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"Rational skepticism" template was removed from the phthalates article on the grounds that this was an inaccurate category. I dispute this, and would continue this category. I assert that the claims made for adverse health affects of phthalates in the environment far exceed the scientific basis for the claims. The issue is similar to the water fluoridation controversy listed below. Would anyone want to review this article, and see what you think? Pustelnik ( talk) 23:47, 11 February 2008 (UTC)
Dowsing - This article needs alot of help from skeptics. Its largely presents the view that dowsing is real... and even worse, that it HAS been proven scientifically...-- Dacium 10:30, 4 September 2007 (UTC)
I was wondering if anyone could have a look at School of Economic Science. It is a religious organasation that offers classes in philosophy, that has been accused of being a cult. I have tried to keep a balanced article, yet the page has been rewritten to exclude criticism of the school by User:Miles Dogood. This is quite frustrating, as the article does not reflect the level of controversy associated with the School :( Gareth E Kegg 12:22, 12 September 2007 (UTC)
"In practice, a scientific skeptic generally focuses on critically examining claims and theories which they believe to be far beyond the mainstream of science." While this statement may be factually accurate, I believe it is POV against dissident criticism. A skeptic may also be skeptical toward mainstream scientific theories. I would argue that a skeptic must especially be critical of the mainstream, because science is a method of disputing established claims by verifying or refuting them. A scientific theory is one which can be refuted by evidence; that is the defining attribute of science. I submit that the words "scientific fact" are weasel words, because science does not establish facts, science disputes claims of fact by testing hypotheses against new evidence. Oneismany 18:12, 22 September 2007 (UTC)
That's sick! So every Einstein, Galileo and so on, must be stupid guys because they violated the "logics" (as you call it) upon which the knowledge was based. Rational skepticism is group thinking. Socialistic science. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 213.140.11.141 ( talk) 23:12, 11 July 2008 (UTC)
Archaeological forgery was recently placed under this project's banner. I don't really think that it belongs. Any takers? - perfectblue 12:06, 7 October 2007 (UTC)
Martinphi is using a boilerplate to attack the members of this WikiProject. I have removed the plate three times now, and he has twice reverted me with manifestly inaccurate claims that I am vandalizing. I ask members of this community to help fight against the personal attacks of this particularly uncivil editor. See [1]. ScienceApologist 21:02, 7 October 2007 (UTC)
Martin, Regardless of the validity of ScienceApologist's right to remove that template, You totally threw AGF out of the window by calling him a "vandal" in the edit summaries( link 1 link 2). ScienceApologist has been contributing to this project for a long time and calling him a "vandal" is a CLEAR violation of WP:CIV, WP:NPA, and WP:AGF. You were totally unjustified in doing that. An apology is in order. Wikidudeman (talk) 15:11, 8 October 2007 (UTC)
Shroud of Turin has been nominated for a featured article review. Articles are typically reviewed for two weeks. Please leave your comments and help us to return the article to featured quality. If concerns are not addressed during the review period, articles are moved onto the Featured Article Removal Candidates list for a further period, where editors may declare "Keep" or "Remove" the article from featured status. The instructions for the review process are here. Reviewers' concerns are here. PeterSymonds | talk 19:19, 14 October 2007 (UTC)
I encourage Wikipedians who watch this page to comment about a new proposal at Wikipedia talk:Fringe theories#Appeal to particular attribution. Thanks ScienceApologist 17:33, 15 October 2007 (UTC)
I added the above to RS. Of particular concern is the health section Nil Einne 07:56, 25 October 2007 (UTC)
Several Arbcom cases over the last year or two have involved issues near and dear to this project (e.g. pseudoscience), and have generated a significant amount of controversy. For the upcoming election, Arbcom candidates have submitted statements, and users can submit questions about relevant issues to each candidate. I would like to submit a series of questions for each candidate about the relevance of WP:FRINGE and NPOV, and I'd like to solicit project members here for aid in drafting these questions. I have no plans to "personalize" these questions - that is, the same set of questions will be posted for each candidate.
Here's my proposed set of questions:
1. Do you think the paranormal case was decided correctly? Why or why not?
2. What is the specific role of Arbcom in arbitrating disputes concerning fringe theories? Should it address user conduct issues, clarify policy, or both?
3. How should advocates of fringe theories be treated when their advocacy becomes perceived as disruption? Some admins and arbitrators have indicated that both sides should be treated equally, while others have expressed the view that some behavior tolerance is allowed for editors who uphold NPOV.
Please edit, add to, or delete as you see fit. I think it's important that candidates discuss their views in this area, as more arbitration concerning pseudoscientific topics is likely in the future. Cheers, Skinwalker 13:45, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
I think the Paranormal arbitration case decision contains wording and recommendations that reflects what Wikipedia is and how it should treat these types of subjects. Rather than expect more arbitration in the future (you need two to tango....), members of this project may want to consider joining others in bringing quality editing to these articles within the recommendations of the ArbCom case, as well as within established policies. These have served us well in other controversial subjects or subjects about which strong POVs exist, and there is no reason to believe that it will not work here, or that it will need a special set of practices and/or policies. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 15:22, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
I am concerned about the adverse effects of pronouncements and decisions that should not be allowed in ArbComs. Maybe some questions related to that should also be asked. The problem of ArbComs being used to run amuck, repeat blatantly false charges, and totally assume bad faith and allow personal attacks of a libelous character, things not normally allowed, was very evident and need to be prevented in the future. Also content disputes should not be discussed or made the basis for decisions when they are side issues to the subject of the ArbCom - a user conduct dispute. ArbComs should stay on-topic. Likewise decisions related to what are reliable sources should not be allowed unless they are the main topic of the ArbCom. That did not happen in my case. Comments that have potentially far reaching consequences were improperly made by ArbCom members about Quackwatch without a proper understanding of the website or any real in-depth discussion, as would be the case if the ArbCom had been concentrated on that issue. Such important decisions should be dealt with in their own ArbComs. Since ArbComs are often what amounts to an uncontrolled kangaroo court without any concern for the protection of human rights one normally can expect in a real court of law (IOW ArbComs violate such rights with impunity), or with any protection for defendants in such cases, they need to be streamlined and controlled, using admins who are real judges in real life. Words are cheap and just bytes (NOT!), but have very real consequences in real life. Questions related to keeping ArbComs on-topic need to be made. -- Fyslee / talk 16:41, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
You could mention the Sadi Carnot case as well. Or is that too straightforward a case? Carcharoth 07:19, 3 November 2007 (UTC)
Thos involved in the desicsion making process for controversial topics should be entirely independent. The should not have edited an article in that topic (other than maintenance and vandalism fighting) for 6 months and should not have been involved in any past disputes with people subject to the Arbcom. They should also not be members of any projects or groups dedicated to the topic.
For example, no member of project rational skepticism or project paranormal should be involved in an Arbcom over a paranormal topic. They should also be prohibited in editing any disputed entries (other than for maintenance) or from having any involvement with the dispute or its participants outside of the Arbcom board. This is essential to ensure that there are no conflicts of interest and no abuse of power.
Earlier this year a member of an arbitrating committee for a subject in which I was involved edited my user page, I noticed the edit about a week later and reverted it . Just over 2 hours later the arbitrator went to the Arbcom board and tried to have me officially censured. The censure demanded was among the strictest of any on the Arbcom, even though I joined the arbcom as an interested party, and was not named in the complaint being arbitrated, and even though I had voluntarily removed myself from the epicientre of the dispute. The argument that they put up was so weak that it was voted down 5-1. Their actions were clearly motivated by personal disagreement and not by the prevailing facts of the case. They therefore violated the neutrality that an Arbcom committee member should have. Thus arbitration committee members MUST be fully removed from all issues in which they are arbitrating in future. - perfectblue 10:59, 3 November 2007 (UTC)
Note: I have copied them here. Ante lan talk 06:47, 3 November 2007 (UTC)
1. Do you think the paranormal case was decided correctly? Why or why not?
This is an important topic, but I think the question needs to be narrowed in order to get a useful response. Perhaps offer several actual findings, and ask if they think these are proper. Here is my suggestion in place of (1):
1) The following are a real principle and finding of fact from a previously decided ArbCom case:
Are these proper decisions? If so, on what grounds? If not, why not? Ante lan talk 06:47, 3 November 2007 (UTC)
2. What is the specific role of Arbcom in arbitrating disputes concerning fringe theories? Should it address user conduct issues, clarify policy, or both?
3. How should advocates of fringe theories be treated when their advocacy becomes perceived as disruption? Some admins and arbitrators have indicated that both sides should be treated equally, while others have expressed the view that some behavior tolerance is allowed for editors who uphold NPOV.
