Wikipedia talk:Neutral point of view/Archive 60

Dispute recent revert to DUE

I dispute the recent revert of my edit made by Peter Gulutzan on the grounds that it was extremely disingenuous by virtue of the facts that the only "context" supporting his view in the entire paragraph appears nowhere else except the preceding sentence, and that the only other purpose the reversion seems to serve is forcing a discussion based on that weak (at best) premise. However, since we are on the subject of that preceding sentence, it represents a deletionist viewpoint, and should be modified, or removed, especially the ...should not be included at all,... bit. But, back to my edit, the original wording also represents a deletionist view, and it is a really terrible example of due and undue to boot. The Earth article would never ever contain a SEE AlSO or anything else about flat Earth [modern concept] simply because the two topics have nothing in common. It has absolutely nothing to do with being due or undue as the deletionist viewpoint would trick you into believing. It appears the only purpose that example serves is to say, "this is why we exclude stuff". Except it has nothing to do with due or undue at all. It's just an excuse to exclude. Another example is Bigfoot. The article says bigfoot is an ape-like creature, but we should never say in our guidance the Ape and Hominid articles don't mention bigfoot at all with the reason being that "it isn't due", since they aren't mentioned because they aren't related. The correct way to represent due and undue in the flat earth example is the way I did it in my edit because flat earth#Modern flat-Earthers is proportionately related to flat Earth, and the correct way to do it with the bigfoot example is to say that bigfoot only has a proportionately small mention in the Humanoid article since they are proportionately related. I propose we restore my edit (or a version of it) and we do something about (preferably delete) the deletionist sentence Generally, the views of tiny minorities should not be included at all, except perhaps in a "see also" to an article about those specific views. because outright exclusion of material is in no way shape, or form, balanced, neutral or proportionate. Huggums537 (talk) 18:56, 31 July 2022 (UTC)

On an article about a fringe theory, it would not make sense to delegate the details of the fringe theory to an overall minority portion of the article; this assumes that the discussion of the fringe theory and its believes are well documented in RSes that are discussing the theory as being fringe, rather than from sources that are treating the fringe theory as fact. That way, there is also discussion of why the fringe theory is wrong or false. So the prior wording implied that the discussion of flat earth on the flat earth article should be handled in a minor way, which is wrong. But that said, I don't think saying that we'd cover flat Earth on the Earth article is right. Instead, it would make sense to say that talking about flat earth on the Spherical Earth article would absolutely be held in a minority viewpoint in line with DUE, and thus would suggest that that article be the representative link there. --Masem (t) 19:36, 31 July 2022 (UTC)

The biggest problem with your great idea is that it doesn't do anything at all to solve any of the deletionist viewpoint issues I brought up. Huggums537 (talk) 19:51, 31 July 2022 (UTC)

Also, your idea is a very poor one that doesn't work anyway since there is a whole entire proportionately due paragraph in the Spherical Earth article devoted to historical beliefs about the flat earth. Huggums537 (talk) 20:13, 31 July 2022 (UTC)

Public apologies to Masem. I misunderstood everything. Huggums537 (talk) 20:44, 31 July 2022 (UTC)

Wait a minute. I feel terrible. I think I have assumed some bad faith. I thought you were suggesting we replace the current Earth link with Spherical Earth, but now that I'm looking at it more closely you are saying we should use my edit, but rather than linking the two parts of flat Earth together, we should say that flat Earth represents a proportionately minor view of the Spherical Earth article in order to be proportionately due. Huggums537 (talk) 20:31, 31 July 2022 (UTC)

Yes, as an example of where DUE would be used to limit a minority viewpoint to maybe a line or paragraph, whereas even with the Earth, you likely wouldn't mention flat earth at all. There are times that we should mention minority views under DUE but as DUE cautions, not give equal weight or false equivalence, particularly when those minority views are themselves notable. Masem (t) 21:50, 31 July 2022 (UTC)

Ok, I think you have an even better idea than mine because I can see how people might get a little bit confused by my example. However, I still disagree that flat Earth [modern concept] would ever be mentioned in the Earth article based on reasons having anything at all to do with DUE. If it isn't mentioned it is simply because it is just plain stupid to do it, not because it isn't allowed and that is exactly the way it should be. This ignorant idea that somebody is trying to fool us with that it isn't mentioned because it isn't allowed needs to be jettisoned out the nearest thermal exhaust port into the farthest reaches of space. Huggums537 (talk) 22:18, 31 July 2022 (UTC)

I mean can we please stop pretending the reason why these articles don't mention fringe is because it has something to do with DUE preventing it, and not just because it simply never belonged in there first place? Numerology isn't in Number theory, Arithmetic, or History of arithmetic, but it does have a proportionate cultural section in Number; and Astrology isn't in Astronomy (except to say they are totally unrelated) or Constellation (because it doesn't belong), but it does have a significant proportional mention in History of astronomy, and the reason is because they belong in one, but not the other, not because they were not DUE in the other. It's like saying polar bears are not in South Africa, and of course the only reason they aren't there is because all the rulers of South Africa decided there is a consensus they should never be allowed there under any circumstances because their rules supposedly say they were never allowed to begin with. It's a bunch of circular logic, and mental gymnastics about something that occurs naturally anyway just for the sole purpose of convincing us there is some kind of imaginary exclusionary rule in DUE. Huggums537 (talk) 00:51, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

I think that "it simply never belonged in there first place" is a pretty good plain English translation of what we opaquely render in edit summaries as "Rm per DUE". WhatamIdoing (talk) 03:25, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

Circular logic again. You would have to point to the exact part of DUE that I'm saying we should remove where it tells you it's ok to "Rm per DUE" because we created this imaginary exclusionary rule that says "it shouldn't be included at all". My whole point is that this sentence of guidance is just an excuse to do the very thing you just described, and it is a fanatical deletionist misrepresentation of what DUE is supposed to be about. Harmful fanatical views should be excised. They are harmful if they misrepresent or deceive. The proper way to handle material that "doesn't belong" is to strengthen the relevant policy or guidance that prevents it, that means find the policy actually related to it, and beef it up, not blow smoke up our ass about DUE. Huggums537 (talk) 04:01, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

That one little sentence is the exception to NPOV that swallows the entire rule. All anyone would ever have to do to overcome a minority viewpoint is claim it doesn't belong per DUE. Huggums537 (talk) 04:13, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

And all YOU would have to do as an inclusionist is provide a small review of RSes about the main article topic which mention the minority view as something that exists and is relevant. And BAM, WP:DUE would support inclusion, proportional to the real estate of those mentions. — Shibbolethink ^{(♔ ♕)} 09:17, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

The key words here being, "small review". That's all it would take to characterize the minority view as "tiny minority". The bar is set very easy to step over. This imaginary smoking gun for inclusion you are portraying is BAM non existent. Huggums537 (talk) 08:34, 2 August 2022 (UTC)

I think what I'm seeing here is that you may be begrudging the process of convincing everyone else of the same. I am sorry, but consensus based on compromise from discussion is a process, and precisely the one this website is based on. You would have to be more convincing than the guy who says "tiny minority." That's just the way it is. — Shibbolethink ^{(♔ ♕)} 15:40, 2 August 2022 (UTC)

No, I have no ill feelings for the process, nor have I shown that I do, but what I do begrudge is harmful guidance that is so problematic it essentially says, "any minorities can be removed if a person simply claims it is "tiny", and the only way to overcome this removal is to argue about what "tiny" was ever supposed to mean in the first place." The guidance is a harmful deletionist loophole, and only encourages disputes. Strike it down. Huggums537 (talk) 19:24, 3 August 2022 (UTC)

Also, it is bad guidance anyway. The only qualifier you need to completely remove a minority view is the vague description of "tiny minority", but any minority view can be made to fit that description when all you have to do is compare it to something else much larger, and that is always easy to do. The "guidance" hands fanatical deletionist views on a silver platter and spits in the face of NPOV. Huggums537 (talk) 04:41, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

I feel as though you may not be understanding that this is not about editor opinions, and if not, then I apologize for the misunderstanding.

