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User:Doug Coldwell aka User:Douglas Coldwell's WP:OR fringe theory, the Petrarch Code, has been known to me as a problem affecting his edits & thus the encyclopedia at least since Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Jerome's De viris illustribus Chapter 1 in March 2007. (Please see the links in that AfD nomination for some further information.) They continue to be an apparent issue with Doug's edits, an issue I have raised today in a new section of Talk:Africa (Petrarch). I feel really unequipped to deal with the vast tide of questionably motivated material that ends up in an article like this one. I believe it is a very fair test of Wikipedia, to ask how long this user's long campaign of editing articles about whose subject matter he holds such extreme fringe views will be allowed to continue. Recognizing that the real work of unentangling the OR from the real history of literature etc. is a thankless and complex task, I bring news of this particular problem to the watchers of this board in the hope that some editors who have the chalcenteric toughness for such jobs may take it up until there is a real solution. Wareh ( talk) 21:41, 23 February 2010 (UTC)
I believe the point of my original posting hasn't been taken. As manifested in Africa (Petrarch), the result of the fringe theory to which Coldwell adheres (that Petrarch's texts contain secrets magically hidden in their English translations) is an issue of WP:UNDUE. I brought it up here because the offense against WP:UNDUE is apparently caused by the editor's adherence to a fringe theory, but apparently people here aren't interested in that background, since this is not an example where the fringe theory has been directly stated in the article space. The list of Romans includes a lot of material that is utterly accidental and insignificant to the subject of the article (Petrarch's poem Africa). It is exactly as if I were to visit Hamlet and fill half the article with all the lines of that play that mention body parts ("out of joint"), and rationalize this emphasis only with sources showing that Shakespeare was interested in the body (while posting in my userspace an exotic theory on how to "decode" the references to body parts in Shakespeare's plays based on a German translation of them and elsewhere claiming Shakespeare wrote the New Testament). The difference, of course, is that everyone knows about Hamlet whereas almost no one has heard of Africa (Petrarch), so it's a pretty lonesome struggle to oppose the WP:UNDUE emphasis of the only editor truly motivated to develop the article. Wareh ( talk) 15:32, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
In the only English translation of Petrarch's Africa (first one in the Secondary sources) these is no listing of the important characters of the 9 Books to the epic poem.
Would someone please add back the "Characters" Section and I will be glad to expand it as is requested. Otherwise this is
censorship!! Anyone is welcome to add or subtract any of the characters. IF they add, then they must be referenced to the poem. I don't want to be accused of breaking the
The three-revert rule.
Keep in mind that Wareh has now come up with 5 excuses not to allow a list of characters.
IF there is a problem with any of the references, I have to be notified which one so I have a chance to correct it or back it up with another reference.
--
Doug Coldwell
talk
16:59, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
Another single purpose account is advocating for the reality of satanic ritual abuse on the talk page again. Input welcome. WLU (t) (c) Wikipedia's rules: simple/ complex 11:51, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
An IP is hitting this, changing the article to make it look as though these are real. Needs some eyes, thanks. (didn't sign this last night, sorry, but the IP seems to have stopped) Dougweller ( talk) 06:01, 27 February 2010 (UTC)
Okay, people, it's time to tackle the big one!
There are a number of articles on UFOs which fairly drip with X-files-type credulity. I'm not saying that we shouldn't acknowledge that such believers exist, only that right now our articles relating to UFOs are almost exclusively filled with believer-based text and seem to lack any understanding of how fringe the topic is. I'm planning on working on the following articles over the next coming weeks:
I would appreciate any help you all can give. In my mind there are three things that need to be done:
I know that there are a few UFO-enthusiast editors still around that may not like this project, but I really think it's high time Wikipedia become a bit better in its editorial coverage.
ScienceApologist ( talk) 20:32, 21 February 2010 (UTC)
I'm not sure how much of this is fringe but I think there are editors here who might know about this. Sinharib99 ( talk · contribs) is rapidly editing articles where he seems to be adding an Assyrian spin, eg changing 'Iraq Christians' to 'Assyrian Christians' and changing a lot of historical articles - usually using Wikipedia articles as references, often adding OR. Dougweller ( talk) 06:01, 27 February 2010 (UTC)
There is ongoing discussion about the use of fringe primary sources in this article, the large amount of text supported by only primary sources, and a significant portion of text which has no support at all. There is also a dispute about the neutrality of certain wordings which assume the reality of Seth as a ethereal being, etc. Please take a look, thanks. Verbal chat 08:19, 28 February 2010 (UTC)
New user Vedicsciences ( talk · contribs) rapidly creating new articles, deleting text in old ones, etc. Not sure if he is actually new or if we've seen him before Dougweller ( talk) 06:42, 2 March 2010 (UTC)
The page on Ashkenazi intelligence has several problems. The most important is that the theory (that Ashkenazim are more intelligent than average and that this is because of having been under an evolutionary pressure to develop because of antisemtism in the dark ages) is somewhat well known because of publication in media - but it is of course far from mainstream. The problem is that the mainstream has dedicated little if any efforts to argue against it. This means that the theory can be said to be notable because of multiple mentions in reliable sources - but that there is not enough reliable sources to introduce the contrary viewpoint prominently in the article. In short we have a conflict between the principle not to give undue weight to a fringe viewpoint and the notability criteria of multiple mentions in the media warranting an article. Untill recently this has been dealt woith by having warning tags on the page suggesting that the page may be including too few viewpoints and may be unbalanced. Currently a user is removing the tags "because they have been their for a long time and nbothing has happened". If this is accepted it is going to mean that we will have a page explaining in some depth that there is a theory that Ashkenazim have developed superior intelligence due to persecution, but without noting that this theory is a fringe theory - and it will have no tags to warn readers that that may be misleading. Comments appreciated at the talk page. ·Maunus·ƛ· 11:36, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
The following AfD might be of interest to the regulars of this noticeboard: WP:Articles for deletion/Israeli art student scam. I don't recall ever seeing so many !votes based only on the current state of an article, with no consideration whatsoever of the subject's notability itself. Hans Adler 08:37, 10 March 2010 (UTC)
I was readin Black Death and I came across this in the overview: "Yersinia pestis and spread by fleas which primarily made use of highly mobile small animal populations like that of the black rat (Rattus rattus). Once infected by the Yersinia pestis bacterium, it is estimated that victims would die within three to seven days.[1] However, this view has recently been questioned by some scientists and historians,[2] and some researchers, examining historical records of the spread of disease,[3][4] believe that the illness was, in fact, a viral hemorrhagic fever." This smells of WP:FRINGE to me, can an expert take a look at this? AzureFury ( talk | contribs) 16:38, 10 March 2010 (UTC)
Ran across this article about a supposedly notable astronomer who is much heralded by the UFO crowd. I can't find anything reliably-sourced to validate the "observation" or its Fortean interpretation. - LuckyLouie ( talk) 19:32, 9 March 2010 (UTC)
Um, really? This is an article ripe for AfD. I've sent it over. ScienceApologist ( talk) 11:45, 13 March 2010 (UTC)
The article uses writing style that encourages reader to think that the resurrection of Jesus Christ had indeed taken place, and only the details are the subject of ongoing debates and research. A large collection of unreliable sources with supposedly authoritative names of scientists and universities are brought in an attempt to substantiate the variety of theories concerning the dematerialization of the body, with no scientific evidence provided for the latter. The primary contributor to the article, User:Brandmeister, seem not to understand the core principles of scientific method, verifiability of knowledge, etc even after numerous and thorough explanations on the talk page. The criticism section does not cover explicitly the resurrection itself as well. -- Barvinok ( talk) 16:32, 11 March 2010 (UTC)
There is an ongoing discussion on Talk:Weak dematerialization (Shroud of Turin) ( article) related to pseudoscience and NPOV tagging. My summary:
I would appreciate some comments from several contributors. -- Fama Clamosa ( talk) 16:53, 11 March 2010 (UTC)
Lulu.com published sources should be removed at sight, unless the writer is notable (even then) and preferably used in the article about himself. The title of the article is problematic to begin with, at first when he created it, he named it Weak materialization, which obviously I moved to clarify it's about the Shroud of Turin. Personally, I think any relevant material should be used in an article on the controversy of the Shroud of Turin and this article deleted. My take on content is that it's essay-like and unencyclopedic, I'm not dealing here about whatever or not it is pseudoscience but rather the tone and the way the subject is presented regardless of the merit of the subject itself. - RobertMel ( talk) 18:00, 11 March 2010 (UTC)
The problem with Lulu.com published sources is, that there is no reviewing process and that there is no way to confirm the info is accurate. It is in fact unacceptable to add a lulu published source. If we were to allow it, what prevent you or anyone to just publish on lulu any position you want on Wikipedia, to use it as reference? Also, another problem, is that there is I think no article on the Shroud of Turin controversy about its dating. I would have been more logical to have that created prior to creating this. - RobertMel ( talk) 20:11, 11 March 2010 (UTC)
I nominated the article for deletion. It has received no third-party notice and so is not notable as an idea. ScienceApologist ( talk) 11:26, 13 March 2010 (UTC)
Richard Amerike seems to be biased in favor of supporters of what as far as I can tell is an ahistorical fringe theory. Anyone feel like taking a look? Cheers, ClovisPt ( talk) 16:46, 12 March 2010 (UTC)
I see similar WP:SYNTH problems in another article by Brandmeister. "Christian influences in Islam" is essentially an originally-researched collection of architectural, artistic and cultural details from various Islamic examples that, in his opinion, constitute Christian influence. Will tag it appropriately and see what others think. - LuckyLouie ( talk) 17:27, 12 March 2010 (UTC)
Islam is, of course, a reaction to Christianity. The Quran itself contains various comments and criticisms of Christianity. This should be extremely easy to reference. But the article for these things is Christianity and Islam. People should focus on fixing the existing crappy articles instead of creating yet more crappy articles. -- dab (𒁳) 08:09, 15 March 2010 (UTC)
This article has been deleted in the past, but it was recreated by Special:Contributions/Stanovc and Special:Contributions/Jazhinca . See talk page there are no reliable sources (some forum links are given) for such a claim as the Illyrians themselves are first mentioned at 4th century BC their ethnogenesis at 1000 BC and there was no such king at 1225 BC. Stavonc removed the Deletion template for no reason diff . This Hyllus the Illyrian 1225 BC fairy-tale has been circulating in Albanian nationalist websites for some time now. Megistias ( talk) 12:22, 13 March 2010 (UTC)
I would be interested in keeping this article around, properly referenced. We have lots of articles on fictitious characters. -- dab (𒁳) 08:04, 15 March 2010 (UTC)
I can trace this "Hyllus the Illyrian died in 1225 BC" to 1914 [3], but I don't know where the claim originates. -- dab (𒁳) 16:09, 15 March 2010 (UTC)
Acrajan ( talk · contribs), who has taught me the true meaning of "FRINGE" back in 2007 ( Devaneya Pavanar) is back after more than two years of absence. -- dab (𒁳) 15:18, 14 March 2010 (UTC)
The Zecharia Sitchin article could use more editors. At the moment, an editor is disputing the neutrality of the article's coverage of Sitchin's fringe ideas, and more than one editor have raised concerns about the sources being used to explain why Sitchin's ideas are considered fringe. Regards, ClovisPt ( talk) 02:28, 9 March 2010 (UTC)
SitchinIsWrong.com generally cites their sources quite well. Please use it as a jumping-off point much as clavius.org is used as a jumping-off point for Apollo moon landing conspiracy theories. ScienceApologist ( talk) 18:44, 16 March 2010 (UTC)
A number of recent threads on ANI and at RFC/U have been related to this fringe theory which really should have got a mention here. As a result of discussions at ANI, I have created a merge discussion at the above page. There appear to be a number of sockpuppets operating at the page and other proponents of the fringe theory have been mistating policy for example "Now, could we please go back to NPOV, equal time, impartial data, and live-and-let-live -- which is what Wikipedia is all about? Wikipedia is not censored."
A New York Times article on an anonymous survey of American Shakespeare academcs gives results such as block
18. Which of the following best describes your opinion of the Shakespeare authorship question?
- 2% Has profound implications for the field
- 3 An exciting opportunity for scholarship
- 61 A theory without convincing evidence
- 32 A waste of time and classroom distraction
- 2 No opinion
which I think formly pouts it in the second category of fringe theory/pseudoscience as given at the top of this board.
Is there an admin here willing to lay down the law?-- Peter cohen ( talk) 10:46, 16 March 2010 (UTC)
Shashki ( talk · contribs) has been adding several statements and links sourced to Jan Lamprecht to the article Hollow Earth. Gabbe ( talk) 10:43, 19 March 2010 (UTC)
Ok folks, I think that the
Sinclair Method is a fringe theory/practice and that wikipedia has been for years used to promote this "method" to readers when it was referenced on the main alcoholism page before
I deleted it today. There are zero hits from pubmed searching in quotes for "Sinclair Method", has no mainstream medical backing that I can see. A single peer reviewed secondary source does mention the "Sinclair Method" but it is by Sinclair himself. Please have a look at the
web site for the "sinclair method" and see what you think of it. The drugs used in this "method" are used to treat alcoholism to encourage abstinence, to reduce relapse etc but this method seems like an advert to me and the Sinclair Method is not a mainstream use of the drug and it is not a
notable subject matter deserving of an article. I have nominated the article for deletion;
Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Sinclair Method if anyone agrees or disagrees, feel welcome to oppose or support deletion.--
Literaturegeek |
T@1k?
22:43, 20 March 2010 (UTC)
New article on a geologist who made various fringe claims about Atlantis, the Garden of Eden, etc. Also known as a biblical UFOlogist. See also Kharsag Epics. I can't find any critiques but I've only been home a few hours from our Venice trip. I'm trying to find out if Dianthus Publishing who published his books is just a small fringe press or self-publisher.
There has been some discussion at WT:NPOV about possibly moving the WP:PSCI section (which is highlighted at the top of this noticeboard) from NPOV to WP:FRINGE. Please stop by and share your views. Blueboar ( talk) 12:43, 21 March 2010 (UTC)
I'd like help with this, created by a well meaning person with a COI and still struggling with our policies and guidelines. There is no such thing as the Kharsag Epics, this is a grouping of some ancient Babylonian texts and given this name by the geologist Christian O'Brien. I can find no academic sources making such a grouping, let alone suggesting that the texts relate to the Garden of Eden or that some 'Shining Ones' created humanity. [4]. Dougweller ( talk) 22:41, 22 March 2010 (UTC)
Some time ago I've spotted two references (Evan Colins, A Question of Evidence. The Casebook of Great Forensic Controversies, from Napoleon to O.J., 2002 and Peter D'Adamo, "Blood groups and the history of peoples" in Complete Blood Type Encyclopedia which claim that the AB blood group had not existed before 700 AD. While I agree that this group could be a genetic blend, the dating seems controversial ( ABO blood group system#Distribution and evolutionary history currently does not clarify the situation). It is interesting, that the relatively recent origin of AB group ("only a 1,000 years old") is also mentioned on one of the nationalist websites, the [http://www.stormfront.org/forum/showthread.php?t=14407 Storm Front]. Is there any mainstream view on when the AB group has appeared? Or the consensus is 700 AD? Brand t] 19:41, 24 March 2010 (UTC)
Two editors are arguing that Reincarnation research is not fringe and is part of psychology, and that critics that aren't experimental psychologists are not qualified to comment. Please have a look at the talk page and recent edits. Verbal chat 08:26, 20 March 2010 (UTC)
The article is now highly POV and Mitsube has continued with his campaign despite his edits being disputed. This needs attention to fix, with removal of highly relevant text supported by quality RS. Verbal chat 11:26, 20 March 2010 (UTC)
Undent. This issue is still being kicked around, the page is now protected but there is resistance to the use of sources that criticize Stevenson's research in detail such as the Skeptic's dictionary. WLU (t) (c) Wikipedia's rules: simple/ complex 12:41, 28 March 2010 (UTC)
here yet another RM. Nefariousski ( talk) 23:17, 26 March 2010 (UTC)
Talk:Reiki#Reviews Editors don't appear to understand how to summarize WP:MEDRS sources, or simply don't want to do so. Someone with more time and patience than I have would be of great help. -- Ronz ( talk) 16:43, 28 March 2010 (UTC)
Godawful mess. Notably, spent two paragraphs describing a single study in a fringe journal with positive results before finally going to a metaanalysis. First word of Criticism is 3/4ths of the way through the article.
Horrible. Shoemaker's Holiday talk 16:52, 29 March 2010 (UTC)
To me, this has all the earmarks of a non-notable fringe theory, but I could be wrong, so a few more eyes might be helpful. - LuckyLouie ( talk) 20:37, 29 March 2010 (UTC)
If anyone wants to have some fun with a fringe conspiracy/UFO theory, Dulce Base could use a little work. ClovisPt ( talk) 01:07, 30 March 2010 (UTC)
Looks like this article is being used to put forward a possibly Creationist viewpoint, I just deleted a paragraph from the definition section which was actually an argument and pure OR. Dougweller ( talk) 05:38, 1 April 2010 (UTC)
Some elements are maintaining denial of the qualification of the biographical subject for membership in Category:Confidence tricksters on the basis that he makes object appear out of nothing. Yes you heard that right. The direct and indirect patronage he attracts for these "displays of divinity" fund aspects of his ashram and wider activities and contribute to his general notoriety. The experts Sorcar and Narasimhaiah, referenced in the article, the latter of which "held the fact that Sathya Sai Baba ignored his letters to be one of several indications that his miracles are fraudulent" found a prevailing view (from non-devotees) that the 'miracles' have a fraudulent basis. Seeking to have that non-prevailing view formally here declared WP:FRINGE, thanks. ResignBen16 ( talk) 01:40, 5 April 2010 (UTC)
A new draft of the race and intelligence article is being edited into mainspace, based on discussion in mediation. It should be completed sometime on 4/1/2010. Since this is a highly contested article that has had numerous debates about neutrality and fringe theories, I am announcing this on the relevant noticeboards to get wider feedback on the draft. Interested editors may review and comment on the draft and suggest revisions at the mediation page, so long as they abide by the mediation rules listed here.
