Tony Sidaway wrote,
>As far as I'm aware, there are no useless or unacceptable
>sources (even /dev/random has a value in the right context), only useless
>and unacceptable citations.
You are not being clear, but I think you are saying that all sources are
valid, but they can be used properly or improperly (for example, Nazi
propaganda about Jews tells you very little about Jews, but tells you a lot
about Nazis). I agree. When I said that some sources are unacceptable, I
thought it was understood that I meant in relation to a particular point
concerning a particular item in a given article (this is I think how the
policies are written so I thought that would be obvious; maybe the policies
could be clearer although I really thought it was obvious).
In any event, conflicts over how to use sources is at the heart of many
content-centered problems at Wikipedia, and arguments over the relevance
and proper use of sources is at the heart of many edit and revert wars that
go on for months and months. This is the problem, and we do need to
address it.
I have stated my views: first, this sort of problem often does not involve
the violation of behavioral guidelines, so the mediation and arbitrations
committees will not address them; second, on many topics there relatively
few of the editors active at Wikipedia have enough substantive knowledge to
evaluate such conflicts over content (they can of course help in editing
the language to make it clearer -- but clear expression is different from
the validity and value of what is being expressed), so the ordinary
mechanism of free content/anyone can edit often does not work. For these
two reasons, I think we need to figure out some other mechanism.
I know many people reasonably disagree with me over the solution. But the
problem itself is real.
Steve
Steven L. Rubenstein
Associate Professor
Department of Sociology and Anthropology
Bentley Annex
Ohio University
Athens, Ohio 45701
>steven l. rubenstein said:
> >
> >>"Tony Sidaway" <minorityreport(a)bluebottle.com>
> >>
> >>Quality of source is usually (but not always) POV. We're supposed to be
> >>writing NPOV articles.
> >>A caveat such as "warning: the article relies on population projections
> >>that were proven by events to be grossly in error" is fine and NPOV. A
> >>caveat such as "the claims at this site are patently incorrect" is POV
> >>and superfluous. Otherwise rely on the general site content disclaimer
> >>and the reader's commonsense.
> >
> > I believe this misrepresents our policy.
>Could you be more specific?
I'm afraid you will have to read my entire e-mail, and not just the first
sentence. I do not see how I could possibly be more specific than I am in
the three paragraphs that you didn't seem to read. If you read them and
don't think I am being specific, I am sorry but I cannot help you. It's as
specific as one can get.
But my advice to you is to read over the other policies that I mention
carefully, and perhaps read through the entire histories of the various
cases that others have mentioned as examples of prolonged conflict over
content. I think if you know more about Wikipedia policies and practices,
you will find it easier to follow this discussion.
Steve
Steven L. Rubenstein
Associate Professor
Department of Sociology and Anthropology
Bentley Annex
Ohio University
Athens, Ohio 45701
So now I have copies of the UN documents listed by
Mitchell Bard. I'll write a report on the contents in
[[Talk:Estimates of the Palestinian Refugee flight of 1948]]
sometime in the next 6-10 hours. Suffice it to say that
Bard did not correctly report them, nor did either Jay
or Bj�rn guess what the 472,000 is.
Zero.
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Bjourne,
If the number is sourced with all the caveats explained, I don't
understand the problem including it. Also, "I wrote him and he didn't
answer" is not a proof that the citation is false.
I am writing this here because I don't know where else
to write it -- perhaps [[Wikipedia talk:Mediation
Committee]] would be preferable, but judging from the
situation I am about to describe, the page doesn't
seem to be particularly closely watched at present.
The MC is currently in an apparent standstill: there
are several requests for mediation that have evidently
gone without response from a mediator for weeks, half
the committee has left for the AC, and the committee's
chair (Bcorr, a fine contributor and mediator) is
seemingly on indefinite leave (certainly he's been
away from mediation for a number of weeks, and I
haven't seen an anticipated return date). To remedy
this situation, which was obviously critical as long
as a month ago, several users (myself included)
presented ourselves as candidates in mid- to late
December. Several of us have, as yet, received
nothing but support votes from the MC and outside
voters. No action, however, has been taken to promote
us....I suspect it is because there is no Chair active
to declare decisions final.
I am, of course, very hesitant to say anything about
this for fear of sounding as though I am grasping for
a role on the MC -- I don't want anyone to have the
impression I'm desperate for power (frankly, the break
following the AC elections has been wonderful). But
mediation needs to be fixed and soon, especially
because AC cases have been refused for not following
dispute resolution steps -- not having an active MC
makes dispute resolution extremely difficult.
I am hoping this note sparks someone's attention to
get the ball rolling. Obviously, as a candidate, I
can't really "be bold" and promote a bunch of us, and
if mediation is alive and well (presumably on a page
other than Wikipedia:Requests for mediation), I hope
someone will tell me. But something needs to be done
before we have too many users (who are apparently open
to mediation) who get entrenched in opposition to each
other because a window of opportunity is lost. Sorry
to be alarmist. Best wishes to all,
James R.
en:User:Jwrosenzweig
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Hello, everybody! I like to draw your attention to the page "Estimates
of the Palestinian Refugee flight of 1948"
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Estimates_of_the_Palestinian_Refugee_flight_of…).
