Wikipedia talk:No original research

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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 changes you make to this policy really do reflect consensus.

Sidebar?

Is this recently added sidebar {{Associations/Wikipedia Bad Things}} appropriate in a policy page? ≈ jossi ≈ t • @ 15:26, 3 May 2006 (UTC)

I kind of like it, Jossi, but I won't mind if you want to remove it. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 20:22, 4 May 2006 (UTC)

Copyright issues

Let me try to briefly summarize this surprising policy and its blatant contradiction with copyright policy, as I see it (please see Wikipedia:Copyrights):

One: No new, previously unpublished material is allowed. Fine. Strange, but fine.

Two: If a contributor writes a new article (or adds new text to an existing article), based on previously published materials (books, magazines, webpages, newspapers, etc.) then almost invariably a self-appointed vigilante will appear, will decide that such material is, must be, in violation of such "copyrighted" reputable publications, and will delete or slash it, and altogether cripple it miserably.

This is no invention, it's a fact that happens too often in Wikipedia. Wonder how much traffic is devoted just to battles consisting of removal and replenishment of materials in articles. I also wonder how, despite this seemingly perennial confrontation, has Wikipedia managed to reach the astounding number of a million-plus articles. Amazing.

Can someone please help clarify this confusion? AVM 20:39, 4 May 2006 (UTC)

I'm not sure what your question is. In order to avoid OR, we should cite our sources, and in order to avoid accusations of plagiarism or copyright violation, we should also cite our sources. So the two policies are mutually reinforcing in that sense, not contradictory. Also, please sign your posts on talk pages. Cheers, SlimVirgin ^(talk) 20:21, 4 May 2006 (UTC)

We're looking for an encyclopedic summary of published mainstream thought on our subjects. The only time any real conflict between WP:NOR and copyright concerns should ever emerge is in cases of there being only a single source on the subject of our article. If that happens, don't get too ambitious; we need to then restrain ourselves to brief paraphrase. If you have an example of your concern, feel free to link to it. Jkelly 20:24, 4 May 2006 (UTC)

Your edit of your original question didn't really clarify where your confusion is coming from. Jkelly 20:47, 4 May 2006 (UTC)

Hi AVM. There isn't really a contradiction. Wikipedia is not a place to add original research. In other words, editors shouldn't add articles that are something they made up. As for the ssecond point, copyright law applies to Wikipedia as it applies elsewhere. So editors should not just copy material wholesale from somewhere else because it is copyrighted. However, copyright covers the expression of an idea, not the idea itself. So if you write an article on MSNBC (say) that describes a new fad for chocolate-covered bats, then you can't just cut and paste the lietral text of the MSNBC article into a Wikipedia article, but you can add an article about chocolate-covered bats and reference the MSNBC article to provide a verifiable source showing its not original research.

This is how Wikipedia works. Of course, my characterization of copyright above is a simplification, but its generally accurate. Good luck, Gwernol 20:31, 4 May 2006 (UTC)

RfC: Interpreting WP:NOR in the context of examples of Mnemonics

Talk:Mnemonic#RfC:_How_should_WP:V.2C_WP:NOR.2C_and_WP:CITE_be_applied_to_unsourced_examples_of_first-letter_mnemonics.3F. The article contained about seventy-five unsourced examples of "first-letter mnemonics," probably representing a mix of well-known but uncited mnemonics, unpublished orally transmitted folk culture, and original creations. Should the WP:V, WP:CITE, and WP:NOR policies be interpreted as allowing such material, on the basis that it is self-verifying (i.e. anyone can see by inspection that the initial letters of "Kinky People Can Often Find Good Sex match those Kingdom, Phylum, Class, Order, Family, Genus, and Species, and the source of the mnemonic is of no practical concern)? Dpbsmith (talk) 22:27, 5 May 2006 (UTC)

I see no harm in this, Dpb, and as you say, people can see for themselves whether they're right or not. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 22:33, 5 May 2006 (UTC)

Me too. There is no major harm in this. --Siva1979^{Talk to me} 16:59, 7 May 2006 (UTC)

Original research in external links?

There's a discussion in Wikipedia talk:External links about whether or not original links can constitute original research. Wikipedia:External links lists, among links to avoid:

Any site that contains factually inaccurate material or unverified original research, unless it is the official site of the article's subject or it is a notable proponent of a point of view in an article with multiple points of view. (See WP:RS for further information on this guideline.)

However, I was under the impression that WP:NOR only applied to the actual content of articles. Having read it along with WP:RS a bit more carefully, I understand that exterior webpages about something that hasn't been talked about in reliable sources can also constitute original research. Is that right? How could we make things clearer on Wikipedia:External links?

(This is pretty much a copy of what I posted on Wikipedia talk:Reliable sources) Flammifer 16:39, 7 May 2006 (UTC)

This policy would seem to mean that links to mainstream journalism would constitute original resource. The key word would seem to be "unverified", but I'm not really sure what that means. If a Washington Post article says something about a subject based on interviews, leaked documents, or whatever, that would seem clearly to consist of "original research" by the Post reporter. I suppose one could say that this is "verified original research," but I'm not sure what that means. I think we really ought to get back to "reliable sources." Original research presented by "reliable sources" like mainstream journalism is acceptable to link to. But the policy would seem to currently exclude such things. john k 23:05, 8 May 2006 (UTC)

Original research by others is fine so long as it's published by a reliable source; it's unpublished OR i.e. OR by Wikipedians that we don't use. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 10:33, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

John k:as far as I can tell, the policy is ok with original research in reliable sources.

SlimVirgin: But how about the case in between - original research that was never published by a reliable source (which would cover most websites), but not written by a wikipedian either? We shouldn't use it as a source for the article, OK, but how about just listing it in the external links? Flammifer 11:46, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

It seems to me that Wikipedia:External links should be changed from "unverified original research" to "original research from non-reliable sources," on the basis of your responses. I think that you can link to sites with unpublished OR if they represent a significant POV. If it's just one guy's crank theories, we probably shouldn't link. I'd also suggest that uncited material is not necessarily original research. A website can contain material which is uncited, but which obviously derives from reliable sources. john k 16:09, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

Flammifer, the standard for external links in what many editors now call the "further reading" section (because the references section usually contains external links too), is much lower than for sources, so it's probably okay to include such links so long as they're not too strange or offensive. It's best not to include blogs or personal websites unless they belong to the person the article's about. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 16:24, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

New synthesis, etc.

The discussion of what constitutes new synthesis or analysis in this article seems to me to be far too broad, and doesn't contain any caveats. Let's repeat it here:

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. However, this would be an example of a new synthesis of published material serving to advance a position, and as such it would constitute original research. "A and B, therefore C" is acceptable only if a reliable source has published this argument in relation to the topic of the article.

Is "A and B, therefore C" really only acceptable if a reliable source has published this argument in relation to the topic of the article? This would seem to suggest that A=An undisputed fact about the subject of the article + B=a dictionary definition of a term defined as "Something possessing characteristic A" cannot be put together to form C="The subject of the article is B", unless somebody has specifically said "The subject of the article is B".

If applied strictly, this policy could be used to exclude virtually any material which is not direct quotations from a secondary source. Every time we paraphrase something, we can be accused of conducting original research "Sure you've shown sources that say that X was born in Finland and has an ethnically Finnish name and his first language was Finnish and served as President of Finland, but it's original research to say 'X is Finnish' because you can't find a source which uses those words." I think we'd all recognize that such an argument is ridiculous, and that saying "X is Finnish" is not original research. But the current wording of the policy seems to support such a view, or at least not to rule it out.

As I write, I realize that an earlier statement, apparently trying to say the same thing, is even worse:

That is, any facts, opinions, interpretations, definitions, and arguments published by Wikipedia must already have been published by a reliable publication in relation to the topic of the article.

This way leads to insanity and complete unworkability, I think. It has the same problems as the quote I discuss above, but is even broader, in that it apparently doesn't actually go to new synthesis or analysis, but to any presentation of facts in the article. For instance, if an article on the Byzantine Empire is offering a sourced statement about the Seljuk Turks - say, what area they originated from - this statement would have to be excluded unless we can find a source which discusses this fact in relation to the Byzantine Empire. This is ridiculous on its face. At the very least, it should say "Any facts, opinions, interpretations, definitions, and arguments published by Wikipedia must already have been published by a reliable publication in relation to the topic under discussion." An article may (briefly) deal with subjects that are only peripherally related to the topic of the article. It is completely ridiculous to demand that any statement about such peripherally connected subjects must be sourced with sources that are directly about the subject of the article.

I'll add, as I think others have in the past, that the prohibition on new synthesis is ridiculous. As I think others have previously pointed out, new synthesis is exactly what an encyclopedia does. The principal meaning of "synthesis" is, according to the American Heritage Dictionary of the English language "The combining of separate elements or substances to form a coherent whole.". Any article consists of synthesis, and the prohibition on new synthesis would mean that we couldn't have any material on wikipedia. I don't even find the philosophical definition of synthesis as "deductive reasoning" to be terribly problematic. Deductive reasoning is often misused by annoying people, but that doesn't change the fact that, given valid premises and valid operation of deductive reasoning, any conclusion of deductive reasoning is a priori true. The problem with people using deductive reasoning is that they generally use it wrong - they either operate based on invalid premises, or else make conclusions that aren't justified by the premises. Banning deductive reasoning would, again, prevent us from doing virtually anything on wikipedia, because any kind of paraphrase involves the use of deductive reasoning. We ought to be very careful about displays of "deductive reasoning," but the way to defeat the problems posed by POV-pushers claiming things are "simple facts" derived through "deductive reasoning" is not to ban the use of what is essentially a basic tool of human reasoning, without which it is completely impossible to write an encyclopedia article. An encyclopedia article is explicitly a work of synthesis, in that it is taking various sources and combining them into a whole. If we can only put together sources which some existing secondary source has already put into a coherent whole already, we are completely useless.

What we really intend to ban here is new analysis. The kind of "synthesis" which seems intended to be banned here seems actually to be analysis disguised as synthesis.

A final comment, which is that these particular parts of the article seem to have been at least partially derived out of disputes over articles relating to the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict. "Tough cases make bad law," says the old adage, and I think it applies here. When it comes to a subject that raises very strong emotions on both sides, there are bound to be issues where policy comes into question. I think it would be best not to base our general policies on issues arising out of such things, because the result is bound to turn out extreme, as I think it has in the case of the WP:NOR policy as it stands today. It is particularly troubling that the sole example of original research in the article is actually a direct quote from one such dispute, with the names changed. I think what is needed on this page is to kind of go back to basics and figure out what is not original research. The current definition would seem to define most of wikipedia as original research, in that it contains new synthesis. john k 22:59, 8 May 2006 (UTC)

Ah, someone who agrees with me, that it is impossible to create an encyclopedia without doing original work in the normally accepted sense. I also agree that the difficulty seems to be that a sensible policy has been steadily expanded to turn it into a dispute resolution tool, with the result that it is in danger of becoming absurd. Sandpiper 15:34, 26 May 2006 (UTC)

I am a new editor. I came to this policy page to understand what was expected of me. If I interpret this article very strictly, all I can do is post information from reputable public domain or free-license sources. If I interpret it with moderate strictness, I can post paraphrased and shortened versions of one reputable source. If I interpret neither strictly nor liberally, I can post paraphrases and abridgements of several sources, so long as the sources are in agreement, or they address different topics and the topics don't interact within my article.

