Wikipedia talk:No original research/Archive 8

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Is linking to a forum post enough non-original reseachness for a nickname?

Exactly the same as the subject. Duke toaster 19:37, 6 July 2006 (UTC)

Do you (Duke toaster) mean that you are editing an article, and want to establish that, for example, Gerry is a nickname for Gerard, so you plan to refer to a forum post that Gerard made using the name Gerry? If so, the forum post should ideally be on a forum that takes reasonable steps to establish the identity of posters. Also, the forum post should clearly establish the link between the formal name and the nickname. Gerry Ashton 20:05, 6 July 2006 (UTC)

That's not really an original research question, more of a reliability of sources question, IMHO. Generally I would say that a forum post is a pretty unreliable source for anything, or as the Reliable Source guidelines put it "Posts to bulletin boards and Usenet, wikis or messages left on blogs, are never acceptable as primary or secondary source". Gwernol 20:06, 6 July 2006 (UTC)

I would add that in general, forums are not acceptable for cites for any purpose. KillerChihuahua^?!? 20:08, 6 July 2006 (UTC)

I might add a caveat that we should never say never. If, for example, Johnathan Smith identifies himself (in a verifiable way) as the user JohnnySmith in Fooforum.org, we may take his posts to in Fooforum.org to be his words. Beyond establishing that John Smith said those words, we cannot use them as statements of fact—they're John's opinions. In other words, given the following,

• Johnathan Smith reports on his website (we can verify that it is his site, and registered to him) that JohnnySmith at Fooforum.org is his account.
• In a post at Fooforum.org JohnnySmith writes "All people from Iowa are geniuses."

We may reasonably write in an article about John Smith, "Johnathan Smith believes that all people from Iowa are geniuses." We may not write in the Iowa article, "All the people in Iowa are geniuses" and cite the forum post as our source. Makes sense? This type of sourcing depends on the strength of the link between forum account and person, of course. I would accept published news reports and verifiable personal admissions as just about the only way to firmly link an online identity to a real person. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 22:44, 6 July 2006 (UTC)

Considering that we have articles that are about specific Usenet posts (like Cindy's Torment) I should hope we can use them as primary sources! It's also not unusual for major figures in the open-source world to make important announcements through these channels, and these seem citable to me. This isn't the place to debate Reliable Sources, but I'd call this into question as a hard rule. Deco 23:03, 6 July 2006 (UTC)

I disagree with Ten above. I'd suggest we could write neither sentence. "Do not use forums" should be a hard rule IMO. There just too fraught from a V perspective and the context in which comments to them are made are often glib, off-hand, sarcastic etc. Marskell 19:10, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

The rule is unusable. There are forum posts, where the person is identified as for example, the Author of a particular book and makes a statement about the contents of the book, or a clarification. That should be a primary source for an article on both the author and the work. The same source who wrote the book is making a statement about the book. That's pretty clear isn't it? Wjhonson 19:56, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

For me to verify a nickname, I would want to see that it was used by someone else than the original poster, in some other location. For example, just because John Smith routinely called himself GodOfEverything in his sig, would not mean that it would be a valid nickname to include in a Wikipedia article. However, if multiple other blogs around the web started talking about him, and were routinely calling him GodOfEverything instead of John Smith (and they were saying it in a good faith way, and not sarcastically), then I would probably agree with including it as a "commonly known as" nickname in a Wikipedia bio. --Elonka 20:26, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

Selective citation to advance a position

This falls between OR and NPOV but I'm a bit concerned by historical articles where an editor cites selected passages from a primary source in order to present a particular opinion as to the topic of the primary source and the concerns of the author.

Does anyone have any ideas about how this policy might address that problem? --SteveMcCluskey 15:30, 8 July 2006 (UTC)

Just after finishing this, I found that Jimbo Wales had something to say about this topic. [1] --SteveMcCluskey 15:37, 8 July 2006 (UTC)

I think this policy already makes it crystal clear that one cannot use primary sources (or even secondary sources) to advance an editor's novel analysis or synthesis or interpretation or explanation. I want to voice one concern about the phrase "selective citation:" since all Wikipedia articles are works in progress, it is inevitable that any given editor provides selective citations. The solution is not to delete such citations but to seek out other sources and other views, i.e. for other editors to add.Slrubenstein | Talk 15:51, 8 July 2006 (UTC)

Without the context it's hard to judge. Selective quoting of sources is always a problem (I had a recent dispute with someone who quoted figures form a report which appeared to back a pressure group's claim that something was significant; the report itself made it clear that other things were much more significant - the solution was to cite all the things in order of significance). So: generally, expand the quotes to give the full context. And if it's a matter of interpretation, show recognised experts stating that interpretation (and other recognised experts violently disagreeing). Vroomfondel and Majikthise may both be cited as sources :-) —The preceding unsigned comment was added by JzG (talk • contribs) 17:40, 8 July 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the suggestions. I don't think adding additional quoatations would work in the case I have in mind, which already involves lengthy quotations from one aspect of the source and ignores the rest of it. Adding similar quotations to give a balanced picture would lead to a lengthy and unreadable article. Citing recognized experts from secondary sources seems to be a more promising approach. --SteveMcCluskey 02:20, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

Yet Another Unenforceable Policy (YAUP)

JA: Like any WP:Policy or Guideline whose fair and equal enforcement would depend on knowing the real-world identity and affiliations of each editor in question, the aspects of WP:NOR, WP:NPOV, WP:VER, and WP:SPAM that deal with advancing particular purposes are simply null and void. Just f'r'instance, nobody has any way of knowing for sure whether that editor or that cabal of evatars who are so insistent about imposing the POV of their favorite secondary source on an article is in fact the author or publisher of the work in question. What will be the result of attempting to enforce a WikiProvision of this type — and I use the word "vision" blindly? The editors who are honest enough to use their real names will be at the disadvantage of the editors, their agents, and their evatars who are not. WikiPar for the course, of course. Jon Awbrey 18:04, 8 July 2006 (UTC)

Jon, I don't think I get your point: none of the Wikipedia policies rely on knowing the true identity of the editors involved. The verifiability policy means that even if the original source of a particular article comes online and makes an unsourced change we won't accept it. As you say there is no way that someone is who they claim to be, so we never rely on that. Perhaps I'm missing yur point? Gwernol 18:50, 8 July 2006 (UTC)

JA: Gwernol, I'll discuss this here because I'm really more concerned about the Big Three WP:Policies than I am about WP:SPAM at the moment, but the analogous SPAM policy has the advantage of providing a slightly more explicit model at the present time. You repeat the frequently heard assertion to the effect that that "none of the Wikipedia policies relies on knowing the true identity of the editors involved". But is that really so? Consider the new advisory recently added beneath the new article creation window:

Wikipedia is not an advertising service. Promotional articles about yourself, your friends, your company or products; or articles created as part of a marketing or promotional campaign, may be deleted in accordance with our deletion policies. For more information, see Wikipedia:Spam.

JA: To whom exactly is this notice addressed? That is, what are the intended denotations of the phrases "yourself", "your friends", "your company or products"? When the notice says "THIS MEANS YOU !!!", who is it talking to, exactly, if not the true identity of the person addressed? Without the assumption that a real person is being addressed the directive is pointless, meaningless, null, and void. Jon Awbrey 15:02, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

JA: Well, let me first ask a question then. Referring to the nutshell statement:

Articles may not contain any previously unpublished theories, data, statements, concepts, arguments, or ideas; or any new analysis or synthesis of published data, statements, concepts, arguments, or ideas that serves to advance a position.

JA: I've been following some of the recent dispute on this page, if only out of the corner of one eye, and it seems like a lot of its has to do with the qualifying phrase "that serves to advance a position". This seems to imply that "any new analysis or synthesis of published data, statements, concepts, arguments, or ideas" that does not "serve to advance a position" is okay so far as this criterion goes. Is that a correct reading? Jon Awbrey 05:14, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

"New analysis..." would, by definition, be Original Research. Just out of curiousity, how many more forums are you going to spam with "Completely Ridiculous and Absurd Postings" (CRAP)? --Doc Tropics ^{Message in a bottle} 05:23, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

JA: Question 2. Then why is anybody worrying over what Doc Tropics is/are implying to be a redundant qualification? (Dear DTs, as many as it takes to get an intelligent answer.) Jon Awbrey 05:34, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

Jon, if you read the policy as a whole, it says that no unpublished information may be added to Wikipedia, and no synthesis of published information if it serves to advance a position. Of course, a new synthesis of published material is allowed if it doesn't advance a position. All Wikipedia articles are new syntheses of published information. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 16:01, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

JA: SlimVirgin, I have read the WP:NOR policy, and all of the major policies and guidelines many times over and spent quite a bit of time in analyzing their logical and practical interactions. I have also observed how they are applied in actual practice, but that's another story. What you say confirms my reading of WP:NOR in general terms, but it still fails to explain the role of the "serves to advance a position" clause, which seems to stress a specific type of linkage between WP:NOR and WP:NPOV. The way I read it, the clause is designed to constrain or weaken the rule of NOR, since it would require objectors to prove an "ulterior motive" behind "any new analysis or synthesis of published data, statements, concepts, arguments, or ideas" before excluding that contribution on the basis of NOR. Is that how you understand it? Jon Awbrey 16:24, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

Jon, you've said you are leaving. You've said all the above on WikiEN-l and it's been noted that your interpretation of the policy and its application is at odds with reality; that in fact it is you who are adding original research (in the form of novel syntheses, precisely as stated). If you read the policies for comprehension instead of looking for support for your tendentious edits, then I'm sure you'll find less ambiguity. It's also been pointed out that your pseudo-intellectual tone and your idiosyncratic formatting serve mainly to obscure what you are saying and make your edits less comprehensible. Have you ever considered listening to other people when they reply to you? As far as I can say the general summary of your "exit interview" thread on WikiEN-l was "goodbye, you'll not be missed". A wise man might conclude that there was at least a grain of truth in the criticisms levelled against you there. Just zis Guy you know? 16:37, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

JA: Dear Just zis Guy you know?, I probably ought to disclose the fact that it's really one of my sockpuppets who's leaving WP — it's just that he's too stupid to use a different nom-de-fume. Jon Awbrey 18:16, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

Jon, every WP article is a new synthesis of published material, so clearly the NOR policy can't disallow that, or we'd be left only with plagiarism. What it prohibits is any new synthesis that appears to advance a position. It's not a question of authorial intention. It's a question of whether the material, or the way it's written up, appears to be trying to persuade the reader that A is right and B is wrong, even if the author didn't intend it to. Whether a text does this is not an objective thing. Sometimes it's very obvious and sometimes it's subtle; there are times when it's so subtle that even very good editors disagree about whether it's being done. You seem to be insisting that it be algorithmic, and that if we can't provide the algorithm, the policy is useless and unenforceable. But in fact all we seek to do here is give general rules for editors to follow as best they can, and we recognize that areas of disagreement will remain, which will be resolved only by editors applying common sense, editing experience, and research and writing skills. We can't dot every single i and cross every t. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 17:08, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

JA: SlimVirgin, I have already given that lecture about "WP:Policy is not an algorithm or an axiom system" several times myself, so let's consider it understood. But policies must have implications for action or else they are not really policies, and if too many people understand them as saying "Go left" when too many other people understand them as saying "Go right", then they have become incoherent in practice, no matter how pretty in principle. The stuff you say mostly makes sense to me, but I have to tell you that what you say is simply not widely understood that way out there in the WP trenches. Indeed, there is every likelihood that the very next WikiPundit who happens across this page will pipe up with a contrary reading in the next few hours. Now that is what I call a real problem with the interpretation and execution of WP:Policies. Unless there is some way that these policies can be explained more clearly and concretely, then I fear that the problem will persist.

JA: Now, I came in the door this time with a sense that yet another Wikipedia policy, specifically the reference to WP:SPAM that's cited in the new Article Creation Notice, simply cannot be fairly enforced with the means at the disposal of WP Management. There is an obvious analogy here with the WP:NOR clause about advancing a position, and so it seems to me that the same problem affects the judgment of compliance with NOR. If you can't tell when people are complying with a policy and when they are not, then that policy is de facto nullified, and the pretense of applying it only generates more bias than it corrects. Jon Awbrey 17:54, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

There's a lot of stuff that's not widely understood in the trenches: NPOV, for example, and how to use sources, how to write grammatically, how to spell. That doesn't mean we should ditch our policies and advise everyone to get out there and starting writing in sentences that can't be parsed. :-) SlimVirgin ^(talk) 18:04, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

Awbrey under doesn't stand you ;-) Just zis Guy you know? 18:26, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

JA: I made a perfectly straightforward observation and asked a couple of simple questions. I don't know why I keep expecting the character of the responses to be any different, but pretty soon I won't. I think they call that learning. Jon Awbrey 21:28, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

Reasonable Inference again

Unfortunately the time for a discussion to go into the archive here is very short, which breaks up discussions of any length.

But as far as reasonable inference goes, I agree with the idea and think some sort of reasonable inference rule is desperately needed.

I also think that any reasonable inference rule is going to directly go up against the example in the page. Deducing that someone is not a plagiarist by a particular dictionary definition uses only simple logic (the definition says a plagiarist is X, they didn't do X, the definition says they are not a plagiarist). It's going to take a lot of hair-splitting to decide that that's a bad inference yet saying "this person is female, this person is a lawyer, therefore this person is a female lawyer" is a good one.

I also think that the idea of allowing "observation" but not "synthesis" or "inference" to advance a position is useless. In the female lawyer example, the source says "this person is female" and "this person is a lawyer" and I'm using those two facts to *argue for the inference* "this person is a female lawyer". It's an inference, not an observation; it only seems like an observation because the type of inference we are using (A, B, therefore A AND B) is a relatively simple one that we don't think much about. In other words, any conclusion is a synthesis or inference. Ken Arromdee 15:45, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

These are allowed so long as they're not serving to advance a position, as the policy clearly states. In the plagiarism example, the dispute was about whether X had plagiarized; therefore, it's not up to a Wikipedia editor to insert his opinion, no matter how obviously correct it appears to be. If an article was about a dispute concerning whether a particular person was both a woman and a lawyer, it would similarly be against policy for a Wikipedian to offer an opinion. But otherwise, where no position is being advanced, and so long as the deduction really is very straightforward, there isn't a problem. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 15:53, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

But you're still advancing the position "this person is a female lawyer" whether the position is disputed or not. Just like every conclusion is an inference, every conclusion is the advancement of a position.

And in the plagiarism example, is there anyone who would really dispute the assertion that "according to this definition, that is not plagiarism"? Note that it's easy to dispute a similar, unqualified, assertion ("that is not plagiarism"), but that's different. (The example gets tricky because the conclusion is implied, not stated, so you can interpret it as making either the qualified or unqualified form of the statement.) Ken Arromdee 18:49, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

The important point is that the section of the article was about whether someone had committed plagiarism. Therefore, it was OR for a Wikipedian to add "according to this definition, he had not." SlimVirgin ^(talk) 20:10, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

Normally, it would be OR because the editor is drawing a conclusion. If you accept any sort of reasonable inference rule, the conclusion is a reasonable inference--it follows from the premises by a simple rule of logic, and it can't be disputed. This exempts the conclusion, as a reasonable inference, from being OR. It's just as if he directly quoted a source that said "according to this definition, he hadn't committed plagiarism". Ken Arromdee 22:59, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

No, it does not exempt it. Had he quoted a source, it would have been fine. But he didn't. He was his own source. Ergo, OR. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 23:06, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

The whole point of a reasonable inference rule is that you can be your "own source" under some circumstances without it being OR. Are you just arguing that there should be no such thing as reasonable inference? Or do you have some reason why this *in particular* should not count as a reasonable inference? If so, what? Just pointing out that he was his own source is not enough, since reasonable inference means that you may make conclusions (i.e. you may be your own source) if the conclusion follows a simple logical rule and cannot be disputed. Ken Arromdee 14:48, 14 July 2006 (UTC)

It seems to me that the reliable sources (defining plagiarism) are obviously relevant to the issue at hand (whether Jones committed plagiarism). SV, since you think that the example consitutes OR, how about adding some discussion of how to do it right: how to report the information from these relevant, reliable sources without committing OR. Ragout 04:47, 14 July 2006 (UTC)

The key is always to use sources who discuss the issue at hand in terms of the specific debate under discussion. So if you're looking at whether X plagiarized, you stick to sources who are specifically discussing the X plagiarism debate. You don't look at other sources to find out how various people define plagiarism. You don't conclude: "Using the definition from such-and-such a publication, X did not commit plagiarism." Instead, you find a source who says it, and you write: "According to the Guardian, the standard definition of plagiarism is ... and the Guardian argues that, according to that def, X did not commit it." SlimVirgin ^(talk) 05:03, 14 July 2006 (UTC)

SV, I think you make a reasonable (if debateable) point when you say: Therefore, it was OR for a Wikipedian to add "according to this definition, he had not." The policy should probably say this.

But striking this kind of conclusion is very different from saying The key is always to use sources who discuss the issue at hand in terms of the specific debate under discussion. The "specific debate" formulation is awkward, hard to parse, and much too restrictive. Surely you're not saying that in this context the definition of plagiarism from a reliable source can't be cited at all? Ragout 05:13, 14 July 2006 (UTC)

The def of plagiarism can't be introduced by a Wikipedian, no matter how well sourced it is. Imagine writing an article on an alleged anti-Semite, Mr. X. All the sources call him an anti-Semite. I then add "However, according to Prof Y, who specializes in anti-Semitism at University Z, the most widely accepted def of anti-Semitism is ..., and according to that def, Mr. X is not an anti-Semite, because he has never said or done a, b, or c, which are part of the def."

Unless Prof Y has talked about this def specifically in relation to Mr. X and reached the same conclusion, adding it is my original research. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 05:32, 14 July 2006 (UTC)

Again, you confuse the two possible problems. For argument's sake, I'll grant that this statement is OR: "according to that definition, Mr. X is not an anti-semite." It doesn't follow that this sentence is OR: "Prof Y defines anti-semitism as ..." In fact, it seems obvious that the second sentence is not OR, since how can quoting someone be OR?

But we're going around in circles. As soon as I get a chance, I'll put some new wording in the example showing how to avoid OR. Ragout 05:41, 14 July 2006 (UTC)

No, please don't. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 17:22, 15 July 2006 (UTC)

Merely reporting someone's definition is not OR. But, if the source does not connect the definition to the subject of the article, then why are you putting it in the article? -- Donald Albury^(Talk) 10:59, 14 July 2006 (UTC)

The definition of plagiarism should be in the flower-arranging-plagiarism article because it's highly relevant, and is a technical point most readers will not be familiar with. Since plagiarism is mentioned in the example, it must be relevant: otherwise the example makes no sense. Ragout 17:20, 15 July 2006 (UTC)

Sorry, but SV is right. FeloniousMonk 17:27, 15 July 2006 (UTC)

I'm glad to hear it! What's SV right about? Ragout 17:43, 15 July 2006 (UTC)

Okay then I will take up a position behind Ragout. If A is B and B is C you can very well state that A is C. Otherwise wikipedia just becomes a million pages of quotation marks and source citations, which no one wants to read. This inference does not qualify as Original Research. Wjhonson 18:05, 15 July 2006 (UTC)

The way the page stands now it does not clarify it confuses. Surely all parties can see this point? There is nothing in the page that states how to *correctly* get across the main point, only what *not* to do. That is not instructive and edifying content. Wjhonson 18:25, 15 July 2006 (UTC)

If the inference is obvious then we can let our readers make it. The trouble with your equation is that the facts we deal with are rarely cut-and-dry. According to whom are "A=B" and "B=C"? Are we sure that both "B"s are the same "B", and not meant in different contexts? Any such equation which isn't indisputable is original research. -Will Beback 18:28, 15 July 2006 (UTC)

By that logic we can't even string together sentences into paragraphs. Its just not tenable. There are only a vanishingly small number of wiki articles that even have footnotes, but this sophism would make every statement be surrounded by quotes and have a footnote citing the source. It's just not workable for an encyclopaedia to be writen in this fashion. Wjhonson 18:45, 15 July 2006 (UTC)

As Will said, if the inference is obvious, there's no problem. It's where it's arguable, or where it pushes a particular POV, that it becomes an issue. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 18:55, 15 July 2006 (UTC)

Meaning of "Novel"

Since the word "novel" has multiple definitions, I've added a clarifying statement. Wjhonson 19:52, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

Since my clarification has been reverted, it is now once again impossible to tell what the founder meant by "novel". So I'll go ahead and use Webster's third definition "a work of fiction". Thanks! Wjhonson 20:26, 15 July 2006 (UTC)

Common Knowledge

I and other editors have encountered a user who appears to have taken this policy to an extreme compulsive level that seems to amount to vandalism. The user appears to want citations for what would be considered common knowledge to those knowledgeable in the field. They use the policy to delete material from an article and destroy it. For example, they might want a citation for the statement: "The sun rises in the east." They might want a citation for "The Internet (also known simply as the Net)..." (see Internet). If all articles were subjected to this extreme use of this policy, there would likely be few articles left. Can something be added to this article to address this?--Who123 20:08, 15 July 2006 (UTC)

We can't really add clauses to policy pages to cover every example of abuse, Who. Which article is it so I can come and take a look? SlimVirgin ^(talk) 19:25, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

The specific issue seems to be quiet at the moment (using "ACIM" as an abbreviation for "A Course in Miracles". One user seems to wish to apply WP policies to the extreme to destroy articles. In particular see Talk:A_Course_in_Miracles. Any input would be appreciated.--Who123 14:36, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

I note that Talk:A_Course_in_Miracles is an article about religion. Hardly anything in religion qualifies as common knowledge. Who123 writes "The user appears to want citations for what would be considered common knowledge to those knowledgeable in the field." The problem with this statement is that religion is contentious. What might be considered common knowledge among Catholic priests might be considered nonsense among atheists, and Wikipedia is for everyone. One can't define "the field" to exclude those with a different point of view. This is different from an electrician reading in a source that a light bulb uses 120 volts and 2 amperes, and writing in an article that the bulb uses 240 watts; this is common knowledge in the field, and no noticeable group disagrees. Gerry Ashton 16:09, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

The specific item that I was referring to that I thought was resolved is not. It is common knowledge the "A Course in Miracles" is sometimes referred to as "ACIM" to those familiar with ACIM. If you have any doubt about this go to a common search engine and type in ACIM. The example I give is referring to the internet as the Net (see Internet).--Who123 16:19, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

It is common knowledge ... to those familiar with ACIM. What about all the editors and readers who are not familiar with ACIM? The Google business doesn't count. If someone is not familiar with 'A Course in Miracles', why should we expect them to go to Google to find out that 'ACIM' means 'A Course in Miracles'?

If someone is editing a subject is not some basic familiarity with the subject expected? If a user wishes to help edit an article and they are not familiar with the subject, should they not accept common knowledge from those who are familiar with the material or at least do some minimal work such as a Google search?

For the reader the common knowledge is presented without a required source. In the internet example above do we need a source to state that the internet is sometimes referred to as the Net? If I were to explain why the sky is blue in an article would I have to source that the sky is sometimes blue? Would it be helpful for someone to just begin going through articles on WP, asking for a reference on anything they do not know, and then tagging the article as OR? If so, I suspect over 95% of WP articles should be tagged as OR.--Who123 21:54, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

How do you know what is 'common knowledge' to other readers? I think that in an encyclopedia it is better to always refer to the 'Internet' instead of the 'Net', unless you are quoting someone who says 'Net'. And if you want to explain why the sky is blue, you need to be citing a good reference for that, instead of looking for a loophole to avoid citing a reference for 'the sky is blue'. By the way, the sky is not always blue. -- Donald Albury^(Talk) 23:13, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

I agree that it is not common knowledge that A Course in Miracles is "sometimes referred to as ACIM" (though only one reference would be sufficient to establish that fact). However it would be common knowledge, in my opinion, to say that "A Course in Miracles is abbreviated 'ACIM'". That is obvious to any reader. -Will Beback 23:20, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

It is also meaningless. Now, why would 'ACIM' as an abbreviation of 'A Course in Miracles' have any place in the article? If there is some significance to its use, you need to source that information. -- Donald Albury^(Talk) 23:44, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

Let us look at today's featured article F-35_Lightning_II.

"known as the Joint Strike Fighter (JSF)"

Although this article is well referenced there is not a reference for every word, sentence, and paragraph.

