SkepticWiki:Community Portal

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[edit] Server Upgraded

The server running this wiki was running out of disk space and rather than wait for the inevitable crash, I upgraded it sooner rather than later. So there was an outage of an hour while this happened.

It's costing an extra couple of quid to do this but I think its for the best. --Diamond 12:14, 23 March 2006 (GMT)

[edit] Wikicite?

I remember reading about someone adding a feature that would allow a quick citation, such as writing "cite:sometitle, somepage#", and it would format by adding a superscript in the text and a numbered list in the references at the bottom of the page. Could someone point out the syntax of the wikicite (if there is one, that is)? Thanks :) --Yahweh 19:12, 24 November 2005 (GMT)

That is done through the use of templates. It is somwhat complex.Geni 16:33, 13 December 2005 (GMT)

[edit] Questions and such

...Right then, not quite sure where to put this yet, so I'll just make a subheading.

NPOV - The first thing that comes to mind, after having had a look at the homeopathy stub, is the amount of NPOV that shall reign here forthwith. Is a "neutral point of view" even desireable in any sense? Seeing that this wiki is a JREF affair, a "JREF majority POV" is probably more of a sensible target, BUT - that might lead to extended edit wars. Opinionated minorities being 13 to a dozen on the forums :). Thoughts? Floyt 22 July 2005 20:10 (PDT)

SPOV would be logical and you are going to get edit wars whatever (and they are not always a bad thing).Geni 23 July 2005 13:39 (PDT)

[edit] My opinion

There are two parts to this question.

Since we want this to become an Encyclopedia, then the definitions, background and claims of something like homeopathy should be put in a factual, historical way. For this project to be successful then we must give accurate information.

The way I would recommend is that each subject should have a "Definition", a "Historical Overview" and a set of claims (which could be quotations from homeopathists as well as skeptics). This would be done as neutrally as possible.

Then I would suggest that people could then post their refutations of claims that have been clearly stated.

Bear in mind that this is not the JREF forum, so the style is more like Wikipedia or the Evolution Wiki than a forum. Check those out to get a sense of style (especially the EvoWiki). The Skeptic's Dictionary is also a good guide to style (although a little short).

Also if you refer to webpages and other source materials, then use links or footnotes to say where you got the information from.

--Diamond 23 July 2005 00:47 (PDT)

I would suggest letting people write articles however they want the style can always be changed latter.Geni 23 July 2005 13:41 (PDT)
I would have to disagree with the writing articles however they want. If the definition of the subject is not accurate, then we're setting up a straw man.

--Diamond 24 July 2005 02:12 (PDT)

If the defintion is a stawman I'm sure this will be challaneged. In fact from past experience I know it will.
Not if the paranormalists are not here to be able to say so. They will simply cite the poor definition as evidence of our "closed-minded bias". --Diamond 30 July 2005 14:21 (PDT)
then reduce the registration requirements. and make it easy for paranormalists to join. Or just greater faith in the honestly and knowage of JREF sceptics.Geni 30 July 2005 23:40 (PDT)
My humble opinion: write the "uncontested definition", the "advocates position", and the "skeptical response". That way, everyone will(!) be content that the truthful side is represented, and that the bull is clearly labeled.

I disagree about the idea of a "neutral point of view" for a sceptical resource. Some articles will be neutral however as an example lets consider homeopathy, it should be stated quite clearly that it is, as far as present knowledge indicates, baloney that quite simply doesn’t work. If new evidence comes to light that shows it does work then the article is updated. I’m also strongly in favour of being very plain and straightforward with how things are described. That is why I strongly believe that in the definition of “homeopathy” it should be mentioned that it is a form of sympathetic magic. To avoid those types of words to produce something that is neutral would be dishonest.

I don't see that the NPOV versus SPOV is that big an issue as people are making it out to be. In most cases, it should be possible to have NPOV and SPOV in the same article. I don't think it's necessary to have a specifically labeled "advocates position." The form I've been trying to adopt is along these lines:
1) What it is
2) How it's supposed to work
3) Whether it does work or not
4) (optional) What shows it doesn't work
5) (optional) Why it's dangerous
6) (optional) Why it's stupid
That provides a progression from NPOV to SPOV and thus draws the reader in. It's just good tactics, I think. There's no problem with calling homeopathy a form of sympathetic magic, because that's what it is. If it worked, it would be a form of sympathetic magic that worked. Of course, it doesn't work, and it's a stupid idea in the first place, but there's no advantage to going in all guns-a-blazing on the first line. epepke 2 October 2005 12:19 (GMT)

[edit] policy

I've created SkepticWiki:Policy feel free to change it for the time being.Geni 30 July 2005 13:09 (PDT)

[edit] Style

See the SkepticWiki:Manual of style.

[edit] LaTeX

eiπ + 1 = 0

x=\frac{-b\pm\sqrt{b^2-4ac}}{2a}


I noticed there were two seperate tags to generate LaTex, and they seem to format roughly the same, the only difference being the fonts:
  • AMSMATH tag:
    <amsmath>x=\frac{-b\pm\sqrt{b^2-4ac}}{2a}</amsmath>
  • MATH tag (I personally find this format more aesthetically appealing):
    x=\frac{-b\pm\sqrt{b^2-4ac}}{2a}
Not that it really matters, but is there a particular reason why there are two seperate tags, and should one of the two styles be adopted as the SkepticWiki standard? --Yahweh 20:54, 13 November 2005 (GMT)
It was the result of trying different things to get LaTeX to work. --Diamond 08:40, November 14, 2005 (GMT)

[edit] Copyrighted images

Can someone clarify the copyright policy as it applies to images? Can images be excerpted as fair use, or is this place stricly public domain only?

