Talk:Neuro-linguistic programming

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Unprotected on one condition

Flavius presents a good comprimise, so I will unlock the article on the condition that only reference conversion to superscripts and end notes is permitted. This is a good guideline to cleanup and to prevent edit wars.Voice of All 13:30, 13 January 2006 (UTC)

Good. First go over the ^ on the references section and see what code name I assign it (like frogs). Then replace the corresponding Harvard notes with {{ref|name}}.Voice of All 03:09, 14 January 2006 (UTC)

I'd like to request editors use html comments around any citations they plan to remove (in leiu of deleting them). These citations carry strong evidence of the edit history on the article and are useful for future editors. I trust all editors will find this suggestion amicable. Peace. Metta Bubble 04:49, 14 January 2006 (UTC)

Lets stop doing further edits and give VoA a freehand to improve the article

I suggest that we should all stop doing edits and lets give VoA complete freedom (referencing, restructuring, cleanup, etc) to improve this article, if he doesn't mind undertaking this task. We can comment on the final draft using the peer review page. I don't mind further personal attacks as long as you can bring yourself to consider this idea in a positive way. --Dejakitty 17:48, 14 January 2006 (UTC)

Any help converting references would be welcome, preferably from the "anti-NLP" group, so as to avoid accusions if an error where made. The subarticle is still there, and can be edited as desired.Voice of All 17:52, 14 January 2006 (UTC)

I agree, but we should avoid splitting the editors into anti-NLP, pro-NLP. Every one believes that their opinion represents neutral point of view. --Dejakitty 18:37, 14 January 2006 (UTC)

Agreed, I put in quotes.Voice of All 18:41, 14 January 2006 (UTC)

At any rate, can you help out with those refs?Voice of All 05:05, 15 January 2006 (UTC)

Is there any one particular editor you would like to nominate to help you with the references? --Dejakitty 22:50, 15 January 2006 (UTC)

Anyone who wants to :).Voice of All 23:16, 15 January 2006 (UTC)

There is still alot of work to do on the references and notes. There must be a better way to handle the page numbers? What is the wikipedia standard for this? Can we get a comment on this? --Comaze 00:11, 19 January 2006 (UTC)

Senses

In the section Foundational Assumptions I can see the clear academic sourcing for the statement " person's experience of the world is processed and organized in terms of the five senses". The trouble is, in modern science, even the most basic models of human beings assume at least nine senses -- and some more than 20. Might this be worth a minor change? See Senses.

Coricus 18:20, 15 January 2006 (UTC)

Coricus, that's a good point but the section is intended to provide a non-normative account of NLPs foundational assumption. All of the NLP literature and seminars that I have experienced identify only five senses. The submodality lists provided at most NLP seminars are divided into visual, auditory, kinesthetic, olfactory and gustatory and the emphasis is generally on the first three. I've yet to encounter otherwise. In terms of providing an accurate account of NLPs position the assumption is correct. In terms of modern science it is plainly wrong. My guess would be that a NLPer would reduce all of the other senses into kinesthetic submodalities. In any event, most of the assumptions are either logically and/or empirically questionable, the unsoundness is not confined to that one principle you have identified. We can't say this as this would be OR, we are obliged to source an expert that specifically critiques the NLP foundational assumptions. If you can find an expert statement that specifically challenges this foundational assumption of NLP then we can add this as a further criticism of NLP. NLP is much more flawed in its detail than the NLP-specific research indicates (on both conceptual and empirical grounds) but because the scientific research into NLP stopped in the 1990s and because Misplaced Pages policy specifically prohibits OR much of the criticism -- derived from discoveries in neurology, psychiatry, psychology, genetics and psycholinguitsics -- will have to go unstated until an expert covers the matter (which is unlikely since NLP is considered dead and discredited anyway). flavius 23:00, 15 January 2006 (UTC)

I agree with Flavius. NLP doesn't teach 9 senses (nor 20), and we need to reflect what it teaches. The sense of heat and cold (Thermoception as described in Senses) is just part of kinaesthetic, I even use humidity occassionally. Vestibular (Equilibrioception??) is the possible exception - some people teach it as integral with Kinaesthetic and others as a separate subset of kinaesthetic. Grinder does teach Vestibular, though I'm not sure if it's in his books at present. It's certainly part of the New Coding of NLP. GregA 00:13, 22 January 2006 (UTC)

Coricus, "A sensory system is a part of the nervous system that consists of sensory receptors, neural pathways, and those parts of the brain responsible for processing the information. Commonly recognized sensory systems are those for vision, hearing, somatic sensation, taste and olfaction." see sensory system --Comaze 23:43, 15 January 2006 (UTC)

Comaze, you're missing the point. The five senses -- which NLPers claim are the basis for encoding of experince -- are insufficient to capture all subjective experience. For example, equilibrioreception and the sense of the passage of time (even though there is no specific system associated with time perception) cannot be reduced to VAKOG. flavius 00:00, 16 January 2006 (UTC)

In NLP, time is covered in Temporal predicates (Patterns 1 1976). A similar example would be Vestibular as they are sometimes lumped together with somatic or Kinesthetic. The 4-tuple (VAKO) is a gross reduction to model primary experience. --Comaze 00:13, 16 January 2006 (UTC)

Again, you are missing the point. Time perception and proprioception can't be reduced to kinesthetic experience. Time predicates can't be shoe-horned into your beloved 4-tuple. The 4-tuple is indeed a gross reduction such that it is incapable of representing the richness of subjective experience. What is primary experience and why doesn't it include time perception? From a purely phenomenological standpoint time perception is no less important that experience obtained from VAKOG. Similarly, proprioception is also subjectively important -- especially for somatic skills -- and it isn't reducible to VAKOG. Even as the self-described definitive (implied by the) study of subjective experience NLP is sorely lacking. flavius 00:40, 16 January 2006 (UTC)

In 4-tuple, proprioception is noted as V_p (developed by Grinder) and this type of tactic knowledge is normally captured via imitation. The 4-tuple is used in the coding phase of NLP modeling. In standard notation future is represented as V and past V. Some people reduce this to V (visual construct), V (visual remembered)... This ofcourse would depend on your modeling project. --Comaze 01:02, 16 January 2006 (UTC)

Then it is an incomplete conceptualisation of subjective experience. flavius 01:41, 16 January 2006 (UTC)

BAGEL model

The BAGEL model, as described, is a model for determining the internal representation systems in use by a person. Body, Access cues (voice tone/tempo), Gestures, Eyes, Language etc. Then the next section ("Eye accessing cues, body cues, and NLP representational systems") describes the rep systems more fully, and then the Eyes and body cues again in a slightly different way. Is there a reason these 2 subsections aren't merged? EG: A "representation systems" section with a subsection for cues to the rep systems (Body, Eyes, etc... "BAGEL".) I have a few other queries about the 2 subsections but that's secondary to the layout/merging question. GregA 01:34, 22 January 2006 (UTC) (ps. I assume the glaring spelling mistake "kinsesthetic" is known?)

NLP Model

See NLP Chat Page

Let's concentrate on improving this article please

Everyone, let's help fixing the references together for starters. We can improve the content later. --Dejakitty 11:25, 16 January 2006 (UTC)

I have reverted one set of edits by flavius so as to avoid more content bickering and edit wars while refs where being worked on (so as to avoid ref fixing being reverted in the process).Voice of All 06:06, 17 January 2006 (UTC)

VoA, How should we reference this statement? Replace the (XXXX) with a footnote superscript? "and Professionals(X) such as Author(Y) (XXXX) consider blah" This is really just a variation of the citation style we are converting from. --Comaze 11:46, 17 January 2006 (UTC)

Dejakitty. Your "archiving" of my comments is consistent with all the other NLPfanatic's censorship efforts. It seems to be a habit of NLP zealots to try to whitewash their agenda. There is nothing wrong with pointing out your persistent attempts to censor facts. HeadleyDown 01:13, 18 January 2006 (UTC)

The comment was a bit harsh and was likely not needed. However, I would recommend that everyone here avoid removing other people's comments. If rude comments pile up and slow progess, I will deal with them. If a comment is harsh but also contains specific article suggestions, then it should not be removed.Voice of All 02:29, 18 January 2006 (UTC)

Hi VoiceOfAll. It is a bit rich, the NLPers demanding so much over the months, and advocating the format change, but then making excuses why they cannot be bothered to do it completely. If they really want to make the impression that they are being constructive, and not just looking for whitewash or excuses to make sneaky deletions, then they should just get on with changing all the citations to the new format. Its also annoying that they take such liberties with changing the discussion page headings, organization, and such to either obscure facts about their own misdeeds, to obscure conclusions that the facts they want banished are actually valid, and to rearange discussion to make it look inconclusive. Their removing or archiving of comments is just more of the same nonsense. Condidering the demands they constantly make for more evidence and more explanation, its time they did some work for a change. Camridge 04:38, 18 January 2006 (UTC)

Only those with a true Inquisition mindset would consider it to be an unfair burden when others demand that lies be removed from the page. Thanks for exposing yourself as being unwilling, even in principle, to let this page be accurate. Quit whining, you flat-earther. 01:36, 30 January 2006 (UTC)

hello everyone, I've been away for a bit, I"m not sure if I have time at the moment but hope to be around more often.

So I don't tread on toes - could someone summarise the current rules for editing which have been agreed to? I notice that VoA said the article was locked and that it's only unlocked for referencing purposes, I assume that means any and all work/discussion is now done here? Is that still current? etc

Thanks GregA 00:03, 22 January 2006 (UTC)

They're the same old Misplaced Pages rules. Any of your censorship, promotion, spam, or whitewash will be reverted, and recruited NLP fanatics will be ignored. HeadleyDown 02:36, 22 January 2006 (UTC)

Then I assume we're keeping the rules of no personal attacks too? Seriously Headley, have you deliberately ignored my question, and responded against me personally? Or is it your understanding that there are no special agreements for editing at the moment? VoA wrote "Flavius makes a good compromise" and said he'd open the article provided editing was only done on references. Is there an agreed procedure for improving the article? If anyone else could fill me in I'd appreciate it, perhaps Headley needs a reminder too? GregA 10:09, 22 January 2006 (UTC)

Assume what you like. But you have just started with the same old repeat questioning again. Go ahead, gang up with some more NLP fanatic meatpuppets and vote for arbitration, a change of mediator, or whatever else you think will get the article to promote NLP. HeadleyDown 14:27, 22 January 2006 (UTC)

Hi Greg. The NLP fans advocated for a new format for references, and it seems that they only wanted to do so in order to make sneaky censorship of criticisms or whitewash. So the thing now is to allow the NLPfans to go ahead and change the ref format, while reverting their sneaky deletions. Well, we're waiting! Camridge 04:55, 23 January 2006 (UTC)

Is this grammar correct

Is this grammar correct. It sounds odd to me "Council Against Health Fraud, and has characterized by ...". Also would it be appropriate to change the word in the article generalisation to generalization if that term spelling specifically through refrences is spelled with a "z"? Course maybe in B&G books in england they print them different hehe. It was kind of odd to see the "s" and I am totally cool with it. I was thinking it might make the article more conform to its own refrences? Or whatever :)jVirus 07:51, 18 January 2006 (UTC)

jVirus, I've corrected some of the spelling errors. The standard for this article is US english. A typical example is the US spelling of modeling (UK:Modelling). Correct me if I'm wrong, but in general usage "z" and "s" can be used interchangeably for words such as generalization (US) and generalisation (UK). --Comaze 01:55, 21 January 2006 (UTC)

Comaze, the spelling style is not so important. You should get a move on with those citation format changes though. Come on now. ChopChop! DaveRight 02:47, 20 January 2006 (UTC)

Hi jVirus. You're right, the grammar is incorrect. Instead of has characterized by it should say has been characterized by. (I'm ignoring the content here - just talking about the grammar). GregA 10:15, 22 January 2006 (UTC)

POV editing - all parties

Comaze, even after explaining the situation to you multiple times, with references, you still try to narrow a view that has been presented in a way as to bias the reader into thinking that the view is fringe skeptcism. Your efforts simply show that NLP is just dianetics for wannabe manipulators. As it has been explained to you already so many times on the discussion page, the only option open now is to explain it more clearly on the article itself. I realize that as an NLP zealot that must be excruciatingly traumatic for you. Tough! Misplaced Pages is about facts. Now get on with your ref format adjustments. Camridge 05:24, 26 January 2006 (UTC)

I think we need to get a third party comment on this. I think Camridge/HeadleyDown's edits are biased POV . Why did you (HeadleyDown) alter the direct quote from Harry Edwards' Skeptics Guide to the New Age? --Comaze 22:51, 26 January 2006 (UTC)

Widely held by people who agree with you. So what? Akulkis 01:27, 30 January 2006 (UTC)

Comaze, I think you're being mischevious (again). Edwards' position is widely held, for this reason it is not necessary (and misleding) to attribute it specifically to him. It is apparent that you are attempting to create the illusion of isolation and idiosyncracy, painting Edwards' view as the lonely voice of a eccentric contrarian. As HeadleyDown correctly points out, that view is shared by many experts, it is the consensus view. We don't need a third party opinion on this. The easy solution (if we are to accept your view that there is a problem) is to rephrase the statement so that it bears no resemblance to Edwards' whilst retaining the content and embellishing it with the numerous references that argue the same point. Clearly, you and GregA are unwilling to accept NLPs status as marginalia in the history of ideas. You and GregA reject all negative expert opinion regarding NLP wholesale. This is fanatical, cultish and irrational behaviour. Yours and GregA's position is fundamentally emotive and disconnected from reality (yes John Grinder there is a reality) that is why your dispute is non-justiciable. It is a matter of fact that a minority of universities and colleges teach NLP. It is a matter of fact that a minority of psychologists, psychiatrists, nurses, social workers and pastors practice NLP. It is a matter of fact that a minority of all professionals (in all categories) use NLP. It is a matter of fact that a minority of the human population have had training in NLP. It is a matter of fact that most topic experts (psychologists, psychiatrists, linguists, philosophers and neurologists) that have researched NLP have concluded against it. It is a matter of fact that most topic experts (psychologists, psychiatrists, linguists, philosophers and neurologists) have either not heard of NLP or if they have regard it as bunkum. It is a matter of fact that NLP was written off in the early 1990s as not worthy of any further research. It is a matter of fact that NLP often appears amongst a constellation of New Age concerns in trainings, books, therapies and personal interests. NLP is not an "epistemology", it hasn't got anything to do with philosophy, maths or logic, it isn't applied psychology, it isn't science, it isn't art, it isn't craft, it isn't a "bridge between empriricism and rationalism", it isn't the study of subjective experience, it isn't a means of accelerated learning, it isn't the tip of an emerging paradigm shift. It's just a great big steaming pile of Californian New Age, Human Potential horse shit that has become big business. flavius 03:40, 27 January 2006 (UTC)

Topic moved to arbcom page. --Comaze 23:15, 27 January 2006 (UTC)

"eschews" ?

To eschew is to avoid habitually. In the Overview shouldn't eschew be replaced with an antonym such as embrace? NLP embraces the New Age notion of "clearing blocks". flavius 12:41, 29 January 2006 (UTC)

This is just another attempt at subversion by inserting Scientology terminology (clearing) ... NOBODY in the NLP community uses such terminology, and you know it, you asshole. 01:11, 30 January 2006 (UTC)

Is there anyone that ban's users for personal attacking abuses? ^---Weak users unskilled in dismatling content resorting to attacking the presenter. WEAK. jVirus 05:23, 30 January 2006 (UTC)

Aaron, you don't know what you're talking about (again). The article doesn't claim that the phrase "clearing blocks" is used in NLP but rather that the concept of "clearing" is ubiquitous. VK dissociation, submodality attenuation, Time Line Therapy, Change Personal History and collapsing anchors are all concerned with eliminating obsolete and now pernicious learnings. They are all regressive methods (ie. the problem is re-experienced) that are predicated on the notion that some present problem is due to some past learning that must be undone/removed/cleared/unblocked/de-energised/neutralised. This is the (re-)programming component of NLP. Also, both the phrase "stuck-state" and the underlying notion are very common in NLP. Do yourself and everyone else a favour and f*ck off. flavius

Guilt by association argument - Scientology/Dianetics

"Historically, NLP has many pseudoscientific associations such as the erroneous adherence of some NLP models to the engram concept"

This was ALREADY HASHED OUT MONTHS AGO....I move that whatever editor AGAIN put this deliberate disinformation into the page be banned from editing the page. 01:25, 30 January 2006 (UTC)

This matter was settled in favour of its inclusion. The notion of the engram is used by NLPers (especially in Europe and Asia) to explain how VK dissociation, submodality attenuation and collapsing anchors are supposed to work. The word engram is not peculiar to Dianetics and Hubbard's use of the word is ditinct from neurologists and NLPers. Again, you don't know what you're talking about. flavius 07:30, 30 January 2006 (UTC)

..and yet, there is a distinct failure to make it clear that the word is being used in the sense that is used by neurologists, in your never-ending quest to connect NLP with Scientology. Is it too much to ask that you quit being an asshole who drags misleading (not to mention completely untrue) writings into this document???? Akulkis 10:10, 30 January 2006 (UTC)

No, you're wrong again. The way NLPers use the term engram is distinct from the way neurologists use it. NLP has nothing to do with Scientology (the CoS "spirtual" doctrine) it's related to Dianetics (the CoS "psychological" doctrine) in a number of ways which I'll detail for you shortly. Rather than spray this page with your paranoid rantings try doing some earnest research. You know f*ck all about NLP and Dianetics as you repeatedly demonstrate so sit back, shut the f*ck-up, read and learn. Soliciting information and evidence from others -- rather than ranting and typing banal expletives -- would go towards relieving you of your ignorance and broadening your pathologically narrow perspective. The only asshole in this discussion is you. Would it kill you to simply ask for more detail regarding a matter which you contest? Or is it that you simply cherish your groundless prejudices and can't bear to lose them (a kook without prejudices is no kook at all). You made a complete dick of yourself regarding Fritz Perls and Dianetics, the false ineffectual-harmless/effective-harmful dichotomy, the issue of Dianetics and hypnosis, the problems of anecdotal evidence etc. etc. etc. and you're about to do it again regarding the similarities between Dianetics and NLP. Is your ability to learn impaired or are you so f*cked-up in the head that you can't resist your own aberrant urges to make an ass of yourself on the WWW? flavius 11:48, 30 January 2006 (UTC)

AKluckis. Its interesting how your behaviour has only managed to demonstrate exactly how extremely cultish your obsessions and agendas are. Not only have you clearly been bent on censoring and whitewashing your dearest NLP devotion, but you have demonstrated how much intense pain it causes you to have the plain facts presented. Just try to realise that rational people can see what you have written. And try not to resent them for being realistic. HeadleyDown 12:55, 30 January 2006 (UTC)

The above article text mentioned by Akulkis does not seem too problematic to me, as the engram is much different in NLP than in neurology. The Scientology associations do seem a little over the top. The research and reviews alone will do here, and we have plenty of them. BTW, lets try to avoid personal attacks, even against other people who use them.Voice of All 13:14, 30 January 2006 (UTC)

Let's avoid guilt by association arguments. Lee Lady's comment ] is personal opinion, and weak evidence at best. Is the intention to denigrate NLP or promote Dianetics/Scientology? With 8 repeats of Scientology, and 11 repeats of Dianetics -- it certainly begs the question. I think we can reduce this to about 1 or two sentences. this is not an article about Dianetics or Scientology. Should we remove the unnecessary repeats of Dianetics/scientology or do we need to get a RfC on this? --Comaze 03:32, 31 January 2006 (UTC)

No it doesn't "beg the question". The point is to present an accurate description of NLP. Since its inception -- because it is fundamentally a commercial venture -- NLP has been shrouded in myth, hyperbole and mystification. An encycopedic article should educate and enlighten, striving to cut through deliberate obscurantism and obfuscation. B&Gs malignant propagandising continues till today (as evidenced by the Grinder interwiew at inspiritive.com and the Bandler interview on mp3.com). NLP doesn't represent a paradigm shift in psychology or psychotherapy, it isn't the cutting-edge of applied psychology, it isn't the future of psychology. NLP is cut from the same cloth as Dianetics and EST -- the experts say this much and the parallels are apparent -- and this is worthy of mention. This is unpalatable to you Comaze because you would like to think of NLP as some sophisticated system of inquiry based on mathematics and logic that somehow evades scientific scrutiny. flavius 15:29, 31 January 2006 (UTC)

Hold your horses. I'm currently (re-)reading Dianetics and you'll be suprised about the similarities between Dianetics and NLP. Dianetics contains an explicit understanding of sensorially encoded memory, the characteristics of those encodings in terms of their sense-specific qualities (ie. submodalities), "reverie" (i.e. light trance), the notion of a "time track" (not unlike the NLP time line), an explicit appeal to instrumentalist epistemology, an explicit understanding of associated/dissociated memory, it's replete with IT metaphors and jargon (just like NLP) and the auditing process itself bears numerous similarites to VK dissociation, Time Line Therapy, submodality attenuation and collapsing anchors. Lee Lady conjectures the role of CoS as a template for B&G:

For a while, Bandler and Grinder thought that they could turn NLP into a product which could be promoted to the general public for a lot of money. I'm sure that they must have had the examples of L. Ron Hubbard and Werner Erhard in mind. (You have to remember that at this point they had no academic position and were living on the edge of poverty. But of course this sort of attitude certainly didn't endear them to the academic world.) (http://www2.hawaii.edu/~lady/archive/history-3.html)

Lady's conjecture is not unusual. Hubbard and Erhardt served as pioneers for the New Age/Human Potential industry. It was my intention to detail these many parallels in this subsection of the discussion page in an effeort to put the myth that NLP has nothing to do with Dianetics to bed. flavius 02:00, 31 January 2006 (UTC)

Comaze, read some of the Dianetics literature written by Hubbard. You will find that there is a great deal of scope for writing more about both Dianetics and Scientology in the article. And it will make the article even more encyclopedic and clear. Presently the mention of Dianetics and Scientology are only brief mentions. Each one can be better explained in their own context. HeadleyDown 03:24, 31 January 2006 (UTC)

disambiguation engram

The engram page has changed to provide disambiguation for the different usage of Engram (Dianetics), and Engram (neuropsychology). I made the change in the article to reflect this. It is still not clear what definition of engram is being used in that section. --Comaze 03:45, 31 January 2006 (UTC)

New Paper Published in Peer-Reviewed Highly Regarded Journal Critical of NLP

Devilly, Grant J. (2005) "Power Therapies and possible threats to the science of psychology and psychiatry". Australian and New Zealand Journal of Psychiatry 2005; 39:437-445

ABSTRACT

Objective: Advocates of new therapies frequently make bold claims regarding therapeutic effectiveness, particularly in response to disorders which have been traditionally treatment-refractory. This paper reviews a collection of new therapies collectively self-termed 'The Power Therapies', outlining their proposed procedures and the evidence for and against their use. These therapies are then put to the test for pseudoscientific practice.

