Wikipedia:Fringe theories/Noticeboard

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Fringe theories noticeboard - dealing with all sorts of pseudoscience
Before posting, make sure you understand this short summary of relevant policies and advice and particularly the guideline on treating fringe theories. Also, check the archives for similar discussions. We can help determine whether the topic is fringe and if so, whether it is treated accurately and impartially. Our purpose is not to remove any mention of fringe theories, but to describe them properly. Never present fringe theories as fact. If you mention specific editors, you should notify them. You may use {{subst:ftn-notice}} to do so.
Search this noticeboard & archives Lowercase sigmabot III will archive sections older than 20 days Additional notes: Discussion of fringe theories will only depend on coverage in reliable sources. Medicine-related claims must comply with more stringent sourcing requirements, but we also generally prefer academic sources. We are not a forum to discuss fringe theories as such. Our goal is to improve articles about them, or create new ones if needed. For concerns about neutrality in articles not about fringe theories, use the neutral point of view noticeboard. Report article content that appears to violate the no original research rule at this noticeboard. Paste {{Resolved|Your reason here ~~~~}} at the top of the section when your concern was addressed. Deploy {{talk fringe|the fringe theory name}} to articles' talkpages under discussion.
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Jordan Peterson

The article on Jordan Peterson is clearly written by cultish fans intent on burying his numerous positions which conflict with reality, including his overt climate denial, his promotion of anti-vax ideas, his pro-Putin, pro-Russia stance, his right-wing talking points, and his continuing struggle with mental illness and drug addition. Strangely, none of this is found in the lead section. Viriditas (talk) 21:30, 19 April 2024 (UTC)

I gave up on the article, too much of a mess. Doug Weller talk 17:37, 20 April 2024 (UTC)

Yeah. While I'm quite thoroughly aware of Peterson I question whether I have the patience, time or willingness to probably end up at an arbcom enforcement discussion that trying to fix that mess would engender. Simonm223 (talk) 18:11, 20 April 2024 (UTC)

Can't read the lede without getting the urge to tag every line, sometimes several times.. Luther Blissetts (talk) 22:38, 21 April 2024 (UTC)

Should we at least throw on a NPOV tag? —blindlynx 19:50, 25 April 2024 (UTC)

I think maybe an RfC on the article to rewrite the lede might help, and, if issues persist, a WP:BLUELOCK. Allan Nonymous (talk) 22:33, 5 May 2024 (UTC)

Speaking of which, there's a particular slant to Ralston College, the place he's chancellor of. Reconrabbit 19:37, 22 April 2024 (UTC)

I'm carefully making a few small edits to the article to at least push it a bit in the right direction. We'll see what happens. Allan Nonymous (talk) 22:12, 5 May 2024 (UTC)

This article is way too long. I would suggest to cut all the "views and works" stuff into a daughter article, and just put a summary in the main article - which seems largely innocuous. We can then clean up the daughter article, with a lot of deletion. Wdford (talk) 13:11, 17 May 2024 (UTC)

@Wdford: I have no stake in this (I'm in the same boat as Simonm223, I don't want to get involved) but here's the section sizes, if it helps. Views takes up 40.24% of the article, so I agree that a split to a Views of Jordan Peterson article (cf. Views of Richard Dawkins, Views of Kanye West, Views of Elon Musk) is probably warranted. — Kodiak Blackjack (talk) • (contribs) 19:46, 20 May 2024 (UTC)

LOL I didn't take my own advice and ended up vaguely involved at Jorpy's page. Simonm223 (talk) 20:15, 20 May 2024 (UTC)

This has now led to a dispute over whether the presentation of Peterson's areas of academic focus and overall impact are appropriately structured in a way that is normal for academic bibliography or whether it's violating WP:NPOV by presenting him as having a much broader area of focus and far more overall academic impact than he really does. The page is now fully edit protected. Simonm223 (talk) 19:11, 27 May 2024 (UTC)

Reliably published book with a fringe chapter, The Geology of the Atlantic Ocean

The first chapter has a lot of fringe, eg [1] Searching that you can find:

"... Celts Perhaps earliest expeditions were those of Celts whose presumed records in Ogam script occur at many places in eastern North America ( Fig . 1 A), where the new- comers could have became established as hunters and farmers . The ..."