To give a fiticious example, I could write that Peter Piper was born in 1496 (source 1) and opened his pickle factory in 1520 (source 2). But I couldn't write that Peter Piper's parents were born in 1497 (source 2) and Peter was born in 1496 (source 1) because that would imply that Peter was born out of wedlock.

As a new editor I found the entire policy off-putting and tempted me to surf elsewhere.

Also, even before I read the discussion page, I noticed that some parts of the policy tasted like the aftermath of editing wars. Gerry Ashton 20:22, 3 June 2006 (UTC)

Help with what constitutes original research

Recently there's been some strife regarding a group of pages that relate to the discussion on Age of consent. The sub pages (eg. Age of consent in Australia and Oceania for sex) list the laws pertenant to the subject with a brief discussion of what they mean.

My question is, does citing Law clasify as original research? At university we were always told under pain of death two things; First - don't plagiarise; Secondly - no original research. In order to satisfy these two points we had to always cite our sources. This meant pointing to both the Law itself (caselaw and legislation) and pointing to reputable discusions of said laws.

Has there been a position set on this at WP as yet? --Monotonehell 07:21, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

If you mean citing legislation, that wouldn't be original research, although you'd need to be careful that you cite current legislation and that you're not using it in any kind of a novel way. But if you mean citing case law, that probably would constitute OR, because you'd be picking and choosing which cases to cite and how to interpret them. It's safer to use a secondary source for that. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 10:30, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

Thank you, that was my take on the policy. --Monotonehell 11:43, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

Got a question

See two edits here and please clarify, should original research be allowed to make something as these two say, NPOV or accurate or both? Or should wikipedia have original research if an article has no reliable sources except those that editors say are innacurate and NPOV? Some claim original research applies to only "It introduces original ideas" and not to requiring reliable sources as citation. DyslexicEditor 10:56, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

Can I use Time as a secondary source?

Can I use this edition of Time magazine, featuring articles on Harry Dexler White as any other secondary source? Time Archive Stor stark7 19:19, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

I would say yes you can. Time is a reputable, independent source. Gwernol 19:30, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

Yes, definitely. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 19:33, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

Ok, thanks --Stor stark7 17:32, 14 May 2006 (UTC)

I would agree as well. - Patman2648 23:45, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

Use by cranks

One of the problems with No Original Research is that it is often used by cranks seeking to exclude any claims that might disprove the pet theory they are peddling.

So for example suppose that Prof A has a paper published by the journal of Economics describing some fancy new statistics technique. The journal publishes the paper because it is a journal of techniques not policy.

Suppose then that the paper contains a conclusion that black is white on the basis of this new statistical technique. Advocates for the B=W theory then peddle the paper in the blogosphere and it is peddled on Wikipedia.

Since the theory is clearly a crank theory no journal thinks it worth rebuttal. The cranks then refuse to allow any negative comment on the crank claim because there is none in scholarly journals - but the paper is torn to shreds in the blogs. --Gorgonzilla 20:40, 14 May 2006 (UTC)

That's correct. If the black=white theory is published by a reliable source, it may be written about in Wikipedia. If it's bad enough and important enough, someone will publish an article about it. We're not here to publish what Wikipedia editors think is true, false, or important, but what reliable published sources are writing about. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 17:34, 14 May 2006 (UTC)

I agree but I think that there needs to be some statement to the effect that a single statement in a single journal does not amount to irrefutable proof. Account has to be taken of the number of papers citing the original claim, the date of publication etc. If a paper has just been published in a journal and six professors tear it apart in their blogs I think it is reasonable to cite the scholarly rebuttals. --Gorgonzilla 20:40, 14 May 2006 (UTC)

Blogs may be cited so long as they're written by widely acknowledged professional expert in their field and there's no reasonable doubt about their identity, but caution should be used, because if the comment were interesting or important enough for us to publish, someone else will have published it, and if they haven't, that should tell us something. Also, there's nothing standing between a professor and the act of publication on his blog, so he's being less careful than he would otherwise be and there's no third-party editorial oversight. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 03:26, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

Question on synthesis of Maps

I have a question about a map showing language distributions. The author has apparently used several language map books to make an image of the distribution of the German language (and dialects), pre-, and post- ww2. Se these two discussions

• Talk:German_language#The removed Maps
• Wikipedia_talk:German-speaking_Wikipedians'_notice_board#Disputed map

Does this constitude synthesis forbidding the use in wikipedia? --Stor stark7 17:40, 14 May 2006 (UTC)

The author has apparently used several language map books I would like to add that the author didn't present to us only language map books as his source, but rigged voting results(ignoring such facts as moving Germans to the region of voting or the fact that different nationalities besides Germans have voted for Germany), allegations against Polish state, data that comes from war situation when German military was present in Poland. All of this contradicting scholary sources indicating much more smaller presence in Poland by German military(including Reich statistics which aren't likely to downplay it). There is no clear source for the image and inclusion of emotional attacks against Poland in the text given as "source" seems to indicate POV. --Molobo 17:50, 14 May 2006 (UTC)

Edits in April

Sorry to dredge up the past, but SlimVirgin seems to have been making a WP:Point when she (?) added the Chicago Manual of Style example to the article (which looking at the edit history was not an uncontroversial change). The example is taken directly from a dsipute in which this user was involved at Talk:Norman_Finkelstein#OR. (Note, I was also involved in this dispute and opposed SV's point of view). Regardless of who was right, it was surely inappropriate for this user to edit the policy while citing it in the dispute, so I ask that the inclusion of this example (and the strict interpretation of OR which it illustrates) should be reconsidered (and of course accepted if there is a consensus in its favour). Cadr 17:47, 14 May 2006 (UTC)

Wikipedia talk:No original research/archive5 Jkelly 00:25, 15 May 2006 (UTC

Did a consensus ever get reached? I couldn't find any evidence of it in the discussion (on archive 5 or archive 6) The repeated suggestion that it was only "new" editors who were opposing SlimVirigin's interpretation of OR on the Finkelstein article was patronising and false -- I've been here for just over 3 years. Anyway, I suppose it isn't feasible to have another discussion of that kind, but it does seem rather inadvisable for SlimVirgin to have made such extensive edits immediately after (and in fact during, so far as I can see) engaging in a debate over the interpretation of the policy. That stands regardless of the user's overall contribution to drafting Wikipedia policy. I apologise for not looking through the talk pages myself in the first place, and for bringing this up a month later -- I only just noticed the situation. Cadr 01:32, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

There was a very clear consensus in its favor, as I'm sure you know, Cadr. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 01:32, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

I looked through the discussion pages and I didn't find it. Maybe it's there -- I'm not suggesting it isn't, I looked through quite quickly -- but I'd like a pointer to it. Cadr 01:34, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

I think all of the changes made by SV in April were problematic, and clearly designed as ad hoc responses to then-current content disputes. As I noted above, I think the phrasing of the OR policy which resulted from this period is indefensible and unworkable. I'd prefer that we go back to the pre-existing version and discuss how it could better be elucidated. john k 01:18, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

As I recall, 17 editors who are familiar with the policy confirmed that no change had been made. I added an example of what the policy already said, that's all, and I'm not going to go over it again. John, I'm surprised at you, given that what you're calling the "pre-existing version" says the same thing as the current page does. You'd have to go back around 15 months, and possibly more, to get rid of the bit you don't like, and I think it may be implied even in those earlier versions (though I'm writing this from memory). And for the very last time, I did not cite the policy while editing it to support what I was citing. I cited what was already there, and then added the dispute (once I had stopped commenting on it) to the policy page as an excellent example of the type of OR some users just don't understand. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 01:31, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

SV, you were still engaging in discussion on the Finkelstein article after your edits to the policy, so far as I can see. Edits to the OR policy at around 08:00 on 11th April; comment on the Finkelstein talk page signed at 23:59 the same day, while there was still no clear consensus on that talk page. That's partly what I object to. However, I don't dispute that you only cited the older version of the policy during that discussion. Cadr 01:42, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

If I only cited what you're calling the "older" version (which was the same as the version after my edits), then there's no problem, so I don't see your point. This is the first edit I made, [1] which repeats what the page already says elsewhere, and a few minutes later, I added this example, [2] which was a disguised version of the OR I had seen someone try to add to Norman Finkelstein, and which is a very typical example of the type of issue some editors have difficulty with: they think if A is sourced and B is sourced, there's no problem adding A and B, even if no source ever mentioned A or B in relation to the topic at hand.

So far as I can see, I made one comment to Talk:Norman Finkelstein after that, [3] and it only repeated a point I'd made earlier, then I had nothing more to do with it (and in fact had very little to do with the dispute before that either: I was a briefly interested passerby, no more). SlimVirgin ^(talk) 02:51, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

My first point was just to establish that it isn't strictly true that you "...added the dispute (once I had stopped commenting on it) to the policy page as an excellent example of the type of OR some users just don't understand..." I also rather resent the implication that I "don't understand" OR -- had you thought that perhaps we might just disagree over what it is/ought to be? I would have thought it should be fairly self-evident why concerns might be raised by someone editing a major Wikipedia policy during (or shortly after, depending on how you look at it) engaging in a debate over the interpretation of that policy. It is, perhaps, the sort of thing that there ought to be a policy against ;)

they think if A is sourced and B is sourced, there's no problem adding A and B, even if no source ever mentioned A or B in relation to the topic at hand.

For the record, I don't find that an accurate characterisation of the discussion on the Finkelstein article itself, but we can't go into that here. In any case, I happen to think that's an overly strict interpretation of OR. If Joe Bloggs says "Black is white", I see no problem in citing a source which says "actually, black isn't white", even if no other source has made the connection -- so long as NPOV is not violated.

Black is not white

It's fine so long as the addition of "black is not white" does not "advance a position or opinion an editor may hold, or to support an argument or definition s/he may be trying to propose," as the policy says. On Finkelstein, one of the editors was trying to argue that someone was or was not guilty of plagiarism (I forget which way round it was), which was the problem. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 17:34, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

The thing is that I can't see the relavent distinction between my "black is white" example and your adaption of the Finkelstein discussion on WP:OR. It seems at best a very subtle one. Also, wouldn't your "A, B therefore C" criterion prohibit any reference to the source saying that black isn't white? The article would be saying, "Joe Bloggs says 'black is white', Joe academic says 'black is not white', therefore according to Joe Academic Joe Bloggs is wrong". And that is prohibited according to you, isn't it? Though it seems perfectly NPOV (assuming that there aren't hundreds of other academics who disagree with Joe Academic, etc. etc.) So I'm confused...Cadr 18:05, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

The Finkelstein section was about whether one of the authors had committed plagiarism. So the way to write that is to say "A says he did, B says he didn't, C says he did according to this definition, D says that definition is wrong and that the author did commit plagiarism according to other definitions" and so on, sticking only to what commentators about this situation have said. What the editors on the page did was to move outside that structure. They added their own view: "According to the Chicago Manual of Style, what D did was not plagiarism" (or whatever the example was: I forget it exactly). Three problems with that: first, the Wikipedians are putting their opinions on a par in terms of importance and relevance with the opinions of the main commentators; two, they are deciding that the Chicago Manual of Style is the best source to quote; three, they're attempting to decide the issue. In other words, the Wikipedians have become commentators on the issue. That is what is not allowed.

