Wikipedia talk:Requests for arbitration/Climate change dispute

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

(William M. Connolley 09:59, 22 Mar 2005 (UTC)) I'll put up my evidence later. For now, I'd like to ask that the arbitrators consider Cortonins behaviour too. Can that be done within this case, or is it necessary to open a separate one?

My accept vote was conditioned on looking at both in this case. --mav 14:12, 22 Mar 2005 (UTC)


(William M. Connolley 20:38, 22 Mar 2005 (UTC)) OK. Thanks.

I've never participated in an RfA before. Is there a preferred procedure and location for replies to the statements of others? If so, what is it? — Cortonin | Talk 08:41, 23 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Yes - if you're responding to a statement on the main page, respond here on the talk page; if you're responding to a statement on the evidence page, respond it to the talk page of the evidence page. -- Grunt   ҈  15:29, 2005 Mar 23 (UTC)
Okay, thank you. — Cortonin | Talk 20:00, 23 Mar 2005 (UTC)

My guess is that no further information will come to light in this case which differs substantially from what has already been presented. If you haven't already begun, you can probably begin your deliberations on the matter. Thank you again for your time. — Cortonin | Talk 16:52, 29 Mar 2005 (UTC)


Contents

[edit] Response to WMC's statement

I did forewarn that WMC would focus his response as an attack on my competence and credibility. I am a physicist, but my claims of physics expertise are intentionally vague. I don't believe ego should have much of a place on Wikipedia, since it only prevents us from working together. I edit a variety of articles, and you can assess my expertise and attempts to provide encyclopedic content at your own discretion. That the majority of my edits are currently under climate related articles is primarily because contributions, which would typically be accepted and worked with in other areas, are usually immediately reverted due to the emotionally charged states surrounding this group of articles. — Cortonin | Talk 08:26, 24 Mar 2005 (UTC)

The entire mesospheric water vapor thing is misrepresented. I included this as part of a larger body of studies describing the complexity of interaction between solar irradiance and water vapor (all of which was completely reverted out). The feedbacks due to solar variation are still an active area of research, with most researchers publishing in this area considering it to have a significant impact on global warming calculations. This contribution of solar variation to global warming and the continued state of research should be represented on the climate pages, rather than having it presented as a done and negative conclusion. — Cortonin | Talk 08:26, 24 Mar 2005 (UTC)

For the "biased" excerpt from the abstract, read the abstract for yourself, and judge for yourself what the point of that paper was. I referenced the net effect, and that was that. — Cortonin | Talk 08:26, 24 Mar 2005 (UTC)

The percentage of the static greenhouse effect due to each greenhouse gas is something which varies greatly depending on which source you quote from (e.g. [1]). There are prominent papers, textbooks, and researchers which quote values as high as 90-95% for water vapor's contribution. Regardless of what WMC or I might feel about the actual percentage (which actually depends a bit on how you define "contribution"), the NPOV policy requires that we include a variety of prominent information about this, and this is precisely what I was attempting to do. — Cortonin | Talk 08:26, 24 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I think that WMC genuinely and honestly does believe that I, and the others he disagrees with, are incompetent and not credible. I also think this is at the heart of the problem. Assumption of good faith doesn't work when you view yourself as the only person qualified to edit a page, and when you assume those around you are incompetent and unable to read. — Cortonin | Talk 08:26, 24 Mar 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Response to Cortonins response (William M. Connolley 09:57, 24 Mar 2005 (UTC))

Cortonins response is deceptive in all respects:

  • That the majority of my edits are currently under climate related articles is primarily... this underplays his edits strongly. Going back over his last 500 edits [2], to 1st feb all but a tiny handful (perhaps 10) of his edits are under climate articles... except... just after I commented that he never edits physics articles, he has suddenly made a bunch of edits to them, presumably to disguise this. Its a welcome development though. Perhaps he'll help reverting vandalism too.
  • Mesospheric: the solar-climate stuff is primarily tropospheric-stratospheric, because thats where the bulk of the atmosphere is. Cortonin made a careless mistake by pulling in an irrelevant reference; sadly ego prevents him from admitting this.
  • Biased abstract... judge for yourself.
  • There are prominent papers, textbooks, and researchers which quote values as high as 90-95% for water vapor's contribution - this is utter twaddle: note Cortonins failure to reference them (oh dear, this is going to get confusing if he starts modifying his stuff: he now adds a ref to the wiki GHG page [3], which is weird, because it precisely supports what I'm saying: there are no credible estimates of WV above the 60-70% range; only if you start considering a case with other gases removed can you push it up higher to the 90-95% Cortonin, wrongly, states are plausible. Cortonin is essentially trolling here: he is wasting everyones time on something that has been agreed on the page for ages William M. Connolley 11:52, 24 Mar 2005 (UTC)). This is all part of the maximise-water-vapour-and-so-minimise-CO2-and-thus-human-effects skeptic POV. The truth is that there are very few papers on this subject, for the very good reason that its not very interesting. Of those there are, the credible ones say 60-70%, and to his credit Cortonin has accepted this in the greenhouse gas article - its a shame that he can't accept it here.

