Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard

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macrotrends.net

• macrotrends.net: Linksearch en (insource) - meta - de - fr - simple - wikt:en - wikt:fr • Spamcheck • MER-C X-wiki • gs • Reports: Links on en - COIBot - COIBot-Local • Discussions: tracked - advanced - RSN • COIBot-Link, Local, & XWiki Reports - Wikipedia: en - fr - de • Google: search • meta • Domain: domaintools • AboutUs.com
• Afus199620 (talk · contribs)

I saw the user spamming the site as reference to past financial result of listed companies. The site seems financial data aggregator , but is that reliable source. (It can go further that is there any possible WP:COI and WP:NOTHERE). Matthew hk (talk) 13:25, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

I am not spamming. The source is reliable for financial data.--Afus199620 (talk) 14:54, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

Not a reliable source. The site clearly aggregates data from other sources with insufficient information about the site's providers, their expertise and their specific methodology. Without such essential information the site's alleged reliability cannot be assessed and it is unreliable by default. Anyone can create such a site based on publicly available data and data APIs, so reliability must be shown with verifiable proof (or atleast some substantial evidence). Also, with the large amount of sponsored content the site's primary focus seems less on data and more on advertising. If primary statistical data is needed, it should be taken either directly from the primary source(s) or from an acknowledged secondary expert source. GermanJoe (talk) 18:12, 2 November 2018 (UTC)

Fair enough, such section was not quite encyclopedic as a collection of stats., i may not object the section if quoting Bloomberg or citing figures from primary source directly (plus more secondary source for not failing WP:NOTSTATS), but in this section using this source macrotrends.net was quite questionable . Matthew hk (talk) 04:34, 6 November 2018 (UTC)

Amazons (genetics)

Reliable edit or not? Peer-reviewed sources:

• Krzewińska, Maja (October 2018). Ancient genomes suggest the eastern Pontic-Caspian steppe as the source of western Iron Age nomads. Science Advances.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: year (link)
• Nikitin, Alexey G. (October 2018). Solving the origins of ancient Eurasian Nomadic Warriors with Genetics (PDF). Biology Department, Grand Valley State University.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: year (link)

--Alperich (talk) 20:14, 31 October 2018 (UTC) Well they were published in a peer reviewed science journal, so not red flags.Slatersteven (talk) 16:09, 2 November 2018 (UTC)

Article "CHMIELNICKI, BOGDAN ZINOVI" in the Jewish Encyclopedia

Source: CHMIELNICKI, BOGDAN ZINOVI

Article: Pogrom

Content: An encyclopedia, written over a hundred years ago (1901-1906) is used to reinforce the statement "The first atrocities against Jewish civilians, on a genocidal scale of destruction, were committed during the Khmelnytsky Pogroms of 1648–1657 in present-day Ukraine". In addition to the question that it does not contain the words " the first", "genocide" and "pogrom" (although some users successfully find them), there is the question - should we use such a source to support such statements?

I, in principle, agree with the statement made in the previous discussion: it "should never be used except (1) to illustrate the historical views of something at the time they were written, , with the article making clear the fact that it is very unlikely to still be the current view, or (2) for the basic plain facts about the biography of a person or the basic description of a place or the like, with care taken to see that they have not been contradicted or basically changed by later work."

I immediately see in this article two gross factual errors:

1. The article states that "Chmielnicki made the Jew a go-between in his transactions with the peasants of Little Russia." This is a complete nonsense. Before the uprising Khmelnitsky was not at all the ruler of Ukraine or any of its significant parts. He was only a Sotnik (Captain) who had little influence (Poles raided his estate with impunity).
2. The article states that rebels "massacred about three hundred thousand Jews". Modern studies estimate the entire Jewish population of the entire Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth at 200 thousand. The Jewish population of Ukraine is estimated at 40-51 thousand (See Khmelnytsky Uprising#Jews and refs there).

More modern Jewish Encyclopedias are much more balanced, and they usually have more detailed and accurate coverage of historical events (as in the case of the Khmelnytsky Uprising). I believe that the use of the Jewish Encyclopedia of 1901-1906 should be significantly limited.--Nicoljaus (talk) 09:15, 2 November 2018 (UTC)

• Comment Nicoljaus is forum-shopping now. He asked for a 3O - which I provided - and he didn't like the answer and proceeded to insist that my opinion was not offered in good faith. Simonm223 (talk) 12:49, 2 November 2018 (UTC)

• You mean this discussion [[1] was a forum shopping too? And the cited words of DGG was said because he just "didn't like the answer"? We have a problem with the using of outdated Encyclopedia. It should be solved.--Nicoljaus (talk) 14:39, 2 November 2018 (UTC)

• The results of an archived discussion from August 2015 (a time when I wasn't actually active on Wikipedia for an extended period) have absolutely no bearing on whether or not you are forum shopping. You had a content dispute. You reached out through a Wikipedia mechanism for a resolution that dispute. That resolution did not provide the answer you wanted. You then reached out to a different mechanism. That's forum shopping. And I might be more charitable if you hadn't been so quick to breach WP:AGF the second I gave an answer you didn't like at article talk. Simonm223 (talk) 14:58, 2 November 2018 (UTC)

Is an article in World Net Daily reliable source?

Is [http://www.wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=41944 this link] a reliable source? There is a discussion of this source at the Mass killings under communist regimes article, and it would be desirable to have a fresh opinion on that account.--Paul Siebert (talk) 16:03, 2 November 2018 (UTC)

Never for factual statements, only in its own article to document its own positions. It's birther central. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 16:07, 2 November 2018 (UTC)

WND is no-no. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 16:13, 2 November 2018 (UTC)

Terrible article, and certainly not to be used as a source for history. Which is hardly a surprise considering this is WND. O3000 (talk) 16:20, 2 November 2018 (UTC)

It is being used in "Mass killings under communist regimes" as a source for quotes from Rudolph Rummel. I think it may meet rs because WND is probably a reliable source for the opinions of authors it publishes. Surely no one doubts that Rummel actually wrote the article. Also per "Exceptions", Rummel could be seen as an expert and therefore the article would be a reliable source for facts. I would omit it however because when an expert writes for conspiracy theory websites, it's often because they want to express views are so far outside the mainstream that they cannot be published in reliable sources. If that is not the case then it would be better to use better sources where he says the same thing. TFD (talk) 16:30, 2 November 2018 (UTC)

I'd be leery citing facts to that article directly. If Rummel is an expert on the subject of the article, he's written all of those facts down before in more reliable sources. Find his original works, and use those instead. It would be very strange for such facts to have been published first, and only, in an article on such a website. --Jayron32 16:37, 2 November 2018 (UTC)

A source which comments on a secondary source or is presented as the basis of a secondary source should not be regarded as an accurate or fair descriptive of it as such. Recommended to not use it, or not regarde it is a fair source, given Rudolph Rummel has existence, good sources you can refer to. 45.62.243.176 (talk) 06:21, 6 November 2018 (UTC)

Articles should not contain quotes from primary or unreliable sources unless the quote is cited to a secondary source which includes it. — Frayæ (Talk/Spjall) 16:41, 2 November 2018 (UTC)

Primary sources are not unreliable. Those are not synonyms. I'm not saying he is an expert, but insofar as someone would be an expert, citing their work is fine. His works on history would not be primary sources. If he's a historian, his books ARE secondary sources. The primary sources would be the documents he used in compiling his research. --Jayron32 16:46, 2 November 2018 (UTC)

I mean primary or unreliable as a general comment on deciding if a quote should be included. As a hypothetical example;

If Mr Jones writes something in say Breitbart then that should not be quoted in the Wikipedia article. If the New York Times reports that Mr Jones wrote something in Brietbart then it can be included in the Wikipedia article.

Equally if a company says in a press releases that includes the CEO saying they have made a flying car, then the CEO of the company should not be quoted in the Wikipedia article as saying the company has a flying car. If the BBC run a feature about flying cars and quote the CEO as saying his company has made a flying car then that quote can then be included in the Wikipedia article. This is basic common sense when dealing with quotes.

I say basic common sense because I can't remember if a policy says this or which policy that would be. Feel free to come up with something else, this is just how I would personally treat whether to quote or not in my understanding of how to make articles neutral and reliable. — Frayæ (Talk/Spjall) 17:04, 2 November 2018 (UTC)

As I expressed below, "opinions of authors it publishes" is not a blank check for WP:RS concerns. Opinion pieces used as sources here must also be published by someone with a reputation for fact-checking or accuracy - that is to say, a source that passes WP:RS - or they cannot be used. WP:ABOUTSELF establishes some very narrow exceptions for opinions that lack the backing of a WP:RS with a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy, but that clearly does not apply here. The idea that being published in WND grants someone's opinions more weight than if they were published on (for instance) Reddit or their personal website is so bizarre that I find it honestly shocking coming from an experienced editor. Wikipedia is not a dumping ground for random opinions and burblings - even the most carefully-worded quote or paraphrase of an opinion, with the most cautious inline citations, still must be cited to a source that passes WP:RS if it violates any of the limitations in WP:ABOUTSELF. This is absolute and non-negotiable, and the idea that someone's opinions on third parties (or history, or exceptional claims in general, or anything that isn't strictly personal details about themselves) could become acceptable for a Wikipedia article via publication in an unreliable source like WND is absurd. WP:RSOPINION still requires that the opinion piece be published in an otherwise-reliable source, not in someplace like WND. --Aquillion (talk) 03:45, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

I responded to this point of yours in your second posting of it below. AmateurEditor (talk) 15:13, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

Its reliable for author words whatever its WP:DUE or not its question for other for board--Shrike (talk) 16:52, 2 November 2018 (UTC)

It absolutely is not WP:RS, not even in that context. Not ever. We rely on whoever published something to perform basic due-diligence and fact-checking even for opinion pieces; WND does not do that. Citing it for "the author's opinion" is no better than citing the author's unfiltered musings on a personal website, forum post, Reddit AMA, email chain or the like. There are very narrow circumstances where we can do that under WP:ABOUTSELF, but this doesn't pass those criteria (it involves claims about third parties, claims not directly related to the source, and - debatably - exceptional claims.) WP:RS is absolutely required even for opinion-pieces - that's why WP:ABOUTSELF, which covers people expressing opinions in venues that lack the fact-checking and accuracy that WP:RS requires, is so restrictive. Implying that we can just put an opinion from WND about third parties into a Wikipedia article is absurd. This is clear-cut enough that I would express serious WP:COMPETENCE concerns for someone who insists on trying to do it. --Aquillion (talk) 03:37, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

Aquillion, WorldNetDaily is included in Wikipedia:Identifying reliable sources/Perennial sources, as a "generally unreliable" source, which I would agree with. However, it does not support your statement that Rummel's 2004 op-ed is not a reliable source in this context (for citing Rummel's opinion, not for citing support for factual material). Here is what the list says about WND, with bold added: "WorldNetDaily is not considered a reliable source for most purposes. The website is known for promoting falsehoods and conspiracy theories.[54]" The listing has two links to where the site has been discussed on this noticeboard in the past and here are the closing remarks for those discussions:

1) "Consensus appears to be that World Net Daily is not generally acceptable as a source for factual material (as is, for example, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal etc.). While prior RS/N "Consensus" is cited evidencing WND "unreliability", individual citation(s) evidencing WND "unreliability" have not, thus far, been provided. As to whether or under what criteria/circumstance WND might be considered WP:RS, opinion is divided."[2]

2) "Resolved: Sigh, not again. It's been clearly agreed (you know, that "consensus" thing we have) before that apart from editorial opinion, if one is unable to source a supposedly factual statement without having to use WND, it probably doesn't belong in an encyclopedia article. Jake, your efforts would be far better aimed at better sourcing rather than this repeated waste of everyone's time, and it's now time to leave the equine corpse alone. There's only a certain number of times before being pointy becomes disruptive. Black Kite (t) (c) 06:56, 1 November 2010 (UTC) "[3]

