Talk:Scott Atlas

Suggest section: headed Covid Controversy
I watched Scott Atlas speak about school openings on MSNBC two days ago. He made statements about Covid not being dangerous to children which seemed to contradict what other mainstream experts such as Dr. Fauci are saying.This suggests that this article cries out for a section listing the differences between his opinions and others, so his word is not taken as gospel without comparing his statements to others.Slipandslide (talk) 11:45, 16 August 2020 (UTC)

See the CDC's own data, which suggests that he is not wrong. Compare that to the 2018-2019 flu season. Note that they do not cover the same time periods and they do not have the same age range breakdowns. Phenym (talk) 22:23, 15 September 2020 (UTC)

All the data supports Scott Atlas' comments. Yes, it should be noted that political figures (and those who wish to virtue signal that they are politically correct) in the United States are contradicting what Scott Atlas is saying, but it also needs to be noted that the people who disagree with Scott Atlas on this question are objectively wrong. And it needs to be noted that this "controversy" only exists in the United States. I'm Australian, and every expert in Australia was adamant that schools should NOT be closed, and the political figures (of all parties) in Australia followed the experts and didn't close the schools, and Australia has almost eliminated Covid 19. Carl Kenner (talk) 09:58, 27 October 2020 (UTC)


 * The City of Melbourne, Victoria just ended a 111-day lockdown yesterday, which included widespread school closings. This, and other claims of the editor above, are not consistent with widely published facts. Theophilus Reed (talk) 14:45, 28 October 2020 (UTC)

Family background
Isreali family background not mentioned. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2001:16B8:C19F:6000:D163:9877:1D4:EA6D (talk) 04:38, 1 December 2020 (UTC)

Large Deletions Reverted
I noticed that you have commented that you are engaging in a "removal of systemic bias," though you are simply removing a lot of sourced content. I've reverted them for now, since a change to the article of that size and scope warrants discussion. Would you please explain how the content you are deleting violates WP:NPOV, in light of the references to reliable sources that are currently present in the article? — Mikehawk10 (talk) 05:23, 11 April 2021 (UTC)

Misstatement
One sentence reads:

"He is a proponent of the 'herd immunity' theory that infection of low-risk people should be encouraged."

This suggests that the concept of herd immunity includes a theory that infection of low-risk people should be encouraged.

It absolutely does not include this theory.

Therefore this article is misinforming people with this false implication.

Herd immunity is one thing; the suggestion that infection of low-risk people shou;d be encouraged is something else entirely.

Please fix this false implication. 2601:200:C000:1A0:B091:A3C7:A63E:212 (talk) 05:32, 20 August 2021 (UTC)


 * ✅. Llll5032 (talk) 06:31, 29 September 2021 (UTC)

Remove subjective “misinformation” claim
“In that role, Atlas spread misinformation about COVID-19,[5] including theories that face masks and social distancing were not effective in slowing the spread of the coronavirus.”

This is improperly asserted as fact. Dr. Atlas ascribed to scientific conclusions, shared by 1000s of licensed, board certified, medical doctors and other scientists, that masks and social distancing are not effective in slowing the spread of Covid. There is significant evidence to support Dr. Atlas’s positions, including studies reported in multiple peer-reviewed medical and scientific journals.

Labeling a highly educated, highly experienced medical doctor’s assertions regarding Covid mitigation measures, as “misinformation,” because he does not agree with the currently-widely-accepted, but entirely false, narrative that there there is a “consensus” regarding “the science” as related to Covid is amateurish and politically-biased, neither of which should have a place on Wikipedia. 2600:8801:8C00:458D:EC15:84FD:B1EB:ECB6 (talk) 10:34, 18 November 2021 (UTC)
 * Reliable sources say it is misinformation.
 * Wikipedia follows reliable sources and not your misguided opinion that a doctorate prevents people from spreading misinformation and that thousands of doctors cannot be wrong. --Hob Gadling (talk) 13:49, 18 November 2021 (UTC)
 * Your response sounds needlessly insulting. Please be more civil on this board. Thank you. 2600:1700:D78:C880:6CA3:333A:E9BA:92C5 (talk) 00:22, 13 February 2024 (UTC)

Actually the source the source says "alleged misinformation", not that it is misinformation. I will change the article to reflect that, but feel free to search other reliable sources with the current, more definite assertion. Tigre200 (talk) 02:21, 15 December 2021 (UTC)

Actually, the actual article in the source article does not have "alleged" in its text, as it is written in the references of the article. Strange... Tigre200 (talk) 02:35, 15 December 2021 (UTC)

