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Arbitration Ruling on Race and Intelligence The article The IQ Controversy, the Media and Public Policy, along with other articles relating to the area of conflict (namely, the intersection of race/ethnicity and human abilities and behaviour, broadly construed), is currently subject to active arbitration remedies, described in a 2010 Arbitration Committee case where the articulated principles included: Pillars: Misplaced Pages articles must be neutral, verifiable and must not contain original research. Those founding principles (the Pillars) are not negotiable and cannot be overruled, even when apparent consensus to do so exists. Original research: Misplaced Pages defines "original research" as "facts, allegations, ideas, and stories not already published by reliable sources". In particular, analyses or conclusions not already published in reliable, third-party, published sources with a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy are not appropriate for inclusion in articles. Correct use of sources: Misplaced Pages articles should be based on reliable, published secondary sources and, to a lesser extent, on tertiary sources. Primary sources are permitted if used carefully. All interpretive claims, analyses, or synthetic claims about primary sources must be referenced to a secondary source, rather than to original analysis of the primary-source material by Misplaced Pages editors. Advocacy: Misplaced Pages strives towards a neutral point of view. Accordingly, it is not the appropriate venue for advocacy or for advancing a specific point of view. While coverage of all significant points of view is a necessary part of balancing an article, striving to give exposure to minority viewpoints that are not significantly expressed in reliable secondary sources is not. Single purpose accounts: Single purpose accounts are expected to contribute neutrally instead of following their own agenda and, in particular, should take care to avoid creating the impression that their focus on one topic is non-neutral, which could strongly suggest that their editing is not compatible with the goals of this project. Decorum: Misplaced Pages users are expected to behave reasonably, calmly, and courteously in their interactions with other users; to approach even difficult situations in a dignified fashion and with a constructive and collaborative outlook; and to avoid acting in a manner that brings the project into disrepute. Unseemly conduct, such as personal attacks, incivility, assumptions of bad faith, harassment, or disruptive point-making, is prohibited. Tag-team editing: Tag teams work in unison to push a particular point of view. Tag-team editing – to thwart core policies (neutral point of view, verifiability, and no original research); or to evade procedural restrictions such as the three revert rule or to violate behavioural norms by edit warring; or to attempt to exert ownership over articles; or otherwise to prevent consensus prevailing – is prohibited. If you are a new editor, or an editor unfamiliar with the situation, please follow the above guidelines. You may also wish to review the full arbitration case page. If you are unsure if your edit is appropriate, discuss it here on this talk page first.

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This article is within the scope of WikiProject Books. To participate in the project, please visit its page, where you can join the project and discuss matters related to book articles. To use this banner, please refer to the documentation. To improve this article, please refer to the relevant guideline for the type of work.BooksWikipedia:WikiProject BooksTemplate:WikiProject BooksBook Start This article has been rated as Start-class on Misplaced Pages's content assessment scale.

This article was nominated for deletion on 19 August 2010 (UTC). The result of the discussion was no consensus.

This article was nominated for deletion on 19 October 2009 (UTC). The result of the discussion was no consensus.

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Intelligence Citations Bibliography for Articles Related to IQ Testing

You may find it helpful while reading or editing articles to look at a bibliography of Intelligence Citations, posted for the use of all Wikipedians who have occasion to edit articles on human intelligence and related issues. I happen to have circulating access to a huge academic research library at a university with an active research program in these issues (and to another library that is one of the ten largest public library systems in the United States) and have been researching these issues since 1989. You are welcome to use these citations for your own research. You can help other Wikipedians by suggesting new sources through comments on that page. It will be extremely helpful for articles on human intelligence to edit them according to the Misplaced Pages standards for reliable sources for medicine-related articles, as it is important to get these issues as well verified as possible. -- WeijiBaikeBianji (talk) 03:55, 11 August 2010 (UTC)

I added the POV tag on 10 August 2010; let's discuss whether this article should be edited or deleted.

I see there was no consensus the last time this article was discussed for deletion. As the ArbCom case winds down, perhaps editors can calmly consider the issue of what the notability of the study/book was or is, and what would be an encyclopedic, NPOV way to discuss it in this article or in a section some other article(s) if this article is deleted. -- WeijiBaikeBianji (talk) 04:00, 11 August 2010 (UTC)

It occurs to me that a statistics expert should take a look at how the study was conducted. -- WeijiBaikeBianji (talk) 04:02, 11 August 2010 (UTC)

I've added an "expert needed" template and posted a short message on the talk page of the Statistics portal about this issue. I've also reverted gthe article one notch to a version which seemed less POVish to me.--Ramdrake (talk) 04:38, 11 August 2010 (UTC)

This is an example of a short survey that was enlarged to a book. The writers appear to have been lobbyists. Once the WP article exists, the only method for discussing or editing it is to use secondary sources. It has not been discussed very much in the literature. I don't see how asking for a wikipedia editor with knowledge of statistics would help; I don't know whether any subsequent secondary source has given a detailed account of the statistical significance of the survey (Jencks & Phillips comment in a footnote on one question), but that seems to be the place to look for any comment—anything else would essentially amount to WP:OR. Mathsci (talk) 06:24, 11 August 2010 (UTC)

Is there perhaps some Misplaced Pages criterion for articles about books that needs to be looked at here? Your point on original research is well taken, but perhaps someone with more statistics knowledge than I have can point to sources that generally discuss issues of survey design and survey interpretation, which would be germane insofar as sources make clear how this survey was designed and interpreted. -- WeijiBaikeBianji (talk) 13:34, 11 August 2010 (UTC)

Ramdrake, I don’t approve of your large rollback of Victor Chmara’s changes. As he explained in his edit summary, mentioning Horowitz’s book is synth, because Horowitz does not discuss this study. The fact that Jensen, Eysenck, Gottfredson and Gordon have received funding from the Pioneer Fund also should not be the way we introduce them, for the same reason that it also wouldn’t be consistent with NPOV policy to introduce Jensen as a “Kistler Prize winner”.

You said in your edit summary for this rollback “please discuss”, so I hope you’ll engage in discussion about the changes you’ve made and why you think they’re justified, and won’t continue to restate them until they have consensus. --Captain Occam (talk) 21:56, 11 August 2010 (UTC)

WeijiBaikeBianji: 1) If you have questions about this article's notability, please read WP:NOTABLE. This article has clearly received significant coverage in reliable sources. So, to my mind, it isn't even close. As to POV, if you have questions about that, feel free to either boldly edit or bring them up at the Talk page. Otherwise, we should probably remove the tag after a week, as usual. 2) "statistics expert should take a look at how the study was conducted" No. It is not our job to judge studies/books in Misplaced Pages. This could be the world's worst study. It could be the best. It does not matter for Misplaced Pages. We report what reliable sources say about the study, nothing more and nothing less. David.Kane (talk) 01:24, 12 August 2010 (UTC)

It's actually quite dubious that this book (which I have at hand in my office) is notable under the specific notability requirements for Misplaced Pages articles about books, but feel free to make the contrary case under the new section I opened focused on that issue. -- WeijiBaikeBianji (talk) 04:47, 14 August 2010 (UTC)

I have removed the POV tag as of 27 August 2010, as there are now plenty of editors here who seem inclined to discuss calmly what the sources say and how to bring the article up to Misplaced Pages policy. -- WeijiBaikeBianji (talk) 01:12, 28 August 2010 (UTC)

Victors edits

I think the worst part of Victors edit is the changes to the Conrad & Horowitz section which focus on the pro-hereditarian part of their argument and deletes their observations that could be seen as critical towards that view. I think Victors description of Sternberg, Grigorenko and Kidd is better than thye previous version. We need to decide about when it is relevant to mention the pioneer fund grantee status in releçation the the hereditarian researchers. I think "no agreement" is a less biased way of presenting the study's reception than "many researchers agree while others". ·Maunus·ƛ· 23:06, 11 August 2010 (UTC)

What do you mean when you say Victor’s version focuses on the pro-hereditarian part of Horowitz’s argument? As far as I’m aware, his version doesn’t mention Horowitz’s article at all, which is appropriate because Horowitz’s article doesn’t discuss this study, so mentioning the article would by synth. Can you quote what part of Victor’s version of the article you’re referring to?

