I don't mind a bit of science creeping into Wikipedia, but let's not
exalt it or enshrine it. Science can make mistakes.
If a bunch of scientists agree on something, that doesn't make it true.
If they change their minds later, that doesn't make it false.
If a hypothesis is true, but scientists refuse to accept it, that
doesn't make it false. And if they eventually decide to accept it, that
ACCEPTANCE does not MAKE IT become true.
What bothers me is when some contributors insist that Wikipedia endorse
a particular point of view (see [[Wikipedia:POV]]) on the grounds that
"scientists believe it" or that "it is scientific". Much ink has been
spilled (or phosphor illuminated) to show that, e.g., the runaway
greenhouse theory (aka Global Warming) enjoys consensus support of the
world's climatologists and that THEREFORE this encyclopedia should stop
dicking around and just ENDORSE it.
I have pretty much decided to stay away from the climate pages, because
I'm tired of this battle. But I'm never going to drop the subject
completely: the subject being,
* "How shall Wikipedia describe unsettled scientific questions?"
1. Perhaps my first error is to assume that global warming has not been
settled. The United Nations' climate panel makes it sound like there's
virtually no other hypothesis being entertained. Only nuts like Singer,
Lindzen and Balunias think otherwise (and they're obviously on the
industry payroll, so they can safely be ignored).
2. Or perhaps even if it's been "settled" (in the sense of all but an
inconsiderable percentage of the world's scientists endorsing it),
Wikipedia should still remain neutral on the question - saying only that
XX% of the world's scientists endorse the theory, according to surveys
conducted by P, Q, and R.
Ed Poor
Great-grandson of the notable astronomer Charles Lane Poor
Nathan J. Yoder wrote:
>>I'm a bit puzzled by your angered reaction. You're making it sound like
>>I was expressing some sort of grudge against you. I assure you I don't.
>>Please calm down a bit.
>>
>>
>I'm a bit puzzled as to why you think I'm angered
>
Flooding a mailing list with messages (by my count, 19 in a little over
24 hours) that are loaded with sarcastic invective will give almost
everyone reading the impression that you're angry.
--Michael Snow
[[Category:Pseudoscience]] is one which gets objections at fairly
regular intervals. The reasons for the objections are pretty
straightforward -- the users making such objections are almost always
either Creationists or Eugenicists or other people who believe in
bodies of thought labeled as "pseudoscience" -- and the response is
generally pretty straightforward as well: Wikipedia is not claiming
these so-labeled articles are actually "pseudoscience", but rather
that they are labeled *by the mainstream scientific community* as
"pseudoscience".
And the text of the category page and the [[Pseudoscience]] article
spell this out pretty clearly, in my mind. The article itself goes to
much length to talk about how the notion itself is seen as somewhat
dubious even in circles of people not labeled as such -- philosophers
and historians of science, for example, have at times gone to lengths
to argue that the boundaries between what is a "science" and what is
not are exceedingly difficult to lay down. Feyerabend, for example,
made a large point out of showing that many things today considered
canonical distinctions between "science" and other modes of thought
did not apply to many of the "fathers" of science (i.e. Galileo,
Newton, etc.) and others have made similar observations both in
historical and current science. After a century of thought on it, the
demarcation problem has still not been convincingly solved.
Okay. So we have a nice NPOV article on the subject itself. But what
about the category? Does that nuance and care get lost when articles
just say "Pseudoscience" at the bottom of the page? Can we trust the
user to click it and read our little explanation/disclaimer?
Let's assume that we can, for a moment.
What if we had an article on [[Satanic lies]], which explains that
followers of certain religion sects view a number of modern practices
and beliefs as lies of the Devil. It also notes that quite a few other
religion sects don't believe in this, and that mainstream philosophers
and scientists find this a pretty poor model of thought. After ten
centuries of thought, the problem of knowing what is a Satanic lie or
not has still not been convincingly solved. A nice, NPOV article.
Would we accept a placement of [[Category:Satanic lie]] onto pages
about Evolution? Sure, the category page itself would not, "Now, this
is only believed by a certain group."
