Talk:Whittemore Peterson Institute

Request for Comment

Comment requested on the following: Is the article NPOV? Does it lend too much weight to a particular viewpoint? Are sources misrepresented? Keepcalmandcarryon (talk) 14:07, 15 January 2010 (UTC)

Thank-you KCACO, but I did ask that we discuss next steps before requesting arbitration, so that we could agree the wording of the request. This page is about a chartered charitable institute and therefore the RFC should also fall under the econ category. -- TerryE (talk) 16:00, 15 January 2010 (UTC)

• Comment from uninvolved person: article seemed to be fairly NPOV. It may have an undue weight in being to paranoid about the institutes funding and mission. For example it seems out of place to criticize in the "Mission" section the feasibility of the research goals (the critique should be in a separate section). Also, I was puzzled that the article gives an impression that the institute is lead by a "former bartender" and then get's a publication in Science. I would suggest you reorganize the article to first present the institute (mission, funding, staff, etc), and then have a separate section about the controversy that apparently surrounds the institute. Finally, I am not going to check all sources so if someone believes a source is misrepresented they need to identify the source and what misrepresentation. Labongo (talk) 05:12, 19 January 2010 (UTC)

• Comment: It is certainly not NPOV to use the unexplained adjective "controversial" in the opening paragraph. The opening paragraph should not seek to cast a pall over the remainder of the article. If the subject's work is controversial, explain why using sourced material, but that's not the role of the descriptive outline. In addition, the heavy use of in-line citations throughout the article is distracting. Uncontroversial statements like "this person is this official" don't need to be individually cited, as long as it's easy to find them using the article's sources. AtSwimTwoBirds (talk) 02:07, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

• From #08 February 2010 edit summaries section, "Is it correct to note that the Science article is controversial?" No, after examining the the sources,[1][2][3][4] they do not state the Science article is controversial. They state that the cause of the illness is still controversial and that the two papers have not clarified the issue. What the papers are mostly discussing are claims or theories the virus causes the illness; something the Science article never did, and the sources don't state it did. This was discusssed on February 6th also.[5][6] A NPOV problem is discussed above by AtSwimTwoBirds. Four editors (AtSwimTwoBirds) (TerryE) (Sam Weller) (Ward20) do not believe the controversial wording belongs in the lead. Ward20 (talk) 21:41, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

We don't vote on what's in a source. The Economist describes this as a fight, complete with battle sound-effects...and it's not controversial? We have any number of sources underlining the controversial nature of the report, starting with the accompanying editorial. Keepcalmandcarryon (talk) 21:52, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

The Economist[7] may add sound effects for reader interest, but they also say:

"Frustrating though this may be for sufferers from CFS, it is discussions like these, as one group of researchers tries to replicate the results of another, that lead to scientific progress. In the meantime, one of the companies licensed to do the American XMRV test claims that of the 300 patients, including some from Britain, who have sent samples in for testing, 36% have tested positive for XMRV. It seems likely that the causes of CFS will continue to be a subject of controversy for a while yet." (emphasis added).

Asking again for the wording from the sources that verify the claim. I don't know what "accompanying editorial" is being referenced. Ward20 (talk) 22:35, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

It's not a battle or a fight, then, if somewhere in some article the word "discussion" is found? When conflicting claims are present, there is controversy, discussion or not. Do you maintain that the WPI article has been universally accepted, that scientists are in complete harmony that XMRV is associated with CFS? If so, what are your sources? Keepcalmandcarryon (talk) 22:40, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

As for your requested sources, even before the UK study appeared, scientists from the skeptical reviewers (as emphasised by WPI) to the contamination-suspecting De Risi (and many others) questioned the results and the methods. See W. Reeves, too. There is no conceivable way to pretend this article is not controversial. Keepcalmandcarryon (talk) 22:42, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

In the Economist piece, the word discussion is used to specifically describe and put in perspective the summary statement of the "fight" (as you described it), "As scientific punch-ups go, this is shaping up to be a good one, with blows (albeit polite ones) being thrown across the Atlantic." If all research had to be "universally accepted", and scientists had to be "in complete harmony" everything would be controversial. Your argument is a straw man. Sorry. Putting the word controversial in the lead to make the rest of the article suspect is not NPOV. Specific wording from sources that verify the claim still haven't been produced by the way. Ward20 (talk) 23:18, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

XMRV and prostate cancer is a similar situation, yet XMRV article never uses controversial when describing prostate cancer research. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.51.82.241 (talk) 15:33, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

Ampligen

A well-sourced sentence about a formerly experimental drug was deleted by Terry E with the explanation that it constituted synthesis and "We don't know when and why AH stopped this drug so this RS quote is irrelevant." In fact, the New York Times states that side effects forced the individual to stop taking the drug. We also know that she stopped taking it before the rejection by the FDA.

Ampligen is not a drug with proven efficacy for CFS, nor is it free of reactions, as evidenced by the FDA rejection. An encyclopaedia can't introduce the drug without explaining this. Keepcalmandcarryon (talk) 22:28, 15 January 2010 (UTC)

Maybe I am going senile, but I've found it wise to check your references for your claimed content. In this case the referenced article [8] (pages 1 and 2) doesn't even contain the word Ampligen so I missed the quote at the bottom of the page "For a while, Ms. Whittemore-Goad had improved on an antiviral drug, but she had to stop taking it because she had a reaction to it." However, since this isn't specific about which drug, to state "she was treated with an experimental antiviral drug, Ampligen, by Daniel Peterson. Side effects have since forced her to discontinue use of the drug" citing this sentence is WP:SYNTH so my decision was correct. Please find explicit RS reference, and then you can reinstate the text.

It would greatly help future discussions if you provided the verbatim extracts which support your case, so we can understand what you are taking about. Thanks. -- TerryE (talk) 03:28, 16 January 2010 (UTC)

I've added the URI of the Philadelphia Business Journal. What I am slightly confused about is that I found this by doing a search on Ampligen in the PBJ website. When I did this I found an article published on the 14th Jan [9] which provides some follow-up clarification.

OK we already have the following coatrack chain (forgive the mixed metaphor)

• Article about WPI
  • whose President is AW
    • her daughter
      • who took drug which absolutely nothing to do with WPI or its scope of research
        • which was withdrawn from experimental use by FDA after she had stopped taking it.

Surely, this is piece of information is totally irrelevant to WPI. Nonetheless if the consensus of the editors is that this fact should go in then we should be saying stating something that actually are a more unbiased reflection of the content of these two references, for example:

In 2009, the Food and Drug Administration has rejected an application for Ampligen as an experimental treatment for CFS and recommended at least one additional clinical study, involving a minimum of 300 patients taking the drug for six months, “which shows convincing effect and confirms safety in the target population.” In Jan 2010, the makers of Ampligen submitted reports of new preclinical data, which it believes should be sufficient to address certain preclinical issues raised by the federal agency".

However, this really does underscore my original point: what on earth has this got to do with the WPI? And why therefore does one editor include it then reinstate it twice into the article when other editors have queried its inclusion? -- TerryE (talk) 15:48, 16 January 2010 (UTC)

Agree, it's OT. I merely ungarbled the OR/SYN, without thereby endorsing it. Sam Weller (talk) 16:24, 16 January 2010 (UTC)

When I read the article, this part stood out as strange to me too. I'm not sure why it's been included. - gf1 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.115.177.29 (talk) 16:26, 28 January 2010 (UTC)

In light of the above discussion, I feel that it is entirely reasonable to remove this fourth indirect reference here. I will leave the reference to Ampligen given our agreement to merge the relevant content on AW-G after the agreed deletion of her article. -- TerryE (talk) 10:56, 6 February 2010 (UTC)

In her bulk revert below, Keepcalmandcarryon has stated "That Ampligen was rejected by the FDA as a CFS treatment deserves and in fact demands mention per our policies on medicine-related claims. It's unfair to our readers to give the impression of drug efficacy without also mentioning that the FDA has not found it efficacious." She has not chosen to respond to my coatrack chain: WPI->its president->her daughter->took drug which absolutely nothing to do with WPI->which was withdrawn from experimental use by FDA after she had stopped taking it. Moreover, yes AWG took Ampligen as part an FDA approved trial some years ago, and yes, its makers applied for approval to market and the FDA turned this down, asking for more approved trials to take place, so there are people like AWG taking part in FDA approved trial today.

I am quite happy for K to try to attempt to raise this point on the Ampligen or Daniel Peterson pages where there is at least some relevance, but what on earth what has this got to do with WPI? If she's feels that it's "unfair to our readers to give the impression of drug efficacy without also mentioning that the FDA has not found it efficacious." then the obvious compromise is to drop all references to Ampligen. -- TerryE (talk) 21:53, 8 February 2010 (UTC)

All This Has Happened Before: The XMRV Imbroglio, Act II

IMO, this blog All This Has Happened Before: The XMRV Imbroglio, Act II is better written and referenced than any of the newspaper and magazine articles cited in the controversy section - as you would expect from a highly regarded science encyclopedist and editor. It contextualises the XMRV controversy within a pattern of predictable behaviour towards other 'unwelcome' scientific findings. Should we use it? Sam Weller (talk) 11:08, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

First of all, his blog is incredibly POV towards XMRV causing CFS. Secondly he gives a completely unrelated example. I'm sure any of us here could think of another 10 examples where the exact opposite happened. Also, it's nowhere near a reliable source, but it's interesting that you should suggest it as one. --sciencewatcher (talk) 14:38, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Sam, thanks for this; it makes very interesting reading and I need to ponder. The first question to me is that this is a blog and the WP:RS guidelines indicate that a blog can be cited as a RS if the author is a "established expert on the topic of the article whose work in the relevant field has previously been published by reliable third-party publications". Whilst Gilman is a reputable science writer[10], his expertise in this field probably falls short of this test, but then again he is making no specific claims about the findings themselves, but focusing on the controversy.

sw, I am not sure what you mean by "incredibly POV towards XMRV causing CFS" since on careful reading it makes absolutely no claims about XMRV being the causal agent for CFS, so I would disagree with this statement. What is does to is to present a secondary analysis of the two main XMRV / CFS studies. It also introduces an analogy with the GM transgene controversy, the introduction of which wouldn't enrich this article, IMHO. I would be inclined to wait until we have further MEDRS sources before extending the content. What I feel that we should focus on in the meantime is tidying up the core article. -- TerryE (talk) 15:58, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Terry, it is pretty clear on reading the article that he believes that XMRV does cause CFS - that is the whole thrust of his argument. And I don't see how the GM controversy has anything remotely to do with XMRV. --sciencewatcher (talk) 16:31, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Sciencewatcher, I agree that the GM controversy has anything remotely to do with XMRV, and that was a point that I was trying to make. Sorry if I didn't spell it out clearly. His thrust is that the WPI has gone through a more rigorous review process and that "his money is on" the WPI paper. Given that this WPI paper explicitly states that its findings do not prove a causal link between CFS and XMRV, I feel that the "it is pretty clear" is your reading. However, whether we agree or not on this point doesn't effect the content of this WPI article :-) -- TerryE (talk) 16:49, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

"Strong correlation" is what Gilman said, echoing "highly significant association" in Science. It was Coffin who wrote (in Science) that XMRV is "a virus whose pathogenic potential for humans is still unknown. However, it is clear that closely related viruses cause a variety of major diseases, including cancer, in many other mammals. Further study may reveal XMRV as a cause of more than one well-known 'old' disease, with potentially important implications for diagnosis, prevention, and therapy."

Gilman quotes PlosOne as stating their peer review took 3 days. Shouldn't that be mentioned? Presently it looks like Mikovits's sour grapes, but the journal says that. Also, why is it absolutely vital to mention the sensitivity of the PlosOne test, but delete any mention of the differences between the two studies (Canadian vs Oxford, fresh WBC vs frozen whole blood, different DNA sequence, PCR and culture vs PCR only, too many to list)? Sam Weller (talk) 17:18, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

But did the 'peer review' take 3 days? It was 3 days from submission to acceptance, but then another month until publication.

I don't have any objection to removing the sensitivity of the PlosOne test, but it wasn't me who added that.

I've copied the talk about Plos One sensitivity to Talk:Xenotropic_murine_leukemia_virus-related_virus#PCR_sensitivity Sam Weller (talk) 15:58, 28 January 2010 (UTC)

As for the differences in the two studies: are they significant? AFAIK the UK team used Fukuda, not Oxford. And if we mention that, we perhaps should mention that the Canadian criteria aren't suitable for research. For example: the Mikovits team tested RnaseL, but that is not a recognised test for distinguishing CFS from controls. By using that as part of their patient selection, they are using a less reliable criteria than the UK team. --sciencewatcher (talk) 18:22, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

The blog is obviously not MEDRS but arguably is RS. It seems that Gilman believes XMRV is important to CFS and will be vindicated, drawing parallels between the XMRV-CFS and GM controversies. However, he does not actually say that it "causes" CFS in such a simplistic sense. I do not remember which news article it was, but in one of them the UK team (or someone from it) accuses the US team of "rushing" the results, which I find odd considering that the US team used 3 different laboratories and the peer-review took 3 months (vs 3 days to 1 month). The US team also used the Fukuda definition, and whether or not the Canadian definition is "suitable for research" is a matter of opinion; it has a diagnostic criteria that can be followed, so why would it be so difficult to use it for research? - Tekaphor (TALK) 02:31, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

If you read the Canadian criteria, it says things like 'show diagnostic promise' (for brain scanning). As for RNaseL (which the US team used), the research clearly shows that it does not clearly distinguish between CFS patients and controls. They use an arbitrary cut-off, which catches 28% of controls and 88% of patients (according to one study). Also, if you read the Canadian criteria it says 'most positive findings of immune system involvement in a physical examination are usually only present in the acute stage and then diminish or become recurrent'. --sciencewatcher (talk) 16:11, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

What the authors of the Canadian consensus document speculate about testing 7 years ago has nothing to do with applying the Canadian criteria to patient selection. - Tekaphor (TALK) 04:17, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

Agreed, Tek. I was mistaken about the Plos One sensitivity test - it keeps being reverted in XMRV, not here. We should not be arguing whether one study or the other is right. Coffin says they both might be right. But failing to describe important differences between the two studies leaves the impression that the same test got done twice with different results. Which is how the media reported it. Sam Weller (talk) 09:18, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

So, if the 7 year old Canadian criteria can't be used for patient selection, why are you saying that the US study is better than the UK one because it used the Canadian creteria to select their patients? Surely the opposite is the case. The fact is, serious researchers don't use the Canadian criteria - it is simply used by patient groups and their supporters (such as WPI) because they believe it makes CFS a more 'physical' condition. --sciencewatcher (talk) 15:28, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

Under "Further Laboratory Testing", the Canadian definition [11] does recommend testing " ... NK cell activity, flow cytometry for lymphocyte activity [...] , 37-kDa 2-5A RNase L immunoassay ...". It indeed states that brain scans (qEEG, SPECT and PET) "show diagnostic promise" and that "most promising findings of immune system involvement ..." become unreliable over time. In the "Supporting Online Materials and Methods" for the US (Lombardi et al 2009) XMRV study [12], it states: " ... diagnosis of CFS is based upon prolonged disabling fatigue and the presence of cognitive deficits and reproducible immunological abnormalities. These included but were not limited to perturbations of the 2-5A synthetase/RNase L antiviral pathway, low natural killer cell cytotoxicity (as measured by standard diagnostic assays), and elevated cytokines particularly interleukin-6 and interleukin-8. ... ".

I never said "Canadian criteria can't be used for patient selection". When I said that the unsuitability of the Canadian definition is a matter of opinion, you raised the issue of the unreliability of brain scans and immune system testing. But this is not the same as selecting patients, based on symptoms, who meet the multiple major criteria (chronic fatigue, post-exertional malaise, chronic pain, sleep dysfunction) and minor criteria ("neurological/cognitive", "autonomic", "neuroendocrine" and "immune" manifestations/symptoms). You are criticising Lombardi et al for using, and the Canadian definition for recommending, objective tests; a common claim is that there are no reliable tests or biomarkers for CFS because they are not found in all patients, however such tests do not need to have perfect sensitivity and specificity to guide diagnosis.

