Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard/Archive 340

This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

The use of the following source for the genetic scientist Eran Elhaik 's wikibio:-

Aram Yardumian,Theodore G Schurr, 'The Geography of Jewish Ethnogenesis,' Journal of Anthropological Research Volume 75, Number 2 pp.206–234

has been challenged on the grounds of insufficient competence by the two scholars who wrote it. Aram Yardumian is part of the team at the Laboratory of Molecular Anthropology at Upenn. Theodore G Schurr is Director of the North American Regional Center of the Genographic Project and has specialized in human evolutionary genetic for three decades. Both have published extensively in peer-reviewed journals on anthropology and genetics. Nishidani (talk) 13:01, 8 May 2021 (UTC)

For what information the cite was used? --Shrike (talk) 13:18, 8 May 2021 (UTC)

The source mentions Elhaik and the Khazar hypothesis only in passing. The mention of the paper including both author's names in running text is quite undue in an article about Elhaik. The source could be used with such prominence in an article that covers the same topic, i.e. an article about the genetic evidence for the origin of the Jewish diaspora population (an article about research, not researchers). But even there, only with all caveats per

WP:RECENT. The source is still new and hardly cited yet by peers. –Austronesier (talk

) 13:31, 8 May 2021 (UTC)

I apologize if this is an annoyingly long wall of text; I hope to cover everything necessary. Much as I expressed earlier on the article's Talk page [[1]], my concern with the source is not as much the authors' competences as concerns that its use may be somewhat

WP:UNDUE given that it proposes a hypothesis that is strongly at odds with mainstream consensus among poplation geneticists, as known from published research (which is that most Jewish groups - e.g. the Sephardi, Ashkenazi, and Mizrahi - do share a substantial Middle Eastern genetic component, with a common origin, though also carrying substantial differential admixtures in each from non-Jewish host population sources), whereas this source "proposes to invert" the traditional model and controversially states that Jewish groups do not have a common origin. But its proposals do not seem to have been cited or otherwise engaged with by the nainstream since its release in 2019. It appears to have no citations. See here: https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C33&q=Yardumian+Jewish+ethnogenesis&btnG=

Currently, there are not "multiple high-quality sources" but rather one source of unclear quality

The authors, of which there are only two, Yardumian and Shurr, while they are published in genetics (Schurr more so than Yardumian), interpret and characterize several papers by more notable and cited researchers in the area of Jewish and Near Eastern population genetics in ways that depart significantly from the conclusions (and statements) of the studies themselves (which are part of the mainstream consensus described above).

For these reasons, the addition seems to me to go against

WP:UNDUE attention to a minority position (which could be described as an "extraordinary claim") advanced in one relatively new work that has not yet been engaged with by the mainstream of researchers in the field. It seems best to wait until there has been some mainstrem engagement with its proposals before using it. Thus I suggested that some caution is warranted. Skllagyook (talk

) 13:33, 8 May 2021 (UTC)

@

WP:RECENT. Skllagyook (talk

) 13:41, 8 May 2021 (UTC)

I must add that my concerns about

WP:PRIMARY only refer to Yardumian and Schurr's own conclusions. Much of the paper however contains a review of exisiting research results; as such, it's a also secondary source, and per the authors' credentials, a reliable one. –Austronesier (talk

) 14:40, 8 May 2021 (UTC)

in no regard is it a prim ary source and the distinction you make confuses policy.

A secondary source provides an author's own thinking based on primary sources, generally at least one step removed from an event. It contains an author's analysis, evaluation, interpretation, or synthesis of the facts, evidence, concepts, and ideas taken from primary sources.

This is purely a secondary source evaluating primary source papers on genetics, and written by two ranking scholars whose credentials attest thorough competence in the field. Their conclusions can not be excerpted as primary except by the most antic of misreadings about how RS criteria are to be read.Nishidani (talk) 15:05, 8 May 2021 (UTC)

It is true that it contains a review. However Yardumian and Schurr's conclusions are in part derived from their interpretations of existing research, and those interpretations (in several cases), the subject of genetics, are very different from those of the conclusions of the authors of that research itself, and in some cases seems to characterize the conclusions of that research differently than its authors do. I'm not sure how one would distinguish their own conclusions from the review. (As mentioned, the

WP:RECENT nature of the paper combined with its proposals that strongly diverge from consensus and lack of engagement -e.g. citations - with its conclusions from other specialists seems to recommend caution as well.) Skllagyook (talk

) 15:13, 8 May 2021 (UTC)

Look. This is getting exasperating. What you criticize is how science works. Hammer is cited by Behar, Behar by Atsmon, Atsmon by Elhaik in a continuing peer group argument as different models and data bases are used bearing on this question, and innovative analytic approaches are developed. All review each others' work and, in science, as in scholarship, reviewing scholars do their job also by disagreeing with their peers when the occasion requires. The fact that Yardumian and Schurr find a different interpretation for the research results of Hammer, Atzmon, Behar Elhaik et al., is perfectly normal. It doesn't mean some 'exceptional claim' is being made. It simply means that there are, in their view, other ways to assess that evidence. That is how serious science and scholarship work, and there is no reason for us to suddenly raise objections to these two scholars because they, in reviewing the evidence, suggest a model they think copes with it in a way that they consider more cogent and, above all, more in accordance with Jewish history, something many of these geneticists are not particularly familiar with (as opposed to many Jewish historians, who know how important conversion has been). Nishidani (talk) 15:45, 8 May 2021 (UTC)

@Nishidani: My concern/criticism, as explained earlier, is not merely with "how science works" or that scholars are reviewing each other with differences of opinion, but that a source is being added that makes an extraordinary claim that seems to strongly contradict the mainstream consensus (which is comprised of multiple studies/reseachers over years) of the relevant community (population geneticists) and as yet has no citations or other other engagement from the mainstream. (And I believe Yardumian and Schurr are also not historians.)

Not very long ago, in an admitedly more extreme than this, but perhaps broadly comparable case, I, and others, engaged in discussion (here [[2]]) with a user who had added a source (which I believe also contained a review) to Early expansions of hominins out of Africa that proposed a theory of Homo Sapiens origins strongly/radically at odds with the mainstream view. It was written by two authors (at least one of whom had relevant credentials), peer reviewed, and published in a legitimate journal, but was recent and had no expert citations. Skllagyook (talk) 16:30, 8 May 2021 (UTC)

I am inclined to accept the reliability of the source, keeping in mind that

WP:DUE. JBchrch (talk

) 15:19, 8 May 2021 (UTC)

I devote I think three lines to paraphrasing their views. The line you quote originally read earlier today

The accuracy and reliability of Elhaik's population genetic research has been strongly criticised by other academics

which has been around apparently for a while, suggested that Elhaik is deemed incompetent by his peers. I made a minor fix - Elhaik trained under Dan Graur, an extremely rigorous and distinguished molecular biologist who has a high regard for Elhaik, and was unfazed by the hullabaloo over the latter's Khazar hypothesis. Whether he accepted it or not is not the point. Elhaik knows his stuff, which is not the impression you get on any wiki mention of him. I'm not here to support Elhaik's hypothesis, but to ensure he is not smeared by reductive caricature as some freak in his field.

The text you cite draws on several nondescript journalistic reports of reactions to his first formulation of the Khazar hypothesis, quoting peers whom Elhaik in turn had vigorously criticized for their ideological fixations.* So that requires expansion, rather than serving as a model of such terse concision that, for example, my paraphrase of the 2019 paper, a mere three lines, might seem a tad excessive. But it is not my parsimony that requires trimming. Rather it is the section you greenquote that requires expansion. Nishidani (talk) 15:52, 8 May 2021 (UTC)

I think this approach makes sense per

WP:IMPERFECT. I cannot commit, but I may work on expanding the other criticisms at some point in the future to correct this (temporary) imbalance. JBchrch (talk

) 16:16, 8 May 2021 (UTC)

::*The dispute is entrammeled by different perceptions of Israel's narrative of return entertained by Elhaik's several peers and one which he, an Israeli, challenges. The ideological investment is best put in the following remark one of the people he criticizes, Harry Ostrer:

'The stakes in genetic analysis are high. It is more than an issue of who belongs in the family and can partake in Jewish life and Israeli citizenship. It touches on the heart of Zionist claims for a Jewish homeland in Israel. One can imagine future disputes about exactly how large the shared Middle Eastern ancestry of Jewish groups has to be to justify Zionist claims. Harry Ostrer, Legacy: A Genetic History of the Jewish People, 2012

My concern is that the refusal to accept a straightforward review article here reflects this ideological tension. The uneasiness that many have with the idea that many Jews do not descend from the early Jewish population of Israel/Palestine. Nishidani (talk) 16:08, 8 May 2021 (UTC)

Maybe, but let's try to

WP:AGF here. JBchrch (talk

) 16:19, 8 May 2021 (UTC)

@

not entirely appropriate. Skllagyook (talk

) 16:30, 8 May 2021 (UTC)

I am absolutely sure that Skllagyook is not one of our ideologists with a POV remit. My apologies if that general statement came over that way. I am much concerned with the neglected WP:Systemic bias problem. I certainly have never noted any edit by you, in articles I have on my watchlist, which suggest you are POV-driven. My point was, editors should be keenly aware that, particularly in areas like this, ideology plays no small role even in scholarship. There is a good article by N. Kirsh showing how deeply these concerns inflouenced Israeli scientists from the early 50s. The ethnonationalist meme of 'return' is however ideological. Of that there is no dispute, and we should be aware that this is operative, even in genetics, as some Israeli geneticists have noted. Precisely for this reason, wikipedians should strive to assess potential articles for inclusion per NPOV. If the two authors here challenge an ideological meme, that is an eminently reasonable point of view, minority (though growing) but certainly not to be treated as fringe, or as some odd disrespect for the 'consensual' meme. Not to be aware of these emotional investments is, - that is the worry - to inadvertently fall prey to what is ideological rather than factual.Nishidani (talk) 16:56, 8 May 2021 (UTC)