The past consensus for this site supports using it in this context, for the op-ed author's opinion. AmateurEditor (talk) 15:13, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

This begs the question of why we would include the author's opinion, instead of a factual statement published in a secondary source, in the Proposed causes section. –dlthewave ☎ 15:43, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

The reason is because the content supported by this source is in the "Proposed Causes" section of the article, where sources' opinions are summarized, rather than facts. In this case, this op-ed was the most directly relevant publication by Rummel for his opinion related to ideology, because he explicitly discusses "Marxism", rather than "communism" generically, which might refer to regimes, rather than ideology. AmateurEditor (talk) 17:06, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

Thank you all. --Paul Siebert (talk) 19:31, 2 November 2018 (UTC)

No, not under any circumstances. It's an absolute garbage source. Daveosaurus (talk) 20:30, 2 November 2018 (UTC)

• Absolutely not reliable. Find a better source. If you can't find a better source, consider that the information in question may not belong in a serious reference work. MastCell ^Talk 22:34, 2 November 2018 (UTC)

The original poster, Paul Siebert, was supposed to include three things in his post here, according to the page notice at the topic of the edit screen for this noticeboard. He did not post number 3: Content. The exact statement(s) or other content in the article that the source is supporting. Please supply a WP:DIFF or put the content inside block quotes. For example: <blockquote>text</blockquote>. Many sources are reliable for statement "X" but unreliable for statement "Y". Here is the missing content for the context of this citation:

Rummel positions Marxism as "by far the bloodiest – bloodier than the Catholic Inquisition, the various Catholic crusades, and the Thirty Years War between Catholics and Protestants. In practice, Marxism has meant bloody terrorism, deadly purges, lethal prison camps and murderous forced labor, fatal deportations, man-made famines, extrajudicial executions and fraudulent show trials, outright mass murder and genocide."[53] He writes that in practice the Marxists saw the construction of their utopia as "a war on poverty, exploitation, imperialism and inequality – and, as in a real war, noncombatants would unfortunately get caught in the battle. There would be necessary enemy casualties: the clergy, bourgeoisie, capitalists, 'wreckers', intellectuals, counterrevolutionaries, rightists, tyrants, the rich and landlords. As in a war, millions might die, but these deaths would be justified by the end, as in the defeat of Hitler in World War II. To the ruling Marxists, the goal of a communist utopia was enough to justify all the deaths."[53]

As you can see, the content is direct quotes of Rummel's own views and has nothing to do with the reliability of WND as a site in 2018. Besides the fact that the op-ed was published there in 2004 (well before any birtherism), the reliability is based upon the author; the publisher is not the source of the reliability. Per Wikipedia:Identifying_reliable_sources#Definition_of_a_source:

"The word "source" when citing sources on Wikipedia has three related meanings:

• The piece of work itself (the article, book)
• The creator of the work (the writer, journalist)
• The publisher of the work (for example, Random House or Cambridge University Press)

Any of the three can affect reliability. Reliable sources may be published materials with a reliable publication process, authors who are regarded as authoritative in relation to the subject, or both. These qualifications should be demonstrable to other people." You can read his Wikipedia article here: Rudolph Rummel. And here is an article about him: R.J. Rummel—A Multi-faceted Scholar. AmateurEditor (talk) 05:10, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

If it's worth including here, then it WILL be found in a RS, and that source should be cited, never WND. If it isn't, then we don't include it. Period. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 05:41, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

With respect, BullRangifer, how is an op-ed by Rummel not a reliable source of Rummel's views? AmateurEditor (talk) 06:26, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

Generally that's true for everything, but we base all of our content on what's in RS, including our documentation of fringe views. If something is only found in unreliable sources, we don't document it. If a fringe source is notable enough for an article here, we will use RS to document it's existence, and we will often use it to document it's own positions, and only its own, but that's about it. An unreliable source is not accepted as a platform for other's views. This can get a bit tricky, so I won't get into that here, but the basic idea is to base all content on RS. If Rummel wants his ideas documented at Wikipedia, he'd better publish them in RS.

I'm not calling Rummel a charlatan, but Jimmy Wales said something interesting that's of some relevance here:

"No, you have to be kidding me. Every single person who signed this petition needs to go back to check their premises and think harder about what it means to be honest, factual, truthful. Wikipedia's policies around this kind of thing are exactly spot-on and correct. If you can get your work published in respectable scientific journals - that is to say, if you can produce evidence through replicable scientific experiments, then Wikipedia will cover it appropriately. What we won't do is pretend that the work of lunatic charlatans is the equivalent of 'true scientific discourse'. It isn't." — Jimbo Wales, March 23, 2014

So stop looking in unreliable source....for anything. It smacks of desperation. Look only in RS. Some things are not worth documenting.-- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 15:34, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

WP:CONTEXTMATTERS. For example, if you are not calling Rummel a lunatic or a charlatan (and you are right not to), then posting that Jimbo quote here seems like a smear in this context. The reliability of a particular source for a particular statement depends on the statement in question, which was not included in the original post here, despite the instructions. That context, of it being an op-ed and that it is being cited for the author's opinion (who is widely regarded as a RS for the topic) makes clear that WND's reliability for facts as a news site has nothing to do with it, especially in 2004, prior to almost all the controversy there. AmateurEditor (talk) 16:13, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

• I don't doubt that these are the words that Rummel wrote, but we use reliable sources for more than just faithful reproduction of words. Reliable sources tell us that these words are accurate and represent a prominent scholarly viewpoint. Rummel's estimates, along with his theory that killings by communists should be lumped together as a single category, represent the WP:FRINGE view and should not be included unless they have been published in academic sources. The final sentence confirms that this is a non-mainstream opinion piece and not a scholarly work: The next time you come across or are lectured by one of our indigenous Marxists, or almost the equivalent, leftist zealots, ask them how they can justify the murder of over a hundred million their absolutist faith has brought about, and the misery it has created for many hundreds of millions more. –dlthewave ☎ 12:28, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

dlthewave, if you don't doubt that the words are what Rummel wrote and accurately reflect his opinion, then you are agreeing the op-ed is a reliable source for Rummel's view, even if fringe. About whether views are "accurate and represent a prominent scholarly viewpoint", there is a separate fringe theories noticeboard for that, Wikipedia:Fringe theories/Noticeboard. The reliable sources noticeboard is just for determining if a source is a reliable for a particular statement in a Wikipedia article. In this case, it clearly is because there can be no more reliable source for Rummel's opinion than Rummel himself. AmateurEditor (talk) 14:40, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

An unreliable source is not a reliable source for the author's opinion about anything other than themselves, period. –dlthewave ☎ 15:01, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

The author here is Rummel himself. The sentences this is being used as a source for are Rummel's opinions, as published in his 2004 op-ed at WND. The source directly supports that and, per WP:CONTEXTMATTERS, is reliable for that unless you think Rummel did not actually write it. WND is not being cited as a reliable source of factual material, such as the news. Using WND in this context is consistent with the results of past discussions here about this site (that it is a reliable source of editorial opinion).[4] AmateurEditor (talk) 15:28, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

If Rummel wants his ideas documented at Wikipedia, he'd better publish them in RS. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 15:46, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

I agree with BullRangifer It is a normal situation when some author publishes some good research in a good journal, and then published more questionable speculations in some less reputable journal or even blog.--Paul Siebert (talk) 15:55, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

AmateurEditor, your linked RS/N discussion was closed with this:

Motion to close with injunction

Resolved

 – Sigh, not again. It's been clearly agreed (you know, that "consensus" thing we have) before that apart from editorial opinion, if one is unable to source a supposedly factual statement without having to use WND, it probably doesn't belong in an encyclopedia article. Jake, your efforts would be far better aimed at better sourcing rather than this repeated waste of everyone's time, and it's now time to leave the equine corpse alone. There's only a certain number of times before being pointy becomes disruptive. Black Kite (t) (c) 06:56, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

That's a pretty good close from Black Kite. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 16:09, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

Again, the reliability of a source depends entirely on how it is used and in this case it is being used appropriately. AmateurEditor (talk) 16:13, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

BullRangifer, Note the "apart from editorial opinion" part. AmateurEditor (talk) 16:15, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

If Alex Jones writes an editorial opinion at InfoWars, it's fair game for the opinion of InfoWars, even though it's a horrible source. (It happens to be notable enough for an article here, but is deprecated as a source.) If anyone else writes an article at InfoWars, we ignore it. They must publish their article at a RS for us to even consider it. The very fact that they chose to write something at InfoWars seriously damages their credibility and makes them less reliable, no matter where else they write. I'd be less inclined to use them at all, even if they wrote in a RS. Such poor judgment should have consequences. We should not suffer fools lightly. Let's ping Black Kite to get their opinion. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 16:31, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

I would say it is fair game for the opinion of Alex Jones, or whoever else wrote it, especially if that person is considered by Wikipedia standards to be a reliable source in their own right for the topic they discuss. There are three definitions of a reliable source, and the creator of the work (who is an expert on the topic in question as well as, of course, about his own opinions) is the one that applies here. AmateurEditor (talk) 16:53, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

No, we don't use unreliable sources to publish other's opinions. We try to avoid using unreliable sources at all. In the example, only Jones, or another editor of InfoWars, such as Paul Joseph Watson, who uses it to publish their dubious opinions, would be considered here, and such "consideration" is no guarantee we'll do anything, because we should only document the ideas they write there which are also mentioned (preferably criticized) in RS. The RS gives it notability enough to maybe be worth mentioning, and the RS is enough of a source, without linking to InfoWars. We do not allow InfoWars to be used as a platform to get their fringe theories documented here. Only if RS mention it. We really need to treat InfoWars like the plague. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 17:03, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

There is no such thing as a reliable or unreliable source outside of how it is being cited. What you mean is that WND (or InfoWars, or whatever) is not a reliable source for statements of facts, such as the news. That's not the situation here because we are citing the op-ed for the author's opinion and citing it as such in the wikipedia article. The op-ed is a reliable source for Rummel's opinion and Rummel is a notable expert for the topic he is discussing in the op-ed. If the website bothers you so much, please keep in mind that a website's reputation can change over time. This was back in 2004, before the controversies that would crop up later. AmateurEditor (talk) 17:16, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

I'm not going to belabor this point and will wait for more outside input. You should seek a third opinion. I'll leave you with this experience. It illustrates how we treated a notable person who lost their way. A number of years ago, we had a new editor who was a Nobel laureate, I believe in physics. They were obviously very notable and a subject expert, and they appeared here to push their own fringe theories, which were rejected by the scientific community. They didn't understand our rules here and demanded we just accept their word for it and use them and their website as a source. Well, we couldn't do that, and they became so disruptive we finally had to block them. I don't recall the name, but that's what happened. If they had published their fringe theories on some unreliable source, we still wouldn't have used that source to document their opinions. Now if it had also been mentioned in RS, we might have mentioned it. I don't recall other details now. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 17:24, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

Fine with me. And it sounds like your previous experience would have fallen under RS guidelines at WP:Self published sources and WP:Academic consensus and the editor might have been referred to Wikipedia:Fringe theories/Noticeboard if they hadn't been disruptive. AmateurEditor (talk) 17:53, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

AmateurEditor, I think we should do our best to improve a reputation of Wikipedia as a serious encyclopedia. Consider a situation when the reference to some "Science for kids" blog is added as a source to the article about Quantum entanglement. Even if this source is authored by a very reputable physicist, by adding this source, we undermine credibility of Wikipedia. Yes, formally, "Science for kids" may be a RS according to our loose standards, and the author is very reputable. However, if this author writes about really serious things, it is quite possible to find the same information is a more serious article published in more reputable sources. By mixing best quality sources with questionable ones (although acceptable by our loose standards) we undermine an overall credibility of Wikipedia. --Paul Siebert (talk) 17:56, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

