Jump to content

Talk:Hubble's law

Page contents not supported in other languages.
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Former good articleHubble's law was one of the Natural sciences good articles, but it has been removed from the list. There are suggestions below for improving the article to meet the good article criteria. Once these issues have been addressed, the article can be renominated. Editors may also seek a reassessment of the decision if they believe there was a mistake.
Article milestones
DateProcessResult
January 22, 2006Good article nomineeListed
September 5, 2009Good article reassessmentDelisted
Current status: Delisted good article

Wirtz paragraph

[edit]

@AThinkingScientist added the following paragraph and I want to explain why I am taking it out.

  • Before Hubble, German astronomer Carl Wilhelm Wirtz had, in two publications dating 1922[1] and 1924 [2], already deduced with his own data that galaxies that appeared smaller and dimmer had larger redshifts and thus that more distant galaxies recede faster from the observer.

As written, the paragraph disputes the title of the article: how can it be Hubble's law if Wirtz discovered it? The claim may be 100% accurate but we have no way to verify this claim. The paragraph now has primary references (which are nice to have) but as explained in WP:PRIMARY such references are not adequate for controversial content. If this claim is "notable", that is important enough to be included in the encyclopedia, then there should be secondary references to back up the claim. See also WP:PSTS. To put it another way, wikipedia editors don't do historical analysis, we summarize historical analysis.

An addition issue is including the content directly in the lead is not correct.

The content needs to be in the body of the article.

References

  1. ^ Wirtz, C. W. (April 1922). "Einiges zur Statistik der Radialbewegungen von Spiralnebeln und Kugelsternhaufen". Astronomische Nachrichten. 215, Page 349 (AN Homepage) (17): 349–354. Bibcode:1922AN....215..349W. doi:10.1002/asna.19212151703.
  2. ^ Wirtz, C. W. (1924). "De Sitters Kosmologie und die Radialbewegungen der Spiralnebel". Astronomische Nachrichten. 222 (5306): 21–26. Bibcode:1924AN....222...21W. doi:10.1002/asna.19242220203.

Johnjbarton (talk) 15:47, 7 July 2024 (UTC)[]