'... Celts , Iberians , and Libyans were associated in their explorations and settlements in the New World . Occasional presence of Egyptian Numidian , Hebrew , Basque , Roman , and "se scripts or words shows , reasonably enough , that..."

"... Libyans , all of whose ship routes lay nearby ( Fig . 1 ). Greek visits to the New World are uncertain . Al- though many short inscriptions in Greek are known and some words of Algonquian appear to be derived from that language , these ..."

"... Celtic ships . A stele in Yucatan denotes in Iberian the route of an expe- dition under the command of a Hanno , prince of Car thage . In fact, most of the identified sites have inscrip- tions in Celtic or Libyan as well as in Iberian ..."

"... Libyans were much influenced by the Greeks after Alexander's conquest of Egypt in 332 B.C. In fact, western New Guinea cave - wall inscriptions made in 232 B.C. by two Libyan captains , Maui and Rata , describe Eratosthenes ' ( of...a" which I think is from this fringe document.[2]

I don't think any of this is being used as a source for articles, but should it be discussed at RSN? Doug Weller talk 12:59, 11 May 2024 (UTC)

If it is not used as a source, what is the point? --Hob Gadling (talk) 19:57, 11 May 2024 (UTC)

@Hob Gadling The book itself is used in various articles, not that chapter. My question is that given the clear lack of proper editorial oversight, should this be taken to RSN as being unreliable for all of the book? Doug Weller talk 11:33, 17 May 2024 (UTC)

Sorry, my bad. For some reason I thought the chapters had individual authors. They don't. This is all written by two authors, which for me casts doubt on all of the book. Doug Weller talk 11:37, 17 May 2024 (UTC)

Ah, that makes more sense. --Hob Gadling (talk) 12:09, 17 May 2024 (UTC)

WP:RSCONTEXT reminds us that context matters for reliable sources. Kenneth O. Emery was a marine geologist, and Elazar Uchupi was likewise trained in geology. A source that is reliable for certain claims (like the physiography of the Atlantic Ocean, a matter Emery and Uchupi seem trained and reputed for) can be unreliable for other claims (like trans-Atlantic oceanic voyages before the 1400s, a matter I would turn to archaeologists and historians for). Hydrangeans (she/her | talk | edits) 17:17, 17 May 2024 (UTC)

Even for most scientific claims a book first published in 1984 is too old in context. Those are eminent scientists of the 1960s-1980s, not today. We really shouldn't be widely using this source. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 17:44, 17 May 2024 (UTC)

Guy McPherson

Guy McPherson is a professor in AZ who makes predictions. In 2007, he predicted that due to peak oil there would be permanent blackouts in cities starting in 2012. In 2012, he predicted the "likely" extinction of humanity by 2030 due to climate-change, and mass die-off by 2020 "for those living in the interior of a large continent". In 2018, he was quoted as saying "Specifically, I predict that there will be no humans on Earth by 2026". He has been interviewed on film, tv, radio, etc.. and is frequently the go-to person if you want an extreme version of climate change, peak oil, etc... He has a following.

He has been described by climate scientist Michael E. Mann as a "doomist cult hero." Michael Tobis, a climate scientist from the University of Wisconsin, said McPherson "is not the opposite of a denialist. He is a denialist, albeit of a different stripe." Andrew Revkin in The New York Times said McPherson was an "apocalyptic ecologist ... who has built something of an 'End of Days' following." The lead section summarizes these POVs, saying he engages in "fringe theories".

On the talk page, User:PESchneider, who has a disclosed COI with McPherson, has requested we remove "fringe theory" because this is a pejorative phrase and not in line with BLP, that McPherson bases his work on science papers, etc..

Should we characterize McPherson as a fringe theorist in the article, or some other wording? -- GreenC 17:35, 12 May 2024 (UTC)

Yes, near term human extinction is a fringe theory. Allan Nonymous (talk) 18:57, 13 May 2024 (UTC)

His speech on near term human extinction is on the blacklisted site globalresearch.ca according to his user page. His memories were published by PublishAmerica, now America Star Books and probably self-published. He doesn't have a COI with McPherson, according to his use page he IS McPherson. His userpage is a copy of the article as he first wrote it[3] and I believe at least that part should be deleted.

