Wikipedia talk:Articles for deletion/Galambosianism (2nd nomination)

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This article was nominated for deletion on January 11, 2005. The result of the discussion was No consensus.

[edit] "Volitional science"?

The article has been substantially rewritten to what amounts to advertisement for "volitional science". The problem here is that Galambosianism is not volitional science, and it is not a term for it. It is doubtful that Galambos' "volitional science" is notable enough to qualify for its own article; Galambosianism as it is already teeters on the edge of unverifiable nonnotability. This is more properly mentioned at the page for Andrew Galambos. (Which, I see, has been edited to reflect this incorrectly as well.) In any case, it should not hijack the page on Galambosianism to expose volitional science. They are different things. Read the article.

I have reverted the article to its original form, that is, without mention of volitional science, which has nothing to do with the concept. "Volitional science" is a concept Galambos created and named; "Galambosianism" is a concept Galambos created but (if I'm not mistaken) didn't name as such. It is nevertheless the one most significant. JRM · Talk 14:33, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] This current article on "Galambosianism" should be deleted.

Please see the letter I wrote to Wikipedia copied below.

Nothing personal, however, whoever has either written the current article on "Galambosianism" is most terribly misinformed. The arrogance of the writer or administrator who continues to replace this article after attempts at correcting it is astonishing. I have no interest in writing an advertisement for Galambos or his company. I am simply someone who has actually read and studied his works for several years; am in contact with other students both past and present; and have a solid enough comprehension about Galambos and his work to know that this article is plain old dross.

What a shame that the writer and/or administrator of this page continues to defend this nonsensical page (along with the pseudobiography of Galambos himself) that serves no purpose but to wrongly defame a person's reputation and denigrate a body of work. Such arrogance! From people who know not the first thing about the man, his biography, his works, his bibliography, his influences, etc.!

This episode reflects so very poorly on these obstinate, intellectually arrogant individuals and on Wikipedia.

Below is a letter I wrote to Wikipedia before I knew about this discussion page. I would be willing to go into more depth in my explanations where I was brief. However, to argue with someone who is clearly not familiar with nor interested in Galambos or his works would be the height of futility.

"To argue with a person who has renounced the use of reason is like administering medicine to the dead." -- Thomas Paine

---

To Whom It May Concern:

I am writing to report serious, probably libelous, issues concerning a series of articles.

I have attempted to correct errors on my own through editing these articles; numerous times as a matter of fact. My articles are rooted in fact with links, references, etc. The fact that these edits are completely undone, and replaced with the same exact article (full of libelous errors) that existed before my edits.

The first set of articles revolves around Andrew Galambos and his scientific work. As I said, I have tried numerous times to correct the errors, and have been undone multiple times.

Allow me to qualify myself:

I am college educated and graduated from UCLA Honors College with a degree in American Literature.

I am a successful businessman who owns several of my own enterprises in Los Angeles, CA.

I have studied Galambos' work through taking courses through his company Free Enterprise Institute, which exists today, as well as by reading his works. I have taken all of his major courses and many minor ones, several times over. I have read much of the work that influenced his work.

I am intimate with the trustees of Galambos' estate and employees of Free Enterprise Institute. I am intimate with several upstanding, successful people who have studied his work over the years.

I am close to associates of Galambos' and his company who edited his book "Sic Itur Ad Astra".

Having said all of this, somebody has chosen to write absolutely false, scurillous, and essentially libelous articles regarding him.

Let's get to the serious errors in this article that I cannot undo by editing alone:

1. In an article entitled "Galambosianism" [1], the error to start with is the title of the article - which is a term that is not nor has never been a term in use to describe his scientific work. His primary body of work is called "Volitional Science" or "The Science of Volition". No one who has ever studied his work seriously (and there are tens of thousands) refers to it as "Galambosianism". To fix this problem, it would be appropriate to delete the article, and say "see Volitional Science". (Any further discussion of the errors is somewhat in vain since the body is in reference to a bunk title / non-existent concept).

2. It starts out with another error: "Galambosianism was a short-lived doctrine of intellectual property absolutism..." Again, no one who has studied Volitional Science refers to it as Galambosianism. Secondly, it is not short lived, in the same way physics wasn't short-lived after the passing of Newton or Einstein. Thirdly, it is not a doctrine, it is a science. Fourthly, if it does not regard "intellectual property absolutism", if I even knew what that meant.

