TL;DR (Too long; didn't read.) Please provide a summary that makes clear what point you are trying to make...
On 26 October 2012 11:55, John Jackson <[email protected]> wrote: > Greetings – > > I hope this is a good place to send a weighty message to Wikipedia. > You’ll want to read all through. > > I am a scientist who has always liked the Wikipedia idea, and I like > your implementation. Lately I’ve started making contributions. > Although I’m a cognitive scientist who taught biological psychology at > degree level for several years and have done AI research since the > ‘80’s, I’ve diverted for a decade or more to resolve a set of major > evolutionary puzzles. > > Fairly peripheral but within the overall project was an investigation > of bird breathing, and I decided to piece together the research into > it, and deliver it properly to the public. Trust me, the finer > details were obscure. On the way I discovered why penguins’ lungs > don’t collapse even at 500m when whales’ lungs collapse by 100m; I > found out what the neopulmo did (though not why) and why penguins > don’t have it, and I changed our understanding of flow within it; I > also resolved the old chestnut of whether birds had counter-current > exchange in their lungs. That is, completely discovered, not just for > myself. By careful editing and addition including the long overdue > diagram the subject needed, I converted the two Wikipedia pages > dealing with bird breathing from an incomplete mire to a place of > revelation (though the German version needs starting afresh, and > Duncker agrees). But it was an honour do so. > > More central to my overall project was cladogenesis, the heart of > palaeontology and just the thing that I, as an MSc in info. sys. > engineering would be expected to get into. I’ve written my own clad. > software, invented and implemented my own heuristic version, proved > the theorem in graph theory that resolves an issue in checking > evolutionary trees by time and rooting them, and highlighted a serious > statistical fallacy invalidating another major current of work in the > time-checking of trees. > > In these activities I was almost entirely alone as regards other > workers in the overall field, since that field, dinobird > palaeontology, is notorious for its abuse of the lack of scientific > and indeed academic constraint that all historical disciplines are > prey to. Applicants for research positions into that biological > science, which relies heavily on computer science and statistics, are > usually accepted with just a geology first degree. Put succinctly but > honestly, the standard of science amongst professional dinobird > palaeontologists is crap, so much so that I’ve never taken the idea of > publishing formally in the field very seriously. I do from time to > time in AI, but any scientist with something sensible to say in > dinobird palaeo will always be violating sacred errors and be blocked. > Although useless, the field is very proud and stubborn. > > But there is a layer of humanity too stupid even to become > professional palaeontologists – and guess what? They’ve established a > self-aggrandising population in the basement of Wikipedia, grooming > their egos by becoming gatekeepers. I’m sick of the sight of their > pathetic award stars. > > I wasn’t surprised; in fact I’d been surprised by the ease with which > my bird-lung editing had been accepted, which is why I’d turned my > attention to another problem page that was actually even more of a > mess. > > Most people, even those interested in the subject, have no idea why > dromaeosaurs had such strange claws, teeth and tails. Many even doubt > that the special foot claw was a weapon. And because they have no > understanding of the vital importance of backtracking in knowledge > engineering, they can’t escape the rut of believing dromaeosaurs were > “pre” flight (“pre” of course being a very dodgy evolutionary > concept). But solving this kind of thing was easy compared to related > subjects, and other visionaries such as Paul and Osmolska had made > their contributions and published some of the basics. The four-winged > flight of volant dromaeosaurs was harder but I found a solution to > that too (...though you’re not going to like it; even I didn’t). > > I know what you’re thinking – Original Work. But of course that was > taken account of: much of the problem with the Velociraptor page was > balance – some theories had been simply ignored, even though works > mentioning them were already in the citation list. Other problems > were solved by pointing out glaring illogicalities: ensuring the > explanation of a difference between two things must be based on some > other difference applying to them. Things like that don’t need > citations, things that needed them were given them, and when necessary > I cited my own book. That after all is very common in Wikipedia, and > there’s no point frowning on the basic principle (especially when it’s > a good book!). > > As you may have guessed or already knew, anyone bringing much-needed > but unfamiliar and unwelcome science (i.e. any science) to dinobird > palaeontology is automatically put on the hate list and from then on > it’s just sociology. Pointing out that modern science knows better > than to talk of “facts”, is the kind of thing that sets the idiots > off, but is one essential principle Wikipedia needs to take on board. > Luckily the pseudo-scientists usually give themselves away, as they > did on the Velociraptor page most bizarrely. First, they insisted the > tail couldn’t bend vertically, alongside a picture showing the last > two-thirds bending up through 60º. Then they insisted its prey only > had one leg whereas two could be seen even in the thumbnail. No > accusations of original work at risk there. Nonetheless they kept on > reversing EVERYTHING I’d written – the illogicality-busting, the > theory-balance restoration, and even corrections to their crap which > was contradicted by the images in front of their eyes. > > The result? Someone’s stopped the repeated reversals, and of course, > they chose to stop it on the lunatic side. Irrespective of the > “Protection is not an endorsement of the current text” message, this > “temporary” status is a massive insult to science, which is why it’s > important, and a massive insult to me which has ensured my action. > > I’m going to find the 100 most influential loud-mouthed Wiki-haters on > the net, show them the crucial photos, and the illogicalities, and I > hope I’m going to be able to say: “Look – some tiny-minded > pseudo-scientists started to infect Wikipedia filling even science > pages with blatant rubbish, but see how good it is? It put them in > their place!” > > I know an organisation of your size won’t bother with anything that > can’t affect it, and I haven’t time to dissolve you with charm. I’m > considering removing all the good work I’ve done in the bird breathing > pages, and their talk pages that explain it, as a token of what you’ll > lose if you reward my kind of work with insults. I was happy to give > it free but people can always buy the book. Put it back if you want, > but if you don’t, the pages will lose a lot and if you do you’ll > underline my value. And of course there’s the stuff above that could > go one way or another depending on you. Much will be done before the > election and as much as is necessary when it’s over. Don’t just hand > this over to another of the dinosaur Wiki-wankers, and don’t let them > keep spuriously using the word “source” to justify feeding the world > crap. > > John V. Jackson. > http://sciencepolice2010.wordpress.com/2010/12/02/sciencepolice2010-launches/ > http://sciencepolice2010.files.wordpress.com/2011/06/sciencepolice-14-latest.pdf > > _______________________________________________ > Wikipedia-l mailing list > [email protected] > https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l _______________________________________________ Wikipedia-l mailing list [email protected] https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
