Talk:Jordan Peterson/Archive1

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I've written an entry that is a full replacement of the Jordan B. Peterson article, while keeping a tiny selection of the original references and lightly treating some of the same subjects that were being referred to. My version is written and attempts to keep in-line with the RationalWiki:Mission. It provides numerous new references to articles in news, magazine, academic archives, etc. There are forward references and backward references, that is examples of people citing Peterson, and examples of Peterson citing others. The improved edition is here: User:Morgan9218/Jordan_B._Peterson. I have revised some of my own wording from a previous edition of this, and was advised by User:David_Gerard to use the Talk page first. So. heyo! here it is. Morgan9218 (talk) 05:28, 15 September 2017 (UTC)

Le WhiteWash. CR (talk) 16:26, 27 September 2017 (UTC)

Yes. We prefer bullshit & feathers. Criticize the guy, sure, but stupid criticism? e.g., "he misuses Jung...to support his whole Christian spiel." His use of Jung is consistent with Jung's writings as far as I can tell. Ariel31459 (talk) 13:57, 12 November 2017 (UTC)

The article needs more rationality and less stupidity

Someone is constantly abusing this article for spreading their own subjective stupidity i.e. personal agenda and opinion without any reference (both information and categories) about Peterson which does not belong on RationalWiki. Reading this Wikipedia for years, yet in recent period it is really becoming to hit a rot bottom.--78.0.122.110 (talk) 12:58, 17 November 2017 (UTC)

RW:SPOV. a ƽøȼɪаլ ^{յμʃтɪȼε шаѓѓɪøӷ} @ 14:17, 17 November 2017 (UTC)

@78.0.122.110 Feel free to provide some constructive criticism. It's hard to address concerns like this unless you say specifically what you have a problem with and why. CowHouse (talk) 15:03, 17 November 2017 (UTC)

@CowHouse being someone who is very rational and supposedly this Wikipedia was meant to promote rationality, unfortunately, it started to become Uncyclopedia. It is ridiculous and pathetic that certain things must be explained to "rational" editors:

"He also seems fairly egotistical, and there's a high level of intellectual poverty on his YouTube channel: he misuses Carl Jung and Friedrich Nietzsche's respective works to prop up his whole Christian spiel, even though Jung was an agnostic-leaning occultist, and you'd be hard-pressed to find someone in that time period (or ever) who hated religion more than Nietzsche. Peterson must know this, but his fan base doesn't, so they treat him as some sort of philosopher king." - some "rational" editor who is obviously egotistical himself, plays as a psychologist, and think he knows better to the point he decides to ridicule a Ph.D. professor and psychologist who worked in Harvard University, who has over 35 years in research, with scientific methods, that is "egotistical" has "intellectual poverty" and "misuses Carl Jung and Friedrich Nietzsche"? Are you joking, it has nothing to do with the scientific or snarky point of view.

"Cult leaders...Batshit crazy...Insufferable assholes...Internet kooks...Transphobia" - Peterson is not a cult leader, there is nothing crazy about him, he is not an asshole, a kook, or transphobic. It is unbelievable according to which criteria and argument he is categorized as such. Did I miss something all these years or RationalWiki has become a playground of the so-called SJW lunatics who go around placing posters in which Peterson is criticized exactly for opposite he is fighting or made research?

"Given that his objections to C-16 resonate with many people, including transphobic individuals, it is unsurprising that many of his fans are reactionaries. Such fans like and support Peterson for his opposition stance to the bill but also due to his view of IQ being a huge determiner of cognitive ability[9] (which the "race realist" reactionaries love to cite), his views on the psychological differences between men and women[10] (which the sexist reactionaries all love), sympathetic views towards conservative values,[11] being hugely anti-Marxist[12][13] (because it's not like any other system has caused mass death at all[14]) and for defending Christianity.[15][16][17]" - The references are misused or other are ignored for claims they do not support. Suddenly on RationalWiki is ridiculed influence of IQ or obvious biological differences between men and women and are deemed as somehow "racist" and "sexist", but since when RationalWiki became a platform of bullshit political correctness and identity politics?; conservative values although due to religion or traditionalism rather than political ideology as he does not identify and could not be considered as a conservative; as if being anti-Marxist he never stated anything against other totalitarian systems which is ridiculous because of the amount of his research on the topic as well often and deliberate criticism of Hitler and Nazism.