As for your question, "why are you saying that the US study is better than the UK one because it used the Canadian criteria", I am guessing this is in response to something I said elsewhere, because I never said that above. All studies which are large enough should use multiple definitions for comparison. Researchers use CDC-1994 because it is authoritative, but research suggests it is inadequate and selects heterogeneous patient cohorts (which helps to explain the lack of universal findings). The Canadian definition was developed to better distinguish ME/CFS from other fatigue states, so perhaps it is more homogeneous; no one is saying it is perfect, but many patients and advocates endorse it because it is a much better reflection of their illness experience. And yes, a comparative study with the Canadian definition (Jason et al [13]) does suggest that it is "more physical" (more physical functional impairment, more fatigue/weakness, neuropsychiatric, neurologic symptoms) with less psychiatric comorbidity. Remember your failed attempt to discredit that? - Tekaphor (TALK) 03:16, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

Accuracy of quotes in XMRV/CFS controversy.)

Thanks to 87.115.177.29 for pointing this one out.

• K's content: ... Soon after publication of the Science paper, Lombardi[3] and his company, owned by the Whittemores,[6] began selling the diagnostic kit for $650. Virologist John Coffin and Myra McClure, corresponding author for the British team, expressed concerns that Lombardi's team were taking advantage of patients' hunger for information.
  In response, Judy Mikovits stated that the UK researchers had "skewed their experimental design in order to not find XMRV in the blood". Mikovits opined that the British team had paid to have their study reviewed quickly and published in the Public Library of Science as part of a UK insurance company plot to discredit the WPI findings. [My Ital to highlight to content in discussion]
• RS wording: "You can't claim to replicate a study if you don't do a single thing that we did in our study," she said. "They skewed their experimental design in order to not find XMRV in the blood."
  The Whittemore-Peterson Institute issued a statement saying the British study was published after only three days of review as opposed to the institute study that underwent six months of vigorous peer review plus confirmation by three independent laboratories before it was published in Science magazine.
  The statement also cited different techniques used in the British study that make its conclusions meaningless, including the use of a molecular plasmid control in water instead of a positive blood sample.
  "They paid to have their study published in the Public Library of Science, and it was then picked up by Science (magazine)," said Mikovits said, who suspects insurance companies in the United Kingdom are behind attempts to sully the findings of the Reno study.

Where do I begin:

1. This is a another RS mangling on the part of K
2. The cited source was interviewing JK in the context of a response to the Imperial Study; it had nothing to do with the VIP Dx test. (Though this may just be bad editorial juxtaposition
3. The "They skewed ... " and "They paid ..." are direct quotes, but the predicate to the first "You can't ..." is an important context which should not have been omitted. These statements where in the context of the referenced formal response press release January 6, 2010: Official Statement from the Whittemore Peterson Institute Regarding UK Study from WPI yet this isn't referenced.
4. JM did not "opine", that is state as an opinion "that the British team ...". The wording "who suspects ... " was an interpretation of Letina Powers, the cited journalist. This was [somewhat provocative] hearsay should not be directly attributed to JW.

I have replaced K's version with one taken directly from the source. Perhaps it is longer but it concentrates on the meat of the WPI response rather than a tabloid summary. -- 02:13, 29 January 2010 TerryE (talk)

"patient-derived XMRV is infectious"

Apologies for posting this here and at Talk:Xenotropic_murine_leukemia_virus-related_virus#PCR_sensitivity.

Can we address the important post-PCR findings reported in Science that AFAIK have not been addressed or cited here, or at XMRV?

Cell culture experiments revealed that patient-derived XMRV is infectious and that both cell-associated and cell-free transmission of the virus are possible. Secondary viral infections were established in uninfected primary lymphocytes and indicator cell lines after their exposure to activated PBMCs, B cells, T cells, or plasma derived from CFS patients. PMID 19815723

1. WPI's pathogenic findings followed on from, and are potentially more important than, their original PCR detection. 2. The London team only tried to validate/replicate WPI's PCR work. What level of detail is appropriate, here and at XMRV? Sam Weller (talk) 08:31, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

Sam, this a more general point as this is only one point covered, but Judy Mikovits did an absolutely fascinating and extremely detailed presentation of the WPI findings cohosted by the HHV-6 foundation on the 22nd. [14]. I strongly urge all active editors of this page to download these videos and watch them. The best way is to register for a vimeo and then you can download them in MOV/M4V formats to watch offline. The URLs that I used for download are [15] and [16]. These are recorded presentation of the WPI director of research and therefore qualify as RS (though falling short of MEDRS). However, given the presentation date 22 Jan it does represent the latest and best RS for issues to do with timelimes, WPI's perspective on the various controversies, etc. The links that I've given are for the hi-res (853 x 480) versions. There is a lower res version of the presentation [17], but it's well worth the extra 400Mb or so download if you want to read the slides.

As I said, fascinating viewing and highly recommended. I think that we should introduce some of this content into the article. -- TerryE (talk) 18:35, 29 January 2010 (UTC) + hires tweaks -- TerryE (talk) 15:24, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

Thanks Terry. The quote I gave above is from the original Science abstract, not from later press releases or conferences. It's remarkable that there has been no mention of it in CFS, XMRV or here at WPI. Only the PCR detection has registered. Sam Weller (talk) 18:52, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

yes I know. I recognised it :-) It's just that JW goes into a bit more detail in her video presentation as well as a lot of other stuff, such as the protracted interaction with the Science review committee and the active involvement of other research teams as well some detailed technical and evidence based discussion of the particular issues that they had to overcome which were'nt really covered by the Imperial team. They did say that they were going to release the slide deck, but they haven't done so yet. Having watched this my views about that flaws in the KCH cohort selection are underlined in my view. Maybe we should open a talk topic on this when a few more have seen it. So lets leave this if and until we decide to have that discussion. -- TerryE (talk) 22:33, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

Sam Weller's opinion that the WPI's infection results are more important than PCR is certainly interesting, but without supporting statements from third parties, it can't well be discussed here. In any case, the contamination hypothesis (which is presented by independent sources but curiously has not made an appearance here), could explain WPI's results, both PCR and culture.

I would caution WPI's supporters here on Wikipedia not to turn this article into an ancillary wing of the organisation's self-advertising, but, instead, to derive the content as far as possible from third party sources. The desire of CFS patients such as TerryE to discuss and debate Mikovits's Q&A session is understandable and praiseworthy; Wikipedia, however, is not the proper location for such a discussion. Keepcalmandcarryon (talk) 01:39, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

Demonstrating infectivity after detection is an important step in fulfilling Koch's postulates. Science emphasized that by including infection in the study title, but that part of their findings has been omitted here. Why? The contamination theory remains completely unproven. Does WP have a policy on using unproven objections to censor reported findings? Sam Weller (talk) 11:06, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

K, The WP:RS does not limit RS to third-party sources, as this RS falls into its "Self-published material may, in some circumstances, be acceptable when produced by an established expert on the topic of the article whose work in the relevant field has previously been published by reliable third-party publications". Have you watched these videos yet or is your position just an abstract one about self-published sources? If you are suggesting that we should not discuss inclusion here first but simple add referenced content to the article, then I am happy to proceed on this basis.

BTW, I am seeking to build an informed and balanced article about WPI on the basis of RS. If you infering that I am acting as "WPI's supporters ... self-advertising", can you please avoid making unsubstantiated personal accusations and just stick to the content herein. -- TerryE (talk) 14:33, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

Starting archive by Mizabot

This page is getting unwieldy and I therefore suggest that we start archiving by Mizbot; something like:

{{User:MiszaBot/config
|archiveheader = {{talkarchivenav|noredlinks=y}}
|maxarchivesize = 250K
|counter = 1
|algo = old(14d)
|archive = Talk:Whittemore Peterson Institute/Archive %(counter)d
}}

but I thought that I'd better check for comments first, just in case anyone has a problem with this. -- TerryE (talk) 15:37, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

Done -- TerryE (talk) 17:16, 3 February 2010 (UTC)

Name

Isn't the proper name for the article The Whittemore Peterson Institute for Neuro-Immune Disease? Ward20 (talk) 01:10, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

Most people refer to it as the Whittemore Peterson Institute or the WPI, and there is only one institute. I would have added a redir for WPI, but the acronym has already been bagged by Worcester Polytechnic Institute so I have already added an entry in WPI (disambiguation). If we request a move of this article to the the full name we would still want to leave a the redir from the shortened form. Perhaps the easiest thing for now is to add a #Redirect for the full title to this article. It might save another potentially heated debate :) -- TerryE (talk) 02:54, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

A redirect sounds good, for now, although Ward20 has a point. - Tekaphor (TALK) 03:21, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

We should refer to the institute by its official name. I failed to use the full title and would not object to a redirect or a new name. Keepcalmandcarryon (talk) 19:40, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

Furthermore, I would suggest that a new article be created on the XMRV controversy, which is not/no longer defined only by WPI's results and actions. Keepcalmandcarryon (talk) 19:44, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

At the moment we have one paper published in Science from a joint team made up from the WPI, Silverman's LRI and three separate departments of the NCI reporting over 2 years work. We also have a paper published in PLoS ONE from a joint team made up from Wessely's KCH and McClure's Jefferiss Research Trust team reporting 2 months work which gives contradictory findings to the first. So at the moment it does make sense to hang this controversy off the article on the lead authors of the first paper. We have a lot of general (that is non-expert) press comment and scant independent expert comment on the record. I suspect that what everyone is actually waiting for are the follow-up papers to be published. I suggest that we do likewise: wait for follow up papers to be published. It makes a lot more sense to do this split as part the work needed to integrate the third ... sources. -- TerryE (talk) 15:41, 1 February 2010 (UTC)

Agree with TerryE, if XMRV controversy means "XMRV and CFS". Is there a controversy about prostate cancer? "Aids controversy" only crops under World Bank, fwiw. Sam Weller (talk) 17:06, 1 February 2010 (UTC)

Aetiology of CFS

I think this one is for sw, though I haven't trawled the history to confirm this. I was just checking the RS for the text "However, although associations of infection and immune dysfunction with disease have been reported at times, the disorders the WPI includes in this category, including CFS, are not yet generally accepted to have an infectious ('acquired') aetiology or to be caused consistently by immune or neurological dysfunction".

The RS itself is a good secondary review which makes good reading (I prefer it to the NICE quidelines version). However, it doesn't actually state its conclusion in this negative form. It states that "the aetiology and the pathogenic mechanisms of CFS are not fully understood, several hypotheses have been postulated" It then lists the main hypotheses: "Infectious theory", "Immunological theory" and "Neuroendocrinological theory" saying that the results are inconsistent for the first two, and the third (sw's favourite HPA hypothesis) is currently supported by more evidence. So it talks about published evidence rather than levels of acceptance amongst the expert or patient communities. Another, and I think more accurate way of combining the context of this RS in the context of the WPI mission would be:

There are three main hypotheses for the aetiology of CFS: Infectious theory, Immunological theory and Neuroendocrinological theory. The published findings for the first two are inconsistent, with the best evidence for the third [ref]. The Institutes's mission is to focus on research into these first two.

Comments? -- TerryE (talk) 15:18, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

That's fine as far as it goes, but what about the other illnesses they believe are caused by neuro-immune disorder, such as autism? At the moment we don't even mention those in the article. As I understand it, we don't even need a RS to say that autism isn't believed to be caused by immune dysfunction. --sciencewatcher (talk) 16:29, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

You are correct in that the [ref] reviews CFS, but that the WPI mission statement does include the text (my ital for highlighting):

Our goals include:

• To facilitate and advance patient care
• Research the pathophysiology of neuro-immune diseases such as ME/CFS, fibromyalgia, atypical MS, and autism
• Develop therapeutics, diagnostics and prevention strategies for this spectrum of diseases
• To advance and support medical education and physician training

How would you suggest that we handle this? If we include this text in this section, then we have introduced WPI claims about atypical MS, and autism, and therefore it is entirely reasonable to cite secondary RS which puts this into MED context. I'll have a look in the Autism and the Multiple sclerosis articles, for suitable references on the medical consensus. On a superficial scan, the MS article only includes a passing reference to the atypical variant and two MEDRS(PMID 16446632 and PMID 9229127 which are not free access).

If I recall correctly, JM did describe in the 22nd presentation some examples of what she called cluster families which had incidents of atypical MS and autism as well as CFS. These atypical MS and autistic family members had tested positive for XMRV, but this is only an RS for WPI claims and not MED consensus. It is quite possible that we won't find a sutiable RS for atypical MS, and autism, and I would be uneasy about repeating this claim without caveats -- or at least explicitly stating that it was a WPI claim. -- TerryE (talk) 01:31, 1 February 2010 (UTC)

I think this is covered by WP:Fringe. If there aren't any WP:MEDRS sources linking these disorders (and I don't believe there are), then we don't need any reliable sources to refute it. We can just say something like 'not recognised by scientists" or similar NPOV language (we're not trashing it, just saying it isn't a currently accepted theory). --sciencewatcher (talk) 02:24, 1 February 2010 (UTC)

I haven't found any MEDRS sources linking these disorders either. How about echoing the wording from WP:RS and avoiding absolute black & white, e.g. "not generally recognised by experts in these fields". I think that this is sufficiently non-contentious that we don't need an RS -- though of course we would need to update this if and when any published in this areas. -- TerryE (talk) 14:15, 1 February 2010 (UTC)

(outdent) How about:

The institute is now known as the "Whittemore Peterson Institute for Neuro-Immune Disease" to reflect its stated goals[ref]:

• To facilitate and advance patient care
• Research the pathophysiology of neuro-immune diseases such as ME/CFS, fibromyalgia, atypical MS, and autism
• Develop therapeutics, diagnostics and prevention strategies for this spectrum of diseases
• To advance and support medical education and physician training.

The Institute is novel in its of grouping of these diseases into a single "neuro-immune" class, which it asserts may be "caused by acquired dysregulation of both the immune system and the nervous system". The main hypotheses for the aetiology of CFS include Infectious theory, Immunological theory and Neuroendocrinological theory, with the best evidence for the third; the published findings for the first two are inconsistent[ref]. Any such associations of atypical MS and autism are not generally recognised by experts in these fields.

How does this sound? -- TerryE (talk) 14:45, 1 February 2010 (UTC)

Fine with me. --sciencewatcher (talk) 16:09, 1 February 2010 (UTC)

Fine with me, too, in general. Two smallish objections: I would prefer a summary to copying the WPI website, and the aetiology discussion should include the hypothesised role of psychological factors (all the more so as WPI specifically attacks the psychological involvement hypothesis). Keepcalmandcarryon (talk) 22:34, 1 February 2010 (UTC)

Would you give examples of where and how WPI specifically attacks the psychological involvement hypothesis? I have seen where they want to, "look at ME/CFS from a neuro-immune perspective"[18], but that's not quite the same as attacking the psychological involvement hypothesis. What they specifically say about the psychological involvement hypothesis is important to tailor the weight of the counterpoint argument. Thanks. Ward20 (talk) 23:06, 1 February 2010 (UTC)

@K, I've already précised the WPI web page to the 4 main bullets. I am not really sure how you could summarise further, apart from arbitrarily leaving bullets out (It would be arbitrary since WPIs wider material indicates that they are doing all four, and I do make explicit "their stated goals ...". As to the omission of the psychological element, I've précised the aetiology section from the reference which has been authored by an cross-discipline team and published in BMC Psychiatry. It contains quite a lot of discussion of the psychological and psychiatric aspects in diagnosis, management/treatment, etc., but not in this aetiology section. -- TerryE (talk) 00:25, 2 February 2010 (UTC)

http://www.wpinstitute.org/xmrv/xmrv_qa.html

Q: "Does this latest information prove once and for all that ME/CFS is not a psychological or psychosomatic illness as described by those who don’t understand the disease?"

A: "Absolutely! Actually, there are thousands of research articles showing the very real biological problems that ME/CFS patient’s experience such as low NK cell count and function, MRI and SPEC scan changes, and repeated chronic infections, to mention just a few. Only the most stubborn and misinformed individuals refuse to believe that this disease is real and serious. The process of placing poorly understood illnesses into a psychological category is very similar to what happened in the early days of MS and epilepsy before the advent of technologies which proved the illnesses were “real.” Unfortunately, many in the scientific and medical fields have not learned from their past mistakes."

