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m Maintain {{WPBS}} and vital articles: 7 WikiProject templates. Merge {{VA}} into {{WPBS}}. Keep majority rating "B" in {{WPBS}}. Remove 7 same ratings as {{WPBS}} in {{WikiProject Biology}}, {{WikiProject Biography}}, {{WikiProject Chicago}}, {{WikiProject United States}}, {{WikiProject Women's History}}, {{WikiProject Women scientists}}, {{WikiProject Women writers}}.
 
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== Request edit on 28 March 2018 ==
== policy violating content ==


<!-- PLEASE READ: Please provide your requested edit after the {{edit COI}} below in a roughly "replace X with Y" format. Explain the rationale behind the edit and provide reliable sources to support the proposed changes. At the end of the request, add four tildes "~~~~" and click "Save Page" -->
I removed the following content. Viriditas restored it. I removed it again. Here it is:


{{edit COI|D|D}}
<blockquote>Like other early presentations of Lovelock’s idea, the Lovelock-Margulis 1974 paper seemed to give living organisms complete agency in creating planetary self-regulation, whereas later, as the idea matured, this planetary-scale self-regulation was recognized as an emergent property of the whole Earth system, life and its physical environment taken together (Lovelock, 1988)<ref>{{cite book|last1=Lovelock|first1=James|title=The Ages of Gaia: A Biography of Our Living Earth|date=1988|publisher=W.W.Norton & Co|location=New York}}</ref>. When climatologist Stephen Schneider convened the 1989 American Geophysical Union Chapman Conference around the issue of Gaia, the idea of “strong Gaia” and “weak Gaia” was introduced by James Kirchner, after which Margulis was sometimes associated with the idea of “weak Gaia,” incorrectly (her essay "Gaia is a Tough Bitch" dates from 1995 – and it stated her own distinction from Lovelock as she saw it, which was primarily that she did not like the metaphor of Earth as a single organism, because, she said, "No organism eats its own waste"<ref name=BrockmanInterview/>). In her 1998 book ''Symbiotic Planet'', Margulis explored the relationship between Gaia and her work on symbiosis.<ref>{{cite book|last1=Margulis|first1=Lynn|title=Symbiotic Planet|date=1998|publisher=Basic Books|location=New York, NY}}</ref>
#Delete "...with Jerry Coyne notably writing on his Why Evolution is True blog about Margulis' supposed "notion that AIDS is really syphilis, not viral in origin at all." rationale: Jerry Coyne's blog posts are not a reputable source. He often attacked Lynn Margulis for her opposition to neo-Darwinism. His claims that neo-Darwinism explain evolution and speciation have been demonstrated to be scientifically inaccurate.
#Delete "Seth Kalichman, a social psychologist who studies behavioral and social aspects of AIDS, cited her 2009 paper as an example of AIDS denialism "flourishing",[48] and asserted that her "endorsement of HIV/AIDS denialism defies understanding."[49] rationale: The statement "The paper did not question the existence of HIV or AIDS, nor that HIV causes AIDS, but suggested that syphilis could have been a co-factor in the spread of AIDS." which precedes the mention of Seth Kalichman is true and therefore the claim of Seth Kalichman cannot be true and should be deleted. Everyone has a right to their opinion, but not their own set of facts." - Patrick Moynihan
In 2001, the Amsterdam Declaration on Global Change (see [[Global change]]) was signed by more than 1,000 scientists under the aegis of the United Nations, and states at the outset: “The Earth System behaves as a single, self-regulating system,”[http://www.colorado.edu/AmStudies/lewis/ecology/gaiadeclar.pdf] suggesting that the most basic tenet of Gaia theory, that of global-scale self-regulation, had become mainstream science, despite the fact that leading neo-Darwinists like Richard Dawkins maintained for decades that such self-regulation was impossible.
[[Special:Contributions/2601:180:8200:C540:156F:42D7:A1F:B175|2601:180:8200:C540:156F:42D7:A1F:B175]] ([[User talk:2601:180:8200:C540:156F:42D7:A1F:B175|talk]]) 18:14, 29 March 2018 (UTC)
{{reflist-talk}}</blockquote>


