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Talk:On the Origin of Species/Archive 7

< Talk:On the Origin of Species
Latest comment: 5 years ago by Humanengr in topic A Darwin misread of Wallace re female trimorphism in butterflies? — request for confirmation
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WP:TFA

Latest comment: 7 years ago12 comments4 people in discussion

I'm thinking about rerunning this one at WP:TFA on its anniversary on November 24. Thoughts? Has the article held up well over the years? - Dank (push to talk) 19:36, 14 August 2017 (UTC)

Btw, the linkchecker found 5 or 6 dead links. See WP:Link rot for some helpful tips and tools. - Dank (push to talk) 22:37, 14 August 2017 (UTC)
This is a great idea, Dank, but… unfortunately, the article cites fake news which is obviously inappropriate for featured articles. Past attempts at removal has led to much frustration, but it’s time to try again, because OTOOS is the most important publication in the biological sciences. --Stan Giesbrecht (talk) 03:41, 20 August 2017 (UTC)
Hi Stan, this edit summary indicates you're being unreasonably pedantic – "fake news" doesn't refer to scholarly publications that make a point you disagree with, that CD uses race in the way we'd commonly use varieties. I've added sources to clarify this point. . . dave souza, talk 12:27, 28 August 2017 (UTC)
No, Dave, I’m not disagreeing with your point that Darwin used race and variety in a similar fashion. That’s not the problem here, as you well know. I’ve pointed out many times that the problem at hand is the citing of passages which explicitly claim that Darwin never referred to human races in OTOOS given that we all agree that he did. Would you cite a passage that claims 2+2=5? Why build a house on quicksand? Have we entered the Twilight Zone where up is down and black is white? And since we are on the topic of fake news, why did you repost your nonsense about something intending “to signify relevance to the moral debates of the time” when you know it has no contact with reality? Thanks --Stan Giesbrecht (talk) 06:01, 1 September 2017 (UTC)
How is an Edward Elgar–published book "news" (be it "fake" or otherwise)? 142.160.131.202 (talk) 20:37, 17 September 2017 (UTC)
Ha ha, well, I don’t care what you call it, so long as we aren’t citing passages explicitly claiming that Darwin never referred to human races in OTOOS, because, of course, the book clearly referred to human races. Any kind of fraudulent information should get a proper response. --Stan Giesbrecht (talk) 07:07, 18 September 2017 (UTC)
Of what relevance is your link to that post on Twitter made by Donald Trump? 142.160.131.202 (talk) 03:33, 22 September 2017 (UTC)
It’s no secret that Darwin referred to human race in OTOOS: it’s listed in the index and it’s something Darwin mentioned in his introduction to TDOM. Anyone passing themselves off as informed on Darwin would know this, especially if they are writing or publishing a book on the topic. So when so-called academics try claiming that Darwin never referred to human race at all, then the tweet represents a metaphor for how Wikipedians should persevere in getting rid of fake news, because the reliability of Wikipedia will reflect that of the sources cited. To let this slide is to build a house on quicksand. --Stan Giesbrecht (talk) 03:05, 3 October 2017 (UTC)
Thanks for agreeing that Darwin used race and variety in a similar manner, in the biological sense of race: we can start from there. Desmond & Moore (2009) covers the other issues, worth expanding. . dave souza, talk 08:18, 16 September 2017 (UTC)
Dave, why don’t we start with what we actually have agreed here – that Darwin used the terms race and variety in a similar manner – without putting more words in anyone’s mouth. With respect to the book by Desmond and Moore that you refer, Darwin’s Sacred Cause, well, their main assertion is that Darwin only discovered the theory of evolution because he opposed slavery. There is no evidence to support such a claim. Darwin wrote many things in contradiction of that position. It is so completely and utterly bat-shit crazy it’s hard to know how to respond. Call it fake news or fake whatever you want, that’s not important. But what is important is to recognize that Desmond and Moore saying something is true doesn’t guarantee that it actually is. The moral of the story here is that we need to be vigilant, using common sense, and when it smells like someone is pushing a POV, to take appropriate action. --Stan Giesbrecht (talk) 07:09, 18 September 2017 (UTC)
Dweller has requested that we rerun this one on the 160th anniversary, 2 years from this November ... does that work for everyone? (It previously ran on the 150th anniversary.) - Dank (push to talk) 14:40, 25 August 2017 (UTC)
Latest comment: 7 years ago2 comments2 people in discussion

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Checked over, no problems found. . dave souza, talk 10:04, 17 October 2017 (UTC)
Latest comment: 7 years ago2 comments2 people in discussion

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Checked over, no problems found. .. dave souza, talk 10:05, 17 October 2017 (UTC)

Recent edits: time to publish, and meanings of 'race'

Latest comment: 7 years ago16 comments2 people in discussion

In a long series of edits, Stan introduced a superfluous paragraph of original research, repeating context of the "time to publish" which is already covered above with secondary sources, and returned to editing the meaning of "races", pushing a pov by attributing widely held scholarly opinion to individuals, and deleting some sources. I've gone back to where he started, and I've copyedited it, adding additional sources and modifying the wording accordingly. I've also put back in a quote from Sober which Stan added, with more context from Sober's article to avoid a misleading impression of Sober's focus. . .dave souza, talk 12:17, 28 August 2017 (UTC)

Other sources which may be of use:
  • Richard Dawkins (22 September 2009). The Greatest Show on Earth: The Evidence for Evolution. Simon and Schuster. pp. 62–. ISBN 978-1-4165-9778-0.
  • Richard Dawkins; Yan Wong (16 December 2010). The Ancestor's Tale: A Pilgrimage to the Dawn of Life. Orion. pp. 154–. ISBN 978-0-297-86541-4.
  • Mark Isaak (2007). The Counter-Creationism Handbook. University of California Press. pp. 5–. ISBN 978-0-520-24926-4.
  • Michael Banton (25 September 2014). Ethnic and Racial Consciousness. Taylor & Francis. pp. 49–. ISBN 978-1-317-88540-5.
These could be used for some expansion of the section, but at this stage I don't think that's needed. . . dave souza, talk 12:46, 28 August 2017 (UTC)
1. Dave, in this edit you post something about “social construct” blah blah blah. Where is your sourcing for that? Oh, none of your sources say anything about that? So this is based on your own initiative? Doesn’t Wikipedia have a term for this kind of research? It seems to me I’ve heard the term before.
2. You also asserted here that inline attribution is somehow inappropriate, when, in fact, Wikipedia requires such attribution in situations where there are sources pushing different points of view. Your post in the WP:TFA section above refers to Desmond and Moore’s book, Darwin’s Sacred Cause, which claims that Darwin discovered evolution by opposing slavery (didn’t Darwin really learned about evolution from the talking unicorns he met on the Galapagos Islands?), so they are definitely pushing their own POV.
3. Richard Dawkins is also pushing his anti-group selection POV in your link above to The Greatest Show on Earth. In doing so, Dawkins grossly mischaracterized what Darwin said about classification, writing:
"Don’t be misled by the ill-chosen and unfortunate subtitle of Darwin’s great book: The preservation of favoured races in the struggle for life. It is abundantly clear from the text itself that Darwin didn’t mean races in the sense of ‘A group of people, animals, or plants, connected by common descent or origin’ (Oxford English Dictionary, definition 6.I). Rather, he intended something more like the OED’s definition 6.II: ‘A group or class of people, animals, or things, having some common feature or features’. An example of sense 6.II would be ‘All those individuals (regardless of their geographical race) who have blue eyes’." (Dawkins, 2009, p.62)
4. In fact, Darwin explicitly rejected methods of classification that were based on common characterises in Chapter XIII, holding that “Descent always used in classification”. Here are some excerpts (of many) from the chapter utterly contradicting Dawkins’ claim above (put in a collapsed box, which I’m not sure works with mobile apps):
OTOOS, pp.422-424
Thus, on the view which I hold, the natural system is genealogical in its arrangement, like a pedigree; … It may be worth while to illustrate this view of classification, by taking the case of languages. If we possessed a perfect pedigree of mankind, a genealogical arrangement of the races of man would afford the best classification of the various languages now spoken throughout the world; and if all extinct languages, and all intermediate and slowly changing dialects, had to be included, such an arrangement would, I think, be the only possible one. … The origin of the existence of groups subordinate to groups, is the same with varieties as with species, namely, closeness of descent with various degrees of modification. Nearly the same rules are followed in classifying varieties, as with species. Authors have insisted on the necessity of classing varieties on a natural instead of an artificial system; we are cautioned, for instance, not to class two varieties of the pine-apple together, merely because their fruit, though the most important part, happens to be nearly identical; … In classing varieties, I apprehend if we had a real pedigree, a genealogical classification would be universally preferred; … If it could be proved that the Hottentot had descended from the Negro, I think he would be classed under the Negro group, however much he might differ in colour and other important characters from negroes.
5. I could go on listing sources pushing their own POV on the topic, but I think this is enough to make my point. In this environment, Wikipedia requires that positions be attributed. Thanks. --Stan Giesbrecht (talk) 07:16, 18 September 2017 (UTC)
If you don't like the views of academics and established historians, perhaps your pov is a minority viewpoint, or even fringe? . . . dave souza, talk 17:24, 18 September 2017 (UTC)
1. So you think my views are fringe? Does that mean you agree with Desmond and Moore that Darwin only discovered evolution through his opposition to slavery? Then please explain to me why Darwin would discuss benefits of slavery in TDOM (1874, p.117) if he hated slavery as much as D&M claim? The fact is, most abolitionists believed in special creation and Darwin would still have opposed slavery, even if he hadn’t discovered his theory of evolution. You know very well that what is fringe here is D&M’s view. That’s not to say that everything D&M write is fringe or otherwise unreliable for Wikipedia, but they are clearly pushing a biased POV, and plenty of people say this. From Joseph Carroll (scholar): “[D&M’s] biography has been widely criticized for the use of intentionally misleading techniques of quotation and documentation” (2003, p.62).
2. Why did you ignore everything I said about Dawkins’ POV pushing? You know that Darwin did not base his classification on common characteristics, so why do you refuse to acknowledge this like a responsible editor would? Why do you refuse to back down when you are wrong? Why do you treat Wikipedia like a WP:BATTLEGROUND?
3. To repeat the main point of my post above (that you are trying to gloss over), Wikipedia does not automatically prohibit the use of sources with biased POVs, but does required that these citations include in-text attribution. Therefore any removal of such attribution stands in violation of Wikipedia policy. --Stan Giesbrecht (talk) 03:09, 3 October 2017 (UTC)
1. You're misrepresenting D&M 2009, and Carroll's "Recommendations for further reading" briefly criticises D&M 1991 – not the same book. I've seen their 1991 book criticised for its emphasis on social or political context, but also respected for its scholarship.
2. We've not used Dawkins as a source for this topic, it may be worth considering, worth noting he's talking about the unit of selection, not classification.
3. Avoid stating facts as opinions applies to uncontested assertions made by generally recognised reliable sources. . dave souza, talk 18:07, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

