July-August updates

Hello everyone, what a busy summer it was for GSoW.  Many of our team members were away from the project but we still managed to get a lot done as you are about to see.  

For those of you not familiar with this blog you will find below all the pages that we have either created brand new or completed major rewrites of.  I encourage you to click on the "before" and "after" for each of these rewrites.  When I see the differences I always get a thrill chill, even after seeing hundreds of these over the last 3 years.  Most of these "befores" have been in this horrible condition for years and if not for GSoW would have probably remained this way forever. 

There is an interview at the bottom of this blog that has this exchange between myself and Emery Emery.  He was thanking us for creating his Wikipedia page.  I answered that I was glad he liked it, but we didn't create it for him, it was created because we felt that it was warranted.  The work we do here is for YOU the reader and for all the Wikipedia readers out there.  I hope you learn something new.  

Enjoy!

Susan Gerbic


A treat for all our readers... Listen to Wikipedia being edited


The Vaccination Chronicles
GSoW members and other skeptics are currently in the process of captioning Richard Saunders' documentary, that features interviews with people who have lived in the time before widespread immunization was introduced, and victims of vaccine-preventable diseases suffered tremendously, often leading to death. It is a pressing warning to everyone: please vaccinate your children.

Progress so far:
Danish subtitles - Claus Larsen (non-GSoW)
Dutch subtitles - Rik and Leon Korteweg (GSoW)
German subtitles - Steff (GSoW)
Italian subtitles - Raffaella Vitali (GSoW)
Portuguese subtitles - Nix Dorf (GSoW)
Russian subtitles - Svetlana Bavykina (GSoW)
Turkish subtitles - Isil Arican (non-GSoW)
Expected: Hungarian, Serbian, Slovak, possibly also Norwegian, Greek, Spanish and Finnish. If you don't see your language here, contact Richard Saunders to see if you can help! (GSoW membership not required)

Leon talks about the project here and here

Dutch

Rob Nanninga - Leon, Emile - Before & After

Stichting Skepsis - Leon, Emile - Before & After

The Four Horsemen (atheïsme) - an edit war and intense discussion about possible deletion resulted in improvement by Leon, Emile and others; the page was kept in a much better condition. Before & After

Victor Stenger - Wim Vandenberghe

English

Alton Lemon - Brand new page

Astronomical Society of Victoria - Greg Neilson  

Bart Bok - Greg Neilson - Before & After

Bill Bradfield - Greg Neilson - Before & After

Brian Brushwood - Todd Dietrich - Before & After

Center for Inquiry - Chris Allen - Before & After

Chris Mooney - Kevin Elsken & Dustin Phillips - Before & After

Comité Para - Leon Korteweg

David Koepsell - Dave Trumbore & Christine Daley - Before and After

Daniele Bolelli - Greg Neilson - Before & After

Dickson Despommier - Kyle Hamar Before & After

Flim-Flam! Psychics, ESP, Unicorns, and Other Delusions - Before & After

Friends Of Science In Medicine - Christine Daley - Before & After

Gesellschaft zur wissenschaftlichen Untersuchung von Parawissenschaften (GWUP) - Michael Steinkellner, Leon Korteweg

Heather Dewey-Hagborg - Janyce Boynton - Before & After

Ian Patrick Harris - Erik Hess - Brand new page 

Joe Nickell - Sarah Gilbert - Before & After

L. Sprague de Camp - Before & After - Janyce Boynton

"List of skeptics and skeptical organizations" was renamed "List of notable skeptics",

List of skeptical organizations split off from it and expanded. - Leon Korteweg

List of skeptical conferences - Leon Korteweg

List of skeptical magazines - Leon Korteweg

List of skeptical podcasts - Leon (additions by András, Svetlana, Todd, Raffaella and Michelle)

Lists about skepticism ("One List To Rule Them All") - Leon Korteweg

Massimo Polidoro - Raffaella Vitali - Before & After 

Matt Dillahunty - Jay Young - Before & After

Vincent Racaniello - Before & After - Kyle Hamar 

Maynard - Greg Neilson - Before & After

Neil Gershenfeld - Jelena Levin - Before & After

Robert Ingersoll Birthplace Museum - new photos (thanks to Tom Flynn & Monica Harmsen)

Richard Wiseman - Walkiria Nubes Cordova & Dustin Phillips - Before & After

Rosemary Altea - Lee Christie - Before & After

Skepter - Leon Korteweg

Skeptics with a K podcast - Leon Korteweg - New page

Stichting Skepsis - Leon - Before & After

Template:Skeptical magazines - Leon Korteweg

Template:Skeptical podcasts - Leon Korteweg

Victor J. Stenger - Todd Dietrich - Before & After

Wonder en is gheen Wonder - Leon Korteweg

Hungarian

Christopher Hitchens - Peter Mogyoros, Attila Harta - Before & After (including June)


Hungarian Skeptic Society - Attila Harta, András Pintér - Before & After (including May and June)

Italian

Massimo Polidoro in Italian - Raffaella Vitali 

Portuguese

Steven Novella - Nix Dorf

Richard Wiseman - Valério Andrade Melo

Russian

Richard Wiseman - Svetlana Bavykina & Jelena Levin

Spanish

Leo Igwe - Erik Hess

----------------------------

Just in case you have missed it, GSoW has had some great new interviews, be sure to check them out.

Skeptically Yours recorded at TAM 2014 - Emery Emery & Heather Henderson Interviewed Susan, Nix and Lei

Data Skeptic - lots of numbers in this interview - skeptics like stats don't they?

