…and this is a 
Andy Schlafly's “success” story
Category: Stupidity
Posted on: June 21, 2007 10:50 AM, by PZ Myers
Another major paper has a story on Conservapædia. I'm sure Andy is proud of his accomplishment — the truly stupid would be proud of promoting stupidity.
Schlafly, 46, started small, urging his students to post brief -- often one-sentence -- entries on ancient history. He went live with the site in November. In the last six months, it's grown explosively, offering what Schlafly describes as fair, scholarly articles. Many have a distinctly religious-right perspective.
There's some complaining at the end—there's a rival wiki, RationalWiki, that comments on Conservapædia silliness, and some of its members also edit Conservapædia, prompting much outrage at those liberals who want to "destroy" them. I don't think we can blame liberal mockery for these entries, though:
Take the Pleistocene Epoch. Most scientists know it as the ice age and date it back at least 1.6 million years. But Conservapedia calls it "a theorized period of time" -- a theory contradicted, according to the entry, by "multiple lines of evidence" indicating that the Earth is less than 10,000 years old, as described in the Book of Genesis.
"We have certain principles that we adhere to, and we are up-front about them," Schlafly writes in his mission statement. "Beyond that we welcome the facts."
Conservapedia defines environmentalists as "people who profess concern about the environment" and notes that some would want to impose legal limits on the use of toilet paper.
Femininity? The quality of being "childlike, gentle, pretty, willowy, submissive."
A hike in minimum wage is referred to as "a controversial manoeuvre that increases the incentive for young people to drop out of school."
And the state of the economy under President Bush? Much better than the "liberal media" would have you think: "For example, during his term Exxon Mobile has posted the largest profit of any company in a single year, and executive salaries have greatly increased as well."
What a mess. I refuse to accept papers turned in to me that cite Wikipedia, and I tell students that Wikipedia is not a reliable source. I haven't warned them about Conservapædia so far, but maybe I'm going to have to start, and let them know that I'll flunk them if I spot the kind of credulity that would think Conservapædia has any credibility at all.
Comments
"We have certain principles that we adhere to, and we are up-front about them," Schlafly writes in his mission statement. "Beyond that we welcome the facts."
Wow, he actually admits that they only welcome facts that don't contradict their idiology. er, I mean ideology.
Posted by: craig | June 21, 2007 10:55 AM
So what...wait a minute...let me catch my breath from laughing...so what...ow, my sides hurt ... so what... ...aw, forget it.
Posted by: RamblinDude | June 21, 2007 11:04 AM
What is up with the "controversial manoeuvre that increases the incentive for young people to drop out of school" business?
Has Conservapedia abandoned the preference for American spelling? Or did the good conservatives wiki editors simply never learn how to spell either maneuver or manoeuvre?
Posted by: Edward | June 21, 2007 11:04 AM
In the "No Shit Sherlock" category, this has got to be the funniest thing I've read this week.
Posted by: Dan | June 21, 2007 11:04 AM
That state of the economy one has to be sabotage. Not even Conservapedia are that dumb. Besides, they're trying to be populist.
Posted by: Ginger Yellow | June 21, 2007 11:06 AM
This is one of those cases of something being so stupid that it's hard to tell whether it's supposed to be a joke or not. Until i read this i was pretty sure that it was a joke.
I disagree with liberals editting it though. Makes it harder to gage exactly what these idiots really think.
Posted by: Brian W. | June 21, 2007 11:10 AM
I don't know Ginger. I've found that even the most skilled satirist cannot hold a candle to the idiocy the believers can spout. It really is impossible to tell the difference between someone sarcastically spouting gibberish to mock them and one of them spouting what they believe.
Posted by: Gex | June 21, 2007 11:10 AM
According to Wikipedia, Andy is Phyllis's son. In this case, the nut doesn't land far from the tree.
Posted by: Russell | June 21, 2007 11:17 AM
"I refuse to accept pappers that cite Wikipedia..."
Are you aware of the study Nature conducted (the original study is only accessible to those who have Nature subscriptions but http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/4530930.stm has a page on it).
Posted by: D.R.M. | June 21, 2007 11:22 AM
"Are you aware of the study Nature conducted..."
I'm not a teacher, but I'm a student (again). And I've had teachers tell me not to use it. I can think of reasons for them not accepting it. After all, if a particular wikipedia statement does in fact have a reference to it, you mind as well click on the link and go for the source of the wiki article.