@

Advocacy" page says, "Wikipedia is not a venue to right great wrongs, to promote ideas or beliefs which have been ignored or marginalized in the Real World,..") Skllagyook (talk

) 17:06, 8 May 2021 (UTC)

All of those policy flags you are waving hav e nothing to do with my work here or my objections to holding a good article to ransom on Elhaik's page. I've been editing for 16 years. I have never seen any challenge to a source as obviously high standard RS as this. Two specialists in the discipline challenged because of their conclusion does not endorse a traditional view. The objections to it remain, in my view, either incomprehensible in terms of standard practice or are totally unrelated to policy, and, as somewhere above, screw up an elementary understanding of one such simply policy (primary/secondary). That disconcerting spectre made me think that a meme is being taken as a verified fact. Note that, all of my remarks about how science works, of which this paper is a normal example, were ignored. Still . I have to go out an do shopping for neighbours and knock off a beer or two with some local cronies. I'd prefer not to continue this conversation. We have said our piece, and this forum is invaluable for third party comments, which I hope will be provided. Co nversation between the parties only serves to create threads that drive off third parties. Nishidani (talk) 17:20, 8 May 2021 (UTC)

Conversation between the parties only serves to create threads that drive off third parties Exactly. So back to the main point. @Nishidani: you have said that I'm not here to support Elhaik's hypothesis, but to ensure he is not smeared by reductive caricature as some freak in his field. What is the role of Yardumian & Schurr (2019) in the BLP then? They mention him directly only once in prose ("This problem cannot be approached analytically in the way that Elhaik (2012) attempted (p. 18 in the linked PDF)") and twice per citation. If it is to illustrate that scholars consider him a worthy peer and can engange and disagree with his research without drama, it should be made explicit in some way. If it is to show that his most vocal critics might be just as off the mark as Elhaik himself (as it reads now), the source better fits in Khazar_hypothesis_of_Ashkenazi_ancestry#Criticism_of_the_Elhaik_studies (no idea if it ever was there with all the back-and-forth editing) and would certainly be an enrichment among all the news articles cited there. –Austronesier (talk) 18:08, 8 May 2021 (UTC)

(Your query should go to the talk page, but I'll reply here. Please follow it up there if you wish) The section deals with criticism of Elhaik. Yardumian & Schurr state the general model and Elhaik's theory have opposed conclusions, but share a common homeland-diaspora dispersion premise, which they criticize.

(1)The major circulating ideas about Jewish ethnogenesis were developed in a time prior to advanced human genetic and genomic studies. These ideas have tended toward the homeland-diaspora model, drawing on biblical and post-biblical sources for an exile/founder effect model, or the Khazar model (which has been tested twice without success;see Elhaik 2012 and Das et al. 2016).The two models, in all their forms, visualize Jewish ethnogenesis as an expansive process, beginning with a single source population that then spreads and develops into multiple different geographic communities.' p.212

(2)It is this uncertainty that has given rise to both the mainstream theories of a Judean ancestry for contemporary Jewry and to alternative theories, such as the Khazar Hypothesis(Behar et al. 2013; Elhaik 2012; Koestler 1976). Neither of these theories, in their simplest forms, are supportable by current evidence.' p.222 n.3

(3)DNA sequences obtained from a variety of Jewish mortuary contexts or even Natufian or other Neolithic/Bronze Age Levantine populations.. .would provide useful information about the nature of genetic diversity that is at the root of the Jewish ethnogenesis narrative. This problem cannot be approached analytically in the way that Elhaik (2012) attempted.' p.223 n.13

I added to the page's Elhaik criticism section therefore:-

Yardumian and Schurr have criticized both Elhaik's Khazar hypothesis and the mainstream model it challenged, on the grounds that, in their view, both assume the same homeland-diaspora expansion model. As opposed to this, they view Jewish ethnogenesis as one rooted in multiple heterogeneous populations which, often after conversion, coalesced to form modern day Jews.'

Why is such a simple use of a quality RS critical of Elhaik not appropriate to the criticism section? Is it because it also criticizes the 'mainstream' model that Elhaik himself opposed? Is one not allowed to mention that though Elhaik's work has been criticized, those who criticize it have also come under challenge? Extraordinary.Nishidani (talk) 20:21, 8 May 2021 (UTC)

@Austronesier: I added disputed text to Khazar Hypothesis as you suggested

https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Khazar_hypothesis_of_Ashkenazi_ancestry&type=revision&diff=1022218010&oldid=1022203273 SteveBenassi (talk) 06:31, 9 May 2021 (UTC)

@SteveBenassi: I don't believe the disputed text should be added anywhere untill the issues discussed are resolved. That has not yet ocurred. Skllagyook (talk) 06:48, 9 May 2021 (UTC)

@Nishidani: Regarding ... (3)DNA sequences obtained from a variety of Jewish mortuary contexts or even Natufian or other Neolithic/Bronze Age Levantine populations.. .would provide useful information about the nature of genetic diversity that is at the root of the Jewish ethnogenesis narrative.

New research does exactly that, and it confirms that Zagoros/Caucasus population during the Bronze Age, and Today, contributed to the Genome in the Levant, indicating Elhaik may be partially correct that Ashkenazi Jews are converts from the north. See Graphical Abstract ... The Genomic History of the Bronze Age Southern Levant https://www.cell.com/cell/fulltext/S0092-8674(20)30487-6 SteveBenassi (talk) 07:37, 9 May 2021 (UTC)

The paper does not support the idea that Ashkenazi Jews are converts from the north, but rather the idea that all Levantine groups have admixture from that area of the north (since/dating to the Chacolithic-Bronze Age) from before the formation of the religion of Judaism and before the Jewish diaspora, some of which admixture would therefore also be carried in Ashkenazi and other Jews (and Levantines/other groups with Levantine ancestry) - not only Ashkenazi Jews. Skllagyook (talk) 07:56, 9 May 2021 (UTC)

@Skllagyook: See Graphical Abstract ... 3 lines from Zagoros/Caucasus at 3 different times including from the Bronze Age to Today. SteveBenassi (talk) 08:13, 9 May 2021 (UTC)

I'm not sure what section you're referring to. The paper in Cell does not say anything about Ashkenazi being descended from northern converts. It found that Levantines in general (since the Bronze Age on, including Bronze Age Canaanites) have/had admixture (from the Zagros or Caucasus) which had arrived in the Levant in the Bronze Age (as your own comment said). This is quite different from the hypothesis of Elhaik, which is that very few of the Ashkenazi's ancestors ever lived in the Levant at all, and that they descend entirely/almost entirely from converts outside the Levant from a much later period than the Bronze Age. Skllagyook (talk) 08:27, 9 May 2021 (UTC)

hypothesis of Elhaik, which is that very few of the Ashkenazi's ancestors ever lived in the Levant at all

That's not 'Elhaik's hypothesis'. The same conclusion could be made from Atzmon (2010), Behar (2013) Costa (2013) and many other papers. It all depends on how you define 'identity' (A light hearted laugh about the genetic industry's Ashkenazi profiling can be found in

WP:NPOV violation.Nishidani (talk

) 09:05, 9 May 2021 (UTC)

@Nishidani: You wrote:

"That's not 'Elhaik's hypothesis'. The same conclusion could be made from Atzmon (2010), Behar (2013) Costa (2013) and many other papers."

But that is not the conclusion made in Atzmon, Behar or Costa, nor in most other genetic studues on the topic. It is in fact a small minority view, as far as can be known from the stated conclusions of the research. Regarding Gideon Levy's article: I suppose this is not the place for such discussions, but Levy seems perhaps not to understand the importance autosomal DNA (which reflects overall ancestry); an individual's paternal and maternal lineages alone are not always representative of overall ancestral ethic makeup (especially coming from a mixed population like the Ashkenazi or other diasporic group), and the majority view is that Ashkenazi autosomal ancestry carries a substantial Middle Eastern component (as well as a substantial European one) - some such as Behar (2017), have also suggested that the R1a branch of Y-DNA Levy carries found in some Ashkenazi, came from the Levant). But this is beside the point I was making, which was merely that the Cell paper does not particularly support Elhaik's theory. Skllagyook (talk) 10:09, 9 May 2021 (UTC)

You're wrong. This is not the place to discuss this. But I suggest you read Atsmon et al 2010 p.857 closely, to cite just one of the four. (And certainly: do not take at their word what the several wiki articles write in their partisan syntheses of the debates). Ignore the fact that they get their history wrong (6 million practising Jews (mostly converts) in Graeco Roman times) on key points. The big difference is that Elhaik and others contest the assumption/meme of a prior 'Jewish genetic' homogeneity in Palestine datable to the time of the Babylonian exile. They don't believe interpretations of genetic data should be sieved through religious writ as though the latter were unimpeachably historical. That is ideological, not science, and the situation is rather like that which emerged when endosymbiotic theory was first broached: the mainstream insisted on an internal evolutionary development of cells - and the minority view argued for gene transfer qua organelles from captured bacteria. But, as I say, this is not the place to argue that. The point here is to decide if a high quality RS critical of both Elhaik and of his critics is appropriate to the criticism section of his page, partioularly since that page is intensely edited to include overwhelmingly criticisms of Elhaik from the mainstream POV, without any conmpensatory balance as NPOV requires.Nishidani (talk) 12:08, 9 May 2021 (UTC)