A Public Thank you from a Fan

Skepticule talks about the GSoW secret forum (at about 8:00)

Here is a dowser's site that is frustrated with Wikipedia editors you might enjoy

------------------------------

As usual if you want to join GSoW or have questions please contact us at GSoWteam@gmail.com

Single Purpose Accounts and Editor Assistance

Wanted to wait a bit before bringing this all up.  I don't want to influence people into getting involved in discussions or edit wars unless they already were editing that page.  So it appears to have run its course and I want to discuss it here.  You don't have to know all about the history of the page, or even understand the topic to learn some valuable lessons.

This is going to be about Vassula Ryden whom you might remember was one of the first pages I had added skeptical content to.  I've used her edits as an example of working backwards, when I found an article in Skeptical Inquirer Magazine by Joe Nickell and added it to her Wikipedia page. 

A month ago I received a letter from an anti-Ryden blogger who had read this blog and appealed to me for help.  She had been trying to edit the Ryden Wikipedia page and kept getting her edits reverted.  I went to Vassula's page and realized that my Joe Nickell edits had been removed.  So I put it back in, this nearly started an edit war (something you do not want).

The talk page got heated up with a person or two (they weren't signing their posts so I'm not sure who said what) I'm going to sum this all up for you, but include the links if you want to read all the details.

They said that they removed my edits because Ryden is a living person and you can't put anything negative (or opinion) about a living person.  Also Nickell had never met Ryden so he could not comment on her spiritual writings from God.

I said "oh yeah! I don't think so, that is stupid" (actually I was much more professional)

They said, "Yeah!  and if you don't like it we are going to tell on you"

So I said "Fine!  I just asked an editor to assist us in this disagreement"

And I did.  I had never done this before but made a request on the Editor Assistance page, I stated my case and then provided the link to the people who I was arguing with back on the Ryden talk page.  The other editors went to the Assistance page and made their argument too. 

Then senior editor looked over the page and said.

Not only should the Nickell edit be put back on, but there should be more criticism like that on the page.  The page is fringe and it is slanted too far towards Ryden.  Editors can not leave their opinion on a page, but the person we quote can leave their opinion, and clearly Nickell was qualified to do so.

The editor then looked at the contributions of all the editors that work on the page and found that these people mostly only work on Ryden's page. Opps!  It appears that they are supporters of Ryden and are not interested in improving Wikipedia, only improving Ryden and they need to knock it off.

So time has passed, my Nickell edit has now been moved up to the beginning of the page and not nearer the end where it was before.  These people I think have stopped editing.

Lessons to be learned here?  Stay calm.  Be professional.  Clearly state your facts.  Allow your opponent to have their say.  You might be completely wrong, step back and see the edits from their point of view.  Also ask for help, sometimes you are right and they are wrong.

Tim Farley is a very smart man.  He has suggested many times that editors need to branch out from editing skeptical sites and edit other topics like your home town page, or your college page.  You don't want to be accused of having a single user account.

Link to Ryden talk page (search for sgerbic)
Link to Editor Assistance page (search for sgerbic)

You can see another editor's contributions by clicking on the blue "contribs" after their name. 

More very very basic Editing ~ Pet Psychics page as example

If you haven't already read This Blog, you might want to visit there first.  We worked on correcting spelling, adding and removing hyperlinks and how to use Watchlists. I'm going to continue editing the Pet Psychic Page as our example.  I do have an article by Karen Stollznow that I want to incorporate into the pet psychic page, I will try to explain my thinking as I edit the page as well as the "how-to" of doing so.  (NOTE: the hyperlink above to the pet psychic page is the one you should use if you are following along with this blog, it contains the page before making these changes. In other words the Before, if you just want to jump to the After then click here.)

As I said before, this is just a wall-o-text, most readers are going to be bogged down trying to read through it.  We need to get a bit more organized before proceeding with Karen's article.  I'm going to insert headings to help.

I don't want to re-write the article, just better organize it.  If you want to have a go at it after reading this blog, please do so.  That is part of the joy of Wikipedia.

We are looking at 7 paragraphs.  The lede (first paragraph) is okay, but I think that the criticism part where it starts "The scientific community has rejected all claims of psychic phenomena..." should be in its own section.  Also the 7th paragraph is about the history of pet psychics and should go towards the beginning. 

At the end of paragraph 3 there is this sentence "In recent years quantum physics has been able to redress the balance with experiments and meta-analyses of work on thought transfer".  I followed the citation at the bottom of the Wiki article and the author is this person.  Dean Radin, the citation is a book that he wrote in 2006, but it gives you no way of following the cite, no page numbers ect.  So this sentence will be removed from the pet psychic article.  If the original editor wants to put it back in then he/she will have to better reference it. 

The last sentence of paragraph 7 is badly worded, "The number of businesses offering pet psychic services has steadily increased but the industry remains unregulated and its claims unverifiable scientifically".  I think that sounds better. 

Love this line, "They claimed they could communicate telepathically,[28] then came the discovery that they could also communicate with animals...even animals that have died." What "discovery"?  Again referencing a paranormal book with no page number where this knowledge is coming from.  I Think this sentence will also change.  "They claimed they could communicate telepathically with animals living or dead."

This whole paragraph needs to go.  "Reasons for consulting a pet psychic vary, but typically center on bringing a troubled human and animal companion relationship to mutual satisfaction.[23][26] Bernadine Cruz, a veterinarian in Laguna Hills, California, states, "animal owners sometimes seek to center themselves through their pets, and whisperers make it easy."[2] Others pet psychics specialize in helping develop a better relationship with a household pet or competitive partnership with a horse." The veterinarian is not noteworthy, and the whole paragraph does nothing for the article. 

I'm going to clean this up further by adding paragraph headings.  This is done by typing ==name of heading==  the more = signs you use, the bigger the font the heading becomes.  So if you are adding a heading to an article that already exists use the same amount of = signs as are in the rest of the article. 