The page lists estimates of how many Palestinian refugees where
created in the 1948 Arab-Israeli war. There are quite a few different
estimates out there, all diverging from each other. Therefore, and
because Jayjg insisted on inserting the number 472,000 in the article
History of Israel
(Ihttp://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=History_of_Israel&diff=6566071&o…),
I felt that a separate page was necessary.
Recently, that page has suffered a violent revert war, in which me,
Jayjg and Viriditas was the combatants. The issue is over the
following text:
472,000 According to the "Progress Report of the United Nations
Mediator on Palestine", as cited by Mitchell Bard on the Jewish
Virtual Library. [1]
[1] links to this page:
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/myths/mf14.html#2
Jayjg insists on retaining that source, while I want it removed. Yes,
it is true that Mitchell Bard claims he is getting the estimate
472,000 Palestinian refugees from the UN document "Progress Report of
the United Nations Mediator on Palestine," but a large part of that
document is availible online, from UN:s own site:
http://domino.un.org/UNISPAL.NSF/0/ab14d4aafc4e1bb985256204004f55fa?OpenDoc…
That document does not mention any estimate of the total number of
refugees. However, this page:
http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/decade/decad170.htm
Contains some more bits of "Progress Report of the United Nations
Mediator on Palestine" which mention the number "360,000 Arab refugees
and 7,000 Jewish refugees requiring aid in that country and adjacent
States." Because of this information and the fact that the number
472,000 Palestinian refugees cannot be traced to any other source, I
doubt that the UN Mediator ever wrote it. I've also had an e-mail
conversation with Mitchell Bard and he has so far refused to quote the
full line(s) from where his number 472,000 comes from. To me, that and
the fact that he is an editor of a strongly pro-Israel site
(www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org), does make his claim less believable.
That is the reason I didn't want the page Estimates of the Palestinian
Refugee flight of 1948, to tell the reader that the UN Mediator (Count
Folke Bernadotte) wrote 472,000. Because currently there is no
evidence for that, other than that Mitchell Bard has written it.
Therefore, I wanted the text to read as follows:
472,000 According to Mitchell Bard on the Jewish Virtual Library. [1]
But if someone can provide a more definite source than Mitchell Bard,
the situation changes.
The other reason that the number 472,000 should not be attributed to
the UN Mediator's report is that it was written before September 16,
1948, many months before the conflict ended. Israel's operations in
the Galilee hadn't even begun! It is estimated that in that operation
1-200,000 Arabs were driven from their homes.
How can you make an estimate of something that hasn't occured yet?!
...
This I have told Jayjg many times
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Palestine-info/Ignoring_the_datum),
and after many days of exhausting discussion, he has changed his
paragraph a little:
472,000 by September 16, 1948 according to the "Progress Report of
the United Nations Mediator on Palestine", as cited by Mitchell Bard
on the Jewish Virtual Library. [1]
But that is still far from factual. What Mitchell Bard really claimed
can be seen when visiting his article:
"This meant no more than 650,000 Palestinian Arabs could have become
refugees. A report by the UN Mediator on Palestine arrived at an even
lower figure -- 472,000"
This claim is made in a paragraph in which he is discussing how many
"Palestinians became refugees in 1947-1949." There is no mention of
the fact that the report was published September 16. If you read the
paragraph it becomes clear that what he is trying to do is to lure the
reader to believe that the UN Mediator estimated that 472,000
Palestinians became refugees due to the war. Therefore, the new
version that Jayjg tried with is also bad - noone but people
knowledgeable about Israeli-Palestinian history knows that a large
number (hundreds of thousands) of Palestinian refugees was created
after September 1948. They will be fooled.
And also, Mitchell Bard did definitely not claim that the UN Mediator
counted 472,000 Palestinian refugees by September 16, 1948.
To solve this dispute, I tried with a footnote:
1: Mitchell Bard alleges that the UN official record "Progress Report
of the United Nations Mediator on Palestine" estimates that the number
of refugees was 472,000. The progress report was published on
September 16, 1948, ten months before the hostilities and the refugee
flight ended. Large parts of the report is availible here
(http://domino.un.org/UNISPAL.NSF/0/ab14d4aafc4e1bb985256204004f55fa?OpenDoc…).
It is estaminated that hundreds of thousands of Palestinians left in
the months after September, 1948. The number 472,000 should therefore
not be seen as an estimate of the total number of refugees, rather as
an estimate on how many Palestinian refugees there were in September
1948.
This compromise was not acceptable to Jayjg who has continued to
revert. So now I'm at loss of what to do. I've posted a Request for
Comments but it hasn't helped very much. One editor said that my
attention was an attempt to skew the article to a particular POV.
Another said the number might be comparing apples to oranges.