It seems to me that this dispute is largely over content rather than user conduct (though the arbcomm may disagree). I suggest that we have two examples here - % of water vapour; and relevance of the mesospheric link - where we disagree very clearly. We could focus on these (and if only one, I would pick the WV example) in order to clarify the dispute, if that is needed.

[edit] Request for page move to WMC vs Cortonin

(William M. Connolley 20:22, 11 Apr 2005 (UTC)) This RFA was accepted subject to looking at both my behaviour and Cortonins. Therefore I think (and request) it should be moved to the A vs B style of naming that it used for such cases: otherwise it risks giving the impression that the case is only about me.

We all know it is not so I don't see much point either way. Nor do I care if it is moved - so long as the other arbs agree to a move or at least don't care. --mav 21:08, 13 Apr 2005 (UTC)
(William M. Connolley 19:42, 15 Apr 2005 (UTC)) OK, moved. I hope to find the template...
I believe it is the role of the arbcom to perform such a move, and not for yourself to do. The rules written at the top of the template state, "If you are a participant in the case or a third party, please don't try to refactor the page, let the Arbitrators do it." and "If something is put in the wrong place, please leave it for the arbitrators to move." — Cortonin | Talk 20:33, 15 Apr 2005 (UTC)
(William M. Connolley 20:38, 15 Apr 2005 (UTC)) I interpreted Mav's comment as an invitation to do it myself: the comment has been there for some time with no objections. I'm sure Mav will complain for himself if he wishes to, without you needing to help him. And of course, I have neither refactored the page nor moved things within it.

I'm fine with the move. --mav 13:28, 18 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Dispute continues

(William M. Connolley 21:38, 20 Apr 2005 (UTC)) Dear arbitrators, the disputes on the pages are continuing, perhaps getting worse (the re-appearence of Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/JonGwynne on Cortonins side hasn't helped). It would be desireable for some more progress in the case could be made. I apologise for pushing you, but I think something really needs to be done.

Sorry for the bad news, but: This case will take some time since we have not heard a case like it before. Injunctions would only apply to those people involved in this case, so that isn't a viable option either. --mav 04:05, 25 Apr 2005 (UTC)
(William M. Connolley 15:53, 25 Apr 2005 (UTC)) OK, I'd guessed you were finding this complex. Well, happy arbitrating.

[edit] Dispute continues 2

WMC and I seem to agree that a resolution would be helpful. There is a group (consisting of WMC, Vsmith, and occasionally Marco Krohn) which in the last week seems to have given up on compromise and discussion, and has simply been reverting without giving reasons, regardless of what edit is tried. It is difficult to do anything if we can't get them to discuss the matter, and can't get them to explain the merits of their reverts. In addition, I would appreciate if the resolution of this RfA contained some sort of clarification of the relationship between advocacy and NPOV, because this has become a rather significant problem on the climate pages. It would also be helpful if you issued a clarification regarding at what point it is desireable for editorial majority to override NPOV. Currently, the method being employed is to gather people together who support advocating a single POV, and formulate the articles to endorse that view. By my reading, the NPOV policy does not say, "whatever the majority of editors think the article should say, it should say," but instead, it expresses a specific style of writing such that nothing is endorsed, sources are not called "right" and "wrong", and everything is simply described in terms of the neutral things which can be attributed to sources. It seems it would be very helpful if you could clarify the mechanism by which NPOV is achieved, and these relationships between NPOV, the editorial majority opinion, objectivity, advocacy, and other related issues. This conflict runs deep, I think, and if these questions remain unanswered, I don't think the matter will be resolved. — Cortonin | Talk 00:16, 21 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Reply to Cortonin's view of the universe

Cortonin has made some rather serious and misleading charges here. And as he has included me in his gang of three I will reply. Cortonin has been insisting on his POV in this series of articles, although he always refers to his edits as NPOV of course. The various unfortunate revert wars he is involved in, and he is just as guilty as anyone, have intensified over the past few days. The intensification is largely due to the return of Cortonin's ally JonGwynne with his particularly abrasive edit style and POV pushing. I and the others named above usually do explain our edits over and over, but I must admit due to irritation with the apparent trolling edits of JonGwynne we have been more terse.

Now, Cortonin states sources are not called "right" and "wrong", however he does just that in his edits on Greenhouse effect and Solar greenhouse (technical) and of course his sources are right and ours are wrong. Of course he was not referring to that was he? He seems to hide behind "unencylopedic" claims quite often. He says we have given up on compromise which means that we don't buy his view of compromise. And we have discussed on and on and on...

