Talk:First Catilinarian conspiracy

"Almost certainly"
Surely these words should be removed from the first paragraph. These seem like weasel words. If the conspiracy was fake, then these words are superfluous, as the reader knows that this conspiracy never happened. If the conspiracy was real, then the entire article would need rewriting. As such, the two-word phrase present in the first paragraph of the article should be deleted. CitationsFreak (talk) 19:35, 25 January 2023 (UTC)
 * It is the correct wording for the degree of certainty; most sources agree it is fictitious. That said, there exists some scholarly debate on the matter, with some reliable and non-fringe scholars arguing it could have been real. Thus "almost certainly" represents that it is the general view of scholars that it is fictitious, but a reliable minority does exist. Per Sherman Kent, "almost certain" is roughly 93±6% probability. Iazyges   Consermonor   Opus meum  19:40, 25 January 2023 (UTC)
 * If the conspiracy was fake... If the conspiracy was real .... We do not know with certainty whether or not it was fictitious. The article goes into detail about this, and our article summarises that per WP:LEAD. NebY (talk) 19:43, 25 January 2023 (UTC)

I meant "if [nearly] all modern scholars think that this was fake", etc. CitationsFreak (talk) 19:45, 25 January 2023 (UTC)
 * The phrase exists to explain in short that there is severe doubt, per the function of the lede (short, less detailed summation). Virtually the rest of the article exists to discuss it. Iazyges   Consermonor   Opus meum  19:50, 25 January 2023 (UTC)
 * Fair enough. Maybe there could be a "Scholars say that...", just to make it not look weird (to me).
 * I'm not sure how to incorporate that easily into the sentence; it's already somewhat wordy. Iazyges   Consermonor   Opus meum  21:50, 25 January 2023 (UTC)