Talk:Jeremy Griffith/Archive 3

Archive 1

Archive 2

Archive 3

Proposed new text

I'd like to ask for consensus for the following text to replace the second paragraph that appears under The World Transformation Movement. I make some comments after the text.

In 1995, Griffith, Macartney-Snape and the Foundation for Humanity’s Adulthood (the World Transformation Movement's name at the time) were the subject of an Australian Broadcasting Corporation Four Corners program. The program became the subject of actions by Griffith and Macartney-Snape in the Supreme Court of New South Wales. With regards to Griffith's action, the Court gave a verdict for the defendants. Griffith appealed to the Supreme Court of New South Wales - Court of Appeal, which dismissed the appeal.

Comments: The most basic information a reader would expect about a Court case is whether a lawsuit or appeal was successful or not. This should appear clearly. Technical words should be avoided (such as qualified privilege), as should words that have a common meaning and a different legal meaning (such as defamatory, justification, malice). Analysis of the decision is WP:OR and prohibited, unless the analysis appears in a reliable secondary source — the analysis Cabrils and I have been making have no place.

It's unfortunate that the sources are so limited. For the NSWSC, the secondary sources are merely summaries, with no explanation. The only exception is the Herald article, which isn't very helpful, but since it's the only source that attempts an explanation, it should be mentioned. For the NSWCA decision, the only secondary sources are summaries. Most of the secondary sources are behind pay-walls, so I've referred also to the free primary sources.

Quadrant is an unreliable source, as has been mentioned several times. Briane from Chilliwack (talk) 01:02, 2 May 2022 (UTC)

For the following reasons I disagree:

1. Your personal agenda

Your actions over the last month show that you are pursuing a personal agenda in a manner which is not consistent with Wikipedia neutrality: WP:NPOV, WP:BLP, WP:TE etc. As noted above, for some reason you seem to be on a personal crusade. Your bias in wanting to disregard the RSs and impose your preferred personal interpretation of the cases on the page has been obvious from the beginning of your edits, which began using an IP account, prior to creating your named account, both accounts being essentially WP:SPA. Your suggested wording further evidences your bias.

Your “Comments” also reveal bias in that they assert, without reference to any Wikipedia policies, what “a reader would expect” and what words “should be avoided” in order to justify the omission of relevant material that is reported in RSs. The current description on the main page is not misleading or overly technical and it accurately reflects the RSs. Your description of the RSs is inaccurate (for example “the only secondary sources are summaries” is untrue and irrelevant).

2. Your proposed wording improperly omits that the Court of Appeal found the ABC’s defamatory allegation about Griffith was not true

The proposed wording removes from the existing page the fact that the Court of Appeal found that the ABC’s defamatory allegation about Griffith was not justified (not true), which is a highly relevant factual matter referred to in two RSs as well as the judgment which is WP:PRIMARY.

Evidence of your bias was noted in the discussion above. You said yourself on 31 March 2022: “The basic issue was whether it was true that “Jeremy Griffith, who holds himself out as a scientist, publishes work of such a poor standard that it has no support at all from the scientific community.” ” On the same day, you again acknowledged how important and relevant the truth or falsity of an allegation is when you said “truth is the best defence of all”. Revealingly, at that time when you acknowledged this self-evident fact, you mistakenly thought that the Court had upheld the defence of truth when you said “The Courts concluded that this was true”.

It was only once it was pointed out to you that Griffith actually won on truth that you did a complete about face and then adopted the position that the defence of truth was not relevant.

The page should – and in fact is required to – reflect what is in the RSs: WP:V.

3. Quadrant article is RS and appropriate in this specific instance

One RS is an article in Quadrant Magazine that reported that the Court of Appeal found that the defamatory allegation about Griffith was not true. As is noted several times in the discussion above, the reliability of Quadrant as a source generally is discussed at: Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard/Archive_269#RfC:_Quadrant_Magazine, which concluded "Quadrant Magazine is considered generally unreliable for factual reporting by this community. As such, any use of it should be avoided wherever possible". Please note the specific terminology: "generally unreliable...should be avoided wherever possible" (emphasis added). It did not state “in every single case and circumstance” but rather “wherever possible”. WP:CONTEXTMATTERS was a point also made by some in that discussion.

