Talk:Brian Leiter

message: There is current somewhat of an edit war occuring on Brian Leiter as a result of some referenced, but not academic, material being added that criticises the subject of the article.  I have done a little Googling and there seems to be a fair body of people critical of Brian Leiter.  Can someone more familiar with philosophy review the available material and if appropriate post a suitably referenced and WP:NPOV criticism section?
The following may help:
(Redacted)
Lineslarge (talk) 21:32, 20 February 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: The edit war appears to be created mostly from Chicago IPs, including one registered to the University of Chicago, and a single-purpose account that bears an extraordinary similarity in name to one of Leiter's colleagues. This pattern (as I learned following an IPs recommendation to look into the archives) has been going on for a while. It is my suspicion, as well as the suspicion of past editors, that the article's subject himself, and his colleagues, are participating in the maintenance of the content to suit a specific POV, which would be a clear conflict of interest as well as intellectual dishonesty. I'll post at some relevant WikiProjects to see if extra eyes can't be brought over. Regards, Cyphoidbomb (talk) 21:43, 20 February 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: Yeah, I saw that too and think it seems pretty plausible that edits are being reverted by someone with a WP:COI.  Currently though the article says nothing negative about the subject.  If there is something valid to say, I suggest we get consensus here before adding it, then we can collectively ensure the article stays WP:NPOV, Lineslarge (talk) 21:51, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

text: *At the present time I am not going to fully protect this page, but I would encourage all editors present to act with care, paying careful attention to our core content policies, and preferably reaching consensus on the inclusion or exclusion of content before editing the article itself.  I would suggest that it may be a good idea for interested editors to work together on a new draft of the article (or portions of the article) in a sandbox if they feel it's necessary, although obviously that's up to you all.  I would encourage you not to worry a significant amount about COI/sock/meat issues at the present time; I'm pursuing a chain of conversations that I believe will deal with a lot of the potential problems with that regard.  I would also encourage editors to stick to using high quality reliable sources and to pay special care to WP:NPOV.  Best, Kevin Gorman (talk) 01:49, 21 February 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: Hi  I found this article while checking up on the list of Pending Changes in my capacity as a reviewer, so I don't have a perspective on this subject one way or another. What quickly became clear was that sourced information had been added, then removed by a Chicago IP with insufficient reason, then re-removed by another questionable IP, then a questionable SPA sprang up and removed the content, as did another infrequent (though autoconfirmed) eidtor. Then going back through the talk page history it appeared that this has been an ongoing practice by individuals close to the subject, and/or by the subject himself. I filed a Sockpuppet investigation as I would do in any similarly compelling case of suspected sock/meatpuppetry. I'm disclosing that to you in the interest of openness and to invite you to participate. The situation that you are describing is not one that I am aware of experiencing before in my general antivandal work. On the one hand, if there's clear evidence of sock/meatpuppetry (which I believe there is here per WP:DUCK), a record of that suspicion should exist so that if there are future violations, editors know what they're dealing with. I don't think that's unreasonable considering the previous accusations of socking in the top secret version of the talk page archives.  On the other hand, since blocks aren't meant to be punitive, rather to dissuade improper use of Wikipedia, I have no inherent interest in blocking IPs or users if you feel that your personal influence can persuade them to contribute constructively to the project and perhaps to steer clear of COI issues. If you have the ears of the interested parties, you might mention that the preferred method for dealing with such changes is to disclose conflict of interest and to use the  template on the article's talk page. If I can be of any other help, please let me know. I don't want you to think that I'm your antagonist (and so far I don't get the impression that you do.) I also don't like to think that I might be an unwitting accomplice in an attempt to denigrate another person. Regards, Cyphoidbomb (talk) 03:26, 21 February 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: I'll make some comments on the SPI in a moment. I certainly wouldn't suggest that there haven't been COI (and potentially sock) issues on this page in the past, but will state that I'm fairly confident that they won't be an issue in the future. Kevin Gorman (talk) 05:04, 21 February 2014 (UTC)

