Template:Did you know nominations/Non-science
- The following is an archived discussion of the DYK nomination of the article below. Please do not modify this page. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as this nomination's talk page, the article's talk page or Wikipedia talk:Did you know), unless there is consensus to re-open the discussion at this page. No further edits should be made to this page.
The result was: rejected by BlueMoonset (talk) 16:17, 13 October 2018 (UTC)
Article was created over six months ago now, and problems persist that do not seem solvable. Time to close this; it can be nominated again should it ever become a Good Article, which would be a good indication that the problems had been overcome.
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Non-science[edit]
... that history is non-science?
Created by WhatamIdoing (talk). Self-nominated at 23:56, 16 April 2018 (UTC).
- Starting the review.Zigzig20s (talk) 19:32, 17 April 2018 (UTC)
- New enough.
- Long enough.
- Well-sourced, with one error in formatting (confusion with article title/work) that I've fixed.
- No close paraphrasing detected.
- Neutral tone.
- The hook is properly formatted, short enough, neutral and interesting.
*User:WhatamIdoing: Do you have a QPQ please?Zigzig20s (talk) 23:14, 17 April 2018 (UTC)
- I don't think that I have five DYK credits yet, but I reviewed Superfest International Disability Film Festival last year. WhatamIdoing (talk) 15:23, 18 April 2018 (UTC)
- Hello, I came by to promote this, but the article right now has a big "{{Globalize}}" template in one of its sections. This might need to be resolved first before this is approved. Narutolovehinata5 tccsdnew 00:15, 28 April 2018 (UTC)
- User:SteveMcCluskey: I removed it as undue. Wikipedia is a work in progress, everything could potentially be improved, but I don't see it as a pressing issue and if it's going to block the DYK, that's not good. The issue could potentially be addressed afterwards, although I don't see it as a problem frankly.Zigzig20s (talk) 07:26, 28 April 2018 (UTC)
It seems there are no more objections from SteveMcCluskey so I am restoring Zigzig20s' tick. Narutolovehinata5 tccsdnew 14:47, 28 April 2018 (UTC)
The hook is decidedly not neutral as there are sources (now cited in the article) that put history (and other humanistic disciplines) within the sciences. SteveMcCluskey (talk) 15:36, 28 April 2018 (UTC)
- User:SteveMcCluskey: I removed it as undue. Wikipedia is a work in progress, everything could potentially be improved, but I don't see it as a pressing issue and if it's going to block the DYK, that's not good. The issue could potentially be addressed afterwards, although I don't see it as a problem frankly.Zigzig20s (talk) 07:26, 28 April 2018 (UTC)
@WhatamIdoing and Zigzig20s: It seems we might need a new hook here given that Steve has added sources which appear to contradict the hook. Narutolovehinata5 tccsdnew 01:56, 29 April 2018 (UTC)
- Not really. Archeology is not history, stricto sensu. History would be the interpretation (or commentary) of archaeological discoveries. Zigzig20s (talk) 02:00, 29 April 2018 (UTC)
- @Zigzig20s: Do you have any suggestions for alternative hooks? Narutolovehinata5 tccsdnew 02:07, 29 April 2018 (UTC)
- I think the suggested hook works, as archeology is not history. It's a tool of history, like statistics or geography.Zigzig20s (talk) 02:09, 29 April 2018 (UTC)
- @SteveMcCluskey: Thoughts? Narutolovehinata5 tccsdnew 02:25, 29 April 2018 (UTC)
- Hello, all, I understand that there's some legitimate disagreement about classifying archaeology in this concept (i.e., a concept that separates natural sciences and similar disciplines from other knowledge-generating activities, like religion and art), because archaeology contains both science and non-science aspects, and any given researcher's work might be best described as one label or the other. Steve added information about the OECD's bureaucratic numbering system, but archaeology isn't really the important example there. The OECD's list explicitly includes the whole of humanities as one of the six areas of science and technology. This means that the OECD believes that (for their funding and statistical purposes) art and religion are "sciences". Opera and religious ceremonies are all perfectly fine in their own way, and they are perfectly legitimate Wissenschaftlich subjects – but they are not Science (in what Steve calls the English sense of the word, i.e., the only sense that's actually relevant for this article). The point of the OECD classification is that when a government gives a grant to encourage religious participation, then that should be called "science and technology research". The point of this concept is that religion is not science.
