Talk:Eliot Tokar/Archive CV style and earlier chat

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[edit] Content of the Article

This reads like a CV, and doesn't establish the importance/notability of this person. Why should we have an article on him? Zimbardo Cookie Experiment 03:01, 30 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Further notes on this article

I posted the stuff below to the author's (User:Bklynbrn) talk page.

I wrote about this on the discussion page, but there have been no replies. You are the author of this article. I am not clear on why we need it at all; Mr. Tokar doesn't seem to be a particularly noteworthy person in general.
I did a Lexis-Nexis search of major papers from the last two years on "Eliot Tokar," and came up with only a letter to the editor. Switched to "Medical News" and got nothing. I can find most of Mr. Tokar's journal articles, but very few cites to them in other articles.
But even if we stipulate that the guy is notable, the page reads exactly like a résumé. I don't think we need a complete list of his publications and lectures, since we don't generally have that for other scholars (even ones who have credentials and Ph.D.s). I don't see the purpose of including a bunch of tendentious stuff about "industrialized biomedicine" and so on. Why should his page be significantly longer than, say, Kenneth Alan Ribet's?
I propose deleting everything after the first paragraph. Your thoughts? Zimbardo Cookie Experiment 01:58, 27 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Response to Zimbardo

My apologies, I have been travelling and due to other time constraits have been unable to effectively address your comments until now. Yes, I am the author of the article and am independent of Eliot Tokar. He is a proponent of naturopathic medicine, while I am a committed consumer of conventional modern Western medicine. My entry is also informed by other voices from conventional Western medicine and this runs in counterpoint to ensure a NPOV.

Mr. Tokar is notable for both his accomplishments and his tenacity in following an unconventional path to a profession, which while obscure in the West, has benefited many. Here lies the challenge. As an educational vehicle, an encyclopedia should inform the young, amongst others, that there is more than one way to pursue a life's goal, and that there are examples of success amongst those who have pursued The Road Not Taken. Furthermore, an encyclopedia is useful if it presents factual information, in an unbiased fashion, that flies in the face of conventional wisdom and enables individuals to seek alternative approaches to solving problems. In this case the entry examines a life's work around a system of medicine different from the industrialized Western model, which is collapsing under its own weight of non-sustainable economics and focus on blocking symptoms rather than achieving and maintaining health. People have a right to know that when the dominant system is unable to help them, there is a choice.

In searching Lexis-Nexis you've fallen into a trap of assuming that the conventional western academic publish or perish model is germane to divining knowledge of naturopathic medicine. I'm certain that if you would search for the traditional Tibetan reference sources, you would come up empty handed. Searching for material on folk medicine might be closer, but you would find scholarly treatises from anthropoligists and historians documenting their research as opposed to studies from those actually practicing traditional methods.

But in light of your proposed stipulation, let me propose this. I am planning to deliver expanded background information relative to the above that more clearly describes the journey. Also, additional and reformatted publication information will be made available. I would ask that you remove your comment tag and continue to monitor the page. Afterwards, I would welcome your comments and would be willing to work together to continue to improve the entry.

--Bklynbrn 15:20, 27 February 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for bringing this to the talk page.
I am not interested in talking about the non-sustainable economics of the industrialized Western model. What I want to know is why Mr. Tokar is notable according to Wikipedia's policies. He's not an academic, but since you list a bunch of his publications, I had a look at WP:PROF; I don't think he really qualifies in that category. Practitioners generally aren't notable per se (my dermatologist isn't listed, for example), so I did a cite check to see how much his papers had been cited elsewhere.
I am not interested in fighting about this; there are plenty of biographies on Wikipedia that don't belong here. The important thing is that it reads like a CV. Wikipedia is not Who's Who, and it's not a place to tell stories about personal journeys.
I'm going to replace the résumé tag. As the author of the article, I hope you will edit it until it reads more like an encyclopedia article, with an appropriate length and so on. I would like to see the page deleted, but I haven't submitted an AFD request and I have no immediate plans to do so. Zimbardo Cookie Experiment 02:33, 28 February 2007 (UTC)

