

The difficulty arises when many want to discard or mischaracterize evidence-basd approaches and mainstream science, and exclude it from Wikipedia, in my estimation. I am fine with putting all variety of flakey and fruitcakey material here; where else are you going to find it carefully described with links? On the other hand, we need to hear all sides and all sides presented clearly. In the case of homeopathy, since it makes money for some people, they want to exclude the allopathic medical side and the scientific side, from my observations over the last 8 months.--Filll (talk) 20:38, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

• Yes, I would agree with all of you. However, the real issue that I have seen on homeopathy and other pages is not so much the rigour of evidence, but rather the polarising of views into intransigent camps. Under those conditions, I would suggest, BOTH sides are wrong. docboat (talk) 00:20, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

Um ok Doc, I will bite. Do you understand what NPOV is?--Filll (talk) 00:24, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

No need to be worried Filll] - I am not asking you, or anyone, to change your views! Yes, I do understand NPOV, quite well in fact. But do you understand the psychology involved in attempting non-bias when the mindset has been established? The point I am making in this debate started by RA is quite simple - firstly that scientific "truth" changes over time and secondly that closed minded attitudes to current scientific understandings are unhelpful. Polarised views are great for fighting, but simply not helpful in making progress. As far as I can see from looking at the history of scientific discovery, it is the person with the questioning mind, the person with the daring to assume that previous ideas are wrong, the person who challenges established notions of "right", who makes the breakthrough discoveries. Yes, excellent scientific approaches are needed, perseverance, observation etc etc. But the mindset is critical for progress, and a closed mind is not good for progress. Is that so radical an idea? docboat (talk) 02:15, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

There's a difference between being open minded and being out of touch with reality. There's nothing to be gained by being open-minded about the prospect of the Earth being supported by a giant tortoise, or communing with the dead via radio static, or the Holocaust having never occurred. Some things really are untenable. Raymond Arritt (talk) 02:23, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

Yes, true Raymond. But that is what they said about heavier-than-air-flight, is it not? Or the dangers of a speeding locomotive >15mph? Or the sound barrier? Combustion engine? Computers in the home? Heart transplants? Theory of quantum mechanics? Exercise after a heart attack? Kooks abound, kooks with closed minds perhaps more so, but a closed mindset is not helpful for non-kooks. docboat (talk) 02:29, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

There's a line to be drawn. Too often those promoting fringe views argue that because we don't know everything, we don't know anything. Raymond Arritt (talk) 03:10, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

Yes, we can agree on that, Raymond. I do think there is a simple solution to the whole issue though - I suggested it on the RfC Adam Cuerden started for homeopathy at [1] this link. docboat (talk) 03:46, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

And curiously they are all excepted by agreeing with the evidence. Sure there where skeptics and naysayers to almost anything and everything. Yet here we are, flying around using the internet, and yet, other pseudosciences cannot still be explained, even after all these other advances. Of course the more rational persons would say "perhaps these psuedosciences are wrong after all" but others, would resort to an odd "keep an open mind arguement" and hence, rather than be rational, they become believers. Shot info (talk) 03:39, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

Docboat, with all due respect - you seem to be suggesting that because science advances over time that we should not report the current consensus. In all of your examples, an encyclopedia could accurately report the consensus mainstream views, and report the fringe with proper weight as well. And of course, publishing a new edition every year would keep things closer to up-to-date. Well, we have a little more power these days in that regard. I don't see the problem. Our articles should say, "the consensus view is...", which of course should be true, and should be adjusted as time passes and the consensus potentially changes. Tparameter (talk) 04:15, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

Not at all - not in the least. And I agree with you. But where I differ from my mainstream colleagues is that I think an article of minority interest (eg homeopathy) should be reported on as an article on that topic, not dismissed and poo-pooed by mainstream editors in the body of the lead. I suggested that such articles should report faithfully the viewpoint of the believers, and THEN the criticism should be documented - that way a seeker can find out what the topic is from the one viewpoint, and then the other. Currently what we see is a line-by-line series of statements and opposing statements or qualifications. This has two effects: firstly we see confusing writing, secondly we have edit-warring. Contentious editors contend. If we were to separate clearly, there would be no need to revert a (referenced) opinion, but merely add to concensus at the appropriate part of the topic. Which also means that a bad-faith editor can be quickly identified, and removed. Seems quite simple a concept to me. Thoughts? docboat (talk) 04:29, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