"Another key point relevant for inclusion is that editors have stacked the Elhaik bio with over 10 hostile sources, that implicitly espouse the 'mainstream' theory. Now that we have one high RS paper that is equally critical of Elhaik and the mainstream model he challenges,introducing some balance, the presence of the latter is being questioned." This sounds like a textbook example of

WP:FRINGE. One or two outliers challenging the mainstream consensus of something is the definition of fringe. In this case, "introducing some balance" introduces "balance" between the mainstream consensus and a fringe view, which is against policy. Policy specifically states not to give such balance, where it says not to present fringe theories "alongside the scientific or academic consensus as though they are opposing but still equal views". It is worth noting that this study has not been cited by anyone else in the field following its publication, which is a strong indication of it being fringe. NonReproBlue (talk

) 11:45, 9 May 2021 (UTC)

Don't be silly. A work published in mid 2019 by definition will take some years to get considered response, as any academic knows. All of these three are tenured professors and scholars, and recognized as competent in their fields. Nishidani (talk) 12:08, 9 May 2021 (UTC)

It's not silly. To contrast this with the mainstream sources, the cited study by Flegontov, et al, had already been cited four times within one year of its publication. Behar, et al, ad been cited 13 times within 2 years of publication. It has been two years since Yardumian and Schurr published, and there have been zero citations to the study. You even admit that their view is not held by the mainstream consensus when you say "include overwhelmingly criticisms of Elhaik from the mainstream POV, without any conmpensatory balance as NPOV requires." The thing is, NPOV does not require us to "balance" the mainstream POV with the fringe POV. Policy actually states the opposite, and says not to give false balance between mainstream consensus and fringe positions. NonReproBlue (talk) 13:20, 9 May 2021 (UTC)

I would add that "The genomic history of the Bronze Age southern Levant" (the aforementioned paper in Cell) was published in 2020 and has been cited 10 times (https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C33&q=Genomic+History+of+Southern+Levant&oq=Geno). Skllagyook (talk) 14:20, 9 May 2021 (UTC)

And it has been reviewed here on his page by Elhaik. Cf. also this. None of this is quotable, because it is his blog. The objection is profoundly silly because you cannot challenge a paper published by tenured mainstream scholars in a standard peer reviewed journal out of personal disagreement with its content (for that is what Skllagyook's objection amounts to, with the point about it contradicting some hypothetical 'consensus'). This would give Wikipedia editors a right to stand over scholarship and assume control over what may and may not be mentioned in state of the art scholarship. To assert it is 'fringe' would require a source, and there is none. It is just new. Nishidani (talk) 16:09, 9 May 2021 (UTC)

It is precisely the job of Wikipedia editors to determine what may and may not be mentioned by weighing the sources and evaluating them based on our policies. But now it seems you are moving the goalposts. As the

WP:FRINGE policy points out, determining that an idea is fringe does not in fact require sources saying that, as many fringe subjects and assertions are just ignored by the mainstream. It is true that it would require a source to say, in Wikipedia's voice, that something is fringe. However, to make a determination that a source is fringe, and outside the scope of mainstream consensus, requires evaluating a source based on the criteria laid in the policy. Furthermore, much, if not all, of this is being derived directly from a primary source (the study itself) rather than secondary sources as would be preferable. What reliable secondary sources do discuss, and describe, is that Ostrer, Behar, etc. represent the mainstream consensus viewpoint. They say it directly. You even say it when you say that this material is equally critical of Elhaik and "the mainstream model he challenges". If SteveBenassi is to be believed, even one of the study's authors says "we can't be placed in the Elhaik camp or in the mainstream view". It is abundantly clear that there is an accepted mainstream model, and this is a single paper that challenges it. That is fringe. There is no other way to view it. If it proves to be correct, the mainstream consensus will support it, and it then would absolutely merit inclusion. Until then, there is no reason why it should be given such prominence. It is clearly undue weight. NonReproBlue (talk

) 17:24, 9 May 2021 (UTC)

Yardumian and Schurr's article is not a primary source. Read the policy. The matter of it being not yet cited is irrelevant. In scholarship, you get published in journals through a prepublication process of peer-consultancy and review. That is why the authors' qualifications, and the authoritativeness of the publishing venue are all that count. Don't any of you know that Mendel's paper on hybridization was ignored, with just 3 cites in the relevant scholarship forthree decades or so, until someone woke up? Going beyond this to assert as editors that the conclusions run contrary to some hypothetical consensus and therefore the piece cannot be used is an abuse of editing, tantamount to censorship. Minority viewpoints are not 'fringe' in this context: we include them. We have no remit to pick and choose RS depending on our personal assessments of the state of scholarship. I expect a very old hand like yourself would chime in this way, but am surprised Skllagyook cannot perceive they have exceeded their remit. Punto e basta.Nishidani (talk) 20:37, 9 May 2021 (UTC)

Seems totally reasonable to expect scholarship to take the same amount of time to make its way into the mainstream now as it did during Mendel's time. I can't think of any information sharing technologies that could have possibly changed between then and now. But please, continue to escalate the ad hominem attacks and move the goalposts rather than deal with the chance there might be substance to what I am saying. Glad to see you are similarly familiar with

WP:FRINGE. NonReproBlue (talk

) 04:48, 10 May 2021 (UTC)

The editors here insist that

@Skllagyook: I emailed Aram Yardumian three days ago about the suppression of his article on Wikipedia, he responded "Dear Steve

Thanks for this email note and the link to the Eran Elhaik wikipedia discussion page. That was interesting to see.

Your question about why our article didn't warrant any news coverage is a good one. First of all, it was just a review article. There was no new data or genetic analysis. Had we undertaken new sample collections or a new kind of analysis -- as Eran Elhaik has done more than once -- I'm sure it would have at least registered a blip on the radar. Review articles often pass unnoticed.

Perhaps also: our view of Jewish ethnogenesis is actually somewhat at odds with Elhaik's. You may be aware that I posted an article on BioRxiv back in 2013 that was very critical of his methods (i.e., using Armenians and Georgians as surrogates for Khazars). Since we can't be placed in the Elhaik camp or in the mainstream view, perhaps nobody really knew what to do with us. Perhaps in some ways it's a blessing.

There's probably more that could be said, but I'll leave it there for now and ask how you came to be interested in this subject...

Regards Aram" SteveBenassi (talk) 14:48, 9 May 2021 (UTC)

A note: I (and others) am referring, not just to (a lack of) news coverage, but also academic citations. Skllagyook (talk) 15:06, 9 May 2021 (UTC)

As I said, high immediate citation has nothing to do with evaluating RS per se. In genetics, research turnover is rapid, with rapid responses, and a very thick field of academic researchers. In history things are slower, and there are not many who have the dual competences (historical anthropology and genetics) which the two authors have. In fact, reading genetics papers irritates historians because there they rarely shown familiarity with the state of the art research on history. Nishidani (talk) 16:09, 9 May 2021 (UTC)

So far we have one completely neutral third party editor providing us with input. So perhaps I should restate the problem so that no one wishing to comment need do the grind of actually reading the paper or the papers it refers to.

Research, particularly at the cutting edge, is often rancorous. Suffice it to read David Quammen's The Tangled Tree, a history of recent evolutionary biology's leading thinkers, to note only one of many studies. In a rapidly developing field like population genetics, it is wrong to speak of consensus, as editors hostile to the use of this paper repeatedly say. The article simply quotes or paraphrases four landmark sources ((Atzmon et al. 2010; Behar et al. 2013; Costa et al. 2013; Xue et al. 2017), which editors here state as mainstream as admitting the Ashkenazis have a close profile to European, rather than Levantine, populations.

• Atzmon et al. 2010 'concluded that Ashkenazi Jews were more closely related to regional “host” European populations than to Levantine or other Middle Eastern populations, whereas Iranian and Iraqi Jews clustered more closely with their host populations in the Arab and Persian worlds. . .In their opinion, the genetic proximity of Ashkenazi Jews to French and Mediterranean populations “favors the idea of ‘non-Semitic’ Mediterranean ancestry in the formation of the European/Syrian Jewish groups.

• (Behar et al. (2013) 'they observed that “Ashkenazi Jews show significant IBD sharing only with Eastern Europeans, North African Jews and Sephardi Jews” (as well as Cypriots and Sicilians), and only minimally with Middle Eastern populations.')

• ((Costa et al. 2013)'They concluded that 65–81% of Ashkenazi mtDNAs belonged to autochthonous European lineages, and that only 8% of them were demonstrably “Near Eastern” in origin.')

• (Xue et al, 2017) 'The most compelling evidence to date of a mosaic ancestry for contemporary Jews comes from the work of Xue et al. (2017). Their admixture analysis suggested a 70% European origin (and within this, 55% Southern Europe, 10% Eastern Europe, 5% Western Europe) and a 30% “Levantine” component in Jewish populations. In making these estimates, Xue et al. (2017) assumed the Levant to be the most likely source for the “Middle Eastern” apportionment of Ashkenazi Jewish ancestry and, thus, did not make any effort to distinguish Levantine from Anatolian or Babylonian ancestral components . .While the analysis was unable to identify the ultimate source population, the founding event for Ashkenazi Jewry almost certainly occurred in Southern Europe.'

