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)

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)

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)

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 positition 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)