Wikipedia talk:Notability (science)/Archive 4

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Contents

This Is Not A Vote™

but a quick poll:

Who likes the guideline?

... (more or less) as it currently (20:51, 10 January 2007 (UTC)) is?

  • --EngineerScotty 20:51, 10 January 2007 (UTC)
  • --EMS | Talk 22:30, 10 January 2007 (UTC)
  • --ScienceApologist 22:39, 10 January 2007 (UTC)
  • --TSO1D 22:42, 10 January 2007 (UTC)
  • --DGG 22:52, 10 January 2007 (UTC)
  • --Trimming issues aside, I have no major objections regarding the content. I think the message is clear. ~ trialsanderrors 01:24, 11 January 2007 (UTC)
  • --I like it! Good job, folks! It captures the main recurring themes. linas 04:29, 13 January 2007 (UTC)
  • --ragesoss 05:16, 13 January 2007 (UTC)

And who doesn't?

  • I think it needs more slimming to make it look more like the other guidelines. Right now it still has a bit of a polemical air. Sdedeo (tips) 22:49, 10 January 2007 (UTC)
  • I have done some serious slimming. Please feel free to revert me, or partially restore content. My goal has been to slim down the introductory material as much as possible to make sure that wider acceptance of the criteria is not hindered by debate over extraneous issues or overelaboration. Sdedeo (tips) 05:52, 13 January 2007 (UTC)
  • I put the "A key element..." paragraph back in. That was the upshot of a lengthy discussion on the original WP:SCI and contains a key disclaimer about the validation criteria we apply, which are significantly different from those of scientific publications. ~ trialsanderrors 01:24, 14 January 2007 (UTC)
  • As I mentioned before, the following statement is factually incorrect:
"An article in a reputable peer reviewed journal and a refuting article in the same or a similar journal are all that are needed. Yet if those two articles are the extent of the coverage of this topic, then it is not having an impact either on the research field to which it relates or in the public at large. A Wikipedia article written on such a topic is therefore acting to introduce it to the world, something that is in violation of the spirit of the WP:NOR policy, but not its letter."
  • A Wikipedia article does NOT introduce to the world, a topic that has already been introduced in a previous published article. WP:NOR makes this clear in the very first sentence. To suggest otherwise is factually incorrect. --Iantresman 22:12, 13 January 2007 (UTC)
I have to agree with Ian here, actually. Can we find a different way to explain things? Sdedeo (tips) 22:19, 13 January 2007 (UTC). Hmm, well no, actually -- I think the crucial question here is the notion of "novel synthesis." A single peer-reviewed paper can not really serve as the basis of an article without, I think, there being a great deal of "novel synthesis." (Or, on the other hand, having the article simply quote from the paper in question.) Sdedeo (tips) 22:21, 13 January 2007 (UTC)
  • Not quite ready yet, per the next topic of discussion below. Edison 23:08, 13 January 2007 (UTC)
  • That's quite different to Original Research. By definition, original research has not been published before, WP:NOR says so in the first sentence. Now, if people think they're unable to write about an article for which there is but one source, then say so, but don't imply it is original research. --Iantresman 22:46, 13 January 2007 (UTC)
  • Might I suggest a slight rewording. From:
"An article in a reputable peer reviewed journal and a refuting article in the same or a similar journal are all that are needed. Yet if those two articles are the extent of the coverage of this topic, then it is not having an impact either on the research field to which it relates or in the public at large. A Wikipedia article written on such a topic is therefore acting to introducemay in effect be introducing it to the world or creating a new synthesis, something that is in violation of the spirit of the WP:NOR policy, but not its letter." Semperf 22:55, 13 January 2007 (UTC)
  • If there is published material, then Wikipedia is NOT introducing a subject to the world under any circumstances, in effect, or otherwise. --Iantresman 23:20, 13 January 2007 (UTC)
Balderdash. Publishing is a booming industry churning out so much stuff that it's patently ridiculous to claim that Wikipedia isn't introducing a subject as long as it has been published. I think someone needs to prance through the fields of WP:NOT. --ScienceApologist 23:34, 13 January 2007 (UTC)

Ian, I think you have to read more than just the first sentence of NOR. Sdedeo (tips) 23:38, 13 January 2007 (UTC)

  • It seems to me the important point to emphasize is the the standard is reliable sources, not published ones. The point of any debate has hinge on the question of reliability. Semperf 00:16, 14 January 2007 (UTC)
  • The statement that I queried mentioned peer reviewed published material. Which part of WP:NOR hints that a Wiki article on the subject might be Original Research, even if this material is published in peer reviewed sources? --Iantresman 00:30, 14 January 2007 (UTC)
  • What I would like to say about this proposed guideline is that scientific information is very different from, say, historical information, and should be treated very differently. A random person who is clearly not notable should not be treated the same way as obscure scientific concepts or facts might be. As an example of what I am suggesting, consider the AfD on this list of asteroids. The consensus, as of this comment, would seem to be that information such as this is scientifically valuable and should be maintained on Wikipedia, whereas other subjects of similar noteworthiness might be less important to Wikipedia. This is because Wikipedia, as an encyclopedia, has more responsibility to discuss scientific principles, even obscure ones, than random non-notable people or other non-notable subjects. Niffweed17, Destroyer of Chickens 04:21, 12 February 2007 (UTC)
    • This isn't even a case for WP:SCI. Primary source material like this goes on Wikisource unless it's copyrighted, in which case it goes nowhere. There isn't any ambiguity about this other than that an appaling number of Wikipedians don't understand the primitives of Wikipolicy. ~ trialsanderrors 06:46, 12 February 2007 (UTC)

"Conference topic" is a backdoor

It probably was not the intent of the submitter, but the present proposal has the result that if anything, no matter how bizarre, pseudoscientific, and disavowed by mainstream science, is the topic of a conference put on by notable scientists, it is notable enough for an article. So if a crew of quacks and dingbats who have been strayed into pseudoscience after making notable contributions, or who have established notability in one area and then have put forward absurd pseudoscientific or tinfoil hat conspiracy theories in an area other than their scientific base, or any individuals widely enough castigated and denounced for scientific charlatanry to deserve their own articles, meet and have a conference about ludicrous pseudoscience, that automatically makes the conference topic notable, even if no coverage of it makes the mainstream press or is published in legitimate refereed journals. This would require that they claim the conference subject is within their area, but is is not a great stretch to claim that, say, flying saucers or controlled demolition theories related to 9/11/2001 are part of physics, or that homeopathic remedies are part of chemistry, or that mystic crystal meditation is part of psychology or crystallography. That provision needs to be deleted or modified to prevent such a travesty, because it would make something inherently non-notable, notable by definition. How much dreck would qualify under this provision is 2 or 3 scientists had a conference in a conference room at a hotel and presented papers about it?Edison 21:44, 13 January 2007 (UTC)

Hey Edison -- can you be bold and suggest a different formulation? For example, I think the anthropic principle, while not the subject of many papers, is something WP should cover in part because of the great number of conferences held on the theme. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Sdedeo ([[User 2007 (UTC)

talk:Sdedeo|talk]] • contribs) 23:40, 13 January 2007 (UTC).

  • Might I suggest that the formulation "multiple, independent" sources (or sim.) might be useful: a single conference might be excluded as lacking a degree of independence. Semperf 00:04, 14 January 2007 (UTC)
  • I'm not a fan of that criterion, but can you actually get a crackpot theory up to a level of organizing a conference around it without it getting public attention? Again, we include unscientific "dreck" as long as the dreck passes the common threshold of notability. ~ trialsanderrors 01:28, 14 January 2007 (UTC)
  • It seems to me that a small-crackpot conference could be characterized as neither sufficiently "multiple" nor sufficiently "independent", since by definition the organizer(s) are creating the theme and assigning the topics. Semperf 15:12, 14 January 2007 (UTC)
  • I decided to be BOLD and removed it. I disagree with Trialsanderrors, I don't think organizing a conference implies any kind of notabillity, I've seen small conferences run by very non-notable groups on very non-notable topics. On the other hand, I do feel that the criterion is redundant - if an idea is important enough to have a conference organized around it, than it will fulfill the citation requirement at the very least (people will have to present papers about the topic at the conference) and possibly the institutional support criterion as well. GabrielF 04:27, 14 January 2007 (UTC)
Driving by a Holiday Inn, I saw on their billboard an announcement of a "Conference on Psychic Energy," which, if 2 of the conferees were "notable" would have made the whole conference topis qualified for its own Wikipedia article under the provision GabrielF removed, even if it lacked any other sources than the conference proceedings. Any pathway to notability by having a conference devoted to it would have to be backed up by basically the same requirement of multiple independent reliable sources in addition to the conference having taken place. Any group of frauds can rent a hotel conference room and read papers. Much more should be required to establish notability. Edison 18:03, 15 January 2007 (UTC)
  • I do not agree with this removal. That conference criteria has been carefully and well worded, and may provide a reasonable means to include an article on an up-an-coming theory. As for Edison's example above: There already is an article on psychic energy in Wikipedia, and IMO it also meets the social awareness notablity standard, assuming that anyone would want to judge it as relating to science. So my view is that the conference criteria is indeed a back door, but it is also one that I would like to see abused before it is removed or revised further. --EMS | Talk 23:09, 15 January 2007 (UTC)
Conferences (and the proceedings thereof) ought to be treated like any other source, and evaluated based on:
  • Who pays attention to them? A band of cranks at the Motel 6 in Billings, Montana who present slides to each other, and are thereafter ignored, doesn't demonstrate anything. If the conference proceedings are mentioned in the literature, on the other hand...
  • How selective and well-known is the conference and/or its organizers? An established conference hosted by IEEE or an organization of similar stature; one which is known to be selective in which papers and talks it allows in, is worth a bit more.
A single conference appearance isn't enough to establish encyclopedic notability for a topic; but an appearance in a well-regarded conference is certainly a stone in the road to notability. --EngineerScotty 23:30, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

Here is the rub: "Awards" has been removed as a criterion based on the argument that awards differ in degree and the awards that bestow notability are usually reported in third-party sources. This means the award announcement as a primary source is not considered a sufficient source to bestow notability. I don't see why conferences should not be subject to the same requirement and more so, I think conferences should especially be held to the third-party sourcing requirement since awards tend to be independent of the recipients while conferences are usually connected with the proponents of a particular theory. That doesn't mean awards and conferences can't be part of the criteria but only with caveat that they must be covered by third-party sources. ~ trialsanderrors 02:43, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

Then here is a suggested compromise: Peer-reviewed conference proceedings can be admissible as part of the literature used to establish notability. This should of course be subject to the same conditions as used to determined whether a journal's articles can be an aid to establishing notability in that the publisher should be respected. --EMS | Talk 04:03, 16 January 2007 (UTC)
I have been a participant in scientific conferences. Conferences differ in how well thought of they are, and in how easy it is to get admitted to read a paper. The criteria for presenting are much less stringent than for the better refereed journals. They are not subject to a high degree of editorial refereeing before or after presentation. Papers are often written or extensively revised shortly before conference; someone is working on a topic and expects to have results in time for the conference, but applies to present a paper even before all the results are in. The refereeing is basically who wants to read a paper and what is the title, in some cases. Then conferences have different degrees of stringency for presentation, from papers read at sessions down to "poster sessions" which are pretty much a gimme. I don't see how we can apply a criterion of refereed to conference proceedings, except to exclude those which we somehow determine to be held in low regard in their field, or conferences in fields which are held in low regard. Edison 15:47, 16 January
First of all, I am having a hard time seeing how a reasonable conference provision can be abused. Such a thing needs to be organized, advertised, etc. If the proceedings are being taken on by a reasonable publisher, then you have a good record of presentations which can be cited and with usable citations. Given that we are not permitting self-references for the same researcher or within a small group of researchers, I fail to see that harm and do see some benefit.
Let me put it to you this way: I do my own original research. Just see my hoe page. Now be advised that I do not want to see anything like what I am working on appear in Wikipedia prematurely. However, we should not be so hide-bound that nothing can get in that is not bona-fide mainstream physics. It is one thing to toss out my theory as I am the only person who subscribes to it, and probably noone else considers it to be serious possibility at this time. However, it is another thing to toss out something that has come to gain attention and consideration, even if it is only by a minority in the field. A conference may be the way that some topic gains notoriety in the field, and the issue is how to ascertain that noteriety has been achieved when it happens.
Let me also point something else out: Doing a conference means that my ideas are described, and provides something that can be cited. However, under these guidelines the citations must come from other articles, and those articlse should come from respected journals and from events other than that conference. I will admit that there is a lot of junk that gets presented at conferences, but there also are some seminal articles that came out of conferences too. In that way, conferences and journals are similar, and paert of our goal is to keep out of consideration both journals and conferences that are not respected in the field. --EMS | Talk 17:50, 16 January 2007 (UTC)
With all due respect EMS, I think that your own argument suggests that a specific clause for conferences is redundant. As you say in the first paragraph, a conference needs to be organized and promoted by somebody, if conference on a topic is organized by a "major scientific institution", than the topic will be notable under the Institutional support criterion. If the proceedings of the conference are published, than the topic will be notable under the Widely cited criterion. I don't see a reason why we can't include conferences as one of the specific types of evidence that would establish institutional support, but I don't see the need for a separate criterion. Perhaps you can help us understand why we need this by offering an example of a notable scientific theory that has been the subject of a conference, but has not received any institutional support and has not been cited by multiple publications.GabrielF 18:28, 16 January 2007 (UTC)
Wait a minute, most conferences are not on a subject, but annual meeting of... I've been on program committees for such, and if there isnt enough good stuff we take the non-notable. Ditto for at least one journal I've edited. If its notable enough for one, its either spectacularly notable, or needs some more support. People in the field know the quality. . The point of more specific guidelines is to let those not in the field use their innate good judgment. DGG 23:54, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
IMO, we are converging. My concern is that at times conferences prove to be watershed events where important findings are announced. Hermann Minkowski's famous speech on "Space and Time" in 1908 in which he proved the self-consistency of special relativity was presented to a conference instead of being printed in a journal. The recent discoveries by Michael E. Brown of several trans-Neptunian objects including Eris was originally intended to be announced at an astronomical conference before the incident that forced him to annouce the discoveries early. Indeed, the goings on a conferences are significant news items in the scientific community because of the regularity with which discoveries great and small are announced there.
My suggestion at this point is to deal with the issue of what makes a source acceptable for being part of a bibliography which established notability. The current guidelines go into means of finding these sources, but not the more mundane issue of how to judge then once obtained. There are three types of sources in this regard: Articles, books, and conferences. They all act together to form the body of knowledge from which we seek to extact and document the notable items. As such, they all can contribute to establishing the notability of a subject, and by being widely cited by other sources their own relevance to an issue is established. I will admit that a lot of junk can be found in books and conferences, but this also applies to peer-reviewed journals too. There really are a lot of failures which surround the successes in any field. It is through the citation tree as a whole that one separates the wheat from the chaff. --EMS | Talk 03:57, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

