Wikipedia talk:Attribution

The project page associated with this discussion page is an official policy on Wikipedia. It has wide acceptance among editors and is considered a standard that all users should follow. Before you update the page, make sure that any changes you make really do reflect consensus.

Editors, please note:

After four months of discussion at Wikipedia:Attribution, editors at Wikipedia talk:Attribution have agreed on a means of merging Wikipedia:Verifiability with Wikipedia:No original research, while also streamlining Wikipedia:Reliable sources into a simpler FAQ at WP:ATT/FAQ.

There are no policy innovations suggested: WP:ATT is intended be a more cohesive version of the core content policies with which the Wikipedia community is already familiar.

(However, there is a dispute about the change of policy from "verifiability, not truth" to "attributable, ... not whether it is true." See "Role of truth" below. --Coppertwig 16:40, 5 March 2007 (UTC))

Specific use question, advice please

I was just wondering if anyone could assist me with a question: Is more attribution necessary if the fact in question explicitly refers to the credits of a television show? From Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader?:

During the credits at the end of the show, a disclaimer states: "Members of the class [the children] were provided with workbooks that covered grade school level material in a variety of subjects. Some of the material could have formed the basis of questions used by producers in the show."

This statement was marked citation needed, which was then replaced by the qualifying statment, "This disclaimer can be viewed by pausing the show at the appropriate point as the credits roll." This obviously does nothing more than repeat that the information is present in the credits sequence, and otherwise is useless.
My first thought is that the statement should be sourced, but the more I think about it ... how can it be? Is the show itself not a primary source? I don't think it'd be easy (if possible at all) to find a different source citing the credits of the show (I've looked). However, this statement shouldn't be discounted if it is true (to which I cannot verify, as I've never paid particular attention to the credits). Any advice? Thanks! –Dvandersluis 19:33, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

No need for the "pause the credits" statement. The show itself is the source. If someone demands a citation try: <ref>''Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader?'', Fox Television, closing credits, first aired: March 1, 2007</ref> If you really want to be accurate (almost to the point of absurdity), time the show and note when the line appears. Blueboar 20:00, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

Thanks! :) –Dvandersluis 20:03, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

You should include enough information that people can verify that the claim is actually supported by the source. The should be able to seek and find the source and then find in the source where the claim is supported. Exactly what degree of detail is needed for this varies between sources. WAS 4.250 22:13, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

A source is something that someone can look up themselves, to prove that a statement came from somewhere. The source may or may not be convenient (maybe it is in a book at the Library of Congress) but at least the sourced statement does come from a place that can then be further researched.

In the case of the source being a claim that the credits state such-and-such... well, this is also something that can be looked up (by pausing a video or Tivo of the show) to prove that it is accurate. Until proven inaccurate, the claim should be left alone. This would be similar to a source citing a book at the Library of Congress. If you personally don't believe the quoted passage, the burden is on you to prove that the claimed source does not exist or that the quoted material is inaccurate. --Pmurph5 23:26, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

Actually we use common sense in these situations. If a known liar says the source is in some hard to access source, they are often reverted. WAS 4.250 23:38, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

What about well-sourced absurd claims?

I had inserted a well-sourced exceptional claim that keeps getting deleted. The claim is that a certain person can change from a man to a woman instantenously. The source is among others a peer reviewed university article. See Talk:Sathya_Sai_Baba#Request_for_Comment:_Exceptional_Controversial_Claim Andries 19:36, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

Any source that states that someone can change from a man to a woman is not a reliable source. Please provide links or citations of a source that states, scientifically, that someone can change from a man to a woman. Thanks. Hipocrite - «Talk» 19:41, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

Why should I? A relevant peer reviewed university press article remains a reliable source, according to this policy, even if the statements in the article contradict your beliefs. Andries 19:49, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

Please provide a link or a citation to this "peer reviewed university press article" which states, as a fact, that someone can change genders. Thanks. Hipocrite - «Talk» 19:50, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

Okay, I will though the article does not state it as a fact. Andries 19:52, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

A peer reviewed article that states that someone else claimed that someone can change their gender is a reliable source for the fact that someone else claimed that someone can change their gender, not a reliable source for the actual gender change. Hipocrite - «Talk» 19:53, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

Exactly. This is the sort of thing where, if you have good sources, you can pass along the info that those sources made that claim. It just should be presented as "X says he saw Y" and not "Y happened". I've been dealing with something very similar at John Edward. --Milo H Minderbinder 19:55, 2 March 2007 (UTC)~

Hipocrite, I replied on your talk page detailing the sources. Andries 20:02, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

But the current wording of the policy suggests that absurd claims even if they are well sourced should be removed. Andries 20:02, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

Not if reasonably read; both the paragraph that says "absurd" and Jimbo's post in the footnote talk only about unsourced material. But I added another "unsourced" to clarify this.Septentrionalis PMAnderson 20:08, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

Our articles on religion are filled with absurd claims. WAS 4.250 22:17, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

(outdent) We can have 'weird claims' or 'absurd claims' if they are properly attributed to a notable person, for example. If that person is the subject of an article, and is otherwise notable, then those claims, attributed to him/her, are includable. In situations where the source is not the article subject, and yet the views expressed are extreme, then we must decide, per Jimbo's fringe exclusion rule, whether the claims are so extreme and represent such a small minority as to be regarded as a fringe view, in which case they would be excluded. If the article is medical or scientific, for example, a reliable source would normally have to be published in a peer reviewed publication, and the more exceptional the claim, the higher the needed quality and quantity of the supporting sources. Crum375 23:02, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

It should be noted that in the talk pages of articles on a number of topics -- religion and political views, for example -- people regularly suggest that the views of those who disagree with them should be removed as absurd or wierd, despite the fact that views representing both sides are held by a substantial fraction not only of the population but professional philosophers/theologians/commentators. Atheists regularly claim that Wikipedia shouldn't have any articles on religion; religious people claim Wikipedia shouldn't have atheist or critical perspectives, you name it. Any proposed policy language that says that well-sourced views can be removed on grounds of absurdity shoud be very carefully vetted to make sure opinionated editors won't be quoting it to remove material based on their own subjective view of what is "absurd". Regarding the specific application raised, I would think that any article on Satya Sai Baba would need to describe the beliefs Sai Baba and his followers have about his nature and activities. A belief in Sai Baba's personal capacity to perform miracles seems to be a central tenent of that faith. However, as with religion articles generally, consistent with WP:NPOV, Wikipedia would do well to report both what believers believe and skeptics' criticisms, using fairness of tone for each, and leaving readers to make up their own minds. Given that the Satya Sai Baba religious beliefs involved are notable, the fact that some Wikipedia editors might think the beliefs involved absurd simply should not influence editorial decisions. A fair presentation of views offered by skeptics will have to do to present such editors' POV. Otherwise, we'll be hearing from editors saying Wikipedia shouldn't have an article on the Resurrection of Jesus or the article shouldn't include the views of theologically conservative Christians on that subject. Best, --Shirahadasha 03:41, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

The keyword here is "multiple". We need multiple references of the claims. If The New York Times, BBC, CNN and Washington Post state cows can fly, I will be the first to edit cow to add that fact. -- ReyBrujo 03:52, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

I would find it sufficient if Nature had a peer reviewed paper showing cows can fly. I would be careful to attribute the claim to the Nature paper, and probably quote the relevant items verbatim. I agree with Shirahadasha that 'absurd' is subjective, what we need here are proper attributions, not opinions about 'truth' by Wikipedians. Crum375 04:04, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

Have a look at Kent Hovind. True, his claims are absurd, but as long as we're careful to attribute to him ("Hovind states", "Hovind theorizes that"), they're entirely appropriate for his article. Seraphimblade ^{Talk to me Please review me!} 04:10, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

There was a single line that explained what was Wikipedia about: "Verifiability, not truth." Unfortunately it seems it was lost in the policy slaughter. -- ReyBrujo 04:58, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

Role of truth

This point has been raised a few times already and I haven't seen any good answer; I suspect it hasn't been clearly understood. The answers I saw seemed to be addressing a logically different point.

I'm concerned about a major policy shift in moving from "verifiability, not truth" to "attributable, not true". The word "verifiable" implies truth; "atributable" does not, and the meaning of the policy is different.

With the new Attribution policy, an editor can argue: "I admit that this statement is false, but I insist that it remain in Wikipedia, and I cite WP:A to back me up. Furthermore, I won't let you insert 'Agency X reports that...' because it will disrupt the flow of the article. There is already a footnote, and the false but attributed statement meets the criteria of Wikipedian policy perfectly. Truth is not a criterion."

That's not the way Wikipedia works, and I don't want it to start.

Attributability is one necessary criterion for inclusion; it shouldn't be the only criterion. Editors use their judgement to select among all possible attributable statements the ones that seem interesting, relevant, and important and that fit into the organization of the article, and in doing so, their perception of what is likely true rightly influences their judgement of what is worth saying.

Example: A Wikipedian article reported that someone did something in a certain year. The year was before the birthdate of the person. A Wikipedian editor rightly removed the obviously false statement. Another correct remedy might be to change it to "Source X reports that the person did this in such-and-such year." Simply leaving contradictory and obviously false information in the article should not be an option -- but the new Attribtution policy supports exactly that.

"Verifiability, not truth" could be fairly easily interpreted to mean that being true is not enough: they must (also) be verifiable. (Even that was argued about.) But "Attributable, not whether it is true" is clearly stating that truth is not a criterion for inclusion of information in Wikipedia -- opening the door to knowing and admitted inclusion of false statements.

I suggest that the policy be modified to either say something positive about truth, or to say nothing about truth. I.e. either delete "not whether it is true", or change it to something like "not only whether it is true," or insert something like: "The purpose of this policy is to ensure, as far as practical, that information in Wikipedia is accurate and reliable." Or: "Not all attributable statements are worthy of inclusion." Or: "In addition to being attributable, material to be included should be interesting, important, apparently true, and relevant to the article."

I would also like to change "the threshold for inclusion" to "a necessary condition for inclusion." The word "the" before "threshold" implies that it's the only criterion, again opening the door to baldfaced false (but attributable) statements.

I think the intended purpose of this policy was to exclude apparently true but unattributable statements, but that the wording can be taken as explicitly encouraging the inclusion of apparently false but attributable statements, so it needs to be edited to more clearly reflect its actual intended purpose. --Coppertwig 02:20, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

If there is no discussion on this point, then I will soon edit in the word "merely" to make the policy page say "not merely whether it is true". --Coppertwig 19:21, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

I suggested an edit very much like that a few weeks back. I'd be glad to see that clarification. DCB4W 19:26, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

Well stated. That makes perfect sense to me, for one. --Wetman 20:55, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

Thanks. OK, I went ahead and inserted "merely" into the policy; I also inserted it into the FAQ in a similar context; and I've proposed an additional related edit to the FAQ at Wikipedia talk:Attribution/FAQ#Truth. --Coppertwig 13:47, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

Coppertwig, please don't change the policies without clear consensus. Adding "merely" changed the meaning of the sentence completely. The point of it is that we don't do truth. We only do sourcing. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 13:50, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

I agree with slim... adding "merely" changes the meaning significantly. Wikipedia does not care if a theory or statement is "True"... for "Truth" is often in the eye of the beholder. That said, what we should care about is "Accuracy". This is a fine distinction, but a significant one. "Truth" is subjective, "Accuracy" is not. Truth can not be cited ... Accuracy can. Blueboar 14:34, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

Also agree. This merely dilutes the concept we want to put across. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 15:24, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

I apologize for not waiting long enough for comments before editing. I feel that a much broader discussion is required before changing the policy from "verifiability, not truth" to "attributable to a reliable published source, not whether it is true"; I see that as a fundamental change in policy.

An alternative is to change those words back to the longstanding formulation, with the advantage of being shorter. What does everybody think of that idea? I would also appreciate comments on how the policy does or should apply in the hypothetical case I mention above of an editor insisting on retaining a statement the editor has admitted is false. --Coppertwig 22:05, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

No, because one of the things achieved in the merge was to get rid of "verifiability," given its implications. There's no appreciable difference between the two sentences, and this was discussed very widely before being put in place. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 22:17, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

Please give links to where there was discussion and consensus to "get rid" of the concept of "verifiability". If the new wording has the same meaning as the old wording, then the old wording should be kept as shorter. If the meanings are different, wider discussion was needed and the change needs to be presented as a change in policy. I await your comment on the concern I raise at the beginning of this section. --Coppertwig 22:58, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

The old 'verifiability, not truth' has the exact same meaning as 'attributability, not truth'. In both cases we are saying that Wikipedians are not here to scientifically or otherwise verify the truth of the statement, but are merely summarizing what was reliably published. One of the reasons for the wording change is specifically because some people misinterpreted 'verifiability' to be related to the search for truth, whereas it simply means that we can provide a reliable published source. Attributability makes that same point unambiguously clear. Crum375 23:06, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

(reset indent) User jossi said in a poll section, "The policy is very clear: We do not make assessments about the truth or falsehood of the assertions made in reliable sources. Period. If editors do not wan t to use a specific source, for whatever reasons, and they reach consensus about not using that source, don't use it. Simple. " Actually, we do make aseessments about the truth or falsehood of the assertions made in reliable sources. Where does it say in policy that we don't? If it says that, it's not true. People almost can't avoid forming opinions of the truth of falsehood of what they read. Editors might choose not to use a source for a variety of reasons; whether it seems to be true is and should be often one of those reasons. If the policy simply says nothing about truth, that's fine: people will naturally assume the encyclopedia is trying to provide true material as much as possible, and will try to do so. But it says "not whether it is true," and the context of this negative statement about the truth is changed significantly by removing the word "verifiability". So it now looks as if it may be telling editors not to use truth as a criterion. Presumably they can still use whether something seems interesting or important, etc. Do writers of this policy actually want it to discourage editors from using apparent truth as a criterion? If someone knowingly inserts false (but attributable) statements into the encyclopedia, are they helping to write the encyclopedia? --Coppertwig 15:19, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

The idea is that we're not in a position to determine whether a statement is true or not. There's a good reason for that: if we do, articles start to reflect the opinion of the authors rather than a neutral representation of the available sources. Reliable sources, however, can make such a determination, and what really matters is the consensus of experts, as expressed in published works. Jakew 15:35, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

I think a basic problem here is that "verifiability, not truth" is pithy, whereas the current version just isn't any more. This happens in writing: sometimes an idea fits well into what you're saying, and sometimes it doesn't. I think to many here, a catch phrase like "verifiability, not truth" is simply less threatening than a more elaborate sentence saying truth doesn't matter. Indeed, further down the spectrum, you could actually say it even more specifically yet: "The question is whether something is attributed. Truth doesn't matter." Would that be ok?

The thing is, also, if not as a good catch phrase, why make this point? Indeed, aren't there an infinite number of things that aren't ultimately the issue, particularly after combining the policies? "Not whether it is true, apt, obvious, important, etc." Particularly after combining the two, singling out truth as not mattering on any issue relating to either seems to take the policies where they didn't go before. I guess the question is: does the immateriality of truth really need to be stated with such prominence? This may have been primary to the idea of "verifiability," but to the combined policy I'm not sure it is. Mackan79 16:02, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

User Jossi said in a section below: This is exactly the stuff we do not want in our policies. Editors' needs to apply their best and collective judgment in these cases. I strongly oppose such wording in the policy. I agree completely! I oppose any wording in policy that is likely to be used to prevent editors from using their best and collective judgement in choosing which attributable statements are or are not worthy of inclusion in an article, and in what order.

I suspect that there may not be much disagreement about what we want the policies to do (or not do). But there is definitely disagreement about the wording.

In reply to SlimVirgin, BlueBoar and Jossi's comments above: As I understand your comments, you're indicating opposition to the insertion of "merely". However, I don't see any comment from you about other possible ways of addressing the concern I raise at the beginning of this section.

"Verifiability, not truth" means, as user tjstrf points out below, approximately the same as "Truth, not truth". The phrase "not truth" is there only to indicate that the part of the word "verifiability" that means "truth" is not what is meant here -- what is meant is attributability. When we move to the word "attributability", we no longer need the "not truth" part -- we can be very concise and just say "attributability". Leaving in the "not truth" part when it doesn't have a truth-word such as "verifiability" balancing it makes it look as if we mean that Wikipedians don't care about the truth, which is of course not true.

Inserting "merely" is one way to move the meaning of the "not truth" part back closer to what it meant when balanced by "verifiability". Deleting "not truth" is another solution. Simply keeping the original words, which are shorter, is yet another solution. There are probably still others.

User Mackan79 makes a very good point above. Think how terrible it would be if the policy were to say, "The threshold for inclusion is whether it is attributable, not whether it is interesting, important or relevant to the subject matter of the article." Then someone could insert information about a famous pet dog into an article that has nothing to do with it, and when people try to revert it, insist on keeping the information in, citing the policy to support them. If the policy says nothing about whether something has to be relevant, then common sense and other policies will prevail; but if it says something negative about relevance, people will use it to keep in irrelevant stuff. Similarly with the truth. The policy should simply say nothing about the truth.

User JulesH said, in another section, that people were confused about the meaning of the word "verifiability". If some interpretations were correct and others were incorrect, then there must be a document or record of a process somewhere, at the level of discussion required for establishment of policy, which clarifies which interpretations are correct. Would someone please tell me where to find this document? If not, then the actual wording "verifiability, not truth" is in itself the policy and all interpretations are equally valid. If these pages are merely the documentation of the policy and there's a real policy somewhere that they're documenting, then where is the real policy? I'd like to read it. --Coppertwig 13:50, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

(I apologize; I think I accidentally cut-and-pasted a user name, changing a signature above, when I meant to merely copy; I think I've fixed it.)

I suggest replacing " The threshold for inclusion in Wikipedia is whether material is attributable to a reliable published source, not whether it is true." with the longstanding wording, "The threshold for inclusion in Wikipedia is verifiability, not truth.". --Coppertwig 14:24, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

Primary sources examples

Should these be moved to WP:ATT/FAQ? Otherwise that section becomes too verbose. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 02:55, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

Right now, "primary source" is chiefly defined by those examples; if we strip them out, we are left with the first sentence. We probably should do this, but we'll need a paragraph to replace this one. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 03:54, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

I liked the simplicity of that paragraph without all the examples. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 02:56, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

Wikilinked to the FAQ. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 03:32, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

independent sources

This edit by Jossi does not preserve the point involved: that an article which uses questionable sources must be based, somewhere, on reliable sources, independent of the subject. The revised phrasing would permit an article to use dubious sources if the article is based on other bad sources.

