Wikipedia's perfection (was Re: Discussion of the relative advantages/disadvantages of PAE (was Re: Memory >3.5GB not used?))

[Thomas Dickey]

On Wed, Apr 25, 2007 at 01:58:55PM -0600, Chad Perrin wrote:
> I definitely agree that's suboptimal.  I'd expand that to include other
> sorts of pages, other than webpages, as well.  It's pretty rare for this
> particular brand of intellectually lazy person to realize that about the
> printed page, though.

I recall reading some interesting comments from studies (second hand, e.g.,
in Science News) which stated that people tended to believe things that
were presented in a credible fashion, not questioning them - using the
paper or page as an authority which amplified their own general beliefs
on a topic.

Aside from the circular referencing that occurs when believing that...

It's certainly hard to see where/how to decide to stop and question the
authority, given that premise (knowing that one is biased).  But it's
perhaps a good habit to get into - observing that reading things that
one already agrees with are perhaps as problematic as those that one
does not.

-- 
Thomas E. Dickey
http://invisible-island.net
ftp://invisible-island.net
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