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This is the talk page for discussing WikiProject Skepticism and anything related to its purposes and tasks.
Archives: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11
Miscellany for deletionThis page was nominated for deletion on October 28, 2006. The result of the discussion was keep.

Archives

Category:Skeptical Wikipedians

  1. We leave Category:Skeptical Wikipedians alone.
  2. We create Category:WikiProject Rational Skepticism members. The Project members should have their own category as with other Projects.
  3. We edit Template:User WikiProject Rational Skepticism to put the user into Category:WikiProject Rational Skepticism members and not into Category:Skeptical Wikipedians. That would move some users into a different category, but they can always add the other category if they want.
How does that sound? --Bduke 06:00, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

Carlos Castaneda

As part of the Paranormal project, i have been working on this article to try and bring some balance to it. it was lacking in documentation of serious critical views and could use some more work towards that end. I mention it here as part of this project because members of this project may be able to help me bring in some well-structured documentation of serious academic issues with Castaneda's works - works he and his publisher have always mainatined are works of nonfiction. A recent article in Salon spurred me towards action. That article covered some of the more disturbing aspects of Castaneda's movement and personal life. Ex-members of his inner group have published books about their experiences wiith the self-described sorcerer and those may be good primary sources. I tagged the article as under the jurisdiction of the paranormal project because Castaneda did promote the view that he was spritiual leader with revealed wisdom of sorcery. LiPollis 07:53, 21 April 2007 (UTC)

Requests for arbitration

There has been a request for arbitration initiated by Minderbinder. You can find it here. ]. If you've been involved in this and would like to become an involved party then just add your name to the list and add a statement concerning your opinions on this matter.Wikidudeman 08:02, 21 April 2007 (UTC)

Life coaching

I am interested in adding perspective to this article. At present, the article is rather vague in its deiniftion of what Life Coaching is or isn't. The section on criticism is equally vague. Since this is one of the topics covered in last year's season of Penn & Teller's Bullshit!, it might be good to try and improve the article. Any help others can give me would be gretly appreciated.LiPollis 03:06, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

  • A most controversial subject, as there are zero credentialing requirements, etc. needed to claim that one is a "life coach"... Remind me later and I will take a look at the article if/when I have a chance, and try to see if we can scrounge up some additional information from other reputable secondary sourced citations. Smee 05:38, 24 April 2007 (UTC).

Unification theory

This long article (Unification theory - not to be confused with Grand unification theory) has just been resurrected, after being deleted once, and I have proposed it for deletion again. The article is not per se about Grand Unification Theory, a legitimate topic of enquiry in physics. Rather, it is a long, rambling treatise which veers off into pseudoscience. Please have a look and comment on its Articles for Deletion page if you wish to support (or oppose) my deletion proposal.—greenrd 19:21, 5 May 2007 (UTC)

WikiProject Pseudoscience (from the WP:WPPS talk page)

The Project Rational Skepticism deals with the same principles as pseudo-science, as well as WP:NPOV which is a very broad area. Therefore I wonder if this project shouldn't be defined as a "daughter" project of Rational Skepticism in order to help "break out" pseudo-science from the very broad scope of that project? (unsigned, by Chrisbak)

