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We were discussing the reliability of a medical examiners cause of death finding over on the RS noticeboard, and we all or almost all, thought that an official medical examiner would be a reliable enough expert primary source to establish the fact of a cause of death, at least in the case of an uncontroversial finding. But then when I went looking at information about typical degrees of certainty in medical examiner findings, I found a document at the National Association of Medical Examiners website thename.org, A Guide For Manner of Death Classification (under General Info, Death Certification): https://netforum.avectra.com/Public/DocumentGenerate.aspx?wbn_key=38c0f1d2-11ec-45c7-80ca-ff872d0b22bc&SITE=NAME That states:
"In general, the certifier of death completes the cause-of-death section and attests that, to the best of the certifier’s knowledge, the person stated died of the cause(s) and circumstances reported on the death certificate. It is important to remember that these “facts” only represent the certifier’s opinion and are not written in stone or legally binding."
But it gets worse. It goes on:
Because the cause and manner of death are opinions, judgment is required to formulate
both for reporting on the death certificate. The degree of certainty required to classify the manner of death depends sometimes on the circumstances of the death. Although such issues will be discussed in further detail below, a general scheme of incremental “degrees of certainty” is as follows:
- Undetermined (less than 50% certainty)
- Reasonable medical or investigative probability (Greater than a 50:50 chance; more likely than not)
- Preponderance of medical/investigative evidence (For practical purposes, let’s say about 70% or greater certainty)
- Clear and convincing medical/investigative evidence (For practical purposes, let’s say 90% or greater certainty)
- Beyond any reasonable doubt (essentially 100% certainty)
- Beyond any doubt (100% certainty)
Seldom, for the purpose of manner-of-death classification, is “beyond a reasonable doubt” required as the burden of proof. In many cases, “reasonable probability” will suffice, but in other instances such as suicide, case law or prudence may require a “preponderance” of evidence—or in homicide—“clear and convincing evidence” may be required or recommended.
Notice that a finding of homicide MAY require a heightened standard of 90%. But that means that the finding MAY NOT require even 90% certainty. A medical examiner may well be using the 70% "Preponderance of medical/investigative evidence" or possibly even the 51% "Reasonable medical or investigative probability" standard. A medical examiner may well have found a higher certainty in a particular case. But until we know, it seems clear to me that we can't state the examiner's opinion of the manner or cause of death as fact in Wikipedia without establishing what degree of certainty the medical examiner is claiming. And we should warn readers that medical examiner's findings may be determined to a surprisingly low degree of certainty, if we don't know the degree of certainty.
I think we need to modify the reliable sources guidelines to warn other Wikipedia editors that medical examiner findings may be only 51% certain, and that if greater weight is to be attributed to such findings, then the medical examiner's degree of certainty level must be verified on a case by case basis. Mindbuilder ( talk) 10:33, 7 January 2015 (UTC)
The answer to your "more likely than not" question is mu. Seriously, spend a few minutes actually thinking it through. We report that the shortstop Omar Vizquel committed only 3 errors in the 2000 baseball season. But whether a particular play constitutes a hit or an error is a subjective judgement—an opinion—rendered by the official scorer. The threshold is for calling a play an error is "more likely than not", or 51%. But we report it as a matter of fact, in Wikipedia's voice, that Vizquel committed 3 errors. We don't include some sort of ridiculous, contrived nonsense about Vizquel's fielding percentage being a matter of opinion. Right? MastCell Talk 04:47, 8 January 2015 (UTC)
Changing a policy to try to win a dispute is the lowest of the low. Hipocrite ( talk) 14:08, 8 January 2015 (UTC)
Obviously this page already rejects using Wikipedia and its derivatives as sources, but recently on Talk:Akira Toriyama someone tried to argue in favour of the status quo because an several external sources had copied minor stylistic details ("The subject is known for this and this") from Wikipedia. I've seen people do this in requested moves and the like as well ("X-source spells his name the same way we do on its title-page because that is the more familiar spelling of this very obscure person's name solely as a result of English Wikipedia. Therefore we shouldn't change the title.")
In my experience when it comes to minor stylistic details like this, otherwise reliable sources quite frequently copy Wikipedia just because the Wikipedia status quo is currently prominent online. When it comes to romanization and order of Japanese personal names, I know the Iwate Prefectural Government does this from time to time since I, on discussion with my other non-Japanese colleague, was the one who proposed it.
Anyone else think we should include a proviso warning against this kind of potential circular sourcing when defending the status quo?
Hijiri 88 ( 聖 やや) 09:44, 16 January 2015 (UTC)
(By the way, while there have been a few such RMs, the one that jumps to mind is at Talk:Emperor Jimmu, where the majority of piecemeal mentions of the figure's name are in books written by people outside the field, and who therefore likely copied their spelling from either Wikipedia or the other source available for free online about the topic -- a 130-year-old public domain translation of the Kojiki. Such books are obviously of minimal value in defending the Wikipedia status quo. My recent comment on WT:MOS-JA cites another almost uncontrovertible example of an essay someone no doubt considers a reliable source on economics, written by someone who obviously consulted Wikipedia while writing. Hijiri 88 ( 聖 やや) 13:28, 16 January 2015 (UTC) )
Dear editors: I came across [1]] which is being used as a reference in a newly created article Boundary (company). "Network World" sounds like a magazine or news website name, but the content is a slide show. Is a slide show considered to be an article, and if so, is Network World a reliable publication? — Anne Delong ( talk) 13:35, 18 January 2015 (UTC)
Hartley College, Point-Pedro, Sri Lanka.