The list of his books on his article is too long and and written entirely by him which explains the number of books written by iterations of PublishAmerca, a book published by the now defunct TayenLane publishing (see [4]. Doug Weller talk 13:08, 17 May 2024 (UTC)

He wrote the existing one sentence description in the lead. I guess he's still technically there as [5] lists him as a professor emeritus, but he no longer seems to be teaching there.[6], THe last part of his list of accomplishments there is interesting.[7]. "America's Registry of Outstanding Professionals" seems very dubious although used in three articles.[8] A couple there seem ok, eg American Men & Women of Science. Doug Weller talk 13:45, 17 May 2024 (UTC)

Original research and fringe (Shakespeare authorship question; Islamo-Arabic contributions in history of science) at Safa Khulusi

There is a discussion at Wikipedia:No original research/Noticeboard#Original research and fringe at Safa Khulusi which is relevant to this noticeboard. Please participate there. ☿ Apaugasma (talk ☉) 08:48, 13 May 2024 (UTC)

I reverted the massive restoration and told them to discuss on the talk page, as well as briefly commenting there. Based on their behavior and that this is a new account, I'd suggest looking into the page history to see who added that material originally, and seeing if the latest account might be connected. For example, this account seems to have added a lot of material back in 2011 and 2012. See also this ANI thread and this SPI about that user. Crossroads ^-talk- 18:51, 13 May 2024 (UTC)

Yes, both the old accounts and the new one seem to be heavily focused on the Eric Ormsby quote (the "large quote" Boing was talking about in the ANI; cf. [9][10] vs [11][12][13]). Very likely the same user. Not sure if it's worth an SPI (accounts are going to be stale), but a clear consensus on the article talk or the NORN thread may help to prevent future disruption. ☿ Apaugasma (talk ☉) 20:32, 13 May 2024 (UTC)

Reichstag fire

• Reichstag fire (edit | visual edit | history) · Article talk (edit | history) · Watch

I think that the article has WP:FALSEBALANCE; see Talk:Reichstag fire#Consensus. Historians may disagree with me. --Hob Gadling (talk) 06:34, 14 May 2024 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard#Suissa and Sullivan

Since a big part of the argument is whether it's acceptable to cite a fringe source for non-fringe content, this may be of interest. Adam Cuerden ^(talk)_{Has about 8.8% of all FPs.} 02:40, 16 May 2024 (UTC)

Yakub (Nation of Islam) has a new infobox

Which reads as though he was real. Doug Weller talk 10:58, 18 May 2024 (UTC)

No infobox is best infobox atm until I can find a better one. Apologies for the confusion, I just wanted to put the photo NAADAAN (talk) 15:16, 18 May 2024 (UTC)

{{Infobox character}} possibly, since he's a mythological figure.--Auric talk 21:06, 19 May 2024 (UTC)

Depending on how "Yakub" is viewed within the religion, Template:Infobox deity or Template:Infobox saint may be appropriate. Both Template:Infobox person and Template:Infobox character could probably be modified well enough to make it work for this page. AnandaBliss (talk) 17:47, 20 May 2024 (UTC)

Gregorian Bivolaru

Paranoid conspiracy theories are being stated in the voice of Wikipedia, see [14]. Note: this is a different issue from that reported at WP:NORN. tgeorgescu (talk) 19:25, 18 May 2024 (UTC)

Yeah, I took a quick run at that article before I saw you'd linked it here, and I cut that bit out entirely because it was definitely fringe/conspiracy-esque, but there's still a lot of the same kind of conspiratorial thinking about the subject's persecution left, and a lot of it was added today. EasyAsPai (talk) 19:59, 18 May 2024 (UTC)

Yup, I'm not saying that WP:SOURCES written by Ion Cristoiu and Gabriel Andreescu would have been misleading or "wrong", just that they have been superseded by more recent events. Cristoiu and Andreescu were perfectly entitled to write about the abuses of the Romanian state and the villainies of the press, but the full truth became obvious much latter, when Finland and France issued European Arrest Warrants for Bivolaru, and the French authorities did arrest him in France (again).

