Talk:Religion in China/Archive 3

Archive 1

Archive 2

Archive 3

Didier should not be relied on for so much

I don’t have an opinion as to whether the material from Didier was paraphrased or constitutes copyright infringement, as alleged in recent removals, but I do think that there is too much material from Didier that is counter to Wikipedia:Make technical articles understandable, probably WP:FRINGE, and possibly wrong.

Didier and his theories have been negatively reviewed and not widely cited in any case.

Saso, Michael (2009), ""In and Outside the Square: The Sky and the Power of Belief in Ancient China and the World, c. 4500 b.c. –a.d. 200." (review)."", China Review International, 16 (4): 491–493, doi:10.1353/cri.2009.0085 cites scholars who give strong arguments against the theory that astronomical knowledge came or had to come across Asia. The Big Dipper, for instance, “is recognizable across the entire northern hemisphere, sometimes with seven or more stars, and it is not necessary to ascribe this recognition to any given culture.” He notes that “Didier suggests, the square, not the circle, is the symbol for the heavens” in early Chinese culture, but ignores or does not know of texts that prove otherwise: “The fact that the work of Didier does not make use of these important texts, contained in the Gu weishu ??? ancient weft texts (also called Weishu ??), challenges the assertion that the heavens are square, a notion basic to the Didier hypothesis.” Saso makes several more points to undermine Didier.

It also seems strange to mention that “John C. Didier and David Pankenier have studied ...” without citing Pankenier directly. Didier feels Pankenier has not done him justice, though for whatever reason he does not want to say so in so many words: Volume I p. iv he says he sent Pankenier his manuscript, which had been circulated to university press referees, “What is most striking is that in our work of 2003 and 2004 Professor Pankenier and I made several of the same mistakes, which errors, with the additional years since 2004, I have been fortunate enough to locate and correct...” [p. v] and “Although apparently my earlier manuscript remains uncited, Professor Pankenier’s work now continues with his recent delivery of a paper on what in both my earlier and present manuscripts I have identified to be the highest, and celestial polar, power of Shang religion....” [vi], though Didier adds that he has come to differ from the position that he and Pankenier had taken earlier.

There is more, but it seems better not to use Didier as a major source or mention him as an authority four times and in a dozen notes.ch (talk) 04:35, 30 September 2016 (UTC)

You should add the arguments made by Saso and other authors rather than delete Didier's and Zhou's theses.--Aethelwolf Emsworth (talk) 18:07, 30 September 2016 (UTC)

The Big Dipper “is recognizable across the entire northern hemisphere, sometimes with seven or more stars, and it is not necessary to ascribe this recognition to any given culture.” → This is exactly what Didier says in his paper and what I reported in the article.--Aethelwolf Emsworth (talk) 18:14, 30 September 2016 (UTC)

There are several reasons to cut Didier material.

1) Didier is not a reliable source for this material. The Saso review is weighty. WP:SCHOLARSHIP says:

Isolated studies are usually considered tentative and may change in the light of further academic research. If the isolated study is a primary source, it should generally not be used if there are secondary sources that cover the same content. The reliability of a single study depends on the field. Avoid undue weight when using single studies in such fields. Studies relating to complex and abstruse fields, such as medicine, are less definitive and should be avoided. Secondary sources such as meta-analyses, textbooks, and scholarly review articles are preferred when available....

There are many good secondary studies of early Chinese religion.

2) It is not Wiklipedia policy that I "should add the arguments made by Saso and other authors rather than delete Didier's and Zhou's theses." On the contrary, WP:ONUS:

While information must be verifiable in order to be included in an article, this does not mean that all verifiable information must be included in an article. Consensus may determine that certain information does not improve an article, and that it should be omitted or presented instead in a different article. The onus to achieve consensus for inclusion is on those seeking to include disputed content.

I have further objections, which I will make in a more general way in a new section, but these are enough.ch (talk) 21:29, 30 September 2016 (UTC)

What do you mean by "Saso's review is weighty"? I can't access the entire article, but from the introduction he doesn't seem to dismiss entirely Didier's hypothesis. The fact that Saso's paper gives voice to "scholars who give strong arguments against the theory that astronomical knowledge came or had to come across Asia", or that the Big Dipper "is recognizable across the entire northern hemisphere, sometimes with seven or more stars, and it is not necessary to ascribe this recognition to any given culture", or that Didier doesn't take into consideration important weft texts is not enough to dismiss Didier's hypothesis. As he notes, there was a knowledge "inside the square" (warp?) and "outside the square" (weft?) and only at a certain point in history the square symbolism passed from Heaven to Earth.