The way that researchers who favor the hereditarian point of view have viewed this study as a vindication of their viewpoint is definitely one of the more notable things about it, as I think can be seen from the six references that discuss this. You’re welcome to suggest a more neutral way to mention this, though.

The Pioneer Fund issue is pretty open-and-shut, in my opinion. It’s important enough to be included in the articles devoted to each of these researchers (which it is), but mentioning it when we’re introducing these researchers in a single sentence smacks strongly of trying to cast them in a certain light. There are dozens of different things that could be said about these researchers in order to introduce them, some of which are more notable than others, such as the universities where they’re professors, the journals in which their research has been published, or the awards they’ve received. As I mentioned above, just as we shouldn’t introduce them by means of their awards in order to cast them in a positive light, we also shouldn’t introduce them by means of them having been funded by the Pioneer Fund in order to cast them in a negative light. Either option is an example of cherry-picking information in order to try and make a point about them. --Captain Occam (talk) 23:26, 11 August 2010 (UTC)

I agree with you about the pioneer fund issue. Victor removed Horowitz comments with is negative towards Rushton and Rothman because it paints them as seeking media attention and scandal. Its an important point imo. He also removed Conrads comment about the excessive media attention boosting popuylar belief in the hereditarian view regardless of its actual merits. Another important point - and removing it distorts Conrads point because it actually has him agreeing with Herrnstein and Rothman and Snyderman - when in fact he is sayiong the opposite.·Maunus·ƛ· 23:35, 11 August 2010 (UTC)

All right, since we seem to be agreed about the Pioneer Fund and Sternberg issues, I’ve changed those back.

I’m not able to find Conrad’s paper at the moment, so can’t easily evaluate Victor Chmara’s statement that the article was misrepresenting his opinion. I definitely have an issue with the description of Horowitz, though. Horowitz’s article is about Rushton, Rothman is only mentioned briefly in a single sentence, and this study is not mentioned at all. Perhaps this could go in the article about Stanley Rothman if one is eventually created, although I’m not even sure about that. But it really seems like a stretch to say that if an article briefly mentions a particular author, that makes the article relevant to Misplaced Pages’s article about a specific study that author has performed. In other words, this still looks like WP:SYNTH to me. Do you disagree? --Captain Occam (talk) 00:19, 12 August 2010 (UTC)

This is what Horowitz wrote about Snyderman and Rothman:

To be sure, in a thoughtful and sympathetic early review of the Rushton book in The National Review (September 12, 1994), Mark Snyderman wamed of the barrage to come. "Philippe Rushton has written his own epitaph. Any genetic predisposition toward the defense of one's race only adds to the near impossibility of rational response to the scientific study of race in a world that has seen the Holocaust and racial subjugation...Rushton's work may be ignored by the fearful, damned by the liberals, and misused by the racists. It is unlikely to be truly understood by anyone." Subsequent events have proved Snyderman prophetic; although Malcom Brown's review in The New York Times Sunday Book Review made a valiant effort at understanding and empathy.

...

In the 1960s there was the work of the late William Shockley, in the seventies that of Arthur Jensen, and in the 1980s that of a group of people much closer to media studies, such as Stanley Rothman. These individuals sought media attention as a mechanism for making their policy views known.

There is no mention of either Snyderman or Rothman beyond these two passages (they are not even mentioned together), and there is nothing about their study anywhere in the entire article.

As to Conrad, I uploaded the relevant passages (p. 148-149) here:

This is how Mathsci decided to present these two sources:

Sociologists such as Irving Horowitz and Peter Conrad have commented on the motivation for writing the article and the book. Writing partly in his capacity as managing editor of the publishing company, Transaction Publishers, that had published the Snyderman-Rothman book and more recently a controversial book by hereditarian researcher J. Philippe Rushton, Horowitz (1995) pointed out that researchers into heredity and intelligence like Rothman "sought media attention as a mechanism for making their policy views known." Conrad (1997) noted that Snyderman and Rothman echoed the claims of Richard Herrnstein, another psychologist of the hereditarian school, in claiming that "the media, relative to the scientific experts surveyed, were overly critical of testing and the heritability of IQ and that it continually manifested an environmental bias in explanations of IQ differences between blacks and whites." Conrad on the contrary suggests that this has been the reaction of the press every time the hereditarian views have become the centre of media attention and that the resulting "avalanche of commentary pieces" has inadvertently promulgated the original message, giving it "unintentional credence".

This is what I changed Mathsci's passage into:

Conrad (1997) noted that Snyderman and Rothman echoed the claims of Richard Herrnstein, another psychologist of the hereditarian school, in claiming that "the media, relative to the scientific experts surveyed, were overly critical of testing and the heritability of IQ and that it continually manifested an environmental bias in explanations of IQ differences between blacks and whites."

Mathsci clearly misrepresented these two sources, violating WP:NOR among other policies. Even thought Horowitz does not discuss Snyderman and Rothman's book or survey at all, Mathsci claims that he comments on S and R's motivation for writing it. Horowitz does not say that he writes in the capacity of S and R's publisher, nor does he say that he has published anything by them, but Mathsci makes it look like as if he did. Similarly, Mathsci quotes Horowitz on Rothman's supposed attention seeking as if Horowitz had commented on the survey or the book. Mathsci also makes it look like as if Conrad's "unintentional credence" bit was about Snyderman and Rothman, even though it is explicitly about the media reaction to The Bell Curve.

It is difficult for me to believe that anyone in good faith would try to reintroduce Mathsci's misrepresentations to the article.--Victor Chmara (talk) 01:18, 12 August 2010 (UTC)

Victor: You are clearly correct in the substance here. Feel free to fix the article again, unless someone has objections. But, also, please assume good faith. MathSci, presumably, made an honest mistake here. We all do, from time to time. David.Kane (talk) 01:28, 12 August 2010 (UTC)

I was a bit harsh. Maunus's claims were probably made in good faith.--Victor Chmara (talk) 01:48, 12 August 2010 (UTC)

I notice Mathsci has just undone my restoring of Victor Chmara’s description of Sternberg, Grigorenko and Kidd, which Maunus had stated was an improvement over the previous version. I would assume that since Victor Chmara was the author of this wording, he also agrees with Maunus that it was an improvement. David.Kane, what do you think? I suspect that consensus will oppose Mathsci about this, but I’m not going to undo his change until it’s clear that this is the case. --Captain Occam (talk) 04:46, 12 August 2010 (UTC)

See below. The edits by both Victor Chmara and Captain Occam misrepresent the source and are POV-pushing. I think most wikipedians would agree that a reference to an uncited 2005 paper of Sternberg, Grigorenko & Kidd which makes no explicit reference to the book/survey of Snyderman & Rothman is misleading and irrelevant. I can't see why an article by Sternberg, Grigorenko and Kidd which doesn't mention the book is remotely relevant to this article. These were very low quality edits which failed WP:V, WP:RS, WP:NPOV, WP:OR, WP:SYNTH and WP:UNDUE. Mathsci (talk) 05:45, 12 August 2010 (UTC)

Um, the source that you’ve quoted below does indeed refer to this study. Did you actually read what you quoted? The relevant part of the quote is this:

“I maintain that no argument should be regarded as a closed one when there are so many psychologists on both sides of a scientific position. In one study (Snyderman & Rothman, 1988), over a thousand psychologists and other experts in intelligence testing were surveyed regarding the Black–White IQ difference. Fifteen percent said the reasons for the discrepancy were entirely environmental; 46% said they were at least partly genetic; 24% said the evidence was inconclusive; and 14% did not respond. The fact that 24% of the experts surveyed expressed uncertainty means that more research and dialogue rather than a “case closed” orientation is needed.”

