Talk:Holistic management (agriculture)/Archive 1

Consensus needed to determine if the proposed rewrite is ready
Please post your vote or advise for improvement here. Thanks in advance.Redddbaron (talk) 21:14, 8 April 2013 (UTC)


 * I have moved the article from your user space to main space. The AFD notice at the top of this page should remain, although it is not applicable to the current version of this article. ~Amatulić (talk) 00:22, 9 April 2013 (UTC)
 * Thanks very muchRedddbaron (talk) 02:38, 9 April 2013 (UTC)
 * Huge improvement compared to the deleted version. Now encyclopedic, NPOV, etc. Thanks for all your work. DocTree (ʞlɐʇ·cont) Join WER 22:22, 9 April 2013 (UTC)
 * Your opinion means a lot. Now if I could just figure out how to load a pic! LMAO Redddbaron (talk) 02:53, 10 April 2013 (UTC)
 * Depends a bit on the copyright status. If its a photo you took yourself or has no copyright restrictions it probably best to upload direct to commons commons:Special:UploadWizard otherwise use File Upload Wizard but only if you can make a case for fair use.--Salix (talk): 04:55, 10 April 2013 (UTC)
 * No, I don't have any pics I took myself, I was only trying to get the article up to GA status or better.Redddbaron (talk) 05:56, 10 April 2013 (UTC)

name changes
The common name holistic planned grazing was substituted for Holistic managed planned grazing and Holistic management where appropriate as suggested by Danny Sprinkle. I left only one full Holistic managed planned grazing (the full scientific name). Thanks for the suggestion Danny.Redddbaron (talk) 17:00, 15 April 2013 (UTC)

Wrong title
"Holistic management" is a general pair of words, and has been used in a very general sense many times to mean things quite distinct from Savory's concept. I list a few, found of WorldCat & Google books. not to mention a great number of journal and magazine articles. on Google Scholar, only a few of which have any connection. Trying to appropriate a common term is promotional.
 * Harnden, Roger, and Allenna Leonard. How Many Grapes Went into the Wine: Stafford Beer on the Art and Science of Holistic Management. Chichester: Wiley, 1994. link I see no connection in the table of contents for the use of this term with Savory's theories.
 * Olsen, Jerry, Thomas W. Nielsen, Susan Trost, and Peter Olsen. Holistic Discipline: A Total Approach to Classroom Management. Frenchs Forest, NSW: Pearson Education Australia, 2006.link No apparent connection.
 * Zink, Klaus J. Total quality management as a holistic management concept: the European model for business excellence. Berlin [u.a.]: Springer, 1998.link
 * Böhm, Klara. Social and Cultural Impacts of Tourism: A Holistic Management Approach for Sustainable Development. Saarbruc̈ken, Germany: VDM Verlag Dr. Mul̈ler, 2009. link
 * Håkanson, Lars, Henrik Ragnarsson Stabo, and Andreas C. Bryhn. The Fish Production Potential of the Baltic Sea A New General Approach for Optimizing Fish Quota Including a Holistic Management Plan Based on Ecosystem Modelling. Berlin: Springer, 2010. link
 * Carona, Michael S. Holistic Management: Developing an Organizational Vision in the 21st Century. Sacramento: Peace Officer Standards and Training, 1991. link

None the less, Holistic management in Sovory's sense is a notable concept, and should be covered. I'm reluctant to suggest "Holistic Management (agriculture)" because the term has probably been used in agriculture to mean  other things also, but I can not at the moment think of a better. Is there a better?

As another problem, the article is at present promotional and contain WP:SYNTHESIS. Not quite so promotion as to nominate for speed deletion under G11, because I think it can be fixed by editing. The first step is to clarify that this is expounding one person's theory, not a general concept. This requires  phrases like "As used by Savory ..." "According to Savory's ideas ... "  I agree theiy are awkward, but I don't see how to avoid them.