===Reply 30-MAR-2018===
Issues:
I've read the paragraph and reproduced it below for this discussion. In the reproduction I note how each assertion is worded, and discuss whether any of the assertions are "out of place". Please note that this quoted text may have changed in the interim. It reflects only how the article looked as of 06:57, 30 March 2018 (UTC).
* sentence 1 ("Like other early presentations...") is not supported by the source provided
<br>
* sentence 2 contains [[WP:OR]] editorializing
{{quote box|width=50%|align=center|1=In 2009 Margulis and seven others authored a position paper concerning research on the viability of round body forms of some spirochetes, "Syphilis, Lyme disease & AIDS: Resurgence of 'the great imitator'?", which states that, "Detailed research that correlates life histories of symbiotic spirochetes to changes in the immune system of associated vertebrates is sorely needed," and urging the "reinvestigation of the natural history of mammalian, tick-borne, and venereal transmission of spirochetes in relation to impairment of the human immune system."{{NoteTag|This is the assertion made by this particular paper being mentioned at this point in the passage: That the life history of symbiotic spirochetes needs to be examined with regards to how they affect the immune system of other organisms.}} The paper did not question the existence of HIV or AIDS, nor that HIV causes AIDS, but suggested that syphilis could have been a co-factor in the spread of AIDS. In a Discover Magazine interview with Dick Teresi published less than six months before her death, however, Margulis spoke provocatively of how, "the set of symptoms, or syndrome, presented by syphilitics overlaps completely with another syndrome: AIDS,"{{NoteTag|Here Margulis is making assertions ''outside'' of the paper, in a magazine interview. The passage clearly states that.}} and also noted that Kary Mullis, a winner of the 1993 Nobel Prize for the polymerase chain reaction, with unconventional scientific views, said that "he went looking for a reference substantiating that HIV causes AIDS and discovered, 'There is no such document.' "{{NoteTag|This is Margulis' assertion of what she believes to be ''another'' assertion made by Kary Mullis. According to Margulis, Mullis was unable to locate the document. Whether or not Mullis found the document or was even looking for it is made clear in this passage. }} This elicited widespread suggestions that Margulis was an "AIDS denialist", with Jerry Coyne notably writing on his Why Evolution is True blog about Margulis' supposed "notion that AIDS is really syphilis, not viral in origin at all."{{NoteTag|This is Coyne's assertion, and the text in the passage makes that clear.}} Seth Kalichman, a social psychologist who studies behavioral and social aspects of AIDS, cited her 2009 paper{{NoteTag|".....cited '''''her''''' 2009 paper": This could be made more clear who '''''her''''' is referring to. I believe it to be Margulis.}} as an example of AIDS denialism "flourishing", and asserted that her "endorsement{{NoteTag|Another instance of '''''her''''' similar to the first. I believe this is also referring to Margulis. This should be made more clear by using the person's name instead of confusing pronouns.}} of HIV/AIDS denialism defies understanding." <span style="border:3px red; border-style:none none solid;">In the Discover Magazine interview, Margulis discussed with Teresi the primary grounds for her</span>{{NoteTag|This use of '''''her''''' is additionally confusing because we're discussing two women: Margulis and Teresi. Which of them this '''''her''''' refers to is unknown.}} <span style="border:3px red; border-style:none none solid;">initial interest in the material of the 2009 "AIDS" paper, being that "I’m interested in spirochetes only because of our ancestry. I’m not interested in the diseases," and stated that to her the fact that both Treponema (the spirochete which causes syphilis) and Borrelia (the spirochete which causes Lyme disease) only have retained about 20% of the genes they need to live freely outside of their human hosts, they should be considered as symbionts.</span>{{NoteTag|This last section highlighted in red is the most confused and problematic in the entire passage, and it's clear that it was added by a different editor than the ones responsible for the other passages. This sentence needs to be rewritten to remove the pronouns and clarify what it is that is being communicated, and by whom.}}<br>
* sentence 3 cites the book and makes claims about it, cited only to the book. This too is [[WP:OR]]
___________<br>
* Sentence 4, the new paragraph, is an example of [[WP:SYN]] that is used here as a [[WP:COATRACK]] to argue that her views are True.


{{NoteFoot}}
Now that Viriditas is here, I am out of here. Good luck all. [[User:Jytdog|Jytdog]] ([[User talk:Jytdog|talk]]) 23:34, 21 July 2015 (UTC)
}}
:I'm not seeing any original research. Sentence 1 refers to uncontroversial, matter of fact observations found just about everywhere in the source, starting in the second paragraph of the preface on p. xix, followed up on pp 7-8 in the second paragraph of that page. Sentence 2 is not original research either and refers to common facts and notable events reported by the best literature on the subject , such as ''The Future of the World's Climate'' and ''Scientists Debate Gaia: The Next Century'', as only two examples. This is also supported by the Brockman cite. It seems you have a habit of preferring deletion rather than ''fixing'' or adding a source for easily verified material. I suspect that sentence 2 may already be sourced by existing citations in the current article as well. This is not "editorializing", this is a matter of making a source request if you find the material objectionable. I notice that you haven't objected to anything. Sentence 3, again, refers to a statement of "fact" and does not reflect any original research whatsoever. It is a fact that Margulis explored the relationship between Gaia and her work on symbiosis in her book ''Symbiotic Planet''. It's beyond bizarre that you would object to that statement as original research as it can be verified and supported in a dozen different ways. In any case, that citation is acceptable. Sentence 4 is not original research either, as we can clearly support the first part with the cited source and verify it in other sources (such as ''The Revenge of Gaia'', p. 25). As for the criticism of Dawkins, while certainly "true", is probably original research unless we have a cited source. Again, just because one half of one sentence might be original research, doesn't justify deleting several paragraphs. The fact is, Dawkins' criticism of the Gaia hypothesis and planetary self-regulation appears in numerous sources, so his position on it today in relation to how mainstream science treats it should be very easy to source. [[User:Viriditas|Viriditas]] ([[User talk:Viriditas|talk]]) 00:12, 22 July 2015 (UTC)
{{clear}}