The WaPo article says "prompting the social media site to remove the tweet for violating its safety rules for spreading misinformation." Twitter considers it misinfo, but since when does Twitter get final say over what Wikipedia considers misinfo? He accurately summarized a WHO report which said "At the present time, the widespread use of masks by healthy people in the community setting is not yet supported by high quality or direct scientific evidence and there are potential benefits and harms to consider (see below)." - https://apps.who.int/iris/bitstream/handle/10665/332293/WHO-2019-nCov-IPC_Masks-2020.4-eng.pdf Hi! (talk) 01:34, 24 October 2022 (UTC)
 * Twitter is not considered a usable source for most claims, but the Washington Post is (WP:WAPO). Per WP:STICKTOSOURCE we can summarize what the Washington Post article says. Llll5032 (talk) 03:31, 24 October 2022 (UTC)
 * How about the WHO, is it a reliable source? That's what I linked to, not twitter. Hi! (talk) 23:41, 24 October 2022 (UTC)
 * Usually the WHO is considered a primary source, see WP:PRIMARY for six restrictions on using primary sources. Wikipedia uses mostly secondary sources. A list of some common reliable sources is at WP:GREL, and also see WP:BESTSOURCES. Llll5032 (talk) 00:05, 25 October 2022 (UTC)

This article is extremely biased
This article is a biased attack on Scott Atlas based on ideology, not facts. As a encyclopedia entry It is just a shame. 95.17.208.103 (talk) 20:57, 1 December 2021 (UTC)


 * I concur. It is a smear job. not an encyclopedia entry.174.87.179.155 (talk) 00:31, 2 December 2021 (UTC)
 * Do you have any specific examples of changes you would make? If so, let's discuss them here on the talk page and attempt to achieve consensus before implementing any of them. — Shibboleth ink  (♔ ♕) 01:00, 2 December 2021 (UTC)
 * based on ideology, not facts Everything in the article is supported by at least one Reliable Source - often several. His actions were his actions; his recommendations were his recommendations; they are described accurately. If you see examples of things that are NOT based on reliable sources, please point them out. -- MelanieN (talk) 01:09, 2 December 2021 (UTC)

Yes, this entry is extremely biased. An example? Well, to cite NBC News as the only "reliable source" to support the accusatory, and opinionated affirmation that "Atlas has spread misinformation about COVID-19" is equivalent to quote Fox News as the only "reliable source" to affirm that "Atlas has been the only voice of reason regarding Covid response in the Trump and Biden administrations." Would you accept the latter as an unbiased affirmation based on a reliable source? I don't think so. Do you think it should be in an encyclopedia entry? No. Both affirmations are out of place in an encyclopedia entry.

The rest of the entry is disproportionately focused on Atlas' views on Covid and Covid response, views that are constantly misrepresented based on the ideology of the contributor(s). Example: The affirmation that "Atlas pushed for establishing herd immunity through infection without mitigation¨ is a gross, biased misrepresentation, as it can easily be seen if one takes the time to read without prejudice the quote in the footnote. Another example: the inclusion as if it were essential information that "The Washington Post reported that Atlas was the leading proponent within the Trump administration for a "herd immunity" approach to the virus, which would kill hundreds of thousands more Americans". Any epidemiologist will tell you that there is not such a thing as a "herd immunity approach to the virus." This is just plain nonsense. Scott Atlas (and the Great Barrington Declaration authors and signers, also mentioned in the entry) advocate for a focused protection strategy, not for a free, uncontrolled infection of the whole population, as the entry suggests. And to predict hundreds of thousands of deaths as a consequence of a misrepresented opinion is scientifically unfounded and immoral.

Ideological bias is behind the whole entry. Atlas' views on Covid should be heavily and correctly summarized, and presented as what they are, his views, but not qualified directly or indirectly as "misinformation" or "murderous." Atlas was appointed to present his opinion and recommendations on a subject that should be open to scientific discussion. Denying, disqualifying and criticizing opinions that do not agree with ours should not be the role of an encyclopedia entry. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 95.17.208.103 (talk • contribs)
 * Thanks for giving specific illustrations. I have modified the lead and the article in several places: to separate policy recommendations from "misinformation"; to make it clear that "herd immunity" calls for spread of the virus only among low-risk populations while protecting the most vulnerable; and to qualify the prediction of additional deaths. -- MelanieN (talk) 17:52, 2 December 2021 (UTC)

