Re: [WikiEN-l] Reliable sources— some of these babi es are ugly

At 04:08 AM 5/23/2010, Ray Saintonge wrote: Indeed. We needed the adhocracy to rapidly develop a broad project, but we failed to incorporate and implement procedures to move beyond that, imagining, I suspect, that we could do it "later." But by the time "later" arrived, constituencies had formed that were broad enough, at the core, to prevent the necessary extensions. It's a common problem with organizations that work when small but break down as the scale increases. Given that projects based on the idea that experts -- i.e., professionals -- should control articles, for free distribution, failed, what would have remained was "amateur experts," who will, indeed, freely contribute content. But an impolite term for "amateur expert" is "POV-pusher." (The parallel term for professional expert is "COI POV-pusher." Experts are rarely neutral!) Experts, however, will not make stupid misinterpretations of sources, as routinely happens with non-experts, and as even often happens with professional media, as anyone who is closely familiar with a topic has become accustomed to noticing when an article appears in a newspaper on what they know. The potential is for Wikipedia to do better than professional media, but it would require structure that was not developed. The key is that experts, indeed, should not control articles, but those who will use the articles should. An expert opinion that is not effective in communication to non-experts is useless except perhaps as a salvo in a battle between experts. Those of us who *need* a neutral encyclopedia will want to insist that expert opinin is used to prevent stupid mistakes, but that where there is variation in expert opinion, it is fairly represented so that we can understand the range of views. Wikipedia sometimes does well with this, but not when political debates and entrenched positions exist between experts. I argued, in RfAr/Abd-William M. Connolley, that those claiming expertise should be considered COI, which was preposterously taken as asserting that they should be sanctioned, a revealing assumption indeed. No, they should be protected, simply not allowed to *control* articles, but rather invited and encouraged to *advise* the community, and to point out supporting sources where possible. It will not always be possible, or it may be possible, but only with more work than we can expect an expert to contribute. At one point, there was some practice of, where a controversy broke out in an article where expert opinion could be valuable, seeking out expert opinion by emailing experts. That's what a professional encyclopedia would have done. In peer-reviewed journals, "private communication with X" as a source is often seen. We did use and should have continued to use this, as equivalent to unreviewed opinion from someone reasonably expected to have an informed opinion. (It's the same as a blog opinion by a recognized expert, an example of where self-published work is sometimes allowed.) None of this will work without true consensus process in place. The famous "anti-expert bias" of Wikipedia was a result of failing to develop such process. Obviously, genuine consensus process should not and would not exclude experts! That's the default, without deliberative process. Because deliberative process can be tedious and can more or less force people to re-examine their beliefs (or abandon the discussion and decision, or turn it into a battle and personality conflict), and because such process was not formalized early on, it has been and continues to be interrupted, and those with special privileges, or with bias that they do not wish to examine, often see it as a waste of time. Ray is correct in the sense that no source is fully reliable, just as no editor is fully neutral, unless ignorant, which sets up quite a conflict in an adhocracy that assumes neutrality for adequate function! Relative reliability and relative neutrality are possible, though. In any case, for Wikipedia, "reliable" is a term of art and does not mean that a fact or unattributed opinion found in such a source (deemed "reliable" because of the nature of the publication) is necessarily true, just that it is, ipso facto, sufficiently notable that neutrality requires it be included in the mix of a neutral article, directly or indirectly, not excluded unless possibly redundant to what is included. That's policy, in fact, confirmed by ArbComm, but when we stray into the obsessions of the anti-fringe interest groups, it has been commonly ignored. Neutrality is fundamental Wikipedia policy, but an error was made, an assumption that any editor or even group of editors, unless very broadly inclusive, can solely judge "neutrality." Bias in text may only be detectable by those who have a contrary bias or POV. Thus the fundamental policy required consensus process, not merely majority or even supermajority rule. "Consensus process" does not mean that everyone, in the end, agrees, but it requires that such agreement be earnestly sought, because whenever a view is excluded and disregarded, there is a risk to neutrality. If neutrality is important, and it certainly is, then, the goal of full consensus must be respected. And I certainly found, in my on-wiki experience, that it is not, and in RfAr/Abd-William M. Connolley, I was astonished to see so many administrators openly express that it was preposterous to seek full consensus. I did not think they would be so bold.