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How a Raccoon Became an Aardvark

newyorker.com

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Re: How a Raccoon Became an Aardvark

#11

Post by huskyr »

acdha wrote: post #6
bediger4000 wrote: post #2

So what. At least with The Internet, Google and Wikipedia, we can see this happening. I would bet money the same sort of thing happened in 1880, the Golden Age of Authority. Some intern at Encyclopedia Britainica slipped in a minor edit, The Time cited it, and then (10 years later) E.B. cites The Times to "prove" the "truth" of the minor edit. This has the stench of old line, mainstream media getting upset about The…

This is too pat a dismissal – it's intellectually akin to the way “all bugs are shallow” aphorism which is pithy, optimistic and wrong. While in theory Wikipedia becomes more correct over time, it's not a given and there are many articles which never receive enough expert attention to catch non-flagrant errors. Wikipedia also has the unique problem that it can become less correct over time, whether due to error or de…

Note that you can permalink to every version of a Wikipedia article using the history tab, e.g. the first version of the Hacker News article [1].

There's also flagged revisions which allows users to 'flag' a revision as the 'accepted' version [2].

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Hacker_News&oldid... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Pending_changes

Re: How a Raccoon Became an Aardvark

#12

Post by cm2012 »

acdha wrote: post #10
cm2012 wrote: post #7

To be fair, it's not like the statement "called the Brazilian aardvark" is not true. If it looks like an Aardvark and someone calls it that, then it is called the Brazilian Aardvark. There are many species of animals which are misnamed with regards to their taxonomy.

In standard usage you would only say it is called something if that were commonly used by many people. We don't update the encyclopedia every time the crank at your local coffee-shop comes up with a new pet phrase.

True, but there is nothing "wrong" with a fact like that proliferating, since it doesn't hurt scientific knowledge and people clearly like the name.

Re: How a Raccoon Became an Aardvark

#13

Post by ladzoppelin »

acdha wrote: post #6
bediger4000 wrote: post #2

So what. At least with The Internet, Google and Wikipedia, we can see this happening. I would bet money the same sort of thing happened in 1880, the Golden Age of Authority. Some intern at Encyclopedia Britainica slipped in a minor edit, The Time cited it, and then (10 years later) E.B. cites The Times to "prove" the "truth" of the minor edit. This has the stench of old line, mainstream media getting upset about The…

This is too pat a dismissal – it's intellectually akin to the way “all bugs are shallow” aphorism which is pithy, optimistic and wrong. While in theory Wikipedia becomes more correct over time, it's not a given and there are many articles which never receive enough expert attention to catch non-flagrant errors. Wikipedia also has the unique problem that it can become less correct over time, whether due to error or de…

I think the problem is that something is considered a verified fact if you link to two separate places on the web. Bloggers have been posting complete garbage and lies for the past 7 years now and even "mainstream" news outlets sometimes believe the garbage and actually re-print the lies making it even easier to get the garbage on Wikipedia.

Re: How a Raccoon Became an Aardvark

#15

Post by tshtf »

For well over three years, the Wikipedia article for Wildebeest stated the plural was Wildebai: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wildebeest&diff=48...

Of course this was false, but it took well over three years for a correction. In the meantime, many other sources still refer to the plural as Wildebai:

https://www.google.com/search?q=wildebai

Re: How a Raccoon Became an Aardvark

#17

Post by leephillips »

bediger4000 wrote: post #2

So what. At least with The Internet, Google and Wikipedia, we can see this happening. I would bet money the same sort of thing happened in 1880, the Golden Age of Authority. Some intern at Encyclopedia Britainica slipped in a minor edit, The Time cited it, and then (10 years later) E.B. cites The Times to "prove" the "truth" of the minor edit. This has the stench of old line, mainstream media getting upset about The…

"I would bet money"

The point is that this sort of feedback loop, and similar pollution of knowledge by the fake authority of Wikipedia, is routine. There's even a joke: "If you don't believe my claim, just check Wikipedia -- but wait 15 minutes before you do."

So I'm not interested in taking up your monetary wager, but can you come up with one example where this happened with Britannica?

"Stench"

The New Yorker is well known for something called "fact checking", where they have a staff that tries to make sure that any claim appearing in the magazine is actually true. Wikipedia has random volunteers who might or might not eventually get around to checking some things that are on the site.

Re: How a Raccoon Became an Aardvark

#19

Post by leephillips »

nollidge wrote: post #18

It seems to me the problem is that people think there even exists such a thing as an authoritative source.

Really? What if we were debating where nollidge was born and where he went to school. Would you not be an authoritative source of information on these subjects?

Re: How a Raccoon Became an Aardvark

#20

Post by untog »

bediger4000 wrote: post #2

So what. At least with The Internet, Google and Wikipedia, we can see this happening. I would bet money the same sort of thing happened in 1880, the Golden Age of Authority. Some intern at Encyclopedia Britainica slipped in a minor edit, The Time cited it, and then (10 years later) E.B. cites The Times to "prove" the "truth" of the minor edit. This has the stench of old line, mainstream media getting upset about The…

I would bet money the same sort of thing happened in 1880, the Golden Age of Authority. Some intern at Encyclopedia Britainica slipped in a minor edit

...and an editor with knowledge in that topic area removed that edit before publication. Which is the part of the process Wikipedia lacks.

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