User talk:Tekaphor/Archive 2

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TALKPAGE ARCHIVE 2 (2010-2011 INCLUSIVE)

General statement at XMRV

Hi, I wrote a little warning for everyone at XMRV. I think going back to the strict sourcing requirements is the only resolution that will bring some peace to the article. Cheers! Keepcalmandcarryon (talk) 15:34, 8 January 2010 (UTC)

OK, thanks. - Tekaphor (TALK) 03:59, 9 January 2010 (UTC)

Whittemore Peterson Institute

We seem to be sliding into an edit war on this one. KCOC is very singular minded, e.g hist latest revert was a reference for funding for the WPI "to serve patients with Neuro-immune diseases such as ME/CFS, atypical MS, Fibromyalgia, Gulf War Illness and Autism, ..." from Congresswoman Berkley's official state website was not an RS since not being a medical expert this is of "secondary relevance" to other RS (e.g the Guardian Newspaper). If I revert I will trigger 3RR. You might want to track this. -- TerryE (talk) 21:46, 14 January 2010 (UTC)

Please see Request for discussion on triggering Edit War Process. Feel free to contribute to this discussion if you wish. I apologise for contacting all contributors, but I have been asked to be impartial by another editor working on this page. -- TerryE (talk) 01:10, 15 January 2010 (UTC)

Thanks, and sorry for the late reply. I have been keeping a cursory eye on the situation, but I am not able to get deeply involved right now, especially when the issues stretch my interest. - Tekaphor (TALK) 02:22, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

Problem user(s)

Hi Tek

I noticed you've been working on MUS recently. Given the remarkable way the MUS meme was propagated last year, you might want to be aware of this:

Recruitment, or reactivation here: [1] followed by:

• Mass revert at CFS[2]

• Deletion of other users' comments about KCCO's problematic editing at WPI:[3]

• Unsubtantiable claim that I attacked her, with a threat of blocking, on my userpage. [4]

I've asked other recently involved editors with more arbitration savvy than I have (TerryE, Ward20 and StevieNic) to look into this, and I thought you might like to know as well. Thanks, Sam Weller (talk) 16:51, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for the notice. - Tekaphor (TALK) 02:34, 18 February 2010 (UTC)

Please see Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Keepcalmandcarryon. Sam Weller (talk) 08:42, 19 February 2010 (UTC)

Thanks again, I just left a message. - Tekaphor (TALK) 02:56, 20 February 2010 (UTC)

Tekaphor,I am trying to decide where to focus my attentions on this whole conduct issue: the puppet analysis or a user conduct RfC. I would appreciate your perspective either by reply here or via wiki E-mail -- TerryE (talk) 14:38, 21 February 2010 (UTC)

Hi Terry. I do not know how long the SPI will take. It is also possible that R1 and KCACO are actually individuals, although some aspects of their tactics and personality are suspiciously very similar. The CheckUser has already been clerk endorsed, so it may be more productive to work on user conduct RfC until the CU result comes through? - Tekaphor (TALK) 02:06, 22 February 2010 (UTC)

FYI

Hi, I just wanted to bring to your attention that I responded to your latest comment to me. Again though, please except my apology. I think I may have been unclear in what I was trying to say plus I don't know the latest thing going on. --CrohnieGal^Talk 19:07, 28 February 2010 (UTC)

Thanks! I responded on your talkpage. [5] - Tekaphor (TALK) 00:40, 1 March 2010 (UTC)

XMRV Page

Hi Tekaphor. It would be great if you could take a look at the XMRV discussion page and add your thoughts on rewording the opening lede. They seem to have reverted most of the lede edits from September, and gone back to slanting it in favor of an XMRV = red herring approach using failure-to-detect studies. But there is a new consensus forming that the lede isn't the place to argue the controversy, which I agree with. HealthandScience (talk) 21:31, 15 November 2010 (UTC)

Sorry for the late reply. I don't think I will be of much use at the moment. The FDA/NIH study may deserve more attention in the lead, but I'm not going to get into an edit war over it right now, and we did some good work on covering it in the main article text. Hopefully, the XMRV/MLV quackmire will be gradually resolved over the next 6 months and it will become a lot easier to make solid edits in the lead as well. - Tekaphor (TALK) 03:37, 8 December 2010 (UTC)

Review on definitions

(This is a continuation of an early August 2011 discussion from http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk:Chronic_fatigue_syndrome&oldid=442769880#Review_on_definitions)

From the abstract PMID 21029269: "the most prominent and widely used of these definitions is the 1994 Centre for Disease Control and Prevention Case Definitions. However, the pre-eminence of this definition over the others has never been substantiated and it has been widely criticized for its lack of specificity. Furthermore, none of the above case definitions have produced evidence to demonstrate their accuracy or precision at defining cases of CFS." Superiority is part of the definition of pre-eminence, so yes, the authors are implying that some people view the CDC 1994 criteria as superior.