- Also, as a general point, I'd like to say that a bureaucratic classification system is a weak source for deciding how one ought to organize knowledge. Epistemiology is an ancient academic subject that is not constrained by the rules written 12 years ago about how governments ought to report their research and development spending to another government agency that they hope will give them money. But if Steve really believes that's the true definition, then I'd invite him to add that definition to Science and see if he can get a consensus for it. If editors agree to re-define Science as including all of these "non-science" subjects, such as the entire list of things called "Humanities" in the OECD list, then we could merge this article away and be done with it. But if they don't – if, as I suspect they will, they insist upon defining Science as being only and exclusively systematic knowledge of a particular kind, and therefore all other knowledge is not science – then we should set the subject of this article accordingly (and probably link to Wissenschaft in the article about the OECD's FOS categories, so readers don't get so confused about religion being considered "science and technology"). WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:47, 29 April 2018 (UTC)
- I think the suggested hook works, as archeology is not history. It's a tool of history, like statistics or geography.Zigzig20s (talk) 02:09, 29 April 2018 (UTC)
- @Zigzig20s: Do you have any suggestions for alternative hooks? Narutolovehinata5 tccsdnew 02:07, 29 April 2018 (UTC)
- Not really. Archeology is not history, stricto sensu. History would be the interpretation (or commentary) of archaeological discoveries. Zigzig20s (talk) 02:00, 29 April 2018 (UTC)
- @WhatamIdoing: Do you have alternative suggestions for a hook then? It seems the original won't fly. Narutolovehinata5 tccsdnew 00:00, 30 April 2018 (UTC)
- Why isn't the original acceptable? It's sourced, and it's the mainstream position. Finding "history" listed in a document about how to report government funding of "science and technology" does not actually prove that there is a general consensus that history is science. WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:27, 30 April 2018 (UTC)
- @WhatamIdoing: I'm personally fine with the hook, it's SteveMcCluskey who has issues with it. Anyway I took a look at the source given in the article, and while it suggests history is considered a non-science, the same article suggests that there's significant debate on the matter and the status of history as a science or non-science is controversial. I suppose to be on the safe side, an alternate hook is suggested here while the original hook remains under discussion. Narutolovehinata5 tccsdnew 03:17, 30 April 2018 (UTC)
- The cited source says, "The English word “science” is primarily used about the natural sciences and other fields of research that are considered to be similar to them. Hence, political economy and sociology are counted as sciences, whereas studies of literature and history are usually not." That doesn't sound like classifying history as non-science is controversial. At minimum, it's no more controversial than the whole (English and French) idea that there is some significant difference between the study of physics and the study of morality, which some (mostly German- and Dutch-speaking) philosophers reject. It is true that some historians in the 19th century tried to re-define science to include the historians' particular style of creating knowledge, but it didn't fly. (See Nomothetic and idiographic for some of that; 'the proton always behaves thusly under these circumstances' is nomothetic knowledge, but 'this Great Man, in this time and place, behaved thusly' is idiographic.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 03:53, 30 April 2018 (UTC)
- My concern is that the article can be read as taking non-science as an inferior grade of "knowledge" -- or even as not being real knowledge at all. Hanssen nicely addresses this issue in his article in the Encyclopedia of Philosophy: "The German term [Wissenschaft] has the advantage of more adequately delimiting of [sic] the type of systematic knowledge that is at stake in the conflict between science and pseudoscience. The misrepresentations of history presented by Holocaust deniers and other pseudo-historians are very similar in nature to the misrepresentations of natural science promoted by creationists and homeopaths." Unfortunately, this important concern is not addressed by the Wikipedia article Non-science, which is one of my problems with it. --SteveMcCluskey (talk) 19:32, 30 April 2018 (UTC)
- I think that having this article at all is the first step in addressing your concern. Step 1 in not thinking that non-science is bad information is discovering that (most) non-science is things like history and art and literature, rather than things like lies and fraud. Can you give an example of a sentence in the article that implies that non-science is inferior? I can understand reading it and learning that some non-science is inferior, but that's the parts of non-science that wouldn't be considered Wissenschaft, either. To put it another way, . WhatamIdoing (talk) 03:19, 3 May 2018 (UTC)
- My concern is that the article can be read as taking non-science as an inferior grade of "knowledge" -- or even as not being real knowledge at all. Hanssen nicely addresses this issue in his article in the Encyclopedia of Philosophy: "The German term [Wissenschaft] has the advantage of more adequately delimiting of [sic] the type of systematic knowledge that is at stake in the conflict between science and pseudoscience. The misrepresentations of history presented by Holocaust deniers and other pseudo-historians are very similar in nature to the misrepresentations of natural science promoted by creationists and homeopaths." Unfortunately, this important concern is not addressed by the Wikipedia article Non-science, which is one of my problems with it. --SteveMcCluskey (talk) 19:32, 30 April 2018 (UTC)
- The cited source says, "The English word “science” is primarily used about the natural sciences and other fields of research that are considered to be similar to them. Hence, political economy and sociology are counted as sciences, whereas studies of literature and history are usually not." That doesn't sound like classifying history as non-science is controversial. At minimum, it's no more controversial than the whole (English and French) idea that there is some significant difference between the study of physics and the study of morality, which some (mostly German- and Dutch-speaking) philosophers reject. It is true that some historians in the 19th century tried to re-define science to include the historians' particular style of creating knowledge, but it didn't fly. (See Nomothetic and idiographic for some of that; 'the proton always behaves thusly under these circumstances' is nomothetic knowledge, but 'this Great Man, in this time and place, behaved thusly' is idiographic.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 03:53, 30 April 2018 (UTC)
- @WhatamIdoing: I'm personally fine with the hook, it's SteveMcCluskey who has issues with it. Anyway I took a look at the source given in the article, and while it suggests history is considered a non-science, the same article suggests that there's significant debate on the matter and the status of history as a science or non-science is controversial. I suppose to be on the safe side, an alternate hook is suggested here while the original hook remains under discussion. Narutolovehinata5 tccsdnew 03:17, 30 April 2018 (UTC)
- Why isn't the original acceptable? It's sourced, and it's the mainstream position. Finding "history" listed in a document about how to report government funding of "science and technology" does not actually prove that there is a general consensus that history is science. WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:27, 30 April 2018 (UTC)