Wikipedia's credibility is undermined by mis-statements of facts (including the fact that someone has some opinion) and by not being consistent in the application of its policies. If certain policies need tightening in your view, then get that change made. If not, then find a replacement source that you prefer for the facts as stated in the article and swap it out. I am sure that would cause no objection from anyone. But trying to delete highly relevant information from what has historically been a very contentious article on a premise that contradicts Wikipedia policies should not get you anywhere, if Wikipedia is working properly. AmateurEditor (talk) 18:24, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

• Not shown to be due. And is not presented as even minimally reliable - such a thing as important to the twentieth century would be the subject of WP:SCHOLARSHIP not op-ed from a suspect source, is it scholarship of the author of the op-ed (and that is what would be cited not op-ed) and what's the prevalence of scholarship in this vein and complementary or qualifying or contradictory scholarship. Alanscottwalker (talk) 18:56, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

Due weight is not relevant to this noticeboard (its a consideration for the NPOV noticeboard). This is only about whether the citation serves as a reliable source for the statement it is used as a reference for. This reference is also not the basis for the article in question, which does have multiple reliable academic secondary sources, including the author in question. See the references and the excerpt section here and the further reading section here. AmateurEditor (talk) 19:12, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

AmateurEditor you wrote Wikipedia's credibility is undermined by mis-statements of facts- What facts? Please tell us. As far as Rummel is concerned it is a fact that was an academic who published statistical data on the lives lost due to the policies of non democratic regimes. I am not aware of a comprehensive critique of Rummel by a reliable academic source. We can cite his statistics on Wikipedia and contrast them with other reliable sources. We cannot as editors state in an article that Rummel is correct or not. The demographic facts of Stalin’s USSR and Mao’s China are disputed, we have a range to cover. We can however contrast him with other reliable academic sources, the topic is covered in Demographic Trends and Patterns in the Soviet Union Before 1991[5]. Rummel is not even cited in their bibliography. Rummel is a 800 gorilla that appears on Fox News to prove that America is the greatest country in the world, he is now sitting down in Wikipedia
Rummel’s claim of 43 million dead in the USSR makes no sense when you put it on a spreadsheet, unfortunately I can’t post that here. --Woogie 10w (talk) 19:13, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

I was not referring to any specific mis-statement of facts in that comment, Woogie, I was responding to Paul Siebert's characterization of how Wikipedia loses credibility. You can review Rummel's body of work for yourself, but I do not know what you are talking about regarding Fox News. Rudolph Rummel died in 2014 so he certainly hasn't appeared there lately. AmateurEditor (talk) 19:22, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

Good point,AmateurEditor. I was referring to Rummel metaphorically, since his 1997 estimate of 100 million deaths due to communism appears on Fox News[6], and the WSJ[7]. Rummel was the grand daddy of this statistic that appears in his "Democide" from 1994 and the Black Book of Communism from 1999. Fox News and the WSJ are widely read sources that we cannot ignore. Reliable or not Fox News and the WSJ parrot a statistic that many readers believe as an accepted fact. We should point out that there was no body count, the 100 million is a demographic estimate. Without posting OR we need to inform readers that Rummel's figures are estimates not established facts. N.B. Rummel subsequently updated the 100 million figure by adding 38 million famine deaths in China --Woogie 10w (talk) 20:59, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

I'd say no. For all I know he chose to publish that in WND because he knew he couldn't publish it elsewhere. And I have no problem with editors pointing out other issues here such as WP:UNDUE, in fact I'd rather deal with all the issues about a source in one spot. Doug Weller talk 19:37, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

Doug Weller, It's probably because this 2004 op-ed was after his retirement from the University of Hawaii in 1995, so we wouldn't expect to see it in an academic source. If you mean why was it in WND rather than some other website or newspaper, that was probably because this was in 2004 when the site had an uncontroversial reputation. Rummel also wrote an op-ed in the Hawaii Reporter the following year, which begins with the following statement: "Many scholars and commentators have referenced my total of 174,000,000 for the democide (genocide and mass murder) of the last century. I'm now trying to get word out that I've had to make a major revision in my total due to two books. One is Wild Swans: Two Daughters of China by Jung Chang, and the other is Mao: the Unknown Story that she wrote with her husband, Jon Halliday. I'm now convinced that Stalin exceeded Hitler in monstrous evil, and Mao beat out Stalin.". The timing may be related to a renewed interest on his part related to that or may not, I can't say for sure. He apparently often preferred to use his own personal website, posthumously maintained now by the University of Hawaii.

If the question is what weight Rummel should have in the article, it should be significant. His work is foundational for many others and is widely cited. A Google Scholar search for "R J Rummel" returns 25,500 hits, the first of which has been "cited by 3423". You can read a list of his publications in his wikipedia article. Here is the list of other academics citing or responding to his work in Mass killings under communist regimes:

• Harff, Barbara (1996), "Death by Government by R. J. Rummel", The Journal of Interdisciplinary History, The MIT Press, 27 (1)
• Harff, Barbara (2017), "12. The Comparative Analysis of Mass Atrocities and Genocide", in Gleditsch, N.P., R.J. Rummel: An Assessment of His Many Contributions, 37, SpringerBriefs on Pioneers in Science and Practice, doi:10.1007/978-3-319-54463-2_12, ISBN 978-3-319-54463-2
• Dulić, Tomislav (2004), "Tito's Slaughterhouse: A Critical Analysis of Rummel's Work on Democide", Journal of Peace Research, Sage Publications, Ltd., 41 (1)
• Valentino, Benjamin A. (2005), Final Solutions: Mass Killing and Genocide in the Twentieth Century, Cornell University Press, ISBN 978-0-801-47273-2
• Wayman, FW; Tago, A (2009), "Explaining the onset of mass killing, 1949–87", Journal of Peace Research Online
• He is included among a 2016 compilation of academic sources assembled by the Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation for an updated range of estimates of those killed by communist regimes, seen here.

These are just the ones easiest to find with CTRL+F on the article page at the moment. Other sources currently in the article cite him but it doesn't cite them citing him. This should be sufficient to show that he clearly remains notable in this area. AmateurEditor (talk) 20:39, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

There is actual WP:SCHOLARSHIP you argue, than use that not op-ed per WP:BESTSOURCES. Alanscottwalker (talk) 20:58, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

The scholarship I listed relates to Rummel's due weight in the article. The best source for Rummel's opinion is Rummel himself, and this source is the best one for his opinion on how ideology related to the killing. Where he wrote it doesn't change who he is. AmateurEditor (talk) 21:22, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

No. It's not BESTSOURCES, at all. And where someone writes does matter per the policies I already cited. Alanscottwalker (talk) 00:05, 4 November 2018 (UTC)

This is the entirety of what WP:BESTSOURCES says:

"Good and unbiased research, based upon the best and most reputable authoritative sources available, helps prevent NPOV disagreements. Try the library for reputable books and journal articles, and look online for the most reliable resources. If you need help finding high-quality sources, ask other editors on the talk page of the article you are working on, or ask at the reference desk."

It links to WP:RS, which begins with this overview, after the lead: "Articles should be based on reliable, third-party, published sources with a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy. This means that we publish the opinions only of reliable authors, and not the opinions of Wikipedians who have read and interpreted primary source material for themselves. The following examples cover only some of the possible types of reliable sources and source reliability issues, and are not intended to be exhaustive. Proper sourcing always depends on context; common sense and editorial judgment are an indispensable part of the process."

Rummel is a reliable source. He wrote the op-ed. It includes his views about about Marxism and mass killing, which are relevant to the article and cited there as his opinion, along with the views of others. It is the best source available for that particular opinion of Rummel's, and WND's later issues have no bearing on any of this because it was written in 2004. AmateurEditor (talk) 00:37, 4 November 2018 (UTC)

Your argument is a bad-joke. The op-ed is not scholarship. Its mode of publication says it's not scholarship. You've been directed to how to identify scholarship. Looking above, it appears multiple editors in multiple ways have told you this: use scholarly sources. Don't use lazy sources in lazy ways and pass it off as worthwhile. Alanscottwalker (talk) 15:01, 4 November 2018 (UTC)

I didn't say the op-ed was scholarship, I said Rummel is a notable scholar and this is a reliable source for the article statements it is being used to support. That is the issue to be discusses at the reliable sources noticeboard and WP:RS is clearly not restricted to scholarship. It is the best source yet identified for his views on Marxism's relationship to the killing, but its reliability as a source depends on the author, not on WND. AmateurEditor (talk) 15:20, 4 November 2018 (UTC)

It remains, you want to use a crap source, instead of scholarship for what should be by weight alone covered in scholarship, and WP:RS does choose scholarship every-time over an op-ed published by an unreliable publisher and so does WP:V. Alanscottwalker (talk) 19:57, 4 November 2018 (UTC)

AmateurEditor, I explained you several times: Rummel is notable for introduction of factor analysis into the area of conflict and genocide research. He also is notable foro his "Democratic peace" concept. However, he is not considered as a good source for figures, and his conclusions he made based on his estimates are not recognised by experts. Therefore, he published his research related to factor analysis in reputable media, and his more extravagant conclusions - in a personal blog.--Paul Siebert (talk) 16:23, 4 November 2018 (UTC)

Alanscottwalker, it is not a choice between a "crap source" and a scholarly one, it is a choice between a reliable source for his views and nothing else (at the moment). Of course we should cite a scholarly source over a non-scholarly equivalent, but we should not delete a source that meets RS criteria (for the author in a question of the author's opinion) before finding a better replacement. AmateurEditor (talk) 06:23, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

It's not a reliable source for his views on this, a reliable source for his views on this intensely covered aspect of 20th century scholarship would be found in his scholarship, not in an unreliable publication. Alanscottwalker (talk) 11:01, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

Paul Siebert, you explaining to me what your opinion is doesn't change what reliable sources we have identified for the article and so shouldn't change how we write the article. We already have identified reliable academic sources that cite his figures, such as Valentino, so his 110 million figure is recognized (and his update to it based on more recent RS publications should be as well). When you say "experts", you are referring to single-country specialists who do not mention the broader topic one way or another, so we cannot come to any conclusion about him from them. AmateurEditor (talk) 06:23, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

Doug, a summary of Rummel's material appeared on the website World Net Daily. Rummel's works were published by Transaction Publishers. I own hard copies of Rummel's four works on "Democide".--Woogie 10w (talk) 20:59, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

Alanscottwalker you cited sources that discuss Rummel. He is a reality that has to be dealt with, an 800 lb gorilla. Using Accounting 101 methodology, I Would take his figures line by line and provide contrasting sources that differ from him line by line. I am currently reading about the Chinese famine which was not a natural disaster, reliable sources are cited that indicate least 40 million deaths, not including the Laogai deaths. The Soviet issues are well covered in the Soviet Studies articles. The Wheatcroft supporters will say that the famine deaths were not deliberate purposeful deaths but in reality caused by poor planning. The Rosefielde,Rummel Fox News crowd will claim a Red Holocaust. Make it simple line by line, with brief explanations. You guys are blogging about an issue that should be put to sleep AASP--Woogie 10w (talk) 21:28, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

Just one more thing, I am reading Demographic Trends and Patterns in the Soviet Union Before 1991 from page 434. 18.5% of all deaths from 1946-58 were not registered, they were estimated. We are not dealing with established facts, but with a rough estimates. An educated guess made in Russia that is treated as gospel in the west.--Woogie 10w (talk) 21:46, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

I cited sources? I think you meant someone else did. Alanscottwalker (talk) 21:49, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

• We should always consider where something was published when considering due weight and whether an opinion is significant enough to include in an article. If an eminent expert on something writes on the wall of a bathroom, the result is still bathroom graffiti. If the best place you can get published is a cracko conspiracy theory rag, that indicates better and more reliable sources do not regard your opinions highly enough to publish them. So in articles about general subjects, we should stick to the opinions of people who are subject matter experts and had them published in high-quality, reliable sources. Seraphimblade ^{Talk to me} 21:36, 4 November 2018 (UTC)
• Pile-on no - It's all been said already (and on this board in the past). Not a good source for statements of fact (or just about anything else). — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 01:28, 6 November 2018 (UTC)

Democratic Peace Blog

Mass killings under communist regimes also cites Democratic Peace Blog, which appears to be self-published by Rummel. Is this a reliable source? –dlthewave ☎ 03:42, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

Like the original poster, dlthewave, you should also be including the content the citation is being used for to provide the needed context, per the instructions at the top of the edit version of this page. Here is the content:

In 2005, R. J. Rummel revised his estimate of total communist democide between 1900 and 1999 upward by 38 million to "about 148,000,000", due to recent publications about Mao's role in the Great Chinese Famine.[33]

In this case, the content is also Rummel's own views, so it being self-published is appropriate. Rudolph Rummel is routinely cited by other academic sources in this area. Here is an article about him if you are unfamiliar: R.J. Rummel—A Multi-faceted Scholar.