The situation is, there are multiple definitions of CFS, the CDC 1994 is the most used but it is often criticized in the literature for lacking specificity etc (anyone who reads the literature frequently would have noticed that, but obviously without sources that is just an anecdote, and I don't have the time right now to hunt all these sources down, maybe another time). However I had another closer look at this "critical review" and it was somewhat disappointing.

Full text on the CDC 1994 criteria: "In particular, Sullivan et al. [30] argue that the validity of the definition is questionable because it has been derived by consensus rather than empirically. Furthermore, Jason et al. [17] argue that the wording of the definition is superficial and does not provide instructions on appropriate interpretation or application. In addition to these problems the ability of the definition to successfully exclude patients with psychiatric explanations for their illness has been questioned. Jason et al. [1] found that the 1994 definition [29] was unable to differentiate between the symptoms of post-exertional malaise, and problems with sleep, memory and cognition experienced by CFS patients from those experienced by patients suffering from depression."

[30] = Sullivan et al 2002 PMID 12171382. [17] = must be an error because it cites Holmes et al 1988 (ie CDC 1988 criteria). [1] = Jason et al 2001 PMID 11379670. Sullivan et al 2002 is a large study but Jason et al 2001 is a small study. Not exactly a strong MEDRS case for being "widely criticized", despite probably being correct in general.

Full text on the Oxford 1991 criteria: "However, this definition is far less rigorous than any of the other case definitions and similar to the 1988 CDC definition [17] can be criticized for citing fatigue as the principal symptom of CFS. The definition also permits the inclusion of patients, whose only symptom is fatigue, thus creating the opportunity for the non-CFS patients to receive a diagnosis of CFS [26]."

[17] = Holmes et al 1988 (ie CDC 1988 criteria). [26] = Jason et al 2000 "Defining chronic fatigue syndrome: methodological challenges." (cited 14 times in Google Scholar but published in the J of CFS so difficult to access but here is the abstract). Again, not exactly a strong MEDRS case for being "far less rigorous", despite probably being correct in general.

Full text on the Canadian 2003 criteria: "Jason et al. [32] in a study comparing the precision of the Canadian definition [31] with the 1994 CDC definition [29] found that the Canadian definition was more effective at differentiating CFS cases from psychiatric cases and was better equipped to distinguish between individuals experiencing chronic fatigue and those experiencing symptoms of CFS than the 1994 CDC definition [29]."

[29] = Jason et al 2004 "Comparing the Fukuda et al. Criteria and the Canadian case definition for chronic fatigue syndrome." (cited 28 times in Google Scholar but published in the J of CFS and was a small study, full text here). So again, not exactly a strong MEDRS case for being better than the CDC 1994 criteria, it is the only study of its kind in existence at present, but as the authors of the review noted no case definition has "produced evidence to demonstrate their accuracy or precision at defining cases of CFS", although they also note that "the Canadian case definition is the first definition to use empirical evidence to generate components of the diagnostic criteria".

Overall I guess you do have some WP:MEDRS grounds for challenging the use of this review, especially if it doesn't rank particularly high as a reliable source. I will have to generally revisit these issues later using better sources as I'm certain such sources exist. - Tekaphor (TALK) 03:17, 3 August 2011 (UTC)

Advice wanted

Hi Tekaphor. I hope you dont mind me messaging you seeing we dont know each other but right now Im a bit confused on the wiki stuff as Im quite new here. Im wondering what the rules are when it comes to edits? Do people usually remove a persons WHOLE POST even the referenced part if they dont think it is referenced enough or just the parts thought to need more reference? Is this usually done before any discussion on it takes place. The remover didnt even bring the removed post into discussion.. should that be done when someone does a removal of a large block of text? (Im currently wondering if Im being targeted by someone or if it is just how things here usually work).

Under treatments I posted the following. Can you give me your opinion of which parts of the following needed more reference? (as I thought most of that was common knowledge and thought the reference I had provided probably would of been enough or do I need references for how those with CFS often have bad treatment towards them due to illness biased etc?? or have to cope with loss of jobs etc etc just to point out in what ways professionally counselling helps? (im sure the impact of CFS is covered in other parts of the wiki page to be understood).

anyway what I'd posted was the following (corrected a couple of very small errors which I'd gone to correct but didnt get a chance to do so), was removed with the reason given "no original research", does that fit?

Professional Counselling

Professional counselling is useful to those with CFS. . This can help a person emotionally deal better with the life changes they are forced to make, due to what having a severe illness does. Many patients loose friends, jobs, their hobbies and the loss can extend as far as even loosing family members or their partners who may not understand the illness.

Professional counselling may be used to help with emotions which may be triggered due to the bias in society, often directed towards those who have this illness which can lead to anger or sadness in the person.

Professional counselling verses CBT

Professional counselling is different to CBT, "illness beliefs" are usually not at all questioned, the degree of illness the person has is completely accepted by the counsellor. Another difference between the two is CBT usually has the goal to try to bring about an increase the persons level of activity, whereas professional counselling is about emotional support with the counsellor sometimes offering tips.

