Wikipedia:Fringe theories/Noticeboard/Archive 66

Breathwork
Hi, My edits are constantly being reverted on the above article by a specific user. In his last revert he claimed that the Cochrane review source I used did not was not related to the article. The review was of Yoga "Pranyama" (breath control) techniques. Breathwork is the new age term for "Pranayama" and so they are the same thing. He did not know this and reverted my edit (again).As I pointed out to him I don't believe that he has sufficient knowledge on the topic to be able to add any meaningful contributions to the page. Please review the talk page on the Breathwork article for more details. Can I please get an admin to take a look. Thanks Darwin3881 (talk) 01:28, 19 July 2019 (UTC)
 * I think you would be more successful if you first tried to write some prose which fairly summarized the Cochrane Review you are trying to include. Essentially, the review only sees "psychological benefit" which is to say that there is no evidence for physiological or immunological benefit beyond those that correlate with improved mental well-being. Also, realize that this article is on a broader class of ideas than just those of pranyama. Certainly pranyama is a prominent form of breathwork. jps (talk) 11:36, 19 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Indeed, and our Breathwork article is a bit of a composite, focussing on the ultra-woo Reichian-like strands of breathwork (not something Cochrane concerns itself with). Pranayama is a different article again (less woo-ish woo). Alexbrn (talk) 11:40, 19 July 2019 (UTC)

British Israelism
Don't know if this is the right place but British Israelism. CambridgeBayWeather, Uqaqtuq (talk), Sunasuttuq 18:38, 20 July 2019 (UTC)

Race & Intelligence
See Talk:The 10,000 Year Explosion where an IP is saying that User:Grayfell's edits are attracting (inadvertently) supporters of the hereditarian perspective. An eye on recent edits by the IP at Henry Harpending would be useful. Doug Weller talk 17:09, 21 July 2019 (UTC)


 * As I've said elsewhere on that talk page, this editor has a history of baiting controversy in support of human biodiversity pseudoscience, and has actively taken advantage of their shifting IP address to create confusion. This editor has a self-declared, mild conflict of interest with Michael Woodley, who is part of the same walled-garden of racialist hardliners as Harpending. More attention to these articles is always welcome.


 * For background, the IP has repeatedly implied that my edits to Gerhard Meisenberg got Meisenberg fired from his school, but the IP has nothing to back this up with other than apparent first-hand knowledge. The article has always mentioned, since before my participation, that Meisenberg's journal, Mankind Quarterly, is widely regarded as racist pseudoscience. The journal's abysmal reputation is undeniable, and its most fierce apologists would have us see it as a badge of honor. Meisenberg, by the way, created multiple sock puppet accounts to edit his own article and post long-winded screeds at Talk:Mankind Quarterly about the nefarious "political agenda" of mainstream science, etc. I don't think this is the same as the IP (although I could be wrong), but it's still one of the many problems these articles have faced. Grayfell (talk) 22:02, 21 July 2019 (UTC)

Robert Schoch
Can people comment either here Biographies of living persons/Noticeboard or on the article talk page about the issues raised, remembering it's a BLP. (Please don't comment here as a split discussion will just be confusing.) Nil Einne (talk) 05:54, 20 July 2019 (UTC)

Sphinx Water Erosion Hypothesis
This report is in reference to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sphinx_water_erosion_hypothesis and sub-reference to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Biographies_of_living_persons/Noticeboard?fbclid=IwAR3MJbZ9DGOCcx2a8fuHnJJbpgsMa5Ladws-lQv-T8JitJ4icoXawy-Dfgg#Robert_Schoch

This content of this page is being used to justify the term "fringe theory", which is a pejorative term to prejudice readers (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fringe_theory)

The content of this page is misleading in inaccurate, yet it is being used an internal reference to label the work of Dr. Robert Schoch as "fringe claims"

Incorrect/misleading claims made on this page

1) Hawass replied: "Of course it is not possible for one reason …. No single artifact, no single inscription, or pottery, or anything has been found until now, in any place to predate the Egyptian civilization more than 5,000 years ago. Response: The iconography of a couchant lion/ess clearly predates dynastic Egypt and can be found in protodynastic grave goods in Abydos in tomb Uj and B 1/2 (see Dreyer/DAI)

2) A different argument used by Egyptologists to ascribe the Sphinx to Khafra is the "context" theory, which notes that the Sphinx is located in the context of the funerary complex surrounding the Second Pyramid, which is traditionally connected with Khafra. Response: Were the hundreds of mastabas in the western and eastern cemeteries of G1 made in the "Khufu context" during the time of this king? No. By far most date to much later times and from the 103 mastabas made during Khufu's time, most stayed empty. The context theory has us believe that adjacent monuments must have been built in the same time. Far from!

3) Apart from the Causeway, the Pyramid and the Sphinx, the complex also includes the Sphinx Temple and the Valley Temple, both of which display the same architectural style, with 100-tonne stone blocks quarried out of the Sphinx enclosure Response: Where in Schoch's model does he dispute that the temples and Sphinx were made in different times? On the contrary.

4) A diorite statue of Khafra, which was discovered buried upside down along with other debris in the Valley Temple, is claimed as support for the Khafra theory. Response: This sort of evidence is actual fringe. Intrusive burials and usurpation of statuary are well known in ancient Egypt.

5) Reader agrees that the Sphinx Temple and Valley Temple are closely associated with the Sphinx, as is the Causeway and even part of the Khafra Mortuary Temple, but suggests this evidence merely indicates these structures also predate Khafra and does not link the Sphinx in any way to Khafra Response: The only link between causeway and temples is the drain channel from causeway into the Sphinx ditch. The inference is that the causeway came before the Sphinx. What is being left out here completely is what Melinda Hartwig, Rainer Stadlemann, and others have long noticed: The causeway avoids the Sphinx suggesting it came later. This debate in other words hinges on the drain channel versus the strange direction of the causeway.

6) Rainer Stadelmann, former director of the German Archaeological Institute in Cairo suggests Khufu, Khafra's father, was the builder of the Sphinx [20] and contends Khafra's Causeway was built to conform to a pre-existing structure which he concludes, given its location, could only have been the Sphinx.[12] Lehner's official website also offers a similar argument based on an Archaeological sequence of structures built in the area. Lehner points to the way several structures in the area incorporate elements from older structures, and based on the order in which they were constructed concludes that the archaeological sequencing does not allow for a date older than the reign of Khafra. Response: No. This is incorrect. Lehner like Lacovara believe the causeway came before the Sphinx because the builders would not have made a drain channel for rain run-off to flow into the Sphinx ditch. Lehner and Stadelmann are at odds. If Stadlemann is correct, the entire Khafre Theory built on "context" collapses.

7) Hawass points to the poor quality of much of the Giza limestone as the basis for the significant erosion levels. He has concluded, from the present-day rapid rate of erosion on the Member II surface of the Sphinx, that "[t]he eleven hundred years between Khafre and the first major restoration in the Eighteenth Dynasty, or even half this time, would have been more than enough to erode the Member II into the deep recesses behind Phase I restoration masonry" Response: Modern day erosion is distinct from the erosion of the Sphinx and its enclosure. Modern day erosion is caused by salting which has two main causes" rising ground water and air pollution. Salting is a modern era process which cannot explain the vertical erosions. For reference see: http://www.stone.rwth-aachen.de/limestone_cairo.pdf

8) Peter Lacovara, an Egyptologist and curator at the Michael C. Carlos Museum at Emory University, Atlanta, assigns "some of the erosional features" on the enclosure walls to quarrying activities rather than weathering, and states that other wear and tear on the Sphinx itself is due to groundwater percolation and wind erosion Response: Wind erosion does not cause vertical channels, where is the proof of this? Where is Lacovara's photographic evidence of wide-spread quarry marks in the vertical erosion channels of the enclosure walls? Why is this process not seen on the walls of the mastaba of Kai and Khentkaws and the rock-cut tombs on the west end of the central field? Where are the positive and negative controls for this opinion?

Omissions: 1) Schoch states that other structures and surfaces on the Giza Plateau are made from the same band of limestone as the Sphinx enclosure, but they do not show the same erosion as the walls of the Sphinx enclosure Response: Specifically, the rock-cut tombs at the west end of the central field and the mastabas of Kai and Khentkawes for example. Same rock, different decay.

2) The seismic refraction data collected by Thomas Dobecki and Robert Schoch which corroborate the Water Erosion Model of the Sphinx.

3) Textual evidence of an older Sphinx: Seyfzadeh, M., Schoch, R. (2018). The Inventory Stele: More Fact than Fiction. Archeological Discovery, Vol.6 No.2, PP. 103-161. Seyfzadeh, M., Schoch, R., Bauval, R. (2017). A New Interpretation of a Rare Old Kingdom Dual Title: The King’s Chief Librarian and Guardian of the Royal Archives of Mehit. Archeological Discovery, Vol.5 No.3, PP. 163-177.

Conclusion: This entire page was stitched together based on incomplete and inaccurate information by editors who do not know the details of the evidence. Yet, the "fringe" label is being used right at the top to bias readers from the get-go against a model they are thus not allowed to evaluate on its scientific merits, but based on opinions by those we are supposed to trust, the scholars. If there is a fringe standard satisfied here, it is being presented by the other side, the trusted scholars. This page, in turn, is then used to label Schoch's claims as "fringe".

This is what should be done: If Wikipedia cannot procure an adequate evidential base for this page, then drop the "fringe" label. There is absolutely no need for it and it only reflects poorly on the higher level editors whose ostensible intention then appears to be the squelching of an honest debate out of the gate. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.194.237.169 (talk) 18:18, 20 July 2019 (UTC)


 * "Fringe" means that it is a view or theory that is dismissed by mainstream experts.
 * Whether or not those experts are correct is not something Wikipedia is interested in debating. As an encyclopedia, our job is to document what mainstream experts think about a topic. ApLundell (talk) 19:15, 20 July 2019 (UTC)

Response: No that's not how the editors are using fringe. By your definition, Rainer Stadelmann, Vassil Dobrev, and Melinda Hartwig all support fringe theories since they don't agree that Khafre built the Sphinx. The term "fringe" is purposefully used to taint contrarian evidence and prejudice readers. If Wikipedia is not interested in debating who is correct then why is Wikipedia taking sides by applying labels to positions taken in a scientific debate? Makes no sense. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.194.237.169 (talk) 22:14, 20 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Please make sure to sign your posts. Also see WP:FORUMSHOPPING (while this noticeboard is appropriate for the topic, this is also already at WP:BLPN).  — Paleo  Neonate  – 22:49, 21 July 2019 (UTC)

User talk:Nudge squidfish/twinkleoptions
In the very least, WP:NOTHERE. -LuckyLouie (talk) 02:35, 21 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Page CSDd and user reported at WP:ANI, — Paleo Neonate  – 23:09, 21 July 2019 (UTC)

Area 51
Some new additions to article regarding the latest Internet phenomenon: As of July 14, 2019, more than 844,000 people signed up to attend the Facebook event, “Storm Area 51, They Can’t Stop All Of Us“, in an attempt to “see them aliens”. Another 740,000+ people said they were interested in the event. The spokes women of the United States Air Force, Laura McAndrews stated that government officials knew about this particular event. She stated in a press release to The Washington Post: "(Area 51) is an open training range for the U.S. Air Force, and we would discourage anyone from trying to come into the area where we train American armed forces. The U.S. Air Force always stands ready to protect America and its assets". Cited to WaPo, however IMO, this could be WP:NOTNEWS and WP:RECENTism. - LuckyLouie (talk) 18:21, 14 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Have to agree this doesn't belong at this time. Assuming there that anything significantly really happens things may be different but that's exceedingly unlikely and in any case irrelevant to us until and unless it happens. Nil Einne (talk) 13:43, 15 July 2019 (UTC)
 * I don't know what kind of regulations the United States miitary has. In Greece an unauthorized entry into a military facility requires its guards to shoot you first, and arrest you later (if you survive). Even military personnel have to identify themselves before being allowed to enter. Dimadick (talk) 14:14, 15 July 2019 (UTC)
 * And a new article Storm Area 51, They Can't Stop All of Us appears to leave out the fact that it's being treated as a joke in media coverage. - LuckyLouie (talk) 16:51, 17 July 2019 (UTC)
 * send it to AFD. Blueboar (talk) 17:10, 17 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Just put up for nomination. Kingofaces43 (talk) 17:27, 17 July 2019 (UTC)
 * More eyes are needed at this new article now due to edit warring and avoidance of gaining consensus on the talk page for new edits. Kingofaces43 (talk) 21:03, 22 July 2019 (UTC)

Daniel in the lions' den
This is about. Source seems pretty WP:FRINGE and WP:SPS. Tgeorgescu (talk) 10:37, 22 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Quick comments. I briefly reviewed both those two sources and, perhaps more relevant, the source used in the main WP article on Daniel, re historical versus legendary. Short version: I don't see any evidence to treat vision.org as a reliable source. My Jewish Learning on the face of it looks slightly more robust BUT there are other issues - the cited source there is firstly, an extract from a book not written for the website; and the source is actually rather complex - it appears to be indicating that there are historical figures called Daniel, but does not clearly state that the Daniel of the biblical story is a specific one of those historical figures; indeed it seems to (rather indirectly) imply the opposite. In contrast, the cited source for the main claim that scholars agree that Daniel is not a historical figure, offered in the WP article on Daniel, does indeed say exactly that: "it is the consensus of modern scholarship that this Daniel never existed". So I think the edit in Daniel in the lion's den is not appropriate and should be reverted. hamiltonstone (talk) 23:34, 22 July 2019 (UTC)

Fringe science - who decides?

 * Talk:Fringe science — Paleo Neonate  – 06:49, 23 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Yet another manifestation of the cryonics forum shopping going on (see above Cryonics section). Alexbrn (talk) 08:18, 23 July 2019 (UTC)

Seed cycling
Most of the sources are about menstrual cycles in general and not about "seed cycling". However, there's enough search results that I don't feel comfortable AFD-ing based on notability. Thoughts on how to repair this article? power~enwiki ( π, ν ) 16:21, 23 July 2019 (UTC)

International Conference on Cold Fusion


This has large numbers of references to New Energy Times (newenergytimes.com), which is definitely not a WP:RS. I propose to remove these references unless anyone objects. Guy (Help!) 14:05, 24 July 2019 (UTC)

Is it OK to describe a 9/11 conspiracy theorist as such in Wiki voice?
There is a dispute about this on Abby Martin. See. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 22:05, 21 July 2019 (UTC)


 * Additional background: Ms. Martin's previous support for 9/11 Conspiracy Theories is well-documented in the body of the article. The contention seems to be whether her now-disavowed support requires mention in the lede. She was not widely known for her 9/11 views, nor was she especially well-known in the movement itself, afaik. Eaglizard (talk) 23:05, 21 July 2019 (UTC)


 * If the high-quality reliable sources (particularly multiple reliable sources) clearly describe a person as a 9/11 conspiracy theorist, and there is no conflict in the reliable sources on this point, then yes, of course that descriptor can/should be stated (and appropriately cited) in the encyclopedia's own voice. Neutralitytalk 23:15, 21 July 2019 (UTC)


 * The question here doesn't seem to be whether "it's okay", but whether this person's past affiliation with 9/11 groups is relevant enough to her reasons for notability to put in the article lead. Since the section on 9/11 conspiracies is just a tiny portion of the article, it doesn't seem like it's worth devoting one of the 3 sentences in the lead to discussing it. Red Rock Canyon (talk) 22:41, 22 July 2019 (UTC)


 * Before you made your comment, another editor had removed a bunch of content from the body of her article about her 9/11 Truther past. Her past in the 9/11 Truther movement is the largest section of the body, with the exception of her criticism of the Russian annexation of Crimea. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 09:56, 23 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Oh, I should've looked at the page history. Still, the even before the removals, the 9/11 section isn't very long relative to the whole article. I think the point I was trying (and failing) to make is that the dispute on the talk page seems to be whether to include language about her time as a 9/11 truther in the lead, rather than whether she should be called a 9/11 conspiracy theorist. Red Rock Canyon (talk) 10:04, 23 July 2019 (UTC)


 * In the lede? Not unless other biographies do. In the body, as a former and repudiated one? For sure. Guy (Help!) 14:06, 24 July 2019 (UTC)

More Jesus in India stuff from a new editor
This[ is totally undsourced, (and copied from a 2005 source, the "Academic Kids Encyclopedia" whose contact, about, and discliamer links take you to blank pages. Its home page was updated in 2013. A new article, [[Mai Mari da Ashtan]] has no sources at all. Some of it is copied from here or  and I've deleted it. I also reverted User:Medz here today.  Doug Weller  talk 10:53, 25 July 2019 (UTC)

Israel Shamir
Talk:Israel Shamir could interest this board.Icewhiz (talk) 05:11, 27 July 2019 (UTC)

Graeme Park ghosts
It strikes me that the existence of ghosts must be the longest running fringe theory around. What is a ghost any way but a dead person walking or flying around who(?) can't be observed by any normal means?

In any case I usually delete ghost stories attached to articles on historic houses. Quite often these seem to be promotional material for "ghost tours" (at $40 per ticket in this case). Sources can exist, e.g. in local newspapers, but often they have their tongues firmly in cheek or are simply promotional.

The specific case is here. Would somebody take a look at this and revert the reversion if I'm not mistaken that the existence of ghosts is a fringe theory?

Smallbones( smalltalk ) 11:56, 27 July 2019 (UTC)
 * ✅ The source is a local news story concluding with a promotion of a $40 ghost tour. Citing a huge section of text to such a poor quality source is WP:UNDUE. -LuckyLouie (talk) 14:02, 27 July 2019 (UTC)

Fresno nightcrawler
Article claiming alien creature seen in Fresno, CA — cited to a crowdsourced website called Odyssey online and The Sun tabloid. Likely an AfD candidate? - LuckyLouie (talk) 15:39, 27 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Yes.Slatersteven (talk) 15:42, 27 July 2019 (UTC)
 * ✅ Articles for deletion/Fresno nightcrawler. - LuckyLouie (talk) 21:31, 27 July 2019 (UTC)

The REAL reason
[https://www.dailystar.co.uk/news/weird-news/794148/Nibiru-Iraq-bush-blair-wmd-salla The REAL reason for the Iraq war? Saddam Hussein 'had stargate portal to alien world'] --Guy Macon (talk) 23:32, 28 July 2019 (UTC)

Lipozene
Our Lipozene article need some attention. This fat burning pill is heavily advertised on TV with claims like... ...but the fine print says "RESULTS NOT TYPICAL. ENDORSER USED LIPOZENE IN COMBINATION WITH DIET AND EXCERCISE AND WAS RENUMERATED". --Guy Macon (talk) 03:54, 29 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Clinically proven to help you lose weight!
 * Still eat your favorite foods.
 * No change in exercise required.
 * Numerous studies have proven that the active ingredient in Lipozene will help you lose weight.
 * Cleaned up the junk, and after that it was apparent there's nothing distinctive about this brand of supplement (in comparison to the many other Glucomannan supplements). Have redirected to Glucomannan. Alexbrn (talk) 07:06, 29 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Yeah, that was the right move. With the exception of the statement that Lipozene was a branded version of Glucomannan made by . . .whoever, the remainder of the content was actually about generic glucomannan, not specifically Lipozene. Agricolae (talk) 07:29, 29 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Yup, I considered rescuing that nugget of info, then decided it was probably undue (why name one supplement?) Alexbrn (talk) 07:32, 29 July 2019 (UTC)

Craniosacral therapy
Craniosacral therapy is under attack at the moment. Medical editors needed? --Hob Gadling (talk) 18:34, 1 August 2019 (UTC)

Deletion discussion for Paul Dunbavin
Potentially of interest to the community here: Articles for deletion/Paul Dunbavin. XOR&#39;easter (talk) 15:21, 3 August 2019 (UTC)

Global Warming Policy Foundation is insufficiently WP:FRINGE-compliant
The lede to Global Warming Policy Foundation is largely self-sourced self-serving gibberish, and fails to clarify to readers that the organization pushes fringe views on the matter of climate change. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 13:12, 2 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Feh. You're right. I'm not sure where to begin fixing that intensity of double-talk and dog-whistling and evasions. XOR&#39;easter (talk) 15:23, 3 August 2019 (UTC)

Siddha medicine
Probably a load of WP:FRINGE and WP:NOT issues. Could uses eyes. Alexbrn (talk) 12:09, 4 August 2019 (UTC)
 * I will re-write this. &#x222F; WBG converse 12:20, 4 August 2019 (UTC)

Law of attraction (New Thought)
Law of attraction (New Thought) - maybe somebody else than me should revert IP fringe edits now and then. --Hob Gadling (talk) 18:54, 3 August 2019 (UTC)
 * I resemble that remark. -Roxy, the dog . wooF 12:35, 4 August 2019 (UTC)
 * That article needs a thorough cleanout down to RSes - lots of primary and fringe sourcing at best - David Gerard (talk) 12:47, 4 August 2019 (UTC)

Book of Joseph (Latter Day Saints) and Joseph Smith Papyri
These seem to be mainly from an inhouse persepctive. I'm not sure if anything at Criticism of the Book of Mormon can help. -- Doug Weller talk 15:39, 4 August 2019 (UTC)

ANI discussion on a topic ban now involves fringe issues
I've just realised I have no idea how to wikilink something that starts

WP:STONEWALLING and WP:IDONTHEARYOU by User:Paul Siebert at Talk:Pontius Pilate then
 * @Closing adminFinal remarks

then
 * Part 3. Ermenrich. To be continued.

so I'll just give the url. It's about this edit where Carrier is being called "a leading supporter of the fringe[4][bote 1] Christ myth theory" - the word "fringe" seems to be the main issue. I'm posting here because it's possible there's a general issue involved. -- Doug Weller talk 18:16, 4 August 2019 (UTC)

FBI has officially designated belief in conspiracy theories as a domestic terror threat
Various sources, eg and it's starting to show up in some articles. -- Doug Weller talk 18:42, 4 August 2019 (UTC)

Hallwang Clinic GmbH
Interesting one this. The BBC ran a story on this clinic in March and this was followed-up by David Gorski. A WP:SPA is now cleansing the article and claiming the BBC piece was "retracted" and indeed the original URL now returns a 404, but so far as I can see the BBC has made no comment. Gorski has commented on Twitter (threaded version here). More eyes/views on how to handle this, welcome. Alexbrn (talk) 16:19, 5 August 2019 (UTC)

Gorski himself writes on http://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1149635497767010306.html that he contacted the journalist. In case we use Gorski as a reliable source in this article so often, than this piece should not be ignored. Neutrality.Checkpoint18 (talk) 16:45, 5 August 2019 (UTC)

Cryonics
There are now two discussions at Talk:Cryonics where editors are invoking WP:FRINGE.