This probably does need to be rephrased; it's been seriously misunderstood twice in the last week; but the point is (and has been reverted to as) consensus. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 04:02, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

This section requires intricate reasoning. It only covers the case of questionable or self-published sources in articles about themselves. In general, sources do not always have to be independent of the subject of the article; in some cases, the concept does not even make sense. --Gerry Ashton 05:14, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

Can a PhD thesis be a reliable source?

Specifically, can this Sociology PhD thesis on the history and social context of Transcendental Meditation be used as an RS for the Wikipedia article on TM? -Sparaig 06:06, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

The short answer is no. Remember what a thesis is: It's someone's opinion on a subject, being submitted for a university examination. Any decent thesis should have reliable sources of its own which can be drawn upon. Use those instead.

Two exceptions come to mind: If you are discussing the thesis itself as part of the article's subject, and the author of the thesis is notable, then it may be suitable as a source. Also, if a thesis gets published in a reputable, reliable scientific joural that is separate from the university, then it's suitable as a source. In both cases, it's important to characterise the thesis as being an opinion, not as an authoritative statement of fact. -/- Warren 06:18, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

The thesis does cite written sources, but it also summarizes interviews by the author of people who are now dead--specifically on the topic of TM and Maharishi Mahesh Yogi and his relationship to his religious tradition. This is central to any discussion of MMY AND TM's history and background since he was secretary to Brahmananda Saraswati, the Shankaracharya of Jyotiermath, and one of the people interviewed served as Shankarachara at the same monastery following their mutual guru's death. The interviews and written sources are probably the best available on the topic. -Sparaig 06:49, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

Use of the interviews rests on evaluation of the author of the thesis as a reliable source or the institution accepting the thesis as an institution that is reliable in verifying interviws in a thesis; and the lack of surprise in the content of the interviews. Something surprising in the interview would need to be corroberated by another source. WAS 4.250 08:42, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

I would say that a thesis is a reliable source. At least in the US, a thesis is reviewed by an academic committee and is published and publicly available in the university's library. A thesis is not an opinion, any more than any academic publication. Kevinp2 08:00, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

I agree with Kevinp2: I don't understand why a Ph.D. thesis should not be considered a reliable source. In addition to the reasons Kevinp2 offered, the work is constantly supervised by at least one experienced professional in the field to ensure quality control and solid presentation. True, there are some flawed (sometimes seriously) Ph.D. theses out there, but given the quality of some published non-fiction, that shouldn't be the reason to deny them for WP citation. By the way, as Kevinp2 stated, a thesis is more than just an opinion: that's why other academics consider it reasonable to cite them in other published works. -- J Readings 08:29, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

I thought a thesis was Original Research? - Peregrine Fisher 08:31, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

We can't put our original research in the article. We can do original research as background to make choices like what is a reliable source and we can use other people's original research as a source if it is reliable and published. WAS 4.250 08:37, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

If a thesis is published, then there's no problem, it's been vetted by another source. We can use that secondary source. If it hasn't been published, then all we can say is so-and-so believes whatever, if we're even doing an article that involves what grad students believe. I think we're talking about non-published thesises, which would be a no-no. Basically just saying what Warren said again. - Peregrine Fisher 08:59, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

But a thesis is also reviewed and approved by an academic committee of the university (to allow the student to graduate) and are then published by the university and made available to the public in its library. I would say that a draft non-approved thesis is probably not yet a reliable source but a thesis that has been reviewed, approved and published by the university is a reliable source.Kevinp2 09:19, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

Exactly. -- J Readings 09:28, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

I agree with Kevinp2. The review of a thesis by an examining board of the university is analogous to peer-review in academic journals; some say that the thesis review is stricter than peer review. If there is a single copy of the thesis always available in the university library for anyone who walks in to look at, it can be considered published as much as the rare-book example discussed earlier. More widely available material is preferred if such exists.

Peer-reviewed publications also contain opinions, and we Wikipedians rely on that: we can't write our own opinions into the articles, but we do need opinions to make the dry facts flow together meaningfully. --Coppertwig 14:31, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

I think I read somewhere (it's hard to tell with the recent reoganization) that we're not supposed to use grad student research papers. Now maybe it's different with a thesis that's accepted, and the student graduates. Is this where it changes? - Peregrine Fisher 09:37, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

It would be nice to be sure. Coplin got his PhD in Sociology from UCSD in 1990. The online version of his thesis is billed as the final version. -Sparaig 09:40, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

You might want to check with the UCSD library to see if what they have matches what he has posted online. You might be able to get the thesis via an interlibrary loan or they may have digitized it (less likely since he graduated in 1990).Kevinp2 10:02, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

it exists. I have no reason to assume he's putting up kilobytes of false info online. -Sparaig 12:28, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

Me neither :-) But it bolsters your case for considering it a reliable source.Kevinp2 16:14, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

I can find it in the library of University of California, San Diego here, so that should help with an inter library loan. The only thing I would place caution on is whether you are giving this source undue weight. What exactly are you looking to substantiate through this source? Steve block Talk 19:41, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

(indent reset) I would tend to agree that the review process for a PhD thesis is analogous to peer-review, so long as it's a thesis for an accredited university. If the university is unaccredited, its fact-checking process is meaningless. Seraphimblade ^{Talk to me Please review me!} 20:04, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

Perhaps we should have an FAQ entry on this subject? JulesH 22:06, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

The university was University California San Diego, for a PhD in Sociology. The thesis covers the early history and historical/social context of the earliest years of the Transcendental Meditation organization, starting in the mid-1950s through the late 1980's, and includes research on the background of Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, as well as summaries of interviews with his earliest students, and a monk who was in the monastery he lived in at the time he lived there who later became head of that particular physical monastery (see here for an explanation of my peculiarly precise wording). At this point, aside from a contention about his date of birth (is he 90 or 95? --even MMY says he doesn't remember, even though someone told him a few years back), I'm not worried too much about including specific bits in the relevant articles, but I wanted to check first. Also, Dr. Coplin only put about 1/3 of his thesis online, and the more meaty bits appear to be the parts he didn't post. If the thesis is considered a RS then I'll bug him more about putting the rest up. I'm also curious for my own interest in the subject. -Sparaig 22:50, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

It's déjà vu all over again. I brought up this question last October; the discussion is at Wikipedia talk:Reliable sources/archive8#Dissertations. —Angr 08:09, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

A doctoral thesis which is accepted by the person's doctoral committee becomes a published piece of scholarly research. It is far from just being like a term paper a student writes for a course. If it were a hoax, biased opinion or shoddy research, it would reflect on the department, the university, the doctoral advisor and the committee, so they have even a stronger incentive to make sure it is accurate and valid than if they were anonymous volunteer editorial consultants for a journal. A scholar has to jump through considerable hoops to get the thing accepted. They are then sometimes cited in books or scholarly journals. They are indexed in Dissertation Abstracts and are available on demand from University Microfilms. They are frequently published in scholarly journals, but we need not wait for that to use them as citable sources in Wikipedia articles. My criterion would be that it had been accepted as part of the requirements for the PhD (not just a draft or preliminary or rejected dissertation) and that the university itself be accredited. That would put it in the same reliable source category as a refereed scientific journal (which is no guarantee that everything in it is absolutely true and accurate and unbiased). But it is far, far more than just someone's opinion, like a blog posting or a letter to the editor. The greater hazard of dissertations is not that they are wrong, but that they are boring unimaginative repetitions or boring empirical studies of subjects that others do not find interesting. Edison 21:44, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

I realise I'm jumping in a little late here but...A thesis is a reliable source, but should not be used in every circumstance. If you are writing in an article, for instance, Some political scientists, such as X (name of author of thesis) (reference), have argued that political power is dominated by a small elite of wealthy corporations, then a thesis is OK as a source. If, however, you are trying to use it as a statement of fact rather than of academic opinion, then it isn't necessarily an appropriate source (unless, for instance, it's a scientific study that generated new experimental data). There's nothing inherently unreliable about a thesis, but it should be used in conjunction with other, more definitive sources. Walton ^{Vivat Regina!} 16:17, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

I would agree that a dissertation in the humanities anyway (I am unfamiliar with dissertations in the sciences) should qualify as a reliable source. The fact that they are overseen by a committee of scholars in the field makes them peer-reviewed sources. In my field, English literature, scholars often rely on dissertations when there are no other sources. Therefore, you do see dissertations quoted and footnoted in both peer-reviewed articles and books when there are no other sources available. I agree that these works are not ideal because they are incompletely argued and contain lots of summary (they are student exercises in many ways), but that does not make them unreliable. Many books and articles also contain the same flaws. I would say that one has to evaluate each dissertation individually; one famous example is of course Derrida's which contained the seeds of deconstruction. One significant problem with dissertations, at least in the United States and Canada, is accessibility; one must obtain them through a well-financed research library. I was under the impression that all dissertations were published through the University of Michigan. They used to have a dissertation microfiche program, although now I think that it is slowly becoming digital. Awadewit 15:28, 8 March 2007 (UTC) - I agree with Sparaig that this should be added to the FAQ on sources so that question doesn't keep coming up.

Press releases as a primary source

I added "press releases" as a type of primary source. It seems appropriate to me, given that Wikipedia links to quite a number of press and news releases for attribution, and we have {{cite press release}} to go along with that sort of usage. Hopefully this is allright. This is a really well-written document, kudos to everyone who's been involved with it. -/- Warren 06:38, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

Thanks, Warren. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 02:55, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

Self-published source restrictions seem too broad

I am a little concerned that the restrictions on using self-published sources will kill off the ability to use a lot of good information that is available on the Internet. I offer the example of Tom's Hardware Guide that is an online site that publishes excellent reviews of computer hardware and accessories. Here is an example of a review of DDR RAM. This review is one that I feel comfortable using to make a purchase worth hundreds of dollars. Yet, we can't use it because it is a self-published source and the author is not a "well-known, professional researcher". Given the fast moving nature of this business, I doubt that this review will ever appear in any printed publication, since it will likely be obsolete by the time it is published. Yet, the review itself seems reasonable and well researched to those who understand the subject matter.

There are numerous such sources of information in many fields of human endeavor. While there is no guarantee that the information is reliable, readers are usually able to read the articles and decide if they are reliable.

At the present time, the reliable sources policy seems biased towards academia, publishing houses and the news media. While these organizations have staff and a peer review process, these processes by no means guarantee reliability, considering some of the news media scandals that have been exposed in recent years. Moreover, they tend to be exclusive in nature, often filtering out authors, subject matters or perspectives that they don't find interesting. The Internet in general is democratically leveling the publishing playing field, whether we like it or not. I certainly agree that some self-published material is unreliable but I also contend that some self-published material is reliable and should be used when appropriate. If we don't come up with some way to do this, Wikipedia will be left behind in future years as more and more good information is directly published by individual citizens.

I would like to invite comment and suggest some criteria that might be feasible:

• The material is signed by a real person using a full name, i.e. no anonymous or pseudonymous postings.
• The real person provides contact information to enable direct communication.
• The material is marked with a special link to indicate that it is self-published i.e. reader beware.
• Restricting sourcing to non-political and non-biographical articles.

Kevinp2 08:48, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

Is Tom's Hardware not a reliable source? I would have thought it was. Do they let just anyone write for them? If they do, then there not reliable. - Peregrine Fisher 09:01, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

They have a list of editors but it is not evident to me about how their authors are selected, or how or if their work is approved. I have never personally heard of any of the authors (which is not surprising in this field). I focus on the subject matter and whether it seems to be reasonably written and well researched. Are you suggesting that having some kind of control process is what you consider important?Kevinp2 09:14, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

(edit conflict)Having an editor who stands in the way of bad info is key. That's why blogs and wikis aren't reliable; anyone can say whatever they want. Basically, there's two kinds of reliable: a writer can be reliable on their own, or an editor can screen writers to make sure they're reliable. In the big picture, there should be no way that a wikipedia editor who wants something added can go and add that info to another source, and then cite it. That's where editors come in. - Peregrine Fisher 09:30, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

There can be cases where blogs can be considered reliable. As an example, Volokh.com is a blog of well know lawyers and law professors. If you read this post by law professor Jonathan Adler, it is a good example of a secondary source, reviewing the primary source of an Ohio Supreme Court ruling. In fact, this is my larger point, that just because something is self-published, does not automatically mean that it is unreliable. I would like to see some high but attainable standard for sourcing self-published material. Perhaps one of the standards could be that the real person who is the source is well known as an expert in the field.Kevinp2 09:53, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

The problem here is that by the rules listed here (and previously at WP:V), these blogs are not reliable sources. I don't dispute that they should be, but the rules are quite clear on the subject. Unless somebody is a "professional researcher", which none of these bloggers appear to me to be, their blogs cannot be cited. JulesH 13:07, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

Which is why I am asking that we change the policy to state that subject to strict criteria, that certain blog posts (as opposed to all posts from certain blogs) and other self-published material can be used, with every use being evaluated individually. The criteria could be all of the following:

• The material is signed by a real person using a full name, i.e. no anonymous or pseudonymous postings.
• The real person provides contact information to enable direct communication and the editor verifies that the real person exists and owns up to the material.
• The real person is acknowledged or reputed to be an expert in the field.
• The material is relevant to the topic at hand and no other secondary source is available that can be used instead.
• The material is marked with a special link to indicate that it is self-published.
• The material meets the other requirements for being a reliable source - i.e. non-partisan, not advancing an agenda.
• The material cannot be used in biographical articles.
• Every use has to be individually evaluated, i.e. if an author's self-published source is used once, that gives it no special credence for future use.
• There is a way to state (perhaps through a < - - comment template ) that the editor has verified that the source meets the above requirements).

The above list sets a high but attainable standard that is reasonable for Wikipedia to accept some of the the increasing amount of good material that is self-published on the Internet and will continue to increase in future years, that will not make its way into the official publication system.Kevinp2 14:29, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

I agree with a lot of the comments you are making, unfortunately blogs and more generally user submitted information is still a new thing to a lot of people who have not grown up with this. But this will only get bigger and bigger, as it becomes more widespread. This is part of "Web_2.0". Consider this, many hundreds of years ago when newspapers were still young we would have heard a lot of similar objections to what we are hearing now. Likewise blogs for instances are increasingly becoming the modern day newspaper, as can be seen by many major newspapers including blogs as part of what they do. It is highly ironic that wikipedia that is itself part of Web 2.0 is not moving with the times and recognising these changes that we too are part of this new improvements of the web. Mathmo ^Talk 03:03, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

Ask youself: why should the reader belive this claim? Oh cause this source says so. Well, why should the reader accept that source for that claim? do others? Is the author an acknowledged expert? By who? was the source reviewed by independent knowledgeable people? and provide in the footnote enough for the reader to judge the nature and quality of the source if there is an issue. WAS 4.250 09:24, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

I would certainly do these things. In this case, I consider Tom's Hardware (the site) to be an acknowledged expert. But the text of the policy (as presently written) still seems to forbid this source. Kevinp2 09:35, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

Are you concerned with "A self-published source is material that has been published by the author, or whose publisher is a vanity press, a web-hosting service, or other organization that provides little or no editorial oversight."? I don't think tomshardware fits this. Their articles are not written by Tom, and I think they have editorial oversight. I looked at there home page and couldn't find where it says what hoops a reviewer needs to jump through, but I think they are significant. - Peregrine Fisher 09:50, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

I agree with you that the web site Tom's Hardware has some kind of editorial oversight, even though the individual authors may not be well known. However (and maybe I am mistaken), I have seen and understood the ban on self-published sourcing to be construed very broadly.Kevinp2 09:57, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

I think the few users talking here today can agree that it's a realiable source. It would be nice if we could get a definitive answer out of this page, that we could use in the future, but we probably cannot. That's the beauty/curse of wikpedia, it's all on the editor to judge. Maybe someday we can use something like the AfD process to decide what sources are reliable; until then it's on a case by case basis. The best you can probably do is provide a rational on the talk page why you think it's a reliable source, mentioning the reasoning we've been talking about. - Peregrine Fisher 10:29, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

Does this all mean that an editorial is self-published? There is not editor for one (the board wrote it). Also, most op-eds are writen in the same atmosphere (no editor can change content) so they should also be considered the same as self published? If so, the page could use some clarification. Pdbailey 02:21, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

By definition, an editorial is not factual, so no, it wouldn't be reliable, no matter what it's printed in. Tom's Hardware, though, I imagine would be-it undergoes fact checking and editorial control, and is accepted as an authority in its field. Seraphimblade ^{Talk to me Please review me!} 02:24, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

"By definition, an editorial is not factual, so no, it wouldn't be reliable, no matter what it's printed in." I completely disagree. Citing editorials from well-known reliable sources is perhaps the best way we have available of showing people's opinions on a subject, and opinions are important in many articles. As to Tom's Hardware, I have no doubt of the site's reliability. The material is not self-published: it is published by Tom's Guide Publishing AG, and is no different in any real respect to most magazines (i.e., it is written on contract for the publisher, which retains editorial control). JulesH 13:07, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

Proposed new example of synthesis

(I originally posted this comment a few weeks ago, and decided at the time to leave the example and revisit the issue when the Attribution policy was live)

I think the whole plagiarism example is hard to understand and ambiguous. It's meant to be illustrating the idea that given points A and B which have reliable sources, you can't a new point C if this argument has not been made in the sources. However, it's not at all clear from the example what points A, B and C are meant to be, particularly as the plagiarism case it is based on is complicated. As a result, different people have repeatedly been coming to different conclusions about what the example is trying to say.

I propose replacing the example in the synthesis section with a more straightforward example along the following lines:

Example:

"In Northtown there were 1000 violent crimes last year_{Reliable source 1}, whereas in Southtown there were 2000 violent crimes in the same period_{Reliable source 2}. Therefore there is more violent crime in Southtown than Northtown_{No source}."

Under the attribution policy, the conclusion that there is more violent crime in Southtown than Northtown is not permitted, where it is not backed up by an appropriate source. This is because coming to a conclusion like this requires careful consideration of the source data; for example, the two statistics might have been calculated in different ways, or using different definitions of which crimes are violent or not. Wikipedia is not in a position to verify this background research itself. Instead, a conclusion must be attributed to a reputable source, unless it is very straightforward and uncontroversial.

