Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/IncidentArchive815

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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A fringe theorist,

talk

) 15:24, 9 October 2013 (UTC)

See the talk page,

talk

) 15:27, 9 October 2013 (UTC)

Not much of a conspiracy theory - it's actually based on the editors behaviors and agenda on the page. I think the reason editors are assuming that vzaak and others are apart of the GSM is because they appear to be editing with the exact same agenda as the GSM. It appears to many to be that the skeptical POV is more important than the NPOV, and that's a reasonable concern. Plus, clearly all the editors in question co-ordinate together like can be evidenced here. That the fact that the GSM is on wikipedia is of course not a conspiracy, they are quite open about it. So it's a reasonable association.

The GSM is not the problem with this editor, and this editor has no ideological agenda. what is the problem is when editors appear to edit a page, wiki lawyer WP policy to support a Skeptical POV above all else, avoid reaching consensus, avoid direct questions, bully and intimidate editors, and most importantly, absolutely fail to deliver verifiable sources based on facts and use personal opinions as reasoned arguments on a BLP. As for conspiracy theories, I would check this talk discussion and references to myself as a 'troll with a social media experiment who fosters global disturbance as his goal' as a good candidate for a proper debunking. Always a good policy to be skeptical about our own ridiculous ideas just as much as we are skeptical about anyone else's. Work reasonably here guys, I just want facts and reasoned arguments - if your not GSM, none of you seem to be contributing to the spirit of WP on that page regardless and if you are GSM, you're really making them look bad.

talk

) 15:59, 9 October 2013 (UTC)

A careful review of all edits, including mine, to this article over the past month is in order. The level of incivility and unwillingness to collaborate is dreadful. Absolutism in championing

WP:FRINGE applies at all. There's bad behavior all around, although careful review will reveal that some have been worse actors than others. The Craig Weller stuff is just a sideshow. There's worse stuff here, predating the Weiller blogpost. A freeze may be in order, because things are degenerating. David in DC (talk

) 16:31, 9 October 2013 (UTC)

One thing at a time. Tumbleman's complaint seems to be that a group of editors are editing the

WP:NPOV. Will you (or anyone) give diffs that show examples of these edits? - LuckyLouie (talk

) 16:33, 9 October 2013 (UTC)

One thing at time. OK. That'll take some work, and multiple edits. To avoid edit conflicts, I'll be working piecemeal, over a bit of time. Let's start with the erroneous claim that Tumbleman has deleted the statements Wolfie complains of. Wolfie is wrong. I'm the one who berated Tumbleman about them. To see the whole exchange, see here, here, here and

here. David in DC (talk

) 18:47, 9 October 2013 (UTC)

Thanks, but those appear to be diffs of Talk and User page discussion. Are there diffs that show edits to

WP:NPOV or other policies)? - LuckyLouie (talk

) 19:00, 9 October 2013 (UTC)

Now some diffs from a group of editors working from the POV that BLP is far less important than

fringe theorist. Here are some admirably honest expression of this POV from the talk page. After a rest from this truly dispiriting review,, I'll put up some diffs from the article. But in truth, after reading these declarations, most any set of revert/re-reverts you see in the article history will suffice: [4], [5], [6], [7], [8], [9], [10], [11], [12], [13], [14], [15], [16], An attempt to start anew, [17], [18], [19], [20], [21], [22], [23], [24], [25]

.

As it happens, the most recent edits to the article are a microcosm of the sorts of edits in question. They clear elevate FRINGE over BLP. [26] David in DC (talk) 20:22, 9 October 2013 (UTC)

You are of the opinion that well sourced criticism should not be included often in BLPs, very good, but don't expect many others to agree with removing well sourced criticisms of fringe views just because it is a BLP,

talk

) 22:40, 9 October 2013 (UTC)

I am of the opinion that well-sourced criticism of fringe theories should be included in articles about fringe theories, without regard to

WP:ATTACK

piece. There is a difference between the way good wikipedia editors handle fringe theories and the way they handle fringe theorists. It requires keener, more nuanced editorial judgment and good-faith collaboration. It is not a good area in which to apply binary, black/white, toggle-switch judgment. Living people are special. They are different. The editing of articles about them is rarely enhanced by the zealotry.

Mind-reading is psuedo-science. So any sentence that starts with "You are of the opinion..." is suspect. Doubly so when what follows is inaccurate. Triply so when the two parties have engaged in this conversation before. "You are of the opinion that well sourced criticism should not be included often in BLPs...." is false. Whether the mis-statement is intentional or negligent, I cannot know.

Assuming good faith, it's negligent. Please take special care to avoid such negligence in characterizing my arguments in the future. Assumptions are, eventually, rebuttable. David in DC (talk

) 02:17, 10 October 2013 (UTC)

Well, maybe they know what your opinions are via mind reading??? EEng (talk) 03:18, 10 October 2013 (UTC)

I know what his opinions are because he keeps telling everyone them. When someone says "in my view" one expects what they say is in fact in their view. "At some point, and in my view the Null article as I first found it had reached and exceeded that point, the "piling on" of sourced derogatory information turns a BLP into an WP:ATTACK piece."

talk

) 07:56, 10 October 2013 (UTC)

Humorless people are so very tiresome. EEng (talk) 11:02, 10 October 2013 (UTC)

"You are of the opinion that well sourced criticism should not be included often in BLPs..." is not an accurate restatement of the prior statement you've now provided. I'll try one last time and then give up on explaining. In a BLP, the sourced derogatory information should be carefully calibrated, so as not to turn a biography into an indictment. This does not mean it should be left out often. Rather, it means it should be included judiciously, with BLP in mind. BLP and FRINGE are in tension on biographies of living fringe theorists. There is more leeway to pile up the derogatory sourced info on a page about fringe theories than on one about living FRINGE theorists.David in DC (talk) 12:09, 10 October 2013 (UTC)

