On Thu, Apr 9, 2009 at 5:04 PM, Bill Carter <billdeancarter(a)yahoo.com> wrote:
These single article experiences sure seem to crop up
often, huh? Anyhow, I'm talking about many articles involving one subject: journalist
Alan Cabal.
It still proves absolutely nothing. Lets say this issue had "cropped
up", as you say, one thousand times. In terms of the things we talk
about on this mailing-list, that would be staggering, we wouldn't be
talking about anything else!
But wikipedia has around 2.8 million articles. A thousand articles are
a lot, but it's only 0.03% of the total. Looking at it from that
perspective, 99.97% can achieve some sort of NPOV, which is an
absolutely incredible result.
My point isn't that 99.97% of wikipedia articles don't have NPOV
problems (I have no idea what the number is, but I reckon it's high),
my point is that ANECDOTAL EVIDENCE PROVES ABSOLUTELY NOTHING! Saying
"article X has NPOV problems, therefore NPOV is a stupid and
unattainable policy" is an absurd argument, and if you argue that way
no one is going to take you seriously.
--Oskar