Method: Therapies were included which self-describe themselves as 'Power Therapies'. Published work searches were conducted on each therapy using Medline and PsychInfo databases for randomized controlled trials assessing their efficacy, except for the case of Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR). Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing has more randomized controlled studies conducted on its efficacy than any other treatment for trauma and thus, previous meta-analyses were evaluated.

Results and conclusions: It is concluded that these new therapies have offered no new scientifically valid theories of action, show only non-specific efficacy, show no evidence that they offer substantive improvements to extant psychiatric care, yet display many characteristics consistent with pseudoscience.

This paper is significant for several reasons:

It represents an answer to Figley's hyperbole on his Traumatic Stress Forum.
The existing criticisms and conclusions regarding NLP are re-iterated (this convergence is important in evaluating earlier research -- pro and con).
NLP is characterised as pseudoscience and essentially a commercial venture.
NLP's status as settled and not worthy of further research is reiterated and it is demonstrated that research has shifted towards the newer "Power Therapies" (EFT, TFT, EMDR, TAT and TIR), which are incidentally advocated and practised by many NLPers.
It is concerned with efficacy, i.e. NLP (and the other Power Therapies) are assessed on their own terms.
It is recent.
It is in a mainstream professional journal.

This vindicates the position of the critical camp (myself, HeadleyDown, Camridge, DaveRight et al) and it shows the position of Comaze and GreagA to be untenable and fundamentally disocciated from reality.

This vindication should have an emboldening and encouraging effect on those that have struggled against the relentless spray of propaganda and the surreal "alternate world landscaping" efforts of GregA and Comaze on behalf of Inspiritive and Grinder.

I will re-read the paper and add the paper as a reference.

PS:- For your amusement see http://sudotherapay.tripod.com/ It's telling of the status enjoyed by the "Power Therapies" (including NLP) that they are being lampooned in this manner. flavius 15:14, 31 January 2006 (UTC)

Flavius, Clinical psychologists' criticism of NLP is already represented in the article. Does Grant Devilly find anything that was not covered by Lilienfield et al (2003)? To be fair we should probably expand Figley's support of VK/D in Traumatology workshops. --Comaze 00:13, 1 February 2006 (UTC)

Firstly, Devilly isn't a clinical psychologist he's a researcher in neuropsychology. Secondly, you don't appear to -- or perhaps don't want to -- understand the notions of consensus of opinion and convergence of opinion. Devilly (2005) converges on the same conclusions as other scientific papers on NLP. We're getting at the point where a firm consensus of expert opinion is being further consolidated. This is very significant. Devilly (2005) presents another literature review that is two years after Lilienfeld (2003) and reiterates the broad consensus opinion on the matter. Furthermore, the Australian and New Zealand Journal of Psychiatry is an important peer-reviewed journal. Devilly (2005) didn't find that previous research into NLP was inadequate, that NLP is based on a whiz-bang epistemology that is not amenable to scientific scrutiny, that NLP is the way forward. In short, he did not find anything that suggests that any of the claims on this site are true. On the contrary he reiterates the consesus opinion of Sharpley, Lilienfeld, Eisner, Druckman and Swets etc. etc. etc. Devilly (2005) is eminently more citable that the shit you have snuck into the article such as Mathison, Tosey and Malloy. No credible peer-reviewed journal would carry the junk spouted by Grinder or Malloy and lapped up by sycophants. Figley carries no weight. Devilly (2005) answers Figley's hollow claims. You are clutching at straws. You've spent AU$10,000 on this crap course and now you're dissonant. In an attempt to reduce this dissonance you're trying to convince yourself that your time and money was well spent. In order to do this you've resorted to landscaping and grooming Grinder's imaginary parallel universe so that you can comfortably reside in it (with GregA). Your sustaining weltenschaung is becoming increasingly bizarre -- I fear that it will soon become so disimilar to everyone else that all communication with you will become impossible. This is very cultish. The pattern of your thinking is becoming increasingly plain. You appear to have accepted the content of your Grad. Cert. in NLP as perfect -- Grinder, Bostic-St Clair and his Australian sycophants the Collingwoods are infallible. The prophet and his apostles have the Truth and they will allow you to share in it for AU$10,000. Thus the validity of the content of your Grad. Cert. in NLP is axiomatic -- it's truth is beyond question (not unlike a Euclidean axiom such as "Things which equal the same thing also equal one another."). The job you have assumed for yourself -- it would appear -- is to re-order the Universe so as to accomodate the content of the Grad. Cert. in NLP taught at Inspiritive. Screw science, screw linguistics, screw logic, screw statistics, screw research design you effectively declare. Your modus operandi appears to be that if anything contradicts anything the Collingwoods taught (passed down to them via Grinder) it must be wrong and must be torn usunder to accomodate the Truth as espoused at Inspiritive. This is cultish thinking. This is all becoming creepy and concerning. In the "Web of Belief" Quine contended that beliefs form interdependent networks, that a given belief will have antecedent and consequent beliefs. In Quine's scheme any belief -- no matter how ridiculous -- can be accomodated the only cost is that the "web" of surrounding beliefs must be altered. Depending on the nature of the belief the whole web may have to be changed. This provides an episetemic understanding of how an adult can believe the Xenu story of the CoS. Clearly, accepting the Xenu story as true will require a massive re-organisation of one's web of beliefs: science will be one of the main casualties. You too are doing the same thing as the Scientologists which you are so desperately attempting to distance yourself from. You too have re-organised your web of belief such that NLP remains true regardless of any contrary evidence. You have in fact gone one step further, you -- following the lead of Grinder laid out in Whispering and to be further elaborate in Red Tail Math have redefined the very concept of evidence. The notion of evidence has been reconstructed in an attempt to invalidate all negative scientific finds against NLP and to preserve its apparent truth value in the face of any future criticism. I'm interested to read from you what your position is regarding the epistemic status of the content of the Grad. Cert in NLP. Do you deem Grinder to be infallible? Is it possible -- according to you -- that Grinder is wrong about NLP? This cuts to the heart of the matter of whether you are entirely rational and worth my (or anyone elses) time and effort. If you do regard NLP as a perfect doctrine in the same way that Fundamentalist Christians regard the Bible (i.e. as inerrant and absolutely authoritative) then your position is one of faith and you are being disingenuous with all your "research". Do you have any criticisms about any of the content imparted to you during the Grad. Cert. in NLP? Is New Code NLP perfect and by implication Grinder infallible? flavius 03:17, 1 February 2006 (UTC)

Flavius, What I personally think about NLP has no relevance to this discussion. I have trained in material from all major schools of NLP including Robert Dilts, Dr. John Grinder, Dr. Stephen Gilligan, R. Bandler, Leslie Cameron-Bandler and Judith Delozier so I can present the different schools of NLP fairly; this is quite a challenge because most of the schools content and delivery differ significantly. However, there are some common elements that can be traced to the beginning of the field. The skeptics and academics points of view should also be represented fairly and attributed to the correct sources. Additionally, there is no need to ditch linguistics, science or any other linguistics subjects --- many people use NLP as an adjunct to their academic and professional qualifications such as cognitive science, linguistics, sales, business, change management etc. There are plenty of published books on the applications. In NLP modeling there is a preference for direct sensory based evidence and for the modeling process a preference for live experience and imitation much like a mentor/apprenticeship relationship. During the initial stage (unconscious uptake) of the NLP modeling process all linguistic filters (prior knowledge) are suspended; later in the coding phase all the academic, scientific, linguistic compentencies are enabled -- giving you full freedom to explicate the coding, artfully so. There is some work being done to get those interested in NLP to work alongside researchers in neuropsychology but most NLP practitioners are interested only in what can be directly applied.. --Comaze 12:29, 1 February 2006 (UTC)

Firstly, your personal take on the epistemic status of NLP and the fallibility or otherwise of Grinder is relevant in that it will ultimately determine whether what you deem contentious is justiciable. If you deem Grinder infallible and New Code NLP perfect then any dispute becomes non-justiciable. On the surface it may appear justiciable but at its core it will be found to be non-justiciable, i.e. unable to be adjudicated over. We can't adjudicate over matters of faith. If your acceptance of NLP is faith-based -- and it appears to be since their is no evidence to support your fervent advocacy -- then the article, unless it is rendered a piece of NLP promotional material, will be always be "biased" in your view. Secondly, that you have trained extensively in NLP is more of a hindrance than a help since it makes you all the more dissonant. You have such an heavy investment in terms of time, money and self-identity in NLP that you have been "captured". You are in this way no different from a member of a cult. Your two broad options are not unlike those of long-term cult members (1) reject NLP and deal with the consequences of the wasted time and money, misplaced trust and ramifications on self-concept; or (2) become more immersed in NLP and re-organise your web of belief more extensively to deal with assaults. Clearly you have chosen the second option and your comments have betrayed the extensiveness of the eccentricity of your network of sustaining beliefs. In an earlier discussion you suggested that psychology isn't scientific and that their are divisions within psychology ergo NLP is a peer of psychology. I answered this concern yet you didn;t respond. The issue of your dissonance is also relevant in that it robs you of your impartiality -- you will see bias when their is none. Thirdly, you write "there is no need to ditch linguistics, science or any other linguistics subjects --- many people use NLP as an adjunct to their academic and professional qualifications such as cognitive science, linguistics, sales, business, change management etc. There are plenty of published books on the applications". There is a need for you (and every other NLP zealot) to reject science and everything else that contradicts the doctrine of NLP and that is precisely what you have done. The consensus of scientific opinion is that NLP is ineffective, theoretically unsubstantiated and pseudoscientific. If you reject the consensus scientific opinion you are effectively rejecting science. Also, "sales, business, change management" have nothing to do with science and their practitioners are not scientists. There are no eminent or even prominent scientists that "use NLP as an adjunct to their academic and professional qualifications". It is not possible to be scientific and embrace a theory and practice that is so fundamnetally at odds -- in method and results -- with science. Who are these scientists that "use NLP as an adjunct to their academic and professional qualifications"? Malloy? Do they number more than 100 globally? Are they reputable? Malloy is a nobody, is he your example of a scientist that uses NLP. This is all reminiscent of CoS propaganda. Specifically, given that TG is dead in linguistics what sort of linguist would embrace a doctrine based on an outdated linguistic theory? Answer: a linguist like Grinder, i.e. a hack academic without reputation that lost his tenure from a New Age College (Kresge). Fourthly, you write, "In NLP modeling there is a preference for direct sensory based evidence and for the modeling process a preference for live experience and imitation much like a mentor/apprenticeship relationship. During the initial stage (unconscious uptake) of the NLP modeling process all linguistic filters (prior knowledge) are suspended; later in the coding phase all the academic, scientific, linguistic compentencies are enabled -- giving you full freedom to explicate the coding, artfully so". This is thoughtless zombie-like repetition of doctrine. Grinder advocates the use of eye accessing cues in the modelling process so as to determine the exemplars "strategy". Eye accessing cues have been thoroughly and conclusively discredited. Bandler himself has abandoned them and concedes (possible) error. Furthermore, many of the patterns derived from NLP modelling have been shown to be ineffective (eg. predicate matching, mirroring). Thus there is evidence that the process of NLP modelling itself is flawed. The acceptance of NLP modelling as sound requires a simultaneous rejection of the results of scientific inquiry into NLP modelling (because the results are not supportive). Grinder's response to the results from the most thoroughly researched aspect of NLP -- namely eye accessing cues and PRS -- indicates that what you are saying is given only lip-service. Grinder's response to the overwhelming lack of support found for the eye accessing cues and PRS hypotheses is a wholesale rejection of scientific method -- I provided the relevant quotes from Whispering in an earlier discussion. Fifthly, you write, "There is some work being done to get those interested in NLP to work alongside researchers in neuropsychology but most NLP practitioners are interested only in what can be directly applied". This is plain bullshit. Devilly is a neuropsychologist and Devilly (2005) is representative of the neuropsychological professions opinion of NLP. Finding two neuropsychologists that think NLP is shit-hot science is entirely insignificant, it is statistcal noise. If we searched we could probably find at least five Crowlian Magickians that are neuropsychologists. What of it? This notion of "what can be directly applied" is a naive means of avoiding the matter of demonstrable efficacy. Eye accessing cues have been thoroughly discredited. Can they be "directly applied"? What does "directly applied" mean? flavius 00:05, 2 February 2006 (UTC)

Maybe this thread should be moved to email -- we need to keep this directly connected to the article. If you are interested I can put you in contact with a cognitive scientist who is currently doing a Graduate Certificate in NLP; he's finding much of NLP is intellectually underpinned by theory available in cognitive science, linguistics (especially Noam Chomsky and Transformational Grammar), neuroscience, and neural networks. He is better informed than me on the latest research in this area. He mentioned a current argument in neuroscience over the role of localisation of certain brain functions such as Visual, Auditory and other sensory systems. The latest fMRI technology is too slow to test eye accessing cues and localization. Nonetheless, mainstream neuroscience accepts eye movements as indicators of internal imagery, and other cognitive functions. This is where typical scientists fail -- in NLP we can use trained subjects, introspection and testimonial evidence. Statistical approaches are not useful for sensory acuity and calibration skills. Even if eye accessing were false they are excellent way for people to hone their calibration and sensory acuity skills by listening for predicates and watching eye movements. I'll hold off on commenting on Devilly (2005) until I get comment from an expert in this area. With the professional postgraduate program in NLP some graduates are moving back into academic and professional ciricles. We may see an increase in published papers, and updates to connect NLP to the latest linguistics, neuroscience and other research. With Grinder moving back into academic publishing (with Malloy and Bostic), there is renewed interest in the academic side of NLP. Prof. Charles Figley (Florida State University - Founding member, Traumatology) is an academic with an excellent reputation. Grinder has set up a research framework so that NLP can be updated with the latest developments from cognitive neuropsychology. By "directly applied" I mean that after seeing a live demonstration of the skill and short instruction, another person can imitate and ellicit the similar responses as shown in the original demonstration; for testing the original demonstrator would sign off that the skill was performed to the same degree of quality. --Comaze 01:02, 2 February 2006 (UTC)

This is becoming ridiculous. So you can put me in contact with one cognitive scientist that thinks NLP is shit hot! I reckon that I can find one of any X that thinks Y is valid (where X is a profession and Y is any theory, religion, cult, superstition, sect, philosophy, creed or conjecture). I want to see a substantial body of opinion from any profession with relevant topic expertise that concludes that NLP is valid. One cognitive scientist won't cut it. If this persons opionion re NLP was worth a shit he'd publish a paper in a peer-reviewed journal of repute. TG is dead amongst linguists. Does your cognitive scientist know that? Also, (artificial) neural networks are a paradigm for computing (as are genetic algorithms), neither is necessarily relevant to human neurology. Arguments about localisation of brain function are conjectures or hypotheses, as conjectures and hypotheses they are to be tested not used to justify NLP. Regarding eye movements all we can say that is true is that eyes sometimes move when we think and remember. This far removed from the eye accessing cues diagram in Frogs and the pile of shit in Whispering. You write, "This is where typical scientists fail -- in NLP we can use trained subjects, introspection and testimonial evidence". Are you serious? You use "trained subjects" because they know what they are supposed to do, they know what role they supposed to play. If NLP were uncovering truths about human neurology and behaviour you should be able to observe your results in people drawn at random from the general population. A trained subject moves his eyes in accordance with the goofy diagram in Frogs because he knows about that diagram and believes that eye accessing cues are real. Testimonial evidence is very low quality evdience and in many domains it isn't even evidence at all. Scientists don't use testimonial evidence because it isn't a valid form of evidence. The rejection of testimonial evidence isn't confined to science. Most people wouldn't beleieve me if I told them I saw the Loch Ness Monster or a Yeti or a space alien, they would demand something more than my testimony in order to accept my claima s real. Scientists do study subjective experience but they do so in an objective way. NLPer study subjective experince in a subjective manner that is why they produce crap. You claim, "Statistical approaches are not useful for sensory acuity and calibration skills". This is vague and perhaps meanigless. Despite Grinder's blather on the topic, inferential statistics are used to aid in the testing of hypotheses. Using inferential statistics we can test whether claimed "sensory acuity and calibration skills" are making a person more persuasive, better able to communicate, more empathic etc. You write, "Even if eye accessing were false they are excellent way for people to hone their calibration and sensory acuity skills by listening for predicates and watching eye movements". No they wouldn't. They are false (so I won't so if) so why gather useless information and then proceed to make invalid inferences of of it? These invalid inferences will only hamper communication. You write, "With the professional postgraduate program in NLP some graduates are moving back into academic and professional ciricles. We may see an increase in published papers, and updates to connect NLP to the latest linguistics, neuroscience and other research". It's a f*cking certificate (and at AU$10,000 its probably the most expensive certificate in Australia -- a TAFE certificate costs between AU$200-$500). In Australia a certificate is the lowest grade of academic certification. The hierachy is: certificate, advanced certificate, associate diploma, diploma, degree, masters, doctorate. The content wasn't sufficiently substantive to have it classed even an associate diploma. Can't the CoS say that they too have members in the academy? We may see many things, even a crocodile riding a unicycle (Hubbard reports to have seen one). You write, "With Grinder moving back into academic publishing (with Malloy and Bostic), there is renewed interest in the academic side of NLP". Where is this ineterest? Given that Figley is involved in the promotion of Power Therapies then he isn't reputable. You write, "Grinder has set up a research framework so that NLP can be updated with the latest developments from cognitive neuropsychology". Where? If NLP were "updated" with scientific discoveries there would be nothing left of it since so part has found any support in science. Also, how can something which you claim to be non-scientific and possessed of its own "criteria of argumentation and evidence" be updated with developments from a scientific discipline? You write, "By 'directly applied' I mean that after seeing a live demonstration of the skill and short instruction, another person can imitate and ellicit the similar responses as shown in the original demonstration; for testing the original demonstrator would sign off that the skill was performed to the same degree of quality." By this definition, throwing your excrement at someone would count as a directly applied skill. flavius 04:42, 2 February 2006 (UTC)