The farce of denial of the appropriateness of the paper by Yardumian and Schurr for inclusion in Wikipedia consists in asserting that it holds a fringe view since there is a putative consensus about the ultimate Levantine origin of Ashkenazi Jews. As the above quotes show, the very authors cited for this consensus say precisely the opposite (of course, some of their papers contain the Levantine qualification, but the authors suggest the empirical evidence for that part of their work is frail). It is acceptable for them to criticize Elhaik, but it is unacceptable to cite them when their work shows that the other school also, like Elhaik, suggests the 'Levantine' component is nugatory. That veto is incomprehensible. All the two authors are doing is (a) pointing out what the ostensible 'mainstream' says: of three Jewish groups, Ashkenazis have a strong Euroipean genetic profile, and (b) this suggests Jewish ethnogenesis is variegated, hardly a shocking surmise. Nishidani (talk) 11:59, 10 May 2021 (UTC)

@Nishidani: Those characterizations from the Yarmudian paper are not entirely representative of the sources quoted or their conclusions. That is what I was referring to when I said that the source characterises papers in a way different from what they state. I will expand upon this, in this comment soon. Skllagyook (talk) 12:18, 10 May 2021 (UTC)

They are not characterisations, but direct quotes. Neither you nor I as wiki editors have a right to sit in judgment over what scholars do. 'I said that the source characterises papers in a way different from what they state.' In other words you are asserting that you privately as a wiki editor contest the accuracy of Yardumian and Schurr's summation of the genetic evidence - their area of expertise, and want to give your reading of the primary sources as proof. That is egregiously

WP:OR, not permitted, and used by an editor to criticize an RS, whose status as RS no one would question. Please don't post a massive expansion of your views. We need third party input, not another endless discussion of our respective private interpretations of genetic papers. I disagree quite strongly with the two authors' reading of Elhaik, but I haven't breathed a word of it, or provided proof (which I have) that they do misread him. We have no right to do this. I have refrained from exceeding our remit, and so should you. Nishidani (talk

) 12:50, 10 May 2021 (UTC)

@Nishidani:. It is not my own interpretation of what the authors they quote say but what the authors (Atzmon et al., Behar et al., and Xue et al.) themselves said that I was referring to, not my views. What you excerpted from Yardumian and Schurr are direct quotes from studies but they appear to be selective in light of what the papers quoted in fact state and conclude. Again, this is not an expansion of my views or judgements but of what Atzmon, Behar, and Xue say (their views, not mine). Above you quoted Yardumian and Schurr's excerpts of Atzmon, Behar, Xue, and Costa to support the statement that the findings of the aforementioned researchers were in line with the idea that Ashkenazi Jews have only nugatory Middle Eastern or Levantine ancestry. But according to the papers themselves, that is simply not the case. (And the opinions of the researchers are relevant to the nature of the mainstream consensus.) See below.

It is not being disputed that it has been found, and is widely agreed, that Ashkenazi Jews have substantial European admuxture (that is fairly mainstream). But Atzmon, Behar, Xue, and others also agree that they, and most other Jewish groups, also carry a substantial shared Middle Eastern admixture component that has been identified as from the Levant and shared with other Jewish groups.

Atzmon et al. (2010) says:

"...genome-wide analysis of seven Jewish groups (Iranian, Iraqi, Syrian, Italian, Turkish, Greek, and Ashkenazi) and comparison with non-Jewish groups demonstrated distinctive Jewish population clusters, each with shared Middle Eastern ancestry, proximity to contemporary Middle Eastern populations, and variable degrees of European and North African admixture. Two major groups were identified by principal component, phylogenetic, and identity by descent (IBD) analysis: Middle Eastern Jews and European/Syrian Jews."

According to them, Ashkenazi and Sephardi Jews were distinguished from Mizrahi Jews by the presence of southern (and other European) admixture in the former lacking in the latter, and other admixture in the lacking in the former (shared Middle Eastern ancestry combined with differential admixtures).

And:

"Two major differences among the populations in this study were the high degree of European admixture (30%–60%) among the Ashkenazi, Sephardic, Italian, and Syrian Jews and the genetic proximity of these populations to each other compared to their proximity to Iranian and Iraqi Jews. This time of a split between Middle Eastern Iraqi and Iranian Jews and European/Syrian Jews, calculated by simulation and comparison of length distributions of IBD segments, is 100–150 generations, compatible with a historical divide that is reported to have occurred more than 2500 years ago. The Middle Eastern populations were formed by Jews in the Babylonian and Persian empires who are thought to have remained geographically continuous in those locales. In contrast, the other Jewish populations were formed more recently from Jews who migrated or were expelled from Palestine and from individuals who were converted to Judaism during Hellenic-Hasmonean times...Thus, the genetic proximity of these European/Syrian Jewish populations, including Ashkenazi Jews, to each other and to French, Northern Italian, and Sardinian populations favors the idea of non-Semitic Mediterranean ancestry in the formation of the European/Syrian Jewish group."

Thus the study concludes the Ashkenazi, Sephardi, and Italian Jews share a substantial component of Middle Eastern ancestry with Iraqi and Iranian Jews that dates to the time of the diaspora and which they attribute to Levantine Jewish migrants, but also carry significant southern European admixture from intermixture with non-Semitic Mediterranean converts (thus they have a mixed origin including both).

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3032072/

You quoted (from Yardumian's discussion of Behar):

"Behar et al. (2013) 'they observed that “Ashkenazi Jews show significant IBD sharing only with Eastern Europeans, North African Jews and Sephardi Jews” (as well as Cypriots and Sicilians), and only minimally with Middle Eastern populations.')"

This does not mean that Behar et al. 2013 conclude that Ashkenazi and Sephardi Jews lack significant Middle Eastern or Levantine ancestry. Behar et al. explicitly state that Ashkenazi Jews mostly share affinity and ancestry with populations from southern Europe and the Middle East (and to a lesser extent Eastern Europe). From the abstract:

"Thus, analysis of Ashkenazi Jews together with a large sample from the region of the Khazar Khaganate corroborates the earlier results that Ashkenazi Jews derive their ancestry primarily from populations of the Middle East and Europe, that they possess considerable shared ancestry with other Jewish populations"

Regarding IBD sharing, Behar et al 2013 explain:

"Analysis of genomic sharing, focused on IBD sharing between Ashkenazi Jews and population groups, further sharpens the results from genetic distance analysis (Figure 6). IBD analysis, which focuses on the most recent tens of genera-tions of ancestry, is expected to generate tighter clustering of individuals within populations, between populations that have a recent common ancestral deme, or between populations that have recently experienced reciprocal gene Áow (Gusev et al. 2009, 2012). Considering the IBD threshold of 3 Mb for shared segments, Ashkenazi Jews are expected to show no signiÀcant IBD sharing with any population from which they have been isolated for >~20 generations. In accordance with the results from the other methods of analysis, Ashkenazi Jews show signiÀcant IBD sharing only with Eastern Europeans, North African Jews, and Sephardi Jews. Sharing was minimal with Middle Eastern populations, a not unexpected result given that the time frame for the split from Middle Eastern populations is beyond the detection power of our IBD."(Page 882)

And according to Behar et al., the populations with the closest affinity to (and most common ancestry with) the Ashkenazi are firstly other Jewish groups from Southern Europe and North Africa, and then Southern Europeans and Levantines. According to them, their genetic signature reflects an admixed ancestry mainly from Levantines and southern Europeans (with a smaller Eastern European component):

"Admixture demonstrates the connection of Ashkenazi, North African, and Sephardi Jews, with the most similar non-Jewish populations to Ashkenazi Jews being Mediterranean Europeans from Italy (Sicily, Abruzzo, Tuscany), Greece, and Cyprus. When subtracting the k5 component, which perhaps originates in Ashkenazi and Sephardi Jews from admixture with European hosts, the best matches for membership patterns of the Ashkenazi Jews shift to the Levant: Cypriots, Druze, Lebanese, and Samaritans."(P.882)

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/264390976_No_Evidence_from_Genome-Wide_Data_of_a_Khazar_Origin_for_the_Ashkenazi_Jews

In Xue et al. 2017 the final Middle Eastern admixture estimate for Ashkenazi is not in fact 30% but 40%, which they estimate after reviewing several methods (whole genome analysis, LAI, and Gkobetrotter) that yeild varying estimates. They estimate that Ashkenazi are about 40% Middle Eastern (which they consider to be Levantine) and about 69% European (with being mostly southern European)

They say:

"The estimates for the total European ancestry in AJ [Ashkenazi] range from ≈49% using our previous whole-genome sequencing analysis [9], to ≈53% using the LAI analysis here, and ≈67% using the calibrated Globetrotter analysis. The proportion of Western/Eastern European ancestry was estimated between ≈15% (Globetrotter and the LAI-based localization method)..."

And:

"Running RFMix on the AJ genomes with our EU [European] and ME [Middle Eastern] reference panels and summing up the lengths of all tracts assigned to each ancestry, the genome-wide ancestry was ≈53% EU and ≈47% ME, consistent with our previous estimate based on a smaller sequencing panel [9]."

"We used the f4 statistics to infer the fraction of European ancestry in AJ, as explained in Patterson et al. [48]. Assuming that the true source is Southern Europe, the EU ancestry proportion is theoretically given by f4(West-EU,YRI;AJ,ME)/f4(West-EU,YRI;South-EU,ME)≈67% (S4 Fig, part B). However, when simulating genomes with 50% European ancestry, the f4-inferred fraction came out as 63%; thus, an inferred European ancestry proportion of 67% is broadly consistent with the RFMix-based estimate of ≈53%."

And finally:

"Finally, we considered GLOBETROTTER [21], which can infer both the contribution of each ancestral source and the admixture time. The first step in a GLOBETROTTER analysis is running CHROMOPAINTER [20], in order to determine the proportion of ancestry of each individual that is “copied” from each other individual in the dataset. Then, an ancestry profile for each population is reconstructed, representing the contribution of each other population to its ancestry [21, 22]. The inferred ancestry profile for AJ was 5% Western EU, 10% Eastern EU, 30% Levant, and 55% Southern EU. The combined Western and Eastern EU component is in line with our other estimates, as well as the dominance of the Southern EU component. However, the overall European ancestry, ≈70% (or ≈67% after calibration by simulations; S1 Text section 5), is about 15% higher than the LAI-based estimate, as well as our previous results based on whole-genome sequencing [9]. Our detailed simulations (S1 Text section 5) demonstrate that evidence exists to support either estimate. Possibly, the true fraction of EU ancestry is midway around ≈60%."