With your "black is not white" example, it's only fine to add "by the way, black is not white" so long as there's nothing at stake. A real example I can think of from a recent page was about a white supremacist who had said to a journalist: "Go don a yarmulke, dance a seder and drink some small child's blood. You belong with the Jews." An editor had added in parentheses that a seder is not a dance. It was OR (an unpublished synthesis of published material, with the synthesis being "X said go dance a seder, but a seder is not a dance"), but it's accurate and there's no harm in it, because it advances no position.

I still don't see any distinction here. There is plenty at stake in the "black is not white" example, i.e. whether or not Joe Bloggs is right. In the Finkelstein article, it was actually the case that various commentators had referenced the CMS (Dershowitz mentioned it originally, here's a source which challenges his interpretation [4]). Even if this was not the case, I don't see anything inappropriate in providing the reader with a definition of plagiarism from an authoritative source in the context of a debate over plagiarism. No position is advanced by doing so, unless it is stated or implied that the cited definition of plagiarism is correct. Of course, one has to be careful to cite a representative definition (or set of definitions), and so on and so forth, but all of that is obvious. There is no inherent problem with citing some definition(s) of plagiarism in that context. Cadr 22:36, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

In borderline cases, judging which examples sit on which side of the fence will boil down to experience. With experience (and perhaps without it), you'll develop a sense of when you've crossed the line into acting as an advocate of a certain position, rather than just reporting what people have said about it. It's the "acting as an advocate" role that the NOR policy tries to limit. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 18:55, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

Well, if that's a personal "you", I have more experience than you here, in terms of the time I've had my user account. Cadr 22:36, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

No, it was a "one," not a "you," and I meant number of non-minor edits to the main namespace. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 03:22, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

Anyway, as I said in the first post I made on this talk page, I just think the edits ought to be reviewed in light of your concurrent/immediately precedent edits to the Finkelstein discussion (and possibly some other pages according to the talk archive, but I haven't checked this out). I was not aware when I first posted of the earlier talk discussion, which did this to some extent; but as I said I didn't see that a consensus was really reached, which some of the discussion here would seem to bear out. Cadr 14:19, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

No, there was a very clear consensus on that point, and if you look properly you'll see that everything I cited on the Norman Finkelstein page was already in the policy and had been there for at least a year, perhaps longer. It's perfectly standard (and indeed is to be expected and hoped for), for experienced editors to add examples and clarifications to policy pages after coming across issues people have difficulty with, so long as the policy is being expanded and clarified, and not changed. That's what I did, and 17 (or so) other experienced editors who are very familiar with the policy agreed with me. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 17:28, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

Again, I looked at the talk archive, and there didn't seem to be any consensus. All the people who disagreed with you at the start still disagreed with you at the end. Also, re your "look properly" comment, I've already explicitly acknowledged that what you cited on the Finkelstein page was not new. I still think that editing a policy in the same period of time that you were engaged in a debate regarding that policy is a bad idea. Clearly, your edits were influenced by the debate, given that you used it as an example. Whether or not the policy was being changed or clarified is open to debate. Cadr 22:36, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

They were new editors, and at least two of them were only out to cause trouble, as witnessed by the vandalism spree that one of them went on around the same time. You'd do better to pay attention to the 17 or so long-term editors who agreed with the example, and who confirmed that it was just an example of what was already there. Finally, my edits weren't in the slightest bit influenced by a brief discussion about Finkelstein, except that I saw it as a good example of the "unpublished synthesis" mistake. I've been editing this page or its draft for around 18 months, and absolutely nothing happened on Finkelstein that was in any way new. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 23:14, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

Though I take your point about the relative levels of experience, I mostly agreed with what the inexperienced editors were saying. Ragout made some pretty good points which were generally just answered with "we're more experienced than you and we drafted the policy". That's no way to build a consensus. I'm a long-term editor, and I found the inclusion of a distorted version of the discussion on the Finkelstein page rather inflamatory, and rather transparently designed to nudge the policy towards a specific interpretation. There was as I saw it a degree of arrogance involved, since the discussion over the interpretation of OR on the Finkelstein article was still going strong when you decided that your interpretation was correct, and "clarification" of the policy was required. I don't want to put any words into John Kenney's mouth, since his views on this issue seem a good deal more nuanced than mine. But he seems to be an experienced editor who is not 100% convinced that your changes were just clarificatory. Cadr 00:00, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

With respect, I believe you don't understand the policy, and I feel that's true of John too. It actually boils down to "don't add your own opinions." But people's opinions can creep in in various ways, so we have to outline those ways. One of the ways it happens is when editors create syntheses of material they've read elsewhere in a way that builds their case for them, but they think it's okay because it's all true and sourced. So the policy prohibits "unpublished syntheses that appear to advance a position or opinion an editor may hold, or to support an argument or definition s/he may be trying to propose." One example of that was the Finkelstein case (where the editors' position was: X did not commit plagiarism). Another one, if you want to get away from that example, and I think we should, is the Holocaust example I give below (where the editors' position would have been: Hungarian Jews would have acted differently had they been told). Perhaps rather than arging back and forth, you could give me a concrete example, apart from these two, of something that has been, or would be, excluded by the wording of this policy, and which you think should not be excluded, and we can take it from there. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 00:18, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

The Finkelstein case wasn't an example of that at all (even accepting your definition of OR) because Dershowitz himself had cited the CMS, and several other sources had commented on this. This is partly why the use of that example in the policy grates (even with names changed). Anyway, venting aside, I think what's making this difficult is that I basically agree that we shouldn't create original syntheses in order to advance positions, etc., etc., but in the particular case of the Finkelstein article, I didn't see that happening. Even supposing no-one had referred to the CMS, I do not see that any position is advanced by referring the reader to a representative definition of plagiarism. That's just hepful, so long as it's carefully worded. So I feel that your example in WP:OR imposes a certain interpretation on phrases such as "advancing a position" which I find unreasonable. To get your main question, I would suggest the "black is white" example again. Maybe it would be better to use an example with a slightly less absurd proposition, so we can have clearer intuitions. Suppose X is an advocate of an ethical and political philosophy based on evolutionary psychology. X is not one of the foremost advocates of such a philosophy (though he has published a couple of articles in reputable journals), so there is no critique specifically addressing his work which can be cited. However, in the exposition of his ideas, it would not be NPOV to fail to mention that his philosophy is somewhat controversial. It would be appropriate to cite more general critiques of moral philosophies based on evolutionary psychology and briefly explain how they apply to his ideas, without taking a stance on whether these critiques were correct. This would appear to violate "[the]...precise argument, or combination of material, must have been published by a reliable source in the context of the topic the article is about." The word "precise", especially, is getting in the way of writing a good, informative article. WP:OR should not be a catch-all policy as it is at the moment -- we ought to exercise our judgement in deciding where source-based synthesis is appropriate. To my mind, it's appropriate when it doesn't violate NPOV, or introduce patently nonsensical arguments. Cadr 01:42, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

Answering below. We'll have to talk about the Finkelstein example some other time, because I can't even remember it, but it was a very clear example of OR. I'll re-read it when I have time. Response to your new example below. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 02:02, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

Just to note, I don't think I ever said that everything I dislike about the current page came in the recent edits. But I do think that the recent edits took an already misguided part of the NOR policy (the references to unpublished synthesis as forbidden) and made it completely indefensible by explicitly defining "unpublished synthesis" in an incredibly broad manner. YMMV. john k 03:05, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

Here's what I think is another good example, one that I'm currently wrestling with myself, because I'd like to add it to a page I'm working on, but it would be OR to do so. I'm writing about Rudolf Vrba, an Auschwitz escapee who brought news of the camp to the Allies in April 1944. His report was not distributed widely enough or fast enough, and as a result (he argues), the Jews in Hungary continued to board the trains taking them to Auschwitz, believing they were going to be resettled, not killed. Vrba, backed by some scholars, says if they had known the truth, they would have run, hidden, or fought back. Other scholars say this is false and that Vrba's information would have made little difference if it had been distributed earlier, because the Jews did already know about Auschwitz, and even if they didn't, they probably wouldn't have believed it and wouldn't have acted on the information. That's the basic debate.

Holocaust survivor Elie Wiesel has talked about his experience as a Hungarian Jew of being taken to Auschwitz, and has said: "The last transport left the station on a Sunday morning. ... It was less than three weeks before the Allies' invasion of Normandy. Why did we allow ourselves to be taken? We could have fled, hidden ourselves in the mountains or in the villages. The ghetto was not very well guarded: A mass escape would have had every chance of success. But we did not know." [5]

This is clearly relevant to Vrba's point and backs it up, and I would like to add it. But to do so would be original research, because Wiesel has never commented on the Vrba controversy, and no historian has ever mentioned Wiesel's statement in relation to that debate. Therefore, for me to decide to synthesize these two accounts would be my POV and my OR. It is this kind of research that the "no novel synthesis" rule seeks to avoid. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 03:06, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

This is a borderline case, and I think there's a fair amount that could be said on either side of the argument, but I think you're right that it should be excluded. But it seems to me that the potential problem with this material is not that it is an original synthesis. It is that it is an implicit original analysis - that is to say, the Wiesel quote is being brought in as part of an analysis of whether we should believe Vrba's version or his opponents'. As I said in my previous comments that everybody ignored, original analysis presented as synthesis needs to be excluded. But original synthesis as such should not be removed. I think that the older version (the one you say has been around for 15 months) made clear that only certain kinds of original synthesis were invalid - ones that were trying to advance a POV, iirc, was the main mention. But I stand by my point that any encyclopedia article is going to contain synthesis, and that this in no way constitutes OR. john k 03:29, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

It still says that, John: "any unpublished synthesis of published material, where such a synthesis appears to advance a position or opinion an editor may hold, or to support an argument or definition s/he may be trying to propose." SlimVirgin ^(talk) 03:34, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

Indeed it does. But it also says other, much broader things, like any facts, opinions, interpretations, definitions, and arguments published by Wikipedia must already have been published by a reliable publication in relation to the topic of the article and "A and B, therefore C" is acceptable only if a reliable source has published this argument in relation to the topic of the article. john k 03:39, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

Yes, therefore, meaning that if a conclusion is drawn from A + B, that conclusion must have been published by a reliable source. In other words, we may not publish "any unpublished synthesis of published material, where such a synthesis appears to advance a position or opinion an editor may hold ..." The two points are saying the same thing. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 04:08, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

But it depends on what "A" and "B" are. The way it is written now seems to be essentially banning all independent use of human reasoning capability. This is, I think entirely unworkable, and I agree with Cadr that the main issues with this are going to come down to the NPOV rule, not the NOR rule. john k 16:57, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

No, it doesn't depend on what A and B are, and it doesn't "ban all independent use of human reasoning". It prohibits unpublished snyntheses that appear to "advance a position or opinion an editor may hold, or to support an argument or definition s/he may be trying to propose." It's actually very clear. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 17:23, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

But the parts I quoted don't say that it's only when they're trying to "advance a position or opinion an editor may hold, or to support an argument or definition s/he may be trying to propose." It says that this is true in all situations. Which was my point. john k 20:34, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

