On Mon, Apr 14, 2008 at 04:15:16AM +0100, Ian Woollard wrote:
The wikipedia doesn't assume that. The wikipedia is quite happy to have people saying both that Jesus was resurrected as well as not, for example.
on 4/14/08 9:14 AM, Carl Beckhorn at cbeckhorn@fastmail.fm wrote:
I don't believe we are happy with that. If an article said any of these things, we would remove them:
"Jesus was resurrected."
"Jesus was not resurrected."
"Jesus Christ is primarily a mythological construct rather than an historical figure."
We would replace them with things like:
"Christians believe Jesus was resurrected."
"Christopher Hitchins criticizes those who believe Jesus was resurrected."
"Rudolf Bultmann argues that Jesus Christ should be interpreted as a mythological figure, rather than an historical one."
The _reason_ we would say these later things, rather than the former ones, is because we can all agree that the latter ones are accurate (true, in a small-t sense). Indeed, because of the way they are written, they only make claims about statements of other people, rather than the correctness of those statements.
The reason we would not say the former ones is because we would not be able to get consensus that they are sufficiently accurate to include as stated.
The key here is that we have to get consensus for article content. If there are wide disparities about a point of view, they will (it is hoped) reflect in the participants who form that consensus.
Exactly! Thank you, Carl. You said it better than I did.
Marc Riddell