Their paper includes a graph (Fig 7) that shows the estimated range of European and Middle Eastern admixture in Ashkenazi Jews: Middle Eastern at 40-65%, southern European 35-60%, and Eastern European 15-25%. (Which is not dissimilar to Atzmon's estimate of 30-60% European admixture in Ashkenazi and Sephardi Jews.)

The authors do identify the Levant as the most likely source of the Middle Eastern component. They state:

"We observed that in simulations of admixed genomes, the Middle-Eastern regional source could have also been recovered by running the same localization pipeline. Applying that pipeline to the AJ genomes, we identified Levant as the most likely ME source: the proportions of chromosomes classified as Levantine was 51.6%, compared to 21.7% and 22.2% classified as Druze and Southern ME, respectively."

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5380316/

Finally, Costa et al. (2013) do propose that the great majority of Ashkenazi MtDNA (maternal) lineages are of European origin, but do not contest that most of their paternal lineages (and a significant component of their autosomal DNA) is or could be of Middle Eastern origin. Costa's findings were cited and have received responses/mainstream engagement from notable researchers in (particularly Jewish) population genetics (including Karl Skorecki, Antonio Torrroni, David B. Goldstein, and Doron Behar), whose reactions (some of which which are mentioned on pages Wikipedia pages discussing the topic) were mixed, with some considering them plausible, and others considering them not likely. Another paper published soon after (Fernandez et al. 2014) found evidence that that the common Ashkenazi MtDNA K lineages identified as European by Costa might in fact have been Levantine (but it is uncertain).

None of this is consistent, as you seemed to imply, with the idea that the Levantine component in Askenazi and Sephardi Jews is nugatory (i.e. trivial/insignificant), but seemingly far from it. That opinion is in fact a small minority one in the published literature, held by Elhaik and his group and proposed (albeit perhaps to a somewhat less extreme extent) in this recent paper that has not yet been engaged with by the mainstream (which does not hold that view). Skllagyook (talk) 14:02, 10 May 2021 (UTC)

The above

@Nishidani: That is not the essense of my post at all. Your description of my reply is unfair and puzzling. I never said or indicated that I knew genetics better than the two professors. Above I quoted the quite explicit statements and conclusions of those notable sources (substantially quoted, which unfortunately caused the reply to be long), with their own positions, not my opinion or synthesis (which I added nowhere). It is not about my personal opinion. You seemed to be indicating that expert consensus is in line with the paper under discussion (and you brought up those sources). It is not (at least not currently) I agree that we need and should wait for third party input. Skllagyook (talk) 18:25, 10 May 2021 (UTC)

In fact your post clearly suggests you know the topic better than the professors. Their description of the sources, you are arguing, is inadequate. Your point seems to be to bury this simple request about competence and RS venue into one more of the endless debates, in genetics and everywhere else, about Jewish origins, about which there is not consensus. Please desist and allow third parties to examine the credentials of the authors and the venue, and make a call whether or not it fits our criteria.Nishidani (talk) 20:49, 10 May 2021 (UTC)

Is the dispute about mentioning Shurr and Yardumian's criticism of Elhaik's conclusions in the article about him? If yes, I don't see a big problem in it; per WP:UNDUE it should be a short mention so that it doesn't appear to be more substantial than other criticism of his work. It doesn't necessarily mean that Shurr and Yardumian's findings need to be mentioned elsewhere. Each case would have to be considered separately as it appears that their conclusions are far from the scientific mainstream. I'm assuming that the scholars who were originally brought up by Nishidani (Hammer, Atzmon, Behar) and then quoted by Skllagyook represent the mainstream. Alaexis_¿question? 21:04, 10 May 2021 (UTC)

Yes. Theirs is the only individual criticism that is fully expressed as such (the rest are all summarized in the preceding paragraph, without going into the details of any individual criticism from the 10 or so sources), and it has nearly the same amount of text devoted to it as the summary of all the other, mainstream criticisms. It seems very much like undue weight, especially considering that they, like Elhaik, hold a fringe viewpoint. NonReproBlue (talk) 03:57, 11 May 2021 (UTC)

There is no 'scientific mainstream', Alaexis, but, so far a 'majority' view which the paper shows tends to repeat the Levantine component, though with differing conclusions. I can't go into the details (which I know about) but Elhaik and his colleagues question the analytic reliability of one of the mathematical techniques used in population genetics - and do so at a very high level of formal criticism that will never make for the kind of tabloid reportage his wikibio thrives on - not sexy enough. That will emerge. In the meantime, wikieditors persist in trying to maintain 10 critical newspaper sources against him, while pressing for extreme limitations on any material, like the present paper, that hints at these complexities. That is where the POV pushing is. Nishidani (talk) 08:55, 11 May 2021 (UTC)

Sorry, I'm a bit lost here. Is the discussion about the criticism of Elhaik's work by Schurr and Yardumian or about the Elhaik's criticism of the majority view? Alaexis_¿question? 10:16, 11 May 2021 (UTC)

It's about Yardumian and Schurr's criticism of both, which I felt was undue (and I feel currently has undue prominence), since, like Elhaik, they take an unusual minority view among geneticists (seemingly held by only them), and their paper has not had any mainstream engagement (not yet cited, etc.). Part of my issue was the undue prominence it was given, especially in the initial form added by SteveBenassi, before Nishidani's rewriting of it, which I welcomed/was an improvement, but even after that as well. I don't know that I'd object to a short reference to it in the Eran Elhaik article, or perhaps among the other refs, whose prominence, per

WP:WEIGHT, is not out of balance with other references criticizing Elhaik (which includes scientific sources, not only Journalistic). Skllagyook (talk

) 10:47, 11 May 2021 (UTC)

they take an unusual minority view among geneticists

Please desist with this undocumented and repeated assertion. You are exceeding your remit in asserting a competence, in a highly technical area of science, for which there is no evidence and, in asserting your superior judgment against two mainstream professors. I for one disagree with their reading of Elhaik, but that is immaterial, and I don't mention it. The appearance of some vaunted master of this topic is embarrassing. Again, let third parties comment.Nishidani (talk) 11:50, 11 May 2021 (UTC)

Your assertions that they are mainstream is belied by the fact that you have repeatedly asserted that they are challenging the mainstream view (and if you trust SteveBenassi, as it seems you do, so does one of the studies author's "Since we can't be placed in the Elhaik camp or in the mainstream view, perhaps nobody really knew what to do with us.") If they are challenging the mainstream view, they cannot represent it. If there is no mainstream view, they cannot challenge it. You say If the two authors here challenge an ideological meme, that is an eminently reasonable point of view, minority (though growing)", then you say that saying they hold a minority view is an "undocumented and repeated assertion". It seems that the real issue might be that you yourself do not agree with the mainstream view, which is fine, but that does not mean that you can add information in such a way as to emphasize what you feel are the shortcomings of that view, out of proportion to what actual mainstream RS say about it. Also, it seems incredibly hypocritical to talk of having secret info about Elhaik's research that you cannot go into depth on that proves both the mainstream and other fringe ideas wrong, and at the same time chastising Skllagyook for "exceeding your remit and asserting a competence, in a highly technical area of science, for which there is no evidence an in asserting your superior judgment". I think your personal feelings on this matter might be clouding your ability to neutrally analyze the body of RS as a whole. NonReproBlue (talk) 12:48, 11 May 2021 (UTC)

Learn to read. By mainstream is meant that there is no evidence whatsoever that Yardumian and Schurr are anything but professors with strong research records and no hint anywhere that their respective research has been challenged as fringe by their peers. Now let's stop this sepulchral drift of chat and its probable function of burying the simple request asked of third parties.Nishidani (talk) 13:27, 11 May 2021 (UTC)

All I see are more ad hominem attacks and aspersions that seem more in line with a battleground mentality than a genuine desire to effectively collaborate with others. Since you are such a pro at reading, perhaps give

WP:NPA a gander. NonReproBlue (talk

) 14:54, 11 May 2021 (UTC)

Could we have third party input please.Nishidani (talk) 14:58, 11 May 2021 (UTC)

I have no control over that. But I have no intention of remaining silent as you insult me, so if you want me to stop responding you are going to have to keep your attitude in check. NonReproBlue (talk) 15:09, 11 May 2021 (UTC)

When I said "an unusual minority view among geneticists" I was only referring to what is stated in/known from the published research, since that is all we can go on. I am not claiming a superior judgement. Perhaps it would have been better to say "an unusual minority view in the genetic literature." or "unusual minority of the genetic research" Or something similar. Skllagyook (talk) 13:05, 11 May 2021 (UTC)

To make that judgment implies you have a total command of the genetic literature at your fingertips, - the premise for the assertion you made. I see no evidence of such technical mastery. Now, can we drop it for once, and listen to others? Thank you.Nishidani (talk) 13:28, 11 May 2021 (UTC)

This is how I would mention their criticism. Possibly it would be worth expanding the section, and then both Schurr&Yardumian's and everyone else's findings can be mentioned in more detail. I'm definitely not an expert, but nothing in the article or in this thread justifies a special emphasis on Schurr&Yardumian's criticism. Alaexis_¿question? 19:29, 11 May 2021 (UTC)

There is no special emphasis. The criticism passage refers to Elhaik's work. Schurr&Yardumian criticize him. Mentioning this upsets two editors. The page is stacked with criticism of Elhaik in poor journalists reports. This new piece criticizes him, and his critics. The furore by POV pushers consists of wishing not to mention that his critics are also criticized for the same topic.Nishidani (talk) 20:20, 11 May 2021 (UTC)