"He treats postmodernism as a serious problem facing academia. Peterson generally misrepresents postmodernism and misconstrues it to be a corrupting force rather than just a branch of philosophy. Despite being a "free speech advocate", Peterson seems confident enough that postmodernism is a threat to make a website targeting University of Toronto professors who teach "corrupted disciplines".[41] He's also repeatedly called for these programs to be ended, "the sooner the better."[42] Predictably, his cult-like, "free speech warrior" followers online have absolutely no problem with this." - How on RationalWiki can be defended postmodernism and its influence in academia, a philosophical ideology criticize rational thinking and support irrationality, which negates the existence of universal truth as it propagates multiple grand narratives, which resulted to the widespread identity politics and various bullshit studies which do not promote any kind of scientific thinking or methods? Instead, to be applauded for his idea that the academia should not be a "safe" and "identity" space with the indoctrination of ideological and irrational thinking, he is criticized and his "followers" are deemed as "cult-like". This is a total nonsense which has nothing to do with rationality. It is evidence that editors who edited or reverted this information ([1]) or 1) are not familiar enough with the topic, or 2) are editing with ideological agenda, or 3) are not rational enough themselves to the point they have no place at RationalWiki. It is a disgrace which offends common sense. --78.0.122.110 (talk) 16:44, 17 November 2017 (UTC)

I'd just like to inform you that we are a wiki, not "a Wikipedia." Wikipedia is a wiki and the start of the wiki craze, but it's not a generic term. a ƽøȼɪаլ ^{յμʃтɪȼε шаѓѓɪøӷ} @ 00:51, 18 November 2017 (UTC)

It has nothing to do with discussion nor the fact I use the term in such a way and context.--78.0.118.239 (talk) 08:18, 18 November 2017 (UTC)

So your response to this article is a poorly-written, unsourced, 5 paragraph long "NO U"? I get the feeling you're not very good at this... ;) 68.145.132.165 (talk) 18:16, 18 November 2017 (UTC)

"But I thought this was supposed to be RATIONALWiki!" Drink! (((Cat A. Lonia))) (talk) 09:52, 18 November 2017 (UTC)

Not a valid argument for another breach of stupidity.--78.0.112.185 (talk) 11:14, 18 November 2017 (UTC)

Edit War Thread

@Kazitor,@Nerd,@Cat A. Lonia Please discuss changes here. That IP is also welcome to discuss. Now if you'll excuse me, I'm off to do research for the Tulsi Gabbard rewrite. RoninMacbeth (talk) 17:14, 18 November 2017 (UTC)

(Edited) I'm not the one who locked the page or engaged in edit war. I only read and utilized the source @Cat A. Lonia provided in the lead section. Nerd (talk) 17:19, 18 November 2017 (UTC)

True, but you were one of the people contributing to the article around the time of protection. What's your take on the contributions? RoninMacbeth (talk) 20:04, 18 November 2017 (UTC)

Protection was me; the BoN kept removing a substantial portion of the article that seemed, to me, to be properly referenced and accurate. The BoN has stated several times that their removal of information is with regards to the talk page, but in the above thread I see no consensus reached over whether any material should be removed. —Kazitor, ^pending 20:35, 18 November 2017 (UTC)

@RoninMacbeth I thought it was a bit much so I reworked the material to make sure what we say is supported by the source provided. Nerd (talk) 01:28, 19 November 2017 (UTC)

/r/JordanPeterson is unhappy

But their responses have all the critical meat of a skeleton. Herr FuzzyKatzenPotato (talk/stalk) 23:04, 27 November 2017 (UTC)

Not relevant to the content of the article, nor Jordan Peterson made a comment, so your title "Jordan Peterson is unhappy" make your response to have "all the critical meat of a skeleton".--89.172.140.63 (talk) 11:03, 28 November 2017 (UTC)

Rename?

Proposition: Rename to "Jordan Peterson".

Evidence for: https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?q=jordan%20peterson,jordan%20b%20peterson,jordan%20brent%20peterson,jb%20peterson ("Jordan Peterson" >>> more searches than "Jordan B. Peterson")

Evidence against: https://www.google.com/search?q=jordan+peterson&pws=0 (at least we're in the top 20)

Thoughts? The FCP Foundation (talk/stalk) 23:14, 27 November 2017 (UTC)

I vote yay. GrammarCommie (talk) 23:30, 27 November 2017 (UTC)

Yes.--RationalP (talk) 04:46, 29 November 2017 (UTC)

Umberto Eco quote

Feel free to point out any exceptions, but aren't quotes featured on articles concerning living people usually by, or directed at, the person in the article? I don't believe the Umberto Eco quote is particularly relevant since it was not directed at Peterson. CowHouse (talk) 15:39, 4 December 2017 (UTC)

I agree. It might be worked into the text of the article with some reference to the academic reaction to Peterson's criticisms. "Ur-fascism" is not a commonly understood term. In fact, "fascism" is often misunderstood: George Orwell said that “as used, the word ‘Fascism’ is almost entirely meaningless.” He is not wrong.Ariel31459 (talk) 15:55, 4 December 2017 (UTC)