This is an obvious dismissal of the notion that ME/CFS is a "psychological or psychosomatic illness", or an illness which should be placed within a "psychological category". However, this is not a direct attack on the notion of "psychological involvement/factors" and should not be misconstrued as such, although I would not be surprised if they dismissed that too.

This article is about WPI, why are we getting into "etiological discussion" and hypothetical psychological factors? If you dispute WPI's notion of ME/CFS as a neuro-immune disease and you want a caveat for the article, saying "the etiology is unknown" is enough, with maybe a link to the CFS_pathophysiology article.

_Tekaphor (TALK) 01:16, 2 February 2010 (UTC)

Sounds reasonable. Ward20 (talk) 01:29, 2 February 2010 (UTC)

So what you are suggesting for this last para is something like:

The Institute is novel in its of grouping of these diseases into a single "neuro-immune" class, which it asserts may be "caused by acquired dysregulation of both the immune system and the nervous system". However, there is no expert consensus on the pathophysiology of chronic fatigue syndrome, and any such associations of atypical MS and autism are not generally recognised by experts in these fields.

Taking up Ks point if we try summarising this discussion here we will just explode references, why not just link to the page which specifically addresses this topic instead? Or is a Main Article format more appropriate? -- TerryE (talk) 02:22, 2 February 2010 (UTC)

Yes, I think that is better than going into the nitty gritty of the various CFS etiology theories. --sciencewatcher (talk) 15:46, 2 February 2010 (UTC)

I, too, support TerryE's proposed wording. Keepcalmandcarryon (talk) 16:18, 2 February 2010 (UTC)

I've implemented this change and on reading the complete text, remove some duplicated wording to make the reading a little smoother. Post back here if you thing that I've changed the meaning from what we've discussed above. -- TerryE (talk) 16:52, 3 February 2010 (UTC)

Suggest a clarification of the association of atypical MS and autism. Do you mean the association of virus with the diseases, or the categorisation of the diseases as neuroimmune? MS is the canonical neuroimmune disease, with both immune-mediated demyelination and inflammation. (Come to think of it, I'm not at all sure why WPI mentions "atypical MS" and not just "MS".) Keepcalmandcarryon (talk) 00:26, 4 February 2010 (UTC)

(outdent)The last sentence arose from my attempt create a consensus statement to address Sciencewatcher's (and I though your) concerns that WPI were collectively grouping ME/CFS, fibromyalgia, atypical MS, and autism into a single "neuro-immune": a grouping that isn't, AFAIK, generally currently endorsed by field experts. Why atypical MS? because WPI limit themselves to the atypical form (JM spends a few minutes discussing this on her 22nd Jan presentation). This sentence was a qualification to the previous. I have make the linkage explicit by separating them by a scolon. -- TerryE (talk) 03:16, 4 February 2010 (UTC)

Unclear: "any such associations of atypical MS and autism". Associations of atypical MS and autism with what? Neuroimmune disease, infection or both? Keepcalmandcarryon (talk) 18:19, 4 February 2010 (UTC)

The semi-colon links the two sentence so the context is the novelty of 'grouping of these diseases into a single "neuro-immune" class', but given the confusion over this wording maybe Tekaphor's earlier suggestion is easier. -- TerryE (talk) 18:44, 4 February 2010 (UTC)

Good solution. Keepcalmandcarryon (talk) 21:42, 4 February 2010 (UTC)

Main points from WPI paper in XMRV/CFS controversy section

I've just reread the article from to top bottom, asking myself the Q "Is it worth adding any extra information before the next material XMRV / CFS related paper? This also links back to Sam W's points in #"patient-derived XMRV is infectious" and the following discussion. One of the useful documents here which acts as a useful prompts is the slide deck of Mikowits' 22nd Jan presentation[19], which has just been released by WPI. I believe this falls within WP:RS, but clearly falls short of WP:MEDRS because of its content hasn't been release though peer review, in say PLoS ONE; so we need to be careful in using its content. However it is worth picking up a few point from this.

• Mikowits gives her own summary of her Science paper. These are crisp bullets, accurate and good summary of the key points so I think that there is a lot of merit in adopting her wording:
  • XMRV DNA found in 67% of CFS patient DNA
  • XMRV protein detected in >85% stimulating/dividing T and B cells
  • Antibody to XMRV Env detected in >50% of CFS patient plasma
  • Infectious virus transmitted for >90% of CFS patient plasma
  • XMRV is a blood-borne, infectious human retrovirus.
• There is additional detail on CFS Cohort distribution, indicating the US cover and international representation.
• The XMRV samples sequenced are philogenetically close but not identical to Silverman's sequenced XMRV and more distant to the MLVs.

The current wording in the article only talks about the DNA detection using PCR, but if you read the content of the article instead of stopping at the the abstract, it is entirely reasonable to state that the paper reported on four separate tests achieving between >50 and >90% detection rates in the CFS patient samples. All tests were accompanied by control groups and only one of these had a non-zero result (DNA detection by PCR 3.7%).

The points about the cohort demography and the philogenetic relationships are probably too detailed for a general article.

Though this wasn't explicitly stated in the Science paper, both Peterson and Mikowits have subsequently clarified that the patient population for tests 2-4 were drawn from the group of 33 patients that failed test 1, which is the reason for the 95% detection rate claim.

I also think that we should report the blood and infectious claims as Sam suggests, plus the statements from Dr. Jerry Holmberg of the DHHS OPHS on blood safety issues who confirmed at the CFSAC meeting on 30th Oct 2009[20] that the DHHS Blood Safety Committee will "investigate the blood safety threat from XMRV, plus Minutes of Advisory Committee, so I think that fact that the BSC is investigation the security of the US blood supply is sufficiently

OK, this is a bit more detail than the McClure paper, but I don't think that this is unreasonable given that this is a summary of work by 5 separate teams from 3 separate organisations over a period of two years.

However, I wanted to gauge the general reaction and comments before proposing a specific change in wording. -- TerryE (talk) 22:31, 3 February 2010 (UTC)

On reflection I do think that the extra 3 test merit a mention, but this is best done by picking the key points from the study itself, rather than introducing the Mikowits presentation as an RS for this. I also can't find wording that clearly supports the sentence "The authors suggested that XMRV might cause CFS or be associated with it as a disease marker.", so again I have their actual wording to make an equivalent statement. -- TerryE (talk) 13:23, 6 February 2010 (UTC)

I concur, Terry. Sam Weller (talk) 16:23, 6 February 2010 (UTC)

From the Science article: "Is XMRV infection a causal factor in the pathogenesis of CFS or a passenger virus in the immunosuppressed CFS patient population?" That is, "XMRV might cause CFS or be associated with it as a disease marker".

As to the points above:

• • XMRV DNA found in 67% of CFS patient DNA

Correct.

• • XMRV protein detected in >85% stimulating/dividing T and B cells

Incorrect: antibodies to mouse MLVs recognised a protein in T- and B-cells.

• • Antibody to XMRV Env detected in >50% of CFS patient plasma

Incorrect: patient sera antibodies detected a SFF envelope protein.

• • Infectious virus transmitted for >90% of CFS patient plasma

Incorrect: in the presence of CFS patient plasma and following centrifugation, type C particles were shed by an indicator cell line.

• • XMRV is a blood-borne, infectious human retrovirus.

Also incorrect; human-to-human transmission has not been confirmed or even investigated, as per the recent Molecular Investigations review. Keepcalmandcarryon (talk) 23:02, 8 February 2010 (UTC)

You are now entering the realms of discussing the accuracy of the report and criticising its accuracy as a technical expert. I was limiting myself to a précis of its contents. We are already into difficult ground because this was an article about an institute rather than a strict MED article. We non-experts should carry out pseudo-technical discussions off Wikipedia. But, the highlight is that we have is follows. I have quoted the relevant introductory preamble from the relevant section describing the test in the paper:

Test	Text in article	Description in Paper	#CFS	#Controls
A	XMRV DNA was found in the blood	we isolated nucleic acids from PBMCs and assayed the samples for XMRV gag sequences by nested PCR	68/101	8/203
B	antibodies to XMVR Env	To determine whether XMRV proteins were expressed in PBMCs from CFS patients, we developed IFC and WB assays, using antibodies with novel viral specificities ... All of these Abs detected the human VP62 XMRV strain grown in human ... cells	19/30	0/16
C	patient-derived XMRV infectivity of activated PBMCs	We next investigated whether the viral proteins detected in PBMCs from CFS patients represent infectious XMRV. Activated lymphocytes ...	10/12	0/12
D	immune response to XMRV	We next investigated whether XMRV stimulates an immune response in CFS patients.	9/18	0/7

The one point where I have linked detail in is in the B description, where "antibodies to XMVR proteins" would be a better summary, and I concede this improvement. As for the rest, I think this demonstrates that my text complies with WP guidelines.

What the paper doesn't make explicit, but was the points later clarified by both Peterson and Mikowits previously that the sample group for tests B-D were the 33 patients that were not detected in test A. So out of 101 patients, 99 where positive in at least one of the four tests. Of the 203 controls only 8 positive were detected out of the four tests. However I wanted to present to the lay readers the key points: there were four tests, and all had high detection rates for CFS patients and low or zero for healthy controls, so I felt it unnecessary to strengthened the claims, by bringing in other sources. On the other hand, your proposed edit is again intended to show the paper in as negative light as possible. Yes one test only had 7 controls, but as least (unlike the Imperial study) they did use healthy patient controls in all tests. -- TerryE (talk) 19:23, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

TerryE, my intent is to portray the paper accurately; not to "show the paper in as negative light as possible". With all due admiration for your efforts at reading this article, I must note that you misunderstand much of it. What you are calling "Test B", "antibodies to XMVR Env", is not a test for antibodies to XMRV Env. It is a test using antibodies to other murine leukemia viruses to probe patient samples. They're using antibodies not from the patients to detect proteins from the patients. Do you understand this difference? Furthermore, the authors tested at least five antibodies (perhaps more, it's not clear) with a wide variety of Murine Leukaemia Virus specificities; they report on the antibody that gives the largest number of positive results (19 out of 30). Of these 19, the authors write, a "majority....also reacted with antisera to other purified MLV proteins". In other words, the number of patient samples positive by multiple antibodies was greater than 9 but less than 19, although the authors state that all antibodies recognised XMRV-expressing cells. The authors don't formally show that the antibodies detect XMRV, i.e. recombinant protein, and they don't make monoclonals to specific viral epitopes.

The infectivity assay does not involve "XMRV infectivity of activated PBMCs". Instead, patient PBMCs were co-cultured with an indicator prostate cancer cell line (known as LNCaP) or an immortalised T-cell line. For either one or two samples, co-culture with healthy T-cells was performed.

The immune response is to SFFV Env as a surrogate for XMRV. The authors do not show directly that the patient antibodies bind XMRV epitopes.

You're correct on one point, however: I should have written, "a minimum" of seven controls, not "a maximum". I apologise for the mistake. Keepcalmandcarryon (talk) 20:13, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

You are again trying to critique the validity of the tests and their context on an expert basis. That is not your job, nor is it mine, and certainly not on Wikipedia; neither of us are independent experts who have published our views in an RS. The content might not satisfy you, but it did satisfy a six month review period by the Science nominated reviewers, who approved its publication. Our job is to précis the key points which relate to this article. If we are disagreeing, then this is an indication that we need less detail not more. How about:

The study also reported findings on three other tests relating to antibody detection, immune response, and patient-derived XMRV infectivity. The three tests had detection rates between 50% and 83% for CFS patients, with no detections for healthy controls.

If you are going to start talking about sample sizes, then we would also need to get into statistics such as the χ² statistics on these data, which I do know about. (The confidence intervals around these data are pretty compelling.) If you want an expert opinion on this, why not use Coffins description, e.g. "John Cofin, a microbiologist at Tufts University in Boston who studies retroviruses, commented 'This was as good as it gets for a first paper, but it is still just a first paper.'", or do you want to balance this with "Keeponcalmandcarryon, an anonymous editor on Wikipedia responded, ..."' -- TerryE (talk) 23:45, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

Manual of Style (medicine-related articles) in Writing style (third bullet) seems to favor the less detail approach. Ward20 (talk) 00:13, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

The inaccurate summaries are still in the article, even after my repeated explanations of TerryE's mistakes. No amount of consensus allows the misrepresentation of sources, and, frankly, the entire explication of this primary and unconfirmed report should be removed per WP:MEDRS. Keepcalmandcarryon (talk) 23:16, 13 February 2010 (UTC)

Please suggest alternative wording that you feel accurately summarises the findings, but can I suggest that we do this in the section that you opened below now that we've started using that -- TerryE (talk) 04:36, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

Mission proposed changes

I removed material that has nothing to do with the mission and simplfied by reorganizing and rewording. For discussion:

The Whittemore Peterson Institute for Neuro-Immune Disease's stated goals are:

• To facilitate and advance patient care
• Research the pathophysiology of neuro-immune diseases such as ME/CFS, fibromyalgia, atypical MS, and autism
• Develop therapeutics, diagnostics and prevention strategies for this spectrum of diseases
• To advance and support medical education and physician training.

Annette Whittemore stated the founders envisioned WPI as an integrated facility for ME/CFS treatment, education and research, and wanted a place where they could find answers more quickly. They investigated the illness from a neuro-immune perspective, and looked for an infectious cause which they thought had too often been dismissed. The scientific director of WPI said that as research progressed they started to realize that diseases with similar etiologies might benefit from their findings.

The Institute is novel in its of grouping of these diseases into a single "neuro-immune" class, which it asserts may be "caused by acquired dysregulation of both the immune system and the nervous system"; however, there is no expert consensus on the aetiology of these diseases.

Ward20 (talk) 22:13, 4 February 2010 (UTC)

It reads well and you are correct in removing the history sentences. If these belong anywhere then they belong in the History section. -- TerryE (talk) 00:44, 5 February 2010 (UTC)

Implemented. Ward20 (talk) 20:09, 6 February 2010 (UTC)

Ward, the recent IP poster flagged a "what?" in this relating to "...they started to realise ...". He/she has a point. The relevant extract from the RS is

A year ago a WPI laboratory under the direction of cancer researcher and virologist Dr. Judy Mikovits, PhD, opened on the University of Nevada, Reno campus. This dynamic researcher, whose enthusiasm Annette Whittemore has called “infectious,” is collaborating with a diverse team of immunologists, clinical virologists, pharmacologists and microbiologists.
Their look at ME/CFS from a neuro-immune perspective appears be paying off, with Dr. Mikovits suggesting it could reap dividends far beyond the disease itself. "We are beginning to realize that our research program at this Institute will have a significant impact on a much larger number of diseases with similar etiologies such as autism, epilepsy and MS."

so given that this is painting an unfolding story, then perhaps this point would be better moved to the previous history section.