Section break

@Charlesdrakew: Hi Charles, you reverted my latest edit. Your edit summary does not provide any justification for such a reversion, nor is it even true. Will you explain, please, on what points you think we agree and on which points we disagree? Editors are expected to work together to reach a consensus. Thanks. --Stan Giesbrecht (talk) 14:00, 18 September 2017 (UTC)

@ Stan, having had a look over your edits, only three of the last 100 aren't on the CD topic, and your talk page also indicates that you're acting as a single purpose account. Indeed, it shows that you were blocked twice for the sort of behaviour you're again showing. Please try to restrain yourself, and act collaboratively instead of trying to push your pov in contradiction of published academic sources. I've removed "the social construct of" which you objected to, in my view it's arguable but reasonable to trim that. If you've other issues, please set them out individually with reference to reliable published mainstream sources, and don't just revert wording or behave as you did last year. . . dave souza, talk 17:24, 18 September 2017 (UTC)
1. Dave, what I’ve been doing is providing evidence that some of the sources you are pushing have “biased statements of opinion”. That means this information “can be presented only with attribution” (WP:ATTRIBUTEPOV). This is core content policy but you are saying that it is okay to ignore this requirement if the editor pointing out the policy violation has a contribution list that is not diverse enough for you. I’m not sure how you think that defense is going to fly, but since we are on the topic of diversity, please review the edit history at this and other Darwin related articles – you already have the practice. Please tell me how many editors you find making substantive edits on sensitive topics, such as Darwin’s views on race. Do the history logs show a broad enough spectrum of editors making meaningful additions to demonstrate that this is a collaborative effort, or is there one dominant editor controlling the narrative?
2. RE: “If you've other issues, please set them out individually with reference to reliable published mainstream sources, and don't just revert wording”: This is exactly what I did in this edit, where I set out the point made by Joseph Carroll (scholar) that when commentators say that Darwin’s Sentence Light-will-be-thrown is his only reference to human evolution, they “overlook” other such references in OTOOS. I did everything you asked, and what is your response? In this edit, you removed Carroll’s main point that saying there is only one reference overlooks other references: you reverted his wording, exactly what you told me not to do. As bad as unilaterally removing relevant and properly sourced material is, that is nothing compared with what you replaced it with: a fake news quote from Janet Browne’s vortex of bullshit on p.60 of Power of Place. The quote you added has three individual claims, two of which are totally false. You also mischaracterized what Browne said in the quote – she most certainly never said there was a single reference to human origins – which I’ll explain in a new section: #Janet Browne on human origins in OTOOS. Furthermore, in the above-mentioned edit and this one, you turned two moderate-length paragraphs into two rambling pages of comments and quotes, adding background details in a section meant to describe the book itself (there is a separate background section). The burning irony here is that your 17:36 18 Sept post informed me that keeping background material “concise” was so imperative that you told me to edit elsewhere, and now you added a lot of background material yourself.
3. RE: “I've removed "the social construct of" which you objected to, in my view it's arguable…”: As you know, I objected to the claim because it was not sourced. As you know, WP:Verifiability is core content policy, yet you brazenly say that your post is nevertheless “arguable”. I want to thank you for so explicitly spelling out your contempt for Wikipedia policy. History has shown that you consider everything to be “arguable”, whether it is true or not, whether it is verified or not, no problem at all, let’s get the spin machine going with a bunch of “arguments”, ie. WP:SYNTHESIS, to defend the post. That’s not how to build an encyclopedia grounded in reality. Claims need to be verified by reliable sources, as you well know.
4. RE: “Please … act collaboratively instead of trying to push your pov in contradiction of published academic sources”: You are once again accusing me of what you have done many times, including when you pushed your bullshit POV that “Darwin did not share the then common view that other races are inferior”. As I mentioned in para.2 of my 05:56 1 Sept post below (# Re: “superfluous paragraph…) Yopienso provided a ton of sources that contradicted your claim, but because you see everything as “arguable” you kept edit warring to push this POV until you finally decided to stick with what the source actually said (the POV hadn’t been verified). I thought we were in the clear on this one, but you had a history of, when squeezed in one area, of doubling down in another, and when I called out Janet Browne’s vortex of bullshit as fake news, you were not happy, and indeed, a couple of days later, you upped the ante, posting (in this series of edits): “Darwin [believed] that black people were fully equal”. Your post was based entirely on your own synthesis, indeed you knew very well that Desmond and Moore (the authors you cited) had been very explicit on their views about Darwin, writing but a few chapters earlier: “He thought blacks inferior”. After your fellow editors pointed out that your claims weren’t true you finally conceded that the gig was up this time, but in the meantime, you were not only “trying to push your pov in contradiction of published academic sources”, as you accused me of, but on top of that, your lying bullshit POV contradicted the very source you cited. So, yeah, any time you decide to stop your ridiculous smear campaign against my editing just because I kick a few of your sacred cows (ie. call out fake news), that would be a very good thing indeed.
5. What this article desperately DESPERATELY needs is more input from a broader range of editors who are both courageous AND intellectually honest!!! My reverted edit added required in-text attribution and removed an unsourced claim, so when Charlesdrakew reverted it, he violated both WP:ATTRIBUTEPOV and WP:V. A responsible editor reverting an edit would engage in a good-faith discussion on points of agreement and disagreement in an effort to reach a consensus, but his motivations here have been made absolutely clear by the edit summary of this reversion: “Rv per Dave Souza”, the very definition of WP:TAGTEAM. And as you know from checking out my talk page, Charlesdrakew is not the only editor who has been reverting my edits and then refusing all attempts to discuss the concerns that led to the edit. Editors should not revert edits on the basis that content wasn’t properly discussed, attack them on their talk page for not discussing content, and then claim to be “not motivated to debate article content” with regard to the very edits they reverted.
6. All of the elements listed in the simple scenario of Multiple-editor ownership are made out here in massive abundance here. There is one dominant editor who rewrites practically everything anyone adds to be in his own words. If anyone challenges any issue being pushed by the dominant editor, there are some supporting editors who are quick to revert but slow to discuss, in opposition to WP:BRD which lays out the principle that it is fine to Revert someone’s edit if there is cause, provided you are willing to Discuss, in good faith, the concerns raised.
7. I know that some editors have a deep emotional attachment to various authors and it hurts to see them being called fake news. But when academically published sources are saying that Darwin based his classification system on common characteristics, that Darwin would not have opposed slavery but for his discovery of evolution, that Darwin never referred to human race in OTOOS, well, Wikipedia has a policy to assume good faith, but we absolutely cannot allow this to be a suicide pact. We are big boys and girls here, and it is time for us to start acting the part. Just like a house is only as sturdy as its foundation, an encyclopedia can only be as reliable as the sources it is built upon. Just like a carpenter needs to recognize quicksand before they build a house, so too must Wikipedians call out BS when they see it. Thanks. --Stan Giesbrecht (talk) 03:16, 3 October 2017 (UTC)
This is evidently a long rant about other editors, what's needed are concise well sourced proposals for article improvement. . dave souza, talk 18:11, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

Re: “superfluous paragraph of original research”

1. Hi Dave. This is getting close to the millionth time you’ve falsely accused me of original research and I have to say it’s getting a tiny wee bit tedious. Paraphrasing published sources is exactly what Wikipedia calls on its editors to do. (Or are you saying that Darwin’s autobiography is not a reliable source??!) Did I make a mistake in quoting or paraphrasing the source? Well, that’s possible, I’m far from perfect, but if so, that’s only a mistake and not original research. On the other hand, if mistakes are made, responsible fellow editors identify what they are and work collaboratively to improve the article, so the fact that you didn’t identify any error here speaks volumes.
2. I started editing Wikipedia a year and a half ago because the Charles Darwin page then claimed that he hadn’t referred to human races as higher and lower, something he did many times in his various publications and letters. At the time, I naively thought that pointing this out on the talk page, along with examples, was step one of a two-step process in removing the false claim. Little did I know… You didn’t respond on the talk page, but when I went ahead with the removal, you quickly reverted me, baldly asserting that it was sourced by Janet Browne’s Charles Darwin: Voyaging. At this point, another editor stepped in, pointing out that Browne had said no such thing and providing plenty of scholarly sources contradicting your bullshit claim. Again, I naively thought that this had to be enough: your claim was unverified and against consensus, but again you surprised me [1] [2] [3]. You conceded that you “don’t find [your own claims] straightforward” because they are “difficult to show”, that they are only “likely” true because this is a “rather complex topic”, but still insisted that your nonsensical arguments negated the requirement of verification by a reliable source, that your incoherent synthesis somehow made your post acceptable. Please tell me, is it even possible to violate more of Wikipedia’s policies at one time? And now you attack me for quoting and paraphrasing a primary source? Where does Wikipedia prohibit that??! If you want secondary sourcing, please feel free to add citations to reliable sources rather than removing properly sourced information.
3. In a long series of your own edits, you substantially expanded the “Publication” section. Among other additions, you cite and paraphrase numerous letters written by Darwin. So, you are citing primary sources yourself, yet when I do a fraction of what you did, you falsely accuse me of original research. Isn’t this amazing.
4. Your series of edits included the quote “by which to work” in the subsection “Time taken to publish” and gives the date for this as December 1838. The quote comes from Darwin’s autobiography: “Here then I had at last got a theory by which to work.” (1958 p.120). Some problems with your edits though. First, you didn’t include a citation which Wikipedia strictly requires for direct quotations. Second, the date Darwin himself provided was October 1838, which you removed along with the citation I provided when you reflexively reverted all my edits.
5. Another problem is that the article does not explain what Darwin was referring to in his theory “by which to work” line. He explains that at the time he had come to understand that natural selection could modify a population, leading to the formation of a new species, but still hadn’t connected the dots into understanding that natural selection could also cause a population to diverge in character, leading to multiple species. Thus Darwin’s theory was not yet fully developed at the time, but you wouldn’t be able to know this from the article, so that is why this context is important. Am I explaining this point in the best way possible? Perhaps not, but deletion is not improvement.
6. Finally, people make typo corrections. When you unnecessarily revert a series of edits, you undo these corrections. You restored the mistaken line that Darwin used the phrase “races of men” three times in OTOOS to refer to human races, when the phrase he actually used was “races of man”. Further evidence that more collaboration and less edit-warring would be a good thing all around. --Stan Giesbrecht (talk) 05:56, 1 September 2017 (UTC)
Thanks for the typo corrections. You added a long paragraph reiterating points already covered in previous sections, which did not need to be restated, without showing secondary sources. Good point about divergence, I'll get that covered, and confine the introductory paragraph to directly relevant brief points. . dave souza, talk 08:43, 16 September 2017 (UTC)
1) Your very welcome Dave, and thank you for not reverting my typo corrections this time around. 2) You cite primary source material all the time (which Wikipedia allows), but as soon as I do the same, you accuse me of something else and everyone can see the double standard. 3) You said the point I was making was already covered in previous sections, but it wasn’t, else you wouldn’t have said you would “get that covered”. 4) I’m in the process of reviewing more secondary material, because this edit doesn’t really provide useful information and leaves the reader with more questions than answers about how and when Darwin started thinking about the connection between natural selection and divergence. --Stan Giesbrecht (talk) 07:03, 18 September 2017 (UTC)
Please stop being tendentious about the edits of others – I cite primary source material backing up secondary sources, or provide secondary sources on request, do thou likewise instead of basing huge paragraphs entirely on CD's writings, as you did. The point about variation is cited to a reliable academic source, any further detail should go in the Genetic divergence article or in the relevant biographical pages about CD. On the Origin of Species#Background should only include a concise overview. . dave souza, talk 17:36, 18 September 2017 (UTC)
(1) You added your “social construct” claim without any source at all and you say that’s “arguable” (ie. justifiable through your arguments / WP:SYNTHESIS) but you give me heck for citing a primary source??! (2) You’re saying that when I cite a primary source, it justifies instant reversion and false accusations of original research, but when you cite a primary source, I am supposed to allow you the opportunity to “provide secondary sources on request”? Why doesn’t the same courtesy apply when the shoe is on the other foot? (3) In the post above, I informed you that I was in the process of reviewing secondary material because I think there is a way to improve the article, and your response is to say that you have everything written out perfectly, there is no room for improvement here, and if I have any ideas on the topic, I can buzz off and take those ideas to another article? That’s being tendentious if anything is. --Stan Giesbrecht (talk) 03:23, 3 October 2017 (UTC)
Unconstructive repetitive complaints are no substitute for concise proposals based on secondary sources. . . dave souza, talk 18:14, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