Historical interest?

Historical interest. It has historically met any of the above criteria within the scientific community or the culture at large but has since either been superseded, disregarded, or dismissed by the scientific community or the culture at large. The article should make note of the subject's status in this regard.

Two things: First, should we numerate the criteria in order, 1-7, or keep them separate by "scientific" and "popular" notability? And second, shouldn't Historical interest be among the scientific criteria? I doubt many of the superseded theories that made it into Kuhn's Structure of Scientific Revolutions have become popular, much less those that are historical touchpoints only in their respective fields. ~ trialsanderrors 07:14, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

Immanuel Velikovsky is notable mostly for historical interest. I wouldn't call him "scientific" exactly. Historicity is broader than science. --ScienceApologist 07:37, 14 January 2007 (UTC)
That doesn't seem to fall under that criterion. My reading is that the criterion matches the intro line at Superseded scientific theories: "A superseded, or obsolete, scientific theory is a scientific theory that was once commonly accepted but (for whatever reason) is no longer considered the most complete description of reality by mainstream science; or a falsifiable theory which has been shown to be false." ~ trialsanderrors 07:55, 14 January 2007 (UTC)
Well, I'm guilty of moving the bar. I think it qualifies now. --ScienceApologist 08:04, 14 January 2007 (UTC)


Sci terms #3

A compelling reason to use the term rather than more common or popular synonyms (eschewing jargon and neologisms)

I think it there was a reason to add this mentioned somewhere above, but the way it sounds it reads like an issue for a page move discussion rather than a notability guideline. ~ trialsanderrors 08:09, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

Say one group of editors wants to use term X to refer to an idea and another group wants to use term Y. How do you determine which term to use? I think this item is the determinator. --ScienceApologist 13:49, 9 January 2007 (UTC)
Don't we defer to reliable sources? Unless you can provide an example of where this may not help? --Iantresman 16:34, 9 January 2007 (UTC)
What does this have to do with a notability criterion? That's an issue for the WP:MoS. ~ trialsanderrors 10:51, 10 January 2007 (UTC)
I added Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Functionality creep to the test cases. ~ trialsanderrors 10:57, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

Bumping this down because I don't think it has been answered yet. ~ trialsanderrors 19:58, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

I think the FC AfD is helpful here -- we need a guideline for when a phrase or term is notable enough to have an entry? I don't quite see what the problem is. Sdedeo (tips) 00:14, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

The guideline (actually a policy) is here: Wikipedia:Naming conventions. There is no reason for us to duplicate or contradict that policy. This is simply outside our scope. ~ trialsanderrors 01:28, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

I see nothing in the naming conventions page that deals with the issues we raise here. Can you point me to where it does, I might have missed it... Sdedeo (tips) 05:48, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

Generally, article naming should give priority to what the majority of English speakers would most easily recognize, with a reasonable minimum of ambiguity, while at the same time making linking to those articles easy and second nature. — Simply put, if there is one term with questionable currency, it falls into our domain. If there are multiple terms with varying degrees of currency, it falls into the domain of WP:NAME. ~ trialsanderrors 07:15, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

So I think we still need to discuss the question of neologisms and so forth, and I think you agree. Do you want to twiddle the text? Sdedeo (tips) 16:10, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

I very much doubt we can say more than the #1 and #2 criteria do, with the caveat expressed about similar terms in different fields and multiple terms in young fields, and send the editors to WP:NAME in case there is a dispute over which term to use. Discussion about definitions, like we just had at Talk: Discoordination game#Some definitions, should mostly be left to the editors to decide on article talk pages. ~ trialsanderrors 00:09, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

Misunderstanding [2]

I've mentioned this in the section "Misunderstanding" (above) and in "This is not a vote" in the sub-section "And who doesn't?". The article writes:

"An article in a reputable peer reviewed journal and a refuting article in the same or a similar journal are all that are needed. Yet if those two articles are the extent of the coverage of this topic, then it is not having an impact either on the research field to which it relates or in the public at large. A Wikipedia article written on such a topic is therefore acting to introduce it to the world, something this is in violation of the spirit of the WP:NOR policy, but not its letter."

However this is described, it is false, misleading and incorrect. Wikipedia does NOT introduce to the world, in spirit, implied or otherwise, material that has ALREADY been published in peer review. This is made crystal clear in the very first sentence of WP:NOR: "Original research (OR) is a term used in Wikipedia to refer to material that has not been published by a reliable source." --Iantresman 23:27, 19 January 2007 (UTC)

Propose an alternative. As per the discussion that followed just because something isn't OR it doesn't mean that it passes WP:NPOV#Undue weight. I'm actually less happy with the passage "NOR is able to keep at bay the worst of the possible abuses of Wikipedia with respect to the sciences." That strikes me as quite a bit outside of WP:AGF. ~ trialsanderrors 01:17, 20 January 2007 (UTC)
I agree, a subject based on just a couple of peer reviewed papers may indeed fail the notability test. But lets fail it for the right reason, not for something that is demonstrably false. --Iantresman 07:56, 20 January 2007 (UTC)
You get no opposition from me, I commented above that I don't like the history lesson. I'm just asking for an alternative to replace this. ~ trialsanderrors 08:04, 20 January 2007 (UTC)
  • If it's a factually incorrect statement, the best thing to do is remove it. --Iantresman 23:28, 20 January 2007 (UTC)

(reset indent) I don't see that statement as being all that incorrect, but do see that point of this guideline as a notability test as having been missed in hindsight. My advice is to remove the last paragraph and rework the third one to explcitly bring out the notability aspect. I would do that myself, but I don't yet see that full form of the revised lead. --EMS | Talk 23:37, 20 January 2007 (UTC)


  • WP:NOR says: "Original research (OR) is a term used in Wikipedia to refer to material that has not been published by a reliable source." (my emphasis)
  • So if a peer-reviewed paper has already appeared, it can't be original research by definition, and Wikipedia is not introducing the article to the world, nor is it acting to, nor is against the spirit.
  • Consequently the statement is utterly incorrect. It should be removed. --Iantresman 00:03, 21 January 2007 (UTC)
I'm going to hang onto it for now until we figure out how to amend what is there to deal with the legitimate concerns of yourseld and Trialsanderrors. I do see material that is buried in a journal and not being responded to as being "introduced to the world" by using Wikipedia to present it. However, the real issue is that it is non-notable and we do not want Wikipedia being used as a means of making it notable (or attempting to). Note what I wrote in that text: It is a violation of the spirit of WP:NOR but not its words. That much I will stand by, but you two have made the case that my words do not come out right.
The bottom line is that the simple removal of that fourth paragraph will not do, but a replacement for it is needed. --EMS | Talk 02:12, 21 January 2007 (UTC)

"introduce to the world"

I'm coming late to the discussion, but it seems to me that the concerns raised about this paragraph are important. I'm not sure why the argument of failing the spirit of WP:NOR is the approach taken here here--surely there are all kinds of things that are not original research that nonetheless fail notability standards and we can state this more baldly, rather than the round-about argument that this effectively introduces x to the world. I suggest replacing paragraph four with something like this:

Although meeting both WP:NOR and WP:V is a necessary condition for inclusion within wikipedia, it is not by itself a sufficient condition. Sources must be judged for their quality as well as their quantity. This guideline is written in order to elaborate and make explicit the parameters on which they should be judged. Semperf 04:43, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
  • Actually it is. Someone asked Jimbo:
"I'm wondering if the proper crieria for inclusion/exclusion is the fact that any theory, beit mainstream, minority or other, is whether or not it is available in print."
  • Jimbo repllied:
"I think that's a very valid way to look at it, yes, absolutely. And this helps to tie the policy here in with parallel policies in other areas, i.e. 'verifiability' has long been accepted as a decision rule. [1]
  • Notability is a guideline which "ensures that there exists enough source material to write a verifiable, encyclopedic article about the topic."
  • So the "introduce to the world" paragraph is false, it fails any criteria of "quality", misunderstands WP:NOR and WP:NOTABLE.
  • And people want the paragraph to remain? What a great advertisement for scientific accuracy, comprehension and good prose. --Iantresman 10:38, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
I'm of the opinion that Jimbo Wales did not have enough information to fully consider the implications of this point at the time he said this (September 2003). The real question is, does he have a problem with what Ian thinks he has a problem. I submit that he's likely to defer to consensus since that's what he seems to appreciate the most anyway. --ScienceApologist 12:47, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
  • You're entitled to your opinion, but until Jimbo defers, "editors working toward consensus are pursuing a consensus that is consistent with Wikipedia's basic policies and principles"[2]
  • The statement is false. Period. It should be removed. --Iantresman 13:42, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
Actually, that's not quite how things work here at Wikipedia, Ian, which you should know since you've been here for quite a long while. Since the editors here are acting in good faith, it is to be assumed that we are all trying to pursue consensus that is consistent with Wikipedia's basic policies and procedures. The statement isn't "false" at all; at worst it is a misinterpretation. --ScienceApologist 14:15, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
  • It is false by definition. WP:NOR tells us that "Original research (OR) is a term used in Wikipedia to refer to material that has not been published by a reliable source"
  • The paragraph in questions says "An article in a reputable peer reviewed journal [..] is therefore acting to introduce it to the world, something that is in violation of the spirit of the WP:NOR policy"
  • These statements are mutually exclusive. One of the them in false. Since WP:NOR is policy, then the statement in the proposed new guidelines if false.
  • I'm not suggesting any impropriety, nor lack of good faith. But the statement is false. --Iantresman 16:04, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
I don't think it is false at all. We're going to have to agree to disagree on this one. --ScienceApologist 18:42, 22 January 2007 (UTC)

OK. But the approach that I'm sugggesting does not include "introduce-to-the-world". I'm suggesting replacing the paragraph with this:

Although meeting both WP:NOR and WP:V is a necessary condition for inclusion within wikipedia, it is not by itself a sufficient condition. Sources must be judged for their quality as well as their quantity. This guideline is written in order to elaborate and make explicit the parameters on which they should be judged.

reactions? Semperf 14:09, 22 January 2007 (UTC)