An editor has proposed that all editors who belong to this project be prohibited from editing paranormal related articles. I thought everyone here should know this due to the possible implications of every member here. Wikidudeman (talk) 17:20, 3 November 2007 (UTC)
Refs:
That proposal is very difficult to take seriously given its length, breadth, width, scent, and flavor. Ante lan talk 07:25, 4 November 2007 (UTC)
It is important to remember the purpose of Wikipedia, which is to document all notable opinions and POV. We do not concern ourselves with truth (since we all think we believe it!), but documentable opinion and POV (which should certainly include "truth", but also includes much nonsense), using V & RS, and then framing it in an NPOV manner. Since POV exists (that's reality), it is only natural that editors with those POV will be here (that's reality), and if they abide by NPOV principles, they can combine their efforts to ensure that good sources are found to document their POV, which is the purpose of Wikipedia - to document the existence of their POV (if it is notable enough). Other editors with other and opposing POV do the same and have the same right and obligation. If no deletionism of well-referenced POV is occurring, the end result should be the inclusion of opposing POV in an NPOV manner:
The article and its talk page are the table at which all factions meet, openly declare their POV, and attempt to cooperate in a collaborative manner that ensures that their own and the other POV are included in the article. -- Fyslee / talk 08:32, 4 November 2007 (UTC)
I was wondering if anyone had any advice for dealing with a conflict of interest issue. I'm editing on dyslexia related topics and have discovered that one of the editors is employed by a commercial dyslexia "treatment", manages their (many) websites that in turn recommend her book and her own website. She is quite assertive at pushing her product, slanting things in the general discussion of dyslexia to include the non-mainstreamed non-researched perspective, and yet managing to downplay competitive commercial products. Yet she has not acknowledged her financial interest but instead projects herself as a neutral expert. To make matters harder, she apparently has a background as a lawyer, and so is quite good at deflecting and turning things into an attack. Any help much appreciated-- Vannin 15:38, 5 November 2007 (UTC)
Correct me if I am wrong, but it appears that the only independent source for Davis Dyslexia Correction that fits WP:V standards is a criticism article from a newsletter. If more independent sources that fit WP:V, especially on self-publication, can't be found, I recommend nominating this article for AfD. Djma12 ( talk) 01:12, 6 November 2007 (UTC)
Where I can find good quality films? Can anyone help me? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 78.107.209.145 ( talk) 01:33, 8 November 2007 (UTC)
Water fluoridation controversy really could use a few more sets of eyes. I'm currently "discussing" the placement of a subsection in the article on it's talk page here and in the immediately preceding subsection. · jersyko talk 18:27, 14 November 2007 (UTC)
This article seems extremely heavy on the critical viewpoint and light on the neutral and supporting viewpoints. Any ideas how this can be rectified? -- Levine2112 discuss 18:37, 14 November 2007 (UTC)
There is now a proposal at Wikipedia:WikiProject Council/Proposals#Due weight for a group which would work to help ensure that our content complies with the principle of WP:Undue weight. One of its foci could definite be the so-called fringe theories, including fringe scientific theories. Any editors interested are encouraged to show their support there. Thank you. John Carter 18:58, 14 November 2007 (UTC)
The Séance article is being used as a vehicle (or WP:COATRACK) for attacking scepticism. An excerpt: "Such beliefs form a central core of their [sceptics'] philosophical dogma, which usually precludes any belief in the existence of spirits and they are thus as fully inarguable..." — — BillC talk 15:40, 17 November 2007 (UTC)
Could someone check over Wheatgrass, Ann Wigmore and Charles Francis Schnabel? Very unreliable sourcing, uncritical view of historical background and health claims, and main editor is a SPA with a clear promotional and anti-mainstream agenda see ( [14]). 86.140.107.204 ( talk) 20:10, 18 November 2007 (UTC)
So what is a SPA? Anthon01 ( talk) 03:20, 19 November 2007 (UTC)
Very unreliable sourcing. Please define what you mean by that? Anthon01 ( talk) 03:22, 19 November 2007 (UTC)
There is a new book about C&AM, with several chapters about the placebo effect. It will make a good reference and source of information. It has more of the early history of the term placebo than that article does, but I'm too busy to update it.
{{
citation}}
: templatestyles stripmarker in |ID=
at position 1 (
help)I've added it as Further Reading in a few obvious articles (the big ones), but it can be used in many individual article. Bubba73 (talk), 03:01, 21 November 2007 (UTC)
Rennes-le-Château needs some serious cleanup. In particular, it has perhaps the worst cite I've seen on Wikipedia in the last few years:
"An international spiritual ascension community has formed around what is regarded by the "new age" community as a strong energy centre in the Rennes Le Chateau region causing real estate prices to have sky rocketed in recent years" -- Cited as: "this is common knowledge in Southern France - the trend can be verified with a cursory reading of net postings""
See WP:VERIFY and WP:CITE for good citation style. -- 201.37.229.117 ( talk) 13:29, 25 November 2007 (UTC)
Comments requested at Talk:Complementary and alternative medicine#Request for Comments: merge proposal for complementary and alternative medicine articles.
To be clear - I'm not advocating for the change, just requesting formation of consensus... Thanks. -- Jack-A-Roe ( talk) 05:23, 9 December 2007 (UTC)
Some discussion on the Talk page of Littlewood's law from people who apparently believe that this "law" is not worthy of any serious consideration. -- Writtenonsand ( talk) 23:57, 23 December 2007 (UTC)
An article on podcast host and blogger Steven Novella has been created. So far we have some good references to establish notability, but not a whole lot of content. We can use your contribution! Head over to the page and give Steve the smartly written and impeccably referenced page he deserves! JFlav ( talk) 17:25, 26 December 2007 (UTC)
Vital for the survival of science textbooks as reliable sources about scientific statements:
Please comment. We need to get consensus on this matter.
ScienceApologist ( talk) 20:54, 27 December 2007 (UTC)
This article is mostly written by one editor and since it doesn't go into the specifics of any one case listed, has lots of talk about experts but is light on their details, does not mention any dissent and has very few sources, I'm a little skeptical. I didn't want to just slap a tag on the page, but if anyone is familiar with the organisation and its work, would you mind checking to see if the article a little one sided? In particular, why are the listed cases notable and why are the things I mentioned above all but missing? If this isn't the right place to ask for a second opinion, I apologise. Thanks for your time, Ben 04:34, 31 December 2007 (UTC)
Hi, I've picked up on a significant number of recent "paranormal" edits into article about Connecticut places that may deserve some attention from this group. Please refer to this user history: [15]. Thanks!-- Pgagnon999 ( talk) 18:52, 5 January 2008 (UTC)
I was toying with the idea of running for admin and since I often participate in discussions about paranormal and fringe topics, I was hoping to get some feedback on my editing. Anyone interested can participate in my RfC at User:Nealparr/RfC. Thank you in advance. -- Nealparr ( talk to me) 06:37, 9 January 2008 (UTC)
Hoping someone here can advise how best to tackle Polyphasic sleep (marked "may contain original research or unverified claims", "may not meet the general notability guideline" and "may require cleanup to meet Wikipedia's quality standards") and Uberman's sleep schedule (marked "may not meet the notability guideline for neologisms") Related articles are Steve Pavlina, Claudio Stampi and Why We Nap: Evolution, Chronobiology, and Functions of Polyphasic and Ultrashort Sleep.
The term polyphasic sleep says what it means and means what it says, IMO. Within the last 5-6 years, the term has been adopted by people calling themselves 'the online polyphasic sleep community', initiated in an Everything2 article by a young blogger calling herself PureDoxyK; she coined the terms Uberman's sleep schedule and Everyman sleep schedule (that article was recently deleted and redirected to Uberman's).
The article Polyphasic sleep opens with a neutral description. What I'd call the weird stuff, the fad stuff, appears first under the subtitle Intentional polyphasic sleep. Thus the lead does not summarize the article. But that's the least of the problems.
I've not been editing Wikipedia all that long and I wonder if tagging for original research / unverified claims / cleanup / notability should be allowed to just stay there indefinitely. If not, what should be done here? I've already started a minor edit-war which has been reverted and died down. I recognize that that is not the way to go. Thanks, -- Hordaland ( talk) 22:01, 20 January 2008 (UTC)
This article, which was a featured article.... is in a sad state. It seriously underplays that this a theory and belief and one not accepted within mainstream society and academia.