Other parts of the problem with promotionalism are
 * 1) The quote from the Prince of Wales, "he work of a remarkable man called Allan Savory" This quote is name dropping to be used at all, and certainly not as a pull quote He's known for his interest in the subject, but he's at most an interested amateur.
 * 2) The use of bullet points. We're an encyclopedia.Bullet points are for sales presentations.
 * 3) The extensive background section explaining why other approaches do not work.
 * 4) The excessive use of see also to every related topic; linking to the justified ones in the article is enough.
 * 5) The use of the single USDA reference to claim widespread use by the USDA. This may be true, but needs better sourcing
 * 6) The use of references from the Savory Institute
 * 7) The use of minor press eleases and news items as references.

The synthesis is the use of general references to ecology to support the theory. This is appropriate for a book by Savory, where he is making a case for the theory. It is not appropriate here, where we are trying to describe it.

I have no previous knowledge of this topic of of him, until I saw a related Deletion Review, and I rather like his ideas as I understand them. His books are published by a very reputable environmental publisher, and are in hundreds of libraries. My main concern at WP these days is to remove promotionalism, which is a danger to our reliability as a NPOV encyclopedia. The only reason IU do not deal with it as I usually deal with articles like this by editing is that I'm not sure the article is viable at all if a proper title cannot be found.  DGG ( talk ) 00:04, 14 April 2013 (UTC)
 * I am curious. Why is the fact that Holism can be used on pretty much any complex natural system, thus be called "holistic management" in the context of applied science, or specifically applied ecology, change the article name? Since obviously ecology is a natural system by definition and Holism is a scientific method? Your argument while well stated appears to me to mainly have a problem with the fact that Holistic management is entering the mainstream and being applied to other fields besides grazing now as well. (a fact I mentioned and gave a couple examples in the article)It seems to me you just gave more examples. I wouldn't mind improving the article at all with your help. Maybe we can expand the uses section? Or possibly instead of that maybe we could change the title to the full title "Holistic managed planned grazing"?Redddbaron (talk) 01:47, 14 April 2013 (UTC)
 * PS The basis for calling it "Holistic managed planned grazing" would be however that of course limits how you would add other uses in the uses section. So I think you could either expand the uses section or change the title, but not both. As to your point about the "see also" section. One of the main criticisms in the original delete discussion was it was a walled garden. So I took their advise and linked it to a bunch of other pages. This also allowed me to write the article in summary form and link to other pages for detailed info. If I went too far, then what would be a happy medium? Holism and systems thinking both are concepts that mean looking at the whole. That means LOTS of other concepts, and thus lots of other wiki pages. For a better context of the discussions, check out my user talk page, since the discussion was put there when I had the page userfied so I could rewrite it. Redddbaron (talk) 02:25, 14 April 2013 (UTC)


 * The title seems entirely appropriate and well matched to the subject of the article, which does an excellent job of providing the context for Savory's concept, by far its most common sense. So much so that one would almost think his Holistic Management International owned the trademark on 'Holistic Management' (which it does). "Agriculture for 200, Alex." "Developed by Allan Savory and most commonly applied in livestock grazing, this provides a decision-making framework to achieve an overarching goal." "What is Holistic Management?" "Right for 200!" Danny Sprinkle (talk) 21:45, 14 April 2013 (UTC)


 * OK some changes have been made.

1)The quote from the Prince of Wales, "he work of a remarkable man called Allan Savory" This quote is name dropping to be used at all, and certainly not as a pull quote He's known for his interest in the subject, but he's at most an interested amateur.
 * I added the Prince Charles quote for two reasons. Notability and the added POV from a political source. The quote is from a talk to the IUCN World Conservation Congress which is primarily a political organization. I will add the IUCN in the article so that the quote doesn't seem like name dropping only. Let me know what you think please?

2)The use of bullet points. We're an encyclopedia.Bullet points are for sales presentations.
 * Would numbers work better? I copied the bullet format from similar pages found on other wiki pages. PS I always saw bullet points as an organizational and educational tool. But I freely admit I haven't attended many sales presentations. So you could be right there and I would have no way of knowing it.

3)The extensive background section explaining why other approaches do not work.
 * I would remind you of a quote.

"Results? Why, man, I have gotten﻿ lots of results! If I find 10,000 ways something won't work, I haven't failed. I am not discouraged, because every wrong attempt discarded is often a step forward"-Thomas Edison
 * This is the development section after all. I wouldn't want to create the false impression Savory developed it out of thin air with no failures along the way.