Flavius, Based on Charles Figley's tenureship, editorialship, publications -- his reputation is excellent. Correction: Under the Australian qualification framework, the hierachy is: Certificate I-IV, Advanced certificate, Diploma, Advanced Diploma, Degree, Graduate Certificate, Masters, Doctorate. The Graduate Certificate in Neuro-linguistic Programming is 333 hours and requires bachelors degree for entry, (the order of Australian qualification Grad.Cert. is in between Bachelors degree and Masters Degree in terms of grade). The certification is issued by a Registered Training Organisation under the Australian Quality Training Framework and is endorsed by co-founder of NLP, Dr. John Grinder. On your question about cognitive scientists, Patrick Merlevede has a PhD in NLP and masters degree in cognitive science. I'm not sure if Patrick Merlevede PhD or Jane Mathison PhD did the first PhD on NLP. Dr. Stephen Gilligan's PhD was in part based partly on his work with Grinder and Bandler in the mid 70s. --Comaze 05:26, 2 February 2006 (UTC)

If Figley is promoting Power Therapies then he is ipso facto not credible. The imposition of the prerequisite of requiring a Bachelors degree in anything for acceptance into the Grad Cert. in NLP is artificial and instituted only to raise the apparent prestige of the certificate. Inspiritive will accept you without a degree -- it after all about lining the Collingwood's pockets. The Grad. Cert. is not between a bachelors degree and masters degree because it is unrelated to the base degree. In Australia, a masters degree consists of advanced study of the material covered in an undergraduate degree. I have a graduate diploma and it is considered a degree equivalent because it contained all the units required to qualify for a degree less the enrichment electives that undergraduates have to enrol in -- it is not considered more advanced than a bachelors degree and it is a diploma that took 1 year full-time to complete. Hence a Grad. Cert. is not just beneath a master's degree. That's just crap. The only graduate diplomas and certificate that are deemed more advanced than bachelors degrees are those that carry undergraduate study to a higher level. Australian tertiary education is in crisis and turmoil so te accreditation of an NLP course is just another negative development. I'm sure it makes it all worthwhile if John Grinder endorses it :-) Patrick Merlvede doesn't may have a PhD in NLP and Stacey Abbott -- God bless her -- has a PhD on Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Djoymi Baker is completing a PhD on Star Trek. Does this mean that Buffy the Vampire Slayer is a substantive topic? flavius 12:38, 2 February 2006 (UTC)

Nice one Flavius. Sure, Devilly needs some more airtime in the article. I seem to remember a similar paper that had Scientology in the same list as the other bullshit therapies. I'll see if I can find it. Comaze seems to be begging for it, bent over, trousers round ankles etc. You can hear Comaze whimpering "Please please please, audit me! Clear my engrams and heal my painful traumas"! Cheers DaveRight 03:27, 1 February 2006 (UTC)

Overviews (criticism and overview)

I've removed the overview text and the intro the the criticism section. Both section were biased. Sathnam Sanghera is a newly appointed columnist (London Fin. Times) and if you include this author it opens the gates for a whole host of authors from similar publications (pro and con). Harry Edwards' Skeptics Guide to the New Age is also inappropriate for the overview of NLP -- it should be written from a Neutral Point of View. --Comaze 02:28, 1 February 2006 (UTC)

Comaze, Sanghera's view and Edwards' views both converge towards the same view as the experts. This convergence suggests where the truth of the matter lies. You are attempting to manufacture an illusion that your views are something other than fringe. flavius 03:21, 1 February 2006 (UTC)

If the skeptical views of Sanghera and Edwards' views are acceptable then so are the hundreds of non-academic books that have been published by reputable authors. I really think we need a separation of academic and non-academic authors here. DaveRight reverted my edits so I'll we might have to resolve this via RfC. --Comaze 03:33, 1 February 2006 (UTC)

Comaze, you seem to have reverted to your last summer's reversionfest. It was clear from the beginning that are not going to remove facts on Misplaced Pages. We all know you just want to promote NLP. The authors presented are presenting the facts concisely, but that does not mean you can erase them off the face of the article. You must realize how desperate you look to rational people. I think its time to torture you with some more realistic facts. Why are you so desperately into sucking moneygrabbing gurus? Falling for pseudoscientific confections is fair enough once in a while, but being such a daily sucker for bullshitting gurus on a daily basis will not do your self cred much good. Once you realise the charlatans have you bent over, taking you roughly from behind, you are supposed to react by kicking, screaming and fighting to recover your selfworth. You're not supposed to return to the same old "roger me brutally again, I'm Comaze the gurubabble sucker". DaveRight 04:57, 1 February 2006 (UTC)

Comaze, no your reasoning regarding "non-academic books" is unsound for at least two reasons: (a) if being non-academic were grounds for exclusion then there would be no citations on the pro-NLP side. We wouldn't be able to include even the NLP primary texts since none of them are academic; (b) again you show an inability or unwillingness to grasp the fundamental notions regarding opinion of consensus and convergence. The profile of expert opinion (that of linguists, psychologists, psychiatrists, psychologists, anthropologists, philosophers, neurologists, neuropsychologists) regarding NLP is that it is inneffective, there is no evidence in its favor, it is theoretically flawed and pseudoscientific. This too is the opinion of most pragmatic clinicians. It is unlikely given the history of science that given the magnitude and direction of consensus and convergence that the opposite is in fact true, i.e. that NLP is efficacious, there exists evidence of its efficacy and it is theoretically sound. Any non-academic opinion is evaluated -- at least partially -- with regard to its relation to the consensus of opinion and whether it converges on the same opinion as experts. If a non-expert, published -- in some place other than a peer-reviewed journal -- some "thumbnail dipped in tar" essay in support of NLP (like this one or this one , incidentally how is it that research using basically those methods that Grinder rejects that finds in support of NLP is included?) that was inconsistent with the broad consensus and that did not converge on the same opinion as most of the other research then that would be not worthy of mention let alone citation. Sanghera may not be a topic expert but his conclusions are consistent with those of topic experts hence he is most likely correct. Edwards' too is citable for this same reason. Non-academics provide a different perspective on the truth as established by experts. They are also able to present expert opinion in an amusing or witty manner. flavius 04:45, 1 February 2006 (UTC)

Flavius, There are actually a few separate issues here 1) Currently, NLP is not primarily an academic subject, recently there have been some papers published by Craft, Tossey, Mathison, Malloy, Grinder & Bostic in academic journals 2) NLP has different criteria for argumentation and evidence to that of science 3) wikipedia also has different criteria for evidence for academic v. non-academic subjects 4) Robert Dilts, Carmen Bostic & John Grinder consider NLP to be a newcomer, a fledgling field that has yet to be established; what is the wikipedia policy for a field that is not yet established? 5) There are thousands of non-academic books published in many different languages all over the world for sales, sport and other non-academic applications --Comaze 05:56, 1 February 2006 (UTC)

Comaze, I'll respond to your points as you've enumerated them. (1) I have copies of Tossey and Mathison's paper and I've commented on it earlier. The journal that they published in itself isn't reputable in its field (it's editorial standard are low, the paper that they respond to that is critical of NLP is itself quite poor). Malloy and Grinder/Bostic published in an online journal without reputation. All journals are not equal. NLP is 30 years old and it is still tightly bound to Bandler and Grinder, so much so that their split spawned two broad schools (or churches) of NLP. NLP isn't a subject so it can never become an academic subject. (2) This is a ridiculous contention! "NLP has different criteria for argumentation and evidence to that of science". Can you list them for us for our benefit? If this were true then how is the substance of these possible? It would seem then that NLP has the same "criteria for argumentation and evidence" as science when the results are supportive but different "criteria for argumentation and evidence" when the results are non-supportive. NLPs criteria for argumentation and evidence are that what Grinder says is true and Grinder need not supply argumentation and evidence only assertion and anecdote and anything that contradicts Grinder is false. Is it as simple as that? Does NLP then have a criterion of evidence such that if something doesn't work according to most people it in fact does work. Is this a form of Dadaism? Is Grinder then a Dadaist? So is NLP art or religion? (3) A non-academic subject doesn't make claims about the nature of illness, cognition, learning, memory, thinking, neurology, motivation etc. unless it is pseudoscience or pop-psychology. (4) Who cares what three NLP advocates claim about NLPs status as a discipline. To date literally hundreds of topic experts have investigated NLP and the consensus opinion regarding NLP is that it is pseudoscience, charlatanry, fraud, New Age pap, cultish and a fad. If NLP is a "fledgling field" then so is Dianetics. The appropriate policy for Wikiipedia vis-a-vis NLP is that of on New Age and pseudoscientific topics. (5) So what? If they are at odds with the consensus scientific opinion then they too are bunkum. flavius 00:37, 2 February 2006 (UTC)

Altering the direct quotes from Sanghera and Edwards violates copyright and wikipedia policy. Someone is doing copy and paste job here and presenting it as original work. If you have permission from the original author then we would need this in writing. --Comaze 05:06, 1 February 2006 (UTC)

Personal attacks - report to ArbCom or Mediator

There has been an increase in the number and severity of personal attacks on this page. I will report any attacks against anyone directly to arbcom. or via email to our mediator. --Comaze 05:13, 1 February 2006 (UTC)

They have been quite funny so arbcom should get a chuckle. flavius

Rule-governed behaviour

I modified the second paragraph to this:

It is predicated upon the assumption that "lthough we have little or no consciousness of the way in which we form our communication, our activity -- the process of using language is highly structured" .

This is the basis of majority of NLP that extends Chomsky's (1957) notion that language is rule governed, Bandler & Grinder (1975a) argue that all human behaviour is also rule governed --Comaze 08:10, 1 February 2006 (UTC)

Rewrite this paragraph on meta model (NPOV)

The meta-model involves the identification of the abandoned theoretical concepts of Chomsky's transformational grammar . These are distortions, generalizations, and deletions. However, in contrast with Chomsky's abandoned theory and with linguistics theory, distortions, generalizations and deletions are universals according to NLP, and are applied directly from untested theory to empirically untested application (REF).

Can someone please rewrite the paragraph above and reinsert it into the meta-model section. At the moment it is poorly articulated. --Comaze 08:40, 1 February 2006 (UTC)

Two distinct points of view: NLP is a therapy / NLP is a model methodology

There seems to be two main points of views in the article, from both the advocates and skeptics of NLP. One group seems to define NLP as an approach to therapy, and the other group as a way to model high performers. We need to make clear distinction betweens the different versions or types of NLP. --Comaze 08:53, 1 February 2006 (UTC)

Comaze, they are just two aspect of the same thing. The distinction itself is dubious. If the products of a method are defective then the method itself must be defective. NLP is predominantly concerned with psychotherpy. The vast majority of NLP "patterns" and literature are concerned with therapy. The aspect of NLP are not mutually exclusive: it is purported to be a method of modeling excellence and an approach to psychotherapy. flavius 00:45, 2 February 2006 (UTC)

There is a necessary distinction here. Modeling is a methodology and psychotherapy is the application of the results of the modeling process. Just as many people apply NLP to sales and business, and apply it to psychotherapy. If you look at the different definitions of NLP provided by the developers, you'll find that the majority do not define NLP as a therapy, but as a methodology for "modeling human excellence". It is mostly the AMA biased "alternative therapy" skeptics (Jack Raso, Stephen Barrett, etc.) who ignore the application of NLP to learning, business, and sales training. --Comaze 01:21, 2 February 2006 (UTC)

This is very disingenuous of you. When NLP debut it was as a set of (alleged) psychotherapeutic patterns. The primary NLP texts have an almost exclusive psychotherapuetic focus. NLP does the most harm as a psychotherapy that is why it has drawn the attention of the AMA. The damage when it is used in sales and management is confined to the companies stupid enough to use it -- there is no public damage as such. Nevertheless, NLP has been heavily critiques in HR and management journals. The distinction isn't important in that NLP (patterns) are crap as is NLP (modelling) so it is sound to simply say NLP is crap. Since you are compelled by useless formalism: (X = A) & (Y = A) → X = Y flavius 05:00, 2 February 2006 (UTC)

Astray

I have noticed that blanket reverts and personal attacks have returned, and the discussion is going astray. Please try to aboid this. Try to avoid making so many edits at once, and try not to be to careless. Some of the edits that where reverted had poor wording and some of the ref changes (like "|21") had no affect.Voice of All 17:05, 1 February 2006 (UTC)

Replace (I'll wait 24 hours before making this change):

It is predicated upon the assumption that all behaviors have a practically determinable structure .

With this:

Voice of All: I want to replace the first sentence with the second, a direct quote from Grinder & Bandler (1975a). I'd settle for an accurate paraphrase of the second. This book has over 175 citations on google scholar which is an accceptable rule of thumb for wikipedia. --Comaze 23:07, 1 February 2006 (UTC)

VoiceOfAll. I appreciate your balanced mediation. But there must be someone official here who can point out Comaze's whitewash, and censorship of fact or ref, and take a good long run up to kick hard his tiny balls. Camridge 04:37, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

What are we doing, guys?

I think that how the article is looking right now doesn't correspond with the requirements for a good Wiki-article. Mosty, as it seems to me, you try to put as many footnotes as you can to prove that your point of view is correct. But this does not clarify anything about the NLP itself (at least for me), most things you're doing is either attempts to say "NLP is bad, bad, bad" or to say "NLP is not bad, not bad, not bad." The fact is that NLP is used by thousands of specialists, businessmen, psychologists, therapists, doctors, intelligence services in many countries. (And it is not used by thousands of specialists as well.) So you cannot just take that model and say "blah blah yada yada yeah it happens, but many people think it's a psychocult, so we shall put the message that it is a psychocult in every line of the text." What I suggest is to divide the article into two sections - one's describing what the meaning of NLP is, what NLPers do, what they are supposed to do, and the second section's for pro's and con's. Perhaps, we should even make a separate article NLP Criticism (where the right to speak should be given to those, who criticize arguments of those, who criticize arguments for NLP, too), because GUYS, WE'VE GOT TO MAKE THIS ARTICLE READABLE, now it's only a worthless piece of a "who's the sharpest nail" battle. Please think in a scientific way--and the scientific way means you don't get prejudice and you're ready to check the model or at least you give the chance of checking the model to others. Cui bono? 7even 20:20, 2 February 2006 (UTC)

Thanks 7even. I really appreciate your constructive comment. The article needs some more fluid structure. Maybe 1. NLP as described by the seeming founders with citings. then 2. What others have described NLP to be Promoters and then Critics. 3. Then maybe a brief history dates and such perhaps. etc... then other points. Maybe we really should think of hammering out a different form ToC here. JVirusX

Thank you for understanding the meaning of my comment. 7even 22:26, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

7even, you make two distinct points and attempt to present them as one, illegitimately drawing conclusions from the wrong set of premises. You write, "you try to put as many footnotes as you can to prove that your point of view is correct". So what you suggesting is that we shouldn't let facts get in the way, screw substantiation, just engage in Monty Pythonesque dialogue: "Oh yes it is!", "Oh no it isn't!". That would be very encyclopedic and informative woudln't it? You write, "But this does not clarify anything about the NLP itself (at least for me), most things you're doing is either attempts to say "NLP is bad, bad, bad" or to say "NLP is not bad, not bad, not bad". How so? Don't you understand the concept of evidence. What is "NLP itself" as oppposed to what the article covers? Are you looking for a tutorial on NLP? You write,"The fact is that NLP is used by thousands of specialists, businessmen, psychologists, therapists, doctors, intelligence services in many countries. (And it is not used by thousands of specialists as well.)". No the fact is that it is used by an very small minority of professionals. Furthermore, so what if it is used by X number of people, what of it? There are most likely as many Scientologists as there are NLPers. Since when could truth be arrived at by a vote? You add, "So you cannot just take that model and say 'blah blah yada yada yeah it happens, but many people think it's a psychocult, so we shall put the message that it is a psychocult in every line of the text.'" NLP isn't a model -- in any technical sense of the word -- and your conclusion doesn't even follow your flawed premises. Are you suggesting that because "NLP is used by thousands of specialists, businessmen, psychologists, therapists, doctors, intelligence services in many countries" the assessment and results of research by topic experts are irrelevant? How did you make the leap from this premise:

P1. "The fact is that NLP is used by thousands of specialists, businessmen, psychologists, therapists, doctors, intelligence services in many countries. (And it is not used by thousands of specialists as well.)"

..to this conclusion?

C. 'So you cannot just take that model and say "blah blah yada yada yeah it happens, but many people think it's a psychocult, so we shall put the message that it is a psychocult in every line of the text.'

An encyclopedic article reports experts opinion on a matter. Numerous authoritative topic experts characterise NLP as a psycho-cult and even a quasi-religion. For this reason, that it is deemed a psycho-cult should be stated. You write, "What I suggest is to divide the article into two sections - one's describing what the meaning of NLP is, what NLPers do, what they are supposed to do, and the second section's for pro's and con's. Perhaps, we should even make a separate article NLP Criticism (where the right to speak should be given to those, who criticize arguments of those, who criticize arguments for NLP, too)". The article isn't a Usenet forum. The criticisms provided aren't those of the editors they are those of scientists and other experts and none of the criticism published in peer-reviewed journals has been answered by NLP proponents because no answers exist. You suggestion has zero merit and you betray a frightening degree of ignorance about NLP, science, basic reasoning skills and the concept of evidence. My suggestion is that you remedy your profound ignorance -- which I would be embarassed to parade even under an alias -- and then revisit the article. Then you add, "because GUYS, WE'VE GOT TO MAKE THIS ARTICLE READABLE". So the issue of content has magically transformed into and inssue of form. How so? You write, "now it's only a worthless piece of a "who's the sharpest nail" battle". So you want to read an advertisement for NLP stripped of any critical opinion, comfortably oblivious of all the pile of criticism levelled and non-supportive research against NLP? You finish (ironically) with, "Please think in a scientific way--and the scientific way means you don't get prejudice and you're ready to check the model or at least you give the chance of checking the model to others". The little numbers that appear on the upper-right of (critical) remarks refer to peer reviewed scientific research. Are you suggesting that Sharpley, Lilienfeld, Eisner, Levelt, Devilly, Druckman and Swets, Winkin, Beyerstein, Pratkanis et al don't "think in a scientific way". Perhaps you should write an email to Willem Levelt -- the Director of the Max Planck Institute of Psycholinguistics -- to let him know that he doesn't understand science. The scientists cited have "check the model". The debate isn't where yiu think it is. NLP has been throughly researched and dound to be theoretically unsupported and ineffective. Any dispute should be made with reference to the existing body of research into NLP. You don't have a grasp on basic thinking skills let alone of scientific method so it is most presumptuous and deluded of you to proffer advice about being scientific. I honestly don't think you'd recognise a scientific journal if one was being stuffed into your flapping mouthing. Also, I suspect that you are a sock-pupper of that half-wit DejaKitty. You have the same peurile writing style and exhibit an inabilty to reason which is structurally similar. flavius 01:26, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

Thank you, flavius, for exposing my ignorance and for such a huge comment. :) I understand your opinion concerning NLP--and this is your map as NLPers say. As for me, I don't like or dislike NLP, I just use it as one of the tools in my inventory. Well, right now I guess, if I am to find some info on NLP that makes sense, I should search someplace else (but I'm sure Wikipedians will keep working on the article and a solution will be achieved after some time). By posting my previous comment I didn't want to start any new discussion, I only sincerely suggested some ways of climbing out of the crisis, how I see them. That's why I didn't try to write a logically structured essay on the topic here. So I'll answer just to a few points you've made. "Since when could truth be arrived at by a vote?" - in fact, there is no absolute truth. There are things which can be considered (only considered) as truth after some verification (and hey, there can be 2+ quite opposite truths with equal amount of evidence for each). But I'm sure you are familiar with the scientific methods, so I won't go further in my comment here. "The debate isn't where yiu think it is." I do not think what you think I do think. That was a bad piece of telepathy, flavius; and I don't even know what to answer here because I suspect this message was designed for somebody else. "Perhaps you should write an email to Willem Levelt" - That's a good idea, thanks; I might do it if I decide to work on this topic closely. "You have the same peurile writing style and exhibit an inabilty to reason which is structurally similar" - I hope the fact that English is not my native language can excuse me, my writing style and an inability to reason. 7even 22:26, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