I'm going to insert headings called ==In the media== and ==Criticism of pet psychics== I've been told by other editors who keep changing my edits that Wikipedia does not capitalize every word in a heading even though I think it looks better that way. 

This paragraph seems to be getting a total pass... "

Parapsychologist Rupert Sheldrake claims that he has shown in experiments that some pets are psychic. A parrot, N'kisi, in New York uttered statistically more words that had to do with random cards her owner were looking at in another room in one series of experiments,^[16] and in another series of experiments a dog, Jaytee, spent statistically more time at the window during the time his owner was on her way home (at random times) than other times when Jaytees owner was out^"

I'm going to have to look into this article and see if there has been any investigation into it.  I just can't let these statements saying there is evidence for psychic pets go unchallenged.  But in true Wikipedia fashion I won't delete the paragraph, but look for something to add to it.  I know Richard Wiseman has done some experiments similar to Jaytee.  But what I would like to find is someone writing about Sheldrake's experiments. 

Okay, some time has passed and I've been reading about Sheldrake's dog coming home tests.  I found an article by Joe Nickell about pet psychics and he mentions Wichard Wiseman's replication of Sheldrake's experiment. Here is the part of Nickell's article that I'm going to glean from. 

The researchers responded to a suggestion by Rupert Sheldrake that just such a study be undertaken, and it followed a formal test of the alleged phenomenon by an Austrian television company. That test focused on an English woman and her dog and seemed successful. Wiseman et al. (1998) conducted four experiments designed to rule out the pet’s responding to routine or picking up sensory cues (either from the returning owner or from others aware of the expected time of return), as well as people’s selective memories and selective matching, and other possible normal explanations.

In all four experiments the dog failed to detect accurately when her owner set off for home, contradicting claims made on the basis of the previous (Austrian TV) study. The experiments suggested "that selective memory, multiple guesses and selective matching could often have sufficient scope to give an owner the impression of a paranormal effect."

Each editor of Wikipedia does this differently, I like to quote.  Wikipedia would rather you write it in your own words and quote only a bit, so lets give it a go here.  

"Replicating Sheldrake's experiment with Jaytee,  [[Richard Wiseman]] in 1998 designed four tests for a dog a Austrian television show felt had been successful knowing when its owner would return home.  Wiseman ruled out all cues and routines the dog could previously have been picking up.  When tested with these controls the dog failed all four tests.  [[JREF]] investigator [[Joe Nickell]] writes that "the experiments suggested "that selective memory, multiple guesses and selective matching could often have sufficient scope to give an owner the impression of a paranormal effect."

Can you improve on my writing? Probably!  Your welcome to edit the blurb on Wikipedia.

Now we need to cite it.  Here is the link to the article again.  http://www.csicop.org/si/show/psychic_pets_and_pet_psychics/  The author is Joe Nickell, for Skeptical Inquirer Magazine,Volume 26.6, November / December 2002, article is called "Psychic Pets and Pet Psychics". Investigative Files is the name of his column This should be all we need to cite the article.  I'm placing this blurb right after the third paragraph where they reference Sheldrake.  I know that what I'm writing is criticism and should go under the criticism heading, but I want it to flow from the previous paragraph.  We can always change it. 

I find it easier to look for another journal reference located on the page I'm editing, copy and paste it where I want it to go (or on a word document somewhere else) then change all the details.  Lets try it.  I found this reference (called "cite web" there were other references that were called "cite book").

<ref name=Gracely>{{cite web |last=Gracely, Ph.D. |first=Ed J. |authorlink= |title=Why Extraordinary Claims Demand Extraordinary Proof |work=PhACT |year=1998 |url= http://www.quackwatch.org/01QuackeryRelatedTopics/extraproof.html|accessdate=2007-07-31}}</ref>

Here is what it looks like in the References area.  ^ Gracely, Ph.D., Ed J. (1998). "Why Extraordinary Claims Demand Extraordinary Proof". PhACT. Retrieved 2007-07-31.

Pretty intimidating looking isn't it?  If you want something to appear as a footnote then you must use something that starts with <ref and ends with </ref>    Everything must be changed exactly, so when you are doing something like this, try not to get distracted.  Do it at one sitting.

<ref name=Nickell>{{cite web |last=Nickell |first=Joe |authorlink= |title=Psychic Pets and Pet Psychics |work=Investigative Files |year=November-December 2002 |url=http://www.csicop.org/si/show/psychic_pets_and_pet_psychics/ |accessdate=2011-08-27}}</ref>

This is what it looks like on "Preview"

^ Nickell, Joe (November-December 2002). "Psychic Pets and Pet Psychics". Investigative Files. Retrieved 2011-08-27.

Lets use Joe Nickell's article for another area on the page.   Here is what Joe writes about pet psychics.

People who are both devoted to their pets and credulous about the paranormal may easily fall prey to unsubstantiated claims of pet psychics. Some profess to treat animals’ emotional problems, for example, after supposedly communicating with them by ESP or other paranormal means, such as through astrology or assistance from the seer’s "spirit guides" (MacDougall 1983; Cooper and Noble 1996).

Having studied pet psychics at work—including Gerri Leigh (with whom I appeared on Springer) and Sonya Fitzpatrick (star of the Animal Planet channel’s The Pet Psychic)—I find that they impress audiences with some very simple ploys. Consciously or not, they are essentially using the same fortunetellers’ technique—"cold reading"—that is used for human subjects. This is an artful method of gleaning information from someone while giving the impression it is obtained mystically (Hyman 1977). After all, it is the pet owners, not the pets themselves, who "validate" the pronouncements. Here is a look at some of the common cold-reading techniques used by pet psychics.

These and other techniques help convince the credulous that pet psychics have telepathic or clairvoyant or other powers.

Lets glean something from this to use in the criticism section. 

