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Examples

There is a discussion at Talk:Pseudoscience#Examples which may interest editors of this article. -- Levine2112 19:26, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

Read, agreed, and, I repeat: "WP:PSCI". Said: Rursus (☻) 16:59, 12 October 2008 (UTC)

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Shouldn't wikipedia belong to the article too? It's not a scientific work, but it alleges as such, and might be mistaken for science, while it in fact only repeats pseudofacts that are written outside wikipedia? Said: Rursus (☻) 16:52, 12 October 2008 (UTC)

As soon as you can find a pair of good WP:RS sources for that... :D --Enric Naval (talk) 18:08, 12 October 2008 (UTC)

OK, OK, I'll see what I can do. Said: Rursus (☻) 06:55, 13 October 2008 (UTC)

I suppose that Brittanica should also be listed then, I mean it fits your definition above. Just for the record, wikipedia does not claim to be a science, nor does it even claim that to tell the truth; it claims to report what verifiable sources say. Finally, whether, or not, it can be mistaken for science is irrelevant to its status as pseudoscience. Phoenix1177 (talk) 04:12, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

Ayurveda?

I don't see a source meeting this list's criteria (in the "skeptical groups" section or any other). AMA doesn't call it anything at all close to pseudo, and I think we've already established that Quackwatch is unsuitable for our purposes here: it's been called a partisan and unreliable source Arbcom (who, in that ruling, were right to criticize Quackwatch but wrong to criticize the editor who had used it in good faith as a V RS, as many had prior to that ruling). The final cite calls unlicensed practitioners "quacks", which is a term that can be fairly applied to unlicensed or otherwise improper practitioners of any medicine, including the modern kind (c.f. chelation therapy). --Jim Butler (t) 12:32, 15 November 2008 (UTC)

(Disclaimer: I wrote that entry with those sources, see Talk:List_of_pseudoscientific_theories/Archive_9#Ayurveda). The AMA source is only sourcing statement-of-fact explanations of what Ayurveda is. The Quackwatch source was added later, and it was repeating some of those statements, so I added it also there. (Mind you, the AMA source cites Carl Sagan lamenting "the rise of pseudoscience and superstition")

If the complaint is that it should be sourced from the CSICOP, then see that their newsletter had an article where Ayurveda was given as an example of the "scientification" of pseudoscience, and Skeptical Inquirer had an article on how alternative medicine misrepresented alternative medicine (aka pseudoscientific claims) (it cites ayurveda as the source of certain beliefs). Would that be enough to verify CSICOP's opinion?

Other sources that could possibly be used: the Skepdic Dictionary lists Ayurveda as an example of "pseudoscientific theories confuse metaphysical claims with empirical claims" website online version of paper book. The Skeptic, the journal of "Australian Skeptics" group, mentions it tangencially page 40, bottom half of middle column, and the same group listed two promoters of Ayurveda as valid reader-submitted nominees for their Bent Spoon Award (search "ayurveda" on the 2005 nominations and 2006 nominations) The Philadelphia Association for Critical Thinking has an article mentioning Ayurveda while reviewing the pseudoscientific aspects of an article on alternative medicine. The National Council Against Health Fraud gives zero scientific legitimacy for Ayurveda, albeit all mentions are either cites of other authors or tangencial mentions. James Randi also criticized it on his newsletter (ok, Randi is neither a "body" nor a "group" :D ) --Enric Naval (talk) 17:26, 15 November 2008 (UTC)

Hi Enric, thanks for gathering all those sources. For purposes of this list, my concern is that while there are quite a few of them, they don't appear to be the right kind. They (i.e., all the sources saying Ayurveda is PS) are all comments by individuals. Regarding CSICOP, while it's probably true that they wouldn't publish something that the editorial board violently disagreed with, the same is true regarding the Massachusetts Medical Society and NEJM. However, we don't assume that papers published in NEJM necessarily reflect the views of the Massachusetts Medical Society, and therefore we don't accept such sources for the first, "sci consensus" tier. Obviously (well, to most people), one author's opinion is not self-evidently the same thing as consensus of a scientific or skeptical group (it's maybe even kind of the opposite). The opinions of even prominent individuals do not suffice for meeting WP:PSCI; cf. Carroll's observation that Karl Popper called psychoanalysis pseuodscientific: WP:PSCI spefifically says that that topic should not be so characterized (and nor should any topic that is neither trivially obvious PS nor "generally considered PS by the sci community"). Putting a topic in category:pseudoscience or on this list, presently titled "List of pseudosciences and pseudoscientific concepts", in fact amounts to characterizing a topic as PS. That is indisputable.

So, if we can't cite Popper in this particular case (i.e., saying a topic *is* pseudoscience), we can't cite some random dude writing for CSICOP either. Of course, that doesn't mean we can't necessarily use those sources elsewhere on WP: e.g., in a topic's own article, or in a list like this but with an appropriately qualified title, e.g. "List of alleged pseudosciences" or "List of fields or concepts that have been labeled as pseudosciences and pseudoscientific" or something. Do you see what I'm getting at? Under the WP:PSCI part of NPOV policy, we can't designate topics as pseudoscience without being able to hit a certain threshold of source, i.e. one showing general scientific agreement. (See also WP:RS#Consensus; NPOV and VER are completely intertwined.) This issue has been a point of contention for practically the lifetime of this article, despite WP's mission to present facts about opinions, not opinions as facts.