OK, so this is a Talk Page dispute rather than any policy violations to the article itself, and in any case, Talk page discussion is not subject to

baiting that is ongoing. - LuckyLouie (talk

) 20:19, 9 October 2013 (UTC)

No. Please re-read the sentence introducing the diffs and the edit summary for introduction of the diffs.David in DC (talk) 20:22, 9 October 2013 (UTC)

OK, back to diffs in answer to Louie's request for diffs showing "...that a group of editors are editing the

WP:BLP should be affording them. This POV is detrimental to the project we all hold dear. David in DC (talk

) 02:48, 10 October 2013 (UTC)

Nothing in my edits which you have shown are BLP violations and I dislike the inference that they are.

talk

) 10:23, 12 October 2013 (UTC)

Calling me a "Fringe Theorist" is completely over the top. This isn't some vague conspiracy. The Guerrilla Skepticism Organization is quite real. They have a website: Guerrilla Skepticism. They have a training/recruiting video. In the video they lay out their tactics and provide examples of sites that they've targeted. They claim to have 90 editors working in 17 languages. They are doing this in direct violation of Wikipedia policy.

They have the support of the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry, (here) a national organization, and JREF, also a national organization. (here). As far as Sheldrake's bio, there is clear evidence of a skeptical attack on his page. I have these sources in my blog post on the subject. It would be amazing if they DIDN'T target Sheldrake's bio.Craig Weiler (talk) 18:36, 9 October 2013 (UTC)

@

WP:FRINGE

applies at all as a problem on the board that needs review. Indeed it does. This isn't a fair review of the arguments and perhaps a little misleading to someone who has to read this for ANI.

My specific argument, which actually is more of a question which the title of my Sheldrake's talk sections clearly shows, was proper sourcing and references to support a

WP:NOT

, it's also just sloppy referencing. I asked this numerous times in TALK directly to a few editors. It was never addressed, the question was either avoided or reasoned discussion for a rational consensus was. All this editor got in return was having his user page under scrutiny, having editors post my IP address and personal information about me, calling me a troll because of some link they have from 2005, etc etc in some sort of bizarre wikilawyered ad hom to my questions. I could have brought this into ANI weeks ago, however I choose to make my case in talk using sourced references and reasoned arguments, to build a new consensus. I have not even edited the page yet!

When my questions were addressed with a reference, the references were poorly sourced, showed evidence of OR to this editor, personal interpretations, etc etc. Honestly to me it looked like a team of editors with an agenda stacked a 'house of cards' case to support the viewpoint they wanted on the page and when reasonably challenged, they resorted to what you are reading right now, this is the third attempt to get me banned from the page and to this editor it just looks like this is the last resort they have to maintain using horrible sourcing to support their POV.

The talk section in exchange with this editor clearly reflects this and I invite ANI to review talk sections 'Request for a new consensus', 'SHeldrake is a parapsychologist, references?', 'is WP:FRINGE being applied unnecessarily to Sheldrake's page?' and 'new edit'. Or any other section. I made a very sincere commitment to make this page better under the guidelines and spirit of WP, so I trust my integrity with my work here so far.

IRWolfie-

, I think it's fair to say that this case you are making here is not a real problem and is serving more like a strawman or a ruse to avoid a new consensus. What IS a real problem is there is NOT a rational consensus amongst editors regarding sourcing and reasoned arguments. I still don't see how this action will help build consensus on the page. That's what we are supposed to do to make the page better. I think a review of the edits is in order as well. (I personally have not made any edits to the page, except one minor one more than 30 days ago that I also retracted because I was mistaken about the source. But more in order is a review of the behaviors on the talk page.

Also, it's absolutely fair to say that working with David in DC on this issue on the board is workable, I do think his intentions as an editor are genuine and I hold him exempt from the behaviors on the board. There is no reason why he and I cannot find or build a rational consensus together.

So, we can try this again? If I am such the problem that this crowd is claiming, wouldnt it be more in the spirit of consensus and WP to actually engage in reasoned arguments with an editor with a genuine concern of violations of BLP and WP at large? I think your case will be better made for ANI if you simply respond to my reasoned and good spirited questioning instead of trying to get me banned off the page for something you don't understand that happened in 2005 just looks like I am getting

talk

) 18:47, 9 October 2013 (UTC)

A certain group of editors, has taken objection to

) 19:55, 9 October 2013 (UTC)

talk

) 20:06, 9 October 2013 (UTC)

@IRWolfie-: (1) "Fringe theorist" is a pejorative term, and I don't think you should be calling a fellow editor one, in contravention of

) 21:55, 9 October 2013 (UTC)

Ian, Craig has commented about his blog himself. Where are you going with that?

talk

) 22:12, 9 October 2013 (UTC)

"Fringe theorist" is an insult, but I've taken so much abuse by skeptics over the years that it hardly matters to me anymore. IRWolfie is right about my blog. I've mentioned it myself. It's fair game.Craig Weiler (talk) 23:39, 9 October 2013 (UTC)

I stand corrected regarding the blog, with apologies to IRWolfie- --Iantresman (talk) 09:37, 10 October 2013 (UTC)

@LuckyLouie I am not sure your role here, but you appear to take a reasonable concern. YES there is a violation of NPOV on the lead section of the page. The reason the TALK section is relevant to the NPOV on the page is because there is commentary like this below is being used to support editing decisions with horrible sourcing: Quote below -

I think we need to find a way to fit the sentence "Sheldrakes ideas are regarded as batshit insane by most scientists" into the lede somewhere. All the scientists I know believe this. --Roxy the dog (quack quack) 15:14, 1 October 2013 (UTC)

Is that acceptable around here? Is it consensus building to have a page controlled by 4 or 5 editors who share a bias and a agenda to promote a skeptical POV over a NPOV? And then to provide no appropriate sourcing or bully other editors off the page? Does that foster consensus? ever? This is not REDDIT, right? The people who participate in reasoned arguments with commentary like this are the ones that want to get me banned from the page and refuse to engage me because I am 'trolling'. oh the irony is not lost on me either.