Templer is offering this as a rebuttal to Sternberg’s claim that the case is closed with regard to the IQ gap being 100% environmental, and that therefore the opinion that genes contributes to it is a political opinion rather than a scientific one. And that’s exactly what was said by the content you removed from the article. In what way did this content misrepresent the source? --Captain Occam (talk) 06:01, 12 August 2010 (UTC)

Captain Occam has not explained why his edits concerning an unspecified paper by "Sternberg, Grigerenko & Kidd" in the text, which made no reference to the survey, could make any sense to a reader or have any relevance to this text. Indeed the reader would probably assume it was a reference to the quite different 2006 paper that appears in the "References" section of the articlem, which is quite incorrect. That is a 2 page note, while the 2005 paper is in a different journal and a full length article. In that paper (directly linked in the section below), the authors don't mention the study; Templer's short letter is not a commentary on the study but on their 2005 paper. This article is not Race and intelligence: it is an article about the survey/book of Snyderman & Rothman. The 2005 paper of Sternberg, Grigerenko & Kidd, or any discussion of it, has no relevance to the article for which this is the talk page. Mathsci (talk) 06:23, 12 August 2010 (UTC)

So if I understand your point correctly, it’s that Templer’s letter is not relevant to the article about this study because even though it specifically discusses this study, it does so in the context of discussing a paper by Sternberg which itself doesn’t discuss the study. If you think this makes it synth for the article to mention Templer’s letter, why not also apply the same principle one step further? Sternberg’s statement that he does not attach much credence to this study was specifically in response to Templer’s letter. If you think the fact that Templer is discussing the Snyderman and Rothman study in the context of an unrelated paper makes Templer’s letter itself irrelevant to this article, then the fact that Sternberg 2006 is talking about this study in the context of Templer’s letter (which you consider irrelevant) would make Sternberg 2006 irrelevant also.

I don’t think Sternberg 2006 actually is irrelevant to this article; I’m just using this as an example to demonstrate the inconsistency in your reasoning. You’re interpreting the policy of WP:SYNTH in a very strange way, and applying it to sources selectively based on what’s conducive to the article conforming to your point of view—in other words, you’re wikilawyering.

I know from my experience with you on the History of the race and intelligence controversy article that once your mind is made up about something like this, there’s generally nothing that can change it, so I’m not particularly interested in having a long argument with you about this like I did there. However, I think I should point out the same thing that ultimately decided the outcome of our argument over that article: at this point, every user other than you who’s expressed an opinion about whether Templer should be used as a source has agreed that he should, including Maunus, who’s one of the more consistently neutral editors involved in these articles. In fact, my restoring of this part of Victor Chmara’s wording was specifically in response to Maunus’s statement that he considered Victor’s summary of these papers to be an improvement over the previous version (which you’ve now restored). If David.Kane ends up having the same opinion about this as me, Victor Chmara and Maunus, I hope you’ll be willing to accept that consensus opposes you about it. --Captain Occam (talk) 07:23, 12 August 2010 (UTC)

Misrepresentation of Robert Sternberg et al

I have no idea why the following short letter by Donald Templer was referred to in the article (by Victor Chmara and Captain Occam).

The article by Sternberg, Grigorenko, and Kidd (January 2005) is well written and contains a wealth of valuable information. I do have, however, a couple of concerns. One is that the authors imply that the question of whether the Black–White IQ discrepancy has a genetic component should be a closed issue. They said,

Thus, the statement that racial differences in IQ or academic achievement are of genetic origin is, when all is said and done, a leap of imagination. The literature on intelligence, race, and genetics constitutes, in large part, leaps of imagination to justify, post hoc, social stratifications. There is nothing wrong, in principle, with people expressing their views on social policy. But they need to recognize these views for what they are: social policy pronouncements, not science. (p. 57)

I maintain that no argument should be regarded as a closed one when there are so many psychologists on both sides of a scientific position. In one study (Snyderman & Rothman, 1988), over a thousand psychologists and other experts in intelligence testing were surveyed regarding the Black–White IQ difference. Fifteen percent said the reasons for the discrepancy were entirely environmental; 46% said they were at least partly genetic; 24% said the evidence was inconclusive; and 14% did not respond. The fact that 24% of the experts surveyed expressed uncertainty means that more research and dialogue rather than a “case closed” orientation is needed.

My second concern is that of the insufficient respect given to the work of Rushton (1995), who contended that greater intelligence evolved in colder climates because of the greater difficulty in obtaining food and protection from the elements. Sternberg et al. (2005) maintained that Rushton's position has no more merit than contending that greater intelligence evolved in tropical climates because of the need to cope with tropical diseases and the violence associated with hot weather. Sternberg et al. (2005) said, “Indeed, post hoc evolutionary arguments made in the absence of fossils at times can have the character of ad hoc ‘just so' stories designed to support, in retrospect, whatever point the author wishes to make about present-day people” (p. 50). Rushton presented a vast array of scientific evidence in his conceptualization, for example, a correlation of .62 between cranial capacity and distance from the equator with 20,000 crania representing 122 ethnically distinguishable populations (Beals, Smith, & Dodd, 1984). Templer and Arikawa (2003) reported a correlation of −.71 between mean IQ and mean high winter temperature and a correlation of −.61 between mean IQ and mean low winter temperature with 129 countries. There are alternative explanations to those of Rushton for such findings. To relegate Rushton's theory to the realm of absurdity, however, would neither constitute optimal scientific reasoning nor represent an ideal spirit of scholarly disagreement.

References

Beals, K. L., Smith, C. L., & Dodd, S. M. (1984). Brain size, brain morphology, climate, and time machines. Current Anthropology, 25, 301–328.
Rushton, J. P. (1995). Race, evolution and behavior: A life history perspective. New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction.
Snyderman, M., & Rothman, S. (1988). The IQ controversy: The media and public policy. New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction Books.
Sternberg, R. J., Grigorenko, E. L., & Kidd, K. K. (2005). Intelligence, race, and genetics. American Psychologist, 60, 46–59.
Templer, D. I., & Arikawa, H. (2003, December). Temperature, skin color, per capita income, and IQ: An international perspective.Paper presented at the meeting of the International Society for Intelligence Research, Newport Beach, CA.

This is a very short letter written about another paper by Sternberg et al and seems to have no relevance to the current article on the survey/book of Snyderman & Rothman. It is an example of WP:UNDUE. How is the reader supposed to know about the 2005 paper of Sternberg et al that Donald Templer of Alliant International University, Fresno, is talking about and what is the direct relevance to this article? Mathsci (talk) 05:15, 12 August 2010 (UTC)

Just to be clear, the 2005 article of Sternberg et al discussed above makes no reference to any work of Snyderman & Rothman. There seems to be no justification at all for the edits by Victor Chmara and Captain Occam. Mathsci (talk) 05:37, 12 August 2010 (UTC)

Mathsci, your reasoning is highly inconsistent here. The short letter by Templer has relevance here to the same extent that the short letter by Sternberg et al. replying to Templer's letter (and to letters by other people) and published in the same issue of American Psychologist has relevance. Both discuss Snyderman and Rothman's survey, albeit briefly. If you think that the Sternberg letter is relevant, then certainly the Templer letter is, too.

This is all that Sternberg et al. 2006 had to say about Rothman and Snyderman:

With regard to Templer’s (2006, this issue) response, we do not give much credence to the Snyderman and Rothman (1988) survey. If the survey were done in 1908, probably there would have been even more emphasis on genes. If scientists in earlier times were surveyed on the causes of fire, they might well all have agreed that phlogiston was responsible. In another era, they would have agreed that the Sun revolves around the Earth. Implicit theories are useful ways of ascertaining popular folk beliefs, including those of scientists, but they are not scientifically definitive.