Attribution dispute

Latest comment: 7 years ago20 comments4 people in discussion

In a series of talk page edits starting at 03:07, 3 October 2017, Stan returned with the sort of behaviour discussed at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/IncidentArchive943#Origin of Species dispute, and likely to get the same response. Doubtful if there are any valid points hidden in the morass. He's returned to demanding inline attribution of points only he disputes, so I've undone his edit to the article
One of the talk page edits included adding a section heading This conversation desperately needs more input from intellectually honest editors – that's clearly unacceptable as a heading, so I've trimmed it.
He concludes with Page is getting long. Setting up automatic archive, similar to Talk:Charles Darwin. Hope it works. Don't know if it will, so would appreciate if someone can check that out. . . dave souza, talk 12:47, 3 October 2017 (UTC)

RE: “Doubtful if there are any valid points hidden…”: When editors are quick to accuse others of original research, tendentious editing, and “trying to push [their] pov in contradiction of published academic sources,” and when they are even quicker to cut & run from that conversation when the evidence is shown to point the other way, then the point is very far from “hidden” indeed: people who live in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones. --Stan Giesbrecht (talk) 22:36, 18 October 2017 (UTC)
Posts by Stan Giesbrecht (talk · contribs) at Talk:On the Origin of Species on 3 October 2017 include:
  • "Anyone passing themselves off as informed on Darwin ... so-called academics ... fake news"diff
  • "why do you refuse to acknowledge this like a responsible editor would? Why do you refuse to back down when you are wrong? Why do you treat Wikipedia like a WP:BATTLEGROUND?"diff
  • "This conversation desperately needs more input from intellectually honest editors ... As bad as unilaterally removing relevant and properly sourced material is, that is nothing compared with what you replaced it with: a fake news quote from Janet Browne’s vortex of bullshit ... fake news"diff
  • "Janet Browne and her vortex of bullshit ... it is truly sad if adults don’t grasp the difference between fact and fantasy"diff
The approach indicated in these extracts is incompatible with Wikipedia and an administrative response will be necessary. The talk page archiving looks good although occasional manual archiving would also work. Johnuniq (talk) 22:29, 3 October 2017 (UTC)
@Johnuniq: 1. Everyone can see why you are here asking for “an administrative response,” John: to provide muscle. The narrative of what gets posted on articles related to Charles Darwin has been more or less entirely controlled by one single dominant editor for the last decade, at least it was until I started editing roughly two years ago. In response to recent editing against his wishes, this editor has reached out to you, asking you to come here and provide support, not support in terms of logic and reason in the talk page discussions, not to discuss content, but support in terms of going through my comments looking for something to complain about, something you have done many times in the past. By your own admission, you have not participated in editing of substance here, except for reverting others. You have reverted me many times and every time you do, you have alleged some irrelevant non-existent infraction on my part, but you have consistently refused to engage in proper discussions that I have had, be they concerns about policy violations or content inaccuracy. This is a gross violation of WP:BRD which requires a good faith Disscusion following a Rerversion.
2. Secondary source double standard: Your bias against me is obvious from your comments. You have told me many times that I would need secondary sources to do anything [4] [5] but you never tell Dave this, even when he uses primary sources. We recently had a conversation at Talk:CD on a proposal to shorten the list of people who had been influences on Darwin. I supported keeping Thomas Malthus on the list and to this end I cited Darwin’s autobiography, to which you quickly told me: “mentions in the infobox should be based on secondary sources, not our analysis of what Darwin wrote.” Funny thing though, when Dave wanted to keep Humbolt and Herschel on the list, he also cited Darwin’s autobiography, and suddenly primary source usage was no problem at all for you. (This isn’t even mentioning Dave’s misrepresentation of the guidance which you also had no problem with.) Anyway, I dutifully provided quotes from Joseph Carroll which confirmed the profound influence Malthus had on Darwin’s discovery of evolution, but everyone can see that your blatant double standard is nothing more than WP:TAGTEAM support. Indeed, all the elements of the simple scenario of Multiple-editor ownership are made out in massive abundance.
3. This dispute is about attribution: In his latest reversion, Dave asserts that the dispute is over “WP:DUE weight” concerns. This is not correct, as we agree on which sources and viewpoints are due and undue. The definitions of each viewpoint are exactly the same as between the two different versions, with the only difference being how they are attributed, as Dave has confirmed in an earlier edit summary: “agreed definition, inline attribution inappropriate per weight.” Thus, I changed the heading to “Attribution dispute” because that is what this is, plus “Disruptive editing” is far from neutral. You have told me a gazillion times (on article talk pages and my own talk page) to “focus on content” and it is long overdue for you to put your money where your mouth is and practice what you preach. You should be willing to engage in discussions on all the relevant points raised. You have extracted four quotes, so let’s focus on that for now.
4. RE: First extract: You object to referring to Geoffrey Hodgson as a so-called academic? Hodgson claimed that Darwin never referred to human race in his great book, OTOOS. Real academics do research before publishing. A real academic would look in the index to see if something is or isn’t in a book before claiming it isn’t and would have known that Darwin used “man” to refer to humans, looked under M and seen that the book most certainly did refer to human race. What am I missing here, doesn’t the evidence speaks for itself?
5. RE: Second extract: I can’t understand why an editor shouldn’t acknowledge when a claim they were proposing turns out to be incorrect. I have attempted to provide evidence that Richard Dawkins’ claim that Darwin based his classification on common characteristics is not true. If you disagree with my analysis or you think it is incomplete, please explain why, and we can discuss our points of agreement and disagreement. But if you can see that I am correct in my analysis, shouldn’t you acknowledge this so we can all move forward together? Isn’t this the best way to build an accurate and reliable encyclopedia together?
6. RE: Third extract: Wow! is all I can say. If calling for intellectual honesty is “inflammatory,” Your Honour, if seeking third and fourth opinions in a two-party dispute “is incompatible with Wikipedia,” well, then you had better lock me up and throw away the key, because as long as I am on Wikipedia, I will continue to push for intellectual honesty and broad based consensuses.
7. RE: Fourth extract: I don’t want to get caught up in a dispute over labels, so long as we can all agree to avoid sources violating WP:RS. The citation to Browne’s p.60 of POP was discussed last year, and was removed by editor consensus that it didn’t unequivocally support the post it cited, yet now has returned like a zombie back from the dead. A quote from p.60 was added (as a footnote reference) which claimed that in OTOOS, Darwin only “allowed himself” 12 words to “refer to human beings” and that “he was completely silent on the subject of human origins”. Shouldn’t you be focusing on this dishonesty rather than quibbling about whether to refer to the quoted passage as a “vortex of bullshit” or a “vortex of false and contradictory claims”. Or would you rather build a house on quicksand?
8. RE: “Life is too short to occupy oneself with the slaying of the slain more than once.”: I certainly don’t disagree with your comment that this Thomas Huxley quote should be a motto here. As mentioned in the preceding paragraph, the Browne citation was removed by consensus last summer, but has made a zombie-like return. History has shown that Dave, when squeezed in one area, has a tendency of doubling down on another topic. On 18th Sept, between 7:03 and 7:17, in this edit I returned the in-text attribution required by WP:ATTRIBUTEPOV and posted a number of comments on the talk page which Dave seemed to not like. And only a few hours later, at 12:18 Dave posted the quote from Browne’s p.60 vortex of false and contradictory claims. So, now the previously slain had returned, and both the timing and the history make this look like cause and effect. Another case of the zombie-like return of a previously “slain” POV is on Darwin’s view of racial hierarchy, which I’ll discuss next.
9. Pushing POV denying Darwin’s racial hierarchy: As I’ve discussed several times already, Dave has a long history of pushing his own POV on this topic with posts such as: “Darwin did not share the then common view that other races are inferior” [6] and “To Darwin the difference [was] not racial inferiority.” [7] Removing this denial of reality was my very first edit on the Charles Darwin article. Dave instantly reverted, falsely asserting that Janet Browne verified what was nothing more than his own POV. Yopiense joined the conversation by pointing out that there were a ton of sources saying otherwise, but Dave ignored them all and tried to swamp the conversation with rivers of nonsense on the talk page, but eventually had to back down, agreeing to stick with what Browne had actually said, and I naively thought that this bullshit POV was slain for good, but alas, it came roaring back like a zombie, some weeks later, when Dave posted (in this series of edits) that: “Darwin [believed] that black people were fully equal” (also in the series: “Darwin shared the belief … that other races were equal humans.”) As Huxley said, sometimes like is too short to mess around, so I came out swinging but you responded by joining the edit war, restoring Dave’s bullshit POV, despite knowing that Desmond and Moore (the cited authors) explicitly wrote that Darwin “thought blacks inferior”. Thankfully, other editors disagreed with you and Dave backed down, again agreeing to stick to the sources rather than continue to push this unverified false POV against consensus. And with that, we slayed what was already once slain, a “slaying of the slain” as Huxley said.
10. RE. Archiving: Anyway, thank you for reviewing the automatic archive settings that I added. It seems to have worked fine. I know in principle that archiving can be done manually, but I have never done this myself. I saw the automatic settings being applied on the Charles Darwin talk page, and with the help of the help page, emulated those settings. Cheers, --Stan Giesbrecht (talk) 22:14, 9 October 2017 (UTC)
Please engage with the current discussion rather than posting a wall of text. I do not see any acknowledgement of the unsuitability of the comments highlighted above. Instead, there is a more measured repetition. Johnuniq (talk) 00:51, 10 October 2017 (UTC)
