The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the miscellaneous page below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the page's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result of the debate was Keep. Consensus below is that, whatever the problems of the quotations list, these are subject to improvement by editing. A (possible) current POV imbalance is not reason to delete a form that is a standard part of all portals. If one has an issue with the supposed bias of this portal, nominating the whole of it would be sensible. Xoloz 14:55, 4 December 2007 (UTC) reply

Portal:Complementary and Alternative Medicine/Quotes

Collection of quotes, mostly long out of date and selected to be as critical of mainstream medicine as possible (despite the mainstream medicine being criticised usually having no relation to modern medicine) used to push a POV on Portal:Complementary and Alternative Medicine. Delete it and all the subpages, and remove from the portal. Adam Cuerden ^talk 21:23, 29 November 2007 (UTC) reply

For the sake of convenience, the quotations are listed below.

If this page is design to be "as critical of mainstream medicine as possible" it is certainly a very weak attempt. Most of the quotes do not criticize medicine or medical doctors at all. They reflect a natural or alternative POV. As old as most of them are, in many instances they're pertinent to the mass move towards alternatives therapies the we are currently undergoing. -- Anthon01 13:21, 30 November 2007 (UTC) reply

• Keep - Although, I do think we need to judiciously decide which quotes should remain. I'm sure there is a policy. Where could I find that? I think quotes form both sides of the issue should be used. -- Anthon01 19:59, 30 November 2007 (UTC) reply

I personally added two anti-alternative medicine quotes. Quotes may be added by any editor. I believe that we have an editor working on some new quotes. If anybody objects to a particular quote the first place to start is commenting on a talk page. I am watching every page of this portal, so that any talk page of this portal will do. Or, even my talk page. -- John Gohde 20:47, 30 November 2007 (UTC) reply

• Keep - This page is part of the Complementary and alternative medicine Portal. Quotes are a feature of 100+ different portals. Therefore, this move to delete the portal's Quotes page is totally inappropriate. Individual quotes should be nominated for deletion on a quote by quote basis.

All quotes are from historic figures, of course. Quotes from Hippocrates (the father of medicine), William Osle (the father of modern medicine), and Florence Nightingale are about as squeaky clean as you can get. History is history. History is incapable of expressing a point of view by definition. History is what makes an encyclopedia an encyclopedia. Of course, there is some overlap with medicine. That is why medicine is in the name of this portal. Just because you don't personally like something is absolutely not justification to delete anything, per the rules of Wikipedia. Of course, the quotes are going to express an alternative medicine theme. That is the topic of this portal. -- John Gohde ( talk) 21:53, 29 November 2007 (UTC) reply

Just to make sure that there is absolutely no hint of favoritism, I just added myself two separate anti-alternative medicine quotes made by Richard Dawkins. As with any portal on Wikipedia. Editors are expected to add quotes of their own. Don't like the present mix of quotes? Then add quotes of your own. Not enough anti-alternative medicine quotes? Then you obviously have not added any. What are you waiting for? Unable to edit a portal? The portal has a quote nomination process that is modeled after the Portal:Medicine. Instructions are provided all over the place. It is entirely your own fault if this portal has less than 300 quotes to work with.

While you are voting on this issue, how about adding some new quotes? We could use a broader mix of quotes.-- John Gohde ( talk) 02:17, 30 November 2007 (UTC) reply

• Keep. I am in favor of keeping this. Is there any formal policy in Wikipedia's guidelines for Portals which deal with this sort of page? Adam Cuerdan, are you also in favor of deleting Portal:Medicine/Quotes_archive then as well? Interesting because muc of the quotes which you say are critical of mainstream medicine actually appear in this portal's quote page as well. -- Levine2112 ^discuss 22:15, 29 November 2007 (UTC) reply

• Delete the Portal. (See below this comment.) Considering the avowed "objectives" of the creator, this portal is itself very questionable. It is blatant POV pushing and intended to be used for advocacy.

