Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Climate change/Evidence

Main case page (Talk) — Evidence (Talk) — Workshop (Talk) — Proposed decision (Talk) Case clerk: Amorymeltzer (Talk)  Drafting arbitrators: Newyorkbrad (Talk) & Rlevse (Talk) & Risker (Talk)

Anyone, whether directly involved or not, may add evidence to this page. Create your own section and do not edit in anybody else's section. Please limit your evidence to a maximum of 1000 words and 100 diffs. Giving a short, concise presentation will be more effective; posting evidence longer than 1000 words will not help you make your point. Over-long evidence that is not exceptionally easy to understand (like tables) will be trimmed to size or, in extreme cases, simply removed by the Clerks without warning - this could result in your important points being lost, so don't let it happen. Stay focused on the issues raised in the initial statements and on diffs which illustrate relevant behavior.

It is extremely important that you use the prescribed format. Submitted evidence should include a link to the actual page diff in question, or to a short page section; links to the page itself are insufficient. Never link to a page history, an editor's contributions, or a log for all actions of an editor (as those will have changed by the time people click on your links), although a link to a log for a specific article or a specific block log can be useful. Please make sure any page section links are permanent. See simple diff and link guide.

This page is not for general discussion - for that, see the talk page. If you think another editor's evidence is a misrepresentation of the facts, cite the evidence and explain how it is incorrect within your own section. Please do not try to refactor the page or remove evidence presented by others. If something is put in the wrong place, leave it for the Arbitrators or Clerks to move.

Arbitrators may analyze evidence and other assertions at /Workshop. /Workshop provides for comment by parties and others as well as Arbitrators. After arriving at proposed principles, findings of fact or remedies, Arbitrators vote at /Proposed decision. Only Arbitrators (and clerks, when clarification on votes is needed) may edit the proposed decision page.

In addition to the usual guidelines for arbitration cases, the following procedures apply to this case:

• The case will be opened within 24 hours after the posting of these guidelines.
• The drafting arbitrators will be Newyorkbrad, Rlevse, and Risker. The arbitration clerk for the case will be Amorymeltzer, but all the active arbitration clerks are asked to assist with this case as needed.
• The title of the case will be Climate change. Participants are asked to bear in mind that case titles are chosen for administrative convenience and do not reflect any prejudgment on the scope or outcome of the case.
• Notice of the opening of the case will be given to all editors who were named as parties in the request for arbitration, all editors who commented on the request, and all editors who commented on either of the two pending related requests ("Sock Puppet Standards of Evidence" and "Stephan Schulz and Lar"). If any other editor later becomes a potential subject of the case, such as by being mentioned extensively in evidence or named in a workshop proposal, a notice should also be given to that editor at that time.
• The issues raised in the "Sock Puppet Standards of Evidence" and "Stephan Schulz and Lar" requests may be raised and addressed in evidence in this case if (but only if) they have not been resolved by other means.
• Preparation of a formal list of "parties to the case" will not be required. In previous cases of this complexity, extensive discussion about who is or is not or should be or should not be a party has often become the focus of controversy, sometimes to the detriment of the parties' focusing on the merits of the case itself. As long as all editors whose conduct is being reviewed are notified of the case, and the decision makes it clear which editors are affected by any sanctions, it does not ultimately matter whether a given editor was formally named as a "party" or not.
• Within five days from the opening of the case (i.e. by 00:28, 18 June 2010 (UTC)), participants are asked to provide a listing of the sub-issues that they believe should be addressed in the committee's decision. This should be done in a section of the Workshop page designated for that purpose. Each issue should be set forth in as a one-sentence, neutrally worded question—for example:
  • "Should User:X be sanctioned for tendentious editing on Article:Y"?
  • "Has User:Foo made personal attacks on editors of Article:Z?"
  • "Did Administrator:Bar violate the ABC policy on (date)?"
  • "Should the current community probation on Global Warming articles by modified by (suggested change)?"

The committee will not be obliged to address all the identified sub-issues in its decision, but having the questions identified should help focus the evidence and workshop proposals.

• All evidence should be posted within 15 days from the opening of the case (i.e. by 00:28, 28 June 2010 (UTC)). The drafters will seek to move the case to arbitrator workshop proposals and/or a proposed decision within a reasonable time thereafter, bearing in mind the need for the committee to examine what will presumably be a very considerable body of evidence.
• Participants are urgently requested to keep their evidence and workshop proposals as concise as reasonably possible.
• The length limitation on evidence submissions is to be enforced in a flexible manner to maximize the value of each user's evidence to the arbitrators. Users who submit overlength diatribes or repetitious presentations will be asked by the clerks to pare them. On the other hand, the word limit should preferably not be enforced in a way that hampers the reader's ability to evaluate the evidence. For example, an editor may present evidence in a form such as "event A occurred [diff 1] and then event B occurred [2], which led to event C [3], followed by a personal attack [4], and an uncivil comment [5], resulting in a block [6], an unblock [7], and an ANI discussion [8]." It sometimes happens that the editor is asked to shorten his or her evidence, and it is refactored to read something like "there was a dispute about a block [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8]." This does not make life easier for the arbitrators who have to study all the evidence. Editors should take this into account before complaining that other editors' sections are too long.
• All participants are expected to abide by the general guideline for Conduct on arbitration pages, which states:

  The pages associated with Arbitration cases are primarily intended to assist the Arbitration Committee in arriving at a fair, well-informed, and expeditious resolution of each case. Participation by editors who present good-faith statements, evidence, and workshop proposals is appreciated. While allowance is made for the fact that parties and other interested editors may have strong feelings about the subject-matters of their dispute, appropriate decorum should be maintained on these pages. Incivility, personal attacks, and strident rhetoric should be avoided in Arbitration as in all other areas of Wikipedia.

• Until this case is finally decided, the existing community sanctions and procedures for Climate change and Global warming articles remain in full effect, and editors on these articles are expected to be on their best behavior.
• Any arbitrator, clerk, or other uninvolved administrator is authorized to block, page-ban, or otherwise appropriately sanction any participant in this case whose conduct on the case pages departs repeatedly or severely from appropriate standards of decorum. Except in truly egregious cases, a warning will first be given with a citation to this notice. (We hope that it will never be necessary to invoke this paragraph.)
• This procedural notice shall be copied at the top of the evidence and workshop pages. Any questions about these procedures may be asked in a designated section of the workshop talkpage.
• After this case is closed, editors will be asked to comment on whether any of the procedures listed above should be made standard practice for all future cases, or for future complex cases.

