Re: Wikipedia is amazing

In article <g7meef$jov$1$8300dec7@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>,
Norman Wells <norman@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
The whole idea of it is that it's self-verifying. If you disagree with the
entry, you edit it, or someone else does. Hence, on the whole, it's great.

I suspect many errors go uncorrected. For example, there is a
mistake in the article about "Equine vision". Whoever made this
mistake actually cites a primary source that contradicts the
statement. However, a reader would need to have fairly specialized
knowledge to realize a mistake had been made. I suspect the error
will go uncorrected until I get round to correcting it myself
(once I have figured out how to edit wikis).

The article on "Horse behavior" contains highly misleading info
on the dominance hierarchy. Imho, it also devotes too much of the
article to it. It looks as if it was written by people who are
familiar with the popular view promulgated by trainers and the
magazines, but unfamiliar with the scientific literature. Indeed,
there aren't any references to primary sources on dominance (with
half of the citations being about sleep). I would say this was a
poor article by Wikipedia standards. I *could* devote time to
improving it, but I suspect any attempt to reduce the emphasis on
dominance would lead to arguments. I certainly don't have either
the time or inclination to get involved in detailed debates. So
I'll probably just leave it as it is - which is sad, because many
readers will be misled by this article.

However, I hope/expect that the more "important" mistakes get
corrected more quickly!

But you just have to accept that it's open to short term abuse by kids
having what they regard as a laugh, and longer term by single interest
pressure groups pushing a particular agenda, for example those wedded to the
notion of global warming, who act in a concerted way, and quite
reprehensibly, to amend everything to their own point of view.

As long as you treat the entries on controversial subjects as suspect, and
learn to query elsewhere anything that seems unbelievable, it's absolutely
fine. It's not the sole fount of knowledge.

As far as the "Horse behaviour" entry goes, there is nothing to
suggest the subject is controversial or unbelievable.

Francis
.

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