Posted by: daenku32 | June 21, 2007 11:32 AM
Beyond Wikipedia's credibility issues (and there are many errors and controversies, notwithstanding the Nature study), the problem with citing Wikipedia is that the article probably will change. I'm a librarian, and I use Wikipedia for things like word definitions or to get a handle on something I know nothing about, but I would never consider it a scholarly source.
Posted by: Maxine | June 21, 2007 11:34 AM
Well done, Andrew Schlafly.
You have proven once again that a person can utterly waste their short span of life on this planet spewing ideological lies and distorted facts and fostering stupidity, all the while receiving the approbation of like-minded idiots.
Wasn't difficult, was it?
Posted by: CalGeorge | June 21, 2007 11:34 AM
In response to PZ's statement that he won't accept papers that cite Wikipedia, D.R.M. (#9) cites a study that purports to show Wikipedia is as accurate as Britannica on "science."
I guess the question would be whether PZ accepts papers that cite Britannica, or indeed any such secondary source.
Posted by: Jud | June 21, 2007 11:41 AM
and I tell students that Wikipedia is not a reliable source.
If I were a college professor teaching some advanced subject I probably wouldn't allow my students to cite wikipedia, but I wouldn't go as far as telling them it's not a reliable source. I can't speak for all the history, math, popular culture, and stuff like that, but from my experience wikipedia is surprisingly reliable.
The vandalism is blatantly obvious. Nobody goes to the Mus musculus article and decide to put in some semi-plausible lies. For example that the centromere in the chromosome is unusual because it is 2.3 times as big as Homo sapiens. Experts may know that's a blatant lie (or not? I just made it up on the spot :P), but most people wouldn't. No, vandals go in and blank out pages, put curse words in random places, say "hi Sahrah!", etc.
As for honest mistakes, most editors know a fair amount about the subject they are editing on. While they're not (always) experts (as there ARE some botanists, biologists, physicists out there), their collective knowledge is something you can put a fair amount of trust in. It's almost like a peer-review kind of thing, although of course the peers are usually not quite as knowledgeable... but the system works surprisingly well.
Posted by: Oran_Taran | June 21, 2007 11:41 AM
err... to clarify,
I can't speak for all the history, math, popular culture, and stuff like that, but from my experience wikipedia is surprisingly reliable.
means that I can't speak for those subjects but from my experience with science articles, it is surprisingly reliable.
Posted by: Oran_Taran | June 21, 2007 11:44 AM
When I TA for an upper division lab course, I also don't accept Wikipedia citations on papers. It might be very reliable (and sometimes it is), but part of the point of looking up references for a research paper is to learn how to find relevant journal articles. If I counted on Wikipedia to stay abreast of current research in my field, I wouldn't get very far at all.
An undergrad class is a good place for students to put in some time and learn how to find the peer-reviewed articles that they need rather than just going with the first Google search result.
Posted by: The Disgruntled Chemist | June 21, 2007 11:50 AM
Oran Taran - before you get too carried away with wikipedia's facts, you need to view the Stephen Colbert Elephant articles...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Elephant/Colbert
Posted by: J-Dog | June 21, 2007 11:52 AM
I agree that Wikipedia is an excellent starting point for investigation.... especially if the authors have included citations...
However, even (good) citations need scrutiny (as I tell my son when he uses the web for research)...
Reliable does not equal truth.... but unreliable generally equals untruth.
If you don't know -- form your own opinions from primary source material. You may (ultimately) be wrong or misguided... but you'll at least get credit for your analysis!
Posted by: tony | June 21, 2007 11:53 AM
"I disagree with liberals editting it though. Makes it harder to gage exactly what these idiots really think."
They're pretty militant about what gets entered. So if the post is not 100% in line with their ideology it's deleted.
What I find particularly exasperating about the Conservapdeia entries is what they don't say. Like the one for Ho Chi Min doesn't even bother to mention he was a communists. You'd think a Conservative would at lest note that.
Posted by: Bob L | June 21, 2007 11:55 AM
As much as I hate Conservapedia, they are pretty close to the truth about the minimum wage thing. Minimum wage and pay rate controls discourage merit-based rewards and discourage competing via high performance productivity and customer service.
Posted by: Aaron Kinney | June 21, 2007 12:01 PM
I'm a retired librarian and I love wikipedia. It's there for a quick, generally reliable reference on just about anything I want to know (Where is Uzbeckistan? What sort of French name is Sarkozy? You know--Life's trivial but burning questions. It's not an academic reference source, but if I were still working, I'd use it as an entry level source, to get a handle on a subject I knew nothing about.