) 06:39, 10 October 2013 (UTC)

My "role" is merely as an editor. I have been around here a while and have in the past seen a number of

arbitrations ensue. Editors on both sides of the conflict are sanctioned, a few people quit or get banned, and everyone's left exhausted and drained. The article remains ugly and unreadable for some period of time, be it months, or even years. Eventually new editors without any old scores to settle come along and work quietly together to straighten out the mess. So forgive me for not joining the party. LuckyLouie (talk

) 00:23, 11 October 2013 (UTC)

All the scientist you know, are not most scientists, and your tone is inappropriate for an encyclopaedia. It is not disputed that Sheldrake has received criticisms. --Iantresman (talk) 09:41, 10 October 2013 (UTC)

Could I ask that if User:Iantresman wants to comment on a post I made on the Sheldrake Talk Page (which he has every right to do), he should do it there, rather than in the middle of somebody else's post here. Isn't it bad form to split a comment in two halves that way? --Roxy the dog (quack quack) 12:11, 10 October 2013 (UTC)

I didn't realise that your comment in bold, was a quote. My apologies for posting in the middle Tumbleman's post. --Iantresman (talk) 14:20, 10 October 2013 (UTC)

No problem Iantresman - I just wanted to make it clear that I did not post that on this page, and that it is here out of context --Roxy the dog (quack quack) 16:43, 10 October 2013 (UTC)

Confirming that

) 17:19, 10 October 2013 (UTC)

A suggestion

I've had a look through the talk page and a brief look through the history. There seems to be a few things here. Firstly, I think calls to topic ban

are jumping the gun. It's my impression from the talk page that though some editors might be motivated by the blog posts put out by Sheldrake supporters, we should give them a fair hearing on BLP-related claims. The way to do that is to have some uninvolved editors from outside the circle of people who care about psi to have a look. There has been a bit of back and forth on the lede today on the article.

Now, the problem I'm seeing is the accusations and counter-accusations regarding membership in Guerilla Skeptics. I've known

back when I wrote for it. They do some good work, and they are a lot less scary than their rather combative name suggests. On the Sheldrake talk page, there are accusations flying back and forth of people being members of the Guerilla Skeptics or not and lots of huff and puff about this. This is unhelpful, and I think further speculation on Wikipedia talk pages as to whether or not people are part of Guerilla Skeptics is unhelpful. Play the ball not the man, as the saying goes.

My suggestion is this: an uninvolved admin goes through the talk page and hatnotes or removes personal attacks and sniping about who is or isn't a Sheldrake supporter or a Guerilla Skeptic. Give people a few days to carry on discussing and if things continue to be unproductive, then we can try fully protecting the article and trying a more formal approach to dealing with the suggested changes that people want to make: some kind of mini-RfC. —Tom Morris (talk) 11:43, 10 October 2013 (UTC)

Hey Tom Morris, thanks for giving this a review. Just a few things for clarification

1.) I am not interested in promoting Sheldrakes theories, I am not a proponent of PSI. I am personally fascinated by Sheldrake philosophically, especially the history of the controversy, but that's because I love philosophy, not psychic pets. So I am truly agnostic when it comes to his research. I'm only promoting agnosticism :) Thanks for removing me from the 'fringe' claim - that would be really weird to apply that to me. Words like FRINGE and PSEUDOSCIENCE are being used as 'weasel words' on the page in a way that is really out of step with a purely NPOV.

2.)I am active on the page to promote a NPOV. Collective editing and building consensus is a big part of my life (I work in media and technology and am developing consensus based platforms). That's the only view I am interested in in this debate.

3.)I'm not sure I share you viewpoint regarding GSM, or at least 'GSM' type editing. Maybe I misunderstand you but are you suggesting that the Skeptical Point of View is primary OVER a Neutral Point of View? Because that is the problem I am encountering in the talk section, that skeptical opinions are being used to support violations of BLP in a way to demean a living person. <<<<< That - that's what irks me regardless of who it is, it turns WP into some kind of grudge and vendetta machine and that is quite harmful to any collective editing platform but more importantly an actual person. None of their edits seem interested in NPOV, they all seem interested in editing the page from the POV of making sheldrake look like a flake because that literally is what skeptics think of him. Is that what we are here to do? No

talk

) 14:30, 10 October 2013 (UTC)

Tom Morris, No one has been accused of being a member of the Guerrilla Skeptics. I have stated this explicitly on the talk page. The Tumbleman asked Vzaak and Barney whether they were members, but did not accuse them. There are no accusations and counter accusations. I don't know where you're getting that from but it is a complete misrepresentation of the discussion and I ask that you retract it.

I'm not sure why you think it's ok to have an ideologically motivated organization running amok on Wikipedia, but this is very harmful to Wikipedia's credibility.Craig Weiler (talk) 14:42, 10 October 2013 (UTC)

Craig on your blog post [34] you wrote regarding the Guerrilla Skeptics "Since June, they have gone on the attack to seriously change Rupert’s Bio." It's true you have not directly accused anyone of being part of the Guerrilla Skeptics group on Wikipedia but you have made it clear in your posts that you believe a Guerrilla skeptic group are "attacking" Sheldrake's Wikipedia article. I have called you out on this twice, but you still list no names of these editors or any evidence. As I wrote already you are confused on this issue. The owner of the Guerrilla skeptics is Sgerbic (talk · contribs) but she appears to be currently inactive on Wikipedia, you keep saying she is breaking Wikipedia policies but she isn't. Wikipedia does not promote pseudoscience Craig, you seem to fail to understand this. Please check the edit history of the Sheldrake article and you would find that Sgerbic has not edited the article at all. You have spread disinformation about this user and her group, and really you should apologize (you have mislead Sheldrake himself with your conspiracy theory and disinformation).

