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Template talk:Infobox scientist/Archive 3

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Latest comment: 15 years ago by Johnuniq in topic Religion field
Archive 1 Archive 2 Archive 3 Archive 4 Archive 5 → Archive 10

Sample Infobox placed over explanatory text

Latest comment: 15 years ago2 comments2 people in discussion

Could someone who knows how move the sample infobox so that it's not over the instructions below? Please and thanks! Sasata (talk) 04:43, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

Well I moved the image for now, but now there's a huge scrollbar and the page is 3 times wider than it needs to be. Now if only wikipedia didn't insist on producing those ugly boxes around a piece of text if a line begins with a space. Headbomb {ταλκκοντριβς – WP Physics} 06:49, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

Religion field

Latest comment: 15 years ago117 comments16 people in discussion
There is a related discussion at Infobox Writer talk. I have added this comment here to alert anyone interested, but mainly in an attempt to delay the archiving of this discussion because it's now referenced at the Infobox Writer talk. Johnuniq (talk) 10:07, 18 April 2009 (UTC)

Searching archive 1 and archive 2 for "religion" shows lots of opinions on whether the religion entry should exist, and when it should be used. From the archive, it seems that the only poll on this topic found 3 people wanted "religion" kept, and 10 wanted it removed.

I noticed a recent edit to Richard Dawkins that shows Dawkins as being "Anglican (pre-1956), No religion/Atheist (post-1956)". It's hard to imagine a clearer example of the perils of trying to artificially categorise objects than that.

I see that the editor (Bletchley) has also recently added "Catholic" to Enrico Fermi, "Protestant" to Max Planck, "Anglican" to Robert Boyle, and "Dutch reformed" to Antonie van Leeuwenhoek. Taking Fermi as an example, some possible actions are:

  1. Research whether Fermi is known for expressing a Catholic faith; revert if no source found, or add source.
  2. Revert addition of "Catholic", asking proponent to first give a source.

But the fact that each scientist has a "religion" field is a magnet for all those who would like to "improve" articles by filling in each field with the closest-matching label, regardless of whether it is actually appropriate. Also, given issues like the Creation-evolution controversy, it seems absurd to categorise a prominent scientist with one simple tag, if that scientist has not prominently associated themselves with the tag (for example, if Fermi can accurately be described as "Catholic", then there should be a notable and sourced event in Fermi's life illustrating that point, and it should be mentioned in the article).

Can we please remove the "religion" field from this template? --Johnuniq (talk) 04:55, 10 January 2009 (UTC)

I would also like to see the religion field removed. It's often of no relevance, unsourced, and isn't even mentioned in many of the articles the infobox is on. It's particularly odd, and to some people offensive, when atheism ends up being labeled as a religion. SlimVirgin talk|contribs 05:04, 10 January 2009 (UTC)
I think it is important and generally something that ought to be in articles about scientists, but I concur that it shouldn't be in the infobox, which collapses something that is typically more complicated (beliefs, traditions, upbringing, cultural context, etc.)--ragesoss (talk) 06:48, 10 January 2009 (UTC)
Again, I agree. It should be removed from the infobox and, if notable and verifiable, integreted into the main text of the article in question.--AC+79 3888 (talk) 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
I agree with the points that the religion should be discussed in the article and the religion in the infobox should be sourced. I was getting around to doing that ;-) I think the problem is solved by expanding articles and adding sources, rather than removing Religion from the infobox and losing good information that has been collected painstakingly for 100s of infoboxes. The religious and philosophical status of scientists is of intense public interest, has a valid position for readers interested in Relationship between religion and science, and therefore should be maintained. As for the idea that "Atheist" could offend people as being in the 'religion' field, I think not...it is merely a statement that the person has no religion.Bletchley (talk) 11:13, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
Would we really be "losing good information"? If an infobox claims a scientist is, say, Catholic, does that mean the scientist had Catholic parents, or that the scientist wrote of their Catholic beliefs? My claim is that it is good if the article covers religion; if it does, the infobox religion is not required, and if it doesn't, the religion should be omitted from the infobox. At any rate, in most cases it would be an over-simplification to describe a particular scientist with a simple and value-laden label. --Johnuniq (talk) 22:22, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
I'm not particulary for or against keeping the "religion field", but here's one example where it is indeed relevant: Philipp Jaffé, who was born Jewish and discriminated his whole life, and finally converted to Lutheranism few years before his suicide. I'm sure there are more of such examples. ––bender235 (talk) 12:44, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
The Philipp Jaffé article has clear text on the facts regarding Jaffé's religion. The infobox doesn't add anything. I'll just add that reading the article does not reveal whether Jaffé was a religious believer, or whether he had no religious belief yet was discriminated against because he came from a Jewish family, and he later converted to Christianity for some political reason. That's my real problem with assigning a label: it is essentially meaningless unless some verifiable details are provided. Such details are often unavailable, or are speculation. --Johnuniq (talk) 22:22, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

Where appropriate, an article should discuss the religion of a scientist (if there are sources showing that religion was important in the life of the scientist). However, a scientist should be concerned with precision and careful deliberation, so it seems offensive to assign a simple label to summarise a scientist's "stance" on anything.

Consider these hypothetical cases, assuming the Catholic religion:

  1. A scientist is baptised as an infant, but never practises religion.
  2. A scientist is baptised, then confirmed at age 16, but never practises religion.
  3. A scientist observes religious practices to age 18, but then only attends church for weddings and funerals.
  4. A scientist attends a religious school and occasionally attends church in later life.
  5. A scientist frequently attends church over many years, but never makes a public statement regarding religion.
  6. A scientist frequently attends church, and refers to religion in several interviews.
  7. A scientist frequently attends church, and includes detailed references to religion in several books.

Which of these cases would accurately be described with the label "Catholic"? The problem with keeping the "religion" field is that all these cases would allow an editor to add "Catholic", and that label would be wildly inaccurate in the first few cases. Particularly for scientists, precision is required.

Eddington is an example of a scientist where the label "Quaker" is justified by the article. However, even in that case, the label is a crude classification; if a "hook" to entice readers is wanted, it would be better to add something like "Eddington was a Quaker pacifist during World War 1" to the infobox notes.

Note that artists, swimmers and writers have no religion field. Why would an ambiguous label be applied to scientists? --Johnuniq (talk) 22:38, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

The answer is that Relationship between religion and science is a hot contemporary issue. Also there is a long history between the interplay of science and religion. See the article on Albert Einstein to get a sense of the intense interest in his religious stance. As for the question of a minimally practicing Catholic, this has been dealt with in some infoboxes by using the term "Nominal Catholic". Enrico Fermi would be a good example of such as Catholic..my bad, if I had forgotten to insert the word "nominal." Bletchley (talk) 22:55, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
We are in good agreement on a couple of points. First, the relationship between religion and science is a hot issue. That's why trying to summarise a person's religious beliefs with a quick label is potentially misleading and troublesome. The Wikipedian way of dealing with issues like this is to just quote what reliable sources say. If a biography of Fermi says that he attended a Catholic school and raised his children as Catholics, that's exactly what our article on Fermi should say (with a reference). If Fermi wrote about his religious views, that should be explored in the article. But there is no point in putting "Catholic" or "Nominal Catholic" as a label in an infobox (since those terms are essentially meaningless because of the wide range of behaviors they encompass).
Our second point of agreement is that people are interested in Einstein's religious stance. However, the article (correctly) gives up trying to label Einstein, and merely says "see main text". I believe that's exactly what should apply to all scientists. --Johnuniq (talk) 09:54, 12 January 2009 (UTC)
Yes, we are in total agreement that the topic is hot and should be properly sourced in the articles. What we disagree on is what the real purpose of an infobox is. The problem is that any argument you come up with against the religion field that also applies other fields, does not count. So far your arguments are too general and could be used to scrap virtually all an infobox! I think the solution is to maintain the infobox as is. It is up to editors to expand and source the articles properly. The infobox field can be dealt with intelligently. In the case of Michael Faraday is it clear cut and not misleading, and in the case of Albert Einstein it has been dealt with in a creative way. And all other cases in between can be dealt with using either of these models. I really think this is a storm in a teacup. The purpose of an infobox by nature is a quick look-up summary of stuff and by nature is meant to be low on information.....and in all cases it is upto the reader to read the article to see the expanded explanations. Some scientists have very complicated stories regarding their "nationality,"... for example....do we therefore all give up and delete the nationality field? No! We leave it in and we get creative :-) Bletchley (talk) 22:14, 13 January 2009 (UTC)

