User:Barney the barney barney/Ignorance

This is an essay on dealing with topics related to fringe theories. "Fringe theories" (FTs) is a euphemism used on Wikipedia for pseudo-scholarship (i.e. pseudoscience, pseudohistory, etc).

Wikipedia being an open encyclopedia with a big edit button tends to attract proponents of fringe theories (hereafter, "fringers"), who usually combine completely misunderstanding what they're talking about with an obsessive intent to WP:RGW.

Wikipedia, being a mainstream encyclopedia, defers to scholarly opinion on these topics, which is generally sceptical of new ideas.

This considers the stages of support and response to a fringe theory.

In assigning categories, it is worth noting that this is a continuum. However, although there may be some movement along it, such ideas rarely

Stage	Commentary on movement/sourcing	Commentary on effect on Wikipedia
1. Complete ignorance.	Generally, obvious nonsense.	This is going to fail a whole host of policies, in particular WP:N, and probably WP:AFD, WP:V, etc. To that end, it's probably not worth
2. Small following, no response.	Blogs and books are published. A small following become very enthusiastic about what claims to be "cutting edge research"; claims which they take at face value. However, the idea is ignored by academics and sceptics, i.e. there is no mainstream response.	This is probably going to fail WP:N, and and probably WP:AFD. See WP:Mainstream sources are needed for fringe topics to be notable. However, there may be exceptions to this. mentions of this can be a problem.
3. Small-scale sceptical response.	This idea has following that's enough to grab the attention of the "professional sceptics". These are people who spend their time challenging FTs from a WP:MAINSTREAM point of view. See WP:Scepticism is mainstream. The professional sceptics may be joined by a small number of research scientists, or prominent magicians.	The idea may now pass WP:GNG. Fringers will try to claim that the mainstream response is only by "some scientists" or other WP:WEASAL wording. They will also claim that contextualising the mainstream point of view is WP:OR or WP:SYNTH. Or that it violates WP:BLP. Or that blogs by prominent critics are not reliable sources.
4. Large-scale sceptical response.	The movement might be addressed by public statements by public bodies, be itself the subject of serious academic studies, etc.	e.g. creation science, homoeopathy, etc. This is generally easier to deal with; the problems tend to be too many sources to deal with rather than not enough.