4)The excessive use of see also to every related topic; linking to the justified ones in the article is enough.
 * I removed a couple. I will probably remove a few more as long as removing them doesn't recreate the walled garden effect again. That's what got the original article deleted in the first place before I rewrote it. PS OK about 1/2 of them removed.

5)The use of the single USDA reference to claim widespread use by the USDA. This may be true, but needs better sourcing
 * Done. Thanks for the advise.

6) The use of references from the Savory Institute
 * Not really sure what I can do about that. If I take off the references, then the paragraphs become unsourced. If I completely remove the paragraphs, then the reader will have no way to know what the management system is, how it works, or how it is applied. It would relegate the article to non useful mediocrity. Kind of a catch 22 there. It was my understanding that primary sources couldn't be used for notability, but could be used when reasonable. I removed all but those two when I rewrote the article. I can't figure out a way to get around the catch 22. Any ideas? PS I added a second reference to the single references, but they are basically just the same type of thing coming from a very slightly different direction. Basically the chain always ends with Savory because he is the primary person who developed it. It is just one small link in the chain farther up and the additional reference I added uses Savory as its source.

7) The use of minor press releases and news items as references.
 * Minor to city folk maybe, but minor to a farmer? I guess it depends on your POV. I realize our society doesn't respect farmers and farming press releases, farming magazines, country magazines, and country newspapers may seem minor. After all the number of farmers in an industrial society is relatively small. But those magazines, press releases etc.. are not necessarily minor in their own context. And they are not stand alone, there are also press releases, magazines etc... sourced in the article from the larger POV of the environment too. Again it seems somewhat like a catch 22. Could you be more specific? I could remove references, but run into the problem of not referencing the article properly. Where can I remove a so called "minor" reference, and not leave the article short on references? Because I have been taking the approach that where ever possible if a weak reference was used to try to add a stronger reference as well. A good example being the criticism section:
 * "Another common criticism of holistic planned grazing is that while farmers and ranchers around the world have proven it consistently works for them and they have even received awards,[37][38][2][39][40] the majority of scientists have consistently stated that rotational grazing systems do not show any evidence of benefit, and those managers' successful examples are anecdotal.[41][42]"
 * Several minor references added together with 2 stronger references and then 2 scientific references at the end, creating a general larger picture. So one statement has 5 references in the middle and 2 at the end. Taken as a whole, they together create a picture greater than the sum of their individual parts! ;) Redddbaron (talk) 19:39, 15 April 2013 (UTC)


 * note: An IP user changed the criticism section precisely at the part discussed above (7) without discussing it for consensus here. I undid the revision and await discussion. Redddbaron (talk) 16:33, 7 May 2013 (UTC)

Changes made to criticism and uses sections
Can we discuss these changes? I believe the use of holistic management in no-til shouldn't be completely omitted. Possibly reworded if people have issues with it. And the criticism section, while I agree that the groups mentioned have arguments that are irrelevant, I included them because no one can deny that they are some of the most critical opponents of Holistic management. You don't have to agree with them to acknowledge their criticisms. Redddbaron (talk) 15:43, 23 June 2013 (UTC)

Thanks for the query. Your points:

1) Holistic farming may include no-till techniques, but I think it is misleading to state that no-till is itself a version of holistic management. There are plenty of no-till farmers who are otherwise no more holistic than their neighbors. It might be OK to say something like 'Holistic approaches to agriculture may include no-till farming, intercropping, and permaculture."

2) These criticisms are of animal production in general, not holistic management specifically. The fact that they criticize holistic range management is simply a part of this overall criticism.  As such, it really does not belong here.  If you want to add it somewhere, put it in the Livestock page. Mukugodo


 * Correct "There are plenty of no-till farmers who are otherwise no more holistic than their neighbors." Just as there are mine reclamation projects that don't use holistic management. And there are ranchers that don't use holistic management. And there are water management projects that don't use holistic management. The uses section is simply various ways holistic management can be used and is being used with references of their use. In no way does it imply that Holistic management is the dominant management system in any of those fields. As far as the criticism section. I'll not sweat it too much since I don't even agree with the criticism, only placing it there to show the criticism others have, but I'll point out I worded it precisely the way I did to show it was related to a general criticism of animal use. So I still don't see why you needed to remove it.Redddbaron (talk) 19:08, 23 June 2013 (UTC)

A) As per your comments, I suggest again the wording I suggested before.