@Johnuniq: 1. RE: “Please engage with the current discussion”: I would love to address your concerns, John, but I have absolutely no idea why you think that it is “incompatible with Wikipedia” for editors to ask for intellectual honesty, for separating fact from fiction, and to broaden talk page discussions about content beyond just two editors. I thought broad community involvement was a good thing, so until you can explain to me exactly why it isn’t, I’ll continue to encourage more input from multiple editors on the talk page discussions about article content, especially given the number of hit & run reverters who then refuse to engage in any discussion about their reversion. Specifically, you reverted my edit, removing attribution that would be required if there are sources pushing biased POVs, so you now have a moral obligation to discuss the clear evidence of POV-pushing.
2. Long before I started editing Wikipedia, Dave had posted the claim that Darwin had not referred to races of humans in OTOOS on account of the fact that Darwin had used the term races in reference to races of cabbages because somehow (in his mind) the one precluded the other. Not only is the conclusion utterly false – Darwin had referred to human races on multiple occasions include three usages of the term “races of man” – but also the logic is absolutely pathetic. I removed the unverified and false post, hoping this would be the end of such propaganda on Wikipedia. One well-known reference to human races, found on p.199, is listed in the index and mentioned in TDOM, so you can only imagine my shock upon realizing that there were so-called academic sources explicitly denying the existence of such references, when Dave added a citation to Geoffrey Hodgson’s p.17 claim that “the Origin of Species does not refer explicitly to human races at all.” When I pointed out that this simply wasn’t true, Dave responded by adding a brief description Darwin’s p.199 reference to human races while continuing to deny that Darwin had used this term to refer to human races! I just Couldn’t. Believe. My own. Two. Eyes! What kind of encyclopedia would deny a book refers to something in one sentence, and then discuss a situation where the book referred to that very thing, in the VERY NEXT SENTENCE??!! This is equivalent to 2+2 = 5 = 2+3! I was absolutely floored. At the time, I simply couldn’t understand what was happening, although I have to say the blatant contradictions did make me a bit hot under the collar given how destructive they are to the very pillars of Wikipedia.
3. Over time I have come to better understand the Twilight Zone Logic (“TZL”) used to supposedly justify the contradictions here, because exactly the same logic is used to explain the claim that there was only one allusion to human origins in OTOOS, even though there was multiple such allusions, because Janet Browne said that OTOOS “was completely silent on the subject of human origins”. The explanation here is that in the Twilight Zone up is down and black is white, so “multiple allusions” becomes “completely silent on” which then becomes “one and only one allusion”. Or to look at this another way, when using TZL, showing that two plus two equals four doesn’t show that two plus two doesn’t equal five, because in the Twilight Zone four is actually five. Needless to say, this is a really lousy way to build an encyclopedia, but the take-away point for the current discussion is that this is absolute clear evidence of serious POV-pushing on this topic. Anyway, following further challenges, Dave added yet another fake news source to “verify” his false claim, before finally removing the now-double-verified-but-still-false post that Darwin hadn’t referred to human races in OTOOS, posting in the same edit that there were a “few references to human races”. So, the article itself was improved in that this false claim was removed, but the fake news citations saying the same thing were kept on the basis that it didn’t matter how many deliberately false claims a source made so long as it makes at least one point that might be accurate.
4. So that’s the backdrop to the situation when Dank posed the question (in section #WP:TFA), asking if this article had maintained compliance with the criteria for featured articles. The answer was no, because of the addition of fake news citations claiming Darwin never referred to human races in OTOOS. I went ahead and removed them, prompting Dave to start a discussion titled: #Recent edits: time to publish, and meanings of 'race' where he listed other sources to replace the removed citations. When I looked into the matter, there was clear evidence of biased POV-pushing, but when I presented the evidence, Dave called such analysis “fringe” (challenging his sources is like kicking a sacred cow to Dave). When I persisted and said that I was here to build an accurate encyclopedia which meant a rigorous analysis of which sources were reliable, Dave cut & run. He started this new section, claiming I hadn’t raised “any valid points” but deep down he knew I was right about the POV-pushing, because if he thought I wasn’t he would have said so, and that is the “current discussion” that you should be engaging in.
5. RE: “…posting a wall of text”: My post might be longer than you might like, John, but when you come here on a hit & run smear campaign of unspecified insinuations with the express intent of getting me blocked, I think I have the right and responsibility of reply. You have a massive double standard in going after me for things that Dave does in much greater abundance where you tacitly endorse the very thing you attack me for. There are many times I would present evidence that article claims (invariably posted by Dave) contradicted Darwin’s own writings where Dave would accuse me of original research and you would support him by telling me that even if it wasn’t true, I would need secondary sources to remove the false claim, but when Dave posted claims citing nothing more than Darwin’s writings, then you didn’t have any problems with using primary sources.
6. When you are calling for editors to be blocked – when you’ve succeeded in the past – you should probably expect that they will start to defend themselves, whether it suits your fancy or not. You cited Huxley’s quote about “the slaying of the slain” as an explicit call to arms for getting me blocked so it then became incumbent on me to show that this metaphor fits better the other way, in that there are at least two examples where I had to battle the reposting of claims that had been previously discredited, like a zombie returning from the dead. Dave reposted his unverified fictitious claim that Darwin had only referred to human origins one time in OTOOS, citing Janet Browne’s equally fictitious claim that “he was completely silent on the subject of human origins” (interestingly, this zombie came back a mere five hours after I had reverted and roasted his extreme bias on Darwin’s usage of the term race). Another example of “the slaying of the slain” was when Dave reposted his previously discredited denial of Darwin’s racial hierarchy (this zombie returning from the dead less than two days after I had called Janet Browne a loon for writing such a vortex of false and contradictory claims as pp.60-61 of POP is). But when I tried slaying this zombie, you restored Dave’s unverified lying bullshit post that “Darwin [believed] that black people were fully equal” despite knowing the cited authors had said exactly the opposite, writing several chapters earlier: “He thought blacks inferior”. Despite this obvious contradiction between the source and the post, despite you reverting me, you refused all my attempts to engage in a discussion on these points, so any administrator considering your request to have me blocked will also have to consider your contempt for the important principles of WP:BRD.
7. Kudos to you for loyalty, I suppose, but this should really be about improving on and building an accurate and reliable encyclopedia, not just about sticking up for your Wiki-friends. Sooner or later you going to have to admit to yourself that Dave has overextended himself in pushing his hard-core left-wing ideology here, definitely going a bridge too far with his claims that Darwin saw all races as fully equal, especially in his responses when Yopienso tried to talk him out of it, which demonstrated for all the world to see that this was nothing more than his own unverified synthesis.
8. RE: “rv: per talk the original is supported by consensus; the links [[Race (biology)|races]] and [[Variety (botany)|varieties]] are helpful” (edit summary for your reversion): I’m not sure what consensus you are referring to here, because we actually haven’t discussed linking those terms in our talk page discussions. Perhaps you are referring to Dave and I reaching a consensus on the point that Darwin used the terms races and varieties in a similar manner. [8] [9] On the point about the links, it’s not such a big deal to me; one thing is that in Darwin’s day, the term varieties did not have the focus on botany as it does today, so that’s a difference to consider, but if this is the sticking point for you, then by all means, we’ll keep the links, add the required attribution, and we can call it a consensus if you want. Cheers --Stan Giesbrecht (talk) 22:28, 18 October 2017 (UTC)

Section break: inline attribution

@ Stan – another long screed rehashing old points and lacking substance. Clearly there's no consensus for stating as opinions facts supported by multiple secondary sources, and not contested except by one editor's opinion of primary sources. As WP:ASSERT notes, "We do not write: "According to the Daily Telegraph, the capital of France is Paris" because doing so would create the impression of doubt or disagreement where there is none." Other pointe repeated in your comment have already been covered, and appropriate modifications previously incorporated. . . dave souza, talk 03:28, 19 October 2017 (UTC)
Is there currently a question about adding or removing a particular item from the article? YoPienso (talk) 04:18, 19 October 2017 (UTC)
The last paragraph of the section "Murray as publisher; choice of title" includes a brief explanation of the meaning of "races" in the title and elsewhere in the book. Multiple sources have been discussed in talk covering the same point, but Stan has repeatedly added inline attribution of points as "according to" individual sources, creating the impression of doubt or disagreement where there is none in reliable secondary sources. As in, this recent edit which was undone. . . dave souza, talk 10:37, 19 October 2017 (UTC)

1. @Yopienso, Thanks for your comments below. As you said, Darwin put the “Preservation of Favoured Races” in his subtitle, so it makes sense to say a few words about this in the article. Your suggestion of trimming that quote was good and I’m glad it worked out. I actually think that the whole Publication section is too long. It was substantially expanded in January (I think excessively) and could use some re-writing and further trimming, but I’m a little bit autistic and sometimes have a laser like focus on one thing to the exclusion of others. I want to respond directly to the comments above, so I’ll insert my comments here with a subheading to separate this from the conversation below.

2. @Dave, RE: “not contested except by one editor's opinion of primary sources”: No, I have the utmost respect for what Darwin wrote; it is the secondary sources you are pushing that are the problem here. Your defence here doesn’t hold water, just like your earlier defence, where you claimed that our dispute was over “WP:DUE weight”, when in fact you had earlier acknowledged that we didn’t disagree on the weight to give each source and viewpoint, which are the same between the two different versions.