This is an important perspective as it gives a background as to why WPI regard some forms of autism, epilepsy and MS as related to ME/CFS. I have worded this as a Mikovits' opinion. -- TerryE (talk) 18:00, 11 February 2010 (UTC)

Also I am at a loss as to why K decided to add random quotes on the four bullets, as the adjective stated in "... stated goals are" already means that the following four bullets are quotations. -- TerryE (talk) 18:19, 11 February 2010 (UTC)

Quotes must be quoted. The quotes weren't random, they enclosed the quoted material. The clauses were unified by adding "to" where appropriate. Keepcalmandcarryon (talk) 23:18, 13 February 2010 (UTC)

So let me get this right? replacing ME/CFS with CFS in one quotation is OK and you don't need quotes, but if you remove a split infinitive then you have to add the quotes. In this case let's loose the quotes and bring back the split infinitives. I think that the real difference here is that you were the originating editor for the first, but not the second. -- TerryE (talk) 04:43, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

Reference Packing

I have been continuing my review of this articles content, and I am a little concerned that there is a pattern of reference packing. One specific case that about this is in the statements about Harvey Whittemore in the Funding and Support section. There are two statements here that I want to discuss:

• "The Whittemore family's wealth derives from business activities including real estate, land development and joint ownership of a gas company and an energy drink.[ref][ref] Harvey Whittemore is also prominent lawyer[ref] and influential lobbyist.[ref][ref]"
• "The institute has received federal funding through the political support of Nevada's senators John Ensign[ref] and Harry Reid,[ref][ref] the latter a close personal friend of Harvey Whittemore.[ref][ref]"

I am comfortable with this content: the first statement provides a overview of the wealth and influence which have enabled the Whittemore's to endow and create the institute; the second is a statement of support by both Nevada Senators and the friendship clause is a reasonable qualification. What I am concerned about is the use of references to introduce redundant citations and articles that are not directly relevant to the context of WPI. Yes, these references may well be valid for the Harvey Whittemore article, but what is the valid reason for repeating redundant citations here? What I will do is to trim these back to a set which support the text in the article. -- TerryE (talk) 02:36, 5 February 2010 (UTC)

There's no reason to "trim" references, especially when such trimming favours primary sources over independent media outlets. Also, please remember to discuss proposed edits rather than simply declaring intentions. Keepcalmandcarryon (talk) 15:18, 5 February 2010 (UTC)

Can we please discuss this rather than a plain "no" + undo. Take one example where we have a statement:

The institute has received federal funding through the political support of Harry Reid

which cites two references: the first is Senator Reid's press release from his own official website where he states that he is supporting "$571,000 for the Center for Molecular Medicine at UNR to purchase equipment for the Whittemore-Peter [sic] Institute"; the second was a Television News article Reno, Nevada from KRNV News the following day. The content is not contentious. We are asserting that X supports Y. We have a RS which is an official statement from X stating that he supports Y. We have a TV news short aired the following day, and since AFAIK there is no easily accessible recording, and therefore it is therefore very difficult to verify if it says X supports Y. Please explain to us all your logic as to why:

1. [REF2] is essential; and
2. Why a practically non-verifiable TV report is a better than an official statement from the senator anyway?

The second undo related to the statement:

... Harry Reid, the latter a close personal friend of Harvey Whittemore.[17][18]

This statement in itself is not contentious, though this article is about WPI and not Harvey Whittemore. Why do we need to cite two articles to support this fact, especially as neither has anything to do with WPI? I have suggested only one is necessary. Unless we can find one that discusses this friendship in the context of WPI, then your own argument in the next section applies and we should just delete this clause in its entirety. -- TerryE (talk) 17:14, 5 February 2010 (UTC)

Our reliable sources guidelines indicate that third-party coverage (such as television news programmes or newspaper articles) is preferable to primary sources (such as a Senator's press release). We don't have to delete the Reid source, but, where possible, independent sources should take precedence. (In addition, independent sourcing establishes the importance of the primary statements and helps us avoid the improper use of primary sources.)

As for removal of the clause, your own argument above applies, not my statement on an unrelated issue below. As the sources demonstrate, Harvey Whittemore's personal relationships with the Nevada senators (and other politicians) have been quite useful in generating support, including funding, for his research institute...to the extent that two Nevada papers have called WPI a "rich guy's charity" and labeled support for it as "pork". In contrast, a British advocacy organisation's selective criticism of a PCR test for XMRV not offered by WPI is irrelevant to the article. Keepcalmandcarryon (talk) 17:30, 5 February 2010 (UTC)

As far as I can see the two two sources[21][22] in the article do not, "demonstrate, Harvey Whittemore's personal relationships with the Nevada senators (and other politicians) have been quite useful in generating support, including funding, for his research institute." The two sources talking about their friendship do not appear to mention WPI at all. The friendship material in the article leads the reader to believe that is a large factor in support of funding. H.Reid has been supporting CFS long before the WPI was conceived.[23] The friendship material should be removed as WP:SYNTH if sources can not be found that states the frindship of Whittemore and Reid influenced support and funding for WPI.

What are the sources for the statement, "two Nevada papers have called WPI a "rich guy's charity" and labeled support for it as "pork"? It doesn't seem to come up on a google search.[24] More important, do these sources say the friendship of Whittemore and Reid influenced support and funding for WPI?

The wording, "The institute has received federal funding through the political support of Nevada's senators John Ensign[25] and Harry Reid,[26][27] is not properly sourced. The John Ensign source indicates a FY 2010 funding request. There is no indication the proposed legislation was passed, or money was received by WPI. The Reid sources state the money is for The Center for Molecular Medicine, Requestor: The University of Nevada School of Medicine. WPI is only part of the The Center for Molecular Medicine, and is collaborating with researchers at The University of Nevada School of Medicine.[28] To say WPI received money on the basis of these sources is WP:OR.

Maybe sources can be found that will corroborate the material in the article, but other sources should not be misused for original research. Ward20 (talk) 20:08, 5 February 2010 (UTC)

I can't derive your above claim[29] from my reading WP:RS. It seems to be another bit of WP:SYNTH on your part, but by all means explain how you come to this conclusion. In the meantime can I quote two specific sentences from WP:V, which I think apply:

• The burden of evidence lies with the editor who adds or restores material. All quotations and any material challenged or likely to be challenged must be attributed to a reliable, published source using an inline citation.
• Verifiability, in this context, means that anyone should be able to check the sources to verify that material in a Wikipedia article has already been published by a reliable source, as required by this policy and by No original research.

Unless you can explain how we can validate the transcript or access a video recording, then we need to loose this citation simply on WP:V grounds, independent of other arguments. The burden is on you to do so. Having to pay an access fee is allowed, but time travel to watch old news isn't. -- TerryE (talk) 02:48, 6 February 2010 (UTC)

Picking up my last point, I have been going through the article checking article text against the citations. Where the point is not controversial as uses multiple references I have removed the redundant references to make reading easier. Where the wording is broadly supported by the reference, but the meaning has been changed, I am reinstating the wording from the reference. Where the wording is not even discussed in the reference and (a) the content is controversial, I am deleting the wording on WP:V grounds; (b) the wording is not controversial then I will add a citation needed tag. I will be happy for the originating editor to reinstate the wording if he or she can provide the burden of evidence as per WP:V.

Note that in case (b) I also check history for the original additional to check that a valid RS citation hasn't been removed during the edit history, before deleting -- TerryE (talk) 14:33, 6 February 2010 (UTC)

I have just realised that Sam Kean published two commentaries. A 900 word one in ScienceNow on Jan 6 (the one that K cited) and a fuller 1200 word version published in Science on Jan 15 which hasn't been discussed. A lot of the material is common, but the second seems to contain more content. This provides a good RS to flesh out the VIP Dx issue. For those without a Science subscription, it is reported here. I'll update the article when I've analysed this content. -- TerryE (talk) 18:35, 6 February 2010 (UTC)

I've now done an intelligent diff of these two (thanks to OOo) and is anyone wants a copy then PM me and I'll send you a URL or attachment. It's in DOC format so you'll need Word or OOo to view it. The Science version has obviously been redrafted after researching the various primary sources and also reviewed by someone who understands the subject and is a lot tighter (e.g. it refers to VIP Dx and removes inaccurate claims). This is a good secondary review of the controversy and provides a balanced view of both sides. It is also clear that this version from the same author supercedes the ScienceNow RS This is a better RS than the ScienceNow or VIP Dx press releases for any VIP Dx text. I will reinsert WP:V conformant versions of the VIP Dx controversy using this RS. -- TerryE (talk) 00:01, 7 February 2010 (UTC) (edits after reading the text /diffs in detail) -- TerryE (talk) 00:26, 7 February 2010 (UTC)

The wording, "The institute has received federal funding through the political support of Nevada's senators John Ensign[18] and Harry Reid,[19][20] the latter a close personal friend of Harvey Whittemore.[21][22]" has been posted to Wikipedia:No original research/Noticeboard#Whittemore Peterson Institute. Ward20 (talk) 04:24, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

Refering to K's claim [30] made above "Our reliable sources guidelines indicate that third-party coverage (such as television news programmes or newspaper articles) is preferable to primary sources (such as a Senator's press release) ..." , I realised that Ward had in fact include the URI for this in earlier edits, which you subsequently removed. The reason that I didn't find it was that the recoding wasn't hosted by the KRNV site, but by the sister E4News site. I watched the 93sec news item. It did not even mention the WPI. What the newscaster did say was to refer listeners to its E4News website for more details. This site includes a cut / paste cope of the content of the Senator's press release. So the "television" reference fails RS, and the proper E4News ref is simply a quotation of the previous source.

As the original RS also doesn't even mention WPI (as Ward has previously pointed out), and I asked you to check your sources before reinstating your content twice before each of your content REDOs, this is at best a piece of sloppy editing on your part, and at worst ... Look, we're all human and can make mistakes, but preventing this sort of mistake giving rise to bogus article content creates a lot of effort for all of us. It would be nice if you occasionally apologised for the inconvenienced caused to others and took steps to avoid this error in future. -- TerryE (talk) 13:40, 11 February 2010 (UTC)

I would advise you to keep your comments civil. As for a primary source from a Senator's office not being RS for the Senator's actions, especially when repeated by a television news source, I advise you to look at your own history of primary source usage, including in articles where such sources have no place. Keepcalmandcarryon (talk) 23:26, 13 February 2010 (UTC)

I asked you to validate the source as I couldn't find it, the onus was on you to do so. You declined to respond, but still reverted twice. I then found and checked the source, and (a) it didn't support your claim; (b) the actual website as simply a verbatim copy of the senators website. And yes, you are correct I have reverted an edit twice for RS failure when it was unjustified, but I did apologise for my mistake [31] when the editor concerned pointed this out. -- TerryE (talk) 04:56, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

Coatracking

Sam Weller, who affixed the controversy tag to the top of this talk page to encourage discussion, has made substantial changes (see also [32]) to the article with out discussion. This information, derived entirely from primary sources, is about an Imperial College assay (or, more accurately, about an advocacy organisation's response to it) and properly belongs in a new XMRV/CFS controversy article as I have previously proposed. Keepcalmandcarryon (talk) 15:26, 5 February 2010 (UTC)

In an article devoted to XMRV/CFS controversy, this assay (and notable criticism of it) could potentially be discussed, although, one would hope, with better sources. Any criticism of one assay, though, should be balanced properly with information on other available assays. Keepcalmandcarryon (talk) 15:45, 5 February 2010 (UTC)

Either the Imperial college work is part of the controversy or it's not: we can't be selective about inclusion. KCACO gave no clear argument for her removal of data provided by the Imperial team on the efficacy of the test, so I will reinstate this aspect, pending resolution of this discussion.

However, there is an argument that criticism by a non-expert 3rd party, the ME association, about the efficacy of this test isn't relevant. However, what is more relevant are Mikowits' own comments on this class of simple PCR test given at her 22nd presentation. I will dig them out. Also for ease of reading I would prefer to juxtapose the discussions on the tests but imposing a sub-section structure on this section: "Published Papers", "XMRV Tests", "Criticisms by the research teams". -- TerryE (talk) 17:34, 5 February 2010 (UTC)

The justification for the removal of information on a putative test from Imperial College was described in detail above: there are no third-party sources, and, if there were, this test has no relation (unlike Whittemore's political ties and funding sources) with the Whittemore Peterson Institute. As I've stated repeatedly, please write an article on the XMRV/CFS controversy if you would like inclusion of this information on Wikipedia. Keepcalmandcarryon (talk) 17:53, 5 February 2010 (UTC)

By this argument we should remove all reference to Imperial and any of its outputs or comment. This is the only XMRV/CFS controversy section. We had a discussion above about when to split off the article in #Name where the position that 3 editors including myself took was that it wasn't sensible to split the article now. You chose not to respond and it is therefore reasonable to assume that you accepted this consensus.

You did a unlateral removal of the basis of your your earlier position. I proposed a sensible midway interim text whilst we come to the consensus on this point. And you have now done a second deletion, a second unilateral actions ignoring all the above discusion. This is not a reasonable position to take. -- TerryE (talk) 18:12, 5 February 2010 (UTC)

I note that you've posted to this talk page, but not responded to my previous post. WP:RS states that "Self-published material may, in some circumstances, be acceptable when produced by an established expert on the topic of the article whose work in the relevant field has previously been published by reliable third-party publications". The fact that it is a primary source is not a valid reason on its own to remove this content. The text is reporting Imperial's decision to introduce a test and this is relevant to the XMRV/CFS controversy, and is therefore valid in this context.

We thought that we had already agreed that the Imperial publications are in scope for the purposes of the controversy section. If you now wish to challenge this then please do so explicitly, so that we can continue this discussion. If and when there is a consensus on this them we will need to cull this section of all reference to the Imperial output. -- TerryE (talk) 03:16, 6 February 2010 (UTC)

1. KC proposed an 'article be created on the XMRV controversy'.[33] I asked whether KC meant '"XMRV and CFS". Is there a controversy about prostate cancer?' KC did not reply, but now claims to have made 'repeated' requests for a XMRV/CFS controversy article. Thanks for clarifying that, KC.

2. KC's accusations (a. coatracking, b. in order to criticize the IC test) cannot be taken seriously. McClure accused WPI of taking advantage of patients, and 4 weeks later offers a rival test of her own. That is clearly part of the same controversy, so I added it the same day. The next day, Dr Charles Shepherd of the ME Association issued a position statement on the test's utility: it's non-diagnostic and there is no therapy. I added that accordingly. Can you both note that he did not offer any comment on the test's efficacy, and that the utility of the WPI test has already been commented on.

I'm replacing the material pending instructions on how a putative XMRV/CFS controversy article ought to be modelled. I would need better examples than AIDS controversy, which is currently merely a paragraph in the World Bank. Sam Weller (talk) 09:56, 6 February 2010 (UTC)

Please note two editors in the section Talk:Whittemore Peterson Institute#Name already discussed why a XMRV/CFS controversy article would not be appropriate with one editor for it. I will add my reasoning why it is not. IMO a XMRV/CFS controversy article would be a Content fork to theWhittemore Peterson Institute and to XMRV. The description of the science article and the plosone article should not be in a controversy section. The journal articles are just descriptions of what scientists found. The magazines and newspapers made a controversy by publishing sensationalist claims the journal articles didn't and framed the aftermath as a controversy. That material can be in a controversy section. WP should not indulge in sensational journalism. There will probably be more journal articles that differ from each other in any case.

There is almost exactly the same relationship between the Imperial College XMRV test and the Imperial College scientists reporting the plosone study to the relationship between VIP XMRV test to the WPI scientists that reported in the Science article. Primary sources may be used with care about descriptive statements that can be verified by any educated person without specialist knowledge. This is what Sam's descriptions were.[34] If it doesn't belong in this article it should belong in the XMRV article.

Lastly, the note on the talk page says, "Please discuss substantial changes here before making them". Please means please, not have to. This note should not be used like a club to revert good faith edits. Ward20 (talk) 10:25, 6 February 2010 (UTC)

I think you're probably right on all counts, Ward20. I've separated the research and the controversy into separate sections.

Sam Weller (talk) 11:06, 6 February 2010 (UTC)

K has reverted the work on the Imperial Test repeating the statement "Rm coatrack section on Imperial College test, as it has nothing to do with WPI." without responding to the content of the discussion below. So K, please respond to this discussion with constructive reasons for your actions.

In parallel to K's 3rd unliateral removal of this content, I was also preparing an update to this section following Imperial's withdrawal of the test. My wording had an update clash so I give now. The ME Association has subsquenty reported a dialogue with Prof Wessely[35]. Imperial has subsequently withdrawn the Test page and put out a statement that this testing is "only available as part of an ethically approved research project" [36]. I'll add this last reference and trim the discussion accordingly. I also reformatted the ref to the original announcement since it was first posted on 27 Jan, according to google archive [37] -- TerryE (talk) 18:01, 8 February 2010 (UTC)

If a third party source were to make a connection between what Sam Weller is calling McClure's test and her criticism of WPI, that would establish the information's claim to space here. Without it, it appears to be coatracking. As TerryE has correctly noted, this test is not being offered to patients directly; thus, Sam Weller's insistence on a qualifying relation appears to be rooted in synthesis.

