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)
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)
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)
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)
extrapolating historical events from non-dubious evidence from a referenced citationthen 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)
The Oxford Advanced American Dictionary gives the definition:"the activity of guessing possible answers to a question without having enough information to be certain".
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."the act of forming opinions about what has happened or what might happen without knowing all the facts".