[EM] Notabililty

[Kristofer Munsterhjelm]

On 03/09/2012 06:53 PM, MIKE OSSIPOFF wrote:

> I'm not criticizing all academics. In mathematics, physics and other physical sciences,
> I have no quarrel with the authority of academics.
>
> But a sweeping worship of academic authority in general is unproductive for progress
> of any kind.
>
> There are areas where academic authority is questionable at best. Have you every looked
> at what academic philosophers write? You'd be surprised how nearly-uniformly muddled and
> befuddled they are. Voting system academics are similar. I'm sorry, but the metaphor
> of "head up the a**" is unavoidable when the subject of voting system academics comes up.
>
> I'm disappointed to hear that about wikipedia.

I think their reasoning for this is that Wikipedia is not supposed to be 
a place where you prove something. Wikipedia is supposed to refer to 
what has already been said so that people who are interested can go to 
the primary sources.

Now, anyone can make statements, so those who argue that only notable 
sources should stay say something like: "if we allow any and every 
reference as a source, the whole thing would become a mess and there 
would be edit wars everywhere. We have to rein in things". Meanwhile, 
others argue that Wikipedia has many eyes so that kind of argument 
doesn't hold. The disagreement between the camps means that policy may 
get applied inconsistently.