In this instance, the source is used to support five factual statements on the page: that Griffith was the subject of an ABC TV Four Corners program; that Griffith sued the ABC; that he was not awarded damages; that he appealed to the NSW Court of Appeal; and that the Court of Appeal upheld the lower Court’s defence of comment, but overturned the lower court ruling regarding the ABC’s defence of truth, finding that what was said of Griffith was untrue. Each of those factual statements by the article’s author are accurate and can be verified in the primary source. They are not the author’s opinions. While the author does go on to analyse and express his opinions about the judgments and the ABC’s conduct, none of that material is referred to or relied upon. The author is Geoffrey Luck, a respected Australian journalist who worked for the ABC for 26 years.

Importantly, there is also the report in the Australian Defamation Law and Practice Bulletin – March 2011, which is an impeccable RS, which says the same thing as the Quadrant article: “The Court set aside the justification finding.”

4. Your proposed wording improperly omits Macartney-Snape won and was awarded $1 million

The proposed wording omits any reference to Tim Macartney-Snape winning his part of that same case Griffith was involved in and being awarded $1 million. The ABC alleged that Macartney-Snape used speaking appearances at schools to promote the Foundation (an organisation founded by Griffith), which was described as a cult, so the ruling in favour of Macartney-Snape is relevant to Griffith and it reflects on the substance, or lack thereof, of the program. The outcome of that part of the case was reported in numerous RSs.

5. Your proposed wording improperly omits Sydney Morning Herald case and that Herald apologised

The proposed new wording omits any reference to the defamation action against the Sydney Morning Herald, (which stemmed from a full-page article authored by the same journalist who produced the ABC program and featured Griffith and Macartney-Snape) which was resolved when the Sydney Morning Herald published an apology.

Summary

Your proposed wording would deliberately omit a whole range of relevant material set out in numerous RSs, including that the defamatory allegation about Griffith was not true (which you acknowledged is the basic issue); that Macartney-Snape won and was awarded $1 million; and that the Sydney Morning Herald apologised for publishing defamatory material. In addition to your previous conduct, your proposed wording shows you are attempting to impose your personal interpretation of the cases, ignoring the RSs and disregarding the requirements set out in WP:SPA, WP:NPOV, WP:TE and WP:BLP. Cabrils (talk) 10:32, 2 May 2022 (UTC)

I only think it necessary to reply about Macartney-Snape's lawsuit.

The article is about Griffith, not Macartney-Snape. It's true that both sued the ABC together, but the basis of the suits were quite different: in Griffith's case, that his work was of poor quality; in Macartney-Snape's case, that he deceived schools and abused his position of influence (see the Herald article). Whether or not Macartney-Snape's deceived schools is irrelevant to the quality of Griffith's work.

I think that the text I wrote strikes a reasonable balance, but I'm not opposed to saying more about Macartney-Snape's lawsuit, or saying nothing at all about it. Briane from Chilliwack (talk) 17:59, 2 May 2022 (UTC)

Macartney-Snape is a highly notable Australian and his support of Griffith, including in the defamation actions, is entirely relevant and reported in numerous RSs over many years. Specifically, it is self-evident that the defamatory allegations against Macartney-Snape directly concerned Griffith: it was alleged that Macartney-Snape’s deception was to “promote Griffith” and “recruit for Griffith”. Thus, that Macartney-Snape was found by the court NOT to be deceiving schools or abusing his position of influence to inappropriately promote Griffith and his ideas, is axiomatically relevant to Griffith. There is no plausible reason to exclude Macartney-Snape’s successful result in the case with Griffith, and good reason to include it: WP:NOTPAPER.

