CZ Talk:Original Research Policy

Original Research Policy still needs to be worked out

I came here from page [1], which states:

Not original research. Articles should be aimed to be excellent encyclopedia articles, and thus are summations of what is known about a topic. Hence, while articles may sum up their topics in novel ways, they should not do so in ways that imply new theories or analyses that in academic contexts would require peer review for publishing. In other words, they should not contain original research or observations. See the original research policy.

(Note: "that in academic contexts would require peer review for publishing" ?? That doesn't seem applicable to anything!)

However, I found a blank page.

Before I do elaborate editing, and certainly before starting new articles, I like the rules to be a little sharper defined. As the term is identical to that of Wikipedia, Larry certainly had in mind something similar to the policy of the same name in Wikipedia (Larry please correct me if I'm wrong). However, I don't recall to have seen in Wikipedia a summary phrasing as here above; and also CZ's neutrality policy is slightly different. Thus the adapted policy will itself probably be a bit original!

In particular, it must fit in with the following requirements that were set out on the same page:

The standards of a good Citizendium article are complex:

Accurate. Articles should have a high standard of accuracy. Editors should review every substantive claim made, and be of the opinion that the claim is well justified, before approving the article. This does not imply that every fact needs a reference; indeed over-referencing articles, can make them unwieldy. References should be selected with care; ideally they should be from authoritative sources and should be verifiable online. References should be given to direct the reader to particularly notable sources of fact or opinion, or to facts the truth of which might reasonably be questioned. (Note: that last sentence appears to state the inverse of what is meant!)

Neutral. Articles must not take a stand on controversial issues. They should report on controversies rather than engaging in them, reporting every side as sympathetically as possible consistent with the sympathetic representation of competing sides, and doling out limited space, where necessary, according to (in the case of mainly academic controversies) the proportion of opinion among experts or, in some broader controversies, the general public whose native language is the language of the compendium. See the neutrality policy.

(Side note: emphasis mine. I see a conflict between "Accurate" according to expert knowledge - surely the first concern of CZ, and "Neutral" in proportion of knowledge among an English-only (or even American-only?!) speaking general public).

The purpose of a CZ article is to allow the reader to make up his or her own mind on any controversial topic, not to 'lead' the reader to a particular conclusion. The reader might be reasonably led by the weight or quality of evidence, but should not be led by rhetorical devices or by selective presentation of evidence. An article that is tranparently seeking to be balanced and fair is more likely to be given credibility than article which appears to be designed to promote a particular position.

At first impression, the particular situation of CZ with expert editors is so different that it may conflict with the current Wikipedia formulation of No Original Research. As asserted on the "We're not Wikipedia page" (I'll emphasize in bold for my concerns):

Our article policies differ. Our aim is to craft compelling introductory narratives, not mere collections of data. We are encouraging our contributors to create coherent, readable, extended narratives that actually do the job of introducing a topic to people who need an introduction to the topic. We are actively discouraging articles that take the form of mere disconnected summaries of subtopics, or other "modular" collections of data that could easily be reshuffled and reorganized. Such "articles" are dull and not likely to be read all the way through.

I suspect that a modular approach is often the only possible solution to satisfy both of Wikipedia's policies concerning neutrality and no original research - some kind of possibly "original narrative" may be the only way to organize all the relevant expert-known information into a smooth, non-modular article. (Larry, could you comment?)

We use an older version of the neutrality policy. Wikipedia has added all sorts of bells and whistles to its original neutrality policy. We've gone back to one of the original versions. And we don't use the neologisms "NPOV" and "POV"; we use the old-fashioned English words "neutral" and "biased." And we actually take the neutrality policy seriously; for many Wikipedia articles, the policy seems to be on hold.

Probably equally old versions of Wikipedia's policies will best match each other to start with.

We take a more sensible approach to citing sources. The editors we have on board actually create the sort of sources that Wikipedia cites. We do cite sources, of course, but we have a sensible approach to doing so. We cite sources because doing so helps the reader. We do not cite sources in order to settle internal disputes, or to "prove" a point to contributors. As seasoned researchers, we know that people can find sources for all sorts of ridiculous claims.

