On 3/31/07, Marc Riddell michaeldavid86@comcast.net wrote:
On 3/31/07, doc doc.wikipedia@ntlworld.com wrote:
I humbly suggest that the code "do no harm" is older and more virtuous than any statue book.
on 3/30/07 8:57 PM, geni at geniice@gmail.com wrote:
However it conflicts with things like NPOV and "wikipedia is an encyclopedia".
"Do no harm" is not a "point of view" - it is a standard of behavior, and must prevail. And, if Wikipedia's identity as an encyclopedia does not include "do no harm", it needs to rethink that identity.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Armenian_Genocide as it stands harms turkey. If we were to change it to reduce this harm we could potentially harm the Armenians as well as producing an article that would be against the law in France.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fair_Game_(Scientology)
Harms Scientology but not publishing it could harm people if Scientology were ever to reactivate that policy.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sylvia_Browne
Harms the subject of the article. But if we change it so it did not the article would be in error
And, thereforeŠ?
Do no harm is not useful as an ethical foundation for wikipedia.
Did you not have your own? And if you did, what was it? And, if not, why not?
I'm not going to explain my entire system of ethics here. It isn't really relevant in any case.