Saso's review even cites Victor H. Mair in the introduction:

"In and Outside the Square is one of the most remarkable achievements of Sinological research that I have ever encountered. The ample subtitle, "The Sky and the Power of Belief in Ancient China and the World, c. 4500 b.c.–a.d. 200," gives an indication of the broad and inclusive aims of this three-volume work. Yet neither the title nor the subtitle can adequately encompass the rich assemblage of themes that are woven together in this outstanding scholarly treatise. To be sure, what we have in John Didier's magnificent magnum opus is the first and only investigation into all significant aspects of the rise of civilization in the East Asian Heartland (EAH), from its beginnings to the establishment of a bureaucratic system that persisted (albeit with numerous changes of dynasty and modifications in details of structure and operation) until 1912.… This grand synthesis of diverse disciplines will stimulate lively, fruitful debate among Sinologists and Eurasianists alike; … the present bountiful offering gives us plenty to feast upon." (I hope they won't delete this direct quotation for copyright infringement!)--Aethelwolf Emsworth (talk) 22:23, 30 September 2016 (UTC)

Here I have to agree with ch... It's not that we should not mention John Didier's work at all. It's just that we're using it out of proportion to its importance in the field. See WP:UNDUE, a sub-section within WP:NPOV:

"Neutrality requires that each article or other page in the mainspace fairly represent all significant viewpoints that have been published by reliable sources, in proportion to the prominence of each viewpoint in the published, reliable sources. Giving due weight and avoiding giving undue weight means that articles should not give minority views or aspects as much of or as detailed a description as more widely held views or widely supported aspects."

It seems that Didier's ideas are idiosyncratic; they have not been widely accepted. I really like Victor Mair. He is a free spirit who works against the received ideas of traditional sinology. For that purpose, he established and is still editing the Sino-Platonic Papers (SPP), whose explicit goal is to publish and encourage "unconventional or controversial" research by "younger, not yet well established, scholars and independent authors". The SPP's programmatic statement, which appears at the beginning of each paper, starts like this:

"SINO-PLATONIC PAPERS is an occasional series dedicated to making available to specialists and the interested public the results of research that, because of its unconventional or controversial nature, might otherwise go unpublished." (my emphasis).

This is where Didier's work was published. SPP challenges received ideas: it is not the place to find new authorities or core ideas for Wikipedia articles! Unless of course they become influential in their field, as should be noticeable in the reliable sources that represent that field. Madalibi (talk) 03:15, 1 October 2016 (UTC)

When an administrator will send me the text of the article as it was before the deletions I will rewrite the parts of the history section trying to give less weight to Didier's emphasis on the square. Is Ruth Chang's Understanding Di and Tian: Deity and Heaven from Shang to Tang Dynasties less controversial? She doesn't treat the square at all. It gives important insights about the development of Di and Tian in the Song and Tang dynasties.--Aethelwolf Emsworth (talk) 11:04, 1 October 2016 (UTC)

Later It is indeed a big problem that editors (and scholars in general) cannot get free access to journals. I may be wrong, but I think that JSTOR offers free access to a certain number of articles per month. Follow this link for possible "Free Access" on Saso's article linked above.ch (talk) 21:20, 2 October 2016 (UTC)

Eno (2008) in Lagerwey & Kalinowski Early Chinese Religion I pp. 73-74 discusses the association of the supreme God to the celestial pole based on Pankenier's research. Eno discusses both the association of the high God (Di) to the pole and the identification of the High God / Shangdi with the Shang's progenitor Shangjia.--Aethelwolf Emsworth (talk) 11:22, 1 October 2016 (UTC)

Pankenier's hypotheses are published by Cambridge University. See Astrology and Cosmology in Early China. At p. 106-107 he criticises Didier's theory for claiming that Di was associated to a "square" constallation; Pankenier's view differs by claiming that the Dipper itself (and the pole star around which it rotates) was instead the representation of Di. In my latest revision of the article I included both Didier's and Pankenier's views, although without pointing out the difference between the two visions, as I did not notice it. My text said that Didier and Pankenier have both studied the association of the supreme God to either "Ding", "Big Dipper" and "Ursa Major".--Aethelwolf Emsworth (talk) 11:52, 1 October 2016 (UTC)

More at p. 133, note 43: Ding is instead the great square of Pegasus at the south of the north pole / Dippers (p. 132), that was used as the "celestial temple" to divine i.e. rectify (zheng *tjen *ten, Gr. "orthos" as in "orthodox") syn. "cauldron" (ding *ten *teen), i.e. to align with the supreme Lord / bring the Order of Heaven to the earth (pp. 137-145). The mistake of Didier is to have identified the square as the supreme Lord itself, while it is the means by which to align with the supreme Lord.--Aethelwolf Emsworth (talk) 11:55, 2 October 2016 (UTC)

In any case, this material is too esoteric for a general level article, see WP:DETAIL. It would be better in a subarticle, see Wikipedia:Summary style. ch (talk) 21:15, 2 October 2016 (UTC)

Of course this knowledge is "esoteric" for contemporary general Westerners, but it is not in China. Indeed, this knowledge constitutes the very core of Chinese religion, and politics, especially since the government has resumed the state cults of the Yellow Emperor. So, a cursory mention is needed. Without this anchorage in the idea of Di and universal order all Chinese religion becomes incomprehensible. Of course, an in-depth description of this knowledge should be developed in separate articles, such as "Chinese theology" or "Tees".--Aethelwolf Emsworth (talk) 12:10, 3 October 2016 (UTC)

@Aethelwolf Emsworth: One test of a topic's notability is whether it is mentioned in general surveys and/or encyclopedia articles. I would be flabbergasted if any of them include such details as "[Ding] was used as the "celestial temple" to divine i.e. rectify (zheng *tjen *ten, Gr. "orthos" as in "orthodox") syn. "cauldron" (ding *ten *teen), i.e. to align with the supreme Lord / bring the Order of Heaven to the earth...."ch (talk) 18:19, 3 October 2016 (UTC)

Please stop hasty expansion

@Aethelwolf Emsworth: : Please -- please! -- heed the wise advice of Madalibi and take things slow! The hasty expansion of the History section raises questions of both form and content. I am preparing a general review of this article which will raise these questions in detail, but in the meantime, here are points on the recent edits:

• I am amazed to see that you added empty sections! This not acceptable.