To be honest, I'm also pretty dubious that the "statements from skeptical groups" are really indicative of general scientific agreement. I've been willing to live with including them as a sort of metastable solution, i.e. one that's the least offensive to most editors, but I would have significant problems with loosening the inclusion criteria even more, e.g. by taking articles attributed to single authors as being the voice of the publishing org. I still think the best solution would be to either retitle the article as above, or have two articles and only keep the first section (and maybe the trivial examples, following the curious logic of WP:PSCI) here. However, experience shows that such proposals always degenerate into polarization and the forwarding of proposals even worse than what we have now. So I think the best thing is to hold the line and keep the inclusion criteria from getting much broader or narrower. regards, Jim Butler (t) 09:07, 16 November 2008 (UTC)

Oh, noes, not this again, please. That section is clearly labelled as "considered by skeptic groups" to clearly separate it from the part that has statements from scientific bodies and academies, there was already a RFC on splitting the list where all those arguments and some more were put forward. About why it's silly to dismiss the statements of skeptic groups when talking of pseudoscience, see my comment at the RFC. (as an example, search for the "Hongcheng Magic Liquid" entry, which only has a book by Sagan as source, as nobody on academia commented on it)

About WP:PSCI, it looks like a strawman in this case: Popper also called Marxism a pseudo-science for the same reasons as Psychology, and nobody argues to list marxism here (among other things because 1962's Popper's definition of pseudoscience differs a bit from 2008's CSICOP's definition). Also, you ought to show that Ayurveda has a "substantial following" on mainstream, so you can show that it's only "some critics" that are saying that it's pseudoscientific....

About using statements by individuals, you see, as far as I know, CSICOP doesn't have an editorial stance (apart from a very general list), so I can't really point you to a CSICOP-sanctioned statement. We will have to do with pointing at what articles they decide to publish on their official journal and newsletter, or pointing at statements by founding members like Randi or Sagan, unless you can think of a better way to decide it. Also, it's pretty clear to everyone that CSICOP considers pretty much all of alternative medicine to be pseudoscience, and ayurveda is an alternative medicine, so I don't think that this part is open to debate... unless you want to argue that CSICOP actually considers Ayurveda as serious science :D --Enric Naval (talk) 22:30, 16 November 2008 (UTC)

"Oh noes"? I don't think you understood my statement: I said that while I had serious reservations about the skepticial society section being included in this list as currently titled, I'm cool with keeping it as a compromise, but not with expanding the inclusion criteria further to include statements by individuals.

The point with Popper is that statements by individuals don't suffice, per WP:PSCI (part of NPOV, not quite a strawman). It's pure original synthesis, not to mention utter absurdity, to argue that "hey, no one contradicted that guy, so his views must represent sci consensus". That's why this edit of yours is wrong in practically every respect possible (WP:UNDUE, WP:RS#Consensus, WP:SYN). We may have to go to article RfC over your fanciful attempt to redefine scientific consensus.

There's a very fundamental point you're just not grokking, Enric: verifiability, not truth. Sure, lots of scientifically-minded types think lots of things are bullshit, if they even consider them at all. Guess what? We don't say, "hey, no way CSICOP could possibly think Ayurveda is for real, let's put it on the pseudoscience list". There's this thing called WP:V that says we have to find a suitable source. And we follow NPOV, which includes WP:PSCI. Topics like Ayurveda (which, from a worldwide view, certainly have a substantial following) don't necessarily have to be assumed pseudoscientific until proven otherwise, or assumed scientific until proven otherwise. They don't have to be characterized as one or the other at all, unless we can find the proper source saying so. If you can't find that source, you don't "make do" with what you have just because you really want to list as many pseudosciences as possible: instead, you work those sources into WP where you can, in ways that are consistent with NPOV. regards, Jim Butler (t) 23:44, 16 November 2008 (UTC)

P.S. The Hongcheng thing clearly belongs on a list like this, but we should tweak the inclusion criteria of that section to include statements by groups (like governmental organizations) that aren't official scientific bodies, but that do, like sci-skeptic groups that are composed of both scientists and laypeople, carry some weight of consensus. --Jim Butler (t) 02:20, 17 November 2008 (UTC)

I opened an article RFC below, as it seems the best course of action. I agree that statements by bodies like governamental organizations can be added.

About Ayurveda, I need to check other sources and tweak that entry, can't do right now. --Enric Naval (talk) 19:36, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

I changed the entry to "Maharashi's Ayurveda", as that's the most pseudoscientific part of it. I need to check some stuff, like a JAMA article destroying Maharashi's and Deepak's version of Ayurveda. It seems that Maharisihi's version of Ayurveda is probably different from what traditional ayurveda was, but I'm unsure on whether the Ayurveda being teached at India's medicine schools is based on Marasishi's version or not. --Enric Naval (talk) 23:11, 21 November 2008 (UTC)

We should be careful about government statements, though: slippery slope, especially from dictatorships, or for that matter highly idealogical governments that have taken anti-science positions for political reasons (cough Bush administration cough). IMO, Hongcheng Magic Liquid falls under WP:PSCI's "obvious pseudoscience", so we don't have to worry about the specific source.