You obviously have a sound intellect and your points are very good. However, I disagree with some of your opinion. I am afraid that an encyclopedia has to have a point of view, and that point of view should strive to be neutral. In the case of fringe views, they should be reported as such, according to the weight of opinion - and they should be reported this way first and foremost. This way, students seeking basic information will get a "safer" version, if you will. While it could be a version that will seem ridiculous in posterity, it will be a version that represents consensus views today. In terms of the general point that I think you're making - I do like the idea of allowing for clearly expressed opinions from various points of view. But, it should be reflected accurately by the weight of each respective viewpoint. Tparameter (talk) 04:58, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

Ok Doc, I see what the problem is, and it is a recurrent problem. You do not understand NPOV, and you do not understand LEAD. It is not up to us to decide what the mainstream is, or what is science, or if it is fair, or open-minded, or reasonable or whatever. We just report it. According to NPOV and LEAD. End of story. --Filll (talk) 04:38, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

<sigh> Whatever floats your boat, Filll </sigh> Tell you what, why don't you pop over to my talk page, or email me, so we can thrash out a few misconceptions floating around? I would appreciate that. docboat (talk) 07:10, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

Per WP:CRYSTAL: "While scientific and cultural norms continually evolve, we cannot anticipate that evolution but must wait for it to happen." More broadly, all the policies necessary to deal with promoters of fringe theories are in place; the problem is the community's refusal to apply those policies. Raymond Arritt (talk) 04:43, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

The DGG Challenge: All you need is WP:AGF and wikilove

DGG's Claim

This is cross-posted from the homeopathy talk page

For what its worth, I think we should accept her latest list unmodified. Someone should simply expand it into an adequately sized article using the material already there. and then we sensible people can join in trying to keep it. Strange. Before i came to WP , I had quite a lot of experience arguing with bigots about science. They were defenders of such ideas as homeopathy, creationism, psychic phenomena, and related follies. I could at least understand why they were unable to resort to rational argument, as the views were in fact not rationally defensible. But it was interesting figuring it out from a sociological point of view why people would believe such things. I know many people who have various delusions and it does not affect their moral worth as people.

But I came here, and i found the worst bigots were the ones of the rational side of the arguments. They were arguing as if nobody would believe scientific evidence if it were fairly presented, as if the only way to show ignorance for what it is was to suppress it, or at least give it only a little space and then paste labels over it. Everything I know about the world convinces me of the correctness of the scientific world view and the validity of its methods of argument. Everything I know about people convinces me that the least effective way to support a good cause is to act as if it needed to be imposed on an unwilling audience by force.

The reason I avoid this argument (except for brief forays) is like Lisa's. I cannot tolerate watching good people who know science and who want to defend it making fools of themselves. There must be something about WP which causes people to take extreme positions--perhaps it's BRD. It brings out the worst in uncooperative editing. An approach at giving a reasonable approach to writing an article on a subject like this collectively seems to generally get rejected. those who care about rational medicine should try to write this article as Lina suggested, because such an article, being the plain truth, is what will persuade people. The believers in homeopathy will believe as they do regardless. Those who come here for information will get accurate information, and will be able to see how weak the non-scientific arguments are even when they are optimally presented. That's what will convince people if they're rational. If they aren't, nothing can help them -- except having the arguments calmly set out here if they ever want to actually listen. DGG (talk) 05:52, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

Filll's Response

Let me say at the outset that I like DGG. I have known DGG a long time and I think I recall voting to support his bid to be an admin. I trust DGG and his judgement in many ways, although we have our differences on some issues.

and for that matter I consider Filll one of the more reasonable people here, if somewhat impulsive. DGG (talk) 20:28, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

The AGF Claim

However, I have seen the attitude he expresses above over and over and over. The fault is always on the side of the rationalists, on the side of the pro-science community, etc. Somehow it is claimed that the problems are all on "our" pro-science side (and some certainly are) because we are not nurturing enough or tolerant enough or WP:AGF of those with WP:FRINGE views. By opposing WP:FRINGE views we have caused all this disruption and unproductivity. All that is required to make everyone on Wikipedia productive is to join hands and sing Kumbaya or "We are the World", and give out lots of wikilove and WP:AGF. And those opposing WP:FRINGE views and undue influence and imbalance are evil people and bigots, who deserve everything that has happened to them.

I've seen a lot of articles where the fault is the other way round, and I've seen a good number where everyone participating is equally unproductive. I was discussing of course a particular situation at a particular article. Judging from the history, a year ago the science people were having a hard time of it there. DGG (talk) 20:28, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

Not sure I agree with AGF Claim

I respectfully disagree, at least in part. I think part of the difficulty is either (1) the anti-WP:FRINGE community is not as skilled socially and adept as those who are making this WP:AGF argument and/or (2) those making the WP:AGF argument are unaware of the depth of the problem. To deal with both of (1) and (2), I propose a challenge I will dub the "DGG Challenge".