One is about whether or not Cryonics is a "Pseudoscience".

The other is about whether the procedure is performed on "corpses", "dead bodies", or "legally dead bodies". — Preceding unsigned comment added by ApLundell (talk • contribs) 00:07, 18 July 2019 (UTC)


 * There is a rather long discussion at TALK:cryonics which should be read as prelude here. A further difficulty is that pseudoscience and fringe science both have talk pages which apparently are not the places to decide whether practices are "pseudosciences" or "fringe sciences" (or protosciences or whatever) for purposes of WP. There is a WP:Fringe theories/Arbitration cases but it's historical. The list of things that WP considers fring science is at fringe science but discussions of the content are not at TALK but at the WP:Fringe theories/Noticeboard (WP:FTN) right here. Finally, I found it. In the process of getting here, I have been accused of WP:FORUMSHOPPING and had discussions closed behind me. Thank you all for your consideration and help, there. I had a dire template about sanctions places on my TALK page about what happens if you make yourself annoying in one or more of these areas. It also does not mention WP:FTN. Accoding to protocol, it is supposed to be placed by an uninvolved Wikipedia administrator, whereas it was actually placed by an involved WP plain editor. Such regard for process! Then, I was accused of WP:COI. A nice assumption of Good Faith. And finally somebody had to mention WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS in case, during my 13 years at WP, I hadn't yet seen this essay. Much appreciated.


 * The difficulty is that dispite discussion about pseudoscience and fringe science, we still don't have good definitions of them. If one claims one is doing science ("Behold! My water-burning engine!") but what you are doing is fraud or mistake and not science, then there is no difficulty. You can prove it right now. But if one is freezing corpses in case the future can extract memories from them, then one must know the future to judge if the idea is crazy, or even if the crazy idea counts as "science." What claims must be made, and by who?


 * One editor insisted that claims by a cryonics ad agency that doesn't do cryonics, count. Then insisted that claims made by a cryonics company that DID say it was doing science and then retracted the claim, should still count anyway (that idea is that "science" here is not praxis). A number of PubMed sources were hauled out, then discarded because many of the scientists had something favorable to say, and thus proved themselves unreliable, QED. No WP:RS, there. A few people (Gorski) said no laws of physics were broken, so the chances were not quite zero. How low must they be? Does Gorski know? A cryobiologist named Hendrickson had a fiece argument against cryonics from the view of work with roundworms, but this argument was with mind uploading as a route to cryonics revival. And yet WP does not regard mind uploading to be fringe-- his essay should go there. A 2002 article from the Guardian in the UK features a cryobiologist named Karlsson who says cryonics is "generally regarded as pseudoscience." This is used without name attribution in the article lede ("it's good enough for me" opined one editor). But one of Karlsson's reasons turns out to be the policy statement of the Society for Cryobiology which changed its position long after 2002, in fact in 2016. Yet editors of the cryonics article would not let the newer 2016 statement be inserted into the article. Another cryobiologist (K. Hayworth) is of the opinion that cryonics is a "theology." I have not attempted to insert this opinion in the lede as a Wiki-voice statement, on cryonics, like Karlsson's. I think it would violate some policy on not directly demonstrating WP hypocrisy by making an edit you know won't survive. Still, there is clearly a double standard at work here. As with the mind uploading and many other science-future speculation articles on WP where the "lede voice" isn't so sure of itself that the article is about a stupid practice that hasn't a chance of ever coming to pass. So-- comments? S  B Harris 07:01, 23 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Something can be both religious and pseudoscientific: I think cryonics fits this bill (as does, say, Reiki – categories are not mutually exclusive). We can usefully expand on the religious aspect in the article. According to our pseudoscience article pseudoscience consists of "statements, beliefs, or practices that are claimed to be both scientific and factual, but are incompatible with the scientific method", so cryonics fits in nicely. And more to the point, we have sources saying so. Despite the fact you have got your contacts at Alcor to edit their web site to try and help you win your imagined argument, in fact you're going to need a time machine (another possible future tech?) to erase Alcor's long form in this matter (e.g. see this statement from the Alcor president in 2004: "We are one step closer to legitimizing the science of cryonics ..."). Cryonics proponents try to pass their offerings off as "science" all the time. Alexbrn (talk) 07:46, 23 July 2019 (UTC)
 * They do indeed, but they generally mean the word in its more-general and older meaning of praxis (formal science, etc). Political science, library science, Christian science, and so forth. Things never meant to trigger the moniker of "pseudoscience" (Although I once heard a college freshman, who should have known better, complaining that political and library science people were putting on airs, and should be renamed or defunded). A science is a set of techniques-- a craft not art. Since this use is very much more common in UK English, are you are from there (as is Alcor's president) I am a bit surprised you're being so slow on this point. I would be interested in statements from cryonics organizations that they are in possession of scientific facts, which the rest of the scientifically-literate world knows are actually incompatible with the scientific method-- any more than is the stuff in the mind uploading and faster than light articles, which I am going to continue to insist as my benchmarks until you treat them similarly. (As Mr. Gerard, who seems to have a philosophilcal problem with transhumanism, threatens any time to do. And yes, that would be David Gerard of RationalWiki. He hates walled-gardens and enjoys pruning back other people's. ;'p. )
 * Indeed, since religion is such a difficult word and broad word, there are things that religions and pseudosciences. I know (as I said) some cryonicists who believe with a reglious fervor (and I know some Democrats and GOP memebers like that, too). And there is Scientology! I'm merely asking to see Cryonics' version of the E-Meter. It should be testable (using the methods of natural science) against their claims, and their claims should fail-- much like homeopathy or energy healing. As you say. So it should have such a thing, no?
 * Otherwise, why can't you and WP just treat these cryonicists as poor sods with a busted hard-drive and be done with it? "I'll bet I can fix this thing" "I'll bet you can't." All that's argument is fine. The problem is when Wikipedia says flat out that it's pseudoscientific to think you even might. That's far over the top.
 * Finally, Ken Storey did NOT say that cryonics was a "religion." He said it was a "theology." If Storey was literally correct about that, it would hardly imply that cryonics is a pseudoscience. Theology is the study of the divine (which dispite etymology, may or may not involve god(s)). Theology is taught at academic universities. It's another of those praxis things that end with "-ology".  But why the hell are we treating Storey as expert and "reliable source" on ANYTHING, least of all the beliefs of cryonicists? Since it appears he has no idea the meaning of the English terms he is using. Storey seems a fine scarecrow-argument-maker, and I petition the court for him to be recognized as an expert at that.  S  B Harris 00:50, 24 July 2019 (UTC)
 * The cryonics people cut the heads off corpses, drill holes in the skull, try to squirt antifreeze into the brain, then freeze it in liquid nitrogren. That is the reality. They describe this as "the science of cryopreserving and caring for terminal patients". If you don't think the cryonicists view is fringe, that's your right, but if you keep pushing it on Wikipedia you are likely to end up sanctioned. Alexbrn (talk) 06:43, 24 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Sbharris has been forum-shopping this question to article space, in - thankfully it was reverted, but messing about with article space to try to win a Wikipedia policy argument is definitely time to consider application of sanctions - David Gerard (talk) 13:47, 24 July 2019 (UTC)

"Thankfully, it was reverted," you say? "Thankfully"? Else the dire consequence for WP would have been WHAT?? A needed clarification of policy? It's not exactly an assumption of good faith to accuse somebody who adds a "please clarify" template to a policy statement, of "forum shopping." To me, doing that looks like the encouraged WP:BRD, as it gets quickly to a goal. In fact, it doesn't even look very bold, which the B in BRD is supposed to stand for. So, we're working on a chilling effect around all this BRD stuff, I gather? Also the templating and different rules for "pseudoscience" stuff are meant to get around WP's usual process for insertion of material, as in mind uploading? How else to explain it? Do we have any instances of mind uploading? No. Are there believers that mind uploading will come to pass? Yes. So, is it a pseudoscience to argue for mind uploading? Should we BAN them? Or just topic ban them? It's so delicious to think about banning. Let's have a closer look at this instance, shall we? Since you brought the matter up, after all. The policy statement in question is this (no cite): "Pseudoscience, however, is something that is not scientific but is incorrectly characterised as science." To which I added. The reason is quite frankly that we need to know by whom! If a practice is characterized as a "pseudoscience" by its enemies, should they even count? Or should they be allowed to perpetrate a straw-man? Ken Storey, a critic, says cryonics is "more or less a theology." And scrubbing away the niceties of definition between theology and religion: "there is really no difference between cryonics and any other religious organization." here. Which if WP accepted his expertise on the matter, would put Wikipedia into the same category as Roman Catholicism and we shouldn't be having this conversation (if we believed Storey, anyhow). Of course, he's not content, as he's not quite sure what he's dealing with. "According to Cryobiologist Dr. Kenneth Storey, when discussing cryonics, the line between religion and science becomes blurred and rational thought processes sometimes go out the window." So don't we need the answer to that template I added? The critics don't like it, but we knew that. The advocates and practitioners have varying degrees of confidence, sometimes zero (I gave the example of J. Bedford, the first cryonics practitioner, who didn't think it would work at all). So now what?

Skeptic (U.S. magazine) which ran the Storey article above, has had opinions on baloney detection and (helpfully) how to tell science from pseudoscience (full disclosure-- I myself have in the past published a number of articles for SKEPTIC, including a very long one on HIV/AIDS denialism, which I accused of being.... a pseudoscience. That is, I took the orthodox line.) I can't quote Shermer's full article, but it is here. After giving 10 ways to help tell science from pseudoscience, Shermer says at the end that it's not always perfectly clear: '''Clearly, there are no foolproof methods of detecting baloney or drawing the boundary between science and pseudoscience. Yet there is a solution: science deals in fuzzy fractions of certainties and uncertainties, where evolution and big bang cosmology may be assigned a 0.9 probability of being true, and creationism and UFOs a 0.1 probability of being true. In between are borderland claims: we might assign superstring theory a 0.7 and cryonics a 0.2. In all cases, we remain open-minded and flexible, willing to reconsider our assessments as new evidence arises.''' Wups, Shermer thinks cryonics a bit more plausable than UFOs and creationism. So now what? Is Shermer, the expert on Skepticism, to be our litmus? Or Storey who knows about hibernation? Or Hayworth who knows about brain preservation? For this, we need a policy clarification and some people willing to put in some thought, and some words, and some citations. Not Gerard, whose idea is that BRD is forumshopping and baliff, gag all the defendent's arguments in case one makes sense.

And finally, yes, Alexbrn I know it bugs you that sometimes they cut corpses' heads off. In the 1960's it bugged people that they cut corpse's hearts out (for transplant into priviledged middle-aged businessmen). At the same time, I suspect it would make no difference at all in your arguments or complaints if they didn't. So why bring it up? It's not germaine to the main problem of whether cryonics is mutton sold as lamb. Do they lie about the decapitation? That would be important. Pseudo means something. Again, it does not mean weird as in mind uploading. "Pseudo" means that what they tell you they do, is not what they actually do. S B Harris 01:03, 25 July 2019 (UTC)


 * So you now agree that "Corpse" and "Decapitation" are the correct words? Progress. ApLundell (talk) 01:42, 25 July 2019 (UTC)
 * There's nothing totally WRONG about them-- they just have the wrong connotation, and better terms exist. People have been resuscitating what they named as "corpses" and "dead bodies" for centuries, with better or worse success. S B Harris 04:45, 25 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Well put. Those terms carry a connotation of irreversibility. Even though it has been proven false in some cases in the past, the meaning of the words has not shifted and is unlikely to do so, because we no longer refer to heart attack patients as corpses. Using them serves only to inject an assumption of a negative conclusion. Which may match Alexbrn's personal opinion, but isn't appropriate for him to use wikipedia to push on others. Cryonics has always positioned its success as probabilistic and contingent on future advances, which is what protects it from the quackery label, and others (including 'religion'). For all legit scientists who are experts in their fields know, if they are honest about it, barring novel discoveries to the contrary, it could work. Lsparrish (talk) 19:45, 30 July 2019 (UTC)


 * We dealt with this argument on Talk:Cryonics already recently - you can't claim the non-disprovability of future success as evidence that present practice isn't nonsense - David Gerard (talk) 20:56, 30 July 2019 (UTC)
 * This part of the conversation is regarding the use of prejudicial language in lieu of actual arguments. Your strong personal opinion that it's 'nonsense' (or anyone's, for that matter) is quite irrelevant to the point of how cryonics patients may be described from a neutral point of view. Lsparrish (talk) 00:40, 7 August 2019 (UTC)

We can all agree that cryopreserving people, whether legally living or dead, in anticipation of possible future revival is a fringe idea that is only endorsed by a very few scientists. However not everything that's fringe is pseudoscientific. The San Diego Frozen zoo was established in 1972 ("At the time there was no technology available to make use of the collection, but Benirschke believed such technology would be developed in the future."). Physicist Gregory Benford endorsed the idea of a frozen "Library of Life" in 1992. Animals from some cryopreserved extinct species have since been recovered by cloning, although much of what is being collected is still being done in anticipation of future technology. The initiative was very speculative 1972, but surely not pseudoscientific because the hypothesis that cryopreserving tissue could help save species was not inconsistent with physical law and is testable over long time scales. The field of De-extinction remains controversial, but is not tagged as pseudoscience. Noted expert on fringe ideas, Michael Shermer called cryonics a protoscience, not pseudoscience, in his book Why People Believe Weird Things: Pseuodoscience, Superstition, and Other Confusions of our Time. If in lieu of analysis based on pseudoscience definition, we are to rely on citations of authoritative sources to make a WP article classification, wouldn't Shermer carry high weight as a source? Shermer has spent more time investigating cryonics than anyone I've seen quoted calling cryonics a pseudoscience, as evidenced by the many times that Shermer has written about cryonics, and not kindly either. Is not the cleanest way to resolve the inconsistency between the cryonics article and the mind uploading article to classify both as Protoscience? Certainly cryonics raises many more contemporary ethical concerns because people are actually paying for it, but that's separate from the intellectual status of the intrinsic idea. Would the cryonics article be classified differently than the mind uploading article if it was merely a theoretical proposition? Cryobiologist (talk) 23:48, 27 July 2019 (UTC)
 * I'm not sure Shermer is the greatest source when we have actual expert scientists giving their view. And in any case in his later book he apparently became rather more sceptical, quoting Mehmet Toner describing the idea of reviving cryonics "preserved" brains as a "ridiculous concept".. Cryonics is an obvious pseudoscience and should be described as such. Alexbrn (talk) 02:01, 28 July 2019 (UTC)
 * That Shermer believes "it's extremely unlikely" that anyone cryopreserved to date will be brought back is the point. Despite always and still believing that it's extremely unlikely, Shermer classifies cryonics as protoscience, not pseudoscience. Did you catch that bit toward the bottom of the page you linked in which Shermer actually corrected an technical error made by cryobiologist Mehmet Toner in commenting about cryonics? Shermer knows more about cryonics than Toner, or for that matter Karlsson, (in this case knowing that higher concentrations of cryoprotectant don't necessarily form ice during rewarming) because unlike Toner, Shermer is a member of the Brain Preservation Foundation advisory board and acted as a witness and judge in the winning of the Brain Preservation Prize in which a large animal brain was structurally vitrified at cryogenic temperature. There are only about 200 people in the world who would call themselves cryobiologists (there are no degrees in cryobiology), and the number working in the field of organ cryopreservation can be counted on the fingers of one hand. If you further condense the fraction of them who have published on brain cryopreservation specifically, you might finally have a real expert on some of the issues. This raises the question: If offhand comments of cryobiologists, rather than detailed writings of philosophy of science experts who have studied pseudoscience and beliefs of cryonicists specifically (Shermer), are to be relied upon, then what if I quote cryobiogists who comment on cryonics without dismissing it? What if hypothetically there were even actual organ cryopreservation experts (not merely cell freezing experts) with sympathetic views toward cryonics? I understand that the natural inclination is to dismiss them because it's "obvious" that cryonics is pseudoscience so we only need to consider quotes that support the obvious, but what makes that obvious is precisely the question before us. Why isn't it obvious that De-extinction or Mind uploading are pseudoscience? Or even manned interstellar travel? If someone started selling $100K tickets to Alpha Centari, pledging to send one of your ancestors there, that would be ethically questionable, but it doesn't make the basic idea that people may someday travel to other star pseudoscientific even if it is very unlikely. Pseudoscientific is another level of crazy beyond that which is merely unlikely, fringe, or protoscientific. Pseudosciences like Homeopathy depart from actual physical law. Not every idea that's crazy to pursue and unlikely to work conforms to the definition of pseudoscientific. Pseudoscience isn't a general purpose pejorative for crazy ideas. Consider that if it's used that way, its clear meaning and utility will be degraded just like "weapon of mass destruction" no longer means what it used to. Cryobiologist (talk) 05:33, 28 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Shermer has had some funny ideas and no relevant standing in the field, yes. As to why cryonics is a pseudoscience, I am not going to repeat myself again. Alexbrn (talk) 08:10, 28 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Shermer is a leading skeptic. His opinion is relevant on issues of pseudoscience. —Wikiman2718 (talk) 12:04, 28 July 2019 (UTC)
 * So far as I can see, Shermer is a controversial and divise figure within sceptical circles. We would need some secondary sourcing to give context to anything he wrote. As it happens David Gorski (a sceptic who does have medical training) has commented on Shermer's cyronics views. Alexbrn (talk) 12:39, 28 July 2019 (UTC)
 * 1) I don't think that Michael Shermer is controversial as a skeptic. As far as I can tell, he is as reputable as any skeptic there is. I'd need to see some high quality sources to convince me that I'm wrong. Additionally, he is against cryonics, but he doesn't think that it is a pseudoscience. 2) Gorski argued that cryonics was infeasible, but explicitly stated that it may not be impossible. This is inconsistent with the classification of cryonics as a pseudoscience and consistent with the classification of cryonics as a questionable science. The opinions of two top skeptics now support this view. --Wikiman2718 (talk) 13:12, 28 July 2019 (UTC)
 * You would need good sources to say it's not a pseudoscience; OR and synthesis don't work here. Pseudosciences don't need to be "impossible" (see acupuncture, ghost hunting, etc.) Alexbrn (talk) 13:28, 28 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Pseudoscience needs to be impossible or disproven. If he said it is not impossible, that fits Wikipedia's definition of questionable science rather than pseudoscience. That's not OR or syntheses. --Wikiman2718 (talk) 13:38, 28 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Now you're just making stuff up. Many pseudoscientific propositions simply cannot be disproven. Let's follow the sources rather than failing logic. Alexbrn (talk) 13:49, 28 July 2019 (UTC)

Pretend for a minute that nobody ever started freezing anybody. What if instead an Ivy League neuroscientist just speculated that if a preservation method good enough to preserve the neural connectivity of the brain could be developed then that might be sufficient for future revival of that brain. Then what if a top expert in organ cryopreservation published a paper in the journal Cryobiology, the actual journal of the Society for Cryobiology, showing that this could be done in mammalian brains. He/she would even show that it could be done in large brains, completely avoiding ice formation in the process. Any expert opinions, whether prior to or in ignorance of this work, expressing skepticism at the possibility of such preservation would be rendered irrelevant. Like Mind uploading, some transhumanists then begin to speculate whether human brains preserved by such or similar methods could be "uploaded" or otherwise revived in the future, consistent with what the Ivy League neuroscientist originally said. In this hypothetical scenario nobody is actually being cryopreserved. People are just speculating, proposing the idea. Is the pure idea of cryopreserving brains with contemporary technology and scanning/uploading or reviving them in the future, as just an idea, intrinsically pseudoscientific? Was it pseudoscientific from the moment the Ivy League neuroscientist first proposed it? If so, then why isn't Mind uploading as an idea also tagged as pseudoscientific? Can we agree that as a matter of philosophy of science that if an idea is proposed that's consistent with known physics, especially if proposed by noted scientists and supported by experiments by other noted scientists, that this by itself is not pseudoscience? What people do in the name of an idea, and charge large sums of money for, is a philosophically separate question. It's the difference between a scientific conference on exobiology and a UFO convention. Cryobiologist (talk) 01:37, 30 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Sure, In that hypothetical world, where cryonics is pursued strictly with scientific rigor and is then proven to be valid, yes, you're right it would not be categorized as pseudoscience.
 * But you could apply that same test to flat-earthers and homeopaths.
 * Science is a human endeavor. Context matters. ApLundell (talk) 03:31, 30 July 2019 (UTC)


 * What you're describing is a science called cryobiology, not the currently observable and documented practices and aspirations called "cryonics". And given your username, you should realise this perfectly well - David Gerard (talk) 09:32, 30 July 2019 (UTC)