Would we allow it? If not, why not? Do we accept it if we lean towards
the mainstream opinion in categorization efforts, or do we see this as
a NPOV problem?
I've been defending the presence of [[Category:Pseudoscience]] for
some time now as a sociological category, but it occurred to me today
that one could imagine all sorts of circumstances in which it would
seem hopelessly POV to have category labels of this sort (one could
include things like [[Category:Hoaxes]] or [[Category:Conspiracies]]
or whatever in this, if those categories exist), even if their actual
articles (and even category pages) were written in perfect NPOV. Does
the brevity of category labels make this impossible? I'm beginning to
think they might, and that these sorts of categories should be
converted wholly into lists. I wouldn't mind a [[List of Satanic
lies]] which clearly noted who thought they were and included
[[Evolution]] on the list. But I would mind having [[Category:Satanic
lie]] put onto the Evolution page.
Any input on this would be appreciated as I mull this over.
FF
Begin forwarded message:
> From: Fred Bauder <fredbaud(a)ctelco.net>
> Date: July 2, 2005 9:45:36 AM MDT
> To: "Nathan J. Yoder" <njyoder(a)energon.org>
> Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] Personal attacks and low EQs
>
>
>
> On Jul 2, 2005, at 8:32 AM, Nathan J. Yoder wrote:
>
>>> "You are a hypocrite" is a personal attack. "You seem to apply a
>>> lenient standard to yourself and a strict standard to others" is a
>>> description of behavior, particularly if you cite examples.
>>>
>>
>> Those mean the exact same thing! You just gave the definition of a
>> hypocrite. You're making a meaningless distinction here and I
>> seriously doubt you follow your own logic. Are you saying you've
>> never called someone a troll or accused them of using sock puppets?
>> Can you honestly say that you've been using a very long-winded,
>> politically correct version of a troll accusation?
>>
>> And I do give examples, but you seem to keep ignoring that repeatedly
>> because it suits you to ignore it.
>>
>> You REALLY do not have the authority to make an arbitrary distinction
>> like that as it's outlined in *zero* policies.
>
> What it says, at [[Wikipedia:No_personal_attacks#Don.27t_do_it]]
> (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:No_personal_attacks#Don.
> 27t_do_it) is "Comment on content, not on the contributor." Let's
> suppose you are trying to add content and someone is reverting it
> on the basis that it is "personal research" "POV" "unsourced" or
> whatever. You look at their edits and find they are doing the same
> thing or a number of other things equally bad and are vigorously
> defending their actions behind a smokescreen of righteousness. This
> is all publicly visible on Wikipedia and can be demonstrated by
> diffs. Going to a person's talk page or the talk page of an article
> and discussing this double standard is not a personal attack. A
> bald statement that someone is a "hypocrite" is.
>
> I have sinned and doubtless will sin again; however, I think I'm
> doing better; partly because looking at all the ways people get it
> wrong and serving as a spokesman for Wikipedia policies does get me
> to thinking about my own behavior. When you find yourself about to
> do something you have banned someone for you can sometimes pay
> enough attention that you don't do it.
>
> As to authority, doubtless Wikipedia policies can be expressed more
> clearly, doubtless decisions of the Arbitration Committee could be
> both plainer and more comprehensive, but Jimbo and through him the
> Arbitration Committee do have authority to make reasonable
> decisions. Please keep in mind that you are only being limited in
> the range of voluntary work you chose to do on a particular website.
>
> This politically correct business is worth a comment. If I succeed
> in following Wikipedia policy or correctly restating it I am in
> some sense "correct" in that I have followed the "party line." That
> is what I am supposed to do. I am not in a state of sin because I
> describe in detail behavior which could be summarized as an
> invidious characterization.
>
> Fred
Begin forwarded message:
> From: Fred Bauder <fredbaud(a)ctelco.net>
> Date: July 2, 2005 8:17:59 AM MDT
> To: "Nathan J. Yoder" <njyoder(a)energon.org>
> Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] Personal attacks and low EQs
>
>
> "You are a hypocrite" is a personal attack. "You seem to apply a
> lenient standard to yourself and a strict standard to others" is a
> description of behavior, particularly if you cite examples. There
> are several policies which do require you to be Mr. Nice Guy in
> addition to general exhortations about Wikiipedia:Wikilove:
> Wikipedia:No personal attacks and Wikipedia:Civility.
