Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard

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Soomrani

Soomrani (Urduسومرانی )is a sub tribe of Magsi[[Baloch

Few body systems

The Asia Pacific center for Theoretical Physics [1] [member countries] recently held a conference on Few-body systems "Fifth Asia-Pacific Conference on Few-Body Problems in Physics 2011" on 22-26 August 2011 [2]. On of the speakers was Yeong E. Kim [3], Professor of Physics and Group Leader Purdue Nuclear and Many-Body Theory Group of Purdue University. In his presentation “Nuclear Reactions in Micro/Nano-Scale Metal Particles” Kim presented how his "Theory of Bose-Einstein Condensation Nuclear Fusion (BECNF) in Metal" can explain "the following experimental observations either qualitatively or quantitatively. Experimental Observations from both electrolysis and gas loading experiments (as of 2010, not complete) (over several hundreds publications !)": Coulomb barrier, excess heat, 4He production, Tritium production, nuclear ashes, hot spots and craters, radiation, "heat-after-death", ...

He also discussed his "Generalized BECNF Theory for Hydrogen-Nickel System" The paper for which is in preprint [4] and he concluded "Recently, generalized BECNF theory is used to make theoretical predictions for BECNF processes in hydrogen-nickel systems." In the speech at the conference (proceedings) and the preprint paper Kim is directly referring that his BECNF theory can be applied to the Energy Catalyzer.

Is this enough RS for a mention in the article Energy Catalyzer that Yeong E. Kim has recently proposed a theoretical explanation for the device. ?

By all means few body systems is not fringe, is it ? --POVbrigand (talk) 13:56, 13 December 2011 (UTC)

Is my question unclear, or is this the wrong noticeboard ? Just let me know, Thanks. Or am I just too impatient ? :-) --POVbrigand (talk) 11:16, 14 December 2011 (UTC)

It's a tough question, and I misunderstood it at first. The Few-body systems article seems a complete red herring, that's not where you want the source used. Let me rephrase the question, maybe that will make it simpler for others to weigh in too.

“ The Energy Catalyzer is a supposed cold fusion heat source. Yeong E. Kim,[5] Professor of Physics and Group Leader Purdue Nuclear and Many-Body Theory Group of Purdue University wrote and presented a paper[6] that proposes preliminary theoretical explanations of the reported results of the device. Can the paper be cited in our article on the device? See also article talk page discussion. ”

If that is the question, I'd say yes. The relevant part of Wikipedia:Reliable sources is Self-published sources: "Self-published expert sources may be considered reliable when produced by an established expert on the topic of the article whose work in the relevant field has previously been published by reliable third-party publications." Given his titles and positions, I'm assuming that Kim has been published before on Bose-Einstein condensation nuclear fusion, and though I don't claim to understand the physics of his paper, it does seem to say it might explain the Energy Catalyzer, then that is certainly a relevant field, so he is an established expert on the topic. So WP:RS is met. Now the question is of due weight. The paper is mostly or completely dedicated to explaining the Energy Catalyzer, it's not just a side mention, so we're not overplaying the weight of the EC in the paper. And our article Energy Catalyzer is huge, with many statements about it by other scientists, so a sentence would not seem to be overshadowing those. So I'd say it's OK. --GRuban (talk) 13:53, 14 December 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the feedback. The first paper about the theory has been published in the peer reviewed journal Naturwissenschaften in 2009. I have found a few seminars at universities discussing this paper and within the field the theory is notable (see for instance this abstract). The above mentioned presentation at the conference on Few-Body Problems also show exposure of the theory in the non-fringe field. --POVbrigand (talk) 07:53, 16 December 2011 (UTC)

It is a pity that I won't be able to edit this into the article, because hordes of anti-fringe-POV-pushers will find a reason, any reason to delete it again. That is the sorry state of wikipedia when it comes to editing fringe articles. The common sense editors have long abandoned the controversial topics and I can't blame them. --POVbrigand (talk) 00:37, 22 December 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia editors are supposed to be against POV-fringe-pushing... AndyTheGrump (talk) 00:52, 22 December 2011 (UTC)

Wrong, ALL editors are supposed to edit NPOV. There is nothing in the policies that prohibits explaining the fringe position in an article about a fringe topic. Editing the above proposed line into the article does not equate to POV pushing. Deleting it for whatever reason is not in line with WP-policy. --POVbrigand (talk) 19:32, 24 December 2011 (UTC)

Could we reach a consensus whether we can add a line to the Energy Catalyzer article referencing Kim? POVbrigand added a line which has been removed by Binksternet (see diff [7]). For some reason, Bink seem to think Prof. Kim is not notable and that the paper is not relevant. Perhaps that reasoning can be explained here? 62.30.137.128 (talk) 08:20, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

Perhaps IRWolfie would like to explain his reasons for reverting the use of this source? 62.30.137.128 (talk) 15:10, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

The self-published paper is clearly not a reliable source as it is not published in a peer-reviewed reputable journal; it is self published. It seems unusual to have a paper that only references his previous work and a technology website. It is ok to use for the opinion of Yeong E. Kim. The question is then of due weight. There is no notability attached to Yeong E. Kim from what I can see and this would need to be shown for his opinions to have due weight. BECNF seems also to be fringe/not well accepted, I see no mention of it on springerlink for example. IRWolfie- (talk) 15:12, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

Maybe you didn't try hard enough: Springerlink --POVbrigand (talk) 19:37, 30 December 2011 (UTC)

They are all by the author himself. A mainstream acceptance of the theory would return hundreds of results. IRWolfie- (talk) 11:48, 31 December 2011 (UTC)

I'd draw people's attention to the abstract:

"Generalized theory of Bose-Einstein condensation nuclear fusion (BECNF) is used to carry out theoretical analyses of recent experimental results of Rossi et al. for hydrogen-nickel system. Based on incomplete experimental information currently available, preliminary theoretical explanations of the experimental results are presented in terms of the generalized BECNF theory. Additional accurate experimental data are needed for obtaining more complete theoretical descriptions and predictions, which can be tested by further experiments".

Further, the conclusion states "In order to explore validity and to test predictions of the generalized BECNF theory for the hydrogen-metal system, it is very important to carry out Rossi-type experiments independently in order to establish what are exact inputs and outputs of each experiment". It seem self-evident that Kim is proposing a hypothetical mechanism, based on incomplete (actually, almost non-existent) data. It looks to me to be exaggeration to state that this is even a "preliminary theoretical explanation" for the Rossi 'results', as POVb wishes to claim. It is little more than a hypothetical explanation for a hypothetical scenario, and Kim doesn't suggest otherwise - so neither should we. Including a non-peer-reviewed pdf which effectively states that it isn't based on any 'evaluation' of data that will allow its conclusions to be validated is totally undue in a section entitled 'Evaluation of the [Rossi] device'. AndyTheGrump (talk) 16:10, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

The assumption here is that this PDF file has not been peer reviewed. Usually it is true that papers presented at a scholarly/academic conference are usually considered to be a reliable source.... precisely because they are peer reviewed and that there is some editorial control over what gets presented at these conferences by the conference organizers. Perhaps it isn't quite as tight as what happens with professional or academic journals, but there usually are presentations that for one reason or another are rejected, and complete cranks and fringe theories usually aren't accepted unless the whole conference is organized by members of a fringe science group (I could give examples, but that is pointless for this example). If you want to attack the conference itself, that perhaps is useful, and I really don't know the reputation of this particular conference, but it does seem at first glance like this paper might be deemed a "reliable source" and deserves inclusion in the article. Usual issues like WP:UNDUE and other factors ought to be considered, but judicious referencing from this paper certainly seems legitimate and does not deserve to be removed from the Energy Catalyzer article simply because it espouses a POV you don't agree with. --Robert Horning (talk) 16:47, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

Please also note that Kim had previously published 2 papers on the BECNF theory in regular peer-reviewed journals to which this paper explicitely reference:

• Y. E. Kim, “Theory of Bose-Einstein Condensation Mechanism for Deuteron-Induced Nuclear Reactions in Micro/Nano-Scale Metal Grains and Particles”, Naturwissenschaften 96, 803 (2009)
• Y. E. Kim, “Theoretical interpretation of anomalous tritium and neutron productions during Pd/D co-deposition experiments”, Eur. Phys. J. Appl. Phys. 52, 31101 (2010).

--POVbrigand (talk) 17:09, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

The Journal of Nuclear Physics, despite the benign sounding name, is a fringe publication and not a reliable source. Articles published in EPJ AP and Naturwissenschaften are generally reliable sources, however. a13ean (talk) 17:42, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

I think you are confused about the reference? Journal of Applied Physics is very distinct from the Journal of Nuclear Physics. Attempts to rubbish Kim will not work, he is notable and his most recent pre-print is very relevant. 62.30.137.128 (talk) 18:43, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

This is also a question of how primary sources should be used, and what we are talking about here is a primary source. BTW, I agree that the Journal of Nuclear Physics is not a reliable source, but we are not talking about that particular journal in regards to the document being questioned here nor do I see where that particular issue was being raised in the first place. Is there a specific problem with the PDF file based upon a presentation at this particular conference, where the pre-print which is publicly available from one of Purdue University's web servers? --Robert Horning (talk) 18:38, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

The | PDF file that everyone's talking about has the same title as a paper in the Journal of Nuclear Physics. This article is not a reliable source. It also appears to be a paper associated with a conference presentation. In general, these are not reliable source, unless they are published elsewhere in a normal peer-reviewed article. This is because conference presentations generally don't undergo a peer review process (like conference papers). For example, for APS meetings non-invited presentations are selected for inclusion based only on their abstract, which can later be changed. Unless this PDF file relates to a peer-reviewed publication in a non-fringe journal, it's not a reliable source. On Kim's own web site it is referred to only as a pre-print. Anything that's actually published in the Journal of Applied Physics, however, is probably notable. a13ean (talk) 19:10, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

I think the problem with this paper is that it's a hypothetical explanation of what is imagined to be happening in an untested device. So that by itself makes it a fringe thing to be avoided. But if a reliable source cites the paper then I guess it should be included Bhny (talk) 18:55, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

If secondary reliable sources discuss the Kim preprint then those sources can be quoted. I do not think that individual papers are appropriate for the article if they are not discussed by others. In that regard, the relevant guideline we should follow is WP:UNDUE. Let's wait until Kim is described by reliable secondary sources. Binksternet (talk) 19:15, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

Note : I gave up on contributing to the Energy Catalyzer article. The final straw was related to the Kim article ... which was a pre-print of an INVITED paper (by definition, Invited papers are NOT peer reviewed : the preprint being on his official Purdue website) by an acknowledged expert in the subject area. (Bose Einstein Condensates). The reason that my last attempt to admit Kim was deleted : there is no "proof" that the eCat contains Nickel and uses Hydrogen (despite the ISSUED patent, and every single article or discussion on the matter, including even the lead paragraph of the wiki itself) , therefore the paper by (reputable) scientist Kim is irrelevant. The proceedings of the (reputable) conference are to be published in the next issue of the (reputable) Few Bodies journal. But now Binksternet asserts that even THAT won't satisfy him: "Let's wait until Kim is described by reliable secondary sources." Alanf777 (talk) 20:20, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

It is through the use of reliable sources that we decide if something has due weight. IRWolfie- (talk) 20:49, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

The BECNF theory is part of the scientific discourse, it has been presented at these universities:

• University of Missouri, Columbia, Missouri - Theory of Bose-Einstein Condensation Nuclear Fusion* - Vice Chancellor for Research Seminar Series - 29 May 2009 - Based on a paper published on-line - Naturwissenschaften DOI 10.1007/s00114-009-0537-6 - (14 May 2009)
• University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign - NPRE 596 Grad Seminar: Low-Energy Nuclear Reactions in Micro-Nano-Scale Metal Particle - Speaker Dr. Yeong E. Kim, Purdue University - Date Oct 11, 2011
• Mitchigan State University - Bose-Einstein Condensation of Deuterons and Nuclear Fusion in Metals - Yeong E. Kim, Purdue University - Wednesday, March 16, 4:10 PM - Nuclear Science Seminar - Biomedical & Physical Sciences Bldg., Rm. 1400
• Purdue University - "Nuclear Fusion in Micro/Nano-Scale Metal Particles" - Professor Yeong E Kim - Thursday March 04, 2010 - 4:00pm PHYS 203 - This is a joint presentation sponsored by Department of Physics and School of Nuclear Engineering

--POVbrigand (talk) 21:33, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

You appear to misunderstand what it is to be part of the scientific discourse. It is not merely being published or presenting your work but other reputable scientists talking about, working on, critiquing your work and using your work as the basis for their own work. Anyway this is irrelvant, as has been highlighted by others with the due weight issue and the non-peer reviewed non-published nature of the article that mentions the Energy Catalyzer. IRWolfie- (talk) 15:47, 30 December 2011 (UTC)

You are incorrect about Kim's paper; it does have due weight - it specifically mentions Rossi, is written by an expert who has previously been published in the same field. It's blatantly obvious that it should be included! 62.30.137.128 (talk) 19:44, 30 December 2011 (UTC)

Note GRuban's comment above (my emphasis): The relevant part of Wikipedia:Reliable sources is Self-published sources: "Self-published expert sources may be considered reliable when produced by an established expert on the topic of the article whose work in the relevant field has previously been published by reliable third-party publications." 62.30.137.128 (talk) 22:54, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

Clarification:

• We are not discussing the technical details of Kim's theory. We are not presenting the theory AS FACT. We are presenting the fact THAT a theory has been proposed by an expert in the field.
• As per Yeong E. Kim's University webpage, the paper is in preprint. The fact that the paper is also hosted on a non-RS blog called "journal of nuclear physics" is not relevant.
• The underlying physics BECNF theory was published in peer reviewed journals Naturwissenschaften and Eur. Phys. J. Appl. Phys
• As announced during the conference, the proceedings of the APFB2011 will be published as an issue of Few-Body Systems [8] - Journal Few Body Systems: http://www.springer.com/physics/particle+and+nuclear+physics/journal/601

Reply to these comments:

• AndyTheGrump: "It seem self-evident that Kim is proposing a hypothetical mechanism, based on incomplete (actually, almost non-existent) data." self-evident by AndyTheGrump == OR
• AndyTheGrump: "preliminary theoretical explanation" ... as POVb wishes to claim." -> Misrepresentation of fact. "preliminary theoretical explanation" as per verbatim in the paper: "Based on incomplete experimental information currently available, preliminary theoretical explanations of the experimental results are presented in terms of the generalized BECNF theory."
• IRwolfie:"self-published paper is clearly not a reliable source as it is not published in a peer-reviewed reputable journal;" -> self published by Yeong E. Kim who is an expert on BEC physics, see WP:SPS. BECNF has been published in peer reviewed journals.
• IRWolfie:" BECNF seems also to be fringe/not well accepted, I see no mention of it on springerlink for example. -> springerlink

--POVbrigand (talk) 20:18, 30 December 2011 (UTC)

Spin it how you like. To claim that the Kim paper is a reliable source for an 'evaluation of [Rossi's] device' is totally undue - the author is hypothesising about a general principle, and has made explicit that it isn't an 'evaluation' based on the information necessary to arrive at any conclusions regarding Rossi's device: That isn't what he sets out to do: "In order to explore validity and to test predictions of the generalized BECNF theory for the hydrogen-metal system, it is very important to carry out Rossi-type experiments independently in order to establish what are exact inputs and outputs of each experiment". Kim is discussing testing the hypothesis, and is seemingly not proposing testing any device actually made by Rossi at all. Science depends on experimentation, and not just on hypothesis. Kim appears not to have performed any experiments, and is claiming no results in his paper. His conclusions don't state anything in regard to 'evaluation' of the E-Cat, and it is synthesis to suggest they do. AndyTheGrump (talk) 20:39, 30 December 2011 (UTC)

Your arguments seem more to be based on WP:JDLI. The importance of its inclusion is that a notable expert in condensed matter physics is of the opinion that Rossi's device could be operating due to the formation of a Bose-Einstein Condensate. This is as equally important an expert opinion regarding the possibilty of the device being real, as Randi's is of the device being a con. For some reason, you are unwilling to see both sides. 62.30.137.128 (talk) 21:43, 30 December 2011 (UTC)

He's not notable. IRWolfie- (talk) 11:47, 31 December 2011 (UTC)

The comment from Andy shows his mode of arguing, he writes: "It is totally undue to claim that the Kim paper is a reliable source for an evaluation of the device". Andy argues that the Kim paper does not belong in the article, because it is misplaced in the "evaluation" section.

The "evaluation" section is a bundle of "what other people have said about the device". The Kim paper equates to a statement from Kim about how he thinks the mechanism of the device could be explained with his BECNF theory, maybe the title of the "evaluation" section should be changed into "opinion from other scientists (and/or journalists)" or something along that line.

The comments above by Andy that Kim did not actually "evaluate the device" are also true for Ethan Siegel who was added by Andy personally to the section.

--POVbrigand (talk) 08:53, 31 December 2011 (UTC)

One paper by Kim that mention his theory shows the lack of acceptance. A mainstream theory would have hundreds if not thousands of related papers. He also purported to have a mechanism for the Fleischmann–Pons experiment which is also fringe and undue. IRWolfie- (talk) 11:55, 31 December 2011 (UTC)

Whether or not the theory is mainstream accepted is not a point of discussion, nobody claims it is a mainstream accepted theory. Stop arguing with straw men. You write: "...which is also fringe and undue". If you read the comments from GRuban and Robert Horning you see that they have carefully thought about and explained their position that adding Kim to the article is not undue. However you keep bringing up undue, to me that leaves only WP:IDL and WP:IDHT to explain your position. --POVbrigand (talk) 13:08, 31 December 2011 (UTC)

I have added the line to the article. --POVbrigand (talk) 08:40, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

How could you conclude from this discussion that you had concensus for the addition? IRWolfie- (talk) 13:49, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

There is no consensus for your action, POVb. Binksternet (talk) 13:50, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

With insufficient input from other editors, there will never be any consensus here. Personally, I don't have a problem with the sentence that was recently reverted [9] Tmccc (talk) 14:27, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

As has been mentioned already, it's unpublished, non-peer reviewed and undue. The cold fusion article already sums up the fringe explanations: "Many years after the 1989 experiment, cold fusion researchers still haven't agreed on a single theoretical explanation or on a single experimental method that can produce replicable results [150] and continue to offer new proposals, which also fail to convince mainstream scientists.[80]". This seems to apply here, a proposed theoretical explanation when the workings of the machine isn't even known. IRWolfie- (talk) 14:45, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

Let's look at the problem with it: "Yeong E. Kim,[10] Professor of Physics and Group Leader Purdue Nuclear and Many-Body Theory Group of Purdue University wrote and presented a paper[11] that proposes preliminary theoretical explanations of the reported results of the device". Exactly - it isn't an 'evaluation of the device'. It is a hypothetical explanation of 'reported results', and Kim makes it absolutely clear that he isn't 'evaluating' anything - he explicitly states that his hypothesis can only be tested after experiments are carried out. It is a single, non-peer-reviewed speculative paper that actually asserts nothing concrete at all with regard to the E-Cat itself. Using Kim's paper in the way proposed is a misrepresentation. Wikipedia policy regarding science-related issues is in any case clear over this: we don't use single primary sources (peer-reviewed or not) to 'disprove' mainstream science. If and when Kim's "Theory of Bose-Einstein Condensation Nuclear Fusion" becomes accepted by the mainstream, the situation may change - but we follow science, rather than gazing into crystal balls... AndyTheGrump (talk) 14:50, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

As you are repeating yourself. Here is my previous comment: The comment from Andy shows his mode of arguing, he writes: "It is totally undue to claim that the Kim paper is a reliable source for an evaluation of the device". Andy argues that the Kim paper does not belong in the article, because it is misplaced in the "evaluation" section. The "evaluation" section is a bundle of "what other people have said about the device". The Kim paper equates to a statement from Kim about how he thinks the mechanism of the device could be explained with his BECNF theory, maybe the title of the "evaluation" section should be changed into "opinion from other scientists (and/or journalists)" or something along that line. The comments above by Andy that Kim did not actually "evaluate the device" are also true for Ethan Siegel who was added by Andy personally to the section.

Whether or not the theory is mainstream accepted is not a point of discussion, nobody claims it is a mainstream accepted theory. Stop arguing with straw men. If you read the comments from GRuban and Robert Horning you see that they have carefully thought about and explained their position that adding Kim to the article is not undue. To me you complaints only leave WP:IDL and WP:IDHT to explain your position.

--POVbrigand (talk) 15:11, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

WP:PARITY applies to the quote from Ethan Siegel since it is a mainstream opinion of the work of Rossi. Parity does not apply to a fringe view commenting on the fringe work. You admitted it is not a mainstream accepted theory. It is a fringe theory, The fringe explanation has no due weight on wikipedia. IRWolfie- (talk) 15:16, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

Or maybe we should just delete the 'evaluation' section entirely - given that the device has never actually been 'evaluated' in any meaningful way? You miss the point, however. Siegel and Thieberger aren't using speculative hypotheses about "Bose-Einstein Condensation Nuclear Fusion" to evaluate the device - they are demonstrating how mainstream science isn't compatible with the claimed results - and it mainstream science that Wikipedia must represent, not unproven hypotheses. Like it or not, Wikipedia has to follow scientific advance, not lead it. AndyTheGrump (talk) 15:19, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

We can just delete Siegel AND Kim and leave the "evaluation" section to comments from people who have actually seen the device. --POVbrigand (talk) 15:25, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

Again since you seemed to miss it: WP:PARITY applies to the quote from Ethan Siegel since it is a mainstream opinion of the work of Rossi. Ethan Siegel has also been mentioned by reliable secondary sources. Parity does not apply to a fringe view commenting on the fringe work. You admitted it is not a mainstream accepted theory. It is a fringe theory, The fringe explanation has no due weight on wikipedia. This has already been discussed on the talk page Talk:Energy_Catalyzer#.27ScienceBlogs.27_article_on_the_E-Cat)IRWolfie- (talk) 15:30, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

You have missed the point of WP:FRINGE of which WP:PARITY is part. "...The fringe explanation has no due weight on wikipedia...." is laughable. Experienced editors here in this talk have analyzed "undue" and concluded that it is not the case. What I am hearing from Andy, IRWolfie and Binksternet is WP:IDL and WP:IDHT. --POVbrigand (talk) 15:44, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

The Kim paper is hypothetical and WP:UNDUE emphasis. Binksternet (talk) 15:46, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

Whether or not the theory is mainstream accepted is not a point of discussion, nobody claims it is a mainstream accepted theory. If you read the comments from GRuban and Robert Horning you see that they have carefully thought about and explained their position that adding Kim to the article is not undue. However you keep bringing up undue, to me that leaves only WP:IDL and WP:IDHT to explain your position. --POVbrigand

The issue of undue weight was not addressed. IRWolfie- (talk) 16:31, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

POVbrigand, by undue weight I mean exactly that. The Kim paper is hypothetical conjecture regarding a field of conjectural science. The Kim paper is not proven to be notable in regard to the topic. Secondary sources have not shown it to be significant. Wikipedia is here to explain the main points to the reader, not to expound on little-known hypotheses in a way not reflected in the larger world. If we give the not-proven-significant Kim paper a platform in the article we are violating WP:UNDUE. We should wait until Kim's ideas gain wider notice and comment. Binksternet (talk) 16:39, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

@IRWolfie & Binksternet. See WP:IDHT:

"... Now the question is of due weight. The paper is mostly or completely dedicated to explaining the Energy Catalyzer, it's not just a side mention, so we're not overplaying the weight of the EC in the paper. And our article Energy Catalyzer is huge, with many statements about it by other scientists, so a sentence would not seem to be overshadowing those. So I'd say it's OK. --GRuban (talk) 13:53, 14 December 2011 (UTC) "

"... Usual issues like WP:UNDUE and other factors ought to be considered, but judicious referencing from this paper certainly seems legitimate and does not deserve to be removed from the Energy Catalyzer article simply because it espouses a POV you don't agree with. --Robert Horning (talk) 16:47, 29 December 2011 (UTC)"

--POVbrigand (talk) 17:08, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

Hi. I got the following message from IRWolfie on my talk page. "You are being quoted as being in favour of including a quote from Yeong E. Kim based on a fringe unpublished non-peer reviewed paper. Perhaps you would like to comment on why you think it has due weight." Yes... just the way any of us would want to start off the new year, I hope you'll agree? :-) Anyway, POVbrigand is quoting me correctly, but it seems those two sentences aren't sufficient. For those who are afraid of TL;DR, your fears are quite justified, as those two sentences do cover it, but for those who aren't:

• Just by counting length of text: The article Energy Catalyzer has 5 text sections (lead and 4 subsections). Each one is at least 2 paragraphs long. The relevant subsection (Evaluation of the device) is the longest one of them: 6 paragraphs, each at least 2 sentences; I count 24 sentences but could be off. So 1 sentence, which seems to be what is proposed here, seems to be under 2% of the article, and even under 5% of section. It's hard to make the argument it would overshadow.
• Now let's look at the contents of the relevant subsection (Evaluation of the device). It includes such gems as:
  • "Skeptic James Randi, discussing the E-Cat in the context of previous cold fusion claims, predicts that it will eventually be revealed to not function as advertised.24" Now I'm very fond of James Randi, I respect him a great deal, I made 7 edits to Pigasus Award back in 2006. He's a great man, a good magician, and an expert in human nature, and revealing hoaxes and scams, and if he were setting up a controlled experiment to test the thing, his judgment would be irreplaceable and invaluable. But he didn't do that, and he's not a physicist, and that YouTube video backing it is published by his own foundation and not peer reviewed either, and even if it were ... it's a prediction. We're in the prediction business now? People above are objecting that the Kim paper is "hypothetical" or a "speculative hypothesis" - the Randi statement is an outright prediction of the future!
  • "Kjell Aleklett, physics professor at Uppsala University, said the percentage of copper was too high for any known reaction of nickel, and the copper had the same isotopic ratio as natural copper. He also stated, "Known chemical reactions cannot explain the amount of energy measured. A nuclear reaction can explain the amount of energy, but the knowledge we have today says that this reaction cannot take place."20" That's 2 sentences backed by a link to a blog post. Again, not peer-reviewed; and, I dare say, less carefully written than the paper. Aleklett is a physicist, so presumably meets the WP:SPS guideline "produced by an established expert on the topic of the article whose work in the relevant field has previously been published by reliable third-party publications", so it should stay; but do note it is 2 sentences, so twice as long as the Kim note is proposed to be.
  • "Theoretical astrophysicist Ethan Siegel and nuclear physicist Peter Thieberger argue that" ... too long to quote fully. That's the entire last paragraph of that section, 5-6 long sentences, based on a self-published blog.[12] Note the length there; 5-6 times longer than the Kim note is proposed to be.
• Fully comparable to Aleklett, Siegel, and Thieberger, Kim is also a professor and a physicist; and in addition, he is a group leader. Purdue is a comparably respected university to Uppsala. And a paper that has been presented at a conference has received at least as much scrutiny as personal blog posts. So similar weight is justified. It looks a lot like the people opposing it are doing so selectively, because they don't like what it says. We don't do that here. --GRuban (talk) 14:50, 3 January 2012 (UTC)

• While not speaking directly to this issue, please note that at most U.S. universities "group leader" is an informal, self-bestowed title. The "group" is typically the professor along with his grad students and postdocs. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 15:05, 3 January 2012 (UTC)

The point is that the other sources are 'evaluating' (or at least 'speculating about') the E-Cat. Kim's paper isn't. He says so. He states that he is testing his hypothesis against 'claims made' regarding the device, not the device itself, and makes it absolutely clear that any conclusions regarding his hypothesis can only be drawn after independent 'evaluation'/experimentation. It is synthesis to represent Kim's paper as an 'evaluation' - and a violation of NPOV to cite his qualifications etc without drawing readers attention to the fact that his 'theoretical explanation' is based on an unproven hypothesis as yet unrecognised by mainstream science. As has already been stated, were Kim's concepts to receive comment in mainstream secondary sources, the situation might well change, but as it stands, all we have is a speculative primary source being misused to imply things it simply doesn't state. AndyTheGrump (talk) 15:13, 3 January 2012 (UTC)

Then there seems to be room for compromise. What do you think the paper does state, and would you phrase it for our article? I think if you and POVbrigand do a few rounds on that, you should be able to come to a compromise on a sentence that you would both be able to accept.--GRuban (talk) 15:41, 3 January 2012 (UTC)

I want to edit in Kim in order to give a NPOV together with the mainstream view of Siegel. We should inform our readers that, while the mainstream does not accept the possibility, other established scientists offer explanations based on theories that have been published in peer reviewed journals. I think it is only fair to our readers to make the text NPOV: scientists have explained why the device cannot work according to accepted physics, other scientists have offered attempts at non mainstream explanations. That's why I added the plain wording about Kim offering his BECNF theory. To offer a piece of text that is NPOV. To show that not only the mainstream scientists have become vocal about the device, but also other established scientists have expressed their view, some by getting quoted by newspapers, others like Kim by writing pre-print papers and present them at conferences. --POVbrigand (talk) 20:07, 3 January 2012 (UTC)

NPOV does not give equal weight to Kim and the mass of mainstream scientists who think cold fusion does not fit any known science. Kim is very much a minor viewpoint, and his theory has not yet been the subject of secondary comment. Bring him in when he is discussed in a reliable secondary source. Binksternet (talk) 20:28, 3 January 2012 (UTC)

I don't think you're right, Binksternet. That's not our standard. Our standard for WP:NPOV is "representing fairly, proportionately, and as far as possible without bias, all significant views that have been published by reliable sources." Kim's paper is a reliable source, dedicated to the subject, by a published expert on the subject. It's a hard argument to make that it is so insignificant that proportionally representing it in an article of this length means not mentioning it at all. The article has maybe 100 sentences in it - are there really 200 different reliable sources on the subject of the article, so that Kim's isn't even worth one? If so, please, show them; if they're that numerous, surely the article deserves to have more than the 20 or so it has. If not, Kim's view deserves a sentence at least. --GRuban (talk) 00:43, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

It is NPOV to say "according to mainstream physics the claimed effect is impossible, however some scientists have offered non mainstream explanations". Now we can't add exact wording with "some scientists", because as far as I know we only have 1 scientist (Kim) as a RS that explicitely refers to the Rossi device. So I have presented the "non-mainstream" voice with the Kim paper. I am not trying to highlight the Kim theory, he just happens to be the only RS with a non-mainstream view. So I have to use him. I am not tied to the wording of the proposed line, I only use Kim as verification of the existence of "non-mainstream" RS. I have no problem to settle with a wording that does not explicitely name Kim, but puts him in as a reference only for verification of the availability of non mainstream views. --POVbrigand (talk) 08:17, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

There is no reliable source that discusses Kim in context with the E-Cat. An unpublished non-reviewed article is not a reliable source. Kim's view isn't one of the significant views that have been published by reliable sources. Specifically, we have no reliable sources that mention him in context with the e-cat. We have nothing to demonstrate his views are significant. IRWolfie- (talk) 18:55, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

"An unpublished non-reviewed article is not a reliable source.". It is published on the university web page of a well respected established scientist. It counts a WP:SPS until it gets published in "journal of few body systems". It was accepted for presentation at a non-fringe conference. --POVbrigand (talk) 21:04, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

That does not mean it is reliable or significant. IRWolfie- (talk) 15:01, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

It does when the source WP:SPS is reliable and significant. See other people's comments (GRuban, Robert Horning, 62.30.137.128, POVbrigand, and myself). This whole thing is going around in circles. Tmccc (talk) 15:15, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

We should wait until the paper gets discussed in a WP:SECONDARY source. Binksternet (talk) 16:06, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

Based on what policy or guideline? That seems to be a standard you are imposing that we haven't written down anywhere else, and that you aren't holding the rest of the article to. Can you consider the half the other references in that section against that same standard? James Randi? Kjell Aleklett? What about the whole last paragraph of that section, from Ethan Siegel and Peter Thieberger? (I didn't even have that in my list above, let me add it.) Those last two are both sourced to self-published blogs by scientists. Why do you consider self-published blogs by scientists reliable, and a conference-presented paper by a scientist not? It seems like the main difference is that you like the content of those, but not this. That's not what our guidelines and policies say. --GRuban (talk) 16:50, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

James Randi is notable, Kim is not. The Ethan Siegel and Peter Thieberger source is discussed by a secondary source, see the talk page, also see the talk page where it was also justified through parity of sources. Kim's view is not discussed in reliable secondary sources, Kim's view is not justified through parity of sources since it is a fringe theory viewpoint on a fringe device. IRWolfie- (talk) 18:16, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

Unfortunately for that argument, notability isn't relevant to reliability, which is what we're discussing here. You can search through Wikipedia:Identifying reliable sources, and not find the word notability. The Weekly World News is notable, but not reliable. And Yeong Kim's paper may not be notable, but it is reliable for this context.

