Wikipedia talk:Neutral point of view/Archive 018

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Removed from article

Reasons for excluding extreme minority views (EMV) EDIT IN PROGRESS
Wikipedia is a general encyclopedia. Articles should not be exhaustive dissertations. Articles packed with EMV waste sorely-needed bandwidth and disk space, reduce usability, decrease Wikipedia's reputation as a source of reliable information, greatly increase the difficulty of maintaining reasonable accuracy. Even a valid view that is an EMV can be extremely difficult or impossible to corroborate from multiple credible sources.
Users will have to wade through loads of junk to find anything useful. If EMV are allowed many articles will become extremely long with little useful information.
The mere presence of an EMV in a main article gives the EMV undue weight and, as a practical matter, grossly distorts the presentation of the article or section. People not familiar with the subject could easily be misled into thinking that the EMV is important even if it is held by only one person, e.g., "Albert Einstein, a clerk in the Swiss Patent Office, recently published a paper on what he calls "special relativity". The paper says, among other things, that space and time are not two distinct things." His idea once was an EMV.
If Wikipedia starts allowing EMV, loads of whackos will start adding their pet EMV's as long as they can find at least one published work they can cite. Under Wikipedia reference requirements, sources do not have to be a print work, a web page, or even easily accessible. Even "newsgroup reference" is allowed.
If articles get packed with EMV the overall useability and maintainability of Wikipedia will be severely diminished.
Advocates of EMV frequently have no regard for NPOV requirements and often tend to become abusive, violate WP civility requirements, engage in edit and reversion wars, engage in vandalism, etc.

This was removed from the policy page as it was a substantive addition that had no prior discussion. FeloniousMonk 00:24, 9 April 2006 (UTC)

It will be a mistake to start discuss reasons to exclude EMV before we agree on how to determine what is an EMV. Beside, I do not think that people disagree about the fact that we should exclude EMV. So, why insisting on it? What is important is to find ways to allow editors to agree on what is an EMV. -Lumière 00:32, 9 April 2006 (UTC)

Agreed. Even more: the statement that "EMV advocates often are" [..]" lacks balance and demonstrates an agenda, as roughly the same may be said about "Extreme Majority View advocates"! And adding a confusion between Einstein and Minkowski doesn't help either... Harald88 09:03, 9 April 2006 (UTC)

Like undue weight, the lack of criteria and the vagueness seems to serve as a means to allow users to bypass discussion of reasons for inclusion or exclusion of a view and enforce the removal or inclusion of views based entirely on their personal biases. Bensaccount 01:14, 9 April 2006 (UTC)

Maybe it is not so vague in the mind of, and I quote Saxifrage here, "those who have a firm grasp of the policy already". Maybe what is important for "those who have a firm grasp of the policy already" is to make sure that the POV pushers cannot speak of the policy with the same authority as they do. Therefore, it is safer for "those who have a firm grasp of the policy already" that the policy remains vague as it is. Of course, "those who have a firm grasp of the policy already" are also POV pushers. The difference is that "those who have a firm grasp of the policy already" say that they have the "consensus" on their side, but it is a consensus that excludes so called disruptive editors that do not understand the policy. -Lumière 01:52, 9 April 2006 (UTC)

We already have "tiny minoroty views", do we really need "Extreme minority views"? --Iantresman 10:31, 9 April 2006 (UTC)

Undue weight and prominent adherents: continuing

I analysed the now archived discussions about Undue weight and prominent adherents and I realized that the comments that are about the section, including those of Saxifrage, etc., are not in opposition one to another. In other words, it should not be difficult to do a synthesis of all these comments into a coherent whole. There is an opposition to a modification of the policy, but when we discuss the policy and how it should be applied we are not in opposition. -Lumière 01:15, 9 April 2006 (UTC)

Speak for yourself, please. I object to the reinterpretation of my words as support of your project. – Saxifrage ✎ 04:20, 10 April 2006 (UTC)

I have addded two items to the section on Undue weight. Neither had received any objection in the recent discussions (see recent archives [1]), probably because one is by Jimbo Wales (who does not require consensus [2]), and the other is already part of policy on the NPOV Tutorial page [3]. --Iantresman 11:13, 9 April 2006 (UTC)

I find it quite disappointing that the new additions, designed to help, are removed despite there having been no objection, and the reason given is that the "Jimbo quote breaks up preceding and following statement so as to not make sense, following section written poorly and will only be abused)".