text: Just be careful about recentism. It's often tempting with living persons to give disproportionate attention to disputes that they are currently involved in, or have recently been involved in, compared to what may be long and varied careers. Often, much of what is currently on the internet will relate to such topical disputes. But whatever Leiter is notable for, it's not the current controversy going on, with all sorts of accusations on both sides. If you do write about it, try to find neutral and reliable secondary sources, rather than trying to synthesise a story from primary sources. If the dispute ends up with cancellation of his Philosophical Gourmet or with him handing it over to someone else, that will be an important thing to record. But meanwhile, try not to get caught up in the rights and wrongs, or in the details, of a dispute that is still unfolding for a living person. Metamagician3000 (talk) 07:19, 1 October 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: I support the toning down and pruning.  I also support the merger, FWIW.  Since the controversy appears to only concern the Gourmet Report, a section on the Gourmet Report could incorporate a more balanced version of the controversy.  Philosophy_Junkie   — Preceding undated comment added 14:12, 28 May 2015 (UTC)

text: I looked at it carefully, and it comports with our BLP section, and the tone matches that of the RSs. There isn't anything substantive that I can see deleting without deleting what the RSs report on and we properly in turn reflect. PhilisophyWiki is an SPA that has just been created, in an article plagued for a long time by sockpuppets (just read the talk page) and SPAs (just read Junkie's talk page), so its opinion should be discounted accordingly. Epeefleche (talk) 07:47, 1 June 2015 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree with Sneekypat, Philosophy Wiki, Philosophy Junkie, and Metamagician3000.  The article as it currently stands gives disproportionate weight to recent controversies about tone rather than substance.  A third of the article is basically devoted to saying that some people think Leiter is rude.  Criticisms of tone are getting more space than any discussion about the substance of his scholarship. He's had a 30+ year career in academe.  Academe is full of argumentative people who think they're the smartest folks on earth and everyone else is an idiot.  Saying he's rude is like complaining that a rock concert is loud.  At most his rudeness deserves a single sentence in a criticism section, and most of the criticism section should cite to academic sources that have critiqued the substance of his views.  Academics love arguing with each other, so it should not be hard to find other philosophers who disagrees with Leiter on philosophical substance and fill most of the criticism section with substance, and with a minor mention of tone.   The issues of tone do not belong in a paragraph in the headliner. Wikaeditor (talk) 01:15, 25 June 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  Controversy 

message: I accepted the latest revision by an IP, which removed claims sourced to a blog. I'm surprised this has been allowed to remain in the article, and I'm not going to reference RS, etc. Blogs are overwhelmingly not reliable. Please find some other source for all that. §FreeRangeFrogcroak 19:10, 27 October 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  Criticism, etc 

message: This page suffers from a serious lack of WP:RS sources. Much of it is either unsourced or sourced to blogs/other primary references. I know the individual is quite notable, so instead of removing content, I have generally just added improvement notifications such that the article can be worked on over time. If it was left as is though, I'd be tempted to AFD it, but think this is a softer step at this time.Jeremy112233 (Lettuce-jibber-jabber?) 02:32, 17 April 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  Lack of sources 

message: As there has already in the past been concern about COI editing on this page, it is worth noting that a complete newbie editor seems to be editing in accord with the past suspected COI editor, and also even though completely new has somehow come to track this page and the page that is being asked to be merged into it. They were also created the same day as another editor with similarly focused edits. This bears watching. See that newbie editor's comments here, as well as his chest-beating as to the subject of this article being a respected person in his blog-like very long postings  here. --Epeefleche (talk) 21:07, 24 May 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  COI editor 