3. RE: “Multiple sources have been discussed in talk covering the same point” and “there is [no doubt or disagreement] in reliable secondary sources”: If your so-called reliable sources were accurate and all making the same point, then we could use Wikipedia voice, but they definitely don’t. They are saying all kinds of different things, pushing biased POVs, with many claiming straight-up falsehoods, hence the need for attribution. In response to me challenging your claim that Darwin hadn’t referred to human races in OTOOS, you dug up and posted citations to Geoffrey Hodgson and Mark Isaak, which, amazingly enough, actually did “verify” your false post. These citations have been for being fake news. You also posted Desmond & Moore’s claim that Darwin only thought about race in relation to slavery and, but for his opposition to slavery, he wouldn’t even have discovered evolution by natural selection, a claim to bizarre even for the Twilight Zone. You proposed citing Richard Dawkins’ claim that Darwin based his racial classifications on common characteristics (along with pushing his anti-group-selection POV), even though Darwin explicitly discussed “a genealogical arrangement of the races of man” on p.422 of OTOOS. Thus we can see a broad range of fictitious claims, a far cry from the unified support of multiple secondary sources required for using Wikipedia voice.

4. RE: “WP:ASSERT”: Yes, the capitol of France is Paris. This is a known objective fact that gets reported in Wikipedia voice. In contrast, Darwin’s inner feelings about what some particular term meant in some broad generic setting is inherently unknowable to 100% certainty, therefore “a matter subject to serious dispute”, as evidenced by your sources shooting in all different directions on the matter, and consequently requires in-text attribution. In contrast again, we can (and do) WP:SUBSTANTIATE specific uses of the term in the book itself. I have found a sentence very similar to, although longer than, the subtitle, which I’ll include (I presume this is where the idea for the subtitle came from).

5. RE: “Other point[s] repeated in your comment have already been covered, and appropriate modifications previously incorporated”: In general, Dave, yes, we have removed numerous false claims so that is a huge improvement and something I am thankful for. But as I mentioned in para.6 (18 October), when I removed your left-wing propaganda that race is a social construct, you reacted five hours later by adding a quote from Janet Browne’s vortex of false and contradictory claims on p.60 of POP. The quote has three claims, two of which are false with the second claim (the single accurate claim) contradicted by the third one. (Is it possible to be more fake news than this?) So more work does need to be done, but one step at a time.

6. @Johnuniq, RE: “rv: all I see on talk are impenetrable walls of text moaning about other editors and the Twilight Zone” (edit summary of your latest reversion): I find it absolutely adorable (ie. very very depressing) that you pretend like you have no idea what the problem is. You are the one is moaning about everything I do (without actually saying what you think is wrong). You have reverted me many times, never commenting on the content dispute, but your edit summary is always moaning about something vague that I allegedly did or didn’t do. You have set out to obstruct me from the very beginning. In response to my 13th edit (a post at Talk:CD), and in a follow-up, you clearly informed me that you didn’t care if an article post was false, you didn’t care how clearly it contradicted Darwin’s own writings, you promised to oppose me if I didn’t find a secondary source meeting your approval to verify that two plus two doesn’t equal five.

7. You have certainly lived up to promise of obstruction. Prior to the present dispute on whether or not to attribute the sources on Darwin’s meaning of the term races, Dave was pushing the citation to Geoffrey Hodgson’s bullshit claim, “the Origin of Species does not refer explicitly to human races at all” as ‘context’ to Darwin’s meaning of the term. You supported him by reverting me, restoring the fake news citation, moaning and puking about everything I said and did, but avoiding any discussion about content [10] [11]. You then had the nerve to attack me on my talk page (permalink), telling me again and again that I needed to focus on content. You told me that if I had any questions, I should ask, but when I did exactly that, you flatly refused to answer, saying again and again that you were not “motivated” to converse with me (eg. “I am not motivated to debate article content”) and rudely asking me: “you would like me to spend time engaging in a discussion on a user talk page about article content?” (yes that is why I asked the question!) and going so far as to say: “I will not engage in further discussion here as evidence shows that is unproductive.” Yeah, no shit, if you refuse to answer even the most basic question on your own editing, the conversation is guaranteed to be “unproductive” which is, of course, exactly what you wanted, because you knew the sources you restored were total fake news, and having a productive discussion would mean acknowledging this. Your conduct here is perfectly described by WP:NINJA.

8. You have also reverted me, restoring the false claim that Darwin only referred to human origins one single time in OTOOS, even though Darwin actually referred to human origins more than once, because Janet Browne had written, “he was completely silent on the subject of human origins” [12] [13]. This is the equivalent of posting to the article 2+2 = 3 because a so-called source claims that 2+2 = 5. If you can explain how two wrongs make a right then I’m all ears, but until then, I’ll call it Twilight Zone Logic.

9. In your previous reversion, you claimed there was a consensus on Dave’s version (edit summary: “per talk the original is supported by consensus”). Here is the diff of your follow-up reply, constituting the talk page at that time. Where is this agreement on any particular version that you speak of? It’s not there. There is only a two-party discussion between me and Dave, not agreeing on attribution. You have interjected to moan and groan about my editing, but say absolutely nothing about content. Or did InternetArchiveBot somehow form the mystery consensus on the attribution dispute??

10. All I’m asking for, John, is that you follow the important collaborative principles laid out in WP:BRD and engaging in content discussions on articles that you edit. Please specify which points you agree with, which ones you don’t, and why you don’t. Is this really too much to ask? And if you aren’t willing or capable of engaging in good-faith content discussions, then you shouldn’t be reverting edits, and you sure as hell shouldn’t be claiming a non-existent consensus in doing so. That would be awesome. Thanks. --Stan Giesbrecht (talk) 23:25, 22 October 2017 (UTC)

@ Stan – to summarise, you're still complaining about other editors and dismissing scholarly sources because they don't say exactly what you want them to say. They provide variations on the theme that Darwin avoided any discussion of human origins or human races, though he hinted at both, and that race is used in the book as a biological term equivalent to varieties. You'd do better to provide any reliable sources that differ, and discuss them on this talk page concisely, focussing on specific suggestions for article improvement. . . dave souza, talk 06:13, 23 October 2017 (UTC)