He states everything is simply described in terms of the neutral things which can be attributed to sources. OK, but that does not mean to be totally gullible and give all sources equal treatment - there are lots of sources out there that are utter garbage, we all know that. So we do have to be selective about our sources and not give the trash equal treatment. And if sources are questionable it needs to be pointed out. Of course he would call that POV editing - we must accept all as equal - total NPOV means totally gullible. And of course Cortonin is quite selective about his sources - and oddly they all support his POV.

He calls for clarification of the relationship between advocacy and NPOV because he sees a significant problem on the climate pages. The POV pushing and advocacy of climate skeptics which he and JonGwynne are engaged in would of course not be what he is referring to. The climate pages give plenty of balance to the skeptic view, but it seems Cortonin thinks it should be 50/50 even though the skeptical view is in the minority within the science and is supported mainly by politicians , economists, journalists and bloggers.
I guess I've babbled enough for now :-) Vsmith 04:00, 21 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] A request for the Arbcom

Perhaps you could make more clear how this concept of the "accurate encyclopedia" is supposed to be different from a "true encyclopedia". — Cortonin | Talk 04:20, 26 Apr 2005 (UTC)

See the next section which says: "... the task is to represent the majority (scientific) view as the majority view and the minority (sometimes pseudoscientific) view as the minority view." Mixing data vetted through peer review with those stated by an author does not an accurate encyclopedia make. Each needs to be presented in context and correctly attributed and qualified. --mav 04:41, 17 May 2005 (UTC)
I agree with these things, but I would like to also draw attention to this section:
First, and most importantly, consider what it means to say that unbiased writing presents conflicting views without asserting them. Unbiased writing does not present only the most popular view; it does not assert the most popular view is correct after presenting all views; it does not assert that some sort of intermediate view among the different views is the correct one. Presenting all points of view says, more or less, that p-ists believe that p, and q-ists believe that q, and that's where the debate stands at present. Ideally, presenting all points of view also gives a great deal of background on who believes that p and q and why, and which view is more popular (being careful not to associate popularity with correctness). Detailed articles might also contain the mutual evaluations of the p-ists and the q-ists, allowing each side to give its "best shot" at the other, but studiously refraining from saying who won the exchange. -- NPOV
This principle of presenting conflicting views without asserting them, presenting things in an attributed and qualified fashion, and refraining from saying who won the exchange, is notably absent in the climate articles, and specifically, is aggressively fought against by WMC. This is the entire reason I brought this RfA before this committee, and the problem remains unaddressed. If Wikipedia continues to present climate controversy by asserting who has won the exchange, then I think a great failure to obtain NPOV has occurred in this RfA. In the past few months I have reverted nearly as much as, but less than, WMC. But if you examine the content of what has been contested carefully, I have been fighting for appropriate implementation of this passage, and he has been vehemently fighting against it. The passage on pseudoscience does not override the very definition of NPOV as presenting without asserting. — Cortonin | Talk 06:17, 17 May 2005 (UTC)
It troubles me greatly that the word "accurate" is being used here by the arbcom to mean "that which I think is true". And in fact, this defeats the entire point of Wikipedia. The most the word "accurate" should mean here is "properly representing and attributed to prominent sources". It should NOT assert an objective truth, and it should not say which source won the exchange, as to do so would be very much against NPOV. If you do anything at all in this RfA, fix the aggressive violations of that. — Cortonin | Talk 06:17, 17 May 2005 (UTC)

---

moved from WP:RfAr

[edit] Confirmation that all parties are aware of the request

[4]

[edit] Confirmation that other steps in dispute resolution have been tried

This is a continuation of an earlier case, and I see no indication that JG has moderated his behaviour since then.

This is not a continuation of another case, but simply another attempt by WMC to silence those who would challenge his extreme POV which undermines the credibility of the wikipedia articles on climate-change. Instead of being an objective discussion of the facts, they are simply IPCC propaganda. --JonGwynne 18:49, 22 May 2005 (UTC)

end of moved text -- sannse (talk) 18:47, 27 May 2005 (UTC)

[edit] The return of JonGwynne?

Have a look at [5]... now how does that remind you of? Now check that IPs contribs [6]... hmmm... climate change and automobiles... who does that remind you of? For example, on Mars, this [7]; also the Kyoto stuff.

So it looks like JG is back, breaking his 6 month ban, and no more sensible than before.

William M. Connolley 09:45, 25 September 2005 (UTC).

[edit] Enforcement updates?

The Enforcement section is empty. User:Cortonin and User:JonGwynne have not contributed for months; is that because were they blocked? Or did they voluntarily obey their bans? (SEWilco 07:59, 20 November 2005 (UTC))