Please discuss changes at the mediation page rather than trying to correct issues in the article directly, at least for the time being. The topic is sensitive, and the best hope of achieving a stable article is to begin from this draft and talk through any revisions needed to create better balance and more complete coverage. -- Ludwigs2 18:36, 30 March 2010 (UTC)
I don't have time to do anything more than flag this article right now -- it is very credulous, conceivably bogus, and if nothing else contains quotations too extensive to be fair use. Looie496 ( talk) 19:38, 4 April 2010 (UTC)
Following Anupam's suggestion, I've taken a look at Category:Exorcists and its subcategories. It seems to me that a lot of these are either not really notable or are WP:ONEEVENT guys. the sourcing seems a bit thin too. Mangoe ( talk) 11:32, 6 April 2010 (UTC)
Anagrammatic dispersion is an article about a cryptographic technique which exists, but it describes at length how it was used in the Bible to add extra messages. It is not my area of expertise, but I have the impression that it is presenting things which are generally considered to be fringe theories as if they are undeniable truth, with many examples that seem at first glance rather farfetched. A critical review of the article by editors more familiar with such "cryptography in the Bible" theories would probably be beneficial. Fram ( talk) 09:55, 7 April 2010 (UTC)
This is apparently a real episode, but is written rather credulously. I mean, is that really Asmodeus's signature? Mangoe ( talk) 16:46, 8 April 2010 (UTC)
The Kharsag Epics AfD ended in merge with Christian O'Brien, now we have an article on the word Kharsag, which is found only in a translation of some Sumerian epics by a scholar named Barton in 1918. This again is an attempt to put forward O'Brien's fringe views. Dougweller ( talk) 05:40, 1 April 2010 (UTC)
By the way, in case you were wondering, "kharsag" is normally transliterated as hursanu or hursag which means "foothill" in Sumerian. It is not a place. See Ninhursag or here. ScienceApologist ( talk) 20:29, 1 April 2010 (UTC)
Please see my latest revisions of this within the Christian O'Brien page. I would be grateful for help, opinions and assistance to gain agreement for Kharsag's own page. Paul Bedson ( talk) 00:46, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
I'd appreciate it if someone could keep an eye on this for a couple of days, we have an editor who despite the content of the article keeps adding to the lead that there is no confirmation that it is a hoax (you'd think men riding dinosaurs would be enough, but the articles makes it clear it's a hoax). Thanks. Dougweller ( talk) 16:43, 11 April 2010 (UTC)
There is a disagreement about the origins of John Hunyadi (Hungarian Janos Hunyadi, Romanian Ioan de Hunedoara).
The text from the current version of the article is this:
“ | Hunyadi is a Hungarian noble family — according to most sources — of Romanian origin. There are also alternative researches suggesting Cuman, Slavic or Magyar (dubious) descendance. | ” |
I think the correct text would be:
“ | Hunyadi is a Hungarian noble family of Romanian origin (a few alternative researches suggest South Slav descendance.) | ” |
Medieval chroniclers state clearly that his father (Voik) and his mother (Elisabetha)
[12] were Vlachs/Romanians. Also there are "numerous documents in which Hunyadi's by-name appears as János Oláh. (Oláh is the Hungarian word for Wlach.)"
[13]
In addition there are
tens of modern sources accepting the Vlach/Romanian descent (I listed only neutral and Hungarian sources, in order not to be said that the Romanian works are biased). Even Britannica and Britannica 1911 state that he was Vlach/Romanian and he came from Wallachia (Romanian medieval principality) and his family migrated to Hungary (so he was an alien, not an ethnic Hungarian)
It doesn't seem ok to me to take in consideration a theory (Magyar descendance) supported by a single source [14], which in addition is a book about literature (and not about history ) and where it is only presumed that he was a Magyar. In this work it is discussed mainly his representation in epic poems, not the historical reality. Below i offered the exact quote from the book
“ | In this poem Stjepan Lazarevic, who ruled over Serbia from 1389 to 1427, is said to marry a girl (not named) of Sibinj (Hermann-stadt, in Transylvania) at the request of the nobles of that place. On the day after the wedding he sets off to Kosovo and is slain there; but in due course his wife bears twins, who are Janko and his sister Rusa. From historical sources nothing certain seems to be known of Janko`s origin; but he was presumably a Magyar | ” |
Also his Cuman origin is supported by a single Hungarian source [15] (possibly biased on this subject, like Romanian sources too, so we must be at least circumspect about its reliability) , where is not written even a word about the alleged Romanian origin which was asserted even in medieval texts ( Umumu ( talk) 07:21, 9 April 2010 (UTC))
The Slav descent has 3 references in the wiki article, and in all of them the Romanian origin is presented as being the most probable, while the theory of Slav origin is presented as being only an alternative theory:
- Source 1 (Hungarian source):
[16]
“ | Romanian or Slav descent | ” |
- Source 2: (Neutral source) [17]
“ | Romanian or South Slav descent | ” |
- Source 3: (Hungarian source) [18]
“ | Hunyadi came from a Romanian (according to some sources, Slav) family, which had migrated from Wallachia to Transylvania. The Hungarian name stems from the castle Vajdahunyad (today Hunedoara in Romania), which Janos's father Vajk, a minor Romanian noble | ” |
See talk page of the article, all theories have their reliable sources. The article also does mention that the majority of sources supports the Vlach descendance, the alternative sources are not overemphasized at all.
According to the
Cambridge University Press source: From historical sources nothing certain seems to be known of Janko`s origin; but he was presumably a Magyar. I think that's pretty much OK as a reference. A couple of English books also state that his mother was Hungarian, which makes John Hunyadi at least half-Hungarian.
Plus, in the above points I don't see that some sources only refer to the obscurity surrounding the family's origins, although this is probably more notable than any of the alternative theories.
Squash Racket (
talk)
17:56, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
Squash Racket ( talk) 15:38, 11 April 2010 (UTC)When the author draws his conclusion, he clearly doesn't talk about the epic song, but adds his own verdict. I won't repeat this once more even if you still don't understand it. Squash Racket (talk) 17:23, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
. iadrian ( talk) 16:28, 11 April 2010 (UTC)Yes, he clearly draws his conclusion from an Epic song(poetry) not historical data. I don`t see how can you even argue about this when the book is called The growth of literature and the "fact" is found in the second part of the book Yugoslav oral poetry in the section called Heroic Poetry. It looks like you are the one who doesn`t understand, or you just don`t want to. Please wait until the thread on the Fridge theory reach to a conclusion to remove the dubious form. Please read the WP:DISPUTED. iadrian ( talk) 16:41, 10 April 2010 (UTC)
First you must understand that Vlach was in the Middle Ages the exonym for Romanian and one single source, that "presumes" based on epic songs doesn`t have a historical relevance. As i said on the talk page, please find another source, i am sure that there is no trouble to present with another reliable source about his Magyar origin? And we can leave the Epic songs out from historical facts. Of course , Romanian/Hungarian sources are not to be trusted as you cited in the Fringe theory thread the Hugh Seton-Watson. iadrian ( talk) 17:16, 11 April 2010 (UTC)
Squash Racket, you must accept that a book about literature where a philologist issues an assumption is not the most scientific and trustable source when we talk about historical facts. Why don't we also take in consideration travel guides or the opinions of historical films directors?
On the other hand the Cuman origin is supported by a single Hungarian source. It is needed at least one more (preferably neutral) reference(
Umumu (
talk)
17:47, 11 April 2010 (UTC))
You mean the
Cambridge University Press reference written by a British historian with his own Wikipedia article?
There are other sources suggesting at least his mother's Hungarian origin, so even without this source his Hungarian ethnic origins couldn't possibly be considered a fringe theory.
Squash Racket (
talk)
19:11, 11 April 2010 (UTC)
From the definition: A fringe theory can be considered notable if it has been referenced EXTENSIVELY , and in a serious manner, in at least one MAJOR publication, or by a notable group or individual that is independent of the theory.
(
Umumu (
talk)
04:44, 12 April 2010 (UTC))
The John Hunyadi article stinks all over; it's not just the ethnicity that's a problem, but pretty much every single sentence in the first section. I've removed one almost certainly untrue claim, but I'm skeptical that this fellow is anything like as important as he is being made out to be in the first section. Mangoe ( talk) 15:29, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
Some nice work by a student for a class project. However, one section of the article entitled God Watches Over His Workers seems to be promoting the idea that an avoidance of injuries during construction was the result of miracles. The sources referenced aren't accessible, so I'm not sure how to correct it. - LuckyLouie ( talk) 15:51, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
See Talk:Daniel David Palmer and this edit. See Talk:Chiropractic history#Patricide controversy and this edit. See Talk:Chiropractic controversy and criticism and this edit. Please discuss on talk page. QuackGuru ( talk) 18:25, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
Is anyone familiar with this fringe book? The article is one-sided at the moment. Dougweller ( talk) 08:46, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
(outdent) My local library system does not have The cult of alien gods: H.P. Lovecraft and extraterrestrial pop culture By Jason Colavito - can you two check yours? That looks to have some excellent content on this book. KillerChihuahua ?!? Advice 19:35, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
I remember this came up in the context of The Nine Unknown . I tagged it back in October. I don't know if it meets WP:BK, but I think you have done a decent cleanup job and I don't mind the article staying around in its present form. -- dab (𒁳) 10:33, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
I've been struggling to convince a few other editors that this marginally notable author of cancer curing recipe books is being given undue weight by attempt to list every paper, article, letter and foreign translation of work discoverable. Most of these references are entirely non-notable and act merely to WP:PUFF. Wise heads and assistance would be very useful. Twiga Kali ( talk) 23:25, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
No comment necessary. Also see the wider opus of Math920 ( talk · contribs). It's been a while since I've seen this level of racialist crackpottery. -- dab (𒁳) 07:29, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
now blanked by author. I'm not sure we should keep this stuff around even buried in the edit history. -- dab (𒁳) 11:04, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
this is also interesting, the author appears to be signing "Otenor" in racialist internet fora. "Gender: Male, Age: 30, Race: Caucasoid, Phenotype: Nordid, Ethnicity: Russian Politics: Liberal[sic!]" Probably himself a member of the exalted Paleoeuropean race, who are, as we learn in the article, "characterized by meso-brachycephaly, short and broad face, high prominent nose and light pigmentation of eyes, hair and skin." -- dab (𒁳) 12:47, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
I also figured out what Math920 means by the "reference" Image is taken from the book-A.Bayar, Sectet history of the Tatars for about two dozen images he uploaded. This translates to "image ripped from http://bayar.ws/ ". The full title of the website would be "Алексанр Бояров. Тайная история татар и Великого переселения народов" ("The secret history of the Tatars and the Great Migrations"). Apparently a "book" self-published online in 2007. -- dab (𒁳) 13:59, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
What this episode does for us is point out a few missing articles. We definitely need Soviet anthropology. And then we also seem to be missing a number of races or "types" proposed in the early 20th century. These can probably all go under Caucasian race, but we seem to be missing all mention of the Borreby, Brünn (lol, Daniel Craig) and Falish (Faelid, Dalofaelid, Dalonordic) types. I have never heard of them, but the racist websites are full of them. The Russians also have lots of other types unknown to en-wiki, see ru:Шаблон:Расы.
-- dab (𒁳) 14:17, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
Among other things, this has supposedly been used to clear murder suspects via written messages from the dead. Seems like a redirect that escaped from Automatic writing by mistake. - LuckyLouie ( talk) 19:47, 16 April 2010 (UTC)
Priceless. It seems we are dealing with Renata Ventura ( talk · contribs). Emmanuel (spirit) is a WP:FRINGE gem, I resisted the urge to slash-burn it so you can enjoy it too. -- dab (𒁳) 09:45, 18 April 2010 (UTC)
Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Out-of-place artifact might be of interest to watchers of this board. Regards, ClovisPt ( talk) 22:15, 17 April 2010 (UTC)
Til is at it once again (or rather, as ever). The Book of Enoch was apparently written by Enoch himself in Ethiopian in 3000 BC. Of course, if this fact has only ever been published it in an untractable obscure journal or memo, it is due to the conspiracy of Eurocentric western pseudoscholarship trying to hide the truth. -- dab (𒁳) 19:49, 19 April 2010 (UTC)
I found this edit [21] about a 'Queen of Sheba' University, [22]. So what is this 'University'? All I can find is that it was "Incorporated by Bernard Leeman, Rutis C Clytus, Sergey Kotelnikov, Queen of Sheba University Incorporated is located at 15 Ferguson Rd WESTBROOK, QLD," in 2008 in Florida. [23] I doubt anything about it belongs on Wikipedia. The editor who added this is also complaining at the talk page, Talk:Kamal Salibi about the removal of stuff about Leeman. Dougweller ( talk) 04:45, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
This article is now mainly about 'Kharsag'. Besides issues such as WP:UNDUE which may apply, I'm not at all sure about the claim that Kharsag is actually used by all these authors. It's partially a language issue, is using 'kharsag' as an element of a word the same thing as that word meaning Kharsag? Because that seems to be what's being done here. First we have co-ordinates, maybe implying they actually pinpoint 'the' location, then the claims "Kharsag; also Khar-sag, Imkharsag, E-kharsag, E-kharsag-gal-kurkurra, E-kharsag-kurkurra, Kharsag-kzurcktra, E-kharsag-kalama, Hur-Sag, Gar-Sag or Gar-Sag-da" - which I think is OR. The cited quotes after this seem to treat all these words as indicating a single location. Then there are various sections, including an archaeology one with no archaeology and a geology one. I don't think it would be at all clear to readers that this is a fringe concept and a minor one at that. Thanks. Dougweller ( talk) 20:00, 16 April 2010 (UTC)
There are understandable problems with language about a location only known to be famous from say 3,500BC to 700BC and then rediscovered in the early 20th century. George Aaron Barton, who is not fringe or OR translates kharsag in 3 seperate Sumerian texts as the same place that I have now cited. Gerald Massey, Morris Jastrow, Jr. (Barton's predecessor) and his school, which includes Boutiflower clearly understand to be the same place, as I would argue does the great sumerologist Samuel Noah Kramer when his use of the word hursag is put in context. The other cites are perhaps of a more cosmological nature as the texts deal with the Sumerian view of the world but still deal with the same place mythologically. Even the great Stephen Herbert Langdon who was quoted against me by Kevin in the deletion discussion DID mention the word in context as "gar-sag-da" translated "netherworld mountain" and I have included a few cites showing later temples dedicated to this site, such as at Nippur and others extending into Assyrian times. I have gone outside Barton to research this and firmly believe that in the time that these great scholars lived, Kharsag as the Sumerian Olympus was well noted and well deserves mention in Wikipedia as due note to their accomplishments in this field. You can rip the O'Brien out of this entirely if you like Doug, but hope you will help me create a balanced and informative page under the guidelines required. Thanks again for informing me of necessary rules, I'm very much in favour and grateful for your weighing up of this article. Paul Bedson ( talk) 22:01, 19 April 2010 (UTC)
It might help to explain that the actual ancient cuneiform these words are translated from is more like picture language than ours. The picture-sign translated as "khar" or "gar" (or for Kramer "hur") in many of these books is that of a garden or enclosure and that of "sag" is a picture sign of a head. Hence mountain in basic translations, but undeniably used in the context of the home or birthplace of the first Gods (Enlil, NinKharsag, etc.) by all these authors and professors as a singular location. Paul Bedson ( talk) 22:42, 19 April 2010 (UTC)
There are various forms of Cuneiform of which Barton's is the most archaic and similar to pictograms. I cannot even find Kharsag used as a common noun meaning simply "mountain" anywhere. Please show cites of this if there are any. I think I have mentioned enough reliable sources now to possibly even take Ninhursag to AfD requesting name change due to WP:UNDUE given to Kramer's translation, when the weight of the majority of sources refer to her as Ninkharsag. Akhilleus is correct that the article should be about NE mythology and I hope I have expressed my agreement with this and intentions to create a kharsag page based on the ground rules. Now where to start? Paul Bedson ( talk) 10:26, 20 April 2010 (UTC)
An IP is editing the articles Pre-Columbian Africa-Americas contact theories and Abu Bakr II in a manner that, to me, seems to be promoting an ahistorical fringe theory. However, I'm starting to feel that both articles could use some work, but I'm not sure how to go about editing them. I would appreciate any interested editors taking a look at the IP's edits, or just editing the articles in light of Wikipedia policies. Thanks, ClovisPt ( talk) 15:19, 17 April 2010 (UTC)
What you call fringe has nothing to do with accurate representation of the sources you cite as the vast majority is weasel worded original research whose only purpose is to discredit a theory, as opposed to providing a neutral report of the facts surrounding the controversy. Statements like "most scholars believe", or arguments against a theory drawn from sources that have nothing to do with debunking the theory only proves this point. My aim was to limit such original research. I contributed to these articles some time ago and tried to present them in a neutral fashion. What you consider "fringe", has no source, it is YOUR opinion. I will keep my opinions to myself but insist on accurate representation of the sources you cite, and not keeping them there or without tags for the sake of simply debunking a theory that you don't like. The Abubakari's success is considered fringe is obviously false since most people don't specifically deal with Abubakari and most who do, come from Mali. When we speak of a "majority of scholars" they must be included, not just European hard nosed academics from the west. They hold no monopoly on facts.
Also, none of what was posted carries undue weight since the articles are about contact theories and the theorists make up a vital portion of the topic. Original research is when you go outside of those dealing with the controversy, and using your own research data to discredit the claims made, as with the botanical data and others. Also the end statement in the section for the Cocaine mummies is simply put there to udnermine the findings. No scientists have even taken up this issue because it's such a mystery. What "conventional explanations", who? It is nonsense, people are writing anything just to discredit a theory that they don't think is popular. Has nothing to do with probability, possibility, or plausibility, they harp on popularity. But even this bespeaks an agenda since most of which is attributed to popular opinion, comes from blog posts (one from a graduate student) and 2 or 3 sources who only dealt with Van sertima. Nonsense. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.207.93.154 ( talk • contribs) 19:30, 17 April 2010
Of course WP:DUE holds for every article on the project, but in the case of these articles, seeing that they are about fringe theories beginning to end and not about real scholarship at all, WP:DUE means assessing the relative weight of fringe theories among themselves, not the weight of fringe theory wrt academia.
That said, any editor complaining about "European hard nosed academics from the west" (i.e. playing of the race card in place of presenting actual evidence) is extremely likely to be misguided about WP project fundamentals and extremely unlikely to contribute anything of value. -- dab (𒁳) 16:21, 18 April 2010 (UTC)
Never heard of this one; stones move by themselves and "no one can explain it"? - LuckyLouie ( talk) 14:21, 20 April 2010 (UTC)
Christian O'Brien's ideas about Sumerian mythology have attracted some attention on this page already; if you've looked at those debates you should note the existence of Kharsag, which looks like an attempt to sneak the material of Kharsag epics into a different article. Comments welcome at Talk:Kharsag and Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Kharsag. This is noted up above, but unless you clicked through it might not have been apparent that there was an active AfD. --Akhilleus ( talk) 03:36, 21 April 2010 (UTC)
Here we have someone else's suppositions that Christianity rites come from somewhere besides Christianity. This has been festering for years. It's at AFD but it should be looked at nonetheless. Mangoe ( talk) 14:49, 20 April 2010 (UTC)
It would be very easy to write a valid article on the topic. That said, I agree that the article as it stands is flawed and under-referenced, even though it contains much valid material and lists relevant sources. It just needs cleanup. -- dab (𒁳) 09:07, 22 April 2010 (UTC)
Recently a few new editors have arrived at the Christ myth theory page and have tried very hard to demolish the article's focus and clarity through tendentious policy objections, "teach the controversy" type tactics, and plain old sloppy writing. It would be very helpful if some of the editors who have experience dealing with this sort of thing were to drop in on the talk page and help rebuff the agitators through adding to the consensus. Eugene ( talk) 19:08, 23 April 2010 (UTC)
The Christ Myth Theory article has been a problem as the definition has is no clear consensus in the literature; There are those who say quite clear that they define "Christ Myth Theory" as the idea Jesus never existed while there are others who define it in such a way that is clearly not what they are saying.
