Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Acupuncture

Main case page (Talk) — Evidence (Talk) — Workshop (Talk) — Proposed decision (Talk)

Case clerk: Callanecc (Talk) Drafting arbitrator: Courcelles (Talk)

Motion passed in lieu of full case on 10:56, 12 January 2015 (UTC)

Case amended by motion on 21:36, 14 December 2022 (UTC)

Once the case is closed, editors should edit the #Enforcement log as needed, but the other content of this page may not be edited except by clerks or arbitrators. Please raise any questions about this decision at Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Clarification and Amendment, any general questions at Wikipedia talk:Arbitration Committee, and report violations of the remedies passed in the decision to Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Enforcement.

Case information

Involved parties

• Kww (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA), filing party
• John (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
• LesVegas (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
• Jayaguru-Shishya (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
• A1candidate (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
• QuackGuru (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
• Roxy the dog (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
• Middle 8 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Prior dispute resolution

• John's talk page
• Talk:Acupuncture

Preliminary statements

Statement by Kww

I am bringing this here because any effort for me to resolve it would likely provoke wheel-warring between me and User:John, obviously an undesirable situation. This is also a holdover of our existing pseudoscience arbitrations, in terms of its application to acupuncture.

Acupuncture appears to have been the victim of flooding, wherein multiple studies with ambiguous results are listed in separate subsections in great prominence, all to give the false impression that the effectiveness of acupuncture is under wide and serious study. It's not: acupuncture is generally viewed as a placebo treatment with no scientific foundation. This summarizes it well: several thousand studies have failed to show any consistent application in which acupuncture is beneficial. Traditional Chinese medicine, the foundation of acupuncture, is also recognized as pseudoscience, a classification which has been mightily resisted by pro-Acupuncture editors. A quick read through that last link will demonstrate how unlikely it is for forward progress to be made. Accordingly, our section on the effectiveness of acupuncture should say just that: not shown to be consistently effective for anything and lacking in any theoretical foundation.

There's no doubt that the pro-science editors have not behaved admirably, but they are faced with entrenched editors that are padding the article with any study that presents acupuncture in a favourable light, misrepresenting those studies, lying about discussions that have taken place elsewhere. John's reaction has been to try to deal with this as an NPOV issue, requiring discussion between the editors: clearly fruitless at this point. He has focused his attention on QuackGuru and Roxy the dog, parties that have, at times, acted poorly out of sheer frustration.

My view is diametrically to John's: that it is our role as administrators to actively detect the users that are attempting to block a reflection of scientific consensus in the article, block them as appropriate, and help provide an environment that will allow our scientifically-minded editors to prevail. I would resolve this problem by blocking or topic-banning LesVegas, Jayaguru-Shishya, A1candidate, and, indeed, any and all editors that attempted to portray acupuncture as having medical legitimacy. This is the Martinphi vs. ScienceApologist problem all over again, and dealing with these people as legitimate editors leads to unsatisfactory results.

I bring this here primarily because it is a systemic problem, and a legacy of the inadequacy of the earlier Arbcom decision, which tells the project that we should strive to be in line with scientific consensus, but does not specifically tell adminstrators to deal with editors asymmetrically: blocking and banning those that would undermine that scientific consensus while encouraging those that attempt to support it.

• Cla68 doesn't misunderstand me: being polite about being wrong to the point that you drive other editors to distraction is to win a war by attrition. That subverts consensus, which is, in this class of articles, the scientific consensus. The only way to prevent this is, in such cases, to define "wrong" and enforce it.—Kww(talk) 00:10, 5 January 2015 (UTC)
• Thryduulf: because they reward patience and numbers, not accuracy. Remember that the professional acupuncturist views having a favourable view of acupuncture in the media as a source of financial gain. Additionally, here the problem is that out of the thousands of studies, there have been the occasional false negatives that portrayed acupuncture as harmful and false positives that portrayed acupuncture as beneficial. Our sanctions don't work well as a protection against cherry-picking.—Kww(talk) 00:47, 5 January 2015 (UTC)
• Courcelles: Precisely why I have only discussed, and haven't entered the fray with my tools. John's statement (in the linked diff) that he viewed me as part of the problem and that he did not recognize the distortions being made in the article made it clear to me that we were not going to come to mutual agreement as to the best way to proceed, especially given that I see John as a major part of the problem, in that, despite admirable motives, the effect of his actions is to provide aid and cover to people that intend to damage the encyclopedia.
• Guerillero: Because few would view me as an uninvolved administrator, I'm not capable of logging sanctions in this area. The history of AE has been that it is counterproductive for alternative medicine articles: note John's administration of Ayurveda, which, while reducing the edit thrash, has permitted the steady drift of the article away from clearly representing it as having no scientific basis.

• Guerillero:Precisely the trouble. Without a clear direction from Arbcom that an article about a medical topic should reflect scientific consensus and authorising actions intended to guarantee scientific consensus, acupuncture and other alternative medical articles won't do so. Alternative medicine is popular, despite generally being nonsense.