In article recommended by AmateurEditor , Harff says (about herself, Rummel, and other genocide scholars):

"Compiling global data is hazardous and will inevitably invite chagrin and criticism from country experts. Case study people have a problem with systematic data because they often think they know better what happened in one particular country. I have sympathized with this view, because my area expertise was the Middle East. But when empiricists focus on global data, we have to consider 190 countries and must rely on country experts selectively. When we look for patterns and test explanations, we cannot expect absolute precision, in fact we do not require it."

She also mentions her own earlier review on Rummel where she says:

"From an empirical viewpoint, there are some problems with Rummel's data. Historical sources rarely can provide accurate estimates numbers of people killed; more often they give give wide ranges or guesses. Rummel chooses numbers of deaths that almost always skewed in the direction of the highest guesses. "

Rummel's data are based on old Cold war sources, and he never revised his sources even when new figures become available. His estimate for the USSR (60+ million) are much greater that total population losses of Russia and the USSR in XX century (the data include WWI deaths, 2 million, Civil war death, from both sides, 10 million, Volga famine deaths, WWII deaths, 27 million, post war famine, 2 million). With China, a situation is the same: how can we seriously cite Rummel's figures for China is the consensus figure of the Great Famine deaths are 15-30 million, and it was the major component of Chinese "democide"? Different Wikipedia articles should be consistent, and if the article about Great Chinese Famine gives the figure of 15-30 million, other articles should not contradict to it. Either one or another figure must be fixed, and I have a feeling Rummel's data should be treated as a Cold war anachronism.--Paul Siebert (talk) 05:41, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

Paul, it's ironic that you say "he never revised his sources even when new figures become available" when the very citation being discussed here is Rummel revising his figures for China based on recent scholarship about the Great Chinese Famine. The quotes you cite by Harff indicate that there will always be an imprecise range of estimates and that Rummel's numbers are often at the high end of the range, but a range will always have a high end by definition. His estimates are not outside the mainstream because they are on the high end of a range. However, those exact quotes do not appear in the link I provided, as far as I can tell, so I think you made some mistakes in your post here. This is the closest passage in there:

"Of great continuing interest is the debate about Rummel’s democide estimates. Rummel created these on a country-by-country basis using published studies, concluding with three figures, a high estimate, a low estimate, and a most probable estimate. These could vary significantly. For the Soviet Union, for instance, Rummel (1990: 3) estimated a most probable democide of 62 million people, but with a range from 28 million to 127 million. In most of his work on democide, he focused on the most probable estimates, leaving himself somewhat vulnerable to criticism for excessive precision in these numbers. However, he also noted that he would be amazed if future research did not come up with figures that deviated significantly from his own. His figures should be viewed as rough approximations (Rummel, 1994: vii–xx)."

"His volume on the statistics of democide, however, as well as the books on the four ‘deka-megamurderers’ (the Soviet Union, China under Kuomintang, China under Mao, and Nazi Germany), contain all the sources and all the numbers and extensive comments on how he selected his own numbers. Some critics, including Harff (1996: 118) have argued that ‘Rummel chooses numbers of deaths that almost always are skewed in the direction of the highest guesses’. In this volume, Barbara Harff (Chap. 12) cites but does not reiterate this criticism. Rather, in discussing Rummel’s numbers for Cambodia, she finds that given his wide definition of democide, his estimates are consistent with established estimates in the literature and she also acknowledges his ‘monumental job in collecting data and information’. A reviewer of Rummel’s volume on democide in the Soviet Union chides him for not using Russian-language sources and for assuming citing a range of secondary sources ‘as if they were all of equal worth’. He also faults Rummel for assuming ‘that the entire labour camp population was innocent’ although some of those who died in the camps ‘were common criminals or actual Nazi collaborators’ (Swain, 1991)."

Having said that, this is not the proper forum to discuss Rummel's ranges. It is the proper forum for input on applying Wikipedia's reliable sources policies. AmateurEditor (talk) 06:14, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

I meant "he never revised his estimates to the lower side". The problem with Rummel was that he took all available data without any attempt to critically analyse them, and treated them as if they were equally trustworthy. As a result, the validity of his figures is very inhomogeneous: thus, his estimate for Canbodia are very accurate, and they well correspond to new Kiernan's data. That happened because the sources that overstated the scale of the genocide (as a rule, Vietnamese or Soviet sources) happened to be balanced by the sources that tried to understate it. However, that is a very rare case. In all other cases, his data collect everything, and good data are diluted with tons of garbage.--Paul Siebert (talk) 16:06, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

Again, this is not the proper place to discuss this, but from the quote directly above, he did not treat all data as if they were equally trustworthy. It says "Rummel created these on a country-by-country basis using published studies, concluding with three figures, a high estimate, a low estimate, and a most probable estimate. These could vary significantly. For the Soviet Union, for instance, Rummel (1990: 3) estimated a most probable democide of 62 million people, but with a range from 28 million to 127 million. In most of his work on democide, he focused on the most probable estimates...". AmateurEditor (talk) 16:39, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

The Web page you are discussing World Net Daily is not a reliable source. The published works by Rummel are reliable using Wikipedia standards. I have read and own Rummel's published works. We need to explain to readers that Rummel takes only English language sources from the cold war era to arrive at his estimates. He ignores and disregards the material from the Soviet archives published in Russia since 1990 as well as the academic discourse in the journal "Soviet Studies". Rummel's estimates are cited by opponents of socialism. Readers of Wikipedia are more likely to be familiar the Fox News with the claims [8] Wikipedia can set the record straight by contrasting Rummel's estimates with the material published in Russia since 1990 as well as the academic discourse in the journal "Soviet Studies"--Woogie 10w (talk) 15:02, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

Also I carried on a E-mail correspondence with Rummel about 15 years ago, he was adamant that the Soviet census data and population data was forged, this claim is also made by Rosefielde. Is Rosefielde a reliable source? Rosefielde has his own population models to support his estimates. We really need to become familiar with the methodology of Rummel and Rosefielde. They claim that the policy of Stalin's USSR was responsible for 22-43 million hypothetical deaths. They also claim that the published archival material is a smokescreen to cover up these hypothetical deaths. The mass media regurgitates these claims. --Woogie 10w (talk) 15:21, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

Methodologies of Rummel and Rosefielde are totally different: the former produces no own data, just non-critically summarises the data from all other sources, the latter makes his own research.--Paul Siebert (talk) 16:13, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

There are two policies that are relevant on whether or not to include this source: reliablity and weight. If passes the first because Rummel meets the criterion for WP:EXPERTSOURCE because "the author is an established expert whose work in the relevant field has been published by reliable third-party publications." It fails the second because publication of an opinion in a conspiracy theory website does not establish notability. So paradoxically, according to policy, we can use the source for assertions of fact but not for opinion. Since the article was used as a source of opinion, it fails weight. TFD (talk) 16:17, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

You appear to have posted this in the wrong thread. dlthewave posted another source in this subsection for Rummel's personal website. I agree that Rummel meets the criteria for reliability as an expert on the topic in his own right. But due/undue weight should have no bearing on the conclusion of the RS noticeboard because that relates to the NPOV noticeboard. AmateurEditor (talk) 16:33, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

Sorry. This is a sub-thread, but my point is relevant to both. There are no valid rs objections to either source and weight is distinct from rs. I agree that the question should have been taken to NPOVN. TFD (talk) 16:43, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

Thank you. AmateurEditor (talk) 16:53, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

Rummel is not a reliable source in light of academic studies of the Soviet population [9], however in his his study Democide he claims 169 million deaths, of which the USSR is 63 million. We lack a critique of the balance of 106 million deaths which covers the entire planet from 1900-1990. The Nazi regime 20.9 million, Red China(1927-87) 38.7 million, Nationalist China 10.2 million, Japan 5.9 million, Pol Pot 2.4 million, the Armenian massacres 2.7 million, N. Vietnam 1.7 million, N. Korea 1.6 million, Expulsion of the Germans 1.6 million--Woogie 10w (talk) 17:21, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

Left wing sources will dismiss these figures as excessive,I agree. Right wing sources cite the figures to prove that the USA is the greatest country in the world, I disagree. Using population data(vital statistics) we cannot prove that Rummels figures are excessive or correct since there is no reliable population data in most of the above incidents that will allow us to validate Rummels claims. Sure you can cite reliable sources that have lower figures, but they are estimates, just an educated guess. Of course some people will accept a claim based on the authors standing in the academic world, that does not make it right--Woogie 10w (talk) 17:37, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

It is clear that Rummel is a reliable source for his stated opinions, regardless of where they are published. Also, he is an expert, hence we can accept the facts he provides as accurate. However, estimates are not facts, but opinions. Different experts provide different estimates. TFD (talk) 17:48, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

You wrote Also, he is an expert, hence we can accept the facts he provides as accurate This is false he does not list facts that are not disputed, he has published his own estimates, not facts.--Woogie 10w (talk) 18:01, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

Disagree that it does not matter where scholarship is published, per WP:SOURCE and WP:SOURCETYPES, it does matter who published scholarship. EXPERTSOURCE, itself, is far from automatic. And as for contentious claims, WP:REDFLAG applies. Alanscottwalker (talk) 20:51, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

From WP:SELFPUBLISH: "Anyone can create a personal web page or publish their own book, and also claim to be an expert in a certain field. For that reason, self-published media, such as books, patents, newsletters, personal websites, open wikis, personal or group blogs (as distinguished from newsblogs, above), content farms, Internet forum postings, and social media postings, are largely not acceptable as sources. Self-published expert sources may be considered reliable when produced by an established expert on the subject matter, whose work in the relevant field has previously been published by reliable third-party publications.[8] Exercise caution when using such sources: if the information in question is suitable for inclusion, someone else will probably have published it in independent reliable sources.[10] Never use self-published sources as third-party sources about living people, even if the author is an expert, well-known professional researcher, or writer."

It matters, but much, much less so when the author is considered a reliable source for the topic in their own right because you are not relying on the publisher of the material as a measure of the reliability.

What is it about WP:REDFLAG that applies here? It doesn't say anything about "contentious" claims. It says "Any exceptional claim requires multiple high-quality sources.[13] Red flags that should prompt extra caution include: surprising or apparently important claims not covered by multiple mainstream sources; challenged claims that are supported purely by primary or self-published sources or those with an apparent conflict of interest;[9] reports of a statement by someone that seems out of character, or against an interest they had previously defended; claims that are contradicted by the prevailing view within the relevant community, or that would significantly alter mainstream assumptions, especially in science, medicine, history, politics, and biographies of living people. This is especially true when proponents say there is a conspiracy to silence them." Remember, this is not about a statement of fact about the estimate in Wikipedia's voice, this is about accurately reflecting the opinion of an expert. I don't think it would be considered an exceptional claim that Rummel believed this, It is not at all out of character for him, and it is not a statement about the prevailing view of the wider community. He already published his estimates in what anyone would consider academic reliable sources. After his retirement, he updated them based on his reading of new publications and that should be reflected in the article. AmateurEditor (talk) 21:14, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

See my post below. The tables on his Hawaii web site, for example, this one, contain the list of sources. I took the book, and it is clear from it that the first figure in the "source" column is a year, the second is the page. Do you see any source published after 1988 there? Do you see any sign that Rummel tried to include fresh data into his tables?--Paul Siebert (talk) 21:51, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

Rummel's estimate is cited as part of a chronological listing of estimates and the date is included. If you have a reliable source that speaks to his figures being obsolete or criticises them in some other way, you should add that to the article right after his estimate, as we discussed earlier. AmateurEditor (talk) 00:21, 4 November 2018 (UTC)

I disagree with the way this section is organised. Chronological listing is good in two cases: either (i) we are talking about a history of the subject, and the modern data are presented separately (for example, Gulag article lists early estimates in a chronological order, and modern data are presented in a separate section), or (ii) we are talking about the subject that is pretty well defined, but the numbers are a subject of debates. Neither the first nor the second criteria are met in this case.

