Misplaced Pages

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The purpose of this essay

I wrote this essay to be a teaching tool for those who believe pseudoscience, conspiracy theories, urban myths, and other things which are not supported by any actual evidence.

For example, the reader may be someone who is a True Believer in magnetic water treatment and who strongly objects to the "bias" in our article on that topic. The same reader is likely to not be a True Believer in laundry balls or phrenology. My hope is that the reader, by seeing all these other pseudoscientific areas where Misplaced Pages is "biased" right next to his pet fringe theory, will come to an understanding of why it is that Misplaced Pages is "biased" against fringe theories in general.

Of course we know that in many cases this list will fail in that goal, because no argument will convince the fringe theorist. In such cases the secondary goal kicks in. This list also helps those who are responding to accusations of bias. All you have to do is to simply cut and paste the list into a talk page discussion with an edit summary of "Yes. We ARE biased." No need for attribution -- I released it under CC0 specifically so that you can use it as if it was your own. This cutting and pasting has been shown to take the wind out of the sails of many fringe theorists who think that they have found the magic words ("Bias!") that will magically cause Misplaced Pages to start promoting things that are not true. In general, cutting and pasting the list is more effective than linking to it, because promoters of pseudoscience have trained themselves to ignore the usual links to WP:V, WP:RS, WP:NPOV, etc. --Guy Macon (talk) 19:15, 21 April 2019 (UTC)

"We are biased towards bible scholarship, and biased against biblical inerrancy."

I would like to discuss this recent good-faith addition.

Argument for removal:

I want to avoid this essay claiming that we are biased against religious beliefs. We are not; we describe them but do not comment on whether they are true or false. We say that the scientific theories behind laundry balls and homeopathic medicines are bullshit, but we do not say that Mohamed or Joseph Smith are or are not prophets, nor do we say that Krishna or Jehovah do or do not exist. It seems to me that biblical inerrancy is a purely religious belief.

Argument for retention:

Even if biblical inerrancy is a purely religious belief, there are a bunch of psuedoscientific beliefs that are based upon some persons's interpretation of the Bible combined with a strong belief in biblical inerrancy. Young-earth creationism for example. On the other hand, there are plenty of Christians who believe in biblical inerrancy without believing in any pseudoscientific or fringe theories. Theistic evolutionists for example.

So, retain or remove? --Guy Macon (talk) 06:48, 3 May 2019 (UTC)

Remove. This crosses the line from science into religion, which is not the intent of this essay. It's also not technically accurate, as biblical inerrancists still believe that the Bible contains allegories and metaphors, so it doesn't necessarily follow that they are all creationists or pseudoscientists. – bradv🍁 13:18, 3 May 2019 (UTC)

Thank you for your views. Misplaced Pages has a strong bias in favor of academic sources for history. That is how it should be. If archaeology says Beersheba was founded 6000 years ago and the bible says it was founded 4000 years ago, archaeology wins. Zero 13:06, 11 July 2013 (UTC)

Quoted by Tgeorgescu (talk) 14:48, 3 May 2019 (UTC)

Tgeorgescu, that's a nice quote, but I don't understand what it has to do with my comment. – bradv🍁 15:14, 3 May 2019 (UTC)

@Bradv: From a WP:HISTRS perspective biblical inerrantist works are WP:FRINGE. This is practiced all over the place inside Misplaced Pages. Some consider history to be a science, i.e. it includes the history of Christianity and Bible scholarship. Tgeorgescu (talk) 15:21, 3 May 2019 (UTC)

Tgeorgescu, using the Bible as a source for scientific or academic viewpoints is the problem though, not just the view that the Bible is without error. For example, the Catholic church claims that the Bible is without error, yet views the creation story as allegorical. – bradv🍁 15:28, 3 May 2019 (UTC)

@Bradv: How about We are biased towards mainstream history, and biased against true believers.? Tgeorgescu (talk) 15:32, 3 May 2019 (UTC)

Or We are biased towards historical method, and biased against pseudohistory. Tgeorgescu (talk) 15:34, 3 May 2019 (UTC)

Are these not both covered under the evolution / creation comparison? We could easily include all kinds of anti-religious examples, but I'm not sure that's wise. – bradv🍁 15:39, 3 May 2019 (UTC)

My take is that people (mostly vandals or true believers) write religious rubbish inside Misplaced Pages because it is not clear to them what Misplaced Pages is about. Making clear what we stand for would reduce unwanted edits. Tgeorgescu (talk) 15:44, 3 May 2019 (UTC)

Agree 100%, but I have serious doubts that this addition will accomplish this in a way that the creationism entry did not. Would any sane person reach the bottom of this list and still doubt that when science and theology disagree Misplaced Pages chooses science every time? What bothers me is the possibility of offending the large number of people who accept science and also believe that the Bible is without error. We might as well add an entry saying that Misplaced Pages is biased against a belief in God.

Billy Graham was one of those people who accepted science while believing that the Bible is without error:

"I don't think that there's any conflict at all between science today and the Scriptures. I think that we have misinterpreted the Scriptures many times and we've tried to make the Scriptures say things they weren't meant to say, I think that we have made a mistake by thinking the Bible is a scientific book. The Bible is not a book of science. The Bible is a book of Redemption, and of course I accept the Creation story. I believe that God did create the universe. I believe that God created man, and whether it came by an evolutionary process and at a certain point He took this person or being and made him a living soul or not, does not change the fact that God did create man. ... whichever way God did it makes no difference as to what man is and man's relationship to God." Source: Billy Graham: Personal Thoughts of a Public Man (1997) p. 72-74

--Guy Macon (talk) 06:40, 4 May 2019 (UTC)

Yup, Misplaced Pages isn't against religion, it is against playing fast and loose with the facts. Tgeorgescu (talk) 07:50, 4 May 2019 (UTC)

Comments on tone, content and purpose here

Alexbrn linked to this essay from a discussion on the craniosacral therapy talk page. I want to say. while I have been involved in Misplaced Pages for over a decade, I haven't been part of the WP:FRINGE vanguard, and I'd imagine if I was I would be very frustrated with the attempts of people with CoIs to push their point of view in articles. I understand the purpose of having high standards here and I wouldn't suggest changing any of that. I would like to point out some wisdom from Carl Sagan in The Demon-Haunted World.