Here is what User:John Gohde has to say about his "Objectives" at Wikipedia:

Founder and developer of the Wikiproject on Alternative Medicine

Single handedly succeeded in making alternative medicine or CAM a collective of articles. It is no longer only a few isolated articles on kooky topics. CAM is now a collective maintained by a collective of editors (See category:alternative medicine). The science trolls have officially lost control over CAM. And, they now know that it is too late to reverse the situation. Time moves on and stops for nobody. Once a person locates just one article on CAM they are now tied in to the collective of over 200 articles. -- John Gohde 09:41, 3 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Source: John Gohde's " Objectives" (his word) ( diff)

The last time I checked, the current year is 2007. -- John Gohde ( talk) 01:43, 30 November 2007 (UTC) reply

So, according to him, mainstream, pro-science editors are "science trolls" and his "collective of [alternative] editors" has (or should have) control of the CAM articles. Interesting agenda for a fringe takeover and control of Wikipedia alternative medicine articles. That is an extreme violation-of-NPOV agenda and reveals he does not respect or intend to follow NPOV. -- Fyslee / talk 00:46, 30 November 2007 (UTC) reply

Fyslee, by the way, is a self-declared participant of the WikiProject on Alternative Medicine. So, Fyslee being that you are an active participant of this project/portal, how come you have not added your own quotes that would balance the present mix of quotes? -- John Gohde ( talk) 03:30, 30 November 2007 (UTC) reply

Thanks for the invitation. Without it I wouldn't have dared since I thought you wanted to control the territory. Thanks for opening things up. BTW, as I recall, Levine2112 was the one who encouraged me to join....;-) I am changing my vote here in keeping with a seeming opening of the project for participation from skeptics, as indicated by John Gohde's invitation for other quotes. I'll add some. -- Fyslee / talk 04:37, 30 November 2007 (UTC) reply

Excuse me, but personal attacks are expressly prohibited by Wikipedia. -- John Gohde ( talk) 01:41, 30 November 2007 (UTC) reply

No personal attack. Just a bit of openness. Personal agendas should not be hidden. You have revealed your agenda here and others need to know it. If you have changed your agenda since then, I suggest you not only revise your user spaces, but start to show openness and that you renounce any tendencies to ownership of alternative medicine subjects. I am not asking for statements, but actual actions and cooperation with skeptics. Learn to "write for the enemy." NPOV requires that all sides are included. -- Fyslee / talk 04:37, 30 November 2007 (UTC) reply

I was invited back to get the project going again. The portal is clearly documented as a group activity. The selection of the name was a group process. The consensus was that the other participants lacked the technical expertise. I simply got the process going. If you want to add 100 anti-alternative medicine quotes go right ahead. -- John Gohde ( talk) 12:17, 30 November 2007 (UTC) reply

• Delete this page of quotes--not appropriate for WP. Anyone wants to delete the portal, they'll have a harder time of it. A better approach is to realize that the WikiProject Alternative medicine is open to everyone interested. DGG ( talk) 02:53, 30 November 2007 (UTC) reply

DGG, do you feel that it is justified to delete Portal:Medicine/Quotes_archive as well by the same logic? Or is there some reason to single out this portal's quotes? -- Levine2112 ^discuss 03:01, 30 November 2007 (UTC) reply

• Strong Delete quotes are useless without context, and these do not deserve to be in an encyclopaedia. The selection is heavily biased, and it adds no useful information. It seems it's just a list of quotes in a random order, and without context the quotes are useless. I do not think there is anything salvageable here. Is it even appropriate for wikipedia? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 47.171.255.159 ( talk • contribs)

A few questions before I vote. How long is it open for a vote? Do many portals have quotes? If so, how can I find them? What is the point of having quotes? How does the average user find these quotes? Thank you. -- Anthon01 16:29, 30 November 2007 (UTC) reply

From doing a Google search it looks like there are well over 100 portals providing quotes. Here, is a list.

• Portal:Holidays/Quotes
• Portal:Military of Australia/Quotes
• Portal:Puerto Rico/Selected quote
• Portal:Art/Quote archive
• Complete Google search list

The portal itself is almost brand new and was created around the 20th of November 2007 and uses the recommended box portal layout. A number of display boxes uses the same recommended random display feature, namely selected article, selected biography, and selected picture. As the portal is brand new, I am open for changing the format of the quote display box.

