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I believe that the present NPOV policy fallaciously attempts to cover too many different aspects of journalistic integrity. First and foremost, understanding POV is pretty simple. POV means that an article's potential meaning to a variety of audiences is compromised because of the author's assumptions about the audience. The most common POV error is the assumption that the reader holds the same set of assumptions about the world as the author. Elsewhere on this page there is a classic example of the Northern vs Southern hemispheric POV on seasons and climate... referring to December as "the winter months" is definitely POV. There's no insidious intent or ulterior motives there... just a ripe opportunity for misunderstanding arising from the limitations of one's habitual experience. It's simple enough, yet Wikipedia seems to insist that POV also covers all types of bias as well. Bias and POV are related problems, but they are not (or shouldn't be) interchangeable terms.
Also, an article that is completely NPOV by Wikipedia standards can still end up being ridiculously biased because it contains information that is factual and NPOV but overwhelmingly in support of a particular agenda or skewed toward a particular interest due to lack of participation from alternative viewpoints. I call this PPOV, or "partial point of view", which is a form of bias arising from the abuse of Wikipedia NPOV policy as it stands today.
I believe this sort of ambiguity fuels a lot of edit wars and causes people unintentionally to provoke one another. It also prevents people from easily getting to the heart of what really causes disputes. The NPOV policy should be reduced to what truly is POV, and editorial bias should be controlled by a separate policy. We should not be afraid to call bias what it is. The Hokkaido Crow 19:55, 31 July 2005 (UTC)
It would be nice to have more detailed guidlines about the mechanics of writing NPOV.
For example 1. Any statement advocating that the reader take an action or make a particular choice couldn't be NPOV 2. Statement which attribute a motivation to a person without supporting evidence are suspect. 3. Blanket statements extoling the superiority of a particular style of anything (cars, sports, etc) over another style is very suspect - regardless of the support which might be mustered for the statement.
Several of these concrete suggestions would be nice at the start. The large controversy could be described later.
Hans Solbrig 31 July 2005
Where would it be appropriate to add a blurb about quotation marks being used as a form of bias? As quotation marks aren't words, we can't put it into "words to avoid". A good example of (somewhat hilarious) quoatation-bias is this: America "invaded" Iraq. We can see how the quotes give a certain bias. It would be better, of course, to simply say: America invaded Iraq. Other examples are: Abortion is the "killing" of a fetus; (or the creationist favorite) the "theory" of evolution; Michael Moore claimed* that America itself was in possession of "Weapons of Mass Destruction". Where could a note about this be added?
ChadThomson 1 July 2005 07:57 (UTC)
I have noticed that articles that are critical of the US are almost always kept. Articles critical of anti-American attitudes are as a rule deleted as "POV".
Examples: Arab dictatorships - deleted Ameriphobia - deleted Islamophilia - deleted Islamophobia - kept 911 conspiracy theories - kept
So it seems that anything too critical of anti-American terorrism or bigotry is immediately deleted, because it is "POV", while POV articles whose very titles imply a position (Islamophobia, History of US Imperialism, etc) are rigorously defended. Even editing such articles brings a swarm of RVs.
The funny part is that arguments made for deleting one article are the dismissed out of hand in the case of keeping another. The most important matter seems to be whether the admin agrees with the article or not politically, ie. fringe Leftwing.
17 June 2005 Dragonlance
Whew, you took the words right out of my mouth! I rarely hear someone talk that way; mostly it's bashing Americans! Scorpionman 02:41, 18 October 2005 (UTC)
There has been a great deal of discussion and disagreement regarding the use of prefixed-styles originating with the new Pope Benedict XVI article which currently begins with the formal style of address, "His Holiness." The question was broadened because it was claimed by Jguk to be an established style policy to begin biographical entries with formal styles, and discussion was moved/continued on the Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style (biographies) page. Prolonged discussion resulted in no apparent consensus, and a survey was proposed and discussed for another week before being submitted. The current survey is posted at Wikipedia:Manual of Style (biographies)/Survey on Style-Prefixed Honorary Titles with discussion at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style (biographies)/Survey on Style-Prefixed Honorary Titles.
The survey is still ongoing, and not scheduled to be closed until after May 14. However, there does not seem as yet to be any consensus forming, rather, there seem to be divided camps which will probably block ultimate consensus for any outcome. By no means is this absolutely certain, and I would not foreclose the survey and discussion prematurely, but I thought you might want to take a look and in particular to provide any suggestions or guidance on what sort of policy would conform with Wikipedia's NPOV requirement. Whig 07:04, 10 May 2005 (UTC)
How is this different from religious dogma? It seems to me NPOV is taken to absurd extremes by some self-important administrators too enamored of their little barnstar award trinkets. Not to mention it is overly sanitizing the pedia to where even a sense of humor becomes verboten, hence the need for the new admin award category: the award of the NPOV Nazi
Well, you do have to give some creedence to this argument. Whenever anything is taken to be an absolute, it opens the door for a person to manipulate that to their own ends. Let me give you an example: the Salem Witch Trials. All someone had to do was describe someone as a witch, and then they could freely assualt that person with no consequences. Well, isn't it possible (indeed, likely) that someone might take this sacred cow, NPOV, and accuse someone else of being not NOPV simply for the ability to attack them or their ideas free of consequences? Surely, there must be safeguards to protect those who are the unortunate victims of this sort of manipulation. May I ask what provisions you have thought of to prvent NPOV from becoming a tool for witch-hunters? Dave
I want Wikipedia to accept a general policy that BC and AD represent a Christian Point of View and should be used only when they are appropriate, that is, in the context of expressing or providing an account of a Christian point of view. In other contexts, I argue that they violate our NPOV policy and we should use BCE and CE instead. See Wikipedia:Neutral point of view/BCE-CE Debate for the detailed proposal. Slrubenstein | Talk 22:34, 15 May 2005 (UTC)
Hey, if you don't care, you don't care. Slrubenstein | Talk 22:43, 15 May 2005 (UTC)
Actually, I'm a Buddhist, and I use CE and BCE regularly. And even if I were an atheist, would my beliefs/nonbeliefs be any less valid just because? And why is something considered good just because it's old, anyway? Feudalism's pretty old. Maybe you'd like to restore feudalistic governments in place of their democratic successors. Better yet, the concepts of the Dark Ages, now those are much older than the modern, non-christian ideas. Let's start burning people at the stake again. Or, better still, Roman ideas predate the Middle Ages. Should I feed you to a lion? Oh, wait, wait..... Sumerian ideas, now we're cooking! Time to sacrafice you to the gods. Come on, hop up on the altar. What? You don't like that old time religion? Well, maybe CE and BCE aren't so bad then. Even if they were thought of recently by those awful atheists. By the by, isn't degrading someone on the basis of their atheism awfully not NPOV of you? Dave 02:43, 23 July 2005 (UTC)
The use of "BCE" removes the word "Christ" from the acronym, but reinforces the root POV even more than the original. Think about it... instead of just saying that a year began before Christ, BCE implies that the current era began at Christ's birth. And when will it presumably end, when Christ returns? Talk about your POV problems... Don't get me wrong, "AD" (anno domini, or "year of our lord") is also problematic, but I think BCE/CE just makes it worse and then draws attention to it. 72.15.90.142 19:25, 31 July 2005 (UTC)
I was looking through the wikipedia and came across a NPOV issue in the Digital Rights Management article. The title itself expresses a certain POV, which is that the technology is used to protect a copyright owner's rights, when in fact it may have consequences far beyond that. Many people feel the same way and have coined the term "Digital Restrictions Management", which is less POV, but still advoctates a certain view. However, digital rights management is the commonly accepted term for this technology. Should the title be changed to simply DRM, with a seperate disambiguation page? There is a slight precedent here that may apply, with Democratic People's Republic of Korea redirecting to North Korea, even though the former is an offical term (and is misleading and POV). The latter is more accepted in common usage though. What does everyone think?
An important policy discussion has started concerning ways in which our content-related polices, such as NPOV, No original research and Verifiability could be better enforced. I've made a proposal to give the Arbitration Committee the ability to consult Wikipedia users who are knowledgeable in subject-areas that apply to cases before them. Such consultation is needed due to the fact that the ArbCom does not by itself have the requisite knowledge to easily tell what is NPOV, original research, or a fringe idea in every field. Please read my proposal at Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/RFC#Alternate solution #9 by mav. Content subcommittee and comment. Thank you! -- mav 02:55, 7 Jun 2005 (UTC)
This is not sarcasm on my part, but a constant theme in "NPOV" usage. A recent edit at Folkloristics is an example of this commonplace usage: under the Edit summary "(NPOV famous scholars - I've never heard of them!)" the editor removed "famous" from the list of linguistics scholars. Few of Wikipedia's genuinely neutral editors currently use the expression "NPOV" -- Wetman 19:41, 10 Jun 2005 (UTC)
" It's important to note this formulation is substantially different from the "some people believe ..." formulation popular in political debates. The reference requires an identifiable and subjectively quantifiable population or, better still, a name."
I've met a few people who suffered from psychological disorders that caused them to believe that they were a historical personage. One told me that she was Princess Diana. Should we re-write the entry for Princess Diana to reflect that one person believes that Lady Di is not only not dead, but alive and well and living at a homeless shelter in Tacoma, Washington? Dave
It seems to me the concept of POV and NPOV on Wikipedia is very similar to subjectivity and objectivity respectively. Is there a significant difference? If not, why create acronyms for a concept that is already described? Spaully 18:48, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)
NPOV is for when its hard to tell what is objective and what is not. When it something is obviously objective, NPOV is irrelevant. Bensaccount 22:39, 21 Jun 2005 (UTC)
Objectivity and subjectivity simply provide basis for reasoning. Objectivity, being casual and neutral concerning definitional and terminological usage, is more likely rational whereas subjectivity, being deeply affected by emotion, is more likely irrational. Telling one side of a story is biased (a.k.a. "POV"). Telling two sides of a story remains biased; however, simply telling the story an objective manner without regard for "sides" is NPOV. A story told in a subjective manner can never be unbiased. Adraeus 04:01, Jun 22, 2005 (UTC)
Objectivity and NPOV are distinct. Objectivity is an unattainable ideal, while NPOV is the state of being in agreement. See m:NPOV is an ideal Banno 21:50, Jun 25, 2005 (UTC)
Objectivity is a hopelessly naive concept. Ayn Rand herself, this past century's most ardent adorer of objectivity, was so subjective in her attempts to destroy her lover/fellow teacher of objectivity that she discredited herself and her entire platform. And so it is with everyone because objectivity assumes you must completely divorce yourself from your own interpretation of the data you recieve via your senses and the only way to do that is not to interpret the data at all. In which case the only part of Wikipedia that wouldn't be deleted would be the lists of things. And even then, there would be disputes..... it is objective to say that the Strait of Juan de Fuca is entirely in Canada or the United States? Would it be objective to describe Snake Island as being Romanian or Ukranian? Even more controversial, how are you to be able to describe objectively, with no lenses or interpretations based on personal predjudices whatever, in what country does the city of Jerusalem reside? You can't dodge controversy. Even if you wrote an article about something as mundane as say, a teacup, someone would find a way to make a storm in that teacup and declare your perspective to be subjective in nature. We can try our best, but you'll always fall short of that goal, just as all objects fall short of Plato's ideal forms. NPOV must not be defined as objectivity if it is to remain an absolute.... simply because there is no absolute obejctivity. Dave 02:57, 23 July 2005 (UTC)
Objective is an ideal. NPOV is an ideal. Both should be strived for.-- 202.147.125.46 22:05, 18 October 2005 (UTC)
There are places in the Wikipedia namespace where advice and guidelines are offered (as distinct from policy), and while a majority of Wikipedians may support this advice, there may be examples where a significant minority disagree (I have in mind inclusionist/ deletionist type dichotomies). In such cases, should the NPOV policy be read as to force the inclusion of strong minority positions (e.g. ~20% support) into pages that discuss Wikipedian behavior (e.g. offer voting guides). Dragons flight 20:47, Jun 19, 2005 (UTC)
i found some questionable pov elements from an article on John Milius and added a check pov template and removed the questionable elements. there has not been any response on the talk page nor any further revisions. do i take down the check pov template? how long do i have to wait? - Seasee 22:10, 21 Jun 2005 (UTC)
On the Neutral Point of View page itself, you use an I Drew This strip to illustrate a point. The strip in question as much as states that the American media is a mouthpiece for the GOP, and implies that the GOP criminally slanders John Kerry. If a reader were to go back or forward, the other strips would be anything but neutral on the subject of American politics; indeed, the artist would probably be insulted if anyone said he made an attempt to be neutral. Because it is a policy article, I hesitate to remove the link, but I don't think it belongs there.
