[Foundation-l] [WikiEN-l] Newbie recruitment: referencing

[Ray Saintonge]

On 11/04/11 1:26 AM, David Richfield wrote:
>>> My opinion (and it's just an opinion) is that it's really hard to give
>>> undue weight to WP:V.
>>
>> "WP:V" is not equal to verifiability itself. You may have adminitis.
>>
>> I think verifiability carries a lot of weight. WP:V is different from
>> verifiability in various important ways, which have been discussed on
>> this list before - Wikipedia's epistemology breaks down really badly
>> and stupidly at the edges.
> Distinction noted.  I'm not an admin, though, just a pedant.
>
Sometimes that's worse. ;-)

We also need to distinguish between verifiable and verified.  Reliable 
sources are no longer reliable sources if all we have done is transfer 
our POV from the article itself to our choice of sources.  Verifiability 
can be put in doubt when we suppress contrary views with different 
sources.  If we give only one single reference for an article it should 
inspire others to look for additional sources; it should not be an 
excuse for deleting the information. As we get into more obscure 
subjects it will increasingly be the case that improvements in the 
sources can only come from a person far away.

Ray