Talk:Mankind Quarterly/Archive 1

Page contents not supported in other languages.
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Archive 1

Verifying Mankind Quarterly contributors

Did Arthur Jensen really contribute an article to Mankind Quarterly? hitssquad

I can't find any reference to him having done so. However without access to their past issues there is no way of being sure. -Willmcw 20:05, August 26, 2005 (UTC)
Their website lists the table of contents for issues back to 1985. Any issues published after Spring 2001 also contain the article abstracts, and occasionally full texts. A search of the site conducted through google for 'Jensen' returns 2 hits, both reviews of Jensen's books. --Nectar T 20:21, 26 August 2005 (UTC)
Since nothing pops up, perhaps we should remove Jensen. We can always add his name again should we find a citation. -Willmcw 20:44, August 26, 2005 (UTC)

Thanks Will. Next up is Cyril Burt. He died October 10, 1971, so it is chronologically possible he contributed something. But then, MQ is obscure and Burt was a hyper-accomplished elitist. It would have been an odd mix.

It also says he is known for [his] work in race and intelligence. Probably not. Burt is famous, partly, for never having done any work in regards to race. -hitssquad 00:05, 27 August 2005 (UTC)

Perhaps, as with Jensen, the original author of this article was confused because of articles about Burt. Whatever the reason for his inclusion, I can't find any sign that wrote for the MQ. -Willmcw 06:20, August 27, 2005 (UTC)
Verushcka contributed that section. That was his sole edit in this article. -hitssquad 06:34, 27 August 2005 (UTC)

Next up is William Shockley. --hitssquad 17:34, 5 September 2005 (UTC)

I just emailed MQ about this. The person who answered said that he can't recall an MQ article by Shockley, but that MQ does not have the resources to check unless I would like to pay for them to search their archives. I know that all of MQ is indexed on FirstSearch, so if anyone happens to have access to that they can check that way. I will remove Shockley from the article. If some new data comes in, his name can be restored. --hitssquad 20:26, 6 September 2005 (UTC)

Who is J.W. Jamieson? --hitssquad 04:41, 7 September 2005 (UTC)

James W. Jamieson. I included him because he is a frequent contributor and gets many Google hits, apparently for the same person. I don't know anything else about him. -Willmcw 08:07, September 7, 2005 (UTC)
Perhaps attaining high status in terms of Google hits does not necessarily make one notable. [1] --hitssquad 09:35, 7 September 2005 (UTC)
That;'s one of the questions which keeps bouncing around Wikipedia. Anyway, as for specifics, being a frequent contributor is sufficient reason for inclusion on a list of notables, so far as MQ is concerned. By comparison, some of MQ's other editors are quite obscure. -Willmcw 09:55, September 7, 2005 (UTC)
If there is conclusive evidence that no one cares who a given person is, there may be sufficient reason anyway to put him in an encyclopedia article and label him notable? --hitssquad 10:34, 7 September 2005 (UTC)
Apparently "J.W. Jamieson" is a pseudonym for Roger Pearson. Why the editor of a scientific journal would use a pseudonym to contribute is not clear to me. -Willmcw 03:38, September 13, 2005 (UTC)

I went through the Mankind Quarterly online table of contents and did not see any paper by Herrnstein or Murray. If that is the case for the non-online issues as well, that reference needs to be removed. 68.155.77.31 01:54, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

I think you may be mis-reading the sentence. It says that many of the works cited by those two were first published in MQ, not thayt the authors themselves were published there. -Will Beback 03:29, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

Neutrality and citations

This article needs to be re-written for balance and citations need to be added in order to comply with the Wikipedia:Neutral point of view policy. -Classicfilms 17:31, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

I've made small improvements, but if you still wish, can you explain how it's particularly unbalanced?--Nectar 06:11, 11 August 2006 (UTC)
Thanks for your edits. I am not familiar with many of the claims made by the Wikipedia article on The Mankind Quarterly and until they are backed up by legitimate sources, it's hard for me to comment - though as the article is written, it is hard to point out that other types of controversial articles are also published. For example, the following essay published by Mankind Quarterly supports both liberal and feminist arguments. It offers an alternative to the standard representation of Grendel's mother, the character in Beowulf who is usually portrayed as a marginalized monster:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grendel%27s_mother#Germanic_earth_goddess. As the Wikipedia article on Mankind Quarterly is currently written, it is hard to understand how this essay on Grendel's mother would have been published by the periodical Mankind Quarterly - and thus I'm not sure where to add the information. -Classicfilms 14:23, 11 August 2006 (UTC)
I have reinstated the neutrality tag for the reasons cited above. -Classicfilms 16:43, 12 August 2006 (UTC)
Why would we include a mention of that essay in this article? Frank Battaglia does not appear to be an especially notable academic. Many journals include works that are outside their defined mission. I just don't see what it is about one insignificant essay from 15 years ago that makes this article "totally disputed". -Will Beback 23:20, 12 August 2006 (UTC)
Hi Will Beback- thanks for your feedback. The trouble is that this article lacks citations which would help me to understand better what this mission is. Could you supply the citations which would back up the claims of the article? Thanks, -Classicfilms 23:37, 12 August 2006 (UTC)
We can get to that. But what does the Battaglia essay have to do with anything? -Will Beback 00:04, 13 August 2006 (UTC)
Great, because without citations the tone of the article seems one sided. As I mentioned, I'm not familiar with the points made in the article and citations would help me to better understand these points. The Battaglia article (which is part of an ongoing discourse in Beowulf studies and is cited in essays on Bewoulf) indicates that the journal publishes articles on controversial topics (in this case, Battaglia's article is of a controversial nature quite opposed to the tone of the Wikipedia article, as it supports feminist and liberal arguments). I don't necessarily have to include it here, but its existence indicates that (to maintain neutrality) the Wikipedia article should state that the journal publishes different types of controversial articles. -Classicfilms 00:40, 13 August 2006 (UTC)
Joseph Campbell was on the editorial board, so, taking into account articles like this Bragglia article, there'd seem to be more to the journal than gets presented by anti-racists and anti-hereditarians.--Nectar 00:57, 13 August 2006 (UTC)
The current lede states:
  • The Mankind Quarterly is a peer-reviewed journal dedicated to physical anthropology and cultural anthropology and associated with the Pioneer Fund [citation needed]. It contains articles on human evolution, intelligence, ethnography, languages, mythology, archaeology, race, etc.
The essay in question appears to fall solidly within the mission of the journal as we describe it. Classicfilms, are you looking for a source which says they cover ethnography and anthropology? -Will Beback 01:04, 13 August 2006 (UTC)
No, since in terms of anthropology this sentence covers it. I am looking for the citations requested on the page and for an indication that the journal publishes different types of controversial articles. Could you provide that? -Classicfilms 01:15, 13 August 2006 (UTC)
Sorry, you've lost me. Isn't the Grendel article related to ethnography, mythology, etc.? What's the problem with that essay?-Will Beback 01:44, 13 August 2006 (UTC)
I'm sorry, I don't understand your question. Could you rephrase it? -Classicfilms 04:41, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

<-- OK. You wrote:

  • As the Wikipedia article on Mankind Quarterly is currently written, it is hard to understand how this essay on Grendel's mother would have been published by the periodical Mankind Quarterly - and thus I'm not sure where to add the information.

Since the introduction to the article says that the journal publishes articles on "ethnography, languages, mythology, archaeology, race, etc..." it seems clear why the journal would publish an essay (and an accompanying book review) on the mythology of ancient Britain. The second point is that I don't understand why this essay is so important that we should add a mention in the article. The journal has published countless essays and papers. What's so special about Battaglia's article on Grendel? -Will Beback 07:55, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

I am not contesting that Battaglia's article is about ethnography - and I did say above that we don't necessarily have to include it in the Wikipedia article here, so that isn't the issue. As I said above, Battaglia's article on Grendel's mother is, within the realm of Beowulf scholarship, controversial but in a way which supports a liberal and feminist viewpoint. The Wikipedia article on Mankind Quarterly makes a number of points which are currently not supported by citation, which implies that the journal publishes only controversial articles of a particular viewpoint that would not support articles which are either liberal or feminist. If the requested citations were added - not about ethnography - but the other points made, it would help. -Classicfilms 15:19, 13 August 2006 (UTC)
So your point is that we say that MQ only publishes controversial articles, but the Battaglis article isn't controversial? I don't see how you get that, as the article doens't mention the word "cotroversy" in the text. -Will Beback 08:01, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

New Right, unite!