I'm finding some growing racism in wikipedia. Mostly about Demographics of certain countries
Am I the only reader who has observed an accelerating abandonment of the principle of neutral point of view in Wikipedia, especially in articles dealing with pop stars, current or recent movies, etc? A lot of stuff comes across as fan pages, written with laudable enthusiasm for the celebrities in question, but "neutral" ? hardly.
OK, I retract the phrase "a lot of stuff" -heck, I retract the whole thing -- because try as hard as I might, I can't (with quick searches anyway) come up with any new, cogent examples of what I'm complaining about. The article that inspired my rant was the one on Rob Zombie. I still contend that, in regard to celebrities and pop culture figures, there's a fannish tone more than the "just the facts, ma'am" style that historical subjects, for example, seem to maintain. But obviously, like every other article, these fan initiated pages just need judicious editing.
This is a minor addition which I don't think needs to be discussed first. People should be careful about using terms such as "might" versus "may". May expresses what is possible, is factual, or could be factual. 'I may have turned off the stove, but I can't recall doing it.' 'Might' suggests something that is uncertain, hypothetical, or contrary to fact. 'I might have won the marathon if I had entered.' So, taking the most cynical view, "may" is about what's possible and "might" about what's uncertain. From American Heritage dictionary:
People can slip in POV by using "might" where "may" is more correct (such as saying that something 'might' be possible when in actuality it 'may' be possible), and this can occur with other terms as well. If there are any linguistically-inclined folks out there who want to add this into the policy, I would suggest doing so now, at least on this page, and probably also in the proper Manual of Style section. -- brian0918 ™ 22:53, 11 July 2005 (UTC)
Here is another possible source for POV: wikilinks being added to titles that have the same name (or a similar name) as the article to which they link, but which aren't necessarily related. Let's say the article is about a school that teaches fringe views, but the courses all have the usual names, such as "Biology", "Chemistry", "Physics", etc. At face value, the names look fine, but when you investigate what they're actually teaching, what textbooks they're reading, it turns out these courses either teach contrary to Biology/Chemistry/Physics, or teach their own fringe brand of the subject. By wikilinking the course titles to the articles on Biology, Chemistry, Physics, we are effectively converting these courses into the legitimate titles. I'm sure there are other examples on all sides and in all aspects, but this was the easiest example for me to cite. -- brian0918 ™ 15:35, 13 July 2005 (UTC)
I just tried to edit out the following bit of bias that suffers from the fallacy of argument from popularity of a point of view argumentum ad populum, aka the consensus theory of truth, and the obscurantists here immediately started a revert battle! Go figure. What's active here seems to be a big bias towards the consensus theory of truth, an absurd notion, as explained in the article on it.
quote:
I've removed this quote - it's on the main page, go look at it there. - brenneman (t) (c) 03:08, 22 July 2005 (UTC)
Now that clearly suffers from the fallacy of argumentum ad populum, and bias towards the consensus theory of truth. Whaever happened to the idea of writing without bias here in Wikipedia? This admin page is certainly not setting a good example. -- 67.182.157.6 01:39, 22 July 2005 (UTC)
The pretty bloody obvious subtle point that you are missing here is that the quote you've placed above makes no mention of objective truth. It is about the number of people who hold a viewpoint. I suggest that you re-read the
WP:NPOV article, while remembering that the purpose of an encyclopedia is not to refine truth. As it explicitly states, "regardless of whether it's true or not" has no relevence to unclusion. A
16th century wikipedia would not have contained the wild "theories" by
Nicolaus Copernicus. And this is as it should be.
;brenneman
(t)
(c) 01:59, 22 July 2005 (UTC)
Your comment seems to have nothing to do with the issue raised, that the section quoted is biased towards ONE POINT OF VIEW, the consensus theory of truth, an absurd notion that suffers from the logical fallacy of argumentum ad populum. If you don't understand the issue raised, then why don't you ask questions about what is baffling you?(unsigned comment by User:67.182.157.6. - brenneman (t) (c) 03:57, 22 July 2005 (UTC)
With regards to you application of a POV tag, how do you propose to resolve this issue? If I understand your arguments, a consensus decision will only be more "argumentum ad populum". Please state, as clearly as possible and without hystronics like "obscurantists", how you'd like to proceed. Suggested word limit: 500.
brenneman
(t)
(c) 03:22, 22 July 2005 (UTC)
You may first note I've corrected your edit which left two versions of this discussion. Thank you for providing the reference to "last at the top". I've left you (later) comments next to the paragraph they referred to.
It is really not necessary to repeat the phrases "consensus theory of truth" or "argumentum ad populum" anymore. Let me be clear: I understand the argument you are proposing. I am suggesting that it does not apply, as the section quoted makes no claims regard truth/untruth.
brenneman
(t)
(c) 03:57, 22 July 2005 (UTC)
Removed text that was duplicated from above: Please state how you'd like to proceed. brenneman (t) (c) 04:40, 22 July 2005 (UTC)
From my point of view it doesn't make sense for a community like this, allegedly open, to have a policy that entails either a dictatorship by Wales, or entails logical fallacy argumentum ad numerum, like the concensus theory of truth, if that is what you insist the policy is here. You can't be serious. -- DotSix 67.182.157.6 04:34, 22 July 2005 (UTC)
I am leaving now for an early start on the week end. One of he joys of being a person of means. 8^) Shall we continue this (hopefully) principled negotiation next week maybe?
The two are not the fully the same (whether in psychology, and especially colloquially). It is irrational to attempt to dialogue with someone who wants to kill you, though it may very well be reasonable.
Predicated on this, I was going to modify the following sentence "We can only seek a type of writing that is agreeable to essentially rational people who may differ on particular points.", until I noticed it was a direct quote. If the creator would so modify it, I would appreciate it. Being a non-reasonable person who is otherwise profoundly rational, I found it somewhat offensive (as well as psychologically a flawed interpretation of rationality). -- 24.22.227.53 21:28, 26 July 2005 (UTC)
I notice that someone had added an NPOV tag to one section and it had been deleted. Is there realy a problem with tagging a section of this article as an NPOV dipute if it genuinely is disputed?-- Heathcliff 03:02, 29 July 2005 (UTC)
" Principled Negotiation is a cooperative process whereby participants try to find a solution which meets the legitimate interests of both parties, which in the context of Wikipedia usually involves appropriate mention of all points of view in an article thus improving the quality of the article. Compromising or "splitting the difference" is generally inappropriate if it means departure from generally recognized points of view, both of which need to be included to achieve Wikipedia:Neutral point of view." -- wikipedia:negotiation
"The policy of having a neutral point of view is not to hide different points of view, but to show the diversity of viewpoints. In case of controversy, the strong points and weak points will be shown according to each point of view, without taking a side. The neutral point of view is not a " separate but equal" policy. The facts, in themselves, are neutral, but the simple accumulation of them cannot be the neutral point of view. If only the favorable (or the unfavorable) facts of a point of view are shown in an article, the article will still be non-neutral." -- wikipedia:NPOV
" Principled Negotiation is a cooperative process whereby participants try to find a solution which meets the legitimate interests of both parties, which in the context of Wikipedia usually involves appropriate mention of all points of view in an article thus improving the quality of the article. Compromising or "splitting the difference" is generally inappropriate if it means departure from generally recognized points of view, both of which need to be included to achieve Wikipedia:Neutral point of view." -- wikipedia:negotiation
The George W. Bush article contains this controversial statment:
On the other hand the Hillary Clinton article contains only Hillary's version of her relationship with Bill Clinton, and nothing critical (much less derogatory) of her statements despite the publication of several critical biographies of her.
I'm only using these only as examples to help define the question rather than posing it as merely abstract. What are the consistently applied principles when it comes to including in an article an item written in a critical biography? patsw 20:08, 2 August 2005 (UTC)
Let me break it down a little more:
Neutral point of view is redirected here. Is it really good to have this kind of redirects from the main namespace to a Wikipedia policy page? I suppose it should be possible to write an article about Neutral point to view from a non-Wikipedia perspective, and anyway I strongly believe a reader should not accidently be transferred from the articla name space to the Wikipedia namespace. / Habj 22:24, 7 August 2005 (UTC)
NPOV says "represent the majority (scientific) view as the majority view and the minority (sometimes pseudoscientific) view as the minority view". There is a reall interesting edit war going on in teh [Creation Science] that revolves around whether the dictionary definition of "science" can be used as "fact". If it can, then "Creation Science" can be factually presented as "pseudoscience". This is basically a "definition point of view" because some editors wish to present the topic from the point of view of the standard dictionary definition.
The alternative is that the definition for science depends on the point of view, and therefore Creation Science views itself to meet the definition of "science", and mainstream science views Creation Science as pseudoscientific nonsense.
Could someone who knows NPOV please explain whether a dictionary definition can be used as fact or must be presented as a POV? Perhaps the NPOV article could contain a new subsection titled "Defintion Point of View" and explain the correct answer.
I fully appreciate what you're doing with this, FeulWagon, but somehow I suspect that even Definition Point of View wouldn't settle the issue with some of our erstwhile editors. Besides, philosophers have a bugger of a time settling on definitions. That's why I think the NPOV policy is as good as it gets.
Main Entry: sci·ence
Function: noun
3 a : accumulated and accepted knowledge that has been systematized and formulated with reference to the discovery of general truths or the operation of general laws : knowledge classified and made available in work, life, or the search for truth : comprehensive, profound, or philosophical knowledge; especially : knowledge obtained and tested through use of the scientific method b : such knowledge concerned with the physical world and its phenomena : NATURAL SCIENCE
synonym see KNOWLEDGE
"science." Webster's Third New International Dictionary, Unabridged. Merriam-Webster, 2002.
http://unabridged.merriam-webster.com (9 Aug. 2005).
-- Parker Whittle 07:11, 10 August 2005 (UTC)
"Subjective language" is a myth. There is no more such a thing as a "subjective word" than there is an "objective word," an "auspicious word," a "cynical word," or a "dangerous word." You need guidelines, but the editors here should try to remember, especially when it comes to questions that ask for this sort of policy, that to weaken a pronouncement is not necessarily to make it neutral; and, of course, to strengthen a pronouncement is not to make it biased. Someone objected to my "unequivocal" in Shamil Basayev (about the Russians' opinion of him). Are we really so wooden-minded that we have to read "uneqivocal" literally?