That his critics are criticised too seems to be less relevant for the article about Elhaik (which is why I asked about the scope of the discussion). It might be relevant for other articles. Alaexis_¿question? 20:52, 11 May 2021 (UTC)

@Alaexis: Your revision seems fine to me. Skllagyook (talk) 20:45, 11 May 2021 (UTC)

@Alaexis: Yardumian and Schurr are Reliable Sources for the Eran Elhaik Wikipedia page. I made two edits to the Eran Elhaik page, one on Ostrer "will not defame Jews" comment, and another on The Geography of Jewish Ethnogenesis paper, causing this debate. The point I am trying to make is, in layman's terms, are Jews a race or not a race. Ostrer and his camp say Jews are a race, they are more homogenous than not, they are closely related, and they are mostly the descendants from the Ancient Hebrew in the Levant. Elhaik, Yardumian and Schurr say no, Jews are not a race, they are more heterogenous than not, they are not closely related, they are not mostly the descendants from the Ancient Hebrew in the Levant, but are mostly the descendants of converts to Judaism outside of the the Levant. Elhaik is a Zionist but is not biased in his research, he says his intention was not to disprove a connection to biblical Jews, but rather "to eliminate the racist underpinnings of anti-Semitism in Europe". Elhaik's paper was highly cited, it created a firestorm, many articles were written about it, because it threatens one of the justifications for Israel's right to exist in Palestine, DNA. I think we should modify this to reflect the above "Yardumian and Schurr have criticized both Elhaik's Khazar hypothesis and the mainstream model it challenged, on the grounds that, in their view, both assume the same homeland-diaspora expansion model. As opposed to this, they view Jewish ethnogenesis as one rooted in multiple heterogeneous populations which, often after conversion, coalesced to form modern day Jews. " SteveBenassi (talk) 04:37, 12 May 2021 (UTC)

I have read the paper of Yardumian and Schurr. It is a secondary source by two qualified authors published in a peer-reviewed scientific journal. The authors openly disagree with the conclusions drawn by some of the papers they review and give reasons for their disagreement; this is how science works and it isn't our business to take sides. I don't want to comment on exactly how it is used in articles, but I don't see the slightest reason to prohibit its use. Zero^talk 07:10, 12 May 2021 (UTC)

Neutral editors please note that the use of this perfectly normal academic article is being edited out of several pages: not only at the

Please read

WP:UNDUE Shrike (talk

) 08:40, 12 May 2021 (UTC)

Vapid policy flagwaving in lieu of a focused argument. What's that got to do with the price of fish? What you are saying is that any new research, issued through the normal processes of peer-review and published in a standard journal, is ipso facto 'fringe' because it happens, in an overview of scholarship to date, to differ from a majority opinion and suggest other ways of interpreting the data ostensibly underwriting that majority view. Were that true Wikipedia could never keep abreast of the fluid world of scholarly developments. Ridiculous.Nishidani (talk) 08:47, 12 May 2021 (UTC)

There is no need to panic remove this from articles. Its not the kind of source that will be disqualified for reliability. It may be out of scope for a biography but that discussion should continue at the article talk page."The Khazar hypothesis" saved lives in Vichy France. It should not be taken drastically out of its historical context to smear Elhaik. Separately, the Khazar hypothesis enjoyed a Muslim revival after the founding of the modern state of Israel and the English speaking rose to the bait [5] but it's never been the heart of Zionism. SteveBenassi asks "are Jews a race or not a race". The answer was once a matter of life or death. But the "right to exist in Palestine" is not justified by genetics. The only place I've seen such rubbish claims is the The New York Times which is not a reliable source for science. Why would Jews who were deported to Israel by the nations that were ethnically cleansing them justify their presence in Israel by genetic studies? On Wikipedia we should not be "taking sides" but continuing to improve the weight or NPOV issue by discussion. Spudlace (talk) 09:34, 12 May 2021 (UTC)

@Nishidani: (and to any other editors reading) In the diffs you (Nishidani) link above (where I removed the disputed additions), SteveBenassi has added the them to several articles while it was being discussed here instead of waiting for the issue to be resolved, after having been warned about edit warring. That did not seem appropriate. He also added them prominently to article leads, which was also undue given that the the additions represent a minority view. In the case of the Jewish history article there is no other material referencing genetic studies, so adding it seemed especially undue. And he had almost completely refused to engage in any kind of Talk page discussion since the beginning (since his first edits at Eran Elhaik).

As I have tried to explain, I do not claim any kind of special knowledge or expertise (I am not an expert), and your accusations - now of "arrogance" - are becoming increasingly personal and uncivil and beginning to enter the territory of

personal attacks

, which I would like to ask that you not do.

In making the point that the new paper is strongly divergent from the mainstream (as we can be aware of the mainstream and majority view, from published research) I merely quoted (and refered to) what much of the research itself says/concludes quite explicitly. I can find no other published research (by population geneticists, the relevant expert community) that takes positions similar to those of Yardumian and Schurr. And you admit above they they are not of the majority view. I merely argued that their position is

extraordinary and has not yet had mainstream engagement (e.g. been cited by experts) and this that some caution should be used at this stage. But if the paper is to be used in this or any article, which I concede that it likely will in some capacity, it should at least not be given undue prominence. Skllagyook (talk

) 11:08, 12 May 2021 (UTC)

@Skllagyook: I am a Newbie, I don't know how to use Wikipedia, I was getting erased by three people unfairly I thought, I fought back, went to Wiki-Jail for 36 hours, made one final post, and this one, I apologize for my inexperience. I am not planning on making any more edits for a while, I got my message out, now I am done, and will watch others and learn. It was quite the experience. Thank You for putting up with me the past few days. SteveBenassi (talk) 12:42, 12 May 2021 (UTC)

@SteveBenassi: Your statement that your violations of Wikipedia policies were honest mistakes from ignorance seems to be directly contradicted by your other recent statement on another page (along with the fact that you repeatedly edit warred and refused to engage in Talk after several warnings and explanations.

Namely this statement that you wrote on your Talk page [[6]]"I intentionally made a scene to draw attention to the Ostrer issue, I knew I would be put in wiki-Jail for a day or two, I thought it was worth it, and it worked, Huldra came to the rescue.". As

WP:ANI) correctly said, this "would seem to strongly suggest that this user is not here to build an encyclopedia. Knowingly breaking policy because the punishments are "worth it" seems like textbook tendentious editing." Skllagyook (talk

) 15:54, 12 May 2021 (UTC)

We can't conduct a civil debate if simple words in English are misunderstood, and even taken as personal attacks. 'Arrogate' in 'arrogate the right' does not mean 'arrogance'. It means 'claim a right without justification'.

When on the wikibio page I showed you that numerous Jewish historians (and they have read these science papers) doubt the claims, you dismiss their objections as invalid because they are historians. The error there is that you are saying historians cannot judge the historical implications of science, but scientists can (re)write history beyond the challenge of historians.

When I note, as several scholarly books have observed, that these claims are, despite the science, embedded in politics, I am told keep politics out of it. But one of the masterly overviews of Jewish identity debates by Weitzman finds it,

'impossible to dismiss the argument that the scholarship of Jewish origin, certainly as practiced in the past but also as being pursued today, is really at its core a form of political self-positioning.' Steven Weitzman, The Origin of the Jews The Quest for roots in a rootless age, Princeton University Press 2017 p.20

Weitzman devotes a whole chapter to the genetic theories you take as an unchallenged consensus, and says they don't work. He is an historian, but rest assured his summary of the material was vetted by competent scholars in the area. He admits he is not competent to judge the merits of genetics (p.298) but he shows that for example claims by genetics about the so-called Cohen hapoltype have been challenged by other geneticists. He looked at Behar and co., notes that Elhaik 'in an interesting way' challenged their conclusions (he is a geneticist like them) and claimed that '70% oif European Jewws ad nd almost all Eastern European Jews cluster with their populations. In other words, Elhaik's analysis showed that the ancestors of Ashkenazic Jews do not hail from the Near East.' op,299

Scrupulously, he then notes Elhaik's conclusions have been challenged and 'there are reasons to be skeptical', since his proxies are poor choices. And he notes Behar's response, which confirmed a Middle east origin. But then Behar's account of Ashkenazic Levites concluded that they were closer to non-Jewish populations of Eastern European origin', a conclusion which shows that Behar and his collaborators 'are willing to entertain historical conclusions at odds with conventional thinking babout the origin of the Jews if that is where the evidence leads them' p.301

Behar also argued that 40% of Ashkenazic Jews came from four founding mothers. His group claimed they originated in the Middle East, but Martin Richards in 2013 contradicted this conclusion, arguing in turn that they were Mediterranean and possibly were converts. (p.302) It doesn't stop there, for another finds East Asian traces in the Ashkenazi. Conclusion? Your vaunted 'majority consensus' is a scam meme that buries the marked differences in research results in a highly mobile discipline of modern science. The point again is made by Weitzman:-

This kind of research is still very new: it seems to be updating itself all the time, and the conclusions described here are tentative and revisable-in fact some have already been revised.

His finally survey is of critics who argue that genetic evidence, though invaluable is 'far less ambiguous' than other types of evidence. In this view genetics is rehabilitating racialized thinking and fails to substantiate the historical claims it has been making. pp.304ff.