I certainly hate seeing this aiming for a decline, especially after the opinions by AE admins all say pretty much what I'm saying: AE is intended to address behavioural problems without much regard to their impact on article quality. What I'm saying is that we are approaching the condition with this, and many other alternative medicine articles, where people have learned that persistent and indefatigable politeness allows them to manipulate content, and that discretionary sanctions based on behaviour alone are not the solution.—Kww(talk) 15:28, 6 January 2015 (UTC)

Statement by John

I don't have much to add here. I will add a slightly comment here in the next few days. I don't think there is any problem in a motion to explicitly include subjects slightly pertaining to pseudoscience to the enforcement area should be problematic; it's been taken as a given in the areas I am familiar with. --John (talk) 22:46, 10 January 2015 (UTC)

Statement by LesVegas

• Opening statement Since this is my first time to be involved in an Arbcom request, I'm not sure exactly what I'm supposed to do so I'll follow along and try my best. If I make any mistakes, please understand that I am new to this process and do not hesitate to correct me in any way. Overall, I object to attempts to topic ban any editor (especially me!) for simply holding opinions contrary to those of other editors. Behavior, policies and guidelines are what matter. At least, I hope. My interest in the Acupuncture article has been to add my linguistic and cultural expertise in places where I felt it was appropriate, and hope that I can continue this endeavor in the future.

• Thryduulf: I have always, to the best of my ability, operated within MEDRS and RS guidelines and NPOV policy when adding sources to the article. Like A1candidate, I also believe acupuncture doesn't clearly fall into the pseudoscience category, but rather into a bit of a grey area. Afterall, crystal healers are not primary care providers in any state, nor do insurance companies reimburse for that modality. I lived in Asia for several years and acupuncture is well adopted by the mainstream scientific community and governmental health authorities there. The NIH, NHS, WHO and others have also issued positive statements on its outcome. With no clear consensus on research, I believe it is better classified as "questionable science" than "pseudoscience". But even if one disagrees with my stance, I hope we all can agree that no matter the article, when sources meet policy and guideline standards we cannot simply delete or censor them because the outcome happens to be positive. Nor do I believe editors should be banned for posting such sources.

• Courcelles: Perhaps this should have been in my opening statement, but given your inquiry about wheel-warring, I would like to point out that Kww has been heavily involved in content disputes for some time on the Acupuncture article and talk page. I find his "reluctance to wheel war" fairly curious because he has been constantly involved in article content and disputes lately. Given that fact, he should know that wheel warring with John (who has never been involved) would undoubtedly result in trouble for him. His involvement also extends to his refusal (even by his own admission) to punish editors who break rules, and even deviates into rationalizing their bad behavior. I may be off-base here, but it seems to me that Kww might not truly coming here out of reluctance to wheel war, but is likely attempting to control article content and remove editors who stand in his way.

• @ ArbCom: Since nobody has brought this up, I figured I would so that the Arbcom could have as much information as possible to make whatever decision with. Just the other day, an administrator, Rjanag, made an identical edit to one that I made earlier, and that Kww contested both on the article and on talk. Rjanag also made a similar edit] on Traditional Chinese Medicine and has protected the page due to edit warring and is opening up discussion on talk. Rjanag has now opened an RfC for the topic. I find it puzzling why Kww seeks to have myself and two other editors topic banned for making and supporting an edit which a previously uninvolved admin has also made. Rjanag's reasoning mirrors many of the comments that I, Jayaguru-Shishya and A1candidate have brought up, namely reliable source violations. If our edits are so controversial, I question why a very similar edit was supported by another party, an admin, on multiple policy grounds? Doesn't this give any kind of validation to our original issues with the article?

Statement by Jayaguru-Shishya

• Opening statement

Greetings! I'd like to stress out that this is my very first encounter with ArbCom, so I am not sure how much in detail one should go with the comments presented here. Anyway, I'd be happy to provide more details if necessary though.

I see Kww bases his argumentation strongly on this division between "pro-acupuncturists" and "pro-science editors". I am pretty surprised that I find myself among these "pro-acupuncturists" that Kww is asking to be banned, since if one looks at the Talk Page, I've been strongly advising all the editors to keep strictly to MEDRS whenever dealing with claims on medical efficiency. I am not an acupuncturist, I have never been to an acupuncturist, and I don't believe that my forestry Finnish town even has an acupuncturist. Kww has made this allegation against me many times earlier, and I have corrected him being wrong every time. I am happy to provide diffs if necessary. If there are some individual edits or behavioural patterns that Kww is frustrated with, is this really the right place to discuss it? This is my first experience with ArbCom so I don't know.

One is free to examine my edit history, I am perfectly comfortable with that. I have 270 Wikipedia articles on my Watchlist, and only three of those fall under the Pseudoscience Discretionary Sanctions. I am not a "pro-acupuncturist", and these three articles express only a very tiny area of my areas of interest in Wikipedia.

* Pseudoscience or not?

First of all, I think it'd clarify this ArbCom case a lot if it just focuses on the discussion of whether acupuncture falls under the label of pseudoscience or not. I am not sure what Kww is trying to accomplish by his apologizes for users Roxy the Dog and QuackGuru. Is he unsatisfied with John's notifications and sanctions on these users? Does he think John's actions have were ungrounded? Does he think that these notifications and sanctions should be nullified? If so, is this the right place to discuss it? I am a first timer here, so sorry if I've have wrong conceptions about some things.

