Wikipedia talk:Scientific standards

Pseudo-controversial examples

Global warming isn't a great example, since it's a broad topic and involves a lot of legitimate controversy (e.g., effect on hurricanes, as explained in Effects of global warming). I think you should take it out. Alternatively, you could replace "global warming" with something more specific, e.g. "Human CO2 emissions have contributed to global warming in the 20th century". I'm not an expert on this, so maybe that's not the best example. Likewise, you could consider replacing evolution by "evolutionary common descent", since again evolution is broad enough to contain multitudes of legitimate controversies (e.g. group selection). You of all people should have no problem coming up with lots of great examples for this parenthetical, but I'd offer "(nonexistence of) cold fusion" and "special relativity" and "(nonexistence of) astrology" and "(nonexistence of) perpetual motion machines" as some other potential options. --Steve (talk) 21:40, 19 August 2008 (UTC)

Since when has there been controversy over Special Relativity outside the scientific community? Deamon138 (talk) 22:26, 19 August 2008 (UTC)

Herbert Dingle, autodynamics, etc. But you're right, Deamon138, there is very little controversy that is notable outside the scientific community. ScienceApologist (talk) 23:05, 19 August 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the links, but yeah any disagreement with Relativity is effectively the equivalent of the Flat Earth Society i.e. very very very fringe. Deamon138 (talk) 00:33, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

Consensus building

In order to be policy, it must reach consensus. Let's start with the goal of getting it accepted (whether it does get accepted or not). Some of the difficulties in achieving that goal include:

• There's overwhelming consensus for NPOV, so this proposal must be compliant with that and make it clear how it is compliant so that readers don't get the wrong idea.

• People have a love-hate relationship with science. They love it when science turns out a new medicine or a new gadget for them to play with, but they hate it when science debunks their traditions and beliefs. We need to make it clear why this policy is needed to make Wikipedia more reliable, in a way that everyone will naturally agree with.

• People equate science with atheism. We need to not beat around the bush and address the elephant that will be in the room directly. The scientific standards policy does not direct editors to adopt an Atheism Point of View on religious articles. We should say that clearly.

• Needs clauses explaining what legitimate scientific disagreements are, and what pseudo-disagreements are.

• Editors involved in conflict articles in the past need to set aside grudges and strive to build a good policy here. Rather than editing from the point of view that "Oh, this would have helped me in that dispute, let's slide that in", we should start fresh and objectively, imagining what tools new editors will need to build reliable articles.

• (More will probably be thought of as we go along)

--Nealparr ^{(talk to me)} 21:54, 19 August 2008 (UTC)

Each point in turn:

• 100% agree.

• 100% agree.

• I'd love for you to draft wording to this effect.

• Not sure I understand this point. I think a legitimate scientific disagreement is like nature versus nurture as advertised. The creation-evolution controversy is not a legitimate scientific controversy.

• I definitely tried to do this. If you find any place where I fell short, please let me know.

ScienceApologist (talk) 23:09, 19 August 2008 (UTC)

Regarding bullet #4, your examples describe what I was trying to say. Nature vs. nuture is a disagreement in science, ie. a legitimate scientific disagreement. Creation vs. evolution is a disagreement with science, ie. not a real scientific disagreement, but a philosophical disagreement. We should explain the difference here. --Nealparr ^{(talk to me)} 00:48, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

I don't think my colleagues in the philosophy department would agree with you. Perhaps "political" or "social" controversy might be more appropriate. But, nevertheless, I get your drift. ScienceApologist (talk) 03:07, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

Some concerns

The first para states: "When describing observable reality, those results should be relied on most heavily and results from other methods should be marginalized or eschewed per our policy on undue weight." This is painted with an overly broad brush. For example, the miracles of Jesus are ostensibly descriptions of observable phenomena. However, it would be undue weight itself to provide skeptical humanist rebuttals of each miracle, because such rebuttals on that topic compromise an extreme minority of the reliable sources on that topic. I'm currently at a loss about how to focus the statement more precisely without being overly restrictive. Thoughts?

A closely following statement has the same issues: "When an article needs to make some description of observable reality, Wikipedia weights the published scientific results that explain the observable reality more heavily than other opinions."