Meaning: following a standard pattern that some occult forces use in their attempt to control and destroy any spiritual movement and any authentic spiritual guide, including Gregorian Bivolaru is a paranoid conspiracy theory. And that source is hagiography. tgeorgescu (talk) 21:07, 18 May 2024 (UTC)

Tariq Nasheed

User:Kodiak Blackjack has been heavily editing this article. Their latest edit is here[15] and changed "Tariq Allah Nasheed is an American film producer, and internet personality. He is best known for his Hidden Colors film series, as well as his commentary and promotion of conspiracy theories on social media.

tp: Tariq Allah Nasheed is an American filmmaker, anti-racism activist, and media personality. He is best known for his Hidden Colors film series, as well as his controversial views and commentary on race relations in the United States, institutional racism, and dating. plus other changes. Do we use newsone.com? I also see some old sources marked unreliable by Headbomb's script , eg YouTube, a tweet, etc. {{ref kust}} Doug Weller talk 16:03, 19 May 2024 (UTC)

Hey, so I think you could've talked to me about this on my talk page before taking the nuclear option and bringing it to the noticeboard. You know, WP:GOODFAITH and all that?

I would say the bulk of my edits to the page have mainly been updating references (eg. giving them consistent refnames, making them list-defined, checking for dead sources, archiving, etc.) and resorting the prose from the Career and Views and reception into appropriate subheaders. I added a section to Personal life about his swatting in 2018, a subsection about his YouTube channel to his infobox (a la Jake Paul), and I did change the lede as you mentioned. I understand that when looking at diffs from before and after, the changes to the article seem pretty substantial, but I think you'll find that the majority of the prose is exactly the same as it was, but maybe just in a different place in the article.

• Re: the lede, I changed it because it's a more accurate summary of who he is and what he does. He is a media personality, not just an internet personality - he had already achieved some notoriety as an author in the early 2000s, before the Internet took off. The NewsOne/Dawson article lists those as what he's best known for, and it's more informative than the NYT opinion piece referenced previously (which is also behind a registration wall), which only mentions him once.
• Re: the YouTube video and Tweet. The YouTube video is his interview with KTTV about the swatting, which was reuploaded to his channel, and was referenced and embedded in the Atlanta Black Star article. The Tweet from IcePoseidon is his response to Nasheed, which is also embedded in the Atlanta Black Star article, and referenced to link back to/archive the primary source. Both are only supplementary to the actual article.

Not trying to make any huge waves here. Just trying to flesh out his page. — Kodiak Blackjack (talk) • (contribs) 16:46, 19 May 2024 (UTC)

I don’t doubt your good faith and note I didn’t revert you, came here for more opinions. Doug Weller talk 17:35, 19 May 2024 (UTC)

Ah, okay. I'm sorry if I came off as a bit overly defensive there, Doug. Anything in particular you want my opinion on?

• When it comes to the NewsOne article: I don't see any reason not to use it on the page, per se. I found this old RS discussion on the matter from 2023, and the consensus there was more or less "depends on a case-by-case basis, treat it like you would Buzzfeed." As far as I can tell, the article seems to be accurate, and there's a fair bit of information there that I haven't found elsewhere yet, so it'd be a big help when it comes to expanding Nasheed's page.
• I'm not familiar with Headbomb's script, so I don't know what sources it's flagging as unreliable. Anything besides the tweet from IcePoseidon and the YouTube video?
• As an aside, I can't find a single reliable source that says his middle name is Allah. I'm pretty sure it's something a vandal snuck into the article for the lulz and it's stayed there since. I'm inclined to get rid of it, but I'd feel like an ass if it was true.