[[Joe Nickell]] believes that [[cold reading]] is the reason why so many pet psychics look like they are communicating with animals.  Watching pet psychics like Gerri Leigh and [[Animal Planet]]'s [[Sonya Fitzpatrick]] work in front of an audience, their conversations with the animals appear to be impressive until you understand that "it is the pet owners, not the pets themselves, who "validate" the pronouncements."

We can use the exact same citation.   At first I didn't hyperlink to Joe Nickell, but looking at the "show preview" as I'm adding this on to the page, it seems it has been many paragraphs since Joe was linked, so I'm going to do it.  Also because I'm checking the "preview" each time I noticed that Gerri Leigh whom I had first tried to hyperlink to is giving me only red print.  I searched for her on Wikipedia and she does not have a page, so I'm removing the [[ ]] around her name. 

There might be more I can glean from Nickell's article, but lets move on.  Here is Karen Stollznow's article that brought me to use the pet psychic page as the example on how to edit.  http://www.csicop.org/sb/show/ballad_of_jed_and_the_pet_psychic  Article called "The Ballad of Jed (and the Pet Psychic)" March 2003 for Skeptical Inquirer Magazine. 

Here are the parts that sum up the article (the conclusion), I will need to glean two or three sentences that will represent the article on the pet psychic page. 

On the basis of this session, Ann didn’t provide any evidence of psychic abilities but instead appeared to employ similar techniques, either consciously or not. As confirmed by Jed’s owners, Ann was completely inaccurate in her reading of Jed’s age, place of birth, background, behavior, health, and my health. The shelter “hit” was more miss, posed as a question, and then an uncertain claim with the caveat “think.” Most damning of all, Jed is not my cat, and my home is not his!
It’s an easy gig to speak on behalf of the voiceless. Animal communication, of a paranormal nature, presupposes that the pet is telepathic, is able to understand human language and thought, and able to “respond” in kind. “Interspecies communication” appears to be a visual and subjective or imaginative interpretation of the physical and behavioral traits of non-human animals. No matter how many commands your dog responds to, no matter how many words Koko can sign, no matter how many words your parrot can mimic, language is human-species specific. We don’t and can’t “know” what animals think. Despite our own linguistic abilities, it’s difficult enough to know what people think. 

I've already read the article several times, so writing it in my own words with very few quotes shouldn't be a problem.  

Linguistic professor [[Karen Stollznow]] writing for [[Australian Skeptics|The Skeptic]] magazine tested a pet psychic with a cat named Jed.  Not only was the psychic "completely inaccurate in her reading of Jed’s age, place of birth, background, behavior, health, and my health..." she was unable to tell that Jed was not her cat.  Stollznow concludes that "language is human-species specific. We don’t and can’t “know” what animals think."

Now our citation.  Lets just use Nickell's cite as a starting point, change out everything to apply to Karen's article.  

<ref name=Stollznow>{{cite web |last=Stollznow |first=Karen |authorlink= |title=The Ballad of Jed (and the Pet Psychic) |work= |year=March 2003 |url=http://www.csicop.org/sb/show/ballad_of_jed_and_the_pet_psychic |accessdate=2011-08-27}}</ref>

^ Stollznow, Karen (March 2003). "The Ballad of Jed (and the Pet Psychic)". Retrieved 2011-08-27.

Notice on the reference cite I left blank the "work=" area.  On Nickell's article I wrote "Investigative Files" on Karen's I didn't know what to write so I just left it blank.  The same thing was done on both Karen and Joe's cites where it says "authorlink=".  I didn't know what to write there so I left it blank.  The citation still footnotes and looks wonderful!   

So now I'm going to preview the page one more time, it is already on my watchlist.  I'm going to write "added two articles and reorganized the page" in the edit summary.  Then when I'm sure I'm completely done I will "publish" the page. 

So I'm done working on this page.  Please feel free to expand the article, rewrite it, fix grammar or whatever you think is needed.  Remember we are looking for neutral tones, let the reference you are citing speak for you.  I left almost everything that was in the page when I got to it, just moved things around and added the two articles. 

There were several things I almost did to make the skeptic side sound better, but I removed them.  For your learning sake this is what I didn't include (but wanted to).  Professor [[Richard Wiseman]] or [[Richard Wiseman]] PhD. 

The same thing with Joe Nickell.  I wanted to write "after years of experience investigating pet psychics..." this would also have been non-neutral, I'm sure I could have come up with references to his "years of experience" but it wouldn't have anything to do with the article.

I did include the words "Linguistic professor" for Karen's blurb.  I suppose that could be removed, but as I was quoting her about human communication, I felt that in this case it was an important part of the blurb. 

Just in case you were wondering how many people we can expect will read our newly improved pet psychic page... About 350 a month or 4,200 a year.  Is that a lot?  If I, Susan Gerbic were to write a blog about those same two articles and place it somewhere on the Internet for the world to read, I doubt that I could get that many reads.  Keep in mind that whether or not I wrote the blog, people are still going to be visiting the Wikipedia page.  I'd rather those 350 people find the Wiki page. 

As I said, I'm moving on to other Wikipedia articles that need improvement as well.  This one isn't perfect, but it is way better.  I hope you learned from my thought process, and maybe it will make you a better editor.  Improve on what I'm teaching you, and the only way to do that is to get out there and EDIT! 

Susan

TAM9 ~ The Amaz!ing Meeting

Wow!  Just getting in from The Amaz!ing Meeting (which it was) and the first thing I'm doing is uploading pictures so I can get started adding them to Wikipedia.