- @WhatamIdoing: It has been one month since the last major edits to the article. Narutolovehinata5 tccsdnew 02:03, 4 June 2018 (UTC)
- Narutolovehinata5, I am not planning any further major changes. The concerns about Wissenschaft are orthogonal – they are, essentially, that this idea should not exist, because people ought to divide knowledge into scholarly vs non-scholarly rather than scientific vs non-scientific. I agree that often they should, but (for other purposes) they shouldn't, and more to the point, they frequently don't. I really don't think there is anything actionable in those comments. WhatamIdoing (talk) 15:43, 4 June 2018 (UTC)
As it appears we're currently stuck, I'm now requesting another uninvolved user to continue this review. Fresh minds are needed here. Narutolovehinata5 tccsdnew 20:56, 4 June 2018 (UTC)- The article seems fine from a neutrality standpoint. If the reader comes away thinking that the humanities is the same as holocaust denial and homeopathy, then that's probably saying more about the reader than it is about the article. The first hook is a little bland. Could go with something like
...that no single test has yet been devised that can clearly separate science from non-science?
, although with the quote given in the citation, I'm not sure it's perfectly supported by the source, but may rather be inferred from the source. If you wanted to go with something with more purposefully dry humor, could go with something like...that non-science includes all areas of study that are not science?
GMGtalk - I think the original hook is fine. Far from being bland, I think the concision is provocative and hence effective as a hook (it worked on me). It's true enough as a general statement and for the nuances people can read the article. More to the point, it's supported by a good source, which is all the DYK rules require. I agree with a lot of what Steve has said, but I don't think it's fair to hold up this DYK for months based on some rather nonspecific concerns that don't directly relate to the hook. – Joe (talk) 07:23, 27 July 2018 (UTC)
- Comment 28/7 I came here to review this, per WT:DYK. What a Mons it's turned out to be. But, since there are now no issues with the article itself, and the major concerns seem esoteric at the best: we need to keep the hook hooky, and tie it tightly to the article. So let's remove "history" as the butt, and replace it with the more alliterative
- ALT1:... that the history of science is non-science?
- I don't suppose I can review this now can I...so ¡por vida! will it sit here for another three months. —SerialNumber54129 paranoia /cheap sh*t room 16:54, 28 July 2018 (UTC)
- I have no objection to your proposed hook; it is accurate, and the symmetry is pleasing. I think that the hook needs to name a universally recognized scholarly field – the point, after all, is that non-science is merely a different approach to acquiring knowledge, and not what an earlier editor called 'an inferior grade of "knowledge"' – but the specific scholarly field named is not important to me. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:21, 23 August 2018 (UTC)
- Reviewer needed for ALT1. BlueMoonset (talk) 03:45, 14 August 2018 (UTC)
- I don't think the above ALT1 addresses any of the NPOV concerns. History of science is a sub-discipline of history and there is clearly ample disagreement about whether history is a science. This could be easily solved by something along the lines of "according to XYZ, history is non-science". IronGargoyle (talk) 01:40, 20 August 2018 (UTC)
- Can you tell me exactly where this "ample disagreement" is documented? The article itself explicitly says (and sources) the statement that history is not a type of science, and if you use a typical modern-native-English-speaker understanding of the word "science", this is indeed the dominant view. Science uses the scientific method and scientists make progress towards better understanding of their subjects through each generation; history uses the historical method but does not necessarily result in historians knowing more than the people who lived through a given point in time. (Steve's comment above was based upon his personal interpretation of the title of a document published by the OECD.) There are informed sources that give a middling view – some aspects of history that might be fairly called science, but (many) other aspects that cannot be, with the balance of the science and non-science aspects depending upon things like whether your sub-field is recent economic history or ancient cultural history; see this one for a good explanation from a famous historian, or that the attempted classification is a mere distraction, because the only thing that matters is the division between good scholarly work and everything else, rather than the division between science and everything else – but I have found no recent reliable sources that take the view that history should be considered purely a science, using the word science in the same sense that 21st-century English speakers use that word. I therefore conclude that there is no serious disagreement on that point. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:11, 23 August 2018 (UTC)
- FWIW I have the same reservations as IronGargoyle. History may not be "purely a science" (emphasis mine), but to label it "non-science" will be taken to imply (much as you don't mean to) that it's uninformative. The bigger problem is that the article doesn't add much to Demarcation problem. The subject of both is the distinction between science and other pursuits of knowledge. The most distinct section is "Areas of non-science", but that's the contentious part. The list of subjects isn't referenced and, at least debatably, parts of history, linguistics, philosophy (cf mathematics), are scientific. I would merge the two articles, personally, along with Parascience as a subsection. In any case, if we're keeping a separate article, we should find a hook that won't invite questions about its least solid section in the same way. Two alternatives:
- Can you tell me exactly where this "ample disagreement" is documented? The article itself explicitly says (and sources) the statement that history is not a type of science, and if you use a typical modern-native-English-speaker understanding of the word "science", this is indeed the dominant view. Science uses the scientific method and scientists make progress towards better understanding of their subjects through each generation; history uses the historical method but does not necessarily result in historians knowing more than the people who lived through a given point in time. (Steve's comment above was based upon his personal interpretation of the title of a document published by the OECD.) There are informed sources that give a middling view – some aspects of history that might be fairly called science, but (many) other aspects that cannot be, with the balance of the science and non-science aspects depending upon things like whether your sub-field is recent economic history or ancient cultural history; see this one for a good explanation from a famous historian, or that the attempted classification is a mere distraction, because the only thing that matters is the division between good scholarly work and everything else, rather than the division between science and everything else – but I have found no recent reliable sources that take the view that history should be considered purely a science, using the word science in the same sense that 21st-century English speakers use that word. I therefore conclude that there is no serious disagreement on that point. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:11, 23 August 2018 (UTC)
- ALT 2: ... that art is non-science?