message: There appears to be no support for merging the Gourmet Report entry with the entry on the subject.  I think the Gourmet Report deserves its own entry, given its prominent place in academic philosophy for 25 years, as evidenced by the many refs that Epeefleche and others have added.  I suggest that the current controversy section be merged into the Gourmet Report entry, since it centers around the subject's role (or former role) in that Report.  Opinions of other editors?  Thank you.Philosophy Junkie (talk) 14:30, 20 June 2015 (UTC)
replies: text: It may be that that will be the ultimate result.  But on what basis do you assert that "there appears to be no support for merging"? And, in any event, the controversy that you continue to seek to whitewash -- you as an editor who emails the subject of this article, and whose initial substantive edits have been to his article -- the controversy of course of great moment both to him and to the report article. Epeefleche (talk) 03:30, 22 June 2015 (UTC)
replies: text:  To the extent that it makes a difference, I've changed my mind on merger.  To be clear, I am against merger of the two articles generally, and also against merging the controversy section of this article with the PGR article.  I think they probably do belong separately at this point as Leiter is being replaced as editor of PGR and the ranking seems to still have cache with academic philosophers. The controversy about Leiter should probably be mentioned in both entries, but I'd like to leave exactly how long and how phrased such mentions ought to be to discussions specific to each article/section. Sneekypat (talk) 16:49, 22 June 2015 (UTC)
replies: text: @Sneeky -- I understand your view on merging the two articles, and can see the points on both sides on that issue. As Leiter's role has been reduced, and apparently is to be further reduced, the argument strengthens to keep them as two articles. I also agree with you that should the articles remain separate, it would not be appropriate to merge the controversy section of this article with the PGR article. The controversy is highly relevant to both him (it related to his behavior, and removed him from a highlighted position in his career), and to the report (it resulted in a change in leadership of the report, which formerly was called the Leiter Report, reflecting his imprint on it and connection with it). Epeefleche (talk) 22:52, 23 June 2015 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree that the case for merging is not very strong, so I think we should focus on revising the recent controversy, so it does not dominate the article.Philosophy Junkie (talk) 02:21, 24 June 2015 (UTC)
replies: text: As an editor with an email correspondence with the subject of this article, and one whose edits have been highly of the "whitewash" variety, I fear your comments and edits are often not appropriate.  You keep -- both in edits and comments -- on trying to whitewash the RS-supported information in this article that Leiter himself may prefer not be here.  He may be your email buddy, but you have a conflict of interest here.  Please stop trying to whitewash this article. Epeefleche (talk) 04:00, 24 June 2015 (UTC)
thread_title: Merging controversy section with Philosophical Gourmet Report entry?

message: *Brian Leiter is a controversial but in fact quite influential philosopher.  It is likely (by which I mean it was previously directly confirmed) that some of the pro-Leiter edits have come from academics affiliated with Leiter in one or another.  It is also likely (by which I mean it was previously directly confirmed) that some of the anti-Leiter edits came from academics with negative views of Leiter.  Neither liking nor hating Leiter invalidates your editing as long as long as you follow WP:NPOV etc.
*It is fairly obvious (I've found at least one such post) that some editors recently drawn to this article were done so by calls-to-action from outside groups.  It's worth noting these calls-to-action rarely have lasting effect regardlesss the subject.  This has included sock and meatpuppeting in the past.
*At least one serious instance of attempted WP:OUTING occurred here in the relatively distant past.  If you even think you may be violating outing, email me asking about the material beforehand.  If I find you to have maliciously attempted to violate WP:OUTING here I'm basically infinity banning you.
*This page will be edited according to standard Wikipedia policies.  Sourcing discussion will follow WP:RS.  WP:RSN is that way if you need it.  Neutrality discussions will likewise be grounded in policy - WP:NPOV/N is thataway if you need it.  And, again, it doesn't inherently matter if a source is pro- or anti- Leiter, we don't weight sources by how well they like (or hate) their subjects.
*Discussion on this page will remain relatively civil, you can disagree without resorting to personal attacks.  Unless someone else brings it up somewhere, I will probably be the person enforcing it.
*I probably missed some significant points.  That doesn't mean that policy I didn't explicitly mention doesn't apply here.
*I am an administrator.  I have had some past involvement in this page, but not to a level that I feel violates WP:INVOLVED.  This is going off memory, but I think I made a minor removal of what was basically vandalism at Leiter's request (I'm involved enough in academic philosophy and Wikipedia, that yes, he apparently had my email - though I may have emailed him previously since I use the Leiter Report as a limited source occasionally.)  I've also semiprotected this page on at least one occasion after repeated vandalism.  Despite these paste interactions, I don't think I fall as involved and intend to act as an uninvolved administrator and general neutral mediator on this page as I have the time. Kevin Gorman (talk) 01:09, 25 June 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  Summary of what's going on 

message: In the 3rd paragraph of the "controversies" section, it states " including 30 members of his 54-member Advisory Board, signed a statement in 2014 that demanded that Leiter relinquish control over the Report's management". Looking at the sources cited, it appears that both the numbers of members and the desired result differ from the sources given. I'm proposing this just in case I'm missing something here. Mdann52 (talk) 20:50, 6 July 2015 (UTC)
replies: text: Good spot!  I knew that Epeefleche was misrepresenting the sources, but missed the fact that he misrepresented the numbers on the Advisory Board.Philosophy Junkie (talk) 01:48, 8 July 2015 (UTC)

text: Do I now have permission (especially from @Philosophy_Junkie WP:OWN) to edit the number from 24 to 30 /54 (aka a majority) and from 175 to "close to 300"? 24.217.247.41 (talk) 01:53, 2 August 2019 (UTC)