I'm in favour of removing the religion field, for many of the reasons outlined above. It seems to me to be useful only as some sort of "score card" for those interested in the atheism v deism debate. And what is even odder is that religion does not seem to be mentioned in info boxes for most clergy or other religious. --Michael Johnson (talk) 23:40, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

It's more than a score card. Philosophical and scientific thought are closely linked. The religion is important for understanding the philosphical influences. The articles themselves discuss this, eg. see Isaac Newton or Albert Einstein. A biography looks at the whole person, not just one aspect. Religion is part of the person. Given that it is discussed in the text of many scientific biographies, it makes sense to see a pointer in the infobox. All the arguments above are not valid, because if you follow the logic you should then remove the large religion section from Albert Einstein's article and not just the pointer in the infobox. I think this is a misplaced argument. Bletchley (talk) 08:27, 12 January 2009 (UTC)
I think everyone here agrees that the article on a scientist should give information on the scientist's religious views (where reliable sources are available). In the two cases you mention (Newton and Einstein), the infobox refers the reader to the article, acknowledging that a single label is not adequate (which is exactly my point). I do not want discussion of religion removed from the articles. The article should say exactly what is known: What did Einstein say about religion? What is known about Einstein's religious practices? What has been written about his views? It's the attempt to over-simplify a scientist's views by applying a label in an infobox that worries me. --Johnuniq (talk) 09:54, 12 January 2009 (UTC)

Whilst I understand your concern, if you browse the infoboxes you'll see the infoboxes have been used intelligently and thoughtfully without oversimplification. For example the Nobel Prize winner Abdus Salam was clearly a devout Muslim and Michael Faraday was a devout Sandemanian, and this is reflected in both the articles and infoboxes. In the cases where there is danger of oversimplification, eg. Isaac Newton and Albert Einstein, the infoboxes intelligently point the reader to article. Given that this has been the clear practice, do you have any further objection?Bletchley (talk) 11:21, 12 January 2009 (UTC)

I appreciate your systematic attempt to improve articles on scientists by putting unused fields in the article infobox, then populating them. My problem is that because the religion field exists, there will be an unending stream of like-minded editors wanting to add a religion label to many scientists. In my view, a simplistic label will almost always be meaningless (does "Catholic" mean "baptised as Catholic", or "has written how Catholic faith influenced work", or something else?). Further, the label will always be redundant because if religion is an issue, the article should cover it (and if religion is not covered, the label should be removed).
In a previous discussion we read "I'm going to stick my neck out for Keep on this, but recommend that 99% of the time this field be left blank. Only use it where they have strong religious views which related to their scientific achievement". However, the template doc merely says "religion : Religious beliefs".
An argument could be made to support keeping the religion field if the template doc was updated, perhaps to read:
religion : Normally omitted. Include only if the article discusses how the religious views were expressed by the scientist in the context of their scientific achievements.--Johnuniq (talk) 01:25, 13 January 2009 (UTC)
This is a possibility. However, it forgets the ethic that wikipedia is evolutionary. If the religion field is populated without expansion in the article: this serves as a flag for editors to expand the article! Why should it be a flag to automatically delete the infobox field? I think we should allow articles to evolve in their good time and not impatiently delete stuff. Infoboxes are great checklists that not only summarize the article, but also flag us if the article is deficient. We need to be focusing on the deficiency of articles and improving them foremost.Bletchley (talk) 22:22, 13 January 2009 (UTC)
The infobox is an authoritative summary of a scientist's achievements, with key biographical details. It is not a to-do list. The article on Fermi might state that Fermi is known for the theory of beta decay, and that claim would be allowed to stand (pending verification). But it would not be satisfactory to put that same claim in the infobox until it was supported. I'm asking that the same principle apply to religion.
An editing guideline concerning the creation of categories states "people should only be categorized by ethnicity or religion if this has significant bearing on their career". I think that guideline should be followed when labeling a scientist in their infobox.
There are two problems: First, particularly when dealing with scientists, we should be precise. Second, it is only rarely possible to determine if ethnicity or religion has had a significant bearing on a scientist's career. Therefore, I think what is known about a scientist's religious stance should be in the article (where reliable references can be quoted), and omitted from the infobox. --Johnuniq (talk) 03:39, 15 January 2009 (UTC)

The religion is important for understanding the philosphical influences. This is the core of the problem. Scientists are firstly and most importantly known for their scientific accomplishments, and rarely for their religious views. For most scientists their scientific accomplishments are pretty much all we know. Some scientists are famous enough that reliable sources are available for other parts of their life, and of course some scientists choose to write on philosophy and religion. And when they do, it is obvious that their outlooks rarely fit neatly into an infobox category. So why have it then? It only invites over simplification and speculation, and is of no practical value to readers because of this. Looking at infoboxes on pages for Antony Flew, Rowan Williams, and Ted Haggard I find no space in the infoboxes used on those pages for religious stance. If we don't have them for philosophers and religious leaders, where the religious affiliation should be easily verifiable, and is very relevant to their professions, why would we have them on scientists pages,where their religious affiliation rarely has any relevance to their notability? Philosophical and scientific thought are closely linked. How so? The evidence seems to be the contrary, scientists of vastly varying philosophical outlooks seem capable of achieving comparable scientific output. Their philosophical outlook seems to have little to do with their work, other than their commitment to scientific method. --Michael Johnson (talk) 22:40, 12 January 2009 (UTC)

There seems to be a consensus to remove the religion field, with all editors except Bletchley agreeing. --Michael Johnson (talk) 23:16, 13 January 2009 (UTC)