Thank you Johnbarton. This can be placed into the body. It is true that the discovery of the expanding Universe was achieved by Wirtz, at a time when astronomers had not realised this to be possible. It is correct to document this properly. Hubble did not discover the expansion, although he contributed significantly to constrain it with improved data. Given the political turmoils of that time, the German contribution was "forgotten".
A secondary reference is by Prof. Dr. Immo Appenzeller, Sterne und Weltraum, November 2009, pages 44-52 ("Carl Wirtz und die Hubble Beziehung"), wherein the history and contribution by Wirtz are accounted for. Would this be acceptable as a secondary reference? Not many people have followed this up, precisely because this collides with the generally-held view that Hubble discovered the expansion.
(I am not German by the way and am merely aiming to have a correct historical record of this affair on Wikipedia.) AThinkingScientist (talk) 16:25, 7 July 2024 (UTC)[]
I tried to place this under "Slipher's observations with the secondary reference to Prof. Appenzeller's article.
=== Wirtz's observations ===
Before Hubble, German astronomer [[Carl Wilhelm Wirtz]] had, in two publications dating 1922 
<ref name="Wirtz-1922">{{Cite journal
  |last1=Wirtz |first1=C. W.
  |date       = April 1922
  |title      = Einiges zur Statistik der Radialbewegungen von Spiralnebeln und Kugelsternhaufen
  |journal    = Astronomische Nachrichten
  |volume     = 215; Page 349 (AN Homepage)
  |issue=17
 |pages=349–354
 |bibcode    = 1922AN....215..349W
  |doi        = 10.1002/asna.19212151703|url=https://zenodo.org/record/1424934
 }}</ref>
and 1924
<ref name="Wirtz-1924">{{cite journal
 |last1=Wirtz |first1=C. W.
 |year=1924
 |title=De Sitters Kosmologie und die Radialbewegungen der Spiralnebel
 |journal=[[Astronomische Nachrichten]]
 |volume=222|issue=5306|pages=21–26
 |bibcode=1924AN....222...21W
 |doi=10.1002/asna.19242220203}}</ref>, 
already deduced with his own data that galaxies that appeared smaller and dimmer had larger redshifts and thus that more distance galaxies recede faster from the observer 
<ref name="Appenzeller-2009"{{cite journal
 |last1=Appenzeller |first1=I.
 |year=2009
 |title=Carl Wirtz und die Hubble-Beziehung
 |journal=[[Sterne und Weltraum]]
 |volume=2009|issue=11|pages=44–52}}</ref>
.
But it gives an error message I cannot solve. It would be welcome if someone can help to import this properly. Wikipedia has a page on Sterne und Weltraum. AThinkingScientist (talk) 16:52, 7 July 2024 (UTC)[]
I think we need to do some more research. See This suggests the story is more complicated. Johnjbarton (talk) 17:25, 7 July 2024 (UTC)[]
Some more refs:
  • GLASS, I.S., 'EDWIN HUBBLE: JOURNEYING TO THE EDGE', Revolutionaries of the Cosmos: The Astro-Physicists (Oxford, 2008; online edn, Oxford Academic, 1 Jan. 2010), https://doi-org.wikipedialibrary.idm.oclc.org/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199550258.003.0009,
    • "Duerbeck and Seitter (2000) cynically remark that ‘Hubble was the last of the early cosmologists who believed that his result confirmed the de Sitter model’. While this is superficially true, Hubble's work was by far the most systematic, especially as to finding distances, so he was not just the last person to point out the result, but he had said the last word on the matter. Other investigators, such as de Sitter himself, Wirtz, Lundmark and Silberstein had been hinting that the high velocities of the galaxies were of cosmological origin. Hetherington (1986) suggests that Hubble's pre-eminence was a result of his legal training that made him adept at advocating his point of view in a highly convincing manner."
  • "Modern Cosmology in Retrospect",  ISBN:9780521372138 United Kingdom, Cambridge University Press, 1990. contains a chapter by Seitter and Duerbeck devoted to Wirtz's work. Also discusses Lundmark and others.
  • Kragh, H. (2014, November). Historical aspects of post-1850 cosmology. In AIP Conference Proceedings (Vol. 1632, No. 1, pp. 3-26). American Institute of Physics.
    • "With more and better data than previous workers in the field, Hubble showed that up to a distance of two megaparsecs (corresponding to a recessional velocity v ≅ 1,000 km/s) the redshifts or Doppler-velocities varied roughly linearly with the distances. In other words, he established as an empirical law that v = Hr, with H soon to be known as the Hubble constant."
    • "It is important to recognize that he did not interpret the redshifts or “apparent velocities” as Doppler shifts caused by the galaxies actually receding from the observer. Nor did he suggest that space is expanding, such as Lemaître had done. As he emphasized in a letter to de Sitter of 1931, he was content having demonstrated an empirical correlation."
Johnjbarton (talk) 16:37, 8 July 2024 (UTC)[]

With >150 references, most of them being journal articles and most of those being dozen-author articles, I was thinking it might be best for readability of the code to go with a list-defined reference as seen in places like List of largest stars and other journal-heavy articles. However, I know this can be potentially controversial so I thought I would bring it up before I spend the time to do so unilaterally. Primefac (talk) 18:52, 7 July 2024 (UTC)[]

Sorry I don't follow your suggestion. How about splitting the long list out and only having a summary here. Johnjbarton (talk) 21:44, 7 July 2024 (UTC)[]
Johnjbarton, see Template:Reflist § List-defined references. Instead of having each reference clogging up the body of the text, they're listed at the bottom as named references to make reading the wikitext a bit easier. Primefac (talk) 22:26, 7 July 2024 (UTC)[]
It seems like this can be done selectively? If yes, it is a clear win if the clog bothers you. Johnjbarton (talk) 22:52, 7 July 2024 (UTC)[]

Saw this ... https://www.science.org/content/article/space-telescope-data-reignite-debate-over-how-fast-universe-expanding-and-whether-new ... with links to this ... https://arxiv.org/abs/2408.06153 ... which suggests new insight for the Hubble Tension section; someone more understanding that I on this subject could probably do a better edit to the main article itself. (Apologies in advance if this isn't the correct format or forum) BlaineGond (talk) 03:28, 15 August 2024 (UTC)[]