This mail is long, probably too long for people to read. The issue
isn't very important and there are many much worse instances of POV in
Wikipedia than this one. But that is why it is so astonishing to me
that it has taken so much time to try and correct one minor POV
detail. I've tried to discuss for over three months now with Jayjg,
but it just doesn't seem to work. His editing behaviour is very
hostile - if something is even slightly POV according to his
perception he will always revert instead of trying to fix it or
working out a compromise. I've written for Wikipedia for over four
years but I've never encountered an editor quite like him.
I don't know what to do. Do you?
--
mvh Björn
zero 0000 said:
> For example he claims results
> of a British census in 1945 when everyone
> knows that the last census was in 1931.
Tony Sidaway replied:
> Well actually there was an extraordinary census in 1939, so the
> information for 1945 wasn't entirely useless. Only somewhat useless,
> given the intervening war and the associated rapid social changes.
There were only two censuses, in 1922 and 1931. There was no
census of the general population in 1939. All figures for the overall
population published by the British after 1931 were adjustments to
the 1931 figures derived from counting of births, deaths and
migration. One of the sources of dispute regarding the number
of Palestinian refugees in 1948 is an Israeli claim that the British
population figure for Arabs was too high by 6%, which the British
denied.
Zero.
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There's going to be a Wikimedia/Wikipedia booth in the exhibition hall
at the Southern California Linux Expo, coming up on February 12-13, 2005
at the Los Angeles Convention Center.
More information on the expo in general: http://socallinuxexpo.com/
We'll have a computer set up for visitors to marvel at Wikipedia, and
perhaps trundle out some fliers or a few CD-Rs of goodies. If you'd like
to help out manning the booth, *please* sign yourself up here:
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Southern_California_Linux_Expo
and drop me an e-mail. So far there's only one other guy listed and I
have no contact information for him.
-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)
Hi,
Tony Sidaway sez:
===
*do not engage in an edit war*
And if and when there is a discussion. *listen* to what people say.
Everybody loves to be listened to.
And then, when you've done enough listening, if you're still sure that
your edit enjoys so much support that it's the right thing to do, *ram
that sucker in again* and *invite people to revert it if they think that
is the right thing to do.*
If this doesn't work for you, it's probably because you haven't yet
learned how to build a consensus.
===
This works 99% of the time. But the LaRouche supporters are not interested in consensus. They firmly believe that LaRouche is the world's greatest economist and thinker. They are on a mission. They believe that everyone who has ever written an article critical of LaRouche is part of a conspiracy that began in ancient Babylon.
As Winston Churchill said: "A fanatic is one who can't change his mind and won't change the subject."
The material the LaRouche supporters post is overwhelmingly from LaRouche publications. They make fantastic claims. The repeatedly engage in personal attacks. They make claims that are false simply based on their one statements on the Talk pages. They will lose some text in a discussion and it appears a few days later, or they arbitrarily delete text that is appropriate. In my case they keep claiming I have invented, misrepresented, or cooked quotes. I have posted whole blocks of text online to show the context, and then they demand that I post an image file to make sure I am not lying.
On the page explaining NPOV it states "Many POV battles would be made much easier through the practice of good research. Facts are not points of view in and of themselves. So an easy way to avoid making a statement that promotes a point of view is to find a reputable source for a fact and cite the source. This is an easy way to characterize a side of a debate without promoting a view. The trick is to find the best and most reputable source you can. "
LaRouche material should be cited when appropriate, but it is taking over page after page on Wikipedia without proper balance or clear discussion of what reputable majority views are about LaRouche and his group. We can be fair to the LaRouche point of view but only if there is some way to resist their constant bullying. I invite everone to visit the LaRouche-related pages and see what is going on. It is not a situation created because we have not "learned how to build a consensus."
Chip Berlet
(Cberlet)
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>"Tony Sidaway" <minorityreport(a)bluebottle.com>
>
>Quality of source is usually (but not always) POV. We're supposed to be
>writing NPOV articles.
>A caveat such as "warning: the article relies on population projections
>that were proven by events to be grossly in error" is fine and NPOV. A
>caveat such as "the claims at this site are patently incorrect" is POV and
>superfluous. Otherwise rely on the general site content disclaimer and
>the reader's commonsense.
I believe this misrepresents our policy. NPOV is very important as a guide
to both content and behavior. But it is not our only policy. Nor original
research, verifiability, and cite sources are equally important
policies. Moreover, those policies make clear that differences in the
nature and reliability or repute of sources must be taken into account and
acknowledged in articles.
If this were not the case, and if NPOV were the only policy, or a policy
that trumps all others, then Wikipedia would not be an encyclopedia, it
would be a bulletin board for everyone's views on everything -- more like
Everything2, maybe. I oppose this.
I understand that the two policies -- say, NPOV and Verifiability -- may
come into conflict. On such occasions we need to be very careful as we
attempt to negotiate an outcome that is, as best possible, in accordance
with the spirit of both policies. But one cannot absolutely trump the other.
Steve
Steven L. Rubenstein
Associate Professor
Department of Sociology and Anthropology
Bentley Annex
Ohio University
Athens, Ohio 45701