Responding to challenges in Wikipedia

Wikipedia editors of a class who regard themselves as guardians of orthodox science, or of orthodoxy in their particular field, have sometimes attacked the articles related to PCT, and this calls us to review them periodically.

One efficient way to check is to look at changes registered in the History page and look for discussion on the Talk page. (These are reached by tabs at the top of the article.) Even if you don’t feel up to responding to something questionable, you can call it to everyone’s attention by posting something about it here in this IAPCT Discourse category.

The Talk page for the Wonder Weeks article records a series of attacks and responses. It also illustrates that it can be effective to occupy the high moral ground by controlling at the Principle level, marshalling facts and explicitly rejecting the dubious social-media pleasures of taking and giving offense. The predominant Wikipedia principles are these three policies

If you adhere to these and appeal to them when challenged you can’t go wrong. They do limit what you can say in the article (not so much on the talk page)—but that’s the nature of an encyclopedia vs. discussion among its authors and editors.

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