7even your inventory in the clear thinking department is bare and NLP isn't helping you here. No, you don't understand my "opinion concerning NLP" and it's not my "map". I'm presenting the consensus of scientific opinion that is derived from objective experimentation. For the time being that is the truth. If you understood the cited literature and comprehended its significance then you wouldn't be advocating NLP. The role of Misplaced Pages isn't to promote pseudoscience, its primary function is to educate. Education is about imparting knowledge. The best method devised so far for obtaining knowledge about the universe is science. The man that coined the phrase "the map is not the territory" -- Alfred Korzybski -- argued that science contains the most accurate maps and the scientific method produces the most accurate maps: "Science represents the highest structural abstractions that have been produced at each date. It is a supreme abstraction from all the experiences of countless individuals and generations" (p.553, Science and Sanity). Bandler and Grinder forgot that bit huh? If "there is no absolute truth" then what is the status of your statement that "there is no absolute truth"? Is your statement that "there is no absolute truth" absolute truth? If it is then there is absolute truth. Your statement that "there is no absolute truth" is self-refuting. Statements such as "there is no absolute truth" or "everything is relative" are idiotic banality disguised as profundity -- nonsense on stilts (to borrow a quote from Bentham). In your attempt to be clever you have once again demonstrated your abject simplicity. I'm sure an eminent, world-acknowledged expert in psycholingustics that directs one of Europe's most prestigious psycholinguistic research facilities has been waiting all his life for a letter from a follower of a pseudocscientific, psycho-cult regarding his ignorance of matters scientific. You must have your head so far up your backside that you're some sort of human Klein bottle. flavius 17:29, 4 February 2006 (UTC)

JVirus/7even, Arbcom is currently votingand it looks like various editors will be assigned mentors. Arbcom will most likely assign 4-5 administrators to this page to help stabilise the article. We need a whole bunch of experienced wikipedias to assist us in bringing this article up to scratch. --Comaze 23:12, 2 February 2006 (UTC)

MMM thx. guess i didnt pick that up from my talk readings :) jVirus 23:37, 2 February 2006 (UTC)

I'm sure it will be worked out well. Good luck! 7even 22:26, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

Makes no difference. If Comaze or any other idiotic NLP fool want to remove facts, having mentors around will not make a bit of difference. The facts remain or will be restored. HeadleyDown 02:43, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

JVirus and 7even. You are wet behind the ears. READ THE ARCHIVES! We have gone over this too many times already. The current format is fine and if Comaze does his chores properly, the current version will be LOCKED into place due to the hard to change new ref format. Its a done deal! DaveRight 03:57, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

DaveRight, Thanks for letting me know I am wet behind the ears. It was a real concern to me. Without it, you might have been lost. ;) jVirus 08:19, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

DaveRight, I'm sorry I hadn't had free time to read all the archives. I thought that I could suggest another direction for this discussion. But now I see the work is being done, so my comment was indeed redundant. 7even 22:26, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

Not a personal attack; Comaze has been wasting everybody's time yet again

Comaze has:

Been deleting facts that were agreed valid through mediation, yet again.
Been whitewashing NLP again
Been whitewashing his own rotten actions again yes! eg
Been making unwarranted accusations on editor's talk pages again (harrasment), and has been adding warning stickers when he was told not to. He has also made SEVERAL threats to block editors when he was told not to by arbitrators/mediators
Comaze has also been removing refs. Any place on the article where there is a (ref) there used to be a reference. Comaze has removed them. He has been censoring solid citations. He should put them back.
And Comaze has been acting in bad faith

These are not the kind of things that wikipedians should be doing. Its very naughty. Take a look at Comaze's history, especially that of last summer. When zealots pretend to be concerned wikipedians, just look at their history and highlight it on the discussion page. Rub their nose in their own shit. DaveRight 04:03, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

Indeed! Comaze has developed a whitewash kneejerk. Thats about all he ever does. Either whitewash or censorship or some kind of vexatious litigation. Wikipedians should not behave like the church of Scientology. Comaze has shown the worst side of cult activities, and is his own worst enemy. Deal with him sharply and briefly. Do not waste too much time on explaining NLP research to him. He only wants to waste everybody's time, cause conflict, and promote his NLP. Camridge 04:25, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

Please be aware of WP:NPA as you are in extreme violation. Swatjester 09:57, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

Swatjester. You have not explained exactly why pointing out persistently bad behaviour is an extreme violation of WP:NPA. Instead of just waving your little forms around for people to look at, why don't you take your head out of your arse and give us a good argument for why Comaze has never been in violation of any wikipedia policies or conventions. HeadleyDown 13:40, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

Persistently? I pointed it out twice. Learn to WP:AGF. I never once said Comaze has never been in violation, instead scroll down. Furthermore, you need to avoid personal attacks yourself. Is this how you great newcomers to an article? How about WP:BITE Swatjester 14:00, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

Summary of recent findings to bring the article forward

Hi Voiceofall. Sure we need to be constructive.

Through discussion, we have some more facts to add. Firstly, the Devilly paper will help clarify things. I will see what we can add there. Sounds like Flavius has his finger on the pulse there. Great stuff!

It is clear that Comaze and co are still bent on removing scientific facts. Therefore, although those facts were well supported throughout mediation, they will require further clarification in the article. Then the fanatics may "get it" (I'm an optimist).

It is clear that certain refs are way down on the hierarchy of researchers out there. Namely, Mathison, Tosey and Malloy, amongst others, which are way down on the list. There are many other far more relevant researchers who could be added. Of course, they tend to stick to science, and will be largely very critical of NLP. Tough! Comaze and co insist on trying to tear the most eminent scientists from the article, so that attitude can be better applied to Mathison, Tosey and Malloy.

I'm sure the article will advance nicely this way. HeadleyDown 14:13, 2 February 2006 (UTC)

Correct, Headley. I might add Comaze has yet to finish his ref format change also. Certainly the Devilly paper is extremely notable. The Comaze problem is not much of a problem for me. I think he's hillarious and I don't spend much time on the miscreant nowadays. But I notice he is still into wasting everybody's time. I think the solution there is simply to disallow any of his warped interests. Namely, remove the said Malloy etc refs. Cheers DaveRight 03:50, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

Yes these are good recommendations. But I know Comaze only too well. I'm afraid he's not interested at all in correcting his crimes. We are going to have to revert all his disgusting nonsense ourselves, and of course don't be too concerned about whether Comaze has something valid or not. Just delete anything that looks like whitewash or unqualified promotion. AliceDeGrey 05:31, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

Change

Comaze : I dont know how all this arbitration or whatever is going on really works or is processing or the process or whatever, but it just might be a good idea if you did not make changes other than grammar without consulting the whole. Ask, talk, convince, and hopefully others will do the same. If they do it without the consent of the whole then they will be the one that everyone will get annoyed with. You are a great editor and I would hate to see you banned or whatever they do to people that are attracting similar flack. jVirus 08:46, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

jVirus. You are pulling my leg. Take a look at Comaze's history, then take a look at the most unrealistically fanatical Hubbardarian zealot on the Scientology article. SNAP! Camridge 08:50, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

I call up on all of the irrisponsible of the world, No whining! jVirus 10:00, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

Yo, I'm not involved in this article, I'm an outside view. You ALL look like you need to back off and stop revert warring. Camridge in particular, I've seen your contribs page and you've clearly violated the 3rr. I'm assuming that Comaze probably did to since your revert war appears to be with him. Maybe it's time you guys all stepped back and let some other editors do it without revert warring hmm? And while at it, review both WP:3RR and WP:AGF. Swatjester 09:46, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

Yup I checked into it. Comaze and Camridge both violate WP:3RR. Furthermore, Camridge, you have violated WP:NPA and WP:AGF probably at least a dozen times today alone. Swatjester 09:59, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

Quite true. What will happen will happen I suppose. jVirus 10:02, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

lol, please, I've lost faith in the admins on this wiki actually blocking anyone with 3RR rule, and even if they do for more than 3 or 4 hours. I've got 2 3RR reports, an RfC, and an RfMediation up, and neither 3RR has gotten an admin response (both on the same person), the RfC isn't getting crap done by any admins even though there's consensus, the RfM was never responded to, and one of my AfD's is constantly being vandalized even thoguh there is clear consensus to delete, and the admins won't go ahead and do anything. Yet, you essentially have to be an editor for 6 months to a year to be an admin or you'll get shot down. Horsepucky I say. Swatjester 10:15, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

I couldn't agree more, Swatjester. But I don't think we need AfD, RfC, ArB in this case. We just need proactive and consistent mediation. If VoA feels up to it, then thats great. If VoA is getting sick of this page, perhaps he should ask another admin to take over the mediation process.--Dejakitty 11:50, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

My whole point in coming here WAS to act as a mediator. See below.

Swatjester! The reason the admins don't block Camridge is due to their being reasonable. Comaze has caused a huge amount of unnecessary work for editors on this article, has acted in bad faith by repeatedly nagging for the same changes to be made when they were resolved through mediation, excess evidence, and consensus, and continues to display the cultlike nature of NLP. Dejakitty is just another of his meatpuppets and has also advocated for removal of eminently supported scientific facts that come to the conclusion that NLP is ineffective and cultlike. I notice you also seem to be siding with Comaze. More fool you! If you wish to support Comaze some more, you will be causing more antagonism for editors who consistently provide accurate facts in good faith, and you will be called names far worse than fool. HeadleyDown 13:35, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

Oh really will I? a) I'm not siding with Comaze. Notice that I point out that he violated 3RR too. Second of all, you're now violating WP:NPA, and threatening me. I'm going to have to ask you to stop.

May we remind you to be civil and to not form personal attacks or edit wars through your or others' comments; doing so will only cause tension and annoyance. (CJ) Swatjester 14:04, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

declaration of purpose: mediation

Let me be blunt here: I'm here to help mediate this topic. I don't give two rats asses about NLP, hell I'd never heard about it until now. I'm here to help mediate your dispute. If we can act civilly, we'll get through this and move on, everybody should be happy, and you continue editing. If both sides choose to continue to personally attack me, or each other, I'm warning you right now, I'll take every action available to me: RfC against each of you, Arbcom, WP:AIV, +protection request, 3RR reports, etc. I don't side with anybody. So far I've seen 3 violators with only minor checking: Comaze, Camridge, and HeadleyDown. I'm more than happy to dig through history here and find every little nugget that ever violated a policy, but that wouldn't be WP:AGF. Show me WHY I should be assuming good faith, and work your problems out here. Swatjester 14:11, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

Furthermore, I advise you all to read the top of this page, where it states "Please follow talk page guideline while posting on this page. No ad-hominem attack on this page please. All messages that deviate from the guideline will be deleted." Swatjester 14:19, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

Swatjester, there was no announcement of your being an official mediator here. How am I to know you are not just an ignorant dickhead NLP zealot who is bent on deleting knowledge from wikipedia! Show your credentials or be ignored. HeadleyDown 17:03, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

Show my credentials? There are no credentials. This is wikipedia, the encyclopedia ANYONE can edit. Anyone is allowed to come in and mediate any dispute. If you choose to accept it, then it's a sign that you're working to improve the article. If you choose to refuse the mediation, it's a further sign that you have no interest in improving the article, only pushing your viewpoint. How do you know I'm not an NLP zealot? look at my contribs on this article: all I've done is grammatical clean up. Am I involved in any other NLP articles? No. See me user page, I tend to only edit for content military and law enforcement pages. I came here after seeing it on the 3rr page. You need to Assume Good Faith, a fundamental policy of wikipedia. Swatjester 17:31, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

OK Swatjester, your cred just about checks out. But I doubt you have the knowledge level of VoiceOfAll. "IF" you are interested in mediating here, you should realise that people come here regularly professing to be wikipedia savvy and uninterested parties, then they turn out to be utter wankers with several NLP certificates and vested interests in promoting their own businesses, cults and religions. They then go on to conduct the most desperately delusional set of NLP "persuasion techniques" in order to somehow magically transform a pseudoscience into a science and trying to fool mediators and arbitrators into believing that piss is wine. Comaze is a long term censor, and as you can see, has just been irritating people for the past few days by repeatedly badgering for deletions that were denied many multiple times during mediation, and by posting harrasment on personal pages. There are some editors here who understand NLP. Not just from reading promotional cult manuals, but also from studying the actual research of the most independent researchers (scientists). So if you really like fluffy and pleasantly sounding ideas, I suggest you disappear. IF you are into hard facts then stick around. The article is just about to get more realistic. HeadleyDown 17:28, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

I could care less about the content of the article. I cuold care less about pseudo science, or facts or anything else. I'm only interested in mediating the dispute. And I'm sticking around. Swatjester 17:32, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

First step

Ok so here's the first step of this. Using the following template, which will show up when you click on edit this section, please state what you feel is the nature of this dispute. Do NOT attack other editors in this... by that I mean say "I feel XXX is pushing POV and deleting stuff he doesn't agree with", not "I feel XXX is an asshole, pushing his retarded POV and deleting whatever truth he doesn't believe in". Each person involved here is welcome to submit a different view of their version of events. If you see one that you already believe in, there will be a section where you can endorse it by signing with ~~~~.

Good start HeadleyDown. I edited your statement, but only to remove the (Stop copying here) and "No wiki" tags, as well as take the date out of the header. Anyone endorsing this view, should sign beneath his statement. Anyone with a different view should come up with their own statement by using the template. Swatjester 20:03, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

Do note that if Swatjester is willing to be a good, impartial, mediator, then we can do this together, I dont mind. I was not blocking due to my role as a mediator. If I was not mediating, people would have been blocked a long time ago. This article may need several mediators.Voice of All 20:27, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

yep, only recently found out you were involved. I'm more than happy to work with other mediators on this, in fact I'm sure I'm going to need to. Swatjester 20:50, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

Looks like we're having some trouble reading here. Lets keep the statements of dispute short please, and limit them only to naming the NATURE of the dispute, not evidence supporting it. What do you think is the problem here? Is it that this user does not show good faith? is it that this other user continuously reverts? what is the actual physical problem, at the lowest level possible? I ask that Comaze, you rewrite your statement to better fit the template's request please? And try to keep it around 4-5 sentences?Swatjester 00:25, 4 February 2006 (UTC)

HeadleyDown's statement of the dispute

(state the dispute here as you see it. Remember, no personal attacks. This section is not for evidence, nor should it need to be more than 4 sentences long. Just state what you think the dispute is over.)

The dispute is the same as always, but the action of the dispute is being used to highlight Comaze's months of fact censorship, slur campaigning on talk pages, and general antagonism. Comaze is not acting in good faith, and any chance he gets he tries to delete (whitewash) sections written by me or others on this discussion page. He also tries to accuse others of personally attacking him. He has been warned by mediators not to post warning or sockpuppet stickers or threats to block on other editors talk pages, yet he continues. Some comments do contain personal attack, but considering the circumstances they are totally understandable, the comments have consistently been directed towards Comze's persistent and daily antiNPOV misdeeds. He has used every surreptitious method possible, including creating extra promotional articles, and altering images irrecoverably. His actions and statements have encouraged many other NLP fans to behave with similar antiNPOV activities. Comaze has caused a huge amount of extra work for editors and mediators here, and he advocated for a ref format change, but expected others to do it for him. We are all waiting for him to finish the job. He decided to antagonize people, make deletions of fact, and continue with his slur campaigning on personal talk pages instead. HeadleyDown 18:06, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

Users endorsing this view, please sign below with ~~~~

flavius's statement of the dispute

Further to Headley's view, the secondary impediment to improving the quality of the article is the regularly rotated gaggle of scientifically illiterate, brainwashed, ignorant cretin wankers (that believe they are super-persuasive) that don't have any familiariry with the cited literature nor an appreciation of its significance that insist on injecting their marginally illiterate, shitful, inspid "pearls" into the article. These are typically one-liners such as, "Bandler says he doesn't do theory", "NLP is a model" etc. The current cast of dead weights includes DejaKitty, Metabubble, 7even, Akulkis and some other tosser that edits anonymously. Although Comaze's behaviour is objectionable I would not include him in this League of (Nihlistic) Morons". I have stated months ago that the disputes regarding this article are non-justiciable, i.e. they cannot be adjudicated upon, and I am being proven correct. I have attempted to elicit reasons from Comaze -- publicly and privately -- in an attempt to yield a justiciable issue. I have found none. Comaze's position is essentially faith-based, he has no substantive resaons for his positions. Comaze's ultimate recourse is simply, "I have found it to be useful" and he appears to believe that this has equal evidentiary value as several dozen (peer-reviewed) research papers and literature reviews. Comaze's position contains an implicit rejection of all of the critical NLP research (and a hypocritical acceptance of favorable research reports). Furthermore, his rejection is justified with (NLP) platitudes and cliches (eg. "NLP has a different epistemology to science", "NLP has it's own criteria of evidence and argumentation") or in a circular question-begging manner ("the research is bad because it is critical of NLP"). There is no way forward with Comaze or with the League of (Nihilistic) Morons. flavius 16:55, 4 February 2006 (UTC)

Users endorsing this view, please sign below with ~~~~

HeadleyDown 17:32, 5 February 2006 (UTC)
BrianH123 19:20, 5 February 2006 (UTC) (I agree with Flavius's standard of evidence for this article as stated above. In particular, "personally found it to be useful" is not good evidence, and "NLP has a different epistemology to science" is nonsensical (or at best a subtle form of circular reasoning). I have no opinion on the rest of Flavius's statement.)
DaveRight 05:13, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

Comaze's statement of the dispute

There is motion to close at arbom so I'll wait until their decision is finalised. Currently I do not have the confidence to contribute to this article. --Comaze 14:19, 4 February 2006 (UTC)

Users endorsing this view, please sign below with ~~~~

minor comment

The following sentence appears to make no sense to me: "Some authors use internal Verbal/Auditory/Kinesthetic strategies in order to categorize people within a thinking strategies or learning styles framework for instance, that there exist visual, kinesthetic or auditory types of manager." --Xyzzyplugh 19:48, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

Yeah it is jacked. jVirus 21:37, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

Read the literature. Hardly any of it makes sense. Bad writing was introduced here at the insistance of NLP zealots and mediators who pushed for that format: Such and such states that: -----------. Normal clear writing usually makes a statement and then has a ref to support it. If you want your ridiculously obscure and lengthy attribution format, then don't fucking complain about how it reads. HeadleyDown 02:33, 4 February 2006 (UTC)

Please, just do something about it Headley jVirus 05:15, 4 February 2006 (UTC)

OK, I advocate the use of clear writing of statements, with references at the end of the line. I also advocate ignoring unreasonable demands of NLP fanatics and mediators. HeadleyDown 06:26, 4 February 2006 (UTC)

The history of this article

Hi new zealots and mediators. If you want to edit/mediate here I suggest you spend about 3 weeks reading the archives first. Basically it goes: NLP idiots don't like the bare facts, so they delete them, and neutrally minded editors restore them. Fanatics demand extra refs, those refs are found, and supplied through library searches, and the fanatics delete regardless. Reversion wars ensue. Mediation takes place at the insistence of NLP fanatics, NLP fanatics do not like mediator's sense of balance, and they beg for a new mediator or for arbitration. NLP fanatics (especially Comaze) become desperate, and try any subterfuge, officious pretence, surreptitious edit, accusation, vexatious litigation, threat in order to try to ban neutrally minded editors, to include whitewash, to censor well supported facts etc. Sometimes it quitens down. So much fact and extra evidence was provided (due to the nagging of NLP fanatics) that the file size was over limits. The article became brevified, and some of that evidence cut.