According to you, Templer's side of this exchange of arguments in the comments section of American Psychologist should be omitted, while the arguments by Sternberg et al. should be included in the article. That's pure POV pushing.

Maunus and Occam have agreed that my description of Templer & Sternberg's arguments is superior to yours. Sternberg et al. 2005 is referred to (though not named) because Templer was replying to it in his letter, arguing that Snyderman and Rothman's survey makes the arguments in Sternberg et al. 2005 dubious. Sternberg et al. 2006 was, in turn, an attempt to defend the arguments in Sternberg et al. 2005 against the criticisms of Templer (and others). The two letters were a part of the debate about Sternberg et al. 2005, and the reader should be made aware of the fact that the letters were written in this context.

This is how I described all this:

Responding to a claim by Sternberg, Grigorenko, and Kidd that the hereditarian view of race differences in IQ is a political and not a scientific position, Templer (2006) argued that the Snyderman and Rothman survey renders such a pronouncement ill-founded. In response, Sternberg, Grigerenko & Kidd (2006) wrote that they "do not give much credence" to the survey's findings, and that the views of the scientists surveyed reflected "popular folk beliefs".

Either both Templer 2006 and Sternberg et al. 2006 must be discussed in the article, or neither.--Victor Chmara (talk) 10:29, 12 August 2010 (UTC)

I agree with Victor Chmara, Occam and Maunus on this one. But before changing it back, I would be curious about other opinions. Anyone? David.Kane (talk) 11:06, 12 August 2010 (UTC)

It’s now been over a day since Mathsci removed Victor Chmara’s wording for this section, and during that time nobody here (other than Mathsci) has expressed anything other than criticism of this change, so I’ve changed it back.

Are we ready to add back any of Victor Chmara’s other revisions that were undone? Nobody seems to be disputing Victor’s point that Mathsci’s wording about Horowitz and Conrad is original research, but I’d like to make sure we’ve come to an agreement about this before I restore that part of Victor’s wording also. --Captain Occam (talk) 10:36, 13 August 2010 (UTC)

WeijiBaikeBianji, do you disagree with this? I would assume that you do because you’ve reverted my edit, but you haven’t explained what objection you have to the justification for this wording that’s been provided by me, Maunus, Victor Chmara, David.Kane. So far, the only person who’s expressed disagreement with us about this is Mathsci, who also hasn’t attempted to address the justification that Victor Chmara has provided for his wording above. If you disagree with Victor about this, you need to explain why; reverting while not engaging in discussion is really unhelpful. --Captain Occam (talk) 04:08, 14 August 2010 (UTC)

As already mentioned below there are three problems with what Victor Chmara wrote and Captain Occam has been restoring. Firstly his partial summary of the content of the 2005 paper of Sternberg, Grigorenko and Kidd is inadmissible. Secondly he fails to mention that Templer in a very brief paragraph just summarises the responses on the Black-White IQ gap. Thirdly the part on folk beliefs did not refer directly to scientists polled in the theory. That is a misreading of the correspondence. My completely newly formulated sentence took into account these three problems. Mathsci (talk) 04:30, 14 August 2010 (UTC)

Captain Occam, you kindly asked, "WeijiBaikeBianji, do you disagree with this?" Actually, I haven't had time to form an opinion on the issue. My revert was not to say, "I agree with the version to which I'm reverting and disagree with the most recent edit" as much as it was to say, "Whoa! Let's discuss this some more before we go catch the train." I haven't been convinced one way or the other what's the most sound statement about the book. But I note here that

* I have the book at hand, in my office,

* I have a large supply of other sources on the topic at hand in my office,

and

* I have a sense of what the use of the book as a source has been in subsequent literature, from years of reading that literature.

As of the moment I posted the NPOV tag on the article, I didn't have the "gut reaction" that the article to that date fully reflected what the literature says about the book. So I have invited editors to discuss how to edit the article, and you and other editors have kindly joined in. I haven't had time to page through the sources I have at hand to check which I can verify directly and which seem most germane to the book. I rather suspect that a few of the sources that have been cited on this talk page in the last few days are sources I have never seen, so I will have to ponder carefully how to regard those on the basis of what you and other editors here say about them. I'm just making the friendly suggestion that consensus shouldn't be assumed, but rather gained by persuasive examination of the sources during discussion with other editors. I'll be busy much of tomorrow, but I do feel obligated to return to this article (after I do some ministerial edits on wholly unrelated articles) to see how the two issues here can be resolved. The two issues here are 1) what should be said about the Snyderman and Rothman book by Misplaced Pages policy, based on the sources (the issue in this section) and 2) whether or not the book should have a separate stand-alone Misplaced Pages article by Misplaced Pages policy on articles about books (an issue for a different section of this talk page). I have not made up my mind about either issue. I see both have been subject to previous discussion and are now being discussed again. -- WeijiBaikeBianji (talk) 05:02, 14 August 2010 (UTC)

As I said in response to you on my talk page, I have two problems with your revert. The first is that the content that Mathsci has been removing was the established version of the article for two months, and there has not yet been a consensus to change it. And the second is that other than Mathsci himself, every editor who’s expressed an opinion about his changes to the established version of the article has disapproved of them. Even if you don’t consider us to have reached a consensus about this yet, I don’t think a non-consensus change that has this little support should stay in the article while we continue to discuss it. If consensus ends up favoring Mathsci’s changes at some later point, we can always add them back. --Captain Occam (talk) 05:44, 14 August 2010 (UTC)

As explained several times on this page now, the content added today was newly devised by me (a) perfectly to match the sources and (b) to be neutral. The material Victor Chmara and Captain Occam favoured stated opinions of Robert Sternberg and his collaborators which did not match the sources. The academic dispute between Templer and Sternberg et al was somewhat irrelevant to the current article. At that level their two short notes constitute primary sources, which we can't really comment on, just as we can't directly comment on the 2005 paper of Sternberg et al. However, as a coincidental commentary by Sternberg et al on the Black-White question in Snyderman & Rothman, the note of Sternberg et al qualifies as a secondary source, in exactly the same way as the footnote of Jencks and Philipps does. Mathsci (talk) 08:56, 14 August 2010 (UTC)

Mathsci, as I said before, I’m not interested in arguing with you about this beyond what I’ve said already. You’re already starting to repeat your earlier claims that have already been addressed, and I know that this can continue for weeks, because that’s what happened on the History of the race and intelligence controversy article. I’m not willing to waste another several weeks of my time on another instance of you doing this. What eventually resolved the discussion over that article was that when it became clear that every other editor involved in it disagreed with you, and that you were going to continue filibustering there indefinitely, we eventually went ahead and edited the article over your objections. I expect the same thing to eventually happen here, but the question is whether we’re at the point yet where that’s appropriate.

WeijiBaikeBianji, do you have anything to say in response to what I’ve said? If you object to my reasoning in my previous reply to you here and in my user talk, I’d like you to explain why. --Captain Occam (talk) 09:45, 14 August 2010 (UTC)

Captain, I think a strong case has been made not to revert to Victor Chmara's version (again, please be wary of claims of previous consensus: that the article wasn't changed in some time may not be indicative of consensus, just that editors were busy doing someting else). I think there are several editors here willing to discuss the issues with this article, and rushing to revert to a specific version is counterproducive at this point. If you want to be producive, please join the discussion and stop pushing for a revert.--Ramdrake (talk) 13:47, 14 August 2010 (UTC)

What I have to say at this moment (at which I plan to spend several hours editing articles other than this one) is that I don't think you, Captain Occam, have yet correctly characterized what Maunus's view is of how the article should be edited. (After you mentioned Maunus as one editor who formed the consensus group you claimed, I looked carefully at his posts here on the talk page and at all of his recent contribs.) But I could be mistaken about that. In any event, I will let Maunus speak for himself. Ramdrake's point is well taken that consensus for reverts shouldn't be assumed from stasis in articles. I've only just begun to make substantive edits anywhere on Misplaced Pages—my personal opinion is that all articles on Misplaced Pages that have anything to do with IQ need huge amounts of editing, and much more attention to the best reliable sources, to correct their many current errors. But I can't do that all by myself, so my absence from editing any one article during a given span of weeks should not be taken as my statement of consensus that the article is in fine shape already. I won't be back here until Saturday evening (United States time zones) at the very earliest, so please do not assume that I am in consensus with anyone here yet. I'm still thinking about the issues. I'm still gravely concerned that Misplaced Pages policy wouldn't warrant a full article on this book (the issue for a different section of this talk page). -- WeijiBaikeBianji (talk) 16:59, 14 August 2010 (UTC)

Let me point out, again, the two outstanding issues here. Victor Chmara has already described these in detail, and no counter-argument has yet been presented to them.

