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Putting aside the political portion, this seems like it could potentially lead to Wiki being "behind the times" at the least and stifling advancements at the ex

by pard68 3y ago

Putting aside the political portion, this seems like it could potentially lead to Wiki being "behind the times" at the least and stifling advancements at the extreme. The telescope was once fringe, and rightly so. Imagine reading that some guy had been able to see something in the sky that you can't see, you gotta trust him bro. Modern medical practice was a fringe view two hundred years ago. My point is if you hide the fringe then you either get left behind or prevent others from moving forward.

helen___keller 3y ago
I don’t think Wikipedia has that issue though. Pick the cutting edge in your field, in mine Wikipedia is reasonably well informed I think this is really only an “issue” when it comes to politics and culture wars
SV_BubbleTime 3y ago
> My point is if you hide the fringe then you either get left behind or prevent others from moving forward. Ultimately they’re OK with both because the politics justify it. It’s so obvious that as formal religion has weakened that informal religion has taken over. It’s not a bible, it’s a screen, you have faith, you think what it tells you, there are priests, you can wear the wrong thing, you do what makes you accepted in your tribe. If you didn’t see it during covid, then you extra double have a religion. All these people that mock religion - and have no idea they have their own is almost entertaining if it wasn’t so destructive. It’s wired into humans, we know it is, and then pretend it isn’t to our detriment.
ska 3y ago
There is an important difference between "leading edge" and "fringe", in this context. Most useful stuff comes from the leading edge. Occasionally from the fringe, but the SNR there is terrible. Either way though, by the time you want it written up in an encyclopedia it's been sorted out if it's useful for something. If you just write up everything, you'll be drowning in half-baked ideas and crackpot theories, the net damage to the value of the place far outweighs any positives.
- pard68 3y ago
  This is probably valid, I'd have to think on it some. As a rule I am against the silencing of thought. I think I can see where you'd be right, but how do you guard against the feedback loop, things not on Wikipedia do not gain traction because they're not on Wikipedia.
  - ska 3y ago
    I guess I don’t think of an encyclopedia as the place to work that out, mainly because its function as an encyclopedia is thereby lessened. Do you feel like there are a shortage of places to discuss ideas that don’t have much traction?
nateglims 3y ago
When was the telescope “fringe”?
- pard68 3y ago
  Feyerabend wrote about this in his book more or less arguing against what Wiki is doing to some extent. In "Against Method" he uses Galileo and his telescope as an example of what happens when "fringe" (he uses the term "pseudoscience", coincidentally this was a term Wiki used for some "fringe" stuff too) science is silenced.
  - nateglims 3y ago
    I see. I never really thought about the telescope aspect before but we are taught some model of how optics works and they would have no clue I suppose.
    - pard68 3y ago
      The book is way broader than Wiki, basically it wants "epistemological anarchy". Let scientists do their thing regardless of what the current view on it is. Only by pushing do we discover new things. I think this is far less true in other arenas, which is why I'm not talking about politics or culture here. Although there is probably some merit in anarchy there too. It'd be naive of us to assume our current understanding of government is complete. Imagine being a Monarchist in the 1700s and thinking there was no more perfect form of government!
      - nateglims 3y ago
        I’ve always found the history of heliocentrism useful for thinking about this. They may have been “correct” in antiquity but the model they had was not that good. I think it’s incredibly valuable to be able to apply it to politics enough to understand what is normal and feels natural to us (liberalism, capitalism, technology) was not always so.
      - Alpha3031 3y ago
cxr 3y ago
Small favor: when talking about Wikipedia, can you please just call it Wikipedia and not say "Wiki" (or "wiki") as a form of casual shorthand?
- pard68 3y ago
  Sure, I guess it does have a more generic meaning these days.
  - plg94 3y ago
    Not "these days". The first wiki (https://wiki.c2.com/ https://wiki.c2.com/), and thus the term "wiki", actually predate Wikipedia by a few years.
    - pard68 3y ago
      Huh TIL
jowea 3y ago
Ultimately yes. Wikipedia tries to be verifiable and follows mainly mainstream sources. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Verifiability,_not_truth https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Verifiability,_not_t...