Also, great care needs to be taken to avoid the pitfalls of a SPOV-style approach. Variations of the SPOV have been criticized by a broad swath of editors at the fringe theories and NPOV talk pages, as well as the policy village pump. These critical opinions voiced over the years need to be carefully considered (and actually listen to) for this proposal to get legs. That said, this does have the raw potential to forge a guideline on scientific topics. After this gets a bit hammered into shape, I would suggest leaving a neutral and polite note asking for feedback at the core science WikiProjects. Vassyana (talk) 22:13, 19 August 2008 (UTC)

I think context is the key here. In the context of telling a story with no specific attempt to appeal to external reality, we can treat the miracles of Jesus in exactly the same way we treat The Physics of Star Trek. That is, we do not need to rebut every "warp drive" reference in a retelling of the Star Trek story nor do we need to rebut every "walking on water" reference in a retelling of the gospel. However, when a claim is made that is directly about observable reality (say, for example, the shroud of Turin) it is absolutely vital that we default to scientific sources lest we mislead the reader into a proselytization scheme. I think there is a very big difference between the flame that does not burn and the miracle of the loaves and fishes. One is absolutely a physically observable event. The other is subject to higher criticism and biblical exegesis. Sure there are biblical literalists who argue that there literally was a supernatural multiplying of loaves and fishes, but their beliefs in general are subject to a scientific critique and singling out a literalist perspective along with a critique at each and every miracle mentioned in the bible is definitively giving undue weight to the literalists. In short, I think we should take a comparative religions approach when reporting on religion which only requires scientific discussion when there is a direct claim of observation. Faith healing is reported with the scientific evidence. Avatars are not. Do you see what I'm saying? ScienceApologist (talk) 23:04, 19 August 2008 (UTC)

"in-universe"

The term "in-universe" is not only jargon, but jargon specific to fictional topics. I get what you mean, but that sentence should really be reworded; I'd just do it myself, except I can't offhand think of a really good way to phrase it. Maybe someone else could? —Ilmari Karonen (talk) 22:24, 19 August 2008 (UTC)

I can't either, but it really does fit the way. The idea is that alternative proposals should not be described on their own terms since that would lend itself to soapboxing. ScienceApologist (talk) 23:11, 19 August 2008 (UTC)

Do we need this?

Just wondering, but what exactly does this proposal bring us that WP:FRINGE, WP:PSCI and WP:UNDUE don't already do? Deamon138 (talk) 22:33, 19 August 2008 (UTC)

IMO, not much. If there is any useful material here, it should be added to WP:NPOV, PSCI and/or FRINGE. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 22:42, 19 August 2008 (UTC)

I just keep coming across issues which don't fit very well into the three areas you all mention. Fringe deals with only fringe theories and doesn't touch much on how to handle mainstream controversy. It also spans much more than just scientific ideas. FRINGE, as a guideline, is intended to deal with how to discuss matters that are fringe. In some sense, it serves a role close to WP:N and in a way I think its existence doomed WP:SCI. WP:PSCI deals exclusively with categorization and by community consensus defers to the arbcom authority in a way that will be very hard to augment. Undue just is a policy for how to handle different perspectives: and it is not specific enough to handle specific issues as they arise. What we need is a centralized source for articles that relate to science. In particular, there are many people that seem to be confused as to when we should worry about what the scientific evidence is for a subject and when we shouldn't. This doesn't fit in very well to any of the guidelines and policies you mention. I got a lot of my material from some very good stuff at WP:SPOV. If you look at WT:SPOV you'll see very little discussion on the actual content of that page, but a lot of discussion on the meta-philosophy associated with that page. I agree with Nealparr above that NPOV is so sacrosanct as to be non-negotiable (Jimbo's words), however, I am all but certain that for lack of some science standards we could have avoided a great number of fights at Wikipedia. We need SOMETHING. There is a vacuum. ScienceApologist (talk) 22:47, 19 August 2008 (UTC)

You say that you "keep coming across issues which don't fit very well into" WP:NPOV, PSCI and/or FRINGE. ScienceApologist, can you give us some examples of these issue and how you feel a policy such as this would help? -- Levine2112 ^discuss 00:09, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

Sure. If such a policy had been in place during the disputes over the plasma cosmology article, it would have saved a lot of megabytes worth of text since the plasma cosmology proponents have failed to generate real controversy in the field of cosmology. ScienceApologist (talk) 00:32, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

I am unfamiliar with that dispute. Can you lay it out for us briefly? -- Levine2112 ^discuss 00:48, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