Similarly to what Mike Godwin has said, fascism is meaningless when used to describe whatever the speaker dislikes. It is not meaningless when used to describe people who make lists of "SJW professors" to be targeted for harassment by alt-right trolls, no matter how many fans on Reddit think otherwise. To compare Peterson to Chomsky is ridiculous. It's one thing to be skeptical of postmodernism, an entirely different thing to use postmodernism as a dog whistle for various right-wing conspiracy theories started by Hitler and dating back to the modernist era. Cat A. Lonia (talk) 16:11, 4 December 2017 (UTC)

It's also worth noting that George Orwell fought the Francoist regime and was perfectly OK with calling them fascists. Their opinions match those of Mussolini in exactly the same way that Peterson's does. It's very unfortunate that his words are appropriated so often by modern-day fascists. Cat A. Lonia (talk) 16:13, 4 December 2017 (UTC)

Nobody compared Peterson to Chomsky. Both men are highly critical of postmodernism in academia. That doesn't make them alike. Please do not revert facts because they conflict with your ideology.Ariel31459 (talk) 16:22, 4 December 2017 (UTC)

Someone did compare Peterson to Chomsky by literally referencing Chomsky in a Peterson article. However, nobody reverted edits because the edits conflicted with an ideology; I reverted the edits because the comparison being made was invalid. Cat A. Lonia (talk) 16:25, 4 December 2017 (UTC)

No I'm afraid you are wrong. When person A criticizes X, and person B criticizes X, this implies that both A and B are critics of X. It implies nothing definite about their respective criticisms or compares A and B beyond the fact that they are critics of X. Also, Peterson proposed a website, he did not create one.Ariel31459 (talk) 16:35, 4 December 2017 (UTC)

If putting Chomsky in the article isn't meant to compare him to Peterson then he is irrelevant to the article and I rightly removed him. The article is about Peterson, not Chomsky. Cat A. Lonia (talk) 15:23, 7 December 2017 (UTC)

Not only he is wrong, yet it is more than obvious that RationalWiki recently became infected by user accounts who do not have nor care about rationality, yet want to use this Wiki for their own identity politics, or spread of postmodernistic ideology, which was heavily criticized by Noam Chomsky, Richard Dawkins ([2]), Steven Pinker ("...our Enlightenment ideals. Those ideals, “products of human reason,” hinge on—well, reason, and science, the latter the “refining of reason to understand the world.” Against these are what Pinker characterizes as manifestations of delusional thinking, including religious faith and the “hermeneutic parsing of sacred texts,” the “suffocating political correctness” on campus, the “disaster of postmodernism” that has devastated humanistic thought, and the “identity-protective cognition” that has made political discourse so soul-killing..." or "Diagnoses of the malaise of the humanities rightly point to anti-intellectual trends in our culture and to the commercialization of our universities. But an honest appraisal would have to acknowledge that some of the damage is self-inflicted. The humanities have yet to recover from the disaster of postmodernism, with its defiant obscurantism, dogmatic relativism, and suffocating political correctness...") among others, yet here we are with ideological sock editors who write that such people, like Peterson, are perhaps "intimidated by postmodernist theories, possibly by finding them to be incomprehensible" (because they are most stupid irrational pseudo-intellectual garbage), or could be labelled as "Fascists". The whole section is a mess of cherry-picking (and lies for e.g. the reason Peterson put the controversial website on hiatus) in defense of postmodern bullshit. --RationalP (talk) 09:28, 7 December 2017 (UTC)

Consider thisAriel31459 (talk) 14:51, 12 December 2017 (UTC)

Lmfao. Cat A. Lonia (talk) 15:23, 7 December 2017 (UTC)

RationalP why not meet me in the gay bar? Davide Piffer sexy italian man in a thong (talk) 09:54, 7 December 2017 (UTC)

Admins should use a checkuser (if can), because someone's obviously making a bunch of sock accounts related to Davide Piffer.--RationalP (talk) 10:06, 7 December 2017 (UTC)

Very few of us actually have the ability to use checkuser, and those who do only use it in very extreme cases where it's absolutely required. This is not one of those cases. ΛίνΡ (ομιλία) (συνεισφορές) @ 14:51, 7 December 2017 (UTC)

Misogyny in opening

If we want to allege that, we have to do more than 1 reference to 1 article. We need quotes -- we need to show his misogyny, not just tell readers that he's misogynist. Mʀ. Wʜɪsᴋᴇʀs, Esϙᴜɪʀᴇ (talk/stalk) 00:35, 5 December 2017 (UTC)