I did not attend any lectures accept 10 minutes of Richard Wiseman's awesome lecture.  And the two Sunday paper presenters who followed me.  Ashley F. Miller was very well received with her lecture on "Emotions Aren’t the Enemy".  I followed Michael Hartwell's polished lecture on "The Media Isn't Calling Your Skeptics Group, and It's Your Fault".  Michael at one point in his presentation talked about how ridiculous would it look if an Alt Med Wikipedia page had no skeptical criticism on it.  It was a perfect lead in for my talk. While I was in the room for the other papers I was focused on my notes and sadly didn't get to hear any of the other presentations.  Guess I will have to wait for the DVD's.

I spent an enormous amount of time in the hallway mostly at the IIG table, meeting people and snapping pictures.  It was such a blast.  Besides hanging out with friends and the "Hug Me I'm Vaccinated" campaign (which was so well done, important and FREE) the best part about TAM was meeting people interested in talking about Guerrilla Skepticism on Wikipedia (and the Got your Wiki Back project).   

Oh my gosh, what a blast it was to be up on stage and have all those people listening to me.  I could have gone on for hours giving examples and answering questions...but I only got 15 minutes.  I gave away maybe 200 business cards with the URL for here, so I can only hope.  If you are new to this blog, Welcome!  We really want you here, please look over the past posts, add us to your RSS feed and please, please, please comment.

About the presentation.  I really had to cut way back on everything, giving a general overview of a project this big is really difficult.  The examples I gave were Joe Nickell's article on Vassula Ryden (which Anna finished editing the same day I presented) and the JREF Pigasus Award to CVS Pharmacy.  I have the video of my lecture and will clean it up and load it to my YouTube site.  I'll let you know when that is finished but I suspect at least a week. 

So here is the Wikipedia lowdown, I'll try to keep it in some kind of chronological order.

Sean Faircloth & Secular Coalition for America:

Wednesday night Stirling and I arrive at South Park Casino in Las Vegas and head to the Del Mar Bar, that's where everyone hangs out.  I struck up a conversation with Sean Faircloth from the Secular Coalition for America, I have seen his lecture at least once before and I remember being very impressed.  He is a great speaker with a "go get em" kind of personality that I can relate to.  I had never visited his Wikipedia page nor the one for the SCA.  I told him about the "Got your Wiki Back" project and asked if he had a picture on his page already.

He said he hated having his picture taken because he rarely came out looking good in pictures.  So I sat him down and snapped one.  I think it turned out rather well, and just added it as the main picture to his page.  I moved the image that was already there to lower on the page (I thought it looked rather gray and dull, but it is one of those nice "action" shots that work well). 

Sean told me that he had heard that it was possible to somehow link the names on his page to other links.  He mentioned Richard Dawkins and several others.  I explained that this should be an easy change and I would look into it when I got home.  And this is exactly what I have done, if you look at the history of the page you will see the before and after. (click on the "view history" tab at the top of the page).  I also went through the page and added hyperlinks to all the proper nouns throughout.

To add hyperlinks go to "edit" at the top of the page next to "view history".  Then you will be looking at the HTML writing, every word or phrase that you want to hyperlink to you just put the [[ in front of the word, then ]] at the end of the word.  Write something in the "edit summary" like "added several hyperlinks".  Check the "watch this page" box so it can be added to your watchlist and you will know if someone has changed this page.  Then hit "preview changes" and look at what you changed.  If there is any red writing then something is wrong.  In the case of Faircloth I tried to hyperlink to name Woody Kaplin and it came out red.  Either Woody Kaplin does not have a Wikipedia page, or the name of his page is different than Woody Kaplin, maybe his real name is Robert Kaplin?  Anyway, I'll leave that for someone else.

I linked to all the names which should have been done when the page was created.  The page really needs a lot more work than I have time for.  Someone with more writing skill than I have needs to go into "edit" and rewrite the page.  This would take me hours to do correctly, but I'm sure one of you can finish it up in minutes.  For example nearly every paragraph starts with "Faircloth this..." or "In (insert year) Faircloth...that". 

Also if his page needs work I'm sure the SCA page needs the same kind of work.  I didn't really look at the page but someone please check into it.  (as usual if you are working on the page could you please comment).  Just checked out the "discussion" page for the SCA, totally funny. 

James McGaha:

I am shocked to discover that he does not have a Wiki page, only a mention.  I've got pictures waiting for a page to put them on...hint...hint...hint.  His TAM9 blurb looks pretty impressive, I've seen him lecture a few times at skeptical events and I would think he needs a page as a part of the "We Got your Wiki Back" project.

Richard Saunders: 

You don't know how bad I want to put this picture on Saunders Wikipedia page.  But I suppose I won't because he is really a good guy.  I think it would jazz up the page quite a bit and it is a tribute to Randi. 

Richard has one of those pages like Brian Dunnings that goes to a   disambiguation page.  Really would like to figure out how to fix this, but I don't have the skill.








While we are on the subject of changing pictures on sites that already have images, take a look at these two pictures I got.  Would love to hear some opinions if these images should go on their pages.

 

George Hrab

Brian Dunning

This next edit I did was completely the idea of Tim Farley.  I was invited to a speaker dinner on Saturday night and Tim pulled me aside and asked me to get a picture of the 4 latest JREF fellows.  Tim had already added a blurb on the JREF page in anticipation of getting an image to go there.

Here is the addition to the JREF page.  While I was in the adding picture mood I just copied the citation and added the image to Karen Stollznow and Steve Novella's pages.  Quick to do once you have it written correctly.  Its just a matter of knowing where to put the image in the page.  Here is what the reference looks like.  

[[Image:Four JREF fellows 2011.jpg|thumb|250px|Latest [[JREF]] fellows.  Tim Farley, Karen Stollznow, [[Steven Novella]] & Ray Hall.  Portrait taken at The Amaz!ng Meeting TAM9 from Outer Space July 16, 2011]]

The 250px that is listed here can be a larger or smaller number depending on how big you want the image to be when saved.  Play around with the number and keep hitting "preview" looking at what the page will look like.  When you have it correct then hit save.  