We can't keep repeating the same words throughout again and again. It always means that unpublished syntheses are not allowed "if they advance a position or opinion ..." etc. It's a question of common sense. This sentence is an unpublished synthesis. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 20:36, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

Well, I think we should try to be clear on issues like that, or we get into trouble with people misinterpreting things. It seems fairly clear to me that the new language added seems to ban all unpublished synthesis. I'm glad to know that this isn't what you were trying to do, but I don't think it changes the fact that right now it's worded in a way that is misleading. john k 20:51, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

I don't think any part of it says or implies that, and even if it seemed to, we have to assume people have common sense. As I said, this sentence is an unpublished synthesis, as are all yours. Therefore, how could all unpublished syntheses possibly be prohibited? SlimVirgin ^(talk) 00:24, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

Example

Suppose X is an advocate of an ethical and political philosophy based on evolutionary psychology. X is not one of the foremost advocates of such a philosophy (though he has published a couple of articles in reputable journals), so there is no critique specifically addressing his work which can be cited. However, in the exposition of his ideas, it would not be NPOV to fail to mention that his philosophy is somewhat controversial. It would be appropriate to cite more general critiques of moral philosophies based on evolutionary psychology and briefly explain how they apply to his ideas, without taking a stance on whether these critiques were correct. This would appear to violate "[the]...precise argument, or combination of material, must have been published by a reliable source in the context of the topic the article is about." The word "precise", especially, is getting in the way of writing a good, informative article. WP:OR should not be a catch-all policy as it is at the moment -- we ought to exercise our judgement in deciding where source-based synthesis is appropriate. To my mind, it's appropriate when it doesn't violate NPOV, or introduce patently nonsensical arguments. Cadr 01:42, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

That would clearly be OR, because if no one has written about it, where is the evidence that it's controversial? SlimVirgin ^(talk) 02:02, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

I think it might help to cite actual examples, because with these hypothetical ones, we'll always end up with "it depends whether this or that." If you cite a real one, we'll have all the variables. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 02:04, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

The only scenario under which your example arises is where you can reference sources that state that X is an advocate of evolutionary psychology, but none of these sources state that X's philosophy is controversial. It would be inappropriate for Wikipedia to draw the conclusion that X's philosophy is controversial when the available sources have declined to do so. Snottygobble 02:38, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

I admit that it's not a particularly good example, and as SlimVirgin points out, hypothetical examples are always difficult to deal with because there are so many "depends on". But I don't see that this is true in the general case. Maybe X advocates some novel theory of Holocaust denial (it's all a conspiracy involving the Martians, etc. etc.) If there is some fairly detailed explanation of this theory on the page about X, for balance it would only be appropriate to say something like "the general consensus is that the Holocaust really happened and wasn't fabricated by Martians; see Holocaust". The evidence that the theory is controversial is, in this case, simply that 99.99% of people believe in a different theory -- there need not be any specific reference saying "yeah, X is a lunatic". Usual problems with hyothetical examples apply. We must assume, for example, that X, despite being a complete lunatic, is somehow notable enough to have a Wikipedia page, but that's not soooo unlikely. I'm afraid I can't think of a real example right now.

Anyway, unless anyone should miraculously agree with me, I'm going to give up at this point, since it's clear that I'm in a minority. As you can see from my first post, my reasons for bringing this up were partly just that it wound me up to see that the debate on the Finkelstein page had been (in my view) misrepresented as an example on WP:OR, and this lead me to question the interpretation of that policy which the example was intended to support. The policy as it stands seems to have a consensus at the moment with one or two exceptions (judging by the pattern of responses and non-responses to my comment), so there's nothing much I can do. I hope there are no (overly) hard feelings. Although I was certainly annoyed with SlimVirgin, this wasn't meant to be a personal attack/vendeta/whatever. Cadr 14:31, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

No hard feelings at all, Cadr. :-) SlimVirgin ^(talk) 03:19, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

Definitions

For editors to propose new definitions of established terms on talk pages, and to edit the article according to these new definitions, violates the "provides" clause in spirit and in practice. Thus, I've changed "provides" to "provides or presumes." Timothy Usher 06:39, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

Question

I have a question about a concrete implication of the NOR policy. On a page about Anti-X[nation]-ian sentiment, would it be OR to add, in the form of examples with quotes and short comments, links to Internet sites, forums, books etc. which, according to the editor, manifest that sentiment?--85.187.44.131 14:51, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

This seems more like a question of quality of sources than original research. I guess it comes down to what your "short comments" might contain: that could fall under original research. I would recommend adding the links (if they are reliable) and quotes but not adding your own commentary. If the quotes demonstrate your point they don't need editorial comment, readers will make up their own minds. If they don't demonstrate your point, you shouldn't use them in the first place. You may also want to review WP:NPOV when considering which links/quotes to include. Gwernol 15:06, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

I was wondering if collecting these statements and classifying them as X-ophobic (a classification which others might dispute) isn't, respectively, a kind of "field work" and a kind of "original analysis" of primary source material? --85.187.44.131 15:45, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

This is just my opinion. This feels like a borderline case. Are you providing sources to show that X-ophobia exists by doing this, or are you providing original analysis? It will come down to the specifics of the links and the article, I suspect. If the links and quotes are out of context and disputed, then you may be pushing a point of view and violating original research. On the other hand you may be providing reliable sources for an article. Without know the link(s) and article(s) involved its impossible to say for sure. Gwernol 15:53, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

Well, thanks for the reply. I kept silent, because I was waiting to see if anyone else would like to comment. In case you're interested, the page I was wondering about was Anticroatian sentiment (sic! bad spelling for technical reasons). Thanks once again. --85.187.44.131 22:09, 20 May 2006 (UTC)

Question 2

What happens if someone starts a stub giving the bare details, and contributors between them add more, creating what is in effect Original Research? Jackiespeel 16:02, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

IMHO this would be treated in the same way as any other case of OR. Add citations if you can (which shouldn't be too difficult if the information in the article is correct), or if it's absolutely unavoidable, remove the uncited material. Cadr 17:34, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

Every single article on wiki began as a stub, then different contributors added more detail. And between them, it is to be hoped, they did indeed create an original article, and this is exactly what was supposed to happen. Sandpiper 15:16, 26 May 2006 (UTC)

Question 3

Can it really be labeled as Original Research if the majority of wiki users accept it and only a small minority, such as one stray admin, does not agree with them?.....I believe that original research was set up so that one wiki user would not put ideas that have no basis. In Real Life, the rule is that if enough people accept it, it becomes a law or the truth. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Lord Hawk (talk • contribs)

"Can it really be labeled as Original Research if the majority of wiki users accept it and only a small minority, such as one stray admin, does not agree with them?" Yes. The majority of Wikipedia are readers, not editors. We don't know if they agree, because they don't post to the article's talk page. Besides, if a reader either doubts the accuracy of an article, or wants to explore it more deeply, the reader should read the references, not try to figure out what the majority of Wikipedia users think. If there are no references, the article is unverified. Gerry Ashton 20:37, 3 June 2006 (UTC)

Discussion about NPOV, NOR, Verifiability etc. on Talk:Fedora Core

I have been asked to mention this discussion here. - Samsara (talk • contribs) 18:21, 3 June 2006 (UTC)

Primary information as "research"

If my interpretation is correct (and I believe that it is, judging from the spirit of the rule as it has been applied in existing articles), the name of this policy may be misleading. I suggest that mention may be added to the policy page of the distinction between what is commonly considered research and the term "research" as it is used by the policy.

Hypothetical example: Historical Individual was tried in 1763, and a large quantity of commentary exists in the form of contemporary primary documents indicating that this happened on May 3, 1763 in Specific Place. This information is available to Editor and is non-controversial in that it is not disputed among secondary sources. Editor sees that the article on Historical Individual does not mention the date or place, or does so incorrectly. Perhaps Editor even brings this to the talk page to verify, if indeed the information is incorrect. Is Editor permitted to make the addition of this information if it is not available in any known secondary sources?

The answer would seem to me an obvious "yes", but I really can't say whether this qualifies as original research as per the WP standard any more than does "researching" secondary sources. This seems to me an ambiguity, and I think it should be clarified in the policy article. Because the policy is so established (and because it would be impractical), I don't recommend a name change (such as to "original data or analysis"), but I think some visible, official clarification would do the job just as well. Fearwig 06:24, 4 June 2006 (UTC)

I see "original research" versus "ordinary" research as a continuum depending on the amount of interpretation that you apply to your source. If you see a photo of George Bush waving and state that George Bush waved, that's just research. If you see a photo of George Bush waving and claim that it's symbolic of his inner turmoil, that's original research. On the other hand, if you find an article by a researcher claiming the same thing, then you can write that and cite it. OR is defined by the "gap" between the source and the claims in the article. How wide a gap is too wide? It's highly subjective and I would expect a lack of consensus over certain items. Deco 06:45, 4 June 2006 (UTC)

I would, too. Which is why I brought this forward--I'd like to hear more on the topic. I still think "original analysis" is a better description of what is inappropriate (again, if I do not misunderstand). Fearwig 15:34, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

I think you may be right that "original research" can be misread: it might be read as saying "You are not permitted to go to the library, research a topic, and post changes to the article based on that research". That's clearly not what NOR is about. We would encourage this kind of research, especially when citing the primary sources. I think the reason "original research" is the term is that the original main purpose of this policy was to stop the many physics cranks on Usenet from posting all their theories here as fact; "this theory is the product of my original research into how to build a perpetual motion machine."

Not sure if "original analysis" is a better description. An example of "original research" that isn't "original analysis": I happened to be a guest at the White House, and I heard the president go on a 5-minute, profanity-full tirade against broccoli. I was the only witness. I posted about this to the president's article, the broccoli article, and a new article I authored called Presidential hatred of broccoli. Actually a more accurate term for this would be "original reporting" rather than "original research". Tempshill 17:58, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

Altered photos

I was discussing with Shawnc a photo he had altered (Image:395px-Keratoconus1-800-edit.png) when he called my attention to an altered photo and a "synthetic animation" that have been promoted to Featured quality:

• Image:Water drop animation enhanced small.gif
• Image:Boxing080905 photoshop.jpg

As stated here at WP:NOR, altered photos are not to be used to illustrate the main Wikipedia namespace, as they are essentially original research. These two examples are both extremely beautiful, but they should not have been promoted to Featured quality for this reason. They should also not be used to illustrate Wikipedia articles.

The reason for the rule is that an altered photo purports to illustrate something that is not true. It captures a moment in time that never occurred. It is false. When the photo retoucher performs his work, he is creating a fact, by himself. This is a clear violation of what the NOR rule is supposed to prevent.