This user applying overzealous WP policies to this (and almost every other article) would edit the article this way and place an OR tag at the top.. Is this what WP wants editors to begin doing to all WP articles? This is an encyclopedia, not a doctoral dissertation.--Who123 00:02, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

:Are you referring to me? Do you have a specific complaint about my editing? I argue for the highest standards in referencing articles in Wikipedia because I believe it is necessary in order to bring Wikipedia to its full potential. I believe that relaxing the requirements for verification and citing sources will only weaken, and possibly destroy, Wikipedia. I do not seek to disrupt Wikipedia or any articles in it, but I do push for improvements to the project. If you don't see it that way, then I will leave you, and go work on some articles that need improvement. -- Donald Albury^(Talk) 01:18, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

Upon reflection, I have decided that I did misunderstand you, and am withdrawing the above comment. I do think that our conversation is going in circles, so I won't pursue it. -- Donald Albury^(Talk) 02:16, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

Just to clarify, I am not talking about anyone here (that I have seen). I am talking about a new user that I believe is mis-using WP policies to attempt to delete or otherwise destroy reasonable articles. The two that I am familiar with are A_course_in_miracles and Endeavor_Academy. These were not written by me but concern a book and a spiritual movement that I have studied for 15-20 years. Hundreds of thousands of others have at some point or another been involved with this. I am 100% with you in verification and citing sources but it is difficult here.--Who123 02:36, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

Ethnicity inclusions

Many of us have become very troubled at one user's application of WP:NOR and find it to violate the core goal of Wikipedia. On the ethnicity pages, an x-American is defined as an American of x-descent. Likewise, countless sources classify an x-American as such. This one user, however, argues that we only include a person in such a category if he or she has directly stated, "I am an x-American" or "I am x". In other words, if someone says, "I am of x descent/heritage/ancestry", or "My parent(s) is/are x" that we cannot include them in categories for x-Americans. In this user's policy, he has set his own definition as to the limited definition he wishes to see on the x-American lists, even going as far as taking out people who have discussed their x heritage at length, expressed an identification with it, and may even be of entirely one ethnicity. This user, however, now requires us to find a source for every person on every list, finding something that specifically identifies them as x-Americans, else we are forced to delete them. We believe this is the equivalent of saying that if someone is called a “female lawyer” that we cannot then put her in the “women lawyers” category as no source directly calls her a woman lawyer. We hold that, as stated in every available definition, an x-American is an American of x-descent. Such categories should not be undermined by one user’s contrary opinion which is based around a Wikipedia policy that the policy was not structured around. It is not original research to say that someone who identifies with his or her Italian roots is an Italian-American. This user, however, believes that it is, and in that case, it must be excluded, as the person is not calling him or herself an x-American. WP:NOR was not built around these inclusions. WP:NOR is, indeed, an important policy, but it should not apply here, as calling someone who is of a certain ethnicity and shows a strong identity to that ethnicity an x-American is not original research. For example, Milo Ventimiglia once discussed in an interview how he got his Italian temper from his father who is from Sicily, yet this user refuses to let us include him as an Italian or Sicilian-American. This user argues that we could classify Ventimiglia’s father as such, but not Ventimiglia. Likewise, Emeril Lagasse has discussed how he is of half Portuguese and half French descent, as well as the large role his heritage has played in his cooking, but this user refuses to let us classify him as a French or Portuguese-American, saying that those would only be good sources for citing Emeril’s parents. Should a person who states his or her heritage, expresses a strong identity to his or her heritage, and has parents from whichever country be defined as an x-American, or should we merely go with someone directly stating, “I am x” or “I am an x-American”, even though every definition available directly states that an x-American is an American of x-descent. Please express your viewpoints below. We had originally taken a poll here [2], but been told to move the discussion to the WP:NOR page. If you have any questions, please contact me on my talk page. Michael 02:46, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

In reading your comments above, I would tend to disagree with you. In the example you give about Milo Ventimiglia if neither himself nor a reliable source describes him as a Sicilian-American, we should not add him to these categories. We cannot say that he is Italian either, unless that is a verifiable fact. The reason for my disagreement is that ethnicity is often assessed to be a value judgement rather than a fact and may be used as a way in which POV may be incorporated in articles, lists and/or categories. Some editors add names to such lists out of a kind of self-affirmation. See WP:LIST#Lists_and_criteria_for_inclusion_of_list_members, so caution needs to be excercised. ≈ jossi ≈ t • @ 03:36, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

I have to agree with Michael. If someone states that their father is from Sicily, a trivial inference would be that that person could be called a "Sicilian-American" this to me is the same thing as the woman lawyer argument. If a woman is a lawyer, she can be called a woman lawyer even if no source actually states "woman lawyer" exactly like that. Wikipedia should not resolve to just a mass of quotations. There is also artistry in arranging the facts into a smoothly flowing article, and that particular arrangement is not by exact quotation. We are free to make trivial inferences and rearrange facts to make the articles read well. Wjhonson 03:49, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

I agree. The policy instituted by Mad Jack actually redefines an x-American, even though he made it under the worry that other people would have different ideas of what the definition should be. When various sources cite an x-American as an American of x-descent, then who are we to go rewrite that definition and say that we cannot consider if they say things citing their heritage or talking about the influence of their background. I have seen cases in which a person's parents have been from a different country, and quotes show the person to identify with that nationality, but under Mad Jack's idea assertions, that cannot stand as enough, as he wishes for them to cite themselves as being x or being an x-American. Even saying, "My ethnic background is composed of x and y" is not enough. Michael 03:58, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

I do not want to split hairs, just want editors to excercise caution. In any case, I question the validity of a category based on ethnicity such as Category:Sicilian-Americans, or similar. For example, that category states "12 million Americans are of Sicilian descent.", but fails to provide criterion for inclusion. For example, is this just for 2nd generation people? 3rd? etc. That is why we have WP:NOR. 04:26, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

Also note that although we have an article on African-American from which we may derive a criterion for inclusion in categories and lists (African American means an American of black African descent), but we do not have an article on Sicilian-American, or Portugese-American. ≈ jossi ≈ t • @ 04:29, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

Actually, we do...and we have articles on Italian Americans, Polish Americans, French Americans, Irish Americans, German Americans, etc. These accurately describe x-Americans as being of x-descent, yet despite this criteria, they have been seen by Mad Jack as being of no substance, nor have the same definitions from other sources. Michael 04:58, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

We don't allow Germans to not be Germans simply by saying "I'm not a German". Ethnicity in an encyclopaedia is not a self-determined property. This isn't the encyclopaedia of what x says about themselves. It's the encyclopaedia of what x *is*. So Mad Jack's criteria that the person has to self-identify is as ridiculous as saying I can only be a female if you find a quote somewhere where I actually state myself that "I am a female". Which is absolutely ridiculous. With the meaning "held up to and subject to ridicule". :) Wjhonson 04:53, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

Thank you. I completely agree. I've used the woman example, too. You cannot deny what is fact. If a woman lawyer says she doesn't identify as a "woman lawyer", we don't remove her fromthe category. It's fact, not what someone feels. Michael 04:58, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

How is it that we may allot to change this and not abide by a policy we think is mistaken? Michael 05:43, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

I'm not sure what you're asking. WP:NOR does not prevent simple inferences, so making inferences is not against policy. Wjhonson 05:32, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

Mad Jack reverts everything if it doesn't follow his personal policy. He'll revert anything that isn't sourced to conform to his definition. I don't know what to doMichael 05:37, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

Stop saying personal, for goodness sake, and don't act so helpess (i.e. "I don't know what to do!" the horror of not being able to include someone with an X great-grandparent in the X-American category! ) . I have several top editors who have worked on this who agree with me. No, you may not make the inference that because someone has an Irish great-great-grandparent, they are automatically Irisih-American. That is your opinion and Wikipedia can only express it if a reliable source expresses it on that person. This is why we have the "Plagarism" example. Just because something fits the definition of plagarism or not plagarism, it does not mean we may call it that unless a reliable source called it that first. It is so incredibly simple. And no, please don't pull the "redefining definition" stuff. There is no redefining of anything, or else you're saying that by not allowing to include "not plagarism" if it doesn't fit the definition of plagarism we are redefining the definition of plagarism. We quote the definition of a term from reliable sources, and then we include those people that the sources have specifically said may be described with that term. Self-identification is definitely part of X-American. Of course it is. Otherwise you're saying that there isn't a single American out there who isn't an X-American. But if a good source calls someone X-American, that is fine too. This "simple inference" thing is easily disputed here. Because, of course, let's say someone is 1/128th X. Would anyone classify them as X-American? Of course not, not even Michael would. How about 1/64th? 1/32? 1/16? 1/4? Yes? You like 1/4? If you said "yes" to any of the above, then that's your opinion. That's precisely the flaw here. Drawing the line at any of the above "ethnic limits" is the opinion of whichever Wikipedia editor does it. 1/2 is reasonable to me, 1/4 is reasonable to Michael, someone else may want to draw the line at 1/64. Someone more insane may not want to draw any line at all. This is why we are not allowed to make any of "logical inferences" of our own, considering any "logical inference" here is the opinion of the Wikipedia editor who made it, and that should be kept out of Wikipedia. No one here could possibly explain to me the difference between X-American and the Plagarism example we so nicely have planted on this page. So I repeat - Wikipedia reports the definition of a term from a reliable source, and then it may report those people that reliable sources have said fit that term. We do not report people who in our opinion fit the term. Now, is this turning into another 5-day discussion full of phrase repeating by each side? I really don't have the time. I propose that any reponse to this post protesting it begin with a nice and detailed explanation of how the NOR policy applies to plagarism but does not apply to this. Mad Jack 06:04, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

We have one definition laid out, not two conflicting definitions. Your own definition does not count as a source. Michael 06:07, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

I have no definition! Didn't you hear me? There are no conflicting definitions of plagarist, not are there are definitions of X-American that include everyone who is 1/1000th X. Mad Jack 06:08, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

No, you have assigned your own definition, stating one must say, "I am x" or "I am an x-American". That is establishing your own criteria, while you say it's because there's no criteria. Many, however, do not agree with your assessment. Michael 06:10, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

No, that is the "criteria" for anything on Wikipedia. I am soo tired of this, honestly. If you want to call something X on Wikipedia, finds a source that calls it that. When I remove names from a list, I am not saying they are not X-Americans, I am saying no sources call them that, so find the sources that do. When you put someone on a list of X-American, you are saying they are X-Americans, even if no source has called that person so before. Again, how is this different from the plagarism example? How? Mad Jack 06:13, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

We have found sources-sources that you will not accept. Becuase something says someone was born to x-American parents or one says he or she is of x-descent, you say that does not make them an x-American. It's that simple. We do not agree with this definition, and who, may I ask, is 1/256 a nationality and knows it? Michael 06:15, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

Sources for what? If you found a source that calls someone X-American, you may call them that. Again, I am not saying someone is not an X-American. I am simply saying you may not call them that until a reliable source does. Can that get any simpler? When you put 'em on a list, you are putting in as fact, verified fact that the person is X-American. If they are not on the list, it means absolutely nothing. It means they could be, but we simply have not verified it. Wikipedia only puts in verified facts. Mad Jack 06:17, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

As for the question, obviously Milo Ventimiglia or however you spell it is probably something like 1/128th Indian (from India). He knows it. In someone's opinion, it makes them Indian-American. Maybe not in your or in mine, but in someone's it does. Why are we discouting their opinion and counting in ours? Eh? We can not count in anyone's opinion except that of reliable sources. If a reliable source said he is Indian-American, then we may ! If not, we may not until we find that source. Mad Jack 06:19, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

No, when an article states that an x-American is an American of x descent, that establishes criteria enough for inclusion. You actually said you didn't care. Why do you care if we follow the criteria laid out in the Wikipedia definition, as well as the definition as stated by other sources? Michael 06:22, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

Again, we can not decide who is or is not X-American. How many times must this be repeated to you? Why don't you answer my question? We have a very nice definition of Plagiarism laid out on that page. I want to use it to say someone is, in fact, not a plaigarist. Yet, I can not and that is excellent and that is exactly why we have the NOR policy. We report the definition from a good source, and then we report the people good sources explicitly said can be called that. Mad Jack 06:24, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

I know your views. Let's hear from some others who may not have been on the ethnic pages. Michael 06:28, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

We've heard from two who said it can not be done and one who said it can. However, again, the internal flaw of this is this - who would you include, Michael? Anyone with any X ancestry? One X grandparent? The problem with this is any answer you give is your own criteria. Mad Jack 06:30, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

As common practice, we have typically listed one if someone is at least 50%, but the lists have gone back somewhat farther. Michael 06:34, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

Ah, common practice. 50%? Do you know whose opinion and idea that originally was? Mine. :) So thanks for agreeing. :) But we can't use my criteria for inclusion, however, as you've so pleasantly said. Mad Jack 06:35, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

That was what you used to do prior to going off this policy and reading it your own way. You actually were not the originator of the 50% policy, if I recall correctly. Michael 06:37, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

I was the one who told you that you probably shouldn't put anyone who is less then 50% on the categories. No one else cares about this and this has never been a policy. It was only my opinion. (Well, formerly) Why are we using my opinion to determine who is or is not X-American? Isn't that original research? Since when did I become a reliable source? This isn't "my own way", this is exactly the way it is supposed to be done, as explained to me and now you by several top editors. The big nagging thing here is that no one seems to be able to explain to me how X-American is different then plagiarism. Mad Jack 06:41, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

We have one definition for x-American...One...It is defined as an American of x-descent. That's the only definition at hand, and as stated by someone jossi above, it may be used for criteria. Michael 06:44, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

But isn't "it may be used for criteria" your opinion? Really? One definition? I don't quite believe anyone who is 1/128th X has been labelled as X-American under any definition. We also have one definition of plagiarism, so what? There are disputes on who is a plagiarist and there are disputes on who is X-American. What's the difference? Mad Jack 06:46, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

Then I should go challenge everyone in the women lawyers category and say we have no sources that directly define them as women lawyers? Furthermore, who is 1/128 a nationality? Michael 07:00, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

What do you mean who is 1/128th? I bet Ventimiglia is 1/128th a bunch of them, based on what he said. Val Kilmer is probably 1/128th a bunch of stuff. The basic flaw here is that this isn't about 1/128th. I'm sure you'd disagre on 1/64th, 1/32nd and 1/16th as well. So would I. But not everyone would. The base problem here is that it boils down as to the opinions on editors on who to list or not to list based on ancestry, and at the end any consensus that would be made on criteria is based strictly on the opinions of Wikipedia editors. And we can not have a whole article based on the opinions of Wiki editors. That's the original research we're trying to avoid. There's no point in challenging every woman lawyer because it would be so incredibly easy to find sources for everyone of them that they are a woman lawyer. It would just be proving a point. It is not "obvious" when a person is X-American or not. When I go to town on these lists I source the people, not just delete everyone on the list and wait for sources. This has so far provided sterling lists like List of Welsh Americans and List of French Americans. Mad Jack 07:06, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

And in the case you can't source them or have a source citing someone as being even entirely of a single descent, you erase the person for not being directly called an x-American. Michael 07:11, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

Well, any unsourced bit on Wikipedia can be deleted (or, in this case, moved to discussion) by any editor. That is the essential and necessary freedom we have as editors. However, as I said, there is nothing even close to a glaring omission in either the Welsh or French lists. Mad Jack 07:13, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

What about the people on the talk pages that have sources discussing their heritage and whatnot but not to your own standards, such as Emeril and Madonna not being in the French list for the reason that they haven't made direct statement calling themselves French-Americans? Michael 07:16, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

The tricky thing about both Madonna and Emeril is that they are half French Canadian, which an interesting identity that is somewhat separate from French American, but not always. Madonna identifies and is identified by the media as an Italian American and never, yet, as a French American, so we have to follow what the sources say. She is on the Italian list. Is that fair? Maybe not. But we can't right the wrongs. I admit Lagasse should probably be on the list. In fact, I'm sure you could find a good source that says he is French if you tried, and of course, if you had the time considering we spend so much of it wasting time discussing this. In fact, we need to discuss each person individually on the X-American pages. Maybe then you'll see this all isn't so unreasonable after all. Mad Jack 07:19, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

No source has a direct statement citing Emeril as a French-American. In each available source, instead, he talks about how his father was French and the influence this had on him and his cooking, just like with his mother being of Portuguese descent. Michael 07:23, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

So what if he was influenced? He could have had a Polish nanny and been influenced by that, or grew up in an Italian neighborhood and been influenced by that. I am pretty positive that if you dig deep enough you'll find a source that says he is French-American. Mad Jack 07:26, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

No source you would deem reliable says that. Michael 07:29, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

Again, we just have to look hard enough. Mad Jack 07:36, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

I ensure you...The interview where he talks about his parents and their influence on him is the best that can be found. Michael 07:39, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

1. I'm sure we can find something if we look hard enough and 2. Why is so absolutely essential to call Emeril a French American if no one else has? Nothing hangs on it and therefore there is no reason to do so if no one else has. Mad Jack 07:42, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

Because he certainly qualifies for that category. I'm sure even you would agree. However, you refuse to accept the source that makes it quite clear that he is. Michael 07:43, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

No, the source doesn't say he is. It's your deduction that it does. If you put his name on the list, then Wikipedia is stating it as a fact that he is. So we've just now turned someone's deduction into fact. What is the poinht or value of doing that? None. Mad Jack 07:45, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

This discussion is perhaps better off taking place on the talk page of the poll, so that other people who are used to dealing with ethnicity issues can weigh in. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 15:46, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

What poll? As to Mad Jack's assertion, its a trivial inference. He is of French origin and he is an American. Therefore he is a French-American. We don't need to find an exact quote stating that in order to make that trivial inference. This has been discussed above ab adsurdum. Wjhonson 18:13, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

Oh really? Are you talking about a person who is 100% French? 50%? 1/128? Anywhere you decide to draw the line is your own opinion, and that's the problem. Mad Jack 18:19, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

Now you're just being argumentative. We all know what we're talking about. Simple inference. If you have an issue with what *is* a French-American, discuss it on the talk of the Ethnicity pages or the talk of the French-American page. We do not need to quote a person stating "I am a French-American" in order to state that they are. That's the most simply way to put it. We are allowed to make trivial inferences. "My father was French" plus "I live in San Diego" equates to x is a French-American. They may be an Italian-American and just a plain American all at the same time as well. The point is, we don't need wikipedia to be a huge collection of cited, quotes. Nobody wants to read an article like that. Wjhonson 18:38, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

No, every X-American list needs sources. They don't need to be right by the name, they should be like they are in List of French Americans. It doesn't matter if the person themselves says "I am French". If a reliable source says so, that is fine. "My father is French" plus "I live in San Diego" = French American is your opinion, and it needs to be kept away from articles. This is why we have the plagiarism example, which forbids me from doing "This person's actions do not fit the definition of plagiarism therefore he is not a plagiarist". As for argumentative, are you kidding? This is a discussion page! The point is your opinion seems to be that if someone's father is X, that is fine. Someone else may think grandfather is better. Someone may think any X ancestry is good. That's the whole problem. That, and how this is different from who is or is not a plagiarist, are two points which have not been addressed by anyone responding to this. Mad Jack 19:00, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

No it is not my opinion, it is a simple inference. I have stated this several times. You don't seem to understand what the word 'inference' means. This is not my opinion, it's logic. You want everyone to be a sophist and deny the possibility of ever joining two statements into one. That is not the nature of encyclopaedic writing. That is why we are called 'editors'. We are not called quoters. Our acts here are not mechanical reproduction of what was stated exactly. We edit the statements into an article. The act of editing implies that we can make simple inferences. Wjhonson 19:30, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

It seems that you are not going to answer either of my questions, and that is fine. Until you do, you simply have no argument. The questions were 1. How is X-American different from "Plagiarism" and 2. let's say you were allowed to make these inferences. The problem now becomes anyone can list whoever they want. Sure, most would agree listing people who are "half". Some may want to list anyone with any X ancestry. Some may want to limit it to people who are full. And of course, we are not allowed to do either. It is not a simple inference because, quite obviously, a simply inference would be something that is 100% agreed on and could not be debated, which this is simply not. Mad Jack 20:27, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

Sure and that's called arriving at a consensus that is *reasonable* instead of extreme. It's a shade of grey and you should have that discussion on the appropriate pages on what "ethnicity" means. But no where should the discussion take into account what the person has said about themselves, that is simply irrelevant. Articles aren't about "what x said about x", but rather, "what x is". That is a different question. If you dispute the meaning of Italian-American you should dispute that on that page or the wikidictionary page and see what consensus you can arrive at. Wjhonson 20:40, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

You have that the wrong way round. We say what X said about X, and what other reliable sources said about X. We don't discuss what X is. Verifiability, not truth. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 20:53, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

Exactly. That is what WP:NOR is all about, and one of the pillars of this project. ≈ jossi ≈ t • @ 21:02, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

SlimVirgin you had stated above that we *can* make simple inferences, now Jossi is using what you said to say the exact opposite. So which will it be? Is wikipedia to be merely a collection of exact quotations? Are are we to exercise our role as "editors" to fit those quotations together in a reasonable framework? By Jossi's logic we cannot even add punctuation where it's needed and we can't correct spelling. Everything must be an exact quote. That is *not* what wikipedia is. Wjhonson 21:10, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

Further, it seems we have a problem here between defining a "class" and naming "members of that class". The definition of a class is sufficient to determine a process for including or excluding members into that class. If you don't agree with a class definition, you should take that up on that class page. Once a consensus has been reached, that that definition holds. Any individual item that fits the definition of that class, can then be named as a member of that class without further effort. That is a simple inference. Just because you state that your dog isn't a dog but rather is a cat, does not change the fact that it fits the definition of a dog. In addition the article about your dog could state that "x said its a cat", but we are not constained to merely mimic what another person has said, rather we can also use the common English definition of a class to mark an element as within that class. If you insist we do not have this ability, than all class-defined lists must be scrapped. You will have to find quotes that state that each "city in Oregon" is actually a "city in Oregon" versus say a city in Jackson County and then also that Jackson County is itself in Oregon. That is simply an unworkable restriction which no concious person can hold without being intellectually dishonest. We could not even hold a conversation if we cannot agree on a common set of definitions for the more common situations. Wjhonson 21:34, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

You're forgetting the magic ingredient that applies to all policy pages and which can't be legislated for: common sense. We report what reliable sources say. We allow straightforward inferences so long as they're not advancing a position.

If a city is described as in Jackson County, and Jackson County is in Oregon, and you state that the city is in Oregon, you're using the two separate statements to advance the position "the city is in Oregon". An 'inference' is the same thing as a 'position'. The idea of making an inference without advancing a position is like making a square without making something with four sides.

(And you can't fix this by claiming that a position isn't just an inference but instead is an inference that can't be disputed. "According to this definition, the guy isn't a plagiarist" can't be disputed, yet you wouldn't allow it.) Ken Arromdee 02:23, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

We give a few examples of what a reliable or unreliable source might be. We give some examples of unacceptable inferences. And then we leave it to editors to use their common sense within that framework. You're asking that every i be dotted and t crossed, but we would neither be able, nor would want, to do that. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 23:09, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

The problem is that unless you make a rule which allows for reasonable inference, any person can, at any time, claim that some statement needs to be removed as OR, and you and I will have no argument against him except "common sense tells us not to follow the rule the way it is written". Ken Arromdee 02:23, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

An editor will be in his right to ask for a reference to support an assertion of fact or an inference. That is what WP:V and WP:NOR is all about. ≈ jossi ≈ t • @ 02:40, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

You are correct. And I never stated that to call someone a "Sicilian-American" we don't need a source. What I am stating is that, if we have a reliable source which states that a persons father is from Sicily and we have a reliable source which states that a "Sicilian-American" is a person whose father or mother is from Sicily, then those two statments can be merged, without requiring a direct quote saying "x is a Sicilian-American". I.E. that we can edit. Wjhonson 23:28, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

This isn't an OR problem or a problem with sources. It's a problem with these ethnicity lists, which are pointless, silly, and unsustainable. Problems there do not need to be brought here. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 01:26, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

Indeed, if you do not agree, say so on the talk page. At the present moment, the definitions are made clear. Those are common English definitions. If editors are not meant to apply actual English usage, we are left with nothing but copying and pasting, which constitutes plagiarism. We do not just copy and paste. I could say, "She wore a yellow dress," even though a source may say, "Her dress was yellow". It's not even common sense-it's a factual definition. Michael 22:28, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

Michael I agree, but I just want to correct one thing you said. Plagarism isn't quoting someone, and cutting-and-pasting isn't plagarism. Plagarism is when you don't give a citation attributing a quote to where you got it from. "Her dress was yellow" (John Brown, The Diarist, p 25) isn't plagarism. But as I've said many times, an article composed solely of this kind of thing is going to be horrendous to read and can't be used as the basis for an encyclopaedia. Frequently articles are writen with all the sources named at the end, that's also just fine. However exact quotes, with quotation marks should be cited, as per standard practice. That leaves the *majority* of the article as paraphrase or indirect quotations or inference. All a reader has to do is look at any 20 articles on here and they aren't exact quotes of their sources. Wjhonson 22:43, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

It's all really simple, actually: Consensus of editors cannot bypass Wikipedia content policies. If you define a class, that definition must be verifiable, and in addition, inclusion in lists of categories cannot be based on editors opinions or inferences, but must rely on a citation by a reliable source. Note that for some categories or lists, this may not be a problem, such as geographical location of cities, and this discussion did not start because of such example, but because there is a dispute about inclusion of a "member" in a "class". In these cases, it is the right of an editor to request evidence of a reliable source to support inclusion the inclusion of a "member" in a "class." See for example, List_of_charismatic_leaders. The definition of "charismatic" is verifiable, and each entry is supported by a reliable source. All lists in Wikipedia need to follow that template. ≈ jossi ≈ t • @ 22:49, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

Of course I agree with that. However inclusion in "women lawyers" does not need an exact quote saying "Jean is a member of the class 'women lawyers'". Nor does it even need an exact quote saying "Jean is a woman lawyer". It is entirely sufficient to have a quote saying "Jean is female" and that "Jean is a lawyer". These two quotes coming from reliable sources, can be edited together into "Jean is a woman lawyer", and then Jean can be adding to the class of "women lawyers". That is what an editor does. That is what we do. No one, not me, has suggested we don't need a reliable source. I have only stated that we don't need an exactly-quoted phrase in order to edit two phrases together into one class, such as "women lawyers". Wjhonson 23:32, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

Exactly...and that was my point on plagiarism. If we change Wikipedia to be a mirror image of every other site, it loses its value. We, however, have the right to use what is commonly used as a definition. No one has said a source citing a woman as a "female attorney" would prevent categorization as a "woman lawyer". It's ridiculous to say such. Likewise, an x-American is said to be an American of x-descent-we have seen no definitions for exceptions. If you do not approve of it as it is, take that up on the "Italian-American" article, but the definition is quite clear and is commonly understood. Michael 23:44, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