There is a lot of info that would be lost. What would be worst thing that could happen if we left it in? Bletchley (talk) 07:33, 14 January 2009 (UTC)
I don't agree either. I agree with Bletchley that we should leave the religion field in. The religion of a scientist is often highly significant to his thinking and his work. Many scientists are also active in society outside of science, which is also an important part of a biography, and that is frequently driven by religious beliefs.
I don't see a consensus here. I see a few editors with strong personal beliefs who have somehow wound up on this page and want to create a new WP guideline. If more editors were aware of this proposal, we would have more editors disagreeing. Nbauman (talk) 18:32, 14 January 2009 (UTC)
More opinions are of course welcome, and there is no attempt to railroad a change. But Bletchley, until you intervened, has been a lone voice. I am interested in your claim that the religion of a scientist is often highly significant to his thinking and his work. While that might be true in some cases, there are also many cases when there is no influence. How is the reader to distinguish between the two by one or two words in the infobox? Even in cases where there is influence, how is the reader's understanding of that influence increased by the use of a brief label in the infobox? It seems to me that the infobox label tells us little, and has the potential to be misleading. --Michael Johnson (talk) 00:34, 15 January 2009 (UTC)
The nature and significance of a scientist's religion is determined from WP:RS, WP:NPOV, WP:WEIGHT and discussion in talk on a case by case basis like everything else. For some scientists, religion may have nothing to do with their lives. For other scientists, religion may be very significant (even for scientists who are not religious in a traditional sense). For example, see Einstein.
The paradox is that many people would say that religion is fundamentally an irrational and even false belief. But it's there. Religion may be a marker for a community of ideas -- for example, German Jewish physicists or Hungarian Jewish mathematicians.
But whatever it is, many autobiographies, biographers, historians, social scientists, etc. often say that religion is a significant part of a particular scientist's life, and when it is clearly a significant accepted viewpoint, it belongs in the infobox. Nbauman (talk) 04:21, 15 January 2009 (UTC)
I agree this discussion isn't wide enough, as I only just stumbled on it myself. Hope you guys weren't trying to steamroller a decision :-) I think the heart of the paradox is Michael Johnson's question: "how is the reader's understanding of that influence increased by the use of a brief label in the infobox?" The answer is simple: an infobox does not increase understanding in any field! The purpose of an infobox is a navigational tool. Often people will browse infoboxes and if it peaks one's interest they then stop and read the article in more detail. I'm very interested in the religious status of scientists (as are many of the public) and so if I see the Religion field in the infobox that immediately alerts me to read the article....and I like to see a broad label to know the flavor of religion; then it motivates me to read the article for the details. I think the purpose of an infobox has not been understood. It is all about pointers to the main article and not attempting to increase understanding; it's an infobox, it doesn't attempt to explain anything. That is the job of the main article. Why are we arguing about this? It seems totally obvious to me. QueenAdelaide (talk) 06:35, 15 January 2009 (UTC)
I personally use the contents box as a navigation tool, and it has the added advantage of a link to the appropriate section. --Michael Johnson (talk) 04:18, 16 January 2009 (UTC)
Nice try, but it doesn't work consistently in practice...because it depends how article is structured. The idea of an infobox is that is had a repeatable structure that is consistent across an number of articlesBletchley (talk) 01:09, 17 January 2009 (UTC)
So what is the infobox? Consistant infomation or an index? It can't be both. The contents box is a uniform guide to the contents of the article. If religion is not mentioned, adding a section on religion to the infobox isn't going to help people find it, is it? --Michael Johnson (talk) 05:50, 18 January 2009 (UTC)
Nbauman, the phrase "German Jewish physicist" refers to ethnicity, not to religion. Substitute "Jewish" for a truly religious designation, or for one of the other terms that appear in the "religion" field in this infobox, and you'll see how ridiculous it is — Hungarian Christian chemist, Scottish Muslim mathematician, French atheist physicist, Canadian Buddhist astronomer.
The fact is that you have no idea what the religious habits are of most of the people who have these labels hung around their necks in this infobox. Does "Christian" mean was born into a Christian family, is a practising Christian, or someone who buys Christmas presents and goes to midnight mass once a year? These terms shouldn't appear in an infobox. If it's relevant to the person's bio, put it in the article with reliable sources and an explanation of why it matters. If it's not clearly relevant according to reliable sources, leave it out. SlimVirgin talk|contribs 00:03, 16 January 2009 (UTC)
SlimVirgin, as I said, Religion = Jewish is a marker for a community, and that community is significant. But there isn't a better marker. You could replace it with Ethnicity = German Jewish, but I think most readers of Wikipedia would find that confusing and maybe pedantic.
Is that what you want to do? Replace "Religion" with "Ethnicity"?
There are commonalities among Jewish scientists and mathematicians in Germany, Poland, Russia, the U.S., Israel, and (in the middle ages) Baghdad. But Germany is sui generis because of its influence. So I and many other people see something significant and notable in the fact that a mathematician or a scientist is Jewish, and particularly German Jewish. It tells me a lot. I go to a lot of scientific meetings. The Jews often stand out in a characteristic way (usually but not always good). It's like the Germans say, that a birch forest has a different mood than an oak forest or a pine forest. It does seem to affect their scientific outlook and social concerns.
Albert Einstein is the clearest case. Many people see the German and Jewish influence in his ideas.
"Muslim astronomer" also seems significant. It makes sense that a religion that requires you to observe the occultation of the moon would encourage the study of astronomy, and by extension, mathematics. "Hindu mathematician" also seems significant.
"Christian" means someone who was brought up in and identifies with the Christian culture. Similarly "Jewish." Until recently most education was religious education, so it does make a difference. Catholics, Protestants and Jews may have had different attitudes towards challenging authority, for example. They may have cosmological teachings which encourage scientists to examine fundamental questions about the universe.
I agree with you that it should be relevant according to reliable sources, by the usual criteria in WP, but I think it belongs in the infobox.
Do you think religion belongs in the infobox at all? What about politicians? Would you support removing the religion field from Rahm Emanuel? Nbauman (talk) 01:00, 16 January 2009 (UTC)
What I meant is that "Jewish" denotes ethnicity, not a religion. It is about Jewishness, not Judaism.
No, I believe religion doesn't belong in any infox, for the reasons stated above. SlimVirgin talk|contribs 01:38, 16 January 2009 (UTC)
Are we saying the theory of relativity is a German idea or a Jewish idea? There was some confusion about that some time back, I seem to remember reading. The answer of course is neither, it is a scientific idea, and science is culture neutral. Of course there are some cultures that have been more amenable to scientific enquiry than others. But labelling somebody a certain religion is not going to help, was a Muslim scientist working during the Islamic Golden Age or labouring under the Taliban? Albert Einstein is an example of how pointless the religious stance field is, the editors have (rightly) given up trying to produce a neat label, and just say "see main text". Charles Darwin is described as "Church of England, though Unitarian family background, Agnostic after 1851". Well he was certainly nominally CofE throughout his life, not because of religious conviction but from social necessity. Was he ever Unitarian, and how can the infobox even start to indicate if this background did have any influence on him? And yes agnostic is probably an accurate description, but certainly not one he would have used, not the least because Thomas Huxley didn't invent the word till 1869. And what if they are an agnostic or atheist, as per for instance Richard Dawkins? Some people find the use of the word Atheist to describe a religious stance offensive, yet to say "none" seems absurd in the case of Dawkins. Maybe it would be best to just say "see main text" in all these cases. Which really makes the field pointless. --Michael Johnson (talk) 04:18, 16 January 2009 (UTC)
SlimVirgin, I'm afraid I still don't understand you. Would you support removing the religion field from Rahm Emanuel? Nbauman (talk) 17:39, 16 January 2009 (UTC)
Yes, I would. Let me know what you don't understand and I'll try to be clearer. SlimVirgin talk|contribs 18:47, 16 January 2009 (UTC)
What is the purpose of an infobox? Nbauman (talk) 23:42, 16 January 2009 (UTC)
To give a quick summary of the most important information about the subject, and I don't see religion in that category. For many, if not most subjects — and perhaps especially for scientists — it might be just as relevant to add their height, weight, color of eyes, and whether they prefer vanilla or chocolate ice-cream. SlimVirgin talk|contribs 03:08, 17 January 2009 (UTC)
Then the issue is whether religion is among the most important information about the subject. I'll leave that to the WP community to decide.
I'm not aware of any biographers or social scientists who claim that ice cream preference has any significance for a scientists' work. Nbauman (talk) 06:07, 17 January 2009 (UTC)
Science should be about verifiable observations, and falsifiable theories drawn from those observations. Conclusions based on a scientist's preferences would not be science, so none of a scientist's personal beliefs belong in an infobox. Of course a scientist may have been influenced by religious beliefs which may have had important outcomes. That should be explored in the article, but cannot be meaningfully summarized with a label in an infobox. --Johnuniq (talk) 09:40, 17 January 2009 (UTC)
I'm an atheist but I think that religion is as biographically important as nationality. Certainly for European Enlightenment-era scientists if no one else! So IMO the religion field ought to remain in this template. Perhaps a note ought to be made somewhere, "A scientist's religion is very likely to be challenged, so per WP:CITE any statement of an individual's religious identification ought to be properly referenced." --❨Ṩtruthious ℬandersnatch❩ 22:05, 17 January 2009 (UTC)

