Talk:Neuro-linguistic programming

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This article has been the subject of a recent arbitration committee case which was brought to end a long standing dispute over the form and substance of this article. 5 mentors have been appointed who have full authority to enforce the arbcom decision, bring everyone to agreement in terms of what the article should say and also to teach the users involved our policies and how to follow them.

This article is a former featured article candidate. Please view its sub-page to see why the nomination failed. For older candidates (where the individual nomination does not exist) please check the archive. Once the objections have been addressed, you may resubmit the article for featured article status.

This article has had a peer review which has now been ]. It may contain ideas that you can use to improve this article.

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This is a controversial topic, which may be disputed. Please read this talk page discussion before making substantial changes. (This message should only be placed on talk pages.)

Archives
Pre-October 2005 October 2005 Disputes October 2005 (Mediated) Disputes 1 October 2005 (Mediated) Disputes 2 November 3 through 13, 2005 (Mediated) November 13 through 25, 2005 (Mediated ) 2005 November 25 through Deceber 22, 2005 (Mediated) 2005 December 22, 2005 through January, 14, 2006 (Mediated) 2006 January 14, 2006 February 6 2005, ends at beginning of mediation and ArbCom decision Mentorship begins

Mentor intros

Woohookitty

I thought it'd be easier to introduce myself here, since there are many users involved in this conflict. Just a little introduction. I've been on Misplaced Pages since December 2004, an admin since June 2005. I believe very strongly in NPOV. Despite my political leanings, I believe very strongly in writing for the enemy. As for my admin style, I try to give people every benefit of the doubt before blocking or banning. My main motto is...argue the issues, not the people. If you follow that, you will be ok. --Woohookitty 11:12, 8 February 2006 (UTC)

Jdavidb

Hi, folks. Just a quick hello and an intro. I've been on Misplaced Pages since about 2004-02. I'm a firm believer in NPOV and consensus as the guiding principles that make Misplaced Pages work; I believe without reservation that these principles will ultimately result in a high-quality encyclopedia.

Hopefully I'm pretty well-suited for this job. I'm well-accustomed to what needs to be done in order to represent a non-mainstream point of view within Misplaced Pages's NPOV framework. After all, I'm a fundamentalist Christian who believes the earth is most likely 6000 years old. ;) (Not sure if that will encourage people or dishearten them, at first.) But I know how to take the high ground in making Misplaced Pages a place where beliefs are fairly and accurately represented without allowing Misplaced Pages itself to take a stand.

I'm reading up on this article and the arbCom case, and I can see that I'll have to read this talk page's history and probably the history of the article, too. Give me a couple of days to get acquainted with the issue, and then we'll all start moving.

I know all three of my fellow-mentors and happen to know from experience that each of them is a great Wikipedian. I think everyone involved here who wants to see a high-quality, fair article on NLP is in for a real treat! Jdavidb (talk • contribs) 13:56, 8 February 2006 (UTC)

Ral315

I suppose I should introduce myself as well. I'm Ral315, and I've been editing Misplaced Pages since December 2004. I also strongly believe in NPOV. Like Jdavidb, I'll be looking through the archives, trying to get a feel for the dispute here. I can also say that all of my fellow mentors are good editors, and will do a good job to try and settle this dispute and get this article to where it should be. Ral315 (talk) 17:20, 8 February 2006 (UTC)

Katefan0

Hi everybody. I won't go into great detail about myself, because my userpage should explain lots about who I am. But as it pertains to Neuro-linguistic programming, I promise that I'll do my level best to help everybody come up with an article that Misplaced Pages can be proud of. At the risk of sounding repetitive, I have full faith in all my fellow mentors and look forward to getting started. As an initial comment, I'd like to echo the sentiments already expressed about sticking on-topic. As tempting as it may be, especially when you get angry or irritated, try not to comment on contributors (or even generically to lob tomatoes at "the other side.") It does nothing to further the debate, and only ends up inflaming passions. · Katefan0/poll 22:52, 8 February 2006 (UTC)

Mentor comments (from Jdavidb)

Okay, folks, your mentors are still busy getting up to speed on everything, but I've read every single comment that's gone across this talk page since I first posted on it, and I have a few observations:

Cries of "censorship" are generally unproductive. Your mentors are going to commit to making sure that everything is fairly represented in this article. No government agencies are going to descend here and bowdlerize the article for public consumption. We'll all get the chance to discuss each point that anyone feels needs to be included and weigh it against Misplaced Pages's standards to decide if it belongs or not, and if so, how to word it.
Personal attacks are counterproductive. Please define "personal attacks" as broadly as possible, meaning please stay as far away as you can from wording that could even be remotely construed as a personal attack. At best, personal attacks add nothing to your point (and they do not add an point to your argument if it did not have one on its own without the attack). At worst, they inflame people, making it more difficult for them to respond constructively, they generate more personal attacks, and the whole situation deteriorates. Simply state your point. If you're hot when you're commenting, consider emailing your comment to a mentor and asking them to translate it, C-3PO style, into a polite statement of your views and posting it on your behalf.
Misplaced Pages does not exist to determine truth. It is not our purpose to decide if NLP's claims are true or not. It is instead our purpose to fairly represent both NLP's claims and the claims of its critics. The purpose of consensus within Misplaced Pages is not to determine truth, but to determine the wording of articles. Nobody needs to modify their personal views in order to achieve consensus on the wording of the article. However, anyone who is not committed to Misplaced Pages's core principles is likely to be more concerned with hammering their viewpoint than they are with agreeing upon wording which fairly represents all side.
Lots of people appeal to their own personal beliefs as to what the standard for the article should be. Very few people are appealing to Misplaced Pages policies. The previous point is one example of this. Some folks (on the 'pedia in general, not specifically this article) have the idea that Misplaced Pages is in fact here to determine truth. Citing actual passages from actual Misplaced Pages policies helps eliminate this, and helps keep us focused on the task of writing an encyclopedia.
Focusing on each other's personal thoughts and motivations is unproductive. Focus on the text of the article, and how you believe it needs to be improved. More on that, later.
This article is protected and is going to stay protected until your mentors agree to change that. Any changes you want in the article during that time period are going to have to get by us. It is my hope that we will guide you through the process of first convincing us, using Misplaced Pages standards, what the wording of specific parts of the article should be, and then eventually peacefully convincing each other. The magic of Misplaced Pages's policies is that even people who disagree completely about the subject of an article can, in fact, agree on its wording.

Jdavidb (talk • contribs) 20:34, 9 February 2006 (UTC)

Adding a couple of things from Woohookitty

Just wanted to say that all of our email links work and that includes Ral, who hasn't chimed in yet. So if you have any concerns or questions that you want to address to us privately, do so. Also, we're going to have a next to zero tolerance policy on uncivility and personal attacks. Argue the issues, not the people. As jdavidb perfectly said, we're here to make an NPOV article, not to "determine the truth". --Woohookitty 20:51, 9 February 2006 (UTC)

A quick note from Ral315

I've been busy with other issues, but I am monitoring this talk page as well as my e-mail, and will chime in when necessary. Ral315 (talk) 21:36, 9 February 2006 (UTC)

Mediators

Note: we'll finish filling out this section after the 24 hour protection period. Thanks, Jdavidb (talk • contribs) 01:00, 10 February 2006 (UTC)

Looking at all the posting on this page, I'm having a little trouble sorting out who the previous mediators are here, so just for myself I'd like to ask anyone posting on this page who considers themselves to be a mediator to sign in below. And I recognize that not everyone may have accepted mediation from any particular mediator, so if you did, I ask you to indicate that. Use three tildes to sign. I'll demonstrate the format.

Also, let me clarify the difference between the mediators and the mentors. The mentors are appointed by the arbitration committee, which reports directly to Jimbo Wales. There are four of us; we're listed above. There may be any number of other people who have stepped in in the past to mediate formally or informally. As I understand it, mediation is voluntary; some participants may accept it, some may not. ArbCom mandates, however, are not voluntary. :) So even if you've got personal feelings about whether or not the mentoring process will work, we're automatically everybody's mentor for the duration, even if you never agreed to mediation. I've even seen articles in the past where somebody considered himself a mediator but nobody on the page actually accepted him as such.

Okay, so please, anyone who's been mediating, sign in below:

Examples:

JimBob, informally mediating
- Kaloss, I accept JimBob's mediation
- Marcus, I accept JimBob's mediation
Chevron, formally mediating
- Kaloss, I accept Chevron's mediation
- CmdrTaco, I accept Chevron's mediation

Thanks, Jdavidb (talk • contribs) 20:47, 9 February 2006 (UTC)

SWATJester, I came here as a formal mediation request. Now that mentors are here, I'm cutting back on the amount of mediating I'm doing. ⇒ SWATJester Aim _Fire! 23:25, 9 February 2006 (UTC)
- Comaze, I accept SWATJester's mediation
- --Dejakitty 00:13, 10 February 2006 (UTC), will support SWATJester's mediation.