• I am disappointed that there are still incomplete references and that the date of Needham's volume is wrong.

• WP:CHINESECHARACTERS "To help establish a simple and clean appearance, if a term is Wikified and　has　an article, do not provide characters or romanization again…. If, however, there is no article, then it is essential to insert traditional or simplified Chinese characters as a minimum…. However, non-English insertions should minimize interruption to the flow of reading. They should always be put within parentheses, as if they were call-outs not part of the sentence."

• WP:CITEKILL There are places with two or more notes, some notes repeated for each sentence in a paragraph.

• WP:UNDUE counsels not to give undue weight. These sections now read like a history of the concept Tian. Some text is clearly Undue. Here is one of many:

Under the influence of foreign cultures and thought systems, new concepts to refer to the supreme God were formulated, such as 天中天 Tianzhongtian ("God of the Gods"), seemingly introduced by Yuezhi Buddhist missionaries to render the Sanskrit Devatideva (of the same meaning) or Bhagavan from their Iranian sources.(Note: Chang p. 38)

By the way, this one of many examples of careless editing: do not put Hanzi first -- see above.

• Reliable sources. There are many excellent histories of these topics, so we should not rely on esoteric sources, perhaps because they are available online. As I said in reply to your request that someone send you a copy of Saso’s review of Didier, I agree that it is a major problem that many editors do not have access to research libraries, but – sadly – this does not mean we can use unreliable sources.

• Major portions of the recent edits simply follow Chang (2000), not the sources that encyclopedic coverage should use. Madalibi has explained that Mair's series explicitly seeks controversial material. She herself says:

Because of the complexity of the problems involved in discovering the meanings behind di and Tian, proposals concerning them put forward in this paper will undoubtedly be disputed by some. (Chang vii)

• There are some places where the phrasing is awkward, but I am happy to touch it up.

ch (talk) 18:02, 3 October 2016 (UTC)

As for point #1: I added empty sections to create the structure, as a work in progress; #2 I will fix that; #3 I will fix that; #4 I have been trying to apply WP:CITEKILL in the past months, it is possible that old edits still have repetitive notes; #5 undoubtedly there is a history of the concept of Tian; to give it less weight we should expand the sections with other sources. I added to the sources Lagerwey's Early- and Modern Chinese Religion as I planned to use predominantly it for the history sections. I agree that there's no need to dedicate this article entirely to Di-Tian, but a nod to the question is needed, as I explained above today. Sino-Platonic Papers is controversial but it's not totally unreliable, as it is published and written by academics. By the way, in my most recent edits I have not deepened the discussion about the astral connections of Di-Tian and especially I have made no further mention of the square identification, which is Didier's fundamental error according to his critics. However, in our article the controversial nature of Didier's work can be balanced with Pankenier's work published by Cambridge University, which points out where Didier has made his mistakes.--Aethelwolf Emsworth (talk) 18:38, 3 October 2016 (UTC)

This is NOT responsive! You should not use mainspace to develop drafts. I do appreciate your correcting some of your hasty and persistent errors, but I pointed them out more than a year ago in Talk:Chinese folk religion#Peer Review and General Editing and you now correct only when I point to specific examples.

There is NO reason to use esoteric sources when reasonable surveys are available. I will start a new section that will make these points, but in the meantime, you should look at other online encyclopedias to see models of clear, well-sourced, and helpful scholarly writing. One example is Pregadio, Fabrizio, "Religious Daoism", The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Fall 2016 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.), here. You should also look at comparable Wikipedia articles such as the dynasty histories.

More important, the article is seriously POV, as I will explain in the new section.

So I renew my request to hold off on new edits until we can come to an understanding.ch (talk) 21:32, 3 October 2016 (UTC)

1. CWH, It is true that I am hasty and sometimes I make format errors, but these are things that can be rapidly fixed, and other users could help to fix them. I think that content is the priority, and that all the format errors such as the addition of unnecessary hanzi, bad prose, etc., can be fixed at a later time.
2. I have already pointed out how sources that you define "esoteric" can be integrated with unquestionably uncontroversial (what you define "reasonable") material such as Pankenier's work published by Cambridge University. Also, I remember well that in past months you complained that I kept "esoteric" material in footnotes and did not integrate it into the main text. Again two weights and two measures in two different occasions. At this point it appears to me that your primary concern is to prevent that a certain knowledge (basically the identification of Di-Tian as the god of the universe) is expressed in the article. As I said, a cursory mention is necessary.
3. CWH, I won't go on with the expansion of the article (which doesn't mean that I won't improve and correct the current version), but in the meanwhile I ask you to restore this material which you removed, integrating the first paragraph and the image caption with the critiques put forward by Saso and Pankenier, and reformulating the reference to the square in the second paragraph (this is giving due weight to all the viewpoints, wholesale removal is not). I will reintroduce the sentence sourced with Espesset pp. 22-28, about Huangdi, that I still don't understand why was removed since it expresses what Espesset says and the publication is not controversial.--Aethelwolf Emsworth (talk) 08:07, 4 October 2016 (UTC)

Thanks for giving a little breathing room! As I said, I am pulling together thoughts and observations on the present state and future shape of the article, which is now at or near maximum length -- see WP:SIZE. It is now hard to navigate and not easy to understand the choice of topics and where they are placed. At this point, suffice it to say that the main article on a rich topic does not need or have room to discuss differences of view on minor points.