The debate over altered photos is of course not original to Wikipedia; altered photos have been an interesting topic in journalism ethics classes for several decades; see the article "Faking images in photojournalism" from 1988. I will expand the rule here on NOR to try to explain 'why' but it sounds like word of the rule needs to be spread to the people who frequent the featured photos discussion. Tempshill 06:39, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

I think you have a grave misunderstanding of WP:NOR and its implications. Matthew Brown (Morven) (T:C) 00:00, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

Less cryptic, please. Tempshill 18:08, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

The image in question is Image:Water drop animation enhanced small.gif, and is used on Tap (valve) and Drop (liquid) where it illustrates both articles quite adequately. Each frame in the animation is assembled from a sequence of many cycles of water dropping from a tap, so that consecutive frames do not show the same droplet. It's a reasonable technique and illustrates droplet formation under free fall quite well. --Tony Sidaway 00:09, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

The image is not presenting an original theory of how water droplets fall or form, only aiming to illustrate the conventional understanding of the subject in a visual way. If it were OR to illustrate conventional understanding, it would be OR to write about it in a new or creative way as well, which is pretty much all we do. Deco 05:29, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

Interesting. If one's position is that Image:Water drop animation enhanced small.gif is an illustration, then it is of course acceptable. If one's position is that it is a movie of an actual water droplet falling, then it is not acceptable, because it isn't. A compromise that preserves the integrity of the articles might be to label each instance as an 'illustration' or the like. Tempshill 18:08, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

All pictures on Wikipedia are used as illustrations; if they were used as evidence of something, they would be original research, regardless of whether they were claimed to be genuine or not. Presenting images as factual evidence might be appropriate on Wikisource, but not here. Of course, not only are all the images discussed here used as illustrations, but the fact that they were digitally altered is clearly documented on their image description page. Thus, there should be no problem here. —Ilmari Karonen (talk) 12:28, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

Evidence....

Will evidence of innacuracy or problems be shown in place of edited material? Call someone a liar or disprove a fact then another fact has to replace it.

--G-Spot 17:30, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

Are you asking a question? Jkelly 17:33, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

I think that if secondary sources conflict, what you have is a scholarly controversy and not "disproof". So both sides should be documented and both sides should cite sources. Fearwig 01:25, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

This policy must be destroyed

This policy must be destroyed, and have its rotten corpse dragged through the dirty streets, for the good of Wikipedia.

Where do I sign? I'm almost sure that there is a "destroy the WP:NOR policy" committee already. If not, I sign here.

1. Dabljuh 12:47, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

Would you care to explain why? If we removed the original research policy Wikipedia would have to take every crank theory and unproveable assertion. No article could be relied on. It seems like a wise princip[le. I suspect you'll have to come up with some fairly convincing reasoning to persuade many people of this view... Gwernol 12:49, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

First of all, Wikipedia can not ever serve as a stand-alone, authoritative source of information, which is what "Wikipedia is an encyclopedia" means, as long as everyone is granted the right to freely edit every article. That simple fact just destroys any sort of authority Wikipedia might want to claim - And thus, shouldn't. Instead, Wikipedia should just try to be a "good" source of information, not an authoritative (encyclopedic) one. For further info, see User:Dabljuh/Politics.

Secondly, the policy does not do the job it was implemented for. IIRC, Jimbo created the policy as a means to deal with crank physics theories, whose inventors tried to add legitimacy by having it appear on Wikipedia. WP:Verifiability as well as WP:Reliable source keeps most of the total nonsense out. Also, WP:NPOV Gives fringe theories their share: Stuff like Flat earth is allowed, as long as the article makes it clear that the theory in question is a fringe view and not accepted by the general (scientific) mainstream.

Thirdly, in conjunction with WP:Copyrights, which is not-negotiateable international law, WP:NOR can be used to censor almost all information on Wikipedia. If a censor wishes to act within the system, and wishes to censor a bit of information, he can variously invoke either policy to have that bit of information removed. Because, if consequently and anally used, WP:NOR would mean that nothing on Wikipedia that isn't largely a carbon copy of a WP:RS is allowed. And WP:Copyrights prevents carbon copied stuff from almost all sources except those in the public domain, such as the US Government. So WP:NOR means the only allowable content on wikipedia are carbon copies of US government statements.

Finally, since NOR isn't doing the job it's supposed to do (keeping nonsense out), it is used by various censors and POV pushers as a tool to censor information and harass legitimate users - i.e. keeping the good stuff out. Let me give you a real world example: Wikipedia_talk:Requests_for_mediation/Medical_analysis_of_circumcision

Summing it up: There's a paper from a WP:RS that says that surgical operations (cuts, wounds etc in a hospital environment) to infants would greatly increase the risk of MRSA infection, a highly anti-biotics resistant and dangerous strain of bacteria. Now, circumcision is quite a cut, and is most commonly done to infants, so a responsible writer would of course want to add that bit of information to the Medical analysis of circumcision article. But oh wait - The censors (who try to keep out any bit of information about circumcision that makes the practice look less favorable) find: While the article talks of all manners of surgical operations performed on infants as a risk factor, he does not specifically name circumcision as one of them. Of course many reliable sources as well state that circumcision is a serious surgical operation, especially when done to an infant - But to combine these two items would violate WP:NOR - Thus one can not state in the circumcision related articles that neonatal circumcision may facilitate an MRSA infection, due to WP:NOR.

Now, even when one finds a quality source online that actually does that thought (geniuses, huh) and publishes this, the source is rejected as being POV. This should tell you that WP:NOR isn't the only problem, and that there is a lot of shit going on near the Circumcision articles, but it still illustrates how WP:NOR has become mainly a tool to harass and censor, and does not at all serve the interests of Wikipedia (being a good source of information). Dabljuh 15:51, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

NOR does not prohibit all original interpretation or combining of sources - whether research is original research depends in a qualitative and subjective way on the degree of interpretation applied. We necessarily engage in some degree of interpretation in the course of ordinary presentation of facts. I would personally consider your particular case acceptable, but others might not. Anyone can cite a policy to try to win an edit war, but that doesn't mean the policy is wrong. Deco 17:04, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

Point taken. I said this was but one particular case. It is not the only one, I believe that WP:NOR is fundamentally flawed and ultimately more than just harmful - outright dangerous - to the integrity of Wikipedia. And that is why this policy must be destroyed. I can see it use as a friendly, although redundant recommendation not to try to publish original research on Wikipedia, but as a policy that - if taken strictly - prohibits writers from their journalistic duty to interpret and present - then that policy has to go. And that is just how the policy is used right now, and that is how it will continue to be used if the policy is not removed. Allowing journalistic integrity is paramount to the continued function of wikipedia, and any policy that just as much as touches this must be revoked as soon as its harmful possibilities can be recognized. And WP:NOR doesn't just touch journalistic integrity, it rapes it, murders it, and pees on its corpse. Not necessarily in that order. Dabljuh 17:13, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

We're not journalists. Jkelly 18:00, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

He didn't say we were; he said we had a journalistic duty, which I think is close to the mark. Actually it's an editor's duty. I think Dabljuh's concern can be addressed by modifying the policy; NOR doesn't have to be destroyed to allow what you are talking about. I do agree to some extent, by the way, on your concern, and think NOR could use some modification in this area, and the overlap with WP:V should be eliminated. Incidentally, and I know this is the wrong page to discuss it, I would say that in the circumcision debate linked to above that seems to have inflamed your hatred, I find the argument powerful that the MRSA link must be marked as purely speculative - but I would call this an RS argument and not an OR argument. Tempshill 18:04, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

The MRSA link *is* purely speculative as the relationship with neonatal circumcision and MRSA has not been investigated yet (MRSA being a very young danger). But even making it clear in the article that this is, as of now, a speculative link would be prohibited by WP:NOR. Dabljuh 19:42, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

I think the WP:NOR policy is misrepresented in these arguments, just as is the concept of an encyclopedia. An encyclopedia is, if you work with the premise that every statement is a subjective argument, a collection of arguments and their justifications (in the sense that the theory of gravity is an argument--just a very, very popular one). As such, NOR prevents WP from being hijacked by editors as a means of disseminating new arguments. NOR is crucial to maintaining NPOV, because (at least in theory) the representation of existing arguments as just that produces a neutral work, one that is a compilation rather than a collection of novel syntheses. This is very much in line with notions of journalistic integrity, and I would argue that it is a superior (or at least more exclusive) standard. What it comes down to is this: Wikipedia could be a source of original analysis, but that would redefine its purpose entirely. Everything2 is an example of a source of original analysis, and its mission is quite distinct from that of Wiki. The example you cited, Dabljuh, is to me not an example of truly original research but rather the superficial application of existing commentary into a discussion. If circumcision = surgery and surgery = a cause of this problem, then circumcision = a cause of this problem (but if any of those relationships are suspect or unverifiable, the entire thing becomes OR). It's a gray area, and I think it's one that should be elucidated by the NOR page. Not everyone would agree with me, but I think it comes down to a question of the "spirit of the rule". Fearwig 18:13, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

It's not a gray area - WP:NOR is very clear on the matter:

An edit counts as original research if it proposes ideas or arguments. That is, if it does any of the following:

(...)

It introduces an analysis or synthesis of established facts, ideas, opinions, or arguments in a way that builds a particular case favored by the editor, without attributing that analysis or synthesis to a reputable source;

And that is technically exactly what "circumcision = surgery and surgery = a cause of this problem, then circumcision = a cause of this problem" is. There is nothing gray or shady about it. And there is no reason to believe that this simple, logical thinking would be false - it simply violates WP:NOR. Now of course one begins to wonder, what the hell are you supposed to write in wikipedia then if you may not even draw the most obvious conclusions from given, verifiable data? When you are forbidden from stating the obvious? I told you: Carbon copies of US government statements in the public domain. Dabljuh 19:35, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

If it is obvious, the connection will have been made before. Summarise it encyclopedically, citing reliable sources. Jkelly 19:59, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

Exactly. And that, in summary, is what an encyclopedia is: the collection of all the information from reliable sources, nothing more, nothing less. Wikipedia is an encyclopedia to the extent that it follows WP:V and WP:OR. You want to create something that is not an encyclopedia. You are of course free to do this, just not here. Gwernol 20:04, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

Failing that, if a relationship is absolutely implicit, I don't think it violates the spirit of NOR. I would even venture to say that this occurs tens of thousands of times in Wikipedia's million-odd articles, but that it's only really a problem when the conclusions are controversial. Which is probably a good thing--if it's controversial, a more careful inspction (and a stricter interpretation of NOR) is probably valid. As it is, I don't think the rules are too strict--I just think people take them as gospel, valid in every possible circumstance, when they are really just principles, tools editors can use in disputes to ensure that a valid approach is being taken in addressing the topic. My interpretation, of course. Fearwig 20:16, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