Now, we seem to have a new mediator, and I guess the process of NLP fanatics demanding extra evidence will rise again (I noticed Comaze's mediation template). So much work has been done here to satisfy mediators and NLP fanatics. Looks like its going round again. No wonder Headley and other neutrally minded editors are so pissed. To put it bluntly: READ THE DAMN ARCHIVES! COMAZE AND OTHER NLP FANATICS CONSISTENTLY (DAILY) ACT AGAINST WIKIPEDIA POLICY. JPLogan 03:04, 4 February 2006 (UTC)

Yes JP. It all is too predictable. I suggest ignoring most of it. It is just a pain. Reduce the overwork by restoring all the extra damning evidence that the moneygrabbing bookburning NLPpromoters asked for. They asked for it. They should get it now. HansAntel 03:49, 4 February 2006 (UTC)

Wow, history repeating. Well, I think your suggestions need acting upon. I kept a lot of those facts, and will restore them in good time. In the meantime, lets remind the mediator what a bunch of weasly cultsucking bullshit merchants the NLP fanatics have been. Mediator! READ THE ARCHIVES! DaveRight 04:19, 4 February 2006 (UTC)

Keep calling names and antagonizing, using vulgarities and pointing fingers. You have learned from history that the squeeky wheel gets the grease so if you squeek loud enough you will finally get what you need! jVirus 05:21, 4 February 2006 (UTC)

Jvirus. Keep making demands, and you will get flack. Either take the time to go to the libraries, look up the facts and make your own adjustments according to fact and NPOV policy, or go away. YOU are causing trouble. I suggest that from now on editors should simply ignore your pointless whinging. Consider yourself flushed down the toilet of poisonous babble. HeadleyDown 06:34, 4 February 2006 (UTC)

Demands? Please help me understand what my demands are. heh. And I try not to "whinge" jVirus 10:54, 4 February 2006 (UTC)

I have just restored some of those uncontroverted facts. The article contains more facts that help to better explain to readers and fanatics the nature of NLP.

Progress

OK now all the newcomers have become more acquainted with what their chores are (so far its mostly been about antagonizing editors and being ignored), I think they can simply get on with mediating instead. In a few weeks, after they have read the archives, they may have something to offer.

In the meantime, there are more facts to restore to the article. We will place them back in as they were, and then start to condense them down a little over time, whilst keeping all the meaningful content and refs.

If Comaze or any other censor wishes to delete any of it, those facts will be enlarged again to their original quote size. If Comaze and co wish to demand answers to questions that have been covered multiple times in the archives then those facts will be enlarged upon and added into the article in order to clarify those facts to the fanatics. Now won't that be fun! HeadleyDown 11:12, 4 February 2006 (UTC)

agreed jVirus 11:19, 4 February 2006 (UTC)

I've read the archives. And I watched as it all unfolded in the first place.

To try to restore information on the basis that there was once consensus is to misrepresent the talk page archives. The edits being restored lately were not agreed to nor was consensus reached. A small clique of editors have been found liberally distributing NLP criticisms throughout the article over the last 6 months (see Arbcom NLP findings of fact #Obsessive and POV editing).

Throughout the NLP archives, there are many editors who have opposed these edits saying they do not meet the minimum standards for reliable sources (again see Arbcom NLP findings of fact #Inadequate sourcing). Consensus has never been reached on these issues. What the NLP archives reveal is that many non-regular editors stated their objection to the tone and content of the article. You'll often find these objections were followed by a pile-on of personal attacks. Most editors simply moved on. The archives are rife with this pattern. Peace. Metta Bubble 12:34, 4 February 2006 (UTC)

Page protection

The page has been protected per mediator request. Place all comments, responses, etc here not on my talk page. KillerChihuahua 12:11, 4 February 2006 (UTC)

Perhaps we can start a practice sub-page (e.g. Neuro-linguistic programming/draft ) to get practice on collaborative writing. When the collaborative process returns normal without edit wars, we can unlock the main page. --Dejakitty 16:04, 4 February 2006 (UTC)

Please cease your general complaints about the behaviors of other editors on this page, and confine your comments in this section to the page protection. Off-topic personal attacks directed at no specific editor are not productive. Off topic personal attacks against specific editors will result in warnings and blockings. Stop the cycle and limit yourself to article-specific productive posts - thanks. KillerChihuahua 13:10, 4 February 2006 (UTC)

How can we open up the page to editing without returning to an edit war? Is there some way to propose edits and have them approved by the mediators or administrator prior to implementation? Maybe this could be done in a structured way that allows other people time to comment? Also, how can we get experience wikipedians involved in this process? --Comaze 14:33, 4 February 2006 (UTC)

That has been done before - mediation in tiny chunks, followed by the edit being placed on the (still protected) page by an Admin. I suggest you work with the current mediator to achieve consensus. The way to avoid edit warring is always the same - talk until consensus is reached before making edits. KillerChihuahua 14:36, 4 February 2006 (UTC)

Fanaticism and the form of discussion here

Please excuse that I use the right to participate in the 💕, as I saw this might not be welcomed here. As a Wikipedian from a non-English speaking country, one of the things I can say is that the form of discussion here resembles many of the discussions in my country and throughout the world. It is always the same story: people try to divide each other into two groups—allies and enemies. The main rule of the discussion is to state in every message that enemies are bloody fanatics, devil worshippers and completely messed up stupid dickheads. About "ourselves" in such discussions it is good to say "oh we've been trying everything, but these fanatics didn't want to listen." Curious thing that usually both sides are working in the same model of dialogue—the model we may call "Put as much trash on your opponent as you can." The most interesting thing, as I see it, happens when an outsider (who's alien to the discussion and is able to look at it without many a bias) comes: for him or her, those who yell about the fanaticism of the other side seem fanatics themselves. The same thing has happened so many times in the history, that it became not interesting to discuss.

Another interesting thing's that when sometimes one side declines to choose the model of "I am the only smartest here" behavior, and works in a civil manner, keeping to the neutrality tone, the other side would claim his actions are fanatical anyway, no matter what real reasons the former had. They just will to interpret his actions this way because according to their tunnel of reality they are doing the best in their interests (that's why in the first comment of mine I asked, Cui bono?). In most cases they believe they are pursuing the truth. You see that's how Lysenkoism happens: when one side keeps only to rational arguments and other side keeps to emotional arguments, for a common third-side person, who's not experienced and not prepared to keep emotions off when it's necessary, the emotional arguments might feel more right, perhaps because emotions compared to reason are philogenetically far more ancient and influence more structures in the organism system. A more experienced person would be able to divide the arguments driven by emotions and the reasonable arguments.

The point I want to make is: please keep your emotions to minimum in your comments. This would happen if you try to avoid

proclamations that your opponent is a fanatic (he may seem fanatic to you and your supporters, of course, but only from your and your supporters' viewpoint)
mind reading, telepathy (i. e. don't interpret the reasons of other's actions because it is the Net, and most things you are able to watch is only RESULTS of actions; e. g. don't say such things as "This guy became desperate", "He wants to avoid evidence" etc)
assumptions on what and who a person is, which cover a personal attack (such as "I honestly don't think you'd recognise a scientific journal if one was being stuffed into your flapping mouthing" or "I suspect that you are a sock-puppet of that half-wit John Smith")
&c

I understand it's probably impossible here, where everybody—no matter what the level of his or her maturity and self-development is—can insert his own word, but I consider it necessary for making a good article or at least a goodwill discussion. In real life, too, if you feel you are right, and you have many friends who feel the same, the little socium you can be considered a part of will massively support your viewpoint, and this will construct a visibility of your own righteousness and unrighteousness of others—that's how it works in real religious cults and with real religious fanatics.

Excuse me for such a long comment, but it could've been much longer. I am not trying to say that one side's right and other is not. However I would like to believe that every one of you does not just push one's own point of view (supporting it with dozens of refs—"we have something for everybody"—or not), but wants to find a compromise because there can be no way to prove that absolute truth is hidden only in your opinion or an opinion of the scientists who support you. I think people have the right to get acquainted with the theory of NLP; and there are many great minds, scientists, and psychologists who use NLP in their practice, and you can't just call all of them freakin fanatics and scientologists only because NLP works well for them. Also I think people have the right to know that other great minds, scientists, and psychologists are opposed to NLP because of research and experimental data (I myself would like to read and consider that kind of information). Thus both sides should be represented in the article, because I think that in the modern world no one should call any one as the Absolute Authority.

Thank you, 7even 13:27, 4 February 2006 (UTC)

What a load of self-important, lumpen blather! "unnel of reality" -- Robert Anton Wilson is a genius isn't he? Do you have a newsletter that we can subscribe to so that we can become as wise and all-knowing as you. I'll burn all of my copies of the Cultic Studies Journal and all of the books I have by acknowledged cult experts like Singer and Lifton. You clearly have all the answers and you're most confident (even though you asserted earlier that there is no absolure truth). You write,"I think people have the right to get acquainted with the theory of NLP; and there are many great minds, scientists, and psychologists who use NLP in their practice, and you can't just call all of them freakin fanatics and scientologists only because NLP works well for them." Who then is interfering with people's right to learn about NLP? The article provides an exposition of NLP drawn from authoritative NLP sources. Can you name some of the "many great minds" and scientists that use NLP? Who cares if "NLP works well for them"?! Treppaning once worked well for the surgeon and patient, blood-letting worked well for George Washington, powdered mummy worked well for its users. Unfortunately human knowledge isn't advanced by treating subjective reports as descriptive of the universe. You understand neither science (its hisory, philosophy, method or results) nor the status of NLP. "Works for me" but can't be demonstrated under controlled conditions to work isn't special, mysterious or outside the scope of science, it's simply placebo, non-specific factors, misattribution and/or post hoc fallacy. Your're profoundly ignorant of basic scientific method and protocol and my implication also of the concept of evidence. There is a consensus of opinion that is becoming consolidated that NLP doesn't work and there is no eveidence that it does work. Further, the progress of linguistics, psychology, neurology, and psychiatry since NLP was formulated has corroded its theoretical basis. NLP has been discredited directly -- through the balance of NLP-specific research data that doesn't support NLPs hypotheses -- and indirectly through the accretion of knowledge in fields that it purports to be based upon. That some people find that NLP "works for them" has been explained many times, most recently by Devilly (2005). This isn't about "feeling right". Remarks like this demonstrate that you don't understand the debate. No-one here -- other than the League -- is going to buy into your (crude) epistemological relativism. If you genuinely believe what you write here then go to the Earth article and edit it to give equal coverage to the "flat earth" and "hollow earth" theories. Surely, people have the right to become acquainted with theories other than the dominant one that the earth is spherical and has a molten rock core. Also go to the Elizabeth_II_of_the_United_Kingdom article and edit it to include David Icke's theory that the Queen of the UK is a reptilean shapeshifter and descends from a reptilian blood-line. Why privilge the notion that she's human, we don't know for certain that she is human and people have the right to become acquainted with all theories about the Queen. We should also give equal weight to L. Ron Hubbard's cosmology -- complete with Crocodiles on Unicycles -- as we do that provided by the likes of Einstein, Hubble, Newton and Hawking. Why not? flavius 18:32, 4 February 2006 (UTC)

I like to read your comments, no jokes. I agree with great many of your theses, with many I disagree; and I appreciate your irony and sarcasm (I like your sense of humor). However I've said what I wanted; and, of course, you are free to interpret my words any way you want. Please pay attention to my message about emotional comments and personal attacks. 7even 19:05, 4 February 2006 (UTC)

Thank you 7even for your input. I agree that there is a lot of room for improvement with regards to our listening skills. I would be grateful if you can make your posting a bit shorter as lots of people feels like they have a lot to say. Thanks --Dejakitty 16:14, 4 February 2006 (UTC)

To Killerchihuahua, I am sorry that you take my message as a form of personal attack. I was just trying to point out behaviour that may disrupt the process rather than attacking any particular editor per se. I think it is important to separate behaviour from people when dealing with these kinds of situation. I hope that you will be able to concentrate on the process rather than get sucked into disputed content. If you think this is still personal attack, please feel free to delete all my posting here. --Dejakitty 15:56, 4 February 2006 (UTC)

I'm not contributing here. I am here as informal mediator adjunct, to monitor, warn, and explain WP:CIVIL, WP:CON, WP:NPA, and any other policy being violated, and to block users if necessary. I did not consider your post a violation of NPA. I did consider it unhelpful commentary on behavior patterns of an unnamed body of editors. KillerChihuahua 18:15, 4 February 2006 (UTC)

you guys are such a tickle ! I thought we were being emotional over in the Dianetics articles ! lol. Terryeo 17:27, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

Wow, where have we come to: a guy that believes in Xenu is amused at our expense. Terry, It's all those body thetans (Damn you Xenu! Damn you! (I'm shaking my fist)). Given that you're a Scientologist and I was taught not to mock the mentally retarded I'll try and leave you alone. I suppose you could hang around to make Comaze look good. The paradox of Dianetics is that all those people that think their parents attempted to abort them with a coat hanger and are attempting to rid themselves of the associated engrams should have been aborted. I propose that there should be no restrictions regarding the termination of Scientologists. In the case of Scientologists their abortion should be permitted ex utero. Have you apologised to Lisa McPherson's family on behalf of your "church"? Has that runt Miscavige apologised to the US public for "Operation Snow White" (and for being a runt). Have you donated to LMT International ? flavius 05:51, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

Flavius, please review WP:NPA. Swatjester 19:12, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

We can edit the NLP (draft) Page

I have retracted my idea of having draft page, given that VoA or other admin will volunteer to do the actual editing while the page is protected.--Dejakitty 01:03, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

Perhaps you should go away. To save yourself the frustration you should exorcise from your mind the hope that the article will be turned into some Kafkaesque puff-piece for the promotion of NLP. flavius 18:46, 4 February 2006 (UTC)

Perhaps you should confine your posts to constructive ones which do no violate WP:CIVIL, flavius. KillerChihuahua 18:50, 4 February 2006 (UTC)

Flavius you know your comment was attacking Dejakitty. You want the article a certain way, she has her own opinions. It is one thing to attack the information, asking for concensus, but attacking a person themselves is often out of desperation and last resort feelings of helplessness. Don't do it, you have a lot of options to get the article to reflect your position/view. jVirus 19:28, 4 February 2006 (UTC)

It would be better not to acknowledge or respond to any unconstructive postings (I am talking in general, I am not attacking anyone here.) either positively or negatively, else you will find yourself sucked into endless futile debate. On the other hand please give more positive support to constructive postings. Thank you. --Dejakitty 20:20, 4 February 2006 (UTC)

I've deleted the above "draft" page because it was created by User:Flavius vanillus to mock other editors and contributed nothing to this debate. Please refrain from making contributions that do nothing to improve the article. I'd also recommend against making any sort of "draft" page at all, even one in good faith. Instead, discuss changes here on the talk page. —Cleared as filed. 20:52, 4 February 2006 (UTC)

Yes, my suggestion is to discuss all changes here on the talk page and then, with the help of a mediator, add those changes to the real article. Writing a draft page together won't provide any "concrete proof" of anything, in my opinion, and will just move the edit war someplace else. As far as I know, there's nothing in Misplaced Pages rules to prevent a draft page, but I don't think it will help solve any problems. —Cleared as filed. 21:14, 4 February 2006 (UTC)

Consensus and some Guidelines

Socks/meatpuppets are a problem here, when it comes to consensus, as it distorts the true consensus. That has been making things difficult. Many editors have edited only NLP articles, and have very similar user pages. We may need more outside opinions.

As I have done recently, personal attacks will be removed. Vague commentary will be removed as well. Edits should be made through admins only, since all else has failed. Vague accuations of POV or simplistic characterizing of everything as a "fact" will not be tolerated either. Accesive associations and other clear NPOV violations should not even be proposed.

Whether NLP is "total fraud" or not, its models, propositions, and criticism must be represented per NPOV. There is enough criticism in this article that we cleary do not need associations with pseudosciences such as Scientology in every paragraph, just because some unheard of practioner also uses them. Intelligent Design is a good article example of a topic that is far more widely rejected by scientists (albeit perhaps as it is more popular and gets more attention), but it does not have things like "ID is quakery nonsense just to endorse christianity (A 19YY)(B 19YY)(C 19YY)(D 19YY)(E 19YY)(F 19YY)(G 19YY)(H 19YY)", as clearly, wording like that has an agenda. The article gets across the point that it is rejected by the mainstream scientific community without having "ID sucks" quotes flooded into the article all over the place. NLP is even less centralized than ID. Due to its high variance, and usage in some reasonable circles (police force, ect...), parts of it likely have some value, and not all of them where studied. Not to mention that it has evolved. Having such a varying disorganized, mainly totally unsupported, models floating all around alots for much confusion about its effectiveness. Overal, one might reasonably say that it is not effective per 1970s/1980s studies, but that does not rule out every aspect. Some people use more classical conditioning like techniques for clients, while ignoring other NLP ideas or "positive/negative energy" Scientology ideas. Others use it in cults in certain European circles.

To concude, we must avoid the use of blanket statements where they can not be used. We must avoid spreading criticism all over every section. We must avoid the excessive use of "NLP sucks" quotes. If a reference is out of context, it should be corrected (and I don't believe that many are). Solid refs that have been unchallenged for months should not be suddenly challenged though. Rebuttals to critics by very minor practioners should not be included, as we don't put in our British Literature profesor's criticism of a novel just because he has a PhD. Notice that Intelligent design avoids such minor critics, as it should, as anyone can dig up some guy that supports them, and through it in as criticism. And remember to avoid origional research, such as "he saw EST lectures, therefore NLP=EST and Scientology". Remember that we have plenty of solid criticism, so personal (WP:OR) critical commentary, beyond being innapproprate per WP:NPOV, is not even needed. That goes for origional research criticism of critism too.Voice of All 21:29, 4 February 2006 (UTC)

Scalpels at the ready

Consensus is not important here, mostly due to the presence of editors who's religion overcomes judgment or recognition of science. Ditching one's religion is necessary to edit in this case. The cold steel of science will be the order of the year on this article. HeadleyDown 17:19, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

resuming mediation

Damn! I go away for 12 hours and everything goes nuts! Ok so just to let everyone know what's up, I've got military training obligations keeping me away today and tomorrow during the day, but I'm here for the evenings. When I return from dinner tonight, we'll begin the first step of the mediation process on the article, which is going to start from the top. So, start thinking in your heads about how you want to present the very first introduction paragraphs on the article. Currently they say this

Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP) is a collection of pseudoscientific self-help rituals proposed for programming the mind (Lilienfeld et al 2003;Raso 1994).

NLP was proposed in 1973 by Richard Bandler and John Grinder as a set of models and principles to describe the relationship between mind (neuro) and language (linguistic, both verbal and non-verbal) and how their interaction might be organized (programming) to affect an individual's mind, body and behavior. It is described by the original developers as "therapeutic magic" and "the study of the structure of subjective experience" . It is predicated upon the assumption that all behaviors have a practically determinable structure .

NLP is based on New Age principles such as the belief in unlimited potential through access to subconscious engrams , and body language cues derived from the observation of “therapeutic wizards” . Some techniques include behavior change, transforming beliefs, and treatment of traumas through techniques such as reframing and the "meta-modeling" proposed for exploring the personal limits of belief as expressed in language.

The practice initially attracted mostly therapists, although it eventually attracted business and sales people, and New Age believers . NLP has been applied to a number of fields such as sales, psychotherapy, communication, education, coaching, sport, business management, interpersonal relationships, seduction, occult and spirituality.

NLP has been criticized in scientific research reviews which conclude that it is scientifically unsupported and largely ineffective . Several reviews have concluded that NLP is merely pseudoscientific mass-marketed psychobabble. NLP is identified as a dubious therapy and described by experts such as Winkin, and the US-based NGO National Council Against Health Fraud as charlatanry and fraudulent and is promoted in the same mold as Dianetics and Scientology.

So, start looking at how you want to revise that if at all. I'm coming back in about 3 hours, and will remain here tonight to listen to the rest of your responses. Swatjester 23:44, 4 February 2006 (UTC)

I want to see the current intro shortened, the removal of the "Dianetics and Scientology references", the removal of false claim like belief in "unlimited potential":

Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP) was originally developed between in 1973-1979 by Richard Bandler and John Grinder as an approach to modeling the behavioral patterns of successful psychotherapists, Virginia Satir, Milton H. Erickson and Fritz Perls. Advocates claim that this approach to the study of human patterning can be applied to any field, and that derivatives have been applied to psychotherapy, business management, sales training, interpersonal, and spiritual contexts.

The methodology and application has been been criticized for lacking substantiative evidence, exaggerated claims, etc.