However, the Ayurveda entry, Maharishi or not, still lacks a source fitting the inclusion criteria of the section it is in, or indeed any section on the list; and more importantly, it lacks a source fitting either of the two categories permitted under WP:PSCI. That's a simple fact; the only thing to debate is whether to expand the list's inclusion criteria, or whether to include such information someplace else on WP in a way that doesn't violate WP:PSCI by "characterizing" them as pseudoscience, as inclusion on this list plainly does. Our discussion seems to be hung up on that point, as well as the RfC below, and to some extent the very existence of the skeptic-group section; so perhaps the next thing to do is ask ArbCom for a limited comment clarifying the relevant ruling, WP:PSEUDOSCIENCE. I think there's an avenue to do that, someplace... I'll try and find it. Let's discuss the wording before submitting it. (I thought you did a very nice, neutral, accurate job of presenting the issue in the RfC, btw. I just want to make sure we include all the relevant issues so we don't have to pester ArbCom more than once.)

A bit more re Ayurveda: (1) No, Maharishi's style isn't taught in Indian med schools, fwiw. (2) If we have a suitable source for "quantum" stuff, then whatever Chopra said might go under that. --Jim Butler (t) 09:43, 25 November 2008 (UTC)

Yeah, government statements have to be taken in context.

Chopra is already under quantum mysticism, search for "Quantum Quackery" on the article. For CSICOP's position on Chopra, see . On the meeting of the American Physical Society, a panel was presented by CSICOP where he was talked about while explaining "some of the wackier attempts to misuse physics" .

For CSICOP's position on Maharishi's Ayur-veda, it seems that CSICOP centrates mostly on his TM and not on his ayurveda, see . However, it turns out that "Maharishi Ayur-Veda is a registered trademark for a line of TM products and services. Dr Chopra had been the sole stockholder, president, treasurer, and clerk of the company that sells Maharishi Ayur-Veda products". So, I'll be damned if skeptic groups like CSICOP don't consider it as clear pseudoscience, as it's owned by Chopra and thought out by Maharishi, and CSICOP considers the ideas of both of them as pseudoscience, even if there is not any "smoking gun" that I can point at. (And the Indian CSICOP published on "Indian Skeptic" two articles relating Maharishi Ayurveda with TM and Chopra respectively: "From Spiritual Sadhana to Maharishi Ayurveda: Transcendental Meditation Evolves" and "Deepak Chopra and Maharishi Ayurvedie Medicine"). And the list is about stuff that groups like CSICOP consider pseudoscience, while WP:PSCI is about what wikipedia should consider pseudoscience.

Traditional Ayurveda would not be considered pseudoscience, as I initially believed. For example, an article on Annals of Internal Medicine explicitely includes it on a different section (I need to tweak the entry again to reflect that and make what it makes reference to).

See also "The authors misrepresented Maharishi Ayur-Veda to JAMA as Ayurvedic medicine, the ancient, traditional health care system of India, rather than a trademark for a brand of products and services marketed since 1985 by the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi's complex network of research, educational, and commercial organizations." --Enric Naval (talk) 03:57, 26 November 2008 (UTC)

Disagreement in a nutshell (re: title a/o inclusion criteria)

(de-indent, continuing from above) Enric, I think this comment of yours sums up our disagreement:

"And the list is about stuff that groups like CSICOP consider pseudoscience, while WP:PSCI is about what wikipedia should consider pseudoscience."

Ah, but this list falls under Misplaced Pages's rules, and its title unambiguously states that the topics are pseudosciences, not that they are "considered pseudosciences (according to certain groups)". Do you see?

To clarify: If this list is about what groups like CSICOP, then it should have a title reflecting that, e.g. "List of topics considered pseudoscientific by skeptical organizations". Instead, it has the title "List of pseudosciences and pseudoscientific concepts": in other words, its title explicitly says "this is what Misplaced Pages considers pseudoscience". The present inclusion criteria violate NPOV, which is why I intend to seek comment from the ArbCom.

For the last two years or so, we have had quite as few editors who believe their own views about pseudoscience, and not WP policy, should dictate what goes on the list. Some (not you) have tended to !vote with little or no explanation of their reasoning, and at least one editor, ScienceApologist (cf. below and recent edit history), has additionally engaged in varying degrees of incivility, WP:TE and edit warring to try and get his way. In a situation like this, there's only one thing we need: more cowbell! more WP:DR, specifically a limited ArbCom comment on how the relevant ruling, WP:PSEUDOSCIENCE, applies to this and perhaps a few related articles.