On the other hand, there could very well be a section on the scholarly approaches to Chinese religions, perhaps called something like "Approaches to religion in China."ch (talk) 21:18, 4 October 2016 (UTC)

A good project to "improve and correct the current version" would be to complete the references for the Lagerwey notes (which now have either no author or title for the chapter or only the author/ title, not the specific page on which a quote or idea appears); Lu & Gong (2014); Davis Encyclopedia; Ruokonen & Huang; Carpenter, den Dulk.ch (talk) 04:49, 6 October 2016 (UTC)

Many thanks, Aethelwolf Emsworth, for completing these references. It's very helpful to have the authors and chapters. Even more helpful would be to use the reference forms, such as the ones I posted to your Talk Page here June 2015. These look neater, don't repeat long notes, and allow readers to jump to the full reference (which can have links to online originals). Thanks also for your patience as I pull together the more systematic review that I hope will be useful in deciding the next stage in the improvement of this article.ch (talk) 16:52, 9 October 2016 (UTC)

Adding distinct references for each chapter of a book would be useful but will expand the already long list of sources. Maybe there's a technical method to have references to different chapters pointing to the same book-source.--Aethelwolf Emsworth (talk) 18:06, 9 October 2016 (UTC)

Yes, you are right: the form is "Author" "Title," in "Source in Reference Section," as you have done (though in a less useful order). The better way is to use the Cite Encyclopedia {{cite encyclopedia}} or {{Citation}}, which has a "Chapter" field. See WP:CT. If this makes the reference section too long, then we should replace narrowly focused sources with ones of broader scope that could be used for more topics.ch (talk) 00:43, 10 October 2016 (UTC)

Please use edit summaries

In the very impressive expansion of this article, most editors, including the energetic and productive Aethelwolf Emsworth have not been following Wikipedia consensus, Always Provide an Edit Summary.

Thanks! ch (talk) 18:58, 27 August 2016 (UTC)

Actually, I always provide an edit summary when I make big changes or additions. I do not write an edit summary when I make the "minor edits" which I tag as such and most of the time consist in little rewording, grammatical and spelling corrections, punctuation, other typos, etc.--Aethelwolf Emsworth (talk) 19:04, 27 August 2016 (UTC)

Actually, Aethelwolf Emsworth.... still keep this in mind.ch (talk) 05:42, 11 October 2016 (UTC)

Limits to size, omission of religious practice, need to trim

Before we add more to this article, we should assess what it lacks and work out the difference in coverage between Religion in China and Chinese Folk Religion. Another important concern is that the article now is unfocused and hard to follow.

Many of my concerns about this article are closely related to the concerns about Chinese folk religion that I presented more than a year ago in Talk:Chinese folk religion#Peer Review and General Editing. In each case, these concerns include technical style and format; approach and style; questions on Reliable Sources; and particular points.

We need to address these concerns now because the guidlines WP:SIZE suggest that this article has reached or will soon reach the length that should be split. As a rough estimate, the DYK check reported that prose size was 15,661 words of readable prose on September 1 and nearly 20,000 words in early October.

The distinction between "Chinese religion" and "Chinese folk religion" is not clear in either article.

A quick glance reveals that these two articles emphasize philosophy and thought to the neglect of practice. These topics are among those missing or under-emphasized:

• birth
• death (mentioned only in passing)
• divination mentioned in passing (including once for Tibet), I Ching
• funerals (mentioned once)
• festivals (New Year is mentioned only for the Qiang people)
• Filial piety, though somewhat covered as Ancestral veneration
• geomancy = Feng shui
• Guan Yu – mentioned only in passing as Guandi
• institutionalized vs. diffused religion
• rites and rituals are discussed in “General definition...” but could be made easier to find and accessible elsewhere
• state or imperial religion
• underworld, hell, Yellow Springs
• weddings
• White Lotus.
• Yin and yang mentioned only in passing, not related to Chinese religion
• the history of the study of Chinese religion in the West & points of view.

