Template talk:Speculation

Template wording to warn people of speculation.

I think this template is very important especially in movie or sensitive articles where people would speculate on them. I have come across so many movie articles that try to "explain" one thing or another and tries to justify it. Speculation occurs sometimes article, where sensitive information are presented, like how or when China would invade Taiwan. (I came across this, incidentally, in a movie article - so this maybe a bad example.) (its there as of oct 5, 2006)

I tried to reword the template a bit but seems like it still fails to warn people who are reading the article of these speculations. So, if you can think of a stronger wording, please apply them to the template.Feureau 21:30, 4 October 2006 (UTC)

We could add Reader beware: but that might come off as offensive, so I don't know. I'll see if I can think of another alternative. Regards, Signature^brendel 22:20, 4 October 2006 (UTC)

It needs to be tersened into a request.

That's all I hav to say about this topic. It's too long. BrewJay (talk) 04:49, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

Please move Speculation in any of the following material into history. I'm linking it to the notability policy, because it's clearly not notable; it's someone's guess.BrewJay (talk) 04:55, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

• Your version was not clear. How do you 'move something into history'? That doesn't make sense. I've reworded it. Most other statements use a statement for the first line, and then place the request underneath it, so I have tried to do the same here. --GW_Simulations_{User Page | Talk} 20:47, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

Unverifiable speculation

Per "Wikipedia is not a collection of unverifiable speculation" (see WP:CRYSTAL), I edited the template to read "This article appears to contain unverifiable speculation and unjustified claims. Information must be verifiable and based on reliable published sources. Please remove unverified speculation from the article." The template previously read, "This article appears to contain speculation and unjustified claims. Information must be verifiable and based on reliable published sources. Please remove speculation from the article." -- Uzma Gamal (talk) 13:31, 6 January 2011 (UTC)

Readded Template:Speculation section to the "See also" list

It had previously been on the list, but was later removed as being redundant with the navbox. While that's true, the navbox is a dense mass of templates, most of which are only peripherally related to this template, whereas Speculation section is very closely tied to this template and those who might be looking to apply it; I think that warrants the duplication.

(I see from the code that this template take the standard override for the default "article" term via the first unnamed parameter (e.g. |section, however that's not documented the way it is in Template:Original research/doc and others. If the documentation is updated to make it clear that Speculation section is a purely redundant template, then I'd see no reason for it to remain on the "See also" list.) -- FeRD_NYC (talk) 14:40, 31 December 2016 (UTC)

Historical speculation?

• This template and the corresponding inline seem treat "speculation" as a synonym for "prediction"; is there another template that is meant for historical speculation (guessing about what happened in the past as opposed to guessing about what will happen in the future)? If there is, I haven't found it. If there isn't, then I think these templates for speculation may need to be edited to clarify their scope.

While historical speculation in many cases could be marked by "dubious" or "citation needed" instead, that doesn't work when the text appears to be extrapolating historical events from non-dubious evidence from a referenced citation. In those cases, "speculation" would appear to be the appropriate template since the problem is extrapolation into the past; however, the guidance provided for this template only appears to acknowledge extrapolation into the future. What's to be done? Scyrme (talk) 22:30, 4 September 2021 (UTC)

@Scyrme: If you look up the definition of "speculation" or "speculate" in a dictionary, all of the meanings are about the future, there's really no way around that. When you "speculate" about the past, what you're really doing is making predictions about what we will learn to be true in the future. In legal terminology that's also referred to as "conjecture".

If the text of an article is extrapolating historical events from non-dubious evidence from a referenced citation then that's likely either synthesis or original research, both of which have cleanup templates ({{synthesis}} and {{original research}}, respectively). If it's not actually in the sources, then it's not a sourced statement. If it's a fair conjecture based on the available evidence, then someone has likely made and published that connection themselves and we should source the claim to them, so it might also be a case of {{only primary sources}} or {{unreliable sources}}. But you're right that we're not supposed to be inserting that sort of conjecture ourselves, not if it isn't supported by the citations. (So the {{failed verification}} or {{unverifiable}} inlines may also come into play.) -- FeRDNYC (talk) 07:12, 6 September 2021 (UTC)

• @FeRDNYC: I don't think it is true that "in a dictionary, all of the meanings are about the future". The primary definition in the Cambridge English Dictionary is:

  "the activity of guessing possible answers to a question without having enough information to be certain".

  The Oxford Advanced American Dictionary gives the definition:

  "the act of forming opinions about what has happened or what might happen without knowing all the facts".

  The former definition applies regardless of past or future, while the latter explicitly includes conjectures about past events. I also don't agree that conjectures about past events are really predictions about what will be learned in the future, but I think arguing on this point is a bit tangential. If historical speculation really is a kind of prediction, as you say, then these would still seem to be the appropriate templates, in which case I think templates could do with an edit to make that clear.

"Original research" could work, but it's very non-specific and I'm not convinced that apparent conjectures by editors about historical events constitute "research". Perhaps in a very broad sense they do, I don't know. "Failed verification" could work where sources are openly accessible but it's still non-specific, and it doesn't help where works are less accessible; it may be better to have something else with which to tag lines that look to be conjecture so someone who already has access can try to verify. "Unverifiable" is a redirect to "nonspecific", which tags references which are too vague so doesn't work here.

Looking at Category:Articles containing predictions or speculation, it seems people have already been tagging conjectures about past events as "speculation". eg. 1846 and 1847 United States House of Representatives elections, 2001 anthrax attacks, History of measurement, Macromerine. Scyrme (talk) 18:49, 6 September 2021 (UTC)