I would note again that your proposed wording to omit Macartney-Snape, as well as the Sydney Morning Herald apology, and most significantly the Court of Appeal’s finding that the ABC’s defamatory allegation about Griffith was not true -- all highly relevant matters reported in RSs -- shows your clear bias. Cabrils (talk) 04:34, 3 May 2022 (UTC)

The current version omits this piece of information that I'm sure readers would be interested to know: that all 3 judges agreed "that the appellant’s work had no support at all from the scientific community" Netanyahuserious (talk) 08:29, 4 May 2022 (UTC)

Sorry that last post wasn't really relative to the thread. I agree with the proposed new text as it is a vast improvement over the current legal gibberish (thanks Bob). Netanyahuserious (talk) 09:01, 4 May 2022 (UTC)

The existing wording seems fine to me and is supported by reliable sources. Truth, comment and privilege are the main defences in defamation lawsuits. I don’t see how the proposed new text possibly meets WP:NPOV. You can’t just remove relevant material you don’t like. Spinifex&Sand (talk) 12:38, 4 May 2022 (UTC)

The Court of Appeal agreed with the trial judge that Griffith's work was "of a poor standard" (par. 62 of the decision) and that Griffith's work "had no support at all from the scientific community" (par. 85). It disagreed that "if the appellant’s [Griffith's] work had been of a materially better standard, it would have received some support from the scientific community" (par. 94). It dismissed the appeal (par. 149, 150 and 151).

I think that this is WP:OR, but if not, it can certainly be added. Briane from Chilliwack (talk) 13:39, 4 May 2022 (UTC)

Definitely WP:OR. You can't put up your own commentary using selective bits and pieces from a primary source. Spinifex&Sand (talk) 23:52, 4 May 2022 (UTC)

So I suggested just giving the result (allowed/dismissed) and leaving it at that. Briane from Chilliwack (talk) 01:24, 5 May 2022 (UTC)

I can't see any issue with what's there now. It's not a personal commentary, if that's what you're suggesting. It's all verified from decent secondary sources. Spinifex&Sand (talk) 02:39, 5 May 2022 (UTC)

As the article reads now it seems in lay terms that the abc program was justified in its allegations (case was dismissed) as well as unjustified (it was defamatory). Netanyahuserious (talk) 02:57, 5 May 2022 (UTC)

The critical issue (which Briane referred to as the “basic issue”) that people want to know in any defamation case is whether the defamatory allegation made about the plaintiff was true or not true. For example, if a media outlet says Joe Blow is a murderer, which is obviously an extremely defamatory allegation, what people ultimately want to know is whether Mr Blow was actually a murderer, or not. If Mr Blow sues and loses the case because the Court found that the publisher was entitled to a defence of comment or qualified privilege, that is very different to Mr Blow losing because the Court found he was in fact a murderer. The point is that a person who loses a defamation case can still vindicate his reputation if he wins on truth.

What the page says is pretty straight forward. The ABC made a defamatory allegation about Griffith. Griffith took the ABC to court and they defended the case. Ultimately, the ABC avoided liability because they established defences of comment and qualified privilege, but critically to Griffith they failed on truth. That is what both the RSs reported. Cabrils (talk) 06:24, 5 May 2022 (UTC)

If directly quoting from the judgment is OR (and I agree it is), surely a synthesis such as "the NSW Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal on the basis of qualified privilege and comment being upheld" is also OR.

But the bigger problem is that the text is incomprehensible to a general reader. What the heck does "qualified privilege" mean? Or "comment"? I'm sure the average reader will think: "Of course what the ABC said is a comment; why is this going to Court?" Briane from Chilliwack (talk) 03:36, 5 May 2022 (UTC)

If it comes from a secondary source it’s not WP:OR. The defences of truth, comment and qualified privilege are all referred to in this Sydney Morning Herald article and it doesn’t define them. That’s what the source says and given the SMH is "the most widely-read masthead in the country", most people obviously have an understanding of what those terms mean. I don’t see any issue in using them on Wikipedia. Spinifex&Sand (talk) 05:55, 5 May 2022 (UTC)

The Herald article is about the Supreme Court decision, not the Court of Appeal decision! The Herald is no reference at all for the Court of Appeal. Briane from Chilliwack (talk) 12:25, 5 May 2022 (UTC)