Posted by: Ellen | June 21, 2007 12:07 PM
"Oran Taran - before you get too carried away with wikipedia's facts, you need to view the Stephen Colbert Elephant articles..." -J Dog
That disinformation was immediately edited out and is only a single case.
Posted by: D.R.M. | June 21, 2007 12:08 PM
@ #1. Craig, you took the words right out of my mouth (er, fingers? keyboard?). I look forward to the day when information and evidence will be recognised for what they are: ideologically neutral.
As it is, Conservapædia's use of 'theorised' and 'controversial' indicate they've taken a page from the wedge strategy of suggesting a scientific debate where there is none.
Perhaps the name Conservapedo would more accurately describe the childish nature of their articles.
Posted by: Brownian | June 21, 2007 12:09 PM
Oran Taran - before you get too carried away with wikipedia's facts, you need to view the Stephen Colbert Elephant articles...
That's a popular culture thing, not a science article. I was specifically talking about the science articles.
Besides, that's the exception, not the rule.
Posted by: Oran_Taran | June 21, 2007 12:09 PM
I agree that Wikipedia is an excellent starting point for investigation.... especially if the authors have included citations...
Posted by: aloysius | June 21, 2007 12:12 PM
Like it or not, Wikipedia is an excellent starting point for any investigation.
I certainly don't let students cite it as a source of peer-reviewed science; they must read the papers.
But as scientists we should contribute our expertise to Wikipedia as well as to our official publications. It doesn't take much time to check out the articles in our field and make corrections and additions where appropriate. That's the best way to make sure everyone gets accurate information.
Posted by: Rosie Redfield | June 21, 2007 12:16 PM
He sounds like a moron, but considering who his mother is it's a wonder he's not climbing-the-walls, shit-munching nuts. Phyllis Schlafly is one of the most stupid and vile people ever to live to the age of 150 (without looking a day over 200).
Posted by: Ira Fews | June 21, 2007 12:17 PM
The problem with Wikipedia for use in scholarship is that it changes.
Entries may be reliable one day and get worse the next.
How the heck is a professor/teacher supposed to deal with that?
Posted by: CalGeorge | June 21, 2007 12:18 PM
Apologies -- I should have prefixed my earlier comments with "FOR NON PROFESSIONAL PURPOSES"
If you're a professional, you should (generally) be using professional sources for your citations (regardless of your profession, but especially in sciences)
I would EXPECT teachers and professsors to deal with 'mutable' references in the way that PZ suggests - Wikipedia is not a citable reference. period. (doesn't mean you can't use it for ideas, or an overview, though)
Posted by: tony | June 21, 2007 12:30 PM
Aaron - re: Minumum Wage
You must be fucking joking?
Unless you postulate a minimum wage that is so outrageously high that it inflates local prices/costs (Switzerland, anyone) then its worth is certainly visible. The minimum wage stops the worst outrages of 'robber baron profiteering'. It does not confer anything but basic poverty on its recipients, and hopefully avoidance of total poverty.
Perhaps you'd rather we change to the 'libertarian' ideal of full-on free markets... In that case you'll be happy to accept that we've reduced your salary by 50% since you're obviously incapable of thinking, and spend too much time on the 'net.
Be careful what you wish for, buddy...
Posted by: tony | June 21, 2007 12:38 PM
PZ deserves bonus points for spelling the name of Schlafly's project correctly.
:-)
Posted by: Blake Stacey, OM | June 21, 2007 12:40 PM
The newspaper sez,
I'm pretty sure that explosive growth can be blamed on ScienceBlogs.com.
Posted by: Blake Stacey, OM | June 21, 2007 12:42 PM
Conservapædia? Oh, how unkind to use the British-English spelling.
Bob
Posted by: Bob O'H | June 21, 2007 12:43 PM
Just noticed another doozy:
"Schlafly calls the armchair psychology "borderline in acceptability" for his site, but he defends the Clinton article on balance as "an objective, bias-free piece from a conservative perspective." [Emphasis added.]
He doesn't know what words mean, does he?
Posted by: Brownian | June 21, 2007 12:51 PM
"it's a wonder he's not climbing-the-walls, shit-munching nuts"
He's not? I can say with a 95% degree of certainty what your stance is on school prayer and evolution, and that's all that's needed for scientific accuracy. (Full Disclosure: I've been banned from Conservaepedia. Not for editing. For putting on my userpage that I was a Godless Liberal Heathen. But they welcome differing viewpoints!)
Posted by: MyaR | June 21, 2007 12:52 PM
Conservapædia is a good example of grassroots/astroturf misinformation and an attempt to push revisionist history. It would probably make a very interesting case study in a sociology course set alongside other more centralized propaganda examples.