After a quick search through the interwebs I found a grand total of zero misogynistic quotes from this guy, plenty of quotes implying racism and transphobia, but no misogyny. GrammarCommie (talk) 01:00, 5 December 2017 (UTC)

The article referenced made his misogyny explicit; I don't even know what is debatable here. He said he's powerless against female insanity. What on Earth is that if not misogyny? It's absurd you would even claim he isn't. Cat A. Lonia (talk) 15:23, 7 December 2017 (UTC)

It literally quotes him saying women are crazy. It's not someone else saying they think he might be a misogynist. It's him explicitly saying "Women are insane." Cat A. Lonia (talk) 15:24, 7 December 2017 (UTC)

@Cat A. Lonia In the article you cited, he does not equate being a woman with being crazy (Peterson concludes that “sane women” should “stand up against their crazy sisters.”) All the article proves is that he thinks there are crazy women, not that all women are crazy. This is flimsy evidence of misogyny. The "women are insane" (mis)quote you mentioned is nowhere in the article. CowHouse (talk) 15:46, 7 December 2017 (UTC)

Seems like he's devoting an unreasonable amount of time singling out "crazy women" for someone who's not a misogynist. Why doesn't he just say "crazy people" if he's not deliberately equating femininity with insanity? His nonsense about not being able to physically fight them is inexcusable within an academic context; it is also an implicit threat of violence. There is a reason he's going on a rant about female insanity. It's not because he thinks they're just as crazy as men; it's because he believes there is something explicitly, uniquely crazy about femininity. That's misogynist. Cat A. Lonia (talk) 16:06, 7 December 2017 (UTC)

He's not equating femininity with insanity since he acknowledges that there are both crazy women and sane women.

So when he points out that there is no implicit threat of violence, you interpret that as an implicit threat of violence? You seem to be interpreting his statements in the least charitable way possible. If someone talks about "crazy men" I don't automatically assume they think men are all crazy. The same assumption of good faith should be applied to Peterson's statement about women. Besides, he didn't say "crazy people" because he is specifically talking about the difference between talking to men and women that he believes are crazy.

He may very well be a misogynist, but you need much better evidence. CowHouse (talk) 16:40, 7 December 2017 (UTC)

Please explain what quotes you've found imply racism and transphobia? --Moobnert (talk) 22:28, 5 December 2017 (UTC)

Ideological people see and live in a fantastic reality where such quotes exist i.e. make them seem so according to their postmodern indoctrination.--RationalP (talk) 09:46, 7 December 2017 (UTC)

My reality is pretty fantastic, I'll give you that. Cat A. Lonia (talk) 15:25, 7 December 2017 (UTC)

Okily dokily, time to put the research part of my education to good use. The following represents December 2017 so far, and I believe it shows a bit of a pattern.

Claiming people are inadequate next to a patriarchal dead white man (his language): https://twitter.com/jordanbpeterson/status/940754665259585536

Dog whistling for the MRAs: https://twitter.com/jordanbpeterson/status/940671360212393984

Kinda hard to link to tweets he retweets, since that's less proven, but he's retweeted James Damore tweeting about the GoogleMemo. https://twitter.com/JamesADamore/status/933075513375186944

He also retweeted this little piece about how school and academia are biased against males: https://twitter.com/DMillardHaskell/status/938505287077715969

Tweeting out a story about how the real gender gap in academia is biased against men: https://twitter.com/jordanbpeterson/status/939976272578572288

Apparently the #MeToo campaign is a Warlock Hunt that is actually bad for women: https://twitter.com/jordanbpeterson/status/939849144381796352

Even his fans noted the sarcasm in how he worded this tweet linking to an article claiming that all these #MeToo women are just wanting to be victims: https://twitter.com/jordanbpeterson/status/938781162914439168

Not all men: https://twitter.com/jordanbpeterson/status/938538911965392897

A little hard to describe this one, but he implies that colleges will put people to death in the name of diversity if they criticize people protesting pro-choice groups. https://twitter.com/jordanbpeterson/status/938526717727080448

Gender diversity is a bad thing. https://twitter.com/jordanbpeterson/status/937904640997208064

-User:PsychoGecko 7:38 AM, 14 December 2017 (UTC)

Lindsay Shepherd censure section

Is this worth featuring in its full length? Our other sections are on his broad-scale views and activities -- this one is awfully specific. FuzzyCatPotato of the Fraudulent Hoses (talk/stalk) 06:21, 7 December 2017 (UTC)

Given its more detailed nature versus the broader position of the article in it's current state I would say yes. GrammarCommie (talk) 16:02, 7 December 2017 (UTC)

@GrammarCommie You used the wrong "it's/its". Normally I wouldn't point that out, but your username is "GrammarCommie" after all. CowHouse (talk) 16:43, 7 December 2017 (UTC)

Fixed it, though at least I didn't fall victim to Muphry's Law. GrammarCommie (talk) 17:41, 7 December 2017 (UTC)

@GrammarCommie "Given its more detailed nature versus the broader position of the article in it's current state I would say yes." CowHouse (talk) 03:02, 8 December 2017 (UTC)

Postmodernism?