...And it looks like most of my edits just got reverted by @Grayfell:. Summoning him here.— Kodiak Blackjack (talk) • (contribs) 20:47, 19 May 2024 (UTC)

"More opinions" means "opinions from more people". This is not the old "I want a second opinion, doctor" - "you are also ugly" joke. This noticeboard is for notifying knowledgeable people of an ongoing discussion so they can go there and participate in it. --Hob Gadling (talk) 06:52, 20 May 2024 (UTC)

Woah, hey, I'm sorry. I didn't really pick up on what he meant by that. My bad. — Kodiak Blackjack (talk) • (contribs) 19:07, 20 May 2024 (UTC)

Middle name was added here. The ref in the infobox for the middle name was not reliable and somebody at some point removed the name and ref from the infobox but apparently missed it in the lead. Schazjmd (talk) 20:55, 19 May 2024 (UTC)

There are fringe issues here, for sure. There are also WP:BLP issues, and unreliable source issues, and due weight issues. Some of these changes were, as Kodiak Blackjack says, non-controversial, but this probably isn't the place to go into detail about which work and which don't. Briefly, Nasheed is both a conspiracy theorist (per sources) and commonly a target of other conspiracy theorists. Figuring out how to summarize this is difficult, but downplaying it by removing it from the lead won't work. Grayfell (talk) 21:00, 19 May 2024 (UTC)

@Schazjmd: Okay, thanks. Glad that's out of there, at least.

@Grayfell: Gonna address this one point at a time:

There are fringe issues here, for sure.

He's a fringe topic. Isn't it kind of unavoidable that fringe issues would crop up?

There are also WP:BLP issues

So, re: stochastic terrorism, since I assume this is what you're referring to - I don't see how it's not?

Definition of stochastic terrorism per its own article is:

"when a political or media figure publicly demonizes a person or group in a way that inspires supporters of the figure to commit a violent act against the target of the communication. Unlike incitement to terrorism, this is accomplished by using indirect, vague, or coded language that allows the instigator to plausibly disclaim responsibility for the resulting violence. A key element is the use of social media and other distributed forms of communications where the person who carries out the violence has no direct connection to the users of violent rhetoric."

• ✔️ Ice Poseidon is a media figure.
• ✔️ He publicly demonized Tariq Nasheed (as per his Tweet, which is also embedded in the Atlanta Black Star article), calling him "evil" and a "professional victim" (in the immediate wake of him getting swatted).
• ✔️ A reasonable person can assume that this would inspire Ice Poseidon's supporters, who have a history of anti-black racism (per Asarch 2018 and the Atlanta Black Star article) and have been implicated in similar swatting attempts against Nasheed before (per the KTTV interview, which is in the Atlanta Black Star article), to commit more violent acts against Nasheed, a black man, in the future.
• ✔️ The Tweet uses indirect, vague, or coded language that allows Ice Poseidon to deny responsibility for any resulting violence.
• ✔️ This took place over social media.

It's stochastic terrorism. If a reliable source says Alice set Bob's house on fire, Bob says in an interview embedded in the source that Alice set his house on fire, and another source says Alice has a history of childhood pyromania, would it be a BLP violation to link to arson?

And before you say, "it'd be a WP:SYNTH violation," the Atlanta Black Star article already embeds both Ice Poseidon's tweet and the interview inside it. A reasonable person can still come to the conclusion that it's stochastic terrorism without the additional article from Asarch 2018, in the same way that I can come to the conclusion that Alice is an arsonist who tried to burn Bob's house down without reading the article about her being a childhood pyromaniac.

and unreliable source issues

I only added a few sources to the article, those being:

• The aforementioned NewsOne article.
• The aforementioned Atlanta Black Star article.
  • The aforementioned YouTube video of the interview.
  • The aforementioned tweet by Ice Poseidon.
• The article about Ice Poseidon's supporters spamming the N-word in chat, which I directly took from his article.
• Nasheed's channel, for the YouTube part of his infobox - which I think is fine. I don't see why you wouldn't link to a YouTuber's YouTube channel when the infobox template tells you to.
• The source from Moguldom about the museum, which based on your edit summary, you didn't think was reliable, but I don't know why.

If you take issue with any of the other sources, like the Business Insider article, it wasn't me - they were there before I started editing the page.

I think you might be confused because I did rework a lot of the references that were there originally to incorporate stuff like archived links, consistent refnames, other parameters that were missing, stuff like that. I can see how that would look like a new source in a diff, but they weren't, and - no offense here - but I think you going scorched earth on anything that had my fingerprints on it was a little hasty.

and due weight issues

...Is this about removing "conspiracy theorist" from the lede? Is that what has everyone here all up in a tizzy?