The problem areas of the text I've highlighted in red are discussed in the notes. The entire last section is the most problematic. I leave this hear to spark discussion on how it should be handled. The editor who made the COI edit request is asked to help form a consensus for change before reactivating the request. Regards, <small>'''<span style="font-variant:small-caps">[[User:Spintendo|<span style="background:#fdd;color:white"><span style="background:#f88"><span style="background:#f00"><span style="background:#700"><span style="background:#008">Spintendo&nbsp;</span>&nbsp;</span>&nbsp;</span>&nbsp;</span>&nbsp;</span>]]</span>'''</small> 06:54, 30 March 2018 (UTC)
:: Yes, the removed content seems basically well-sourced, correct, and encyclopaedic. If a little more sourcing is required, that's a matter for a CN tag, or better a little bit of sofixit cement. In fact I think I may have a tube handy. [[User:Chiswick Chap|Chiswick Chap]] ([[User talk:Chiswick Chap|talk]]) 17:22, 22 July 2015 (UTC)

Hi -

Thanks much Viriditas & Chiswick for your support and involvement with this. Viriditas, I think you accidentally put a couple of paragraphs from my edits of the Gaia hypothesis section into the Symbiosis section, and so I have just moved them back.

When Jytdog wrote -

* sentence 1 ("Like other early presentations...") is not supported by the source provided

he really didn’t seem familiar with the source (Lovelock's The Ages of Gaia), because, as you said Viriditas, what I was suggesting, and using that book as a citation for, is really all over the text, and is actually the theme of one early section of the book, i.e., how the Gaia idea grew and changed from its early days. One interesting aspect in that section, I might add, that could have some interest for this article, since it is hard to talk about Margulis without talking about her battle with the neo-Darwinians, is that Lovelock pointedly discusses how the neo-Darwinian criticisms helped to make that growth and maturation of the idea take place, something not often enough said. Lovelock in that section likened it to taking a cold bath.

What I had written earlier about the Margulis article as a whole is that there was a structural problem with it, I felt, in that there was little to distinguish what were Margulis’ primary contributions and what were controversial things she got involved with, but were not fundamentally her own life’s work. There was a certain amount of back and forth with editor Adrian Hunter about this, and, taking from some of his thoughts on it, I then set out to restructure the entry so that there was a “Contributions” section and then a “Controversies” section for the other things that weren't quite her own life's work, but were worthy of being included in the article. I still think that this would be wise, given the special nature of this entry. Keep in mind that there are no issues more controversial than things like 9/11 and AIDS conspiracies. Further, Margulis' own work was highly controversial initially, and now some parts of it are not, but there are still certain folks who would really enjoy having it all be considered controversial. Thus, I see it as very important, in making this a good article (and I personally think that it is an important article since Margulis was such a major figure), to wall off the life's work, discussing the initial controversies, the work's gradual acceptance, etc, from the kinds of things that can easily take over on the rest of the article, because people (including Margulis) feel so passionately about them, like 9/11, AIDS, etc. That is above all what I was trying to do, and I hope that you will be supportive if I re-introduce that, by having a "Controversies" heading with a brief intro, as I had put in yesterday.

Frankly, I really don’t even mind the removal of the 9/11 material, it might even be for the best, and I confess that I felt particularly unsure of how to handle that material, but right now there is still the larval transfer theory section and the AIDS section, and so having a "Controversies" section I think could be helpful in providing context to inclusion of the material.

Further, I do think that what I did with the HIV/AIDS section was a real improvement on what is currently there – and note that I didn’t even remove the statements about Margulis supposedly being an “AIDS denialist.” I agree with what you said yesterday to Jytdog about wholesale removal, and I am well aware that basic protocol here is to try to avoid removing critical content. For a bunch of reasons I discussed earlier, I also do think that this section is a bit special – Wikipedia considers alternative AIDS theories in a special category, and does not want to lend them authority. Calling Margulis and "AIDS denialist" both lends that viewpoint more authority, seen from one perspective (i.e., akin to the intelligent design people citing Margulis), while it disses Margulis, seen from another. Therefore, both to be true to Margulis and to WP policy, it should not be allowed to stay as it is, I would say. Note, by the way, from my prior posting, that when I first wrote about this here I had not even read the Margulis et al “Great Imitator” paper, but then studied it in order to deal with making these edits. I was very struck, when reading the actual paper, with how what the blocked COI editor (a co-author of the paper) had written to Jytdog and Hunter was accurate – the paper really was not at all an AIDS denialist paper. Further, what he had written about the quote of one Seth Kalichman was also right, that he should not be called an "AIDS researcher", because in this context that sounds like it means a virologist, an applied scientist, but that is not the case, these are the comments of a community psychologist, and so have rather little weight.