In a brief defense (of a sort) for wikipededia... I agree it is not a citeable source beyond informal conversation, but it does provide a fine starting place and summary in many many cases to figure out methodology and sources to actually use. Just as one doesn't cite News and Views in Nature, but they are damn useful.
Posted by: travc | June 21, 2007 12:53 PM
I don't accept encyclopedia citations, either.
And yes, of course, I don't somehow ban them from reading Wikipedia or Britannica, but I tell them those are only starting points, and if you're going to endorse a fact by citing it you need to dig into the primary literature to do so.
Posted by: PZ Myers | June 21, 2007 12:55 PM
Wikipedia also has the virtue that it provides a limitless source of "teachable moments." Every day, somewhere on the site, an event transpires to which a teacher can point and say, "And that, Johnny, is why we need bibliographies!"
It's also a good training ground for aspiring nonfiction writers.
Posted by: Blake Stacey, OM | June 21, 2007 12:56 PM
CalGeorge: You can create links to particular versions of wikipedia articles. For example, http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Octopus&oldid=135014268 is clearly vandalism, while http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Octopus&oldid=139164467 seems to contain links to potentially interesting sources.
Presumably, if you're going to talk about a wikipedia entry, you're going to want to talk about a particular version of it.
Posted by: silence | June 21, 2007 12:56 PM
In a course I took this spring, the instructor was handing back one of the papers, and discussing them a little bit. Things like, "A lot of you did ____, which was very helpful" and "Any number greater than 4 digits needs commas." Then the kicker: "Wikipedia is not a valid source." This brought chuckles from many in the class, which was part of his intention.
Oh, did I mention this was a graduate level class?
I agree with the person above who said that if the info is in Wikipedia, it ought to have a citation. Just go to the original & verify it, and there's your source.
Posted by: brain | June 21, 2007 1:00 PM
An interesting sidebar is the actions and methods the admins at Conservapedia use to keep unpleasent facts out of articles like Intelligent Design. Unlike the encyclopedia Conservapedia exists to counter, Wikipedia, admins at Conservapedia have literally carte blanch to mete out whatever measures they choose. The results have a long string of credible editors blocked without warning for ridiculously long periods, usually months, for adding readily verifiable facts to articles. Probably the most egregious abuser of his admin position at Conservapedia is a former Wikipedia admin. He was not just an admin at Wikipedia, but a bureaucrat, a role that indicates the highest level of trust by the community, and one that comes with a powerful set of tools. First he was defrocked of his bureaucrat role by Wikipedia's arbitration committee for abusing his position. Not long after his was stripped of his admin status and tools for again abusing his position by blocking his opponents in a fight over biased content. In both instances his conservative pov played a role in his inability to restrain his abusing his position. Now he's largely running the show at Conservapedia. Draw your own conclusions as to the likelihood well-meaning editors will ever be able to contribute unbiased content to articles at Conservapedia.
Posted by: triviality | June 21, 2007 1:02 PM
As one of the early members of Rationalwiki I wanted to point out that while a great deal of rationalwiki is about detailing and reacting to the anti-science, anti-reality stance of conservapedia we are attempting to do a whole lot more. I think many of the commenters and readers here would be interested in exploring it a little deeper. For example we are starting a collaborative effort to do a point my point refutation of Behe's "interview" defending his new book: http://www.rationalwiki.com/wiki/Behe:_The_Edge_of_Evolution%2C_Interview
Posted by: tmtoulouse | June 21, 2007 1:04 PM
"Be careful what you wish for, buddy..."
Yeah, isn't it interesting how the proponents of such a system always think they will be the winners, that the losers will always be somebody else.
Posted by: Obdulantist | June 21, 2007 1:12 PM
Classic. There's really nothing more needed to be said here...
Posted by: Brain Hertz | June 21, 2007 1:16 PM
Ah, yes. Phyllis Schlafly. She spent much of the seventies traveling around the country telling mothers they should stay home with their children.
Posted by: Lana | June 21, 2007 1:17 PM
You can link to a specific version of an article.
ex. http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Elephant&oldid=135671028
As for the effect that Colbert had on the elephant article, it's been noted that the length and quality of the article increased significantly during and after the 'attack'.
Citing wikipedia is a bit silly, of course, since you should use the original sources cited by the article (possibly after verifying they're legitimate (and editing the article if not!)). If an article is poorly cited, then it should be considered questionable. Fix it! :)
Posted by: GTMoogle | June 21, 2007 1:19 PM
And she was right! Look how screwed up her kids are!