- less contentious (obvious, even), but brief enough and stark enough that it might be enticing.
ALT 3: ... that non-science is neither science nor pseudoscience?- almost a definition, but "non-science" is equal parts novel and understandable to most readers, so I think it might still intrigue some.
- › Mortee talk 00:12, 24 August 2018 (UTC)
- ALT 2: ... that art is non-science?
- To clarify I'm not saying the article is wrong to classify history as non-science – it's typically classified as a humanity, with its own methodology – but I can see the issue with the hook and without really solid referencing in the article on that point, I don't think we can write it off as a slightly provocative hook. › Mortee talk 00:19, 24 August 2018 (UTC)
- Mortee, thanks for watching this so long.
- ALT3 is factually incorrect: non-science does encompass pseudoscience. The split is science vs everything else (as opposed to, say, science vs non-scientific scholarly pursuits vs garbage).
- The second sentence of the article directly says that history is non-science, with a source cited at the end of the sentence: "In this model, history, art, and religion are all examples of non-sciences."[1]. That has been present and cited since the first revision of the article. The source itself – a respectable, widely cited, general-audience encyclopedia – says "The English word “science” is primarily used about the natural sciences and other fields of research that are considered to be similar to them. Hence, political economy and sociology are counted as sciences, whereas studies of literature and history are usually not." And, to be clear, this is not an uncommon or minority POV. It is one that most historians accept: they are in the humanities division.
- As for the concern that people might think that means that history is uninformative – well, I doubt that it will change anyone's minds, but the contrast between our science-is-everything culture and the reality that some non-science fields are valuable (and valuable even to those very people who say they want everything settled by the Gospel According to Science) is exactly what makes it "hooky". WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:00, 25 August 2018 (UTC)
- (edit conflict) Struck ALT 3 as you're quite right. I misread "proposed calling these academic fields the parasciences, to distinguish them from disreputable forms of non-science, such as pseudoscience". In that case though, "non-science" does include pseudoscience, which the article should probably mention. I agree with you that history is, in the sense you describe, a "non-science" - I mentioned humanities myself. But, especially since parts of history are scientific and there's only one source for that line of the article so far, my concern is that the hook will be misinterpreted and at the same time lead readers to the part of the article that's most open to debate. I hope the same principles about hookiness and science-vs-value might apply to ALT2. › Mortee talk 22:12, 25 August 2018 (UTC)
- I'm ok with ALT 2. My hesitation with history revolved around the fact that many history departments are included in schools/divisions/colleges of social and behavioral science in academia. Furthermore, these are all short hooks so I don't think they would lose their "punch" with an attribution (which can be an important tool to maintain NPOV), but ALT 2 is ok if you want to stay away from the "according to XYX, ABC is non-science" for some reason. IronGargoyle (talk) 19:55, 29 August 2018 (UTC)
- (edit conflict) Struck ALT 3 as you're quite right. I misread "proposed calling these academic fields the parasciences, to distinguish them from disreputable forms of non-science, such as pseudoscience". In that case though, "non-science" does include pseudoscience, which the article should probably mention. I agree with you that history is, in the sense you describe, a "non-science" - I mentioned humanities myself. But, especially since parts of history are scientific and there's only one source for that line of the article so far, my concern is that the hook will be misinterpreted and at the same time lead readers to the part of the article that's most open to debate. I hope the same principles about hookiness and science-vs-value might apply to ALT2. › Mortee talk 22:12, 25 August 2018 (UTC)
User:Mortee, will your concern go away if I spam a few more citations onto the end of that sentence? I could cite, for example:
- "Belief systems, and associated practices, can usefully be categorized as: Science (either mature or proto-science), Pseudoscience (non-science that claims to be science) and [other] Non-science (History, Art, Theology, Philosophy, etc.)." [1]
- "Both scientists and nonscientists seek to gain information and improve understanding in their fields of study. The differences between science and nonscience are based on the assumptions and methods used to gather and organize information and, most important, the way the assumptions are tested. The difference between a scientist and a nonscientist is that a scientist continually challenges and tests principles and assumptions to determine cause-and-effect relationships. A nonscientist may not be able to do so or may not believe that this is important. For example, a historian may have the opinion that, if President Lincoln had not appointed Ulysses S. Grant to be a general in the Union Army, the Confederate States of America would have won the Civil War. Although there can be considerable argument about the topic, there is no way that it can be tested. Therefore, such speculation about historical events is not scientific. This does not mean that history is not a respectable field of study, only that it is not science. Historians simply use the standards of critical thinking that are appropriate to their field of study and that can provide insights into the role military leadership plays in the outcome of conflicts." [2]