Section break: discussion 28 October 2017

@Dave: 1. Thanks for adding the note to the subsection below, pointing out that it is a continuation of the conversation above.
2. RE: “…dismissing scholarly sources because they don't say exactly what you want them to say. They provide variations…”: The issue at hand is not about adding or removing sources and citations, but rather about what is the proper attribution. As you mention here, there is tremendous variation in what the different sources are saying. This means that in-text attribution is required, because Wikipedia policy is very clear that to post something in Wikipedia’s voice, reliable sources need to be unified on the point.
3. RE: “Darwin avoided any discussion of human origins or human races”: While it’s true that your so-called scholarly sources have said that Darwin “was completely silent on the subject of human origins,” and that “the Origin of Species does not refer explicitly to human races at all,” the claim that Darwin never talked at all about human origins or human races in OTOOS is total fiction. Fake news will get properly dismissed.
4. RE: “you're still complaining about other editors”: This is a bit rich coming from an editor who started the section #Recent edits: time to publish, and meanings of 'race' to falsely accuse another editor of original research, following that up with various other complaints, but when the evidence showed that the arrow of guilt actually pointed in the opposite direction, quitting that conversation to start this one with the express purpose of complaining about that editor, and going to another’s talk page to WP:CANVASS support for your complaint. And indeed, that editor came here to complain about my demands for intellectual honesty and separating fact from fiction, saying I should be blocked for such a scandalous request, so my response is simply my right and duty of reply.
5. But you are correct that I am unhappy with editors who violate Wikipedia policy, which requires differences to be discussed on the talk pages, as explained in WP:BRD misuse, which identifies two problematic editor types: • revert ninjas and • filibusterers. With the latest reversion, I have now been reverted by seven different editors here. Six of these seven are nothing more than revert ninjas, as they have never engaged in any discussion on content and refuse to answer any question I put to them to explain their reversions. As the guidelines explain (boldface added):
“The key to dealing with an edit ninja is to force them to discuss their edits. Call them out for being edit ninjas and let them know about WP:BRD. You may not make one bold edit after another or a series of reverts without attempting to discuss why you did that.”
This is exactly what I did; I was letting editors know that BRD requires them to discuss their reversions. If editors are unwilling or unable to engage in good-faith content discussions, they shouldn’t be reverting in the first place.
6. RE: “You'd do better to provide any reliable sources that differ, and discuss them on this talk page concisely, focussing on specific suggestions for article improvement”: You make this request sound reasonable, Dave, but your history is clear that when sources differ from the POV you want to push, you simply ignore them and respond with filibustering and stonewalling. One very prominent example of this is when you were defending your false claim that Darwin saw all races as fully equal, YoPienso did provide you with a ton of sources showing your post to be incorrect. But rather than concede something as basic as 2+2 ≠5, you responded with incredible filibustering, the likes of which I have never seen before. I’ve touched on this in other posts, but haven’t spelt out in detail the manner of your filibustering, and if you are claiming to respect sources that contradict the POV you want to push, then I need to expand on this point, but in a collapsed box.
Filibustering and stonewalling reliable sources that were provided
6A. You had long ago posted your denial of Darwin’s hierarchical view of race [14] [15], something I had come to realize was false, so I removed this denial of reality. When you restored it (claiming support from Janet Browne), YoPienso responded by saying you were wrong along with overwhelming evidence. At this point, I really really thought it would be a slam dunk case; there were now two editors opposing with only one in support; Janet Browne had never said anything of the sort, so I naively thought that when you realized you were unable to show that your post was verified, you would realize the gig was up. How stupid of me. The rivers of bullshit that flowed on the talk page in an effort to swamp any resistance completely caught me by surprise. Here are some of your responses:
  • You acknowledged that Desmond and Moore had written that Darwin “thought blacks inferior” and you said your claim was “difficult to show” and you “don't find it straightforward” (this is proof that your claim has no business being on Wikipedia, post it in your own blog!) Beyond that, your post was filled with irrelevant tangential and/or nonsensical information, talking about how Darwin had a black tutor and was opposed slavery (this was true but didn’t logically support your claim), rambling on about Desmond & Moore, Janet Browne, John Wilkins, and William Rathbone Greg, something about cabbage races and that you didn’t think anyone made the nature/nuture distinction till 40 years after OTOOS. (Even if any of this made any sense, even if this logically demonstrated your post, which it didn’t, you are still not allowed to use your own arguments / analysis / synthesis to justify your post, because original research is prohibited.) [16]
  • You posted again with more tangential information. You also said that it was such a “complex topic” that it was only “likely” for your post to be true. (Red flags confirming the unacceptability of your post on Wikipedia.) [17]
  • You kept going and things got weirder. You referred to “the ‘lowest’ races” and said Darwin’s “egalitarianism varied over time” (which contradicted the post you were allegedly trying to defend). You also prattled on and on about Darwin meeting the Fuegians, about the enormous difference between savage and civilized men, about how Jemmy’s mind was very different from an educated one, and about how this somehow flew in Lyell’s face. Seriously, what the hell difference does all this rambling about what Lyell might or might not have believed have to do with your claim that Darwin saw all races as fully equal? You knew very well that Darwin had consistently referred to races as higher and lower, but you were so hell-bent on controlling the narrative that you filibustered and filibustered and filibustered. [18]
  • If that wasn’t enough, you also posted that Lyell thought humans were diverse, and that they weren’t diverse. It seems we are in the Twilight Zone were up is down, black is white, and “diverse” is “showing slight deviation”, definitely not logic acceptable for a world class encyclopedia. [19]
6B. You eventually got caught saying polygenism meant something it didn’t, at which point you finally backed down and agreed to stick with what Browne actually said (gasp, what a concept WP:STICKTOSOURCES) and, again, I foolishly thought this POV monster was slain for good.
6C. But a number of weeks later, I decided to totally blast Janet Browne’s vortex of bullshit on pp.60-61 of POP and I guess you were pretty mad that I went after your beloved source rather than accepting all her false and contradictory claims (ie. drink the WP:KOOLAID), because less than two days later, you reposted your lying bullshit POV, like a zombie returning from the dead, claiming Darwin believed “that black people were fully equal”. Your claim wasn’t verified but rather you cited a passage where Desmond and Moore discuss Darwin’s black tutor. Somehow you “synthesize” the claim that having a black tutor means that you see everyone as “fully equal”, an obvious non sequitur (logic). You did this all, despite the fact that YoPienso had provided you with Desmond and Moore’s actually analysis from a few chapters earlier, that happened to differ from the POV you wanted to push, where they said that Darwin “thought blacks inferior”. Notwithstanding the fact your claim said exactly the opposite of what your source did, this didn’t stop your revert ninjas from edit warring to maintain your bullshit post [20] [21] [22]. But when another editor pointed out that your claim was not true, you quickly backed down, again agreeing to stick with what the source actually said. This is such a shitty way to build an encyclopedia. You should have been sticking to what the sources were saying right from the beginning, rather than pushing your own false POV in contradiction to the very source you were citing, and this demonstrates that your current request for me to provide “reliable sources that differ” is unlikely to be in good faith, as you have already provided plenty of sources showing disunity.
7. So to recap, the narrative on these articles was in the past entirely controlled by one dominant editor, supported by a number of revert ninjas, until I started challenging this dominance roughly two years ago. In the time since, none of these revert ninjas have ever engaged in talk page discussions or constructive editing, although they have complained about this, that, and the next thing. There have been a handful of other editors who have done some editing on the article, and have joined some of the talk page discussions, sometimes supporting me, sometimes opposing, as one would expect from good-faith discussions, but these editors have never resorted to reverting me. If they disagreed with something, they explained why on the talk page, which is the only way a proper consensus can be reached. Thus all the elements of Multiple-editor ownership are made out in massive abundance (boldface added):
“The involvement of multiple editors, each defending the ownership of the other, can be highly complex. The simplest scenario usually consists of a dominant editor who is defended by other editors, reinforcing the former's ownership. This is often informally described as a tag team, and can be frustrating to both new and seasoned editors. As before, address the topic and not the actions of the editors. If this fails, proceed to dispute resolution, but it is important to communicate on the talk page and attempt to resolve the dispute yourself before escalating the conflict resolution process.”
8. In conclusion, the talk page portion of the dispute is between two editors. This is definitely not how a collaborative community-based project is supposed to operate, which requires more editors to discuss differences frankly in an effort to reach a consensus. As to the sources on this topic, they are basically all saying something different. Many of them are making inaccurate claims, as I’ve demonstrated. Thus there is not the unity of sourcing that is required to post in Wikipedia’s voice. That is why attribution is required, and it is this point that editors need to address if they want to get involved. --Stan Giesbrecht (talk) 20:15, 28 October 2017 (UTC)
@ Stan, the sources are consistent in agreeing the main point, that races refers to varieties (or breeds) rather than the modern tendency to use the word on its own to signify human races. Of course we don't expect all sources to be worded identically, but we also don't use inline attribution in a way that suggests significant disagreement without secondary sources for such disagreement. You're still not providing new sources, instead going obsessively over old arguments you've produced. So, I disagree with the wording you're edit warring to include. Please provide new sources and a clear statement supporting your proposals rather than keeping going over stale discussions. . dave souza, talk 21:02, 28 October 2017 (UTC)
1. RE: edit summaries, “nope to Stan” [23] and “no thanks … + stop … original research” [24]: Sounds like entitlement, like someone thinks they own the article. You should run a blog, Dave, and you could remove comments for whatever reason you wanted, but here on Wikipedia, you need actual reasons, not baseless allegations.
2. RE: “the sources are consistent in agreeing the main point, that races [does not refer to] the modern tendency to use the word on its own to signify human races”: NONE of your sources say this, Dave, you’re just making it up (ie. WP:OR), just like you just made up the claim that Darwin didn’t view any races as inferior, given that Janet Browne said nothing of the sort.
3. RE: “but we also don't use inline attribution in a way that suggests significant disagreement without secondary sources for such disagreement. You're still not providing new sources”: There is no such requirement, you’re just filibustering here. The simple fact is to build an encyclopedia, editors are allowed to have, and need to have, editorial discretion. There isn’t going to exist a published source that says that another source needs to be attributed in Wikipedia (of course that’s the point of filibustering), but even if I found a secondary source that said as much, we all know your history with secondary sources contradicting your POV-pushing. You ignore them and filibuster, as I explained in para.6 above. When you were provided sources (including Desmond & Moore) that contradicted your claim that Darwin saw all races as fully equal you responded with filibustering the likes I have never seen, rambling on and on and on about cabbage races and the nature/nurture distinction and how Jemmy’s mind was very different from an educated one and how this all flew in Lyell’s face because Lyell thought humans were both diverse and not diverse. This was the most egregious display of WP:OR and WP:SYN one could imagine (more commentary and links are provided in the collapsed box above). And if that wasn’t enough, some weeks after you had finally backed down, you reposted your bullshit POV, claiming that Darwin thought “black people were fully equal”, citing Desmond and Moore, the very source you were provided with that said “He thought blacks inferior”. So when you are given a source you disagree with, you take it and post the exact opposite, proof that your current request for secondary sources is not in good faith, but rather an effort to filibuster, because you know very well that the sources you have provided on the meaning of race are all over the map. --Stan Giesbrecht (talk) 16:12, 29 October 2017 (UTC)
1. the edit summaries refer to this discussion, and to the odd addition of a supposedly similar quote from the body text – any similarity is synthesis, supposition unsupported by a secondary source showing that it's of any significance.
2. You've paraphrased my comment, misrepresenting it, and then you misrepresent the sources.
3. Avoid stating facts as opinions applies to uncontested assertions made by generally recognised reliable sources – if no secondary source contests the assertion, we don't imply there's [unsourced] controversy about the statement. . dave souza, talk 18:31, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

Discussion to trim quote

[continuation of discussion from #Section break: inline attribution as of 10:37, 19 October 2017 (UTC), now subdivided with new subsection heading "Discussion to trim quote" ... dave souza, talk 06:21, 23 October 2017 (UTC)]

Thanks. I've been away from this article for so long I consider myself fairly uninvolved. As such, it seems to me that that section reflects behind-the-scenes disputes between editors as to Darwin's views on human races. That issue is off-topic.
I suggest removing On 28 March Darwin wrote to Lyell asking about progress, and offering assurances "that my Book is not more un-orthodox, than the subject makes inevitable. That I do not discuss origin of man.— That I do not bring in any discussions about Genesis &c, & only give facts, & such conclusions from them, as seem to me fair." because it has so little to do with the topic of the section. The quote is from a postscript to the letter but is presented as if it were the main point of the letter. So, the first and last sentences of the present first paragraph could be joined with the current second paragraph. The removed section may belong is the "Religious attitudes" section.
The whole last paragraph sounds like a discussion on the definition and usage of race, and as such should be removed, certainly from this section. It may belong in a section about human evolution or about controversies. It doesn't have anything to do with Murray or the title. YoPienso (talk)
Amendment to suggestion on last paragraph:
Oh, yah--"race" is in the title! But the paragraph needs to be reworked, starting with changing "Here" to "In the title."
Also, by "behind-the-scenes," I meant nothing nefarious, but talk page discussion, which Average Joe consulting Wikipedia wouldn't notice. YoPienso (talk) 14:31, 19 October 2017 (UTC)

Thsnks YoPienso, good to have an outside view on this. Now we've got a section on "Human evolution", Darwin's offered assurance "That I do not discuss origin of man" is more relevant there, so I've added that line to the section. More tentatively, I've tried to focus "Murray as publisher; choice of title" on-topic by moving the full quote into the inline citation, leaving only the avoidance of unorthodoxy, and have reworked the last paragraph along the lines of your suggestion. Think that works better? . . dave souza, talk 04:28, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

Yes, I do think it's better. Thanks for taking the time to work on it. YoPienso (talk) 05:43, 20 October 2017 (UTC)
Thanks to you, these were useful suggestions you made. The full quote sets the context, but it's now available when anyone hovers over the citation link so isn't needed in the main article, and that all goes for the "Human evolution" section. . . dave souza, talk 08:27, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

Worth noting 1858 papers in lead?

Latest comment: 6 years ago2 comments2 people in discussion

The lead is correct, OtOOS introduced the theory and evidence to the world at large, but as noted in the relevant section outlines of the concept by CD and ARW were published jointly in the preceding year. Maybe worth clarifying. . . dave souza, talk 04:19, 17 January 2018 (UTC)

The diff introduced the underlined text:
Darwin's book, using the theory of Natural Selection published the year before by Alfred Russel Wallace, introduced the scientific theory that populations evolve over the course of generations through a process of natural selection.
Yes, Wallace published in 1858 but the proposed text suggests that Darwin's book was based on Wallace's work, and/or that Darwin needed Wallace's work to devise natural selection. That is misleading as Darwin had been working on his ideas for decades. There are many cases in science where the conditions are such that several people come up with similar ideas at around the same time. Wallace's work is explored in the article, but the lead should not suggest that it was the core of what Darwin did. In particular, it should not do that because no reliable source makes that claim. Johnuniq (talk) 04:56, 17 January 2018 (UTC)

Janet Browne on human origins in OTOOS

Latest comment: 6 years ago4 comments2 people in discussion

1. Hi. Dave, I truly don’t understand your obsession with Janet Browne and her vortex of bullshit on p.60 of Power of Place. In this edit, you added a fake news quote from this vortex, which consisted of three individual claims, two which are completely false. Furthermore, your characterization of what Browne said is also false. You claimed that in the quote you provided, she said there was a single reference to human origins in OTOOS, when she explicitly said exactly the opposite: “In this book, he was completely silent on the subject of human origins”. I’ll parse the quote out in para.7, but first some history on Wikipedia’s treatment of human origins in OTOOS.