I well understand that these sections – AIDS and 9/11 – involve some of the hardest material to deal with on Wikipedia. I think you were probably right, Viriditas, to remove my 9/11 studies site reference - please understand that, given that this is an article about Lynn Margulis, I was just trying to find some approach, if her 9/11 views were to remain in the article, to characterize Margulis’ involvement with this 9/11 material: in her 'Explosive Evidence' interview, most of it is not even about 9/11 itself, but rather about the scientific method as a whole, and how we should consider it when looking at something like 9/11, and so I was thinking of this as being like the '9/11 Studies' idea. Of course, it might not be right to privilege this kind of “physical evidence” view of those events with the name “9/11 Studies” – after all, Richard Clarke taught a Terror Studies class at Harvard some years back, which was certainly NOT oriented in that way, and his approach could, I suppose, just as well lay claim to the title “9/11 Studies.” [[User:Terradactyl|Terradactyl]] ([[User talk:Terradactyl|talk]]) 04:32, 23 July 2015 (UTC)

:: Thanks for these very sensible comments. The AIDS denialist claims certainly need review, followed either by additional sourcing (and if need be rewording), or deletion. [[User:Chiswick Chap|Chiswick Chap]] ([[User talk:Chiswick Chap|talk]]) 05:57, 23 July 2015 (UTC)
::: I checked the AIDS denialist claims in the AIDS section. All are true except the quotes purporting to be from the Discover article, which does not contain them, so I removed the quotes sentence. [[User:Chiswick Chap|Chiswick Chap]] ([[User talk:Chiswick Chap|talk]]) 07:50, 23 July 2015 (UTC)
::::{{ping|Chiswick Chap}} Those quotes are in the Discover article – you just need to scroll through to the third page. (I couldn't see any way to link to the third page directly, or I'd have done so already.)
::::: Ah, "my bad" as they say in America, that's ok then. I'll tweak the citation. [[User:Chiswick Chap|Chiswick Chap]] ([[User talk:Chiswick Chap|talk]]) 08:19, 23 July 2015 (UTC)
::::I'll just note for clarity that James D. MacAllister is not "blocked" in the usual Wikipedia sense of the word, as described at [[WP:BLOCK]]. [[User:Adrian J. Hunter|Adrian&nbsp;'''J.'''&nbsp;Hunter]]<sup>([[User talk:Adrian J. Hunter|talk]]•[[Special:contributions/Adrian J. Hunter|contribs]])</sup> 08:13, 23 July 2015 (UTC)
::::::Thanks Chiswick Chap.
::::::There seems to at least be agreement that the long-standing description of Kalichman was misleading ("HIV researcher"), so I've [https://en.wikipedia.org/enwiki/w/index.php?title=Lynn_Margulis&diff=672707030&oldid=672699911 changed] it as described [[#Response to Adrian Hunter about the AIDS-HIV theory section of the Lynn Margulis page|above]]. I also removed the "spent a year infiltrating HIV denialist groups" bit to avoid casting aspersions upon Margulis' entire research group. I'm open to further adjustments. [[User:Adrian J. Hunter|Adrian&nbsp;'''J.'''&nbsp;Hunter]]<sup>([[User talk:Adrian J. Hunter|talk]]•[[Special:contributions/Adrian J. Hunter|contribs]])</sup> 09:44, 23 July 2015 (UTC)


Hi, thanks much, guys. I've just copied below how my version of the AIDS section had read before being reverted, and I wonder if you wouldn't agree that it isn't really far more even-handed than the current version? It's not a question of whether the Discover quotes are "true" or "false." Just like in a court of law, context can mean everything. If you take the famous Rodney King video, when you only allow jurors to see a few selected frames, you can shape those frames' meaning one way, but if you let them see more and more, a quite different picture clearly emerges. Just yesterday, a new such document, the amazing dashcam recording of Sandra Bland's arrest, was going all over the internet, and it too will likely get used in a court case at some point, if I had to guess, and the context and what gets selected (since it apparently runs for 50 minutes) will likely get used to try to control the meaning. In what I wrote, I really tried to give the controversy a bit of leg room, some context, which I think helps readers understand it a lot better - and I think that the Discover interview was VERY important to it. Basically, the whole thing starts to make sense in my version, otherwise it just doesn't make much sense. Note that just from what is in my one paragraph, the fact the Jerry Coyne was obviously incorrect is just as evident as the fact that Margulis was speaking provocatively. Here is what I had:

In 2009 Margulis and seven others authored a position paper concerning research on the viability of round body forms of some spirochetes, "Syphilis, Lyme disease & AIDS: Resurgence of 'the great imitator'?"[2], which states that, "Detailed research that correlates life histories of symbiotic spirochetes to changes in the immune system of associated vertebrates is sorely needed" and urging the "reinvestigation of the natural history of mammalian, tick-borne, and venereal transmission of spirochetes in relation to impairment of the human immune system."[52] The paper did not question the existence of HIV or AIDS, nor that HIV caused AIDS, but suggested that syphilis could have been a co-factor in the spread of AIDS. In a Discover Magazine interview with Dick Teresi published less than six months before her death, however, Margulis spoke provocatively of how "the set of symptoms, or syndrome, presented by syphilitics overlaps completely with another syndrome: AIDS," and also noted that "Kary Mullis [winner of the 1993 Nobel Prize for DNA sequencing, and well known for his unconventional scientific views] said in an interview that he went looking for a reference substantiating that HIV causes AIDS and discovered, 'There is no such document.' " [25] This elicited widespread suggestions that Margulis was an "AIDS denialist", with Jerry Coyne notably writing on his Why Evolution is True blog about "dreadful stuff" in the Discover Magazine interview and Margulis' supposed "notion that AIDS is really syphilis, not viral in origin at all." Clinical community psychologist and professor of social psychology Seth Kalichman cited the Margulis et al 2009 paper as an example of AIDS denialism "flourishing",[53] and argued that her supposed "endorsement of HIV/AIDS denialism defies understanding."[54]. In the Discover Magazine interview, Margulis discussed with Teresi the primary grounds for her initial interest in the material of the 2009 "AIDS" paper, being that "I’m interested in spirochetes only because of our ancestry. I’m not interested in the diseases," and stated that to her the fact that both Treponema (the spirochete which causes syphilis) and Borrelia (the spirochete which causes Lyme disease) only have retained about 20% of the genes they need to lively freely outside of their human hosts, they should be considered as symbionts.

