Sounds like university-type political correctness gone wild. With the web becoming (if not already) the primary (only?) source for learning about history (and everything else), it would be nice to learn about all sides, free from bias and distortion, especially from a source that has pretensions to become the people’s Encyclopedia Galactica. But as they say, history is the tale of wars as told by the victors, written in the blood of the vanquished. Truth be damned.
As I’m writing this column for the Financial Post, I am simultaneously editing a page on Wikipedia. I am confident that just about everything I write for my column will be available for you to read. I am equally confident that you will be able to read just about nothing that I write for the page on Wikipedia.
The Wikipedia page is entitled Naomi Oreskes, after a professor of history and science studies at the University of California San Diego, but the page offers only sketchy details about Oreskes. The page is mostly devoted to a notorious 2004 paper that she wrote, and that Science journal published, called “Beyond the Ivory Tower: The Scientific Consensus on Climate Change.” This paper analyzed articles in peer-reviewed journals to see if any disagreed with the alarming positions on global warming taken by the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. “Remarkably, none of the papers disagreed with the consensus position,” Oreskes concluded.
[…]
Why can Tabletop speak for Peiser but not I, who have his permission?, I thought. I redid Tabletop’s undid and protested: “Tabletop is distorting Peiser. She does not speak for him. Peiser has approved my description of events concerning him.”Tabletop parried: “We have a reliable source to this. What Peiser has said to *you* is irrelevant.”
Tabletop, it turns out, has another name: Kim Dabelstein Petersen. She (or he?) is an editor at Wikipedia. What does she edit? Reams and reams of global warming pages. […] If you have read a climate change article on Wikipedia — or on any controversial subject that may have its own Kim Dabelstein Petersen — beware. Wikipedia is in the hands of the zealots.
Follow the MONEY !!! Those with the money can hire an unlimited number of flacks to BEND THE TRUTH – OR ERASE IT COMPLETELY !!! Consider it WHACKY-PEDIA, and take every entry with a grain of salt and a TON OF SCEPTICISM (A word you could look up on the Wiki, but be careful!) !!!
The point being (without SHOUTING): if it’s not been peer reviewed and is controversial, don’t trust Wikipedia, because the truth can be hacked by either side of the controversy.
I find Wikipedia to be a fairly reliable resource for hard science and math articles. I doubt I would trust it for even a filmography of “Bedtime For Bonzo.”
It’s true that many sleepless zealots have acquired squatters rights over many Wikipedia articles.
I was going to disagree. Seems my reading lull has been broken by Wikipedia–then I realized I was confusing Wikipedia with the Web in general because in general Wikipedia is near the top in most searches AND it does a good job of being on point.
I’m reading MORE because after reading wikipedia/web then when of interest I go to magazine articles or other web sources.
So, yea–books are falling out of favor but wikipedia is not taking over==only showing its info must be confirmed, and actually, that is a good thing.
Wait, wait, a couple of paid flacks for Big Energy are snuffed on Wikipedia and it calls the Encyclopedia into question?? It seems to me that the editorial project is working, not failing. Why doesn’t this Lawrence clown provide a document from Benny Peiser (who doesn’t really strike me as an unimpeachable source himself) challenging what has been published?
Why doesn’t Lawrence reformulate all his crap into its own Wikipedia article and publish it? Let’s seee … could he be …. SATAN??!?
In a way, I think yes. He doesn’t want an unbiased platform, nor an honest dialog; he wants all enviro stuff quashed.
Anybody who didn’t think from the outset that Wikipedia would be like this is incredibly naive.
And it isn’t just the corporate side that bends the truth. So do the “True Believers” in just about any category.
Last I saw, research indicated similar levels of accuracy (or inaccuracy, if you prefer) in both Wikipedia and traditional encyclopedias such as Encyclopedia Britannica.
Furthermore, another study showed that so-called “experts” in particular fields found Wikipedia fairly accurate. Non-experts in the field were less trusting.
(And no, I don’t have links to them right off-hand.)
Looking through that Wiki article’s edit history will tell you the true story of what happened. It seems this Lawrence Solomon character is upset the original researcher (Oreskes) limited her search to peer-reviewed articles. The second researcher (Peiser) did not limit his articles to only peer-reviewed sources and of course found more “deniers.”
Reading the edit history some more, it’s clear that Solomon’s idea of “I have added specific information, rather than interpretations, to better allow readers to judge for themselves.” is to remove valid criticisms of Peiser’s research and replace it with simply stating that Peiser found more “deniers.”
Furthermore, reading the edit history will show you that Solomon was violating Wiki guidelines and was repeatedly told such. Additionally, not everything he added was rejected.
#8–natefrog==excellent post. Nothing is free of bias. If you show the sources, the history you have done the most that can be done===with “maybe” a panel of experts to review same with comments and sources? And by experts, I mean mainstream for both sides, if there are two sides.
There should be a similar “Wikigovernment.”–ie sources and history.
Our government is corrupt. Proof?==where on the web can you find ALL the earmarks? This is the least that can be done to provide good government==and its not being done.
#3 – I doubt I would trust it for even a filmography of “Bedtime For Bonzo.”
Bedtime for Bonzo is a film, and thus it would not actually have a filmography. However, the director, Frederick De Cordova, has a filmography that spans 41 titles if you include episodic television.