"If it is obvious, the connection will have been made before." Not necessarily. The big, big advantage Wikipedia has over classical paper encyclopedias is that it is most up to date. This is one big reason why Wikipedia is successful. The threat of MRSA in this example is a very new one - and despite its obvious ramifications with circumcision, it may take months or years until someone writes a paper detailing circumcision risks of MRSA. I mean, if I'd ask a doctor, any doctor, if he'd write a paper detailing MRSA and neonate circumcision, it'd be something like "Hey, yeah, circumcision facilitates MRSA infection" - That is not really anything new. We knew that already. Because it is so obvious. The time of doctors is limited and when things are very obvious, there is just no incentive at all to release a paper that states the obvious, unless one wants to assault his peers with boredom. Lets make a different, fictious example. "Marilyn Monroe was a white woman". Original research! Can't say that unless you find me a *medical* peer reviewed journal that says so. Yeah, there's her picture and all that and she's very obviously white (although not necessarily blonde) but looking at the picture and drawing the conclusion that she must have been white is original research by the very meaning of the policy. Even more, even though we could presume that if she was white, her birthparents must have been white too, that's original research. The policy commands pure madness and does nothing to improve the objective and subjective quality of wikipedia articles. Drawing conclusions is one of the most important jobs of a journalist, judging sources, weighting different sources against each other, and making sense of all the gibberish. This is even more important for an encyclopedia. Mind you, it'd be perfectly ok to state something like "Pluto is Mickey Mouse's dog. Pluto is Donald Duck's dog" when we could find WP:RS for both. It doesn't make sense - contradictions like that leave the reader confused, making the article, and Wikipedia less useful. The objective assessment "Pluto is a character in the Donald Duck and Mickey Mouse series comics" would first have to found in a reliable source that explicitely and decisively states so - without any room for interpretation. And that doesn't happen a lot I tell you. An article on Wikipedia or any real encyclopedia absolutely MUST be more than just randomly gathered sentence fragments or carbon copied public domain material. But exactly this is the result of WP:NOR. Now I want to throw a challenge: Give me a hypothetical or real example where WP:NOR would actually improve the quality of Wikipedia, that is, where _no_ other policies and guidelines are sufficient to avoid compromising the quality of Wikipedia as a whole. Dabljuh 20:46, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

Not really. If one believes there is a legitimate question as to the usability on Wikipedia, it can be discussed on another web forum and placing a note there helps to notify interested parties who may want to contribute to a site intent upon the merging of such nonsense - just not wikipedia. This a encyclopedia content matter and, this being a free encyclopedia whose summaries are based solely upon based facts able to be referenced, we should take it seriously. No killing of these policies. I would suggest that, if you think about it, you'll realise that you're not talking about the point of wikipedia at all but a free for all blog with no restrictions to keep questionable content to a minimum. Engaging in personal research and round about composistions isn't what this site is about at all. -Zero^Talk 18:58, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

Hallucinations! Fever dreams! WP:V, WP:RS, WP:NPOV, WP:NOT and all those other fun policies are still in effect. You have yet to give me one example where those other policies would not be sufficient to keep "questionable" content out. Dabljuh 19:01, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

Whatever. Numerous policies are in effect to sustain content and prevent editors from gaming the system in cases where a policy doesn't happen to say they can't do it. The policies aren't going anywhere. We don't take unnecessary risks. -Zero^Talk 19:09, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

That would imply you would be in favor of the "You may not add any content, ever" policy. Dabljuh 19:38, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

This policy allows WP to be highjacked by sensationalist publishing

"If it bleeds, it leads" is the philosophy of the media. They're not interested in telling uninteresting stories, so if the truth is dull and uninteresting (which it often is), it often never sees print or airing, and thus becomes uncitable. Too often, it thus becomes unavailble to WP, according to WP:NOR. That's a problem.

WP:NOR, as you all know, essentially demands that something be printed or published somewhere else, before being put in WP. Original research or personal facts can be included, to be sure, but only if they're seen print somewhere else first. But getting the boring truth printed is not easy. Publication costs money. That money comes from somewhere. This causes bias. WP:NOR inevitably causes WP to follow that systemic bias.

That problem will continue so long as this policy is in place. The reason is that one can always get a reference for "man bites dog" because it's news and somebody will have printed it. But if you want a print reference for "dog bites man" you may well be in trouble, even if you're the man the dog bit. And if you want one for "dog didn't bite man", forget it. Again, even if you're the man the dog was erroneously supposed to have bit. Nobody will be interested. It doesn't sell papers. It doesn't attract advertising dollars.

WP, the FREEEEE encylopedia, consisting only of factoids originally printed because somebody wanted to sell a book, a journal, a story, a newspaper, or some kind of advertising. And untroubled by skepicism of same, because its editors must maintain a NPOV about this stuff, and cannot question it on their own. No matter how wacky it is, if it's in print, it's citable, and if the obvious problems with it are not in print, too bad. Sbharris 21:30, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

First I think you're really complaining about verifiability not original research, though of course the two are intimately related. Either way, an encyclopedia is the collection of knowledge published elsewhere. That's why these two cornerstone policies are there. Remember its about verifiability not truth. Yes, that means that there will be some articles that can't be written (yet), but what's the alternative? Well, the alternative is to open the floodgates and allow anything to be written here with absolutely no way to tell if its true or reputable.

Personally I think the tradeoff is the right one and WP:V and WP:OR are essential to Wikipedia. Gwernol 21:40, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

Ok, why again would removing WP:NOR open the floodgates to allow anything? WP:NPOV, WP:V and WP:RS would still be in place. Dabljuh 21:47, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

Like I said, I believe Sbharris (and you) are really arguing against WP:V not (simply) WP:OR. The two are complements of each other. Remove one and you remove the other (and therefore WP:RS as well). Gwernol 21:57, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

Well, speaking for myself, my problem is verifiability and reliability are not exact complements of each other, or equally important, even though WP treats them a two equal legs of a policy which otherwise supposedly would not stand up. I have no problem, for example, with much of what is said in WP:RS--- I think it is fairly wise. For example "Avoid the popular press as a source". However, it does not go far enough. Worse still WP:V seems to go over the same ground and regards the popular press as an acceptably verifiable source to get around NOR, even though its reliability score is (admitadly) very bad. But the reasoning for this wallows around between RS and V in a very confusing way, as though somebody can't make up their mind why it's okay to quote newsprint.

The WP:V site, for example, spends time talking about reliablity when it's supposed to be talking about verifiabiity: It has this to say:

Anyone can create a website or pay to have a book published, and then claim to be an expert in a certain field. For that reason, self-published books, personal websites, and blogs are largely not acceptable as sources.

My reaction to this statement is that the phrase "for that reason" does not follow logically. For what reason? That anyone can do it? Odd to hear from WP! It is certainly true that few people and institutions have the resources to buy and control their own large newspapers or television stations, but it does not THEREFORE follow that the few who do, are somehow more credible ipso facto, than people with less money. What, wealth and power buys integrity? How's that again? Say what?

History is full of bad examples of media which are utterly controlled by a certain POV and are unreliable in one or more areas. One thinks of propaganda outlets like Pravda or Völkischer Beobachter, or examples of Yellow Journalism in the US. But there are less obvious examples, such as the pro-Mormon coverage of the Deseret News and KSL in Salt Lake City, and so on.

Peer-reviewed publications tend to be more reliable due to the review process itself, but the fact that they are (or may be) print publications or radio or TV channels, does not guarantee such a process. They may be Christian channels. Or Fox News, fair and balanced. Or the journal may be an organ of the pharm industry or some other industry. Some journals exist to publish Creationist "research" articles. Who owns these journals? Who advertises in them? Such a process may occur on any scale, in print or on the web. Size and money is not good proxy for it, and WP should abandon the idea that print is a marker for ANYTHING. It's pernicious. All it's a marker for, is that somebody has money enough to kill trees. They may be a few trees, and give a low V. The person killing the trees may have a crazy agenda, and there may be a low RS. The fact that a tree died to produce something, really means nothing.

I'll stop there for other's comment, but I can't resist amplifying the thought that TRUE verifiablity has the same problem with overlap. Remember "reliablity" is how likely the source is to be high quality (for ease of discussion, "true"). Verifiablity V only refers to how easy it is to check to see if the source is a "genuine" source, and not a made-up one. But now we run into two questions: why should we care about the "genuiness", V, of bad or unreliable sources? If they are utterly unreliable, couldn't we just as well make the same statement without source? Isn't using a source of poor reliability (RS) worse than having no source at all, since a source with both poor R and poor V may be at the same time difficult to check, and wrong as well? Current WP policy assumes that standard media (at least printed publications) are ipso facto more verifiable than web sources, but this is no longer always true, and in the future it's going to be blurrier still. Okay, you can cite your printed source as the Welsley Poetry Quarterly, v. 10, 1972. How easy is that to check vs. some webpage which is mirrored in a dozen worldwide archives, and which couldn't be erased even if everybody made a concerted effort to do it. Do YOU want to find that old back issue of that dinky puff poetry journal, in some basement of some dusty library? Verifiability is a different thing in practise than in theory. And there's no reason to single out electronic sites for special skepticism, on that basis alone. If they're hard to change and easy to check, they're verifiable. Not the same thing as accurate or reliable, but not meant to be. Sbharris 04:48, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

I disagree strongly. The original spirit of the rule (prevent crank physics theories) is implemented by WP:V alone - You can't post real original research on Wikipedia since it is not verifiable. We don't need WP:NOR for that. See, there's this other rule, that most people don't even need to be told: WP:SENSE - use common sense. Now for example something like "circumcision -> surgery, surgery -> infection, thus circumcision -> infection" would appear as common sense to pretty much anyone. WP:V doesn't keep people from stating the obvious because we have WP:SENSE. WP:NOR however does that, and exactly that. WP:NOR intentionally limits the general, conscious freedom people have about what to post and what not - by taking away their right (and duty) to interpret facts and present them in a sensible manner. WP:V works well on it's own. We don't need WP:NOR to keep crackpot ideas out of wikipedia, but we essentially can't write quality articles that conform to policy with WP:NOR. Dabljuh 22:07, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

That's what I am talking about. The obvious, even if without a doubt true, must not necessarily be found in WP:RS - especially with recent developements. Should Wikipedia state the obvious? I'd say, tongue-in-cheek, that stating the obvious is the only real task of any general encyclopedia. Dabljuh 21:45, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

Simple question.

I've been reading the debate and would like to focus on one basic question:

Are there any cases where WP:NOR is needed to prevent the insertion of text that doesn't belong, and the other rules do not suffice? Al 01:43, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

[6]. Jkelly 02:04, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

Probably only a few hundred thousand such cases exist on Wikipedia. Seriously though, NOR is about making sure the articles are about existing information, not information put forth by the editors. It's about Wikipedia being a collection of notable information and not a blog site. Fearwig 02:15, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

Basically, our goal is to prevent editors from making shakey connections and questionable inferences. Unfortunately, it's being used to silence obvious and solid syllogisms. In the example you link to above, there links made were sketchy, so I can see why there's a problem. Even there, the solution is to either find attribution or tone down the strength of the alleged links, not to remove the entire section. WP:NPOV and WP:V would suffice to prevent this sort of thing, without any need for a specific WP:OR rule.

How can WP:NOR be abused? Let me quote myself from a recent RFM that went nowhere:

I'm beginning to wonder if we need a rule for No Original Desynthesis. We have one source saying there's a link, but you won't allow it because they're an activist group. We have a newspaper offering incidents that strongly suggest a link, but you won't allow it because it's not a medical study. We have a medical study that admits that any cutting is linked, but you won't allow it because it expects doctors to know that circumcision involves cutting. We have a site that mentions all three pages, but you won't all that because, once again, the site is considered partisan, even though it includes the opinions of doctors. We could point out the links ourselves, but you won't allow that because it would be original research (even though, in fact, it's not at all original). Round and round we go... to extraordinary lengths to avoid mentioning the obvious.