When Tim Farley's wiki page is launched (hopefully soon) we can add this exact same reference to his page.  Same for Ray Hall.

I had some really great conversations with some of the speakers that were kind enough to talk to me.  The questions I received were all pretty typical ones, "How do you get an edit to stay on the page?", "Can I edit my own page?" and so on.  They all sounded pretty excited about someone having their Wiki backs, even a little modest about having a page at all.  Most said they have seen their page and wish it could be updated. 

Carol Tavris asked if I could retake her picture when she was wearing something colorful. She was wearing a burgundy outfit at the time we were talking but she got scooted away too quickly.  Actually I really like the image I took of her that is on the page right now. 

I had so many things I wanted to get done those days, but really there was so much going on and by the third day I was exhausted. The same can be said for all the speakers that wanted help with their Wikipedia pages, they were overwhelmed and tired.

After I gave my paper presentation I had several people come up to me to talk about helping out.  This was one of my favorite parts of the whole weekend.  Everyone of them were intelligent and pumped on wanting to help out.  Most asked "what do you want me to do?" as you remember I only had 15 minutes on stage to get the plea out for help as well as describe what the project is all about.  I usually asked each one about their interests and also tried to determine what was their Wiki editing skill level.  I had beginners as well as advanced, but all willing to help out.  

I really wish I had done a better job of getting names from those that approached me, I got a few business cards but only a few.  The things I heard from them were great, one woman (her name was Britney but I think it was spelled differently than normal) told me that as a whole the skeptic community has more intellectual ability than it knows what to do with, editing Wikipedia is an obvious outlet for that.  She said that she hangs out with some really smart people who love to complain, but when she asks what they plan on doing about it, she just hears crickets.  (I'm sure I misquoted you a bit Britney, but that was the general overview of our conversation?)

Linda was another one that Got It!  She said that she could spend as little or as much time working on this project.  Exactly correct.  You can work on these projects when you have the desire and time to do so.  I ask that you please write on the "discussion page" of the article you are working on telling other editors what you had planned to do next, and so on, giving them a guide of how to finish what you were doing. 

I explained that we need help with everything.  Grammar, photos, re-writes, adding citations, adding references, getting people into categories, and on and on.  Editing Wikipedia for skeptical content should be a joy, I don't want to assign anything to anyone.  I might make a few suggestions for people who are beginning, but really I want editing done in an area that is of interest. 

Tim Farley suggests that an editor should not stay only on one subject matter as it is possible that the other editors will feel there is a conflict of interest.  Yes, I know, I have a  conflict of interest as I'm editing with the clear goal of adding skepticism to the articles.  But unless someone looks really closely at my edits they won't see that pattern.  What would turn up would look more like a list of edits I've made.  It would look something like this, Steve Novella, Power Balance, John Edward, The See Clearly Method, The Simpsons, IIG and Sean Faircloth.  No clear pattern for someone outside the skeptic community to see.  Tim suggests that if you are worried about creating a pattern, you should edit something completely different like your hometown's page or maybe your school. 

All in all, I'm exhausted but super thrilled that I was able to meet like-minded people out there who understand how important this project is.  We are the front line people.  We have the ability to change minds and really impact the skeptical community.  Pick the area that is of interest to you and get to editing! 

"We Got Your Wiki Back" Project ~ The Bigger Picture

Hopefully by now everyone understands that Guerrilla Skepticism usually involves "tagging" paranormal Wikipedia pages inserting a bit of critical thinking into the knee-deep woo. At its best that is what I advocate.

But what about the skeptical sites. Do we really need to update and cite people involved in the skeptical movement. Why do they need their own personal pages? Everyone knows who Carl Sagan is so why keep up his page?

Because I said so! That's why!

No seriously, it is a good question. We need to think about what the "big picture" goal here is. When our skeptical "heroes" speak out for us in the "real world" they need the credibility of having a well maintained and cited page backing them up. Face it most people don't know who is who in the skeptical movement, Carl Sagan may be the exception but stop 10 people on the street today and ask them who James "The Amazing" Randi is and they will sadly shrug their shoulders. That's almost unfathomable to us skeptics. My point is, we don't live in the real world (so to speak) our language is unique to us (woo, troother, JREF, IIG, SI) are just a few examples. When someone turns on CNN and there is Randi talking about Sylvia Browne how many people are going to say "who is that?" a quick search on Wikipedia is going to do a lot of educating, and shame on us if we don't have Randi's back.

Also skeptical topics and people should have a ton of links the researcher can follow that will expand the knowledge of not only the lay person but also avenues that we skeptics didn't know existed. Many times I have been reading a Wikipedia page and discovered podcasts and articles that I didn't know they were on. Having a live link to click on opens up my interest level and the next thing I know I've found a new podcast to subscribe to.

Face it we are a very small group of fish in this ocean. There are more bowling activists than there are skeptic activists (don't ask for the stats on this cause I just made it up). We have a lot of work to do to get the message out that skepticism is awesome and active. We also need to look out for each other. Someone looking on Joe Nickell's page is going to see links to other podcasts and articles he has been quoted in.

When someone looking at Vassula Ryden's (see earlier blog post) Wikipedia page sees the article by Joe Nickell they might follow his hyperlink. When they say "who is this guy?" they can click on his link and find out exactly who this guy is. There are a ton of people on her site that reportedly have investigated her, only one has a hyperlink to a Wikipedia page, all the others I say "who the hell is this?" No credibility at all.

