Craig Weiler and Rupert Sheldrake promoting conspiracy theories

[James Cunningham]

I have been following the debate, it's quite hilarious.

You can get a glimpse of the controversy on rationalwiki:

http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Rupert_Sheldrake#Skeptical_conspiracy

In June 2013, Sheldrake began endorsing the opinion of Spiritualist crank Robert McLuhan that a group called Guerrilla Skepticism on Wikipedia‎ were coordinating the actions of editors at the online encyclopedia to unfairly label subjects as pseudoscience and promote a skeptical point of view about psychic phenomena. He also came to believe they unfairly targeted his own Wikipedia biography article for special abuse. But despite the name "Guerrilla Skepticism", the edits actually being made by the group were rather tame and typically uncontroversial, such as improvements to biographies of high profile skeptical personalities like Carl Sagan or additions of criticism to balance fringe claims in articles like Chupacabra. And since Wikipedia policies actually require that pseudoscience and other fringe views be marginalized, the group's work was completely in sync with the encyclopedia's goals.

By October, Sheldrake's accusations had been making the rounds of internet forums populated by psychic and paranormal enthusiasts. Self-proclaimed "psychic healer" Craig Weiler published an incendiary blog post titled "The Wikipedia Battle for Rupert Sheldrake’s Biography". He wove a complex conspiracy theory that claimed Sheldrake's article was being unfairly edited to marginalize his ideas, not just by Gerbic's group, but by organized skeptics everywhere. Like McLuhan and Sheldrake before him, Weiler had not actually read Wikipedia's editorial policies. Encouraged by McLuhan and Weiler, Sheldrake endorsed the new conspiracy theory, posting a wacky rant titled "Wikipedia Under Threat". Gratified by Sheldrake's response, Weiler erupted with a series of blog posts that accused atheists and materialists of taking over Wikipedia. Weiler soon began posting his accusations of a skeptical conspiracy on the discussion page of Wikipedia's Rupert Sheldrake article.

The conspiracy theory spread quickly among the woo community. Other supporters, like Annalisa Ventola, a parapsychologist and Executive Director of the Parapsychological Association, and notorious internet troll Rome Viharo posting under the username Tumbleman appeared on the Sheldrake article's Talk page to accuse skeptics of conspiracy. After finally being nailed for sock puppetry and disruptive behavior on Wikipedia, Viharo (posting as Tumbleman) was indefinitely blocked from editing by the unanimous decision of five Wikipedia administrators.

An increasing number of crank sites, including (unsurprisingly) Deepak Chopra, have taken up the conspiracy narrative, alleging that a vast network of skeptics are controlling all of Wikipedia.

It's clear from the evidence that no militant group of skeptics have been editing Sheldrake's Wikipedia article.

Here's Jerry Coyne on the conspiracy theory:

Sheldrake continues his rant on his website, blaming the editing of his page on the “Guerilla Skeptics,” a group dedicated to policing dubious pseudoscientific claims and giving skeptics themselves decent Wikipedia pages. Sheldrake writes:

"The Guerrilla Skeptics are well trained, highly motivated, have an ideological agenda, and operate in teams, contrary to Wikipedia rules. The mastermind behind this organization is Susan Gerbik [sic]. She explains how her teams work in a training video. She now has over 90 guerrillas operating in 17 different languages. The teams are coordinated through secret Facebook pages. They check the credentials of new recruits to avoid infiltration. Their aim is to “control information”, and Ms Gerbik glories in the power that she and her warriors wield. They have already seized control of many Wikipedia pages, deleted entries on subjects they disapprove of, and boosted the biographies of atheists."

The “ideological agenda” here, though, is simply that false or unsupported claims not be presented as the truth. If that’s an agenda, I’m all for it.