Being brief about this subject is a bit difficult, but suffice to say the "controversy" over plasma cosmology right now is a pseudo-controversy despite having been a legitimate controversy in the past. This can be seen because there is no acknowledgment of the controversy by the experts in the field: in fact, there is a specific denial that a controversy is real. Nevertheless, amateur (and professional) advocates for this idea appear at Wikipedia from time-to-time to argue that the controversy is legitimate. Megabytes of text were wasted trying to explain to them why this isn't the case and one of them was actually banned from editing articles on the subject by arbcom. Hardly an ideal situation, to say the least. I have no doubt with a set of standards in place this controversy would have been much less protracted. ScienceApologist (talk) 00:59, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

Let me see if I got this right then. So there was a historical controversy but now this controversy is all but squelched. However, there is still some who recognize the controversy, but since there are only a fringe amount of such proponents, the controversy - according to this policy - would be considered only a "pseudo-controversy" and thus it should not be mentioned in the article at all. Is that about right? -- Levine2112 ^discuss 01:41, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

Um, I'm not quite sure what you mean by "the article". Obviously, plasma cosmology is mentioned in the plasma cosmology article. The "claims of a controversy" are also mentioned there too, but they are contextualized as being independent of the scientific community in much the same way as the creation-evolution controversy is characterized as not being a controversy within science. This was the major bone-of-contention with advocates of plasma cosmology who saw the controversy as inside the scientific community despite the lack of acknowledgment by independent sources that such a "controversy" existed within science. ScienceApologist (talk) 01:53, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

I'd also like to point out that I didn't always feel that such a thing was needed at Wikipedia. However, in Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration/Pseudoscience#Notability, the arbitration committee asked the community to give some guidance on the issue. The proposal was rejected ultimately by the community but I've seen the need persist. I think such a proposal will go a long way toward helping guide certain conflicts in positive directions in much the same way that WP:FRINGE has helped. ScienceApologist (talk) 22:52, 19 August 2008 (UTC)

Jossi, if you were right, then there wouldn't be a single argument about NPOV on this project. OrangeMarlin ^{Talk• Contributions} 00:08, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

We need this all right, but not the way it has been written. I have added a section that I think necessary for balance I have not yet attempted to harmonize it with the discordant elements in some of the previous sections, some of which I consider rather clear violations of NPOV, and objectivity, as well as a rather naive approach to "observable reality". I will be modifying those to fit a little later on today. I commend Sa for his initiative, and I think this work may serve as the basis for a clear statement acceptable to the consensus. WP should write its articles so that the anti-scientist and the scientist will each see what support there is for their views, and be able to follow up further on all sides of the question. Being as convinced an exponent of the so-called SPOV as anyone else around here, I have not the least doubt about what a neutral or naive reader will conclude. I even think that a respectful presentation of the non-scientific and even anti-scientific points of view may lead those with an inclination in those directions to perhaps take a broader perspective--and lead the exponent of science to take a more effective approach DGG (talk) 00:18, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

That was well said, DGG. But this proposed policy/guideline as written, does not address the issues you raise. I would support a tight, simple, and direct policy/guideline that expands on what you say above and that it does not play with the boundaries of NPOV, V, and NOR, but this ain't it. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 00:24, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

It is meant to be something of a work in progress, Jossi. I'm just responding to what I see as a gaping hole. Of course, it's gaping to me because I tend to get lost in it for extended periods of time. We had a discussion a while back on the nexus of scientific evidence and religious proclamations. I think we may need to revisit that discussion before this thing is through. In particular, I'm sort of under the impression that you think ANY claim made by a religion is off-limits to scientific critique -- or at the very least scientific critique should be segregated from the religious claim so as not to bias the reader against the religious claim. I acknowledge that there are instances where science is irrelevant to the discussion of a religious practice, dogma, or belief (see my discussion with Vassyanna above), but it make me feel a lot better if I could see that you recognized that sometimes a claim that is based in a religion is subject to discussion of scientific scrutiny AND that independent scientific review of a religious claim is more reliable than a preacher who disputes the review, for example. I just get the feeling that you are far too in favor of balance over WP:V, WP:RS and other standards for referencing. An encyclopedia shouldn't be treating the claims of religious gurus about, say, the age of the Earth as on par with scientific sources. To do so does a serious disservice to our readers. ScienceApologist (talk) 00:42, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

(didn't read the above on purpose)

Yes we need this. There is no policy on Wikipedia specifically addressing science related topic standards. There's many "don't push a POV" policies like WP:PSCI and WP:FRINGE, but nothing about keeping quality in science related articles. Science topics are very important to Wikipedia, and there's a lot of editors from all walks of life who like to participate in science-related articles. There should definitely be standards for these type of articles. If for no other reason, it will help the layman who wants to participate in an article about a topic they saw on the Discovery Channel to be better science-writers. Most Wikipedia editors aren't scientists (I'm not). It makes sense to develop a standards policy and guide them, in the interest of being a reliable and educational encyclopedia.