This may sound somewhat radical, why not do what an editor is supposed to do... and edit them? --Iantresman 13:51, 9 April 2006 (UTC)

Your sections confuse inclusion of opinions with creation of articles. This is harmful and should be avoided. Bensaccount 15:27, 9 April 2006 (UTC)

Neither was my opinion. Both additions were quoted from other areas of Wikipedia, one by Jimmy Wales (who makes policy), and the other from a Wiki tutorial on NPOV, both written to clarify policy. That editors are unable to edit these statements into the article speaks volumes. --Iantresman 15:52, 9 April 2006 (UTC)

Does every policy look the same to you? Bensaccount 16:01, 9 April 2006 (UTC)

Every policy is policy. We don't get to choose whether certain policies are more or less important, or whether some can be open to interpretation and concensus. In that sense, all policies are implemented similiarly. --Iantresman 18:58, 9 April 2006 (UTC)

Ian, this is not an article. It is a policy. We do not want to edit a policy in the same way as we edit articles. My suggestion is that we work on an alpha version while we discuss here in the talk page. Anyone else supports this suggestion? -Lumière 16:08, 9 April 2006 (UTC)

I revised Ian attempt to have a less exclusionistic Undue weight section. See the alpha version. However, I realised that I have a problem with this part: ...editors should avoid to unwittingly or deliberately present a subject in an unfair way by:

Entirely omitting significant citable information in support of a minority view, with the argument that it is claimed to be not credible.

It seems to me that, unless we clarify what we mean by (non tiny) minority view, this part makes obsolete one essential point of the Undue weight section, which is that we do not want to include in an article every thing that is published in some "reputable" source somewhere. If there is only one paper in some non peer-reviewed journal that supports a given view, or even a few papers but all in scientific journals of publishers with a specific interest on this view and related views, maybe we should not include it. -Lumière 17:45, 9 April 2006 (UTC)

The difference between "tiny minority view" and "significant minority view", is that the latter has prominent adherents. This MUST be verifiable, otherwise it is open to interpretation. It also seems to me that the verifiable source must be credible, and that means a peer-reviewed source.

The only way to ensure that no-one gets acused of unfair bias by "omitting significant citable information", is to include all "significant minority views" that editors wish to include. I doubt there are many articles where editors will find 50 different peer-reviewed theories, and will want to include them all.

Including a "significant minority view" does NOT mean undue weight. HOW we include a "significant minority view" does (ie it must be written in an NPOV style).

--Iantresman 18:58, 9 April 2006 (UTC)

Significant minority / Prominent adherents

It seems that there are two distinct issues here: criteria for significant minority, and criteria for inclusion. The former seems to be a policy issue, the latter a guidline issue. Regarding significant minority, we have only one criterion listed: "prominent adherents". But what about popular acknowledgment (e.g., Google count), or hostile majority acknowledgment (e.g., members of a majority view acknowledging the minority view by rebuttal, or similar) – are these included under "prominent", and if so, should we make that explicit; if not, should we add them as valid criteria? Regarding inclusion, we touch on it in different places (e.g., "A solution is that we accept, for the purposes of working on Wikipedia, that "human knowledge" includes all different significant theories on all different topics. So we're committed to the goal of representing human knowledge in that sense."), but perhaps a new guidline would be appropriate to give examples, and to be a bit more specific about when a view is relevant to include and when it is not (assuming significant minority as a baseline)? Just thinking out loud here, I don't mean to push the envelope or anything. --MonkeeSage 04:24, 8 April 2006 (UTC)

Indeed, though both criteria are defined by policy. Regarding inclusion of significant minority views (emphasis mine):

An "article should fairly represent all significant viewpoints, in proportion to the prominence of each". [4] (ie. no prominence, no mention).
"Articles that compare views ... may not include tiny-minority views at all " [[5]] (this does not include significant minority views)
"... editors may unwittingly or deliberately present a subject in an unfair way [.. by ..] Entirely omitting significant citable information in support of a minority view" [6]

There is no ambiguity, and no requirement for interpretation by consensus. Policy tells us that (1) Omitting significant views is unfair, (2) Omitting tiny minority views may be justified (but not significant views)

--Iantresman 09:49, 8 April 2006 (UTC)

Zooming in to what IMO is the hot potato: how to decide if we consider information to be significant enough to include in a certain article or not. But that happens to be what Monkeesage just said... Harald88 16:06, 8 April 2006 (UTC)

How can a hostile majority acknowledgment (e.g., members of a majority view acknowledging the minority view by rebuttal, or similar) exist without an articulation of the minority view itself being presented by a promnient adherent somewhere where it can be cited? Where did the majority view discover the minority view in order to rebut it in the first place?