Comparison of DGG and Filll

Although DGG is a good editor and a good administrator and has a wide range of skills, I do not think he has spent much time in the swamps. I look at his contributions and he has a large number of edits, but few involved with building or defending and patrolling a controversial article under concerted WP:FRINGE attack. For comparison, we both started on Wikipedia at roughly the same time, but I have almost 10 edits per page, and about 25000 edits including about 11400 mainspace edits. DGG has about 28400 edits and only 1.75 edits per page, and 8325 mainspace edits. The most number of edits to any mainpage DGG has is about 60; on any article talk page about 40. These are on noncontroversial topics. I have several mainspace pages on which I have several hundred edits, and several sandbox pages on which I have several hundred edits, building the encyclopedia, often on contentitious and controversial topics. Similarly, I have several article talk pages on which I have made several hundred edits, including controversial pages like evolution and evolution related pages, intelligent design, homeopathy and black people. A huge difference in experience, frankly.

Filll is quite right. I do not make substantial edits to controversial articles where i have a strong POV. I have done a few such mediations, but always on topics that do not greatly affect my passions. Nor do I work on building up articles to GA status--I find it more critical to do something about the ones on the bottom. I did try editing evolution when I came here, and the evolutionists chased me away, saying in effect that I was a traitor because i was suggesting that the other side use better arguments. That has somewhat affected my subsequent actions here. DGG (talk) 20:28, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

Intro to DGG Challenge

Sometimes the WP:FRINGE people are like scientologists who will stop at nothing to harass, including using legal means or hacking or private investigators or allegedly even worse. Sometimes the WP:FRINGE elements are like intelligent design proponents who raise armies of sock puppets and meat puppets and canvass for them at meetings and websites and even have a paid publicity firm involved (the "Swift boat ad" firm in Virginia).

I suggest that DGG, to either show us how WP:AGF will solve all problems, and how to do it, or to learn more about what he constantly lectures about, should try to apply his theories and principles and demonstrate that they work in practice. Theory is great, but then there is practice. And pretend I am from Missouri: Show me.

DGG Challenge

To this end, I suggest that DGG adopt a controversial article of moderate intensity like homeopathy. The test should be to forge a better article than now presently exists that satisfies all the WP:FRINGE elements circulating around the project, and keep it stable and maybe even get it to FA status.

• I suggest that all other editors and admins that oppose undue and excessive WP:FRINGE material in Wikipedia and in particular in homeopathy should leave the article alone for the duration of the challenge/experiment/test.

• I suggest that the test last at least 6 months.

• I suggest that the article be completely unprotected for the duration of the test

• I suggest that DGG refrain from using his administrative tools or resorting to any administrative remedies such as RfC, RfAr, Mediators, etc during the test. If he has to do so, it should only be as a last resort after a good solid month of other efforts, and he should file all the paperwork and diffs required and gather the certifications required himself.

I have never in my life taken formal action about any article. I wouldnt know how to do it. i joined in one RfC on userconduct, which convinced me that they were bad ideas in general. If you'lll look at my log, you'll see what I do with my tools, which is almost entirely removing total garbage and sometimes blocking in connection with that.DGG (talk) 20:28, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

• I suggest that DGG patrol the article for at least 8 hours per day.

Unfortunately, the real world is still with me, and, having a deadline for a talk about wikipedia, I will not be around much the next week or so. DGG (talk) 20:28, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

• I suggest that DGG work at an intensity level to compile at least 500 edits on the mainspace page over the duration of the test. These can be either vandalism fighting, or article improvements.

• I suggest that DGG not violate 3RR, and maybe self-impose a 1RR restriction.

I use 2RR generally--if I havent made my point by then, time to try another day.DGG (talk) 20:28, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

At the end of the test period, the product should be evaluated by a neutral outside panel, mutually agreed upon, for the satisfaction of WP:UNDUE and WP:NPOV, WP:LEAD etc. It should be compared against the version of the article which first achieved GA status.

DGG can do as he stated above; start from the list of Lina's he is referring to above, or build off the current article, to create a better article that is more pleasing to the WP:FRINGE elements by the application of WP:AGF alone, and still meets the needs and requirements and policies of Wikipedia. The WP:FRINGE community should also be polled at the end to see that an overwhelming majority are satisfied with the article and the portrayal of homeopathy.

Summary

That is my proposed challenge. I think if he or a like-minded admin accepts, we should watch and learn. One way or another, we will learn something, or someone will. And I think it would be very interesting.