Further comments in response to Zimbardo

Thanks for taking the time to further describe your position. I removed your tag again merely to get your attention since I don't have your e-mail address. I welcome your concern about the significance of Tokar's work, however, relative to your main point of challenging the noteworthiness of this individual I think that your analogies are not congruent to the situation at hand. To compare this man to a mathematician or to your dermatologist is inappropriate and does not create a standard with which to measure his work or its notability. Some might also improperly argue that any non-Western information or knowledge is not of note because it is not buttressed by Western academic research or that Gandhi was not a political figure of note because he was never elected to office or held an official government position.

I am not claiming he is an academic scholar, yet if you used Wikipedia's own academic criteria for notability he clearly satisfies both:

1)The person is regarded as a significant expert in his or her area by independent sources. 2)The person is regarded as an important figure by independent academics in the same field.

According to the stated policy meeting only one of these is necessary and sufficient. The fact is that Tokar is clearly an important pioneer in his fields of alternative medicine and Tibetan medicine. Especially at this time of the rise of globalization of knowledge, individuals who work to successfully spread cross-cultural ideas in a responsible and credible manner are of note. However, Tokar's noteworthiness is proven by the facts, such as: that despite not being an academic, a biomedical doctor or institutionally based he has published articles in academic journals and has an article on MEDLINE; that one of his self-published works was added to the Stanford University library collection; that he has been invited to speak at America's most highly ranked medical colleges such as Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis and the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine; that he has been invited to speak at American universities such as Princeton University and New York University; that he has been invited to speak at prestigious internationally recognized centers of knowledge such as the New York Botanical Garden and at New York's Asia Society; that he was asked to serve as an advisor to the American Medical Student Association (AMSA) the largest medical students organization in America; that he was invited to serve on the steering committee of a year-long academic study group at Columbia University; and that he was selected as a nominee for the White House Commission on Complementary and Alternative Medicine Policy proposed by the U.S. Senate in 1999.

However, Wikipedia should probably not think that the mere standards of Western academia should in anyway be the measure of someone who is practicing in a field such as Tibetan medicine. But what do we find beyond this measure? In my own research that was not narrowly constrained to Lexus/Nexus I discovered facts, such as, that he was the sole Western Tibetan doctor to be invited to give a paper at the first modern international academic conference on Tibetan medicine held in Tibet in 2000 and that he has served as an advisor to H. H. the Dalai Lama's diplomatic office in New York City in regard to Tibetan medicine. In fact, because of your challenge I did some investigation and found out that one of Tokar's talks, at the University of Michigan Medical School, was only arranged because of the fact that the afore mentioned Office of Tibet was willing to verify his status as a genuine authority in the field.

Given the facts that I gleaned from my research I must respectfully disagree with your conclusion. I do not think that Wikipedia can be seen as a credible international reference source if it is constrained by narrow prejudices regarding knowledge. Standards are important, but they must be appropriate to Wikipedia's mission as a broadly inclusive, yet serious, source of knowledge and of noteworthiness.

I must also disagree with the implication that your own lack of interest in the “non-sustainable economics of the industrialized Western model”, or that you find critical discussions about industrialized biomedicine to be “tendentious”, to be a reason to eliminate the discussion of such crucial modern issues form Wikipedia. Anyone of us might find any discussion of scientific, political, religious, social matters not to their liking but that does not mean that they are not key to universally important international, societal or personal knowledge of our times. If Wikipedia is limited to simply what one group or individual finds valid, it will become irrelevant as a knowledge source, and it is clear to anyone who has read a newspaper for at least two decades that healthcare and its availability and sustainability is a central challenge in the world today.