BTW you also say above "No one has been accused of being a member of the Guerrilla Skeptics" but this isn't true because the user

talk · contribs) has accused myself and many other users on the Sheldrake talk page as being members (none of us are) but he continues to throw around those accusations (easy to find evidence of that). You have also been posting on forums stirring this issue up and asking other paranormal believers to help you edit the Sheldrake article and promoting conspiracy theories that Wikipedia is run by "materialists" [35], [36] and on this forum here you talk about setting up some kind of petition against Wikipedia [37]. Do you think your behavior is acceptable Craig? It seems you have a long history of stirring up trouble on the internet and trolling [38]. I believe you only joined Wikipedia to stir up trouble, nothing you have said is productive or has anything to do with improving the Sheldrake article. Dan skeptic (talk

) 15:10, 10 October 2013 (UTC)

So what? Dan skeptic I admit that I have been public about being *suspicious* that specific editors are working the agenda of the GSM and their leader SGerbic, but on their talk pages because they are co-ordinating on their talk pages about how to deal with the 'tumbleman' problem. Dan Skeptic's agenda is the same agenda as GSM, who cares if he is a card carrying member or not? I refer to the position of GSM editors on the page because it's the actual agenda of these editors on the page, voiced in their own words. Sorry, blame GSM for branding the style and creating the copy cats, not me. I am concerned that an ideological group, or individual, has an outside agenda other than make the page better and more neutral. I am questioning the actual agenda of those editors based on their behaviors on the page, not some ideology i have or they have. I WANT the skeptical POV on the page too, it's necessary. It just can't become the mainstream view of WP and dominate everything else. We can't have four or five of these editors on any page and control it and avoid consensus, it's going to destroy WP eventually. If this is the direction WP is going in, I'm out.

Maybe an admin or

) 16:04, 10 October 2013 (UTC)

My point is very simple: if there are people who are acting problematically, it doesn't matter whether they are affiliated with the Guerilla Skeptics. If there are particular editors with issues, let's discuss those. If appropriate, blocks or topic bans etc. can be doled out. If there aren't behavioural problems, speculation as to whether or not users are affiliated with some group of editors—or speculation about their motives—is unhelpful and serves only to distract editors from trying to find consensus on the talk page. My suggestion was simply that: we clear the behavioural back-and-forth off the talk page and invite wider participation from the Wikipedia community on the content changes. —Tom Morris (talk) 16:57, 10 October 2013 (UTC)

Tumbleman you have admitted you have no problem with some skeptical sources on the article (this is good) but then you want to make it "neutral" by adding fringe sources as well to giving Sheldrake a "fair unbiased" hearing. This doesn't work because the majority of sources criticize Sheldrake's ideas as pseudoscience, it is not possible for an entirely "neutral" balance when it comes to fringe and pseudoscience topics because the scientific community reject them. I have not come across a single scientific reference that has supported Sheldrake's work, only parapsychologists and fringe proponents do. It's dangerous to be promoting pseudoscience, and it has no place on Wikipedia which receives millions of views everyday. I'm no expert on all of Wikipedia policies (so do feel free to have a go at me If I have got it wrong) and am rather new here myself but what I do know is that Wikipedia does not support pseudoscience (that is 100% clear and something that "psychics" like Craig Weiler seem to constantly ignore). There is over-whelming reliable sources that have criticized Sheldrake's psychic ideas as pseudoscience and there is no reason they should be ignored, removed from the article or toned-down. The idea of a "balance" when 99% of the scientific references criticize Sheldrake's views as pseudoscience is indeed quite mad. There's no scientific evidence psychic powers exist and there's no reason why pseudoscience should be supported on Wikipedia. Weiler talks about SGerbic breaking Wikipedia policies but he's wrong it's himself breaking policies by inserting pseudoscience on Wikipedia and stirring up conspiracy theories. I personally don't want to get involved in debating this issue anymore. I will look into other articles and stay away from the Sheldrake one. Good luck with your editing and the outcome of all this. Dan skeptic (talk) 17:14, 10 October 2013 (UTC)

Dan skeptic, I think some of the confusion is that this article is a biography, not an article elaborating his theories (which should have their own article, if they are notable). A BLP discusses their early life, education, early career, later career, major contributions to their field, possibly a list of their publications. If some of the subject's work is controversial, that can be noted. But a BLP is not the appropriate place to have a debate about science vs. pseudoscience.

It is, above all, a biography not an article about an idea, practice or theory. As far as I see it

WP:FRINGE

only applying to a section devoted to criticism of his work.

This is not an unusual case. There are also sorts of controversial figures (justly or unfairly) on Wikipedia and BLP and NPOV applies to controversial journalists, scientists, bloggers, scholars, radio hosts, war criminals, celebrities, criminals, etc. It's only incidental that Sheldrake happens to work in an area that is judged by some to be "fringe". He should be treated fairly even if some Editors object to his ideas. Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 02:26, 11 October 2013 (UTC)

This is the best explanation of this concept I've yet read. Skeptics, please read what Liz wrote. She's right. Thank you, Liz. David in DC (talk) 04:56, 11 October 2013 (UTC)

When an idea only has one significant proponent often it is not independently notable and it is placed in the biography. So no I disagree that Biographies don't cover theories, they clearly do, and the Sheldrake article clearly covers much about his "Morphic Resonance". Treating a viewpoint fairly means putting it into context with respect to the mainstream, and assigning weight via

talk

) 08:46, 11 October 2013 (UTC)

That's not how I read it at the moment. I agree that biographies can include a person's theories, and I agree that we must put those views into context. The