This appears to prescribe the writing of articles that would be called "original" in Wikipedia.

Harald van Lintel 16:17, 27 November 2007 (CST)

Yes, this is all contradictory. I particularly object to the phrase about "the general public whose native language is" English, which has nothing to do with neutrality. I asked Larry to remove this phrase and he has not. The Editorial Council needs to take a strong hold on this issue, because it is not in good shape at this time. --Martin Baldwin-Edwards 16:25, 27 November 2007 (CST)

I agree that wikipedia would consider some of what we do as "original research" and this is one thing that sets us apart. In other words, the original research policy at wikipedia should be different than it is here precisely because we have editors with real names that place their reputations as the source. --D. Matt Innis 18:01, 27 November 2007 (CST)

First version, mostly based on Wikipedia

I'll now import a version of Wikipedia, of about the same time period as the NPOV policy (see argument here above); next I'll immediately make a few modifications as I see fit (such as eliminating some unnecessary complexity and perhaps modernize the header). Next it's for others to comment and improve. Harald van Lintel 16:22, 27 November 2007 (CST)

However, I now discovered that the corresponding policy on Wikipedia is a much more recent development, it only started in 2003 and even the 2004 version is a very poor mix between neutrality and no original research... IMHO the "least bad" versions are the most recent ones. Thus I now selected a version of yesterday and start from there. Harald van Lintel 16:56, 27 November 2007 (CST)

OK, done! :-)

I made many important changes, but it still strongly resembles the Wikipedia article from which it was derived (eventhough I think that it's already better). Thus I guess that it's not (yet) the time to put the "Live" tag on. Harald van Lintel 18:24, 27 November 2007 (CST)

Basically, I'm not comfortable with a brand new author writing a very long, consequential policy out of whole cloth. I've deleted the policy from the page, but I'll put Harald's proposal on CZ:Original Research Policy/HVL proposal. The next step is for any such proposal to get attention from editors and for it to be made into an Editorial Council resolution. --Larry Sanger 18:52, 27 November 2007 (CST)

Yes, you're right, Larry. I should have said so, too. This is a major policy issue, and needs experienced editors to hash out a policy for the Editorial Council to examine. --Martin Baldwin-Edwards 19:03, 27 November 2007 (CST)

reconciling goals

The Wikipedia "no original research" policy has as an explicit goal keeping out cranks. Citizendium's editor policy has as an explicit goal attracting people who do useful original research. Presumably, CZ wants to keep out cranks as well, but that creates a potential conflict. The conflict is, however, not that terribly difficult to resolve, I think. Much of what is ready to appear in Citizendium will be based on existing published research - the latest observations and interpretations may not really be ready to appear in an encyclopedia. However, sometimes something new really is significant enough to appear, and hopefully, sometimes it will be a CZ author or editor who does the research which should be included in the encyclopedia now.

My suggestion: Peer review. CZ's Original Research policy should allow authors and editors to include the results of their own research, provided it has been subjected to independent peer review. This will usually mean publication in a journal with which the author is not affiliated, but we could conceive of allowing CZ editors to provide a preliminatry review of a work which is otherwise "in press". Perhaps work which has only been reviewed by CZ editors would be kept on a subpage, until outside peer review is complete. Anthony Argyriou 20:00, 27 November 2007 (CST)

I thought about this recently during one of my musings, and it occurred to me that a lot of research is done and published in scientific journals. Now until the results of the research are accepted as scientific fact and are evidenced as such, it seems like they would fall under the category of "original research". Why don't we include a subpage on articles that is designed for theories and areas of research on subjects and explicitly label it as such? At least that way we could indicate that there is a reasonable uncertainty as to the confirmation of this content, but it still pertains to the particular subject matter. I think this would do well. --Robert W King 20:22, 27 November 2007 (CST)

Ha! Apologies Anthony, we had about the same idea. --Robert W King 20:27, 27 November 2007 (CST)