Encyclopedias are, as you said, not a Who's Who. They are meant to put flesh on the bones of information and teach us something as a result. Therefore I still assert that as an educational vehicle, an encyclopedia should inform us about the meaning of a noteworthy person's accomplishments on a human scale. Read the article on George Washington Carver and tell me if it does not describe a journey. An encyclopedia like Wikipedia, that is democratic and that wants to use the unique qualities of the internet is useful if it presents factual information, in an unbiased manner, presenting both mainstream and alternative thought. This is not a vague 'new age' idea. Rather it is at the root of all truly creative and pioneering intellectual, technological and artistic work and it clearly belongs in Wikipedia as does Tokar's biography.

Finally, I need to comment on your concerns of relative length. Who is to say that it is OK to have 10 pages devoted to 'Pink Floyd' or 2000 words on 'submarine sandwich' but only 30 words on Eliot Tokar? Or that as a non scholar his lectures cannot be listed? I think I am able to find listings of every Pink Floyd album and song. There are lists of every Star Trek episode. Are you an official editor or administrator, and if not, with respect, why should you have the power to limit information that might be useful to some segment of the global Wikipedia user audience? Maybe you should go on to another page and come back in the future when the revisions are complete. --Bklynbrn 20:59, 28 February 2007 (UTC)

Because we have heard of Pink Floyd, and hardly anyone on this wiki has heard of Eliot Tokar. The list of articles was too long- there don't tend to be such lists on here, at the most, mention a couple of his most well-known articles. Hence I am removing some of the links too. We are all official editors on here, and Zimbardo just seems to know the rules of notability etc well. This article is almost worth listing for deletion and the reason for its existence needs to be explained by what he has done, in an encyclopedic style (not a CV or informal biography style. Read more articles such as Gillian McKeith to get an idea of possible styles.Merkinsmum 13:32, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Sources needed

There are no notable sources included in this article. Unless they are put in soon, deletion should be considered.Merkinsmum 14:25, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] compare to Christopher Hansard

Christopher Hansard is a far more notable (if controversial) practitioner, the size of this article should reflect Eliot's degree of notability. You can't judge Eliot by the academic criteria for notability, as he's not an academic and you admit this.Merkinsmum 14:29, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Poor Editing and Daft Comments

What a funny bird you are Mum. Why you and that zimbardo cookie seem to have it in for this Tokar chap I will never fathom. I was using this page just yesterday and there were some useful links posted. Now I do not see them. And last time I was back in Brighton the fellow who runs our local Indian take-away was telling me about an interesting article on herbs that he read by this very fellow. Move along and take up suduko or some other hobby and leave this editing be. I hope they restore this lot. Maybe go for a walk on the heath. There's a good girl. - Stig --65.188.192.230 04:06, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

Feel free to use the article history to find any material that might have been removed. Take care. Zimbardo Cookie Experiment 05:48, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Unfortunate Actions

While I am merely tired of excessive democracy in editing and interpretation, the subject of this article has contacted me and is quite unhappy. Only my best efforts to reassure him keep me from having to pull this article down totally. He did indicate to me that further malicious tampering such as the most recent effort will be considered misleading and libelous, and that he fully intends to pursue legal action against the Foundation in order to identify and file suit against the culprits. --Bklynbrn 04:38, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

I wish him the best of luck in his legal action. Merk's edits were a little messy, but clearly in good faith. The article as you re-edited it seems to be much better, although it needs references to external sources under standard WP:BIO rules. Also, there are an awful lot of external links; could we prune this?
Incidentally, if the author of the article is contacting you, it's probable that you are way too close to the subject to be authoring these articles; you might want to check WP:COI
Best wishes! Zimbardo Cookie Experiment 05:43, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Petty Squabble

Well done! It looks like you've made a real balls-up of it now Cookie love! Here, I've set things right so it's actually useful and the bloody barristers aren't hot on your trail. I'm beginning to detest these vile little skermishes between arrogant little prigs. Been looking at your track record and see no contributions but a host of reversions. Bloomin destructive little parasite, aren't we? And you try to hide behind the rules and get it wrong more often then not. Sod off old darling, least I have a word with Jimbo. - Stig --65.188.192.230 15:00, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