I'm not sure about the activity at the Pseudoscience WikiProject. We used to be rather active, but haven't done much recently, especially after a few of our major editors (Hillman, for example) left Misplaced Pages out of frustration. Our efforts aren't very organized now. However, we always had a broader scope than just pure pseudoscience, and dealt with quackery and other such topics as well, much like the Rational Skepticism project. It may be better to just merge the two projects. I hadn't realized that this project existed, and so will probably be more active here in the future. --Philosophus 21:05, 8 May 2007 (UTC)
It is OK with me (I'm a member of both projects, but haven't been very active for more than a year.) There are more members of Rational Skepticism project than Pseudoscience project, but there is condiderable overlap between the two sets of members, I believe. Bubba73 (talk), 01:25, 9 May 2007 (UTC)
Is there a need for two very similar projects? Does Rational Skepticism cover anything that is not pseudoscience? - and, of course, vice versa. Totnesmartin 11:51, 9 May 2007 (UTC)
  • A most interesting question. I would have to respond with a follow-up question out of curiosity: Which project has more active members, and more activity overall? Perhaps both projects could thus be merged into whichever one that is... Smee 12:00, 9 May 2007 (UTC).
Rational Skepticism has more members listed, and several people are in both. We probably don't need both projects, probably better to combine them. However, Rational Skepticism probably does cover things other than pseudoscience. First, the philisophy of being a scientific/rational skeptic. Second, "paranormal" and "pseudoscience" aren't equivalent. Bubba73 (talk), 14:23, 9 May 2007 (UTC)
And RS might also cover philosophical/logic-related topics. Totnesmartin 14:26, 9 May 2007 (UTC)
Another thing to consider is that Rational Skepticism has a tag for articles, whereas Pseudoscience does not. People who believe in pseudoscience usually object to their beliefs being called pseudoscience, so I think it would be better to use Rational Skepticism.
And speaking of the tag, I think there is a bug in it. It doesn't list the "importance" field, although it puts the article in a category by importance. Bubba73 (talk), 14:30, 9 May 2007 (UTC)
Hrm, I don't think there is a bug. I'll check that out when I get a chance... Smee 15:40, 9 May 2007 (UTC).
We had a tag for articles, which I made some time ago. It was not well received by supporters of the theories whose articles I tagged. In the end I decided that edit warring over tags was absurd. --Philosophus 19:48, 9 May 2007 (UTC)
The tag is still around in some places, because I saw it a day or two ago. But I know what you mean. I remember probably summer of 2005 someone (I think it was C. Hillman) going around adding the tag to UFO articles and I could see UFO true beleivers stalking him and removing the tags. (BTW, there are "paranormal project" tags on things that aren't paranormal.) Bubba73 (talk), 19:55, 9 May 2007 (UTC)
That's a good thing. Only 36 articles! (probably should be more.) For the last 15-16 months, I've been concentrating on chess articles. The chess project tag acquired importance and quality parameters only about two weeks ago, and we've been busy tagging articles. I think there are over 800 of them with chess tags. I think the importance/quality tags help us organize the articles and see where work needs to be done. Bubba73 (talk), 22:57, 9 May 2007 (UTC)
Exactly! Meaning we should get busy tagging relevant articles to this project. The number in the 30s only means that more other relevant articles out there have not been tagged yet - not that they are not out there... Smee 23:12, 9 May 2007 (UTC).
Tagging in this case can be difficult. There will be editors who remove them, and most likely even edit war over them, but I expect that we can still be successful if we have enough editors doing the tagging. Another thing to consider is the quality scale. I don't think that the standard quality scale is really relevant to the project; in many cases, articles will be content-complete but highly biased. We might want to think about coming up with a new scheme that will take these things into account - perhaps a two-factor scale, with one being completeness/text-quality and the other being NPOV. --Philosophus 23:52, 9 May 2007 (UTC)
I suspect that editors may encounter resistance regarding the project tags in much the same manner that WP:PARA. People commonly assume that the tag equals a judgement rather than understanding it's real purpose is simply to mark the article as falling under the scope of the project. I would suggest caution since feelings about project tags can explode on a talk page and begin debates that are of little benefit to the article or the project in question. I would also guess, based on past experience, that the project tag for Rational Skepticism would be more likely to be accpeted without controversy than would the tag for PsuedoScience. Just something to keep in mind. If you do meet resistance, I have found the best defense is not to argue the article's content but rather to remind other editors of the role of wikiprojects.LiPollis 16:13, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

AfDs

Would anyone object to there being a list of relevant AfDs for the project? If not, I will probably start such a list, and would appreciate it if other editors would add relevant AfDs that they start or notice. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Philosophus (talk • contribs).

  • I have recently done some remodeling of the Project, WP:SCN, and we have a sub-page now where we list relevant AFDs. If you like, I could remodel this project in the same fashion at some point... Smee 23:16, 8 May 2007 (UTC).
  • The remodeling is amazing! As a minor suggestion, however, it might be better to have Current/Older (open/closed) instead of Most Recent 10/Older, since there is a clear Recent/Not Recent distinction with AfDs. --Philosophus 23:24, 8 May 2007 (UTC)
  • Thank you for the compliments on the remodeling! Can you clarify what you mean on the Current/Older? I will attempt to modify and see if I understand correctly... Smee 04:15, 9 May 2007 (UTC).
  • AfDs are either open or closed. I think it would make the most sense if the list were divided by that, instead of being divided by Most Recent 10/Older, since there will be some people who will only be interested in open AfDs. --Philosophus 19:51, 9 May 2007 (UTC)
  • Thanks! Well, if there are no objections after a while, I can begin to shift the project over to a new remodeled version which I'll create. Once it's more user friendly, that might also spur more people to either join and/or become more active with the project... Smee 00:05, 10 May 2007 (UTC).