If people are famous enough, as for Fermi, Planck, Leeuwenhoek, & Boyle, a great deal about their personal life becomes of importance. Their philosophical and religious views should be discussed as for other aspects of their life. We covers famous people's biographies in considerable detail, not just their science. Additionally, in some cases, as for Dawkins or Boyle, religion is very relevant for even the most basic description. For the others mentioned, it can be argued also that it is of some scientific relevance. And there is certainly evidence for them all from other bios. The question is however summing it up in an infobox. This is rather tricky, as in all such brief summaries. I don't think it should be done routinely, and only where actually of high relevance, with very good sourcing. This certainly is the case for Dawkins. In any case, Dawkins is notable as a controversalist on religion, not just a scientist--I would even say that this is is primary notability. Because of this, I think it must stay in the infobox for Dawkins. (which is where we started) . Even on Johnuniq's view, it's relevant for him. DGG (talk) 22:59, 17 January 2009 (UTC)

Yet the irony with Dawkins we have immediately above the "religious stance" section we have what Dawkins is know for - his anti-religious stance and athiesm. So just in case the reader misses it the first time, we repeat it the second time. Just how stupid do we think the average Wikipedia user is? --Michael Johnson (talk) 05:44, 18 January 2009 (UTC)
DGG, I can't quite follow your point. No one here wants to remove a discussion of religion, and I would say we all agree with the first half of your post. However, would you want "Anglican (pre-1956), No religion/Atheist (post-1956)" in the infobox for Dawkins?
My concern is that the infobox doc merely says "religion : Religious beliefs", and the fact that the field exists is an invitation for editors to find scientists with no entry, then find the closest matching label, regardless of whether reliable sources show that religion was relevant for that scientist. Is my concern reasonable? If so, how should it be addressed? --Johnuniq (talk) 09:00, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

Nationality

Nationality for particular individuals could be equally complicated as religion is for Dawkins and there may exist scurrilous POV-pushers who wish to claim as many notable individuals for their own nationality, but I don't think that either of those possibilities would be a good argument for removing the "Nationality" field from this template. --❨Ṩtruthious ℬandersnatch❩ 05:42, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

Nationality could be complicated, but such cases are rare (do you know of any?). Nationality generally is well defined and known; any contentious cases could easily be handled with "see main text" (as is done for Einstein's religion).
By contrast, religious stance cannot be clearly defined. Of course, there is no problem if a scientist has documented their beliefs, and there is no problem in having the article text say (for example) that a scientist was raised in a Catholic family. However, it is not reasonable to label a scientist as "Catholic" without specifying what that means. --Johnuniq (talk) 09:41, 20 January 2009 (UTC)
Your statements there don't make sense to me, particularly the "do you know of any?" prompt. An individual can easily have changed citizenship and residence frequently during their life or can simultaneously hold multiple citizenships and be heir to multiple ethnicities, and in fact this is so common an occurrence among notable scientists that I am not going to bother to run off and dig up an example. For that matter, the national boundaries or the very existence of particular nations may have changed radically over the course of an individual's life.
So it appears to me completely rhetorical that you are attempting to convey that nationality is somehow cut and dried and straighforward, and "see main text" is an easy and usable solution for complexities, while an individual's religion is so obscure and difficult a scholarly topic that it should be avoided completely in the infobox and "see main text" is somehow a less manageable approach when there are complexities.
Not so at all, religion and nationality are entirely and definitely comparable in this context. Heck, it probably won't be long before there'll be a case of a notable scientist where gender is difficult to explain, if one or more haven't occurred already. --❨Ṩtruthious ℬandersnatch❩ 06:27, 25 January 2009 (UTC)
Sorry, my wording must have been misleading. I was not trying to suggest that nationality is always straightforward, while religion is always difficult, and I accept that in some cases establishing nationality could be complex. When I asked "do you know of any?", I had it in mind that by "complicated" you were referring to extreme complications, such as POV-pushers claiming a scientist for a particular nationality (which you mentioned). I withdraw the question.
In principle, a person's nationality can be determined by objective criterion, and is often well documented. For example, a scientist born in France to French parents, and who only briefly visited other countries, is known to be French. We don't need a statement by the scientist affirming their nationality. Other cases could be complex, but my guess is that nationality generally would be well documented. Citizenship can be more contentious, but is at least capable of being examined according to the citizenship laws of the involved countries.
By contrast, the religious beliefs of many scientists are not documented. Without statements from the scientist concerned, there is no method to determine their religious stance. We can say that someone attended a religious school, but we have no way to infer their beliefs unless that person made public statements about them. --Johnuniq (talk) 09:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)
Ah, yes, then, probably a simple misunderstanding. I initially responded to your example of Richard Dawkins transitioning from an Anglican upbringing to atheism, so I was thinking in terms of an equivalent complexity in an individual's nationality - a scientist being born in one nation and then choosing a different one as his or her home and identity (or perhaps losing that nationality completely if the nation itself ceases to exist.) My point was simply that the case of Dawkins having technically been Anglican at one point, and then not any more, presents no more of an obstruction than does the nationality of such scientists.
If your response to me was about the verifiability of a scientist's self-identified or practiced religion, rather than any discussion of the complexity of some individuals' religious history being a justification for removing the field, then we definitely agree - I certainly think the field should only contain valid and accurate information and as I proposed elsewhere, I would be fine with requiring a citation on the content of this field.
Here's another thought - how about an element in the template guideline to specify that the source for an assertion of a scientist's religion has to be attributing a religious identity during adulthood, or perhaps during the scientist's professional career? That might at least address some of these cases, where an editor is being too, er, enthusiastic about extrapolating an individual's religious identity in childhood.
Another idea - maybe we could stipulate criteria for when the field should simply say "see main text" as you mentioned. --❨Ṩtruthious ℬandersnatch❩ 13:41, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

Wrapping up this religion debate

Ok, it looks like we have 5 delete, 4 keep and one neutral....which is converging to no-concensus, therefore keep. So I suggest to keep everyone happy we all do our best reference the religion field if used. If we see an unreferenced one somewhere we should insert the "[citation needed]" tag to remind the local editors to find a reference. Then it is upto local editors to delete religion from specific articles, if a reference isn't forthcoming. All those who think this is a reasonable approach under the present circumstances, say "aye." Bletchley (talk) 02:35, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