When it comes to the pseudoscience labeling, my argumentation has been as follows: 1) Acupuncture pre-dates what we know as modern science, so it cannot be "pseudoscience" in that sense, 2) whenever making claims on medical efficiency, we should uncompromisingly adhere to MEDRS, and 3) when just simply reporting mere "believes" without a dimension of medical claims, we could ease the requirement to RS. The third one I've actually discussed with user User:Bladesmulti when there was a similar discussion at Ayurveda (I can actually easily concur to Robert McClenon who closed the RfC there: "...it was only pseudo-science to the extent that scientific claims were made, and that its roots were in religion rather than science, and were not pseudo-science because they preceded the concept of modern science")

If any more information is needed, I'd be happy to provide. Cheers! Jayaguru-Shishya (talk) 15:36, 6 January 2015 (UTC)

Statement by A1candidate

• Opening statement:

I regret that this dispute had not been resolved through substantial talk page discussions and I acknowledge my status as an involved party. If this case request is accepted, I'll be willing to offer any information that may aid the community in resolving the dispute.

• Thryduulf:

Enforcing the existing pseudoscience discretionary sanctions at AE may not be the best solution because much of the dispute rests on whether acupuncture and Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) in particular should be classified as pseudoscientific in the first place. Based on numerous scientific reviews as well as the consensus statements of medical organizations and the assertions of medical textbooks, I believe there is enough hard scientific evidence to make a strong case against the labelling of acupuncture as a form of pseudoscience. Despite my repeated attempts to engage with Kww and others, a consensus appears to be far from sight. Kww's filing for arbitration clearly demonstrates the polarity of the positions that we have taken in this dispute.

• Roger Davies:

Acupuncture should not be classified as fringe science because

1. The American Heart Association's consensus statement says that acupuncture's mechanism of effect appears to be through sensory mechanoreceptor and nociceptor stimulation induced by "connective tissues being wound around the needle".[1]
2. Britain's National Health Service says that acupuncture is used in the majority of pain clinics and hospices in the UK and it is "based on scientific evidence that shows the treatment can stimulate nerves under the skin and in muscle tissue".[2]
3. Cancer Research UK says that "medical research has shown that acupuncture works by stimulating nerves to release the body’s own natural chemicals." [3]
4. The New England Journal of Medicine says that "some physiological phenomena associated with acupuncture have been identified" [4]
5. Harrison's Principles of Internal Medicine says that "the emerging acceptance of acupuncture results in part from its widespread availability and use in the United States today, even within the walls of major medical centers where it is used as an ancillary approach to pain management" Chapter e2, Page 5, McGraw-Hill, 2011, ISBN 9780071748902

I am not aware of any WP:MEDRS compliant sources that specifically describes acupuncture as "fringe science" or "pseudoscience".

• A Quest For Knowledge and Robert McClenon:

WP:DRN is unlikely to resolve the dispute because of the dirty tactics used by Kww and others to prevent consensus for the use of medical literature per WP:MEDRS. As a matter of fact, there had been a DRN case regarding the inappropriate classification of Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) as "largely pseudoscience". [5] However, this was closed by a disinterested volunteer claiming that "Consensus seems to have been reached" without stating clearly what the consensus was. A careful look at the discussion shows that there was in fact no consensus - both sides continued to repeat their arguments.

In addition, there is also an ongoing WP:RFC for Traditional Chinese Medicine [6] regarding the labelling of TCM as "largely pseudoscience" (again). The result of this RFC is unclear, but regardless of what sort of "consensus" it yields, things will not change unless Kww and others first change their behavior. Their refusal to faithfully represent scientific consensus is exemplified by the following behaviorial patterns in talk page discussions:

Making personal attacks and accusations

LesVegas: The use of NCCAM received broad support amongst uninvolved editors at WikiProject Medicine [7]

Kww and others: I have caught you blatantly lying [8]

A1candidate: I don't see any uninvolved editor opposing NCCAM per se [9]

Kww and others: That A1candidate defends it makes him an accomplice [10]

Ignoring an editor's request for explanation

A1candidate: The claim that TCM is pseudoscientific is not supported by scientific literature. If you disagree, show me a review article that says so. [11]

Kww and others: The burden is on you [12]

Misrepresentation of guidelines

A1candidate: Show me an WP:MEDRS compliant source that says TCM is pseudoscientific [13]

Kww and others: Per WP:REDFLAG no such source is needed [14]

(Note: WP:REDFLAG asserts the opposite of what User:Tgeorgescu claims. As an administrator, Kww failed take action against User:Tgeorgescu for his misrepresention of Wikipedia's policies)

There's one way the Committee could help to resolve this dispute: Ensure that Kww and others provide a reliable source per WP:MEDRS before claiming that TCM or acupuncture is pseudoscientific. If Kww and others repeatedly ignore WP:VERIFY, all efforts to resolve the dispute through WP:DRN and WP:RFC would inevitably be futile, as past attempts have clearly demonstrated.

• JzG:

1. Please refrain from making such accusations. I am neither a practitioner, consumer, nor advocate of acupuncture. I only support the scientific study of the subject.

2. Purinergic signalling is not a WP:COATRACK. It is an interesting topic of scientific study and a recognized field of medicine. Sicne the late 2000s, medical researchers studying purinergic signalling have discovered how it was related to traditional medicine and I covered that area of study per WP:MEDRS and WP:NPOV. According to Trends in Molecular Medicine, "these antinociceptive effects of acupuncture were entirely dependent on A1R activation". [15]. More information can be found on Talk:Purinergic_signalling. Our acupuncture article fails to state this important finding.