As I've mentioned on the mentors talk pages, though it hasn't been signed here, Headlydown originally did accept the mediation.⇒ SWATJester

Aim _Fire! 17:47, 13 February 2006 (UTC)

Archived -- and going forward

All -- the page has been archived in its entirety, save a few comments from mentors intended to guide our discussions from here on out. This is so we can start fresh, with a clean slate. I know this will probably not be popular with some of you, and we're sympathetic to those concerns. So we want to reassure everyone that your views will be heard and considered. This isn't an attempt to censor anyone's viewpoints, but rather to clear the air a bit.

Additionally, you all should know that as of this posting, we will be enforcing Misplaced Pages's policies on no personal attacks and civility on this and related pages. If a comment falls afoul of these rules, we will refactor it so that it's not offensive. Please try to focus on content, rather than making personal comments, either directed at someone in particular or at a side of the dispute in general. This isn't rocket science -- just be polite. You don't have to agree with one another, and you don't even particularly have to respect one another. But you must be cordial. · Katefan0/poll 23:56, 9 February 2006 (UTC)

Just chiming in so everyone knows Katefan0 wasn't acting unilaterally. I think we all agreed this was the thing to do. Jdavidb (talk • contribs) 00:35, 10 February 2006 (UTC)

Just wanted to say that I agreed to this as well. And no we are not trying to censor anyone. Just need to clear the air and start fresh. --Woohookitty 09:40, 10 February 2006 (UTC)

As do I. Sometimes it's best during heated discussion to take a 24-hour break, and reflect on things. Ral315 (talk) 15:55, 10 February 2006 (UTC)

Thank you Katefan0. --Dejakitty 00:08, 10 February 2006 (UTC)

I noticed that some of my comments are not in the archives...strange...meh.Voice of All 17:49, 10 February 2006 (UTC)

It's possible some comments may have gotten lost in the cleanup; you can add them to the archives if that's the case. But in any case, they're all in the page history. · Katefan0/poll 17:51, 10 February 2006 (UTC)

I see what happened... sorry. I thought I'd copied all the way down, but hadn't. Everything should be in there now. · Katefan0/poll 17:58, 10 February 2006 (UTC)

Workshop

All,

We have opened a workshop page which you are free to edit; it's at Neuro-linguistic programming/Workshop. Here are the ground rules:

No reverts.
If there is a section of the text that you have problems with, move it to the workshop's talk page where you will be expected to discuss it and come to a consensus. Text moves may not be reverted.
Non-trivial changes must be discussed on the talk page.
No incivility. Anything that's rude will be refactored or removed.
Mind the arbcom's directions on sourcing and attribution of views.
Any changes that receive a consensus and follow WP's policies can be incorporated into the main page.
Those who can't follow the rules will earn a block.

A related note: We are watching related pages and will be enforcing the arbcom's probation on those pages -- including Principles of NLP, Tony Robbins, Engram and any other related pages. · Katefan0/poll 15:51, 12 February 2006 (UTC)

Universal applicability claim needs explaining

Hi all. A very important claim that NLP promonents make is that NLP is universally acceptable simply because it is all form and no content (Dilts et al 1980).

I think this needs explaining especially from a scientific point of view. I can have a stab at it now though. Generalizablilty is a key word often used in scientific papers that measure the efficacy of various methods. Also, the term "limitations" is a very important concept. These seem largely to be absent from NLP texts, and indeed, the NLP push is generally towards "unlimited potential" and universal application or general use. I believe the terms, "panacea", "universally applicable" and "unequivocal" could be used in both the opening and the main body of the NLP article. Camridge 09:11, 13 February 2006 (UTC)

Citation

When the page is unprotected, could the citation in the first line, Lilienfeld et al 2003;Raso 1994, be footnoted? — Asbestos | Talk (RFC) 14:45, 15 February 2006 (UTC)

We already agreed to footnote the citations...that can therefore be done while protected, as nothing is being deleted/added.Voice-of-All 01:36, 23 February 2006 (UTC)

Unprotected

I've unprotected this because there has been no discussion on the talk page in well over a week. --Tony Sidaway 01:39, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

Try Talk:Neuro-linguistic programming/Workshop instead. Of course this could've been pointed out if you'd left a polite talk page message to one of us four. · Katefan0/poll 22:35, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

Okay, I didn't realise the mentors were holding this on that tight a leash. Wow, must be some serious problems here! --Tony Sidaway 02:42, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

Yep there is. --Woohookitty 02:49, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

Understatement of the year award, Tony...and it's only March! ;-) Akulkis 22:30, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

Pseudoscientific

forgive me for not reading the umpteen archived talk pages, but is it really accurate to state that NLP is pseudoscience? i was under the impression that NLP methods were subjected to hypothesis testing, and that the researchers found that the NLP methods work. also, even if this is disputed, isn't it POV to describe NLP as pseudoscientific right there in the first sentence of the article? not trying to rouse rabble; just trying to increase knowledge. Streamless 14:07, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

I agree. IMO, it violates WP:NPOV to explicitly state (and in the opening) that this is pseudoscience. NPOV would dictate that we say that authorities A, B, and C have called it pseudoscience, without actually taking a position on the issue in the encyclopedic voice. BTW, why is this article protected? Crotalus horridus (TALK • CONTRIBS) 18:06, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

As the result of a recent arbitration committee case Misplaced Pages:Requests_for_arbitration/Neuro-linguistic_programming. Work is ongoing at Talk:Neuro-linguistic programming/Workshop, which is mentioned at the top of this page. You're both more than welcome to come participate -- much work is needed on disputed text that isn't terribly NPOV. · Katefan0/poll 18:24, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

i don't know much, but i think there should be a distinction between the application of certain elements of NLP (e.g. using certain phrases, gestures and expressions in conversations in an attempt to make others feel relaxed or happy) and the "sale" of NLP as part of the self-improvement industry. Streamless 20:05, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

I was under the impression that NLP doesn't claim confirmed scientific status, but acknowledges that it's a work in progress; wouldn't using the term protoscience be more accurate while still conveying that it's "kind-of" science? Eringj 00:25, 23 March 2006 (UTC)

This is ridiculous. I look up NLP on[REDACTED] and the first thing I see, on a protected page, is that it is pseudoscience and that's a fact. You can't leave that as the first thing on a page, protected for an extended period, using the justification of achieving objectivity! That's just bizarre. --82.41.96.242 00:18, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

Dianetics and pseudoscience.

Hello editors. It's been some time now. An RfC has been filed on the Talk:Dianetics article regarding its npov status (the main page, not the talk page). As NLP and Dianetics apparently have some similarities, I thought you all might be interested to weigh in here. Mentors and admins on this page, I'd be especially interested in your comments on the revert war firing across that page (4 content reversions, and 1 content deletion out of a total of 6 edits for a day?). Thanks for your time and interest. ⇒ SWATJester Aim _Fire! 07:48, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

The supposed similarities between NLP and Scientology are highly contentious and cannot be suported to any degree that could be describd as meeting a NPOV standard. At the same time, the differences between NLP and Scientology are overwhelming. I can see only one point on the current page referring to a specific similarity between the two practices, but it still seems a little slanted. 'Clearing blocks' is not a phrase I have really seen used in NLP literature. The underlying concept is that we learn patterns of behaviour which serve us in some way at the time, but as circumstances change these patterns can become problematic, so it is more useful to learn new patterns. This concept is not unique to Scientology, or even to the new age. It is the theoretical basis underpinning Freudian clinical psychotherapy. Therefore I propose the following edit (I've been careful only to add to, rather than overwrite someone else's POV):

NLP participants are taught that the human mind can be programmed, and that mis-programming by negative input is the norm. Like Fredudian psychoanalysis, Scientology, rebirthing and other clinical and alternative therapies (Raso 1994)(Lilienfeld 2003) NLP embraces this Null Hypothesis and the classic concept of 'clearing' or 'reprogramming' these blocks (Singer 1996).