"Or, alternatively, they seized on the reports of an obscure Jewish Holy man bearing this name and arbitrarily attached the "Cult-myth" to him." Dodd, C.H. (1938) History and the Gospel under the heading Christ Myth Theory Manchester University Press pg 17
"This view hold that the story of Jesus is a piece of mythology, possessing no more substantial claims to historical fact than the old Greek or Norse stories of gods and heroes,..."[ Bromiley (1082 International Standard Bible Encyclopedia: E-J]. The first paragraph of the related material tells us about the Christ Myth theory, second tells us what it is (using story of), third line talks about the supposed parallels, and the fourth uses Apollonius of Tyana while using Lucian as an example, and the final sentence gives us the examples of Attis, Adonis, Osiris and Mithras. The next paragraph mentions ONE work by Wells and two counterpoints to his arguments. The paragraph after that starts "These examples of the Christ-myth idea..." please note the plural. The paragraph after that talks has the lead in Bertrand Russel leave the question open and the very next sentance says "This negative attitude is shared by P. Graham, The Jesus Hoax (1974)" NOWHERE in any of this are any of the greats (Bruno Bauer, Arthur Drews, J. M. Robertson, William Benjamin Smith, etc) of the non historical concept mentioned. What we get instead is, in order, are Lucian, Wells, and Bertrand Russel. Hardly a cross section of the non historical idea as Akhilleus has tried to claim in the past. Troy and Vinland are also part "old Greek or Norse stories of gods and heroes". Last time I check Troy and Vinland (ie North America) existed.
"The theory that Jesus Christ was not a historical character, and that the Gospel records of his life are mainly, if not entirely, of mythological origin." Encyclopaedia of Religion and Religions (1951) by Pike, Royston
"At first glance, the "Jesus-myth" seems to be a stroke of genius: To eliminate Christianity and any possibility of it being true, just eliminate the founder! The idea was first significantly publicized by a 19th-century German scholar named Bruno Bauer. Following Bauer, there were a few other supporters: Couchoud, Gurev, Augstein [Chars.JesJud 97-8]. Today the active believer is most likely to have waved in their faces one of four supporters of this thesis: The turn-of-the-century writer Arthur Drews; the myth-thesis' most prominent and prolific supporter, G. A. Wells, who has published five books on the subject; Earl Doherty, or Acharya S. Each of these writers takes slightly different approaches, but they all agree that a person named Jesus did not exist (or, Wells seems to have taken a view now that Jesus may have existed, but may as well not have)." Wells, G.A. "A Reply to J. P. Holding's "Shattering" of My Views on Jesus and an Examination of the Early Pagan and Jewish References to Jesus" (2000) Please note this post dates Jesus Myth which Wells himself accepted a possible historical person being involved but few if any of the Gospel accounts were historical.
"The year 1999 saw the publication of at least five books which concluded that the Gospel Jesus did not exist. One of these was the latest book (The Jesus Myth) by G. A. Wells, the current and longstanding doyen of modern Jesus mythicists." Doherty "JESUS — ONE HUNDRED YEARS BEFORE CHRIST by Alvar Ellegard"
"The theory that Jesus was originally a myth is called the Christ-myth theory, and the theory that he was an historical individual is called the historical Jesus theory" Walsh, George (1998) "The Role of Religion in History", New Brunswick: Transaction, , p. 58 No WP:RS explanation of how the first part does not fall under Wells' current mythic Paul Jesus + Historical teacher = Gospel Jesus has been provided nor how Meed's 100 BC Jesus does not fit the second part.
"When Bertrand Russell and Lowes Dickinson toyed with the Christ-myth theory and alternatively suggested that, even if Christ were a historic person, the gospels give us no reliable information about him, they were not representing the direction and outcome of historical inquiry into Christian origins." Wood, Herbert George (1955) Belief and Unbelief since 1850 I asked again if the Christ-myth theory is an either/or than how do you toy with it?! Never mind the "the gospels give us no reliable information" could fit within Pike's and Dodd's definitions but are excluded by those of Farmer, Horbury, and Wiseman.
WHile this is a little long it shows the problems with the deviation being used in the article.-- BruceGrubb ( talk) 12:56, 24 April 2010 (UTC)
More eyes on this would be very helpful. Anthony ( talk) 13:12, 24 April 2010 (UTC)
I deleted this page as being "pure nonsense", and my deletion has been challenged. It is now located at User:Int21hexster. Can people look and tell me if I was hasty?— Kww( talk) 02:36, 24 April 2010 (UTC)
See also my reply to that comment here. I am not 100% sure whether this is a joke, vandalism, or sincerely believed, but it is certainly nonsense. It contains bits and pieces of notation and language from various branches of mathematics, but there is no substance to it at all. For example, names of branches of mathematics and mathematical methods are thrown out at random, such as "Imaginary Numbers ", "lambda calculus", "Hilbert Space", etc. None of these is part of a sentence or explained or followed up in any way. Nothing else in the page has any connection with the lambda calculus at all; nothing else has any connection with Hilbert space, and so on. Then we have "Four axises [sic] can be defined in terms of tangents.
z= (Tan(x^2) + Tan y^2))^2
y= (Tan(x^2) + Tan z^2))^2
x= (tan(z^2) +Tan(y^2))^2
Z*pi=(tan(x^2)+tan(y^2))^s".
This does not define axes, nor anything else. There is no explanation as to what x, y, z and s are, nor why they should satisfy these equations, or what connection it has with axes. Nor are these equations used in any way or referred to anywhere else in the page. The whole thing is like this: it consists of fragmentary remarks, equations, and diagrams taken in an apparently random way from as many different aspects of mathematics as the author can find, strung together without any system or meaning. The equivalent would be an article claiming to be about history which said:
First world war.
The Roman empire.
The comparative method.
(then a photograph of Winston Churchill)
Mo Tse Tung, chairman of the party.
(then a map of Portugal in the 15th century)
Columbus's first voyage.
and so on.
This is such complete nonsense that I think it may well be intended as such. However, even if the author of it sincerely believes that it means something then it does not belong here because it is original research (stretching the meaning of "research" considerably: in any case it is original). The author's message on
my talk page indicates quite unambiguously that he/she regards it as original research. I have been a graduate mathematician since 1973, and I have never heard or read of "Holographic Metaphoric Mathematics". When I searched for it on Google I found nothing at all other than Wikipedia. In conclusion, (1) this is complete nonsense, and (2) it has never received any coverage anywhere, so by Wikipedia's standards it is not notable. To answer Kww's question, no you were not too hasty at all: you were absolutely right to delete the article. In fact in my opinion even having it as a user page is not consistent with our guidelines: it is nothing to do with editing or preparing any legitimate contributions to the encyclopedia; it is written by an editor who has made no other contributions to the encyclopedia; it may possibly be vandalism, and if it isn't then it is original research and published here in order to promote the author's work.
JamesBWatson (
talk)
09:46, 24 April 2010 (UTC)
Thanks, everyone. I didn't think I had missed anything, but felt it was my duty to ask.— Kww( talk) 14:03, 24 April 2010 (UTC)
Thanks Guys, I understand that your correct in that the page does seem totally uncorrelated. I meant to flesh it out as I went along. I do agree it is original research... if it could be called that. I agree with that statement as well. I'm skeptical of the results my self, and that is why I wanted as many eyeballs as possible. Is it still an issue to keep it on my user page to continue to flesh it out?
I know the topics look random, but to me they make sense. You use imaginiary numbers as an index into hyperbolic space, then from there use the indices as matrix operations. So things don't get crazy messy, you use an inverted DWT so it's no longer time variant. that is were the euclidean and non-euclidean space reference comes in along with hilbert space. The space itself is a representation of a 5 dimensional square. I am working on more concrete examples as QED. I might be a crackpot... who knows. It wouldn't be the first time an idiot figured out the next big thing.
Regardless I thank you for the review. At least I know it still looks like nonsense
Just double checked all the comments from everyone and it's true, this doesn't belong on here. I will remove everything once I get it copied down.
Thanks Everyone, I hope at the very least you got a laugh out of it.
oh, just for the record, if your indexing into hyperbolic space and see that imaginary numbers act like a binary(well trinary)system, you can use a k-map to simplify the operations into matrix multiplication. The way I look at it is putting a several hyperbolic places together and into a box, then looking into the box through several hyperbolic planes that are semi-transparent.
Anyway Thanks!
Sorry for the continual updates, one last thing. Schroedinger cat is alive/dead/ and something imaginary...
Can someone check to see whether this is an appropriately weighted addition?
I'm recusing myself from any and all edits to such articles.
ScienceApologist ( talk) 18:09, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
I am currently working on a new draft of Shakespeare authorship question, a problematic article about a minority view, and would appreciate input from some uninvolved editors with specific areas of expertise (like those here at Fringe). Here is the latest draft that I am seeking help on: [ [25]]. Can some of you give me input on any issues that jump out at you? Please leave comments here or on my talk page. Thanks. Smatprt ( talk) 15:25, 28 April 2010 (UTC)
There's an RfC on the question of whether the Christ myth theory can legitimately be categorized as pseudo-history. Please comment. Eugene ( talk) 16:42, 28 April 2010 (UTC)
There has been recent major publicity about a claim that Noah's Ark has been discovered (with a really pathetic video). There's an entry cited to a blog with a statement that it's a hoax. An IP removed it, and I replaced arguing Wikipedia:PARITY#Parity_of_sources allowed it, but I used what WP:Fringe says is a shortcut, WP:PARITY but typed it with lower case, WP:Parity, and the IP summarily reverted again with an edit summary saying just 'red link'. Now although the newspapers reporting it are reliable sources, their source is clearly not, so I think we can use the blog. I'd like some comments on this and maybe an eye on the article in any case, as it's hot news now. Thanks. Dougweller ( talk) 07:11, 29 April 2010 (UTC)
Icelandic Elf School ( | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
What do you think? Is this school notable? How should it be discussed? What is its context in relevance to hidden people and the oft-reported (though perhaps not verified) claim that the majority of Icelanders believe in elves?
ScienceApologist ( talk) 20:42, 27 April 2010 (UTC)
I looked it up on Google Books and added a few more sources to the article. It seems notable enough for an article but I hardly think that it can be taken as a reliable source, per se, on the prevalence of the belief in elves. Eugene ( talk) 17:14, 28 April 2010 (UTC)
No, the "prevalence of the belief in elves" in contemporary Iceland is a very complicated, and interesting question. It involves tourism, ethnic clichés and autostereotypes, the feedback loop of globalized popular culture and local folklore, and the " Jedi phenomenon" type of response to surveys and polls on religious beliefs.
One could probably write a book about it, but of course not on-wiki. -- dab (𒁳) 12:07, 30 April 2010 (UTC)
Repeating my previous request, we need someone who can patiently describe how to properly interpret andd present systematic reviews on Talk:Reiki. The talk page is now filled with discussions on this, but we're making very little progress. A brief, clear explanation would could then be used to start a subsection in WP:MEDRS. -- Ronz ( talk) 17:43, 30 April 2010 (UTC)
A user is claiming that democracy has its roots in the Bible, using 19th century sources to do so [26]. See also related the related talkpage thread Talk:Democracy#Erroneous_rationale_for_deleting_.22Biblical_foundations.22. Athenean ( talk) 22:07, 30 April 2010 (UTC)
We have a new editor on these articles -- see also [28] where he is looking forward "to the reaction of the mob". Both articles could use some eyes on them. Dougweller ( talk) 14:49, 1 May 2010 (UTC)
I've been pondering what is the best way of tackling reviews of fringe works. The problem I'm finding is that fringe works usually tend to be reviewed enthusiastically by fellow travellers on the fringe but are ignored by the mainstream. There are a few cases where fringe works get mainstream attention - the intelligent design textbook Of Pandas and People is one example - but for the most part you end up with a completely one-sided set of reviews. The trouble is that this gives a distorted impression of where the balance of the debate lies. You would naturally expect creationists to respond enthusiastically to other creationists' work, but the total absence of any reviews from a mainstream stance makes it seem, misleadingly, like the creationist viewpoint is the only game in town and fails to convey the mainstream viewpoint.
I'm not sure what the best solution is to this. Any advice? -- ChrisO ( talk) 19:28, 1 May 2010 (UTC)
The "Pseudoscience and related fringe theories" ( WP:PSCI) section of WP:NPOV has been moved to WP:FRINGE (a guideline), and was removed from NPOV (a policy) (see its April 30 version).
PSCI has been temporarily restored to NPOV and there is an RfC at WT:NPOV which may result in its removal. Johnuniq ( talk) 04:10, 2 May 2010 (UTC)
Some edit warring going on here with IndigoAdult ( talk · contribs), an SPA, involved. Dougweller ( talk) 05:23, 2 May 2010 (UTC)
I think everyone with an interest in fringe theories needs to look at this RfC as it could greatly affect how these articles can be edited. Dougweller ( talk) 05:45, 2 May 2010 (UTC)
The article Ten Indian commandments seems to be utter horse shit. The single source, though inaccessible to me, seems to fall short of WP's standards of reliability. The 'commandments' themselves can be found all over the Internets but nowhere with a credible source. This sort of facile stereotype (we have so much to learn from these noble savages) ought to be killed with fire. 75.147.24.105 ( talk) 19:39, 3 May 2010 (UTC)
Merge with Noble savage or delete it. Tom Reedy ( talk) 13:19, 5 May 2010 (UTC)
I am currently working on a new draft of Shakespeare authorship question, a problematic article about a minority view, and would appreciate input from some uninvolved editors with specific areas of expertise (like FRINGE, NPOV, etc.). Here is the latest draft that I am requesting comments on: [ [31]]. Can some of you give me input on any issues that jump out at you? Please leave comments here or on my talk page. Thanks. Smatprt ( talk) 18:20, 4 May 2010 (UTC)
These are generally awful. But I dared to look into Category:Modern human genetic history just now, and I see that the ethnic pov-pushers are now beginning to create one "genetic history" article per group on top of the (already awful) "origin" article. We thus have now Genetic origins of the Turkish people and Genetic origins of the Kurds (the latter on top of Origins of the Kurds. Mind you, I wouldn't complain if these articles were solid and well-written, bona fide WP:SS spin-offs. But they are invariably tendentious WP:SYNTH crap. It appears that nobody is looking after Wikipedia:WikiProject Human Genetic History these days. -- dab (𒁳) 07:30, 5 May 2010 (UTC)
Article almost entirely sourced to publications by Rupert Sheldrake, no mainstream perspective found, and not sure if it meets WP:GNG. - LuckyLouie ( talk) 13:57, 4 May 2010 (UTC)
A long-standing embarrassment sourced to radio talk shows, about.com, and ghost buster web sites, complete with purported photos, drawings, and originally-researched "scientific explanations" (as if science has recognized and commented on such a thing). One brief mention in a book on folklore, otherwise completely ignored by reliable sources. It may be time to put this out of its misery at AfD. - LuckyLouie ( talk) 14:10, 5 May 2010 (UTC)
A classic WP:FRINGE author, he essentially claims that Darwinism is a Masonic/Zionist conspiracy responsible for terrorism. Article coverage tends to suggest that this author "contributes" to the "creation-evolution debate". The reality is that this is an all-out fundamentalist crackpot and the article badly needs to move away from relying on primary refereneces self-published by the subject towards a representation of third party assessments. The article is possibly affected by COI, at least Oktar has taken the pains to compile an extremely detailed critique of his Wikipedia article, at http://www.replytowikipedia.com/ -- dab (𒁳) 13:47, 6 May 2010 (UTC)
At this point, the open question remains, who is financing this? This is not just a nutcase, it's a nutcase with many millions to burn. He is giving away thousands of free copies of his 800-page, full-colour, glossy-paper "Atlas". He is atm plastering the billboards in my neighborhood [32], paid for in Swiss Francs (which is how he got my attention). This hints at an astounding financial potency for a schizophrenic jailbird from Istanbul. -- dab (𒁳) 21:25, 6 May 2010 (UTC)
Are the descriptions of personality types by sleeping position in the article Sleeping position pseudoscientific? Abductive ( reasoning) 19:33, 6 May 2010 (UTC)
Someone has finally gotten around to trying to put up sources for the claim that bells are rung at noon in support of Hunyadi's defense of the city of Nándorfehérvár. Unfortunately, there are big problems: one of the sources is from the 1860s, and the other is a modern translation of a work that doesn't give me good scholarly vibes, to say the least. And over in the article on noon bell, we find some comments in the talk page that suggest that this is essentially a Hungarian legend; unfortunately one of the links given there is in Hungarian, which I can't read, and the other leads to a page which my virus protection blocks out absolutely. The CE article on Callistus III states that he established ringing of bells in support of the crusade, but doesn't mention Hunyadi or any particular battle (see here). Another page [33] doesn't specifically say "noon". There are other articles that doubt that he ordered any such thing at all. In any case I see no sign that this translates into any modern practice.
Could someone who reads Hungarian take a look at some of this? Or for that matter, can someone pull up the original papal decree? Mangoe ( talk) 02:48, 8 May 2010 (UTC)
An RFC has been opened on the recent merger into the Gavin Menzies article of two other articles, 1421: The Year China Discovered the World and 1434: The Year a Magnificent Chinese Fleet Sailed to Italy and Ignited the Renaissance. Menzies is a promoter of fringe theories, specifically in the two pseudo-historical works (1421 and 1434), which when they are not ignored are roundly dismissed. The RFC is here: Talk:1421:_The_Year_China_Discovered_the_World#RFC:_Merger_of_a_notable_book_into_the_author.27s_article; the discussion that lead to the merger is here: Talk:Gavin_Menzies#Forthcoming_book_on_Atlantis, as are the angry responses the merger generated from (so far) a single IP account. I would quite honestly appreciate any input; while I support the merger I'm happy to change my position if that's what 'pedia policies and guidlines indicate is the proper course of action. Regards, ClovisPt ( talk) 03:28, 13 May 2010 (UTC)
Article about French occultist which is basically a textbook on his ideas, eg:"Guénon's writings encompass a wide range of metaphysical themes, yet these works as whole evince a unity and organic coherence which Guénon always saw as a critical part of his work. As a result, each topic is integrally related to many others. For that reason, in this section is presented an overview, intented at presenting René Guénon's writings to someone discovering them, leaving a detailed exposition to the following sections."
It weighs in at exactly 100Kb, and I think much of it may be plagiarised directly from his books. Possibly copyvio, I'm not sure. Dougweller ( talk) 19:04, 13 May 2010 (UTC)
certainly has {{ tone}} issues, if nothing else. -- dab (𒁳) 19:16, 13 May 2010 (UTC)
SamuelTheGhost (
talk ·
contribs) recently put a fact tag on a statement at
Pre-Columbian Andalusian-Americas contact theories that read ""These theories are generally not credited by mainstream historians, however." I removed this with the edit summary "please take this to the talk page and show how this is really contentious - do you really think it's wrong or are you making a point?". He has now as asked started a discussion at
Talk:Pre-Columbian Andalusian-Americas contact theories writing ". Insofar as I was making a point, I seem to have succeeded by showing that the statement concerned was not easily to be sourced. As I (very imperfectly) understand it, the theories concerned have simply been ignored by mainstream historians. On the face of it, there is evidence which requires examination. My question is: has any "mainstream" scholar examined the documents concerned, if not, why not, and if so, what was their conclusion? At the moment we have the unsupported word of wikipedia editors that the documents are effectively to be treated as worthless. This is not a satisfactory way to leave it, and my addition of the tag was drawing attention to that fact.".