78.78% of the entry dedicated to this 66-year-old guy (1359 words out of 1725) is devoted to a very skewed portrayal of the four months he served as Trump’s Covid advisor (a mere 0.5% of his life). If you don’t see a biased lack of proportion here, there’s little else I can say... I don’t believe we should be using a public information tool to spread our own agendas. For more accurate information, read Atlas’ profile at Stanford: https://profiles.stanford.edu/scott-atlas If Wikipedia wants to include an entry about this man, it could just copy and paste what is found in the Stanford profile. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 95.17.208.103 (talk) 20:39, 2 December 2021 (UTC)
 * Since Wikipedia is based on reliable sources and sources typically report more about interesting stuff than about uninteresting stuff, it is normal that articles concentrate on interesting stuff, such as someone being willing to be employed by a highly notorious demagogue. But if you have reliable sources talking in detail about, for instance, Atlas' preschool time, then you can bring them and people will discuss if the material is WP:DUE. --Hob Gadling (talk) 11:46, 3 December 2021 (UTC)
 * Your reply comes across as hostile and sarcastic, which is not helpful. Please be more civil in the future. Thank you. 2600:1700:D78:C880:6CA3:333A:E9BA:92C5 (talk) 00:27, 13 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Those four months are the period when he was most notable, most in the spotlight, and did the things for which he will be forever remembered. There is no requirement or policy that coverage should be proportional to the length of one's life. On the contrary, it should be proportional to the amount of attention each action receives in reliable sources per WP:DUE. It is unfortunate that Dr. Atlas threw away such an interesting and productive career by becoming a COVID contrarian and taking the pandemic as an intellectual exercise. But it is not for us to judge. Our job is simply to report what is said in secondary, independent, reliable sources. His stanford profile is not a reliable source. — Shibboleth ink  (♔ ♕) 12:00, 3 December 2021 (UTC)

"It is unfortunate that Dr. Atlas threw away such an interesting and productive career by becoming a COVID contrarian" is your view and that of the Wikipedia entry author(s). It shouldn't be the main point of the entry to talk at large about this, as, unfortunately, happens in this case. Encyclopedia entries should be objective. "if you have reliable sources talking in detail about, for instance, Atlas' preschool time, then you can bring them" is a very funny comment. You should be a comedian. Now it is very unfortunate but up to you to turn Wikipedia into a platform in which liberal comedians write about other people, despising those who they don't like and shamelessly praising those who they love. A pity. Now, for any minimally rational, sensible person, this particular entry is incredibly biased, a smear job, and a total shame. Have fun with it and your "reliable sources."
 * You are in the wrong place. This is for discussing improvements to the article, based on reliable sources. You have nothing you could contribute. Go to Twitter or YouTube or wherever. --Hob Gadling (talk) 16:44, 3 December 2021 (UTC)

Bravo! And who exactly has entitled you to tell me where I should go or if I have something to contribute or not? Again, if you'd really like to improve the entry, use Scott Atlas' Stanford profile: https://profiles.stanford.edu/scott-atlas And yes. This profile is a way more reliable source than any news appeared on NBC News, CNN, the NYT (or Fox News, for that matter...). — Preceding unsigned comment added by 95.17.208.103 (talk) 16:56, 3 December 2021 (UTC)
 * No, it is not. Read WP:RS and WP:PRIMARY. You will not succeed in changing the basic rules of Wikipedia and have the subjects basically write their own Wikipedia articles. Wikipedia is not a collection of CVs, and it should not be. --Hob Gadling (talk) 17:20, 3 December 2021 (UTC)

Wow. You not only feel entitled to tell me that I am in the wrong place, kick me out of Wikipedia and send me to Twitter, YouTube or wherever, but think you know what Wikipedia is and is not... Anybody with basic literacy skills and not blinded by prejudices could see that the Atlas' entry (like, unfortunately, many other Wikipedia entries) is a perfect example of what an Encyclopedia entry should NOT be. A CV contains infinitely more relevant and objective information on this person that the bunch of biased garbage collected in the entry, and is a way more reliable source than any of the sources quoted (all of them labeled as questionable, by the way, in the very same references that you patronizingly feel entitled to give me.) Throughout the years, Wikipedia grew from being a very poor, non-recommendable source of information to becoming an extremely useful tool with the potential to be the biggest and best pool of knowledge available to the biggest amount of people in the history of humanity. Unfortunately, certain contributors have recently been turning it into a noxious stew of cheap ideological garbage. A pity, but still reversible. If you had the will, you could start by improving this entry by simply doing what I said above: Atlas' views on Covid should be heavily and correctly summarized, and presented as what they are, his views, but not qualified directly or indirectly as "misinformation" or "murderous." And they should be complemented with a lot more information about the professional activity of the person, which is precisely what a CV/the Stanford profile provides. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 95.17.208.103 (talk) 19:37, 3 December 2021 (UTC)


 * TL;DR. Do you have a specific proposal for the article or do you just want to ramble? Kleinpecan (talk) 21:46, 3 December 2021 (UTC)
 * Ah, I see that you want us to remove the misinformation descriptor (which would run afoul of WP:FRINGE) and use his CV as a source (which would run afoul of WP:PRIMARY, as has been already pointed out to you). (By the way, the article does not describe his views as murderous—that seems to be your hallucination.) Kleinpecan (talk) 22:00, 3 December 2021 (UTC)

A much better entry:

[Copyright violation of https://profiles.stanford.edu/scott-atlas redacted. Kleinpecan (talk) 22:33, 3 December 2021 (UTC)]

You welcome.