RSes, not our opinions, tell us what is and is not a "tiny" minority view, by describing or not describing it in their sources dedicated to the main topic. And we should include such views in proportion to their "real estate" in RSes. For example, if I were to look up RSes about "Earth" (Google Scholar  · Semantic Scholar  · Google News  · Nexis Uni) I find extremely few mentions of the "flat earth" theory. hence, why "flat earth" is mentioned only once in the "Earth" article, in passing. However, I find a HUGE amount of references to the existence of climate change and humanity's exploitation of Earth's non-renewable resources, hence why this receives an entire section in the Earth article. — Shibbolethink ^{(♔ ♕)} 09:19, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

I feel as though you may not be understanding that we have to consider and take into account that editors will attempt to force their personal opinions whether they are supposed to or not, and there is a great impact from this every bit as strong as whatever RSes say. Thus, the resulting WP:Systemic bias issues we face. I believe major contributing factors to this issue are contrary lines of guidance like the one we are discussing, and I also believe it will go a looong way toward the improvement of that issue by the removal of that harmful guidance. It's not just about deletion VS inclusion, it's about the removal of guidance that is blatantly oppressive and biased against minority viewpoints, totally contradictory to NPOV, and NPOV is supposed to be one of our WP:Five pillars. Huggums537 (talk) 09:05, 2 August 2022 (UTC)

We can even use the example you gave above to illustrate why it is important to take this into account. It will be possible to do this because there is no such thing as some kind of RS calculator that tallies up sources, and then spits out precise results. Instead, the sources are interpreted and judged by the opinions of the involved editors. Without even looking at your search results, I can already see there is a lot of potentially debatable material there to influence the opinions of editors. First, I don't know what kind of mentions about flat Earth are in the ones that do mention it, then I don't know how many additional sources there are that indirectly mention it just as our own article does, and these details are important because it brings up another debate about Whether Wikipedia is actually making the appropriate representation or not. The difference between flat Earth (historical concept and myth) and flat Earth (modern day fringe theory). One could easily argue (and I do) that linking to the flat Earth article without any explanation of what you are linking to is the same thing as not linking to anything for any reason at all. Pretty much vandalism really. Except, the Earth article does give an explanation about what it is linking to, but it doesn't point to anything about modern flat Earth beliefs, only the historical belief. In my view this is extremely far too weak to be counted as a "passing mention" for something worthy enough for inclusion in our policy that is one of our 5P. Huggums537 (talk) 13:47, 2 August 2022 (UTC)

there is no such thing as some kind of RS calculator that tallies up sources, and then spits out precise results. Instead, the sources are interpreted and judged by the opinions of the involved editors Welcome to WP:CONSENSUS. i have yet to see any alternative that would be better equipped to achieve Wikipedia's goals. — Shibbolethink ^{(♔ ♕)} 15:42, 2 August 2022 (UTC)

Ok, well at least we agree on something. Huggums537 (talk) 18:56, 3 August 2022 (UTC)

I believe that most of the Flat Earth article should feature what flat-earth theorists said since that is the subject, though of course the fact that it's superseded is quite rightly in the introduction, and the mention in the Earth article is quite rightly short, as WP:NPOV says, and -- as far as I can interpret -- Huggums537's attempted change does not say. Peter Gulutzan (talk)

I thought my edit was self explanatory, but as I admitted earlier in the discussion, I can see how people might get confused between Myth of the flat Earth and Modern flat Earth beliefs which are both covered in the Flat Earth article. That is why I think the better idea is the improvement Masem suggested about my edit. Huggums537 (talk) 08:13, 2 August 2022 (UTC)

Minority vs. Fringe in WP:FALSEBALANCE

WP:FALSEBALANCE begins, "While it is important to account for all significant viewpoints on any topic, Wikipedia policy does not state or imply that every minority view or extraordinary claim needs to be presented along with commonly accepted mainstream scholarship as if they were of equal validity." The phrase "minority view" links to WP:FRINGE. Perhaps it would be better for the text to also be "fringe theory" instead of "minority view", if that is the intent. I think that would be better, so as not to give the impression that due weight is a winner-takes-all popularity contest. (And I have certainly seen more than one editor approach a dispute with that very attitude.) Sennalen (talk) 04:53, 31 July 2022 (UTC)

I think there's room for improvement on the WP:EGG-iness of the link, but I would oppose a change from "minority" to "fringe" in the text. It's important to continue having the policy push against giving minority views equal weight to mainstream scholarship. Speaking generally, the policy text as written does not imply a "winner-takes-all popularity contest"—maybe more like "winner-takes-most". Firefangledfeathers (talk / contribs) 05:06, 31 July 2022 (UTC)

Agree with @Firefangledfeathers that such a change would be antithetical to WP:DUE. Minority viewpoints deserve more coverage than FRINGE ones, but not as much as viewpoints which have widespread acceptance among relevant experts. — Shibbolethink ^{(♔ ♕)} 16:58, 31 July 2022 (UTC)

Agree with Sennalen. Equating "minority view" with fringe is not supported by WP:FRINGE itself, which states that significant-minority views published in reliable sources should be represented fairly and proportionately. The examples chosen to illustrate FALSEBALANCE, like flat-earth and the moon landing hoax, are examples of fringe. These are not merely minority views, they aggressively contradict all available evidence. - Palpable (talk) 17:09, 31 July 2022 (UTC)

That's a good point as well. "Minority view" conflicts with both the link and the examples. What if, in addition to changing "minority" to "fringe", the paragraph were also appended with Shibbolethink's summation: "Minority viewpoints deserve more coverage than FRINGE ones, but not as much as viewpoints which have widespread acceptance among relevant experts." Sennalen (talk) 22:43, 31 July 2022 (UTC)

I think that @Sennalen has a good suggestion. A smaller change (if that feels like too big a change) would be to insert a separate mention of fringe-ness: "...imply that every minority view, fringe theory, or extraordinary claim needs to be presented...". WhatamIdoing (talk) 03:23, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

I like it. Firefangledfeathers (talk / contribs) 03:39, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

I would support either of these two changes, with slight preference for WAID's. I think we can remove the link, and then mention fringe separately. Important to still mention fringe theories. Important to still mention that representing every minority viewpoint is also UNDUE. — Shibbolethink ^{(♔ ♕)} 04:03, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

That isn't UNDUE, though. UNDUE begins, "Neutrality requires that mainspace articles and pages fairly represent all significant viewpoints that have been published by reliable sources, in proportion to the prominence of each viewpoint in the published, reliable sources." FALSEBALANCE piles on saying not only should the minority be less prominent, it should not be treated as equally valid. That treatment should be reserved for FRINGE. If the majority and minority views come from sources of similar stature, even if the minority is due less space, they should be treated as equally valid. Sennalen (talk) 12:50, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

I think you may have misunderstood me. I meant "it is important that the policy still mentions FRINGE somewhere", not "It is important to mention FRINGE viewpoints in articles to comply with policy." I see how my wording may have been confusing.

To the rest of your comment, If the majority and minority views come from sources of similar stature, even if the minority is due less space, they should be treated as equally valid -- Uhhhhh, no. They should be treated as proportionately worthy of inclusion and discussion as depicted in the proportionality of their prominence in published reliable sources, exactly as described in the UNDUE quote you provide.

"Validity" has no place on Wikipedia, It literally does not enter into any equation. We don't determine winners and losers. We determine what is verifiable, due, and how much real estate each idea should have. See also: WP:NOTTRUTH.

As to our treatment of minority viewpoints as "viable ideas", that depends on the consensus of relevant experts per policies such as Wikipedia:MEDASSESS, WP:SOURCETYPES and the many other policies described in WP:SCICON. A viewpoint may be discussed a lot in RSes, but if all that discussion is mostly debunking, then we discuss it in reference to debunking it, just like the relevant scholars do. We don't get to twist it around to whatever angle of "validity" we want, and we don't get to pick and choose which sources we use, we must use the consensus of what sources are "reliable" as described in policy and as delineated at WP:RSN and WP:RSP, and with the hierarchy set up in WP:SOURCETYPES.