I'm new here, so forgive me if this comment is in the wrong place, i'm genuinely interested in contributing to a resolution. --Jrds 05:55, 8 April 2006 (UTC)

I know little of NLP or Scientology, but I do know that the author, Robert Anton Wilson, is one of the strongest supporters of NLP but one of the biggest critics of Scientology. --82.41.96.242 00:38, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

Hello 82.41.96.242. It is a fact that many scientists view NLP as pseudoscience. Robert Anton Wilson is an advocate of NLP and the occult. In fact, he says that before embarking on practicing occult rituals, start off by taking psychoactive drugs and learning NLP. If you wish to present any such facts, the NLP workshop would be a good place to start. ATB Camridge 03:12, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

If I thought I had much to add. All I'd like to see is a more balanced article sooner rather than later - perfection is never possible. By the way, Wilson holds degress in both physics and psychology, for what its worth. But the point I am really making, is that the workshop process can't be allowed to drag on for months and months as this one appears to be doing. An intermediate update, based on the workshop so far, would be preferable surely? --82.41.96.242 11:08, 14 April 2006 (UTC)

Please tag appropriately

Hello mentors. Could somebody put a tag or two on this article that accurately reflects the ongoing dispute. Something like {Template:POV} ? I don't think a majority of readers will bother wading through the various sub-levels of talk pages and articles to find out why it's been locked from editing. I realise it's an out-of-process request, but then again, it's fairly out-of-process to lock an article for this long. Peace. ॐ Metta Bubble 09:43, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

Okey-doke. Ashibaka tock 01:53, 25 March 2006 (UTC)

John Bradshaw

As far as history goes, it might be worth noting that inner child pop psychology guru John Bradshaw was a NLP practitioner and promoter prior to his "dysfunctional family" movement heyday. Mr Christopher 17:53, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

Notice

Please note that Johntex has been made a mentor for Neuro-linguistic programming, per the arbitration ruling, to join the current four. Hopefully this will help things run better. Dmcdevit·t 01:33, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

Thank you very much - I hope I can help out. Best, Johntex\ 01:37, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

Basic NLP factuality is still poorly explained

Moved to Talk:Neuro-linguistic programming/Workshop

Advice (not an order!) from Jimbo

I fully and completely trust the admins who are mentoring this page to use good judgment and to keep a very close eye on the page and work with all the editors (especially those who were the subject of the arbcom ruling) to generate a peaceful and harmonious editing process. I would like to suggest, as gently as possible of course, and with full consideration for the difficult task you have accepted, that protecting the page is something that should be done sparingly and only for very specific reasons.

One of the things that we want to produce as an outcome of this is, hopefully, friendships among the previously warring parties, and a sense among them that they should behave in a trustworthy manner because, in part, we have shown that we trust them. Page protection doesn't move things forward in that arena. Of course, if page protection is necessary, then it is necessary.

As I say, I trust your judgment, and I only came to give a small bit of hopefully helpful thoughts on the matter.--Jimbo Wales 23:18, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

Greetings Jimbo. Protecting the page is a hard measure. There are many things I would like to change, especially regarding the improvement and representation of the sociological views on NLP. However, protecting the page has definitely led to a far more peaceful communication between editors, largely due to it preventing the desperate censorship of the article. I believe it to be a wise move. We are getting the hang of civility, and the NLP advocates have been reducing their repeat requests for removing scientific views, and for removing the "incriminating" statements of NLP authors and promoters. "Friendship" is indeed closer than before. The block history is very one sided, but I realise thats only because the NLP advocates are always on the verge of leaving and the mentors are reluctant to scare the NLPadvocates away altogether. Whatever, I also trust the mentors to move this forward, and I appreciate your encouragement. It will all help us in the months and years to come. ATB. Camridge 08:15, 23 March 2006 (UTC)

In the months and years to come? How long do you intend locking this page? It seems to me, as someone just visiting the topic, that someone isn't picking up on the hints from senior wikipedians to get the finger out. The locking process itself is close to vandalism, as I see it, in this case. --82.41.96.242 17:13, 14 April 2006 (UTC)

Can I suggest to the mentors a brief, prominent paragraph at the top of the talk page, explaining why the page is protected, how the mentoring works, and directing people to the workshop page? At the moment it's not obvious to people not familiar with this dispute (such as me) what is going on here. Enchanter 07:47, 8 April 2006 (UTC)

There is a prominent paragraph at the top. I added a bit to it. --Woohookitty 07:59, 8 April 2006 (UTC)

Thanks! Enchanter 08:36, 8 April 2006 (UTC)

Why is this page still protected?

I'm getting increasingly concerned at how long this page has been protected for. Protection of pages in the case of content disputes is generally meant to be for a "cooling off" period. That is, when tempers have got too high and productive editing is replaced by unproductive edit-warring, we protect the page so that everyone can go away for a few days and come back when people have had a chance to cool off and maybe give the article some more thought. The current protection has been in place for much longer than is warranted just for cooling off, and it's just not obvious to me why. It is stated that the article is protected "as the result of the arbcom decision"; however, while I stand to be corrected if I'm missing something, I can't see anything there that would suggest protecting the page, and certainly not for this abnormal length of time.

As Jimbo states above, protection should be used sparingly and for specific reasons. I request that the page is unprotected. I'm quite happy to change my mind if there are particular reasons why protection is absolutely necessary, but in any case there needs to be some sort of timetable or specific plan to move towards unprotection. Enchanter 01:15, 16 April 2006 (UTC)

The page is still protected as a result of an arbcom case, as it says above, because the people participating on the page can't work together. At some point it will be, but not yet. · Katefan0/poll 16:48, 16 April 2006 (UTC)

That hasn't answered my question; as I said, it is stated that the page is protected "as a result of an arbcom case", but I can't see anything in the arbcom case that even mentions protecting the page. Please could you point me to the part of the arbcom case, decision, related discussion where it was decided to protect the page for longer than the typical cooling-off period?

I recognise that page protection is sometimes necessary, and I recognise that I haven't followed all of the facts or background of this case in detail. However, a page protection for this length of time is very unusual and not in line with normal policies, so there need to be good reasons and these need to be presented clearly. Enchanter 17:18, 16 April 2006 (UTC)

The arbcom case says that the mentors (of which I am one) are "to have a free hand" in reigning in behaviors of editors engaged in this article. It's our judgement that the protection is still needed at the moment. You can read the whole arbcom case by clicking on the link at the top of the page. · Katefan0/poll 19:06, 17 April 2006 (UTC)

Again, my question is why, in your judgement, is page protection necessary in this case?

There doesn't appear to be an edit war going on at the workshop page, so I'm confused as to why page protection might be seen as the only solution to stop an edit war breaking out here. Enchanter 21:22, 17 April 2006 (UTC)

No, your question was under what policy we have the right to keep the page protected; I answered it above. Your second question I've also answered -- they can't work together. After two months of nonstop talking on the workshop's talk page, the editors involved have been able to agree on absolutely nothing, not even the smallest change. I have little confidence at this point that that will translate well into opening editing. · Katefan0/poll 21:38, 17 April 2006 (UTC)

I'll trust your judgement on this one, but I would encourage all involved to move towards unprotecting the page and moving the discussion from the workshop page to here as quickly as is possible - or at the very least, experimenting with doing that for a trial period. Sooner or later this page will need to be unprotected, and waiting longer to do it may not really be helping much. Enchanter 22:02, 17 April 2006 (UTC)

But just suppose it's the intention of one or more editors to never terminate this process. How will the mentors use their "free hand"? Locking indefinitely is not a solution. --82.41.96.242 00:30, 19 April 2006 (UTC)

Hello 82.41.96.242. And welcome to input your ideas to the workshop. The most solid, verifiable, and relevant facts have been objected to on the workshop page. And the editors making all the objections are the ones most motivated to get the article unlocked and changed fast. Its a strange situation. The more Misplaced Pages verifiable facts are presented, the more stuck the situation becomes. Outside input is welcome. Regards HeadleyDown 00:48, 19 April 2006 (UTC)

Mentorship changes

As Ral315 and Jdavidb have both recently resigned, Will Beback has been appointed as a new mentor, to bring the total back up to the original 4. Dmcdevit·t 05:34, 14 April 2006 (UTC)

Proposing minor changes

In the Questionable Applications paragraph controvercy should be controversy.
Some words in headings (such as Applications above) have a capital initial without any apparent reason.
The list of developers in the See also section IMO would look better if the asterisks and the footnote were replaced with an entry such as:

John Grinder and Richard Bandler, (considered to be the) co-creators/co-originators of NLP. --Army1987 18:39, 17 April 2006 (UTC)

Almost an attack page, needs to be seriously reworked

It's a shame that a page with so evident a POV problem is protected. This article is more about why NLP is not a real science than about what it is. It's like if the astrology article was an endless discussion about why horoscopes are untrustworthy, with two hundred and sixty-one footnoted references, without explaining how they are made. I suggest this is rewritten using Misplaced Pages:Summary style, so a separate article criticisms of NLP can treat this issue in depth, while the main article deals with what NLP is, rather than what it is not. I have some limited knowledge about what NLP claims (i.e., that using certain body postures you can force your brain to work in certain ways, or something like that), because I once read about it on a magazine. If I didn't, from this article I would have very hardly understood at all what NLP is/claims to be.--Army1987 18:54, 17 April 2006 (UTC)