The question is, will one of these believers in the great WP:AGF faith step up to the plate? Or demur and back away? --Filll (talk) 14:12, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

these are just comments. If I ever accepted a role as a mediator, i would make my own suggestions about how. But guidelines for the article would be easy--I would just copy Lina's. If you want a good article, just do exactly as she suggested. DGG (talk) 20:28, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

Those are good comments. I think we want to get the widest range of ideas and inputs here while we consider this more from an abstract meta role, trying to understand exactly how best to manage WP and article creation and management, particularly in controversial areas.--Filll (talk) 02:43, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

Other discussion of DGG challenge

AGF and wikilove are part of the problem. The pov-warriors (whatever side they take, in whatever battles they choose) are here to promote their agenda by gaming the system the best they can. To them AGF is a means to play the victim when they're caught, something to accuse others of not following (even when the pov-warriors themselves assume bad faith of anyone that stands in their way). Wikilove is what the pov-warriors take advantage of when they face blocks, when they point out that others might be doing the same or worse, or that they just need a mentor or a new start. --Ronz (talk) 17:08, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

It does seem like that. But then we have wikilove true believers and those that believe the entire problem is not enough WP:AGF. So I am willing to entertain that suggestion. Show me you are right. Let's be scientists here. Don't just lecture me. Show me.--Filll (talk) 17:12, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

Ever look at the Ilena/Fyslee ArbCom? --Ronz (talk) 17:14, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

Toothless. Editor under sanctions actively edits through meatpuppets who remain unblocked after revelation. PouponOnToast (talk) 17:21, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

Yes, pretty much toothless, but shows all the problems I mention, many demonstrated within the Arbcom itself. --Ronz (talk) 17:33, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

No, is it good? Relevant? Interesting? Worthwhile? Where is it?--Filll (talk) 17:17, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

I agree that a general lack of knowledge of WP:GAME is a huge problem. This guideline does not get nearly enough exposure as it deserves, and I recommend exploiting it to the fullest extent. Too often has it been the case that a few trolls gain a foothold in an article by gaming the system, causing enormous upset and disruption before finally being chased off. This has to stop. We need Userpage {{Uw-game}} templates and a cabal of sympathetic administrators willing to intervene early in cases of system-gaming behavior. Silly rabbit (talk) 17:15, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

What is the point of this challenge? It is setting DGG up for ownership, why would we want to do that? The best articles are edited by teams of editors, there should be no reason to patrol an article for eight hours a day. This challenge needs to address how a group of editors work together not how DGG works in an article. David D. (Talk) 17:31, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

and why exactly would I want to own this article? I'd rather keep as far away from it as possible. I commented only in the hope of encouraging my friends to be more reasonable. DGG (talk) 20:30, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

You wouldn't, that is my point. You would want to edit with a team of others some of whom have a fringe perspective. Not on your own with only fringe editors. David D. (Talk) 20:59, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

That is part of my point. This is something DGG would not want to do, and I have done similar things in the past and I would definitely not want to do. Even a decline is instructive I think, but all part of considering the question about how best to manage these kinds of situations.--Filll (talk) 02:47, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

You are not quite getting the point. DGG has stated repeatedly (and others have as well) that the reason there is trouble on these WP:FRINGE and controversial science topics is that the pro-science and antiWP:FRINGE community is not able to work with WP:FRINGE proponents as part of a team, with consensus and cooperation, to build an encyclopedia.

This is a modification of my previous invitations or expressed wishes for WP:FRINGE editors to themselves to form a team to produce a better article. This is slightly modified because it would be a team of WP:FRINGE editors together with DGG, suitably restricted in his actions, but well-armed with WP:AGF and wikilove, to show either (1) how we are doing it all wrong as he claims over and over and/or (2) to learn more about the situation so he can have a more realistic picture of what is going on instead of flitting in and out like a bee visiting flowers, and not hunkering down to do the hard work of (a) building encyclopedia articles (b) forging consensus himself instead of just berating others for not being able to form a consensus (c) educating and/or convincing WP:FRINGE editors regarding the rules and principles under which WP operates (d) protecting and patrolling article long term under attack instead of theorizing about how easy it is and how worthless those who do the heavy lifting are.

The 8 hour figure is arbitrary, but what I mean is that the article should be checked at regular intervals throughout the 24 hour day and not left unattended.

Let me reiterate: I am proposing a team; a team consisting of DGG and these WP:FRINGE proponents. If he can use wikilove and WP:AGF to forge a team and a consensus with long term benefits under these circumstances, I will be mightily impressed and we will all learn something. --Filll (talk) 17:45, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

But why DGG and only one side of the debate? Surely he needs to have all opinions in his team to craft a good article with his approach? Does DGG know this is here? My guess is that his own reply would be more helpful since mine can only guess at his intentions. David D. (Talk) 17:54, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

You are quite correct. It does not have to be DGG. I only put his name on it since I have heard this claim from him several times. I have heard several others make the same assertion. But I know DGG better and his name is easy to type, so I will honor him by naming it after him.

