User talk:John David Best

Welcome!

Hello, John David Best! Welcome to Wikipedia! Thank you for your contributions. You may benefit from following some of the links below, which will help you get the most out of Wikipedia. If you have any questions you can ask me on my talk page, or place {{helpme}} on your talk page and ask your question there. Please remember to sign your name on talk pages by clicking or by typing four tildes "~~~~"; this will automatically produce your name and the date. If you are already excited about Wikipedia, you might want to consider being "adopted" by a more experienced editor or joining a WikiProject to collaborate with others in creating and improving articles of your interest. Click here for a directory of all the WikiProjects. Finally, please do your best to always fill in the edit summary field when making edits to pages. Happy editing! DVdm (talk) 07:56, 15 June 2016 (UTC) Getting Started Contributing to Wikipedia The five pillars of Wikipedia • Tutorial • Your first article How to: edit a page • upload an image Getting Help Frequently Asked Questions New contributors' help page Where to: ask questions • make requests Tip of the day Request administrator attention Policies and Guidelines Neutral point of view • Reliable sources Verifiability • Citing sources • No original research What Wikipedia is not • Biographies of living persons Simplified Manual of Style • Three-revert rule Copyrights • Non-free content • Image use policy External links • Spam • Vandalism • Sock puppetry Deletion policy • Conflict of interest • Notability The Community Community Portal • Adopt-a-user program Assume good faith • Civility • Etiquette No personal attacks • Resolving disputes Build consensus • Village pump IRC channels • Mailing lists Discover what's going on in the Wikimedia community (The Signpost) Things to do Be bold in editing • Help develop an article Maintenance • Peer review • Requested articles Join a WikiProject • Translating articles Cleaning up: General • Spam • Vandalism Miscellaneous Categories • Disambiguity • Stubs User pages • Talk pages Useful templates • Tools • User scripts

June 2016

Welcome to Wikipedia. We welcome and appreciate your contributions, including your edits to gravity, but we cannot accept original research. Original research refers to material—such as facts, allegations, ideas, and personal experiences—for which no reliable, published sources exist; it also encompasses combining published sources in a way to imply something that none of them explicitly say. Please be prepared to cite a reliable source for all of your contributions. See also wp:COI and wp:NOTFORUM. - DVdm (talk) 07:56, 15 June 2016 (UTC)

Field Alignment theory of gravity

You deleted my edit regarding this theory in the "Modern Alternative Theories" section. The reason apparently given is that it has not been published in "Reliable sources". I provided a reference (link) to the original article of which I am the author where this theory is originally published. It has received over 400 public views and comments from many practicing physicists. If by "reliable sources" you mean mainstream scientific journals such as "Nature" et al, I'm sure you are aware that no alternative to any mainstream view of a physics topic has any chance of being published in a publication regarded as prestigious. By submitting my edit in the "Alternative" category, it is clear that it does not represent the mainstream view, and no one would be confused about this. The term "Alternative" in fact implies that it differs from the mainstream view.

If you are the responsible party for the Gravity page, it is clear that you are a staunch supporter of mainstream viewpoints. Perhaps you should take a less prejudiced view. Every great new idea in science began with only one supporter; its author. Throughout history, almost every scientific theory that was regarded as unchallengeable fact at one time, was later shown to be false. You are doing a disservice by using your editorial power to limit the content of the Gravity page to only that which agrees with your own viewpoints.John David Best (talk) 09:34, 15 June 2016 (UTC)

Wikipedia is all about mainstream viewpoints. New or alternative viewpoints can only be mentioned if they are notable and covered in a sufficient number of relevant secondary sources—see our policies on wp:secondary sources, wp:UNDUE and wp:FRINGE. DVdm (talk) 10:05, 15 June 2016 (UTC)

In responce to your {{helpme}} template: I have no editorial powers here and my viewpoints are irrelevant. I do have some experience in helping pointing out Wikipedia's policies and guidelines. You could easily undo my revert, but it would almost certainly be reverted again for the same reasons, either by myself or by someone else, and you would get another warning, probably a "stronger" one. Instead you could open a section on the article talk page Talk:Gravity, and try to find some kind of consensus with the other contributors—see wp:CONSENSUS and wp:BRD. I'm pretty sure you will not find such a consensus though. I will not mark the {{helpme}} template as closed; someone else will probably do that—a second opinion, so to speak. Cheers - DVdm (talk) 10:37, 15 June 2016 (UTC)

"Instead you could open a section on the article talk page Talk:Gravity" - please don't do that, it would just be a waste of time for everyone. Your "theory" does not belong to Wikipedia. Alternatives like MOND have publications in peer-reviewed journals. There are literally hundreds of different non-mainstream but relevant theories published in them. It does not have to be Nature or Science, but it has to be a peer-reviewed journal used by the scientific community.

"Perhaps you should take a less prejudiced view." - maybe you should do that concerning the validity and reputation of what you call "theory". Every great new idea in science began with someone knowing the existing science. You clearly do not know it - how can you think you found something new if you don't even know all the experimental results that a new theory would have to describe, and all the different attempts to make new theories that have been shown to fail?

"Throughout history, almost every scientific theory that was regarded as unchallengeable fact at one time" - not really, and your belief in that shows that you do not know how science works. --mfb (talk) 15:30, 15 June 2016 (UTC)

Please refrain from using talk pages such as Talk:Gravity for general discussion of the topic or other unrelated topics. They are for discussion related to improving the article; not for use as a forum or chat room. If you have specific questions about certain topics, consider visiting our reference desk and asking them there instead of on article talk pages. See here for more information. Thank you. - DVdm (talk) 06:48, 16 June 2016 (UTC)

"One reason why is that because I lack affiliation with any academic institution, I must pay to read articles in scientific journals." - no you don't. In astrophysics, nearly everything is put on arXiv, and freely available. Wikipedia is a summary for laypeople, it does not want and cannot replace scientific publications. --mfb (talk) 01:19, 18 June 2016 (UTC)

John David Best, you are invited to the Teahouse!

Hi John David Best! Thanks for contributing to Wikipedia. Be our guest at the Teahouse! The Teahouse is a friendly space where new editors can ask questions about contributing to Wikipedia and get help from experienced editors like Samwalton9 (talk). Visit the Teahouse We hope to see you there! Delivered by HostBot on behalf of the Teahouse hosts 16:02, 16 June 2016 (UTC)