Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Talk:Homeopathy/Selection of studies

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The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the miscellaneous page below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the page's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result of the debate was Userfied/Keep - the page was userfied in the middle of the discussion at the specific request of an active editor. This preserves attribution (which cannot be eliminated simply because originator was banned), while removing the material from article/Talk space where it was offensive as WP:OR, etc. These concerns are not a concern in the userspace of an active editor who presumably will use the material as a reference without incorporating it directly into articles, unless properly balance with other material. As a precaution Template:Userpage is being prepended to the page Doug.(talk • contribs) 19:45, 10 April 2008 (UTC)


[edit] Talk:Homeopathy/Selection of studies

This is a highly-biased selection of studies spammed around talk pages by a now-banned user. It serves no encyclopaedic purpose whatsoever. Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 13:22, 5 April 2008 (UTC)

Clerk note: the list has been userfied at User_talk:Peter_morrell/Selection_of_studies --Enric Naval (talk) 17:00, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

  • Keep It's a list of sources which seem relevant to the article to which it is attached. I'm not seeing the problem since this seems to be exactly the sort of helpful content that I would hope to see on talk pages. Colonel Warden (talk) 17:04, 8 April 2008 (UTC)
Comment They are all primary sources. Using them when there are plenty of secondary sources and meta-analysis available would be engaging in WP:OR, since we would have to decide which studies are biased, which are important, etc. --Enric Naval (talk) 17:25, 8 April 2008 (UTC)
Looking at scientific papers on the subject is not OR. A paper such as Studies of the principles of homeopathy; the changeover from in vivo to in vitro experimental research seems quite relevant. Since the material isn't the article but seems to be a good faith effort to assist in the provision of sources, I'm still not seeing the problem. Colonel Warden (talk) 17:38, 8 April 2008 (UTC)
That's still a primary source. And there is no rationale anywhere as to why this study was picked from dozens of other studies. How do we know that it wasn't hand picked with the others to give a certain bias? Who is going to evaluate it against the other studies? Where and when has this study been published? Was its methodology sound? And, again, there are notable sources that are more relevant and get published on notable journals, and we should be using those. P.D.:lol, I just saw shoemaker's comment below. So, it *is* cherry picked after all --Enric Naval (talk) 20:03, 8 April 2008 (UTC)
  • Comment, I'm unclear as to your rationale for deletion. Which part precisely of the Wikipedia:Deletion policy do you think applies to this page? Is it part of Wikipedia:What Wikipedia is not? If so which? Tim Vickers (talk) 19:26, 8 April 2008 (UTC)
    • Wikipedia:Deletion policy applies to articles, not sub-pages of talk pages that were copied over as a favour to a banned user =). While it was probably right for you to make a subpage at the time, this is not a neutral list: This is a collection of purely positive studies, when the mainstream view and research shows that homeopathy probably does not work, meaning thsat negative studies were (presumably) excluded. As an otherwise indescriminite list of "studies that user likes the findings of", and since, per WP:REDFLAG, extrordinary claims, such that mainstreamm science and medicine are wrong, require extrordinary sources, it's very hard to support priveleging this list with a permanent link. According to Linde et al, Impact of Study Quality on Outcome in Placebo-Controlled Trials of Homeopathy, J Clin Epidemiol Vol. 52, No. 7, pp. 631–636, 1999, doi:10.1016/S0895-4356(99)00048-7  homeopathic studies do not generally hold up very well to quality standards, there is evidence of bias, and very few homeopathic studies are blinded, randomised, or any of the other criteria necessary to make a reliable study. This puts a random list of 100% positive studies in further doubt. I suppose it doesn't matter much, now that the link was removed from the references section, but, well, doesn't seem to have any encyclopaedic use. In short, we have metaanalyses that scientifically and rigourously scan the literature as a whole. , we should not be using collections of primary studies that are chosen to only support one viewpoint as any sort of evidence whatsoever. Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 19:57, 8 April 2008 (UTC)
  • OK, as the person who created the page I'll take responsibility for this. As Peter thinks he might find the content useful, I have copied the list for him to User talk:Peter morrell/Selection of studies and deleted the redirect. Hopefully this is a solution that will please everybody. Tim Vickers (talk) 16:22, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
  • Delete Homeopathy has been fought over forever. Anyone who wanted to use this list certainly has by now. It's not worth keeping around anymore. SchmuckyTheCat (talk)