In light of these questions, we need to trim excess detail, perhaps to be moved to sub-articles.ch (talk) 05:08, 11 October 2016 (UTC)

It may be due to my philosophical training, but I think that this article should focus more on general theory and philosophy of religion in China, while in-depth analysis of practices (rites of birth and death, wedding, divination, underworld) should be kept in separate articles. I know that religion in China is more living and lived (so, practice) than abstract theory, but this is already pointed out in the "description of what in China is religious", and may be explored further there. Many of the points of your list might be discussed in future expansions of the Chinese folk religion (or Chinese religion) article. There is indeed a need of a deeper analysis of the yin-yang concept in this article, but this would be better understood starting from a description of the universal principle (Tian - Di) which/who articulates and moves in this duality (so, in the section about "general conception of God").--Aethelwolf Emsworth (talk) 08:48, 13 October 2016 (UTC)

Copyvio's

Violation Possible74.0%

• Was reading this today and took a look at one of the refs for more info and noticed our text was copy from the source. 74 percent sounds high....but I think all we need is some simple paraphrasing or quotes here. Nothing outrageous...but i am not the guy to do this as i have 0 knowledge of the topic...thus not sure whats best to quote or re-word.--Moxy (talk) 19:44, 13 October 2016 (UTC)

Those are footnotes. Citation of source texts is possible when limited, clearly attributed to the author, and contained in quotemarks ("..."). The issue was already discussed here here. Also see WP:CLOP.--Aethelwolf Emsworth (talk) 22:17, 13 October 2016 (UTC)

Not sure that much copyrighted text is good - note copy and pasting is not a runaround on copyright....huge amount here. Limited quotation from non-free copyrighted sources is allowed...not full (2008) excerpts. Perhaps best to read the guideline over an essay MOS:QUOTE. That said great article and if others have looked.....I guess ok..--Moxy (talk) 22:40, 13 October 2016 (UTC)

Moxy I appreciate your drawing this to our attention!

1) I have strong objections to such a great number of informational footnotes, especially those with extensive quotes, but did not focus on the copyright issues.

2) You say it's "OK if others have looked," but they have not. The linked discussion of the issue at the Administrator's board was

a) just that, a "discussion," not approval

b) concerning a different issue.

The admins did not discuss, much less sanction the use of this material.ch (talk) 03:05, 14 October 2016 (UTC)

Moxy Most of the direct quotes are very short and are not cut-and-paste from the original sources. I can't find the full excerpts (2008 source) you write about.--Aethelwolf Emsworth (talk) 21:05, 2 November 2016 (UTC)

Remove Zhou Jixu hypothesis again

Since Aethelwolf Emsworth let us know on Novemmber 2 (above) that he would be busy in he activities of the "real world," I have hesitated to make major changes in this article. Welcome back!

Although AE and I have major differences, I still want to work for consensus. But there the discussion on Dider (and Pankenier) has been extensive, to say the least, and with the help of madalibi we had reached consensus. I wanted to remove the paragraph completely, but left compromise language. I confess that I was happy to see the IP editor 99.242.89.243 remove some of the Zhou sentence, and am quite surprised at the explanation that AE gives in his edit summary: "The fact that certain publications challenge the "mainstream" (i.e. vulgar mass culture and the Western academia haunted by certain ideologies) only corroborates their authority." here To say that a source challenges the mainstream is to say that it does not meet the requirements of WP:RS. And I fear that the emotional language is a clue to a non-encyclopedic viewpoint.

In addition to being controversial, the sentence (like the compromise paragraph) will be confusing to the sorts of readers who come to the basic and introductoring article on Religion in China.

I would be happy to see mention of the Sino-Bablonian hypothesis, which, to be sure, now has more evidence than a generation ago. But the removed material is not the way to go. ch (talk) 20:47, 21 December 2016 (UTC)

I said that I would have "reduced my contribution to the minimal", not that I would have stopped completely. I have returned just for a very short break, however. "And I fear that the emotional language is a clue to a non-encyclopedic viewpoint". You are free to interpret it that way (the phrase, actually, was meant to be somewhat ironic, see the quotation marks of "mainstream"), I do not see, anyway, how it could be related to "un-encyclopedic" things. The important is that article content remains unbiased. I have read citations of Zhou's paper in Victor H. Mair's work: Mair is an acknowledged sinologist (i.e. mainstream) = Zhou can be considered "encyclopedic", at least as a "marginal" position. I do not see a two-line paragraph as giving undue weight. The undue bias, here, is that expressed by the IP.--Aethelwolf Emsworth (talk) 22:10, 21 December 2016 (UTC)

Anyway, I will not add back the paragraph about Di = Tees = Dyeus, for now. I am sure that within a few years "Sino-Indo-Europeanism" will be an established field of study. Bye.--Aethelwolf Emsworth (talk) 23:14, 21 December 2016 (UTC)

Sinitic religion

I just started the new article "Sinitic religion" which is the broader definition of Chinese religion, overcoming the dichotomy between popular or folk and élite religion, vernacular practice and high ritual and philosophy, which persisted throughout this and other articles of Wikipedia.--Aethelwolf Emsworth (talk) 00:04, 23 December 2016 (UTC)

Thank you for this useful information. However, the new article constitutes a WP:CONTENTFORK, that is, "the creation of multiple separate articles (or passages within articles) all treating the same subject."

It also may possibly be a "point of view (POV) fork," that is, a "content fork deliberately created to avoid a neutral point of view (including undue weight), often to avoid or highlight negative or positive viewpoints or facts. All POV forks are undesirable on Wikipedia, as they avoid consensus building and therefore violate one of our most important policies."