NO. Just because a few editors have wandered in and support you POV you don't get to wrap it up. And please don't edit my talk page contributions. Let's summerise it here - we are told that this field is important and the examples of Einstein and Dawkins are referred to - yet in the Einstein box the issue is regarded as so complex the field refers to the article, the Dawkins box repeats the same infomation twice, the Darwin box gives three mutually exclusive classifications and leaves the reader confused, and so it goes on. And some editors want it because they can't find the contents box. The religion field is pointless, often carries inaccurate infomation, is subject to oversimplifcation, and a magnet for edit wars. Lets get rid of it. --Michael Johnson (talk) 05:44, 18 January 2009 (UTC)
Aye. --Bletchley (talk) 10:53, 18 January 2009 (UTC)
Aye - with the caveats that the template's documentation needs to carry a suitable warning (perhaps "Only use this field if the subject's religion impacted on their work or fame. Any such use must be referenced"; and that the field should be labelled such that "atheism" may be used meaningfully as as an entry. Andy Mabbett (User:Pigsonthewing); Andy's talk; Andy's edits 11:23, 18 January 2009 (UTC)
Aye. Nbauman (talk) 16:27, 18 January 2009 (UTC)
Aye. --❨Ṩtruthious ℬandersnatch❩ 05:42, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
No. The current problems will remain. People will read that someone is Jewish and will think it's a religion. Or that someone was born into a Church of England family and will assume he's a Christian. And the source would have to confirm that the religion is relevant to the subject, a requirement that many editors will just ignore, so this proposal will change nothing. SlimVirgin talk|contribs 13:15, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
No. The whole point is that whereas "citation needed" sounds great, there is no specification for how to decide what was the religious stance of a particular scientist. Would a reference stating that X was confirmed as a Catholic justify describing the religious stance of X as "Catholic"? (The answer is no.) --Johnuniq (talk) 09:41, 20 January 2009 (UTC)
Aye The field is already widely used and important. Potential problems can be resolved with appropriate guidelines.TorontoFever (talk) 23:18, 25 January 2009 (UTC)
Comment. John highlights the fundamental problem with this template. What it seems to be doing is identifying how a person's parents were labelled, and then labels the offspring that way too, though the offspring may never have given their informed consent. There is no such thing as a "Christian child." There are children whose parents are Christian, but that doesn't impose the label on the child, until he's an adult himself and chooses to accept it. Any sources for this template, and indeed for the articles, would have to state clearly that the subject was a practising Christian, or whatever, himself. SlimVirgin talk|contribs 19:19, 20 January 2009 (UTC)
  • I came here looking to save the religion field, but the above arguments have convinced me that the field should be removed. Religion is too complex an issue to be summarized in the infobox and is often completely irrelevant. When it's relevant, it should find its way in the article, not in the infobox. Headbomb {ταλκκοντριβς – WP Physics} 02:15, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
  • I came here looking to remove the religion field, but the above arguments have convinced me that the field should be kept. Religion is too compelling an issue to be not be summarized in the infobox and is often of significant interest. When it's relevant it should find it's way into the article and the infobox.CatState (talk) 10:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
If religion is an issue it does not belong in the infobox, it belongs in the body of the article. Issues need to be explained and explored, not simplified down to a single word in the infobox. --Michael Johnson (talk) 12:34, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
Have a different opinion all you want, and voice it all you want, but don't make shit up about how you came here looking to remove the religion field when you weren't, for sake of being able to use a debating technique used to expose hypocrisy. There's no hypocrisy in my opinion, and you're dishonestly presenting yourself. Grow up. Headbomb {ταλκκοντριβς – WP Physics} 10:29, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
As Shakespeare once said: "the lady doth protest too much." Methinks you have just exposed yourself with a little bit of projection on your part. I rest my case. CatState (talk) 12:23, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
Please follow WP:AGF and assume good faith, no matter how suspicious, improbable or absurd it may seem. Nbauman (talk) 20:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

Defining a template guideline for the religion field

Following an off-line discussion with Johnuniq that can be seen here, Johnuniq suggests that we move things along and write a guideline for use of the religion religion field. He feels that the religion field is salvageable if it is used correctly. So we propose to put an updated guideline on the template page. Here is a first stab at trying to write such a guideline, please feel free to chip in to discuss it and tweak it:

(Attempt #1) Guideline for use of the religion field:

(a) The religion field must be left blank if it cannot be demonstrated with a reference that the scientist identified him/her self with a particular belief system. In some cases, self-identification may not be necessary if the religious stance is clear from other factors, example: Gregor Mendel who was a monk.
(b) The religion field must be left blank if the scientist was only nominally connected to a religion. Example: references show that Catholicism played a major role in the life of Augustin Louis Cauchy, whereas Enrico Fermi was only a nominal Catholic. Therefore in the case of Fermi it should be left blank.
(c) If there is intense interest in the belief system of a scientist, where the beliefs are so self-styled rendering simple labeling too complex, then the religion field should state "see main article." Example: see Albert Einstein.
(d) In cases where a scientist does not subscribe to a particular doctrinal tradition, but where references exist that indicate relevant philosophical or religious leanings, such as subscribing to Platonistic (ie. dualistic) thinking, materialism, logical positivism etc. or not, these are appropriate for this field. Example: Roger Penrose.
(e) In the null case, where it is documented that the scientist is an atheist, the "atheist" label can be entered in the religion field to clearly indicate to the reader that there is no religion in this case. Example: Paul Dirac.
(f) Ideally the religion field should be used when the religion of the scientist is discussed in the article. However, for many articles "in progress," without the relevant discussion, the religion field can be entered if it is accompanied by a reliable reference.

Any thoughts/discussion? Sanity check please. Bletchley (talk) 13:13, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

Too complicated and subjective. Isn't it enough for an authoritative source, like Who's Who, American Men and Women of Science, or the Nobel web site biography, or the scientist's own self-identification, to identify the scientist's religion? I think so.
BTW, as in the example of Abdus Salam, is it enough to cite a source for the scientist's religion in the body of the article, and not have to additionally provide a cite in the infobox? I think so.
If you require a cite for religion in the infobox, then why not require a cite for citizenship, nationality, etc., which are sometimes equally contentious, like Eric Kandel?
And where did "Religious stance" come from? Why do we say that and not simply "Religion"? What's the difference between "Religious stance" and "Religion"? Nbauman (talk) 15:51, 22 January 2009 (UTC)
"Religious stance" comes from the argument over whether atheism is a religion or not, ie it was put there specificity to accommodate atheists. By the way there is a difference between people with "no religion" and atheists. Not that the subtleties of this really seems to interest those keen to just slap labels on people. Nor do these labels account for people who professed religion for social or cultural convenience, or those who were obliged to adopt a state religion through fear for their life or career (or, indeed adopt atheism in the Soviet states). However if we must have religion in the info box I would generally support Bletchley. How you are going to police it is another thing altogether. Regarding cites, all information in Wikipedia should be sourced. Nationality is usually much easier to establish and clear-cut than religion, obviously there are exceptions. --Michael Johnson (talk) 21:07, 22 January 2009 (UTC)
Re citizenship: While sometimes contentious, it is at least in principle determinable. For example, a person may move to a country where citizens are conscripted for military service. A court case might occur if the person was conscripted, yet that person denied being a citizen. Without commenting on the "ultimate truth" of the situation, we could report the outcome of the court case.
By contrast, there is no objective way to determine a person's religious stance. We can say that someone attended a Catholic school, but we have no way to infer their beliefs unless that person wrote about them. --Johnuniq (talk) 08:34, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

Actually thinking on this further, I think the religion field should only be included if the topic's religion is discussed and sourced in the article. After all the infobox should be a summary of information in the article, not an article in it's own right. --Michael Johnson (talk) 21:27, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