Further information: Aryan_Invasion_Theory_%28history_and_controversies%29 § Later_racialised_theories

it is very funny to see Alain de Benoist and Subhash Kak united as contributors in a racist/nationalist journal: their outlook is really comparable, ethnic nationalism paired with mythic fantasies of noble "Aryan" forbears, just that Benoist of course places the Proto-Indo-Europeans in Europe, while Kak places them in India, each implying, I suppose, concentric circles of racial degradation around the original homeland. This makes them 100% related in terms of their mindset, and 100% opposed in its application to geography dab (𒁳) 14:22, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

Intelligence Citations Bibliography for Articles Related to Human Intelligence

You may find it helpful while reading or editing articles to look at a bibliography of Intelligence Citations, posted for the use of all Wikipedians who have occasion to edit articles on human intelligence and related issues. I happen to have circulating access to a huge academic research library at a university with an active research program in these issues (and to another library that is one of the ten largest public library systems in the United States) and have been researching these issues since 1989. You are welcome to use these citations for your own research. You can help other Wikipedians by suggesting new sources through comments on that page. It will be extremely helpful for articles on human intelligence to edit them according to the Wikipedia standards for reliable sources for medicine-related articles, as it is important to get these issues as well verified as possible. -- WeijiBaikeBianji (talk) 15:37, 25 August 2010 (UTC)

Two good sources for further edits of this article.

Getting to know the various articles in the same category as this article during the recent Arbitration Committee case alerted me to some authors and sources who don't usually appear in the mainstream professional literature on psychology. And following up on some citations I found in those Wikipedia articles, in turn, helped me find some sources that explain the origin of much of the minority literature on this subject, especially Mankind Quarterly and several related publications.

  • Green tickY Tucker, William H. (2007). The funding of scientific racism: Wickliffe Draper and the Pioneer Fund. University of Illinois Press. ISBN 978-0-252-07463-9. {{cite book}}: Invalid |ref=harv (help); Unknown parameter |laydate= ignored (help); Unknown parameter |laysummary= ignored (help)

I'm very impressed with how thoroughly Tucker cites his vast array of sources and how thoughtfully he describes the context of the different authors, writings, and historical movements he surveys. These books are helpful, reliable secondary sources for most of the articles here on Wikipedia related to Mankind Quarterly or to authors who publish writings in it. In general, all of the articles within the scope of the topic sanctions from the recent ArbCom case could be improved if more Wikipedians refer to these sources for further editing of the articles. -- WeijiBaikeBianji (talk) 03:02, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

Speculation about the founding of MQ?

The article states of MQ:

Its foundation in 1960 may in part have been a response to the 1954 Supreme Court decision Brown v. Board of Education

What exactly does this "may in part" bit mean? Is this merely speculation on part of the cited sources? If so, is it really appropriate to include it in this article? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Mr. Bloggz (talk • contribs) 23:48, 27 September 2010 (UTC)

Check some of the better sources. For example,
* Tucker, William H. (2007). The funding of scientific racism: Wickliffe Draper and the Pioneer Fund. University of Illinois Press. ISBN 978-0-252-07463-9. {{cite book}}: Invalid |ref=harv (help); Unknown parameter |laydate= ignored (help); Unknown parameter |laysummary= ignored (help)
which is far from the only reliable secondary source that goes back to archival collections of the papers of the founders of Mankind Quarterly to explain the origins of the publication. -- WeijiBaikeBianji (talk) 16:26, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

Academic Journal

Isn't calling MQ an "Academic Journal" a bit dishonest? Its completely discredited and is not considered citable in academia, so I think its somewhat abusive to Academia to blame them for this mess of a magazine. 203.59.93.176 (talk) 07:45, 10 November 2010 (UTC)

It's not just dishonest, the whole article as it is now is a total joke. It's a white supremacist/racist publication which tries to pretend it's somehow "scientific" by having its publications "peer reviewed" by fellow racists.Volunteer Marek (talk) 19:28, 13 April 2011 (UTC)

Correct.·Maunus·ƛ· 19:31, 13 April 2011 (UTC)

It is an academic journal. This article and much of the criticism of the journal is extremely biased.Royalcourtier (talk) 07:45, 18 December 2014 (UTC)

What else do you read about the topics covered in Mankind Quarterly? It is available in a library I visit regularly (just in the last twenty-four hours, in fact), but most serious scholars in most fields related to the topics it covers far prefer other sources. -- WeijiBaikeBianji (talk, how I edit) 13:12, 18 December 2014 (UTC)


I don't dispute that Mankind Quarterly has been criticized a lot, or that this article should reflect that. But I think that the new criticism added by Volunteer Marek is approaching WP:COATRACK levels, where the article is giving more space to how much everyone hates this journal than it is to describing what the journal actually is. For comparison, look at the articles about Mein Kampf and The Protocols of the Elders of Zion. These are two of the most racist books ever written, and the articles make it obvious that this is how they're viewed. But the criticism of the books doesn't dominate the articles. The majority of both articles is taken up by historical information explaining what the books are, how they've been translated, etc. It's strange to have this article be more dominated by criticism than the articles on either of those books. Even if this journal is viewed by a lot of people as being racist, it can't possibly be viewed as racist by more people than Mein Kampf.Boothello (talk) 01:45, 25 April 2011 (UTC)

The obvious difference between MK and TPotEoZ on one hand and MQ on the other is that most people already know MK and TPotEoZ are racist junk. But they may not be aware that MQ is as well, particularly since 1) the journal tries very hard to establish a veneer of respectability and 2) it seems that some Wikipedia editors really wish to whitewash its nature and pretend it is something which it is not.
Also here is Boothello's comment left on my talk page, as well as my response [2]. I would prefer if the discussion was continued here, where it belongs.Volunteer Marek (talk) 03:52, 25 April 2011 (UTC)
The argument that less people know is not really a valid one encyclopedially. What is a valid reason is that there is a large body of knowledge analysing Mein Kampf and the Protocols in a disinterested way, because they have historical value. About Mankind quarterly the body of literature analysing or describing it is much smaller and mostly criticizes and exposes. That is the reason that the article should do the same.·Maunus·ƛ· 12:08, 25 April 2011 (UTC)
I see your point, those weren't great examples. A better parallel might be The Turner Diaries. This is a white nationalist novel that's infamous for having inspired several real-life crimes, including the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing. As far as I know, every secondary source in existence that discusses this book has something nasty to say about it. The only debate that exists over it is whether the it's dangerous enough that it should be banned from publication. I don't think anyone could reasonably claim that Mankind Quarterly has been criticized more than this book has.
But even the for article about the Turner Diaries, criticism isn't taking up more than half the article like it is on this one. Why is that? It can't be that Mankind Quarterly is criticized more in the source material than this book, because I don't think there's any publication in the U.S. that's had a more overwhelmingly negative reception than The Turner Diaries. I think the reason is just that the authors of that article know that it isn't encyclopedic for an article to be nothing but a coatrack of criticism. We even have a policy about this, Wikipedia:Attack page, which disallows any article "that exists primarily to disparage its subject". As a result of Marek's recent edits, I think that's what this article does.Boothello (talk) 17:07, 25 April 2011 (UTC)
The criticism section was not written by me. I don't think it's too long or anything but it's true that other parts of the article are under expanded. The thing is... if we expand the article to include the history of the journal it's going to be mostly negative. Same for if we write about "notable" publications. That's simply because the journal has a negative history and negative publications. This is different from TD where there's at least a (very very hokey) plot to summarize. But it's not like the section "Crimes associated with the book" can be described as "positive" - so aside from the plot section, yes, I do think that "criticism" is pretty much what the TD article is about. I guess here, we could include some technical publisher info to expand the rest of the article.Volunteer Marek (talk) 19:09, 25 April 2011 (UTC)

Impact factor

I removed the section about Journal Citation Reports removing the journal's impact factor, because the significance of that is unclear. While it is true that the journal's impact factor was removed, Mankind Quarterly was just one of about 50 journals that had its impact factor removed and no details were provided about what was anomalous about any of those journals' citations that had caused the impact factor to be pulled for them. If more details become available to explain the problem, I wouldn't object to the information being re-added to the article. --Metropolitan90 (talk) 03:48, 6 July 2012 (UTC)

  • An IF is an import part of what makes a journal notable and has been used in the past here to argue for MQ's notability. And although 50 may seem like a large number, the JCR covers almost 9000 journals. Some of the covered journals have rather large proportions of self citations, so the abuse must be rather egregious in order to be pulled from the list. That's why I think that the fact that MQ was pulled should probably be mentioned in the article. --Guillaume2303 (talk) 08:14, 6 July 2012 (UTC)
    • Here is a reference about the removals. If you agree, I'll re-add the info on the pulled IF with this reference added. --Guillaume2303 (talk) 10:03, 9 July 2012 (UTC)

How much criticism is too much?