WP:PARITY also plays a role here; if all the journalists are praising some idea, but all the scholars are dunking on it, we go with what the scholars say. Similarly if all the supportive mentions of a minority viewpoint are in primary articles, or publications in non-topic-relevant journals with poorer quality peer-review, but all the critical mentions are in secondary review articles published in topic-relevant expert-staffed and expert-reviewed journals, then we lean towards the critical viewpoint but mention the existence of the minority view. That goes for everything, not just science, and not just medicine. — Shibbolethink ^{(♔ ♕)} 16:31, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

@Shibbolethink: FALSEBALANCE says (emphasis mine) "Wikipedia policy does not state or imply that every minority view or extraordinary claim needs to be presented along with commonly accepted mainstream scholarship as if they were of equal validity." That is the heart of what makes FALSEBALANCE its own entity within UNDUE, and why it's problematic to make "minority views" part of FALSEBALANCE. It implies that minority not only impacts proportionality, but also impacts validity. Sennalen (talk) 16:39, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

If it's a minority of relevant experts, then yes, it should impact how we treat it as "viable" or "valid" or whatever. That is the very heart of FALSEBALANCE. We don't treat all viewpoints as equally valid because the scholars don't. We follow what the literature says. Wikipedia follows, it does not lead. If the majority of experts are wrong, then so is Wikipedia. That's the consensus of how Wikipedia has been run for quite a few years now. Who are we to say that all non-FRINGE ideas are equally valid? Why do we, as amateur editors, get to decide that, when the actual content experts don't agree? — Shibbolethink ^{(♔ ♕)} 16:41, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

But we shouldn't treat a minority of relevant expert scholars as less valid just for being a numerical minority. FALSEBALANCE as it stands can be read as suggesting we should do that. Sennalen (talk) 16:46, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

we shouldn't treat a minority of relevant expert scholars as less valid just for being a numerical minority
Au contraire mon ami, we absolutely should. We should do exactly that.

And thankfully a consensus of wikipedia editors has agreed with me in numerous challenges to FALSEBALANCE. And since it's part of a policy, not just a guideline, the bar for changing it to be completely different is extremely high. Thank the lord our god Jimbo himself that it isn't so easy to do as you wish, and open the door to all manner of snake-oil salesmen, cranks, charlatans, quacks, pseudoscientists, hoaxters, fools, and mountebanks to push their chicanery on the most visited website in the world.

You see, every crank wants to be a persecuted minority. They are all the Einstein of our day, relegated to patent offices where no one sees their brilliance. And interestingly, they all think they are exactly that, brilliant, but misunderstood by the hegemony. Its just the man keeping them down, they aren't really FRINGE. There's way more people who believe what they believe than the MAIN-STREAM MEDIA would have you believe. Nobody calls themselves "FRINGE", they are simply misunderstood and underestimated.

Wham bam, no thank you, ma'am. Over my cold, dead, astrally projected - naeviomanced - extispiced - zombified - and ultimately cryonicized body, my friend. — Shibbolethink ^{(♔ ♕)} 16:52, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

Conflating minority views with "snake-oil salesmen, cranks, charlatans, quacks, pseudoscientists, hoaxters, fools, and mountebanks" is borderline disruptive, and it sounds like we need a guideline to make that clear. Palpable (talk) 16:59, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

You see, the problem is that every one of those people emphatically thinks they are a minority view. Keeping it as it is, a spectrum of inclusion from --nothing-- to --majority real estate-- and all the stops in between keeps things actually working around this place. For example, I listed cryonics in there. I would also say life extension. Both of these have fervent supporters who espouse a minority view.

They aren't really fringe, at least not most of the believers, because they operate within the architecture of the scientific establishment, or within respected parts of academia anyway. But that doesn't mean we should say that these whack-a-doodle ideas are equally valid as their contrapositive - that cryonics is taking your cold dead body and making it colder, in a way that is, to all current scientific tests and estimations, completely useless. Your "brain architecture" is probably not preserved. At least not in any meaningful abundance in the most important areas for your personality and what makes you - you (the cortex) [1] [2][3]

Basically everyone who was gung-ho and all-in on cryonics before 1973 has now had their body defrosted and cremated due to the absolutely insane idea that any corporation will outlive the only people who actually need it to survive. [4] [5]. The entire set of ideas rests on theoretical future developments which, to the mind of any actual working molecular neuroscientist, won't happen for many many multiple decades, if not centuries. Have you ever seen the brain of someone who didn't have oxygen for 5 minutes? I have. Multiple times a day, almost every day, for more than a year now. It's not pretty. Ain't no preservation of inter-synaptic architecture. It's all a sludge of edema and dead cell parts and inflammation as the body tries to wall off all the dead bits, but SURPRISE, it's all dead bits. So the brain just eats itself. And the real sad news is that after a cardiac arrest and induced anoxia (one of the most common ways to die in modern America and much of the world [6]) you can't be declared legally brain dead and viable for cryonics until this damage gets really bad. [7] [8]

But, interestingly, this entire field is chock FULL of dozens and dozens of crappy primary research articles and blog posts and self-published treatises on how great of an idea this is. You have to wade through this stuff to get to the actual experts talking about the actual viability of these ideas. And when you get there, the outlook is not good.

So appropriately, we don't talk about Cryonics as though it is an extremely viable and worthwhile set of notions that deserve equal "validity" as its detractors. Because the actual experts don't view it that way.

I think, on summation, this discussion is probably a massive waste of time. I doubt that anyone who fervently holds a minority viewpoint as their sacred cow is going to be convinced that this policy change is a bad idea. Not that such a person isn't acting in good faith, I think they are, but the very bias itself is believing that minority viewpoints deserve equal time. equal footing. It's hard (if not impossible) for the brain to truly know itself, and to truly understand its own shortcomings. I don't think any of us can do it. — Shibbolethink ^{(♔ ♕)} 17:18, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

This is not about cryonics. Nor is it about flat-earth, moon landing denial, cryptids, leprechauns, Santa Claus, or any of the other snarky strawman arguments that keep coming up when someone wants to weaken NPOV and slip in a few thinly veiled insults on the side. - Palpable (talk) 17:41, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

Hi, where do I insult anybody here? Please let me know so I can fix it. Thanks. I thought Cryonics was actually a very good illustrative example since it's got the full spectrum of minority - to - fringe, with most people probably on the more reasonable end, and a very vocal small group of FRINGE people just being really loud about it.

when someone wants to weaken NPOV and slip in a few thinly veiled insults on the side Quick question, who is proposing that we change things around here? It isn't me. I'm not trying to change anything, I like the policy as it stands.

So I think the idea that I'm trying to "weaken NPOV" is a big ol' failure of WP:AGF and a misunderstanding of the space-time continuum and the nature of action and reaction. — Shibbolethink ^{(♔ ♕)} 17:43, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

Collapsed as I move this in its entirety to my talk page as WP:TALKOFFTOPIC. Anyone is free and welcome to go there and contribute to the discussion as they see fit.— Shibbolethink (♔ ♕) 19:54, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