Posted by: PZ Myers | June 21, 2007 1:20 PM
Whoops, people covered most of my points by the time I submitted... Stupid work, getting the way of my posting! :)
Posted by: GTMoogle | June 21, 2007 1:25 PM
Back in April, this was the entry for Margaret Atwood's "Handmaid's Tale":
The Handmaid's Tale is a novel set in the near future in which conservative Christianity has achieved ascendancy over the United States of America. Though often thought of as a dystopia, the novel contains many positive aspects, such as the outlawing of abortion, and the abolishion of the separation of church and state.
What can be more positive then hanging women and doctors who perform abortions. And hanging people who are critics of the regime.
Seems that people who actually read the novel realized just how stupid that entry was so it has been updated to this:
The Handmaid's Tale is a dystopian novel by Margaret Atwood set in the near future in which an oppressive authoritarian government has achieved ascendancy over the United States of America. She apparently intended it to be a fable about a backlash against feminism[Citation Needed]. It was made into a movie in 1990.
Yeah, this is a site I CAN TRUST.
Posted by: Janine | June 21, 2007 1:33 PM
Hah. Sometimes when I'm bored, I create an account on Conservapedia, put in a fact, and watch gleefully as my account is blocked in minutes. I edited the gorilla page by just changing "Comparison of DNA sequences of humans and gorillas show them to be 99% identical, but even with these similarities there are so many gaps in the sequence that it is nigh impossible for them to have descended from a common ancestor." to simply read "Comparison of DNA sequences of humans and gorillas show them to be 99% identical."
I was blocked, and the reason for the block was just the word "VANDAL".
The really funny thing is that the sysop who blocked me, BethanyS, has a line in her profile that says
"As a Conservapedia Sysop, I will NEVER ARBITRARILY block anyone who is not in violation of the Conservapedia Commandments or related CP Guidelines."
Posted by: george | June 21, 2007 1:43 PM
Wikipedia: The ultimate in revisionist history...
The saving *grace* is that you CAN see the old versions ! The challenge is that the 'majority' prevails.... let's hope that majority is never 'Moral'!
(sorry for the gawdly word, but their memes have infected the english language to too great an extent... I can't even swear without invoking a gawd!)
Posted by: tony | June 21, 2007 1:44 PM
Conservapaedia: simply revisionist.
No good, all bad, and damn ugly!
Posted by: tony | June 21, 2007 1:46 PM
Phyllis Schlafly is particularly good at sneeringly explaining "obvious" things that turn out upon investigation to be untrue. She's been a thorn in the side of the body politic for a long, long time, having first come to fame for her Barry Goldwater campaign book (A Choice, not an Echo). She dislikes political polls (sometimes I agree with her there), but she is a statistical ignoramus and criticizes them on completely specious grounds. She truly doesn't know any better (and doesn't even suspect that she doesn't know).
Posted by: Zeno | June 21, 2007 1:47 PM
And she was right! Look how screwed up her kids are!
I dunno about that. How much more screwed up might they be if she'd stayed home with them?
Posted by: Eamon Knight | June 21, 2007 1:49 PM
Have a short look outside the USA. Any halfway First World country will do.
We're in science here. Observation trumps theory.
Posted by: David Marjanović | June 21, 2007 1:56 PM
she is a statistical ignoramus
Which she's passed on to her children. There have some hilarious conversations around Andy Schlafly's "statistics", like his claim that Wikipedia is 6X more liberal than the American population. And his claims about his statistical predictive superpowers, which amuse me no end.
Posted by: MyaR | June 21, 2007 2:16 PM
re comment 22:
Conservapedo would have (it's not a standard word) a curiosly fitting meaning in Spanish - roughly "fart repository"
Posted by: pleistoscenic | June 21, 2007 2:21 PM
"As a Conservapedia Sysop, I will NEVER ARBITRARILY block anyone who is not in violation of the Conservapedia Commandments or related CP Guidelines."
Get a life. Jeeeeeebus.
Posted by: CalGeorge | June 21, 2007 2:45 PM
You don't accept Wikipedia citations, P-Zed? Do you accept Britannica?
In fact, other than the occasional defacement (that will get fixed extremely quickly, often within seconds) I have yet to see someone point out where Wikipedia is inaccurate. There are some political pages and things like that where it seems they're trying to be too "fair" but that's the society we live in and I don't think that any other Encyclopedia is going to be any more likely to take those issues on properly anyway.