In addition, there are other specific objections to sourcing and structure of the article, which call its creation into question, which we should discuss on the TalkPage there.ch (talk) 03:41, 23 December 2016 (UTC)

The article is not in any way conceived to be a POV fork (I haven't moved there any of the controversial contents). As for the rest, discussion continues there.--Aethelwolf Emsworth (talk) 08:54, 23 December 2016 (UTC)

More on why Didier is not a good source & Rise of Confucianism

@Aethelwolf Emsworth: Please see the new section above for further reasons that Didier's abstruse detail is out of place in this article.

The section "Rise of Confucianism" is not well based. Relying on Didier misses the point that "Confucianism" did not rise in the late Zhou, but not until the Han. Using a standard survey would be more useful in writing an article for our readers. The new material is partly fringe ("inside the square"?) and partly just unclear -- "deluded with the widespread vulgarisation"? "the crucial knot"?

Why persist in using challenged sources when perfectly sound and widely accepted sources are available? If we want to include discussions or disagreements, then Fingarette would be much more useful, since he is widely cited.ch (talk) 06:01, 11 October 2016 (UTC)

Aligning with Heaven is the starting point and reason of development of all types of Chinese religion, so I insist that the fundamental astral connections of Tian/Di are at least cursorily mentioned in this article. It is not only Didier who discusses these things, but also Pankenier and other authors. The Indo-European links that some authors have traced (and the contestations by other authors) fit perfectly in the "history" section, since it is a question of "historical origin of a concept".

The section about Confucianism can be easily expanded and modified.--Aethelwolf Emsworth (talk) 08:58, 13 October 2016 (UTC)

@Aethelwolf Emsworth:, Thanks once again for your articulate reply.

I agree that the concept Tian is basic and should be explained to readers, though it exaggerates to say that it is "the starting point and reason of development of all types of Chinese religions." -- Buddhism? Christianity? If the "fundamental astral connections" are discussed only in highly specialized or even peripheral publications, then they are not basic to this article. See WP:DETAIL &/or WP:UNDUE, amng others.

The section on Confucianism illustrates an important problem. It is better to follow the selection of topics in surveys and established topical syntheses than to pick random topics from specialized monographs. Wikipedia is not the place for cutting edge research. Starting with such sources as Didier and even Pankenier gives the impression that we did an internet search and used the most accessible sources instead of starting from books and articles that scholars in the field would use in their undergraduate teaching.

Among the useful resources is Riegel, Jeffrey (Summer 2013). "Confucius". In Zalta, Edward N. (ed.). The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. {{cite encyclopedia}}: Invalid |ref=harv (help)CS1 maint: year (link)

I also should have noted that when you re-inserted the three paragraphs that I then cut, you did not correct obvious style errors.ch (talk) 20:56, 13 October 2016 (UTC)

Added Riegel for future improvements. Regarding Tian/Di and its/his astral connections, they are fundamental to "Chinese religion" (Confucian and Taoist, state and popular religion, ancient and modern, even ethnic minority religions). Buddhism is a much more complex issue (it contains similar sacred teachings but the perspective is different), and of course they are not fundamental to modern decadent Christianity, which has completely lost this original sacred core of knowledge.--Aethelwolf Emsworth (talk) 22:10, 13 October 2016 (UTC)

@Aelthelwolf Emsworth: We do not have consensus on the material you restored. Your re-restoration borders on edit warring. You have not responded to the arguments I made in the original section above, which were seconded by @Madalibi:. To repeat what I pointed out above, it is not Wiklipedia policy that I "should add the arguments made by Saso and other authors rather than delete Didier's and Zhou's theses." On the contrary, WP:ONUS:

While information must be verifiable in order to be included in an article, this does not mean that all verifiable information must be included in an article. Consensus may determine that certain information does not improve an article, and that it should be omitted or presented instead in a different article. The onus to achieve consensus for inclusion is on those seeking to include disputed content.

You "insist"? I have tremendous respect for your energy in writing this article and your extensive contributions to the PORTAL:Chinese folk religion, but these do not give you the power to "insist." Please see WP:OWNER

What you "insist" is that the "fundamental astral connections of Tian/Di" should be "at least cursorily mentioned...."

The three paragraphs restored here are not a "cursory" mention: The restored material is just under 500 words; deals with graphical and phonetic etymologies of the character Tian (which are not relevant here); two Hanzi that will be incomprehensible to anyone but scholars who are already too knowledgeable to need this article; the in-group debate between respected but not authoritative scholars; diem as the accusative of dies; and other matters too esoteric to fathom. As I argued in the section on the need to control the size of this article, we also do not have room, even if this material were important.

I would, however, be willing to see the restored material replaced with a sentence or at most two, of 50 to 100 words on the theory.

Again, to repeat, you restored this material without correcting the style errors that violate WP:CHINESECHARACTERS as I pointed out long ago and then again above.ch (talk) 04:28, 14 October 2016 (UTC)

Compromise: I added a compromise shortened version (143 words) of this material that I hope explains the interesting basic point without confusing readers.ch (talk) 18:50, 16 October 2016 (UTC)

@CWH:: Hello CWH.

- I generally appreciate the syntheses you have made.

- However, I would not have removed all that content (mostly Lagerwey references) from the lede.

- It would be great to find better sources than New York Times and Xinhua.

- The Jesuitic interpretation of religion in China and secularisation of Confucianism: it is of fundamental importance, as it influenced not only the Western perception of China, but also secularisation in the West and in turn the secularisation of China in th early 20th century. The topic would fit the history section.