BTW, I went to the "the talk page". Here's what it says. "The blog was co-written by Dr. Peter Thieberger, Senior Physicist at Brookhaven National Laboratory; a reliable source. It was noticed by other blogs (such as The Wall Street Journal's) and discussion boards, and reprinted in the news magazine New Energy Times. The blog is worthy of this article about the E-Cat, and any other article about nickel-to-copper cold fusion schemes. Binksternet (talk) 21:27, 9 December 2011 (UTC)"

Well, the WSJ link is just that, a link; it doesn't discuss the article, it doesn't even reprint the article, it just links to it, without comment. From that, and from the header: "(Posted on ScienceBlogs : Combined Feed)" I would suspect it is an automated agglomeration. And the New Energy Times has also reprinted Dr. Kim's paper. http://www.newenergytimes.com/v2/conferences/2010/ARL/Pres/01Kim-BoseEinsteinCondensates.pdf I do believe Siegel and Thieberger's blog post is worthy of mention in our article per WP:SPS (though 6 sentences seems undue weight). But I similarly believe Kim's paper is worthy of mention in our article, and for the same reasons.--GRuban (talk) 19:13, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

Oh, and here's another wonderful comment from "the talk page" :

"It's written by two physicists so I don't see why not. As long as the criticisms are attributable that seems to meet the criteria for a fringe article. A criticism of the device is not going to be in the peer reviewed literature because it's not part of the scientific discourse.IRWolfie- (talk) 23:22, 7 December 2011 (UTC)"

That seems to be from you, IRWolfie. It seems like it should apply to Dr. Kim's paper.--GRuban (talk) 19:21, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

Yes, as per parity of sources (which I already mentioned above). The mainstream criticisms are attributable. Parity of sources does not justify the inclusion of a fringe theory onto the fringe topic. Here Siegel is quoted by discovery.com [13]. On your other point above; The opinions of a notable person have more due weight in an article than the opinions of someone who is not notable. This is quite clear, for example, if Stephen Hawking commented on the E-Cat clearly it would have due weight. IRWolfie- (talk) 19:59, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

Let me check that I understand you correctly. You are writing that if a scientist should criticize the Energy Catalyst, we should include their statement. But if that same scientist should instead support it, we shouldn't include their statement. Do I have that right? --GRuban (talk) 01:55, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

If a scientist makes an extraordinary claim it requires extraordinary proof. From parity of sources, mainstream opinions are not always in journals; i.e because the Catalyzer is not mainstream and is not published, as such it is acceptable to use the Siegel blog (which coincidentally recieved attention from secondary sources as I showed above). Wikipedia should reflect the mainstream opinion with significant minority opinions sourced from reliable independent sources. What you wish to do is take a fringe theory, and say that it explains the workings of a fringe device, this does not have due weight. Yeong E. Kims promotion of his fringe theory, which is not mainstream, to explain the Catalyzer is an extraordinary claim, but you wish to include it from a mediocre source. It is not a significant minority opinion of the E-Cat. IRWolfie- (talk) 12:02, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

So that's a "yes"? --GRuban (talk) 16:14, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

The paper does not mention E-Cat so it cannot be included in the E-Cat article. What's needed is a secondary source that connects the dots, saying Kim's hypothesis applies to the E-Cat. Binksternet (talk) 16:25, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

The BECNF theory by Kim is discussed in these papers which were published in mainstream peer reviewed journals:

• "Storms, E., Status of cold fusion (2010). Naturwiss., 2010. 97(10): p. 861-881."
• "Krivit, S. and J. Marwan, A new look at low-energy nuclear reaction research. J. Environ. Monit., 2009. 11: p. 1731-1746.".
• "Advances in proposed D-Cluster inertial confiment fusion target by George H Miley et al. Journal of Physics: Conference Series Volume 244 Part 3"
• "A possible in situ 3H and 3He source in Earth’s interior: an alternative explanation of origin of 3He in deep Earth by Songsheng Jiang, Jing Liu and Ming He NATURWISSENSCHAFTEN Volume 97, Number 7, 655-662".

These papers are all secondary sources to the BECNF theory. --POVbrigand (talk) 16:54, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

Links for the above Storms Krivit Miley Jiang a13ean (talk) 17:10, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

TO quote the first one "The absence of a useful theory is presently a major handicap to progress". The second one has a brief mention of a paper by Kim, along with a large number of other theories. The third one has a single sentence line mentioning Kim. The last one also has a very brief mention, and mentions a reaction from the paper. None of these seem to do much more than acknowledge that Kim wrote this paper, and don't seem to relate it to any particular device. a13ean (talk) 17:22, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

Looks bad for your argument, POVbrigand. Binksternet (talk) 17:33, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

No, it is not bad for my argument Binksternet. We do not write that BECNF is the right one, do we ? The BECNF is not presented as the correct theory, this is not about promoting Kim as the correct theory. We write THAT a theory has been proposed by a credible scientist to add a perspective to the Siegel blog paragraph. All the peer reviewed papers have noted and commented on Kim's theory, some agreeing, some disagreeing. Thus the BECNF theory is discussed within the field (Storms, Krivit) and outside of the field (Miley, Jiang). Your argument was that there is no secondary source, here are four of them, and all from scientists in mainstream peer reviewed journals. A theory proposal by a respected scientist that was peer reviewed and is mentioned in other peer reviewed sources is not something you can just dismiss.

The pre-print paper we are discussing is Kim's proposal how this BECNF theory can also explain Ni-H fusion and he explicitly refers to Rossi's device. We are not discussing a brand new theory that was written after Rossi appeared a year ago. With his pre-print paper Kim expresses that his theory also applies to Rossi's device.

--POVbrigand (talk) 19:26, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

A person unfamilar with the scientific method may think that an idea is significant if it is mentioned in a journal, this is not the case. 2 mentions where J. Environ. Monit. is not an appropriate journal does not make something part of the discourse (2 mentions is actually a tiny mention). You appear to miss the scale of these fields. But the BECNF theory isn't on trial (no matter how fringe a view it is). What is of interest is significant coverage in reliable sources that link the BECNF to the E-Cat of which there is zero. Yeong Kim is not notable, his BECNF theory is fringe. In fact, no reliable source makes the link of the BECNF to the E-cat. IRWolfie- (talk) 21:42, 7 January 2012 (UTC)

Wikipedia is NOT the place to ONLY present the mainstream science view, read WP:FRINGE. A person unfamiliar with physics may think that the only view on the subject is the mainstream view, this is not the case. As per NPOV, we should not mislead our readers by presenting ONLY a blog entry explaining why the mainstream view thinks the device cannot work. In his interview Bushnell spoke about the Widom-Larson theory and the Rossi device. Kim offers his BECNF theory as an explanation. These are both respectable scientist. I am not interested in highlighting one of those theories, but if we want to have a NPOV article, then we must somehow mention that there is more to it that just mainstream ideas, that non-mainstream physics views regarding the device exists. Currently none of that is mentioned, a clear case of POV editing. --POVbrigand (talk) 12:57, 8 January 2012 (UTC)

Japanese scientist Ken-ichi TSUCHIYA from Tokyo National College of Technology writes in his 2011 paper "Theoretical study of nuclear reactions in solids using Bose-Einstein condensation model": "In our previous work on Bose-Einstein condensation (BEC) approach to the theoretical interpretation of cold fusion [1], we estimated the transition temperature of BEC in palladium deuteride. It was based on the Kim’s work [2] by using equivalent linear two-body method to the many-body problems of charged bosons trapped in an ion trap. In the recent work of Kim et al.[3], they have expanded their theory in order to explain the Rossi’s experiment [4]. In this study, BEC for the two species case in solids and its transition temperature are discussed by using Kim’s theory." [14]

Within the field it is noted and discussed that Kim has "expanded his theory in order to explain Rossi's experiment".

--POVbrigand (talk) 17:28, 8 January 2012 (UTC)

It would seem reasonable that Kim is included; I find it difficult to understand why people keep reverting the one sentence that references him. Tmccc (talk) 18:33, 8 January 2012 (UTC)

Good find, POVbrigand. It's not quite what I pictured, some journalist writing an article about the topic, but it establishes that other researchers in the field, ones unrelated to Rossi or Kim, have connected the dots and placed Kim's theory in context with the E-Cat. Binksternet (talk) 18:43, 8 January 2012 (UTC)

We should make it clear that "dots" Storms, Krivit, Miley, Tsuchiya, et al. are all in the cold fusion/LENR "universe". I.e. They are all related. —ArtifexMayhem (talk) 19:44, 8 January 2012 (UTC)

I am glad that we got that out of the way, I will reinsert the original line, please feel free to add or rewrite. --POVbrigand (talk) 20:00, 8 January 2012 (UTC)

Yes it should be made clear that it is in-universe, the mention is from a cold fusion conference. IRWolfie- (talk) 20:23, 8 January 2012 (UTC)

Propose to close the discussion here and continue on the article talk page. --POVbrigand (talk) 20:51, 8 January 2012 (UTC)

Use of reliable media reports as secondary sources to support primary sources

  1. A full citation of the source in question.
  2. A link to the source in question.
  3. The article in which it is being used. For example article name
  4. The exact statement in the article that the source is supporting.
  5. Links to relevant talk page discussion. See diffs for an explanation.

1. "Giant asteroid passes near Earth" BBC News, November 9, 2011 and "Asteroid 2005 YU55 passes close by Earth" The Washington Post, November 9, 2011

2. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-15572634 and http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-science/asteroid-2055-yu55-passes-close-by-earth-how-close-did-it-get/2011/11/09/gIQAdQpw5M_story.html

3. 2005 YU55

4. On November 8, 2011, NASA released a statement mentioning a number of puzzling structures on the surface of the asteroid, which were detected as it passed near the Earth.

5. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:2005_YU55#Strange.2FPuzzling_structures

Diff of deletion of references: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=2005_YU55&diff=465285428&oldid=465241886

Other editors are claiming the BBC and Washington Post are "low-quality" sources and that press releases from NASA (a primary source) are sufficient. They have deleted the press report references, claiming they are inaccurate. Ghostofnemo (talk) 00:41, 14 December 2011 (UTC)

• Per WP:SCIRS#Use up-to-date evidence "While articles should be kept up to date by citing current literature, care should be taken to avoid recentism, focusing too much on new sources that have not yet been evaluated by the relevant community." delete the lot about puzzling or strange structures. Pre-press reports of data are readily misinterpreted—this is a perfect example of where data has not fully been evaluated. Await scholarly publication of sources analysing the surface of 2005 YU55. Fifelfoo (talk) 00:51, 14 December 2011 (UTC)

Also from WP:SCIRS (the lead-in): "Scientific information should be based on reliable published sources and should accurately reflect the current state of knowledge. Ideal sources for these articles include comprehensive reviews in independent, reliable published sources, such as reputable scientific journals, statements and reports from reputable expert bodies, widely recognized standard textbooks written by experts in a field, or standard handbooks and reference guides, and high-quality non-specialist publications. Although news reports are sometimes inappropriate as reliable sources for the technical aspects of scientific results or theories, they may be useful when discussing the non-technical context or impact of science topics, particularly controversial ones." No mention of government press releases. Ghostofnemo (talk) 14:31, 14 December 2011 (UTC)

Actually, press releases are mentioned here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Identifying_reliable_sources_%28natural_sciences%29#Other_sources Ghostofnemo (talk) 14:45, 14 December 2011 (UTC)

In these sort of fields, media reports are almost never going to be secondary sources in the way that we want them for Wikipedia. Wikipedia is not news. We actually require our secondary scientific sources to possess the expertise to make meaningful summary and commentary on primary sources, At present it seems no such secondary sources exist, and there is no compelling reason for the NASA press release on "puzzling structures" to be in the article at present. Wait for it to be published in a peer-reviewed scholarly journal, preferably as part of a systematic review or similar. If this issue is really so significant, it's certain that academics will be quite capable of providing us with a decent secondary source in the near future. --RexxS (talk) 14:56, 14 December 2011 (UTC)

Are you suggesting that all the material in the article that is not sourced from peer-reviewed scholarly journals also be removed, or just the one line that has shown notability by its coverage in the mainstream press? Ghostofnemo (talk) 16:47, 14 December 2011 (UTC)

Popular reactions in a science article can definitely be sourced to newspapers; if they're WEIGHTy enough. "With the observation of object FRED2014 being on a collision course with Canberra, the Prime Minister of Australia said, "Bloody hell, lets evacuate."(Sydney Morning Herald 1 March 2015)." But content that falls under the SCI in SCIRS should not primarily be sourced to popular sources or "primary" scientific sources. If there's already a secondary (ie: journal article) source then sometimes it is nice to include "non-expert" readable summaries that are correct in addition to the secondary source. But the article should still be written out of the reliable scholarly sources. Fifelfoo (talk) 21:29, 14 December 2011 (UTC)

Ghostofnemo has failed to describe the problem. We are dealing with a currency issue. On November 8, NASA published a press release announcing the release of the asteroid radar film. Subsequent coverage by the popular media referred to this initial coverage. However, more recent coverage on November 11, superseded the initial observations and replaced the speculative "puzzling" and "strange" reports.[15] Viriditas (talk) 23:33, 14 December 2011 (UTC)

Actually, the problem currently (as I understand it from looking at the deletion diff and reading the article talk page discussion) is that this line in the article was based only on one primary source (press releases from NASA), so I added mainstream press reports in order to provide secondary sources. But the secondary sources were deleted. I should also add that this was widely reported in the mainstream press, so that readers looking for this in the article would likely be surprised not to see it mentioned there, as I was. Ghostofnemo (talk) 23:49, 14 December 2011 (UTC)

Do you understand that initial, speculative popular media reports of a NASA report are superseded by newer releases? Viriditas (talk) 23:56, 14 December 2011 (UTC)

NASA has made a conjecture as to what the "structures" are, but their follow-up report doesn't appear to be definitive and has not been discussed by reliable secondary sources (as far as I know). Even if they did release sufficient evidence to prove exactly what the structures are, and it was being discussed in secondary sources, you'd still want to note the fact that they were noticed in the first place. Ghostofnemo (talk) 00:32, 15 December 2011 (UTC)

Much of astronomical observation is "conjecture" and far from "definitive". In fact, most scientific "facts" are based on underlying theories that can't be described as "definitive". Finally, there's nothing wrong with using NASA as a reliable source to cover this topic. Viriditas (talk) 00:40, 15 December 2011 (UTC)

Ghostofnemo, do you think Richard C. Hoagland was right when he claimed that YU55 was a UFO and shaped like the Death Star from Star Wars? Do you think the "structures" might be artificial? Wikipedia is not here to support fringe theories or fear mongering. When peer-reviewed papers are put out about the YU55 2011 passage they can be added to the article as reliable sources. Your thought process concerns me and does NOT make sense to the other editors of the YU55 article. -- Kheider (talk) 16:36, 15 December 2011 (UTC)

Do the BBC and Washington Post articles that I want to use as references say that? Did I ever try to add that to the article? Then why are you insulting me like this? Your attempts to paint mainstream media sources as somehow suspect, and removing them as unreliable sources concerns me. Ghostofnemo (talk) 11:47, 18 December 2011 (UTC)

Ghostofnemo, you have yet to get even one editor that agrees with your actions in the article. It has even been suggested by this review process that your "strange structures" sentence be completely removed from the article. The ONLY reason I have not removed the sentence is because it is rebutted by a reliable source (NASA) in the following sentence. Please quit beating a dead horse or I may file a complaint elsewhere. -- Kheider (talk) 14:25, 20 December 2011 (UTC)

That sounds like a threat intended to stifle discussion. If major mainstream news organizations found this notable, chances are it's notable. Ghostofnemo (talk) 11:30, 3 January 2012 (UTC)

Who's in the picture?

Not sure if I'm in the right place for this, but here goes. This image is stated to be of Ace Frehley, yet Zrinschchuck (talk · contribs) keeps removing it from Frehley's article claiming the image is actually of Tommy Thayer. This is his rationale, what needs to be done here? Hearfourmewesique (talk) 03:25, 22 December 2011 (UTC)

Well, if it is really from the Kiss Alive/35 World Tour and really taken at the Helsinki performance of May 27, 2008 then it'd have to be Thayer. Frehley left the band for good in 2002. Tarc (talk) 03:38, 22 December 2011 (UTC)

We normally accept the image description at Commons as being accurate. The rationale seems dubious to me: the original was added to an article about a 2008 tour, and therefore that addition was automatically correct? Maybe it was the 1999 Helsinki show, so it was Frehley. There's no date on the image description page.

However, I suspect that he's right, because there is a date in the file's metadata that corresponds to the evening of the second Helsinki concert in 2008. Either the picture was taken at the concert that night (with a digital camera) or the user "just happened" to scan an image from a prior concert that night. Assuming that he "just happened" to scan it during the concert seems a bit too much of a coincidence to me. I'd therefore suggest that it'd be safe to assume that the person is currently misidentified, and change the descriptions to the more likely (perhaps with a note that explains the situation and the rationale for the change, in case anyone's ever curious about it). WhatamIdoing (talk) 03:50, 22 December 2011 (UTC)

How can we change the info on the image and change its title without breaking WP:V? Hearfourmewesique (talk) 19:52, 22 December 2011 (UTC)

I changed the description at Commons and explained the change on the talk page there. Andrew Dalby 12:35, 23 December 2011 (UTC)

Since the image file is called "Ace Frehley", is there any way the title can be changed? Hearfourmewesique (talk) 06:12, 24 December 2011 (UTC)

I think they have bots to do that, and that it is done occasionally, but I must admit I don't really know. I bet someone else does. Andrew Dalby 08:22, 24 December 2011 (UTC)

I discovered "Template:Rename" on Commons and I will add it to the commons file page. We'll see what happens. Andrew Dalby 10:43, 25 December 2011 (UTC)

Resolved

It worked! Andrew Dalby 20:54, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

More of a side point, but concerning the statement: "We normally accept the image description at Commons as being accurate." - if someone is doing that, they should stop. The ability to upload a photo and type a caption does not in any way make the claims made in the caption reliable. I've seen plenty of images used on articles purporting to be various things that are just wrong. DreamGuy (talk) 16:48, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

FAIR.org

Hi, i'm traveling & editing from a dumbphone so forgive me if my markup's sloppy. The news emerging now re GE prompted me to visit the company's article, where there is a FAIR.org source by one Sam Husseini, described as "FAIR's activist coordinator": "Felons On The Air." Currently it's reference #69. Can FAIR be considered an RS in this context? I don't have a problem with the information itself, incidentally, but i do think a neutral source like Bloomberg or Reuters should be insisted on in an article like this. Article: General Electric. Source: http://www.fair.org/index.php?page=1254 —Biosketch (talk) 18:33, 23 December 2011 (UTC)

Generally Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting has an excellent reputation for fact checking and accuracy, being comprised of professional reporters who often point out inaccuracies in mainstream sources. I can't find any record of their having made a mistake since 1993. Selery (talk) 11:44, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

The Raw Story

In the article Occupy Marines an article in the The Raw Story is used a source. Elements of the article are contradicted by other sources and it is used to source some contentious statements about funding. The wikilink states this is a weblog publication, so I have some concerns about its use as a WP:RS. I consider it should be used with caution. I would welcome external opinion. Wee Curry Monster talk 02:40, 24 December 2011 (UTC)

A link to the current discussion can be found here Talk:Occupy_Marines#Templates. The specific issue is whether or not Muriel Kane, “Occupy movement spins off OccupyMARINES and Occupy Police”, The Raw Story, 23 October 2011 is a reliable source for

Along with a newly formed online entity 'Occupy Police', Occupy Marines has been described as "staking out a new realm of metaphorical occupations" beyond the physical territories associated with the Occupy Wall Street movement

--Nowa (talk) 02:55, 24 December 2011 (UTC)

No that is not the sole issue, there are also contentious statements as to how the group is funded. Can we try and get an external opinion please? Wee Curry Monster talk 03:12, 24 December 2011 (UTC)

What exactly is being contradicted by other sources? And what is contentious about the funding statement? Silverseren^C 03:28, 24 December 2011 (UTC)

Cheers, continuing the arguments here are a sure fire way of deterring the outside opinion desired. Wee Curry Monster talk 20:48, 24 December 2011 (UTC)

Except you're asking about the reliability of The Raw Story in a biased manner, making claims that you have yet to explain. You have made a number of claims in regards to the article and its sourcing, but have refused to be specific about anything. Silverseren^C 21:17, 24 December 2011 (UTC)

I don't think (as an involved editor and one who hangs out here as well) that we need to worry to much about how the request is presented, most participants here can suss out bias in a request when it occurs. And we need some outside opinions, so let us hope we will get some. --Nuujinn (talk) 20:07, 25 December 2011 (UTC)

Wee Curry Monster, for clarification please explain your assertion, "Elements of the article are contradicted by other sources and it is used to source some contentious statements about funding." This is confusing because you've bundled together two distinct issues without being specific about either one.

First, which elements of the article are contradicted by other sources? Apart from Funding, The Raw Story is referenced by only a single sentence in Occupy Marines, and that cites Muriel Kane's description of Occupy Marines as "staking out a new realm of metaphorical occupations." Is Kane's description contradicted by other sources? If so, please cite those sources.

Second, what "contentious statements about funding" do you detect in Occupy Marines? Please note, Occupy Marines does not declare as fact that the group's webpage was donated by The Pirate Party of New York or that the umbrella group Velvet Revolution will be acting as the group's fiscal sponsor. Rather, Occupy Marines states that such "was reported on Oct. 23, 2011" by The Raw Story. Again, if you have found other sources that contradict any of this, please cite them.

My concern is that you have framed your request for "external opinion" in such a non-neutral way as to prejudice anyone approaching this matter with an open mind. You're insinuating that The Raw Story is an unreliable source without telling us how you know so. JohnValeron (talk) 08:15, 26 December 2011 (UTC)

This is the project namespace, John, no one has to write comments on a noticeboard according to NPOV. Wee Curry Monster is free to express his opinion. Basalisk ^{inspect damage}⁄_berate 13:13, 26 December 2011 (UTC)

Basalisk, I don't object to Wee Curry Monster expressing his opinion. I'm asking that he substantiate his insinuations that The Raw Story is an unreliable source. JohnValeron (talk) 14:08, 26 December 2011 (UTC)

From a reliability standpoint, the first use of the source (where it is used in support of the "new realm of metaphorical occupations" statement) is fine. It directly supports an attributed statement as to Muriel Kane's opinion. We can argue about whether we should mention Murial Kane's opinion in the first place (does mentioning her opinion give it undue weight or not), but as long as we do mention it, we can not get a more reliable source than the website where she states it.)

The second usage (on the funding) is more problematic. This is a statement of fact about something appears on Occupy Marines website... as such the best source would be the Occupy Marines website itself. Blueboar (talk) 13:42, 26 December 2011 (UTC)

Blueboar, please explain how editors could justify citing the Occupy Marines website in an article about Occupy Marines. Would that not be a primary source and thus unacceptable? According to WP:PRIMARY, "Material based purely on primary sources should be avoided." JohnValeron (talk) 14:02, 26 December 2011 (UTC)

From my experience and what others have told me before, if you have a choice between a primary source and a secondary source that states information that is on the primary source, it is always better to use the secondary source. Silverseren^C 10:55, 27 December 2011 (UTC)

Of course it is. And that brings us back to the subject of this thread: the reliability of The Raw Story as a secondary source. We've posed a series of questions here directly to the editor who disputes said reliability. And he (Wee Curry Monster) has failed to respond with sufficient particularity to build a consensus for his view. Let's give it another week and, if he still hasn't convincingly made his case, we ought to be justified in removing his [unreliable source?] and [dubious – discuss] tags from Occupy Marines. JohnValeron (talk) 11:23, 27 December 2011 (UTC)

The purpose of this thread was to elicit outside opinion on the reliability of the Raw Story as a source. From the web page it appears to be a collection of blogs, which as an WP:SPS would not usually be considered a reliable source. Trawling through the archives of WP:RSN I have found that in the past it was not considered a reliable source and it was advised not to use it. John seems to relish creating unnecessary conflict and turning things on their head. The Raw Story has been challenged as to whether it is a reliable source, the onus is actually on him and others to demonstrate that it meets the requirements of WP:RS, it is not on me to demonstrate it is unreliable. Wee Curry Monster talk 17:04, 7 January 2012 (UTC)

external infomation is out of date, unsure how to proceed

hi there

I was reading this page and found that the table information relates to table from 2007. I am unsure how to add the new table as a image to wiki. It currently is just text on another page on wiki [[16]]. I was wondering if anyone has more experience than me and can update the page. I haven't done this before. Sam

http://www.lifehacker.jp/ reliable?

It is a Japanese website, if http://www.lifehacker.jp/2011/12/111225magician.html could be a reliable resource for article Magican? By the way, please tell me at least how much reliable resource we should provide when editing an article?Thanks.

Someone who reads Japanese would have to verify, but it doesn't look reliable. The name, layout, images in the photos and so forth all suggest something unreliable, but that's more of a gut feeling. We don't outright ban foreign language sources but in general we should be very cautious with them, as most of our editors can't verify if the claim being made in the article is really supported by the site or anything about the site itself. Barring a good argument to the contrary I would default to no, it's not reliable. DreamGuy (talk) 16:52, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

Seems to be the Japanese version Lifehacker, it should be considered reliable, see Lifehacker#Accolades (common sense applies, of course). Regarding the "name", hacker in this sense refers to Life hack / Hacker (hobbyist) / Hacker (programmer subculture), it is not about "hacking into computers" --SF007 (talk) 05:19, 7 January 2012 (UTC)

Is TMZ.com reliable

TMZ.com must have come up before, but a search for TMZ but found nothing.

I believe TMZ is a reliable source. It was controlled by Time-Warner, the outfit responsible for Time Magazine; it is still controlled by AOL News. My local newspaper, The San Jose Mercury News, often uses TMZ as source.

Currently, there is a dispute on Sons of Guns about TMZ's RS. It concerns this TMZ article:

• Sons of Guns Stars Punished By the Feds for Major Firearms Violations, TMZ, 23 December 2011, retrieved 12/28/2011 {{citation}}: Check date values in: |accessdate= (help)

TMZ is not a blog, does not appear to be self-published in the sense of a single author, and claims to vet its stories.

Glrx (talk) 06:33, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

Just remember that reliability is not inherited either. We know FOX News and News of the World share the same publisher but their reliabilities are gauged differently. See [17] Morbidthoughts (talk) 19:06, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

There has been extensive discussion of TMZ before: [18]. Results of those discussions seem to be mixed, but I read slightly more people weighing in on the side of reliability than of not. --GRuban (talk) 20:08, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

Thanks. I don't know why my archive search failed the first time around. TMZ isn't a great source, and it would be nice to have a better source. Archives had a great comment that if it was on TMZ and WP:N, then there should be a better source. Sadly, nothing on the ATF website about the settlement or in searches that I tried. Glrx (talk) 21:20, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

If the only substantial source is TMZ then the statement should be clearly attributed: "Gossip website TMZ reported... ", and if TMZ is the only source for a significant statement then WP:UNDUE may be engaged.Martinlc (talk) 22:19, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

Is using a GPS receiver to find coordinates original research?

