[WikiEN-l] Catholic Encyclopedia

Mon Jan 26 22:43:51 UTC 2004

Sascha Noyes wrote:

>On Monday 26 January 2004 12:30 pm, Ray Saintonge wrote:
>
>>Sascha Noyes wrote:
>>
>>>A good example of why it is a bad idea to use the CE as a starting-point
>>>for a wikipedia entry: (found on [[Witchhunt]] and quickly removed)
>>>
>>>"The question of the reality of witchcraft is one upon which it is not
>>>easy to pass a confident judgment. In the face of Holy Scripture and the
>>>teaching of the Fathers and theologians the abstract possibility of a
>>>pact with the Devil and of a diabolical interference in human affairs can
>>>hardly be denied"
>>>
>>>;-)
>>>
>>Further to my previous post, the incomplete quotation is more POV than
>>the full sentence in the CE.  Here's the rest of it:
>>
>>>but no one can read the literature of the subject without realizing
>>>the awful cruelties to which this belief and without being convinced
>>>that in 99 cases out of 100 the allegations rest upon nothing better
>>>than pure delusion.
>>>
>>One should at least give credit to the editors of the CE for recognizing
>>that the topic was problematic.
>>Ec
>>
>I concede the points you are making. I wrestled with myself about removing the 
>CE content, and had a look at the edit history of the particular article. 
>Only once had a content-related edit been made to the CE text. There were 
>however still opinions like the one I quoted above stated as fact. I agree 
>that the CE text is a valuable resource, and I have therefore moved the text 
>to the talk page where salvageable material can be extracted. I am still 
>unchanged in my opinion, however that old texts make unfruitful starting 
>points for wikipedia articles.
>
>Best,
>Sascha Noyes
>
Perhaps the most important consideration in determining what is 
salvageable is relevance.  Our article is about witch"hunt" while the CE 
article is about witch"craft".  They don't have a separate article about 
witchhunts.  We already have an article about witchcraft so we don't 
need to get into that here.  Among the most significant statements in 
the CE article is that there were no mass witchhunts for the first 1300 
years of church history, and the first barbecue did not take place until 
1275.  Heresy was always a more serious crime. For our puposes in this 
article the church's reaction to witchcraft is more important than the 
witchcraft itself.

Ec