Btw and I reporting this to the right place? Sethie ( talk) 07:19, 9 February 2008 (UTC)
Hi, I just happen to come across this wikiproject, but after reading the intro page, I have a question about the scope of the project. Obviously NPOV and Verifiability are cornerstones, but this is not the NPOV/Verifiability Wikiproject. So is this project just focused on science/philosophical NPOV/Verifiability, or is there something deeper I am missing? Does it look out for the crazy article entries like "According to Dr. Quack, acupuncture can cure HIV/AIDS" or is it meant to ensure that acupuncture itself is not cited to have qualities which it doesn't have in the first place? I hope this make sense, and if I'm in left field on this, I'd love to hear where I've misunderstood. Thanks, -- Rhetth ( talk) 03:08, 16 February 2008 (UTC)
Hi all,
Though Satanic ritual abuse currently has a religion wikiproject tag at the top, I think given it's current status and page contents rational skepticism might be a good source of input as well. It's a pretty heavily referenced page, but it's also in need of some more experienced editors, calmer opinions and general guidance. Would anyone be interested in having a look? The page is locked until Feb 19th, after being locked for a couple weeks before, and there's an active set of editors discussing on the talk page (with middling civility). WLU ( talk) 01:47, 18 February 2008 (UTC)
What is the role of science in producing authoritative knowledge? How should Wikipedia report on pseudoscience? Veterans of numerous edit wars and talk page battles spanning dozens of articles across Wikipedia, User:Martinphi and User:ScienceApologist will go head to head on the subject of Wikipedia, Science, and Pseudoscience in a groundbreaking interview to be published in an upcoming issue of Signpost. User:Zvika will moderate the discussion. Post suggested topics and questions at The Martinphi-ScienceApologist Interview page. 66.30.77.62 ( talk) 18:24, 10 March 2008 (UTC)
Here is a quality template. This can be added to many articles related to skepticism. Any suggestions. QuackGuru ( talk) 21:02, 4 March 2008 (UTC)
Ussher_chronology No really any mention of the real scientifically accepted chronology.-- 155.144.251.120 ( talk) 03:52, 20 March 2008 (UTC)
See Talk:Orthomolecular_medicine#Request for comment on the attribution of criticism in the lead, all comments welcome. Tim Vickers ( talk) 17:34, 21 March 2008 (UTC)
Just a quick check to see if this has project backing....
Would I be right in saying that there was a project consensus that the idea that "ghosts, aliens and things that go bump in the night are creatures from other dimensions that are crossing over into our dimension" should be treated in the same manner ask David Ike's alien lizards, rather than as hard science?
perfectblue ( talk) 21:27, 21 March 2008 (UTC)
Antelan: Thanks for your intelligent post.
"The" problem here is that a horrifyingly large percentage of contemporary people have no functioning "baloney detector" to speak of (
http://users.tpg.com.au/users/tps-seti/baloney.html ), and in addition are completely ignorant of everything except pop culture. In other words, many people are unable to figure out for themselves whether things are being passed off as imaginary or as fact.
Examples:
Wikipedia is supposed to be, essentially, a collection of true things. If we don't very explicitly tell people, "This is true; that is untrue; this other is fantasy", very many people will not be able to figure these things out for themselves.
--
Writtenonsand (
talk)
16:05, 23 March 2008 (UTC)
Moving on to your example of the debate at Talk:10,000_BC_(film). This one is simple: Wikipedia regs (specifically WP:V and WP:OR) state that in order for you to include something a third party must have written about them in the current context. This means that a Wikipedia editor can't look in a textbook and find elements where the film diverts from reality. Instead somebody else must have done it, and that somebody must specifically be referencing that films. For example, you couldn't write a criticism section for the film Superman 3 which criticized Superman for being an outmoded male stereotype and then source it to a film critic whom was talking about Superman 2.
Put simply, in order to point out the scientific errors in the film (I haven't seen it so I can't comment on it) all that you have to do is to find evidence that somebody of note has found some inaccuracies, and then cite them.
perfectblue ( talk) 13:04, 24 March 2008 (UTC)
OK, context, context, context.
Let me provide an example.
There is a modern myth about a monster/ghost/specter of some sort. It has been verified to a reliable source as being an existing myth (The myth is real, the creature is not. This is not in dispute). Notability has been clearly established (this is also not in dispute). The entry has been correctly framed by its introduction, which describes it as a creature from modern myth (It is made clear that it is "baloney").
One variation on the myth says that the creature is from another dimension, and that the site where it is supposed to live is a nexus that allows it to wonder in and out of our dimension more or less randomly.
The question is "is there a consensus that, because this is an unreal creature, the fact that it is said to come form another dimension should be treated as something that is also unreal, and not as an issue of serious physics?".
perfectblue ( talk) 13:04, 24 March 2008 (UTC)
Came across your project on another page and wondered it any of these might fall under it.
Thanks -- Nate1481( t/ c) 10:10, 16 April 2008 (UTC)
Hello. I have nominated the article Richard Dawkins for the FA status. The article is within the scope of WikiProject Rational Skepticism. Users who are interested in the article can make contributions. Regards, Masterpiece2000 ( talk) 02:58, 17 April 2008 (UTC)
Getting It: The psychology of est is up at WP:FAC, comments would be appreciated. FAC discussion page is here: Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Getting It: The psychology of est. Cirt ( talk) 07:06, 18 April 2008 (UTC)
Please see Talk:Chiropractic#RfC: Effectiveness of chiropractic care. Comments are welcome; please see Talk:Chiropractic#RfC: Comments on claim of bias and proposal for fix for comments so far. Eubulides ( talk) 16:27, 24 April 2008 (UTC)
No balance whatsoever. There are various meta-analyses and properly run studies that show how this therapy is useless for various issues, and while there are positive ones they're usually of pretty low quality, or meta-analyses relying on studies of low quality. In any case, some balancing and less how-to/advocacy is needed. 206.126.163.20 ( talk) 03:27, 20 May 2008 (UTC)
This is an article started recently, but the original editor has now left, and needs a lot of work. From what I gather he has published information on "non-human intelligences" such as angels. Would this fall under the remit here? Paulbrock ( talk) 18:11, 28 May 2008 (UTC)
you can't place your project tag on every article which you don't agree with. since when do single persons decide, on wiki, if a aricle shall be the "playground" for you skeptics?! this is what _I_ call vandalism. examples are articles which are related to the ufo phenomena. this is not your personal playground nor the skeptic inquirer. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 79.233.73.54 ( talk) 19:00, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
it isn't "vandalism" by any stretch, but driveby article tagging can indeed be disruptive. Remember that you can also improve articles without owning them, and without decorating their talkpages first. dab (𒁳) 10:40, 9 June 2008 (UTC)
Please help me try and figure out what to do with this big ole mess of an article! Thanks LiPollis ( talk)
I have listed the article Dianetics for Good article reassessment. Input would be appreciated at Wikipedia:Good article reassessment/Dianetics/1. Cirt ( talk) 22:51, 20 June 2008 (UTC)
Abduction phenomenon is tagged as being improved by this WikiProject. The article has dozens of cites, but they're almost all from contributors to Alien Discussions: Proceedings of the Abduction Study Conference. Anybody have any other
good sources relevant to this subject?
(Obviously, edit at
Abduction phenomenon -- I'm not just looking for comments/feedback here on this page.) --
Writtenonsand (
talk)
17:01, 3 July 2008 (UTC)
As you may have heard, we at the Wikipedia 1.0 Editorial Team recently made some changes to the assessment scale, including the addition of a new level. The new description is available at WP:ASSESS.
Each WikiProject should already have a new C-Class category at Category:C-Class_articles. If your project elects not to use the new level, you can simply delete your WikiProject's C-Class category and clarify any amendments on your project's assessment/discussion pages. The bot is already finding and listing C-Class articles.
Please leave a message with us if you have any queries regarding the introduction of the revised scheme. This scheme should allow the team to start producing offline selections for your project and the wider community within the next year. Thanks for using the Wikipedia 1.0 scheme! For the 1.0 Editorial Team, §hepBot ( Disable) 21:19, 4 July 2008 (UTC)
A new tactic being advocated is that WP:FRINGE doesn't apply to Cold fusion. I started a request for comment on the subject. ScienceApologist ( talk) 19:56, 5 July 2008 (UTC)
Currently, 713 articles are assigned to this project, of which 366, or 51.3%, are flagged for cleanup of some sort. (Data as of 14 July 2008.) Are you interested in finding out more? I am offering to generate cleanup to-do lists on a project or work group level. See User:B. Wolterding/Cleanup listings for details. Subscribing is easy - just add a template to your project page. If you want to respond to this canned message, please do so at my user talk page. -- B. Wolterding ( talk) 16:19, 21 July 2008 (UTC)
Rational Skepticism looks like an interesting topic with lots of high priority items that I'll consider commenting on as I'm a skeptic by temperament and rational by training.