And I do not know if DGG knows this is here or not, but I am sure he will know eventually since he does visit this page from time to time. And he can respond at that point if he so chooses. Or not.

DGG, and the WP:FRINGE proponents as well, have both claimed that the problem is that they do not need the anti-WP:FRINGE and pro-science side on the team, since the pro-science and anti-WP:FRINGE side ruin NPOV and make the articles nonneutral and attack articles etc and that we do not understand NPOV and so on.

So this is an opportunity to test that hypothesis. They make a claim or assertion or conjecture. So let's test it. Let's develop the parameters for a fair test, and test.

After all, are we scientists, or politicians here? Let's be scientists, and do a test. An experiment. And we might learn something instead of just fighting.--Filll (talk) 18:11, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

Strike or Boycott

Cross posted from my talk page--Filll (talk) 18:35, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

I agree with everything you just wrote. And it is indeed necessary to pick one's battles. Instead of "boycott" or "strike" we need to use words like "organize" and "pick our battles". There is no shame in deciding we don't have the time, as a group, to fight every unending POV battle on wikipedia. Letting some whole areas "go to the dogs" is not unreasonable given that we have millions of articles and are unpaid. Good luck to you on your online and offline endeavors! WAS 4.250 (talk) 18:24, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

I am uncomfortable with the words "strike" and "boycott" since they are inflammatory and not particularly descriptive.

I would however supporting experiments and testing, and investigating different ways to manage and develop articles.

What we have is

• a system that is currently not working optimally, or some suspect is not as good as it could be

1. A group of nonmainstream proponents who believe they could do better than what has been achieved so far using their strategies and methods
2. A group of WP admins and editors who believe that the problem is not enough wikilove and WP:AGF and that if there was more wikilove and WP:AGF that we would achieve better results using their strategies and methods.

So why not let group (1) or group (2) or both demonstrate that what they claim is true? Or why not brainstorm to see if other methods and strategies are more efficient for developing and managing articles, particularly in controversial areas?

That is all. --Filll (talk) 18:33, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

The wonderful thing about Wikipedia is that there is no covenant not to compete--strikes and boycotts are unnecessary when you can simply go somewhere else. ~ UBeR (talk) 20:30, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

In fact, you can even do both. And there is nothing whatever to keep from copying their article here., or vice-versa. The licenses, though not identical, are essentially compatible, at least for text. DGG (talk) 03:08, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

No question about it. And in fact I think Jimbo said something similar when Citizendium was announced. All these wikis are valuable, particularly if they have interchangable licenses.--Filll (talk) 03:32, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

Article probation

Cross posted from User: Jehochman's talk page: Homeopathy is being considered for article probation, but I wonder if this a good idea?--Filll (talk) 21:04, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

You think that is the way to go? I am not so sure, but maybe.--Filll (talk) 20:38, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

Let's try. If it doesn't work, we can undo it. Jehochman ^Talk 20:40, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

Well the problem is not so much incivility. There is a group, represented by User:Orangemarlin and User: Peter morrell for example, that is not always civil, but who cares? They are productive and are willing and able to follow the rules and they have demonstrated this, and as far as I am concerned, that is the main thing.

However, there is a second group, consisting of a good half dozen or more "regulars" on the homeopathy pages, and a few socks, anons, meats, etc that appear and disappear, that are (1) unproductive (2) reject ideas to try to make things productive or cooperative or bury the page in text spew repeating the same nonsense over and over so we are flooded with garbage and cannot function and (3) are unable and / or unwilling to follow the rules and procedures of Wikipedia.

I do not know if the administrative structions can handle or are even aware of the second group, since they are civil. The administrative procedures go after the first group, because they are easy to spot, particularly when one says something like "You are a flaming $#^%*!!". The system "works" and targets people from group 1, but over and over and over, ignores people from group 2.

It is just too hard and too much effort to sanction people from group two, compared to people from group one. So that is what the system does; it follows the easy path.

And we get what we get. Now by being even more aggressive, will the attention be focused on group one or group two? Cracking down on group one harder will do NOTHING that is needed. It is group two that is our root problem. --Filll (talk) 21:04, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

I will point out that there are other groups involved on all sides that are not uncivil or disruptive, or trying to forge a consensus etc.--Filll (talk) 21:04, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

Analysis of Article Probation

Now that the homeopathy articles are under probation, things might calm down on those articles, however, will the articles improve?

• When you have a hammer, everything looks like a nail. And that is what article probation is; a blunt instrument.