3. Contrary to JzG's misleading claims, the source used to support the statement that "The anti-nociceptive effect of acupuncture is mediated by the adenosine A1 receptor" is a review article (according to PubMed) and therefore an excellent WP:MEDRS source.

4. I base my assessment of Ullman on the quality of his arguments, not on his reputation

I am neither a practitioner, consumer, nor advocate of acupuncture. I only support the scientific study of the subject. JzG should stop making these baseless accusations.

• John Carter:

The Encyclopedia of Pseudoscience: From Alien Abductions to Zone Therapy (ISBN 0-8160-3351-X) is an unreliable source that fails WP:MEDRS. It is neither a widely recognised medical textbook nor a scientific review article and its reliability has been seriously questioned by the skeptic community [16]. Please refrain from using this source in all medical articles.

Statement by QuackGuru

Jayaguru-Shishya

Jayaguru-Shishya was informed of the discretionary sanctions in early April of 2014. Jayaguru-Shishya is making a lot of counterproductive edits and most of his edits are just reverts from beginning to end at the Acupuncture page. His first edits to both acu and TCM are reverts. I previously tried to resolve some of the issues with Jayaguru-Shishya. See User_talk:Jayaguru-Shishya/Archive_1#Please_stop_making_counterproductive_edits_at_the_acupuncture_page. See User_talk:Kww#Editor_has_no_learning_curve_and_is_unintentionally_being_destructive. Jayaguru-Shishya has a pattern of reverting as soon as he recognizes there is a dispute with the wording at the Acupuncture page.

After I reverted the OR from the acupuncture page added by an IP the OR was restored by Jayaguru-Shishya. The word "many" was OR.[17] Is Jayaguru-Shishya restoring the OR intentionally or unintentionally? At this point I think it is irrelevant.

The reverting by Jayaguru-Shishya has bubbled over to the Traditional Chinese medicine page again. Jayaguru-Shishya deleted text from the body of the Traditional Chinese medicine page back in June 2014. He deleted this: an editorial in Nature said that while this is simply because TCM is largely pseudoscience without a rational mechanism of action for the majority of its treatments, advocates have argued that it is because research had missed some key features of TCM, such as the subtle interrelationships between ingredients. Now in January 2015 he removed similar text from the body and now also the lede.[18][19] There was a previous successful DR where the consensus was to keep the wording "pseudoscience" in the lede and the body. See Wikipedia:Dispute_resolution_noticeboard/Archive_92#Traditional_Chinese_medicine. QuackGuru (talk) 03:10, 7 January 2015 (UTC)

Middle 8

Middle 8 appears to have a COI and should not be allowed to continue to edit the acupuncture page and related pages so aggressively. See User:Middle 8/COI.

In late October 2013 the acupuncture page was junk with Middle 8 editing the page. Editors added numerous reviews and Cochrane reviews and updated the page. Middle 8 is laser focused on acupuncture. So it was no surprise that Middle 8 was not thrilled with the changes.

Middle 8 signed a malformed RfC against me.[20] See Wikipedia:Requests_for_comment/QuackGuru2#Outside_view_by_Jmh649_.28Doc_James.29. See Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/Archive259#Proposed_six_month_topic_ban_of_User:Middle_8_and_User:Mallexikon. See Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/IncidentArchive845#User:Middle_8_again. User:Middle 8 is well aware of the sanctions.[21][22]

Middle 8 continued to make unfounded claims at Wikipedia talk:Requests for comment/QuackGuru2 even after he signed a malformed RfC against me.[23] See Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/IncidentArchive825#There_was_a_previous_proposal_for_a_six_month_topic_ban_for_both_User:Mallexikon_and_User:Middle_8.

Middle 8 added WP:OR to the lead: ...and therefore preventable with proper training. The verified text is: "...it is recommended that acupuncturists be trained sufficiently."

Middle 8 deleted a failed verification tag[24] but did not fix the original research he originally added to the lead.[25] The word often was OR. The word many is sourced.

Middle 8 was edit warring over the specific numbers in the lede. The text he added was also original research.[26][27][28][29]

Middle 8 added poor evidence and misleading text to the lede: "but have not been reported in surveys of adequately-trained acupuncturists." Only after User:Doc James commented on the talk page Middle 8 claimed he misread the text. Middle 8 has a pattern of making a lot of bad edits according to the evidence presented.

He deleted sourced text from the lede and body but he claimed the source does not support the statement.[30] The comment he posted on the talk page shows he did read the source. WP:CIR to edit. Another editor finally restored the text after a long discussion.

During the discussion, Middle 8 was commenting about RexxS rather than the content: RexxS's ad hominem & general drama is a confession of weakness. Middle 8 was not assuming good faith with User:RexxS. Middle 8 continued to argue against including to the text. See Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Medicine/Archive_51#Acupuncture_again. QuackGuru (talk) 04:46, 11 January 2015 (UTC)

TimidGuy

In one of the diffs provided by TimidGuy, he accused me as one of the editors who was edit warring.[31] After I made my proposal I immediately reverted my own edit and discussed my proposal on the talk page. How is it editing warring when I reverted my own edit for discussion?