(Footnote re Ayurveda and CSICOP: I still don't see a group statement from CSICOP, but please correct me if I'm wrong.) regards, Jim Butler (t) 04:14, 27 November 2008 (UTC)

RfC: Can we use individual staments to measure scientific consensus on pseudoscience

Template:RFCsci

On the Pseudoscientific concepts per scientific consensus, there is a dispute (see section above) on WP:NPOV/WP:PSCI interpretation and on what type of sources are sufficient to WP:V verify properly the "scientific consensus" on a topic. This part is undisputed:

The following have broad consensus concerning their pseudoscientific status. Indicative of this are assertions by mainstream, specialized scientific bodies (e.g., a society of plasma physicists) or one or more national- or regional-level Academies of Science

And this other part was removed as a violation of WP:UNDUE, WP:RS#Consensus and WP:SYN (see section above):

or, in the case of non-notable concepts that have received no attention from those bodies and academies, and only then, the indicative can be that expert scientists have challenged the legitimacy of these ideas and no other expert scientists have contradicted them.

The question is, should we keep this text or remove it?

• keep there are topics notable enough to get an article, but not notable enough to get a statement by a scientific body declaring them pseudoscientific (and/or unscientific), so it's impossible to meet that level of verifiability. WP:PSCI does not require statements from scientific or governmental bodies, if there is a statement by a notable scientist of the field on a reliable source saying that it's pseudoscience, and no other notable scientists saying that it's not, then that should be enough. There is no requirement anywhere that sources for scientific consensus can't be from individual scientists. WP:RS#Consensus says, for example, that consensus can be determined from "independent secondary or tertiary sources that come to the same conclusion", and it just warns about using reliable sources for claims of "most scientists". The section of the policy has never required anything other than "a reliable source for the consensus" (or a version of that wording), see the creation of the section on December 2006, and versions of January 2007 and April 2008. --Enric Naval (talk) 19:32, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

Comment: If we are talking about "non-notable concepts", how can there be scientific consensus? WP:N is the criterion for whether an article per se should exist, not whether it should be on a list. Non-notable things can be on the list, per WP:PSCI, but it seems to me that those would go under "obvious pseudoscience" rather than "generally considered pseudoscience" by the sci community. (The exception would be for obscure topics that belong to a an established pseudoscientific superset, e.g. perpetual motion machines, and our existing wording does cover that.) "Generally considered" requires a high threshold in terms of sourcing; "obvious" does not. You say "There is no requirement anywhere that sources for scientific consensus (or "most scientists") can't be from individual scientists" -- is there a V RS, anywhere, saying that they can or should, and when they should? Per WP:BURDEN, you need to provide one if you want to put single scientists alongside scientific academies. Otherwise there's a huge WP:UNDUE problem. Or we can just go with "obvious pseudoscience", which stuff like "Hongcheng liquid" obviously is, and put it under the "idiosyncratic" heading or something like that. regards, Jim Butler (t) 21:53, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

• Keep per Enric's arguments. Statements that this is contrary to the ArbCom findings are incorrect, and it is misleading to say that we are taking one persons view and using it to represent consensus. Protestations that we should wait for the Royal Society or similar to declare something PS grossly misunderstand the nature of these organisations and are unreasonable demands that would damage the Misplaced Pages project. Verbal chat 19:38, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

  Also Keep current name. There are no NPOV, V, or RS problems with the article content or the name. Renaming has been the subject of other RfCs, and has not gained consensus. Verbal chat 07:41, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

  Also keep in current location. There are no NPOV, V, or RS problems with current placing or usage. Basically No Change. Verbal chat 20:10, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

  Question You seem to have a novel notion of "scientific consensus": you're saying that somehow we can infer it from one scientist's stated opinion. Wow. One dude = consensus. That is amazing -- it's like that scientist must have superpowers or something, to be able to impose the sheer force of his will upon reality, thereby forging a sort of singular consensus. Hey, consensus means agreement, right? And no good scientist would disagree with himself! The implications are profound... so, um... got a source supporting your position? --Jim Butler (t) 21:53, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

  Isn't it obvious? Since all expert scientists are always objective and fully informed when talking about science, and there is only one, objective, scientific truth, a statement by a single expert scientist is of course enough. The qualifications ("non-notable concept", no contradiction) are only needed to prevent damage in case someone is not actually a real expert scientist. Sadly, that's not such a rare phenomenon, after all.

  More seriously, Verbal, there are plenty of brilliant scientists who are openly racist, antisemitic, antiislamic, etc. Would you trust their judgement about a somewhat dubious field that is tangential to their main area of expertise? What if we don't know anything about the expert scientists character? Scientists may stay away from a subject because they think it's not sufficiently promising, or because of funding problems. It's unfair to take this as prima facie evidence it is pseudoscience, and to lower the bar for applying this pejorative label so extremely. --Hans Adler (talk) 23:17, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

  Maybe in this case "scientific consensus" is like a singularity or a unitary executive.  ;-) --Jim Butler (t) 07:25, 20 November 2008 (UTC)

  Where have I said or supported the use of a single persons opinion to describe scientific consensus? Verbal chat 07:58, 20 November 2008 (UTC)

  I think it was the part where you supported keeping the proposed wording, in the RfC, under the indicated section. --Jim Butler (t) 08:47, 20 November 2008 (UTC)