1: The Horowitz article does not discuss this study. It briefly mentions one of the study’s authors (Rothman) in the context of discussing Rushton, but it isn’t clear whether Horowitz has this study in mind or any of Rothman’s other writings. This could go in the article about Stanley Rothman if one is ever created, but in an article about this study specifically it’s an example of synthesis. This is the same standard that’s generally been applied to every other article about a specific book: it’s synthesis to include information from articles that discuss the book’s author or publisher, if those articles don’t discuss them specifically in the context of the book in question.

2: It’s a violation of NPOV for the article to cite the Sternberg letter but not the Templer one. Sternberg’s letter was specifically in response to Templer’s, so by including one and not the other we’re only presenting one side of this conversation. Both letters discuss this study, although not in depth, so any claims about synthesis or lack of relevance apply to one just as much as to the other. I think the article should include them both. Including neither is also an option, but what definitely shouldn’t be an option is including one but not the other.

If people want to assume there’s no consensus about this yet, I guess that’s fine. But the larger problem here is that these are, in my opinion, fairly obvious violations of WP:SYNTH and WP:NPOV. At least three people (and possibly four, if Maunus can be included) agree that they are, and nobody has yet presented an argument that they aren’t. If other people object to these things being changed, shouldn’t they be able to provide a policy-based explanation for why these parts of the article are better in their current state? And nobody can provide one, isn’t it appropriate to change them? --Captain Occam (talk) 04:44, 15 August 2010 (UTC)

It’s now been over two days since I pointed out why I think these parts of the article are violating WP:SYNTH and WP:NPOV, and nobody has made any effort to dispute what I’ve said here. I’m not going to make a claim either way about what the consensus is, but if there are parts of the article that violate these policies, then they need to be changed. I’m going to wait a little longer before changing them, to make sure nobody has an argument against the explanation I’ve provided for why these parts of the article violate these policies. But if nobody does, then it’s appropriate for me to edit the article in order to remove what by all appearances are policy violations. --Captain Occam (talk) 10:12, 17 August 2010 (UTC)

My eyes glaze over at about 10 ":"'s ("::::::::::") deep. Is there a better solution than redutio ad "he said she said"? (or augmentation in this case?) I apologize I'll be busy the next few days...

... but just to take a step back: regarding "The material Victor Chmara and Captain Occam favoured stated opinions of Robert Sternberg and his collaborators which did not match the sources." I rather thought that what reliable sources/individuals state trump whether or not we (personally) agree that what reliable source/individual states about X matches our estimation of what we (personally) would say about X—that is, after all, what one says when contending a statement does not match the source being characterized. It would seem the appropriate solution is to attribute statements. To be clear, I have NOT deciphered the material in question; this is purely a procedural matter, as much as I hate quoting procedure. Therefore, also, to the degree Sternberg's evaluation does not match the evaluation by others of same, those need to be included as well. I really don't have the energy to wade through Occam vs. Mathsci above. @Occam, can you provide several succinct bullets summarizing proposed changes? There's no rush, and rushing on your part will be looked upon askance as the arbitration is still in progress. "If I don't hear anything in X days,..." in my experience leads to nothing but trouble, regardless of whether edits in scope are warranted or not. PЄTЄRS J VЄСRUМВА ►TALK 13:04, 17 August 2010 (UTC)

The most succinct way to describe the changes I’m hoping to make is by linking to Victor Chmara’s version of the article, which contained these changes for around two months, until Ramdrake removed them. There are three main changes that I think need to be made here.

• In the last paragraph of this section, Victor Chmara, David.Kane and I have said that we think the Horowitz material should be removed, because the cited article from Horowitz doesn’t discuss this study. It (briefly) mentions Stanley Rothman, but doesn’t say anything about which of Rothman’s writings it’s referring to, and the article is mostly about Rushton. Therefore, discussing the Horowitz article here is synth.

• Victor Chmara, David.Kane and I are also suggesting that in the same paragraph, the last sentence of the Conrad material should be removed. If you read the part of Conrad’s book that’s being cited, it’s clear that the statement about "unintentional credence" is specifically about the reaction to The Bell Curve, not about Snyderman and Rothman. This instance of synth isn’t as severe as the previous one, but David.Kane, Victor Chmara and I still think this sentence isn’t relevant to the study.

• And finally, in the paragraph before that one, if we’re going to describe Sternberg’s response to Templer’s letter, we should also describe the letter from Templer that Sternberg is responding to. Both letters discuss this study about the same amount, so they’re exactly as relevant as one another, and it’s a rather obvious NPOV violation to include one side of this conversation while excluding the other.

You’re welcome to make these changes yourself, if you agree with them. In fact, I’d kind of appreciate it if you did. They definitely need to be made, because violations of WP:SYNTH and WP:NPOV shouldn’t be allowed to stay in the article indefinitely, but I know it’s preferable for involved parties in the arbitration case to edit these articles as little as possible while the case is in progress. --Captain Occam (talk) 14:05, 17 August 2010 (UTC)

Well, I’ve gone ahead and changed these things. I know there’s no hurry with this, but there’s also no reason to leave apparent violations of WP:SYNTH and WP:NPOV in the article when nobody is disputing that these policy violations exist. These problems have been pointed out here for several days now, and nobody has tried to argue with my explanation of why they need to be changed.

If there’s anyone who disagrees with this, I hope they’ll actually provide an explanation here of why they do which addresses my own points, rather than just reverting my edit without discussing it. The latter would be a pretty clear example of POV-pushing. --Captain Occam (talk) 00:21, 19 August 2010 (UTC)

Okay, now I’ve been immediately reverted by WeijiBaikeBianji, with the edit summary “This still needs more discussion before a revert.” WeijiBaikeBianji has not commented here to explain what additional discussion is necessary, despite my specifically asking anyone reverting this material to do so. These issues have been discussed at length for more than a week, the relevant parts of the articles being cited have been quoted or linked to by Victor Chmara, and nobody has actually argued against the arguments which are being presented (yes, with citations) that the material in question violates these policies. These parts of the article have already been discussed as much as it’s possible for them to be discussed until someone explains why they think they don’t violate the policies in question. WeijiBaikeBianji, do you not recognize the problem with reverting this while refusing to address the justification being provided for this change?

If you aren’t willing to either undo your revert or engage in discussion about the material that you’re reverting, what you’re doing is POV-pushing. There’s really no other term that can be used for it. --Captain Occam (talk) 01:37, 19 August 2010 (UTC)

I appreciate the back-and-forth here.

