On Wed, Dec 31, 2008 at 7:03 PM, Ian Woollard <ian.woollard(a)gmail.com> wrote:
On 31/12/2008, David Gerard <dgerard(a)gmail.com>
wrote:
2008/12/31 Ian Woollard
<ian.woollard(a)gmail.com>om>:
That is A definition of right and wrong,
you're saying that the
wikipedia is more important than individuals. You're valuing the
wikipedia more than them. That's your right. But it's also his right
to value individuals above the wikipedia.
False dichotomy.
No, no. It's not a dichotomy at all, there's a continuum between how
much people value rules/ordered societies and how much they're
prepared to trample over a few rights or people's lives and how much
it's essential not to trample on anyone. It's not about good or bad,
it's just how different people look at things; it's about values.
There's no provable right or wrong on this.
BLP only works insofar as it doesn't
contradict NPOV.
What part of valuing individuals do you consider requires violating NPOV?
Well, off hand (and not necessarily a perfect example) the Star Wars
kid's name. It may well be considered that not having his name in the
article violates NPOV. I'm not saying that I think that or that I
don't, but *purely* for the sake of argument let's say that it is
obviously a violation not to have it and let's say in our hypothetical
world that absolutely all sources have it.
Then one point of view would then be that his name should be in the
article, unless BLP then gets in the way, in which case you can
reasonably argue that NPOV was violated because you value the impact
it could have on the kid and that is more important to *them*.
On the other hand some people will argue that NPOV should triumph,
because all sources have it, and so it's NPOV to have it and the rule
is intended to improve and give an orderly and well written wikipedia
and so in the long run improve countless people's lives; perhaps even
save their lives, and this is more important to *them* than the
(possibly minor) inconvenience to the Star Wars kid of NPOV forcing
something into the article.
That's the general idea anyway-this guy probably puts it better than
me (it seems to be about the same idea, although he explains it in
political terms):
http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/jonathan_haidt_on_the_moral_mind.html
- d.
--
-Ian Woollard
We live in an imperfectly imperfect world. Life in a perfectly
imperfect world would be much better.
_______________________________________________
WikiEN-l mailing list
WikiEN-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org
To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Actually, I do see it as a false dichotomy. We're presenting it as
"rights" against publication of verifiable, reliable,
already-published material. These rights do not exist. I do not have a
right to tell you that you may not talk about me or publish
information about me, provided what you say is true.
People do, to some degree, have a right to privacy, but not nearly as
extensive of one as most would believe. We already cover that with
NOR, V, and RS-digging through someone's tax records and synthesizing
a conclusion is already unacceptable, and if no other reliable source
has seen fit to publish what's found in those records, we shouldn't
either. However, once something is already -in- public, and reliable
sources with ethics departments and legal departments have already
published it, it's no longer private information. At that point, there
is no BLP issue other than possible neutrality violations.
How do we avoid neutrality violations? We follow, rather than
second-guess, reliable sources. In every case, every time. That's what
NPOV means. Imposing our own viewpoint, including "They SHOULDN'T have
published that!", is the very definition of a violation of NPOV.
NPOV is still a pillar and the founding cornerstone of our project.
BLP is a necessary reaction to a bad incident (Siegenthaler) that was
originally well done but now has gotten way out of scope and way out
of control. There should be no question about which is primary. The
fact that there is any question is unsettling at best.
--
Freedom is the right to say that 2+2=4. From this all else follows.