Evidence presented by BozMo

Too few uninvolved admins are trying to do too much

Someone with a better tool set can check the numbers but I think there have been around 100 cases (?98) discussed on the enforcement pages with at least 5000 diffs worth of discussion in a matter of months. You need to be pretty self-confident as an uninvolved admin to get stuck in without having a reasonable feel for precedent. In practice most cases are dealt with by the same (roughly five) admins discussing them. We need ventilation; about five or ten more people who, like 2/0 originally feel called to get stuck in and some sort of rotation system. If we cannot get uninvolved admins prepared to do this forever then doing one month shifts or similar would help. --BozMo talk 08:04, 13 June 2010 (UTC)

@ZP5. I am not sure that this is the place for you to bring up what is essentially another enforcement case below (an enforcement case which has, pretty much, been discussed to death on the enforcement pages in all the cases you mention although you are clearly unhappy with the conclusions). Rather than presenting all this (arguably off topic) material and encouraging others to respond with all of the context and detail in the various points again, perhaps you could explain how you feel the probation is going, whether it should carry on and what could be improved in it (we recognise of course your feeling it could be improved if fewer people disagreed with your perspective on WMC's editing pattern). --BozMo talk 6:11 pm, Today (UTC−4)

Evidence presented by ZuluPapa5

William M. Connolley should be topic banned for repeated uncivil disruptions

Where the Request for Enforcements have been unable in whole, ArbCom should review William M. Connolley's newbie biting, overwhelmingly single purpose, antagonistic, and hostile "ownership" behavior in the Climate change articles and remove WMC to restore civility and progress the content with a NPOV. Diffs from William M. Connolley's (WMC) 18 cases "for disruptive edits, including, but not limited to, edit warring, personal attacks, incivility and assumptions of bad faith". Brought by 10 editors and involving many other users time in the Climate change probation from January to June 2010. Opening and closing comments linked to an index. Demonstrates that WMC has continued: edit-waring; interacting uncivilly with other editors; making repeated comments unrelated to bettering the articles and repeatedly discussed other editors, instead of discussing the article; to basically not be a model Wikipedian; after knowing he crossed the line.

Newbie biting, PA and other antagonistic examples

1. Newbie biting confession "being excessively soft on overenthusiastic noobs does not do them any favours in the long run"
2. "spoon feeding for the hard of understanding"
3. "AQFK's assertions of impartiality indeed appear 'laughable'...Could we try to stick to reality, please"
4. "What are you on, old fruit?"
5. "If you don't want to be condescended to, I suggest you stop making quite so many mistakes."
6. "@MN:noob"
7. "repair for the incompetent"
8. "this entire section is stupid"
9. Unproductive jab ("utter rubbish").
10. Adds an insinuation that an editor is a fool to his comment
11. Adds an accusation of bias to his comment
12. "MN is, as usual, defending anything anti-GW, regardless of reality"
13. Attacks editor with "pointless malicious revert"
14. Calls an editor "malicious"
15. Repeats above infraction
16. Edits another editors post to say he does not care
17. Accuses another editor of "Spamming"
18. Same as above "spam"
19. Accuses an editor of being "snarky"
20. Attacks editor with "you should learn to make coherent valuable content edits."
21. edit summary "clueless", directed at Mark Nutley. Text: "Face it, you really don't know what is going on here but are determined to push your POV anyway"
22. Incivility directed at MN: "you should find an arera to edit that you understand"
23. "MN's statement reflects a lack of understanding of the science, and was correctly removed. It is regrettable that he is adding material that he doesn't understand. It cannot be a co-incidence that this suits the POV" #"I note that MN is still pushing his bizarre "this is what all the sources call it" unmarked reverts"
24. "It's good to see you chaps finally coming out into the open and admitting you're a team. Full points for honesty, well done Cla and ATren!"
25. Refers to an editor's contribution "we don't expect miracles"

Edit waring during the sanctions

1. [1]
2. [2]
3. [3]
4. [4]

Example of WMC ownership and uncompromising edits in a single article

In December 2009, before the Climate change probation, admin 2over0 instructed WMC to talk and provide compromises. In the Scientific opinion on climate change article example, I counted 9 instances of WMC negative edit summaries (i.e. "no" and "not" language) and 35 instances in the article talk page. This demonstrates WMC inability to provide for compromise by consistent reverting with "no" an "not" language. The example demonstrate that the editor's narrow point of view and ownership behavior is obstructing article progress. From this behavior analysis, I concluded that WMC is an "indignant reverter" and, at that time, should have been subject to a zero revert restriction.

• The editor's 9 "no" and 'not" reverts to the main article: [6], [7], [8], [9], [10], [11], [12], [13], [14] (Reverts to other articles excluded.)

• The editor's 35 "no" and "not" talk, without or with little compromise: [15], [16], [17], [18], [19], [20], [21], [22], [23], [24], [25], [26], [27], [28], [29], [30], [31], [32], [33], [34], [35], [36], [37], [38], [39], [40], [41], [42], [43], [44], [45], [46], [47], [48], [49]

In whole, this example of excessive negativity is cause for concern with WMC's WP:OWN behavior. It is largely uncompromising and often defended with personal attacks [50] and other uncivil behavior, such as introducing original research and synthesis from his blogs [51], during the discussion on the article talk page.

What is most concerning, is WMC attempts to circumvent dispute resolution and have newbie editors banned [52] [53] with personal attacks and socking allegations.

WMC's Conflicts of Interests

WMC's owns the point of view and opinions put forth by a political organization of scientists known as the IPCC. This group has a narrow mission, which WMC aggressively advocates on Wikipedia with uncivil conflict. Owning a POV is sufficiently harmless; however, WMC's activism in the Scientific opinion on climate change article (and others), has antagonistically excluded [54] [55] reliably published views from other legitimate organizations NIPCC, causing harm to the content's NPOV. Editing to represent a single owned POV in the climate change articles is a conflict of interest. Wikipedia's best interests are maintained when many views and opinions, from diverse organizations, are combined into a NPOV.

WMC's owned views and activism has adversely affect biographies of living persons, which was recently determined in Fred Singer (NIPCC contributor) for which he was banned. However, List of scientists opposing the mainstream scientific assessment of global warming largely created by WMC, is a BLP violation designed to present scientists who oppose WMC's owned POV in a false light. The listing itself has no source support, it was constructed for WMC's activists views and harms BLPs. WMC (and others) select membership based on their owned opinions and synthesis of other scientists views, so as to distort them as being in (battleground mentality) opposition to the IPCC. [56]

WMC holds his activist views above other editors and published sources, to the point of causing other users great pains with uncivil personal attacks. A true Doctor of Philosophy, meaning "teacher in philosophy", is chiefly concerned with educating the newbie over denigrating them with their knowledge, for their owned selfish benefit.

Essentially, WMC would like Wikipedia to serve his vested interests in a POV, rather then him civility serving the Wikipedia community to reach a NPOV.

Editor comments on WMC's civility

• Wikipedia_talk:Arbitration_Committee_Elections_December_2009/Comments/William_M._Connolley
• Wikipedia:Arbitration_Committee_Elections_December_2009/Comments/William_M._Connolley
• Wikipedia:Requests_for_comment/William_M._Connolley
• Wikipedia:Requests_for_comment/William_M._Connolley_2
• Editors WMC incited to misbehave [57]

Drama resulting from Lar blocking WMC

Arbcom should review and affirm Lar's original block to WMC. In addition, it should be noted that the escalations associated with this 1 hr block, are precedent to the elaborations in the RFC and this ArbCom case.

• Lar blocks WMC for 1 hr for "Disruptive Editing" [58] citing this diff [59], and follows up with [60], [61]
• 2over0 quickly unblocks WMC [62] and files for ANI review [63] where Stephan Schulz is implicated.
• 2over0 opens Climate Sanctions RFC claiming "Most of the disruption boils down to often heated or uncivil disagreement ..." [64]
• ArbCom opens "Climate change", combines "Stephan Schulz and Lar" filing from ANI dispute, after disappointment with RFC. [65]

Scibaby sock investigation performance

The preliminary analysis indicates xxx accused sock with xxx true positive finding, xx socks found (but were not Scibaby) and xx editors falsely accused with possible preemptive blocks.