I have the book at hand in my office. I'm reading other sources that are more germane to editing other articles on Misplaced Pages right now, so you see that I haven't joined in on editing this article after posting the NPOV tag. I'm glad that several editors are joining issue on what the Snyderman and Rothman study means, what influence it has had, how significant the book is, and whether the book's conclusions accurately represent facts in the world. Keep up the good work. Thanks. -- WeijiBaikeBianji (talk) 13:31, 13 August 2010 (UTC)

My own understanding is that not much has been written on the survey. However, here is a statement from 1998 by Lee Ellis who conducted a similar survey in the 1990s:

Only recently have surveys been conducted among social scientists that even remotely bear on the heritability-of-IQ debate, and the results of the three that I am aware of, have provided only vague glimpses into where most social scientists stand on this debate. Snyderman and Rothman (1988) contended that a majority of the “psychologist experts” they surveyed believed that genetic factors were important in determining racial variations in intelligence. However, an earlier survey by Friedrichs (1973) based on sounder sampling procedures found that only 28% of psychologists held this view. In a survey conducted by Sanderson and Ellis (1992) p. 37) the “average sociologist” attributed only 13% of racial variation in academic achievement to any type of biological factors (with 4.6% specifically attributed to genetics). Notice that none of the questions asked in these three surveys pertained specifically to genetic influences on IQ except in the context of race variations. This means that even today, no one knows whether social scientists (let alone scientists in general) have shifted their positions with regard to the influence of genes on IQ. Regarding the narrower issue of genetic influences on racial variations in IQ, most social scientists appear to remain skeptical, and no study of scientists in general has ever been conducted.

Mathsci (talk) 13:40, 13 August 2010 (UTC)

his quoe seems particularly relevant to include in the article - perhaps more so than the orowitz/Conrad material.·Maunus·ƛ· 17:52, 13 August 2010 (UTC)

The current article doesn’t contain any quotes that are anywhere near this long, so I think including this entire quote would be WP:UNDUE, but it seems reasonable that Ellis’s view on this study ought to be mentioned here. Does anyone have any arguments against me reinstating Victor Chmara’s changes to the Horowitz and Conrad material, and also adding a summary of the Ellis article? --Captain Occam (talk) 00:48, 14 August 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for your comments. It seems to me that what makes a quotation undue in length or not has much to do with how much the quotation fits into the mainstream published literature on the subject, and little to do with the length of the quotation. Mathsci's search of the literature (thanks for that) raises to me the concern that this article goes beyond Misplaced Pages policy in devoting a whole separate article to what is, at best, a minor source that would be cited in perhaps a dozen or so articles across all of Misplaced Pages. I would think that job one here would be to review the criteria already established by Misplaced Pages policy for articles about books, and make clear whether or not this article meets those criteria. -- WeijiBaikeBianji (talk) 01:12, 14 August 2010 (UTC)

(ec) The problem is that, apart from the enthusiastic remarks by those involved in gifted educatin and by supporters of hereditarian research, there are very few statements in the literature directly commenting on this survey. The statements of Horovitz and Conrad concern a different issue to that discussed by Ellis, so I don't support any changes at the moment on that issue without a more extensive discussion.

The preamble to the statement of Sternberg et al still seems to be WP:SYNTH and involves selective quoting on issues not related to the survey. It's fine to quote Sternberg et al (2006), but the WP:NPOV way of doing that is to write something like:

Sternberg, Grigorenko & Kidd (2006) harvtxt error: no target: CITEREFSternbergGrigorenkoKidd2006 (help), replying to comments on an earlier paper of theirs by Donald Templer who he had cited the responses on the Black-White IQ gap in Snyderman & Rothman, stated that they did not give "much credence" to the survey.

The statement by Ellis above was found after a long search (there could still be further comments elsewhere by other commentators). I agree with Maunus that ths commentary is very apt. I don't agree that cutting or summarising it is a good idea, since the formulation is rather precise. It is one of the only commentaries so far that compares the survey with similar surveys before and after, so its inclusion would not be WP:UNDUE at all. Perhaps it might be worth discussing why wikipedia has an article on the survey of Snyderman and Rothman (1984) but not on those of Friedrichs (1973) or Sanderson & Ellis (1992). Mathsci (talk) 01:34, 14 August 2010 (UTC)

“The statements of Horovitz and Conrad concern a different issue to that discussed by Ellis, so I don't support any changes at the moment on that issue without a more extensive discussion.”

The reason for Victor Chmara’s changes to the Horowitz and Conrad material has nothing to do with Ellis; it’s because your wording of this section involved original research. This has already been explained in depth, and if you don’t have anything to say in response to his explanation of this, saying that we need “a more extensive discussion” isn’t meaningful.

“I would think that job one here would be to review the criteria already established by Misplaced Pages policy for articles about books, and make clear whether or not this article meets those criteria.”

These are really two separate questions. If you think the topic of the article isn’t notable, then I suppose you could nominate it for deletion again (I say “again” because it survived a deletion attempt in October). But as long as it exists, our job is to make sure each viewpoint about this study is described in proportion to its prominence.

The “response and criticism” section actually does not contain any quotes like this; each author’s opinion is just summarized in a few sentences. In order for Ellis’s view to be presented differently from that of every other author who’s commented on the study, his view would need to be significantly more important than that of any other author. Is there anything about Ellis’s view that makes it inherently more important than that of Silverman, Lennon or Sternberg? --Captain Occam (talk) 01:54, 14 August 2010 (UTC)

There are no rules for quotes vs paraphrases. The claim of WP:OR seems to be incorrect, since the sentence about Rothman satisfies WP:V (see below). It could be tweaked if necessary. Mathsci (talk) 02:56, 14 August 2010 (UTC)

Horovitz article

Here is the paragraph from the 11 page article of Horowitz that I used:

In such a context, the media drives the data as much as the data drives the media. Attention to racial elements in intelligence is hardly unprecedented. In the 1960s there was the work of the late William Shockley, in the seventies that of Arthur Jensen, and in the 1980sthat of a group of people much closer to media studies, such as Stanley Rothman. These individuals sought media attention as a mechanism for making their policy views known. The fact is that for a non-discussible subject, the issue of race and genetics has been rather widely examined. The sequence has typically been to break out of the narrow professional journal literature first in a major book or, sometimes articles in general interest magazines. The next step is the widespread publication of reviews and commentary in newsprint form, followed in quick order by cover stories in news weeklies, radio and television talk shows, and the conversion of the whole communication chain into an object of news unto itself. Behind the information curtain is generous support from funding agencies with special interests in publicizing issues of racial imbalance and inheritance. Indeed, a review of major figures in psychology supported by the Pioneer Fund, ranging from Jensen to Rushton, indicates a more than casual interest in those who work the area of racial genetics. Such foundations measure success as much by media coverage as by scientific results.

I can't quite see what I'm supposed to have misrepresented (elsewhere in the article Horowitz explains his role as editor). Mathsci (talk) 02:53, 14 August 2010 (UTC)

That's a good research example, Mathsci. Thank you. -- WeijiBaikeBianji (talk) 02:56, 14 August 2010 (UTC)

The problem with this, as Victor Chmara already pointed out, is that it doesn’t talk about this study. It’s not even clear whether the author of the quoted paragraph had this study in mind when he wrote it, or some of Rothman’s other writings. For us to assume that Horowitz was specifically referring to this study when he wrote that is an example of original research. And if we don’t assume that he was referring to this study, and assume that was just writing about Rothman in general (which is all that he states), then for us to include it in the article about this study is an example of synthesis. Either way, it doesn’t belong in the article. --Captain Occam (talk) 03:16, 14 August 2010 (UTC)

It talks about the motivations of the author for publication in this particular area. Of course that is relevant. And what was written has not been misrepresented or synthesized as you and Victor have claimed. Mathsci (talk) 03:18, 14 August 2010 (UTC)

The Horowitz article doesn’t even mention Mark Snyderman and Stanley Rothman in the same sentence. The article is mostly about Rushton, with a few brief references to other authors. And this is coming from the same person who claimed it was synthesis to cite the Templer letter which specifically discussed this study, because of the fact that the letter was mostly in response to Sternberg? Do you not see what a glaring double standard you’re using, depending on what does and doesn’t support your personal point of view?