"I don't think that facts are necessarily 'true', so I don't think that scientific fact, even if they are correct from within the domain that they were generated, I don't think that that necessarily makes them true. And I know that I'm gerrymandering the definition of 'truth', but I'm doing that on purpose, because I'm trying to nest truth within the Darwinian framework -- which I think is a moral framework -- and I think the logic of your argument about morality is going to push you in the same direction, inevitably." --Peterson, on "Waking Up with Sam Harris" episode 62, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1gdpyzwOOYY

Peterson describes himself as an epistemological pragmatist, and allows the truth value of claims to be "held hostage" to a moral context in which things which are useful to know/believe are held to be true, and things which will eventually lead to the destruction of humanity are false. To me, it sounds pretty damn postmodernist. I leave it to someone with better objectivity and writing skill to insert it in the article, if they wish. 98.111.140.174 (talk) 04:08, 23 January 2018 (UTC)

One problem that comes up involving discussions of postmodernism is some of us are not really certain what constitutes a postmodernist idea. If you are saying a statement sounds postmodernist, what criterion are you using?Ariel31459 (talk) 04:56, 23 January 2018 (UTC)

Miscellaneous Woo.

I plan to remove this section because the references seem to be ambiguous with respect to the strange claims being made. I think in the first case it is an example of free association gone wrong, assuming the double helix is some kind of archetype; and in the second case I think Peterson was referring to all proofs of theorems about God (e.g. Spinoza's Ethics), not all mathematical proofs, but didn't make that clear.Ariel31459 (talk) 23:08, 23 January 2018 (UTC)

That's exactly the problem: Peterson's lectures often rely on free association between mythological concepts without evidential support and the use of pseudoscientific Jungian archetypes. I started with the examples I did because they were particularly egregious, but I plan to expand it with more examples when I have time. For now I have added a section at the beginning for clarification.--Mrtonysinclair (talk) 01:22, 24 January 2018 (UTC)

I think you may be making an unfounded assumption, that a psychologist's clinical hypothesis is supposed to be completely scientific. How do you think religious people can receive therapy? By telling them their beliefs are bullshit? Much of clinical theory is more art than science. One thing you can't claim about Jung is that his practice was unsuccessful. Therapy works in the interest of the patient. Epistemological status of the technique is secondary. Although it is always better to understand why a particular therapy works, the fact that it works, or doesn't work, is paramount. So, I don't find your section compelling. The quote about mathematics is certainly misleading. He is not saying mathematical proofs depend on god's existence. That would be stupid. For interpretations of this koan-like tweet look here. I still plan to remove it, but others may want to have a say.Ariel31459 (talk) 01:43, 24 January 2018 (UTC)

Rationalwiki's official stated purposes include "Analyzing and refuting pseudoscience" and "Documenting the full range of crank ideas", and to those ends Jungian psychology has already been listed as an outdated and pseudoscientific school of psychology. I have no doubt that some people have found Jungian psychology to be helpful in their lives, just as some people find religion to be helpful in their lives. Nonetheless, what distinguishes a field as pseudoscience is its lack of rigorous methodology and standards of evidence, not its ability to occasionally get results. Seeing as the current article on Jung is light on details, it's probably a good idea to expand it to explain why it's pseudoscience and why modern psychologists consider it to be outdated. Nonetheless, I think it is worth pointing out that Jungian psychology *is* pseudoscience and does not adhere to the evidential standards of modern psychology --even if some people find it helpful. With regards to the tweet about proof, I think the fans on Peterson's subreddit are unduly giving him the benefit of the doubt on a dumb statement (which Peterson had the good sense to delete). But, seeing as some people think it's ambiguous I'll remove it until I can find more evidence of what Peterson intended.Mrtonysinclair (talk) 10:01, 24 January 2018 (UTC)

I have removed your criticisms of Peterson that are essentially criticisms of Jung. You can make them on the Jung page if you want to do so.Ariel31459 (talk) 14:13, 24 January 2018 (UTC)

The section you removed was not a criticism of Jung, because (as far as I know) Jung himself did not make the connection between DNA and snake motifs. As mentioned in the source video, Peterson's opinion regarding the connection between DNA and snake motifs was inspired by The Cosmic Serpent: DNA and the Origins of Knowledge by Jeremy Narby (he did not mention the author's name in the video), rather than Jung directly. I admit my line about the collective unconscious in that section was a bit imprecise, as Peterson's ideas here are only tangentially related to Jung's concept of the collective unconscious, so I'll edit it to make it clear that the idea did not originate with Jung himself.Mrtonysinclair (talk) 04:58, 25 January 2018 (UTC)

This article is a joke

@Ariel31459 has brought this article to my attention, claiming @Johnnyfog is being overly critical of Peterson.