[[User:Terradactyl|Terradactyl]] ([[User talk:Terradactyl|talk]]) 18:34, 23 July 2015 (UTC)


Thinking about it a bit more, I realized that, following Adrian Hunter's rewording of the Kalichman quote, the differences between what I had done and what was currently there only concerned additions of mine, no subtractions of other people's edits at all, and so I just took the liberty of adding back in the things I had included, but kept Adrian's exact wording for the Kalichman quotes, which was slightly different from mine, although I'm fine with what he had. I hope that no one is unhappy with this, it makes the section somewhat longer, but, as I said above, I think the added context simply helps it to make sense. [[User:Terradactyl|Terradactyl]] ([[User talk:Terradactyl|talk]]) 19:09, 23 July 2015 (UTC)

== Request edit on 23 July 2015 ==

<!-- PLEASE READ: Please provide your requested edit after the {{request edit}} below in a roughly "replace X with Y" format. Explain the rationale behind the edit and provide reliable sources to support the proposed changes. At the end of the request, add four tildes "~~~~" and click "Save Page" -->

{{request edit/answered}}
In the introduction to Lynn Margullis the following:
"Lynn Margulis (born Lynn Petra Alexander;[1][2] March 5, 1938 – November 22, 2011)[3] was an '''''evolutionary biologist''''' who was the primary modern proponent for the significance of symbiosis in biological evolution: historian Jan Sapp noted that, "Lynn Margulis’s name is as synonymous with symbiosis as Charles Darwin’s is with evolution."[4]"
should be replaced with:
"Lynn Margulis (born Lynn Petra Alexander;[1][2] March 5, 1938 – November 22, 2011)[3] was an '''''evolutionist''''' who was the primary modern proponent for the significance of symbiosis in biological evolution: historian Jan Sapp noted that, "Lynn Margulis’s name is as synonymous with symbiosis as Charles Darwin’s is with evolution."[4]
Rationale: Margulis never considered herself an ''evolutionary biologist'' because that field, evolutionary biology, was neo-Darwinist, She referred to herself as an "'''evolutionist'''" and her degrees were in zoology and genetics. Now that the Modern Synthesis and the Dawkins idea of "the selfish gene" have been demonstrated to be incomplete or wrong in all assumptions and rules,<ref>{{cite web|last1=Noble|first1=Denis|title=Evolution and physiology: a new synthesis|url=http://www.voicesfromoxford.org/video/evolution-and-physiology-a-new-synthesis/355|website=Voices from Oxford|publisher=Voices from Oxford|accessdate=24 July 2015}}</ref> it seems inappropriate to call her something she disagreed with for almost her entire 50-year career.
{{reflist-talk}}
[[User:James D. MacAllister|James D. MacAllister]] ([[User talk:James D. MacAllister|talk]]) 19:03, 24 July 2015 (UTC)

:Another idea: The very first citation of the article is the NY Times obit, which called her an evolutionary theorist, and that could be used, but how about not searching for the ONE word that depicts Margulis, but rather listing all of her areas of expertise? This is in fact done with a great many Wiki entries, including many other important biologists, and given that she was so broad based and had such wide and diverse expertise, I should think that this would be highly appropriate.

:It's true that I called her an evolutionary biologist, but before it was American biologist, and given the importance of evolutionary process to what she did for biology, I just changed it to that reflexively - I actually don't think it's bad to take the word back from the neo-Darwinists, but there's also nothing special about the name either. We can forego it.....