I've got something to suggest to this group with a relatively low priority, namely, an article that currently exists on Wikipedia concerning so-called "wilderness diarrhea," which is among other things, a pseudo-category of medicine.
The topic is the subject of much folklore among backpackers. There is a fair bit of research that makes clear that a good bit of the issue is based on confusion and hysteria. I think the item as it currently stands on Wikipedia, could benefit from the attention and input of a few experienced, skeptical editors. Calamitybrook ( talk) 03:20, 9 August 2008 (UTC)
Please consider assisting at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/NLP Modeling. -- John Vandenberg ( chat) 06:15, 12 August 2008 (UTC)
Wikipedia:Scientific standards
I have drafted a new proposal and would like help in clarifying, adjusting, adapting, and improving it. It is based on five years of work here at Wikipedia (not always the prettiest, I might add). I think it summarizes the opinions of a great majority of editors as to how to handle scientific situations. This proposal serves as a nexus between WP:NPOV and WP:RS for cases where we are dealing with observable reality. It is needed because there are a lot of editors who don't seem to understand what entails best-practices when writing a reliable reference work about observable reality. I don't pretend that this version is perfect, and would appreciate any and all additions, suggestions people may have for getting to some well-regarded scientific standards.
Note that these standards would apply only when discussing matters directly related to observable reality. These standards are inspired in part by WP:SPOV but avoid some of the major pitfalls of that particular proposal. In particular, the idea that SPOV even exists is a real problem. However, I think it is undeniable that we should have some standards for writing about scientific topics.
See also WP:SCI for another failed proposal that dovetails with this one. I hope this particular proposal is more in-line with the hole I see in policy/guidelines for dealing with these situations.
ScienceApologist ( talk) 19:54, 19 August 2008 (UTC)
While I've been editing wikipedia for quite a while, I've just joined this wikiproject after stumbling upon it by accident. I'm trying to get a feel for the scope of articles generally considered appropriate here. Here are a few perpetual motion related articles that I think might be appropriate to tag, and I'd like to get some opinions on whether others think that they are in scope or not. Obviously, feel free to tag any that you think are unquestionably in scope:
Thoughts? -- Athol Mullen ( talk) 03:27, 24 August 2008 (UTC)
Members of this project may be interested in the articles that have been nominated for deletion mentioned at this section of WP:ANI. -- Steven J. Anderson ( talk) 09:56, 26 August 2008 (UTC)
If someone's interested, Robert Spencer Carr might be a nice article to expand. Right now, pretty much all it says is about his science fiction writing, but [16] talks about his originating a lot of details for the modern UFO myth. I have to save it for someone with more time and hopefully more knowledge about at least the surrounding concepts.-- Prosfilaes ( talk) 17:41, 27 August 2008 (UTC)
There's an RfC open here about a proposed guideline for choosing reliable sources in medicine-related articles. In general, the guideline prefers up-to-date secondary sources (i.e., reviews) published in refereed scientific journals and recent medical textbooks. This RfC may interest some members of this project because of this project's work in some medicine/alternative medicine articles, and because it might (I suppose) someday be used as a model for a more general "science" RS guideline.
I thought I'd publicized it enough, but the most recent response indicated otherwise. His user page says he's a member here, so I'm spamming this notice to you all as well. In the WPMED tradition of providing perhaps excessive opportunities for community-wide comment, we've {{ proposed}} it as a guideline and opened a policy/guideline RfC, as well as making a few announcements. The views of all interested editors are welcome and wanted. WhatamIdoing ( talk) 19:55, 27 August 2008 (UTC)
Due to its relation to this project within WP, members might have an interest in this discussion. -- self-ref (nagasiva yronwode) ( talk) 19:26, 4 September 2008 (UTC)
Wikipedia 0.7 is a collection of English Wikipedia articles due to be released on DVD, and available for free download, later this year. The Wikipedia:Version 1.0 Editorial Team has made an automated selection of articles for Version 0.7.
We would like to ask you to review the articles selected from this project. These were chosen from the articles with this project's talk page tag, based on the rated importance and quality. If there are any specific articles that should be removed, please let us know at Wikipedia talk:Version 0.7. You can also nominate additional articles for release, following the procedure at Wikipedia:Release Version Nominations.
A list of selected articles with cleanup tags, sorted by project, is available. The list is automatically updated each hour when it is loaded. Please try to fix any urgent problems in the selected articles. A team of copyeditors has agreed to help with copyediting requests, although you should try to fix simple issues on your own if possible.
We would also appreciate your help in identifying the version of each article that you think we should use, to help avoid vandalism or POV issues. These versions can be recorded at this project's subpage of User:SelectionBot/0.7. We are planning to release the selection for the holiday season, so we ask you to select the revisions before October 20. At that time, we will use an automatic process to identify which version of each article to release, if no version has been manually selected. Thanks! For the Wikipedia 1.0 Editorial team, SelectionBot 23:30, 15 September 2008 (UTC)
It's been suggested to exclude Cochrane Collaboration and similar medical reviews from Chiropractic on WP:OR grounds. Comments are requested at Talk:Chiropractic #Request for Comment: Excluding treatment reviews. Eubulides ( talk) 07:00, 17 September 2008 (UTC)
L. Ron Hubbard has been nominated for a good article reassessment. Articles are typically reviewed for one week. Please leave your comments and help us to return the article to good article quality. If concerns are not addressed during the review period, the good article status will be removed from the article. Reviewers' concerns are here. Cirt ( talk) 09:38, 1 October 2008 (UTC)
The definition of a Hasty Generalization would seem to preclude scientific study. For instance, the Polya conjecture example might indicate to some readers that a generalization is hasty if it holds for 906150256 entities, but not the 906150257th, even if the 906150257th hasn't been investigated yet. This would indicate that we can reasonably make no conclusions, for instance, in the evolutionary biology, because the 906150257th fossil might be a human skeleton in Jurassic rock. This is probably not what the article intends to state. —Preceding unsigned comment added by HorridRedThings ( talk • contribs) 13:57, 1 October 2008 (UTC)
Alien autopsy is IMHO surprisingly bad. The overall tone of the article is, "Although scientific and medical experts as well as the makers of the films themselves state that the films are hoaxes, the question of their authenticity remains open." I think that this violates Wikipedia:Neutral point of view and especially WP:WEIGHT. -- 201.53.7.16 ( talk) 13:29, 5 October 2008 (UTC)
We have an article
Double-nosed Andean tiger hound. Seems to me that that's very likely a hoax. (Article cites a BBC photo of a dog with a "double" nose, but I've never heard of a "double-nosed" breed.)
Is there anything constructive that can be done with this? (Note, I've posted to
Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Cryptozoology and
Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Dogs on this to see if anybody there does have any reliable source.) --
201.53.7.16 (
talk)
22:24, 9 October 2008 (UTC)
Could people please take a look at Firewalking? Contains various statements that IMHO need to be tweaked a little. -- 201.53.7.16 ( talk) 01:29, 10 October 2008 (UTC)
I don't know if it is either way, it seems more like newage religious mumbojumbo than anything, but if anyone knows of any sources stating it one way or the other it would be appreciated Talk:Aura_(paranormal)#Aura_is_Pseudoscience.3F.3F 24.76.161.28 ( talk) 03:15, 11 October 2008 (UTC)
Believe it or not, we have an article Harpeth Hills Flying Monkey Marathon which claims that
"mythical Harpeth Hills Flying Monkeys ... are reported to live in Percy and Edwin Warner Parks in Nashville [ Tennessee, USA]. According to the legend, the flying monkeys, named the after the geologic region where they reside, are an endangered species and are only rarely seen by humans."