• If admins are going to be more aggressive about enforcing NPOV etc, I am not hopeful. Many of the homeopathy proponents are subverting NPOV, pushing unreliable or discredited studies, using unreliable sources, and pushing this same material 10, 20, 50 times after it was shot down. They just bury the opposition, and wear them out, or get the opposition to lash out in less than civil manner after they hear the same discussion many many times. However, an admin coming to this discussion without being familiar with the science, or the history of the page, will of course just go with the homeopathy proponents with their volumes of information and mostly civil manner.

• If article probation is the only path to a quality article, why did intelligent design and evolution make it there without article probation?

• I fear that admins like this tool because it gives them more power and they can stamp out incivility. But incivility is not the problem. It is the baiting and the refusal to listen to the countervailing arguments and to compromise, and to agree what is a WP:RS, and abide by things like WP:LEAD and WP:FRINGE and WP:NPOV.

• As Jim62sch and others have pointed out, how do we know what is a homeopathy article? Charles Darwin took a homeopathy remedy for a while and then abandoned it because it did not work. This lead homeopathy proponents to introduce a paragraph or two about homeopathy into the Darwin article, and have announced, with administrator support, that it is their intention to put homeopathy into every single biography of every single famous person that ever tried it. And announced that they want separate homeopathy miniarticles in every substance that is used in homeopathy remedies (does this include sugar and water? ) How many hundreds, or thousands or tens of thousands of articles with minihomeopathy sections in them would this be? Will admins stop this? At least one or two now is promoting this. There is no consensus and no agreement and no compromise about what to do here, and I think it is vital.

All in all, I do not predict that this will be beneficial without coming to terms with some of the underlying problems we need to agree on things like:

• how many minihomeopathy articles are reasonable and where.

• what is NPOV here

and similar things, not on stomping on X because he called Y's profession a load of  %$^^&%.--Filll (talk) 14:12, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

Well, the first thing to get straight is that we have to be unfailingly civil, almost to the point of unctuous ingratiation. Nothing else will work because the admins calling for probation have stated that they don't care about content, only conduct. Experience shows the homeopaths will try to goad others into losing their cool. Don't take the bait. Raymond Arritt (talk) 14:19, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

Yes clearly so. I am intending to participate even less than I was already participating because it is just going to be too dangerous. If others do what I am intending to do, it will be in effect a version of the expert strike on homeopathy.

Also, what is interesting to me is that the WP:AGF only medicine did not cure the patient, so the prescription is to give 10 times as much of the same WP:AGF medicine and see if this works.--Filll (talk) 14:33, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

Are you suggesting that diluting WP:AGF to nothing be more potent? Now you're sounding like the homeopaths :) Sorry i couldn't resist. And i see the flaws in my argument. David D. (Talk) 16:30, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

That is a good joke. What I am suggesting, in everything I have written on this issue, is that we have to experiment and do tests and see the results. And then we might learn something. To claim that the entire problem with WP is that we do not WP:AGF enough, and that is destroying the project, really is just a bit of an untested and unproven hypothesis to me. Let's formulate some other hypotheses and try them and see the results. Let's do trial and error and learn something, instead of some politically correct proclamations.

Of course we can enforce WP:AGF. But will it result in better articles?--Filll (talk) 16:38, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

if anyone is actually proposing to start ignoring AGF, "as an experiment," they will probably find themselves blocked. Experimenting in this way with WP will most likely be considered disruption. DGG (talk) 20:07, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

Would you consider calling other editors "stubborn" the kind of thing that would be "disruptive?" PouponOnToast (talk) 20:18, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

No, one has to do much more than that, to violate NPA. I suggest not making the experiment :). DGG (talk) 22:55, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

So somewhere between "shit eating dicklicker" and "stubborn" is the kind of name that I can expect to be called by people on "probation?" How about "pov-warrior?" PouponOnToast (talk) 22:56, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

(ec)You might want to scroll a couple of sections up to see the experiment he's referring to - it's in fact quite the opposite, to see if AGF and wikilove alone can make a good article. --Infophile ^{(Talk) (Contribs)} 20:19, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

When did I ever use the term "wikilove"? I do accept that I usually do assume good faith, because how can one make progress otherwise? Bu maybe I use the term too much, and maybe I sometimes use it with an ironic implication. If you need to say someone is editing in good faith, it tends to mean that you think he's editing wrongly. DGG (talk) 23:07, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

I personally have never seen DGG use the term "wikilove". I added it to add a little levity to the more serious question here about how best to manage our portfolio of resources, editors and articles.--Filll (talk) 02:50, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

Yes exactly. I want to see if using HUGE amounts of AGF and wikilove and tolerance of newbies and trolling and socks etc will help. Some claim it will. Let's see.

Also, some are claiming that using words like "stubborn" or phrases like "homeopathy promoter" are uncivil, and people who use those uncivil phrases are not AGF and should therefore be blocked. Ok, fair enough. I do not think I buy it. I just start to wonder if we are not taking things too far?