WP:BLP (b) Sheldrake has been denied his PH.D doctorate in biochemstry, whereas his doctorate is clearly acknowledged on the University of Cambridge website as recent as last year.[41] I have no problems with the appropriate part of his biography noting that some consider his theories pseudoscience, wrong (or however they are described by reliable sources) and that they consider his field of research to be in parapsychology. --Iantresman (talk

) 15:42, 11 October 2013 (UTC)

That's nuts, that he is not credited with the Ph.D. he earned. Education is a basic part of biographies, even critical ones. Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 20:45, 11 October 2013 (UTC)

If you look at the article the PhD clearly is mentioned and it was also when Ian wrote his comment: [42].

talk

) 10:26, 12 October 2013 (UTC)

@

) 17:36, 10 October 2013 (UTC)

@Dan skeptic I suggest using fringe sources, really? Can you cite an example where I do this? Please go to my sandbox, look at my edit, and HELP me identify a fringe source because if there is one in there, I want it out too. Also, what is a 'fringe' source anyway? can you define it rationally here to the community so we understand what you mean?

As to sheldrake being a pseudoscientist. Well there are about two or three opinions that he is in the sources on the page that feel very passionately that he is. THOSE ARE OPINIONS, they are not facts. It is important to the page that we SHOW those opinions, YES, but not as fACTS. For it to be a fact, we have to have a source that is from a scientific journal that shows a scientific consensus, through the process of science, that MR is pseudoscience. There is no 'closure' on MR being pseudoscience. I am not seeing that reference. I DO see academic journals however talking about how sheldrake's ideas are treated by *some* scientists and question the issue of bias in those attacks. But there is also a sourced opinion of a prominent mainstream scientist who does not think it is pseudoscience. Actually there is a BOOK written by a prominent scientist in discussion with 12 other scientists about sheldrakes ideas. Some of them think MR is quite valid, some do not. [^ ^ Durr, Hans-Peter;, Gottwald, Franz-Leo (1999). Rupert Sheldrake in der Diskussion. Das Wagnis einer neuen Wissenschaft des Lebens [Gebundene Ausgabe]. Berlin: Fischer Scherz.

) 17:36, 10 October 2013 (UTC)

I couldn't have said it better myself. As I recently mentioned on talk:sheldrake, it is worth comparing the tone of contentious articles between Wikipedia and encyclopaedias such as the

Encyclopedia of Pseudoscience (publ. 2000), has a more encyclopedic tone, even in its article on Sheldrake. --Iantresman (talk

) 17:57, 10 October 2013 (UTC)

That's not surprising. Wikipedia allows anyone with an Internet connection to use this website to promote their pet pseudoscientific belief (per

Rule #10). Britannica doesn't. Our articles on obscure fringe science (and fringe figures) are generally written as a tug-of-war between True Believers and determined skeptics. That polarization tends to drive away the sorts of people who would write good encyclopedic prose. MastCell ^Talk

18:07, 10 October 2013 (UTC)

Wikipedia has always sided with the "determined skeptics", which is as bad as "True Believers" pushing only their view. The idea of an article "promoting" any viewpoint is a abhorrent to many editors. --Iantresman (talk) 18:27, 10 October 2013 (UTC)

Now, now. I think you're exaggerating. The True Believers catch a break every now and then. After all, you were unbanned. MastCell ^Talk 21:04, 10 October 2013 (UTC)

As an atheist with a scientific background I find your label pejorative, and inappropriate per

WP:CIVIL. --Iantresman (talk

) 09:49, 11 October 2013 (UTC)

"Iantresman, in his editing philosophy, favors challenges to standard knowledge, which he sometimes terms "dogma" [78], his personal website, a site devoted to scientific anomalies"

talk

) 10:59, 12 October 2013 (UTC)

(1) I disagree with that description, and it is not supported by the sources (I'm interested in murder mysteries, but that doesn't mean I condone them) (2) Regardless of what I may or may not believe, does not mean that editors are absolved from being civil, per

WP:WIAPA. --Iantresman (talk

) 14:23, 12 October 2013 (UTC)

Are you accusing ArbCom (who I quoted) of invading your privacy?

talk

) 21:19, 12 October 2013 (UTC)

is this issue being addressed?

(

talk

) 02:47, 12 October 2013 (UTC)

The Tumbleman, please understand, it's unlikely that uninvolved Admins are going to want to wade through the vast amount of debate on this Talk Page. You might get a better response if you

1. Provide diffs on problems edits that you see (that is, not just name names but point out instances of problems)

2. State what actions you would like an uninvolved Admin to take

Admins, like Editors are volunteers who have demands on their time. If you can fairly summarize what a) what the problem is and b) what solution you want, it's more likely that they will pay attention to your request for assistance. Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 02:30, 13 October 2013 (UTC)

Tumbleman does a good job of acting the neutral onlooker but be aware that he has just been blocked for a week due to sock puppetry on the Sheldrake page,

talk

) 21:58, 13 October 2013 (UTC)

Craig Weiler

) 02:35, 13 October 2013 (UTC)

I agree, I think trying to stoke further controversy off wiki as he is doing is only causing further issues and compounding the difficult to getting consensus by encouraging

talk

) 11:11, 13 October 2013 (UTC)

I believe that this is the paragraph from my blog post that you're referring to:

"This means that Wikipedia is aware that a skeptical organization is editing their site against their rules, but have taken no action against them. They haven’t even bothered to ban the organizer. If that’s the case then the only solution would be to have a similarly secretive organization in opposition to them. Then two opposing ideologue groups would be battling for all of the alternative pages on Wikipedia. Wouldn’t that be lovely? I don’t think so, personally. It has happened in other areas of Wikipedia and the results aren’t pretty. No one wants Wikipedia to be the place where objectivity goes to die. Yet what is the alternative?"