Rev. Thomas Hall Squance got a plot of land near the beach at Point-Pedro from a person named Nagappar for a land named ‘Thenny’. The Mission built a Health Bungalow and School Room in 1815 (according to Rev. Peter Percival ) or 1817 ( as written in the Methodist Mission records). This later evolved into ‘Mission School’, ‘Girls Bilingual School’ – 1823,was destroyed by a fire. Rev Peter Percival in 1838 purchased an adjoining land with Pounds four-hundred obtained on a personal loan, and put up buildings in 1838. He named one section of the buildings as ‘Point-Pedro Wesleyan Mission Central School’. This was renamed Hartley College by it’s Principal Mr. C.P.Thamotheram in 1943. This was in gratitude to Rev. Marshal Hartley, Foreign Secretary of the Methodist Mission in England. The latter visited the school in 1917 and laid the foundation stone for the science lab.
Source ‘Tales of an enchanted boyhood’ by Dr.Philip G Veerasingam –
ISBN
978-955-1723-29-3 Cite error: There are <ref>
tags on this page without content in them (see the
help page).
http://imagessrilanka.blogspot.com/2012/04/mghs-and-hartley-point-pedro-sri-lanka.html Cite error: There are <ref>
tags on this page without content in them (see the
help page).
The Girls Bilingual School continues as the Methodist Girls High School to the present day.
Submitted by Dr.Philip G Veerasingam - email <philipv203@gmail.com> — Preceding unsigned comment added by 61.245.163.120 ( talk) 02:19, 25 January 2015 (UTC)
After recently being rapped over the knuckles for using Britannica as a source, I thought I'd read this article to see what I had done wrong. I found this:
Tertiary sources such as compendia, encyclopedias, introductory textbooks, obituaries, and other summarizing sources are helpful for overviews or summaries, and in evaluating due weight, but should not be used in place of secondary sources for detailed discussion
I am just as confused as before.
It seems to me that articles in EB, given the way that articles there are produced, are easily the equivalent of academic articles, or books. Myrvin ( talk) 07:50, 15 December 2014 (UTC)
I have read Wikipedia:WikiProject Encyclopaedia Britannica, but this doesn't seem to help. However, if EB isn't to be used, how come there's a WP project on how to use it? Myrvin ( talk) 09:14, 15 December 2014 (UTC)
Myrvin ( talk) 12:47, 22 December 2014 (UTC)Respected tertiary sources such as Encyclopaedia Britannica, Encyclopedia Judaica, and Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, may be cited, as long as such citations are not in the majority in an article.
Myrvin ( talk) 18:10, 28 December 2014 (UTC)Respected tertiary sources, where articles are written by experts in the field and have editorial panels, such as Encyclopaedia Britannica, Encyclopedia Judaica, and Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, may be cited.
I apologize for the lateness of my replies:
There is a discussion on Talk:Lewis Carroll about the use of a BBC TV documentary as a reliable source. There is no mention of broadcast documentaries in this guideline, and I wondered if editors had views on the general use of such sources. I note that Wikipedia:Citing sources#Film, TV, or video recordings has a suggestion for citing them. Myrvin ( talk) 20:40, 4 February 2015 (UTC)
An edit war about this is now underway. Myrvin ( talk) 18:32, 5 February 2015 (UTC)
Hello, can anyone tell me whether this website [2] is reliable or not as per WP:RS? Itz arka ( talk) 10:04, 12 February 2015 (UTC)
Where countries hold official materials and records of events, such as maps, military records, government papers, local authority records and the like. Are these classed as acceptable sources, or original research. For example the British National Archives, at Kew, permits free and unfettered access to any source of documents that are kept there. If it is acceptable then it should be stated in the main page. Equally so it should be stated if they are not permitted. At the present it appears that an author can access those records, interpret them as they see fit and publish a book, which is then considered as an acceptable published source. Richard Harvey ( talk) 09:29, 23 February 2015 (UTC)
I wonder if someone who follows this page, and has the time and patience, might perhaps look at an issue raised in a DYK nomination that is under consideration? The conversation there is long. I apologize for my part in that.
In short, the part that an RS expert can help with, especially one who has given thought to this guideline's language with regard to the use of primary vs. secondary sources, is whether certain statements by certain secondary RS sources can be relied upon there. This is a bit more complicated than determining whether they are RSs -- it is more about whether what they stated can be viewed as RS-supported.
The discussion is here. As the DYK is caught in a bit of difference of opinion, any assistance will be much appreciated.
Many thanks. -- Epeefleche ( talk) 02:32, 24 February 2015 (UTC)
I think perhaps we should add a statement about the reliablility of sources (creators and publishers) changing over time. Newer authors and companies can gain reliability with experience and established sources can lose reliability when there are changes in personnel or policy. And maybe a statement that reliability should be determined as of the date of publication (because the reliability of a specific work shouldn't change just because its creator or publisher changes over time). Since this concept applies generally, I think maybe it should be in the section " WP:RS#Definition of a source". Sparkie82 ( t• c) 22:36, 17 February 2015 (UTC)
Is Vicious Candy considered a reliable source? Since the full birthdate and birthplace of Ashley Hinshaw appears in no journalistic cite but only on IMDb, which this appears to copy, I'm not sure and would like other editors' opinions: http://www.viciouscandy.com/happy-birthday-ashley-hinshaw/ -- Tenebrae ( talk) 19:46, 5 March 2015 (UTC)
WP:ELNO prohibits External links to web pages that are primarily commercial sales sites. For example, we can't cite a book and link to the Amazon.com page where you can buy that book. However, there's no word about that in regards to inline citations. So if we cite, and drive traffic to, commercial web pages selling the book, song, etc. in question, is that really allowed in footnoting, though disallowed in ELs? -- Tenebrae ( talk) 20:10, 2 March 2015 (UTC)
News sources are by any account subjective observations of things. Official statements are official statements. Official reports are official reports. They can always be traced back to their source. I am splitting this part of my inquiry from the one above because it differs, even though it was recently a part of it.