Generally I think you are among the more reasonable people pushing the idea that WP must endorse the skeptic POV. However, in the specific discussion at Talk:COVID-19 lab leak theory#Science new paper on Huanan Market, you did resort to the Bigfoot comparison to refer to a significant-minority view attributed to respectable scientists in reliable sources. If you don't think that's insulting, I hope you'll rethink after this discussion. Similarly, it's hard to see "snake-oil salesmen, cranks, charlatans, quacks, pseudoscientists, hoaxters, fools, and mountebanks" as anything but a list of insults. On the same talk page, you twice conflated the "insufficent data, likely natural origin" position with the "engineered bioweapon" position, applying the defamatory labels "conspiracy theory" and "pseudoscience" to the former while citing sources about the latter. I still don't see how somebody could confuse those two positions in good faith, and you declined to explain when I brought it up. I think this is exactly the confusion we are discussing here and I think it illustrates the need for a guideline against conflation of minority and fringe, particularly motivated conflation that leads to defamatory labeling. Again, I think you are one of the more reasonable people arguing this POV. There are others who employ the insult-by-strawman style with what appears to be glee rather than frustration. - Palpable (talk) 18:45, 1 August 2022 (UTC) I'd like to start off by saying this edit appears to be a criticism of me personally, and thus inappropriate for this talk page. It more appropriately belongs on my or your User Talk. If it's alright with you, I'd like to move it to one of those two venues, so as to distract less from this discussion about ideas and not about people. I feel strongly uncomfortable with it being here, and it surely must run afoul of parts of WP:TALKOFFTOPIC. That said, here is my response to the content of your comment, made in good faith: Ahoy! Thar be off-topic dragons in here, thar be! pushing the idea that WP must endorse the skeptic POV do you mean the POV set down in WP:NPOV, WP:DUE, WP:FRINGE, WP:SCHOLARSHIP, WP:BMI, WP:RSUW, etc? I am not proposing any changes here. I'm "pushing" what is already written down as WP:PAG. Similarly, it's hard to see "snake-oil salesmen, cranks, charlatans, quacks, pseudoscientists, hoaxters, fools, and mountebanks" as anything but a list of insults. See, this is interesting, because I didn't say any of those things in reference to anyone on this page. Literally not applicable to anyone here. Not to say I haven't met people who fit those labels on this site, I absolutely have. They just aren't here right now. I said those things to demonstrate the people who would take advantage of this well-meaning change and thus bring about lots of bad changes to this site I love so much. The fact that you or anyone else thinks that those labels apply to you says a whole lot more about how you view yourself, or how you think that I view you, than it actually does about how I actually view you. I never made any reference or indication that those labels were about you. You're so vain... etc etc. Truly, it isn't about you. It's about what will happen if this well-meaning change actually happens. On the same talk page, you twice conflated the "insufficent data, likely natural origin" position with the "engineered bioweapon" position, applying the defamatory labels "conspiracy theory" and "pseudoscience" to the former while citing sources about the latter subtlety here, I sometimes refer to one and sometimes the other, but I don't conflate the two. I am referring to them separately in different contexts as applicable.That's why I say things like "There are versions of". There are more reasonable and less reasonable lab leak versions. There are some versions of the lab leak that are conspiracy theory. In some ways, it's all a conspiracy theory as it all boils down to requiring a conspiracy of actors to work together to "cover up" certain research projects. Literally a theory relying on the existence of a conspiracy. But as I have acknowledged before, I will acknowledge again, there are versions of the lab leak which are not "conspiracy theory" in the conventional sense, such as the idea that a virus was part of a sampling expedition and thus transferred to humanity without being part of any intentional research project. There's no conspiracy involved there. Still less likely. But this is the issue with the lab leak, it's big, amorphous, and it's as though most people are playing a Motte and bailey game with it. Referencing their preferred more radical versions when convenient, and retreating back to the most reasonable when inconvenient. But, as an aside, I think"pseudoscience" actually does apply to basically the entirety of most versions of the Lab leak theory. Because many of the versions of the leak are not based in scientific fact. These formulations are based in the absence of certain evidence. E.g. "We don't have the exact SARS-2 virus sampled directly from a living animal in the market back in November 2019, before the pandemic, and the exact same virus in a human, who was right next to that animal, before anything else, in exactly the way I want it, so therefore the zoonosis theory is dead in the water." I am not making that up, it is extremely close to something somebody said to me on twitter the other day. It's called special pleading. Eventually, the backflips one has to make to ignore the existing pro-zoonotic data get so big that one is creating special circumstances to keep the preferred version of the theory viable. THAT is an element of pseudoscience, because it has the appearance of science "I'm making a hypothesis, I'm talking about science-y things" but it doesn't follow the practice of science. E.g. it doesn't presume a null hypothesis and try to disprove itself. It doesn't use constructs such as occam's razor to find the most plausible construct devoid of new assumptions. it doesn't steel-man its own assertions. Etc. etc. It doesn't change the likelihood of itself to fit current data, the very ESSENCE of science. If its adherents did this, they would see the mounting evidence that various precursor viruses were circulating in bats, in and around the market, and underwent what appear to be multiple zoonotic transfer events into the human race (actually a common thing in zoonoses e.g. HIV-1 and HIV-2 and HIV-gorr, various subtypes of Flu-A, etc). All of which are consistent with a zoonotic narrative. And there has been no new data, no actual evidence, in support of the lab leak theory. All these lab leak theorists spend all day tearing down evidence they see as supporting a hypothesis they disagree with, and don't have any new evidence to support their own. That's a bad sign, epistemologically speaking. Ever seen this Futurama clip? It's the god of the gaps. And in some cases, it's actually complete misconceptions and/or misunderstandings. E.g. the idea that the furin cleavage site in SARS-CoV-2 is somehow unique or specially targeted towards humans. it's not. Lots of other coronaviruses which infect humans actually have this same cleavage site. Coronaviruses swap parts of themselves around all the time. It is not at all surprising or special that the site is there, or that it looks the way it does. A similar thing is true about the CGGCGG codon doublet. This exists in literally thousands of coronavirus species. It is not special in any way. It just isn't very common in the coronaviruses which are most "famous" or known to infect humans. But, again, it's 1) not that far off from known codons in the same exact virus, and 2) it could have been passed in recombination, just like happens all the time. In conclusion, I am sorry that you were insulted by my comments, that was not my intention. I do not want you to feel that way, and I apologize for any way in which my comments created that feeling. That's why I asked what I said to insult you, because I do not want to insult you. I have glee in this interaction because I am just so amazingly surprised at the many forms this argument takes. At the ways well-meaning people sometimes twist logic and policy up into knots to support their preferred outcome. I am truly, completely, and authentically, flabbergasted. If you are picturing me, I would like you to do it with my hands thrown up in amazement. That is the origin of my demeanor, not any ill feelings or will towards you or anyone else around here. — Shibbolethink (♔ ♕) 19:18, 1 August 2022 (UTC) I agree - don't want to derail the discussion here, and after posting I thought maybe it would have been better on your talk page. If you could move it to your talk page I will follow up there. I'm not sure where the best place to cut is without giving someone the last word, I may leave a short note here if I feel like my position has been left misconstrued. Thanks - Palpable (talk) 19:48, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

I can't possibly be any clearer that I'm not trying to talk about clearly FRINGE content. I'm talking about unsettled science from reliable, prestigious, elite, peer-reviewed, academic journal sources. You would not go through Alternatives to general relativity or Controversies related to chronic fatigue syndrome and start stripping minority scholarly views from the article solely on the basis that they are a minority. Sennalen (talk) 17:03, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

And no one is suggesting we do that. No one in those two articles is taking the status quo of FALSEBALANCE and removing notable minority based on it. That's a straw man. What you're suggesting is that we make a change to a policy that would allow someone to go to General relativity and increase the amount of real estate dedicated to alternative ideas until it's equal with the accepted narrative.

Both of the actual articles you indicated are bad examples because they are articles about controversy. So they already include more minority content than any majority article. The better example would be how this would apply to Chronic fatigue syndrome and how some random guy would be able to say "hey we need to talk about my viewpoint more, that CFS is actually caused by post-treatment chronic lyme disease and we need to treat it by giving everybody antibiotics" and we would have to do it. Until it no longer was an article reflecting the actual state of the science, that that is an extremely unlikely proposition. [9][10] — Shibbolethink ^{(♔ ♕)} 17:37, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

Someone could not change General relativity in that fashion because of WP:UNDUE, which is based on the quality of sources and the quantity of material within sources. I'm not sure that quality articles would look any different if FALSEBALANCE did not exist as a policy at all. It's more of an explanatory note, and in its role as such it can lead people astray with cavalier linkage of "minority" with "validity". Quantity in sources should guide quantity in articles, but quantity in sources does not speak to validity. Sennalen (talk) 17:56, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

Yes, per above, minority views are not always equivalent to fringe theories, though fringe theories are a subset of minority views. --Masem (t) 17:10, 31 July 2022 (UTC)

• Oh crap, is this another attempt to change the WP:PAGs to open up a line of argumentation in favour of the bloody Lab leak conspiracy theory? I propose not changing policy in response to local spats. Wait a bit till the craziness has died down; it can't hurt. Otherwise, what particular problem is being addressed here (examples please!) Alexbrn (talk) 16:58, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

  This is not directly in pursuit of any particular edit on any particular page. COVID-19 lab leak theory however is an excellent example of how an article does and should distinguish between minority scholarly viewpoints and fringe viewpoints. Sennalen (talk) 17:13, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

  Exactly, this is all a ploy to open up an argument take the "lab leak" nonsense out of being WP:FRINGE. Not gonna happen because Wikipedia ultimately is based on sources and reality. Alexbrn (talk) 17:36, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

  As far as I'm concerned, the lab leak page already adheres to my interpretation of what the policy should be. If you want to edit it, you know where to find it. Sennalen (talk) 17:43, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

  Then let me say this, the proposed change here would very likely lead to that article changing for the worse. We describe the scientific consensus several times therein (that the zoonosis is the most likely explanation, and the lab leak is not very probable according to the actual experts in virology, epidemiology, etc.).

