[WikiEN-l] Docs look to Wikipedia for condition info: Manhattan Research

[Ken Arromdee]

On Fri, 29 May 2009, Ian Woollard wrote:
> >> Please explain how removing publicly available, legal, verifiable,
> >> information from the wikipedia is common sense again?
> >
> > Because whether it's common sense to remove the material doesn't depend
> > on whether it's publically available, legal, or verifiable.
> 
> You didn't answer the question. I want to know why legal information
> that can be googled up in a minute or so shouldn't be in the
> wikipedia.

Because that's like saying "if everyone else litters, why shouldn't I litter,
too".  We have an obligation to avoid harm caused by us, even if other people
may cause similar harm.

And anyway, the other Googleable sites
* are much less prone to vandalism and errors
* are less trusted by Internet users
* are much less *prominent*.

> > (And anyway, it's only verifiable under ideal circumstances.
> Straw man.

It's not a straw man.  You wanted to know why we should remove verifiable
information.  The answer is that if we have this particular verifiable
information we will have time periods where it's vandalized (and therefore
not verifiable at that moment).

> > If we have it, it will get vandalized.
> Unlike... the rest of the wikipedia? And nobody ever checks for and
> removes vandalism of course.

If it gets vandalized and the vandalism is fixed, there's an interval of
time when the vandalism is in existence.  This is an acceptable cost if the
article is about George Washington's birthdate; it's not an acceptable cost
when someone could get hurt.  Moreover, the time it takes to fix vandalism
can vary greatly, and several factors make it more likely that vandalism
will stick around on drug articles than on, say, the Obama artlcle.

> So on that 'logic' we should remove all information that even
> theoretically could be harmful from the wikipedia immediately, because
> ummm... it might get vandalised!
> So I think we should start with the hydrogen article. Knowledge of
> hydrogen could get people killed! It's an EXPLOSIVE GAS!!!! We should
> definitely remove the flammability limits- it's heinous that people
> should know how much hydrogen you need to burn it!!! People could die.

Chances are very low that someone who wants to burn hydrogen is going to go
to Wikipedia to find out how much they need to burn.  Likewise, chances are
low that someone's going to use Wikipedia's information to build an aircraft.
This is where the common sense comes in: some types of information are more
likely than others, *in practice*, to be used in situations where someone
can get hurt.