[Taxacom] Wikipedia vs. science

Mon May 14 18:03:25 CDT 2012

Somehow, most of the dialogue I quoted got left out of this post, but it is all at the linked page, anyway ...
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S

________________________________
From: Stephen Thorpe <stephen_thorpe at yahoo.co.nz>
To: "Tony.Rees at csiro.au" <Tony.Rees at csiro.au>; "dipteryx at freeler.nl" <dipteryx at freeler.nl>; "taxacom at mailman.nhm.ku.edu" <taxacom at mailman.nhm.ku.edu> 
Sent: Tuesday, 15 May 2012 10:57 AM
Subject: Re: [Taxacom] Wikipedia vs. science

Stemonitis* continues to backtrack and rewrite recent history ad nauseam, see : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Munididae
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No, I don't think WoRMS is seriously or deliberately introducing any novelties. It has just made a mistake. It is a secondary source by all reasonable definitions of that term. Incidentally, we can probably stop discussing WoRMS here now. It is not used by the article at all, and has been fixed to exclude the dubious names anyway. I think we can close this discussion and all move on now. --Stemonitis (talk) 13:30, 14 May 2012 (UTC) 
* It is an interesting question as to why we are all having to try to talk sense into one person (of unknown identity) in order to improve (or even contribute to) a Wikipedia article on squat lobsters??? It may or may not be relevant that Wikimedia is funded by donations ...
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Stephen
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________________________________
From: "Tony.Rees at csiro.au" <Tony.Rees at csiro.au>
To: stephen_thorpe at yahoo.co.nz; dipteryx at freeler.nl; taxacom at mailman.nhm.ku.edu 
Sent: Monday, 14 May 2012 10:45 PM
Subject: RE: [Taxacom] Wikipedia vs. science

Stephen, again pardon me if you have suggested this already, but how about aking the WoRMS editor/s to correct the mistake at source? That is what I normally do in such cases. Then if it is corrected relatively promptly, you can simply cite the corrected version... In any case, it is presumably better for all concerned if WoRMS is correct and not erroneous.

Cheers - Tony

________________________________
From: Stephen Thorpe [stephen_thorpe at yahoo.co.nz]
Sent: Monday, 14 May 2012 6:02 PM
To: Rees, Tony (CMAR, Hobart); dipteryx at freeler.nl; taxacom at mailman.nhm.ku.edu
Subject: Re: [Taxacom] Wikipedia vs. science

Wikipedia update:

edit on Munididae talk page by Stemonitis: 07:18, 14 May 2012<http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk:Munididae&oldidI2481456>? Stemonitis<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Stemonitis> (talk<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Stemonitis> | contribs<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Contributions/Stemonitis>)? . . (10,856 bytes) (+580)? . . (?<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Munididae#Dispute>?Dispute: no negative proof needed) [quote]We can choose as editors to disregard WoRMS, which would involve removing the whole last paragraph. No-one has argued for that yet, but I could see it working. I'll give it a go. --Stemonitis<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Stemonitis> (talk<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Stemonitis>) 07:18, 14 May 2012 (UTC) [unquote]

edit on article Munididae by Stemonitis: 07:19, 14 May 2012<http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Munididae&oldidI2481577>? Stemonitis<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Stemonitis> (talk<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Stemonitis> | contribs<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Contributions/Stemonitis>)? . . (3,033 bytes) (-1,190)? . . (remove all mention of WoRMS)

edit by same on talk page: 07:52, 14 May 2012<http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk:Munididae&oldidI2484256>? Stemonitis<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Stemonitis> (talk<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Stemonitis> | contribs<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Contributions/Stemonitis>)? . . (11,225 bytes) (+369)? . . (?<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Munididae#Dispute>?Dispute: correction) [quote]Correction: I have since seen that Stho002 had recently suggested exactly this course of action. I am still slightly uneasy about only citing a single source, especially where we would normally cite WoRMS, but I'm prepared to go with it if everyone else is also happy with it. --Stemonitis<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Stemonitis> (talk<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Stemonitis>) 07:52, 14 May 2012 (UTC)[unquote]

Really, it becomes a reliable source because it was JUST an error. An error means it is unreliable and should not be used. -- Kim van der Linde at venus 17:07, 14 May 2012 (UTC) 
That wasn't my argument. You were saying it became a primary source rather than a secondary source because of the (now historical) error, and I disputed that. --Stemonitis (talk) 17:34, 14 May 2012 (UTC) 
Sorry, you were the main proponent who claimed WoRMS is a reliable source to the point that you repeatedly reverted a person who, now banned, was actually correct and you wrong. Your argument that it was a reliable source is dismantled either way. Either it contains original taxonomic insight and is a primary source, or it contains errors and is hence unreliable. You make your pick. I suggest further that you post a mea culpa at the appropriate places and get the editor in question unblocked. It is very easy to smack the many policies around someone's ears and frustrate people so much they say something less nice, and then use that to smack them around even harder with the second set of policies. Editor baiting through stubbornly repeating that the "rules" are at your side is so childish, and yes, you can win those by getting editors blocked and out of the way. -- Kim van der Linde at venus 18:23, 14 May 2012 (UTC) 
I reject that characterisation. I claimed that WoRMS is generally a reliable source (and in this group, it is), and at the time, it was the only source for the article (although that soon changed). What I reverted was one editor's repeated additions of superfluous cleanup tags to an article already tagged for that cleanup; nothing more. I was more than happy for the article to be so tagged, because it was always a fair point. I have made no special claims for that particular page on WoRMS, and nor would I. The blocked editor was blocked for incivility, not for anything to do with source reliability, reversions or indeed the contents of this article at all.
I realise that this very short article (only intended to link the genera to the higher taxa at the time) has received a lot of attention recently, including at locations outside Wikipedia, but this page should only be used to discuss potential improvements to the article. There has been a lot of recent attention of Wikipedia's coverage of squat lobsters, but little improvement to it as a result. So, please, unless you're coming here to discuss the article itself, rather than its history or related topics, this is the wrong forum. --Stemonitis (talk) 18:35, 14 May 2012 (UTC)
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