  Note the plural: "scientists". Don't link to inappropriate and silly essays please, it's rude. A better link would be one where I say a single persons say so is allowed - which I haven't done. That isn't what the wording asks for. Scientists are multiple people, a scientist is a single person. m:Don't_be_dense indeed. I am therefore fully endorsing the view that Enric has given. There is another essay that might be relevant for you behaviour, Jim, but I'm too polite to link to it. Indeed, I specifically stated "it is misleading to say that we are taking one persons view and using it to represent consensus". Verbal chat 10:07, 20 November 2008 (UTC)

  That sounds like a distinction without a difference: using two or three scientists (or five or fifty, if they're just signing a petition or something) to indicate "consensus" is just as ridiculous as using one. (Yes, such sources have weight; no, they shouldn't be used under the "consensus" header.) If some alt-med article wanted to cite a study involving a few self-selected patients, "skeptical" editors would nuke the source, and rightly so; yet those same editors are saying they want to use the same type of source here?? Seriously, the irony astounds me.

  So, I'm sorry if I misrepresented your position, but you did say you agreed with Enric's comment above (emphasis mine), which included the statement that "if there is a statement by a notable scientist of the field on a reliable source saying that it's pseudoscience, and no other notable scientists saying that it's not, then that should be enough." And above, you again said you are "fully endorsing" Enric's position, while in the next breath you contradict yourself and reiterate that "it is misleading to say that we are taking one persons view and using it to represent consensus". So maybe you'll excuse my confusion. Where do you and Enric agree, and where do you diverge? Maybe one scientist isn't consensus, but at what point when you add the second or third or tenth or whatever, does consensus emerge? How exactly does that work? What RS says things work that way? This reminds me of a quote on Eldereft's user page: "The plural of anecdote is confirmation bias".

  I'm not meaning to be a WP:DICK, but I do find it unhelpful when editors just state their opinion and don't explain their reasoning with detail or consistency. If I've misunderstood, let alone misrepresented, your position, my apologies; please assume I'm dense and explain specifically how WP policy supports your position, and why my interpretation is wrong. And again, please show us a source supporting your position regarding what constitutes "consensus we can believe in", so to speak. --Jim Butler (t) 12:23, 20 November 2008 (UTC)

  I agree (more or less) with Jim Butler that this is what the RfC is about. You even seem to be endorsing Enric's clear statement: "There is no requirement anywhere that sources for scientific consensus can't be from individual scientists." The problem is that we can't rely on such statements to be interpreted reasonably. Do you remember the spiteful Nigerian quackery article, the abstract of which was for a long time our only source for claiming homeopathy to be pseudoscience? If that's not what you have in mind, you should be more careful about what you endorse.

  BTW, you may be wondering why I didn't comment elsewhere in this RfC. That's because while I think the current wording is no good, the question is complex and I am not sure what would be the best solution. (Short of removing everything non-notable from this list, that is. I am generally deletionist wrt lists and categories, and most of this article seems to be an excuse for labelling. I don't see why it's encyclopedic to list non-notable and borderline pseudosciences. But that's really an argument for merging into pseudoscience.) --Hans Adler (talk) 09:03, 20 November 2008 (UTC)

  Hi Hans. I agree with you that the word of one person generally shouldn't be used (possible exceptions for people like Feynman, and perhaps the head of the RS, or similar, but those would need discussion). Jim has (AGF) misunderstood my comments and the original wording, and the RS policy, where it has always been plural; "from individual scientists" not "from a scientist". I think this distinction is important, but seems to have confused a few people. Verbal chat 10:16, 20 November 2008 (UTC)

  The text we are discussing (the one in bold above) has "expert scientists" in a context that is already plural ("in the case of non-notable concepts"). Given the context (for non-notable pseudoscience it's hard enough to find even one expert; a history of label pushing related to pseudoscience; no details about the number of experts required) I don't think it's correct to read it the way you seem to be doing, and even if it was correct, many would misread it.

  Moreover, I can't find your statement about individual scientists in WP:RS. What I found instead under WP:RS#Consensus: "The statement that all or most scientists, scholars, or ministers hold a certain view requires a reliable source." After reading the sentence in context I think it says even if there is unanimous agreement among all physics textbooks and all physicists (who talk about the topic) that things tend to fall down, saying there is a scientific consensus on the question still requires a RS that says there is such a consensus. (In this case I would say WP:IAR, but not in a contentious matter.) --Hans Adler (talk) 11:19, 20 November 2008 (UTC)

• Keep There are some things that are clearly pseudoscience that the academies have not yet issued statements on. It would be disingenuous to not label these as pseudoscience just because the academies have better things to do. -Atmoz (talk) 23:05, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

Comment We can do that under a different section than the "scientific consensus" one. WP:PSCI mentions two categories: "generally considered PS by the sci community" and "obvious pseudoscience". Isn't it more encyclopedic to be a bit more selective with the former? --Jim Butler (t) 21:53, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

• Keep. Well formulated and necessary given the amount of pseudoscience cropping up on this wiki. Pcap ping 14:36, 19 November 2008 (UTC)
• Keep, but not in this section (see proposal below) On reflection, the particular sentence debated in this RfC sounds OK to include in the list as titled, but why don't we just stick it under the Idiosyncratic ideas section instead of the "scientific consensus" section? I agree with all the other editors who have commented so far that we should include the info on WP, but we shouldn't overreach: it cheapens scientific consensus to throw the term around casually and WP:SYN-ishly assume it exists. We can just go with WP:PSCI's "obvious pseudoscience" for topics that are obscure and flaky enough for just one major dude to have commented on, no? As I mentioned above, how can "scientific consensus" exist over obscure things, except for those that belong to a an established pseudoscientific superset, e.g. yet another perpetual motion machine?

