Message: 4 Date: Sat, 24 Jan 2004 03:16:31 -0600 From: "Ira Stoll" irastoll@hotmail.com Subject: [WikiEN-l] Policy Suggestions To: wikien-l@Wikipedia.org Message-ID: Law12-F47IGOHE44UQu0001b8be@hotmail.com Content-Type: text/plain; format=flowed
That's exactly what I'm getting at. The wikipedia should be packed with clickable citations.The reason why I've always loved encyclopedias so much is the quality of the information, and the impartial manner in which it was presented. Citations (particularly linkable) bring with them evidence for belief, and an option for the reader to learn further, investigate for themselves (by clicking on it). A basic of polite discourse (and a policy in my debate club) was to accept another's argument so long as it is logical, and to accept their premise so long as you could not disprove it (like thru a citation). What I Don't like about the wikipedia is when the truth (or a way of interpreting it) is removed from an article, regardless of the quality of citation, due to overriding majority POV. My suggestions are meant to address that. JackLynch
I agree completely. Lack of citation and traceability is IMHO a big glaring deficiency in traditional encyclopedias, and it's one that should be remediable in a hypertext encyclopedia. (However, like so much about Wikipedia, there's no big barrier to "just doing it" and hoping that others will follow suit. Much as I'd like better Wiki-apparatus for the purpose).
As for "Wikipedia is not a list of citations"—fine; neither is Lauren Hillenbrand's "Seabiscuit: An American Legend," but every darn statement she make in that readable, popular bestseller is documented and attributed.
The omniscient viewpoint adopted by textbooks below the college level and encyclopedias is intellectually dishonest. When an educated person reads any factual matter, the question "Why should I believe this?" is (or should always be) in the back of their mind. "Because it's in a book and 'they' wouldn't print it if it weren't true?" "Because the style of writing gives me the impression the author knows what he's talking about?"
Verifiability is important. (And it's just as important for noncontroversial facts as for controversial facts).
One of the nice things about Wikipedia is that it gives us an opportunity to think about the nature of knowledge and authority.
-- Daniel P. B. Smith, dpbsmith@world.std.com alternate: dpbsmith@alum.mit.edu "Elinor Goulding Smith's Great Big Messy Book" is now back in print! Sample chapter at http://world.std.com/~dpbsmith/messy.html Buy it at http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1403314063/
Daniel P.B.Smith wrote:
I agree completely. Lack of citation and traceability is IMHO a big glaring deficiency in traditional encyclopedias, and it's one that should be remediable in a hypertext encyclopedia. (However, like so much about Wikipedia, there's no big barrier to "just doing it" and hoping that others will follow suit. Much as I'd like better Wiki-apparatus for the purpose).
But this seems to assume that the citations will all be to websites, which isn't likely to be the case--most respected, reliable information is still not available online. So citations of that sort will have to be to books or journal articles, which in many cases won't be accessible through hypertext.
-Mark
On Jan 24, 2004, at 2:36 PM, Delirium wrote:
Daniel P.B.Smith wrote:
I agree completely. Lack of citation and traceability is IMHO a big glaring deficiency in traditional encyclopedias, and it's one that should be remediable in a hypertext encyclopedia. (However, like so much about Wikipedia, there's no big barrier to "just doing it" and hoping that others will follow suit. Much as I'd like better Wiki-apparatus for the purpose).
But this seems to assume that the citations will all be to websites, which isn't likely to be the case--most respected, reliable information is still not available online. So citations of that sort will have to be to books or journal articles, which in many cases won't be accessible through hypertext.
Not necessarily. ISBN linking is a tremendous help here, and hopefully other methods, if there are any, will become features one day. Though I can't think of one right now.
Peter
--- Funding for this program comes from Borders without Doctors: The Bookstore Chain That Sounds Like a Charity. --Harry Shearer, Le Show
Ugh. I'm glad I haven't tried to read that. How tedious.