So? Your idea of majority/consensus used repeatedly to challenge the use of new research flies in the face of what science does, particularly here at its cutting edge. It is an open vibrantly fluid field of various hypotheses, in which papers develop, refine or challenge peer conclusions in a rapid turnover of research. The sociology of science is full of narratives of minority views that are generally discounted only to achieve acceptance in a generation or two (Horizontal gene transfer or symbiogenesis are obvious cases in point. In your approach no one could have mentioned early hypotheses in the literature until decades later, when the hypotheses were broadly confirmed. Rubbish. Wikipedia must keep abreast of what qualified scholars and theorists are arguing, and avoid the dangerous editorial authoritarianism of censoring new research because it 'contradicts' what is just a generally widespread viewpoint or model or, as here, a dicey meme.Nishidani (talk) 13:02, 12 May 2021 (UTC)

By all means reply, but do not give us your personal view of the state of the art, to contradict Weitzman's summary. What you have to answer to is the fact that you appear to assert is either that there is no minority view within population genetic research on Jews/Ashkenazim or no disagreement in the ranks. Secondary sources affirm the opposite, and, so far, your repeated claims of a consensus are personal takes on the topic which ignore the diversity of conclusions that have emerged over the last decade, a diversity reflected in the very paper you are trying to suppress from being cited here. That is wildly exceeding our remit as editors, and I am quite shocked third parties so far can't see it for what it is.Nishidani (talk) 13:10, 12 May 2021 (UTC)

@Nishidani: You are correct that I misread "arrogate" as "arrogant". My mistake, and my apologies.

As I mentioned before, it is not controversial that European Jews have substantial European/non-Near Eastern admixture (some studies indicating which some of the Weitzman excerpt mentions). But this is different from the position that they have negligable Middle Eastern or Levantine ancestry, a view held by Elhaik which does not seem to be mainstream.

Regarding Weitzman and his status as a historian you wrote:

"The error there is that you are saying historians cannot judge the historical implications of science, but scientists can (re)write history beyond the challenge of historians."

What I was saying is that historians such as Weitzman (without qualifications in genetics) may be quotable and reliable sources on other topics and contexts, but their opinions on the genetic evidence would not be quotable/

WP:RS on pages or article sections covering genetic evidence and studies (that are meant to represent the findings and conclusions of scholars in that field). Nor does it speak to the consensus in that field, which is the relevant consensus in this duscussion. Skllagyook (talk

) 13:52, 12 May 2021 (UTC)

No need to apologize. There is a vast difference between Middle Eastern and Levantine ancestry. You evidently haven't read Elhaik ('the position that they have negligable Middle Eastern or Levantine ancestry, a view held by Elhaik'). Elhaik explicitly identifies two Middle eastern areas as formative for the foundation of the Ashkenazi. Let's not go into the details here.

You have no qualifications in genetics by your own admission. Neither do I. But you alone are holding out against our use of historians and specialists whose work analyses the literature and who have the competence to do so. Yardumian and Schurr publish widely on the topic. Weitzman is Professor of Semitic Languages and Literatures in the department of Religious Studies at the University of Pennsylvania, and has written one of the defining overview analyses of Jewish identity arguments, his book is peer-reviewed (that means here he got competent specialists to read over what he wrote about genetics) and is published by Princeton University Press; Aram Yardumian specializes in Human evolutionary genetics ep. re the Caucasus, Anatolia and the Middle East regions at the Laboratory of Molecular Anthropology at the University of Pennsylvania; Theodore Schurr is Professor of anthropology at the Population Studies Center at UPenn, Director of the North American Regional Center of the Genographic Project, and Head of the Laboratory of Molecular Anthropology at the University of Pennsylvania. And you personally object to their presence on a page splotched with tabloid level coverage of this genetic dispute by the likes of Matthew Thomas, Jordan Kutzik, Jon Entine and Cnaan Liphshiz, none of whom have any professional knowledge of population genetics, and all are publicists/journalists. It is quite outrageous that we are having this debate on Wikipedia. In normative wiki editing the source selection would be inverted, eliding the journalists and privileging people who have the academic professionalism or area-specific competence of the three scholars named. Nishidani (talk) 15:44, 12 May 2021 (UTC)

@Nishidani: You wrote: "There is a vast difference between Middle Eastern and Levantine ancestry. You evidently haven't read Elhaik"

I have read Elhaik. I spoke imprecisely. The position that Ashkenazi Jews are of Iranian, Anatolian, and Slavic descent and have very essentially no Levantine ancestry is also a minority position (judging by the statements of the published research by experts in the field). My argument is not that the majority position is unchallenged (that is rarely the case in science) but that certain strongly divergent positions (under discussion here) are marginal enough/enough of a minority to warrant caution in giving them too much weight (and certainly avoiding

WP:FALSEBALANCE). As mentioned, I concede that Yarmudian and Schurr will be included in some capacity on the page. The issue is now how to incorporate the source and how much prominence to give it. I currently see no problem with User:Alaexis's edit. Skllagyook (talk

) 16:09, 12 May 2021 (UTC)

My full disclosure is that I haven't read Elhaik. I was responding to the suggestion proposed above by SteveBenassi that doesn't mention Ashkenazi:

"Yardumian and Schurr have criticized both Elhaik's Khazar hypothesis and the mainstream model it challenged, on the grounds that, in their view, both assume the same homeland-diaspora expansion model. As opposed to this, they view Jewish ethnogenesis as one rooted in multiple heterogeneous populations which, often after conversion, coalesced to form modern day Jews."

The form of the Khazar theory that is taken seriously by scholars is not a theory of Ashkenazi ancestry. Khazar was a slur in Soviet Russia (basically calling them Turks and blaming them for everything, which we call anti-Semitism), and it was also a theory developed mostly by Karaim scholars about Karaim origins.

The related Khazar hypothesis of Ashkenazi ancestry is not supported by any evidence, historical or scientific, and is not taken seriously by any scholars, with the apparent exception of Elhaik. I think we can call this fringe.

Yardumian and Schurr are reliable and can be used in other articles. Despite the comments in the email, I don't think this is a new or fringe position. The well-established Rhineland hypothesis implies multiple heterogeneous populations. It remains controversial but it's not fringe. The issue of deleting the Yardumian and Schurr source from multiple articles as non-reliable came up. While there is no consensus here for that, it can still be challenged under other policies like

WP:UNDUE. Spudlace (talk

) 05:26, 13 May 2021 (UTC)

Several geneticists, Behar included, had earlier (2004) suggested might be a possible line of investigation. Elhaik took up the challenge (the theory had a long history of support in many Jewish historians), but his paper was deemed flawed for its choice of proxy. Normal science. (a 'Perhaps this? (b) 'Well, here's my model.' (c) 'No, that doesn't work . . .' Elhaik was singled out for a firestorm of outrage for testing that hypothesis, as his peers suggested worth doing, and much of this was political. In 2019, two scholars reviewed all the evidence, criticized both the mainstream school and Elhaik, and offered a theory of multiple origins (which, in any case, is implicit in much of the literature). One editor went overboard and edited out mention of this on four wiki articles. So0 far there has been no cogent reason given for eliding the article from Elhaik or any other page. It is a legitimate view, even if minority. And, in particular, given that Elhaik's page is stacked with negative criticism sourced to journalists, the balancing act Yardumian and Schurr follow, in treating both the widespread view and the Elhaik theory as sharing a similar assumption, is necessary per NPOV. In the Elhaik section, the undue weighting overwhelmingly in favour of negative press reportage that favours the 'mainstream' view, is somewhat balanced if we add a brief note that the 'general' view is itself challenged. Fail to do that, and the wikibio looks like an attack page, studiously exempting any mention of problems with the mainstream model his paper questioned.Nishidani (talk) 11:58, 13 May 2021 (UTC)

There's just no actual evidence of any East to West migration of Khazars fleeing from Genghis Khan. It's a work of creative historical fiction and it was rejected because there is no good explanation for the vast linguistic difference. Khazars disappear from history in the time of Genghis Khan is why Elhaik's study has been rejected. The assumptions he makes are wild and implausible in many ways. The Caucasus is relatively isolated (with the exception of the many dignitaries, visitors, oil explorers, Persian travelers and occupying armies that visited one of the worlds most significant oil producing countries). And Sephardim and Ashkenazi have been marrying for centuries. You don't have to be an expert in genetics to see that this doesn't add up. For RS/N purposes the source should not be removed for reliability but it was removed as

WP:UNDUE I don't think we can resolve it here. Spudlace (talk

) 21:59, 13 May 2021 (UTC)

Just wanted to get a sense from some uninvolved users regarding the use of this book on articles about controversial aspects of the Balkans in WWII, specifically regarding the Ustasha genocide of Serbs, Jews and Roma. The book was reviewed in Slavic Review in 1962 here. Given the observations that Paris (now deceased) was not a historian or a participant, not a "craftsman of scholarship", had not "bothered much with the rules for screening, organising, and presenting evidence", and that he had overlooked important sources and made numerous errors, and the age of the work, nearly sixty years old, in an topic area where a lot of scholarship has been ongoing since the early 1960s, it seems to me that it cannot be considered reliable for articles regarding the Ustasha genocide. Thoughts? Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 08:24, 5 May 2021 (UTC)

Another issue is apparently critics of his work state Paris had a large bias against the Catholic Church which motivated writing literature magnifying any negative historical instances, perhaps magnifying, involving Catholic individuals or related groups. I don’t know if anyone here might have more about it. His quotes of testimonies have been used in other articles recently and I am concerned as well, is this a reliable source to be used all on its own?OyMosby (talk) 13:17, 5 May 2021 (UTC)

I wouldn't use an article from 1961 because per Age matters older sources may no longer be accurate. That doesn't mean we cannot mention the work if it is cited in recent reliable sources. Even if the information is accurate, weight is also a requirement for inclusion. If you can't find the facts in more recent publications, then they lack weight for inclusions. TFD (talk) 23:03, 5 May 2021 (UTC)

I cannot think of hardly any cases where it would be appropriate to cite a source from 1961 for World War II atrocities. So in short I would not cite it (t · c) buidhe 22:27, 6 May 2021 (UTC)

Thanks all. Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 10:38, 10 May 2021 (UTC)

I'd look at what it is being cited for. If more modern sources disagree then that's one thing, if simply contains not particularly controversial details not found elsewhere I wouldn't dismiss it. Controversial coverage not discussed elsewhere is going to raised the question of why, it being a controversial claim, it hasn't been discussed at all since 1961. Simple age is not a good reason to dismiss - stuff written closer to WW2 does at least have the advantage of more direct sourcing. FOARP (talk) 12:34, 14 May 2021 (UTC)

I am trying to use H Ref as a source https://www.h-ref.de/literatur/h/hoffmann-joachim/gutachten.php but some one is saying it is not a good source to use https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Joachim_Hoffmann#Holocaust_sub-section. But it is recognized in real life as a reliable source on the Holocaust.Thelostone41 (talk) 02:47, 13 May 2021 (UTC)

BY Markus Nesselrodt Holocaust deniers have existed since the Holocaust. This is a decades-old phenomenon that can still be found today. In the Federal Republic of Germany, denial of the Holocaust has been a criminal offense as incitement to hatred under Section 130 (3) of the Criminal Code (StGB) since 1994.