Lots of alternative examples along similar lines could also be considered. What do you think? Enchanter 11:47, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

Your example seems to fall into the "simple mathematical calculation" exception to me. Can we come up with something that does not involve numbers? Blueboar 13:55, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

If the current is too complicated, then this is too simple. What's good about what we have now is that statement C actually involves research: picking up the manual of style and making an apperantly harmless observation, that is in fact OR. Note it's an "if/then" statement (with "then" elided) and this is central to why it's OR. The suggested lacks the nuance of the current. Marskell 14:16, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

I suggest changing the beginning of the 2nd quoted text from "If Jones's claim that he always consulted the original sources is false, ..." to "If Jones merely copied references, ..." This also has the advantage of shortening it.

Even better: Delete the first sentence, and change the second sentence to: 'The Chicago Manual of Style does not refer to copying references as "plagiarism." ' --Coppertwig 14:16, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

The suggestion is too simplistic, and it's not clear it's an example of an unpublished synthesis that serves to advance a position. The example we have in the policy is a real one, and it's illustrative of the complexity of the examples we often have to deal with. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 22:37, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

Could you explain further? Do you mean that complexity in itself is desirable, to illustrate that these situations are complex? Or, is there some essential aspect of the example which my edit would remove, and if so, what is it?

How about this instead? Source A classifies armed robbery as a violent crime. Source B states that Brown was convicted of armed robbery. Wikipedia should not state, based only on those sources, that "Brown committed a violent crime."

How about a simple fictional example, plus a link to the more complex, real-life Smith/Jones example on a subpage, perhaps in the FAQ? --Coppertwig 02:13, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

It's better to have a real example than a fabricated one. The examples you're giving aren't really examples of an unpublished synthesis serving to advance a position. An armed robbery, for example, is unquestionably a violent crime, and you offer no context for us to judge whether a position is being advanced. The real example is complicated, and it needs to be, otherwise there would be no point in including an example. The simple cases are easy to understand. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 02:53, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

What we need is a simple example which is easy to understand, in order to illustrate the concept of "synthesis". It's not obvious to me that someone who was convicted of armed robbery committed a violent crime; maybe they just had a gun in their pocket during a nonviolent crime or something. Could you come up with a simple example of disallowed synthesis? Concepts are normally illustrated with the simplest possible example that illustrates them. I don't think "synthesis" means "complex". I see nothing wrong with having both a simple, fabricated example and a real, complex one.

Here's another example: Source A says that everybody in a certain town always wears a hat all day on Sunday. Source B says that a resident of the town was interviewed on a Sunday. Wikipedia should not say, based only on these sources, "The resident was wearing a hat during the interview." --Coppertwig 04:04, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

The synthesis in the hat example is a flawed synthesis because the resident of the town might not have been in the town at the time of the interview. If the example stated the residient was in the town during the interview, the synthesis would be allowable. The section of Attribution that justifies rejecting the example is not "Unpublished synthesis" but rather "Exceptional claims require exceptional sources." It is an exceptional claim that everybody in an entire town always wears hats all day on Sundays.

I'm not commenting just for the sake of poking holes in Coppertwig's logic. I think this illustrates that for any synthesis example we use, our objection should be just to the synthesis process, and not because the statements taken from source A or B are difficult to believe.--Gerry Ashton 04:32, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

A couple of notes on SlimVirgin's comment above:

• I don't understand the argument that it is better to have a real example than a fabricated one. It is irrelevant to a reader trying to understand the policy whether the example is real or not; and
• I strongly disagree with the argument that complicated examples are a good thing. The point of this page is to explain policy. If people don't understand the example, they are likely to fail to understand the policy that the example is supposed to be illustrating.

I suggest that, at minimum, the existing example is simplified so that it is clear to the reader what is going on, without having to guess at what the context and background is. (the statement that "The whole point of this paragraph is the conclusion that, given the Chicago Manual of Style's definition of plagiarism, Jones did not commit it." does not logically follow from the text above it, although this is not obvious given the complexity of the example). Enchanter 23:27, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

Perhaps we need two examples: first, an example of a synthesis of the type which is allowed, and secondly, an example of one which is not allowed. Here's another example: Source A states that residents of a certain town are always wearing boots when they're on the street in January. Source B states that a resident was interviewed on the street in that town. Wikipedia should not say (or should it?) based only on these sources, "The resident was wearing boots during the interview." --Coppertwig 01:36, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

lecture not a reliable source

Is a lecture about how a discovery or theory-change was made a "reliable source?" Specifically, I'm in an edit war over this phrase in the article on John Hagelin. The other editor says that Hagelin isn't a reliable source concerning... something... :

• 1986: After a series of discussions with Maharishi Mahesh Yogi on the potential relationship between Physics and Vedic Cosmology (see [1] and [2]), Hagelin made some preliminary modifications in Flipped SU(5) Superstring Theory to make it more in-tune with Vedic philosophy, which also made the theory more robust from a Western scientific perspective. He contacted John Ellis of CERN with this information who then contacted Dimitri Nanopoulos and the three published many papers on the subject over the next several years." -Sparaig 07:51, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

Any claim that connects Vedic Cosmology and Superstring Theory needs to be very very reliable and some lecture is nowhere good enough. It like claiming Columbus not only discovered America but also inspired computers. WAS 4.250 07:56, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

The point is that Hagelin contacted the other two after applying his philosophical beliefs to the theory. This is, in principle, no more controversial than Kekulé using a dream to explain the structure of benzene, though of course Kekulé didn't go on to write long articles on the relationship of snakes to chemistry. -Sparaig 08:05, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

As I've said elsewhere, this doesn't satisfy V at all (a lecture a TM supporter went to?), certainly doesn't satisfy RS, and comes nowhere near satisfying the Acceptable Sources criteria of the Pseudoscience ArbCom decision for sources on science. Both of the Hagelin papers also clearly fail the AS criteria, as well as RS. --Philosophus ^T 08:27, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

Actually, a video of a lecture Hagelin gave, formally distributed by his university (IOW, published). Regardless, it's Hagelin's account of how he came up with his initial changes to the theory, and is certainly as RS as Kekulé's account of how he came up with the structure of benzene in a dream which is mentioned in the wikipedia article on Kekulé:

He wrote that he discovered the ring shape of the benzene molecule after dreaming of a snake seizing its own tail, a common symbol in many ancient cultures known as the Ouroboros. This dream came to him after years of studying the nature of carbon-carbon bonds. Kekulé claimed to have solved the problem of how carbon atoms could bond to up to four other atoms at the same time. While his claims were well publicized and accepted, by the early 1920s Kekulé's own biographer came to the conclusion that Kekulé's understanding of the tetravalent nature of carbon bonding depended on the previous research of Archibald Scott Couper (1831-1892). Furthermore, the Austrian chemist Josef Loschmidt (1821-1895) had earlier posited a cyclic structure for benzene (and many other cyclic systems) as early as 1861, although he had not actually proved this structure to be correct. -Sparaig 09:43, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

OK, as I see the discussion here, we're talking about using a self-published source by the subject of the article to fill in some historical information about how he claims he developed some theory (which I'm not familiar with, and am not about to attempt to understand). I don't really see an issue here -- the guy is, presumably, the best available source on how he developed his own theory. The only thing that strikes me about the text quoted above is that "which also made the theory more robust from a Western scientific perspective" requires an additional third party source that's qualified to make such a statement. JulesH 13:00, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

That's pretty much the gist of it, except he didn't develop the theory originally, Dimitri Nanopoulos did. According to Hagelin, he did his initial tweaks of the theory, contacted Ellis with a fax "Isn't this the sweetest little thing" or similar words, and Ellis contacted Nanopoulos and the three collaborated on a bunch of papers. Flipped SU(5) isn't that important these days, but back in the day, it was a contender--it even got a special mention in the first episode of Sliders with John Rys-Davies scornfully scribbling the name on the blackboard because no-one in the Physics class could remember it. It isn't that important in the article save as insight into how Hagelin went from a hotshot theorist to being a New Age physicist: he made his mainstream Physics rep using the theory in the first place. -Sparaig 13:27, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

More accurately, he made his reputation by applying his philosophy to a mainstream theory. The question of whether or not it was better is unanswerable: it is what he says about it. One assumes that Ellis and Nanopolous agreed with him or they wouldn't have published papers with him on the subject. While Hagelin is bright, I don't think his reputation was such that they would have sought HIM out if he hadn't already made some substantial contribution to the theory--he was head of the Physics department at Maharishi International University (now called Maharishi University of Management) at the time, which was and is hardly a prestigious school in the Physics community. Regardless, I can certainly add a "which Hagelin believed" to the article in order to avoid OR. -Sparaig 19:28, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

Saying that Nanopolous and Ellis agreed about the Transcendental Meditation parts of this is likely a BLP violation without an extremely strong source, considering that if it were true, it would completely destroy their reputations. --Philosophus ^T 00:26, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

Except this source doesn't appear to satisfy WP:V. We can't just rely on Sparaig's word (even disregarding the COI problems with doing so). --Philosophus ^T 00:26, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

I'm sorry. I apparently have paraphrased Hagelin so badly that you have completely misunderstood. At no time did Hagelin say that he told Ellis that "TM made this theory better." He made no mention of including anything about Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, Vedic philosophy or TM in the fax to Ellis. All Hagelin asserts is that following his conversations with MMY about Vedic Cosmology, he examined several theories and decided that Flipped SU(5) was the most amenable to modification along Vedic lines. After his initial modifications, he realized that the modifications made it stronger scientifically,and faxed Ellis with a copy of his initial modifications and the note "isn't this the sweetest little thing?" or similar words. Ellis contacted Nanopolous, the original author of Flipped SU(5), and the three published many papers on the subject over the years. This was the gist of Hagelin's lecture. I have it on video someplace, and I'm quite willing to forgo adding the phrase until I review the video again. I'll even put it on youtube if I can figure out how if you are worried that my COI is coloring my memory so badly. -Sparaig 01:32, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

Important item missing from RS

Plase see this discusion - which was suddenly archived (shortly after I advertised in on WP:RFC and WP:VPP). Since now the entire RS page is being shoved aside, I'd like to raise the point of historigraphic bias here.-- _{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk}  18:43, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

My thoughts on the subject of historiography and bias is that bias is not really in the realm of RS (or even ATT... it is more a NPOV issue). A source can be reliable under our rules and still be biased. The key is how you use it... a history written with a distinct Nazi or Soviet bias is certainly reliable for what it says (as a statement of the opinion of the author if nothing else)... however, when using such sources in an article, it would be helpful to have some context, such as a mention of the potential bias of the source, what current authors say about that bias and contrasting what it says with other sources. Blueboar 19:41, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

Quite right; what do we have on the proper identification of sources? Septentrionalis PMAnderson 19:50, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

(edit conflict)As far as I can see the point being made here is that Communist historiography was blatantly Marxist, and dropped politically inconvenient facts down the memory hole. Both these things are of course the case; but Piotrus' conclusion seems to be that we should declare all such sources inherently not-reliable and ignore them completely.

I dispute this, and I see signs that Piotrus would qualify his remarks upon reconsideration. For one thing, the Stalinist PoV is a substantial PoV on many questions, and we should include it (together with refutations, often) under WP:NPOV. Again, work published under the Communists may well be the best current work on, say, Kievan Rus', although we should take the circumstances into account when judging its reliability against other sources. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 19:50, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

I don't claim we declare such sources not usable for Wikipedia. Certainly they have many real facts, and their POV is usually notable. However I see some editors ignore such POV and claim for example that if a prominent Soviet researcher said A, and prominent modern Western scholar(s) say B, views of both sides should be presented as equal, even when the issue concerns an area that would very likely be affected by Soviet ideology. After some thought I agree it is closely related to WP:NPOV#Undue_weight, but I don't think Stalinist (Soviet POV) should be give the same weight as modern research. Particulary when 'only' Soviet sources support such claims, can we claim they fail the current part of RS claims not supported or claims that are contradicted by the prevailing view in the relevant academic community.? For a case study, see Polonization, where a certain editor inserted a POVed view by a Soviet-era scholar, and keeps removing contradictory modern research...-- _{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk}  05:10, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

RfC in a Dispute concerning Original Research

Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Language and linguistics (the request as of 07:19, 1 March 2007).
07:20, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

Thanks, JulesH, PMAnderson and WAS 4.250 (in alphabetical order), for answering the RfC. Of the three, JulesH and Was 4.250 sided with my position (like Grouse before you), while PMAnderson suggested some compromise, which Yom accepted and promptly incorporated into the Semitic languages article. I consider PMAnderson's suggestion an improvement over the previous version, so i'm pleased with this development. Nevertheless, i think this suggestion is still not entirely satisfactory in terms of complying with the attribution policy. I'd appreciate it if interested parties (the three above or others) spared some time to express their opinions in this matter. PManserson described his suggestion in his comment as of 18:59, 2 March 2007 on Talk:Semitic languages, and my critique of it can be found in my comment as of 07:59, 3 March 2007 on the same page.

I'd also be grateful for your participation in the related discussion that's been going on on the Talk:Tigrinya language page between JulesH, MikeG and myself.

Thanks. Itayb 07:47, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

I've indicated in the article whatever criticism i had. I'm pleased with the modified compromise. It seems to be stable (has lasted three days now). I've therefore struck the RfC request off the list of RfC's. I thank everyone who's stepped in to help. :) Itayb 08:43, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Isn't there a policy saying Wikipedia itself is not a reliable source?

I asked this at Wikipedia talk:Reliable sources and was advised to ask here... Didn't the reliable sources guideline once spell out explicitly that Wikipedia articles themselves are not considered to be reliable sources? Am I mistaken? Or is this now addressed somewhere else, and if so, where? (In another venue, someone has cited Wikipedia as if it were a reliable source, and I'd like to point out that Wikipedia itself does not accept Wikipedia as a reliable source... but can't find what to point to). Dpbsmith (talk) 21:31, 26 February 2007 (UTC)

The point of wikipedia providing published reliable sources is to provide a way to verify our content, to establish credibility, and to provide a resource for further learning. See also and other internal links provide a source of further learning but pointing to ourselves does not add to legitimate credibility nor provide an independent way to verify our content so those aims must be met by linking to reliable published sources other than ourselves regardless of whether we are or are not ourselves reliable. We are actually at the point that we are more reliable than newpapers but less reliable than Britannica and have been cited by courts of law and numerous newspapers as well as scholarly papers using us as a primary source. Once you fully understand that even the most reliable sources have errors, it all becomes a matter of careful intelligent use and not bright-line distinctions. WAS 4.250 00:52, 27 February 2007 (UTC)

Whether we are more reliable than newspapers depends on the paper and on the article. We are less reliable than the NYTimes, but whether we are less reliable than News of the World is debatable. DGG 03:02, 27 February 2007 (UTC)

I believe there is a sentence to this effect in WP:ATT/FAQ. "Wikis, including Wikipedia and other wikis sponsored by the Wikimedia Foundation are not regarded as reliable sources." JulesH 09:22, 27 February 2007 (UTC)

When this was in RS, it was explained that Wikipedia articles were not reliable for several reasons... one, it would be a self reference (never a good idea)... two, since wikipedia is a work in progress, any information cited could well change or even be deleted at any time (which would affect the verifiability of any statement that was cited to a Wikipedia article)... three, because anyone can edit Wikipedia, we do not know if the person who wrote the article knows what they are talking about or not.... and four, there is no editorial oversight, peer review, etc. In other words, Wikipedia does not meet a number of our requirements for reliability. Blueboar 14:48, 27 February 2007 (UTC)

That's nonsense.

The first reason doesn't apply. A self-reference is saying something like "in this article..." Using Wikipedia as a source isn't a self-reference, as long as if you copied the article somewhere else outside of Wikipedia, the reference would still make sense.

The second of the four reasons given above is wrong. Wikipedia has the ability to link to a version made as of a specific date. This can't change or be deleted at any time; it's no more subject to change than any ordinary web-based source.

Reasons three and four amount to "it's a self-published source". While we *usually* can't use self-published sources, there are circumstances under which self-published sources are allowed.

This should be fixed, in the FAQ too. WP:RS has a lot of problems with this, among which is this problem. Ken Arromdee 17:09, 27 February 2007 (UTC)

• For the first point, see WP:SELF for the relevant sense of self-reference: a statement which implies that "this is a Wikipedia article".
• For the rest: Wikipedia is not a reliable source; if any source were appealled to which was as inaccurate, PoV-pushing and self-serving as the average WP article, I would insist, at a minumum, on a prose attribution. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 21:52, 27 February 2007 (UTC)

1) Using Wikipedia as a source does *not* imply "this is a Wikipedia article".

2) Saying that Wikipedia is inaccurate, POV-pushing, and self-serving is the same thing as saying "it has the problems of a self-published source". Nevertheless, self-published sources are allowed under some circumstances. Ken Arromdee 14:40, 28 February 2007 (UTC)

Using Wikipedia in Wikipedia is allowable, but should be avoided where possible; because we're almost all writing that article from a strong PoV. Beyond that, I see nothing to (2) at all. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 22:22, 28 February 2007 (UTC)

You're forgetting that this isn't just about Wikipedia articles. I can't think offhand of any case where we'd want to use Wikipedia articles as sources, but we might want to use articles from other Wikis or even Wikipedia talk pages. Consider the case where someone writes a statement about themselves or their own activities on a talk page (like the one where Eric Raymond says a particular accusation is false and the person who made it apologized). This is a self-published primary source. If Eric Raymond wrote that on his own web page, it would be clearly permitted as a self-published source in an article about the author, where there is no reasonable doubt who wrote it. It should be permitted if he writes it on a Wikipedia talk page instead. Ken Arromdee 14:59, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

How about linking to Wikipedia in another language? Somethig like: See the French version of the article for more info. --Brian Wiseman 00:30, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

The reason is that we are a tertiary source, but we use secondary sources. What works for one may not work for the other.

We strive to use mainly secondary sources. Our sourcing guidelines are geared mainly towards secondary sources; there is much doubt as to whether or not other wikis or sources of similar nature can be authoritative in that role. As secondary sources are by definition introducing new ideas to the world--ideas which can't easily be verified by following a citation--other means, such as peer review and author reputation, must be used to vouch for their reliability. Wikipedia is not a reliable secondary source (and per WP:NOR, not a secondary source at all), and shouldn't be used as such.

