[WikiEN-l] Age fabrication and original research

[FT2]

On Thu, Oct 1, 2009 at 6:27 PM, Ken Arromdee <arromdee at rahul.net> wrote:

> This is logical, but only proves that our rules contradict ourselves every
> which way.
>

Indeed. And we are broadly fine with that, to an extent. A number of policy
and project pages explicitly point out that not everything will be 100%
consistent.



> This implies that you *can't* use an object as a source, since it would be
>  your personal eyewitness account of the bridge or whatever.



But that affects all sources. How do we know that report X in peer-reviewed
journal Y is fairly summed up as described? All we have is one or more
editors who read it, and wrote about what they think it says. To be
unsubtle, take the most highly regarded authoritative book on a topic, and
cite it in a topic as a source for some point or other. What enters
Wikipedia will be "your personal eyewitness account" of what
ultra-widely-acknowledged expert X wrote or ultra-authoritatively-regarded
journal Y says.

A bridge is presented to the senses of eyewitness no more nor less than a
paper, a rock, or any artifact. It's editor interpretation, opinion and
judgment that we avoid, not reporting faithfully what any reasonable witness
exposed to that same item would agree is obvious to the five senses.

FT2