But Sheldrake is dead wrong in his accusations. The person who did most of the woo-removing edits of Sheldrake’s page has posted an article decisively refuting the claim that there is a Guerrilla Skeptic “conspiracy” to debunk Sheldrake (the author says that he/she is not a member of this group, nor were they involved). Further, Tim Farley of Skeptical Software tools has investigated the edits thoroughly and confirmed that no Guerrilla Skeptics seem to have been involved. Finally, Farley checked with the GSoW boss, Ms. Gerbic, who denies involvement. Farley concludes:


". . . the central claim, that Guerrilla Skeptics are controlling Sheldrake’s bio, is demonstrably false. It is a classic conspiracy theory. I asked Susan Gerbic directly, and she confirmed that Sheldrake’s bio was not on their current project list. But you don’t need Susan’s word, just search for the name “Sheldrake” at the project blog and you find only a post about a related article, and no indication they had worked on Sheldrake’s bio. (Believe me, they’re not shy about showing off their work – it’s part of their outreach efforts).

Look in the editing history of the people actually editing Sheldrake’s article, and you’ll find only cursory overlap with articles the guerrilla skeptics have bragged about editing."

So Sheldrake and Weiler et. al. are actually complaining about the wrong thing entirely! Instead of floating conspiracy theories about the Guerrilla Skeptics, they should be studying the Wikipedia rules and trying to understand why it is their edits keep getting rejected.

Sheldrake not only paints himself as a martyr again, but singles out the wrong group for “persecuting” him.

http://whyevolutionistrue.wordpress...oomeister-rupert-sheldrakes-galileo-syndrome/

Further reading:

http://whyevolutionistrue.wordpress...ving-equal-time-to-climate-change-denialists/

http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Rupert_Sheldrake

http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Craig_Weiler

https://skeptools.wordpress.com/2013/10/12/right-wrong-complaints-craigslist-sheldrake-wikipedia/

http://theness.com/neurologicablog/index.php/chopra-shoots-at-skepticism-and-misses/

BTW Craig Weiler and now Deepak Chopra are still promoting the conspiracy theory:

http://www.sfgate.com/opinion/chopra/article/The-Rise-and-Fall-of-Militant-Skepticism-4951613.php

 

[wardenclyffe]

I don't think Sheldrake and Weiler matter much, but if Deepak Chopra continues to participate in this debate, it might get a wider audience, which is good.

Ward

 

[James Cunningham]

I don't think Sheldrake and Weiler matter much, but if Deepak Chopra continues to participate in this debate, it might get a wider audience, which is good.

Ward

The whole thing already has quite a large audience. Sheldrake promoted the conspiracy theory in a live interview with a television reporter which obviously received 1000s of views. The problem is the conspiracy contains not an element of truth and has actually be refuted but Sheldrake and Weiler refuse to listen and are still promoting it as factual on blogs and forums. They should actually be apologising to Susan Gerbic for spreading misinformation about her but they won't.

Deepak has jumped on the conspiracy bandwagon... perhaps Dean Radin will be next. They are only embarrassing themselves

 

[wardenclyffe]

Yeah, it's a large audience, but it's just preaching to the choir on both sides. Chopra is an internationally known name who is 10 times more famous than the rest of them put together. He is the key to making this a better-known story.

Ward

 

[krelnik]

I've blogged on this controversy this week. (Again. Some of that text from Coyne above is actually quoted from my earlier blogs on this. I much appreciate the signal boost from Jerry, he has far more readers than I do.).

It turns out that if you simply look at the statistics of the editors involved, it is blatantly obvious that the pro-Sheldrake editors are woefully inexperienced on Wikipedia and spend the bulk of their time on there arguing with other editors rather than actually contributing. In contrast, the Guerrilla Skeptics (who have never touched the Sheldrake article) spend 87% of their time productively editing and only 13% in meta-discussion.

Craig Weiler in particular has written 13,000 words on this matter and held himself out as a brave battler of skeptics on Wikipedia, when in fact he's only made ONE edit on Wikipedia, that being a deletion of text.

You can read all the details at my Skeptools blog post titled "When you’re not here to create an encyclopedia, your Wikipedia statistics show it"