:So, what about -

:Lynn Margulis was an American evolutionary theorist, biologist, microbiologist, taxonomist, bacteriologist and protistologist with degrees in zoology and genetics, and is above all known as.....[[User:Terradactyl|Terradactyl]] ([[User talk:Terradactyl|talk]]) 23:31, 24 July 2015 (UTC)
::(I hope neither of you mind, but I refactored a little above.) Probably pick EITHER "microbiologist" OR "bacteriologist and protistologist" (redundant to include both), and drop "biologist" as it's redundant to everything else. [[User:Adrian J. Hunter|Adrian&nbsp;'''J.'''&nbsp;Hunter]]<sup>([[User talk:Adrian J. Hunter|talk]]•[[Special:contributions/Adrian J. Hunter|contribs]])</sup> 00:22, 25 July 2015 (UTC)
:::Just a note to say that Lynn Margulis was not a microbiologist, that was not her field. Microbiologists deal with macromolecules and extrapolate from things like DNA sequencing. Although the name might lead you to believe they look through microscopes, they don't (although I am sure there are a few who do). They avoid "whole organism" biology as antiquated (of course this is nuts). So let's not put in that Lynn Margulis, who loved nothing better than an uninterrupted weekend or holiday looking through the light microscope at live organisms, a microbiologist. That is as bad as evolutionary biologist! Both fields were as far from what Lynn did as "biology" gets and she provocatively said both had "taken the life out of biology". I think her work as an educator is also exemplary and needs to be featured in that description along with the other disciplines she had mastered.
:::Otherwise I think the introduction--thanks everyone--is a vast improvement over what was there maybe a month ago. I also appreciate that Adrian Hunter has made the changes to the HIV/AIDS theory section. Lynn Margulis certainly said the things she said in the Discover article, but she liked to be provocative (give folks an intellectual dope slap when she thought it was needed--she was above all a teacher). In context, nothing that she said was inaccurate but any questioning of a sacred cow like the HIV hypothesis is labeled as "AIDS denialism". I do appreciate Terradactyl's suggestion that some things such as this be moved to a "controversies" section. These are after all, a few sentences from a 50-year career. There is also another "controversial" subject that Lynn Margulis and her lab did extensive work on and that is '''chromidia'''. These are a form of propagule that got tossed out of science because they did not occur in animals, plants and fungi, but Margulis and her lab would maintain that this is one of many ways that protoctists deal with dramatic changes (such as desiccation) in their environments. I could write something up about this with references and make an edit request. This is a subject that may have few if any secondary sources, but it is postulated and not stated as a fact, so I would hope that her papers would be permissible as references to her work in this area. It may also have been the subject of some of her graduate students' and PhD students' theses and dissertations.[[User:James D. MacAllister|James D. MacAllister]] ([[User talk:James D. MacAllister|talk]]) 13:50, 25 July 2015 (UTC)


Thanks all. Since there were no negative comments, and several positive ones, on the "controversies" section concept, I just restored, again moving the Five Kingdoms back into contributions. Since the 9/11 material got removed by Viriditas, there are now only 2 controversies - perhaps what James suggests could be added.....

Another idea: could one potentially take the spirochete symbiont aspect of SET theory and treat it here, as a continuing 'controversy', rather than adding better material about it within the endosymbiotic theory section?


===Reply 04-APR-2018===
I don't have really strong feelings about the opening list of fields, so if anyone else wants to do some triage on that, I'm fine with whatever you all come up with.....but I like, and prefer, the idea of not trying to have just one word to define her.....and I don't think that, just because she didn't like "evolutionary biologists" that including that word among her activities is a bad thing, although I did remove it......I agree with Adrian, that real redundancy should be avoided, although some overlap is inevitable, because of the interrelated nature of the vaarious fields of expertise.....[[User:Terradactyl|Terradactyl]] ([[User talk:Terradactyl|talk]]) 18:31, 25 July 2015 (UTC)
I must disagree with the idea that the text outlined in red is the most problematic. Perhaps the biggest problem with the discussion of Lynn Margulis's ideas about various spirochetoses (infections with spirochetes) is that this section should not be called "AIDS/HIV theory". A better title would be "Viability of Spirochete 'round bodies'". This is the subject of the 2009 paper which I was a co-author and an editor. There was then and there still is a controversy, but the controversy is not about HIV/AIDS theory. Instead the controversy is threefold: first, is wheher or not round bodies (a pleomorphic shape that spirochetes may take or in which some spirochetes spend all of their life history in) are viable (alive); second, that antibiotics are guaranteed to cure infections by spirochetes (syphilis and Lyme disease); and third, that the standard tests used for screening for spirochetoses are reliable. Much of mainstream biology and medicine still assume that round bodies are not viable (dead), that antibiotics cure spirochetoses, and that standard screening tests for spirochetoses are reliable. There is abundant evidence (which I can provide if requested) that these assumptions are examples of what Whitehead called the fallacy of misplaced concreteness. That is that they are commonly believed but are in fact not supported by scientific study. Since neither Jerry Coyne nor Seth Kalichman has any expertise on the question of whether or not spirochete round bodies are viable, the question of the effectiveness of antibiotics in treating spirochetoses, and the reliabilty of the standard screening tests in use, I see no reason to include their opinions which are wildly off-the-mark and seem to have been included by someone with a desire to disparage Lynn Margulis with the ad hominem label of "AIDS denialist". As the title of our 2009 paper makes clear, she did not deny the existence of Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome. What she questioned was whether or not HIV alone was the exclusive causitive agent. Margulis's thinking that AIDS may have co-factors is a position shared by Luc Montagnier, the French virologist and joint recipient of the 2008 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for his discovery of the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV). [[Special:Contributions/2601:180:8200:C540:CD25:ACDF:ECB7:9418|2601:180:8200:C540:CD25:ACDF:ECB7:9418]] ([[User talk:2601:180:8200:C540:CD25:ACDF:ECB7:9418|talk]]) 18:00, 4 April 2018 (UTC)
::I removed "microbiologist" from the list of things Lynn Margulis was because she wasn't a microbiologist. I would include a reference but it is hard to reference the negative. I would suggest moving "educator" to the front of the list.[[Special:Contributions/71.234.176.148|71.234.176.148]] ([[User talk:71.234.176.148|talk]]) 18:42, 25 July 2015 (UTC)