  The change described here would probably lead to those mentions all being rolled back in favor of giving the lab leak (which I think many around there think is a minority and not a FRINGE view) equal footing to the zoonosis explanation. As "equally valid." An equal footing which it does not deserve, given the current state of expert opinion on the matter. — Shibbolethink ^{(♔ ♕)} 17:48, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

  It is equally valid, which is to say lab leak is a plausible hypothesis given the evidence, with support from respectable scholars in respectable journals. Since lab leak is less prominent in the sources, it also gets proportionally less space than zoonosis in Investigations into the origin of COVID-19. All of that is because of WP:DUE None of that would change if WP:FALSEBALANCE were altered or even deleted, because WP:FALSEBALANCE is (properly) about fringe topics. Sennalen (talk) 18:36, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

  The lab leak theory is not currently accepted by the mainstream virology community. I also would dispute the idea that there really is any substantive or concrete evidence in support of the leak. Right now it's just an idea fueled by some cursory surface-level coincidences that look great if you don't look too closely, that hasn't been completely disproven, hanging on due to lots of unanswered speculation that likely will never be answered. There's quite a few versions of the lab leak which are unfalsifiable hypotheses, and thus unscientific.

  See this extremely relevant part of FALSEBALANCE: plausible but currently unaccepted theories should not be legitimized through comparison to accepted academic scholarship. It seems as though there is quite of this policy that is incompatible with the views you've stated here.

  In particular, this thing you've stated is flat out incorrect: support from respectable scholars in respectable journals. I would like to see these respectable scholars in respectable journals. Unless you mean non-peer-reviewed opinion pieces. Because that's a pretty big thing to leave out, since it makes such pieces non-RSes. — Shibbolethink ^{(♔ ♕)} 18:46, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

  "plausible but currently unaccepted theories" are fringe. What I'm trying to talk about is when the minority is also "accepted academic scholarship". If you don't accept that applies to Covid lab leaks, fine. This isn't the venue to hash it out. There are many fields however where there is more than one legitimate viewpoint within accepted academic scholarship. Sennalen (talk) 19:01, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

  "plausible but currently unaccepted theories" are fringe. Does it say that in WP:FRINGE anywhere? The word "plausible" does not appear anywhere in that article, except as part of "implausible."

  There are many fields however where there is more than one legitimate viewpoint within accepted academic scholarship The magic of FALSEBALANCE and DUE is that such ideas would be given proportional "validity", and thus be treated a lot closer to the majority viewpoint in such cases. — Shibbolethink ^{(♔ ♕)} 19:29, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

I do not think the wording needs changing, if it is a minority it is also a fringe. Slatersteven (talk) 18:21, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

49% is a minority. Sennalen (talk) 18:39, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

Fringe has a pretty fuzzy definition, but if yours includes all minority positions, I hope you know that your understanding differs from that of most editors and from a plain reading of policies and guidelines. Maybe you'll reconsider? Firefangledfeathers (talk / contribs) 18:48, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

I get the feeling this is actually a typo and Slatersteven meant to say "If it is fringe it is also a minority." similar to Masem above. But only they can clarify *shrug* I was wrong. (edited 15:37, 2 August 2022 (UTC)) — Shibbolethink ^{(♔ ♕)} 18:50, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

No I meant what I said per wp:fringe "In Wikipedia parlance, the term fringe theory is used in a very broad sense to describe an idea that departs significantly from the prevailing views or mainstream views in its particular field.", in other words WE emean a minority view. Slatersteven (talk) 18:53, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

Fringe is different than minority. What if 90% of people support a hypothesis because it has a 3% chance higher than a different hypothesis? The hypothesis held by 10% of people isn't fringe, it's just a minority view. All fringe viewpoints are minority but not all minority is fringe. BooleanQuackery (talk) 19:33, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

This whole misconceived idea that in science there are "supporters" (like it's sport) is part of the issue. If something is uncertain generally a scientist will survey the field and say "it's uncertain", or "possible but unlikely" or, "reasonable to assume", or whatever, without cheerleading for a take. It only tends to be outside science that we get "supporters" of notions, in politics and on social media for example. Thus it is with the lab leak conspiracy theory, the idea that morgellons disease is a physical condition, that amygdalin cures cancer, and so on. These are things which have "supporters". I'd go to far as to say the fact that a "scientific" notion has "supporters" is a very strong predictor that it's WP:FRINGE. Alexbrn (talk) 07:39, 2 August 2022 (UTC)

Precisely. Because if it were mainstream, it wouldn't need supporters. All the scientists would begrudgingly agree with its plausibility/premise, as they have for many other theories which went from fringe to accepted based on evidence. — Shibbolethink ^{(♔ ♕)} 15:37, 2 August 2022 (UTC)

The term "proponent" is probably the better one to use neutrally, but I don't think "supporter" is quite so off to never use it this way. Where the difference is 'I think explanation A is more likely than B, but B is possible' (see: just about anything on the Lists of unsolved problems) I think proponent and supporter is equally valid. Particularly for those whose research focus lies directly in trying to find such evidence, E.g. Planet Nine and the primary proposers of the hypothesis (Brown and Batygin) working to put together more observational evidence they expect is more likely to confirm than refute their hypothesis.

I'd argue the boundary between a supporter of a minority alternate theory and a supporter of fringe quackery is that the former would admit their favored explanation is wrong when the evidence is presented, and the quack never will. Bakkster Man (talk) 18:15, 2 August 2022 (UTC)

Agree that zealotry is usually but not exclusively associated with quackery.

I think it's more useful to talk in terms of degrees of belief than right vs wrong, because the evidence is usually incomplete and often conflicting. Instead we update our prior beliefs continuously as new evidence comes in. Bayes's rule breaks down when you become 100% certain either way. - Palpable (talk) 19:30, 2 August 2022 (UTC)

• The first thing this reminds me of is that often editors confuse false information with "unpopular views". In relation to FALSEBALANCE this is an important distinction. For instance, the claim that Ivermectin is effective against SARS-CoV-2 is false and the claim that it is not promoted as such on Wikipedia because it would be "an unpopular view" or "suppressed information" is a conspiracy theory. So is the claim that climate change is an ideology and that if WP articles don't reflect that it's because WP editors have a conflict of interest, the same for creationism. Again, presenting a false balance in any of these example cases would simply be promoting falsehoods, no matter how many people believe it or not. —PaleoNeonate – 18:58, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

  This is probably the right concern to have. Not all minority theories are fringe ones, but often fringe view promoters like to portray them as if they were legitimate minorities. WP:FRINGE/ALT mostly does a good job of explaining how a legitimate scientific view can be the minority (PAG-page FRINGE), without being quackery or pseudoscience (derogatory colloquialism 'fringe'). But the guidance is still that these earnest and legitimate minorities be described relative to mainstream, for the avoidance of doubt that they are indeed non-mainstream.

  If Sennalen feels there's misinterpretation for a 'winner take all' attitude about significant minorities, that seems like it would be the right think to address, rather than rewording away from FRINGE's existing applicability to significant minority views. Perhaps a link to WP:FRINGE/ALT instead of the overall page would be a better clarification than seemingly changing the existing meaning of these two PAGs. Bakkster Man (talk) 01:33, 2 August 2022 (UTC)

arbitrary section break

• This whole discussion honestly reads like people not understanding what the words "equal" or "valid" mean. I'm not suggesting that's the case, just saying that's what it looks like. A minority view is not, in any ways "equally valid" to an expert consensus. That's the whole purpose of having an expert consensus: to know what ideas are more valid.

