Talk:Jeroen C. J. M. van den Bergh

COI

Per the connected contributor box above, the subject of this article has written most of it. Needs to be reviewed by independent editors for NPOV before tag can be removed. My goodness. Research83 you must stop directly editing this article. Jytdog (talk) 02:00, 20 March 2015 (UTC)

RESPONSE: Categories were added as this was requested. A few selected books and articles (out of a total of 16 books and more than 160 articles by the person described) were added; note that such selections are included in many other Wikipedia articles on scientists, so the article is perfectly consistent with these. Finally, one sentence was added on two coined terms by the person, with a reference. It is overdone then to start questioning the neutrality of the article. It is not a surprise that many scientists are disappointed about how Wikipedia treats articles about living scientists. A lot of detail on football players, writers and actors (also mediocre ones), and very limited info on scientists. Most articles on scientists don't provide any interesting, non-trivial information. For some reason you don't allow that their work and essential contributions are explained - but this is surely what readers would like (and deserve to) know. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 88.12.118.119 (talk • contribs)

Your response is not responsive to the problem. The problem was explained at WP:COI/N and at User_talk:Research83, and I've been something of a defender of your contribs so far. You'll lose the ally you have if you don't even acknowledge others' attempt to define the problem. While we try to refrain from biting wikipedia editor newbies, they are expected to be responsive to behavioral feedback as well as content feedback. I concur with your description of your contribs, but their quality has no bearing on the problem others' have articulated. Try again? NewsAndEventsGuy (talk) 10:47, 20 March 2015 (UTC)

Yes the response (which I also assume is Research83) is not on point and additionally, does not accurately reflect the contributions, which can be seen here. Research83, who is the subject of the article per the dif in the connected contributor box above:

• created the article
• has contributed 92% of the content
• and made 87.4% of the edits.

This is a massive violation of COI. Jytdog (talk) 13:08, 20 March 2015 (UTC)

However, if the overall project is improved, then our policy to WP:Ignore all rules should probably trump the lesser behavioral guideline covering WP:Conflict of interest, and I'd change "should probably" to "definitely" if the doc decides to build the encyclopedia by working on the subject matter and not just his autobiography. NewsAndEventsGuy (talk) 13:13, 20 March 2015 (UTC)

I don't see it that way. There is no COI when an expert adds well-sourced, NPOV content about work in their field, citing themselves rarely if ever. That kind of editing behavior would be very welcome, and would not violate COI. Jytdog (talk) 13:21, 20 March 2015 (UTC)

RESPONSE 2: Thank you for your extended reaction. But I find it difficult to understand. Perhaps because I am a newcomer to Wikipedia editing. Despite my experience as an academic editor and author, I haven't seen such abstract, cryptic reviews before. You suggest you try to "refrain from biting wikipedia editor newbies", but the treatment applied strikes me as sharp. I am in doubt whether I am expected now to make further changes in the article, or stop editing it (as suggested in the first set of comments). If the first, should I then delete the lastly added sentence in the article? Or why don't some of you edit the article - I thought this was the idea of wikipedia, rather than limiting or forbidding others to make changes. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 88.12.118.119 (talk) 21:23, 20 March 2015 (UTC)

Let me make this perfectly clear.

1) read WP:COI to which you have already been pointed many many times.

Here I will fucking quote it for you, and will put lots of space around it, so you can focus on it.

• "You should not create or edit articles about yourself, your family, or friends."

here is another quote for you:

• "Using material you have written or published is allowed within reason, but only if it is relevant, conforms to the content policies, including WP:SELFPUB, and is not excessive. Citations should be in the third person and should not place undue emphasis on your work. When in doubt, defer to the community's opinion."

That is plain mother fucking English.

2) FOLLOW IT.

It is not rocket science. Read it. Follow it.

As an academic scientist you can only be fully aware of what "conflict of interest" is, and of the importance of managing COI in any scholarly endeavor. Yet you have been flagrantly blowing off Wikipedia's conflict of interest guideline.