I'm sorry, but I find this ridiculous. We have verifiable facts here and yet there is opposition. I can't explain it while simultaneously assuming good faith, so I'm just going to throw my hands in the air. Either you are misunderstanding the rules or the rules do not apply here. Al 00:11, 31 May 2006 (UTC)

See what I mean? Al 04:36, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

It sounds to me as though these people have legalistically abused or just misinterpreted the rule. If it exists in legitimate print, it is a source, because you can say: "Medical Journal states in (issue) that infant shaking may cause global warming." This is encyclopedic. It is not biased, even though it's nonsense. Similarly, "CEI believes the moon is made of dogs, and is an active advocate of this position. They also claim responsibility for the Martian holocaust." It's all about the phrasing. Put out what people say, not what you think, no matter how supported it is, and your edit will survive and continue to be useful. In doing so, you're not compromising... you're being clear. And accurate. You don't even have to make the link if you think the readers can do it themselves (e.g. posting legitimate statistics on infant surgery--this lets the reader decide whether you have to cut something in order to circumcize it, no matter how obvious). A partisan site can still be a good source, too--an article isn't POV as long as the source in question is indicated as a source of opinion, and not a source of say, scientific, journalistic or scholarly opinion. Fearwig 05:35, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

As it turns out, I endorsed inserting a single sentence to the effect that a named group of doctors has suggested a link, followed by SIX citations. The text attributed the idea to this group, did not claim their idea was true, and was heavily cited. It has been opposed, to the point of a failed RFM and multiple blocks. Now can anyone tell me why NOR still exists? Al 22:29, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

No. When the BMJ states that the moon is made of earwax, we don't have to say the same thing or treat it as truth, when we believe it to be obvious nonsense. It would be irresponsible to simply spread outrageous claims from any source without cross-checking.

What we always can do, regardless of truth value, is to quote them directly. We can state "in a 2004 published statement, the BMJ explained that the moon was made from earwax" rather than "the moon is made from earwax". There is a very distinctive difference there - We, Wikipedia, treat the latter statement (*X is*) as objective truth, and we post it because (we believe in good faith) we can verify it with reliable sources. The premier one (*Y say X*) is merely a quote - we do not treat it as the objective truth, but merely as the (noteworthy - subjective judgement) opinion of a group. It doesn't matter if it's right or not - we can quote them in a manner that does not infer either, and the only thing that decides whether that quote can go into the article is whether we find it notable enough or not. The problem is that articles full of "These say this" "those say that" quickly becomes incomprehensible to a reader that just wants clear information. Thus, overuse of this technique is rightfully discouraged, and conflicts between sources is what WP:NPOV is all about - We have to separate mainstream and fringe views and indicate which is which and give them their due respect.

In the example with the Circumcision-MRSA link, it would have been perfectly appropriate to state something like this:

"MRSA is a new strain of highly antibiotics resistant bacteria occurring in hospitals that especially endangers children that undertake pediatric surgery. *cite* DOC, a group that opposes circumcision, raises concerns about how infant circumcision, as a surgical procedure done to infants could faciliate MRSA infection *citedicite*"

We state the surgical danger of MRSA endangers children. This is, objectively and verifiably the truth, or at least what we should note as truth. We furthermore quote and relativate DOC, not saying necessarily anything about the truth value of their statement (although in this particular case it would be obvious). Yes, opposition to such an addition to the article does not contribute to wikipedia, it prevents the article from getting better, and is the sad work and harrassment of POV warriors.

The question is, iff there was NO notable source reporting the latter jump to conclusion, should we, or should we not, be able to state this rather obvious (and notable) conclusion because of the sheer obviousness? Mind you, this IS an obvious example. I would not bring it up if anyone could raise serious doubts about the validity of the conclusion. Yes this is a subjective matter - But we make subjective judgements already when we decide over what constitutes a reliable source for example. There is simply no way to remove subjective judgements from the editing process. The idea is, that we work out our differences - Consensus is found in debate and thus again, subjective judgement. I have already explained that we must judge all the time, and that we have a ethical duty as editors to keep our articles as accurate and good as we can possibly make them. WP:NOR deliberately keeps us from doing so, while doing nothing to help us other than redundantly reminding us that Wikipedia wants verifiable sources and therefore doesn't like unpublished original research.

Alienus and I have now both asked for a concrete, specific example of a situation where a malicious disruptive addition could not be kept out from Wikipedia by WP:V and WP:NPOV alone. That is, a specific incident where only WP:NOR - and no other policy - could have been used. Simply stating that there would be thousands of incidents, yet then not detailing a single one of them, does not sound very convincing to me. Dabljuh 09:59, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

Let me add my voice (making it now three of us) asking what NOR does that isn't already done by a combination of V, RS, and NPOV. Just posting it on a Wiki ONCE gives it a presense on the web which is good as long as there are servers and archives, and thus a better V than many an old newspaper of small publication in a morgue file. But when this is pointed out, the opponents readily switch from wanting to argue V to wanting to argue RS. Okay, let us argue RS. Why is (say) my private synthetic opinion on a scientific or medical matter not as "reliable" as (say) that of your average science journalist, and his or her desk editor? Suppose I'm a working physician and/or scientist with many publications in science journals, and they aren't? We've all seen errors in popular science publications. Some are pointed out by readers the next month. By contrast, errors in science fact get found and fixed much faster on WP. So RS is less of a problem on WP than many places elsewhere (skip favorable comparison of the content of WP to other encylopedias, but you all know they're fairly comparable). We are told in WP:RS not to trust newspapers for science information. So.... why does this not suggest trusting individual science professionals for their opinion over newspapers and most other media?

Answer: Back comes the objections from WP:V. How does anybody verify personal opinion statement on WP? (this is separate from the question of their accuracy). Well, answer: again because old Wipidedia entries have high V, as noted. Then, because WP:RS can no longer be used as an argument, we come down to the REAL reason for NOR: It's the argument of last resort to the above challenge when somebody is finally done flipping back and forth between bludgeoning somebody with WP:V and WP:RS. It's the last refuge of certain people who really feel in their heart of hearts that the writings of professional journalists are more to be trusted than are the writings of professionals of all other kinds.Sbharris 03:45, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

Appear to advance a position

I'm not sure that this revert was an improvement. RJII's phrasing was easier reading, and we should probably not have incoherent arguments that are WP:NOR either. Jkelly 04:30, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

My objection has been adequately addressed.Timothy Usher 04:33, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

The point behind my edit was that new syntheses of concepts to advance an argument is original research. But, so is new syntheses of concepts NOT used to advance an argument. The sentence seemed to restrict original research to only those new syntheses or novel interpretation which are used to advance an argument. I don't even know if I fixed it. It's an awkward couple of sentences. RJII 04:42, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

I'll look at it more in a bit, style-wise, but...while your edits that I'd reverted scared me (what? advancing original arguments is now okay???), I no longer have that feeling. You're on the right track, substance-wise.Timothy Usher 05:05, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

Just to place this in some context, it turns out that User:RJII has a pretty obvious motive for modifying WP:NOR. You see, he's engaged in an ongoing battle to get his favorite writer listed as a "major philosopher" on List of philosophers. When his efforts failed, he tried to get the article deleted. That's not working, so now he's trying to modify WP:NOR to shift the balance towards his goals. In short, anything he does here should be evaluated in the context of these goals, and reacted to appropriately. Al 05:08, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

Ever heard of Assume Good Faith? In consulting this article in the midst of that conflict, I simply noticed that the definition was akward and a bit misleading. Regardless, my edits stand on their own regardless of my motivations. I think everyone here is bright enough to recognize that. By the way, Ayn Rand is far from my "favorite writer." I know little about her philosophy and haven't even read anything but a few excerpts. I'm not sure if I even like her writing. You really need to watch yourself. RJII 05:11, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

As I pointed out in my edit comment, WP:AGF is not a suicide pact. Al 05:17, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

Alienus, I take this very seriously, but am sadly too tied up in a number of discussions to review Ayn Rand, List of philosophers, etc. at this moment. Can you summarize your assertion for the readers of this page?Timothy Usher 05:23, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

Briefly, RJII has shown through his edits that he is an advocate of novelist/philosopher Ayn Rand. Unfortunately for him, her name keeps getting removed from the list of major philosophers at List of philosophers, primarily because Rand has no academic credentials or credibility. She's omitted from multiple 1000+ philosophical encyclopedias that manage to find room to mention many minor philosophers and all major ones.

Once he realized he couldn't get her listed, he tried to get the page deleted. This has failed. Then, I made the mistake of mentioning WP:NOR, so now he's here to attack this rule so that it allows Rand on the list.

That's the short version. Al 22:34, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

I've returned the phrase "serving to advance a position" (or whatever the wording is), because all Wikipedia articles are new syntheses of published material, if they're not plagiarized. The point of the policy is that a new synthesis of published material should not serve to advance a position held by a Wikipedian, as it states elsewhere in the policy. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 17:56, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

I wonder if we can think of some better phrasing. We shouldn't be presenting new arguments of any kind at all, even if they are some kind of back-and-forth incoherency that doesn't advance anything. This is, perhaps, a minor detail that isn't as important as emphasising the point that "appears to advance a position" is making. On the other hand, I wouldn't want to see arguments that some argument isn't "original research" because it fails to "advance a position". Jkelly 18:43, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

I agree with Jkelly. The important thing isn't whether the user is using it to advance their crank theories or whatever, it's whether they offer too much novel interpretation or novel ideas over available reputable sources. Also, it's often impossible to judge a person's intent accurately. Deco 20:29, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

As I recall, the "advance a position" thing was added because someone rightly pointed out that all Wikipedia articles are new syntheses of published material. If you can think of better wording, I'd be fine with it, but I'd say that all arguments advance a position; I can't think what kind of argument wouldn't. So by including "that advance a position," I don't agree that we're in danger of allowing new arguments that are original research but don't advance a position. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 20:33, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

The above must be one of the worst sentences I've ever written, but I hope you see what I was trying to say. ;-) SlimVirgin ^(talk) 20:34, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

But, what about "new interpretation, analysis, or synthesis of published data, statements, concepts" that DON'T appear to advance a position? That would be original research as well. RJII 20:50, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

Because it's obvious that no new interpretations and analyses of any kind are allowed. But we can't say that no new synthesis of published material is allowed, because all Wikipedia articles are a new synthesis of published material. Therefore, it's only a particular type of new synthesis that isn't allowed, and that is when it serves to advance a position. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 20:53, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

I disagree with that. Say, for example, someone gets some numerical economic figures from various sources and then does his own calculations to come up with a metric and puts the result in a table. He's not trying to advance a position --he's just conducting a synthesis of information and presenting the result as factual. That would still be original research, as far as I understand the concept. For it not to be original research he would have to find the already calculated metric in a source. RJII 20:57, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

We've had problems with mathematical issues a few times, where some people have argued that unpublished calculations are OR and some have argued not. The phrase started life as no new synthesis of published material, and I would agree with that, but then others raised the point that all articles are a new synthesis etc.