We need to remember that most of the skeptics on Wikipedia also have other interests not related to skepticism. For example Yau Man Chan is known for his time on the reality show Survivors, plus he is really active in the world of ping-pong. We know him for being one of the Skeptologists. I recently listened to him lecture at SkeptiCalCon in Berkeley this May, while there I photographed him wearing his nametag and holding the JREF Pigasus. I uploaded the picture to WikiCommons and posted it on his Wikipedia page along with this reference "Yau-Man Chan & JREF Pigasus after lecture at SkeptiCalCon, May 29, 2011 Berkeley, CA". There wasn't any reason to post a blurb on his site as he lectures all the time and there was nothing notable about the SkeptiCalCon lecture. BUT the picture is really cute and awesome and I'm able to link back to the JREF and if SkeptiCalCon had a Wikipedia page of its own it would also be linked.

Also from that same conference I photographed Anthony Pratkanis, Robert Carroll and Peter Gleick all three of these men had Wikipedia pages but none with a picture. Now they all do, with the reference back to SkeptiCalCon. This might expose people reading their pages to this concept of skepticism.

Mark Edward is known as a mentalist as well as a skeptic heavily involved in Guerrilla Skepticism, his Wikipedia page expresses both of these worlds. I have left his name on the famous mentalist Wikipedia page as well as the Street Magic page. People interested in knowing more about the mentalists and street magicians will see his name and follow the hyperlink and discover Mark. This is kinda a back door to exposing them to skepticism, there is a quote on Mark's page saying "I've always been a skeptic because I'm a magician. When I see something in this hand (points to right hand) I automaticly want to know what the other hand is doing." This quote may engage anyone coming to his site with a magic interest.

In some minds, Skepticism is thought of as a negative term, "only old white men with no humor are skeptics" seems to be the statement most popular. My friend John Rael from Skeptically Pwnd recently told me that we need to "take back the term skeptic and remind people how cool that word is". Well okay John I agree, in my opinion we don't need to be looking for a better word to describe ourselves, just need to market ourselves better.

One way is to show on the Wiki pages how human we actually are. Check out Barry Beyerstein's page. When I first tried to read this page I nearly fell asleep (look at history of page before I began to edit it and you will see what I mean) another editor on Wiki approached me and asked if I could help edit the page. I knew Barry and loved his sense of humor and compassion for people (he would go to any lengths to explain something) just an all-round neat guy. So I remembered that he had signed a book for me that he wrote an auto-bio essay in called "Skeptical Odysseys" (yes we can and should be quoting from books also). So after reading the essay a few times I took notes and quoted a ton from it.

Should note that this is not the correct way to edit references on Wikipedia, you are to use your own words as much as possible. But I loved the tone and that it seemed to come from Barry's voice so I did something totally different and wrong. So sue me! Its been months and no one has said a word (its on my Watch List). If and when someone does I'll clean it up or allow them to do so. But for the moment Barry describes himself like this " I frequently found myself the odd man out...(they thought) I was a nice guy, but hopelessly 'linear' and 'left-brained', despite my de rigueur shoulder-length hair, tie-dye t-shirt, bell bottoms and cowboy boots.” How human is that?

He didn't even have a picture on his site. I did have some group pictures I had taken years ago, so I cleaned them up the best I could and inserted them on his page. I then "friended" his daughter on Facebook and let her know I had updated his page. She was delighted and said that her dad would be very happy with it. Recently I asked Lindsay if she would please upload some nicer images of her dad (she is a photographer) to WikiCommons and I'll link those pictures to his site. She assured me she would get to it soon and again thanked me.

So remember the big picture. We need to keep these pages up to date and well tended. If they don't have a site maybe we should consider making one (currently I am working on James Underdown and Barry Karr's pages). We want to market skepticism better and give these people more creditability, so get on it.

Vassula Ryden on Wikipedia ~ Working Backwards

Work Backwards!

This is one of my Guerrilla Skepticism mantras when you aren't sure where to start editing Wikipedia. Its nice if you have favorite topics but it can be a bear to find the citations that Wikipedia needs to be notable.

In the case of Vassula Ryden (whom I had never heard of) I found an article in Skeptical Inquirer written by Joe Nickell about her purported written messages from God and friends. So I had a well sourced document on hand and she had a Wiki page that was mostly positive or neutral. Start with all this, carefully read the source and write a small blurb about the article, then "tag" the Wiki page while also using "ref" tags linking it back to the original article. And your done!

Here is the article...

"Rydén is best known for her writings entitled "True Life in God", which is a compilation of nearly 2000 messages she claims to have received from God since the year 1985 when she was living in Bangladesh. While she was writing a grocery list, she reports to have suddenly experienced a light electrical feeling in her right hand and, at the same time, an invisible presence. She says she felt led by this presence and, permitting her hand to be guided, she wrote a line in a very different style from her own with the words: "I am your guardian Angel and my name is Daniel."

A long list of "investigators" all listed on her page looked into her writings and here is what they determined...

"...three possibilities are open for discernment – a diabolical origin, a psychic origin or a supernatural origin. The findings of these investigations of Rydén’s case – documented in books and articles – systematically rule out the first two possibilities and conclude that the writings are a phenomenon of supernatural origin"

How about just FRAUD. Have you thought about that? Apparently not. Wonder if someone should check these references?

Another investigator researched her writings and came up with this...

"Laurentin carefully examines and addresses the many objections made against Rydén. He states: "Vassula is one of the most balanced and transparent seers that I know. Nevertheless, she has excited more opposition than any other. As is often the case for mystics, disbelief, fear, opposition and calumny appear in like measure with the graces received."

One more...

"”The theological analysis of her writings brings into relief themes like: devotion to the Holy Spirit, the Alliance of the Hearts of Jesus and Mary, Christian unity, the conversion of Russia, devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary, the spreading apostasy."