TimidGuy restored without consensus a non-reputable organization and then deleted text from a MEDRS compliant review from the safety section without explanation.[32] He blindly deleted Acupuncture seems to be safe in people getting anticoagulants, assuming needles are used at the correct location and depth. Studies are required to verify these findings.[33] See Talk:Acupuncture#Weight violation for the current discussion. Using poor evidence from a NCCAM article is clearly a weight violation when the effectiveness sections are bloated with a number of better sources. QuackGuru (talk) 05:32, 11 January 2015 (UTC)

Statement by Roxy the dog

It looks as though this request is going to fall by the wayside, which is a shame, as there is a need to deal with the genuine issues highlighted by kww. The issue isn't confined to those articles named here, but endemic in most pseudoscience and fringe related topics across the project. Mainstream editors are being out-polited by true believers. Some old polite hands are named and taking part here, plus a newbie who has the technique down to a T.

The problem is partly caused by a lack of understanding of the science involved. As an example in the case of Acu, this causes editors to confuse the fact that pricking somebody with a needle hurts, is genuine evidence for medical efficiency that some editors claim. Also interesting in a recent RfC close debacle at Ayurveda is that if it is ancient, it cannot be pseudoscience. "Flat Earth Theory" is ancient, and believe it or not, pseudoscientific. WP:CIR people.

The debacle at Ayurveda that has driven away so many good editors (including myself - but I don't include myself in the 'good editors' category) will happen again and again unless admins give support to those supporting policy. Badly concieved and enforced unilateral sanctions don't work. -Roxy the dog™ (resonate) 10:41, 7 January 2015 (UTC)

Statement by Middle 8

Kww is wrong -- spectacularly so -- that acupuncture isn't under wide and serious study. Ironically the first source he cites demonstrates this, cf. its long list of recent research. In fact, that source is one of a pair of invited pro/con editorials (here's the pro). If acupuncture were really not taken seriously, a mainstream journal like Anesthesia & Analgesia wouldn't have given the pro view equal time.

A perusal of Pubmed and Cochrane reviews also shows that acu is taken seriously and shows some evidence of efficacy (see here and here), as does the fact that it's used at numerous academic centers including some of the best (Harvard, Stanford etc.). Yes, for most conditions acupuncture has been shown not to work, but certainly for pain and nausea there is mainstream debate, cf. Cochrane. All these results are the fruit of recent, "wide and serious study".

In fact, the single best MEDRS there is -- Vickers et. al. (2012) [34] -- concludes that acupuncture "is more than a placebo" and a reasonable referral option. This meta-analysis uses individualized patient data (IPD), which is the most rigorous approach, the "gold standard", a way to find information other good reviews have missed [35]. It was accepted by other sources, e.g. the well-respected Medscape [36]. It was criticized by the usual alt-med critics, e.g. [37][38]. The latter weigh, but not much compared to Vickers: they are not even peer-reviewed journal articles. They are at best on the lowest rungs of MEDRS while Vickers is at the very top. Vickers' IPD meta-analysis should be in the lede, yet it remains barely mentioned owing to POV-pushing from anti-acu editors. (See also an effort to dismiss Vickers as a MEDRS, which was not favorably received.)

If acupuncture were as fringe as skeptics say, we wouldn't be seeing positive conclusions in top-quality MEDRS's and indignant objections in blogs. It would be the other way around (as e.g. for homeopathy).

Additionally, there is serious objection to the "pseudoscience" label; see here.

What we should do is have one or more RfC/A's. The article needs more eyes, or perhaps some of the more aggressive anti-acu editors ought to be topic-banned. Following Kww's advice would only worsen WP's single worst problem, the shrinking (and demographically narrow) editorial pool. It would also reflect a painfully embarrassing misreading of the literature. --Middle 8 (contribs • COI) 10:24, 8 January 2015 (UTC)

Preliminary decision

Clerk notes

This area is used for notes by the clerks (including clerk recusals).

Acupuncture: Arbitrators' opinion on hearing this matter <9/4/0/1>

Vote key: (Accept/decline/recuse/other)