Give it time. Don't judge it by what's currently there. Judge it by the idea that an educational reference needs standards for science topics. --Nealparr ^{(talk to me)} 00:58, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

We certainly don't need this to be a policy. It's a nice essay, however. II | (t - c) 01:16, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

As a fairly new editor I have to say that this sort of thing is desperately needed. The standards put forth in WP:V etc. are necessarily vague so as to encompass subjects inside and outside the sciences. This leads to a deep confusion on whether peer reviewed literature is the gold standard source on subjects where such is available. A clear unmistakable policy that the prefered source on subjects dealing with fields scientifically investigated is the peer reviewed article would make things much clearer IMO. The wording of this page could be better and finding the boundary that respects faith beliefs while still maintaining this position may be hard to find but this is definitely a policy/guideline worth having. Kbs666 (talk) 04:11, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

Verifiability#Reliable_sources already says quite clearly and unmistakably: the most reliable sources are peer-reviewed journals and books published in university presses; then, university-level textbooks; then, magazines, journals, and books published by respected publishing houses; mainstream newspapers are frequently the most reliable sources on subjects which have not been treated in journals and books.. Dlabtot (talk) 04:21, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

And that quote would be wonderful if not for those weasel words in front of it "In general..." Which allows all sorts of interpretations and weaseling. A clear cut no weasel words statement that peer reviewed articles are the prefered source material on wikipedia would go a long way to improving the situation, IMO. Kbs666 (talk) 04:33, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

This policy when it's finished won't be just about reliability. It'll be about what is necessarily needed to write science articles. That's not something covered by WP:RS, and it's more than an essay. It's essential for any educational reference that covers scientific topics. --Nealparr ^{(talk to me)} 04:45, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

Issues with technical language

One problem with science articles is that they often are very technical. This is a double-edged sword. It is a dirty-little-secret of academia that very obscure and technical articles which rarely see any editing activity are excellent resources and more than a few professors I know use Wikipedia to get a quick summary of an obscure idea. However, they are often simply inaccessible for most of our readers. I ran into this problem trying to get Force to pass as a featured article. Right now, there is a mish-mash of solutions to the problem. There is introduction to special relativity and introduction to quantum mechanics which are meant to serve as the "lay articles companions" to the technical special relativity and quantum mechanics articles. I always thought that this wasn't the ideal solution to the problem, but I have to admit that I often fail to realize how difficult it is to write accessibly. Take my last featured article, redshift, as an example. I bet a lot of people can't get very far reading that article. Are there any ideas for how or if we should address this issue in these standards?

ScienceApologist (talk) 01:04, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

Religious impact

If this was adopted as policy, how would it affect an article such as God, or more specifically God#Scientific_positions_regarding_God, if at all? -- Levine2112 ^discuss 01:34, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

Not at all, as far as I can see, except perhaps only to reinforce the approach that seems to be taken at that article. I think that article handles the situation fairly well. ScienceApologist (talk) 01:36, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

Two points.

• The term observable reality is very vague, do we need scientific resources for our article on Rocky? Or are the film not part of observable reality?
• I don't like the fact that we here are to a very large extent putting our heads in the sand. The fact that legal battles are being fought over the place of evolution in the US is an important part of the topic evolution.

Taemyr (talk) 02:05, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

• • The physical projection and the film itself are observable reality, but the universe portrayed in Rocky is not. I will admit, though, that the terminology is frought. Please suggest an alternative.
  • Depending on how you think of the evolution topic, the controversy may or may not be relevant. This is because evolution, as a topic, is not wholly "scientific". It has broader implications than just the fact that it is a dominant scientific paradigm in biology. The more pertinent question might be, if we have an article on the evolution of the horse, do we include the creationist claims that the horse didn't evolve? The answer is no. However, if some independent third-party has noticed the creationist claim and commented on it making it notable and prominent enough for inclusion in an article devoted to creationism, we might see it included there. Still, I see your point. We might want to include some things about broad topics which may need to discuss aspects that are scientific and not strictly scientific (perhaps like evolution).