If you continue to violate the COI guideline, I will seek a site ban. I am disgusted, and am done here. Jytdog (talk) 21:31, 20 March 2015 (UTC) striking, shouting was bad, and i apologize - see below Jytdog (talk) 13:49, 21 March 2015 (UTC))

Jytdog,

WP:Please don't shout

Thanks

NewsAndEventsGuy (talk) 21:50, 20 March 2015 (UTC)

While you're at it, compare WP:Civility and WP:WikiBullying, then ask if you're citing WP:COI in a civil manner, or citing it to defeat the spirit of WP:Civility, which is what a WP:wikilawyer would do. NewsAndEventsGuy (talk) 21:55, 20 March 2015 (UTC)

That is awesome! I had no idea that you could multiply bigs like that. Thanks for showing me that. I am happy to work with people who try. And I fully understand that Wikipedia can be bewildering for new editors. However, response #2 was utter bullshit; and if there is one thing that ends my patience sharply, it is arrogant bullshit. Well, that, and lazy arrogance. how many fucking times do people have to say, "hey pal you have a COI issue" before you actually fucking stop and read about what that means, where you are? What got his attention, was power. I said he would be blocked if he didn't start responding. So he responded. (weak applause) And showed zero evidence of giving a fuck about COI much less having read it, much less caring about the integrity of WP. Academic scientists know what COI is - they have to fill out disclosure forms all the time, including when they publish papers. Done, and fucking done. I am going to start working on cleaning up the shitpile of an article. We cannot have shitpiles littering Wikipedia. Jytdog (talk) 21:57, 20 March 2015 (UTC) (striking, per below Jytdog (talk) 13:49, 21 March 2015 (UTC))

Surprising to read the “shouting” and strong language by Jytdog above. Never in my career (of more than 25 years) I have seen such an extreme over-reaction . I would like to think that Wikipedia editors are calm, reasonable and neutral. In the academic world, such behavior (even if corrected and apologized for as done below) would be the end of your career as an editor. It is difficult to believe then that this editor has afterwards made the drastic changes as s/he has done in an unprejudiced way. I had been revising this for a year now, trying to constructively respond to the various comments. And now I find that all the subtleties have been removed in one stroke by an editor who has no clear expertise on the person or area of research described in the article.

None of the previous reviewers/editors have stated that I could not make changes in the article. In fact, the tone was always that I should make changes in response to the comments, and so I did. This was the first time someone said I should stop making changes, and I immediately did. And I have no problem if my suggestions (when are deemed reasonable) are included through another editor. It is not fair then by Jytdog to suggest I was not open to this.

I, however, don’t question Jytdog’s editorial qualities and am happy that below s/he clearly motivated several (but not all) of the changes s/he made. I respond to these motivations immediately below each of them. Research83 (talk) 05:43, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

do over

• (OK, so I have been reflecting on my behavior here. I regret having lost my cool and shouting and apologize to everybody who has had to read that. I am ashamed of that, and I apologize. I should have said the exact same thing, much more calmly. So, I am striking what I wrote above, and saying it again here, in a way that I can stand behind.)

Research83, you are an academic and you understand what "conflict of interest" is - you have had to make COI declarations when you have submitted papers, and you have written about it in at least one paper. You have been pointed to WP's COI guideline many times and you have not responded. Here and here, the latter of which referred you to here. it was only after i noted that you could be site banned if you continue to ignore our efforts to call your attention to COI (here and here) that you finally started talking back above.

So. You need to deal with your conflict of interest, and Wikipedia's guidelines for COI and the WP's policy on self-promotion. Ignoring those things, and ignoring people trying to talk to you about it, is not OK.

1) Please read WP:PROMO, which is Wikipedia policy. Every single edit you have made, (and I reviewed them all) has been to add content about yourself to WP.

2) Please also read WP:EXPERT, especially #5 under "advice" We greatly value experts, but not when they come here to use to WP for self promotion.

3) please read WP:COI.

Here are two key quotes from it for you:

• "You should not create or edit articles about yourself, your family, or friends."
• 'Using material you have written or published is allowed within reason, but only if it is relevant, conforms to the content policies, including WP:SELFPUB, and is not excessive. Citations should be in the third person and should not place undue emphasis on your work. When in doubt, defer to the community's opinion."

4) So... follow the COI guideline, and do not continue to use Wikipedia for self-promotion.