• I'm awaiting more statements before opining one way or the other on this, but I would like to see comments from those wanting a case addressing why enforcing the existing pseudoscience discretionary sanctions at AE would not work. Thryduulf (talk) 00:40, 5 January 2015 (UTC)
  • I'm leaning decline now. I take the point that it is not agreed whether acupuncture is pseudoscience, but the discretionary sanctions actually apply to "Pseudoscience and Fringe science" because (at least in part) there was a similar discussion about whether cold fusion is or is not pseudoscientific, and I don't see that there is a dispute that acupuncture is one of these. I have opined in the past (but not as an arbitrator at that point) that if there are reliable sources calling something pesudoscience or pseudoscientific (regardless of whether other sources agree) then these discretionary apply, without that implying anything about whether it is or is not pseudoscientifc for article content purposes. Together with my colleagues comments below, it is now clear that the Committee regard the pseudoscience discretionary sanctions as applying to acupuncture. If a formal motion is necessary we could do that, but I'm not sure it's necessary.
    All that said, I'd like to see the opinion of one or more uninvolved experienced AE admins for their opinion of whether they think AE would be able to handle this. Absent their strong opinion that it would be ineffective at resolving the dispute though I anticipate declining. Thryduulf (talk) 10:15, 5 January 2015 (UTC)
  • Decline a full case. I see though that there is a legitimate uncertainty about whether this is covered by the pseudoscience and fringe science discretionary sanctions or not and that is something that we the committee can clarify. Given that there appears to be no objections to applying DS to the topic, only debate about whether they already are, there seem to be two useful ways forward - either officially stating that (as I suggested before my term as an arbitrator) any topic where there are reliable sources that describe it as pseudoscience or fringe science are covered by those discretionary sanctions (without passing judgement on whether they are or not) and noting that this explicitly includes accupuncture; or passing a motion ammending the "pseudoscience and fringe science" discretionary sanctions to "pseudoscience, fringe science and complementary and alternative medicine". Thryduulf (talk) 13:12, 6 January 2015 (UTC)
  • @KWW: It is not the job of either arbcom or AE to rule on article content issues, beyond stressing that NPOV is non-negotiable. What NPOV means in terms of the balance of each individual article is something for the editors of that article to determine by consensus. If editors are unable to come to a consensus due to behavioural issues then that is what the discretionary sanctions can help with. If editors are unable to come to a consensus for other reasons then you need to get other input as described at WP:CONTENTDISPUTE. Thryduulf (talk) 16:10, 6 January 2015 (UTC)
  • procedurally accept so that we can pass a motion. Thryduulf (talk) 12:39, 8 January 2015 (UTC)
• Awaiting statements, I'd especially like to hear from John. I do not, looking at he request, get why Kww's statement "any effort for me to resolve it would likely provoke wheel-warring between me and User:John" is true. Surely two experienced admins don't enter a situation expecting it to end in wheel warring? Courcelles 01:07, 5 January 2015 (UTC)
• @Roger Davies: I don't think we need to decide that question at all, actually. DS are authorised for "all pages relating to pseudoscience and fringe science, broadly interpreted." I'd contend that anything there is a reasonable debate as to its status as pseudoscience or fringe science would be covered, without expecting admins (or us) to sort through the actual label applicable; that there is a debate is enough to hit the broadly interpreted clause. If there is agreement on this, and if a motion is seen as desirable, I:m happy to pass one, but I'm not seeing the need for a full case here. Courcelles 17:27, 5 January 2015 (UTC)

• Decline It's fairly clear there are steps before arbitration that still should be tried. Courcelles 17:16, 6 January 2015 (UTC)

• Procedural accept as I think a carefully crafted motion can be useful here. Courcelles 10:35, 8 January 2015 (UTC)

• @Kww: why haven't you taken this to AE? --Guerillero | My Talk 01:17, 5 January 2015 (UTC)
  • That sounds like you are coming here instead of AE because you think that we are going to come up with the outcome you want. Further, if you think that AE will think that you are involved than you most likely are and should not be in the equation for wheel warring. Decline and refer to AE --Guerillero | My Talk 01:59, 5 January 2015 (UTC)
    • I will let the motion go by --Guerillero | My Talk 01:25, 9 January 2015 (UTC)
• Decline, agreed with Guerillero. Seraphimblade ^{Talk to me} 04:35, 5 January 2015 (UTC)
• Comment I suppose the million-dollar is whether acupuncture is fringe science or not. I really don't know the answer to that but I do note that it is widely available as a state-provided therapy in the UK and France. If it is fringe science, it's covered by DS but if it isn't, it isn't.  Roger Davies ^talk 14:47, 5 January 2015 (UTC)
  • @Courcelles: That's true enough though some of these alternative medicines articles end up as neverending feuds between sceptics and enthusiasts, and I'd hate AE to have to make a long list of which bits are covered and which bits aren't. If it's messy, these things always come back to us, which much wasted effort in the meantime,  Roger Davies ^talk 17:38, 5 January 2015 (UTC)
    • Procedural accept to pave the way for a motion,  Roger Davies ^talk 09:49, 8 January 2015 (UTC)
    • Homeopathy is considered fringe but is still available through the UK's National Health Service. The list of such treatments includes acupuncture, aromatherapy, chiropractic, homeopathy, massage, osteopathy and clinical hypnotherapy.[39] So it can be fringe science and still be provided by a state health service. Dougweller (talk) 11:03, 6 January 2015 (UTC) It's been suggested that I point out that the availability of homeopathy in the NHS has been steadily decreasing and the NHS web page discussing it says it is considered to be based on "scientifically implausible principles" and no batter than placebo treatment.[40]. Dougweller (talk) 11:59, 7 January 2015 (UTC)
• Decline The issue is not whether acupuncture (and indeed, homeopathy, aromatherapy, iridology etc.) is a pseudoscience or not, but whether it falls under the heading of pages relating to pseudoscience and fringe science, broadly interpreted, as per the Pseudoscience DS ruling. Any reasonable broad interpretation of "relating to pseudoscience and fringe science" would include TCM and acupuncture, since both have been extensively discussed in this light; it doesn't actually matter whether they genuinely are fringe sciences. This therefore falls within the purview of the existing discretionary sanctions. It is therefore unncessary for the Committee to provide an additional ruling specifically for this article. Yunshui ^雲_水 14:38, 6 January 2015 (UTC)
• Decline. Agree with @Yunshui and Thryduulf:, and others. @Roger Davies: I don't think it matters whether it is fringe science; its still related to the subject area, and debate as to whether it is or isn't is most certainly under DS. LFaraone 15:03, 6 January 2015 (UTC)