 * The problem with calling cryonics (as distinct from the practice of cryonics) pseudoscientific is that what I wrote above isn't hypothetical. In 2010 MIT, and later  Princeton, neuroscience professor Sebastian Seung gave a TED Talk where at time mark 16:20 he says, "The best way to test a hypothesis is to consider its most extreme implications...," and goes on to describe connectome preservation as a necessary and testable condition for cryonics to work. This is a top neuroscientist who two years later wrote an entire chapter in his book,  Connectome about cryonics, framing the question of adequacy of contemporary brain preservation methods for future revival as a testable neuroscience and cryobiology question. In 2015 the laboratory of cryobiologist and organ preservation expert Gregory Fahy, the inventor of modern vitrification in cryobiology, published a paper in the journal Cryobiology showing that mammalian brains could be cryopreserved without ice formation, preserving ultrastructure indistinguishable from controls viewed by electron microscopy. Fahy's group was awarded the Small and Large Animal Brain Preservation Prizes by the Brain Preservation Foundation for this work because it was judged by neuroscientists doing  FIBSEM analysis to have achieved connectome preservation, a valued research goal by neuroscientists, but also the testable hypothesis put forth by Sebastian Seung five years earlier as a necessary condition for cryonics to work. This has several implications. It renders all scientific opinions that brains intrinsically can't be vitrified (cryopreserved without ice formation) as either uninformed or obsolete. It should also render obsolete any cryobiological opinions about cryonics that are not informed by brain vitrification being possible, which was certainly the case for the cryobiologist claiming that cryonics was a pseudoscience back in 2002. If high ranking scientists like Seung and  Minsky believe that the idea of cryonics, meaning contemporary preservation of brains for future revival, is amenable to scientific discussion and investigation and could work in principle, that's inconsistent with labeling the entire idea of cryonics as pseudoscience. Cryobiologist (talk) 07:27, 31 July 2019 (UTC)
 * It's nice that cryonics fans give each other prizes, but what matters here is that what cryonicists do is not science, but they pretend it is. Thus it isn't surprising we have sources for calling cryonics pseudoscience because it's a textbook case. What needs to happen now is that this thread needs to be deep frozen because the WP:PROFRINGE WP:STICK-wielding is getting tiresome. Alexbrn (talk)
 * I'm asking what is required for an idea not to be pseudoscience, the same way that Mind uploading or De-extinction aren't tagged as pseudoscience. There are Ivy League neuroscientists who treat cryonics as a testable hypothesis. Papers have been published in reputable journals about ice-free brain preservation, including the journal of the Society for Cryobiology itself, addressing neuroscience questions asked. The only philosophy of science expert I'm aware of to weigh in on the topic (Michael Shermer) has specifically said that cryonics is a protoscience, not pseudoscience. The basic idea of cryopreserving something in anticipation of future technology cannot be intrinsically pseudoscientific, or the Wikipedia article on the Frozen Zoo would be marked up as pseudoscience. Is cryonics to be held to the standard that no scientist quotes exist that it is a pseudoscience, regardless of vintage? Then why aren't mind uploading and resurrection biology (de-extinction) held to the same standard? We can all agree from general observation that cryonics is widely scoffed at and has low regard in academia and medicine. An encyclopedia article needs to report consensus scientific skepticism about an idea that so that some poor kid doesn't do a school project on cryonics thinking that it's mainstream, and so that people don't pay big money to be frozen thinking that an article on Wikipedia implies legitimacy. However pseudoscience means more than just low regard among scientists. It means that an idea cloaking itself in a mantle of science is not actually compatible with known physical law or scientific investigation methods. Why does cryonics conform to that definition, but not mind uploading or resurrection biology? Cryobiologist (talk) 21:43, 31 July 2019 (UTC)

Latest forum-shop: Dispute resolution noticeboard. Note this is substantially the same DRN as the one from a month or so ago - David Gerard (talk) 12:02, 4 August 2019 (UTC)

American, ultra-religious archaeologists are descending on the West Bank to promote their beliefs
See here]. Doug Weller talk 19:00, 4 August 2019 (UTC)
 * I wouldn't use that source for anything. It's run by the UAE and has a massive bias for arab nationalism. 74.70.146.1 (talk) 05:21, 7 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Why the alarmist tone, Doug? These are apparently excavations by Bryant G. Wood's organization, "Associates for Biblical Research". They have been active since 1969. For a history of the organization, see here. Dimadick (talk) 06:50, 7 August 2019 (UTC)

Space elevator


I removed some self-sourced / self-published material including books on lulu.com. Someone thinks this is bad because being in-universe is not a thing unless you're talking about comic books. Guy (Help!) 21:54, 7 August 2019 (UTC)

Yonaguni Monument
See recent edits and talk page. I don't have the energy or time (new young dog) for this. Doug Weller talk 14:29, 24 July 2019 (UTC)
 * There is a chapter here and a podcast that might help? Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk, contributions) 14:46, 24 July 2019 (UTC)
 * I will try and make time for this. Unfortunately, the watchlist tag somehow got unchecked and I have been totally oblivious to all of the editing and talking that has been going on. Paul H. (talk) 20:47, 24 July 2019 (UTC)
 * A new, open access book is Archaeology of the Ryukyu Islands: A Regional Chronology from 3000 B.C. to the Historic Period by Richard Pearson, 2018, University of Hawai'i Press. Paul H. (talk) 13:29, 25 July 2019 (UTC)

An editor is arguing that that this is not a FRINGE issue, and has asked that Paul H remove his comments to make way for a THIRD opinion.

I've done some rough cleanup of the article, but it needs a great deal of work. --Ronz (talk) 15:37, 9 August 2019 (UTC)

The Medical Medium
The Medical Medium's article could use some additional eyes, I think. He learns about medicine from spirits and then shares that magical knowledge with the world with the help of friends like Gwyneth Paltrow. Now a bestselling author. Came to WP for more information after hearing a bit about some celery juice fad he's apparently responsible for. The article seems, to my eye, rather too charitable in describing his various claims. &mdash; Rhododendrites  talk \\ 04:16, 10 August 2019 (UTC)
 * "He learns about medicine from spirits and then shares that magical knowledge with the world" – well, it worked for Rudolph Steiner ... Alexbrn (talk) 05:45, 10 August 2019 (UTC)

Olavo de Carvalho
Someone keeps deleting appropriate categories such as Category:Pseudohistorians. More watchful eyes? --Hob Gadling (talk) 19:45, 10 August 2019 (UTC)

Nebuchadnezzar II
This is about. What wants from us is that we should teach the controversy about alternative historical facts, based upon pseudoscholarship. Hint: it's a history article (as in "historical facts"), not a theology article. Tgeorgescu (talk) 13:12, 8 August 2019 (UTC)

More hammering at. It seems that the socks drawer has been opened. It seems a complete mockery to poo on the historical method and then call your papers history writing. Since the Enlightenment the supernatural has been purged from history, yet some Wikipedia editors seem unaware of this fact. Tgeorgescu (talk) 13:44, 11 August 2019 (UTC)

Empathizing–systemizing theory
and (and redirects like Extreme male brain) look like fringe science to me, but I am not an expert. The phrase "Empathizing-systematizing theory has faced some criticism on ideological grounds" jumped out at me as being particularly POV pushing. Is this theory mainstream psychology, or fringe medicine?

(Also being discussed at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Medicine --Guy Macon (talk) 21:44, 9 August 2019 (UTC)


 * On the talk page of the Empathizing–systemizing theory article is the claim regarding Simon Baron-Cohen that "the entire part on criticisms is based heavily on feminist scholarship and not on independent research". The same editor who wrote that added a "The neutrality of this article is disputed" tag to the article. Could it be that it is the criticisms that are fringe? --Guy Macon (talk) 15:19, 10 August 2019 (UTC)
 * ( ...Sound of Crickets... ) --Guy Macon (talk) 15:59, 12 August 2019 (UTC)
 * E-S theory is accepted, although a bit outdated. Some of the criticism relates to how that, building on earlier research, has led to a skewing of the diagnostic criteria which have led to perverse outcomes; underdiagnosis of autism in women and girls, behavioural analysis as a long term mitigation for autism etc.
 * Random Acts of Language (talk) 07:55, 13 August 2019 (UTC)

Pre-Columbian trans-oceanic contact theories
A recent edit added "Similar claims have been made based on interpretations of carvings from the Bharhut Stupa (2 BC) and Jambukeswarar Temple, Thiruvanaikaval (2 AD) that are claimed to represent the fruits of Anacardium occidentale. Some translators of ayurvedic texts in Sanskrit have also associated certain plant names to Anacardium occidentale. "

I can't find any discussion of these in mainstream sources. Doug Weller talk 15:36, 14 August 2019 (UTC)

Jaredites and the Olmecs
Dubious sourcing - all from various Mormon authors, no suggestion that mainstream scholars don't agree. Doug Weller talk 16:03, 14 August 2019 (UTC)

Annie's Coming Out
Deletion discussion regarding a fringe topic. Articles for deletion/Annie's Coming Out --Wikiman2718 (talk) 16:14, 6 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Maybe someone here can try explaining that WP:FRINGE doesn't cover works of fiction that depict fringe topics, as the message doesn't seem to be getting through. From the way the AfD is going so far, I get the feeling the nominator would complain that our article on Ghostbusters doesn't explicitly include a disclaimer that ghosts aren't real. &#8209; Iridescent 16:19, 6 August 2019 (UTC)
 * As noted in the deletion discussion, the movie is non-fiction. --Wikiman2718 (talk) 16:35, 6 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Only the names have been changed to protect the innocent.Slatersteven (talk) 16:36, 6 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Whether it is fiction or not is hardly relevant. WP:FRINGE can "cover" works of fiction if there is some sort of agenda at work in, say promoting a fringe idea through the fictional account. And while Ghostbusters is not at risk of being "debunked", you cannot deny that Dan Akroyd has some *ahem* beliefs with respect to parapsychology that are somewhat counter to our best understanding of that subject. To be clear, AfD doesn't seem like the best place to address these issues. However, there are ways in which WP:FRINGE can be applicable to such articles provided sources which properly contextualize these fictional pieces can be found. jps (talk) 18:16, 6 August 2019 (UTC)
 * @jps Sure, but "this film is based on a highly dubious premise" is not a reason for deletion, or The Passion of the Christ, The King's Speech and 300 would all be redlinks. At no point is the article making the claim that this is a true story, just that the central character is on a real person, something which isn't in doubt. &#8209; Iridescent 19:23, 6 August 2019 (UTC)
 * On that we agree. jps (talk) 19:35, 6 August 2019 (UTC)
 * What it comes down to is the AfD is based on WP:NFRINGE and should be based on WP:NMOVIE. Simonm223 (talk) 18:18, 6 August 2019 (UTC)
 * I don't agree. If the movie were a documentary, we would apply fringe guidelines. If it were fiction we wouldn't. This movie "tells a true story" and is based on a fringe-pushing work of non-fiction by the same name. Reviewers make it clear that they believe in the reality of an intellectually disabled person learning to communicate. Therefor I am inclined to judge it per WP:NFRINGE. Without skeptical sources we cannot write a neutral article. Neutrality is why we have the WP:NFRINGE guideline. --Wikiman2718 (talk) 18:34, 6 August 2019 (UTC)
 * A "true story" is fiction. I am reminded of Fargo, which in the opening credits says "This is a true story" ( = completely made up )... Alexbrn (talk) 18:52, 6 August 2019 (UTC)
 * I see no reason to treat this movie as a documentary. It's a fiction work that happens to espouse fringe beliefs. But should 2012 (movie) adhere to WP:NFRINGE? Simonm223 (talk) 18:53, 6 August 2019 (UTC)
 * A true story spans the entire spectrum from completely made up to actually true. In this case, however, the sources make it clear that they believe that the fringe being pushed is real. It is also notable that this fringe theory was widely believed at the time the movie was released. It was only debunked in the coming years. Given the book it was based off of, it is clear that the makers of the movie were using it to (successfully) push what is now a fringe position. Sources like this one treat the fringe view as non-fiction. --Wikiman2718 (talk) 19:16, 6 August 2019 (UTC)
 * A true story spans the entire spectrum from completely made up to actually true. In this case, however, the sources make it clear that they believe that the fringe being pushed is real. It is also notable that this fringe theory was widely believed at the time the movie was released. It was only debunked in the coming years. Given the book it was based off of, it is clear that the makers of the movie were using it to (successfully) push what is now a fringe position. Sources like this one treat the fringe view as non-fiction. --Wikiman2718 (talk) 19:16, 6 August 2019 (UTC)

Have you done a thorough search for sources about the film and the book upon which it is based? I find multiple mentions of it in various skeptical literature. I'm not sure why you think it hasn't been noticed. jps (talk) 19:35, 6 August 2019 (UTC)
 * I only checked for the movie on google and google news. I couldn't find anything skeptical. Do you mind sending me a link? --Wikiman2718 (talk) 19:47, 6 August 2019 (UTC)
 * . See if you can obtain some of the literature listed there. jps (talk) 20:45, 6 August 2019 (UTC)

The fringyness comes from the fact that one of the listed "authors" could not possibly be an author unless we accept fringe science as fact. However, I don't see any valid deletion reason. ApLundell (talk) 19:43, 6 August 2019 (UTC)


 * I have some concern that having identified that FC has risk if used in isolation, that's being used as the basis for systemic deletion of articles around significant people in the disability rights, and specifically autism rights, communities.


 * We've already got some significant issues with how autism is presented in Wikipedia, with articles reminiscent of the late 1990s in terms of understanding, and a degree of ownership preventing efforts to modernise and reflect current thinking. The exclusion of a number of voices on the basis that they themselves use FC, amongst other methods, is a concern.


 * Where is our threshold over the credibility of an published author, and how dp we demonstrate that we as editors have more authority to decide than a publisher?


 * Random Acts of Language (talk) 10:54, 7 August 2019 (UTC)
 * I think that what needs to be done is identify excellent WP:Independent sources. Unfortunately, the non-disabled advocates of FC have created something of a WP:Walled garden around the subject and the disabled people for whom they claim to be advocating. As such, this circling of wagons prevents us from engaging in high-quality scholarship. However, disability rights, as a topic, has excellent approaches which show how to move away from this ableist walled garden. Focusing, then, on such "weeding out" approaches is an excellent way to avoid the WP:FRINGE issues that affect source attribution and other patronizing approaches that non-disabled FC facilitators continue to promote. jps (talk) 16:04, 7 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Speaking of walled gardens, be careful of "amongst other methods". FC gets the media attention, but there are other techniques, and other words for techniques that are just as nonsense. Like most forms of pseudoscience, interested parties have spun off their own variants. (Which no one can seriously question without holding their own favored variant to scrutiny.) ApLundell (talk) 16:03, 8 August 2019 (UTC)
 * How would you suggest that we avoid systemic exclusion of voices in the topic?
 * The issue we have is that the cluster of Autism related articles don't reflect current thinking of the condition, and the issue around FC is being used as an excuse to delete a number of articles, that have the potential to contribute to evolving the treatment?
 * Specifically with respect to FC, the debate here has become very binary, and I'd note a specific conflict of interest in the debate related to the opportunity to silence voices? Essentially how do we improve the quality of the Autism related articles, in an environment where there is significant resistance to doing so.  What would you suggest as an approach?
 * Random Acts of Language (talk) 08:51, 9 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Use WP:RS and WP:MEDRS That support current thinking to support edits you want to make. -Roxy, the dog . wooF 11:53, 9 August 2019 (UTC)
 * It would help if you gave specific examples so that we might be able to help. Speaking only in the abstract, it is hard to know exactly what your concerns are. I can give one specific example to illustrate the problem from the perspective of disability rights: Articles for deletion/Amy_Sequenzia (2nd nomination) was decided in part on the basis of a complete lack of sources that indicated that Amy Sequenzia was actually producing the words attributed to her. The idea behind the deletion was not one of attempting to silence Sequenzia, but rather the problem is that there hasn't been a consistent WP:Independent source that verifies that Sequenzia is communicating. Those who attest that she is communicating and not her non-disabled facilitators do not present the analysis that we can use to verify that she is producing the work attributed to her. The problem is that Wikipedia cannot right this wrong if indeed it is Sequenzia communicating. The onus is necessarily on the sources and not on the content curators here at this website. jps (talk) 15:07, 9 August 2019 (UTC)
 * "Potential to help evolving the treatment" is a worrying phrase.
 * 1) Because no reputable medical researcher or practitioner is getting their data from Wikipedia. So what you're really talking about is non-professionals trying stuff because it sounds good.
 * 2) Are we still talking about FC? Because that's a pseudo-science. Not just because it doesn't work, but because of the completely non-scientific way people are approaching it. I have no doubt that it will continue to "evolve" as new gurus latch onto it, just like crystal therapy, homeopathy, or even ghost hunting continues to evolve as new practitioners add their own creative touches to the established mythos.
 * ApLundell (talk) 05:19, 10 August 2019 (UTC)
 * It should be fairly clear when I'm talking about how WP treats autism I'm talking about autism, not FC. FWIW I'd agree that FC in isolation is extremely high risk, but it hasn't been used in isolation for many years.  If we're helping non-speaking autistics to learn to communicate then it's a step on the path, particularly helping those who exhibit apraxia.  RPM rather than FC can help in conditioning motor response, and in learning the use of the AAC.  I wouldn't be comfortable treating it as unmediated in the long term, if a learner isn't becoming independent, then try another AAC.
 * What we've got in WP at the moment is a very outdated representation of autism, and resistance to evolving that representation. Given that those who are resistant aren't demonstrating particular good faith in their approach at the moment are mitigated, or should we just leave a featured article preserved in aspic?
 * Random Acts of Language (talk) 09:12, 12 August 2019 (UTC)
 * I understand. I guess at the moment I'm trying to get my head around the approach, as I look at the range of Autism related articles and updating it looks like an insurmountable challenge at the moment.  I'm particularly conscious that we've got three articles about "autism" at the moment, with resistance to merging them using fairly arbitrary and undefined terms.  With one of those being a featured article, and resistance to bring it up to date I have a feeling that we'll drop into a problem of inertia.
 * My issue with picking out specifics is that it doesn't really help to address the fundamental issue with the treatment of the topic; it's outdated and not reflective of current research. I'm conscious that there is a school of thought within autism commentary that would prefer the last ten years of research hadn't happened and could we please go back to when it was nice and simple and autistics didn't express opinions.
 * Part of the issue with the Amy Sequenza article is that her use of FC, as one of her methods of communication, was used to undermine the whole thing. Water under the bridge, and again a weakness of the WP method, but essentially what we're now saying is that we can't use sources from people like Prof Baron-Cohen, given that he's interviewed her as part of his research.  Just an example of the issues that I'm seeing.
 * Random Acts of Language (talk) 09:12, 12 August 2019 (UTC)
 * I haven't really been following the FC discussions, but the mention of bad autism content is concerning (though whether that's for a fringe noticeboard I'm not sure). Since the discussion is very abstract, could somebody please give an example of the best (the very best) source that we're not using, that condemns our content to being "very outdated". Alexbrn (talk) 09:20, 12 August 2019 (UTC)
 * I'd suggest your phrasing typifies the inertia risk. Why should it take an external criticism of Wikipedia to update the content?
 * Given that there are three articles on Autism that would benefit from being merged, the fact that there are three articles on the same condition should start some alarm bells ringing. DSM5 published in 2013 is a fair reference.  ICD10 was published in 1994 and the replacement has just been ratified this year as well.
 * I'm in a bit of a quandary about where to start to be honest.
 * Random Acts of Language (talk) 10:20, 12 August 2019 (UTC)
 * I don't know what is meant by "external criticism" (ah - by "that condemns" I mean "by which omission causes"). But if WP has "a very outdated representation of autism" then it follows there are up-to-date sources which differ from what our articles contain, that we are not using. I just wanted the most obvious example? All WP can do is reflect sources. Alexbrn (talk) 10:34, 12 August 2019 (UTC)


 * I took your question "that condemns our content to being "very outdated"" at face value; autistic literalism perhaps. But, something that identifies that Autis/ Aspergers/ ASC/ Classic Autism are all the same thing might be Dr Luke Beardon, Autism & Aspergers Syndrome in Adults, 2017, Ch1.  He lists a series of terms that all mean the same thing.  Luke is the Director of the Autism unit at Sheffield.  I'd add that SBC has said very similar things at Cambridge.
 * Random Acts of Language (talk) 10:39, 12 August 2019 (UTC)
 * That's helpful. I know Simon Baron-Cohen is a controversial figure wrt autism but had not heard of Luke Beardon. So what we are talking about is individuals' opinions as published in the lay press? If so, that does not strike me as showing Wikipedia as horribly out-of-date, but might raise question on whether these guys' view are given due weight. To decide that we'd need to know how influential their views are on mainstream thinking. Alexbrn (talk) 10:55, 12 August 2019 (UTC)
 * I'd suggest that the authoritative indicator of Autism, Aspergers and Autism Spectrum Condition are the same thing would be the diagnostic schema. I imagine that'll be dismissed because they're primary.  The only difference between Aspergers and Autism in DSM IV was around rate of juvenile verbal language acquisition, but I imagine that constitutes original research?
 * I'm not entirely sure that I'd characterise Luke and SBC as "some guy", given that they're both leading academics in the field. SBCs Theory of Mind model from the early 90s is no longer particularly supported.
 * This is really helping illustrate that it's likely an exercise in futility to try to get a more representative articulation of the space.
 * Random Acts of Language (talk) 11:27, 12 August 2019 (UTC)