GoRight's Request for Arbitration should be reopened in this case

• GoRight's good faith request, [[66]] where ArbCom placed faith in the Climate change probation to solve disputes. Which resulted in GoRight being banned.

Responses not covered in talk page

@BozMo see [67], your request would approach ArbCom like an RFC. There are other opportunities for collecting comments and attempting to set Wikipedia content or policy. WMC's behavior has been disputed for years in the climate change articles, by many others than me. Time for an arbitration with Wikipidia's principles front and center along side of WMC's disruptive behavior.

Evidence presented by Polargeo

Lar should not act as an uninvolved admin in Climate Change Enforcement but particularly in cases where he has displayed personal animosity to a user

A previous arbcom ruling highlights the problems and sensitivities in the area [68]

Avoiding apparent impropriety

All editors, and especially administrators, should strive to avoid conduct that might appear at first sight to violate policy. Examples include an administrator repeatedly making administrator actions that might reasonably be construed as reinforcing the administrator’s position in a content dispute, even where the administrator actually has no such intention; or an editor repeatedly editing in apparent coordination with other editors in circumstances which might give rise to reasonable but inaccurate suspicions of sockpuppetry or meatpuppetry.

• The most supported viewpoint in the recent RfC/U was Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Lar#Outside view by Short Brigade Harvester Boris which clearly states If adherence to the spirit of policy is of any interest at all, then Lar's continued involvement in enforcing the climate change probation is problematic
• The view in the RfC/U that Lar was involved regarding William M. Connolley was not supported however, the most relevent evidence only came to light late on on the RfC/U talkpage and these diffs were never presented on the main page. I give examples of them here and here. I think Lar's animosity towards WMC started with him undoing the close of an MfD [69], before and after undoing this close Lar participated in the discussion and so was not acting as an uninvolved admin. These examples show that in two completely unrelated cases, shortly before Climate Change sanctions began and where Lar was not acting as an admin in either, Lar has shown a clear animosity towards WMC. Therefore Lar now acting as an admin on sanctions enforcement with often the heaviest calls for bans against WMC shows that he is not in line with the arbcom ruling I outlined earlier. Polargeo (talk) 16:45, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

Evidence presented by Count Iblis

Current situation

Like almost all science related articles, the global warming related pages are edited according to WP:SPOV, despite this not being official policy. This then leads to tensions in which the sceptics seem to engage in bad behavior a lot more than the other editors, because of the following dynamics.

From the perspective of a sceptic, it is not nice to find out that the rules are only used against you. When a rule favors your position, it is not valid "by consensus"; this may invite more arguments based on the rules which then will be seen to be wikilawyering by the other editors, ultimately escalating into Adminstative interventions which tend to target the sceptics. This may lead to a perception that the Administrative processes are biased against the sceptics, which in turn polarizes things even more, even leading to disputes at the Admin level.

How we got where we are today

While the main Global Warming article was always written from the SPOV perspective, there was vigorous opposition to this by sceptical editors until early 2007. There were frequent edit wars, but despite that, the editors succeeded in maintaining the FA status of the article. The crucial thing that made this possible was not Adminstrative involvement, topic bans or anything of that sort (Apart from Scibaby, no one was banned). Instead, it was keeping the politics away from the main article and moving that to the global warming controversy article.

What changed in early 2007 was that the bikkering on the talk page became a lot less after a poll on article subject was held with the discussons indicating a consensus on scientific focus his was not the first poll of this sort and it came after a sceptical editor asked for help here and and here in vain. So, the support for the scientific perspective was quite solid, but by making that more explicit by holding polls, the sceptics could see more clearly that they were fighting a losing battle.

Here is the reason I gave for rejecting inclusion of politics in the article at that time. As is clear from that discussion, you could not do that at that time, because this would inevitably bring in bad science in the article. Today, the political climate surrounding global warming is a bit different and that has allowed the editors to have a paragraph in the article about the politics.

Fazit

What should be clear from the history is that the right decisions were made in sometimes difficult editing environments. Whether or not someone had engaged in personal attacks in 2007 is not relevant at all to understanding the evolution of the article. What the above history does show is that there is a tension perceived by the sceptics between the Wiki rules and the scientific focus of the article. This leads to tensions today, because the sceptical editors of today are different from those in 2007 who conceded after vigorous discussions.

The only way to address this is by either making the de-facto SPOV official, or having to go through the same vigorous discussions every few years when the group of sceptics changes and start to question the consensus for SPOV. Count Iblis (talk) 01:22, 20 June 2010 (UTC)

Evidence presented by Cla68

" ...because I'm increasingly frustrated that an editor with a grand total of 106 main space edits, nearly all of them political POV pushing, keeps distracting and baiting valuable expert editors with thousands of constructive main space edits. I think this aspect needs to be highlighted. If we want to build an encyclopedia, we need to protect our most valuable assets better. And that value is, in the end, the ability to contribute actual content. I believe in WP:SPADE. Establishing a pleasant climate of cooperation between 150 undereducated morons by driving away everybody who has an actually qualified opionon cannot be our primary mission. As for the mu (negative): It's about the only useful answer to the "have you stopped beating your wife" type of questions. ”

- Stephan Schulz (italics and bolding mine).

More to come

I will be away from the computer for a couple of weeks. I should be back around 3 July. I probably won't be able to check Wikipedia, or email, much during that time. I will finish my evidence section, if the case is still in the evidence phase, at that time. Cla68 (talk) 22:59, 18 June 2010 (UTC)

Evidence presented by Stephan Schulz

Scientific competence

The alleged "Science Cabal" editors share an unusual level of expertise. Very many of them have PhD level qualifications, are or have been published research scientists, and have served as editors or reviewers for scientific journals. Several have made significant peer-reviewed contributions to climate science and related topics. Their largely synoptic view on the climate science articles thus is adequately explained by a common scientific approach and understanding of the scientific process.

A statement on the qualification of several editors has been provided to NYB directly to maintain privacy. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 12:55, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

Massive sock-puppeting

The climate change articles have been the target of an extremely aggressive and persistent sock-puppeting campaign. See

• Wikipedia:Long-term abuse/Scibaby
• Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Scibaby/Archive
• Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Scibaby/Archive/2009
• Wikipedia:Requests for checkuser/Case/Scibaby (2007 and 2008 cases)
• Category:Wikipedia sockpuppets of Scibaby currently has some 660+ entries
• Category:Suspected Wikipedia sockpuppets of Scibaby has 170+ more entries
• Not that, while Scibaby is the most prolific sockmaster by far, several of the cases in 2010 and 2009 have also found other cases of sock-puppetry that could not be linked to Scibaby. Nearly all of these socks represent so-called "sceptical" positions, sometimes subtly, sometimes obviously.