This whole debate seems to be led by people who never read anything in the Mankind Quarterly at all. It doesn't get into my head why it should be called a "racist" journal although very little of what is published there is about race differences or race politics. Perhaps 20% or so is. Most of this is innocuous, such as papers about differences in athletic track records (e.g., E.C. Dutton & R. Lynn: Ethnic differences in success in cricket. MQ 55: 226-241, 2015). Such papers are standard fare for an anthropology journal. The opinions that authors express in MQ articles are not even especially lopsided. For example, in the Spring/Summer 2014 issue there was a target article for discussion in which the author proposed a Piagetian developmental model as an explanation for the rise of modern, industrial society (G.W. Oesterdiekhoff: The rise of modern industrial society. The cognitive-developmental approach as a new key to solve the most fascinating riddle in world history. MQ 54: 262-312, 2014). The author claimed that education is responsible not only for rising intelligence (Flynn effects), but also for any measured intelligence differences between races. Not one of the five critical comments contested the author's assertions in any way that could be described as "racist", or as otherwise outside the range of academic etiquette. It should also be pointed out that many authors who publish in the journal are not the kind of people who can credibly be labeled racists. They rather include educational researchers from the Middle East who report about IQ studies in their countries and generally attribute their results to characteristics of the local educational systems (e.g., A. Batterjee: Intelligence and education: The Saudi case. MQ 52, 133-190, 2011), Asian researchers who write pieces about ethnography or cultural history (e.g., A. Qurrat Ul Ain & L. Jianyou: Historical Narratives embedded in stone: analyzing the inscription on X'ian ancient mosque steles. MQ 55: 3-29, 2014), and African scholars who publish pieces about traditional African culture (e.g., P. Simelane-Kalumba, T. Mabeqa and S. Ngubane: The use of proverbial names among the Nguni people. MQ 55: 214-225, 2015). What distinguishes the Mankind Quarterly from most other journals in the field of anthropology should be evident for anyone who ever flips through the pages of the journal: There are lots of tables with quantitative data, not in all articles but in a majority of them. This is very different from the qualitative approaches and theoretical musings that otherwise dominate the field of cultural anthropology. It is more "scientific" than the kind of anthropology that its detractors seem to prefer. A Wikipedia article should inform readers about what is actually published in an academic journal, not what someone claims it is. The current Wikipedia article is a piece of sleaze that needs to be removed and replaced by something that summarizes the facts, in an objective way that can be verified. I am not too familiar with the early history of the journal, which is of limited interest anyhow. An important piece that needs to be in the article is indeed that its publication was transferred to the Ulster Institute at the end of 2014. Roger Pearson was 87 years old at the time, and his age and the difficulty he had in keeping up with the work is perhaps the main reason why he and his journals became easy targets for political activists. Gmeisenberg (talk) 15:50, 17 October 2015 (UTC)

Lots of anthropologists work with quantitative data and publish about human biological diversity. Nonetheless for an anthropology of any sort to publish in Mankind Quarterly would amount to professional suicide. That is the reputation of the journal, which has been well deserved as documented since Juan Comas first criticism. The reason Pearson and his journals became targets for political activists was because Mankind Quarterly as well as most of his other journals were themselves based on political activism from the extreme rightwing of the political spectrum. The idea that tables of quantitative data makes something more scientific is absurd, and would mean that astrological pamphleths are more scientific than historical journals. Mankind Quarterly has shown itself to be consistently incapable of sorting science from pseudoscience, and that is the way it has deserved its abysmal reputation among serious scholars and scientists. If current or future editorship aims to change it by published better research then I am sure that will be welcomed by the rest of academia. ·maunus · snunɐɯ· 21:01, 17 October 2015 (UTC)
The reason why the Mankind Quarterly became a target for attacks was that it (1) published empiric data that some political activists found incompatible with their agendas; (2) some contributors criticized social developments such as school desegregation in America that they claimed didn't work; and (3) unlike other journals that publish material of this kind, the Mankind Quarterly was not published by a major publisher with a big legal department but by a reclusive old man who didn't have the cash to pay a lawyer. Journals like Personality and Individual Differences and Intelligence publish a lot more obnoxious stuff than the Mankind Quarterly and much of this is of dubious quality. The reason why nobody attacks them is that they are published by Elsevier, and anyone starting a smear campaign against them would have to deal with their lawyers.
One thing you will find about the Mankind Quarterly is that it repeatedly published controversial material that became mainstream only later. Example: The "survival of the richest" in pre-industrial Europe became a leading explanation for the rise of early modern Europe only in 2007, when it filled a chapter in Gregory Clark's "A Farewell to Alms." In the Mankind Quarterly, the same pattern of differential fertility by wealth was already described in 1990 (V. Weiss: Social and demographic origins of the European proletariat. MQ 31, 127-152, 1990). The Mankind Quarterly also published the first list of IQs for 81 countries (R. Lynn & T. Vanhanen: National IQ and economic development: a study of eighty-one nations. Mankind Quarterly 41, 415-435, 2001). Later, Lynn and Vanhanen published their results in a series of 3 books published in 2002, 2006 and 2012. This research became respectable only later, and by now the three books combined garnered more than 1000 citations according to scholar google. National IQ differences have been the most rapidly growing field in intelligence research recently. Also, this whole field has merged with the study of school performance with tests such as PISA and TIMSS. (e.g., G. Meisenberg and R. Lynn: Intelligence: a measure of human capital in nations. Journal of Social Political and Economic Studies 36, 421-454, 2011). Basically, IQ studies and scholastic achievement tests like TIMSS and PISA measure the same thing at the country level. Only the rhetoric surrounding them is different. Of course you can label TIMSS and PISA "racist" if that's your obsession, because they measure race differences. More recently, methods for the study of population allele frequencies of genes for "educational attainment" and similar outcomes were pioneered in two papers published in the Mankind Quarterly (D. Piffer: Statistical associations between genetic polymorphisms modulating executive function and intelligence suggest recent selective pressure on cognitive abilities. Mankind Quarterly 54, 3-25, 2013; D. Piffer: Factor analysis of population allele frequencies as a simple, novel method of detecting signals of recent polygenic selection: the example of educational attainment and IQ. Mankind Quarterly 54, 168-200, 2013). Very obnoxious! Still, today you find this research published in major journals (e.g., D. Piffer: A review of intelligence GWAS hits: their relationship to country IQ and the issue of spatial autocorrelation. Intelligence 53, 43-50, 2015). There are lots of "racist" databases such as 1000 Genomes and HapMap, and also fossil genomes of populations that lived thousands of years ago. People are realizing that to be credible in science, they cannot suppress this whole research area (although some try anyway).
And what about Flynn effects? Environmentally caused rises in intelligence are the strongest argument against genetic race differences. Where do you think these studies are published? In many cases, in the Mankind Quarterly! Some examples: G. Meisenberg et al.: The Flynn effect in the Caribbean: Generational change of cognitive test performance in Dominica. Mankind Quarterly 46, 29-70, 2005. A. Batterjee: Intelligence and Education: The Saudi case. Mankind Quarterly 52: 133-190. H.-Y. Chen et al.: Two studies of recent increases of intelligence in Taiwan. Mankind Quarterly 53, 348-357. James Flynn himself wrote a comment about Flynn effects in the Mankind Quarterly (J. Flynn: The folly of writing history without a cognitive dimension. Mankind Quarterly 54, 313-321, 2014) in which he argued, for example, that rising intelligence was a reason for the ethical advances on which the civil rights movement was based. You can of course argue that Flynn is a racist because he writes that intelligence is important, and intelligence is different between races, but don't put that in Wikipedia! It is also interesting that many of those who have published about these environmentally caused Flynn effects, either in the Mankind Quarterly or elsewhere, have been accused of being racists at one point or another. They include people like Richard Lynn, Ed Dutton, Jan te Nijenhuis, Heiner Rindermann and Gerhard Meisenberg. The dividing line is between scientists who describe how the world works, and politically motivated agitators who use intimidation to suppress those parts of science that don't seem to fit with their agendas. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Gmeisenberg (talk • contribs) 14:35, 24 October 2015 (UTC)

To return to the general question of criticism in Wikipedia pages. It would seem that it makes sense to not overdo it as has perhaps been done in this article. Having one section called Criticism and moving the major chunk of the criticism there would make sense and be comparable to other pages, e.g. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theory_of_multiple_intelligences#Critical_reception, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Paradox_of_Choice#Criticism (sub-section in this case), or https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elsevier#Criticism_and_controversies (where it also forms a large chunk of the content). Right now, there is a lot of name-calling in the intro-section, most of which could be moved to the Criticism section. One could also note the general non-academic sources of the name-calling. It also seems fair to include some mention of the name-calling in the intro-section.