I don't like this tendency to weaken that dominates political topics on Wikipedia. I understand that it's a natural trend, that it's equillibrium given the current rules; but it shouldn't be. -- VKokielov 05:18, 14 August 2005 (UTC)
Please have a look at Wikipedia_talk:Eras#What.27s_the_real_problem_here on the long-running AD/BC vs. CE/BCE debate.
It's important because the NPOV policy doesn't seem to cover the issue of language use. I don't mean content but rather form. For example, this policy does not mention or cover Gender-neutral language, which is an issue that should not only be covered as content (what is the issue, what are the positions) but also as form (how does Wikipedia apply gender neutrality).
Because of this gap we now have a new and controversial debate about Anno Domini vs. Common Era. It's easy enough to cover this as content. The articles handle the POV issues of each one in a NPOV way. The problem is that wikipedia seems to lack a policy on language pattern usage in POV situations. This is form, not content. Does wikipedia use AD or CE? And why? This should be covered in the NPOV policy.
Some relevant questions:
Sbwoodside 05:37, 15 August 2005 (UTC)
"Whether God exists or not is a question of fact, not a question of value. But as the fact is essentially undiscoverable, so far as anyone knows, whether God exists will usually be couched in terms of opinion or value."
This is a perfect example of agnosticism, not a neutral point of view. There are a great many people who think that they have proved the issue one way or another. How about just say that whether God exists is greatly debated and a point of great contention, etc.?
~ Nauraran 02:06, 18 August 2005 (UTC)
I personally disagree with you, on a number of well established philosophical grounds, to wit: those who believe that they have proven God's existence don't have a very good conception of proof. (Note: and this need not be an agnosticist view point, ie: I believe that my mother and father love me, but I know that I don't have what constitutes rigourous proof to prove it.) Nevertheless, I would be willing to consider a change to the text, if only to remove a controversial example on a policy page that may be more trouble than its worth. Func( t, c, @, ) 17:26, 18 August 2005 (UTC)
Well, no, no pain. I've been reading the section "A simple formulation" from the NPOV page a few times. The least that can be said is that the title of that section doesn't match the content of the second half of the second paragraph of that section: the "God" topic is treated with lots of added complexity, no way near a "simple formulation".
I try to work on it as a whole, so I copied the whole section to here in order not to lose context out of sight (I also changed "Socrates" to "Plato", because "Socrates" might be a questionable example taking account of the Socratic problem):
We sometimes give an alternative formulation of the non-bias policy: assert facts, including facts about opinions — but don't assert opinions themselves. There is a difference between facts and values, or opinions. By "fact," we mean "a piece of information about which there is no serious dispute." In this sense, that a survey produced a certain published result is a fact. That there is a planet called Mars is a fact. That Plato was a philosopher is a fact. No one seriously disputes any of these things. So we can feel free to assert as many of them as we can.
By value or opinion, on the other hand, we mean "a piece of information about which there is some dispute." There are bound to be borderline cases where we're not sure if we should take a particular dispute seriously; but there are many propositions that very clearly express values or opinions. That stealing is wrong is a value or opinion. That the Beatles was the greatest band is a value or opinion. That the United States was wrong to drop the atomic bomb over Hiroshima and Nagasaki is a value or opinion. That God exists... this might seem a troublesome one. Not with the definitions given above: That God exists... is a piece of information about which there is some dispute. This corresponds with how talking about God (or, alternatively, the non-existence of God) is experienced by most people: it's hard to talk about God or Atheism without mixing in opinion, or at least talk about value(s).
Wikipedia is devoted to stating facts in the sense as described above. Where we might want to state an opinion, we convert that opinion into a fact by attributing the opinion to someone. So, rather than asserting, "The Beatles were the greatest band", we can say, "Most Americans believe that the Beatles were the greatest band," which is a fact verifiable by survey results, or "The Beatles had many songs that made the Billboard Hot 100," which is also fact. In the first instance we assert an opinion; in the second and third instances we "convert" that opinion into fact by attributing it to someone. It's important to note this formulation is substantially different from the "some people believe ..." formulation popular in political debates. The reference requires an identifiable and subjectively quantifiable population or, better still, a name.
In presenting an opinion, moreover, it is important to bear in mind that there are disagreements about how opinions are best stated; sometimes, it will be necessary to qualify the description of an opinion or to present several formulations, simply to arrive at a solution that fairly represents all the leading views of the situation.
But it's not enough, to express the Wikipedia non-bias policy, just to say that we should state facts and not opinions. When asserting a fact about an opinion, it is important also to assert facts about competing opinions, and to do so without implying that any one of the opinions is correct. It's also generally important to give the facts about the reasons behind the views, and to make it clear who holds them. It's often best to cite a prominent representative of the view.
...I also cut out some parts that are treated separately in the "religion" section lower on the NPOV page.
Feel free to work on the text above! -- Francis Schonken 22:20, 19 August 2005 (UTC)
We sometimes give an alternative formulation of the non-bias policy: assert facts, including facts about opinions — but don't assert opinions themselves. Certainly, there are bound to be borderline cases where a fact is disputed but we're not sure if we should take the dispute seriously, or where the distinction between fact and value will itself necessarily be in dispute. Nevertheless, there are many propositions that clearly express undisputed facts, and others that clearly express values or opinions. That a survey produced a certain published result is a fact. That there is a planet called Mars is a fact. That Plato was a philosopher is a fact. No one seriously disputes any of these things. So we can feel free to assert as many of them as we can. On the other hand, that stealing is wrong is a value or opinion. That the Beatles was the greatest band is a value or opinion. That the United States was wrong to drop the atomic bomb over Hiroshima and Nagasaki is a value or opinion.
Where we might want to state an opinion, we convert that opinion into a fact by attributing the opinion to someone. So, rather than asserting, "The Beatles were the greatest band", we can say, "Most Americans believe that the Beatles were the greatest band," (... etc ...)
... there you go. I think this destroys the incoherencies while strengthening the main point of the section. Fool 14:09, 21 September 2005 (UTC)
I think this part of the policy need to be edited in one way or another. The problem as it is stated right now is that it gives benefit to anyone who just ads a chunk of text, regardless of its quality before some who writes from scratch. A lot of old encyclopedias and other pieces of old work have become public domain and therefore become a cheap source of information for Wikipedia. The problem is that they often are of quite low quality. This has been done, and is being done, quite systematically and is a threat to the quality of Wikipedia.
The amount of work needed to edit such a text in such a way that it becomes a NPOV-article of good quality might often exceed the amount of work needed to write a NPOV-article of good quality from scratch. It would, in my opinion, be wise to add to the policy something about this, i.e. the policy should state that it is only OK to remove NPOV-material if the work needed to correct it exceeds the amount of work needed to create the same material from scratch. Gunnar Larsson 14:49, 21 August 2005 (UTC)
The neutrality policy is used sometimes as an excuse to delete texts that are perceived as biased. Isn't this a problem?
In many cases, yes. Many of us believe that the fact that some text is biased is not enough, in itself, to delete it outright. If it contains valid information, the text should simply be edited accordingly.
There's sometimes trouble determining whether some claim is true or useful, particularly when there are few people on board who know about the topic. In such a case, it's a good idea to raise objections on a talk page; if one has some reason to believe that the author of the biased material will not be induced to change it, we have sometimes taken to removing the text to the talk page itself (but not deleting it entirely). But the latter should be done more or less as a last resort, never as a way of punishing people who have written something biased.
There's a guy called Sean Wright who is blatantly using Wikipedia to market his vanity releases. The guy's the worst author in the world, a literary Ed Wood, and his books are printed in limited runs typically about 3,000 copies. He is not famous, in fact he only came to attention from spamming (under pseudonyms) a couple of book forums I use, a tactic he also uses for his own books on Amazon. I've worked with the article but he continues to change it to promote himself and now he is using Wikipedia to create pages for all of his books, his vanity press, authors going through his vanity press.
On reading his article it looks like he's name dropping and the only source for many of the supposed "facts" he spouts off (such as the late Queen Mother owning his artwork) can only be found on his website, the original template for his version of the article.
It reads more like a mixture of recollections and ego massaging. I'm tired of editing this article as it is proving to be a waste of my time. It's certainly not a neutral point of view. Connor Wolf 13:33, 31 August 2005 (UTC)
If person A is employed by organization B or person C, should they be disallowed from editing articles regarding organization B or person C, to prevent bias, sanitized PR entries, or deletion of all criticism?
Yes, many people initially think that the way to build an unbiased article is to delete every biased statement in the article. That may seem like a good idea at first glance, but these are the very people who are closest to the facts of the matter. Would you block all earthlings from editing the article on Earth? Also, consider the possibility that some of these people might actually be whistle-blowing critics of the organization they are associated with. Banning individuals because they might mess something up seems analogous to banning forks because they might be used to commit a felony.
I think the Wikipedia:Neutral_point_of_view#Dealing_with_biased_contributors section covers it. The problem is bias. Let us directly attack the actual problem, rather than attack people who we speculate might possibly be somehow associated with the problem. -- DavidCary 03:57, 13 September 2005 (UTC)
The basic fundemental of Neutral Point Of View is to come to a opinion or understanding that is collective, that fairly represents all parties involved.
The problem with NPOV is that it destroys individuality and objectivism, thus there must be grouping among those who think alike to create majoritys and minoritys to level the fairness of NPOV.
I am simply stating what I think a NPOV should be, the problem is there is no NPOV , it simply cannot exist because no matter how hard you try there will always be bias. Even in a collective there can be no NPOV because everyone's perception is different. NPOV in itself is a philosophy, the whole premise of NPOV is a total contradiction within itself.
I see on wikipedia in general a pattern of typical mainstream propaganda, the sad part is people come here to get information and get educated. NPOV is just a way of saying majority rules, while me the minority sits back and watches, the problem is there is no way using the NPOV system that all sides can be represented, as NPOV is something that is strived for yet it is impossible and will be the downfall of wikipedia. My intentions are to educate people on variations and the other side of the story, for example to say that the name of God is Yahweh and that Yahweh is the only God who created everything is a NPOV by means of "Popular conception", but the fact is the name of God is Marduk who is the head of a council of Gods which is a fact is considered a POV and violates policy here, is not only misleading, it makes it impossible for for someone to make a properly informed choice. Im not saying that all the articles here are misleading, there are some really well written articles, but a good majority of articles, especially those on religions are seriously misleading because they dont state the facts, they only state the popular NPOV versions and when you try to edit them to say anything that goes against the popular beliefs it is a policy violation. For example the Christianity article will tell you all the basics of the belief, but it fails to state anywere in the article that Christianity borrowed all of it's ideas, concepts and basis from earlier pagan religions which is a fact. Now if I was to go in there and state these facts it would be removed as non consensus and as a POV, so how can wikipedia be reliable as a valid factual source of imformation? Ultimately the downfall of wikipedia is eminent, this is were Wikinfo will dominate because of the sympathetic point of view policy. Khaosinfire 02:43, 20 September 2005 (UTC)
I sort of tripped over this page, but found it rilly hard to read - partly because of too many multiple negatives. I'm new around here, so I don't feel like fixing it; and anyway, if I'd written it orginally, I'd appreciate more the comment and the chance to fix it myself, than the fait accompli.