Do adherents of majority points of view argue in public with silent, invisible or secret adherents of minority points of view for whom there is no prominent adherent?

The google test for this purpose is defective as well since it cannot identify the indicated point of view actually to be the point of view of the source where the hit is located. (Does the flat earth really have as many as 2,200,000 adherents?); the sky is blue merely 750,000?) patsw 17:14, 8 April 2006 (UTC)

The Google test is indeed flawed, but as the article it says, it is just a rule of thumb. So a Google search for flat earth merely tells you that it is mentioned on a certain number of pages, rather than the number of people who advocate the idea. But it can be useful in assessing whether words or phrases are "known". Likewise, a peer-reviwed citation does not prove a theory, nor necessarily support a theory, if a subsquent peer-reviewed papers suggest otherwise. --Iantresman 20:52, 8 April 2006 (UTC)

AFAIK, the google test is generally used to determine if a website is well known, or more generally if a word or phrase is well-known or widely used. It's use to determine the adherents of a view seems rather obviously inappropriate... JesseW, the juggling janitor 00:36, 9 April 2006 (UTC)

I completely agree. A google test cannot and should not be used as a measure of number of adherents of a certain POV. ≈ jossi ≈ t • @ 04:27, 10 April 2006 (UTC)

Ian - I'm not sure what you mean by "There is no ambiguity". If there is no ambiguity, what are you trying to clarify? It seems that there is ambiguity, due to the policy being general, and specific cases being, well, specific. I don't think that the terms "significant minority" and "prominent adherents" are intended to have technical, defined meanings in the policy; they are intended to refer to their general, common meanings. I don't think there is, or should be, criteria for being a "significant minority" or a "prominent adherent", they are not used as terms of art, they are used as common language. (On another note, I do appreciate Lumiere explaining why he had to change accounts. I had not heard that before, and I would suggest he could get the edits associated with his previous account added to his current one. I think that's technically feasible.) JesseW, the juggling janitor 00:36, 9 April 2006 (UTC)

What? Lumiere getting yet another username?. This may be the third in the last month. Unacceptable. ≈ jossi ≈ t • @ 04:29, 10 April 2006 (UTC)

patsw and others: The issue is not as clear-cut as you seem to think it is. How about the situation where someone from the majority view has criticized another view in their books, but has not named the people who hold that view (and the editor isn't familiar with the minority view to know who the majority critic is speaking of) – is the criticized view a "significant" minority, since it got the attention of the majority, even though a particular "adherent" is not known? And if, in the same situation, the minority adherent is named by the hostile majority critic, is that what we mean by "prominent" (as you seem to assume), or do we mean something else (like general popularity/familiarity, which leads to the other issue). And what about Google counting – is "prominence" something like "their peers take their ideas seriously," or is it more like "their ideas are familiar to a large number of people", or something of a mix of these – or even something else altogether? Without a clear, specific criteria for "significant minority" there will be abuses; and the current "significant minority" criterion is neither clear nor specific, and it will not be without some fleshing out of what is meant by "prominent". --MonkeeSage 02:04, 10 April 2006 (UTC)

We MUST be able to verify prominent adherents, and the only way to do this is if they are named, and in print. This has nothing to do with whether the ideas are taken seriously; as Jimbo Wales clarified, we consider "information which is verifiable and which can be easily presented in an NPOV fashion." [7] —Preceding unsigned comment added by lantresman (talk • contribs)

MonkeySage, I like very much your last pâragraph. This is exactly the right questions to ask, and I like the answers that you suggest. However, let me go back to your first paragraph in this section. I guess that I attribute a different meaning than you do to the expresion "criteria for inclusion". For example, for me, verifiability is a criteria for inclusion and it is not at all a guideline issue. Every criteria for inclusion, in accordance with my interpretation of this expression, is a fundamental aspect of the policy. By definition, if a criteria for inclusion is violated by a view, this view is not acceptable for inclusion. This is too important to be considered a guideline. One of our challenge is to define the criteria for inclusion that applies in the Undue weight section. The current situation is a mess because we do not use the same terminology, or because we do not attribute the same importance to the inclusion criteria in general. -Lumière 05:12, 10 April 2006 (UTC)