See Wikipedia talk:Obtaining geographic coordinates#Coordinates and original research. --Rschen7754 22:46, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

We have an entire project devoted to Obtaining geographic coordinates? A source has to be published. So, not it's not a reliable source and is a form of original research. That said, there's nothing wrong with using a GPS unit to double-check a published source. But you need to cite the source, not the GPS unit. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 22:57, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

But if the location is accessible to the public, anyone can go there with their GPS unit and reproduce the result, so it is no different than citing a book that is available in a single library. Jc3s5h (talk) 23:16, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

Better yet, anyone can click on coordinates in an article and verify whether they are where they should be using any of dozens of trusted map services, aerial photography, and other indicative sources. —EncMstr (talk) 23:31, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

Taking a GPS reading is no different than taking a photograph. Feel free to put GPS coordinates in articles as appropriate. Binksternet (talk) 00:22, 30 December 2011 (UTC)

I would say that the spirit of WP:CALC applies. Make the measurement or use a map (judges may take judicial notice of published maps). If nobody objects to the coordinates, then they are good to go. If somebody objects, then a consensus should rule; I doubt a no consensus would happen in many cases. There can be bizarre results (especially from maps), so beware. Mapmakers introduce deliberate errors into their data so they can prove a map was copied. Whether deliberate or not, I've seen errors as large as 500m on Google maps. Glrx (talk) 00:39, 30 December 2011 (UTC)

PS. IIRC, Death of Osama bin Laden introduced the coordinates of the compound in a manner that many would claim to be original research -- in other words, editors started looking at aerial photos to find a compound that matched the government's plan. The first published location was close but didn't fit; the correct location was ultimately found. Other editors could verify by clicking on the coordinates and comparing the satellite view to other sources. I think that method is OK; it seems more like WP:CALC than WP:OR because other editors can agree the "calculation" was done right. Glrx (talk) 00:48, 30 December 2011 (UTC)

Sorry, but running a GPS is not like checking a single book in the library. It's WP:OR, pure and simple. It's no different from anyone making a claim in any article and saying "because I say so". There are lots of things like this that I think are valuable exercises, but nay in the sense that they would be good for some other website completely, and not directly on Wikipedia. If someone wants to make there own website for geographic coordinates, and that eventually because trusted enough to be seen as a reliable source, then the info would make sense to be added to Wikipedia sourced to that site. Glrx's example above is one of many ways allowing people to put down their own coordinates without a reliable source can be bad. We should not make an exception for this violation of key Wikipedia principles just because someone started up a Wikiproject for it. DreamGuy (talk) 17:06, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

I don't see how this could possibly qualify as a case of because I say so because anyone else that has access to a GPS device could easily verify the information to be true just as someone else could find another copy of a book that someone else read in a library. This is not something that could only be know to the person who first posted the coordinates meaning that at least IMO the because I say so argument is completely invalid.--70.24.207.225 (talk) 01:56, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

The best parallel is the use of photographs. Running a camera is certainly not like checking a single book in the library. It's WP:OR, pure and simple. After all, what is the difference between going to a place and taking a picture of it, and going to a place and checking the coordinates of it? And yet, we allow it. WP:OI. Similarly this should be allowed, with the same restrictions - non-controversial, unaltered, etc. --GRuban (talk) 02:08, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

First, A Quest For Knowledge, GPS coordinates don't have to have a reference to the best of my knowledge because the verification is done by clicking through the coordinates to a mapping tool such as Google Maps. Besides, this is one of those things doesn't even need a reference because of the existing tools and ability to verify the results by anyone with the appropriate tool.

Second, DreamGuy, not all references are created by reading books, and this isn't really OR as it's easy to verify if the coordinates are or are not correct because of what was stated before. As stated in my first response, this sort of data don't need the book and paper verification method. In fact, I defy you to come up with a single reference of coordinates to any object from a book that doesn't require a calculation. What are the coordinates of the United States Capitol building? Do you have a reference for that? Would that come from a book?

Most coordinates are found by using Google Maps or similar, and I there's no guarantee that their lat-long values are correct, but they're within a meter and as far as geolocation goes, that's sufficient. In short, depending on what you're referencing, a set of GPS coordinates should be fine as an extension of WP:CALC, except a machine is doing the calculation and you're simply transcribing the results of the calculation. It's certainly not a form of OR. --Walter Görlitz (talk) 02:11, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

Political science source in climate change articles

Dunlap, Riley E. and McCright, Aaron M. (2011). "Climate Change Denial: Sources, actors, and strategies". In Constance Lever-Tracy. Routledge Handbook of Climate Change and Society. Taylor & Francis. ISBN 0415544785.

Can it be regarded as a reliable academic secondary source? Or is it tertiary? Can it be used widely in articles on the politics of climate change? Itsmejudith (talk) 20:22, 30 December 2011 (UTC)

Would be glad for any comments. Itsmejudith (talk) 15:22, 31 December 2011 (UTC)

At an initial glance, it seems to be reliable (has someone argued that it isn't? What were their concerns?) ... The principle author appears to be a respected academic. Blueboar (talk) 15:44, 31 December 2011 (UTC)

On Climate change denial, someone thinks it is too tertiary in nature to be of use. Itsmejudith (talk) 15:49, 31 December 2011 (UTC)

Of course it is a reliable source. What I was saying is that it is a summary of other papers and a tertiary source. And by the way climate change denial is not an academic study of political science. Dmcq (talk) 17:27, 31 December 2011 (UTC)

It is the other way round: 'climate change denial' is an entirely appropriate field of study for social and political sciences. AndyTheGrump (talk) 17:32, 31 December 2011 (UTC)

Did anyone have a chance to look at the paper itself? It doesn't appear to me to be a summary of papers. It does of course refer to the existing literature and brings together many ideas that the authors have been developing over a number of papers. These are perhaps the two most important authors in the new literature on the politics of climate change. Itsmejudith (talk) 21:45, 31 December 2011 (UTC)

What statement is it being used to support that is at issue? IRWolfie- (talk) 02:04, 8 January 2012 (UTC)

I have given up interest in the area. Dmcq (talk) 23:38, 10 January 2012 (UTC)

Ninjato again

I would put it in the above section, but i'm afraid people won't see the new info. User:Chanbara has added new sources to try to cover the museum info in the Ninjatō article. However, these concern me a lot more than his previous attempt (which was overall still useful, just not for what it was trying to be used for). The sources include these two pages, which at first glance seems like they would be useful, as there is at least commentary with the images, albeit short. But if you reduce the URL to find out what this site is supposed to be, you end up here, a fan site for Christa Jacobson. So...I don't think those two pages are reliable.

Also added was a link to Japanese Warrior, which I have no reason to believe is reliable. There's no listing of who writes it or what the website is being published on. So, anyways, are these sources reliable or not? Silverseren^C 21:32, 30 December 2011 (UTC)

Anyone? Silverseren^C 23:00, 1 January 2012 (UTC)

Why is everyone responding to other sections below, but not this one? :( Silverseren^C 01:29, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

• First one to tripod, no, not reliable. Second one, also no, I see no evidence of editorial control. Darkness Shines (talk) 01:39, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

• Okay, thanks. :3 I'm still going to wait until 1 or 2 more people respond here before taking any action. Silverseren^C 01:59, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

• Can someone else please respond to this section? Silverseren^C 01:36, 8 January 2012 (UTC)

Agree with the comments of Darkness shines

As above, [19][20] is unreliable as it is a self created website [21]

[22] looks like a self published website as well. No indication of reliability nor even who runs the website. IRWolfie- (talk) 01:54, 8 January 2012 (UTC)

I had no idea this board existed. Now that I do, let me ask. What would constitute a "reliable source" for this? There are many different sites which have photos taken by people who have visited these museums and taken photos of the swords (I myself visited the Iga museum in person). How are multiple first hand reports (blogs, photo-albums, etc...) and in-person visits from a variety of different people with similar photographic evidence not reliable evidence? The official Iga-ryu Ninja Museum website has a photo of the display in question, but unfortunately it's very small. Before I attempt to find new "reliable sources", I would appreciate any guidance or suggestions you may have. Cheers. Chanbara (talk) 03:19, 8 January 2012 (UTC)

Per WP:RS, the first step is that reliable sources need to be published. The only alternative to that is for them to have been sources made by an expert in the field, which would fall under WP:SPS, but those should be used sparingly. So what you're looking for is published information, such as news articles, books, papers, things like that. A random photograph that anyone took isn't reliable because we have no proof that it is what it says it is. Only if it is known that the person or place where it is being hosted is reliable, with the person being an expert or the place being a published location, then we know it is reliable. Silverseren^C 06:47, 8 January 2012 (UTC)

Ok, well I have a few questions then. Is an official website considered a "published" location? And am I to assume that unlike the saying "a picture is worth a thousand words", on Wikipedia a photo (or multiple different photos from different people for that matter) is worth zero words? And also does what you said mean that if I was to find a "published article" talking about one of the museums featuring a photo clearly of the sword the Wikipedia article is about, but not mentioning it by any one of its names, it would be insufficient? What if a published location like this has a photo of the same sword seen on many visitor report blogs and photos (like these 123456789), calls it by name, and lists "(c)Ueno City Tourist Association" on it? Is that sufficient? I know the Iga-ryu Ninja Museum is not mentioned by name, but "(c)Ueno City Tourist Association" and "Copyright © 2011 Igaueno Tourist Association" which is what's listed on the official "Iga-Ryu Ninja Museum website refer to the same thing (see here). The small photo of the display is here listed under "Ninja Experience Hall" on the official Iga-ryu Ninja Museum website. I assume it can't be used by itself and can't be used in conjuction with any of the other links listed above to coroborate it? Not trying to be difficult, just trying to understand all the rules. Cheers. Chanbara (talk) 13:14, 8 January 2012 (UTC)

I'm sure there do exist reliable sources on the topic. The visitor pictures on blogs and self published sources are not suitable. I don't see any indication from web-japan that it is an official website of anything, it seems to be self published as well. IRWolfie- (talk) 15:28, 8 January 2012 (UTC)

Which site are you refering to when you say that it's not an official website of anything? The one I listed as being the official Iga-ryu Ninja Museum site? Because it is indicated on web-japan, see here and here. Or do you mean web-japan itself which is "sponsored by the Japanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA)" and also says on the museum section that it's "produced for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs by Kodansha International Ltd."? Cheers. Chanbara (talk) 20:48, 8 January 2012 (UTC)

I don't see any mention of it being the official Iga-ryu Ninja Museum site; this one appears to be [23]. Web-japan appear to be sponsored by the MOFA but it is not a goverment website. I am unsure if it is reliable; need more input from others. IRWolfie- (talk) 10:37, 11 January 2012 (UTC)

There seems to be some confusion here. I'm not saying Web-Japan is the official Iga-ryu Ninja Museum site, just that they refer / link to it directly here and here. I clearly stated above that the official website for Iga-ryu Ninja Museum was http://iganinja.jp/en which is the same thing as yours http://iganinja.jp/en/index.html And how is it possible that a site about Japanese tourist destinations like museums sponsored by the Japanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) might not be considered reliable?! Cheers. Chanbara (talk) 19:33, 11 January 2012 (UTC)

Academic Conferences

Hi all, I've been directed here from Wikipedia:Dispute_resolution_noticeboard#Augmentative_and_alternative_communication_discussion. There is a dispute at Augmentative and alternative communication (the full conversation is at Talk:Augmentative_and_alternative_communication#Rate_enhancement_strategies although it wanders off into a separate dispute as well.

We would like some help resolving a difference of opinion on the answer to the question of "Are the peer reviewed proceedings from academic conferences considered acceptable sources for wikipedia?" (Two pertinent facts may well be that a: both editors would like the article to go to FAC and have the required high-standard of sourcing and b: the conferences in question are often computer science ones that may be treated differently by some editors).

We are aware that this has been covered on this board before, but the results of those discussions are disagreed about. Anyone who wants to comment here, at the dispute thread on the talk page, or at the dispute noticeboard would be very welcome to do so.

Thank you very much in advance. Failedwizard (talk) 07:39, 31 December 2011 (UTC)

I don't think we can give a straight yes or no to conference proceedings. Some reports of proceedings are very strictly peer reviewed and just as good as any edited collections of academic papers. Others are hardly reviewed at all, and the papers may be tentative work-in-progress. We can be guided by the editor's introduction, by the publisher's policy, whether the proceedings are part of a series, and other indicators. Also on whether the papers have been subsequently cited. If an author has subsequently published a revised version of the paper in a journal, or makes the same point in a peer-reviewed source, then we should use that other source instead. Itsmejudith (talk) 09:44, 31 December 2011 (UTC)

Agree, mostly. In computer science in particular, high-class conference proceedings (e.g. published by Springer or AAAI) are the primary means of scientific publishing, and are equivalent to good journal articles. They are fully peer reviewed. However, just as with a journals, there is a spectrum of conferences, and some are less reputable. As an example, the proceedings of IJCAR or IJCAI are high-quality sources equal to any journal in the field. On the other hand, everything that starts with "World Multiconference..." is, to phrase it carefully, "less generally accepted". --Stephan Schulz (talk) 23:06, 1 January 2012 (UTC)

I agree that it truly depends on the conference, and perhaps on the paper and author as well. All of my examples are also in information technology, where I have attended conferences ranging from highly peer-reviewed, to an approval process that did not imply endorsement, to presentations what essentially amounted to "we have released a new version of the software, and here is why you should upgrade." The latter might be reliable for a list of features, but probably not for an analysis of the competitive ecosystem. For example. In other words, maybe. HTH Elinruby (talk) 22:00, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

It depends also what it is a source for. Here there are a number of factors:

• How remarkable is the claim?
• How is it worded? (cf. Foos are bars... X's preliminary study showed foos are bars.... X has been studying whether foos are bars... )
• Is it an early result where it make sense to use this reference until something else is available?

Rich Farmbrough, 12:17, 3 January 2012 (UTC).

Thank you very much Judith, Stephan, Elinruby and Rich - Sorry for not making much contribution - I wanted to make sure that I was getting a community opinion without influencing with my own views. Given that there doesn't appear to be a hard and fast rule in general - can I ask about the specific case? Would you guys have an issue with the conferences ASSETS, IUI, and SLPAT.

• ASSETS - Peer reviewed [24] (acceptance rate 37% [25])
• SLPAT - Double blind peer reviewed [26] (can't find acceptance rate)
• IUI - Double blind peer reviewed [27] (acceptance rate 29%)

being used to support [this] added paragraph? That would let us bring in a lot more modern work in the field even if we restrict ourselves to just those conferences. Failedwizard (talk) 08:10, 10 January 2012 (UTC)

All seem OK to me but you need views from people who know more about ICT research. Itsmejudith (talk) 17:13, 11 January 2012 (UTC)

I read that paragraph previously, and there is nothing exceptional about it, it is made fairly clear that the proposed solutions are being researched, therefore I would accept any reference supporting that (apart form a fraudulent grant submission ). The only thing I have a possible issue with is the first sentence, a good AAC may or may not need "new utterances" programming manually (and if so, often not by users) depending on the utterance and definition of "new", and, possibly, the interface. And therefore it is there that I would look for clarification in the reference, and for stronger support for the statement (which is an absolute one about the subject, rather than a meta statement about research). And indeed briefly checking the reference this does seem to have been a rather sweeping extrapolation:

At the simplest level, people with Complex Communication Needs (CCN) can cause a pre-stored message to be spoken by activating a single switch. At the most sophisticated level, literate users can generate novel text using input methods ranging from a single switch to a full keyboard.

(For me, one of the most interesting things for me, about reading papers these days is how much authors say without supporting references, which would be challenged here.)

Rich Farmbrough, 18:45, 11 January 2012 (UTC).

Well, papers are read by reviewers, who are supposedly knowledgeable about the domain, so they can apply an expert version of WP:CK. They are intended for an expert audience. And finally, researchers are expected to present original research, not forbidden from it. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 21:22, 11 January 2012 (UTC)

Just as a quick point, I think it's actually this sentence in the source that was used for the first sentence, if the paragraph goes back in I'll add the direct quote as a comment.

This results in a situation where new utterances must be prepared in advance either by the user or a carer, with a large time and energy cost.

Failedwizard (talk) 20:03, 12 January 2012 (UTC)

As I wrote on my talk page: It's not my field, and I'm really too busy to check this in detail. However, my first instinct is that conferences associated with the ACM should be acceptable. Workshops are not, generally, at the same level - in general, Workshops will also present work in progress, and first results. However, there are some prestigious conferences that simply continue to be called "Workshop on...", so that is not a strong criterion. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 21:29, 11 January 2012 (UTC)

So if I can summaries this - the answer in general is roughly 'it very much depends', and in the particularly case of these three conferences there are no particular warning bells being thrown up? (Which is lovely, of course). Thank you all so much for your help, my plan now is to take some more advice at dispute with a view to either reinstating the paragraph to see what happens, or reopening the dispute in general. Thanks again.Failedwizard (talk) 20:03, 12 January 2012 (UTC)

Biography of a living person

When writing a new article that is a biography of a living person - can that person be a reliable source? קולנואני (talk) 19:24, 31 December 2011 (UTC)

They would be a primary source, so they can be used though they must be used with caution, but any information from a primary source still needs to be published somewhere. At minimum, you would need to get the information off of their personal website. Any "they told me" adding of information counts as original research. What are you trying to add and where? Silverseren^C 20:06, 31 December 2011 (UTC)

I am not trying to add anything. Someone else wrote an article, based on an interview they did with this person. The interview was never publish. I add "Unreferenced" template to the article and they got angry at me for doing so. קולנואני (talk) 23:32, 31 December 2011 (UTC)

Can you tell me which article you're talking about? Silverseren^C 00:29, 1 January 2012 (UTC)

The article is he:נילי צרויה. It is not in english. קולנואני (talk) 16:19, 1 January 2012 (UTC)

We can't give advice related to Hebrew Wikipedia. It has its own rules. You will have to ask there. Itsmejudith (talk) 17:23, 1 January 2012 (UTC)

I am asking here, becasue I want to know what EN Wiki's rules are, since the HE's rules are not clear. For example: I read something (in EN Wiki) about someone (famous person who is alive), and than I look them up in yellow pages, give them a call and ask them to confirm something that is written about them. They say that the information is not correct, give me the correct info, and I edit the article according to what they told me over the phone. Is this a reliable source? קולנואני (talk) 22:26, 1 January 2012 (UTC)

No as that would fail WP:V Darkness Shines (talk) 22:30, 1 January 2012 (UTC)

Can you please explain the logic behind this? If I publish my own peronal web site - it's not RS, but if I write publish a book that is my Autobiography, with the same content - it IS a RS? קולנואני (talk) 23:01, 1 January 2012 (UTC)

What does a website or book have to do with a phone call? A personal website should be ok, but how can you prove it is that persons site? Anyone can create a site after all. If it can be proved to be that persons website then I see no reason why it may not be used, Darkness Shines (talk) 23:08, 1 January 2012 (UTC)

If an editor said that they called the famous person on the telephone and got information from them, how do we know that the editor is telling the truth about the phone call? However, if someone calls a famous person on the telephone, gets information from them, and writes an article containing that information which is published in a reputable newspaper or magazine, that's different. In that case, the newspaper or magazine would be vouching for the writer and asserting that the article is accurate. --Metropolitan90 (talk) 03:33, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

Pastizz

In the opinion of editors here, do the sources cited below reliably support the statements made in this passage of text?

The Maltese expression "selling like pastizzi" is equivalent to the English "selling like hotcakes", to describe something which seems to have inexhaustible demand. Things which are "coming out like pastizzi" can be said to be emerging at a fast rate, sometimes too quickly.

Thank you, Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 17:27, 1 January 2012 (UTC)

I think reference 4 shows it as existing in the Maltese language -- if it says, as I guess it does, "Poinsettias are selling like hot pastizzi" -- but it needs someone who really knows Maltese to confirm this and to say what the proper form of the expression would be in that language. If that can be confirmed, reference 1 then gives it to us in English: it wouldn't be good enough by itself, because we couldn't know from this text alone whether the journalist made it up one day as a localization of the usual English phrase, but if the Maltese expression is confirmed by reference 4, then reference 1 is a good sign that the expression also exists in the English of Malta. That's as far as I can get :)

These would be primary sources for the existence of the expression, but I don't see any reason not to use them. Andrew Dalby 21:14, 1 January 2012 (UTC)

I agree that the sources are examples of the existence of such expressions both in in Maltese and in Maltese English. But I see no mention in those sources of any equivalent meaning or equivalent expression in (non-Maltese) English. For that, if my understanding is correct, reliable secondary sources would need to be found. In the absence of those, it seems to me that the translations of the meanings are pure WP:OR. But I'd appreciate comment from others on this. Thank you. Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 00:05, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

So your question is really about the equivalence between this expression and the common English one? That wasn't clear (to me).

I don't see why it's a big deal. Does somebody doubt that the expressions are equivalent? If nobody doubts it, no source is needed, because (to those who admit the philosophical possibility of translation) their approximate equivalence is obvious and we don't need sources for obvious things. If somebody doubts it, reliable sources might be a bilingual dictionary or a philological article about Maltese idioms. If no such source can be found, the doubter could delete the common English equivalent "selling like hot cakes" from the article. Wikipedia would be only slightly poorer. Andrew Dalby 10:03, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

I speak Maltese and I can confirm that the expression 'selling like cheesecakes' is more or less the exact equivalent to 'selling like hotcakes'. There are actually two references from English language national newspapers and two from Maltese language national newspapers. There is also a reference to things 'coming out like cheesecakes', which is a slightly different usage of the expression to suggest that things are emerging too quickly. This is a reference from an article written by Alfred Sant, who used to be the Prime Minister of Malta and is one of the nation's best known living novelists. I have restored these references to the article as there was really no reason for removing them as they are all accurate, from respectable sources and neither contentious or controversial. No disrespect intended, but there is no way a Maltese speaker would doubt the inclusion of this part of the article as it is such a commonly used expression in Maltese. Kont Dracula (talk) 11:40, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

I think you're right. I'd suggest that you make it clearer in the text that two languages are involved here: you could add (citing reference 4) the Maltese-language form of the idiom, alongside the English-language form.

If you happen to find a phrasebook or dictionary or list of idioms that mentions this expression, it would be a good idea to cite it. Wikipedians like secondary sources! Andrew Dalby 12:49, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for your advice, which I've tried to take. And yes, of course some secondary sources would be good here. Thank you, Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 14:31, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

Jeremy Brett

Are entries and sources from Terry Manners reliable? Manners's biography of this topic is considered unreliable and biased. --George Ho (talk) 18:13, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

The wikipedia article does seem to overly rely on the opinion in the book. If can find no significant mention of it in reliable sources to ascertain it's reliability. To me it doesn't seem a suitable. IRWolfie- (talk) 02:19, 8 January 2012 (UTC)

I don't know which statements to remove, but must I remove Manners's bio as a source? Would this imply: I must remove whatever is cited by Manners? --George Ho (talk) 04:54, 16 January 2012 (UTC)

when is youtube a good source?

I have a dispute with another editor about the extent that web-published video can constitute strict publication. I'm too tired to type one more sentence of summary or bickering, so I thought perhaps I could start a thread discussion the topic in the abstract. What conditions do you believe need to be in place to consider a networked video (e.g. YouTube) to be a good, reliable, verifiable source of information? Squish7 (talk) 02:38, 3 January 2012 (UTC)

Thats not very specific. I'm no expert but I think never, that doesn't mean you cant use it at all but usually no. It depends on who originally published it and under what license. Weekly Republican Address has 140 youtube videos for example. If the original source is good enough to use but the copyrights are in question it is best to provide only a reference in text without a link:

<ref>person(s), "the title of the production", who published it, the date it was published.</ref>

In stead of, for example:

<ref>Mr G., "Under Pressure", Do Try This at Home, Season 2, Episode 1, 2014</ref>

You could look at other articles how sources are used. Here is a search for "youtube.com".

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special%3ASearch&search=youtube.com&fulltext=1

84.106.26.81 (talk) 00:31, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

• The IP address above is completely incorrect. It's actually very simple about when you can use Youtube. If the video is hosted on the channel of an official news organizations, like the official Fox News or CNN Youtube channel, then the video are both reliable and don't violate copyright. Silverseren^C 04:24, 6 January 2012 (UTC)
  • I have not clicked on all of them at the Republican article but so far a couple are perfect examples of when YouTube can be used. Example: this is a primary source (so use it with care) but it should be OK. The YouTube channel is verified as being official with the link to it from here (lower right). There are some concerns overall (not enough secondary sources, refs are not formatted correctly) but those are a whole other issue. More info can be seen at an essay I started: Wikipedia:Video links.Cptnono Follow-up:Didn't realize we were looking at it as an "abstract". There are too many variables to give an answer here which is why YouTube videos should be judged on a case by case basis.(talk) 20:48, 8 January 2012 (UTC)

An official Facebook?

I know Facebook and other social media sites are generally not reliable sources. However, if a post/status is made on an official Facebook or other social media site of someone involved in a show's production, can that be used to source something on the show's article? Specifically, I'm wondering if a post like this one made by Debby Ryan on her official Facebook (or posts to her Twitter or WhoSay, where she has also posted things like the Facebook post I linked to) could be used to source international airdates on the article Jessie (TV series). - Purplewowies (talk) 03:17, 3 January 2012 (UTC)

She happens to be right, but I'd suggest a source such as this, the online version of the magazine fr:Télé Loisirs. Andrew Dalby 10:05, 3 January 2012 (UTC)

Okay, I do understand that if a better source is out there, it should be used. But what if her social media is the only/best source, since she's posted about other countries as well? Or is it still unreliable because it's Facebook/Twitter/etc? - Purplewowies (talk) 19:26, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

Practice seem to be if you can get away with it then... but if you use Facebook/Twitter/etc, an editor will be able to delete with an edit summary that it violates policies and guidelines and to restore would actually invoke burden of proof or an act that can be seen as edit warring. Just because an editor states there is "no other" or "this is best" does not mean it will be accepted anyway. Applicable reasoning:

• Reliable, third-party sources.
• WP:SOCIALMEDIA
• WP:REDFLAG
• WP:Notability
• WP:No original research
• This is just a quick check and there are probably others. Otr500 (talk) 16:59, 13 January 2012 (UTC)

Okay, makes sense. I won't use her. Thanks. - Purplewowies (talk) 19:17, 13 January 2012 (UTC)

Nelson Antonio Denis

Nelson Antonio Denis (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)

Are sources in this article reliable? I see one statement overcited. --George Ho (talk) 09:07, 3 January 2012 (UTC)

Which ones do you find problematic? I've done some editing of this article in the past, and I agree that at one time its sources were questionable. I was under the impression the problems were fixed. ScottyBerg (talk) 23:03, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

Stuggling to get an article approved.

Hello Wikipedians,

I have been trying to get an article approved on a software that I am using to design websites. I am having trouble getting the article approved for one reason or another. Each time I submit for review I seem to get a new list of things to change and take out and add. It now seems that I have had to take so much useful information out I would like to share with others because of questions on reliability of the sources. I have referenced the page of the software as well as independent review websites. Please can someone help me to get this page uploaded. The article I have been trying to upload to Wikipedia can be found at the following link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:Articles_for_creation/XSitePro

Thanks in advance for your help Carl

It's lucky that there are two reviews that seem (to me) to be independent (on PCWorld and The Web Reviewer). To put it simply, you need to write the article from those reviews (and any others that are really independent). Write neutrally, citing the independent reviews: don't cite or use the official website and avoid borrowing wording from it; don't use inside knowledge; remember that you're not here to sell XSitePro. A link to the official website can be included under "External links", of course.

If you find all this difficult, you could try writing or improving an article about some other software first. Andrew Dalby 13:56, 3 January 2012 (UTC)

WND (WorldNetDaily?, WorldNetWeekly?, not sure what the acronym stands for)

An anonymous user has inserted the following story into four settlement articles (Marion, Alabama; Dover, Tennessee; Red House, Virginia and Commerce, Georgia thus far) from www.wnd.com: 35 terror training camps now operating inside U.S. - Government does nothing to impede expansion of 'Soldiers of Allah' network. I'd say that WND (I'd never heard of it until today) is extremely right wing at very least and so anti-Muslim that it is likely unreliable as a verifiable source for the above story, at least on this particular subject. Am seeking additional community input to avoid bias. Altairisfar (talk) 00:55, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

From multiple previous discussions, NOT a reliable source. Ravensfire (talk) 00:59, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

Most definitely an unreliable source. Completely useless. Dominus Vobisdu (talk) 01:13, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

Notoriously unreliable, with a reputation for a complete lack of fact checking on even the most absurd of claims. Hrafn^Talk_Stalk(P) 02:48, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

Heartily agree. Elinruby (talk) 05:09, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

...and on that note we should probably do something about this... Sean.hoyland - talk 05:24, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

It'd be okay for articles about its own staff, and the bizarre conspiracy theories it promotes, per WP:ABOUTSELF (assuming none of the restrictions in that policy are violated), but I agree that everywhere else it should go. Hrafn^Talk_Stalk(P) 05:44, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

Well, the (sort of) good news is that of the 851 entries shown, only 301 are in actual articles... Fat&Happy (talk) 05:47, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

I guess redirecting wnd.com urls to tin foil hat isn't an option... Sean.hoyland - talk 05:54, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

You'd probably get complaints from tinfoil hat-wearers that you were making them look bad by lumping them in with WND. Hrafn^Talk_Stalk(P) 06:20, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

Okay, great. So now I won't have to worry about removing it on sight. Thanks! Altairisfar (talk) 14:40, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

• We probably should also take a close look at the sourcing of Muslim Mafia (book) (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) an article about a book that has the dubious distinction of being published by WND. Most of the article appears to be a fairly superficial media he-says/she-says, rather than any substantive/expert analysis of the book's sensationalising claims. Hrafn^Talk_Stalk(P) 06:51, 4 January 2012 (UTC)
  • WND, Canada Free Press, Hudson Institute, Investigative Project, Pajamas Media, ..., ..., oy, it's a goldmine of unreliable sources. And someow I'm not surprised to see that the creator is indefinitely blocked for abuse of editing privileges. You're right, that article seriously needs cleanup. –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 22:04, 4 January 2012 (UTC)
• An editor on Burlington Township High School (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) seems to think that WND is okay as long as its explicitly quoted (they also think an unpublished school statement is an acceptable source). Hrafn^Talk_Stalk(P) 05:21, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

The Guardian and CounterPunch are extreme left-wing and anti-Semitic sites that are used as reliable sources on Wikipedia. Another left-wing extremist site regularly used is Haaretz. So I suppose the only reason WMD is not acceptable for Wikipedia is because Wikipedia itself is a left-wing extremist site.