I have tried to be as open and friendly as possible about this entire process. I'm not terribly concerned with what an anonymous editor with 0 previous article edits thinks of my record, but you might want to check out WP:CIVIL and WP:AGF. I am not worried about legal action resulting from my removing a bunch of arbitrary external links. Best wishes. Zimbardo Cookie Experiment 18:21, 2 March 2007 (UTC)
PS: You probably mean "solicitors" instead of "barristers." Zimbardo Cookie Experiment 19:48, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Charming to the Last

One supposes the only thing in life you won't be able to correct is your ego. Probably an Arsenal supporter. Life is too short for this. Please fight amongst yourselves. I'll leave you with some Byron:

Eternal Spirit of the chainless Mind!

Brightest in dungeons, Liberty, thou art;

For there thy habitation is the heart -

The heart which love of thee alone can bind;

And when thy sons to fetters are consigned,

- To fetters, and the damp vault's dayless gloom -

Their country conquers with their martyrdom,

And Freedom's fame finds wings on every wind.

Chillon! thy prison is a holy place,

And thy sad floor and altar, for 'twas trod,

Until his very steps have left a trace,

Worn, as if thy cold pavement were a sod,

By Bonnivard. -May none those marks efface!

For they appeal from tyranny to God.

- Stig --65.188.192.230 03:12, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] More on the state of this page

1. I don't know if it's a coincidence that most of the people who've edited this page have done no editing of Wikipedia other than this article, but I must admit I'm a little suspicious that there are some sock puppets here, and I still believe that this is essentially a vanity page.

2. That said, I appreciate that Bklynbrn has put a lot of effort into trying to establish the notability of this person, and we *want* Wikipedia articles to establish the notability of the person on the page, some inclusion of his credentials is a good idea. Perhaps something about the fact that he was an advisor to the Dalai Lama's office and that he was the only Western doctor to give a paper at the Tibetan conference. This helps us understand why Mr. Tokar is an important guy in his field, and when it's separated from a flood of irrelevant information (for example, about his mother the homemaker) and the stream of facts in his CV, it will help the article.

3. Bklynbrn may not be the best person to edit this page, seeing as he's apparently in close contact with Mr. Tokar. But no matter who edits it, we want to make sure that it conforms to WP:LIVING. In particular, we want sources and attribution for statements we make about the guy.

4. With regard to the external links, I deleted links that I thought were either essentially fansites or commercial sites under my best interpretation of WP:EL. We also don't need this article to be a repository of links about Tibetan medicine, because there's a Tibetan medicine page for which those would be better suited.

5. The bullying (explicit and implicit) in the entries above is really distressing. Zimbardo Cookie Experiment 18:53, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

Please excuse me because I am merely a user of this Wikipedia, not a contributor. I must say, however, that I have been increasingly distressed by what I have been reading here. I agree with Zimbardo that this page could have used some proper editing and I also thank Bklynbrn for his contribution. However, it seems to me that you have all gone a bit overboard now and educational links have been eliminated. The ones that I placed back were NOT to commercial sites, sir, but to content that is educational. If you wish to properly call an end to bullying then you must also not indudge in this yourself. Please be so kind as to add these three links back.
I believe that people whose noteworthiness is merely centered on themselves are in fact not very worth knowing about. I wish to respectfully point out to you all that Dr. Tokar’s work is important not because of his personal fame but rather because he is a recognized expert who is speaking out internationally about issues that are key to the survival of our traditional medicine in the East. From what I have seen his credentials are impressive although certainly different from those of us in biomedicine or academia. What we, the Wikipedia readers, can glean from his work is most relevant to millions of people internationally who are concerned about our cultural survival in the context of globalization. I am, as I have, said not an expert on this Wikipedia, but it seems that sharing this type of information is a first-class use of this resource. So please, all of you, stop your foolish fighting and let those of us who have critical interest in serious topics use this Wikipedia to help us understand our world in a better fashion. Thank you for your attention Namaste. --DesiDoc 20:26, 2 March 2007 (UTC)
I don't see what's bullying about following the WP:EL guidelines. Note that we are to avoid "Links to sites that primarily exist to sell products or services," which certainly describes the jcrows.com link, and also "Sites that are only indirectly related to the article's subject," which certainly describes the NPR pieces. Zimbardo Cookie Experiment 21:09, 2 March 2007 (UTC)
I felt it was bullying, what the stig person said, it was very nasty. Especially as it wasn't even clear who he was addressing it to. I've not been editing here a lot, for very long, so I'm sorry if my efforts were clumsy. My concern was just to make it encyclopedic in tone. it's almost there. I don't think it needs as many links and it certainly shouldn't say 'this ancient system of natural healing' in the lead. Because that's not an encyclopedic, neutral tone.