Which paragraph? There are two that use the phrase, and I don't see this paragraph as being a replacement for either one. --ScienceApologist 14:15, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
  • Sorry, I was unclear. To start again, I think the concluding paragraph from the lead (which now starts "as the encyclopedia matures") takes the wrong tack in raising a hypothetical article with only a single primary and a single secondary source, and suggesting that this effectively "introduces to the world". It seems to me that this passes over what is the more fundamental problem, that notability requires more than WP:NOR and WP:V and I think this guideline would do better by concentrating on that point here rather than a hypothetical article and the vague notion of "introduce to the world". Semperf 14:34, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
You are on the right track here, although I think that the focus of the revised paragraph should be on the issue of notability and what that in general means. At the least, if you use the word "quality" you need to provide some definition of what you mean.
I also will warn you about Ian Tresman, who is fascinated by a trivial non-mainstream theory called the "Electric Universe". He has had the articles on that theory and the theory's adherents removed through AfD, and this proposed guideline was a factor in that occurance. So Ian very much wants this guideline to be highly inclusive instead of being as restrictive as it current is. This is not the say the Ian is lacking in good faith or that his comments are not useful, but it is to say that Ian's comments need to be looked at in the context of where he is coming from. --EMS | Talk 15:32, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
  • I think that could be interpreted as an ad hominem; editors should criticize the edits, or the content, and not the person. To suggest a warning could imply something negative about an individual. --Iantresman 16:26, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
as I understand that paragraph, it is arguing that this is NOT enough and that WP should NOT introduce to the world. Are you perhaps saying that the text could be used at present the opposite way, since it say 1+1- meets the current standard? DGG 15:58, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
  • Yes, I think the paragraph is trying to say that, in direct contradiction of Jimmy Wales (see his quote above). --Iantresman 16:18, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
I think that the gist is fine, but those words are creating some odd issues that need to be addressed. Perhaps a way of putting this is to say that Wikipedia should be reflecting the status of an idea. If it is trivial (or little known), then Wikipedia shold not be presenting an article on it as if it is of some significance. Often articles on trivial topics relating to the sciences are placed here to generate interest in and notice of an idea that would not otherwise rate said interest. That is a violation of WP:NPOV#Undue_weight and an abuse of Wikipedia.
BTW - As for the words "introduced to the world": Someone enters the world when they are born, but usually is otherwise unknown to the world. If they should become the topic of a major news story (like say "Young singer now has a top 10 hit"), then they get introduced to a wider audience if not the world. Similarly, being published places a topic into the journalistic record for physics, but most scientists will read the article and shrug. However, if a prominent scientist should endorse the idea or choose to comment on it due to how often he hears about, or a news story is written on the idea, then in such cases it gains notoriety and by one of those events becomes "introduced to the world".
At this point my request is to stop trying to twist words. Let's get back to the issue of what we are trying to say and the best way to say it. --EMS | Talk 16:31, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
  • There is no requirement for an article to attain a certain "status" or "significance". But if there are sources describing the "status" or "significance" of an idea, then we describe it according to WP:RS and WP:NPOV.
  • Trivial topics are described on Wikipedia because they reflect such topics in the real world. WP:NPOV#Undue_weight tells us that "None of this is to say that tiny-minority views cannot receive as much attention as we can give them on pages specifically devoted to them." which is wholly consistent with Undue weight, and not a violation.
  • A peer reviewed paper has already been introduced to the world, whether people choose to take notice or not; subsequent publicity may make the subject known to others. Every reader who learns something new from Wikipedia is being introduced that idea, which seems to me to be the object of an encyclopedia. --Iantresman 17:10, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
  • Wikipedia "introduces to the world" any subject which has not already been published; that is the definition of WP:NOR. It means that I can not publish my own pet theory on Wikipedia.
  • I think the text is trying to say that for a subject on which there is just one peer reviewed paper, that is not necessarily sufficient criteria by itself, for inclusion on Wikipedia. My contention is that the paragraph gives the wrong reason (ie. WP:NOR) which a peer reviewed article fulfills.
  • Indeed, a single peer reviewed article fulfills WP:RS (by definition), and consequently WP:NOR is automatically invalid. A subject the fulfills WP:RS also automatically fulfills WP:NOTABLE which is solely to do with "non-trivial published works", and has nothing to do with "importance" (as described in WP:NOTABLE). --Iantresman 16:17, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
IMO, both sides are bringing up valid points here. On the one hand, I don't see why publications on a theory have to be especially extensive in order to write an article on it that (1) puts it in proper context, (2) is verifiable, and (3) is written from a neutral point of view. If we can always do those three things, I honestly don't see a problem with covering such a topic. The idea of a barely-published theory being written up in Wikipedia does not alone to me say that WP:NOT a soapbox is being violated, but chances are, that problem will be coming up and is the real source of concern. The problem in such circumstances is user behavior, not that the article topic is inappropriate per se. Mangojuicetalk 16:51, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
  • Thanks for that. (My, this page sure fills up quickly.) I am still unconvinced that the "introduce-to-the-world" argument is way to get where you want to go. Just to toss out a another idea: WP:RS is reliable and sources, which implies judgements about both quality and quantity. It strikes me that the potential problem with the two-article scenario mentioned is not so much that it violates WP:NOR (which it could--and, yes, Ian, I understand your point and you don't need to make it yet again), but that it makes WP:NPOV impossible to achieve, since by definition one secondary article means one POV. And here is the real problem with many pseudoscientific items is that usually only the believers think it worthy of discussion--"real" scientists have better things to do with their time than to explain how we know that the earth is not flat or the universe propane-powered. Semperf 17:46, 22 January 2007 (UTC)

"Introduce to the world" is a catch-phrase that can be worded but the sentiment is reasonable. Wikipedia is not supposed to be a place where novel ideas are presented for the express purpose of presenting a novel idea. It is important that the idea be notable for another reason other than the fact that it is novel, obscure, or unknown. I will try to reword the two sentences that use this phrase to be less vague. --ScienceApologist 18:42, 22 January 2007 (UTC)

  • There is nothing in Wikipedia which suggests that a subject needs to be notable in the sense that it is interesting, or significant, or important. And there is nothing against "novel" ideas... history is full of them. --Iantresman 18:54, 22 January 2007 (UTC)--Iantresman 18:54, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
  • If a Wikipedia article is for "the express purpose of presenting a novel idea.", then it comes under WP:NOR and is prohibited.
  • Either way, there is nothing which suggests that an idea for which there is but one peer reviewed source, is problematic. --Iantresman 18:54, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
I certainly encourage the replacement of my "introduce to the world" phrase. I wrote that to get a certain point across and it is now obvious that much better can be done in that regard. About the only warning that I can give Semperf or anyone else interested in creating a suitable replacement is to be careful in setting up the wording: Some pseudoscience is quite notable (such as flat Earth theories). I am looking for a wording that reflects what the criteria given in the proposal are getting at: That a topic that lacks attention in the field, attention in the media, or any other form of cultural awareness is not an appropriate topic for Wikipedia. --EMS | Talk 18:46, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
  • The amount of attention that a topic has received is immaterial. If it has received a lot, we say so; otherwise we don't. The more specialized a field, the less attention it receives outside of that field. It seems that "attention" has nothing to do with "notability" as described by WP:NOTABLE --Iantresman 18:54, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
  • The issue more is that some editors (present company excluded of course) use obscurity as a rationale for writing about the topic (we had a recent disagreement over at WP:PHYSICS regarding someone who wanted to talk about how the Stirling Approximation is obscurely related to the Planck blackbody equation and used obscurity as a primary means to justify his advocacy). This is unacceptable. Indeed, the obscurity of the topic is immaterial -- as long as it satisfies one of the notability criteria it can be included. --ScienceApologist 19:00, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
You know, SA -- your clarification definitely helped clarify your view, and it also clarifies this whole proposal for me, enough that it's clear I don't support it. The key is that theories, discoveries, and so on, not only have to be presented neutrally and verifiably, but also put into their proper context. And it seems to me that the idea that more fringy theories should simply not be written about robs the encyclopedia of lots of potentially interesting and balanced articles. What's more, this doesn't only affect fringe theories or findings, it also affects new results in the mainstream -- and not only brand new results, but also ones that haven't been established for long enough to build up a lot of citations. Mangojuicetalk 19:16, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
There is nothing in either this pNG or in the policies that peer-reviewed but recent and unvetted findings cannot be mentioned in Wikipedia. The simple protocol is to include them within their respective context, in the article on the phenomenon they describe. ~ trialsanderrors 20:23, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
It seems to me that what you, Mangojuice, may object to is notability in and of itself as a guideline in Wikipedia at all! You may actually not be upset with this particular science guideline, per se, but rather with the whole idealization of notability. Notability may rob the encyclopedia of articles on interesting persons, music, etc. but that's sort of beside the point. No one said (to my knowledge) that we were supposed to have an encyclopedia that had every interesting article possible. Inclusionist/deletionist rears its ugly head again. I suggest you ascend a level and discuss your objections at Wikipedia:Notability rather than here which is iteratively removed from the notability philosophy. To wit, new discoveries that are of import attain notability almost immediately by being discussed by a wide range of sources (take the Bullet cluster observation for example). New discoveries of less import probably don't belong here in part due to their obscurity, but mostly due to issues regarding verifiability. New theories that haven't been established long enough absolutely shouldn't be covered at Wikipedia because including such ideas goes above and beyond the purpose of an encyclopedia. --ScienceApologist 20:26, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
I recognize that without guidelines on people or bands, Wikipedia would easily become an indiscriminate collection of information. However, no such urgency exists when it comes to scientific theories we can otherwise write articles on. No, my problem lies squarely with this proposal, not WP:N, which, if you read the current version, is basically restating that WP:V/WP:RS are required barriers for any topic. It's redundant, IMO, and I don't like using the word "notability" interchangeably with "verifiability" because the words do not have at all similar meanings. If the goal of this proposal is to restate that basic point in terms of Scientific theories, then fine, I have my stated problem with the term "notability" but this is really no different. But if the goal is to actually put any further barriers in the way of inclusion of scientific topics, then I totally reject that. There is no such thing as a topic in science we shouldn't have, if we can write about it while meeting WP:V, WP:RS, and WP:NPOV. I think your recent edit clarifies that this is really what this proposal is all about. Mangojuicetalk 21:59, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
I'm not sure what you are meaning by "further barriers" here. Let's take, for example, a hypothetical obscure alternative to inflation that is explicated in a Physics Review D article and then a short response letter appears six months later pointing out a paradox in the theory. If there are no other references to this idea, the consensus of most editors here was that such a subject was not notable enough to be encyclopedic. We've listed a generous portion of criteria to allow subjects to be notable, but there do exist subjects which conform to the letter of NOR/V but seem to defy what editors here consider notability. We were charged with developing notability guidelines. If you think there are other criteria we should consider, then please do help us develop them. However, I would hope that you would justify your inclinations from more than a bare inclusionist bent. It really does seem to me that you are objecting to notability in-and-of-itself. You think that indiscriminate collections of information can only occur for subjects related to people and bands. Others are saying that science also applies. Notability should, in principle, be applicable to every subject here at Wikipedia. If you have a problem with that, then you have a problem with WP:N. --ScienceApologist 03:31, 23 January 2007 (UTC)
Exactly what is a "theory that we can write articles on"? I have seen a number of attempts to place articles here that are nothing more than a copy-and-paste from a web site, and on which nothing can be said based on reliable sources. The simple fact of the matter is that most unpublished and/or unreferenced works are that way for a reason, and often the creator does not want to acknowledge those reasons. I agree with you that this guideline should not place any unnecessary barriers to inclusion and most certainly should not require than any included material be "mainstream". However, there must be some test for notability if this encyclopedia is to stay a project that is relevant to others. BTW - One thing that this guideline will do is to standardize the notability tests. Also do note that I have worked to have it worded that this guideline can only provide a reason for inclusion, but cannot provide a reason for exclusion. (The exclusion would come if there is no other basis that this guideline on which to decide if the article is acceptable.) --EMS | Talk 22:41, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
  • There is a test for notability, it is described clearly at WP:NOTABLE: "non-trivial published works from sources that are reliable", in other words (a) a peer reviewed source (b) multiple published sources. --Iantresman 23:34, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
  • I've never heard of the "Stirling's approximation", but if someone has published something on is relationship to the "Planck blackbody equation", then as long as it satisfies WP:V with WP:RS, and conforms to WP:NPOV, then that's fine by me.
  • No editor is here to judge a theory (new or otherwise), nor decide its significance, nor it's notability, nor whether it's right or wrong. Editors are here to describe a published theory so that it conforms to NPOV. It's that simple. And if subsequent papers note that it's garbage, insignificant, wrong, or pie in the sky, I want to read those comments too. --Iantresman 21:45, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
Well, not quite every published theory. Sometimes a single article in a minor journal is definitely enough, as it was for cold fusion, but this was then accompanied by major press releases, and it was the press coverage when ensured that it was immediately notable. Anomalous water was another one, but the article was a cover article in Nature, and was soon followed by widespread attention. The new theory has to be noticed. About half of all published papers in Web of Science are cited once or never. For almost all theories ones in question here, they generally do have public attention from the newspapers--or at least from some newspapers, and I think we can safely go by that for non-standard science: if either the scientists or the public notice it substantially, then it is notable.--which is just the general N criterion. DGG 21:59, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
  • According to WP:NOTABLE, notability has nothing to do with media attention. And anyway, if an article on a subject has not received much attention, then very few people will read it; on the other hand if some people read such an article, then it is obviously notable to them, and the article has served its purpose, and the encyclopedia has done its job. --Iantresman 22:22, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
According to WP:N, notability is not determined by media attention. Media attention can confer notability on a subject though. --ScienceApologist 03:31, 23 January 2007 (UTC)

Arbitrary section break

Iantresman: Editors are here to describe a published theory so that it conforms to NPOV. — Exactly. And to cite the closing argument of one of the original cases that gave me the impetus to create this pNG:

The argument that this should be kept because it doesn't fit in the main article is somewhat redundant, if it is POV there then it is POV here. There don't seem to be enough sources to warrant a separate article from the parent, and with the quotations removed from the article, it would be best presented in the main article, giving the information the due weight it deserves. Information which would unbalance a main article by giving it undue weight is considered a POV fork when split out.