(I am curious about which parts of history you think are scientific. The "repeatable experiment" part seems to be pretty much impossible, for example.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:25, 31 August 2018 (UTC)
- I think it would help, certainly. Since opinions vary on what's science and what's not, adding multiple references is not spam. There's no inline citation on the line mentioning history right now, though the nearby SEP citation does support it. Do you feel strongly that history is a better subject for the hook than art? CC IronGargoyle for his view. With more references I wouldn't object to the hook. › Mortee talk 00:30, 1 September 2018 (UTC)
- Mortee, the second sentence in the whole article says this, along with a citation. It says "In this model, history, art, and religion are all examples of non-sciences.[1]" – complete with the very first little blue clicky number in the article, which points to the SEP source. As I said earlier, this sentence, complete with its citation, has been present in every single revision of the article since the very first one. The very first mention of the fact that history (and art, and religion) are not sciences (as that word is understood in English) is already cited, and always has been. WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:33, 8 September 2018 (UTC)
- WhatamIdoing Sure, I understand that. I read the article, its history and its references, before commenting and since. I ask about art because that hook has been approved. Do you feel it's so much weaker than using history as the example that you don't want to go ahead with the DYK using it? In either event, adding another reference to the article would not be a bad thing, partly because the article states plainly (as does ALT0) that history is a non-science. The SEP reference caveats that with a "usually", suggesting that view isn't quite universal. › Mortee talk 12:56, 8 September 2018 (UTC)
- I hope you can understand why I have been finding your responses frustrating. I have now quoted the sentence that says history is a non-science, complete with its citation, in reply to you twice on this page, and you claim to have read the article – so that's now three separate times that you should have encountered this citation – but despite this, you still wrote "There's no inline citation on the line mentioning history right now" in your previous reply. It feels like either you're not reading what I've written anywhere, or you're forgetting it immediately afterwards. Too much cognitive dissonance, maybe? (We are all subject to it.) I can't actually do circles and arrows and a paragraph typed on the back, and blink tags don't work on Wikipedia, but if this conversation isn't sufficient to stop these repeated and absolutely false claims that there's no inline citation on that sentence, then I really don't know what else to try. WhatamIdoing (talk) 23:07, 8 September 2018 (UTC)
- @WhatamIdoing:. The article has changed in the last couple of hours. Up until then there was an inline citation for the claim "Non-science includes all areas of study that are not science" but not on any of the lines about particular subjects. That's what my one-time mention of the lack of inline citations, a week ago, was about. Your response above doesn't help at all to understand if you think ALT2 is acceptable or not. › Mortee talk 23:17, 8 September 2018 (UTC)
- I hope you can understand why I have been finding your responses frustrating. I have now quoted the sentence that says history is a non-science, complete with its citation, in reply to you twice on this page, and you claim to have read the article – so that's now three separate times that you should have encountered this citation – but despite this, you still wrote "There's no inline citation on the line mentioning history right now" in your previous reply. It feels like either you're not reading what I've written anywhere, or you're forgetting it immediately afterwards. Too much cognitive dissonance, maybe? (We are all subject to it.) I can't actually do circles and arrows and a paragraph typed on the back, and blink tags don't work on Wikipedia, but if this conversation isn't sufficient to stop these repeated and absolutely false claims that there's no inline citation on that sentence, then I really don't know what else to try. WhatamIdoing (talk) 23:07, 8 September 2018 (UTC)
- The removal of the Globalize tag doesn't solve the problem that views on what "is science" vary strongly not only between the English-language tradition and France/Germany/Poland, but also according to same-language philosophers of science). (On history itself, Historical method gives a long discussion of the historical method in general. And an interesting example: the historical hypothesis that Spanish silver was important in the Roman Empire implied predictions for lead isotope fractions in Roman coins; this prediction was tested successfully. So at least part of the historical method can be considered predictive and falsifiable by measurement.) In any case, terminology about which generally accepted academic fields are "non-science" is not directly "knowledge", it's more a question of philosophy of science. The well-sourced existence of the demarcation problem implies that even putting "that art is non-science" as the hook is risky (e.g. some art includes optical illusions and contributes to evidence of how our brains work). I suggest ALT4:
- ALT4: ... that defining non-science is related to the demarcation problem?