The Holocaust Reference website would like to offer arguments against Holocaust deniers and at the same time document their positions. Navigation through the portal is possible along thematic focal points. The menu item “The literature of Auschwitz deniers” lists texts that Holocaust deniers refer to again and again. Keywords can be searched in the “ABC”. Well-known theses of an alleged “preventive war” and other positions directly connected with the war are listed in the “War” section. In the next menu item, specific denials, for example with regard to the Babi Yar massacre, the use of Zyklon B and the Wannsee Conference are refuted. The term “persons” refers to actors, but also deliberately misinterpreted scientists, to whom Holocaust deniers repeatedly refer. Some clubs and groups, those who deny the reality of the genocide of the Jews in Germany are presented under the heading "Organizations". “Numbers games, tricks and deception maneuvers” make it their task to refute the arguments of the Holocaust deniers in detail and to pave their way through the thicket of perfidious falsification of history and distortion of facts. Finally, numerous anti-Semitic and other conspiracy theories are refuted under the heading “Enemy Images”.

The operator of the portal and author of the texts, Jürgen Langowski, has created a huge pool of arguments and counter-arguments that make it possible to respond to Holocaust denial. http://lernen-aus-der-geschichte.de/Lernen-und-Lehren/content/8978/2010-11-08-Webportal-Holocaust-Referenz. And this is Markus Nesselrodt https://www.netzwerkdpforschung.uni-bonn.de/mitglieder/markus-nesselroth.Thelostone41 (talk) 03:04, 13 May 2021 (UTC)

• (commenting here because Thelostone41 mentioned me as "someone" in this request). This is a self-published source at best. Looking at individual postings (like that one), I do not see who is the author of the postings. Jürgen Langowski appears on the bottom of the page only as a copyright holder. But even if he is an author of all these postings (I am not sure), is he actually an expert on the subject? Who is he? Do we even have a page about him? If person X is indeed a Holocaust denier, I am sure there are much better scholarly sources that call him such. Labeling people as Holocaust deniers based on questionable sources is a very bad idea. My very best wishes (talk) 03:04, 13 May 2021 (UTC)

• If a sit is recognized in the holocaust field in Germany I don't see how its a bad source.Thelostone41 (talk) 03:12, 13 May 2021 (UTC)

• Why do you think that Jürgen Langowski is author of all these texts? Also, can you please make any links to publications about Jürgen Langowski, so we could see that he is an expert, rather than a political activist who wants to defame/accuse of crime other people on his personal website? My very best wishes (talk) 03:36, 13 May 2021 (UTC)

• The sit is recognized in the holocaust field in Germany I don't think it would be recognized in the holocaust field. If it was some political activist who wants to defame/accuse people of a crime like you said.Thelostone41 (talk) 03:45, 13 May 2021 (UTC)

• Can you show that it is routinely cited in academic sources? TFD (talk) 03:49, 13 May 2021 (UTC)

• This is good suggestion, but something like Kavkaz Center was cited in many books, which does not make it an RS. And even if it was cited, this is still a self-published source simply by definition. This is published by a single person. No fact checking by colleagues, etc. My very best wishes (talk) 04:09, 13 May 2021 (UTC)

• Here is one source http://lernen-aus-der-geschichte.de/Lernen-und-Lehren/content/8978/2010-11-08-Webportal-Holocaust-Referenz and one more that talks about it trategien der extremen Rechten: Hintergründe - Analysen - Antworten on page 598 Websites such as the homepage Holocaust - Reference ' contain an extensive fund of arguments against right-wing extremism and the denial of the Holocaust. https://www.google.com/search?q=Die+Holocaust-Referenz-Website&hl=en&sxsrf=ALeKk02opFRHaXuvbupxjHH-bGlyegNY4A:1620879134117&source=lnms&tbm=bks&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwil3Yyo5cXwAhUMn-AKHYLZCO0Q_AUoAXoECAEQCw&biw=1920&bih=938 Thelostone41 (talk) 04:18, 13 May 2021 (UTC)

• I did show the site was fact checked by a reputable institute and recognized in the holocaust field in Germany.Thelostone41 (talk) 04:18, 13 May 2021 (UTC)

• Comment. Not only this is a self-published posting of uncertain authorship, but it is used to support such very strong claim. However, even this self-published source does not explicitly makes such claim if one looks at the Google translation. This is very simple. Please produce at least a couple of strong academic RS that explicitly make such claim (as opposed to an ordinary criticism/scientific discourse), and we can include it. My very best wishes (talk) 22:59, 13 May 2021 (UTC)

• Comment. I already showed sources that show h-ref is recognized in the holocaust field in Germany. He said in Auschwitz a number of only 74,000 victims can be considered certain https://www.h-ref.de/literatur/h/hoffmann-joachim/gutachten.php. .That's a Holocaust denier talking point? Just like we say on Grover Furrs page he is a Soviet war crimes denier who holds fringe views regarding Soviet and Communist studies.Thelostone41 (talk) 23:15, 13 May 2021 (UTC)

No. What you are saying: (a) based on a single questionable source, and (b) represents

WP:SYN. You need strong multiple secondary RS explicitly saying that "person X is a conspiracy theorist/racist/pseudoscientist/whatever" as opposed to something like "what a hell he was saying nonsense in the court as an expert-witness" (that is more like the claim by your self-published source). My very best wishes (talk

) 23:25, 13 May 2021 (UTC)

Ok then what about this Joachim Hoffmann (1 December 1930 – 8 February 2002) was a German historian, who held fringe views on World War II and was the scientific director of the German Armed Forces Military History Research Office. there are sources on the page. That say Hoffmann has been criticized by historians for his uncritical attitude to the Nazi regime, just like we say on Grover Furrs page he is a Soviet war crimes denier who holds fringe views regarding Soviet and Communist studies from the sources that are on that page.Thelostone41 (talk) 23:40, 13 May 2021 (UTC)

Then you need sources saying that he held "fringe views" (I do not see such sources either). More important, such content must be specific. What exactly views/ideas by person X were criticized and why in RS? My very best wishes (talk) 23:47, 13 May 2021 (UTC)

I responded to you on here about your concern https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Joachim_Hoffmann#Controversies.Thelostone41 (talk) 00:05, 14 May 2021 (UTC)

• Comment. What exactly scientific or other expert credentials the alleged author of these postings (Jürgen Langowski) has? If he has significant credentials, authored some books on the subject, etc., then the source might be regarded as a self-published opinion by an expert per
  WP:SELFPUB. But if not, then no. We also need to know that Jürgen Langowski was indeed the author.My very best wishes (talk
  ) 15:16, 14 May 2021 (UTC)

• Geni
• Geneanet
• Geneastar
• MyHeritage
• WikiTree
• Ancientfaces
• Genealogics

Thanks--Farfall (talk) 19:42, 13 May 2021 (UTC)

No. Most of them are user generated, hence not reliable. Even if they were reliable, we could not use the information since it would require interpretation. Writers of secondary sources may of course use these sources to assist their research, but then we are relying on the writers' ability to assess the accuracy and significance of the data, which is something Wikipedia editors cannot do. TFD (talk) 17:05, 14 May 2021 (UTC)

Hope this is the right place to do this, as this is my first RFC post. Would the LA Times' "HS Insider" (https://highschool.latimes.com/) be considered a reliable source? I figured so since it's a division of the

Here's an example article from this source.

Thanks a lot for your help in this manner Wizzito (talk) 04:59, 14 May 2021 (UTC)

I don't think it has sufficient fact-checking to be considered reliable. Basically they publish stories submitted by students. But the students aren't professional journalists and there is no indication that the paper fact-checks their stories. Also, a story originally reported by a student writer than is not picked up beyond HS Insider isn't noteworthy. TFD (talk) 17:16, 14 May 2021 (UTC)

I found this book called Genetics. It’s written by this one biologist, named Benjamin Pierce. I can’t find any Wikipedia articles on the author so I’m not sure if he’s the most reliable source in the world, but doing a google search on this guy shows that he’s a biology professor at Christian universities.

So I’m not so certain he’s the nos reliable to be honest. I told myself that just because someone is a biologist at a Christian university doesn’t mean they aren’t reliable.

I wanting to use this source for biology related articles. So what’s y’all opinions?

It’s a college textbook, written by a professor at an accredited university and published by a major publishing house. Looks pretty RS to me. I would not be concerned about the author’s teaching at a university associated with the United Methodist Church, a mainstream denomination that accepts evolution. John M Baker (talk) 05:44, 14 May 2021 (UTC)

Echoing

WP:C. Szmenderowiecki (talk

) 18:48, 14 May 2021 (UTC)