The article itself was a lenghty and detailed discussion of one scientific journal article, in a journal of marginal impact and no connection to a reputable scientific publisher, plus one extremely sketchy survey. The POV intention in this case was given in the title ("health benefits" instead of "health effects"), but it's not always that easy to detect POV or COI problems. The closure (which was upheld on review) very much reflects the community interpretation of WP:NPOV and WP:NPOV#Undue weight which has been confirmed over and over again at AfD: If an article is published in a reputable journal, it is qualified per WP:RS to be mentioned as an authority in the relevant article (here Falun Gong), but it is not inherently "article-worthy", especially if promoting a single source to an article unbalances our core NPOV policy. I don't know if your comment about that this is really what this proposal is all about is aimed at the group here at large, Mango, but I certainly reject that for myself. ~ trialsanderrors 22:31, 22 January 2007 (UTC)

  • It seems that it is already covered in the main article in the section "Research into health benefits", so the subject has not been entirely deleted.
  • I see from the AfD that this appears to be a collection of source material. I can see little difference to a page of "Lists" or "Categories", and I don't see why the page could not have supplemented the main article, as long as it was balanced with available article "for" and "against". Such a list of sources would have been very notable to anyone wanting to do more research. --Iantresman 23:48, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
There was no "list". The "list" of published research items on FG health effects contains one entry: The Li-Johnson-Li article. As such it is a perfectly valid authority to be cited in the main Falun Gong article. Once it is turned into a self-contained article it undergoes a fundamental transformation: from authority to subject. As soon as it's subject of an article it has to pass the fundamental WP:NPOV#Undue weight threshold, namely show that it reflects a viewpoint of more than a tiny minority. That's the threshold it failed. ~ trialsanderrors 00:06, 23 January 2007 (UTC)

WP:RS and scholarship

I just wanted to draw the attention to the pertinent bullet points in WP:RS (emphasis added):

Wikipedia relies heavily upon the established literature created by scientists, scholars and researchers around the world. Items that fit this criterion can always be considered reliable. However they may be outdated by more recent research, or controversial in the sense there are alternative scholarly explanations. Wikipedia articles should point to all major scholarly interpretations of a topic.
  • The material has been thoroughly vetted by the scholarly community. This means published in peer-reviewed sources, and reviewed and judged acceptable scholarship by the academic journals.
  • Items that are recommended in scholarly bibliographies are preferred.
  • Items that are signed are more reliable than unsigned articles because it tells whether an expert wrote it and took responsibility for it.

I emphasized the "and" qualifier in the first bullet point because it goes beyond mere peer review as criterion for reliability. It means that the contribution has to be accepted outside the original source. ~ trialsanderrors 05:40, 23 January 2007 (UTC)

  • Reliability refers to the reliability of the published source (ie. that it is reliably attributable), not that the theory itself is reliable.
  • A paper that has gone through peer review, has already been judged acceptable scholarship for publication, though it in no way implies that the content of the paper is correct, nor that other academics will find it significant or important. --Iantresman 09:38, 23 January 2007 (UTC)
  • I think you're a bit naive about the peer review process. Publication in a peer reviewed journal might imply acceptable scholarship in the competitive journals, but the majority of journals are not exactly competitive, so the additional qualifier here (wrt academic journals – note plural) makes a lot of sense. And of course publication does not imply correctness, I think we're beyond that discussion. ~ trialsanderrors 09:59, 23 January 2007 (UTC)

NPOV: draft version

I drafted a revised version of the contested paragraph based on the discussion above. I think it's clear that the NOR claim was unsupportable and should be removed, so the new version uses NPOV as starting point. There are now duplicate mentions of the relevant policies and guidelines, but I didn't want to take them out before we have a discussion here on whether this is an improvement. ~ trialsanderrors 07:23, 23 January 2007 (UTC)

  • A good start, but I feel the following statement misunderstand NPOV and is false:
"Research published in reputable publications passes these thresholds but reflects the point of view of one researcher or research term and, unless it generates an outside response by the scientific community or the population at large, fails NPOV,"
  • Describing a single point of view neutrally, fulfills NPOV; the only requirement to describe multiple, or counter-POVs is if they are available in reliable sources. If multiple or counter POVs are not available, then giving the impression that they exist is misleading, and fails WP:V and Undue weight.
  • For example, the article on Dark matter included in the section "Observational evidence" information on "results published in August 2006,". This description appeared in the article in August 2006,[3] with the extraordinary claim that "dark matter has been observed separate from ordinary matter".
  • This information (a) had no critical reviews (b) This statement "dark matter has been observed separate from ordinary matter" is written as if it were fact, which is misleading and fails WP:NPOV: "assert facts, including facts about opinions — but do not assert opinions themselves"[4]
  • However, it does seem that all those interested in the article are content that this single POV has been described neutrally. --Iantresman 09:59, 23 January 2007 (UTC)
    That edit is ,more of less what I was looking for. I think it may still need work but it goes in the right direction.
    To Ian: The full dark matter quote is
    According to results published in August 2006, dark matter has been observed separate from ordinary matter ... .
    I agree that an unqualified statement that "dark metter has been observed" would fail NPOV, but that is not what was written there. The "[a]ccording to results ..." cluse makes the full sentense an uncontestable statement of fact, with the fact being that the observations has been claimed rather than that it is. --EMS | Talk 15:33, 23 January 2007 (UTC)
  • Exactly, it is a single POV reported neutrally, with no other critical POVs. In other words, addition POVs are not required in order to make a POV neutral. So a single peer reviewed paper (perhaps on Dark Matter), can be described neutrally. Likewise a single POV on a fringe theory can also be described neutrally. --Iantresman 15:41, 23 January 2007 (UTC)
    That line is not a POV. Instead it is a notable news item which has been covered by numerous secondary sources in both the scientific news sites and the general media. Note that it is the reporting that has made it notable, in accord with this proposed guideline. I see no such set of independent secondary sources for the "electric universe" concept. That is the difference, and it is a major one. --EMS | Talk 20:13, 23 January 2007 (UTC)
    Saying "DM has been discovered" is a POV, since it might arguably be controversial that what has been discovered is actually DM. Saying "BBC reports that DM has been discovered" might be a fact per WP:NPOV, if the existence and content of the BBC report is not contested. If it is, this can continue until the BBC article is quoted directly: "BBC reports that '[w]ith the aid of 7,000 separate measurements, the researchers have been able to establish that the galaxies contain about 400 times the amount of dark matter as they do normal matter.'". How far you have to push this depends mostly on who edits the article. But Ian conflates sources and articles again. The inclusion of sources in an article is governed by WP:RS, not by WP:N or WP:NPOV. ~ trialsanderrors 21:16, 23 January 2007 (UTC)
  • Actually it is not the BBC that "reports", it is the BBC that notes that certain researchers have reported, and that they "claim" that this suggests that dark matter has been discovered.
  • This turns the POV (that DM has been discovered) into NPOV by noting that some researchers have claimed this.
  • We don't need to describe the counter-POV, that their observations are consistent with dark matter, and does not necessarily mean that dark matter has been discovered, because NPOV statements stand by themselves. --Iantresman 21:33, 23 January 2007 (UTC)
  • That's what Is aid, the cycle can be repeated ad nauseam. Challenge the wording until the factual basis is uncontested. ~ trialsanderrors 22:11, 23 January 2007 (UTC)
  • Yes, the line is a POV of the authors of the original press release, that has been repeated by the newspapers.
  • The Dark matter article is not reporting on the newspaper reports; it is reporting on the original published results, just like the newspapers are doing.
  • Again, you are confusing notability with popularity. All the newspaper reports echo the original press release, which is what makes the report notable, not the newspaper articles.
  • The Electric Universe is based on (a) articles by Wal Thornhill published in a variety of publications, plus (b) articles by Ralph Juergens in a variety if publication, plus (c) a book by Don Scott, plus (d) several conferences, plus (e) several Web site, provide the multiple independent sources for the Electric Universe. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Iantresman (talk • contribs)
  • Last I checked Dark matter is a multiple-sourced article, so no notability issues there. It even looks like Discovery of dark matter could survive as a stand-alone article, due to the number of sources and notability of the event. Re: the rest of Ian's comments: NPOV requires unbiasedness and admits that sources always represent a biased perspective. The way to reconcile these statements was to formulate the original notability criterion, which requires multiple independent sources. This is perfectly congruent with the scope of our core policies and has widespread support. ~ trialsanderrors 19:14, 23 January 2007 (UTC)
  • The Dark matter statement I described above, is based on a single press release which newspapers reported; The newspapers are not multiple independent sources because none of them were attempting to be critical about the press release, they were merely reporting the same POV.
  • The newspaper reports allow us to corroborate the press release, nothing more, and make it a more reliable source, and it is this which defines notability. --Iantresman 21:35, 23 January 2007 (UTC)
  • Quick check tells me that JSTOR has 41 journal articles with the words "dark matter" in the title. And JSTOR doesn't even carry physics journals. So the notability of DM seems out of the question, and the article itself was created way before August 2006, so the supposed empirical discovery of DM is largely irrelevant to the notability of the DM article. Now if someone spun out a Discovery of dark matter article you'd have more of a point if all the media outlets do is paraphrase the original press release, but I have a hunch that coverage, scientific and popular, goes beyond that. But since no one has spun it out yet, this discussion is moot here. ~ trialsanderrors 21:50, 23 January 2007 (UTC)
  • Sorry, I have no problem with dark matter per se. I was querying the statement in the section "Observational evidence" information on "results published in August 2006,". This description appeared in the Wiki article in August 2006,[5] with the extraordinary claim that "dark matter has been observed separate from ordinary matter".
  • At the time, the statement was based on a single press release (probably based on a single peer reviewed source), presumable from a single team of researchers. Newspapers reported this singular POV, and there were no additional peer reviewed papers commenting on this POV.
  • By the arguments mentioned earlier, Wikipedia was "introducing to the world" information from the one press release, just like the newspapers, since the scientific community had not formally commented on this one paper.
  • Yet the statement seems to accepted as notable (despite there being just one source), and it attempts to conform to NPOV. --Iantresman 22:00, 23 January 2007 (UTC)
  • How many times do I have to repeat this: Notability is not about sources in articles, but about subjects of articles. If you want to challenge the inclusion of that source in the DM article, do it at WT:RS. Also, the endless repetition of "X happened to article Y" arguments is the reason why WP:ININ was written. Just because some editors do something somewhere it doesn't make it policy. ~ trialsanderrors 22:11, 23 January 2007 (UTC)
  • No, I wasn't suggesting it was. I was pointing out that the statement in the Dark matter article about an August 2006 report, was based on just one singular press release. The newspapers reported the one source, just as the Wikipedia article on Dark matter did.
  • According to these notability guidelines, this fails NPOV because at the time, it generated no response from the scientific community or the population at large (who all reported it) --Iantresman 23:02, 23 January 2007 (UTC)
While there was only one source mentioned in the article, there are plenty of sources available regarding this observation: [6]. This is all iterative anyway. If Ian has problems with the Dark matter article, he should discuss them at Talk:Dark matter and not here. --ScienceApologist 00:10, 24 January 2007 (UTC)
  • It's not the multiple observations that is the problem, but the singular conclusion that "dark matter has been observed separate from ordinary matter".
  • The problem is in relation to these proposed guidelines on notability. --Iantresman 00:41, 24 January 2007 (UTC)

Scientific journals

Should this guideline also contain a section on scientific journals? And if so, what would be the criteria? ~ trialsanderrors 02:10, 24 January 2007 (UTC)