We also have a serious challenge at the terminology level. We have many kind of minorities: "(ordinary) minority view", "significant minority view", "tiny minority view" and, lately, "extreme minority view". In addition, we also have the expression "significant view". We also have the concept of "prominent adherents". Saxifrage also use the concepts of "acceptance of a view within a community", and even the concept of "acceptance of a community within a larger community", which I believe are very useful concepts. Until, the policy clarifies these concepts, and only use those that are really necessary, the situation will remain a mess. -Lumière 05:12, 10 April 2006 (UTC)

My view is that our objective should be to determine what are the inclusion criteria in terms of some of these concepts, which we must clearly explain. I propose that we follow what is implicit in Saxifrage's answer to Ian, which is that the "significance" of a view is the main inclusion criteria of the Undue weight section. If I paraphrase Saxifrage, a view is "significant" if it has prominent adherents or if it has an acceptance within a well defined community. In this way, we have related the concept of "significant view" to the concept of "prominent adherents" and the concept of "acceptance within a community", and have defined the main inclusion criteria of the Undue weight section. The other inclusion criteria is relevancy, which can be seen as a natural complement to "significance". -Lumière 05:12, 10 April 2006 (UTC)

In summary, our main inclusion criteria is "significance", and a view is significant if it has prominent adherent or it has acceptance within a well defined community. Our challenge is to define the notion of "prominent adherents" and the notion of "acceptance within a well defined community". To determine if an adherent is prominent, we might consider using a Google test or similar test. To determine acceptance within a community the natural approach is to consider the publications. If the sources for a view are published in journals that are associated with a community, we can conclude that the view has an acceptance within that community. For example, we can say that a view that is sourced in a peer-reviewed journals in astrophysics has gained acceptance within that community. In a way, we can say that the journals are a way to identify the community. One could consider that the prominent adherents are also a way to identify a community, but this way of thinking is not clear to me. I prefer to consider that the existence of prominent adherents is simply another way to determine the significance of a view, which does not necessarily imply the existence of a well defined community. -Lumière 05:12, 10 April 2006 (UTC)

As far as relevancy is concerned, I don't see that it is possible to provide specific rules. IMO, we must rely on consensus, but I would add that a strong opposition to a view is an indication of relevancy, not the opposite. One question should be discussed, however. If a view is a criticism of the adherents to an opposite view, not of this view per se, but only of its adherents, should we consider such a view as relevant? My answer is yes, but this criticism must be higly significant in itself. The prominent adherents to such a criticism should be highly prominent or the sources for such criticism should be highly reputable. Strong claim beg strong sources. We want to avoid propagation of gossips. Also, the criticism should have some relation to the validity of the view. In particular, we must avoid fallacious adhominen arguments. -Lumière 05:12, 10 April 2006 (UTC)

-Lumière: That was a very thoughtful analysis. Thank you. For clarity, what I meant by saying that inclusion is a guidline issue, was not inclusion anywhere, I meant inclusion in a particular article – in other words, the policy issue establishes the right of inclusion somewhere, and the guidline would establish where to include. For example, on a page about about Global Warming the minority view which denies global warming has a right of mention, however, on a related page about, say Greenpeace, it may not be prudent to mention said minority view, as it is only tangential to the topic. Does that make my distinction clearer? --MonkeeSage 05:34, 10 April 2006 (UTC)

Yes, I do understand what you are saying, I think. I understand that I did not explicitly address this issue in my analysis. For example, I define the general concept of "inclusion criteria" without specifying whether the inclusion is somewhere in Wikipedia or in a particular article. It is an important point, which definitively must be clarified. Thank you. Now that you have me think about it, I realize that I have defined the significance criteria in an absolute manner, that is, not in relation with an article. In particular, the notion of prominent adherents does not make any reference to the article. Similarly, the notion of acceptance within a community also does not make any reference to the article. However, the notion of relevancy is of course a notion that is relative to the article. What you suggest would move the relevancy criteria at the level of guideline. This would have to be discussed, but my vote would be to keep all inclusion criteria, including the relevancy criterion, at the policy level. -Lumière 05:51, 10 April 2006 (UTC)

