User talk:OrangeCatholic

Welcome to Wikipedia
- 2/0 (cont.) 19:35, 12 March 2010 (UTC)

Introduction. Current interests March 2010
Thanks, 2/0. My current areas of interest are:


 * The role of the immune system in autism . I have been discussing whether it's appropriate to label the vaccine hypothesis "implausible", considering that the immune system is a hot area of research for autism scientists.  I've also been looking for studies that purport to show the safety of childhood vaccination, but I keep coming up with abstracts.


 * The role of abstracts in Wikipedia citations. I believe abstracts are only useful for referencing a scientist's opinion, and do not properly serve the content of the article (which remains hidden).  What's worse, abstracts are no fun.  Readers wishing to use Wikipedia as a starting point for research are poorly served by hitting a paywall upon checking citations.


 * Wikipedia accountability and verifiability. If Wikipedia is 100% apolitical, then there's no reason to hide our identities.  We could be receiving writing credits for our contributions, regardless of the fact that they're released under Creative Commons.  Wikipedia has grown to the point where it should include a "real life" aspect, where editors know and trust one another.  In particular, anonymity allows editors to hide their political affiliations and conflicts of interest. This should not be necessary in the majority of articles, and generally is detrimental.


 * I performed an analysis of the 1986 incident where Amy Bishop shot her younger brother.  The factually verifiable contributions were small, a testament to the good work done by prior editors. But the exercise was useful in that Wikipedia's account of the incident - from shooting to dropping charges - is a mere four sentences, and can easily be fleshed out.

For origins of the name OrangeCatholic, please see Orange Catholic Bible


 * Ah, that would explain why the username seemed familiar. It has been an age since I read those books, thanks for the memories. - 2/0 (cont.) 16:43, 13 March 2010 (UTC)


 * Please review WP:MEDRS - for a variety of reasons. First, abstracts are by nature only a portion of the article in question, missing out on the introduction, discussion, and specifics of the methodology and results - see here.  Editors are discouraged from citing an article without reading the whole thing (particularly in controversial areas).  Second, we are expected to place the most weight on secondary sources.  For medical articles, secondary sources means review articles.  Recent systematic reviews in high-quality journals are the preferred source of information with which to build an article.  Primary sources can be cherry picked to support nearly any hypothesis, which is why systematic reviews are so important.  Third, we are to respect scientific consensus - in other words, we do not give undue weight to fringe ideas published in low-impact journals, or letters to the editor, or self-published materials.  Other high-quality sources of information include medical organizations such as the CDC, IOM, NIH, AMA, and particularly the WHO.  The Cochrane Collaboration, generally seen as the paragon of high-quality evidenced-based medicine, has also published a review of evidence and it also found no association between vaccination and autism.  The role of the immune system with regards to autism may be significant, but the role of vaccination is not.  This is widely rejected in nearly all scientific circles, and accordingly should not be pursued as a viable, ongoing hypothesis.  In addition, we are expected to represent ideas as they are present within the community - with thousands of articles being published on autism every year, it is again possible to reference nearly anything by the use of isolated studies.  This is why we must take care to represent things proportionately to their interest in the scientific community.  The scientific community took this issue seriously.  It investigated the hypothesis, designed and published a lot of studies, and they all converged on no correlation between autism and vaccination.  Continuing to press the issue causes unnecessary anguish for parents, places their children, and other children at risk of deadly diseases (that disproportionately harms the unvaccinated - see here, here and here for a start).  For a popular summary of the topic, you could do worse than Sciencebasedmedicine.org.  In addition to anguish, demanding more research on an already well-researched area wastes huge amounts of time and money - time and money that could go towards researching the actual causes of autism, treatments to address them, or interventions to allow individuals with autism to communicate and interact with others in society.
 * As far as the use of abstracts goes - if you are interested in the sources themselves, I would suggest requesting reprints from the authors. I have done so many times and usually have no issue getting a PDF.  However, not that without good reason to suspect the editor in question, we are enjoined to assume they are fairly representing the article in question.  Accusing another editor of bias without evidence is seen as uncivil and generally looked down upon.
 * Demanding real-life identities from editors is both counter-productive, and unnecessary. The evidence and citations should speak for themselves, not who put them there.  The consensus of the community also informs interpretation (minimal) and summary of the information.  I also note that unless your first name is Orange, and your last is Catholic, you are demanding an unequal standard.  If you are interested in articles edited only by people confirming their real-life identities, I would suggest Citizendium.  In addition, editing can be political such as editors working on articles related to homosexuality or political issues in countries where these activities are frowned upon and can result in serious consequences, including executions, if discovered.  But overall, if an editor can only make their edits on the basis of their identity rather than the references that support the topic at hand, they should not be editing wikipedia.  See for instance, the Essjay controversy.  If you are really interested in this topic, you should start by reviewing WP:ACCOUNT, particularly this section.  But irrespective, an editor's opinion should not be discounted because of who they are, that is a form of the ad hominem logical fallacy.  An exception can be made however, for sockpuppets of blocked or banned editors who are, or have been editing tendentiously without regard to consensus.
 * Wikipedia has a lot of rules, in the form of policies and guidelines. The easiest ones are here, but there are a lot more.  If you are editing a controversial area, or a well-established page, I would suggest becoming familiar with at least the basics, and WP:MEDRS/WP:MEDMOS for any medical areas.  It will save you frustration and a lot of time over the long term.  You may also be interested in this essay I wrote for new editors as it is a general introduction to wikipedia's mores and laws.  WLU (t) (c) Wikipedia's rules: simple/complex 12:46, 15 March 2010 (UTC)

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Thank you. DASHBot (talk) 02:53, 19 March 2010 (UTC)