I was just using the SMH article to show how truth, comment and privilege are used in the general media without being defined. Spinifex&Sand (talk) 22:05, 5 May 2022 (UTC)

So do you agree that, for the Court of Appeal, the text should simply say that the appeal was dismissed, and leave it at that? Briane from Chilliwack (talk) 23:33, 5 May 2022 (UTC)

No, didn’t you read what I posted? The existing wording seems fine to me and is supported by reliable sources. The ruling that the allegation was not true has to be included to meet NPOV. You can’t just remove relevant material you don’t like. Spinifex&Sand (talk) 00:40, 6 May 2022 (UTC)

So I'm confused. Do you perhaps believe that Quadrant is a reliable source? Maybe I should have more clearly mentioned the 2019 consensus that Quadrant is "generally unreliable for factual reporting". See also WP:Reliable_sources/Perennial sources.

If there's any secondary source other than Quadrant saying that the Court of Appeal decided on the basis of qualified privilege and comment, and that it found that the defamatory allegation the ABC made about Griffith was not justified, then I don't see it. Briane from Chilliwack (talk) 01:43, 6 May 2022 (UTC)

Yes, I think Quadrant can be relied on here. There’s quite a bit of discussion about it above including reference to that 2019 discussion.

I can’t access the other source (Australian Defamation Law and Practice Bulletin) but you and Cabrils both say it says “The Court set aside the justification finding”. Spinifex&Sand (talk) 04:13, 6 May 2022 (UTC)

This is the report from the Australian Defamation Law and Practice Bulletin - March 2011: https://imgur.com/a/Y5T1qiN. Cabrils (talk) 04:27, 6 May 2022 (UTC)

Surely that's WP:COPYVIO. Briane from Chilliwack (talk) 04:54, 6 May 2022 (UTC)

Posting a link on a Talk page to a small portion of a publication for these purposes is permissible under fair use/fair dealing. Cabrils (talk) 07:36, 6 May 2022 (UTC)

Wikipedia is replete with pages containing various levels of technical information (like complex surgery, engineering, chemistry, quantum physics etc) and it’s up to readers to inform themselves of things that they don’t know about. An accurate summary of the relevant matters is appropriate and in the case of biographies of living persons, is required: WP:BLP. Cabrils (talk) 06:30, 5 May 2022 (UTC)

It certainly would be WP:OR and would also breach WP:NPOV and WP:BLP at least. At the risk of repetition, as I stated above:

For starters, by selectively focusing only on two sub-elements of the defamatory allegation and completely ignoring what the thrust or sting of the defamatory allegation actually was and the crux part of what the Court of Appeal judgment actually said (see in particular paragraphs 20, 50-51 and 86 to 95), you are misrepresenting the decision.

When the Court of Appeal says at paragraph 94 “Given the disadvantages referred to in par [88] above, I would not be satisfied that, if the appellant’s work had been of a materially better standard, it would have received some support from the scientific community; or that the lack of any support from the scientific community demonstrated that the work was of a poor standard”, the Court was acknowledging that any lack of support for Griffith’s work was likely to have been caused by the pre-existing “disadvantages” he faced such as those referred to in paragraphs 20, 88, 89, 90 and 91 of the judgment, rather than by the standard of his work. In its proper context, paragraph 94 reflects the finding in Griffith’s favour.

It’s obvious to any fair minded reader of the judgment that the Court of Appeal thought that the reasoning of the ABC and of the trial judge on the issue of truth was fundamentally wrong, which is why his decision was overturned.

I realise what I’ve restated above is all OR too, but your deliberate misrepresentation of the judgment shouldn’t go uncorrected. For example, in the part you quoted from paragraph 94 of the judgment, you’ve implied that it was Griffith’s argument that the Court disagreed with, when it was actually the ABC’s argument the Court rejected. The ABC tried to prove, but couldn’t, that any lack of support for Griffith work at the time was caused by the standard of his work. What the Court said was that it was likely caused by the various “disadvantages” he faced. So it’s extremely misleading how you’re trying to spin paragraph 94.