This is a rhetorical question demonstrating the problem of having an organization of ideologues on Wikipedia. It invites opposition from other ideologues which creates an ideologue war which is harmful to Wikipedia. It is a call for Wikipedia to do something about their ideologue skeptic problem. (There is a difference between a skeptic and an ideologue skeptic.) I am not inviting other editors into the fray. Frankly the talk page is quite chaotic enough thank you very much.Craig Weiler (talk) 16:14, 13 October 2013 (UTC)

Hmm, this seems pretty thin grounds for complaint. I can't help speculating this might be part of a campaign by certain editors on the Sheldrake article to try to ban people who disagree with them on whatever grounds they can cook up. Who will be next? 149.241.210.195 (talk) 20:15, 13 October 2013 (UTC)

149.241.210.195 They've somehow managed to get [Tumbleman banned] for a week for sockpuppetry. It's completely bogus. He doesn't need a sockpuppet. The way we're being attacked is incredibly bad behavior.

They won't come to a consensus on anything. I started a section to deal with just one citation that I thought needed to be removed. That's why they're trying to ban me. The section I created is filled with opinion, but not one comment from them has actually addressed the points I made.Craig Weiler (talk) 02:54, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

He got blocked because he was creating multiple accounts:

talk

) 09:26, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

Craig, you have invited your "psychic" buddies to join Wikipedia and delete skeptical sources, as seen here [45], one of these users says he is going to join Wikipedia and delete skeptical sources on purpose. Your friend from that link (who has just turned up on the Sheldrake article inserting pseudoscience) ECCarb (talk · contribs) has now been deleting skeptical references on the John Lorber article, which he said he was going to do on that forum post. You are encouraging pseudoscience promoters to join Wikipedia Craig and start deleting sources, this is not acceptable behavior. This is clearly against Wikipedia rules. You talk about harming Wikipedia but it is yourself doing this and from your track record of [46] it's seems you have no interest in stopping. Dan skeptic (talk) 13:30, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

Dan skepticOn my blog I am talking about what is happening on the Rupert Sheldrake Biography page. What other people choose to do after they read those articles is their own business. I am not actively soliciting people to participate. If this person has gone over to a different Wikipedia page, then I can hardly be accused bringing people in to support me on the Sheldrake article. I also don't control who reads my blog and as you've just demonstrated it is read by skeptics and proponents alike. My blog could just as easily attract more skeptics to the page.

OMG!!! YOU'RE QUOTING RATIONAL WIKI!!!! ROFL, LMAO!!! (Ir)RationalWiki is not a credible source of information and one only has to refer to my "biography" there to see that. They accuse me of trolling. -Using my real name!- How hilarious is that?Craig Weiler (talk) 15:08, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

---

Could somebody shut down the blacklisted links task again for now please? The bot seems to be going wild again — it's now tagging old archive pages, talk pages, user pages, log pages, process pages, etc., for blacklisted links.[47][48][49][50] There is a broader discussion to be had somewhere soon about this bot and its many problems, just hoping to avoid a bunch of nonsense tags for now. Thanks, - Wikidemon (talk) 08:27, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

It is currently disabled, see User:Cyberbot II/Run/SPAM. This of course means that all those unintended tags will not be removed again automatically. Amalthea 08:37, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

Thanks. - Wikidemon (talk) 08:41, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

I agree that this bot needs some major changes before it is allowed to run again. It is too unstable, has made numerous errors and obviously lacks supervision: in this last run it tagged 950 pages erroneously over a four hour period. I have started to revert these manually, but it would be good to see the bot operator, Cyberpower, help with this job. Slp1 (talk) 13:25, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

I can mass-rollback those if desired. Amalthea 13:43, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

I hadn't thought about that. That would be great idea... I've done a hundred manually and it is a slow job; and there are 850 to go... Can you point me to the page where the mass-rollback procedure is described? I guess I could probably do use mass rollback myself, but I think I'd rather let you do it this time so that I can watch and learn.Slp1 (talk) 14:00, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

A mass rollback script is at User:John254/mass rollback.js, there are probably others. In this case I'll do some work first to make sure no other edits are rolled back, and I think there was an option to add a "bot" flag to hide the reverts from recent changes. Amalthea 14:08, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

Thank you. I will watch how you do it from your contributions, I guess.--Slp1 (talk) 15:20, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

• 950 pages erroneously? This is the first time I've ever seen this bug. The API isn't communicating correctly with the bot. I have no idea what's causing it.—
  ^Chat
  _Offline 13:49, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

The bot is operating normally again after resetting the connection to the API. The connection was apparently "half-dead" for a lack of a better choice of words. Provided the bot is switched on, the bot can remove it's own mess.—

^Chat

_Online 16:04, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

User:Amalthea (bot) has already kindly taken care of cleaning up the mess. Cyberpower, I realize that you are frustrated, but by far the best thing you can do is to wait for consensus to develop about this bot, hat it should be doing and how. I will have some concrete proposals for the community to consider shortly. --Slp1 (talk) 16:30, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

• Nevermind my question. When it gets the data from the API in it's serialized state, PHP doesn't seem to be able to unserialize the data. I don't know the cause at the moment. As a result it's getting blank data in place of the page that tells the bot which links and pages to ignore. Once I have the bot working again, I will re-enable it to have it remove the incorrect tags.—

  ^Chat

  _Offline 13:53, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

"I have no idea what's causing it" that's one of the problems with this bot... Overall, there needs to many changes to this bot and its operation before it is let loose again. Please do not re-enable the bot again until there is consensus to do so. Too many editors have too many concerns about it over a period of more than a month. Slp1 (talk) 14:00, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

