Wikipedia talk:Neutral point of view/Archive 010

message: NPOV has an (extremely bizarre!) pseudo-democratic conception of fairness ("undue weight") which can easily be shown by the court analogy to be extremely (!!!!) unfair and biased. If we are to be genuinely fair, Each point of view should be given the same, exact, space for arguing its reasons, regardless of how popular it is. (Another approach is to give each viewpoint the same space on the main article, but allow it as much space as it needs on a different article, for example by using a Viewpoint: namespace)
: Often we hear the opposite claim: some people want to enforce what they claim to be the "scientific viewpoint", but which in practice is a minority suppression tool of groups who pull the strings. They think that Wikipedia should give no or almost no space to minority point of views. In practice, the current NPOV policy is a workable compromise by avoiding complete indoctrination without allowing Wikipedia's articles being overwhelmed by cranky views. Harald88 18:02, 15 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  See formulation below --80.230.233.101 09:46, 16 January 2006 (UTC)

text: This section is entirely wrong. Viewpoints *must* be weighted by popularity and acceptance. We don't give flat-earthers space on shape-of-the-earth articles; we don't give creationists space on the scientific discussion of evolution (in which context the appropriate test is scientific acceptance, not popularity in the general population of any one country...); we don't give global warming skeptics equal weight on global warming. William M. Connolley 12:20, 16 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: And for a more pointed example, we don't give race supremecists equal weight on the American Civil Rights Movement article. KillerChihuahua?!? 12:23, 16 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: But most unfairly, we don't give FSMers equal space anywhere! Seriously though, why don't we give global warming skeptics equal weight on global warming? This isn't holocaust revisionism, this a scientific matter with scientists on both sides. Stevage 18:46, 17 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: See formulation and comments below --80.230.233.101 20:56, 17 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Don't repress minority viewpoints!

message: On many fields (e.g. science!), appropriately informed experts comprise a tiny minority of the population. Viewpoints should be primarily presented and judged by their arguments and logic, not their popularity!
: ANd how should we organise the judging process, do you think?... Harald88 17:23, 17 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  judged - means judged by the reader, sorry for not being clear --80.230.233.101 21:07, 17 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: You misunderstand: us editors need to be able to judge what should be included long before the readers can judge what to believe. How should we do this?  — Saxifrage | ☎ 23:04, 17 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree, and that should be discussed separately. But remember that "fringe" views in very abstract fields (ie philosophy) or difficult (physics) are bound to stay "minority" within the general population. Using "minority view" as euphemism for "a view that doesn't sound reasonable to wikipedia's editors" is very misleading and dishonest on the policy level. (see also my response above) --84.228.107.148 17:11, 19 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: A viewpoint's quantification simply doesn't matter!

message: An important point brought up is that the current style policy deals mainly with factually presenting opinions. Thus mocks Wikipedia's claim for being primarily an educational "encyclopedia" rather than a populist "culture blog" which deals with popular opinions.
--80.230.233.101 12:35, 15 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  Like Taxman said, it seems as though you are trying to complain about as much as you can just for the sake of it. Try to precisely state your single biggest concern and maybe we can find a solution. Bensaccount 15:58, 15 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  Please look at the example formulation below --80.230.233.101 09:46, 16 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Expository writing, not persuasive writing

message: ===Wikipedia's editorial policy===
(Note: this is only a short example!)
A general principle: As an encyclopedia, wikipedia's purpose is to educate and convey knowledge. Articles should be written in an expository manner and present verifiable and referenced facts.
An article in wikipedia is comprised of two distinct conceptual parts:
1. Illustration: In this part, the subject should be defined, presented, and elaborated, with an informative and uncritical language. Concepts and assumptions that are native and essential for its exposition are presented from the subject's perspective. 
For example: An article about "quark" should adopt a scientific perspective which is useful for the understanding of quarks. "Reincarnation" should be written from a religious or spiritual perspective that allows understanding the subject and its concepts within its proper context.
2. Interpretation: An important part of human knowledge is the interpretation and evaluation of ideas. Wikipedia aims for fairness in its presentation of viewpoints, allowing competing viewpoints an equal space; An article may also contain relevant viewpoints, with accordance to the following requirements:
:Relevant: viewpoints should be specifically relevant to the subject and provide an additional outlook on it.
:Informed, rather than stated: viewpoints should be informed about, rather than stated, with an appropriate reference to a more comprehensive treatment.
:[community decided filter here]
	
[An article which is already written in this manner (which is IMO excellent) is Myers-Briggs Type Indicator: note the useful, uncritical, perspective, and the informative "Skeptical view" section in its bottom.]
--80.230.233.101 09:46, 16 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Some clarifications: by "specificaly relevant" it is meant that the viewpoint does not actually refer to a larger issue. For example: a viewpoint about "Global warming" that is based on nonscientific reasoning, actually refers to the scientific method, this is not made clear in the example, I know. --80.230.233.101 20:53, 17 January 2006 (UTC)

text: This is wikinfos article policy. Please edit there. Kim Bruning 19:38, 17 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  This has nothing to do with wikinfo's policy. This is not about "sympathetic viewpoint", it's about being informative and noncritical - both positively and negatively, in the illustration part, and being critical at the interpretation part. It's not that simplistic. --80.230.233.101 21:00, 17 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: An example formulation