I beg to differ. I do not see a problem with the "female lawyer" example, by I see one with the "Italian-American" example. A person whose parents are Italians may not have been referred to as "Italian American" by himself/herself, or by a reliable source. In these cases editors should avoid making that "connection", as ethnicity is in some cases used as value judgements or to assert a POV. ≈ jossi ≈ t • @ 01:25, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

Even someone with two parents who immigrated to American from Italy might not consider themselves Italian-American; they might insist, in fact, that they were simply "American", not some hyphenated American. Or it may turn out that though their parents were from Italy, they were from ethnic minority and did not consider themselves to be Italian. The possibilities are endless, but the point is that Wikipedia does not decide under exactly what ethnicity people should be classified; instead, if it absolutely must be done (and that's a big if), Wikipedia cites reliable sources on the matter. Jayjg ^(talk) 01:41, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

Saying that ethnic identification is a value judgement or POV appears to be your opinion. The mere fact that someone says "I don't want to be considered as Italian" is irrelevant. This isn't the encyclopaedia of what Madonna wants people to think. So I wish people would stop using that argument as its entirely pointless. If a reliable source states that her Italian is a significant part of her life, then its entirely appropriate to put her in that classification. And again I have stressed many times, you should take this to the appropriate talk pages of those articles, not here. Wjhonson 02:07, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

If someone says "I'm black, not African-American," is it inappropriate to describe them as African-American in a list? What if someone says "I have a relationship with God, not a religion," something that some people actually do claim. Would it be incorrect to list a religion on a page about them? Ken Arromdee 02:23, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

That is the problem I was refering to. In these cases we better stick with being conservative and apply WP:NOR and WP:V to their full extent. ≈ jossi ≈ t • @ 02:43, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

The fact of the matter is that people do not have discretion over what they are, else this would not be worthy of encyclopedic inclusion. Wikipedia is not composed of one-article fan sites for people, on which the people have a say over what is included. We report what is encyclopedia. These categories are encyclopedic. They are not to be subject to the subjective opinions of the people they discuss. If it is noted on Wikipedia that an x-American is an American of x-descent, a definition that is applied throughout Wikipedia and other mediums, then we cannot defy this and say that we cannot use a person's heritage as a means of categorization when that is, in essence, what we are supposed to be doing. It's all or none. Either we need an exact statement to back up a source, or we limit everything incredibly because of the handicaps some believe we have that prevent us from actually understanding that synonyms are terms for the same thing. In this case, saying an American is of x-descent is the same as calling the person an x-American, an American of x-descent. Michael 03:29, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

Why do people keep bringing up these definitions? Don't they know that the NOR policy strictly prohibits Wiki editors from matching definitions to determine who is or is not an X-American, a plagiarist, etc. etc. etc. No one has answered either question 1 or question 2. Mad Jack 03:33, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

In fact, this whole "logical inference" is so simply disputed that it's pointless even discussing it. Even if we ignore the whole NOR thing - I'll use the Lagasse example above. Michael puts him on the French American list with a quote saying his father is French Canadian. OK, I can remove him off the list because any Wiki editor can remove anything that isn't cited to say exactly what the text removed said. Michael says it's obvious that Lagasse is French American because of his father. He says he is making that logical inference. I can now very easily say that it's not obvious, because A. he may not even consider himself French-American B. He may consider himself something else C. the definition for French Americans does not say "people of French Canadian and Portuguese" descent. The fact that an editor disputes an edit with reasonable grounds means the edit is, of course, not a logical inference. And Wikipedia isn't here to turn the logical inferences of certain editors that are disagreed on by other editors into fact. It doesn't get any simpler then that. As long as there's someone that disagrees with you under reasonable grounds if the source doesn't say it, it's not a logical inference. Mad Jack 03:41, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

He would also be under Portuguese-Americans for that reason, Jack. Don't be ridiculous. He is of French descent-the Portuguese ancestry is not considered. To be a French-American, nowehere does it say one must be fully that ethnicity. It's quite simple. If I were categorizing an actress of both film and television, she could go in both categories, as we do not say that the television actors category cannot include actors who are also film actors. That point makes no sense. Further, we cite encyclopedic information; what one merely idenitifies with is not encyclopedic, and you, Jack, cannot place a limit on the criteria when many of us find the criteria to be clear in saying that an x-American is an American of x-descent. You cannot rip that apart and then say that it may mean the person can only be of one ethnic background. Michael 04:01, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

Why on earth can't it? According to you, we're allowed to make logical inferences of our own. That's my logical inference! And this is precisely, precisely why this policy is here and why these so-called "Logical inferences", that aren't, are not allowed. Mad Jack 04:02, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

An inference to a definition is not the same as disassembling a statement and shredding it apart to look for loopholes. An x-American is stated to be an American of x-descent. There are no limiting statements there that would make a person eligible for one ethnicity. You cannot add fact where it is not stated, but if an American says, "I am of French descent", he or she is a French-American by definition, not inference. Michael 04:06, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

No, he or she is French-American because you think he is and in your opinion he fits the definition. In my opinion (let's say), he doesn't. Therefore this is not a logical inference and is every bit as NOR as everyone up above except for Wjhonson said. Anyway, no one has yet explained to me, and I'd bet a million big ones no one ever will explain how X-American is different then plagiarist. There's no point in continuing this discussion for the third time. Enough already. If you want to put some on a list of X, find a source that says they are X! Mad Jack 04:09, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

The definition is clear enough that whether someone fits it is not an "opinion". You can't disagree on whether something meets the definition. You *can* disagree on whether the definition should be used in the first place. However, in that case, you would be rejecting it because *whether the definition should be used* is POV--not because *making the inference* is POV.

If we adopt a reasonable inference rule, that would not preclude rejecting a reasonable inference for other reasons. Ken Arromdee 14:34, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

That is so ridiculous. No. It isn't clear enough. No person in the world considers someone is who is, say, 1/246th X to be X-American. That is simply fact. You couldn't find a single someone like that described as X-American. The line obviously has to be drawn somewhere. The problem is Wikipedia editors can not make the decision where. Not to mention the other factors mentioned above - self-identification, ambigitiouty, etc. etc. If the definition was clear enough, we would not be having this discussion. And, to me, the definition of plagiarism is clear enough. Am I allowed then to go around saying who is or is not a plagiarist? Probably not. Mad Jack 17:10, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

You didn't read what I wrote. If, in fact, nobody calls someone who is 1/246 X an X-American, then a definition which just says that being any part X makes you X-American is a definition that shouldn't be used. It fails because you're using a bad definition, not because you're making a bad inference. Ken Arromdee 19:16, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

Of couse we can make the decision. That is what *editors* do, otherwise Jack what exactly is it, you think editors do? The entire categorization process, every category is an *edit*. Choose any category and I can guarentee you, that half the members of that category are there not by an RS quote, but because an editor added them. You keep coming back to the extreme argument of 1/264th, but that's just an argumentative position, to score a point. I suggest that it would be useful to check what Webster's says a "Spanish American" is.Wjhonson 19:29, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

Just curious, why is it that the people who disagree with me are the ones who pursue long discussions with me, while those who agree with me just say they do and then never post on here again? This whole thing is really taking up too much time. Again, we do not match definitions to people we think match those definitions. That's why we have the plagiarism example. Yes and I am scoring that point very well, because obviously people who are 1/200-whatever should not and are not considered X-Americans, but if you use "certain" definitions some editors may say they are. We can not draw the line anyway. It's that simple. We can't have "List of French Americans - oh, btw, don't include anyone who has less than this X ancestry because 10 Wikipedia editors decided that's not sufficient to be X-American". Again, I don't see the motivation for this discussion. Look at List of Welsh-Americans and List of French Americans - perfectly fine lists sourced under Wiki policy. There is no reason to break NOR just so we can include a few more people in the lists. Mad Jack 19:37, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

Exactly. You said it yourself - there's more than one definition, or the definition is unclear, debated, etc. And if that's the case, then we can't make our own inferences because we can't chose a definition or narrow it done ourselves, etc. For all we know, a particular person who is 1/246 is called X-American in a good source - then we have to include them (of course, the large majority are not called that). Really, if you just saw the lists done under strict NOR - List of French Americans or List of Welsh Americans are good examples - you wouldn't even be arguing with me - they are perfectly fine lists and perfectly sourced under "X-American" only if source said they "are" X. Do we get the occasional exlucsion, like the Emeril Lagasse example? Sure, we do. But so what? Mad Jack 19:26, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

Actually, Jack, if you have a problem with the definition, take it up on the ethnicity pages. Go to each one. Tell me how the "Italian-American" article can say an American who is of Italian descent is an Italian-American if that's not allowed. One definition is stated. Either go edit each and every one of those to conform to your argument or change your mandate, because as it is, there is an immense discrepancy between your interpretation and what is stated as the definition. Michael 04:16, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

Can you not talk about the definition ever again? It doesn't matter what the definition is. I have got no problem with the definition. We report what the definition is from a reliable source, and then we report whichever people reliable sources have labelled with that definition. We don't go around deciding ourselves who does or does not fit the defintion. Enough. Already. You haven't answered the plagiarist question, and you will not answer it because it's impossible. That's why I asked it. There is no answer because there is no difference. We have a definition for what a "plagiarist" is, and yet we can not go around saying who is or is not one until a good source tells us. Enough. Mad Jack 04:19, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

There is no source discreapncy here-just one definiton that you attempt to limit. If you have a problem with this, look for a source that provides you with a definition that is more to your liking and rewrite each of the x-American articles. Until then, your argument is without base, as you (in your own definition) have placed limiting factors on the definition which simply do not exist. Michael 04:30, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

No there is no source discreprancy on plagiarism either. We have a nice definition right up top on that page and this does not seem like it is disputed. If X-American was not disputed, we wouldn't exactly be having this discussion, now would be. I have to tell you, though, this is taking up too much of my time and this is the third time we've gone over this. If you can not understand the policy I can not explain it over and over. I have little more to say, so if you wish further replies from me - just read over everything I've written above. For the last time - we report the definition of a term and then we report those that sources have explicitly said fit the definition. Nothing more. Mad Jack 04:33, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

I have not asked for you to reiterate what you are saying. I understand it, but in no way do I agree with it. Michael 04:41, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

After reading this debate I must conclude that while Mad Jack may have a reasonable point to begin with, I find his use of instrumental rationalisation leads to an irrational outcome. Reason lies in finding a balance, not following logic to the extreme. IMO a too strict policy of deleting or omitting logical inferences leads to a dry, unreadable list of quotes instead of an encyclopaedia. --Tchoutoye 07:49, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

So we still lack agreement, in other words. Michael 23:14, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

Hmmmm Tchoutoye must not have seen the lists, i.e. List of Dutch Americans or so on. They are perfectly reasonable, avoid original research, and for the most part do not lack people who are 100% X, and include most who are 50% (i.e. under the "is X" thing). The biggest problem facing "the opposition" is, obviously, if I was not here - what would they do? Put anyone with any X ancestry on? Anyone with an X grandfather? What? Any decision they make leads to a "List of people Wikipedia editors have decided and reached consensus on being X-Americans", which we do not need and can not have, rather then "List of X-Americans" (as reported by reliable sources, though that is needless to say since every article on Wikipedia is "reported by reliable sources"). As for "Agreement" or "consensus", you may not have it here, simply because you can only only "reach conesus" on things that have nothing to do with reliable sources, i.e. FAs, administrators, whether something is relevant to an article, which source is more reputable, etc. etc. Anything like X-Americans is exclusively in the hands of reliable sources, not a batch of anonymous people. Mad Jack 23:37, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

Oh, and my reply here does not in any way indicate a desire to restart this conversation. What it comes down to is, an editor has a source or they don't. If an editor feels so strongly that someone simply must be called an X-American, they should spend their time looking for a source that says so, rather than discussing this with me, because, I don't make these decisions, only the source can. Mad Jack 23:40, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

That editor may hold that an x-American is an American of x descent as stated in every available definition. That does not violate WP:NOR. Original research is not reporting a fact, which by virtue of definition, may, indeed, have synonyms. Is there a policy against using synonyms in articles? Michael 00:48, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

I've come in late, and I have no intention of reading every word of the above. But I agree with Mad Jack. "X-American" cannot be applied to every single American person with any non-zero amount of X ancestry. Determining whether someone is "X-American" requires a certain amount of sophisticated judgement; it must take into account the proportion of X ancestry that the person has; the degree to which they have been exposed to and embraced the heritage and culture of that ethnic group; and whether the person identifies as a member of that ethnic group. Because it is a complex matter requiring careful judgement, it is utterly inappropriate for Wikipedians to make the call. That would be OR. We should leave it to outside sources to declare a person "X-American". Snottygobble 01:11, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

As of now, we're not able to add someone who is half a nationality and expresses a strong connection to it. Further, Jack will allow information to be included if something directly calls the person x or an x-American. If someone says he or she is of x-descent, Jack won't allow it. Michael 01:36, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

"Jack will allow information to be included if something directly calls the person x or an x-American". Yes, you'd think that a list of X-Americans would have people on it who reputable sources have called X-Americans, would you not? The big problem that you will never, ever, ever solve without violating NOR is that, say, if I were to leave and there would be no one monitoring the X-American lists for NOR, who would you list? If you could go to List of Italian American actors, for example, what exactly are the standards you would use? The problem is any answer you give is your opinion, and let's say you have 10 people agreeing with you, it remains the opinion of all of you which still amounts to nothing, because the opinions of random people can not dictate the content of Wikipedia articles. If you reply to this, please reply to the question I asked - i.e. who would you list, I don't mean specific people's names, I mean what standards would you use. And then explain how the standards you use don't turn the list into "List of people Wikipedia editors have decided are Italian Americans" Mad Jack 01:45, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

The fact that Americans of Italian ancestry are, by common definition, Italian-Americans. We don't let the individual people decide whether they are Italian-Americans. That would be unencyclopedic at best. Michael 21:08, 4 August 2006 (UTC)

Research, Rephrasing and Reasoning

I'm not quite clear on what the difference is between Original Research and Rephrasing or Reasoning something. My example is slightly obscure, but is the best I can come up with at the moment. If say, no-one anywhere had published something saying that the District Line had the most number of stations on the London Underground (this 'factoid' has been published, but for the sake of argument let's say that only the number of stations on each line had been published). Would it then be Original Research to look at a list of the number of stations on each line and say "The District Line has the most number of stations". To me this is similar to the "deductive reasoning" section above (which concerned deducing people's nationality), but this is a clearer case of deductive reasoning. Other cases I can think of include saying things like "team Y is the first team to have won trophy X by this scoreline since 1860". This sort of thing is verifiable, but if it hasn't been published elsewhere, the only way to verify it is for the reader to go and check various lists and see if this is true. So where is the line drawn between rephrasing and representing a set of facts and maybe adding some obvious deductive reasoning, and this process becoming Original Research? A similar process would be seen for the process of rewriting and rephrasing things from a source. Where is the line drawn between summarising several sources (which is one of the prime purposes of a tertiary source like an encyclopedia), and synthesising those sources in such a way that (maybe accidentally) new connections and insights are revealed about the topic? I've also raised this at the Village Pump (policy) section. Carcharoth 00:49, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

That's interesting you mention summarizing. I was just now reading Wikipedia:Don't include copies of primary sources which is a guideline, and says that we should summarize a treaty, don't include all the text. The act of summarizing requires a fairly significant level of reasoning and deduction, this isn't a purely mechanical process. So I'd say this page is another tool to use against those who would ask us to be robots copying quotes. A trivial deduction seems safe, and as long as you're not pushing a point-of-view, I wouldn't expect much objection. Wjhonson 00:58, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

Carcharoth, it's fine to do that so long as it's straightforward and there are no ambiguities. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 01:28, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

Exactly. No one is arguing that we need to become "robots copying quotes", but in articles whose subject is controversial, we ought to respect the request from editors to provide citations for material about which there is a dispute. I am sure no one will ask us to provide a reliable source to make the assertion that "The District Line has XXX stations, that compared with other London tube lines, has the most number of stations", because that is an easily verifiable fact. But if any of you has edited any articles about which there is controversy, you know that you may not not get away with making assertions of fact without having these supported by a reliable source. ≈ jossi ≈ t • @ 01:32, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

That's great. Thanks. I'll point people to this discussion, or come back with more examples if the need arises. Carcharoth 09:31, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

Discussing interpretation of poems, novels, and the like

How does this policy affect sections of articles discussing interpretations of poems, novels, and the like? For example, would it be allowable to write something like "Others have countered that the second stanza alludes not to the German bombings of Exeter but instead to the actions of a serial killer active in the city at the time" and then cite a selection of sources advocating this position, even if those sources were self-published? As the article will only claims the existence of this alternative interpretation (and will not claim greater authority for it), would the use of self-published sources be appropriate - after all, the existence of several documents detailing an interpretation does seem to be reliable evidence for the existence of that interpretation? --Safalra 19:34, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

Interpretations from non-reputable sources normally are not encylopedic. I could imagine situations where the mere existance of non-reputable interpretations might be worthy of mention (for example, a famous author-painter says "I got so tired of answering interview questions about silly interpretations of my first novel that I gave up writing and started painting") but I'd think situations where the non-reputable interpretations are worth mentioning would be rare. Gerry Ashton 20:28, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

Plagiarism example

Recent discussion has frequently mentioned the WP:NOR#Synthesis of published material serving to advance a position. The example says that one shouldn't take information from two reputable sources, Chicago Manual of Style and Harvard's student writing manual, to contest a conclusion in a (made-up) reputable source, Smith (the conclusion being that Jones committed plagiarism). Since editors aren't supposed to do original research, it stands to reason that an editor shouldn't contest a reputable source through his own reasoning, but rather, should find another reputable source to contest the conclusion.

The problem illustrated by the example is that one source, Smith, says flatly that Jones committed plagiarism. The two others do not make a flat statement that Jones did not commit plagiarism, instead, they provide some general information about how to cite sources which might or might not apply to the Jones case; it requires considerable interpretation and reasoning by the editor to conclude that the Chicago manual and the writing manual support the idea that Jones didn't plagiarize.

The discussion on the talk page sometimes seems to be claiming that the plagarism example shows that one should not make simple uncontested conclusions; I don't think that's what the example means. I think the example means editors shouldn't try to contest a reputable source through their own reasoning.

Gerry Ashton 20:13, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

Actually, the example ends with a very unambiguos statement:

For this paragraph to be acceptable in the article about Jones, the editor would have to find a reliable source who had commented on the Smith and Jones dispute and who had himself made the point that: "If Jones's claim that he always consulted the original sources is false, this would be contrary to the practice recommended in the Chicago Manual of Style..." and so on. That is, that precise argument, or combination of material, must have been published by a reliable source in the context of the topic the article is about.

≈ jossi ≈ t • @ 23:32, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

Pointing out that a policy makes an unambiguous statement about something is not a responsive contribution to a discussion about changing the policy. Ken Arromdee 14:56, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

The point is that we only need to change policy if it is needed. The paragraph above is an excellent response to the concern expressed by Gerry Ashton. ≈ jossi ≈ t • @ 15:10, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

Looking at the context of the example, we can say that when one is about to make or refute an insulting conclusion about a person (Jones), "that precise argument, or combination of material, must have been published by a reliable source in the context of the topic the article is about." That does not necessarily mean one may not combine material for more mundane and uncontested purposes, such as making a passage shorter or easier to read. Gerry Ashton 18:38, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

Making a passage shorter or easy to read is always a good endeavor to undertake as editors. Simple, uncontested conclusions, are not a problem either. But if is is an argument that is being contested by another editor as being OR, we ought to find that precise argument in a reliable source for it to stay in the article. ≈ jossi ≈ t • @ 20:14, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

There should be EXCEPTIONS to this policy

Some types of information are just not going to be published anywhere, but are important to explaining ideas in an article.

For example, look at the Emergent Gameplay article (probably a poor article as it stands, I know). In the section on examples of emergent gameplay, these will seldom to never be published anywhere and so by this "No Original Research" policy would not be able to be included. However these examples are important for conveying to the reader what emergent gameplay is.

There should be some strict guidelines describeing exceptions to this policy, such as:

Exceptions to the No Original Research Policy are allowed if:

• There is otherwise no published sources of the information
• The topic is not highly controversial
• The unsourced information helps to enrich the article
• There is no legitamate objection to the validity of the information

Further, exception to this policy are already a de facto part of wikipedia. A sizeable percentage of wikipedia would be gone if the policy were enforced consistantly across wikipedia.

-AbstractClass 21:41, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

How would such an exception be implemented?, perhap by saying if one person objects and it can't be sourced, the article must be either fixed or deleted? The door you propose to open unfortunately leads directly into encyclopedia hell, which reminds me I need to start an article on "encyclopedia hell" too, something I imagine we could find agreement on over a beer or two.

What is proposed here to justify all the current garbage that finds its way into Wikipedia by making a rule to allow it. That is somewhat like saying everybody parks here by that "no parking" sign, so let's just change the sign instead... Kenosis 21:55, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

I think you were joking there, but surely encyclopedia hell would be a neologism as well as original research. Unless it really is a phrase that is widely used outside of, um, Wikipedia! :-) Carcharoth 23:09, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

Perhaps the editors in this area underestimate their writing ability. Maybe a few of them should get together and write an article for a paper magazine, an on-line magazine, or even an academic journal like (IEEE Technology and Society Magazine).

The goal of Wikipedia shouldn't be to scoop other publications; the goal of Wikipedia should be to publish lots of reliable information. Gerry Ashton 21:58, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

Surely some Wikipedia editors are already published, and some at least contribute papers to things like Wikimania. The important thing here is that other editors summarise those papers and decide whether an article needs something from that paper. Carcharoth 23:09, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

proposed wording change

I propose changing

• "Wikipedia articles include material on the basis of verifiability, not truth. That is, we report what other reliable sources have published, whether or not we regard the material as accurate." to
• "The threshold for the inclusion of material in Wikipedia articles is verifiability, not truth. That is, we report what other reliable sources have published, whether or not we are in agreement that the material is accurate." This describes the best way we know how to approach accuracy; the phrase as currently written may give the impression that accuracy isn't even a concern. Precis 02:40, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

I don't care for using the word we. I still don't think there is enough emphasis on caring about the truth. How about this:

• "The threshold for the inclusion of material in Wikipedia articles is verifiability, not truth. An editor should choose published information over unpublished information, even if the editor has more confidence in the unpublished information."

This is an opportunity to point out there is a way to use original research in connection to Wikipedia. If I were to find a published source about, say, an electronic circuit, I could build and test the circuit. If it turned out the published source was, in my view, wrong, I could just throw away the published source and ignore it. I can't put original research into WP, but I can omit published sources based on original research. Gerry Ashton 03:00, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

What do you do if someone else claims to have built the circuit and got it working? Carcharoth 09:33, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

The original wording seems to me tighter and simpler. ≈ jossi ≈ t • @ 05:13, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

• The threshold for inclusion of material in Wikipedia is verifiability, not truth. That is, we report what reliable sources have published, whether or not we agree with those sources.

This is even shorter than the original version. Does it capture what we are trying to say? (The first "we" could be replaced by "editors", if desired.) Precis 07:31, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

I agree that the word "editors" should be used instead of "we". Carcharoth 09:34, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

You CANNOT delete a view from a published source based on original research. That would violate NPOV. All verifiable views can and should be included in Wikipedia regardless of whether an editor agrees or disagrees. Period. user:slrubenstein

Gerry said "omit", not "delete". Precis 13:00, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

You CANNOT omit a view from a published source based on original research. That would violate NPOV. All verifiable views can and should be included in Wikipedia regardless of whether an editor agrees or disagrees. Period. KillerChihuahua^?!? 13:12, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

That's the offense known in the legal profession as "passive concealment" :) Precis 13:34, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

Er, actually, we do tend to omit published sources that fall into the 'just plain loony' category. Sometimes they will get shunted off to special articles about particular conspiracy theories or crank physics models. A published source is necessary but not sufficient for inclusion. Anybody can spend a few thousand dollars to crank out a few hundred copies of a book at a vanity press. If I were to create a 'published' work in that way that says that Dick Cheney is actually a robot then I would expect to be rebuffed if I tried to add it as a footnote to Dick Cheney, even if that were verifiably my view. While verifiability is important, it is certainly not the only criterion for inclusion in articles. Remember, Wikipedia is not an indiscriminate collection of information, and we are expected to employ at least some editorial judgement when confronted by fringe theories. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 14:13, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

The decision on what published view to include as significant view and what to omit is a difficult and error-prone one. We do have some astroturfers and whatnot around who determinedly camp out on certain articles in an effort to represent their points of view as more significant than they actually are. This is a particularly thorny issue because it does require judgement, and cannot be reduced to the black or white terms of a policy document.

However a published view is probably not original research in the sense in which we use it on Wikipedia. If I say "Some people are of the opinion that boiled eggs should be opened at the big end" and cite my blog, that's original research. If I say the same thing and cite a doctrinary statement by a church, school of theology, school of philosophy or political party, it may still be inappropriate for inclusion because the view is too insignificant, but it isn't original research. --Tony Sidaway 14:22, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

Agree. It is useful to remember that WP:NOR does not stand alone. WP:V and WP:NPOV are there also. One policy cannot do without the others. And as always, good judgement is needed on how to apply these. ≈ jossi ≈ t • @ 15:44, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

Oh, I agree as well. I was objecting to the blanket statement that 'All verifiable views can and should be included'. I concur with Jossi that we have to remember that none of our policies exist in isolation, and that we shouldn't try to expand WP:NOR to cover every content dispute. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 17:13, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

Crime Rate Example

Imagine Police Chief Smith of Metropolis holds a sparsely attended press conference to announce this year's crime statistics. His exact words are "Last year we had 33 violent crimes. This year we had 149 violent crimes". A wikipedian is present at this press conference and decides to add this to the article on Metropolis. Would it violate NOR to write:

Metropolis experienced a 350% increase in violent crime.