Don't despair! Merging the three articles seems like a good way to start achieving the (laudable) goals you have in mind for autism content at Wikipedia. I can see a very strong case for merging these designates since the best and most reliable sources no longer contend there is a clear diagnostic demarcation available. As far as your concern about FC "steps", as it were, the best thing to do is to make sure to focus on the steps that are verifiable beyond any FC sources. For example, if there are particular autism advocates who had FC intervention in their childhood but now verifiably produce communication that is unaided, it's best to stick with the stuff that is verifiably attributable. jps (talk) 14:34, 12 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Yes. After all, the conclusion "X verifiably produces communication, and they had FC intervention in their childhood, therefore FC was useful" is the same type of superstition as "X has become better, and they took homeopathic medicine earlier, therefore homeopathy was useful" - this bad logic is called post hoc ergo propter hoc. --Hob Gadling (talk) 17:02, 12 August 2019 (UTC)
 * fwiw, given that my focus is on improving the Autism coverage rather than FC, that particular point is quite a useful illustration of the challenge. Selection bias in sourcing, and narrow focus, have somewhat skewed the decision.  In this case, Amy Sequenza has used FC during her has been used as a reason to exclude coverage.  We also know that she now types independently, as FC/ RPM was used as a technique to help her improve her ideo-motor control as a result of apraxia.  Water under the bridge, I'm not particularly attached to either FC or her as an author.
 * Notwithstanding that, FC isn't widely used in autism support any more. It is used to help teach the use of an AAC, but the point of that is helping to move towards the AAC independently. Exclusive use of FC is more the preserve of those who would wish to silence autistics by controlling the narrative, rather than empower.
 * Random Acts of Language (talk) 14:16, 13 August 2019 (UTC)
 * I'll consider how to put together the arguments. I have a feeling that proposing a merger will generate the same resistance that it's had before, particularly from very longstanding editors.  The arguments are pretty specious, but when it's all about voting I'd expect they'll carry more weight and it'll get nowhere.
 * Can't hurt to try though, because at the moment it reads like it was written 20 years ago and never updated.
 * Random Acts of Language (talk) 14:16, 13 August 2019 (UTC)
 * There may be legitimate arguments from those that are resisting, but it seems reasonable to think in terms of a hierarchy of articles at the very least with something like "Autism Spectrum" at the top level and the rest of the articles serving as WP:CFORKs at least. jps (talk) 15:41, 13 August 2019 (UTC)
 * They're only legitimate if you ignore the last ten years of research. There is a segment of the wider community, largely parents without autism, who reject DSM5.  I noticed that it went through FS in 2005/ 2007.  And that's reflected in the current wording.  It uses a lot of old sources, and the language attributes those as current.
 * There is an issue in the wider autism industry; it's very lucrative for people without autism and it's inconvenient to them that autistic people reject a lot of it. In particular the "gold standard in therapy" is widely condemned as damaging to autistics; only three academic papers analyse the damage that it does, so we end up with a volume of poor quality research supporting it as viable.  That's also reflected in the research, with academics tending to focus on biological and genetic research, so we end up with selection bias in the sources.  At INSAR this year it became apparent that many "autism researchers" had never met an openly autistic person.
 * It's going to take some time to put together a sound argument. AS we've seen with FC, it's easy to have a simplistic argument using outdated source material, somewhat more challenging to reflect a subtler argument and the WP policies are somewhat blunt instruments.
 * Random Acts of Language (talk) 08:41, 14 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Why should it take some time to put together a sound arguement? The material used to support the FC article is not at all outdated but references the most modern WP:RS and WP:MEDRS that there are. You appear to be asserting that we are not using up to date science. This is of course because we use "reliable sources" rather than the latest unconfirmed cutting edge research. We perhaps could report all the modern speculative, unconfirmed research, but not as the project as currently constituted. If I could give you three pieces of advice about wiki editing, they would be 1) Use good sources, 2) Use good sources, and 3) ... -Roxy, the dog . wooF 10:31, 14 August 2019 (UTC)
 * I think you missed the point of what I said. I'm not all that worked up about FC, although it's a useful demonstration of the flaws in the approach.  Having now spent some time reviewing all of the material on autism, it's woefully out of date and some very established editors are resistant to updating it.
 * I'm sorry that you're offended by my observations on the flaws in the WP model. The same flaws it had 10 years ago and have never really been addressed.
 * Random Acts of Language (talk) 08:07, 15 August 2019 (UTC)

FYI Firstly, the AFD was SNOW closed as Keep. Secondly, please use WP:WikiProject Autism to work out the issues concerning how Autism is covered in WP. Roger (Dodger67) (talk) 10:49, 14 August 2019 (UTC)
 * As I've just been chewing over, that's probably an exercise in futility, but that you for your welcome and constructive contribution to the discussion
 * Random Acts of Language (talk) 08:07, 15 August 2019 (UTC)

Help with an edit request
Regulars here might be more able than I am to determine if there's any validity to the edit request made at Talk:Misogyny, and what exactly to do about it. Thanks, –Deacon Vorbis (carbon &bull; videos) 13:44, 15 August 2019 (UTC)
 * The Edit requester is absolutely spot on. I have done what they requested. If someone wants to find a better source detailing Darwin's misogyny, the section can be rewritten. jps (talk) 13:50, 15 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Great, thanks. –Deacon Vorbis (carbon &bull; videos) 14:03, 15 August 2019 (UTC)

Auxiliary issues
The contributor who wrote the Charles Darwin section on Misogyny is now blocked for copyright violations, but I suspect in the contribution history we might find a lot of problematic fringe content that needs to be removed or recouched:

Special:Contributions/Shootingstar88

jps (talk) 13:55, 15 August 2019 (UTC)

RFC on handling popular critics of campus sexual assault research
There is an ongoing RFC that may be of interest to editors with background in WP:FRINGE materials. The RFC concerns how to handle non-academic critics who argue that the academic research on campus sexual assault is methodologically flawed. Please comment here. Nblund talk 17:16, 16 August 2019 (UTC)

International Chiropractors Association
Two new editors on the article have been removing information from International Chiropractors Associations articles page about their anti-vaccine views. There is sourced information including that the organization invited Andrew Wakefield to one of their annual conferences. They also screened Vaxxed at the same conference. They also have other anti-vaccine views but I want to see if others agree that it should be included in the information on their organization. -- VViking Talk Edits 01:52, 17 August 2019 (UTC)


 * On my watchlist. Thanks for bringing this to my attention. --Guy Macon (talk) 02:01, 17 August 2019 (UTC)
 * watchlisted. Roxy, the dog . wooF 09:39, 17 August 2019 (UTC)

Placebo studies
Lust came across this. Looks like a big of a POV fork of Placebo, especially since it's rich in Ted Kaptchuk sources. Alexbrn (talk) 19:50, 16 August 2019 (UTC)
 * It's a field of research. It doesn't have a POV. And stop stalking my edit history. --Wikiman2718 (talk) 20:00, 16 August 2019 (UTC)


 * Is the phrase "Placebo Studies" commonly used to describe this area of study?  Google results are mostly just places where it's been used as a casual shorthand for "double-blind experiments". ApLundell (talk) 20:47, 16 August 2019 (UTC)


 * The term is in common use. You may be confusing "placebo studies" with placebo controlled studies. A placebo-controlled study is a type of scientific experiment, while placebo studies is the field of research that studies the placebo effect. --Wikiman2718 (talk) 20:52, 16 August 2019 (UTC)


 * I'm well aware of what placebos are used for in medical research.
 * My point was that, with a quick google search, I didn't immediately see the phrase "placebo studies" being used in the same sense as the article. It doesn't seem to even appear in the article's sources. (Although I'll admit I only glanced at them.)
 * Perhaps you could provide examples of the term being used outside of Wikipedia?
 * ApLundell (talk) 21:07, 16 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Sure. Here's one. --Wikiman2718 (talk) 21:45, 16 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Even that article calls it a "nascent" field. There just doesn't seem to be much recognition of this as an actual field.  At best, this seems WP:TOOSOON.  Maybe a section or so at placebo effect could be salvaged?  –Deacon Vorbis (carbon &bull; videos) 22:55, 16 August 2019 (UTC)
 * It could possibly be merged with Program in Placebo Studies, but I'm sure there is enough for an article. At very least we should agree that this topic is not fringe. --Wikiman2718 (talk) 02:06, 17 August 2019 (UTC)
 * It's fringe alright. In essence this article is a coat rack for Kaptchuk's fringey views that placebos have therapeutic potential ("even Parkinson's disease" as the article suggests). The gushing claim that he "pioneered the field" fails WP:V though, as does the extraordinary claim (sourced to a Kaptchuk article) that "it became widely known throughout the academic community that placebo effects could in fact result in clinical changes and results". More on this here. Probably this article should be deleted/merged to Placebo per WP:NOPAGE, but in lieu of that the fringeiness needs to be placed in context. Alexbrn (talk) 08:50, 17 August 2019 (UTC)
 * The source doesn't call placebo studies fringe. It says that the studies are well conducted, but disagrees with many of the interpretations. It's also a blog post. --Wikiman2718 (talk) 13:23, 17 August 2019 (UTC)
 * See also, which is related, but seems to be of questionable notability anyway. –Deacon Vorbis (carbon &bull; videos) 22:44, 16 August 2019 (UTC)

Jenny McCarthy
User retaining comments making accusations of bias while collapsing my shorter response to those comments. --Guy Macon (talk) 07:25, 17 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Guy Macon, you posted the same essay on Jenny McCarthy, Intelligent design and science and at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Skepticism over a period of about 10 minutes. The intelligent design article hasn't even had a significant discussion on talk for over a year, and the last time that bias turned up as an issue was seven years ago. I'm not sure how the essay was relevant to any remotely current issue on that talk page. With Jenny McCarthy, you've never previously invovled yourself in any of the discussion - just turned up today to post your mini-essay, with no context and in a thread all of its own. Reading the discussion there, the problem is not specifically accusations of anti-vaccination bias, but claims that McCarthy's beliefs have been mischaracterised. Adding a context-free essay saying "yes, we're biased" to concerns that we are being biased towards a living person is far from helpful, and will just make things harder - exspecially given that there has been no movement on the discussion for over a week, and it appears to be all but done. - Bilby (talk) 09:45, 17 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Bilby, that essay it is a terrific tool to explain how wikipedia works to in-universe editors who don't understand. I use it myself from time to time. McCarthy is a rabid anti-vaxxer well known to anybody who edits in fringe medical areas. It provides a short sharp wake-up-you-woolly-thinker message to woosters, without having to go round the Wrekin time and again. Your action suggests you support the lunatic charlatans of the world? -Roxy, the dog . wooF 09:55, 17 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Because I think that it is unhelpful to respond to someone saying "you are mischaractersing a living person's beleifs" with what amounts to a "we're biased - deal it it" essay posted without any context, the assumption is that I must be a supporter of lunatic charlatans? That seems equally unhelpful. - Bilby (talk) 10:04, 17 August 2019 (UTC)
 * "without any context". Nah. -Roxy, the dog . wooF 11:13, 17 August 2019 (UTC)


 * That user is beginning to look like a WP:SPA here to Correct Our Bias&trade; on vaccines not causing autism. Guy (Help!) 11:24, 17 August 2019 (UTC)
 * I didn't remove the collapse because I want to avoid edit warring, but It really isn't NPOV for Bilby to leave multiple accusations of Wikipedia having bias against antivaccination (and that is exactly what they are, not accusations of bias against Jenny McCarthy, who appears to consider being against antivaccination to be a badge of honor) up while collapsing my (shorter) response with edit comments indicating that he did so because he doesn't like what I wrote. Bilby, could you please self-revert that collapse? The response here has certainly established that it was controversial, and I would argue that it violated WP:TPOC. --Guy Macon (talk) 15:58, 17 August 2019 (UTC)
 * I try not to allow Bilby's quixotic defence of antivaxers to wind me up. Guy (Help!) 17:33, 17 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Unfortunately, until we accept that BLP is not optional - even with people we don't like - I'm stuck with defending people I disagree with. - Bilby (talk) 23:20, 17 August 2019 (UTC)


 * It's a good essay. Perhaps we should pin it to the top of the talk page. – bradv  🍁  17:39, 17 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Done. Bilby has received a pseudoscience discretionary sanctions notice in the last year, so I can go right to WP:AE if he continues his behavior. --Guy Macon (talk) 19:30, 17 August 2019 (UTC)
 * I think posting essays like this remains a bad idea, but so be it. - Bilby (talk) 23:20, 17 August 2019 (UTC)

Aha. Ha. Hahaha
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Kimball_Atwood#Kimball_Atwood Roxy, the dog . wooF 10:02, 18 August 2019 (UTC)

Effects of blue light technology
I’m not familiar with the topic, but recent changes by SPAs have altered the article’s POV significantly. - LuckyLouie (talk) 22:53, 18 August 2019 (UTC)

Hydrogen water
Another edit war at Hydrogen water and related pages by spa who has been editing for two days. Eyes needed. Xxanthippe (talk) 06:26, 20 August 2019 (UTC).

Environmental Working Group


Notorious chemophobes the Environmental Working Group have paid someone to try to buff up the article. So far they are sticking to Talk, but they aren't going away any time soon. More eyes would be appreciated. Thanks. Guy (Help!) 08:39, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

Interesting quotes from Meta

 * "This list for example would suggest that the Young Earth Creationism community deserves special protection because it is a Religious group."
 * Source: meta: Talk:Strategy/Wikimedia movement/2018-20/Working Groups/Diversity/Recommendations/2


 * "The classic notion of an encyclopaedia and ‘universal knowledge’ needs to be discarded."
 * Source: Strategy/Wikimedia movement/2018-20/Working Groups/Diversity/Recommendations/2


 * "Some editors might not agree on the need of content diversity and continue deleting articles based on notability reasoning and tensions might emerge."
 * Source: Strategy/Wikimedia movement/2018-20/Working Groups/Diversity/Recommendations/2

--Guy Macon (talk) 00:29, 21 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Reading the Recommendations (and many of the comments) it is clear that the working group has either not read, or does not understand WP:GREATWRONGS. If this gets implemented, I’m outta here. Blueboar (talk) 00:54, 21 August 2019 (UTC)
 * If they are implemented then governing bodies in the future won't be able to consist of three people, because you can't have at least 40% women and 40% men with three people, unless you count one person as both at the same time (that would also satisfy the 20% "representatives of other diverse communities" I guess). Most of the recommendations sound reasonable, some are way too vague to be useful, some are weird. Some are directly dangerous. Making it easier to search for homosexual people in Russia, atheists in Saudi Arabia and so on - what could go wrong? Let's just hope these users are dishonest enough or all wise enough to not fill out the checkboxes. --mfb (talk) 08:31, 21 August 2019 (UTC)

Antivax case at AE
FYI: Arbitration/Requests/Enforcement --Guy Macon (talk) 01:46, 21 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Looks like the admins get towards an agreement. --mfb (talk) 08:45, 21 August 2019 (UTC)

Unplanned
There is a discussion at talk:Unplanned regarding the inclusion of sources critiquing the anti-abortion film's factual accuracy, and indeed its status as an anti-abortion film. Guy (Help!) 09:38, 21 August 2019 (UTC)

Gary Null
Judging from the legal threat I just received off-wiki it looks like Gary Null's people are about to mount yet another attempt to whitewash the article. Guy (Help!) 09:28, 21 August 2019 (UTC)
 * "has an unorthodox approach to AIDS" - they are funny. --mfb (talk) 10:22, 21 August 2019 (UTC)
 * There is another off-wiki legal threat extant (for info Dlohcierekim) which sounds like the same legal people. -Roxy, the dog . wooF 10:47, 21 August 2019 (UTC)

G. Edward Griffin


Someone has liovingly linked tot he source (usually full text PDF or YouTube video) of every single bonkers thing G. Edward Griffin has ever said. Almost all of it is self-published through his own company American Media, which has no other obvious clients. Is this large section on bibliography and filmography WP:UNDUE? Do YouTube videos count under "filmography"? Some of this material is hosted on Freedom Force International, a websuite that has inspired at least one mad bugger to go out with a gun. Guy (Help!) 18:37, 21 August 2019 (UTC)

The Vision and the Voice
Unsourced article about a book by Alastair Crowley. -- Doug Weller talk 18:17, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

Peter Mt. Shasta
This is a terrible article. I removed some junk and replaced some tags. His books are self-published by his "Church of the Seven Rays". -- Doug Weller talk 18:22, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

Climate psychosis
Denialists trying to pathologize science - I deleted two paragraphs but I guess they will come back. --Hob Gadling (talk) 07:20, 12 August 2019 (UTC)


 * I just put them back. While I almost always agree with you, in this case you are calling the New York Post. the Guardian, and various Swedish sources "climate change deniers" and deleting sourced material as being from climate change deniers. I think this should go to the article talk page, and if that doesn't result in a consensus, to an RfC. --Guy Macon (talk) 14:58, 13 August 2019 (UTC)
 * No, I am not. See Talk:Climate psychosis. Actually, this revert improves the chances of the article being deleted, since it made it much, much more fringey than it was without that crap. So, thank you, I guess. --Hob Gadling (talk) 16:35, 13 August 2019 (UTC)
 * It is inappropriate to add junk material to an article with the intention of getting it deleted. Xxanthippe (talk) 22:46, 13 August 2019 (UTC).
 * He didn't restore it. I did. And my position of fringe views is perfectly clear; see User:Guy Macon/Yes. We are biased., especially the bit about climate change. We don't remove fringe views from articles where they are relevant and well-sourced. We document them, then we document what the mainstream view is, clearly labeling both.--Guy Macon (talk) 01:30, 14 August 2019 (UTC)
 * It is the Guardian and so on listing what climate change deniers say. Despite this coverage it is still a fringe opinion. --mfb (talk) 22:49, 13 August 2019 (UTC)
 * So if the Guardian documents what creationists say, we shouldn't put that in our Creationism article because it is a fringe view? Show me where Fringe theories says that we are not to include what reliable sources say about fringe views. --Guy Macon (talk) 01:30, 14 August 2019 (UTC)
 * What Guy said. The usual problem with fringe views is lack of reliable sourcing to document them appropriately. It's perfectly fine where we have a reliable source that discusses them to use that. No matter how batshit insane the theory. We just make sure it's attributed and clearly explained as such. Only in death does duty end (talk) 13:06, 14 August 2019 (UTC)
 * But the views of fringe proponents have to be relevant to the subject. We do quote flat-earthers in the article Flat Earth, but not in the article Earth. We do not quote Immanuel Velikovsky in Venus or Erich von Däniken in articles on serious archaeological subjects.
 * We do quote climate change deniers in Climate change denial, and in articles about the people who deny, but not in articles about subjects where their input serves only as noise. Climate psychosis seems to be a real thing, and what the deniers say does not help understand it - they just inappropriately attribute it to scientists and their supporters. --Hob Gadling (talk) 16:18, 15 August 2019 (UTC)
 * While it seems to me that we should keep some examples, there seems to be an overload of quotes. Some of them also include common denialist narratives that can probably be shortened (i.e. "I explain to my students..."; those who are aware global warming is happening usually already know about natural variation that does not conflict with the fact that anthropogenic emissions are the current concern).  In an article like this, it's important for the lead and the rest to clarify that this is about name-calling (like pseudoskepticism accusations) or actual cases where specific events are linked to global climate change by the public when climatologists do not mention these direct links, it should not be denialist apologetics...  — Paleo  Neonate  – 19:33, 22 August 2019 (UTC)
 * And I should have visited the main article link rather than only diffs in the history, I only noticed it's now a redirect by consensus after posting the above. — Paleo  Neonate  – 19:37, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

Any Russian readers? Need help evaluating new source for Dyatlov Pass article.
An interesting theory has been added to the Dyatlov Pass incident article.

Apparently it's possible that "Arctic Madness" contributed to the accident. It's sourced, but given the article's tendency to attract wacky theories, I'd appreciate it if someone familiar with Russian could evaluate the reliability of the source.

Thanks. ApLundell (talk) 21:39, 26 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Who is that guy? Google translate of the article just describes him as "a resident of Nizhny Tagil" - not as an expert in anything. --mfb (talk) 22:52, 26 July 2019 (UTC)


 * I first heard of "menerik/meryachenie" when this popped up on my watchlist. Coincidence? FWIW the Russian WP article on that phenomenon looks reasonably authoritative. I'm not Russian so can't speak for quality of sourcing, but it does mention a medical journal. It seems to describe a form of cultural psychosis prevalent in Arctic peoples in Siberia. Connecting that to cosmic rays and sunspots looks absolutely dodgy.  Daß &thinsp;  Wölf  03:57, 11 August 2019 (UTC)
 * what’s the problem? Nobody knows for certain why these young people went insane. There is no conclusion by authorities about that. Moreover, vz.ru is not a tabloid. The link presents just another version. Incnis Mrsi (talk) 13:50, 12 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Simply because nobody knows the answer is not a reason to put unsupported guesses into an article. ApLundell (talk) 17:04, 12 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Sorry for my English. Its non good source. Its very very bad source. --El-chupanebrej (talk) 14:15, 13 August 2019 (UTC)


 * Ok. I've removed it. Thank you. ApLundell (talk) 20:45, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

Graham Phillips (writer)
I ran into this article (again, I seem to have visited it in 2010) when I found its creator using him as a source. At the moment it's just a promotional stub for a fringe authorl. Doug Weller talk 19:00, 15 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Adding: Hawkstone Grail is also related, — Paleo Neonate  – 00:26, 23 August 2019 (UTC)

thefieldreportscom.wordpress.com as a ref for Starchild skull
New ref and content added here: Given the apparent quality of the ref, I've left it in for now. Anyone know who Chase Kloetzke and Kerry McClure are, and if they'd be considered experts for this content? --Ronz (talk) 22:54, 22 August 2019 (UTC)
 * It looks like a self-aggrandizing WordPress blog recently created by a couple of ufologists from MUFON, who appear skeptical about some things, but other things, not so much, e.g. "...but seriously, let’s work together to help push “fringe science” into an acceptable field of study, before the masses push it into the abyss of fakery and hoaxes". They also publicize ghost hunts. Not a WP:RS. - LuckyLouie (talk) 12:57, 23 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Oh god no. "Not a RS" is such an understatement that it's an understatement to call it simply an understatement. There is so much cringe there it's difficult to decide where to start.  G M G  talk  13:05, 23 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Moved to Talk:Starchild skull. - LuckyLouie (talk) 15:12, 23 August 2019 (UTC)
 * I've gone ahead and removed the content from the article given the comments above. --Ronz (talk) 15:32, 23 August 2019 (UTC)

Quantum mind
I was skimming the new physics articles report and noticed Draft:Avicenna-Bohm Theory, which looks like promotion of a fringe idea that was just published (and is a copy-and-paste that would be a copyvio if the original weren't technically CC licensed). This led me to Quantum mind, where I cut a section that had been added by an IP which geolocates to the institution of the authors themselves. I guess that (a) keeping an eye out for COI violations would be good, and (b) this is as opportune a time as any to try improving the quantum mind page a bit. For starters, having two not-so-short quotes in the lead seems vaguely essay-like and not quite encyclopedic in tone. Any thoughts? XOR&#39;easter (talk) 04:02, 23 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Oh, apparently the licensing was incompatible after all. XOR&#39;easter (talk) 00:28, 24 August 2019 (UTC)

"I will put this up every day of my life ... I will death curse you." (Völva, Seeress (Germanic))
Hey, folks. So, while I'm used to getting threats from cryptozoologists, climate change deniers, and Young Earth creationists and whatever, this is a first for me:
 * Added important unique entry for Völva, I will put this up every day of my life if I have to and I will be unable to update information and sources if I am at war with you. Practicing Svartur Völva here, I will death curse you.