No, you suppose wrong. See WP:RS and WP:NPOV for Wikipedia's policies on sources and neutrality and search WP:RSN for discussions about specific sources. Sean.hoyland - talk 04:31, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

Extraordinary claims require extraordinary sources. WND is at the edges of what could be considered RS, and you wouldn't use it as the sole source for a contentious claim involving Islam. The way it is used in that article mentioned above, about the school, is likely appropriate, because it is cited critically and contrasted with other sources. Not to mention that it's being used as a source about fundamentalist Christianity in the latter case.

As far as that list of 35 alleged Jamaat ul-Fuqra training camps, there was such a list, but it may be long out of date. It appears to be something the police or prosecutors used in a case involving the group years ago, see the case study Identifying the Links Between White-Collar Crime and Terrorism (ncjrs.gov). The timeframe involved was 20-30 years ago.

As an aside, a commenter on the SPLC's blog says that while JI might have had a presence in Marion, AL at one time, there's an Episcopal church at that location now.[28] Squidfryerchef (talk) 01:32, 10 January 2012 (UTC)

Family Tree Legends

I'm unfamiliar with the site Family Tree Legends, and didn't find any references to it in the RSN archives; can I get a consensus on whether or not its data is reliable for WP:BLP purposes? At the article Peter Ostrum, Connormah (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA) is using it to cite the DOB of the article subject, and I want to be 100% on the reliability of the source used. — Fourthords | =Λ= | 04:57, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

FTL seems to be a software company with some of its genealogy app databases online. I'd be wary of accepting it as a RS across the board, but in this case there doesn't appear to be a better source and the claim isn't a controversial one. A quick check suggests that all major sites that mention Ostrum (none of them RSes, alas) give the same DOB. So the reality is that the article can either list that date—unsourced or unreliably sourced—or omit DOB. (The latter option is impractical because innumerable editors will simply add it in again.) A longer-term goal would be to find a print source for the date. Rivertorch (talk) 06:10, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for the input (and the minor rewrite; that's better). There was a previously reliable source for a MOB of November 1957 (see this version); would you (and other contributors at RSN) prefer the reliability of the MOB as previously cited, or this DOB as currently cited? — Fourthords | =Λ= | 08:42, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

Hmm...I'm not sure. The memoir I Want It Now ought to be reliable but apparently only confirms month and year. I've noticed a problem, though: in the current version I was looking at the infobox, not the lede. Re the lede's refs, the Today/MSNBC article does not mention any DOB, as far as I can see. It would be nice to know more about the Dallas Morning News ref: it sounds like a column and is probably reliable. Based on incomplete info, my suggestion would be to remove the Today/MSNBC ref as non-germane, leave the Dallas Morning News ref in place for the time being, and remove the Family Tree Legends ref from the infobox. You might also start a thread on the article's talk page providing a link to this discussion, to allow editors with the article watchlisted to chime in. Rivertorch (talk) 12:02, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

Actually, I don't know why Connormah moved the MSNBC & DMN references; I originally vetted both of them, but they were only being used to cite Dallas as Dr. Ostrum's place of birth. The only citations there've been for the birthdate have been the MOB from I Want It Now!, and the DOB from Family Tree Legends. I'll leave a message at both the user's talk page and the article's. — Fourthords | =Λ= | 19:01, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

As for moving the cites, the citations were clogging up the lead (and per MOSBIO, the place of birth isn't usually in the lead) and IIRC there shouldn't be a huge amount of citations in the lead. As for the site, I'll leave it up to others to decide here, but from my experiences with it, it seems to be accurate. – Connormah (talk) 19:04, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

I didn't realize MOS:BIO stipulated no POBs in the lede unless it was relevant to their notability, thanks for the heads up. #tmyk — Fourthords | =Λ= | 17:59, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

I don't want to be badgery, but can anybody else provide input on this matter? Rivertorch and I recommend removing the FTL citation, and Connormah feels its reliable but seems lukewarm on its maintenance. I like my consensuses (consensi?) to have more input before accepting it in my favor. — Fourthords | =Λ= | 17:59, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

Summarising: We have the month and year; we don't know how reliable the Family Tree Legends data is and it's our only source for the day of the month. Is that right?

Responding to your plea, then, what I would do is to put only the month and the year in the text, and to add approximately as follows in a footnote: "The day of his birth is given as November 1st at [URL Family Tree Legends], without full sourcing." N.B. This is only a slight variant on what Fourthords proposes to do, i.e. start a talk page thread; that would be fine too of course. This would be, in fact, an explicit challenge to future editors to find a reliable source.

Unless I'm mistaken, we don't know exactly how Family Tree Legends compile their data; well, I know databases where you are forced to fill certain relevant boxes with a valid digit. For all we know, that could have happened here. Andrew Dalby 09:36, 7 January 2012 (UTC)

Is Catholic Answers Reliable?

This discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
Catholic Answers is a Catholic Apologist website. I feel that it should be viewed as a legitimate source on Wikipeida for general facts about the Catholic Church and its history. Some of the articles carry a Nihil Obstat while others do not. A Nihil Obstat is basically a stamp of approval that is given by an empowered clergy member that means that there is no moral or doctrinal errors (in accordance with the Catholic Faith) are found in the document. It doesn't mean that the Church agrees with the opinion of the author, et cetera. After having read into the source, it would seem as if there is a review process for articles, and solid sources (Bible passages, CCC paragraph number, Ecumenical Council) are always given to support their answer. The website's professed mission is basically to be a resource of Catholic Apologists. Because of these reasons, I think that we should view it as a fairly good source that will prove useful in writing basic information about Catholicism. It's not as academic as say a book on theology, but yet some real work, research, and review goes into the source. One editor on here sometimes gets in a debate with me about the site. She terms it as having an agenda and therefore we shouldn't trust it. I guess in a technical sense you could say it has an agenda in that it wishes to teach and clarify the Catholic Faith, but I don't see that I ruining the possibility of it being a source. Particularly, at least as far as I've seen, other sources support it. So no, I'm not advocating that we use this as a source to in-depth theology, but it does seem to be good enough for some general background information, and shouldn't be deemed as having an agenda. --Fictio-cedit-veritati (talk) 05:55, 4 January 2012 (UTC) For ANY information of encyclopedic value that could possibly be added to WP, a MUCH more reliable source can be found than Catholic Answers. Find and use that source. There is absolutely no need to rely on Catholic Answers at all. Dominus Vobisdu (talk) 06:06, 4 January 2012 (UTC) The trouble would appear to be that it is neither a neutral scholarly source (so WP:RS doesn't apply) nor an official organ of the Catholic Church (so WP:ABOUTSELF doesn't apply either). I agree with DV -- don't use it "at all". HrafnTalkStalk(P) 06:14, 4 January 2012 (UTC) Well I agree with you guys, WP as an encyclopedia should have better sources, but the trouble is I am running into people who are quoting news papers as reliable sources about the history of the Catholic Church. I'm all for doing research, and enjoy doing so, but it seems that to keep up with the speed at which people edit you can't give them a first century text in Greek in any timely fashion. I'll give you an example: right now I'm in a debate with an editor about the Catholic Church's teaching on artificial contraction. She is saying (and using as a source a news paper) that the Church only adopted this stance in the 1930's. Anybody that knows a bit about Church history knows this to be false, but finding an authoritative article without any alleged biased is very difficult. Any advice? --Fictio-cedit-veritati (talk) 06:40, 4 January 2012 (UTC) There are most probably hundreds of scholarly books and articles written on the Catholic Church's stance on sexual reproduction. Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL HrafnTalkStalk(P) 06:55, 4 January 2012 (UTC) @FCV: It's pretty difficult to say that the Church had any definite official policy on artificial birth control at all before Casti Connubii in 1930. Up until about that point, there really wasn't a pressing need to. The need arose in the 1920's, when latex condom manufacture was first automated, making condoms far cheaper and more available, and when the Anglican Church decided to allow the use of artificial birth control. Dominus Vobisdu (talk) 07:18, 4 January 2012 (UTC) Also an explicitly apologetics organisation will have a fairly obvious motivation to maximise/exagerate the antiquity/continuity of church doctrine -- so is hardly an appropriate source for such claims. HrafnTalkStalk(P) 07:32, 4 January 2012 (UTC) A further problem is the fact that nowhere does the cited page ever state that contraception was against official Catholic doctrine before 1930. It simply lists a number of individual prominent Christians who condemned it. As such it fails to WP:Verify the claim, even if its were allowed as a reliable source. HrafnTalkStalk(P) 07:40, 4 January 2012 (UTC) All of this is pretty much exactly what I said on the article talk page about why Catholic Answers cannot possibly be admitted as a reliable source, so thank you. –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 21:54, 4 January 2012 (UTC) I see the point that this website is not as reliable as a scholarly article, but I'm confused as to why news sources can be considered legitimate sources about Church history when a website devoted to understanding Church history, et cetera, isn't. I could see rejecting both more than I could see rejecting just one. Also, just because a site exists to promote an understanding doesn't mean that it isn't neutral. One those grounds, I strongly reject what an above editor said when saying that an apologetic organization will have bias. Apologetics is all about explaining and teaching something to others through logic. A calculus textbook is an apologetic source for mathematics and yet nobody is going to say that it isn't a good source to talk about math theory because it seeks to promote an understanding of math! Maybe it wouldn't be seen as a good source to criticize math, but I'm certainly not saying that any apologetic source would be good to criticize it's topic. --Fictio-cedit-veritati (talk) 23:47, 4 January 2012 (UTC) I am acqueinted with the website and actually radio show, being a practicing Catholic myself (disclaimer). Some of the material from some of its sources are occasionally very reliable. I for instance remamber during the last papal election the radio show having a correspondent live from the Vatican, who was a bit of an expert on papal elections. Having said that, some of the other content is sometimes rather clearly apologetic in nature, and occasionally at least a bit biased. If one could find better sources, like, maybe, statements from leading theologians or church officials, they would clearly be preferable, but I think it probably would generally qualify as meeting the minimum standards of RS, although there often might be better sources out there. John Carter (talk) 00:47, 5 January 2012 (UTC) It is NOT "a website devoted to understanding Church history" it is a website devoted to promoting the Catholic understanding of Church history. it is an explicitly partisan source. This is one reason why it is considered less reliable than a newspaper. "Apologetics is all about" promoting a particular worldview and defending it against competing worldviews (which generally have their own competing apologetics efforts). It generally uses rhetoric, rather than rigorous logic. Comparing apologetics to mathematics tuition is therefore utterly nonsensical. HrafnTalkStalk(P) 03:28, 5 January 2012 (UTC) I think what we're arguing about is different perspectives. Yes, the website is explaining the history of the Catholic Church, a church in which it has no connection to. If a history textbook (or website), who's professed purpose is to explain US history (just as this site's is to explain Catholic history, et cetera), explains US history (citing documents to backup its claims, as this site does) do we call it biased? No, though we may find it interesting or in some situation important to note that it covering history from a US perspective. So if there was a situation in which it would be important to note that this is history of the Catholic Church as viewed by an independent organization that seeks to explain Church history, then we may, of course, do that. But just as with the history textbook, there is no reason to completely disqualify it. Secondly, apologetics is anything but rhetoric. Apologetics seeks to explain something using exclusively reason and logic. Saying that a math textbook could be apologetic to some mathematical concepts was a sound way to use the word. Thirdly, yes, I agree with John Carter. I am the first to admit that there are plenty of better sources out there, but that based on RS standards, and based on precedent of other sources accepted, this should be, at minimum, considered an acceptable introductory source. --Fictio-cedit-veritati (talk) 04:21, 5 January 2012 (UTC) Catholic Answers is an apostolate dedicated to serving Christ by bringing the fullness of Catholic truth to the world. We help good Catholics become better Catholics, bring former Catholics “home,” and lead non-Catholics into the fullness of the faith. — Mission and Vision So: No, "the website is" not primarily "explaining the history of the Catholic Church" -- it is primarily promoting the Catholic Church, and subsidiarily promoting a version of its history that casts it, and its teachings, in the best possible light. Therefore to claim that "it has no connection to" this church that it is explicitly 'evangelising' is again utter nonsense. If we were to view this same history through the lens of a fundamentalist Protestant (or Buddhist, or Atheist) apologetics organisation, we would see many things completely differently. Therefore the reasonable thing to do is to take none of their words for it. Please cease and desist doing me the incivility of insulting my intelligent by offering such transparently ludicrous arguments. HrafnTalkStalk(P) 04:43, 5 January 2012 (UTC) First off, please keep a polite tone as per WP:EQ and WP:CIV. You insulting my arguments is not logical, and it does nothing to further this conversation. 1) You need to substantiate this claim. The mission statement that you provides doesn't, it basically just says that it wants to spread Catholic knowledge. For this first claim to be met you will need to directly show that the website attempts to cast teachings, etc., in the best possible light- not simply explain them. 2) No, just because the source seeks to help spread knowledge, doesn't mean that it has some compromising connection to the Church. Again, they are separate bodies, and one independently explains the other. Go back to the textbook analogy (an analogy you have yet to refute). Church history is to Catholic Answers as US history is to US published textbook- both are independent of what they are publishing about and both wish to spread knowledge of their respective topic, thusly attempting to spread that topics knowledge (as per the mission statement). 3) An interesting claim, but as it stands, unsubstantiated. If you care to provide solid sources that give support to this claim, I'll be happy to take a look. Note though, that even finding two different sources that disagree on some historical fact doesn't prove anything other than different perspectives. Just as the US published textbook about US history may be different from the UK published textbook on US history. If, in an article a difference of opinion on historical fact came up, obviously, both sources would be noted as that would help further the depth of knowledge of the reader. --Fictio-cedit-veritati (talk) 05:41, 5 January 2012 (UTC) Nope. An organisation that sets out to 'spread Catholic knowledge' isn't an independent source regarding issues concerning Catholicism, end of story. We don't have to provide sources for the self-evident.... AndyTheGrump (talk) 05:48, 5 January 2012 (UTC) It's just as much of an independent source concerning Catholicism as a textbook who's implicit goal is spreading knowledge of US history is a independent source on US history. I take time to write posts that have a conclusion supported by premises. Please don't be illogical by attacking the conclusions in the future. --Fictio-cedit-veritati (talk) 05:55, 5 January 2012 (UTC) No, it isn't. AndyTheGrump (talk) 06:01, 5 January 2012 (UTC) @FCV: Not quite. As a matter of fact, not at all. The burden of proof is not on , or anyone else, to prove that the source is unreliable, but on YOU to prove that it is, and you haven't done so (and never will). I'm sorry, but tee rule on sources here on WP is "guilty until proven innocent". We're talking about two different concepts of history itself. Apologists create and promulgate their own white-washed version of history for the purpose of making their religion or cause look as innocent and appealing as possible. Apologetics has a lot more to do with PR than with history as a scholarly pursuit. There is an inherent bias that severly compromises the reliability of the claims of apologists, just as there is an inherent bias in blatantly anti-Catholic sources. One of the themes of apologetic history is continuity, the idea that the Church has remained essentially unchanged since the first century, which is relevant to what you are trying to say about the Church's stand on artificial birth control. Major upheavals and reforms that fundamentally redefined whole aspects of the Church are ignored, minimalized or reinterpreted as being continuations rather than discontinuities, and when that isn't possible, they are presented as a return to the original state of the Church rather than as wholesale innovations. Having studied the history of the papacy in depth, I can assure you that there are often huge differences between the apologetic version of history and the modern scholarly version. Apologetic sources have a clear agenda (as they themselves state), and history in the scholarly sense is not simply part of that agenda. They are therefore fundamentally unreliable for history, including the history of the Church itself. That is why WP policy insists on independent sources. Comparing apologetic sources to mathematical textbooks is an absurd notion. I'm sorry, but, bottom line, sites like Catholic Answers are of little worth for our purposes compared to independent scholarly sources. They provide little useful information of encyclopedic value, and when they do provide useful information, it still has to be critically evaluated in terms of independent scholarly sources. It's therefore best to rely exclusively on independent scholarly sources, and treat apologetic sources with extreme suspicion, using them with extreme caution, if they are used at all. Last of all, your "analogy" comparing apologetic sources to textbooks is fundamentally absurd. There is no resemblance at all. Statement like this make me seriously question your competence as a WP editor. Dominus Vobisdu (talk) 05:59, 5 January 2012 (UTC) Fictio-cedit-veritati: That my claim is substantiated is blindingly obvious from the definitions of Catholic Answers' own core self-descriptions: Apologetic: "The defensive method of argument; often spec. The argumentative defence of Christianity." Evangelism: "The preaching or promulgation of the Gospel; performance of the function of an evangelist." Neither of these activities has the least implication of neutral, disinterested provision of information. Therefore it is not "insulting" to point out that your argument does not have the least smidgeon of merit. You may also notice that nobody else is giving your argument the slightest credence, so kindly WP:Drop the stick and back slowly away from the horse carcass. HrafnTalkStalk(P) 06:13, 5 January 2012 (UTC) Catholic.com is not always reliable, and in areas where it is reliable there are better sources to use. Net result: we should not use Catholic.com as a source. Binksternet (talk) 16:01, 5 January 2012 (UTC) At ATG- I have no idea what you're even responding to in your one sentence response. No matter what is, you won't convince me by simply saying that I'm wrong. @DV: The burden of proof is on me for showing that the website is reliable, but that is not what I asked of Hrafn. I asked him to substantiate the claim that Catholic history and, for example, Buddhist history, would depict a historical event differently. That is a claim that he made in trying to support his conclusion that I was skeptical of. Do you see how your argument is a straw man one? I, of course, accept that the website that I am arguing for here is guilty until proven innocent, and that is why I am trying to prove it innocent in this conversation. What I asked the other editor to prove was a claim the he made- making it something that he would have to prove. Now let's look at a claim that you made: "Apologists create and promulgate their own white-washed version of history for the purpose of making their religion or cause look as innocent and appealing as possible. Apologetics has a lot more to do with PR than with history as a scholarly pursuit." You say some interesting things in here that I believe to be false. What I take issue with is that you claim that apologists glosswa over things, et cetera, in their explanations. Now since this is your claim, and since I disagree with it, you will need to provide some evidence to back it up before we can use it in this debate. Here is another claim that you make: " Major upheavals and reforms that fundamentally redefined whole aspects of the Church are ignored, minimalized or reinterpreted as being continuations rather than discontinuities, and when that isn't possible, they are presented as a return to the original state of the Church rather than as wholesale innovations." I don't believe this one either, and it being your claim, you will need to back it up with some good source(s). Here is another "Apologetic sources have a clear agenda (as they themselves state), and history in the scholarly sense is not simply part of that agenda. They are therefore fundamentally unreliable for history, including the history of the Church itself." All of these quotes you have been giving me, if true, would be really valid points, and I would, obviously, reconsider if they were. But right now, as far as I'm concerned, they aren't true since you haven't sourced any of them. I'm not trying to be difficult, I honestly just don't think you're right. So please show me you're right by sourcing the claims. You're last statement of dismissing my textbook analogy makes me have concerns about you not understanding how to logically refute somebodies claim. You can't simply say 'the conclusion is absurd' or 'the entire analogy is absurd'. If you wish to refute my conclusion you must attack the premises, not proclaim the conclusion to be false. @Hrafn: How does a desire to teach others something inherently make something biased? Sure, it is possible, as you argue, that since their professed mission is to spread knowledge, faith, etc., that they could stretch some things, exaggerate, etc., but it certainty isn't self evident that just because an organization wants to spread information that they are being less than honest with that information. I think my overall point here is being forgotten about. I am not arguing that this source is super reliable. All I'm saying is that it meets the minimum standards for a source. Yes, as some have pointed out, there are more reliable sources, but there is no rule on Wikipedia that you must always use the most reliable source. I don't intend for people to use this source to write a page about some complicated theological topic or anything of that nature. All I'm saying is that it gives some good background information that could be useful. Like with all sources on wikipeida, if other sources disagree with it then there can, of course, be a discussion on the talk page, and a conclusion reached. I understand that there are calls for me to stop this debate. I am reluctant to do that for the following reason. I have offered some logical reasoning for my arguments, and usually this reasoning is completely ignored. Yes, I am a legalistic person, but I don't think that it is asking too much for you to respond in a way that logically refutes my claims as apposed to simply saying that they're wrong. This doesn't apply to everybody, of course. --Fictio-cedit-veritati (talk) 02:18, 6 January 2012 (UTC) You are wasting your time. We don't need to offer a complete 'logical refutation' of anything. It has been clearly explained that the source you wish to use cannot be regarded by us as neutral - it is set up for a purpose which any reasonable person can see might tend to make its usefulness suspect. Furthermore, there seems to be nothing of any great significance on the site that can't be found elsewhere. We cannot possibly engage in an in-depth analysis of everything sourced from this site - and we have no need to if other, less controversial sources can be found. AndyTheGrump (talk) 03:04, 6 January 2012 (UTC) You need to offer a complete logical refutation insofar as you need to logically dismiss my conclusions, not illogically. Yes, you're right, you guys have offered some good reasons why it shouldn't be trusted, but these reasons are based on facts that I'm not so sure of. Wouldn't the rational thing for you guys to do at this point be to source your facts? I understand your 'reasonable person' argument, but I think a reasonable person would (given all the evidence) side the other way. We should probably just leave this proverbial person out of it since neither of us are likely to agree as to who he'd side with. Yes, I agree, hardly anything on the site seems to be 'original', but that's alright, for a source to be legit there is nothing that says it must be original. Again, I agree, there probably are less controversial sources, but from my experience, they take much longer to find. Could I find, in a library, a fact that is referenced on that site? Yes, probably, but it would likely take hours. It seems unfair (and in my case, at least, often times prohibitively impractical) to have to spend this much time for the simplest of facts. So yes, better sources would be preferred, and should indeed be sought out, but I really don't see why we can't term this source as minimally acceptable, or maybe more aptly, an 'entry level source'. Also, if the article on the site carries a Nihil Obstat (as some but not all do), it would make sense to consider that article highly credible within the scope of what the Nihil Obstat means. Any of this making sense? --Fictio-cedit-veritati (talk) 03:35, 6 January 2012 (UTC) For a start, there's no such thing as an 'entry level source' as far as Wikipedia is concerned. We don't make definitive assertions about the reliability of any source - even the most careful can make mistakes sometimes, and an otherwise-entirely-useless source may be cited as opinion. It all depends on what a source is being cited for. If you wish to cite the source for something specific, we can discuss its merits, but otherwise there is little point in continuing this further. This isn't a court of law, and we aren't here to reach a verdict - we are trying to write an encyclopaedia. This requires judgement based on an incomplete knowledge of facts sometimes, and often means relying on little more than rules of thumb: one of which is that sources which are set up to promote a cause tend not to be the most impartial in relation to that cause. If you feel that this is unfair in relation to this particular source, there is little we can do about it - we aren't going to change our methods on the basis of a single discussion - and none of the points you raise are new, we've seen all sorts of arguments regarding questionable sources before, and no doubt will see more of the same. I suggest that you therefore drop this debate, and instead do things our way. It seems to work... AndyTheGrump (talk) 04:23, 6 January 2012 (UTC) Yes, I'm aware there is no such thing as an 'entry level source'; I just meant that to denote that it is acceptable but subordinate to some other kinds of sources. It would seem that Wikipedia simply says that 'care should be taken' when assessing a source that promotes a cause (as this one certainty does). I am trying to take great care in negotiating this source's use, and that's why I'm having this conversation. I understand your argument about using simple rules of thumb and you are certainly right to point out that this generally has worked out pretty well for Wikipedia thus far. My issue is that, having examined the pages devoted to sourcing (where the rules of thumb are codified), I haven't been able to find any rule that would object to this source from being seen as acceptable. I think the closest they get to saying it wouldn't be acceptable is, as I said above, noting that care must be taken when addressing a source that mainly advocates for something. I think I have given this matter great care, setting forth, among other arguments, many logical experiments which people never refuted. There has been no supported evidence that anybody has brought forward to suggest that this source is compromised by a bias, et cetera, and as outlined in a post above, proving or disproving other peoples' claims is not my burden. By using this website as a source, we would aid in expanding Wikipedia because it would be a valuable starting point, and point of basic reference for Catholicism related articles. Therefore, I suggest that since I have explained and taken great care in discussing this source (and it should be noted that it did receive support from editors other than myself), and that by Wikipedia's own rules, no editor has been able to find any violation to these rules by this source, we end this debate accepting that Catholic Answers is an acceptable source within the scope set forth above. --Fictio-cedit-veritati (talk) 03:11, 7 January 2012 (UTC) No way. Binksternet (talk) 03:33, 7 January 2012 (UTC) Nobody else agrees with you here. The source will not be used in the way you advocate, end of story. Can I suggest that someone closes this discussion, as the time-waster it has become. Fictio-cedit-veritati, if you wish to contribute to Wikipedia, you will have to do it our way, or not at all - we cannot engage in endless discussions about matters already determined by basic policy. AndyTheGrump (talk) 03:41, 7 January 2012 (UTC) (edit conflict)Fictio-cedit-veritati (i) You did not "receive support from" any editors here. (ii) The consensus here appears to be that Catholic Answers is, at best, a problematical source best avoided. (iii) Your suggestion that "we end this debate accepting that Catholic Answers is an acceptable source within the scope set forth above" is therefore blatant WP:IDIDNOTHEARTHAT. (iv) Closer examination of the one specific instance under discussion, Catholic Church and abortion and whether the Cathloic Church forbad abortion before 1930, demonstrates that your source does not in fact support your contention. HrafnTalkStalk(P) 03:41, 7 January 2012 (UTC) @FCV: It has been abundantly explained to you that apologetic sources have an inherent bias and an agenda that severely compromises their reliability. It appears that you, likewise, have an agenda that severely compromises your competence to edit here on WP. I suggest finding another outlet. I will now close this discussion, as it appears you have no desire to listen to the advice you supposedly came here for. Dominus Vobisdu (talk) 03:48, 7 January 2012 (UTC)

Is the The Legacy of Jihad an unreliable source?

Just found this edit at Islam and war where everything sourced to the author of this book was removed with the edit summar "Removed unreliable work by Bostom who has no expertise in any related field". It looks ok to me, but I'd like other comments to help me decide whether this should be reverted. Thanks. Dougweller (talk) 06:43, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

Not to make a snap judgement, but at a quick glance, I would say Bostom looks almost as reliable as, say, Daniel Pipes and the Middle East Quarterly. Fat&Happy (talk) 07:12, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

The main issue would seem to be that his academic expertise is in a completely unrelated field. On the other hand, he does appear to be a published author on the topic. Therefore I'd give him middling reliability (lower than an expert, but roughly similar to an average newspaper report). Hrafn^Talk_Stalk(P) 07:24, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

This is published on Bostom's own website (andrewbostom.org) and hence should be treated as self-published content - which means "not acceptable". This source could be, however, considered reliable for providing Bostom's views at Andrew Bostom per WP:SELFSOURCE.VR _talk 12:24, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

Agreed, this should not be used. It's a book a) by a polemicist with no expertise in the subject, b) published by a non-scholarly publisher with an anti-religious and anti-Islam bent, c) which has been described as unreliable by sources that are reliable, like the journal Race and Class. Nothing about this suggests "reliable source." –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 21:58, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

Several issues. 1. The book has a WP article. If one wishes to find it a "non-notable work" then AfD is -> that way. 2. an SPS from the author of the book is RS for what his own opinions are - whether the book is "unrelaible" or not is irrelevant to that issue. 3. The book is a published work - the question at best would be whether "Prometheus Books" is an RS publisher. As a publisher of over 2,500 books, the normal presumption for WP:RS is that it is indeed an RS publisher. If one looks at refs in WP articles, one can find a great many refs which someone would say are by "polemicists" but that is not how WP:RS works. In short - if you wish to AfD the article - go ahead. Meanwhile, WP:RS suggests that the material meets the Wikipedia policy. Collect (talk) 22:32, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

Buh? No one is arguing over whether or not the book is notable. It's just that "notable" very much =/= "reliable." –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 23:00, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

WP:RS looks primarily at the publisher to determine whether something is RS (which does not have anything to do with infallibility or correctness of what it says, if you read the policy). The book, published by an RS publisher, is RS for what it says. Where the material is opinion, the opinions are citable as opinion, just like all other RS sources. I fear you are conflating "reliable" with "correct." Wikipedia makes no such judgements, esecially where dealing with matters of opinion. Collect (talk) 23:11, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

If the book was being cited only for Bostom's opinions, we wouldn't be having this conversation. –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 23:13, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

Um -- most books contain opinions. It seems that you object to particular opinions in an RS published book -- but WP:RS does not make that distinction. Sorry - you are stuck with it as meeting WP:RS just like all those other books. Collect (talk) 00:41, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

Am I missing something here? Yes, other books contain opinions. However, other books pass WP:RS because their authors have studied the subject at some point in their lives and are sometimes even experts on it, or because they are published by reliable publishers (which is not determined by the number of books they have published, though I'm sure some AuthorHouse customers are knocking at your gate right now), or because other reliable sources judge that they are reliable. None of these things are true of Bostom's book. See also Fat&Happy's very apt citation of WP:REDFLAG. –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 03:26, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

From WP:REDFLAG (all emphasis in quotations below added):

Red flags that should prompt extra caution include: ... claims that are contradicted by the prevailing view within the relevant community, or that would significantly alter mainstream assumptions, especially in science, medicine, history, politics, and biographies of living people. This is especially true when proponents say there is a conspiracy to silence them.