I'm not trying to whitewash his article or downplay that he's a conspiracy theorist. I'm not on the Tariq Nasheed Defense Squad™ or anything.

When I started editing the page (and also the way it is right now, because of the reverts), that sentence had (has) no in-line citations following it. It was unsourced. Textbook WP:BLP violation. Of course I was going to delete it and rewrite the lede with something a little less pointed.

Some of these changes were, as Kodiak Blackjack says, non-controversial, but this probably isn't the place to go into detail about which work and which don't.

Should we move this to the talk page then?

I mean, to be frank, I'm not really sure why this is taking place there instead of here in the first place. Is this noticeboard just to discuss whether he should be considered a fringe topic or not? Because if it is... Yeah? He is. Unequivocally. And the Wikipedia:Contentious topics/Pseudoscience and fringe science notice should be added to his talk page. I'm honestly kind of surprised it hasn't been already.

Briefly, Nasheed is both a conspiracy theorist (per sources)

Sources that weren't in the lede.

and commonly a target of other conspiracy theorists

Figuring out how to summarize this is difficult, but downplaying it by removing it from the lead won't work.

see response to "and due weight issues"

Look, I get that this is a high-profile page, that's extended-protected, that's related to several contentious topics, that's a BLP and everything that comes along with that, that's also had at least two instances of a literal paid shill trying to edit the article to paint Nasheed in a more favorable light... but I'm literally just trying to contribute to it. I think everybody here is overreacting a little. — Kodiak Blackjack (talk) • (contribs) 22:47, 19 May 2024 (UTC)

A multiple-page contribution on a specific article, posted on a board for notices, certainly counts as overreacting. Can you do this discussion on the article talk page please? One of many reasons: it will be easier to find next year when someone wants to know the reason for the edits that resulted from the discussion. --Hob Gadling (talk) 06:52, 20 May 2024 (UTC)

@Hob Gadling ok, mea culpa. But I just don't have the time or energy to handle this sort of thing by myself. I don't seem to know when it is ok to bring stuff here and when it is not. I will add another point, to describe him in Wikipedia's voice as anti-racist is just wrong. I:m sure he considers himself anti-racist. Doug Weller talk 08:05, 20 May 2024 (UTC)

mea culpa No! You did the right thing, posting a notice. That is what this board is for. After that, if people move discussion from the article talk page to here, that is out of your control. --Hob Gadling (talk) 11:00, 20 May 2024 (UTC)

@Hob Gadling Thanks for clarifying. I think our reply system confused me. Doug Weller talk 11:43, 20 May 2024 (UTC)

As I said, there are conspiracy theory issues here. Since Kodiak Blackjack removed the term 'conspiracy theorist' from the article's lead, this page is a reasonable place to get more eyes on that specific issue. There are also multiple other issues here, so resolving the 'conspiracy theory' issue alone wouldn't be sufficient to restore those other changes. Since sources do support that he is a conspiracy theorist, and those sources are cited in the body of the article, it is not a "textbook BLP violation' and downplaying that description is whitewashing the article even with the best of intentions.

As for Nasheed being targeted by other conspiracy theorists, for convenience, a source cited in that article helps explain how Nasheed's work was quoted and subverted by the 2022 Buffalo shooting murderer, which was tied to conspiracy theories. Grayfell (talk) 09:12, 20 May 2024 (UTC)

@Kodiak Blackjack There are sources for conspiracy theorist. Did you not read that part of the article? It’s sourced Doug Weller talk 18:47, 20 May 2024 (UTC)

Oh, no, I know it's sourced in the article's body. It not being sourced in the lede is my point of contention. MOS:CITELEAD states that The necessity for citations in a lead should be determined on a case-by-case basis by editorial consensus. Complex, current, or controversial subjects may require many citations; others, few or none. This article has two contentious article headers on its talk page, and it's a BLP, so I figured it'd probably be better to lean on the safe side. As I said over on the talk page, I'm fine with keeping conspiracy theorist in the lede, I just think we ought to have an in-line citation after it. — Kodiak Blackjack (talk) • (contribs) 18:59, 20 May 2024 (UTC)

References

Pre-RfC stage @ Talk:Jinn

• Jinn (edit | visual edit | history) · Article talk (edit | history) · Watch
• Pre-intimation:
• A user has proposed updates for consideration at this sand box for the article Jinn.
• Users are discussing DUE/UNDUE relevance and fringe-ness inputs requested also at Talk:Jinn#Comparative mythology.