I think he is reading 'generally not credited' as 'discredited'. My problem here is that I'm not convinced that this is contentious enough to require a fact tag, and we have the old issue of fringe theories which have been ignored by mainstream scholars. This lack of attention has, not surprisingly, not caught the attention of mainstream scholars, so we could be left in some cases with an article that appears to have mainstream approval if not read carefully. It's made a bit worse in this specific article because the article is so specific, being a small sub-article of the general topic
Pre-Columbian trans-oceanic contact. In fact, a merger proposal was made last month but no one has replied - I meant to, but forgot.
So, if we can't source this specific statement, how can it be handled so that it meets our policies and guidelines and still shows that these suggestions enjoy no mainstream support? Thanks.
Dougweller (
talk)
02:52, 12 May 2010 (UTC)
Well, it could be phrased better. I have learned to dread "however" clauses on Wikipedia. Prove a positive instead. Say something like "'Pre-Columbian Andalusian-Americas contact' is the topic of a number of pseudohistorical theories" and cite a source stating that they are all bunk. Then you won't need to prove that they are "not, however, generally credited by mainstream historians". -- dab (𒁳) 15:43, 12 May 2010 (UTC)
I have reviewed this and find this is simply a merge candidate, to be de-puffed. I also found a little walled garden surrounding Hisham Kabbani if anyone feels like looking into that [34]. -- dab (𒁳) 16:48, 12 May 2010 (UTC)
There is discussion at Talk:Ebionites#Possibility of bringing the article back up to FA, most of which is, yes, from me, regarding whether certain sources currently included in the article in their own section deserve that much weight and attention in the article, or even whether they deserve any attention at all. It might be worth noting that at least one party in the history of that page had been earlier topic banned from related content for a year regarding his edit warring to include material referenced to Eisenman and Tabot, the two primary sources for the section in question. Any input regarding the works themselves, and on the material referenced to those works, is more than welcome. John Carter ( talk) 21:00, 15 May 2010 (UTC)
I am currently working on a new draft of Shakespeare authorship question, a problematic article about a minority view, and would appreciate input from some uninvolved editors with specific areas of expertise (like FRINGE, NPOV, etc.). Here is the latest draft that I am requesting comments on: [ [35]]. Can some of you give me input on any issues that jump out at you? Please leave comments here or on my talk page. Thanks. Smatprt ( talk) 21:15, 15 May 2010 (UTC)
A lot of this seems based on a personal web page [36] and the Majestic 12 documents. Dougweller ( talk) 07:31, 17 May 2010 (UTC)
I'm having some problems dealing with a non-standard cosmology promoter across various articles:
173.169.90.98 ( talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log).
Any and all help would be appreciated.
ScienceApologist ( talk) 23:24, 17 May 2010 (UTC)
Richard Goldstone is a distinguished former South African judge who is generally regarded as a leading proponent of human rights and a key anti-apartheid figure who played a major role in undermining and dismantling the apartheid system. A handful of editors want to add material to the biographical article on Goldstone that portrays him as a bloodthirsty "hanging judge" and supporter of apartheid, based on claims published 12 days ago in a tabloid newspaper. This is obviously a clear " red flag" issue, a claim that is "contradicted by the prevailing view within the relevant community, or that would significantly alter mainstream assumptions, especially in science, medicine, history, politics, and biographies of living persons". I've highlighted the BLP problems with this fringe theory at Talk:Richard Goldstone#Summary of BLP issues. Some input from uninvolved editors would be much appreciated. -- ChrisO ( talk) 07:43, 18 May 2010 (UTC)
Discusion now continuing on WP:RSN and other noticeboards too. Itsmejudith ( talk) 22:05, 18 May 2010 (UTC)
I've done the following:
ScienceApologist ( talk) 15:48, 16 May 2010 (UTC)
I've nominated this page for what I think are fairly obvious reasons. Comments are invited. cheers Deconstructhis ( talk) 15:57, 20 May 2010 (UTC)
Does this source count as a fringe theory source or not. The article as is mentions a positive review, but other reviews which can be found cited at Talk:Ebionites#Possibility of bringing the article back up to FA are rather pronouncedly less favorable. There are three other reviews mentioned there which I haven't myself yet gotten, but I would welcome any information about them which can be found, as well as any opinions on the fringe/non-fringe status of the work in question. John Carter ( talk) 16:24, 20 May 2010 (UTC)
Most edits by Sebastiano venturi ( talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) appear to aim to make his own research about iodine, lipids and evolution feature as prominently as possible in Wikipedia. There are some indications that the whole thing may be fringe science, such as a low number of Google hits for "iodolipids", and most content about this topic being associated with Venturi himself. My question to editors of a more scientific bent is, is there a fringe science / WP:UNDUE problem with these edits, apart from the obvious WP:COI problem? Sandstein 10:24, 21 May 2010 (UTC)
Would anyone care to take a look at Origin theories of Christopher Columbus? It's mostly a collection of fringe speculations, given that Columbus is widely recognized to have been Italian (or Genoese, if one prefers). In particular, an anon editor has been pushing changes to the Portuguese section that could use some outside review. Cheers, ClovisPt ( talk) 19:01, 21 May 2010 (UTC)
The newly-created article Catastrophic Geology could probably use an overhaul. At present, it implies that plate tectonics is a form of Catastrophism. Gabbe ( talk) 08:22, 21 May 2010 (UTC)
There is a little edit war going on at Pseudoscholarship. Editors who frequent this board may be able to help sort out what kind of page/article this is, and what the definition of "pseudoscholarship" should be. --Akhilleus ( talk) 05:03, 23 May 2010 (UTC)
This is courtesy of our pedant demographic who have their faces glued to the letter of our guidelines. I have given up negotiating with this type a long time ago as they do not much damage in proportion to the nerve required to have a coherent conversation with them. -- dab (𒁳) 15:06, 25 May 2010 (UTC)
I've noticed a lot of strange activity on articles devoted to obsolete racial categories. user: JoseREMY is adding weird stuff to the Nordic race article, which is now in a bad way [38]. User:STUTTGART is creating or altering a number of articles on obscure racial categories which are presented as though their existence is accepted scientific fact:
Some of these should probably be redirected and others rewritten. Paul B ( talk) 17:09, 24 May 2010 (UTC)
This discussion may interest you. Eugene ( talk) 19:02, 25 May 2010 (UTC)
I started a discussion at Wikipedia talk:Fringe theories, and realised it should have been here. What I posted was:
Hi. Could I have some help dealing with an anon editor over at synthetic telepathy. The article is currently filled with fringe conspiracy theories about mind control, all of which is original research because, apparently, the real sources are classified information. GDallimore ( Talk) 22:25, 19 May 2010 (UTC)
This is a potentially serious science article, but has been hijacked by conspiracy theorists who think that synthetic telepathy can be used for mind control and that governments have already conducted secret experiments confirming this as confirmed by the fact that they are legislating against its use. That's just one argument that's going on. The anon is intractable and it's getting into edit war mode. Please could someone help? Thanks. GDallimore ( Talk) 23:33, 19 May 2010 (UTC)
I spent an hour cleaning up the article. Further observation reveals that "synthetic telepathy" is a term popular with mind-control conspiracy theorists [39]. If no significant coverage by academic sources can be found for the subject, I recommend the article be deleted or merged with brain computer interface. - LuckyLouie ( talk) 13:58, 20 May 2010 (UTC)
Related AfD at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Psychotronic (mind control) - LuckyLouie ( talk) 16:07, 28 May 2010 (UTC)
What we have here is a "fringe theory" in the best sense of the term, respectable scholarly minority view, for a change, but nevertheless the article suffers from WP:FRINGE/WP:DUE issues. Content should be no means bulldozed but tweaked for proper perspective. The problem is that the article addresses items from the whole scale of "consensus status", from mainstream to very fringy. The mainstream part concerns a number of undisputed substrate influences of Welsh on English. The "respectable minority view", or perhaps WP:RECENTISM concerns an apparently "emerging" view that Welsh substrate is significantly responsible for the transition from Old to Middle English. If this view has any credibility, it should be given proper coverage at Middle English creole hypothesis (and history of the English language). Finally, the "very fringy" material concerns the views of Theo Vennemann that English via Celtic 'transitively' experienced a Semitic substrate. -- dab (𒁳) 15:25, 26 May 2010 (UTC)
A user called Jembana is currently rampaging around the pages on Tartessian, Lusitanian and anything related zealously advocating the Atlantic Celtic origins theory of Koch as if they are established fact (this is the idea that the Celts originate with the Atlantic Bronze Age, not with the Hallstatt culture) I've tried being nice about it, as have a couple of other users, but it's looking as if there's a fanatic at work. Can someone have a word with this user and/or would it be a good idea to create an article discussing this theory in more detail, to which much of this stuff can be moved? Paul S ( talk) 15:57, 22 May 2010 (UTC)
"Celts originate with the Atlantic Bronze Age"? No scholar who isn't steeped in nationalist chauvinism to their eyebrows would consider this seriously for more than five minutes. But apparently Wales is not so different from Bulgaria or Armenia when it comes to state-sponsored nationalism brewed at universities. I suggest this should be treated on a par with reports of Neolithic Pyramids in Bulgaria. -- dab (𒁳) 15:10, 25 May 2010 (UTC)
You may remember a fringe theory that was floating around a while back about "Sudden Jihad Syndrome" (supposedly a condition that Muslims are susceptible to). An article on that subject was deleted some time ago - see Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Sudden Jihad Syndrome. A similar fringe theory, "Jihobbyism", appears to have emerged in certain quarters and has duly been "documented" - with a plethora of blogs being used as primary sources - at Jihobbyist. Editors with an interest may wish to see the related AfD at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Jihobbyist. -- ChrisO ( talk) 02:28, 28 May 2010 (UTC)
I find these terms hilarious and would be unhappy to see deletion. Surely they can be merged into Jihad? -- dab (𒁳) 10:15, 28 May 2010 (UTC)
This term popped up in Religion in the United States, where in discussion the claim was made that this is one person's phrase and not in wide use. Please take a look if you would. Mangoe ( talk) 12:28, 31 May 2010 (UTC)
Both Low-frequency collective motion in proteins and DNA and Pseudo amino acid composition seem to be based on the primary sources of just a few authors. The articles are a mess anyway so could clearly do with some help if they are actually notable. Verbal chat 20:53, 31 May 2010 (UTC)
Alleged political conspiracy theorist. Someone more interested in this kind of stuff might want to take a look at it. Does seem dubious re notability. Misarxist ( talk) 13:15, 31 May 2010 (UTC)
A theory which has been postulated by Michael Baigent and Richard Leigh in The Temple and the Lodge concerning Robert de Bruges, has recently been added and defended as having a high probability in that article (at AfD), and in Lambert I, Count of Leuven and Robert de Brus, 1st Lord of Annandale. I have explained my arguments about it at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Robert de Bruges. Some additional input about whether this is indeed a fringe theory or whether I am on the other hand, like the other editor claims, a "paranoid administrator", is welcome. Fram ( talk) 08:54, 3 June 2010 (UTC)
Could people come back to this again? It seems to me to be veering back into original synthesis. I dipped my toe in the water a while ago, but have been put off by the volume of blather on the talk page. I think I can identify at least 3 quite separate things going on. 1) Bruno Bauer and others - very old, completely superseded scholarship, to be treated as history of ideas. 2) Freke & Gandy - recent fringy writing that theologians have dismissed in contemptuous terms. 3) Hitchens and Dawkins - turning the tables and demanding positive evidence for the historicity of Jesus. No logical link between these, but is that just me? Anyone else have a view? Itsmejudith ( talk) 16:45, 1 June 2010 (UTC)
Given the wide range of opinions about the historicity of Christ due to the very poor evidence of his existence, it may be inaccurate to even consider CMT to be a single cohesive theory. CMT is not a single theory that has developed over time, like the theory of evolution. It is just a philosophical position on the historicity of Jesus that some people have arrived at through an objective evaluation of the poor empirical evidence for Jesus' existence. Some of those people have published articles and books on the subject. It is misleading to slap together a collection of paragraphs about some of these people and their ideas and then present CMT as if it is a single cohesive theory. The article ends up saying, essentially, "This crazy anti-Semite said 'this' and this godless communist said 'that', and hey, look at what this Nazi thinks. The goal appears to be to impune those who question the historicity of Jesus with guilt by association.
But there is a larger problem here. Wikipedia's definition of a "fringe theory" pertains to ideas that contradict scientific scholarship and the focus is on pseudoscience. It goes against the spirit of Wikipedia to label a theory as "fringe", simply because a majority of people who have been schooled in a religion that is threatened by that theory do not agree with it. The evaluation of the theory should be empirical and based on evidence (or lack thereof). It is certainly relevant to let readers know that a majority of theologians have great disdain for the theory. However, an evaluation of it's qualification as a "fringe theory" should be based on it's acceptance in the scientific community not a particular religious community that holds belief in the existence of Christ as a matter of faith, the questioning of which puts one in danger of eternal damnation in Hell. (Yes, I know not some of the Bible scholars that are quoted in Eugene's infamous FAQ #2 claim to be agostic, not Christian, but they almost all obtained their degrees from institutions that hold belief in an historical Jesus as a core principle and an unquestionable matter of faith. Few if any are scientists.)
If the majority of Book-of-Mormon-scholars reject the theory that the Book of Mormon was a hoax document written by John Smith, is the hoax theory a fringe theory? Of course not. The standard of evaluation is empirical evidence, not faith.
If the majority of astrologers reject the idea that astrology is false, is disbelief in astrology a fringe theory? No, of course not. Again, the standard of evaluation is empirical evidence.
The reality is that most scientists find they have better things to do than try to evaluate every religious theory and apply an empirical standard to religious truth claims, so there may be limited research that uses the objective standard of empirical evidence to evaluate the truth claims of a particular religion. To freethinkers who objectively evaluate the empirical evidence for the historicity of Jesus, Christianity is the fringe theory.
Should Wikipedia have articles for "Anti-astrology Theory" and "Book of Mormon Hoax Theory"? Probably not.
Should all of the articles in Wikipedia pertaining to Christianity be held to the fringe theory standard? That would be the counterpart to what the current WP:OWNers of the Christ myth theory are doing with their unreasonable "three-theological-scholarly-journal-reference rule" to allow anything into the CMT article. But note that treating Christianity as the fringe theory is using empirical evidence as the standard, whereas treating the CMT as fringe theory is using appeal to theological 'authority' as the standard.
The Wikipedia standard of evaluation of theories is evidence-based, not faith-based. CMT does not fit the Wikipedia definition of a fringe theory. PeaceLoveHarmony ( talk) 22:18, 3 June 2010 (UTC)
PeaceLoveHarmony, you commit a number of blatant errors in your understanding of the CMT and the academic field. As you have made clear on other parts of WP, your opinion is based on an erroneous assumption that defending the historicity of Jesus (as all ancient historians I know of studying the period maintain) do so because they are ideologically threatened by the hypothesis. That is false, especially when we make account on the fact that ancient historians and New Testament scholars from all backgrounds have evaluated the hypothesis, and see it lacking substance. I am thinking of non-Christian scholars such as the late Michael Grant (Classicist) and Bart Ehrman (NT Scholar). But that said, there is also no reason why those serious academics, utlising sound historical criteria and publishing in the peer review should be excluded because of your personal distaste for scholars with religious affiliation. You go on to claim that "The evaluation of the theory should be empirical and based on evidence (or lack thereof)." That is the basis that ancient historians and related scholarship has dismissed the CMT. The theorists consistently fail to account for the evidence, utilise ancient historical method and are left with outrageous theories to explain away the evidence we do have. These reasons are evidenced in many of the works that deal with the fringe theory. And by the end of your comment you make it clear that you are here only for the sake of agenda pushing. "To freethinkers who objectively evaluate the empirical evidence for the historicity of Jesus, Christianity is the fringe theory." I would love for you to explain why there are no freethinkers in the academy speaking in favour of CMT? Non-Christian historians dismiss it as pseudo-historical, non-Christian NT scholars dismiss it as pseudo-history - and we have scholars who pride themselves on not being religiously affiliated writing entire books on what we can know about the historical Jesus (specifically, I am thinking of Maurice Casey's forthcoming book where he brands himself "an Independent Historian"). Unless you can provide RS in the relevant field that say the historicity of JEsus is defended only because of ignorance by everyone except PeaceLoveHarmony who sees the light, your criticism is meaningless. WP is about verifiability - that CMT is a fringe theory is attested to by everyone in the field. -- Ari ( talk) 06:40, 4 June 2010 (UTC)
This thing is beginning to rival the Shakespeare authorship debate in terms of fruitlessness and futility. IHS, guys. -- dab (𒁳) 10:04, 4 June 2010 (UTC)
Akhilleus, the article at least must be plausible, otherwise what is the point?
It is dubious from the start because the very definition is illogical: How can you believe "Jesus never existed" while allowing that an actual first century teacher/rabbi may have articulated some of the sayings or performed some of the acts of Jesus and these were appropriated by the authors of Jesus? Can you believe he never existed, while allowing half of Q came from an actual 1st century individual? three quarters? all? Can you believe there was no historical Jesus but some rabbi stormed through the temple overturning tables? Can you believe there was no historical Jesus while allowing that the table turner and Q might have been the same person? Can you believe it and allow that the table turning Q might have been crucified? Where do you draw the line?
It fails to convince reasonable, intelligent, open-minded readers of its neutrality and veracity because it is riddled with derogatory ad hominem implications.
As for the arguments against, the first refutation of contemporary CMT is Bruce's assertion that, according to the apostle Paul, Jesus was an Israelite, descended from Abraham. His proof is Gal 3:16
but at the end of the letter (Gal 3:28-29) Paul says16The promises were spoken to Abraham and to his seed. The Scripture does not say "and to seeds," meaning many people, but "and to your seed," meaning one person, who is Christ.
making it clear that one doesn't have to be a genetic descendant of Abraham to be his seed. This is sophistry. Should I go on? Anthony ( talk) 18:39, 4 June 2010 (UTC)28There is neither Jew nor Greek ... for you are all one in Christ Jesus. 29If you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham's seed, and heirs according to the promise.
