[Wikipedia-l] Non-notability "abuse"

[George Herbert]

On 9/17/07, Ray Saintonge <saintonge at telus.net> wrote:
> Similarly, neutrality does not imply any need for long-winded
> debunkings, nor does it require labeling with such epithets as
> "pseudoscience".  Certain avenues of scientific investigation eventually
> failed when more information became available, and eventually faded from
> public consciousness.  It is grossly disingenuous to attach retroactive
> value judgements on these failed theories.  That these avenues were once
> pursued remains as an historical fact deserving of a proper
> explanation.  Anyone reading old material will encounter literary
> references to these concepts, and should be able to find an explanation
> about what the author is saying without wading through a lot of
> polemics.  The failure of many of these theories can often be stated in
> one short paragraph that undermines a fundamental premise for the theory.

Ray;

With all due respect, quite a number of these "theories" are never
sufficiently credible to be properly called scientific in the first
place.

I do not believe in being so neutral and open minded that our brains
fall out and we fail to distinguish between serious science that
turned out in the end to be wrong on one side, and interplanetary
billiards a la Velikovsky, creationism, and the like on the other.

The latter are not science, and we do a disservice to the readers if
we call them that.


-- 
-george william herbert
george.herbert at gmail.com