As for the controversy article, yes, I meant XMRV/CFS controversy. There's a minor scientific controversy over the prostate cancer results that's probably not notable; the XMRV results have sparked a scientific controversy and a social controversy that's quite notable and includes many aspects in which WPI does not figure prominently. I'll create the article myself if others have no interest. Keepcalmandcarryon (talk) 23:13, 8 February 2010 (UTC)

In that case, the appropriate article is here: Controversies_related_to_chronic_fatigue_syndrome. Sam Weller (talk) 09:50, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

Misc. changes

Ref material:[38] "The Whittemores are trying to raise more money, and have received donations as large as $50,000 from friend down to a few dollars from patients who are sick, out of work and broke, but eager to support any research that may one day help them."

Changed "The Whittemores have solicited contributions as large as $50,000 from family friends, as well as smaller amounts from individual CFS patients". to "The Whittemores have obtained contributions as large as $50,000 from friends, to as little as a few dollars from individuals with CFS who are ill, unemployed, and poor, but passionate to help". I removed word solicited, it was not used in source and often has a negative connotation (for example in prostitution), and added material from the source. Ward20 (talk) 21:19, 6 February 2010 (UTC)

The interleaving of coverage on the research and on the testing makes the reading of the Press Coverage very confusing. I've split these into two separate sub-sections and this now reads better. -- TerryE (talk) 01:12, 7 February 2010 (UTC)

I have removed text on Mikowits detailed rebuttal of the McClure paper, as this gives unbalanced emphasis to the WPI responses. This all falls into the previous crisp summary "Supporters of the two teams traded accusations of conflicts of interest, technical sloppiness and failure to care about patients." anyway, so I have rolled up these references. What I propose to add here are some comparative statements from Keen's secondary review in Science. -- TerryE (talk) 01:24, 7 February 2010 (UTC)

OK, following my comments about about replacing the references to Kean's ScienceNow article with his more detailed Science one the following week[39], I have now done this. It's difficult to get the right balance and here is a copy of the article if anyone wants to check my summary or tweak the wording. I've focused on the test discussion in the article for this section. I've currently dropped the issue of "widely discussed in the press" as well as the WPI response. We may want to reintroduce this point but if we do then we will also need to include the Science article's or the WPI's statements that licence fees fund further research to maintain NPOV. Also note that the reason that I've kept the bare references to "Coffin" and "McClure" because the Science article has some informed comparison of the research that we should include, and here is the point to set the context for Coffin and McClure. However, it's now way past my bedtime so that's me done for the night. -- TerryE (talk) 04:50, 7 February 2010 (UTC)

Here is my first cut précis of Kean's content in the Science review on the clinical pros and cons. I guess I am too edit fatigued to trust my own inclusion of this text. It just goes into two much detail.

Strangely, XMRV, a rodent retrovirus, had previously been implicated in an aggressive prostate cancer. No one knows how XMRV might contribute to either or both diseases, but the [Science paper's] authors argued that the link made some sense: XMRV ravishes natural killer blood cells, which attack both tumors and cells infected by viruses. Other scientists thought the link dubious, criticizing the [authors] for not explaining enough about the demographics of their patients or the procedures to prevent contamination. Several virologists around the world practically sprinted to their labs to redo the experiments. A U.K. team already exploring the XMRV–prostate cancer link won the race, submitting a paper to PLoS ONE challenging the claim on 1 December 2009. It was accepted for publication after 3 days of review.

The British team, led by retrovirologist Myra McClure of Imperial College London used PCR to search for two viral sequences, one from XMRV and the other from a closely related virus. They discovered nothing. At a press conference discussing the results, published online 6 January in PLoS ONE, McClure was blunt and confident: "If there was one copy of the virus in those samples, we would have detected it."

This null result prompts the question of what—if anything—was wrong with the original paper. The PLoS ONE authors seem to suggest that contamination was at fault, stating that they were careful to work in labs that had never handled XMRV and use PCR machines that analyze no mouse tissues. But McClure says her group merely wanted to make that explicit, not accuse anyone. The U.S. team followed the same procedures, retorts Lombardi, a biochemist. He also expressed bewilderment that the McClure group didn't search its CFS samples for the same DNA sequence as his team had, raising the possibility that they had different results because they searched for different things. The McClure team, however, looked for not only an XMRV sequence but also a sequence in a closely related virus, MLV. That MLV sequence, highly conserved among viruses of its class, would presumably have been found if XMRV was present, they said.

One distinct possibility, says John Coffin, a microbiologist at Tufts University in Boston who studies retroviruses and wrote a separate analysis for Science when the original paper was published, is that both papers are right. He called the PLoS ONE paper too "preliminary" to settle the debate and said XMRV could show more genetic variety, and thus be harder to detect, than anyone assumed. It's also possible that distinct strains of XMRV appear in different parts of the world, as do the retroviruses HIV and HTLV (a leukemia virus). Coffin says one more possibility, raised by many scientists, is that CFS is actually a suite of diseases that present the same symptoms and so might have many causes. Lombardi agrees.

so I yield to other editors. -- TerryE (talk) 18:23, 7 February 2010 (UTC)

The History of the full name of WPI

I was a little concerned that we had implicitly removed the text "WPI has been known as 'The Whittemore Peterson Institute for Chronic Fatigue"[3] and the "National Chronic Fatigue Syndrome Institute"[4]' with Ward's recent implementation of our #Mission proposed changes proposed changes, so I went back to the cited RS. I also looked at the cited RS for the comments "their motive for founding the CFS research institute"[1][2] in the #History and the comment "The Whittemores envisioned WPI as an integrated facility for dedicated CFS treatment, education and research[3]" and "The institute is now known as the "Whittemore Peterson Institute for Neuro-Immune Disease" to reflect its wider stated goals:[5]" in the #Mission section. I have local copies of all the cited references including the ones cited for these:

1. The WSJ "Cancer-Causing Virus Linked to Chronic Fatigue" article
2. The Prohealth "Annette Whittemore and the Making of the Whittemore Peterson Institute in Reno" Article
3. The RGJ "Washoe projects receive funding" article
4. The Davidson Academy Annette Whittemore profile.
5. The WPI Mission statement

My only problem is on detailed reading supports none of this thesis that the name and scope of the institute has evolved. For example

1. uses the text "Whittemore Peterson Institute for Neuro-Immune Disease" in its body.
2. does discuss the goals an aims of AW+DP mentioning AWGs CF as a driver but it also includes the text "they envisioned something that had never been done before...an Institute that would: Provide cutting edge treatments, Stimulate research into neuro-immune issues, And provide outreach to a new generation of physicians and researchers."
3. does include the text "Whittemore-Peterson Institute for chronic fatigue at UNR received $3 million", but note the capitalisation of WPI and the lower case for "chronic fatigue" as opposed to article test which is all capital case. This usage is descriptive rather than a formal title
4. does use the headline "National Chronic Fatigue Syndrome Institute", but in the body of the article it later refers to the "Institute for Neuro-Immune Disease"
5. clearly only talks about the WPI for Neuro-Immune Disease.

Hence none of the cited references provide any evidence that the intent of AW has ever been anything other than to set up a "Whittemore Peterson Institute for Neuro-Immune Disease". Yes they use convenient descriptive alternatives to describe the WPI such as the "national chronic fatigue syndrome institute" (since this is a title it would be in title case), but in the body of the text they refer to WPI by its short or full title.

So in short, none of the references provide any evidence that the Whittemores' intended to found anything other than the "Whittemore Peterson Institute for Neuro-Immune Disease". Yes, it has been referred to by other shorthands, but so what? A convenient description is not the same as the assertion of a formal title.

One other comment: I have yet to find any RS which states that Dr P had anything to do with the founding of the WPI. Certainly none of the RSs cited in this article do. Any references that I have found suggest that "Andrea Whittemore" or "the Whittmores" named it in recognition of (the suffering of) their daughter and and (the work of) Dr Peterson. Under WP:V rules, unless K can provide an RS to substantiate this claim, it goes too. -- TerryE (talk) 17:34, 7 February 2010 (UTC)

The founding issue is interesting. I have been listing sources in conjunction with the the weight issues of AW and HW here[40]. It appears Peterson was heavily involved in the conception. Then HW stepped in to help plan and fundraise, but AW is mentioned as the founder in most articles[41] including the official WPI page.[42]

"Over Andrea's bedside, concerned activist mother met frustrated physician/researcher - and a partnership was born that may change the face of ME/CFS research and treatment...Dreaming big, they envisioned something that had never been done before...an Institute", Annette's husband Harvey Whittemore, an attorney and real estate developer, had been active in Nevada's political circles for many years. Harvey signed on to the project, and the three began the long odyssey of gathering the necessary financial and political support.",[43]

As far as the somewhat related issue of article weight on AW and HW and DP, I used Google page hits, specifically, "Annette Whittemore" "Whittemore Peterson Institute" 11,900,[44] "Harvey Whittemore" "Whittemore Peterson Institute" 648,[45] "Annette Whittemore" "Harvey Whittemore" "Whittemore Peterson Institute" 224.[46] AH>HW 18 to 1. "Daniel Peterson" "Whittemore Peterson Institute" 8,220 [47] Ward20 (talk) 19:26, 7 February 2010 (UTC)

Harvey Whittemore prefers to remain out of the spotlight, as he has stated in interviews. Obviously, as a lobbyist and a high-profile businessman, this is often impossible for him. With WPI, it is possible. Annette can take the public presidency, Peterson can serve as medical advisor, Harvey can stay in the background. All three are important to WPI. Keepcalmandcarryon (talk) 17:07, 8 February 2010 (UTC)

K, please respond on the substance of the WP:V issues above. "Obviously" is not a valid reason for inclusion of content. Verifiable content from RS is. One little example where I has left the text but added a fact tag: please supply an RS that Dr Peterson founded WPI. -- TerryE (talk) 17:47, 8 February 2010 (UTC)

08 February 2010 edit summaries

1. WPI is described by a reliable source as a small, private pathology laboratory. Typically, an Institute contains multiple laboratories and working groups; without a reliable description of WPI's size, describing it as an Institute is misleading.
2. The report was controversial. It is amongst the most controversial reports in science today, all the more so because its subject matter is at the cutting edge of retrovirology.
3. Science and other journal names should be rendered in italics.
4. That Ampligen was rejected by the FDA as a CFS treatment deserves and in fact demands mention per our policies on medicine-related claims. It's unfair to our readers to give the impression of drug efficacy without also mentioning that the FDA has not found it efficacious.
5. The historical names of WPI should be mentioned in the history section.
6. No valid reason given to exclude the support of John Ensign and Harry Reid, or Whittemore's ties to either.
7. The aims must be represented more clearly as quoted from the website.
8. rm "The scientific director of WPI said that as research progressed they started to realize that diseases with similar etiologies might benefit from their findings". There is no known aetiology for CFS, nor is the aetiology of autism, fibromyalgia or Gulf War Syndrome known. If this sentence is to remain in the article, it must be rewritten as Mikovits's opinion, an opinion inconsistent with current scientific knowledge. I've made an attempt at this.
9. Mikovits/Kerr grant: language is taken from the grant proposal title; application proposes to develop "new strategies to decipher..."
10. The estimate of 95% is in the WPI sample.
11. The name ME/CFS, although used by some, is least of all used in the United States; the Wikipedia article should use the currently accepted name of the condition.
12. The CFSAC information should probably be included elsewhere. CFSAC, whilst important to CFS internet groups, doesn't have much clout, i.e. significance or notability.
13. Minor rewrites for NPOV.
14. Rm coatrack section on Imperial College test, as it has nothing to do with WPI.
15. Restoring Mikovits comments on insurance company conspiracy, etc. Keepcalmandcarryon (talk) 17:04, 8 February 2010 (UTC)

Keepcalmandcarryon, three editors have worked on this article over the weekend. The history of this work is discussed in detail in the above discussions. All changes were specific reasons as per their change comments or in the relevant discussion sections. It would help up all greatly if you responded correctly in the relevant sections, rather than listing off the changes with your declared position. I don't want to move the discussions here, but I give a simple example: you make the statement "The historical names of WPI should be mentioned in the history section"; well please refer to #The History of the full name of WPI where I analyse the accuracy of your original edits and show that they fail WP:V. The onus is on you to provide verifiable references before you can reinstitute this content and claims, under Wikipedia policies. Unilateral action without doing so is unreasonable. Please work with us on the appropriate discussion sections. -- TerryE (talk) 17:42, 8 February 2010 (UTC)

Keepcalmandcarryon, I've just realised that your made over a dozen separate changes all in a single commit with a reference to this section. I have decided to roll back to the version before your change. This is not because I necessarily reject all changes, but given that we have followed best practice and made one content change per commit with the relevant justification in the talk section (or change log where this is accepted practice). All I ask is that you address each of your proposed changes by first reponding to the relevant issue in the discussion section and only make your change if you feel that your argument supports it. If we keep to one change per commit, it just makes everyone's life a lot easier and there exists a proper audit trail. For your convenience, I have cross-referenced your points to the appropriate section as follows:

1. #The History of the full name of WPI
2. #Request for Comment and article history comment
3. Accepted. Good point and non-controversial
4. #Ampligen
5. #The History of the full name of WPI
6. #Reference Packing
7. #Mission
8. #Mission
9. The wording is taken from the current RS, if you want to propose new wording then please propose a new PS first, then make the change.
10. #Main points from WPI paper in XMRV/CFS controversy section
11. ME/CFS has been an alias in for Chronic Fatigue Syndrome sine 2006
12. #Main points from WPI paper in XMRV/CFS controversy section
13. Please explain what you mean here?
14. #Coatracking
15. #Personal Interest ?

-- TerryE (talk) 18:57, 8 February 2010 (UTC)

It would seem that the concept of talk page discussion has become meaningless on this page. Editors ask for discussion, but then proceed to make changes without discussion. There's been no waiting for alternative viewpoints or suggestions. Instead, declaration has improperly taken the place of discussion, and the agreement of two editors has been mistaken for consensus, even to remove reliably sourced information of direct relevance to the article. Keepcalmandcarryon (talk) 20:27, 8 February 2010 (UTC)

Given that many of the points related to WP:V where at various points we've all discussed issues. Where for example I lay out as in #The History of the full name of WPI a cross referenced discussion of why this fails WP:V, removing the text pending your response is an reasonable action. A reasonable response is to argue why it not the case or to supply additional RS to support the text. Instead you state an earlier claim that I've refuted by evidence: "The historical names of WPI should be mentioned in the history section." and unilaterally reapply the same changes. So there was discussion, there was presentation of evidence, it's just that you happened to be offline during the weekend. I will repeat for the third time the Wikipedia policy (see here) is that "The burden of evidence lies with the editor who adds or restores material". You add material; someone points out that it isn't supported by the RS giving evidence; you decline to reply to the substance of the initial objection; then reinstate the content. So yes, there is one editor on this page who makes the bulk of unilateral changes without discussion, and you can easily remedy that by attempting to following Wikipedia best practice and work constructively with the other editors. -- TerryE (talk) 21:27, 8 February 2010 (UTC)

I've restored my edits, which were properly described in a detailed fashion above. I have changed the language on the historical (reported) names, as I agree a progression should not be implied. However, these names were used by reliable sources and, in my opinion, should be included. Keepcalmandcarryon (talk) 21:40, 8 February 2010 (UTC)

And again:

1. WPI is described by a reliable source as a small, private pathology laboratory. Typically, an Institute contains multiple laboratories and working groups; without a reliable description of WPI's size, describing it as an Institute is misleading. This is found in a reliable source, and it's one of the only factual descriptions of the Institute's size. Or is the Guardian wrong? Does WPI have many, many investigators, post-docs and techs?
2. The report was controversial. It is amongst the most controversial reports in science today, all the more so because its subject matter is at the cutting edge of retrovirology. The controversy is primarily what makes WPI notable: the controversy over the first report and the subsequent failed verification.
3. Science and other journal names should be rendered in italics. This was agreed, but also reverted. Why?
4. That Ampligen was rejected by the FDA as a CFS treatment deserves and in fact demands mention per our policies on medicine-related claims. It's unfair to our readers to give the impression of drug efficacy without also mentioning that the FDA has not found it efficacious. I emphasise again: we can't put out this tantalising claim of a miracle cure without giving the rest of the story; we should also mention that A W-G had to discontinue due to side effects (per NYT, WSJ).
5. The historical names of WPI should be mentioned in the history section. But I agree, no progression should be implied. And I also stated that these names were reported, not necessarily the official name.
6. No valid reason given to exclude the support of John Ensign and Harry Reid, or Whittemore's ties to either. That's still the case. Both appropriated funds, both are beneficiaries of HW's largesse, both are friends, Reid is a close friend. Relevant, well sourced.
7. The aims must be represented more clearly as quoted from the website. These sentences were not "summarised" as TerryE has falsely stated; they were copied. They must be quoted.
8. "The scientific director of WPI said that as research progressed they started to realize that diseases with similar etiologies might benefit from their findings". There is no known aetiology for CFS, nor is the aetiology of autism, fibromyalgia or Gulf War Syndrome known. If this sentence is to remain in the article, it must be rewritten as Mikovits's opinion, an opinion inconsistent with current scientific knowledge. I've made an attempt at this. Yet it was removed without discussion or comment. Wikipedia is not an outlet for the quasi-scientific statements of a single individual; if such a person must be quoted, then let's make it a direct quote or indicate how and why she's wrong.
9. Mikovits/Kerr grant: language is taken from the grant proposal title; application proposes to develop "new strategies to decipher..." Again, this is a direct quote and must be quoted. The previous language is also inaccurate by eliminating the first two words. It's a technology proposal, not a mechanism proposal.
10. The estimate of 95% is in the WPI sample. Why was this reverted?
11. The name ME/CFS, although used by some, is least of all used in the United States; the Wikipedia article should use the currently accepted name of the condition; see WP:MOSMED. CFS is the name to use, here and throughout Wikipedia.
12. The CFSAC information should probably be included elsewhere. CFSAC, whilst important to CFS internet groups, doesn't have much clout, i.e. significance or notability.
13. Minor rewrites for NPOV.
14. Rm coatrack section on Imperial College test, as it has nothing to do with WPI. I've given my position on this repeatedly.
15. Restoring Mikovits comments on insurance company conspiracy, etc: notable (and rather shocking) comment from RS by the research director. Keepcalmandcarryon (talk) 22:02, 8 February 2010 (UTC)

I am utterly, utterly at a loss as to how to respond to this. We have a series of detailed discussions ongoing where we've made points and asked for your contribution. I have asked you politely to engage in them. There are some very specific instances where your content fails WP:V based on detailed examination of those very RSs that you cite, yet you sweep all this discussion aside with a statement that "the concept of talk page discussion has become meaningless on this page" and that your edits "were properly described in a detailed fashion above" and you again restore your edits as a single bulk edit. Your position seems to be: edit war or give in. I just feel that to respond in your fashion is demeaning us all to these standards. -- TerryE (talk) 22:14, 8 February 2010 (UTC)

I explained each of my edits in full. I responded, again and with more specificity, to your comments. In my reversion, I acquiesced to your agreement with Ward20 that a progression of names should not be implied and changed the language. Which of my points do you disagree with? Do you suggest that it's good editing to copy and paste information from the internet without quoting it, as you have done? Do you feel that the names of journals should not be italicised? That the name and purpose of a grant should be selectively mangled at will? That Harry Reid and John Ensign did not appropriate money for WPI? That WP:MOSMED does not apply to this article? That comments by the WPI's lead scientist, reported in reliable sources, attacking other scientists by accusing them of outright fraud, are to be glossed over by omission? Keepcalmandcarryon (talk) 22:23, 8 February 2010 (UTC)

This weekend I downloaded all of the RS cited in this article and reconciled all of the contentious statements against this actual copy. Every time I found that the source didn't refer to the text or there was a material reinterpretation, I reported it on this page. The other editors that were active over the weekend were monitoring this and broadly endorsed what I was doing. These points of issue are sufficiently grave that they do merit you detailed response, unless you wish to ignore Wikipedia policies. "Oh no they don't." isn't quite what the policy makers intended when they said, "The burden of evidence lies with the editor who adds or restores material". I could start debating each point, but wait -- that's why we've got all this open discussion sections above. I will quote your responses in the relevant open sections, and continue the discussion there. I refuse to move this discussion to a new section simply because you find previous open thread on these same subjects too inconvenient to responds to.

I urge all editors to do likewise and limit their comments here specifically to any new issues that your raised -- TerryE (talk) 23:57, 8 February 2010 (UTC)

Keepcalmandcarryon, your edits reverted material back to original research or against consensus. Again, please go back to the sections where the original discussions are and state passages from the sources that support the claims. This I agree with: "Science and other journal names should be rendered in italics". "The aims must be represented more clearly as quoted from the website". The Imperial College test is moot as they appear to have withdrawn it from public access. Some of the "Minor rewrites for NPOV". Ward20 (talk) 09:37, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

When "consensus" is defined as one editor writing, "I concur" after whatever similarly minded editors write, the word has lost its intended meaning. Additionally, when consensus involves editors with intense interest that we all know in some cases borders on or ventures into actual conflict of interest, it's likewise lost any valid meaning.

In any case, a vote of editors does not decide whether or not we will follow WP:MOSMED for the name of an illness; whether we will properly indicate and attribute quotes; or whether reliably-sourced, relevant information will be included in an article. It's become quite apparent that several editors here wish to conceal the history of WPI, namely that the Whittemores established the institute to research chronic fatigue syndrome; to remove verifiably accurate on Ampligen and Daniel Peterson; and to delete any reliably sourced information they feel reflects negatively on Judy Mikovits, Harvey Whittemore or WPI in general. I understand and appreciate why these editors are doing this, and I share their ultimate goals, but these reasons aren't valid on Wikipedia and are harmful to the project. Please, I again implore those of you with a personal interest in this article to reconsider whether your motivations are compatible with objective editing.

There appear to be several issues that remain to be resolved:

• Is it correct to note that the Science article is controversial?
• Are the article's conclusions, particularly as regards antibody testing and culture, presented accurately? (I maintain that they are not).
• Is it improper to refer to past reported names of the institute?
• Is it improper to refer to the employment history of Mikovits?
• Is it wrong to mention US federal support for WPI, or to mention that at least one of the Nevada Senators is a personal friend of Harvey Whittemore?

If we are unable to resolve our differences through compromise, I suggest that we request arbitration. Keepcalmandcarryon (talk) 15:56, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

Keepcalmandcarryon, where we have already existing discussions ongoing on one of the points that you make here I repeat: you must understand that we can't arbitrarily terminate that discussion and post here for your convenience. Use browser search and the history to track comments. However, for those topics where the discussion section has been archived and there isn't an existing topic in the current talk page, then it makes sense to open a new section per item (otherwise the discussion threads get hopelessly entangled). I suggest that we use a title like 08 Feb Mass Revert #N or equivalent, so that we can track them back, and then we can cross reference the archived discussion at the head of each. -- TerryE (talk) 08:49, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

09 February restoration of scientific inaccuracies

TerryE] has reverted a scientifically accurate description of the WPI article's results in favour of a misleading summary. TerryE's edit summary was "We are drilling down into technical critique. See talk page". Unfortunately, TerryE has chosen not to explain his reversion on the talk page, nor to respond to my detailed response to his comments in a previous section.

Although I have already explained why TerryE's previous version (the one to which he has now reverted) is wrong, I will do so once more.

• "antibodies to XMVR Env" is incorrect. First, it's XMRV, not XMVR, but more importantly, the assay found antibodies to a murine leukemia virus env. It is not yet known if this antibody is actually to XMRV.
• "immune response to XMRV" is the same thing as in the previous point. It's inaccurate and wrong to describe this as two separate detection assays.
• "and patient-derived XMRV infectivity of activated PBMCs" doesn't make sense. Infectivity is a property of virus; susceptibility is a property of cells. In any case, what the authors measured was the presence of proteins recognised by anti-MuLV (not anti-XMRV) antibodies in cells of a prostate cancer "indicator" line, an immortalised T-cell line, and, using just one patient sample, primary activated T-cell culture.

If editors wish to include details from the paper, they must be presented accurately, not in a slapdash and scientifically inaccurate manner. Keepcalmandcarryon (talk) 19:10, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

Keepcalmandcarryon, did you not read the summary given by Mikowits herself that I quoted earlier in this very talk page where we originally discussed this proposed change? "Antibodies to XMVR Env" were her words and not mine. Are you now adding an attack on Mikowits, an agreed expert in this field, in this page to the attack that you made on Aubrey de Grey in his talk page?

In terms of your claim "TerryE has reverted ... TerryE has chosen not to explain his reversion on the talk page, nor to respond to my detailed response to his comments in a previous section", please see my post [48] which I posted after immediately the change. I posted this on the thread where we had been discussing this topic. It's not my fault that you ignore active threads and decided unilaterally to start new threads for ongoing discussions after this odd statement [49].

I wanted to keep technical discussion off this page but I feel that I must respond, using some of my post on your talk page:

• Yes tests B-D were based on a set of animal infected MLV antibodies. We both know that antibodies can usually show this type of broad class response. The authors explicitly demonstrated that the these tests were positive to the human VP62 XMRV strain, and therefore demonstrate an antibody reaction to XMRV. (You omit to mention this.) So perhaps more strictly we could might said "a gammaretrovirus class which includes XMRV".

• Of course "patient-derived XMRV infectivity of activated PBMCs" makes sense, though the wording could be improved. Yes, infectivity is a property of virus, but it can be a property of many things such as bacteria and fungi -- and in this case were a PBMC containing an integrated (XMRV) retrovirus, then activating the PBMC could in turn activate the integrated retroviral DNA leading to the production and budding of XMRV virions and the subsequent infection of the human Raji, LNCaP and Sup-T1 cells (these are "immortal" cell lines which have been shown to be very susceptible to gammaretrovirus infection in earlier studies). In other words a PBMC sample, with only a few cells having integrated XMRV, could cause an infection cascade that could then be detected by IFC or WB assay.

But, I repeat. We should not be having this discussion here or using this page to attack the credentials and integrity of a paper (and its authors) that has been widely reviewed by true field experts. We should not be mounting personal attacks on other editors. We should stick to the content. The study details four tests. Do we just say "four tests" without naming them or do we give them short descriptive names from the paper text? I am not saying mine are the best. I do think that we should consider alternatives, such as a better rewording from the RS or by using other brief descriptive names introduced by elsewhere in RS by the authors. However, this must stop short of OR by any of the editors.

Having thought about it perhaps "XMRV infectivity of activated patient PBMCs" might be a better wording. Please suggest alternatives. Please engage constructively, but stick to WP:V, WP:NOR, and leave the vitriol to blogs such as ERVs, eh? -- TerryE (talk) 03:55, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

As a codicil, I do find it amusing that you make such a big issue of my not responding to your change (when in fact I did), when you yourself with a single mass revert [50] backed out the work of three editors made over three days which included some 35 changes to the article with this terse statement [51] as the entire justification and dismissing the some 30 comment posts amounting to some 5,000 words of discussion on this talk page by the same editors, with your explanation "the concept of talk page discussion has become meaningless on this page" !! -- TerryE (talk) 04:25, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

Stop reverting

Consensus is Wikipedia's fundamental model for editorial decision-making. It isn't about being right, it's about having consensus. If you're the only editor with a position and there are two others who disagree, you don't have it. I recommended article WP:RFC. Gerardw (talk) 10:15, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

I have removed 'controversial' from the lead, per RFC, as it is clearly intended to delegitimize the research and the institute. Editors may like to read Talk:Simon_Wessely#Sentence_removed for a discussion of the use of the word 'controversial' in a BLP where the subject himself said in the Lancet that he is controversial, and has frequently been described as such elsewhere, but two admins have blocked the use of the word, and any description of the controversy.

I have also moved the "small path lab" to the context of the building development. If the Whittemores had founded a university, and the first building up and running was the admin, would we say "Whittemore University, consisting of an admin block"?

I have also changed the loaded word "obtained", which has roughly the same meaning as "solicited", and can also be used to describe a offence (Deception_offences#Obtaining_property_by_a_deception) to the neutral source term, "received".

In conclusion, KC insists at all times that her interpretation is a. right, and b. neutral. However, I've seen more than enough examples of OR, SYNTH and POV that cast serious doubt on those contentions. Tekaphor's comparison with ex-editor RetroS1mone is right on the money, afaic. Sam Weller (talk) 11:12, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

"suggested that XMRV may be a contributing factor in the pathogenesis of CFS"

The present wording in the article impies the Scence article stated a possible causal relationship. In reality, they proposed questions that need to be determined.

In summary, we have discovered a highly significant association between the XMRV retrovirus and CFS. This

observation raises several important questions. Is XMRV infection a causal factor in the pathogenesis of CFS or a passenger virus in the immunosuppressed CFS patient population? What is the relationship between XMRV

infection status and the presence or absence of other viruses that are often associated with CFS (e.g., herpesviruses)? Conceivably these viruses could be cofactors in pathogenesis, as is the case for HIV-mediated disease, where co-infecting pathogens play an important role (20). Patients with CFS have an elevated ncidence of cancer (21). Does XMRV infection alter the risk of cancer development in CFS?

Proposed new wording:

and offered the questions: whether XMRV might cause CFS or simply be a passenger co-infection, if there is a relationship with other viruses identified with CFS, and if the virus could affect cancer risk in CFS.

Ward20 (talk) 22:20, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

Of course they implied that a causal relationship could exist. They have done so not only in the Science article, but also in sundry press releases and interviews. A scientific question presents the possibilities, i.e. the things that you believe could be. You then test your hypotheses to find out which of them is/are correct. Lombardi et al propose that XMRV could be a causal factor in CFS or could be a passenger virus. I'm flummoxed by this insistence that they do not do so. Keepcalmandcarryon (talk) 22:32, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

Please read again, they implied that a causal relationship could exist, or not, if it's a passenger co-infection. The whole story has to be presented, not a part of the story. Ward20 (talk) 23:26, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

"but also in sundry press releases and interviews.". We are summarising the study. Please read WP:NOR. If you want to discuss a proposed wording for the Coverage of Research (oops you unilaterally deleted that heading, but the same place) then please do so. -- TerryE (talk) 04:33, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

Edits by 74.51.82.241

This IP address editor has just made a batch of edits relating to the recent discussions. The post comments indicate that this is far from a novice unlike most IP posters, and the WP policies specifically permit such anonymous editing. From the IP location (Prairie Grove, Arkansas) I don't believe that we is one of the other editors posting on this page. His changes were as follows:

• 17:21 (-2) -- Media coverage and controversy: changed 'the' to 'a'
• 17:19 (-413) -- Media coverage and controversy: from Wikipedia:NPOV- "Try not to quote directly from participants engaged in a heated dispute; instead, summarize and present the arguments in an impartial tone." Removal of McClure comment
• 17:14 (2) -- Funding and support: WPI 'joined forces' with University of Nevada, kind of cumbersome to state in detail. Less is more. http://www.medicine.nevada.edu/cmm/
• 17:01 (-13) -- Funding and support: combined sentences
• 17:00 (-507) -- Funding and support: the article is about the WPI, not the Whittemore family's finances
• 16:58 (-8) -- History:  ??? Garbled comment ??? but removal of reference to WPI as a laboratory
• 16:54 (23) -- History: combined sentences
• 16:52 (-277) -- History: the fact that a random article once got the Institute's name wrong is not relevant information for an encyclopedia
• 16:50 (-44) -- History: citation needed for 2004, 'a CFS research institute' is not accurate, WPI is established to research neuroimmune disease such as CFS, fibromyalgia, and GWS, among others
• 16:40 (-69) -- (Intro): Extraneous info, not important to intro
• 16:21 (3) -- Media coverage and controversy
• 16:20 (-19) -- Media coverage and controversy: including 'according to WPI' implies dishonesty or at least an alternative arrangement, with the only other alternative being WPI is lying