The Wikipedia project, on the other hand, is based on the assumption that the wiki model can produce a reliable tertiary source, which is what Wikipedia strives to be. With tertiary sources--especially ones which insist as strongly as this one does that the provenance of information be documented--you don't have to trust the author to know what he/she is talking about (at least not as much); in theory, everything is checkable. (In practice, there's a lot of work to do). So as a tertiary source, we are reliable. We hope.

However, we prefer to cite seconary sources. If tertiary sources cite each other (or themselves), there is the danger of tautologies being introduced. We avoid that issue by citing sources which are not likely to cite us for anything.

--EngineerScotty 22:36, 27 February 2007 (UTC)

If we are using another Wikipedia article as a source, then why aren't we cutting out the middleman and using the sources cited in that article? Oh, wait a minute, you say the Wikipedia article doesn't have sources for the information we want to cite the article for? Oh dear! -- Donald Albury 00:36, 28 February 2007 (UTC)

Exactly. Of course, tertiary sources have tremendous value--a well-written science textbook is probably a better source for information on general relativity than are the papers of Albert Einstein, as the former aggregates and arranges the information into a cohesive whole--but for many topics, well-written tertiary sources don't exist. Or the only well-written tertiary source is Wikipedia. (Or a Wikipedia article exists, but it isn't well-written). --EngineerScotty 01:02, 28 February 2007 (UTC)

A Wikipedia talk page, for example, is a reliable primary source about itself. Usually this is useless, because the page isn't notable. But if it is notable: if, for example, an inflammatory comment on a Wikipedia talk page is widely quoted in newspapers and therefore causes an international incident, someone later writing a Wikipedia article about the original cause of the incident could (in my opinion) use the original comment on the Wikipedia talk page as a reliable reference -- not as a reference to verify claims made on that talk page, but to verify the wording, date and time of the notable comment. It's reliable because we assume nobody tinkers with the page histories. --Coppertwig 02:24, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

Re the original question above: Wikipedia articles are not to use other Wikipedia articles are sources, in order to avoid circularity. This does not mean that Wikipedia is not a "reliable source" to people who consult Wikipedia for information. We should not give out the impression that Wikipedia does not consider itself a reliable source. For the more well-developed articles, Wikipedia may be a better source (in some ways) than any other, because it is based on several other sources and has been extensively discussed. It still should not be used as a source for writing other Wikipedia articles. --Coppertwig 02:30, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

There may be rare exceptions, but I would think even in this case it would still be a good idea to require using the media sources as primary information. If enough information didn't get into secondary sources to be worth writing an article, this would be some indication the phenomenon is ephemeral and not encyclopedic. The requirement that there be enough information in reliable secondary sources to support and verify an article also offers a check on media self-centeredness -- the tendency of a medium, such as Wikipedia, to focus unduly on itself. The requirement of secondary sources helps us avoid unduly encouraging personalities who might use Wikipedia to create rather than merely report events. --Shirahadasha 13:03, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

The existence of the media articles is needed to establish notability, but the verification of the facts (what was the wording of the actual original talk page comment that started the whole thing?) would be best done in this case by referring to the original talk page article. --Coppertwig 17:41, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

Someone should then check Essjay, as it is quoting user talk pages. -- ReyBrujo 17:43, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

No problem. That quote from a user talk page is a self-published comment (published on a Wikipedia talk page) by a notable person and presumably can be verified to have been written by that person. That's equally as valid as using a notable person's personal webspace blog as a reliable source: that is, it can be used as a reliable attribution of what the words were that the person said, not necessarily as a verification that what they said was true. --Coppertwig 01:16, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

Yes problem. The problem is that the attribution policy and FAQ explicitly rules out all uses of Wikis as sources. No exceptions are given such as "wikis are okay as self-published sources when other self-published sources would be accepted". When I tried changing it so that it did say that, it got reverted, and people above are fiercely arguing against it for what seems to me to be spurious reasons. Ken Arromdee 16:26, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

Skeptic Magazine not a reliable source?

I have been "informed" by two non-admin editors that Skeptic Magazine is an "Unreliable source", "not a reliable source" in this article [3]. Any opinions pro or con? The dispute is about this article: When Scholars Know Sin: Alternative Religions and Their Academic Supporters by Prof. Stephen A. Kent and Teresa Krebs. --Tilman 12:15, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

I'd say it is reliable, but you have to be careful about potential bias, as it has a stated and all-guiding political goal. I'd make sure I attributed opinions explicitly to the magazine, but see no reason it cannot be used. JulesH 12:48, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

These articles are clearly in the nature of editorials, so even in the absence of other issues they would be reliable for purposes of offering the opinions of its authors. --Shirahadasha 12:56, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

Correct, they are the opinions of their authors. However, in the article they are treated to support factual claims. Anyways, Skeptic Magazine is by itself not a relevant source, since its readership is confined to a narrow portion of the population. Fossa_?! 18:13, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

So is every magazine. There is no magazine that is read by a large portion of the population. The more scientific a publication is, the less read it. This argument is silly to the extreme. --Tilman 19:11, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

I have now been informed that the Skeptics Society is an activist organisation, like the KKK: [4]. Life is full of surprises. --Tilman 17:11, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

Well, undoubtedly Skeptics Society is an activist organization, they are an interest group, just like the KKK or NAACP is. That's, frankly, a banality. Fossa_?! 18:17, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

I would argue that it is an organization that clearly has as specific viewpoint. As such, we should not create a blanket statement such as "this is a reputable source" or this is not one. Each edit needs to be evaluated within its context. Please discuss in that article's talk page and find common ground, and if you can't, please pursue dispute resolution. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 18:46, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

I'm not experienced enough to try this, and it would probably cost more weeks of work. If the skeptic society is activist about something, then it is to be pro-science. It could as well be said that the APA is an activist organisation (pro psychiatry), thus the "APA monitor" would no longer be a reliable source per WP:Fossa. This is simply a bad faith attempt to keep out something by Wikilawyering, instead of doing research to find articles with a different point of view.

I also consider the comparison with the KKK very offensive, because this also associates me, a longtime occasional reader of their publications, with the KKK. --Tilman 19:08, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

As said many times, and as clearly stated in this policy: How reliable a source is depends on context; what is reliable in one topic may not be in another. Rather than engage in edit wars there, or bring your dispute here, please discuss in the talk page of article you are editing rather than here, and follow dispute resolution if you are unable to find common ground. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 19:33, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

Ok, understood, EOD. I'm outahere. --Tilman 19:43, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

The publishers of Science (journal) are the American Association for the Advancement of Science, which "defends scientific freedom, encourages scientific responsibility and supports scientific education for the betterment of all humanity." They are thus an activist organization, and many of its presidents have been controversial advocates of various viewpoints, such as evolution, medical experimentation on animals, eugenics or the development and use of nuclear weapons. Yet the journal is a highly reliable source. Nature (journal) is a similar respected source, of which its article says "The relatively progressive, controversial nature of the journal’s first articles and writers may have contributed to its success, as many early publications included evolutionary theory and Darwinism, at the time a divisive issue due to its radical nature and its religious implications." Its mission statement shows its activist viewpoint: "It is intended, FIRST, to place before the general public the grand results of Scientific Work and Scientific Discovery; and to urge the claims of Science to a more general recognition in Education and in Daily Life; and, SECONDLY, to aid Scientific men themselves, by giving early information of all advances made in any branch of Natural knowledge throughout the world, and by affording them an opportunity of discussing the various Scientific questions which arise from time to time." Lancet (journal) is another highly respected reliable source, whose article says "The Lancet takes a stand on several important medical issues - recent examples include criticism of the World Health Organization, rejecting the efficacy of homeopathy as a therapeutic option and its disapproval of Reed Elsevier's links with the arms industry." These and other respected scientific journals dating back to the 17th century publications of the Royal Society would probably endorse the stated viewpoint of the Skeptics Society: "The Skeptics Society is a nonprofit, member-supported organization devoted to promoting scientific skepticism and resisting the spread of pseudoscience, superstition, and irrational beliefs." Thus there is no basis for rejecting the Skeptical Inquirer as a reliable source due to its organization having a viewpoint favoring science, unless our mission is seen as spreading and promoting pseudoscience, superstition and irrational beliefs. Edison 22:20, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

My compliments

Anything that creates fewer, more easily understood and less "secret" rules is just wonderful. Wikipedia needs a small number of policies that are as solid as a rock, well known and easily understood, not a proliferation of policies, guidelines and essays with varying degrees of adherence and enforcement. This consolidation is a huge step in the right direction. Thank you to all who worked on it for the past four months. Dino 18:26, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

Personal Experience and Knowledge as a Primary Source

The idea that I know something personally and am able and willing to share it with the world obviously does not make that knowledge acceptable under the attribution guidelines, especially if I am not an acknowledged expert in that field and may not have previously published the knowledge in question. But doesn't that very policy exclude huge bodies of knowledge that might otherwise be lost? I can state with absolute certainty the name of the High School and College that I attended. This information could be attributed to me, but would it be verifiable and therefore acceptable? Probably not, on the basis that I could just as easily lie about the school names. But what about useful information. and maybe just some trivia, that has no source other than a person's memories? Memories (even mine) are sometimes faulty, but more often (I believe) they are real and reliable, and as such, should not be lost to the world. I've contributed to a few articles with items that I know to be true, though I can't necessarily come up with a source. Some survive, others have been taken down by editors. This stings a bit personally, and while I laud the goals of Wikipedia, I would still like to be able to contribute what I KNOW, and not just what I can cite. I think one of the great strengths of Wikipedia is that people who KNOW things about a given topic can share that knowledge easily and freely. To tap into that huge treasure of knowledege requires a certain lowering of the bar with regard to academic credentials, as some here have already suggested, and some degree of trust. -- Esjones 22:36, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

If the knowledge is that important, a reliable source will report it. If there is no source, we can not and should not include it. Blueboar 22:46, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

That is the very crux of why we need the attribution policy - "probably" can't cut it because it'd be impossible to separate fact from fiction, without having in-depth knowledge about the subject. But as a general encyclopedia, readers shouldn't need that in-depth knowledge. While it seems easier to just add what you know, at the end of the day it's actually more work, in terms of maintenance and the separation of fact from fiction - but it isn't done by whomever adds what they know, so it seems easier to them. If we didn't have mechanisms for separating fact from fiction, we'd just be another message board. ColourBurst 03:53, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

What you say makes enough sense that that is indeed how wikipedia was run at first. But at some point what one person knew to be true conflicted whith what another person knew to be true and revert wars started. OK so revert wars are outlawed. But people knew they were right so they brought in friends and battled. what to do? what to do? They tried to convince each other. With sources. And so here we are. You can add stuff without a source. But if someone wants to remove it, what can you say? That you know the truth and they don't? WAS 4.250 03:57, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

There are other wikis that have more lenient policies related to sources, such as Wikiinfo. Maybe that wiki would be more suitable for your knowledge. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk)

image manipulation

Existing text:

Manipulated images should be prominently noted as such. If they are noted as manipulated, they should be posted to Wikipedia:Images for deletion if the manipulation materially affects the encyclopedic value of the image.

This seems to be too strong. Some image manipulation, such as brightening an image to make it easier to view (without in any way altering the information provided by the image), or cropping an image to remove things honestly irrelevant to the article, should be allowed and should not automatically need to be noted. Things like that are a normal part of moving a photo from a camera to a computer (and in fact no raw image from a camera is suitable for Wikipedia without some manipulation such a scaling). I also question "materially affects" (should be "materially degrades"?) and finally "encyclopedic value" is a weasel phrase. I think the purpose of this part of the policy is to prevent image manipulation that constitutes original research or bad faith, such as adding or removing objects from the image. Here is a proposed replacement, based slightly on Reuters' policy.
Proposed text:

Minor adjustment of photographs, such as scaling, cropping, and tweaks to brightness and hue are permitted provided the resulting image does not materially differ in content from the original. That is, the new image must convey the same relevant information to the reader as the old image. Greater manipulation, such as addition or deletion of objects, unrealistic alterations of color or lighting, or blurring to disguise something in the image, are not generally permitted. All such manipulations must be noted by the uploader, who has the onus of justifying them.

--06:05, 5 March 2007 (UTC) As an example of a plausible exception: if I take a photo of my dog to illustrate dog, then I might use Photoshop to remove the table leg that sticks into the edge of the frame. That should be ok so long as I don't alter the dog, but I should still have to mention the alteration when I upload the image. (Major news organisations would not allow this example, but I think we should. Only the dog in the photo is actually relevant to the article.) --Zero^talk 06:05, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

I'd be happy with this change. It's a nice and simple statement, and seems to achieve everything required of it. JulesH 14:40, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

Let's put that detail in the FAQ. Let's keep the wording in the policy as simple and as succinct as possible. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 17:03, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

text needs clarification

"Deductions of this nature should not be made if they serve to advance a position, or if they are based on source material published about a topic other than the one at hand." --- What does the last part of that mean? What scenario is being envisaged here? I honestly don't know. I asked about this once before, but nobody offered an explanation; can someone explain it now? Better still, can someone reword it so that the meaning and motivation is clear? --Zero^talk 06:18, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

Does Wikipedia talk:Attribution/Archive 11#Suggestion for OR example to replace A + B = C example help? "Someone adds sourced data that the witness said it was a moonless night. Someone else adds a statement sourced from the almanac that there was a quarter moon. Someone else adds that that there was heavy cloud cover blocking the moon sourced from a local newspaper. Someone else adds a statement sourced from a rival newspaper that the first newspaper's weather reports are unreliable. NOR shuts this nonsense down." WAS 4.250 16:22, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

That example certainly breaches the OR barrier, but how is an ordinary editor going to read this policy sentence and know what things are supposed to be excluded by it? Policy which nobody can understand is worse than no policy. I propose to delete the words "or if they are based on source material published about a topic other than the one at hand". --Zero^talk

That's been there a long time, Zero, and is an important part of the policy. I think it's fairly clear what it means. It means don't use sources to make a point about X unless the sources are talking about X. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 23:01, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

Unfortunately, it doesn't really make sense though. What it seems to unintentionally say is that there are two absolute violations: 1. Where you're advancing a position, or 2. Where you're taking from something which is talking about something else. The second one can't have been intended, though. Why would that be worse than any other synthesis, if it isn't to advance a position? Would you solve the problem then by simply desourcing the statement? If that rule needs to be there, it should simply be placed in the general discussion, and probably better explained. Mackan79 23:39, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

Of course it makes sense, and the example in the article is a great illustration (the plagiarism example). As soon as you allow people to bring in sources that aren't dealing specifically with the topic of the article, they'll pull in sources from all over to build their arguments - the very definition of OR. Jayjg ^(talk) 00:22, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

Mackan, if I weren't such a good-natured creature, I might suspect you were following me. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 02:12, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

I know how you feel :P No, I was actually looking at this earlier, but held off on commenting so as not to attract attention... foiled twice, unfortunately. Further context, if you like, is here. Still, I'm not saying this point shouldn't be made, simply like Zero, that it seems to have been misplaced. Mackan79 21:32, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

I don't have any problem with the section containing the plagiarism example, but the text I quoted is from a different section. It is in reference to "straightforward mathematical calculations or logical deductions". The plagiarism example doesn't work there. What would be an example of an otherwise-acceptable "straightforward mathematical calculation or logical deduction" that is excluded by this rule? Suppose I'm editing Mormons. If I had a source that says "over 10% of New York's 18 million people are Mormons", then I think I'm allowed to write "there are more than a million Mormons in New York". Now suppose my source only says "10% of the people in NY are Mormons", and I also have a book on New York politics that gives the population as 18 million. Am I not then allowed to write what I want because the book is not about Mormons? What I'm questioning is whether this clause is required in this section. --Zero^talk 09:30, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

I think you're on shaky ground there; you have no idea if the author of that book was looking at similar figures for New York's population as you found when they made that claim. Jayjg ^(talk) 22:34, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

The Register

I'm sure I have seen the answer around somewhere but can someone confirm whether or not The Register is a reliable source? Thanks Spartaz ^Humbug! 20:55, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

Be cautious with them; they often publish unsubstantiated rumours, but they do meet the absolute bare minimum requirements of not being self published and not falling into the 'questionable' category. JulesH 21:08, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for that JulesH. Would you agree that they would be a dubious single source for an subject? Talk:Irish passport the section on Shielding is what I'm wondering about. The other sources don't address the point specifically and most of the bit therefore looks like original research. Thanks. --Spartaz ^Humbug! 21:32, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

I have replied on the article's talk page. JulesH 21:56, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

Copying of information from Village Pump

The Village Pump archive says that material is deleted after 9 days, and that before that time material can be moved to the relevant talk pages. I copied to here some discussion which relates to whether there is consensus on replacing WP:V and WP:NOR with WP:ATT. Someone has deleted it. Please put it back. We need a record of what happened. It contains significant comments related to the discussion. It can be moved to the archive page of this talk page, not deleted. I do not see anywhere a consensus for the replacement of the old policies with the new policy. I see disagreement. --Coppertwig 23:04, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

I was the one who removed it, see my edit summary, feel free to replace it though, but adding this discussion seems kind of pointless. Garion96 (talk) 23:26, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

There is a definite point in copying over that discussion: it relates to the question of whether there is or was ever consensus for getting rid of "verifiability". In that discussion, a user comments on that very issue. --Coppertwig 13:21, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

Clarification of "in relation to the topic of that article"

In the "What is original research?" section, there is the following definition: "introduces an argument without citing a reliable source who has made that argument in relation to the topic of the article". The "in relation to the topic of the article" is unclear to me, and could be a point of considerable acrimony in many pseudoscientific topics. Does the statement require that the source make the argument in direct and explicit relation to the topic of the article, or does it only require that the argument be in relation to the topic of the article implicitly or as a member of a general class?

A very good example of this distinction may be found in the topic of perpetual motion devices. There are some such devices which are notable, but no one in the scientific community bothers to write a source calling each one pseudoscientific and rejected by the scientific community: perpetual motion machines are considered to be such by default, as can be supported by many sources. If the definition covers implicit relation, then it would be acceptable to include sources that label all such devices as pseudoscience on pages about particular devices. If, on the other hand, it requires explicit relation to the specific topic, then most articles on perpetual motion devices would not be able to include any criticism, despite that criticism being obvious.