It is my opinion that since there have been so many scandals in the media in the last decade that we should not use News Sources at all. If a current event can not be described without them then the event should not be described. If we absolute have to use them then a lack of consensus or at least the lack of a majority vote should trump reliability and a report should not be inlcuded if it is seen as controversial or if logical or rational arguments can be raised against it which in turn leads to a vote that shows that there is no clear majority in support of including the article. Would anyone be in favour of this as a way to resolving disputes such as the one above? 78.68.210.173 ( talk) 10:04, 12 March 2015 (UTC)
Hi, I was wondering what the policy is regarding the use of internet publications that do not have a print version. I notice that "journals", "magazines" and "mainstream newspapers" are considered to be acceptable sources, but there are plenty of publications these days that do not have print versions (e.g. Huffington Post).
I see a hint in the statement that "questionable sources are those with a poor reputation for checking the facts". However, a poor reputation among whom? What happens if there are divergent views on the overall reliability of a particular source (either in different ideological circles or in different geographical areas)? Does public perception have any role in all this? For example, if an opinion poll shows that a particular source is not trusted by the public on a particular topic, can that be reason enough to not use it? What if the public in one country trusts that source, while those in other countries do not? Esn ( talk) 19:30, 14 March 2015 (UTC)
(Reposting my enquiry here as I was told, will include the discussion as far as it came)
I'm trying to see how this works. In some articles people say that state media isn't reliable. This mainly goes for state media in countries with low press freedom, almost always in the East. PressTV, Chinese newsagencies and for example Russia Today. Now I would like to ask you if you can actually substantiate this. Has it been shown by any independent review that PressTV or RussiaToday is exceedingly incorrect in its reporting compared to other news agencies.
Also in the wake of the many admissions, especially in european and US press about the involvement of intelligence assets in major newsoutlets such as BBC and Der Spiegel, should their reliability for that decrease? Does the generally false or at least regurgative reporting concerning the reasons for war in Iraq defile the reputation of almost all major newsorganisations in the west or not?
I am trying to see if we can establish a common standard for these things or not. Basically this is an open discussion with a few specific questions. What spurred my interest is an article in which basically every Eastern (excluding of course Ukranian ones) newsource is disregarded in this article here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Battle_of_Ilovaisk since the start of the article. People simply claim "it's not reliable" and others are force to accept it at face value. It even includes the main news agency Ria Novosti (now reformed). This is even when Western sources contradict each other. But this should discuss the wider issue, including China, Iran and other perceied oriental sources that often stand in opposition to occidental ones in key issues. 78.68.210.173 ( talk) 09:26, 12 March 2015 (UTC)
There is a question on whether a reference is or is not reliable. The URL for the source is http://www.blabbermouth.net/news/living-sacrifice-to-release-ghost-thief-in-november/
Is it a reliable source for discussion related to the content of the album and genre? Walter Görlitz ( talk) 04:18, 21 March 2015 (UTC)
I've written an essay at Wikipedia:Applying Reliability Guidelines that could be a useful adjunct to this page. I'd like to add it to the list of related essays. Please give feedback here or on the essay talk page. Rhoark ( talk) 23:28, 8 April 2015 (UTC)
As Arnoutf and I have noted as part of another discussion, the phrase
is overly broad and non-specific, and can be interpreted as saying that once a person has had their work published through peer review, any subsequent opinion of theirs is an RS, no matter where or how published. We need to make it clear that peer review is the big differentiator to how material can be cited, i.e. the difference between "water is blue[1]" and "Smith claimed in a 2015 blog post that water is blue[2]"
I therefore believe something like the following amendment needs to be made:
Samsara 14:55, 6 April 2015 (UTC)
author is an established expert whose work in the relevant field has been published by reliable third-party publications
author is an established expert in the relevant field
Peer review applies to scholarly journals, which usually only publish information of interest to experts in a field, or at least of interest to a well-educated readership. More elementary information that is important for an encyclopedia just isn't of interest in scholarly journals, so a requirement that only information from peer-reviewed sources would destroy Wikipedia. Jc3s5h ( talk) 22:29, 6 April 2015 (UTC)
"can be interpreted as saying that once a person has had their work published through peer review, any subsequent opinion of theirs is an RS, no matter where or how published" This is exactly how it should be interpreted, and is not a failing of the system. Don't forget "Verifiability, not truth". The resolution to any problems that arise is WP:ONUS. Rhoark ( talk) 23:23, 8 April 2015 (UTC)
Should articles that hold to a stricter-than-normal criteria for sources be required to notify editors of this condition for editing?
When editorials from very reputable newspapers are fine in some articles but called "poor sources" in others it strikes me that we need some clarification on the WP:RS policy. How is an editor to know that such sources are acceptable for some articles but are not acceptable for others? WP may be a volunteer project but even volunteers deserve to know when they might be wasting their time using the wrong sources.
I started a discussion at WP:VPP#How to inform editors of a variance in WP:RS standards? and would like to get WP editors who are fluent with sourcing issues to comment on this topic. The WP:RS policy page talks about sources in context and also fact-vs-opinion sources. I am sure this discussion touches on those concepts and I am not opposed to such variances in requirements but I think there are some logistical questions that need to be answered for the benefit of both editors and the encyclopedia as a whole. Please join the discussion at the VPP link above if you have anything that would help on this topic. Thank you. 104.32.193.6 ( talk) 05:25, 13 April 2015 (UTC)
I would like to ask whether The Diplomat magazine ( http://thediplomat.com/) is considered a reliable source or not. -- Magioladitis ( talk) 12:15, 17 April 2015 (UTC)
I underline that the magazine has a wikipedia page: The Diplomat. -- Magioladitis ( talk) 12:20, 17 April 2015 (UTC)
AndyTheGrump
This is the edit in question. Especially, the first part that contains the The Diplomat magazine link. Thanks,
Magioladitis (
talk)
13:29, 17 April 2015 (UTC)
Note that this is *NOT* the place to discuss this, WP:RSN would be. -- Francis Schonken ( talk) 14:50, 17 April 2015 (UTC)
I want to know why all of my edits have to have sources, why does everyone else's edits get to be published without sources, I want to know a reason why all of my edits have to have sources. 216.145.89.11 ( talk) 21:56, 20 April 2015 (UTC)
Do we have a database where we can easily put in a given web site or a given author and find out whether or not consensus has been achieved on whether or not to consider it a reliable source?