Foundation for the Study of Cycles

I'm not sure what the general method of notification for this project is, but for WikiProject Pseudoscience we used to use the project talk page to notify people of current or upcoming controversies, so I am following that method. RayTomes is back, working on a new article on the Foundation for the Study of Cycles (though it appears to just be mostly the same old article) on a subpage of his user page, User:RayTomes/Foundation for the Study of Cycles, for eventual inclusion into Misplaced Pages, and is asking for help editing. Some of you may remember Ray, as he was one of Hillman's adversaries, and the Foundation for the Study of Cycles article was redirected to Edward R. Dewey after an AfD resulted in a lack of consensus between deletion and redirection. --Philosophus 10:49, 15 May 2007 (UTC)

1976 Tehran UFO incident

In reading 1976 Tehran UFO incident, I remember seeing a TV program that showed the tape of the F-4 radar. It showed the object "flying" under the surface of the Earth at one point, hence the radar was having problems. Does anyone know of a source for this? (It isn't in Randi's book.) Bubba73 (talk), 15:10, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Articles in need of attention

I have been looking over the cultural phenomenon of "Indigo Kids" lately since it's getting a lot of press now that Comedianne Jenny McCarthy has been discussing her belief in this concept. (She has aan autistic child who she believes is an Indigo child). In looking over the two articles on the subject here on wikipedia, I detected a noticeable absence of criticisms of the concept/phenomenon despite there being a large body of criticism. Perhpas some members of this project might wish to look the articles over and determine if some balance can be added. Please be aware that these beliefs border on areas of spirituality and religion and as a result, generate very strong feelings in some readers and editors. Also, since these children are usually also suffering from autism or some other disorder, please be cautious about any characterizations of the children themselves.

The articles are:

  • Indigo children - They are alleged to be kids born with special powers who have been "sent" to earth to save us from ourselves.
  • Kryon - the entity Indigo kids believers say is behind the sending of the Indigo kids.

Please take a look-see when you have time. There is quite the cottage industry now in supporting the homeschooling of "Indigo" kids and in alternative therapies for their many mental health and physical health issues. There is even a new subdidvision of "Indigo" Kids called "Crystal Kids" butthere is not an article on them yet. Just google the terms and you'll see how popular these subjects have become.LiPollis 16:25, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Conspiracy Con AfD

Conspiracy Con has been nominated for deletion--even after extensive sourcing. Please give your comments/vote. Thanks. -Eερ² 21:47, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

New Version of main page

I haven't read it all, but it sure looks a lot nicer. I noticed that the inactive members aren't listed. Bubba73 (talk), 14:13, 22 May 2007 (UTC)
They are, go to the subpage itself, they just aren't listed on the Main Page. It's hidden. I'll add a shortcut to make it easier to navigate there. Thank you for the kind words. Smee 14:14, 22 May 2007 (UTC).
It says that goal #3 of the project is "To place pseudoscience tags on articles related to pseudoscience". Shouldn't that be "rational skepticism" tags? Bubba73 (talk), 15:48, 22 May 2007 (UTC)
Change the width so it will fit in 800x600 screens. Right now on my 800x600 screen it's too wide and doesn't fit on the screen.Wikidudeman 16:16, 22 May 2007 (UTC)
  1. This request is easy.
  2. This resizing request I don't know how to do. Smee 22:26, 22 May 2007 (UTC).
I'm not familiar with the style of formating. Who made that page the way it was? There must be some way to make it easily viewable for those with 800x600 screens(most people).Wikidudeman 00:04, 23 May 2007 (UTC)
It runs off slightly on my 1268x1024 screen. Bubba73 (talk), 00:12, 23 May 2007 (UTC)
All the tables and cells of the page are set to expand and contract, so normally it would look fine on 800 x 600. The problem is in two areas.
One non-breaking area is in the "Templates" section and the long no spaced text like {{RationalSkepticismTasks}}. Since lines like {{RationalSkepticismTasks}} have no space in which to break at, the browser can't resize that cell. You'll probably have to break that tag into spaced words, live with the table not being collapsable, or place it in its own row (instead of the right column).
The other non-breaking area is the tables in the "Assessment" area, or more specifically, this table. Like in the above, it doesn't collapse, and would need it's own row or placement outside of that right column.
Hope this helps. --Nealparr 00:28, 23 May 2007 (UTC) <-Code Monkey
  • I wonder if Randi's picture should be on the page. He is so reviled by some people that I think that it might be best to leave his picture off. Bubba73 (talk), 00:23, 23 May 2007 (UTC)
See if you can fix it, Nealparr.Wikidudeman 03:30, 23 May 2007 (UTC)
I've done some tests on the actual templates lowering their width but it didn't change a thing. The borders on the page in question didn't change at all, only the templates did.Wikidudeman 03:45, 23 May 2007 (UTC)
Try it now WDM.
--Nealparr 03:58, 23 May 2007 (UTC)
Not quite enough.Wikidudeman 03:59, 23 May 2007 (UTC)
We talkin' smidgen here or big gap?
--Nealparr 04:01, 23 May 2007 (UTC)
Problem's fixed as of this post, but let me clean it up some more. It was the Assessment and Category boxes. Give me a few moments.
--Nealparr 04:05, 23 May 2007 (UTC)
Well for me on my 1280x1024 screen, it no longer is wider than the screen. Thanks Neal! Bubba73 (talk), 04:27, 23 May 2007 (UTC)
I think I'm done. I also fixed the "edit"/"watch" links. They were messed up on a few boxes. Enjoy! I'll send you the bill : ) --Nealparr 04:55, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