Hi Army1987; your participation is welcome. Active participation should go to: Talk:Neuro-linguistic programming/Workshop where editing is progressing on a dummy page while people work out their differences in wording. See you there. · Katefan0/poll 19:07, 17 April 2006 (UTC)

I saw that page, and, well... I think that, being almost totally ignorant about NLP, I shouldn't even dare to post on a page where there are endless arguments about the wording of every single sentence... I'm afraid I can't help...--Army1987 10:16, 18 April 2006 (UTC)

We'd appreciate anything you can give, Army1987. The mentors aren't exactly "experts" ourselves. Anything that can make the article clearer is more than welcome. --Woohookitty 11:55, 18 April 2006 (UTC)

Hello Army1987 and Addsquad. Yes, the article has had many requests to back up the negative scientific findings, and has had scientific fact deleted and restored on an almost daily basis for months. Your input is welcome and I believe requires nothing more than common sense and a willingness to verify or acknowledge simple scientific/sociological fact. Some editors seem to require a lot of sexy word-juggling (something about NLP persuasion patterns). Don't let it put you off. The mentors can write pretty straight and have offered a lot of useful guidance. Regards HeadleyDown 13:56, 18 April 2006 (UTC)

Do NOT use sockpuppets

DaveRight has been proven to use sockpuppets. Specifically, he created and used the accounts of JPLogan and Medius Maximus. All 3 accounts have been blocked indefinitely. Please. Do NOT use sockpuppets. It is not going to help you. If anyone here is using sockpuppets right now, I would suggest ceasing. Thanks. --Woohookitty 02:20, 18 April 2006 (UTC)

Change to opening

Hi all. I added a rather well discussed section from the workshop and I have not removed anything else but the first small line. I understand other parts will need discussion for removal. Anyway, I wanted to supply the article with something quite neutral that the workshop managed to provide. Please feel free to state anything you like about how to make the article more verifiable and more neutral. All input is welcome, and please be nice to the mentors. ATB. Camridge 05:35, 19 April 2006 (UTC)

A good start. I'm for your edit and we work from there.--82.41.96.242 23:39, 19 April 2006 (UTC)

Here are some general suggestions: The article needs a lot more clarity. This can be provided using the rather large amount of very clarifying literature that has been uncovered in the workshop. The mentors have given us a much better idea on how to clarify wording. I believe this is about the most helpful thing I have seen in months. The section I added shows the "kind" of clear writing necessary. Fancifull unexplained terminology is not going to help much.

If its verifiable, it can be included. We are not looking for truth. All views can be included. To keep it readable we need to prioritize though. The most important statements first, and the most important and clarifying cricitisms (to be fair). Lets leave it up to the reader to decide what they think of NLP. ATB. Camridge 05:46, 19 April 2006 (UTC)

I am open to the remaining opening being set aside (removed) for a while at least (the new section remaining). Then we can work on the main body and adjust the opening accordingly. Camridge 05:51, 19 April 2006 (UTC)

Well I think some of that original opening needs to stay. We could probably get rid of "the practice mostly attracted...." para, but there is some very useful science based fact in the last para of the opening. Some of it can be toned down though, or can be an enlarged version of the criticism line (second para) including the science facts. Its mostly a case of making the wording more readable and neutral. And using active voice (critics state that..... scientists state that.....) etc. Bookmain 06:28, 19 April 2006 (UTC)

There are many objections yet to be addressed to take into account other points of view. Camridge's opening is essentially the same as DaveRight/HansAntel's suggestion, see my post . ---=-C-=- 08:41, 19 April 2006 (UTC)

Of course there are objections Comaze. But the passage also includes some very clear wording, which I am sure is what we would all like to encourage. Certainly, there were some good lessons included in the new passage that we learned from the mentors during the workshop that will be beneficial to the current article. I am sure nobody is saying anything here is carved into stone. This is Misplaced Pages. Using this kind of example, it will be constructive to move forward with this kind of clarity in mind. I am sure the "neutrality is disputed" label will be here for a while. But lets stay constructive. ATB. Camridge 09:36, 19 April 2006 (UTC)

Is it ok to make the changes outlined in thia workshop post? I'll attempt to merge your version with the objections outlined here ---=-C-=- 09:44, 19 April 2006 (UTC)

Well camridge, thank you for discussing the change and ignoring any contrary opinion. Greg 16:08, 19 April 2006 (UTC)

Hello. I have no objection to making any changes to the opening, as long as it retains the same level of clarity, and only if that passage is moved to the discussion page for the purpose of discussion, and only if that is the only section to discuss.

The only change made to the article on the workshop was the swish pattern, and that was against a great deal of contrary fact. So it would only be fair to provide a clear opening, in contrast with the unclear and confusing swish passage. Of course, neither are immutable.

As it stands, the opening two paras are very good, and clear. They represent the sum knowledge on NLP very well. Of course, if you only ever read NLP books you will find it objectionable. There is nothing we can do about that. Misplaced Pages includes objectionable facts, and anything verifiable, and the opening is fine in this respect. HeadleyDown 17:01, 19 April 2006 (UTC)

An interesting objective view --82.41.96.242 23:34, 19 April 2006 (UTC)

References and import from workshop dummy page

Are we to discuss here or at the workshop? Anyway, I want to import all the updates that were made to the Workshop dummy page into the article. Any objections? The reference formats are especially important. ---=-C-=- 07:54, 19 April 2006 (UTC)

Here. --Woohookitty 09:07, 19 April 2006 (UTC)

Any objections to moving the body of the workshop article into the main article? ---=-C-=- 09:45, 19 April 2006 (UTC)

Give it a day or so, so others can chime in. --Woohookitty 09:52, 19 April 2006 (UTC)

Hello Comaze. If you are proposing to make the same amount of objections to the same sections, then I would say that is unconstructive. Those points need proper attribution, and that is a simple task. What we need to do is focus on a single section all together until we gain some kind of agreement, without some editors suddenly finding something else to do in order to simply avoid agreement. Regards HeadleyDown 17:05, 19 April 2006 (UTC)

Eye accessing cues

A question which has me curious; what is the scientific evidence on the validity, (or lack thereof), for eye accessing cues? It strikes me as an area which ought to be quite easy to test through experiment, so I'm sure it must have been tried (I'm aware of the evidence against the existence of "preferred representational systems" mentioned in the article, but this doesn't appear to directly address the validity of the concept of eye accessing cues). I think this is an area that could usefully be expanded in the article if anyone has some good references. Enchanter 19:27, 19 April 2006 (UTC)

Hi Enchanter. The studies of eye accessing cues and rep systems are probably the most commonly done ones. Platt (2001) neatly summarised some 70 studies saying that 2/3 don't support what NLP says - and though Platt was just reading abstracts listed on a webpage not really researching anything, that number is probably pretty representative. Medline indexes just 14 NLP studies and 8 of those are Rep System studies. 7 of these studies were done prior to ~1990 and I think were entirely negative, there was one more recent and supportive but in a very specific context (please take my response as a generalisation until I can find a link back!)

Preferred Rep Systems (PRS) and Primary Rep Systems are often confused still (even in this page) and PRS is taught differently now (by some schools) to what was taught originally. The really interesting thing with the research is that many of these rep system studies are referred to as NLP, they are referred to by later reviewers as "the studies of NLP" when, as you've noted, it should have been "the studies of NLP's rep systems concept". Still damning stuff, but it'd be very useful to specify what it is not supporting and what it's not testing at all. The rep systems studies also have a clear reply from Einspruch & Forman about problems with the studies (debated by Sharpley), and there's an extensive US army/government review (Druckman/Swets) which clearly summarises rep system studies pro and con. Greg 22:15, 19 April 2006 (UTC)

Thanks Greg.

Hello Enchanter. Yes there have been many studies on PRS and many other aspects of NLP. Some of the testing was sound, and other testing was not. So qualified reviewers have reviewed the evidence and the results are negative. None of it works according to research (in lay terms). Regards HeadleyDown 00:14, 20 April 2006 (UTC)

Hi GregA. You seem to be presenting your own original research (OR). NLP has failed the test of time (according to triangulating/corroborating scientific reviews). The corroborating reviews all say NLP has failed. NLP has failed the test of time, it has failed to receive any scientific support according to peer-reviewed reviews of the literature, and it has been generally classed as a pseudoscience. In fact, the background "theories" of NLP are so incorrect in neurological and psychological terms, reviewers have said that a key influence of NLP comes from the pseudosciences of phrenology and dianetics. The serious research dried up after Sharpley put the last nail in the coffin in 1987. No reputable researcher has ever answered or refuted Sharpley87. Most of this is already written in the article, and the rest is to follow with added clarity and readability. ATB. Camridge 07:32, 20 April 2006 (UTC)

Parlez-vous Français?