--Stephan Schulz (talk) 16:35, 20 June 2010 (UTC)

Malicious and sophisticated socking

A recent case of socking via open proxies involved a group of accounts suggesting connections to a Wikipedia user and imitating some of his mannerisms. Another sock from the same group brought an SPI case against that user. The evidence is at Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/GoRight/Archive. Due to the use of open proxies, there is, so far, no incontrovertible evidence connecting these socks to any user, however, I find the circumstantial evidence presented at the case suggestive. Either way, this is a case of malicious and disruptive WP:POINT. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 16:35, 20 June 2010 (UTC)

Off-Wiki campaigning

There is significant off-wiki campaigning targeting the Wikipedia climate change articles and several Wikipedia users, particularly User: William M. Connolley. These campaigns range from the merely malicious to paranoid and from nuisance to active harassment. It includes explicit recruiting of inexperienced new POV editors (meatuppets). Several Wikipedia editors are involved in these campaigns. Much of this campaigning is based on plain wrong claims. Examples are below.

1. CONNOLLEY WATCH blog: "DOCUMENTING THE EVERY MOVE OF WILLIAM M. CONNOLLEY...William M. Connolley, is a fraudster...Welcome to your nightmare Connolley. Send him a hello on his Wikipedia talk page and let him know he is being watched." - stalking, and invitation to on-wiki harassment.
2. Lawrence Solomon, also User: Lawrence Solomon:
   • Lawrence Solomon: Wikipedia’s climate doctor: "How Wikipedia’s green doctor rewrote 5,428 climate articles...All told, Connolley created or rewrote 5,428 unique Wikipedia articles. His control over Wikipedia was greater still, however, through the role he obtained at Wikipedia as a website administrator, which allowed him to act with virtual impunity. When Connolley didn’t like the subject of a certain article, he removed it — more than 500 articles of various descriptions disappeared at his hand. When he disapproved of the arguments that others were making, he often had them barred — over 2,000 Wikipedia contributors who ran afoul of him found themselves blocked from making further contributions." Note that the numbers cited apparently came from the, at that time completely open, edit counter. Note that "5428" was the total number of unique pages ever edited by WMC (not climate articles), the "500 articles that disappeared at his hand" were RfA closures and speedy requests, (nearly) all unrelated to climate change, and the "over 2,000 Wikipedia contributors who [...] found themselves blocked from making further contributions" are nearly exclusively the subject of 24 hour blocks per then-standard WP:3RR policy, again all unrelated to climate change.
   • These, to be generous, "mistaken" claims have been widely and uncritically echoed in parts of the blogosphere: James Delingpole in the Telegraph blog [70], who also adds "Do you want to know just how ugly? I’ve been saving the worst till last. Here it is: William Connelley’s Wikipedia photograph.", Watts Up With That at [71], and then down to [72] and any number of other attack blogs.
   • Lawrence Solomon: Climategate at Wikipedia: "William Connolley, a Climategate member and Wikipedia’s chief climate change propagandist...Battles like this occurred on numerous fronts, until just after midnight on Dec 22, when Connolley reimposed his version of events and, for good measure, froze the page to prevent others from making changes". This refers to the editing initiated by this edit in the history of Medieval warm period. Note that the description does not only use extremely biased language, it also is factually wrong. William's edit "just after midnight on Dec 22" was a change unrelated to the previous edits described by LS, the article was not "frozen", but semi-protected, not by William, but by me (following IP vandalism), and not "after midnight on Dec 22", but nearly a day before the claimed time.
3. Two particular paranoid ranting have been submitted in private since they contain false and damaging claims about an unrelated Wikipedia editor.
4. Wikipedia Watch, run by User: GoRight and with contributions by User:Thegoodlocust, contains explicit instructions for effective meatpuppery at [73].

More on request. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 10:53, 23 June 2010 (UTC)

Evidence presented by JohnWBarber

User:Polargeo, an administrator, has repeatedly violated behavior policies and guidelines

• A case on the WP:GSCCRE page resulting in sanctions for disruption against him, May 27-30 [74]
• WP:DISRUPT -- April 29 on WP:GSCCRE, creates a WP:POINTy complaint against himself [75]
• A series of Personal attacks against Lar (this is a selection):
  • April 27 ("Lar you lost the last little tiny tiny micro shred of credibility you ever had on this matter some time ago and you just keep on reinforcing your ludicrous bias time and again.") [76]
  • April 29 ("totalitarian regime [...] Lar") [77]
  • May 4 (disparaging both Lar and his wife) [78]
  • May 24 (to Lar: "I can only take my hat off to you. You are a true operator.") [79] Merriam-Webster's definitions of "operator" [80]

• Personal attacks against others:
  • May 2 (compares editors to high schoolers "who you knew were likely to be unemployed") [81]
  • June 16 (calls me guilty of a "smear" for the above diffs; editors supporting Lar "a rag tag bunch [...] some of whom are [...] nutcases") [82]

The latest examples of William M. Connolley's personal attacks

• 11:11 June 15 ("I think the fact that folks like JWB and Cla think its fair, whilst Boris thinks not, makes the fairness entirely clear. I agree with Boris [...]") [83]
• 21:30 June 16 -- To ZuluPapa5 ("I don't think anyone could focus you.") [84]
• 21:30 June 18 -- Regarding LessHeard vanU ("It would be nice to have a less partial admin comment. Alas, they are all busy it seems.") [85]

I could fill up the page with daily doses of these, but the above should get across the idea that these are ongoing and recent, so I think I'll stop here. The numerous diffs from various editors on this page indicate the size of the problem and how irritated other editors are. Timestamp for this paragraph point -- JohnWBarber (talk) 13:54, 19 June 2010 (UTC)

Hipocrite's promotion of a WP:BATTLEGROUND atmosphere

Violations of WP:CIV, WP:NPA and other violations and comments contributing to a WP:BATTLEGROUND atmosphere on climate change articles:

• March 16 [86] -- "this [incubator] article is [...] still a PoV fork, except now it's a sneaky attempt to move the content from the existing title to a title that is highly partisan. It seems to me that this is, at best, a userspace draft, but, honestly, is little more than a wikipolitical sideshow."
• April 30-May 3 at Talk: Judith Curry For the context, which occurred roughly simultaneously in two threads, it's best to simply click on this link [87] and look at the bottom of this "Curry's notability...." section and the "Some refs" section:
  • April 30:
    • [88] -- to Marknulty ("Let me try this for the millionth time. STOP USING BLOGS AS SOURCES" -- Mark wasn't; he was asking a question about using a source)
    • [89] -- again to Marknulty ("[...] at the very least have the dignity to propose the specific change on the talk page [...]"
  • May 1-3 -- comments directed to me.
    • 05:21 May 1 [90] -- exaggerates my comment in a very disparaging way (""So, your argument is we need to use blogs as sources for quotes because it's VERY IMPORTANT RECENT INFORMATION, and for VERY IMPORTANT RECENT INFORMATION, we don't use an encyclopedic tone? No.")
    • 23:15 May 1 -- NPA against me: ("I don't have calm, reasonable discussions with people that want to use blogs to libel living persons, so sorry." [91]) After I asked him to substantiate his charge ("Please point out the libel. Please point out where I wanted "to use blogs to libel living persons." 23:33 May 1 [92]) there was no response.
    • 23:13 May 2 [93] -- incivility to me, including an unjustified accusation of incivility ("because apparently somewhere in your brain [...] Beyond that, you decided that this was the moment to become incivil.I'm just disregarding everything you say.")
    • 02:51 May 3 [94] -- WP:BATTLEGROUND, WP:CIV to me ("Please, bring this to any noticeboard you want. When you're soundly smacked down, will you drop it?")
• May 24 [95] -- WP:BITE, WP:CIV unwelcoming comment directed at a new editor, Samwyyze (section title Hipocrite created: "A new user arrives") This was the response to the first and, as it happened, last edit by Samwyyze.
• May 25 [96] -- disparaging people with a different POV who edit climate change articles ("I was answering the question that I assumed SV was asking - to wit "Where does the article on Global Warming deal with the fringe crackpots and fraudsters that deny global warming is in substantial part caused by man's activities."")
• June 3 [97] -- WP:CIV, WP:TALKNO (misrepresentation) to Lar on his talk page ("Just this once I'd like you to admit that the most obvious reading of your comment was different than what you actually meant to say." Lar explained [citing his own words] how his meaning was clear)
• June 3 [98] -- to Lar on his talk page ("that's what your side says [...] your sockpuppet friends" -- "your side" mildly promotes WP:BATTLEGROUND behavior and is a minor incivility, but part of the overall pattern; "sockpuppet friends" is an NPA implying bad motives)
• June 10 at Talk:The Gore Effect, promoting WP:BATTLEGROUND atmosphere in a discussion at Talk:The Gore Effect with violations of WP:CIV, WP:TALKNO ("Do not misrepresent other people") and WP:IDIDNTHEARTHAT (full thread [99] for context):
  • 13:13 [100] -- to me ("But, I'll wait for yet another person to inform you about exactly how wrong you are about policy and practice before responding to you again. At what point are you going to realize that you don't get it?")
  • 18:38 [101] -- referring to my argument by caricaturing it rather than responding to it, in the same thread as the last example ("the redonculous argument (which, you are correct, allows you to insert blog sourced content across any article, as long as you preface it with "BLOG SAYS,")"). In the same post, suggesting to User:ActiveBanana that that editor should also not respond to points I made that neither editor had responded to earlier ("AB, you appear to still be responding. [...]").

More to come

Evidence presented by Jayen466

BLP editing by William M. Connolley

I found the editing behaviour by William M. Connolley related to the BLP of Fred Singer, a noted climate sceptic, problematic.

• This edit by WMC (31 December 2009) added a self-published source (link is to the most recent archive.org version, the page is no longer online) to Singer's BLP, in direct contravention of WP:BLPSPS ("Never use self-published sources—including but not limited to books, zines, websites, blogs, or tweets—as sources of material about a living person, unless written or published by the subject"), a policy which WMC is well aware of.
• This edit (2 November 2009) reinserts a ref to a site WMC is personally involved in, to contradict an opinion voiced by the article subject. None of the articles presented at the cited site actually discuss Singer, so this appears to be a case of using this BLP as a coatrack for conducting a scientific argument (as well as WP:SYN), rather than a reflection of Singer's reception.
• This (15 October 2009) is unsourced WP:OR commentary.
• This edit (15 May 2010) changes the description of Singer's SEPP institute from "a non-profit research institute, where he serves as president" to the dismissive "a website skeptical of global warming, which he runs", a change that is unsourced and is out of step with reliable sources.
• This edit (13 May 2010) as well as this (15 May 2010) as well as this (16 May 2010) diminished the subject, who continues to be described as an atmospheric physicist in the press.
• In the BLPN discussion related to this last point, ten editors (MastCell, Will_Beback, Cla68, Crum375, Bill the Cat 7, FormerIPOnlyEditor, SlimVirgin, Off2riorob, mark nutley, JohnWBarber) advocated (or agreed with) dropping the "retired" label, yet WMC showed himself unable to accept input by uninvolved editors, dismissing the entire noticeboard thread as "forum shopping" (08:38, 20 May 2010 in that discussion).
• Pointy edit. --JN466 11:56, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

Edit warring at Singer's Science & Environmental Policy Project

1. Talk page discussion
   • [102], [103], [104], [105], [106], [107], [108], [109].
2. Cited source: New York Times, describing the Science and Environmental Policy Project as "a research and advocacy group financed by private contributions."
   • [110], [111], [112], [113], [114], [115], [116]
   • Talk page discussion

Evidence presented by Heyitspeter

The editing environment created by some users pushes NPOV editors out of the arena

I think this statement sums it up wonderfully. A review of the talkpage of that (from all reasonable perspectives) more or less inconsequential article should help you get an idea of the deleterious effect that some editors in this topic area have on the editing climate. I believe that a review of Hipocrite's edits, for example, in this article and elsewhere, reveal a (net) strongly negative effect on this topic area, and that it would be constructive to remove him or her from the area entirely. I do not mean to single out Hipocrite (though that will sound hollow given that I have technically done just that). I have elsewhere suggested that the removal of most of the strong personalities from (either side of) the topic area would have a positive effect, though I believe the evidence presented on this page should demonstrate that the 'pro-consensus' block of editors is consistently home to some of the worst behavior seen in the topic area. A significant portion of the editors in this topic area are extremely hostile and unabashedly interested in pushing a single POV and removing others, which discourages editors interested in maintaining a neutral point of view from editing the articles and ipso facto polarizes the editing community. I believe removal of these editors from the topic area would be appropriate and ameliorative.--Heyitspeter (talk) 09:26, 18 June 2010 (UTC)

WP:FRINGE and WP:UNDUE are not applied appropriately in this article space

Users claiming to represent the 'scientific consensus' have repeatedly and inappropriately attempted to categorize as WP:FRINGE reports in reliable sources that appear to damage the reputations of 'mainstream' climate change scientists in an attempt to disqualify those reports under WP:UNDUE. A simple statement by arbitrators that 'WP:FRINGE and WP:UNDUE should be followed' is therefore insufficient to resolve the problem of coverage of reliable sources that appear to cast a negative light on mainstream scientists.

An example of this maneuver can be found here. The main article space claimed that allegations of misconduct by researchers at the CRU were made exclusively by global warming skeptics. Attempts to fairly represent numerous other reliable sources (including the Wall Street Journal, the BBC and the the British government) making identical allegations were countered by claims that because these allegations were also made by global warming skeptics they were skeptical allegations and should not be independently represented in the article, for fear of making the skeptical position appear stronger than it is in violation of WP:UNDUE. (I'm not making this up. See quotes below.) The sources here discussed have yet to be included in the lead, though skeptical allegations are covered.

Highlights, including carefree violations of WP:OR:

The notion that the accusations can be disengaged from the denial campaigns is inherently biased. It is to ignore the statements of scientific organizations and of the most prominent qualified scientists. The article is indeed biased. It has been stripped of the opinions of the most reliable sources. Tasty monster (=TS ) 00:40, 9 May 2010 (UTC)

The question is where those allegations came from. Clearly they originated with denialist blogs and right-wing think tanks, and were then taken up by sections of the media. I think it's important to note the sequence of events here: the blogs created the initial framing of the story, which the media then reported fairly uncritically (and as it turned out, wrongly). So when we say that the allegations were made by denialists, perhaps we should be saying that they originated with denialists. -- ChrisO (talk) 00:08, 9 May 2010 (UTC)

Once again, you seem to by trying to play up relatively minor criticisms and downplay the central part played by "skeptics", presenting "skeptical" claims as though they were mainstream, giving undue weight and support to the "skeptic" claims and unbalancing the lead. Not an improvement. . . dave souza, talk 12:18, 13 May 2010 (UTC)

(Dave souza continues with the same line later at these diffs [117][118][119])

(@Stephen Schulz' "scientific competence" statement)

I note that most users edit wikipedia anonymously (or with a false identity), often on principal, with the explicit good blessing of the project, and that attempts to determine the credentials of those users Stephan Schulz takes himself to be in opposition to would violate WP policy. (I have met several obviously well-qualified users that edit from IPs for philosophical reasons: e.g..)