The opening sentence of The Legacy of Jihad (p. 24):

The late philosopher and theologian Jacques Ellul emphasized in his forward to Les chretientes d'Orient entre Jihad et Dhimmitude: VII^e-XX^e siecle (1991) [Bat Ye'or, ISBN 978-2204043472], how contemporary historiography whitewashed the basic realities of jihad war: ...

and further content from the two subsequent pages:

The prescient critiques of Jeffery and Rodinson anticipated the state of contemporary scholarship on jihad. Two salient examples of this current apologetic trend will suffice.

...

[Bat Ye'or] highlights ... the "thematic structure" of Esposito's selective overview, typical of the prevailing modern apologetic genre: ...

Just something to consider. Fat&Happy (talk) 00:40, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

Bostom is not reliable on the topic of Islam and war. I suppose one could write an encyclopedic article on that topic. But our current article is very far from encyclopedic. It seems it was broken out from jihad, which may be OK as "jihad" means struggle, not necessarily violent conflict. But now it needs to go to WikiProject Military History for some serious attention. For example, the Damascus affair, a 19th century antisemitic incident, was whipped up by the French consul and had nothing to do with Islam and very little even with the Turkish authorities. Itsmejudith (talk) 17:54, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

Hulu As A Reference - Yea or Nay?

Okay, so I was watching an episode of Celebrity Ghost Stories on Hulu and I thought, "Could this episode be used as a reference for, say, Corey Feldman claiming that his grandmother's ghost helped influence his divorce?" Not that I would necessarily add something like that, but it's certainly out there for all to see, and I can't imagine it not being a RS when it's from his own mouth. My question is this: what is WP's position on using/linking Hulu as a reference to something like this, or anything else? Is linking Hulu stuff as a reference okay? Doc talk 10:07, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

That should be an external link, not a reference, although I'm not an administrator. Hulu videos come and go. --George Ho (talk) 10:09, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

They do come and go for sure. External links are one thing, but we can link websites as references. Is the content on Hulu a "no-no" for the url section of the cite web template, the same as most YouTube stuff is? Hulu strictly abides by copyright laws, and would therefore seem to be a far more reliable source than YouTube. Doc talk 10:15, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

...Certainly not Hulu as "reliable". WP:Identifying reliable sources and WP:Verifiability can help. --George Ho (talk) 10:24, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

"In scholarship, a secondary source is a document or recording that relates or discusses information originally presented elsewhere." Hulu is not a secondary source? Thanks for the policy pointers, but I have been here for a little while. Anyone else? Doc talk 10:35, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

To me, anything distributed in Hulu is primary. Secondary source analyzes or reviews the primary sources (WP:No original research). --George Ho (talk) 10:57, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

Hulu acts, at best, as a WP:Convenience link, and probably not a particularly stable/reliable one (due to likely anonymous uploading to it, and inability to verify that it is a full, undoctored copy). In most cases it will be a convenience link to a primary source, but it is possible that it is one to a secondary source (e.g. of a televion program showing an expert offering analysis of something). Hrafn^Talk_Stalk(P) 11:04, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

We can credit something if it is backed by, let's say, ABC's 20/20. We can cite that information as coming from that episode of that broadcast, whether or not a URL is available. Can we use the URL from Hulu in the cite news and cite web templates when we cannot from YouTube? Hulu is not at all like YouTube: these are the real programs, not bootlegged, with full copyright compliance. Doc talk 11:10, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

(Striking some parts of my earlier comment.) How stable are the links? Can we be certain that a link will still be around in a year or two? On a more personal level, I'm leary of citing video content (as it's not searchable, and so forces the reader to watch through it to verify claims), and especially so for video content that a significant proportion of the English-speaking world cannot access. Hrafn^Talk_Stalk(P) 11:19, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Some links are more stable than others: some will probably always be there, while others are routinely removed, never to return. I thought exactly the same thing about the video vs text citations; and I'm confident that I am not the first one to bring up Hulu as a RS. Linking an entire episode for one brief citation could be a small concern - but is it actually allowed with a free site like Hulu that is providing the same content that would otherwise be "sourced", but with no available transcript to prove it? Doc talk 11:35, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

Speaking of video content, what topics do you want to research, Doc? What content? --George Ho (talk) 11:23, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Here is an instruction to citing a program: http://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/747/09/. Search at http://dmoz.org to find citation formats. --George Ho (talk) 11:25, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

Because we are allowed to use URLs when citing things, I tend to prefer them when they are available and legitimate. But these tips are very useful - thanks! Doc talk 11:35, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

Cyberbaiting - is this a neologism?

I keep seeing this term - Cyberbaiting - pop up in media sources. Quick examples: supposedly from the NYT and huff post. There's only one meaningful reference in Google Scholar (the first I listed), but a half-million in plain Google. We do not currently have an article on this, and I'm waffling over whether we should make one. I'd like to, personally, but I'm uncomfortable with the current sourcing. Looking for input. --Ludwigs2 17:58, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

I was just cyberbaiting last night! Oh, wait, I think that you're talking about something else... Seriously, WP:NEO is the policy that applies. It makes a distinction between sources about a term and sources that use a term. I did a quick search and found the following potential sources.[29][30][31][32][33][34][35] I didn't read them, but it's a start. But I wonder, is cyberbaiting different than cyberbullying? A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 18:21, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

Well, yeah: cyberbullying (as I understand it) is direct abuse of someone (usually a peer) using online media; cyberbaiting is closer to entrapment and seems to be used mostly on teachers - basically goading them into doing something stupid, recording it surreptitiously, and then youtubing it. maybe it would be best, though, to add a section to the cyberbullying article rather than make a new article. I'll look over your links and mull it a bit. --Ludwigs2 01:08, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

COLOURlovers and made-up colors

The website COLOURlovers allows its users to make up colors and color names. I've just removed one such from an article, as a spamlink; but thought I should come here to establish some consensus before proceding further. Thoughts? Comments? Seems to me like WP:UNDUE and an excuse to add spamlinks, but I am not always right in my analyses. --Orange Mike | Talk 20:49, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

If you mean this, I'd suggest your removal was justified on at least three fronts:

1. the content has a promotional tone and certainly does seem spammish;
2. the content isn't noteworthy unless reported by independent sources;
3. we can't suggest that "sunny orange" is vermilion just because COLOURlovers, an unreliable source, says it is.

According to our article, COLOURlovers is a social networking and blogging site and shouldn't be used to source anything except, in limited circumstances, articles discussing itself. Rivertorch (talk) 21:25, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

If Pantone (Color of the Year) is able to nominate a color of the year, then I don't see why the users of Colour Lovers shouldn't be able to nominate THEIR own color of the year and have it be identified in Wikipedia like the Pantone color of the year is. Isn't that what Web 2.0 is all about--the users providing the content rather than having content fed to them? Keraunos (talk) 08:51, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

I'm not quite sure what Web 2.0 has to do with the matter of reliable sources, which is what this noticeboard addresses. The relevant guideline would appear to deprecate COLOURlovers. I suppose that Pantone is a reliable source because they've been widely accepted as one of the leading entities in the field of color management for decades. If you think there's a problem regarding the use of Pantone-related content, however, by all means bring it up on the talk page of the relevant article. Rivertorch (talk) 06:22, 7 January 2012 (UTC)

The difference is that Pantone is recognized around the world as a reputable and hugely notable entity and the Colour lovers website is some nothing silly site with no recognition by reliable sources as having any notability. DreamGuy (talk) 18:22, 15 January 2012 (UTC)

I completely agree that COLOURlovers an unreliable source and back when I used to be a active editor I used to remove it when I encountered it. At one point I tried to put together a guideline on sources for color coordinates Wikipedia:WikiProject Color/Sources for Color Coordinates. Note that a bunch of stuff that probably should have been on the talk page ended up directly in the article page itself. The other issue is that there is a bias towards RGB coordinates and one to one mappings of RGB in many of the sources used even though that really doesn't make sense. Most color terms are vague and represent collections of similar colors. On the other hand their have been concerns with using sources such as Pantone since they are copy-righted. See also Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Color/Archive 4#Proposed Wikipedia policy/guideline on color/colour articles and swatches. PaleAqua (talk) 19:05, 11 January 2012 (UTC)

As a result of this section I investigated the site and our article about it and decided to put the Wikipedia article up for deletion. So far only one other person has commented. Anybody else want to give their input? DreamGuy (talk) 18:18, 15 January 2012 (UTC)

Enrique Iglesias

Current reference is to [36] and says 55 million records, handful of new users are insisting it is 100 million based on [37], which to me does not seem as reliable. Thoughts?--Jac16888 ^Talk 22:10, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

Indonesian News Websites

Hi all, I am doing an expansion of Chrisye and hoping to bring it to FA in the near future. A fellow editor has suggested that I use several sources to show that numerous acts, including Afgan, Ari Lasso, Kahitna, Fariz RM, Peterpan, and Sherina, were influenced by him. However, we've never had a look into the reliability of these websites. In order to have a discussion to cite, I'd like us to look into them.

First, www.kapanlagi.com is an independent Indonesian celebrity news website with editorial control and paid staff. It is often quoted in more mainstream media, such as here, and has been integrated into the local version of Chrome and is among the more popular sites in Indonesia.

Second, www.okezone.com is a celebrity news website owned by media giant Media Nusantara Citra, also with editorial control and paid contributors. It is sometimes quoted in the mainstream media, like here.

The third, Inilah.com, is fairly popular news portal with editorial control that sometimes has articles reprinted in more mainstream media, like here.

Any feedback would be welcome. Crisco 1492 (talk) 05:48, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

• Bump. Crisco 1492 (talk) 01:35, 13 January 2012 (UTC)

Ryan Doyle

I have an ongoing dispute with an editor over my source use on the article Ryan Doyle (created last month). I've spent exhaustive, full time days studying what she's asked me to study and revising my writing. She's spent, and has asked I come here, a suggestion seconded by the dispute resolution board: Wikipedia:Dispute resolution noticeboard#Ryan Doyle. My qualms particular to her aside, she's correct that a lot of my opinions, questions, etc., are community issues, or disputes with what the majority of editors may feel. I act, feel, and argue from what I claim to be a brilliant understanding of the spirit of Wikipedia. The more I'm directed to guidelines, the more support I find for things I already believed, and the more justifications I've come up with to back my view. The whole point, e.g., of WP:YT, is to filter out people who are not established experts/etc. If Doyle is an established expert, then he is by definition a reliable source for information.

I clearly, absolutely agree that all the generic disputes one would usually have with the article on a first glance, i.e. minus my endless scrutiny of facts and policy, would be warranted. This has nothing to do with the particulars of the topic, the content of all references, which are a clear factor in the policies. Three editors total have agreed about the poor source status, but none have addressed the particulars at length, and none are anywhere near as versed with the subject as I am. That makes it a battle between my experience, and editors' abilities to judge situations at a glance, which I claim is inadequate in this case.

The entire spirit of the point of barring original research as defined ad nauseum, supports my "research" to prove Doyle's worth with references and policy. I claim there is a special factor that the more questionable sources when examined inter-intrinsically (new word) clearly show Doyle notable and reliable. This is backed in policy by that all factors should be weighed as a complex whole (including content). A lot of people act mechanically around here, not dynamically. No one will say "Doyle is not notable, because..." or "Doyle isn't an important person, because..." They simply state surface policy that if X comes from Y source in Z ways, it can't be included. I've not done research that can't be verified, I've done analysis that can be verified, but no one will verify it. Squish7 (talk) 07:40, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

Can you be more specific, please? Pick a specific source and statement it is being used to back up. --GRuban (talk) 15:30, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

The issue is about the general balance of sources, i.e. whether a primary sources tag on the top is warranted. I can give you the two I'm most annoyed about people putting down, though. Ryan works with Red Bull, and has been featured on an MTV series featuring parkour athletes. I've been told these are primary sources because they "don't have independent fact-checking going on" and "won't say anything negative about the subject". This seems outside the ballpark of reality to me, because these are the parties on earth that have the most motive to find and feature the best and most creative parkour athletes, i.e. the most motivated to check facts independently and scrutinize the information they have. It's also a very logical and natural way for someone like Doyle to be discovered. Who else on the planet would have the motive to seek out such talent? They're the ones who would discover that first. With infinitely professional skill, and every motive to be objective, I think these are extremely objective, second-party sources to establish Doyle a notable expert in the field. Squish7 (talk) 20:30, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

Aha. Well, the first sign that there is a problem is that you're writing two orders of magnitude more on the talk page than on the article. May I suggest giving a little? There's a middle ground that you and Cindy can reach. I admit I didn't read the whole thing, since it's just so darn long, but it seems she's worried that you're making the article into a puff piece. If so, she does have a point. Can you step back and imagine this article being read by someone who doesn't particularly like Doyle? Are there any parts of it that person could point to, and say were puffery, rather than cold, hard, fact? Try to rewrite them to just give the facts. Less of what Doyle is thinking, hoping, dreaming, and aspiring to, more of what he has actually done. If you do that rewrite, I suspect Cindy will be easier on the tagging. Don't worry about notability, you've proved Doyle is notable, you've put in plenty of sources, and the article isn't particularly controversial as such, it won't be deleted. The only question is what it will look like. BTW, here is another source you could use that isn't primary.[38] --GRuban (talk) 21:27, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

Thank you for your input. My talking was a result of that she would not talk at all for a good period of time, which left me nothing but trial-and-error; write and remove, etc. In absence of any particulars how she thought the policies she referred me to applied, I simply had to cover all the clauses... She would say blanket things like Doyle's personal philosophies are not encyclopedic, when a large part of parkour is the philosophy of it. I hence wrote a paragraph about his teaching style, incorporating factual information (pretty solid, as he's an expert) with a bit of philosophy of the teaching incorporated; she tore it down with no suggestion or explanation other than reference to policies I told her I'd studied and applied carefully, calling me completely stubborn and 100% disregarding of policy and what "I was told" not to do. I've been seeking outside help for clarification of what part of her concerns reflect the community, and what parts do not. Trust me, I was already well aware of the idea of compromise and balance. I created the article fully equipped to handle the delicacy of these issues. Anyway, thank you, this has helped. Squish7 (talk) 22:25, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

Note that a special problem is that the more notable Doyle is, the more reliable his own sources become. That is, it's nontrivial to what extent I've proved his notability. If his expertise was exhaustively proved, referencing his videos ("self-publications" I designate them) would be much more appropriate. The main sources establishing his notability (MTV and Red Bull) have been continuously put down; someone even just said "we should them the same as his personal websites", citing this as the reason the article should be shortened... Note that Doyle studied media, and that his fans/students/etc are almost entirely younger people, who mostly use youtube/etc. Given web publishing is free, i.e. no need of an established middle ground propogating his publications (let's just consider the videos the equivalent of short stories or shorter scientific journal papers), does this not present him some reliability for being a publisher beyond a notable figure?... In other words, if he could be a reliable source for information about parkour, wouldn't be incredibly reasonable to include his viewpoints on the science/math/etc..? Squish7 (talk) 22:37, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

It would fall under WP:SPS as self published sources, which should be used sparingly and carefully. Silverseren^C 23:17, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

Note to all: Since this was filed I've given the article a major rewrite/copy edit, and reduced its length by more than half. — Mr. Stradivarius ^♫ 23:09, 7 January 2012 (UTC)

Dwarf planets

We are having an extended debate dwarf planet and related articles (Haumea, Makemake, {{Moons of dwarf planets}}, etc.) about reflecting sources. One side wants to reflect only the POV of the International Astronomical Union, which has not addressed the issue since 2008. The other wants to also reflect more recent POVs from leading planetary astronomers, such as Scott Sheppard and Mike Brown. At issue is whether we say that an object "is" a dwarf planet, is likely to be, or is accepted as such by (whoever). (3 are universally accepted, 2 more are accepted by the IAU, and 4 more by Brown and some others.) This has been going on for months, with a lot of bad-faith edits and personal attacks. These articles are FA, which makes the lack of up-to-date sourcing more egregious. — kwami (talk) 18:51, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

This seems more like a POV dispute than a reliability issue. Generally speaking, when reliable sources disagree, we document the dispute without taking sides. However, Mike Brown is not an independent source. From what I can gather, NASA regards both Haumea and Makemake as dwarf planets.[39][40] A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 19:13, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

"we document the dispute without taking sides": That's exactly what I'm advocating. The other side of this debate wants to take the IAU's side, because they see them as the authority. IMO we should only say an object is a DP when all RS's agree that it is, and otherwise say that it is accepted as a DP by the IAU or whoever. Either that, or say that an object is a DP when any RS says it is. But not say it is if my preferred source says it is, and not otherwise.

Brown is the leading expert in the field, and there are other astronomers who agree with him. Yes, Haumea and Makemake are generally regarded as DPs, due to their acceptance by the IAU, but Sheppard, who co-discovered half the moons in the Solar system, does not accept that as established. He says that they are "likely" to be DPs, the same term he uses for the four others that Brown advocates. Sheppard, the IAU, Brown, and Tancredi have different criteria for which objects it is safe to say qualify as DPs, and come up with 3, 5, 9, and 12 dwarf planets. One side of this WP debate wishes to restrict our articles to the IAU view, and say that all the IAU five and only those five "are" DPs. — kwami (talk) 19:50, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

If there is a dispute between the IAU and other experts in the field, then you cannot say de facto that anything is something. You have you say that the IAU considers this to be a DP and these other experts consider it to likely be a DP. An short explanation of the different standards that these experts are using may also be required for clarification in the article. But if there is a dispute between experts in the field (and the IAU count as experts, but experts alone and shouldn't be held as definitive on the subject. Our readers must place their own emphasis on which opinion holds better weight, we as editors may not), then you must adequately show both sides of the dispute without being biased toward one side or the other. Silverseren^C 23:21, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

Could you say that at talk:Haumea (dwarf planet)? — kwami (talk) 10:53, 7 January 2012 (UTC)

There is no dispute. kwami simply tries to present it as a dispute by lying about sources. See my detailed answer. Ruslik_Zero 13:20, 7 January 2012 (UTC)

Nonsense: Sheppard say there "are" 3 DPs. The IAU says there "are" 5. Brown says there "are" 9. Tancredi says there "are" 12. No amount of sophistry will change that. — kwami (talk) 02:26, 8 January 2012 (UTC)

Sheppard (page 7) says Haumea and Makemake are likely dwarf planets in the same sentence that he claims smaller objects are also likely dwarf planets. At no point does he claim the IAU is wrong. Michael E. Brown, Scott S. Sheppard and User:Kheider are not 100% certain Hauema and Makemake are dwarf planets. But we are also not 100% certain we will be alive tomorrow. This is not really a controversy, it is more POV pushing to "upgrade" the status of 4 more dwarf planet candidates in the dwarf planet article. -- Kheider (talk) 16:28, 7 January 2012 (UTC)

The point, of course, is that Sheppard does not draw the line where the IAU does. That is a real difference. — kwami (talk) 02:27, 8 January 2012 (UTC)

Two points:

• From a pure policy perspective, Brown and Sheppard are not independent sources as they are discovers of some of these objects. We should rely on more independent sources such as NASA and IAU which regard both Haumea and Makemake as dwarf planets. I really don't think that we're in position to overrule NASA and IAU.
• From a pure practicality perspective, I doubt if the average reader cares about this POV dispute. We write our articles for the reader's benefits, not our own. I really am having trouble burdening the reader with having to read about whether these are really planets. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 04:16, 8 January 2012 (UTC)

"Overrule"? Any point in not reporting the sources we have, instead deciding for ourselves which to report and which not to? --JorisvS (talk) 10:25, 9 January 2012 (UTC)

RFC

I have started an RFC on the use of primary sources in Calvary Chapel (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) at Talk:Calvary Chapel#RFC: Use of primary sources. Regulars may wish to comment. Hrafn^Talk_Stalk(P) 08:58, 7 January 2012 (UTC)

Criticism of concordats

Criticism of concordats (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) is a relatively recent creation, by User:PeterBrietbart (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs). My concerns about the article's sourcing are twofold:

1. The article appears to extensively reference the concordats themselves, to make synthetic claims critical of them.
2. Many of the secondary sources that are in the article appear to be to online publications of uncertain reliability and/or prominence (examples: [41][42][43][44]).

Is there enough well-sourced material here to be worth saving? Or would I be better off merging what little clearly-reliably sourced material into Concordat (of which this article appears to be a WP:POVFORK)? Hrafn^Talk_Stalk(P) 09:38, 7 January 2012 (UTC)

• I have proposed this article be merged at Talk:Concordat#Merger proposal. Hrafn^Talk_Stalk(P) 02:59, 11 January 2012 (UTC)

Der Spiegel

[45] shows why no source, however "reliable" is to be ever taken as "truth" -- unless you can really believe Theodore Roosevelt in 1933 banned private ownership of gold ... Anyone care to think Spiegel Online should now be barred? Cheers. Collect (talk) 15:33, 7 January 2012 (UTC)

It appears to be a mere typo -- it was in fact Franklin D. Roosevelt who did so -- see 1933 Double Eagle. Hrafn^Talk_Stalk(P) 15:37, 7 January 2012 (UTC)

Is there a reason for this post? Are you currently in a debate elsewhere where someone is arguing to discredit a source on the basis of a factual error or several factual errors and you are arguing to keep it? Some context would be helpful. –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 17:33, 7 January 2012 (UTC)

I don't know what point Collect was trying to make, but the conclusions I draw from this is: (i) no source, however reliable, is perfect. (ii) Even for a reliable source, the further it gets from its core area of expertise (and a German newspaper's core expertise probably does not include early 20th century American history), the more likely they are to make a mistake -- therefore better to rely on sources within their area of expertise. Hrafn^Talk_Stalk(P) 17:49, 7 January 2012 (UTC)

Yes, but even if the author's core area of expertise is finance, this seems to be a typical lapse.Henrig (talk) 18:22, 7 January 2012 (UTC)

1. Some folks seem to think an error makes a source not "RS" - the point made is that all sources suffer brain-rot from time to time. 2. I thought the rationale was exceedingly clear - I do not know in any way why Rosco seems to think otherwise at all. 3. All too often, folks here fail to understand what WP:RS actually refers to - which has absolutely nothing to do with "facts" but only with "can we verify that the place published it". Cheers. Collect (talk) 22:33, 7 January 2012 (UTC)

yespakistan.com

Is this a reliable source for information in a BLP? I can find no editorial oversight on the site. Darkness Shines (talk) 17:44, 7 January 2012 (UTC)

Probably not, but it might depend on specifics. The website appears to be published by the Human Development Foundation (a Thai-based charity, which makes the Illinois address listed on the website rather odd). Hrafn^Talk_Stalk(P) 17:54, 7 January 2012 (UTC)

• Any thoughts on this one ideasevolved for use in a BLP? Darkness Shines (talk) 18:21, 7 January 2012 (UTC)

Is Encyclopedia Britannica a reliable source?

As I am having problems with two users, Athenean and Alexikoua, who keep repeatedly deleting every citation i make from Encyclopedia Britannica, I want to ask if Encyclopedia Britannica can be accepted as a source in Wikipedia or not. I have seen that scores of articles use at a source, so we have to establish if this source should be allowed in Wikipedia. (Edvin (talk) 00:31, 8 January 2012 (UTC))

See for example Talk:Albania#Encyclopedia Britannica is regarded as a trusted source by Wikipedia community. There are several articles involved in a consensus building exercise including Albania, History of Albania, London Conference of 1912-1913 in which many sorts of sources are being offered up for examination including, primary sources--contemporary news paper accounts, secondary sources and tertiary sources. In this case EB stands for http://www.britannica.com rather than Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition. -- PBS (talk) 23:59, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

A reliable source for what? As is made clear at the top of this page, we need more information. What is it being used as a source for? I'd also suggest you read WP:PSTS - the Encyclopedia Britannica is a tertiary source, and we quite explicitly state that "Some tertiary sources are more reliable than others, and within any given tertiary source, some articles may be more reliable than others". There is no yes-or-no answer to your question. AndyTheGrump (talk) 00:41, 8 January 2012 (UTC)

EB is, at best, a tertiary source per many past discussions here. In addition, the online version solicits revisions from readers, which has also been established at RS/N. And since "RS" has nothing to do with "truth", EB is pretty much ruled out as a source - you probably should look at the sources the EB cites instead. Cheers. Collect (talk) 00:45, 8 January 2012 (UTC) Appending: The OP seems to also be posting related complaints at AN/I concurrently. Collect (talk) 00:47, 8 January 2012 (UTC)

I have added Cheers article from EB as "Further reading" source rather than reference. If you want, you can still add EB articles into "Further reading" section; don't forget, be bold! Cheers, George Ho (talk) 00:56, 8 January 2012 (UTC)

"EB is pretty much ruled out as a source" What?! That's the craziest thing I've read on Wikipedia all day. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 04:19, 8 January 2012 (UTC)

Since when was EB ruled out as a source? I've never ever heard that, especially when we cross-post public domain content from old versions of it. Silverseren^C 07:17, 8 January 2012 (UTC)

Multiple discussions on RSN and elsewhere - if a fact needs a cite, the EB is where you look to find a cite, but as a tertiary source it is deficient for most WP purposes. And since the online EB solicits revisions, it is even less an RS. Cheers. Collect (talk) 12:26, 8 January 2012 (UTC) By the way, the 1911 edition was used to "populate" Wikipedia at the start, and is now generally regarded as having been a mistake. It was only "public domain" at the start because of the odd US copyright laws of the time, and most uses on WP are being removed over time. See Wikipedia:1911_Encyclopaedia_Britannica, and the fact that there is a specific template for such articles Collect (talk) 12:40, 8 January 2012 (UTC)

You mean discussions like this, where you're the only person saying it is an unreliable source? I think you're really the only one or one of very few here that thinks Britannica isn't a reliable source. As Andy pointed out above, it does depend on what you're using it for, but that's true for any source. As a whole, the Britannica is reliable, it's just not as good as a secondary source, since it is a conglomeration of secondary sources, but tertiary sources are still perfectly reliable, especially for general, big picture information. Silverseren^C 13:02, 8 January 2012 (UTC)

I fear you have missed a number of discussions on this - including opinionf from Jimbo, Gwen Gale and a number of others about it as a source. [46] Meaning, once editors begin to dig at all into a topic, encyclopedias are out, gone, toast, the end. Stay away from 'em, other than as a means to find out what to look for and where, but even that can be way dodgy, owing to the wanton systemic bias of most any tertiary reference. [47] etc. also show remarkable unanimity that non-specialized encyclopedias are tertiary sources at best. [48] ditto. Sorry - I am far from the only person with this view. [49] shows a view on a GA page. [50] ditto. [51] ditto. [52] ditto. [53] and another. [54] and another. But you could only find s single discussion? I find literally hundreds of them. Cheers - EB was, and remains, "tertiary". And it is specialized tertiary sources which are usable. Not "general ones. Collect (talk) 18:57, 8 January 2012 (UTC)

It's nice that Jimbo and Gwen Gale have opinions, but personal opinions aren't policy. Our policy states that reliable sources are those who have a reputation for accuracy and fact-checking. Clearly, Encyclopedia Britanica has such a reputation. I mean, are you honestly trying to say that EB isn't a reputable encyclopedia? A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 00:32, 9 January 2012 (UTC)

And well over two dozen other editors and admins ... and so far "tertiary sources" remain "tertiary sources." And remember "reputable" != "reliable source" per WP:RS so that cavil fails. The fact is that Wikipedia requires stronger sourcing than tertiary encyclopedia articles are. And that should end the issue utterly. Collect (talk) 00:52, 9 January 2012 (UTC)

It depends on who wrote the EB article. If it is written by an acknowledged expert, then it becomes an article by a secondary source and is then better than a secondary source written by a layman.

Collect, I think you are making a mistake in assuming that all secondary sources are of the same type of quality. For example I have recently been involved in a discussion over the year in which a man was allegedly knighted by Queen Elizabeth I. We have found a secondary source that uses primary sources that does not list the man as one who received a knighthood in that year (but the source may not have surveyed all the primary sources). However, it seems that for this fact many modern day secondary sources rely on Victorian secondary sources, which rely on an 18th century source that cites a 17th century source. We have not yet found a secondary source that cites a primary source. But clearly when (or if) such a secondary source is found, it will be "better" than all the sources that cite older secondary sources. A secondary source that does not cite primary sources, but relies on other secondary sources is no better or worse than a general encyclopaedia as a source, and many many books support facts with citations to other previously published secondary sources. An good example of this is the propagation in may English language books published from the 1960s until the late 1990s of the incorrect figure of 130,000 killed in the bombing raids on Dresden in February 1945. German historians had provided the correct figures back in the 1970s, but these were ignored in many books and articles in favour of David Irving incorrect figures published in his book The Destruction of Dresden. It took a decade after he was discredited in court before the correct figures became generally accepted (and were stated as a fact without hedging in the Wikipedia article).

BTW where is the alleged fact that Wikipedia requires stronger sourcing than tertiary encyclopaedia articles to be found in the verifiability or WP:PSTS policies? -- PBS (talk) 05:11, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

It depends. Nothing wrong with citing tertiary sources in general, but if there are better sources, they should be preferred. Dicklyon (talk) 04:52, 9 January 2012 (UTC)

Yup. Another pointless argument about abstract 'reliability'. As far as Wikipedia policy is concerned, there is no such thing. Since the OP has declined to tell us what the Encyclopaedia is being cited for, I suggest that we close this 'debate', and all do something more useful instead... AndyTheGrump (talk) 05:15, 9 January 2012 (UTC)

The issue is, it isn't an RS issue at all, it's a copyright issue. Brittanica is very much an RS. The 1911 edition was used appropriately to populate our early articles about botany, for example. But if we absorb lots of content from a tertiary source that we're basically in competition with, that can cause problems. Squidfryerchef (talk) 01:57, 10 January 2012 (UTC)

How is it a problem? -- PBS (talk) 05:11, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

I'm surprised we're even questioning EB's use as a source. If EB is ruled out, then we ought to erase millions of other far more dubious sources which are gaily quoted on Wikipedia but have no verifiable standing - e.g. random websites, newspapers and magazines which may just be one person's uninformed (and possibly biased) opinion. --Bermicourt (talk) 07:21, 10 January 2012 (UTC)

Wikipedia has certial rules about "tertiary sources." It has nothing whatsoever to do with "truth" but to do with the desired nature of Wikipedia's sourcing. And opinions are citable only as opinions in any case, and most "random websites" are utterly unacceptable, so that sort of argument holds no water. And if something can be found in a tertiary source, it should reasonably be findale in an acceptable secondary source, just as we also rule out most primary sources on the basis that important information should be findale in a secondary source. Cheers. Collect (talk) 07:31, 10 January 2012 (UTC)

The basic policy about tertiary sources is 'Reliably published tertiary sources can be helpful in providing broad summaries of topics that involve many primary and secondary sources, especially when those sources contradict each other.'