This is complete crap, right? Made up only to advertise this race? Anybody want to do anything with this? -- 201.53.7.16 ( talk) 16:40, 22 October 2008 (UTC)
HELP! We have Cold Fusion proponents dramatically asserting ownership over cold fusion. I need all the help I can get. ScienceApologist ( talk) 16:00, 27 October 2008 (UTC)
There is a oddly phrased article at Effective microorganism that seems a bit unclear on whether it is NPOV or sourced correctly. Thought this project might like to be made aware of it.-- ZayZayEM ( talk) 06:39, 4 November 2008 (UTC)
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 1 | ← | Archive 3 | Archive 4 | Archive 5 | Archive 6 | Archive 7 | → | Archive 10 |
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 1 | ← | Archive 3 | Archive 4 | Archive 5 | Archive 6 | Archive 7 | → | Archive 10 |
"Rational skepticism" template was removed from the phthalates article on the grounds that this was an inaccurate category. I dispute this, and would continue this category. I assert that the claims made for adverse health affects of phthalates in the environment far exceed the scientific basis for the claims. The issue is similar to the water fluoridation controversy listed below. Would anyone want to review this article, and see what you think? Pustelnik ( talk) 23:47, 11 February 2008 (UTC)
Dowsing - This article needs alot of help from skeptics. Its largely presents the view that dowsing is real... and even worse, that it HAS been proven scientifically...-- Dacium 10:30, 4 September 2007 (UTC)
I was wondering if anyone could have a look at School of Economic Science. It is a religious organasation that offers classes in philosophy, that has been accused of being a cult. I have tried to keep a balanced article, yet the page has been rewritten to exclude criticism of the school by User:Miles Dogood. This is quite frustrating, as the article does not reflect the level of controversy associated with the School :( Gareth E Kegg 12:22, 12 September 2007 (UTC)
"In practice, a scientific skeptic generally focuses on critically examining claims and theories which they believe to be far beyond the mainstream of science." While this statement may be factually accurate, I believe it is POV against dissident criticism. A skeptic may also be skeptical toward mainstream scientific theories. I would argue that a skeptic must especially be critical of the mainstream, because science is a method of disputing established claims by verifying or refuting them. A scientific theory is one which can be refuted by evidence; that is the defining attribute of science. I submit that the words "scientific fact" are weasel words, because science does not establish facts, science disputes claims of fact by testing hypotheses against new evidence. Oneismany 18:12, 22 September 2007 (UTC)
That's sick! So every Einstein, Galileo and so on, must be stupid guys because they violated the "logics" (as you call it) upon which the knowledge was based. Rational skepticism is group thinking. Socialistic science. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 213.140.11.141 ( talk) 23:12, 11 July 2008 (UTC)
Archaeological forgery was recently placed under this project's banner. I don't really think that it belongs. Any takers? - perfectblue 12:06, 7 October 2007 (UTC)
Martinphi is using a boilerplate to attack the members of this WikiProject. I have removed the plate three times now, and he has twice reverted me with manifestly inaccurate claims that I am vandalizing. I ask members of this community to help fight against the personal attacks of this particularly uncivil editor. See [1]. ScienceApologist 21:02, 7 October 2007 (UTC)
Martin, Regardless of the validity of ScienceApologist's right to remove that template, You totally threw AGF out of the window by calling him a "vandal" in the edit summaries( link 1 link 2). ScienceApologist has been contributing to this project for a long time and calling him a "vandal" is a CLEAR violation of WP:CIV, WP:NPA, and WP:AGF. You were totally unjustified in doing that. An apology is in order. Wikidudeman (talk) 15:11, 8 October 2007 (UTC)
Shroud of Turin has been nominated for a featured article review. Articles are typically reviewed for two weeks. Please leave your comments and help us to return the article to featured quality. If concerns are not addressed during the review period, articles are moved onto the Featured Article Removal Candidates list for a further period, where editors may declare "Keep" or "Remove" the article from featured status. The instructions for the review process are here. Reviewers' concerns are here. PeterSymonds | talk 19:19, 14 October 2007 (UTC)
I encourage Wikipedians who watch this page to comment about a new proposal at Wikipedia talk:Fringe theories#Appeal to particular attribution. Thanks ScienceApologist 17:33, 15 October 2007 (UTC)
I added the above to RS. Of particular concern is the health section Nil Einne 07:56, 25 October 2007 (UTC)
Several Arbcom cases over the last year or two have involved issues near and dear to this project (e.g. pseudoscience), and have generated a significant amount of controversy. For the upcoming election, Arbcom candidates have submitted statements, and users can submit questions about relevant issues to each candidate. I would like to submit a series of questions for each candidate about the relevance of WP:FRINGE and NPOV, and I'd like to solicit project members here for aid in drafting these questions. I have no plans to "personalize" these questions - that is, the same set of questions will be posted for each candidate.
Here's my proposed set of questions:
1. Do you think the paranormal case was decided correctly? Why or why not?
2. What is the specific role of Arbcom in arbitrating disputes concerning fringe theories? Should it address user conduct issues, clarify policy, or both?
3. How should advocates of fringe theories be treated when their advocacy becomes perceived as disruption? Some admins and arbitrators have indicated that both sides should be treated equally, while others have expressed the view that some behavior tolerance is allowed for editors who uphold NPOV.
Please edit, add to, or delete as you see fit. I think it's important that candidates discuss their views in this area, as more arbitration concerning pseudoscientific topics is likely in the future. Cheers, Skinwalker 13:45, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
I think the Paranormal arbitration case decision contains wording and recommendations that reflects what Wikipedia is and how it should treat these types of subjects. Rather than expect more arbitration in the future (you need two to tango....), members of this project may want to consider joining others in bringing quality editing to these articles within the recommendations of the ArbCom case, as well as within established policies. These have served us well in other controversial subjects or subjects about which strong POVs exist, and there is no reason to believe that it will not work here, or that it will need a special set of practices and/or policies. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 15:22, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
I am concerned about the adverse effects of pronouncements and decisions that should not be allowed in ArbComs. Maybe some questions related to that should also be asked. The problem of ArbComs being used to run amuck, repeat blatantly false charges, and totally assume bad faith and allow personal attacks of a libelous character, things not normally allowed, was very evident and need to be prevented in the future. Also content disputes should not be discussed or made the basis for decisions when they are side issues to the subject of the ArbCom - a user conduct dispute. ArbComs should stay on-topic. Likewise decisions related to what are reliable sources should not be allowed unless they are the main topic of the ArbCom. That did not happen in my case. Comments that have potentially far reaching consequences were improperly made by ArbCom members about Quackwatch without a proper understanding of the website or any real in-depth discussion, as would be the case if the ArbCom had been concentrated on that issue. Such important decisions should be dealt with in their own ArbComs. Since ArbComs are often what amounts to an uncontrolled kangaroo court without any concern for the protection of human rights one normally can expect in a real court of law (IOW ArbComs violate such rights with impunity), or with any protection for defendants in such cases, they need to be streamlined and controlled, using admins who are real judges in real life. Words are cheap and just bytes (NOT!), but have very real consequences in real life. Questions related to keeping ArbComs on-topic need to be made. -- Fyslee / talk 16:41, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
You could mention the Sadi Carnot case as well. Or is that too straightforward a case? Carcharoth 07:19, 3 November 2007 (UTC)
Thos involved in the desicsion making process for controversial topics should be entirely independent. The should not have edited an article in that topic (other than maintenance and vandalism fighting) for 6 months and should not have been involved in any past disputes with people subject to the Arbcom. They should also not be members of any projects or groups dedicated to the topic.
For example, no member of project rational skepticism or project paranormal should be involved in an Arbcom over a paranormal topic. They should also be prohibited in editing any disputed entries (other than for maintenance) or from having any involvement with the dispute or its participants outside of the Arbcom board. This is essential to ensure that there are no conflicts of interest and no abuse of power.
Earlier this year a member of an arbitrating committee for a subject in which I was involved edited my user page, I noticed the edit about a week later and reverted it . Just over 2 hours later the arbitrator went to the Arbcom board and tried to have me officially censured. The censure demanded was among the strictest of any on the Arbcom, even though I joined the arbcom as an interested party, and was not named in the complaint being arbitrated, and even though I had voluntarily removed myself from the epicientre of the dispute. The argument that they put up was so weak that it was voted down 5-1. Their actions were clearly motivated by personal disagreement and not by the prevailing facts of the case. They therefore violated the neutrality that an Arbcom committee member should have. Thus arbitration committee members MUST be fully removed from all issues in which they are arbitrating in future. - perfectblue 10:59, 3 November 2007 (UTC)
Note: I have copied them here. Ante lan talk 06:47, 3 November 2007 (UTC)
1. Do you think the paranormal case was decided correctly? Why or why not?
This is an important topic, but I think the question needs to be narrowed in order to get a useful response. Perhaps offer several actual findings, and ask if they think these are proper. Here is my suggestion in place of (1):
1) The following are a real principle and finding of fact from a previously decided ArbCom case:
Are these proper decisions? If so, on what grounds? If not, why not? Ante lan talk 06:47, 3 November 2007 (UTC)
2. What is the specific role of Arbcom in arbitrating disputes concerning fringe theories? Should it address user conduct issues, clarify policy, or both?