Is it fringe? Is it notable? Itsmejudith ( talk) 14:04, 2 June 2010 (UTC)
It screams {{ vanity}}, doesn't it. However intelligent the concept may or may not be, this is a neologism from some recent book being touted on Wikipedia and as such we should have very little patience with it. -- dab (𒁳) 16:16, 2 June 2010 (UTC)
This page is an archive. Do not edit the contents of this page. Please direct any additional comments to the current main page. |
User:Doug Coldwell aka User:Douglas Coldwell's WP:OR fringe theory, the Petrarch Code, has been known to me as a problem affecting his edits & thus the encyclopedia at least since Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Jerome's De viris illustribus Chapter 1 in March 2007. (Please see the links in that AfD nomination for some further information.) They continue to be an apparent issue with Doug's edits, an issue I have raised today in a new section of Talk:Africa (Petrarch). I feel really unequipped to deal with the vast tide of questionably motivated material that ends up in an article like this one. I believe it is a very fair test of Wikipedia, to ask how long this user's long campaign of editing articles about whose subject matter he holds such extreme fringe views will be allowed to continue. Recognizing that the real work of unentangling the OR from the real history of literature etc. is a thankless and complex task, I bring news of this particular problem to the watchers of this board in the hope that some editors who have the chalcenteric toughness for such jobs may take it up until there is a real solution. Wareh ( talk) 21:41, 23 February 2010 (UTC)
I believe the point of my original posting hasn't been taken. As manifested in Africa (Petrarch), the result of the fringe theory to which Coldwell adheres (that Petrarch's texts contain secrets magically hidden in their English translations) is an issue of WP:UNDUE. I brought it up here because the offense against WP:UNDUE is apparently caused by the editor's adherence to a fringe theory, but apparently people here aren't interested in that background, since this is not an example where the fringe theory has been directly stated in the article space. The list of Romans includes a lot of material that is utterly accidental and insignificant to the subject of the article (Petrarch's poem Africa). It is exactly as if I were to visit Hamlet and fill half the article with all the lines of that play that mention body parts ("out of joint"), and rationalize this emphasis only with sources showing that Shakespeare was interested in the body (while posting in my userspace an exotic theory on how to "decode" the references to body parts in Shakespeare's plays based on a German translation of them and elsewhere claiming Shakespeare wrote the New Testament). The difference, of course, is that everyone knows about Hamlet whereas almost no one has heard of Africa (Petrarch), so it's a pretty lonesome struggle to oppose the WP:UNDUE emphasis of the only editor truly motivated to develop the article. Wareh ( talk) 15:32, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
In the only English translation of Petrarch's Africa (first one in the Secondary sources) these is no listing of the important characters of the 9 Books to the epic poem.
Would someone please add back the "Characters" Section and I will be glad to expand it as is requested. Otherwise this is
censorship!! Anyone is welcome to add or subtract any of the characters. IF they add, then they must be referenced to the poem. I don't want to be accused of breaking the
The three-revert rule.
Keep in mind that Wareh has now come up with 5 excuses not to allow a list of characters.
IF there is a problem with any of the references, I have to be notified which one so I have a chance to correct it or back it up with another reference.
--
Doug Coldwell
talk
16:59, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
Another single purpose account is advocating for the reality of satanic ritual abuse on the talk page again. Input welcome. WLU (t) (c) Wikipedia's rules: simple/ complex 11:51, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
An IP is hitting this, changing the article to make it look as though these are real. Needs some eyes, thanks. (didn't sign this last night, sorry, but the IP seems to have stopped) Dougweller ( talk) 06:01, 27 February 2010 (UTC)
Okay, people, it's time to tackle the big one!
There are a number of articles on UFOs which fairly drip with X-files-type credulity. I'm not saying that we shouldn't acknowledge that such believers exist, only that right now our articles relating to UFOs are almost exclusively filled with believer-based text and seem to lack any understanding of how fringe the topic is. I'm planning on working on the following articles over the next coming weeks:
I would appreciate any help you all can give. In my mind there are three things that need to be done:
I know that there are a few UFO-enthusiast editors still around that may not like this project, but I really think it's high time Wikipedia become a bit better in its editorial coverage.
ScienceApologist ( talk) 20:32, 21 February 2010 (UTC)
I'm not sure how much of this is fringe but I think there are editors here who might know about this. Sinharib99 ( talk · contribs) is rapidly editing articles where he seems to be adding an Assyrian spin, eg changing 'Iraq Christians' to 'Assyrian Christians' and changing a lot of historical articles - usually using Wikipedia articles as references, often adding OR. Dougweller ( talk) 06:01, 27 February 2010 (UTC)
There is ongoing discussion about the use of fringe primary sources in this article, the large amount of text supported by only primary sources, and a significant portion of text which has no support at all. There is also a dispute about the neutrality of certain wordings which assume the reality of Seth as a ethereal being, etc. Please take a look, thanks. Verbal chat 08:19, 28 February 2010 (UTC)
New user Vedicsciences ( talk · contribs) rapidly creating new articles, deleting text in old ones, etc. Not sure if he is actually new or if we've seen him before Dougweller ( talk) 06:42, 2 March 2010 (UTC)
The page on Ashkenazi intelligence has several problems. The most important is that the theory (that Ashkenazim are more intelligent than average and that this is because of having been under an evolutionary pressure to develop because of antisemtism in the dark ages) is somewhat well known because of publication in media - but it is of course far from mainstream. The problem is that the mainstream has dedicated little if any efforts to argue against it. This means that the theory can be said to be notable because of multiple mentions in reliable sources - but that there is not enough reliable sources to introduce the contrary viewpoint prominently in the article. In short we have a conflict between the principle not to give undue weight to a fringe viewpoint and the notability criteria of multiple mentions in the media warranting an article. Untill recently this has been dealt woith by having warning tags on the page suggesting that the page may be including too few viewpoints and may be unbalanced. Currently a user is removing the tags "because they have been their for a long time and nbothing has happened". If this is accepted it is going to mean that we will have a page explaining in some depth that there is a theory that Ashkenazim have developed superior intelligence due to persecution, but without noting that this theory is a fringe theory - and it will have no tags to warn readers that that may be misleading. Comments appreciated at the talk page. ·Maunus·ƛ· 11:36, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
The following AfD might be of interest to the regulars of this noticeboard: WP:Articles for deletion/Israeli art student scam. I don't recall ever seeing so many !votes based only on the current state of an article, with no consideration whatsoever of the subject's notability itself. Hans Adler 08:37, 10 March 2010 (UTC)
I was readin Black Death and I came across this in the overview: "Yersinia pestis and spread by fleas which primarily made use of highly mobile small animal populations like that of the black rat (Rattus rattus). Once infected by the Yersinia pestis bacterium, it is estimated that victims would die within three to seven days.[1] However, this view has recently been questioned by some scientists and historians,[2] and some researchers, examining historical records of the spread of disease,[3][4] believe that the illness was, in fact, a viral hemorrhagic fever." This smells of WP:FRINGE to me, can an expert take a look at this? AzureFury ( talk | contribs) 16:38, 10 March 2010 (UTC)
Ran across this article about a supposedly notable astronomer who is much heralded by the UFO crowd. I can't find anything reliably-sourced to validate the "observation" or its Fortean interpretation. - LuckyLouie ( talk) 19:32, 9 March 2010 (UTC)
Um, really? This is an article ripe for AfD. I've sent it over. ScienceApologist ( talk) 11:45, 13 March 2010 (UTC)
The article uses writing style that encourages reader to think that the resurrection of Jesus Christ had indeed taken place, and only the details are the subject of ongoing debates and research. A large collection of unreliable sources with supposedly authoritative names of scientists and universities are brought in an attempt to substantiate the variety of theories concerning the dematerialization of the body, with no scientific evidence provided for the latter. The primary contributor to the article, User:Brandmeister, seem not to understand the core principles of scientific method, verifiability of knowledge, etc even after numerous and thorough explanations on the talk page. The criticism section does not cover explicitly the resurrection itself as well. -- Barvinok ( talk) 16:32, 11 March 2010 (UTC)
There is an ongoing discussion on Talk:Weak dematerialization (Shroud of Turin) ( article) related to pseudoscience and NPOV tagging. My summary:
I would appreciate some comments from several contributors. -- Fama Clamosa ( talk) 16:53, 11 March 2010 (UTC)
Lulu.com published sources should be removed at sight, unless the writer is notable (even then) and preferably used in the article about himself. The title of the article is problematic to begin with, at first when he created it, he named it Weak materialization, which obviously I moved to clarify it's about the Shroud of Turin. Personally, I think any relevant material should be used in an article on the controversy of the Shroud of Turin and this article deleted. My take on content is that it's essay-like and unencyclopedic, I'm not dealing here about whatever or not it is pseudoscience but rather the tone and the way the subject is presented regardless of the merit of the subject itself. - RobertMel ( talk) 18:00, 11 March 2010 (UTC)
The problem with Lulu.com published sources is, that there is no reviewing process and that there is no way to confirm the info is accurate. It is in fact unacceptable to add a lulu published source. If we were to allow it, what prevent you or anyone to just publish on lulu any position you want on Wikipedia, to use it as reference? Also, another problem, is that there is I think no article on the Shroud of Turin controversy about its dating. I would have been more logical to have that created prior to creating this. - RobertMel ( talk) 20:11, 11 March 2010 (UTC)
I nominated the article for deletion. It has received no third-party notice and so is not notable as an idea. ScienceApologist ( talk) 11:26, 13 March 2010 (UTC)
Richard Amerike seems to be biased in favor of supporters of what as far as I can tell is an ahistorical fringe theory. Anyone feel like taking a look? Cheers, ClovisPt ( talk) 16:46, 12 March 2010 (UTC)
I see similar WP:SYNTH problems in another article by Brandmeister. "Christian influences in Islam" is essentially an originally-researched collection of architectural, artistic and cultural details from various Islamic examples that, in his opinion, constitute Christian influence. Will tag it appropriately and see what others think. - LuckyLouie ( talk) 17:27, 12 March 2010 (UTC)
Islam is, of course, a reaction to Christianity. The Quran itself contains various comments and criticisms of Christianity. This should be extremely easy to reference. But the article for these things is Christianity and Islam. People should focus on fixing the existing crappy articles instead of creating yet more crappy articles. -- dab (𒁳) 08:09, 15 March 2010 (UTC)
This article has been deleted in the past, but it was recreated by Special:Contributions/Stanovc and Special:Contributions/Jazhinca . See talk page there are no reliable sources (some forum links are given) for such a claim as the Illyrians themselves are first mentioned at 4th century BC their ethnogenesis at 1000 BC and there was no such king at 1225 BC. Stavonc removed the Deletion template for no reason diff . This Hyllus the Illyrian 1225 BC fairy-tale has been circulating in Albanian nationalist websites for some time now. Megistias ( talk) 12:22, 13 March 2010 (UTC)
I would be interested in keeping this article around, properly referenced. We have lots of articles on fictitious characters. -- dab (𒁳) 08:04, 15 March 2010 (UTC)
I can trace this "Hyllus the Illyrian died in 1225 BC" to 1914 [3], but I don't know where the claim originates. -- dab (𒁳) 16:09, 15 March 2010 (UTC)
Acrajan ( talk · contribs), who has taught me the true meaning of "FRINGE" back in 2007 ( Devaneya Pavanar) is back after more than two years of absence. -- dab (𒁳) 15:18, 14 March 2010 (UTC)
The Zecharia Sitchin article could use more editors. At the moment, an editor is disputing the neutrality of the article's coverage of Sitchin's fringe ideas, and more than one editor have raised concerns about the sources being used to explain why Sitchin's ideas are considered fringe. Regards, ClovisPt ( talk) 02:28, 9 March 2010 (UTC)
SitchinIsWrong.com generally cites their sources quite well. Please use it as a jumping-off point much as clavius.org is used as a jumping-off point for Apollo moon landing conspiracy theories. ScienceApologist ( talk) 18:44, 16 March 2010 (UTC)
A number of recent threads on ANI and at RFC/U have been related to this fringe theory which really should have got a mention here. As a result of discussions at ANI, I have created a merge discussion at the above page. There appear to be a number of sockpuppets operating at the page and other proponents of the fringe theory have been mistating policy for example "Now, could we please go back to NPOV, equal time, impartial data, and live-and-let-live -- which is what Wikipedia is all about? Wikipedia is not censored."
A New York Times article on an anonymous survey of American Shakespeare academcs gives results such as block
18. Which of the following best describes your opinion of the Shakespeare authorship question?
- 2% Has profound implications for the field
- 3 An exciting opportunity for scholarship
- 61 A theory without convincing evidence
- 32 A waste of time and classroom distraction
- 2 No opinion
which I think formly pouts it in the second category of fringe theory/pseudoscience as given at the top of this board.
Is there an admin here willing to lay down the law?-- Peter cohen ( talk) 10:46, 16 March 2010 (UTC)
Shashki ( talk · contribs) has been adding several statements and links sourced to Jan Lamprecht to the article Hollow Earth. Gabbe ( talk) 10:43, 19 March 2010 (UTC)
Ok folks, I think that the
Sinclair Method is a fringe theory/practice and that wikipedia has been for years used to promote this "method" to readers when it was referenced on the main alcoholism page before
I deleted it today. There are zero hits from pubmed searching in quotes for "Sinclair Method", has no mainstream medical backing that I can see. A single peer reviewed secondary source does mention the "Sinclair Method" but it is by Sinclair himself. Please have a look at the
web site for the "sinclair method" and see what you think of it. The drugs used in this "method" are used to treat alcoholism to encourage abstinence, to reduce relapse etc but this method seems like an advert to me and the Sinclair Method is not a mainstream use of the drug and it is not a
notable subject matter deserving of an article. I have nominated the article for deletion;
Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Sinclair Method if anyone agrees or disagrees, feel welcome to oppose or support deletion.--
Literaturegeek |
T@1k?
22:43, 20 March 2010 (UTC)
New article on a geologist who made various fringe claims about Atlantis, the Garden of Eden, etc. Also known as a biblical UFOlogist. See also Kharsag Epics. I can't find any critiques but I've only been home a few hours from our Venice trip. I'm trying to find out if Dianthus Publishing who published his books is just a small fringe press or self-publisher.
There has been some discussion at WT:NPOV about possibly moving the WP:PSCI section (which is highlighted at the top of this noticeboard) from NPOV to WP:FRINGE. Please stop by and share your views. Blueboar ( talk) 12:43, 21 March 2010 (UTC)
I'd like help with this, created by a well meaning person with a COI and still struggling with our policies and guidelines. There is no such thing as the Kharsag Epics, this is a grouping of some ancient Babylonian texts and given this name by the geologist Christian O'Brien. I can find no academic sources making such a grouping, let alone suggesting that the texts relate to the Garden of Eden or that some 'Shining Ones' created humanity. [4]. Dougweller ( talk) 22:41, 22 March 2010 (UTC)
Some time ago I've spotted two references (Evan Colins, A Question of Evidence. The Casebook of Great Forensic Controversies, from Napoleon to O.J., 2002 and Peter D'Adamo, "Blood groups and the history of peoples" in Complete Blood Type Encyclopedia which claim that the AB blood group had not existed before 700 AD. While I agree that this group could be a genetic blend, the dating seems controversial ( ABO blood group system#Distribution and evolutionary history currently does not clarify the situation). It is interesting, that the relatively recent origin of AB group ("only a 1,000 years old") is also mentioned on one of the nationalist websites, the [http://www.stormfront.org/forum/showthread.php?t=14407 Storm Front]. Is there any mainstream view on when the AB group has appeared? Or the consensus is 700 AD? Brand t] 19:41, 24 March 2010 (UTC)
Two editors are arguing that Reincarnation research is not fringe and is part of psychology, and that critics that aren't experimental psychologists are not qualified to comment. Please have a look at the talk page and recent edits. Verbal chat 08:26, 20 March 2010 (UTC)
The article is now highly POV and Mitsube has continued with his campaign despite his edits being disputed. This needs attention to fix, with removal of highly relevant text supported by quality RS. Verbal chat 11:26, 20 March 2010 (UTC)
Undent. This issue is still being kicked around, the page is now protected but there is resistance to the use of sources that criticize Stevenson's research in detail such as the Skeptic's dictionary. WLU (t) (c) Wikipedia's rules: simple/ complex 12:41, 28 March 2010 (UTC)
here yet another RM. Nefariousski ( talk) 23:17, 26 March 2010 (UTC)
Talk:Reiki#Reviews Editors don't appear to understand how to summarize WP:MEDRS sources, or simply don't want to do so. Someone with more time and patience than I have would be of great help. -- Ronz ( talk) 16:43, 28 March 2010 (UTC)
Godawful mess. Notably, spent two paragraphs describing a single study in a fringe journal with positive results before finally going to a metaanalysis. First word of Criticism is 3/4ths of the way through the article.
Horrible. Shoemaker's Holiday talk 16:52, 29 March 2010 (UTC)
To me, this has all the earmarks of a non-notable fringe theory, but I could be wrong, so a few more eyes might be helpful. - LuckyLouie ( talk) 20:37, 29 March 2010 (UTC)
If anyone wants to have some fun with a fringe conspiracy/UFO theory, Dulce Base could use a little work. ClovisPt ( talk) 01:07, 30 March 2010 (UTC)
Looks like this article is being used to put forward a possibly Creationist viewpoint, I just deleted a paragraph from the definition section which was actually an argument and pure OR. Dougweller ( talk) 05:38, 1 April 2010 (UTC)
Some elements are maintaining denial of the qualification of the biographical subject for membership in Category:Confidence tricksters on the basis that he makes object appear out of nothing. Yes you heard that right. The direct and indirect patronage he attracts for these "displays of divinity" fund aspects of his ashram and wider activities and contribute to his general notoriety. The experts Sorcar and Narasimhaiah, referenced in the article, the latter of which "held the fact that Sathya Sai Baba ignored his letters to be one of several indications that his miracles are fraudulent" found a prevailing view (from non-devotees) that the 'miracles' have a fraudulent basis. Seeking to have that non-prevailing view formally here declared WP:FRINGE, thanks. ResignBen16 ( talk) 01:40, 5 April 2010 (UTC)
A new draft of the race and intelligence article is being edited into mainspace, based on discussion in mediation. It should be completed sometime on 4/1/2010. Since this is a highly contested article that has had numerous debates about neutrality and fringe theories, I am announcing this on the relevant noticeboards to get wider feedback on the draft. Interested editors may review and comment on the draft and suggest revisions at the mediation page, so long as they abide by the mediation rules listed here.