Why or why not? - O^O

Lies, damned lies, and statistics should answer your question. Carcharoth 16:57, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

OK, so that is a boring historical article. To address your example, supplying the 350% figure on its own is misleading. Supplying the figures of "33" and "149" and adding that this is a 350% increase is OK. Similarly, if an article shows someone's exact birth and death dates (down to the exact days), then it would be OK to add that they died at the age of (say) 97. That is a minor, trivial, and neutral (that last bit is important) extension (I would call it rephrasing or repackaging) of existing information. In some cases, the percentage figures for something would be so wildly misleading that you will encounter opposition (eg. the number of women over 70 giving birth doubled last year - seems OK, until you realise that it went from 1 case to 2 cases). In cases like this, an editorial consensus has to be reached. Carcharoth 17:03, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

It would be better to simply write exactly what was reported—'Chief Smith of the Metropolis Police reported that police responded to 33 violent crimes in 2004 and 149 in 2005.' This allows us to avoid adding unwarranted interpretation. Stating that violent crime increased is an interpretation rather than fact—there could be a bias (the police force increased its budget and cracked down, it annexed a surrounding community and so is responsible for a larger area, etc.) rather than increased crime. Besides, the 350% figure is less informative; it doesn't tell us what level of crime actually was reported (was it a jump from 33 to 149, or from 3300 to 14900?). TenOfAllTrades(talk) 17:11, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

Thank you. Those opinions suffice for my needs at the time. - O^O

It seems to me that we would be much better off saying that this is okay with respect to original research but should not be included because it is taken out of context or otherwise misleading. There are reasons to exclude things other than being original research, after all.

Maybe I should write a reasonable inference proposal that explicitly mentions this. Ken Arromdee 20:46, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

I would love to see a "reasonable inference" proposal. I will donate some examples: (1) the statistics examples given here; (2) Saying (from a list) that the District Line has the most number of stations on the London Underground; (3) Working out someone's age at death from their exact birth and death dates; (4) Updating trivia and records as happened during the recent World Cup. Carcharoth 02:58, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

The Wikipedian at the press conference would need a published source for the WP-report on crime. Basing the report solely on personal recollection of the press conference is original research. Precis 21:54, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

Basing the report on personal recollection of the press conference is unverifiable. It isn't original research, though, since the editor is not trying to draw any conclusions (at least, no more conclusions than would be drawn by working from a written transcript instead). Please, don't try to classify every bad inference as original research. Ken Arromdee 20:21, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

Original research is a term used on Wikipedia to refer to material placed into articles by Wikipedia editors that has not been previously published by a reliable source. I rest my case. Precis 20:35, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

If that's what it says, it should be changed. According to that definition, anything not verifiable is automatically original research, and we shouldn't even have a verifability rule since the original research rule completely covers it. Ken Arromdee 04:44, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

It also says, "Because the three policies are complementary, they should not be interpreted in isolation from one another", and otherwise makes it clear that NOR, V and NPOV are three sides of the same coin. Each, taken in the correct spirit, implies the other two. That's not a bad thing. -GTBacchus^(talk) 04:53, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

Press Conferences however are published. Wjhonson 20:38, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

Some statements made at sparsely attended press conferences are unpublished. And this statement was one of them; that's why personal recollection was necessary. Precis 20:55, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

Personal recollections of Wikipedia editors are unverifiable per se, and so are not eligible for inclusion in Wikipedia articles. Gerry Ashton 21:14, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

Correct, and one can just as rightly say "Personal recollections of unpublished statements are OR per se, and so are not eligible for inclusion in Wikipedia articles." Precis 21:22, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

It doesn't mean that anything "not verifiable is automatically original research". Something not verifiable is simply not verifiable, that means, you cannot tell if its a real source citation or not. It's ambivalent, its unclear. That's not the same as WP:OR which is a clear statement. Wjhonson 06:19, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

I was original poster of this question, so let me refine the question further. Assume the press conference was sparsely attended, and no record of the press conference appeared anywhere in print. But assume further that the Police Department has a strict policy that anybody can come to the station IN PERSON, and have them the Chief repeat his statements. Now the original wikipedian's recollection is trivially verifiable by any person who chooses to visit the station. Now that the information is verifiable, are there any objections to including it in an article? - O^O

Yes. The sparsely attended, unrecorded, news conference fails to qualify as a "published source", in my opinion, and thus referring to it violates WP:NOR. I would go further and say that it also violates WP:V because it would be too costly for most Wikipedians to do the verification. Here is a related example. A bookstore in Nepal owns a rare book, the only one of its kind in the world. You travel to Nepal to get a quote from this book for Wikipedia. You could claim that your quote was verifiable because anyone who wants can travel to Nepal to verify your quote. But I don't think most Wikipedians would agree that this constitutes verifiability. Precis 14:10, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

Your example: "Metropolis experienced a 350% increase in violent crime" is not only original research, but also violated WP:NPOV. You could write: "According to Police Chief Smith of Metropolis, the city experienced a 350% increase in violent crime", and you could follow it by "... and this is disputed by statistics complied by Metropolis' Bureau of statistics, which reports an increase of 120%". Describe the viewpoints, without asserting them. ≈ jossi ≈ t • @ 17:08, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

truth

Does anyone object to replacing

• Wikipedia articles include material on the basis of verifiability, not truth

by

• The threshold for including material in Wikipedia is verifiability, not truth

If so, why? (Both have 11 words.) Precis 22:05, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

It may seem that both phrases say exactly the same thing. But while the second one looks at two factors and prioritizes, the first one might leave the impression that verifiability is the only game in town. Is that really what we want to say? When I decide on the various points of view to include in an article, verifiability is my top priority, but I also strive to paint an accurate picture. Verifiability and truth are not mutually exclusive. Precis 07:39, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

The problem is, whose 'truth'? By requiring verifiability we should be able to build a Wikipedia that accurately reflects human knowledge. 'Truth', on the other, is in the eye of the beholder, as is all too evident from some of the revert wars we have seen. -- Donald Albury^(Talk) 10:50, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

Eloquently put. My sentiments exactly. And the proposed new wording emphasizes that verifiability always gets priority over truth. But unlike the current wording, it won't leave anyone with the impression that we are unconcerned with building a WP that "accurately reflects human knowledge". Precis 11:45, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

I do not see a threchold between verifiability and truch. i see them as distinct values. Therefore, i oppose to the "threshold" language user:slrubenstein

The threshold is not between verifiability and truth, its between what can and cannot be included in Wikipedia. The second proposed language seems marginally better to me because it is closer to the way this notion is expressed in the verifiability policy. Gwernol 14:03, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

I liked the language there and borrowed it. I make no claims to originality. Precis 19:59, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

Are we maybe splitting hairs here? ≈ jossi ≈ t • @ 20:03, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

Yes. And for that reason, when I make the change, nobody will take the trouble to revert. (Just kidding--I'll drop the issue, for lack of consensus.) Precis 20:10, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

I would prefer to leave "the truth" right out of there since it has less applicibility than an article that reads in an interesting way. The threshold for including information is actually, "verifiably previously published to the broad, general public". (I believe). And whether that information is up, down, true, false, red or green, that information can be included. Terryeo 05:53, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

Wikipedia uses NO such definition as your POV "published to the broad, general public". Be advised that wikipedia is NOT a forum for you to promote your original research.--Fahrenheit451 17:21, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

heh! F, you have "advised" me about 10 times now, on this exact issue on various pages. Are you cutting and pasting? "Published" does mean "to the general public" when that idea is placed up against, "distributed to members of an organizaition". The term, "public" comes from the idea of "the adult population" and earlier from "people". Were you to check a dictionary you would not see, "distributed to a membership" as your arguement which you posed to me stated. Terryeo 13:16, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

No, publish does not mean "to the general public" in the common english dictionary. It does only in your POV. Your viewpoint is unfortunately very fixed. I never stated, "distributed to a membership", rather you have falsely accused me of saying that. Knock it off, Terryeo.--Fahrenheit451 20:21, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

violating V implies violating NOR?

Original research is a term used on Wikipedia to refer to material placed into articles by Wikipedia editors that has not been previously published by a reliable source. I rest my case. Precis 20:35, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

If that's what it says, it should be changed. According to that definition, anything not verifiable is automatically original research, and we shouldn't even have a verifability rule since the original research rule completely covers it. Ken Arromdee 04:44, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

I would like to propose a counterexample to this notion that violating V implies violating NOR. Suppose that the SF Giants organization published an article about Barry Bonds in their official program, distributed at a September 1, 1993 game in Candlestick Park. A WP editor puts into an article a fact about Bonds that stuck in her mind, citing the official program. Neither she nor anyone she knows can find a record of the program. Since she added material that was previously published by a reliable source, she cannot be accused of violating WP:NOR. But one can still say she violated WP:V. Precis 10:24, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

Argueablely, the official program was distributed to a select, private audience which had purchased tickets. Should a publisher then put together a book about the Giants and include a portion of that program, distributing it to the general public, it would become published. Terryeo 13:21, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

I guess one can come up with special cases. The fact remains that the spirit of WP:V and the spirit of WP:NOR are the same spirit. What's the point in showing a case where something is not verifiable and yet not strictly original research? If all we're trusting is some Wikipedians memory of a published source, it might as well be original research? What's at stake here? -GTBacchus^(talk) 10:44, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

I have the right to give a counterexample to a statement (see second paragraph above) which I consider false. I truly don't think I have to justify my point beyond that. I agree with your point about spirit. Precis 11:44, 22 July 2006 (UTC) P.S. I've decided to answer the last question "What's at stake here?" Analyzing subtle differences between policies not only helps us better understand what these policies say, but also fosters an appreciation for the wisdom in having several interdependent policies in lieu of a single overarching one. Precis 12:25, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

What's at stake is the false accusation by one editor that another is doing WP:OR. If I cite a source of a newspaper, that only exist on microfilm, it does pass WP:V which only states that a source must be verifiable not that that process must be easy. The other editor might complain that my source is "for all intents" unverifiable, but regardless of the merit of that logic, it is still not WP:OR by the definition and WP:AGF that I'm not making it up. Wjhonson 18:11, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

It's not like violating WP:OR is a crime or something shameful, or that saying that someone is violating WP:OR is in any way an accusation of bad faith. A lot of my first edits to the Wikipedia violated WP:OR, because I didn't know any better, but that didn't make me a bad editor or anything. A source on microfilm certainly is verifiable, and using it doesn't constitute original research. A false accusation of violating original research probably isn't going to hurt anyone, though. Is there a specific case we're talking about here, where someone's giving someone a hard time over some specific contribution, or what? -GTBacchus^(talk) 18:19, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

You'd be surprised how these things can snowball. A few accusations, unsupported by anything except editors opinions, and a persons reputation is shot. Then they have gnomes following their edit trail looking for anything to attack them with. At any rate, I just wanted to make sure that what was WP:OR was clearly distinguished from the more controversial idea that its not WP:V. And your statement about newspapers is one of the issues that will be discussed. (The specific case is in mediation :)) Wjhonson 18:28, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

NOR covers the case where a statement is advanced by an individual in a verifiable way, but where that statement is unreliable or utterly fringe. If some kook believes he's developed a new Grand Unified Theory of physics and publishes it on his website, it is possible to verify through a variety of means that it is his theory, and that he did present it, and so forth. However, it would not be appropriate for Wikipedia to include his theory or present his work in any of our articles (unless we had one on the kook himself) because it is original research. Until the work was published by a third party (a scientific journal, in this case) Wikipedia would not be an appropriate venue to present the theory. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 14:01, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

Can you point out where NOR says that kook statments aren't allowed? The basis of WP:OR is that the statement has not been previously published, in a WP:RS and is WP:V. Its unrelated to whether the statement is "unreliable" or "fringe". Wjhonson 18:33, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

There's actually a pointer from WP:NOT, under the section Wikipedia is not a publisher of original thought. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 01:03, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

I'm not seeing "kook statement" anywhere in there. I think what you meant to say was "original statement". However if a kook has been reported on in secondary published reliable sources, as a kook, that kooks statements, from those sources, is wikifiable. Wjhonson 06:07, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

Wikipedia articles include material on the basis of verifiability, not truth.

I think truth should be at least as important as verifiability. Can someone please explain to me the purpose behind ignoring the truth.01001 03:32, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

• "The problem is, whose 'truth'? By requiring verifiability we should be able to build a Wikipedia that accurately reflects human knowledge. 'Truth', on the other, is in the eye of the beholder, as is all too evident from some of the revert wars we have seen. -- Donald Albury(Talk) 10:50, 21 July 2006 (UTC)" reposted by Doc Tropics ^{Message in a bottle} 03:48, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

Donald has summarized the issue with clarity; "Truth" is often a function of belief; as an encyclopedic resource we should rely on verifiability. Note that most 'truths' are also verifiable; it's that when a 'truth' has not been verifiably reported by someone else (prefereably a reliable source) that we, as an encyclopedia, cannot report on it. --Doc Tropics ^{Message in a bottle} 03:48, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

How can there be truth if it cannot be verified?01001 04:14, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

You might be amazed how many people just know that something is true, and then insist on inserting it into articles :) --Doc Tropics ^{Message in a bottle} 04:25, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

After giving the matter some thought, there cannot be truth that is not verified, but certainly that which is not true can be verified.01001 05:35, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

I feel that "verifiability, not truth" mis-juxtaposes the two ideas. The meat of the matter is, Wikipedia deals in and presents only one catagory of information. That catagory of information is "published to the broad, general public" information and no other kind of information. If and only if information has been previously published to the broad, general public, can it be included into Wikipedia. Some people might 'get it' when reading the policy, verifiability, not truth, perhaps it is the best way to state it. But I feel it could be stated more clearly. Terryeo 05:46, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

Terryeo, you are again attempting to promote your POV definition of the word "publish". Wikipedia does deal with published information. Please stop interjecting your own definitions as if they were common english ones. --Fahrenheit451 17:19, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

Heh, this is about the 11th time you have stated against the definition pevalent in common dictionarys [3]. "Published" means "distributed to the public" and not "distributed to selected individuals who are a member of an organization". Verifiability always works out that way. A piece of information which isn't verifiable simply hasn't been published. Perhaps you might look up each of the terms? Terryeo 13:29, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

And "public" is a group of people who share a common interest. I would suggest you look up the terms in the dictionary, but it appears to me that you are not dealing in good faith, and would not sincerely take my advice. --Fahrenheit451 20:23, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

Please let us know if this is OR...

Hello, I'm looking for some help. Over on the Moscow Metro talk page we're trying to pick one of two tables for inclusion in the article listing the lines of the Moscow Metro. We currently have two proposals. One of the editors feels that the second proposal constitutes original research. Please let us know if this is the case. I realize that this sounds ridiculous, but it's true. I asked him to back up his position, but he didn't really answer properly. It seems that he's simply using NOR as an excuse to prevent the inclusion of the second table. Let us know if he's correct in his accusations.—lensovet–talk – 19:37, 24 July 2006 (UTC)

All I can say is that I do not understand the user's concern, as the dispute seems to be about whether the subway line name or number should be presented in the first column of the chart. If that really is the entire dispute, I suggest that the chart layout is a perfectly reasonable thing to discuss, but bringing WP:NOR into a conversation about the order of the columns is more confusing than helpful. Jkelly 19:58, 24 July 2006 (UTC)

You are correct, the user's concern is if the number or the name should go first. He believes that putting the line numbers first is a misrepresentation of sorts, and is therefore original research. I beg to differ. —lensovet–talk – 20:49, 24 July 2006 (UTC)

Unless the second table inherently exhibits or strongly suggests facts that are not widely accepted, it is just an issue of presentation and not OR. Deco 19:59, 24 July 2006 (UTC)

hmm - I came to this page because I was going to make a simple edit to the Ballia page describing the statues in the roundabouts. I lived in Ballia. It'd be easy to 'verify' that they're there, there's over 100,000 people living in the city. Anybody who goes outside sees them. They're not controversial. But as near as I can tell I shouldn't say anything about them since it'd be 'original research'??? The statues are pretty obvious. The article's a stub, and has the usual note pleading for people to expand it. So I guess I should make a web page somewhere, noting that Ballia has statues, then reference myself? Anniepoo 22:23, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

Nobody has ever written about them before? They're not mentioned in any tourist brochures, in any local history pamphlet, on the local website? Jkelly 22:28, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

Of course, if anyone actually wanted to verify the existence of the statues, they'd probably find the statues themselves easier to locate than some random tourist brochure. An online source, of course, would be the easiest of all to verify, but otherwise I'd go with TenOfAllTrades's advice below. Mind you, there's a good chance there is a print source somewhere to be found that describes not only the statues themselves, but also their history: who made them, when and why were they put there, what do they represent? Such information is precisely what an encyclopedia should provide, and for that we do need a source other than the statues themselves. —Ilmari Karonen (talk) 08:19, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

I'm pretty sure there's a corollary to NOR, that is, "No original research, but don't be silly about it." If they're real statues, mention them. Don't include discussion about them beyond purely factual stuff ("There is a statue of a midget riding a horse" is fine, "The midget rider is the country's ugliest statue" is not) without references or citations ("The New York Times says that the midget rider is the country's uglist statue" would be acceptable.) Unless someone is removing the info and demanding citation, don't worry about it. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 01:15, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

I used to live in Duckburg. I'm going to write an article describing the statues there. Next to an oak tree in the center of town is a giant statue of Lenin. Well, hmmm, maybe it was Stalin, I'm not sure. Come to think of it, the tree might have been a maple. Oh well, I'll just put down that there is a statue of Lenin next to a large oak tree. If I'm wrong, someone from Duckburg will undoubtedly read my article in the next year or two and correct me. Precis 13:54, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

Precedents for AfDs regarding "no new analysis or synthesis"

According to WP:OR: "Articles may not contain any previously unpublished theories, data, statements, concepts, arguments, or ideas; or any new analysis or synthesis of published data, statements, concepts, arguments, or ideas that serves to advance a position." Are there any AfD precedents pertaining to this that would help in the interpretation of that policy at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/United States health reform 1912-1920? Thanks! Medtopic 07:00, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

• I think the answer here is straightforward in principle. (Whether my examples are right is what we have editors and sources for.)
  • An opinion which is in fact consensus in the world around us may be included in Wikipedia's voice. ("Medicare was a substantial health care reform".)
  • Contested opinions ("On balance Medicare had no substantial flaws" vs. "It had flaw A" or "B" or "C" must be attributed (at least to "Some authors say", and it is better to describe the authors) and should be balanced with other opinions.
  • Isolated opinions ("The great flaw of Medicare is that it prevents patients from keeping zebras") should not be included in any article, even if sourced, unless they have so specialized a topic that mentioning the opinion would not be undue weight; Medicare and pets would probably be fine. Septentrionalis 23:41, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

You just hate zebras. You were probably biten by a zebra as a child and now continue to have hostile feelings toward them. Wjhonson 06:59, 29 July 2006 (UTC)

lol. Terryeo 05:41, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

Could someone define "self-published"?

I'm having difficulty with the concept of "self-published". Exactly what does it entail?

It is unlikely that an author would be invited to write a book about a subject by a publisher. Rather an author writes a book on a certain topic and then tries to find someone willing to publish it. I thus guess the policy refers to the presence of absence of a publisher? Or does it refer to the quality of the publishing firm? If it is the latter then it is quite a slippery policy. How are publishing houses graded into acceptable and not acceptable?

I know of a Swedish reporter who wrote a book so critical of the Swedish banking family, the Wallenbergs, that he could not find anyone publisher who dared publish him. He then chose to publish his unedited manuscript on the internet for free. I guess that example would constitute self published. But if he had found a publisher, what criteria would the publisher have to meet to label the author "self-published"?

For example, are the authors published by this publishing house "self-published", or admissible as sources in wikipedia? Algora Publishing --Stor stark7 ^Talk 15:54, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

Self publishing usually means the author pays for the publication of the work directly. So if I go to a vanity press or print on demand vendor and pay them to create my book, I am self publishing. Likewise if I put a book up on my website (presumably I pay hosting fees of some kind) I am self-publishing.

The key is that self-publishing never involves any form of peer review or editoral process. Traditional publishers decide which books they will publish based on the merit of the book. This acts as a filter to decide what is noteworthy. This is why published sources are preferred to self-published ones. Anyone with enough money can self-publish anything, no matter how worthy or ridiculous the content. Hope that helps, Gwernol 16:00, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

Thanks, that helped a lot. I guess it is OK to use books published by Algora Publishing then, since they do not seem to be a Vanity press. As an extra precaution I guess I can check that the book in question has been purchased by at least some libraries, which should mean it has been vetted. --Stor stark7 ^Talk 16:15, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

Self-published material might appear in libraries. It's best to check, if in doubt, that the publication isn't a vanity one, but it's usually quite easy to tell if they are. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 01:49, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

A personal website is self-published. When the author of information stands the costs of presenting his information to the public, then the "self" which created the information is the "self" who is publishing the information. My son-in-law writes Science Fiction as a profession. He uses an agent who has a list of kind of small publishers who publish books by relatively unknown authors. The way it worked with his first published book, he sold the rights to them for something like $ 5000.00 and they ran a printing and distributed it. A publication house like that has a distribution set up, awaiting books to come out of publication and into the distributional network. Terryeo 05:39, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

To the general public

Terryeo, what does published "to the general public" mean? SlimVirgin ^(talk) 06:03, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

If Terryeo wants it to mean it's published in large quantities and widely distributed, that would be a problematic definition. Wjhonson 06:10, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

I paraphrased the meaning of the term "published" from dictionarys. It means, simply, to anyone and everyone.

• To prepare and issue for public distribution or sale, its derivation meaning, act of making public [4] and public meaning, Of, concerning, or affecting the community or the people, derived from adult population or people [5].
• Another dictionary gives To prepare and issue for public distribution or sale, [6] derived from, to make public[7] where "public" means, The community or the people as a whole, derived from adult population, originating from people [8]. The issue being that publication is an issuance of information to, ideally, everyone, without regard to membership in a club, without regard to education or being part of a Church, Company, or any other qualification. Terryeo 00:54, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

In general it is not the number of copies which makes information published or not, but the intent of distribution which makes an information published or not. On the other side of the fence would be "privately distributed information" (of any number of copies). Terryeo 00:54, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

But it you don't demand that a large number of copies be printed, what happens to your "broad, general public" ? Is 100 copies "broad" ? There are art prints, that are done in limited series, I'm sure you've seen "74/100" meaning its the 74th copy of 100 copies. And yet, would you claim the work of art was not "published" ? It's merely distributed to 100 people willing to pay for it. Well that's published by your definition, since the item is sold to anyone willing to pay, so it must be that publication doesn't have to be "broad". Or by "broad" do you mean, "available for purchase by any member of the general public" ? Wjhonson 04:38, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

The original of published was the town crier, today web pages present a single copy and are published. So the quantity of copies isn't a determining factor in publication, though it is possible the publishing industry has a standard. I don't know what that standard is, but they might have a standard. Yes the art print is published by the definitions of common dictionarys because they are distributed to anyone willing to purchase them. Likewise a webpage is viewable by anyone willing to click to it and read it. On occassion a publication doesn't actually cost anything. "available for procurement by any member of the general public" sounds right to me. Terryeo 13:36, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

There are 2 thresholds to meet before an information can be included. First, it has to have been previously published. Then it has to be verifiable. I am attempting to reduce the amount of editor discussion necessary, the amount of time we spend with "is this piece of information verifiable ?". I am attempting to reduce our workload by by stating that a piece of infomation must be published before it can be considered. After that first threshold then would come the second threshold, "is the information verifiable?" Terryeo 13:49, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

Published = Made Public

JA: 'Nuff said. Jon Awbrey 06:12, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

Define "made public" Wjhonson 06:26, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

JA: The point of the remark is that the concept of publication is about as well understood as it's going to get, and is certainly not helped by tautological additions like "published to the general public". Publication itself does not bear the entire weight of the criterion in question, since there are also the qualifications of reliability and reputation to be taken into account. In this respect, circulation does not substitute for credibility. Jon Awbrey 06:44, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

But John, can an item be "distributed" without being published? That's Terryeo's argument. Is a magazine that is sent to 100 private subscribers, published ? Wjhonson 06:51, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

JA: Best to stick with the way that dictionaries and scholars normally use these words. No good will come of trying to write specific circulation numbers, much less specific distribution histories into the definition. Many journals have small print runs. The fact that a work is printed and can turn up in a library means that it's public. A lot of scholarship is based on sources that are rarer than that in their initial publications. Jon Awbrey 07:16, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

I like JA's economy of language, but if he'll permit a bit of inflation, I'd say "published=made publicly accessible", to rule out unrecorded speeches and broadcasts. Precis 06:31, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

Published and accessible are two seperate concepts. Published items can be inaccessible, and accessible items may not have been published. Wjhonson 06:42, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

Exactly. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 06:48, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

I could be mistaken but I think any published information which we might use will be accessible in some manner or another. Terryeo 13:41, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

So would you say an unrecorded broadcast is published? Yes or no? Precis 07:01, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

Yes. As the town crier once published news, so to the unrecorded broadcast is made public. Terryeo 08:01, 4 August 2006 (UTC)

A broadcast that no has has kept any kind of record of: no audio recording, no transcript, no published story about it? Then it would not be notable, and we wouldn't have to worry about the philosophical question of whether it had been published. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 07:08, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

That's like the question" "if a trees falls in a forest and there's no one to hear it, did it make a sound?" Or my personal favorite: "If a man speaks in a forest, and there's no one to hear him, is he still wrong?" ;-D SlimVirgin ^(talk) 07:10, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

I'm highly offended by SV's last line :-D. Now to the point. Since SV won't answer the question, I'll answer it myself with a simple syllogism.