3. How should advocates of fringe theories be treated when their advocacy becomes perceived as disruption? Some admins and arbitrators have indicated that both sides should be treated equally, while others have expressed the view that some behavior tolerance is allowed for editors who uphold NPOV.
An editor has proposed that all editors who belong to this project be prohibited from editing paranormal related articles. I thought everyone here should know this due to the possible implications of every member here. Wikidudeman (talk) 17:20, 3 November 2007 (UTC)
Refs:
That proposal is very difficult to take seriously given its length, breadth, width, scent, and flavor. Ante lan talk 07:25, 4 November 2007 (UTC)
It is important to remember the purpose of Wikipedia, which is to document all notable opinions and POV. We do not concern ourselves with truth (since we all think we believe it!), but documentable opinion and POV (which should certainly include "truth", but also includes much nonsense), using V & RS, and then framing it in an NPOV manner. Since POV exists (that's reality), it is only natural that editors with those POV will be here (that's reality), and if they abide by NPOV principles, they can combine their efforts to ensure that good sources are found to document their POV, which is the purpose of Wikipedia - to document the existence of their POV (if it is notable enough). Other editors with other and opposing POV do the same and have the same right and obligation. If no deletionism of well-referenced POV is occurring, the end result should be the inclusion of opposing POV in an NPOV manner:
The article and its talk page are the table at which all factions meet, openly declare their POV, and attempt to cooperate in a collaborative manner that ensures that their own and the other POV are included in the article. -- Fyslee / talk 08:32, 4 November 2007 (UTC)
I was wondering if anyone had any advice for dealing with a conflict of interest issue. I'm editing on dyslexia related topics and have discovered that one of the editors is employed by a commercial dyslexia "treatment", manages their (many) websites that in turn recommend her book and her own website. She is quite assertive at pushing her product, slanting things in the general discussion of dyslexia to include the non-mainstreamed non-researched perspective, and yet managing to downplay competitive commercial products. Yet she has not acknowledged her financial interest but instead projects herself as a neutral expert. To make matters harder, she apparently has a background as a lawyer, and so is quite good at deflecting and turning things into an attack. Any help much appreciated-- Vannin 15:38, 5 November 2007 (UTC)
Correct me if I am wrong, but it appears that the only independent source for Davis Dyslexia Correction that fits WP:V standards is a criticism article from a newsletter. If more independent sources that fit WP:V, especially on self-publication, can't be found, I recommend nominating this article for AfD. Djma12 ( talk) 01:12, 6 November 2007 (UTC)
Where I can find good quality films? Can anyone help me? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 78.107.209.145 ( talk) 01:33, 8 November 2007 (UTC)
Water fluoridation controversy really could use a few more sets of eyes. I'm currently "discussing" the placement of a subsection in the article on it's talk page here and in the immediately preceding subsection. · jersyko talk 18:27, 14 November 2007 (UTC)
This article seems extremely heavy on the critical viewpoint and light on the neutral and supporting viewpoints. Any ideas how this can be rectified? -- Levine2112 discuss 18:37, 14 November 2007 (UTC)
There is now a proposal at Wikipedia:WikiProject Council/Proposals#Due weight for a group which would work to help ensure that our content complies with the principle of WP:Undue weight. One of its foci could definite be the so-called fringe theories, including fringe scientific theories. Any editors interested are encouraged to show their support there. Thank you. John Carter 18:58, 14 November 2007 (UTC)
The Séance article is being used as a vehicle (or WP:COATRACK) for attacking scepticism. An excerpt: "Such beliefs form a central core of their [sceptics'] philosophical dogma, which usually precludes any belief in the existence of spirits and they are thus as fully inarguable..." — — BillC talk 15:40, 17 November 2007 (UTC)
Could someone check over Wheatgrass, Ann Wigmore and Charles Francis Schnabel? Very unreliable sourcing, uncritical view of historical background and health claims, and main editor is a SPA with a clear promotional and anti-mainstream agenda see ( [14]). 86.140.107.204 ( talk) 20:10, 18 November 2007 (UTC)
So what is a SPA? Anthon01 ( talk) 03:20, 19 November 2007 (UTC)
Very unreliable sourcing. Please define what you mean by that? Anthon01 ( talk) 03:22, 19 November 2007 (UTC)
There is a new book about C&AM, with several chapters about the placebo effect. It will make a good reference and source of information. It has more of the early history of the term placebo than that article does, but I'm too busy to update it.
{{
citation}}
: templatestyles stripmarker in |ID=
at position 1 (
help)I've added it as Further Reading in a few obvious articles (the big ones), but it can be used in many individual article. Bubba73 (talk), 03:01, 21 November 2007 (UTC)
Rennes-le-Château needs some serious cleanup. In particular, it has perhaps the worst cite I've seen on Wikipedia in the last few years:
"An international spiritual ascension community has formed around what is regarded by the "new age" community as a strong energy centre in the Rennes Le Chateau region causing real estate prices to have sky rocketed in recent years" -- Cited as: "this is common knowledge in Southern France - the trend can be verified with a cursory reading of net postings""
See WP:VERIFY and WP:CITE for good citation style. -- 201.37.229.117 ( talk) 13:29, 25 November 2007 (UTC)
Comments requested at Talk:Complementary and alternative medicine#Request for Comments: merge proposal for complementary and alternative medicine articles.
To be clear - I'm not advocating for the change, just requesting formation of consensus... Thanks. -- Jack-A-Roe ( talk) 05:23, 9 December 2007 (UTC)
Some discussion on the Talk page of Littlewood's law from people who apparently believe that this "law" is not worthy of any serious consideration. -- Writtenonsand ( talk) 23:57, 23 December 2007 (UTC)
An article on podcast host and blogger Steven Novella has been created. So far we have some good references to establish notability, but not a whole lot of content. We can use your contribution! Head over to the page and give Steve the smartly written and impeccably referenced page he deserves! JFlav ( talk) 17:25, 26 December 2007 (UTC)
Vital for the survival of science textbooks as reliable sources about scientific statements:
Please comment. We need to get consensus on this matter.
ScienceApologist ( talk) 20:54, 27 December 2007 (UTC)
This article is mostly written by one editor and since it doesn't go into the specifics of any one case listed, has lots of talk about experts but is light on their details, does not mention any dissent and has very few sources, I'm a little skeptical. I didn't want to just slap a tag on the page, but if anyone is familiar with the organisation and its work, would you mind checking to see if the article a little one sided? In particular, why are the listed cases notable and why are the things I mentioned above all but missing? If this isn't the right place to ask for a second opinion, I apologise. Thanks for your time, Ben 04:34, 31 December 2007 (UTC)
Hi, I've picked up on a significant number of recent "paranormal" edits into article about Connecticut places that may deserve some attention from this group. Please refer to this user history: [15]. Thanks!-- Pgagnon999 ( talk) 18:52, 5 January 2008 (UTC)
I was toying with the idea of running for admin and since I often participate in discussions about paranormal and fringe topics, I was hoping to get some feedback on my editing. Anyone interested can participate in my RfC at User:Nealparr/RfC. Thank you in advance. -- Nealparr ( talk to me) 06:37, 9 January 2008 (UTC)
Hoping someone here can advise how best to tackle Polyphasic sleep (marked "may contain original research or unverified claims", "may not meet the general notability guideline" and "may require cleanup to meet Wikipedia's quality standards") and Uberman's sleep schedule (marked "may not meet the notability guideline for neologisms") Related articles are Steve Pavlina, Claudio Stampi and Why We Nap: Evolution, Chronobiology, and Functions of Polyphasic and Ultrashort Sleep.
The term polyphasic sleep says what it means and means what it says, IMO. Within the last 5-6 years, the term has been adopted by people calling themselves 'the online polyphasic sleep community', initiated in an Everything2 article by a young blogger calling herself PureDoxyK; she coined the terms Uberman's sleep schedule and Everyman sleep schedule (that article was recently deleted and redirected to Uberman's).
The article Polyphasic sleep opens with a neutral description. What I'd call the weird stuff, the fad stuff, appears first under the subtitle Intentional polyphasic sleep. Thus the lead does not summarize the article. But that's the least of the problems.
I've not been editing Wikipedia all that long and I wonder if tagging for original research / unverified claims / cleanup / notability should be allowed to just stay there indefinitely. If not, what should be done here? I've already started a minor edit-war which has been reverted and died down. I recognize that that is not the way to go. Thanks, -- Hordaland ( talk) 22:01, 20 January 2008 (UTC)
This article, which was a featured article.... is in a sad state. It seriously underplays that this a theory and belief and one not accepted within mainstream society and academia.