I would NOT say we need the wild west here with no AGF rules at all. However, I have said repeatedly I respect someone like User: Peter morrell, who is occasionally uncivil and a homeopathy supporter but a world expert in homeopathy and very productive here, FAR more than some homeopathy supporters who are incredibly civil, but just unproductive, and working at cross purposes to NPOV, LEAD, FRINGE, RS etc.

I think the goal should be productivity and efficiency over all, not a wikilove festival. Of course if things are too uncivil and not enough AGF is used, the project productivity will probably suffer as well, because people will not want to join or stay or contribute.

It is a tradeoff. All I am arguing for is an open mind, and a willingness to test our assumptions, and make sure we understand the difference between the goals and the means. AGF is not a goal in itself and should not be. It is only helpful if it helps us meet the real goal, which is productivity.

And if we dump someone like Peter morrell who is productive and a contributor but sometimes uncivil, we will suffer on the productivity end, but maybe have a more civil environment. See? I would keep Peter and his occasional exasperated outbursts over several others I could name who do not have outbursts, but are not at ALL productive and not working within the WP framwork and policies.

Is that clearer?--Filll (talk) 20:28, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

While a wikilove vs tough love test would be neat, it seems to me productive to see if the German's are really having more success. A 'panel' of scientists who have experience at both the English vs the German Wikipedias could see if Speculations regarding German Wikipedia is applicable. Maybe the Germans have the right or at least most efficient approach. Cheers! Wassupwestcoast (talk) 21:04, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia Institute of Management Studies

Does such a thing exist, under this name or another? Should such a thing exist? A central clearing house for studies of the functioning of WP and its growth or change, and how it responds to various policies and management strategies and directives? If such a thing does not exist, it should feature essays/papers and surveys etc to try to get feedback and information for more optimally managing this enterprise. Comments?--Filll (talk) 02:37, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

Some members of Wikipedia Review have made superficial efforts in this direction. Some academic studies of wikipedia exist on the net and can be found with google searches. The trouble is that careful studies are either limited in scope or out of date; and most of what exists in the way of evaluation is anecdotal and biased. What is needed is funding to do a constant ever updated impartial evaluation. Wikimedia is just now getting its act together enough to be able to approach other existing nonprofits with grant proposals for things like this. WAS 4.250 (talk) 10:52, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

See Wikipedia:Wikipedia in academic studies for published academic articles about wikipedia. --Salix alba (talk) 11:57, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

I think that it would be valuable if we formed such an organization internally to start collecting pointers to these resources, and featuring our own essays etc and doing surveys etc.--Filll (talk) 15:15, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

Striking example of wikilove

Now this is what I am talking about !--Filll (talk) 15:17, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

Another perfect example, as I am accused of WP:SYN:[2]. So...--Filll (talk) 17:31, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

I notice the talk page there is now being spammed, as it has been for months on end, with nonsense, and now it appears as though a new account is involved. As I have seen several times before. Hmm...--Filll (talk) 17:47, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

Fill, part of the nonsense there is your misunderstanding of the methods of statistical meta-analysis. No evidence of efficacy is not evidence of lack of efficacy. DGG (talk) 05:01, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

Actually it can be. The logic behind it is a tad complicated, but when you've actually looked for evidence and failed to find it, this is in actuality evidence against. I wrote up a blog post on it a while back I'll just direct you to for the long version: [3]. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Infophile (talk • contribs) 05:04, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

Resp DGG, I went to a very enlightening talk on meta-analysis once and one of the things complained about was lack of negative studies. Lack of data will skew the results of a meta-analysis. This is especially important in things like tests for new cancer drugs which generally only have a small percentage of improvement. A few missing negative studies could make the difference between a drug being approved or not. --Salix alba (talk) 08:27, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

Tests and meta-analyses are needed to make good judgments when a treatment has a plausible mode of action. As for homeopathy... Raymond Arritt (talk) 10:27, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

As I pointed out on the talk page, and pointed out many other places, it is impossible to "prove" that homeopathy does not work. Proof and truth are for mathematics and logic, not science.

In science, you can either find evidence, or no evidence. If you find no evidence, you can report "no evidence", which is what you should do. If you find evidence, you can report "evidence" which is what you should do. If you find that your study and/or other studies were faulty and so you cannot report evidence or no evidence, you should report "we were incompetent and designed faulty studies...oops".

Now I have not read the study or studies in question. However, my understanding from others that have read these studies is that there are some results in the study constitute "no evidence", and some that might be in the "we have such lousy studies we cannot say anything" category. This should be reported carefully and accurately, for what they are. If any study finds no evidence, you should not report it as "we have such lousy studies that we cannot say anything".