2. When I started editing here nearly two years ago, you had long ago posted that Darwin alluded to human origins one and only one time in OTOOS: “His only allusion to human evolution was the understatement that "light will be thrown on the origin of man and his history".” (I’ll refer to this statement as “Claim XYZ”). I used to naively accept Claim XYZ as gospel fact, if Wikipedia said that Darwin had only alluded to human evolution one time, who was I to question it? Wikipedia has strict rules requiring posts be verified by reliable sources, right? But my BS detectors went off when I was reading TDOM, because in the introduction Darwin refers back to OTOOS and mentions two instances where he discussed human origins: Sentence Light-will-be-thrown on p.488 and Comment sexual-selection-applies-to-humans on p.199.

3. So, Darwin’s own writing contradicted Claim XYZ, common sense contradicted Claim XYZ, it should have been easy to change “His only allusion to human evolution was…” to “He alluded to human evolution with…”. But alas, this was not to be. You trotted out Janet Browne’s vortex of bullshit to justify your post. Not only did Browne say Darwin was “completely silent on the subject of human origins” in the quote you provided, in the preceding sentences, she went on in grand theatrical style about how Darwin had long ago drained his manuscripts of any reference to human origins, and that he hadn’t reintroduced them, and that he had avoided talking about the origins of human beings “with profound deliberation”. This just didn’t make any sense to me, because Darwin had alluded to human origins on at least two occasions, so why the over-the-top claims that he hadn’t? Whenever I brought this up on the talk page, you insisted that I was just too stupid to comprehend Browne’s brilliance. You said it should be parsed out as “he was silent... except” even though that would have led to the opposite conclusion you were claiming. It was so confusing for me, I didn’t understand what was happening, until…

4. I still remember that feeling, riding in my cousin’s car, reading OTOOS, when I came to the passage on page 479 where Darwin wrote that bone patterns in our hands being homologous to other mammals “at once explain themselves on the theory of descent with slow and slight successive modifications.” This set the gears whirling in my mind. OTOOS says that our morphology is explained by Darwin’s theory of descent with modification??! How can you have a more explicit reference to human evolution than that?!!! My blood ran cold as the light finally dawned on me. Browne knew. She knew very well there plenty of references to human evolution in OTOOS. She had deliberately set out to fuck over the truth. She wanted to provide cover for the left-wing thought police to “aggressively push their biased perspective on the rest of the world” and she knew the best place to hide a lie was in plain sight, mixed in with other lies, in one grand vortex of bullshit. And she knew she had to put in enough accurate and ambiguous statements for the thought police to defend the fake news passage. I looked in the mirror and knew I had two choices: throw in the towel or confront this poison head on.

5. Having realized that Browne knew very well of plenty of references to human evolution in OTOOS, I called out many of her false and self-contradictory fake news claims in her pp.60-61 vortex of bullshit, not just about references to human origins in OTOOS, but also about references to the Creator and origins of life as well. Despite this, you kept insisting that everything Browne wrote was perfectly clear and reliable, although other editors disagreed, and finally a consensus was reached to remove her citation because it was found to be too ambiguous. You then put in the place of the removed Browne citation, you replaced it with a citation to James Costa, which unbeknownst to you described Darwin’s p.199 comment on sexual selection as a “reference to human origins”. This is exactly what I had been saying, the very point you had been giving me hell for, and now the source you added contradicted everything you had been claiming about OTOOS only having one allusion to human origins. But even after I pointed this out to you, you still kept banging on that both Browne and Costa were in perfect accordance. It felt like being in the Twilight Zone where up is down and black is white. I guess that’s why they call it fake news.

6. Joseph Carroll (scholar) is a modern academic scholar on Darwin and writes that commentators who say that Sentence Light-will-be-thrown is the only reference to human evolution “overlook” other such references. But, what do you do in response to me posting this point to the article? As mentioned in para.1, the first thing you did was to remove it and replace it with a quote from Browne’s vortex of bullshit as a footnote reference – currently #185 – and to falsely claim that the quote you added said there was a single reference to human origins in OTOOS. And with that edit, along with this one, you expanded two paragraphs into two pages, with much background material in a section meant to describe the book itself, as there is another section for background material to go.

7. So, let’s parse out the quote you added, which contains three separate claims. I’ve reproduced the relevant parts here with the individual claims numbered for reference:

“In this book, (1) he was completely silent on the subject of human origins … (2) he did refer in several places to mankind … (3) The only words he allowed himself … [to] refer to human beings were … 'Light will be thrown…'.” Janet Browne, Power of Place (2002), page 60

Let’s rephrase Browne’s three claims and put them in a list. The quote you added says that in OTOOS, there are:

  1. zero references to human origins,
  2. several references to human beings, and
  3. one and only one reference to human beings, namely Sentence Light-will-be-thrown.

Claims 2 and 3 are in direct contradiction with each other: either there is only one reference to human beings or there is more than one. Claim 2 is the correct one here of course: there is obviously more than one reference to human beings in OTOOS. Claim 3 is simply false: Darwin certainly “allowed himself” more than the 12 listed words to “refer to human beings”. Claim 1 is also false: the book was obviously not “completely silent on the subject of human origins”. So Browne is hitting one for three, a 33% accuracy rate, hardly good enough to qualify as a reliable source for this great encyclopedia we are trying to build. To add insult to injury, your claim that the quote says that there is one and only one reference to human origins in OTOOS is also false (last time I checked, zero references ≠ one reference, and human beings ≠ human origins). If we include this inaccurate claim in the calculation here, we get a paltry accuracy rate of 25%. Definitely not in compliance with WP:RS.

8. Carroll would hardly have been referring to fake news in saying that scholars overlook references to human evolution, but rather to authors such as Michael Ruse and Robert J. Richards, who in The Cambridge Guide to the “Origin of Species” (2009), page xvii, write in the introduction: “The Origin in not directly about humans. The only explicit reference is an almost throwaway passage at the end of the book. ‘Light will be thrown on the origin of man and his history.’” Given the obvious reality that there are other references to humans in OTOOS, Carroll is absolutely correct to say that Ruse and Richards have overlooked them.

9. It might be cute when kids believe that the gifts they find under the tree were delivered by a fat guy riding a flying sleigh and sliding down the chimney, and it might be cute when adults pretend to believe in Santa, but it is truly sad if adults don’t grasp the difference between fact and fantasy. Similarly, we are adults here, and it is time for us to act like grown-ups. It is time for us to recognize that just like Santa Claus isn’t real, neither are many of the statements made on pp.60-61 of Power of Place. --Stan Giesbrecht (talk) 03:34, 3 October 2017 (UTC)

Stan, another long rant going over ground we've discussed already – you seem to read Browne differently from everyone else, and I note that Carroll recommends her biography of Darwin. . dave souza, talk 18:18, 30 October 2017 (UTC)
1. RE, “ground we've discussed already”: Let’s look a bit closer at the ground we’ve covered so far. You kept pushing the line that Darwin had alluded to human evolution one and only one time (on p.488) [25] [26] when I pointed out that Darwin himself had said that he had alluded to human origins on p.199. You insisted that this couldn’t be because Janet Browne had, in your words, said there was only one allusion to human origins. Yet, you had also claimed (correctly this time) that Browne had said that Darwin had deliberately avoided all discussion of human origins (either way though, Browne clearly said that there was not more than one allusion to human origins in OTOOS).
2. When I put this contradiction of one or zero references to David Wilson, he conceded that “the passage on p.60 is somewhat ambiguous and can be easily misinterpreted” and therefore “it should of course only be cited to support statements when the support it provides is unequivocal”. This allowed me to remove the citation, which you promptly replaced with a citation to James Costa. My eyes nearly popped out of my head when I read Costa, because he explicitly stated exactly what I had been saying, that Darwin’s comment on p.199 about sexual selection applying to humans was a reference to human origins.
3. So here were two sources you were pushing, who said diametrically opposing things on this point, these are your words, Costa saying there is more than one allusion to human origins in OTOOS and Browne saying there wasn’t, yet you also said that you supported using both sources on this very point. When I asked you to clarify your position on this contradiction, you stonewalled, prompting YoPienso to ask you to answer the question of how Browne and Costa could both be good source on the very point they made opposing claims. Unfortunately, you took a diversion first (reposting disputed content on another page), before coming back to Talk:CD where your response was to slag me for this that and the next thing, rather than actually addressing the issue. This further prompting YoPienso to post a link to a frozen waterfall on your talk page.
4 Going back to your edit prompting this whole conversation, based on the conversations that have actually occurred on this topic, I’d bet dollars to donuts that you are the only one here who thinks it’s a good idea to quote one historian saying: “In this book, he was completely silent on the subject of human origins” as a source for the post: “Many modern historians have seen this sentence as Darwin’s only discussion of human origins”. --Stan Giesbrecht (talk) 06:49, 2 February 2018 (UTC)
Hi Stan, have a doughnut. Fair point that we shouldn't be giving just one historian as an example, without pointing to the source for the many: "Following Darwin's lead, most commentators cite this one passage as the only reference to man in the Origin, but they thus overlook, as did Darwin himself, two sentences that are, in their own quiet way, even more effective." Quoting Carroll. So, I've added that quote and a citation to him. May review how we phrase our text. . . dave souza, talk 19:44, 2 February 2018 (UTC)