I don’t know anything about Peterson other than that he appears to be right wing, and was recently interviewed by a channel 4 journalist who, according to his fans, made a complete fool of herself and had subsequently been harassed. However, quoted like “Peterson is doing the Dawkins Slide where you go from "respected public intellectual" to "old man yelling at cloud", but he began at "yelling at cloud", so we have no idea where he's going. It's not pretty, though.” and “You should give his book Maps of Meaning a try. The narcissism, Cold War paranoia, and hypocrisy w/r/t "postmodernism" have been in effect since the '90s. Everything he says is tailor-made for right wingers in a weird way. If he doesn't outright say it, he'll dog-whistle it. Everything from bashing "beta males" to praising Trump's high IQ.[26][27] He thinks raging against safe spaces is anti-fascist; the left is fascist; and women are born to be the irrational chaos into which men can dip their toe and feel alive again.[28]” are childish. I’ll be removing the paragraphs I mentioned and several others if no one objects or does it first. Christopher (talk) 16:08, 25 January 2018 (UTC)

Please don't edit the article if you don't know anything about Peterson. Why not research him, reading both pro and anti opinions, and then propose some changes? --Gospatric (talk) 17:45, 25 January 2018 (UTC)

Also please don't put quotations that contain double quotation marks inside double quotation marks: it makes it very hard to know what you're talking about. HTML has a blockquote tag you can use, and RW has a wide variety of quote templates, or just alternate single and double quotes like they teach in school. --Gospatric (talk) 17:47, 25 January 2018 (UTC)

I think Johnnfog's addition needs an edit (perhaps even a re-write) to make it more organized and to remove redundancies and fluff (like the "yelling at cloud" part). I don't think it's a good idea to put the stuff about e.g.Solzhenitsyn under a "pseudoscience" header. That being said, I think most of the criticisms are basically warranted and @Johnnyfog compiled a pretty extensive list of references. If you don't know much about Peterson beyond the recent interview you might want to look into them before an outright removal.Mrtonysinclair (talk) 18:22, 25 January 2018 (UTC)

I agree, you might think the additions are childish if you knew nothing about Peterson and how childish his entire public image is (ignoring whatever his academic accomplishments are which I'm not qualified to comment on). Cat A. Lonia (talk) 20:21, 25 January 2018 (UTC)

The problem with what Gospatric is proposing is, there already was an article on Peterson and it was completely overhauled without discussion to the point where almost everything in the article involves severe contumely directed at Peterson. Even his daughter is called a crank because of some cookbook she published. So now, instead of working on new sectional improvements, section by section from a reasonably neutral article, we are asked to work on an inflammatory bunch of childish exaggeration. I for one am not optimistic about the project.Ariel31459 (talk) 18:52, 25 January 2018 (UTC)

RationalWiki is not supposed to be neutral. Feel free to correct factual inaccuracies where you find them - but if you object to the article because you think its tone is insulting you really don't understand what this site is about.Mrtonysinclair (talk) 20:05, 25 January 2018 (UTC)

The previous article only existed because you kept reverting every edit to it and no one could be bothered at the time to engage in a war of attrition with you. This one is much better. RationalWiki is not Wikipedia. Cat A. Lonia (talk) 20:28, 25 January 2018 (UTC)

I"m sorry that you feel that way. If you add facts with references I would not revert them.Ariel31459 (talk) 21:27, 25 January 2018 (UTC)

@Mrtonysinclair The article is replete with factual inaccuracies. Also, you registered yesterday. Don't get excited.Ariel31459 (talk) 21:27, 25 January 2018 (UTC)

@Ariel31459 With respect to this edit, my guess is degeneracy theory was supposed to be degeneration theory.

@Mrtonysinclair You are correct that RationalWiki is not neutral. However, I think Ariel's point is that it's easier to work from the starting point of a neutral article rather than, as Ariel puts it, a "bunch of childish exaggeration[s]".