== "opposed competition-oriented views" ==
{{request edit/answered}}
I would like to request that the last line of the opening paragraph of the Lynn Margulis page, "Margulis was also the co-developer of Gaia theory with the British chemist James Lovelock, proposing that the Earth functions as a single self-regulating system, and was the principal defender of the five kingdom classification of Robert Whittaker." I request that we add that she "was the principal defender and promulgater of the five kingdom classification of Robert Whittaker." My rationale is that Margulis edited and published four editions of "Five Kingdoms: An Illustrated Guide to the Phyla of Life on Earth" (the fourth edition was retitled "Kingdoms and Domains: An Illustrated Guide to the Phyla of Life on Earth". [[User:James D. MacAllister|James D. MacAllister]] ([[User talk:James D. MacAllister|talk]]) 20:10, 11 August 2015 (UTC)
:Sounds reasonable to me. I've added "and promulgater" per your request. Thanks, [[User:Adrian J. Hunter|Adrian&nbsp;'''J.'''&nbsp;Hunter]]<sup>([[User talk:Adrian J. Hunter|talk]]•[[Special:contributions/Adrian J. Hunter|contribs]])</sup> 11:00, 14 August 2015 (UTC)
I just realised the original edit request from 23 July was still open. I've closed it, as I ''think'' the original concern has been addressed. But just to confirm: {{ping|James D. MacAllister}}, are you ok with "evolutionary theorist"? I actually prefer this term over "evolutionist", as just about any time I've heard the latter, it's been used as a disparaging term by a creationist (and I see I'm [http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Evolutionist not the first] to notice this).
I've removed "biologist" and "microscopist" from the first sentence, as both seem redundant to "bacteriologist" and "protistologist". I haven't moved "educator" to the front as Margulis' obituaries in ''Washington Post'', ''New York Times'' and ''The Guardian'' all emphasise her work as a scientist much more than her work as an educator.


In 'Symbiosis as evolutionary force': "'''She opposed competition-oriented views of evolution''', stressing the importance of symbiotic or cooperative relationships between species." Can someone clarify this? Surely she gave full credit to competition ''within'' species...? And this needs to be clarified: Did she disagree with the entire notion of competition between species, or simply with that being the overwhelming focus of research and theory? Maybe someone with a deep enough knowledge of her work can fairly address these points. [[User:Heavenlyblue|Heavenlyblue]] ([[User talk:Heavenlyblue|talk]]) 17:56, 27 April 2018 (UTC)
It sounds like a section on chromidia would be a valuable addition, especially as these are [https://en.wikipedia.org/enwiki/w/index.php?search=chromidia&title=Special%3ASearch&go=Go barely mentioned] in Wikipedia. So long as such a section were short enough not to give undue weight, and did not overstate the acceptance of chromidia by other scientists, I think this would be a legitimate use of primary sources. [[User:Adrian J. Hunter|Adrian&nbsp;'''J.'''&nbsp;Hunter]]<sup>([[User talk:Adrian J. Hunter|talk]]•[[Special:contributions/Adrian J. Hunter|contribs]])</sup> 11:35, 14 August 2015 (UTC)

Latest revision as of 01:07, 7 January 2024

Request edit on 28 March 2018

[edit]
  1. Delete "...with Jerry Coyne notably writing on his Why Evolution is True blog about Margulis' supposed "notion that AIDS is really syphilis, not viral in origin at all." rationale: Jerry Coyne's blog posts are not a reputable source. He often attacked Lynn Margulis for her opposition to neo-Darwinism. His claims that neo-Darwinism explain evolution and speciation have been demonstrated to be scientifically inaccurate.
  2. Delete "Seth Kalichman, a social psychologist who studies behavioral and social aspects of AIDS, cited her 2009 paper as an example of AIDS denialism "flourishing",[48] and asserted that her "endorsement of HIV/AIDS denialism defies understanding."[49] rationale: The statement "The paper did not question the existence of HIV or AIDS, nor that HIV causes AIDS, but suggested that syphilis could have been a co-factor in the spread of AIDS." which precedes the mention of Seth Kalichman is true and therefore the claim of Seth Kalichman cannot be true and should be deleted. Everyone has a right to their opinion, but not their own set of facts." - Patrick Moynihan

2601:180:8200:C540:156F:42D7:A1F:B175 (talk) 18:14, 29 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Reply 30-MAR-2018

[edit]

I've read the paragraph and reproduced it below for this discussion. In the reproduction I note how each assertion is worded, and discuss whether any of the assertions are "out of place". Please note that this quoted text may have changed in the interim. It reflects only how the article looked as of 06:57, 30 March 2018 (UTC).