Posted by: Timothy | June 21, 2007 2:46 PM
"Conservapedo"--isn't that former Congressman Mark Foley's nickname?
Posted by: Captain C | June 21, 2007 3:14 PM
No instructor should be accepting either Wikipedia or any other encyclopedia as a primary source in a paper. Anyone teaching research stresses the importance of the primary source and the scholarly source. An encyclopedia is a starting point, but by its very nature not the in-depth, up-to-date resource that most research other than the historically-based requires.
Accuracy is not the sole issue; depth, breadth, and recency are of equal or greater importance.
Posted by: Faithful Reader | June 21, 2007 3:16 PM
Back in April, this was the entry for Margaret Atwood's "Handmaid's Tale":
The Handmaid's Tale is a novel set in the near future in which conservative Christianity has achieved ascendancy over the United States of America. Though often thought of as a dystopia, the novel contains many positive aspects, such as the outlawing of abortion, and the abolishion of the separation of church and state.
I think he's just mad because the conservative woman in that bookws clearly modeled after his own mother. She, too, used to like to leave her family to travel the country and speak about how women belong at home with their families. When she actually got her way, but now had to stay home all the time, she got rather depressed.
Posted by: Library Diva | June 21, 2007 3:29 PM
I don't accept Wikipedia as a source for High School papers let alone college level work.
I haven't had a conservapedia citation pop up yet, but given the leanings of some of the families in our school district, I expect to see them before too long.
Posted by: dogmeatib | June 21, 2007 3:34 PM
Timothy--
PZ said (#36) he doesn't accept citations from encyclopedias. He's right not to, especially for a college class.
But I strongly agree with you that, for day-to-day use, Wikipedia is a wonderful, surprisingly accurate (on the whole) resource.
Posted by: Leon | June 21, 2007 3:44 PM
I tend to agree that Wikipedia is usually accurate. I agree that encyclopedias of any kind are inappropriate resources for research papers.
For me the interesting question becomes: Is Wikipedia accurate because it mimics the traditional encyclopedia it purports to replace? That is to say, is it accurate because it relies on experts to write, edit, and monitor entries on the subjects of their expertise? Does this mean that Wikipedia is merely parasitic on more established forms of knowledge production?
Posted by: fardels bear | June 21, 2007 4:13 PM
Of course Wikipedia is "parasitic" on more established forms of knowledge production, its explicitly stated in their editing guidelines: "no original research." All of the information is supposed to be cited with a footnote providing a link or page reference to a generally accepted source, which in practice vary from top tier journals to sketchy websites.
Wikipedia is good at aggregating a variety of knowledge from a variety of sources very quickly, but of course it is not providing any new knowledge, all of the claims can all be found elsewhere, or else they are deleted (in theory). Therefore, I think that a policy of not accepting citations from Wikipedia is certainly the correct policy, because the student can still use Wikipedia, they just must only use it as an intermediary step. If the article in Wikipedia is reputable it will be extensively cited, and the resources that are cited can be found and used by the student to get the same information, and likely a lot more.
Wikipedia is for quick knowledge, and also works very well as a starting point when doing initial research, to get a feel for the topic, and to get a bibliography from which one can jump off to more in depth and scholarly research.
Posted by: eukaryote | June 21, 2007 4:29 PM
One of the things I'm fascinated by with the Conservapaedia thing is its stated purpose -- to be a source for research for high school students. By the time I was in sixth grade, I knew that encyclopedia cites were not valid for a real research paper and by high school it was completely disallowed. (Granted, I grew up in a very good school district.) To encourage students not to find primary sources seems to be just very bad education. But then, it is aimed at fundamentalist home-schoolers...
Posted by: MyaR | June 21, 2007 4:50 PM
I heard a story on NPR in March about this. For fun, look up "Kangaroo" on conservapedia and learn that kangaroos (like all animals) originated in the middle-east and either migrated to Australia over a land bridge (which no longer exists) or floated on jetsom[1].
In bending over backwards and exposing my buttocks and spreading my cheeks in fairness that conservipedia in no way deserves, conservipedia does not "only welcome facts that don't contradict their idiology". They just have an agenda to place conservative opinions first and state that they are more believable than any other, and place creatist theories and terminology ("A baramin is a lineage of earthly life which is believed by creationists to be created by God during the Creation Week, and corresponds in some functional aspects to the secular concept of species. However, unlike species concepts that are based on Darwinian thinking, the baraminic barrier is inviolable, as other baramins do not evolve from earlier baramins.") above scientific facts, er, unsupported highly controvesrial beliefs. Other than that you get the same level of information as an elementary school book. ("Kangaroos have large ears on top of their small heads, a long snout, and short arms with clawed fingers. Their legs are strong, powerful, and are made for leaping. Their feet have four toes at the end of elongated metatarsi that they rest on when standing. They also have a powerful, thick tail that is used as support when standing, a third-leg when walking slowly, and for counterbalance while leaping. Like all Marsupials, female kangaroos have a pouch on their stomachs in which they carry their young.")