This paper (in French) is used as a reference in the article to support the statement "NLP is sometimes referred to in scientific research reviews as a cult". However, I can't see anything in the paper that even mentions cults. Unless I'm missing something, it looks like this reference has been given in error. Enchanter 22:36, 19 April 2006 (UTC)

Much of the referencing in this article needs cleaning up -- there are too many references entirely, and some of them are being used as sourcing for points that the text doesn't really back up. I would encourage users to go through the referencing in this article carefully. · Katefan0/poll 00:04, 20 April 2006 (UTC)

References need to be gotten under 100. --Woohookitty 05:27, 20 April 2006 (UTC)

Sure Enchanter. Its all been chopped and changed over the edit wars. Confusion seems to be a general strategy of some editors. The view that NLP is a cult is a widely held one, especially in the scientific community. It will all be sorted in time (when anonymous editors stop arbitrarilly deleting facts. Regards HeadleyDown 00:17, 20 April 2006 (UTC)

Hi Enchanter. Winkin says NLP is like a religion. We have a good deal more new info on NLP as a new alternative religion, and that is so large it will probably require a new section. As far as cults go, NLP is widely considered to be a "secte" in France. Secte is translated as; a cult with a deliberate intention to harm. ATB. Camridge 02:00, 20 April 2006 (UTC)

Yes Woohookitty. Keeping refs below 100 is a good idea. ATB Camridge 05:42, 20 April 2006 (UTC)

I've now removed the reference to this paper in the context of cults. Enchanter 19:12, 20 April 2006 (UTC)

I couldn't find any occurrence of the word "secte" in this text. If someone can point us to the specific language, this can be perhaps reinstated; otherwise I support its removal as a reference for that specific point. · Katefan0/poll 19:16, 20 April 2006 (UTC)

Yes Winkin is not appropriate in the cult section (apart from to explain why it is a cult). There are more official French docs to place NLP as a secte. Regards HeadleyDown 02:13, 22 April 2006 (UTC)

Suggested opening lines

Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP) is a set of techniques or rituals and beliefs that adherents use primarily as an approach to psychotherapy, healing, communication and personal development. NLP developers state that NLP is the study of the structure of subjective experience and is based upon neuroscience, linguistics, and the assumption that behavior is programmed. NLP fosters New Age notions and beliefs such as altered states, altered realities, and magic, and as with other New Age developments such as Dianetics, the various groups of NLP have no centralized control and differentiate themselves using slightly different approaches or emphases. NLP adherents also state that NLP is ethically neutral and promotes non-judgmental attitudes towards any behavior. NLP is also known as a power therapy, or alphabet therapy.

Critics say that NLP promotes pseudoscientific and magical thinking and ethically questionable behavior, that NLP is a cult, and that NLP is ineffective and is promoted using exaggerated claims characteristic of fraud and charlatanry.

My suggestion: If we are going to discuss this on its own to agreement, then fine. If not, we can remove it and work on some other aspect as a group. Regards HeadleyDown 00:23, 20 April 2006 (UTC)

I agree Headley. If we're not going to agree then lets skip it - discuss some of the subsections first till agreement and then use the opening to summarise what the subsections say.

Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP) promotes methods for enhancing a person's quality of life. It claims to do this through exploring experiences from different perspectives (and states of mind), reproducing an expert's abilities, and techniques for behaviour change - and its approach has been applied to many fields, primarily psychotherapy, communication, and self-development. Critics say that NLP lacks experimental evidence to support its claimed efficacy, and some psychologists label it pseudoscientific.

Please note that the main criticism of this is that "it adds nothing new". I personally do not think the opening paragraph should be adding anything new.

The other alternative is removing the opening line, which is redundant in light of the following information and was thrown in just before the article was locked anyway, without any agreement. Greg 00:30, 20 April 2006 (UTC)

Hello GregA. The lines I suggested have been agreed upon by quite a few editors, and they benefit from the kind of writing style the mentors have been encouraging. Your suggestion removes some of the more obvious facts about NLP. What we need to agree upon now is to work on incrementally changing the lines I suggested until we come to agreement. Not to argue for a month and then suddently start getting busy with work, or fascinated with reference format just to avoid the issue. So are we going to work towards agreement or not? HeadleyDown 00:45, 20 April 2006 (UTC)

You know this isn't a case of "agreed upon by quite a few editors". There are clearly 2 camps at present, both claiming neutrality. I must note again that you have not disagreed with anything I've written - should I assume that endorses what I've said so far, but that as you say there are some other "facts" that are still debated? If so lets start with the one we agree to (which doesn't say it all yet) and see what can be added.

ps. I think it's a weak argument to say I've argued for a month and then suddenly got busy - as if I'm holding things up. I don't know where you work but my busy times are not to my choosing, much as I'd like them to be. Greg 13:50, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

Yes GregA. I've been working with that in mind. I have not been disagreeing with your suggestions every time as I've been busy suggesting better versions (in my opinion) and I've objected to them many times before. But I do also get the feeling that after a set of passages have had umpteen refs to back them up, it is a little odd that objecting editors suddenly find something else to do. This is why I would suggest finding one spot, and working on it until agreement. HeadleyDown 14:14, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

Fair enough - as I've said umpteen times, working on the opening was bound to be controversial. Better to work on subsections. I am busy at the moment, but you're also right that with the to-and-fro-ing without getting anywhere my motivation to respond and get nowhere is low. Greg 06:43, 22 April 2006 (UTC)

Baby steps: And confirmation bias

Sorry Headley, I disagree (and I have changed my mind). Flat-out denial has been too much of a kneejerk even during the workshop. So on reflection, the opening is really a huge step (top down). It doesn't matter how much compromise you make, or how much verifiable fact you present, you are not going to get any agreement.

So lets start working on agreeing on verifiability in small steps (bottom up). I suggest the small Beyerstein section for starters. We have done some work on that in the workshop, and it is clearer already. So explaining why people think NLP works even though the evidence is shows that it doesn't. This means, we can attribute one small bit properly, and clarify it, and get some kind of agreement. If we work this way in small steps, we may get editors into the habit of reasonable acknowledgment of facts. ATB. Camridge 01:56, 20 April 2006 (UTC)

Here is the last adjustment to Beyerstein and Tye by HeadleyDown:

Tye states that NLP can be explained with reference to the "psycho shaman effect.": a combination of cognitive dissonance, placebo effect and therapist charisma. Beyerstein states that NLP is a pseudoscientific fringe therapy, and explains that bogus therapies can be explained by the placebo effect, social pressure, superficial symptomatic rather than core treatment, and overestimating some apparent successes while ignoring, downplaying, or explaining away failures ." In Brianscams, Beyerstein states that when the New Age brain manipulators such as NLP are challenged, critics typically encounter anecdotes and user testimonials where there ought to be rigorous pre-and post treatment comparisons (Beyerstein 1990). In addition, Beyerstein states that "Unless a ritual, technique, drug, or surgical procedure can be shown to have met logical and evidential requirements of safety and effectiveness, it is ethically questionable to offer it to the public, except on an admittedly experimental basis -- especially if money is to change hands.

I suggest this be placed at the bottom of the scientific analysis section. ATB Camridge 02:07, 20 April 2006 (UTC)

Yes I agree. If we focus on small parts of the whole, then agreement is more likely. ALso, issues of neutrality and fairness are irrelevant this way. They are only an issue for the article as a whole. According to the workshop, the above lines are about 100 times more quotable and verifiable than any NLP text. So how about some agreement? Bookmain 03:29, 20 April 2006 (UTC)

Good point Camridge. I agree, this way would be far more constructive for the article. Regards HeadleyDown 12:48, 20 April 2006 (UTC) OK if there are no objections, I suggest the passage be placed into the article. Regards HeadleyDown 13:02, 20 April 2006 (UTC)

Actually, I can make an adjustment to the passage. The last line will be better off in the ethical concerns section:

Beyerstein,B. Beyerstein BL. Brainscams: neuromythologies of the new age. Intern J Mental Health. 1990;19:27-36.

Tye 1994 Neurolinguistic programming: Magic or myth? Journal of Accelerative Learning and Teaching, 19, 309-342.

