Yes, non-mainstream scientific theories are something different than
pseudoscience; i.e. that whole "Variable Speed of Light" theory
whatnot that a few legitimate physicists have advocated and is
considered within the bounds of physical research but is not currently
accepted by most physicists as likely being true. (At least, that's my
understanding of it -- I'm no physicist)
A better label might do it, but at some point you risk things being
unmanageable and bordering on self-parody. [[Category:Is labeled as a
"pseudoscience" by the mainstream scientific communitiy]] is more
accurate and NPOV, but for obvious reasons it seems impractical.
If there was some way to make it so that when somebody entered in
[[Category:Pseudoscience]] it would say that at the bottom of the
page, it would be more practical, but as far as I understand it the
best one can do along these lines is a redirect which doesn't fix the
problem. And I don't think this is necessarily a sensible modification
to request for MediaWiki -- it would be somewhat complicated and the
developers have better things to do.
Hmm. If someone could come up with a better title that might fix it,
but I fear there are no simple titles. And anyway, it still doesn't
solve the question of symmetry: [[Category:Considered a Satanic lie by
certain religious sects]] would still feel too much like pandering to
a certain POV for me to feel comfortable with it on the [[Evolution]]
page.
I'm leaning towards just creating a [[List of pseudosciences]] which
would redirect to [[List of "pseudosciences"]] or some other title
which would indicate explicitly the problematic nature of the term. I
don't think there is an article like this at the moment, with the
exception of [[List of alternative, speculative, or disputed
theories]] which is not quite the same thing, is not a great title,
and is currently in debate on VfD, I believe. Then I would nominate
[[Category:Pseudoscience]] for CfD. However I'm not sure it would pass
-- there are a lot of people who are (rightfully, in my mind)
suspicious of such nominations as either misunderstanding the
category, or being someone who is just unhappy with falling under it.
Clearly neither is the case in this instance but I'm not sure
everybody else would see it this way.
On the other hand, I'm inclined to think that there SHOULD be somewhat
POV "warnings" on some pages of *some* sort. It would be counter to
the idea of producing a true encyclopedia of *reliable* knowledge if
it was impossible to distinguish things which have good support for
their belief from things that do not. Of course, I fully recognize
that my sense that science is a more reliable form of knowledge than
most others is reflective of a certain POV I carry (and honestly, I'm
a lot more moderate on these lines than a good number of people --
there are some branches of science I definitely take more seriously
than others, and I've probably spent more time than most in looking at
the problems with the scientific "system", at least from a historical
point of view). In an ideal world, a well-written NPOV article though
ought to indicate that sort of thing pretty clearly and pretty early
on.
And in the end, maybe what it comes down to is: Categories should not
serve as "warning" flags. They are meant to just be taxonomic devices.
Obviously taxonomy carries strong implications towards meaning (viz.
George Lakoff's work), but this fact just reinforces the point that
taxonomy needs to be considered strictly under the NPOV policy as
well.
Hmm. Well anyway, I will think about it some more still, there is no
rush on this. I appreciate the comments given so far in response to
this.
(And I'm clearly not trying to imply that this is just MY decision to
make, of course! But I'm aware other people have other things they are
working on, so if I imply that this is something weighing of me
specifically, it's just because I know that this is not likely at the
top of anyone else's agenda)
FF
On 6/27/05, Gregory Maxwell <gmaxwell(a)gmail.com> wrote:
On 6/27/05, Delirium <delirium(a)hackish.org>
wrote:
Well, I happen to be a scientist by training and
profession, and not a
Creationist or Eugenicist, but I really dislike
[[Category:Pseudoscience]]. This *is* indeed making a claim from
Wikipedia that said articles describe pseudoscience, which is not
particularly neutral. If, as you describe, we want to describe
something as "labelled pseudoscience by the mainstream scientific
community", it should be given a category that reflects that more
neutrally, such as [[Category:Non-mainstream scientific theories]].
Sort of how we have [[Category:Alternative medicine]] rather than
[[Category:Quack medicine]].
But a major aspect of Category:Pseudoscience is that they generally
aren't scientific theories at all, but rather that they use scientific
language without the accompanying rigor. They might be right, but they
generally are not science.
I agree that a more neutral sounding name would be nice, but I'm not
sure what would work... I believe the category is useful, so we
shouldn't just do away with it.
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