Also, all this fetishization of the word "fringe", trying to define it as a specific subset of minority views is nonsense. It's either mainstream or fringe. Fringe isn't a pejorative label that means "nonsense". It just means "fringe". Like "it's at the fringes of the mainstream". Loop quantum gravity is a fringe theory. It's the ur-example of a rigorous fringe theory. Happy (Slap me) 12:21, 2 August 2022 (UTC)

Another great example would be String theory. [11] [12] Not yet mainstream accepted science, but one of many possible explanations all coexisting. — Shibbolethink ^{(♔ ♕)} 15:34, 2 August 2022 (UTC)

There's a reason they call the alternative the Standard model. Happy (Slap me) 16:58, 2 August 2022 (UTC)

• I'm not convinced that there is a problem with the existing text, and none of the proposed modifications I can sift out of the discussion above strike me as definitive improvements. I don't have a strong opposition to WAID's suggestion ( "...imply that every minority view, fringe theory, or extraordinary claim needs to be presented..."), but I don't have the feeling that it's necessary, either. XOR'easter (talk) 16:42, 2 August 2022 (UTC)
  • Such a change would be fine with me. I think the text could do with some culling of some of the wikilinks. I like Truzzi, but I don't think he deserves a link from a core policy. On the other hand WP:ECREE as a policy is a better thing to send the reader to for "extraordinary claims". Also, I don't think the wikilink for "viewpoint" is at all edifying. 10:53, 3 August 2022 (UTC)
    • Yes, Wikipedia:Verifiability#Exceptional_claims_require_exceptional_sources is probably a better link target, if we go that route. XOR'easter (talk) 03:48, 4 August 2022 (UTC)

Constructive and obsessive criticism in science

A new paper from Prasad and Ioannidis may be of interest to folks who would like to see better discussions of science on Wikipedia. - Palpable (talk) 15:53, 12 August 2022 (UTC)

News sources

I'd like to resurrect the discussion started by User:Novem_Linguae above. I support the outcome of the discussion that making primary sources UNDUE would be detrimental, however, I think that the lack of guidance on using news sources to establish NPOV does hamper neutrality.

The policy states Neutrality requires that mainspace articles and pages fairly represent all significant viewpoints that have been published by reliable sources, in proportion to the prominence of each viewpoint in the published, reliable sources. It also says Neutral articles are written with a tone that provides an unbiased, accurate, and proportionate representation of all positions included in the article. The tone of Wikipedia articles should be impartial, neither endorsing nor rejecting a particular point of view.

I've seen several instances when this policy is used by editors to present a new widely publicised opinion or a point of view as neutral and/or mainstream only because it's published by multiple news outlets. While this seems to conform at least to the letter of policy, I think there's a problem with such approach as it can easily lead to loss of impartiality.

News media coverage in many newspapers and other media shifted to presenting viewpoints in a subjective way. It isn't entirely a question of source reliability. Even top publications combine somewhat sensationalist news reporting, full of catchy argumentative quotes and emotive labels, and analytical publications with in-depth analysis pieces. But both have equal weight per policy resulting in, say, a quote of a prominent politician, to be automatically considered to have significant WEIGHT and therefore DUE because it's been widely presented in recent news coverage.

In my view, using the quantity of news reports as a sole measure to establish mainstream point of view or balance harms impartiality, not to mention making articles harder to read. There are many examples when articles diverge from summary description of the subject and instead provide a chronological summary of news coverage. I think some guidance to address limitations of the recent news coverage when establishing weight of viewpoints would've been helpful.

Please point me in the right direction If this is already covered in the policy or guidelines.

There was a recent thoughtful discussion of the use of news sources and ensuing weight concerns in Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard/Archive_385#Discussion_(Fox_News_news_website). Unfortunately, the comments about news sources weight and NPOV weren't summarised in the closing statement, so I'd like to ping those participants who commented on the use of news sources in general to continue the discussion here: @Blueboar, Andrevan, Masem, SamuelRiv, and Atsme: --PaulT2022 (talk) 22:59, 30 September 2022 (UTC)

I have been thinking of some formulation of NPOV where RECENTISM is accounted for - in that when figuring out weight, sources close to an event should be less valued compared to those written months or years afterwards, which should be given more weight. But I have not formally made such a proposal yet. Masem (t) 23:04, 30 September 2022 (UTC)

I'm responding because I was requested, but I don't particularly support the idea of reducing the weight, impact, or value of reliable news sources. However, I do think that one of the outcomes of the Fox RFC, was that the community should develop further what the standards are for the guideline about fact checking and a reputation for accuracy. It's not enough to just be an outlet, there are rigorous standards that WP:NEWSORGs worthy of being WP:GENREL go through.

There seems to be an idea floating around that journalists are just putting whatever on the front page of U.S. corporate news sites like ABC, NBC, CBS, etc. That couldn't be further from the truth. These outlets have a very robust process for pre- and post-publication review, as well as codes and standards of ethics, as well as manuals of style, content guidelines, and processes for resolving internal reviews like an ombudsman or a public editor. The reason why some sites like Newsweek, Business Insider, aren't considered generally reliable is because they haven't met those standards due to a spotty record of factual reporting, mixing fact and opinion in a misleading way, etc. However I have not seen such evidence furnished for gold standard outlets like Washington Post, New York Times, etc., despite evidence-free claims of such.

More reliable sources, should be given more weight due to their increased value and prominence. Depending on the context, reliable reporting in a generally reliable source may be just as good or better than a reliable book or a reliable journal article for according weight, conferring significant coverage and notability, and determining what facts to summarize in the article. And as far as recency, the policy and consensus views of WP:RECENTISM and WP:NOTNEWS do not say we should not cover recent events or that recent news reports should be underweighed. Quite the contrary, it says we should write about recent events with a long-term view. What that means is that we might not cover all the day-to-day routine goings-on, but a significant event is going to need coverage from news articles before the books written about it are published. I wouldn't support a change to policy or guidelines to eliminate the usage of recent news to cover events that are significant, the policy simply urges that we consider the context and significance of these events. Are these news reports relevant to long-term impacts, or the overall progression of the events of the article subject people or organizations? If so, they should not be excluded simply because they are recent. Andre🚐 23:24, 30 September 2022 (UTC)

I'm against restricting coverage of recent events as well.

A situation I'm concerned about is when recent coverage by ABC, NBC, CBS and a few more, is eventually followed, say, by an analytical piece published in NYT in a few weeks possibly presenting a different viewpoint or providing a better balance overall because several journalists worked on it for a while, this viewpoint would be considered minor or even fringe because the neutrality is determined "in proportion to the prominence of each viewpoint... in sources" and the proportion of the "NYT" viewpoint is 1/10. Something isn't right about this. (Could be that my reading of policy is wrong.) PaulT2022 (talk) 23:40, 30 September 2022 (UTC)

I understand what you mean. On this point, my view is that it is up to the consensus of editors to determine which older reporting is out of date, and has been replaced by more in-depth or corrected understanding in newer reporting. I agree with you that not all reporting is created equal, and an in-depth, well-researched investigative series may occasionally correct an error from in-the-moment, newsroom raw reporting, which is still secondary but almost kind of akin to a primary source since it's so close to the incident. However, I don't think this can be universally assumed to be a rule of thumb. In some situations, there might not be much difference in reliability, and we wouldn't want to categorically discourage timely reporting. That being said, I think if a bunch of articles around the time of an incident all had pretty low-in-detail, cursory confirmation of basic reporting, and then later on, a few in-depth sources went further in, you could give more weight and prominence to the latter group for the same reasons that academic journal articles and books might get more prominence compared with routine news and reliable blogs. So even though there might be 5 articles from an event in 2010 that were all routine, you could give more weight to 3 articles from 2015 that were deep dives which themselves were widely cited or were widely considered by other RS to be more authoritative. When RS disagree, a consensus of editors may determine how their prominence or reliability may differ depending on what the other RS say about each other. That is my understanding of how it may be done. I wouldn't entirely oppose fleshing out the explanation more though, if we agree on the general high level view and think it's not completely clear as written. Andre🚐 02:03, 1 October 2022 (UTC)

Oh and actually, the policy does cover this: Claims sourced to initial news reports should be immediately replaced with better-researched ones as soon as they are published, especially if those original reports contained inaccuracies. All breaking-news stories, without exception, are primary sources, and must be treated with caution in WP:RSBREAKING Andre🚐 02:42, 1 October 2022 (UTC)

@Andrevan thank you for finding this!