So yes one should avoid using them for particular facts but they can be used to help with the summary and overall structure and with assessing weight. And primary sources can very often be more reliable than secondary sources, just we must not trawl through primary sources for new things but only use stuff which has been mentioned in secondary sources. Basically primary sources give no notability but may be more accurate and have some weight. Dmcq (talk) 11:11, 10 January 2012 (UTC)

While there is nothing in WP:PSTS against using tertiary sources, there are strong restrictions on the way that primary sources can be used, and unpublished primary sources may not be used. -- PBS (talk) 05:11, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

It is not always clear cut whether something is a secondary or tertiary source. For example is the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography as secondary or tertiary source? -- PBS (talk) 05:11, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

You can use tertiary sources for particular facts as well. I think the current policy formulations are often somewhat misunderstood. Imho it is a mistake or misunderstanding to take taking that policy all too literally. The notion that tertiary are per se "inferior" is rather misleading. First of of all there is often no clear cut distinction between secondary and tertiary and more importantly the quality (and domain) of a source is much more important than a formal distinction between secondary and tertiary. Meaning a high quality tertiary source (say an academic special subject encyclopedia or a standard textbook) is often better and more reliable source than some mediocre secondary source. Another thing to keep in mind, is how WP articles are actually written. The (ideal) situation, that a domain expert with an overview of all relevant secondary (and primary) sources compiles them into an article, is simply not a workable scenario for the bulk of our articles/content. Instead many WP articles are written by non experts with only a limited or even no overview of the relevant secondary sources. Such authors usually compile the knowledge of (academic) textbooks and (academic) encyclopedias into WP, which are usually at least partially tertiary sources. From that perspective you might even argue that the bulk of our reliable sources is tertiary to begin with.

As far as the original problem (editors deleting any EB references (or any tertiary reference) is concerned, I'd even consider that vandalism, that is, people removing EB references without replacing it by another (superior, secondary) source. Now there can be individual cases where you can consider an EB reference as insufficient or inappropriate, but that needs to be judged on case by case basis. Also the very recent (user based) content additions of the EB need to be viewed with a greater scrutiny. But then again I find it hard to image a scenario where no reference is better than an EB reference.--Kmhkmh (talk) 06:22, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

• It seems to me the whole 'philosophy' behind the RS guidelines is to maximise the accuracy of relaying information. A good secondary sources should rely on primary sources, so are one step away from the facts. Tertiary sources rely on secondary sources and therefore are two steps away, so you get an escalation of the chinese whisper effect. That doesn't make tertiary sources unreliable, just less reliable than a secondary source by its very nature; also a good tertiary source like EB is better than a poor secondary source like the Daily Mail (where we've actually had instances of them making up stories (I don't recall similar discussions about EB). So in general, if something is good enough for EB it probably should be good enough for Wikipedia, but the aim should always be to seek out sources that put us closest to the facts. Betty Logan (talk) 06:38, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

Well yes there is potential "whisper effect". However high quality (scholarly) tertiary sources are usually written by experts that looked at all or most relevant primary and secondary sources, which means (ideally) there's no whisper effect at all in such a scneario. Also instead of seeing it from the whisper effect perspective, you can also see it as an error removing filter perspective, meaning good tertiary sources add an additional level of expert scrutiny and are without possible errors and mistakes still contained in original primary and secondary sources. As far as "closest" to the facts is concerned, you could argue that's an argument for primary rather than for secondary sources. But the problem there is, that the perceptions of facts might differ and that for an encyclopedia the simple stating of facts is not enough either (knowledge versus information). Encyclopedia needs to contextualize, connect and explain facts and also consider different perceptions, incomplete information/"missing facts and such. That's exactly where the secondary and tertiary sources come in.--Kmhkmh (talk) 07:10, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

"Editors can post questions here about whether particular sources are reliable, in context, and editors interested in sourcing issues will answer. "

I agree with User:AndyTheGrump. There is no "abstract 'reliability' without exact context. Since the OP has declined to tell us what the Encyclopaedia is being cited for, I suggest that we close this 'debate', ..." without any conclusion due to lack of the context and the fact there is no abstract general reliability.--Antidiskriminator (talk) 07:56, 15 January 2012 (UTC)

I added the context as in insert at the top of this section. -- PBS (talk) 23:08, 15 January 2012 (UTC)

Question regarding Huffington Post and relability

A question came up at the discussion at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Thrive (film). The question is in regard to the use of a blog on Huffington Post, and whether this is considered a reliable source. What is the general consensus for HP with regards to being used as a reliable source? Wildthing61476 (talk) 02:46, 8 January 2012 (UTC)

I don't think there is any consensus, but a blog is only reliable for citing the opinions of its author. Jezhotwells (talk) 04:23, 8 January 2012 (UTC)

Thanks, I was thinking that as well, but it's good to have an involved party chime in. Wildthing61476 (talk) 04:26, 8 January 2012 (UTC)

For this issue (asserting reliable coverage for purposes of WP:GNG), HuffPo is unquestionably reliable. //Blaxthos ( t / c ) 07:21, 8 January 2012 (UTC)

HuffPo allows all sorts of people to post blogs there with little or no oversight as long as they are willing to put up free content HuffPo can put ads all over. Being mentioned on a blog page on the site somewhere is nothing like our normal standards for GNG. It's like trying to say if something appears on blogspot.com it must be notable. So I would have to disagree quite strongly with your assertion. DreamGuy (talk) 18:31, 15 January 2012 (UTC)

• Ummm, nothing on the Author's HuffPo Bio seems to qualify her as a professional film critic, so why does this piece qualify as either a reliable or notability-enhancing source? This is the problem with HuffPo, although some of its content appears expertly-authored, and thus reliable, a good deal of it isn't. Hrafn^Talk_Stalk(P) 08:16, 8 January 2012 (UTC)

Agree with Hrafn here. Unless the reviewer has a demonstrated reputation as a film critic, the review does little to establish notability. Dominus Vobisdu (talk) 08:23, 8 January 2012 (UTC)

• Taking a view of HuffPo as whole, I would suggest that their editorial oversight is, at best, very uneven -- I have heard of quite a bit of pseudoscientific nonsense being published by it (perhaps because their authors were friends of Arianna Huffington). I would therefore suggest that it might be appropriate to treat it as effectively equivalent of a WP:SPS published by its author: where that author is an otherwise-published expert on the topic it should be considered reliable, where the author is not (as appears to be the case in this example), it should not. Hrafn^Talk_Stalk(P) 08:39, 8 January 2012 (UTC)

• Where the HuffPo blog is erratic both in what it covers and when it is written by the author proposed as the source, it is clear that it is a "blog" and not a source which has any notability or reliability per WP policy at all, and is not, in this case, even usable for "opinion." We have no reason here to assign any notability to the author as expert in the field at all. Collect (talk) 12:46, 8 January 2012 (UTC)

• I don't believe the Huffington Post is a "blog" in the sense of being a self-published source, I'm under the impression they have an editorial staff, etc. They may advertise themselves as being a blog, but they're basically a published media source. I would agree that some of what shows up there is erratic, and I'd put it more at the level of the Daily Mail or TMZ than the staff blogs of the Washington Post, but it's still a "published" source. Squidfryerchef (talk) 01:49, 10 January 2012 (UTC)

Content on Huffington Post varies widely. Much of it is just pure blog content with no oversight. It may be that after AOL bought them ought they turned it into something more like Examiner.com where basically anyone off the street can get a blog on it than the online publication it used to be. DreamGuy (talk) 18:34, 15 January 2012 (UTC)

• Keep in mind that the context of why this question is being asked has more to do with notability of the movie, not the reliability of HP. I would say that in this context, HP is an acceptable source in making a determination of this film's notability. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 02:26, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

• Why? You have offered no argument or substantiation to back up your bare assertion. HuffPo does not appear to have consistent editorial oversight, the author in question has no subject-expertise. What basis in WP:RS then do you have for declaring this piece a reliable source (and thus relevant to WP:N's "significant coverage in reliable sources...")? Hrafn^Talk_Stalk(P) 03:01, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

• I try to focus on the big picture of what policies actually mean. The issue here is whether the the world at large has given this topic significant attention. HP is an award-winning and hugely popular site. See Huffington_Post#Awards Yes, one can quibble over whether the HP is a reliable source or a questionable one or whatever. None of that really matters for the purposes of this discussion. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 20:19, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

• The "big picture" is that the internet is chock full of questionable sources (many of them "hugely popular", at least for a time) covering every manner of non-notable topic. This is why WP:N specifically requires reliable sources (and why questionable sources are routinely dismissed in AfDs). This has the additional "big picture" advantage of ensuring that we actually have a bare minimum of reliable sources with which to write an article, before committing Wikipedia to keeping the article. Hrafn^Talk_Stalk(P) 04:36, 15 January 2012 (UTC)

• I'm sorry, but your post assumes facts not in evidence. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 05:28, 15 January 2012 (UTC)

• The only 'facts' (as opposed to interpretation) that I stated above was that there are many popular websites of questionable reliability, and that much of their coverage is on topics which (due to their lack of coverage in more reliable sources), Wikipedia does not find a suitable topic for an article. I would have thought that this would be patently obvious to any, even casual, observer of the internet, but I can give you numerous examples if you think the point requires substantiation -- particularly in the area of bizarre conspiracy theories (an ever-popular, if ever changing, field). If you want substantiation of dismissal of WP:QSs at AfD, I'm fairly sure I can dig up some of those as well. Hrafn^Talk_Stalk(P) 05:51, 15 January 2012 (UTC)

• Yes, please provide a link to a discussion where consensus was reached that only unquestionably reliable sources are to be used to determine notability and that's the reason why this specific wording of WP:N was chosen. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 02:54, 17 January 2012 (UTC)

Is YouTube a RS for Milton William Cooper?

A list of shortwave programs originated by Cooper is featured in the article. The list includes comments on the subjects of the broadcast, all sourced solely to YouTube. - LuckyLouie (talk) 20:55, 8 January 2012 (UTC)

YouTube isn't a source for anything - it consists of material generated elsewhere, and uploaded to the site. On that basis, the question should be is the original material a reliable source for what it is being cited for (with the caveat that it may have been altered before being uploaded). Then again, material is often uploaded to YouTube in breach of copyright - which is in itself a sufficient reason to be wary of linking to it. Given that the multiple links seem to source nothing but a list of radio broadcast titles, I can see little merit to doing anything beyond deleting the list itself, per WP:INDISCRIMINATE. AndyTheGrump (talk) 21:19, 8 January 2012 (UTC)

Andy is correct... YouTube is not a source... YouTube is a venue. The source is the person who posted the video to YouTube. There are several issues here...

First, in assessing this source, we need to ask whether we have a reasonable expectation that the YouTube videos are reliable "true copies" of Cooper's original broadcasts. In this case, I have to say: "No, we do not have such a reasonable expectation." The videos were posted to YouTube by an anonymous blogger going by the name "Conspiracy Scope". This anonymous blogger could easily have edited Cooper's broadcasts in some way (so that they no longer are "true copies" of the broadcasts). Indeed, you could say that "Conspiracy Scope" has altered the original... since he has added video to what was originally an audio broadcast.

Second, as Andy has pointed out, we do not know if Conspriacy Scope has permission to post a copy of Cooper's broadcast... if not, we violate copyright laws by linking to it. Blueboar (talk) 21:57, 8 January 2012 (UTC)

Surprisingly, I agree with Andy for the most part (saying "YouTube isn't a source for anything" could be confusing to a new editor). A couple of the uploaders at YouTube (axis4peace4 and ConspiracyScope) are not RS as they do not have a proven "reputation for fact-checking and accuracy". Although it might sound weird, the community has objected to including videos unless it can be verified that they were uploaded from RS since there could have been some modification. There is also a question of copyright but I doubt he had that work copyrighted (unless it is automatically assumed for short wave broadcasts). Also note that even if those videos were from a primary source, they would not assert notability (mentioning since it is up for deletion). Cptnono (talk) 22:00, 8 January 2012 (UTC)

Just FYI, under current copyright law, everything is automatically copyrighted at the moment it is created. No copyright notice or registration is required. Whether the broadcast is protected by copyright depends on things like when it was made, whether it was pre-recorded or live, etc. You just can't assume anything that can be copied is free from copyright. In particular, since these broadcasts were made in 1993 and on, they are protected by copyright unless they were explicitly put into the public domain by their creator. Yworo (talk) 00:55, 9 January 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for the insights. What would be a RS for the "episode list"? Wait, I think I can answer that: a program listing published by a radio station (in Cooper's case, a shortwave outlet that rented air time by the hour) might qualify as an acceptable source for a list of show titles and broadcast dates. Unfortunately I think SELFPUB Cooper fan sites are where the current info has been gleaned from. - LuckyLouie (talk) 02:33, 9 January 2012 (UTC)

One further point. Sourcing material may often be necessary to justify inclusion in an article, but it isn't in itself sufficient. The list of broadcast titles tells the reader nothing of any real significance about their content - as I suggested earlier, I think the list itself is of little merit, regardless of issues over sourcing. AndyTheGrump (talk) 05:22, 9 January 2012 (UTC)

I agree. I'll remove per WP:INDISCRIMINATE, but I doubt the fans won't revert it. - LuckyLouie (talk) 14:48, 9 January 2012 (UTC)

Yes, the list itself was reverted and explained in an angry note left on my Talk Page saying, "These broadcasts exist. They are verifiable by simply listening to them, whether you listen to them on youtube or not." - LuckyLouie (talk) 14:51, 10 January 2012 (UTC)

USA International Business Publications isn't reliable?

I am trying to use USA International Business Publications for a citation and another editor has repeatedly refused to allow me to to cite them but won't explain why they aren't considered reliable or provide a link an article explaining why. What's more a number of articles cite USA International Business Publications. If there is nothing wrong with the group I'd like to report this person's behavior. --CatholicW (talk) 08:48, 9 January 2012 (UTC)

As far as I can make out, IBUS is a fly-by-night book-on-demand shop. Their website is not even half configured (try their Shipping & Returns page or their Privacy Policy or their Conditions of Use page). Unless you have good evidence otherwise, I'd call then non-reliable. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 15:06, 9 January 2012 (UTC)

Your "respectable source" isn't a reliable source because, as you have been told, it is a reprint of a Wikipedia article. Even if you like what it says, you cannot use Wikipedia as a source for itself. - SummerPhD (talk) 22:24, 9 January 2012 (UTC)

And in case CatholicW needs actual evidence of that, try comparing the text starting "In response to the rumours circulating over Kim's health and supposed loss of power" onwards on this page of the book in question with the matching sections of our article in 2009. USA International Business Publications appears to be totally self-published and copying Wikipedia articles, their books should be removed from any article they are used as a source in. 2 lines of K₃₀₃ 10:42, 10 January 2012 (UTC)

I went through and yanked a bunch right after posting here. Most were fairly harmless: which is the largest in a particular group of islands and such. In any case, they're all "citation needed" now. - SummerPhD (talk) 12:38, 10 January 2012 (UTC)

Diamond Calk Horsehoe Company/ Otto Swanstrom

The article is reliable. To confirm its accuracy or to expand on its content please contact me at:

Harry W. Deckard

The Law Office of Harry W. Deckard 808 West 10th St. Suite 100 Austin, TX 78701

(512) 589-2698

War Diaries

Hi several articles in the Sinai and Palestine Campaign have War Diaries for references. There have all been made available in there original uncorrected form by the Australian War Memorial site. These are obviously primary documents, filled in by several persons over a length of time. But are they considered reliable? I would suggest not, but was looking for some other opinions. Here is a link to one of the diaries used [55] Jim Sweeney (talk) 09:13, 9 January 2012 (UTC)

Can we say Fog of war? I'd consider them reliable for individual experiences, but not for most factual information. Hrafn^Talk_Stalk(P) 09:20, 9 January 2012 (UTC)

I included small numbers of references to a Royal Australian Air Force operations record book (which is the RAAF equivalent of a war diary) and a personal file in the National Archives of Australia in the No. 79 Squadron RAAF and John Treloar (museum administrator) articles with no complaints at all during their FACs. Hawkeye7 also referenced several war diaries in the FA Battle of Sio and (from memory) several articles which have passed A class reviews, so there's no generic problem with using these primary sources in articles. My personal approach is to only use them to add extra details to topics which are explicitly covered in secondary sources and where there's a clear-cut need for this information, and I think that's the approach most other editors take. The official war diaries held by the AWM are one the bedrocks of Australian military history and have been heavily used by virtually all serious Australian military historians, so they can be presumed to be a broadly accurate records of the unit's experiences. They are primary sources though, so they need to be used in moderation and with great care. You might be interested in John Treloar (museum administrator)#World War I for an indication of the kind of effort which went into ensuring that the war diaries were of a good standard. Nick-D (talk) 10:45, 9 January 2012 (UTC)

OK if they have been accepted at FAC, will accept that. Jim Sweeney (talk)

That sounds more pompous then I meant. Jim Sweeney (talk) 10:53, 9 January 2012 (UTC)

They are obviously primary sources. However, they will have been written at the time, as the commanding officer saw the situation: he may not have been able to see the wider picture. Subsequent writing by historians who have been able to compare them with other sources and one war diary with that of the next unit should provide a more balanced synthesis. Peterkingiron (talk) 01:01, 15 January 2012 (UTC)

Naval Memoirs by Admirals of the Fleet

I wish to contribute to the existing very brief article on the Dover Patrol which has serious issues at the moment. The available sources seem to range from brief mentions on non-academic websites on the one hand, to the more or less contemporaneous memoirs of the senior Admirals involved on the other. Specifically: "The Crisis of the Naval War", by Jellicoe published 1920, and "The Dover Patrol 1915-1917" by Bacon (who commanded the Patrol during this period) published in 1919. Having read the relevant policies and guidance, would I be right to conclude the such sources are not considered "primary" but nevertheless are "first hand" and therefore lack the required independence for use as reliable sources in general? But would they be considered reliable sources for basic factual information, such as numbers of ships, dates of events, and roles of the personnel iyou won't nvolved? Might they be considered reliable sources for other material and if so what sort? I assume that other indpendent secondary sources would be essential for such matters as establishing the contribution of this force to the various campaigns and eventual outcome of WW1? Inspeximus (talk) 18:31, 9 January 2012 (UTC)

Your understanding looks correct to me. Memoirs should be used with care, but can be assumed to have gotten the basic facts right. As you note, they're note useful for assessing the contribution the forces under the command of the author made, unless you make it clear that it's the commander's opinion (eg, "In his memoirs, Bacon stated that the Dover Patrol had been very successful..."). In regards to sources on this, I think that the official history of the Royal Navy in World War I should have material on the Dover Patrol and is a reliable and independent source. Nick-D (talk) 10:35, 10 January 2012 (UTC)

Jellicoe and Bacon ought to do for certain matters, but bear in mind that one of the reasons Jellicoe was sacked at the end of 1917 was because he was protecting Bacon, whose failure to adequately close the Channel to U-Boats led to his own dismissal at the start of 1918. Hood had been sacked in 1915 because Churchill thought he wasn't aggressive enough, something I doubt you'll find (but I'll check my copy) in Churchill's The World Crisis. Modern secondary sources are necessary to lend some perspective. —Simon Harley (Talk | Library). 13:45, 10 January 2012 (UTC)

Thank you both for your useful responses and guidance. Might I ask if you know whether the official Naval History is available online and if so where? Finally, given the wealth of material on Wikipedia relating to other aspects of the Navy in WW1 could you speculate as to why there is so little in the existing Dover Patrol article itself? For example, is this a very contentious subject that is unsuitable for a novice in such matters? Perhaps this latter point would better be answered on this page Talk:Dover_Patrol Inspeximus (talk) 15:55, 10 January 2012 (UTC)

The official naval histories (five volumes) by Corbett and Hurd will give some details on the formation of the patrol and the actions it took part in. It's not necessarily all that accurate because it was working from most but not all the official British records, and only from published accounts on the German side, which weren't necessarily all that accurate either. Revised editions were published of the earlier volumes only a decade or so later. Volume Two is available for download here. I think the main reason why no one has edited the Dover Patrol page is just lack of interest: I've been on Wikipedia for six years now editing mostly naval articles and don't remember looking at the article once until this week. —Simon Harley (Talk | Library). 10:44, 11 January 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for the references and online link. It would seem that the official histories are all in copyright still but one volume has slipped through the net. I've contributed a draft of a replacement article via my user space - as explained here: Talk:Dover_Patrol. Inspeximus (talk) 08:34, 12 January 2012 (UTC)

• You need to look at how more recent historians have regarded these memoirs. I was recetnly looking at a WWI history which cited some one's memoirs and referred to them as unreliable. It all depends on how far the author relied merely relied on his own memory and how far on officail records or contemporary diaries. Even then he is inevitably giving his own POV on the subject. Try to use the work of more recent historians, who will have considered the memoirs against other historical sources. Corbett has a good reputation as a historian. A current article may only be short, because no one has taken the trouble to find out about it and write something longer. Be bold, others are likely to be watching the article and will pull you up if you go off the rails. Peterkingiron (talk) 00:46, 15 January 2012 (UTC)

Google+

Has Google+ been discussed as a reliable source here? I tried to search the archives, but due to the name the results were less than useful, even for "Google Plus" in quotes. Yworo (talk) 19:35, 9 January 2012 (UTC)

It's a social network. It would be the same as Twitter or Facebook. --Walter Görlitz (talk) 19:46, 9 January 2012 (UTC)

That's what I thought, but I wanted to make sure there wasn't something about Google+ specifically that I was unaware of. Yworo (talk) 02:33, 10 January 2012 (UTC)

Well I hate to tell you but G+ is being presented as a reliable source. I have just learned at Wikipedia talk:External links/Perennial websites that it can be used, and if "localized consensus approves the inclusion of text" then that apparently is all that is needed. Otr500 (talk) 02:00, 15 January 2012 (UTC)

External links policy is not the same thing as reliable source policy. We do link to some things that we should never use as sources. DreamGuy (talk) 18:37, 15 January 2012 (UTC)

Penumbra (band)

The page of the band 'Penumbra' on wikipedia, says that the band is active from 1996 till present. But I did some reasearch on some different information sources, and I came to the conclusion that the band has split-up in 2009, cause the only sourses that say Penumbra is still active, are wikipedia and sites based on wikipedia. Metalarchive says they've split-up, and their last.fm biography stops at 2009. Their Myspace has a comment about them being split-up. So I think it's pretty clear Penumbra isn't active anymore. I edited the wikipedia page saying "1996 - present" to "1996-2009". I would appreciate it when this edit gets confirmed, except if anyone thinks the band is still active, I don't know them personnaly, so I'm not 100% sure, but I'm like 90% sure they've split-up in 2009.

Illustrious Americans (1896)

The book "Illustrious Americans - Their Lives and Great Achievements" by Edward Everett Hale, published 1896, is used as a source in Thomas Jefferson. I have some reservations about using such an old source, especially in a field where there are plenty of modern sources, but would welcome some additional opinions. There already is a somewhat acrimonious discussion at Talk:Thomas Jefferson#1896_Illustrious_Americans that might profit from some cooler heads, too. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 22:12, 9 January 2012 (UTC)

This is a very old source to be citing on such an important figure. We have had 115 years of further historical research since, during which historians will have refined theri views on the subject. If writing a book on him, it would be appropriate (indeed usual) to include a historiographic discussion of the changing views, but not in a short beiogaphic article, which is all WP can offer. Peterkingiron (talk) 00:38, 15 January 2012 (UTC)

www.fansshare.com news articles for Maisie Williams

Hi, this board seems kinda swarmed, but I hope somebody can have a look at this. Basically I am looking for sources to expand Maisie Williams. Now www.fansshare.com has an interesting set of articles on her. The question is are they reliable? So far I have determined the following:

• The site doesn't seem to have an "about" page describing how it works and who is behind it
• The sites name and slogan ("by fans, for fans") seems to indicate content is user submitted and this is clearly the case for images and comments to news articles.
• However, if you visit the job page they seem to have a professional team of editors: "We work out of Los Angeles and require a writer who can commit to office hours on a 8am until 6pm basis, Monday to Friday. You will be working with a team of 10 who are located in-house and externally across the world."
• No name or pseudonym is given as author of the news articles.

What do you think? Yoenit (talk) 22:59, 9 January 2012 (UTC)

That site raises BLP alarm bells to me, I wouldn't touch it. --POVbrigand (talk) 12:14, 12 January 2012 (UTC)

The name alone rules it out, I would think.DreamGuy (talk) 18:40, 15 January 2012 (UTC)

I have these references for my article yet administrators keep saying they are not relabile enough

Retrieve Date : 2012-01-09
No 1 : http://www.gamespot.com - Alexa Ranking : 429 , Google Page Rank : 8
No 2 : http://xin.07073.com - Alexa Ranking : 3,122 , Google Page Rank : 5
No 3 : http://www.mmorpg.com - Alexa Ranking : 9,362 , Google Page Rank : 5
No 4 : http://www.bbgsite.com - Alexa Ranking : 17,043 , Google Page Rank : 4
No 5 : http://www.onrpg.com - Alexa Ranking : 20,987 , Google Page Rank : 5
No 6 : http://mmohuts.com - Alexa Ranking : 25,108 , Google Page Rank : 6
No 7 : http://browsergamez.com - Alexa Ranking : 80,844 , Google Page Rank : 5
No 8 : http://www.monstermmorpg.com - Alexa Ranking : 87,933 , Google Page Rank : 3
No 9 : http://gameonline2.com - Alexa Ranking : 165,623 , Google Page Rank : 1

The articles used as references

By Ange Perdu (2011) : http://mmohuts.com/browser-games/monster-mmorpg
By Remko Molenaar (Proxzor), OnRPG Journalist Co-Written by Darren Henderson (DizzyPW), OnRPG Editor-in-Chief (10-12-2011) : http://www.onrpg.com/MMO/MonsterMMORPG/review/MonsterMMORPG-Fight-to-the-Top
By Qing Lan (2011-12-09) : http://xin.07073.com/haiwai/539191.html
By GameSpot administration : http://www.gamespot.com/monstermmorpg/platform/webonly
By MMORPG.com administration : http://www.mmorpg.com/gamelist.cfm/game/731/MonsterMMORPG.html
By bbgsite.com administration : http://gamelist.bbgsite.com/goto/monster-mmorpg.shtml
By browsergamez.com administration : http://monster-mmorpg.browsergamez.com/
By gameonline2.com administration : http://gameonline2.com/online/monster-mmorpg


This was my submission : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MonsterMMORPG

Now this is a browser based mmorpg game. It is most fit at this category and same genre with the games there : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Massively_multiplayer_online_role-playing_games
When i look the games there listed, 90% of them has lesser authoritative references links than me. I really do not understand how the reviewers are deciding whether a link is authoritative or not.
So i believe that the references are enough to prove that MonsterMMORPG is a notable game to be listed on wikipedia. Thank you.
OnlineGamesExpert (talk) 10:58, 11 January 2012 (UTC)

I tried to tell user ShareToGain, on IRC (#wikipedia-en-help), to focus on the better links (such as this) and dump the less credible references (such as this and this), but ShareToGain is determined to use all of the links. Banaticus (talk) 00:25, 10 January 2012 (UTC)

Note that some of the generally more notable references (gamespot) have very minimal content (almost database/directory style for this particular game)

Note that it is not particular for this game. GameSpot does not make full reviews for browser games yet (at least it is what i am said) but they do analyze the game and decides whether the game is notable enough to be added their game listing or not. Also there are very good and not very good reference links and what should really matter is sum of the reference links authority to decide whether game is notable or not.OnlineGamesExpert (talk) 10:58, 11 January 2012 (UTC)

Non published article hosted on dropbox.com

[Note: The article is published and was out on newsstands officially on January 10, 2012, with advance copies released a week before. Article links to PDF was removed to adhere to copyright policy.]Expectgood (talk) 03:38, 10 January 2012 (UTC)

It is dated for March 2012, in the future, and is hosted by a source not of the Magazine in question. Is this a reliable source? Can this be used to support the content of the article? --RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 01:25, 10 January 2012 (UTC)

As noted previously to RightCowLeftCoast: The article IS ALREADY PUBLISHED. Go to the bookstores and check the newsstands and buy the magazine. Skin and Ink Magazine (http://skinandink.com) publishes in advance, and dropbox.com is an open sharing file, just like how Wikipedia is supposed to be used.

As most print publications are barely surviving these days, the magazine encourages people to buy the publication instead of reading its entire contents online. The PDF page on dropbox.com serves as a reference since the article is not available online. Clearly the cover with the title is on the magazine's homepage (an indication that it's already been published) as on other magazine retailers' site (e.g. http://www.comixzone.com/itemdesc.asp?ic=07447050214203). Expectgood (talk) 03:38, 10 January 2012 (UTC)

Please sign additions to talk pages, as requested on your talk page.

Please see WP:BURDEN. It is not up to me to provide a reliable source; I can question the source as reliable. The reason for my posting this concern is that I am looking for other opinions to form a consensus as to whether the article hosted on a third party site is in fact a reliable source.