"How long have you got to vote," I am not really sure. I believe just a few days. The average user will find the quotes, when they find Portal:Complementary and Alternative Medicine. Each time the portal is viewed, a new quote appears. Only one quote is shown at a time, on about the middle of the portal, or about three or four computer screen pages down. The reason is the same for all portals. To entertain visitors and serve as a portal or introduction to other articles on Wikipedia that are about the topic of complementary and alternative medicine. -- John Gohde 18:34, 30 November 2007 (UTC) reply

I don't know how long "voting" is open, but I would advice you to check out Portal:Medicine/Quotes_archive for a related portal's quote page (which has the same or less context as the CAM portal's quote page). My thought was that these quote pages serve mainly as a "database" to feed the randomizer quote module on the portal's main page. If this isn't allowed, then I would think that the same who think that this portal's quote page should be deleted would also be in favor of deleting the medicine portal's quote page. Though I have posed this question, thus far no one has commented on it. -- Levine2112 ^discuss 17:46, 30 November 2007 (UTC) reply

I'd probably say delete the Portal:Medicine quotes too. This is not Wikiquote, and they're poorly chosen. But that isn't the subject of this debate. Adam Cuerden ^talk 22:02, 30 November 2007 (UTC) reply

Then might I suggest you nominate that page for deletion. Since it is part of a less controversial topic, perhaps the responses there to the request would be less fogged by a real or imaginary haze of bias against the topic. Also, how about 100+ other portals with link pages? Should all of those be removed as well. Please understand this (and no disrespect intended), but Adam Cuerden, you give me the perception of editing with bias against CAM and thus your nomination of this page for deletion seems to me based more on your bias rather than as part of your administrative duties or editorial adherence to Wikipedia policy. Again, I reiterate, this biased-POV could be completely imagined on my part. I am just informing you of how it appears to me. -- Levine2112 ^discuss 22:40, 30 November 2007 (UTC) reply

I'm against POV presentations of Alternative medicine, and think that many of its proponents have a highly inflated opinion of the importance of it - for instance, adding homeopathic usage sections to articles on everything that's ever used in homeopathy - even when a substance is used a lot in homeopathy, it's highly questionable whether the homeopathic usage is significant in the context of that substance.

I'm also strongly against that unfortunate habit in many fringe treatments and fields to think that the way to promote your preferred idea is to viciously attack the mainstream one. And, as that is a violation of WP:UNDUE anyway, I think it's best to nip it in the bud.

Also, it doesn't help that one of the homeopathic proponents - actually, several, though most of the worst have, thank god, been banned - have a habit of viciously attacking anyone who dares question homeopathy in any way. This makes it very hard, or at least, stressful, to get it covered in an NPOV way, and also has the unfortunate habit of making you a little paranoid. Adam Cuerden ^talk 00:04, 1 December 2007 (UTC) reply

I understand your plight and sympathize with you. However, targeting your frustrations on this simple quote page seems a tad misdirected in my opinion. Over a hundred portals have very similar quote page which have a main purpose of feeding into a the portals home page via the randomizer module. If you agree, I strongly urge you retract this MfD. -- Levine2112 ^discuss 00:30, 1 December 2007 (UTC) reply

I don't know - this one sems rather more biased and questionable than most. For one thing, what do most of the quotes have to do with alternative medicine, as opposed to attacking mainstream? Adam Cuerden ^talk 00:34, 1 December 2007 (UTC) reply

If you take issue with some of the content of the quotes page, please take it up on the talk page there. John Gohde has made it abundantly clear that it is open to suggestions from anyone. (This is Wikipedia after all.) But not liking some of the content is not grounds for this MfD. -- Levine2112 ^discuss 00:38, 1 December 2007 (UTC) reply

• Keep. I don't really see how this is necessarily biased. A quote almost invariably has some sort of POV. That's what makes a quote notable, witty, and cool to use. I fail to understand how the quotes in the portal are any more POV than those in Portal:Medicine. For example: "I firmly believe that if the whole materia medica, as now used, could be sunk to the bottom of the sea, it would be better for mankind -and all the worse for the fishes." Is this not POV? What about "Cured yesterday of my disease, I died last night of my physician"? Is that not also POV? Didn't these quotes also attack the mainstream? If such a quote was used in an article on medicine, it would of course be removed. But seeing these are quotes in a portal to enhance the content, I see no reason not to keep it. bibliomaniac 1 5 03:03, 1 December 2007 (UTC) reply