B) Deleted because the criticism is not about holistic range management, it is about range management in general. If you want to say exactly that, OK, but I still think it is out of place.

In both cases, it is a matter of distinguishing between statements about holistic management per se, and topics ancillary to (merely related to) holistic management
 * Fair enough. I'll leave the paragraph removed from the criticism section off. AND I replaced the No Til with intercropping, and permaculture and used a qualifier "certain forms" to avoid confusion with conventional non-holistic versions of agriculture. I also made a few very minor clean up changes so the article reads well, while keeping the majority of the changes you made. There is still one part that the wording seems strange to me, but I'll let it simmer a bit and see if a better wording comes to mind later. Thanks for your interest in the article and helpful edits. Redddbaron (talk) 17:23, 24 June 2013 (UTC)

The page title
A remaining major problem is the title of the page. It is not about holistic management in general, but Holistic management in agriculture. I've suggested  that as a title, and it's still a good idea. (in fact it's about Holistic management in agriculture as a specific theory by an individual, but even that is less important than getting the material away from a title that does not describe the subject discussed,.  DGG ( talk ) 17:15, 24 May 2013 (UTC)
 * I'd be happy with Holistic management (agriculture).--Salix (talk): 17:18, 24 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Moved accordingly. I also rewrote the introduction to match. And I removed the etymology of what are two rather common words.  DGG ( talk ) 17:25, 24 May 2013 (UTC)
 * The title change is good. The vast majority of of this is used in agriculture. But there are some who use it for resource management, wildlife management, ecosystem reclamation etc..., which isn't always agriculture, but usually is. Fine line I guess. Close enough. The etymology I think should be there, at least partly. Maybe just the etymology on Holistic? It seems a fairly large number of people tend to associate either a religious or dogmatic connotation to the word and I placed the etymology there to help resolve that right from the get go. It is using the word from its basic Greek root of "whole" not from something being necessarily "Holy" (Which ironically in some ways probably has a similar Proto-Indo-European root but went an entirely different direction). I tested this out on a lot of people when I was writing the article and that simple change seemed to resolve the connotation issue pretty well.Redddbaron (talk) 18:57, 24 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Since no one objected, I tried a partial etymology to see if the other editors like it as a compromise between no etymology and the original long winded one. Hopefully we retain the readability. Redddbaron (talk) 12:59, 26 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Porobably just a link to Holism is important, as the name has come from the general idea of Holism developed in the late 20th century.--Salix (talk): 13:45, 26 May 2013 (UTC)
 * How do you feel about the removal of "a systems thinking approach to managing resources."? It seems to me as if the rewrite removing that phrase and the addition and emphasis on (agriculture) only is an attempt to use reductionism on something inherently and by definition something using holism. It kind of strikes a nerve in my thinking process to use reductionism on holism. I don't know how to explain it better than that. One of the primary things about holistic management is it also carbon and water cycles and other resources that extend beyond the agriculture itself, not to mention things like wildlife management, mine reclamation, reversing desertification etc that aren't even necessarily agriculture at all.Redddbaron (talk) 15:53, 26 May 2013 (UTC)
 * OK, since no one commented here, I slightly reworded the initial statement to better reflect the actual holistic view as opposed to the reductionist view. Hopefully it is a good compromise. I want to avoid an edit war at all costs. But I do think that the slight change to a broader POV is important. Redddbaron (talk) 14:38, 29 May 2013 (UTC)

"Holistic management" redirects to "Holistic management (agriculture)". This is the first instance I've seen of a redirect from "X" to "X (Y)". Seems to me that any redirect of that form should be the name of the article and not merely a redirect to it. Vaughan Pratt (talk) 17:28, 26 July 2014 (UTC)
 * I have to agree. But certain compromises had to be made to avoid an edit war.Redddbaron (talk) 01:03, 28 July 2014 (UTC)