Scientific skepticism article

Scientific skepticism has had a lot of material tagged as uncited and removed, replaced, and removed again. It may need attention to cite things. (A strange thing is that PerfectBlue97 is tagging and removing, yet PerfectBlue removes cited material, removes citations, and changes sourced statements to read differently from what the source said, in at least one other article.) Bubba73 (talk), 00:53, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

He's also adding fact tags to his changes, and adding fact tags to things where sources can be found in less time than it takes to add the fact tags (quotations easily found in reliable sources through Google, places where references aren't given but the reader is pointed to more detailed articles where references are given, and so on). --Philosophus 09:14, 27 May 2007 (UTC)
So just remove the "fact tags" and put the sources in place. If he tries to remove the sources then put them back and we can get him on the 3rr if he is truly doing it not in good faith and not explaining his reasoning.Wikidudeman 09:30, 27 May 2007 (UTC)
I mainly reverted him for his changes to the text, which in my opinion were not improvements. I was also too tired at the time to add the sources; thank you for doing so. --Philosophus 18:32, 27 May 2007 (UTC)

Heim theory

This article is a mess again. Heim theory is a notable borderline-pseudoscientific theory, but the article is currently presenting it as real science, and giving excuses for the lack of reputable sources. We need to improve this to comply with WP:ARB/PS, WP:V, and WP:NOR. --Philosophus 18:32, 27 May 2007 (UTC)

Request for comment, BDORT

There is a request for comment on the article BDORT, which is about a patented "alternative medecine technique". Thought this request might interest someone here. It is not about the validity of the technique (which few people in the argument are seeking to defend), but whether a New Zealand medical tribunal is discussing the patented technique or something else with the same name. See:

Thanks. 13:20, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

HHO gas and Brown's gas

You all might be interested in the deletion debate over these two articles. They are supposedly "promotional" and non-neutral, though I've been working very hard to present them in a neutral way, add notable criticism from reliable sources, etc.

I really think it's important that we have articles about these, as long as they are maintained in a neutral state. A lot of people believe the "water-fuelled car" crap and we need to debunk it.

Considering that promoters of this "technology" have tried to get the article deleted in the past, I think it's going in the right direction.  :-) — Omegatron 13:53, 8 June 2007 (UTC)

For the record, a small majority (including several admins) voted to keep the article, but it was deleted by a biased admin anyway. It is now up for deletion review, but even that continues to be a ridiculous mess. They continue to make claims like violations of WP:NOR and WP:RS, despite the fact that we've already demonstrated sources in the AfD, and despite the fact that DRV is only for discussing the deletion process itself; not the merits of the article.
But apparently it is so fundamentally impossible to find reliable sources that the opinions of a majority of competent editors are irrelevant: "Claiming Randi is a valid source for criticism is ludicrous." *Rolls eyes* — Omegatron 03:22, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

FAR

Isaac Asimov has been nominated for a featured article review. Articles are typically reviewed for two weeks. Please leave your comments and help us to return the article to featured quality. If concerns are not addressed during the review period, articles are moved onto the Featured Article Removal Candidates list for a further period, where editors may declare "Keep" or "Remove" the article from featured status. The instructions for the review process are here. Reviewers' concerns are here.

103 articles in the project

Someone has evidently been tagging away with {{Rational Skepticism}} -- Good job! Smee 09:39, 13 June 2007 (UTC).