As Meisenberg says, it makes sense to note the recent transfer of ownership, which to some degree severs the current staff from its more dubious earlier history. As far as I know, none of the current members of staff are known to advocate race-based policies, but maybe I'm wrong.

Disclaimer: I have published one paper in MQ. Deleet (talk) 00:44, 3 November 2015 (UTC)

On the one hand, people prefer to seek out sources confirming their own beliefs and try hard to stigmatize source contradict them. Such tendency is probably evolved as part of process of self-deception. Unfortunately, some people reject the notion that mind is evolved, let alone any racial difference. The article currently is heavily biased by opinions from race-denying people, even though only some articles on MQ are about racial differences. On the other hand, Wikipedia rely on reliable sources. If things on many WP:reliable sources are heavily biased or simply wrong, Wikipedia still have to reflect them. In this case, there are many criticisms from reliable source listed in the article, so perhaps the article is not problematic on Wikipedia’s standard. The only way to make the article less biased is to add content based on reliable sources that are sympathetic to MQ, or response to criticism. I hope anyone could list them here for editing of the article. --The Master (talk) 16:24, 4 January 2016 (UTC)

The observation by The Master that the current article is heavily biased is obviously correct. I found that many people from non-Western backgrounds are puzzled by this kind of bias. They do not know that in the West, there is an academic subculture of dogmatically-inclined individuals who are obsessed with race differences. They are firmly convinced that there are large race differences in intelligence, and they are equally convinced that such knowledge is dangerous because it leads to bad attitudes. The conclusion is that either research related to race differences, or the dissemination of the results of such research, needs to be prevented. To my knowledge, neither of these two core beliefs has scientific support. For causes of race differences, we need more studies in molecular genetics. In the case of attitudes we know, for example, that people who believe that gays are "born that way" tend to support gay rights. People who don't believe in genes often end up blaming victims. These inconsistencies aside, the dogmatic approach creates a lot of misunderstandings. For example, about one third of the papers that were published in the Mankind Quarterly during the last 4 or 5 years were from a research program that studies intelligence in countries, usually developing countries that are struggling to improve their educational systems. The authors, most of them natives of these countries, usually discuss their results with reference to the inadequacies of the educational systems in their countries. But for dogmatics like Marek and Maunus, these studies are racist because any IQ differences between countries could possibly be related to genetic differences, and therefore knowledge about them is dangerous. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Gmeisenberg (talk • contribs) 16:49, 28 January 2016 (UTC)

To answer the question asked by the section title here, there should be as much criticism of the journal in this article about the journal as is reflected in reliable, secondary sources about the journal. I have read many issues of the journal (the library I use most often for research has a large collection of back issues of the journal) and I have read much about the topics treated by the journal in other sources. And I have read about the history of journals that cover the same topics, and the history of how scholars who work on the same topics view Mankind Quarterly. In my observation, this article has long "hid the ball" on how much Mankind Quarterly is derided by serious scholars on the topics that the journal claims to cover. -- WeijiBaikeBianji (Watch my talk, How I edit) 20:42, 31 May 2016 (UTC)

1963 Federal case citing MQ

This Federal civil rights case regarding the racial segregation of Georgia schools devotes a paragraph to IQ research from the Mankind Quarterly. I think this puts some historical context on the journal, and it's worth adding to the article. Stell v. Savannah-Chatham County Board of Education, 220 F. Supp. 667 - Dist. Court, SD Georgia 1963 Waters.Justin (talk) 00:33, 31 July 2017 (UTC)

Racism is creeping back into mainstream science – we have to stop it

That's the title of an article in The Guardian today.[3] It starts with "University College London has been unwittingly hosting an annual conference attended by race scientists and eugenicists for the past few years. This might have come as a shock to many people. But it is only the latest instalment in the rise of “scientific” racism within academia." It has quite a bit on MQ. Doug Weller talk 11:11, 23 January 2018 (UTC)

Right-wing

I was manually looking up scholar google for Mankind Quarterly articles to find those with "political activism from the extreme rightwing of the political spectrum." Perhaps I didn't take enough time, but I couldn't find any rightwing political activism there. The "political" issues I found discussed there by some authors were mainly about educational policy in Saudi Arabia, Sudan and similar places. Interesting note: Omar Khaleefa, who published several articles in the Mankind Quarterly, disappeared some years ago after running up against Sudanese authorities because of his advocacy for educational reforms in the country. If political activism is so important for Wikipedia, should this be mentioned in the article? At least, because the article is only about politics, can the editors please add citations of articles that were actually written in the journal that qualify as rightwing political activism? Then readers can verify whether the claims of political activism are justified, or whether it's all bogus and slander. The present article seems to have not a single source of this kind cited. I couldn't even find much about genetic explanations of race differences. In one debate about geographic differences in economy and IQ, the controversy was only between the importance of sunlight versus the importance of economic history (Federico Leon & Mayra Antonelli-Ponti (2018): UV radiation theory and the Lynn (2010) Italy debate. Mankind Quarterly 58, 621-649. Vittorio Daniele: Solar radiation, IQ and regional disparities in Italy. Mankind Quarterly 58, 654-665). None of the commentators defended genetic explanations. An article about a journal should be about what is actually written in the journal, not about what dubious outside sources have at various times claimed about it. Doesn't Wikipedia have a "neutral point of view" policy?Anamika1988 (talk) 13:48, 26 July 2018 (UTC)

Wikipedia summarizes reliable sources with a strong preference for independent sources. Wikipedia is not a publisher of original research. According to those reliable sources, Mankind has a long history of whitewashing extremist pseudoscience by presenting it as mainstream, or by distorting the underlying statistics. Your personal research into the journal doesn't change that. Wikipedia isn't a platform for fringe pseudoscience. Grayfell (talk) 20:11, 26 July 2018 (UTC)

Including a reference in an article is not publishing original research. References and links are required to give readers the means to verify the claims made in the article. Most of the references cited are polemics by fringe individuals (Kincheloe etc). These are not works by reputable scholars and are not "reliable sources" about the journal. They are reliable sources only about the subculture to which these authors belong. The claims of these individuals can be verified or falsified by factual information about the journal, but the article systematically suppresses this information. For example, there is the claim that it is a white supremacist journal, but the article does not mention what proportion of editors and authors are of mainstream white origin. The journal website shows immediately that many are not. Few of the editors and authors are from places where white supremacists are endemic. You refuse to cite evidence that would support or invalidate your claims. Systematically excluding evidence is not Wikipedia policy. Wikipedia policy is that every substantive claim made in an article needs to be supported by evidence. In this case, the only evidence that can support or refute the claims made is what has been written in the Mankind Quarterly. These sources belong in the reference list. You must provide evidence whenever a substantive claim is made. For example, when you claim Newton wrote that the sun revolves around the Earth, you have to cite the work in which Newton made that statement. You cannot refuse to do so by claiming Newton was a heretic and therefore is not a reliable source. I can only conclude that you do not want readers to inspect the factual sources of the statements made in the article. Anamika1988 (talk) 17:01, 30 July 2018 (UTC)

This is indeed a strange article. Because it is so adamant that Mankind Quarterly as a hereditarian and racist journal, I took the time to check this on google scholar. For the early years I got only the abstracts, but some of the recent stuff is there full text. This is what I found: In the sixties, when there was a good deal of controversy, the journal was indeed "racist" in the sense that about half of the articles were related to racial characteristics or race differences, both physical and mental/cultural. This went down only a bit in the 70s, but from 1980 to the present, there was very little related to race, less than 10%. This is in part because the physical anthropology which the journal covered prominently in the 60s and 70s was replaced by cultural anthropology since about 1980, especially of the historical kind. People like Edgar Polome and Marija Gimbutas were contributors at that time. Throughout the 80s and to some extent later, the Mankind Quarterly is better described as a journal of historical anthropology, and certainly not a "racist" journal. Most recently, the emphasis shifted again, and now a large part is about developing countries and especially IQ studies from these countries. Richard Lynn is a coauthor of most of these. Nothing of this is reflected in the Wikipedia article.

