Humanist Discussion Group, Vol. 32, No. 391.
            Department of Digital Humanities, King's College London
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                       www.dhhumanist.org
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    [1]    From: Henry Schaffer 
           Subject: Re: [Humanist] 32.389: the question on Wikipedia (15)

    [2]    From: savoye@eapoe.org
           Subject: Re: [Humanist] 32.389: the question on Wikipedia (12)

    [3]    From: Willard McCarty 
           Subject: the question of the question on Wikipedia (27)


--[1]------------------------------------------------------------------------
        Date: 2019-01-27 22:09:05+00:00
        From: Henry Schaffer 
        Subject: Re: [Humanist] 32.389: the question on Wikipedia

I have edited a few Wikipedia articles on quite controversial topics, and
have contradicted and been contradicted by other (volunteer) editors, as
would be expected on a controversial topic. But I have not experienced the
heavy handed poor treatment that Ken Friedman mentions that his colleague
did.

The are many, many volunteer editors. There are many fewer higher level
editor/administrators. So we have a sample of size N=1 about the category
of editor/administrator. Can we confidently generalize from that sample to
say that it describes all of Wikipedia? I agree that even one of those is
too many - but we also have to distinguish between anecdotes and data.

--henry schaffer



--[2]------------------------------------------------------------------------
        Date: 2019-01-27 13:29:13+00:00
        From: savoye@eapoe.org
        Subject: Re: [Humanist] 32.389: the question on Wikipedia

I think the Wikipedia situation can be reduced to the following sequence:

1) Wikipedia is a product made and run by people, often a large number
of people

2) People are inherently frustrating, especially in large numbers

Jeffrey A. Savoye
The Edgar Allan Poe Society of Baltimore
https://www.eapoe.org



--[3]------------------------------------------------------------------------
        Date: 2019-01-27 06:47:30+00:00
        From: Willard McCarty 
        Subject: the question of the question on Wikipedia

I can see and respect an area of human concern about getting things
right, but then I wonder. What is the fuss all about? -- i.e. why not 
just use it, warts and all, as a somewhat unreliable starting point? 
Then I wonder why is this discussion taking place? We deal with 
unreliable sources all the time and always have, in scholarship as in 
ordinary life. Does the digital machine have something to do with this 
other than merely being its platform? I wonder in particular whether 
the centrality of modelling and simulation that it has brought is 
responsible. When, that is, we realise that our best answer to the 
question of "what there is" (Quine's elegant phrase for 'ontology') 
is not merely incomplete or temporary but that the question itself is 
incoherent, then we are at sea without a boat, even one we must 
continually be repairing while sailing it.

To put the matter in pedagogical terms, what do we teach our best
students -- the ones who feel if not realise the problem?

Yours,
WM
--
Willard McCarty (www.mccarty.org.uk/),
Professor emeritus, Department of Digital Humanities, King's College London;
Adjunct Professor, Western Sydney University; Editor, Interdisciplinary
Science Reviews (www.tandfonline.com/loi/yisr20) and Humanist
(www.dhhumanist.org)




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