I think we need an easy tool for this purpose, like if there is a list of discussions and if we could alphabetize them or organize them in some way.
Not that it has to be static or anything, a once-reliable could be altered to unreliable in future or vice versa. But just so we have a record of who was considered reliable when, how that opinion was achieved, and by whom, that'd all be really cool.
Like for example: I came across an article by Milo Yiannopoulos on the Breitbart News Network and I don't know whether to use it as a reference to improve a page or not because I don't know how to tell if others will agree with it or not.
We need more than just a vague guideline on how to identify reliability, because people interpret these guidelines differently, we need an easy way to access an official 'status' of reliability for previously-considered works. Ranze ( talk) 11:20, 4 April 2015 (UTC)
This
edit request to
Wikipedia:Identifying reliable sources has been answered. Set the |answered= or |ans= parameter to no to reactivate your request. |
123.138.245.162 ( talk) 05:49, 29 April 2015 (UTC)
This isn't a new idea, but I'm not sure who originally floated it, so I'm going to start over. There are basically three ways to use a guideline on reliability:
Our advice for these different purposes is and should be different:
So what I'm thinking is: Let's add a short section on the subject of how to use this guideline to further the goals of the project. I'm not sure exactly what the content is, but if you think it would be interesting or helpful, then perhaps you would also have some ideas about other points that could be made in it. What do you think? WhatamIdoing ( talk) 01:23, 20 April 2015 (UTC)
Since nobody responded to the general idea, here's a specific proposal:
Sometimes, editors will add properly published sources that verify the material but are not ideal to support appropriate, encyclopedic information. For example, they may add primary sources or newspaper articles when it would be better to source a scholarly publication. In those instances, do not revert or blank the source. Instead, add a better source yourself, or tag it with {{ better source}}, {{ primary-inline}}, or {{ medrs}}.
It only addresses part of the question, but what do you think? WhatamIdoing ( talk) 17:51, 24 April 2015 (UTC)
The page for "reliable sources". says: "While specific facts may be taken from primary sources, secondary sources that present the same material are preferred". Suppose a secondary source (for instance a news story about a court case) is not in agreement with the (primary source) court records? Or for another example, suppose an article in a popular science magazine (a secondary source) does not report a scientific study (primary source) correctly? To give another example, suppose published documents from an estate (primary) exonerate a deceased person, while a biography (a secondary source) accuses them of some unethical mistake? I propose that this guideline needs clarification, as follows:
When a secondary source misrepresents a primary source used in it's references, editors should quote the primary source (or link to publicly available evidence in English where it can be seen, allowing other editors to examine it.) on the talk page and outline the difference between the erroneous secondary source and the primary source. Then, the error should be removed, replaced with the correct information, report, or material, and properly referenced. Editors should assume good faith on the part of the author of the secondary source, and assume the same for Wikipedia editors who originally referenced it. Once this has been done, the burden of proof should be on the editor who used the erroneous source.
As it stands now, any published article that's in error can supplant correct information from a primary source. This is especially important for biographies of living persons and controversial subjects. A single biased or unreliable secondary source can be used to manipulate wiki's contents, and violate NPOV while appearing to stay within the guidelines.
Will an editor or administrator who is experienced handling reliable source issues please add this to the guidelines? I look forward to reading any discussions that follow this request, which is a matter of editing guidelines, and not a specific case. I put this question on the [ Reliable sources noticeboard] and I got a clear answer with respect to legal instances ("you go with what is in the primary source as being factual and give it priority"), but nothing about scientific or biographical information. I may have put it on the wrong page. To be clear: I am asking that the rule be amended, as above. Thank you. Manyinterests2525 ( talk) 18:46, 5 May 2015 (UTC)
Today I came across Buddhism, which cites Encyclopedia Brittanica to support the claim in the first sentence that Buddhism is non-theistic. I feel like there should be a general rule against citing other general-interest encyclopedias like Brittanica, Encarta, World Book, and Funk and Wagnalls. Wikipedia is aiming to be a tertiary source, not a quaternary one. I can understand citing topic-specific encyclopedias, like the Catholic Encyclopedia or Flowering Plant Families of the World (which is why we have {{ cite encyclopedia}}). These might actually be secondary sources themselves, or they at least provide a higher level of detail than Wikipedia aims to, which makes them useful for readers seeking more information. They are also presumably written by subject-matter experts. I wouldn't expect encyclopedias which have the same audience and scope as Wikipedia to provide any additional information. It would be a bit weird to essentially repeat everything Brittanica says, and cite Brittanica as the source for half of it.. Being too close to primary sources can result in being unreliable due to lack of context, but I think being too far from them also increases the chances of inaccuracy because summaries of summaries of summaries are like playing a game of telephone. Wikipedia should be doing its fact checking against secondary and expert sources when possible; that's the only way it can be the most reliable general reference. -- Beland ( talk) 19:48, 9 May 2015 (UTC)
A discussion is ocurring on the Talk:Acupuncture page regarding the use of journal impact factors to identify the reliability of sources. I decided to research this. I have searched various WP pages (below) for statements regarding the impact factor of journals.