In terms of improvements, here are my suggestions:

• The article needs a rewrite in certain sections where you can tell they were written at different times by different people (e.g. the C-16 section).
• This article is currently high on snark and low on substance (e.g. it’s doubtful he’s read any more than the Wikipedia page for anything he talks about ... You should give his book Maps of Meaning a try. The narcissism, Cold War paranoia, and hypocrisy with respect to "postmodernism" have been in effect since the '90s.). To reference FuzzyCatPotato's essay (which is not policy but a good guide), there is too much LACing and not enough TATing.

CowHouse (talk) 02:14, 26 January 2018 (UTC)

I have gone and reverted a number of Ariel's deletions that were based on spurious reasoning, sometimes with mild modifications, but the ones I did not revert should not be construed as agreeing with them; I don't have time. Others can go over them. Cat A. Lonia (talk) 06:28, 26 January 2018 (UTC)

I reverted all the edits, and will continue to do so if the editing continues to be so irrational. A bunch of leftists who don't like Peterson, who don't have any scientific knowledge and authority, gathered to misrepresent him or his work. Not to mention that much of information in the revision was redundant and out of scope, all over the place, you are giving him too much credit and notoriety. A shameful example of the culture war. RationalWiki is literally becoming infected with ideological polarization. Stop.--RationalP (talk) 19:42, 31 January 2018 (UTC)

@RationalP It's unhelpful and unproductive to call other editors a "bunch of leftists who don't like Peterson, who don't have any scientific knowledge and authority, gathered to misrepresent him or his work".

If your edits are reverted, don't revert them back. Edit warring is a waste of everyone's time.

Rather than reverting, you should write a comment on the talk page justifying why the content should be removed. Also, your criticisms so far are vague and not persuasive. You should explain why specific parts of the article are flawed. CowHouse (talk) 04:47, 1 February 2018 (UTC)

"should explain why specific parts of the article are flawed" - you are joking, right? So let's say that somebody comes and edits the article (like these editors who made accounts a few days ago), it's obviously false and uncritical, or written in a style which is incoherent, instead to revert that (and they were constantly reverting their edits back), we should accept it, edit upon these mistakes, or fix their mistakes one-by-one? That's not being friendly, that's ignorant bullshit. The editor whose edit has been reverted should explain their edit here on talk page, not those who reverted them due to obvious reason.--RationalP (talk) 10:49, 1 February 2018 (UTC)

F* this bullshit, now will write you a wall of points with criticism.--RationalP (talk) 11:05, 1 February 2018 (UTC)

Here:

• "Conservatives consider him to be an oasis in the desert of academia" - the two references are not reliable, don't substantiate the claim, neither the claim is deserving of mention in the lead
• "anti-alt-right" - again completely unintentional to mention "alt-right", in whatever form, in the lead
• "Patreon ... pulling in 65k / month" - no reference
• "Pseudoscience..." - what pseudoscience, and according to whom?
• "went to Toronto ... serving up his postmodern version of Nietzsche, Jungian mythology, and Bible studies. Evidently postmodernism is acceptable as literary theory." - no source, opinion is pathetically wrong
• "He has pointed out that Nazism and Marxism filled the vacuum left by the West's "rejection of God" and that the Catholic Church provides the only bulwark against this descent into chaos" - wrong, the ideologies filled the vacuum left by the West's "rejection of God" i.e. nihilism which predicted Nietzsche, and religion should be embraced again to provide the bulwark against the nihilistic chaos.
• "What Peterson seems to be trying to do is to glue 'traditional values' on to Jungian archetypes, which is an odd one because it basically drops the veneer of scientism that these sort of attempts normally cloak themselves in (e.g. evo-psych just-so stories, statistically irrelevant IQ test results, and so on). Despite basing his entire philosophy in the beliefs of Carl Jung, a historical figure who presented unfalsifiable theories within the unfalsifiable discipline of psychoanalysis, he constantly derides postmodernism in a series of lectures presenting postmodernist interpretations of Christianity ... While Peterson presents himself as a defender of science and criticizes fields like sociology for poor methodology, Peterson himself is not above using unfalsifiable Jungian constructs such as mythical archetypes and the collective unconscious in his books and lectures. This Jungian approach to mythology, which holds that similarities in myths and narratives across cultures "strongly points to an underlying commonality of structure and purpose" sometimes leads him to draw unconventional conclusions and make connections that don't actually exist. This is ironic since actual scientists usually criticize postmodern critical theory for its continued reliance on antiquated and discredited schools of thought, like psychoanalysis, simply because they were considered relevant in the time of modernist critical theory." - these unsourced opinions are simply a nonsensical misrepresentation of scientific credibility of Peterson's and Jung's work, or psychology and intelligence research in general, with a complete misunderstanding of postmodernism and critical theory, basically giving them the same credibility as rational and empirical scientific research
• "Soviet Union..." - whole section taken out of context
• "Everything he says is tailor-made for right wingers, from bashing "beta males" to praising Trump's high IQ" - what about his criticism of the alt-right, tribalism, ethnonationalism? That doesn't exist because some ignoramus decided to edit the article depicting him as an alt-right activist?
• "He thinks raging against safe spaces is anti-fascist and women are born to be the irrational chaos into which men can dip their toe and feel alive again" - taken out of context to represent him as a sexist
• "Anti-postmodernism..." - pathetic misrepresenting and the whole explanation of Peterson's quote clearly point to the conclusion the editors were those who don't understand the topic and support postmodernism
• "He frequently compares "trans activists" with Chairman Mao (yes, that one) because they both believe group identity is paramount..." - taken out of context
• "Conspiracy theories..." - another slander section with intention to discredit his credibility, depict his followers as alt-right, i.e. polarize him and the ideas
• "Self-help..." - mocking programs which were made by academics to help students is alright? Really?
• "In his interview with fellow kook Paglia, he lets on that any time he's arguing with a man, he has it in the back of his mind that the guy might decide to slug him in the face, and he then generalizes this weird quirk, suggesting that all normal men have this fixation..." - what?
• "Meanwhile PragerU has a video out where they literally justify British colonialism." - what this has to do with Peterson's video, as well, the fact "colonialism" was mentioned it again proves these editors were those from postmodern studies.
• "Right-wing activists ... Woo-meisters" - that's it, the revision is nothing but a slander to misrepresent Peterson.--RationalP (talk) 11:34, 1 February 2018 (UTC)

