Talk:American Humanist Association

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sources not cited[edit]

I think some of the information on the page for the "American Humanist Association" is taken directly from their website without citing it.

Had to immensely clean up[edit]

Much of the content was in the 1st person, and was directly advocating the AHA. "We welcome", "such outstanding members include", etc.

How many members?[edit]

I would like to confirm a report that I had that there are 6,000 AHA members. Thanks. --Couttsie 10:00, 2 March 2006 (UTC) The AHA's membership is between 8000 and 9000. 71.232.81.141 17:38, 19 June 2007 (UTC)DAN[reply]

A request for verification from AHA[edit]

Following the example set by Dacoutts in verifying content on the International Humanist and Ethical Union and Amsterdam Declaration articles, I have sent a request to AHA to verify information to be included on this web page. I hope to receive a response to the following questions soon:

"Hello. I am an editor of Wikipedia, an online information resource, and I had some questions about your organization, the answers to which could help me verify the contents of some Wikipedia articles. Is AHA a religious organization, a secular one, or both? Do some of its members consider themselves to be religious Humanists? Do some of them consider themselves completely secular? Does AHA have a religious tax exemption? Your answers will help me greatly in improving Wikipedia by ensuring that the information it provides is as complete and accurate as possible. Thank you."

Bravo - this is excellent. I'm assuming that you accept that they are nonthesitic, given their acceptance of the IHEU Minimum statement on Humanism? --Couttsie 03:31, 3 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]
One note to clarify: RELIGIOUS HUMANISM is *still* non-theistic and does not incorporate the supernatural. In fact, its actual beliefs are identical to SECULAR Humanism. The only difference between these two branches is that the former prefers to think of Humanism as a *religion* and practice it as such, and the latter prefers to think of Humanism as a philosophical life-stance, and an ALTERNATIVE to religion. The difference is in mode of practice and style - but the positions on reality are the same. All modern practicing Humanist groups are non-theistic and naturalists. This is why the AHA goes with the IHEU's position that there is simply "Humanism" and drops all the adjectives. --Daniel 15:43, 3 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]


Wikipedia Guidelines Discussion[edit]

Um, I think this is really starting to veer toward WP:OR. On Talk:International_Humanist_and_Ethical_Union, I suggested that checking an orthographic convention with an organization might be ok, and as it does not affect the content of an article, and is a judgement call anyway, it may just avoid being OR. But only just.

The WP:OR page states: Original research that creates primary sources is not allowed. Querying an organization and getting an email back seems to me to be creating a primary source. However, the process is being used to verify facts not "propose ideas or arguments" so there may be a grey area. My first guess is that in contacting an organization, it is only appropriate to ask where one might look for answers to certain questions, perhaps in their own literature, or perhaps in press clippings they could point to. But overall, this whole concept of contacting the subject of an article seems a bit dodgy. I strongly suggest trying to find someone who has seen this issue come up before and finding out how it was resolved.
--Plover 04:50, 3 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

"I think this is really starting to veer toward [[WP:OR]" Surely not? All we are trying to do is get credible facts, and hopefully provide online citations to existing material.
"My first guess is that in contacting an organization, it is only appropriate to ask where one might look for answers to certain questions, perhaps in their own literature, or perhaps in press clippings they could point to." Exactly, which is what I thought Rohirok was doing. --Couttsie 05:13, 3 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]
One more point. Does Wikipedia object to the orgnaisation in question creating new material on their own website (as happened with the IHEU)? I doubt it. --Couttsie 05:17, 3 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Under the letter of WP:OR, it's fairly easy to argue that this is OR. However, this is not really the sort of problem the OR rule was really intended to solve, so there are arguments the other way. That's why I suggest finding out what's been done in the past. It might be fine. But if it isn't, there is probably a good reason why that's so.
It occurred to me that this may really fall under WP:V. I suggest looking at the section Verifiability, not truth:
A good way to look at the distinction between verifiability and truth is with the following example. Suppose you are writing a Wikipedia entry on a famous physicist's Theory X, which has been published in peer-reviewed journals and is therefore an appropriate subject for a Wikipedia article. However, in the course of writing the article, you contact the physicist and he tells you: "Actually, I now believe Theory X to be completely false." Even though you have this from the author himself, you cannot include the fact that he said it in your Wikipedia entry.
There's also the Reliable sources page, which says: We may not use primary sources whose information has not been made available by a credible publication. This would include emails from the organization.
--Plover 06:19, 3 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Now you're confusing me. Do you agree or disagree with the verifiability of the IHEU article? I thought (on the IHEU talk page) that you said that you agree. Here it sounds like you disagree. Plus, it was not just an email. You (much to Rohirok's delight) called into question my claim that the IHEU preference was for capitalization, by pointing out the lack of capitalization on their front page. They changed it, because I contacted them. Either of you could have done the same. That's not an email. We also have the endorsed statement on Humanist Identity. We also have the Amsterdam Declaration. Isn't that enough?
Why do we we need the IHEU email at all? Only because Rohirok continued to question the verfiability of the information, even after the website changed. What was being attacked in the end was not the verifiability of the IHEU article, but me. To protect my integrity, you are invited to ocntact the IHEU who have indicated that they are willing to back me up.
What is the point of all this legalistic wrangling, anyway? I thought the aim was to have true, neutral POV articles. That's what I was doing on the IHEU article, and that - I believe - is what Rohirok is trying to do here. Rather than add salt into the wound, why not just wait for Rohirok to get back to us? --Couttsie 06:48, 3 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]
We appear to be a doing a good job of confusing each other. My citations here concern what Rohirok is doing, which as I noted above, I don't really think is equivalent to what you did. At the IHEU page, I have gone over what I think your communication with IHEU does and doesn't prove, and why it wasn't necessary to convince me, at least, concerning use of capitalization on pages related to IHEU and its documents. It was not my intention to completely call into question their preference for capitalization, my point was that the preference wasn't strong enough to make the arguments from it that I saw you as making at the time. If you have more questions about this, it is probably better to put them on my talk page rather than here.
OK --Couttsie 23:39, 3 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]
According to WP:V, the aim is to have verifiable, neutral POV articles, and that the criterion really is verifiability rather than truth. While this fits with what I'd read before, it isn't how I was thinking about it. (I hadn't actually registered the distinction until I was writing my previous post here.) I was trying to not devolve to legalistic wrangling, which is why I suggested finding someone who had seen this problem before rather than just coming up arguments from the text of the guideline pages.
--Plover 07:28, 3 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Separate page for magazine[edit]

I don't understand why the (Humanist) magazine search is redirected to the AHA article. There should be a separate article for the magazine. I have seen many other instances (too numersous to mention) of other articles about an organization with a closely associated magazine and in all the other cases the magazine was given a separate article. But not in this instance. That's what I sometimes hate about Wikipedia when these arbitrary decisions are made by someone who thinks that there shouldn't be an article. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.177.156.116 (talk) 11:18, 24 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

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