I have already posted this at the Village Pump.
The cherished goal of NPOV for Wikipedia often seems to be getting farther and farther away from realization. One of the most intractible problems is that POV warfare is carried on in a highly organized basis, not only in the editing, but oftentimes in administrative functions as well. It takes the form of what have been described variously as WikiCliques or POV posses, which generally have one or more Designated Administrators, administrators who carefully avoid direct participation in specific conflicts, but will intervene with administrative powers on the side of their respective teammates. An example of such behavior is what I call the Protection Racket, where admins watch the Requests for Protection page in order to protect the versions desired by their buddies, and POV warriors time protection requests so as to intersect periods when their Designated Admins are on patrol.
At present, the remedies are inadequate. Wikipedia:Requests for de-adminship seems very unwieldy and is seldom used. So, I am making the following proposal:
I think that there ought to be a higher echelon of administrators, whom I propose be called ombudsmen, who would be held to a far higher standard of propriety and neutrality than present administrators. A member who becomes an ombudsman could lose that status at the slightest hint of partisanship in any dispute where ombudsman powers are invoked. And here are what I propose ombudsman powers should consist of:
1. The authority to discipline admins by imposing temporary bans on their use of admin powers, just as admins may temporarily ban ordinary editors from editing. This authority would be used when admins are found to be using their authority to further the POV-pushing of their allies.
2. The authority to temporarily intervene into POV disputes by setting ground-rules for conflict resolution in specific articles (this idea needs some refining; my intention is to take some of the load off of the mediation and arbitration committees, and speed conflict resolution.) -- HK 21:48, 17 September 2005 (UTC)
I think we need some sort of explicit policy to deal with apologetics. There are a lot of articles, especially those dealing with the historicity of the Bible, that tend to become filled with apologetics. Now, of course, the traditional understanding of the historicity of various books of the Bible ought to be discussed. But apologetics are very distinctly not the traditional understanding. For instance, the traditional understanding of the Pentatech is that it was largely written by Moses, with the probable exception of the end of Deuteronomy, which describes Moses's death. But the traditional basis for this was simply that it was traditionally ascribed to Moses. Modern scholarship then came along, and came up with numerous arguments as to why the Pentateuch should not be ascribed to Moses. As far as actual mainstream scholarship goes, nobody any longer believes in Moses as the author of the Pentateuch. Many traditional Christians and Jews, however, continue to accept Mosaic authorship. But, given that there are now arguments being made against the traditional understanding, apologetics are needed to reconcile the traditional account. So, arguments that the Pentateuch is all of a piece, and that it seems to have been written by one person, and that various elements of it strongly suggest that it is quite old, perhaps as old as the second millennium BC are essentially apologetics. They are neither a mainstream scholarly position (no mainstream scholars that I am aware of believe the Pentateuch to have been written by a single source in the 2nd millennium BC); nor does it represent the traditional Judeo-Christian viewpoint (which simply accepts that the Pentateuch was written by Moses, without relying on any kind of textual or other arguments to prove it). Both the traditional view and the scholarly view should be represented on wikipedia, and wikipedia should not say that the scholarly view is "correct" and the traditional view is "wrong." It would be a violation of NPOV to do this. But that does not mean that we have to give equal time to apologetics. Apologetics are the equivalent of pseudoscience. Pretending that there is a legitimate dispute among scholars as to whether Moses wrote the Pentateuch is like pretending there is a legitimate dispute among scientists as to whether or not intelligent design provides a better view of the development of life on earth than Darwinian evolution. It is mistaking religion for history. And the works of scholars who are already predetermined to come to a given conclusion (that the Bible is invariably accurate) simply cannot be taken seriously as scholarship. For an example of a discussion of this sort, I'd refer you to Talk:Book of Esther. I'd like to propose that some sort of policy for how to deal with apologetics be put into place. john k 23:46, 27 September 2005 (UTC)
Articles like Radiocarbon dating, and what not, are not a serious problem with apologetics. Obviously, in general, particularly notable apologetical arguments should be mentioned in articles. And articles on non-Biblical subjects generally do fine, even if apologists do invade them. The problem comes in things like articles on Biblical books and the like, and the big problem is not so much the apologetics themselves. The problem is that, on the one hand, the POV represented by apologetics is given the weight of the traditional view of the Biblical books, which it doesn't deserve because the apologetics themselves are merely after the fact justifications of traditional views, not independent explanations of the traditional views; and, on the other hand, the apologetics are described as equivalent to the scholarly views they are arguing against. Apologetics obviously has a (small) place in articles. But apologetical arguments need to be marked as such. They should not be described as elaborations of the traditional views, or as scholarly views, because they are neither. These conflations give apologetical views a certain claim to equal treatment that it should not otherwise have. john k 01:17, 28 September 2005 (UTC)
How to deal with them who continousely delete the NPOV tag while the article is being discussed?-- Nixer 20:10, 29 September 2005 (UTC)
Are external links subjected to NPOV? How? Does it mean that we should remove any link that bring wikireaders to a biased page? Does it mean that we should have various links pointing to various POV? This problem needs to be adressed ASAP and included in the next revision of NPOV policy-- equitor 02:20, 4 October 2005 (UTC)
Links to POV websites are allowed, however a particular selection and placement of a link could violate NPOV. It would fall under the same guidelines for including criticism in an article. Nathan J. Yoder 07:06, 26 October 2005 (UTC)
FYI: a discussion of many of the issues touched on this page
Although i'm relatively new, i'm already enjoying myself by trying to resolve semi-random NPOV disputes from the list. However, one of the things i seem to bump in at every turn, is the fact that NPOV is used to contest any claim found repugnant, regardless of arguments.
Obvisouly, this is a distortion of what NPOV is meant for, and is not a byproduct of NPOV an sich. Still, the fact that NPOV seems to be promoted as the most important of all Wiki policies (as seems to be the case with the recent revert of this article page), to my mind, encourages the relativism of arguments towards opinions.
The Armenian genocide article is already hopelessly lost because every argument has become an opinion and vice versa. Sure, we have to be neutral towards opnions, but we should be clear in assessing arguments. As another weird example, the Kurdish flag's very existence is considered POV (actually, i think i might remove that POV flag shortly).
This diffusing of the line between arguments and opinions is having other strange effects. For one, consensus on differing opinions is much harder to come by, resulting in a strange policy adopted by some (quite a few actually) to balance opnions to gain neutrality. For an (amusing) example check here, and be sure to check the talk page for the reasoning that the For and Against should have an equal amount of arguments (!) to retain NPOV.
Like I said, this is not a direct consequence of NPOV, which in all aspects is a great policy. But regarding NPOV as the most important Wiki-policy (like this recent revert of this very article seems to indicate) implies that opinions, and the neutrality thereon, are more important than arguments, and the validity thereof. I think this severely undermines Wikipedia, if not on the short run, then on the long haul. We are an encyclopedia after all.
Wikipedia being wikipedia, there is probably some discussion on this hidden in some nether-region. If so, i would appreciate a pointer in the right direction. If not, then it might be time to open one. -- The Minister of War
Hmm...you guys seem to be arguing past each other a bit. Minister of War seems to be making an argument about times when ostensible NPOV makes articles ridiculous - both inaccurate and, to be honest, POV. Francis is reasserting the centrality of NPOV as a wikipedia policy. So, to both of you - Minister of War, I don't think that the problem has to do with how central NPOV is to wikipedia policy. It has to do with the fact that there are a lot of persistent cranks on the Internet and it's hard to deal with them. Francis - I do think that Minister of War is describing a real problem, and his descriptions of the problems with "on the one hand, on the other hand" NPOV is a real one. I think that this kind of false-NPOV is perhaps not addressed clearly enough in the policy. Articles that compare views need not give minority views as much or as detailed a description as more popular views. is the basic statement on this subject. But this doesn't seem to be clear enough to me. It isn't precise, and it implies that the only difference between POVs should be in the space we give to presenting each one. It seems to me that the current exception, if it were followed to the letter, would force us to actually give a lot of space at the evolution article to creationists - after all, creationists form a pretty large percentage of people, so their view is not simply a "small minority" view. Anyway, I think Minister of War has isolated a real problem, although I'm uncertain if his solution would do much. Even changing the "undue weight" section here to make it more specific probably wouldn't help much - the problem is not so much with the policy, as with the fact that there will always be POV-zealots who try to push their POV under the false banner of NPOV. john k 17:45, 9 October 2005 (UTC)
(edit conflict, this is a reply to TMoW's reply above that of James) No, I'm sad to say, I'd like we agreed but we don't.
First, "some POVs arent worth including at all" can't be said in absolute terms. Besides being a philosophical error, stating that thus is also against NPOV policy. However, trying to get wikipedia:importance from a proposed guideline (which it is for as long as I know that guideline) to an effective guideline might help. As said way up in this point the "space and balance" section of NPOV tutorial depends on that definition of "importance" (and links to that proposed guideline) - so defining wikipedia-importance might help in drawing the line what gets included and what not. But I would never state that in terms of "aren't worth including".
Second, "prove your point on the talk page" gets rejected if that "proving" involves original research. So, no (for example) there are no secondary sources available defining copyleft, in an umbrella view of what Richard Stallman, the Creative Commons and Linus Torvalds say about it, so I couldn't prove on talk:copyleft that my intro to the copyleft article was better than the one that is there now (and pretty much only reflects the Stallman view). So false-NOR can be as much a problem as false-NPOV.
Third, "once you decide to include, then by what degree and how?", well again, the two first paragraphs of the "Space and balance" section of the NPOV tutorial sort that out. But seems like you're not very inclined to see the importance of those two paragraphs.
-- Francis Schonken 09:49, 10 October 2005 (UTC)
It has been propsoed that Wikipedia:Dealing with fringe science be merged into with WP:NPOV. While my comments, and indeed the whole issue of dealing with fring since, do derive from the NPOV policy 9and to soem extent the verifiability policy, I feel that this is an imporetant special case. I therefore oppsoe the merge. I wrote the text no present in connection with the debate on Jack Sarfatti, but it applies in a wider context. i intend to expand the current text a bit, making it into a useful essay or perhaps a proposed guideline, a fleshign oput of WP:NPOV, WP:NOR, and WP:V as they apply in this specific and often controversial area. This proposed merge is now being discussed at Wikipedia Talk:Dealing with fringe science#Proposed Merge DES (talk) 22:00, 15 October 2005 (UTC)
Wikipedia is supposed to be neutral. It is not supposed to side with anyone; it is supposed to show both sides of the issue. Well, I have to agree that this is what should happen. But it's not! What do all encyclopedias, newspapers, and textbooks have in common? THEY ALL SHOW EVOLUTIONARY BIAS! Every time I read an article on dinosaurs or the like, it says that they existed "millions of years ago, before man came to be on the earth"! Is that neutral? NO IT'S NOT! Never in this, or any other encyclopedia, have I read, "All creation existed peacefully until the Fall; then animals and people started killing each other, Earth began to decay, the climate began to change, volcanoes and other natural forces ravaged the earth"! All the articles state evolutionary bias! If Wikipedia is suppposed to be neutral, someone better get busy and edit the articles to say "According to evolutionists, the tyrannosaurus rex lived approximate 6.5 billion years ago, millions of years before man"! This is quite dissappointing! Scorpionman 02:38, 18 October 2005 (UTC)
This page 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. |
I believe that the present NPOV policy fallaciously attempts to cover too many different aspects of journalistic integrity. First and foremost, understanding POV is pretty simple. POV means that an article's potential meaning to a variety of audiences is compromised because of the author's assumptions about the audience. The most common POV error is the assumption that the reader holds the same set of assumptions about the world as the author. Elsewhere on this page there is a classic example of the Northern vs Southern hemispheric POV on seasons and climate... referring to December as "the winter months" is definitely POV. There's no insidious intent or ulterior motives there... just a ripe opportunity for misunderstanding arising from the limitations of one's habitual experience. It's simple enough, yet Wikipedia seems to insist that POV also covers all types of bias as well. Bias and POV are related problems, but they are not (or shouldn't be) interchangeable terms.