If you continue to violate the COI guideline and to abuse Wikipedia for self-promotion, I will seek a site ban. That would be a shame, as you are an accomplished economist, and we can always use more expert contributors. But if you continue to show that you are not here to build an encyclopedia then you will lose your editing privileges.

I hope that is clear to you now.

To answer your questions directly:

a) if you want to see changes to this article, you should suggest them on this page, for other editors to implement. (This process is described in the WP:COI guideline, which is part of the reason why I have urged you to read it.)

b) about the " abstract, cryptic reviews ".... these are not "reviews", they are comments of people trying to talk with you. If you decide to stick around (and although it might not seem that way, I hope you do, albeit it only if you behave in a different way) you will find people responding to you and to what you write, and citing guidelines and policies by linking to them. You need to read what is linked to. That is how we communicate information about policies and guidelines here. It does make communications appear brief and somewhat cryptic, but we are all volunteers and the policy/guideline documents are well thought out and explain what you need to know. Bottom line is that you need to read links that other people embed in their comments to you. We have lots of policies and guidelines but the one that rules them all is WP:CONSENSUS - we talk to each other. That is how we collaborate and work things out.

Thanks. Jytdog (talk) 13:49, 21 March 2015 (UTC)

coinings

article said he coined "GDP paradox", apparently based on his 2009 paper. I found no secondary source to confirm that, and while searching, found this from 2008. So I took that out. He also claimed coining "agrowth" based on his 2011 paper (although he has an earlier paper from 2010) but again I found no secondary source confirming that, and also found a blog about sustainability in ag using the term that started in 2008. Jytdog (talk) 01:14, 21 March 2015 (UTC)

“GDP paradox” in the blog mentioned is just an ad hoc title of a short essay in an unknown blog. Moreover, this title is not repeated in the article itself, and the paradox is not well explained. Instead, the van den Bergh article was published in a serious refereed academic journal with an impact factor, offers a very clear and unique explanation of the paradox, and among his articles represents one of the most cited per year. Moreover, this article was submitted in July 2008 as it says in the published version. “Agrowth” has been commented upon in various websites as a relevant and innovative notion (I had included references to these websites). Research83 (talk) 05:45, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

here is the original text with its sourcing:

He coined the notions of GDP paradox and agrowth, the latter denoting a third position next to the polarized pro- and anti-growth views, suggesting to focus on effective public (e.g. environmental) policies and not worry about their impact on economic growth.

References

the only support offered for the coining, were van den Bergh's own papers, which cannot be sources for the claim that he coined the term. I found no secondary source supporting that claim. Would be happy to see any. Jytdog (talk) 11:53, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

Royal/Shell Prize / aka Koninklijke/Shell Prijs econoom

I removed the following: "he was awarded the 2002 Royal/Shell Prize for research on ‘Sustainable Development, Environment and Resources’." (source was "Koninklijke/Shell Prijs 2002 voor professor Van den Bergh". Nieuwsbank.nl.) I googled both "Royal/Shell Prize" and "Koninklijke/Shell Prijs econoom" and found mostly references to him citing it, and a few stray others. Doesn't seem to be notable. I would be happy to see some source showing that prize is some kind of big deal worth mentioning.. like a list of winners somewhere or the like. Jytdog (talk) 01:40, 21 March 2015 (UTC)

The Royal/Shell prize (Koninklijke/Shellprijs) was one of the largest science prizes in the Netherlands. It has been awarded since the 1950s as a general science prize (notably for physics, chemistry, engineering), and since the late 1990s was refocused on environmental sciences. The prize award at that time was € 100.000,- and the prize winners were selected under auspices of the Royal Dutch Academy of Sciences (KNAW - https://www.knaw.nl/nl) – both of which illustrate that this was a serious prize. There used to be a website with the list of all the winners, but Shell stopped to award the prize several years ago, and the website was after some time cancelled. The link I put in the article (http://www.nieuwsbank.nl/inp/2002/10/16/P158.htm) was therefore to another source to identify that van den Bergh won the prize in 2002. Here are more links about the prize and other winners (all in Dutch):

http://www.bkb.nl/en/node/147

http://www.fom.nl/live/nieuws/archief_personalia/personalia2003/artikel.pag?objectnumber=47546

http://www.vno-ncw.nl/publicaties/Forum/Pages/Uitreiking_KoninklijkeShell_Prijs_Wetenschapper_maakt_biomassa_vloeibaar_14196.aspx#.VQ3Is45XnkY