RickK
"Daniel P.B.Smith" dpbsmith@world.std.com wrote: As for "Wikipedia is not a list of citations"�fine; neither is Lauren Hillenbrand's "Seabiscuit: An American Legend," but every darn statement she make in that readable, popular bestseller is documented and attributed.
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That's why all that material is in the endnotes, not cluttering up the text. References are the foundation of the building, not the living room furniture.
Stan
Rick wrote:
Ugh. I'm glad I haven't tried to read that. How tedious.
RickK
"Daniel P.B.Smith" dpbsmith@world.std.com wrote: As for "Wikipedia is not a list of citations"—fine; neither is Lauren Hillenbrand's "Seabiscuit: An American Legend," but every darn statement she make in that readable, popular bestseller is documented and attributed.
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There are several ways of adding citations that do not clutter up the text.
1. A superscript which point to a footnote.
2. A hypertext link to the source like [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/All_wet] which will display [1].
3. Using comments while editing that do not show up in the displayed text:
<!-- via Wikipedia: Pierre de Fermat
last updated: 2004-01-01T18:44:37Z 193.230.240.14
-->
Fred
From: Stan Shebs shebs@apple.com Reply-To: English Wikipedia wikien-l@Wikipedia.org Date: Sat, 24 Jan 2004 16:28:50 -0800 To: English Wikipedia wikien-l@Wikipedia.org Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] Re: Packed with clickable citations
That's why all that material is in the endnotes, not cluttering up the text. References are the foundation of the building, not the living room furniture.
Stan
Rick wrote:
Ugh. I'm glad I haven't tried to read that. How tedious.
RickK
"Daniel P.B.Smith" dpbsmith@world.std.com wrote: As for "Wikipedia is not a list of citations"fine; neither is Lauren Hillenbrand's "Seabiscuit: An American Legend," but every darn statement she make in that readable, popular bestseller is documented and attributed.
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On Saturday 24 January 2004 07:45 pm, Fred Bauder wrote:
There are several ways of adding citations that do not clutter up the text.
A superscript which point to a footnote.
A hypertext link to the source like
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/All_wet] which will display [1].
- Using comments while editing that do not show up in the displayed text:
<!-- via Wikipedia: Pierre de Fermat last updated: 2004-01-01T18:44:37Z 193.230.240.14 -->
Or my personal favourite:
<sup>[[Articlename#References|<nowiki>[</nowiki>1<nowiki>]</nowiki>]]</sup>
Best, Sascha Noyes
On Jan 24, 2004, at 8:36 PM, Sascha Noyes wrote:
On Saturday 24 January 2004 07:45 pm, Fred Bauder wrote:
There are several ways of adding citations that do not clutter up the text.
A superscript which point to a footnote.
A hypertext link to the source like
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/All_wet] which will display [1].
- Using comments while editing that do not show up in the displayed
text:
<!-- via Wikipedia: Pierre de Fermat last updated: 2004-01-01T18:44:37Z 193.230.240.14 -->
Or my personal favourite:
<sup>[[Articlename#References|<nowiki>[</nowiki>1<nowiki>]</ nowiki>]]</sup>
Which will hopefully become a feature before too long.
Peter
--- Funding for this program comes from Borders without Doctors: The Bookstore Chain That Sounds Like a Charity. --Harry Shearer, Le Show
On Tue, 27 Jan 2004 03:26:08 UTC, Peter Jaros rjaros@shaysnet.com wrote:
...
Or my personal favourite:
<sup>[[Articlename#References|<nowiki>[</nowiki>1<nowiki>]</ nowiki>]]</sup>
Which will hopefully become a feature before too long.
It looks nice, but how is it really going to work? Does it really just take you to the References section? I often want to cite a specific work for a specific piece of text I've written, and I don't see how this does it. In fact, one may want to cite a work twice, with different page numbers each time, and I don't see how that will work. I think this discussion will require a lot of worked-out examples before it's done.