This will not be easy. (groan). It is obvious that not all peer-reviewed journals are of equal quality, and that there is an approximate hierarchy of journals, measured in some fields very approximately be Impact Factor. But that means very approximate. Publishers informally class the journals they publish into A, B, and C, and though there will be disagreements about any particular title it is usually clear which ones are in which third. But this is self-reinforcing: Peter Principle: the quality of a journal is dependent upon the papers it attracts, and it the papers it gets will depend on the perceived quality (and fashion). And recall that some journals not technically peer reviewed are of the highest quality, such as Physics Today. See Impact factor and bibliometrics and be aware that there is no consensus on anything. I give my view, but others will go mainly by reputation or number of papers published or cited. There are many other factors: the X country journal of ornithology may not be a prestigious place to publish general articles, but it normally will be for the birds of its region.
Current N standards emphasize the use of review journals to judge articles, but this has the problem that all review journals are not equal, and also that some have historically taken the position that their articles should be comprehensive lists of everything in the field.
I would avoid any exact specification, and let the specialists fight it out over individual cases. It will be much clearer in a particular case than as an overall rule. This will otherwise be an unending argument here, as there has been in all sorts of other forums. You will not find agreement on any exact statement. Be warned. DGG 03:59, 24 January 2007 (UTC)
I think that DGG has given us a good piece of advice. I would call for the journal to be "well known and respected", and leave it at that. We need some reasonable guideline here, but there also has to some room for interpretation and flexbility for the occasional odd cases here. --EMS | Talk 05:54, 24 January 2007 (UTC)
I don't think we should dig into impact factors, but longevity, reputable publisher, citation record are simple tangible criteria we can list. Anything intangible like "well known and respected" we don't even need to bother. I'm just surprised that this hasn't been done yet given the seedy underbelly of scientific publishing. ~ trialsanderrors 07:21, 24 January 2007 (UTC)

Recent rv

I've reverted these edits. I think they are not straightforward and need a consensus. For one thing, the change to "but simply a reflection ... community]]" made the language fuzzier and removed "inside/outside" which allows misinterpretation. AvB ÷ talk 10:24, 24 January 2007 (UTC)

  • No problem--it's a wiki after all.
  1. On "inside/outside", this struck me as saying, in effect, "either A or not-A", which is everything and therefore otiose. I don't mind keeping it.
  2. In "is simply a reflection of" is the "simply" helpful? It strikes me that it is not helpful, since considerations of inclusion/exclusion are not "simply" this.
  3. Is NPOV really the main policy here? Or an important one?
Semperf 12:52, 24 January 2007 (UTC)
  1. To me, the advantage of spelling out inside/out is that future wikilawyering types won't be able to bend the guideline to mean only inside (or only outside). But that's just me; let's wait and see how others like it.
  2. You're right about "simply". It's both unhelpful and incorrect - "a reflection of the quality (...) of responses" isn't simple. I think we can replace it with "mainly" which is more to the point. But leaving out "simply" does not solve the problem of the task being anything but simple. It should actually be a rather straightforward process since we do not want to rely too much on the ability of editors to judge the quality of responses. Editors should judge the quality of the sources though, which is the main point of this guideline I guess. Perhaps something along these lines may solve it:

    Inclusion or exclusion is therefore not a judgement on the validity, importance or accuracy of a scientific contribution, but mainly a reflection of the quality of the sources and the quantity of responses it received inside and outside the scientific community.

  3. I think WP:NPOV is the main policy; both WP:NOR and WP:V derive from it. AvB ÷ talk 15:04, 24 January 2007 (UTC)
  1. Yes, I think it is better to keep inside/out.
  2. "Mainly" addresses my concern. Might "largely" be better?
  3. That is a good point, but I wonder whether we shouldn't appeal to the "principle" of npov rather than the policy (the policy being a specific implementation of the principle).
Semperf 18:36, 24 January 2007 (UTC)
Thanks for fine-tuning. On NPOV, I think the agreement is that if a contribution fails WP:V or WP:NOR, there is not much need for this guideline to decide on the validity of an article. WP:NPOV and WP:N contain significant grey areas, in that they call for multiple sources and significant minorities, and leave it open what those terms mean in the context of a particular subject area. This guideline offers some milemarkers on when the sources reach the multiple level and when a viewpoint is shared by a significant minority. ~ trialsanderrors 19:54, 24 January 2007 (UTC)
That about sums it up. I had a different problem with the "principle" edit: it seemed to equate principle and policy (unintentionally, as it turns out).
I like "largely" too. Any thoughts about the "quality of the sources" addition?
I'd like to extend kudos to all participants here. The amount of quality effort apparent in this guideline is impressive. AvB ÷ talk 00:19, 25 January 2007 (UTC)

NPOV2

Hi folks, have just read the latest version and think it is very good. I think focusing on issues of NPOV is excellent, and really hits at the heart of why a single or small number of WP:RSs is problematic when it comes to science. Sdedeo (tips) 00:29, 25 January 2007 (UTC)

One final thought

On reading over the page one last time, it strikes me that once we get to the criteria, we find "at least one of the following criteria", which for 90% of articles is not true. In fact, almost all science articles of any value in wikipedia meet all, or almost all of the criteria that are applicable. I wonder whether it wouldn't be worth saying something like, "in an ideal case, editors should aim at demonstrating as many of these criteria as possible" (or sim.) Semperf 03:02, 25 January 2007 (UTC)

Sounds fine as long as it's clear that "at least one" is OK -- be bold. Sdedeo (tips) 03:07, 25 January 2007 (UTC)
Kindly keep in mind that this guideline is not here to aid in determining that the 99% of the Wikipedia science articles which on obviously notable subjects obviously belong here. Instead it is for dealing with that last 1% or less. One example is Le Sage's theory of gravitation on which I have helped out a bit. That is a theory that never had any widespread support and only limited textbook coverage in the 19th century as best I can tell. However, it was condered and debated quite a bit in the 19th century and advocated as an alternative to Newton's theory of gravity even as far back as the 17th century. It is therefore of definite historical interest but little more. I think that it is an appropriate (if niche) topic for Wikipedia. There really is a need to determine where the line is here, and while I am not an "inclusionist" I do think that Wikipedia should be reasonably broad in terms of what it will accept.
My personal test for whether an article should be included goes like this: "Is it reasonable to expect someone to come to Wikipedia looking for information on this topic? Alternatively, is it reasonable to expect someone who has come to Wikipedia looking for information on a related topic to find this article useful?". What this standard is doing is to help us derermine reliably whether a topic can pass that test. --EMS | Talk 04:06, 25 January 2007 (UTC)

Institutional support?

3. Institutional support. It is or was supported or examined by major scientific institutions, such as by funding, sponsoring seminars, or invited presentations.

Coming back to our criteria, I think the current wording for institutional support offers another backdoor. In my first or second year as grad student I received funding from the Sasakawa Foundation, not because my research had anything to do with them, but because my field advisor has some hookup with them and had to find a way to pay my stipend. So I duly added "Supported by the Sasakawa Foundation" to my papers and still get their pamphlets in the mail every half year. Now from what I can tell the Sasakawa Foundation might qualify as major, but the funding they gave me was certainly minor, and it shouldn't make my second year term papers notable. Comments? ~ trialsanderrors 03:41, 25 January 2007 (UTC)

How about substantial funding to remove all the minorly supported such as yourself (no offense intended)? There are a few subjects I can think of that derive notability purely because they are supported insitutionally, in particular a number of areas of military science are neither widely cited nor "textbook science" but certainly notable enough to be encyclopedic, so I don't think eliminating this criteria is a good idea. --ScienceApologist 03:54, 25 January 2007 (UTC)
I too can support the addition of the word "substantial" before "funding", but beyond that would like to see this used as a backdoor before we seriously consider tossing it out. The truth of the matter is that someone clever will come up with a way to twist our guideline that we have never thought of. So we need to put together as solid a guideline as we can based on past experience, and see how it is used as time goes on. Remember that even this quideline can be edited at need. --EMS | Talk 04:15, 25 January 2007 (UTC)
I agree that unlike awards and conferences substantial institutional funding can be a notability criterion even if only first-party evidence exists. So possibly a footnote could be added with clarification/examples what constitutes "substantial" and "major". What about the "examined by" part? ~ trialsanderrors 04:23, 25 January 2007 (UTC)
I added Future Map as a test case. It seems like the major claim to notability is an (invited?) presentation at a NECSI conference. ~ trialsanderrors 06:36, 25 January 2007 (UTC)

Ball lightning as a test case?

I'm not following this discussion very closely, so I hope I'm not out of line. Ball Lightning is a natural phenomenon that is flashy but difficult to study, so, while if does attract a small amount of interest from serious scientists, it also attracts a lot of cranks. There is no significant controversy in the article right now, except that casual editors have several times in the last couple weeks tried to add references to an experiment that is already covered in the article, in the paragraph of Ball Lightning#Analysis that starts with "If ball lightning releases energy stored in chemical form, ...". The reason I think it might be interesting to discuss the case here is that it is a new result and the only references we have so far are to news stories, so there is neither a peer reviewed article nor critical response. I nevertheless feel that it should be mentioned because it builds on a theory that is several years old by an entirely different group, and the work was done at a university (in Brazil). I did remove mention of the result from the introduction because I thought that was too much weight. So, if your are interested, have a "ball". --Art Carlson 10:43, 25 January 2007 (UTC)

It seems that this is at best a test case for WP:NPOV. The standard for mention in an ancillary article is much lower than in a stand-alone article, and is generally governed by WP:RS. Ball Lightning itself has a long history of notability, so there is nothing there for us to test. ~ trialsanderrors 18:53, 25 January 2007 (UTC)

Here's an interesting test case

Not from from science, strictly, but from social science: socionomics. Would it survive notability? There's a book about it--indeed, a whole publisher [7], a foundation[8], and an institute[9], but these all seem to be operated by the same guy, market guru Robert Prechter, who seems to have called for a market crash to about 10% of its current value every year for the last couple decades. How does wikipedia handle such a thing? Semperf 23:11, 25 January 2007 (UTC)

Not to ignore the Journal of Socionomics, which seems to have generated all of 5 articles. Note there is also Socioeconomics. ~ trialsanderrors 01:03, 26 January 2007 (UTC)
This example shows that looking at the references can tell you a good deal. let's pick something a little nearer the dividing line. DGG 01:09, 26 January 2007 (UTC)

Hard to say if this is notable or not. I think the real lesson here is that you really need some folks with deeper knowledge of sociology or economics to tell you what is going on. On the surface... oh wait, just got to the rest of the article. This is crazy non-notable stuff -- about finding the Fibonnaci sequence in the stock market and so on. Looks like the "academic support" quotes have been taken way out of context. I think a well-written, succinct AfD would be successful. Sdedeo (tips) 01:20, 26 January 2007 (UTC)

Economics and sociology are twin sciences, there is enormous overlap in historical and current research, from Karl Marx and Thorstein Veblen to Stanley Milgram and Duncan J. Watts. if you do behavioral economics or formal sociology you pretty much operate in the intersection of the two sciences. The idea that someone can claim the term for their own brand of research is pretty preposterous. It might be worth a pitch, but the Prechter article has been nominated for AfD and kept already. ~ trialsanderrors 01:36, 26 January 2007 (UTC)

All right, I gave it a shot: see here Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Socionomics. Sdedeo (tips) 20:58, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

Hi, I'm the guy involved in the RfA [10] involving Socionomics Elliott wave principle and Robert Prechter. Thanks to all of you who helped get socionomics deleted. I've posted some of my thoughts about this and WP:SCI on the WikiProject Pseudoscience page [[11]].
My concern is with "theories" which the scientific community generally ignore, but are notable for other reasons. Even though every social scientist might know that the "science" behind a given concept is doubtful, if the community ignores it, there is not a clear way to cite a reliable source saying "this is not science." WP:SCI seems to be one way to deal with this, but if the "theories" are notable, they can't be deleted through using this guideline. Indeed, I think a Wikipedia article written in NPOV is one of the best ways of exposing this type of stuff.
My particular concern is financial economics. There are con-men who can make a great deal of money peddling pseudoscientific theories about how to predict the stock market and some of them like to put infomercials on Wikipedia. Any attempt to edit the articles can be met with furious but nonsensical defenses, reversions, etc. by paid spokespersons. I think the "disputed science" tag might be one way to deal with these articles. Perhaps "importing" some of the criteria of this guideline into the Pseudoscience Project might help, e.g. if the theory doesn't meet these criteria, then it's reasonable to note "This theory is not supported by the general scientific community." Any comments or suggestions? I.N.I. Smallbones 18:47, 10 February 2007 (UTC)
Post 'em on my talk page next time you come across one, these are some of my favorite folk, because quackery can be quite notable, but it ain't science, and there's a right way and a wrong way to get that across with a NPOV. The "disputed science" tag is, imo, the wrong way, because it's not science that is being disputed, it's simply not science. KP Botany 23:08, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

Limits of "science" within academia

This just occurred to me because of an ongoing case at WP:DRV. Our concern last time we discussed this was to delineate the boundary between "instutional science" and "fringe science", but what are the boundaries within academia? Do we consider the humanities as a branch of science for this guideline? What about jurisprudence, architecture, business research? ~ trialsanderrors 20:33, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