Here is info available in English (http://www.feweb.vu.nl/nl/afdelingen-en-instituten/spatial-economics/awards-and-nominations/index.asp), where it says: “Royal Shell Prize for Jeroen van den Bergh: The Royal Shell Prize 2002 was awarded to the environmental economist professor Jeroen van den Bergh. He received the prize for his research in the field of sustainable development, the environment, and natural resources. He was unanimously chosen by the members of the jury and received the amount of 100,000 Euro.” Research83 (talk) 05:46, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

no one is disputing that you won the award - you have cited that about yourself a million times. yes i had found all those sources. none of them discuss the notability of the prize. the site from the PR company BKB is especially not useful. as a a counter example, the Lasker Award is well known and there are many many sources as to its prestige. Jytdog (talk) 12:02, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

You are simply trying to avoid that something is in the article that supports vdB's reputation, like info on the handbook or on the two general prizes. Doesn't information in other languages than English (Dutch, Catalan) count? Many articles on scientists mention less important awards. So there is no consistency in how this article and other, similar ones are being treated. Research83 (talk) 16:57, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

please discuss content not contributors per WP:TPG. Your other remarks are not on point - the question is whether the award is notable. again, every year when the Lasker is awarded, newspapers report it. it is significant. what secondary sources regularly report on either of the awards you would like to mention? Jytdog (talk) 17:04, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

I perfectly understand that it would be ideal if a reference could be made to a website explaining the prize and showing a list of its past winners. I’ll ask the KNAW and Shell if they can restore the old website about the prize, which is necessary in current times when information seems to be valid only if it is digitized and available through the Internet. However, I think that every reasonable person would agree that a prize with a money amount of € 100.000 is an important prize, in any context – whether national or international. This insight itself should suffice to include a mention of the prize in the article. A link to an eventual website with more detailed information, if it comes available, might then be added later. Research83 (talk) 18:56, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

Here http://www.volkskrant.nl/archief/een-poldermodel-voor-de-aarde~a631075/ is a weblink to an article in the main left-wing newspaper of the Netherlands, De Volkskrant of October 2002 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/De_Volkskrant), with an interview with vdB due to having been awarded the Royal/Shell prize. This answers your question for a secondary source/newspaper article. Research83 (talk) 19:49, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

I am not going to respond to you further if you continue to refuse to indent your posts. That is a useful source. i will add content about the shell prize back to the article. Jytdog (talk) 19:53, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

Thanks. Sorry for not indenting - didn't know this was needed (or how to do it). I am trying to do it now.

Btw, one error in the article that I forgot to mention: vdB is elected member of the Academy of Europe (Academia Europaea) as of October 2010, not 2015 (ref. to his cv at ICREA can be made). Research83 (talk) 20:12, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

"Sant Jordi Environmental Prize"/"Premi Sant Jordi de Medi Ambient"

"Sant Jordi Environmental Prize" yields only references to van den Bergh. (content was sourced to here) ditto "Premi Sant Jordi de Medi Ambient". all self-promo, it appears. as above, i would be happy to see some evidence that this prize is notable. Jytdog (talk) 01:46, 21 March 2015 (UTC)

The "Sant Jordi Environmental Prize"/"Premi Sant Jordi de Medi Ambient" is a serious science prize given yearly to a researcher in environmental science by the Institut d’Estudis Catalan (IEC) – the “Academy of Sciences” of the region Catalonia (with capital Barcelona) in Spain. Here is a link to the IEC that provide information (on page 2) indicating that van den Bergh won this prize in 2011 (unfortunately, most of the information is in Catalan, but with internet translators everything is now accessible):

http://www.iec.cat/institucio/documents/Premis_2011.pdf Research83 (talk) 05:47, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

i never disputed that you won the prize. the question is whether it notable/worth mentioning, as above. Jytdog (talk) 12:03, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