It’s obvious you are attempting to create a biased article that suits your personal interpretation of the cases by proposing to remove all the content that shows that the media publications were discredited, or when that doesn’t work for you, wanting to add your own spin by cherry picking elements from the judgment even though it is OR. All of which is in flagrant breach of Wikipedia's three core content policies. Cabrils (talk) 06:15, 5 May 2022 (UTC)

In all this, Cabrils’s Joe Blow example is compelling. Griffith won on truth, in the Joe Blow example he’s not a murderer. Leaving out the truth finding would not only be extremely unfair but incredibly defamatory. It would plain misrepresent what happened and what the RSs reported. WP:BLP is very clear that biographies of living persons need to be edited with particular care and a high degree of sensitivity. Where a public figure is accused of an allegation, their denial of it should be included (WP:BLPPUBLIC), so where a court finds an allegation is untrue it most definitely should be included: “Material that may adversely affect a person's reputation should be treated with special care; in many jurisdictions, repeating a defamatory claim is actionable, and there are additional protections for subjects who are not public figures”: WP:NPF. Schnitzelking (talk) 08:33, 6 May 2022 (UTC)

This discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
[Editors] actively "clean" edits that are based in fact Jeremy Griffith is a (BLP violation removed) and (Personal attack removed). Or how else would you explain that adding to the article, the fact - which is of encyclopedic value- that the animal he tried finding living specimen of, at the time was widely regarded as, and to this day still is regarded as, EXTINCT. Or the fact that edits correcting the false notion Griffith has "theories" for the correct fact he has "hypotheses", become reverted with no basis in Wikipedia standards. Or the fact that asking for a source BY WHOM for a dubious claim that seem to be in the ECONOMIC INTEREST of Griffith to be on this page, is labelled as "biased". It would indeed seem that a (Personal attack removed) is keeping this article under strict review. 85.226.142.134 (talk) 02:59, 21 November 2022 (UTC) The extinction status of the Tasmanian tiger is noted in the body of the article; it does not need restated in the intro. You may have a point about the motive for his founding the WTM. However, the egregious BLP violation that you also added with regard to climate change required the rollback of the edit and, frankly, called into question your motives. Your attacks in the message above do as well. —C.Fred (talk) 20:52, 21 November 2022 (UTC)

Word choice in the intro

He later became noted for his writings on the human condition and theories about human progress. ^{[emphasis added]}

The 85.226.* IP user has suggested changing this from "theories" to "hypotheses" to avoid the scientific denotations of what a theory is. Should we change it thusly? Should we go with "concepts" to finesse our way around that issue? —C.Fred (talk) 20:57, 21 November 2022 (UTC)

Probably worth noting that this article (already used on the page) refers to Griffith’s work as a “theory”, twice. —Schnitzelking (talk) 08:20, 22 November 2022 (UTC)

@Schnitzelking: Sounds like we should keep to what the RS say, then. —C.Fred (talk) 15:25, 22 November 2022 (UTC)

That makes sense to me Schnitzelking (talk) 20:15, 22 November 2022 (UTC)

there is the colloquial sense of theory which is largely coextensive with things like hunch or even prejudice. Yeah, I agree that in science we think of a theory as a coherent intermeshing of observations, axioms, and deductions/predictions, and that this tosh is, well, not so much... 2A01:CB0C:CD:D800:B1C5:1E95:9E6:61B9 (talk) 08:44, 19 January 2023 (UTC)

Peer reviewed publications

If anyone can find sources for any of his publications in scientific journals, or any peer reviewed publications, I'd appreciate it. Thanks! Cloudjpk (talk) 22:12, 10 February 2022 (UTC)

For clarity, this section has emerged from the discussion above regarding Cloudjpk’s desire to delete Griffith’s vocation as a “biologist”, so all that is said above is relevant. The definitions of biologist, scientist and independent scientist were reviewed, and I noted Cloudjpk’s overly-narrow interpretation of the scientist page, where he claimed elements including publishing peer reviewed articles were a requisite, and I noted that the scientist page was replete with important qualifying riders that he failed to include, which was a serious omission: “mostly”, “normally”, “some”, “often”, “usually”, “may”-- not “always”, “every time”, “all”, “always”, “must”.