Hi T&E. What is DRV? I personally think our guidelines are good only for the "sciences" usually considered. So, just to lay it out: jurisprudence (no), architecture (no, unless actually history of engineering, etc.), business research (yes if quantative methods used.) In general, I think the question of whether or not quantative claims are made (to be totally reductive, there has to be some math in there somewhere.) I don't think it would be possible for us to use these guidelines to determine whether or not some subvariant of, say, deconstruction or Brutalism is notable, if only because these are primarily social activities and the criteria there are much trickier.
But perhaps you could elaborate on the difficulties you encountered that might make my suggestion unhelpful? Sdedeo (tips) 21:13, 27 January 2007 (UTC)
WP:DRV = Deletion review. Hmm, my thinking is mostly that the main driver for this guideline is the shared academic publication mechansim. So for instance political science has branches like politcal economy that are mostly quantitative, and brnaches like international relations that are almost entirely qualitative. They still share the key journals like AJPS or APSR. Jurisprudence on the other hand has an academic dialogue, but research is disseminated via non-peer reviewed law reviews and notability is often established on the bench. That might put it outside our scope. There is of course an academic discourse on architectural theory, but that might be dwarved by the non-academic coverage, so our guideline isn't that helpful. ~ trialsanderrors 21:27, 27 January 2007 (UTC)
DRV is Deletion Review, which hears appeals of AfD decisions, and at the moment, tends to confirm 90% of the deletions. The general atmosphere there is a certain amount of impatience with quacks, but also a lack of understanding of anything reflecting serious academic concerns. But the people there are self-selected, and can include any editor, just as at AfD, and what is necessary to make ourselves better understood is to go there and explain ourselves. DGG 21:30, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

I worry about making blanket statements on the nature of publication in the humanities. It's just a very different world out there -- journals are much more "partisan", there are many more of them (and thus there are many non-notable ones created for the sole purpose of advancing one or two careers), and indeed the "unit" of academic advancement in the humanities is thus the book. A humanities prof really needs at least two monographs to get tenure alone in the humanities, when such things would be unthinkable in the sciences. Sdedeo (tips) 21:33, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

The key element in science and hard social sciences is the presence of Science Citation index and Scopus, which make it possible to trace influence. GS can do this, but not as well except for very recent work--and it is much more indiscriminate in what it collects, so one has to actually examine the results. there is a WoS portion for the humanities, but since it covers only journal articles, it is not used much except as a supplement. Humanities books do gte book reviews, but they are almost always either totally bland or very POV.
In any academic field, we should try to avoid making the decisions here and let the specialists make them in heir own forums. Within the academic world, the forums are university departments. . All tenured faculty at major universities--in any subject-- have their positions as the result of such decisions. They have passed several external reviews by experts for their notability in the profession. We dont establish notability, we see if the profession has established notability. It doesn't apply to every college, but it does to major research universities. Others might be notable, but then it isn't as obvious & we might have to assemble more varied evidence.
Other fields are also different. since all specialist physicians are associated in some manner with a university department, one cant use this criterion there by itself, nor can one use it for engineers, and so on. DGG 04:52, 28 January 2007 (UTC)

If we want to generalize to humanities, a notable concept is probably the subject of one (or maybe two -- I'd learn towards two) monographs published by a press with peer review (e.g., university presses.) Journal articles are just not as significant a forum for those guys as far as I can tell from colleagues. Sdedeo (tips) 05:07, 28 January 2007 (UTC)

Beyond physics etc.?

How many of the participants in this discussion are actively involved in sciences beyond physics, astronomy, mathematics or chemistry - either in the outside world or in terms or editing WP articles? Are editors in fields such as psychology, archaeology, political science, sociology etc. involved? What about biology, neuroscience and medicine? Surely medicine has its share or crackpots wanting to promote their stuff with gushing WP articles.

If people outside the "physics etc." realm are not involved in this debate, then here are some questions: Don't they have any such problems in their field as these draft guidelines are trying to resolve? Don't they care if they do have such problems? How confident can we be that what one group of people think is good for physics etc. is also going to be accepted by those who work in a different types of science? Robin Whittle 11:35, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

Well, I'm an economist, although I'm not sure if the publication mechanisms in economics are sufficiently different from physics to make a difference here. What were you thinking of? Anthropology? ~ trialsanderrors 17:56, 14 January 2007 (UTC)
I'm a computer scientist by trade, though my business card says software engineer; and many in my profession (including myself, a lot of the time) engage in work which is more analogous to carpentry than it would be to civil engineering, materials science, or architecture.  :) My discipline is well-known for advances coming out of industry (or hackerdom), rather than academia--advances which, while they work, are often lacking in formality or rigor. Academia often criticizes industry for its ad-hoc approaches; many useful concepts in CS such as object-oriented programming and design patterns were originated or incubated in industry, but have not been, until recently, set on a firm formal footing. Likewise, many researchers in theoretical computer science often see fit to make pronouncements on software engineering issues (such as claims that a theoretical advance will lead to greater productivity than current practice); pronouncements which are widely seen as ridiculous by practitioners. The two sides are getting along better now... but there still is a wide gulf between the theory and the practice; a gulf which is probably wider than any other applied science you could name.
Making this rant relevant to the present page; a lot of the source material which documents the state of the field, comes from the trade press rather than the academic press. (And quite a bit of the state of the art is found on wikis and such--sources that Wikipedia consideres unreliable. And no, that isn't ironic or hypocritical).
I don't see any cases where the literature practices of computer science would require enhancements to this proposal, but it is worth noting that the trade press is frequently a reliable source.
--EngineerScotty 19:32, 14 January 2007 (UTC)
I don't believe anybody in WikiProject Mathematics knows about this, besides Linas, and I'm not sure he considers mathematics as being covered here. There are substantial differences between science and mathematics in terms of the discipline and accepted norms (even within mathematics, it can be quite varied). This proposal came to my attention when trialsanderrors transcluded the afd for Zariski surface (a mathematical topic) into the test cases subpage. Seemingly, some of the people here consider this science notability proposal as including mathematics; however, the WikiProject has not been notified, and the proposal's standard seem at odds with standards in the mathematics community. For example, the comments on what is considered "significant" number of citations is just ludicrous. --C S (Talk) 12:46, 21 January 2007 (UTC)
  • Bumping this down because I don't think anyone has noticed Chan-Ho's comment. Two points: 1. Should we !canvass the relevant WikiProjects, and 2. what exactly are your objections to "significant" number of citations, Chan-Ho? ~ trialsanderrors 20:06, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

Peer review

I think Chan-Ho needs to be more explicit about how citation works in mathematics. I'm not sure if our current citation rules are too loose or too strict for his tastes. Sdedeo (tips) 20:15, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

Though not a mathematician, I am a science librarian, and that necessarily means some knowledge of these patterns across different subjects. Math papers are unpredictable. The density of citation is very low, much important work resides in arXiv or elsewhere on the web and is never "published", though it is cited, (in pre-web days they resided in mimeograph copies informally distributed--my former library had a long row of file cabinets for them).
But you can see for yourself, with data from JCR--the five highest ranking math journals in JCR has impact factors, total cites, & half-lives for 2005 as follows
J AMER MATH SOCIETY,   IF 2.323, 1230 cites, 8.6 years
ANNALS OF MATHEMAT, IF 2.009, 5296 cites, >10.0 years
COMPUTING COMPLEXITY, IF 2.000, 391 cites, >10.0 years
COMMUN PUR APPL MATH, IF 1.784, 3900 cites, >10.0 years
BULL AMER MATH SOC, IF 1.800, 1949 cites, >10.0 years
For comparison, the 2 highest non-review journals in general physics have:
PHYS REV LETT, IF 7.48, 250,617 cites, 6.6 yrs
PHYS LETTERS B, IF 5.301, 55,129 cites, 7.5 yrs
In words, math papers are relatively low in number-- from the total cites, and have relatively few citations per paper, -- the Impact Factor, and take a very long time to accumulate the citations -- from the half-life.
I'll just mention in passing that some fields of medicine and cell biology have twice the IFs and half the half-lifes of physics. And computer science has yet another pattern, etc. etc. There are no formulas that work across all fields of science, and attempts to use of in ranking scientists and institutions and journals have a very bad name , see the criticism section of the article on Impact Factor. By the way, this is the fabled OR, and to determine what standards to use we need to do the research; to apply them, we hope to find a standardized way of doing it, because the alternative is to do an ad hoc OR comparison for each individual article--many AfD discussions are in fact necessarily OR, though the articles aren't. DGG 21:18, 29 January 2007 (UTC)
There was a lengthy discussion on this at the original WT:SCI (Archive 1 now). The upshot was to use the language "widely cited ... relative to other publications in the same area". The self-cite and peer-review qualifiers were added later. I think the self-cite one is proper. I have problems with peer-review from both angles: 1. Not all peer-reviewed material is reliable, and 2. not all reliable material is peer-reviewed. ~ trialsanderrors 21:31, 29 January 2007 (UTC)
I agree with T&E about "peer review", however almost all respected journals (which are the ones we are interested in) use it. Personally I would rather demand that articles be published in respected journals instead of peer reviewed ones. Example: We had a tussle over on twin paradox a few months ago due to an article by someone named Unnikrishkan that appeared in the peer-reviewed Indian Jounral of Physics. I'd love to know who did that "peer review" and what it said, as that article would never have been published in the mainstream physics journals. (In fact I doubt that it would have even been sent out for review by any respectable journal.) Another incident over on Ehrenfest paradox involved articles in an obscure SE Asian journal that also claimed to have a peer review system.
IMO, for mainstream purposes we are looking for a topic to make itself notable by garnering attention in respected journals. Those are not necessarily the same as "peer-reviewed" journals. (Most likely this is a subset of peer-reviewed journals, but it is not impossible that for a journal on a small enough discipline which is staffed by experts in that field to make all of their editorial decisions through a purely "in house" process and still be a respected source. In fact peer review is a means of distributing the work of evaluating articles when a jounral receives too many submissions for its staff to handle.) --EMS | Talk 22:14, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

DGG -- fascinating! It sounds like the solution here is T&E's -- "relative to others" -- and with clarifications for different fields. Sdedeo (tips) 21:56, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

I'm sure DGG can elaborate on this, but a good proxy for quality is competitiveness. A journal that publishes only 10% of the submitted papers can be expected to have a more thorough peer review process than one that publishes 75%. ~ trialsanderrors 22:43, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

Tough. Physical Review D accepts the vast majority of articles, but still is a well-respected journal. I kind of want to reiterate that I think the only real solution here is going to have general "relative to the field" rules, with elaborations for different fields. As far as I can tell from DGG, we can't, for example, develop criteria that could be equally applied to physics and math. Sdedeo (tips) 23:39, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

This sort of analysis was pioneered by Eugene Garfield, (whose WP article needs much expansion), and discussions of many different disciplines can be found at [12] As needed, I'll summarize if asked.
But as for quality of journal=stringency of peer review, it varies. Sometimes there is one single key journal everyone in the field tries to publish their best articles in , like Cell, or Physical Review Letters, or Journal of Financial Economics, and they have a 5 or 10% acceptance rate, but in other fields the one key journal simply expands to take them all, as American Journal of Physiology or Astrophysical Journal, and those consequently has a 50% acceptance rate. There are no shortcut formulas, but if I had to pick one standard way to evaluate a journal in science or hard social science it would be relative position in the JCR category: 5th place is different if its #5 out of 8 or #5 out of 80. (But this breaks down in very narrow special fields, where the key journal may be only midway in a more general list) DGG 05:11, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

I don't think my issue is really a matter of "strictness" or "looseness", but if I had to choose one, I would say these guidelines really are too strict and don't apply to pure mathematics. They may be necessary in subjects with a high number of citations and lower barrier to publication, but in many areas of pure mathematics, significant work will not achieve anywhere near the numbers stated in "note 2". I would be surprised, for example, if the average number of citations to a paper (excluding self-cites and non-peer reviewed) in my area was more than one or two in the first several years after publication.

