[WikiEN-l] The Community vs. Scholarly Consensus

[Phil Sandifer]

On Dec 18, 2008, at 4:52 AM, WJhonson at aol.com wrote:

> Surely we can figure out how to summarize Derida, or anyone else,  
> without
> injecting too much of our own overt positioning into the summary.

I don't think that's the problem, Will. I think most anyone who would  
want to summarize Derrida on Wikipedia can do that.

The problem is that WP:NOR says explicitly that they're not allowed  
to. It says, and I quote,

"a primary source may be used only to make descriptive claims, the  
accuracy of which is easily verifiable by any reasonable, educated  
person without specialist knowledge."

Now, perhaps you don't think that explicitly rules out Derrida. But on  
the face of it, it does. And in plenty of people's interpretations, it  
does.

I mean, I agree with you on what you say should be allowed. The  
problem is that Wikipedia policy does not agree with us.

-Phil