[WikiEN-l] Re: The integrity of Wikipedia

Thu Feb 12 21:30:10 UTC 2004

----- Original Message -----
From: "Poor, Edmund W" <Edmund.W.Poor at abc.com>
To: "English Wikipedia" <wikien-l at Wikipedia.org>
Sent: Friday, February 13, 2004 12:49 AM
Subject: RE: [WikiEN-l] Re: The integrity of Wikipedia

Ruimi replied to Theresa:

> Well, I don't know what exactly is "truth", I don't know if it
> covers much more than "2+2=4", but I'm sure that it's not
> helping much to say it would be different for each person. By
> definition, it's supposed to be shared by everybody. Am I
> mistaking?

The doctrine that there is no absolute truth is usually called
"relativism". Bloom estimated that over 90% of incoming freshman at
America's best colleges subscribed to this doctrine. So it's an
important issue to consider at Wikipedia.

=> Yes, but there are at least three "relativism". Aesthetic, moral or
knowledge relativisms. First one is best candidate. Others are more dificult
to defend. In China, it is also bad to rape and kill a young girl, and
2 plus 2 are also 4. Even the rudest moral relativist wouldn't say that he
feels "morally" allowed to kill someone for no reasons.

We need to be clear on the distinction between NPOV and relativism. (See
my post of 5 minutes ago.)

=> Read and agreed. For me NPOV is not moral relativism because NPOV doesn't
apply to a person, but to an encyclopedia. I would hate a NPOV person (with
never any personal opinions), I like some books expressing opinions but I
wouldn't trust nor read an encyclopedia that is not (trying to be) neutral.