- This article is justifiable (I guess) to list attempts to define what is not science, although a merger with demarcation problem might be needed unless there is a big community of philosophers of science who insist that the term "non-science" is relevant. On a slight tangent, astronomy is about to become a non-field-of-study in Poland, the birthplace of Nicolaus Copernicus, while theological sciences will remain a field-of-study (pdf, pl) according to the draft text from the higher education Ministry. Boud (talk) 20:37, 8 September 2018 (UTC) [Just to clarify on my tangent point: studying astronomy will not be forbidden; "field-of-study" means "academic field", for the purposes of university organisation, ministry-level management, funding decisions by robots based on bibliometry weighted by numbers of printed paper copies of a journal, and so on.] Boud (talk) 21:06, 8 September 2018 (UTC)
- Since noone edited or commented yet, I modified ALT4. The reason is that non-science itself does not really depend on the demarcation problem (e.g. if we include art and history as non-science, then art and history themselves do not depend on the demarcation problem, so my ALT4-before-anyone-else-commented was invalid). It seems to me not so easy to make a hook like this without putting the focus on the demarcation problem, since unless you have an opinion on the "right" answer to the demarcation problem, you can't even claim what your own definition of non-science is; a definition of non-science requires a decision/answer to the demarcation problem, except if non-science is defined as one-of-the-two-parts-of-whatever-is-the-result-of-answering-the-demarcation-problem. That's why I put "related to", so that the focus remains on "non-science." Boud (talk) 21:23, 8 September 2018 (UTC)
- (edit conflict) Hi Boud, thanks for the thought you've put in here. I think ALT4 pre-editing was too vague to be a good hook, and this version is just a definition, so I'm not sure it's a great hook either. Do you think there's enough controversy to ALT2 (art = non-science) that it should actually be struck? I really hope not. My own view is that the use of optical illusion as a tool of science, as useful and interesting as it is, doesn't make art a science any more than potato printing makes farming an artform. It's an area of connection but not in a way that's going to cause readers who see "art is a non-science" to balk too fiercely. Since the DYK is five months old now I'm just hoping to find a hook enough people agree on, which I'm still hoping is ALT2 – the only one ticked so far – and to leave other discussions like merger for another time. › Mortee talk 21:38, 8 September 2018 (UTC)
- I agree that it would be nice to close this off, but ALT2 still seems problematic to me. I'm wondering whether Zalter claims that maths is a science... Mathematics and art have strong overlaps. If maths "is science" then there's an independent problem with "art is non-science". The problem with ALT2 is that we can't really say that A is B when there's controversy about what B is, even if B is a negative definition. The lead and the section Areas of non-science would need to be corrected for ALT4 to make sense, and I think both (the lead and section Areas of non-science) should be corrected anyway. The lead and the definite style of language, implying that no variation in academic opinion exists, such as "includes", "encompasses", are inconsistent with the Classifying knowledge section preceding it. Some WP:NPOVing such as "According to Edward Zalter,", or if more sources are found, "Non-science is typically defined to include all or most of the humanities", would help in NPOVing (and in making ALT4 viable). I guess I'll have a go at this, since I've spent this long thinking about it... Enough blabla, I'll edit... Boud (talk) 21:59, 8 September 2018 (UTC)
- I find it hard to imagine a world where art, as a discipline, is considered a science. So far, the sources in the article (I still don't think adding more would hurt) agree. There may be more nuances in the case of history. Maths is always an interesting case in (discovery vs invention etc) but, for DYK purposes, I don't think it affects the art/science distinction one way or another. › Mortee talk 22:24, 8 September 2018 (UTC)
- There are multiple POVs about whether the formal sciences (e.g., mathematics) is "science" in the modern English (also French, BTW) conception of that term. This is mentioned in the article, as the very first sentence at Non-science#Areas of disagreement, with two citations.