Basically, this particular user demands that we maintain a separate page for völva complete with a bunch of WP:SYNTH, WP:OR, and you name it, rather than have the article redirect to its main article, referenced with very solid sources throughout, which is Seeress (Germanic). As Seeress (Germanic) makes clear (as does every work of scholarship on this topic), Old Norse völva is one of several different synonyms for seeresses in the North Germanic record.

Now, even the user's lack of familiarity with the topic is evident and chances are at worst they'll accidentally turn the milk in their fridge sour or whatever, nonetheless it'd be nice to get some more eyes on this stuff. I'm not exactly keen on the prospect of being stalked by yet another threat-tossing edit-warrior for the foreseeable future. . &#58;bloodofox: (talk) 15:55, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Watch out for that death curse I hear it takes many forms. Simonm223 (talk) 15:57, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Yikes! &#58;bloodofox: (talk) 16:01, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Kudos - LuckyLouie (talk) 17:38, 3 September 2019 (UTC)


 * I've indeffed per our policy against death curses. I'm also pretty sure their material is copyvio. It sounds like it, and it's pretty hard to believe this, for example, is copied from the two-day-old article on Wikipedia. Bishonen &#124; talk 16:55, 3 September 2019 (UTC).
 * I've just posted to your talk page. I recognised that material when I finally looked at their version of Völva; they basically restored the version before Bloodofox rewrote the article last month; Bloodofox also moved it to Seeress (Germanic). So if that's the copyvio, it was the copying-within-Wikipedia-without-attribution kind; I'd assumed you realised that. Yngvadottir (talk) 17:34, 3 September 2019 (UTC)


 * well that worked spectacularly well for them, didn't it? Guy (help!) 19:38, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

General knowledge cites fringey author Richard Lynn
As pointed out in a New Yorker article today about Amy Wax, our article on General knowledge heavily cites work by disgraced professor Richard Lynn, who seemingly should be considered a fringe source. Quoting New Yorker:

"Wax sent links to two studies whose lead author is Richard Lynn, a British psychologist who is known for believing in racial differences in intelligence, supporting eugenics, and associating with white supremacists. (She also shared the Wikipedia page for “general knowledge,” which cites several of Lynn’s studies.)"

Need some eyes on the article. --Krelnik (talk) 21:39, 23 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Wow. That article is bad. Look at the "Scope" section &mdash; it cites Lynn for the definition of the subject. XOR&#39;easter (talk) 18:55, 24 August 2019 (UTC)

Society for Scientific Exploration
See  Doug Weller  talk 07:54, 25 August 2019 (UTC)

Postbiological evolution
This looks like WP:SYNTH to me. Is this SYNTH?

jps (talk) 19:03, 25 August 2019 (UTC)
 * And some...interesting physics. XOR&#39;easter (talk) 19:41, 25 August 2019 (UTC)
 * The dictionary definition of Evolution is any process of formation, growth or development. This isn't an encyclopedia article; it's a school report that somebody put off until the last minute. I don't see anything in it really worth saving. XOR&#39;easter (talk) 01:37, 26 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Concur with comments above; not only is it chock full of original research and inaccuracies, but even the stuff that could have citations added is still fringe futurological speculation. AfD probably warranted. -Crossroads- (talk) 01:54, 26 August 2019 (UTC)

AfD initiated: Articles for deletion/Postbiological evolution. jps (talk) 11:09, 26 August 2019 (UTC)

Placebo
This is about, which two editors want to get it undone at the talk page. Tgeorgescu (talk) 18:48, 26 August 2019 (UTC)


 * Placebo is about as far from a "fringe" theory as is possible to get. The problem seems to be Tgeorgescu's incorrect belief that placebo is a fringe theory. --sciencewatcher (talk) 18:58, 26 August 2019 (UTC)


 * "Placebo does heal real illnesses" is the fringe view. Tgeorgescu (talk) 19:02, 26 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Let's keep this on the talk page. --Wikiman2718 (talk) 19:04, 26 August 2019 (UTC)
 * ... This page is for notifying people who are interested in fringe topics that something fringey is going on somewhere. ... --Hob Gadling (talk) 06:33, 19 April 2018 (UTC) Quoted by Tgeorgescu (talk) 19:09, 26 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Well, "Placebo does heal real illnesses" is very vague, and isn't what anyone is saying on the talk page. What we are saying is that the placebo effect can have real objective effects, in terms of neurotransmitters, and changes to objective pain, depression and perhaps Parkinson's motor control and sleep. This is what the science says, and it isn't in any way fringe. --sciencewatcher (talk) 19:26, 26 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Slight correction: the evidence was inconclusive for sleep. —Wikiman2718 (talk) 19:42, 26 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Yes, the evidence may not be entirely conclusive for certain conditions. However it would be incorrect to say that it is fringe. --sciencewatcher (talk) 19:47, 26 August 2019 (UTC)
 * I agree entirely. Just trying to set all our facts straight. —Wikiman2718 (talk) 20:06, 26 August 2019 (UTC)


 * Had a quick look. Cochrane sources are regarded as strong and generally exempt from the "5 year rule" because they get updated when the underlying evidence changes (as MEDRS says). There are certainly a lot of fringe claims made for placebos, yes. Alexbrn (talk) 21:30, 26 August 2019 (UTC)

A possible fringe theory about sexual behavior in animals and humans
Some comments are requested here:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Copulation_(zoology)#Questions_for_FTN

Issues involved are the definition of a fringe theory/theorist, possible use of Wikipedia by a fringe theorist to promote their ideas, and whether or not that theorist's material is a reliable source or whether the content should be trusted. -Crossroads- (talk) 16:26, 20 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Update: this seems solved for now (with Wunsch's material considered fringe and points to detect future socks at the bottom of this thread (permalink)). — Paleo  Neonate  – 03:04, 27 August 2019 (UTC)

Lyle Blackburn


Non notable cryptozoologist. Also being publicized at Lizard Man of Scape Ore Swamp and Fouke Monster.-LuckyLouie (talk) 20:32, 25 August 2019 (UTC)

It continues. See Talk:Lizard Man of Scape Ore Swamp. -LuckyLouie (talk) 12:39, 27 August 2019 (UTC)

White privilege
An editor thinks White privilege is violating WP:NPOV by giving insufficient attention to people who don't believe white privilege exists. This is, frankly, very deep into WP:PROFRINGE territory based on current social science. Any editors with a background in social sciences and an interest in fringe who want to help out would be welcome. Simonm223 (talk) 12:51, 14 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Has anyone found evidence for the existence of white privilege? For white privilege to receive protection under WP:FRINGE as a sociological theory, there would need to be scientific evidence for it. I don't think this is fringe. --Wikiman2718 (talk) 14:17, 16 August 2019 (UTC)
 * (Not cite-able in an article, constitutes OR, but... I am walking, talking evidence for the existence of white privilege. I think most people who deny the existence of white privilege fail to understand and fully grasp the concept.)~  ONUnicorn (Talk&#124;Contribs) problem solving 16:00, 16 August 2019 (UTC)
 * First of all, WP:FRINGE says nothing about whether ideas have scientific evidence or not. But, in this case: Yes, there is lots of evidence for its existence. As a heuristic, it was lately popularized by Peggy McIntosh and it has been subsequently verified by many sources you can find in the article. jps (talk) 14:56, 16 August 2019 (UTC)
 * The viewpoint that white privilege exists is hardly fringe. The problem is that neither is the viewpoint that it does not exist. The article needs to treat both viewpoints as mainstream. Blueboar (talk) 15:16, 16 August 2019 (UTC)

I'm sorry, what scholarship is there that indicates that white privilege does not exist? jps (talk) 15:26, 16 August 2019 (UTC)
 * The OP suggested that the concepts was supported by social science as grounds to exclude dissenting opinion. From the article:


 * In the late 1980s, the term gained new popularity in academic circles and public discourse after Peggy McIntosh's 1987 essay White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack.[27]In this essay, McIntosh described white privilege as “an invisible weightless knapsack of assurances, tools, maps, guides, codebooks, passports, visas, clothes, compass, emergency gear, and blank checks," and also discussed the relationships between different social hierarchies in which experiencing oppression in one hierarchy did not negate unearned privilege experienced in another.[1][28] In later years, the theory of intersectionality also gained prominence, with black feminists like Kimberlé Williams Crenshaw arguing that black women experienced a different type of oppression from male privilege distinct from that experienced by white women because of white privilege.[29] The essay is still routinely citedas a key influence by later generations of academics and journalists.[30][10] :::In 2003, Ella Bell and Stella Nkomo noted that "most scholars of race relations embrace the use of [the concept] white privilege".[31] Sociologists in the American Mosaic Project at the University of Minnesota reported that widespread belief in the United States that "prejudice and discrimination [in favor of whites] create a form of white privilege." According to their 2003 poll, this view was affirmed by 59% of white respondents, 83% of Blacks, and 84% of Hispanics.[32]


 * This looks to me like an unscientific idea that has gained prominence through philosophy and essays-writing. A fair article should represent this idea as a theory, not a fact. I see no evidence that this theory is so well accepted as that everyone who disagrees is pushing fringe. In my opinion, the NPOV tag was well-placed. --Wikiman2718 (talk) 15:32, 16 August 2019 (UTC)


 * No one has yet provided any evidence that the existence of white privilege is being denied by any relevant mainstream scholarship. What it looks like to you is irrelevant to our purposes. To be clear, the idea that white privilege exists is one that has been backed up by empirical papers including a number that are referenced in the article, so to claim that it is an "unscientific idea" is basically to broadcast a profound ignorance of the relevant literature. jps (talk) 15:49, 16 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Also, please try to avoid using the incorrect "theory vs. fact" dichotomy. It's tiresome when creationists pontificate on it, and it's not a welcome misconception to continue to promote. jps (talk) 15:54, 16 August 2019 (UTC)
 * I am currently looking at Google Scholar and not a single source so far looks like "white privilege does not exist". Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk, contributions) 15:58, 16 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Indeed. I can see some papers arguing that its impact is overstated and that other factors are more significant, but I can't see anything that argues that there's no such thing. (Nor, indeed, can I imagine any credible academic making such a claim, whatever their political position.) &#8209; Iridescent 16:05, 16 August 2019 (UTC)


 * It is important to remember that “mainstream” is not limited to academia. While there may not be academic papers saying that white privilege does not exist, there are many non-academic sources that do say this.  I can see the argument that we should give MORE weight to the academic sources, but that does NOT mean we should ignore the non-academic ones. Blueboar (talk) 11:54, 21 August 2019 (UTC)
 * It was for exactly this reason that we started WP:MAINSTREAM as a concept. For many claims, it is often very possible to find a lot of non-academic people who claim something doesn't exist which the academy essentially agrees does exist or vice versa. Wikipedia necessarily pays most attention to the best sources -- and those are the sources from the academy because those are the sources which follow most closely our rules for reliability and verifiability. It is the case here where WP:PARITY almost automatically works in a way to exclude the non-academic works. If someone thinks that a non-academic perspective is worthy of inclusion in an article on a technical subject like white privilege, then it is up to them to produce evidence that this perspective has been prominently noticed by people who are relevant experts (producing the sources that we are using in the article). If they cannot find such sources, excising is our only choice.
 * Let's take, for example, the case of redshift which was fought more than a decade ago at this point. In that conflict, the non-academic and pseudo-academic sources the WP:FRINGE proponents were arguing for were almost entirely unnoticed by the relevant academics who were explicating the subject. Our current article only mentions those very few interpretations which were tossed around for historical context. There is nothing left of the kinds of wacko redshift mechanism proposals that had once polluted the article because, in spite of the people who don't believe in general relativity and the expansion of the universe, there really isn't any reliable source paying attention to such claims. I think the parallels to this situation are clear.
 * jps (talk) 14:44, 27 August 2019 (UTC)

Draft:Dr. Mukesh Bangar
Looks fringe and COI-ful. XOR&#39;easter (talk) 21:55, 26 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Thanks for sharing! Nominated it for deletion. -Crossroads- (talk) 23:50, 26 August 2019 (UTC)
 * It's been speedily deleted per WP:G11. XOR&#39;easter (talk) 17:02, 27 August 2019 (UTC)

Response to WP:GOODBIAS
I got a response to my essay at WP:GOODBIAS in my email.

Here is is (with the identity of the sender removed -- newly created username, zero edits):


 * I'm bias too, I am bias against Earth only thinking:


 * Many extra terrestrial aliens on other planets in other galaxies and universes have unconventional cures for diseases that on their planets are as bad as cancer and AIDS is on our planet. You, your pro science Wikipedian friends and all of the mainstream doctors in the USA, Asia, Canada Europe and Australia would never believe that these extra terrestrials' unconventional methods would cure their diseases (but they do work and do cure those sick aliens on other planets). A lot of these methods are similar to Alternative Medicine.  You can't disprove this Mr Science man can you?  Try being a skeptic on their planets when their methods actually are proven to work and you'll look like a nut job.


 * There are many Earth like planets in other galaxies and universes that have extra terrestrials on them (about as advance as we are) and on some of those planets, their planets' scientists' predictions of climate change turned out to be wrong (with as much evidence or more evidence than our scientists have about our climate change, if there was a Wikipedia on those planets and you were an editor, you have been like you are here about our climate change but on those planets you would have been WRONG). So on those planets, that single digit percent chance that climate change wouldn't occur came true (like the 1993 Bills comeback in the playoffs over the Oilers that rare).I believe in climate change (where is my prize).


 * Some 'debunked' science methods may actually work on other planets in other universes (different laws of nature universes).


 * I am dead serious, there are billions of galaxies in our universe and billions of universes in our dimension.

I am certain that we are all relieved that that has been cleared up... :) --Guy Macon (talk) 20:29, 26 August 2019 (UTC)
 * You don't even need to invoke aliens.
 * What if Bottlenose Dolphins are reading Wikipedia? They're going to be really confused by our medical articles if they don't realize that their anatomy is different than ours. ApLundell (talk) 20:40, 26 August 2019 (UTC)


 * Not just me then!! -Roxy, the dog . wooF 18:55, 27 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Hmm. Does the fact that these extraterrestrial aliens have no Wikipedia help or hurt their case that they are roughly as advanced as we are?  C Thomas3   (talk) 21:48, 27 August 2019 (UTC)
 * What do you mean "extraterrestrial aliens have no Wikipedia"? I have long suspected that the WMF are all space aliens. --Guy Macon (talk) 14:34, 28 August 2019 (UTC)
 * This reminds me of and  (hypothesis that climate change may play a role in other civilizations, making them even rarer and reducing the lifespan of their industrial revolution and space exploration)... — Paleo  Neonate  – 13:45, 28 August 2019 (UTC)

Section blanking: LessWrong and the neoreactionary movement
- advocates of the site want to remove the section on LessWrong's links to the neoreactionary movement, which have been exhaustively cited. There's an editor who comes by every few days to blank it under various spurious claims, and refuses to discuss it. More eyes would be appropriate - David Gerard (talk) 16:31, 15 August 2019 (UTC)
 * The section in question seems relevant and sourced. I noticed you brought it up on the talk page too - a good thing. If not good reason is provided for removal then it should stay.Ramos1990 (talk) 19:07, 17 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Ah, they're back, and for the first time they've bothered with the talk page. To make a bizarrely false claim about the sources, but anyway - David Gerard (talk) 18:46, 24 August 2019 (UTC)
 * It is not well sourced; as I have now said five or six times, all its sources derives their content from previous iterations of the Wikipedia page for the site, or less commonly from RationalWiki, which has a well-documented political grudge against LessWrong. There is long-standing editor consensus on Talk:LessWrong that this claim is baseless and the sources are weak; David Gerard is the only dissenter. It is shameful that he has been allowed to promote his personal view to this extent; repeating a lie often enough to get it into well-regarded sources does not make it become the truth. --PDVk (talk) 19:27, 28 August 2019 (UTC)
 * You're claiming conspiracy, then? You've provided no evidence the cited sources are derived from the Wikipedia article or the RationalWiki article. And if you claim literally a "well-documented political grudge against LessWrong", you really need to document that too. Then you need to document how that makes any claims from that source factually incorrect, or not reflecting the actual facts of the matter. You're leaping a lot of necessary steps to make your case that RSes you don't like should be impeached - David Gerard (talk) 23:34, 28 August 2019 (UTC)

Warsaw concentration camp: Giant gas chamber in road tunnel killing hundreds of thousands
Did you know that 200,000 or possibly even 400,000 non-Jewish Poles were killed in a giant gas chamber in road tunnel under Warsaw as part of a huge Warsaw concentration camp complex? (for scale - would rank in top-5 in Extermination camp). Well, the Encyclopedia of Camps and Ghettos, 1933–1945 (which covers the camp in Volume I, part B, pages 1511-1515) saw fit to devote precisely zero space to this conspiracy theory, and describes the camp (part of the time as a sub-camp) as operating for approx. a year (clearing the ruins of the ghetto) - with a total of 8,000-9,000 inmates (mostly Jews from outside of Poland) of which 4,000-5,000 died as victims.

The conspiracy theory is covered in this recent piece in London Review of Books - Under the Railway Line, Christian Davies, 9 May 2019. According to LRB this is advanced by proponents of "Polocaust" who try to create a parity or even "greater victimhood" of Poles in the Holocaust - Per LRB this related to the "'standard trope on the Polish nationalist right that Jews have exaggerated their victimhood in order to extort money from the Poles and obtain global power and influence'" LRB also notes:"'But the more Trzcińska’s claims were challenged, the more determined her supporters became. Marches, demonstrations, public meetings and religious ceremonies were held, bogus maps circulated, false testimonies promoted, Wikipedia entries amended. Worst of all, plaques and monuments bearing false witness to the secret genocide started to appear around the city.'"

Our Warsaw concentration camp contained this hoax for 15 years and 3 days. It has spread to other articles - for instance on German camps in occupied Poland during World War II it lasted for 13 years 3 months and 27 days (2006 diff, 2019 removal). This (will) top the list at List of hoaxes on Wikipedia (current maximum is 13 years, 3 months).

I have rewritten the camp article based on mainstream sources. Credit here also goes to who cut some of the un-sourced garbage (the whole article was mostly missing citations) in May 2019, and to an IP and  who alerted in 2006 (see, , , ). I have also removed this from several articles throughout the English Wikipedia.