Zim if you missed the comment I considered nasty I think it was addressed to you actually lol, you are certainly not bullying IMHO compared to some comments that have been made towards you.Merkinsmum 23:01, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

Oh and DesiDoc, you are an editor, by virtue of having an account, and writing here. Namaste.Merkinsmum 23:03, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

Please Zimbardo. I do not mean to get involved in this whole mess. I sincerely apologize if you took umbrage at my saying that you were bullying, but you do need to recognize your contribution to all of this improper fighting. As an editor you have assumed an important role to this Wikipedia and to those of us who are its readers. However, your approach has not necessarily always helped to restore much needed civility, although I feel that things might be on a better track for now.
Please allow me to respond to you in detail:
1. Please sir, you must realize that guidelines are just that. We must use judgment as well. Even in our academic journals, writing guidelines are used with discretion. No respected journal in America, Europe or Asia is merely legalistic about what they publish. No journal is edited based merely on guidelines; they require individuals with expertise in a given field of knowledge through peer review and other editorial means to make good judgments about what is sound.
2. I did not even see the rest of the jcrows.com site when I saw this article. No one else who followed the link would be able to either. I had to especially look it up due to your declaration. It is true that in other parts of the jcrows.com site there are commercial links, but they appear nowhere in Dr. Tokar’s article, which is presented as a pdf. In fact, as and editor, if you want to assist the likely audience of this kind of Wikipedia page you should also restore the link to http://www.jcrows.com/EliotInterview1.pdf, which I believe would be very helpful for those Westerners who wish to understand our Asian culture.
3. To say that the NPR piece is only indirectly related to Dr. Tokar's work is frankly not credible. It is an interview about his central area of expertise by an authoritative media outlet in the USA that allows him and others to express their diverse opinions on the issue of Tibetan medicine and cultural survival. I would think that a piece that offers diverse opinions and not only Dr. Tokar’s would be most pleasing to the spirit if not a narrow interpretation of Wikipedia’s guidelines.
4. Writing that there is a citation needed to prove that Dr. Tokar is one of very few Western experts practicing Tibetan medicine, I apologize to say, displays a lack of knowledge in this area of medicine. Even a basic Internet search shows that there are very few Westerners practicing in this field internationally and almost none whose name is connected with the caliber of academic institutions and publications that Dr. Tokar has been associated with according to my research.
5. If you do not like the phrase 'this ancient system of natural healing', the phrase 'this ancient system of traditional Asian medicine” is most academically correct.
It is clear that Dr. Tokar is not a celebrity; even the kind that exists in what is nowadays termed in healthcare as Complementary and Alternative Medicine. As such, external links that represent the importance of his contribution will thankfully not be solely about him but rather about those matters about which he is an expert. I assure you that there are not very many Western people who show his fluency in these important international issues and in traditional Asian medical culture. His expertise and body of work is the only reason that I have been able to discover for him being associated with many respected publications, organizations as well as institutions of learning and culture both in the West and in the East.
Please accept my humble opinions in the spirit that they are meant and thank you for your efforts. Namaste, --DesiDoc 23:40, 2 March 2007 (UTC)
The thing with the books previously cited is they were cited as if Eliot had written the whole of them, rather than an article in them. So it appeared misleading.Merkinsmum 01:21, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Books