Regards HeadleyDown 00:03, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

Hi all. Are we assuming that this set of lines will be placed into the article whether there is agreement or not? ATB Camridge 02:21, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

No, I don't see any reason that would be the case. Johntex\ 08:45, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

Ok great! Does anyone have any particular desire to withold these lines from the article? Camridge 08:53, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

Looks fine to me. I guess others are busy frantically mulling things over. HeadleyDown 11:59, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

Very busy. I have to reread my previous replies to these as I can see they're not addressed. As a quick question - could you explain how cognitive dissonance explains why NLP works - as it's written it sounds nice and scientific but on closer examination it doesn't make much sense. Thanks Greg 13:44, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

Cognitive dissonance is the feeling of discomfort you get when you have invested a lot of time and or money into something, and you don't want to admit to others or yourself that it doesn't work. So you become biased towards the things that confirm your belief in its effectiveness, and discard or seek to censor the negative evidence. This explains why people fool themselves into thinking it works. Actually what I've just written there could be more appropriate for the passage above. Just a thought. HeadleyDown 14:18, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

I don't think you've defined Cognitive Dissonance - but you have defined it in terms of how you're using the phrase with respect to NLP - so thanks. Cognitive Dissonance in general is, afaik, the thinking the brain does in order to resolve 2 contradictions. So in your above quote, it places "faith in NLP" vs "evidence against NLP" - and only one can be held. I'm going to ignore the scientific arguments (they belong elsewhere) - but in terms of Cog Dissonance, I really don't see any explanatory value into why a person picks option A vs B, those reasons are a separate phenomenon. Really it seems identical to simply having to make a choice, and in making choice-A discounting the reasons for choice-B. I know the skeptics guide defines it similarly to what you have (though you were clearer) - I just don't get the relevance. Your usage seems almost identical to saying "some people choose their own experience over scientific evidence", but it doesn't explain why.

On a related note - with ANY change work, I want to introduce a 2nd perspective (and 3rd etc) to create, I guess, a cognitive dissonance - to get the brain thinking, processing, and dreaming (whatever) about these differences - to give the person space to develop a new equilibrium that's more effective for them Greg 06:42, 22 April 2006 (UTC)

Yup! Thats the way it works. You lead yourself through some useful steps (eg, the resource gets a bit better when you switch submodalities, therefore it works an bit. Then you work on another angle and it gets even better and so on) Its all inexplicable to scientists, but the average human is actually capable of doing amazingly powerful stuff even on their own. This is not part of scientific thinking. Hell, scientists even think we are limited to holding only 7 things in your head at once. NLP corrects that limited thinking in a couple of lines. So, yep in my book cognitive dissonance works. So use it! In fact the only way you can really understand NLP is by trying it for yourself. Do it NOW! Its just as empirical as any science. Learn to really OBSERVE. Have a go, see for yourself, and learn. Really learn. Then you can start writing a proper article. Superkyewl 07:59, 22 April 2006 (UTC)

Hello Superkyewl. Welcome. Dissonance is just bad feeling that you don't want. You don't want to pay for therapy/technology that doesn't work. SO you conclude it is working to feel better. NLP sets it up by claiming amazing result. Its scam. HansAntel 09:28, 22 April 2006 (UTC)

Semi protection

I have no idea if this page has ever been semi protected before, but I feel like I should explain it. It means that users with accounts older than about 4 days can post. So that's going to cover basically everyone but IP posts and brand new users. We should probably keep it for awhile until things are sorted out a bit better. --Woohookitty 13:07, 20 April 2006 (UTC)

Thanks Woohookitty. Thats clearer. Regards HeadleyDown 13:33, 20 April 2006 (UTC)

Thanks Cat. Just to elaborate a bit -- anons can still contribute on the talk page; if someone has a suggestion they're free to make it. But things are still a little too volatile to allow anons to edit the live page at the moment; too little accountability for their actions. · Katefan0/poll 19:17, 20 April 2006 (UTC)

Hello this is interesting. I got a few psychoanal friends who can help out here and I did a big project on Neurolinguistic Programming a few moons ago myself. So if we hang about for a few days we can edit? I know this is a controversial subject. Am I allowed to submit my own dissertation? I think I can throw quite a few new links and references your way.... LemonMnM

Hmmm. That depends. If by "dissertation" you mean PhD thesis/committee reviewed dissertation, then if it is relevant it might be citable as source if it has been published in a scholarly journal and if it supports something being written into the article. If it is just your own ideas that you have created as a result of reading about NLP then the answer would be a definite "no". Please see WP:NOR for why we don't include our own original research. Please see WP:CITE for information about what makes a source notable enough to be cited here as an authority.

As for throwing more links and references our way - I'm not sure we need more references at the moment. What we are trying to do here is to write an encyclopedia article. That means we are trying to write something that is generally accessible to a broad audiance. We are not trying to write a 40 0 page definite work on NLP. Having said all that, I don't want to scare you away. If you have a truly great reference, please tell us about it. Maybe it is better than one we are already using.

Finally, on discussion pages like this one, please sign your posts with ~~~~. This will automatically create a link to your user page. Thanks, Johntex\ 07:51, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

Oh thanks Johntex. My dissn is just a poxy masters. I know some others that are publishing tho. NLP's a tough one. So vaguely defined in general still I think its worthwhile a go. I think I'll sit back a while and think how to make it more accessible without too much jargon appearing from my "minithesis". LemonMnM LemonMnM 08:02, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

Hi LemonMnM. Your input can be very helpful. The more the merrier also. I believe if you've done some thinking on paper, you'll find this article pretty interesting to research or check. If a view is verifiable then it can be included. So in your thinking, consider any significant views the researchers or NLP practitioners have (not your own views in particular), and please help us verify them. There will be a certain amount of prioritising as the article cannot grow forever. So the most important or significant views come first. If they are from peer-reviewed sources that will help. If you can find understandable ways to explain what NLP authors are really on about, it will also help. The mentors are giving us a good idea of how things can best be written in encyclopedic terms. ATB. Camridge 08:32, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

Yes welcome LemonMnM. I'd very much like to see your thesis (abstract and refs would be nice) headleydown@yahoo.com HeadleyDown 13:37, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

Dead link

I've removed this dead link from the article; does anyone have a link or reference to whatever this was meant to point to? Enchanter 20:39, 20 April 2006 (UTC)

Observations on sourcing

This sentence: NLP is based on New Age principles such as the belief in unlimited potential through access to subconscious engrams 8, where 8 links to: , the site of an author of a book called "An ABC of NLP."

This website -- a link to one self-published book by one author of his own interpretation of NLP -- is nowhere near strong enough to support such a broad statement of fact (i.e. that NLP is "based on ... the belief in unlimited potential through access to subconscious engrams.") Beyond it being insufficient to support such a sweeping statement, self-published books are inappropriate as sources except as an author's opinion about themselves. · Katefan0/poll 21:01, 20 April 2006 (UTC)

In other words, publishing a book doesn't automatically make it includable. --Woohookitty 21:47, 20 April 2006 (UTC)

This has been explained during the workshop in some depth. I will start again. The statement is not comprehensively attributed. The statement is corroborated by Drenth, Devilly, Levelt, and others. So I believe that makes Sinclair an acceptable source. Camridge 02:08, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

Don't trouble yourself -- this one's simple. If you have so many other sources that say the same thing, it should be no trouble to use them instead. Since this book is self-published, it isn't appropriate for the article in any fashion. · Katefan0/poll 02:16, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

Hi Katefan0. Here is an adjustment:

NLP is based on New Age beliefs in unlimited potential and the access to subconscious engrams (Levelt 1995; Drenth 2003; Devilly 2005), and body language cues derived from the observation of “therapeutic wizards” . Techniques include behavior change, transforming beliefs, and treatment of traumas through techniques such as reframing and "meta-modeling" proposed for exploring the personal limits of belief as expressed in language.

I added the link to institute resources. They are not quoting lines from a self published book. So I guess it is acceptable. ATB Camridge 02:46, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

If you have another source, go ahead and add it to the article. Right now it's flagged as "citation needed." · Katefan0/poll 03:22, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

Thanks. Will do Camridge 04:05, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

This sentence: The fact that some people perceive NLP to work sometimes can be explained by the placebo effect, social pressure, superficial symptomatic rather than core treatment, and overestimating some apparent successes while ignoring, downplaying, or explaining away failures. as well as this one: In addition, "Ethical standards bodies and other professional associations state that unless a technique, process, drug, or surgical procedure can meet requirements of clinical tests, it is ethically questionable to offer it to the public, especially if money is to change hands."