However, I am sure I missed some spots on English Wikipedia with this. Also - while the Polish Wikipedia is in a fairly good state (the Polish Wikipedia generally is in a fairly good state on this topic - often more mainstream than the English Wikipedia), this drivel has spread to other language Wikipedias - for instance the French, Dutch, Finnish, Chinese - all seem based on what was present on the English Wikipedia (the Chinene and French seem to be straight one to one translations). On English Wikipedia this got into more top-tier pages - e.g. German camps in occupied Poland during World War II and Extermination camp. Help checking where else this got to on English Wikipedia as well as spreading the word to other language Wikipedias would be appreciated. Icewhiz (talk) 09:15, 29 August 2019 (UTC)
 * The German Wikipedia had a paragraph about this claim - and how it is wrong - since 2009. Probably not surprising that the German and Polish articles about the topic are fact-checked thoroughly. --mfb (talk) 13:00, 29 August 2019 (UTC)

Deletion discussion for Category:Scientific racism
See Categories for discussion/Log/2019 August 24 and User:Johnpacklambert's removal of that category and Category:White supremacy from articles. Doug Weller talk 09:34, 30 August 2019 (UTC)
 * And an outgrowth from that? Doug Weller  talk 09:44, 30 August 2019 (UTC)
 * I particularly like the bit in the CfD where the nominator insists that Science is and has always been a detached and objective pursuit one sentence after invoking Lysenko. XOR&#39;easter (talk) 16:02, 30 August 2019 (UTC)

Stephen C. Meyer
Is quoting David Gelernter appropriate here? See recent history. --Hob Gadling (talk) 10:12, 31 August 2019 (UTC)


 * Someone ought to inform User:Ricardo Ferreira de Oliveira of discretionary sanctions in the area of pseudoscience. It looks to me like we may have another white knight for the creationist cause. jps (talk) 11:55, 31 August 2019 (UTC)

Mickey Robinson has visited both Heaven and Hell
according to this new article. Doug Weller talk 15:04, 31 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Created by user ("help create and improve articles of well known christian figures, pastors, and televangelists"). One that has been in hell and heaven, one that prayed for the death of Obama, one that wants to get rid of public schools. We'll get more of them. --mfb (talk) 00:54, 1 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Swedenborg claimed to have visited heaven, but at least there are plenty of sources about him. Xxanthippe (talk) 02:23, 1 September 2019 (UTC).
 * This user has a suspicious knowledge of page moves and infoboxes. Anybody up to creating a report at WP:SPI? Any idea who the sockmaster might be? --Guy Macon (talk) 04:58, 1 September 2019 (UTC)
 * No idea who, but I agree with you that his activity is suspicious. If anyone had similar interests and is now blocked, they could be a suspect. Also, this editor is likely to be a troublesome evangelist and their username may indeed be an issue, although it "helpfully" makes their agenda more obvious. -Crossroads- (talk) 18:31, 1 September 2019 (UTC)
 * There is also a pending draft by the same name.-- Auric   talk  11:11, 1 September 2019 (UTC)


 * I wonder at the appropriateness of an explicitly proselytizing user name.  G M G  talk  13:24, 1 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Ripe for AfD. Xxanthippe (talk) 22:22, 1 September 2019 (UTC).
 * And I wonder about the spectacularly lousy sources, which are: the subject himself, YouTube, YouTube again, The Christian Broadcasting Network, and a credulous interview from 2001 in Charisma Magazine. Well, and something from The Post which I can't access because of the GDPR — I got a 451 — and I can't even figure out which Post. See our disambiguation page The Post. Perhaps somebody not in the EU could check that one? Link here. Anyway, I've PRODded. That's unlikely to stick, but I'll be glad to take it to AfD. Bishonen &#124; talk 17:21, 3 September 2019 (UTC).
 * It's apparently the Brunswick Post, as in Brunswick, Ohio, population 34,255.  G M G  talk  17:31, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Hate speech

 * I just found this beauty of a paper. Anna Stubblefield argues that speaking out against facilitated communication should be banned as hate speech. --Wikiman2718 (talk) 16:00, 29 August 2019 (UTC)
 * "Disagreeing with my beliefs regardless of evidence to the contrary constitutes hate speech" is, unfortunately, the way the wind is blowing. Given that The classic notion of an encyclopaedia and ‘universal knowledge’ needs to be discarded. Having top priority content about any group of people, nation,... is in this direction. The idea of encyclopedic knowledge feels problematic. What is a “universal knowledge”? Who gets to decide what is “universal”? We need to focus on moving from a single center to multiple ones." is about to be written into formal WMF policy, we're fairly soon not going to be to label crank theories as "fringe", let alone refuse to give them equal billing with actual demonstrable facts. &#8209; Iridescent 18:59, 29 August 2019 (UTC)
 * I've seen that ridiculous proposal, but I don't fully understand the source of it. Does it have a realistic chance of passing? --Wikiman2718 (talk) 19:02, 29 August 2019 (UTC)
 * In a word, "no". (Actually, it's not even a recommendation itself, it's in the justification for a recommendation which is itself pretty anodyne.) As for the rest of this, I doubt that anyone on Wikipedia is going to accept a monograph by Stubblefield as a reliable source for anything. We've weathered similar storms (Verifiability, not truth!, WP:CRYBLP, etc.) in the past and predict this pendulum swing too shall pass. jps (talk) 19:03, 29 August 2019 (UTC)
 * If you are concerned, you can speak out against it on meta:Talk:Strategy/Wikimedia movement/2018-20/Working Groups/Diversity/Recommendations/2 I'd imagine. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk, contributions) 20:26, 29 August 2019 (UTC)
 * My impression was that it was not official and gathered no attention... To change or clarify policies, debates usually occur on the relevant talk pages, for each wiki (there are exceptions where the WMF can enforce actions and/or where policies should also comply for legal reasons, like for copyright, etc).  — Paleo  Neonate  – 23:10, 3 September 2019 (UTC)


 * The story in a nutshell. &#x222F; WBG converse 19:22, 29 August 2019 (UTC)
 * I will just leave this here: --Guy Macon (talk) 19:53, 29 August 2019 (UTC)
 * I will just leave this here: --Guy Macon (talk) 19:53, 29 August 2019 (UTC)

fringe edits relating to Pre-Columbian trans-oceanic contact theories
I found this addition today to the main article on Pre-Columbian trans-oceanic contact theories: "Adenostemma viscosum'' This plant, native to the Americas, was found in Hawaii by Hillebrand in 1888 who considered it to have grown there before Europeans arrived, because it was growing throughout the low-elevation woods on all the islands of the archipelago within 75 years after Capt. Cooks arrival. A legitimate native name and established native medicinal usage confirmed the pre-Cookian age. "

And then I found "Origins of the Hawaiian flora: Phylogenies and biogeography reveal patterns of long‐distance dispersal" which lists its dispersal, by adhesion to birds, as "W(AU + EA + I + P)" - the W "indicates a lineage that arrived from a widespread species" and the regions are " Au = Australasian, I = Indo‐Malayan, EA = East Asian, NT = Neotropical, NA = North America." Plus our article on Adenostemma shows it is a widespread genus. I'm always concerned when it appears that someone is trying to make an argument but only uses sources that back their argument. I'm sorry, User:Geneva11, but your edits appear to be searching for proof of trans-oceanic contact without looking to see if anything contradicts it. See also this - you haven't read that paper, right? And as it isn't published, how can it meet WP:VERIFY. I don't have time right now but there seem to be other similar edits.

I haven't reverted it because it may be better to leave it in with the evidence that it's wrong than remove it. Doug Weller talk 19:13, 28 August 2019 (UTC)


 * Some might be coming from this. Doug Weller  talk 20:30, 28 August 2019 (UTC)


 * And now I'm really pissed, or really wrong, because I added my source then wondered why Hillebrand got it so wrong, so looked at his book which is downloadable (you need to create a free account, then you can download a txt or pdf copy).https://archive.org/details/mobot31753003034128/page/n1] Nothing. Then I found John L. Sorenson and Carl L. Johannessen, “Scientific Evidence for Pre-Columbian Transoceanic Voyages” Sino-Platonic Papers, 133 (April 2004) - fringe authors both, and they say


 * "Origin: Americas Summary: The plant was found in Hawaii by Hillebrand, who considered it to have grown there before Europeans arrived, because it was growing throughout the low-elevation woods on all the islands of the archipelago within 75 years after Capt. Cook’s arrival. A legitimate native name and established native medicinal usage confirm the age. Furthermore, Chopra et al. describe its distribution as “throughout India” with no hint that it could have been a modern introduction and still account for that distribution." but then:


 * "Hillebrand 1888, 192. A. viscosum, Forst. “A genus of few American species, of which the following is spread over many warm countries.” Under the species entry he also notes: “Common in the lower woods of all [Hawaiian] islands. Nat. name: ‘Kamanamana.’ An infusion of the leaves is used as a remedy in fevers by the natives. The species is widely spread over the Americas, Polynesia, N. Australia, Asia, and Africa.” Not marked to indicate a post-Capt. Cook import."


 * So I'm confused. Doug Weller  talk 19:05, 29 August 2019 (UTC)


 * Hillebrand didn't have it wrong, one of the most renowned botanists of that century, George Bentham, identified it as a species originating in America, a few decades earlier than Hillebrand in 1866, and stated that Adenostemma was (p.462) "(a) genus of very few American species, one of which spreads all around the warm zone of the globe."


 * indeed it does appear that it was native to the Americas - the problem is that its transfer to the Old World seems to have been millions of years ago. Doug Weller  talk 15:31, 3 September 2019 (UTC)


 * That article is talking about the genus Amaranthus. Adenostemma viscosum is of the Adenostemma genus. In order to avoid unnecessary reverts on this particular Wiki page, here is a proposal, in order for an item regarding a theory of pre-Columbian diffusion to or from North America involving flora/fauna to appear on this particular Wiki page, I would propose the following: 1.  There must be some archaeological/anthropological/linguistic scientific research data underlying the theory 2. There must be an evaluation (if suitable scientific material is available) of the potential of non-human transport,and 3.  There must be an evaluation and discussion (if suitable scientific material is available) of the potential of pre-human distribution of a genus or species. Is this generally suitable to those Wiki editors that police this particular page? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Geneva11 (talk • contribs) 21:39, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
 * If dealing with such old sources is needed, a more recent and reliable source that refers to them should probably be used... Said source must also make the conclusions so that the text of the encyclopedia can reflect it.  Editors shouldn't do the science, original research or synthesis (WP:PRIMARY, WP:OR, WP:SYNTH).  An old source is fine for an uncontroversial description, but not to support an outdated hypothesis, except in a historical context (i.e. "at the time, foo believed that ...", etc).  — Paleo  Neonate  – 23:24, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Differential K theory
Differential K theory misleadingly implies that a fringe, racialist theory has academic legitimacy, and it seems to be getting worse. recently added several obscure studies to the article, to flattering affect.

To briefly explain the topic, J. Philippe Rushton attempted to apply r/K selection theory to humans and human racial categories (specifically "Mongoloid", "Caucasoid", and "Negroid") starting in 1985. Rushton's version of this theory has been dismissed by biologists for multiple reasons. As one example, Joseph L. Graves describes Rushton's grasp of life history theory as "rudimentary", "amateurish", etc. As Graves explains, his work was rejected by evolutionary scientists on methodological grounds, which Rushton misrepresented as being ideologically motivated. To put it more bluntly, when scientists began looking at Rushton's work, they found sloppy assumptions, not good scholarship. Rushton's work on this theory is, however, still cited in some papers and textbooks, although these almost always either criticize the theory, or gloss-over Rushton's explicitly racialist conclusions.

Two of the recently added studies were published in Personality and Individual Differences, which is one of the very few legitimate journals that continued to published on the theory. These sources seem to make minute adjustments to a grossly flawed theory. None of them appear to be particularly significant, especially weighed against the many more substantial criticisms on a broader range of publications. The authors of the studies include Richard Lynn, Michael Woodley, Edward Dutton (twice), and Aurelio José Figueredo. All of these are contributors to Mankind Quarterly, among other fringe outlets. As one example of this walled garden, Figueredo's support for Rushton's theory has been specifically described as an example of scientific racism in academia. Dutton distanced himself from Rushton in 2019, although I don't think he's reliable either way, so I'm not sure if this matters. Grayfell (talk) 22:26, 3 September 2019 (UTC)


 * The sources added are from mainstream sources: one from Journal of Criminal Justice, and two from Personality and Individual Differences. These are both mainstream Elsevier journals. These articles were all recent, published 2016, 2018 and 2018. I saw this article, browsed Google Scholar for published recent work and came across these articles. User Grayfell apparently has some personal dislike for these researchers, perhaps he should excuse himself from such topics. AndewNguyen (talk) 07:31, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
 * The idea that the Elsevier imprimatur is some kind of quality guarantee is wrong: they publish some real shite (including, infamously, a journal devoted to homeopathy). If these academics' views have no independent secondary coverage they probably are not suitable for encyclopedic coverage. Alexbrn (talk) 07:35, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

has already received the notice. That should suffice for now. I hereby additionally warn them to use the talk page to generate consensus for any disputed sources before reverting any removal of disputed material. Please return here if there are further problems. Please be patient and polite to one another. If the next person agrees this is enough, please close this thread. Jehochman Talk 02:04, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

User inserted non-RS Scientology source for tenth time, after prior ANI and sanctions alert
, an eight-year-old account with less than 100 edits, has repeatedly added the same non-reliable source to multiple articles. The first four times on 14 August:

Upon removal as a non-RS, user promptly readded without discussion on 15 August:.

User was reported to ANI and alerted to discretionary sanctions, and on 20 August, the material was removed from the four pages by admin User:JzG as a non-RS. 

On 31 August, the user re-added the same source for a ninth and tenth time.

In addition to other issues, the source has a reputation for financial entanglements with the objects of their study. In particular, the source (CENSUR) reportedly had financial ties to Aum Shinrikyo which led its members in 1995 to giving a public press conference, erroneously arguing that the group could not have manufactured the Sarin gas (which the group did in fact use in the Tokyo attacks). CENSUR had instead publicly claimed that the group was merely the victims of religious persecution. Also posted to ANI and RSN Feoffer (talk) 07:04, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

Autism causes vaccines!
I'm just saying. --Guy Macon (talk) 14:39, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
 * It's funny because it's true. --Wikiman2718 (talk) 15:49, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

Articles for deletion/Anachronisms in the Book of Mormon
This should be of interest here. Doug Weller talk 13:29, 6 September 2019 (UTC)

Roza Bal
New editor, eyes needed. I don't think it's another sock. Doug Weller talk 21:18, 6 September 2019 (UTC)
 * See my talk page where the new editor justifies their edits I reverted. Off to bed now. Doug Weller  talk 21:33, 6 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Actually, I'm afraid it could be a sock. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 11:06, 7 September 2019 (UTC)

Articles for deletion/Varadaraja V. Raman
Potentially of interest to the community here: Articles for deletion/Varadaraja V. Raman. XOR&#39;easter (talk) 19:20, 5 September 2019 (UTC) "Hinduism also asks a different set of questions and frames those questions in a different perspective. V.V. Raman, a physicist with a long-running interest in questions of science and religion, explicitly takes this on in his essay "Science and the Spiritual Vision: The Hindu Perspective." Using the Vedantic System to describe Hindu thought, Raman says: "What makes the Vedantic System unique is that, unlike doctrines in some other religious systems, Vedanta is not simply based on the sacredness of this book or that. The Vedantic vision is not a theology or philosophy or even metaphysics. Rather, it is a formulation of a worldview arising from a unique mode of exploration.""
 * Whole nomination is a shocking display of Eurocentrism. A Hindu writing on Hinduism is "turning to woo"? Hyperbolick (talk) 19:27, 5 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Here is the citation to Raman in "Science Vs. Religion: Beyond The Western Traditions" by Adam Frank (a respected astrophysicist himself) in NPR, July 13, 2014:


 * Some might call that woo -- but no question he is noted for it. Hyperbolick (talk) 19:41, 5 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Being briefly quoted is not the same thing as being noted. XOR&#39;easter (talk) 20:38, 5 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Why put this on this noticeboard? Is the existence of this person proposed to be a fringe theory? Is Hinduism? Hyperbolick (talk) 20:45, 5 September 2019 (UTC)
 * 1. Because people who hang out here are generally familiar with the intersection of science and spirituality and can be counted upon to evaluate fairly whether an individual is noteworthy for their writings in that area, whether or not they personally agree with those writings. 2. No. 3. No. XOR&#39;easter (talk) 20:52, 5 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Can't NPR evaluate fairly? They choose who they quote. Hyperbolick (talk) 21:05, 5 September 2019 (UTC)
 * NPR's standards on who to quote are not the same as Wikipedia's standards on who to have an article about. ApLundell (talk) 02:32, 6 September 2019 (UTC)

Have rewritten the article. You’d be surprised. If V.V. Raman were on this noticeboard he’d be joining in with those defending science against superstition. Hyperbolick (talk) 03:41, 6 September 2019 (UTC)
 * , you do not have seem to have much of any clue about how stuff operates within the Hindutva echo-chamber. For all your aspersions of Eurocentrism, I am from India (as some previous versions of my u/p will allude to) and I have a keen interest (which may be academic or non-academic) in the domain, &#x222F; WBG converse 04:53, 6 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Haven’t yet added 10% of sources available, this is a winner of national honors for his work. Why try to hide it? Emotionally driven bad judgment calls trying to strip away good sources. Step away. Hyperbolick (talk) 04:57, 6 September 2019 (UTC)
 * , please resist from commenting on my emotional state or derivatives thereof, which might be construed as personal attacks. Rather than inserting sheer meaningless bloat in the form of his columns and other trivial coverage in local dailies, point me to source(s) that takes him past our notability guidelines in a bright-line fashion. &#x222F; WBG converse 05:03, 6 September 2019 (UTC)
 * WP:NAWARD. Outstanding Educator award, presented in Washington D.C. by the American Association for Higher Education & Accreditation. Clearly an award itself notable, and independent of him. Think they hand those out like souvenirs? Hyperbolick (talk) 05:08, 6 September 2019 (UTC)
 * , AAHEA is an unrecognized accreditation mill. Also NAWARDS is a failed proposal and I have no clue, as to your's pointing to it. &#x222F; WBG converse 05:13, 6 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Doesn’t add up that his university president would nominate him for a bogus award. Article is 2009, award was in 1988. What was the status of AAHEA in 1988? Hyperbolick (talk) 05:18, 6 September 2019 (UTC)
 * AFAIK, it squatted over some erstwhile legitimate organisation based on DC. At any case, I don't care much and it's your business to prove the legitimacy.
 * Even if it were legitimate, we don't count such awards as propelling someone to notability. &#x222F; WBG</b> converse 05:24, 6 September 2019 (UTC)
 * This is the kind of thing you do. I added NPR as a source for his expertise in Hinduism, because it specifically notes his writing on Hinduism. You disagreed that it reflected that, but instead of FIXING it to reflect more accurately what you think it does convey you deleted it, as if it doesn’t discuss him at all. But it does. So why couldn’t you fix it? Hyperbolick (talk) 05:30, 6 September 2019 (UTC)
 * , trivial mentions like that are not included in any encyclopedic article. Read this article for some interesting stuff on AAHEA. &#x222F; <b style="color:#070">WBG</b> converse 05:32, 6 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Trivial mention would be his name on a list of people at an event. This describes who is and solemnifies that his writing is that significant. Cite NPR for this sort of thing is routine. Hyperbolick (talk) 05:35, 6 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Trivial mention would be his name on a list of people at an event. This describes who is and solemnifies that his writing is that significant. Cite NPR for this sort of thing is routine. Hyperbolick (talk) 05:35, 6 September 2019 (UTC)


 * Note: Another substantial source. C. Mackenzie Brown spends a solid several pages of his book Hindu Perspectives on Evolution: Darwin, Dharma, and Design criticizing Raman's approach, noting that Raman has written that certain scientific truths "can also be apprehended through the mystical mode via meditation, prayer, or yogic exercises", and grouping Raman with Subhash Kak and Gopala Rao as "scientists [who] employ their expertise to confirm teachings of the sadhus and, not infrequently, to deplore the naturalistic theory of Darwinian evolution," concluding that for Raman, "the urge to lyricize and scientize tradition is clearly irresistible". Hyperbolick (talk) 21:18, 6 September 2019 (UTC)
 * In short, Raman is another fringe. Thanks for digging that out, for me. &#x222F; <b style="color:#070">WBG</b> converse 16:22, 7 September 2019 (UTC)
 * But widely published. Perhaps now delete the article to hide from the public that he's been called out as fringe? Or keep it for public knowledge? Hyperbolick (talk) 17:19, 7 September 2019 (UTC)

Bob Lazar


Someone who doesn’t understand our policies is contending on the Talk page that Benjamin Radford is an unreliable source for facts. - LuckyLouie (talk) 18:42, 7 September 2019 (UTC)

Editor adding original material - also pov, to Ivan Van Sertima
I've reverted and warned User:Olatunji Mwamba twice. I'm not sure that they are going to be reading their talk page but I'm obviously stopping at two reverts. A sample edit, added just in front of a citation from a reliable source:"These 'Meso-American' scholars act as if they have a monopoly on scholarship. The only thing necessary to this task on History is a command of the various Scientific disciplines necessary to the task. Those sciences are Archaeology, Anthropology, Linguistics, Etymology, Radio-Carbon Dating, and other scientific research. And last I checked, the mastery of these scientific disciplines are all that is necessary to the task of speaking with confidence on this topic." I may have to take him to ANI. Doug Weller talk 13:13, 8 September 2019 (UTC)

Strategies for Engineered Negligible Senescence


Both these articles were largely sourced to sens.org, which can hardly be considered independent. Every reality-based commentary in the main article had a rebuttal from sens.org or the Methuselah foundation or both.

I have redirected the SENS Research Foundation article to the main article. The small amount of content that wasn't self-sourced, is essentially there already, with better context. It was mainly added by a now-departed WP:SPA,, and by a series of IPs. This is normal for anything to do with life extension, of course.

The Methuselah Foundation article is a wonderful advertisement for them, but looks very fringey to me. Guy (help!) 17:15, 8 September 2019 (UTC)

Most royal candidate theory
(This is not the type of fringe usually dealt with here but . . . .) Most royal candidate theory is about a genealogical/historical proposition conjured up by a self-promoting bond trader who became a media go-to genealogy expert by purchasing a prominent publication on the English Peerage. It proclaimed that every US presidential election up to the year 2000 was won by the candidate with the best/most-royal bloodlines in their ancestry. The theory itself has all the hallmarks of fringe (including made-up data, hand-waving, retrospective discovery of 'better' descents when the picked candidate lost, plus being demonstrably false) but it got reported in several successive election cycles by British and American news sources as a 'different take' on picking who was going to win the latest tedious American election campaign, along the lines of the octopus picking the winner of the World Cup.