This is definitely worth adding. I'll do it sometime in the future unless someone beats me to it (the text does not easily fit into the article right now). Banedon (talk) 08:48, 15 August 2024 (UTC)[]
We should wait until the paper is reviewed or cited by a significant number of other papers. The paper very carefully avoids claiming any resolution of the Hubble tension. The discussion concerns highly technical details of data analysis that are not easy to summarize without a secondary reference. Johnjbarton (talk) 14:59, 15 August 2024 (UTC)[]
Well it's easy enough to summarize: systematic effects appear to be the cause. Furthermore, the paper is making waves already among cosmologists (this is a field that widely relies on arXiv), and the paper is also likely to pass peer review substantially unchanged. I think we should add this directly. We don't say the tension is resolved, we say there is some indication that it is due to systematics. Banedon (talk) 08:37, 16 August 2024 (UTC)[]
How is your view of what makes waves or your judgement that the paper is likely to pass peer review relevant? Wikipedia relies on verifiable sources, not rumors posted to Talk pages. Why should we take @Banedon's word for it? Johnjbarton (talk) 15:00, 16 August 2024 (UTC)[]
Does this convince you? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OkGUoKukwk8 Banedon (talk) 22:59, 16 August 2024 (UTC)[]
I happen to think you are right. But if we include this pre-publication result on any basis short of the criteria given across wikipedia, WP:SOURCES, then how do we revert fringe additions and random news additions? These additions is how our article get clogged up with non-encyclopedic junk. Essentially the same kind of discussion regarding the "making waves" and "likely to pass peer review" can be launched for many new arXiv preprints. Johnjbarton (talk) 23:39, 16 August 2024 (UTC)[]
The argument here is that Cosmology Talks is run by an expert in Cosmology (Shaun Hotchkiss - [1]). So the fact that the paper is featured on that channel implies that it has already passed some level of peer review. As for how the same argument can be made for many new arXiv preprints - can you name some? One might name the OPERA faster-than-light results, but those still made waves, even if the "groundbreaking" result had been refuted before it was formally published. Banedon (talk) 06:44, 17 August 2024 (UTC)[]
WP:EXPERTSPS is solid ground for including this pre-print. Tercer (talk) 21:36, 17 August 2024 (UTC)[]
I strongly oppose adding the material, similar to the statements by Johnjbarton.
  1. Since anyone can post to youtube the accepted wikipedia view is that it is not a reputable source. I don't think we want to start into "well, this youtube is and this is not". Since youtube (the company) does not cross-check, such videos have to remain as unverified (but useful) sources.
  2. Why is there a rush? If it passes review and then there are 12-20 other preprints quoting it, then it is a fairly standard exception to WP:TOOSOON. However, it needs more than just passing review, it needs the community to commit (not just youtube) to that it is notable.Ldm1954 (talk) 16:14, 17 August 2024 (UTC)[]
I have a posted on physics and astronomy for comments.
Based on the feedback so far I reverted the addition. If the tide turns on feedback or citations arrive we can revisit. Johnjbarton (talk) 18:52, 17 August 2024 (UTC)[]
I'll echo the "Why the rush?" attitude shared above. If it really does make a splash, or waves, or whatever, then that will become obvious soon enough. XOR'easter (talk) 21:24, 17 August 2024 (UTC)[]
Depends on how you define "soon enough" I suppose. I wouldn't expect any new developments w.r.t this paper for months, since it involves new data (unless there's an OPERA-style retraction). Banedon (talk) 05:29, 18 August 2024 (UTC)[]
The news section in Science magazine can be considered a secondary source, and a well vetted one; that alone justifies the addition. That's specially so as it does not involve an extraordinary claim, requiring extraordinary evidence. All it's saying is systematic errors seem to be a likely reason for the Hubble tension. fgnievinski (talk) 02:17, 18 August 2024 (UTC)[]
FWIW, I made the edit, but I hadn't checked the talk page and I got pointed here by a friendly revert message (thanks, Johnjbarton). One important thing to note is that Wendy Freedman is a very well-known and respected expert on the subject of H0 measurements. Some preprints aren't worth the bits they're rendered with, but she's a Reliable Source on the subject even without additional peer review. (That's why I didn't hesitate to drop the result straight into the article.)