I also note that most of the articles "on global warming", e.g., Climatic Research Unit documents controversy and The Gore Effect, require no scientific expertise whatsoever.

I don't see how his point can be awarded any import given that this is so.

Evidence presented by William M. Connolley

• WMC: [120], [121]
• AQFK: [122]; [123], GWC: [124]
• ZP5: [125]
• MN: [126] [127] (GWC: [128], [129], [130]) [131] [132]
• Lar: [133]
• P: [134]

(more to follow)

William M. Connolley (talk)

Evidence presented by Thegreatdr

@Heyitspeter: Just as a side note, I thought of making some edits to the Global Warming article back in November 2006. While I was treated with respect, I did notice the editing history of that article back then was a revert first/coordinate on edits later environment, which was new in my experience in Wikipedia at that time. It defintely doesn't fit the be bold comment concerning editing which greeted me when I joined wikipedia in January 2006. It doesn't appear to have changed much since then, and how the climate change (CC) articles are edited remains uniquely different within my wikipedia experience from how the tropical cyclone and meteorology projects function. Back then, blogs were considered reliable sources within the CC articles, but popular science magazines were not, which surprised me. They're pretty much on equally weak footing per wikipedia standards. Every so often, I still see editors squabbling over some details, trying to use blogs as proof that someone's wrong about some nuance of global warming. Last I checked, they're still not reliable, original sources. I have tried to stay away from editing the global warming set of articles since then, though I did have some luck upgrading the Urban heat island article to GA since then, and because of the 2006 experience, I did learn how to work better with people from that project. Thegreatdr (talk) 05:43, 19 June 2010 (UTC)

Evidence presented by WavePart

People are being blocked as sock puppets to enforce article bias

It seems that there is a lot of sock puppet witch-hunting going on and indefinitely blocking of people as suspected sock puppets without any shred of evidence. In my case, without warning I logged on and saw that I was set on an indefinite block with the stated reason, "Abusing multiple accounts: fails the WP:DUCK test". This was quite surprising to me, since obviously I am not a sock puppet.

It seems my example started (without warning) with this edit by Hipocrite, followed 46 minutes later by this edit where I was again declared an "obvious" sock, given a permanent ban by The Wordsmith, and presumed without any evidence to be someone named Scibaby. Many ridiculous failures of logic then occurred on my talk page, where I was presumed guilty without a shred of evidence ever given, except repeated declarations that I was "obviously" a sock puppet. It was only on the third day that a rational admin finally removed the block declaring it "based more on suspicion than evidence".

I was also added to here as a sock puppet, which I was of course not. There appears to be a discussion here about the failures of "Duck" evidence. In that discussion, a user named User:Weakopedia challenged Hipocrite's standards for reporting "sock puppets", so Hipocrite promptly reported Weakopedia as a scibaby sock puppet, which received some criticism as a dubious action. It seems Hipocrite has indicated he supports policy changes to actively block editors with a POV contrary to his, and has stated that "all new editors that are brand newish and show single-purposed difficultness should be blocked ... that's the level of draconian I support".

Here is an example of the standards of evidence being used here by admins to support these blocks when users challenge them, such as "blatant", "obvious", and "compelling". Also, things like knowing how to use wikipedia tags, or knowing wikipedia policies, are being used as grounds for blocking. It is my understanding that wikipedia policies such as Clean Start and Privacy provide plenty of legitimate pathways for users with prior wikipedia experience to have new accounts, and thus mere familiarity with wikipedia cannot be grounds for blocking.

I mostly hope for the arbitration committee to issue a ruling about minimal standards of evidence before a sock puppet block is issued. It is my understanding that to even be a sock puppet, you essentially need to be using a new account to evade a block, ban, or injunction, or you need to be using multiple accounts at once to deceptively sway a debate. Yet clearly new users are being blocked indefinitely (and in a biased manner) without evidence being shown that EITHER of those two things have been done, and that really needs to stop.

I also hope that the arbitration committee can issue an injunction specifically against Hipocrite reporting any more "sock puppets", given his apparent abuse of this process for the purpose of winning arguments and enforcing bias.

WavePart (talk) 06:43, 21 June 2010 (UTC)

Evidence presented by User:Guettarda

Coverage of climate change in the media gives undue weight to fringe position

Through content analysis of US prestige press—meaning the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times, and the Wall Street Journal—this paper focuses on the norm of balanced reporting, and shows that the prestige press’s adherence to balance actually leads to biased coverage of both anthropogenic contributions to global warming and resultant action.

Boykoff, M. and J. Boykoff, 2004. Balance as Bias: Global Warming and the U.S. Prestige Press, Global Environmental Change, Vol. 14, No. 2, pp. 125-136.[135] Note, this is an influential paper that has been cited 69 times according the ISI Web of Knowledge.

When mass media report on this particular issue, research has found that attention has been paid particularly to more extreme viewpoints rather than those in convergent agreement...It was found that minority views—in this case alarmist and denialist discourses—earned much more amplified attention in media reports (pp. 442–443)

Boykoff., M., 2009. We Speak for the Trees: Media Reporting on the Environment, Annual Review of Environment and Resources, Vol. 34, pp. 431–57.[136] Annual Reviews are a family of journals that publish prestigious, invited review articles.

Contrary to news presentations, "skeptics" represent a tiny minority among climate scientists

A broad analysis of the climate scientist community itself, the distribution of credibility of dissenting researchers relative to agreeing researchers, and the level of agreement among top climate experts has not been conducted and would inform future ACC [anthropogenic climate change] discussions. Here, we use an extensive dataset of 1,372 climate researchers and their publication and citation data to show that (i) 97–98% of the climate researchers most actively publishing in the field support the tenets of ACC outlined by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, and (ii) the relative climate expertise and scientific prominence of the researchers unconvinced of ACC are substantially below that of the convinced researchers.

William R. L. Anderegg, James W. Prall, Jacob Harold, and Stephen H. Schneider, 2010. Expert credibility in climate change. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences "Early edition". doi:10.1073/pnas.1003187107

Evidence presented by MuZemike

Private evidence

I have emailed the Committee some private evidence in which, for potential outing reasons, I will not mention here as it may be related to this case. –MuZemike 18:47, 22 June 2010 (UTC)

Evidence provided by Collect

I include all my prior comments by reference, and also include [137] as being the current version of material presented in the RFC/U on Lar. [138] is, in fact, even more striking.