Kinda makes you want to be sick doesn't it? Anyone looking this woman up would find little criticism of her "talent" to someone on the fence it kinda looks like she is the real thing. Messages from God? Well Okay, why not? She is not telling people to jump off cliffs but to Love one another and spread the Word of God. This was the article before I got a hold of it.

Enter Joe Nickell. CFI investigator of the paranormal, also an expert on handwriting analysis.

"In Skeptical Inquirer Magazine investigator Joe Nickell took an objective look into these “purported messages” and found “the contrived handwriting, the linguistic lapses, and the indications of fantasizing all suggest that Vassula Ryden is not in touch with supernatural entities but is simply engaging in self-deception that in turn deceives the credulous. Her automatic writings therefore are not works of revelation but simply of pious imagination.” Furthermore Ryden's personal misspellings and grammar are identical to those written by Jesus, God, Mary and her own invisible “guardian angel, Daniel which all seem to have the same hand writing and grammar. Nickell states, “If God deigns to use the English language, should we not expect it to be rendered accurately?” In conclusion Nickell writes, “One suspects that if Ryden were prevented from seeing what was being written, the entities supposedly guiding her hand would be unable to so faithfully follow the lines! I invite Ryden to accept my invitation to perform a scientific test to refute or confirm this suspicion."

Insert arm pumping here! That is pretty exciting to this Guerrilla Skeptic! There was nothing critical of her on her page, and shame on us for that. We should never allow this kind of woo to go unchallenged. Do you think any hint of doubt ever entered the head of one of her followers? This isn't so in your face that I'm calling her a fraud (which I have no idea or not if she truly believes these claims) and that isn't important here. What is important is to state the facts with no opinion. But it was okay for me to quote Nickell's opinion. See the difference?

Still we badly need more criticism on her page. She isn't one of the popular woos so she doesn't get the attention that grief vampire Sylvia Browne does. We need to get the link to the SI article "active" I've written to Barry Karr of SI and asked if we can't get these articles to become something people can click on and in an instant able to read. As it stands now they have to order the magazine article or go to the library and look it up. Hardly something people are likely to do. Just waiting for a reply from Barry.

This adventure isn't truly over. I had a problem with the wording in the first paragraph of the article. They had written...

"She receives no personal royalties, fees or benefit for her efforts.

Yeah sure. So I added the line "Other than personal recognition from devoted fans, she receives no personal royalties, fees or benefit for her effort".

That was taken out. So on the discussion page I state that the editor is not NPOV (in other words not neutral point of view, which is against Wikipedia's policies) the editor is showing bias towards Vassula Ryden. I say either remove the line completely or allow mine to stay. This all happened in March 2011. I waited and waited and no one said anything (the page is on my Wikipedia Watch List) so in June I wrote rather aggressively...

"Been more than 2 months. I'm removing the non-NPOV statement about her "doing this for free" line. Does she SELL her books or not? Amazon has quite a few books listed of hers for sale, wonder if they know they are supposed to be for free? I'm willing to go through arbitration with Wikipedia senior editors if you try to put it back into her page. Sgerbic"

So far so good. Sometimes you have to get a bit aggressive and use Wiki phrases to make them think you know what you are doing. Just be confident.

Just for the fun of it check out a few of the comments from other editors on the discussion page which just reek of bias and craziness.

if you read the documents from the Vatican, there can be no doubt that the writings ARE NOT private relevation (from Heavan) but personal considerations of Mrs Ryder. It is implied that, like Fatima and Lourdes, the writings are on the same level. This is blatently misleading, because Fatima and Lourdes ARE private relevations, recognised by the church, without warnings from the Vatican, and Mrs Ryder's writings are only personal consideration, with warnings from the vatican."

AND

"Since it appears that the real theologians at the Vatican have nixed the possibility that Jesus "this time" is really communicating through this woman, it seems that demons would most likely be responsible. They like to lie about who they are. They love to pretend to be good beings suggesting that they are Jesus or angels of Heaven. Look at the stupid demon who began talking to Joseph Smith. Smith was arrested for divining which is an occultic activity. Then when the supposed angel Mormoni began talking to him he believed that it was a Heavenly angel. What he didn't seem to understand is that someone who messes around with the occult is not going to get Heavenly visiters but demonic ones! I mean Mormoni? Please!"

To the person who "trusts" the messages of Mrs. Ryden why not just read the real Bibles and get your messages from them instead of another Christian who seems to be loosing her way by one of Satan's monkeys?"

"If anyone tries to re-modify this article, putting author-opinionated comments such as stating Vassula's writings not being of divine origin etc, this WILL be taken on to the next level and we will get an independent 3rd party to intervene based on the abovementioned guidelines.
I don't feel like getting an account to make the needed changes..."

Priceless...

There is a bit of hope though. this is from August 2010.

"Does making "prophetic" predictions automatically give someone notability? How many predictions did she make that didn't come true? This article has problems. Like this blatantly biased statement, "Vassula has recorded many prophetic messages, some already fulfilled and others yet to unfold." This is ridiculous and implies that she has some kind of mystical power, a theme found throughout the article. And regarding notability, almost all the references to her writings are from religious organizations, her own website, or clergy with very few sources in the non-religious media. I think that this article needs to be heavily edited and unsubstantiated, biased claims of prophecy and especially the section on "supernatural phenomena" removed. The sections on her work with other churches and the United Nations, and the controversy with the Catholic Church is fine and well sourced, but the rest is questionable. I may be out of bounds, I don't edit a lot here. ch473 "

I wrote to ch473 thanking him/her for their skepticism and advising them to please make the changes they think will improve the article.

I'm telling you there is A LOT of work out there to do. I have Vassula Ryden on a Google Alert hoping for more articles about her (hopefully critical ones) that I can add to the page. So far I've only gotten a couple hits, mostly in some other language and a link to her fan page on Facebook. (Which only has 39 fans BTW).