Per Johnjbarton above, I definitely agree that the conclusions need to be carefully phrased, and I tried to do that in my edit. The tension isn't resolved until the problem with Cepheids is identified; this study only suggests (pretty strongly) that there is a problem which will resolve the tension once found.
But given that we have a list of frustratingly inconclusive 21st century measurements wrestling with the tension, this is an important addition and deserves of a place there. We should limit our dispute to what conclusions to draw from the observed discrepancy between the three methods. Would people be happy with something like "this made measurements using three distance-ladder techniques, with two results consistent with the CMB value and the Cepheid-derived result consistent with other Cepheid-based measurements," and no statement about the implications? It's suggestive, and I'll link the news articles, but WP will refrain (I'll add a comment in the wikitext!) from drawing any inferences. 97.102.205.224 (talk) 21:48, 19 August 2024 (UTC)[]
First I want to thank everyone here for especially civil discussions. Second I want to restate the case in favor of an exception to our general approach to new preprints. As various posts here have clarified, my previous summary was incomplete and (accidentally) biased. Here is my new case:
I feel confident that making this exception will not create a precedent we will regret.
If I may summarize the main case against addition it is that "there's no rush", which is to say that an encyclopedia acts as a summary of knowledge, not a news publication. I agree, but this is also an online volunteer encyclopedia. As a practical matter we have limited attention and no real mechanism to come back in six months. Competent editor enthusiasm is perhaps our most important asset and I think the arguments in favor presented here are compelling.
@Ldm1954 @XOR'easter @Parejkoj: I have taken another look and changed my opinion: I think this is a reasonable exception to our normal practice. I hope you will reconsider as well. Johnjbarton (talk) 23:18, 19 August 2024 (UTC)[]
I support making an exception in this case, per the above. Renerpho (talk) 00:37, 21 August 2024 (UTC)[]
Wait/Oppose as before. I don't feel vehement about this, so will accept the consensus. That said, I remain of the opinion that there is no need to rush. For certain I am wary of exceptions, as that opens a massive can of worms. Which other YouTube channels are RS, which are not, and how is that determined? To be truly NPOV this should be posted to the reliable sources talk page for a wider concensus rather than being a physics decision IMO. Ldm1954 (talk) 02:11, 21 August 2024 (UTC)[]
I don't see why we need to involve WP:RS, and there's no "precedent" to be created. The rules for this haven't changed in a while. Whether a YouTube channel is a RS is clearly stated in WP:RSSELF: ... personal pages on social networking sites, tweets, and posts on Internet forums are all examples of self-published media. Self-published expert sources may be considered reliable when produced by an established expert on the subject matter ... It doesn't matter if it's YouTube, Twitter, or any other non-peer-reviewed source. What matters is whether the person who runs the channel is considered an expert. There's a reason why we have things like Template:Cite YouTube and Template:Cite Twitter. Renerpho (talk) 02:20, 21 August 2024 (UTC)[]
@Ldm1954: The question is whether a specific person (the question remains who exactly, since this may have to be discussed individually) qualifies as a subject matter expert. The last such discussion I was involved in was Talk:Barbara Blackburn (typist). This can get funny. Renerpho (talk) 02:28, 21 August 2024 (UTC)[]
@Johnjbarton, Ldm1954, and Renerpho: Well, I went ahead and added it to the article. Ldm1954, the rush is simply that it's interesting now, and editors are motivated now. I don't want to succumb to death by delay. It's not like we're giving it WP:UNDUE weight; it's not presented as divine revelation, just one entry in a long list of attempts to resolve the tension, and the list is presented primarily as evidence of the conflicts. 97.102.205.224 (talk) 05:54, 21 August 2024 (UTC)[]
@Renerpho @Ldm1954 In my opinion, the Youtube interview video is a minor aspect of this issue. It amounts to the opinion of one cosmologist. Strike it from the list in your mind. I mainly mentioned it to clarify that the video was not being used as a reliable reference. Johnjbarton (talk) 14:40, 21 August 2024 (UTC)[]