#11–Sag==yes, worth the read but it shows that sarcasm has some real drawbacks.
Wikipedia has its place, like butter knives. I just used a butter knife to tighten a screw. Probably there are better tools for such a job?
#13–Sag==if you didn’t see it, maybe its not there? I’ll go back and check too.
Wikipedia is very helpful but must always be understood that it is seldom the final source. It is sort of like asking a gas station attendant for directions. Usually the directions are pretty good, but there is always the chance they aren’t.
If you would believe that a concept like Wikipedia would give honest results to the par of a true Encyclopedia, then you deserve to believe all that “Wikiganda”
#16–answer==not so different.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/4530930.stm
>>I find Wikipedia to be a fairly reliable
>>resource for hard science and math articles.
As usual, Mr. Ray, you are correct. I find it to be a fairly reliable resource for most things that are not controversial. Just this morning I read an article there on the difference between chino cloth and khaki cloth. And I believe every word.
On the other hand, anything controversial, one must take the entry with a grain of salt. It’s a darned good starting point for most inquiries, though.
Earmarks on the web is coming. Coburn and Obama were the sponsors.
#19–Mike==last I heard its already here. There is a website that shows the earmarks but only of those fine honest folk who allow their earmarks to be posted. The rest of the congressional criminals keep the paper trail wiped clean.
Point is–all of government should be as “transparent” as possible. The supposed benefits of secrecy even on most issues in national security create more unlitmate/longterm harm than good. Outside national security there is no reason at all except cockroaches don’t like light.
OFTLO will chide me on this, but all political leaders are scum. They should be voted out of office until a new class arises to do the people’s business. They don’t understand anything but absolutes.
Bobbo, I prefer the lamp post and target practice solution, or maybe a trebuchet and tall cliff (relative positions optional), but voting them out would be acceptible.
However, what would happen next is that the bureaucrats would gain power over the incoming politicians. Perhaps a 10 year total term limet on anyone working for the government, followed by a hempen suspension?
#21–Phillep==yep, 10 years seems long to me, but any change would be better than what we have today.
An informed electorate is necessary for a well functioning democracy. What we have today is secrecy and a compliant press.
McCain and Hillary as 2 of the 3 contenders and Obama an unknown? If I had any hope, I would be disappointed.
#16 – If you would believe that a concept like Wikipedia would give honest results to the par of a true Encyclopedia, then you deserve to believe all that “Wikiganda”
If you don’t believe that an encyclopedia can be democratized and made reliable, then what do you believe?
Do you believe in a centralized authority? From what or where does Britannica derive the trust they enjoy?
If not a centralized authority, then what do you believe in?
#22 – An informed electorate is necessary for a well functioning democracy.
True.
What we have today is secrecy and a compliant press.
Mostly bullshit.
Details of of the legislative process are only secretive to those who don’t bother to look up what they wish to know in the public record.
The press is only compliant when they file a report that isn’t in keeping with your own agenda. That’s why jingoistic bulletheads watch Fox.
We keep hearing… they are biased to the right… they are biased to the left… they are playing softball with X (X = president, senator, etc)… they are playing hardball with X… they are lying about X… X is lying to them…
In the end, if you can’t trust anything, how the hell do you know what is reliable and what isn’t? If everything is a conspiracy, what is the truth? In fact, what would be the value of truth if you truly believed that all media and government lies and the masses are to stupid to see that?
Frankly, I don’t have much, and so I don’t have much to lose… If the government collapsed, I’d be pretty much the same when the dust settled as I am now… so I honestly wish we could pull the rug out from under government, just so people with their intellectually lazy, unsupportable, and ultimately hypocritical disdain for government would find out just what life can be like without it.
I’m not that much different than you in that I am very critical of the many things I think my government is doing wrong. But I am not at all unaware that government gets plenty right, and of all those things I think they do poorly, there are obviously a substantial number of voters (who might not actually be dumber than me) who think things are okay…
What’s really scary?
The people who are so quick to ostracize Wikipedia are frequently the same ones who automatically trust [insert traditional encyclopedia/news media/other source here] without even questioning their own trusted sources.
Perhaps the operative words there are “their own.”
It’s my source, so therefore, it’s correct![/sarcasm]
It should be all government contracts.
What information sources are not given over to propaganda these days? I mean, even dvorak.org puts a hefty spin on the truth.
Good God, John, if you would bother to read the history of this thing you would know that the Wikipedia editor was absolutely right in this case and that the complainers are professional climate-change deniers.
What the author of the article you quote wanted to do was insert into the Oreskes biography the climate-change denial of a guy named Peiser — who is *not* a climate scientist (but he’s the only “scientist” they could find that has weighed in on Oreskes’s work). The only argument he could give about why some random guy’s objection to Oreskes’s work should be inserted in her bio page was that his critique was “notable” — because it appeared on Fox News.
C’mon, John, *read* the original documents before you blog about them. Sheesh…!
Looked up food irradiation on wp, and was obviously biased on being good and wholesome. Where was the other pov? Edited out.
#29–jj==food irradiation is only good and wholesome, any other position is propaganda. Why don’t you post the opposing “facts” if you have any???????