Also, an article that is completely NPOV by Wikipedia standards can still end up being ridiculously biased because it contains information that is factual and NPOV but overwhelmingly in support of a particular agenda or skewed toward a particular interest due to lack of participation from alternative viewpoints. I call this PPOV, or "partial point of view", which is a form of bias arising from the abuse of Wikipedia NPOV policy as it stands today.
I believe this sort of ambiguity fuels a lot of edit wars and causes people unintentionally to provoke one another. It also prevents people from easily getting to the heart of what really causes disputes. The NPOV policy should be reduced to what truly is POV, and editorial bias should be controlled by a separate policy. We should not be afraid to call bias what it is. The Hokkaido Crow 19:55, 31 July 2005 (UTC)
It would be nice to have more detailed guidlines about the mechanics of writing NPOV.
For example 1. Any statement advocating that the reader take an action or make a particular choice couldn't be NPOV 2. Statement which attribute a motivation to a person without supporting evidence are suspect. 3. Blanket statements extoling the superiority of a particular style of anything (cars, sports, etc) over another style is very suspect - regardless of the support which might be mustered for the statement.
Several of these concrete suggestions would be nice at the start. The large controversy could be described later.
Hans Solbrig 31 July 2005
Where would it be appropriate to add a blurb about quotation marks being used as a form of bias? As quotation marks aren't words, we can't put it into "words to avoid". A good example of (somewhat hilarious) quoatation-bias is this: America "invaded" Iraq. We can see how the quotes give a certain bias. It would be better, of course, to simply say: America invaded Iraq. Other examples are: Abortion is the "killing" of a fetus; (or the creationist favorite) the "theory" of evolution; Michael Moore claimed* that America itself was in possession of "Weapons of Mass Destruction". Where could a note about this be added?
ChadThomson 1 July 2005 07:57 (UTC)
I have noticed that articles that are critical of the US are almost always kept. Articles critical of anti-American attitudes are as a rule deleted as "POV".
Examples: Arab dictatorships - deleted Ameriphobia - deleted Islamophilia - deleted Islamophobia - kept 911 conspiracy theories - kept
So it seems that anything too critical of anti-American terorrism or bigotry is immediately deleted, because it is "POV", while POV articles whose very titles imply a position (Islamophobia, History of US Imperialism, etc) are rigorously defended. Even editing such articles brings a swarm of RVs.
The funny part is that arguments made for deleting one article are the dismissed out of hand in the case of keeping another. The most important matter seems to be whether the admin agrees with the article or not politically, ie. fringe Leftwing.
17 June 2005 Dragonlance
Whew, you took the words right out of my mouth! I rarely hear someone talk that way; mostly it's bashing Americans! Scorpionman 02:41, 18 October 2005 (UTC)
There has been a great deal of discussion and disagreement regarding the use of prefixed-styles originating with the new Pope Benedict XVI article which currently begins with the formal style of address, "His Holiness." The question was broadened because it was claimed by Jguk to be an established style policy to begin biographical entries with formal styles, and discussion was moved/continued on the Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style (biographies) page. Prolonged discussion resulted in no apparent consensus, and a survey was proposed and discussed for another week before being submitted. The current survey is posted at Wikipedia:Manual of Style (biographies)/Survey on Style-Prefixed Honorary Titles with discussion at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style (biographies)/Survey on Style-Prefixed Honorary Titles.
The survey is still ongoing, and not scheduled to be closed until after May 14. However, there does not seem as yet to be any consensus forming, rather, there seem to be divided camps which will probably block ultimate consensus for any outcome. By no means is this absolutely certain, and I would not foreclose the survey and discussion prematurely, but I thought you might want to take a look and in particular to provide any suggestions or guidance on what sort of policy would conform with Wikipedia's NPOV requirement. Whig 07:04, 10 May 2005 (UTC)
How is this different from religious dogma? It seems to me NPOV is taken to absurd extremes by some self-important administrators too enamored of their little barnstar award trinkets. Not to mention it is overly sanitizing the pedia to where even a sense of humor becomes verboten, hence the need for the new admin award category: the award of the NPOV Nazi
Well, you do have to give some creedence to this argument. Whenever anything is taken to be an absolute, it opens the door for a person to manipulate that to their own ends. Let me give you an example: the Salem Witch Trials. All someone had to do was describe someone as a witch, and then they could freely assualt that person with no consequences. Well, isn't it possible (indeed, likely) that someone might take this sacred cow, NPOV, and accuse someone else of being not NOPV simply for the ability to attack them or their ideas free of consequences? Surely, there must be safeguards to protect those who are the unortunate victims of this sort of manipulation. May I ask what provisions you have thought of to prvent NPOV from becoming a tool for witch-hunters? Dave
I want Wikipedia to accept a general policy that BC and AD represent a Christian Point of View and should be used only when they are appropriate, that is, in the context of expressing or providing an account of a Christian point of view. In other contexts, I argue that they violate our NPOV policy and we should use BCE and CE instead. See Wikipedia:Neutral point of view/BCE-CE Debate for the detailed proposal. Slrubenstein | Talk 22:34, 15 May 2005 (UTC)
Hey, if you don't care, you don't care. Slrubenstein | Talk 22:43, 15 May 2005 (UTC)
Actually, I'm a Buddhist, and I use CE and BCE regularly. And even if I were an atheist, would my beliefs/nonbeliefs be any less valid just because? And why is something considered good just because it's old, anyway? Feudalism's pretty old. Maybe you'd like to restore feudalistic governments in place of their democratic successors. Better yet, the concepts of the Dark Ages, now those are much older than the modern, non-christian ideas. Let's start burning people at the stake again. Or, better still, Roman ideas predate the Middle Ages. Should I feed you to a lion? Oh, wait, wait..... Sumerian ideas, now we're cooking! Time to sacrafice you to the gods. Come on, hop up on the altar. What? You don't like that old time religion? Well, maybe CE and BCE aren't so bad then. Even if they were thought of recently by those awful atheists. By the by, isn't degrading someone on the basis of their atheism awfully not NPOV of you? Dave 02:43, 23 July 2005 (UTC)
The use of "BCE" removes the word "Christ" from the acronym, but reinforces the root POV even more than the original. Think about it... instead of just saying that a year began before Christ, BCE implies that the current era began at Christ's birth. And when will it presumably end, when Christ returns? Talk about your POV problems... Don't get me wrong, "AD" (anno domini, or "year of our lord") is also problematic, but I think BCE/CE just makes it worse and then draws attention to it. 72.15.90.142 19:25, 31 July 2005 (UTC)
I was looking through the wikipedia and came across a NPOV issue in the Digital Rights Management article. The title itself expresses a certain POV, which is that the technology is used to protect a copyright owner's rights, when in fact it may have consequences far beyond that. Many people feel the same way and have coined the term "Digital Restrictions Management", which is less POV, but still advoctates a certain view. However, digital rights management is the commonly accepted term for this technology. Should the title be changed to simply DRM, with a seperate disambiguation page? There is a slight precedent here that may apply, with Democratic People's Republic of Korea redirecting to North Korea, even though the former is an offical term (and is misleading and POV). The latter is more accepted in common usage though. What does everyone think?
An important policy discussion has started concerning ways in which our content-related polices, such as NPOV, No original research and Verifiability could be better enforced. I've made a proposal to give the Arbitration Committee the ability to consult Wikipedia users who are knowledgeable in subject-areas that apply to cases before them. Such consultation is needed due to the fact that the ArbCom does not by itself have the requisite knowledge to easily tell what is NPOV, original research, or a fringe idea in every field. Please read my proposal at Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/RFC#Alternate solution #9 by mav. Content subcommittee and comment. Thank you! -- mav 02:55, 7 Jun 2005 (UTC)
This is not sarcasm on my part, but a constant theme in "NPOV" usage. A recent edit at Folkloristics is an example of this commonplace usage: under the Edit summary "(NPOV famous scholars - I've never heard of them!)" the editor removed "famous" from the list of linguistics scholars. Few of Wikipedia's genuinely neutral editors currently use the expression "NPOV" -- Wetman 19:41, 10 Jun 2005 (UTC)
" It's important to note this formulation is substantially different from the "some people believe ..." formulation popular in political debates. The reference requires an identifiable and subjectively quantifiable population or, better still, a name."
I've met a few people who suffered from psychological disorders that caused them to believe that they were a historical personage. One told me that she was Princess Diana. Should we re-write the entry for Princess Diana to reflect that one person believes that Lady Di is not only not dead, but alive and well and living at a homeless shelter in Tacoma, Washington? Dave
It seems to me the concept of POV and NPOV on Wikipedia is very similar to subjectivity and objectivity respectively. Is there a significant difference? If not, why create acronyms for a concept that is already described? Spaully 18:48, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)
NPOV is for when its hard to tell what is objective and what is not. When it something is obviously objective, NPOV is irrelevant. Bensaccount 22:39, 21 Jun 2005 (UTC)
Objectivity and subjectivity simply provide basis for reasoning. Objectivity, being casual and neutral concerning definitional and terminological usage, is more likely rational whereas subjectivity, being deeply affected by emotion, is more likely irrational. Telling one side of a story is biased (a.k.a. "POV"). Telling two sides of a story remains biased; however, simply telling the story an objective manner without regard for "sides" is NPOV. A story told in a subjective manner can never be unbiased. Adraeus 04:01, Jun 22, 2005 (UTC)
Objectivity and NPOV are distinct. Objectivity is an unattainable ideal, while NPOV is the state of being in agreement. See m:NPOV is an ideal Banno 21:50, Jun 25, 2005 (UTC)
Objectivity is a hopelessly naive concept. Ayn Rand herself, this past century's most ardent adorer of objectivity, was so subjective in her attempts to destroy her lover/fellow teacher of objectivity that she discredited herself and her entire platform. And so it is with everyone because objectivity assumes you must completely divorce yourself from your own interpretation of the data you recieve via your senses and the only way to do that is not to interpret the data at all. In which case the only part of Wikipedia that wouldn't be deleted would be the lists of things. And even then, there would be disputes..... it is objective to say that the Strait of Juan de Fuca is entirely in Canada or the United States? Would it be objective to describe Snake Island as being Romanian or Ukranian? Even more controversial, how are you to be able to describe objectively, with no lenses or interpretations based on personal predjudices whatever, in what country does the city of Jerusalem reside? You can't dodge controversy. Even if you wrote an article about something as mundane as say, a teacup, someone would find a way to make a storm in that teacup and declare your perspective to be subjective in nature. We can try our best, but you'll always fall short of that goal, just as all objects fall short of Plato's ideal forms. NPOV must not be defined as objectivity if it is to remain an absolute.... simply because there is no absolute obejctivity. Dave 02:57, 23 July 2005 (UTC)
Objective is an ideal. NPOV is an ideal. Both should be strived for.-- 202.147.125.46 22:05, 18 October 2005 (UTC)
There are places in the Wikipedia namespace where advice and guidelines are offered (as distinct from policy), and while a majority of Wikipedians may support this advice, there may be examples where a significant minority disagree (I have in mind inclusionist/ deletionist type dichotomies). In such cases, should the NPOV policy be read as to force the inclusion of strong minority positions (e.g. ~20% support) into pages that discuss Wikipedian behavior (e.g. offer voting guides). Dragons flight 20:47, Jun 19, 2005 (UTC)
i found some questionable pov elements from an article on John Milius and added a check pov template and removed the questionable elements. there has not been any response on the talk page nor any further revisions. do i take down the check pov template? how long do i have to wait? - Seasee 22:10, 21 Jun 2005 (UTC)
On the Neutral Point of View page itself, you use an I Drew This strip to illustrate a point. The strip in question as much as states that the American media is a mouthpiece for the GOP, and implies that the GOP criminally slanders John Kerry. If a reader were to go back or forward, the other strips would be anything but neutral on the subject of American politics; indeed, the artist would probably be insulted if anyone said he made an attempt to be neutral. Because it is a policy article, I hesitate to remove the link, but I don't think it belongs there.