We can use images released under:
Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike
Public domain
Those are the two I'm certian of
I think we can use images released under:
Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike
Creative Commons Attribution
Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial
We may be able to use images lisenced under the GFDL but I really rather no one tried that for the time being.
In thoery we can use stuff under fair use however haveing started to try and sort out the mess that is fair use over at wikipedia I will delete anything claimed as fair use unless it is uploaded by someone who can provide notoried documents to the effect that they are a fully qualified lawer with experties in fair use law.Geni 20:19, 24 October 2005 (BST)


[edit] My ideal wiki edit controller module

by Diamond

  1. Each registered user has a "karma" attribute assigned to them.
  2. Each SysOp has a karma of 500. Every designated "editor" has a karma of 400 (this would be a new attribute for each contributor)
  3. When a new article is written, the karma of the author is increased by 5 points.
  4. Every time an article is edited, the modifications are made to the wiki instantly, but are stored for a finite period (Bureaucrat settable parameter) and the author is informed of an edit to his/her original article. The modification is shown in a different color until the edit is accepted.
  5. If the edit is accepted, the karma of the person who made the edit is increased by +1
  6. If the edit is not accepted, the karma of the person who made the edit is either zero or reduced by 1.
  7. If the edit is rejected, then the editors are informed of the rejected edit. If an editor decides that the edit is justified, then the edit is put in and the karma of the person who made the edit increased by +2. If the editor decides the edit is not justified, or if the editors do not respond to the edit at all within some (bureaucrat-set) period, then the edit is junked and the originator informed that his/her karma has been decreased.
  8. If a contributor's karma reaches the level of the editors, then the contributor becomes an editor (if he/she desires).
  9. If a contributor's karma reaches some low point (like -25) then the contributor's edits get bumped straight to the attention of the editors.
  10. If a contributor's karma reaches some minimum (like -50) then the contributor's edits get immediately thrown in the bin.
  11. If a contributor does not have an account, the IP address gets a karma of zero. If the edit is accepted, then the karma of the contributor is not increased, but if rejected, then the karma is decreased.
  12. The bureaucrats can decide that if they have an authoritative expert, then that person's karma can be raised to whatever value up to an editor.
  13. The editors have the discretion to punish vandalism with more negative karma.
  14. Each article has a star-value (like the barnstars). The more stars the article gets, each star adds +1 to the author's karma (up to a maximum of 10).
  15. There can be more than one author assigned to an article, up to a maximum of five.
  16. If an article is deleted then -6 to -10 points are taken from the author's karma at the editor's discretion.


[edit] Discussion

This means that vandalism is discouraged, sensible contributions are rewarded, idiots get less and less attention until they effectively ban themselves. Bad articles or troll articles are a quicker way to get the contributor to give up their privilege to contribute to the wiki.

Editors and stylists (such as what Project Galatea are trying to do) would exercise weight to preserve the contents of the wiki from attack, increase the intellectual weight given to authors of particular articles.

Everybody can contribute to the wiki regardless of background, and quality is rewarded

[edit] Comments please

this is what we call institution creep on wikipedia. This is a particularly bad example since it would require new softwear and is worryingly complex. On top of that it just isn't needeed. I can already use recent changes to watch every edit. I already have an internal sytem of keeping track who I can trust.
You appear to be terrified of vandalism. I've seen the best vandles the web has to offer and frankly I'm not impressed. I've single handedly held off entire forums in the past. If you are so worried about vandalism recurite some more admins.Geni 01:23, 27 October 2005 (BST)
Actually it's not aimed at vandalism (although that's a nice side-effect). It's actually aimed at people making small changes whose effect is to make the article incoherent. This is the problem with wikipedia, where nobody really owns an article, and the SysOps may not be able to distinguish a minor changes which improve, from changes which bury or delete key facts, to making the article more difficult to parse, or adding sections or paragraphs which are irrelevant or meaningless.
I'm also not sure that this would be difficult to implement, but I'm going to ask a developer of a similar tool to confirm this (or not)
--Diamond 07:32, October 27, 2005 (BST)
Wikis need to be as open as posible in order to grow. Frankly one of the biggest atractions to people is that they can have things included straight off. At present every new editor has their edits checked anyway so there is not need to come up with some hudge complex way to do it. Finaly see this on meatball.Geni 14:55, 27 October 2005 (BST)
I have taken your point into consideration by altering point 4 above. The wiki is instantly changed but the modifications will be in a different color until either author or editors have accepted the change.


[edit] Question re: Category vs List...

Hi: I have a question about the role of Categories. I had thought of using them as a way to develop subject hirarchies. The current WikiMedia can support nested categories. However, I found myself accidentally using them as a way to compose lists. For example, CAM is a subject, but it also serves as a category of CAM modalities. Another example would be "Questionable Medical Devices," which is a very short entry, but would be a long list of questionable medical devices. So: would I want two subjects: Questionable Medical Devices and List of Questionable Medical Devices. CAM would have links to List of Questionable Medical Devices and List of Questionable Medical Treatments &c. How have other Wikis approached this? - blutoski


I'll look into this and email a few people over at wikipedia to ask. Good question. --Ducky

[edit] Request: Cite module for references

Hi: I'd be grateful if we could add the Cite extension, to support ref tags. I'm not looking forward to editing my entries backwards to APA. - blutoski


Hi Blutoski: I am working on the dev site to add this functionality along with other tag functions (such as specialized math/chemistry etc. tags.) Once I have a working test site, I will work to move the installs to the live site here. -Ducky

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