Please discuss changes at the mediation page rather than trying to correct issues in the article directly, at least for the time being. The topic is sensitive, and the best hope of achieving a stable article is to begin from this draft and talk through any revisions needed to create better balance and more complete coverage. -- Ludwigs2 18:36, 30 March 2010 (UTC)
I don't have time to do anything more than flag this article right now -- it is very credulous, conceivably bogus, and if nothing else contains quotations too extensive to be fair use. Looie496 ( talk) 19:38, 4 April 2010 (UTC)
Following Anupam's suggestion, I've taken a look at Category:Exorcists and its subcategories. It seems to me that a lot of these are either not really notable or are WP:ONEEVENT guys. the sourcing seems a bit thin too. Mangoe ( talk) 11:32, 6 April 2010 (UTC)
Anagrammatic dispersion is an article about a cryptographic technique which exists, but it describes at length how it was used in the Bible to add extra messages. It is not my area of expertise, but I have the impression that it is presenting things which are generally considered to be fringe theories as if they are undeniable truth, with many examples that seem at first glance rather farfetched. A critical review of the article by editors more familiar with such "cryptography in the Bible" theories would probably be beneficial. Fram ( talk) 09:55, 7 April 2010 (UTC)
This is apparently a real episode, but is written rather credulously. I mean, is that really Asmodeus's signature? Mangoe ( talk) 16:46, 8 April 2010 (UTC)
The Kharsag Epics AfD ended in merge with Christian O'Brien, now we have an article on the word Kharsag, which is found only in a translation of some Sumerian epics by a scholar named Barton in 1918. This again is an attempt to put forward O'Brien's fringe views. Dougweller ( talk) 05:40, 1 April 2010 (UTC)
By the way, in case you were wondering, "kharsag" is normally transliterated as hursanu or hursag which means "foothill" in Sumerian. It is not a place. See Ninhursag or here. ScienceApologist ( talk) 20:29, 1 April 2010 (UTC)
Please see my latest revisions of this within the Christian O'Brien page. I would be grateful for help, opinions and assistance to gain agreement for Kharsag's own page. Paul Bedson ( talk) 00:46, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
I'd appreciate it if someone could keep an eye on this for a couple of days, we have an editor who despite the content of the article keeps adding to the lead that there is no confirmation that it is a hoax (you'd think men riding dinosaurs would be enough, but the articles makes it clear it's a hoax). Thanks. Dougweller ( talk) 16:43, 11 April 2010 (UTC)
There is a disagreement about the origins of John Hunyadi (Hungarian Janos Hunyadi, Romanian Ioan de Hunedoara).
The text from the current version of the article is this:
“ | Hunyadi is a Hungarian noble family — according to most sources — of Romanian origin. There are also alternative researches suggesting Cuman, Slavic or Magyar (dubious) descendance. | ” |
I think the correct text would be:
“ | Hunyadi is a Hungarian noble family of Romanian origin (a few alternative researches suggest South Slav descendance.) | ” |
Medieval chroniclers state clearly that his father (Voik) and his mother (Elisabetha)
[12] were Vlachs/Romanians. Also there are "numerous documents in which Hunyadi's by-name appears as János Oláh. (Oláh is the Hungarian word for Wlach.)"
[13]
In addition there are
tens of modern sources accepting the Vlach/Romanian descent (I listed only neutral and Hungarian sources, in order not to be said that the Romanian works are biased). Even Britannica and Britannica 1911 state that he was Vlach/Romanian and he came from Wallachia (Romanian medieval principality) and his family migrated to Hungary (so he was an alien, not an ethnic Hungarian)
It doesn't seem ok to me to take in consideration a theory (Magyar descendance) supported by a single source [14], which in addition is a book about literature (and not about history ) and where it is only presumed that he was a Magyar. In this work it is discussed mainly his representation in epic poems, not the historical reality. Below i offered the exact quote from the book
“ | In this poem Stjepan Lazarevic, who ruled over Serbia from 1389 to 1427, is said to marry a girl (not named) of Sibinj (Hermann-stadt, in Transylvania) at the request of the nobles of that place. On the day after the wedding he sets off to Kosovo and is slain there; but in due course his wife bears twins, who are Janko and his sister Rusa. From historical sources nothing certain seems to be known of Janko`s origin; but he was presumably a Magyar | ” |
Also his Cuman origin is supported by a single Hungarian source [15] (possibly biased on this subject, like Romanian sources too, so we must be at least circumspect about its reliability) , where is not written even a word about the alleged Romanian origin which was asserted even in medieval texts ( Umumu ( talk) 07:21, 9 April 2010 (UTC))
The Slav descent has 3 references in the wiki article, and in all of them the Romanian origin is presented as being the most probable, while the theory of Slav origin is presented as being only an alternative theory:
- Source 1 (Hungarian source):
[16]
“ | Romanian or Slav descent | ” |
- Source 2: (Neutral source) [17]
“ | Romanian or South Slav descent | ” |
- Source 3: (Hungarian source) [18]
“ | Hunyadi came from a Romanian (according to some sources, Slav) family, which had migrated from Wallachia to Transylvania. The Hungarian name stems from the castle Vajdahunyad (today Hunedoara in Romania), which Janos's father Vajk, a minor Romanian noble | ” |
See talk page of the article, all theories have their reliable sources. The article also does mention that the majority of sources supports the Vlach descendance, the alternative sources are not overemphasized at all.
According to the
Cambridge University Press source: From historical sources nothing certain seems to be known of Janko`s origin; but he was presumably a Magyar. I think that's pretty much OK as a reference. A couple of English books also state that his mother was Hungarian, which makes John Hunyadi at least half-Hungarian.
Plus, in the above points I don't see that some sources only refer to the obscurity surrounding the family's origins, although this is probably more notable than any of the alternative theories.
Squash Racket (
talk)
17:56, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
Squash Racket ( talk) 15:38, 11 April 2010 (UTC)When the author draws his conclusion, he clearly doesn't talk about the epic song, but adds his own verdict. I won't repeat this once more even if you still don't understand it. Squash Racket (talk) 17:23, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
. iadrian ( talk) 16:28, 11 April 2010 (UTC)Yes, he clearly draws his conclusion from an Epic song(poetry) not historical data. I don`t see how can you even argue about this when the book is called The growth of literature and the "fact" is found in the second part of the book Yugoslav oral poetry in the section called Heroic Poetry. It looks like you are the one who doesn`t understand, or you just don`t want to. Please wait until the thread on the Fridge theory reach to a conclusion to remove the dubious form. Please read the WP:DISPUTED. iadrian ( talk) 16:41, 10 April 2010 (UTC)
First you must understand that Vlach was in the Middle Ages the exonym for Romanian and one single source, that "presumes" based on epic songs doesn`t have a historical relevance. As i said on the talk page, please find another source, i am sure that there is no trouble to present with another reliable source about his Magyar origin? And we can leave the Epic songs out from historical facts. Of course , Romanian/Hungarian sources are not to be trusted as you cited in the Fringe theory thread the Hugh Seton-Watson. iadrian ( talk) 17:16, 11 April 2010 (UTC)
Squash Racket, you must accept that a book about literature where a philologist issues an assumption is not the most scientific and trustable source when we talk about historical facts. Why don't we also take in consideration travel guides or the opinions of historical films directors?
On the other hand the Cuman origin is supported by a single Hungarian source. It is needed at least one more (preferably neutral) reference(
Umumu (
talk)
17:47, 11 April 2010 (UTC))
You mean the
Cambridge University Press reference written by a British historian with his own Wikipedia article?
There are other sources suggesting at least his mother's Hungarian origin, so even without this source his Hungarian ethnic origins couldn't possibly be considered a fringe theory.
Squash Racket (
talk)
19:11, 11 April 2010 (UTC)
From the definition: A fringe theory can be considered notable if it has been referenced EXTENSIVELY , and in a serious manner, in at least one MAJOR publication, or by a notable group or individual that is independent of the theory.
(
Umumu (
talk)
04:44, 12 April 2010 (UTC))
The John Hunyadi article stinks all over; it's not just the ethnicity that's a problem, but pretty much every single sentence in the first section. I've removed one almost certainly untrue claim, but I'm skeptical that this fellow is anything like as important as he is being made out to be in the first section. Mangoe ( talk) 15:29, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
Some nice work by a student for a class project. However, one section of the article entitled God Watches Over His Workers seems to be promoting the idea that an avoidance of injuries during construction was the result of miracles. The sources referenced aren't accessible, so I'm not sure how to correct it. - LuckyLouie ( talk) 15:51, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
See Talk:Daniel David Palmer and this edit. See Talk:Chiropractic history#Patricide controversy and this edit. See Talk:Chiropractic controversy and criticism and this edit. Please discuss on talk page. QuackGuru ( talk) 18:25, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
Is anyone familiar with this fringe book? The article is one-sided at the moment. Dougweller ( talk) 08:46, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
(outdent) My local library system does not have The cult of alien gods: H.P. Lovecraft and extraterrestrial pop culture By Jason Colavito - can you two check yours? That looks to have some excellent content on this book. KillerChihuahua ?!? Advice 19:35, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
I remember this came up in the context of The Nine Unknown . I tagged it back in October. I don't know if it meets WP:BK, but I think you have done a decent cleanup job and I don't mind the article staying around in its present form. -- dab (𒁳) 10:33, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
I've been struggling to convince a few other editors that this marginally notable author of cancer curing recipe books is being given undue weight by attempt to list every paper, article, letter and foreign translation of work discoverable. Most of these references are entirely non-notable and act merely to WP:PUFF. Wise heads and assistance would be very useful. Twiga Kali ( talk) 23:25, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
No comment necessary. Also see the wider opus of Math920 ( talk · contribs). It's been a while since I've seen this level of racialist crackpottery. -- dab (𒁳) 07:29, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
now blanked by author. I'm not sure we should keep this stuff around even buried in the edit history. -- dab (𒁳) 11:04, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
this is also interesting, the author appears to be signing "Otenor" in racialist internet fora. "Gender: Male, Age: 30, Race: Caucasoid, Phenotype: Nordid, Ethnicity: Russian Politics: Liberal[sic!]" Probably himself a member of the exalted Paleoeuropean race, who are, as we learn in the article, "characterized by meso-brachycephaly, short and broad face, high prominent nose and light pigmentation of eyes, hair and skin." -- dab (𒁳) 12:47, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
I also figured out what Math920 means by the "reference" Image is taken from the book-A.Bayar, Sectet history of the Tatars for about two dozen images he uploaded. This translates to "image ripped from http://bayar.ws/ ". The full title of the website would be "Алексанр Бояров. Тайная история татар и Великого переселения народов" ("The secret history of the Tatars and the Great Migrations"). Apparently a "book" self-published online in 2007. -- dab (𒁳) 13:59, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
What this episode does for us is point out a few missing articles. We definitely need Soviet anthropology. And then we also seem to be missing a number of races or "types" proposed in the early 20th century. These can probably all go under Caucasian race, but we seem to be missing all mention of the Borreby, Brünn (lol, Daniel Craig) and Falish (Faelid, Dalofaelid, Dalonordic) types. I have never heard of them, but the racist websites are full of them. The Russians also have lots of other types unknown to en-wiki, see ru:Шаблон:Расы.
-- dab (𒁳) 14:17, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
Among other things, this has supposedly been used to clear murder suspects via written messages from the dead. Seems like a redirect that escaped from Automatic writing by mistake. - LuckyLouie ( talk) 19:47, 16 April 2010 (UTC)
Priceless. It seems we are dealing with Renata Ventura ( talk · contribs). Emmanuel (spirit) is a WP:FRINGE gem, I resisted the urge to slash-burn it so you can enjoy it too. -- dab (𒁳) 09:45, 18 April 2010 (UTC)
Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Out-of-place artifact might be of interest to watchers of this board. Regards, ClovisPt ( talk) 22:15, 17 April 2010 (UTC)
Til is at it once again (or rather, as ever). The Book of Enoch was apparently written by Enoch himself in Ethiopian in 3000 BC. Of course, if this fact has only ever been published it in an untractable obscure journal or memo, it is due to the conspiracy of Eurocentric western pseudoscholarship trying to hide the truth. -- dab (𒁳) 19:49, 19 April 2010 (UTC)
I found this edit [21] about a 'Queen of Sheba' University, [22]. So what is this 'University'? All I can find is that it was "Incorporated by Bernard Leeman, Rutis C Clytus, Sergey Kotelnikov, Queen of Sheba University Incorporated is located at 15 Ferguson Rd WESTBROOK, QLD," in 2008 in Florida. [23] I doubt anything about it belongs on Wikipedia. The editor who added this is also complaining at the talk page, Talk:Kamal Salibi about the removal of stuff about Leeman. Dougweller ( talk) 04:45, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
This article is now mainly about 'Kharsag'. Besides issues such as WP:UNDUE which may apply, I'm not at all sure about the claim that Kharsag is actually used by all these authors. It's partially a language issue, is using 'kharsag' as an element of a word the same thing as that word meaning Kharsag? Because that seems to be what's being done here. First we have co-ordinates, maybe implying they actually pinpoint 'the' location, then the claims "Kharsag; also Khar-sag, Imkharsag, E-kharsag, E-kharsag-gal-kurkurra, E-kharsag-kurkurra, Kharsag-kzurcktra, E-kharsag-kalama, Hur-Sag, Gar-Sag or Gar-Sag-da" - which I think is OR. The cited quotes after this seem to treat all these words as indicating a single location. Then there are various sections, including an archaeology one with no archaeology and a geology one. I don't think it would be at all clear to readers that this is a fringe concept and a minor one at that. Thanks. Dougweller ( talk) 20:00, 16 April 2010 (UTC)
There are understandable problems with language about a location only known to be famous from say 3,500BC to 700BC and then rediscovered in the early 20th century. George Aaron Barton, who is not fringe or OR translates kharsag in 3 seperate Sumerian texts as the same place that I have now cited. Gerald Massey, Morris Jastrow, Jr. (Barton's predecessor) and his school, which includes Boutiflower clearly understand to be the same place, as I would argue does the great sumerologist Samuel Noah Kramer when his use of the word hursag is put in context. The other cites are perhaps of a more cosmological nature as the texts deal with the Sumerian view of the world but still deal with the same place mythologically. Even the great Stephen Herbert Langdon who was quoted against me by Kevin in the deletion discussion DID mention the word in context as "gar-sag-da" translated "netherworld mountain" and I have included a few cites showing later temples dedicated to this site, such as at Nippur and others extending into Assyrian times. I have gone outside Barton to research this and firmly believe that in the time that these great scholars lived, Kharsag as the Sumerian Olympus was well noted and well deserves mention in Wikipedia as due note to their accomplishments in this field. You can rip the O'Brien out of this entirely if you like Doug, but hope you will help me create a balanced and informative page under the guidelines required. Thanks again for informing me of necessary rules, I'm very much in favour and grateful for your weighing up of this article. Paul Bedson ( talk) 22:01, 19 April 2010 (UTC)
It might help to explain that the actual ancient cuneiform these words are translated from is more like picture language than ours. The picture-sign translated as "khar" or "gar" (or for Kramer "hur") in many of these books is that of a garden or enclosure and that of "sag" is a picture sign of a head. Hence mountain in basic translations, but undeniably used in the context of the home or birthplace of the first Gods (Enlil, NinKharsag, etc.) by all these authors and professors as a singular location. Paul Bedson ( talk) 22:42, 19 April 2010 (UTC)
There are various forms of Cuneiform of which Barton's is the most archaic and similar to pictograms. I cannot even find Kharsag used as a common noun meaning simply "mountain" anywhere. Please show cites of this if there are any. I think I have mentioned enough reliable sources now to possibly even take Ninhursag to AfD requesting name change due to WP:UNDUE given to Kramer's translation, when the weight of the majority of sources refer to her as Ninkharsag. Akhilleus is correct that the article should be about NE mythology and I hope I have expressed my agreement with this and intentions to create a kharsag page based on the ground rules. Now where to start? Paul Bedson ( talk) 10:26, 20 April 2010 (UTC)
An IP is editing the articles Pre-Columbian Africa-Americas contact theories and Abu Bakr II in a manner that, to me, seems to be promoting an ahistorical fringe theory. However, I'm starting to feel that both articles could use some work, but I'm not sure how to go about editing them. I would appreciate any interested editors taking a look at the IP's edits, or just editing the articles in light of Wikipedia policies. Thanks, ClovisPt ( talk) 15:19, 17 April 2010 (UTC)
What you call fringe has nothing to do with accurate representation of the sources you cite as the vast majority is weasel worded original research whose only purpose is to discredit a theory, as opposed to providing a neutral report of the facts surrounding the controversy. Statements like "most scholars believe", or arguments against a theory drawn from sources that have nothing to do with debunking the theory only proves this point. My aim was to limit such original research. I contributed to these articles some time ago and tried to present them in a neutral fashion. What you consider "fringe", has no source, it is YOUR opinion. I will keep my opinions to myself but insist on accurate representation of the sources you cite, and not keeping them there or without tags for the sake of simply debunking a theory that you don't like. The Abubakari's success is considered fringe is obviously false since most people don't specifically deal with Abubakari and most who do, come from Mali. When we speak of a "majority of scholars" they must be included, not just European hard nosed academics from the west. They hold no monopoly on facts.
Also, none of what was posted carries undue weight since the articles are about contact theories and the theorists make up a vital portion of the topic. Original research is when you go outside of those dealing with the controversy, and using your own research data to discredit the claims made, as with the botanical data and others. Also the end statement in the section for the Cocaine mummies is simply put there to udnermine the findings. No scientists have even taken up this issue because it's such a mystery. What "conventional explanations", who? It is nonsense, people are writing anything just to discredit a theory that they don't think is popular. Has nothing to do with probability, possibility, or plausibility, they harp on popularity. But even this bespeaks an agenda since most of which is attributed to popular opinion, comes from blog posts (one from a graduate student) and 2 or 3 sources who only dealt with Van sertima. Nonsense. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.207.93.154 ( talk • contribs) 19:30, 17 April 2010
Of course WP:DUE holds for every article on the project, but in the case of these articles, seeing that they are about fringe theories beginning to end and not about real scholarship at all, WP:DUE means assessing the relative weight of fringe theories among themselves, not the weight of fringe theory wrt academia.
That said, any editor complaining about "European hard nosed academics from the west" (i.e. playing of the race card in place of presenting actual evidence) is extremely likely to be misguided about WP project fundamentals and extremely unlikely to contribute anything of value. -- dab (𒁳) 16:21, 18 April 2010 (UTC)
Never heard of this one; stones move by themselves and "no one can explain it"? - LuckyLouie ( talk) 14:21, 20 April 2010 (UTC)
Christian O'Brien's ideas about Sumerian mythology have attracted some attention on this page already; if you've looked at those debates you should note the existence of Kharsag, which looks like an attempt to sneak the material of Kharsag epics into a different article. Comments welcome at Talk:Kharsag and Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Kharsag. This is noted up above, but unless you clicked through it might not have been apparent that there was an active AfD. --Akhilleus ( talk) 03:36, 21 April 2010 (UTC)
Here we have someone else's suppositions that Christianity rites come from somewhere besides Christianity. This has been festering for years. It's at AFD but it should be looked at nonetheless. Mangoe ( talk) 14:49, 20 April 2010 (UTC)
It would be very easy to write a valid article on the topic. That said, I agree that the article as it stands is flawed and under-referenced, even though it contains much valid material and lists relevant sources. It just needs cleanup. -- dab (𒁳) 09:07, 22 April 2010 (UTC)
Recently a few new editors have arrived at the Christ myth theory page and have tried very hard to demolish the article's focus and clarity through tendentious policy objections, "teach the controversy" type tactics, and plain old sloppy writing. It would be very helpful if some of the editors who have experience dealing with this sort of thing were to drop in on the talk page and help rebuff the agitators through adding to the consensus. Eugene ( talk) 19:08, 23 April 2010 (UTC)
The Christ Myth Theory article has been a problem as the definition has is no clear consensus in the literature; There are those who say quite clear that they define "Christ Myth Theory" as the idea Jesus never existed while there are others who define it in such a way that is clearly not what they are saying.