However, if someone can produce an RS supporting the position that uncontradicted statements by notable scientists really can indicate a scientific consensus position on fringe topics, then sure, let's do it. (My objections, expressed in the section above, to expanding the inclusion criteria without changing the list's title apply to including sources like the one disputed for Ayurveda, i.e. individual, non-notable scientists writing for CSICOP, or any single source commenting on a notable topic, like chiropractic, etc.) regards, Jim Butler (t) 19:54, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

• Drop, or any alternative solution that solves the problem I will describe. It took some time for me to get an opinion about this, but by now I feel very strongly that we have no business diluting WP:RS#Consensus:

The existence of a consensus within an academic community may be indicated, for example, by independent secondary or tertiary sources that come to the same conclusion. The statement that all or most scientists, scholars, or ministers hold a certain view requires a reliable source. Without it, opinions should be identified as those of particular, named sources. Editors should avoid original research especially with regard to making blanket statements based on novel syntheses of disparate material.

Consensus claims based on original research is exactly what we are discussing here; and in the context of a pejorative label, too. We are discussing the following argument, which is a clear case of WP:SYN: "A, B, C said X is the case. A, B, C are experts on the subject. No other experts contradicted them. Therefore A, B, C is scientific consensus." --Hans Adler (talk) 22:42, 20 November 2008 (UTC)

Comment Completely agree. I too am dubious about many aspects of this list, and while I'm open to compromises (cf. below), my own views are very close to yours. Couldn't have said it better. regards, Jim Butler (t) 02:31, 22 November 2008 (UTC)

Note: This discussion has been listed on the Fringe theories noticeboard. - Eldereft (cont.) 17:06, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

• Drop: if these topics are truly non-notable then they should not be included in this article. If, on the other hand, they are notable then there should be demonstrable scientific consensus to deserve inclusion here. Individuals' opinions may well deserve mention on the topic's own page, but are not justification for inclusion here. hgilbert (talk) 02:33, 21 November 2008 (UTC)

Obviously these topics are notable in the sense of Misplaced Pages, since they all have articles. Notability in the field of science that is qualified to talk about them is an entirely different matter, though. I think something like the section "idiosyncratic ideas" really is in order here, but its introduction should explain (in guarded language!) the connection to the article's title. --Hans Adler (talk) 08:57, 21 November 2008 (UTC)

I mean notable as examples of pseudoscience. If they are notable in this respect, sources (generally more than a single individual scientist) will have mentioned this connection. If they are not, they don't belong here (this is not meant to be an exhaustive list of every topic in connection with which someone has used the term pseudoscience, or an equivalent!) hgilbert (talk) 03:54, 23 November 2008 (UTC)

I completely agree with Hans Adler's and Hgilbert's comments in this thread. --Jim Butler (t) 09:56, 25 November 2008 (UTC)

• Keep but word it less prescriptively. There will obviously be borderline situations, and it will depend on the degree of authority. DGG (talk) 02:22, 22 November 2008 (UTC)

Hi DGG - can you explain why you mean by "word it less prescriptively"? Also, would you be open to moving the wording to a different section, cf. below? thanks, Jim Butler (t) 02:36, 22 November 2008 (UTC)

• Comment: I've suggested just above, under the preceding section, that if we can't resolve this RfC we may want to go to ArbCom. I think there's a particular, limited avenue for asking them to clarify a particular ruling, which in this case is WP:PSEUDOSCIENCE. I'll try and find out how to do that; anyone else know? regards, Jim Butler (t) 09:48, 25 November 2008 (UTC)

• Remove This list is of poor quality and would be best deleted. But while it exists, it should be held to a high standard and so the statement of a single person is not enough to establish such a POV. For one thing, who are "expert" in such cases? For example, consider faith healing. It doesn't seem to me that this is a science of any sort - it seems to be a practical art inspired by religious ideas. But who would be the experts on such a categorisation - philologists; philosophers; historians of science; theologians; etc? We need a broad consensus of such, not a narrow one, in order to make such a finding. Colonel Warden (talk) 14:48, 26 November 2008 (UTC)

• Remove Per Colonel Warden. In general, a list of what some skeptic groups or persons have labeled "Pseudoscience" seems trivial. Further, as lists are subject to NPOV, the compilation of a list based solely on unconfirmed opinions seems a bit POV-forkish. We should keep the criteria high and - as per WP:PSCI - only include topics which are generally considered pseudoscience or an obvious pseudoscience. And in that case why have this when we already have Category:Pseudoscience? -- Levine2112 23:13, 26 November 2008 (UTC)

Proposed alternative, re RfC above: keep the wording, different section

Proposal: include the disputed wording (italicized below) under the section Idiosyncratic ideas, in the spirit of WP:PSCI's "obvious pseudoscience":

• The following concepts have only a very small number of proponents, yet have become notable; or have enjoyed popularity as fads or otherwise received attention but have become discredited. An indication of this can be that one or more expert scientists have challenged the legitimacy of these ideas and no other expert scientists have contradicted them.