I've reverted the addition of material based on a preprint. Peer-review exists for a reason. Let the process happen. Once it clears peer-review, then we can include it. Being an expert does not mean you can't make mistakes in analysis. That's what peer-review is for. And even then it doesn't catch everything (e.g. BICEP2 results not taking cosmic dust into consideration, even thought their statistics confirmed things at the 7-sigma level). Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 06:14, 21 August 2024 (UTC)[]

I support your reversion. There was (is) no consensus as yet to add it, the inclusion by 97.102.205.224 was premature. Ldm1954 (talk) 07:51, 21 August 2024 (UTC)[]

FWIW, In an epic cosmology clash, rival scientists begin to find common ground is a useful WP:SECONDARY reference on these results, being written by a PhD physicist who solicited comments from additional cosmologists. 97.102.205.224 (talk) 11:10, 6 September 2024 (UTC)[]

That's just a newspiece, it doesn't help with reliability. It does support mentioning the result on notability grounds, though.
When the BICEP2 preprint came out it was mentioned in that article as a notable claim, and when the mistake was found that was added as well. I think that was indeed the best course of action. Tercer (talk) 12:17, 6 September 2024 (UTC)[]
@Tercer: To help me understand, I agree that it's a news piece, but could you clarify what you mean by the adjective "just"? There's a ridiculous amount of utterly uncritical "reporting" that's a cut and paste of a press release, and I've seen lots of science stories grossly mangled by uninformed journalists.
This article, however, does not seem to suffer from either flaw. The author contrasts the Freedman paper and a response from Riess and the SH0ES group, and canvasses additional uninvolved cosmologists. It's hardly a review paper or textbook on the subject, but this sort of synthesis and analysis is what makes a source secondary. Obviously, there's no additional information that's not already in the primary sources, but multiple subject matter experts taking them seriously argues for reliability on WP:USEBYOTHERS grounds. That is the point I was trying to make.
(The Riess paper is not only a response, but it does cite to and respond to the Freedman paper.)
97.102.205.224 (talk) 14:14, 6 September 2024 (UTC)[]
A newspiece is not a scholarly source. There is good and bad reporting, and this is a good one, but this is besides the point. Tercer (talk) 15:03, 6 September 2024 (UTC)[]
@Tercer: But it is precisely the point! That's just a newspiece, it doesn't help with reliability. It does support mentioning the result on notability grounds, though. Of course it helps with reliability. Science News is a reliable source, and it establishes the reliability of what's said in the news story. It has no bearing on the reliability of the scientific papers, but I don't think there could possibly be a secondary source that could do that, and I don't think we should be looking for one. The question is, do we include the debate about the new results in the article. And for that, notability is what we need. Renerpho (talk) 15:30, 6 September 2024 (UTC)[]
Why this insistence on the Freedman results, and not on the conflicting Lee results, which are based on the same data? We are not cutting edge researchers looking for implications based on suppositions and what ifs. We're a tertiary source, and we wait for research to clear review. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 16:38, 6 September 2024 (UTC)[]
@Renerpho: It has no bearing on the reliability of the scientific papers... er, why doesn't WP:USEBYOTHERS apply? We must be on guard against reporters fabricating a conflict by giving WP:UNDUE weight to a WP:FRINGE position, but... in this case? I already argued pretty vociferously above that Wendy Freedman, with a distinguished 30-year career as an expert on this exact subject, does not publish crap papers. In the ScienceNews article I pointed to, Emily Conover checks up on this by asking Saul Perlmutter (another distinguished subject-matter expert who won the 2011 Nobel prize in physics for measuring the § Acceleration of the expansion) who agrees that the possibility Freedman raises of systematic errors should be taken seriously. (The exact quote is it may suggest that we still have to get to the bottom of systematic uncertainties first before we get as concerned about a major problem with the cosmological model.) That sure seems to have some bearing on the reliability of the papers.
@Headbomb: You seem to be focusing on waiting for the truth to settle out of the debate and losing sight of WP:Verifiability, not truth. Of course there are conflicting results; that's the central point of the entire section! Waiting for the entire debate to be resolved would imply deleting the entire Hubble tension section, which is obviously stupid. Why ... not .. the conflicting Lee results: yes, cite to the entire pile of recent JWST-based measurement papers. It has long been known that the cosmic distance ladder is a technically very difficult measurement; that's why such results have larger error bars than the CMB measurements. But people have looked very hard for mistakes and haven't been able to find any, thus all the "new physics" excitement. Freedman's paper doesn't find any mistakes either, but it does points to an apparent problem in a specific part of the distance ladder, reigniting the "unrecognized systematic errors" argument that had been languishing for lack of evidence.
The goal of the proposed update is not to resolve the issue, but just to document the continuing scientific study of the subject. That seems a worthy goal for WP. 97.102.205.224 (talk) 00:35, 7 September 2024 (UTC)[]
And that can wait until the paper is published. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 05:09, 7 September 2024 (UTC)[]
We routinely add information based on news reporting, as that establishes notability and is a reliable source for the existence of the claim. Waiting for the underlying paper to be published would be a remarkable change in policy and, more importantly, a disservice to our readers. Tercer (talk) 09:49, 7 September 2024 (UTC)[]
I don't agree with the analogy between news reporting and preprints. A news report is citable evidence of a notable event. We vet the news report through the historical track record of the publisher. Quality new organizations have internal reviews by editors and typically have no relationship to the notable event. A preprint is a self-published report more similar to a blog post and the authors have a significant relationship to the content. Requiring a minimum of peer review would not be a change in policy. I think policy here is clearly on the side of excluding the content if we view the preprint as a kind of "news" item. As I posted earlier, I think there are specific reasons to consider an exception for this particular preprint, but I do not support any generalizations. Johnjbarton (talk) 20:49, 7 September 2024 (UTC)[]
I'm afraid you misunderstood me. I'm talking about reporting about the scientific claim itself. Tercer (talk) 22:23, 7 September 2024 (UTC)[]
Sorry, then I'm confused about your "Waiting for the underlying paper to be published would be a remarkable change in policy". Peer review as a minimum is the policy. Allowing preprints to be considered reliable sources would be chaos. And adding a news article about a preprint is just what we discussing here. Johnjbarton (talk) 23:01, 7 September 2024 (UTC)[]
We report on announcements of discoveries all the time, without waiting for the underlying paper to be published. We wait for peer review to consider the paper reliable and treat the discovery as fact, not to merely mention the claim. Tercer (talk) 20:06, 8 September 2024 (UTC)[]