About the characterization of the journal as "hereditarian", I checked the discussion sections of some of the more recent papers that were available full text. Here I found that some authors who wrote about IQ in exotic countries or sex differences and similar attributed their results to cultural and environmental causes while others preferred genetic or other biological explanations. But mostly the papers are empirical and simply present their results. Without access to full text I can only guess that this was different in the 60s and 70s, but more recently there isn't much of a hereditarian slant. I also found very little related to eugenics for all periods, all the way from 1960 to present. Not zero, but less than 5%. Again this is not what I expected based on the Wikipedia article.

Some of the "reliable sources" that Grayfell mentions are more than suspect. When I looked up the reference in Kincheloe's "measured lies", I found that on the same page (page 39) from which the Wikipedia article quotes, the author writes that "contributors and advisors to the Mankind Quarterly include Corrado Gini and Ottmar von Vershauer". Kincheloe did not seem to know (or care) that these people were long dead when he wrote this in 1996. Corrado Gini died 1965, and Otmar von Verschuer (not Ottmar von Vershauer) died 1969. Some other sources, including William Tucker and Gavin Schaffer, are more scholarly, not as scientists but as historians. Their writings about the Mankind Quarterly are mainly about its role in the 60s and to some extent the 70s. We have to be cautious about these sources, too. They belong to an intellectual tradition that tends to attribute progress in behavioral genetics and intelligence research to a racist conspiracy. This is not mainstream and it limits the credibility of these sources.

Perhaps this is research and therefore not acceptable for Wikipedia, but this kind of information is publicly available for everyone who bothers to look it up, and Wikipedia articles shouldn't disseminate things that just aren't true. Burlika (talk) 13:29, 28 August 2018 (UTC)

Where are all these single purpose accounts coming from?

It can't be a coincidence that in the last few weeks we've had User:Burlika whose only edit is to this page, User:Anamika1988 who only seems to be editing MQ related pages with their 18 edits, and now the above editor whose first edit is here. Doug Weller talk 11:44, 9 September 2018 (UTC)

The other SPA was Gmeisenberg... It possibly could be the same person, although old accounts seem abandoned, avoiding concurrent edits... —PaleoNeonate – 23:03, 9 September 2018 (UTC)

Concerning the sources, the article already says that the journal was criticized during the "Bell Curve wars". The Bell Curve wars were polemic rather than scientific in nature. Therefore there is no disagreement about the nature of the sources. In addition, the quotations from these sources in the article prove that these are polemical rather than scholarly sources. No serious scholar would write about "tainted sources", "scientific racism's keepers of the flame" etc. It is also agreed that only one side in the Bell Curve wars is cited in the article. So much about NPOV. More to the point, the article has very little verifiable information about the journal. It's mainly name-calling. Therefore I just made a few cautious additions to remedy this deficiency, without deleting anything: 1. Added one more sentence about the kinds of articles that the journal publishes, and another one about the subjects that are most prominently represented in the journal. Justification: This is standard information about academic journals. The additions reflect the content of recently published articles (all available on Google Scholar), and are essential information about any journal. 2. I folded the section about editors into the introductory part. Justification: This is basic information about the journal that should be up front. We are not dealing with a big and important journal justifying an article with many sections. 3. One sentence with information about geographical origins of the editorial board members is added. Justification: In addition to place of publication, this provides additional information about the geographical reach of the journal. This is especially important here because international orientation is a main feature of the journal. This is also reflected in the authors. According to Google Scholar, of the 61 authors who published in Mankind Quarterly in 2017, 19 were from Europe, 9 from North America or Oceania, 7 from the former Soviet Union, 14 from Middle East or North Africa, 6 from Asia, 4 from Latin America or the Caribbean, and 2 from sub-Saharan Africa. An unusually large percentage of 45% of articles qualified as international collaborations. While info about authors may be prohibited research, the origins of the editors are simple factual information verifiable with a single citation. 4. One sentence from the introductory (and main) part has been moved to the Criticism section. Justification: This sentence consists of quotes from activists mainly from the time of the Bell Curve Wars. It is puerile name-calling with zero factual information, therefore it doesn’t belong here. We have to separate the adult stuff from the culture warfare. Yucahu (talk) 22:50, 14 September 2018 (UTC)

Why did you post this here, and not the section above? This comment doesn't relate to this topic, making it disruptive. You still haven't answered Doug Weller's questions, which is important. Constantly introducing new complaints while ignoring other people's responses is not appropriate behavior.
Further, all of your comments, and most of the comments of your "predecessors" on this page, have been original research. Original research is not permitted on Wikipedia. If a reliable source compiles this information and presents the conclusion that the journal has somehow rehabilitated its abysmal reputation, let's see it. As a primary, involved sources with an abysmal reputation for accuracy and fact checking, Mankind is not a reliable source for anything other than the most routine, least controversial details. Wikipedia isn't a platform for advocacy or promotion, and as an encyclopedia, Wikipedia is especially not interested in whitewashing WP:FRINGE topics like scientific racism.
So, regarding this topic. Right now Gmeisenberg, Burlika, Anamika1988, and now Yucahu are all SPAs, all use the same formal grammar and wall-of-text long paragraphs, show enthusiasm for sampling the journal itself to WP:SYNTH conclusions about its ideology, are strongly familiar with the journal's history and contributors, and are only shallowly familiar with NPOV. I consider SPI a last resort, but if this becomes any more disruptive than it already is, I will start one. Grayfell (talk) 23:01, 14 September 2018 (UTC)

Grayfell, you are obfuscating things. What new complaints are you talking about? The fact is simply that we have here a crappy article with zero factual information. It is an embarrassment for Wikipedia. All the edits that I made and that you deleted were pieces of factual information. Describing kinds of articles published by the journal is not research. Listing journal content is not research. And listing national origins of editors from the journal website is not research. Why do you not want this in the article? Info of this kind is standard in articles about academic journals. You are abusing the No Research argument to keep relevant information out of the article. You mention scientific racism. So you admit that you have an agenda, and that factual information of the kind that I added doesn’t fit with your agenda. Right? Please describe your agenda. What are the claims that you are pushing? Be specific. What is uncontroversial is that the journal was founded by people who believed in the importance of race differences at a time when this view was falling out of favor due to political developments. Although it is sectarian jargon and therefore not very appropriate for Wikipedia, you can call this “scientific racism” if you like, in the same sense that others have written about “international finance Jewry” to describe certain real-world phenomena. The origin of the journal belongs in a specific historical context more than half a century ago. What you seem to claim is that the journal is racist now. If this is your point, you have to provide verifiable evidence for this. Facts, in other words, not remote guilt by association and retweets of ancient tirades. You have not done this. If you can find verifiable evidence, this should be included in the article, together with any available counterevidence. That’s how things are meant to work. Yucahu (talk) 16:51, 15 September 2018 (UTC)

We need independent sources, not editors, to describe the journal. We would normally list only people who are notable enough to have their own articles, and rely upon those articles to mention their national origins. That's the way we work - or rather should work, you will always find articles that don't follow our policies and guidelines. The term "scientific racism" is perfectly appropriate, by the way. I'm concerned about your comment about people writing about "international finance Jewry" to describe real-world phenomenon. If you want another editor to discuss their agenda, perhaps you should explain that first. Doug Weller talk 17:39, 15 September 2018 (UTC)

The proposal is not to list individual editors, either with or without their countries, but only the countries where editors come from. This is not done with most journals, but should be done here because the presence of people from developing countries (e.g., Middle East) and historically excluded ones (e.g., ex-Soviet Union) is sufficiently unique that it provides important information about the journal, for example for people from these countries who want to submit a paper for publication. The independent source is the journal website. The analogy between scientific racism and international finance Jewry is obvious. Both terms are "ethnic markers" that identify the writer as member of a (fringe) community. Both were created to disparage people (Jews and scientists, respectively), and both are associated with conspiracy theories. Hitler blamed international finance Jewry for the German defeats in both world wars (therefore the holocaust), and those fighting scientific racism blame scientists for the problems of minority groups in America. That's why it looks bad to have this stuff in Wikipedia articles, except those that deal specifically with these ideologies. The broader problem with this article is that it has all the trappings of an attack page on some snarky portal. There is the sectarian lingo, the retweeted insults, selective omission of facts, twisting of sentences to imply things for which no evidence is presented... We should not underestimate the intelligence of Wikipedia users. When people read the Wikipedia article and then they check the abstracts on the journal website or the published papers on Google Scholar, they will conclude that the Wikipedia article is rubbish. Actually, they will conclude that immediately when they read the article. At the very least, the article should be structured properly to present only basic info about the (real)journal in the lead, only info about the history in the history section, and only info about controversies in the criticism section. Yucahu (talk) 17:16, 16 September 2018 (UTC)