I'm finding some growing racism in wikipedia. Mostly about Demographics of certain countries
Am I the only reader who has observed an accelerating abandonment of the principle of neutral point of view in Wikipedia, especially in articles dealing with pop stars, current or recent movies, etc? A lot of stuff comes across as fan pages, written with laudable enthusiasm for the celebrities in question, but "neutral" ? hardly.
OK, I retract the phrase "a lot of stuff" -heck, I retract the whole thing -- because try as hard as I might, I can't (with quick searches anyway) come up with any new, cogent examples of what I'm complaining about. The article that inspired my rant was the one on Rob Zombie. I still contend that, in regard to celebrities and pop culture figures, there's a fannish tone more than the "just the facts, ma'am" style that historical subjects, for example, seem to maintain. But obviously, like every other article, these fan initiated pages just need judicious editing.
This is a minor addition which I don't think needs to be discussed first. People should be careful about using terms such as "might" versus "may". May expresses what is possible, is factual, or could be factual. 'I may have turned off the stove, but I can't recall doing it.' 'Might' suggests something that is uncertain, hypothetical, or contrary to fact. 'I might have won the marathon if I had entered.' So, taking the most cynical view, "may" is about what's possible and "might" about what's uncertain. From American Heritage dictionary:
People can slip in POV by using "might" where "may" is more correct (such as saying that something 'might' be possible when in actuality it 'may' be possible), and this can occur with other terms as well. If there are any linguistically-inclined folks out there who want to add this into the policy, I would suggest doing so now, at least on this page, and probably also in the proper Manual of Style section. -- brian0918 ™ 22:53, 11 July 2005 (UTC)
Here is another possible source for POV: wikilinks being added to titles that have the same name (or a similar name) as the article to which they link, but which aren't necessarily related. Let's say the article is about a school that teaches fringe views, but the courses all have the usual names, such as "Biology", "Chemistry", "Physics", etc. At face value, the names look fine, but when you investigate what they're actually teaching, what textbooks they're reading, it turns out these courses either teach contrary to Biology/Chemistry/Physics, or teach their own fringe brand of the subject. By wikilinking the course titles to the articles on Biology, Chemistry, Physics, we are effectively converting these courses into the legitimate titles. I'm sure there are other examples on all sides and in all aspects, but this was the easiest example for me to cite. -- brian0918 ™ 15:35, 13 July 2005 (UTC)
I just tried to edit out the following bit of bias that suffers from the fallacy of argument from popularity of a point of view argumentum ad populum, aka the consensus theory of truth, and the obscurantists here immediately started a revert battle! Go figure. What's active here seems to be a big bias towards the consensus theory of truth, an absurd notion, as explained in the article on it.
quote:
I've removed this quote - it's on the main page, go look at it there. - brenneman (t) (c) 03:08, 22 July 2005 (UTC)
Now that clearly suffers from the fallacy of argumentum ad populum, and bias towards the consensus theory of truth. Whaever happened to the idea of writing without bias here in Wikipedia? This admin page is certainly not setting a good example. -- 67.182.157.6 01:39, 22 July 2005 (UTC)
The pretty bloody obvious subtle point that you are missing here is that the quote you've placed above makes no mention of objective truth. It is about the number of people who hold a viewpoint. I suggest that you re-read the
WP:NPOV article, while remembering that the purpose of an encyclopedia is not to refine truth. As it explicitly states, "regardless of whether it's true or not" has no relevence to unclusion. A
16th century wikipedia would not have contained the wild "theories" by
Nicolaus Copernicus. And this is as it should be.
;brenneman
(t)
(c) 01:59, 22 July 2005 (UTC)
Your comment seems to have nothing to do with the issue raised, that the section quoted is biased towards ONE POINT OF VIEW, the consensus theory of truth, an absurd notion that suffers from the logical fallacy of argumentum ad populum. If you don't understand the issue raised, then why don't you ask questions about what is baffling you?(unsigned comment by User:67.182.157.6. - brenneman (t) (c) 03:57, 22 July 2005 (UTC)
With regards to you application of a POV tag, how do you propose to resolve this issue? If I understand your arguments, a consensus decision will only be more "argumentum ad populum". Please state, as clearly as possible and without hystronics like "obscurantists", how you'd like to proceed. Suggested word limit: 500.
brenneman
(t)
(c) 03:22, 22 July 2005 (UTC)
You may first note I've corrected your edit which left two versions of this discussion. Thank you for providing the reference to "last at the top". I've left you (later) comments next to the paragraph they referred to.
It is really not necessary to repeat the phrases "consensus theory of truth" or "argumentum ad populum" anymore. Let me be clear: I understand the argument you are proposing. I am suggesting that it does not apply, as the section quoted makes no claims regard truth/untruth.
brenneman
(t)
(c) 03:57, 22 July 2005 (UTC)
Removed text that was duplicated from above: Please state how you'd like to proceed. brenneman (t) (c) 04:40, 22 July 2005 (UTC)
From my point of view it doesn't make sense for a community like this, allegedly open, to have a policy that entails either a dictatorship by Wales, or entails logical fallacy argumentum ad numerum, like the concensus theory of truth, if that is what you insist the policy is here. You can't be serious. -- DotSix 67.182.157.6 04:34, 22 July 2005 (UTC)
I am leaving now for an early start on the week end. One of he joys of being a person of means. 8^) Shall we continue this (hopefully) principled negotiation next week maybe?
The two are not the fully the same (whether in psychology, and especially colloquially). It is irrational to attempt to dialogue with someone who wants to kill you, though it may very well be reasonable.
Predicated on this, I was going to modify the following sentence "We can only seek a type of writing that is agreeable to essentially rational people who may differ on particular points.", until I noticed it was a direct quote. If the creator would so modify it, I would appreciate it. Being a non-reasonable person who is otherwise profoundly rational, I found it somewhat offensive (as well as psychologically a flawed interpretation of rationality). -- 24.22.227.53 21:28, 26 July 2005 (UTC)
I notice that someone had added an NPOV tag to one section and it had been deleted. Is there realy a problem with tagging a section of this article as an NPOV dipute if it genuinely is disputed?-- Heathcliff 03:02, 29 July 2005 (UTC)
" Principled Negotiation is a cooperative process whereby participants try to find a solution which meets the legitimate interests of both parties, which in the context of Wikipedia usually involves appropriate mention of all points of view in an article thus improving the quality of the article. Compromising or "splitting the difference" is generally inappropriate if it means departure from generally recognized points of view, both of which need to be included to achieve Wikipedia:Neutral point of view." -- wikipedia:negotiation
"The policy of having a neutral point of view is not to hide different points of view, but to show the diversity of viewpoints. In case of controversy, the strong points and weak points will be shown according to each point of view, without taking a side. The neutral point of view is not a " separate but equal" policy. The facts, in themselves, are neutral, but the simple accumulation of them cannot be the neutral point of view. If only the favorable (or the unfavorable) facts of a point of view are shown in an article, the article will still be non-neutral." -- wikipedia:NPOV
" Principled Negotiation is a cooperative process whereby participants try to find a solution which meets the legitimate interests of both parties, which in the context of Wikipedia usually involves appropriate mention of all points of view in an article thus improving the quality of the article. Compromising or "splitting the difference" is generally inappropriate if it means departure from generally recognized points of view, both of which need to be included to achieve Wikipedia:Neutral point of view." -- wikipedia:negotiation
The George W. Bush article contains this controversial statment:
On the other hand the Hillary Clinton article contains only Hillary's version of her relationship with Bill Clinton, and nothing critical (much less derogatory) of her statements despite the publication of several critical biographies of her.
I'm only using these only as examples to help define the question rather than posing it as merely abstract. What are the consistently applied principles when it comes to including in an article an item written in a critical biography? patsw 20:08, 2 August 2005 (UTC)
Let me break it down a little more:
Neutral point of view is redirected here. Is it really good to have this kind of redirects from the main namespace to a Wikipedia policy page? I suppose it should be possible to write an article about Neutral point to view from a non-Wikipedia perspective, and anyway I strongly believe a reader should not accidently be transferred from the articla name space to the Wikipedia namespace. / Habj 22:24, 7 August 2005 (UTC)
NPOV says "represent the majority (scientific) view as the majority view and the minority (sometimes pseudoscientific) view as the minority view". There is a reall interesting edit war going on in teh [Creation Science] that revolves around whether the dictionary definition of "science" can be used as "fact". If it can, then "Creation Science" can be factually presented as "pseudoscience". This is basically a "definition point of view" because some editors wish to present the topic from the point of view of the standard dictionary definition.
The alternative is that the definition for science depends on the point of view, and therefore Creation Science views itself to meet the definition of "science", and mainstream science views Creation Science as pseudoscientific nonsense.
Could someone who knows NPOV please explain whether a dictionary definition can be used as fact or must be presented as a POV? Perhaps the NPOV article could contain a new subsection titled "Defintion Point of View" and explain the correct answer.
I fully appreciate what you're doing with this, FeulWagon, but somehow I suspect that even Definition Point of View wouldn't settle the issue with some of our erstwhile editors. Besides, philosophers have a bugger of a time settling on definitions. That's why I think the NPOV policy is as good as it gets.
Main Entry: sci·ence
Function: noun
3 a : accumulated and accepted knowledge that has been systematized and formulated with reference to the discovery of general truths or the operation of general laws : knowledge classified and made available in work, life, or the search for truth : comprehensive, profound, or philosophical knowledge; especially : knowledge obtained and tested through use of the scientific method b : such knowledge concerned with the physical world and its phenomena : NATURAL SCIENCE
synonym see KNOWLEDGE
"science." Webster's Third New International Dictionary, Unabridged. Merriam-Webster, 2002.
http://unabridged.merriam-webster.com (9 Aug. 2005).
-- Parker Whittle 07:11, 10 August 2005 (UTC)
"Subjective language" is a myth. There is no more such a thing as a "subjective word" than there is an "objective word," an "auspicious word," a "cynical word," or a "dangerous word." You need guidelines, but the editors here should try to remember, especially when it comes to questions that ask for this sort of policy, that to weaken a pronouncement is not necessarily to make it neutral; and, of course, to strengthen a pronouncement is not to make it biased. Someone objected to my "unequivocal" in Shamil Basayev (about the Russians' opinion of him). Are we really so wooden-minded that we have to read "uneqivocal" literally?