See what I said above under the Royal/Shell Prize. Anyway, what do you consider as sufficiently notable? Only international prizes? vdB won two main environmental science prizes in two different countries. Few people can say this. Not notable enough? Research83 (talk) 17:02, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

I am looking for any source discussing the prize itself, that shows it is worth mentioning in an encyclopedia for the general public. Jytdog (talk) 17:16, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

It is a bit too much asked for a Catalan science prize to be advertised at Wikipedia like the Lasker prize you mentioned. But at this webpage http://www.iec.cat/activitats/noticiasencera.asp?id_noticies=247 it says at the end something that you are asking for: “Des que es van instituir el 1914, els Premis Sant Jordi de l’IEC distingeixen les institucions i les persones que han contribuït, amb llurs activitats o treballs, a la consolidació i al prestigi de la recerca científica i de la cultura catalana, amb una incidència especial en la promoció dels joves investigadors de tots els àmbits de les ciències i les humanitats.” Translation: “Since they were instituted in 1914 , Sant Jordi Awards of the IEC distinguish institutions and individuals who have contributed with their work or activities, to consolidate the prestige of scientific research and Catalan culture with special emphasis on the promotion of young researchers from all fields of science and the humanities.” And at the beginning of the same document it says: “Entre els premis generals destaquen el Premi de Medi Ambient per a Jeroen van den Bergh”, translated: “Among the general prizes the Environmental Prize for Jeroen van den Bergh is notable”. Research83 (talk) 18:06, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

you make my point that the jordi prize is not a big enough deal for a Wikipedia article. it is nothing like a lasker. and the press release you cite does what press releases do. i am looking for something like this Jytdog (talk) 18:22, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

Few prizes are equivalent with Nobel prizes. If this is the standard against which to measure, than indeed very very few prizes can be mentioned. You moreover need to do some cleaning up in Wikipedia and get rid of many prizes mentioned that are too far from the Nobel prize level. Please try to be consistent with what has been accepted in many other articles, and don't apply other or more stringent standards to this article. I would be interested to hear the opinion of others on this. Research83 (talk) 19:08, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

the article i linked to was not about a nobel- that is a strawman argument. i agree that other voices would be useful here. Jytdog (talk) 19:32, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

If you are looking for a newspaper article on this prize: Here www.iec.cat/butlleti/pdf/153_butlleti_recull_premis_sant_jordi.pdf is an article in a main Spanish (4th most circulated) and the most important Catalan newspaper La Vanguardia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_Vanguardia) about the prize, with vdB also mentioned at the end. Research83 (talk) 20:04, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

selected papers

to give this some meaning, i cited his top 5 most-cited papers from google scholar (which has the benefit of being freely available). I doubled checked at the Web of Science (more scholarly but proprietary) and it roughly matched. Here is the list from Web of Science

• 1.

Spatial sustainability, trade and indicators: an evaluation of the 'ecological footprint' By: van den Bergh, JCJM; Verbruggen, H ECOLOGICAL ECONOMICS Volume: 29 Issue: 1 Pages: 61-72 Published: APR 1999 Times Cited: 207

• 2.

Ecological-economic analysis of wetlands: scientific integration for management and policy By: Turner, RK; van den Bergh, JCJM; Soderqvist, T; et al. ECOLOGICAL ECONOMICS Volume: 35 Issue: 1 Special Issue: SI Pages: 7-23 Published: OCT 2000 Times Cited: 178

• 3.

Economic growth and emissions: reconsidering the empirical basis of environmental Kuznets curves By: de Bruyn, SM; van den Bergh, JCJM; Opschoor, JB ECOLOGICAL ECONOMICS Volume: 25 Issue: 2 Pages: 161-175 Published: MAY 1998 Times Cited: 152

• 4.

Economic valuation of biodiversity: sense or nonsense? By: Nunes, PALD; van den Bergh, JCJM ECOLOGICAL ECONOMICS Volume: 39 Issue: 2 Pages: 203-222 Published: NOV 2001 Times Cited: 133

• 5.

Alternative models of individual behaviour and implications for environmental policy By: van den Bergh, JCJM; Ferrer-i-Carbonell, A; Munda, G ECOLOGICAL ECONOMICS Volume: 32 Issue: 1 Pages: 43-61 Published: JAN 2000 Times Cited: 75

• 6.