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Merge Content from Criticism Section with Allan Savory Criticism Section
I have attempted to redress some of the bias in the criticism section of the Allan Savory article that is exclusively about Holistic management (agriculture), but the very presence of that content there does not actually seem appropriate. I propose removing all of that criticism content and moving it into the criticism section of this article which focuses on Holistic Management. Militärwissenschaften (talk) 17:33, 9 March 2018 (UTC)

I leave it to others here to revise and incorporate the appropriate material. Content from the Allan Savory criticism section follows:

Criticism and Rebuttals An assessment of multiple research studies, published by the United States Department of Agriculture, concluded that "these results refute prior claims that animal trampling associated with high stocking rates or grazing pressures in rotational grazing systems enhance soil properties and promote hydrological function". Similarly, a survey article by Briske et al. (the same author) that examined rotational grazing systems found "few, if any, consistent benefits over continuous grazing." A paper by Richard Teague, a coauthor of the USDA paper, et al. pointed out that Briske had examined rotational systems in general and not Savory's holistic planned grazing process, developed in the 1960s when Savory recognized that a hundred years of rotational and other prescribed grazing systems had exacerbated desertification, even in the U.S. as stated in Savory’s TED talk. The paper contrasted the success reported by many ranchers practicing multi-paddock grazing with the general lack of evidence found by formal research.

Earlier research that compared short duration grazing (SDG) and Savory Grazing Method (SGM) in southern Africa and found no evidence of range improvement, a slight economic improvement of a seven-unit intensive system with more animals but with individual weight loss. That study found no evidence for soil improvement, but instead that increased trampling had led to soil compaction.

In March 2013, the Savory Institute published a research portfolio with selected abstracts of papers, theses and reports supporting holistic management and responding to some of their critics. The same month Savory was a guest speaker with TED and gave a presentation titled "How to Fight Desertification and Reverse Climate Change". Responses were posted on several prominent blogs, including the blog The Wildlife News, by Ralph Maughan, who said "The idea that we can almost like magic, green the desert and the degraded lands, by running even more livestock, albeit in a different fashion, sucking up greenhouse gases all the while, is a compelling and dangerous fantasy."

In addition to claims about reversing desertification, Savory stated at the same time, “…people who understand far more about carbon than I do calculate that for illustrative purposes, if we do what I’m showing you here, we can take enough carbon out of the atmosphere and safely store it in the grassland soils for thousands of years, and if we just do that on about half the world’s grasslands that I’ve shown you, we can take us back to pre-industrial levels while feeding people." In 2014 this concept was summarized in an article produced by the Yale School of Forestry & Environmental Studies, emphasizing the crucial role of soil in climate regulation. []. ""Animals are moved so that no plants are overgrazed, and grazing stimulates biological activity in the soil. Their waste adds fertility, and as they move in a herd their trampling aerates soil, presses in seeds, and pushes down dead plant matter so it can be acted upon by soil microorganisms. All of this generates soil carbon, plant carbon, and water retention. Savory says HPG doesn’t require more land — in fact it generally supports greater animal density — so it can be applied wherever livestock are raised."" However, on the climate commentary site RealClimate Jason West and David Briske, set out figures for carbon storage and uptake by the world's vegetation, and concluded that, "It is simply unreasonable to expect that any management strategy, even if implemented on all of the planet’s grasslands, would yield such a tremendous increase in carbon sequestration."

In a 2014 article in The Guardian writer George Monbiot, citing the criticisms of Briske and others, looked into the claims made by Savory and concluded that there was no scientific evidence to support them. Monbiot's conclusions were in turn criticized in a subsequent Guardian article by sustainability advocate Hunter Lovins. Patrick Holden of the Sustainable Food Trust, and others also came to Savory's defense. A 2014 review in the International Journal of Biodiversity criticized Savory's methods and assertions, finding little peer-review support for many of his more contentious assertions. The authors concluded that: "Ecologically, the application of HM principles of trampling and intensive foraging are as detrimental to plants, soils, water storage, and plant productivity as are conventional grazing systems. Contrary to claims made that HM will reverse climate change, the scientific evidence is that global greenhouse gas emissions are vastly larger than the capacity of worldwide grasslands and deserts to store the carbon emitted each year."

