[WikiEN-l] Proposal for simplified credentials model

[Daniel P. B. Smith]

> From: <charles.r.matthews at ntlworld.com>
>
> William Pietri wrote
>
>> As the Chronicle of Higher Education wrote, "But the incident is  
>> clearly
>> damaging to Wikipedia's credibility -- especially with professors who
>> will now note that one of the site's most visible academics has  
>> turned
>> out to be a fraud."
>
> I'm going to sound like a snob. Why would anyone think tenure at a  
> private college in the mid-West in theology was any kind of high  
> academic profile? Academics would know how to rate this (i.e. there  
> are thousands of middle-aged guys in this general category).

It's not a _high_ academic profile, but I heard a relevant joke on "A  
Prairie Home Companion" a few weeks ago:

Q: "What do you call a doctor who graduated at the bottom of his class?"
A: "Doctor."

I am certain that _any_ of those "thousands of middle-aged guys" have  
read more books about theology than I ever have. Probably 90% of them  
have read and remember, not only more than I, but more than a  
software engineer of my acquaintance who teaches Sunday school, the  
one whom I call whenever I want to know things like what "the TULIP  
of Calvinism" is.

A "tenured professor at a private college in the mid-West" is an  
excellent source of knowledge for anything that a) _within_ the area  
of the coursework he did as an undergraduate and grad student, and b)  
_not_ within his area of deep expertise--the area in which he has  
written his thesis or published research. Those are exactly the areas  
in which he may have a strong point of view and/or bees in his  
bonnet, and feel that his credentials entitle him to speak ex cathedra.

On the other hand, he's a great person to ask about material from  
that course he hated and got the "C" in twenty years ago, because  
he'll feel insecure and check his facts. The point is, he'll know  
exactly what facts to check and where to go to check them, and he'll  
be able to find them quickly and easily.

Academic credentials are easily verified, represent disinterested  
third-party testimony, and are an imprecise but _valid_ indicator  
that the degree-holder had at one point in one's life mastered a  
certain body of knowledge for long enough to pass an exam.

Of course, there could many basic areas in which a layperson, writing  
with "Catholicism for Dummies" at hand and consulting it while  
writing, could do better than a tenured professor speaking off the  
top of his head.

But somewhere between "credentials mean nothing" and "credentials  
mean everything" is The Truth, which is: "credentials mean _something._"