Thus, the present day data are not presented in this section (I realise these data relate to separate countries only, but that is not the reason to exclude them from this section. Othewise, the section should be renamed to something like "Early attempts to estimate a combined Communist deaths toll"). Second, different estimates deal with different definitions of "death toll": thus, Rummel's figures are astronomically high because he assumed several tens of millions were killed in camps, but he didn't include some deadly famines. Other authors include different categories, so each estimate deals with different events. The section in its current state is deeply misleading, and since we all know that, that means we deliberately mislead a reader.

If you agree that should be fixed, let's continue on the article's talk page.--Paul Siebert (talk) 15:44, 4 November 2018 (UTC)

We should definitely continue this on the article's talk page. I agree with adding single-country estimates, but not in a different section from the "historical" estimates. It should be an extension of that section. AmateurEditor (talk) 06:02, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

"not in a different section from the "historical" estimates" is exactly what I did few month ago, but it was reverted. --Paul Siebert (talk) 06:38, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

I fully realise that further discussion is more relevant to the NPOVN, but, as far as I know, our rules recommend not to split a discussion among several noticeboards, so, as soon as we started here, it makes sense to finish it here too. I took Rummel's "Lethal politics" (the book where he makes his own estimates for the USSR), and below is my analysis of the sources he used and a description of his approach.

• First. Rummel does not do his own low and high estimate. What he is doing is as follows (p. 239). (i) If a source says the figure is "conservative", Rummel puts in into a category of low estimates. (ii) If a source just provides a figure (or says something liek "as many as"), Rummel puts in in "middle" category. (iii) if the source says something like "no more than", Rummel puts it in "High" estimate. Therefore, "Low" "Medium" or "High" are not Rummel's estimates, but his estimates of "low", "medium", or "high" estimates made by others.
• Second. Rummel assumes 10, 20, and 28 annual mortality rate (low, medium and high, accordingly) for all camps during the whole period of Soviet history. Currently available data are much more accurate and time specific, however, Rummel prefers to use this liberal assumption.
• Third. I looked through the sources Rummel used for his estimates. I took post-WWII late Stalin's period (table 9A). Below is the list of the sources used in this table (I omit the sources that describe low mortality, so their contribution to the overall figure is negligible, e.g. Small and Singer, 7,500 death in Hungary):

• Kosiuk, Concentration camps in the USSR. London, Ukrainian Publishers, 1962
• Rosefielde, An Assessment of the Sources and Uses of Gulag Forced Labour 1929-56. Soviet Studies, Vol. 33, No. 1 (Jan., 1981), pp. 51-87
• Stewart-Smith, DG. The Death of Communism. London, Lidgate Press., 1964
• Solzhenitsyn's Archipelago
• Hingley. The Russian secret police: Muscovite, Imperial Russian, and Soviet Security Operations 1565-1970. London, Hutchinson&Co, 1970
• Rewddaway (press report, 1973)
• Heller & Nekrich. Utopia in Power: The History of the Soviet Union from 1917 to the Present. 1986
• Possony. From Gulag to Gutik. 1975
• Philips. The tragedy of Soviet Germans. John Philips, 1983
• Glaser&Possony. Victims of politics: The state of human rights. Columbia University Press. 1979

It is easy to see that the sources compiled in this table (It is the same table as the one published in his democide blog) are obsolete Cold war era sources. All modern sources are totally ignored. Conquest, Ellman, Wheatcroft, Getty, Rittersport, Zemskov, Maksudov, Werth, and others are not represented in this table. Even Rosefielde, whose 1981 article is used for this table, published several more recent works, and his newer figures differ from his early estimates. I need some time to analyze the rest of the book, but I believe it is clear that, whereas Rummel meets our RS standards, his data is a summary of obsolete sources, and, therefore, his book is a good source for description of a history of this subject, not of the current state of knowledge.--Paul Siebert (talk) 21:41, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

Paul, that book is not cited in the article, except by the 2016 compilation by the Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation website, where it is used for the low end of the range for North Korea. And all of the sources in the article are being cited as historical estimates, in the sense that the estimates are being presented chronologically, in the context of their dates of publication. AmateurEditor (talk) 21:52, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

Paul without going into a lengthy analysis we can cite Rummel's data and contrast it with other sources. Take Rosefielde, a reliable source, for example who has a figure of 20-22 million deaths in the Stalin era. Add c.60+ million Chinese famine and Laogai deaths along with PolPot and N. Vietnam and N. Korea. The result is in the ballpark of 100 million. Please don't tell us that the Soviet and Chinese famines were natural disasters. --Woogie 10w (talk) 21:55, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

Please, do not mix all Soviet and all Chinese famines: some Soviet famines were a result of strategic blunders, some (Volga famine and 1947 famine) were consequences of devastating wars, Chinese famine was partially natural (famines were routine events in China, which was desperately poor and the whole life of peasants was an incessant war for survival). Only few famines (mostly Holodomor) are considered genocide, others are fully or partially man made (like Bengal famine in India).

In any event, this your comment ignores my major point: Rummel provides a summary of obsolete sources, his methodology is questionable, and he should be treated accordingly.--Paul Siebert (talk) 23:09, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

Woogie 10w, re your comments at 18:01, 3 November 2018. I wrote above, "estimates are not facts, but opinions." You replied, "This is false he does not list facts that are not disputed, he has published his own estimates, not facts." Yeah, that's what I said. I also wrote two postings above that, "the article was used as a source of opinion." TFD (talk) 22:13, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

The Four Deuces, the reason I am here is because I have read and own Rummel's works. The problem here is that some editors are not familiar with Rummel's works as well the statistical arguments related deaths under communism. Some editors shop around the internet for the highest or lowest number and then attempt to push a left or right POV. They will blog pushing a POV all day long about a topic that they don't understand. Don't get me wrong, they edit in good faith, they are welcome here. Maybe they will learn something here. Anyone can edit Wikipedia--Woogie 10w (talk) 22:55, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

I am well aware of that. That is why I think that discussing the reliability (as defined in WP:RS) is a red herring. Since we are discussing opinions, the relevant policy is WP:WEIGHT - what weight should the article provide to Rummel's opinions published in WND? TFD (talk) 00:38, 4 November 2018 (UTC)

AmateurEditor, this book is cited in the article, because the figures from Rummel's blog are taken from this book. Rummel's figures of Soviet "democide" come from this book. Have you read Rummel (I mean his books, not his Webb site)?--Paul Siebert (talk) 23:02, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

I see your point that the contents of that book are in a sense cited indirectly, but Rummel's estimates in the article are literally cited from his 1994 book Death by Government (text from his books are reproduced on his website, but the article is not actually citing his "blog" for that estimate). No, I have not read the book, but I stand by the current citations. Please don't waste your time doing your own analysis and expecting that to be incorporated into the article. You know very well that is original research. It is not up to you or me to decide what sources are obsolete. If reliable sources are still citing his figures, they are not obsolete. But even if they were, we cite them in the article in a chronological list with other estimates by other sources with the years of publication provided, so readers can see all that for themselves and no one is being misled. AmateurEditor (talk) 23:25, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

You wrote If reliable sources are still citing his figures, they are not obsolete. True but readers need to know that the statistic of 63 million Soviet deaths(1918-87) is a distillation of many many different sources. AmateurEditor I wish I could put this listing of sources up on the page, but it would way too long. I wonder how Rummel had access to so many sources way out in Hawaii, he must have had buddies in the Library of Congress and the British Library. His sources are exclusively in English.--Woogie 10w (talk) 00:03, 4 November 2018 (UTC)

You could try using the sandbox page we set up as a workspace, here. AmateurEditor (talk) 00:23, 4 November 2018 (UTC)

Woogie 10w, it was not "a distillation of many many different sources", but a rather arbitrary treatment of a handful of not the most reliable sources (including public speeches, memoirs, or statements made by political organisations). --Paul Siebert (talk) 00:55, 4 November 2018 (UTC)

AmateurEditor,the list would be hundreds of lines long, he cited thousands of stats and then blended them. It's way too long to copy by hand or even photocopy. It can be compared to a mutual index fund that incorporates many different stocks. Rummel is a good source for sources, his page citations have never been wrong when I do research at the NYPL--Woogie 10w (talk) 00:37, 4 November 2018 (UTC)

::::OMG, now I understand. You guys are looking at the Rummel web page summaries. The detailed listing of the sources he used to make his estimates are in the published works.--Woogie 10w (talk) 00:07, 4 November 2018 (UTC)

Woogie, Rummel's web page tables and the tables published in "Lethal policies" are the same tables.--Paul Siebert (talk) 00:26, 4 November 2018 (UTC)

You are right paul, now I see. AmateurEditor here are you lists. [10] [11] [12] [13] [14] The bibliography listing the sources does not seem to be included--Woogie 10w (talk) 00:55, 4 November 2018 (UTC)

AmateurEditor, you write "so readers can see all that for themselves and no one is being misled", however, "misleading" is exactly what we have here. The Rummel's book was published in 1994, but all his data for the USSR were taken from "Lethal policies" (all tables and figures are identical). Therefore, by giving a reference to this "new" book without due reservations, we mislead a reader: for me, it took a considerable amount of time to realise all Rummel's figures are an obsolete bullshit, and we cannot expect an ordinary reader will do the same job. By the way, by writing that Rummel reconsidered his figures in 2005, you imply he critically analysed all figures. In reality, that was not the case: all figures for the USSR were totally preserved, and he reproduced all odd claims that followed from these ridiculously exaggerated data. --Paul Siebert (talk) 00:34, 4 November 2018 (UTC)

We reference the "new" book because it contains his estimates for communism as a whole. That it incorporates his estimates from his USSR-specific book published in 1990 is unsurprising. That you don't like his conclusions means very little, especially considering that they are not being used in the article as a consensus view of any kind (we only cite them as being his opinion at the time he published them). Find a reliable source that states his stuff is "obsolete bullshit" (or words to that effect), and then we can talk about making sure that is reflected in the article appropriately. AmateurEditor (talk) 00:54, 4 November 2018 (UTC)

AmateurEditor, the question is not that I "don't like something". I am absolutely neutrally pointing your attention at the fact that Rummel uses only obsolete data for his estimates of the USSR deaths. The fact that all modern data are beyond the scope of his book is so obvious that your persistent refusal to accept it is totally impossible to understand.--Paul Siebert (talk) 01:04, 4 November 2018 (UTC)

I don't understand why you think that your conclusion that his 1994 data is obsolete should make a difference without sources stating such a conclusion. We have multiple high quality academic reliable sources citing Rummel figures and no sources saying they are obsolete or bullshit or the like. Why are you trying to get me to accept your way of looking at things (rather than presenting sources that agree with your way of looking at things) when we have clear rules against injecting our own conclusions into articles? In any event, that conclusion has no bearing on how Rummel's estimate is actually used in the article now, which is as part of a chronological list of various estimates published over time by various sources. You are acting as if he is being cited as the current best estimate, when in reality, there is (properly) no consensus estimate in the article and several different and more recent overall estimates are presented right after his. The article's Estimates section literally says this:"According to R. J. Rummel's book Death by Government (1994), about 110 million people, foreign and domestic, were killed by communist democide from 1900 to 1987.[32] ... In 2005, R. J. Rummel revised his estimate of total communist democide between 1900 and 1999 upward by 38 million to "about 148,000,000", due to recent publications about Mao's role in the Great Chinese Famine.[33]" There is nothing incorrect about that (or even misleading considering the list it is a part of), and that is what matters. AmateurEditor (talk) 01:34, 4 November 2018 (UTC)