If I am correct in believing that only implicit or class-based relation is required, then the definition needs to be clarified, or else I will have to argue this point with every new nut who comes to Wikipedia. And of course, if explicit relation were required, then the policy would likely conflict with the Pseudoscience ArbCom decision, particularly the Serious Encyclopedia finding, and there would be no point in me or many other editors continuing to edit, since making pseudoscience articles follow NPOV would be impossible. --Philosophus ^T 23:14, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

Here is my take. If Mr. X invents a device Y, and we have a reliable source classifying Y as 'perpetual motion machine', then we are allowed to wiki-link to perpetual motion, as that is a standard well-defined concept. Crum375 23:20, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

But can we also cite reliable sources that argue that perpetual motion devices violate basic laws of physics? Those sources would not be related to the specific topic, but would be related by the perpetual motion source. --Philosophus ^T 23:22, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

No source that alledges they have built a perpetual motion machine is reliable except with respect to article about that specific source, or about the author of that specific source. Hipocrite - «Talk» 23:25, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

IMO all we would need to do is to link to perpetual motion (PM), where the reader can read more about it. I would stay away from further addressing and citing sources about PM in the article about X, as we would then be creating a mini-PM article inside X's entry, thereby implying that we as Wikipedia editors agree with the PM classification, which would be OR-ish. Crum375 23:31, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

What about having something like "According to X, the device is a perpetual motion machine, which if true would mean that it violates commonly accepted physical laws"? My current application of this is with Transcendental Meditation, which includes a bunch of mind-qft type pseudoscience. The material was discussed in What the bleep do we know, and there are many reliable sources calling everything in that movie nonsense scientifically, but no one has bothered to explicitly address the theories espoused by TM supporters, since the general material has already been addressed many times. If such sources cannot be used, then the paid TM supporters editing the page are essentially free to portray the scientific community as having no objections to the ideas. --Philosophus ^T 23:37, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

My own personal inclination, without having examined the TM article, is to stay way from making the connections. IOW, I think that saying "According to X, the device is a perpetual motion machine, which if true would mean that it violates commonly accepted physical laws" is OR-ish, whereas "According to X, the device is a perpetual motion machine" is not. Now odds are high (I'm guessing here) that X also said something else besides classifying the device as PM, and that would of course be citable and most useful. So for example, "According to X, the device is a perpetual motion machine and violates commonly accepted physical laws[1]" would be fine if X said it. I think that we need to take a step back, and as much as we personally believe something (and I'll admit here that I personally, along with the USPTO, don't believe in PM), we need to stick to our rules and stay as neutral and OR-free as possible. I think that if done properly we can send a message to our readers that we as WP are bending over backwards to be neutral in all matters, and that everything we say is based on reliable published sources. Crum375 01:00, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

Is an expert posting to a moderated mailing list reliable?

If an expert in the field of radioactive airborne hazards faced by people in the Navy posts an email message to a moderated mailing list on radiation protection claiming that someone else was given an award by the Navy for making a decision about protection from airborne radioactive hazards, isn't the poster a reliable source? His signature is certainly verifiable. James S. 23:16, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

While I strongly oppose the use of such, the main reason that there are big gaping holes in our policy with respect to exeperts posting on unreliable sources is because the creator of Babylon 5 likes to write to usenet, and the fans of that series had the clout to water down the guideline for the entire encyclopedia. As such, I would argue that if you can be absolutly certain the poster is who he says he is without even the slightest doubt, then it would be a reliable source. I have not reviewed the link in question for questionability of identitiy. Hipocrite - «Talk» 23:21, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

In principle, no. Email messages are not considered reliable sources, unless described in a third-party published source that meets the requirements as presented in this policy. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 23:28, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

As the policies current stand, it boils down to relying on IAR. If you think it makes wikipedia better, you can do it, but if challenged you must rely on evidence, logic and the ability of others to see your point rather than blindly follow non-IAR policies. This is actually sort of standard in much of our pop culture area. WAS 4.250 00:49, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

I'd like to modify this issue a bit by stating that there are *some* "moderated email lists" which are archived in a permanent location. For example I happen to belong to a genealogy list where experts in medieval genealogy post messages to each other about questions or new things they've found. All the email messages are archived online, and available for anyone to peruse, in their own time. So in effect the "list" becomes a bulletin board of a sort, although you can't reply directly through the archive. In a case like this I believe we'd treat the archive as the source and link to it directly, rather than saying "Email list so-and-so" we'd have to say "as archived at link". Email lists have a verification problem, but if they are archived, that problem disappears and we're left with the lower bar of reliable. Wjhonson 00:56, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

Surely this comes down to being a document self-published by a professional researcher, i.e. it is an accepted exception? JulesH 06:40, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

James & I have an ongoing disagreement about this. IMHO, the researcher exception doesn't apply. If you follow the link, the researcher (Riel) isn't being offered for information within his field, he's being offered to establish that a third party (Taschner) recieved an award. This use is specifically forbidden by WP:ATT, in bold face, no less. Specifically, the relevant section states: "Self-published sources, such as personal websites and blogs, must 'never be used as third-party sources about living persons, even if the author is a well-known professional researcher or writer; see WP:BLP." As a general matter, I don't think the professional researcher exception applies to personal facts about other third parties. Let's say that Riel, a nuclear physicist, writes an e-mail saying that Taschner, another nuclear physicist, once won an otherwise unverifiable award. Why is that statement any more reliable than the same statement on Taschner's wife's blog or his son's myspace page? TheronJ 15:00, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

The RADSAFE mailing list is moderated, and there are specific exemptions for moderated mailing lists in the policies you cite. Why do you say that Taschner's award is not information in Riel's field? Earlier you implied that you thought Riel's field was history of science -- why? If you would please phone Riel as I have asked, then you could ask him directly. James S. 18:22, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

If the poster's identity were not verifiable, a mailing list posting would be an anonymous source. If the mailing list is archived and the poster's identity is verifiable, I would think that would fall under the cautions/restrictions on self-published, non-fact-checked sources. (Of course, if the email is later republished in a fact-checked, reliable publication, it's a reliable source.) Seraphimblade ^{Talk to me Please review me!} 18:39, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

When did this happen?

And can I still cite "No Original Research" in argument for an action? Blueaster 23:50, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

Sure. Use WP:NOR. Jayjg ^(talk) 00:27, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

Web-based fora

I'm inclined to use a web forum as a primary source for a language-usage article. While I would understand an objection if I was attempting to use a forum post to justify the addition of a "fact" such as "the world's biggest ball of twine is located in Joe Franklin's basement", since the issue is one of common language usage, a forum should serve as a primary source, as it records actual conversations. Any thoughts? --Dante Alighieri | Talk 01:24, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

It's definitely a primary source. The problem is "for what?" I think the only thing that a forum can be used for is a primary source about the speech habits of that forum - you couldn't generalise it, internet fora are too diverse. ColourBurst 01:54, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

Conducting surveys is original research. In most instances, it would be necessary to survey many posts to many web forums to extablish language usage, and such a survey would be original research. --Gerry Ashton 02:09, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

Hmm, you're right, as soon as you move out of quoting a singular instance to generalizing speech patterns of a forum, that would be original research. I still stand my assertion that you couldn't generalise it for any forum even if you had the data available in the forum somehow. ColourBurst 02:54, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

In many cases it is necessary to see how things are referred to in many newspapers and books in order to establish use. Looking a web sites and reading are similar. This is the reasoning that would have us describe novels from book reviews. Drawing obvious conclusions from data that is in front of our eyes is not OR. DGG 06:17, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

I understand the hesitancy, but it's not as if I'm actually generalizing from the forum to society at large. I happen to "know" about the usage of the terms (as do many people, they are common enough terms), I'm just looking for something that I can cite to "prove" that the terms are in use. In that limited sense, wouldn't a forum be appropriate? I think it's a bit much to ASSUME that the usage is unique to a given forum. --Dante Alighieri | Talk 06:26, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

I've certainly done this myself before, although I wasn't comfortable with it at the time. Yes, a web forum or any other self-published document is a primary source that a particular word is in use (and, in many cases, that it was in use at some particular time). There are almost always better ways of achieving this, however. For instance there are a number of web sites that catalogue new language usage which are self-published by professional researchers in the field (e.g. languagelog, double-tongued word wrester) which may be more appropriate sources. JulesH 06:38, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

Case in point: WP:ATT

(Copied from Wikipedia:Village pump (policy)/Archive where apparently stuff is deleted after 9 days. Please do not delete this information. You may move it to the archive page of Wikipedia talk:Attribution. See Wikipedia talk:Attribution#Copying of information from Village Pump --Coppertwig 13:26, 6 March 2007 (UTC))

Talking about mergers... I'm sure many of you have seen WP:ATT, but it's now ready to replace WP:V and WP:NOR. It has already been tagged as policy, so please have a look at the talk page for the deployment plans. --Merzul 04:28, 16 February 2007 (UTC)

Of course I absorbed a major shock when I viewed the page, but it's wearing off, and I kind of like the idea. Just make sure to note, on that page, that Wikipedia is a tertiary source, and perhaps give the definition of a tertiary source. That's all; good job, people who worked on it. Gracenotes^T § 05:47, 16 February 2007 (UTC)

And perhaps if WP:V redirects to it, mention the word "verifiability" at least once in the policy? Gracenotes^T § 05:48, 16 February 2007 (UTC)

NOTE WP:V and WP:NOR ARE NO LONGER POLICY

(Copied from Wikipedia:Village pump (policy)/Archive. Please do not delete this information. You may move it to the archive page of Wikipedia talk:Attribution. See Wikipedia talk:Attribution#Copying of information from Village Pump --Coppertwig 13:26, 6 March 2007 (UTC))

PLEASE NOTE that Wikipedia:Verification and Wikipedia:No original research have been merged and replaced by Wikipedia:Attribution. This may come as a surprise to some, as this merger was not well advertized when in the proposal stage. From what I can tell, the folks who worked on this new Policy did a fairly good job (although I do wish they had announced their intentions sooner and more frequently). I do not see any substantive changes from what WP:V and WP:NOR had to say. Editors may also wish to note that several of the editors working on that page have expressed the intent to subsume the guideline: Wikipedia:Reliable sources into this new Policy and replaced with a FAQ.

While I actually approve of this merger (one Policy instead of two eliminates the potential for contraditary statements where they overlaped), I am not happy about how it was done. Policy changes should have broad community consensus, and I don't see how the editors who created WP:ATT can claim to have this when it comes as a bit of a surprise. The intent should have been shouted from the roof tops several weeks ago to give everyone LOTS of notice.

So... just so everyone understands, let me repeat this in loud voice: WP:V and WP:NOR ARE NO LONGER POLICY. They have been replaced by WP:ATT. ALSO - IT IS PROPOSED THAT WP:RS BE REPLACED with a combination of WP:ATT and a FAQ. (please don't kill the messenger.) Blueboar 17:51, 24 February 2007 (UTC)

None of these pages has ever had "broad" consensus. They've been written and decided upon by a small number of users who care a lot about the issues, and those who aren't interested in constant fighting and wikilawyering are outvoiced. WP:RS isn't that bad anymore, but I have yet to see it used for anything but abuse. — Omegatron 18:00, 24 February 2007 (UTC)

can't say I agree with that. Without WP:V or WP:NOR, Wikipedia would fall apart in a matter of weeks. It really all boils down to WP:ENC, but a lot of people do need this spelled out in greater detail. dab (����) 18:06, 24 February 2007 (UTC)

well, it is misleading to say that WP:V and WP:NOR are "no longer policy". They still are. They were just merged into a single page. It is an extremely bad idea to keep these pages around as "inactive", since they are not. If people feel they must be merged into a single page, make them redirects along the lines of WP:UNDUE. dab (����) 18:04, 24 February 2007 (UTC)

I've tagged both of the pages back to policy status. Consensus indicates that they should be merged, but this doesn't mean they should be "rejected" as policies and no longer be in use. I concur with Dbachmann, please make them redirects instead. Michaelas10 (Talk) 20:26, 24 February 2007 (UTC)

FYI, I did not mean to say that the concepts behind V and NOR were being rejected... Dbachmann is correct to say that is misleading. The point of this was really to draw attention to the merge, and to let editors know that the merge was a done deal. For instance, if an editor is in the midst of a content dispute or an AfD that centered on V or NOR, they need to know that they should point to ATT now instead of V or NOR. This post was really a "shout from the roof tops" to advertize the merge rather than a complaint about it. Blueboar 03:05, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

• Please note that I supported this policy and the merger. My only issue was with timing and how much notice was given. Looking back, I have to say that there was consensus for it - and that consensus is growing daily as more and more people come by and actually read what the policy says. Is it perfect, no... but it is a damn sight better than having multiple contradictary policies and guidelines. Blueboar 14:03, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

Poll re "verifiability, not truth" versus "attributable ... not whether it is true".

Please state whether you support or oppose changing the wording of the policy from "The threshold for inclusion in Wikipedia is verifiability, not truth" to "The threshold for inclusion in Wikipedia is whether material is attributable to a reliable published source, not whether it is true." --Coppertwig 13:37, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

1. Oppose for the reason explained in "Role of truth" above. --Coppertwig 13:37, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

• No problems with the "attributable" language. It means the same thing to me. Blueboar 13:52, 6 March 2007 (UTC)
• Comment The wording of this poll is somewhat confusing. The change described has already occurred, so to oppose would presumably be interpreted as to support changing it back.
• Support The policy name has change from verifiability to attribution because many editors were confused about what verifiability meant as a term of art on Wikipedia and were interpreting it in its natural meaning. The original intended meaning of the phrase is more clearly evident in the current phrasing than it was in the old one. JulesH 14:01, 6 March 2007 (UTC)
• Oppose: "Verifiability, not truth," has a long history on Wikipedia, and the new language doesn't present much improvement, if any. TheronJ 15:12, 6 March 2007 (UTC)
• Support the change that already gathered consensus Yes, virginia, this was already decided upon. No, I'm not going to go dig through the archives to look for specific discussion; I had this page watchlisted from almost the first day it was drafted months ago. And I continue to believe that this is a superior wording for presenting the old meaning. GRBerry 18:08, 6 March 2007 (UTC)
• Support. This already has broad consensus. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 01:09, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

Poll re handling of apparently false, but attributable, statements

Suppose a Wikipedia article makes an assertion which is attributable to a published source normally considered reliable, but which the editors of the page are convinced is false, and suppose they can't find an acceptable published source to support the other position. Do you support the following:

It is better to either delete the statement (if it is a relatively minor point) or change it to indirect speech than to leave a Wikipedia article making an assertion the editors believe is false.

An example of changing to indirect speech is to insert "The Daily Times reports that..." --Coppertwig 13:49, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

1. Support The purpose of Wikipedia is to provide a useful reference, that is, to attempt to provide information which conforms to reality as often as possible. --Coppertwig 13:49, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

Coppertwig, this page is getting hit by six threads a day. This is silly. Marskell 13:51, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

• Oppose this is best dealt with by the editors themselves, rather than being prescribed in policy, IMO. Note that there is no policy that requires the inclusion of all material which is attributable. JulesH 14:03, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

• Clarification This poll is not proposing adding that sentence into policy. --Coppertwig 14:17, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

Then what is the Point of it? Oh... never mind, I think I answered my own question. Blueboar 14:26, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

• Support the statement, but if it's not going to be added to the policy, fail to see the point of the poll, per Blueboar. --AnonEMouse ^(squeak) 14:52, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

• Comment For the reason why this poll is happening, see section "Role of truth" above. --Coppertwig 14:57, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

Polls are evil. Do we really need to run a poll on this? I don't think so. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 14:59, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

If you want to discuss this subject, let's discuss, but please do not use polls. They are not helpful. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 15:00, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

I want to discuss it. Please. In "Role of truth", above. Poll continues, however. --Coppertwig 15:08, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

Discussions are the way to go. Polls in these cases are not useful. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 23:33, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

The policy is very clear: We do not make assessments about the truth or falsehood of the assertions made in reliable sources. Period. If editors do not wan t to use a specific source, for whatever reasons, and they reach consensus about not using that source, don't use it. Simple. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 15:03, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

• IMHO, it's a terrible idea to suggest that editors should delete attibutable content that they personally believe to be false. It will lead to edit wars like you have never seen, and to POV warriors scouring the encyclopedia of everything that offends them. I would be open to a policy addition that it is acceptable to delete everything that TheronJ believes to be false, but otherwise, it wouldn't be good for the encyclopedia. TheronJ 15:11, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

Some common sense is called for. If the statement is really Fringe, I see no problem removing it if that is the clear consensus of those editing the article. However, if there is the slightest doubt, it is much better to keep the statement - but make it a statement of opinion as opposed to a statement of fact ("According to the author Ima Loony...."). Blueboar 15:22, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

Support. It is sometimes appropriate to move something which is sourced but silly to the discussion page rather than leave it on the project page. No one objected when in the article Talpiot Tomb which refers to the "lost tomb of Jesus" I removed from the article to the talk page the sentence from the Discovery Channel's Discovery News ""Frank Moore Cross, a professor emeritus in the Department of Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations at Harvard University, told Discovery News, ”The inscriptions are from the Herodian Period (which occurred from around1 B.C. to 1 A.D.). " This is silly and somehow garbled or a typo in the source, because there were two "King Herods" and our article on them gives neither such a short and amazingly coincidental time span, The professor likely said first century to second century. If a Nobel Prize chemists says that water generally boils at sea level at 10 degrees celsius and the sun rises in the west, it does us no good to leave such a misstatement of fact in an article. Move it to the discussion page and get more input. Leaving a silly misstatement on the article page and then "balancing" it with a statement from a science book that water boils at 100 celsius and the sun rises in the east still leaves a silly article to no point. Typos and verbal flufs do not add to the knowledge base expected of an encyclopedia unless the article is intended to be a humorous collection of missprints and misstatements. Edison 22:30, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

Comment - With the caveat that such a restriction is *only* applicable to articles *other* than the article about the source itself. It is *always* acceptable for example to quote the National Enquirer on it's own article, no matter what the quote says. For example: "The National Enquirer is known for claims such as: 'Three-headed baby born to Jessica Simpson!'" We should not put any restrictions on claims made by a source, in the article *about* the source. "Adolf Hitler claimed that Jews eat babies for breakfast" would be entirely acceptable in his article. It would not be in an article about breakfast foods. Wjhonson 23:24, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

This is exactly the stuff we do not want in our policies. Editors' needs to apply their best and collective judgment in these cases. I strongly oppose such wording in the policy. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 23:32, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

A poll is not going to decide policy. This is a waste of time. —Centrx→talk • 23:49, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

Agree. We don't change policy via polls. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 01:10, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

The problem with allowing editors to use best judgment is that the rules don't make it clear that best judgment is allowed. A number of editors *right here on this page* have suggested that one may *never* remove material that is sourced but which one believes to be false, with no judgment allowed. Ken Arromdee 20:50, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

I still think a paragraph in the key principles section that tells editors to use their judgement when evaluating sources would be helpful. Basically stating that a source that's appropriate for one claim on one article may not be appropriate for another claim on a different article, and to consider the type of claim made and the type of article (i.e. whether it's a biography, scientific article or whatever) when evaluating sources. JulesH 11:16, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Loss of convenience links

I notice that the section of the old WP:RS about convenience links (accessible here) is not a part of the new policy. Is this intentional, or an oversight? It occurs to me that we should say something, either here or at WP:CITE, about the distinction between a source and a convenient link to it (or a reprint), and whether the latter should be included. Jakew 15:57, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

It was copied over, but since it really didn't quite fit, it was moved to the FAQ page that is attached to this policy. See: WP:ATT/FAQ#What_is_a_convenience_link Blueboar 16:27, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

Thank you.