Instead to be rational with criticism, if we allow such ideological editing we are intentionally supporting on RationalWiki dumb radical polarization and promotion of the current identity politics and culture war.--RationalP (talk) 11:42, 1 February 2018 (UTC)

Replaced Google scholar by Scopus

In the introduction I have replaced Peterson's articles/citations count and h-index by the one of Scopus because usually Google scholar inflates those number by double counting articles and citations and by considering articles which have not been peer-reviewed. Nevertheless, Peterson's academic work is still impressive. McLaghing (talk) 10:25, 26 January 2018 (UTC)

@McLaghing Reverted to Google Scholar. Can you give a review also on ResearchGate so we can find an intermediate solution?--RationalP (talk) 20:28, 31 January 2018 (UTC)

Wait, I gave an explanation why I replaced Google Scholar with Scopus. If you think I did wrong then explain why it is so, do not just revert anything back. McLaghing (talk) 10:22, 1 February 2018 (UTC)

These resources often don't have the same number of papers, citations, and as such h-index. According to whom (source) one should be excluded (Google Scholar), while others included? In comparison, on 1 February, on GS had circa 129 papers, 9205 citations, h-index 50; on ResearchGate circa 120 papers, 5790 citations, h-index ?; on Scopus had circa 91 papers, 4537 citations, h-index 38. Obviously none of them is complete, and there's no reason to not cite them all.--RationalP (talk) 12:14, 1 February 2018 (UTC)

"According to whom (source) one should be excluded (Google Scholar), while others included?" <- As I have written before, Google Scholar usually shows a higher articles/citations/h-index count because it double-counts papers and includes non-peer-review papers. This is the case because Google Scholar is an automatic system, to the extend that if you upload on the Internet your CV, citing all your papers, then Google Scholar counts it as an article of yours and it also increases your citations! That is why nobody uses Google Scholar as a metric to evaluate scientists (although often it is useful to find papers). If you want a sources check this. On the other hand, Scopus is not automatic but its entries are checked by professional people one by one, and it considers only papers published in reputable journals. McLaghing (talk) 16:38, 1 February 2018 (UTC)

A BoN weighs in =

Who wrote this article? It didn't get anything this person said. It's full of strawmans and plain ad hominem arguments, as most gender and feminism related articles I've read. Rational Wiki should be renamed "Postmodern-disguised-as-rational Wiki" or "Rational (only against right-wingers) Left".^{— Unsigned, by: 200.59.144.84 / talk / contribs}

"But I thought this was supposed to be RATIONALWiki!" Drink! (ƨɛɪᴙᴛᴎoɔ) (ʞɹᴀᴛ) ɒnippiɿqƧ @ 14:43, 26 January 2018 (UTC)

Add

https://mobile.twitter.com/classiclib3ral/status/956835897487618048

32℉uzzy; 0℃atPotato (talk/stalk) 04:31, 30 January 2018 (UTC)

@FuzzyCatPotato Is there a link to what you actually want to add commentary upon?Ariel31459 (talk) 14:27, 30 January 2018 (UTC)