The consensus above was to retain the description of Griffith as “biologist”, based in particular on the fact that he is described as a biologist in multiple IRSs, and has a degree in biology.

So regarding peer reviewed articles, the context of the above discussion is important, and for simplicity I’ll put here what I posted above:

Given Cloudjpk’s contention that a credible biologist needs to have published papers subjected to peer review, I might point out that in Professor Harry Prosen’s Introduction to Griffith’s book Freedom, he does summarise the danger of an overly-narrow interpretation of what a scientist is:

“Thomas Kuhn was certainly right when…he said that ‘revolutions are often initiated by an outsider—someone not locked into the current model, which hampers vision almost as much as blinders would’. Kuhn also recognized that ‘When a field is pre-paradigmatic (introduces a new paradigm, as Jeremy’s work does)…progress is made with books, not with journal papers’”.

Relevantly, Prosen goes on to quote Geoffrey Miller’s point that Darwin was “a lone genius, working from his country home without any official academic position”. Cabrils (talk) 04:21, 11 February 2022 (UTC)

It's an interesting quote and POV. If such an "independent scientist" has made a new significant discovery, wouldn't we expect other scientists to then verify it, build on it ? Like obviously happened with Darwin. Aesma (talk) 13:00, 9 August 2022 (UTC)

ha ha, those were different times. In reality, Darwin was as embedded and respected in the academic community of his time as one could be. 2A01:CB0C:CD:D800:B1C5:1E95:9E6:61B9 (talk) 08:46, 19 January 2023 (UTC)

but since Darwin was a man of leisure working from his mansion, I can see that the lay person would fall for this... I think it goes a long way to illustrate how Prosen operates/d. 2A01:CB0C:CD:D800:B1C5:1E95:9E6:61B9 (talk) 08:47, 19 January 2023 (UTC)

There is a much more mundane explanation for Kuhn's "books not papers" observation which is that the community, and especially handling editors and reviewers, have certain expectations about (and tolerance for) how much novelty is to be crammed into a single paper. 2A01:CB0C:CD:D800:30A1:F00A:F51:6ADE (talk) 09:07, 19 January 2023 (UTC)

Controversal content

I removed the content from this article that obviously violates WP:NOR and WP:UNDUE, and User:Divinecomedy666 (the author of the content added) undid my edits. After reviewing his/her contributions, I realized that he/she had done similar edits in 2011, which got my attention even more. Bbb23 advised me to get the discussion here without starting an editing war. --BiH (talk) 21:24, 18 April 2014 (UTC)

I vote that this whole article by tagged as violating WP:NOR and WP:UNDUE. It is not a neutral point-of-view and relies too much on Griffith's own words about himself. ProfGiles (talk) 13:56, 14 May 2014 (UTC)

I'm not much of a Wikipedia user, but I agree with ProfGiles. How can this be done? I've just been looking up various things about Griffith and the World Transformation Movement, which has been advertising heavily on sites I use at the moment, and it all seems pretty dodgy... — Preceding unsigned comment added by 89.100.158.3 (talk) 14:46, 21 June 2014 (UTC)

Yes, he is still at it, now appearing on YT ads. All of which seems to indicate that he has become the patsy (useful fool... something along such lines) of a bunch of rich people. It is the old fallacy of social darwinism, in that a biological explanation of how we came to be as we are can be parlayed into a justification for the rich getting richer. Quite apart from the merits of the explanation (and volumes can be written about this alone), it can never become a justification. That's a categorical error. 2A01:CB0C:CD:D800:30A1:F00A:F51:6ADE (talk) 09:11, 19 January 2023 (UTC)

Yes i agree — Preceding unsigned comment added by 213.233.155.189 (talk) 16:39, 2 January 2021 (UTC)