I have checked the magazine's website and have not seen the MARCH 2012 magazine hosted, so cannot independently verify whether the article in question is published or not. --RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 02:22, 10 January 2012 (UTC)

If the magazine article is a published reliable source, the article can be cited as a reference. However, it is hosted on Dropbox in violation of copyright and the citation cannot link to it. Yworo (talk) 02:27, 10 January 2012 (UTC)

Links to the PDF article has been removed to adhere to copyright policy, including the one posted on this talk. As noted, the March 2012 issue was officially out on newsstands on January 10, 2012, with advance copies released a week before. RightCowLeftCoast: Please do your research before you start flagging away.Expectgood (talk) 03:38, 10 January 2012 (UTC)

If it is in fact on newsstands, as verification need not be online, it may meet VER, but that doesn't mean that a request to verify cannot be made. --RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 17:47, 10 January 2012 (UTC)

• Some academic journals will undertake an on-line pre-publication of articles, someties only to subscribers (e.g. society members). This is a form of publication, as much as putting it on a more public website, but it may be unwise to provide a link to it, as it is liable when the website is altered after it is published as hard copy. Alternaively, you need to watch for that happening to update the link/citation. The fact that a publication bears a date that has not yet arrived is not too concerning: magazine publihsers frequently do this, so that it looks like next week's issue early, rather than last week's out of date one. Nevertheless, a dropbox item may potentially not be the final version, so that you need to be wary. Peterkingiron (talk) 00:56, 15 January 2012 (UTC)

Blog by claimed "expert"

In two recent occasions, different days, different IP editors have tried to add a reference to a blog. Blogs are not generally considered reliable sources. However, as it has been raised twice, I would like the opinion of other editors where the following link is to be considered a RS:

• http://www.andrewerickson.com/2011/07/general-chen-bingde-pla-chief-of-general-staff-becomes-first-chinese-official-to-confirm-publicly-that-%E2%80%9C2700-km-range%E2%80%9D-df-21d-anti-ship-ballistic-missile-asbm-is-in-development/

An IP editor claims the person to be a "foremost expert", and I don't have an independent verification of the claim. The individual appears to be an Associate Professor at the U.S. Navy War College; but that doesn't explain the removal of information hosted at a consulate website, which is a reliable source. --RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 02:15, 10 January 2012 (UTC)

The expert exception pretty much requires that the expert has been previously published by an independent publisher in the field of expertise. Just saying they are an expert is not enough, ask what books or journal articles of theirs have been published. If they have a reasonable bibliography of published (not self-published!) material, they probably qualify. Yworo (talk) 02:19, 10 January 2012 (UTC)

I looked at the blog. Those U.S. Naval Institute Press books of which the expert is the first listed co-editor would tend to indicate that the expert is qualified. Most likely the same information is also in the books. It would be better to cite the books, if possible. Yworo (talk) 02:23, 10 January 2012 (UTC)

Yes. Unless the blog is outright fraudulent, the author would seem eminently qualified to comment on the range of Chinese missiles. --FormerIP (talk) 02:28, 10 January 2012 (UTC)

It does meet rs standards for self-published works as the writer is an expert. However judgement should be used. This is really an anomaly in rs. The consequence is the blogs of experts who are politically involved (e.g., Chomsky, Gingrich, Ignatieff, Krugman) become elevated to rs. TFD (talk) 02:58, 10 January 2012 (UTC)

WP:RS is clear on this one - a named expert, recognized as such, writing in his sphere of expertise, is a "reliable source." If editors do not "like" a source countradicting what they WP:KNOW then they must, perforce, find sources by other experts with disparate views. Too often we find editors insisting "but that expert is wrong" or "others disagree with that expert" in an attempt to remove writings by a person generally acknowledged to be an expert from an article. Cheers. Collect (talk) 06:56, 10 January 2012 (UTC)

The editing dispute appears to be specifically about the maximum range of a missile (either it's 2000, 2700, or 3000 mi.) Since he is a recognized expert, might not there be other reliable sources that echo his opinion? That may help defuse the "sourcing to a blog" problem. - LuckyLouie (talk) 15:05, 10 January 2012 (UTC)

There is no "sourcing to a blog" problem, since it meets the "expert" exception. Also, the date is most likely also in one of the expert's books. That's where I'd suggest looking for a replacement for the blog cite, even though there is no need to do this. Yworo (talk) 16:12, 10 January 2012 (UTC)

Note: The provision for using experts writing in their own field dates to March 2009. Collect (talk) 16:25, 10 January 2012 (UTC)

Ludovico Arroyo Bañas

I would like to call in to question the references used to support the content found at the article Ludovico Arroyo Bañas. The two major references used is an essay hosted on Angelfire, and affidavits that I cannot verify the existence of.

I am looking for community opinions as to whether the references used in the article meet WP:RS.--RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 20:12, 10 January 2012 (UTC)

Though question. Normally I would say that Angelfire is not RS, but reading through the page I noticed a few things:

The article is well written. The authors are introduced and to me seem to be capable of providing an overview of the topic. Further, the page has a bibliography, indicating that some of the information is from other sources and not primary:

• Historical Calendar, National Historical Commission, Manila 1970
• Philippine Information Paper submitted to the Trade Union Seminar/conference for Asian Labor Leaders September 14 to October 14, 1978, Federal Republic of Germany
• Reyes, Edmundo A., A History of Amateur Radio in the Philippines, Quezon City, 1974
• Reyes, Pedrito , Pictorial History of the Philippines, Quezon City 1953
• Stevens , Frederic H., Sto. Tomas Internment Camp (1942-1945), Limited Edition 1946
• Telecom News, Bureau of Telecommunications, Manila

And finally, the author left his email address, maybe he can be contacted to clarify which parts are primary sourced by him and his co-author and which parts are from RS.

To me those are signs that, maybe, the use of this source should not be dismissed outright. Which doesn't mean it is 100% proof RS, the "unreliable source" tags are absolutely justified.

Finally, I can imagine that free web hosting sites like Angelfire are popular in countries were internet infrastructure is set up differently than in the US or Europe. For the authors, it might be a viable way of self publication. That should be taken into consideration too.

--POVbrigand (talk) 12:02, 12 January 2012 (UTC)

Talk:James_Kirchick#Kirchick_Integrity

An editor has removed a claim on the James Kirchick article based on a YouTube video by someone named Ben Swan reporting for something called Reality Check. I never heard of either him or Reality Check, and it isn't clear if the person who uloaded the video has the rights to it. See Talk:James_Kirchick#Kirchick_Integrity for a link to the video. I don't think this is a reliable source from which to remove the information from the article. The Mark of the Beast (talk) 22:17, 10 January 2012 (UTC)

ffmpeg.org

Hi, can anyone tell me if ffmpeg Hall of Shame direct link (not working) archived version can be considered a reliable source to document a copyright violation? In other words, if the "Hall of Shame" lists program X as being in violation of ffmpeg's copyright can we consider that a "reliable source" and include those claims in the article about program X? My POV is that it is a self-published source, a primary source, with a clear conflict of interest, and therefore not a Reliable source. It would also be a violation of Wikipedia:Biographies of living persons as we are reporting unsourced accusations and as a consequence cause Wikipedia:Libel problems. Feedback welcome. --SF007 (talk) 23:12, 10 January 2012 (UTC)

I would say no. It's a cheap-shot attack page. Unless they took the alleged offending parties to court and won or settled out of court, which would be in the news, it's just their assertion, and even if they claim to provide "proof", could not be considered a reliable source. Yworo (talk) 23:31, 10 January 2012 (UTC)

Agree completely with Yworo on this. DreamGuy (talk) 18:43, 15 January 2012 (UTC)

Book by Donald R Hale

Hi folks, I just obtained a copy of this book, but I'm not sure if it qualifies as a reliable source (for this article primarily). Its author has written a bunch of civil war books, but I don't think he was an academic historian--he seems to have been the president of a couple local history societies [56]. The book I have was published by this publisher, it's apparently a Private press. So do you think this book is a reliable source? Mark Arsten (talk) 23:55, 10 January 2012 (UTC)

• After reading your question, I just reviewed WP:RS again and noticed these policies that might be helpful here: "Articles should be based on reliable, third-party, published sources with a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy" and "One can confirm that discussion of the source has entered mainstream academic discourse by checking the scholarly citations it has received in citation indexes" and also along the lines of the citation index: "How accepted, high-quality reliable sources use a given source provides evidence, positive or negative, for its reliability and reputation. The more widespread and consistent this use is, the stronger the evidence." It seems like it would be worthwhile to confirm what type of references are listed in the book's bibliography as well. These are a few thoughts I had on your question and as you might have noticed, there are quite a few editors who seem to be extremely well-versed on sourcing issues. Maybe your question will catch their attention as well. Good luck.Coaster92 (talk) 05:11, 11 January 2012 (UTC)

• Good thoughts, thanks. I did notice that the authors of this book list Hale as a good source in their research. Mark Arsten (talk) 18:03, 11 January 2012 (UTC)

From my reading of the Wiki policy, this tends to give reliability to the source because this reflects that Hale's book is considered a reliable source by other authors, at least these authors, according to the full WP:RS guideline on this:

"Usage by other sources Shortcut: WP:USEBYOTHERS How accepted, high-quality reliable sources use a given source provides evidence, positive or negative, for its reliability and reputation. The more widespread and consistent this use is, the stronger the evidence. For example, widespread citation without comment for facts is evidence of a source's reputation and reliability for similar facts, while widespread doubts about reliability weigh against it. If outside citation is the main indicator of reliability, particular care should be taken to adhere to other guidelines and policies, and to not represent unduly contentious or minority claims. The goal is to reflect established views of sources as far as we can determine them." There is also this section of WP:RS: "The reliability of a source depends on context. Each source must be carefully weighed to judge whether it is reliable for the statement being made and is the best such source for that context. In general, the more people engaged in checking facts, analyzing legal issues, and scrutinizing the writing, the more reliable the publication." It sounds like you are going in the right direction.Coaster92 (talk) 04:32, 12 January 2012 (UTC)

Sources in Ensoulment

Look at me, dragging obviously unreliable sources here again because of POV-pushing users who refuse to get the point.

In Ensoulment, we have a recently added section on ensoulment (= the point at which a human gets a soul) in Judaism. The section is already poor, because it was written by an agenda-pushing user without regard for the weight given to various points of view in reliable sources, but I've already committed to dealing with that when I can find time so this isn't about that. What we have is the repeatedly added claim that a text supports ensoulment at conception, cited to these lovely, lovely sources:

• "Does the Soul Survive? A Jewish Journey to Belief in Afterlife," a document by a paranormal theorist hosted on a "shamanic healing" website, which mentions the text in a footnote as support for its claims about reincarnation (incidentally, it doesn't support the text this user is citing it for, but when has that ever mattered...)
• "Divine Seeding," a PhD dissertation from an evangelical Christian seminary, which attempts to use the text as support for its theories about the virgin birth of Jesus
• An 1899 translation (the first such) of the primary religious text

I've argued that when you have to resort to Christian student papers, loopy fringe material, and analysis of primary documents to write about Judaism, what you are writing does not belong on Wikipedia. PhD dissertations have been judged reliable in the past, but all reliability discussions are contextual and the fact that this user apparently can't produce anything by scholars who study Judaism (or, y'know, actual published academics regardless) that discusses this text doesn't say much for the worth of this paragraph he has repeatedly inserted. (And this is completely apart from the weight issue.) –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 08:24, 11 January 2012 (UTC)

The straightforward statement "The Chronicles of Jerahmeel picture the soul as entering into the sperm even before conception" seems to be quite adequately sourced in the words of the book itself and in what a published Ph.D. dissertation says. Esoglou (talk) 09:37, 11 January 2012 (UTC)

Two problems with the Chronicles of Jerahmeel: it's a primary source, and we don't know how noteworthy it is. We require reliable mainstream scholarly secondary sources for both interpretation and to establish noteworthiness so we know how much weight to assign. A dissertation from an evangelical Christian seminary falls far short of the mark here. Evangelical Christian seminaries do not exactly have a reputation for top-notch scholarship. Ph.D. dissertations are sometimes reliable for factual data they may contain, but rarely for conclusions. If the statement about ensoulment in the Chronicles is truly noteworthy, it will have been discussed in far more reliable sources. If the dissertation is all you have, then that indicates that the statement is of little importance in modern Judaism. As far as historical Judaism is concerned, top-notch academic sources are required. In either case, "Does the Soul Survive?" is clearly not reliable. Dominus Vobisdu (talk) 09:59, 11 January 2012 (UTC)

The Chronicles of Jerahmeel, "one of the most important and comprehensive anthologies of Hebrew prose" (The Oxford Handbook of Jewish Studies), is clearly notable. It is not cited as a primary source for when animation actually takes place: it is instead quoted as "picturing" the soul as entering the sperm, as it explicitly does without any need of an "interpretation". That this Jewish work does picture the soul as entering the sperm is not a "conclusion" reached by the Ph.D. dissertation: it is instead a factual datum that it mentions. Esoglou (talk) 10:26, 11 January 2012 (UTC)

No. "An important and comprehensive anthologies of Hebrew prose" does not mean that it is an authority on Jewish thought on reproduction. As for your "picturing" argument, that seems like a poor defense of OR to me. The noteworthiness of the Chronicles' statement on ensoulment still needs to be backed up with solid scholarly sources. The noteworthiness of the book as a whole is not the question here, but of the statement itself and its relevance to modern Jewish beliefs on ensoulment. Furthermore, the concept of sperm did not even exist until the invention of the microscope, and the concept of fertilization as we understand it was not worked out until the 20th century. Interpreting a pre-modern text in terms of modern biology is OR. Dominus Vobisdu (talk) 10:47, 11 January 2012 (UTC)

I would have thought whatever was taught nowadays should be given as the major point of view and the others mentioned as other ideas. I've come across that story in the Chronicles of Jerahmeel before and I viewed it then as just a pretty story and still do, it could be mentioned but should have very low weight. The idea of sperm is not a stopper, the idea of the seed has been around for a very long time and that's all sperm means. Basically the weight needs to be got right but I see no problems with anything as a reliable source. Dmcq (talk) 11:40, 11 January 2012 (UTC)

The space given to Aristotle, Stoicism, Epicureanism, etc., makes it clear that article is not about modern views. The concept of "sperm" or "seed" has existed for millennia - you must be thinking of the concept of "sperm cell" or "spermatozoon" - and "sperm", from Greek sperma, meaning "seed", is used by the Chronicles of Jerahmeel in its sense of "semen", Latin for "seed", the only sense that the word had then. People did not have to wait until the 20th century to have a concept of "conception" ("fertilization" is used neither in the Chronicles of Jerahmeel nor in the account of it in the Wikipedia article). Again Wikipedia is only saying, as stated in the Ph.D. dissertation, that the idea of the soul entering the semen (let us use this less ambiguous term, both here and in the article) even before it is placed in the woman's womb is found in this Jewish writing. Other views of a human soul as entering with the first breath after birth are also mentioned in the article. Wikipedia is not made to say that the soul does enter the semen before conception. It is not even made to say that this was a general Jewish belief. Esoglou (talk) 11:47, 11 January 2012 (UTC)

I agree with Dmcq that it should be mentioned though with low weight. Esoglou (talk) 11:51, 11 January 2012 (UTC)

I think it is fairly clear from the Christianity section that modern views should be made prominent and others noted as historical or apocryphal. The lead doesn't say it is historical. Dmcq (talk) 11:56, 11 January 2012 (UTC)

If y'all want to get into a discussion of due weight, I'd be happy to do that as well, but right now let's deal with the fact that none of these sources are even reliable. –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 17:32, 11 January 2012 (UTC)

Why are they not reliable sources for the article? Dmcq (talk) 19:05, 11 January 2012 (UTC)

Because a website promoting reincarnation and a seminary student paper about the virgin birth of Jesus do not have the "reputation for fact-checking and accuracy" required by WP:RS that would allow us to cite them when writing about Jewish beliefs. As for the primary source, it's long understood that we can't just cite religious texts - there needs to be reliable secondary-source analysis, that's why we have Template:Religious text primary. –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 19:21, 11 January 2012 (UTC)

Roscelese has removed the mention of the Chronicles of Jerahmeel, alleging an agreement on this noticeboard that the cited sources are rubbish. Has it really been agreed here that the half-line mention in the Judaism section of the Ensoulment article of what that book says is devoid of reliable sources? Esoglou (talk) 10:29, 12 January 2012 (UTC)

I don't see any justification for mentioning it at all unless it has been mentioned in serious academic sources. The secondary sources used are clearly unreliable, and the use of the primary source borders is basically OR. Dominus Vobisdu (talk) 10:34, 12 January 2012 (UTC)

My opinion is that the section "Judaism" offers several different Jewish views on the timing of ensoulment. From an outsider point of view every possible timing of ensoulment is more or less mentioned. The Chronicles add one more timing to the collection, the timing of ensoulment in the sperm before conception. The Chronicles of Jerahmeel is, as I understood, an accepted primary religious source. Primary sources should be used with great care, for religious primary sources maybe with even more care, I don't know. The sentence in question: "The Chronicles of Jerahmeel picture God as making the soul enter the semen even before conception." correctly reflects what the primary source says and it is correctly attributed to the source. I think that there is no original research or synth in the representation. The next question is whether the view from the Chronicles is worth mentioning or undue. As the whole section lists up different timings of ensoulment and this accepted primary source merely adds another one, I would say that it is not undue to make a tiny mentioning. I believe that my opinion is backed up, because this timing has also been mentioned in a dissertation. A dissertation may not be a good source to state something as fact, but in this case the dissertation is only used to show that the timing of the chronicles has been noted and discussed in a scientific paper. So I think that it is no problem to mention the timing from the chronicle and that only the dissertation should be used as proof for "noteworthiness" of the timing, the other secondary sources are not neccesary. Generally, I agree with Dmcq. --POVbrigand (talk) 11:28, 12 January 2012 (UTC)

"How the section currently looks" is not a very good barometer because the current section is poorly written with the aim of promoting the view that Jews believed in early ensoulment, in contrast to the weight given to different views in reliable sources, as I elaborate on the talk page. I'm meaning to get around to overhauling it in a NPOV fashion but time is a constraint. With this in mind - keeping in mind, I mean, that the gist of the section, once written properly with reference to reliable sources, will not be "Jews' beliefs about when ensoulment happened were all over the place, but they liked the idea of ensoulment at conception, just like us Catholics" but "Jews did not develop a unified theory of ensoulment and what we know about Jewish philosophers' thoughts on it generally comes from other contexts and from when something does not have a soul; the earliest pseudo-consensus was for 'formation' at 40 days, but the prevailing view is ensoulment at birth" - it's even more evident that this section is Esoglou trying to shoehorn in something that more closely suits his beliefs, regardless of WP:RS. As Dominus Vobisdu has pointed out, student work from an evangelical Christian seminary does not meet the academic standards we consider when talking about RS. –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 17:39, 12 January 2012 (UTC)

Surely the phrase can only be judged in its actual context, not in line with some non-existent hypothetical context pictured by Roscelese. Roscelese's hypothetical context is not the only one that could be presented. Even today there are Jews who say: "According to the Divine Plan, G-d infuses each microscopic drop of semen with a soul. This soul is a living vitality of its own, the source of life, and cherished by G-d, who has commanded us not to waste it. ... Each drop of semen is more than a "potential" life - it is already a living soul. For this reason, the willful sin of spilling semen in vain is considered like the spilling of blood - like taking the life of a person." And there are Jews who say: "It is forbidden to discharge semen in vain ... It is stated in the Talmud that the offender incurs the punishment of 'death by heaven' as these actions are considered the equivalent of murder." So this idea, which existed among Jews in the time of the Chronicles of Jerahmeel, also exists among Jews today. And so this is an alternative hypothetical context that would show up even more clearly than now the unreasonableness of Roscelese's deletion of the mention, even just as something in the past, of the existence among Jews of an idea of ensouled semen.

I agree with POVbrigand and Dmcq, who have rightly said that in the actual existing context, the context in which all of us except Roscelese are judging it, the statement, "The Chronicles of Jerahmeel picture God as making the soul enter the semen even before conception", is reliably sourced. Esoglou (talk) 20:27, 12 January 2012 (UTC)

I'm having OR issues here too. I do not get any sense of how the Jerahmeel statement represents anyone's view other than its author. Even our article on the work doesn't give a sense of that. We need some secondary source for how much this viewpoint was accepted. Mangoe (talk) 13:12, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

And yet, it is demonstrably a historical Jewish view (one moreover that exists even among today's Jews), like the historical Jewish view of ensoulment at birth and the historical Jewish view of ensoulment when the child first answers "Amen", for neither of which is information given on how widely or narrowly it was held. These views may have been minor ones, but they were Jewish views. Esoglou (talk) 13:52, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

And the Secret Gospel of Mark may or may not be a historical Christian view (the jury is still out on "historical"). But it's inarguable that it's unimportant in the history of the mainstream of Christian theology, because there's is next to no ancient reference to it. We need to know whether these things were minor or not; if nobody discusses them, then it's safe to assume that they are minor. In Judaism, the rabbis discuss the heck out of everything, so if ensoulment is even an issue for them, the Talmud should discuss all the options. Mangoe (talk) 12:10, 15 January 2012 (UTC)

Well it doesn't seem to be a real issue because there isn't this idea of original sin. They discuss things ad nauseum when it might matter in actual life, not angels on the tip of a pin sort of stuff. Dmcq (talk) 18:04, 15 January 2012 (UTC)

Although the intention was just to present the view of the Chronicles of Jerahmeel, discussion above has gone instead to whether that view was shared by anyone else. For that reason I have now added information on ideas in other Jewish sources. Esoglou (talk) 08:47, 16 January 2012 (UTC)

Powerpopaholic: usable as a source?

I'm in the process of trying to clean up an article that's up for deletion (Skeleton Staff) and most of the links were unusable. The sole site that survived is a blog called "Powerpopaholic". I'm almost entirely sure that this blog is unusable as a reliable source, but before I completely remove the article's remaining sources I wanted to double check that this blog is non-notable and not usable as a reliable or trivial source. The blog is only sporadically used on Wikipedia, with most of the links that I found belonging to a similarly titled blog that is now dead in the water. Here's a link to the website: [57].Tokyogirl79 (talk) 13:30, 11 January 2012 (UTC)tokyogirl79

[58] makes it pretty clear that while the person may well be wonderful, the blog falls squarely under the WP definition thereof. Not RS as a source. Collect (talk) 13:40, 11 January 2012 (UTC)

Ica Stones query about historical material sourced to Skepdic where original source is dubious and in any case challenging its inclusion

I originally brought this up at FTN, partially because I wasn't sure if this was mainly fringe, RS or NPOV, but in the course of the discussion, or at least my thoughts on the matter, I decided it is really an issue about sources and how they are used, so I'm copying it here and will put a note at FTN asking people to move here

The issue is a sentence that says "In the past, a number of engraved stones were uncovered in the context of archaeological excavations, and some engraved stones may have been brought from Peru to Spain in the 16th century." It's sourced to Skepdic.

On the talk page, I've written:

Let's make one thing clear, when we speak of the 'Ica Stones' we are not just referring to any old engraved stones, but to stones "decorated with etched depictions of advanced technology and medical procedures, depictions of other planets and unknown continents, as well as numerous depictions of humans and dinosaurs co-existing." My concern is that by making a statement that engraved stones were taken to Spain without any evidence that these qualify as 'Ica Stones' we are misleading our readers. I'm also saying that we have problems with the sources for this claim. As another editor wrote recently at RSN, "Sources are not inherently reliable or unreliable simply because they are one type or another. What makes a source unreliable is how we use them."

I've tried to trace where the sources got this from to see if that provided any evidence that any stones that can legitimately be called 'Ica Stones' were found and taken to Spain. I found [59] which says "One student of prehistory, JR Jochmans, claims that a Jesuit missionary, Father Simon who accompanied Pizarro along the Peruvian coast in 1525,". But Jochmans is not what we think of as a typical 'student of prehistory' but someone who among other things claims to have 'ghost co-authored' the book "Secrets of the Lost Races" by Rene Noorbergen and other strange stuff. [60] I can't find anything about this Father Simon. Other sources (eg [61]) use the claim (ie Father or Padre Simon found some engraved stones, Spanish explorers took them to Spain in 1562) but no one has any sources for this.

We have no reliable sources justifying our origins section. The fact that real engraved stones may exist/existed in the 16th century is not sufficent reason to suggest that they are the 'origins' of the Ica Stones or bear any relationship to them.

I've had a response, focussing on my statement that "when we speak of the 'Ica Stones' we are not just referring to any old engraved stones, but to stones "decorated with etched depictions of advanced technology and medical procedures, depictions of other planets and unknown continents, as well as numerous depictions of humans and dinosaurs co-existing." - the argument is that Ica Stones should refer to any stones "found in or near Ica." and that the sheer volume of stones speaks for them being old. I'm not sure if this is an RS or NPOV question, but it's certainly a fringe one and I strongly disagree that the phrase Ica Stones refers to anything else than these stones decorated with dinosaurs, etc. Dougweller (talk) 18:51, 9 January 2012 (UTC)

This is all very odd. There are only two respectable sources here, Carrolland Coppens. The point at issue is simply this: were there any engraved stones known from before 1966, when Javier Cabrera Darquea started his theorising? and if so, should the article mention them?

Coppens says "Cabrera’s private museum includes a collection of stones belonging to his father – Bolivia Cabrera, a Spanish aristocrat – gathered from the fields of the family plantation in the late 1930s." Later on he relates "The Soldis’ interest began in 1961 when, according to Herman Buse, the Ica River flooded and “uncovered in the Ocucaje region a large number of engraved stones which ever since have been an object of commerce for the huaqueros who found them” ". Similarly we have "Santiago Agurto Calvo, then rector of the Universidad Nacional de Ingenieria, who bought many and, in 1966, began excavating pre-Inca tombs around Ocucaje. In an article that year, he described the designs as “Unidentifiable things, insects, fish, birds, cats, fabulous creatures and human beings [..] in elaborate and fantastic compositions.” "

Coppens goes on to say "discoveries of engraved stones in the Ica region go back to Spanish records of the mid-15th century". As to what the older stones showed, he says "While some investigators claim that they were refused permission to see the Calco collection in the Museum of Ica stash, Neil Steede was granted access. He concluded that these “definitely genuine” stones show a finer workmanship and have less deep cuts than Cabrera’s stones. This is a clear indication of a more highly skilled manufacturer than Cabrera’s artisan. Furthermore, they are restricted to depicting conventional humans and existing animals, not extinct animals; nor do they include any examples of the more exotic motifs of the Cabrera stones."

Coppens sums up "It is quite possible for the engraved stones, if authentic, to have a simple anthropological origin." and "It seems increasingly likely that the Ica stones have been fabricated, but it is difficult to believe that they are all – estimates run to 50,000 pieces – made by one poor, uneducated farmer. No independent study has been made, if only to separate any possibly authentic artifacts from the fakes."

Carroll adopts a similar tone, ending with "Are the stones authentic? If by authentic one means that they were engraved by pre-Columbians, then the answer has to be an unqualified 'not all of them.' Some engraved stones are said to have been brought back to Spain in the 16th century. It is possible that some of the stones are truly examples of pre-Columbian art."

All I'm saying is that the article should admit the existence of old stones and appraise them in the same way as the sources. I am at a loss to understand Dougweller's motivation in trying to exclude such content. SamuelTheGhost (talk) 12:54, 10 January 2012 (UTC)

references

I thought you'd decided on my motivation, your edit summary talks about suppression of information. I don't think you've addressed my concerns. One is whether by 'Ica Stones' is meant 'any engraved stones from Ica', or the actual subject of the various fringe publications on what they call 'Ica Stones', ie stones engraved with dinosaurs, high tech, etc. I'm arguing that a badly sourced comment on some engraved stones which may have been sent to Spain is irrelevant and misleading to our readers. I'm also arguing that we have no reliable source for the statement - no mainstream historian, no historical texts we can somehow check, nothing but Carroll and Coppen repeating what a fringe writer said a long time ago. Do you really believe there could possibly be such '15th century' records? Before Columbus? Maybe that's just carelessness on the part of Philip Coppens (who by the way is not Philip Coppens but a fringe writer, eg [62]. He's simply not an acceptable source for an historical claim like that.

I also note that an editor has replaced the passage without discussion on the talk page. Not only that, he replaced other material I removed which concerned a statement that there were collections of these stones at two museums although my edit summary said "This is from the author's personal website, not a reliable source (not just because it's a personal site but also because he isn't a reliable source for this". The reason for replacing the material was "there's nothing unreliable about the report. When I went to the regional museum of Ica, they were there. I'm not sure about the others, but if what it said about that one is true, the others probably are too." which is clearly irrelevant to our policy on sources. Then he removed the descriptions which are key to the article, saying they were obviously fakes. That's a bit confusing - what I gather from that is that he agrees that the dinosaur etc engraved stones are fakes, which I agree with, but then what's the point of the article?

