On 11/6/03 11:20 PM, "Delirium" <delirium(a)rufus.d2g.com> wrote:
The Cunctator wrote:
One of the great flaws with the traditional
approach to history is its bias
towards the narrative of the hero--that the current world is best understood
as a single dramatic storyline with a few important protagonists and
antagonists. Perhaps you believe that is a complete and accurate
representation of the world, but I don't. I believe that the world, society,
etc. are best understood as products of the interaction of billions of
individuals. To gain a perfectly accurate picture of the world, we'd need to
know all of their stories. The closer we come to that the better.
Of course, one would want to start with those that are collectively accepted
as pivotal.
But we should not exclude knowledge in the pursuit of understanding.
So I take it you are proposing that we drop Wikipedia's long-held claim
that it is not a geneological database? Everyone who has ever lived
thus deserves to be included, as long as the facts are verifiable?
Every event that ever took place deserves to be included? Should I
upload a scan of my diploma (verifiable by contacting my university's
registrar)? How about articles on about 75 of my relatives who were
refugees from Turkey during the Greek-Turkish war (but were otherwise
not notable)--verifiable by Greek government immigration records. How
about a professor of mine who is currently on leave in Pennsylvania
(also verifiable)? My neighbor, who once ran unsuccessfuly for school
board (verifiable from the election records)? This just seems
ridiculous to me.
Note the "one would want to start with those that are collectively accepted
as pivotal."
I see the inclusion of the type of information you're discussing being
something that eventually happens in the lifetime of Wikipedia, but not in
any serious quantity any time soon; there would need to be improvements of
the backend software, etc. E.g. when the Wikipedia at some point becomes
self-aware and starts adding entries on its own.
I really do go back to the reasonableness criterion. I *trust* you that if
you reasonably believe that there should be an entry on one of your
relatives, that you should be able to make it.
A big control on all of this is that Wikipedia entries need to be linked
from other entries.
For example, one of my relatives is an influential computer scientist.
There's an entry in Wikipedia on him. Nothing exciting there. The more
contentious issue would be that if (when) more information is added to the
entry, it would indicate that he was strongly influenced and inspired by an
older relative who is less famous. A good entry on that person could then be
written, discussing his various accomplishments, etc., using information
that is freely available elsewhere.
I understand that because everyone has parents, it would be "dangerous" to
say that a mention of a person in Wikipedia is sufficient to allow an entry.
I'm not advocating that.
I am advocating trusting each other to be responsible in their efforts to
contribute to Wikipedia, rather than try to erase each other's contributions
and spin imagined scenarios of the imminent death of Wikipedia.