I don't like this tendency to weaken that dominates political topics on Wikipedia. I understand that it's a natural trend, that it's equillibrium given the current rules; but it shouldn't be. -- VKokielov 05:18, 14 August 2005 (UTC)
Please have a look at Wikipedia_talk:Eras#What.27s_the_real_problem_here on the long-running AD/BC vs. CE/BCE debate.
It's important because the NPOV policy doesn't seem to cover the issue of language use. I don't mean content but rather form. For example, this policy does not mention or cover Gender-neutral language, which is an issue that should not only be covered as content (what is the issue, what are the positions) but also as form (how does Wikipedia apply gender neutrality).
Because of this gap we now have a new and controversial debate about Anno Domini vs. Common Era. It's easy enough to cover this as content. The articles handle the POV issues of each one in a NPOV way. The problem is that wikipedia seems to lack a policy on language pattern usage in POV situations. This is form, not content. Does wikipedia use AD or CE? And why? This should be covered in the NPOV policy.
Some relevant questions:
Sbwoodside 05:37, 15 August 2005 (UTC)
"Whether God exists or not is a question of fact, not a question of value. But as the fact is essentially undiscoverable, so far as anyone knows, whether God exists will usually be couched in terms of opinion or value."
This is a perfect example of agnosticism, not a neutral point of view. There are a great many people who think that they have proved the issue one way or another. How about just say that whether God exists is greatly debated and a point of great contention, etc.?
~ Nauraran 02:06, 18 August 2005 (UTC)
I personally disagree with you, on a number of well established philosophical grounds, to wit: those who believe that they have proven God's existence don't have a very good conception of proof. (Note: and this need not be an agnosticist view point, ie: I believe that my mother and father love me, but I know that I don't have what constitutes rigourous proof to prove it.) Nevertheless, I would be willing to consider a change to the text, if only to remove a controversial example on a policy page that may be more trouble than its worth. Func( t, c, @, ) 17:26, 18 August 2005 (UTC)
Well, no, no pain. I've been reading the section "A simple formulation" from the NPOV page a few times. The least that can be said is that the title of that section doesn't match the content of the second half of the second paragraph of that section: the "God" topic is treated with lots of added complexity, no way near a "simple formulation".
I try to work on it as a whole, so I copied the whole section to here in order not to lose context out of sight (I also changed "Socrates" to "Plato", because "Socrates" might be a questionable example taking account of the Socratic problem):
We sometimes give an alternative formulation of the non-bias policy: assert facts, including facts about opinions — but don't assert opinions themselves. There is a difference between facts and values, or opinions. By "fact," we mean "a piece of information about which there is no serious dispute." In this sense, that a survey produced a certain published result is a fact. That there is a planet called Mars is a fact. That Plato was a philosopher is a fact. No one seriously disputes any of these things. So we can feel free to assert as many of them as we can.
By value or opinion, on the other hand, we mean "a piece of information about which there is some dispute." There are bound to be borderline cases where we're not sure if we should take a particular dispute seriously; but there are many propositions that very clearly express values or opinions. That stealing is wrong is a value or opinion. That the Beatles was the greatest band is a value or opinion. That the United States was wrong to drop the atomic bomb over Hiroshima and Nagasaki is a value or opinion. That God exists... this might seem a troublesome one. Not with the definitions given above: That God exists... is a piece of information about which there is some dispute. This corresponds with how talking about God (or, alternatively, the non-existence of God) is experienced by most people: it's hard to talk about God or Atheism without mixing in opinion, or at least talk about value(s).
Wikipedia is devoted to stating facts in the sense as described above. Where we might want to state an opinion, we convert that opinion into a fact by attributing the opinion to someone. So, rather than asserting, "The Beatles were the greatest band", we can say, "Most Americans believe that the Beatles were the greatest band," which is a fact verifiable by survey results, or "The Beatles had many songs that made the Billboard Hot 100," which is also fact. In the first instance we assert an opinion; in the second and third instances we "convert" that opinion into fact by attributing it to someone. It's important to note this formulation is substantially different from the "some people believe ..." formulation popular in political debates. The reference requires an identifiable and subjectively quantifiable population or, better still, a name.
In presenting an opinion, moreover, it is important to bear in mind that there are disagreements about how opinions are best stated; sometimes, it will be necessary to qualify the description of an opinion or to present several formulations, simply to arrive at a solution that fairly represents all the leading views of the situation.
But it's not enough, to express the Wikipedia non-bias policy, just to say that we should state facts and not opinions. When asserting a fact about an opinion, it is important also to assert facts about competing opinions, and to do so without implying that any one of the opinions is correct. It's also generally important to give the facts about the reasons behind the views, and to make it clear who holds them. It's often best to cite a prominent representative of the view.
...I also cut out some parts that are treated separately in the "religion" section lower on the NPOV page.
Feel free to work on the text above! -- Francis Schonken 22:20, 19 August 2005 (UTC)
We sometimes give an alternative formulation of the non-bias policy: assert facts, including facts about opinions — but don't assert opinions themselves. Certainly, there are bound to be borderline cases where a fact is disputed but we're not sure if we should take the dispute seriously, or where the distinction between fact and value will itself necessarily be in dispute. Nevertheless, there are many propositions that clearly express undisputed facts, and others that clearly express values or opinions. That a survey produced a certain published result is a fact. That there is a planet called Mars is a fact. That Plato was a philosopher is a fact. No one seriously disputes any of these things. So we can feel free to assert as many of them as we can. On the other hand, that stealing is wrong is a value or opinion. That the Beatles was the greatest band is a value or opinion. That the United States was wrong to drop the atomic bomb over Hiroshima and Nagasaki is a value or opinion.
Where we might want to state an opinion, we convert that opinion into a fact by attributing the opinion to someone. So, rather than asserting, "The Beatles were the greatest band", we can say, "Most Americans believe that the Beatles were the greatest band," (... etc ...)
... there you go. I think this destroys the incoherencies while strengthening the main point of the section. Fool 14:09, 21 September 2005 (UTC)
I think this part of the policy need to be edited in one way or another. The problem as it is stated right now is that it gives benefit to anyone who just ads a chunk of text, regardless of its quality before some who writes from scratch. A lot of old encyclopedias and other pieces of old work have become public domain and therefore become a cheap source of information for Wikipedia. The problem is that they often are of quite low quality. This has been done, and is being done, quite systematically and is a threat to the quality of Wikipedia.
The amount of work needed to edit such a text in such a way that it becomes a NPOV-article of good quality might often exceed the amount of work needed to write a NPOV-article of good quality from scratch. It would, in my opinion, be wise to add to the policy something about this, i.e. the policy should state that it is only OK to remove NPOV-material if the work needed to correct it exceeds the amount of work needed to create the same material from scratch. Gunnar Larsson 14:49, 21 August 2005 (UTC)
The neutrality policy is used sometimes as an excuse to delete texts that are perceived as biased. Isn't this a problem?
In many cases, yes. Many of us believe that the fact that some text is biased is not enough, in itself, to delete it outright. If it contains valid information, the text should simply be edited accordingly.
There's sometimes trouble determining whether some claim is true or useful, particularly when there are few people on board who know about the topic. In such a case, it's a good idea to raise objections on a talk page; if one has some reason to believe that the author of the biased material will not be induced to change it, we have sometimes taken to removing the text to the talk page itself (but not deleting it entirely). But the latter should be done more or less as a last resort, never as a way of punishing people who have written something biased.
There's a guy called Sean Wright who is blatantly using Wikipedia to market his vanity releases. The guy's the worst author in the world, a literary Ed Wood, and his books are printed in limited runs typically about 3,000 copies. He is not famous, in fact he only came to attention from spamming (under pseudonyms) a couple of book forums I use, a tactic he also uses for his own books on Amazon. I've worked with the article but he continues to change it to promote himself and now he is using Wikipedia to create pages for all of his books, his vanity press, authors going through his vanity press.
On reading his article it looks like he's name dropping and the only source for many of the supposed "facts" he spouts off (such as the late Queen Mother owning his artwork) can only be found on his website, the original template for his version of the article.
It reads more like a mixture of recollections and ego massaging. I'm tired of editing this article as it is proving to be a waste of my time. It's certainly not a neutral point of view. Connor Wolf 13:33, 31 August 2005 (UTC)
If person A is employed by organization B or person C, should they be disallowed from editing articles regarding organization B or person C, to prevent bias, sanitized PR entries, or deletion of all criticism?
Yes, many people initially think that the way to build an unbiased article is to delete every biased statement in the article. That may seem like a good idea at first glance, but these are the very people who are closest to the facts of the matter. Would you block all earthlings from editing the article on Earth? Also, consider the possibility that some of these people might actually be whistle-blowing critics of the organization they are associated with. Banning individuals because they might mess something up seems analogous to banning forks because they might be used to commit a felony.
I think the Wikipedia:Neutral_point_of_view#Dealing_with_biased_contributors section covers it. The problem is bias. Let us directly attack the actual problem, rather than attack people who we speculate might possibly be somehow associated with the problem. -- DavidCary 03:57, 13 September 2005 (UTC)
The basic fundemental of Neutral Point Of View is to come to a opinion or understanding that is collective, that fairly represents all parties involved.
The problem with NPOV is that it destroys individuality and objectivism, thus there must be grouping among those who think alike to create majoritys and minoritys to level the fairness of NPOV.
I am simply stating what I think a NPOV should be, the problem is there is no NPOV , it simply cannot exist because no matter how hard you try there will always be bias. Even in a collective there can be no NPOV because everyone's perception is different. NPOV in itself is a philosophy, the whole premise of NPOV is a total contradiction within itself.
I see on wikipedia in general a pattern of typical mainstream propaganda, the sad part is people come here to get information and get educated. NPOV is just a way of saying majority rules, while me the minority sits back and watches, the problem is there is no way using the NPOV system that all sides can be represented, as NPOV is something that is strived for yet it is impossible and will be the downfall of wikipedia. My intentions are to educate people on variations and the other side of the story, for example to say that the name of God is Yahweh and that Yahweh is the only God who created everything is a NPOV by means of "Popular conception", but the fact is the name of God is Marduk who is the head of a council of Gods which is a fact is considered a POV and violates policy here, is not only misleading, it makes it impossible for for someone to make a properly informed choice. Im not saying that all the articles here are misleading, there are some really well written articles, but a good majority of articles, especially those on religions are seriously misleading because they dont state the facts, they only state the popular NPOV versions and when you try to edit them to say anything that goes against the popular beliefs it is a policy violation. For example the Christianity article will tell you all the basics of the belief, but it fails to state anywere in the article that Christianity borrowed all of it's ideas, concepts and basis from earlier pagan religions which is a fact. Now if I was to go in there and state these facts it would be removed as non consensus and as a POV, so how can wikipedia be reliable as a valid factual source of imformation? Ultimately the downfall of wikipedia is eminent, this is were Wikinfo will dominate because of the sympathetic point of view policy. Khaosinfire 02:43, 20 September 2005 (UTC)
I sort of tripped over this page, but found it rilly hard to read - partly because of too many multiple negatives. I'm new around here, so I don't feel like fixing it; and anyway, if I'd written it orginally, I'd appreciate more the comment and the chance to fix it myself, than the fait accompli.