  Procedural accept to deal with by motion. LFaraone 19:36, 12 January 2015 (UTC)

• 'Decline' It's clearly a subject "relating to pseudoscience and fringe science, broadly interpreted". I understand the concern but don't think that at this time it's an issue for the Committee. Dougweller (talk) 16:58, 6 January 2015 (UTC)
• Procedural accept Dougweller (talk) 10:57, 8 January 2015 (UTC)
• Decline per Courcelles. Reconsidering one aspect. -- Euryalus (talk) 14:07, 7 January 2015 (UTC)

  Procedural accept to deal with by motion. DGG ( talk ) 23:06, 12 January 2015 (UTC)

• Decline per Courcelles and DGG. -- Euryalus (talk) 06:32, 8 January 2015 (UTC)

• Decline I too do not see this as an insoluble dispute, rather as one where arb com is asked to determine where the NPOV actually lies--in fact, where it might even seem we are asked to determine that the NPOVis in a particular requested direction. We should be very reluctant to do this. DGG ( talk ) 06:24, 8 January 2015 (UTC)
• Procedural accept to allow for a motion. GorillaWarfare (talk) 18:31, 8 January 2015 (UTC)
• Procedural accept (if that's the right method to go for a motion instead of a case). -- DQ (ʞlɐʇ) 22:46, 8 January 2015 (UTC)
• Accept. The more I think about it, the more I think we need a full case rather than a simple motion, authorising DS. Salvio ^{Let's talk about it!} 12:39, 11 January 2015 (UTC)

Motion

In lieu of a full case, the Arbitration Committee authorises standard discretionary sanctions for any edit about, and for all pages relating to Complementary and Alternative Medicine. Any sanctions that may be imposed should be logged at Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Acupuncture. The Committee urges interested editors to pursue alternative means of dispute resolution such as RFC's or requests for mediation on the underlying issues. If necessary, further requests concerning this matter should be filed at the requests for clarification and amendment page.

Enacted - Callanecc (talk • contribs • logs) 10:45, 12 January 2015 (UTC)

Support

1. As proposer. On reflection, I think this gets completely around the question of whether or not CAM is or is not PS/FS. Courcelles 22:22, 8 January 2015 (UTC)

   @NuclearWarfare: One of the reasons for a new log is to explicitly indicate there is not a content ruling being done here. I'd prefer to stay as far away from anything that could be interpreted as such, which using the same log would do. Courcelles 23:07, 8 January 2015 (UTC)

2. Per Courcelles,  Roger Davies ^talk 22:26, 8 January 2015 (UTC)
3. GorillaWarfare (talk) 22:27, 8 January 2015 (UTC)
4. I would urge that discretionary sanctions and other forms of dispute resolution are given a genuine chance to succeed before any filing at ARCA. Thryduulf (talk) 22:33, 8 January 2015 (UTC)

   @Cla68: The existence of discretionary sanctions does not give anyone the right to ban anyone else from a topic area because they do not like them or anything else a specious as that. Uninvolved administrators will quickly WP:BOOMERANG any attempts to misuse the sanctions in this manner. Thryduulf (talk) 00:40, 9 January 2015 (UTC)

5. This is a better alternative than making what I feel would be a content decision. -- DQ (ʞlɐʇ) 22:42, 8 January 2015 (UTC)

   I have no objection to it being listed under the previous case for simplified logging as HJ Mitchell pinged and Seraphimblade noted below. -- DQ (ʞlɐʇ) 07:43, 9 January 2015 (UTC)

6. This deals with the immediate problem of behavior, without going into whether our role is to decide what specifically constitutes PS/FS. — Preceding unsigned comment added by DGG (talk • contribs)

   This is already under the previous psudoscience DS but meh. This should cut down on drama --Guerillero | My Talk 01:21, 9 January 2015 (UTC)

7. I fail to see the purpose of splitting the logs rather than just logging any such under the pseudoscience case, but I'm not worried about it enough to oppose. Seraphimblade ^{Talk to me} 05:37, 9 January 2015 (UTC)
   • There's a strong argument for having a single centralised log for all DS sanctions, arranged chronologically. It will make sanctions easier to find and make it much easier to pick up people hopping across state borders (as it were). But I don't think the tail should be wagging the dog on this,  Roger Davies ^talk 08:48, 9 January 2015 (UTC)
8. Per Seraphimblade. Yunshui ^雲_水 07:53, 9 January 2015 (UTC)
9. Support, although I agree with Roger's point about one centralised log. Dougweller (talk) 10:26, 9 January 2015 (UTC)
10. Support. LFaraone 19:36, 12 January 2015 (UTC)
11. Support. DGG ( talk ) 23:06, 12 January 2015 (UTC)

Oppose

1. I am persuaded that we should have a full case. Salvio ^{Let's talk about it!} 12:39, 11 January 2015 (UTC)

Abstain

Comments

• Per NuclearWarfare, I am starting to worry that we are setting up a Kobayashi Maru for our AE admins and that by solving this one problem, we are creating 25 more. Is there stomach for extending our current Psudoscience DS to this topic area explicitly? --Guerillero | My Talk 17:38, 9 January 2015 (UTC)