=====
[1]Consistent with their view that the fossil record as a whole does not support the evolutionary position[2][3], creationists state that there is a lack of transitional fossils showing an evolutionary origin of kangaroos:
The Macropod family is alleged to have evolved from either the Phalangeridae (possums) or Burramyidae (pygmy-possums)...
However, there are no fossils of animals which appear to be intermediate between possums and kangaroos. Wabularoo naughtoni, supposed ancestor of all the macropods, was clearly a kangaroo (it greatly resembles the potoroos which dwell in Victoria's forests). If modern kangaroos really did come from it, all this shows is the same as we see happening today, namely that kangaroos come from kangaroos, "after their kind." [4]
According to the origins theory model used by young earth creation scientists, modern kangaroos are the descendants of the two founding members of the modern kangaroo baramin that were taken aboard Noah's Ark prior to the Great Flood. It has not yet been determined by baraminologists whether kangaroos form a holobaramin with the wallaby, tree-kangaroo, wallaroo, pademelon and quokka, or if all these species are in fact apobaraminic or polybaraminic. There is, however, no evidence of a genetic bottleneck in the kangaroo species which would be expected if all kangaroos were descended from two individuals.
After the Flood, these kangaroos bred from the Ark passengers migrated to Australia. There is debate whether this migration happened over land[5] with lower sea levels during the post-flood ice age, or before the supercontinent of Pangea broke apart[6], or if they rafted on mats of vegetation torn up by the receding flood waters.[5] The idea that God simply generated kangaroos into existence there is considered by most creation researchers to be contra-Biblical.
Other views on kangaroo origins include the belief of some Australian Aborigines that kangaroos were sung into existence by their ancestors during the "Dreamtime" [7] and the evolutionary view that kangaroos and the other marsupials evolved from a common marsupial ancestor which lived hundreds of millions of years ago.[8]
A majority of biologists regard evolution as the most likely explanation for the origin of species including the kangaroo.
Note that despite reluctantly admiting the evolutionary viewpoint and even admitting that the majority of biologists accept it, the give it the dead-last position and give an aboriginy creation myth (which they clearly don't believe) higher priority. Also the details is as scanty as possible.
Actually I read this first in march and then it claimed the evolutionist viewpoint was a religious opinion and shouldn't be considered science. A few days later they retracted that it was religious opinion but explained that evolution theory was questionable. This "majority of science" is new and actually blows me away.
I get the feeling they put the creationist stuff with high priority mainly as a sense of solidarity in that somehow belief in science, oops I mean evolution, is "liberal" and the religious faith is "conservative" and you can't be religious without literalism. But I imagine enough conservatives who actually know anything about biology have complained or edited. After all, conservapedia pertains to be an encyclapedia and represent conservative views. Actual conservatives probably don't want to be embarrassed.
Also when I first viewed the page it insisted ant the top in claiming there were "There are at least sixty-nine baramin of kangaroo" (italics mine) and now it has replaced baramin with species. So even in something this idiotic, common sense is advancing.
I guess that's a good thing...
Posted by: woozy (but I'm not really sure) | June 21, 2007 6:08 PM
Promulgating the results of other people's research to a wider public (properly referenced, of course) is not in any way, shape or form to be considered 'parasitic' on the production of knowledge. Quite the contrary. One of the tenets of the Enlightenment that is dearest and closest to my heart is the notion that knowledge should be spread, shared and studied simply for its own sake.
In this sense, some Wikipedia articles resemble the review articles that you will sometimes find in professional journals (and while the vast majority fall short of such professional articles, I have actually seen a couple that I would not have been surprised to read in a real journal) - they sum up the state of the art, giving credit where credit is due and providing an introduction and review for new readers (that being said, Wikipedia still isn't a valid citation for professional research).
- JS
Posted by: JS | June 21, 2007 6:22 PM
... women are childlike now? Margaret Thatcher. gentle? Angelina Jolie. pretty? the Queen of England. willowy? Dawn French, Rosie O'Donnell, i could go on... submissive? anyone who's not religious...
oh dear.