I could go along with Bletchley's suggestions, except for (d), (e), and (f). Re (d): References suggesting that someone is a Platonist or logical positivist have nothing to do with religion. Re (e): Atheism is not a religion; many atheists would be offended to see that entered into a religion field. Re (f): All articles are in progress; if there are references showing religion was important in someone's life and they have self-identified, put it in the article, then in the infobox, not the other way round. SlimVirgin talk|contribs 21:45, 22 January 2009 (UTC)
Is the term "Religious stance" a neologism? Can anyone cite a major reference book that uses the term? Nbauman (talk) 21:56, 22 January 2009 (UTC)
If people want to add things like Platonist, materialist, atheist, another idea might be to stop calling it the religion field, and call it something else e.g. philosophical position. SlimVirgin talk|contribs 22:02, 22 January 2009 (UTC)
Calling it a "Philosophical position" would be deleting the Religion field, after we got a consensus to keep it.
The template says "religion". How did it get changed to "Religious stance"? Did people manually change it? Nbauman (talk) 23:10, 22 January 2009 (UTC)
Don't see any consensus. --Michael Johnson (talk) 23:22, 22 January 2009 (UTC)
Calling it something else would solve the problem of people wanting to add atheist and Platonist. SlimVirgin talk|contribs 06:40, 23 January 2009 (UTC)
I'd like to know where this term "Religious stance" came from. It's not in the template, as far as I can see it was never in the template, there was never a consensus decision to use it, and it's a WP:neologism. Correct? Nbauman (talk) 00:55, 23 January 2009 (UTC)
"Religious stance" is quite a common term. Here for Google books; here for Google. SlimVirgin talk|contribs 06:40, 23 January 2009 (UTC)
It's not answering your question, but this edit introduced "Religious Stance" (changed to "Religious stance" in next edit). --Johnuniq (talk) 08:34, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

I like Bletchley's guideline above, but I'm still hoping to have the religious label removed. My view is that some editors will want (for example) to apply "Catholic" to any scientist who had even a brief encounter with Catholicism, while other editors will want to remove all religious labels. There is a Wikipedean way to resolve this: quote reliable sources in the article. A scientist labeled "Catholic" might have been raised in a Catholic tradition, yet have no religious beliefs (but chose to avoid family conflicts by not saying so). Alternatively, "Catholic" might refer to a scientist who had written extensively about their faith and how it inspired their work. Therefore a religious-stance label is meaningless and should be omitted.

Nevertheless, I would be satisfied if Bletchley's guideline were placed in the template doc (although I think labeling Roger Penrose as "Materialist Platonist with no doctrinal stance" is way over the top). Thanks Bletchley for the wording. --Johnuniq (talk) 08:34, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

1. From Johnuniq's helpful link [1], it seems that "Religion" was changed to "Religious Stance" on 8 December 2007 without any mention in the Edit box or any discussion in the Talk page. There was some objection in the Talk page afterwards but nothing came of it. So the change was made by an individual editor on his own initiative without consensus. Is that correct?
2. I realize that the phrase "religious stance" is used occasionally -- I did a Google search too -- but my question was, "Can anyone cite a major reference book that uses the term?" Who's Who, American Men and Women of Science, etc., use "Religion." Nbauman (talk) 17:33, 23 January 2009 (UTC)
Clearly the term "religious stance" (which I am no more attracted to than "religion") helps those who insist on inserting something into this field no matter what. For instance atheists, or people like Einstein, whos religious outlook defies classification. If you return to "religion" (which I have no objection to) then in my opinion it should be made clear the field should only be used when the subject is a verified practitioner of a particular denomination or sect. --Michael Johnson (talk) 23:45, 23 January 2009 (UTC)
I agree with Michael Johnson here that "religion" is better than "religious stance" and that the field ought only be used when an individual's religious identity has been confirmed somehow - though in addition to the person being a verified practitioner of a religion, per the "Abdus Salam" discussion below I think that self-identification as a particular religion ought to qualify as well, to avoid any discussion of religious practices if it's not necessary.--❨Ṩtruthious ℬandersnatch❩ 06:27, 25 January 2009 (UTC)
I'm personally neutral on the issue of whether it should be called "Religion" or "Religious stance", either sound ok to me...but to stop complaints from atheists, I think we are going to need to compromise and call it "Religious stance." Personally, I would like to see this field broadened and would like to call it "Philosophical position" ...so we put in any religious and/or philosophical positions that are properly cited for that scientist, eg. "Anglican, logical positivist." But what I'm not sure about is if other editors would object or not to using the word "Philosophical" to cover religion also.... I can't see why it would offend anybody, but let me know how it sounds to you guys. Can we get a consensus to swap the label "Religious" for "Philosophical"? Any thoughts? Bletchley (talk) 08:30, 25 January 2009 (UTC)
I appreciate the spirit of compromise you're proposing it in but it seems to me that calling it "philosophical position" would lead to lack of clarity for its purpose because philosophy is very distinct from theology and even more distinct from religion. Hence I wonder if such a change might eventually result in someone proposing to separate out a "religion" field from the philosophy field, and we might find ourselves going in circles. --❨Ṩtruthious ℬandersnatch❩ 11:42, 25 January 2009 (UTC)
Indeed yes and even more difficult to verify. Which is the problem, many scientists don't have a religion, but do have a philosophy of life, impossible to summarise in one or two words in an info box. --Michael Johnson (talk) 22:50, 25 January 2009 (UTC)
In the spirit of compromise, I would be happy to see two fields: "Religious position" and "Philosophical position", only to be used if verified by references. In the "Philosophical" I'd like to see, for example, if a quantum physicist was a Copenhagenist or not. Where known, it is very useful to know if a scientist was philosophically Platonist or anti-Platonist and so on. This really helps to understand their approach to science. I see no problem with any of this, so long as we stick to references! Guidelines above seem ok; can't see a problem. TorontoFever (talk) 23:25, 25 January 2009 (UTC)
I'm not sure this is much of a compromise, considering the debate is between those who want one field (religion) and those who want none at all. I'm just against putting these simple labels on what are complex contexts best discussed in the article. --Michael Johnson (talk) 23:28, 26 January 2009 (UTC)
As I said, all the major reference books that I know of -- Who's Who, American Men and Women of Science, etc. -- use "Religion." I asked whether anybody could cite a major reference book that uses the term "religous stance," and nobody has given me an answer. I assume the answer is that there is no major reference book that uses the term "religious stance" to describe scientists. Correct?
Furthermore, it was never adopted for the template by consensus, and there's no guideline requiring or recommending its use, so no one is obligated to use it in WP. Correct? Nbauman (talk) 04:00, 27 January 2009 (UTC)
IMO the "it's too complex to be in an infobox!" argument is thoroughly debunked; as I pointed out above, nationality can be equally as complex but there aren't any calls to delete the nationality field. And of course, the context in which TorontoFever's proposal is a compromise (good idea!) is that it addresses the concern about atheists being offended.
It seems to me like we're getting into a "bait and switch" situation here, where an objection to the field is put forth but when it's successfully addressed a different objection is raised. (I don't mean to allege bad faith on anyone's part by that, it's just a sort of tail-chasing thing that happens in these discussions sometimes.)
In a further spirit of compromise - to avoid adding an additional "Philosophical position" data field we could add an on/off parameter that switches the label on the field. (Or maybe even do some kind of search for the values "atheist", "Platonist", etc. and switch the label automatically, if anyone knows how to do fancy stuff like that.) --❨Ṩtruthious ℬandersnatch❩ 05:27, 27 January 2009 (UTC)
Well of course I would deny that the objections to a "religion" field have been successfully debunked, on the contrary, the arguments for are totally inadequate from my point of view. HOWEVER as has been pointed out the opinion on this amongst editors on this page is evenly split, so no consensus, so the status quo remains for now. I'm not sure what the "major reference books" have to do with it, but "Religion" at least can be verified - scientist X was known to go to church every Sunday, etc. If there is no religion, then no use of the field. Problem is that Wikipedia editors being what they are, they like to fill these fields even with the slimmest bit of evidence. And then there is the problem of atheists, and others of ill-defined outlooks. "Religious stance" covers them but admittedly is a rather odd term. "Philosophical position" really is problematic. We then get into third party opinion (ie according to Jones, Brown was a Platonist, etc). Further it is not either/or. It would be quite possible for both, say, a Catholic and an Atheist to hold the same philosophical position in relation to science. My vote would be for "Religion" with a strong statement that it not be used except when there is verifiable evidence that the individual was a practicing member of that religion. --Michael Johnson (talk) 07:05, 27 January 2009 (UTC)
I kind of agree with everything you say, with the exception of your statement "Wikipedia editors being what they are":-) I don't think we need concern ourselves with them, as such editors will get policed by local editors who are experts on the biography of the said scientist. The Albert Einstein article has had its section on religion thoroughly debated and hammered out by 100s of editors, and that's a good example of excellent wiki collaboration (ok, there were a few wars along the way but the article now looks great. And, hey, at least no blood was shed along the way). As I said before I don't really care if it is "Religion" or "Religious stance", they both seem fine to me. But the "stance" was added to keep atheists happy, so it might be wise to leave in or we might rouse the ire of other editors. Alternatively, if "Religious position" sounds better, why don't we go for that? Basically, everything in your statement appears to be in agreement with the spirit of the above guideline (a)-(f). So can you confirm if you are happy to move forward with (a)-(f) or do you have some specific modifications in mind? TorontoFever (talk) 08:14, 27 January 2009 (UTC)
Actually I already have, near the top of this section! --Michael Johnson (talk) 21:21, 27 January 2009 (UTC)
I apologize, I did not intend to convey that all objections to a religion field have been thoroughly debunked; just the one that suggested that an individual's religious identification is too complex a topic to be included in an infobox.
What major reference books have to do with it is that one of the five pillars of the Wikipedia project is that it is an encyclopedia. (see also WP:ENC.) WP is in many respects a new kind of encyclopedia (see WP:NOTPAPER) but we can't just write our own ticket in regards to defining what an encyclopedia is. So in ascertaining what is properly encyclopedic we must look to other established encyclopedias and reference works.
I agree with everything you said in regards to difficulties with verifiability of an individual's religious stance, Michael Johnson, and I acknowledge the dangers posed to WP quality by POV-pushers. But these seem like good reasons to ensure articles adhere to WP:V and WP:NPOV rather than reasons to change other practices, particularly encyclopedic ones. --❨Ṩtruthious ℬandersnatch❩ 18:36, 27 January 2009 (UTC)
Michael, I have read you comments at the top and I can't see anything you've said that disagrees with the essence of guidelines (a)-(f). Pls can you write down here any specifics you would like to see changed so we can discuss directly? TorontoFever (talk) 21:37, 27 January 2009 (UTC)
I agree with Struthious Bandersnatch.
I object to
(c) If there is intense interest in the belief system of a scientist, where the beliefs are so self-styled rendering simple labeling too complex, then the religion field should state "see main article." Example: see Albert Einstein.
I object to
"Religion" at least can be verified - scientist X was known to go to church every Sunday
This is WP:OR. If the usual WP:RS such as the Nobel Prize web site, Who's Who, American Men and Women of Science, or a New YorkTimes biography or obituary says a scientist is Jewish, that should be sufficient for the infobox. It's WP:OR for WP editors to read biographies of Einstein to find out whether he went to Synagogue every Saturday.
(c) would let the people who object to the religion field to eliminate religion from the infobox by claiming that there is "intense interest" in it. It says that a "self-styled rendering" isn't enough. (c) places an impossible burden on establishing facts, beyond WP:RS -- and sometimes against WP:RS. So even if we demonstrate unequivocally that Einstein considered himself Jewish, you could eliminate Jewish from the infobox by arguing that it's "too complex." How complex is "too complex"? The religous beliefs of scientists are always complex. Nbauman (talk) 21:59, 27 January 2009 (UTC)
Certainly an editor claiming to see a scientist in church every Sunday is OR, and that is not what I meant. However a using a biography as a source is not OR, although you can argue that some sources are more reliable than others. If you want to restrict sources in this case to the Nobel Prize web site, Who's Who, American Men and Women of Science, or a New York Times biography or obituary that is fine by me. And yes I agree entirely that the religious beliefs of scientists are always complex, which is precisely the reason I have been arguing they should not be summarised in one or two, often misleading, words, but should be fully discussed in the article itself. --Michael Johnson (talk) 00:03, 28 January 2009 (UTC)