"Or, alternatively, they seized on the reports of an obscure Jewish Holy man bearing this name and arbitrarily attached the "Cult-myth" to him." Dodd, C.H. (1938) History and the Gospel under the heading Christ Myth Theory Manchester University Press pg 17
"This view hold that the story of Jesus is a piece of mythology, possessing no more substantial claims to historical fact than the old Greek or Norse stories of gods and heroes,..."[ Bromiley (1082 International Standard Bible Encyclopedia: E-J]. The first paragraph of the related material tells us about the Christ Myth theory, second tells us what it is (using story of), third line talks about the supposed parallels, and the fourth uses Apollonius of Tyana while using Lucian as an example, and the final sentence gives us the examples of Attis, Adonis, Osiris and Mithras. The next paragraph mentions ONE work by Wells and two counterpoints to his arguments. The paragraph after that starts "These examples of the Christ-myth idea..." please note the plural. The paragraph after that talks has the lead in Bertrand Russel leave the question open and the very next sentance says "This negative attitude is shared by P. Graham, The Jesus Hoax (1974)" NOWHERE in any of this are any of the greats (Bruno Bauer, Arthur Drews, J. M. Robertson, William Benjamin Smith, etc) of the non historical concept mentioned. What we get instead is, in order, are Lucian, Wells, and Bertrand Russel. Hardly a cross section of the non historical idea as Akhilleus has tried to claim in the past. Troy and Vinland are also part "old Greek or Norse stories of gods and heroes". Last time I check Troy and Vinland (ie North America) existed.
"The theory that Jesus Christ was not a historical character, and that the Gospel records of his life are mainly, if not entirely, of mythological origin." Encyclopaedia of Religion and Religions (1951) by Pike, Royston
"At first glance, the "Jesus-myth" seems to be a stroke of genius: To eliminate Christianity and any possibility of it being true, just eliminate the founder! The idea was first significantly publicized by a 19th-century German scholar named Bruno Bauer. Following Bauer, there were a few other supporters: Couchoud, Gurev, Augstein [Chars.JesJud 97-8]. Today the active believer is most likely to have waved in their faces one of four supporters of this thesis: The turn-of-the-century writer Arthur Drews; the myth-thesis' most prominent and prolific supporter, G. A. Wells, who has published five books on the subject; Earl Doherty, or Acharya S. Each of these writers takes slightly different approaches, but they all agree that a person named Jesus did not exist (or, Wells seems to have taken a view now that Jesus may have existed, but may as well not have)." Wells, G.A. "A Reply to J. P. Holding's "Shattering" of My Views on Jesus and an Examination of the Early Pagan and Jewish References to Jesus" (2000) Please note this post dates Jesus Myth which Wells himself accepted a possible historical person being involved but few if any of the Gospel accounts were historical.
"The year 1999 saw the publication of at least five books which concluded that the Gospel Jesus did not exist. One of these was the latest book (The Jesus Myth) by G. A. Wells, the current and longstanding doyen of modern Jesus mythicists." Doherty "JESUS — ONE HUNDRED YEARS BEFORE CHRIST by Alvar Ellegard"
"The theory that Jesus was originally a myth is called the Christ-myth theory, and the theory that he was an historical individual is called the historical Jesus theory" Walsh, George (1998) "The Role of Religion in History", New Brunswick: Transaction, , p. 58 No WP:RS explanation of how the first part does not fall under Wells' current mythic Paul Jesus + Historical teacher = Gospel Jesus has been provided nor how Meed's 100 BC Jesus does not fit the second part.
"When Bertrand Russell and Lowes Dickinson toyed with the Christ-myth theory and alternatively suggested that, even if Christ were a historic person, the gospels give us no reliable information about him, they were not representing the direction and outcome of historical inquiry into Christian origins." Wood, Herbert George (1955) Belief and Unbelief since 1850 I asked again if the Christ-myth theory is an either/or than how do you toy with it?! Never mind the "the gospels give us no reliable information" could fit within Pike's and Dodd's definitions but are excluded by those of Farmer, Horbury, and Wiseman.
WHile this is a little long it shows the problems with the deviation being used in the article.-- BruceGrubb ( talk) 12:56, 24 April 2010 (UTC)
More eyes on this would be very helpful. Anthony ( talk) 13:12, 24 April 2010 (UTC)
I deleted this page as being "pure nonsense", and my deletion has been challenged. It is now located at User:Int21hexster. Can people look and tell me if I was hasty?— Kww( talk) 02:36, 24 April 2010 (UTC)
See also my reply to that comment here. I am not 100% sure whether this is a joke, vandalism, or sincerely believed, but it is certainly nonsense. It contains bits and pieces of notation and language from various branches of mathematics, but there is no substance to it at all. For example, names of branches of mathematics and mathematical methods are thrown out at random, such as "Imaginary Numbers ", "lambda calculus", "Hilbert Space", etc. None of these is part of a sentence or explained or followed up in any way. Nothing else in the page has any connection with the lambda calculus at all; nothing else has any connection with Hilbert space, and so on. Then we have "Four axises [sic] can be defined in terms of tangents.
z= (Tan(x^2) + Tan y^2))^2
y= (Tan(x^2) + Tan z^2))^2
x= (tan(z^2) +Tan(y^2))^2
Z*pi=(tan(x^2)+tan(y^2))^s".
This does not define axes, nor anything else. There is no explanation as to what x, y, z and s are, nor why they should satisfy these equations, or what connection it has with axes. Nor are these equations used in any way or referred to anywhere else in the page. The whole thing is like this: it consists of fragmentary remarks, equations, and diagrams taken in an apparently random way from as many different aspects of mathematics as the author can find, strung together without any system or meaning. The equivalent would be an article claiming to be about history which said:
First world war.
The Roman empire.
The comparative method.
(then a photograph of Winston Churchill)
Mo Tse Tung, chairman of the party.
(then a map of Portugal in the 15th century)
Columbus's first voyage.
and so on.
This is such complete nonsense that I think it may well be intended as such. However, even if the author of it sincerely believes that it means something then it does not belong here because it is original research (stretching the meaning of "research" considerably: in any case it is original). The author's message on
my talk page indicates quite unambiguously that he/she regards it as original research. I have been a graduate mathematician since 1973, and I have never heard or read of "Holographic Metaphoric Mathematics". When I searched for it on Google I found nothing at all other than Wikipedia. In conclusion, (1) this is complete nonsense, and (2) it has never received any coverage anywhere, so by Wikipedia's standards it is not notable. To answer Kww's question, no you were not too hasty at all: you were absolutely right to delete the article. In fact in my opinion even having it as a user page is not consistent with our guidelines: it is nothing to do with editing or preparing any legitimate contributions to the encyclopedia; it is written by an editor who has made no other contributions to the encyclopedia; it may possibly be vandalism, and if it isn't then it is original research and published here in order to promote the author's work.
JamesBWatson (
talk)
09:46, 24 April 2010 (UTC)
Thanks, everyone. I didn't think I had missed anything, but felt it was my duty to ask.— Kww( talk) 14:03, 24 April 2010 (UTC)
Thanks Guys, I understand that your correct in that the page does seem totally uncorrelated. I meant to flesh it out as I went along. I do agree it is original research... if it could be called that. I agree with that statement as well. I'm skeptical of the results my self, and that is why I wanted as many eyeballs as possible. Is it still an issue to keep it on my user page to continue to flesh it out?
I know the topics look random, but to me they make sense. You use imaginiary numbers as an index into hyperbolic space, then from there use the indices as matrix operations. So things don't get crazy messy, you use an inverted DWT so it's no longer time variant. that is were the euclidean and non-euclidean space reference comes in along with hilbert space. The space itself is a representation of a 5 dimensional square. I am working on more concrete examples as QED. I might be a crackpot... who knows. It wouldn't be the first time an idiot figured out the next big thing.
Regardless I thank you for the review. At least I know it still looks like nonsense
Just double checked all the comments from everyone and it's true, this doesn't belong on here. I will remove everything once I get it copied down.
Thanks Everyone, I hope at the very least you got a laugh out of it.
oh, just for the record, if your indexing into hyperbolic space and see that imaginary numbers act like a binary(well trinary)system, you can use a k-map to simplify the operations into matrix multiplication. The way I look at it is putting a several hyperbolic places together and into a box, then looking into the box through several hyperbolic planes that are semi-transparent.
Anyway Thanks!
Sorry for the continual updates, one last thing. Schroedinger cat is alive/dead/ and something imaginary...
Can someone check to see whether this is an appropriately weighted addition?
I'm recusing myself from any and all edits to such articles.
ScienceApologist ( talk) 18:09, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
I am currently working on a new draft of Shakespeare authorship question, a problematic article about a minority view, and would appreciate input from some uninvolved editors with specific areas of expertise (like those here at Fringe). Here is the latest draft that I am seeking help on: [ [25]]. Can some of you give me input on any issues that jump out at you? Please leave comments here or on my talk page. Thanks. Smatprt ( talk) 15:25, 28 April 2010 (UTC)
There's an RfC on the question of whether the Christ myth theory can legitimately be categorized as pseudo-history. Please comment. Eugene ( talk) 16:42, 28 April 2010 (UTC)
There has been recent major publicity about a claim that Noah's Ark has been discovered (with a really pathetic video). There's an entry cited to a blog with a statement that it's a hoax. An IP removed it, and I replaced arguing Wikipedia:PARITY#Parity_of_sources allowed it, but I used what WP:Fringe says is a shortcut, WP:PARITY but typed it with lower case, WP:Parity, and the IP summarily reverted again with an edit summary saying just 'red link'. Now although the newspapers reporting it are reliable sources, their source is clearly not, so I think we can use the blog. I'd like some comments on this and maybe an eye on the article in any case, as it's hot news now. Thanks. Dougweller ( talk) 07:11, 29 April 2010 (UTC)
Icelandic Elf School ( | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
What do you think? Is this school notable? How should it be discussed? What is its context in relevance to hidden people and the oft-reported (though perhaps not verified) claim that the majority of Icelanders believe in elves?
ScienceApologist ( talk) 20:42, 27 April 2010 (UTC)
I looked it up on Google Books and added a few more sources to the article. It seems notable enough for an article but I hardly think that it can be taken as a reliable source, per se, on the prevalence of the belief in elves. Eugene ( talk) 17:14, 28 April 2010 (UTC)
No, the "prevalence of the belief in elves" in contemporary Iceland is a very complicated, and interesting question. It involves tourism, ethnic clichés and autostereotypes, the feedback loop of globalized popular culture and local folklore, and the " Jedi phenomenon" type of response to surveys and polls on religious beliefs.
One could probably write a book about it, but of course not on-wiki. -- dab (𒁳) 12:07, 30 April 2010 (UTC)
Repeating my previous request, we need someone who can patiently describe how to properly interpret andd present systematic reviews on Talk:Reiki. The talk page is now filled with discussions on this, but we're making very little progress. A brief, clear explanation would could then be used to start a subsection in WP:MEDRS. -- Ronz ( talk) 17:43, 30 April 2010 (UTC)
A user is claiming that democracy has its roots in the Bible, using 19th century sources to do so [26]. See also related the related talkpage thread Talk:Democracy#Erroneous_rationale_for_deleting_.22Biblical_foundations.22. Athenean ( talk) 22:07, 30 April 2010 (UTC)
We have a new editor on these articles -- see also [28] where he is looking forward "to the reaction of the mob". Both articles could use some eyes on them. Dougweller ( talk) 14:49, 1 May 2010 (UTC)
I've been pondering what is the best way of tackling reviews of fringe works. The problem I'm finding is that fringe works usually tend to be reviewed enthusiastically by fellow travellers on the fringe but are ignored by the mainstream. There are a few cases where fringe works get mainstream attention - the intelligent design textbook Of Pandas and People is one example - but for the most part you end up with a completely one-sided set of reviews. The trouble is that this gives a distorted impression of where the balance of the debate lies. You would naturally expect creationists to respond enthusiastically to other creationists' work, but the total absence of any reviews from a mainstream stance makes it seem, misleadingly, like the creationist viewpoint is the only game in town and fails to convey the mainstream viewpoint.
I'm not sure what the best solution is to this. Any advice? -- ChrisO ( talk) 19:28, 1 May 2010 (UTC)
The "Pseudoscience and related fringe theories" ( WP:PSCI) section of WP:NPOV has been moved to WP:FRINGE (a guideline), and was removed from NPOV (a policy) (see its April 30 version).
PSCI has been temporarily restored to NPOV and there is an RfC at WT:NPOV which may result in its removal. Johnuniq ( talk) 04:10, 2 May 2010 (UTC)
Some edit warring going on here with IndigoAdult ( talk · contribs), an SPA, involved. Dougweller ( talk) 05:23, 2 May 2010 (UTC)
I think everyone with an interest in fringe theories needs to look at this RfC as it could greatly affect how these articles can be edited. Dougweller ( talk) 05:45, 2 May 2010 (UTC)
The article Ten Indian commandments seems to be utter horse shit. The single source, though inaccessible to me, seems to fall short of WP's standards of reliability. The 'commandments' themselves can be found all over the Internets but nowhere with a credible source. This sort of facile stereotype (we have so much to learn from these noble savages) ought to be killed with fire. 75.147.24.105 ( talk) 19:39, 3 May 2010 (UTC)
Merge with Noble savage or delete it. Tom Reedy ( talk) 13:19, 5 May 2010 (UTC)
I am currently working on a new draft of Shakespeare authorship question, a problematic article about a minority view, and would appreciate input from some uninvolved editors with specific areas of expertise (like FRINGE, NPOV, etc.). Here is the latest draft that I am requesting comments on: [ [31]]. Can some of you give me input on any issues that jump out at you? Please leave comments here or on my talk page. Thanks. Smatprt ( talk) 18:20, 4 May 2010 (UTC)
These are generally awful. But I dared to look into Category:Modern human genetic history just now, and I see that the ethnic pov-pushers are now beginning to create one "genetic history" article per group on top of the (already awful) "origin" article. We thus have now Genetic origins of the Turkish people and Genetic origins of the Kurds (the latter on top of Origins of the Kurds. Mind you, I wouldn't complain if these articles were solid and well-written, bona fide WP:SS spin-offs. But they are invariably tendentious WP:SYNTH crap. It appears that nobody is looking after Wikipedia:WikiProject Human Genetic History these days. -- dab (𒁳) 07:30, 5 May 2010 (UTC)
Article almost entirely sourced to publications by Rupert Sheldrake, no mainstream perspective found, and not sure if it meets WP:GNG. - LuckyLouie ( talk) 13:57, 4 May 2010 (UTC)
A long-standing embarrassment sourced to radio talk shows, about.com, and ghost buster web sites, complete with purported photos, drawings, and originally-researched "scientific explanations" (as if science has recognized and commented on such a thing). One brief mention in a book on folklore, otherwise completely ignored by reliable sources. It may be time to put this out of its misery at AfD. - LuckyLouie ( talk) 14:10, 5 May 2010 (UTC)
A classic WP:FRINGE author, he essentially claims that Darwinism is a Masonic/Zionist conspiracy responsible for terrorism. Article coverage tends to suggest that this author "contributes" to the "creation-evolution debate". The reality is that this is an all-out fundamentalist crackpot and the article badly needs to move away from relying on primary refereneces self-published by the subject towards a representation of third party assessments. The article is possibly affected by COI, at least Oktar has taken the pains to compile an extremely detailed critique of his Wikipedia article, at http://www.replytowikipedia.com/ -- dab (𒁳) 13:47, 6 May 2010 (UTC)
At this point, the open question remains, who is financing this? This is not just a nutcase, it's a nutcase with many millions to burn. He is giving away thousands of free copies of his 800-page, full-colour, glossy-paper "Atlas". He is atm plastering the billboards in my neighborhood [32], paid for in Swiss Francs (which is how he got my attention). This hints at an astounding financial potency for a schizophrenic jailbird from Istanbul. -- dab (𒁳) 21:25, 6 May 2010 (UTC)
Are the descriptions of personality types by sleeping position in the article Sleeping position pseudoscientific? Abductive ( reasoning) 19:33, 6 May 2010 (UTC)
Someone has finally gotten around to trying to put up sources for the claim that bells are rung at noon in support of Hunyadi's defense of the city of Nándorfehérvár. Unfortunately, there are big problems: one of the sources is from the 1860s, and the other is a modern translation of a work that doesn't give me good scholarly vibes, to say the least. And over in the article on noon bell, we find some comments in the talk page that suggest that this is essentially a Hungarian legend; unfortunately one of the links given there is in Hungarian, which I can't read, and the other leads to a page which my virus protection blocks out absolutely. The CE article on Callistus III states that he established ringing of bells in support of the crusade, but doesn't mention Hunyadi or any particular battle (see here). Another page [33] doesn't specifically say "noon". There are other articles that doubt that he ordered any such thing at all. In any case I see no sign that this translates into any modern practice.
Could someone who reads Hungarian take a look at some of this? Or for that matter, can someone pull up the original papal decree? Mangoe ( talk) 02:48, 8 May 2010 (UTC)
An RFC has been opened on the recent merger into the Gavin Menzies article of two other articles, 1421: The Year China Discovered the World and 1434: The Year a Magnificent Chinese Fleet Sailed to Italy and Ignited the Renaissance. Menzies is a promoter of fringe theories, specifically in the two pseudo-historical works (1421 and 1434), which when they are not ignored are roundly dismissed. The RFC is here: Talk:1421:_The_Year_China_Discovered_the_World#RFC:_Merger_of_a_notable_book_into_the_author.27s_article; the discussion that lead to the merger is here: Talk:Gavin_Menzies#Forthcoming_book_on_Atlantis, as are the angry responses the merger generated from (so far) a single IP account. I would quite honestly appreciate any input; while I support the merger I'm happy to change my position if that's what 'pedia policies and guidlines indicate is the proper course of action. Regards, ClovisPt ( talk) 03:28, 13 May 2010 (UTC)
Article about French occultist which is basically a textbook on his ideas, eg:"Guénon's writings encompass a wide range of metaphysical themes, yet these works as whole evince a unity and organic coherence which Guénon always saw as a critical part of his work. As a result, each topic is integrally related to many others. For that reason, in this section is presented an overview, intented at presenting René Guénon's writings to someone discovering them, leaving a detailed exposition to the following sections."
It weighs in at exactly 100Kb, and I think much of it may be plagiarised directly from his books. Possibly copyvio, I'm not sure. Dougweller ( talk) 19:04, 13 May 2010 (UTC)
certainly has {{ tone}} issues, if nothing else. -- dab (𒁳) 19:16, 13 May 2010 (UTC)
SamuelTheGhost (
talk ·
contribs) recently put a fact tag on a statement at
Pre-Columbian Andalusian-Americas contact theories that read ""These theories are generally not credited by mainstream historians, however." I removed this with the edit summary "please take this to the talk page and show how this is really contentious - do you really think it's wrong or are you making a point?". He has now as asked started a discussion at
Talk:Pre-Columbian Andalusian-Americas contact theories writing ". Insofar as I was making a point, I seem to have succeeded by showing that the statement concerned was not easily to be sourced. As I (very imperfectly) understand it, the theories concerned have simply been ignored by mainstream historians. On the face of it, there is evidence which requires examination. My question is: has any "mainstream" scholar examined the documents concerned, if not, why not, and if so, what was their conclusion? At the moment we have the unsupported word of wikipedia editors that the documents are effectively to be treated as worthless. This is not a satisfactory way to leave it, and my addition of the tag was drawing attention to that fact.".