These two sentences, which contain fairly strong statements, are supported by a reference here. However, this article does not mention NLP in any fashion. It is therefore not adequate as a source. To keep these arguments in the article, editors must find someone who believes that NLP can be explained by the placebo effect etc., as well as that NLP fails to meet ethical standards for sale to the public, else these arguments need to be removed. · Katefan0/poll 00:20, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

The author believes that NLP is both pseudoscientific and a dubious therapy. It can be further supported by research that is already cited on the article. Camridge 02:08, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

The author makes no mention of NLP in this specific article. If he believes this, use another of his publiations where he does mention NLP specifically to support this assertion, or a different source. But this article doesn't cut it. · Katefan0/poll 02:16, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

Hi. This is handled in the "baby steps" section above. ATB Camridge 02:53, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

Great, then it should be no problem for you to source both assertions properly. If they aren't sourced properly, they need to be removed. · Katefan0/poll 03:12, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

Thats easy, its all in detail in the workshop. I'll do the honours. Camridge 04:21, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

This sentence: described by ... the US-based NGO National Council Against Health Fraud as charlatanry and fraudulent is supported by this link , a NCAHF newsletter.

This document says nothing about NLP being "charlatanry and fraudulent." Even worse, this isn't a position statement for the NCAHF on NLP; rather, the only reference to NLP therein is a summation of Jack Raso's "Sorting Out Junk Science," which mentions NLP. Including a summary of a debunking of what one author considers junk science is not the same thing as the NCAHF itself having taken this position. It may well be that they have, but this link isn't enough to support such a strong position statement on behalf of NCAHF. Another source needs to be found. · Katefan0/poll 00:37, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

Yes this needs some adjustment. Camridge 02:08, 21 April 2006 (UTC) Here is another version:

NLP is identified as a dubious therapy by and the US-based NGO National Council Against Health Fraud as and described by experts such as Winkin and Parker (1999) as charlatanry and fraudulent and is promoted in the same mold as Dianetics and Scientology.

This is disingenuous. It is not described by the NCAHF as a dubious therapy. Their newsletter includes a book review for an author that describes it as a dubious therapy. Either find a real statement of position from this group to this effect or the information will be removed. · Katefan0/poll 03:24, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

Here's another version:

NLP is identified as a dubious therapy by and the Handbook of Cognitive-Behavioral Therapies (Dobson 2001), and by experts such as Winkin and Parker (1999) as charlatanry and fraudulent and is promoted in the same mold as Dianetics and Scientology.

Camridge 04:02, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

Thanks Camridge. You certainly answered the sourcing observations. I still think this below is a better option. I mean, who cares about sourcing if its correct:

It certainly reads better. I believe we should still go for bottom-up though, main body to summary. Regards HeadleyDown 11:52, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

This sentence: "...the Engram... is used within NLP to explain how NLP works" has this webpage given as a reference. This is a webpage in French which does not mention engrams, or anything that could reasonably be translated as "engram", at all. Enchanter 01:00, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

Engram in French is Engramme. Have another look. Engramme is the "neurological" explanation for neuro in NLP. Its a common New Age usage of neuro concepts. Camridge 02:08, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

Ooops, you're right! I missed that. Enchanter 08:05, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

What special expertise does this Web site claim? Does it meet the bar set out by Misplaced Pages's policies on reliable sources? I am doubtful, but am willing to be convinced. · Katefan0/poll 02:21, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

A deeper look shows that this Web site is run by a French compay called Aimesey. No idea what that is or whether they claim some special expertise in psychology either. · Katefan0/poll 02:25, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

Here is a description from a second party . Looks like an accurate enough dictionary of psychology to me. Camridge 02:56, 21 April 2006 (UTC) BTW, a lot of these kind of links were requested by the mediator during mediation in order to clarify the point. It was accepted and found to be helpful (it shows clearly that the engram concept is used to explain the neuro part of NLP). It is also more scientifically accurate than many NLP books. Camridge 02:59, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

This is a recursive explanation. The infotheque website simply says dicopsy.com is a resource on psychology put out by something called Aimesey, which tells us nothing more than what the dicopsy.com site itself already says. Additionally, this infotheque website is nothing but links -- that's not enough to validate the dicopsy.com site's information as reliable for our purposes. I notice there are utterly no other links to it anywhere discernible on the web. Dicopsy.com uses no sourcing I can see and has no information about where it derives its expertise. These are rather weak justifications and you will need to come up with more than that to argue that it's a reliable source. · Katefan0/poll 03:12, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

Sure Katefan0. I don't mind removing it, but it will probably reapear in future when another mediator drops by. Most of the sourced info on this article was added at the insistence of objectors who wanted excess sources to back up a fact they didn't like, or at the encouragement of previous mediators. There are plenty more reliable sources to support the view. So I'm flexible. ATB Camridge 03:27, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

That's fine. We can take it right back out -- if it's not reliable now, it won't be reliable later. · Katefan0/poll 03:32, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

Question on Levelt

This is partly based on a babelfish translation from Levelt who is cited by Drenth (2003) in criticising Drs. Jaap Hollander. Is this just sarcasm? There are no references, or basis for this what appears to be a joke in a sceptics magazine. It seems that Levelt's joke got lost in the translation... "What still is more done with neuro? Except the continuing recurrence that NLP concerns representations in the brain and has attention for the interaction between body and psyche, which belongs to the same cybernetic system, I have still only been able to find (in Hollander et al.) a long consideration are possible to find concerning engrammen, 'spatial and temporary patterns of active lord warrants'. Thus we read active engram, cause a collar response of each other activating engrammen. If that runs easily, we marks nothing of it. But if it gets bogged down somewhere (there is no involved-engram) then the last engram in the chain becomes conscious, accompanied by a negative emotion. There activity in the motorial lord cortex, excites then, engages (there are no involved engrams) and then we will cry or sigh. Here a dubious psychological tale is packed in engrammen metaphor which adds nothing and absolutely no predicting value has. It sounds quite scientific of course." Willem Levelt, Skepter 9(3), September 1996 ---=-C-=- 03:08, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

Hello Comaze. This has also been explained in detail in the workshop. The actual source is Intermediaire, a published Journal. This was misprepresented by someone who wanted to label it as a skeptic source. The skeptic magazine just copied it onto their site. Levelt is a world renowned psycholinguist and professor and is eminently quotable. ATB Camridge 03:16, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

It is not indexed medline or psychoinfo. Levelt may be citable, but not misrepresented. And not given too much weight. I may just need assistance with the translation. ---=-C-=- 03:19, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

Camridge recent change "NLP is based on New Age beliefs in unlimited potential and the access to subconscious engrams (Levelt 1995; Drenth 2003; Devilly 2005) I have checked Levelt (1995) and Drenth (2003) and these authors do not support the attributed text. "34emotions" link is not in english and on first glance does not appear noteworthy. So this statement rests on Devilly. I can get access to Devilly's paper over the weekend. Can someone else provide a direct quote from Devilly that support this statement? And what well-known practitioner basis their version of NLP on engrams - we've discussed this for months and still no solid evidence that connects to any of the main NLP authors - I doubt that Devilly supports this. ---=-C-=- 08:20, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

Hello Comaze. Levelt et al talk directly about engrams in NLP. I can seperate the unlimited potential sentence if you like but its not going to make much difference. As Levelt explained, the whole of NLP rests on the engram concept. We have been explaining this for months and it is so obvious. All of the internal sensory concepts of NLP rest on the new age/dianetics engram concept. Its not surprising as Perls and many other new age human potential authors were using the concept throughout their therapies (including Gestalt therapy). Camridge 08:38, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

Both Drenth and Levelt are Dutch and there was something lost in the translation. It seems Levelt is criticising Drs. Jaap Hollander, Ph.D. He does NOT say "whole of NLP rests on engram concept" See also, Jaap Hollander's reply to Drenth (and Levelt): NLP and Science: Five recommendations for a better relationship. There is no mention of engram. My Levelt's translation is not so clear still on this. ---=-C-=- 09:32, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

Hello Comaze. Hollander writes about engrams in NLP. The engram concept is used in NLP throughout every book. It is core to NLP. To be fair, it is a common concept in human potential new age developments and is generally used out of its proper context (its just a theoretical concept). Every time NLP authors talk of internal visual, auditory, or kinesthetic circuits, they are using the engram concept. Hollander does not dispute this. He does place NLP on a par with the scientific method though. He looks like he is presenting a perfect example of pseudoscientific argument. Camridge 09:42, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

Levelt and Drenth have criticised Hollander for his ideas about engrams, however the views of a single practitioners are not representative of the entire field. There are 192 (Book, Book Section, Journal Article, Thesis) indexed in medline and psychinfo, to my knowledge, none explain use engram trace or localization of memory to describe how NLP works. Drenth and Levelt are not experts on NLP, none of their articles in NLP have been indexed in medline or psychinfo. You say that Hollander's reputation is not that high. So this is a circular argument. Are you able to produce one reference of[REDACTED] standard for this claim about engram? You say Devilly supports this assertion, but I seriously doubt it. And based on my translation, Levelt does not support your statements either. ---=-C-=- 10:10, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

No Comaze they critiqued NLP. Hollander doesn't even mention the Levelt. The engram koncept is clear is part of core NLP neuro. HansAntel 10:19, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

Your partly right. Hollander's "NLP and Science" is published in "NLP World: Vol 6, 1999" before Drenth (2003) magazine article so it is not a reply. There is still a gap in the argument here, Hollander is not representative of NLP. Also you failed to address the important issues inclduding that Drenth does not provide any evidence for claims about engrams except to cite Levelt who criticises Hollander. You also failed to address the complete lack of evidence in the published psychological or experimental literature for Drenth and Levelt's claims. ---=-C-=- 11:19, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

I made a compromise on the article. Instead of bracketing neural networks, I made the engram linkable to the neural network article. The biological neuronal network and the engram are similar (except of course NLP uses the engram concept in a rather outdated and unfounded way). Regards HeadleyDown 11:45, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

Get anyone to do anything!