A paragraph has been in the article for a while referring to a 2012 Daily Mail article about a tweenager who used online genealogies (which are of notoriously abysmal quality) to trace all US presidents to King John of England. The Mail story does not mention the 'most royal candidate theory' at all, but an editor is insisting that it is relevant because it deals with presidents and royal descents and thus cannot be removed, and if erroneous (which it is) it can only be countered by a WP:RS that addresses its accuracy. I would suggest that scholars don't take the work of 12-year-olds seriously just because the Daily Mail reported it, and neither should Wikipedia. Am I off base here? Agricolae (talk) 08:53, 30 August 2019 (UTC)


 * Pure fringe woo and not worth a mention. "Royal blood" is nonsense; over 40 generations almost anyone of European descent is descended from who was living in Europe 800 years ago, provided that person had multiple offspring survive infancy. Almost anyone in the US who has a single white person in their family tree is a direct descendant of King John of England, Alexander Nevsky, William the Conqueror or whichever other medieval monarch takes your fancy. (Charlemagne is the usual example in discussions of this particular misreading of statistics.) The original paper proving that all Europeans share common ancestors once you go back 40 generations is here.
 * If you want a genuine method of predicting US elections, then "tallest candidate (almost) always wins"  easily demonstrable (in the 20th century, "taller guy" won 18 elections, "shorter guy" won 6, with one dead heat in 1992). &#8209; Iridescent 10:53, 30 August 2019 (UTC)
 * If you want a genuine method of predicting US elections, then "tallest candidate (almost) always wins"  easily demonstrable (in the 20th century, "taller guy" won 18 elections, "shorter guy" won 6, with one dead heat in 1992). &#8209; Iridescent 10:53, 30 August 2019 (UTC)


 * The proponent would never give what the actual descents were, just vague claims of 'President A descended from king Y, while defeated candidate B only descended from king X', and some of these were completely inexplicable, based either on long-discredited 19th century family histories, or completely made up - the pedigree of Andrew Jackson only has 4 known people, the earliest being his (non-royal) great-grandfather, so he couldn't have a more-royal pedigree than anyone. The media credulously reported it as a curiosity (like the football-picking octopus) each successive election cycle, whether his previous guess had been right or wrong (if wrong, he would retroactively 'discover' - make up - a superior descent for the winner).  The media never fact-checked it or they would have immediately seen how ludicrous it was, with Adams beating Jefferson in 1796, then Jefferson beat Adams in 1800, so Jefferson must have changed his ancestors in between the two elections (the pattern repeats in 1824/28, 1836/40 and 1888/92).  Proponent was also the person who kept getting 'Queen Elizabeth descends from Muhammad' stories reported, based on a completely confused pedigree.  An obituary of him said "his great advantage for journalists was that he was always available to make an arresting comment; his disadvantage was that he was often wrong."  Agricolae (talk) 11:40, 30 August 2019 (UTC)
 * By this tedious logic we could just as easily set forth that every US president is a legitimate successor to Ghengis Khan. Simonm223 (talk) 12:05, 30 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Just to be clear, though, the original claim was made by someone who was publisher of one of the premier scholarly works (even if he owed the credential solely to purchase), and was thus accepted by the media as an expert. He actually wasn't, just a self-promoting hack, but the papers were implicitly taking his word for it as an expert.  That scenario is different in kind to the story about the 12-year-old, which is a 'look what the precocious kid has done' story, one that is claimed to demand inclusion by its very existence and require a published refutation to question. The favoring editor says today on article's Talk today that  and so must be included and its accuracy can't be questioned.  To me, this would be like insisting on including a 'teenager studying genetics in her garage claims Lysenko was right' newspaper story in a Wikipedia article about Lysenkoism - though the the theory itself was bogus it is noteworthy, but not what a 12-year-old thinks about it, no matter how many newspapers reported her conclusion.  Agricolae (talk) 15:56, 30 August 2019 (UTC)

Newspapers are not the epistemic communities where the political science analysis of who does or does not win elections is discussed. WP:FRINGE applies when a topic is ignored by experts. Self-proclaimed doesn't count. jps (talk) 01:10, 31 August 2019 (UTC)
 * I have initiated an RfC to merge to the article on Harold Brooks-Baker, as the content of this article is at least half about him, and the sources are all either about him or quote him. Guy (help!) 17:27, 8 September 2019 (UTC)

Generic Objects of Dark Energy


Regulars here may be interested in this new article, which seems especially fringey. There's probably some inappropriate claims being made in Wikipedia's voice. I'm also unsure of the notability – some of the sourcing is questionable, including at least three cases of churnalism (phys.org, EurekAlert, and one other all republishing the same press release). –Deacon Vorbis (carbon &bull; videos) 03:49, 11 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Looks too soon at best. XOR&#39;easter (talk) 14:32, 11 September 2019 (UTC)

Zamzam well
New editor adding huge table and what looks like OR about health properties. Doug Weller talk 20:19, 11 September 2019 (UTC)

Pillars of Hercules
Editor adding OTZ(I think I must have meant OR), first as IP, twice with account. I've reverted twice myself and warned him. Doug Weller talk 17:52, 8 September 2019 (UTC)


 * Is that editor seriously pushing the theory that Plato knew about America, or is the person claiming that about him wrong? --Guy Macon (talk) 05:01, 10 September 2019 (UTC)
 * I think seriously pushing. Doug Weller  talk 14:38, 12 September 2019 (UTC)

Theory of Phoenician discovery of the Americas and Phoenicia
User:Anacarolina13 is heavily promoting someone's PhD in both articles (and es.wiki). Here's the text: "Diógenes Silva completely denies the existence of Phoenicians in Brazil in his thesis, defended before 5 PhD members of the Thesis Tribunal in Madrid, Spain, at Complutense University of Madrid, on 15 January 2016, having as director: Carlos González Wagner. It received unanimous maximum qualification, “cum laude”, and recommended for publication. The text was previously approved by the Deptº. of History of the University of São Paulo - USP. And officially revalidated in Brazil by the Federal University of the State of Rio de Janeiro - UFRJ, in 2018.

Its 418-page text, containing figures, maps, photos, and transcripts, analyzes the reasons for the origin and permanence of the false theory of alleged Phoenician navigators of Brazil from the fifteenth century to the present. By explaining the true economic and political interests that false assumption has been able to cover up and perpetuate among Brazilian, American, and European intellectuals. From Christopher Columbus to the Internet. Involving to: Catholic Church; the Portuguese-Spanish dispute for control of the colonies; the missions of the Naturalist Travelers; the demarcations of the South American borders; the independence of Brazil; the reign of Peter II and slavery; advertising during the 1930 Revolution; the brazilian carnival; your songs; and popular movies. In addition to publications in world newspapers and magazines, fraudulent discoveries, fake rock inscriptions, and imagined abandoned cities plated with gold. As a result of fake news, the thesis proves that the Phoenicians never trod America."

He's right of course, but this doesn't belong in the article for various reasons including NPOV and WP:UNDUE and she's editwarring without any discussion. Doug Weller talk 14:43, 12 September 2019 (UTC)

Marxism
A newcomer called has claimed in a number of articles that Marxism influenced the philosophy of science as well as science studies. The only sources I can find to back this up come from Marxist authors. We could use some help to determine if this viewpoint is fringe. --Wikiman2718 (talk) 15:24, 5 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Well, it certainly influenced Trofim Lysenko when he invented Lysenkoism. I'm just saying. --Guy Macon (talk) 16:32, 5 September 2019 (UTC)


 * It certainly did. Loren Graham(bluelink I hope?) has written on this. Within the Soviet Union and its satellites, Marxism was seen as the ultimate and perfect theory of everything (because to say otherwise was an act of lèse-majesté against their hero Marx, and as Marx was now safely dead he could be idolised like this without any risk of him being denounced later). So Marxist theory (broader than Marxist economics) provided a framework for analytical thought, and that could be applied anywhere. In particular, historical materialism was seen as a Marxist theoretical justification of evolutionary theory and indeed almost anything. As Guy has mentioned, Lysenkoism is the most famous. I believe linguistics is perhaps the one where it had the deepest (and ongoing) influence. However Marx was applied to everything.  To not apply Marx to one's own theory would be against the principles of the New Soviet Man and to suggest a theory which went against Marx would be a career-limiting move, at the least.   Except in metallurgy, where Marxist metallurgy was something of a failure in the Soviet Union and famously utter chaos in China during the Great Leap Forwards. Cybernetics was another field with a deep literature based on sound Marxist principles, where reality showed a reactionary reluctance to comply with it.
 * Marxism, like many such things, can be applied to any field. A skilled Marxist, such as anyone who managed a successful career in local government or social services in London during the '70s or '80s, needs must be an accomplished duckspeaker. Particularly if one is a more skilled or knowledgeable Marxist than the others in the room, like being a more successful storefront preacher, one can turn the structures and orthodoxies of Marxism to excuse anything.  This is how Marxism-Leninism, Marxism-Trotskyism, Marxism-Stalinism, Marxism-Maoism, Marxism-Hoxhaism and Marxism-Kim Il-sungism all manage to co-exist so happily with Marx, the complete and perfect guide to everything, yet seemingly in need of extension by every new leader.  When the core theoretician is both verbose and dead (yet having only published three volumes of a promised corpus of about six), that leaves a lot of opportunity for commentaries and extensions upon it.
 * You can make much of the same claims for any set of theories. Postmodernism has made great contributions to astrophysics, as noted in the Sokal paper.
 * So Marx clearly can be, and has been, applied to these fields. It has even achieved influence. In a few it might have achieved useful influence. That doesn't stop it also having been applied nonsensically, by ignorant dogmatists who mistook conformity for accuracy. But we're not here to record accuracy of a theory, so much as the history of its development. Andy Dingley (talk) 17:12, 5 September 2019 (UTC)
 * I mean the ignorant dogmatists of Capitalism think it's the answer to everything too, so I suppose there's that. But as to whether the suggestion that Marxism influenced the philosophy of science? I'd suggest that it's not, in and of itself, a fringe supposition, but one where fringe views are likely to appear and as such great care in sourcing should be required. Simonm223 (talk) 17:45, 5 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Postmodernism has made great contributions to astrophysics, as noted in the Sokal paper. ... Wait. Wut.  G M G  <sup style="color:#000;font-family:Impact">talk  17:22, 5 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Precisely. Hyperbolick (talk) 17:45, 5 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Aaaanyway. Yes, Marx was pretty influential, and also in the philosophy of science (see also Dialectical materialism). But he was not this influential. We can talk about the influence he had, but we do not ourselves apply a Marxist interpretation of the history of science, which is what an edit like this appears to be attempting to do.  G M G  <sup style="color:#000;font-family:Impact">talk  17:49, 5 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Marx himself had almost nothing to do with dialectical materialism. He never referred to it himself, it's mostly a pastiche of Hegel's dialecticism, recycled by commentators on Marx. Andy Dingley (talk) 18:30, 5 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Well, that's probably a matter of opinion to some extent. Surely we wouldn't be sitting here talking about Hegel were it not for Marx.  G M G  <sup style="color:#000;font-family:Impact">talk  19:22, 5 September 2019 (UTC)
 * We might not be in a thread called "Marxism" talking about Hegel, but to think that Hegel would be unknown if it wasn't for Marx? Well, now that's a fringe view. Andy Dingley (talk) 19:33, 5 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Not that he would be unknown. But anyway, at then end of the day, we can agree about post-modernism, and that's enough for me to buy you a drink should we ever meet.  G M G  <sup style="color:#000;font-family:Impact">talk  19:58, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

Marxism is not a fringe theory. It is a major intellectual tradition with an elaborate body of adherents and respected texts. Its contribution to various disciplines, including science studies, is acknowledged by many who are not Marxists, such as Professor Loren Graham of MIT and Harvard, mentioned above. He does not reduce Marxism to Lysenkoism, which was definitely a complex, tragic and prolonged episode in this history. In mainstream encyclopedias, there are many entries documenting this. For example, the Encyclopedia of Science Technology and Ethics has a number of articles on Marxism and Marxists and their positive contributions to this field. Why should the status quo be Wikiman2718's dogmatic denial of this rather than my informed assertion of this? ProfZeit (talk) 09:40, 6 September 2019 (UTC)ProfZeit
 * Marxists have a strong tendency to be unreliable with respect to what they say about Marxism, so in general it is best to avoid pro-Marxist sources. If you want to add information about Marxism to these articles, it should be done with non-Marxist sources. --Wikiman2718 (talk) 13:35, 6 September 2019 (UTC)
 * What is Marxism other than what Marxists say? They can be wrong about the history of their system, and one faction within Marxism can be unfairly disparaging about another, etc., but there's no blanket reason to avoid pro-Marxist writers as sources for what pro-Marxist writers write.
 * Looking at the disputed edit, phrases like a seminal event and a major force are likely overselling and POV-pushing, but Among those influenced by a Marxist approach to science were J.D. Bernal, J.B.S Haldane,... is justifiable. We cover who influenced whom, without making a final judgment about whether that influence led to truth or error. XOR&#39;easter (talk) 14:50, 6 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Marxist sources may sometimes be reliable sources for explaining Marxist philosophy, but not for explaining the role of Marxist philosophy on science and society. If I want to know the influence of the republican political philosophy on science, I probably shouldn't use the RNC as a source. --Wikiman2718 (talk) 14:59, 6 September 2019 (UTC)
 * The article in question is not science, but science studies, the field that investigates of the scientific process and community by sociological means, and which most scientists probably regard with the same level of concern that birds have for birdwatchers. That Marxist philosophy could have had an influence on such a field is not a remarkable claim. (One slice of history is given by The SAGE Handbook of the Philosophy of Social Sciences. [T]he excitement surrounding early STS fed off the frisson of radical critique associated with the rhetoric of 'alienation', which tapped into the rediscovery of the 'young' or 'humanist' Karl Marx, whose unpublished manuscripts were translated into English in the 1960s. [... Marxism] came back to haunt STS after the collapse of Communism and the onset of the Science Wars. [...] Bernal explicitly followed Marx in believing that something like a Lakatosian rational reconstruction of the history of science could provide guidance on science's future trajectory ]...] His Social Function of Science (1939) written at the peak of Western enthusiasm for the scientific promise of the Soviet Union, followed by the most comprehensive Marxist history of science ever written, the four-volume Science in History (1971), are worthy precursors of social epistemology and are among the earliest works in the sociology and social history of science. Sokal and Bricmont, neither Marxists nor sympathizers to most "science studies" practice, discuss Marxism and reactions thereto in Fashionable Nonsense (1998)'s exploration of how the political left embraced postmodernism. The influence has often been indirect; as Karen Barad said somewhere, New materialisms are of course deeply indebted to Marx, and to others indebted to Marxism, including Foucault and a generation of feminist engagements with Marxist insights that travel under the names “materialist feminisms”, “feminist science studies”, to name a few. Marxism indirectly influenced STS via Latour being upset with it, and Marxists of various stripe then being upset with Latour; the rabbit hole is arbitrarily deep.) XOR&#39;easter (talk) 16:39, 6 September 2019 (UTC)
 * I agree that it is not remarkable to claim that Marxism influenced science studies. However, this particular account has also made a similar edit to philosophy of science, which is a different matter entirely. In general, I think it is best to avoid Marxist sources, especially in cases like these where they are not independent sources. --Wikiman2718 (talk) 19:17, 6 September 2019 (UTC)
 * To be fair, I'd prefer to avoid Capitalist sources when discussing economics. Sadly we live in the real world where you'll have to put up with Marxism not being a fringe philosophy until you can prove it in a way that doesn't depend on blatantly capitalist sources and where I'll have to put up with the orthodox school of economics for at least until the climate crisis completely destabilizes our civilization. I think my wait will be shorter. Simonm223 (talk) 19:20, 6 September 2019 (UTC)
 * That edit to philosophy of science seems OK to me, except maybe for the adjective "rich", which is perhaps on the POV-ish side. XOR&#39;easter (talk) 21:44, 6 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Does anyone have an example of a contribution by Marxism to the philosophy of science? —Wikiman2718 (talk) 21:48, 6 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Off the top of my head, you can't understand the history of the interpretation of quantum mechanics without it . David Bohm was a Marxist, and this definitely influenced the course of his career, if not his opinion about quantum mechanics; Jean-Pierre Vigier worked on hidden-variable models of quantum physics expressly because of his Marxism, and the view that French Marxist physicists had about causality accordingly sustained interest in Bohmian ideas against those of the previous generation. Lakatos' philosophy of mathematics descends in part from Hegel and Marx. An actual philosopher could probably come up with more examples; I just happen to have read what I have read for other reasons and have found French Marxism, Soviet Marxism, post-Marxism, counter-Marxism, etc., splattered all about the place. XOR&#39;easter (talk) 00:01, 7 September 2019 (UTC)
 * I admit that I wasn't able to access that paper you linked, but these look like contributions by Marxists. I have no doubt that Marxists have made contributions to science, and that Marxists states have sponsored scientific research, but I still have not seen evidence that the Marxist philosophy itself has influenced the philosophy of science (maybe it's in the paper). We need to draw such a distinction, otherwise we would have to credit almost every philosophy as having contributed to science since scientists are such a diverse group. --Wikiman2718 (talk) 00:33, 7 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Apart from the biographical blurb on Bohm that sprang to mind, all of that was philosophy influencing the philosophy of science, not just scientists who happen to be Marxists doing science. In addition to the paper by Camillieri, there is a good deal on this in the works of Olival Freire, which I can dig up when I next get a chance (again, I'm just going by what I recall in references I read for other reasons and a long time ago, so my knowledge is not at all systematic). XOR&#39;easter (talk) 00:49, 7 September 2019 (UTC)

It is not fair to assert that Marxists are unreliable in writing about Marxism and therefore cannot be cited. Are the authors I have cited unreliable? How? Are citations of Marxist texts to be be banned on wikipedia? How far to go with this? Are logical positivists unreliable when writing about logical positivism? Are members of the Edinburgh School unreliable writing about the strong programme? By the way, most Marxists were not born Marxists. They came to it in a search for truth. Many were eminent scientists: Bernal, Haldane, Langevin, Joliot-Curie and they wrote about science from a Marxist point of view. Is anybody with a world view banned from writing about it or only Marxists? --ProfZeit (talk) 09:52, 9 September 2019 (UTC)ProfZeit

So how to proceed with this? I propose that I reinstate my edits on the entries on philosophy of science and science studies. My one on philosophy of science is only one sentence. I can delete the word 'rich'. On both, I can add non-Marxist sources. It would not be a good idea to delete the Marxist ones I have chosen, because they survey the field in a relatively comprehensive way and lead on to many other sources. Otherwise, I'll take it to dispute resolution. I don't yet know how to do that, because I am new to Wikipedia editing and was only intending to make a few strategic edit, but I regard this as a matter of principle. --ProfZeit (talk) 09:50, 10 September 2019 (UTC)ProfZeit
 * Okay, I'll give a crack at this. I don't think this is necessarily an issue of reliability. Prominent Marxist authors are reliable for subject mater relating to Marxism. What this really is is an issue of WP:DUEWEIGHT, and specifically WP:PROPORTION: strive to treat each aspect with a weight proportional to its treatment in the body of reliable, published material on the subject (emphasis added). That last bit, "on the subject" means a lot when you are dealing with broad overarching topics.
 * To take a non-controversial example, if you're interested in the subject of WWI, then I highly recommend the writings of Peter Hart (military historian). So, he's got an entire book about the Battle of Passchendaele. That book is undeniably a solid source when it comes to Passchendaele. However, we ought not be using Hart's book on Passchendaele in order to judge due weight on the main article for WWI. Hart isn't writing about WWI. He's not making editorial decisions about the broad subject, which bits are more or less important relative to the others. He's not weighing Passchendaele against Verdun or the Somme. He's just writing about Passchendaele. In order to judge the relative weight that is due to the subject of Passchendaele on the broad article for WWI, we need to use sources specifically about WWI, where they have gone through this editorial decision making process. We should follow their lead when assigning weight, and we can use Hart's book when we get around to improving the article specifically about Passchendaele.
 * So I'm not saying that content about Marxism doesn't belong on the article for Science studies. But Science studies is a broad subject with surely many dozens of related articles nested beneath and around it thematically. What I am saying is sthat if we want to judge that appropriate weight, we need to be using sources about the broad subject of science studies, and if we want to use sources more specifically about how Marxism related to science, then those might be useful on an article specifically about the relationship between Marxism and science, but it's not necessarily helpful on the top-level article.
 * TL;DR DUEWEIGHT requires us to use particular sources on particular subjects, and broad sources on broad subjects.  G M G  <sup style="color:#000;font-family:Impact">talk  11:52, 10 September 2019 (UTC)
 * It is notable that Marx already has a mention in philosophy of science were he is called one of the founders of social science. This mention may be due weight. I do think that Marx may deserve some weight in the science studies article, but we still need some sources to determine what that weight it. --Wikiman2718 (talk) 19:56, 10 September 2019 (UTC)
 * See my note about relevant sources at . Biogeographist (talk) 22:06, 10 September 2019 (UTC)

On the due weight issue, I have, if anything, erred on the other side, in writing so few sentences about such an elaborate intellectual tradition. As to whether it belongs in a general article on philosophy of science or science studies, I argue that it does. Marxists have taught in mainstream universities, presented at mainstream conferences, published in mainstream journals and publishing houses for decades now. They have interacted with and been respected by non-Marxists. There are many academics, who are not Marxists, who have nevertheless been influenced by Marxism, some knowingly, but others through the evolution of their disciplines, even if they are not knowledgeable about their disciplinary histories. I am for reinstatement of my edit, although I agree that the overall article is very poor, with or without it. --ProfZeit (talk) 09:41, 13 September 2019 (UTC)ProfZeit
 * I have commented at about, and opposing reinstatement of the edit. I invite others to comment there if interested. As  said above, this is a WP:DUEWEIGHT issue, but the issue is made especially difficult here by how inadequate the existing article is. Biogeographist (talk) 17:58, 10 September 2019 (UTC)
 * The preceding comment was cross-posted to, where I responded. Biogeographist (talk) 15:53, 13 September 2019 (UTC)

Parental alienation
This caught my eye because it makes a bunch of what look like medical claims without anyh WP:MEDRS-compliant sources to back them up.

So, has this crossed the line into being a fringe theory? --Guy Macon (talk) 03:10, 11 September 2019 (UTC)
 * 1) There appears to be several editors editing the page who pretty much edit nothing else.
 * 2) There is a large motivation to insert bias into the article by those who are currently accusing others of PA or being accused of same.
 * 3) The lead says things like "It is a distinctive form of psychological abuse and family violence" and only way down in  the history do you discover that Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders considered and rejected PA as a diagnosis.
 * 4) Some of the sources are pretty clearly advocacy books pushing a particular POV instead of scientific papers on a psychological topic.
 * 5) The article really seems to cover only one of the following possibilities:
 * 6) * Evil parent unfairly alienates child against good parent.
 * 7) * Good parent alienates child against evil parent, and rightly so.
 * 8) * No actual alienation, but one parent falsely accuses the other of alienation.
 * 9) * Both parents are evil and both are alienating the child against the other parent.