Insisting absolutely on excluding preprints which have not been formally published would require removing mention of Perelman's proof from Poincaré conjecture, as it appears only on the arXiv and has never been submitted to any journal. This seems Obviously Stupid, so there must be exceptions. What are they? Does WP:RSSELF apply? 97.102.205.224 (talk) 13:31, 7 September 2024 (UTC)[]

This is covered at WP:VANPRED. Specifically the bit where it says preprints (unless vetted by the wider community) "can only be used to support basic uncontroversial claims". Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 13:45, 7 September 2024 (UTC)[]
Yay, so there are forms of acceptable vetting other than formal publication. Well, guess what? The last few weeks of discussion here in this talk page have been about how these preprints based on JWST data are being vetted by the wider community! The article I linked to a few paragraphs above was relevant to this discussion precisely because it includes the opinions of established but unaffiliated experts.
Evaluating papers is WP:OR, but evaluating authors (or "sources" in general) is a basic function of a Wikipedia editor. The preprints under discussion here are reliable because their authors are reliable subject-matter experts. I'd say more, but I can't really improve on what Johnjbarton wrote on 19 August.
Since you raise the issue it's worth pointing out that, on the subject of this talk section, "there seems to be a problem with the Cepheid calibration" is a basic uncontroversial claim. It's long been considered likely, as it's one of the most difficult parts of a difficult distance ladder measurement. The evidence for a measurement problem is being taken seriously precisely because it doesn't need to be extraordinary. 97.102.205.224 (talk) 15:53, 7 September 2024 (UTC)[]
IP is spot on. Headbomb, do you have any cosmology (or at least astrophysics) expertise? Like, what is your justification for claiming that this is not a 'basic uncontroversial claim', while Perelman's proof is? Banedon (talk) 16:27, 7 September 2024 (UTC)[]
Lee et al. results for instance, look at exactly the same data and conclude the opposite of Freedman et al. Once the paper clears peer review, we can include it. Otherwise this is an extraordinary claims paper (and does so on fairly weak evidence, e.g. data from only 10 galaxies). Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 16:41, 7 September 2024 (UTC)[]
I'm with Banedon and the IP here. There's no justification to exclude this based merely on the fact that it's not published in a journal. Renerpho (talk) 19:57, 7 September 2024 (UTC)[]
Since you call this an "extraordinary claims paper" I conclude you have no cosmology expertise. In light of the emerging consensus in favor of inclusion, I'm re-adding the material. Banedon (talk) 22:55, 7 September 2024 (UTC)[]
Sorry there is clearly no consensus. Johnjbarton (talk) 22:56, 7 September 2024 (UTC)[]
It does not look like that to me at all. If I'm reverted, I will start a RfC and get a formal number count. Banedon (talk) 23:07, 7 September 2024 (UTC)[]
Yes, you would do an RfC rather than assume your opinion as a strong proponent of one view is consensus. Johnjbarton (talk) 23:18, 7 September 2024 (UTC)[]
From a straight numbers count it hardly seems like an assumption, especially considering objections like yours that the paper hasn't been cited yet (since it has been). But okay. RfC below. Banedon (talk) 04:04, 8 September 2024 (UTC)[]