I do think there's a slight contradiction with NPOV (which doesn't make same exceptions for weighting recent news that WP:PRIMARY+WP:PRIMARYNEWS and WP:RSBREAKING do), but seems that in practice issues surface when editors ignore WP:PRIMARYNEWS and treat any recent news story with bare-bones analysis as a secondary because it's one step removed.

I've erroneously assumed that press reports of events and statements are secondary because they usually include some sort of attempt to achieve neutrality in their wording (compare two statements side-by-side, add a couple of sentences on historical perspective etc) and a lot of editors seemed to treat them as secondary sources. Thank you for clearing it up! PaulT2022 (talk) 03:00, 1 October 2022 (UTC)

No problem. I don't think it's a contradiction per se because primary sources are usable for facts, just not for interpretations. In the case where facts have changed, that doesn't necessarily conflict with NPOV, which tells us when reputable sources contradict one another and are relatively equal in prominence, describe both points of view and work for balance. This involves describing the opposing views clearly, drawing on secondary or tertiary sources that describe the disagreement from a disinterested viewpoint.. In the case where authoritative secondary sources have clearly shown the breaking news sources to be outdated, the policy checks out I believe. Andre🚐 03:46, 1 October 2022 (UTC)

See also Wikipedia:Reliable_sources#Age_matters Andre🚐 03:57, 1 October 2022 (UTC)

Thanks! In my experience, most of the time they don't "clearly show" this. Gradually shifting balance from presenting one POV as mainstream to another is much more typical. This is of course normal, as early on there's more noise than analysis. But I always feel uneasy when editors try to determine mainstream view themselves by evaluating frequency and tone of coverage of different aspects or opinions in multiple breaking news (primary) sources, encouraged by WP:WEIGHT.

This is actually touched in WP:PRIMARY: Any interpretation of primary source material requires a reliable secondary source for that interpretation. and Do not base an entire article on primary sources, and be cautious about basing large passages on them.

I tend to agree that it's covered by existing policies and guidelines. I wish that it wouldn't require so much wikilawyering to get to the root of it. WP:RS/WP:NEWSORG, a primary point of call for understanding sourcing policies, discusses what's primary and not briefly and vaguely, whereas WP:OR/WP:PRIMARY links to WP:PRIMARYNEWS, which is much better written and has better examples. It seems that WP:OR and relevant guidelines cover all concerns about WP:NPOV I expressed, but finding this interplay between the policies wasn't trivial (I couldn't do it without your help, for which I'm grateful) and this is a fairly common sourcing/NPOV question IMO. PaulT2022 (talk) 05:13, 1 October 2022 (UTC)

Don't forget that The rules are principles and WP:PRIMARYNEWS is an essay, though it can be a good one to read and think about for sure. It's always tricky talking and thinking about this all in the abstract. Remember that policy pages and guidelines are intended to be guides that are subject to editors' consensus. So while it's true that an entire section probably shouldn't be written based on a primary source, the policy says to be cautious about doing that, not that it categorically should never be done. A case where some very important event was recently covered might be one example where it is OK to use primary sources to establish facts alone - not interpretations which are beyond simple facts. Andre🚐 05:29, 1 October 2022 (UTC)

I've often thought I'd like to see a prohibition on any primary news source less than (say) one year old; the very idea we have to deal with "breaking news" flies in the face of WP:NOT. Just think of the amount of useless fighting this would reduce, while focusing minds on proper encyclopedic coverage of topics! Readers coming to Wikipedia to find an update on what's happening in the world should ideally leave disappointed. Editors who want to write news coverage should select the appropriate WMF project. Bon courage (talk) 05:38, 1 October 2022 (UTC)

If a primary source used to establish a fact and it doesn't contradict coverage in other reliable publications, it's usually fine as often may be the only available source and beneficial for the article.

What I'm concerned about is when editors analyse coverage multiple breaking news sources to determine how they covered the fact (language that was used, sentiment etc) and then essentially synthesise meta-analysis of multiple primary news sources, ignoring WP:OR (A primary source may be used on Wikipedia only 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.) and WP:V (drawing inferences from multiple sources to advance a novel position is prohibited by the NOR policy) because WP:WEIGHT is formulated in a way that seems to encourage it.

I think it'd be helpful if either WP:OR would allow such synthesis for primary sources explicitly (if WP:NPOV is indeed supposed to allow it), or if WP:WEIGHT would mention problems that arise from "basing large passages" on multiple primary sources and caution from introducing WP:OR when using multiple primary sources.

(One might say that such meta-analysis of sources is the entire purpose of WP:WEIGHT and a large part of editors' work, but note that WP:OR applies the "only to make straightforward, descriptive statements of facts" restriction only to primary sources and not to secondary ones - in case of which WP:WEIGHT assessment makes sense.) PaulT2022 (talk) 06:59, 1 October 2022 (UTC)

Particularly when news coverage skews how a topic is covered, eg any Western coverage of the Ukraine-Russia war is going to be in favor of the Ukraine stance (which may morally be correct, but WP does not operate from any moral position). We need on breaking and current events articles to stick as much to the fundamental facts that have been validated by multiple sources, and assert claims of fact to sources when appropriate, until we have time go by and for better clarity of the situation to be determined. Otherwise, we can (and have) spin articles in favor of one side or the other by blindly taking the news sources at their word. Masem (t) 13:13, 1 October 2022 (UTC)

I don't agree with the premise that any Western coverage is going to be biased in favor of Ukraine. That's a huge assumption and you haven't provided any evidence. I also don't agree that reflecting what sources say is spinning or blind. Actually, if we were to "balance" the coverage by giving false weight to pro-Russian narratives, that is POV pushing. Andre🚐 17:23, 1 October 2022 (UTC)

Here's one that crossed my feeds this morning - Russians push baseless theory blaming US for burst pipeline from AP. Not the headline but the statement that leads The Kremlin and Russian state media are aggressively pushing a baseless conspiracy theory blaming the United States for damage to natural gas pipelines in the Baltic Sea in what analysts said Friday is another effort to split the U.S. and its European allies. We have no idea who or what happened to the pipelines, so to say that the Russian claim is "baseless" is inappropriate, so we should not report that angle. Or in Russia abandons Ukrainian bastion, Putin ally suggests nuclear response from Reuters calling the withdraw a "stinging defeat" for Russia, which is an opininated statement that favors the western stance. These articles are still giving basic facts that are usable (that Russia did withdraw from Lyman for example), but we have to watch for the language around these points to not a Western bias on the coverage. Masem (t) 17:30, 1 October 2022 (UTC)

And to add, I would not "fix" the problem by counter-balancing with pro-Russia sources, just make sure our wording doesn't include phrasing that gives it a pro-Western stance. Masem (t) 17:33, 1 October 2022 (UTC)

Putin's claim is not merely baseless, it's fucking stupid. No, the pipeline was not[13] damaged by Anglo-Saxons. Don't be WP:PROFRINGE. Bon courage (talk) 17:39, 1 October 2022 (UTC)

Until there's full proof, we cannot assert who or who didn't do it. It is not pro-fringe to not call the claim "baseless", just that we assert it is Putin's claim, and not fact. Masem (t) 17:45, 1 October 2022 (UTC)

Rubbish - go with the reliable sources. You are sounding like a full-on conspiracy apologist for fringe propaganda. What next? you'll be saying Putin's assertions about the West's "Satanism" are up for discussion until we know for sure. Get some WP:CLUE. Bon courage (talk) 17:49, 1 October 2022 (UTC)