• published = made public (the title of this section)
• An unrecorded live broadcast (or public speech or concert or matinee) is obviously made public
• Ergo, an unrecorded live broadcast (or public speech or concert or matinee) is published.

Most of us are unwilling to accept this conclusion , so we cannot accept the initial premise either. In short, the answer to my question is NO! That's why I brought accessibility into the picture. SV's point about notability is simply wrong. I doubt if all of Rachmaninoff's unrecorded public concerts can be called non-noteable. Noteability isn't always a prerequisite for citations anyway. An organization is allowed to use non-notable published sources in an article about itself.

P.S. "publicly accessible" does not mean "easily accessible". I'm fully aware that some published items are only available at great expense. I'm also aware that there some previously published works are now completely inaccessible. Hence my definition isn't perfect, if you're of the school that says "once published, always published". Precis 09:15, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

A public broadcast or play is published. The original was the Town Crier who "published". Reproduceable is another concept. Until reproduced, an information can not be verified. Terryeo 01:04, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

Your syllogism was a tautology, and therefore didn't result in a meaningful conclusion, Precis, but nice try. I'm reminded of Wittgenstein's private-language argument here. There is no such thing as a private language, he argued, because all languages require an element of publicity and public agreement e.g. that "table" means a thing with legs that you can rest other things on, and that it will mean this to all native English speakers. You confirm this by interacting with them around the issue of tables, and sure enough, they seem to be using the word the way you're using it, so all is well: you know you're speaking a language, because the public is confirming that they know what you're saying, and also that you're using the term consistently. This discussion is heading along the same lines. We need public affirmation of some kind before publication can be said to have taken place. We need an entry on Amazon, or a mention in The Times (or local paper), or a letter to the editor, or a transcript of a tape, a copy of a broadcast, and so on. It has to be out there in some form, not just a broadcast that maybe no one even heard, or if they did, they didn't themselves publish their thoughts about it. So maybe there was a sense in which it was made public, but that sense was ephemeral, like me trying to teach myself a private language: that S means sensations like the one I feel in my leg now, and that S1 means sensations like the one I feel now, where I can only hope (but can never know) that the next time I use S or S1, I will use them correctly — because there is no one out there I can share them with, and therefore no one who can tell me if I'm wrong.

SlimVirgin ^(talk) 03:59, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

:) ≈ jossi ≈ t • @ 04:03, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

The purpose of a language is to communicate. The purpose of publication is to use language to communicate to the broad, general public. We have gotten used to reproduced and reproducable publications, but publication was common before printing known. and before the common person knew how to write. Even today there are verbal methods of reliably reproducing published information, an editor was talking about how he might create a Wikipedia article about a tradition passed on only by word of mouth. Terryeo 01:10, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

I see it this way. Material to be usable as a reference in an article...

1. Needs to have been published by a reliable source;
2. Needs to be verifiable;
3. Better if published in a secondary source, but it if it is only available in a primary source, context comes to play as for its validity for inclusion.

I have yet to see an example that cannot be addressed, as it pertains to its validity for inclusion in an article, by using the simple formulation of WP:V and WP:NOR. ≈ jossi ≈ t • @ 15:46, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

The 3-point Policy statement in WP:V completely leaves off your second point. That's especially embarrassing because it is a statement of policy about Verifiability itself. Precis 20:52, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

To amplify Precis's point, WP:V repeatedly sets the standard of verifiability as "published by reputable sources" or other forms of those words. It does discuss what a reputable source is, but does not discuss what "published" is. This leaves possible areas of dispute. Is a document distributed by a reputable organization with a good reputation for fact checking verifiable if the distributor has taken active measures to prevent the document form falling into the hands of people outside a defined group? Is a widely distributed motion picture verifiable from the time it is no longer in the cinemas until the time the DVD is released? --Gerry Ashton 21:35, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

Exactly, precisely, exactly the area of difficulty. "Publish" needs the further clarification to mean, "to the general public, without regard to membership of any kind", that is, "assessible to everyone equally. Terryeo 00:38, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

Terryeo, your offered definitions are very unrealistic and unworkable, as is your "general public" notion. And I don't see where anyone in this discussion used membership as a criteria. I think you have imagined that. No information is "accessible to everyone equally". You must be making your definitions up, because they have nothing to do with dictionary definitions - or reality.--Fahrenheit451 04:56, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

F, this is about the 12th time you have posted that. I got it when you posted it on my user page difference on the 15th of July. I don't agree. "Published" means "distributed to the public" and not "distributed to a select membership (a selected public)" as you have said. And said. And said. Terryeo 14:19, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

No, published does NOT mean "distributed to the public". That is nonsense. A good couter-example is a website. That is not distributed, but rather made accessible. "Public" is a group of individuals who share a common interest, like english-speaking people, stamp collectors, software developers, golfers, etc. --Fahrenheit451 20:27, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

A website which does not require a password is published. It is distributed by the action of a mouseclick but made public by its availability. Its potential availabilty is "everyone" (i.e., the public). Most dictionarys use the word "the" as in "to the public" which means published can never include:

• Reproduced (by any source) and distributed to memebers of a club.
• Reproduced (by any source) and distributed to the people who bought baseball tickets for the 3rd of Jan, 2007 (or any other date).
• Reproduced (by any source) and distributed to attendees of School X, Club Y, or Concert Z.

  But, "published" always applies when an information has been distributed to public without regard to prequalifying criteria. A broadcast via the electromagnetics spectrum would always be published, when information is distributed to a gathered crowd it is published because the crowd is not a prequalified group who have purchased tickets, membership, or prequalified themselves in some other way. There's nothing specialized about reading any common dictionary and applying the words it states.

  "Public" is sometimes used to refer to and seperate from consideration, certain subgroups of people. But the base from which the word springs, its derivation is "people" without any qualification whatsoever. [9]. Everyone, all mankind. "Public" would not include animals nor plants nor rocks nor trees, but instead, "people". When a dictionary states, "published to the public", with no modifier to the word "public" the dictionary means, "published to all of the public", i.e. although not every individual person receives a copy, the target published to is "everyone". Terryeo 08:19, 4 August 2006 (UTC)

You believe that a live unrecorded ballgame is published, but the printed programs handed out at that game are NOT published. Could you explain the rationale? Precis 08:26, 4 August 2006 (UTC)

Absurd, Terryeo. No publication can be intended for the generality of "everyone". Being a media person, I can tell you, again, that your notion is unreal and false. Publications, broadcasts, displays and the like are always intended for a target audience. The people you refer to is a general concept in the abstract. Public, here, refers to the specific case of a group of people who share a common interest. It is too bad that you can't seem to differentiate between the two meanings. I suppose we could blame the english language, but it looks to me like a case of "Terryeo doesn't want to know".--Fahrenheit451 21:02, 4 August 2006 (UTC)

What about CNN? It's not on free to air. You have to subscribe to see it. I thought they published the news? Garrie 01:45, 16 August 2006 (UTC)

Opening policy nutshell

Hurts my eyes to read such a tortuous sentence. Wjhonson 06:42, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

My assessment is that it is an excellent summary of the policy. Could you explain what does not work for you? ≈ jossi ≈ t • @ 15:47, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

JA: It's been rewritten since Wjhonson's comment. Bad semicolon fixed and split into two sentences. Jon Awbrey 21:40, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

A better way to look at accessibility

Reliable, reputable published sources must always be publicly accessible. I think most everyone here would agree. Are they publicly accessible by virtue of being published? (There is disagreement here--some say that the concepts "published" and "accessible" are not that closely related.) Are they publicly accessible by virtue of being reliable? (There is disagreement here too--some say that the concepts "reliable" and "accessible" are not that closely related.) Are they publicly accessible by virtue of being both reliable and published in conjunction? Here I'm guessing that the consensus is YES. If so, it wouldn't hurt to make this holistic interpretation clear on the main pages. (Note: "publicly accessible" doesn't necessarily mean "easily accessible"). Precis 10:45, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

I agree, that is exactly right. Terryeo 00:35, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

'Accessible' and 'reliable' are orthogonal concepts. There are lots of web sites that would qualify as 'accessible' but not 'reliable'. Contrariwise, private communications between subject matter experts may be 'reliable' but not 'accessible'. To answer the other part of your question—yes; once published in print or online, it's generally fair to say that a work is 'accessible'...but depending on the nature of the publication it may still constitute original research within the meaning of this policy. If you have some specific circumstances in mind, we might be able to provide futher guidance. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 13:13, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

"Published" is one thing, reliable another. The first step is published and the second step, reliable. Understand the first one and the second one might or might not become visible. Terryeo 00:35, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

Here is a specific circumstance. If we don't accept that accessibility is built into the phrase "reputable reliable published source", then we are faced with the absurd and embarrassing situation where the synopsis of the Verifiability policy at WP:V has little or nothing to do with verifiability. If you disagree, go to the three-point policy section on that page and tell me where accessibility (the cornerstone of verifiability) is mentioned. If we don't require accessibility in that Policy section, how can we say this is a policy about verifiability? Can editors verify something that is inaccessible? Thanks. 13:26, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

But accessibility is part of "published", not part of reliable. The Weekly World News is available at most kiosks in the English-speaking world; but I hope we are not citing it for anything - except, I suppose, itself. Septentrionalis 14:24, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

It is only me? But when I read the whole page on WP:V everything is crystal clear. There is no ambiguity there. IMO, the ambiguity is in editors minds.... ≈ jossi ≈ t • @ 15:17, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

A personal website is published and verifiable, but is not reliable. So Jossi, what do you understand "published" to mean that it is not automatically "verifiable"? Terryeo 00:35, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

Yes, accessibility is prominently mentioned elsewhere on the page. But do you have a good reason why it should be omitted from the synopsis? Including it there might end a lot of cognitive dissonance. Ambiguity may be in the editors' minds, but it is triggered by suboptimal writing. Precis 20:45, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

We raise problems when we walk past a stated idea. NPOV states All significant published points of view are presented, not just the most popular one and the word "published" is walked right past. A large number of editors simply don't understand that reliable published information IS verifiable information and that privately distributed information is not verifiable and that personal websites, while published and verifiable, are not reliable. Terryeo 00:35, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

Common knowledge, but no source

I am having a problem with not being able to source a common knowledge and widely accepted opinion, which a user wants to remove because there is no source, even though he agrees it is accurate and factual. It is related to the section Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition#1911 Britannica in the 21st century - and talk discussion Talk:Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition#Original research. User:John Kenney is saying that because there is no source for the errors in the EB1911, they should be removed from the article. The errors in EB1911 are self-evident and clear and factual and quoted. Do we really need a third party to "confirm" the errors before they can included in Wikipedia? How do we resolve this? Are we not allowed to say that EB1911 has problems as a 100 year old source? This seems so self-evident and supportable by quotes from EB1911. And I've looked, and have not been able to find a recent critical review of EB1911. -- Stbalbach 18:23, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

JA: This is a generic problem in Wikipedia, and it betrays a number of places where the policies are not written as well as they might be. Outside of here, it is generally understood that we are concerned with grounded research, and that audit trails can ground out in several different ways besides an explicit citation. Common knowledge and common sense are some of those common grounds, but it's notoriously difficult to give a rule to common sense. Have to break here, will get back to it later. Jon Awbrey 19:46, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

The section mentioned makes a number of factual statements, or implies that a number of "facts" in the 1911 Encyclopedia Britiannica are false. While the section seems plausible, I wouldn't be easily able to find a reliable source for any of the statements. Indeed, some of the "facts" from may be tough to conclusively refute. While "a population mainly of good English blood and instincts" does not strike me as the most likely reason for the American revolution being successful, I'd be hard put to find a source that difinitively proves some other reason why the revolution was successful. Perhaps the section should be rewritten to point out aspects of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britiannica that are proveably false. --Gerry Ashton 20:15, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

And, to make it clear, all the claims seem to be either statements like Gerry Ashton's example, which are not now consensus; or statements like the railroad connections of 1911, which are simply no longer true. This is not the extremely contentious claim that the EB was flawed as a statement of the best available knowledge as of 1911. Septentrionalis 00:45, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

Gerry, we can't set out to prove EB1911 is false because that would be Original Research. No? Or is there some way to just list false statements and inaccuracies? -- Stbalbach 01:17, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

The overall premis of the section is that EB1911 is out-of-date. I suppose that is a novel position, and collecting all kinds of little clues from primary and secondary sources to support that position would indeed be original research. So I would be much better to find a secondary source that says EB1911 is out of date. Once you find that secondary source, I suppose it would be OK to find additional information to bolster the position. ---Gerry Ashton 02:35, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

No such source exists that I can find. A modern critical review of EB1911, but no one reviews 100-year old reference works. Therein lies the problem. We all know it is true, but there is no source that says it. -- Stbalbach 04:14, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

JA: Oh, is that all. An encyclopedia is a tertiary source and the statements in it do not have to be treated with that kind of awe. The burden of verifiability remains on the one who wishes to retain the statement, and it can be deleted if it cannot be verified independently. Another alternative is simply to cite the old curioisity sop verbatim as "blah-blah" (EB 1911), and let the reader judge. Most folks will avoid the absurdity of that unless it's a really amusing absurdity. Jon Awbrey 21:34, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

Solecism/Tautology

JA: Discussion below moved from user talk page. Jon Awbrey 18:36, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

At WP:NOR one of your recent edit summaries stated: 22:08, 31 July 2006 Jon Awbrey (Talk | contribs) (revert solecism). Did you mean the edit you reverted was:

• 1. A nonstandard usage or grammatical construction,
• 2. A violation of etiquette, or
• 3. An impropriety, mistake, or incongruity ? [10]

  The reason I ask this questions is because:

• It has not been discussed on NOR's discussion page and because I am the editor whose you stated had created a solecism. So I ask which you consider my edit (which stated publish to the broad, general public), which you consider the solecism to be, nonstand use, violation or impropriety ?
• I ask because of all reproduced information ever created, all of it was created with one of two ideas in mind. 1. Pubished to the broad, general public i.e., everyone, without regard to membership in a club, emplyment in a business, or any other private or specialized consideration. or 2. Privately distributed to the individuals of a club, business or other limited, private distribution such as being a member of the CIA and receiving orders from the chain of command. Feel free to reply here or on my user page or at WP:NOR where the issue is present. If you wish to catch up on the discussions involving this issue, a lot of it took place at the WP:RS discussion page, where editors generally agreed the issue belongs in NOR. Terryeo 18:08, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

JA: Sorry for the ambiguity. I was referring to the tautological aspects of "publish to the public", and so was using solecism in the sense of a defective bit of logic, in particular, a qualification posing as information that conveys in fact no additional information. For example, the unabridged Webster gives: "a theory, situation, act, etc., not consonant with logic, circumstances, known facts, or the like". Jon Awbrey 18:28, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

JA: My general sense here is that you are making a mistake very similar to that of writing too specific a patent or policy, in that every clause you add only magnifies and multiplies the loopholes. We are not charged to create a novel definition of publication here — indeed we are proscribed from doing so. Jon Awbrey 18:36, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

So charged? I fail to understand what you mean. When "publish" is specifically spelled out to mean, published to the broad, general public, as any dictionary will tell you the common use of the term provides, it can save Wikipedia editors huge amounts of discusssion. There is the other possible misunderstanding of the term "publish" and that common misunderstanding would include documents which Ford Motor company created and distributed to their car dealerships, documents which spell out their pricing policy for the season. Those documents are unpublished, those are privately created and privately distributed to individual representatives. Wikipedia can not use that sort of information but can only use "published to the broad, general public" information. It will save us editors large amounts of "prove it is verifiable" if we will only make a good definition of publish here at NOR. Terryeo 03:31, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

I respectully disagree. The content policies of WP need to be taken as a whole. "Prove if verifiable" is part and parcel of the editing process where there are content disputes. The Ford brochures are not verifiable, and and not "published" for the purpose of Wikipedia for that reason. ≈ jossi ≈ t • @ 03:36, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

Jossi, I like your work and respect your understanding, but disagree in this instance with your reasoning. I would say the Ford brochures are not published and can not be used because they are not published. Of course, your point is valid, they are not verifiable. On the other hand, they were privately distributed and not published (to the public) and therefore, they are not verifiable. But the hypothetical brochures would never come to the Wikipedia table if editors understood what "publish" meant. Terryeo 08:26, 4 August 2006 (UTC)

Terryeo, your statement "published to the broad, general public, as any dictionary will tell you the common use of the term provides," is an outright falsehood. That is your definition that represents your POV. Publication is always done to a public, that is, a group of people who share a common interest, be they english speaking, knitting hobbyists, or bicyclists. Your definition is rather useless and unrealistic.--Fahrenheit451 20:45, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

14th time you have said something about "published to a public". But dictionarys say, "published to the public". It is certainly my POV that I understand dictionarys, no arguement about it. :) "the" is general, "a" is specific. Publication is general, distribution is specific. It will save us huge amounts of discussion if we simply go with what WP:NPOV states, "published" and that means "published to the public". I have spelled out that difference a number of times to you, F, and you continue to use the specific word a when dictionarys use the general word, the. Terryeo 14:25, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

JA: Text below moved from my user talk page, as I'm only here off and on anymore, and stuff on my talk page is likely to lose all connection with relevant context. Jon Awbrey 03:42, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

I read your reply as saying there is a logical inconsistancy in defining "publish" to mean, "published to the broad, general public", i.e. everyone? As compared to the idea that publish might mean the distirbution of copied information by anyone, anywhere? But you see, the latter definition would be to say that Wikipedia could cite secret government documents, if only they could be verified, that Wikipedia could expose the innermost secrets of Freemasonry if only the verifiability were present. Now, you have stated a chain of logic without stating the reason you did the revert. Would you go right ahead and state the reason for your reversion, please ? Terryeo 03:25, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

JA: No, a tautology is not an inconsistency. A tautology is simply not informative, as published already means made public, and that's all she wrote as far as publication goes. Jon Awbrey 03:42, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

I think you are saying, "publish" means "to the broad general public" and therefore, to state, "published to the general public" is a tautological statement. I only wish every editor saw it the same way. Unfortunately, not every editor does. here, at WP:RS 2 editors take an opposite point of view, they seem to consider any information with a lot of copies, distributed to a lot of people is "published" information. I am running into too many examples of that kind of thinking, of editors citing unpublished information which has been privately distributed to a selected audience. User:Fahrenheit451, to name one, insists such a distributed information is "published". He has a copy in his hand and therefore feels it is citeable information in Wikipedia. But it has never been published, the creator of the information says it is not published. But it isn't just one editor, many of the discussions which happen at WP:RS are about "verifiability" of information which has never been published, but which has been distributed to a private group. Yes, I understand it is a tautology to say: "Published to the general public", but it sure seems necessary ! Terryeo 03:54, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

But, doesn't Wikipedia:Reliable sources still apply? -- Donald Albury^(Talk) 10:51, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

Terryeo, please stop lying about my discussion statements. I never stated that distributed information was published. You falsely accuse me of that. I ask you to immediately stop spouting lies in our discussions.--Fahrenheit451 20:49, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

It is not a personal issue, F. Terryeo 18:22, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

Perhaps I am not understanding something. I keep saying, published to the broad general public to distinguish the distribution of information from, distributed to a private group of individuals. Do editors understand these two statements to mean different things? I assume everyone understands the two phrases to mean different things. A website owner publishes, a company which produces and sells books publishes, while Freemasonary distributes their booklets to members and that is not published information but distributed information. What am I not understanding here, help me out? Terryeo 13:11, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

NPOV says that the article should fairly represent all significant viewpoints that have been published by a reliable source. That statement necessarily excludes unpublished information. Examples of unpublished information would be the Freemasonary booklets, Ford Motor Company's orders to its production companys, and so on. We have had to test the verifiability of many such unpublished, but distributed information. Invariable unpublished information fails the verifiability test. But it ties up editor discussion pages. If we include the tautology, published to the general public (or something of that nature), we will have more productive editing, I believe. Terryeo 13:22, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

Frankly, nonsense. Distributed information is certainly verifiable – one privileged member can leak the document, scan it, and post it online – but it's not a reliable source about anything but itself. (That is, suppose I am a member of the very secret society, The Stonecutters. Every member has access to the Sacred Parchment which describes all of our very secret rules, rituals, and origins. If I post a photograph of the Sacred Parchment online, I would be able to say things like "The Stoncutters' Sacred Parchment describes the first Stonecutter, Bob I, as nine feet tall, with flaming red hair." The Sacred Parchment, however, is not a reliable or peer-reviewed source, so I wouldn't be able to state flatly "Bob I, the first Stonecutter, was nine feet tall." Please, Terryeo, stop trying to rewrite NOR so that you can exclude information you'd prefer we didn't report about Scientology. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 14:31, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

That is an example of the sort of issue which drives editor discussion. It begins with a distributed piece of information (unpublished, unverifiable and unuseable). Period. Then someone stole it. Someone attempted to publish it. They placed it in public view. At that moment it is published ! But not before. However, once published Wikipedia requires it be verifiable (a webste would be verifiable) and reputable / reliable. The personal website fails in that regard. A discussion on that (hypothetical) information should never reach the WP:RS discussion page because it is unpublished except for the stolen copy, it being of poor repute and only verfiable to itself and not to the good, created information the Stonecutters use. Terryeo 14:31, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

I am surprised by your statement. A scan of the "Sacred Parchment" posted on a personal website cannot and should not be used as source for the article on the Stonecutters. Reasons: (a) personal websites are not reliable sources; (b) violation of WP:V; (c) Violation of WP:NOR. Now, if A scholar writes a book or an article in which that "Sacred Parchement" is described, then we can cite from that book or article how the parchment is described by the scholar, but we cannot describe its contents directly even if we have a copy in our hands. Again WP:V and WP:NOR prevents us from doing that. Now, if there is an article in WP about Bob, the first stonecutter, because he is a notable individual, we may with great caution, use primary sources from his website, and this may include a description from Bob's viewpoint on the said parchment, by attributing the description to Bob. ≈ jossi ≈ t • @ 15:12, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

I am afraid that I would have to emphatically disagree with such a narrow interpretation of the policies. Unless there is reason to be believe that a photograph or scan was altered or forged, such images certainly satisfy the criterion of verifiability.