Does that really need more references? Is it reasonable the whole removal of everything? Please share if Im really doing anything wrong here.

thanks (sorry for the long post, I have Aspergers so tend to do long posts. strangely that reference on that page doesnt work after cut and paste to your message board and I cant figure out why.. its to http://www.cdc.gov/cfs/general/treatment/index.html --Taniaaust1 (talk) 02:30, 8 December 2011 (UTC)

Hi Taniaaust1. Every statement in a regular Wikipedia article should be supported by a reliable source (see WP:RS) and be worded to reflect the content of that source (see WP:NPOV). For example, the CDC article you used as a reference does mention professional counselling, but it does not describe it in detail as you have done, neither does it state that professional counselling is "helpful", only that it is "available". I'm sure there are sources for all your statements, but if none existed for your commentary on professional counselling, Wikipedia would regard it as "original research". WP:OR suggests that obvious facts can be added without sources but if these are challenged then the burden is on the editor who wants the text in question to remain. Also, the CDC article does describe some of the consequences of illness so you may be OK there if it is close enough to what the CDC says. If you wish to keep the other statements, find additional sources to cover them, and such sources (usually) should meet the WP:MEDRS guideline if covering statements about specific medical issues.

The MEDRS guideline and the NPOV policy are probably the most important to understand, otherwise you're going to get easily trampled on by regular Wikipedians who take issue with your edits. However, note that MEDRS is not the be all and end all of medical content as some people may have you think, it is a guideline which recommends summarising the scientific consensus, making readers aware of any uncertainty or controversy, and prefers high quality secondary sources where possible eg a review article in the literature. Whereas NPOV is a mandatory policy which states we must fairly represent all "significant" viewpoints in proportion to their "weight", and if MEDRS conflicts with this policy then NPOV takes preference. Also, MEDRS doesn't apply to non-medical issues like controversies and politics surrounding ME and CFS.

As for the actions of other editors in general, sometimes people do remove content without adequate explanation or reason, but this time there was some grounds for removal, although yes it could have been done more constructively by rewording the correct parts. The rules at Wikipedia can be compared to a giant labyrinth with pitfalls and moving walls. I've been here part-time on and off for about 5 years and I only have a general gist of them, there is too much for me to understand in detail unless a specific situation calls for it. To make matters worse, there is room for interpretation so editors often end up arguing over them. However for the last few years I've been working offline on an introductory summary for beginners who want to edit the ME and CFS related pages at Wikipedia. I hope to finish this soon, when I'm done I will post it on my userspace and leave a message about it on your talkpage.

The embedded CDC reference didn't work on this talkpage because in order for the <ref> tags to work this page would need to have the reference template {{reflist}} embedded in it. This isn't usually done on a talkpage so it wasn't there by default, but I will add one below so you can see. Hope the above helps! - Tekaphor (TALK) 01:55, 9 December 2011 (UTC)

References demonstration

Thanks for all the explaination of things. Ok I see now that the issue was I just needed to have added lot more references for what I said or keep it very very simple so the CDC one fully covered it. Pity finding good references takes so much time. I'll try to find more references some time to support it and then try again.

Your introductory summary for beginners would be great. Looking forward to seeing it when you are finished.

oh Im still completely confused on the relist thing and not comprehending it thou I can see you have tried to simply explain it. I cant figure out where the actual reference itself is placed in relationship to typing the heading and the {{reflist}} part. Ive going to have to do a lot of experiementing when Im feeling up to it to try to see if I can work it out.

--Taniaaust1 (talk) 05:13, 12 December 2011 (UTC)

wow it the reference appeared here again cause i copied the reflist word in those weird shaped brackets but as I didnt write in the actual reference, I cant figure out how it knew what reference even to put when I didnt type any in or where it was put even originally. (even more confused)

I think Im going to have to give up on trying to do references on talk pages and just do them simply in articles

another post: just posted last part and looked and wasnt seeing what I saw before. The wiki is enough to drove a person insane :P --Taniaaust1 (talk) 05:48, 12 December 2011 (UTC)

That was me...I saw what you'd unwittingly done and fixed it for you. As for references, let me see if I can explain it, Aspie to Aspie. :) Basically, <ref>...</ref> tags just say "insert a numbered footnote here", but say nothing about what to do with the actual text of the footnote. The <references /> or {{reflist}} commands say "put a copy of the footnotes here". So when you typed {{reflist}} above, it saw that as a command and happily put a second copy of the references instead of just showing you the text {{reflist}} as you'd intended. I've used two of the most common methods of getting the wiki to not parse what you've typed as a command (which you'll see if you try to edit this section)—the simplest one is surrounding the command with <nowiki>...</nowiki>. (The other way is for use with templates, which is a bit more advanced of a topic.) Make sense? – RobinHood70 ^talk 07:14, 12 December 2011 (UTC)

Accusations

On Talk:Chronic fatigue syndrome you accused me of abusing my admin tools. Please provide evidence for this accusation, or retract it as soon as you can. Thank you for your cooperation. JFW | T@lk 09:15, 13 December 2011 (UTC)

Done.[6] - Tekaphor (TALK) 02:47, 14 December 2011 (UTC)

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