3. The next part of the sentence says: "founded in the 1960s by Joseph Andrew Galambos, also known as Andrew Joseph Galambos". This too is wrong: he is not also known as Andrew Joseph Galambos - that was his name. His father was Joseph Galambos, and to avoid confusion with his father's architectural and scientific legacy, he made sure that he was referred to as Andrew Galambos.

4. Sentence continues: "...and descended from libertarianism and/or the teachings of Ayn Rand." This is just plain false. He was not a libertarian. He never, ever claimed to be one. I can quote from his lectures and writings wherein he plainly stated "I am not a libertarian." And he definitely did not "descend" from Ayn Rand. He enjoyed aspects of her fiction, but that's where it ended.

5. The next sentence: "The primary concept of Galambosianism was that one's ideas were one's "primary property", a higher form of property than physical assets (which were merely "secondary property"), and second only to one's life (one's "primordial property")." First of all, I continue to object to the use of the term "Galambosianism" as it is completely inappropriate, much like would be inappropriate to refer to Einstein's works as "Einsteinianism". I object to the use of the past tense with reference to his works, in much the same way that it is inappropriate to speak in the past tense when referring to the law of thermodynamics or the special theory of relativity. Next, the sentence is wrong: the "primary concept" was non-existent, in much the same way that I challenge you or a physicist to describe the "primary concept" of physics. The rest of the sentence is full of inaccuracies that would take up too much space to correct.

6. The next sentence: "In Galambosianism, property rights were absolute; Galambos was quoted as saying that freedom is the condition in which everyone has 100% control of their property and 0% control of anyone else's property." Again, I object to the use of the term 'Galambosianism'. I object to the use of past tense. The sentence is rife with out of context, absurd inaccuracies. I don't know how to respond to the term "Property rights were absolute." That means nothing to someone who has knows his work, and is not correct.

7. The next sentence makes no sense. "This held that any new idea belonged irrevocably and in perpetuity to its inventor and their heirs, who were entitled to control and profit from its use in perpetuity." Again - out of context, poor writing, misleading, and plain wrong.

8. Next sentence: "Galambosianism did not allow for a public domain; the owners of ideas or their heirs could not renounce ownership of an idea or even waive payments due to them." As with any lie that contains a speck of truth, this article is ruinous to his work and reputation. It implies things without further clarification and without any definitions. It is false and intentionally misleading.

9. The next sentence is plain false: "It is said that Galambos believed, for example, that the word "liberty" was the primary property of the heirs of Thomas Paine, and would drop a nickel into a fund, to give to Paine's descendants, every time he used it."

10. This sentence is wrong; intentionally, willfully, and maliciously untruths. "It is also said that Galambos changed his name from Joseph Andrew to Andrew Joseph to avoid owing his father (whose primary property, by his own arguments, his birth name was) royalties for using it."

11. This sentence is completely wrong as well: "It is also said that Galambos changed his name from Joseph Andrew to Andrew Joseph to avoid owing his father (whose primary property, by his own arguments, his birth name was) royalties for using it." He didn't truly change his name in the first place, and whatever he did in his work to clarify and separate his name from his father's similar name was for the sake of avoiding confusion in the mind of the public between his father's and his work. Whoever is writing this has obviously not read Galambos' work or taken his classes, and has a malicious vein in his writing.

12. This sentence: "As such, in memetic terms, Galambosianism was sterile." is again malicious opinion and a wrong opinion at that.

13. Last sentence: "It has been argued, though, that recent efforts to extend the scope of copyright and patent laws (such as the Digital Millennium Copyright Act and various WIPO treaty proposals) are the intellectual heirs of Galambosianism." What is it to say "it has been argued"? Is this a way to further discredit Galambos' reputation and work? That is like my wrting about you: "It has been argued that monkeys flew out of your ass."