Ah, and the inclusion as if it were essential information that "The Washington Post reported that Atlas was the leading proponent within the Trump administration for a "herd immunity" approach to the virus, which would kill hundreds of thousands more Americans," as the entry read a day ago, implies that Atlas' views are potentially murderous, actually, mass murderous (in the hundreds of thousands!). His views, of course, are mischaracterized in the entry, because there is not such a thing as a "herd immunity approach to the virus," to begin with, and neither he nor the Great Barrington Declaration advocate for a free, uncontrolled infection of the whole population. Hallucination, no. Bias, yes, a lot! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 95.17.208.103 (talk) 22:31, 3 December 2021 (UTC)

"Virtually Zero Risk"
Immediately after saying Atlas spread misinformation, the article says he claimed that children "have virtually zero risk of dying" from COVID. It then says the disease has a 0.0029% fatality rate. It may be controversial to say 0.0029% is "virtually zero", but it's not outright misinformation. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Cgervasi (talk • contribs) 00:24, 10 January 2022 (UTC)
 * What do the WP:SECONDARY reliable sources say? Llll5032 (talk) 00:53, 10 January 2022 (UTC)
 * USA has 25 million children. If all of them get COVID and 0.0029% of them die, that is 725 children. "Virtually zero" for Atlas, too many for non-innumerate non-sociopaths. --Hob Gadling (talk) 09:29, 24 October 2022 (UTC)
 * Hob, where do you get the figure 25 million for the population of children in the US? It's actually around 72 million, so you are off by close to a factor of 3.
 * As for the words "virtually zero", it seems to be just your subjective opinion that he is downplaying the deaths that occur, rather than putting them in the larger perspective.
 * As for charging that anyone who disagrees with you on your interpretation of "virtually zero" is a mathematically-challenged sociopath, I really have to ask why you are consistently hyperbolic, defensive, insulting, and sarcastic in your replies. Discussions would be more civil and productive without such attitudes. I trust that you do not have any official position within Wikipedia, and that your replies are your own responsibility. 2600:1700:D78:C880:6CA3:333A:E9BA:92C5 (talk) 00:56, 13 February 2024 (UTC)
 * What counts as "virtually zero" in your opinion? If we are dealing with percentages, 0.0029% death rate is "virtually zero" in my book (the use of 0.095% of all deaths is misleading, as the vast majority of people survive, saying children account for 20% of deaths by lightning strikes would be scary, until one realizes that deaths by lightning are incredibly rare). While it is sad when anyone dies, adding an inflammatory statement saying that Atlas spreads misinformation and then quoting numbers that the average person would consider "virtually zero" will only serve to confuse.
 * Perhaps this makes everything moot, but I could not find the term "virtually zero" or any other parts of the quotes in the archived versions of the cited articles. Would it then be best to remove this whole section until we can find quotes of Atlas stating what is claimed? --Jevandezande (talk) 20:38, 26 February 2024 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 22 March 2022
This page is seriously outdated, incorrect and not up to Wiki standards. Capitalistone (talk) 21:15, 22 March 2022 (UTC)
 * Red question icon with gradient background.svg Not done: it's not clear what changes you want to be made. Please mention the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format and provide a reliable source if appropriate. --Ferien (talk) 21:50, 22 March 2022 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 19 July 2023
Much of what was considered misinformation when Atlas served at the White House is now viewed as controversial but not objectively wrong. This page should reflect that he stated things that were controversial but about which public dialog has continued in the years since he served. Thoughtfulful reader (talk) 20:18, 19 July 2023 (UTC)


 * Red question icon with gradient background.svg Not done: it's not clear what changes you want to be made. Please mention the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format and provide a reliable source if appropriate. Xan747 (talk) 20:54, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

Misinformation
the section that mention "misinformation" should be reviewed in light of the most recent studies about masks, "herd immunity", harm of school closure, and effectiveness of some therapeutics. it is recommended that the word "misinformation" be deleted and only the word "ontroversial" be used. 100.35.167.187 (talk) 16:38, 28 September 2023 (UTC)