- I have seen zero support in reliable sources for the idea that art is a science. There is even some disagreement about whether art (i.e., making a painting) is a proper scholarly field of study/Wissenschaft. (In that POV, the artist is a mere tradesman, and the art critic and the art historian are scholars.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 23:21, 8 September 2018 (UTC)
- I find it hard to imagine a world where art, as a discipline, is considered a science. So far, the sources in the article (I still don't think adding more would hurt) agree. There may be more nuances in the case of history. Maths is always an interesting case in (discovery vs invention etc) but, for DYK purposes, I don't think it affects the art/science distinction one way or another. › Mortee talk 22:24, 8 September 2018 (UTC)
- I agree that it would be nice to close this off, but ALT2 still seems problematic to me. I'm wondering whether Zalter claims that maths is a science... Mathematics and art have strong overlaps. If maths "is science" then there's an independent problem with "art is non-science". The problem with ALT2 is that we can't really say that A is B when there's controversy about what B is, even if B is a negative definition. The lead and the section Areas of non-science would need to be corrected for ALT4 to make sense, and I think both (the lead and section Areas of non-science) should be corrected anyway. The lead and the definite style of language, implying that no variation in academic opinion exists, such as "includes", "encompasses", are inconsistent with the Classifying knowledge section preceding it. Some WP:NPOVing such as "According to Edward Zalter,", or if more sources are found, "Non-science is typically defined to include all or most of the humanities", would help in NPOVing (and in making ALT4 viable). I guess I'll have a go at this, since I've spent this long thinking about it... Enough blabla, I'll edit... Boud (talk) 21:59, 8 September 2018 (UTC)
- (edit conflict) Hi Boud, thanks for the thought you've put in here. I think ALT4 pre-editing was too vague to be a good hook, and this version is just a definition, so I'm not sure it's a great hook either. Do you think there's enough controversy to ALT2 (art = non-science) that it should actually be struck? I really hope not. My own view is that the use of optical illusion as a tool of science, as useful and interesting as it is, doesn't make art a science any more than potato printing makes farming an artform. It's an area of connection but not in a way that's going to cause readers who see "art is a non-science" to balk too fiercely. Since the DYK is five months old now I'm just hoping to find a hook enough people agree on, which I'm still hoping is ALT2 – the only one ticked so far – and to leave other discussions like merger for another time. › Mortee talk 21:38, 8 September 2018 (UTC)
- Since noone edited or commented yet, I modified ALT4. The reason is that non-science itself does not really depend on the demarcation problem (e.g. if we include art and history as non-science, then art and history themselves do not depend on the demarcation problem, so my ALT4-before-anyone-else-commented was invalid). It seems to me not so easy to make a hook like this without putting the focus on the demarcation problem, since unless you have an opinion on the "right" answer to the demarcation problem, you can't even claim what your own definition of non-science is; a definition of non-science requires a decision/answer to the demarcation problem, except if non-science is defined as one-of-the-two-parts-of-whatever-is-the-result-of-answering-the-demarcation-problem. That's why I put "related to", so that the focus remains on "non-science." Boud (talk) 21:23, 8 September 2018 (UTC)
- WhatamIdoing Sure, I understand that. I read the article, its history and its references, before commenting and since. I ask about art because that hook has been approved. Do you feel it's so much weaker than using history as the example that you don't want to go ahead with the DYK using it? In either event, adding another reference to the article would not be a bad thing, partly because the article states plainly (as does ALT0) that history is a non-science. The SEP reference caveats that with a "usually", suggesting that view isn't quite universal. › Mortee talk 12:56, 8 September 2018 (UTC)
- Mortee, the second sentence in the whole article says this, along with a citation. It says "In this model, history, art, and religion are all examples of non-sciences.[1]" – complete with the very first little blue clicky number in the article, which points to the SEP source. As I said earlier, this sentence, complete with its citation, has been present in every single revision of the article since the very first one. The very first mention of the fact that history (and art, and religion) are not sciences (as that word is understood in English) is already cited, and always has been. WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:33, 8 September 2018 (UTC)
- I think it would help, certainly. Since opinions vary on what's science and what's not, adding multiple references is not spam. There's no inline citation on the line mentioning history right now, though the nearby SEP citation does support it. Do you feel strongly that history is a better subject for the hook than art? CC IronGargoyle for his view. With more references I wouldn't object to the hook. › Mortee talk 00:30, 1 September 2018 (UTC)
- WP:NPOV and WP:CSB problems: This edit
completelydestroys much of my work in making the text match the sources. Hansson clearly refers to English-language definitions of science versus non-science, and his main point is about non-science versus pseudo-science, not science versus non-science. ALT2 is misleading in relation to Hansson's main point. Sorry, but at least for the moment, I'm not going to do more work to try to NPOV this article or try to get the text to match the sources. Anyone interested in bringing this article to DYK standards should consider reverting that edit or going to the edit and editing from there if reversion is no longer practical. A hook "... that A is B" where we have a decent quality article saying that B is a disputed term (by the sources, not by Wikipedians) is not a hook that qualifies for the front page IMHO. Boud (talk) 00:10, 9 September 2018 (UTC) (minor edit: strike "completely", add "much") Boud (talk) 00:45, 9 September 2018 (UTC) (minor edit: s/much/much of/) Boud (talk) 01:03, 9 September 2018 (UTC)- I think that the parts not recently edited by me also need checking for matches between sources and text before this article could be considered to qualify for DYK in terms of sourcing. Boud (talk) 00:20, 9 September 2018 (UTC)
- This edit is quite surprising too: the source mainly talks about how in the 1980s it was found that there were some quite serious scientific contributions from alchemy; the edit matches half the information in the source's title, but hides the main point of the source, even though it's relevant in the context. Anyway, I'm not going to edit-war here - others will have to decide whether or not to restore my edits. Boud (talk) 00:45, 9 September 2018 (UTC)