According to the article, "NLP book titles include ... “Get Anyone to Do Anything”". There is a popular book of this title, by David J Lieberman, but it does not appear to have anything to do with NLP - indeed, it is full of references to mainstream psychology journals. Unless there is another book by the same name relating to NLP, this would appear to be here in error. Enchanter 22:46, 20 April 2006 (UTC)

... and expanding on that, the article also claims "NLP book titles include "The Unfair Advantage in Sales" and "The Science and Technology of Getting What You Want"..."

I can find no reference to a book called "the Science and Technology of Getting What You Want" (see for example this google search, which only points back to the Misplaced Pages article.)

I also can't find "The Unfair Advantage in Sales", although there is a book called "The Unfair Advantage: Sell with NLP" , which would of course make an equally valid reference.

Enchanter 00:43, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

Thanks Enchanter, you are correct. The Science and Tech book is "Nlp: Neuro Linguistic Programming the New Art and Science of Getting What You Want by Harry Alder" Constant deletes have screwed up a lot of lines. ATB Camridge 02:14, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

The main thing we're going to eliminate is cases where there are literally 3-4 citations for once sentence. I have a feeling that all came about during the period of the most fighting over this article, i.e. alot of "I have a source!" "I do too!". Just overkill. --Woohookitty 03:23, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

Really it was something that was requested by those wishing to remove facts. There seem to be a lot of academics here who are happy to provide sources. When somebody wanted to remove a fact, it was often demanded on the basis that there were only one or two or three sources to back it up. So editors helpfully searched and provided more. We were'nt competing for how many we could stuff in there. It would be nice to be properly appreciated one day for the hard work applied to saving the more obvious facts from being deleted. ATB Camridge 03:32, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

Thanks Camridge, you've been really helpful with today's problem solving and sorting. JP just sent me some new stuff about who thinks NLP is dubious. I know Woohookitty doesn't want it all in the article, but it includes other facts that will be useful. I'll send them over. AliceDeGrey 04:59, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

Removing un-needed, unused, and duplicate references

This article currently has a tremendous number of references. References are a good thing. I applaud all the editors who have worked on this article for finding references to back up facts included here. However, there really is such a thing as too much of a good thing. Therefore, beginning this week-end, I will be removing some references that seem unessesary to me. Some of these may need some discussion - I will post again here as I actually begin the work. Thanks, Johntex\ 00:07, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

Hi Johntex, during the workshop I removed all unused references and converted to the standard inline as recommended for feature candidate articles. See the source of "Notes and References" section on the workshop dummy page, the reference list is automatically generated based on what is used in the article, with links back and forth. Is there some way we can merge the changes to "notes and references" format? It shows how many times each reference is used with backlinks to the text sections which is useful for establishing the relative weight given to each reference and POV. Some editors will object because some controversial text (for example, multiple false associations to Dianetics) was moved into the Workshop discussion, and we were unable to reach consensus to import it back in. Can you think of a middle way, where we can maintain the "notes and references" while attempting to reolve the aoutstanding issues. ---=-C-=- 00:36, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

The logical way would be to attribute all sources according to the helpful recommendations of the mentors, and once that is done, then refs can change format or be removed if they are not used. There is a section on Beyerstein that you may want to comment on before it is placed into the article. Camridge 02:11, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

This diff may assist with checking the references Note the way I converted

<ref name="drenth"/>

and how the reference list with back links is automatically generated with

<references />

. Only the first occurrance of a references needs to have the full citation details, for example:

<ref name="drenth">{{cite journal

| author=Drenth, J.D.
| title=Growing anti-intellectualism in Europe; a menace to science
| journal=ALLEA Annual Report | year=2003 | volume=- | pages=- | url=http://www.allea.org/pdf/17.pdf

}}</ref> ---=-C-=- 09:45, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

I began converting the references. I'll finish it over the weekend which will assist us check the sources and the facts. ---=-C-=- 02:42, 22 April 2006 (UTC)

Source

This is quite a good reference I think, but underutilized. Its language is clear and yet I feel that the article as it stands doesn't capitalize on its plain language to explain the critiques of NLP. Rather, we have choppy things about "therapeutic wizards" that snark but don't quite capture the nature of the criticisms. Anyway, I don't have time to digest it all or make more suggestions besides this one tonight, as I'm off to Baltimore to catch a show. FWIW, just an observation. · Katefan0/poll 20:51, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

Hello. I have made studies of the field of modern therapies in this particular area, and wish offer some insights on the sources and knowledge presented. The article here as a whole is quite outstanding in its use of scientific literature, and I have never found such a comprehensive collection of literature in this particular area (NLP) in one spot before. Well judging by the comments I have read over the past week, perhaps the academic tone is not appropriate for Misplaced Pages. So I can point out further pieces of literature that use a more accessible tone. The author, Drenth, displays a typically deep understanding (from an organizational psychology perspective) of modern psychotherapy and indicates a good overview of the area as a whole. This is not surprising considering his credentials. I have no understanding of Dutch, but Levelt also seems to be using lay terms throughout, and gives a rare insight into the neurolinguistic side of NLP (according to the keywords I have managed to sift). I should point out that postmodern and anti-establishment human potential therapies generally do not rely at all upon scientific testing. They all tend to be quite negative towards the scientific method, and work more towards eclecticism and practitioner insight. From an historical perspective this is not a criticism, though many other areas of academia will certainly give NLP a very hard time about it. The ethical side is all very debatable, and I'm sure the various parties will have their views. The postmodern therapies also (rather paradoxically) use scientific terms and often as a substitute for "spiritually enlightening" fact. The "pseudosciences" of the past used the fact that the sun rises in the east in order to support their various ideas. Now they tend to rely on more "scientific" ideas that convey a similarly "enlightening" or spirit provoking vision of salvation. Anthropologically speaking its all quite valid and is a fairly consistent follow on from traditional shamanism. So Hunt and his collegues are quite deep in their description of NLP and its relations, and they do use good examples for the lay reader. I believe that will help, especially in overview. I have no understanding of French either but Winkin does give indication that he attended seminars in California, and I get the feeling his words are pretty plain. I read the Sharpley paper a few years ago, and he definitely uses quite simple language. He draws upon the literature of NLP. Again here, he talks about NLP's magic. This can be confusing. A lot of modern therapies will use magic both as a metaphor and a "reality", just as the traditional occult fields use magic as a metaphor and a "reality". The human potential developments have often been fascinated with the esoteric and will do their best to formalise it or explain its structure in technical terms. Thus its simply a follow on from earlier followings, and is consistent with the anti-establishment radical push of the new age and human potential industry. Magical thinking has been very much criticised by science, though many Freudians and Jungians will make liberal use of it in their practice. Obviously they are also criticised for this. Perls, Erickson, Satir, and Bateson also drew heavily from occult or shamanic practice and spirituality (Eastern) for developing insight and utilizing the elements of "human potential". This is why the human potential developments are synonymous with the new age. New age is the realization of the spiritual focus inherant in the human potential movement. So when being plain about spirituality in NLP it is probably fine to refer to both the more semi-religious components and the psychological (goal, mission, and purpose) elements of spirituality. This will be even more plausible as NLP does not want science, and indeed has been found to be unsupported after thorough testing. NLP is probably easiest for a reader to understand (sympathetically) as a belief system, and its common rituals (or NLP patterns) will make the reading easier. I noticed the Dilts encyclopedia is online. He has a scientific background and his writing is very accessible. I get the impression he is also quite honest, though oversimplistic in his theories. Also, Lilienfeld (though clearly very concerned) is also very clear in his writing. Definitely, more can be made of the clearer elements of the literature. Enjoy your show in Baltimore. Oblio Yu HKU 06:09, 22 April 2006 (UTC)

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