I have to at least, in part, agree with Bon courage, here, Masem. I don't see the problem here with trusting the AP and other reliable Western sources that the Russian statement is a baseless conspiracy theory, though we would still summarize and attribute the claims of the Russian state actors, though I would allocate less weight to that. Russian state media shouldn't be given fully balanced countervening weight, especially when they are pushing a conspiracy theory. This reminds me of the Ghouta chemical attack back in the mid-2010s. There are still shill trolls coming to the talk page years later pushing the idea that the rebels gassed themselves in a false flag attack. For the pipeline, we have an official US position, and we have an official Russian position, and we should attribute both official government positions as notable POVs. The AP article discusses the idea that there is a conspiracy theory going around The suggestion that the U.S. caused the damage was circulating on online forums popular with American conservatives and followers of QAnon, a conspiracy theory movement which asserts that Trump is fighting a battle against a Satanic child-trafficking sect that controls world events. I don't see that the AP article says exactly what happened to the pipeline, so we wouldn't cover that. But we do have enough sources to say that there were conspiracy theories already circulating through identified misinformation channels that line up with the Russian government statement. Andre🚐 17:56, 1 October 2022 (UTC)

Yes, the problem here is that Masem is being a useful idiot legitimizing the propaganda of a Nation State. It's reprehensible. Bon courage (talk) 18:00, 1 October 2022 (UTC)

Be careful of WP:NPA. I know useful idiot is a term of art so I'm not redacting it, but I think it does skirt WP:AGF. I know Masem is someone who has contributed a lot of time and effort to improving Wikipedia so I am willing to engage with him on the merits and assume he is offering something of value, even if I don't agree with him much of the time. Andre🚐 18:08, 1 October 2022 (UTC)

We can absolutely talk about the US denying its involvement, and the conspiracies around it, but as there is yet no firm answer who did it, we as a neutral source cannot assert in wikivoice anything factual about who or who did not do it. That's simply the issue with using the word "baseless" because that's making the assumption of the US's statement being 100% true; it is very very unlikely the US did that, and it definitely is the element of conspiracy theories, but we don't have a hard answer to the US's non-involvement, so we simply can't report that as fact in Wikivoice. Masem (t) 18:09, 1 October 2022 (UTC)

I draw the line if the RS are saying it. If we have multiple trusted outlets saying that Putin's claim was baseless, we may also say that. At least, under the present policy, it wouldn't be a violation of NPOV to say what the sources say. NPOV doesn't say we should balance against fringe minority views while an event is recent. Andre🚐 18:29, 1 October 2022 (UTC)

And that's the whole point of this thread. We shouldn't be taking the news sources written so close to an event as being "the Bible" in terms of truth and fact. We can write about the pipeline issue and reactions to it, but because it just happened and no authoritive source has determined who or what was responsible, we can't take even reputable news sources claiming that one party did or did not do it as fact. Wait for the full investigation to complete and use those sources to better document it in full then, but in the short term, since we have a bunch of "he said, she said", we should simply document those allegations without pointing any fingers in Wikivoice. Masem (t) 18:40, 1 October 2022 (UTC)

While the policy does say that those recent event breaking news articles should be considered primary sources and therefore are usable only for facts, this is not a "he said she said" situation, because it's an established fact that the claims by the Russian government are circulating in conspiracy misinformation channels and appear to lack a basis. Therefore, it's not pointing any fingers in Wikivoice to simply characterize the conspiracy theories being promulgated by dubious sources as such, provided that reliable RS report them as such. It's not a "both sides" situation if the sources present certain facts unambiguously. We aren't claiming any facts that the sources don't claim, and by calling the Russian government position baseless, we aren't saying that the U.S. government claims are based. We should simply report what RS report as factual as factual, and avoid making interpretations. An interpretation would be more than a simple fact. "Baseless" isn't inherently an interpretation. In the AP article, I would consider this an interpretation and one that existing policy says we should leave out: what analysts said Friday is another effort to split the U.S. and its European allies. That's an interpretation of the why and should be attributed, but since it is attributed to "analysts" only, it comes under the WP:RSBREAKING caution. Andre🚐 18:47, 1 October 2022 (UTC)

Wouldn't the "baseless" need to be attributed then? I.e. AP's David Klepper stated that the Russian media distribute a baseless conspiracy theory (primary) because it's promulgated on conspiracy theorists' forums and because Russia has spread similar disinformation previously (analysis/secondary coverage of facts). PaulT2022 (talk) 19:39, 1 October 2022 (UTC)

In my view, that does not need attribution if it is stated as fact by multiple sources. That is not an interpretation, but a fact. Andre🚐 19:47, 1 October 2022 (UTC)

Quite. WP:YESPOV and all that. Bon courage (talk) 19:49, 1 October 2022 (UTC)

I'm confused. In my observations, when an editor picks multiple primary peer-reviewed articles and tries to state that what they state as a fact is indeed a fact, that would usually be considered OR. However, when the same is done when news sources state something as a fact, making such conclusion is often seem ok.

Both journalists and scientists analyse a number of primary sources to make a conclusion, which would often be a primary one (unless it's a systematic review or similar).

What's the difference here that I'm missing? It's almost as if media fact-checking of recent news coverage is assumed to be more robust than the peer review process in academia. PaulT2022 (talk) 20:49, 1 October 2022 (UTC)

I disagree. That seems like a misinterpretation of OR. It is not OR to take primary sources for facts. It is only the interpretation and combination of facts to create conclusions which do not appear that would be synthetic. A fact that appears in multiple sources is still a fact. It is only a conclusion when you're using the facts as a basis for a conclusion. In scientific studies, they often make conclusions based studies, but we don't want to put too much weight on a study, because the conclusions are analytic. A simple fact from a study might just be the underlying data, but drawing interpretation about what raw data means is conclusive. News articles that say that an event occurred or someone did X or said Y, that is not conclusive, that is factual. Andre🚐 20:53, 1 October 2022 (UTC)

Perhaps we could use another example?

I've randomly opened the most recent Bloomberg news article https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-10-01/city-of-london-shellshocked-by-kwarteng-s-fiasco-of-a-budget?srnd=premium-uk

It starts from saying A mini-budget designed to please bankers instead left many in the City of London appalled, but there's nothing in the article that suggests where the claim that mini-budget was designed to please bankers (rather than an honest attempt to boost economy that resulted in a disaster in bonds/FX markets) came from. This is simply an emotional journalist's (and editor's) opinion about a recent fact - announcement of a mini-budget.

What happens right now, is some editors throw WP:OR out of the window, pick a few major media that would make similar subjective comments about the same fact (and this is not hard to do with the mini-budget example), and insist that because these sources are reliable for the statements of fact, any unattributed statement in recent news coverage can be used to state the fact (that the mini-budget was designed to please bankers in this case) and should be in the article per proportion of coverage because WP:WEIGHT says so.

I think such interpretation of NPOV is incorrect because of the direct contradiction with WP:OR/WP:PRIMARY. (Or WP:PRIMARY needs to mention it if it's correct.) PaulT2022 (talk) 19:10, 1 October 2022 (UTC)

Who are these some editors that throw OR out the window? I agree in your Bloomberg piece, Wikipedia should not say the budget was designed to please bankers, unless other sources also state that it is a known fact that the budget was designed that way. It appears to be an interpretation and not a fact, or an assumption being made by the reporter. It could be a fact though if enough sources had reported that in fact, bankers were kept in mind by legislators when they designed the budget. However, the fact that those in the City of London were appalled could be a fact that we attribute if we can get more specific about who was appalled and what they said or did. I'm not sure I agree with you that it's OR, just that we need to be cautious about what is factual and what is an assumption being made by the reporter. Andre🚐 19:53, 1 October 2022 (UTC)

I've seen this happening in completely different subject areas, didn't mean anyone specific.

It could be a fact though if enough sources had reported that in fact, bankers were kept in mind by legislators when they designed the budget. - that's definitely the case, but the jump from the "keeping bankers in mind" to "designing for bankers" is purely emotive there (or at least not supported by the analysis in the article).

I think this article is a reliable secondary source for the left many in the City of London appalled as a fact because it analyses the response, but it doesn't demonstrate what the budget was designed to do, which is a journalist's speculation.

I agree that we need to be cautious about what is factual and what is an assumption being made by the reporter is probably the key consideration in such cases. PaulT2022 (talk) 20:06, 1 October 2022 (UTC)