Iantresman, I want to add that the above is not related to some of your proposed paragraphs that are about inclusion of views in their own separate articles. It is only related to your proposed paragraphs that are about inclusion of minority views in a given article. You are saying that we must avoid excluding (minority) views that are significant, and this is perfectly in accord with the above. -Lumière 05:51, 10 April 2006 (UTC)

Thinking more about the last comment of MonkeeSage, I realize that to be more respectful of the spirit of the Undue weight section, we need to consider the significance of the community itself. If a view has an acceptance within a community (in terms of publication in some journals), but this community is a tiny minority inside the community interested in the topic of the article, perhaps we should not include the view in the article. This is obviously closely related to Iantresman's original question. How do we determine if a community is a tiny minority within another community? -Lumière 06:18, 10 April 2006 (UTC)

I think we have to be careful about defining prominent adherent in "well defined groups", otherwise we have people saying, "he's not prominent in my group". It also means we have the additional problem of defining the "well defined group". Again, the only objective and verifiable way to assess prominent adherents is whether their name appears in print, is verifiable, and is credible (ie. peer reviewed). --Iantresman 07:48, 10 April 2006 (UTC)

This begs the question I raised (and points up the reason I raised it): What do we mean by prominent? Both "peer reviewed" and "popular/familiar" are objectively verifiable. What exactly do we mean by "prominent"? --MonkeeSage 09:53, 10 April 2006 (UTC)

Who is speaking of prominent adherents "in well defined group"? Not me. Let me summarize my proposal without the last part, which seems controversial, and then I will reexplain this last part. I propose two inclusion criteria: significance and relevancy. I will only reexplain signifinace here. I define significance to be: existence of prominent adherents OR acceptance within a well defined group. These are two different ways to justify the significance of a view: if a view has no prominent adherents it may still be significant if it has an acceptance within a well defined community. To verify that a person is an adherent to a view we must provide a source, which is required anyway by WP:Verifiability. However, for many, including Bensaccount, WP:verifiability is not sufficient to justify a view for inclusion, and thus the existence of prominent adherents OR acceptance within a community must be more than WP:verifiability. To check that an adherent is prominent I propose that we use a Google test or a similar test. Note that, in this proposal, a prominent adherent does not need to be prominent within a group. To verify that a view has an acceptance within a well defined community, I propose that again we use the sources, but this time not to look for prominent adherents but to see if these sources correspond to a well identified community. The requirement on the sources should depend on the community. For example, if a statement suggests that a view has an acceptance within all the people in the USA, this statement should have some highly reputable sources that represent all the USA people. If a statement suggests that a view has an acceptance within the scientific community at large, the sources should be peer-reviewed journals that have a large scope. On the other hand, if the statement only claims acceptance within a small scientific community, then one peer-reviewed journal that is associated with this community is enough. Note that WP:Verifiability already says that what is a reputable source depends on the topic. Here we say that what are reputable sources for a view depends on the community that supposedly accepts this view. It is closely related. -Lumière 14:41, 10 April 2006 (UTC)

After I made this proposal, I thought that perhaps "acceptance within any well defined community" was not sufficient and that we should require "acceptance within a significant community" instead. I think that this is where the proposal received oppositions. I agree that what we mean by "significant community" would have to be defined, and I do not see how we can capture this concept in a way that is not subjective. We already require that the community should be identified through associated publications. This perhaps is enough, and we don't need the last part. This is something that should be discussed, but it has nothing to do with prominent adherents in "well defined groups" or communities. It has something to do with what we mean by "well defined community". Again, I propose that communities are identified through associated journals or publications. Religious journals identify that community, scientific journals identify that community, etc. One might say that general newspapers identify the general population in the area (the city, the state, the country, etc.), but I would be careful here. I think that we should always be very critical when a view is attributed to a general population, especially if the view has some opponents within the editors. I would request multiple independent sources because it is a strong claim. If the view is not controversial such as the sky is blue, then it is OK. -Lumière 14:41, 10 April 2006 (UTC)

A few days ago I would have agreed with that sky example; however, then I spoke to a guy from Bolivia who had had a conversation in an airplane with a high placed individual (well-known but not to be mentioned here) and who stated "the sky is red" - true at that very moment; and next they had an intense argument about it! Anyway, IMO in general it seems to be a practical rule: what all editors agree upon that "everyone" agrees upon may safely be stated as matter-of-fact.