Btw and I reporting this to the right place? Sethie ( talk) 07:19, 9 February 2008 (UTC)
Hi, I just happen to come across this wikiproject, but after reading the intro page, I have a question about the scope of the project. Obviously NPOV and Verifiability are cornerstones, but this is not the NPOV/Verifiability Wikiproject. So is this project just focused on science/philosophical NPOV/Verifiability, or is there something deeper I am missing? Does it look out for the crazy article entries like "According to Dr. Quack, acupuncture can cure HIV/AIDS" or is it meant to ensure that acupuncture itself is not cited to have qualities which it doesn't have in the first place? I hope this make sense, and if I'm in left field on this, I'd love to hear where I've misunderstood. Thanks, -- Rhetth ( talk) 03:08, 16 February 2008 (UTC)
Hi all,
Though Satanic ritual abuse currently has a religion wikiproject tag at the top, I think given it's current status and page contents rational skepticism might be a good source of input as well. It's a pretty heavily referenced page, but it's also in need of some more experienced editors, calmer opinions and general guidance. Would anyone be interested in having a look? The page is locked until Feb 19th, after being locked for a couple weeks before, and there's an active set of editors discussing on the talk page (with middling civility). WLU ( talk) 01:47, 18 February 2008 (UTC)
What is the role of science in producing authoritative knowledge? How should Wikipedia report on pseudoscience? Veterans of numerous edit wars and talk page battles spanning dozens of articles across Wikipedia, User:Martinphi and User:ScienceApologist will go head to head on the subject of Wikipedia, Science, and Pseudoscience in a groundbreaking interview to be published in an upcoming issue of Signpost. User:Zvika will moderate the discussion. Post suggested topics and questions at The Martinphi-ScienceApologist Interview page. 66.30.77.62 ( talk) 18:24, 10 March 2008 (UTC)
Here is a quality template. This can be added to many articles related to skepticism. Any suggestions. QuackGuru ( talk) 21:02, 4 March 2008 (UTC)
Ussher_chronology No really any mention of the real scientifically accepted chronology.-- 155.144.251.120 ( talk) 03:52, 20 March 2008 (UTC)
See Talk:Orthomolecular_medicine#Request for comment on the attribution of criticism in the lead, all comments welcome. Tim Vickers ( talk) 17:34, 21 March 2008 (UTC)
Just a quick check to see if this has project backing....
Would I be right in saying that there was a project consensus that the idea that "ghosts, aliens and things that go bump in the night are creatures from other dimensions that are crossing over into our dimension" should be treated in the same manner ask David Ike's alien lizards, rather than as hard science?
perfectblue ( talk) 21:27, 21 March 2008 (UTC)
Antelan: Thanks for your intelligent post.
"The" problem here is that a horrifyingly large percentage of contemporary people have no functioning "baloney detector" to speak of (
http://users.tpg.com.au/users/tps-seti/baloney.html ), and in addition are completely ignorant of everything except pop culture. In other words, many people are unable to figure out for themselves whether things are being passed off as imaginary or as fact.
Examples:
Wikipedia is supposed to be, essentially, a collection of true things. If we don't very explicitly tell people, "This is true; that is untrue; this other is fantasy", very many people will not be able to figure these things out for themselves.
--
Writtenonsand (
talk)
16:05, 23 March 2008 (UTC)
Moving on to your example of the debate at Talk:10,000_BC_(film). This one is simple: Wikipedia regs (specifically WP:V and WP:OR) state that in order for you to include something a third party must have written about them in the current context. This means that a Wikipedia editor can't look in a textbook and find elements where the film diverts from reality. Instead somebody else must have done it, and that somebody must specifically be referencing that films. For example, you couldn't write a criticism section for the film Superman 3 which criticized Superman for being an outmoded male stereotype and then source it to a film critic whom was talking about Superman 2.
Put simply, in order to point out the scientific errors in the film (I haven't seen it so I can't comment on it) all that you have to do is to find evidence that somebody of note has found some inaccuracies, and then cite them.
perfectblue ( talk) 13:04, 24 March 2008 (UTC)
OK, context, context, context.
Let me provide an example.
There is a modern myth about a monster/ghost/specter of some sort. It has been verified to a reliable source as being an existing myth (The myth is real, the creature is not. This is not in dispute). Notability has been clearly established (this is also not in dispute). The entry has been correctly framed by its introduction, which describes it as a creature from modern myth (It is made clear that it is "baloney").
One variation on the myth says that the creature is from another dimension, and that the site where it is supposed to live is a nexus that allows it to wonder in and out of our dimension more or less randomly.
The question is "is there a consensus that, because this is an unreal creature, the fact that it is said to come form another dimension should be treated as something that is also unreal, and not as an issue of serious physics?".
perfectblue ( talk) 13:04, 24 March 2008 (UTC)
Came across your project on another page and wondered it any of these might fall under it.
Thanks -- Nate1481( t/ c) 10:10, 16 April 2008 (UTC)
Hello. I have nominated the article Richard Dawkins for the FA status. The article is within the scope of WikiProject Rational Skepticism. Users who are interested in the article can make contributions. Regards, Masterpiece2000 ( talk) 02:58, 17 April 2008 (UTC)
Getting It: The psychology of est is up at WP:FAC, comments would be appreciated. FAC discussion page is here: Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Getting It: The psychology of est. Cirt ( talk) 07:06, 18 April 2008 (UTC)
Please see Talk:Chiropractic#RfC: Effectiveness of chiropractic care. Comments are welcome; please see Talk:Chiropractic#RfC: Comments on claim of bias and proposal for fix for comments so far. Eubulides ( talk) 16:27, 24 April 2008 (UTC)
No balance whatsoever. There are various meta-analyses and properly run studies that show how this therapy is useless for various issues, and while there are positive ones they're usually of pretty low quality, or meta-analyses relying on studies of low quality. In any case, some balancing and less how-to/advocacy is needed. 206.126.163.20 ( talk) 03:27, 20 May 2008 (UTC)
This is an article started recently, but the original editor has now left, and needs a lot of work. From what I gather he has published information on "non-human intelligences" such as angels. Would this fall under the remit here? Paulbrock ( talk) 18:11, 28 May 2008 (UTC)
you can't place your project tag on every article which you don't agree with. since when do single persons decide, on wiki, if a aricle shall be the "playground" for you skeptics?! this is what _I_ call vandalism. examples are articles which are related to the ufo phenomena. this is not your personal playground nor the skeptic inquirer. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 79.233.73.54 ( talk) 19:00, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
it isn't "vandalism" by any stretch, but driveby article tagging can indeed be disruptive. Remember that you can also improve articles without owning them, and without decorating their talkpages first. dab (𒁳) 10:40, 9 June 2008 (UTC)
Please help me try and figure out what to do with this big ole mess of an article! Thanks LiPollis ( talk)
I have listed the article Dianetics for Good article reassessment. Input would be appreciated at Wikipedia:Good article reassessment/Dianetics/1. Cirt ( talk) 22:51, 20 June 2008 (UTC)
Abduction phenomenon is tagged as being improved by this WikiProject. The article has dozens of cites, but they're almost all from contributors to Alien Discussions: Proceedings of the Abduction Study Conference. Anybody have any other
good sources relevant to this subject?
(Obviously, edit at
Abduction phenomenon -- I'm not just looking for comments/feedback here on this page.) --
Writtenonsand (
talk)
17:01, 3 July 2008 (UTC)
As you may have heard, we at the Wikipedia 1.0 Editorial Team recently made some changes to the assessment scale, including the addition of a new level. The new description is available at WP:ASSESS.
Each WikiProject should already have a new C-Class category at Category:C-Class_articles. If your project elects not to use the new level, you can simply delete your WikiProject's C-Class category and clarify any amendments on your project's assessment/discussion pages. The bot is already finding and listing C-Class articles.
Please leave a message with us if you have any queries regarding the introduction of the revised scheme. This scheme should allow the team to start producing offline selections for your project and the wider community within the next year. Thanks for using the Wikipedia 1.0 scheme! For the 1.0 Editorial Team, §hepBot ( Disable) 21:19, 4 July 2008 (UTC)
A new tactic being advocated is that WP:FRINGE doesn't apply to Cold fusion. I started a request for comment on the subject. ScienceApologist ( talk) 19:56, 5 July 2008 (UTC)
Currently, 713 articles are assigned to this project, of which 366, or 51.3%, are flagged for cleanup of some sort. (Data as of 14 July 2008.) Are you interested in finding out more? I am offering to generate cleanup to-do lists on a project or work group level. See User:B. Wolterding/Cleanup listings for details. Subscribing is easy - just add a template to your project page. If you want to respond to this canned message, please do so at my user talk page. -- B. Wolterding ( talk) 16:19, 21 July 2008 (UTC)
Rational Skepticism looks like an interesting topic with lots of high priority items that I'll consider commenting on as I'm a skeptic by temperament and rational by training.