I've placed the quotes below. I count 5 quotes out 24 antagonistic to medical professional. I have no idea why deletion was suggested. -- Anthon01 04:54, 1 December 2007 (UTC) reply

• Keep. Maybe the quotes will spark readers' interest and investigation into how things have been, who "they" are and that there are different points of view historically, and from historical personages. I count one quote as antagonistic to medical professionals, the others question philosophical or practical bases, or they are antagonistic to other commercial influences in medicine. Also I have not noticed that it was a perfect world out there either.-- I'clast 12:09, 3 December 2007 (UTC) reply

Please edit above this section only.

The quotations prior to MFD

I count 5 quotes out 24 antagonistic to medical professional.

"Cured yesterday of my disease, I died last night of my physician."

"Avoid nostrums and patent medicines. The habitual use of any drug is harmful. The most eminent physicians are now agreed that very few drugs have any real curative value. The essential thing is right habits of life."

"Treatment originates outside you; healing comes from within."

"Nature, time and patience are the three great physicians."

"Water possesses no power whatever to cure any disease. Nature is the remedial principle."

"Shall we begin by taking it as a general principle--that all disease, at some period or other of its course, is more or less a reparative process."

"Volumes are now written and spoken upon the effect of the mind upon the body. Much of it is true. But I wish a little more was thought of the effect of the body on the mind."

"Homeopathy has introduced one essential amelioration in the practice of physic by amateur females; for its rules are excellent, its physicking comparatively harmless--the 'globule' is the one grain of folly which appears to be necessary to make any good thing acceptable. Let then women, if they will give medicine, give homeopathic medicine. It won't do any harm."

"It is not for the sake of piling up miscellaneous information or curious facts, but for the sake of saving life and increasing health and comfort. The caution may seem useless, but it is quite surprising how many men (some women do it too), practically behave as if the scientific end were the only one in view, or as if the sick body were but a reservoir for stowing medicines into, and the surgical disease only a curious case the sufferer has made for the attendant's special information. This is really no exaggeration."

"We know nothing of the principle of health, the positive of which pathology is the negative, except from observation and experience. And nothing but observation and experience will teach us the ways to maintain or to bring back the state of health. It is often thought that medicine is the curative process. It is no such thing; ... nature alone cures. ... And what [true] nursing has to do ... is to put the patient in the best condition for nature to act upon him."

"He's the best physician that knows the worthlessness of the most medicines."

"The best of all medicines is resting and fasting."

"If we could give every individual the right amount of nourishment and exercise, not too little and not too much, we would have found the safest way to health."

"Natural forces within us are the true healers of disease."

"It is more important to know what sort of person has a disease than to know what sort of disease a person has.”

"Your lifestyle - how you live, eat, emote, and think - determines your health. To prevent disease, you may have to change how you live."

"The concept of total wellness recognizes that our every thought, word, and behavior affects our greater health and well-being. And we, in turn, are affected not only emotionally but also physically and spiritually."

"The perfect no-stress environment is the grave. When we change our perception we gain control. The stress becomes a challenge, not a threat. When we commit to action, to actually doing something rather than feeling trapped by events, the stress in our life becomes manageable."

"A careful physician, before he attempts to administer a remedy to his patient, must investigate not only the malady of the man he wishes to cure, but also his habits when in health, and his physical constitution."

"The good physician treats the disease; the great physician treats the patient who has the disease”"

"One of the first duties of the physician is to educate the masses not to take medicine."

"There are, in truth, no specialties in medicine, since to know fully many of the most important diseases a man must be familiar with their manifestations in many organs."

"The philosophies of one age have become the absurdities of the next, and the foolishness of yesterday has become the wisdom of tomorrow."

"So what is this mysterious thing, disease? Simply the effort to remove obstructing material from the organic domain, and to repair damages. Disease is a process of purification.

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the page's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.