(can someone else finish this for me -- I'm out of time)... --Comaze 00:37, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

Consider your throat cut. Your request is badgering. Nothing more. Refer to the archives. Dianetics and Scientology will become more than a cursory mention. You obviously don't get it, therefore, it will be enlarged upon with explanation. HeadleyDown 17:26, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

Swatjester, Comaze thanks for volunteering. This talk page is full. Would it be helpful to make a page with a list of proposed changes (Neuro-linguistic programming(RequestforEdits)) for people to comment on and vote for. I think that we will have to rely on admin's good will to make update edits of approved changes, something like once every 1-2 month? Looks like VoA is getting on the right track. So I don't think you need my further unsolicited intrusion. Goodbye --Dejakitty 00:51, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

I like the way this is going, it leaves plenty of room for criticism and makes a great intro flow. Starting with explicit background. I think we should extend it. As an edit, I am wondering, as in the first sentence NLP being was not so much developed as an approach to modeling but was the result of modeling. They modeled VS, ME,and FP and as a result formed explicit patterns for which the term NLP was applied to represent. I wish I was more versed and fluent with this. I might state it closer to:

Neuro-Linguistic Programming or NLP was originally developed between 1973-1979 by Richard Bandler and John Grinder. Modeling the behavioral patterns of successful psychotherapists such as, Virginia Satir, Milton H. Erickson and Fritz Perls, Bandler and Grinder developed a series of explicit patterns...<someone maybe could continue this>

I wish I had more to add, I am just not fluent enough. jVirus 03:47, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

If I could make a stylistic point jVirus...once you've referred to a person by their full name, you need not use it again unless there is someone with the same name. So since you've already fully identified Richard Bandler and John Grinder, the second time you mention them you need only say "Bandler and Grinder"... Swatjester 03:49, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

Good point. It looked dumb, I just didn't know how to fix it heh. jVirus 03:53, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

Re: Dejakitty's suggestion up above, no new page is needed for this discussion. The talk page is where people expect to find it, and it will do just fine. Perhaps if one of the mediators thinks it is worthwhile, some of the above discussion can be archived so this talk page isn't quite as long. —Cleared as filed. 05:20, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

I'd like to see references to New Age removed from the intro. New Age is an obscure term that post-dates the creation of NLP (according to the New Age article). Unlimited Potential is also an obscure term. It is unsure what exactly the sentence about unlimited potential, new age and engrams is meant to be trying to say. If the comment is meant to be critical of NLP, save it for a specific criticism context or be more open about what exactly the criticism is. Engram is an obscurely used NLP concept, if at all. It should be on thin ice for the entire article, let alone the intro. New Age belongs in the body of the article when refering to the history of the founders and their friends. Peace. Metta Bubble 06:25, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

New Age is not an obscure term and as a movement it emerged at the time NLP was created, i.e. the early 1970s. The phrase 'unlimited potential' derives from the Human Potential movement which is another trend that was coincident with the emergence of NLP. NLP is an off-shoot of these two social trends, i.e. New Age and Human Potential. I'm not the originator of the remark in the article but I take it that its neither supposed be critical or laudatory but just descrirptive. Something should be said about the zeitgeist from which NLP emerged, that is consistent with encyclopedic standards. I don't have a string opinion on the ngram issue. In the English-speaking world the word is rarely used in NLP seminars and literature but it is used in Europe and Asia. In the interests of avoiding being parochial this should be taken into consideration before removing all references to engram. flavius 10:36, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

Hi Flavius. I stand by my request. New Age is defined as obscure on the New Age page here at wikipedia. It also says the term gained popular use in the 80's. The term unlimited potential doesn't even appear on the page. I have no huge problem with your following statements except that the things we are discussing are so obscure they don't belong in the intro. Peace. Metta Bubble 08:47, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

Indeed, New Age needs expanding in the article in relation to NLP. Metabubble has asked for its removal before. Nothing new was added to arguments that have been presented in the archives multiple times. That is badgering and antagonistic. For the sake of keeping a steely peace, request is ignored. HeadleyDown 17:26, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

Metabubble, reading the Misplaced Pages article on New Age hardly counts as research for editing another article. If all editors did what you just did Misplaced Pages would slowly degrade as falsehoods are spread to other articles. For a start consider

"The New Age movement--a lush jungle of exotic spirituality, lifestyle preferences, metaphysical preoccupations, and voguish superstitions--is in many respects a codifying of what in the late 1960s and up through most of the 1970s was called "alternative" culture. When the radicalism and bohemianism of the 1960s decanted into the pop psychotherapies and religious cultism of the 1970s, the result came to be called the Human Potential movement. When the human potential gurus stirred into the mixture a fragrant broth of traditional occultism, old-fashioned American transcendentalism, parapsychology, and utopian one-worldism, it was termed New Age." (Carl A. Raschke, "8 New Age Spirituality," Spirituality and the Secular Quest, ed. Peter H. Van Ness (New York: Crossroad Publishing, 1996) p. 207).

I'll provide more shortly. I'm beginning to doubt your sincerity you've yet to demonstrate that you are acting in good faith by actually researching anything that you wish to force upon us. flavius 18:43, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

Also, discussing Margaret Mead, Gardner writes:

"In 1978, knowing she was dying of cancer, Mead began seeing daily a Chilean psychic healer in New York who called herself the "Reverend Carmen diBarazza." The Star, a sleazy competitor of the National Enquirer, headlined an October 31, 1978, story: "Famed Scientist Calls Faith Healer to Bedside in Bid to Beat Cancer." Mead had been introduced to Carmen by her good friends Robert L. Schwartz and Jean Houston. Schwartz heads the Tarrytown Group, in Tarrytown, New York, a forum that sponsors workshops and a newsletter stressing all aspects of the "New Age" movement--holistic medicine, parapsychology, psychic phenomena, and so on. Schwartz and Mead cofounded the group. A promotional leaflet sent to me a few years ago begins: "This is your invitation to join a worldwide bunch of cranks and crazies. . . . It is your opportunity to network with some of the most irreverent thinkers on earth. . . ." (Martin Gardner, The New Age: Notes of a Fringe Watcher (Buffalo, NY: Prometheus Books, 1991)) Incidentally, Gregory Bateson -- the intellectual father of NLP -- was Margaret Meads husband. flavius 18:57, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

Also,

"In comparison to New Thought, the New Age movement is a relatively new phenomenon. It developed in the late 1960s and emerged as a selfconscious movement in the early 1970s. As a movement, it both absorbed New Thought themes and reached out to New Thought groups with its message, but drew most of its inspiration from Theosophy and Spiritualism, and, to a lesser extent, the Eastern religions. It arose, not so much as a new religion, but as a new revivalist religious impulse directed toward the esoteric/metaphysical/Eastern groups and to the mystical strain in all religions." (James R. Lewis, and J. Gordon Melton, eds., Perspectives on the New Age / (Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 1992) 18) flavius 19:05, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

Also, see Chapter 5 of Steven J. Sutcliffe, Children of the New Age: A History of Alternative Spirituality (London: Routledge, 2002). The early 80s were the culmination of the New Age social trend which commenced in the early 1970. Regarding the phrase "New Age" Sutcliffe writes, "How prominent is the expression 'New Age'? Briefly, not very. Usage is comparatively rare. Certainly Muz Murray, in his seminal alternative magazine Gandalf's Garden, based in London, had proclaimed in 1968 that a 'long awaited Dawn of Consciousness' was finally 'glimmering in the minds of New Age Man-to-Come'. 7 And the cognate form 'Aquarian' turns up in the chorus of Hair-'This is the dawning of the Age of Aquarius!'-and in advertisements for the 1969 Woodstock music festival in New York state. But evidence elsewhere is pretty thin. The Aquarian Guide to Occult, Mystical, Religious, Magical London and around lists just two explicitly 'New Age' bodies (Strachan 1970:120-1)". (Sutcliffe 109). The phrase did not come into popular usage until the 1980s but it was used as early as 1968. You are definitely wrong. flavius 19:24, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

flavius 19:24, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

Mettabubble. I repeat my request for you to be blocked. You are badgering and attempting to cause conflict. If you came to this article 12 months ago you would come to the conclusion that NLP is "the difference that makes the difference". Go and do some proper research on the new age, and fix the new age article. Refrain from your badgering on this article and do not come back until you have written in detail about the actual nature of the new age on the wikipedia new age article. Alternatively do not edit at all on wikipedia until you develop a respect for facts. HeadleyDown 12:12, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

NCAHF Removal

I'd like references to the National Council Against Health Fraud removed from the article entirely (see ; ). This group -- along with Quackwatch -- is widely known to knock ALL CAM therapies, including Chiropractic, Herbal Remedies, Organice Food, Vitamin pills, Yoga, and Meditation. That they also knock NLP is no surprise. To have the NCAHF prominent in this article is tantamount to suggesting it should be prominent in every single CAM article on wikipedia -- when in fact, it isn't even mentioned on other CAM pages. If we can find a better consumer advocate than the NCAHF I'm open to discussion on it, but considering the World Health Organisation and various articles on Medline condone NLP, it would be hard to find a source that takes precedent. Peace. Metta Bubble 06:25, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

This matter has already been dealt with please, consult the archives. It was decided that there is sufficient reason to preserve the NCAHF (see the archives for the reasons). In the interests of progressing the article (and not presenting as an obstructive miscreant) can you consult the archived discussions before making recommendations? flavius 10:54, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

Hi Flavius. I stand by my request and I don't concur with your summary of archived discussion. I'd like you to state a countercase in summary form, if there is one. Peace. Metta Bubble 08:44, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

Your link to WHO doesn't show that WHO "condones" NLP; it just shows that someone who wrote an article for one of their newsletters is an NLPer. Your link to Medline doesn't show anything at all; it just pulls up a search page. (Please cite specific studies if you think they're relevant.) The fact that an organization criticizes multiple CAM therapies doesn't prove that that organization is unscientific, and the fact that NCAHF is not mentioned in other Misplaced Pages articles is irrelevant. Some information that is of value in your post is the link to the court decision that NCAHF lost (about homeopathy), but from reading the decision, the reasons seems to be that: (a) NCAHF tried to shift the burden of proof to the defendants, and the court rejected that strategy; and (b) Congress had explicitly allowed homeopathic claims. In short NCAHF's lawyers lost a case against homoeopathy for legalistic reasons, not based on the merit of homeopathy itself. That's interesting information, but irrelevant to whether they're biased against NLP.
But if you want another health organization to cite, how about the American Cancer Society?

— BrianH123 22:48, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

Again I request for Metabbubble to be blocked from this discussion. Mettabubble, you are saying all the right stuff for irritating the editors here. It is not Flavius' fault that there is no magic search function for the archives. There is an overwhelmingly compelling reason for the NCAHF to be included, and it relates in part to the zealously litigous nature of cults and pseudoscience promoters. This has been covered in depth, and Metabbubble is indeed trying to pull the wool, repeat nag, and screw as much out of the new mediator/s as possible. I repeat my request for the blocking of Mettabubble. HeadleyDown 12:22, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

Indeed, Metabubble is badgering in the same way that other "editors with vested interests in NLP" have persistently done. Request for metabubble to be blocked. HeadleyDown 17:27, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

Scientology & Dianetics Removal

I'd like to see references to Dianetics and Scientology removed from the article entirely. This all covered by New Age. Connections to dianetics and scientology are no more and no less relevant than Bandlers connection with computing mathematics and Grinders connection with Rock-climbing -- two topics which are never mentioned in the article. This seems like selective inclusion of the founders connections in an attempt at guilt by association. There's plenty of ammo to knock the founders without resorting to GBA. Peace. Metta Bubble 06:35, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

Bandler has absolutely no connection with "computing mathematics". I tire of repeating this but he's spread so much disinformation about himself that his lies have gained the status of the truth. I have gone to much trouble to confirm Bandler's educational background and crednetials. Bandler has a BA in psychology and philosophy and an MA in theoretical psychology. The college that he studied at (Kresge) never taught mathematics or computing and still doesn't. Bandler has no work experience or credentials in mathematics or computing. He in fact has no work experince outside of NLP training, authoring and psychotherapy. Please, I don't want to hear anything about Bandler and maths and computing again. Please. Grinder knows more math than Bandler. Grinder once taught a unit in formal languages at Kresge. But anyway that's besides the point, I understand what you are contending regarding Scientology and Dianetics but I don't agree with you that its all incidental or an attempt at GBA. From a history of ideas stance or social trends stance the NLP/Dianetics connections are relevant. NLP was one of many regressive, imprint (or engram) based therapies (eg. Primal Scream) that emerged at the time. This category of psychotherapies were influenced by Dianetics, commercially they were influenced by the success of the CoS and EST. It is interesting from merely a sociological and historical perspective and should be included on that basis. flavius 10:54, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

I have to say I really appreciate your position Flavius. I think if you feel that refrences to New Age, Scientology, Dianetics, Zeitgeist and others are extremely important. There are several users here that have much interrest in having a "best as possible" representation of Neural-Linguistic Programming, I think yourself included. One thing that is very important to you, so I seem to understand, is that this article does not slip one bit in its communication reguarding the critical opinions and facts reguarding this topic. This is where you are really going to be able to add to the article in a very sharp way that others may not. I am even thinking there just might need to be a seperate article, well written by someone with interrest "Super Greatly" expounding the critisisms of NLP. Maybe a "Neuro-Linguistic Programming Criticism" Page. I sure know there is so, so much criticism to be accounted for, it might be important to have such a refrence on Misplaced Pages. One main import of the NLP article being readability, to not detract from the fluidity of the article, the great abundance of criticism just might have to be expanded yet to this and another article. Does this make sense? What do you think? I dunno. heh. jVirus 11:27, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

No it does not make sense. Stop wasting editor's time. Read the archives and aquaint your self with science. HeadleyDown 17:31, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

I'd like to see some quotes from the founders in the intro so that readers get a feel for where these two were coming from. Perhaps something like:

"Physics changes, but reality stays the same"
"Remember, there’s only two things in the universe. You either put things together or you take things apart."

I think these convey the founders attitude to science in a fairly neutral way and also capture something of the personality of NLP. This would be useful for setting the tone of the article. I am sure someone could suggest more appropriate quotes. Peace. Metta Bubble 06:42, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

Neither Bandler or Grinder are scientists (Grinder stopped doing linguistics 30 years ago) so what is the relevance of their view of science? In any event neither has a cogent position on science. A banal quote doesn't constitute a statement of their position on science. The aim of an encyclopedia is to educate not to indulge the ignorance of some of its readers. A trite quote doesn't magically negate the relevance of science and the article should not contain any innuendo that such is the case. Neither Bandler or Grinder have ever said anything significant (and hence quotable) about science. The personality of NLP is anachronistic -- it emerged from a zeitgeist which has long since ceased to exist. Bandler is wrestling with phantoms -- he still seems to think that Freudian psychoanalysis is the dominant paradigmm in psychology and psychiatry. Grinder is stuck on TG even though liguistics has long since abandoned it. The "personality" of NLP is like that of a an old, superstitious, insular and narcissistic used-car salesman. flavius 11:13, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

Good grief! Mettabubble has badgered for Dianetics etc to be removed before, and other NLP promoters have done the same throughout the archives. I shall repeat some for the sake of the present newbie mediators. NLP has been clearly compared to Scientology/Dianetics in the research for many reasons. Dianetics and NLP are: Ineffective, pseudoscientific in theory, results and excuses. They both use the same occult based principles (eg reality is not real Korzybsky etc), they have proponents in common (eg Perls), they are based heavily on hypnotism or command suggestion, they are thought to be religions or quasi-religions, they encourage dissociative delusions for “treatment”, they derive their beliefs from new age notions of superhuman potential and beliefs such as reincarnation, they often use hypnotic regression and past life regression, they refer to pseudoscientific principles (long since debunked by science), they actively encourage occult notions of magic, they both make liberal use of outlandish stories for indoctrination and retention of recruits, and they suggest that people require re-programming through some kind of mental clearing process, they both use the 90% or 99% mind potential myth, and they both pay homage to misleading left/right brain myths. They also both have the same marketing strategies. In the interests of punishing those who conflictingly nag for the simple reason that they think they can get away with conning the new mediators, I request that Mettabubble be blocked from editing or commenting on this discusion page. Camridge 06:29, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

"New Age" Intro Removal

Metta Bubble : I really like your suggestion to remove the Term "New Age" from the Intro. I think it might be more clear if we set up a structure for the article. If we chose to make the Intro closer to very basic simple purpose and things as described by the original co-founders, I think the intro itself will be quite hammered down solid? Perhaps we could then have a body describing some of the things in the intro, followed by a conclusion. And whatever. This being the basic form of our article. What do you think? This also means Flavius that in the intro, however long the intro may be, toward the end of the intro we would have a nice criticism paragraph about the same size as one of the intro paragraphs, or whatever is rationally needed. Those criticisms could then be expounded in the body in a order, similar to the other expoundings from the intro. Is this favorable or what might be your concerns if any? This means actually that in the intro critisim part you could if it is agreeable to everyone say something like "NLP is criticised as being of the New Age, Pseudoscientific, having little or no effect as to it's claims" or whatever is needed. Then we could expound on the intro criticism area in similar order in the body. The body being a reflection of the Intro if it might be. What do you think ppl? jVirus 11:00, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

The article shouldn't be an advertisement for NLP -- either in its parts or as a whole. You can't arbitarily ignore all of the science regarding NLP. NLP isn't some new and as yet untested type of psychology and it shouldn't be presented as if it is. NLP has been tested many times in its many aspects during these 30 years. To pre-empt the predictable responses, all scientific knowledge is tentative, it is always open to revision. However, that scientific theory or law which has a consensus amongst scientists (after the application of all the usual protocols and standards) is the best description and/or explanation that we have of a natural phenomenon -- for all practical purposes it is the Truth (or more precisely our best approximation of it). The history and results of science demonstrate -- just as Korzybski contended -- that the scientific method is the very best method for discovering things about the universe and scientific knowledge is the most accurate knowledge (we have) regarding the universe. Thus, if there is a consensus amongst scientists regarding the invalidity and ineffectiveness of NLP and there is a scientific explanation for its apparent efficacy then that is our knowledge regarding the matter. NLP has not advanced some devastating critique of scientific method such that 400 years of inductive proof of the efficacy and efficiency of scientific method is negated. NLP has been tested according to the same standards and protocols that we test drugs, surgical procedures, conventional psychotherapies, construction materials, paints, adhesives, pesticides etc. and it has failed, miserably. The tests have been repeated sufficient number of times such that we can be confident of them. There is nothing peculiar about NLP such that it can't be tested using the scientific method: either NLP works better than placebo in treating anxiety/depression/phobia or it doesn't; either NLP language patterns make one more persuasive than no technique or they don't; either your eyes move upwards when you make pictures in your head or they don't. The point is that what science says about NLP is the highest quality information we have about NLP. This isn't a matter of aesthetics or of faith thus science and the scientific method are entirely relevant. The article should state in the article intro what the scientific position is. Until a better method of learning about the universe than science comes along this is how it will have to be. jVirus, 7even, Metta bubble, Comaze, and DejaKitty you all need to learn something of the methods and history of science and of the concept of evidence. This will go a long way towards reducing the conflicts regarding this article. flavius 11:58, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

Flavius I am sorry. My intention has not been to "advertise Neuro-Linguistic Programming". Thanks for pointing that out. If you ever see me making an advertisement please point out the exact string of words for me. This I do not want to be accused of. Aparently you also feel I communicated my desire "ignore all of the science reguarding NLP". Once again I am very sorry I have communicated this to you. If I ever do give you the impression that I want to ignore all science reguarding anything, I really need you to point that string out, describing to me. Not my intention again. Sorry if I gave you either impression. I misscommunicated. jVirus 20:37, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

JVirus. Read the archives. Your request is actually antagonistic. This has been dealt with in depth. I will repeat some of it for the sake of those who cannot be bothered to do a bit of reading. New age is stated in the scientific literature as a category for NLP. New age is one category that NLP promoters use to promote their "product". NLP is advertised within and among the new age sections of magazines, catalogues, and bookshops. New age is technically correct, and placing the term new age in the opening line of the article will give the reader a very useful set of concepts to understand NLP as professional researchers understand NLP. The new age term is useful and should get more of a mention in the article for the sake of clarity and brevity. The same goes for the useful clarifying comparisons Dianetics, Scientology (because those are closely similar and have been around longer), and terms such as ritual, and occult. DaveRight 04:58, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

Since you placed your comment in order as responding to the comment directly above it, ie. "Flavius I am sorry." I am assuming you mean that my request for Flavius to point out my exact string of words when he sees me advertising, or other, is antagonistic? Or are you not really replying to my statement just above yours? jVirus 08:48, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

Removal of information

The following was removed:

"Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP) is a collection of self-help recommendations, promoted through the popular psychology, self development, and New Age sections of bookshops, and advertised in various media including the Internet and infomercials."