As a discussion facilitator fyi a WP:DUE discussion (some aspects may touch WP:Fringe) is at Talk:Jinn#Pre-RfC stage's WP:RSN#Hachette Livre and WP:ORN step. After RSN and WP:ORN step, RfC formatting is likely to be discussed at Talk:Jinn#Pre-RfC in a new sub section. Bookku (talk) 07:20, 20 May 2024 (UTC)

Argument from ignorance

• Argument from ignorance (edit | visual edit | history) · Article talk (edit | history) · Watch

As a way of reasoning used by fringe theorists, maybe only marginally relevant here. New user trying to force their opinion into the article. --Hob Gadling (talk) 11:04, 20 May 2024 (UTC)

Stab-in-the-back myth

• Stab-in-the-back myth (edit | visual edit | history) · Article talk (edit | history) · Watch

Another history subject edited by someone who does not believe in what WP:OR and WP:RS say. --Hob Gadling (talk) 11:15, 20 May 2024 (UTC)

Vegepet

A dietary supplement for vegan pets. Concerns have been raised that the article contains fringe content, WP:OR and lacks independent sourcing. Psychologist Guy (talk) 16:44, 22 May 2024 (UTC)

This is one very poorly written article. I removed a search query being used as a source, but it probably needs WP:TNT 174.171.79.146 (talk) 03:58, 23 May 2024 (UTC)

I was disappointed to discover that "vegepet" wasn't a term for a houseplant kept by someone who doesn't want to oppress animals by keeping them as pets. Brunton (talk) 19:07, 27 May 2024 (UTC)

@Brunton, sounds like a brilliant business opportunity! It could be the 21st century's pet rock. Schazjmd (talk) 19:17, 27 May 2024 (UTC)

Ghosts of the American Civil War and Lincoln's ghost

Both Ghosts of the American Civil War and Lincoln's ghost describe ghosts and entirely rely on primary and questionable sources. Both articles focus on supposed "sightings" and largely do not discuss anything else. ―Susmuffin ^Talk 18:33, 27 May 2024 (UTC)

I imagine that this stuff was once in the main articles but got tossed out to become content forks. The blatantly credulous stuff is mostly sourced to 'ghost expert' sources, but there are a few travel and local sources that appropriately treat the topic as folklore. A quick fix would be to rename the articles American Civil War ghost stories and Abraham Lincoln ghost stories, and then merge Lincoln into the first. Note that both article creators have since been blocked, one for continual copyright violations, so there may be copyvios lurking. - LuckyLouie (talk) 19:33, 27 May 2024 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Village_pump_(policy)#Notifying_Wikiprojects_and_WP:CANVASS

For the interested. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 07:25, 28 May 2024 (UTC)

It's the UFO crowd again

If interested the latest from these peeps is now out. I only watched the first few minutes and they have a stick and aren't letting it go. Possibly they will be making more trouble for the editors they feel are targeting the UFO/UAP disclosure they so want to happen. The interviewee for this specific show says he has a list of editors and their real life names and professions and apparently is planning on exposing them. Oh and @LuckyLouie is Mick West, of course he is. I went on this YouTube channel last month and tried to explain and have a discussion with them, it was a 3-hour interview and they removed over an hour of content. I would say it was a waste of my time, except I'm always interested in trying to help people understand, plus it was fascinating to get a peek into their mindset. You can find it on their channel if you are interested along with their other nonsense about how Wikipedia works, when it is obvious they have no clue how it works. I only raise this issue as of course I know we are attacked all the time, but this seems to be at least for a few people to be escalating. [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4W1lohseihc]. Sgerbic (talk) 14:55, 28 May 2024 (UTC)

Yup, they're irrational. They think that Satan + Illuminati are covering up the truth about UFOs, in order to let the Reptilians rule unabashed. E.g. there was a guy who killed his own two children because he thought they have "serpent blood". tgeorgescu (talk) 15:15, 28 May 2024 (UTC)