Perhaps you've misinterpreted what I said. I agree that the Sacred Parchment would not be a reliable source on the topic of the Stonecutters. It certainly would be worthy of mention and quotation within context, as part of a discussion about the mythology of the Stonecutters. Providing a photograph or scan of the document would allow us to verify that the particular primary source hasn't been misquoted or misrepresented. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 16:06, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

a) is false, there are many examples of where "personal websites" can and should be used as sources for articles, in particular "widely known journalists, acknowledged experts in their field of study, who have been previously published by third-party publishers"; b) is sketchy, but in general I might agree, publish the photo in the newspaper or a journal, and on the web, then link to it; c) how is a photo OR ? Does NOR actually address the issue of photos? A photo does not "describe the contents", it is an image. Also a transcription of that image is not OR.Wjhonson 16:49, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

We are talking about websites that do not fall within the category of "widely known journalists, acknowledged experts in their field of study". ≈ jossi ≈ t • @ 19:25, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

Simply upload the photo, release it from copyright and you're good to go. Your own photo is your own copyright, even if you are photographing something else, so you can release it. Wjhonson 16:55, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

That photo, I am afraid, will not be worth its pixels as it pertains to Wikipedia. ≈ jossi ≈ t • @ 19:25, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

TenOfAllTrades wrote "Unless there is reason to be believe that a photograph or scan was altered or forged, such images certainly satisfy the criterion of verifiability." The circumstances in this discussion are (a) the Stonecutters are a notable secret society, (b) a person has published on a personal web site a scan of a document that purports to be a secret Stonecutter ritual, and (c) this document is not available from any reliable publisher. I feel these circumstances alone create suspicion that the document was fabricated or altered by a person unaffiliated with the Stonecutters, and this document should not be used on Wikipedia. Material appearing on the unreliable personal website should only be used in an article about the website, and no material from that website should be used that refers to a third party. --Gerry Ashton 17:52, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

Exactly. 19:26, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

A good example for purposes of illustration. The word "publish" in any dictionary will present published as being to the broad, genearal public because it arises from the word "to the public", that is, to everyone (ideally). We have gone around and around for a long time about verifying distributed information. But that isn't the point at all, the point it, such information is unpublished until it becomes published. When it is published (by whatever method) then it can be included into Wikipedia, but not before. This is what places Wikipeda above an expose' newspaper because Wikipedia only deals in previously published to the general public information. And as soon as soon as the public has it from a reliable source, *BAM*, it can be included in wikipedia. Terryeo 19:17, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

The big problem with your argument Terryeo, is that the "general public" is a general concept and does not identify a who. Those who publish, and I speak from firsthand experience, target one or more groups of people who share a common interest as a means to make information public. It can be english-speaking people, spanish-speaking people, coin collectors, joggers. Your "broad, general public" argument, quite frankly, is contrived nonsense. --Fahrenheit451 20:56, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

Terryeo, "general public" is an undefined and undefinable term, and it's a really bad idea to try to re-write policy simply so you can remove negative material from Scientology articles. Jayjg ^(talk) 21:00, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

I am not attempting to remove information anywhere. That is not at all what I am doing, not at all. Please compare these two statements: Information must be verifiable distributed by a reliable publisher and Information must be published to the general public by a reliable publisher. The two statements, for practical purposes, work out to be exactly the same because any information which is privately distributed is not going to be verifiable. The information which is commonly verifiable is information which has been presented to the broad, general public. Don't you see? It practical terms, both statements are equal. So, let me tell you what I am trying to do, which has nothing to do with removing information. I am trying to save us work. We have used the "verifiable" statement for a long time. But, it is based on "published", NPOV actually says "published" and means in the common, broad, to the public sense. NPOV does not mean "privately distributed to selected individuals, members of a Church, a club, a company. It works out the same when you examine it on a case by case basis, but it saves editors huge amounts of discussion to simply follow what NPOV already says,All significant published points of view are presented, not just the most popular one. We editors are constantly examining one source or another to determine, by a concensus, whether the source is reliable. There is actually a more foundational, undercutting step which would save us huge amounts of discussion. That step is, "has the source been published to the broad, general public". Terryeo 00:19, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

I don't know much about the Scientology example, but if the concern is the use of primary sources, disputes about verifiability of sources, and/or concerns about original reserarch, then these can be addressed by involved editors, via the dispute resolution process, rather than attempting to fix something in this policy that may not be necessarily broken. ≈ jossi ≈ t • @ 21:14, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

I fail to see how anyone could possibly not understand "published" to be anything other than "created and distributed to anyone willing to pay for or otherwise procure a copy", i.e., the broad, general public. However, Several editors obviously consider "publish" to mean something different. Verifiability does bring these two confliting points of view into direct opposition and a concensus of editors at WP:RS then determines whether a piece of information fulfills Wikipedia standards, or doesn't. Fine, good. I am saying, "publish" has only one meaning in WP:NPOV and that meaning is not "distributed to a seleted, non-public group". I fail to see where the issue is not clearly presented. I rather don't like F451's tone either, who accuses me of direct lies when this issues has been clearly stated and I've included his words, by link, which state almost word for word what I am stating here. Terryeo 00:27, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

Terryeo, now you have gone from "published to the public" to this abstract generality of "broad, general public". I object to your lying about what I have presented in these discussions and you have not included any links because you have nothing factual to link. Reminds me of the Office of Special Affairs ad-hominem attack tactic. I suggest you knock it off.--Fahrenheit451 04:36, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

I would appreciate if editors can take their inter-personal disputes to their own talk pages, rather than airing them here. Thank you for you consideration. ≈ jossi ≈ t • @ 05:30, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

I think it would be good if Terryeo kept to the topic and refrained from personally attacking other editors so they do not have reply to that nonsense.--Fahrenheit451 05:53, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

It is not a personal issue, F. Terryeo 18:25, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

syllogism

Your syllogism was a tautology, and therefore didn't result in a meaningful conclusion, Precis, but nice try. I'm reminded of Wittgenstein's private-language argument here. There is no such thing as a private language, he argued, because all languages require an element of publicity and public agreement e.g. that "table" means a thing with legs that you can rest other things on, and that it will mean this to all native English speakers. You confirm this by interacting with them around the issue of tables, and sure enough, they seem to be using the word the way you're using it, so all is well: you know you're speaking a language, because the public is confirming that they know what you're saying, and also that you're using the term consistently. This discussion is heading along the same lines. We need public affirmation of some kind before publication can be said to have taken place. We need an entry on Amazon, or a mention in The Times (or local paper), or a letter to the editor, or a transcript of a tape, a copy of a broadcast, and so on. It has to be out there in some form, not just a broadcast that maybe no one even heard, or if they did, they didn't themselves publish their thoughts about it. So maybe there was a sense in which it was made public, but that sense was ephemeral, like me trying to teach myself a private language: that S means sensations like the one I feel in my leg now, and that S1 means sensations like the one I feel now, where I can only hope (but can never know) that the next time I use S or S1, I will use them correctly — because there is no one out there I can share them with, and therefore no one who can tell me if I'm wrong. SlimVirgin (talk) 03:59, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

You are making my point almost perfectly. We need public accessibility (you called it affirmation) before we can call something published (by my definition). The very ephemerality of the live broadcast prevents me from saying it is "published". I'm fully aware that some others use the broader definition of published, viz., "made public" and would say for example that an Aerosmith concert is published. That seems to me a strange usage of the term, a usage which is moreover far removed from Wikipedia. Finally, your comment about tautology is off the mark. Here is an example of a syllogism:

• A implies B, and B implies C, therefore A implies C

This is a valid and frequently used syllogism. And of course it is a tautology. To criticize it for being a tautology is like criticizing an implication for being true. My syllogism had the form

• S=T, and x is in S, therefore x is in T

which is another valid and frequently used argument. Its purpose was to show that if you accept the premise that S and T are well-defined sets that equal each other, then you are forced to accept the rather bizarre conclusion as well. Thus one should reject the premise, as I now think you do. Precis 11:04, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

I don't think I ever held the premise, which was "published = made public." I agree that publication in this context can't mean only "made public." If I type up some words on a piece of paper then staple it to a lamp post, I've made it public, but I can't be said to have published it in any sense that's meaningful for Wikipedia. We have to be able to attribute our edits, to point to our source in a way that allows the reader to go to where we're pointing, and without unreasonable effort. There are probably legal definitions of "publication" we could use if someone wants to track them down, because courts will have ruled when something that shouldn't have been published (e.g. a state secret or a libel) can be deemed to have been. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 13:40, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

Because you questioned my definition and left the first one alone, I'd jumped to the conclusion that you held to the first one. I apologize. What you just said above is very wise, but perhaps I only think so because I'm in complete agreement with it. Precis 13:55, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

The first step of publish is to make public. This is the area I'm addressing. Had the notice been stapled to the Science Club's bulletin board then the notice would not have been "made pubic" because it was addressed to a specific group. But, when stapled to a public telephone pole, the information is then "made public". This would be the very first step of "publish". This very first step is not spelled out clearly enough, it causes editor discussions. I have posted some example of the difficult discusssions which happened because this first step of "made public" was not fulfilled by some citations in some articles. WP:RS has also had a number of discussions about information which was never "made public". Often those fall back on the threshold, "is the information verifiable", when actually a good deal of discussion could be saved if editors understood that to be published, information must be presented to the public. Terryeo 18:34, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

SF Giants programs

Argueablely, the official program was distributed to a select, private audience which had purchased tickets. Should a publisher then put together a book about the Giants and include a portion of that program, distributing it to the general public, it would become published. Terryeo 13:21, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

Are you saying that if tickets were free that day, the baseball programs would be published, but since there was an admission charge, the programs are not published? Bizarre. Precis 13:38, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

Normally, people pay to attend a baseball game, so I used that illustration. But the cost is not the significant factor I attempted to communicate. The idea of information being distributed to a selected group of individuals does not constitute "published". Instead, "published" means "to the public" and "the public" is not a specific group of persons, but everyone, anyone, without regard to whether they attend a baseball game or stay home or go to the beach. Terryeo 18:37, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

No, published means to make public. Public being a group of persons who share a common interest. In your example the group of persons are those interested in baseball. The publication may reach those who are not, but the intended target of the publication would be reached. --Fahrenheit451 20:31, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

I wonder if Fahrenheit 451 would accept "publish means making available to that portion of the public who choose to take an interest in the information; if the distributor takes active measures to restrict who can receive the information, on any basis other than payment of the appropriate fee, the information is not published". --Gerry Ashton 21:04, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

That is one of the better definitions I have seen here. I would strike the "choose to" as redundant.--Fahrenheit451 00:49, 4 August 2006 (UTC)

Without "choose to" and stated briefly it becomes: "Publish means making available to any public who take an interest in the information", but, "if the publisher makes any restrictive action about who can get the information, the information is not published" ? Terryeo 00:45, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

Not quite Terryeo, you omitted "on any basis other than payment of the appropriate fee," Also, what purpose is served in a short definition being "stated briefly" when it greatly alters the defintion? Inquisitive minds question your motives.--Fahrenheit451 01:59, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

I think the "choose to" could indeed be dropped. Also the definition would still have to be interpreted with a little common sense. For example, because I belong to the IEEE, I can buy the (US) National Electrical Code for $55 instead of the $65 that non-members have to pay. I'd say it is still published, even though members get a discount. But if some hypothetical society sold a publication to members for $55, or nonmembers for $10,000, I'd say that isn't published. --Gerry Ashton 02:24, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

Regardless of whether the information was technically "published" or not, it's clearly authoritative and verifiable, and I would accept it. Besides, many scientific journals are "restricted" to those willing and able to shell out the cash for them. Deco 21:03, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

The idea of information being distributed to a selected group of individuals does not constitute "published". ... Terryeo 18:37, 3 August 2006 (UTC) Then please explain why you consider a live circus performance to be published. Also, since you do not consider SF Giants programs to be published, does that mean a Giants program could not be used as a (self-published) source in an article about the Giants? Precis 21:23, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

No prequalification is done, anyone may purchase entry and view the circus performance. The circus will sell a ticket to anyone. Therefore, the circus is published. With the Giants game, the game is likewise published (anyone may purchased a ticket). But, when a phamplet is distributed to the people who have purchased a ticket and are sitting in seats, there has been a pre-qualification. Those people who are sitting in seats are no longer "the public" in the broadest meaning of the word. They have become a selected group of individuals. Therefore, the phamplet which they receive has been targeted to a preselected and individual group of people who are no longer 'the public' but are attendees. That phamplet is not published when it is distributed to them. The phamplet might become published later, if a newspaper article carrys it. The attendees of the Giant's baseball game are published to for only the information which they purchase tickets for. They are not published to for additional information which they did not intend to purchase. Terryeo 08:48, 4 August 2006 (UTC)

I don't understand this logic. The live (unrecorded) ballgame is available to anyone who comes to the game. The printed program is also available to anyone who comes to the game. Both the program and the game itself have the same target audience. The same degree of prequalification exists in both situations. If you buy a ticket, you get the program and you get to watch the game. If you don't have a ticket, you don't get a program and you don't get to watch the game. Precis 09:14, 4 August 2006 (UTC)

The difference is intent. Tickets are sold to the general public who purchase and have thereby made a legal contract, transfering ownership (I think) of the entertainment. Assuming there is a stack of programs which anyone who comes to the game can pick up, but which has not been specified by the purchase of a ticket, the programs are not published. They have not been contracted to, nor have they been purchased. Their information is not part of the ticket price, in fact they might have advertisements within them or notes of human interest quite apart from the purchased entertainment. They represent information which is distributed to a targeted audience. (I think) Terryeo 17:20, 4 August 2006 (UTC)

The program still exists after the game, and could be transferred later to anyone interested in it. It would be possible for an interested WP reader to locate somebody with a copy of the program and acquire it from them. It isn't possible for such a reader to view the game, because there is no fixed copy of it. Publication only refers to fixed copies, I think. JulesH 16:21, 4 August 2006 (UTC)

You are now entering the Terryeo zone... I'm afraid those of us who've edited the Scientology-related articles are familiar with his curious logic. :-) A program for an event is plainly published - not only that, it constitutes an important and well-established source of information (see ephemera). Admittedly, it isn't necessarily very easy to find, but in the case of the SF Giants I would bet that you would be able to access a copy at the SF Public Library and certainly in the Giants' own archives. This plainly differs from an unrecorded live performance. Terryeo's assertions that ownership of the entertainment in a live event is "transferred" is completely bizarre - ownership remains very firmly with the performers, as anyone who's tried to make a bootleg recording will find out. When you pay for admission to an event you're actually only paying for entry to a private area for a limited period of time. You're not guaranteed to see anything - the performers might get sick, there may be technical problems, etc. An unrecorded live performance cannot be a verifiable source but a recorded live performance can, as it's available in a "fixed" format. -- ChrisO 21:11, 4 August 2006 (UTC)

The logic is curious to me for another reason. I don't understand how there is a difference in intent. The intended audience for the live game and for the stack of programs is the same: the subset of the public willing to pay the price to enter the stadium. Precis 21:32, 4 August 2006 (UTC) p.s. Yes, the program has ads in it, but the stadium is also plastered with ads, so there is no difference there either. Precis 21:32, 4 August 2006 (UTC)

Generally, in modern times, the purpose of publication is to make money. This idea could be expanded to: "providing jobs for people, bettering people's lives" but isn't necessary. What is necessary is some exchange, something valuable given (information / entertainement) for something valuable received (money). The tickets get sold, the game is 'published' (by my arguement, though this is a specialized aspect of the term, 'publish'). It is made public in exchange for money. The target is "the public" (anyone who buys a ticket). But, when those persons arrive at the game then they are no longer the general public, but are a preselected group from the general public. So, any distribution of information to them, which is exclusively to them, is privately distributed information to a selected audience. The intent of the privately distributed information is not to reach the general public, but is to reach people who attend the baseball game. This sounds a little weak to me, too, but I think the intent of publish is always and necessarily to the general un-preselected public, or it doesn't meet the definition of publish. Terryeo 00:41, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

You say But, when those persons arrive at the game then they are no longer the general public, but are a preselected group from the general public. So, any distribution of information to them, which is exclusively to them, is privately distributed information to a selected audience. Once the game starts, it is being presented to the very same group which you no longer consider the general public. So why do you say the game itself is published? Precis 01:04, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

I say the game is published when the game is played. The game is played because the public purchased tickets to see it. Whereupon the publisher must then fulfill his end of the contract, he must act ! He must publish the entertainment to fulfill the contract(s) he has made. The playgd game is the publication, while the sale of tickets is a promise to publish, a contract to publish. Counterwise, to use that audience (which is a self selected portion of the public) as a target for a private distribution of information which they did not purchase tickets for, does not constitute "publication" (as I understand the word). Terryeo 19:38, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

If it were printed on each ticket that the ticketholder is entitled to a free program, would that contractual obligation change your mind, i.e., would you then call the programs published? Precis 22:01, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

Signed Posts

If I had a public key for Linus Torvalds, Bill Gates, or Donald Trump that my bank signed, then I think I would be able to trust their material as verbatim. But perhaps the key should also bear their e-mail address or web site, just in case any kids bear those legal names.

And, I guess the verbatim and complete material might go in wikiquote, just in case you wanted to check the signature, yourself, to ensure that you were talking to the same Elvis.

[11] 216.234.170.66 16:18, 3 August 2006 (UTC) Costello, that is.

Information collected in that manner would be {WP:NOR|original research]], and could not be used in Wikipedia. -- Donald Albury^(Talk) 17:30, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

The process of finding and using a post probably would be original research. However, we use lots of material from the web. We usually use the domain name and the reputation of the organization that owns the domain name to establish reliability. A digital signature on a web page by a suitable person or organization could be an alternative to relying on the domain name for reliability. --Gerry Ashton 21:12, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

What if it's published in a journal first?

Hi.

I'm wondering about this "no original research" policy, specifically, would the following scenario be against the policy?:

1. Person publishes their original research in a peer-reviewed journal.

2. Research passes 5 years of vigorous scrutiny.

3. Person writes an article here about their own research, BUT they ONLY include the ideas that were in the published, peer-reviewed journal, and reference it.

If this is against the policy, then I think this needs to become an exception because the whole point has to do with peer review and verifiability. If it gets peer review and the peer-reviewed content is all that is mentioned in the article, it shouldn't matter if the research is technically "original" (ie from the same person as the author of the article) or not. If it _doesn't_ go against the policy, perhaps this should be made clear.

--70.101.146.206 21:31, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

The policy already says "If an expert editor has published the results of his or her research elsewhere, in a reputable publication, the editor can cite that source while writing in the third person and complying with our NPOV policy. " --Gerry Ashton 21:42, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

Indeed: NOR means that the source should be a journal, and not Wikipedia. For the NOR policy it's irrelevant who authored it. As a matter of fact, experts are encouraged to contribute to Wikipedia; strong cases of self promotion yield of course unbalanced articles that are nevertheless easily detected and corrected. Harald88 22:14, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

So what, exactly, is the criteria which distinguishes an "expert"? Is it "a published journal or better?" How much recognition is required before an individual can be quoted from his own, personal website? Terryeo 00:20, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

The policy should spell out the fact that this is inevitably a relative concept--does it? In other words, the qualifications of a notable "expert," "researcher" or "critic" will vary from topic to topic--you would expect degrees, professorships and papers in scholarly journals from an expert in, say, thermodynamics or medieval miltary history. But those would not be appropriate minimum expectations for an expert in some field where the bulk of discourse takes place outside of academia: Beanie babies, professional boxing, Disneyland. BTfromLA 00:52, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

My great uncle, who had only a high school education, was consulted by university professors for his knowledge of the habitat and ranges of varieties of the Apple snail in the Florida Everglades. Unfortunately, he never published, so I can't cite him as an expert. It all comes back to be varifiable from published, reputable sources. -- Donald Albury^(Talk) 01:31, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

Verifiable and published are separate questions from what constitutes an expert. A "reputable source" in the world of Beanie Baby collecting would certainly not meet the standard for a reputable source about elections in Iraq, which in turn probably wouldn't meet the standard for a reputable source about blood coagulation. The policy should be flexible enough to recognize that, seems to me. BTfromLA 01:36, 6 August 2006 (UTC) To clarify: I mean that they will not meet the same standard, if the standard is drawn in terms of just one type of discourse. If "reputable" requires peer-reviewed scholarship published in a printed academic journal, for example, lots of popular culture topics will have very little to draw from. BTfromLA 01:46, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

I agree. Publication in an academic journal is never a requirement for a reputable source, although in many research areas almost all reputable sources are. In popular culture areas there are often authoritative or respected figures or works which take the place of this, such as the official Beanie Babies website. Deco 01:51, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

All true, and all requiring the exercise of good editorial judgment. It does no good to get too precise about details in our policies. We want to avoid too many loopholes while allowing the needed flexibility. For an interesting take on what it means to be an expert, see this article in the current issue of Scientific American. -- Donald Albury^(Talk) 02:31, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

To me, an "expert" would indicate someone with a high level of "expertise", or knowledge in a specific subject, not necessarily having a degree. You could vigorously study lots of technical <insert field here> texts of every level and subject imaginable for 15 solid years on end and accumulate a high level of "expertise" in the field, but not a degree. Also, I believe peer review is the most important thing -- if one gets a goodargument it should pass peer review. Degrees shouldn't enter in, or even whether or not the journal is academic. Although the reviewer/journal publisher might require a degree. Anyway, that's just my 2c, feel free to disagree & debate. (BTW, I'm the original poster here, but my IP changes with the wind.) 67.138.199.173 20:50, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

Being well-read in a field does not make one an expert in that field. Expertness appears to come primarily from hard and prolonged practice. Yes, one can become an expert without a degree, but in many fields the practice that is necessary to becoming an expert is available almost exclusively only to participants in the academic systems leading to a degree (physics, for example). On the other hand, there are fields where academic degrees have little or nothing to do with becoming an expert (writing fiction springs to mind, despite all of those Creative Writing programs). -- Donald Albury^(Talk) 00:00, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

But hard practice also doesn't *require* a degree, or a FORMAL education. One can participate in those systems, but that doesn't mean one has to do a *formal degree program* (unless of course they just award the degree simply because of all the hard practice). Knowledge is from reading, expertise is from practice. 70.101.145.181 22:21, 20 August 2006 (UTC)

Need some opinion here

The editors of the Bob Dylan article are arguing that their prose does not violate OR and some others have nominated it to FAR. This desparately needs some neutral, third-party eyes to step in here. Of interest too is the talk page for the article. I'm not sure I'm expert enough to step in myself. I'd always assumed "brilliant prose" still needed to be backed up by sources - I can't say something's the greatest thing since slice bread unless a reputable and verifiable source has made that claim, right? plange 23:10, 4 August 2006 (UTC)

Proposed definition of Publish

Based on Gerry Ashton's definition, I propose this definition of publish: "Making information available to the interested public without active restrictions (lawful non-disclosure agreements, statutory confidentiality), other than a means of exchange (barter, fees) or a level of knowledge (pre-requisites)."--Fahrenheit451 02:23, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

Counterproposal—"Publish: To make available in fixed form (i.e. paper, CD, web page) to the interested public without active restrictions (i.e. non-disclosure agreements), except non-free publishers may apply restrictions to assure payment."

I don't like the idea of barter, because this could restrict distribution to people who have something unusual. I don't like the idea of a level-of-knowledge restriction; I've heard of it for university classes, but never for just buying a publication. --Gerry Ashton 02:42, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

Actually, I was using it to illustrate that something like algebraic topology is still published even though the pre-requisite might be a course in abstract algebra.--Fahrenheit451 03:03, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

What does that Oxford Concise say ? Terryeo 07:36, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

We have already been through dictionary defintions, Terryeo. This discussion came into being because those were not clear enough for our purposes, leading to editing disputes.--Fahrenheit451 23:12, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

Why are we trying to re-invent the wheel? I would argue that the defintion of publish as intended in this policy is related to "to make generally known" coupled with "to have one's work accepted for publication". More definitions here and here. ≈ jossi ≈ t • @ 03:00, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

I like the to make generally known and to release for distribution at Jossi's second link, there. Terryeo 08:02, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

No wheel reinventing intended. I think this discussion arises out of a need for a definition that is clear for editing purposes and conforms with the dictionary definitions.--Fahrenheit451 03:05, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

If that is the case, let's keep it consistent with widely accepted definitions of the term. The proposed wording above is not. ≈ jossi ≈ t • @ 03:10, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

In addition, I do not think that it would be useful to define "published" without sufixing it with "reputable". The directing we should go shold be around: "A source Material made available to the public by a reputable publisher." ≈ jossi ≈ t • @ 03:14, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

Dear jossi, no attempt is being made to slip past "reputable" nor to slip past "verifiable". We are attempting to lay a solid foundation which editors will clearly understand. On that foundation goes the next brick which will probably be "reputable". It is an attempt to make easy, easy to understand and hard to misunderstand. It is an attempt to reduce the amount of quibble, not an attempt to circumvent WP:V. Terryeo 04:49, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

Here is an alternate proposal, followed by my rationale.

• For the purposes of Wikipedia, a published source is one which provides verifiable information to the public.

Rationale: When Wikipedia policy refers to "published", verifiability is a necessary condition, with no exceptions. Jossi's idea to combine "published" and "reputable" is tenable, except on the rare occasions when Wikipedians want an understanding of "published" independent of reputability, for example, when an organization uses a self-published source in an article about itself. Precis 08:25, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

Precis' define has strong points. I would prefer.

• For the purposes of WIkipedia, a published source is one which provides verifiable information in a reliable way to the general public.

Rationale: "to the general public", rather than "public" can prevent misunderstandings. Including "Reliable way" is again, almost redundant. But reliability, stability, is important to Wikipedia. Terryeo 16:05, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

And "general public" is an abstract, general term which has nothing to do with publishing. The target of publishing is "a group of people who share a common interest" which is not a mob, or the masses, or everybody.--Fahrenheit451 22:45, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

Not every person who is published to and receives a copy of something "shares a common interest". Sometimes the person is in a location which is being broadcast to by the electromagnetic spectrum or by audio speakers. Other times a person is sitting in a airport seat and reads a newspaper sitting nearby, or a magazine. "publish" is broad, general and does not specify exactly who gets the information, instead the information is distributed to just anyone and that is what is meant by the word, "public" (people). Terryeo 22:58, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

Not true, the common interest could be a common language and english-speaking people are a public.--Fahrenheit451 23:00, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

Would other editors please comment on this issue? Terryeo 23:03, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

Actually, I like the evolution of Gerry Ashton's definition of publish:"To make available in fixed form (i.e. paper, CD, web page) to the interested public without active restrictions (i.e. non-disclosure agreements), except non-free publishers may apply restrictions to assure payment." I think this is the most workable definition proffered thusfar.--Fahrenheit451 23:04, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

"fixed form" is another issue. Distribution is the issue we can't seem to come to a mutual agreement about. Terryeo 00:18, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

Publication implies fixed form. Terryeo, you seem to believe that watching Dumbo do tricks at the circus is a publication, and it is not, it is a performance. A recording of the performance made available to attendees would be a publication. On the matter of distribution, the consensus seems to be that a group of interested persons is the intended public of a publication. --Fahrenheit451 02:38, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

I would argue that a definition of "publish" that deviates from the common definition would be a no-no. Ashton's proposed wording is not based on that common understanding. I am observing that editors are trying to "fix" policy so that they can use or otherwise challenge a source in articles they are involved with. That may be obfuscating their ability to make proposals that may improve the current wording. I would argue that anybody that comes to check Wikipedia, would have a very simple and direct understanding of what "published" means and what a "reliable source" means. We already have enough work in explaining to newbies and the world what NPOV is, and we do not need to say "but wait: we also define 'published' very differently than you do". Let's keep it simple, shall we? ≈ jossi ≈ t • @ 01:32, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

Let us not deviate at all. Let us use a good dictionary definition. Someone suggest one. My main interest is that "publish" means "to people" and not to "the selected group of people holding a firecracker in their hand" (or some other selected group) which would be non-dictionary based. Terryeo 02:50, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

And Terryeo makes up a wierd, unrealistic example to propagandize his POV "the selected group of people holding a firecracker in their hand". Terryeo has been presenting his particular definition of publish, which there is a consensus against.--Fahrenheit451 04:43, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

Jossi, I don't see that adding a definition of publish will make matters worse for wikipedians. On the contrary, I think it could bring clarity to the editing process. Yes, it should not be different than the dictionary definition, rather it should be similar, but refined for our editing purposes.--Fahrenheit451 02:43, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

F451, I simply don't see how you can possibly consider "published to a public" to be a definition at all of published ! The word "public" means "poeple", that is people without any qualifications or preselection. i.e. everyone, i.e., the common public, i.e., the general public. I simply don't understand why you don't get what (I think) everyone else understands "publish" to mean. Terryeo 02:53, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

Terryeo, please knock off your lying nonsense. I never stated "published to a public" You stated that. Other editors have already unfavorably commented on your rather unrealistic and shortsighted definition of publish. --Fahrenheit451 04:47, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

My lying nonsense? I don't understand. Terryeo 05:45, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

You do understand. No false pr please.--Fahrenheit451 06:27, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

Lying nonsense. I think I'll take offence to that, User:Fahrenheit451. Please stop your personal attacks, per WP:PAIN. There are better communications you could use than "lying nonsense" no matter how strongly your opinion differs from mine. Terryeo 08:52, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

Terryeo, that is exactly what you are doing. Please stop falsely accusing me of personal attacks. You are repeatedly misrepresenting what I have stated in this discussion and that is not opinion, it is documented fact. Knock it off.--Fahrenheit451 12:31, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

User:Fahrenheit451 you stated: I changed the article in the definition "public" from the to a editing difference and stated the "a" (not "the") this editing difference. Also, you have made the statement in other places, always insisting on "published to a public" in preference to "published to the public" which is what common dictionarys use. Example: To bring to the public attention; announce [12] Terryeo 06:24, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

And you took that from an old thread which is no longer under discussion. I have no objection to "the" public as long as "public" is taken in the correct context of "a group of people who share a common interest". --Fahrenheit451 13:05, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

By your reasoning, something in Playboy wouldn't be considered "published" because Playboy is only available to adults. In fact, something published in a newspaper isn't really published, because the newspaper might not be available in some parts of the world. (Of course, you could buy a copy and mail it, but that's true of all unpublished material.) Heck, even if the newspaper's published everywhere in the world, it's still only available to people willing to pay for it, and that isn't everyone.