THe journal is not an independent source, we would need independent secondary sources showing that the origin of the editors is signficant, see WP:UNDUE. And no, the lead is a summary of the article, we aren't going to keep any of the main points out of the lead. See WP:LEAD. You are asking us to break our policies and guidelines. Doug Weller talk 17:40, 16 September 2018 (UTC)
Struck sock edits this time as User:Grayfell has also replied. Doug Weller talk 13:51, 3 October 2018 (UTC)

"peer-reviewed academic journal"

There is some edit-warring going on about whether this (admittedly crappy) journal should be described as "peer-reviewed academic journal". Some editors want to remove this as "puffery", but in my eyes, neither "peer-reviewed" nor "academic" are badges of honor, but just neutral descriptors. Being a "peer-reviewed academic journal" does not guarantee that the peer-review is actually good or that the academic stuff is not perhaps in the realm of fringe or even pseudoscience. --Randykitty (talk) 22:55, 4 January 2019 (UTC)

For now I will accept that this is peer reviewed in some capacity, and "academic" is vague enough to be a distraction. So if these are accurate, does that mean they belong in the first sentence? Are these descriptors helping people to understand the topic, or are they confusing things by emphasizing specific qualities beyond their significance? Peer review exists as an assurance of quality, to put it simply. Why else bother with this process? So while, of course, the reviews might be terrible or incompetent or conflicted, the underlying assumption is that this is a positive trait. Otherwise it would be no more significant that the font size or mailing address or similar trivial qualities. In this sense it's a lot like "award winning". The awards could be "Worst of the year" but that's not what's implied, and that's the problem. As I see it, indirectly implying that something is a positive trait, and listing it as a defining trait, is a form of puffery. Grayfell (talk) 23:19, 4 January 2019 (UTC)
Well-said. To the average reader, these descriptions are badges indicating that the journal is respectable and reliable. Sure, many of us know that there are too many predatory journals (this one isn't predatory) that also use that description, but we aren't the average reader. Doug Weller talk 14:06, 5 January 2019 (UTC)
Do we have articles on Astrology journals that are described as "peer-reviewed academic journals"? If so, then this journal could also be so described, no? Pascalulu88 (talk) 01:47, 23 January 2024 (UTC)
I don't think we should adapt our writing because we think our readers aren't sophisticated enough to understand us. And as soon as people read beyond the opening phrase, they'll see that this is generally considered to be a crappy journal, peer review and academic notwithstanding. But let me propose an alternative wording that might satisfy us all, by just reordering the lead a bit:

Mankind Quarterly is a peer-reviewed academic journal that has been described as a "cornerstone of the scientific racism establishment" and a "white supremacist journal",[1] "scientific racism's keepers of the flame",[2] a journal with a "racist orientation" and an "infamous racist journal",[3] and a "journal of 'scientific racism'".[4] It covers physical and cultural anthropology, including human evolution, intelligence, ethnography, linguistics, mythology, archaeology, etc., and aims to unify anthropology with biology. It is published by the Ulster Institute for Social Research in London.

How about this? --Randykitty (talk) 14:28, 5 January 2019 (UTC)

I think it makes more sense to describe what a journal covers before quoting a barrage of descriptions from critics. If you were describing a book to someone, would you first give them quotes from a bunch of reviews (e.g. "most thorough book written", "extreme in detail") and then tell the person what the book is about (e.g. history of Roman Empire)? Probably not. So I would reverse the order above, but the version above is OK with me as well. Deleet (talk) 17:43, 5 January 2019 (UTC)

There's a double standard being employed here which no one seems to be highlighting: If we are to claim that, because a descriptor has secondary positive effects, we should be weary about including said descriptor in the first line or even at all, we would have to apply this consideration to every article. We don't because Wikipedia aims for neutrality, and the only reason why there's controversy here is because this journal has been accused of scientific racism and the people removing the descriptors don't want to give the journal any incidental praise even if the descriptors are factually true. It is as though there were a band of people meticulously editing Adolf Hitler's article opening paragraph to remove descriptors like "dictator" and "leader", in fear that, by leaving descriptors which incidentally praise him, we are somehow complicit in creating a soapbox for anti-Semitism. This is bias, full stop. 2601:42:800:A9DB:247A:471F:BF64:D64D (talk) 22:26, 5 January 2019 (UTC)

Bottom line is that you need independent reliable sources for "peer reviewed" and "academic". That's all there is to it.Volunteer Marek (talk) 08:36, 7 January 2019 (UTC)

  • But we can call it a journal, can we? Or do we need an independent source for that, too? Should we call it a periodical? Any source for that? Do we have an independent source for who publishes it? No? Then that should go, too. Any independent source for who the editor-in-chief is? Or do we throw that out, too? This is getting ridiculous. Saying that it is a peer-reviewed academic journal is as much puffery as saying that it's cover is read (oops, we have no independent source for that, just the cover itself). --Randykitty (talk) 09:34, 7 January 2019 (UTC)
I took the time to look for some sources for this, mainly using Google Books and Google Scholar. Here's some I found:
@Randykitty: Could you give your input about how to proceed? It seems clear from the discussion on this page that there isn't consensus for the removal of the terms "peer reviewed" and "academic", and the editors restoring this change have not engaged with the arguments against it.
There is a similar situation on the Linda Gottfredson article, involving the same two editors, so I'd appreciate you giving your input there as well. Deleet (talk) 05:24, 10 January 2019 (UTC)
  • Hi, thanks for these sources. The Index Copernicus is not very important (they mostly present user-contributed stuff) and close to being "fake", but the books are fine. What should be done here is clear. For years this article started with "peer-reviewed" and "academic" in the first sentence of the lead. This was boldly changed in mid-December, but then challenged. Per WP:BOLD, this means that the stable version should be restored and the issue discussed on the talk page. I also note that this article is under discretionary sanctions. What should happen is that the editor who has been edit-warring to keep "academic" and "peer-reviewed" out of the lead would self-revert until the discussion here comes to a consensus to change the lead. As for the Gottfredson article, yes, I saw that something similar is going on there. For the moment I don't intend to get involved, but I would like to warn any editors involved that that article is also under discretioonary sanctions (and they should especially read what is said on the talk page about "tag team editing". --Randykitty (talk) 09:11, 10 January 2019 (UTC)

Given the silence here, I am going to restore the long-term stable version (i.e. "peer-reviewed academic journal"). As there was disagreement about my compromise proposal, I will not implement that at this time. Please do not revert back until consensus has been reached at this discussion. Thanks. --Randykitty (talk) 22:39, 10 January 2019 (UTC)