Can you think of different wording i.e. something other than "serves to advance a position." Could it simply be weakened to "may serve to advance a position"? This is the essence of the calculations objection: that we don't know whether it advances a position or not: all we know is that it hasn't been published. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 21:03, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

Since I've been in the midst of the debate with RJII over at the list of philosophers page, I would like to clarify has been going on there. RJII is currently trying to make the argument there that the NOR rule should be construed so strictly as to not allow the use of synonymy. He claims that one cannot assume, for example, that the words 'major' and 'important' share even a degree of common meaning. That is, he maintains that one could not use sources stating that some Dr. X is an extremely important philosopher as evidence that Dr. X is a major philosopher -- simply because, on his reading, assuming any sort of shared meaning among regular English words and phrases amounts to engaging in original research. In other words, he maintains that the only allowable kind of evidence for being a major philosopher is a source that explicitly states that the person is a major philospher. A source that claimed Dr. X is the greatest philosopher of all time would not be admissible, on his view, because it would be original research. I hope the problems with this reading of the NOR policy are evident. Now, I can't say for sure whether his edits here are meant to back up this extremely strict reading of NOR, but I hope everyone here will consider this background issue when they are evaluating his changes. I would also invite you to check out the discussion on the List_of_philosophers talk page for yourself. I apologize in advance for the volume of comments there. fi99ig 02:23, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

My argument over there is that simply we can't assert that a philosopher is a "major" philosopher unless there is a source that says they're a major philosopher. It's not for us to decide who is or isn't a "major" philosopher. To assert someone is a major philosopher without a source saying so is "original research." Then, with that as a premise, I'm saying since we have no objective criteria for what it means to be "major," the rational thing to do is look for sources that use the term "major philosopher" --otherwise you have an unresolvable debate because everyone has their own interpretation of what "major" would constitute. I'm just offering a rational way to acheive consensus. I'm don't want any part of a debate over who is or isn't a major philosopher. The only thing I'm interested in is whether the sources say the philosopher is a "major philosopher." I don't want to engage in an unresolvable debate. It's as simple as that. RJII 15:23, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

Unclear section

I've removed the following section as some of it seems unclear and may even encourage OR:

The following are not original research:

• Listing well-known claims which have few (or possibly just one or two) adherents (e.g. Shakespearean authorship theories or Linus Pauling's advocacy of Vitamin C)
• Listing notable claims that contradict established axioms, theories, or norms (e.g morphogenetic fields or conspiracy theories)
• Including research that fails to provide the possibility of reproducible results (e.g. theological or philosophical theories)
• Citing viewpoints that violate Occam's Razor, the principle of choosing the simplest explanation when multiple viable explanations are possible (e.g. Phlogiston, Aether)
• Listing ideas that have been accepted for publication in a peer reviewed journal
• Listing ideas that have become newsworthy: they have been repeatedly and independently reported in newspapers or news stories (such as the cold fusion story).

The point of the policy is that all of the above are fine iff they have been published by a reliable source, so it might be confusing to list them as though they're special cases. Also, it's not clear what "citing viewpoints that violate Occam's Razor ..." refers to. Of course it's fine to publish views that violate Occam's Razor, iff they've been published by a reliable source. (What's special about Occam's Razor?) SlimVirgin ^(talk) 17:52, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

This appears to be oriented towards certain misapplications of the rule. Sometimes people will mistakenly think that because a topic is unscientific, in the sense of lacking a testable hypothesis or contradicting established facts, that it is unsuitable for inclusion. I'm not sure how much this has do with OR though. Deco 20:25, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

This policy is non-negotiable

For those who have missed this: The WP:NPOV, WP:NOR and WP:V policies are now officially non-negotiable. This took effect on 7 February 2006 when this edit to WP:NPOV went through without significant discussion or opposition.

Um, say what? Jimbo Wales says that WP:NPOV is non-negotiable, and then some other guy on Feb 7 says this applies to V and NOR *exactly as written at that time*, and because nobody chirped up, this statement is presumed to lock WP policy from now-on? Or until we hear from on-high?

What is your basis for making this statement? Is it verifiable and reliable?Sbharris 16:23, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

According to Francis Schonken, "a basic problem is that too many people tried to *negotiate* the content of the policy page. Better keep it clear: there's no such procedure as changing wikipedia's NPOV policy by negotiation. As said, there's no separation between the NPOV policy and the way it is formulated on the NPOV policy page, or, if there would be, that separation would be different per person, so that's not a workable distinction."[7]

It is probably too early to tell whether or not the change is an improvement and will stand the test of time (assuming it can be reverted subject to consensus which seems self-contradictory). However, it does not seem too far-fetched to suppose it can (and should) be used as implied by Francis: to cut off attempts to negotiate the content of policy pages as redundant and, indeed, disruptive. AvB ÷ talk 14:36, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

Does that mean, in order to get this policy removed we must bribe / blackmail / assassinate Jimbo? Dabljuh 17:15, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

No, because it's not clear if Wales had anything to do with it. The proposal being discussed was made by Jossi, who is not Wales so far as I can tell (unless it's the outlaw Jossi Wales, yuk, yuk), and yet is now claimed to be engraved on stone like the Ten Commandments, simply because at the time it "went through" without "significant discussion or opposition." This is a bizzare assertion. Also, the comment by AvB ÷ talk doesn't try to back up, or in any way reference, their odd assertion that the WP rules have thereby changed permanently in this fashion---- making this whole statement doubly ironic, considering our subject. Hey, AvB ÷ talk, have you got a reference for your idea above? We'd like to see your primary source to check your RS and V. Failing that, I happen to think that what you wrote is your personal POV. Has Mr. Wales signed off on it? Sbharris 17:40, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

I suggest the following strategy: We start recruiting people that share our goals (of a Wikipedia free of insane policies with nightmarish ramifications) and when we have enough, we simply remove the policy and declare it out of effect. Any RV gets RV'd. We do it until either everyone accepts that the policy is nonsense (and we win) or Jimbo or whoever is responsible shows up and faces us for a discussion. Dabljuh 17:51, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

Sounds good to me. Meanwhile we have too many people like AvB ÷ talk making really authoritative-sounding statements, like the one that heads this article, when they have no more authority here than you or I. The best way to flush out true authorities on WP policy is be bold, make reasonable and reasoned changes, until the real authorities (not you AvB ÷ talk-- you seem to have mistaken yourself for The Boss), I say, until the real authorities like Jimbo come out of the woodwork and tell us that we've gone too far. My policy on this is rather like that Thomas Paine's "Sir, when God tells me something, that's revelation. When you tell me He told you something, that's hearsay." So far, I've gotten a lot of hearsay. Sbharris 18:01, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

Teehee I like this response! Please consider the possibility that I have succeeded hiding my opinion of this specific policy language. Or just click on the links I gave. Woohoo! AvB ÷ talk 18:08, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

What links?? The only link you gave is to somebody else's opinion, a person who, so far as I can tell, has no more authority on these matters than you do. Why don't you just issue a fatwah and call it that?

I'll spell it out for you. Click on the links I gave. From there click on links that look relevant, like "older edit," "newer edit," "older revision" and "newer revision". Look up the facts, check if what I wrote is relevant. It's much more interesting than bothering the messenger and immensely more interesting if you don't trust the messenger. AvB ÷ talk 18:59, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

I must concede I'm lost, here. Why ever should the policies that dictate the insertion, removal and type of content introduced into the encyclopediac scheme not be non-negotiable..? We're entitled to our opinions of Jimbo's activities, and AvB is entitled to his opinion on the quality of given edits. We know the encyclopedia is intent on the output of information that can be supported by solid facts and a referenced basis; there's no need to go on saying that policies should be negotiable and whatnot. I find this constant tweaking on what and how facts can be introduced depressing; I thought we, as a serious encyclopedia were intent upon the hard and veritiable facts on subjects, not original research, un-veritiable content and biased views. No. This website shall never degrade to that. These policies are non-negotiable, and shall proceed to be as long as wikipedia is a encyclopedia with the purpose to give informative content. -Zero^Talk 18:14, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

I am unable to find any place in which the policies of WP are set forth in unchangable fashion, by ONLY those who have the authority to make them (which I presume is Jimbo and I don't know who else), and signed. If you look at the history pages of WP:V and WP:RS you'll find that they mutate day by day. There is thus a lot of Talmudic commentary on a Torah which I can't seem to locate. Do you know where it is? I'm tired of reading lay exegesis on scripture which nobody seems to have available. Do you see my point? Sbharris 18:22, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

Yes. We're a bad ass and serious encyclopedia and all that shit. But the policy essentially says you can't say 2+2=4 if you don't find a source that says that. However, you can say 2+2=5 if you find a source that satisfies WP:RS - you can't say its wrong, however, since that would be OR again. That is not serious encyclopedia-making. That isn't even uncyclopedia-making. That is just lunacy and a violation of all that is good and holy and sexy about Wikipedia. We, as editors, need be given our RIGHT back, to point out the obvious - if necessary. "True" original research, like the policy originally intended to keep out, is already prevented by WP:V. WP:NOR is just the result of the overreaction of one man who was fed up dealing with physics cranks. Worse even, every article on Wikipedia that is not a 1:1 carbon copy of a Britannica 1911 article, is a synthetic product that may or may not advance a point, and thus violates NOR policy. What is more important, this policy, or the absolute sum of everything that is Wikipedia? I say we take this policy behind the barn with a shotgun and blow the mother away. Dabljuh 18:32, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

The changes of policy doesn't ussually result in the introduction of such disreputable material. Tweaking across policyspace is also an act that any editor can perform, and results in no long term standing of material unless backed or not challenged by concensus. That's not what I'm refering to, however.

I am solely speaking of these policies and these alone. For it is these policeis that dictate and enforce the additions of material and how the encyclopedia operates. For that reason, these policies make clear such actions pertaining to original research and the like are not permitted. And they shouldn't. This is an encyclopedia and a very serious project open to the public. We're not perfect, but we're trying and as a general interpretation we are running quite smoothly. We don't require the fiddling of these key policies to decrease the value of the encyclopedia. It is for this reason these policies will always be non-negotiable. -Zero^Talk 18:33, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

As I've already explained a zillion times, NOR is not an absolute rule. In the course of ordinary presentation we inevitably engage in some degree of interpretation. NOR just says not to apply too much interpretation, where too much is subjective and determined on a case-by-case basis. Deco 19:22, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

You are deeply mistaken, like most people who enter the discussion. You have no idea: There is no subjective part involved. Its OR, forbidden if, "It introduces an analysis or synthesis of established facts, ideas, opinions, or arguments in a way that builds a particular case favored by the editor, without attributing that analysis or synthesis to a reputable source". I.e. any article or sentence that is not carbon copied from a reputable source. I repeat, since you appear slow: No subjective degree of interpretation regarding what is original research and what not. The only subjective judgement you make is whether a source is reliable enough for the given claim, or not. Dabljuh 19:43, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

That is certainly the position someone attempting to destroy this rule would take. But you're just setting up a straw man. Also, please refrain from personal attacks. Deco 19:52, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

You call a direct quote from the policy a straw man? What the... ? Dabljuh 19:54, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

Also, if you find me pointing out that you don't know what you are talking about (and its not such a long piece of text, just read it once in a while) a personal attack, then I must say, I find your allegations of personal attacks a personal attack. Please abstain from hurting my soft squishy heart. Dabljuh 19:56, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

I find WP:NOT extremely sufficient. This policy has ramifications that make it harmful to the entire encyclopedia, overruling any WP:SENSE, making it only useful to trolls, pov-pushers, wikilayers and stealth vandals. Dabljuh 18:39, 11 June 2006 (UTC)