What is the a2k hall of fame all about?

I do that all the time and there ain't nothing wrong with that, which was the point I was going to make before I tossed in a petty insult, which is what I thought was stupid about my post. Same principle applies to working in literary references IMO. When someone like a dlowan works in a Frost or a Poe into her post it's I see it the same way, without the knowledge of literature she wouldn't have been able to do so. And I should also not sneer at those who are willing to actually research their posts instead of just winging it. That is something that should be respected and encouraged here, not sneered at.

People also like to sneer about Wikipedia, and the internet as a whole, but I don't share that sentiment at all (which makes my use of Finn's insult all the more inexplicable). I said that mean-spiritedly and quite frankly I think the snobbiness toward Wikipedia is silly and elitist. Just because the information is more accessible (and in studies Wikipedia is as accurate as any published encyclopedia so that angle falls flat to me) the people who avail themselves of it are treated like the nouveau riche and scorned for not having acquired the same knowledge through more noble means. The nouveau sage if you will.

It's just snobbiness to feel better than others, if someone learns from a book versus an electronic book they are no more informed for it. Given that I am entirely autodidactic and have no formal education that is a kind of academic snobbery that was really just stupid. Especially when you consider how big a fan I am of the use of the internet for learning, and how big a Wikipedia fan I am (I often spend hours at night reading and writing Wikipedia).

It makes my use of the insult doubly dumb because it is an insult to the internet as well that I don't agree with. It reminds me of a line from Tom Wolfe's A Man in Full where he writes something like "a website, pronounced porn shop, on the internet, pronounced massage parlor" and a lot of people unjustifiably turn their noses up at the internet.

I particularly, had no business doing so. I've learned more from Wikipedia than I have any formal education and should be the last one turning my nose up at what someone's reference sources are.

As one of the engineers in my group (an extremely socially conservative gentleman) put it, even if 90% of the Internet is porn, that still leaves millions of sites that aren't.

I agree with that, however, i do have problems with Wikipedia as regards their articles on history. I will give two examples, but first i would point out that i have tried, without being one of their editors, to point out errors to them many time in the past, literally for years, and nothing has been done.

In one case that i still recall clearly, they had an article about the Antikythera device, which is reasonably considered to be the world's first computer, and is more than 2000 years old. I've not visited that article for about six months, but at that time, it had still not been revised. The article uses almost wholesale the text of the news report i first read on the subject (Reuters, BBC? . . . i don't recall now). It claims that the device was found in the wreck of a ship which was carrying booty back to Rome for a triumph to be celebrated by Julius Caesar. Although i always use Iulius Caesar, because the letter "J" did not exist at that time, that was not what i criticized. The article says that the wreck dated to from 80 BCE to 150 BCE. Iulius Caesar was not alive in 150 BCE. His date of birth is not certain, it was between 102 and 100 BCE. But even if one accepts 80 BCE as the date of the wreck, the story is not plausible. In 80 BCE, Caesar had done nothing for which the Senate would have voted him a triumph, so that part of the story is obviously wrong.

So i wrote a description of my objection to their article on the comments page. I'm never surprised that journalists get things like this wrong, it's very common. I was greatly amused that journalists suddenly became aware of the battle the Serbs fought against the Turks in Kosovo in 1389 (perhaps, the date is disputed). It seemed to be news to them that the Serbs cherish a greivance about Kosovo and have done for more than 600 years.

However, Wikipedia, if it has any claim to being a reliable source, should do better than that. When i last checked, nothing had been done about the gross error in that article, which in fact inferentially contradicts their main article about Iulius Caesar.

The second example regards the Norse in Greenland and North America. Their article on Bjarni Herjolfsson has some serious problems, as do their articles on all of the other main players in the story of the Norse in North America. Bjarni Herjolfsson is the first European to sight North America for which there is a reliable historical record (there are inferential passages in sagas that there might have been one or more who preceded him, but they are dubious and the Bjarni Herjolfsson voyage is not). It is obvious from their article that whoever wrote it did a sloppy job, and just relied upon the Groenlendiga Saga (the Greenlander's Story), which is valuable for providing information which appears in no other saga sources, and a Greenlander's perspective on matters which otherwise have an Icelander prejudice, but it is wholely contradicted on many important points by the three other, very reliable sources--The Short Saga (a fragment of the Erik the Red saga which is derived either from the oldest recension, or even from the very first written version of the saga), the Erik the Red Saga (more or less complete, but from much later recensions than the Short Saga) and the Thorfinn Karlsefni saga. The most glaringly error in the Wikipedia articles on the people involved is that they treat the voyage in about 1000 CE to attempt to find Leif Eriksson's Vinland (it failed to find it) as three separate voyages--and the Groenlendiga Saga is the only source which does that. All of the other sources (and it is mentioned in the Floamanna Saga, the Islendignabok and the Landnammabok) show that the saga skalds knew that it was one voyage by three expeditions pooling their resources, and involving four ships.

Disgusted with the failure of any response to passages i had written on comments pages of other articles, i sent an e-mail to them, hoping to get someone's attention. I cited two scholarly sources on the saga records, both of which were focused on the Norse in Greenland and North America based on the evidence of the saga sources. I got no response, and the last time i looked at any of those articles (about a week ago), they continued to provide erroneous information.

I realize these are not big deals to people who are not interested in history, but they are important to those who are, and in two other forums devoted to history in which i read and occasionally post, it is taken as a matter of course that Wikipedia is a dubious source. I usually only use it for dates and for the spelling of names, or to get an outline from which i can do further research from more reliable sources.



