Fake Professor in Wikipedia Storm

Join the discussion
Ask a follow-up here, or get your own question answered by working scientists, mathematicians and engineers — people, not an autocomplete.
Real named experts · corrections over time · the nuance an AI answer skips
18 replies · 4K views
Physics news on Phys.org
Who cares. It's theology.
 
What a dummy
 
Astronuc said:
All H*** would break loose. :biggrin:

dontdisturbmycircles said:
What a dummy

I admit that I groaned instead of laughed, but it wasn't that bad of a joke.
 
arildno said:
But..what if he's got the transsubstantiation wrong??

God forbid!

arildno said:
That would be to propagate heresy, wouldn't it?

Good. We need more heresy. Means people are thinking. And then they turn dogmatic too and...

Never mind, I'm in bad mood.
 
I have a feeling there is a lot of people like him on Wiki..

few days ago, I was reading the discussion page of Bell theorem, people shouldn't write and edit pages on wiki when they are high...
 
ziad1985 said:
I have a feeling there is a lot of people like him on Wiki..

few days ago, I was reading the discussion page of Bell theorem, people shouldn't write and edit pages on wiki when they are high...

They shouldn't have edit wars, either, where one editor deletes information, a second adds it back in, and on and on.

Wiki has its uses, mainly because its quick and mostly reliable. I wouldn't depend on it for anything formal. I'd use the links it lists as a quick means to a better source.
 
My comment was in reference to him gathering his information from "Catholicism for Dummies". :smile: Appropriate book name for the context. Made me laugh.

EDIT: I am not saying that catholics are dummies, don't misunderstand. :P
 
Last edited:
dontdisturbmycircles said:
"Catholicism for Dummies". :smile:

Quite. I mean is there any other? (Context : I'm technically Catholic).
 
Dimitri Terryn said:
Who cares. It's theology.

Theology is a legitimate academic discipline. That's probably the reason this is being taken so seriously.
 
Well if he pulled it off, it must mean that it isn't that difficult to pretend to be a theology professor. Perhaps that's why it is being taken so seriously... hehe
 
verty said:
Well if he pulled it off, it must mean that it isn't that difficult to pretend to be a theology professor. Perhaps that's why it is being taken so seriously... hehe

The big deal of it is that Wiki apparently just take's people's word for it about their credentials, even if giving them a position of editor. C'mon, you don't have to make their real name public knowledge just to verify their credentials. I wonder how many of their other theology editors are frauds too if they didn't notice discrepancies in what the person claims their credentials are and what their knowledge level really is. Or maybe they did notice and that's the source of such editing wars that Janus mentioned.

It just reinforces that anyone can get away with pretty much anything for a very long time. Who's to say the entire editorial staff there isn't filled with frauds. When you rely on people's honesty to represent themselves accurately on an internet forum, well, it's the internet and we all know that not everyone is who they say they are.
 
What I find more "amusing" about this is that people are still "surprise", "shocked", and "dismayed" that such a thing is happening on Wikipedia.

HELLO??!

Are people THAT naive (stupid?)?

I really do not blame this fella. I blame those who actually put "faith" in something like this. I've said this earlier, but really, if people actually expect a consistent valid info out of something like this, then they DESERVE to be taken in! They paid attention to something that can easily be bogus, and then acted surprised by it. At some point, some people should not be saved from their own stupidity.

Zz.
 
ZapperZ said:
At some point, some people should not be saved from their own stupidity.

Zz.

That'll never happen. The whole purpose of humanity is to save each other from stupidity somehow. :rolleyes:
 
jtbell said:
When I read about this affair, my first thought was of a http://www.cartoonbank.com/product_details.asp?sid=22230. Egad, I can't believe it's approaching 14 years old!

Very true. I worked with a post-doc who for some reason loved that cartoon, but I think her poor English must have given it a different meaning to her, because she used it for the most inappropriate situations (like stuck into a slide for lab meeting). Now I don't laugh at the cartoon (because I've seen it so many times), but at remembering her odd usage of it (we had to tell her to take it out of an interview seminar :bugeye:).
 
Last edited by a moderator: