User talk:Questionic/Archived talk from 2009

Your recent edits
Hi there. In case you didn't know, when you add content to talk pages and Wikipedia pages that have open discussion, you should sign your posts by typing four tildes ( &#126;&#126;&#126;&#126; ) at the end of your comment. If you can't type the tilde character, you should click on the signature button located above the edit window. This will automatically insert a signature with your name and the time you posted the comment. This information is useful because other editors will be able to tell who said what, and when. Thank you! --SineBot (talk) 16:53, 14 January 2009 (UTC)


 * Dear SineBot, thanks for the note. I have been signing my talk page contributions with four tildes, and your bot has nevertheless been coming around and signing my already-signed contributions. I do not know why this is happening, but it isn't because I am skipping the four-tilde effort. I do notice that, for whatever reason, my sigs come out missing the hyperlinks to user page &etc, which may be why your bot is finding them. Signing this now with four tildes, let us see what happens next ... Questionic 17:08, 14 January 2009 (UTC)


 * Yep, didn't work right. OK, let's try the signature button. --Questionic 17:09, 14 January 2009 (UTC)

Please sign your talk-page comments. Type four tildes at the end of a message. ( &#126;&#126;&#126;&#126; ) Or press the 4-tilde button from the menu below the edit window. When you don't sign, a robot signs them for you, and then I don't see that you've commented on the talk page of an article because bot edits don't show on my list of recent edits to watched pages. THF (talk) 05:27, 18 January 2009 (UTC)


 * If you're saying that you are signing, but your signature isn't showing up, check the "my preferences" at the top of the page -- maybe you inadvertently undid the wikilinks, and that is what is triggering the bot. THF (talk) 05:40, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

Fact tags
Separately: are you putting fact tags on material because you're going to go and fill in the cites later, or are these "challenge" fact tags asking me to back them up? The problem is that the page is widely ignored, so if you or I don't fill them in, they're not going to get filled in; but the other problem is that I've written on much of these issues, so my first reaction to filling in the cites would be to cite myself, which would violate WP:COI.

The mass-tort cycle of attorneys investing in new mass tort theories, for example, is well documented by myself and others, but you've deleted it, though I agree that it's not the number of attorneys that is causing the issue. THF (talk) 05:38, 18 January 2009 (UTC)


 * Hi THF -- thanks for your advice about the preferences; I hope that will repair the four-tilde problem. I put fact tags on assertions by other people with the idea that those people should back up what they are saying with WP:V information. For example, if an article talks about "attorneys investing in new mass tort theories" I'd like to know if this means five attorneys in NYC or four-out-of-five law firms across the country. For balance, I'd like to know how the attorneys' investment compares to the investment that Phillip Morris (for example) has made in promoting new tort limitation theories. Questionic (talk) 15:26, 18 January 2009 (UTC)


 * How do you propose we resolve the problem I described? THF (talk) 15:37, 18 January 2009 (UTC)


 * It makes more sense to discuss this on the Tort reform talk page, doesn't it? Sorry, not trying to be rude though it came out sounding that way. Separately, I have people coming over for lunch in a half hour, so I won't be answering very fast in any case. Questionic (talk) 15:38, 18 January 2009 (UTC)


 * I'm not asking about content (yet), I'm asking about how best to edit collaboratively, and since we're the only two people watching the page, and this deals with our particular editing idiosyncracies, no reason to broadcast to the world. We'll talk more next week. THF (talk) 15:51, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

I just want to balance the article so that it gives a fair treatment to the facts and opinions on both sides of an argument. Right now it has too much arm-waving spin, too few facts, and way too little that meets WP:V.

I am not a lawyer or anybody's advocate. I am one of those Wikipedians who likes to try to improve little bits of the project. I personally don't object to your own real-life involvement with tort reform so long as you make a good-faith effort to help create a balanced article. How about if we both start trying to make the section "Claimed inefficiency of the legal system" better? Questionic (talk) 00:43, 19 January 2009 (UTC)


 * Not everything in this piece I wrote is relevant to the article, but a lot is, and there are lots of footnotes to RS arguments on both sides. THF (talk) 03:51, 20 January 2009 (UTC)


 * Thanks for the link; this looks like a useful and well-written source of pro-tort-reform arguments. I think some of the references cited here could be good sources for Tort reform, assuming they are online so that people can check for themselves what the researchers found. Just for example, I notice that this article (p. 32) characterizes Klick/Stratman (2005) as showing that "health outcomes improve when sensible tort reforms are implemented" -- when the Klick/Stratman's own summary states the opposite: "We show that some malpractice law reforms have lowered the level of care provided, as indicated by an increase in infant mortality. This suggests that some of the tort reforms lead to worsening health outcomes." Questionic (talk) 11:49, 20 January 2009 (UTC)


 * Yes, collateral source reforms (which I also oppose) are counter-productive, while noneconomic damages caps reduce mortality. Note that many anti-reform sources are in the footnotes. THF (talk) 12:35, 20 January 2009 (UTC)


 * Apologies, when I said your article was a good source of pro-tort-reform arguments, I did not mean to imply that you only cite anti-reform sources. All I meant was that the article is an opinion piece, well-written and well-cited but clearly structured to advance one POV and to attack another. For example, it does not (nor would I expect it to) discuss your own opposition to collateral source reforms. But as for those noneconomic damages caps...


 * To quote your own source, Klick/Stratman (2005), "For white infant mortality, we do not find a beneficial effect of the increased access to physicians occasioned by the passage of non-economic damage caps. ... In the specifications that do not include state-specific trends, we find that non-economic damage caps reduce black infant mortality by 55 deaths per 100,000 live black births, a relative effect of nearly 6 percent. When state-specific trends are included, the effect is no longer statistically significant." In my opinion, "noneconomic damages caps reduce mortality" gives a misleading summary of those findings. In my opinion, "health outcomes improve when sensible tort reforms are implemented" gives an even more misleading summary of KS's conclusion that collateral source reforms increase mortality while other reforms have effects on mortality whose statistical significance disappears when looked at in context of state-specific trends.


 * Do you want to add some material to the "efficiency" section or do you want to start a re-write on a different section, maybe one of the "Debates over individual reforms"? Questionic (talk) 14:10, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

Rent-seeking behavior by the best and brightest
Just a comment on this statement in your article: "When the best and brightest are encouraged to devote their lives to the game show that American civil litigation has become, the rest of us are deprived of the contributions they would have made as engineers, scientists or other innovators."

Before my nephew graduated from Harvard a couple of years ago, he told us that something like 70% of his classmates had signed up to interview for jobs at Goldman Sachs. Which just goes to show, among other things, how very misguided the best and brightest can be.

Litigators' fees make an impressive talking point when you are denouncing lawyers to John Q Public, but they're not a patch on what top executives get -- e.g. what GM President G. Richard Wagoner made in 2007 for driving his company steadily into the ground ... "$14,415,914 in total compensation according to the SEC. " So if you want to promote science and engineering by capping the incomes of less useful citizens, I'm not sure lawyers are the place to start. Questionic (talk) 14:46, 20 January 2009 (UTC)


 * Yes--if GM had paid more they might have gotten a better CEO, though GM's problems are a consequence of the regulatory environment they operate in. As I discuss in the article, one can distinguish between corporate executive pay and attorney income, the latter of which is a symptom, rather than the actual problem. THF (talk) 18:17, 20 January 2009 (UTC)


 * Phil Greenspun had a different take on high salaries, which has the added merit of being funny. Questionic (talk) 21:17, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

Talk:Tort reform
Hi Questionic, I wondered if you might like to comment on the conflict of interest I just reported for User:THF and the tort reform article, here? It took me a few minutes to figure out what the course of editing was, so excuse me if I made some comments on your role which weren't proper; it appears that you've engaged in quite a bit of work, and then you proposed a merger with the US tort reform page: I think that it would be a good idea to go ahead with that, as I said on the talk page there. You can look it up in the recent history of the tort reform page as it now stands, which is back the way it was before it was replaced with the material you appear have tried hard to change. The point is, simply, it's appropriate for America specifically and would sit well there rather than a general and global tort reform page.  Wik idea  21:22, 9 February 2009 (UTC)

I would too
Wikidea and I have history, so I won't do anything, but agree with your sentiments here. Do you mind if I copy them into a new heading on WP:ANI? Alternatively, you could post a heading yourself, and I would reply, perhaps adding diffs. I think these attacks are way, way over the line, and uninvolved admins should have a look at it.

Incidentally, do you still favor merger of the tort reform articles? I think it would fix the poor coverage of US topics at Tort reform, but your views might have been changed now that Wikidea's more international version has been restored. Cool Hand Luke 16:59, 10 February 2009 (UTC)


 * If nobody takes up my suggestion that Wikidea should be blocked where I made it, feel free to move it and post it somewhere it might get noticed. My actual real life is asking more time from me than I've given it so far today, and I have an essay on Thackeray to put together that somehow doesn't seem to be writing itself. So I really don't want to drain off any more neurons into analyzing the Tort reform article if I don't have to. 17:40, 10 February 2009 (UTC)


 * Will do. I've started merging in your contributions. You're absolutely right that they shouldn't be brushed aside. Cool Hand Luke 18:07, 10 February 2009 (UTC)

Tort reform
You have my permission to revert Wikidea's edits (once, anyway). There's a consensus -- me, Luke, you, and Wikidemon (on COIN) -- that Wikidea's version is a mess. Wikidea has already reverted four times today, and if he does so again, it's a violation of 3RR. Just identify the consensus on the talk page in a new section, and say you're reverting. If he attacks you, too, it will be clear he's over the line. THF (talk) 17:20, 10 February 2009 (UTC)


 * Thanks but what I want is for Wikidea to cool off and go back to productive editing. It would also be nice if he would apologize to you and Luke, IMO. Meanwhile, as I just said (above) I have a Thackeray paper on my conscience and don't want to drain off any more neurons into Tort reform. After Wikidea gets (I hope) blocked, briefly, and the screaming calms down, I would like to join with others in figuring out how to accommodate the US-based material, which many of our readers will be looking for, as well as the international stuff. 17:51, 10 February 2009 (UTC)


 * Wikidea has a real ownership problem; he takes tags and edits of his work very personally. (Witness how he insists he knows more about US class action law than me. Lots of people do, to be sure, but he's not one of them.  Which would be perfectly alright if he wasn't relying so heavily on original research.)  He's been upset at me and Luke since July 2007 because we objected to his similar mangling of the competition law article, and I don't know if it is within his power to be civil--he's pulled the same stunt of massive reverts of weeks of work by other editors on other articles.  He's relatively good when it comes to case squibs of British law, but he just can't seem to write encyclopedically or collaboratively when it comes to longer articles (or editors who don't share his particular brand of politics).   THF (talk) 18:00, 10 February 2009 (UTC)