>
> And by the way, this is not "Gotcha." You are subject to a one year
> ban on editing articles which relate to gender or sexuality. All
> the rest of Wikipedia is open to you including all the policy
> discussions. You are subject to a personal attack parole for one
> year. Just don't do it. You are by no means done here. Now as a
> practical matter, you can, if you chose to, convert this minor
> setback into general opprobrium, but that is your responsibility.
>
> Fred
>
> On Jul 2, 2005, at 7:46 AM, Nathan J. Yoder wrote:
>
>> There's no policy on Wikipedia saying you have to be Mr. Nice Guy.
>> Whenever I make an accusation like hypocrite, I always explain why
>> I'm
>> giving that accusation. So this doesn't make any sense at all,
>> you're
>> saying I'm allowed to do it with explanation, but that's exactly what
>> I was banned for doing.
>>
>> So let me get this straight about the real policy: if you're in favor
>> with the admins and you make an accusation of hypocrisy with an
>> accusation, it's ok, but if you're not, you get banned. Gotcha.
>
By the way, personally, I do think that the Wikicities site should keep
advertisements on the gaming pages. This is potentially a fabulous opportunity
for Wikicities.
Hello,
The third Wikimedia Quarto is fully available in english (though not yet
moved to Foundation website :-)). You may find it at
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Translation_requests/WQ/3/En/1.
Please do not hesitate to fix typos you might meet :-)
You will find the usual essays, Jimbo's letter, reports of the
Foundation, conference summaries, and updates from the developing
projects. As always, we are open to your suggestions and submissions;
please send letters to newsletter-at-wikimedia.org, or leave comments on
the meta-wiki.
Special thanks to the translators who continue to make this effort such
a far-reaching success, and to the designers who have helped produce the
current clean look.
Anthere
Hi,
I'm a sysop in HuWiki and we have the following problem.
Some revert warriors took up the habit of logging out during a revert
war to get around the 3RR (we have the same 3RR rule as EnWiki).
So basically they are using their logged out IP as their sockpuppet
for revert warring.
When they were blocked since it was obvious from the anon users' edit
history and from the steps in the revert war that the anon and logged
in user was the same person, they started attacking the blocking
sysops for this, referring to their legal rights to privacy.
Also, for exactly the same reason, there is a collection of IP
addresses used by one of the revert warriors on a user page, so that
anyone can see where he edited from, even when he was not logged in.
The revert warrior and his friend claims that such a collection of IP
addresses is a violation of privacy rights and Wikipedia's published
privacy policy.
So my questions:
Is it against the privacy policy or the law to:
1a) publicly claim that an anon user is the same as a logged in User
when they take part in policy violations such as 3RR
1b) publicly claim that they are the same person when they haven't
violated any policies yet
2) publish a list of IP addresses assumed to belong to a user who have
already violated policy (3RR, personal attacks)
Thanks,
nyenyec
Whoops! Looks like somebody didn't like the truth told of them, they booted
me off the list for speaking truth to power.
You wanted abuse of power? There you have it JT.
Seems to happen a lot around here and on Wikipedia. Speak truth to the
circle-jerk of power mad fools known as Admins, get booted.
Ambi is the Red Queen of arbcom - running around like a complete fat fool,
screaming "Orf Wiv is 'ead" whenever a case comes before her. She gets some
sadistic pleasure from it I'm sure.
The rest of ArbCom isn't any better. Never do they actually talk to anyone
involved in a case. Never do they let little things like facts get in the
way of their witch hunts.
Ambi posts up a message that her say-so ought to be considered basis enough
for banning Marmot, whose only crime was exposing the Adminship
self-protection racket for what it was, and you all just sit there
applauding.
I think you proved Marmot's case FOR him.
An arbitration request comes up and someone adds an extra name to it, and
all of a sudden the original name on the arbitration request isn't even
MENTIONED in the final verdict and an innocent user who (and I checked the
log to be sure) has not used a single naughty word is banned.