It occurs to me that it may work better - and be easier to find - if reorganised a little. I suggest that we add something to WP:CITE#How to cite sources that a) defines convenience links and distinguishes them from actual sources, and b) directs people to more detailed discussion at the ATT FAQ page. Any thoughts? Jakew 17:41, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

Inflation adjusted numbers--Original Research or Reasonable Calculation?

I recently listed in an article dollar amounts spanning several decades. I then also listed the inflation adjusted (or constant dollar) amounts with them and cited the inflation calculator used. That edit was removed (without discussion beyond saying "WP:OR". I understood the implied objection.

But after thinking about it and then reading the new Attribution policy section it sounds like this addition of constant dollar figures falls under, "straightforward mathematical calculations or logical deductions based on fully attributed data that neither change the significance of the data".

It seems that in the case of 'inflation adjusted figures', this calculation is more encyclopedic than not. The only problem I see is the possible inability to corroborate the adjustments, hence the inclusion of the calculator as a source as well.

Feedback, thoughts, assistance... -- Tony of Race to the Right 17:29, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

There are many ways to calculate historic prices, and which method to pick is a matter for experts. I don't see that this falls into the obvious deduction category. Even calculating meaningful present-day exchange rates is problematic. Angus McLellan (Talk) 17:46, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

Even if FX isn't an issue, and for many articles it wouldn't be, what inflation measure to use is an issue itself. In the US, we have at least the following measures: Consumer Price Index for All Urban Consumers (CPI-U), Consumer Price Index for Urban Wage Earners and Clerical Workers (CPI-W), Chained Consumer Price Index for All Urban Consumers (C-CPI-U), The national CPI-U is published for 99 data segments: ranging from "All Items" down to "Personal computers and peripheral equipment" or "Tobacco and smoking products". All of these are available in both seasonally adjusted and non-adjusted series. The main public release has about 44 different geographic subdivisions of the CPI-U (some are published every other month). The BLS' generate your own data tool limits output to only 200 data series at a time, as they offer the cross product of 44 geographical segments * ~373 what bought segments * 2 seasonal adjusted/not segments = ~ 32,800 inflation data segments for the CPI-U. Add the other series they publish, and you are up to around 100,000 different inflation measures for the U.S. (The monthly press release covers a lot fewer of these, only about 99 of the what bought segments (full country only) and 30 of the geographic regions (all items only). The popular press usually mentions only CPI-U, all items, national and CPI-U, all items except food and energy, national.)

Similarly, Australia publishes data series for all eight of its capital cities, with segmentation into at least 13 purchasing groups - and that is just the press release, so they probably are publishing on the general order of 1,000 - 10,000 inflation measures for Australia. I don't know how many series the UK goverment publishes, but the one I use for work is named RPI02 - so I know there is more than one. I've seen for work multiple series for France, but don't have them bookmarked.

Picking the inflation series to use is the original research. Even for an article specific to a single country, there are too many possible series to have a definite right answer. GRBerry 18:38, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

I'm not so sure... I don't think it is OR to use an accepted model for calculating constant dollars. To me this fits the "calculation" exception. As long as you specify which model was used, ("according to the Consummer Price Index" or some such statement) It is simple calculation after all... you just plug one number into the formula and get another number out the other end. To be completely NPOV, I suppose you could give the constant dollar prices per several of the more common methods... but I still don't see it as being OR. Blueboar 18:49, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

The various indices are valid for various kind of purchases. I know that in the USA there are indices for producers, consumers, and wages, at the very least. Determining the appropriate index is original research. Now, if a reliable source determined which index was appropriate, but only did the calculation for selected years, I'd accept the argument that an editor could calculate constant dollars for years that fall within the years given in the reliable source. I wouldn't accept years outside the range given in the reliable source, because there could have been a change in how the index is compiled, or what alternative indices existed. --Gerry Ashton 19:04, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

I would think that it would be acceptable to state something such as "The building cost $2 million to build in 1979", as this would be verifiable fact? Unless a secondary source made a conclusion as to what the cost is in inflation-adjusted dollars, though, that would seem to be more than a trivial calculation. Seraphimblade ^{Talk to me Please review me!} 20:45, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

OK, for example in the Widget Prices article I want to put the average price of a widget in 1970 was $100 ($433.81 in 2000 constant dollars) and the average cost in 2000 was $450. Obviously trying to keep the example short and simple...the link (if you hate clicking links like I do) is the CPI calculator from the US Dept of Labor. Should that be an exception to Original Research? -- Tony of Race to the Right 22:22, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

I would think since anyone can put any numbers in and it comes from the DoL page that it would be reasonable to use that with the ref-footnote indicating what parameters were put in and the date accessed. I'm not sure. JoshuaZ 22:27, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

Tony, can you include a diff or link identifying the specific article where this dispute came up? I think it might be helpful to see it in context, but I can't find it. TheronJ 22:28, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

I would love to show you the context but it was the victim of some nasty edit warring and I do not have the time to sort through edit histories for it. The context was on the Global Warming Controversy article in a pair of sections that are sometimes there and sometimes not, Funding of Skeptics and Funding of Supporters. One section had figures mostly from about 1995 to 2000. The other section had no figures. I began adding some which were from 1975 to the present and with those added the figures in constant dollars with the link to the calculator (wasn't DoL, I think it was statistical abstract or similar). I then added the constant dollar figures to those that were already there. They were all reverted within about 15 minutes and after pressing for an explanation they provided only a link to WP:NOR. Like I said, there is some pretty nasty edit warring there and has been for a few years. -- Tony of Race to the Right 02:46, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

My view on this is that it ought to be ok to state inflation adjusted numbers so long as the original cost is stated, and if anybody a disputes the quanity a "reference" is made which states the method used to calculate the estimated cost. Mathmo ^Talk 02:46, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

Is this really policy?

It looks very much as if this policy is a particular synthesis of a lot of individual Wikipedia working practices, though excludes many others. Looking through the archives, it looks to me as if there is a lack of consensus on a lot of the points (I personally am particularly concerned about the relevance of "truth" or accuracy, and the difference between "attributable" or "verifiable" and "attributed" or "sourced"), and that the statement that this is Wikipedia policy would fall foul of Wikipedia:Attribution itself. Indeed "Editors often make the mistake of thinking that if A is published by a reliable source, and B is published by a reliable source, then A and B can be joined together in an article in order to advance position C" applies precisely to what seems to have happened here. To me that makes it a Wikipedia:Essay not a Wikipedia:Policy. --Henrygb 20:10, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

This is policy. It simplified existing policy documentation by merging two pages into one. Those pages are Wikipedia:Verifiability and Wikipedia:No original research. Most of the discussion was about a few types of issues: 1) do we make changes at the same time, and if so what - answer: no substantive changes, 2) how to merge the existing policies without changing the meaning, and 3) can we also merge in the guideline WP:RS - answer: nothing unique to that page here, put relevant bits in the FAQ. There was a lot of the discussion because changing policy documents isn't done lightly or quickly and a lot of time was spent making sure the actual policy was properly worded. In any role of life, some things become "magic words" and are very hard to change, even for the better. An example is the "verifiability, not truth" formulation from "Wikipedia:Verifiability", which has been replaced by a new formulation that means the same thing, but people object nonetheless because they are used to the old wording, poor as it was. GRBerry 20:39, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

"Verifiability, not truth" was a bad formulation anyway, since it was a self-contradiction that meant "Truth, not truth". It only made sense in the context of Wikipedia:Verifiability, not wikt:verifiability. The attribution phrasing makes more sense even if it doesn't flow as well. --tjstrf talk 20:47, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

Exactly right. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 20:49, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

Right. I always read "verifiable" in WP:V to be synonym what WP:ATT calls "attributable": it referred to material that in principle could be attributed to a reliable source. I think that "attributable" is clearer, so I like the change of words. CMummert · talk 21:01, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

Henrygb - Something you have to remember is that consensus does not mean the same thing as unanimity. None of our policies have unanimous support, and there are always people who disagree with what it says. The two previous policy pages (WP:V and WP:NOR) from which this policy emerged had those who disagreed with individual provisions. So will this policy page. However, the vast majority of Wikipedians approve of this policy. That is called consensus.

I am confused by your statement that this policy does not follow itself... This isn't an article, so it doesn't have to. This policy applies to Articles, it does not apply to policy/guidleine pages. Nor does it apply to talk pages, user pages or the Village Pump. Blueboar 21:11, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Verifiability started [5] as saying that "the goal of Wikipedia is to become a complete and accurate encyclopedia"; statements in articles should be verifiable (in the sense of checkable that they were true) and that citing sources and avoiding weasel words would help other editors check statements. The statement of policy is drifting towards "everything in Wikipedia should be attributed even if this makes it incomplete and even misleading". This new page is part of that drift - indeed it makes the change more explicit. My perception is that the majority of editors (most of whome come nowhere near this page) still take the earlier view and this is what has made Wikipedia so good. --Henrygb 22:02, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

There's no drift, it's your interpretation that is wrong. "the goal of Wikipedia is to become a complete and accurate encyclopedia" does not have to equate with your assertion that "statements in articles should be verifiable (in the sense of checkable that they were true)". It would appear the policy draws a different meaning, stating that where an editor takes issue with an edit they should "check the sources. If you can confirm the statement using them, leave it in". This would suggest that it is not truth, as you assert, that was the goal, but accuracy. Accurate summary of source material, not positions which individual editors held to be true, a position the WP:NPOV policy would appear to dictate editors should not do. That would be my reading of how that policy was written. Looking at it, I'd also note that is not how the Verifiability page started, there's over 18 months more of history before the edit you picked. Surreptitiously 01:19, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

OK, I could have started with [6] at the end of MyRedDice's initial drafting in 2003, which said "The goal of Wikipedia is to become a complete, accurate encyclopedia. Verifiability is an important tool to achieve accuracy, so we strongly encourage you to check your facts. However, don't be too keen to remove unverified information at the cost of completeness." It still makes my point perfectly (neither it nor I disagree with NPOV) even if it did not have a policy label at the time, while my 2005 quote was the first to do so. --Henrygb 08:47, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

• Rather than argue over which version is the first, perhaps it would be neater to address the other point I made. That your interpretation of what accuracy means is in this instance incorrect. In this instance it refers to the representing of the source accurately, as seen by the quote I reproduced above. I would also note that asserting a statement as truth is in violation of WP:NPOV, which states None of the views should be given undue weight or asserted as being the truth. The quote you are using does not make your point, since your point is made on a misunderstanding of the use of one word. Accuracy has many meanings. Surreptitiously 14:56, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

I hope that the new, shorter document that people have worked on so hard will succeed (with some changes) in replacing the two other documents. There has to be a proper process for changing policy. There was an RfC, but it pointed to this page which stated that no policy was being changed -- they were simply being merged, and any actual changes would be done later. So, busy people may not have looked closely at the edits. In order to make significant changes to policy, there needs to be an RfC that leads to a policy discussion, not to a statement that no policy is being changed.

To change policy, there has to be more than just someone saying "there was consensus". There has to be an actual record of consensus. Consensus can exist when there is disagreement, if those who disagree waive their opposition. In this case, how are those who disagreed alleged to have indicated that they waived their opposition? --Coppertwig 13:57, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

• I've not seen an assertion in this thread that the policy has changed. Could you clarify where that assertion is, and what evidence has been brought to substantiate the claim? Surreptitiously 14:56, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

It sounds like the point is that the rules were tightened during the merge, when nothing was supposed to change. - Peregrine Fisher 14:16, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

• I've not seen an assertion in this thread that the rules were tightened. Could you clarify where that assertion is, and what evidence has been brought to substantiate the claim? Surreptitiously 14:56, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

I don't see where any rules were tightened or changed. Some of the wording was revised, but the intent and meaning behind what is said is exactly as it was under WP:V, WP:NOR and WP:RS.

What I think is happening here is that the merger has drawn attention to what these policies said all along... and some people are discovering that they disagree with some of the policy points. The entire "verifiability" vs. "attribution" as they relate to "truth" issue is a case in point. It is clear that what WP:V meant was that Wikipedia demanded that a statement be verifiable as to who said it, and that they did indeed say it. Verifiability in context of WP:V did not mean that a given statement was true... only that it had to be verifiable that it was stated by it's source, and that the statement accurately reflects what the source said. With the merger, the word "verifiablilty" was changed to "attributability" (or something along those lines) ... but the intent and meaning of the policy point is the same.

Something else to consider, in this current discussion, is that there have always been editors who did not like WP:V and WP:NOR to begin with... since those were longstanding policies, however, with long standing consensus they had little chance of changing them to fit their desires. With the merger, they are seeing a chance to do so... by claiming that this "NEW" policy does not have consensus. I reject that argument. Since this policy does indeed contain all of the policy points of the previous two, with the same intent and meaning that they had, the consensus they enjoyed carries over into this one. In short, nothing has changed... except perhaps peoples awairness of what the policies have said all along. Blueboar 15:04, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

(edit conflict). Agreed. The requirements Coppertwig proposes for documenting consensus go far beyond the mere existence of consensus, which is all that is required here. There is no "proper process" to document consensus as far as I can tell. As with every other WP page, editors show they have waived their opposition when they don't make substantial changes and when the question "are there any serious objections" doesn't generate any. That appears to be the case here. CMummert · talk 15:08, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

(in response to Blueboar, re. drawing attention to policy) I think the issue is a little more fundamental than that. I think a large part of the problems we're seeing with people not liking WP:ATT stems from them misunderstanding WP:V. As I see it, a huge number of people have seen 'verifiability, not truth' as requiring both verifiability *and* truth, usually because they somehow feel that something can't be verifiable if it isn't true. But that's not how WP:V defined verifiability, and that use of a word to mean something slightly different from what it normally means seems to have mislead a lot of people into thinking the policy said something different from what it actually said. And this is one of the reasons I think this version is so great -- it is easier to understand, and we're just seeing the natural fallout of that now. JulesH 15:14, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

The fact that you are seeing fallout suggests that there is not a consensus now, and perhaps there was not before while verifiability was having its meaning changed away from the earlier and natural "capable of being checked to be true". I personally have no doubt that what is said now is not the same as what was being said in 2003 or 2005, and there are unanswered questions in the 11 archive talk pages here plus 17 at Wikipedia talk:Verifiability; to me that is a common symptom of a suggested policy failing to achieve consensus. To give an example of my understanding of verifiability, I don't think anyone seriously doubts that the British won the Battle of Trafalgar and so I think it does not need attribution (it is easily checked); there is less clarity over whether the British won the Battle of Corunna (though fewer questions about the details of the battle) and here sourcing of statements is more helpful. --Henrygb 19:33, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

Which is the same under this policy. It's clearly possible to attribute that to somewhere, but as it is a statement that's unlikely to be challenged, it is not necessary to actually do so. What's changed? JulesH 08:08, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

Two things. This page puts the source before the content and explicitly says "any unsourced material may be removed"; it makes no mention of the accuracy of the content, instead concentrating on the nature of the source. Secondly, I can find a secondary source challenging it (ISBN 978-2258038400 in French) "Curieuse «victoire», qui se traduisit par la morte de l'amiral de la flotte anglaise, Nelson, fauché par une balle tirée du Redoutable. Il faut avoir l'outrecuidance de nos amis d'Outre-Manche pour se vanter d'un tel désastre", roughly "Curious 'victory', which resulted in the death of Nelson, the admiral of the English fleet, mown down by a ball fired from the Redoutable. You need to have the impertinence of our friends across the Channel to praise yourselves for such a disaster", but this simply undermines the source, without affecting the validity of the statement that the British won.--Henrygb 09:16, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

Which is exactly the same thing that Verifiability said -- right up at the top, "Editors adding new material should cite a reliable source, or it may be challenged or removed by any editor." The fact that sources contradict each other is irrelevant, it just means that you can "verify" (by the meaning described at Verifiability) things that aren't actually true. This doesn't help your point -- it just illustrates that sometimes it is hard to know what is true. JulesH 10:00, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia is not Wikiquote, and the primary aim should be accuracy in encyclopedic statements, not accuracy in attribution. Sourcing is an aid to accuracy and building an encyclopedia, not an end in itself. I still don't believe there is a consensus around what is said now, while they may have been in 2005. --Henrygb 10:18, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

So, if I understand your point correctly, you basically wish to dispute that there has been consensus for WP:V since this edit in January 2006, which first added the statement that unsourced material may be removed? JulesH 10:20, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

I am disputing where there is a consensus for the current state of the page, not trying to revert one particular change or return to one particular date (though I think looking at changes since April 2005 is a good start for analysis). There have been many changes before and after that date while have switched the direction of the policy in a direction away from the practice of most editors. For example: removal of accuracy objective and weakening suggestion this is about fact checking [7]; removal of idea that degrees of verifiability should aim at those likely to know about the subject [8]; stopping aiming to be complete and reliable and remove advice on checking edits[9]-I could go on. -Henrygb 19:45, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

(reset indent) Where was it asked whether there were major objections? Major objections about what? There's a big difference between "Are there any major objections? ... We're not changing policy" and "Are there any major objections to classifying Wikipedia:Verifiability as no longer policy?" How long did people wait to see whether there were major objections? Were people given adequate time to inform themselves by reading through the archived discussions before beginning to express their objections? Who decided which objections were "major"? I have a major objection. Changing the whole purpose of the encyclopedia from trying to provide information that conforms to reality as much as possible, to a purpose of merely collecting published stuff regardless of whether it's typos and misstatements, is a major, fundamental change and requires further discussion. --Coppertwig 13:47, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Comment on secondary sources