There already has been a discussion about its concerns and consensus has already been established, if you ask me. It could also be a PHP error. There is no logical reason why the bot can't read the API anymore. I have made no change to the framework recently that could affect it. Ordinarily the bot should terminate itself in the event of an API failure. I'm going to try a reboot of the script to see what happens once the run completes.—

^Chat

_Online 14:11, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

Rather than attempting some sort of half-arsed diagnostic analysis here, will you please accept that there is sufficient concern about your attempts at automation for you to cease and desist this process until you can satisfy people who actually know what they are doing that you have the necessary grasp of development, testing and execution to prevent further examples of the wholesale incorrect and disruptive tagging with which your bot has been associated in recent weeks? Leaky Caldron 14:26, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

And with that snarky comment, I have just disabled all of my bots.—

^Chat

_Online 14:43, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

Thank you. I think that is a very good decision.--Slp1 (talk) 15:20, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

I meant I shut them all down.—

^Chat

_Online 15:30, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

Yes, I had understood that.--Slp1 (talk) 16:30, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

Just so we are clear, that means RfX Reporter, tally, adminstats, badimage task, afdbot, rfubot, rfppbot, noombot, and others as well. If that's how you're interpreting it, then I'm going to ask, why? If not, now you know.—

^Chat

_{Limited Access} 17:36, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

Yup, you are right, now I do know. Your behaviour is a variation of WP:DIVA and taking your ball and going home. Is that really what you want? I doubt it, I truly do.--Slp1 (talk) 17:53, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

No it's not. I am responding to Leaky Caldrin's statement. Just as editors here with

^Chat

_Online 18:12, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

Loads of editors raised concerns no more like a few who have decided to almost stalk the bot if you ask me and on top of that Leaky caldron's comment above is completely out of order. The bot has one fault just now and on all previous runs its not been a fault with the bot but rather users not happy with links being on the blacklist. What on earth is the point in having a blacklist if we don't enforce it. The answer is their isn't one at all. Think maybe a RFC specifically on how we enforce the blacklist and remove links that have sneaked in is the way forward getting full community support so that the few who aren't happy with it being enforced can have no complaint. Very disappointed in some users conduct regarding this.Blethering Scot 14:51, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

Cyberpower, there's about 3 or 4 editors who attack your bot every chance they get. Don't let them convince you they're a bad idea with everyone else saying otherwise. Leaky cauldron, this has came to ANI once already, and to

WT:BRFA, and neither of those established consensus that the task should be stopped. Jackmcbarn (talk

) 14:56, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

No, the bot has had multiple problems, and in fact has had to be stopped twice in the last two days for errors in tagging [51]. And please note accusations of stalking require serious evidence. It is also disappointing that other editors are choosing to misrepresent the concerns from other editors: as far as I can see on all the discussions all editors understand the problem and that blacklisted links removed or whitelisted, but are unhappy about the method that has been chosen, most especially when the bot seems to be quite unstable and often runs unsupervised. Having said that, I would thoroughly agree with Blethering Scot that an RFC about how we deal with blacklisted links is a very good idea. That should be the first step before this bot is renabled. I was actually about to launch something in this line. Slp1 (talk) 15:14, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

(edit conflict)We all know that consensus can change. There is clear evidence that this bot has random characteristics that may be doing harm and creating much work to rectify. There can be nothing more off-putting to lay readers (not wikipedians) who see a wall of text at the top of an article they are researching that talks about blacklists, whitelists and what to do about essentially technical errors on the page. It's about time we looked at this from the perspective of the general public user of our articles, not those of us who simply maintain the stuff. These messages in their current location are gobbledygook. If it was accurate gobbledygook that would be one thing. It turns out that much of it is inaccurate gobbledygook. Leaky Caldron 15:17, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

(

^Chat

_Online 15:22, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

• Looks like this was a simple case of the connection to API timing out. The bot seems to functioning normally again.—
  ^Chat
  _Online 15:38, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

Some of those links are blacklisted for copyvio - and copyvio links don't belong anywhere. I'd like to see the bot working again for that reason and because we should be enforcing our blacklist.

talk

) 17:46, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

I don't think anybody disagrees that we need to get rid of the blacklisted links. But there are other ways of achieving the same end with some changes to the bot's method of operation without causing so many problems. Please see the suggestion at

Wikipedia talk:Bots/Requests for approval that I am about to post. Slp1 (talk

) 17:53, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

To my eye 98+% of the "problems" are "ermagherd there's a big ugly tag scaring people away from clicking this link". The solution to the "problem" is the removal or whitelisting of the bad links - something that would still be in ostrich mode if not for the bot. - The Bushranger _{One ping only} 20:17, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

