[WikiEN-l] Re: Example vs. Original research

[Ray Saintonge]

Ryan Delaney wrote:

> Ray Saintonge wrote:
>
>> Haukur Þorgeirsson wrote:
>>
>>>> The difference is that some people actively argue that the earth is
>>>> not a sphere, whereas those who argue that Paris is not the capital of
>>>> France so far have kept their activities secret.
>>>>
>>>> If a fact is contentious, then it should be backed up with a cite.  
>>>
>>> How many religious fundamentalists does it take to
>>> make a fact contentious? How actively do they have
>>> to argue? Where are you going to draw the line? And
>>> why should we privilege the points of view that
>>> happen to be held by people alive today?
>>>
>>> Wikipedia would be a parody of an encyclopedia if it
>>> held that the approximately spherical shape of the
>>> Earth is contentious. People expect an encyclopedia
>>> to be written from a scientific point of view - and,
>>> for the most part, that's how Wikipedia is written.
>>
>> It's not a matter of the number of religious fundamentalists, or how 
>> persistently anyone argues, or lines being drawn.  I certainly don't 
>> believe that today's points of view should hold sway over historical 
>> ones.
>>
>> When we put forth these intuitive truths as examples of the need for 
>> citations we put up a straw man that is there to be knocked down.  
>> There is a presumption that any statement is true unless and until it 
>> is challenged.  Of course the more ridiculous and outrageous 
>> statements will be challenged very quickly.  Statements about the 
>> near-spherical shape of the earth may not be challenged at all.
>>
>> The "scientific point of view" would be fine if it meant rigorous 
>> adherence to the principles of scientific method; it is not fine if 
>> it means support for the prevailing prejudices of mainstream scientists.
>>
>> Some people may very well expect an encyclopedia to be written from 
>> that mythical "scientific point of view"; others may expect it to be 
>> from a "religious point of view" of some sort.  We still need to 
>> stick to a neutral point of view.  Implicit to the neutral point of 
>> view is the dynamic of questioning everything.
>
> My big problem with this is that very frequently, especially in fields 
> like science and philosophy, commonly held beliefs might be very 
> different from the "correct" beliefs, or the consensus among learned 
> experts. But because of the format of Wikipedia, some extremely wrong 
> beliefs are inserted into articles because they are commonly held, 
> even if they wildly contradict the research that professionals in the 
> field are doing -- and I mean this is just as bad as saying the Earth 
> is flat. The only difference is that the roundness of the Earth is 
> common knowledge, but there are some things in science that are just 
> as obvious to professionals but completely unknown to the general public. 

"Commonly held beliefs", "'correct' beliefs", and expert consensus are 
three different frames of mind, and all three can still be wrong.  
Often, but certainly not always, the professionals have it right; that's 
reason enough to leave open the avenues for criticizing science.  
"Correct" beliefs are often promulgated by people with a political end 
in mind, and they have no qualms about bending facts if it will help 
their cause  The general public, and thus our editors are often in the 
difficult position of having a limted basis for making a decision.  The 
need to cite sources should apply equally to the scientists and to those 
who express commonly held beliefs; the scientists have an advantage here 
because that practice has been a part of their experience. 

Science is very poorly reported to the general public.  An understanding 
of what's going on is incompatible with the 15-second sound bite.  Look 
at the evolution of a long established publication like "Popular 
Science".  In its early days, shortly after the US Civil War it had a 
lot of articles designed to get everybody to think about science; since 
then it has managed to evolve into something far more gadgety.  Much of 
science has retreated into the ivory tower.  This is great for the 
protection of scientific sinecures, but is terrible for the promotion of 
scientific understanding by the general public. 

One of the greatest things that Wikipedia could accomplish would be to 
produce a generation of critical thinkers with both the tools and the 
confidance to question any kind of established truth wherever they can 
find it.

> The [[Race and intelligence]] article is a perfect example of this 
> phenomenon. People who know nothing about the research done in this 
> field have many times gone into that article and edited it mercilessly 
> in the name of NPOV because the established scientific opinion 
> presented (and extensively referenced) in the article is very 
> contradictory to the "politically correct" opinion. In my view, 
> Wikipedians need to have more respect for references and experts to 
> prevent this kind of thing from happening. The usual Wiki philosophy 
> usually works in other cases, but in such an emotional subject as 
> [[Race and intelligence]], people tend to go way overboard, and the 
> NPOV and "everyone's equal" policies only make them more convictional 
> about their right to push their POV over that of the academic consensus. 

It's a challenge.  The statistics say what they say - nothing more, 
nothing less.  The statistics thenselves are unconcerned about how 
anyone misinterprets them.  People don't usually understand what 
statistics are all about, and are quick to draw conclusions that are not 
warranted.  This subject matter is a good example where we can look for 
creative ways to build consensus.  Simply telling the public that they 
are wrong and that they should pay attention to their academic betters 
will get us nowhere except into a never ending flame war.  Somewhere 
along the way the scientists dropped the ball.  Lewis Terman was 
respected as a scientist in his day when he worked to develop the 
Stanford-Binet intelligence tests.  He wrote in his 1916 book, "The 
Measurement of Intelligence" (pp. 91-2)  --

    "It is interesting to note that [the two subjects] represent the
    level of intelligence which is very, very common among
    Spanish-Indians and Mexican families of the Southwest and also among
    negroes. Their dullness seems to be racial, or at least inherent in
    the familyn stocks from which they come.  The fact that one meets
    this type with such extraordinary frequency among Indians, Mexicans,
    and negroes suggests quite forcibly that the whole question of
    racial differences in mental traits will have to be taken up anew
    and by experimental methods.  The writer predicts that when this is
    done there will be discovered enormously significant racial
    differences in general intelligence, differences which cannot be
    wiped out by any scheme of mental culture.

    Children of this group should be segregated in special classes and
    be given instruction which is concrete and practical.  They cannot
    master abstractions, but they can often be made efficient workers,
    able to look out for themselves.  There is no possibility at present
    of convincing society that they should not be allowed to reproduce,
    although from a eugenic point of view they constitute a grave
    problem because of their unusually prolific breeding."

Terman was from the academic community.  How is a general public that 
has been instilled with the principle of respecting scientists to deal 
with such comments?  For other academics to say, "He's not really a 
scientist," doesn't help us with a public that may only see that as 
bickering between scientists.  If either side in that debate is 
believed, respect for academics will have been undermined.  If Terman's 
view are to be criticised on the basis that they reflect thinking from 
89 years ago the public deserves an explanation of how we got from there 
to here.

> In these cases, I don't think that any amount of voiciferous objecting 
> and arguing should be considered relevant. I think that even if the 
> consensus of Wikipedians editing the article disagrees with it, that 
> consensus should lose, unless they can find some evidence that the 
> article is wrong. This obsession with consensus has a real possibility 
> of going terribly wrong. I think the emphasis should be on having 
> Wikipedia advance _correct_ beliefs, not popular ones. 

"Correct" too easily becomes "politically correct".  It's too easy to 
become emotionally attached to one's "correct" beliefs.  There is great 
normalizing power to effective consensus building.  Scientists would do 
better by judiciously planting seeds in Wikipedia's great fractal 
Mendelbrot.

Ec