But now, to be honest, you wrote so much text that I completely lost my way, and I'm afraid that may be the case for about everyone. Most of us have our lives outside of Wikipedia, and limited time and attention span you know! Harald88 20:41, 10 April 2006 (UTC)

-Lumière, please take your discussion on this topic to your user talk page and free up this page for other discussion on other topics. FeloniousMonk 02:04, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

OK, I will avoid long posts. I will also remove what I posted, but will wait to make sure that there is no objection. In the future, I will try to limit myself to some key points to allow a discussion. Sorry that you lost me. BTW, I am aware that the "the sky is blue" was not a good example, and the underlying principle itself is controversial – it was not a main point. -Lumière 02:16, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

The short version

I can explain my point using this from Jimbo Wales, September 2003, on the mailing list:

If a viewpoint is in the majority, then it should be easy to substantiate it with reference to commonly accepted reference texts;
If a viewpoint is held by a significant minority, then it should be easy to name prominent adherents;
If a viewpoint is held by an extremely small (or vastly limited) minority, it doesn't belong in Wikipedia (except perhaps in some ancillary article) regardless of whether it's true or not; and regardless of whether you can prove it or not.

We will only consider the three categories that are defined in the last part of each of the three sentences. The first category corresponds to what I called "an acceptance within a well defined community". Remember that I said that we should verify such an acceptance using publications. Jimbo Wells went directly to the point: "subtanciated with commonly accepted reference texts". I can easily retract my terminology "acceptance within a ... community". It is the practical and verifiable definition of the category that is important. The second category corresponds to what I called "existence of prominent adherents". In my proposal, a view is "significant" if it belongs to the first or the second category. The third category contains what remains, the non significant views. Even a view that is "non significant" is acceptable in its own separate article, if it is verifiable. -Lumière 02:47, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

The term "significance" can be replaced by something else, though I think its use here is consistent with Saxifrage's use of this term in his answer to Iantresman. -Lumière 03:32, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

Please stop using my name in support of your project. If you want to know whether your interpretation of something is consistent of mine, ask. If I deign to reply, you will then know. Simply asserting that my view is consistent with yours is misleading. – Saxifrage ✎ 04:46, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

Saxifrage, your acknowledgement that my use of the term "significance" is consistent with your use of this term was not expected at all. It would have been naive from me to expect such an aknowledgement or any form of support from you. My point depends only on your use of the term significance in your answer to Iantresman, not on your support now. I will not even ask you what is your interpretation of Jimbo's post. I am too afraid that your answer would be that it is all a rule of thumb! -Lumière 05:25, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

I see you don't understand. Do. Not. Use. MY. Name. A tonne of bricks will be kinder than I if you persist. – Saxifrage ✎ 05:58, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

SlimVirgin's request

Harald88, MonkeeSage, Iantresman and Bensaccount what do you think of SlimVirgin's request. Don't worry! A break is not a problem, if it can help. Just tell me whether you feel it will be better for our progress that I take such a break.—Preceding unsigned comment added by -Lumière (talk • contribs)

Yes, -Lumière, please stop cluttering up the policy talk pages. I skip over your comments because I do not find them useful. You are not engaging in useful discussion, but you do give the appearance of trying to beat everyone down by your incessant posting. We are not going to change these policies because you say so, no matter how many times you say it. Give it a break! – Donald Albury^(Talk) 11:31, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

A break merely delays the time when discussion will begin again. And again, And again, until the issue is resolved. If people can't be bothered to participate and EXPLAIN their points of view, then don't winge when others decide things in their absence.

Clearly, not participating is a tacit acknowledgement that the status quo is satisfactory. THIS IS THE STATUS QUO... post after post after post. --Iantresman 11:49, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

No one is trying to CHANGE policy. People are trying to clarify it. --Iantresman 11:49, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

People have participated, read the archives. They've all come to the same conclusion that some here aren't interested in actual discussion, but in furthering their own views and so are completely resistant to reason. Opinions already expressed here by some the project's long-term, credible contributors indicate that they fail to see a problem that needs fixing and that these proposals are not acceptable. The only problem here is that a few are unwilling to accept it. Enough editors have objected over the months to the incessant droning on about this alleged "issue" that any further ignoring of requests to take long-winded, one-sided discussion on this same topic to user talk pages can and will be moved to free up this page for other discussions. FeloniousMonk 20:48, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