Forgive me for mentioning Christopher Hansard, I meant only that it's easier to sources for what he has done, by virtue of him having published several books on Amazon http://www.amazon.com/s?ie=UTF8&search-type=ss&index=books&field-author=Christopher%20Hansard&page=1 When I looked the other day Hansard's article was on here, I didn't realise it had been deleted. I hope Eliot will write his own book someday soon.Merkinsmum 23:15, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

You make a good point that it would be good to see a book from Dr. Tokar in the future. However, I did see that he will have a new publication in the journal of the International Association for the Study of Traditional Asian Medicine, which is titled Asian Medicine: Tradition and Modernity. This is a very nice journal that I would recommend to you, which publishes many good papers on Ayurveda, the Unani system, Chinese medicine and Tibetan medicine. I also received an e-mail from a colleague in Pondicherry that a new book on Tibetan medicine will be published in the EU that will include chapters by Dr. Tokar and other experts. I have not had more details than this.
I do not know anything about Christopher Hansard’s work. I did find this site http://christopherhansard.blogspot.com/ among others. He seems like quite a controversial fellow. Regards --DesiDoc 00:34, 3 March 2007 (UTC)
Yes he is:) I didn't mean anything by comparing Eliot to him, except that Hansard is a more widely known practitioner of Tibetan Medicine, for good- or ill:)Merkinsmum 01:17, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] professional organisations?

I just wondered if Eliot Tokar is a member of any traditional or complementary medicine organisations such as the American Association of Oriental Medicine? Then we could mention any professional affiliations in the article.Merkinsmum 01:35, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

Merkinsmum, You make a very wonderful point for us above that is most instructive for our entire discussion. That is, fame does not necessarily equal credibility and is not necessarily the same as notability in all fields of endeavour. There are many individuals who do important work and deserve recognition here even if they are not necessarily famous or possess conventional credentials, and then there are others who are very easy to see and hear but not necessarily worth seeing or listening to.
If I may say, it seems to me that Wikipedia is an important place where that needs to be understood, and the case of Dr. Tokar is just one of many examples of that lesson. This is why I have tried to explain what I have to Zimbardo regarding the use of guidelines. What defines notibility in all the diverse fields of endeavour in the world cannot be covered in any set of guidelines. So, we need to use guidelines and also to use our good judgment. Thank you very much indeed for helping to make clear this insight.
As far as your question about organisations, how can this be found out? We have some information from Bklynbrn's description and there is some on the Tibetanmedicine.com site, but otherwise I do not know anything about how such queries are answered here on Wikipedia. I am very inexperienced in all of this. Regards--DesiDoc 02:07, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Place of Origin

I went to high school with his brother. Eliot grew up in Howard Beach. I think he still lives here. Shouldn't we say that to be more exact? What do the rest of you think?

Mary Anne --Gentillo 03:56, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

It means nothing to those of us in other countries, New York is detail enough, remember we are striving for the tone of an encyclopedia entry and trying to be concise.

[edit] does him a bit more justice

I think it now does him a bit more justice, the article had not mentioned before the positions he served on commitees etc, which I have now included, and the lectures.

Its the abundance of links and list of articles that needs to be summarised now rather than listed, and only one or two most important ones mentioned, not a list of everything he has ever written. So please pick out those articles/links you think are most important. Can you see the encyclopedic tone coming out a bit?Merkinsmum 04:09, 3 March 2007 (UTC)


[edit] Let Us Compromise

I think that we all need to find a compromise that works here. Our friend Bklynbrn would still like to add a great deal of narrative and our friend Zimbardo wants the minimum. I smell another battle brewing. I think that the model offered by Merkinsmum provides a good middle ground and at least a starting point. I have made some changes:

1. I think if we want to be encyclopedic we must understand that the historical significance of Dr. Tokar is that he is one of the first Westerners to learn, practice and teach about this Tibetan medicine.

2. I have added a note about his work with the Dalai Lama's office as suggested by Zimbardo.

3. I have added some more details that the academic mind would find useful such as the location of the conferences cited.