This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page. |
Archive 45 | Archive 46 | Archive 47 | Archive 48 | Archive 49 | Archive 50 | → | Archive 55 |
The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
We were discussing the reliability of a medical examiners cause of death finding over on the RS noticeboard, and we all or almost all, thought that an official medical examiner would be a reliable enough expert primary source to establish the fact of a cause of death, at least in the case of an uncontroversial finding. But then when I went looking at information about typical degrees of certainty in medical examiner findings, I found a document at the National Association of Medical Examiners website thename.org, A Guide For Manner of Death Classification (under General Info, Death Certification): https://netforum.avectra.com/Public/DocumentGenerate.aspx?wbn_key=38c0f1d2-11ec-45c7-80ca-ff872d0b22bc&SITE=NAME That states:
"In general, the certifier of death completes the cause-of-death section and attests that, to the best of the certifier’s knowledge, the person stated died of the cause(s) and circumstances reported on the death certificate. It is important to remember that these “facts” only represent the certifier’s opinion and are not written in stone or legally binding."
But it gets worse. It goes on:
Because the cause and manner of death are opinions, judgment is required to formulate
both for reporting on the death certificate. The degree of certainty required to classify the manner of death depends sometimes on the circumstances of the death. Although such issues will be discussed in further detail below, a general scheme of incremental “degrees of certainty” is as follows:
- Undetermined (less than 50% certainty)
- Reasonable medical or investigative probability (Greater than a 50:50 chance; more likely than not)
- Preponderance of medical/investigative evidence (For practical purposes, let’s say about 70% or greater certainty)
- Clear and convincing medical/investigative evidence (For practical purposes, let’s say 90% or greater certainty)
- Beyond any reasonable doubt (essentially 100% certainty)
- Beyond any doubt (100% certainty)
Seldom, for the purpose of manner-of-death classification, is “beyond a reasonable doubt” required as the burden of proof. In many cases, “reasonable probability” will suffice, but in other instances such as suicide, case law or prudence may require a “preponderance” of evidence—or in homicide—“clear and convincing evidence” may be required or recommended.
Notice that a finding of homicide MAY require a heightened standard of 90%. But that means that the finding MAY NOT require even 90% certainty. A medical examiner may well be using the 70% "Preponderance of medical/investigative evidence" or possibly even the 51% "Reasonable medical or investigative probability" standard. A medical examiner may well have found a higher certainty in a particular case. But until we know, it seems clear to me that we can't state the examiner's opinion of the manner or cause of death as fact in Wikipedia without establishing what degree of certainty the medical examiner is claiming. And we should warn readers that medical examiner's findings may be determined to a surprisingly low degree of certainty, if we don't know the degree of certainty.
I think we need to modify the reliable sources guidelines to warn other Wikipedia editors that medical examiner findings may be only 51% certain, and that if greater weight is to be attributed to such findings, then the medical examiner's degree of certainty level must be verified on a case by case basis. Mindbuilder ( talk) 10:33, 7 January 2015 (UTC)
The answer to your "more likely than not" question is mu. Seriously, spend a few minutes actually thinking it through. We report that the shortstop Omar Vizquel committed only 3 errors in the 2000 baseball season. But whether a particular play constitutes a hit or an error is a subjective judgement—an opinion—rendered by the official scorer. The threshold is for calling a play an error is "more likely than not", or 51%. But we report it as a matter of fact, in Wikipedia's voice, that Vizquel committed 3 errors. We don't include some sort of ridiculous, contrived nonsense about Vizquel's fielding percentage being a matter of opinion. Right? MastCell Talk 04:47, 8 January 2015 (UTC)
Changing a policy to try to win a dispute is the lowest of the low. Hipocrite ( talk) 14:08, 8 January 2015 (UTC)
Obviously this page already rejects using Wikipedia and its derivatives as sources, but recently on Talk:Akira Toriyama someone tried to argue in favour of the status quo because an several external sources had copied minor stylistic details ("The subject is known for this and this") from Wikipedia. I've seen people do this in requested moves and the like as well ("X-source spells his name the same way we do on its title-page because that is the more familiar spelling of this very obscure person's name solely as a result of English Wikipedia. Therefore we shouldn't change the title.")
In my experience when it comes to minor stylistic details like this, otherwise reliable sources quite frequently copy Wikipedia just because the Wikipedia status quo is currently prominent online. When it comes to romanization and order of Japanese personal names, I know the Iwate Prefectural Government does this from time to time since I, on discussion with my other non-Japanese colleague, was the one who proposed it.
Anyone else think we should include a proviso warning against this kind of potential circular sourcing when defending the status quo?
Hijiri 88 ( 聖 やや) 09:44, 16 January 2015 (UTC)
(By the way, while there have been a few such RMs, the one that jumps to mind is at Talk:Emperor Jimmu, where the majority of piecemeal mentions of the figure's name are in books written by people outside the field, and who therefore likely copied their spelling from either Wikipedia or the other source available for free online about the topic -- a 130-year-old public domain translation of the Kojiki. Such books are obviously of minimal value in defending the Wikipedia status quo. My recent comment on WT:MOS-JA cites another almost uncontrovertible example of an essay someone no doubt considers a reliable source on economics, written by someone who obviously consulted Wikipedia while writing. Hijiri 88 ( 聖 やや) 13:28, 16 January 2015 (UTC) )
Dear editors: I came across [1]] which is being used as a reference in a newly created article Boundary (company). "Network World" sounds like a magazine or news website name, but the content is a slide show. Is a slide show considered to be an article, and if so, is Network World a reliable publication? — Anne Delong ( talk) 13:35, 18 January 2015 (UTC)
Hartley College, Point-Pedro, Sri Lanka.