My experience is that responding to these kind of discussions doesn't make any difference. The proposers know what they want and don't listen to my opinions. It has been explained that many of the 'clarifications' will just open loop-holes. There is a good reason why we are told to avoid instruction creep. I've also seen editors spend a lot of time and effort tidying-up a policy, only to see most of their work overturned when it comes time to put it into effect. These policies have been around for a while, and IMO don't need 'clarification'. Three or four editors getting together to try to change a policy like this one is just not going to fly. I am not contributing to the discussion because I think the proposed changes are not needed, but I will step in to oppose any such changes if someone actually attempts to insert them in the article. – Donald Albury^(Talk) 14:49, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

Why would users be pre-opposed to any changes which try to clarify the policy, regardless of whether they succeed? My guess is that as Lumiere has aptly noted, it feels safer for those who have a "firm grasp of the policy already" to keep it vague (see above). Lumiere does not need to be suppressed, just more succinct. Bensaccount 15:58, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

Anyone who wants my support for fixing this policy is going to have to do a much better job of convincing me that it is broken. And I don't respond well to hearing the same arguments made over and over and over and... – Donald Albury^(Talk) 16:51, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

Thank you Donald for such a succinct expression of exactly my position. – Saxifrage ✎ 17:18, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

SlimVirgin's request

Harald88, MonkeeSage, Iantresman and Bensaccount what do you think of SlimVirgin's request. Don't worry! A break is not a problem, if it can help. Just tell me whether you feel it will be better for our progress that I take such a break.-Lumière

Yes, -Lumière, please stop cluttering up the policy talk pages. I skip over your comments because I do not find them useful. You are not engaging in useful discussion, but you do give the appearance of trying to beat everyone down by your incessant posting. We are not going to change these policies because you say so, no matter how many times you say it. Give it a break! – Donald Albury^(Talk) 11:31, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

A break merely delays the time when discussion will begin again. And again, And again, until the issue is resolved. If people can't be bothered to participate and EXPLAIN their points of view, then don't winge when others decide things in their absence.

Clearly, not participating is a tacit acknowledgement that the status quo is satisfactory. THIS IS THE STATUS QUO... post after post after post. --Iantresman 11:49, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

No one is trying to CHANGE policy. People are trying to clarify it. --Iantresman 11:49, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

People have participated, read the archives. They've all come to the same conclusion that some here aren't interested in actual discussion, but in furthering their own views and so are completely resistant to reason. Opinions already expressed here by some the project's long-term, credible contributors indicate that they fail to see a problem that needs fixing and that these proposals are not acceptable. The only problem here is that a few are unwilling to accept it. Enough editors have objected over the months to the incessant droning on about this alleged "issue" that any further ignoring of requests to take long-winded, one-sided discussion on this same topic to user talk pages can and will be moved to free up this page for other discussions. FeloniousMonk 20:48, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

My experience is that responding to these kind of discussions doesn't make any difference. The proposers know what they want and don't listen to my opinions. It has been explained that many of the 'clarifications' will just open loop-holes. There is a good reason why we are told to avoid instruction creep. I've also seen editors spend a lot of time and effort tidying-up a policy, only to see most of their work overturned when it comes time to put it into effect. These policies have been around for a while, and IMO don't need 'clarification'. Three or four editors getting together to try to change a policy like this one is just not going to fly. I am not contributing to the discussion because I think the proposed changes are not needed, but I will step in to oppose any such changes if someone actually attempts to insert them in the article. – Donald Albury^(Talk) 14:49, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

So since I suggested a clarification of the Undue weight policy, where is/are your suggestion to it? Please give ANY example, real or made up, where clarification of a policy introduces loop-holes, rather than removes them? Please indicate where "instruction creep" forms part of policy? Making changes without discussion and forming consensus is against Wiki policy. No one said that the existing policy is broken, only that it can be improved. --Iantresman 23:38, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

Why would users be pre-opposed to any changes which try to clarify the policy, regardless of whether they succeed? My guess is that as Lumiere has aptly noted, it feels safer for those who have a "firm grasp of the policy already" to keep it vague (see above). Lumiere does not need to be suppressed, just more succinct. Bensaccount 15:58, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

Anyone who wants my support for fixing this policy is going to have to do a much better job of convincing me that it is broken. And I don't respond well to hearing the same arguments made over and over and over and... – Donald Albury^(Talk) 16:51, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