It doesn't make sense to say that something is only published if it's available to absolutely everyone. Available to a large group of people has to be enough. Ken Arromdee 03:10, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

Have I said "must be available to everyone?" no. I have stated the common, dictionary definition of "publish" which is to distribute to "public", to "the people". Playboy is published because it is available to "the adult population" which is exactly the derivation of "public" which common dictionarys use. dictionary.com- Written at 03:51, 6 August 2006 by Terryeo. (sorry, signing) Terryeo 05:45, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

Terryeo, please sign your posts. And stop the lying, you did say everyone: "Normally, people pay to attend a baseball game, so I used that illustration. But the cost is not the significant factor I attempted to communicate. The idea of information being distributed to a selected group of individuals does not constitute "published". Instead, "published" means "to the public" and "the public" is not a specific group of persons, but everyone, anyone, without regard to whether they attend a baseball game or stay home or go to the beach. Terryeo 18:37, 3 August 2006 (UTC)" and "Public" is sometimes used to refer to and seperate from consideration, certain subgroups of people. But the base from which the word springs, its derivation is "people" without any qualification whatsoever. [9]. Everyone, all mankind. "Public" would not include animals nor plants nor rocks nor trees, but instead, "people". When a dictionary states, "published to the public", with no modifier to the word "public" the dictionary means, "published to all of the public", i.e. although not every individual person receives a copy, the target published to is "everyone". Terryeo 08:19, 4 August 2006 (UTC)" and "F451, I simply don't see how you can possibly consider "published to a public" to be a definition at all of published ! The word "public" means "poeple", that is people without any qualifications or preselection. i.e. everyone, i.e., the common public, i.e., the general public. I simply don't understand why you don't get what (I think) everyone else understands "publish" to mean. Terryeo 02:53, 6 August 2006 (UTC)" --Fahrenheit451 04:50, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

Hmmmm. I used a word to make clear an idea. I used "everyone". I am attempting to spell out a difference.

• Publish to a public suggests that information which is distributed, is to a group of people who might be club members or the people within a stadium or the people within a room or the left-handed, brown-eyed people with short hair. That is not a possible use of the word, "publish".

And your statement is ridiculous: There are hunting magazines, fly-fishing magazines, mountain bike magazines, golfing magazines, etc. that cater to specific groups of people who share a common interest. Publishing to a public occurs all the time, therefore your conclusion is utter nonsense.--Fahrenheit451 06:38, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

The publishers of those magazines would strongly prefer to find their publications more widely accepted and they make lots of extra copies in an effort to increase the circulation of their magazines which, they know, are purchased by people with an interest in them, purchased by doctor's offices who keep a copy to amuse their patients, purchased by libraries, purchased by sporting goods stores who might keep a copy for browsing on their counter, purchased for subscription by wives for their husbands for birthdays, and the list could grow extensively. Sure, there is a targeted audience but that targeted audience is not the exclusive distribution of a publication. A publication distributes beyond, well beyond, those people who will actually use the information within the publication; i.e. "anyone, the public". Terryeo 08:52, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

Having written magazine articles and worked with magazine publishers, I can tell that those publishers want to increase subscriptions by finding more people who are interested in the subject matter of the publication. And it is not "anyone", the publisher is looking for more interested people to subscribe. The public is a group of people who share a common interest, and it isn't just those who use the information, but all who are interested. So, no it isn't "anyone". It isn't for those who are not interested or dislike the subject matter. Printing copies for "anyone" would bankrupt the publisher. Your argument is fallacious, Terryeo.--Fahrenheit451 12:50, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

• Publish to the public suggests the targeted people are unspecified. Because the word "public" means an unspecified group of people, the people, the adult population, then "the public" is anyone at all. Not just the people of a club, not just the people within a room, not just the people within a stadium, but anyone. I used "everyone" in an attempt to make this idea clear. There was no lie intended. The concept seems wonderfully simple to me and it exapperates me that anyone would consider it could mean anything else because any dictionary says the same definition, to the public. Terryeo 05:53, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

All right, then just name us one publication that is intended for "the public".--Fahrenheit451 06:40, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

Webster's II New Colege Dictionary pub.1995 by Houghton Mifflin Company, ISBN 0395962145. It states on page 895, "Publish: To issue and prepare for public distribution and sale" and defines "Public: open to the judgement or knowledge of all." Terryeo 07:59, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

I asked you to name one publication that is intended for "the public" and you did NOT do that, instead you listed a link to definitions you selected. Again, if you cannot provide the name of a publication that is intended for "the public" as you define, your argument is invalid.--Fahrenheit451 12:36, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

Ken Arromdee, available to a large number of people suggest the information was published, but not always. Some computer documents are in the hands of thousands of programmers and managers, but they are not published because these people had to sign non-disclosure agreements to get the documents. I don't have a government security clearance, but I presume some secret documents are distributed to tens of thousands of people. --Gerry Ashton 04:02, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

To fix your continuous problem between "the" and "a", I would suggest that you consider whether: "Anyone who has the means, may obtain a copy from the publisher, without undue interference." Or language to that affect. Wjhonson 19:28, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

That definition is o.k. I dn't know whether you were addressing me or not, but the definite versus indefinite article controversy is long over for me. I guess Terryeo is still fighting that battle.--Fahrenheit451 20:21, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

Statement of Gerry Ashton's proposed definition

Please comment on this: "Publish: To make available in documented form (e.g. paper, CD, web page) to the interested public without active restrictions (e.g. non-disclosure agreements), with the exception that non-free publishers may apply restrictions to ensure payment for a publication." --Fahrenheit451 05:28, 6 August 2006 (UTC) revisions in script--Fahrenheit451 13:14, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

"Interested public" narrows the field too much. It is not the meaning of "published" that the information only reaches the "interested public". It is the intent of "publications" that information reach the broad, general public with no restriction about interest, color of hair, location, language spoken or any other parameter. Terryeo 05:57, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

Terryeo, no one stated that "interested public" was the meaning of published. Please identify those publications that intend to reach those who are not interested, live anywhere, or do not speak the language of the publication. If you cannot document any such publications, then your argument is invalid.--Fahrenheit451 06:33, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

Good gosh. That you say my statement is invalid does not make my statement invalid. I state that "Publish" derives from the word "public" and means, "publish to the public". This is not rocket science. I state that to constrain the distribution of published information in any manner whatsoever ("interested public" or any other constrainment) is counter to and specialized from the common use and understanding of the term, "publish". The common understanding of the term is stated in common dictionarys. Terryeo 07:46, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

When you contradict yourself, that makes your argument invalid. You insist that a game played in front of people within a stadium is "published". Yet you say (emphasis mine)

• Publish to a public suggests that information which is distributed to a group of people who might be club members or the people within a stadium or the people within a room or the left-handed, brown-eyed people with short hair. That is not a possible use of the word, "publish".

That's a flat-out contradiction. You can try to explain yourself by bringing in other issues, such as publisher's intent, but it's too late: the contradictory statement has already been made. Note: It is your view that a live football game is published but the half-time band entertainment is not, even though both are performed before the same public (those in the stadium). To avoid further contradictory statements, it may help to specify the other criteria you use in your definition (publisher's intent, public expectation, or whatever). Precis 09:28, 6 August 2006 (UTC) p.s. You state that if the distribution of material is constrained "in any manner whatsoever" then you wouldn't consider it "published". Yet you consider a live football game published even though the publisher is imposing a constraint: only people in the stadium get to watch the game. So you contradict yourself once again. (It is irrelevant that tickets are available to the general public. If you are too sick to go to the stadium, you don't get to watch the game, whether you have season tickets or not.) Precis 11:52, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

I'm not sure I understand what on earth is going on here. An "interested public" is self-selected. A magazine, or a journal, or a book is published to be purchased and read by whoever in the public is interested in it. Thus, the interested public. People who are not interested will, by definition, not buy it, because they are not interested. I suppose one can come up with silly exceptions, like "the guy who catches part of a movie in an electronics store," but that's just silly and not an exception which really warrants changing the definition. That things are published for the interested public is more or less a tautology, and I can't for the life of me understand why it is controversial. Also, everyone should remember that etymology is not destiny. Just because a word derives from a particular Latin root does not mean that its meaning is forever cicrcumscribed by the meaning of that Latin word. Beyond that, though, I've got some doubts about Gerry Ashton's definition - "except non-free publishers may apply restrictions to assure payment" is both awkward and not grammatically correct, if I'm not mistaken. It would at least need a "that" after except to be grammatically right, but even so it's an awkward and artificial way of saying things. I'm also somewhat concerned about the mention of "web pages." That makes for a pretty broad definition of "published," which would include, say, every blog in the world. Why so much emphasis on "published sources" in this extremely broad sense, when what really matters is reputable published sources? john k 12:56, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

Point well taken, but "reputable" is something other than "published". Sure, web pages are usually published.--Fahrenheit451 13:12, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

Well, I suppose, although web pages aren't a fixed form, usually. john k 13:25, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

I guess one could consider billboards to not be fixed form because they can be changed as well. However, a copy or image of the original can be saved, but I will revise by substituting documented for fixed.--Fahrenheit451 13:38, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

I used fixed as a synonym for recorded in any way, and in contrast to live performance or live radio or TV performance that was not recorded in any way. The audience of WP policies and guidelines might not think that is the definition of fixed so documented is probably a better word. --Gerry Ashton 16:46, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

When I wrote the first verision of this definition I should have used e.g. instead of i.e. because paper, CD, and web page are only examples of publication media, not an exhaustive list; similarly a non-disclosure agreement is only one of many ways a distributor could use to distribute a work and yet prevent it from being published. --Gerry Ashton 16:46, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

I just amended it accordingly.--Fahrenheit451 16:52, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

I believe there is no need to define this as a matter of policy - it should be left to editor discretion. If there's one "exception", I don't see why there might not be more. What if they only offer it, for example, to people who complete a brief survey? Deco 17:54, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

What if they offer it in exchange for completing a survey, and the survey includes questions that would facilitate identity theft? The whole point is to rule out any restriction that excludes groups of WP readers and editors for reasons that are not in keeping with a free and open exchange of ideas. Some restrictions might be in keeping with free and open exchange of ideas, for example, a library in a generally affluent country might require patrons to wear a shirt and shoes. Other restrictions are not in keeping with the free and open exchange of ideas, for example, a white supremacist organization might require a person to join the organization before receiving documents. --Gerry Ashton 19:00, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

O.K. Good point. I will amend by substituting exchange for payment.--Fahrenheit451 18:39, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

\

I continue to oppose a narrow interpretation of "publish". This navel gazing does not reflect well on this project. I would ask editors to refrain from making comments such as "you are lying", "it is ridiculous", etc. These are uneeded, unacceptable and detracts from the debate. ≈ jossi ≈ t • @ 19:04, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

I'm afraid "to ensure exchange for a publication" does not make gramatical sense. Also, exchange is too general a term. Saying that an information distributor can require anything in exchange for a publication and still consider it to be published makes the entire definition pointless. --Gerry Ashton 19:07, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

I don't see anything wrong with the grammar there. According to Oxford exchange means: "an act of giving one thing and receiving another (esp. of the same type or value) in return." This is in response to the editor who brought up the point of requiring completion of a survey. We could fall back to "payment", it's just that there will be some exceptions to the definition. I guess that's o.k.--Fahrenheit451 20:12, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

Terryeo does not answer proof challenge

When asked on two occasions in these discussions to provide examples of actual publications that fit his definition of publish, he did not do so. --Fahrenheit451 13:33, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

I sure don't follow your reasoning. Every book in a bookstore is "published" and I used a copy of Webster's dictionary in replying to your "challenge" above. Terryeo 18:20, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

LOL! Terryeo has been unable to provide Examples of publications that fit his definition of published. So, just assuming Terryeo is really using Webster's Dictionary as an example of his definition of published, we find that Webster's is written in english, this excludes all non-english literates. Thus, Webster's is published to a group of people who share a common interest, the english language. It is also not published with distribution to those who do not want it, but use another, like Oxford. That is not "everyone". I think it can be stated that Terryeo's arguments for his definition have been demolished.--Fahrenheit451 18:32, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

That's not entirely true, it is published to the broad, general public and anyone may purchase it. Which is the actual intent of the word, "publish".

I stated that above your "LOL" response, before you made your response. "published" means to "anyone, everyone" without qualification. That idea is opposite to the idea which you keep presenting which is "published means to a specific group of people". I state, "published to the public" and you state, "published to a public". This seems a very clear difference to me, and easily addressed as an issue, it revolving around a single word. Terryeo 23:18, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

Definitions of "Publish"

Princeton's WordNet

Verb

• S: (v) print, publish (put into print) "The newspaper published the news of the royal couple's divorce"; "These news should not be printed"
• S: (v) publish, bring out, put out, issue, release (prepare and issue for public distribution or sale) "publish a magazine or newspaper"
• S: (v) publish, write (have (one's written work) issued for publication) "How many books did Georges Simenon write?"; "She published 25 books during her long career"

Adjective

• S: (adj) published (prepared and printed for distribution and sale) "the complete published works Dickens"
• S: (adj) promulgated, published (formally made public) "published accounts"

Wikipedia Publish

"Publishing is the industry concerned with the production of literature or information – the activity of making information available for public view. In some cases, authors may be their own publishers. Traditionally, the term refers to the distribution of printed works such as books and newspapers. With the advent of digital information systems and the Internet, the scope of publishing has expanded to include websites, blogs, and the like. As a business, publishing includes the development, marketing, production, and distribution of newspapers, magazines, books, literary works, musical works, software, other works dealing with information. Publication is also important as a legal concept; (1) as the process of giving formal notice to the world of a significant intention, for example, to marry or enter bankruptcy, and; (2) as the essential precondition of being able to claim defamation; that is, the alleged libel must have been published."

Wiktionary [13]

1. (intransitive): To issue a publication.
2. (transitive): To issue something (usually printed work) for sale and distribution.
3. (transitive): To announce to the public.

I would argue that we do not need to go around tyring to find a definition of "published". Just use these or a combination of these. ≈ jossi ≈ t • @ 19:08, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

Jossi you keep coming back to "we don't need to", and yet when you are pressed on particular examples you fall back on some other policy like WP:V. Like the Supreme Court, you're skirting the main issue, on a technicality. Wjhonson 19:32, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

Jossi, I acknowledge that you don't like us formulating a editorial definition of "publish" here, but the editors in this discussion see a need to assist in preventing disputes. The dictionary definitions unfortunately don't quick succeed in that.--Fahrenheit451 20:27, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

The number of editors involved in this discussion, that agree to a look for a narrow definition of "published", does not warrant a change in this policy, IMO. My assertion is that there is no need to define what is already defined and widely accepted, and so far no one has been able to explain why there is a need for a definition that is different. All the discussions so far have been about finding a definition, and not about the need for a definition. Fort those forwarding the argument that "it will be helpful in avoiding disputes" I would respond, that maybe the issue here is that "it will be helpful in avoiding my disputes". We have a dispute resolution process in which users such as Terryeo and Fahrenheit451 can resolve content disputes. There is no need to change policy for that. ≈ jossi ≈ t • @ 20:45, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

I endorse what users ≈ jossi ≈ and Deco have been saying--this talk page contains a lot of non-productive fussing over something that is best left to editors' judgement and to the established methods for dispute resolution when conflicts occur. BTfromLA 20:52, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

I disagree with Jossi, BTfromLA, and Deco, and I agree with Fahrenheit451. There is too much fighting already over what is a reliable source and what constitutes original research. We need to get these definitions nailed down. We do not need to give the crackpots (I just took one to arbitration) and conspiracy theorists more leeway to sneak original research into Wikipedia. --Coolcaesar 03:42, 7 August 2006 (UTC)

Jossi and BTfromLA are right. 'Published,' 'reliable source,' and 'original research' have all been sufficiently defined at Wikipedia for a very long time; recent attempts here to redefine these terms are fatally flawed and will never pass muster and make into canon. FeloniousMonk 04:10, 7 August 2006 (UTC)

CC, I think this page fairly pins down what OR is. As for inventing a new definition of publishing, I don't see the point. Terryeo, can you give me an actual example of a situation where not knowing what the word "published" means has caused a problem in Wikipedia? SlimVirgin ^(talk) 05:02, 7 August 2006 (UTC)

Yes. this edit This extensive discussion Talk:Suppressive_Person#The_.22Cross-Hatting.22_paragraph came about because User:Fahrenheit451 made the edit which introduced quoted information referenced to an unpublished document which he cited. F451 said he had the document in his possession because he was once a member of the Church and had kept a copy. The document is unpublished. I quoted and cited from a published, available book which states that it is unpublished. Editor discussion then followed which revolved around the WP:V arguement, is the information verifiable. F451's arguement was that a person could verify the document by purchasing a course for $21,000.00 (or some vast figure) and could then verify it.

User:Really Spooky held high the torch, he and User:Fahrenheit451 did a small edit war over it.

User:Fahrenheit451 still insists the document is published, most recently stating; My point is that it IS published, but of rather limited distribution, which can make verifiability difficult.--Fahrenheit451 19:23, 24 July 2006 (UTC) [14] (difference). But I have repeatedly told him and quoted from a source that the document is not published, can not be purchased, and even when taking the course the student can only "listen to" the document and read its transcript. Terryeo 06:33, 7 August 2006 (UTC)

Terryeo, please stop misinforming the editors in this discussion. The student receives a copy of the transcript and gets to keep it. So, it is published, although to a small public. Here is an image link to a promotional leaflet for the course, which is published by the way [15] and [16]--Fahrenheit451 02:59, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

Nope, it is not published. Your document which you have in your possession was not purchased by you. The public can not purchase it. Even after I quoted the specific text which said so, you continued to insist it to be published. Probably you still think it is published.Terryeo 18:45, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

Yep, it is published. Those who do the course get a transcript, a fact you refuse to acknowledge.--Fahrenheit451 19:11, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

I do believe that almost all Wikipedia editors would reject Fahrenheit451's argument. There is no need to modify this policy to deal with an idiosyncratic interpretation pushed by a lone editor. I had largely tuned out this discussion because it seemed so fruitless. At this point I call for a sense of the house that the policy is adequate and that the bulk of Wikipedia editors are capable of understanding and applying this policy as it stands. I note that some editors have already affirmed such a position. This discussion really needs to end now. -- Donald Albury^(Talk) 11:58, 7 August 2006 (UTC)

Whew, thank you. Terryeo 14:51, 7 August 2006 (UTC)

You are thanking him for accepting your false information. Pretty crappy tactic, Terryeo.--Fahrenheit451 03:01, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

"Pretty crappy tactic" is uncivil. Terryeo 18:45, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

I agree with Donald. As for the specific Scientology example, I would urge the editors involved to seek dispute resolution, where neutral editors can make comments about that case, which at first glance seems quite straight forward and resolvable. ≈ jossi ≈ t • @ 15:27, 7 August 2006 (UTC)

I agree as well. It's a really bad idea to try to totally revamp policy to deal with the problematic edits and interpretations of one editor. Jayjg ^(talk) 15:36, 7 August 2006 (UTC)

Yes, this sounds like an application-enforcement issue, not a policy issue. BUT, if we did want to talk about policy, I would add that we should gnerally try not to rely on dictionaries (except for spelling). User:Slrubenstein

I agree. The document is unpublished. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 19:02, 7 August 2006 (UTC)

I had hoped a small clarification would prevent future disputes because past, similar disputes have happened. Specifically, User:ChrisO cited unpublished Class VIII lectures, much as User:Fahrenheit451 has cited unpublished administration documents.Terryeo 18:45, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

There is no evidence the cited lectures are "unpublished".--Fahrenheit451 19:23, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

So this whole thing is part of a dispute about scientology? Tough cases make bad law. We shouldn't use such a dispute as a basis for what our definition of whether something has been "published" is. As far as I can tell, there is no major dispute about what "published" means, and the dispute is not one which ought to be resolved by refining our definition of "published," but rather by the normal methods of WP:V. If Fahrenheit's statements can be verified by sources available to other people, it is acceptable. If not, it isn't, even if it's true. john k 19:33, 7 August 2006 (UTC)

This whole thing begin when Fahrenheit451 insisted that his document was published, when I quoted him text that said it wasn't he essentially called me a lier and implied the quotation from a published book did not exist. Terryeo 18:45, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

I think it's worth pointing out that Terryeo is the product of a culture (namely the Church of Scientology, of which he's a member) which is incredibly bureaucratic, bound by thousands of pages of procedures and dependent on dictionaries to define just about everything. I have the two main official Scientology dictionaries on my bookshelf - they're something like 1,200 pages long. See Study Tech#The Three Barriers to Study for some background on the Scientology approach which I think underlies Terryeo's contributions to this page. As regards the example quoted by Terryeo, I agree that the source in question isn't verifiable and shouldn't be used (and have said so on the related talk page). I completely endorse Jayjg's comments about it being a totally bad idea to revamp policy based on this one case. ChrisO 19:34, 7 August 2006 (UTC)

I consider it uncivil to consider me a product of a culture because I don't bring up the declared status you hold with the Church, a similar product of a similar culture. Terryeo 18:45, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

Unfortunately I think much of the impetus for Terryeo's involvement in this policy discussion is provided by a wish to gain advantage in Scientology-related arguments; discussions here have been followed up by fresh arguments on a range of Scientology article talk pages. It's also worth noting that Terryeo has confined his article space editing almost entirely to Scientology-related topics; his exposure to the wider context on Wikipedia is limited, to say the least. This isn't to say that Terryeo is automatically wrong on these issues, but he should bear in mind that an approach which seems natural and appropriate to a Scientologist isn't necessarily suitable for Wikipedia. -- ChrisO 19:34, 7 August 2006 (UTC)

You have never understood the simplicity of my statement. I work to adhere to Wikipedia policies and guidelines because it is my opinion if Wikipedia policy and guidelines are fulfilled, if reliable information is used, any and every article, including Scientology articles, will present good, reliable information to the reader. ChrisO has opposed my position in that regard many times and has frequently cited unplished information and used personal website information as a secondary source of information. Terryeo 18:45, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

I think Kasreyn's comments over at Talk:Suppressive Person during the original dispute are a propos for that particular dispute: The problem is not that they haven't been published. The problem is that they haven't been published where Wikipedia can get to them and cite them as sources. The sources have obviously been published. They are simply not verifiable because they haven't been published in a form where any significant number of wikipedians can verify them. The dispute has nothing to do with the definition of "published," the normal understanding of which would include things like the lectures in question. john k

I agree absolutely, I don't know why Terryeo has chosen this particular example. It's certainly not apposite to the definition of "published". -- ChrisO 19:40, 7 August 2006 (UTC)

I chose this one because it is most recent Terryeo 18:45, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

As an editor familiar with Terryeo's editing I can vouch that, to the best of my ability to assess such things, ChrisO's comments above about Terryeo's motivation and his Scientology-informed approach to rules and written definitions are exactly on the mark. BTfromLA 19:55, 7 August 2006 (UTC)

Let's keep our characterizations/assessment of fellow editors out of this debate, shall we? Regardless of what I or other editors think about the subject, there is no reason not to apply policy consistently across all articles. If material is published by a reliable source (better if that source is a secondary one, and if not, use caution) and if it is verifiable as per WP:V, that material is welcome in WP's articles. If not, it doesn't. If there are disputed gray areas as it pertains to that specific article, these can be taken through the WP:DR process. ≈ jossi ≈ t • @ 20:15, 7 August 2006 (UTC)

In general, I would agree with Jossi that comments about the motives or mentality of other editors are inappropriate. In my view, this is the exceptional case that proves the rule, and ChrisO is absolutely correct in saying that these matters are "worth pointing out" in the context of this particular discussion. BTfromLA 20:45, 7 August 2006 (UTC)

While you might think so, Policy says otherwise. Discussion pages are for issues, not personalities.Terryeo 18:45, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

I would prefer, BTfromLA, that these issues are dealt at article talk pages or at user RfCs, but not here. We should not single out a fellow editor, unless that editor is disruptive, and deserving an admonition for such behavior. I don't see any editor exhibiting such behavior in this discussion. Maybe a bit persistent, but hey, that is different.≈ jossi ≈ t • @ 20:59, 7 August 2006 (UTC)

Point taken. Terryeo has been an extremely disruptive editor in the Scientology pages, but if you don't see the relevance of that here, I certainly don't want to derail the discussion. There's no need for a more precise definition of "published." Have we reached a consensus on that at this point? BTfromLA 21:26, 7 August 2006 (UTC)

It's not an admonition - merely advice to Terryeo that he might want to take into account the fact that his perspective is possibly a rather narrow one. -- ChrisO 21:13, 7 August 2006 (UTC)