-- TerryE (talk) 19:40, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

08 Feb Mass Revert #11 -- The name ME/CFS

You change ME/CFS to CFS citing "The name ME/CFS, although used by some, is least of all used in the United States; the Wikipedia article should use the currently accepted name of the condition", REDOing this change twice. Can I point out that the context in the article is the sentence "Annette Whittemore stated that ..." taken from an RS, and AW actually used the term "ME/CFS" in this RS. Since when has it become the job of editors to make debious 'corrections' when quoting RS content? I am reinstating this wording. --- TerryE (talk) 13:53, 11 February 2010 (UTC)

If you insist on quoting AW, you must also explain what "ME/CFS" means and why it is not in favour. It's much easier simply to use the prevalent terminology. Unless, that is, you're intent on promoting a cause rather than building an encyclopaedia. Keepcalmandcarryon (talk) 23:29, 13 February 2010 (UTC)

It is the common usage in the UK, though not by the CDC in the US. However, you are correct in that we should include an interpage link ME/CFS. As I said above this has been in place since 2006. I will make this change now. -- TerryE (talk) 01:19, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

Not only is "ME" not in universal use in the UK, many experts object to the misleading implications of the name. Furthermore, the Whittemore Peterson Institute is in the United States. Finally, that Myalgic encephalomyelitis redirects to CFS demonstrates that CFS is the proper terminology for the encyclopaedia. Please remove the name and the improper double redirect. Keepcalmandcarryon (talk) 01:51, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

The UK bible for this is the NICE guidelines: Chronic fatigue syndrome / Myalgic encephalomyelitis. They swapped the order round a couple of years back. ME/CFS is not the dominant usage in the US but it is an accepted usage. I repeat, in this section (unlike other references) we are quoting a source, and given that is an accepted usage and the actual phrase is used by the source, then we shouldn't change it. -- TerryE (talk) 04:01, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

08 Feb Mass Revert #13 -- Minor rewrites for NPOV

One of the deletions by K was the deletion of a new para relating to the work of the HHC BWC. Since none of the other items cover this, I assume that this is a "minor rewrite of NPOV". The extract has appropriate RS, and Dr Holmberg references findings of the WPI paper as the reason for this action. I welcome constructive and evidence based improvements to this para, but not its entire deletion without a justifiable reason. I am reinstating this content. -- TerryE (talk) 14:06, 11 February 2010 (UTC)

Inappropriate content, as agreed by multiple uninvolved editors at WP:MED. I would also note the characterisation of Ward20's editing behaviour as "soapboxing". Keepcalmandcarryon (talk) 23:30, 13 February 2010 (UTC)

I agree that we should update this decision in the light of the final WP:MED recommendation. -- TerryE (talk) 05:11, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

08 Feb Mass Revert #13 -- Minor rewrites for NPOV (II)

One of the edits that Keepcalmandcarryon has introduced is the attribution of ownership of VIP Dx to the Whittemores citing the CFIDS article "a Nevada company owned by the Whittemore family, formerly known as RedLabs USA. VIP Dx", however, the later Science article qualifies this with the statement "(Test proceeds roll back into research and development at Whittemore, which licenses the test to VIP Dx. VIP Dx has also received financial support from the Whittemore family in the past.)", which I guess that he added after validating the WPI statement in their press release [52], "Dr. Lombardi is an employee of WPI, and has no personal financial interest in VIP Dx. Likewise, the Whittemore family put their interest in VIP Dx into a trust to benefit WPI.".

We either have both the ownership claim and the clarification of putting this interest into trust, or we drop both. Restoring one without the other fails NPOV. I propose we keep it simple and drop both, but I'll leave it a day or so for K to comment. -- TerryE (talk) 18:45, 11 February 2010 (UTC)

The Whittemores own it. They pledge to give the profits to their own Institute. Is there something confusing about this? Lombardi founded VIP Dx. Now he is a WPI employee. It's not clear when his personal financial interest was dropped, but it apparently was. Keepcalmandcarryon (talk) 23:33, 13 February 2010 (UTC)

Read the references and previous discussions. The Whittemores have put there interests in VIP Dx into trust. The proceeds go to WPI. They hired Lombardi from VIP Dx to work at WPI full time. His only interest in VIP Dx is (unpaid) quality control validating the XMRV test. Yes, it is confusing which is why I would like to restructure / trim but hopefully maintaining NPOV and consensus amongst the editors -- TerryE (talk) 05:15, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

08 Feb Mass Revert #14 -- Imperial College test Coatrack

Keepcalmandcarryon's statement is that the announcing and subsequent withdrawal of the Imperial College test is nothing to do with WPI, and that she has therefore removed this. However, I would also point out she herself added this association by stating in original text [53] for the article "Virologist John Coffin and Myra McClure, corresponding author for the British team, expressed concerns that Lombardi's team were taking advantage of patients"[my ital]. She has now restored this McClure claim 3 or four times.

We have two teams A and B. We quote BossB for criticising team A for taking an action. Shortly after team B takes the same action then later decides to withdraw it. We either have both point or neither. This is either in scope or out. In or out. I don't care which, but we can't cherry pick to present a POV. Keepcalmandcarryon, I'll let you choose. -- TerryE (talk) 19:05, 11 February 2010 (UTC)

It's a couple of days since I asked you this and you have been active on Wikipedia in the interrim, so I think that it is reasonable for me to propose a some wording here. Perhaps the easiest thing is to drop the clause "including Coffin and McClure" so the wording is now "Some scientists feared that the VIP Dx took ...". Shorter and reads better but leaves the point. I think that this closes this Imperial Coatrack issue, but the whole relationship and coverage of VIP Dx is still too tangled for the general reader to fallow, but I'll open a new section to discuss this. -- TerryE (talk) 17:14, 13 February 2010 (UTC)

Coffin and McClure made these points; where possible, name names instead of using weasel words. Keepcalmandcarryon (talk) 01:52, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

OK, I don't have a problem with this, but in this case you are bringing into scope McClure criticising WPI + VIP Dx for releasing the test. However some 14 days after this statement by McClure, Imperial was itself planning to release a test. Drawing the line on one side of both or the other side of both maintains NPOV, and as I said above I would be happy with either. Adopting the middle as you suggest doesn't. -- TerryE (talk) 04:08, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

08 Feb Mass Revert #15 -- Mikovits comments on insurance company conspiracy

K, As you yourself observe, this is a "notable and rather shocking comment" that you attribute to a living person. In other words this falls under WP:REDFLAG scope. The context must be properly verifiable from a high-quality source. Let's examine the actual wording from the RGJ article written by the jounalist Lenita Powers in the RGJ.

"They paid to have their study published in the Public Library of Science, and it was then picked up by Science (magazine)," said Mikovits said, who suspects insurance companies in the United Kingdom are behind attempts to sully the findings of the Reno study.

The reference to having to pay for publication is PLoS is a direct attribution, but the "who suspects ... " is an interpretation by the journalist, that is indirect hearsay. The onus in this case is on you to prove that this is a directly attributable to the person concerned, this RS does not support your claim and therefore falls short of the REDFLAG guideline. I am removing this text and if you reinstate this for what is now the third time, without providing a proper RS, then we can take this to BPLN. -- TerryE (talk) 20:07, 11 February 2010 (UTC)

Sorry, I didn't address the "accusation .. of fraud" element. The RS doesn't contain the word fraud. This is pure fabrication on your part. -- TerryE (talk) 20:11, 11 February 2010 (UTC)

Again, please drop the uncivil language. You don't gain anything by insulting me or accusing me of fabrication. When a scientist says another scientist cooked their results, that's called accusing them of scientific fraud. And that's precisely what Mikovits did. She accused McClure et al of setting up their experiment in such a way as to obtain the result they wanted. She also accused them of "paying" (read: bribing) to have their paper published quickly, and of being part of an insurance company-funded conspiracy to discredit her results. Previously, you included an entire paragraph from the Reno paper; I simply summarised, and in an accurate fashion. That's not fabrication; it's writing. Keepcalmandcarryon (talk) 23:38, 13 February 2010 (UTC)

No "paying" means "paying" which is what the authors have to do to publish PLoS ONE. This is a simple fact. (I also approve of authors doing this BTW). If there is an inference of bribrary, I don't know whether this is on your part or the journalists. At least your statement "That comments by the WPI's lead scientist, reported in reliable sources, attacking other scientists by accusing them of outright fraud, are to be glossed over by omission" was made on the talk pages. So let me understand you: insulting experts is OK, but not other editors. I regret both, even if I am sometimes mortal.

I've already quoted one extract from the RS above, the other relevant one is: "You can't claim to replicate a study if you don't do a single thing that we did in our study," she said. "They skewed their experimental design in order to not find XMRV in the blood." I agree that the second sentence is provocative and I feel that JM was unwise to say that. (However, they did chose not to use the assays that WPI had made available to the research, and use an assay that has been criticised by some technical reviewers. Had they done so, then any comparison with the WPI findings would have had stronger merit.) So provocative and ill-advised perhaps, but this is short of your text. I stand by my position. You can always choose to ignore it and revert this edit. -- TerryE (talk) 04:29, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

Edit Whittemore Peterson Institute#History section Feb 12 2010

Replace, "The Whittemores describe their motive for founding the CFS research institute as a desire to help their daughter, Andrea Whittemore-Goad, and other CFS patients. Their daughter developed symptoms as a child and was diagnosed with CFS at the age of twelve.."

with

"The Whittemores, and Daniel Peterson established the Whittemore-Peterson Institute in 2005 to aid patients with Myalgic Encephalomyelitis/Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, Fibromyalgia and related illnesses. Annette Whittemore, founder and president of the institute, describes the inspiration for the institute was the illness of her daughter, Andrea Whittemore-Goad. She was diagnosed with CFS at the age of twelve."

This establishes material for the lead that isn't in the body, is better sourced, and eliminates redundancy. Ward20 (talk) 00:21, 12 February 2010 (UTC)

Remove, "subsequently rejected by the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA)."

AWG was taking Ampigen under an Investigational New Drug program which is still ongoing.[54] The FDA's rejection of the approval of Ampligen's New Drug Application for retail marketing approval has nothing to do with AWG nor WPI. Ward20 (talk) 01:48, 12 February 2010 (UTC)

First, the name of the disorder is CFS. Unless you're going to quote directly and explain subsequently what "ME/CFS" is and why most doctors consider ME to be a misleading name, please simply use the prevalent name. Second, the Whittemores founded WPI to investigate CFS. I am bemused by the insistence of several editors here that WPI is about anything except for CFS. Sure, WPI has a statement to that effect, but read any CFS website, read any history of WPI, and you will reach the inescapable conclusion: WPI was founded to find an acquired cause of CFS. It was founded because the Whittemore's daughter was sick. Annette Whittemore has even stated that she does not want to cure CFS unless she cures her daughter. In other words, it's the daughter who matters, and other CFS patients are an afterthought.

Ampligen was rejected by the FDA in December 2009. You can add any number of caveats to that, but it was rejected. The drug has efficacy issues, perhaps others, and we can't introduce it here without mentioning the negative aspects.

Editors on this page must stop abusing Wikipedia as a soapbox for promoting this Institute uncritically, with deletion of any information deemed negative. Keepcalmandcarryon (talk) 23:43, 13 February 2010 (UTC)

I agree that we mustn't promote or abuse WPI uncritically, but Ampligen has nothing to do with the WPI. Should we also say that WPI employee X smoked and start giving health warnings about smoking? -- TerryE (talk) 05:22, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

The reference that is specifically dedicated to the creation of the WPI[55] specifically states Myalgic Encephalomyelitis/Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, Fibromyalgia and related illnesses. Other sources and the instute use ME/CFS[56][57]. Unilaterally second guessing references about the teminology they use is original research. Myalgic Encephalomyelitis and Chronic Fatigue Syndrome terminology are well explained on the Alternative names for chronic fatigue syndrome. It can easily be linked.

Keepcalmandcarryon stated, "It was founded because the Whittemore's daughter was sick. Annette Whittemore has even stated that she does not want to cure CFS unless she cures her daughter. In other words, it's the daughter who matters, and other CFS patients are an afterthought." Keepcalmandcarryon, produce a RS to verify your statement or it will be removed as a BLP violation. This news source directly contradicts that statement.[58] (start at timestamp 15:40)

Keepcalmandcarryon please read the paragraph I wrote above your post.[59] If the reader wants to read more about ampligen the material is there. This article is about issues concerning the Whittemore Peterson Institute not the regulatory merits or demerits of AWG's treatments. Ward20 (talk) 06:00, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

The quote by Annette Whittemore is in the New York Times, alongside additional Whittemore Peterson Institute information you have chosen to suppress by a 3-2 vote, including the employment history of the Institute's scientific director:

"'She is just really very, very sick,' Mrs. Whittemore said. 'She’s had this for a long time. We’ve got to get something for her as soon as possible. That is the driver for the speed on this. I don’t want to lose her. I can’t lose my daughter. I don’t want to win this battle and lose the war.'"

The "driver" for the Whittemore's urgency, then, is their daughter's condition, CFS, not the suffering of various fibromyalgia and autism patients, as the article currently claims. Whittemore "can't lose" her daughter. She doesn't "want to lose her". She doesn't "want to win this battle" (finding a viral cause for CFS) and "lose the war" (saving her daughter). The "war" for Mrs. Whittemore, is the fight for her daughter's health. The relatively minor "battle", for her, is fighting CFS in general. And she doesn't want to do that unless she also saves her daughter. I'm not sure how one argues with the directly quoted words of Annette Whittemore (even if she has elsewhere contradicted herself, as you suggest).

In any case, you've neatly diverted the discussion to a frivolous BLP charge: My point was not to explore the Whittemore's motivations, but that editors of this article have repeatedly removed reliably sourced information they consider negative. There's no good reason for this type of behaviour apart from what I repeated from the WP:MED discussion: soapboxing for the subject. Keepcalmandcarryon (talk) 19:13, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

As for Ampligen, this experimental drug has been rejected as a treatment for CFS. Even AWG had to stop taking it due to side effects, according to the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal. Per WP:MEDRS, we are obligated to provide accurate information about this drug; currently, it is presented as a wonder drug, the only product to help the Whittemore's daughter. That's inaccurate and against policy. Ward20's continuing suppression of negative, reliable information about this drug is beginning to appear somewhat suspicious. Keepcalmandcarryon (talk) 19:18, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

Yes, and we have a few RS which confirm that secondhand smoke is tied to cancer (e.g. NYT Jan 8, 1993), but what has this to do with WPI either? The article has a single reference "with the experimental antiviral drug Ampligen" when discussing AWG, but as you can see that reference links to the Ampligen article which explains the issues around Ampligen in a lot more depth than your caveat. Of course a simple alternative would be to follow one of the references and remove the word Ampligen entirely. How about that for a proposal? -- TerryE (talk) 20:02, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

If removal of Ampligen is the only way out, then I agree. But the Ampligen story appears to be a vital part of the background to WPI's founding, as reported by the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal: AWG was supposedly doing better for a while on Ampligen, then had a reaction and was forced to stop taking it, and the Whittemores, as exemplified by Annette Whittemore's NYT quote, were frantic to arrive at new answers. Hence, WPI. Of course, Ward20 and TerryE have chosen to remove both AWG's adverse reaction to Ampligen and the fact of Ampligen's FDA rejection. Keepcalmandcarryon (talk) 20:09, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

I have made this change. -- TerryE (talk) 20:43, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

Ampligen can come out. The WPI was created in 2005 when AWG was on Ampligen. She came off Ampligen several years after 2005 and her health declined. Please see [60][61], these sources show that AWG was doing fairly well when the WPI was founded so Ampligen did not play the role in the founding of WPI Keepcalmandcarryon suggests, "AWG was supposedly doing better for a while on Ampligen, then had a reaction and was forced to stop taking it, and the Whittemores, as exemplified by Annette Whittemore's NYT quote, were frantic to arrive at new answers. Hence, WPI." Ward20 (talk) 21:05, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

I wrote, "If removal ...is the only way out". As for TerryE's edit summary about restoring split infinitives, there were no split infinitives, and I didn't ask you to remove anything, as you incorrectly imply. With this misleading edit summary, TerrE has restored a grammatically incorrect, improperly cited crib from the WPI website.