I think he is reading 'generally not credited' as 'discredited'. My problem here is that I'm not convinced that this is contentious enough to require a fact tag, and we have the old issue of fringe theories which have been ignored by mainstream scholars. This lack of attention has, not surprisingly, not caught the attention of mainstream scholars, so we could be left in some cases with an article that appears to have mainstream approval if not read carefully. It's made a bit worse in this specific article because the article is so specific, being a small sub-article of the general topic
Pre-Columbian trans-oceanic contact. In fact, a merger proposal was made last month but no one has replied - I meant to, but forgot.
So, if we can't source this specific statement, how can it be handled so that it meets our policies and guidelines and still shows that these suggestions enjoy no mainstream support? Thanks.
Dougweller (
talk)
02:52, 12 May 2010 (UTC)
Well, it could be phrased better. I have learned to dread "however" clauses on Wikipedia. Prove a positive instead. Say something like "'Pre-Columbian Andalusian-Americas contact' is the topic of a number of pseudohistorical theories" and cite a source stating that they are all bunk. Then you won't need to prove that they are "not, however, generally credited by mainstream historians". -- dab (𒁳) 15:43, 12 May 2010 (UTC)
I have reviewed this and find this is simply a merge candidate, to be de-puffed. I also found a little walled garden surrounding Hisham Kabbani if anyone feels like looking into that [34]. -- dab (𒁳) 16:48, 12 May 2010 (UTC)
There is discussion at Talk:Ebionites#Possibility of bringing the article back up to FA, most of which is, yes, from me, regarding whether certain sources currently included in the article in their own section deserve that much weight and attention in the article, or even whether they deserve any attention at all. It might be worth noting that at least one party in the history of that page had been earlier topic banned from related content for a year regarding his edit warring to include material referenced to Eisenman and Tabot, the two primary sources for the section in question. Any input regarding the works themselves, and on the material referenced to those works, is more than welcome. John Carter ( talk) 21:00, 15 May 2010 (UTC)
I am currently working on a new draft of Shakespeare authorship question, a problematic article about a minority view, and would appreciate input from some uninvolved editors with specific areas of expertise (like FRINGE, NPOV, etc.). Here is the latest draft that I am requesting comments on: [ [35]]. Can some of you give me input on any issues that jump out at you? Please leave comments here or on my talk page. Thanks. Smatprt ( talk) 21:15, 15 May 2010 (UTC)
A lot of this seems based on a personal web page [36] and the Majestic 12 documents. Dougweller ( talk) 07:31, 17 May 2010 (UTC)
I'm having some problems dealing with a non-standard cosmology promoter across various articles:
173.169.90.98 ( talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log).
Any and all help would be appreciated.
ScienceApologist ( talk) 23:24, 17 May 2010 (UTC)
Richard Goldstone is a distinguished former South African judge who is generally regarded as a leading proponent of human rights and a key anti-apartheid figure who played a major role in undermining and dismantling the apartheid system. A handful of editors want to add material to the biographical article on Goldstone that portrays him as a bloodthirsty "hanging judge" and supporter of apartheid, based on claims published 12 days ago in a tabloid newspaper. This is obviously a clear " red flag" issue, a claim that is "contradicted by the prevailing view within the relevant community, or that would significantly alter mainstream assumptions, especially in science, medicine, history, politics, and biographies of living persons". I've highlighted the BLP problems with this fringe theory at Talk:Richard Goldstone#Summary of BLP issues. Some input from uninvolved editors would be much appreciated. -- ChrisO ( talk) 07:43, 18 May 2010 (UTC)
Discusion now continuing on WP:RSN and other noticeboards too. Itsmejudith ( talk) 22:05, 18 May 2010 (UTC)
I've done the following:
ScienceApologist ( talk) 15:48, 16 May 2010 (UTC)
I've nominated this page for what I think are fairly obvious reasons. Comments are invited. cheers Deconstructhis ( talk) 15:57, 20 May 2010 (UTC)
Does this source count as a fringe theory source or not. The article as is mentions a positive review, but other reviews which can be found cited at Talk:Ebionites#Possibility of bringing the article back up to FA are rather pronouncedly less favorable. There are three other reviews mentioned there which I haven't myself yet gotten, but I would welcome any information about them which can be found, as well as any opinions on the fringe/non-fringe status of the work in question. John Carter ( talk) 16:24, 20 May 2010 (UTC)
Most edits by Sebastiano venturi ( talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) appear to aim to make his own research about iodine, lipids and evolution feature as prominently as possible in Wikipedia. There are some indications that the whole thing may be fringe science, such as a low number of Google hits for "iodolipids", and most content about this topic being associated with Venturi himself. My question to editors of a more scientific bent is, is there a fringe science / WP:UNDUE problem with these edits, apart from the obvious WP:COI problem? Sandstein 10:24, 21 May 2010 (UTC)
Would anyone care to take a look at Origin theories of Christopher Columbus? It's mostly a collection of fringe speculations, given that Columbus is widely recognized to have been Italian (or Genoese, if one prefers). In particular, an anon editor has been pushing changes to the Portuguese section that could use some outside review. Cheers, ClovisPt ( talk) 19:01, 21 May 2010 (UTC)
The newly-created article Catastrophic Geology could probably use an overhaul. At present, it implies that plate tectonics is a form of Catastrophism. Gabbe ( talk) 08:22, 21 May 2010 (UTC)
There is a little edit war going on at Pseudoscholarship. Editors who frequent this board may be able to help sort out what kind of page/article this is, and what the definition of "pseudoscholarship" should be. --Akhilleus ( talk) 05:03, 23 May 2010 (UTC)
This is courtesy of our pedant demographic who have their faces glued to the letter of our guidelines. I have given up negotiating with this type a long time ago as they do not much damage in proportion to the nerve required to have a coherent conversation with them. -- dab (𒁳) 15:06, 25 May 2010 (UTC)
I've noticed a lot of strange activity on articles devoted to obsolete racial categories. user: JoseREMY is adding weird stuff to the Nordic race article, which is now in a bad way [38]. User:STUTTGART is creating or altering a number of articles on obscure racial categories which are presented as though their existence is accepted scientific fact:
Some of these should probably be redirected and others rewritten. Paul B ( talk) 17:09, 24 May 2010 (UTC)
This discussion may interest you. Eugene ( talk) 19:02, 25 May 2010 (UTC)
I started a discussion at Wikipedia talk:Fringe theories, and realised it should have been here. What I posted was:
Hi. Could I have some help dealing with an anon editor over at synthetic telepathy. The article is currently filled with fringe conspiracy theories about mind control, all of which is original research because, apparently, the real sources are classified information. GDallimore ( Talk) 22:25, 19 May 2010 (UTC)
This is a potentially serious science article, but has been hijacked by conspiracy theorists who think that synthetic telepathy can be used for mind control and that governments have already conducted secret experiments confirming this as confirmed by the fact that they are legislating against its use. That's just one argument that's going on. The anon is intractable and it's getting into edit war mode. Please could someone help? Thanks. GDallimore ( Talk) 23:33, 19 May 2010 (UTC)
I spent an hour cleaning up the article. Further observation reveals that "synthetic telepathy" is a term popular with mind-control conspiracy theorists [39]. If no significant coverage by academic sources can be found for the subject, I recommend the article be deleted or merged with brain computer interface. - LuckyLouie ( talk) 13:58, 20 May 2010 (UTC)
Related AfD at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Psychotronic (mind control) - LuckyLouie ( talk) 16:07, 28 May 2010 (UTC)
What we have here is a "fringe theory" in the best sense of the term, respectable scholarly minority view, for a change, but nevertheless the article suffers from WP:FRINGE/WP:DUE issues. Content should be no means bulldozed but tweaked for proper perspective. The problem is that the article addresses items from the whole scale of "consensus status", from mainstream to very fringy. The mainstream part concerns a number of undisputed substrate influences of Welsh on English. The "respectable minority view", or perhaps WP:RECENTISM concerns an apparently "emerging" view that Welsh substrate is significantly responsible for the transition from Old to Middle English. If this view has any credibility, it should be given proper coverage at Middle English creole hypothesis (and history of the English language). Finally, the "very fringy" material concerns the views of Theo Vennemann that English via Celtic 'transitively' experienced a Semitic substrate. -- dab (𒁳) 15:25, 26 May 2010 (UTC)
A user called Jembana is currently rampaging around the pages on Tartessian, Lusitanian and anything related zealously advocating the Atlantic Celtic origins theory of Koch as if they are established fact (this is the idea that the Celts originate with the Atlantic Bronze Age, not with the Hallstatt culture) I've tried being nice about it, as have a couple of other users, but it's looking as if there's a fanatic at work. Can someone have a word with this user and/or would it be a good idea to create an article discussing this theory in more detail, to which much of this stuff can be moved? Paul S ( talk) 15:57, 22 May 2010 (UTC)
"Celts originate with the Atlantic Bronze Age"? No scholar who isn't steeped in nationalist chauvinism to their eyebrows would consider this seriously for more than five minutes. But apparently Wales is not so different from Bulgaria or Armenia when it comes to state-sponsored nationalism brewed at universities. I suggest this should be treated on a par with reports of Neolithic Pyramids in Bulgaria. -- dab (𒁳) 15:10, 25 May 2010 (UTC)
You may remember a fringe theory that was floating around a while back about "Sudden Jihad Syndrome" (supposedly a condition that Muslims are susceptible to). An article on that subject was deleted some time ago - see Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Sudden Jihad Syndrome. A similar fringe theory, "Jihobbyism", appears to have emerged in certain quarters and has duly been "documented" - with a plethora of blogs being used as primary sources - at Jihobbyist. Editors with an interest may wish to see the related AfD at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Jihobbyist. -- ChrisO ( talk) 02:28, 28 May 2010 (UTC)
I find these terms hilarious and would be unhappy to see deletion. Surely they can be merged into Jihad? -- dab (𒁳) 10:15, 28 May 2010 (UTC)
This term popped up in Religion in the United States, where in discussion the claim was made that this is one person's phrase and not in wide use. Please take a look if you would. Mangoe ( talk) 12:28, 31 May 2010 (UTC)
Both Low-frequency collective motion in proteins and DNA and Pseudo amino acid composition seem to be based on the primary sources of just a few authors. The articles are a mess anyway so could clearly do with some help if they are actually notable. Verbal chat 20:53, 31 May 2010 (UTC)
Alleged political conspiracy theorist. Someone more interested in this kind of stuff might want to take a look at it. Does seem dubious re notability. Misarxist ( talk) 13:15, 31 May 2010 (UTC)
A theory which has been postulated by Michael Baigent and Richard Leigh in The Temple and the Lodge concerning Robert de Bruges, has recently been added and defended as having a high probability in that article (at AfD), and in Lambert I, Count of Leuven and Robert de Brus, 1st Lord of Annandale. I have explained my arguments about it at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Robert de Bruges. Some additional input about whether this is indeed a fringe theory or whether I am on the other hand, like the other editor claims, a "paranoid administrator", is welcome. Fram ( talk) 08:54, 3 June 2010 (UTC)
Could people come back to this again? It seems to me to be veering back into original synthesis. I dipped my toe in the water a while ago, but have been put off by the volume of blather on the talk page. I think I can identify at least 3 quite separate things going on. 1) Bruno Bauer and others - very old, completely superseded scholarship, to be treated as history of ideas. 2) Freke & Gandy - recent fringy writing that theologians have dismissed in contemptuous terms. 3) Hitchens and Dawkins - turning the tables and demanding positive evidence for the historicity of Jesus. No logical link between these, but is that just me? Anyone else have a view? Itsmejudith ( talk) 16:45, 1 June 2010 (UTC)
Given the wide range of opinions about the historicity of Christ due to the very poor evidence of his existence, it may be inaccurate to even consider CMT to be a single cohesive theory. CMT is not a single theory that has developed over time, like the theory of evolution. It is just a philosophical position on the historicity of Jesus that some people have arrived at through an objective evaluation of the poor empirical evidence for Jesus' existence. Some of those people have published articles and books on the subject. It is misleading to slap together a collection of paragraphs about some of these people and their ideas and then present CMT as if it is a single cohesive theory. The article ends up saying, essentially, "This crazy anti-Semite said 'this' and this godless communist said 'that', and hey, look at what this Nazi thinks. The goal appears to be to impune those who question the historicity of Jesus with guilt by association.
But there is a larger problem here. Wikipedia's definition of a "fringe theory" pertains to ideas that contradict scientific scholarship and the focus is on pseudoscience. It goes against the spirit of Wikipedia to label a theory as "fringe", simply because a majority of people who have been schooled in a religion that is threatened by that theory do not agree with it. The evaluation of the theory should be empirical and based on evidence (or lack thereof). It is certainly relevant to let readers know that a majority of theologians have great disdain for the theory. However, an evaluation of it's qualification as a "fringe theory" should be based on it's acceptance in the scientific community not a particular religious community that holds belief in the existence of Christ as a matter of faith, the questioning of which puts one in danger of eternal damnation in Hell. (Yes, I know not some of the Bible scholars that are quoted in Eugene's infamous FAQ #2 claim to be agostic, not Christian, but they almost all obtained their degrees from institutions that hold belief in an historical Jesus as a core principle and an unquestionable matter of faith. Few if any are scientists.)
If the majority of Book-of-Mormon-scholars reject the theory that the Book of Mormon was a hoax document written by John Smith, is the hoax theory a fringe theory? Of course not. The standard of evaluation is empirical evidence, not faith.
If the majority of astrologers reject the idea that astrology is false, is disbelief in astrology a fringe theory? No, of course not. Again, the standard of evaluation is empirical evidence.
The reality is that most scientists find they have better things to do than try to evaluate every religious theory and apply an empirical standard to religious truth claims, so there may be limited research that uses the objective standard of empirical evidence to evaluate the truth claims of a particular religion. To freethinkers who objectively evaluate the empirical evidence for the historicity of Jesus, Christianity is the fringe theory.
Should Wikipedia have articles for "Anti-astrology Theory" and "Book of Mormon Hoax Theory"? Probably not.
Should all of the articles in Wikipedia pertaining to Christianity be held to the fringe theory standard? That would be the counterpart to what the current WP:OWNers of the Christ myth theory are doing with their unreasonable "three-theological-scholarly-journal-reference rule" to allow anything into the CMT article. But note that treating Christianity as the fringe theory is using empirical evidence as the standard, whereas treating the CMT as fringe theory is using appeal to theological 'authority' as the standard.
The Wikipedia standard of evaluation of theories is evidence-based, not faith-based. CMT does not fit the Wikipedia definition of a fringe theory. PeaceLoveHarmony ( talk) 22:18, 3 June 2010 (UTC)
PeaceLoveHarmony, you commit a number of blatant errors in your understanding of the CMT and the academic field. As you have made clear on other parts of WP, your opinion is based on an erroneous assumption that defending the historicity of Jesus (as all ancient historians I know of studying the period maintain) do so because they are ideologically threatened by the hypothesis. That is false, especially when we make account on the fact that ancient historians and New Testament scholars from all backgrounds have evaluated the hypothesis, and see it lacking substance. I am thinking of non-Christian scholars such as the late Michael Grant (Classicist) and Bart Ehrman (NT Scholar). But that said, there is also no reason why those serious academics, utlising sound historical criteria and publishing in the peer review should be excluded because of your personal distaste for scholars with religious affiliation. You go on to claim that "The evaluation of the theory should be empirical and based on evidence (or lack thereof)." That is the basis that ancient historians and related scholarship has dismissed the CMT. The theorists consistently fail to account for the evidence, utilise ancient historical method and are left with outrageous theories to explain away the evidence we do have. These reasons are evidenced in many of the works that deal with the fringe theory. And by the end of your comment you make it clear that you are here only for the sake of agenda pushing. "To freethinkers who objectively evaluate the empirical evidence for the historicity of Jesus, Christianity is the fringe theory." I would love for you to explain why there are no freethinkers in the academy speaking in favour of CMT? Non-Christian historians dismiss it as pseudo-historical, non-Christian NT scholars dismiss it as pseudo-history - and we have scholars who pride themselves on not being religiously affiliated writing entire books on what we can know about the historical Jesus (specifically, I am thinking of Maurice Casey's forthcoming book where he brands himself "an Independent Historian"). Unless you can provide RS in the relevant field that say the historicity of JEsus is defended only because of ignorance by everyone except PeaceLoveHarmony who sees the light, your criticism is meaningless. WP is about verifiability - that CMT is a fringe theory is attested to by everyone in the field. -- Ari ( talk) 06:40, 4 June 2010 (UTC)
This thing is beginning to rival the Shakespeare authorship debate in terms of fruitlessness and futility. IHS, guys. -- dab (𒁳) 10:04, 4 June 2010 (UTC)
Akhilleus, the article at least must be plausible, otherwise what is the point?
It is dubious from the start because the very definition is illogical: How can you believe "Jesus never existed" while allowing that an actual first century teacher/rabbi may have articulated some of the sayings or performed some of the acts of Jesus and these were appropriated by the authors of Jesus? Can you believe he never existed, while allowing half of Q came from an actual 1st century individual? three quarters? all? Can you believe there was no historical Jesus but some rabbi stormed through the temple overturning tables? Can you believe there was no historical Jesus while allowing that the table turner and Q might have been the same person? Can you believe it and allow that the table turning Q might have been crucified? Where do you draw the line?
It fails to convince reasonable, intelligent, open-minded readers of its neutrality and veracity because it is riddled with derogatory ad hominem implications.
As for the arguments against, the first refutation of contemporary CMT is Bruce's assertion that, according to the apostle Paul, Jesus was an Israelite, descended from Abraham. His proof is Gal 3:16
but at the end of the letter (Gal 3:28-29) Paul says16The promises were spoken to Abraham and to his seed. The Scripture does not say "and to seeds," meaning many people, but "and to your seed," meaning one person, who is Christ.
making it clear that one doesn't have to be a genetic descendant of Abraham to be his seed. This is sophistry. Should I go on? Anthony ( talk) 18:39, 4 June 2010 (UTC)28There is neither Jew nor Greek ... for you are all one in Christ Jesus. 29If you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham's seed, and heirs according to the promise.
Is it fringe? Is it notable? Itsmejudith ( talk) 14:04, 2 June 2010 (UTC)
It screams {{ vanity}}, doesn't it. However intelligent the concept may or may not be, this is a neologism from some recent book being touted on Wikipedia and as such we should have very little patience with it. -- dab (𒁳) 16:16, 2 June 2010 (UTC)