As far as letting the WikiProjects know, I think that is the only fair thing to do. As demonstrated by DGG's data, expertise in a discipline is necessary to understand the standards. Right now, WikiProject Mathematics has a number of experts who are able to lend their expertise in AFD discussions. I fear what may happen with the proposed guideline (in current form) is that people may read it and feel emboldened in contradicting the experts who really know better. --C S (Talk) 08:46, 30 January 2007 (UTC)

Appeal to authority has been resoundingly rebuffed as argument in deletion discussions. Experts, like any other editor, have to state their case via arguments and facts. Average is a poor metric for cite counts but I agree that the footnote is misleading. I don't even think we should give numbers at all. 1. It's too cumbersome, and 2. they will always be questionable. "Relative to other publications in the same area" can be established via comparison to notable articles in the same field, so expert opinion can help identify them and drive the discussion. ~ trialsanderrors 10:04, 30 January 2007 (UTC)
I think it's really uncharitable of you to sum up my view as "appeal to authority". I think I have enough experience in AFD to know that some AFD participants welcome expert advice and opinions. Of course, a simple statement like "vote the same way I do because I am expertz!!" will be rebuffed. The kind of comparison you describe requires a large amount of expertise, and that's what I was suggesting But not everybody is so willing to let expert opinion "drive" the discussion. This is because as suggested by others, this kind of thing really is based not on factual material but personal experience in a discipline. A number of AFDs turn out a certain way because a group of people all agree on one thing. Sometimes this group consists of a number of mathematicians, which skews the results one way. Other times, the group consists of mainly non-mathematicians, who have no idea about standards in mathematics, which often skews results the other way. I've seen very experienced Wikipedians vote against the experts because they have an idea that something is notable when it is not. I don't see this as a good outcome. --C S (Talk) 20:16, 30 January 2007 (UTC)
This of course is one of the reasons for this standard - So that people have a criteria to work with in determining if a topic is notable or not. Example: The electric universe (concept) survived multiple deletion attempts. Finally a well crafted deletion request got it removed. A standard such as this can help to direct a discussion and will make it easier for experts to make the case for deletion. Beyond that, I don't think that items should be removed becuase the disagree with mainstream ideas, but rather because they have nothing in terms of notability to recommend them. Usually the two come out to the same thing, but on always. --EMS | Talk 22:38, 30 January 2007 (UTC)
Sorry if it came across as a blanket summary of your comment. I was only referring to the last part — "(people schould not) feel emboldened in contradicting the experts who really know better". As EMS points out, our goal is to summarize tools experts use to gauge notability first and foremost. Of course we're always trapped in the middle, we have to be vague enough to be wide-reaching but clear enough not to be meaningless or prolix. Re your concern that mathematicians might be outvoted at AfD's, see yesterday's List of formulae involving π AfD. It happens, and pretty much the only way to avoid it is to get all editors quickly up to speed on how to evaluate things. ~ trialsanderrors 02:22, 31 January 2007 (UTC)
Uh...you modified my last sentence to mean something completely different. In relation to contacting the WikiProjects, I said, "I fear what may happen with the proposed guideline (in current form) is that people may read it and feel emboldened in contradicting the experts who really know better." I wasn't saying "people shouldn't" something or the other. Currently the proposal is just plain wrong, may mislead people into thinking it applies where it does not, and I can certainly see people reading it and feeling like they can contradict experts based on this misinformation. Either acknowledge the irrelevance of this proposal to mathematics (and whatever else) with a clear note in the lead, or contact the relevant people to get their input. --C S (Talk) 02:36, 31 January 2007 (UTC)
OK, struck with apologies. I don't think a "This guideline includes physic, poli sci, anthropology, but excludes mathematics and ecotrophology" disclaimer is helpful. So canvassing the WikiProjects it is. ~ trialsanderrors 02:54, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

See my comment below. I think we should be general and use "relative" language in the guideline, and then have greater clarification later for different subfields. Right now we are solid on physics (go us), but Chan-Ho's definitely pointed out how we should be very careful in our generalizing. It's a lot more work, but I think it would be valuable for the community to really firm these up, and my experience in watching AfDs is that most voters will, having been presented with explanations of how a field works, be certaintly willing to "trust the experts" (in this case, apparently, us.) Sdedeo (tips) 02:40, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

notability & mergism

Should we think about adding a section in notability pointing out a difference between what is needed for a self-standing article vs. what is fine as part of a larger article? What makes me wonder this is the recent deletion discussion at Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Socionomics: socionomics has only one noteworthy advocate, Robert Prechter, who is notable enough for an article of his own. Might we find a way to say that theories (like socionomics, imo) whciih are not worthy of a self-standing article can sometimes be merged into their sole/primary advocate? Semperf 14:27, 30 January 2007 (UTC)

  • I think there might be enough for an article about the book itself, even though the appeal to science falls short. In the world of "Business Research" there are lots of topics that get picked up by practitioners but not by the scientific community. The point here is that the evidence needs to be in line with the claim to notability, and the claim that Prechter createda neologism that took hold in the scientific community is stronger than the claim he published a book that was noted on Wall Street. Re merging, reliable sources don't have to be balanced, so they can perfectly be included in the article on the author. ~ trialsanderrors 19:22, 30 January 2007 (UTC)

continuing the math debate

Talked with some colleagues here who are mathematicians, who definitely reaffirmed Chan-Ho's comments about math citations. Just to be explicit and clear, I think the "relative to others in the field" standard is great as stands and that what we need to do is be explicit about different fields that have different characteristics. Does anybody disagree? Sdedeo (tips) 02:33, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

I nixed footnote 2. I'm sure we'll have to define "widely cited relative to" later in a footnote, so the #2 note is reserved for that. Any attempts? ~ trialsanderrors 02:56, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

I think we'll probably need a separate section, which is what I've created. I think this is the way to go -- slowly filling out this section with information on different fields? Sdedeo (tips) 03:02, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

TLDR. Seems like the art of brevity is underdeveloped at the scientific institutions. Really, this is going nowhere. ~ trialsanderrors 03:15, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

Hi T&E, not sure what you mean here. Is the physics passage TLDR? Or do you think the whole idea -- talking about each field separately -- is the wrong way to go? Do you have an alternate suggestion? Sdedeo (tips) 16:17, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

The whole thing as it is is already TLDR. It's self-defeating to create a guideline that takes half an hour to read through. We should be trimming, not adding content. In my opinion "respective field" and a footnote saying that editors should post a note on the relevant Wikiproject in order to get expert input on peer review standards covers it. Adding more clutter which will never get read and will never be comprehensive just creates negative returns. ~ trialsanderrors 17:52, 31 January 2007 (UTC)
Got it -- I see why you are deleting material now instead of just moving it around. I would say, go ahead and start making drastic trims because I am seeing your point. Sdedeo (tips) 17:53, 31 January 2007 (UTC)
The problem with "relative to others in the field" comes with both biology and mathematics, HUGE fields, that have many areas with a very small number of researchers for various reasons, but often due to complexity issues. This is why I kept after the one Stirling article, the type of research done and discussed in this article may be the type of obscure research with a small number of citations that is important due to it developing the underlying concepts for a much larger body of research. This is becoming much more common in the botanical genetics, a recent example of where it happened is in floral development genetics. I was reading on a topic last year, in a book, by a scientist who would never meet Wikipedia notability criteria because his book is such an incredibly low seller on Amazon (! in the four millions), and is not necessarily cited in all the papers written now on the topic. HOWEVER, when I got interested in the field I asked some of the top half dozen scientists in the field what I should read for background, and every one of them individually via e-mail answered the same thing, this one book. So, the top researchers in the field, consider this one scientist to be number one, but he would never meet Wikipedia criteria for notability. And, I suspect his number of citations may be low relative to the rest of the field (I'll research this before posting). So, bam, he's out. YET, the top scientists in the field consider him to be among the most important.
I think that there are a lot of obscure areas in mathematics and in botany and in other sciences, where numbers are NOT how you rank importance, and Wikipedia overrelies upon numbers. I see it all the time on AfD: book only 400,000 on Amazon, only 20 references on Scholar, blah, blah, blah, but nobody can read the research, or has contacted the project, or has any idea what the scientist writes about. KP Botany 04:00, 31 January 2007 (UTC)
Can you offer a concrete example? Using Amazon sales counts is discouraged in the sources section. ~ trialsanderrors 04:39, 31 January 2007 (UTC)
It may be discouraged, but I've seen it used. I never thought of ranking a scientist by his book sales UNTIL I saw it here, on Wikipedia, in AfD. KP Botany 01:01, 1 February 2007 (UTC)

I moved the field-specific comments on "widely cited" to Wikipedia:Notability (science)/Widely cited. ~ trialsanderrors 07:59, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

OK to delete this now with the new footnote, or does someone want to expand it? ~ trialsanderrors 18:39, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

New footnote 2

Citation counts and peer review mechanisms differ vastly between sciences, fields, and subfields, and editors are urged to inform the relevant WikiProject about ongoing debates to get expert input. It should also be noted that quantity of citations is often only a poor approximation of quality.

Please review, discuss, or edit as you please. ~ trialsanderrors 18:03, 31 January 2007 (UTC)


Wikipedia:Notability (science)/Irrelevant arguments

Created as essay, in order to unclutter the main page. ~ trialsanderrors 21:43, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

Awards

There is no separate talk page for the essay, and perhaps it would focus discussion if thee were. But to start with, I've some doubts about "Awards" awards are convenient tokens for notability, and very easy to document from RS without any need for detailed discussion about the scientific merits They facilitate discussions with those who do not understand science, because the are widely used in other fields, especially ones which have few other definite criteria. Articles in WP on the award itself are particularly helpful in establishing this. I agree they are not the fundamentals upon which N in science is based, but they are good indicators of it. They do show N is a wider sense--N is based upon recognition by one's peers, and awards do establish that. I would suggest striking out that point entirely. DGG 02:33, 1 February 2007 (UTC)

I strongly disagree with this. I analyzed that situation quite carefully and came to the conclusion that the thing that makes a prize like the Nobel Prize special is its ability not just to confer notability, but to do so in accord with the other parts of this guideline: In other words, the press coverage that results in enough to make the topic notable. In addition, the Nobels also tend to reflect a pre-existing recognition that also manifests itself in enough citations, texbook mentionings, and institutional support to make the topic notable independent of the prize. As one person put it, a Nobel Prize usually means that the state of science was permanently changed by this work. It is that change and/or the press coverage that makes the topic notable. The prize itself need not be cited as a reason. --EMS | Talk 06:03, 1 February 2007 (UTC)
Awards are clearly not irrelevant. The argument is that if no one notices the award ceremony it can't be that important, so we should rely on the sources that cover the ceremony instead. I would say we can merge the three institutional types into one bullet point:
  • Instutitional recognition. The scientific contribution received significant institutional recognition, such as a major award, significant research funding or the organization of a conference around it. | Footnote: Consider the frequency, geographic reach, number of recipients or amount of funding to decide whether the recognition was major, and also whether the recognition itself was covered by independent sources.
Opinions? ~ trialsanderrors 06:55, 1 February 2007 (UTC)

Watch out for that "conference" criterion! -- how about:

  • Instutitional recognition. The scientific contribution received significant institutional recognition. Such recognition might come from a major award, the significant research funding, or the organization of a conference. The institution involved should be itself notable and independent of the idea's original proponents. | Footnote: Consider the frequency, geographic reach, number of recipients or amount of funding to decide whether the recognition was major, and also whether the recognition itself was covered by independent sources.

Sdedeo (tips) 22:14, 1 February 2007 (UTC)

Looks good. I might have to think about the wording, but I think we can post it and let the community have at it. I'll post my version and let you change to yours for proper attribution. ~ trialsanderrors 23:05, 1 February 2007 (UTC)

Done. For future ref., I am not fussed about attribution! Sdedeo (tips) 02:42, 2 February 2007 (UTC)

Today in "test cases"...

A pretty good discussion on "Original research by synthesis", which didn't factor into our discussions much so far:

~ trialsanderrors 02:18, 2 February 2007 (UTC)

Any opions on this article?
Lilac chaser – An optical illusion invented in 2005, only discussion I can find is from a high school paper. ~ trialsanderrors 01:02, 10 February 2007 (UTC)
It's a fairly well written article, but I see little evidence that the effect is well known. It would make for an interesting AfD. --EMS | Talk 05:05, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

Tough call. I got the illusion to work (briefly.) These kinds of things usually have names and so forth, but on the other hand, new ones sometimes turn up. If I were to argue for deletion (not sure I would) the problem I would say is that maybe this is actually just a variant on a different optical illusion that has been much better studied (e.g., imagine if we had a pyramid version of the Necker Cube.) That said, I wouldn't be comfortable arguing for deletion unless I had talked to someone who worked on vision, and would prefer to tag parts of it OR. Sdedeo (tips) 06:25, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

Very tough call. (Like many such visual effects, different people will see them differently. Some traditional demonstrations of optical illusions do work for me, some don't. This doesnt, but I assume it does for others. But that is really OR in the rare literal sense)

But one real point is whether the content of WP should include a moving image--are there any others?--or do i misunderstand and the effect is produced from a static gif--in which case it should be pointed out in the article." For a number of optic phenomena the articles do show an illustration of the effect. It can be mus clearer than words. DGG 09:04, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

The animation is actually a candidate for featured picture. Yeah, we have quite a couple of them, e.g. Roundabout. ~ trialsanderrors 09:18, 10 February 2007 (UTC)
The animation is excellent. I was not able to achieve the full effect (as the chaser kept catching my gaze and so the dots never vanished), but I don't doubt that it is real. My concern is whether this article is properly documenting a well-known illusion or promoting one that is not (yet?) well known. Any AfD must be based on the notability of this effect, not its reality. (BTW - I'm not sure that I care to remove the article either. At the least, it would be nice to get an opinion from someone who is knowledgable about optical illusions on this matter before trying to do so.) I will however warn everyone that this article requires a well crafted AfD request if it is to be removed. --EMS | Talk 15:13, 12 February 2007 (UTC)
Announcement-to-article example
I just noticed this announcement on the Berkeley website. Interesting because it ties in with some of the discussion on how early we can have an article on inventions that have the potential to be groundbreaking. It looks like we have an article on distributed Bragg reflectors but not on high-index contrast sub-wavelength grating yet. ~ trialsanderrors 01:13, 14 February 2007 (UTC)