I have already posted this at the Village Pump.
The cherished goal of NPOV for Wikipedia often seems to be getting farther and farther away from realization. One of the most intractible problems is that POV warfare is carried on in a highly organized basis, not only in the editing, but oftentimes in administrative functions as well. It takes the form of what have been described variously as WikiCliques or POV posses, which generally have one or more Designated Administrators, administrators who carefully avoid direct participation in specific conflicts, but will intervene with administrative powers on the side of their respective teammates. An example of such behavior is what I call the Protection Racket, where admins watch the Requests for Protection page in order to protect the versions desired by their buddies, and POV warriors time protection requests so as to intersect periods when their Designated Admins are on patrol.
At present, the remedies are inadequate. Wikipedia:Requests for de-adminship seems very unwieldy and is seldom used. So, I am making the following proposal:
I think that there ought to be a higher echelon of administrators, whom I propose be called ombudsmen, who would be held to a far higher standard of propriety and neutrality than present administrators. A member who becomes an ombudsman could lose that status at the slightest hint of partisanship in any dispute where ombudsman powers are invoked. And here are what I propose ombudsman powers should consist of:
1. The authority to discipline admins by imposing temporary bans on their use of admin powers, just as admins may temporarily ban ordinary editors from editing. This authority would be used when admins are found to be using their authority to further the POV-pushing of their allies.
2. The authority to temporarily intervene into POV disputes by setting ground-rules for conflict resolution in specific articles (this idea needs some refining; my intention is to take some of the load off of the mediation and arbitration committees, and speed conflict resolution.) -- HK 21:48, 17 September 2005 (UTC)
I think we need some sort of explicit policy to deal with apologetics. There are a lot of articles, especially those dealing with the historicity of the Bible, that tend to become filled with apologetics. Now, of course, the traditional understanding of the historicity of various books of the Bible ought to be discussed. But apologetics are very distinctly not the traditional understanding. For instance, the traditional understanding of the Pentatech is that it was largely written by Moses, with the probable exception of the end of Deuteronomy, which describes Moses's death. But the traditional basis for this was simply that it was traditionally ascribed to Moses. Modern scholarship then came along, and came up with numerous arguments as to why the Pentateuch should not be ascribed to Moses. As far as actual mainstream scholarship goes, nobody any longer believes in Moses as the author of the Pentateuch. Many traditional Christians and Jews, however, continue to accept Mosaic authorship. But, given that there are now arguments being made against the traditional understanding, apologetics are needed to reconcile the traditional account. So, arguments that the Pentateuch is all of a piece, and that it seems to have been written by one person, and that various elements of it strongly suggest that it is quite old, perhaps as old as the second millennium BC are essentially apologetics. They are neither a mainstream scholarly position (no mainstream scholars that I am aware of believe the Pentateuch to have been written by a single source in the 2nd millennium BC); nor does it represent the traditional Judeo-Christian viewpoint (which simply accepts that the Pentateuch was written by Moses, without relying on any kind of textual or other arguments to prove it). Both the traditional view and the scholarly view should be represented on wikipedia, and wikipedia should not say that the scholarly view is "correct" and the traditional view is "wrong." It would be a violation of NPOV to do this. But that does not mean that we have to give equal time to apologetics. Apologetics are the equivalent of pseudoscience. Pretending that there is a legitimate dispute among scholars as to whether Moses wrote the Pentateuch is like pretending there is a legitimate dispute among scientists as to whether or not intelligent design provides a better view of the development of life on earth than Darwinian evolution. It is mistaking religion for history. And the works of scholars who are already predetermined to come to a given conclusion (that the Bible is invariably accurate) simply cannot be taken seriously as scholarship. For an example of a discussion of this sort, I'd refer you to Talk:Book of Esther. I'd like to propose that some sort of policy for how to deal with apologetics be put into place. john k 23:46, 27 September 2005 (UTC)
Articles like Radiocarbon dating, and what not, are not a serious problem with apologetics. Obviously, in general, particularly notable apologetical arguments should be mentioned in articles. And articles on non-Biblical subjects generally do fine, even if apologists do invade them. The problem comes in things like articles on Biblical books and the like, and the big problem is not so much the apologetics themselves. The problem is that, on the one hand, the POV represented by apologetics is given the weight of the traditional view of the Biblical books, which it doesn't deserve because the apologetics themselves are merely after the fact justifications of traditional views, not independent explanations of the traditional views; and, on the other hand, the apologetics are described as equivalent to the scholarly views they are arguing against. Apologetics obviously has a (small) place in articles. But apologetical arguments need to be marked as such. They should not be described as elaborations of the traditional views, or as scholarly views, because they are neither. These conflations give apologetical views a certain claim to equal treatment that it should not otherwise have. john k 01:17, 28 September 2005 (UTC)
How to deal with them who continousely delete the NPOV tag while the article is being discussed?-- Nixer 20:10, 29 September 2005 (UTC)
Are external links subjected to NPOV? How? Does it mean that we should remove any link that bring wikireaders to a biased page? Does it mean that we should have various links pointing to various POV? This problem needs to be adressed ASAP and included in the next revision of NPOV policy-- equitor 02:20, 4 October 2005 (UTC)
Links to POV websites are allowed, however a particular selection and placement of a link could violate NPOV. It would fall under the same guidelines for including criticism in an article. Nathan J. Yoder 07:06, 26 October 2005 (UTC)
FYI: a discussion of many of the issues touched on this page
Although i'm relatively new, i'm already enjoying myself by trying to resolve semi-random NPOV disputes from the list. However, one of the things i seem to bump in at every turn, is the fact that NPOV is used to contest any claim found repugnant, regardless of arguments.
Obvisouly, this is a distortion of what NPOV is meant for, and is not a byproduct of NPOV an sich. Still, the fact that NPOV seems to be promoted as the most important of all Wiki policies (as seems to be the case with the recent revert of this article page), to my mind, encourages the relativism of arguments towards opinions.
The Armenian genocide article is already hopelessly lost because every argument has become an opinion and vice versa. Sure, we have to be neutral towards opnions, but we should be clear in assessing arguments. As another weird example, the Kurdish flag's very existence is considered POV (actually, i think i might remove that POV flag shortly).
This diffusing of the line between arguments and opinions is having other strange effects. For one, consensus on differing opinions is much harder to come by, resulting in a strange policy adopted by some (quite a few actually) to balance opnions to gain neutrality. For an (amusing) example check here, and be sure to check the talk page for the reasoning that the For and Against should have an equal amount of arguments (!) to retain NPOV.
Like I said, this is not a direct consequence of NPOV, which in all aspects is a great policy. But regarding NPOV as the most important Wiki-policy (like this recent revert of this very article seems to indicate) implies that opinions, and the neutrality thereon, are more important than arguments, and the validity thereof. I think this severely undermines Wikipedia, if not on the short run, then on the long haul. We are an encyclopedia after all.
Wikipedia being wikipedia, there is probably some discussion on this hidden in some nether-region. If so, i would appreciate a pointer in the right direction. If not, then it might be time to open one. -- The Minister of War
Hmm...you guys seem to be arguing past each other a bit. Minister of War seems to be making an argument about times when ostensible NPOV makes articles ridiculous - both inaccurate and, to be honest, POV. Francis is reasserting the centrality of NPOV as a wikipedia policy. So, to both of you - Minister of War, I don't think that the problem has to do with how central NPOV is to wikipedia policy. It has to do with the fact that there are a lot of persistent cranks on the Internet and it's hard to deal with them. Francis - I do think that Minister of War is describing a real problem, and his descriptions of the problems with "on the one hand, on the other hand" NPOV is a real one. I think that this kind of false-NPOV is perhaps not addressed clearly enough in the policy. Articles that compare views need not give minority views as much or as detailed a description as more popular views. is the basic statement on this subject. But this doesn't seem to be clear enough to me. It isn't precise, and it implies that the only difference between POVs should be in the space we give to presenting each one. It seems to me that the current exception, if it were followed to the letter, would force us to actually give a lot of space at the evolution article to creationists - after all, creationists form a pretty large percentage of people, so their view is not simply a "small minority" view. Anyway, I think Minister of War has isolated a real problem, although I'm uncertain if his solution would do much. Even changing the "undue weight" section here to make it more specific probably wouldn't help much - the problem is not so much with the policy, as with the fact that there will always be POV-zealots who try to push their POV under the false banner of NPOV. john k 17:45, 9 October 2005 (UTC)
(edit conflict, this is a reply to TMoW's reply above that of James) No, I'm sad to say, I'd like we agreed but we don't.
First, "some POVs arent worth including at all" can't be said in absolute terms. Besides being a philosophical error, stating that thus is also against NPOV policy. However, trying to get wikipedia:importance from a proposed guideline (which it is for as long as I know that guideline) to an effective guideline might help. As said way up in this point the "space and balance" section of NPOV tutorial depends on that definition of "importance" (and links to that proposed guideline) - so defining wikipedia-importance might help in drawing the line what gets included and what not. But I would never state that in terms of "aren't worth including".
Second, "prove your point on the talk page" gets rejected if that "proving" involves original research. So, no (for example) there are no secondary sources available defining copyleft, in an umbrella view of what Richard Stallman, the Creative Commons and Linus Torvalds say about it, so I couldn't prove on talk:copyleft that my intro to the copyleft article was better than the one that is there now (and pretty much only reflects the Stallman view). So false-NOR can be as much a problem as false-NPOV.
Third, "once you decide to include, then by what degree and how?", well again, the two first paragraphs of the "Space and balance" section of the NPOV tutorial sort that out. But seems like you're not very inclined to see the importance of those two paragraphs.
-- Francis Schonken 09:49, 10 October 2005 (UTC)
It has been propsoed that Wikipedia:Dealing with fringe science be merged into with WP:NPOV. While my comments, and indeed the whole issue of dealing with fring since, do derive from the NPOV policy 9and to soem extent the verifiability policy, I feel that this is an imporetant special case. I therefore oppsoe the merge. I wrote the text no present in connection with the debate on Jack Sarfatti, but it applies in a wider context. i intend to expand the current text a bit, making it into a useful essay or perhaps a proposed guideline, a fleshign oput of WP:NPOV, WP:NOR, and WP:V as they apply in this specific and often controversial area. This proposed merge is now being discussed at Wikipedia Talk:Dealing with fringe science#Proposed Merge DES (talk) 22:00, 15 October 2005 (UTC)
Wikipedia is supposed to be neutral. It is not supposed to side with anyone; it is supposed to show both sides of the issue. Well, I have to agree that this is what should happen. But it's not! What do all encyclopedias, newspapers, and textbooks have in common? THEY ALL SHOW EVOLUTIONARY BIAS! Every time I read an article on dinosaurs or the like, it says that they existed "millions of years ago, before man came to be on the earth"! Is that neutral? NO IT'S NOT! Never in this, or any other encyclopedia, have I read, "All creation existed peacefully until the Fall; then animals and people started killing each other, Earth began to decay, the climate began to change, volcanoes and other natural forces ravaged the earth"! All the articles state evolutionary bias! If Wikipedia is suppposed to be neutral, someone better get busy and edit the articles to say "According to evolutionists, the tyrannosaurus rex lived approximate 6.5 billion years ago, millions of years before man"! This is quite dissappointing! Scorpionman 02:38, 18 October 2005 (UTC)