Jamie Hyneman

A user prematurely wants to jump to arbitration after just a few edit reversions in the Jamie Hyneman article. From a quote in which Hyneman said he is pretty much against the whole God thing without explaining the specifics of what he meant, one user is insisting on calling either an atheist or (worse because it involves vague language we don't use in an encyclopedia) likely an atheist. There is a clear difference between atheism and agnosticism, and the Hyneman quote does not indicate that he is either. Actually, a person could be against God and still believe God exists. That seems unlikely in this class, but that's my point: It involves telling the readers how to interpret his sentence. Could someone please weigh on in the issue at Talk:Jamie_Hyneman and maybe help those people resolve this? Doczilla 17:08, 8 July 2007 (UTC)

New article to ponder

Geologic column looks fairly reasonable (if unreferenced), but most references to it on the web are from creationist sites (at least, the ones I clicked on were). Is this a creationist neologism? Totnesmartin 15:34, 9 July 2007 (UTC)

The user who made this article had objectionable content on her user page and has continued to make edits in contravention of Misplaced Pages policies and guidelines. I suggest that members of this project look carefully at User:Janet1983's contributions from time to time to make sure she isn't unduly promoting creation science in Misplaced Pages pages. --Mainstream astronomy 10:48, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

Dealing with those dammed new agers

After being exposed to mouth breathers who actually believe in quacks like Sylvia Browne, I'm wondering how you guys deal with the thousands of editors who should have been blocked for spreading propaganda. I mean why is it against the rules to call the scum that is Ms. Browne a Quack? She is for Christ sake! Apparently, I can't tell them to get lost casually (I made a banner telling them to). How do you deal with these magic-minded fools?Science Solider 18:08, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

Science Solider perhaps you misunderstand the nature of Misplaced Pages. As editors, is it not our job to police beliefs we disagree with. Our only job is to document the notable. New Age beliefs are not actually all that new, they are just recent remixes of various forms of pre-existing Mysticism and retreads of Spiritualism which was once so common in the US and UK as to almost be mainstream. I do not say that those beliefs are valid but their validity isn't up to me. Our job as editors is merely to document what is notable and insofar as she has sold millions of books, the woman certainly is notable. What rational Skeptics CAN do is seek to esnure that there is balance in articles dealing with what we consider to be fringe beliefs. We do this by documenting any controversies and referenciing those opposing views with reliable sources.
For example, I am an anthropologist and Folkorist. I have been working on documenting the controversy surrounding the teachings of Carols Castaneda. Mind you, people in my field were enthralled with this man for decades despite his published works being clearly just a bunch of almagamated nonsense. it is my opinion that his work is BS and therefore not my job to try and get articles on him and his offshoot topics deleted. it's also not my job to "expose" him. What I have done is describe the existing controversies over his works and cult of personailty and provide references for those statements and/or facts. In my view, this is the most productive thing we can do - seek out solid academic statements and references and add those to such articles to properly document that there is more than one view.
If Science Soldier's name was "Christian Soldier" and his statement about miss Browne was left intact, it would read like a POV attack from one religion to another wouldn't it? We must be ever aware of the danger of letting ourselves fall into the practice of Pseudoskepticism. Should we, as rational skeptics, get ourselves that worked up about beliefs we don't find valid? Isn't that too similar to fundamentalism? How do we deal with these "Magic minded fools"? Well first off, calm the heck down. Second, remember it is not the job of a scientist or science advocate to try and apply scientific reasoning in the area of religion. You m ight want to look at what Stephen Jay Gould had to say about the issue of Non-overlapping magisteria. Basically he states that Science and religion don't mix so don't try and force them to mix. So don't let religious people apply religious reasoning to science and in turn, do them the favor of not applying scientific reasong to their religious or magical beliefs. fair enough? I promise you, if you do that, you won't need as much Maalox and you'll be more fun at parties!LiPollis 19:39, 11 July 2007 (UTC)
I agree with most of what Lisa writes, but I think that we need to make sure that we maintain the integrity of the encyclopedia in terms of fact versus fiction. I was under the impression that this was what this WikiProject was about. If there are statements Sylvia Browne which indicate that she actually possesses psychic powers, that would be a compromise on the integrity of the encyclopedia. However, if there are statements to the effect that she believes she has psychic powers even though her claims have never been subjected to any testing, that would be an acceptable analysis. --Mainstream astronomy 19:44, 11 July 2007 (UTC)