In another place, I was disparaged for believing in the value of statistical analysis <g> And that the reversion of "Scibaby" is a protected class - even when a substantial number have been "proven innocent." I have now found hundreds of reverts -- many of which are of those officially shown not to be Scibaby. I therefore iterate that having multiple editors co-ordinate reverts using the handy excuse of "of course it must be Scibaby because it does not agree with us" becomes a Catch-22 for anyone to disprove. Collect (talk) 19:58, 25 June 2010 (UTC)

At this point, I ask that ArbComm note the use of sideways disparaging comments from any editor regarding any other editor. My "intersections" with any of the others involved here are minimal. Collect (talk) 20:06, 25 June 2010 (UTC)

Editors involved in Global Warming as their primary interest appear to be apt to act in what appears to be a co-ordinated manner

Not only is a small group apparently extraordinarily apt to edit on the same user talk pages in far beyond random chance numbers but also appears to act in reverts in what appears to be a non-random minuet in GW.

I decided to only look at the immediate past week in order not to show any biases on my part.

Examining only 3 articles out of many which I could list, I found

[139] Hipocrite 24 June [140] Squiddy 24 June [141] Hipocrite 24 June [142] Connolley 24 June [143] Hippocrite 24 June [144] Connolley 24 June [145] Atmoz 23 June [146] Connolley 23 June

All on one article in a very short period of time for one basic edit.

[147] Squiddy 24 June [148] Connolley 23 June [149] Wikispan 23 June [150] Connolley 23 June

All on one article for one basic edit

[151] Prolog 24 June [152] AgnosticPreachersKid 24 June [153] same 24 June [154] Connolley 22 June [155] Souza 21 June [156] Schulz 21 June [157] ChrisO 21 June [158] Atmoz 19 June [159] Connolley 19 June

Which suggests an extraordinary amount of co-incidental opinions and actions among a relatively small group of editors.

With regard to the valuing of the co-incidence level of the "wikistalk" results, I ran 30 editors with 30K+ edits who are currently active through a rough bubble sort, and found no group of six with anything near the overlap on user talk pages. I ran them twelve at a time, removing, one by one, anyone with esentially no UT overlap with the other 11. I invite any one else to extend that work. Collect (talk) 15:36, 25 June 2010 (UTC)

It is claimed that Scibaby is the reason why reverts get co-ordinated -- I do not find that a credible excuse, especially since a non-trivial number of editors aserted to be Scibaby "per the usual" have been shown not to be Scibaby. And some have been blocked "per the usual" without any backing by any checkuser. And, lastly, the range blocks are broad enough to block non-Scibaby editors. Collect (talk) 13:04, 26 June 2010 (UTC)

Evidence presented by 2over0

RfC/Climate change

The request for comment on continued community support for the sanctions in this topic area has expired. I initiated the request, as required by the discussion establishing the probation, and offered an opinion so I will not attempt to summarize the RfC. I do feel, though, that it has some useful ideas and provides a decent overview of some of the problems that have lead to this case. - 2/0 (cont.) 05:20, 26 June 2010 (UTC)

Evidence presented by LessHeard vanU

Preamble

I did consider that I might not evidence any of my concerns regarding the editing of AGW/CC related articles, since in my role as uninvolved admin I did not participate in the editing of any articles and my involvement regarding issues was therefore second hand; I was not exposed to the editing environment and could not ascertain that the requests I was involved in represented the norm in interactions of editors with opposing views. However, this ArbCom case has provided sufficient incidences of (IMO) non optimum attitude and viewpoint that I feel I should detail them - as well as an incident in which I was involved in outside of the Probation enforcement request page. LessHeard vanU (talk) 19:36, 26 June 2010 (UTC)

Curious claims in respect of both consensus and "new editor requirements " at Bishop Hill (blog) article

I was asked as an uninvolved admin to look at the matter of a contested source at the Bishop Hill (blog) article - now merged into the Andrew Montford article. Since it was my opinion that there was a slow edit war, I protected the article in an attempt to draw the contributors back onto the article talkpage. Upon a further request, and noting discussion had resumed as intended, I lifted the protection, whereupon there was a short edit/move war after which I sanctioned the involved editors. Given the circumstances, I placed the article on my watchlist. I subsequently became involved in issues arising on a RfC upon merging the article with that of its writer, of which more later. Soon after the RfC commenced the article was again redirected, reverted, and redirected again, after which I reverted as edit warring and then protected again. (Some comment was raised, both within AGW/CC Probation space and also ANI - where I noted my actions - that I should not have both reverted the last instance of edit warring and protected the article against further warring; which reasoning I disagree with and would be happy to have reviewed again in this ArbCom case). It should be noted that both times the article was redirected the editors concerned noted "per talk" and "...consensus", although as noted the RfC on the merger had commenced only two days previously and had been started because there was resistance to there being a merge or delete of the article (a recent AfD has been closed as inconclusive, defaulting to keep). I submit that editors, especially the two who performed the redirects, who voiced support for the merging of the articles either momentarily misunderstood WP:Consensus or were disinclined to provide any weight to the arguments of those opposing the merge per WP:IDON'TLIKEIT.
The RfC mentioned above was filed by SlimVirgin (talk · contribs), an experienced content contributor who had started editing the article around early May. While familiar with both Wikipedia practice and - I don't think this will shock too many readers - editing in controversial areas of the encyclopedia her contributions were both swiftly removed and her motives questioned, to such an extent that I felt I had to comment more than once, drawing complaining editors attention to the point that SlimVirgin was acting in accordance to established WP practice. SlimVirgin's raising of an RfC, given that her choice in contributing to the article had drawn criticism previously for not having been made after careful review of the editing and talkpage histories, was condemned by some parties as a means of delaying a merger proposal that had already attracted counter arguments. I submit the above, and indeed the entire merger discussion (and especially the Threaded discussion section), and the talkpage in its entirety, as evidence of the lack of application of Wikipedia policy, practice, and common courtesy on the part of certain editors, most of whom edit toward the scientific consensus regarding AGW, when presented with arguments for the inclusion or retention of material that is inclined toward a CC skeptical viewpoint.

LessHeard vanU (talk) 22:41, 26 June 2010 (UTC)

{Write your assertion here}

Place argument and diffs which support the second assertion; for example, your second assertion might be "So-and-so makes personal attacks", which should be the title of this section. Here you would show specific edits where So-and-so made personal attacks.

Evidence presented by Mark Nutley

The use of the term ClimateGate

The use of the term Climategate has been forced out of wikipedia by a small group of editors, if one thing comes from this case it should be a ruling that the use of the term is allowable within article content per wp:v. It is policy to use a term which the sources use yet the following diff`s will show a wilful disregard for policy.

• User:William_M._Connolley [160] removes Climategate even though the source uses the term. [161] Reverts out climategate again. [162] and again. [163] and again

User:ChrisO [164] removes the term, even though it is the name of the book which the article is about. And removes it again from another article, [165]

This has happened in plenty of articles and i feel a ruling here is necessary to stop this constant removal of the term. Especially as this is what all the sources use [166]

This got to the stage were i did an RFC about the issue [167] I believe there was a consensus there to allow it`s use yet the same editors continue to push their POV against policy to remove the term from wikipedia mark nutley (talk) 13:46, 27 June 2010 (UTC)

Response to hipocrites comments on climategate

Below User:Hipocrite has presented this diff [168] stating Just now, marknutley has started inserting the word "climategate" without discussion in articles that were relatively stable. This kind of tension-elevating activity is par for the course This is entirely incorrect. That article section had been called climategate since it was moved into mainspace. It is Chris0 who has created article instability by changing a long standing section header, i would assume due to what i have written above. mark nutley (talk) 14:21, 27 June 2010 (UTC)

Evidence presented by Hipocrite

Global warming

The articles on "global warming" are neutral, presenting all points of view in equal amount to their weight.