AmateurEditor, there is a big difference between making a conclusion and writing the article. If no sources exists that claim that Rummel's estimates are obsolete, we cannot write that in that article. However, by looking at the list of the sources Rummel cites and by comparing it with the list of available good sources we can and must make a conclusion that Rummel's data are obsolete (I believe you cannot disagree with that), and to reorganise the structure of the article accordingly.--Paul Siebert (talk) 01:45, 4 November 2018 (UTC)

We don't have that kind of leeway and we have already organized the article based on the lack of consensus in the sources. NPOV policies require us to follow the lead of our identified reliable sources for structure, so basing it on a conclusion that would be original research if you entered it into the article explicitly is also a policy violation by entering it implicitly via article structure. From WP:DUE: "Neutrality requires that each article or other page in the mainspace fairly represents all significant viewpoints that have been published by reliable sources, in proportion to the prominence of each viewpoint in the published, reliable sources.[3] 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. Generally, the views of tiny minorities should not be included at all, except perhaps in a "see also" to an article about those specific views. For example, the article on the Earth does not directly mention modern support for the flat Earth concept, the view of a distinct (and miniscule) minority; to do so would give undue weight to it. Undue weight can be given in several ways, including but not limited to depth of detail, quantity of text, prominence of placement, juxtaposition of statements and imagery. In articles specifically relating to a minority viewpoint, such views may receive more attention and space. However, these pages should still make appropriate reference to the majority viewpoint wherever relevant and must not represent content strictly from the perspective of the minority view. Specifically, it should always be clear which parts of the text describe the minority view." See also WP:BALANCE and WP:IMPARTIAL and the rest of the sections in WP:NPOV. AmateurEditor (talk) 02:06, 4 November 2018 (UTC)

The article is organized in the way that directly violates NPOV. That policy directly prohibit the structure that creates an apparent hierarchy of sources, but all good quality sources are split among different sections, whereas obsolete and politically biased sources are assembled together to present a totally false impression that these lousy data represent the views of true experts.

With regard to Rummel, a simple explanation of the origin of his data (a list of sources he used) and their itemising (to allow a reader to compare his ridiculous claims about the USSR with good quality modern data) would resolve the problem. In addition, since Rummel presented no new data in his Death by Government, why don't we explain that this book contains just a compilation of figures from his older books? --Paul Siebert (talk) 02:32, 4 November 2018 (UTC)

Everything sentence in the article ought to be supportable (ideally, supported) by a reliable source. Per WP:NPOV: "All encyclopedic content on Wikipedia must be written from a neutral point of view (NPOV), which means representing fairly, proportionately, and, as far as possible, without editorial bias, all of the significant views that have been published by reliable sources on a topic." About the current article structure creating a hierarchy of sources, WP:STRUCTURE says: "The internal structure of an article may require additional attention, to protect neutrality, and to avoid problems like POV forking and undue weight. Although specific article structures are not, as a rule, prohibited, care must be taken to ensure that the overall presentation is broadly neutral. Segregation of text or other content into different regions or subsections, based solely on the apparent POV of the content itself, may result in an unencyclopedic structure, such as a back-and-forth dialogue between proponents and opponents.[1] It may also create an apparent hierarchy of fact where details in the main passage appear "true" and "undisputed", whereas other, segregated material is deemed "controversial", and therefore more likely to be false. Try to achieve a more neutral text by folding debates into the narrative, rather than isolating them into sections that ignore or fight against each other. Pay attention to headers, footnotes, or other formatting elements that might unduly favor one point of view, and watch out for structural or stylistic aspects that make it difficult for a reader to fairly and equally assess the credibility of all relevant and related viewpoints.[2]" Having an estimates section that is arranged chronologically is not an example of a POV-segregated structure. If you are referring to single-country sources being separated from the estimates section, the two of us already agreed on including a table of such estimates in the estimates section and that has nothing to do with your critique of Rummel, so that is not relevant to this conversation. AmateurEditor (talk) 15:02, 4 November 2018 (UTC)

Paul you are right, Rummel's figures are an obsolete bullshit. But we have to convince the people who listen to Fox News and then check Wikipedia. Is there a reliable academic source that says Rummel's figures are as soft as shit? Is there somebody here who can cite criticism of Rummel? --Woogie 10w (talk) 00:55, 4 November 2018 (UTC)

We don't need any source to fix this problem. If we all will agree that the situation with Rummel must be fixed, I have an idea how to do that. However, this noticeboard is not the best place for that.--Paul Siebert (talk) 01:06, 4 November 2018 (UTC)

AmateurEditor, Rummels work was sponsered by the United States Institute of Peace Rummel,Received numerous grants from NSF, ARPA, and the United States Peace Research Institute. [15] No wonder they love him on Fox News and Conservapedia--Woogie 10w (talk) 01:15, 4 November 2018 (UTC)

Paul Siebert, we absolutely do need a reliable source to make your fix. Consensus among just the editors interested in this article does not overrule the three Core Content Policies (WP:V, WP:OR, and WP:NPOV). Until you find a reliable source for it, your identification of this problem is OR and not relevant to the article's NPOV. Per WP:CONLEVEL: "Consensus among a limited group of editors, at one place and time, cannot override community consensus on a wider scale. For instance, unless they can convince the broader community that such action is right, participants in a WikiProject cannot decide that some generally accepted policy or guideline does not apply to articles within its scope. WikiProject advice pages, how-to and information pages, and template documentation pages have not formally been approved by the community through the policy and guideline proposal process, thus have no more status than an essay. Wikipedia has a standard of participation and consensus for changes to policies and guidelines. Their stability and consistency are important to the community. Accordingly, editors often propose substantive changes on the talk page first to permit discussion before implementing the change. Bold changes are rarely welcome on policy pages. Improvements to policy are best made slowly and conservatively, with active efforts to seek out input and agreement from others."

AmateurEditor, I sincerely cannot understand you: I provided an exhaustive evidences that Rummel's theory (at least, regarding the USSR, I need some time to look through his book on China) is based on the sources that, by and large, are Cold war era sources. Obviously, these sources cannot be better than modern data. What those sources are? Memoirs (which always should be treated with caution), CIA reports (that cannot be more precise than the data that became available after Perestroika), documents prepared by human right activists (who are not professional historians, and who were more concerned about the fight against the regime than about accuracy), Cold war era authors who wrote their books based on vague estimates and intuitive assumptions, and some of whom, like Robert Conquest, reconsidered their early conclusions in light of fresh evidences, and similar sources. As modern data demonstrate, Rummel's estimates are inconsistent with the demography of the USSR: they violate elementary rules of arithmetic. In addition, these data ignore (and contradict to) a huge number of very good data. This is a problem, and we need to think how to resolve it without committing a sine of original research. However, instead of that, you are maintaining that "as soon as formal RS criteria are met, everything is ok". This your position really puzzles me.--Paul Siebert (talk) 03:01, 4 November 2018 (UTC)

AmateurEditor and Paul, R.J.Rummel was a hack writer of US government financed propaganda. On the back cover of Lethal Politics the description reads he has a grant from the United States Institute of Peace Readers of Wikipedia should know this important fact. R.J.Rummel's research project was sponsored by the US government. I question the reliability and neutrality of Rummel's research based on the financial support given to him by the US government.--Woogie 10w (talk) 03:27, 4 November 2018 (UTC)

Woogie, your are not right. It is absolutely not a problem to have a grant from a state supported fund. As a rule, university professors in the US are totally independent, and the most important thing they are concerned about is their reputation. Rummel is good scholar, he made several important contributions to science, however, some of his conclusions and some of his figures are questionable, and some of them are dramatically outdated. The only thing we should do is to put Rummel into a proper context, and the problem will be resolved.--Paul Siebert (talk) 03:36, 4 November 2018 (UTC)

Paul, about your statement "This is a problem, and we need to think how to resolve it without committing a sine of original research." That is the key point, "without committing the sin of original research", including OR in article structure as prohibited by WP:UNDUE. About your statement "However, instead of that, you are maintaining that "as soon as formal RS criteria are met, everything is ok"." Yes, as soon as formal RS and NPOV criteria are met, then everything is "ok" as Wikipedia defines it. Wikipedia:Verifiability, not truth. AmateurEditor (talk) 15:02, 4 November 2018 (UTC)

AmateurEditor, you added "and NPOV" to my statement, but the problem here is that NPOV is not meet. Next problem is that we, being intellectually honest, cannot write an obvious nonsense: if some reliable source say that, we must find some tools to circumvent it.--Paul Siebert (talk) 15:36, 4 November 2018 (UTC)

Paul Siebert, I added NPOV as part of my response, not as part of your statement which mischaracterized my position. We cannot "circumvent" OR restrictions in this way. From WP:NPOV: "All encyclopedic content on Wikipedia must be written from a neutral point of view (NPOV), which means representing fairly, proportionately, and, as far as possible, without editorial bias, all of the significant views that have been published by reliable sources on a topic. NPOV is a fundamental principle of Wikipedia and of other Wikimedia projects. It is also one of Wikipedia's three core content policies; the other two are "Verifiability" and "No original research". These policies jointly determine the type and quality of material that is acceptable in Wikipedia articles, and, because they work in harmony, they should not be interpreted in isolation from one another. Editors are strongly encouraged to familiarize themselves with all three. This policy is non-negotiable, and the principles upon which it is based cannot be superseded by other policies or guidelines, nor by editor consensus."

Also from WP:NPOV: "Neutrality requires that each article or other page in the mainspace fairly represents all significant viewpoints that have been published by reliable sources, in proportion to the prominence of each viewpoint in the published, reliable sources.[3]"

You call Rummel's estimates "obvious nonsense", but have provided no reliable source yet saying so. On the other hand, we do have reliable sources citing Rummel's numbers as not nonsense, such as Valentino. Therefore, until you can come up with some reliable source for your view that his estimates are nonsense, they aren't, as far as Wikipedia is concerned. AmateurEditor (talk) 06:02, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

AmateurEditor, your mistake is that you mix two totally different things. Our policy says that all material in Wikipedia must be attributable to a reliable, published source. However, that relates to materials, not to the structure of articles. My arguments that you are answering relate to the structure, not to materials, so all your references to the policy are irrelevant. Modern sources, accepted by mainstream authors, say that much less amount of people died in the USSR as result of wars, famines, repressions and forced labor (including two world wars) than, according to Rummel, were killed in Gulag alone. That means Rummel's figures, which are based on Cold war era rough estimates, are total bullshit. Being a good faith Wikipedian, you cannot disagree with that. However, being a good faith Wikipedian, neither you or me can write "Rummel's data is a bullshit" in the article. However, since I (and you, I believe) understand that the blatant contradiction between Rummel's data and modern figures is a problem, and that we have to resolve this problem (because the article in its current form undermines credibility of Wikipedia), we need to decide how can we fix this problem without committing a sin of original research. How can we do that? The answer is simple: by reorganising the structure of the article. I have some ideas on that account, and if you agree in general, let's do that.--Paul Siebert (talk) 06:36, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

WP:RS is clear. Blogs by an "expert in the field" are allowed as sources, and the rest of this is a continuation of interminable objections which have cause the article talk page archive to reach astronomical lengths. Rummel is a valid expert, and anyone who says he should be excised as a "hack" is likely not paying attention to the Wikipedia rules about sources. And the rest? 12,000 words on the current talk page, and another 700,000+ (minimum) words in the archives. (One archive alone is over 270,000 bytes) Not to mention more than fifty discussions at RS/N. And dozens of discussions on other boards. At some point, will folks decide that interminable posts do not really help the project? Collect (talk) 12:05, 4 November 2018 (UTC)