So I am asking you to find use of the phrase 'Ica Stones' in a context that is solely about engraved stones that have been authenticated by mainstream archaeologists and do not have dinosaurs, etc., to back up your claim that 'Ica Stones' as a phrase is not specific to such fringe claims. I'm also asking you to explain what makes Carroll or Coppens a reliable source for the claim about 16th or 15th century stones being found and sent to Spain. What I think is necessary to make a claim that similar stones were found in by Spanish explorers is a clearly reliable source from an archaeologist or historian about such stones describing them as having dinosaurs, heart transplants, star maps, etc. Dougweller (talk) 08:03, 11 January 2012 (UTC)

• Dougweller says "I am asking you to find use of the phrase 'Ica Stones' in a context that is solely about engraved stones that have been authenticated by mainstream archaeologists ...". I am asking Dougweller not to indulge in such silly rhetoric. As he must well know, I am not aware of any proper published study of Ica Stones at all by mainstream archaeologists, and if I knew of such I would certainly cite it. As for "I'm also asking you to explain what makes Carroll or Coppens a reliable source ...", they are certainly imperfect sources, but the best we seem to have. If they're not good enough, Dougweller should be listing this article at wp:afd and have done with it. But if we're accepting Carroll and Coppens, which I think reasonable in the context, Dougweller has no justification in his attempt to cherrypick their testimony as he clearly is trying to do.
• One can often see discussions of collections of artistic or historically significant objects where fakes may occur amongst the genuine things. Normally the approach is to try and concentrate on the genuine ones, and ignore the fakes. This is I think the first time I've seen someone say "let's ignore the genuine and concentrate solely on the fakes". If I were to go to Ica, find an andesite stone and scratch a picture of a dinosaur on it, apparently according to Dougweller this will be an "Ica Stone", but if I find one in an ancient tomb, it won't. Weird!
• Dougweller asks rhetorically, above, "what's the point of the article?". My answer to that question is that it should be a description of inscribed andesite stones found at or near Ica, with as good as possible an analysis of their probable origin and significance. It would really be illuminating if Dougweller could give us his answer to the question, particularly as he raised it. SamuelTheGhost (talk) 18:14, 11 January 2012 (UTC)

As I note above, I've moved it here. And I repeat, the phrase 'Ica Stones' is clearly specific to a large set of stones inscribed with dinosaurs, high tech, etc. It is not used by archaeologists to describe 'inscribed andesite stones near Ica'. My question was about another editor removing descriptions of stones on the grounds they were fake, but the point of the article is that it is about a set of stones that fringe sources claim are inscribed with images showing dinosaurs and men together, heart operations, etc, and that mainstream sources say are hoaxes. Dougweller (talk) 19:16, 12 January 2012 (UTC)

So if a stone isn't "inscribed with dinosaurs, high tech, etc." it isn't an "Ica Stone" at all? and they aren't Ica Stones if there are "fringe sources" which don't "claim (they) prove either a YEC perspective or something similar"? I think we need a little attention to our basic logic. SamuelTheGhost (talk) 21:33, 13 January 2012 (UTC)

I don't claim to understand the last part of your statement/question, but yes, I'm arguing that the reason we have an article called 'Ica Stones' is that there are a body of stones engraved with dinosaurs, high tech stuff, etc with that name. Ah, perhaps the reason I can't understand what you've written is something went wrong with what I wrote and some words got deleted. I've rewritten it leaving out the YEC bit as I can't recall exactly what I wrote (although I do know that one of the fringe writers takes a YEC position on this). And there are no reliable sources saying that such stones were taken to Spain. And even though we can verify that a source, Coppens, claims that there are text saying they were taken to Spain in the 15th century, we also shouldn't use that just because we can verify he said it (in case anyone misses the point, I'm sure Coppens meant 16th century but that's not what he wrote). Dougweller (talk) 22:17, 13 January 2012 (UTC)

I was trying to force you into a ridiculous position, but you seem to have gone there quite voluntarily. You're saying that a stone is only an "Ica Stone" if it has "dinosaurs, high tech stuff, etc" on it. Otherwise we are to deny or ignore its existence. Cabrera's collection has thousands of stones. Only a few have dinosaurs or high tech stuff on them, so we are not to take any notice of the rest. We are to assume that the reader has no interest in the possible anthropological or historical significance of the many stones which are probably ancient. We are, according to you, to be focussed solely on the "set of stones that fringe sources claim" support the strange theories held by a tiny minority. What you are asking for amounts to gross POV-pushing. It lacks common sense or a sense of proportion and is insulting to the intelligence of our readers. SamuelTheGhost (talk) 20:48, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

Great, so all you have to do to show I'm pov-pushing is find some archaeological sources that use the phrase "Ica Stones" but don't use them to describe this fringe view but as a label for a set of stones of general archaeological interest. And maybe you could drop the personal attacks? Find a peer reviewed analysis of these stones, discussion in some books on the archaeology of the area, that sort of thing. Do the work that's needed to back your views. I've looked and couldn't find use of the phrase outside of discussion of this fringe view. Dougweller (talk) 06:40, 15 January 2012 (UTC)

I'm sorry if you see my criticism of your position as a personal attack. Perhaps I can remind you that on a previous occasion you were kind enough to describe my request for a source as "repugnant" while also lecturing me on the need to use WP:COMMONSENSE. Now you're demanding I find sources which I would indeed dearly wish to find, but ignoring my suggestions, based on WP:COMMONSENSE, as to what this article should say in the mean time. SamuelTheGhost (talk) 13:55, 16 January 2012 (UTC)

Just so others don't have to bother, what I said was "The suggestion that calling Holocaust denial pseudohistory contentious (and doubting that there is a source saying so) is to me repugnant." I stand by that. Are you really arguing that Skepdic is a good source for such a vague claim about Spanish texts? Dougweller (talk) 21:58, 16 January 2012 (UTC)

http://sevensixtyeight.com/

I'm wondering if this would be a reliable source to use for this page?--Jamcad01 (talk) 07:08, 13 January 2012 (UTC)

It's a local pop scene website, desperately looking for writers (even if they don't have any experience). I'd say definitely not for an article of such global subject matter. --Orange Mike | Talk 20:25, 13 January 2012 (UTC)

Reliable sources have "a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy". No evidence for that here. Cusop Dingle (talk) 20:57, 13 January 2012 (UTC)

Agree that the source is not reliable. Consensus is that sources for that article have to be of the highest standard. This site is far from it. Dominus Vobisdu (talk) 21:15, 13 January 2012 (UTC)

Three Kingdoms: Resurrection of the Dragon

Has several sources. I fear that almost none of them may meet WP:RS though as not being sufficiently "on point" to say much about the film. Will someone kindly examine that article? The best of the lot seems to be boxofficemojo.com, but the others seems a teeny bit inadequate at best, or only tangentially mentioning the film. (bcmagazine.net as a source for "as many onlookers claim that Zhao Zilong's armour resembles the samurai's" and asianbite.com for " the costume she wore was made from faux fur instead.[3]") Cheers. Collect (talk) 13:13, 13 January 2012 (UTC)

teenage scholars in theology

Is this anonymous, titleless article on a music website, a source that can be cited on the Wikipedia? [63] And what about this anonymous homework paper by a Texas teenage prodigy "noel12"[64]? [65] Amazingly enough, the article was written when the said scholar was 15. Some Wikipedia editors insist that these two sources are valid and are unwilling to remove them from a protected page. Please clarify the matter so that there is no further argument over such an obvious thing.--70.64.86.187 (talk) 00:36, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

In principle they might be cited for the opinions of their authors (or, at least the 2nd one could) - but one would need to show that they were in some way qualified to speak authoritatively on the subject, and that their opinion was worth taking into consideration. Otherwise: no chance. But what are they being cited for? We can't make definitive statements in regard to abstract questions. AndyTheGrump (talk) 01:19, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

Sorry, I did not indicate that it was the Judaism article for the fear of word-bricking [sic]. The 10th and 11th citations here were nonsense till someone just removed them.[66]--70.64.86.187 (talk) 01:53, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

Majority judgment

There is a "caution, primary sources" tag on the criteria compliance section of Majority judgment. The sources in question are written by the authors of the method, but they are also peer-reviewed academic papers; as such can't we count them as reliable on simple mathematically-verifiable facts such as these? 200.49.190.24 (talk) 02:10, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

In some senses they are primary sources because they are written by the "authors of the method" however, if they are peer reviewed and published in respected journals then they have received editorial oversight that gives them a higher value as sources, even so context is important. If they are being used to support health claims then there is a higher standard and you may want to read WP:MEDRS. Good Luck-- — Keithbob • Talk • 19:19, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

The Making of Modern Israel

The book The Making of Modern Israel by Leslie Stein has been cited in 1948 Palestinian exodus, and other hot-button pages, in support of contentious and novel assessments of the historical narrative. I have never before heard of the book or the author, and am struggling to ascertain its reliability. Although there are nearly 70,000 Google hits for the title, almost all are Amazon or other bookshop sites. Looking closely, I have found one critical review on Tikkun, and one, possibly supportive, behind a pay-wall at Social Science Research Network. I have found precisely 0 reviews at Google News archives. Although Stein is described on the Amazon website as a "Senior Research Fellow at Macquarie University", he is neither a historian nor a Middle East expert; his field of studies appears to be development, and in particular the Japanese economy. Given this, and in the apparent absence of any serious peer reviews of the book, can it be regarded as a reliable source for contentious statements? RolandR (talk) 10:31, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

Here's some stuff I found in a 2 minute search. Not sure how you only came up with Tikkun.

• polity [67] quotes blurbs from various reviews in some reliable sources.
• Israel Studies Review [68] (can't read the actual review, but someone took the trouble to review the book)
• The Australian Jewish News [69]

Then I stopped looking. No More Mr Nice Guy (talk) 20:18, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

As TDA notes, Google gives different results, depending not only on geography, but also on previous searches. I had seen the first site you quote, but blurbs are certainly no evidence of anything. I too can't actually read the ISR review. It's significant that the review in Australian Jewish News (which I had not found in my Google search) states "He is unashamedly pro-Israel, and at times some readers may feel he is too one-sided"; this does not inspire me with confidence in the book's reliability. RolandR (talk) 00:37, 15 January 2012 (UTC)

I found these links: [70] [71] [72] [73] [74] [75]. Sometimes Google doesn't give us the best results first time around and different countries may have different issues searching for sources. Stein appears to be mentioned in a few notable places. Of course, that does not make Stein reliable in general. However, there is a tier system of reliability in my opinion and, in this case, Stein certainly meets the threshold for inclusion as representing a prominent view on the Arab-Israeli conflict. He should not be treated as an authoritative source on what actually happened, but his views are worthy of inclusion with the typical considerations we give partisan sources.--The Devil's Advocate (talk) 20:29, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

How did you came to the conclusion that he is a partisan source?--Shrike (talk) 05:54, 15 January 2012 (UTC)

Comments from reviews: "Stein’s work is in many ways a partisan account of the early years of Israel’s existence"[76]; "While Stein takes pains to declare himself a dispassionate historian, he is clearly making an argument"[77]; "He is unashamedly pro-Israel, and at times some readers may feel he is too one-sided"[78]; "He remains cocooned in his avowedly unashamed sympathy for 'Israel's general plight'."[79]; "Stein is a proud Zionist and never questions the murderous rampage of Zionist fighters against the British before Israel's birth"[80]. Thewre is barely a mention which does not note the author's bias, and the author himself states that he is "unashamedly sympathetic to Israel's general plight". This is clearly a partisan source, whether reliable or not. RolandR (talk) 11:18, 15 January 2012 (UTC)

This should placate the editor who opened this discussion

• The book is from a well-known publisher Polity that publishes scholarly texts[81].

• It is subject to a vetting process and peer review which makes it compliant with WP:RS. It is readily available and verifiable per WP:V.
• The author has published a number of scholarly texts[82]
• The book has been listed as a “good read” on the Barnes & Noble website[83]
• And here is the publisher’s Synopsis and exhaustive list of peer review and accolades (cut and pasted):
  • "Israel moves forward. Palestine stands still. Israel builds its future. Palestine guards its past. Stein's work provides a good introduction to this sad saga for the perplexed and the uninitiated." History Today "This volume could very well last as required reading about Israeli history for the next decade to come." Shofar: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Jewish Studies "Stein takes us on a fascinating tour, highlighting major and lesser events in the history of young Israel." Democracy and Security "Balanced, well researched and will substantially extend the knowledge of any student of Israeli history." Birmingham Jewish Recorder "Leslie Stein explains in this eloquent, highly readable and well-researched study how the Israeli state overcame the threat to its existence and emerged as the most feared military power in the Middle East ... Stein's account of the events leading up to the 1967 war is one of the most masterly and lucid to appear in years ... There is little doubt that his study will be viewed as an indispensible authority on one of the most intractable conflicts of our time." Tribune "This book can serve as a refresher course for more knowledgable readers and a sound introduction for novices." Hadassah Magazine "There is little left uncovered in this up-to-date and meticulously researched book. Anybody wanting a quick and easily understandable account of Israel's formative years would do well to read this refreshing, informative and concise telling." Canadian Jewish News "He offers a good historic overview of the respective period, his book is elegantly written, easy to read and his knowledge of the material is broad." H-Soz-u-Kult "Any reader of this book, however familiar he or she is with the history of this crucial period, is bound to learn something." Jerusalem Post "The deeper into the twenty-first century we get the less we know about the twentieth. This ignorance has so distorted even educated people's grasp of the conflict between Israel and its Palestinian and other Arab neighbours that public discussion of it routinely descends into half-bias, half drivel. Leslie Stein's elegant and learned book is, first of all, truthful, a rare enough quality in this research area. Beyond that, it is well written and argumentative in the sense that his topic requires. The years 1948-1967 constitute the crucible of discord. Without a clear understand of these two decades, which this volume so amply provides, the citizen is in the desert with only mirages to (mis)lead him or her." Martin Peretz, Editor-In-Chief of The New Republic "With great verve and a robust appreciation for the Zionist achievement, Leslie Stein accurately captures the drama, excitement and danger of the fledgling Jewish state's first two decades, thus putting its current tribulations in perspective. Daniel Pipes, Director of The Middle East Forum (Pennsylvania) and Taube/Diller distinguished visiting fellow at the Hoover Institution of Stanford University "The Making of Modern Israel is an invaluable contribution to our understanding of one of history's most extraordinary and inspiring stories. Leslie Stein is to be commended for authoring what is certain to become an indispensible resource for scholars, decision-makers, and students." Michael Oren, Senior Fellow at the Shalem Center, Jerusalem and author of Six Days of War: June 1967 and the Making of the Modern Middle East "Continuing his masterful previous history of Israel before statehood, Leslie Stein tells the complicated story of the state's first nineteen years in this highly readable, admirably concise and eminently fair-minded account. Threading his way deftly through controversial minefields with sure footing, Stein manages to convey the best up-to-date scholarship with unusual clarity. This book is strongly recommended for the general reader and as an excellent introductory text for the classroom." Alan Dowty, Emeritus Professor of University of Notre Dame and author of Israel/Palestine "Anyone who wants to find the way through the internal politics and external wars that accompanied Israel in its early and formative years can rely on Professor Stein. He gives it straight. This ought to become a standard work on the emergence of Israel to the place it holds on the international scene." David Pryce-Jones, former senior editor of National Review, former literary editor of the Financial Times and of the Spectator and author of The Closed Circle--Jiujitsuguy (talk) 07:02, 15 January 2012 (UTC)

The contentious information is :

Some historians have argued that if anyone was seeking the ethnic cleansing of Palestine, it was the Arabs who were seeking to ethnically cleanse the region of its Jewish population. They point toward the ever-increasing vitriolic rhetoric espoused by various Arab leaders and commanders in connection with their plans for the Jews of Palestine.

As mentionned here above, this is a wp:rs source.
But more, this is not totally speculative. It is true that the wording could be neutralized : the sentence : if anyone was seeking the ethnic cleansing of Palestine, it was the Arabs is pejorative. But the information that some historians argue (this part is important !) that Arab [and some of their leaders] wanted to exterminate the Jews is true. Benny Morris in his last book 1948, Efraim Karsh in Palestine Betrayed, Zvi Elpeleg in his biography of the Mufti, Klaus-Michael Mallmann in Nazi Palestine argue this. To be perfectly NPoV, the arguments they use to justify this and the arguments given by others against this should be introduced too. Eg, Yoav Gelber wrote that it is speculative (and not scientific) to try to give the aims of the Arabs given we don't have access to Arab sources of the period ; Benny Morris support the idea that Islam is antisemite ; Karsh choses some quotes (and forget others) such as the fake Azzam one, ... 87.66.170.243 (talk) 10:10, 15 January 2012 (UTC)

• Regarding the author, Leslie Stein is an Associate Professor in the Department of Economics, Macquarie University. Sean.hoyland - talk 11:28, 15 January 2012 (UTC)

One of the reviews above says concerning Stein's book that "Stein estimates that the victorious Israelis expelled half of the 800,000 Palestinians displaced." This doesn't dovetail very well with the text that's being proposed based on this book. Cheers, --Dailycare (talk) 19:33, 15 January 2012 (UTC)

@Dailycare : on the contrary. It proves this guy is very neutral.

• about half of the Palestinian refugees of '48 were expelled (particularly during operations Nachshon, Dani, Hiram and Yoav). Morry writes this in his book 1948 and this explains why several historians compare or claim Israelis performed an ethnic cleansing.
• but Morris also claims (and several others given here above) that, would the Arabs have won, they would have done the same.

If Leslie Stein reports both these points of view, it is good for his reliability.

(It seems it is a tertiary source).

@RolandR : "This is clearly a partisan source, whether reliable or not."

He seems to look a little bit like Morris. He is one-sided as a person but reliable and more neutral in his profession. I underline I don't know this author but he seems worth reading even if disappointment could come after this reading. A good review by Daniel Pipes is of course a very bad point.

@all : another review : "On the whole, it is not easy to judge Stein’s “The Making of Modern Israel”. He offers a good historic overview of the respective period, his book is elegantly written, easy to read and his knowledge of the material is broad. The strong points of the book are to be found when he describes domestic developments and political decision makings. Yet the book is troublesome in the sense, that he is at times overtly Zionistic and thus in his judgments often very one sided and apologetic. Consequently he rejects findings of the so called New Historians like Avi Shlaim or Ilan Pappe right out of hand, with the partial exception of Benny Morris. But even the latter’s works are hardly incorporated when reaching critical conclusions. Thus the weakest point of the book is the almost total declining or ignoring of most of the findings of the New Historians."

91.180.49.186 (talk) 08:16, 16 January 2012 (UTC)

thepeerage.com

I am wondering if thepeerage.com is ok to use as a source for basic biographical data i.e. birthdates, marriage dates etc. It looks SPS, but it seems to be pretty well sourced by reliable sources. I have tried to search for some of the sources it uses online, but to no avail. Betty Logan (talk) 22:07, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

No, I'd think not. Apart from other issues, it cites Wikipedia, and e-mails from private individuals, as sources: [84]. AndyTheGrump (talk) 22:54, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

It is an acceptable source, but not strictly WP:RS, as some of its sources are not. Where its source is Burke or Complete peerage, it is quoting a WP:RS, and so is itself one. If it is quoting WP, we have a circular argument. If it is quoting provate information it is rather too close to WP:OR for comfort, unless the informant states precisely where his information came from. Thepeerage.com is a massive comilation, and is very frequently cited as a source in WP, but if it conflcts with a better source, the better one is to be preferred. Peterkingiron (talk) 00:30, 15 January 2012 (UTC)

If it quotes a reliable source such as Burke, we should use that. Of course we should actually read the source, not just copy the reference across! Cusop Dingle (talk) 08:18, 15 January 2012 (UTC)

It's a self-published site written by someone who does not appear to be a published expert on the topic. It does not qualify as a reliable source.   Will Beback  talk  08:25, 15 January 2012 (UTC)

I agree. It isn't a reliable source in our terms. Andrew Dalby 09:48, 15 January 2012 (UTC)

As per Will Beback, as a self-published web site not by an established expert it is not a reliable source. Let me add, though, that the citation of a "reliable source such as Burke" is not a good metric. The Burke works are of variable reliability, depending on the edition and the time period being covered. Unlike Complete Peerage, these are not presented in a scholarly fashion, lacking footnotes or bibliographical information, and in earlier times served as little more than a credulous vehicle for the vanity of the families whose pedigrees were being presented. Experts in the field only use Burke's publications with extreme caution and only for material nearly contemporary with the publication date. The routine unqualified citation of Burke's volumes for earlier times tends to speak against the reliability of a web site, not for it. OR is not a concern. Sources are allowed to do OR, and reliable sources should do OR. It is just Wikipedia editors who are not to. The failure to cite precise source details speaks not to the propriety of the OR, but again to its reliability. Agricolae (talk) 20:53, 15 January 2012 (UTC)

Is BET a reliable source?

Various artist's sales are based on confirmations by either VH1 or MTV, so I was wondering if BET, short for Black Entertainment Television, is regarded reliable as well? Thanks for your replies. Malcolmo (talk) 22:57, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

celebritynetworth.com

Was added to David Copperfield (illusionist) as a specific source for his "net worth" and I doubt it meets WP:RS. I do note that it is used as a source for about thirty articles, in some cases for no actual apparent reason, and suggest that if it is not RS that it be removed from them. Collect (talk) 21:18, 15 January 2012 (UTC)

It looks highly questionable: "Neither we nor any third parties provide any warranty or guarantee as to the accuracy, timeliness, performance, completeness or suitability of the information and materials found or offered on this website for any particular purpose. You acknowledge that such information and materials may contain inaccuracies or errors and we expressly exclude liability for any such inaccuracies or errors to the fullest extent permitted by law". [85]. It gives no indication of how it comes by such figures - I see no reason to see it as anything more than guesswork. AndyTheGrump (talk) 21:28, 15 January 2012 (UTC)

My exact view. Collect (talk) 22:31, 15 January 2012 (UTC)

Terrorism

Are Christopher Hitchens' works, including ones specifically on Terrorism, not RS for the reasons proffered on Talk:Terrorism, to wit that he was not an "expert" in the field (He was not an expert on terrorism or anything else for that matter), that Getting a BA with a C average and being a popular journalist with the Trotskyist and popular press does not make one an expert. The fact he co-authored an instant book on Callaghan and wrote an alternative narrative for Cyprus do not make him an expert either and that Hitchens' opinions on terrorism as just not notable. I suggested RS/N as a good place to ask this question, but do not think it likely the other editor would do so expeditiously. Cheers. Collect (talk) 22:31, 15 January 2012 (UTC)

A reliable source for what? He was certainly a reliable source for his own opinions (of which he had plenty), but what exactly is it proposed he be cited for in relation to the Terrorism article? Clearly, not every source on a subject needs to be written by an 'expert' - but some things probably should be sourced to those recognised as having relevant expertise. AndyTheGrump (talk) 00:02, 16 January 2012 (UTC)

An editor said he was surprised that the article Terrorism did not mention Hitchens' 1986 Harper's magazine piece "Wanton Acts of Usage - Terrorism. A cliche in search of a meaning". I replied that Hitchens "was not an expert on terrorism or anthing else for that matter". Collect then replied that he was "a British Trotskyist" who studied at Oxford [he had a third class BA degree] and had a career in journalism. But as I explained to Collect, the issue is not an issue of rs, but of weight. How much weight does Hitchens' article have in terrorism studies? Collect has not even explained what part of the article he believes should be added to the article. There is no evidence that this article has become part of the study of terrorism, and the editor who mentioned it was doing so in order to point out the contradiction between Hitchens' views in 1986 and after 2001, which may be important to an article about Hitchens but is irrelevant to the article about terrorism. TFD (talk) 02:30, 16 January 2012 (UTC)

Please actually deal with what I wrote instead of possibly misleading people here about what you claim I wrote. The words you ascribe to me were clearly a quote from a source which I clearly indicated, and were not a claim made by me whatsoever. [86] The sources clearly also indicated that Hitchens was a major journalist who had written on topics about politics etc. and chopping words from the sources and acting like they were claims made by me personally is a quite irresponsible tactic in a post here. Cheers - but please when you are quoting a post, be sure not to imply that the editor wrote what he has quoted from a reliable source! Collect (talk) 04:04, 16 January 2012 (UTC)

I would hope that everyone would agree that 'former Trotskyist' was more applicable in Hitchens' case, and yes, he seems to have changed his mind on the issue of terrorism, so maybe he can't really be cited for his own opinions either. ;-) The point remains though that without further details, it seems difficult to answer this one way or another - though the fact that Hitchens changed his mind is clearly more relevant to his biography than to the 'terrorism' article. I'd suggest that unless someone makes a concrete proposal, we leave the matter undecided - there really isn't any point in doing anything else. AndyTheGrump (talk) 02:41, 16 January 2012 (UTC)

Since there's doubt whether he's a recognised expert on this subject, one way we find out is by verifying whether his views on this subject are cited and taken seriously by confirmed experts. That would also apply to any older article by him: if recent reliable sources on that subject cite it and take it seriously, we have reason to cite it too; if not, not. Andrew Dalby 11:52, 16 January 2012 (UTC)

Ugg boots and the Peoria Journal Star

Hi! There have been various claims that this should be brought here for discussion, and that makes a lot of sense. So:

The article in question is Davis, Jim (December 26, 20011) "Ugg kicking it in the U.S.", Peoria Journal Star [87]. The author is a freelance writer who is a partner in a Chicago law firm. There are two claims from the article that are in dispute:

• "By 2010, all of the Australian manufacturers combined added up to only 5.9 percent of Deckers sales for Ugg boots alone."
• "In the case of Uggs, even some Australian manufacturers have been found guilty of making counterfeits."

The arguments in support of the source's reliability are primarily that the newspaper would do fact checking, and would be more careful for a freelancer. Arguing against it, the article is written in a tone that suggests that it may be advertorial, there is no additional support in other publications for the claim that Australian manufacturers have been found guilty of counterfeiting, sales figures for Australian manufacturers (which is largely a cottage industry) would be unavailable (and again, no additional support in other publications), and Deckers, whom the article is about, are known to use Chicago law firms to protect their IP online, although there are no substantiated claims that Deckers ever used the author's particular law firm.

Anyway, this has been kicking around for a while, and although consensus is currently against using it, the idea of bringing it here for neutral evaluation seems fair enough. The discussion is at Talk:Ugg boots#Another new source - hopefully I summarised the main points ok. - Bilby (talk) 01:53, 16 January 2012 (UTC)

Is a source necessarily reliable if a secondary reliable source uses them?

An article I'm editing has a press release sent out by the article subject's company, it was copied almost verbatim, and made up the entirety of, articles distributed by 2 other news providers/aggregators, with credit for the info going to the subject of our article listed at the end of the articles. It was not independently reported on by either 3rd party news provider. If either of the news providers are deemed to be reliable, does that then infer "reliable" status onto the primary document/press release? (If it's relevant, the 2 secondary sources are www.prnewswire.com and www.thestreet.com) -- Maelefique ^(talk) 04:29, 16 January 2012 (UTC)

I think this depends on the concrete context/case and what reliable refers to exactly. If you mean that content of the press release becomes automatically "factual" if a few newspapers more or less copy it verbatim, then the answer is no. If it is just used to give a reliable description of the company's position, the press release alone might be good enough and the news providers don't really matter much.--Kmhkmh (talk) 05:00, 16 January 2012 (UTC)

The news item in question deals with an event, and notability, if these secondary sources just push out the press release without any other journalism attached, does that make it notable? I will paste the actual links here, but I'd rather get opinions that can't have any subject bias attached first. -- Maelefique ^(talk) 05:11, 16 January 2012 (UTC)

In reviewing the sources you provided it seems to me they are mostly press release distributors. If that is the case, I would think that until the story is picked up by a news agency such as the AP or AFP, or Reuters, to name a few, it is not yet published and therefore neither the original press release, nor the reproduced ones can be conspired reliably published by a secondary source.--Luke Warmwater101 (talk) 05:42, 16 January 2012 (UTC)

A press release is only usable as a WP:SPS. Self-published and questionable sources may be used as sources of information about themselves, usually in articles about themselves or their activities, without the requirement in the case of self-published sources that they be published experts in the field, so long as:

1. the material is not unduly self-serving;
2. it does not involve claims about third parties;
3. it does not involve claims about events not directly related to the source;
4. there is no reasonable doubt as to its authenticity;
5. the article is not based primarily on such sources.

But keep in mind that if the information is truly worth reporting, secondary sources would have reported it. So, yes, they can be used, but they should be exception, not the rule (so to speak). A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 22:42, 16 January 2012 (UTC)

YouTube (sort of)

Rick Snyder (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)

An editor removed the following material from the article: "In January 1976, he enrolled at the university (cite to YouTube]) and earned a Bachelor of General Studies with high distinction in 1977, then a MBA from the University of Michigan Business School with distinction in 1979, and a Juris Doctor from the University of Michigan Law School in 1982." The edit summary read: "YouTube is not acceptable reference". I raised this on the article Talk page, and the editor agreed it wasn't a copyright issue - it would seem that he just has his own blanket "policy" that one can never cite to YouTube.

The video on YouTube is from a little-known website news source, AmericaJR.com. It is AmericaJR's official channel, so there's no copyright issue. The normal question would then be whether AmericaJR.com itself is a reliable source (that was questioned by another editor). However, as I pointed out on the Talk page, except for a nothing introduction at the beginning of the video, the entire video is just Snyder's speech. We're not citing to any content provided by a reporter from AmericaJR.com. So, the only real issue is whether we can cite to Snyder (WP:SPS) for the material in the article. This has nothing to do with YouTube or even with AmericaJR.com, although both are "providing" the content.

At the moment, as I pointed out on the article Talk page, the YouTube cite is back in the article. It wasn't reinserted by me, but by a bot rescuing the named ref. The original removing editor hasn't commented further.

Assuming Snyder's speech supports the material, does anyone see a problem citing the video of the speech?--Bbb23 (talk) 16:35, 16 January 2012 (UTC)

One reason why we do not usually accept Youtube as a reliable source is the difficulty of verifying that the content is what it claims to be. On what authority should we accept that this is an authentic unedited video of this person's speech on that particular day? Cusop Dingle (talk) 18:18, 16 January 2012 (UTC)

• Surely there is a better source for his academic record than the crappy copy of this speech. Niteshift36 (talk) 18:51, 16 January 2012 (UTC)

LOL. In response to Cusop, although AmericaJR may not be the world's best news source, it is probably good enough to accept the fact that the video has not been edited, and, partly in response to Niteshift's comment, you'd think that if they edited it, they would done a better job. :-) My guess is I can find other sources for his academic record, but the story about what happened when he approached UM would probably be harder. At the same time, it's not terribly important material, more just a cute story.--Bbb23 (talk) 22:15, 16 January 2012 (UTC)

• And you've already answered my next response....."cute stories" aren't important. A solid source that shows where he went to school and when is much better than a crappy recording that makes you waste 10 minutes to find out the info, is from a questionable "news source" and leaves this many questions. Niteshift36 (talk) 23:07, 16 January 2012 (UTC)