This is possibly the only factual statement that is known about NLP. I am not here to argue for its inclusion, I just want to know the reason for its removal. Bensaccount 16:11, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

NLP is not just self-help, altough that is what it mainly is. I would reword to:

"Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP) is a collection of recommendations and models, often promoted in the form of self-help literature through the popular psychology and self development sections of bookshops, and advertised in various media including the Internet and infomercials."

That would be more accurate. We should try to reword as opposed to just deleting. I will add that in if no one objects.Voice of All 16:32, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

The procedure we are finding useful in resolving a somewhat similar difficulty in another subject is to specifiy how the editors wish to treat the information which makes up the subject. Pseudoscience WP:NPOV#Pseudoscience, Single source original research, multiple sources publishing original research, contradictory, theory WP:NOR#How_to_deal_with_Wikipedia_entries_about_theories, or otherwise. These are catagories of how the public views the subject, the body of information which composes the subject. We've found this approach of getting editor agreement in this area to be useful at Talk:Dianetics. Terryeo 17:37, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

This is definatly accurate. No facts biased. The description of NLP being so varied, this is quite possibly among the few descriptions common to the experience of the present masses. If the masses want a basic factual description to hit upon first when reading this is a great start. Objections : Me, I am in more favorable response to a more historical description intro from the first NLP literature similar to the one I inserted, modified from Comaze, followed by such a common experience description as we are considering. A historical type description from it's co-founders being virtually a neutral opening, having no judgements. You definatly have more exp. editing wiki's VOA, what do you think about what I have said? jVirus 20:28, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

Can you post your intro idea up here so I can see it? Thanks.Voice of All 20:39, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

intro thought

Neuro-Linguistic Programming or NLP, originally created by Richard Bandler and John Grinder (19XX-19XX), modeled the behavior of successful therapists, Virginia Satir, Milton H. Erickson and Fritz Perls, developing a series of explicit patterns designed to produce rapid change for the client in therapy.

The last 5 words are very weak. They need to gel in my brain for a bit. jVirus 21:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

Stating it as their intention to model would be more NPOV. Then to cut it into two sentences so the second one can be more open to clarification. My understanding of current wikipedia mediation guidelines is that mediators shouldn't be making edit recommendations. I think the process here would be beautifully improved if we followed mediation guidelines. What section of a bookshop promotes what topic doesn't appear at all relevent to an encyclopedia to me. Should we scour the bookshop sections and update all our articles at wikipedia? Peace. Metta Bubble 11:44, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

I disagree. Stating it as their "intention" is POV. All we know is that is what their CLAIM is. Most of the scientific literature deals with the CLAIMS of NLP proponents and the term CLAIM is stated in the literature. These are tested and have found to be false. The statement will only be encyclopedic from this scientific perspective. We have dealt with this many times, and the evidence is clearly presented in the article. No excuses. Block MettaBubble from making such antagonistic and useless suggestions that misleadingly portray all NLP promoters as having perfect intentions. HeadleyDown 12:31, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

I agree with Headley. How would you know what their intention was? Even if B&G told you personally told you what their intention was it would still be no reason to accept it as their true intention without some sort of evidence. In any event, their intent is relevant. All that matters is what they claimed to be doing. flavius 18:09, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

I think I am going to continue on with first my understanding of the positions of all the users herebefore I continue thinking about the intro,however I am curious, HeadleyDown & Flavius, do your reflected positions above about the intention stuff, mean that as I stated intro relative to Metta Bubble's words my statement is better than his suggestion to change it?

What the intro should contain

I'm withdrawing the part of my earlier proposal where we have separate Pro and Con sub-sections, because it's not supported by some of the principal editors on this article, and I'm having seconds thoughts about that myself.

What remains of my proposal is what the Intro should contain. Here are my thoughts, and then I'm preserving only those comments that have to do with the Intro part. (If deleted anything you want to keep, I apologize -- please add it back, in a separate section if it dosn't have to do with the Intro per se.)

Guidelines for the Intro:

It should be relatively short and completely neutral with regard to Pro or Con characterizations.

It should avoid vague words that don't really say what NLP is but make it sound sexy.

It should avoid criticisms such as "New Age," "pseudoscience", etc. These claims can be made later (where they will be more effective anyway once elaborated upon. For example, explain what pseudoscience is, and explain in detail why NLP is pseudoscience, if you believe it is. This kind of detail cannot be done in the intro, but without it, "pseudoscience" is just a missile word.).

Avoid descriptions of NLP as "techniques practiced by successful psychotherapists". "Successful" is vague and subjective, and this doesn't tell what NLP is anyway. It just states the writer's opinion of some who have practiced it.

We might start off with something like this, which I believe is neutral:

NLP, which stands for "Neuro-Linguistic Programming", is a self-improvement training program which purports to teach people how to speak directly to ("program") the unconscious mind, both of themselves and others, using particular "linquistic patterns". It was founded in 1973 by Richard Bandler and John Grinder.

Leave your comments below.

-- BrianH123 21:12, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

Support. I support the broad thrust of your approach. I don't want to see any of the NLP cliches in the introduction. Whether Fritz Perls, Virginia Satir and Milton Erikson were "successful" or "excellent" therapists is neither generally agreed upon nor self-evident. flavius 03:47, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

Support. I also support this broad approach. My apologies when using the term "successful" and the like. I was hoping to give the historical description by B&G rather than my opinion. This I could see how it would be taken by the casual reader as described by the article not a subjective description by its originators. jVirus 23:05, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

Stabilize the discussion page

The only stabilization required is on the discussion page, because that is where the problems are. Repeat (daily) badgering questions, and requests for censorship and pseudoscience to gain priority over science have destabilized the discussion and caused a lot of conflict and extra work. With a mentor for Comaze and others with a similar agenda, the discussion will likely improve. HeadleyDown 03:30, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

I agree, Headley. The only reason for mediation is to keep the miscreants in order on the discussion page and on personal talk pages. Mediators have already made statements that they don't care about the difference between science and pseudoscience, so they should be kept out of it. DaveRight 05:07, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

Progress

Good, looks like we're making good progress here. I'm going to step back for a little bit and watch as you guys decide on the information. I'll still be here watching. Swatjester

Yeah I am excited. jVirus 08:41, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

Headly

Headly, please stop trying to dominate this talk page. Your last several edits have been demanding and confrontational, and ignoring users with differing opinions does nothing to help the further development of this page. Please try to edit constructively and join this mediation, for the good of the article. Swatjester 01:44, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

I will not dominate. Science WILL. HeadleyDown 02:47, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

Swatjester, this isn't a matter of aesthetics, we're not arguing about the "greatest band in the world". NLP makes specific claims about learning, memory, cognition, mental illness and neurology. These aren't unclaimed subject domains that are up for grabs. Scientific method is the best method that we have for learning about the universe and its inhabitants and scientific knowledge is the most accurate knowledge we have about the universe and its inhabitants (with regards to non-religious and non-ethical concerns). Until science is displaced by NLP as the means for investigating reality then the scientific view should prevail. This is non-negotiable. NLP is not peer of science and whereas science has a well-established method of inquiry, NLPs is entirely conjectural and because of the invalidity of the techniques it has generated most likely flawed. We're not going to be served a plate of shit and told its a delicious chicken dinner. flavius 04:13, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

I'm not getting into the specifics of NLP, because I don't know, and I don't care. But we have to conform with NPOV, and right now it's not happening. Domination of this article will lead only to revert wars like the one that got this page locked. This is what we're trying to avoid here. Instead of being defensive, we need to be constructive and reach a compromise here. Swatjester 04:31, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

Oi mate! Swatjester I don't believe you have been here long enough to know. Headley is not dictating. He has consistently been the most cooperative, constructive, anti-propaganda editor on this article. He seems to be enforcing the "spirit" of NPOV policy better than you. The nonpromotional editors are constructive and cooperative. Now we have gained your attention, I think it is time to continue improving the article from its already advanced form - With NLP fanatics under a tighter state of apprehension. DaveRight 04:42, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

He's alreay been blocked once for personal attacks on this article. That's hardly cooperation and constructive approach.Swatjester 15:17, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

Ok Swatjester, what is this? You against me? Who should mediate now? HeadleyDown 16:33, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

Not at all. I'm just trying to facilitate the article. Swatjester 16:39, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

Swatjester, NPOV conformity doesn't entail passing bullshit off as fact and privileging pseudocience such that it speaks as loud as science in the article. If it did then the half of the Earth article would be devoted to flat-earth theory. flavius 05:21, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

The problem here is that two different sides believe two different things. You believe from your POV that NLP is bullshit. The other side believes that it's an actual science. NPOV would show that you need to submit both sides' POV's. You, DaveRight, Headly, and Flavius apparently seem to be only wanting to show your POV of the article. It may be correct, I don't know, and it doesn't matter. The article needs to show ALL SIGNIFICANT POINTS OF VIEW. Thus far I've identified two: Your side's (it's not science) and the other side's (it is science). Therefore both need to be included. What we are supposed to be doing here is trying to find a way to balance it out so that each side is satisfied with the result. Swatjester 15:17, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

No Swatjester. The terms some of the the eminent scientists use regarding NLP are eg - pseudoscience, psychobabble, psychopablum, banal, trite, infantile, highly dubious, extremely questionable, devious, and the kind of language that the scientists use are eg - "NLP proponents such as Robert Dilts are now seriously modeling the strategies of Jesus Christ and Sherlock Holmes and selling books about it; God help us! (Singer 1999)". Notice the term BULLSHIT is not used in the article. However, for explanatory purposes, although the term BULLSHIT may be quite inappropriate for encyclopedias, it will one of the words in the mental model of experts, and therefore should be conveyed somehow to the reader. HeadleyDown 16:29, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

Swatjester, you appear to be well-meaning so I'll strive to be patient with you. You write, "The problem here is that two different sides believe two different things". That isn't the problem. Some people believe the most unexpected of things: the second Gulf War never occurred, 911 was the work of the US government, 911 was the work of Israeli Intelligence, there have been no lunar landings, the earth is flat, the UK Royal Family are reptilean shapeshifters, we have been inflitrated by space aliens etc. If you search you will find at least one person that contests some widely held view. Simply because a person can adopt a psoition on a matter doesn't magically legitimise that position. The critical notion that is missing from your understanding of the dispute is evidence. In the absence of evidence a belief -- on non-religious and non-aesthetic matters -- is conjecture and speculation. It is possible to generate an infinite number of conjectures and speculations because we have imaginations. We determine fact and truth by reference to evidence. In this conext what we believe is entirely irrelevant. What matters is what we can prove. Given that we have imaginations and we are fallible we can believe anything. However, we can't prove anything. Proof requires evidence and/or argumentation. Regardless of what NLP proponents or critics believe -- it's irrelevant anyway -- there is no evidence that NLP works and it is inconsistent with established theory. You write, "You believe from your POV that NLP is bullshit. The other side believes that it's an actual science." Beliefs regarding NLP are -- in this instance -- irrelevant. What matters is what can be demonstrated to be true, i.e. what can be proved. You are making a "category mistake". You are reasoning about matters that are resolvable with reference to evidence as if they were religious or aesthetic concerns. There is no evidence based method for determining the "One True Faith" nor is there a an evidence-based method for determing "The Best" ice cream flavour. Whether NLP works or not or whether it is theoretically sound is not a faith issue nor is it a subjective preference. It is an empirical matter. NLP has been rigourously tested and its theoretical basis has been reviewed and the conclusions are not supportive. At this point the only available means of resisting the scientific evidence and evaluation are metaphysical and epistemological. A number of options are available in this regard but I'll describe only the polar extremes. The NLPer can appeal to a form of radical epistemological relativism, i.e. there is no such thing as objective knowledge and optionally the universe does not exist -- that is one side of the polar extreme. The other polar extreme is that the scientific method is flawed or somehow inapplicable and the body of scietific knowledge that contradicts NLP is incorrect. However, these forms of metaphysical and epistemological scpeticism canot simply be asserted they must be argued for and that justification must include an explanation of the apparent explanatory and predictive power of science. In the absence of philosophical treatise that successfully invalidates the scientific evidence against NLP the matter is settled with reference to scientific method and scientific knowledge. flavius 17:06, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

Which scientists? Please cite the full MLA style documentation? Furthermore, the ArbCom decided that in the article, things like "pseudoscience, psychobabble" etc. need to be attributed as a quote to the scientists that said them, not to the editor of the article. Then, to show the other significant viewpoint, the other side will need to find scientists that say it's a valid science, attribute a full MLA style citation, and then in the article, attribute their viewpoint to the scientists that said that, not to the editor. (note, when I say MLA style, it could be any other accepted citation format such as APA, AMA, MLA, Chicago style, etc.) Swatjester 16:39, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

The article contains the references you seek the only thing lacking from some of them is page numbers. There are no scientists that say that NLP is a science. In any event that is not how science works. If you search the scientific abstracts you'll find at least one paper that contradicts what is generally regarded as proven (eg. that smoking doesn't cause respiratory disease). Scientific evidence is assessed with reference to the methodology of the research, its reproducibility and whether it was published in a well-regarded peer-reviewed journal. Only if there are a substantial number of methodologically sound research papers that have been published in peer-reviewed journals that reject the null hypotheis does the scientific community collectively reject the null hypothesis and thus promote a hypothesis to knowledge. flavius 17:06, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

Swatjester says, "Your side's (it's not science) and the other side's (it is science)." -- I do not think that anyone is claiming that NLP is a science. However, Gregory Bateson does say in the introduction to Structure of Magic Volume 1, " have succeeded in making linguistics into a base for theory and simultaneously into a tool for therapy."(p.x 1975a). Grinder & Bostic (2001) do make the claim that NLP based primarily on Gregory Bateson's epistemology (1972, 1979) and Chomsky's Transformational Grammar. When we refer to "NLP" we need to identify who specifically or what aspects of NLP we are referring to. --Comaze 00:48, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

As you very well know, Comaze, NLP proponents have been criticised for claiming that NLP is science, and criticised for misleading the public that NLP is science. And as you know already, theory is a core building block of science, and even Bateson is dressing NLP up as science. The theories of NLP have been measured and found to be false. They continue to be promoted as being true, and therefore NLP is a pseudoscience. WE do not refer to NLP, the NLP proponents, and the scientists who research NLP refer to NLP. I request for Comaze to be blocked for badgering and wasting my and everybody's time yet again. HeadleyDown 03:22, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

What does this Article need?

Maybe what would help is, if we got one (specific) sentence statement from each user, ie refrences, honesty, clarity, punctuation, structure, whatever that might help. I am just not sure any longer. We maybe need clarity from people on what they feel the article needs to be finished. If it needs anything at all. Just one clear sentence would be good. The most important thing in your opinions maybe. (feel free everyone to edit your own opinions to make them more clear)

jVirus

I am not so sure what the article needs any longer. I need some precise input from other users to make a more clear determination jVirus 03:48, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

Flavius

Please, enough already of this "lets hold hands and form a giant chain" bullshit! What this article needs is a commitment and re-orientation towards scientific and factual evidence. Even if this article were left like a baby to the vultures of NLP commercial interests and pseudoscience what do you think would happen? The NLP proponents would bicker amongst themselves about whose "kung-fu" is the best -- go visit alt.psychology.nlp if you doubt me. Pseudoscientists arguments are never resolved because they have no basis for settling disputes -- you can't determine whether the "Swish pattern" works by trading anecdotes. When pseudoscientists disagree they form their own "denomination" -- what else can they do -- that's why we have so many competing types of "Power Therapies", witchcraft, graphology, palmistry, "body psychotherapy" etc. If you've dispensed with rigorous experimentaion as a means of moving closer to the truth then you're left with mental masturbation. You can see the consequences of this mental masturbation if you visit any New Age bookstore. Rational discourse is the only (civilised) means of settling disputes regarding matters that are neither aesthetic or religious. Rational discourse concerning empirical matters requires evidence. Scientific evidence is high-quality evidence -- it is the highest quality evidence and the accomplishments of Western civilisation testify to this. Anecdote and testimony are not suitable evidence for empirical matters. If the NLP proponents could re-orient themselves towards the notion of evidence that would eliminate much of the conflict. Comaze and DejaKitty want to pass off unsubstantiated claims and falsified claims as fact. Comaze seems to think that claiming that "NLP has a different epistemology" somehow absolves him of the responsibility for substantiation. The inclusion of unsubstantiated claims based on anecdotal evidence is unacceptable. This is non-negotiable. Anecdotal evidence is often unacceptable in day-to-day life a fortiori it is unacceptable for an encyclopedic article. flavius 04:49, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

Sweet, precisely what I wanted to know. Now we have a record of it. Course you could have said, you felt that it needed more scientificly backed data. Your paragraph is good. (feel free to edit your desires for the article if you need to) jVirus 08:24, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

BrianH123

The article needs some editing so it presents its evidence in a less redundant and more well organized way.
Specific quotes from references should be used more, and paraphrase-followed-by-stream-of-footnotes used less.
Terms such as "pseudoscience" and "New Age" should be put in the mouth of a source, not left unattributed. The reasons why the source believes NLP to be pseudoscience, etc., should be stated.
The intro should be as neutral and dispassionate as possible, if only because the reader needs to know what NLP is before you hit him over the head with opinions about it.
In the article, the bulk of the text and the emphasis should be what is sourced in scientific studies. See the NPOV policy for more on representing "majority" and "minority" opinions. For the purpose of an encyclopedia article on an empirical subject, scientific consensus is the majority view, not anecdotes. Claims that NLP "has an alternative epistemology," which excuses it from the standards of evidence to which we hold every other field of inquiry, is begging the question.

-- BrianH123 18:14, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

Brian Would you be willing to list your desires of the above stated Hierarchically. But make them into just 3. Your top 3 wants for the article Hierarchically. jVirus 00:04, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

Before I reduce my list, let's see what common ground we can find. I'd hate to throw away an item and then wonder if it might have been the only one that someone else could agree on. :-) Also, I don't care which is acted upon first. --BrianH123 04:27, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

SWATJester

This article needs all of the editors to step back a second and realize that editing this article is not a life or death thing. This is only the internet, after all.
This article needs complete and accurate citations. Whatever the format, AMA/APA/MLA etc, it needs to be cited 100% all the way down to the page number, for verification purposes.
This article needs to have attribution of terms to users, as per Brian above.
This article needs to be as dispassionate and neutral as possible, as per brian above.
This article should be structured with a format like this: Section 1: introduction. Section 2: History. Section 3:Current Teachings, or Current Practices, or whatever it should be called. Basically how NLP is practiced today Section 4: Famous NLP-ers. Section 5: Controversies and criticisms. Section 5: External links, see alsos, etc. Section 6: Citations.

Swatjester 20:20, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

I don't know that I agree with putting all the scientific criticisms at the end. I think if X is presented as a "current teaching", then scientific evidence critical of X should be nearby. Also, I don't want my use of the word "neutral" to be taken as not wanting (well-documented) criticism of NLP. I do want that, just not in the introduction before the reader even knows what NLP is. Also, info about famous NLPers is, in my view, almost valueless. If it's included, it certainly shouldn't be at the expense of pushing criticisms of NLP further down the page. —BrianH123 21:10, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

Ok, easily solved by moving the "criticisms" section to immediately follow the "current practices" section. My new proposed order would be Intro, History, Current practice, Criticism and controversy, Famous NLPers, External links and see alsos, Citations. I also have to disagree with you that famous NLPers is valueless. In my wikipedia experiences, most good articles about a science, religion, school, etc. have a section for "famous practicioners/alumni". It's interesting for a student doing research to look up a subject and then be able to see wikilinks for who are the experts in the field, and also who are the critical detractors or skeptics. Note also, maybe Famous NLP'ers is a bad title, because I'd also want to include "Famous NLP Critics and Detractors" in that subsection. Swatjester 21:43, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

Swatjester would you maybe your wants of the above stated for the article hierarchically. But make them just your top 3. Your top 3 wants for the article hierarchically. jVirus 00:06, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

I don't understand what you're asking me Jvirus. Swatjester 00:34, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

Heh, sorry. I mean: I am getting lots of things from people that they want to see changed or adhered to or to improve etc.. You have yourself a list of things you want to see done with the articleIf you would be so kind as to make a list of of your top 3 things you want done, priorities for the article. Then we can see what everyone feels is their top priority for the article. IE. - John Doe feels that we 1st. need to correct all the grammar. 2. we need to get rid of slander 3. we need to make refrences more specific. I am just thinking by knowing what yours and others #1 thing they want to change is, we might be able to progress a bit further in negotiations. kinda make sense? jVirus 03:54, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

DaveRight

Is your position the same as Flavius,that what this article needs is more Scientific Backed Evidence? If you had to pick your top priority. jVirus 08:33, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

HeadleyDown

JVirus, you seem to me to have misunderstood (perhaps deliberately) the requirements. We don't necessarily need MORE scientific evidence (though plenty more exists), but we do need more scientific explanation for the sake of clarity (a commitment to explanation of views from the point of view of science).

