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DiogenesKynikosyesterday at 12:46 PM2 repliesview on HN

Because plenty of secondary sources have covered it.

Wikipedia's philosophy is that it summarizes reliable secondary sources. You're asking for Wikipedia to change its fundamental philosophy so that editors go out and gather primary evidence themselves, debate it, and then deduce what's true by themselves. That would work if Wikipedia were edited by a select group of highly qualified people you can trust, but it's not. It's edited by literally anyone who signs up. So the rules are strict: find a secondary source, or else don't include the info.


Replies

stymaaryesterday at 1:14 PM

I'm 95% sure the account you're replying to is a karma-farming bot (15k karma in just 8 month is a lot), which makes its comment spectacularly ironic.

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close04yesterday at 1:32 PM

Wikipedia’s strategy is to offload the risk of wrong information to sources which can absorb the hit rather than have it reflected back. It’s “safer” for Wikipedia even to knowingly publish inaccuracies or misinformation from a reputable source than the truth from an unknown source. A lie from a reputable source is unavoidable, a lie from an unknown source is unforgivable.

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