4. I have deleted two of the articles listed because they do not seem to be key to his published work.

5. I have deleted some of links as suggested by Merkinsmum, consolidating the information with the remaining articles. Wikipedia users can now find relevant narrative without it taking up space on the page.

I hope that we can work together in a harmonious fashion to make a page that does justice to Dr. Tokar's most significant work within the framework of Wikipedia's structures. Adding useful information is fine but we need to be concise, accurate and to the point as well. Please let me know what you all think. I apologise for my lack of skill in this Wikipedia environment, but this is all a new experience for me. Warmest Regards--DesiDoc 05:38, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Sources

There are still no sources for this article except his webpage. One page that might describe what is meant by this if you feel you might benefit from it is [Wikipedia:Citing_sources]. Only certain sources are actually really counted. The problem is the 'christopher hansard phenomenon.' I'm not saying Tokar or his followers are making it up, just that there's no sources for any of these claims in the article. And after Hansard, I would like to see sources cited for claims such as these. Please put them in. I'm going to put the unreferenced tag back in, someone took it out. It's not a slur on the article, just a fact about it and it will also help us improve it to be reminded. So please no-one remove it until we have a larger number of acceptable sources in.Merkinsmum 11:47, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

Merkinsmum, Your desire for sources is quite fine, however, I think that from what I have read the Hansard analogy is most highly inappropriate. Their work and careers seem wholly different even though it touches on the same field. To make the comparison therefore does not help us solve the source problem that you assert and can cause others to feel that we are forming a slander. For example, from what I can determine Dr. Tokar does not seem to have any "followers" whatsoever and he has built much of his reputation through his connection with objective academic and cultural institutions. What kind of references would be useful here that we can obtain without directly contacting him? Please give specific actionable suggestions so that we can move forward. Thank you for your ideas. --DesiDoc 13:23, 3 March 2007 (UTC)
I didn't mean it like that, just that if we could find sources to back it up, (which we should be able to easily do- such as details of these conferences, commitees etc that mention him) we can prove that he is not like that. Because personally I sometimes am involved in alternative medicine circles, and people make all sorts of claims. We should be able to prove that Eliot Tokar is the rare exception.:) Finding sources is not something I am expert at and none of us seem to be able to understand how easily. Please try and find independent sources that mention the conferences, commitees etc. I am going to request a wikipedia admin or someone more experienced than I comes and helps us do so.Merkinsmum 16:45, 3 March 2007 (UTC)
Thank you very much for clarifying your point. I think that this helps enormously. Regards--DesiDoc 19:35, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] A Fair and Proper Rendering

Bloody hell Mum! If you want something done right, you must do it yourself. I saw this bollocks between you and Bklynbrn and you both got it wrong. You cut out all the fat and the meat at the same time! Leave it be I tell you. This poor devil has suffered enough at our hands. I've never seen him on the telly. His face is not plastered all over the market. He's not a shill for Horlicks or Aero bars. Now stop tinkering. - Stig --65.188.192.230 17:21, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

I have tried to improve on what Stig has added making corrections based on the sources that he has cited and that are available. I have also tried to add some sources in line with Merkinsmum suggestion. In this area there are some natural limitations to what sources may be available but we can try to do our best. I do not know if I have done this properly or what you all might think but I hope that we can arrive at a result that is proper through creative cooperation. Namaste--DesiDoc 19:05, 3 March 2007 (UTC)
Stig if you don't like the article, feel free to discuss any constructive changes you would like to make. There is no need to take a 'tone' with other editors. You might like to make an account too, then the machine signs for you and there are probably other advantages.Merkinsmum 21:13, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Good but

This is good but some of the notes [2] are just like that, please try and fix them. Now it has some good stuff in it, much better than the earlier versions, brill, thanks Desidoc:):) My only concern is it might be taken from somewhere, a book or something? we can't quote a lot without copyright issues. But it's brill, thanks.Merkinsmum 21:27, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