At the last evaluation, there were zero peer reviewed studies that contradict the major conclusions about global warming - that it is real, and caused, in large part, by anthropogenic CO2.[169] A recent United States National Academy of Sciences study shows that "97–98% of the climate researchers most actively publishing in the field support the tenets of ACC outlined by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, and (ii) the relative climate expertise and scientific prominence of the researchers unconvinced of ACC are substantially below that of the convinced researchers." [170] Denialism, therefore, is nothing more than politics - they merit no mention as science, as there are no published sources on the science of denialism - it compares to Holocaust Revisionism in level of acceptance.

The main article in the space - Global Warming includes entire sections about the manufactured controversy, and links to sub articles that detail the controversy, providing more than due weight to the minority view that all of modern climate science is wrong. [171]

Compare Atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. There are peer reviewed studies and, in fact, entire academic works by well regarded (but a minority of) scholars that claim that bombing was not a military action in WWII, but rather the opening shot of the Cold War, or a propaganda requirement placed on the army by the populace. This is not detailed in the article, which hardly even mentions this interpretation, routing every single contrary fact into the sub article. The section in the main article is two paragraphs, and fails to note any peer reviewed works which disagree with the historical consensus that the bomb was dropped to minimize causalities in a hypothetical US invasion of the home islands. articlepeer reviewed dispute, and The Decision to Use the Atomic Bomb, Alperovitz, Gar, Vintage, 1996. Others on request. In fact, Global Warming is far more friendly to minority opinions than any other controversial article surveyed, except for those taken over in-full by said minority opinions.

Adminstrative conduct

Despite this, administrators who are skeptical or ignorant of the status of Global Warming have inserted themselves into the process, purporting to be "uninvolved." (lar diffs LHVU diffs) They are not uninvolved - their statements and protestations about being uninvolved are belied by their other statements about the content - they have determined preferred content and have manipulated results to ensure their favored version(lar diffs, LHVU diffs). This pernicious use of administrative powers and authority to win content disputes is directly contrary to our expectations of administrative conduct.

Further, Lar was in conflict with WMC before Lar's first action ever in relation to Global warming (diff). Antagonizing an editor, especially on the eve of what might have been a difficult electoral loss is not acceptable. Later following that editor with the goal of exiling him from a topic area he has provided value to is even more problematic. (lar diffs)

BLP concerns

I am unhappy with WMC's edits to articles about deniers . I am equally unhappy about deniers edits to articles about scientists. I am most unhappy with people who pretend to care about BLP and kvetch about only one of the two.

Marknutley

I include only the first violation of BLP in each article - There are others, as recently as June 21, where marknutley returns to the first scientist he attacked and adds a link to a fringe attack book as a see-also.

• Adds totally non-npov accusation of fraud to bio of scientist [172] This accusation of fraud continued over multiple reverts and other attempts to accuse a living person of fraud.
• Adds totally non-npov accusation of conflict of interest to a politician [173] - "an obvious conflict of interest."
• Adds poorly source accusation of having leaked information to the biography of a scientist[174]
• In a branching out, returns poorly source fringy criticism about a US political candidate [175]

Disruptive behavior by various individuals

Most of the users who have little or no experience in other areas of the encyclopedia are disruptive - they have demonstrated no interest in providing encyclopedic coverage, opting instead to attempt to push their personal fringe beliefs, providing undue weight to unreliable sources, wikilawyering policies to say what they hope they say, or alternatively, just making things up.

Some examples:

• [176] - ZuluPapa5 writes in this very arbitration "least one reliable source has presented a consensus view on the science, which would could threaten the IPCC's monopoly view" - False. When repeatedly asked to provide this source, he stalls.
• [177] - Marknutly makes multiple things up. He attributes the quote "alarmist" to the wrong person. He uses a document from 2007 to document something that happened in 2009. He describes a position paper by an individual as representing the position of an entire national government. He invented that the position paper was "commissioned" by the Indian government.
• [178]. Cla68, normally a reasonable editor, fabricates the location of Al Gore. Even after this discussion, Cla68 again fabricated the location of Al Gore ([179], [180]).
• [181] Cla68 supports the addition of information sourced to a deleted blog comment, writing that the information sourced to said blog comment is "reliably sourced, neutrally written, and succinct." In the same argument, it is called "smoke & mirrors, and/or intimidation" to insist that our content fairly represent sources and not engage in plagiarism. Even later, Cla68 states that "Curry's blog post is directly referenced in the NY Times article." This is fabricated - Cla68 later admits that he "got the blog wrong." In response to this massive abuse of blog-sourced nonsense, Lar later wrote [182] - "The statements by Ms. Curry are impeccably sourced." When repeatedly challenged about this, Lar said that he didn't mean that the statements by Dr. Curry are impeccably sourced, but rather some of that removed content was poorly sourced, and that when he said "The statements by Ms. Curry are impeccably sourced," he actually meant that "The statements by Ms. Curry in the New York Times are impeccably sourced. He says this with a straight face while asserting attempts to "Spin Control," by others. In that same comment he stated that he "started by looking carefully at the article beforehand, and walking the diffs and checking the refs." In so doing, he did not, apparently, find it relevant to note the deleted blog comment being used as a source about a living person.([183])
• In [184], JohnWBarber asks me to read WP:BLPSPS, as a justification for including self-published sources for material about a living person. When I point out that BLPSPS says exactly the opposite, JohnWBarber says that we don't need to follow BLPSPS because it's just a guideline.
• In [185], A Quest for Knowledge includes information sourced to a blog, arguing that blogs can be used as reliable sources for opinions of the blog owner. Would he believe the same thing if people were to put blog-sourced opinions in articles about 9-11 conspiracy theories? Of course not. (ref)
• Just now, marknutley has started inserting the word "climategate" without discussion in articles that were relatively stable. This kind of tension-elevating activity is par for the course. [186]. Regarding this, Mark stated "That article section had been called climategate since it was moved into mainspace." This is not accurate. Per [187], mark changed it, without discussion, just a week ago for the first time. The article was made in mainspace. This kind of inaccuracy is also par for the course - if it's incompetence or dishonestly, it's disruptive.

Pile-on disruption of noticeboards

Noticeboards are supposed to be areas where uninvolved users can assist in working things out. In this area, however, editors disrupt the functioning of said noticeboards by not allowing independent comment, drowning it out by showing up to push their partisan side (as opposed to their policy interpretation - the policy interpretation is always fluid enough that things they like are ok, things they don't like are banned). (diffs)

Evidence presented by {your user name}

before using the last evidence template, please make a copy for the next person

{Write your assertion here}

Place argument and diffs which support your assertion; for example, your first assertion might be "So-and-so engages in edit warring", which should be the title of this section. Here you would show specific edits to specific articles which show So-and-so engaging in edit warring.

{Write your assertion here}

Place argument and diffs which support the second assertion; for example, your second assertion might be "So-and-so makes personal attacks", which should be the title of this section. Here you would show specific edits where So-and-so made personal attacks.