Rev. Thomas Hall Squance got a plot of land near the beach at Point-Pedro from a person named Nagappar for a land named ‘Thenny’. The Mission built a Health Bungalow and School Room in 1815 (according to Rev. Peter Percival ) or 1817 ( as written in the Methodist Mission records). This later evolved into ‘Mission School’, ‘Girls Bilingual School’ – 1823,was destroyed by a fire. Rev Peter Percival in 1838 purchased an adjoining land with Pounds four-hundred obtained on a personal loan, and put up buildings in 1838. He named one section of the buildings as ‘Point-Pedro Wesleyan Mission Central School’. This was renamed Hartley College by it’s Principal Mr. C.P.Thamotheram in 1943. This was in gratitude to Rev. Marshal Hartley, Foreign Secretary of the Methodist Mission in England. The latter visited the school in 1917 and laid the foundation stone for the science lab.
Source ‘Tales of an enchanted boyhood’ by Dr.Philip G Veerasingam –
ISBN
978-955-1723-29-3 Cite error: There are <ref>
tags on this page without content in them (see the
help page).
http://imagessrilanka.blogspot.com/2012/04/mghs-and-hartley-point-pedro-sri-lanka.html Cite error: There are <ref>
tags on this page without content in them (see the
help page).
The Girls Bilingual School continues as the Methodist Girls High School to the present day.
Submitted by Dr.Philip G Veerasingam - email <philipv203@gmail.com> — Preceding unsigned comment added by 61.245.163.120 ( talk) 02:19, 25 January 2015 (UTC)
After recently being rapped over the knuckles for using Britannica as a source, I thought I'd read this article to see what I had done wrong. I found this:
Tertiary sources such as compendia, encyclopedias, introductory textbooks, obituaries, and other summarizing sources are helpful for overviews or summaries, and in evaluating due weight, but should not be used in place of secondary sources for detailed discussion
I am just as confused as before.
It seems to me that articles in EB, given the way that articles there are produced, are easily the equivalent of academic articles, or books. Myrvin ( talk) 07:50, 15 December 2014 (UTC)
I have read Wikipedia:WikiProject Encyclopaedia Britannica, but this doesn't seem to help. However, if EB isn't to be used, how come there's a WP project on how to use it? Myrvin ( talk) 09:14, 15 December 2014 (UTC)
Myrvin ( talk) 12:47, 22 December 2014 (UTC)Respected tertiary sources such as Encyclopaedia Britannica, Encyclopedia Judaica, and Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, may be cited, as long as such citations are not in the majority in an article.
Myrvin ( talk) 18:10, 28 December 2014 (UTC)Respected tertiary sources, where articles are written by experts in the field and have editorial panels, such as Encyclopaedia Britannica, Encyclopedia Judaica, and Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, may be cited.
I apologize for the lateness of my replies:
There is a discussion on Talk:Lewis Carroll about the use of a BBC TV documentary as a reliable source. There is no mention of broadcast documentaries in this guideline, and I wondered if editors had views on the general use of such sources. I note that Wikipedia:Citing sources#Film, TV, or video recordings has a suggestion for citing them. Myrvin ( talk) 20:40, 4 February 2015 (UTC)
An edit war about this is now underway. Myrvin ( talk) 18:32, 5 February 2015 (UTC)
Hello, can anyone tell me whether this website [2] is reliable or not as per WP:RS? Itz arka ( talk) 10:04, 12 February 2015 (UTC)
Where countries hold official materials and records of events, such as maps, military records, government papers, local authority records and the like. Are these classed as acceptable sources, or original research. For example the British National Archives, at Kew, permits free and unfettered access to any source of documents that are kept there. If it is acceptable then it should be stated in the main page. Equally so it should be stated if they are not permitted. At the present it appears that an author can access those records, interpret them as they see fit and publish a book, which is then considered as an acceptable published source. Richard Harvey ( talk) 09:29, 23 February 2015 (UTC)
I wonder if someone who follows this page, and has the time and patience, might perhaps look at an issue raised in a DYK nomination that is under consideration? The conversation there is long. I apologize for my part in that.
In short, the part that an RS expert can help with, especially one who has given thought to this guideline's language with regard to the use of primary vs. secondary sources, is whether certain statements by certain secondary RS sources can be relied upon there. This is a bit more complicated than determining whether they are RSs -- it is more about whether what they stated can be viewed as RS-supported.
The discussion is here. As the DYK is caught in a bit of difference of opinion, any assistance will be much appreciated.
Many thanks. -- Epeefleche ( talk) 02:32, 24 February 2015 (UTC)
I think perhaps we should add a statement about the reliablility of sources (creators and publishers) changing over time. Newer authors and companies can gain reliability with experience and established sources can lose reliability when there are changes in personnel or policy. And maybe a statement that reliability should be determined as of the date of publication (because the reliability of a specific work shouldn't change just because its creator or publisher changes over time). Since this concept applies generally, I think maybe it should be in the section " WP:RS#Definition of a source". Sparkie82 ( t• c) 22:36, 17 February 2015 (UTC)
Is Vicious Candy considered a reliable source? Since the full birthdate and birthplace of Ashley Hinshaw appears in no journalistic cite but only on IMDb, which this appears to copy, I'm not sure and would like other editors' opinions: http://www.viciouscandy.com/happy-birthday-ashley-hinshaw/ -- Tenebrae ( talk) 19:46, 5 March 2015 (UTC)
WP:ELNO prohibits External links to web pages that are primarily commercial sales sites. For example, we can't cite a book and link to the Amazon.com page where you can buy that book. However, there's no word about that in regards to inline citations. So if we cite, and drive traffic to, commercial web pages selling the book, song, etc. in question, is that really allowed in footnoting, though disallowed in ELs? -- Tenebrae ( talk) 20:10, 2 March 2015 (UTC)
News sources are by any account subjective observations of things. Official statements are official statements. Official reports are official reports. They can always be traced back to their source. I am splitting this part of my inquiry from the one above because it differs, even though it was recently a part of it.