- I encourage you to start the "study of religion in China" section, where to add back the material removed from the "20th century history" section: "wenhua re", "religious ecology", etc.

Besides, I'll be busy in activities in the "real world" until the early months of 2017, so I'll reduce my contribution to the minimal.--Aethelwolf Emsworth (talk) 20:53, 2 November 2016 (UTC)

Thanks! Please keep an eye on this article as well as the "real" world, as both of them need your help.ch (talk) 21:25, 2 November 2016 (UTC)

Over 760 Wikipedia articles cite Sino-Platonic Papers references, which clearly means it's a WP:RS. Notwithstanding Saso's review, to claim that Didier's SPP article is unreliable is extraordinary, and requires extraordinary evidence. Keahapana (talk) 23:02, 27 December 2016 (UTC)

Some are RS, some aren't, Keahapana -- can't generalize.

The objection is not only RS, but, as you can see looking here and in the archive, that, to quote from earlier discussion:

• "abstruse detail is out of place in this article" A whole paragraph on the differences between Didier and Pankenier is detail understood only by graduate students.
• WP:ONUS:

While information must be verifiable in order to be included in an article, this does not mean that all verifiable information must be included in an article. Consensus may determine that certain information does not improve an article, and that it should be omitted or presented instead in a different article. The onus to achieve consensus for inclusion is on those seeking to include disputed content.

• "Why persist in using challenged sources when perfectly sound and widely accepted sources are available?"
• The article is already roughly twice the "generally accepted standard" in the editing guideline Wikipedia:Article size @ WP:SIZERULE, which says that if the “readable prose size” is greater than 100 kB, which roughly corresponds to 10,000 words, then the article “Almost certainly should be divided.” So at 20,000 words of readable prose we should be pruning, not adding. :Hope this makes my point clearer!ch (talk) 06:08, 31 January 2017 (UTC)

New CFPS 2014 figures

Many thanks to Aethelwolf Emsworth for bringing these figures up to date. However I could not make the url work, either by clicking it or copying it into my browser, so I added the "Dead link" note.

I also restored "Chinese Folk Religion" in the chart, since a Google search for "common diffused piety" did not get any hits and the link was to Chinese Folk Religion.

If AE is indeed returning, it is good news! We can work toward consensus on the tasks listed in the section of 11 October 2016]. One important task is to reduce the size of the article, but that should be addressed in another section.ch (talk) 00:02, 25 February 2017 (UTC)

Hello CWH. I am returning just for this weekend. "Common diffused piety" is a generic locution, not the specific name of any religion, and since we have ascertained that the name "Chinese folk religion" in Chinese defines the sects only, I thought a generic locution like "common diffused piety" was better. Regarding the link to the results of CFPS 2014, my browser uploads it with no problems. It is possible that your providers block certain websites from China. I have temporarily archived the table here. Results are also available for download here. They appear to be still at the preliminary stage and, certainly, more complete data will be published in the near future.--Aethelwolf Emsworth (talk) 12:12, 25 February 2017 (UTC)

Thanks for the quick work, though I can't get the first two links to work and the table in the third at first glance doesn't seem to add up to the figures in the chart. FutureTrillionaire and Wiki id2 have edited and may have better access than I. But when we report from a source, we need to use that source's terminology when possible.ch (talk) 07:19, 26 February 2017 (UTC)

What if we put in "Chinese Folk Tradition" rather than "Not religious / Traditional Chinese Religion" as Chinese Folk Tradition acts as a substitute that covers your position regarding secularism in the modern age and the gradual revival of traiditonal cultural practices since the end of Mao's rule. (Wiki id2(talk) 11:28, 26 February 2017 (UTC)) thumb|400px

Wiki id2 As discussed throughout the article, and also by CFPS researchers in their official data release of CFPS 2012 (reported in the article's current citation #1), there is no clear distinction between "not religious" people and what in English is inaccurately called the "folk religion" (more accurately called "common diffused religion/worship", see terminology), since most "not religious" people hold such traditional piety and are "not religious" in the sense that they do not belong to the five official churches (the exact definition of "religion" in Chinese language is "church/religious body/religious organisation").

CWH I have uploaded the table from the link and you can find it here on the right. As you can see, Buddhism → 15.87%, other → 5.94%, Taoism → 0.85%, folk religious sects → 0.81%, Islam → 0.45%, Protestant Christian → 2.19%, Catholic Christian → 0.34%, not religious → 73.56%, as of 2014. Indeed, there is a slight difference between such figures and those in the CFPS website Excel tables, which appear to be not finalised for release.--Aethelwolf Emsworth (talk) 11:46, 26 February 2017 (UTC)

(Wiki id2 section starts) Hey guys, as you know information release from China is notoriously difficult and unreliable. Due to the "great firewall of China" and the internet censorship. Regardless I think we can talk about religion freely here. I have found new sources and references that is evidence of change in China pre and post chariman mao.

here have a look: https://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/08/world/asia/china-religion-regulations.html?_r=0 and this one: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/china/10776023/China-on-course-to-become-worlds-most-Christian-nation-within-15-years.html http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/08/06/china-religion_n_4860813.html

This is news information being published in reliable media outlets which accurately reflects religious practices changing in China. Of course post-Mao there was still significant state censorship and it was impossible to peer inside China and get accurate sources on religous practice. But the unofficial religious figures seem to be undergoing formalisation and I thiink as academics and educated scholars we should adapt accordingly.