All right Mum, I'll ease up, but now you've got to get the wog under control. Too much of the passive voice and he keep's using the subject's first name, like it's his mate waiting for him down at the pub with pint and a packet of crisps. We just need to tell the story without all the repeated names and prepositions. And I don't want an account just now. I'm not afraid to show an IP and won't be making a career of this. I wonder what happened to that Arsenal supporter Zimbardo. I hope I didn't run him off. No hard feelings. - Stig --65.188.192.230 05:19, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

The article as it is is completely unsourced and a total mess. It will need to be fixed. I don't have the time to deal with this in more detail at the moment. Zimbardo Cookie Experiment 06:40, 4 March 2007 (UTC)
Hi Zimbardo, yesterday I left a request for admin to come and look at this article, hopefully they'll check the sources, neutrality, notability etc. Stig please do not be abusive to others or make racist comments.Merkinsmum 11:35, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Let us try and keep to a fair and postive process

Our process is once again threatening to take on dysfunctional qualities. I believed that we were actually getting somewhere. Even Stig, as rude as he is on this discussion page, was trying to make a contribution of some sort. Now, Zimbardo reemerges suddenly, making blanket negative assessments, but failing to make any positive or constructive suggestions. This is exactly why I cautioned earlier that there are varied forms of bullying.

Please forgive me Zimbardo, but if you wish to take a position of authority you must take a responsible approach as well. If we truly are seeking to engage in honest debate, express credible opinions, critical thought or editorial ideas they should appear in the form of contributions and suggestions and not merely hyperbolical expressions such as “completely unsourced and a total mess”.

The responsibility of a competent editor is both to guidelines and to content, and good editing resolves that dialectic in a manner that promotes knowledge. Those of us who have written and published in peer-reviewed journals know about the use of citations and the need for proper editing. I would like to assert once again that editing is a constructive and creative process not merely a legalistic one.

We must be careful to use Wikipedia rules to improve this page as suggested by Merkinsmum, not merely to reflect bias. Excuse me for saying so, but it was the latter approach that made a necessary editorial process, originally properly recommended by Zimbardo, descend into a foolish fight that he was a regrettable participant in. Now after many useful changes that have been discussed on this page we are back to hyperbole. I fear that soon we will be back in a mess as well.

I would hope that Wikipedia is able to be a source for information about more than celebrities, pop culture, and academic subjects. In the West you already have enough sources of information about these bloody things, and, excuse me for saying so, you increasingly treat knowledge as consumerism. In your evolving system, only creatures of the media, academics and publicity firms (which are all increasingly tied under corporate aegis) can have a voice. [America seems to lead in this area, and now it has even gone to war based on falsehoods promoted by authorities who justified their actions based upon “sourced” intelligence.] These 21st century approaches to hegemony are why our cultural expressions like Tibetan medicine and other forms of traditional knowledge are having their existence threatened, unless of course they can be categorized as “intellectual property” or placed in sterile packages and sold on your store shelves. It is Dr. Tokar’s continuing willingness to speak out on subjects such as biopiracy, and not any kind of personal celebrity, that, in my opinion, makes his work of note.

My request to Zimbardo is that when you have the time to come back and “deal” with this you do so in a manner that is fair and appropriate to both Wikipedia and this subject matter and not merely engage in a legalistic exercise. Democracy must also retain civility for it to function. As I have stated before no respected journal in America, Europe or Asia is merely legalistic about what they publish. No journal is edited based solely on guidelines; they require individuals with expertise in a given field of knowledge who make good judgments about what is sound.

I, therefore, appeal to our friend Zimbardo to use his knowledge to help those of us who have been trying to improve this page, and not to chop it to bits. I would also like to appeal to our friend Merkinsmum to continue to advocate for improvement and depth in this page, and to not be too anxious to give into assumed authority. Your efforts over the past few days have helped us go from chaos to a good, although admittedly imperfect, result. Others now need to also contribute intelligently, with consideration to the nature of the subject matter, if we are to make the article better, and not merely the center of another rude struggle. Regards to you all --DesiDoc 17:34, 4 March 2007 (UTC)