- Whether alchemists produced any "scientific contributions" is just irrelevant to this article. (You could add that material to the Alchemy article.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:10, 9 September 2018 (UTC)
- Sorry, I forgot to put a label here. WP:NPOV and presenting an English-language point of view as a world point of view mean that the article is not consistent with Wikipedia policy. It "requires considerable work before becoming eligible". Boud (talk) 01:03, 9 September 2018 (UTC)
- Your changes made it sound like non-science – one of the two "halves" of knowledge that result from the demarcation problem – was just one guy's idea, which is misleading in the extreme. WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:10, 9 September 2018 (UTC)
- This edit is quite surprising too: the source mainly talks about how in the 1980s it was found that there were some quite serious scientific contributions from alchemy; the edit matches half the information in the source's title, but hides the main point of the source, even though it's relevant in the context. Anyway, I'm not going to edit-war here - others will have to decide whether or not to restore my edits. Boud (talk) 00:45, 9 September 2018 (UTC)
- I think that the parts not recently edited by me also need checking for matches between sources and text before this article could be considered to qualify for DYK in terms of sourcing. Boud (talk) 00:20, 9 September 2018 (UTC)
Help finding the inline citation[edit]
User:Mortee, please have yet another look, right here, in this image. Can you now find the little blue superscripted [1] at the end of a sentence that names "particular subjects"? Can we please agree that this means that there is indeed an inline citation in this article, for this fact? Please? I think I'm going to go mad if we can't reach an agreement about something that is so obvious. WhatamIdoing (talk) 23:55, 8 September 2018 (UTC)
- No, Hansson does not say that history is a non-science, and he does not say that art is a non-science. He says that in English, history is usually considered to not be a science. I see nowhere where he mentions art. Boud (talk) 00:10, 9 September 2018 (UTC)
- WhatamIdoing you're right, and I apologise. I was focusing on the section "Areas of non-science" too much. › Mortee talk 06:16, 9 September 2018 (UTC)
- Thank you. I'm glad that we have that resolved. WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:10, 9 September 2018 (UTC)
- It appears that the sourcing issue has been resolved, can this move forward now? Narutolovehinata5 tccsdnew 01:44, 11 September 2018 (UTC)
- (from Talkback) Since a second source has been added that does say that history is a non-science (the original said that it was 'usually' considered one; not precisely the same thing), I don't object to that hook any more, as a reflection of what the article says and cites. It was IronGargoyle who originally objected to it, though; I just agreed and tried to offer an alternative, which has since been struck by Boud. I'm not standing in the way of this, so if there aren't continuing objections from them, go for it. › Mortee talk 10:30, 18 September 2018 (UTC)
References
- ^ a b Hansson, Sven Ove (2017). "Science and Pseudo-Science". In Zalta, Edward N. (ed.). The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Summer 2017 ed.). Metaphysics Research Lab, Stanford University.
IronGargoyle has not responded to multiple requests to return to this review, while Boud has not edited in over two weeks. As such, a new reviewer is requested to finish this. Thanks. Narutolovehinata5 tccsdnew 21:11, 25 September 2018 (UTC)
- There was nothing really for me to respond to. I made a suggestion to try to get this moving forward. When my suggestion wasn't taken, I checked ALT 2, but then the discussion went sideways again. I came here to give a few suggestions and try to move this forward. I didn't come here to get involved in an Asian land war. IronGargoyle (talk) 21:21, 25 September 2018 (UTC)
I'm almost of the thinking that this should be closed simply because it's been open too long, but because I would spend less time reviewing this than figuring out who was at fault: the bulleted list of non-science disciplines requires a source, and the hook, in my view, is too obvious to be hooky. Vanamonde (talk) 01:37, 27 September 2018 (UTC)
- Let's see if my new attempt to improve WP:NPOV and WP:CSB and matching text to sources in this edit is accepted by others. There's no point debating a hook if the article itself diverges too far from Wikipedia guidelines on NPOV, CSB, and inline sourcing. The version right now has (as mentioned by Vanamonde) one cn entry, which would need to be fixed (sourced or removed) before considering this for DYK. I WP:COOLed off after my previous edits disappeared; it would be nice if my new edits could be built upon rather than reverted. Boud (talk) 22:45, 3 October 2018 (UTC)
Unfortunately, with how long this nomination has been around and with how long it's stalled, it doesn't seem likely that the issues can be resolved in a prompt manner. Considering that issues still continue to exist with the very concept and how it is handled in the article, it appears that solving the problem is difficult. Taking these into account, it is with regret that this nomination is marked for closure as stale. Time to put this out of its misery. Narutolovehinata5 tccsdnew 01:19, 8 October 2018 (UTC)
- ("requires considerable work before becoming eligible"). Given that my efforts to improve the article according to inline citation, RS and NPOV were reverted in this 8 Sep 2018 revert and this 8 Oct 2018 revert, I agree that this article will take a long time to bring up to minimal Wikipedia standards. I can see that there are new references that have been found and could be used to improve on my latest version, and also other changes that could improve on my version, but wholesale reverts are not an easy way to converge. Discussion on the talk page but external to this DYK nomination covers the "world knowledge" aspect, and there seems to be disagreement about whether French speakers' opinions on what "is science" should come from testimony by one Wikipedian or rather from French-speaking Wikipedians' understanding of French-language sources as reflected in the French-language Wikipedia article fr:science (for example, it's clear that "history" is a science for French philosophers of science even under a strict definition of the word, at least according to the present state of the article fr:science). After two full reverts rather than constructive edits of my two recent efforts, I'm not motivated to make further edits on this article any time soon. After all, I don't own it. Boud (talk) 19:08, 12 October 2018 (UTC)