In 2009 Margulis and seven others authored a position paper concerning research on the viability of round body forms of some spirochetes, "Syphilis, Lyme disease & AIDS: Resurgence of 'the great imitator'?", which states that, "Detailed research that correlates life histories of symbiotic spirochetes to changes in the immune system of associated vertebrates is sorely needed," and urging the "reinvestigation of the natural history of mammalian, tick-borne, and venereal transmission of spirochetes in relation to impairment of the human immune system."[note 1] The paper did not question the existence of HIV or AIDS, nor that HIV causes AIDS, but suggested that syphilis could have been a co-factor in the spread of AIDS. In a Discover Magazine interview with Dick Teresi published less than six months before her death, however, Margulis spoke provocatively of how, "the set of symptoms, or syndrome, presented by syphilitics overlaps completely with another syndrome: AIDS,"[note 2] and also noted that Kary Mullis, a winner of the 1993 Nobel Prize for the polymerase chain reaction, with unconventional scientific views, said that "he went looking for a reference substantiating that HIV causes AIDS and discovered, 'There is no such document.' "[note 3] This elicited widespread suggestions that Margulis was an "AIDS denialist", with Jerry Coyne notably writing on his Why Evolution is True blog about Margulis' supposed "notion that AIDS is really syphilis, not viral in origin at all."[note 4] Seth Kalichman, a social psychologist who studies behavioral and social aspects of AIDS, cited her 2009 paper[note 5] as an example of AIDS denialism "flourishing", and asserted that her "endorsement[note 6] of HIV/AIDS denialism defies understanding." In the Discover Magazine interview, Margulis discussed with Teresi the primary grounds for her[note 7] initial interest in the material of the 2009 "AIDS" paper, being that "I’m interested in spirochetes only because of our ancestry. I’m not interested in the diseases," and stated that to her the fact that both Treponema (the spirochete which causes syphilis) and Borrelia (the spirochete which causes Lyme disease) only have retained about 20% of the genes they need to live freely outside of their human hosts, they should be considered as symbionts.[note 8]
___________

  1. ^ This is the assertion made by this particular paper being mentioned at this point in the passage: That the life history of symbiotic spirochetes needs to be examined with regards to how they affect the immune system of other organisms.
  2. ^ Here Margulis is making assertions outside of the paper, in a magazine interview. The passage clearly states that.
  3. ^ This is Margulis' assertion of what she believes to be another assertion made by Kary Mullis. According to Margulis, Mullis was unable to locate the document. Whether or not Mullis found the document or was even looking for it is made clear in this passage.
  4. ^ This is Coyne's assertion, and the text in the passage makes that clear.
  5. ^ ".....cited her 2009 paper": This could be made more clear who her is referring to. I believe it to be Margulis.
  6. ^ Another instance of her similar to the first. I believe this is also referring to Margulis. This should be made more clear by using the person's name instead of confusing pronouns.
  7. ^ This use of her is additionally confusing because we're discussing two women: Margulis and Teresi. Which of them this her refers to is unknown.
  8. ^ This last section highlighted in red is the most confused and problematic in the entire passage, and it's clear that it was added by a different editor than the ones responsible for the other passages. This sentence needs to be rewritten to remove the pronouns and clarify what it is that is being communicated, and by whom.

The problem areas of the text I've highlighted in red are discussed in the notes. The entire last section is the most problematic. I leave this hear to spark discussion on how it should be handled. The editor who made the COI edit request is asked to help form a consensus for change before reactivating the request. Regards, Spintendo      06:54, 30 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Reply 04-APR-2018

[edit]

I must disagree with the idea that the text outlined in red is the most problematic. Perhaps the biggest problem with the discussion of Lynn Margulis's ideas about various spirochetoses (infections with spirochetes) is that this section should not be called "AIDS/HIV theory". A better title would be "Viability of Spirochete 'round bodies'". This is the subject of the 2009 paper which I was a co-author and an editor. There was then and there still is a controversy, but the controversy is not about HIV/AIDS theory. Instead the controversy is threefold: first, is wheher or not round bodies (a pleomorphic shape that spirochetes may take or in which some spirochetes spend all of their life history in) are viable (alive); second, that antibiotics are guaranteed to cure infections by spirochetes (syphilis and Lyme disease); and third, that the standard tests used for screening for spirochetoses are reliable. Much of mainstream biology and medicine still assume that round bodies are not viable (dead), that antibiotics cure spirochetoses, and that standard screening tests for spirochetoses are reliable. There is abundant evidence (which I can provide if requested) that these assumptions are examples of what Whitehead called the fallacy of misplaced concreteness. That is that they are commonly believed but are in fact not supported by scientific study. Since neither Jerry Coyne nor Seth Kalichman has any expertise on the question of whether or not spirochete round bodies are viable, the question of the effectiveness of antibiotics in treating spirochetoses, and the reliabilty of the standard screening tests in use, I see no reason to include their opinions which are wildly off-the-mark and seem to have been included by someone with a desire to disparage Lynn Margulis with the ad hominem label of "AIDS denialist". As the title of our 2009 paper makes clear, she did not deny the existence of Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome. What she questioned was whether or not HIV alone was the exclusive causitive agent. Margulis's thinking that AIDS may have co-factors is a position shared by Luc Montagnier, the French virologist and joint recipient of the 2008 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for his discovery of the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV). 2601:180:8200:C540:CD25:ACDF:ECB7:9418 (talk) 18:00, 4 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]

"opposed competition-oriented views"

[edit]

In 'Symbiosis as evolutionary force': "She opposed competition-oriented views of evolution, stressing the importance of symbiotic or cooperative relationships between species." Can someone clarify this? Surely she gave full credit to competition within species...? And this needs to be clarified: Did she disagree with the entire notion of competition between species, or simply with that being the overwhelming focus of research and theory? Maybe someone with a deep enough knowledge of her work can fairly address these points. Heavenlyblue (talk) 17:56, 27 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]

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