Yoder gets caught in an infinite ban loop by an Admin who was involved in
his case, and you idiots spend your time jerking off saying "well you
shouldn't have crossed an admin" and calling him names rather than paying
attention to what was going on. And you're STILL DOING IT.
And then there's what you did a couple days ago to Kurita77. A new user
comes in, reads the tutorials, makes edits, and you ban him for the crime of
knowing too much? I was watching that. Poor kid didn't do anything wrong but
you spent your time harassing him, one of you sends him crank emails, and
before you know it we have a user screaming profanities.
Not his fault. YOUR fault.
There's a reason I post these sentiments anonymously. It's because you
power-mad cretins would like nothing more than to get ahold of anyone who
dares to speak the truth about you around here. You'd ban my Wikipedia
account just out of spite if you knew who I was. And I know you WAY too well
for you to claim otherwise, JT.
Come on. Prove me wrong. Show some sense. Show for even ONE SECOND that you
actually respect the policies and procedures of Wikipedia.
Biting the newbies, attacking anyone who's not part of your inner circle
jerk, and insulting new users once you've bitten them isn't doing you any
favors.
A. Nony Mouse.
>>
>and your a sockpuppet but that's beyond the point, I would be interested in
>seeing an iota of proof of any of these accusations, that would support
>your case, and the case of the longwinded Nathan J. Yoder much better than
>these unceasing tireless rants.
>
>-Jtkiefer
>_______________________________________________
>WikiEN-l mailing list
>WikiEN-l(a)Wikipedia.org
>http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
_________________________________________________________________
Don't know what Meegos are? Click to find out. http://meegos.msn.ie
> Global warming is a bad example. That's an area that involves
> considerable controversy and contention among scientists, there really
> is no scientific consensus on it. Also, all sides are at least
> capable of being scientific (as they are very falsifiable) and there
> is science being practiced , to some extent, on both sides.
>
> This is quite a bit different than well-established, non-controversial
> theories for which there is near unanimous consent in the scientific
> community. Especially in cases where the only opposition is religious
> and/or political in nature.
Agreed. And of course the line of reasonable
doubt has to be drawn somewhere. I think that
it is noble and a sign of the high quality
of Wikipedia editors that they are generally
willing to err on the side of caution. It's just
that I don't think we should err *enormously*
on the side of caution. Let's look at a few
propositions:
A 1. The Earth is less than 10 thousand years old.
A 2. Homeopathic remedies are more effective than
can be explained by the placebo effect.
B 1. Human beings did not land on the moon in the 1960's.
B 2. Jews were not systematically exterminated in Europe
under the Nazi regime.
- - - My line of reasonable doubt - - -
C 1. Human activities are not having a significant
effect on global weather patterns and average temperature.
C 2. When presenting the case for invading Iraq,
the Bush administration made no attempt to exaggerate
the threat of Iraq's purported weapons of mass destruction.
I'd say the propositions in the B class are an order of
magnitude more reasonable and probable than those in the
A class. They don't break any laws of physics. They do,
however, involve vast forgery of documents and a conspiracy
to conceal the truth which is so enormous as to be entirely
improbable.
The propositions in the C class are again an order of
magnitude more probable than those in the B class.
They don't break any laws of physics and they don't
require vast conspiracies. They do, I think, require
interpreting a lot of data in creative ways but I'd
say they are tenable enough for Wikipedia to take
into account when discussing the relevant phenomena.
The line has to be drawn somehwere. There comes a point
where attempting to take every theory into account gets
in the way of writing a useful encyclopedia. We shouldn't
need to qualify statements about the Earth's age and we
shouldn't hestitate to put a discipline that involves
shaking water and pretending it's medicine into a
pseudo-science category.
- - -
I think the Neutral Point of View is a good policy.
When reasonable people disagree about a subject we
should report all sides of the argument. That's what
I try to do myself, take my article on [[Hrafnkels saga]]
as an example. There are many theories on the saga's
origins and the article tries to describe each of them
fairly.
Of course Wikipedia can't settle every argument and
establish the truth of every proposition. But when the
truth is known beyond reasonable doubt we should report it.
And we do.
Regards,
Haukur