Structural decomposition analysis of physical flows in the economy By: Hoekstra, R; van den Bergh, JCJM ENVIRONMENTAL & RESOURCE ECONOMICS Volume: 23 Issue: 3 Pages: 357-378 Published: NOV 2002 Times Cited: 63

• 7.

Evolutionary policies for sustainable development: adaptive flexibility and risk minimising By: Rammel, C; van den Bergh, JCJM ECOLOGICAL ECONOMICS Volume: 47 Issue: 2-3 Pages: 121-133 Published: DEC 2003 Times Cited: 62

• 8.

Evaluation of risks of metal flows and accumulation in economy and environment By: Guinee, JB; van den Bergh, JCJM; Boelens, J; et al. ECOLOGICAL ECONOMICS Volume: 30 Issue: 1 Pages: 47-65 Published: JUL 1999 Times Cited: 60

• 9.

Material flows and economic models: an analytical comparison of SFA, LCA and partial equilibrium models By: Bouman, M; Heijungs, R; van der Voet, E; et al. ECOLOGICAL ECONOMICS Volume: 32 Issue: 2 Pages: 195-216 Published: FEB 2000 Times Cited: 54

• 10.

Insurance against climate change and flooding in the Netherlands: Present, future, and comparison with other countries By: Botzen, W. J. W.; van den Bergh, J. C. J. M. RISK ANALYSIS Volume: 28 Issue: 2 Pages: 413-426 Published: APR 2008 Times Cited: 52

If somebody has a better idea, i am all ears. Jytdog (talk) 02:11, 21 March 2015 (UTC)

Mentioning the top 5 most-cited papers from google scholar is questionable for various reasons: - It gives too much attention to citations, and neglects important journals or diversity of topics, or topics that are most characteristic for this author. - It does not take into account whether the author was the first/main author or not. It would make more sense to select from the list the articles that van den Bergh authored alone or where he was mentioned as first author. - These are relatively old publications, which partly contributes to them being much cited. One might also look at articles that are relatively much cited given the time since publication (i.e. ranking according to citations per year). This procedure is now invented by the editor, and I it is not consistent with lists of selected articles found in other articles about scientists. Usually articles are mentioned that reflect best the work or ideas of the respective people, like the list which I had originally included. I would like to suggest the editor therefore to revert to that original list. Research83 (talk) 05:49, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

what are the sources for the selection of the original papers as being your best work? we need some basis on which to decide which of the ~150 papers to include. otherwise it violates WP:INDISCRIMINATE. as i wrote above i am open to some other criteria but it needs to be based on something we can cite as a source. it cannot just be van den Bergh's preference. Jytdog (talk) 12:05, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

My suggestion was to not focus on a narrow citation criterion but to use a kind of multi-criteria approach, taking into account the criteria I mentioned above: citation, average citation per year since publication, vdB as first or main author, an important journal, and the topic being important in vdB's research. Please don't ridicule my point - it is clear I didn't suggest to mention all (more than 160 journal publications) by vdB. The list I had included originally in the article fits better the mentioned set of criteria. I am not saying this is necessarily the best/optimal choice (this would be a difficult decision problem), but it is considerably better. Many others choices would be better two. To be more specific: of the articles you mention above, numbers 1, 4 and 5 are ok, but the others less so. Probably, the article on the GDP paradox should appear here too, as it is one of the most cited ones in the last years. Given vdB's shift in research focus since several years to climate policy, something on this topic would also make sense to appear in the list of selected articles. You can see that this logic is consistent with my original list. Research83 (talk) 17:16, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

last time i will respond. i am not being sarcastic or ridiculing. we need some external sourcing to guide the selection. i suggested # of citations, supported by google scholar which is backed by Web of Science. if you want different criteria, say what they are, and what external sources we would look to determine what papers meet them. it cannot just be the ones you select, based on your authority. That is original research which is forbidden by policy. your personal opinions do not matter here, nor do mine. that is the essence of the WP:OR policy. Jytdog (talk) 17:21, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