Race, attribution, etc. February 2018 further discussion

Latest comment: 6 years ago8 comments4 people in discussion
1. Claims of misrepresentation don’t count for anything without at least some explanation of what was and wasn’t misrepresented and actually cut against the claim on the presumption that if something is misrepresented people will explain what it is. The "Recommendations for further reading" referred to here comes from 2003, well before Darwin’s Sacred Cause of 2009. Thus it is highly possible that Joseph Carroll might also criticize D&M’s newer book if he felt they were still making “use of intentionally misleading techniques of quotation and documentation” as they did in their older book.
2. RE, Richard Dawkins was not talking about classification: I will reproduce the passage referred to (repeating what I did a few posts up from the link you provided) and let readers judge for themselves whether Dawkins doesn’t talk about classification in the passage or if the claim is simply to distract from Dawkins getting Darwin’s classification criteria wrong:
"Don’t be misled by the ill-chosen and unfortunate subtitle of Darwin’s great book: The preservation of favoured races in the struggle for life. It is abundantly clear from the text itself that Darwin didn’t mean races in the sense of ‘A group of people, animals, or plants, connected by common descent or origin’ (Oxford English Dictionary, definition 6.I). Rather, he intended something more like the OED’s definition 6.II: ‘A group or class of people, animals, or things, having some common feature or features’. An example of sense 6.II would be ‘All those individuals (regardless of their geographical race) who have blue eyes’." (Dawkins, 2009, p.62)
3. You cited WP:YESPOV, the explanation section of Wikipedia’s neutral point of view (WP:NPOV) policy, citing the third bullet point: Avoid stating facts as opinions which says, “Uncontested and uncontroversial factual assertions made by reliable sources should normally be directly stated in Wikipedia's voice.” A more relevant bullet point is the second: Avoid stating seriously contested assertions as facts which says, “If different reliable sources make conflicting assertions about a matter, treat these assertions as opinions rather than facts, and do not present them as direct statements.” The simple truth is, the sources that you have presented for the meaning of race fit into the latter (second bullet point) rather than the former (third bullet point). They are all over the map, none of them saying the same thing. Geoffrey Hodgson [27] and Mark Isaak [28] claim that Darwin never referred to human races in OTOOS, whereas James Costa and Desmond & Moore [29] clearly say that he did, so this obviously doesn’t fit into the “uncontested and uncontroversial factual assertions” category you cited as justification for removing the in text attribution I added. --Stan Giesbrecht (talk) 06:44, 2 February 2018 (UTC)
Stan, the more you go over old arguments, the more incoherent you seem to get – are you just trying to score points? Please start afresh, comment on the text as it is now, and make concise proposals for improvement, citing the sources which support your proposals. . . dave souza, talk 19:51, 2 February 2018 (UTC)
1. Really? It’s incoherent to point out the possibility that Joseph Carroll might have the same criticism of D&M 2009 as he expressed for D&M 1991? It’s incoherent to point out that not only did Richard Dawkins discuss the criteria Darwin used to classify races, but also that what he said on the matter was incorrect? I am extremely disappointed to be accused of trying to score points. Do I really need to point out that Wikipedia’s First Pillar is to build an encyclopedia, which means not compromising on accuracy. This of course includes sources, because we all know you can’t build a stable house on quicksand. The accuracy and reliability of this great project is the only “score” I am concerned about.
2. Following your suggestion, I reinstated the in text attribution on the meaning of “race” per WP:WikiVoice, Avoid stating seriously contested assertions as facts which says, “If different reliable sources make conflicting assertions about a matter, treat these assertions as opinions rather than facts, and do not present them as direct statements.” As well as points above and below, there is a citation to Bernasconi & Lott, who according to Jonathan Gribetz said that Darwin did not refer to human races in OTOOS [30]. This point is contradicted by James Costa and Desmond & Moore who say that Darwin did refer to human races [31]. As stated above, the policy on conflicting assertions means that in text attribution is required.
3. As mentioned in the History section of WP:NPOV, this policy flows, in part, from comments made by Jimbo here. This guidance, from the very early days of Wikipedia, is as relevant today as it was back then.
“Perhaps the easiest way to make your writing more encyclopedic, is to write about _what people believe_, rather than _what is so_. If this strikes you as somehow subjectivist or collectivist or imperialist, then ask me about it, because I think that you are just mistaken. What people believe is a matter of objective fact, and we can present _that_ quite easily from the neutral point of view.”
4. I also reposted the sentence from the book which includes the line “the preservation of favoured individuals and races”. In this post you objected, saying the sentence was an “odd addition of a supposedly similar quote from the body text – any similarity is synthesis”. In fact, Wikipedia’s policy on using primary sources (WP:PSTS) states:
“A primary source may only be used on Wikipedia to make straightforward, descriptive statements of facts that can be verified by any educated person with access to the primary source but without further, specialized knowledge.”
5. It clearly doesn’t take specialized knowledge to recognize that in the sentence from the text, the term “favoured” applies not just to “individuals” but also to “races” because of the word “and”. This is basic grammar, nothing specialized here, so saying that “the preservation of favoured individuals and races” is similar to “the Preservation of Favoured Races” most certainly does not violate Wikipedia’s policy of WP:NOR. Nevertheless, I did not identify the sentences as similar when making the post, because readers will be able to recognize this for themselves. --Stan Giesbrecht (talk) 05:04, 5 February 2018 (UTC)

Nope, still looks like a mix of original research and speculation about what sources might have said if they'd been published later. It won't do, and you're verging on slow edit warring. As above, please start afresh with a new section, discuss the present text rather than your past battles, and be concise and to the point. . . dave souza, talk 19:34, 5 February 2018 (UTC)

1. I don’t know how to be any clearer. Some of the sources you added say that Darwin did refer to human races in OTOOS (James Costa and Desmond & Moore [32]), some of them claim he did not refer to human races (Geoffrey Hodgson [33], Mark Isaak [34], and Bernasconi & Lott according to Jonathan Gribetz [35]). How can they be more opposite than that? These are not some obscure sources you haven’t heard of, they are the very sources that you added to the article. Wikipedia policy is absolutely clear on how to treat a situation like this, yet your only response is “nope”? You should be addressing rather than ignoring the issue.
2. And how many times are you going to trot out that tired old line of original research every single time someone points out that you are violating some policy or that your source doesn’t say what you posted? As I’ve told you many times, it says: “This policy of no original research does not apply to talk pages and other pages which evaluate article content and sources” (emphasis added). --Stan Giesbrecht (talk) 05:48, 6 February 2018 (UTC)
Please stop quoting policy—people here know the basics. Obviously (WP:AGF) mention of original research refers to what arguments support content in the article. Please start a new section with no mention of policy or other editors. Focus on one small change and let's deal with that. Johnuniq (talk) 07:16, 6 February 2018 (UTC)
@Johnuniq. 1. You have reverted me many many times for non-reasons, so no surprise that you did that again, this time citing WP:DR and WP:RSN in your edit summary. None of the steps at WP:DR support ignoring policy. Rather, the first step WP:DR identifies is for editors involved in editing and/or reverting to discuss concerns raised on the talk pages. WP:RSN is for discussing the general reliability of one or more sources and doesn’t strike me as the place to discuss whether editors should comply with Wikipedia’s core content policy, but you can raise the issue there if you want.
2. As Dave identified here, the guiding policy in this dispute is neutral point of view (WP:NPOV), and he cited the third bullet point to justify removing the in text attribution: Avoid stating facts as opinions which applies to “Uncontested and uncontroversial factual assertions”; so the question becomes whether or not the assertions made on this topic by the sources presented meet this criteria. Some of the questions that you need to answer include, are there sources saying Darwin did refer to human races in OTOOS, yes or no, and are there sources saying Darwin did not refer to human races, yes or no. Getting your response to these questions is obviously the first step required by WP:DR, but of course, no one is holding their breathe given your record. You have preached to me many many times to focus on content, focus on content, and have even come to my talk page (permalink) to tell me that. So, I said fine, let’s focus on content, let’s discuss your edits where you reverted me, but you flatly refused, time and time again, using lines such as “I am not motivated to debate article content” and “I will not engage in further discussion”; definitely not responses in compliance with WP:DR.
3. You say I am “Obviously” guilty of violating WP:OR and that everyone needs to blindly assume that you and Dave are making this claim in good faith. But WP:AGF says to assume people are trying to help the project “Unless there is clear evidence to the contrary” and to “avoid accusing others of harmful motives without clear evidence”. That’s the criteria provided, so let’s look at the evidence.
  • One of the main reasons I started editing here was because, at the time, Wikipedia was making such claims as Darwin never saw any races as inferior and that he had not alluded to human origins more than once in OTOOS. These claims are utterly and nonsensically false, but when anyone would point this out, Dave would immediately accuse them of original research, and you would join the edit war. Even though neither Browne nor Costa actually said that Darwin mentioned human origins one and only one time, you reverted me to restore this unverified claim [36] [37]. This is what is explicitly prohibited by WP:OR: the posting of claims to the article that are not stated in some published source.
  • When I removed the false claim that Darwin never saw any races as inferior, Dave immediately reverted me, prompting YoPienso to provide a ton of sources showing the claim to be false. But he ignored all the secondary sources that disagreed with his post and responded with rivers of his own interpretation and spin on the talk pages, even though he should have immediately agreed to remove the claim if his source did not say what the post did. We managed to remove the claim, but then Dave tried again some weeks later, posting that Darwin believed “that black people were fully equal” which was simply synthesized from the fact that Darwin had a black tutor and opposed slavery, facts that were sourced by Desmond and Moore, based on Dave’s belief (or delusional fantasy) that the latter proved the former. This despite the fact that YoPienso had informed him that Desmond and Moore had considered the matter and reached the very opposite conclusion, writing: “He thought blacks inferior but was sickened by slavery”. So Dave’s claim contradicted the very source he cited, but this didn’t stop you from reverting me to restore his post, which you knew was original research.
  • It wasn’t just me, of course, other editors had challenged this claim long before I started editing, including Filanca (archive). When Filanca pointed out that Dave’s post that “Darwin did not share the then common view that other races are inferior” was both not true and not sourced, you jumped on the bandwagon to accuse Filanca of violating WP:OR. The post was clearly synthesized from Darwin having had a black tutor (a total Non sequitur (logic) argument if there ever was one). None of the authors that you or Dave mentioned on the talk page said what the post did, so it obviously violated WP:OR, but even if one of the authors had stated that, no citation was added to the claim on the article, so it still would have violated WP:OR until the citation was added. But in any case, Filanca pointing out that the post was unverified and false is definitely not WP:OR. It’s getting pretty hard not to see a pattern emerging here.
4. As Jimbo said (para.3, 5 February post above), we can’t necessarily know precisely _what is so_ on every topic. This includes Darwin’s state of mind, what precisely he was thinking when he chose the title of his most famous book. On the other hand, we do know what various authors wrote on the matter, so attributing what they said is the farthest thing from original research that could be posted to the article. --Stan Giesbrecht (talk) 02:44, 16 February 2018 (UTC)

Administrator note: I have no opinion on the merits of the arguments above; my role as an administrator is to prevent disruption to the Wikipedia project. To that end, I have two tools at my disposal: article protection, which in this case would lock the article for all editors including those uninvolved with the dispute, or identifying and blocking the source of the disruption. I chose the latter and blocked Stan Giesbrecht, as having the least impact on the project for the most benefit. I regret doing this because he has been engaging on the talk page, but the WP:BURDEN rests on the person who wants to add content, and that burden is not satisfied by revert-warring (or, for that matter, writing walls of text that other editors are disinclined to read). ~Anachronist (talk) 05:46, 16 February 2018 (UTC)

A Darwin misread of Wallace re female trimorphism in butterflies? — request for confirmation

Latest comment: 5 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion

See here re this page of Origin of Species. Thx, Humanengr (talk) 17:57, 26 December 2018 (UTC)

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