I've got something to suggest to this group with a relatively low priority, namely, an article that currently exists on Wikipedia concerning so-called "wilderness diarrhea," which is among other things, a pseudo-category of medicine.
The topic is the subject of much folklore among backpackers. There is a fair bit of research that makes clear that a good bit of the issue is based on confusion and hysteria. I think the item as it currently stands on Wikipedia, could benefit from the attention and input of a few experienced, skeptical editors. Calamitybrook ( talk) 03:20, 9 August 2008 (UTC)
Please consider assisting at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/NLP Modeling. -- John Vandenberg ( chat) 06:15, 12 August 2008 (UTC)
Wikipedia:Scientific standards
I have drafted a new proposal and would like help in clarifying, adjusting, adapting, and improving it. It is based on five years of work here at Wikipedia (not always the prettiest, I might add). I think it summarizes the opinions of a great majority of editors as to how to handle scientific situations. This proposal serves as a nexus between WP:NPOV and WP:RS for cases where we are dealing with observable reality. It is needed because there are a lot of editors who don't seem to understand what entails best-practices when writing a reliable reference work about observable reality. I don't pretend that this version is perfect, and would appreciate any and all additions, suggestions people may have for getting to some well-regarded scientific standards.
Note that these standards would apply only when discussing matters directly related to observable reality. These standards are inspired in part by WP:SPOV but avoid some of the major pitfalls of that particular proposal. In particular, the idea that SPOV even exists is a real problem. However, I think it is undeniable that we should have some standards for writing about scientific topics.
See also WP:SCI for another failed proposal that dovetails with this one. I hope this particular proposal is more in-line with the hole I see in policy/guidelines for dealing with these situations.
ScienceApologist ( talk) 19:54, 19 August 2008 (UTC)
While I've been editing wikipedia for quite a while, I've just joined this wikiproject after stumbling upon it by accident. I'm trying to get a feel for the scope of articles generally considered appropriate here. Here are a few perpetual motion related articles that I think might be appropriate to tag, and I'd like to get some opinions on whether others think that they are in scope or not. Obviously, feel free to tag any that you think are unquestionably in scope:
Thoughts? -- Athol Mullen ( talk) 03:27, 24 August 2008 (UTC)
Members of this project may be interested in the articles that have been nominated for deletion mentioned at this section of WP:ANI. -- Steven J. Anderson ( talk) 09:56, 26 August 2008 (UTC)
If someone's interested, Robert Spencer Carr might be a nice article to expand. Right now, pretty much all it says is about his science fiction writing, but [16] talks about his originating a lot of details for the modern UFO myth. I have to save it for someone with more time and hopefully more knowledge about at least the surrounding concepts.-- Prosfilaes ( talk) 17:41, 27 August 2008 (UTC)
There's an RfC open here about a proposed guideline for choosing reliable sources in medicine-related articles. In general, the guideline prefers up-to-date secondary sources (i.e., reviews) published in refereed scientific journals and recent medical textbooks. This RfC may interest some members of this project because of this project's work in some medicine/alternative medicine articles, and because it might (I suppose) someday be used as a model for a more general "science" RS guideline.
I thought I'd publicized it enough, but the most recent response indicated otherwise. His user page says he's a member here, so I'm spamming this notice to you all as well. In the WPMED tradition of providing perhaps excessive opportunities for community-wide comment, we've {{ proposed}} it as a guideline and opened a policy/guideline RfC, as well as making a few announcements. The views of all interested editors are welcome and wanted. WhatamIdoing ( talk) 19:55, 27 August 2008 (UTC)
Due to its relation to this project within WP, members might have an interest in this discussion. -- self-ref (nagasiva yronwode) ( talk) 19:26, 4 September 2008 (UTC)
Wikipedia 0.7 is a collection of English Wikipedia articles due to be released on DVD, and available for free download, later this year. The Wikipedia:Version 1.0 Editorial Team has made an automated selection of articles for Version 0.7.
We would like to ask you to review the articles selected from this project. These were chosen from the articles with this project's talk page tag, based on the rated importance and quality. If there are any specific articles that should be removed, please let us know at Wikipedia talk:Version 0.7. You can also nominate additional articles for release, following the procedure at Wikipedia:Release Version Nominations.
A list of selected articles with cleanup tags, sorted by project, is available. The list is automatically updated each hour when it is loaded. Please try to fix any urgent problems in the selected articles. A team of copyeditors has agreed to help with copyediting requests, although you should try to fix simple issues on your own if possible.
We would also appreciate your help in identifying the version of each article that you think we should use, to help avoid vandalism or POV issues. These versions can be recorded at this project's subpage of User:SelectionBot/0.7. We are planning to release the selection for the holiday season, so we ask you to select the revisions before October 20. At that time, we will use an automatic process to identify which version of each article to release, if no version has been manually selected. Thanks! For the Wikipedia 1.0 Editorial team, SelectionBot 23:30, 15 September 2008 (UTC)
It's been suggested to exclude Cochrane Collaboration and similar medical reviews from Chiropractic on WP:OR grounds. Comments are requested at Talk:Chiropractic #Request for Comment: Excluding treatment reviews. Eubulides ( talk) 07:00, 17 September 2008 (UTC)
L. Ron Hubbard has been nominated for a good article reassessment. Articles are typically reviewed for one week. Please leave your comments and help us to return the article to good article quality. If concerns are not addressed during the review period, the good article status will be removed from the article. Reviewers' concerns are here. Cirt ( talk) 09:38, 1 October 2008 (UTC)
The definition of a Hasty Generalization would seem to preclude scientific study. For instance, the Polya conjecture example might indicate to some readers that a generalization is hasty if it holds for 906150256 entities, but not the 906150257th, even if the 906150257th hasn't been investigated yet. This would indicate that we can reasonably make no conclusions, for instance, in the evolutionary biology, because the 906150257th fossil might be a human skeleton in Jurassic rock. This is probably not what the article intends to state. —Preceding unsigned comment added by HorridRedThings ( talk • contribs) 13:57, 1 October 2008 (UTC)
Alien autopsy is IMHO surprisingly bad. The overall tone of the article is, "Although scientific and medical experts as well as the makers of the films themselves state that the films are hoaxes, the question of their authenticity remains open." I think that this violates Wikipedia:Neutral point of view and especially WP:WEIGHT. -- 201.53.7.16 ( talk) 13:29, 5 October 2008 (UTC)
We have an article
Double-nosed Andean tiger hound. Seems to me that that's very likely a hoax. (Article cites a BBC photo of a dog with a "double" nose, but I've never heard of a "double-nosed" breed.)
Is there anything constructive that can be done with this? (Note, I've posted to
Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Cryptozoology and
Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Dogs on this to see if anybody there does have any reliable source.) --
201.53.7.16 (
talk)
22:24, 9 October 2008 (UTC)
Could people please take a look at Firewalking? Contains various statements that IMHO need to be tweaked a little. -- 201.53.7.16 ( talk) 01:29, 10 October 2008 (UTC)
I don't know if it is either way, it seems more like newage religious mumbojumbo than anything, but if anyone knows of any sources stating it one way or the other it would be appreciated Talk:Aura_(paranormal)#Aura_is_Pseudoscience.3F.3F 24.76.161.28 ( talk) 03:15, 11 October 2008 (UTC)
Believe it or not, we have an article Harpeth Hills Flying Monkey Marathon which claims that
"mythical Harpeth Hills Flying Monkeys ... are reported to live in Percy and Edwin Warner Parks in Nashville [ Tennessee, USA]. According to the legend, the flying monkeys, named the after the geologic region where they reside, are an endangered species and are only rarely seen by humans."
This is complete crap, right? Made up only to advertise this race? Anybody want to do anything with this? -- 201.53.7.16 ( talk) 16:40, 22 October 2008 (UTC)
HELP! We have Cold Fusion proponents dramatically asserting ownership over cold fusion. I need all the help I can get. ScienceApologist ( talk) 16:00, 27 October 2008 (UTC)
There is a oddly phrased article at Effective microorganism that seems a bit unclear on whether it is NPOV or sourced correctly. Thought this project might like to be made aware of it.-- ZayZayEM ( talk) 06:39, 4 November 2008 (UTC)
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