Several of these criticisms have specification flaws summarized by Sheldon Frith. While focused on rebuttal of the 2017 summary of criticism by Hawkins, these errors were present in multiple papers by Briske, Carter, and Holechek specifically cited as "(Briske et al. 2014; Briske et al 2013; Briske et al 2008; Briske et al. 2011; Carter et al. 2014; Holechek et al. 1999)". The programs analyzed in those cases included practices that directly violate the procedures of HGP such as burning overgrowth, and also ignore extensive implementation guidance which is part of the program delineated by Savroy in the "Holistic Management" manual.

Article is written like a PR piece for Holistic management (December 2018)
E.g. see the following:


 * An adaptive management plan was needed for the integration of the experiential with the experimental, as well as the social with the biophysical, to provide a more comprehensive framework for the management of rangeland systems. None of these sources of knowledge could be understood except in the context of the whole. Holistic management was developed to meet that need.

The article should aspire to be more neutral and objective, preferably accurately reflecting the consensus of the research community regarding the method. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 79.138.14.33 (talk) 02:16, 6 December 2018 (UTC)


 * This was already hashed out years ago in my honest opinion. Not sure why someone can bring up old issues already solved through long negotiations and get the article tagged again? The article is written to explain holistic management, how when why etc... Whether holistic management is the best or not is for some other forum or the criticism section. I wrote a different criticism section originally for this article. But over time it was edited because of being too critical and frankly I agree. Because currently hundreds of millions of acres are successfully using HMPG. But I had to do it to avoid this same neutrality issue popping up. As it has again. The critical section, although true that people criticise it, can be easily proven to be false spurious complaints by people who don't understand Savory's work. How to handle this in wiki framework is a difficult question but I am certainly willing to put the effort in yet again to get all these tags removed with better edits. Please make proposals here. Redddbaron (talk) 10:45, 22 December 2018 (UTC)

Please stop with the bias wars.
There have been many edits to the page and its quality is slowly degrading and ultimately will fall to the same low quality that got it removed completely from WIKI. This is because many editors are deciding to fight a debate in the form of edit wars. Please stop this. It is not improving the article. The whole "support" section is largely unneeded. I would completely remove it. The criticism exists. Doesn't mean it is factually correct, it only means these criticisms have been made. No need to do a hack job supporting or criticizing what objectively exists. In a similar way "designed to" is a factual statement not an endorsement. This is what it was designed to do. Whether or not it accomplishes that design could potentially be criticized, but it is silly to change the wording to hypothesized. This is an attempt to shift the bias against what has factually and objectively happened. Also the "trademarked" should be removed as this article clearly delineates between the narrow trademarked use of the term and the broader meaning that couldn't be trademarked legally at all. This may be part of the confusion in fact. But changing it then criticizing it and removing important informative parts is counter productive. Savory has relinquished the general use of the trademarked term, as can easily be seen as HMI (holistic management international) is not associated with Savory at all any more. This needs reverted to the previous "systems thinking" and / or "Systems science". That wording was very carefully chosen to be both NPOV and informative. I would also change back the "hypothesis" wordage changes and also the NRCS as these are important to the quality of the article. If you want to explain what they mean to avoid jargon problems, that's fine. But they should be included. Also a reference showing that the USDA is actively teaching this is important. Why would you remove that? The USDA-NRCS thinks it is importantant enough to spend a whole lot of effort teaching this new Paradigm, while wikipedia can't even mention it? Very very biased approach. I would request both sides stop this edit war as slowly the article is getting less informative rather than more informative. Leave the debate to other forums, not wiki. (added on 03:49, 23 September 2019‎ by User:Redddbaron)


 * I see no edit war and no "sides", and I'd suggest people think long and hard before accusing anyone of "bias". I can't speak for but all I've done is to tidy up some refs and avoid having Wikipedia speak with Savory's voice. I have brought multiple Agric. articles to GA status, and have no axe to grind other than improving article quality across the sector.