  • Strong Keep no convincing reasons have been given for deletion. The only arguments given thusfar are weak, nitpicky and strongly prejudicial. Peter morrell 05:15, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
  • Possible Keep If the only problem with this page is that a banned user disrupts it we can semi-protect the page instead. MaxPont (talk) 06:48, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
  • Delete Relevant policy: WP:TALK,
    1. WP:TALK says "The policies that apply to articles also apply (if not to the same extent) to talk pages,".
    2. The page violates WP:OR because it's a cherry picked selection of primary source studies from dozens of them, so it shoud be removed from the "talkspace" of the article.
    3. users that have defended the page have not explained what criteria was used to pick the studies, and have not addressed the fact that there are plenty of better secundary sources already doing the work of picking the relevant studies.
    4. by WP:IAR, not deleting this page will damage the encyclopedia on the long term, since leaving the page in place will encourage other users to make the same type of lists arguing WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS, and they will point at this deletion debate to argument how wikipedia allows editors to make pages dedicated to OR. Not deleting the page because of a restrictive interpretation of deletion policy would be forgetting the end goal of wikipedia of making an encyclopedia based on NPOV.
    5. by Wikipedia:Rough_consensus#Rough_consensus, which is linked from the deletion policy page, "Consensus is not determined by counting heads, but by looking at strength of argument, and underlying policy (if any). Arguments that contradict policy, are based on opinion rather than fact, or are logically fallacious, are frequently discounted."
    6. unsupported by the only point on WP:TALK that could apply Wikipedia:TALK#How_to_use_article_talk_pages " Share material: The talk page can be used to store material from the article which has been removed because it is not verified, so that time can be given for references to be found. New material can sometimes be prepared on the talk page until it is ready to be put into the article.". Those studies have never been into the article and have no chance to make it to the article or contribute usefully to the discussion, so they are not an adequate use sharing of material under the talk page. Better sources are already available, so there is no sense on waiting for confirmation from these. --Enric Naval (talk) 11:55, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
  • Comment WP:TALK is not a policy, it's a guideline. Amongst other things, it says, Archive — do not delete: When a talk page has become too large or a particular subject is no longer being discussed, do not delete the content — archive it.. So, since this material forms part of the discussion of input to the article, it should be retained per this guideline. Colonel Warden (talk) 12:10, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
As far as I can tell, it was NEVER used in discussion. Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 13:52, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
(edit conflict) *WP:TALK explains how to apply policies to the talk page, so it shouldn't be dismissed because it's just a guideline. Also, this list was never part of the talk page. Actually, it was added to the talk page and then it was quickly deleted [1] because it didn't belong there. The rest of the talk page is regularly archived by MiszaBot. It's apparent that this page ought to follow the same destiny as the editions that added the list to the talk page. Notice also that the user posting the list was a sockpuppet of an indef blocked account Talk:Homeopathy/Article_probation/Incidents#Sorry_for_wasting_everyone.27s_time.... And that this list is just a rehashing of other quickly reverted attempts to push POV by using OR here and here and here and here and here and here and here, and those are all on the same tak page. It's obvious that the list creator is pushing a POV and just isn't respecting WP:OR, and the list reflects that --Enric Naval (talk) 14:01, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
  • Delete. As it was apparently created by a then-banned user, it should be deleted, without prejudice to re-creation if an another user wants to take credit for it. Also, without prejudice to that user being banned as a sock puppet of the banned user. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 12:49, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

Keep As part of the discussion on the Talk page, these research studies may be a helpful resource. A frequent argument against the legitimacy of homeopathy has been the claim that there have been no scientific studies that validate the principles of homeopathy. Some of these studies do just that. (Of course, the anti-homeopathy POV will claim that these studies were not of "high quality", but will insist that studies that do not support homeopathy were "high quality". That's why the NPOV principle in Wikipedia is so important.) Arion 3x3 (talk) 15:23, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