Posted by: Lepht | June 21, 2007 7:35 PM
One thing I love about Wikipedia is it's a gold mine for trivia on pop-culture that would NEVER grace the pages of a more stuffy, proper reference work like Brittanica or even World Book Encyclopedia...obscure sh*t from the 1970s, 1980s, especially television, music, video games, whatever...simply AMAZING. Internet culture, too, of course. I read my fair share of BoingBoing, but I certainly don't catch every trend, novelty, etc. It's a great starting point for a lot of stuff. Also an excellent time-killer while doing otherwise boring-ass nightshift work.
It's not a "proper" resource for scholarly research, but hell, I use it at work because 1) it's FREE and 2) it's fast/cheap; If I need a quick overview of some obscure country where a client is locate (I work in Travel Insurance), bingo, Wikipedia has saved my @ss more than once--that & Google-Earth--and Yahoo! Maps (though the way they "improved" Yahoo! Maps lately REAALLLY sucks--no where near as reliable as they used to be).
I wonder how many others out there who work as office clerks for various corporations use Wikipedia in the workplace on account of the cost-factor (free versus $$?? for a real online Encyclopedia)...?
Posted by: JJR | June 21, 2007 7:40 PM
Will I ever meet a Wikipedia detractor who's noticed the "permanent link" button on every page?
Posted by: Azkyroth | June 21, 2007 10:37 PM
Though the infantile sort of defacements you mention do seem to be far more common.
As for changing text, citations of Web sites are supposed to include the date it was referenced, and at Wikipedia it is trivially easy to pull up the version of the article as it existed on a given date. (But maybe the citation should have a timestamp too, given how frequently some articles are edited.)
Posted by: Bobby | June 22, 2007 2:16 AM
I don't recall any teacher from high school on ever allowing any kind of tertiary source attribution(Primary--first hand account, secondary--from someone relying on eyewitness accounts, tertiary--compilation of primary and secondary sources, like encyclopedia, wikipedia, or textbook [comment #13]). We were always expressly directed away from such sources-- they could be used to locate sources, but could not be used as a source. Of course, all my term papers were written on an IBM Selectric, but that's another matter.
Posted by: Mark C | June 22, 2007 3:14 AM
I'm a retired librarian and I love wikipedia. It's there for a quick, generally reliable reference on just about anything I want to know.
I know it comes in bloody useful for clarifying subject cataloguing and access when you simply need a feel for how something fits into LoC or some other controlled vocabulary.
I analysed it for a library paper, once. I'd provisionally accept it for an overview - *provided* other cites were given as well.
I have to love the person who edited the article on homo florensis (the pygmy man they found near Indonesia) to include a link to Ronnie Corbett...
Posted by: Phoenician in a time of Romans | June 22, 2007 4:13 AM
The thing is, most good Wikipedia entries have sources listed at the bottom, so it's only a matter of one more click or two to get to the original material. I tell students to think of Wikipedia not really as an encyclopedia, but as a mini-database that has a nice summary at the beginning of the search results. That helps take them out of the mindset that Wikipedia is a source in its own right, and helps teach them to follow references.
Posted by: Carlie | June 22, 2007 10:16 AM
Uh oh. I think it's time for a new Conservapedia article.
http://www.conservapedia.com/Generalized_Second_Law_of_Thermodynamics
Posted by: Dustin | June 22, 2007 11:06 PM
Now, what do you do if a student cites the Uncyclopedia? I am not sure whether it or the Conservapedia is more dangerous ...
Posted by: Keith Douglas | June 23, 2007 1:02 PM
The article in Nature that appeared to show that Wiki was almost as error-free as Brittanica was somewhat debunked. If the criticism is true, Nature used some shoddy and possibly mendacious practices in their study.
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2006/03/25/britannica_wikipedia_nature/
Wiki's great for pop-culture stuff that nobody else would bother to catalog. If you want to know about obscure Star Wars characters, then it's your source (actually, for Star Wars caharacters, wookiepedia is your REAL source). For more serious topics, the contributors are simply lifting and paraphrasing the original sources, with all the possibility for error and misinterpretation that that entails.
Posted by: CJ22 | July 25, 2007 8:37 AM
I noticed you could not point out one flaw in the Conservapedia theory of evolution article.
Posted by: PeterMoore | October 22, 2007 9:34 PM
PeterMoore,
I noticed that there was no mention of a Conservapedia theory of evolution article in the comments, just one about kangaroos. There's a slight difference between the two.
Posted by: Shiritai | November 1, 2007 10:23 AM