The De Bruijn et al. and Turner et al. articles are not important in vdB’s research and he is not the first author of these. It would be reasonable to replace them by the nearest articles in vdB’s Google Scholar publication list of which he is single author:

- The GDP paradox, JCJM Van den Bergh, Journal of Economic Psychology 30 (2), 117-135

- Evolutionary thinking in environmental economics, JCJM Van den Bergh, Journal of Evolutionary Economics 17 (5), 521-549

These are moreover two themes (environment-vs-growth debate and evolutionary environmental economics) that are important in vdB’s work next to climate change/policy. Wrt to the latter theme, you might add the Climate Change or Nature Climate Change article that was part of the list I proposed. Research83 (talk) 17:47, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

You are not proposing anything I can WP:VERIFY with an external source. Jytdog (talk)

You don't respond to my argument. Please do so. And I strongly get the feeling (based on this item and that on the two prizes discussed on this page) that you apply standards which are clearly different from what has been accepted in many other Wikipedia articles. Most selected publications in Wikipedia contributions that I have seen are not motivated by "most cited articles in Google Scholar". So why follow a different, ad hoc approach here? Research83 (talk) 19:20, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

you are not responding to the need for some external sources to bring to bear. let's wait and see what others have to say on this too. Jytdog (talk) 19:33, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

Article “The GDP Paradox” published in Journal of Economic Psychology 30(2), was awarded a "Citation of Excellence" by the Emerald Management Reviews. Less than 1% of all articles in the database receive this acclaim. The list is available at . This together with the fact that this is one of the most cited articles of vdB on average per year is a good reason to include it in the list of selected journal articles. That it is much cited on average per year can be quickly seen by comparing year of publication and position in Google Scholar list: This paper is from 2009 and on the 10th position, while the first nine in the list are from the period 1997-2003.

Research83 (talk) 09:11, 23 March 2015 (UTC)

COI tag

I went over the article and removed puffery and cited everything. still relies a lot on WP:SPS but per WP:BLPSELFPUB that is marginally ok, i guess. typical academic.. not much independent discussion of him per se. I removed the COI tag. it can stay off as long as the subject avoids editing it directly. I have it watchlisted. Jytdog (talk) 02:34, 21 March 2015 (UTC)

More changes have been made by Jytdog, notably deleting the sentences (with reference/link) on the Handbook of Environmental and Resource Economics, which was an important contribution by van den Bergh to his discipline. And deleting the weblinks to various aspects of van den Bergh’s work at the end (this was added upon the suggestion of earlier reviewers/editors). It would be reasonable to revert these links. Research83 (talk) 05:50, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

with regard to the Handbook... it is already listed in the Book section. There is no reason to discuss things twice. the text i removed from the "academic career and activities" section was:

He edited the Handbook of Environmental and Resource Economics (1999, Edward Elgar Publ., 1328 pages). This has been evaluated as a constructive synthesis of mainstream and heterodox approaches.

References

On the external links, I provided the justification for removing each of them as I went, but in general please read WP:ELNO Jytdog (talk) 12:11, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

So nothing interesting about vdB's work can be mentioned. Is this based on the idea that Wikikpedia should minimize the amount of interesting information about the works of scientists. I accept your point that repetition should be avoided if possible (in this case, it would be logical then to give priority to the sentence over the mere mention of the publication in the selected books section), but isn't it also good to not be dogmatic in this respect. Please realize that since the 1970s very few handbooks have been published in the area of environmental and resource economics. This one is moreover unique wrt scope and heterodox character, as reflected by the book review by the ex-president of the Europ. Assoc. of Env and Resource Economists. But I guess nothing about vdB's work is considered interesting (yes, I have become cynical). Research83 (talk) 16:50, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

of course it can. it needs to be reliably sourced is all. i'll add mention of the review in the list of books. (the remark that ", some authors have a propensity to cite themselves more than is strictly necessary" was interesting. Jytdog (talk) 17:01, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

Please refrain from making suggestive remarks that don't serve any purpose here and only can cause irritation. I am also doing my best, which is not easy as I am not convinced yet (but willing to give it a chance) that you are perfectly neutral regarding this article. And thanks for responding twice to my comments with a change in the article. Research83 (talk) 19:30, 22 March 2015 (UTC)