message: (Note: this is only a short example!)
A general principle: As an encyclopedia, wikipedia's purpose is to educate and convey knowledge. Articles should be written in an expository manner and present verifiable and referenced facts.
An article in wikipedia is comprised of two distinct conceptual parts:
1. Illustration: In this part, the subject should be defined, presented, and elaborated, with an informative and uncritical language. Concepts and assumptions that are native and essential for its exposition are presented from the subject's perspective. 
For example: An article about "quark" should adopt a scientific perspective which is useful for the understanding of quarks. "Reincarnation" should be written from a religious or spiritual perspective that allows understanding the subject and its concepts within its proper context.
2. Interpretation: An important part of human knowledge is the interpretation and evaluation of ideas. Wikipedia aims for fairness in its presentation of viewpoints, allowing competing viewpoints an equal space; An article may also contain relevant viewpoints, with accordance to the following requirements:
:Relevant: viewpoints should be specifically relevant to the subject and provide an additional outlook on it.
:Informed, rather than stated: viewpoints should be informed about, rather than stated, with an appropriate reference to a more comprehensive treatment.
:[community decided filter here]
	
[An article which is already written in this manner (which is IMO excellent) is Myers-Briggs Type Indicator: note the useful, uncritical, perspective, and the informative "Skeptical view" section in its bottom.]
--80.230.233.101 09:46, 16 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Some clarifications: by "specificaly relevant" it is meant that the viewpoint does not actually refer to a larger issue. For example: a viewpoint about "Global warming" that is based on nonscientific reasoning, actually refers to the scientific method, this is not made clear in the example, I know. --80.230.233.101 20:53, 17 January 2006 (UTC)

text: This is wikinfos article policy. Please edit there. Kim Bruning 19:38, 17 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  This has nothing to do with wikinfo's policy. This is not about "sympathetic viewpoint", it's about being informative and noncritical - both positively and negatively, in the illustration part, and being critical at the interpretation part. It's not that simplistic. --80.230.233.101 21:00, 17 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Wikipedia's editorial policy

message: Consider the following section.  As far as I can see, in this section people keep indenting until it makes no sense to continue. As a consequence, the decision to go back to the margin seems unrelated to the logical content. This section would not require  so many indents, if indents were only used for comments that break the normal flow.  Moreover, in this example, the readers cannot easily distinguish the comments that have been indented because they break the normal flow from other comments.  I would like to know where in WP this kind of issues should be pointed out. I put it here because it does apply to this talk page, but would like to mention this small technical point in a more appropriate location, and only keep a wikilink here.  --Lumiere 16:22, 18 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Small technical point about use of indents in this talk page 

message: I have an example of suppression of information and I am not sure how the NPOV policy applies to this example. It is a genuine question about the NPOV policy, not a way to replace a Rfc. However, I think one must look at the case Talk:Natasha Demkina before one can answer the question. It is about an experiment/TV show to evaluate whether or not a young girl, Demkina, has an X-ray vision to see inside human bodies. 
She had a score in the test that could only be obtained with probability 1/50, but this was not enough to "pass the test". There is one side that says that the experiment was not well designed and the arguments, I believe, were originally presented by a Cambridge physicist Brian Josephson in his web site. There is the other side which is represented by two skeptic organizations that regroup respected scientists. The current article suppresses the original article by Brian Josephson and replaces it by an article by a journalist in some independent magazine. This article presents some of the points of Brian Josephson, but it first discredits him as being "scorned by his colleague for his enthousiasm for the paranormal" and only have nice words for the other side such as "key member", "respected", etc.  
Is this a valid suppression of information? This is a genuine question about the NPOV policy because there is the fact that Brian Josephson has only posted his article in  some Cambridge his personal website without any refeering process. Note that there was no refeering process at all for the whole thing. The experiment itself was published in a non peer-reviewed magazine that belongs to one of the skeptic organizations. So none of the sides has sent anything to an independent peer-review process. --Lumiere 01:33, 19 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I now have no time to look into this, but it may be useful to compare it with the proposed examples of POV Wikipedia:information_suppression. -- Harald88 10:06, 19 January 2006 (UTC)

text: I already read the main page, this entire talk page (not the archives) and followed most links, including the one you just suggested, but did not find the answer to my question. The problem is that NPOV does not discuss much its connection with WP:verifiability, which states that personal web page are not acceptable. --Lumiere 20:09, 19 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Example of suppression of information 

message: One idea I came up with for possibly improving or at least bolstering the existing NPOV policy would be to place a disclaimer either on the front of the site, or automatically via template on each entry stating that, although policy is used to keep the quality of articles as high as possible, because of the dynamic nature of the site, it is unrealistic to expect that it will at all times have the same degree of editorial quality and objectivity as a conventional encyclopedia.
I personally believe that the ambition for this site to have the same degree of quality and factual accuracy as a print encyclopedia is entirely unrealistic anyway, if for no other reason than the nature of the technology itself. That however is not to say that this site cannot still be immensely useful and valuable...it already is, and will doubtless continue to be. I am also not necessarily suggesting that the maintainers adopt a lower standard, either; rather simply that readers be informed of the magnitude of the difficulty involved in attempting to maintain said standard on a constant basis.
Edit: I just noticed the disclaimer link at the bottom of the page; about no guarantee of validity etc. That's more or less exactly what I had in mind...but the disclaimer link a bit more prominently might be good.
Petrus4 04:00, 22 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Possible improvement idea