User:Sjb72/AGF Challenge 2 Exercise Answers

2.1 Taking a Leak

Jack Leak is an author who is frequently in the news for his controversial theory that oil and gas are not the result of millions of years of decomposition of organic material. Leak has published a series of books describing his theories. Leak is a prominent faculty member at an Ivy League university. He believes that oil and gas are the result of inorganic processes deep within the earth's crust.

The faculty in Leak's department have put a statement on the department webpage stating they disagree with Leak's theory. Surveys of other scientists in his field show that over 99% of them think his theory is unscientific and contradicted by the evidence.

Almost every review of Leak's books by other scientists is negative. His work is quite popular among the public, however, who do not want to believe that the supply of fossil fuels is finite, and that we might run out of oil. Leak has testified as an expert witness during several legal trials where environmentalists were trying to block deep offshore drilling or drilling in the arctic. The opposing side in these trials has always ripped Leak's testimony to shreds, ridiculing him. However, he remains very popular with the majority of the public.

An article about one of Leak's books, Earth Juices, on Wikipedia includes links to several negative reviews. One prominent Wikipedia editor demands that these negative reviews be removed, since they violate WP:BLP. The claim is that anything negative about these books in the reviews reflects negatively on Leak's work, and on Leak himself, and therefore violates WP:BLP.

In addition, several editors on Wikipedia have objected to statements in Leak's biography on Wikipedia stating that the "scientific community disagrees with his theories". They claim that one cannot measure what the scientific community believes, so that this statement does not belong and is not valid.

Do the negative reviews of Leak's work constitute a WP:BLP violation? Can Wikipedia link to these negative reviews? Can Wikipedia state that the "scientific community" agrees or disagrees with his theories? Are articles on this author's ideas WP:FRINGE theories since most of the public subscribes to them? What does WP:NPOV state about how these ideas should be presented on Wikipedia? How many hours of editor time should Wikipedia spend to deal with this?

My answer

First off - how much of my time should I devote to it? As much as it takes to get a satisfactory solution.

Ok, so we have an article about someone who has had negative reviews, and someone objects under BLP. My first thought is that negative reviews are not an automatic violation of BLP - it has happened, these were published in verifiable secondary sources, and so Wikipedia can report it. End of story?

However, my second thought kicks in at this point, reminding me that it is not so much the inclusion of the negative reviews, but more of the manner of these inclusions. The above paragraph...

In addition, several editors on Wikipedia have objected to statements in Leak's biography on Wikipedia stating that the "scientific community disagrees with his theories". They claim that one cannot measure what the scientific community believes, so that this statement does not belong and is not valid.

...makes the point very well. Any article including the uncited phrase "scientific community disagrees with his theories" is violating WP:WEASEL and should be removed. If someone notable has been quoted as saying that "...the scientific community disagrees with his theories", then this phrase can be included, provided it is clear in the article that it is attributed to this person.

So unless anyone has said that, then the article should just list a few negative reviews, and make sure that they are clearly cited and attributed. But how many reviews? And what about the positive reviews?

Lets think about newspaper letter pages. I remember reading a Daily Mail in my younger days, and seeing a letters page that was devoted to just one topic. I forget what the topic was now, but I do remember the gist of the letters. The topic was about an article (which was more to do with the Mail's opinion than actually reporting the facts...) a few days earlier. The Mail stated that they had received a lot of letters, and were surprised that most of these people were taking the opposite stance to the Mail.

So when I read through the letters, I was surprised (I was less of a cynic back then) that the majority of the letters printed agreed with the paper, and they only printed a few that dissented. Surely they should have published the letters in a proportion that agreed with the proportion of letters received?

And this is what should be happening in the article, although this may not be particularly easy to do. The editors of the article should strive to make the reviews reflect the proportion of positive and negative reviews. However, as that may not be so easy to achieve, just have an equal number of each, and make sure that these reviews are attributed accordingly. If a Nobel prize winner says the theory is rubbish, whilst a national newspaper has a column written by a self-confessed scientific dunce that they believe it to be a sound theory, then these should both be included. If the quotes are attributed correctly, then the facts will speak for themselves.

2.6 The US is collaborating with space aliens

A prominent belief in certain Muslim countries that is spread in the mainstream Islamic media is that the United States has a secret program to collaborate with aliens from outer space to (1) scare Muslims and (2) build space weapons to attack Muslims. As proof, they often refer to the internet video called the Alien autopsy video which some "claim" was shown to be a hoax. Nevertheless, in the Muslim world, the "proof" that this video was a hoax perpetrated by someone trying to raise money is dismissed as US government disinformation, and the Alien autopsy video is said to be a leaked official US government video made at Area 51. It is repeatedly asserted that this video is obviously an official classified US government video.

Several editors create articles on Wikipedia propagating this theory. Text segments describing this concept are introduced in articles about the United States and UFOs and in several other articles as well. Sources are provided to articles in the mainstream Islamic media. Huge edit wars erupt.

What should be done? How should this topic be represented on Wikipedia? Are the mainstream Islamic media sources reliable sources for this subject? If mainstream European and American media sources ignore this rumor or dismiss it, should they be given more prominence than the mainstream Islamic media sources? If public surveys in Islamic countries show that 80-90 percent of the population of Muslim nations subscribes to this belief, does this subject qualify as a WP:FRINGE belief? How can one decide if this story qualifies as a WP:FRINGE story or not if Western media ignore this story completely, and there are no surveys of Westerners to compare? How many hours of editor time should Wikipedia spend to deal with this?

My answer

First off - how much of my time should I devote to it? As much as it takes to get a satisfactory solution.

How would I deal with it? Wikipedia is an encyclopedia, and if a topic is notable, it should be included. Provided it is written with neutral point of view, properly sourced, then the article should stand.

Where should it be included? Not so easy to determine, but hopefully the hypothetical example below will explain it.

There are many thousands of Elvis Presley impersonators out there. The vast majority are local tribute acts who are not notable in the slightest under WP:MUSIC. However, some are notable - like Mitch Benn. Because he impersonates Elvis regularly on Radio and has written a song called Everybody's Elvis, there is a link to the main Elvis article on his page.

However, Wikilinks are not a two-way process. If you look at the Elvis page, there is no mention at all about Mitch whatsoever. This is because there is nothing that he has done that has caused the decendants of Elvis, nor those who own his estate or the rights to his music to comment about Mitch. If the day came that these people held a competition to find the best Elvis impersonator, and Mitch were to win it, then the link should be placed there.

Now to the question above. There should be an article about this alien autopsy, written with NPOV and no OR. It should include links to all the people and organisations that are mentioned in the article. However, these linked articles should make no mention of the autopsy article, unless there are secondary sources to state that they have commented about it, or done some action (such as sueing for libel, issuing a statement denying involvement, being charged by the police on illegal alien autopsies, or even admitting that they did it) that recognises that the autopsy issue exists. As long as the people involved ignore the autopsy, then so should their article.