14. References / Links: With the singular exception of the reference to his first book "Sic Itur Ad Astra", the rest are trash and fatuous as references. Harry Browne, who has written some good work, was a one-time student of Galambos' who did not complete his study of Galambos, was caught plagiarizing Galambos, and whose work was discredited by Galambos and his company. They did not get along and were serious disputants. This is much like referencing Glen Curtiss when writing an article on the Wright Brothers. The next reference is to some book written in 1971 (in the middle of Galambos' development of some of his major achievements), by a non-scientist who has clearly not studied nor read Galambos - - someone name "Jerome Tucille". [2] This completely absurd "reference" is to a quote that is an author's (who never studied Galambos) hearsay about someone's hearsay, in a conversational, absurdist, sarcastic, and demeaning tone. The reference to this quote that quotes hearsay is filled with flat out lies and absurdities. These are not appropriate references: what about Amazon.com for the Sic Itur Ad Astra page; what about references from the book, from the company website, from the myriad other writings and references to Galambos.

The entry on Galambos himself is equally as bad. Someone is obviously intent on libeling and discrediting this magnificent scientist and humanitarian. The article should be written by someone who is actually an expert in Volitional Science or by someone who has read the works of Galambos and knows his biography or by someone who has researched both in depth. What is exciting about Wikipedia is the opportunity to enter facts into an encyclopedia, and hopefully these facts have references to substantiate them further. What is bad about Wikipedia is the opportunity for libel to be spread and read. Please fix this serious, actionable problem referenced above, and advise as to what action is being taken as soon as possible.

I will await your corrective action and response. If I do not hear from a representative within 10 day or see corrective measures taken within that time, I will have to take my complaint elsewhere.

Sincerely,

A. Kouba

Thank you for your extensive comments. Let's go over them in order.

First of all, please sign any comments you make with four tildes: ~~~~. This inserts your account name and the time of your comment, which helps keep track of things. Apropos account, feel free to register one.

Second, I will gladly admit to being wholly ignorant of Galambos and his works. That I reverted your edits, then, has nothing to do with their perceived accuracy or the accuracy of the original, or indeed with my attitude towards Galambos, intellectual arrogance or no. Nor should this decision be considered "final" in any sense. It is simply a matter of editorial policy: on Wikipedia you are encouraged to be bold, but not reckless. Complete rewrites of an article that change its scope and remove existing information should be explained on the talk page—as you have done now, but did not do originally. Although we strive to assume good faith, some edits are too bold to leave as is without clarification. I hope you can understand why we usually presume current and longstanding versions of articles to be mostly correct until the opposite is shown.

Third, that I called it an advertisement has good reason: it certainly read as one, regardless of whether this was the intent. The article repeatedly referred to the lectures on volitional science and where to get them, which, while informative to some degree, certainly does not warrant mention three to four times in an article. The decline in writing style was another factor that contributed to the decision to undo the change, a "shoot first, since we can always undo the shooting later" thing. Again, no editorial control is implied in this, it is simply a particular decision in time.

With this out of the way, let's go over your actual objections.

There is no question that "Galambosianism" is not the name of the works of mr. Galambos. This is the first problem. If you read this article as talking about "volitional science", it will obviously come out incorrect, and the bulk of your objections center around this. Your main argument, then, seems to be that Galambosianism as a concept does not exist, or rather was invented by others based on a (possibly deliberate) misunderstanding of Galambos' ideas. Because his ideas are not widely disseminated, this is certainly a possibility. Most of the article seems to come from Browne's eulogy, supplanted with tidbits from the clearly hostile piece by Tuccille.

With that in mind, an argument for deletion on grounds of Wikipedia:No original research and/or Wikipedia:Verifiability can certainly be made, since a single eulogy and an excerpt from a hostile work do not a reference make. Information on volitional science does not belong here; that should get an article at volitional science. Your arguments sound plausible enough to me that I've listed the article for deletion once more (it was previously kept, but solely on grounds of interest—nobody questioned the validity of the concept). You will probably want to cast your vote at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Galambosianism (2nd nomination); for this, please register an account first, because votes by anonymous editors are typically discounted. Please also familiarize yourself with the deletion policy if you wish to voice an opinion, since deletion arguments should be grounded in Wikipedia's policies (i.e. not merely "this article is bad").