As I said previously, I don’t expect you to ever admit you’re wrong here. But if all or most of the other editors involved in this article disagree with you, you’ll still need to let us restore Victor Chmara’s wording. --Captain Occam (talk) 03:34, 14 August 2010 (UTC)

What is it in the text that disagrees with the source? Only Rothman is mentioned. Could you please confine your discussion to the secondary sources? Thanks, Mathsci (talk) 04:00, 14 August 2010 (UTC)

What disagrees with the source is stating that Horowitz was commenting on “the motivation for writing the article and the book”. He was commenting on Rothman’s motivation for writing about this topic in general, but assuming that he was commenting on this book specifically is original research. Horowitz could have just as easily been referring a completely unrelated unrelated piece of writing from Rothman about this topic. And as I said above, if he wasn’t commenting on this book specifically (which he wasn’t), it’s synthesis for the article to include a general comment about one of the book’s authors from an article that’s mostly about Rushton. As the person who complained about synthesis in the discussion about Templer’s letter (which did specifically discuss the study), you should be aware of this. --Captain Occam (talk) 04:27, 14 August 2010 (UTC)

Continued misrepresentation of Sternberg, Grigorenko and Kidd (2006)

Here is the full text of the article:

The second part of Captain Occam's paraphrase seems to be WP:OR. Sternberg, Grigorenko and Kidd did not write that "that the views of the scientists surveyed reflected 'popular folk beliefs'". Perhaps Victor Chmara was the editor responsible for that misrepresentation and Captain Occam was merely restoring his edit, but it is clearly unacceptable. They were referring to the same question in the survey on the Black-White IQ difference discussed by Jencks and Phillips that Templer cited in his correspondence (reproduced in a previous section). Mathsci (talk) 03:16, 14 August 2010 (UTC)

Let's not forget to focus on Misplaced Pages criteria for articles about books.

Misplaced Pages has criteria for articles about books. Which, if any, of those does this article meet? -- WeijiBaikeBianji (talk) 03:55, 14 August 2010 (UTC)

Just a reminder to discuss this separate issue here. I think a legitimate case can be made for deleting this article, even by a rather inclusionist editor like me. -- WeijiBaikeBianji (talk) 05:05, 14 August 2010 (UTC)

Please read WP:N. Any book that is discussed in other reliable sources is notable enough for inclusion in Misplaced Pages. This book passes easily, as evidenced by the many references. David.Kane (talk) 15:27, 14 August 2010 (UTC)

WP:N says if a subject has received "significant coverage" it is worthy of inclusion, and then goes on to specify that "significant coverage" "means that sources address the subject directly in detail". I believe that what is being debated here is whether the sources that do mention the survey mention in quite directly and in detail, or just in passing, in which case it would fail the "significant coverage" criterion.--Ramdrake (talk) 15:34, 14 August 2010 (UTC)

No. You need to read the subpage of WP:N devoted to books (WP:NB) and, especially, the footnotes therein. Key line: "The book has been the subject of multiple, non-trivial published works whose sources are independent of the book itself, with at least some of these works serving a general audience." And make sure to check the footnotes, especially "The "subject" of a work means non-trivial treatment and excludes mere mention of the book, its author or of its publication, price listings and other nonsubstantive detail treatment." So, since this book receives several sentences, paragraphs or pages of coverage in other works, it is notable enough. The threshold for notability is very low, as it should be. David.Kane (talk) 16:13, 14 August 2010 (UTC)

I'll think about this a while, but I think there are grounds for deletion of articles that apply even to articles on notorious (that is, undoubtedly notable) subjects. And if this book is notable, so are very many books on related subjects that are not yet in Misplaced Pages, so perhaps I should devote my time to creating many more articles about books. -- WeijiBaikeBianji (talk) 17:02, 14 August 2010 (UTC)

I agree that there "are very many books on related subjects that are not yet in Misplaced Pages" and which belong there. The same applies to famous academic articles. If you have the time (you clearly have the knowledge), I would love to enlist your help in making this article better. David.Kane (talk) 18:00, 14 August 2010 (UTC)

I've turned to my copy of Snyderman and Rothman this evening (= I finally added enough entries to my bibliography that Snyderman and Rothman was unburied from other books in my office). Jensen 1969 was a much more important publication. I'll have more to say about the book discussed here in a few days. -- WeijiBaikeBianji (talk) 04:51, 15 August 2010 (UTC)

I have the article, and I have the book.

I visited the friendly local state flagship university library today to photocopy the article by Snyderman and Rothman to go with their book, which I had already circulated on an earlier visit to that library. I've been doing the usual kinds of searching for reviews of the article and of the book too. I'll be happy to dig into my ever growing list of sources too to see what they say about Snyderman and Rothman's activities. I did turn up one online source from the Pioneer Fund that gives the book prominent mention.

1. Snyderman, Mark; Rothman, Stanley (February 1987). "Survey of Expert Opinion on Intelligence and Aptitude Testing". American Psychologist. 42 (2): 137–144. ISSN 0003-066X. Retrieved 15 August 2010. {{cite journal}}: Invalid |ref=harv (help)CS1 maint: date and year (link)
2. Snyderman, Mark; Rothman, Stanley (1988). The IQ Controversy, the Media and Public Policy. New Brunswick (NJ): Transaction Books. ISBN 978-0-88738-839-2. {{cite book}}: Invalid |ref=harv (help)

-- WeijiBaikeBianji (talk) 22:51, 15 August 2010 (UTC)

Per mine to Captain Occam, and to clarify, WP:BLP is urgent, anything else is not. I'll be looking forward to see what sources you uncover that specifically relate to the study. PЄTЄRS J VЄСRUМВА ►TALK 13:10, 17 August 2010 (UTC)

I'm digging into the sources here to check what they say and compare that to what's said in this Misplaced Pages article so far. -- WeijiBaikeBianji (talk) 13:22, 22 August 2010 (UTC)

I have begun a line-by-line look at this article for NPOV, having obtained and printed out most of the sources that were recently discussed here on the talk page. I note for the record that the article creator has supported deletion of this article in the AfD discussion. -- WeijiBaikeBianji (talk) 15:32, 22 August 2010 (UTC)

by the way the link to the most recent afd at the top of this page takes me to the old afd, and not the most recent one. futurebird (talk) 11:29, 27 August 2010 (UTC)

Good catch, Futurebird, I just fixed that. -- WeijiBaikeBianji (talk) 15:34, 27 August 2010 (UTC)

I'm slogging into substantive edits of the article (slowly but surely), relying on the sources I have at hand to document how the book has been received and what its impact on the subsequent literature has been. -- WeijiBaikeBianji (talk) 01:10, 28 August 2010 (UTC)

I no longer support deletion of this article, but I do support a rename and a top-to-bottom rewrite with broader sourcing.