text: it appeared to be there when I added it, I've removed the tag now. Mdann52 (talk) 10:09, 17 July 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  Discrepancy between source and article 

message: 1. Apparent whitewashing of the controversial behaviors and critical depictions of Brian Leiter from this wikipedia page. 
:Examples include unexplained deletion of Controversy section and unexplained deletion of "Leiter is among the more controversial voices in the philosophical blogosphere, and he has come in for criticism for both his communication style and for comments he has made to other philosophers.http://chronicle.com/article/The-Man-Who-Ranks-Philosophy/149007/" https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Brian_Leiter&diff=prev&oldid=677240911, unexplained deletion of "and Controversy" from section header https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Brian_Leiter&diff=next&oldid=718331461, deletion of "..."Those whom Leiter finds wanting are deemed "morons" or "zombies" or "demonstrably incompetent."..." https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Brian_Leiter&diff=next&oldid=344062750, deletion of "controversial" https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php? title=Brian_Leiter&diff=next&oldid=346286834,  deletion of "... Hunter Baker... alleging Leiter was "attacking" both a student writer and "academic freedom."https://web.archive.org/web/20070222120336/https://www.nationalreview.com/comment/baker200403150909.asp https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Brian_Leiter&diff=prev&oldid=102004087, among others. 
::The subject called someone a "moron" on his blog, and you think that is notable?  A 2004 opinion piece in NRO?  This bio already gives too much attention to the trival 2014 controversy about the PGR and spins it in a way too critical of the subject.  Read some other entries on philosophers for perspective about what matters and what does not.71.105.133.121 (talk) 17:25, 6 August 2019 (UTC)
replies: text: User 71, what these edits show is a pattern of deleting information critical of the subject, with little to no explanation, that I find concerning. Thank you for your suggestion re perspective. Here's one philosopher I found with a substantial "controversy" section for 1 incident from 2004: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Francis_J._Beckwith#Controversy. (In fact, I wonder if this page should have similar notices to that of Beckwith's talk page.) Here's a BLP that includes a criticism section for the subject's comments in an op-ed: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Singer#Criticism. Here's another scientist with an extensive section for his potentially 'racist' comments: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Watson#Comments_on_race. It seems sections on controversial actions for BLPs are not out of the ordinary. So, again, I propose that this philosopher should also have a "Reception/Criticisms/Controversy" section in line with what other BLPs have, since the 2014 protest is only tangentially related to PGR in that his resignation happened as a result of a protest to his online behavior toward another professor. 24.217.247.41 (talk) 07:30, 8 August 2019 (UTC)
replies: text: There has been extensive discussion of edits to this page, some now archived.  Much material, both positive and negative, has been deleted over the years, and much critical material has been added, including by me in response to 24's earlier suggestions.   It's not in my opinion a good use of time to rehash old debates from the Talk pages.   Also, 2014 protest was directly related to PGR, it called for the subject to step down as editor and threatened not to participate in the PGR otherwise.  We should discuss whether to add a subheading about criticisms/controversy to the section of the entry on rankings.  I think that is appropriate, but would like to hear from others before doing so. Philosophy Junkie (talk) 22:48, 9 August 2019 (UTC)
replies: text: These criticisms are trivial, they do not deserve their own section.  A brief word about the PGR controversies is justifiable, but there is already too much about them as is.71.105.133.121 (talk) 13:24, 15 August 2019 (UTC)
thread_title: Summary of Issues with this page

message: * I'm a bit concerned with all of the talk page comment refactoring that's been going on and by all of the attempts to reorganise everything. Most discussions don't need this type of card shuffling, so I hope you've all finally gotten the talk page to a place where you feel discussion can resume again. Please remember that it's generally considered unfavorable to refactor other editors' comments, and with the exception of a few indentations here and there, we probably shouldn't be so fastidious with the organisation. Confusion sometimes happens, and sometimes it's better just to slap an  template down and start from the far left. When in doubt, see WP:TPG. Cyphoidbomb (talk) 04:04, 5 August 2019 (UTC)
replies: text: Hi Cyphoid, I was only following the lead of the other users. The only reason I moved the responses was because Philosophy Junkie praised User:204.2.36.120 for copying and pasting his reply from the original section to a new section (which already had a dozen responses to it). I was just going to copy & paste my reply to him, but it seemed more fair to just copy and paste the replies all the users had already made to him/her. 24.217.247.41 (talk) 00:17, 7 October 2019 (UTC)
thread_title:  Talk page comment refactoring and all of the recent tidying up