The policy states that "Secondary sources are documents or people that summarize other material, usually primary source material." - I am only going to comment on this statement. As an academic myself, I would dispute that secondary sources "summarize" primary sources. In fact, the more scholars summarize, the worse a book or article is because they are not presenting their own interpretation of the texts or historical events (this is primarily a problem in the humanities). The aim of secondary sources in the humanities is to provide an interpretation of events or of a set of texts (or both). SparkNotes and things of that ilk try to "summarize." Awadewit 00:56, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

I agree. I think secondary sources summarize and/or analyze and/or interpret primary sources. Crum375 01:19, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

Is this not covered in the policy in the line "A journalist's description of a traffic accident he did not witness, or the analysis and commentary of a president's speech, are secondary sources."? Surreptitiously 01:36, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

Yes, the journalist example says it, but the generic description did not, so I just modified it. Let's see what others think. Crum375 01:43, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

Generally, a definition that must rely on examples is not considered a good definition; it is vulnerable to attacks based on the specifics of those examples. In this case (secondary sources), examples are certainly not necessary for definitional purposes; they are illustrative only. I think that Crum375's changes are good. Awadewit 03:18, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

Use of printed material rather than online sources

Is there any official Wikipedia policy prohibiting the use of resources that can be found in a real brick and mortar library rather than a blog or online version of a magazine? An editor removed sourced and relevant content from an article based on the argument that I was using offline sources of information, and he demanded that I provide online sources in order for the content to stay online. This is the first I've heard of such a standard, and it seems to me profoundly anti-intellectual. Can anyone comment? csloat 02:19, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

You are correct. I read through the entire *issue* including your Talk page. The block was inappropriate, imho, and you are correct that citing offline magazines like Vanity Fair is certainly appropriate. Wjhonson 02:36, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Because it is usually difficult to get something published on paper without a fair amount of editorial oversight, offline sources are often more reliable than online ones. (This is not always the case, see vanity publishers. Also some online sources can have perfectly good editorial oversight.) It can be frustrating for other users who are unable to look at the offline source and check your work, but so long as the source is reliable, they should trust you. However, since offline sources can be hard for others to check, I would recommend using inline references to make it as unambiguous as possible which information is based on the offline sources. Also try to provide the ISBN to make it easier for others to find the book. — Armed Blowfish (talk|mail) 02:40, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the quick responses! I have complete copies of the articles if anyone really doubts they exist, but I don't think anyone truly does. I've been editing for a while now and have not had problems before with citing offline materials. csloat 02:49, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

Uploading the copies to Wikipedia would likely be a copyright violation, however I doubt anyone would mind if you sent them by email to another involved editor. Also note that attribution is most likely not the only relevant policy. — Armed Blowfish (talk|mail) 02:59, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

I would just like to note that most truly scholarly material in the humanities is going to be offline or inaccessible to the general public. Unfortunately, the databases that cover the major humanities journals are available only to those who have access to research libraries that subscribe to them (they are very expensive) and the most important work done in the humanities is almost always published in book form. If you want an excellent article on Jane Austen or Charles Dickens, for example, do not demand online sources. In my own editing on wikipedia, I have tried to follow the inline citation idea Armed Blowfish mentioned above, but it can get silly. See Mary Wollstonecraft and Anna Laetitia Barbauld. I also prefer offline sources since online sources can disappear and change (i.e. the information you cited may disappear from the page). Asking readers to dig up a cached version of the page is, in my opinion, irresponsible. Awadewit 03:27, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

OK hold on though, (I just found out about this discussion) we're not talking about "scholarly material" here, but allegations that Hitchens is an alcoholic and speculation that it's "getting the better of him". As this is sloat's replacement for poorly sources blogged insults which clearly violated BLP, it's reasonable to demand checkable citations to insure it's compliant. <<-armon->> 02:36, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

The citations are clearly "checkable" Armon. I have checked them myself, and you are welcome to as well -- as is anybody else in the world! And there is no evidence that any of this violated BLP, so please stop making that false claim. csloat 02:41, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

Hmmm; in spite of this discussion (and in spite of a comment on his user page), the user in question has reverted me, again deleting the offline sources with the same demand that I find online sources because he doesn't trust the offline ones. Is there a solution other than an endless 3 reverts per day on this? I feel the material is sourced, relevant, and important, and I don't think there's any defensible case that it contravenes WP:BLP. I'm not sure this rises to the level of WP:AN/I; or perhaps it does? Can anyone suggest any other alternatives? I agree with all the comments here that offline sources are, if anything, more reliable than online ones, and not less. csloat 03:46, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

In this specific case, although everything does appear to be well sourced, it isn't clear that having such a long section is NPOV. I moved it to the talk page (it is well-sourced, so not an apparent BLP problem) for discussion. CMummert · talk 04:48, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

AN/I it. This sounds like a classic case of an unreasonable Admin using his/her powers inappropriately. If I'm wrong, he/she should have no problem justifying his/her actions. --Dante Alighieri | Talk 07:50, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

I'm not sure I understand -- the user in this case who appears to be acting inappropriately -- Armon (talk · contribs) -- is not an admin. He's not using any special powers against me that I know of; just reverting sourced and relevant text and making demands on the talk page. csloat 09:25, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

I misunderstood, I thought that he had blocked you for your actions. --Dante Alighieri | Talk 17:31, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

Why are all the old redirects hijacked?

I have never ever seen that done before. Apart from the back that it makes old discussions confusing, what if I want to link to the old policies? -Amarkov moo! 05:16, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

Wiki's change, if you want to be sure something will be there you need to include a revision number in your link. ^HighInBC ^{(Need help? Ask me)} 05:18, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

That's not my point. My point is that some people might want to link to V and OR, and they are now shortcut-less. -Amarkov moo! 05:20, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

There's no reason to link to those pages. Everything that was there is here, so you can link to WP:NOR and be taken to the correct section here, or link to WP:V or WP:RS and be taken to the section about sources; or WP:ATT if you want to refer to the policy as a whole. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 01:12, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

They can still use the proper names. ^HighInBC ^{(Need help? Ask me)} 05:23, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

Anyone always could use the proper names. But people don't, because it's inconvenient. And I don't see what benefit comes from redirecting here; anyone who knows the old shortcuts knows about this, and people who don't won't ever have reason to use them. And being superseded does not mean that V and OR are now wrong, which they aren't. -Amarkov moo! 05:26, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

But WP:OR goes to the current #No_original_research section, and WP:V goes to the current #Reliable_sources section. I think it is more important to link to the current state of those concepts than some historical, old revision. ^HighInBC ^{(Need help? Ask me)} 05:29, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

What is the point of this merger if they're still being treated as seperate concepts? I thought the idea was to treat verifiability and original research as different parts of "attributability". If it's not, why was this done? -Amarkov moo! 05:37, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

A single concept can have more than one facet, that is why we have headings. ^HighInBC ^{(Need help? Ask me)} 05:44, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

Agree with redirecting to sections within the new policy. It's very important and appropriate during a transition in a commonly-used resource to give legacy content a smooth path to the new resource as a matter of pragmatically managing a complex system without disruption. Providing a smooth transition is well worth the price involved, particularly prices consisting of esthetic or conceptual purity. --Shirahadasha 18:41, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

People are used to the old redirects, so letting people type WP:NOR rather than WP:A#NOR or something similar is helpful. You'll notice that the same thing happened when WP:VAIN became WP:MOREPOLITICALLYCORRECTTERMFORVANITYPUBLISHING. --tjstrf talk 19:43, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

Research by a wikipedian

Previously the issue has arisen here, or on WP:NOR about a Wikipedia wanting to post their own Original Research into an article. If my memory serves me, which it may not, the suggestion has always been, post your link/material to the Talk section and see if another editor will add it for you, instead of you adding it yourself.

The suggestion provides a way of vetting or peer-review if you will. Now I've done that on the Talk page of Michael Huckabee and a complaining editor has taken a case to WP:AN/I here. I would appreciate it if someone could comment here on whether my actions were or were not appropriate, and if not what the appropriate actions would have been in this case. Thanks. Wjhonson 23:09, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

The material to be added should be published by a reliable source, whether it was written by a Wikipedia editor or not. The source, superficially, appears to be a wiki, and would be unreliable unless demonstrated otherwise. --Gerry Ashton 00:38, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

The idea of having a wikipedian ask another editor to review and add material that he/she came up with is not a way around NOR, but a work around to prevent Conflict of Interest. For example, an author may have published something that he/she feels is relevant to an article. Since there could be COI problems if he/she adds it him/herself, it is better for him/her to ask someone else to do so. However, the rules for ATT still apply... the material should be reliably published as outlined on this policy page. Blueboar 01:17, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the clarification. Now that you mention it, I remember the COI issue more clearly. So I guess what I did was pointless, I could just add the underlying sources to the article itself since they are all published by third-party reliable sources. I collected them all in one spot, but I suppose the act of collecting and presenting the information in a certain set format with interpretive clauses, would itself be considered OR. It's just a little annoying doing that work and then essentially having to do *part* of it all over to post each underlying citation here ;) Thanks for your guys input. Wjhonson 07:03, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

In effect, a synthesis which has not been fact-checked or peer-reviewed would be original research, no matter whose it is. Seraphimblade ^{Talk to me Please review me!} 07:06, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

You've given me an interesting idea. Sort of similar to Jimbo's idea of having a "stable" article and an editable article. This particular page, I've *locked*. It would be interesting to have a peer-reviewed site for genealogy. I don't really think there are any yet. Wjhonson 07:11, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

I would like to thank the three editors here who hve all clarified for WJhonson that his efforts do go against WP:ATT. Thank you. ThuranX 12:49, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

I'm a little confused by this policy. Say wikipedia were lucky enough to have X, one of the foremost scholars on Y, contributing to an article on Y. Could they not cite their own scholarly works on Y, along with other scholars' works? In my field, English literature, scholars often cite their own work in this way (especially if they are writing a book that includes ideas from a previously published article). I just want to be sure I understand the policy so that when I become the foremost scholar on something, I'll know what to do. :) Seriously, we shouldn't discourage scholars from quoting their own works, particularly if they are significant. Awadewit 15:09, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

Note "has not been fact-checked or peer-reviewed" is original research. If the work has been fact-checked or peer-reviewed, and we would under any other circumstances accept that source as reliable, there certainly would be no problem with a scholar citing his own work. The problem would arise if the person wished to engage in synthesis which had not yet been fact-checked or peer-reviewed. But sure, anyone can cite a reliable source, regardless of whether (s)he also happened to write it. Seraphimblade ^{Talk to me Please review me!} 15:13, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

We are usually unable to confirm that the self-proclaimed expert has the credentials he claims if he does not give his real life name on his user page. We just went through the embarrasment of a "noted theologian, PhD, professor of theology, and former department head" who in editing fell back on his credentials to argue others into submission, and who turned out to be an imposter with respect to the credentials. Someone who claims to be a doctor, lawyer, rocket scientist or Nobel Prize winning theoretical physicist may be none of those. If they have published something in a respected journal which satisfies WP:ATT they or anyone else can cite it. Edison 15:22, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

ThuranX you mischaracterized what occurred. My *actions* did not violate any policy whatsoever. My actions were to post a link to a Talk page. ATT does not address this issue. Wjhonson 23:46, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

Photographic evidence, paywalled sites allowed?

We're having a bit of a problem currently with the Dancing puppets trick article - the information in the article has been mentioned or alluded to in a variety of different websites, but none of them can be counted as reliable sources. To date, one article has been found which does seem to fulfill the requirements, but it's behind a paywall. A recent deletion discussion resulted in no consensus and a relisting in two weeks if no attributable sources are found. Anyway, my questions are the following... first of all, does anyone know the rules for paywalled articles? Also, I've found several photographs online of the thing which is described in the article. Can these photographs be used as evidence? The pics in question: [10], [11] Esn 02:26, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

It's always OK to cite a printed newspaper article (from a reputable newspaper). Linking to the newspaper's site is what's known as a "convenience link", and is not required, but you should give the exact day and if possible the page number. --NE2 03:13, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

There is nothing wrong with citing reliable sources that must be paid for, whether online or printed. Last time I checked, bookstores were not giving away books free. The only objection would be a conflict of interest, where the editor who writes the citation somehow profits from sales of the material that is cited. --Gerry Ashton 04:19, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

Additionally, the photographs you point to are not adequate to support the article, which talks in-depth about details that are not visible in the photographs. I'd also be concerned that your newspaper article is unlikely to be anywhere near as in-depth as the article we have. JulesH 07:53, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

I would generally tend to think that an editor's own interpretation of a photograph would be original research in any case. Seraphimblade ^{Talk to me Please review me!} 15:14, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

The article does have serious citation (ie none) and NOR issues. The list of where this scam has been observed, for instance, seems pure OR - relying on the personal observations of the editors who have seen it in action. It should be deleted or majorly re-worked. Blueboar 15:19, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

Peer review

Is "peer review" always a guarantee that a source is reliable? Should any source be automatically declared Reliable because it is peer reviewed, and should articles published in peer reviewed journals be given credibility based on the peer review? Along the same lines, is there any way of verifying that a publication that claims peer review actually does it, or what degree of scrutiny and rigor is used in a particular publication's peer review?

An association can publish a journal and say that it is peer reviewed - do we always accept that claim? A couple specific examples are things like the Journal of Scientific Exploration and journal of the Society for Psychical Research. There is concern that "peer reviewed" is being used to give an inappropriate impression of scientific credibility at fringe topics such as Electronic voice phenomenon. --Milo H Minderbinder 17:53, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

Obviously peer review does not guarantee reliability in the usual sense of the word. Neither does it mean the source qualifies as a "reliable source" in the Wikipedia sense. An individual judgment must be made as to what is a "reliable source", based on the situation at hand. The phrase "peer review" is also vague and can refer to a range of kinds of review. Some journals consider that they are reviewing for plausibility. Some journals demand correctness and require referees to give a submission extensive checking. This should be kept in mind when considering whether "peer review" suffices to make something a reliable source in a specific context.

Also, as you pobably intend to point out, peer review can be a chimera when the association does not adhere to high standards. A paper published in the Journal of the American Mathematical Society can be expected to adhere to higher standards than one appearing in a small, "local" journal. Not only because the AMS is a very respected mathematical society, but this is their "flagship" journal, known to use rigorous refereeing. It also depends on the standards of the field. In pure mathematics, quality of refereeing (correctness) is highly correlated to the prestige a journal has (the other important factor is the importance of the results they publish). Even a very prestigious journal will take a hit in its prestige if they are found to publish a seriously wrong paper. This does not appear to be the case in all scientific disciplines. In some subjects, I get the impression that for even some good journals, if a wrong paper is published; the blame goes almost completely to the author(s), not the editors or referees.

Anyway, I expect this is why the policy basically says to "use your head" so as not to be blinded by the use of buzz-words like "peer review". --Chan-Ho (Talk) 18:15, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

The point of all of this is that someone other than the author stands behind the theory or ideas being presented. In accademia this is achieved through "peer review", for the rest of us it is achieved through "reliable publication" (as opposed to vanity publication). Blueboar 18:21, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

The purpose of peer review is to reflect that the material has been prepared in a manner complying with the methods and beliefs of the organization or community conducting the peer review. Its value is only as good as the organization, and is not an assurance that it is true. There are are topics where people disagree on basic questions such as what way of thinking or inquiry one uses to arrive at truth; on those issues, the key point is to accurately describe each organization conducting the peer review to avoid misrepresentation. The Catholic church conducts peer review on Catholic theology to determine whether it reflects a genuinely Catholic point of view and arrives at truth using Catholic methods. Whether one believes it true or not depends on whether one accepts the assumptions underlying Catholicism. It is a nonetheless a kind of peer review, whether one believes in the outcome or not. Similarly, a newspaper assures the material has been reviewed by journalists and editors, whose methods sometimes aren't perfect either. --Shirahadasha 20:40, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

Sure. That is why editors' best judgment is always needed. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 20:50, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

This is silly.