by pard68 3y ago

helen___keller 3y ago

I don’t think Wikipedia has that issue though. Pick the cutting edge in your field, in mine Wikipedia is reasonably well informed I think this is really only an “issue” when it comes to politics and culture wars

SV_BubbleTime 3y ago

> My point is if you hide the fringe then you either get left behind or prevent others from moving forward. Ultimately they’re OK with both because the politics justify it. It’s so obvious that as formal religion has weakened that informal religion has taken over. It’s not a bible, it’s a screen, you have faith, you think what it tells you, there are priests, you can wear the wrong thing, you do what makes you accepted in your tribe. If you didn’t see it during covid, then you extra double have a religion. All these people that mock religion - and have no idea they have their own is almost entertaining if it wasn’t so destructive. It’s wired into humans, we know it is, and then pretend it isn’t to our detriment.

ska 3y ago

There is an important difference between "leading edge" and "fringe", in this context. Most useful stuff comes from the leading edge. Occasionally from the fringe, but the SNR there is terrible. Either way though, by the time you want it written up in an encyclopedia it's been sorted out if it's useful for something. If you just write up everything, you'll be drowning in half-baked ideas and crackpot theories, the net damage to the value of the place far outweighs any positives.

pard68 3y ago
This is probably valid, I'd have to think on it some. As a rule I am against the silencing of thought. I think I can see where you'd be right, but how do you guard against the feedback loop, things not on Wikipedia do not gain traction because they're not on Wikipedia.
- ska 3y ago
  I guess I don’t think of an encyclopedia as the place to work that out, mainly because its function as an encyclopedia is thereby lessened. Do you feel like there are a shortage of places to discuss ideas that don’t have much traction?

nateglims 3y ago

When was the telescope “fringe”?

pard68 3y ago
Feyerabend wrote about this in his book more or less arguing against what Wiki is doing to some extent. In "Against Method" he uses Galileo and his telescope as an example of what happens when "fringe" (he uses the term "pseudoscience", coincidentally this was a term Wiki used for some "fringe" stuff too) science is silenced.
- nateglims 3y ago
  I see. I never really thought about the telescope aspect before but we are taught some model of how optics works and they would have no clue I suppose.
  - pard68 3y ago
    The book is way broader than Wiki, basically it wants "epistemological anarchy". Let scientists do their thing regardless of what the current view on it is. Only by pushing do we discover new things. I think this is far less true in other arenas, which is why I'm not talking about politics or culture here. Although there is probably some merit in anarchy there too. It'd be naive of us to assume our current understanding of government is complete. Imagine being a Monarchist in the 1700s and thinking there was no more perfect form of government!
    - nateglims 3y ago
      I’ve always found the history of heliocentrism useful for thinking about this. They may have been “correct” in antiquity but the model they had was not that good. I think it’s incredibly valuable to be able to apply it to politics enough to understand what is normal and feels natural to us (liberalism, capitalism, technology) was not always so.
    - Alpha3031 3y ago

cxr 3y ago

Small favor: when talking about Wikipedia, can you please just call it Wikipedia and not say "Wiki" (or "wiki") as a form of casual shorthand?

pard68 3y ago
Sure, I guess it does have a more generic meaning these days.
- plg94 3y ago
  Not "these days". The first wiki (https://wiki.c2.com/ https://wiki.c2.com/), and thus the term "wiki", actually predate Wikipedia by a few years.
  - pard68 3y ago
    Huh TIL

jowea 3y ago

Ultimately yes. Wikipedia tries to be verifiable and follows mainly mainstream sources. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Verifiability,_not_truth https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Verifiability,_not_t...