The Cattell link doesn't contain the cited text on 148, but it certainly says some things about Mankind's reputation. Perhaps the book itself does, but the linked version doesn't describe the journal as academic or peer-reviewed. At least, not for me, but Google is like that, so... The available content on the journal describes it not as a scientific or academic work, but as part of a walled garden of scientific racism. A source which characterizes the journal in ideological terms cannot be used to justify a vague, unsupportable adjective implying its methodological legitimacy. This is directly contrary to the substance of the source, which is to discount the journal's legitimacy.
The Aryan Idols source also seems to have difficulty with Google's OCR, but if we wanted to call it "academic, racist journal" we would be having a different conversation, wouldn't we?
As noted, the Index Copernicus page is a routine listing which was almost certainly provided by the journal itself, making it useless. The last one is even more flimsy. What is the Kentucky Tech "anthropology guide"? It appears to be a single page handout for undergrad class or similar. No author or instructor or anything at all explaining what it is or where it came from other than the URL. Without context, it's absolutely nothing.
I'm sure there are more sources that someone with a point to prove could cobble together, but that's not good practice. Anybody can google "mankind quarterly peer review" and regurgitate it on a talk page. We judge sources in context, and the two usable source presented strongly support a context of racism and pseudoscience first, with other qualities as secondary. Ignoring the context to pull adjectives out of a source is cherry-picking. Nobody is disputing that these terms apply, in some broad sense, we are disputing that they belong as part of the very first sentence, and we are disputing that they provide a neutral, helpful summary to readers.
So again, which reliable sources treat "peer reviewed" as a defining trait, above and beyond "racist"? Grayfell (talk) 02:07, 11 January 2019 (UTC)
You're turning things around. For 99.9% of all academic journals on which we have articles, we accept "peer-reviewed academic journal" if a periodical describes itself as such. Just as we accept "monthly journal" from their own website, without asking for an independent source. Then, if there are peer-review failures that have been documented (think Sokal hoax, for example), we discuss those in the article. The same should be done here. MQ describes itself as "peer-reviewed academic journal". We have good sources that tell us that this is basically an academic "walled garden" as you call it. We also have good sources that document that it publishes crap and is a racist rag. All that stuff belongs in the article. But just as we accept MQ's claim that they publish on a quarterly basis, just so should we call it a "peer-reviewed academic journal". There really is no risk that people will only read the first line and think "wow, this is a respected journal!" In addition, we could modify the first line as I proposed above and then even a lazy reader who doesn't go farther than the first line knows exactly what they are dealing with. I'm pinging DGG, who as academic librarian may have something to contribute to this discussion. --Randykitty (talk) 09:03, 11 January 2019 (UTC)
  • Peer-reviewed academic journal is a very loose descriptor. The nature and rigor of the review in different journals can vary very widely. Even some of the parasitic journals are technically peer-reviewed--the articles are indeed set out for review, but the recommendation is expected to be to accept them, and almost always is. Judging the quality of the peer review is a key step in evaluating a journal. There are common small abuses of the system--papers written by members of the editorial board are sometimes not reviewed further, or sent to reviewers who will know to recommend they be accepted. This was the case for 2 papers of mine (admittedly in a second rate journal), but also for one in a first rate journal where my advisor was the North American editor. Some journals of the highest standard have not been formally peer reviewed. In earlier years PNAS would publish anything submitted by a member of the academy, and Nature under a previous editor sometimes published papers just atthe editor's discretion.
There are also exceptions to peer review in journals that are basically peer-reviewed. If there is a news or editorial section, material there is usually published at the discretion of the editor. If the first article in an issue is a review, as is the case for many journals, the reviews are done by invitation of the editor, and are not necessarily pee-reviewed. Book reviews are almost never peer-reviewed, and it is at the discretion of the editor to send a book to a friend or enemy of the book's author. If the journal publishes a special issue, the papers are accepted at the discretion of the special issue editor--they maybe sent for review, or they may not. Once when I edited a special issue, I made sure everything was peer reviewed, because some of the authors I wanted could claim credit only for explicitly peer-reviewed articles.

With respect to MQ, peer review is not a ay or avoiding bias. Editors use their own judgement is deciding where to send articles for review. In any field where there is consistent major controversy, there are normally journals whose editors tend to support each of the positions, and the articles are sent to reviewers of the same persuasion. There have been fields where all the major journals have been of one particular position, and that leaves authors of another tendency the choice between getting their friends together and starting a new journal, or publishing in a more general journal, sometimes an obscure one that may never have heard of the controversy.

It's a very rough standard. To use it as the only standard in the academic world indicates in my opinion less than first rate academic judgement, whether by an instructor in limiting sources used for a student paper, or academic administrators evaluating faculty for tenure. But it is in wide use, and it's one of the basic things people want to know. DGG ( talk ) 17:36, 12 January 2019 (UTC)

Thank you for that helpful perspective.
As I said multiple times, I don't think anyone is disputing that Mankind is peer-reviewed in some capacity, so that's not the issue I have with it being in the lede. We should be clear about what the goal of this Wikipedia article is. I absolutely do think that some editors will read the first sentence and then misinterpret that to mean this is a respected journal. This is a legitimate risk, and giving misleading impressions is the kind of thing Wikipedia should be concerned about for obvious reasons. As DGG points out, it's clearly not as simple as a basic fact, since it's often used as a pass/fail test for legitimacy, but its a flawed one, at best. People who have experience with academic publishing are going to have different perspectives on this than people who don't. We have to accommodate that and hopefully explain this in language both audiences will understand.
This is about describing this specific journal as academic and peer reviewed. This journal is primarily known for its ideological slant and historical association with pseudoscience. If other journals with similar documented histories have similar issues let me know (seriously), and perhaps we should discuss this elsewhere. We have to evaluate this article based on its own sources and its own merits.
Again, I do think a significant subset of readers are likely to see "peer reviewed" and "academic", misinterpret what that actually means, and read no further. The lede, and even the the first few words of the lede, are frequently the only thing people see. It's tempting to be dismissive of this as lazy, but there are legitimate reasons for this, especially for mobile users. Grayfell (talk) 22:22, 12 January 2019 (UTC)
  • In that case I would once again like to point to my compromise proposal above, which avoids any misinterpretation, even if all people read is the first sentence of the article. --Randykitty (talk) 05:07, 13 January 2019 (UTC)
Yes, absolutely. I would accept this as an improvement over the current wording. The first paragraph should mention two things: what it is (an anthropology journal), and why it's noteworthy (very poor reputation, racism). If "peer reviewed" fits into that, that's fine, but we should be careful not to create a false impression. I admit this is awkward and seemingly fussy, but this is important. Grayfell (talk) 23:32, 15 January 2019 (UTC)
We must remember that “sending the right message” is secondary to describing the journal in an encyclopedic manner. The lede should first include its description as a peer-reviewed academic journal and the branches of science it specializes in, before the charged criticisms are noted. It is neutral and fair to add them at the end of the lede since many independent sources do address the journal as such, but to include them in the first sentence is contrary to how we address other journals and denies the journal fair representation. That said, I agree with Randy’s proposal so long as the order is reversed — fair description first, criticism second. 2601:42:800:A9DB:B127:69FF:2D5E:EA54 (talk) 05:21, 16 January 2019 (UTC)
Nobody said anything about "sending the right message", and I'm not sure what's encyclopedic about misleading information. Ignoring context and reliable sources to treat this journal like other, superficially similar journals is not impartial, it's partial. They are specifically saying that this isn't like other, respected journals. Presenting this as similar to other journals implies it has a level of credibility which has not been demonstrated by any reliable source I have seen. We treat this journal in proportion to how sources treat it. That's how Wikipedia determines "fair representation". Therefor we should not feel obligated to present this the same as other journals. Sources do not treat this as prestigious or even legitimate, they treat it as obscure, pseudo-scientific and fringe. There's nothing wrong with writing a Wikipedia article to clearly indicate what sources say about a topic. Grayfell (talk) 00:10, 17 January 2019 (UTC)
I fail to see what is "misleading" about saying that this is a peer-reviewed journal of scientific racism. Obviously, the "peers" reviewing for such a journal would be other scientific racists, otherwise it would soon stop being racist and rejoin mainstream science. And like it or not, but many of these scientific racists (for example, J. Philippe Rushton, Glayde Whitney, Arthur Jensen, or Gerhard Meisenberg) are academics, so what's the problem with calling the journal they publish in an "academic journal"? Being an academic (just like being an academic journal) does not mean that one is a good academic. It's just a job description. Same for peer-reviewed. Now if you have sources that state that the peer-review here is non-existent or crappy, that can be added to the article (just as we do for predatory publishers such as OMICS Publishing Group). In any case, the article and its sources already make it abundantly clear that this is a crappy journal, even with "peer-reviewed academic" included. --Randykitty (talk) 10:08, 17 January 2019 (UTC)
This source is cited at Roger Pearson (anthropologist) for the claim that Pearson used many pseudonyms for the journal to praise and review his own work:
I don't currently have access to this source, so I am not willing to add or remove it from an article, but I accept that this claim is valid. This is not real peer review, this is deception.
If we accept that the "peers" might not be credible or reliable, or even exist, why does being peer reviewed actually matter? To me, this starts to look similar to "award winning". It's implying something that might be factually accurate, but which doesn't seem particularly meaningful either way. Even without this, a journal which is peer-reviewed by pseudoscientists (such as scientific racists) is, fundamentally, no more legitimate than one which is not peer reviewed at all. So who, other than scientific racists, actually cares? This is why it seems misleading. People who don't fully understand what "peer reviewed" means might not realize the significance of this detail, and those who already accept scientific racism aren't going to care either way. So why should we?
I have mixed feelings about "academic". It is potentially promotional, but this is an academic journal, not a general magazine, and the term makes this clear. Grayfell (talk) 01:12, 18 January 2019 (UTC)

Per my now-defunct Quackford English Ducktionary, this is not peer-reviewed, it's appear-reviewed. :-) Guy (Help!) 17:14, 23 January 2019 (UTC)