I have found an interesting PDF document: ej.lib.cbs.dk/index.php/cjas/article/download/19/18 now this PDF is a cached copy from 2005 which suggests that there has been movement of information from the internal Chinese internet to the outside world. And they have put on a cached copy (I know it sounds conspiratorial but when discussing different civilisations we should be a bit mindful of different cultural values and just show a little respect and tolerance) it says that there is a signficaint presence of Daoism, Christianity and Buddhism as well as Islam. (now I'm guessing these Islam statistics includes the Uyghur minority and the Buddhism statistics includes Tibet and the Christianity statistics includes Hong Kong or Macau) and this may provide a more holistic picture of Chinese cultural and religious values.

I have used a sort of thesaurus idea and changed the 'Not religious' to 'unaffiliated' I think that provides a more broad perspective than just western reference of ATHEIST or AGNOSTIC (sorry for the caps lock) and also a more sophisistcated term than "not religious" because at this point in different regions of China it is hard to accuarately translate the "chinese hieroglyphics" and seperate the religous from the cultural. So the term unaffiliated / Chinese folk religion or unaffiilated/Chinese traditional religion works better. What do you guys think?

And do tell me what you guys think about these new statistical sources (quantitative data) and the news articles (qualitative) and lets update these articles in accordance with research and lets assume good faith because we can establish a wikipedia talk page community and translate much of Chinese works, religion and culture into the mainstream English language. Start like a wiki project or something maybe?

Kind regards (Wiki id2(talk) 12:34, 26 February 2017 (UTC))

You have got the point of what religion in China is by saying that "in different regions of China it is hard to accuarately translate the Chinese hieroglyphics and seperate the religous from the cultural" and by changing "not religious" to "unaffiliated". As for the news media, especially Western ones, unfortunately they are mostly biased, unreliable and (obviously) unscholarly (as I pointed out in past discussions, see #1 and #2). We must rely upon statistics institutions like the Chinese Family Panel Studies for accurate data about religion, collected through large-sample surveys. As for internet censorship, Chinese internet is accessible to those who are able to navigate using Chinese characters. I do not believe in "great firewalls" and censorship. I have, instead, encountered many cases of Chinese websites blocked by Western providers.--Aethelwolf Emsworth (talk) 12:46, 26 February 2017 (UTC)

As for Hongyi Larry Lai's article The Religious Revival in China (Copenhagen Journal of Asian Studies, 2003) which you have linked, it is a good scholarly article but it is quite outdated, as it refers to late 1990s statistics. As you can see, it reports a number of Buddhists between 90 and 132 million, while the most recent CFPS 2014 survey has found 16% of the population declaring to be Buddhists, which is more than 200 million.--Aethelwolf Emsworth (talk) 12:58, 26 February 2017 (UTC)

Yes Emsworth regarding your point civlisational censorship goes both ways. (much of western censorship is overlooked by observers) but we can use the news articles to update tiddly bits of religion on other pages like China, Communist Party of China approach to religion, Deng Xiaoping, Jiang Zemin, Hu Jintao and Xi Jinping. There has been plenty of update in the theme of economic modernisation in China around wikipedia. But work on the social modernisation project underway in China has largely been overlooked. I think the other thing that is difficult to quantify is the role of Confucianism both the philosophy and the religous practices derived from it and what sects of Buddhism, Daoism and the "traiditonal unafifliated folk reliigon" has actually infused Confucian philosophy. This notwithsanding the expansion of both Christianity and Islam in China. Perhaps more detail on the Chinese Catholic Church maybe and what makes this new eastern type Church distinct from its counterpart in Rome rather than just one that is seperated but one that may look at the Chinese state wanting a chinese-style christianity rather than one that directly relates to Ancient Roman history? (Wiki id2(talk) 04:03, 27 February 2017 (UTC))

Falun Gong

Anyone mind telling me why Falun Gong isn't mentioned at all in the article? Seems a it fishy. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 157.157.213.125 (talk) 17:17, 4 March 2017 (UTC)

It is mentioned in the section People's Republic of China, with a link to the full article. ch (talk) 20:47, 25 April 2017 (UTC)

Christianity china

I listen many times that hundreds chinese become christians every year and that christianity in china is in the rise. Attactos (talk) 15:49, 16 July 2017 (UTC)

The circulation of such claims is the work of what US president Donald Trump calls *fake news media*.--Aethelwolf Emsworth (talk) 12:07, 22 July 2017 (UTC)

So.. how many are Muslim again?

"National surveys conducted in the early 21st century estimated that some 80% of Han Chinese, that is more than a billion people, practice some kind of Chinese folk religion or Taoism; 10–16% are Buddhists; 2-4% are Christians; and 1–2% are Muslims."
But wait, the image on the right has a note saying that the 0,45% thing may be because they primarily asked Han Chinese. I assume this is meant to be for all Chinese? Bataaf van Oranje (Prinsgezinde) (talk) 22:02, 2 October 2017 (UTC)

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