I am not saying exclude Rummel,only that we should let readers know that he was funded by the United States Institute of Peace. BTW that is why his work is dismissed by many other academics. Collect you are right, this blog is way too long. I wasted my time here.--Woogie 10w (talk) 12:23, 4 November 2018 (UTC)

No, to add an information that some scholar was funded by some state agency means to convert Wikipedia in some marginal blog. It is absolutely normal for a scholar to be funded by some govermnent associated institution.--Paul Siebert (talk) 15:36, 4 November 2018 (UTC)

If we are all in agreement about Rummel being a RS, then lets get back to normal editing. AmateurEditor (talk) 15:02, 4 November 2018 (UTC)

We can start normal editing when we agree that if some reputable expert writes something in their blog, and this information is missing from their publications in more reputable media, then there may be some problem with this information. Many participants of this discussion agree with that. Do you agree?--Paul Siebert (talk) 15:36, 4 November 2018 (UTC)

In general - no. And in the specific instance - still no. We can not cherry pick within an oeuvre of an expert. Sorry. Collect (talk) 15:57, 4 November 2018 (UTC)

Have you familiarized yourself with the arguments presented by other users above? It looks like you totally ignore what they say without any explanations. Cherry-picking means something different. In that case, the question is if the statement found in a personal blog has the same weight as the statement published in reputable sources. --Paul Siebert (talk) 16:43, 4 November 2018 (UTC)

Accusing editors of "ignoring" the tens of thousand of words where the gist of the discussion has a simple answer is not really sensible. Wikipedia generally treats blogs by experts in a field as being reliable sources, in and of themselves. Self-published expert sources may be considered reliable when produced by an established expert on the subject matter, whose work in the relevant field has previously been published by reliable third-party publications. I suggest that the interminable discussions should be whittled down a bit. Collect (talk) 13:58, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

No. Even your "generally" claim does not give any simple answer. ("may" also does not give a formulaic simple command, either). So, don't try to shut discussion down. And your position does not even make good common sense, we would not ignore the manner of publication and we don't. Alanscottwalker (talk) 14:10, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

Collect, it is not an accusation. That is my impression. The relevant section on the policy page says: "Self-published material and content from non-staff contributors may sometimes be acceptable when the author is an established expert whose work in the relevant field has been published by reliable third-party publications. Such material, although written by an established author, likely lacks the fact checking that publishers provide. Avoid using them to source extraordinary claims." One criterion of an extraordinary claim is surprising or apparently important claims not covered by multiple mainstream sources. That means when one finds in WND some claim that surprises them, and other sources that support this claim is missing, this claim can be considered extraordinary. However, if other sources exist that say the same, that makes this blog redundant. Therefore, there is nothing to discuss here.--Paul Siebert (talk) 14:42, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

The blog at issue is not only not WND, the claims are fairly in line with other works by the author. Why did you compare this blog by an expert with WND? By the way WP:Verifiability[ is a policy. It outranks "content guidelines" last I checked (especially ones where your link was added all of two weeks ago).. Rummel is a high level expert in the field, thus his writings on the topic in which he is an expert, is considered a "reliable source." Collect (talk) 20:16, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

Collect, you are right, of course, I meant a Democratic peace blog (sometimes, when you switch between two different topics, that may happen :-)). With regard to the rest, guidelines usually specify details that are not covered by policy. The policy says Self-published expert sources may be considered reliable when produced by an established expert ..., but a footnote says that exceptional claims need exceptional sources. In addition, the next sentence of this policy section says exactly what people already explained to you: "if the information in question is suitable for inclusion, someone else will probably have published it in independent reliable sources". By the way, I never claimed all information from Rummel's blog is garbage: thus, a significant part of this blog reproduces his books he published earlier ("Deaths by government", "Lethal policies" etc). These facts and data are, without any doubts, reliable. However, I don't understand why should we provide a reference to this blog when we can use these books directly?--Paul Siebert (talk) 20:33, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

Opinions sourced to WorldNetDaily

This is both an RS and NPOV issue, but I'm bringing it here so that it can be discussed in one place. I removed opinions sourced to WND from Conservapedia [16] and Ann Coulter [17]. My concern is that although a non-rs may be used as a source of opinion in certain situations, these particular opinions do not seem to meet WP:WEIGHT because they do not appear in reliable sources. This is currently being discussed on both talk pages, and I'm coming here to get some clarity on A) when a non-rs can be used as an opinion source and B) whether it is appropriate to include these opinions per WP:NPOV. –dlthewave ☎ 01:06, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

• @Dlthewave: This will be redundant to #Is an article in World Net Daily reliable source? above unless it is an RfC, in which case it should be templated as such. — Frayæ (Talk/Spjall) 01:26, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

I see this as a separate issue, since these RS questions are usually handled case-by-case and the "expert" credentials of the quoted person will vary. –dlthewave ☎ 02:14, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

I would also like this issue addressed from a general perspective, because there seems to be some inconsistency. Is an op-ed published on an otherwise non-RS site a reliable source for the author's opinion or not? WorldNetDaily is listed in Wikipedia:Identifying reliable sources/Perennial sources, as a "generally unreliable" source, with the following description (bold added for emphasis):

"WorldNetDaily is not considered a reliable source for most purposes. The website is known for promoting falsehoods and conspiracy theories.[54]"[18]

The listing has two links to where the site has been discussed on this noticeboard in the past and here are the closing remarks for those discussions:

1) "Consensus appears to be that World Net Daily is not generally acceptable as a source for factual material (as is, for example, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal etc.). While prior RS/N "Consensus" is cited evidencing WND "unreliability", individual citation(s) evidencing WND "unreliability" have not, thus far, been provided. As to whether or under what criteria/circumstance WND might be considered WP:RS, opinion is divided."[19]

2) "Resolved: Sigh, not again. It's been clearly agreed (you know, that "consensus" thing we have) before that apart from editorial opinion, if one is unable to source a supposedly factual statement without having to use WND, it probably doesn't belong in an encyclopedia article. Jake, your efforts would be far better aimed at better sourcing rather than this repeated waste of everyone's time, and it's now time to leave the equine corpse alone. There's only a certain number of times before being pointy becomes disruptive. Black Kite (t) (c) 06:56, 1 November 2010 (UTC) "[20]

If an op-ed on the site is not permissible as a source for the op-ed author's opinion, then the description in the listing should be updated so this doesn't come up here again. AmateurEditor (talk) 05:26, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

If I understand it correct, the issue is whether we are supposed to trust a person (e.g., a renown expert) or a source. When a person who is an established scholar publishes their view on some site with questionable reputation, what should we do with that?

This story reminds me a situation with publication policy of the Royal Society. In past, some established scientist were granted a permission to publish their paper in Royal Society journals, and they could publish whatever they wanted. That was an old analog of a modern peer-review procedure: instead of subjecting each paper to a peer-review procedure, Royal Society "peer-reviewed" scientists themselves: as soon as some scientist successfully passed a "peer-review", his manuscript were published without any restriction. However, later, this strategy was abandoned, and now each paper is subjected to a peer-review. (Arguably, the only exception is Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of U.S.A., which publishes manuscripts authored by members of the National Academy without peer-reviewing; as a result, everybody knows that a PNAS article authored by some academician may be of lower quality than the articles submitted by other authors).

In connection to that, the idea to trust an expert, not a source, is a step back as compared to the old publishing strategy that existed in a scientific world a 100 years ago. I don't think Wikipedia will benefit from that.

Frankly, I cannot understand the motives of Wikipedians who are advocating various questionable web sites. When some renown expert publishes their thoughts on such a web site, and the same information cannot be found in more trustworthy sources, that this expert is not totally confident in what they say: such statement may be inaccurate, provocative or questionable, and its publication in peer-reviewed of other good quality media may lead to some sort of reputational risks. In other words, publications of that sort should be considered as the expert's "hobby", and treated accordingly.

Wikipedia has a very non-uniform reputation, some say it contains a lot of bullshit. If we really want to improve it, it would be better to too rigorous than too liberal when we select sources.--Paul Siebert (talk) 06:14, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

According to WP:RS a person is a source, as is a publisher and a work, so it is not choosing between a person and a source. AmateurEditor (talk) 06:28, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

No. Not alone, who-by and where it's published matters to source evaluation. Alanscottwalker (talk) 11:13, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

Only to a considered extent in an overall evaluation, the conditions for inclusion are section 1 OR section 2 OR ... not AND. Dmcq (talk) 11:54, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

Sorry? I understand, I think, the first part of your comment, "overall evaluation", as I said it is part of the evaluation of a source, (who by, who the publisher is, where, where is it published) but I don't understand the second part, are they abbreviations(?) (eg. WP:OR? WP:AND?) and what you are trying to say there? Alanscottwalker (talk) 13:06, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

I'm saying the basic conditions for inclusion are condition 1 OR condition 2 OR condition 3 etc, not condition 1 AND condition 2 AND condition 3. AND means all conditions must be satisfied, OR means one or more must be satisfied. I capitalized them so you would have a chance of noticing them. Dmcq (talk) 17:22, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

You're comment is still cryptic, "condition for inclusion" is odd, but to the extent you are arguing that you consider things in isolation your statement makes little, even common-sense. We consider things in context, given several factors that are bound together simultaneously not in some fictitious isolation. -- Alanscottwalker (talk) 18:05, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

AmateurEditor, I really cannot understand why you are so persistent: this approach would decrease quality of Wikipedia. Imagine some serious article about, e.g. black holes, which is based on good articles from Science, Nature and PRL: will it benefit if we add there some claim from some "Flat Earth society" portal? Even if our rules do not prohibit that, a good faith user is supposed to avoid such things.

And, by the way, you interpret WP:EXPERTSOURCE incorrectly. Expert's opinion published in questionable sources is acceptable only when this statement is uncontroversial: our policy does not allow it as a support of extraordinary claims. Obviously, that means that everything written in WND should be treated with greater suspect. --Paul Siebert (talk) 15:05, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

• WorldNetDaily is an appropriate source for uncontroversial facts about itself on the article WorldNetDaily and pretty much nothing else. Anything which is said only on WND and not repeated by reliable independent secondary sources, is WP:UNDUE pretty much by definition. Guy (Help!)

