Talk:The Art of Seeing

message: I think it may be best to give balanced reporting of both sides, and to try to be as non POV as possible.
The fact that Huxley's vision was not normal in 1952, or that he may have had a relapse, may not be conclusive proof that his vision did not benefit at all.  Many stroke victims, for example, practice physiotherapy, sometimes for long periods.  It is generally accepted that some do benefit from their physiotherapy, though many, if not most, remain disabled for life, particularly if they had suffered a major stroke.
http://www.directionjournal.com/vision/gauld.html
See also
http://www.iblindness.org/forum/index.php?topic=52.0
It is also quite possible for some to benefit from a treatment, while others do not; while some of the latter, may nevertheless fake improvement.
Roo60 00:06, 12 March 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I think you need to include some evidence for the assertation that he suffered a relapse in his vision. Otherwise its just supposition. Famousdog 16:57, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

message: I removed the following:
Huxley, however, had only claimed that the Bates method improved his eyesight,
 
and he was nearly blind to begin with.''
Because, the claim that the Bates method can improve vision is very contentious (see the Bates method page!), and labelling it "only improvement" is not only POV, but is a strong statement in support of the Bates method. Finally, Huxley's claim of improvement is the whole point of the book, so citing the book in an article about the book in order to show that Huxley said what he said in the book is a bit circular! Famousdog 14:45, 5 September 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: What this meant was that Huxley had not claimed that the Bates method made his vision normal, only better than the nearly-blind that it had been.  I don't think its POV to state what an author wrote, and Huxley certainly thought this method worked.  Without this cite, the whole article is an obscure anecdote to claim that the book is false.  Maybe it can be rephrased?  --Karuna8 17:59, 5 September 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I understand that Huxley wasn't claiming that the Bates method had made his vision perfect. But, as I said, the claim that the Bates method has any effect whatsoever upon vision is very contentious indeed and there is plenty of evidence to suggest that it does not improve vision at all. Saying that it had "only improved" his vision rather than "perfected" it is still a very controversial statement. I will try to re-word the section. Famousdog 13:49, 11 September 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Removal of material 

message: :I think the best answer is to condense the content of this article and merge it into Aldous Huxley. I suggest it be merged there rather than into Bates method because imo the Bates method article's current discussion of Huxley's case is very good, with appropriate detail, balance, and length of quotations, sticking mostly to the points which secondary sources emphasize. And there may be a bit more latitude in the Aldous Huxley article to report on his views. PSWG1920 (talk) 09:27, 27 September 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: Huxley is an important writer. About half of his books have separate articles and it is clear from the use of redlinks that the consensus amongst his editors is that in due course they all should. There is no reason to make an exception here just because someone doesn't like the book's content. SamuelTheGhost (talk) 11:35, 28 September 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: You may be right. I recently came to the conclusion that Wikipedia is trying to be too many things other than an encyclopedia, and consequently has become way too bloated in terms of the number of articles, and that affected my thinking here. PSWG1920 (talk) 19:16, 28 September 2009 (UTC)
thread_title: Merge?