Thank you Donald for such a succinct expression of exactly my position. – Saxifrage ✎ 17:18, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

Seconding this approach --Francis Schonken 21:07, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

The problem is not that the policy is broken, but that some users find it unclear. When your screen door breaks you need to fix it. Unfortunately, this is not a screen door. Bensaccount 00:29, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

The very fact that this discussion has been ongoing for so long demonstrates that there is a problem. That it has been demonstrated that there is an ambiguity in the policy, demonstrates that there is a problem. That the policy is open to interpretation, demonstrates that there is a problem. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Iantresman (talk • contribs)

Not really. The only reason for these discussions is Lumière's relentless posting in these pages, despite comments by countless editors to leave it alone. You may want to refer to your RfC at Wikipedia:Requests for comment/-Lumière. ≈ jossi ≈ t • @ 00:56, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

Circular reasoning is not very convincing. – Saxifrage ✎ 01:07, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

Users find the policy unclear. Your solution is telling them to shut up. But this only works until another user comes and asks the same question. Bensaccount 01:29, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

Take it to Lumiere's talk page and stop trying to continue this fruitless project here. – Saxifrage ✎ 01:39, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

I don't know anything about Lumiere, nor do I wish to go to his/her talk page. I am rather annoyed that my section (What is a "prominent adherent"?), which simply requested for the community to define and clarify the terms used in the policy with regard to "significant minority," was moved to a personal talk page. But if the editors here wish to leave the terms ambiguious and open to misuse for POV-pushing (where "prominent" can be taken to mean anything from "I like them" to "respected by their peers" to "alot of people know about them" to "they were mentioned in my school paper" and so on; and "adherent" can be taken to mean "person" or "idealogical group"), because of a grudge against some editor or whatever the case may be, then so be it. I wash my hands of the matter. --MonkeeSage 11:15, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

It's not a grudge. The reason for not defining those words is because Wikipedia policy runs on common meanings of words, not technically-defined meanings. Further, defining them in an technical way would make the definitions policy, not clarify the existing policy. Since the definitions were not and never have been a matter of policy this would be a change of the policy itself (not just its wording), and changes to core policy require the overwhelming support of the entire community. – Saxifrage ✎ 17:58, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

Saxifrage and everyone else who insists discussion stop; you are forfeiting your voice on this issue. Now cease arguing about Undue weight. Bensaccount 19:14, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

Laughing at such a statement would be impolite, so I won't. – Saxifrage ✎ 19:22, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

If you want the issue dropped you can't keep arguing your side. Bensaccount 19:25, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

So long as people keep trying to argue that the policy needs to be changed in this particular way, I will argue against it. Your absurd statement that you somehow own the policy because you want to talk about changing it is definitely you continuing your argument and very much reason for me to continue to oppose. – Saxifrage ✎ 19:33, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

If you try and enforce silence, it can not be everyone else but you. Bensaccount 19:39, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

Disrupting discussion

Per numerous requests from the community to either drop the issue or take it to his personal talk pages and his constant refusal to abide by the wishes of the community, this discussion has been moved to User_talk:-Lumière#Discussion about the Undue weight section of Neutral point of view FeloniousMonk 21:16, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

WP:POINT: [8] FeloniousMonk 21:29, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

Let us not fight them. Anyone interested is welcome to continue the discussion in my User talk page or we can move it elsewhere. We will come back when we will agree amongst us. -Lumière 21:48, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

I am part of the community, and I do not object to Lumière's attempt to engage in discussion on its proper page, so your statement is false. Wiki policy, that "Our policies keep changing, and their interpretation as well. Hence it is common on Wikipedia for policy itself to be debated on talk pages," [9], so I assume that moving the discussion is against Wiki policy. --Iantresman 23:44, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

FM didn't say that the community was unanimous; he said (rightly) that many members of the community have asked (over some considerable time) that the handful of editors who have been tirelessly nagging the rest of us to change one of our central policies in order to let them edit in a way that is currently not allowed should give up and go and do something constructive, or at least witter about it among themselves on their own Talk pages. --Mel Etitis (Μελ Ετητης) 17:17, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

Right. Jkelly 18:20, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

Please stop creating sections dedicated to disrupting discussion; this thread ends here. Bensaccount 19:01, 12 April 2006 (UTC)