 * It looks to me as if Leo Breman has similarly copy-edited for tone, removed unreliable sources, and checked others to verify the claims made, which doesn't seem much like taking sides overall, but I haven't studied all his changes in detail; but his edit comments are sometimes rather highly coloured, it is true.


 * We must be very careful with sources; blogs for example can rarely be used. Agriculture articles should in general use only textbooks, review articles in reputable journals, and (for news only) major newspapers. We should not rely on non-scientific journals or those which do not have a solid reputation for peer review. We equally are enjoined to be very careful with citing primary research, such as in-house journals which have a specific point of view; much better is to find review articles which look back over years of earlier research and evaluate that body of work. If we have to use primary sources we need to make it very clear that the findings are tentative ("early work suggests that ...") and we don't endorse them. Chiswick Chap (talk) 08:42, 23 September 2019 (UTC)


 * Hi Redddbaron! Glad you can comment. Yes, bias wars is a bit strong. I've removed many references that were inappropriate= some 75% of the twenty I checked were defunct, went to blogs or people's personal google drive doc.s, or did not mention the word "holistic" at all. I gather you added them back in 2013, perhaps you can find something better now? Regarding "system thinking", provide a source for this statement! If what you say is true regarding trademark, provide a source! Regarding USDA-NRCS, I can check again, but the source you provided which I removed was not endorsing this system, merely a calender listing of a course being taught by a separate organisation. While you are at, can you provide an independent source on how many people use this? From what I've seen so far, only 25 people at most. As I told Chiswick Chap, at agricultural college years ago holistic farming was briefly mentioned in the syllabus, so it needs a Wikipedia page, but this is just badly done! Regards, Leo Breman (talk) 08:59, 23 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Exactly. You saw the poor quality of the section "support" with its poor quality edits and even in creating an unneeded section. Those should have been removed and I would be in favor of removing the section completely as it is very biased "pro". Further the criticism section should be rewritten, although by definition it might contain an "against" bias, it should be stated factually as what criticisms have been made, without siding as to whether those criticisms are valid or not. I also am in favor of bringing back the "framework" section. I understand that wiki doesn't wish to look like a "how to" guide. But without that section a whole lot of very wrong ideas about what "holistic management" in agriculture means. It becomes too easily conflated with "holistic" medicine, which is completely different.Redddbaron (talk) 11:01, 23 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Removed the 'Support' bit as totally flaky. The Nordborg paper (end of article) should be discussed in Criticism. Chiswick Chap (talk) 19:13, 23 September 2019 (UTC)

Original Research
Hi, I've reverted a claim supported by an enormous list of citations. This is a sure sign of original research by synthesis, i.e. an editor is inferring a rule from a set of instances, something forbidden by policy. What is required is a reliable secondary (or tertiary) source, ideally a review article, which looks over the whole topic and makes the claim in its words, not Wikipedia's. Chiswick Chap (talk) 07:31, 24 September 2019 (UTC)


 * Now I have heard everything. The topic you put was awards. I listed massive citations of awards because many people all over the world have recieved them. This is the first time I ever heard that it was a bad thing to win too many awards. It means it must be a hoax, too many people are using it to acheive excelence. Clearly you are not interested in actually providing encyclopedic information on HM, and your sole purpose is to make it seem as if the process is controvercial or might not actually do anything. "a hoax" as SineB says. That is a clear example your true purposes is to sabatage the article. Exactly the edit war I reportedRedddbaron (talk) 02:42, 27 September 2019 (UTC)


 * Please read WP:SYNTH and WP:OR. You are also treading very close to the line on WP:NPA. Chiswick Chap (talk) 06:55, 27 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Absolutely not personal attacks at all. Just stating facts. One came out and said "the whole thing is a hoax" clearly stating their intent. And the other editor given a "enormous" list of citations and a potential synthesis, deleted everything rather than rewriting it in a way that includes the information without breaking wiki style guidelines. That shows by actions there is no intent to improve the article, only tear it down. Redddbaron (talk) 10:40, 27 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Not true. I was acting purely on policy, and the fact that I keep feeling I need to defend my actions is a clear indication that something very close to an attack is in progress. I will state only that 99% of my edits are to build articles up, using sources, text, images, diagrams, and templates, but when necessary I remove WP:OR and synthesis of primary sources and copyedit for conciseness. I will remind you for one last time that talking about "the other editor" - any other editor - is immediately in attack mode, and is off-limits on Wikipedia. I have already cited the relevant policy. If you have reliable secondary sources, use them. Chiswick Chap (talk) 10:50, 27 September 2019 (UTC)


