User:TenOfAllTrades/temp

The credibility window, the follow-up gap, and the lack of environmental regulations in the noosphere.

Wikipedia has difficulty maintaining responsible, accurate, neutral coverage of certain topics. Typically, these topics meet the following criteria:


 * 1) These topics are widely perceived as falling on the fringe of science or medicine;
 * 2) These topics have a small number of very enthusiastic followers; and
 * 3) These followers believe they are victims of persecution or suppression by mainstream science and the media.

Topics in this category include, for example, cold fusion (and the nebulous haze of "low-energy nuclear reactions" around it) and all manner of alternative cancer treatments. Comparisons to Galileo or Einstein are not uncommon (and often evince substantial misunderstanding about the scientific community's actual response to Einstein.)

Between assertion and follow-up
In general, proponents like to take advantage of the "credibility window" – the time between the positive press release (and favorable coverage by a small number of credulous bloggers and second-rate columnists) and the time when more responsible sources get around to following up the announcements and finding that they lack substance – to put a favorable slant on these fringe articles for a few days, weeks, or months at a time.

The follow-up that never comes
It is symptomatic of the non-encyclopedic route by which many of these pathological articles about pathological science are developed (see also Blacklight Power). Proponents tend to treat these articles as blogs about their favorite magic energy technology rather than as encyclopedia articles; each new press release and announcement gets a shiny new sentence or paragraph, no matter how self-serving or uninformative the source may be.

Wikipedia as stenographer
Frequent use of "So-and-so has claimed..." formulation to permit introduction of dubious material that wouldn't be allowed in Wikipedia's voice: Wikipedia as stenographer.

The economics of clickbait
Externalities, tragedy of the commons - the costs of low-quality science coverage are not borne by the bloggers and columnists who write the columns. noosphere - economic incentives favor pollution.

When a source is worse than no source
In constructing an article, having no sources is problematic (and forbidden by policy). Having many sources from which to choose is usually ideal. Having a source is...worrying.

WP:RS is generally insufficient, as applied to coverage of scientific content - general "news" and popular science articles are treated as 'reliable' for fringe claims.

Wikipedia's regulatory approaches
WP:FRINGE - parity of sources (presenting back-and-forth he-said-she-said from lower-quality sources) is used as a substitute for real editorial judgement when presenting low-quality, dubious-notability claims.

WP:RSN, WP:FTN

WP:MEDRS - the proper solution: demand high-quality sources to support important claims.