"Appear-reviewed"! Yes.
I have made Randykitty's proposed change, since there seems to be total consensus among unblocked editors.
I'm going to try and track down Tucker's book, and if it's useful, I will expand this article based on that. If this does challenge the legitimacy of this "peer review", we can reevaluate at that time. Grayfell (talk) 22:28, 30 March 2019 (UTC)
The other thing to consider is that our emphasis and WP:DUE weight depends on the weight and focus of the sources. If they describe themselves as peer-reviewed, but that gets little focus or attention in the sources, then it shouldn't be given prominence in the article, either. Or, more specifically - what sources are we relying on to describe it as peer-reviewed? It is obviously not a RS about anything and this is clearly too self-serving a claim to be cited via WP:ABOUTSELF. Neither do I think that the indexes and lists above are sufficient - they generally rely on self-reporting; they're not actual RS coverage. --Aquillion (talk) 04:42, 23 January 2024 (UTC)

Source ages

User:IntoThinAir, I saw your edit with the Mehler, Barry (December 1989) source. Do you think you could find something newer? I don't object to the edit or source, but as noted in WP:RS would be nice to have a more recent one. Deleet (talk) 15:37, 10 January 2019 (UTC)

References

"Mankind Quarterly" is not a reliable source for its own article. There is long-standing consensus for the current lead and several reliable sources are provided explaining why the journal is regarded as controversial. Mathsci (talk) 00:38, 23 December 2020 (UTC)

Revert explanation

CLOSED
Editor who proposed this has been blocked as a sock. –dlthewave ☎ 04:16, 2 February 2021 (UTC)

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Mathsci on Dec 23rd reverted to a previous version with no explanation of the revert. Next time, edit specific things that you have a problem with & list the reasons why you are removing them, and even better, discuss on the talk page. This is more helpful than reverting everything, as helpful information and other edits were deleted. I've undone mathsci's revert but kept the changes made by IP 84.251.87.218 and Monkbot that were added after mathsci's revert. DishingMachine (talk • contribs) 18:43, 25 January 2021 (UTC)

The explanation is in the section above. Mankind Quarterly is not a reliable source, and the things you are trying to cite it for are unduly self-serving, so they can't be used via WP:ABOUTSELF, either. --Aquillion (talk) 19:48, 25 January 2021 (UTC)
This is valid, the language they use on their website is biased. Thank you for the explanation. However, the Wikipedia page for the National Institutes of Health cites itself, for example. I obviously see the difference here, but I don't think literally all remotely self-citing statements need to be removed, in line with WP:ABOUTSELF.
I will consider adding back some information if it meets the following criteria:
the material is neither unduly self-serving nor an exceptional claim;

it does not involve claims about third parties; it does not involve claims about events not directly related to the source; there is no reasonable doubt as to its authenticity; and the article is not based primarily on such sources.

For example, the editorial board "includes scholars from 12 countries who represent a wide variety of disciplines including primatology, physical anthropology, archaeology, cultural anthropology, human genetics, differential psychology, sociology, and history."[1] is unduly self-serving, but some of these fields of research were there before my edit. The wording can be changed to the editorial board "includes scholars from 12 countries" who have done work in various fields, such as "primatology, physical anthropology, archaeology, cultural anthropology, human genetics, differential psychology, sociology, and history."[1]
This does not violate WP:ABOUTSELF and does not violate reliable source as the specific information listed here is not controversial; indeed, the organization themselves is the only source where this information can be sourced from.
Additionally, the edit:
The journal states that the editors "welcome controversy and new ideas," and "see it as part of the journal’s mission to provide a forum for the presentation and discussion of theories and empiric research that challenge entrenched beliefs."[1]
is not a statement of fact, but is simply a quote. The quote isn't stated as true, and is a (and is in fact the most) reliable source on itself. It's fine to use the journal as a source for a quote about the journal.
I will consider adding these two edits, with biased wording removed, if there isn't a valid reason why they shouldn't remain.

DishingMachine (talk • contribs) 18:43, 25 January 2021 (UTC)

Aquillion has stated it well in their most recent edit summary: "rm. unduly self-serving cites to Mankind Quarterly itself; not a WP:RS, not citable for this via WP:ABOUTSELF." Mathsci was right to revert you in the first instance too. It might help to reflect on both WP:NPOV and WP:CONS before editing further. Generalrelative (talk) 23:18, 25 January 2021 (UTC)
Agreed. The information added was unduly self-serving. The article doesn't benefit from vague and poorly-attributed quotes plucked from the website and stripped of context. This kind of puffery wouldn't belong in any article, but it especially doesn't belong here. Wikipedia is not a platform for promotion, and a pseudojournal with a documented history of manipulation is not reliable to describe itself. Grayfell (talk) 23:54, 25 January 2021 (UTC)

References

  1. ^ a b c "Mankind Quarterly - About". www.mankindquarterly.org. Retrieved 2020-12-21.
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The lead still seems to downplay this journal's negative reputation

As I've said before, I do not think the lead properly explains just how fringe this journal is. Emphasizing its peer-reviewed status as a simplistic fact still falsely implies a level of legitimacy which is not supported by reliable independent sources.

I just came across this incident from 2020:

Gregory Christainsen is an economist and emeritus professor at California State University, East Bay. He's been published in Mankind Quarterly (at least) twice in 2016 and again in 2020. In 2020, it came out that his teaching included pseudoscience about racial IQ rankings, as well as his work for Mankind. This lead to a closer look at earlier work with ISIR and Intelligence (journal).

The school's senate (who are Christainsen's peers in the conventional sense) voted to censure Christainsen, citing his work with Mankind and other papers as a demonstration of academic malpractice. According to the school paper, a knock-on effect of this was a petition to remove the dean of Christainsen's department from his position.

The connection drawn by sources from this incident to Mankind specifically is not as clear as I would like, but it does say something about what being published in Mankind can do to someone's career. Grayfell (talk) 00:36, 4 September 2022 (UTC)

The controversy section is also a bit brief. It received a significant amount of controversy from the moment it was founded; there are entire fairly significant papers devoted to criticising it from the moment it was founded (eg. [4]) up to today. Comas' critique seems particularly worth mentioning in-depth because it appears to have gotten a lot of followup coverage both at the time and more recently. --Aquillion (talk) 04:07, 4 September 2022 (UTC)
In agree with you both, and I support bold edits to bring this article more into line with the way its subject is discussed in reliable, independent sources. Another option would be to eliminate the "Controversy" section and simply fold it into "History", as is suggested by the essay WP:CRITICISM. After all, the History section is mostly devoted to controversy and criticism already, which is only proper per NPOV. That aspect could certainly be expanded. Generalrelative (talk) 16:48, 4 September 2022 (UTC)
I like the idea of merging the criticism section with the history section. As you say, the journal always been controversial. Grayfell (talk) 22:33, 4 September 2022 (UTC)

How can you expect the lead to be anymore damning? Before people even know what it is about they are told it is a bad thing that should never be read.

What use is there of a controversy section if the whole article is covered in diatribes about the journal's racism? The grammar of the controversy section also needs to be touched up "supporting eugenics,[32] racist or fascist.[33][34". Is it eugenicist? Is it racist? Is it facist? Is it 2 of the 3? Is it fascist but not racist? Is it racist but not fascist? ~~ Kind Regards, NotAnotherNameGuy (talk) 15:42, 21 September 2022 (UTC)

What use is there of a controversy section Indeed. See WP:CSECTION.
If you want something positive, you need reliable sources saying something positive. --Hob Gadling (talk) 15:53, 21 September 2022 (UTC)
here: [5] on a prominent far-right website, you can read an endorsement of Mankind Quarterly, which is supposedly a "groundbreaking racialist journal". Pearson, the publisher of the journal, just to give you an account of his personal beliefs alone, said later on in the interview: "I thoroughly enjoyed Montana. The people were very nice, and even the people at the university were. There were no real Left-wingers, and I can’t remember any colored people on the faculty. it was amazing. It was a very happy time there." He was chairman of the WACL which was basically a world right wing extremist network. Mankind Quarterly has deep ties to right wing extremism. Freyheytlid (talk) 07:38, 10 March 2023 (UTC)
that link got removed: in hindsight I'm quite glad it did. that's a vile page. Regardless, Mankind Quarterly is a vital part of the racist pseudoscience establishment. This is an established fact Freyheytlid (talk) 07:39, 10 March 2023 (UTC)
Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk:Mankind_Quarterly/Archive_1&oldid=1227262455"