As for Ward20's primary source, the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal are preferred sources for the encyclopaedia. The context of the Whittemore quotes in the New York Times, in particular, supports my assertion. Keepcalmandcarryon (talk) 21:12, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

Sigh. I thought that we had agreed, but obviously I thought too soon. On a lighter note, I incline to the Gower interpretation on the split infinitive, which also includes a split from any implied "to" prefixing an infinitive: so the marriage vows -- at least according to Cranmer's Book of Common Prayer -- include the phrase "to have and to hold" and not "to have and hold"; in this case the second "to" is implied from the first and split by "have and", just the same way as "To facilitate and [to] advance patient care" to even "To facilitate ... [To] Research the pathophysiology". Still, I only did Maths at Uni -- though I did need to pass "Use of English" to get into Cambridge :) I guess that you were an English major, so I bow to your greater knowledge. Grasshopper he say: lighten up, it was humorous comment, and certainly not meant to cause offence. -- TerryE (talk) 23:17, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

Request for comment: several unresolved issues

• WPI is known in the media for one paper: a 2009 report in Science that a retrovirus is associated with and may cause chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS). Much of the coverage of WPI mentions the controversial nature of this and past viral association claims, and the controversy was heightened in January with release of a contradictory study finding no evidence of the retrovirus in CFS patients. Is it appropriate to characterise (as in this previous version of the lead) the report as "controversial"?
• WPI is currently a "small private pathology laboratory" according to The Guardian (see this article). The Institute's website seems to indicate that the Institute has only two PhD scientists. Is it appropriate to mention the Institute's current size alongside its plans for expansion in future?
• According to The New York Times, the scientific director for WPI, Judy Mikovits, was was hired as a direct result of an introduction made by a client of a yacht club bar where she was working as a bartender (see this article). Is it appropriate to mention this fact briefly alongside the scientist's previous employment history?
• When scientists from two UK universities published results contradicting WPI's virus claim, the lead investigator for WPI explicitly accused them of doctoring their experiments; paying to have their publication expedited; and of being part of an insurance company plot to discredit her institute (see the Reno Gazette-Journal). Is it appropriate to summarise these comments as "accused the British team of scientific fraud, paying to publish their results and participating in an insurance company conspiracy to discredit WPI"? Keepcalmandcarryon (talk) 22:41, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

Responses from uninvolved editors

Point 1, Yes. The institute is not very notable, it is only notable for it's unreplicated article, without the controversy it would go to Articles for Deletion. Point 2, Yes it is small and the Guardian is a good source, for ward20 pathology laboratory can be left off. Point 3, Yes but make it short, it is minor, Point 4, Yes but make it short also. Comments. The article is too big for a small family institute and there is too much from the institute press releases. Use reliable sources to make it encyclopedic. MiRroar (talk) 23:33, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

• Support KC, Wikipedia, WP:MEDRS, WP:RS. The article is good.

1. very controversial.
2. very small.
3. yes to mirroar
4. " "

Do not let them discourage you, I go from Wikipedia six months, people still attack me, they have agenda, they attack every thing you do, also when you are gone. They say NYT and guardian are false, also, lol!! Ignore, ok?!! RetroS1mone talk 14:36, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

Responses from involved editors

• The first bullet point was already discussed on this talk page in an RFC here and later here. The result was Keepcalmandcarryon wanted to include, and Labongo, Ward20, 74.51.82.241, and Sam Weller expressed not to include controversial in the lead. I didn't find where TerryE specifically expressed their viewpoint. Ward20 (talk) 23:17, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

• The second bullet point was already discussed on the talk page section, Mass reversion (now in the archives here). The result was Keepcalmandcarryon wanted to include the wording "small private pathology laboratory" from The Guardian. Tekaphor, Sam Weller, TerryE, and sciencewatcher did not think the wording was accurate. Ward20 doesn't either. The Guardian states, "The study in Science, by Vincent Lombardi and colleagues at a small private pathology laboratory in Reno, Nevada..." Most of The Guardian wording is wrong according to other reliable sources. One problem is some colleagues are also from the the National Cancer Institute and the Cleveland Clinic.[62][63] If one assumes The Guardian forgot about the other institutions and was talking about WPI, The Guardian is still wrong. WPI is a public charity,[64] not a private entity. The Guardian is also wrong about it being a pathology laboratory. A pathology laboratory mostly does testing of tissue samples, and bodily fluids for diagnosis and monitoring of diseases.[65] The WPI describes itself as a research institute[66] and the NY Times agrees[67] (the NY Times also describes WPI as a research foundation and a research center). We could consider the word small, but I would suggest getting a better source than The Guardian because it has a lot of errors on this topic. Ward20 (talk) 09:02, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

• Also other editors and an RfC commentator have stated that we shouldn't be introducing controversial claims in the into para. If you look, I've put the laboratory comment in the history section. As W says, "private" is factually incorrect. "small" is a subjective description. -- TerryE (talk) 14:08, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

• Re your point 3, do you dispute my explanation that this anecdote is factually incorrect, as per our discussions in the Bartender section in the archive? If so, on what grounds? If not, then why are you wanting to include text based on an extract which is known to be factually incorrect? -- TerryE (talk) 14:12, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

• Re your point 4, McClure found no evidence of XMRV using her nested PCR amplification procedure amongst her sample of UK patients. As subject experts such as John Coffin have pointed out the McClure findings do not contradict the WPI paper as there are many plausible reasons why both conclusions might be correct. Can we please stick to reporting the opinions of reputable independent experts and not refute them from claims of personal expertise? -- TerryE (talk) 14:20, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

-There's a difference between being known in the media and being notable. The WPI will be the first translational research facility devoted to the study of neuroimmune disease, including CFS, Fibromyalgia, Autism, etc. in the entire country. That is extremely notable, and that should be the main focus of an encyclopedia article.

-To describe the WPI as a small pathology laboratory is not accurate. When the WPI opens it will occupy 15,000 square feet on both the second and third floors of the UNR's Center for Molecular Medicine. The CMM, where the WPI will be housed, is not finished being constructed, therefore 'plans for expansion' is not an accurate description.

"More than 15,000 square feet on the second and third floors will house the Whittemore Peterson Institute for Neuro-Immune Disease, the first institute of its kind in the United States. Dedicated to finding a cause and cure for Chronic Fatigue Syndrome and other neuro-immune diseases such as fibromyalgia, Gulf War Illness and autism, the Whittemore Peterson Institute will not only conduct research in the new facility but will also treat patients and develop educational programs for complex disorders of the immune system and brain." http://www.medicine.nevada.edu/cmm/CMMGroundbreakingRelease2.25.07.pdf

Notice the Floor 2 and 3 pdf's, the red is where the WPI will be. http://www.medicine.nevada.edu/cmm/Floor1.pdf http://www.medicine.nevada.edu/cmm/Floor2.pdf http://www.medicine.nevada.edu/cmm/Floor3.pdf

-As for Dr. Mikovits, I would say that her working 20+ years at the NCI in the field of retrovirology is more suitable for an encyclopedia.

-As far as the insurance industry bit, that was not a direct quote and could well have applied to the general situation regarding the inappropriate influence of the insurance industry in CFS research, which was suggested to be formally investigated in the 2006 'Gibson Report', a UK government inquiry on the status of CFS/ME- note the CFS/ME used in the title of a British Government report. http://erythos.com/gibsonenquiry/Report.html —Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.51.82.241 (talk) 03:10, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

As proposed above, I think the scientific controversy does not belong here, and locating at CFS Controversies would help to shorten an overlong article.

On Point 4, the Plos One discussion comment that their care to avoid contamination differentiated them from WPI/CC/NCI was highly unusual, to say the least. Mikovits's response at Faculty of 1000 (see below) and the comment in yesterday's Retrovirology paper, make clear it was also unnecessary, ill-judged and provocative. If we are going to report Mikovits's response to the unsupported allegations in Plos One (and McClure's high-profile press conference), it should be contextualised to maintain NPOV. Sam Weller (talk) 12:38, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

As accurately stated above by User:Miroar, without the scientific controversy, WPI is not notable. Indeed, notability on Wikipedia is significant coverage in the media. The media coverage of WPI is almost entirely to do with the controversy. The "unsupported allegations" in PLoS ONE were not at all unsupported or unusual, and they were hardly the first broaching of the possibility by notable scientists. Keepcalmandcarryon (talk) 14:55, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

K, there are four regular and 3 occasional editors who seem to think this institute is notable. The fact that you + one guest commentator don't does not form a majority on this. But the notability Q is a valid one. I will insert some supporting material for the Institute's notability. -- TerryE (talk) 22:57, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

KC, Raising the 'possibility' of contamination is par for the course. Plos One did not do that: it stated that the IC study was different from WPI because they had taken care to avoid MuLV contamination. McClure also said WPI 'rushed' their study out. IMO, both statements were "unnecessary, ill-judged and provocative". Sam Weller (talk) 12:04, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

TerryE believes that in filing this RfC, Keepcalmandcarryon hasn't fulfilled the requirements of WP:RFC#Request comment through talk pages #3 in that on each of these bullets she states has not framed these issues in a set of neutral statements, and does not reference the thousands of words of discussion and the many valid questions asked of her by other editors in trying to resolve these issues and where she declines to respond. I could proffer an alternative phrasing of these same four bullets:

• Should we be using the word controversial in the second sentence of this article to describe a paper published in Science, when none of the cited references describe it thus? There is a full section describing the media controversy following.
• Should we be describing an institute that has received worldwide recognition (including on the floor of Congress by a US congressman) by a phrase used by one RS out of the hundreds which haven't, in the first sentence of this article? This point is addressed later in the History section.
• This article is about an institute. When discussing its technical staff should we limit ourselves to their technical qualifications for their role, or can we introduce a spicy anecdote about their race, ethnicity, non-professional interests, or whatever (and out of the original RS context) just because one out hundreds of RSs happens to recount it?
• When two teams of scientists ill-advisedly use the press to trade insults against each other, should we (a) rap these up in a blanket "Supporters of the two teams traded accusations of conflicts of interest, technical sloppiness and failure to care about patients" with a selection of references; (b) join in the exchange by picking a balanced set of accusations from both parties; (c) remove all criticism of one party, but find the most damning from the other then rephrase the wording of the RS to spice it up further.

Yes this my POV on these same issues, but how you phrase these Qs effects the answers and the independent commentators can now choose which they prefer. -- TerryE (talk) 02:24, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

04:30, 16 February 2010 and 04:45, 16 February 2010 reverts

The first revert put "controversial" back in the lead. This is still being discussed in the RFC and there is still consensus it should not be in the lead at this time.

The second revert added back, "and formed a CFS research institute in 2004."[unsourced] This conflicts with other sourced information in the article so I will remove that material.

This material was also re-added, "The Whittemore Peterson Institute for Neuro-Immune Disease has also been reported variously as "The Whittemore Peterson Institute for Chronic Fatigue"[68] and the "National Chronic Fatigue Syndrome Institute". [69] Come now, let's be sensible, The same Davidson Academy article[70] also reported WPI as "The Institute for Neuro-Immune Disease" and The NY Times called the WPI a "research foundation" and a "research center". If all the names that sources call the institute are added this would get silly. I am going to remove this obvious POV material. Ward20 (talk) 06:54, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

WPI views itself as a research center. The Guardian notes that this research center consists of a single lab. There's no contradiction and there's no reason not to report the Institute's size.

The Institute now claims that it exists to research autism, etc. It's mission at founding was manifestly to research one particular view of CFS, with the primary goal of helping the Whittemore's daughter. The past names are part of that history. In addition, Senator Reid's funding requests from 2007 call WPI the "Whittemore Peterson CFS Institute". Why is there a need to conceal this reliably sourced, relevant information? Keepcalmandcarryon (talk) 14:50, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

edit 07:45, 16 February 2010

Harmonize material in lead to material in history section, and use reference that is specifically about creation of the Whittemore-Peterson Institute.[71] Ward20 (talk) 08:27, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

Faculty of 1000 reviews

An even-handed blog discussion of Lombardi vs Erlwein mentions extensive reviews of Lombardi et al, here (Citation) Faculty of 1000 Biology: evaluations for Lombardi VC et al Science 2009 Oct 23 326 (5952) :585-9

Faculty of 1000 is clearly a relevant RS for this controversy. In particular, Mikovits responds in some detail to the contamination issue raised in the single dissenting review (out of nine): (Citation) Faculty of 1000 Biology: evaluations for Lombardi VC et al Science 2009 Oct 23 326 (5952) :585-9 http://f1000biology.com/article/id/1166366/dissent

I found it easy to log in for the free trial period. Sam Weller (talk) 10:08, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

Blog discussions, as Sam Weller has agreed previously, are not RS. On the other hand, if Sam Weller has had a change of mind, there are some very interesting blogs the CFS special-interest editors would certainly object to, but that we should include for NPOV. Keepcalmandcarryon (talk) 14:51, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

I merely mentioned that this blog pointed to a peer-reviewed expert discussion at Faculty of 1000, which appears to this editor to be RS for this controversy. Interesting that you selectively ignored that, and chose instead to misinterpret it as a request to include a blog as RS. Sam Weller (talk) 15:08, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

K, re Blog discussions, we haven't agreed on this. Last time I quoted the relevant section of WP:RS -- and I do so again: "Self-published material may, in some circumstances, be acceptable when produced by an established expert on the topic of the article whose work in the relevant field has previously been published by reliable third-party publications." Mikowits falls into this category as does Prof Vincent Racaniello with his secondary commentary on this discussion. However, I agree that we need to handle all our sources with balance and care. -- TerryE (talk) 19:37, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

Umm no, medrs. RetroS1mone talk 14:25, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

MEDRS and consensus

I have attempted once again to bring this article into line with Wikipedia's policies and guidelines, especially those governing medicine-related articles. Several editors will no doubt accuse me of acting against consensus. To those editors and others scrutinising my actions, I encourage you to take into account as well the opinions of other editors as articulated at the fringe noticeboard and at WP:MED. Editors JFW, Doc James, Whatamidoing and Scray are some of the most respected medical editors we have. I don't claim that they would necessarily agree with all of my edits, but there is certainly little support outside what TerryE has called the "inner circle" of CFS special-interest editors for writing articles like this from press releases. Compliance with Wikipedia policies is not a matter of polling. Keepcalmandcarryon (talk) 15:31, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

K, I think that your suggestion to keep the MEDRS elements on the XMRV article might help to remove some of the heat out of discussions on this article. So that leaves us with the overview, history, mission, funding, organisation, media coverage, etc. I will address notability in a separate section.

However, what you have actually done here is to do another mass edit cutting across and undoing the work of half a dozen editors less than 7 days after your last "stop reverting" warning. You have posted a manipulative and POV RfC less than six hours after the previous RfC lapsed without reference to previously agreed consensus and many open issues and points which those editors have asked you to comment on, dismissing them with your statement that such discussions have become pointless. WP:IDIDNTHEARTHAT. Whenever you raise an issue or a question on this talk page, at least one of the other editors tries to give you a reasoned direct and constructive response. Can I ask you to do likewise instead of ignoring many if not most of the points, issues and questions that we raise in return?

You have accused what appears to be all frequent of the editors on this page of being a determined cabal promoting fringe ideas without a shred of evidence. You have accused me of threatening litigation, conflict of interest, promoting bad science for repeating text from a field expert, of attacking you, this article and other contributions that you've made, of coordinating attacks against you on Facebook. This all becomes very tedious. Can I ask you to stop these tactics on this page, to stop the accusations and talk of cabals and inner circles, to work with us constructively to improve this article? Can we please stick to the content, and work within Wikipedia policies?

IIRC, three other editors have raised comparisons between your behaviour and that of Retros1mone. I can't directly comment since I never edited across her, however looking at some of her editing tactics and having now read WP:RFC/RetroS1mone, I can understand this view. I would really prefer functional cooperation, but if you don't start doing this, I can't see any alternative to proceeding along this route. Lastly I apologise if the protocol should be for me to raise this on your talk page, but (i) our issues here relate to your conduct on this page and (ii) On the last few times that I've posted on your talk page you've simply deleted my comment without reply. -- TerryE (talk) 12:33, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

TerryE, your exasperation is justified. Wikipedia should not be used as an attack blog. 32nd degree cabal member, Sam Weller (talk) 12:48, 17 February 2010 (UTC)