That's an alarming thought, and does not inspire confidence in me. It may be only in the area of history that Wikipedia has so many warts, but i doubt it. I am reminded of an anecdote by Carl Sagan. He comments that with regard to Immanuel Velkiovsky (the most notorious modern catastrophist), his astronomy was utter bullshit, but he (Sagan) has always been impressed by his knowledge of ancient literature. Sagan was at a faculty get together and was chatting with a gentleman who was expert in ancient literature, when the subject of Velikovsky's Worlds in Collision came up. The other professor told Sagan that, of course, Velikovsky's references to ancient literature were utter bullshit, but that he (the other professor) had always been impressed by Velikovsky's knowledge of astronomy.

That's why i find Wikipedia suspect as a source for many subjects, and not just history. If you want to get the geneology of a royal family in European history straight in your mind, by all means, use Wikipedia--but don't rely on their interpretive passages about the history of those royal families.

I was impressed just yesterday, though, to note that they have cleaned up their article about William Bligh and the mutiny on HMAV Bounty. Then i clicked on a link to Sir John Barrow, whose 1831 book was the basis for the Nordhoff and Hall trilogy of novels about the mutiny, and is the source for the picture of Bligh as an ogre. That article has not been revised, and does not comment on the inaccuracy of Barrow's book. Oh well . . .

I think you'd get a hell of a kick out of editing if you give it a try. I love wikis, and am going to build one here some day (with a different focus than wikipedia) and I think that once you get the hang of it you'd really enjoy it.



The harder the science, the better Wikipedia tends to do (while also getting pop culture stuff down pretty well) but there have been studies comparing Wikipedia to print encyclopedias favorably in terms of factual errors.

But yeah, it's a source that anyone can edit. You need to keep that in mind. Personally I find myself using the cited references from Wikipedia more than anything else. When I go there it's usually to click on those tiny links at the bottom and read their primary sources, and for things like that they really do shine.

dlowan just admitted having/using a VCR

<thud>

I used to go there once in a while to track down cjhsa's edits - point 'em out and apologize to wiki.

That is one of the great features of that site, but it is a fairly recent development. They are good, too, about putting a notice at the top of page if the substance of the article is in doubt, has been challenged or has not provided citations for it's claims.

That is something they are really good at. The very day that Robert Gates was confirmed as Secretary of Defense (by which i mean Bush's administration), i went there to look for bio information, and they showed him as Secretary of Defense as of that date. When Syd Barrett died, they had that information posted literally within minutes of the story being published at The Times web site.

Ok, here's my composition. An a2k play:

Spendius

I couldn't be any more bothered to acquaint myself with the finer points of carp than I can with wiping the drivel from this motley lot from my screen. Especially Asian carp who are a sight more certain to be evolutionists for goodness sake. That's enough to lead one to take up absolute unutterable drivel as a pastime.

Thought bubble: And what would my beloved Queenie, the muse that I positively pine for, think of me were I to be beset by the odor of carp? Heaven forbid that I find favor with this vulgar lot. I debase myself to strut and preen to an unperceptive throng.


Setanta

"Did Not Eat Asian carp ? ! ? ! ?"

What i find now clear is that this joker surely hasn't considered that in the Battle of Normandy, on June 6th, 1994 at about two in the afternoon, it is said by more than four reputable historians that not less than three soldiers were suddenly beset by a pernicious craving for Asian Carp. So spare me this load of horseshit this putative historian regurgitates, i can't be faulted if this clown cannot read and i maintain that Asian carp was consumed on the battle field in Normandy.

Thought bubble: Clown.

Robert Gentel

I get that you feel that Asian carp is not adequate to your current needs (and parenthetically, who doesn't after all Asian carp does a piss poor job at being un-Asian), and I understand that you are looking for a table, but with proper funding and resources I am sure that I can make Asian carp more than suit your needs both as a vibrator and a table.

Thought bubble: (composing another post disjointedly instead of just doing one at a time) I get that you feel that African carp does not adequately suit your needs as a dresser...


Gargamel

Holy ****, Asian carp! What can I say but that I love me some ******* Asian carp! I could go on, and probably will, about my passionate history with carp in general but that would suck! Instead I'm going to tell you about just one of my many torrid encounters with this sexy beast. This one time with Slappy, a midget, and copious amounts of lube we reached Nirvana simultaneously and I called him Jay-Z. Yeah, thought you guys would want to know about that!

Thought bubble: Hey look, something shiny!

ok, something weird has happened with the display on this page, but only recently...

Off yer meds again, Region?

negatory!

this is a screenshot of what i'm seeing (i scaled it down 90%)...

nemmind...







(now where'd i leave those meds?)

<pat> <pat>

<kiss><kiss>

i mean, if you scroll down quickly, it really does look like a bunch of posts, not just one post with tricksy avatars... dunnit?

He got it!


I think this means that Robert did a fantabulous job.

Gargamel would be a bit more literary tho. He's not just about midgets and lube. I mean, that's most of it, but not ALL of it.

I think there needs to be some kinda poetry reference for it to be True Garg.

But I sure loved that.

Yeah, but I just couldn't find any of his serious posts to draw inspiration from within 3 pages in his profile.

I also wanted to do Setanta in the dry history article mode instead of the more colloquial one but couldn't easily find one of those either (bit pressed for time an didn't notice the one right above me in this thread). So the 5 minute composition version is just hyperbolic caricature (including mine, I hope).

http://able2know.org/topic/140784-2#post-3889453

I quite enjoyed this.