• "In the way that skepticism is sometimes applied to issues of public concern, there is a tendency to belittle, to condescend, to ignore the fact that, deluded or not, supporters of superstition and pseudoscience are human beings with real feelings, who, like the sceptics, are trying to figure out how the world works and what our role in it might be. Their motives are in many cases consonant with science. If their culture has not given them all the tools they need to pursue this great quest, let us temper our criticism with kindness. None of us comes fully equipped." (page 298)
• "The chief deficiency I see in the skeptical movement is its polarization: Us vs. Them — the sense that we have a monopoly on the truth; that those other people who believe in all these stupid doctrines are morons; that if you're sensible, you'll listen to us; and if not, to hell with you. This is nonconstructive. It does not get our message across. It condemns us to permanent minority status." (page 300)

I worry that this essay and Jimmy's ad hominem "lunatic charlatans" has made it a bit too open season on anyone painted as WP:PROFRINGE. Like a correction was needed, but perhaps the pendulum has swung too far in the other direction. An approach that specifically focuses on attacking ideas lacking evidence, rather than people with fringe beliefs seems more appropriate to me. You can see a little of this in the current list, for example:

• We are biased towards cargo planes, and biased against cargo cults.

I'm not even sure how to interpret that. Is it trying to say Misplaced Pages is biased against isolated groups of people who developed rituals based on their brief experiences with cultures that had more advanced technology? People practicing in cargo cults aren't doing anything wrong, they're just very sadly--but also very understandably--mistaken. Are we against those people? Against their beliefs? Against the conditions that created their mistaken beliefs? It's also somewhat self-contradictory. If it wasn't for cargo planes, it's likely they there would be fewer cargo cults.

I think whoever wrote that meant to say something more like We are biased towards cargo planes, and biased against cargo cult science. At least I would hope so. But even taken in that charitable way, this does seem to fit a pattern I see of anti-fringe criticism is becoming so strident that it's getting sloppy, causing a degree of collateral damage, and discouraging good faith editors. - Scarpy (talk) 23:57, 8 September 2019 (UTC)

Re: cargo cults, you make a good point. I have changed the place that link points to. I do want to keep the alliteration whenever possible, but I also really want to avoid any hint that we are biased against unpopular religions. That's why you will never see "we are biased against Scientology" on the list.

Re: Sagan, I agree with his take, but this page is not designed to convince anyone to have a skeptical viewpoint or to convince anyone to abandon any of the beliefs that I say we are biased against. This essay doesn't contain any arguments and it does not say why we are biased against X and biased toward Y. There are plenty of words that have been written in various places that try to do that but this is not one of them.

The purpose of this essay is to speak to the heart of someone who, say, really believes that the proponents of antivax are right, that Misplaced Pages is wrong, and that what Misplaced Pages says about vaccines shows a bias.

I am not trying to convince them that vaccines don't cause autism. The article does that and has failed to persuade them. What I am doing is taking advantage of the fact that the antivax proponent is very unlikely to also believe in flood geology, laundry balls, or phrenology. By seeing how we are "biased against" those topics, my hope is that the antivax proponent will understand why we are "biased against" antivax.

And even if I cannot convince them if that, at the very least I will have answered the accusation of bias by clearly stating "Yes. We are biased. And we are not going to change." --Guy Macon (talk) 00:52, 9 September 2019‎ (UTC)

I don't see any good faith editors being discouraged in a way which damages the project - if indeed that is an issue. True Believers™ can edit "in good faith" and still create havoc. Then they need to be discouraged. Alexbrn (talk) 06:21, 9 September 2019 (UTC)

Have been thinking good and long about this essay and Misplaced Pages:Lunatic charlatans, and I'm coming around more to the POV expressed in them (I know they're like 5 years old now, but are new to me as I don't often have reason to read or edit alternative medicine articles on Wikipedi). I am a little bit of a bleeding heart for the True Believers™ but in the balance between skepticism and wonder, it does make sense for Misplaced Pages to be biased towards skepticism. That's how it's always been most useful to me. - Scarpy (talk) 18:30, 17 September 2019 (UTC)

Science is not a belief, it's a method based on facts, there's no bias

Although I personally appreciate this entry (and did not know it was recent, nice effort!), I think it in fact misrepresents and diminishes the very point it's trying to make: that science and verifiability are not based on opinion but on a method relying on facts. Thus, writing that WP's community is biased (towards scientific evidence) is I think a misrepresentation, as the point is to reduce bias. Reducing bias might look like a bias when you come from a biased standpoint, but it's not because it looks like a bias that it is an objective bias. Just my 2 cents, and I'm not meaning that this essay should be cancelled ;-) Also I'm not touching on the issues of biases in science, it's a whole other methodological problem that has a different meaning and cause than opinion biases as is the intended (counter-)meaning in "We are biased". --Signimu (talk) 21:47, 17 October 2019 (UTC)