10:57, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

• When we can't trust the publisher/editor, we can't trust what they published or how they edited it. Alanscottwalker (talk) 11:13, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

We don't need everything peer reviewed on Wikipedia. That is a daft idea. In this case we're not talking about WND as a general source but its editor as a source about conservative ideas on the Bible. The appropriate criterion to judge that by is section one of WP:NEWSORG. Dmcq (talk) 11:47, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

It's WP:SPS for that, and its editor is not a notable qualified commentator on the subject. $RANDOMBLOWHARD cited to their own website is never a good idea for Wikipedia sourcing. Guy (Help!) 12:06, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

Comment: I don't have an opinion regarding if WND is a reliable source. However, I do have concerns when I see all material cited to WND systematically removed without asking if a lower quality source is really a concern and/or if an alternative source is available. Take a case where WND is reporting the views/statements of a person who's opinion on a subject would generally have WEIGHT. Unless we think WND is actively changing/misquoting people then I would say there is ONUS to show that WND is not reliable for such basic material. That doesn't establish WEIGHT, only an assumption of a low level of reliability. If the author is someone who's opinion on the subject would generally be notable then we shouldn't exclude it just because it was published on WND. In that case I would treat it like self published material from an expert. Unlike such an opinion published in say the NYT, I wouldn't take the fact that it was published on WND as evidence that the opinon/views/facts etc in question have WEIGHT. If WND reporters are interpreting facts/events then I would say the bar is higher and it sounds like the general answer is no, not reliable. However, this does not mean any material that is sourced to WND should be automatically removed from articles especially with no effort to find an alternative source for the same material/quotes. Instead if the sourced material is factual (quotes, otherwise non-controversial statements/attributions) then an effort should either be made to find alternative sources or start a talk page discussion asking if removal is justified. Springee (talk) 14:23, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

Springee, I think you are not right. Per WP:EXPERTSOURCE, a statement published in WND may be acceptable when it is made by an established expert, and it contains no extraordinary claim. Removal of materials supported by WND happens not because someone dislikes this source, but because someone considers the claim this source makes extraordinary. If that happened, the best way to restore this material is to find a better source that supports the same claim. If that was done, the material can be restored, and, probably, the WND reference can be restored too (optionally). However, per WP:BURDEN, all of that should be done by those who want to restore this material. It would be absolutely incorrect to say that "there is ONUS to show that WND is not reliable", but the opposite is correct: a proof should be presented in each case when WND is used that this particular WND article is reliable. However, if such a proof (in a form of another publication in more reputable source) has been provided that makes WND redundant.--Paul Siebert (talk) 15:26, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

I don't think we actually disagree here. The question is what counts as "extraordinary"? Consider an article statement, "Expert A said, "This is a good idea because..." ". WND is only being used to claim that Expert A made the statement. In that case are we claiming WND falsified the statement? In any case, an editor removing material from a Wiki article because it is cited to WND should make a good faith effort to see if an alternative source for the claim is available. Springee (talk) 15:57, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

That is not a big question. "Extraordinary" means "surprising or apparently important claims not covered by multiple mainstream sources". That means any surprising statement not supported by better sources can be considered extraordinary unless opposed has not been proven. Regarding "good faith efforts", that is what I usually do. However, that is not mandatory. --Paul Siebert (talk) 16:12, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

Do not include spaces between replies per MOS:INDENTGAP Walter Görlitz (talk) 16:36, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

It seems wikiEd adds spaces automatically. Just in case if other users are having this problem, disabling of wikiEd resolves it. Or switch to from Firefox to Chrome...--Paul Siebert (talk) 16:54, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

• Same as above. Bathroom graffiti written by an eminent expert is still bathroom graffiti. If the best source someone could get published in is a totally junk publication like WND, we should probably ask ourselves "Huh, why didn't better sources publish this too?", and then use those better sources, and the things they chose to publish about the subject, instead. Seraphimblade ^{Talk to me} 17:27, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

Well better sources by our standards have said essentially the same thing there, but they are sources which one would expect to pooh ppooh some nutcase conservative idea. This is a dyed in the wool right winger and creationist that one might expect to be supportive saying the project is nutty. Dmcq (talk) 21:49, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

• Almost never - Basically what JzG said. Maybe an opinion about itself or one of its authors, used in the article about itself or said reporter, but basically nothing else. Too often we find something to be a terrible source, but exercise no discretion when it comes to including those sources anyway, but with attribution. If something is as poor of a source as WND, we just shouldn't be using it except in remarkable circumstances. — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 01:18, 6 November 2018 (UTC)

Threestooges.net

Would the website Threestooges.net be considered reliable? I occasionally see it cited in articles about actors. After reading the site's About This Site page and the About Team Stooge page, I am inclined to think it is not reliable. Eddie Blick (talk) 01:59, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

• It is more or less a personal website, at the very best a fansite with no real editorial oversight. Not reliable in a Wikipedia sense. — Frayæ (Talk/Spjall) 02:06, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

Thank you, Frayae. I appreciate the feedback. Eddie Blick (talk) 13:00, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

One other thing that I forgot to ask. When I encounter that site used as a source, should I delete it or leave it but mark it in some way? Eddie Blick (talk) 14:45, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

You can remove it. Or you can put a {{better source needed}} tag directly after it. It is up to you whether to leave it or not. If you want to replace it with another source that is also good. — Frayæ (Talk/Spjall) 16:21, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

Edit filter

I monitor links to unreliable sources. Vast numbers of them. I think it would be helpful to have a talk page edit filter to warn people that the source they are about to propose is generally considered unreliable. All the sites should be included in the filter (with /blog or whatever for sites like HuffPo where only blog content is unreliable). This would be a Warn filter, so they can still propose the link if they feel they must. Guy (Help!) 11:02, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

Seems fair, buit this might be best at (say) village pump. Lets get a wider input.Slatersteven (talk) 11:13, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

I think I proposed something like that before but I cannot remember where. Basically, it would mean expanding Special:AbuseFilter/899 and setting it to also warn people which I doubt has consensus (it was a hard-fought discussion to enable warnings for The Daily Mail (Special:AbuseFilter/869)). Maybe though 899 can be expanded to monitor these links so you and other interested editors can easily find such additions. Regards SoWhy 11:33, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

freemarketnews.com

I found some links to freemarketnews.com: Linksearch en (insource) - meta - de - fr - simple - wikt:en - wikt:fr • Spamcheck • MER-C X-wiki • gs • Reports: Links on en - COIBot - COIBot-Local • Discussions: tracked - advanced - RSN • COIBot-Link, Local, & XWiki Reports - Wikipedia: en - fr - de • Google: search • meta • Domain: domaintools • AboutUs.com , this is now defunct (the domain is up for sale) and despite the fact that it was "Driven By Truth", I can't find any evidence it was ever a reliable source. I removed the references from mainspace. Guy (Help!) 12:04, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

Defense Visual Information Distribution Service

Is Defense Visual Information Distribution Service a reliable source. It appears that at least some of its content is submitted by readers. It has been cited in Carrabelle, Florida, here,

Coast Guard Station Carabelle, a small boat and rescue station of the U.S. Coast Guard, is located on the city's waterfront. The station is assigned to Coast Guard District 8, Coast Guard Sector Mobile, and is also the homeport for U.S. Coast Guard Cutter Seahawk (WPB 87323), an 87 foot Marine Protector-class patrol boat and her crew.

. - Donald Albury 12:14, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

For that content? Seems reliable enough. Their FAQ says "All content on the DVIDS hub website is created and submitted by US Military personnel, US Government agencies, and contractors operating in the US Army Central Area of Responsibility, including Iraq, Afghanistan, and throughout the world" and "Contact your Unit Commander or NCOIC to determine if your unit is already registered for DVIDS submission. If not, your unit must first be registered to use the DVIDS system. Contact the DVIDS Training Chief for assistance in this process. Once your unit is online, you may submit content subject to proper release authority through your chain of command." It doesn't appear that anyone can just put up random content. --tronvillain (talk) 17:42, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

Thanks. I didn't look hard enough, and missed the FAQ. - Donald Albury 18:27, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

References

Is a review published in a blog reliable source?

A review authored by Klas-Göran Karlsson was published by https://www.levandehistoria.se/, which seems to be a blog. The artcile about the author is a stub, and I failed to find any sources about this author. This review has zero citations in google scholar. Author does not seem to be an expert in the field. Is this source reliable for the article Mass killings under communist regimes and Crimes against humanity under communist regimes? In the latter article, it is the only source that defines the article's subject as a separate category.--Paul Siebert (talk) 20:42, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

Paul Siebert, not a blog, it's part of the Swedish department of culture:[21]. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 21:48, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

Yeah, I don't think it's correct to call this a "review published on a blog". Michael Shoenals is the co-author and he's a fairly well-known historian of China. Klas-Göran Karlsson appears to have published books on Soviet history. Nblund ^talk 21:59, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

The Forum for Living History appears to be a Swedish national institute, so I don't know that "blog" is accurate. He may not meet WP:PROF though - the current page almost certainly doesn't. --tronvillain (talk) 22:11, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

Good. Thanks.--Paul Siebert (talk) 22:15, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

Circular sources

On David_Wolfe_(entrepreneur) we have two claims - that he is a flat earther and that gravity is toxic - which are in turn supported by two refs, American Council on Science and Health Blog and The West Australian. My problem with the two sources - in particular with the American Council on Science and Health Blog - is that they were published after we placed those two claims in the article, and I'm worried that they may have taken the claim from us. Given that they were posted long after we wrote that Wolfe is a flat earther, are those sources reliable? If not, would it be better to go with alternative sources which may come directly from Wolfe, be more independent of our article, or which predate us making those claims? I have found an article by Wolfe where he seems to state that gravity is toxic, but I'm having a bit more trouble with the flat earth claim - there is a strong possibility that he did say that at the Lightning in a Bottle festival, but the sources for that are a bit more difficult. - Bilby (talk) 00:15, 6 November 2018 (UTC)

You replaced the more reliable source (the West Australian) with Wolfe's own blog where he says this (how his own blog can be a source for criticism of his position is quite beyond me, but that is a different question).

You appear to have no doubt about the content -- that he believes the earth is flat and that gravity is toxic.

You have provided no evidence that either the ACSH or the West Australian are citing Wikipedia.

There is nothing in this objection. It is a complete waste of time. Jytdog (talk) 00:30, 6 November 2018 (UTC)

I do have some doubt about the Earth is flat claim, as in a post on his website he describes Flat Earther's as "Flat Earth consipracy theorists", which at least raises some doubt. I think it is reasonable to look for a source which is not circular. As to the ACSH, which is my main concern, it contains a series of accusations against Wolfe which mirror our article at the time. In regard to the West Australian, I'm ok with keeping it, but I'd like to add Wolfe's own words as a clear statement of what he believes on the assumption that it is unquestionably independent of what we wrote. - Bilby (talk) 00:35, 6 November 2018 (UTC)

If you have any doubt it is from sheer lack of trying. In this old version of our article, there was this youtube video from him where he goes on and on about how "ridiculous" the idea is, that the earth is round and how work coming out of NASA is one big long hoax and explaining his "evidence" that the earth is flat. There are many sources for this. There is zero doubt about this. Zero. Jytdog (talk) 00:51, 6 November 2018 (UTC)

I've watched that video. To be clear, my interest is in adding the best sources, not in necessarily removing the claims. With that video. it isn't posted by Wolfe - it was posted by an anonymous YouTuber called "IbelieveIcanfly", appears to have been edited, and doesn't explain where it came from. It has no context. The best I can track down is it is probably from the 2016 Lightning in a Bottle festival, so I'm following those leads to see if I can get a reliable source on what he said there. This is counter to the article he posted on his website where he discusses the Authagraph projection as the best map because of how it translates an oblate spheroid, which raises some doubt as to what he believes. If we can improve the sourcing we can remove concerns. - Bilby (talk) 01:17, 6 November 2018 (UTC)

I'll tell you what. Try to have the West Australian correct their story. You can link to the correction at the Wolfe talk page and then we'll remove that source. Until then this remains a complete waste of time. Jytdog (talk) 01:43, 6 November 2018 (UTC)

• Just the fact that something appeared on Wikipedia before it appeared in a reliable source doesn't make it suddenly unreliable. If there's actually strong evidence that it was cribbed from Wikipedia, e.g. the exact or near exact wording of the article also was used in the source, that might be a different story, but we can't presume everything published after it appeared on Wikipedia was gotten from Wikipedia. Seraphimblade ^{Talk to me} 00:47, 6 November 2018 (UTC)

I agree. I had flags raised because the American Council on Science and Health Blog lists a series of accusations against Wolfe, which mirror the list in our article at the time, and provides no sources. - 01:21, 6 November 2018 (UTC)

• I haven't read all of the above, so apologies if this is known already, but he says something in this video about flat-earthism. Hard to know what he's saying exactly, but "there's something going on in Antarctica", and the world has been misdescribed. SarahSV ^(talk) 02:17, 6 November 2018 (UTC)

I hadn't encountered that one. The site seems worrying, but the video appears to be good. - Bilby (talk) 04:27, 6 November 2018 (UTC)

RE Alison Lundergan Grimes

@Binksternet @Muboshgu --- Are Fox News and the Associated Press not considered reliable sources anymore (see [22], [23], [24]). And we may as well have a look here to see if any issues arise. Thanks, Quis separabit? 03:45, 6 November 2018 (UTC)