It is my opinion that since there have been so many scandals in the media in the last decade that we should not use News Sources at all. If a current event can not be described without them then the event should not be described. If we absolute have to use them then a lack of consensus or at least the lack of a majority vote should trump reliability and a report should not be inlcuded if it is seen as controversial or if logical or rational arguments can be raised against it which in turn leads to a vote that shows that there is no clear majority in support of including the article. Would anyone be in favour of this as a way to resolving disputes such as the one above? 78.68.210.173 ( talk) 10:04, 12 March 2015 (UTC)
Hi, I was wondering what the policy is regarding the use of internet publications that do not have a print version. I notice that "journals", "magazines" and "mainstream newspapers" are considered to be acceptable sources, but there are plenty of publications these days that do not have print versions (e.g. Huffington Post).
I see a hint in the statement that "questionable sources are those with a poor reputation for checking the facts". However, a poor reputation among whom? What happens if there are divergent views on the overall reliability of a particular source (either in different ideological circles or in different geographical areas)? Does public perception have any role in all this? For example, if an opinion poll shows that a particular source is not trusted by the public on a particular topic, can that be reason enough to not use it? What if the public in one country trusts that source, while those in other countries do not? Esn ( talk) 19:30, 14 March 2015 (UTC)
(Reposting my enquiry here as I was told, will include the discussion as far as it came)
I'm trying to see how this works. In some articles people say that state media isn't reliable. This mainly goes for state media in countries with low press freedom, almost always in the East. PressTV, Chinese newsagencies and for example Russia Today. Now I would like to ask you if you can actually substantiate this. Has it been shown by any independent review that PressTV or RussiaToday is exceedingly incorrect in its reporting compared to other news agencies.
Also in the wake of the many admissions, especially in european and US press about the involvement of intelligence assets in major newsoutlets such as BBC and Der Spiegel, should their reliability for that decrease? Does the generally false or at least regurgative reporting concerning the reasons for war in Iraq defile the reputation of almost all major newsorganisations in the west or not?
I am trying to see if we can establish a common standard for these things or not. Basically this is an open discussion with a few specific questions. What spurred my interest is an article in which basically every Eastern (excluding of course Ukranian ones) newsource is disregarded in this article here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Battle_of_Ilovaisk since the start of the article. People simply claim "it's not reliable" and others are force to accept it at face value. It even includes the main news agency Ria Novosti (now reformed). This is even when Western sources contradict each other. But this should discuss the wider issue, including China, Iran and other perceied oriental sources that often stand in opposition to occidental ones in key issues. 78.68.210.173 ( talk) 09:26, 12 March 2015 (UTC)
There is a question on whether a reference is or is not reliable. The URL for the source is http://www.blabbermouth.net/news/living-sacrifice-to-release-ghost-thief-in-november/
Is it a reliable source for discussion related to the content of the album and genre? Walter Görlitz ( talk) 04:18, 21 March 2015 (UTC)
I've written an essay at Wikipedia:Applying Reliability Guidelines that could be a useful adjunct to this page. I'd like to add it to the list of related essays. Please give feedback here or on the essay talk page. Rhoark ( talk) 23:28, 8 April 2015 (UTC)
As Arnoutf and I have noted as part of another discussion, the phrase
is overly broad and non-specific, and can be interpreted as saying that once a person has had their work published through peer review, any subsequent opinion of theirs is an RS, no matter where or how published. We need to make it clear that peer review is the big differentiator to how material can be cited, i.e. the difference between "water is blue[1]" and "Smith claimed in a 2015 blog post that water is blue[2]"
I therefore believe something like the following amendment needs to be made:
Samsara 14:55, 6 April 2015 (UTC)
author is an established expert whose work in the relevant field has been published by reliable third-party publications
author is an established expert in the relevant field
Peer review applies to scholarly journals, which usually only publish information of interest to experts in a field, or at least of interest to a well-educated readership. More elementary information that is important for an encyclopedia just isn't of interest in scholarly journals, so a requirement that only information from peer-reviewed sources would destroy Wikipedia. Jc3s5h ( talk) 22:29, 6 April 2015 (UTC)
"can be interpreted as saying that once a person has had their work published through peer review, any subsequent opinion of theirs is an RS, no matter where or how published" This is exactly how it should be interpreted, and is not a failing of the system. Don't forget "Verifiability, not truth". The resolution to any problems that arise is WP:ONUS. Rhoark ( talk) 23:23, 8 April 2015 (UTC)
Should articles that hold to a stricter-than-normal criteria for sources be required to notify editors of this condition for editing?
When editorials from very reputable newspapers are fine in some articles but called "poor sources" in others it strikes me that we need some clarification on the WP:RS policy. How is an editor to know that such sources are acceptable for some articles but are not acceptable for others? WP may be a volunteer project but even volunteers deserve to know when they might be wasting their time using the wrong sources.
I started a discussion at WP:VPP#How to inform editors of a variance in WP:RS standards? and would like to get WP editors who are fluent with sourcing issues to comment on this topic. The WP:RS policy page talks about sources in context and also fact-vs-opinion sources. I am sure this discussion touches on those concepts and I am not opposed to such variances in requirements but I think there are some logistical questions that need to be answered for the benefit of both editors and the encyclopedia as a whole. Please join the discussion at the VPP link above if you have anything that would help on this topic. Thank you. 104.32.193.6 ( talk) 05:25, 13 April 2015 (UTC)
I would like to ask whether The Diplomat magazine ( http://thediplomat.com/) is considered a reliable source or not. -- Magioladitis ( talk) 12:15, 17 April 2015 (UTC)
I underline that the magazine has a wikipedia page: The Diplomat. -- Magioladitis ( talk) 12:20, 17 April 2015 (UTC)
AndyTheGrump
This is the edit in question. Especially, the first part that contains the The Diplomat magazine link. Thanks,
Magioladitis (
talk)
13:29, 17 April 2015 (UTC)
Note that this is *NOT* the place to discuss this, WP:RSN would be. -- Francis Schonken ( talk) 14:50, 17 April 2015 (UTC)
I want to know why all of my edits have to have sources, why does everyone else's edits get to be published without sources, I want to know a reason why all of my edits have to have sources. 216.145.89.11 ( talk) 21:56, 20 April 2015 (UTC)
Do we have a database where we can easily put in a given web site or a given author and find out whether or not consensus has been achieved on whether or not to consider it a reliable source?