An experienced Wikipedian who monitors Article for Deletion discussions has convinced me to stop recommending deletion of this article. I agree with his view of the current state of the article: it looks like POV-pushing, and the article needs to be renamed to the title of the book by Snyderman and Rothman and to be rewritten almost from the ground up. Some of the sources now cited in the article will still be useful. It will be very useful for other editors to have the actual article by S and R, and their actual book, at hand as editing continues, as I do. Other reliable sources related to the topic will also be useful, and all of you are welcome to recommend more sources. See you here and on the article page itself as the AfD fizzles out for lack of support and the article editing resumes. -- WeijiBaikeBianji (talk) 14:59, 26 August 2010 (UTC)

The AfD result was (once again) no consensus. Let's discuss how to improve the article. If I hear no objection, I will soon rename the article to be the same as the name of the book produced by Snyderman and Rothman, and I will look to the WikiProject on books for guidance on how to improve the article. I appreciate suggestions from other editors here. -- WeijiBaikeBianji (talk) 22:00, 26 August 2010 (UTC)

I support your suggestion for new name.--Victor Chmara (talk) 07:12, 27 August 2010 (UTC)

As you can see, done. -- WeijiBaikeBianji (talk) 15:37, 27 August 2010 (UTC)

Last paragraph

Currently, the last paragraph reads as follows:

Sociologists such as Irving Horowitz and Peter Conrad have made comments on the role of the media. Writing partly in his capacity as managing editor of the publishing company, Transaction Publishers, that had published the Snyderman-Rothman book and more recently a controversial book by hereditarian researcher J. Philippe Rushton, Horowitz (1995) pointed out that researchers into heredity and intelligence like Rothman "sought media attention as a mechanism for making their policy views known." Conrad (1997) noted that Snyderman and Rothman echoed the claims of Richard Herrnstein, another psychologist of the hereditarian school, in claiming that "the media, relative to the scientific experts surveyed, were overly critical of testing and the heritability of IQ and that it continually manifested an environmental bias in explanations of IQ differences between blacks and whites." Conrad on the contrary suggests that this has been the reaction of the press every time the hereditarian views have become the centre of media attention and that the resulting "avalanche of commentary pieces" has inadvertently promulgated the original message, giving it "unintentional credence".

The paragraph misrepresents the sources it uses, because in the sources:

- Horowitz does not say that he writes in the capacity of S & R's publisher
- Horowitz does not mention S & R's study or book
- S & R are not even mentioned in the same sentence in the Horowitz piece, and when they are briefly mentioned, it is not directly connected the book or the study
- the last sentence in the paragraph makes it look like as if Conrad were talking about S & R's work, when he is in fact talking about The Bell Curve.

According to WP:NOR, to "demonstrate that you are not adding original research, you must be able to cite reliable published sources that are directly related to the topic of the article, and that directly support the material as presented". As Horowitz's article does not mention the subject of this article, i.e. S & R's book and study, Horowitz's article is not directly related to the topic and therefore cannot be used as a source. At best, Horowitz's claims with regard to Rothman (and only him, not Snyderman) are indirectly related to the topic, but that is not enough.

The only part of the paragraph that does not violate any Misplaced Pages content policies is the following:

Conrad (1997) noted that Snyderman and Rothman echoed the claims of Richard Herrnstein, another psychologist of the hereditarian school, in claiming that "the media, relative to the scientific experts surveyed, were overly critical of testing and the heritability of IQ and that it continually manifested an environmental bias in explanations of IQ differences between blacks and whites."

We will have to either retain only this bit of the paragraph, or remove it entirely. I think it should be removed entirely. Any comments before I do so?--Victor Chmara (talk) 12:08, 28 August 2010 (UTC)

Who else has the Horowitz source at hand? I'm not as convinced as you appear to be that to keep out information from someone who is knowledgeable about the origin of the book and about its author upholds Misplaced Pages policy, but I would have to see the source to decide how to resolve this issue. Maybe there is a better source that speaks more directly to that issue anyhow. I do have the S and R 1987 article at hand, and I wonder if any Wikipedian has yet added to the Misplaced Pages article their acknowledgment that Richard Herrnstein helped them design their survey of psychologists? That, it seems to me, is quite important information about the composition of the book, and definitely belongs in the article, as it is irrefutably well sourced. -- WeijiBaikeBianji (talk) 18:24, 28 August 2010 (UTC)

Horowitz's article is partially available here. That version contains all that he has to say about S & R, namely:

To be sure, in a thoughtful and sympathetic early review of the Rushton book in The National Review (September 12, 1994), Mark Snyderman wamed of the barrage to come. "Philippe Rushton has written his own epitaph. Any genetic predisposition toward the defense of one's race only adds to the near impossibility of rational response to the scientific study of race in a world that has seen the Holocaust and racial subjugation...Rushton's work may be ignored by the fearful, damned by the liberals, and misused by the racists. It is unlikely to be truly understood by anyone." Subsequent events have proved Snyderman prophetic; although Malcom Brown's review in The New York Times Sunday Book Review made a valiant effort at understanding and empathy.
...
In the 1960s there was the work of the late William Shockley, in the seventies that of Arthur Jensen, and in the 1980s that of a group of people much closer to media studies, such as Stanley Rothman. These individuals sought media attention as a mechanism for making their policy views known.

Horowitz may be knowledgeable about this topic, but in that article he does not directly say anything about it. If you think Herrnstein's involvement should be mentioned, then we could use the short version of Conrad's argument quoted above, and mention Herrnstein's involvement in that context.--Victor Chmara (talk) 19:52, 28 August 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for your comments. I should clear up one factual issue. The Horowitz (1995) article, which I have at hand, is headed by a boxed paragraph that includes the statement "This statement relects the views of its author, not only as an academic concerned with policy-making and social sciences, but also as a publisher of academic and scholarly books, and as a citizen who take the First Amendment seriously." So Horowitz was writing as

1) an academic,

2) the publisher at Transaction Books (as is abundantly made clear from other context in the full source),

and

3) a United States citizen.

It's very valuable to have a book's publisher available as a source when editing a Misplaced Pages article about a book. I didn't write the paragraph being discussed here, so I don't have any ego invested in how it is now written. Maybe the paragraph needs a rewrite. (And I think the Misplaced Pages article could end in a much different way, but it will take some work to lead up to a better ending after more editing.) It will be good for other editors, I think, to take a look at the source (I was able to obtain my copy of the Horowitz article from a print copy kept at my county library system) for perspective on the composition of the book and the milieu in which the book was published. I don't see any Misplaced Pages policy violation here. -- WeijiBaikeBianji (talk) 01:00, 30 August 2010 (UTC)

According to WP:NOR, a source to must be directly related to the topic of the article, and it must directly support the material in the article. In other words, we can only use direct quotes from sources or paraphrases of them. Horowitz's article is about Rushton and he writes partially in his capacity as Rushton's publisher, but nowhere in the article is there even an inkling that he has ever published anything by S & R, let alone that he were writing as their publisher. Horowitz's article has nothing to do with S & R's book, and the only reason Mathsci used it was because it contains a brief, somewhat negative characterization of Rothman. If there was a source saying that "Stanley Rothman is a brilliant and meticulous scholar, and his research warrants great attention", and this source was about one of Rothman's other works and not directly related to The IQ Controversy book, do you think it would be okay to quote it in this article? Perhaps we should ask about this at WP:NOR/N.--Victor Chmara (talk) 09:25, 30 August 2010 (UTC)

I'm happy to hear from other editors who are reading this talk page about that question. I invite everyone who is reading along to have the Snyderman and Rothman book at hand (noting which company published it) and the Horowitz article at hand as the discussion continues. -- WeijiBaikeBianji (talk) 13:48, 31 August 2010 (UTC)

I looked over the Horowitz article and agree that the paragraph looks like original research. In the time I've been quietly paying attention to this article, I've seen little support for keeping it. I think it's probably time to can it if no one else can give WBB a reason it should stay. -Ferahgo the Assassin (talk) 22:23, 3 September 2010 (UTC)

Before doing the revert, maybe it would be a good idea to bring up this interpretation of original research policy on the appropriate noticeboard, with a link to the recent ArbCom case findings. -- WeijiBaikeBianji (talk) 00:36, 4 September 2010 (UTC)

That seems like overkill to me - I don't think there's enough of a dispute here to drag this onto a noticeboard. Though, if you really strongly disagree that this is original research, then maybe it makes sense to do that. Do you have an argument against Victor’s point? -Ferahgo the Assassin (talk) 07:29, 4 September 2010 (UTC)

I'm adding WikiProject Books standard templates and Infoboxes to the article and talk page

While we discuss other edits, I'll refer to WikiProject Books for information about how to put together a Misplaced Pages article about a book. You are all welcome to advise me on how to do this right. -- WeijiBaikeBianji (talk) 13:54, 31 August 2010 (UTC)

• Start-Class Book articles
• WikiProject Books articles