 * This page has some serious woo in it, and the editors working on it are really into walls of text. I could use some help here. --Guy Macon (talk) 18:17, 13 September 2019 (UTC)


 * I'm not willing to touch this myself since this particular rabbit hole is so deep, but I would suggest that keyword searches for "parental alienation" + politics would turn up relevant sources. I could be wrong, but my understanding is that this is a controversial and politicized topic. Biogeographist (talk) 18:38, 13 September 2019 (UTC)

Legitimate scientific papers of the month
--Guy Macon (talk) 22:02, 13 September 2019 (UTC)
 * How do wombats make cubed poo?
 * Does pizza protect against cancer?
 * Must be approaching the IgNobel season. Guy (help!) 22:20, 13 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Did I read somewhere that lovely tomato in its many forms has some value in protection against sunburn, et seq? -Roxy, the dog . wooF 01:19, 14 September 2019 (UTC)
 * + +  ++ clicks link ++  +  + . Oh. Roxy, the dog . wooF 01:23, 14 September 2019 (UTC)


 * You foreigners may mock, but Australian bush-walkers and hikers have been puzzled forever by the cubic shape of wombat poo. This is an important discovery. More seriously, the mechanism inside the wombat's gut is being seen as a possible future idea for some manufacturing processes. HiLo48 (talk) 03:55, 14 September 2019 (UTC)
 * That's why I like the paper so much. It is serious research covering a very interesting aspect of the natural world, AND the title is really funny. --Guy Macon (talk) 05:03, 14 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Would make a good song title too. Hyperbolick (talk) 13:39, 14 September 2019 (UTC)

Nations and intelligence
There is a content dispute at this article in relation to material mostly from Rindermann. A few SPAs and IPs appear to insist for inclusion while some regulars object. I think one of our very experienced editors also argues for inclusion although he has not edited the article yet about this ('s comment on the talk page invites to reason, pinging as a courtesy). I'll personally stop reverting there as I lack the time and already shared my impression; an IP address editor still insists for more discussion, so more participation welcome. — Paleo Neonate  – 21:47, 15 September 2019 (UTC)
 * I can see this is going to be fun and not at all tedious. I love playing "whose edit is it anyway" with dynamic IP addresses. Simonm223 (talk) 14:26, 17 September 2019 (UTC)

You won't find this sort of information in the mainstream media...
This just in: English language "is just a dialect of Chinese" say academics

Bonus info:


 * "Even more shockingly, Professor Zhai’s colleague Professor Zhu Xuanshi went on to say that all European history before the 15th century is a lie.


 * He claims that everything we are taught about Europe prior to the middle ages is 'fake news' designed to cover up Chinese domination of the world in previous centuries.


 * Because Europeans found the fact of a global Chinese empire 'humiliating' they agreed to edit history to hide the fact that they are just a 'sub-civilisation' of Chinese culture."

Related: --Guy Macon (talk) 19:41, 9 September 2019 (UTC)
 * I see the Star has improved a lot since I last read it. That was possibly before the internetz. -Roxy, the dog . wooF 20:10, 9 September 2019 (UTC)


 * Well in a few years we might well find it in Chinese school textbooks.... Apparently, someone is funding them very well... Johnbod (talk) 14:32, 17 September 2019 (UTC)

Wikiversity
May I discuss Wikiversity:Motivation and emotion/Book/2015/Masturbation motivation here? Seems like total WP:FRINGE/PS. I proposed it for deletion there. Tgeorgescu (talk) 12:30, 17 September 2019 (UTC)


 * Even though it is on another wiki, I think that [A] it is OK to notify us of the deletion discussion here, but [B] per Canvassing, such notifications must neutrally worded, which the above is not.


 * I have a related question: the Wikiversity page in question is an obvious and transparent attempt to get something that looks exactly like a Wikipedia article but would not survive an AfD published on Wikiversity. Does Wikiversity have a rule against that?


 * I also asked the above question at Help desk. --Guy Macon (talk) 13:16, 17 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Generally, I think Wikiversity has no rules on anything. I don't see anything fringe in the article on a quick scan - more "sky is blue" stuff, though certainly not written or referenced to WP:MEDRS standards. At least no one will read it. In fact it's been there since 2015, & has had 2,549 views in total, many no doubt by the auther when constructing it. Johnbod (talk) 13:27, 17 September 2019 (UTC)
 * What about canvassing? Should I strike my comments? Tgeorgescu (talk) 13:32, 17 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Just my opinion, but I think it is OK as it is, but is something to avoid in the future. The real point of our canvassing rules is to avoid the gathering of votes/opinions that agree with you and thus not being fair to the article creator, and pretty much everyone who reads this noticeboard is experienced enough to make an independent judgement no matter what your opinion is. Heck, I don't even know if Wikiversity has a canvassing rule, and I am pretty much arguing that we should follow Wikipedia's rules because they are good rules even though we aren't actually required to do so when dealing with Wikiversity. --Guy Macon (talk) 13:45, 17 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Yes - logically, since Tgeorgescu put it up for speedy deletion, the only immediate result of his post here could be that someone will remove his tag - you can't really endorse a speedy as part of the process. Johnbod (talk) 14:25, 17 September 2019 (UTC)


 * Wikiversity have a process for nuking fringe bullshit (as Abd found out). Ask over at their admin-o-rama thingy wikiversity:Wikiversity:Request custodian action. Guy (help!) 14:39, 17 September 2019 (UTC)

Constitutional acupuncture

 * Articles for deletion/Constitutional acupuncture
 * Articles for deletion/Constitutional acupuncture

According to this (New?) article


 * "Differ from the form of Western medicine, constitutional acupuncture treats every patient and make the therapeutic remedy due to the patient's unique constitution, which contains the specific way his or her organs affect health, living habits, how he or she looks and behaves. Individualized approach of constitutional acupuncture, which including Saam acupuncture, Taegeuk acupuncture, eight constitution acupuncture and herbal acupuncture, is based on the theory called constitutional energy traits, and is able to assist to cure neurological disorders and analgesic"

I'd PROD it, but some charlatan would deprod, so I'd like some comment from here? It actually needs Jytdog to take a big fat red pen to it, nevertheless ... -Roxy, the dog . wooF 10:06, 13 September 2019 (UTC)
 * The first thing to do is strip out everything based on Chinese sources, per WP:MEDRS and the known issues with Chinese studies of woo. Do you have time? I don't right now. Guy (help!) 11:17, 13 September 2019 (UTC)
 * I voted at yout AfD, thanks, and I'll see how that progresses first! -Roxy, the dog . wooF 11:34, 13 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Yeah, this looks like a POV content fork. No not that Western "acupuncture" this article is about the real stuff. Have stated as much at the AfD. Simonm223 (talk) 12:38, 13 September 2019 (UTC)


 * This is acupuncture ordered by SCOTUS? Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 17:35, 13 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Because I'm a dog, I'll bite. I know what OTUS means ....? Roxy, the dog . wooF 18:52, 13 September 2019 (UTC)
 * The Supreme Court of 'Merca. Simonm223 (talk) 19:02, 13 September 2019 (UTC)
 * SCOTUS. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 20:28, 13 September 2019 (UTC)


 * See also: Articles for deletion/Constitutional acupuncture. –<b style="color:#77b">Laundry</b><b style="color:#fb0">Pizza</b><b style="color:#b00">03</b> ( d c̄ ) 22:18, 13 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Weeeee. A Circle of Oroboros, from memory. -Roxy, the dog . wooF 01:17, 14 September 2019 (UTC)
 * The example paragraph quoted above is a typical claim of "holistic approach"... — Paleo  Neonate  – 16:14, 14 September 2019 (UTC)
 * We're gonna end up with a lot more of it if some at the WMF get their way regarding "eliminat[ing] the western points of view on what is universal knowledge." -Crossroads- (talk) 17:29, 14 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Good luck getting that past Jimbo. Guy (help!) 17:42, 14 September 2019 (UTC)
 * The obviously rational approach (obvious to me, though apparently not to those on either side of these debates) is to treat it from the Western point of view, and also from the Chinese-- simply presented as an alternative tradition.  Those who still object to including it could regard that as the equivalent of how we handle treatment of a topic in fiction.  DGG ( talk ) 23:34, 15 September 2019 (UTC)
 * And also present the origin of life as the evolution point of view, alongside the God/Allah did it alternative tradition? Hard pass. I say we not let these charlatans hide behind "culture" or "alternative knowledges" or whatever. -Crossroads- (talk) 03:21, 17 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Rationality means that you can explain your train of thought and rational people will have to agree. "Obviously rational, but only to people on my side" is nothing but a combination of bluff, insult, and Poisoning the well.
 * This is not about compass directions. It is about competence and about the social climate in dictatorships where people who fail at something, such as achieving statistical significance, can face dire consequences. When Chinese studies have about 100% positive results, they are just not science: neither Western, nor Eastern, nor South-south-eastern-with-a-liiittle-bit-upwards science.
 * Unreliable sources are unreliable. That's all there is to it. We will not treat science and fake bullshit as "just two alternative traditions". --Hob Gadling (talk) 03:36, 19 September 2019 (UTC)

Malicious Bots and Trolls Spread Vaccine Misinformation
[ https://www.snopes.com/news/2019/09/18/malicious-bots-and-trolls-spread-vaccine-misinformation/ ] --Guy Macon (talk) 06:39, 19 September 2019 (UTC)

Walter Russell
Howdy hello! I got into this debate as a result of a WP:3O (see Talk:Walter_Russell for the original discussion), but one of the original participants left, leaving just myself and User:WikipediansSweep. The article in question is Walter Russell, a purported polymath of the early 20th century. At issue is whether Russell's theories are fringe, whether he has a doctorate in science, and whether he discovered Neptunium and Uranium before Niels Bohr. I believe it is very much pseudoscience, and that Russell was a quack. That's evidenced by this statement in the lead derived from Russell's own book: He claims his mastery in many fields to mystical experience starting from the age of 7 years culminating every 7 years until a 39 day cosmic illumination experience in his 49th year where he claims to derive all of his scientific knowledge. Some feedback, or at least another voice in the debate, would be much appreciated. Captain Eek Edits Ho Cap'n!⚓ 06:17, 16 September 2019 (UTC)

Hello, I am the other participant in the discussions. Im glad that you admit it as a belief. Since you have admited that a change of the page is necessary to, at least, show its solely an opinion as of now. Can you explain how that statement is evidence for your claim? There are many people who have received powerful information in the form of visions. Nicola Tesla was one, in which he saw the AC generator still in use today. I never find it mentioned that he was a psuedoscientist, also he was a follower of Russells and told him to bury his work for 1000 years in the Smithsonian because humanity wasn't ready for it. His first sculpture was at 56 and commissioned by Thomas Edison, and it was a masterpiece. Surrounded by Tesla, Einstein, Edison, and debating scientist in the New York Times there has yet to be one incident of crank-calling. Hopefully, if you stand corrected, you will be able to say so.

Sidenote: Its odd how one can call someone a quack indirectly but if i would call you a quack that would be inappropriate. Its a very degrading term if i might add, along the lines of retard, idiot, fool, babboon, joke, etc. In essence you're saying this man is dumb yet have trouble explaining it. It should be fairly simple. Also saying or calling someone a derogatory term only furthers the division and lessens your ability to comprehend their position, whether it be lunacy or fundamentally different views. WikipediansSweep (talk) 09:18, 16 September 2019 (UTC)


 * Einstein in 1925

Einstein was very fringe in 1924, as his views were not accepted by the mainstream at all. The coming years validated his work afterwards, nevertheless he was a fringe scientist. — Preceding unsigned comment added by WikipediansSweep (talk • contribs) 11:22, 16 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Remind me, when did he win the Nobel Prize for physics? Brunton (talk) 11:51, 16 September 2019 (UTC)


 * There's certainly a load of crap in this article (I have trimmed some). A library search for this guy returns zilch that's solid. I'm wondering if there is any decent RS and thinking this might be ripe for deletion ... ? Alexbrn (talk) 12:17, 16 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Superficially, it looks like he would be wiki-notable for his art career, but frankly, I don't trust the documentation the article provides for it. The old newspaper sources need to be checked to ensure they're represented accurately, for starters. Reference 2 looks unreliably published, reference 3 is unverifiable, reference 4 may be unreliable, etc. XOR&#39;easter (talk) 02:08, 17 September 2019 (UTC)
 * The science-based claims are 100% junk. Xxanthippe (talk) 02:38, 17 September 2019 (UTC).

Can someone please warn User:WikipediansSweep of the DS on pseudoscience? Thanks. jps (talk) 16:09, 18 September 2019 (UTC)


 * Already done, see . Tgeorgescu (talk) 17:13, 18 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Then time to take this to WP:AE. It is clear they are not going to let up. jps (talk) 01:08, 19 September 2019 (UTC)
 * I have opened a case at WP:AE. Captain Eek  Edits Ho Cap'n!⚓ 16:35, 19 September 2019 (UTC)

Impressed my correction comment was deleted leaving only my atrociously wrong statement intact... I corrected it to 1904 whenever it took academia quite a while to adjust to Einstein, which i was using as essentially an educational pointer that not confirming to the mainstream is actually the means in which science progresses. WikipediansSweep (talk) 08:26, 19 September 2019 (UTC)

Also check the talk page as i have listed many sources, albeit poorly(format wise not content), under the modern leonardo, if anyone of you is in New York you can access the herald tribune online through a library card to get genuine confirmation on the modern leonardo claim, even though i have it additionally being sourced after his death, there are definitely more claims of it nonetheless i doubt one can separate it from the herald article. WikipediansSweep (talk) 08:49, 19 September 2019 (UTC)
 * It's an incidental point, I know, but "1904" is wrong again. It's true that the embrace of special relativity and the abolition of the luminiferous aether were not as rapid as oversimplified schoolbooks would suggest, but there was never a point when Einstein was "fringe" in the sense of our WP:FRINGE guideline. XOR&#39;easter (talk) 16:30, 19 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Oh, and the NYT "sources" look to be Russell and other people yelling in the Letters to the Editor pages, with nobody actually coming across as knowing any physics. For example, I can now see that Kepler's mention of a single focus, and his failure to mention the other, coupled with Newton's single attribute of matter to attract matter without mentioning its equally apparent power to repel, deprived science of a possible solution to the universal riddle &mdash; it's like GeoCities in newsprint. Historical inaccuracy is the least of its problems. XOR&#39;easter (talk) 18:31, 19 September 2019 (UTC)

I looked at one of Russell's books, A New Concept of the Universe (1953), and there is clear evidence of pseudoscience (e.g. arguing that God can be proved in the laboratory) and a form of quackery (confidently proclaiming knowledge/expertise one does not have) in the introductory section. He describes hydrogen as being an octave, and isotopes as being octave based. He also claims there are 21 elements before hydrogen, and that carbon can be split into isotopes by a gyroscopic method, in a similar sense to musical octaves being split into sharps and flats. Then he says hydrogen is 'weightless fuel' and can be transmuted from the atmosphere to avoid the need of storage containers. None of this makes any sense, from a basic science (chemistry) standpoint, and I think this would have been obvious as of its publication date. The weight of hydrogen was established in the 1700s by Cavendish, hydrogen cannot be transmuted from nitrogen (as Russell clarifies his meaning on p. 124) except by expensive fission, isotopes aren't "sharps and flats" (mass and atomic number are distinct and correspond to proton and neutron counts, so overlapping mass number is not an identical element, unlike sharps and flats in music), and there really can't be 21 atomic elements before hydrogen because that would imply less than one proton. Lsparrish (talk) 18:29, 19 September 2019 (UTC)

Friends of Science
The recent contributions of single-purpose account Bonvi-a to our article on climate-denial organization Friends of Science could use wider attention. (For past discussion here of this organization, see Fringe theories/Noticeboard/Archive 44) —David Eppstein (talk) 19:55, 17 September 2019 (UTC)

Actually, the recent blatant denial of facts by Eppstein is what needs wider attention. Sadly the automatic rejection of my edits to a Wikipedia page wreaking of alarmist propaganda is proof that Wikipedia is nothing more than a disinformation tool for climate alarmism. I had been warned that trying to correct the misinformation on this page would be a waste of time... My friends are correct, you are a waste of time. Bonvi-a (talk) 05:34, 18 September 2019 (UTC)
 * If you think everyone but you is a ghost driver, maybe reconsider if you are really on the right side of the road. --mfb (talk) 12:09, 18 September 2019 (UTC)
 * This edit is completely out of line. Bonvi-a may find my essay at WP:1AM to be helpful. --Guy Macon (talk) 12:35, 18 September 2019 (UTC)

If you are right dont give in. They cant win if you are truly right. WikipediansSweep (talk) 16:37, 18 September 2019 (UTC)


 * Actually, we don't care who is right. All we care about is what the sources say.
 * "fourth century B.C. around the fourth century B.C., it would have reported the view that the Earth is flat as a fact and without qualification. And it would have reported the views of Eratosthenes (who correctly determined the earth's circumference in 240BC) either as controversial, or a fringe view. Similarly if available in Galileo's time, it would have reported the view that the sun goes round the earth as a fact, and Galileo's view would have been rejected as 'original research'. Of course, if there is a popularly held or notable view that the earth is flat, Wikipedia reports this view. But it does not report it as true. It reports only on what its adherents believe, the history of the view, and its notable or prominent adherents. Wikipedia is inherently a non-innovative reference work: it stifles creativity and free-thought. Which is a Good Thing." --WP:FLAT
 * --Guy Macon (talk) 16:43, 18 September 2019 (UTC)


 * The first sentence of the quote from WP:FLAT is not quite true, according to the lead of Flat earth: "The idea of a spherical Earth appeared in Greek philosophy with Pythagoras (6th century BC), although most pre-Socratics (6th–5th century BC) retained the flat Earth model. In the early fourth century BC Plato wrote about a spherical Earth, and by about 330 BC his former student Aristotle provided evidence for the spherical shape of the Earth on empirical grounds." NightHeron (talk) 02:24, 19 September 2019 (UTC)
 * What would the majority of 4th century B.C. reliable sources have said about the shape of the earth? I am pretty sure that if Wikipedia had been around we would have reported the scientific consensus that it is flat, and would have reported the fringe view that it is round if that view was notable. --Guy Macon (talk) 03:43, 19 September 2019 (UTC)
 * But science in our sense (falsifiable theories verified through careful experiment) did not exist then on any significant scale. Among prominent thinkers, probably Aristotle was closest to being a scientist in the modern sense.  So determining the "scientific consensus" would have meant "ask Aristotle".  If 4th century B.C. Wikipedia had done that, it would have been told that the Earth is spherical. NightHeron (talk) 14:19, 19 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Wikipedia is not strictly a website about science. It's about "expert consensus". I'm not sure that Aristotle would have been a representative of mainstream experts as things were figured at the time.    ApLundell (talk) 18:20, 20 September 2019 (UTC)
 * , sure, but as I understand Wikipedia policy, when a fact of nature (such as the shape of the earth) is being discussed "expert consensus" means "scientific consensus". Of course, we're all making the counterfactual assumption that 4th century B.C. Wikipedia would operate according to 21st century policies and practices.  That is, we're assuming that the modern meaning of "scientific" was a part of ancient Greek civilization (it wasn't), that the concept of an encyclopedia was known to them (it wasn't), and that they had the Internet. NightHeron (talk) 19:41, 20 September 2019 (UTC)

Real theory that is weird enough to seem like a fringe theory of the month
Elitzur–Vaidman bomb tester: Sometimes the real science is weirder than the fringe science. --Guy Macon (talk) 14:55, 21 September 2019 (UTC)
 * "the experiment can verify that the bomb works without ever triggering its detonation, although there is a 50% chance that the bomb will explode in the effort." Well, that's terrifying, glad it's not my job.  He  iro 15:39, 21 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Is there a cat involved? Roxy, the dog . wooF 15:54, 21 September 2019 (UTC)

Mary Higby Schweitzer
Maybe not quite the best board, but there doesn't seem to be any that quite fits as I'm not sure BLPN is the best place for dealing with this. Can editors take a look at Mary Higby Schweitzer? I noticed this due removal of content for questionable reasons. But looking at the article, it does seem to to have a fair amount content sourced exclusively to published papers, so I'm not sure if it's clear all the content is significant or properly presented. It sounds like her work has received attention from creationists in the past. Nil Einne (talk) 04:56, 20 September 2019 (UTC)


 * That article fails to mention the creationist's attempts to twist Schweitzer's work:


 * http://discovermagazine.com/2006/apr/dinosaur-dna
 * https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Soft_tissue_preservation#The_Schweitzer_fossils
 * https://www.icr.org/article/6220/
 * The problem with ignoring this sort of woo is that a significant number of people will hear the creationist claims, come here, and see no coverage mentioning her repudiation of the creationist claims. --Guy Macon (talk) 05:26, 20 September 2019 (UTC)
 * From the discover article:


 * "Some creationists, noting Schweitzer's evangelical faith, have tried to pressure her into siding with them. 'It is high time that the "Scientific" community comes clean: meaning that the public is going to hold them ACCOUNTABLE when they find out that they have been misled,' reads a recent e-mail message Schweitzer received. She has received dozens of similar notes, a few of them outright menacing. These religious attacks wound her far more than the scientific ones. 'It rips my guts out,' she says. 'These people are claiming to represent the Christ that I love. They're not doing a very good job. It's no wonder that a lot of my colleagues are atheists.' She told one zealot, 'You know, if the only picture of Christ I had was your attitude towards me, I'd run.' "


 * --Guy Macon (talk) 05:30, 20 September 2019 (UTC)


 * I like this scientist. I don't know her at all, and I'm unfamiliar with her work, but I like her for what isn't in her article -Roxy, the dog . wooF 15:57, 21 September 2019 (UTC)

Richard Milton (author) now a Brexit Party candidate
A search on his name and Usenet is interesting. Besides being a climate change denier he has other conspiracy theories about science. Note his signature on his Usenet posts. Doug Weller talk 17:42, 21 September 2019 (UTC)

John de Ruiter
Does this article seem excessively positive to anyone else, especially the lead, and especially in not explaining his "College" is not an accredited educational facility, but, as far as I'm aware, an auditorium. Adam Cuerden (talk)Has about 6.9% of all FPs —Preceding undated comment added 21:28, 22 August 2019

Agree. de Ruiter is notorious in the Edmonton area for erratic behaviour and potentially leading a cult. I will work to find local sources and revise. Worrypower (talk) 19:52, 25 September 2019 (UTC)