ScienceApologist (talk) 02:52, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

Nature of observable reality

I have a concern with the metaphysics of this proposal. The proposal as currently written assumes that observable reality is the same thing as truth. This belief is not universal. Compare, for example, the philosophy of substantial forms as advanced by Plato, Aristotle, and medieval philosophers such as Thomas Aquinas. Such a metaphysics assumes that forms or universals—which are not themselves observables—actually exist. So for ancient Greeks and medievals, observable reality is not the same thing as truth; in fact, observable reality is only a poor image of truth, as Plato described in his allegory of the cave.

If the present proposal is adopted as written, then it commits Wikipedia's scientific articles to some sort of physicalism. Physicalism (or any other metaphysics) is a POV, so this proposal contradicts WP:NPOV.

The only way to adhere to NPOV is to adopt no metaphysical viewpoint whatsoever. Any viewpoint meeting the standards of WP:RS, WP:N, WP:NOR, etc. merits inclusion. This is true even when there is scientific consensus against that viewpoint, such as intelligent design; an article that attempted to give a broad survey the beginnings of humanity must contain not only evolutionary explanations of human origins but also religious and pseudo-scientific explanations. That won't make us all happy; but the only other choice is to discriminate against some viewpoints, and we don't do that here. Ozob (talk) 02:16, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

I really was not trying to propose physicalism as a preferred philosophy at all. I was simply trying to say that when an article is about observable (physical) reality we should use the best scientific evidence to discuss that topic. Sure there may be "other planes" which are "more real" than the material, but that's really outside the scope of this particular proposal. The fact isthat writing an encyclopedia is an activity which is EXTREMELY discriminatory, and the current policies and guidelines we have, including the ones you cite, testify to this fact. The problem comes when someone argues that their particular source is reliable and someone else dismisses it. Since WP:RS only covers reliability in the meanest sense, what's to say that Gene Ray's website isn't a reliable one for documenting time? It's certainly a reliable enough source for time cube. Why is it reliable for one article and not another? It's not original research: it's notable enough for inclusion the article about his site, and since we make exceptions for notable people who are experts in their field in sourcing, surely an exception should be made for Gene Ray who is, after all, the wisest man to ever walk the four-cornered Earth (don't believe me? you don't have to. I can verify it from both Gene Ray and independent sources which agree with him. You say they're only a joke, I say that you can't prove it... etc. etc.) The point is that we need to know when the context is such that we should use scientific explanations to explain a point. When someone wants to know where a rainbow comes from, they shouldn't be bogged down with explanations from Aqua Teen Hunger Force. Only your particular perspective right now makes me believe that you would willingly accommodate such an explanation so as to not be "discriminatory". ScienceApologist (talk) 03:02, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

Ozob, there is a single established completely noncontroversial way to interact with the universe, methodological naturalism. In a very basic way that is the basis of the scientific methopd and also how each of us functions on a day to day basis. An individual may hold any sort of spiritual or philosophical belief but the only successful way to interact with the environment is through MN. Writing wikipedia articles from only this POV is certainly NPOV since no other POV is successful in interacting with the physical world. Kbs666 (talk) 04:27, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

'Observable reality' seems to be just a synonym for The Truth as the author sees it. Dlabtot (talk) 04:15, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

Or rather "natural phenomena"

NPOV suggests that we cannot say for certain that the supernatural realm does not exist. Nor can we state with absolute certainty that only the natural realm exists. Science has limits, limits imposed upon themselves through demarcation. Fortunately, all of that works in our favor when writing this policy proposal.

We can't say "observable reality", because that overrules the possibility of miracles, loosely defined as supernatural intervention into the natural world. Miracles as such would be observable reality that just so happens to be supernatural.

Science doesn't say miracles are impossible. What they say is that miracles are not natural. Science separates natural phenomena from the (may or may not exist) supernatural. It limits itself to what it can study, what it can evidence exists. The science article addresses this very well in the first paragraph. Science studies natural phenomena.

What we can do under the scope of NPOV is separate "natural" from "supernatural". I'm replacing every instance of "observable reality" in this proposal with "natural phenomena". That will save us a lot of headaches as we develop the proposal. --Nealparr ^{(talk to me)} 05:08, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

Natural Phenomena may be a problem. Does archaeology deal with natural phenomena? What about sociology? Kbs666 (talk) 06:32, 20 August 2008 (UTC)