What is also very important is the recognition that some "editors with promotional agendas" have repeatedly asked and acted for the deletion of certain facts so that they cannot have explanations. Those views and explanations of experts work against commercial promotion of pseudoscience. The constant requests for certain authors to be disallowed, is an example of this. Eg, the repeat pleading and actions by Comaze, Akulkis, and Dejakitty for the emminently qualified authors, Singer, Lilienfeld, Carroll, and Eisner to be ejected from the article.

Correct me where I am off target Flavius, I believe CLEAR EXPLANATION with the benefit of rigorous research and science is your recommendation. I cannot speak for Dave, but I believe that is where one strong area of agreement is. HeadleyDown 12:02, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

Headley, yes that is my position. The article includes ample scientific evidence, the problem isn't one of quantity. Some form of explanation and elaboration with reference to the research and science is needed though I'm uncertain as to precisely what form that should take. Would it be useful to turn some of the keywords pertaining to scientific method and research design (eg. "placebo", "controlled", "randomised", "clinical trial" etc.) into "Wiki links"? This would enrich the article and help non-scientists better appreciate the cited studies without inflating the article size. I suspect that scientific illiteracy amongst the NLP advocates (and the general public) is a large part of the problem. Producing clear explanations that an intelligent lay audience can understand that don't involve OR is a fine line to walk. I'll give this some more thought. flavius 16:04, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

Yes, I've often envisaged a wikiproject or set of articles that helps the readers to sift the dross and collect the gold on matters of science and pseudoscience in some small way. The web can be so troublesome for some learners (including wikipedia). I believe diagrams, clear illustrations, or concept maps may be a useful addition. If there's time, and if constant edit wars etc are prevented, then that may yet happen. HeadleyDown 16:12, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

HeadleyDown : Sorry with my words to DaveRight that you and Flavius responded to, I was not meaning along the lines that there was not enough evidence in the world to support, but rather questioning if he felt there were not sufficient scientificly backed passages as in, he Does he want more of the claims to be well scienficially refrenced. blah blah. foot in mouth on my part. Anyway. jVirus 00:00, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

What I am understanding, you and Flavius feel that this article itself, the content and structure of it, needs a recommittment to scientificly backing up all of its statements? I am restating this as accurately as I can with letters and phrases. When you read the article you see lots of information that is not scientifically supported. Is that correct? And you both want to see more scientific backing up for each statement. If it is going to be claimed, back it scientifically, Right? jVirus 00:00, 7 February 2006 (UTC) ----Another thing you want is for Metta Bubble and Comaze to be blocked. Am I understanding everything correctly? jVirus 04:09, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

Metta Bubble

The article to more closely follow WP:NPOV policy in regards to scientific viewpoint being a subset of NPOV.

"The task before us is not to describe disputes as though, for example, pseudoscience were on a par with science; rather, the task is to represent the majority (scientific) view as the majority view and the minority (sometimes pseudoscientific) view as the minority view; and, moreover, to explain how scientists have received pseudoscientific theories. This is all in the purview of the task of describing a dispute fairly."(WP:NPOV "Pseudoscience")

The article to represent all scientific opinions of NLP and not just those that find it distasteful.

There are no positive scientific views of NLP appearing in peer-reviews, credible scientific journals. If you can find any then present them.flavius 04:27, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

Opinions beyond the realms of science to have a fair hearing as per WP:NPOV (Government bodies, Management, Social Support Groups).

"Articles that compare views need not give minority views as much or as detailed a description as more popular views, and may not include tiny-minority views at all (by example, the article on the Earth only very briefly refers to the Flat Earth theory, a view of a distinct minority). We should not attempt to represent a dispute as if a view held by only a small minority of people deserved as much attention as a majority view, and views that are held by a tiny minority should not be represented except in articles devoted to those views. To give undue weight to a significant-minority view, or to include a tiny-minority view, might be misleading as to the shape of the dispute."(WP:NPOV "Undue weight")

The article to more closely follow WP:NPOV by removing wording intended to imply guilt by association (ala Scientology, Dianetics, Chomsky, etc)

You are begging the question. First demonstrate that wording isn't intended to imply guilt by association, establish the source of the statement and if it doesn't come from a scientist then campaign for its removal. flavius 04:27, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

The article to more closely follow WP:NPOV in regards to terms that are veiled attacks (ala New Age, Cult-like, Rituals, Quasispiritual, etc)

As above. flavius

The article to more closely follow WP:NOR in regards to emphasis on non-core NLP ideas (like bagel, engrams, and others).

BAGEL is from Dilts and he presents it in his NLP Encyclopedia. flavius 04:27, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

Some quotes in the article from the founders of NLP about their work. It would give a feel for what these people were like and is obviously relevant to the article.

That properly belongs in the John Grinder and Richard Bandler articles. flavius 04:27, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

Wikilinks to sub-articles, including criticisms of NLP, principles of NLP, Rapport, Modelling and other topics.

Sub-articles are POV forks in drag. flavius 04:27, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

A section briefly summarising each important contributor to the field of NLP, Bandler, Grinder, Dilts, Delozier, Leslie Cameron-Bandler, etc.

Biographical information belongs in biographical articles. flavius 04:27, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

BrianH123's suggestion to be given a go. It seems amenable and is at least a start for workshopping a better process.
Comaze's intro a couple of sections above to be the starting point for a better intro.
This talk page to more closely follow WP:CIVIL and enforcement for those who don't.

It would indicate good faith on your part if you actually researched even some of things you take issue with. flavius 04:27, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

This talk page's specific discussion outcomes to be cited as diffs if relevant (as opposed to people pretending it might be in the archives).
Mediators to mediate, not suggest edits.
The group of editors from the yahoo skeptics group to identify themselves openly and refrain from tag-team "here here" style comments in this discussion. It gives a false impression of consensus to new-comers.

I am not affiliated with any SIG. Comaze and GregA are NLP practitioners and associate trainers with a large NLP seminar provider. Comaze and GregA draw an income from NLP practice and teaching. Why is it that you're not concerned with the biases and pecuniary interests of the NLP proponents contributing to the article? This is very cynical of you. flavius 04:27, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

Peace. Metta Bubble 23:23, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

Metta Bubble will make your wants of the above stated for the article hierarchically. But make them just your top 3. Your top 3 wants for the article hierarchically. jVirus 00:08, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

Terms such as Dianetics, Scientology and Chomsky are not guilt by association. They are the qualified views of scientists, and with citations they are facts. They require more explanation. The views of scientists are the most dispassionate and credible. New age, cult-like, rituals, quasispiritual are all technically correct terms, and they all come from scientific research. I request Mettabubble to be blocked for deliberately attempting to irritate editors by repeat badgering for the censorship of facts. NLP is a fringe practice and requires no sub-pages. The only people setting up sub pages here are the NLP fans/promoters with vested interests. No neutrally inclined editor has ever set up subpages. Those subpages were all criticised by non promotional editors for being "how tos" and were criticised for being biased and promotional. NLP literature is designed to be intrinsically promotional. Any subpage should be written largely from the perspectives of researchers who research NLP, rather than NLP promoters who only wish to feather their own nests. Comaze and his intro should be deleted from this discussion for the sake of keeping the peace. The ONLY problem with this article is the presence of editors such as Mettabubble and Comaze who are using the new situation as a further opportunity to remove factual information from wikipedia. I request that they both be blocked. HeadleyDown 03:08, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

Dejakitty

Heal the group first before attempting fixing the article or forming consensus
We need a clear set of ground rules of acceptable behaviour, like a contract for all the editors to sign and abide to.

How about visiting a library and researching before pontificating about a topic? Would that be a useful ground rule? flavius 04:36, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

Admins should work closely to enforce (e.g. removal of inappropriate postings) ground rules consistently in a transparent manner based on the agreed contract.
Transgressions should be dealt with by admins promptly and consistently in a transparent manner in accordance to the contract.
Everyone should ignore all inappropriate postings, no arguing, no answer back, no whining, no joining in.
Everyone should respond warmly and positively to constructive postings even though you may not agree entirely what the other person say. If you disagree with what the other person is saying, acknowledge the value of their contribution before stating your own point of view. Give reasons why you disagree rather than discounting what the other person has to say. Always communicate your opennes to search for ways to accomodate each others rather than just sticking to your own point of view.

Says who? Some views are without substance, sense or logic. Why should I "acknowledge the value of their contribution" when it has no instrinsic value. If you don't value facts thenn your disposition is fine otherwise it is intellectual poison. flavius 04:36, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

Avoid getting into the game of "who has the last words" debate or "who is going to write the longest paragraph".

So you don't want argument and you don't want dialogue? flavius 04:36, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

Do not encourage the separation of editors into different ideological camps. Do not propose any changes that treat editors differently based on their pressumed ideological alignment.
Listen, Listen, Listen with the bits between your ears.

Have you tried reading, reading, reading of those paper things that you find in libraries? flavius 04:36, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

Follow the contract deligently without giving into the temptation of cutting corners.

Did you feel holier than thou by this point?

--Dejakitty 00:25, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

I agree with the suggestion to work on stabilizing this discussion, rather than the suggestion to censor facts from the article. The terms "pseudoscience" "New Age" and so on are actual facts according to NPOV policy. They are also facts attributed to eminent scientists. This article is concerned with pseudoscience, and science is most important for clarifying the facts. Removal of the terms "pseudoscience" and "new age" from the article is censorship. This has been dealt with in detail already in the archives. HeadleyDown 02:53, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

DejaKitty : will make your wants of the above stated for the article hierarchically. But make them just your top 3. Your top 3 wants for the article hierarchically. jVirus 03:47, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

protected edit

In regards to this edit , actually I think that page ix is correct. Normally in an introduction, the foreword is listed in lowercase roman numerals, such as ix, which would actually be page 9. This makes sense also because stylistically when citing a page, one cites the numerical number (in this case 6) not the written number (six). If the user really meant six there, he'd have put "6" instead, so I believe it really did mean to be "ix". Can we get clarification? Swatjester 04:35, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

Yes this is correct. But it needs more clarity from science. Some readers may miss the banal stupidity of Bateson's remark. To state that any science avoids theory is utter nonsense. If he said that "behavioral occult technology has often avoided theory" he would be right. We have views of scientists that state "NLP has contributed nothing to behavioural science". This will make a smart comparison for clarifying the issue. DaveRight 04:49, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

Dave, I agree. We have to make due allowance for the naive reader that may know nothing about NLP, psychiatry or psychology (eg. a school student doing a project) that they could be forgiven for imbibing that piece of misinformation. Disseminating misinformation is antithetical to purpose of encyclopedias in general and Misplaced Pages specifically. Bateson's remark is unadulterated bullshit. It is plainly wrong and reveals how little he know about the subjects he pontificated upon. IIRC he states that psychiatry has traditionally avoided theory. This is utter shite. Freud is generally credited as being the father of modern psychiatry and Freudian psychodynamic theory is thoroughly theoretical -- it isn't merely a set of techniques and "laws". The work of his successors was perhaps more theoretical (eg. Jacques Lacan). Now that Freud is pretty much dead in psychology and psychiatry the pursuit of theory (ie. explanation) is no less strong. Cognitive-Behavioural oriented reserach psychiatrists and psychologists and biologically oriented research psychiatrists remain concerned with not only the discovery of laws and models but also with their explanations (ie. theory). Either expurgate Bateson's bullshit or qualify it with a statement regarding the actual orientation of scientific enterprise. flavius 05:04, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

This isn't what matters. The only thing we were discussing is whether it was "six" or "ix". Swatjester 15:10, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

No Swatjester. What matters is we gain something constructive out of this situation. Stand corrected! HeadleyDown 16:06, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

I do not. If you want to discuss the topic above, then make a new section for it. This section was only for clarification on "six" vs. "ix" Swatjester 19:09, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

The quote is definitely p.ix (page 4) and is on the first page of Gregory Bateson's introduction to Structure of Magic Vol.1. --Comaze 22:42, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

ArbCom Ruling Complete

ArbCom Ruling complete. You can read it here but let me summarize it for you.

Rules: 1) Users who edit in a point of view or obsessive way may be banned partially or completely 2) It is not sufficient to simply refer to "Jones (1984)" as the source of information. There are a number of acceptable formats but a sufficient reference includes sufficient information to enable others to easily find the text relied on. 3) Misplaced Pages:Neutral point of view contemplates inclusion of all significant points of view regarding the subject of an article.

Situation: 1) A number of users have been engaging in aggressive point of view editing of Neuro-linguistic programming and related articles as well as personal attacks, examples may include but are not limited to: Comaze, HeadleyDown, JPLogan, Camridge, DaveRight, AliceDeGrey, and Flavius vanillus. 2) Most of the cited sources in the article do not meet minimum standards for reliable sources, lacking information regarding page number and identification of edition. 3) The article could more closely conform to neutral point of view by ascribing controversial viewpoints such as "NLP is pseudoscience" to those who have expressed such opinions, rather then presenting them as bald statements of fact.

Punishment: 1) Any administrator, upon good cause shown, may ban any user, from editing Neuro-linguistic programming or a related page. All bans shall be posted on the affected user's talk page and at Misplaced Pages:Requests_for_arbitration/Neuro-linguistic_programming#Documentation_of_bans 2) Comaze, HeadleyDown, JPLogan, Camridge, DaveRight, and AliceDeGrey are reminded to provide an adequate description of the source of information included in the article, in the case of publications to page and edition 3) Comaze, HeadleyDown, JPLogan, Camridge, DaveRight, and AliceDeGrey are reminded to ascribe point of view statements to those making them. 4) Comaze, HeadleyDown, JPLogan, Camridge, DaveRight, and AliceDeGrey are required to discuss any content reversions on Neuro-linguistic programming on its talk page.

Mentorship: 5) The article Neuro-linguistic programming is placed under the mentorship of three to five administrators to be named later. All content reversions on this page must be discussed on the article talk page. The mentors are to have a free hand, do not have veto over each other's actions, will be communicating closely and will generally trust each other's judgement. Any mentor, upon good cause shown, may ban any user from editing Neuro-linguistic programming or a related page. All bans shall be posted on the affected user's talk page and at Misplaced Pages:Requests_for_arbitration/Neuro-linguistic_programming#Documentation_of_bans. The mentorship arrangement will be reviewed in three months. If, at that time, the mentors agree that the article has demonstrated the ability to grow without strife, the mentorship may be ended and this remedy declared void.

Blocking: 1) If a user banned from editing under this decision does so, they may be briefly blocked, up to a week in the event of repeat offenses. After 5 blocks the maximum block shall increase to one year.

Now, with that out of the way, lets get back to editing constructively. Swatjester 15:21, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

Swatjester. Just so you understand. Proper detailed and sufficiently fussy attribution will be attained as long as mentors do their duty and get the fanatics off the back of the neutrally inclined editors. If mentors allow NLP fanatics to remove facts that have been established through the supported (with citations) views of scientists and proper researchers, then those page numbers, ISBNs and all the other infernal beurocracy can be dealt with, regardless of whether the views and facts are as common sense and blatantly obvious as they are already. Better still, if mentors can somehow encourage the NLP fanatics into looking up the refs and supplying the appropriate page numbers etc, then the editors who work in good faith can simply get on with clear explanations. Here is a constructive suggestion: Comaze and other similar "editors" have yet to make the changes to the ref format that they advocated. I'm sure they can kill two birds with one stone, and supply a lot of the details that have been so requested at the same time. After all the requests were supplied by arbitration that NLP fans demanded. It would be very sensible and constructive to divert the NLP fans to "pay" for the excessive amount of strife THEY have caused. HeadleyDown 16:01, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

I doubt if mentors will even try to restrain NLP fan(atics) from attempting the unreasonable. We are going to do it ourselves no matter what. Camridge 07:32, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

You're missing the point. Everyone now has to provide that kind of citation, both the pro-NLP and anti-NLP camps. Furthermore, nobody is being allowed to remove any facts for two reasons. 1) the page is protected, and will be until this is resolved. 2) any edits by the named parties in the arbcom must be discussed and agreed upon on the talk page. Swatjester 16:42, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

No Swatjester, you were talking about bullshit. Nobody has refused to provide citations. You are antagonizing and finding fault where none exists. HeadleyDown 02:48, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

Please, no personal attacks. The Arbitration Commitee unanimously found that the citations were inadequate. Swatjester 03:02, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

Swatjester, editors have already stated that such details will be provided. Do you have something constructive to add? Camridge 07:32, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

Headley. I find words like fanatic uncivil. I feel I am a neutrally inclined editor so I'd like to ask you to please respect we all have different views on what is neutral. Peace. Metta Bubble 23:27, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

Go to a dictionary, and look up the term fanatic. Compare the definition with your activities on this discussion/article. The term fanatic is correct in your case. HeadleyDown 03:10, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

==Archival== I'm preparing to archive everything from "Summary of findings" above. Swatjester 20:21, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for volunteering, Swatjester. It may be better to request an admin to do the archiving to avoid (I am not accusing anyone here, just talking in general.) accusation of censorship for the time being. Remember, do not respond to, acknowledge or give your attention to any personal attacks or inappropriate postings. Though in general it is permissible to remove any hypothetical abusive posting, in this particular case, it is better to leave this to admins to do it for the time being. --Dejakitty 22:24, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

Yeah. But we won't need an admin to do it, and I think everyone involved on this page knows that we have at least 4 admins watching (KillerChihuahua, VoA, Bagdhani, and Cleared-as-filed, possibly more). In order to avoid any censorship accusations I'm cutting the archive short of where I wanted to, but I think starting from the "summary of findings" gives a good enough impression. If I don't hear anything by midnight tonight, I'll go ahead with the archive. BTW, you can preview the archived version by clicking the "archive 10" link at the top of this page. Swatjester 23:33, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

Yeah I say do it, maybe give it an extra day if you or Dejakitty is really concerned. Im in. jVirus 00:10, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

Swatjester, JVirus, I have no fundamental objection to doing archiving. The talk page needs one badly. I was just considering potential porblems with archiving in tense situations. I trust you to make the right decision using your judgement. --Dejakitty 00:38, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

I agree, if there are no objections, go ahead and archive. --Comaze 00:53, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

Archive. --BrianH123 04:33, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

REALISM

There's a lot to read today, so I will be brief. I am not dictating, but here is how the article will be, nomatter what ANYBODY says.

The article will continue to be presented by neutrally minded editors within the bounds of NPOV policy. We have some excellent researchers here and their ability to find facts and present them within NPOV policy has been admirable.
The request by arbitrators for all the "bits and pieces" to be added to citations will move forward slowly. NLP promoters have thus far acted in bad faith on the whole, and that is unlikely to change. It will therefore, fall upon the more neutrally inclined editors to provide such details.
NLP promoters will continue their attempts to harass, slur, cause conflict, and generally do their best to remove the facts they find objectionable. Mediators and arbitrators have thus far done little to remedy this, and it will be up to the more neutrally minded editors to somehow cope with this problem. That is a problem, but neutrally minded editors seem to be well equipped to cope.
NLP promoters will also continue to suffer the facts being presented on the article. The facts are presented according to NPOV policy. The facts that they most want removed will be enlarged upon and clarified by neutrally minded editors. They are facts, and therefore, deserve explanation in the article. The more "misunderstanding" NLP promoters exhibit, the more they will suffer the facts being clarified in the article within the bounds of NPOV policy.

JPLogan 05:01, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

Yes, thats pretty clear. I commit to coping with the everpresence of NLP fan(atics) and NLP promoters with vested interests. I encourage other editors to do the same. It seems we have no other option but to "correct" the misbehaviour and misconceptions of NLP sharks and sheep ourselves. Misplaced Pages arbitrators and mediators! I thank you for allowing me to recognize and accept this reality, and I will act accordingly. Camridge 07:22, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

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