(unindent for people with tiny screens ;^) Just to be clear, I do think that Michael Johnson and Johnuniq's points about complexity are valid concerns, I simply think that they aren't a basis to remove the field. I think it would be worthwhile to try to flesh out c) above, when the field ought to say "see article". If there's no citeable instance of self-identification on the part of the scientist and there are two or more conflicting reliable sources cited in the article that disagree on the proper categorization of the scientist's religion (i.e. one says she was a Catholic and another says no, for these reasons she considered herself Episcopalian), I think in that case we ought to endorse the field saying "see article". --❨Ṩtruthious ℬandersnatch❩ 06:43, 28 January 2009 (UTC)

Guys, ok I see the problem and I see now that I didn't write (c) very clearly. My intention was to only put "see article" in the religion field if the article has a good section on religion (eg. Albert Einstein) and if the labels are too complex. Therefore I have now rewritten (c) for you all to check. The "see article" link in the Einstein article has survived there for nearly a year, and there are 100s of very aggressive local editors patrolling that article day and night. If we make a proposal to that removes it they will probably start a huge war...the Einstein editors are very territorial! So because it has peacefully worked in that article (and others) for sometime, and it is a fairly sensible thing to do when the article does have a good religion section, I would suggest to find a way to preserve it. Because this page is getting awfully cluttered and hard to follow, I have started a new subsection below where you can comment on which parts of the guideline you want tweaked up. Bletchley (talk) 08:27, 28 January 2009 (UTC)

Second try at defining a template guideline for the religion field

Following the suggestion of Michael Johnson that guideline (c) neeeds fixing, here is what the updated guideline proposal looks like:

(Attempt #2) Guideline for use of the religion field:

(a) The religion field must be left blank if it cannot be demonstrated with a reference that the scientist identified him/her self with a particular belief system. In some cases, self-identification may not be necessary if the religious stance is clear from other factors, example: Gregor Mendel who was a monk.
(b) The religion field must be left blank if the scientist was only nominally connected to a religion. Example: references show that Catholicism played a major role in the life of Augustin Louis Cauchy, whereas Enrico Fermi was only a nominal Catholic. Therefore in the case of Fermi it should be left blank.
(c) The religion field must be left blank if there are no suitable labels to describe the case where a scientist espouses a non-standard or highly complex belief system. However, in such cases where the main article has a referenced section on the scientist's religious stance, then the religion field should state "see main article." Example: see Albert Einstein.
(d) In cases where a scientist does not subscribe to a particular doctrinal tradition, but where references exist that indicate relevant philosophical or religious leanings, such as subscribing to Platonistic (ie. dualistic) thinking, materialism, logical positivism etc. or not, these are appropriate for this field. Example: Roger Penrose.
(e) In the null case, where it is documented that the scientist is an atheist, the "atheist" label can be entered in the religion field to clearly indicate to the reader that there is no religion in this case. Example: Paul Dirac.
(f) Ideally the religion field should be used when the religion of the scientist is discussed in the article. However, for many articles "in progress," without the relevant discussion, the religion field can be entered if it is accompanied by a reliable reference.