 * Well show me then Here is your list " Almost 100 Holistic Management practitioners have received state, national, and international awards for their efforts." https://holisticmanagement.org/awards/ I am sure if your purpose is to actually include the information, you will find one or two from the list to allow a comment that land managers around the world using holistic management have won awards. If your purpose is to actually include the information as you claim. I am very happy to work with editors actually attempting to improve an article, instead of just tearing it down. So show me.Redddbaron (talk) 11:20, 27 September 2019 (UTC)
 * That is not a reliable independent source. Please study WP:RS. And you are still arguing ad hominem which is not allowed. Chiswick Chap (talk) 11:33, 27 September 2019 (UTC)


 * Hi All, does the group here not realize that the whole thing is a hoax set up by this Allan Savory? The earlier recommendation to remove the whole page can only be supported. It is unbearable that Savory even wanted the term "Holistic Management" get protected for himself with a trademark, while the holistic approach to management and problem solving is as old as the Greek philosophers and taught in all faculties of science. A simple internet search yields in many references exposing Savory and that scam. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 102.166.244.228 (talk) 23:30, 26 September 2019 (UTC) <!--Autosigned by SineB

Many of the references used are fake, and do not mention this system
In my opinion this article stinks and does not deserve a B rating -I'm just going to downgrade it. The main problem is that is not "neutral and objective"and used false references which do not corroborate the statements and are often not about this subject at all. I am going to delete the references in question, will leave prose as is, unless too egregious to ignore. Nothing is ever hashed out if someone thinks they can improve the article! Cheers, Leo Breman (talk) 14:48, 21 September 2019 (UTC)


 * Support. The article was in a sorry state. Much remains to be done to bring it up to B standard. Chiswick Chap (talk) 15:27, 22 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Speaking of sources, I know the name of the article has come up a bit, but I went digging a bit in terms of WP:MOSTM, and it's tentatively looking like independent sources use the term Holistic Resource Management instead. I'm still trying to figure out what the best course of action is for the article too, but I thought I'd throw that one out there for now for differentiation. Kingofaces43 (talk) 20:22, 24 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Hmmm, people are feeling ganged up on here I gather. I don't know what I can add to the argument below. I lowered the rating, in most other Wikipedia groups a "B" would never fly considering the above. I deleted chunks (of praise) which were not referenced correctly, made text more neutral, removed 15-20 references which didn't even include the word "holistic" at all; or went to lists on Google Drive, Dropbox analogs, blogs... Editors should see why that is necessary, if you are a fan of this or not. I also endeavoured to make an attempt at a concise definition somewhere in the front of the article, as I want to do with many of these agriculture articles, whether I agree with the content or not, more important is I understand what is being talked about.
 * As I gather, based on that article in the Yale student mag. about sequestering CO2 in soil, many disparate things having to do with mitigating climate change are being conflated with the concept of being "holistic", simply because the author of that piece mentioned Savory, thus everyone else mentioned in that article got pulled into this Wikipedia page. The Google Drive file was from the guy who owned the consultancy advising Holistic Resource Management, as mentioned in the Yale mag, and the Australian woman who claims cows do not emit methane was added to this article (I deleted her) and is also mentioned in the Yale mag, for example.
 * I don't know how this article can be improved further. It has been written by someone who would like to promote the concept, but I am a sceptic who would like a practical and understandable explanation, and some science! When I studied agronomy "holistic" was mentioned once or twice, but not in conjunction with Savory as I recall. I am fine with this only being about Savory, though, it could provide an example of what people are talking about when they try to sell stuff by using the confusing term "holistic". Leo Breman (talk) 20:19, 29 September 2019 (UTC)

Wiki Education assignment: Environmental Justice
— Assignment last updated by Ashlopez101 (talk) 15:58, 7 February 2023 (UTC)