Princples are not the same as effects. There is no evidence for water memory, there is no evidence the law of similars is a generally-applicable law. If a low-dilution homeopathic compound was shown to have an effect, it would not validate 30C dilutions, or the entire system in general. Also, per WP:REDFLAG, you really shouldn't be claiming conspiracy if you want to be taken seriously. Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 14:56, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
I really do not understand why you would write "shouldn't be claiming conspiracy if you want to be taken seriously" - I never stated anything of that sort. Arion 3x3 (talk) 15:19, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
You are talking about "the anti-homeopathy POV" as if it was a coherent group. That's too near to claiming a conspiracy. For "high quality" see the same thread I link below Talk:Homeopathy/Article_probation/Incidents#Attempts_to_block_pro-homeopathy_research_articles --Enric Naval (talk) 15:36, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
(edit conflict again) As mentioned above, they have been for days and gone unused because they are primary sources picked with a POV bias. Meanwhile, on the talk page, people is ironically complaining about smeta-analysis that are not being covered because there are so many of them to pick from. See Talk:Homeopathy#References_to_more_meta-analyses and Talk:Homeopathy#How_to_choose_from_the_398_reviews_and_meta-analyses. Also notice that saying that the studies are or are not high quality without sources that can confirm it is a OR evaluation of clinical studies --Enric Naval (talk) 15:00, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
The point I was making was that the anti-homeopathy POV editors use that "not high quality " excuse to dismiss important research that is supportive of homeopathy. Arion 3x3 (talk) 15:22, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
If research is not of high-quality, then saying so is not out of line. Per WP:REDFLAG, extraordinary claims need extraordinary sources, and if a piece of research genuinely is of low-quality, it's not inappropriate to say so. This iss one of the major reasons metaanalyses of homeopathy tend to be preferred to individual trials. They collect together all the research, methodologically make an approximate evaluation of its quality, using pre-decided checklists of criteria, and then try to see if any valid results can be obtained. Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 15:32, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
/(edit conflict again) I think Arion is getting confused with an argument about what a certain meta-analysis meant by "high quality studies". This was already discussed on Talk:Homeopathy and on Talk:Homeopathy/Article_probation/Incidents#Attempts_to_block_pro-homeopathy_research_articles --Enric Naval (talk) 15:36, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
I am not confused. The repeated resurfacing of claims that research that supports homeopathy is not of "high quality" is a tiresome refrain. Just study the last 5 months of archives if you do not believe me. Arion 3x3 (talk) 15:58, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
I have been watching Talk:Homeopathy for a month and a half and I have seen sources against validity of homeopathy being discussed, dismissed as non-reliable and some of them replaced by better sources. The bias that you are claiming does not exist. It's not the editors' fault that people are trying continuosly to push low-quality sources to validate homeopathy due to high quality already being on the article or being against its validation. --Enric Naval (talk) 16:57, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
Sorry, but to state "if a piece of research genuinely is of low-quality, it's not inappropriate to say so" is wrong. It is not appropriate for Wikipedia editors to be doing this - and that is what I was referring to. Such statements, which I have observed ad nauseum over the last 5 months in discussions on homeopathy related articles on Wikipedia, are personal opinions and original research (WP:OR). Arion 3x3 (talk) 15:42, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
Original research does not apply to talk page discussions. Indeed, applying WP:RS may require OR on the talk page. Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 15:59, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
Oh, why can't editors say that a certain study is of low quality? Especially if they are citing secondary sources saying so. --Enric Naval (talk) 16:57, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

One further point, I dimly recall someone saying this list can be added to and updated in due course, as folks see fit, in which case why the big problem? if that is so, we can add any studies we like positive or negative and so a balance would be achieved of all types of studies, avoiding also the need to delete it on POV grounds. Just a wee point Peter morrell 16:19, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

TimVickers just deleted this page of studies, with the comment: "Housekeeping and routine (non-controversial) cleanup". Under what stretch of logic could this deletion be considered "non-controversial"? Arion 3x3 (talk) 16:31, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
The content hasn't been deleted, but moved into Peter's talkspace with his agreement. All I deleted was a redirect. See the comment above. Tim Vickers (talk) 16:42, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the page's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.