Peer review

Is it sufficient for a publication to claim peer review for us to accept that? I'm wondering specifically about publications on "fringe" scientific topics - anyone can start an organization with Science in the name and claim that their material is peer reviewed. Should we always trust that claim, or should other criteria of reliability be used? --Milo H Minderbinder 17:43, 12 February 2007 (UTC)

I think the only reasonable thing to do is to evaluate that claim as neutrally as possible. Other criteria would be hard to insist on: people don't very often write about specific journals in reliable venues. Mangojuicetalk 17:48, 12 February 2007 (UTC)
Having both done and been subjected to peer review myself, I would never consider "peer review" by itself a hallmark of quality. This ties in with the discussion above about criteria for academic journals. It the minimum, we should consider the journals notable by themselves before we consider their peer review process trustworthy. ~ trialsanderrors 18:02, 12 February 2007 (UTC)
The example in this particular case is the Journal of the Society for Psychical Research (JSPR). I would tend to consider it not a reliable source (and suspect that their "peer review" is done by those with similar fringe beliefs), but I'd like to get more opinions from those who have dealt with fringe articles. --Milo H Minderbinder 18:13, 12 February 2007 (UTC)
Well other than the subject matter, it might be hard to shoot this down based on lack of pedigree: [13]. One test would be to look at current contributors and see if they also publish in unquestionably reputable journals. ~ trialsanderrors 19:02, 12 February 2007 (UTC)
There is an immense literature on peer-review in general and I'll do some editing to the WP page eventually to reflect some of it. As it relates to specific journals, there is informal discussion of various listservs, particularly CHMINF and Liblicense, but it relates primarily to journals with very low acceptance rates. Physical Review Letters, for example, has about a 90% rejection rate, but they are not exactly rejections, because half get published in the other APS journals. Many excellent journals such as American Journal of Physiology, accept about half, which they think represents all articles that meet a reasonable standard, not just the few best. But a journal with a rejection rate of 10% is an indication of either very lax peer review, or a small close-knit community of workers. Such journals do not refer to their rates is public sources, but many of us can think of a few.
JSPR is a special case.--special enough that WP should do an article on it, & I think there is some outside documentation. It is the best journal in the field, with the highest standards. As the standards of that field are quite low, the articles reflect it. In the rare occasion that a psychology (or whatever) journal publishes an article on a subject, that wouldbe preferred. But mainstream journals ae not necessarily god with fringe science: it was Nature itself than published the article on anomolous water, and on HIV not being the cause of AIDS. What's the article? DGG 02:13, 14 February 2007 (UTC)

Aww man, Nature. Don't get me started... they have also published very misleading stuff on cold fusion. One thing to note is that Nature is not peer reviewed! Sdedeo (tips) 02:15, 14 February 2007 (UTC)

I have seen some odd viewpoints get promoted here based on their appearing in some peer-reviewed overseas journal, and each time I am left to wonder what criteria the reviewers used with that selection. Then there is this intersesting claim that Nature does not use peer review, which I am inclined to believe. If you read the peer review article, it states that the purpose of peer review is to lessen the editorial load on the internal staff of a journal. So there is no reason why a quality journal with an adequate staff and appropriate policies needs peer review. At the same time, it seems to me that peer review is not at all synonymous with "quality", although I can understand why people (such as Jimbo) would equate the two. IMO, the real issue is that the journal be respected within its field, and never mind whether it is peer revewed or not. --EMS | Talk 04:12, 14 February 2007 (UTC)
This particular case is Electronic voice phenomenon‎, and it turns out the JSPR and the Journal of Scientific Exploration, another journal that covers mainly "fringe" topics seem to be the closest we have to reliable sources. There doesn't seem to be any mainstream coverage at all of the topic, which means it's potentially a candidate for deletion due to lack of notability. It has been mentioned that the topic gets some mainstream coverage in fiction and cable shows like Ghost Hunter - that could help a notability claim, but if those are the sources, the article should describe the subject as something mostly notable in fiction, and go into minimal "scientific" detail on studies not accepted by mainstream science. Other opinions on the article would be appreciated. --Milo H Minderbinder 13:57, 14 February 2007 (UTC)
They look like serious attempts to deal with fringe topics to me, although you never know, there are any number of loopy researchers at Berkeley or Stanford. I would probably qualify quotes with a meantion of "JSPR, a journal devoted to the exploration of the paranormal". That should tip readers off. ~ trialsanderrors 10:07, 18 February 2007 (UTC)

"noteworthy primarily on cultural or sociological bases"

In the case of a subject that fails scientific notability (fringe references but no mainstream ones) but has cultural and fictional references, is it appropriate for the article to go into scientific detail or give equal weight to cultural and scientific info? Or to put it another way, if the subject is notable culturally, does that make the scientific details (such as going into detail on studies that aren't peer reviewed or that are only covered in "fringe' publications) notable as well? --Milo H Minderbinder 21:31, 14 February 2007 (UTC)

In a case like this, the science (or pseudoscience) involved becomes fair game. However, one normally would not delve as far into the details as they would given mainstream acceptance on the topic itself. After all, the cultural circumstances that made the topic notable are in this case a major subtopic in need of coverage. OTOH, the fringe theory may well be behind the effort in question. Examples to consider are cold fusion and warp drive. --EMS | Talk 06:38, 17 February 2007 (UTC)
Thanks. The article in question is Electronic voice phenomenon. Editors there seem to agree that it is only notable due to cultural/fictional mentions, but there's still strong insistence from some that the article keep a ton of details on "experiments", mostly self published and non-peer reviewed ones. Any outside perspective would be welcome there. --Milo H Minderbinder 15:25, 17 February 2007 (UTC)

What if it doesn't?

The current sentence is: "In general, a contribution in the field of science is notable enough to merit inclusion in Wikipedia if it meets at least one of the following criteria, which fall under two general headings, scientific notability and popular notability...". What if the contribution doesn't meet any of the criteria? Currently the statement says nothing about that situation. Did we mean it to say, "In general, a contribution in the field of science is notable enough to merit inclusion in Wikipedia only if it meets at least one of the following criteria..."? Sancho McCann 05:06, 17 February 2007 (UTC)

That is the intent here. A topic is notable as a contribution to science only if a requirement set in here is met. That is not to say that the topic could not be notable in some other context. (For example, a theory on what makes a paint glisten may be a joke as a mainstream science topic but could be of serious interest to the subject of art.) So this standard cannot be directly used to deny inclusion, but if the only grounds for inclusion is being of scientific interest then this standard can and will block a topic from Wikipedia. If you know of a case where this standard may work to block an otherwise worthy topic, please let us know about it. --EMS | Talk 06:47, 17 February 2007 (UTC)
Oh, I wasn't thinking that this phrasing would block any worthy topic. On the contrary, it blocks no topics, because it says if, instead of only if. Sancho McCann 18:24, 17 February 2007 (UTC)
This proposed guieline is not intended to explicitly block anything. As I mentioned above, it is possible that an article that is not notable as a scinece article could be notable in another context. I don't see that as happening often, but it can. My benchmark is for this guideline (ironically) is whether it is sufficient to block my own original research as that work currently stands, and it is. (You can get an idea of what I am doing on my user page). It also sets what I see as some reasonably high (but not too high) criteria for inclusion. Please keep in mind that most OR is placed here as a topic of interest to science. If the topic cannot pass that test, there usually is nothing else to which to creator can turn to as a notability basis, and then the topic is AfD-ed and removed in short order. --EMS | Talk 05:32, 18 February 2007 (UTC)
Notability guidelines are never written as "if and only if" guidelines. They capture the general cases, with exceptions possible if inclusion helps the project. ~ trialsanderrors 10:04, 18 February 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Attribution

Seems like WP:NOR, WP:RS and WP:V have been merged into WP:A (Attribution). Not sure how this affects this guideline, I haven't read it in detail yet, but it certainly requires some changes. ~ trialsanderrors 18:23, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

widely cited

Why has this been marked as bandoned? Its the most objective standard we have.DGG 02:59, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

The initial plan was to include standards for a wide variety of subfields, but from the discussion above this was considered too unwieldy. ~ trialsanderrors 03:42, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

Automatically passes?

Hi. I saw this: "The main policy impetus for this guideline comes from Neutral point of view (NPOV). ". Does this mean that any scientific theory/hypothesis/etc. that can pass WP:NPOV and WP:ATT automatically passes this guideline or does this guideline set a higher bar? If it's aiming to set such a higher bar, should that be stated? mike4ty4 02:12, 12 March 2007 (UTC)

There is no "automatic pass". If there was such a thing, deletion debates would not be needed. Deletion guidelines such as this one are mostly to help the editor consider the possible dimension in which a scientific contribution can be notable. The actual appraisal of the evidence has to be left to the community, or otherwise we would have bots doing all the deletions. ~ trialsanderrors 18:38, 14 March 2007 (UTC)
In some cases at AfD when an article technically passes, but does not seem actually N, the article has been kept as following the rule; some may have been decided otherwise, & I dont think there is general consensus either way.DGG 18:43, 14 March 2007 (UTC)
My hope for this guideline is to have a higher bar. That is not to say that the initial sentence cited above is incorrect. It seems to me that the truth of the matter is found if you turn yoru statement around: Anything that fails WP:NPOV or WP:ATT automatically fails under this guideline. The point is that meeting those policies is required for but not necessarily sufficient to merit inclusion in Wikipedia. --EMS | Talk 04:35, 15 March 2007 (UTC)
I disagree that notability guidelines should set a higher bar. They should apply policy rather than create policy. But neutrality is a policy that's frequently ignored in content discussions and other notability guidelines, where the existence of 1 1/2 reliable sources is often considered sufficient material to write an encyclopedic article. But under the principle that strong claims require strong evidence, the claim that X developed a novel scientific theory is a stronger claim than X started an internet meme, so there are policy-compatible reasons to set different bars in different subfields. ~ trialsanderrors 08:03, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

Evaluating Consensus for adopting as a guideline

It seems that there should be some discussion before specifically acknowledging this as a guideline. There is no specific procedure, but there should be something more than "seems to have died down" as a justification for inclusion as a guideline. --Kevin Murray 23:03, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

We have half a year's worth of discussions if you want to read them... ~ trialsanderrors 02:10, 16 March 2007 (UTC)
What is most pertinent is that there be significant consensus from a broad enough range of editors. This has not received wide attention and there is no clarity for consensus. This is not receiving much attention since the entire notability structure is being evaluated. A lull in the argument does not demonstrate consensus being reached. What has been negotiated here is essentially meaningless. --Kevin Murray 02:55, 16 March 2007 (UTC)
Perhaps you may wish to share your objections. I for one do like this guideline, and see it as being quite appropriate. --EMS | Talk 04:18, 16 March 2007 (UTC)
Indeed. Kevin, you say (correctly) that there's no specific procedure, and then you ask that we invoke a specific procedure anyway for "specifically acknowledging" this page. There's 380 kb worth of discussion about precisely the subject. WP:NOBOOK. >Radiant< 09:36, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

Fiction as a reference of science

Quote from proposal: "Press and fiction. It is or was well known due to extensive press coverage, or due to being a recurrent theme in notable works of fiction. In this case the article should make note of this status. A single article on the theory, even if from a major media source such as New Scientist or Scientific American, is not a sufficient criterion."

    • How can a scientific principle be validated by fiction? If it is a ficticious theme like a Star Trek warp drive, it should be covered by WP:FICTION, but more likeley be merged into an article about the work of fiction. --Kevin Murray 01:07, 16 March 2007 (UTC)
      It is not the principle itself that gets validated, but rather its notability. The wormhole is one concept that gets regular attention in science fiction, and so is more notable than it would be if it was just an obscure speculation associated with black holes. BTW - There is the Alcubierre drive, which if it should somehow be implemented would be a warp drive. For that reason, it got significant press coverage and the cutural significance resulting from its being called a "warp drive" or "warp drive metric" gives it ongoing notability. So whether or not it is good science, it deserves to be part of Wikipedia. However, I certainly agree that Alcubierre's math and the fictional Star Trek drive are two seperate topics. --EMS | Talk 04:28, 16 March 2007 (UTC)
        • I'm not saying that these are not notable, but they are not true science. Why must they be mentioned here, when these issues would already be notable under WP:N and WP:FICT? --Kevin Murray 04:32, 16 March 2007 (UTC)
          • We agreed that the scope of this guideline is everything that makes an appeal to science. The intro paragraph is very clear that we don't try to usurp the authority to decide what is science, only what has been noted as such inside or outside the scientific community. As I said, it would help if you familiarized yourself with the key points of the deabte so we don't have to repeat everything. ~ trialsanderrors 04:55, 16 March 2007 (UTC)