• Labelling acupuncture as a pseudoscience unacceptably enters the Committee into the content dispute. But I agree with T Canens and a few others above, that two separate logs is one too many. Prefer Timotheus' suggestion of expanding the pseudoscience name to include complementary and alternative medicines and logging them together. -- Euryalus (talk) 21:21, 9 January 2015 (UTC)

• @NuclearWarfare: @Timotheus Canens: and pretty much everyone else. Okay, point taken. I'll float an idea, and am willing to be told I'm crazy. What if we renamed the Pseudoscience case to something like "Scientific editing" or "Scientific debates" and also made the DS there for all edits "relating to pseudoscience, fringe science, and Complimentary and Alternative Medicine (CAM)" That would seem to avoid labeling CAM as pseudoscience, which I still think it would do if we do not rename the underlying case. Courcelles 21:30, 9 January 2015 (UTC)
  • A centralised log does away with most of these intricacies because the log itself isn't tied to a case (and the baggage that comes with it). The topic listing then becomes just that, cross-headings.  Roger Davies ^talk 21:52, 9 January 2015 (UTC)
    • I'm wondering more about the issuance of alerts than the actual logging of sanctions, though, now that warnings/alerts don't have to actually be logged. Courcelles 22:41, 9 January 2015 (UTC)
      • The only purpose of an alert is to let someone know that DS apply, broadly construed, to the area they're editing in. If they continue editing within, broadly, the same area of conflict, it doesn't much matter which alert they get providing their conduct is covered by the standard DS prohibitions. The transition to standard DS has greatly reduced the need to tie DS to specific cases and i fact there is nothing to prevent rolling all these DS into, as you suggest, a broader heading (ie Science controversies or whatever) without the need to rename any cases. We were only tied to specific case when the DS varied considerably from case to case and we used the case name to identify the set of DS which applied.  Roger Davies ^talk 22:55, 9 January 2015 (UTC)
        • The simplest solution for alerts for closely related areas is to simply combine the alert - letting people know that DS is enabled for the areas of "Pseudoscience, fringe Science and complementary and alternative medicine" with links to the two decisions. With a central log it doesn't matter which edit their area falls into. Thryduulf (talk) 11:57, 10 January 2015 (UTC)
          • I suppose the question here is probably to identify the specific issue we're trying to address. If an area is closely related, any overlap is covered by "broadly construed" anyway and using the edit filter on a user talk page lists all their alerts. If the net is cast too wide we get false positives. For instance, incivility in Acupuncture doesn't really establish a pattern if it's compared with POV-pushing in Cold Fusion. Apart from which, we already get overlaps and AE isn't paralysed by them. An obvious example being BLP vio within say the India-Pakistan area of conflict. That could be covered by the community BLP provisions, the DS BLP ones, and the ARBPIA ones. I can also envisage situations where edits on the scientific aspects of Climate change could attract potential sanctions either under both Climate change DS and the Pseudoscience ones. A similar theoretical clash could arise between the GenderGap DS and Sexology DS. The answer is probably to tweak the DS procedure to say that an alert in one area is sufficient to apply sanctions in another separate but closely related topic provided the nature of the edits are similar.  Roger Davies ^talk 13:52, 10 January 2015 (UTC)
            • That does make sense, and it has been pointed out to me separately that templates would need (probably minor) redesign to link to two decisions. To avoid any wikilawyering it might be worth putting a sentence into the alerts reflecting your comment. Thryduulf (talk) 15:24, 10 January 2015 (UTC)
  • @NuclearWarfare:. I raised a centralised log here twelve hours ago. It needs a bit of fine-tuning but I'm glad you support the principle.  Roger Davies ^talk 22:11, 9 January 2015 (UTC)

Final decision

Remedies

All remedies that refer to a period of time (for example, a ban of X months or a revert parole of Y months) are to run concurrently unless otherwise stated.

Contentious topic designation

Superseded version

Former title: "Standard discretionary sanctions". 1) In lieu of a full case, the Arbitration Committee authorises standard discretionary sanctions for any edit about, and for all pages relating to Complementary and Alternative Medicine. Any sanctions that may be imposed should be logged at Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Acupuncture. The Committee urges interested editors to pursue alternative means of dispute resolution such as RFC's or requests for mediation on the underlying issues. If necessary, further requests concerning this matter should be filed at the requests for clarification and amendment page. Passed by motion, 9 to 1 at 10:56, 12 January 2015 (UTC) Superseded by motion at 21:36, 14 December 2022 (UTC)

2) Complementary and Alternative Medicine, broadly construed, is designated as a contentious topic.

Amended by motion at 21:36, 14 December 2022 (UTC)

Amendments

Motion: contentious topic designation (December 2022)

As part of the 2022 adoption of the contentious topics procedure, the Arbitration Committee adopted the following motion to re-designate existing discretionary sanctions remedies as contentious topic designations.

21) Each reference to the prior discretionary sanctions procedure shall be treated as a reference to the contentious topics procedure. The arbitration clerks are directed to amend all existing remedies authorizing discretionary sanctions to instead designate contentious topics.

Passed 10 to 0 with 1 abstention by motion at 21:36, 14 December 2022 (UTC)

Enforcement log

Any block, restriction, ban, or sanction performed under the authorisation of a remedy for this case must be logged at Wikipedia:Arbitration enforcement log, not here.