If you have a better method for applying Wikipedia's policy to editors who refuse to recognized the unpublished status of some documents, who insist that personal websites belong in articles as secondary sources, and who cite newsgroups and blogs, by all means, tell me about it. Terryeo 18:45, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

Seems to me that it's quite useful for anyone here who is not familiar with the context of this debate to be made aware of it. I arrived here having no idea what was going on, or why Terryeo was arguing the way he was. Knowing that he is a Scientologist, and that this argument arose out of a dispute on a scientology-related topic makes this considerably easier to understand. At any rate, I fully agree that there's no need for a more precise definition of "published," and that the dispute over the particular issue which seems to have brought about this discussion more clearly belongs in the domain of WP:V. john k 21:40, 7 August 2006 (UTC)

Legal definitions of "published" refer to restricted distribution of this nature as "unpublished." Govt departments distributing confidential documents to certain people doesn't count as "publication," for example. I would see the Scientology example as akin to that. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 21:55, 7 August 2006 (UTC)

Only it is not the same thing or closely similar. One is buying a course and receiving a recorded transcript that is one's property. Here is an image link of a promotional leaflet [17] and [18] for the course I refer to.--Fahrenheit451 03:20, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

Buying the course, in that case, does not give you possession of a transcript. Terryeo 18:45, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

Doing the course does give one ownership of the lecture transcript.--Fahrenheit451 19:22, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

(unindent) The most recent phase of this discussion started when User:Donald Albury that the current policy is adequate as it stands. There were then posts from seven editors agreeing that if a distributor imposes substantial restrictions on who can receive a work, the work is not verifiable for Wikipedia purposes, and that current policies and guidelines are sufficient to deal with any editor who cites such material in Wikipedia. I've always been ambivalent about whether there should be a policy or guideline change, but I've been firmly opposed to the wrong changes. The personal experiences that make this an issue for me have nothing to do with religion and everything to do with quasi-published information in the electronic design software arena. I'm content to leave the policies and guidelines as they are. --Gerry Ashton 23:27, 7 August 2006 (UTC)

I purposely did not review any of the edits and background to this so that I could stay objective. Regardless of how Terryeo might have behaved or what his motivations are, he is right. Whatever this document is, it is not held in either a public repository (like a library) or for sale to the general public and so it cannot be verified according to WP:V, pure and simple. plange 05:38, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

Refraining from review of edits or background information does not imply one will be objective, but it can lead one to be deceived and naive. The edit issue Terryeo has cited was settled 25 July 2006, and dredged up by him for his own propaganda purposes on 7 August 2006. We were discussing a possible definition of "publish", here. If you were to make an honest statement, you could have stated that no public repository has been identified or sale is exclusively to those individuals enrolled on the particular course. Your rehashing of this issue is unnecessary.--Fahrenheit451 07:19, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

To conclude this particular thread, Terryeo was unable to provide any real examples of a publication that fit his POV definition of "publish". His arguments for this definition were demolished. He then was allowed to change the subject and interject an attack on myself. That attack was dissapated and the status quo of "publish" remains. --Fahrenheit451 09:17, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

Fahrenheit, this is not the place for your statement. And it is completely untrue. I believe you still don't understand that your edit of an unpublished citation prompted this convoluted affair. Publish means "to the general, broad, public". Terryeo 18:17, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

Terryeo, my statement is verifiable fact. You refuse to acknowledge that your POV definition of publish started this whole mess. Publish does not mean "to the general, broad, public" and there is a consensus against your definition.--Fahrenheit451 19:09, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

Why this discussion started

This lengthy discussion originated by Terryeo claiming that the word "published" means "published to the public" and "public" being some abstract generality as "everyone". The edit cited by Terryeo I let go because this published material is of rather restricted distribution so as to be difficult at present to verify. That is the simplicity of it. We don't need any further rumor-mongering from Terryeo about how this developed. I have no objection to ending this discussion. However, I think that we have not heard the last of this distorted POV definition. Dispute resolution process, here we come.--Fahrenheit451 03:17, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

I stated many times, "broad, general public" and once used the word, 'everyone' as an illustration of 'anyone'. The discussion begin because more than one unpublished document has been used in the Scientology articles. In the most recent situation, editors (at last) agreed the document wasn't verifiable but it was never published. To regard the unpublished status as a stop, rather than hammer through "can it be verified" would have vastly simplified the situation. And, there is simply no need for the snipes which you take at me with "rumor - mongering" and "product of a culture", etc. It is even against policy to make statements of that nature. Terryeo 19:00, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

Wrong, this discussion began because you promoted your very faulty, "published to the public" definition. The issue you have dredged up for your own purposes was settled on 25 July 2006. Your generality of "editors agreed" is nonsense. I never sniped at you with "product of a culture". That is another rumor you are starting and I object to it. You are hereby advised to Knock it off.--Fahrenheit451 19:17, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

Definition of "published" — Resolved, we don't need another one, an informal poll

In an effort to get to the finish line:

RESOLVED: There is no need for a Wikipedia-specific definition of the word "published."

• Endorse. -- BTfromLA 05:45, 8 August 2006 (UTC)
• Endorse. -- ChrisO 07:50, 8 August 2006 (UTC)
• Endorse. -- john k 12:22, 8 August 2006 (UTC)
• Endorse. Jon Awbrey 14:00, 8 August 2006 (UTC)
• Endorse. -- ≈ jossi ≈ t • @ 15:38, 8 August 2006 (UTC)
• Endorse. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 15:40, 8 August 2006 (UTC)
• Endorse. Terryeo 19:01, 8 August 2006 (UTC)
• Endorse.--Fahrenheit451 19:18, 8 August 2006 (UTC)
• Endorse. If relevant, such a definition should be established on an article-specific basis. -- Deco 19:44, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

Another informal poll: Editors to take their personal disputes elsewhere

• Endorse. -- ≈ jossi ≈ t • @ 19:17, 8 August 2006 (UTC)
• Endorse.--Fahrenheit451 19:19, 8 August 2006 (UTC)
• Endorse. (As a reminder--I don't think anybody actually proposed this ought to be a site for personal wrangling) -- BTfromLA 19:27, 8 August 2006 (UTC)
• Endorse. --Siva1979^{Talk to me} 19:32, 8 August 2006 (UTC)
• Endorse. Terryeo and Fahrenheit clearly have a feud going on; this whole debate has been an extension of that. IMO, they should take it to dispute resolution rather than dragging the rest of us into it. -- ChrisO 19:33, 8 August 2006 (UTC)
• Present. --Gerry Ashton 19:47, 8 August 2006 (UTC)
• Not sure. Much of this discussion is only relevant to the specific content dispute at the article they're conflicting over, and they're trying to make it a matter of policy. Some of the discussion is vaguely relevant to the policy itself, but most of it should just be copy-paste moved to an appropriate talk page and followed up there. Deco 19:49, 8 August 2006 (UTC)
• Endorse. There's plenty to do during the best of times. Terryeo 22:13, 8 August 2006 (UTC)
• This talk page is Watchlist spam, it changes every few minutes. Go away. SchmuckyTheCat 23:51, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

The true meaning of Original Research

Dear friends:

Forgive me for being obtuse, but I always thought that the better encyclopedias were composed of articles written by experts who did original research in determining what points to emphasize, what authorities had to say in the field and just what the article MEANT to the readers of the encyclopedia.

Encyclopedia articles are quite often signed, either with a full name or initials.

Obviously I can't argue against this established policy of Wikipedia, but I don't fully understand it, even though I try to follow it in my Wiki-editing and Wiki-writing. Every writer picks and chooses his material, so there is inherent "originality" in what he accomplishes.

Second point, this dictum ("no original research") is more honored in the breach than the observance. Click on "Random article" in the column at the left, and you will probably get a screenful of original research — or a screenful of words that very seldom are backed up by any sources. Just try it.

As an aside, I refer you to Jonathan Club, an article which I just completed and in which I attempted to source every fact. Well, I didn't succeed, because there are one or two sentences that are still unsourced and (gasp!) an interpretation of the material that surrounds them. If you can figure out a way to write the piece without the (very few) interpretations, I would be glad to hear them — or rather, see them.

I hope to hear from you on both of the above points.

Yours sincerely,

GeorgeLouis 07:10, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

Re 1988, see [19] I'm hard at work looking for a source to determine if the 1940 chicken dinner was served with mashed potatoes or rice. Precis 08:37, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

Thanks, Precis, for going along with the humorous intent of the second part of my note, although your footnote goes to the wrong source, and maybe that was intentional. And now, my friends, can we not address the first part? Do not printed encyclopedia articles often have an author's voice, and don't they involve what WikiP calls "original research" that involves sorting out facts and reaching conclusions based upon them?

Sincerely,

GeorgeLouis 14:59, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

Yes, many articles lack sources, but editors are working hard at referencing these. If you see such an article, you can add {{unreferenced}} at the top of the article. This will tag this article as one that needs sources. As for your question about what "original research" means in the context of this project, I would argue that the Policy in a nutshell is a good answer: "Articles may not contain any previously unpublished arguments, concepts, data, ideas, statements, or theories. Moreover, articles may not contain any new analysis or synthesis of published arguments, concepts, data, ideas, or statements that serves to advance a position.". ≈ jossi ≈ t • @ 15:35, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

Well, to answer why that is, the encylopedia knows who to go after if they get things wrong. They also interview and hire the best people so they can trust that they are the subject experts needed. This here is a completely different animal. Anyone can edit, we don't ask for credentials, editors come and go, and so the way to protect WP is to ask no WP:OR please and cite everything.plange 15:54, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for your comments. I suppose criticizing the "No Original Research" rule is much like criticizing the doctrine of the Holy Ghost (or Spirit, if you like) in Catholicism. One may not understand it, but one must accept it.

Yours sincerely,

GeorgeLouis 19:01, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

Just think of V, NPOV, and NOR as the Trinity. Precis 22:16, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

But, we very much want you to understand it, so that you can provide informed support for it. There is an acculturation period for most Wikipedians. It is not always immediately clear why we do what we do and the way we do it. Part of that acculturation probably comes from watching what happens to articles when editors ignore the policies. Experience shows us that the best way to produce quality, useful articles is adherence to the policies. We have no way of verifying who contributors are, or what their expertise is. Therefore, we cannot take anything that someone says on just their say so. The only way we can judge the validity of material added to articles is to look at the sources cited for it. If you still have questions about any of the policies, ask them. We'll try to answer them as best we can. There is no penalty in Wikipedia for questioning policies, or suggesting changes, as long as the discussion stays on talk pages until consensus is reached. Making edits against policy, or trying to unilaterally make significant changes to policy, will get a reaction, however. -- Donald Albury^(Talk) 22:29, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

Friends, I know exactly what the rule is; the problem is that, carried to its logical conclusion, every single sentence would have to be sourced, and we all know that is just not happening and will not happen. Take this section from Yoyogi Park, for example:

What is now Yoyogi Park was the site of the first successful powered aircraft flight in Japan, on December 19, 1910, by Captain Yoshitoshi Tokugawa, following which it became an army parade ground.

Yeah, who said? No source. And the reference at the bottom of the article leads to a Web site in Japanese. Yet the article as a whole is a good contribution to WikiP if you don't read Japanese. None of the editors who have worked on it during the past two years have flagged it as unsourced. Should it be? Take a look at it and let me know. Thanks very much for your time. I appreciate your comments. Sincerely, GeorgeLouis 05:45, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

You could insert the source [20], unless this site lifted its info from the WP article Yoyogi Park. Thanks for the eagle eye. If you find any more unverifiable material, just let us know :) Precis 07:44, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Well, Precis, that is a very interesting page (in English, too), but it does not say anything about powered aircraft flights, Capt. Tokugawa or army parade grounds. As I mentioned above, you could click on any "Random article" and find similar unsourced material, so the stricture against "no original research" is really a hollow one. I really do not think most WikiP writers know HOW to credit their material within the body of their work (if they care to at all); college professors have struggled for decades to help students learn this technique, and I think most high school teachers have just given up.

Sincerely, GeorgeLouis 16:17, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

I think in general one should distinguish between an article being cited and an article being original research. If one started an article on Charles Dickens, and wrote, without giving any sources, "Charles Dickens was a 19th century English novelist who wrote Oliver Twist, David Copperfield, Great Expectations, and many other novels," that would not be original research, it would just be unreferenced. Those are not the same thing. I think one of the basic issues here is that one should assume good faith. If a change looks like a good faith contribution, and one's own knowledge is not sufficient to tell one if it's true or not, one should assume the person is not inserting original research (or wrong information). One can still ask for sources, and the more dubious the particular piece of information seems to you, the more you should do this. Something is not original research because it isn't sourced. Something is original research because it can't be sourced. john k 17:04, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

I do think GeorgeLewis has a very good point, though I don't think it has as much to do with the policy of banning original research as it does with a tendency toward absurdly literal-minded application of WP:NOR and WP:CITE. Some editors seem to think that any original sentence constitutes original research, and that every fact, no matter how uncontroversial, requires a citation. I've seen those policies used as a sort of cudgel to combat contents that an editor who is an aggressive advocate on a topic dislikes, even when the facts in question are not in dispute. Demands for citations of every detail and every adjective can disrupt the editing process, and--most importantly--lead to ugly, clotted articles, for which the existence of citations seem to trump all other editorial standards. Is there an ongoing discussion somewhere about these issues? BTfromLA 17:31, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

<<Something is not original research because it isn't sourced. Something is original research because it can't be sourced.>> This is probably this best distinction I have seen and perhaps should be added to the Original Research page, wherever that might be.

I think the distinction can also be made between an article that states "The speed of light is 186,000 miles an hour" (no source needed because it is common knowledge) and "The Ferrari was traveling 96 miles an hour when it hit the light pole, according to information taken from the onboard data recorder and quoted in the police report at www.malibucops.com/Ferrari.html" (source needed).

We can't go around needing a citation for "George Washington wore wooden false teeth," but we would need one for "Sammy Stutz, the drummer in Four Little Dood-Heads, carried a four-leaf clover for luck at each concert in months beginning with the letter J." It's really up to the article writer (and the editor) to be able to make a distinction between commonly known data that needn't be sourced and lesser-known data that should be sourced so that readers can look it up themselves if they are so minded. Sincerely, GeorgeLouis 20:54, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

As I understand it, George has a question and a criticism of the policy. As to the criticism: I think the apple pie exception, which is pretty well-underdtood by experienced editors, takes care of what seems to be your concern for extreme applications of the poplicy. As to your initial question, your question contains the answer. Other encyclopedia articles are written by recognized scholars and vetted by boards of recognized scholars. Wikipedia is not. The NOR rule is the main compensation for our not having articles written by established scholars nor vetted by an editorial board. It is one way we police ourselves. Slrubenstein | Talk 21:07, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

And there is a very good reason why we should provide a source for everything, because George Washington did NOT wear wooden false teeth.George Washington's false teeth not wooden -- Donald Albury^(Talk) 01:30, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

That's a funny article--how his false teeth will allow unappreciated aspects of Washington's personality to be expressed in sculpture beats me. But I disagee that everything should be sourced--there needs to be some threshold. Facts that are neither a subject of legitimate dispute nor key to further research on the topic at hand shouldn't be subject to reflexive demands for citations--it adds needless work to the editing process and makes the articles more difficult to read: gobs of irrelevant citations don't help the articles. For example, let's imagine that an article on Dentures includes the following bit: "George Washington, the first President of the United States, is a man whose false teeth became the stuff of legend; the image of Washington's wooden dentures is familiar to generations of American schoolchildren, despite the fact that Washington's teeth were actually carved from hippopatamus ivory." How much of this needs to be sourced? The story of the so-called wooden teeth being identified as ivory, certainly. But do we need to verify that the story of wooden teeth was told to schoolchildren? Or that Washington was President? Or that he was a man? At some point, the citations become counter-productive and even silly. BTfromLA 01:59, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

I see so many editors make the argument that we don't need to cite common knowledge, so every time I see a bit of common knoledge mentioned that isn't really true, I have to jump on it. I don't know what the upper limit on the number of citations we should have in an article is, but we are nowhere near it. I think it is a bit premature to be complaining about too many citations in an article. I think that there is no choice in the matter; if someone asks for a citation, provide it. -- Donald Albury^(Talk) 22:59, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

Do you really think it would be a productive use of editor's time and an improvement to Wikipedia to provide citations verifying the fact that George Washington was President, or was a man--in an article on dentures? (And, yes, I'm aware of the claim that John Hanson and six others were president before Washington... but I don't really think the dentures article is the place for that digression, do you?) This is not so far-fetched an example as it may seem. Folks who have edited the Scientology articles, for example, will recognize that ill-conceived demands for citations related to material or sources that an editor personally dislikes have derailed the editorial process and driven good faith editors away. (This also tends to shift editorial attention from questions of readibility and relevance to whether or not something is "cited," leading to overlong point-counterpoint lists of claims, charges and anecdotes in articles about contentious topics.) I'd agree that, overall, Wikipedia isn't over-footnoted--far from it. In general, more and better reference sources are to the good of the project. But the demand for citations can be abused, and it seems to me that we should make an effort to create an environment where principals of good editing are not trumped by mechanical application of rules. BTfromLA 16:27, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

You'll be telling me that he never cut down the cherry tree next! ;-) -- ChrisO 15:44, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

As I understand it, Washington ate the brains of his opponents and invented cocaine. This fact is sadly under-reported, as are numerous others found at the site linked. john k 19:00, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

Well, there you go. John found some vital information on the 'Net, excerpted it, added it to WikiP, sourced it and went to bed a happy man and a productive Netizen. We should all be so fecund. GeorgeLouis 05:01, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

I think part of the confusion arises from the difference between the Wikipedia policy of 'NOR' and the academic usage of the phrase 'original research'. Furthermore I think it would be worth clarifying this point as I believe it is an important factor in discouraging many humanities academics from contributing to Wikipedia, as I have personally encountered a number who feel they do not understand how to adhere to NOR. The Wikipedia definition assesses individual words, sentences and statements to establish whether they can be traced to reputable sources. By contrast the academic definition looks at the piece as a whole to consider whether it makes, as a whole, an original contribution. In the humanities, and particularly in history, a piece of work can be 'original research' even when it advances no new interpretations or causal narrative whatsoever, but merely brings together bits of information which were previously uncollated. Historiography is partly the act of collation - and finding the information to include, and selecting what to exclude, may under certain circumstances be enough on its own to constitute 'original research' for academic purposes. The dividing line between a term paper and original research is not, contrary to popular opinion, always the use of unpublished sources, or even the advocacy of a new line of argument, but can also be the attempt to address a subject for the first time, even if all the sources used are other scholarly publications (I take this definition from the rules of my own university). Such collation of materials is what many Wikipedia articles have to do, since for many minor historical topics, it may be that no sustained discussion of the topic in question has ever been published, although there may be an adequate supply of published references to draw upon which address discrete aspects of a topic. Articles of this type are NOR in a Wikipedia sense, because the individual sentences can be sourced, but may feel to an academic like 'original research', albeit of a fairly simple kind, where the completed article makes an 'original contribution' by collating pre-existing knowledge. I would suggest including in the WP an explicit acknowledgment of the difference between the Wikipedia meaning of 'NOR' and the possible implications of the phrase for professional academics and graduate students, especially historians. I think this might help to bring more subject specialists into Wikipedia, ensuring that its historical articles conform to the highest scholarly standards. Happydemic 03:34, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

Dear Happy—

Good suggestion. How about boiling it down into one or two succinct sentences?

Sincerely, GeorgeLouis 05:01, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

Sure. To be added either to the 'Expert Editors' section or in the (in my opinion rather confusing) 'Primary and Secondary Sources' section: 'Note that the Wikipedia definition of original research is specific to Wikipedia and may differ from usages of the phrase in other contexts. Wikipedia articles may, and sometimes must, bring together information which is not collated elsewhere. Provided that all factual and analytical statements made could, if requested, be referenced to reputable published sources, a contribution meets the criterion of "no original research".' Happydemic 14:14, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

Well done, Happydemic! BTfromLA 16:29, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

Thanks - I've relocated this into a new section (below) to encourage more comments. Happydemic 17:12, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

Coincidentally, I have been experiencing a need today to express similar thoughts to George, independently of you guys, and, I suspect, thousands of miles to your east. I've never really liked the sound of the NOR thing, it always sounded like navel-obsessed project anoraks making trouble for themselves. Recently I coined a couple of acronyms which I find necessary in my area of research - linguistics - put them on disambiguation pages, and nobody has objected. The thing I could prove is the need for them, and the fact that one of them has been used elsewhere (by myself!). I looked into the history of the policy on the article page, and at once understood. Yes, modern physics does have cranks with crackpot theories, common sense seems to tell you that, but perhaps the latter's not all that common. I think Wiki chair Jim Wales is a shrewd judge of these matters to highlight the problem, but to me, this should have resulted in giving him a stake in the modern physics debate, qualified or not, rather than a desire and a mission to persecute genuine original research. And there is a contradiction in the birth of the policy: surely Wales's perception that some physics theories were cranky, a perception shared by myself and no doubt many others, is itself original research - and none the worse for it!?

I think Precis hit a nail on the head, also: 'Just think of V, NPOV, and NOR as the Trinity.' Authoritarians tend to nurture, promote and protect rules uncritically out of all proportion to their humble provenance, till they become just like another kind of cult - we must watch out for this, not just the things we've been told to watch out for.

I'm with you, George - and for research and originality - yes, even in an online encyclopedia, with no immediate prospect of payment, recognition, or reward. --Etaonsh 20:20, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

I've created a new section - Proposal: State that "no original research" has a specific meaning on Wikipedia - for discussion of the wording I proposed above, which GeorgeLouis and BTfromLA appeared to support. Please have a look and accept or reject, or make suggestions for amendment. This wording does not address many of the issues raised in this discussion, but it does aim to clarify the question of information collation. Happydemic 17:12, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

I guess that my main problem with the ban on "original research" is that it really seems too authoritarian and closed-minded. After all, the whole idea of wikipedia is to be *different* from paper encyclopedias, it isnt just a matter of it being on the internet, the whole spirit of the internet is open-mindedness and belief in the public's ability to sort things out on their own, *without* a god-like authority repressing everyone supposedly "to help them". Since anyone can easily edit any page, what is the big deal with original research? If somebody disagrees with it, or has a source that disargees, they can just write that into the article. I think that would be by far the more democratic and the greatly easier and much less power-driven way to deal with "original research". Unfortunately while the page on "No Original Research" pretends to be open-minded, it's clear from the comments of the wikipedia founder about the policy designed against "cranks" and "trolls" that its anything but open-minded - the fact is that these editors really do assume anything which is not "verifiable" from a "reliable" source is somehow false or crazy, and that only an insane person would ever post it. That really does seem the core assumption involved, an assumption which is very anti-thetical to the whole meaning of the internet, and to my mind, wikipedia as well. So to repeat, i really wish wikipedia would get rid of the ban on "original research" for many reasons, having to do first of all with the *very* fuzzy definition of "original research", it seems to be based on a very arbitrary and subjective point of view, secondly, the points made earlier by someone that you can easily point to examples of "original research" to some extent in all wikipedia articles, and thirdly the very vague nature of what is a "reliable" source. Fourthly, the solution is to just allow everyone to edit all the articles, that way if someone thinks some "original research" is erroneous they can just try to prove their point, this could lead to a constructive approach which over time, with many many users and many many attempts, would produce a way better article. Sometimes someone might have an idea which definitely does belong in an encyclopedia even if they dont necessasrily have access to multiple "reliable" sources. It is an errant assumption to think that the meaning of "reliable" can be known objectively. Thanks, thats all i had to say. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Lacking Lack (talk • contribs)

I would suggest you take some time to digest what our policies are and how these are applied to content, before you pass judgement or offer insights on how to make these better, remove them, etc. Somebody has already welcomed you and placed useful pointers in your talk page. I invite you to explore these and contribute some content within policies and see how that works for you. ≈ jossi ≈ t • @ 20:18, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

Yes i was glad that the person at least tried to give me some tips or hints but i still think that my original point stands, just telling someone they need to "digest" is not really a good answer to their complex argumentation about something. Perhaps i was just wrong about what i thought wikipedia was, i really do enjoy reading the articles sometimes, and i have learned a lot from wikipedia and maybe you are right that the risk of crazy people is too great to permit "unverified claims" but it just seems so robotic and bland if all we are allowed to do is basically repeat what someone else has already said for our articles. It would seem that wikipedia-formation could almost be mechanized. Lacking Lack 07:54, 19 August 2006 (UTC)

I sometimes think of rules as being there for bad people/bad days. 'Those who are led by the Spirit aren't bound by the Law.' --Etaonsh 09:46, 19 August 2006 (UTC)

When I write something, I hope people will read what I wrote and believe me. Since Wikipedia readers know nothing about me, and most of them don't even know my name, I need a way to convince them that what I wrote is likely to be true. The way to do that is to cite reliable sources.

Also, source based research can be just as challenging as original research; there are many sources to choose from, and deciding which ones are worth mentioning and which should be ignored is no easy task. Finally, while we can't include original research, we can use original research to exclude material. Suppose I find a source that claims a certain electronic circuit will work a certain way. I can build the circuit, and find it does not work as claimed. Instead of adding the material to an aricle, as I originally intended to do, I can just put the dust cover on my keyboard. --Gerry Ashton 15:12, 19 August 2006 (UTC)

And how do you then address the issue of another contributor that states that the circuit does work based on the mentioned source? He does not bother to build it and is perhaps incapable of doing so or of interpreting the results of his experiment. How do you now address that with your covered keyboard? You certainly cannot delete his edit, it is correctly sourced; nor can you add your results, you are unpublished.--Justanother 18:51, 22 August 2006 (UTC)