And why is Wikipedia using reports that completely consist entirely of "we have such lousy studies that we cannot say anything"? Surely after millions of dollars of effort in dozens of countries for decades, we have some decent studies we can report on, which either produced either "evidence" or "no evidence". I find it hard to believe that all of these studies are designed badly or neglected some important part of the homeopath's procedure to make it work. Seems a bit odd to me somehow...--Filll (talk) 15:42, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

Anyone surprised?

[4]. No further comment necessary. --Infophile ^{(Talk) (Contribs)} 05:19, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

Give up and join the boycott until admins are left with managing their own creation. Until it is content over civility, the civil editwarrers will win. Shot info (talk) 05:26, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

Oh, I've already signed up for the boycott. I just wasn't aware it had actually started. --Infophile ^{(Talk) (Contribs)} 05:29, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

No time like now! Shot info (talk) 05:46, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

You guys are really boycotting? For real? And if so, by what criteria and when would you come back? If already written, just point me... ——Martin^phi ☎ Ψ Φ—— 05:58, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

As a start you can add your names to here. Shot info (talk) 06:19, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

Silly. The community isn't going to throw out Civility. A far better solution would be to try to work within the established guidelines and be Civil about it.Wjhonson (talk) 05:06, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

No, the community certainly isn't going to throw out civility. No-one here is suggesting that. But it will throw out content. What does dispute resolution prioritise? Mostlyharmless (talk) 22:52, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

Unfortunately the established guidelines are being ignored by admins as they only monitor civil. So content suffers by admin ignorance. How to fix it? Admins need to overcome their ignorance of the subject matter, rather than rewarding the civil POVpusher. Easy solution but most admins are pushing back because they realise it requires some effort on their behalf and most are only after the kudos anyway... Shot info (talk) 22:57, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

I have to agree with Raymond (if he actually said this): you're handing over a huge issue when you essentially forgo civility or set up an either-content-or-civility dichotomy. Civility enables you to persuade other people, which is why it's important in this sort of environment. Incivility is much more apparent at a quick glance than things like tendentious editing, POV-pushing, etc assuming they are done with any degree of subtlety. Why shoot yourself in the foot and make it easy for people to ignore what you (we) have to say? MastCell ^Talk 23:01, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

There wouldn't be much of a problem if the incivility level that got you punished involved something along the level of cursing out other editors. However, the bar seems to be much lower. Simple sarcasm is out of the question, even when used to illustrate a point. In my case, I originally used that comment to make a point about how irrelevant and subjective arguments about a category being a pejorative are. When Arion repeated the same argument he'd used before (even though it was addressed), I repeated my illustrative sarcasm. However, since I figured it wasn't necessary to put in the disclaimer about the intent of it a second time (I was wrong), it was deemed uncivil.

Meanwhile, Dana Ullman gets his sarcasm/snideness defended by his mentor. He might not have gotten away with that on any page relating to Homeopathy, but if that behavior is at all uncivil, it shouldn't be defended like that by an admin. On the other hand, if that doesn't qualify as uncivil, why did I get banned for a similar act? You see how nebulous the bar is for incivility? --Infophile ^{(Talk) (Contribs)} 23:42, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

Yes, incivility is inherently subjective and arbitrarily defined, which is why I hate the idea of blocking or sanctioning solely based on incivility. But the underlying problem remains: regardless of whether you're blocked, banned, or patted on the back by a sympathetic mentor, incivility erodes one's credibility and ability to get things done. I've learned this the hard way (I'm still learning) - but WP:CIVIL is not the enemy here. MastCell ^Talk 23:45, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

You are correct, WP:CIVIL isn't the issue, the issue is admins rewarding POV-pushing by civil editors. NPOV loses, content loses, the encyclopedia loses. But heck, it's a nice civil place... Shot info (talk) 23:53, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

Simple sarcasm is out of the question, even when used to illustrate a point.' this is a problem with online media, what you may mean in jest can be taken a very different way. All the subtle body language and voice inflections are lost. Many problems arise when an statement is miss-interpreted. --Salix alba (talk) 23:56, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

(ec)While I agree pretty much with what you're saying, it does raise one subtle problem: If incivility is subjective, it's all too easy for some person to go to a point which doesn't cross their own threshold of what counts as incivility, but does cross someone else's threshold. Even if you think you're holding yourself in check enough, someone else might not think so. The only way to avoid this is to be unerringly polite, but human nature prevents perfect politeness in situations like this where frustrations tend to build. Personally, I tend to become sarcastic when frustrated, and though this doesn't cross my personal threshold for incivility, apparently it does for others. --Infophile ^{(Talk) (Contribs)} 23:58, 4 February 2008 (UTC)