I think we need an easy tool for this purpose, like if there is a list of discussions and if we could alphabetize them or organize them in some way.
Not that it has to be static or anything, a once-reliable could be altered to unreliable in future or vice versa. But just so we have a record of who was considered reliable when, how that opinion was achieved, and by whom, that'd all be really cool.
Like for example: I came across an article by Milo Yiannopoulos on the Breitbart News Network and I don't know whether to use it as a reference to improve a page or not because I don't know how to tell if others will agree with it or not.
We need more than just a vague guideline on how to identify reliability, because people interpret these guidelines differently, we need an easy way to access an official 'status' of reliability for previously-considered works. Ranze ( talk) 11:20, 4 April 2015 (UTC)
This
edit request to
Wikipedia:Identifying reliable sources has been answered. Set the |answered= or |ans= parameter to no to reactivate your request. |
123.138.245.162 ( talk) 05:49, 29 April 2015 (UTC)
This isn't a new idea, but I'm not sure who originally floated it, so I'm going to start over. There are basically three ways to use a guideline on reliability:
Our advice for these different purposes is and should be different:
So what I'm thinking is: Let's add a short section on the subject of how to use this guideline to further the goals of the project. I'm not sure exactly what the content is, but if you think it would be interesting or helpful, then perhaps you would also have some ideas about other points that could be made in it. What do you think? WhatamIdoing ( talk) 01:23, 20 April 2015 (UTC)
Since nobody responded to the general idea, here's a specific proposal:
Sometimes, editors will add properly published sources that verify the material but are not ideal to support appropriate, encyclopedic information. For example, they may add primary sources or newspaper articles when it would be better to source a scholarly publication. In those instances, do not revert or blank the source. Instead, add a better source yourself, or tag it with {{ better source}}, {{ primary-inline}}, or {{ medrs}}.
It only addresses part of the question, but what do you think? WhatamIdoing ( talk) 17:51, 24 April 2015 (UTC)
The page for "reliable sources". says: "While specific facts may be taken from primary sources, secondary sources that present the same material are preferred". Suppose a secondary source (for instance a news story about a court case) is not in agreement with the (primary source) court records? Or for another example, suppose an article in a popular science magazine (a secondary source) does not report a scientific study (primary source) correctly? To give another example, suppose published documents from an estate (primary) exonerate a deceased person, while a biography (a secondary source) accuses them of some unethical mistake? I propose that this guideline needs clarification, as follows:
When a secondary source misrepresents a primary source used in it's references, editors should quote the primary source (or link to publicly available evidence in English where it can be seen, allowing other editors to examine it.) on the talk page and outline the difference between the erroneous secondary source and the primary source. Then, the error should be removed, replaced with the correct information, report, or material, and properly referenced. Editors should assume good faith on the part of the author of the secondary source, and assume the same for Wikipedia editors who originally referenced it. Once this has been done, the burden of proof should be on the editor who used the erroneous source.
As it stands now, any published article that's in error can supplant correct information from a primary source. This is especially important for biographies of living persons and controversial subjects. A single biased or unreliable secondary source can be used to manipulate wiki's contents, and violate NPOV while appearing to stay within the guidelines.
Will an editor or administrator who is experienced handling reliable source issues please add this to the guidelines? I look forward to reading any discussions that follow this request, which is a matter of editing guidelines, and not a specific case. I put this question on the [ Reliable sources noticeboard] and I got a clear answer with respect to legal instances ("you go with what is in the primary source as being factual and give it priority"), but nothing about scientific or biographical information. I may have put it on the wrong page. To be clear: I am asking that the rule be amended, as above. Thank you. Manyinterests2525 ( talk) 18:46, 5 May 2015 (UTC)
Today I came across Buddhism, which cites Encyclopedia Brittanica to support the claim in the first sentence that Buddhism is non-theistic. I feel like there should be a general rule against citing other general-interest encyclopedias like Brittanica, Encarta, World Book, and Funk and Wagnalls. Wikipedia is aiming to be a tertiary source, not a quaternary one. I can understand citing topic-specific encyclopedias, like the Catholic Encyclopedia or Flowering Plant Families of the World (which is why we have {{ cite encyclopedia}}). These might actually be secondary sources themselves, or they at least provide a higher level of detail than Wikipedia aims to, which makes them useful for readers seeking more information. They are also presumably written by subject-matter experts. I wouldn't expect encyclopedias which have the same audience and scope as Wikipedia to provide any additional information. It would be a bit weird to essentially repeat everything Brittanica says, and cite Brittanica as the source for half of it.. Being too close to primary sources can result in being unreliable due to lack of context, but I think being too far from them also increases the chances of inaccuracy because summaries of summaries of summaries are like playing a game of telephone. Wikipedia should be doing its fact checking against secondary and expert sources when possible; that's the only way it can be the most reliable general reference. -- Beland ( talk) 19:48, 9 May 2015 (UTC)
A discussion is ocurring on the Talk:Acupuncture page regarding the use of journal impact factors to identify the reliability of sources. I decided to research this. I have searched various WP pages (below) for statements regarding the impact factor of journals.