Finally, regarding "if I do not hear from a representative within 10 day or see corrective measures taken within that time, I will have to take my complaint elsewhere": please keep in mind that we are all volunteers. Asking for "representatives" is somewhat spurious. I hope that by "taking your complaints elsewhere" you are not making an implicit legal threat, since we have a policy of not allowing legal threats mentioned on Wikipedia for the chilling effect they have. Basically, if someone wants to sue the Wikimedia Foundation, they should contact the Foundation. I'm quite certain this is not necessary, however. JRM · Talk 14:14, 31 December 2005 (UTC)

Forgive my calling you arrogant, as I can see that it was premature to do so. In my unfamiliarity with the policies and procedures of Wikipedia, I mistook this article and the undoing of my edits as some sort of arrogance mixed with obstinancy. I would have never guessed that you, the author of this response, was the same person who wrote that article, who deleted my edit, and who defended the deletion of my edit on the discussion page. AK 17:56, 4 January 2006 (UTC)

That's because I'm not—I did not write the article (nor have I made any significant contribution to it, in fact), nor was I the one who reverted your edit the second time. (I did undo it the first time, with explanation on the talk page.) You can see the article's history by clicking the "history" tab, which will give you a complete list of people who have edited the article. JRM · Talk 13:16, 6 January 2006 (UTC)

Thank you for nominating it for deletion.

If I may rebut your rebuttal. The reason I referenced where to get information on his work as many times as I did was because the article itself asserted multiple times that the works of Galambos are dead. It mislabeled the works; it said it was short-lived; it referred to the work in the past tense; it's *references* were obscure and misleading (and not all that current); it referred to the work as sterile; etc., etc. When I read it and wrote my response, I tried to show that it was mislabeled; it is still "living"; it has current references that are more reliable, and are primary sources for research; and it is not sterile. I felt that the current edition of the article repeated this sense of it's being dead/sterile/obscure/past-tense, and perhaps out of a sense of frustration at this repetitiveness, I over-emphasized to the contrary. I wanted to point the way clearly to where people could learn more about Volitional Science - not because I want them to learn more - but because of the availability of the primary source! Buy the book used for all I care! Or Google Galambos or Volitional Science. But if you want to judge for yourself, here's where to go to get it. I think that a more appropriate edit on your part would have been to delete one or more of the "three to four times" I referenced where to get the works.

Decline in writing style. I won't argue with this, although in my world, substance always trumps style. Perhaps if you edited my article's "decline in writing style" it would have been more appropriate then simply completely deleting it, and then defending your article's content on the discussion page? AK 17:56, 4 January 2006 (UTC)

The problem here is that none of the explanation you offered above was on the talk page when you made your edit. All I saw was someone removing large parts of the article, completely turning it around, without explaining why. If I had edited it, I would have brought back most if not all of what you deleted, because there was no reason to assume it was incorrect. Bad me for not checking out the sources? Maybe, but as I'll explain below, this sort of judgement call is common. JRM · Talk 13:16, 6 January 2006 (UTC)

I thank you for recognizing my central point (which really makes all of what I say above moot), i.e. that an article on "Galambosianism" needs to be deleted.

No implicit threat of legal action. More of an implicit threat that I would tell my friends, colleagues and family about the truth of my experience with Wikipedia, the quality, accuracy and depth-of-research of its articles, and its editorial and administrative policies, procedures and practices. It's all about word-of-mouth to me. The truth is that I am much happier with the editorial and administrative policies, procedures and practices after this experience. I did jump the gun in my frustration and ignorance of your system here. I am very pleased with the response of the administration of Wikipedia in response to the is issue, although I have a difficult time understanding how poor articles make their way in, and then corrections, accurate edits/additions, etc. need to be *justified* in a seemingly more rigorous process than the original article has to endure. I probably need to read much more about the way Wikipedia works. AK 17:56, 4 January 2006 (UTC)

Wikipedia is editorially shallow, in the sense that anyone can give their opinion on an article and defend it with edits, and in fact anyone does. What I did was a mindless editorial process whereby you favor what looks like a good article but is not factual over what looks like a bad article which may very well be more factual. This is a crude yardstick and it can go wrong, but Wikipedia gets thousands of edits every day (or more, I haven't checked) and as it grows, it will have more of this "shoot on sight" behavior towards radical edits.

Where I went wrong is in not properly informing you, a newcomer, about what I had done and why, and invite you to the talk page. This would have saved some acrimony. JRM · Talk 13:16, 6 January 2006 (UTC)