I think it makes sense to put the wording here, because the topics it covers should indeed be on the list, but by definition there will be no scientific consensus for non-notable topics. (The exception would be for topics that are just obvious variations on a theme in the first section, e.g. various kind of "creation science" which we include without an academy-level statement for each one: pseudoscience is indeed a many-headed hydra.) Thoughts? -Jim Butler (t) 08:06, 20 November 2008 (UTC)

Disagree per arguments in RfC above. Verbal chat 08:41, 20 November 2008 (UTC)

You mean the part where you explain "There are no NPOV, V, or RS problems with current placing or usage"? Gee, thanks for clarifying. --Jim Butler (t) 08:51, 20 November 2008 (UTC)

Snark aside, it would be helpful if you could explain the reasoning behind your opinions. It's very hard to pursue compromise without knowing why other editors agree or disagree. regards, Jim Butler (t) 02:34, 22 November 2008 (UTC)

Comment. Basically, this proposal has the opposite effect of the previous one, so it's unlikely to work as a compromise. The relaxed consensus definition (which I reject) might have allowed us to move some topics from "Idiosyncratic ideas" to "Pseudoscientific concepts per scientific consensus"; this proposal has the effect that a topic that is not even discussed by a single expert must be dropped from "Idiosyncratic ideas". I think that would be a good thing, since not being discussed at all is a good indication for not being noteworthy in this article. But I don't really care. --Hans Adler (talk) 22:50, 20 November 2008 (UTC)

Hans - Regarding the "Idiosyncratic" section, I didn't mean to suggest that we start excluding stuff like "Time Cube" that no scientific RS has deigned to comment upon. I just meant we might add some more stuff to that section. But anyway, I like Enric's idea below to have these things in their own section. And I absolutely, 100% agree that we should not relax the definition for scientific consensus; if we do that, we might as well quit pretending WP is an encyclopedia at all. (Ironically, I bet a large plurality of scientists and academics, if not a majority, already don't take WP very seriously. Wonder why.) --Jim Butler (t) 09:05, 22 November 2008 (UTC)

Hum, I don't like the idea of mixing it with "idiosyncratic ideas", but only because it seems to be a different thing. Maybe, as a compromise, we can make a separate section for "topics called pseudoscience by individual scientists (and not covered by neither scientific bodies nor skeptic groups)" or something --Enric Naval (talk) 22:30, 21 November 2008 (UTC)

Sounds good, as long as we stick to relatively "obvious pseudosciences" per WP:PSCI and don't start including "questionable sciences", as I mentioned above under the RfC. (That simply means we wouldn't use Popper for psychoanalysis, or Andrew Weil for chiropractic, etc.: we'll have alter the wording somehow to be explicit about WP:PSCI's distinction from the start, or else we may see "criterion drift" as some editors start adding anything that a single scientist has commented on, despite WP:PSCI.) Otherwise, sure: since my other concern is that we not put it under the "sci consenus" section (or any section implying consensus by a group), it would be fine to put it in its own section. thanks, Jim Butler (t) 08:50, 22 November 2008 (UTC)

I need to go down the list and pick a few examples, so we can discuss them --Enric Naval (talk) 04:17, 26 November 2008 (UTC)

Remember this? -- This is a Solomon's Sword solution to the above morass

Talk:List_of_pseudoscientific_theories/Archive_9#Counter_proposal? I do. The consensus is that a two-tiered system demarcating difference between "skeptical" organizations and "scientific societies" is not supported by reliable sources and is essentially an original synthesis attempt to demarcate between things that Wikiepdia cannot demarcate. We therefore combine the two sections as per the consensus seen in that section. I'm surprised that this wasn't done earlier. ScienceApologist (talk) 15:31, 26 November 2008 (UTC)

Ahem. I haven't got the time to look at your edits in detail or to follow the link, because my little daughter is bothering me. Will try to do all that later. But did you consider the fact that there is also an obvious demarcation problem between "sceptical" and "pseudosceptical" organizations? --Hans Adler (talk) 17:44, 26 November 2008 (UTC)

Show me a reliable source which reliably demarcates anything being "pseudoskeptical". ScienceApologist (talk) 18:05, 26 November 2008 (UTC)

Show me a reliable source which reliably lumps together sceptical organisations and scientific societies. Aren't they typically run by scientific laypeople? Doesn't their membership consist mostly of people who are at most school teachers of scientific subjects? Do they all occasionally accept that they got something wrong, or do some of them suffer from the same subjective infallibility that pseudoscientists do? --Hans Adler (talk) 18:50, 26 November 2008 (UTC)