So, the old policies don't get force. That's reasonable, it would be hard to keep them updated. Then they don't get shortcuts. I disagree, but I can fix that with a Javascript hack to give me buttons to put the names it, so it doesn't matter that much to me. But now they don't get talk pages? Why don't we just go ahead and slap on a protected redirect, if nobody is allowed to do anything with them? -Amarkov moo! 00:34, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

You're right; it's incredibly silly. The "old" policies are here, on this policy page, so why would anyone want to post on the old talk pages? SlimVirgin ^(talk) 00:41, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Think of the old policies as an archive, if you want to bring something up, come the this page, the current page. ^High_InBC^{(Need help? Ask me)} 00:46, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

But they're not just archives. They're policies that existed for years. -Amarkov moo! 00:58, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

They were expressions of policy. There is nothing sacred about the form we give to policies, otherwise policies would be carved in stone. The policies and guidelines that were formerly expressed on the pages Wikipdia:Verifiability, Wikipedia:No original research and Wikipedia:Reliable sources are now expressed on this page. Those superseded pages are now historical, of interest in reviewing the history of our policies, but no longer the living expression of our policies. -- Donald Albury 03:24, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

The issue is not why would anyone WANT to post on those pages. Rather the issue is a small group of editors trying to suppress any posting to those pages. Whether we want to or not, should not be in the hands of people who don't *want* us to. We should be able to post comments to *any* talk page we feel like posting. There could any number of reasons why we would want to, but that isn't relevant. What's relevant is that we should have the freedom to do so, without getting attacked. Wjhonson 03:46, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Wjhonson, you are saying that you want to do something that many or most of us consider disruptive, without telling us why, and because "you feel like it". The only motivation I can see at this point is WP:POINT. Please invest your resources in more productive directions. Thanks, Crum375 03:56, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Change is the nature of wikis, the same policy still exists, just on this page. ^High_InBC^{(Need help? Ask me)} 03:58, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Having a conversation about a Talk page on that page can never be construed as disruptive. The active conversation that several of us were engaged in, on that page, did not disrupt any aspect of Wikipedia whatsoever. Can you be painfully specific as exactly *how* this could possibly be perceived as disruptive? That would be helpful. And again High, the issue is not whether we should post here, but are we being *forced* to post here. That is, are we to engage in suppression and censorship on that other Talk page from now on? That's the issue. Wjhonson 04:01, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

I suppose you can talk there, but decisions will not be binding because it is done away from where the main populations of editors discuss such things. It is not about censorship, it is more that we are holding the meetings somewhere else now. ^High_InBC^{(Need help? Ask me)} 04:03, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Wjhonson, when you start posting to old/mothballed/historical pages, it creates a disruption because editors must now monitor multiple pages referring to the same topic, and because newcomers may mistakenly be attracted into a thread on an old page, not realizing it is obsolete. It can also lead to conflicting and/or overlapping threads about the same topic. All of these are totally unnecessary and highly disruptive. Crum375 04:10, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Obviously this man does not feel he is part of 'we'. There is never a good reason to remove or otherwise obstruct the use of a talk page unless it is being used to violate policy. Jtrainor 04:06, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Disruption and WP:POINT, per my comments above, and the impeding of the building of our encyclopedia, is a violation of policy and can result in a block after appropriate warnings. Crum375 04:10, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Talk: pages are for the purpose of improving article content. Since these are defunct policies, the Talk: pages can no longer be used for that purpose - in fact, they have no purpose any more, and are as defunct as the policies themselves. Wikipedia is not a message board or blog; if you feel you need places to have conversations with your buddies, please find more appropriate ones. Jayjg ^(talk) 04:55, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Look, it's disruptive because it's causing this disruption, and there's no need for it. The problem with keeping the old talk page active is that new editors may see the discussion, not realize the policy has moved, and then things will be discussed there rather than here, meaning other editors have to monitor both pages, and on and on with yet more pointless time-wasting. The policy moved and the policy talk page moved with it, and to ask people to cooperate with that isn't censorship, just common sense. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 04:56, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

So add a link to this page at the top of the old talk page with a notice that that policy is now obsolete. Problem solved. Jtrainor 06:04, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

We've done that. Problem unfortunately not solved because some people could find problems in heaven itself. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 19:09, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

I find that argument circular. You punch me in the face, I complain, but somehow I should accept getting punched in the face. My complaint "don't punch me in the face" is disruptive. If the comments had been left alone, as they should have been, this discussion would never have started. If anything is disruptive it's what occurred to *start* this, which is the wiping out of the Talk page comments. That is disruptive to the smooth editing of the project. If those editors who wish to force us to not talk on that page i.e. censor us or suppress us would leave us alone instead, they would show that they are not being disruptive. If you could explain how a person would *not* see it as antagonistic I'd appreciate it. But I'm not about to accept that those of us who wish to not have our comments wiped are being disruptive as opposed to the few who wish to wipe the talk comments of other people who are merely exercising their right to post comments on talk pages. Do not wipe the talk page comments of others unless you can point to a policy that those comments are violating. That's a pretty basic, civil request. I'd like to see an argument against it. Wjhonson 00:06, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

I find the use of pumpwords like "disruption" and "point" to be grossly counter-productive. They are words used to beat editors, not to assist them. I agree with the above, that there should be no restrictions to posting to talk pages unless they are used to violate policy. Whether that's common sense, isn't relevant. What's happening is censorship, not assistance. Repression, not expression. Wikipedia should never be the place where that sort of thing occurs. And no one should be wiping other people's talk comments for any reason other than policy issues. This isn't one. And speaking of pumpwords how about WP:AGF ? That wasn't done here, I do not enjoy being accused of disruption and WP:POINT when we are trying to improve the project. Wjhonson 07:15, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Oops... in reading over AGF I see that I shouldn't accuse someone of violating AGF "...without presenting supporting evidence". So my supporting evidence is that my Talk page comments were wiped out three times in as many hours, with no imho just cause and the last time was by an admin who then posted a personal Talk page comment asserting that I may be being disruptive and WP:POINT when really I was just annoyed that my Talk page comments were getting wiped in the first place. Those edits did not WP:AGF from my point-of-view, they WP:ABF which is rather insulting. So that's my evidence ;) Wjhonson 08:11, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

SlimVirgin said: "...and are as defunct as the policies themselves.". No, the policies are not defunct. The policies have not changed. Wikipedia:Verifiability is still policy. To change the policy, there would have to be a consensus-building process which checks whether there is any major objection to demoting the old policies. This was not done. Instead there was a question as to whether there was any major objection, linked to statements that the proposed procedure would not be changing any policies. --Coppertwig 13:58, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Point of information: I said no such thing. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 19:11, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Coppertwig - You take Slim's words out of context. The concept of "verifiablility" is still policy (as it is included in this policy), but the policy page "WP:Verifiability" is defunct. There is a difference. Also, you seem to be confusing consensus with unanimity. There certainly is a consensus in favor of this policy, but there is not unanimity about it. Blueboar 14:09, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

(conflict) Yes it was done. The talk page for this policy was advertised in numerous locations, including on the talk page of Verifiability on multiple occasions, with the clear suggestion that it was a proposal to replace V. Objections were discussed and the vast majority of those who had objections were happy to drop them once minor changes to the phrasing of this policy were made to accomodate their views. This process lasted several months, during which time anybody was free to comment. The question about major objections was merely the last step of the process, one final check before going live, once we were already nearly certain that consensus had been achieved. JulesH 14:11, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Independent Sources, means not duplications? Or does it mean more than that?

Where is the reference in wikipedia that sources have to be independent of each other? I'm sure it is somewhere, but with the changes that have been happening I can't quite see what has happened to it. I'm looking through WP:ATT but can't find any reference to independence of sources. I'm presuming they can not all be a repeat of each other. For instance if Australian Associated Press gives a press report about an incidence which is then published in a hundred newspapers unchanged we can not solely use that as a basis for an article when no other sources exist? At least I'll presume that is what is meant by independence, or am I missing something? Mathmo ^Talk 04:58, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Sources don't have to be independent of each other in the sense that the previous guideline (WP:RS) said, but they also shouldn't be duplicates. If the AP reports something which is repeated by 100 newspapers, you can't use those as 100 separate sources. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 05:19, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Yes, that is what I thought. Indepent = not duplicate. Mathmo ^Talk 06:57, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Independent of the Subject

Another related question I'd like to have confirmed that I'm thinking clearly about this, is to do with sources independent of the subject. I pressume by that it is meant sources that are not written by the subject. For instance I could not write an article about a physics professor if the only information about him had been written by himself. But if there existed several sources published about him which had been written by physics professors other than himself then that would be enough to write an article with. Mathmo ^Talk 05:08, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

There have to be sources that are independent of the subject. If there aren't, we shouldn't write an article about that person. If there are, you can write the article, and then you can also use material published by the subject. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 05:21, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Yup, already knew very well all of what you just said. You seem to be repeating back what I said. Trying to get confirmation/clarification on what "independent of the subject" means. I'll re-state it. The other physics professors are all independent of the subject, right? The fact that they do physics as well makes no differences, because the word subject is refering to is obviously the subject of the article which is the professor. Not subject area of physics. Of course for the article about physics we would like to have references from people who are not doing physics, as well as those who are doing physics. But that is completely different from the main example I'm concentrating on, because it is a subject area not an individual person. Mathmo ^Talk 07:03, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

There is no reason for an article ion a general subject we should have sources from people who do not know the subject. There's no reason to have references for the physics article from other sciences. What there is need for is, that for a given controversial theory, there must be references (and probably quotes) from both supports of the theory and their opponents. For the article English, we have sources talking about the language, and they dont have to be in French or German to provide a theoretical "outside" view.

Yeah, I do realise referring to the physics article wasn't an ideal example, because nobody is going to dispute that we should have an article about physics. I just have physics and maths on my brain a lot, so it is the first example that came to mind. But if in a crazy alternative universe where we are disputing if the physics article should stay then we would like to see sources from people other than physicists. (all hypothetical, so replace words as need be) Anyway, this was merely a tangent to my main question to do with biographical articles. In which anybody other than the person themself would be independent of the subject (excluding I'm sure a few rare exceptions, they always exist. Guess an example would be if only close family members had written about the person). Mathmo ^Talk 09:20, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

For the matters we are actually discussing, individual and things closely associated with them, we ned some reference from outside to a/be sure they arent making the whole thing up, and b/ there is some measure of objectivity, someone other than the author who says his book is important.DGG 08:12, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Mathmo, "independent of the subject" would mean not the subject and not any source of information controlled by the subject. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 19:13, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

I got the impression he was talking about a biography. He did say "about a physics professor" as opposed to "about a physics theory". Maybe I'm wrong. Wjhonson 08:14, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Yes, refering to biographical articles. Obviously when it comes to books the author would not be independent. What I was referring to (a biography) all seems pretty straight forward too, but no harm in double checking! Mathmo ^Talk 09:14, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Yes Mathmo. If a few of her colleagues write biographies of her, you can paraphrase them all together into one article. And then threw in some quotes directly from her for spice. Wjhonson 07:12, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Thanks! Not quite what I was asking. More focussing specifically on independence from the subject, but I think this response has been enough for me to completely confirm that I am thinking along the right tracks. Mathmo ^Talk 08:12, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

"in articles about themselves"

The wording keeps getting changed back to "in articles about themselves", but this isn't the actual criteria. This wording is both too broad and too restrictive for neutrality. Questionable sources should not be used for concrete statements of fact, but they should be used for statements about themselves or their authors. In other words, you can't say "the earth is flat", and use someone's blog as a reference for it, but you can say "blog writer x says the world is flat" and use the blog as a reference. It has nothing whatsoever to do with being in an article about the blog or about its author. — Omegatron 07:36, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

What makes you think a random blog passes the test for use as a reliable source in the first place ? Wjhonson 08:08, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

It is a reliable source in an article about the blog or its author. But why such an article would claim the Earth is flat is beyond me... JulesH 10:31, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

"It has nothing whatsoever to do with being in an article about the blog or about its author." Yes it does, because such a statement would have no place on any article but one about the blog or its author. Marskell 10:37, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Primary source

See: Archive 11: Primary source --Philip Baird Shearer 12:14, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

I don't see your point. There is a definition of what a primary source is, and a number of good examples too. JulesH 12:21, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

The change I am making is to put similar information after the definition, instead of using the term before it is defined. Also it is not edits to text that are covered by this policy document but rather "All material in Wikipedia" (the text once the edits have been made). --Philip Baird Shearer 12:38, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

I don't see a problem with using a term and then defining it in the next sentence. This is fairly standard practice and helps the document flow better. I'm also not sure why you're picking solely on primary sources when the exact same arrangement is also used for secondary sources, 'original research', 'reliable sources', 'questionable source', and 'self-published source'. I do agree with you that the reference to 'edits' is perhaps wrong, and should probably be changed to 'articles'. JulesH 12:43, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

I have not yet altered secondary sources etc., because incremental changes are better than large changes. You may think that it helps the document flow better, but the structure of this pivotal policy document should be close to a well written legal document, and in those definitions always come first to avoid ambiguity in the text. After all the reason for combing WP:V etc into one was to clarify things which were already there but in several documents and it helps if this document should be constructed in such a way as to reduce ambiguity still further. One way to do this is to make sure that it is structured logically.

Also I have problems with "The Bible cannot be used as a source for the claim that Jesus advocated eye removal (Matthew 18:9, Mark 9:47) for his followers, because theologians differ as to how these passages should be interpreted." Why pick out the Bible for consideration why not the Koran or any other religious book? The current wording implys that the Bible holds a special position inside Wikipedia. --Philip Baird Shearer 13:04, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

The bible is the most widely distributed primary source material in the English language. This is the English Wikipedia. The Koran is not generally translated into English, so few of the English-speaking readers of this web site will be familiar with its content. The reasoning behing this choice is obvious.

I also disagree that the structure of a wikipedia policy should mimic that of a legal document. Most people find reading legal documents difficult and tedious; wikipedia is not a beurocracy and we want to encourage people to understand the policies rather than needing lawyers to interpret them for them. The policy should therefore follow the structure of documents designed to inform, i.e. educational texts. The style of using a word then explaining its meaning is common in such texts. JulesH 14:17, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Choosing the Bible may be in your opinion "obvious" but it is not in my opinion an example of systemic bias and probably breaks the WP:NPOV policy. If this needs to be mentioned it should be in the FAQ not in this policy article.

How do you know that most people find reading a legal document difficult and tedious? I think it depends on the document. In the past when solicitors were paid by the word I would have agreed with you, but modern contracts drawn up with a consideration for plain English are much easier to understand. I put it to you that if this article is structured in such a way as to minimise inconsistencies, it is less likely to misunderstood. --Philip Baird Shearer 16:34, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

And I suggest that if we introduce the reason why the reader of the policy should care about a concept before describing the meaning of the concept, it is more likely to be read. What precise ambiguity is introduced by using the phrase "primary source" in the sentence before it is defined?

And, what other source can we use for an example that a significant proportion of our readers will be familiar with? JulesH 21:12, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Burden of evidence

The introduction to this statement of policy mentions the "burden of evidence". I've never heard of the burden of evidence. Ought it not read "burden of proof"? DavidCBryant 15:33, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

What's really required is some evidence that backs up the editor's claims, not necessarily definitive proof. Evidence is really a minimum requirement since without any evidence there's certainly not proof. ChazBeckett 15:43, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

The statement means that the burden of providing evidence to back a claim (ie a citation to a reliable source) is upon the person wishing to add the claim to the article. Blueboar 16:55, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Exactly, and not to be confused with the burden of evidence about the truth of the cited assertion. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 16:58, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Indeed. If we said "the burden proof" people would think in terms of the truth of the assertion ... by saying "burden of evidence" we make it clearer that we are talking about who has to add sources. But perhaps "burden of providing evidence" would be clearer yet? Blueboar 17:12, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

question about application of Wikipedia:Attribution

What is the rule concerning a user who removes text because of Original Research of their own? For example, a use who removes an argument because they think its false based on their own original synthesis of other sources?--Urthogie 17:18, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Since we should not have argument based on an editor's original synthesis in the first place, the editor not only may, but is encouraged to remove it. If you like the argument and wish to keep it in the article, go look for an independant secondary source that states it. Blueboar 18:23, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

I think you misunderstand my question. I'm saying when the removal itself is based on the removers OR.--Urthogie 19:02, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

This is not prohibited. Neither, however, would restoring the information be. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by JulesH (talk • contribs) 21:20, 9 March 2007 (UTC).

I would say it is prohibited. Jayjg ^(talk) 22:32, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

JayJg - Which is prohibited, removing or restoring? Blueboar 22:47, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Of course it's not policy violation to restore non-OR (unless its 3RR). My question, though, is if its a policy violation to remove something because you find it to not be true based on your own obvious original research. And this is assuming everyone editing agrees with you that X isn't true after you show your evidence.--Urthogie 23:24, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

(unindenting) I'd say it depends. If by "original research" we are talking about an experiment, I'd say no: if you have come up with a rigorous experiment that contradicts received opinion, the best thing to do would be to see how you can get your results published in the appropriate periodical. If by "original research" we are talking about a secondary source that claims that source X had a given passage in it, & you have read source X & found that it does not -- I'd say that is possible grounds to remove that use of the secondary source. I'd try to find one or more Wikipedians who know the subject, show them your findings, & solicit their input first, though; there may be good reasons why this happened. -- llywrch 23:59, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Another question, I don't see the new policy mentioning tertiary sources. Are they considred to be reliable sources? --Brian Wiseman 00:35, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

WP:ATTFAQ says that "[t]raditionally published encyclopedias are reliable sources". All the same, unsigned encyclopedia articles are hardly desirable sources. Angus McLellan (Talk) 01:13, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

Effects on External links

Via the WP:EL#Links normally to be avoided #2 guideline, this policy page now applies to external links (normally). The nutshell states that this policy applies to material in Wikipedia. Was this intended? AndroidCat 17:50, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Your question really should be asked at the EL page... if the original intent at EL was that WP:V, WP:NOR and/or WP:RS were to apply to External Links, then this page (or the relevant sections) should apply as well, since this policy is a continuation of those Policies. Blueboar 18:29, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

External links are material in Wikipedia, but that doesn't mean the content of the sites we link to must adhere to ATT. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 19:15, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

The guideline in question reads: Except for a link to a page that is the subject of the article or an official page of the article subject—and not prohibited by restrictions on linking—one should avoid: ...

...Any site containing factually inaccurate material or unverifiable research.

It then gave a wiki-link to the old WP:RS guideline. I think the purpose was to help the editor define what is meant by "verifiable resarch". If that is the case, then the intent is the same when linking to this Policy. If they mean something else, or find that their intent is not met within this page, then it is up to the folks at EL to re-word their page. Blueboar 19:30, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Weak sources or sources used outside context

In the article Norouz as celebrated by Kurds, this source has been used:

"Rasbridge, Lance Andrew; Kemp, Charles (2004). Refugee and Immigrant Health: A Handbook for Health Professionals. Cambridge University Press, pg. 236. ISBN 0521535603."

To support a statement regarding legends behind a spring festival. This book is obviously focused on something completley different, not only to the festival, but to the ethnic group we are discussing here. I believe there was just a note regarding this festival to explain hazards probably regarding injuries caused by jumping over a fire (a tradition of this festival) or something similar.

I wanted to know whether this can be used as a primary source to support a statement and whether it can be called a "weak" source. It must be appreciated that the statement has another reference too so I am just using this as an example and do not object to the statement that the reference has been used for here. Regards, --Rayis 16:23, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

Non-scholarly sources

In a recent AFD discussion where someone was complaining of the sort of sources used in an article on a fictional subject, I had attempted to provide them a link to the section in the old WP:RS that discussed non-scholarly sources. When i discovered the recent merger and that the section was no longer included i looked and discovered that the section had been removed from the original RS on Feb. 24th without any discussion. I am restoring the section to the main page here, as it was removed without consensus in the first place. If anyone would like to discuss changes to the section I invite them to do it here. -ΖαππερΝαππερ ^Babel_Alexandria 16:53, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

Individual sections need tagging

I'm noticing that there are shortcut links to bring readers/editors directly to core principals (like NOR). This is fine but unfortunately it can be a bit disorienting to suddenly "teleport" via a hyperlink to a section and not immediately understand what it is pertains to. I think it would be sensible that each shortcutted section be tagged as being representative of policy so that individuals are not obliged to review the entire page (and in particular the top) to understand they are looking at Wikipedia policy. I would like to edit these features in. Is there anyone who disagrees with this idea? (→Netscott) 17:47, 10 March 2007 (UTC)