Should the article include Wendy Freedman's [3] measurements of the Hubble constant? Banedon (talk) 04:04, 8 September 2024 (UTC)[]

Well, in my opinion you just made a good case to include all the preprints you cite. I would definitely not cite the preprint as if it were scientific consensus. I would however definitely cite the preprints you mention as part of an ongoing scientific debate, especially if such debate has been covered by secondary sources.--cyclopiaspeak! 08:39, 26 September 2024 (UTC)[]
Yes -- I agree with Banedon's main points. Also, this is a notable part in the ongoing story about the Hubble tension. There is no need to wait for peer review in this case, not only because of the subject experts who have weighed in, and also because the actual subject is the debate, not the result itself.
I also agree with Headbomb that Lee's results should be mentioned alongside Freedman's. If we want to present the debate accurately, we have to show all the sides. Renerpho (talk) 15:58, 8 September 2024 (UTC)[]
Comment - For those of us pinged into this RFC without context, what reliable sources exist covering the mentioned debate? Is Dr. Becky's Night Sky News considered reliable in this space? Thanks! Suriname0 (talk) 18:28, 8 September 2024 (UTC)[]
  • No Just news. We have plenty on this debate and this paper alone won't resolve it as it is likely to be disputed. Maybe I disagree with the RFC as written and most of the (IMO irrelevant) arguments offered by Banedon in favor. The paper is self-published, equivalent to a blog post. The team and their track record would be the sole basis for including the reference.
I like the idea of positioning the reference in the context of the long-established debate on the Hubble tension as suggested by Renerpho. This makes the blog-post an expert teams perspective on the subject. Headbomb says this is an extraordinary claim backed by limited analysis, but I see it as more like a technical analysis for a topic chalk-a-block with technical analysis.
Most of the proponent arguments amount to "This is big news" according various cosmology news sources. But we are not a news site, they are. Thus I don't agree to the urgency of the addition or the need to cite these folks as peers (they seem to focus on news not technical review).
I would like to see the RFC amended to give proposed addition, especially if that can include the viewpoint of Renerpho with the references raised by Headbomb.
Johnjbarton (talk) 19:34, 8 September 2024 (UTC)[]
I find some of the arguments irritating as well. I stick with my yes vote (for now), although it seems that Banedon's proposal isn't what I had in mind. The probability that either paper will turn out to be correct, or that they'll pass peer review, is absolutely irrelevant to me. That's the point why I have no problem voting yes -- I do not care about the results at all. Banedon's "betting game" (which is highly dubious, by the way) is beginning to convince me that they don't share that view. Renerpho (talk) 20:51, 10 September 2024 (UTC)[]
This is an abuse of SPS. They're reliable for uncontroversial claims, for example "Freedman is an astrophysicist, working at the University of Chicago" (from the header of arXiv:2408.06153) or something like "In the last century, Cepheid variables have become the de facto golden standard to determine extragalactic distances" (section 6.3).
SPS are not considered reliable for novel results. These are unpublished results that have not undergone peer review, and that someone is an expert is completely irrelevant there. Experts make mistakes all the time. Peer review is the bare minimum needed for a source to become acceptable for novel results. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 22:20, 13 September 2024 (UTC)[]
No, this is not abusive as WP:PREPRINT specifically cites WP:SPS, "Their use is generally discouraged, unless they meet the criteria for acceptable use of self-published sources...". This usage does meet these criteria because Freedman is a highly respectable expert who has specialised in the Hubble constant and previously published significant results for it so that there's a section in her article about it. So, it's all right there in the relevant policies and this usage fits their guidance perfectly.
Also, the claims are not exceptional as they are within the range of previous estimates and the paper states "These numbers are consistent with the current standard Lambda CDM model, without the need for the inclusion of additional new physics." It is a confirmation rather than some radical new theory. And, as the data comes from a powerful new instrument, it seems to represent the state of the art and WP:AGE MATTERS.
Andrew🐉(talk) 12:57, 14 September 2024 (UTC)[]
"acceptable use of self-published sources..." do not include novel results. If this were the case, preprints would be general reliable sources for any claim because most preprints are written by experts. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 13:25, 14 September 2024 (UTC)[]
Neither WP:SPS nor WP:PREPRINT use the phrase "novel results". I've been quoting the actual policies. You're just making stuff up. Andrew🐉(talk) 17:27, 14 September 2024 (UTC)[]
First of all, as a former scientist and current professional science writer: there is quite a misconception here in how preprint archives such as arXiv work. They're not mere blog platforms. Qualms on peer review aside (there are a lot of misconceptions on its role, which is far less important than people think, but it's a topic for another day), the research they publish is not peer reviewed yet but it is serious research made by established scientific groups, and it will be published as a peer reviewed paper most likely unless very exceptional circumstances arise. Especially in physics, math and related disciplines, scientists work day by day relying on preprints as their literature source. They're not significantly less reliable than the peer reviewed published versions.
Second, as a Wikipedia editor: argument above notwithstanding, the results have been discussed in depth by several, generally reliable secondary sources es. [7],[8],[9]. As such they deserve a mention. Their not-yet-peer-reviewed status should be mentioned, of course.--cyclopiaspeak! 08:34, 26 September 2024 (UTC)[]
I think we understand how arXiv works. Cherry-picked papers by experts on arXiv are as you describe, but plenty of papers on arXiv would not pass peer review and are never published. To select between them requires an expert judgement comparable to peer review. I think it is unnecessary and unwise to agree that anonymous editors of wikipedia can make that judgement. Whatever case you make against peer-review, it provides a clear and unambiguous expert opinion on a source which we will otherwise have to debate in exactly the fashion of this Talk page topic, over and over again. Johnjbarton (talk) 14:46, 26 September 2024 (UTC)[]
I do not believe that us editors should make that judgement. I mean that arXiv papers, by the way authors are selected (it's not like, ehm, viXra where every crackpot can post) and the way the community uses them, are not that substantially different from any other type of academic publication, regardless of peer review (which is hardly "clear and unambiguous", but whatever). However, I agree that picking obscure preprints as sources would not be a good idea, in general. This case is different: this preprint has been picked up and discussed by several secondary sources. And in these secondary sources, experts are quoted as giving their opinion on the paper:

Saul Perlmutter, a Nobel Prize–winning cosmologist at the University of California, Berkeley, who was shown the team’s preprint prior to its release, told Quanta that the results suggest “we may have a Hubble tension just within the [star-based] measurements. That’s the tension that we really have to be trying to figure out more than trying to invent new [cosmological] models.”

Riess, after studying the preprint, told Quanta that he takes issue with the small set of supernovas that Freedman’s team used in one step of the analysis, which he says could bias the results. “The new measurements are lovely and in fact are in excellent agreement with the same measurements obtained … several years ago by our group, so the distance measurements seem under control,” he said. “However, I fear this study of such a small supernova sample gives a somewhat misleading impression of the value of the Hubble constant.”

“I see these results as supporting … the fact that we have this difference between what we expect from our standard cosmological model and what we see from these measurements,” says cosmologist Lloyd Knox of the University of California, Davis, who is not involved with either team.

While not being exactly peer review, it's not like we are in the dark. These are notable measurements and we have expert opinions on them (which is arguably better than the peer review stamp of approval, given that rarely peer reviews are disclosed publicly), being discussed in high profile secondary sources. --cyclopiaspeak! 15:08, 26 September 2024 (UTC)[]
No one disputes that this is a hot news item among cosmologists. The essential dispute is whether this actually not "news", but rather a form of encyclopedic knowledge is so important that we should breach a long standing, agreed line on peer-review, accepting the consequence of endless rounds of similar discussions for other preprints that hit the news. Johnjbarton (talk) 15:39, 26 September 2024 (UTC)[]
"Notable measurements" which 1) aren't peer-reviewed yet 2) make extraordinary claims that based on weak evidence (low N statistics, see Dr Becky, Riess, etc) 3) are disputed by other analysis based on the same data (Lee et al). Once a paper clears peer review, it can be included. Not before. We are an encyclopedia, not a new organization. Our ideal sources for these things are reviews, not preprints. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 17:18, 26 September 2024 (UTC)[]