If you would like to impeach any source in the article, you may do so by asking WP:RSN if it is a good source for the article. Otherwise, I think we're done playing games here. Specific issues with the article only, please. General critiques such as the one you are attempting do not help. ScienceApologist (talk) 18:59, 26 November 2008 (UTC)

OK, now I had the time to at least look at the article, and I can certainly return the compliment about "playing games". Your version gives statements by " skeptical groups" the authority (by association) of statements by scientific societies. That's completely unacceptable, since they are not even playing in the same league. Scientific societies become notable by having a lot of members who are scientists. Sceptical organisations become notable by doing good media work, so their notability is only indirectly correlated with their reliability. As a result of your edits we had the following structure:

List of sciences and pseudoscientific concepts (article title)

Topics which notable scientific or skeptical groups consider to be pseudoscientific (section title)

Hypnosis is actually not pseudoscientific itself, but it's often used in pseudoscientific contexts.

To make this clear: If you don't want a separate section about pseudosciences by scientific consensus, that's fine with me. Just put everything into the section for topics criticised by sceptical organisations. (I would be very surprised if the first category wasn't a proper subset of the second.) What is completely acceptable is giving fake authority to the entire second category by merging parts of the description of the first category into it. If you don't understand what I am talking about, think about the following:

List of things that are flat

List of things that scientists;; or notable works of literature consider to be flat

Earth is where we all live. Nowadays there is almost universal agreement that it is not flat, but many literary works, including…

Last time there was no consensus for your proposal, and your representing it as a compromise doesn't make a consensus, either. For some reason I don't think you would see removing all the misleading references to scientific bodies or scientific consensus as a compromise, so I have simply reverted. If I was wrong, please say so. --Hans Adler (talk) 21:04, 26 November 2008 (UTC)

There is consensus for the proposal, no one has put forth any suggestions for what distinguishes a "skeptical" organization from a "scientific" organization and Misplaced Pages cannot be in the business of demarcating between the two. If you have a source which offers a demarcation between the two, show it. Otherwise, please stop being obstructionist. ScienceApologist (talk) 22:39, 26 November 2008 (UTC)

I read through the proposal and saw no consensus for it. This is a major and controversial edit which you are suggesting. Please let's open it up for community discussion before reverting again. Thanks. -- Levine2112 23:16, 26 November 2008 (UTC)

ALREADY HAPPENED AND NO ONE DISAGREED.

Further, if we are to keep the "Skeptics" section (which I am against), I think it is important to demarcate what is generally considered "pseudoscience" by the scientific community and what is only labeled as such by a skeptical organization or person. -- Levine2112 23:19, 26 November 2008 (UTC)

There are no reliable sources that distinguish between a "skeptical organization" and a "scientific organization". This is just proven disruptive editors like Levine2112 currently blocked for similar actions at Chiropractic confusing the issue.

ScienceApologist (talk) 23:24, 26 November 2008 (UTC)

I have reverted because, as usua,.

There is clearly a difference between scientific organizations and skeptical organizations, and no one would confute the two. It is appropriate to distinguish between two very distinct types of entities. It is not appropriate to attack other editors, even (especially?) in edit summaries; ad hominem arguments (read, WP:Personal attacks) are unacceptable here. Let's look at the current version; where are the problems? The advantages? hgilbert (talk) 00:04, 27 November 2008 (UTC)

According to WP:PSCI: Questionable science: "Theories which have a substantial following, such as psychoanalysis, but which some critics allege to be pseudoscience, may contain information to that effect, but generally should not be so characterized." We may contain information to that effect. QuackGuru 00:21, 27 November 2008 (UTC)

QG, you are not helping by introducing additional complexity. So far it was only an edit war about the structure of the list. Now you have introduced another dimension. In any case I have asked for page protection at WP:ANI#List of pseudosciences and pseudoscientific concepts. It's a pity that SA's edit behaviour (edit-warring instead of discussion) will probably be rewarded by protection on essentially his version, so that he can safely continue to not engage in reasonable dialogue. --Hans Adler (talk) 00:38, 27 November 2008 (UTC)

I don't know what you want to say with your quotation. It clearly says that, e.g., in the article psychoanalysis we may mention that critics say it is a pseudoscience. (FWIW, I agree with them, more or less.) It says nothing about whether we are allowed to put psychoanalysis in a "list of pseudosciences", although it seems clear that we break the spirit of the ruling if we do it without some kind of qualification. These questions have nothing to do with the original dispute here. Did you get confused because ScienceApologist moved things around? --Hans Adler (talk) 00:46, 27 November 2008 (UTC)

The section title is Topics which notable scientific or skeptical groups consider to be pseudoscientific. This is attributed per WP:PSCI. QuackGuru 00:51, 27 November 2008 (UTC)

Your explanation makes no sense to me. My point is that it is improper to have a list of topics criticised by sceptical organisations and to give the impression that they are criticised by scientific organisations. ScienceApologist's point is apparently that he proposed his changes 3 months ago and the people who disagreed with him at the time didn't use bold face – and that whoever disagrees with him is a POV pusher. What's your point? --Hans Adler (talk) 01:02, 27 November 2008 (UTC)

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