Please list any comments, suggestions, corrections, objections below.Bletchley (talk) 08:27, 28 January 2009 (UTC)

Okay, yeah, I misunderstood the purpose of c). I think then that we're missing a list item for when two reliable sources assert different / conflicting / incompatible things? IMO in that case we ought to endorse either leaving the field blank or entering "see article" into it. (It's not that I have actually encountered this situation, it just seems like something that ought to be addressed in the guideline.) --❨Ṩtruthious ℬandersnatch❩ 09:23, 28 January 2009 (UTC)
(c) violates WP:RS, by setting a higher standard for religion than other facts. If the Nobel Prize biography, or Einstein's self-written Who's Who entry, says Einstein was Jewish, why isn't that sufficient to describe him simply as Jewish in the Infobox?
How do you decide that a scientist's belief system is "non-standard or highly complex" without WP:OR? Nbauman (talk) 15:47, 28 January 2009 (UTC)
Nbauman I think that your concerns are valid as to how those things are to be determined, so perhaps (c) needs rewriting or more fleshing out, but I don't think I agree with your application of those two policies. WP:RS would not be violated because this isn't changing the facts or references presented in the article. And similarly WP:OR prohibits the presentation of original research as encyclopedia content; it doesn't prohibit editors from doing research and learning or thinking about article subjects. (Though I would say that this is a matter of providing guidelines for good editorial decision-making anyways, rather than anything that would qualify as research, original or otherwise.) --❨Ṩtruthious ℬandersnatch❩ 21:55, 28 January 2009 (UTC)
Nbauman: Very few people care whether Einstein was Jewish. The fascination for many readers is what Einstein believed. The "Religious views" section in Einstein's article doesn't even mention "Jew" or "Judaism", except in one quote from Einstein.
Your comments would be valid if the infobox religion entry were labeled "Family religion". But most readers think that a "Religious stance" entry is an assertion about the personal beliefs of the scientist. That's why this field needs proper validation.
The proposed guidelines do not violate WP:RS or WP:OR. I'm asking that we quote reliable sources which comment on the religious stance of the scientist concerned. The source might say that X was raised as a Catholic, or that X attended a Catholic university, or that X had described their Catholic beliefs. No problem: just quote what the sources say. The guidelines concern when a single label about beliefs should be attached to the scientist. --Johnuniq (talk) 22:46, 28 January 2009 (UTC)
I believe that if the Who's Who biography, American Men and Women of Science, the Nobel biography, and/or the New York Times obituary say that Einstein is Jewish, then we should be able to say in the Infobox that Einstein is Jewish. Do you agree with that? Nbauman (talk) 23:08, 28 January 2009 (UTC)
Actually no, because it is not clear what the context is. Are they talking about his heritage, his ethnic background, or are they claiming he was a practising Jew? This biography of Einstein does not mention his religion at all. Given it is the official Nobel website I'm not sure what you are referring to. If you are referring to a form Einstein may have filled in for the Nobel committee in 1921 where he ticked the "Jewish" box under religion, we have numerous other statements from him where it is clear he is not a practising Jew, and where it is clear his religious philosophy is counter to Jewish doctrine. To pick one statement out of context and claim it is authoritative is clearly WP:OR. For editors to attempt to synthesise his various statements into a view of his religious stance is also WP:OR. All we can do is take authoritative biographies where his religion is discussed, and source these. Where there is conflict between these sources, WP:NPV requires we reflect those conflicts. --Michael Johnson (talk) 23:48, 28 January 2009 (UTC)
I agree with Michal Johnson on this one basically. That sort of criteria for determining an individual's religion should only be a complete last resort, if there isn't any other source at all anywhere besides the summary / infobox-like sections of those works.
The primary importance of those sort of sources in this context is that they demonstrate it is indeed encyclopedic in some situations to present religious biographic information in a summarizing section or sidebar like an infobox. But we aren't ceding to them the method or guidelines by which Wikipedia summarizes its own article content: that is something that Wikipedia ought to decide on its own, with internal guidelines like the one we're working on here. --❨Ṩtruthious ℬandersnatch❩ 23:10, 29 January 2009 (UTC)
That's an excellent point. Some Wikipedian articles may resemble American Men and Women of Science, but Wikipedia should develop its own policies for how biographical information is summarized, and does not need to accept labels chosen with some unknown criterion. --Johnuniq (talk) 07:44, 31 January 2009 (UTC)
Whilst I agree with Michael, may I suggest that Einstein-specific discussion is taken to the Einstein talk page? What we are trying to do here is hammer out the guidelines (a)-(f)...I would like to see you guys suggest modified wording if you see any problems. The fact is that "Jewish" is Einstein's ethnicity. It is not a religion. "Judaism" is a religion, not "Jewish." His real religious views are complex and therefore the "see article" tag in his infobox is a perfect solution in that case. He was not the kinda of guy you'd bump into at the local synagogue:-) Bletchley (talk) 00:48, 29 January 2009 (UTC)


On reflection, the best resolution might be to adopt Bletchley's excellent guideline. Naturally I can find some points I'm not entirely happy with, but it's livable. Following are two suggested changes. The first is a minor expression tweak, and the second attempts to handle Struthious Bandersnatch's point about conflicting sources.

(a) Change text "... other factors, example: Gregor Mendel who was a monk" to "... other factors, for example, as with Gregor Mendel who was a monk".

(c) Change end of first sentence "... belief system" to "... belief system, or where reliable sources give conflicting accounts of the religious stance of a particular scientist".

As per Bletchley's suggestion, let's use this section to discuss the above guidelines. Any comments on the text? Would you support or oppose the inclusion of the guidelines into the template doc? --Johnuniq (talk) 07:46, 31 January 2009 (UTC)

Support with small change Support for the reasons discussed above, with the additional small change of "monk" to "Catholic monk" to avoid Western-o-centrism.  ;^) --❨Ṩtruthious ℬandersnatch❩ 10:12, 31 January 2009 (UTC)
Support with small change All suggested changes so far are reasonable. Supported. TorontoFever (talk) 05:01, 1 February 2009 (UTC)

Do we have some sort of consensus here? --Michael Johnson (talk) 23:20, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

Support with changes as above; we need this same attention to detailed verifiability on all infoboxes and also on religious and ethnic categories, which are frequently abused too. --John (talk) 02:39, 5 February 2009 (UTC)
Support if you eliminate (c). Otherwise Object. I believe that (c) "where a scientist espouses a non-standard or highly complex belief system" violates WP:NPOV. You could call any belief system "highly complex," and therefore you could eliminate any reference to religion in all infoboxes. I believe it should be enough to have a WP:RS identify the scientist's religion, and it should be enough to have a scientist self-identify in a religion. If for example Who's Who, American Men and Women of Science, and the Nobel Prize biography listed Einstein as Jewish, that should be sufficient for the infobox. If they don't, that should be sufficient to leave it out. If they conflict, the editors can discuss it, as is customary in WP. Nbauman (talk) 02:58, 5 February 2009 (UTC)
I just want to point out again that I think you're operating under a slight misunderstanding of WP:NPOV here: NPOV is a guideline about the content of encyclopedia articles, but we're talking about an internal Wikipedia policy here. A WP policy very definitely may contain a point of view and cannot violate WP:NPOV because it isn't an element of encyclopedia content. Some policies actually exist for the very purpose of indicating bias in favor of a point of view; for example WP:AGF promotes a bias in favor of the good faith of Wikipedia editors, rather than being neutral in the appraisal of anothers intentions. You probably mean to say that you want to avoid having an element of this policy that might have the potential to encourage articles presenting a point of view. --❨Ṩtruthious ℬandersnatch❩ 07:23, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

Also I'd like to remind Nbauman that "Jewish" is not a religion, it is an ethnicity. The religion is "Judaism" and Who's Who claims nothing of the kind for Einstein.11:07, 10 February 2009 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by TorontoFever (talk • contribs)

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