• A trout to Leaky Caldron for their utterly inappropriate comments. And to Slp1 for some of their comments. These are two users who clearly have next-to-no coding knowledge whatsoever, otherwise they wouldn't be making the downright stupid comments they have made (such as claiming it is a good idea for all Cyberbot programs to be closed down, despite the fact that the issue is one minor bug that isn't even necessarily the bot's fault) and they would also understand just how much effort coding takes. Without bots like Cyberbot, Wikipedia would be a far worse place. Bushranger is 100% correct; rather than bitching and whining about "omg there's this big tag on mah article" (when the tag is no larger than the COPYVIO tag, and is potentially as important), people should actually make the effort to get the link whitelisted, or replace it. It would be FAR more constructive if people did so. Lukeno94 (tell Luke off here) 21:51, 14 October 2013 (UTC)
  • Who suggested that he shuts down all of his bots? It wasn't me. Cyber decided to chuck all of his toys out of the pram, don't blame that on me. I might not be able to code - but I can read. I stick by every word. You know what you can do with your trout. Leaky Caldron 22:01, 14 October 2013 (UTC)
    • +1
      Leaky Caldron and Slp1 are right here. Cyberpower shouldn't be such a diva and should do more rigorous testing of his bots. I'm lightly reminded of Betacommand. --MZMcBride (talk) 01:05, 15 October 2013 (UTC)
    • Regarding the comment "There can be nothing more off-putting to lay readers (not wikipedians) who see a wall of text at the top of an article they are researching that talks about blacklists, whitelists and what to do about essentially technical errors on the page." - does that mean you also support removing templates such as {{BLP sources}}; {{Unreferenced}}, and {{notability}} from their position at the top of articles? - The Bushranger _{One ping only} 03:36, 15 October 2013 (UTC)
      • The advisability of cleanup tags on article pages may be a question for another day. The vast majority of people who see articles are not article editors, and it does them no good to subject them to tags designed to goose the editing community into taking action. Tags that call into question the quality or legitimacy of article content diminish Wikipedia's function of providing authoritative information to the reader. Sometimes that's apt and necessary, for example, NPOV or COI tags flag for the reader that there is a dispute among editors regarding whether article content is apt. A notability or even an AfD tag lets the reader know that this may not be a worthy encyclopedia article, and a reference-related tag lets editors know that the article may not be trustworthy. A blacklist tag, by contrast, taints the entire article for the presence of a single questionable link. For questions of spam, there are plenty of other ways to goose (or better yet, empower) editors without degrading the reading experience or calling the article quality into question. - Wikidemon (talk) 04:14, 15 October 2013 (UTC)
        • We're going to get off-topic if we return to the issue of the template headers themselves. The issue for this thread is surely the recent mistagging - after which the bot was disabled, its owner established the cause and another editor quickly cleaned it up (thank you Amalthea). There may or may not be arguments regarding the degree of care required for bot operation, about civility, about the operation of the blacklist, about whether to template article or talk pages. But AN/I is not the place to resolve these disputes. As a specific incident, this is surely close to being "resolved." Euryalus (talk) 04:30, 15 October 2013 (UTC)

As I understand (and I'm not a coder either), there was a problem with this bot's interaction with the API,

^Chat_Online has seen to the correction to this problem. I'd say that he can reenable the bots he runs. Larger conversations about the role of bots, the use of templates goes beyond this incident with Cyberbot and I agree with Euryalus

, it should be moved to a different forum.

AN/I is a place to discuss "incidents" and it sounds like this one has been resolved, thanks to Cyberpower. Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 11:43, 15 October 2013 (UTC)

I disagree. The bot has made many faulty edits for various technical/design reasons since launch and the evidence is that the author uses considerable guesswork in their root cause analysis, to quote "This is the first time I've ever seen this bug. The API isn't communicating correctly with the bot", "The connection was apparently "half-dead", "PHP doesn't seem to be able to unserialize the data. I don't know the cause at the moment", "There is no logical reason why the bot can't read the API anymore", "I have no idea what's causing it", "The bugs that happened, was a result of a labs NFS shutdown confusing the bot. This bug isn't logical" and finally in this section "Looks like this was a simple case of the connection to API timing out." There a dozens of similar explanations about this Bot on other pages where complaint has been made during the last 3 weeks. This sort of scatter gun approach to diagnostic problem solving is a sure fire way to one thing only; further problems. No matter the cause, Bot owners must take responsibility for their process to handle exceptions and error conditions in a non-disruptive, elegant manner. Simply restarting an interface without some sort of measure to prevent the bot reacting the same way the next time a connection times out is insufficient. I see no evidence that this process owner is doing anythinbg to his script to learn from these numerous events. Without collaboration involving relevant experts to establish robust exception handling this bot must not run again. Leaky Caldron 13:13, 15 October 2013 (UTC)

What evidence are you looking for? What "experts" do you suggest? I've strained myself trying to

the only conclusion that can be reached about all this is that there's a disturbingly sizeable, and obviously vocal, group of editors who really would rather everyone's heads be stuck in the sand when it comes to the widespread distribution of links that are on the spam blacklist on Wikipedia's pages, and since Cyberbot II kicked the anthill it must be destroyed. (And once again, I have 7,250 pages on my watchlist and have seen all of two taggings - and none since the last brouhaha.) - The Bushranger _{One ping only}

14:47, 15 October 2013 (UTC)

I have no idea regarding the motives of anyone but myself. Don't waste your time scouring previous conversations on this topic for any evidence that "I don't like it" because you'll be wasting your time. I have no opinion other than those expressed in this section. To summarise:

• the software as it currently stands is not stable,
• has a track record of failure leading to potential harm,
• has resulted in others needing to get involved in recovery,
• the author of the bot appears to be in denial about the extent of their competence to identify root cause & prevent further malfunctions,
• has so far been reluctant to seek advice from those bot experts (he is a relative novice, I understand) to achieve a stable process fit for live operation,
• Until these concerns are progressed, there is more risk than gain in allowing this bot to resume.

Leaky Caldron 15:05, 15 October 2013 (UTC)

• Given that you are VERY clearly not competent enough to run such a bot, or even understand the work that goes into it, I think that you are just being disruptive now. The bot does not have a track record of failure; it has a track record of a couple of errors, and a history of people like yourself hugely overreacting/throwing hissy fits every chance you get. And you prove your own incompetence with the arrogant and stupid statement of "the author of the bot appears to be in denial about the extent of their competence to identify root cause & prevent further malfunctions", given the fact that C678 has worked hard to fix the issues, and appears to have done so. Lukeno94 (tell Luke off here) 17:28, 15 October 2013 (UTC)

• And with that, this discussion has officially jumped the shark. The bot's offline, the latest errors have been cleaned up, and a broader discussion of blacklists and the bot is underway elsewhere. Can we please close further discussion as moot? - Wikidemon (talk) 17:49, 15 October 2013 (UTC)

• That would be wise, I think, seeing as apparently "when you're in a hole, stop digging" doesn't seem to be on the table. - The Bushranger _{One ping only} 19:31, 15 October 2013 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.