Some are very irrational. But that does not mean that they can be disruptive here on Wikipedia AND cause headaches with their "outing" of editors real life names vs user names. Plus the nonsense when they get it completely wrong like Louie and West. Sgerbic (talk) 15:22, 28 May 2024 (UTC)

So we now have "true" Guerrilla Skeptics going after Guerrilla Skeptics of Wikipedia... Ladies and gentleman, Siphonaptera (poem). Horse Eye's Back (talk) 15:32, 28 May 2024 (UTC)

I love it when one of them hits the nail on the head and states "...I notice patterns in everything..." which is the problem, e.g. apophenia, with many fringe theories. Paul H. (talk) 17:08, 28 May 2024 (UTC)

Early history of Palestine making fringe claims

[16] The early history section here makes some religious claims in wikivoice. 107.116.165.24 (talk) 22:44, 28 May 2024 (UTC)

I agree, this is a religious account of the history which is not supported by archaeology. It's fine to mention the traditional account but we shouldn't say it's true, especially not over the archaeological account. Loki (talk) 01:41, 29 May 2024 (UTC)

That section was written by one editor.[17], User:Kharbaan Ghaltaan. Out of about 26 sources I see just one academic one. The rest run from poor to dreadful, eg [18] Can anyone read this one?[19] It loads and then I get a blank screen. Lots of use of encyclopedias, Britannica etc.

Just found this[20] that the editor also wrote, in fact they have written 53% of the article editing it 90 times.. A lot of the article is no longer about the State of Palestine but the history of the area and should be removed. Any objections? Doug Weller talk 08:09, 29 May 2024 (UTC)

Nope, go ahead. Loki (talk) 17:57, 29 May 2024 (UTC)

The Lightning Process

I don't edit fringe medical topics often but recent edits, particularly about a BBC Radio 4 piece ([21]), seem very egregious and would appreciate somebody with more experience of this sort of thing to have a look. Cakelot1 ☞️ talk 15:58, 30 May 2024 (UTC)

Yikes, there was some WP:PROFRINGE twisting there. I've poked it a bit. Bon courage (talk) 16:25, 30 May 2024 (UTC)

TRIZ

Maybe this is the wrong noticeboard, but what is TRIZ? The lead is very promo-y and this article cites lots and lots of self-published stuff. Zanahary (talk) 06:05, 2 June 2024 (UTC)

Based on a quick read, I don't think this is a fringe theory...just a very poorly-written article about a quirky/fad engineering-psychology method. Not my field, so I'm probably not the one to improve the article. WeirdNAnnoyed (talk) 14:36, 2 June 2024 (UTC)

Nano-ayurvedic medicine, again

• Nano-ayurvedic medicine (edit | visual edit | history) · Article talk (edit | history) · Watch
• Previous discussion: Wikipedia:Fringe theories/Noticeboard/Archive 99#Nano-ayurvedic medicine

About two months ago, there was an apparent consensus that this is a fringe topic, without sufficient sourcing to keep in mainspace, and it was draftified. An IP editor has been repeatedly attempting to reintroduce it to mainspace without fixing the problems. Based on a talk page comment, I tried to change it from a draft, to a "redirect with history" ([22]), but the IP keeps reverting it back into mainspace.

I'd like to get some more opinions about what to do with this page. If it seems unlikely that the content can be appropriately sourced, perhaps it should either be made into a semi-protected redirect, or be taken to a deletion discussion and WP:SALTed. --Tryptofish (talk) 20:35, 3 June 2024 (UTC)

Next, relativistic medicine and galaxy-scale water memory. AFD and SALT. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 20:42, 3 June 2024 (UTC)

Taken by Headbomb to Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Nano-ayurvedic medicine. --Tryptofish (talk) 20:52, 3 June 2024 (UTC)

Its self promo. Various IPs have been adding random Lopus, M references for a long while. Check everything the original author of this article (based on the fringe works of Lopus M) contributed before starting the article. Only adding Lopus, M references. Do a search for articles referencing them, and find one where it wasn't added by an IP or an account dedicated to promoting the works of Lopus, M, i.e.[23] 12.75.41.67 (talk) 23:21, 3 June 2024 (UTC)